RB PBEM #1 - Discussion Thread - No Players!

[Swiss Pauli]

I'll be intrigued to see how the Death Valley Settlement goes

As I see it, sooooo is very much the form horse (with Dreylin being the dark horse), so his biggest concern should be tall poppy syndrome. Ruff's blocking city is a bit of a gamble: by intentionally missing the corn he'll send a pretty clear message, though with the week's hiatus he'll surely have to come to negotiating table (though a week-long filibuster would make fun viewing ).

It'll be interesting to see how Dreylin reacts: his best move might be to act as an honest broker; he'll need an ally owing to his map position, but it's too early in the going to commit.

[regoarrarr]

Yeah I was trying to figure out how that race would play out. It seems like ruff will have a settler in the area first, but you're right - he's going to have to negotiate about it.

One thing soooo has for him is that he has better map info on that area, though I guess ruff could get some from Dreylin.

I'm trying to decide if the ruff / dreylin partnership is one that will be the leaders, or if it's just a case of lots of talking. I do think that in MP games like this, the folks that talk the most do the best

[darrelljs]

I predict sooooo and Ruff find a way to avoid war (at least in the Ancient and Classical eras), although right now things certainly seem to be headed in that direction.

Darrell

[darrelljs]

the mountains completely blocked off access between Ruff (India) and sooooo on the east side of the map, and that would be really boring.

...

I started by doing some editing of the peaks.

...

On the eastern side of the map, I did the opposite, deleting some of the mountains between Ruff and sooooo to create a similar pass through which units could move.

I didn't pay much attention to this at the time, but check out the initial map:



And the after edit result:



Here's the initial again with the deleted peaks in red:



A pretty significant tweak...Death Vaelly certainly made things the opposite of boring 8).

Darrell

[regoarrarr]

Yes it will be certainly interesting to see who gets there first and when and with what force

[kalin]

If I am not mistaken, at this point it looks like Ruff will get there within some 10 turns with 2-3 axes. Sooooo still had some 4 turns left on the pyramids, so I don't think he'll be able to get there before Ruff. However, given that that land is closer to Sooooo, it's not clear to me how easy it'll be for Ruff to maintain it. In any case, I also think that they'll find a way to avoid conflict as it's so detrimental to both.

I am also curious how the trades will go along with Soooo having alpha, and Ruff maths which leads to construction...

K

[Sullla]

A pretty significant tweak...Death Vaelly certainly made things the opposite of boring 8).

Thanks for noticing, darrell. I did some heavy editing in that area, no doubt about it. (Can you imagine how horribly Dreylin would have been screwed with that initial map, and how much of a runaway Ruff would be?) Aside from the goofup with Ruff not being able to sail on his saltwater lake, I'm very pleased with how the map has shaped up. I intended those narrow valleys to be hot real estate commodities, and we're already seeing that.

I do think that in MP games like this, the folks that talk the most do the best

This is unquestionably true. In all of the Demogames I've seen, the teams that chase up their neighbors nonstop inevitably outperform those who rarely talk much. Or, in Civ4 terms, why does Mansa Musa always do so much better than Tokugawa?

EDIT: I also enjoy watching the players make metagaming assumptions about the game setup. For the record, I did not deliberately place anyone at their starts - they were purely random. sooooo and Ruff as neighbors is a total coincidence. sooooo also thinks I put him in the tundra to negate a specialist economy - I wish I could think that far ahead! Also nothing more than chance.

[Krill]

Wow Sullla, bearing a grudge I see...Although I'm just impressed that I've already entered the RB culture even though this is my first visit

Interesting map though. One point about Athletes start; you gave him the gold tile behind his city, but he also has abn irrigated wheat and gold in front of his city as well, so your point about a choice in expansion doesn;t really hold.

PS. If anyone else wanted to start a second one of these games up, I'd be up for it...

[Kodii]

I'm just impressed that I've already entered the RB culture even though this is my first visit

*wave*

PS. If anyone else wanted to start a second one of these games up, I'd be up for it...

*wave*

[Krill]

After looking at the map Sullla posted, I'm not sure just how balanced is; sooooo, despite possibly being cut off by Ruff, has better land than he credits, if he can reach CS quickly to irrigate. m-h OTOH has a grand total of 6 food res and 3 flood plains...of which 4 make the land marginal at best in the early game and can't really improve after that. sooooo otoh has 8, with at least 5 of them placed in such away that they can be used by decent cities (the western deer could have been better placed if that land was irrigatable).

soooo has the best position in the game by far IMO, especially if the negotiations over death valley end up with no war being declared; Ruffs 'land isn't enough to compete IMO, considering that Dreylin has blocked off north of the gems for a couple of cities that can only be reached by galley for everyone else (or require OB with him).

I envy Dreylins position really. m-h isn;t a threat long term becuase of the bad land and triats, Ruff has to attack him at Dreylins' second city, through a tight choke point, soooo is far away and Athlete doesn't have the same experience, but also has to grab the land away from Drelyin asap .

I think if Dreylin grabbed the pigs/horses spot with a couple of axes and spears he'd be in a very strong spot.