[SPOILERS] Serdoa goes to war II

[Serdoa]

Thanks Ceil... I guess

Played T37, but nothing interesting happened, I just finished Writing. I probably should instead have gone for Poly -> Mono because the religion is still available, I won't build Libraries right now, instead I will build Pyramids but without math-powered chops (just normal ones) and when I get Pyramids I want to switch to Rep and Slavery (yes, I am still not in Slavery). I could have coupled that with Org.Rel as well. I am thinking about doing this still now for a couple of reasons:

1. Lew has Poly
2. Commist has Medi
3. Brian is creative
4. scooter does not have Poly and his GNP is bad enough that he can't beat me to it

So, that all indicates at first that - despite my error in going Writing first - I should not have any competition for it. Only... yeah, everyone who played with Lewwyn or followed him in one of these games knows that he loves to get multiple religions. So, I actually expect him to go for it soon. But he has finished IW last turn, so he is trying to get his stone as well. And that means he has to research Masonry first. Probably it also means that he is trying for the Pyramids as well - won't beat me though as I have 2 turns on him AND turn order advantage.

Still, Masonry is 69 beakers while Poly is 87. And he probably got overflow into it, while I haven't gotten much from Writing. Also he got IW at EOT36, so he has T37 to put into Masonry while I finished Writing EOT37. So, if I am right and he is going Masonry -> Mono he will beat me to it. But without religion I don't need to go for it as switching to Org.Rel will only cost money without benefit. So what is the meaning of all that? Well, I'll ignore Mono, instead go for Mathematics, get some more cities up, build HG when I have 8+ and then I celebrate

Ok... uh, was there anything else I wanted to talk about? I think I wanted to talk about C&D. I'll do that next post in my aim to get at least a semi-reasonable post count

[Serdoa]

So, C&D for EOT36:

Cities:

scooter: 7/3/3/2 = 15
Commist: 4/3/2/1/1 = 11
Lewwyn: 5/3/1/1 = 10
Brian: 4/4/2/2 = 12
Serdoa: 6/4/2/2 = 14

Tech:

scooter: Fishing (34), TW (52), Agri (52), Hunting (34), Myst (43), Mining (43), BW (104), Pottery (69), AH (87) = 518
Commist: Fishing (34), TW (52), Agri (52), Hunting (34), Myst (43), Mining (43), BW (104), Pottery (69), AH (87), Medi (69), PH (52), Sailing (87) = 726
Lewwyn: Fishing (34), TW (52), Agri (52), Hunting (34), Myst (43), Mining (43) BW (104), Pottery (69), AH (87), Poly (87), IW (174) = 779
Brian: Fishing (34), TW (52), Agri (52), Hunting (34), Myst (43), Mining (43), BW (104), Pottery (69), AH (87), Writing (104) = 622
Serdoa: Fishing (34), TW (52), Agri (52), Hunting (34), Myst (43), Mining (43), BW (104), Pottery (69), AH (87), Masonry (69), IW (174), Writing (104) = 865 (+ half researched Medi (50/69)

My thoughts when looking at this? I think I played a pretty good game till now and it can only be a matter of time before I fuck it up No, but seriously:

a) scooter: I think he has ignored tech too much. But he has the most important ones right now and he should have the most workers of all of us (for comparison, I have 7 right now). I think Joao is actually made weaker in this game simply by 3 other players having Imp as well, so he can't pull ahead that easily. He also was probably set back by one of his cities which he settled far away (8E,2N of the capital). I mean I understand why he settled it, it is a great spot and opens up floodplains-heaven and the ivory with another city. But god is that city far away from home. And he has further in the north Commist as his neighbour. If he really tries to go in that direction, I think he will find out that his cities are too far away to defend effectively. Not to speak of the maintenance. And if he does not expand there, then this city is simply a drain for the fact that there are spots as good as this one but much closer to the cap.

Rating up to now:

Pick:
Tech:
Expansion:

(Yes I have stolen that from Gaspar, don't tell him )

b) Commist: They are doing not badly and I expect them to get Oracle and use it on Machinery, leaving them just with Writing, Monarchy, Feudalims and Guilds for Cataphracts. That could be pretty nasty if they do it like that. I hope they won't because there is not much one can do in that case. I do expect them to go for scooter or Brian first though, simply because the lands to the northwest (were we meet) are jungled and therefore automatically not as interesting as all that great land in the south and east. They also got first to 5 cities, but they did that by settling 2 at the same turn and that was T35 (that was btw hard to figure as they LOST 1 pop that turn, despite settling 2 cities...). I don't expect them to have enough workers to really take care of those plus their other cities especially as they need some to chop out the Oracle what I expect them to do. And that means that those two cities, despite getting them the lead in city count, are actually not really getting them much. I think they would have been better off settling one and getting another worker instead of the 2nd settler. Apart from that they researched Sailing last I think. If that is correct, I am not sure on the reasoning for that. I'll find out as soon as I check for known-civ bonus (too lazy for that right now).

Pick:
Tech:
Expansion:

c) Lewwyn: Started with Agri, despite it delaying the corn quite a long time. Has the least pop and one of his cities sits at pop 1 since forever. I guess he has not enough workers to improve those cities as he focussed on tech. Though he did that right from the start. I understand that in case of getting Hunting quickly, though I am not sure if Inca really was worth not starting with Hunting, but after that he kept doing that. As soon as I settled Incense and Gold he fall behind quite clearly on that front, so it actually didn't gain him anything to do that - apart from a religion which he would have gotten anyhow. Also that is not the normal Lewwyn play of expanding till he crushes his economy and then some. Not sure what to make of all that. Right now I think he is going for Pyramids and knowing Lewwyn he probably won't stop going for it, even that he should have realized that I am the one with IW and Masonry. Not by C&D of course (I don't think Lewwyn does that ever) but simply because I finished Stonehenge and IW should be obvious from soldiers (its 10000 points).

Pick:
Tech:
Expansion:

d) Brian: Aztecs certainly was an interesting pick and I think pairing it with IMP/CRE isn't bad at all but I don't agree with whipping like he did. Though much less I agree with whipping from 4 to 2 on T24 and then taking till T29 to regrow to 3. That hurts. He did a much better job the second time around, whipping on T33 and regrowing to 4 on T35. Also tells me that he has a Granary up finally in his cap. His tech is ... nothing to write home about. He is the only other player to have a second city at 4 pop right now though. Still, he hurt himself quite a bit by his whipping and he'll have to show that he can make up for it. As of now he is just keeping up in expansion while getting behind in tech.

Pick:
Tech:
Expansion:

[Serdoa]

Update T38 / EOT37 for the others:

Brian whipped one of his size 4 cities down to 2 and grew one of the size 2 to 3. Technically he as well could have only whipped the size 4 down to 3, but that would not really make sense if there is no emercency and with only warriors around (Brian might have a spear / chariot, but he is the only one) I have a hard time imagining an emercency situation.

That led to the following sizes:

scooter: 7/3/3/2 =15
Commist: 4/3/2/1/1 = 11
Lewwyn: 5/3/1/1 =10
Brian: 4/3/2/2 = 11
Serdoa: 6/4/3/2/1 = 16

No new techs discovered, only Commist got Landpoints. Pretty uninteresting turn so far, so I'll probably get myself some "fun" by starting on the dotmap. I tried to do a complete map-stitch (I am missing like 2-3 tiles for a complete map) but somehow I got some issues with different tile spacing in the upper and the lower part of the screenies. That makes it hard to stitch them together. Not sure why that happens, but after wasting 2 hours on it, I decided I am not going to invest more time right now.

[Serdoa]

Ok, world maps nearly complete (and that was some shitty work, I can tell you...)

Big (Caution, 2.46 MB)

and smaller version, still 926 KB

And now I am too exhausted to do the dotmapping

[Gaspar]

(Yes I have stolen that from Gaspar, don't tell him )

Mum's the word.

Just caught up on the thread, I have high hopes that you will stick with it for once.

[Serdoa]

I'm sorry for everyone hoping for C&D-stuff or elaborate turn-reports. I might do them sometimes this weekend, I might be working instead. Not sure, as my life is a little bit ... difficult right now.

Anyway, gladly no C&D is necessary to explain what happened geopolitically the few last turns. For one, I got Pyramids. Kinda great and all, yadda, yadda, yadda. Unfortunately that means people will assume I run away with the game when I am not. I would be in a much better position right now if I had simply kept expanding. I have used up 4 forests for the Pyramids + 6 turns of production in my capital. Thats 3 settlers or some such at least, even with having stone. Still, I will settle city 6 next turn, not sure how much everyone else has. Maybe I'll try to work that out today, might get my thoughts away from my life

In other news, Commist bulbed MC and oracled Machinery. Yes they can get to Guilds pretty quickly right now, especially if they bulb it with a GE. But even without, thats just 10 turns more, if that much. I am not sure if I should have denied them Oracle, it was clear that they go for it and wait for the bulb and I could have finished it easily before them (heck, I had one micro-plan with Colossus build at T43, Oracle around T35 or T36). But if I had done that, I could not have got Pyramids as well - or would have had to stay at max. 4 cities still. Is that worth it? I don't think so. Sure, the others would have been helped by that, but I would have to play catch up from there on, with an added chance of the phracts going first for me as I am the one being most behind. Of course, now they probably come for me because I am in front

Anyhow, the need to defend myself is great. A pre-emptive strike is not going to work, they will get X-Bows for sure. So, what to do? Elephants and Catapults seem to be the only thing worthwhile to think about. I will finish maths soonish, will get to 8 cities, build HG (have the perfect city to chop it), get Construction, settle Elephants. I will have settled next turn the city to ferry a galley over there and I will simply use several chops for Phants. Thats not great and I will also need some sentry-chariots for spying on Commist and his troops (Airships would be really helpful, any idea how I can bulb in the next 20 turns to them Seven?).

But whatever I do, I fear that Commist will come for me anyway and probably first because he'll know he has a clear advantage right now and I am probably the one in the best position (with Phi and Pyramids) to get to a point where I can beat his troops if he let me live to long.

So yeah, life sucks, game sucks, everything sucks... except for my wife.

[Ceiliazul]

(Airships would be really helpful, any idea how I can bulb in the next 20 turns to them Seven?).

So yeah, life sucks, game sucks, everything sucks... except for my wife.

[Gaspar]

At least you've got your wife!

[Serdoa]

Well, I did some C&D. I'll throw it in here for now. I have played the last 5 turns or so in a rather bad state, so I'll probably screwed up some stuff (for example, I am not having enough workers still but I'll have some Granaries soon... not sure if they are really worth it with this land though, old problem of when to whip). Also those C&D-works don't include the last turn.

Cities:

scooter: 7/5/4/1/1/1 = 19
Commist: 6/4/3/3/2 = 18
Lewwyn: 6/4/3/2 = 15
Brian: 4/4/3/2/1 = 14
Serdoa: 6/4/3/3/1/1 = 18

I have whipped 2 pop this turn, grew 1 pop and will settle another city the turn after next. I'll also grow 3 or 4 pop in that time. Should be fine on that front, taking into account that I built SH and Pyramids as well. I just suck at workers - as always. I could 2 turn them in the cap right now, but I want to grow it to 9 or 10 first, what needs a Granary of course. And then while I grow I can't build them either. Probably will grow on a Library. Just need other cities to take over that duty. Unfortunately my second city (the incense one) is really, really bad placed. It might have been necessary at the time I placed it but damn, is that a shitty city. I have other cities, settled much later (horse, fish for example) which are MUCH better.

Techs: we all have the first 6 (Fishing, Myst, Mining, Agri, TW, Hunting) as well as BW, Pottery, AH

scooter: Writing (104), Sailing (87) = 191
Commist: Medi (69), PH (52), Sailing (87), MC (391), Machinery (609), IW (174), Archery (52) = 1434
Lewwyn: Poly (87), IW (174), Masonry (69), Monotheism (104), Priesthood (52) = 486
Brian: Writing (104), IW (174) =278
Serdoa: Masonry (69), IW (174), Writing (104), Sailing (87) = 434 (+50 in Medi, 160 in Maths) ~644

So, uh, yeah, who would have guessed, Commist has most beakers "researched"...

More interesting though, those techs explain the high soldier scores. 73000 for Commist, 72000 for Brian. Commist was easy, once I figured out that they got two military techs the same turn and another one just the turn after. Brian on the other hand made me nervous at first, especially as I hadn't done C&D for some turns - turns he used to jump from 39000 to 72000. And he did build some troops of course. But some was tech as well (IW) + I think a Barracks. Not that I am sure about that or understand why someone would build a Barracks right now (not being Agg that is), but whatever. I presume that Brian has right now

2 Axes
2 Chariots
1 Spear
4 Warriors

The spears and chariots are interchangeable, both are worth 4000 points. Chariots just make overall more sense. Anyway, thats more then everyone else has by far, but at the same time not nearly enough to invade anyone. I'll have to keep a close eye on that though, but I am producing a safety chariot and axe and have another chariot roaming around, so that should hopefully be enough if he intends to come at me. He should fear Commist much more, but I bet nobody is reading the demos correctly (scooter has not interest in that, Lewwyn the same and Brian didn't strike me as someone to really dive deep into that either) and everyone is just looking at "Oh, he has Pyramids and SH and ... uh, lets kill him, he'll run away" *sigh*

[Serdoa]

Played 2 more turns, again have done no C&D (at this point you really need time and the nerves for it and I have neither). But well, soldier score didn't change all that much (Brian gone from 72000 to 79000 so probably 1000 for another pop [every 2 give 1000] and 6000 for an axe) and apart from that, Demos are just showing that I'm fine:



My GNP is inflated for culture of course but I think the next highest is either Commist (who has also culture...) or Lewwyn (who is trailing in everything else). But of course, GNP is not as good as it should be. I need to get Libraries going. But the same is true for Granaries and Lighthouses in most cities. It's still expansion-time though, so of course those who put down cottages are better off in GNP right now. Won't help much though if they are stomped by Commist because they lack production potential for the necessary defenders.

Anyhow, this game won't be decided by skill but by whom Commist chooses to attack. Unfortunate for me of course, because as leader (right now at least) I can only lose in that case but certainly won't win anything, no matter who he attacks.