[PB64] Amicalola Gets To Heaven with Tarkeel and Ljubljana

[Tarkeel]

The big lesson from this game should probably be that Serfdom is good against uncoordinated players (PB58), but way too prone to die to the simultaneous whips of multiple players (PB64). A valuable lesson to learn, even if it was rough for poor Ginger and me.

I think the bigger difference between the games is that we had a lot more to cover the lack of slavery in 58. Being able to draft muskets and then rifles from some 40 different cities makes a ton of difference, not to mention the monk trio.

IMHO, Nationalism is the civic that allows Serfdom to outperform Slavery.

[Amicalola]

T232
The strong do what they can, and the weak do what they must. 


I really hope Superdeath wins this game. It's getting more plausible by the minute.  

The Heroes of Software Man live to fight another day. 


My main picture didn't save, but most of Nauf's troops are threatening Get To Heaven. I think we can actually hold it for now, but once their big stacks move from the East again cities will start falling. I also might be wrong. 

Commodore disembarked most of his troops, but left one galley loaded. Our units auto-promote because I turned it on for Blast Doors last turn - how are our enemies supposed to beat this many first strikes?!



Spot the winner of the Celto-Sumerian Alliance: 


Thankyou Big Daddy Commodore for sacrificing your army to help me stay in the game - Naufragar, 2022 (probably)

[Amicalola]

Did you whip every city you own? How many pop is that? Holy crap.

(Turn Report Above) Most of them, yeah. Maybe all, I can't remember. Desperate times... 


@Tarkeel: I don't know if Nationalism would have helped much here. Definitely a bit, but we're pushing the happy cap everywhere here as is. But it definitely would have been somewhat helpful. One could possibly make the argument that Ginger and I just swapped too early.

[Amicalola]

T233
Naufragar demanded peace for 30gpt, then white peace. I declined - in theory, Ginger declared war and should be attacking with his Amicalola-funded galleons any minute now, which might be why Naufragar would want white peace. Naufragar is growing his stack here:


I think this is enough to take Get To Heaven, but it's pretty close. And Naufragar might not think so. Meanwhile, they are healing their stacks here:


So long-term we're still pretty screwed, unless Ginger does something. Ginger declared war on Naufragar this turn, but also on Superdeath, and he cancelled our iron/iron deal from earlier. I guess I can only hope he's as good as his word. I'll be very dusappointed if he just takes 700 gold and runs, particularly if this was the critical chance for peace and we've missed it.

[Amicalola]

T234
Commodore fucked up. Our lowest odds this turn are 90% for the three privateers, and then even if one of those loses we should get good odds with the galleons. Right? Ha Ha.


Here are the combats:


The four losses were 90%, 90%, 46% (vs. a barely-injured privateer), 80%. So no changes on that front.  I know, I know - "Amicalola complaining about combat results again?" But I was grumpy and I did some maths; we were dozens of times more likely to lose zero units than just the first two, let alone four. And when the whole world is against us, and we're weak on the seas, and everyone is hammer-poor, who needs two double-promoted frigates to protect their vulnerable lifeline anyway???  


And even if we ignore the long-term implications, this isn't some small-fry shit that I'm just whining about; those four losses represent nearly two turns worth of empire-wide production! And seriously, this shit Just. Keeps. Happening. I mean, fuck me. So look, I won't pretend that didn't sour things. But even then, somehow, this was a good turn, and Commodore just barely managed to avoid being dragged, kicking and screaming, into victory. 

Naufragar apparently disagreed with me about Get To Heaven:


So, if we don't die from an aneurysm before the game ends, it looks like victory is still on the cards after all.

[Amicalola]

I actually did the maths to check: this was the odds of losing these four units as the combats went down (and even this is unrepresentative, because it assumes low damage on a privateer with an early loss): (1/10) * (1/10) * (27/50) * (1/5) = 27/25000, or 0.00108 (0.11%; or just over one in a thousand).

The odds to lose nothing were (9/10) * (9/10) * (8/10) * ((99/100) * 3) = 0.62875 (62.86%, or just under two thirds of the time). In other words, we were almost twice as likely to lose nothing as every other result combined, let alone the four units we actually lost. I'm not crazy!!!

Edit: Although, one of the RB mathematicians is welcome to tell this History pre-service teacher why their maths is terrible, if applicable.

[Mjmd]

I'm not a mathematician, but as you've only isolated those 4 combats and not the whole combat, I'm betting the overall math isn't AS bad (if still probably below low).

[Amicalola]

I'm not a mathematician, but as you've only isolated those 4 combats and not the whole combat, I'm betting the overall math isn't AS bad (if still probably below low).

You're right, although including the only other non-99%+ combat (the 80% winning frigate), the odds of him losing too go down to 0.000216 (0.02%; or two in ten thousand). The 99%+ combats make things even more ridiculous. By my understanding, that means the odds of the combat being even worse are negligible. If you include them, maybe it gets to something like 0.0015 or something overall (being very generous), which is still 0.15% or 1.5 in a thousand.

I'm pretty sure that when losing no units is twice as likely as the rest combined, losing four (or more) is just always going to be astronomically unlikely.

[Amicalola]

This stack was supposed to be with the cannons, threatening Naufragar's territory, able to fork two directions. It accidentally moved up towards Distant Past instead of the lone HA splitting off, meaning it can do neither.


SD also offered to liberate a city this turn - I sent a counteroffer, assuming this stack would be in range to defend. It no longer is with this movement, meaning I am likely just paying for my city to be razed if he accepts.

[Amicalola]

T235
We move our main army to this tile, to threaten Naufragar's new city and Cistercia. If he keeps his units in place, we can't advance, but this pins down a lot of defenders in case Ginger is going to do something (which, sadly, seems less likely with every turn that passes  ). Nauf's cannon stack has grown to 20 now, with the avoidance of casualties that he managed during the invasion. 




We lost a lot of workers getting the galleons out (not getting the frigates out too is super consequential, as mistakes go  ), so cities that get a lot of whip overflow are 1-turning workerse to minimise non-growth turns. This turn New Reptiles draws the short straw. 



Superdeath offered Cherry back for 25gpt - tell 'im he's dreaming! This city is probably costing SD money, and it's not growing anytime soon - it's a dead weight. I offered back the two cities for 15gpt each; even that is more than SD deserves. 


He converted back into Serfdom, and cracked top MFG.  



Commodore offered peace finally this turn. I offered it back for either Sean or 20gpt, though I doubt he accepts those. We'll see.