[SPOILERS - El Grillo & Charriu PB51] One step at a time

[El Grillo]

T117:



The universe has a cruel sense of humor, and Plemo finishes the Colossus right on cue, and now he gets moneybag coast tiles for 7 more turns. That 7f5c lake fish of his is also pretty sick. Vanrober made a Great Scientist as well, hurray.

Scouting:

Lazteuq has something like a dozen defenders on this border, it's quite impressive. I really hope superdeath lets him be so he can plausibly contest the islands with Plemo, but honestly I wouldn't expect him to want to be the first one to declare war. That responsibility falls to me, sadly.

Demos:

Just twiddling my thumbs for another 3t until our Golden Age. Turning on tech for CoL next turn.

Graphs:

Let's hope the slopes of the CY graph keeps improving and those of the Power graph doesn't get too much worse.

[El Grillo]

T118:



Ramk finished the Great Library with a 2-pop whip overflow in Timbuktu, so he won't be too far from his first Mausoleum Golden Age. Plemo swapped into OR but nothing else, so he's locked out of running Caste System during his Golden Age and has one more free swap opportunity in 5 turns, likely for HR.



Continuing with Amicalola's naming theme of Appalachian Trail landmarks for cities in this region, we founded city #17, Blood Mtn. All the Workers gathered we here for chopping are in position to get these floodplains cottages up and running. Our last city for this wave will be founded next turn down by the coast.

Scouting:
I forgot to take a screenshot, but we saw more Lazteuq troops positioned along the border. Really wish we could see his power chart, but his rating is below ours so that must mean his giraflorens border is pretty much undefended.

Demos:

Just a few beakers short of Code of Laws, but it wasn't worth swapping off of better tiles for.

Graphs:

Abroad, Plemo founded city #18 on T117, and Ramk founded city #11 on T117. GKC is continuing to rebuild his military after making peace with gira. Round two perhaps?

[El Grillo]

I dreamed that I had reported this turn, and then realized I hadn't. How's that for the Tetris Effect in action? The past few days have been busier as a result of work, I'm getting involved with some projects related to mortgage accounting, and it's been a fairly long time since I had to look at journal entries and account reconciliation processes Gotta see how things are done before you can start thinking about how, or if it makes sense to, automate pieces of it.

T119:



Superdeath came with a happy resource swap which I was glad to take. I have one more silk coming online and I've been trying to shop it around, no takers just yet.



Oh bloody hell Plemo, is that seriously worth a Settler as your 19th city? We're going to be winning the fish tile with a Caste Artist and a missionary shipped over from the mainland, and I'm sure Mjmd is planning to bring his own missionaries as well.



Elsewhere, Lazteuq started a Golden Age and giraflorens built the Great Wall.



This Plemo Galley coming from the west confirms that there's another island bridge in the GKC/Gira/Vanrober part of the wrap, and I delayed settling for a turn so the Axe could cover, just in case.

Scouting:

And here's Lazteuq's capital. Going to reserve judgment until we defog the rest of the tiles, but that looks like at least a +11 food surplus with another food bonus and what looks like 4 floodplains tiles.

Demos:

Graphs:

T120:



Mjmd built Chichen Itza, though that hardly seems like a big enough deterrent against a dedicated attack. Meanwhile, Lazteuq declined our silk-for-incense trade again.



Settling our 18th city of Little Yosemite bounced Plemo's Galley west instead of trapping it between our culture, even though it started the turn 1E of the fish. Never was confident about how that would work, I guess this way we spare him declaring war to get his unit unstuck.

Anyway, with the birth of our Great Prophet and Code of Laws in the books, we launched our Golden Age and swapped to Caste System/Pacifism. Unfortunately I wasn't able to grow my specialist cities quite as large as I would've liked, especially Point Reyes which I whipped twice in excess I suspect. We're not quite going to be able to get the next two Great People out quickly enough as a result, so I think the plan has to be using them separately for Academy and trade mission rather than saving both. As a result, our tech goal before the end of the GA has to be Feudalism so we can swap into Vassalage/Theocracy, and I need to make sure Point Reyes finishes its Great Merchant before Springer Mtn finishes its Great Scientist, since that city has more slots and GPP after we leave Caste System.

Scouting:

[/screenshot]

Lazteuq had an amazing start, his second city got to claim two wet corn tiles even if he wasn't CRE, and his capital turned out to be as good as expected with three floodplains tiles and the grass cow for +10f surplus.

Demos:

Well when the top 3 players are all running Golden Ages and you're third in GNP and MFG, that's not particularly promising... Also, GKC and superdeath have begun seriously building more military.

Graphs:

T121:

Pretty quiet turn. Feels like a storm is coming when GKC attacks Ramk or Gira and when superdeath attacks Lazteuq. Ramk has been whipping steadily in recent turns as well.

Scouting:

Demos:

Graphs:

[El Grillo]

T122:

Another quiet turn. Literature is in so Springer Mtn will get started on the National Epic, and Olympic Forest on the Heroic Epic after it finishes its Courthouse. Even aside from the EP which REM taught me to value highly, the Courthouse in Olympic Forest is worth 7.5gpt already, so the southern production cities will definitely want them ASAP, while other cities will whip them a bit more gradually. Lazteuq swapped into Bureaucracy so he's not playing for an Astronomy bulb, so we're going to need to hurt Plemo significantly before he gets his EIM or we can just call the game there.

Scouting:

I want to get vision on the Plemo/GKC/Ramk area so I sent a sentry WC, hopefully Ramk doesn't interpret it as a hostile action given all the other peaceful interactions we've had so far. Ramk also offered his dye for our silk, and even though we're already getting dye from superdeath, and won't have our third silk connected for another couple of turns, we want to give consistently friendly signals and this one costs us nothing since none of our cities are at the happy cap (sadly).

Demos:

Graphs:

T123:



Based on score increases, it looks like Plemo teched Vassalage and also built ToA, which I suppose has value with Representation and marble, and I'm sure he also squeezed some fail-gold out of the build. Meanwhile, Mjmd chopped out the Parthenon, and might be on the Music tech path? I'm still waiting for superdeath's hammer to drop on him, honestly.



Our GA is ending sooner than I'd like so I've microed the cities and Point Reyes in particular to finish its Great Merchant in 4t and also finish teching Feudalism in time to swap out on the last GA turn to HR/Vassalage/Slavery/Theocracy. I'd love to run OR for a long time and whip in infrastructure but I don't think we have that luxury.



Meanwhile, Springer Mtn is going to make the most of its boosted GPP rate to come out of the GA with just over 300GPP and then finish its Great Scientist since it has the Library slots to do so. By then our Workers will have improved most of its tiles so we can finally grow the city to the happy cap.

Scouting:

Demos:

So close to 1st in every category... Of course that doesn't account for the deficit we've accumulated running behind Plemo

Graphs:

Superdeath, GKC, and Ramk are all spiking in power, and I think Lazteuq is beginning to as well. We have a bunch of nearly-finished units (mostly Catapults) waiting in the queues for +4xp from civics of course, along with what I think will be the earliest Heroic Epic online, so I don't think we're falling too far behind here.

Abroad, vanrober founded city #9 on T122.

[El Grillo]

T124:

Plemo's GA is at an end (Representation/Vassalage/Slavery/OR + Buddhism), and Lazteuq generated a Great Merchant, which at this point he could be saving for a Guilds bulb, or just a trade mission.

Scouting:

We've defogged all of Lazteuq's current cities. He doesn't seem to have much in the way of forces or roads prepared against gira, which is consistent with how many units we saw to the south. Vanrober's latest city has insane specialist-running potential, +16f surplus with the two fish, pig, and two Lighthouse lakes. Vanrober just isn't chopping enough. It really makes me think about attacking him and then going for a Renaissance wonder with chops...

Demos:

Demos should continue to improve past break-even, and a Courthouse in Olympic Forest and a Market in Tuolumne Meadow will complete at EoT for a nice boost in gold.

Graphs:

Judging by superdeath and Lazteuq's power, your days are numbered, Mjmd... Hopefully he can quickly whip out some Hwacha and maybe make it to Feudalism?

[El Grillo]

T125:

Turn 125 was extremely quiet. Ramk generated a Great Scientist from his Great Library city which I expect to start his first Mausoleum Golden Age.

Demos:

T126:



Ramk popped his first Mausoleum-boosted Golden Age, but the big news is GKC resuming the war against gira. Global power and war weariness suggests that fighting already took place on the first turn of the war. I'm a bit conflicted on how I want this to shake out. On the one hand, a strong GKC on Plemo's flank increases the odds that one of us can actually oppose and hinder him at some point. On the other, since it seems that GKC is fighting with Classical army + Catapults, I don't know if he'll be able to make good his gains in time before Plemo runs him over with Knights. The Dutch have Feudalism and Metal Casting already at least and are banking 1000g + 200gpt outside of a GA, and I believe that includes at least one city running a bunch of Rep Merchant specialists for a possible Guilds bulb or just even more gold. Scary stuff from the game leader.



At least my GPP math worked out, and we're just able to squeeze out the Great Merchant from Point Reyes EoT.

Scouting:

Ramk is moving to claim a space on the vanrober border. I'm considering settling two more spots further south against vanrober once I have Longbows to defend them with. Hopefully vanrober will be more willing to fight Ramk than me for the earlier aggression from Mali, and since I'm twice his city count.

Demos:

Barely 1st in GNP when Ramk and I are the only ones in a Golden Age is a bit sad. At least I think I'll take the CY lead next turn once I fire all those Merchants from Point Reyes.

Graphs:

Abroad, superdeath continues to amass power and continues not to declare war. Mjmd is putting a ton of EP into me and he has some Courthouses too, so I gave up on keeping his graphs. Last I saw of his power rating, he's dead meat unless he starts whipping a lot more than he has been.

GKC founded city #12 on T124, Mjmd founded city #11 on T125, and giraflorens founded city #8 on T125.

[El Grillo]

T127:




Gira used the Great Prophet from last turn to build the Christian Shrine, which seems awfully optimistic in wartime. There are only ~5 cities with that religion, so it's clearly less strong in the short term as a Golden Age or honestly maybe even the super-specialist. He did revolt to Theocracy though, so perhaps he gets a promo edge over GKC. Speaking of which...




We might be in these civics for a long time This means 2-promo units everywhere and 3-promo mounted units from the HE+GG Olympic Forest. Trust me, we're going to be leaning on this, hard. I talked earlier about wanting to fight Plemo with mounted units not melee units, but that extends just as much to naval units if not more so. While I would have dearly loved to get circumnavigation, we can still build 3-move Galleys and C2 Caravels, which I think might be our best bet to actually do damage, raiding and razing along the coasts before Astronomy while holding our land border with a reactive collateral stack. We also can build W2 melee and G2 archery units at will, though we don't really have great units to take those promotions just yet. The fact that Plemo can get to Maces/Knights much faster than us also makes me hesitant to want to try attacking him overland.

How about this for a strategic plan:
1) Afore-mentioned naval raids + defense on land against Plemo, looking to raze his tiny icy islands and maybe one or two of his core coastal cities if we can take him by surprise. Shock Crossbows and CR2 Swords off the boats, perhaps?
2) Take and hold some cities off vanrober with a slow-mover stack of Crossbows/Longbows/Catapults with supporting Spears and WCs.
3) Slow down Plemo a bit and force him to garrison all his coastal cities, while we continue to add cities and grow tall. Limit the damage Plemo can do in the era of Knights and EIM, and aim to come back later with a decisive decapitation strike when we can better afford to throw away units at him overland.

We can start building the Galleys and defensive Catapults/hitters now while teching Metal Casting, Machinery, Archery, Compass, and Optics with some help from our Great Merchant gold. Engineering soon after, perhaps.

All roads lead to eternal war with Plemo, I think this may be our best chance of getting to fight it on our terms. Even if we end up a step behind again as I'm coming to expect, it still gives us some options to counter-punch and retain some initiative to do damage.

Scouting:

A rare sighting, Lazteuq's Great Merchant in the wild. I hope to defog along the northern coast and get some visibility on GKC's conquest-in-progress.

Demos:

At least I get one Golden Age turn at 1st in GNP/MFG/CY, if barely. I'm morbidly curious what our break-even rate looks like next turn. Well, nothing more Courthouses can't fix.

Graphs:

Abroad, GKC founded city #13 on T126. Superdeath's power continues to rise, I wonder what he's still waiting for or thinking about.

[El Grillo]

T128:



4 7xp Catapults fresh off the presses, yum. Ramk won the Music Great Artist unsurprisingly, he's probably looking to launch a second Golden Age soon as a way to claw his way back into contention.




We're finally set up to 1-turn military from Olympic Forest. The overflow cushion will eventually allow us to weave in some more expensive units but for now it's 1t Galleys and Catapults and Longbows so we don't waste any of it. Don't worry about the bare grass being worked in that shot, those were the fired Scientists from Springer Mtn that were put back on mines.

Demos:

Thankfully, demos aren't as bad out of the GA as I had been afraid. Courthouses are excellent for our large empire, and no one else seems to be building them aside from Mjmd. That said, Plemo still has his 1500g stockpile and is deciding how best to make his next move, and is still far in the lead.

I've been trying to secure stone forever now and I finally got a bite from Mjmd, who accepted my wines. Really would've been nice to get that sorted out a dozen turns ago, but better late than never.

Graphs:

Abroad, I don't have gira's graphs but he has yet to lose a city and GKC's power has taken a beating. Not a good sign per my prior reasoning. One reason we need to militarize quickly is to either keep Plemo on his toes about 2v1ing GKC, or in case he does, be in position to declare in solidarity with GKC and threaten Plemo's two southern cities.

Mjmd is now paying superdeath 20gpt which I'm guessing was a demand-for-enforced-peace from Rome. 200g is probably 1.5t of gold saving for Mjmd, so it seems like a cheap price for a full whip cycle, honestly.

[El Grillo]

T129:




Well there it is. Superdeath has given Mjmd way too long to prepare for this (he has Chichen Itza defending against Praetorians and Catapults, for crying out loud!) but unless Mjmd has been spamming units since I lost graphs on him superdeath is going to have a window to do quite a bit of damage.



I don't have visibility on the conflict but here's what the border looks like. Will superdeath try to hit CivCalltoPower before Mjmd can reinforce, or move in one power stack against Oregon Trail en route to Lemmings?

Mjmd came asking for gold (for an excess silver, so basically free for him), which after thinking a bit I decided to give him. Unlike GKC who I want to win quickly, I'd prefer superdeath to have to slog against Mjmd, and letting him whip more Hwacha sounds like a good result for me. Ideally Lazteuq uses this opportunity to dogpile giraflorens, and then Plemo will have to border three strong opponents in 25 turns. I've been scoping out staging tiles for a 3-mover Galley attack and I could conceivably raze 3 cities on turn 1 from the fog, two undefended size-1 iceballs and size-13 Maastrict on the border. I could move up the timetable substantially and launch with just 3-move Triremes as escorts instead of Caravels, but that would also greatly limit by ability to move further into Plemo's territory and threaten more cities, it would have to be more of a raid-and-retreat maneuver. At that point I could really skimp on the escorts. Having research visibility on the Dutch in 3-4 turns will help me make up my mind.

Demos:

Plemo got a Great Scientist so I expect him to build an Academy and start spending his ~1500 gold, which is probably something like 5 turns of 100% research for him. I'll be curious to see if he goes for Knights or straight on toward Rifles or EIM. The civforum.de players don't seem to value the Knight stack timing window very highly, after all. Demos competitive with 1st place just aren't good enough unfortunately.

Graphs:

Abroad, GKC captured a city from gira, seemingly with heavy losses, and vanrober settled city #10 where the barbarian city on the coast used to be. Lazteuq has been whipping heavily in recent turns and I wouldn't be surprised for him to get the majority of gira's cities, the western Persian cities have single Archers as defenders and are in the process of being whipped down.

[El Grillo]

Plemo just posted a sentry Spear on the coastline by Maastrict and reinforced the city with Walls and presumably more units, so that strike is out, which makes the southern strike much less appealing. Really good timing on his part, I could've hit the city as early as two turns from now, but it seems I'm cursed to continue being 1-2 turns behind the competition. You know, the 1-2 turns I would've saved by having circumnavigation. Grumble grumble.

I think I'll use those units instead to post a fortress city in the no-man's land between me and Plemo and Ramk to claim the cow/sugar/copper/ivory. The Galleys will be diverted back south to secure marble island with an additional city, some Workers, and troops to take out Mjmd's city there. He'll hardly be in a position to resist.

I'll continue espionage spending to get city visibility on Plemo in ~5 turns (thanks for being Buddhist), but I think I'll have to look elsewhere for more territory. My sentries see Ramk's units mobilizing to perhaps make an opportunistic attack on GKC, and vanrober's power is still fairly flat.