[SPOILERS] Pindicator as Qin Shi of China - Boring Ol' Vanilla

[Ceiliazul]

Great game, Pindicator. The recapture of Barryland rivals The Exodus in the tales of your deeds.

[Gazglum]

Great game Doctor Saul. Some epic moments.

[pindicator]

Thanks guys! I've skimmed through the lurker thread instead of doing homework tonight, and I was a bit touched at all the cheering I got. Especially by the post where Ceiliazul calls me a badass twice

So I guess we're about removed enough to start collecting thoughts and evaluating what went right and what went wrong.


Things Done Well

Taking it To Barry



I could also call this "Making the best of a bad situation". I've already harped on the map design (yum, shit sandwich) and how being the middle of a 3-way island is all kinds of wrong. But I had the presence to strike out and attack one of my neighbors. I also was happy with how I accomplished it, securing a 10-turn peace window with Cyneheard which allowed me to do the bulk of my damage out east. Now, Cyneheard also played it smartly and grabbed the lands between us in that time, but you can't win all the races...

Anyway, with Barry settling exclusively towards me (and ignoring some very good lands to his east) it did feel a bit of a troll game from him, but I managed to defeat him and secure a nice holy city in it.


Attacking Cyneheard



While there was some other stuff going on at the time, I knew I had to make some kind of move. I kind of feel my timing was off all game -- attacking when I should have been developing the economy and developing the economy when I should have been attacking. But this was a move that needed to be made and if I hadn't been invaded from dtay may have succeeded.


Being a Badass



The counter attack against dtay's invading forces has to be one of my favorite all-time civ moments now. While I don't think anything can top PB8 and being the eternal thorn in the side to Commodore that scooter and I was, the way I handled dtay's invasion was wonderfully done: evacuating every unit in the east to pull together a force to counter-attack with, upgrading with every bit of gold, and then finally culminating that trade of land for time with a successful counter attack and taking back the lands I had previously lost.

Oh, and I did it at a considerable tech disadvantage: CKNs, knights, and pikes killing Cavalry and Rifles.


Things Done Not-So-Well

Cottages Gone Wild



I don't know if I spoke on this too much, but one of the things I wanted to test i this game is if a cottage-primary economy could work in RtR. I would use whips to get by in the early game and then aim for Democracy and rush-buy in the end game. Sadly, this meant awful production most of the game. I tried to counter that by designating a few cities as production - building workshops in Shoal, Twelve Duns, & Avernus - but the main improvement was cottages and I suffered for the choice.

In RtR, cottages can't compete to workshop+Caste. Workshop produciton can build many units, can be converted to research, and is instantaneous unlike cottages that need to be grown. In a game that had hundreds upon hundreds of units, I did field some large armies. But I was not able to quickly replace them, and if I ever had to fight a war on two fronts I would have failed. Cottages are necessary - you need to be able to tech after all - but once you get to Code of Laws and Metal Casting (now cheaper), workshops are quite a bit better.


Not Pushing Harder Against Dtay



Right after conquering Barryland, all I wanted to do was consolidate and tech away. What I should have done is attack, attack, attack. Perhaps it would have meant falling farther behind, when I was trying to finally build some infrastructure, and wear away all the whip anger I had built up from getting together the army I used to kill Barry in the first place. What was needed was doubling down and making sure dtay did not get a foothold to begin with. Even making this worse was when I declared on him and stupidly gave him peace a turn before planting my front-line city which would have blocked him out of his western-two city locations.

Then I repeated the mistake after the successful badassery, and when I had dtay on the ropes I had a personal war weariness high enough to simply take his peace offer. Well, to be fair I may have been worried about Cyneheard attacking in the west a few turns later. Still, that was my opportunity to kick him off my continent for good.


Being Unaware of the Geopolitics

Basically, I had no idea of the world outside of my neighbors. And with that came limited information for making decisions. I had no idea that Krill bordered dtay, for instance. Or where BGN ever was. Or that there was a person on a 1-team island. (Man, I wish I had started with that!) Perhaps I wouldn't have been able to explore as early or dedicate the same resources as others, but I shouldn't have neglected it to the extent that I did.