[spoilers] Pindicator and Regoarrarr - Bismark of Ethiopia

[pindicator]

Yeah, I've got nothing against what Commodore did. Even if he didn't push more than he has gone now, simply taking BB is a huge blow to us. So props to him for making that call. Will it be a better choice than just expanding as well? Can't say that without seeing what he has.

[regoarrarr]

Yeah, I've got nothing against what Commodore did. Even if he didn't push more than he has gone now, simply taking BB is a huge blow to us. So props to him for making that call. Will it be a better choice than just expanding as well? Can't say that without seeing what he has.

Sure. I mostly agree with this. But it doesn't change the fact that it makes playing a lot less fun than it was say 5-10 turns ago....

And it's not even like we were caught with our pants down playing some the RB-Standard insano-farmers-gambit ™. We had a fairly healthy military IMO - we were like #2 or 3 in soldiers

[Serdoa]

You make it sound like early warfare is not an acceptable part of the game. While the RB metagame has moved more toward a farmer's opening being standard, someone pulling out knives and going after people early in the game is a bit of a change of pace. Whether or not it is successful in the long run, it is a different strategy to pursue and at least has a chance of being successful, I guess that depends on how much of an army the farmer can build in time. And I wouldn't hate too much on anyone trying to have a good time, but I don't see this invasion as being an indication that Commodore doesn't want to win the game. I assume he believes it will help his chances or he wouldn't have tried it. I'm not in communication with him in PB5, I'm a global lurker, so I'm not giving anything up here. I'm only inferring what would seem to be a reasonable decision making process.

I'm not sure if Rego wants this thread to turn into a "is early warfare viable?"-discussion (hey, it gives you posts, you can still win the postcount ), but I'd like to comment on that and so I do.

Early warfare is normally a losing proposition. Not because you can't win (though it gets harder every turn and you will only find a few early rushes that worked) but because even if you win, more often then not, you are crippled despite winning. Now, of course you might argue that if you were in an unwinnable position before nothing has changed for you and you had at least fun. And truth be told, there is not much I can argue against that. The question is just if it is worth it to have your fun to the detriment of the other players fun? And the longer I'm around here, the stronger I would argue for "No, it is not worth it.".

As for early war being a losing proposition: Often when wars happen, players will make an overview of lost hammers for all involved parties. But for early warfare thats missing the point. The question is not how many troops you lost, but how many hammers you invested. For example, 10 chariots on quick will be 200 hammers. Thats equal to 2 settlers and 2 workers. So you need to take at least 2 cities (with some infra) with those just to make up the hammers lost. But you also lose turns till you have those cities, so you probably need to take 3 cities. But then, 3 cities with 10 chariots? Even if your opponent can just build archers that probably will not be easy. So you'll invest even more - and the spiral starts. And works against you. Every turn he can stall you, you lose more against all the opponents who build away in peace. That's why early warfare is only seldomly done in RB-games. And that's why you'll only on rare occasions will really better your position with an early war.

[regoarrarr]

Houston, we have a (metallic) problem



Not sure where he got metal (I can't see his resourcces any more, and he doesn't have the copper from BB yet.

Nobody we have contact with is giving him metal.

He could have teched IW which would account for some of his crazy power spike

[regoarrarr]

Well at least we're not making it easy...

[regoarrarr]

Yeah Serdoa I think those are good points. I hold nothign against Commodore - as much as my delusional fantasies like to attribute this attack to some sort of PBEM26 rage-hangover, I'm sure he did that because a) he likes early aggression and b) he thought that it improved his chances of winning (maybe even seeing it as his ONLY chance to win with no metal)

But I think it's highly unlikely to work. I saw the same thing in PBEM17 - I thought that dave's attack was very unlikely to grant him enough land to compete with nospace and darrell, and while he actually did a lot better than I thought he would, in the end he was significantly behind them (at least as far as I remember ).

(Bonus points for bringing up the fact that he still "won" )

So yeah. I don't know.

What i DO know is that we need a good quest to play for. Obviously we could dedicate our game to making sure Commodore doesn't win (which is another reason that early aggression rarely pays), but that's pretty played out. Anyone got any other ideas?

[regoarrarr]

I would also like to mention that we have chosen to be "gentlemen" on the turn timer, even though (especially this turn) it would have been very useful to not be.

We could have definitely taken out his exposed chariot with our spear and possibly sank some of his galleys (before they pick up those axes)

I am not expecting some sort of cookie but just mentioning it for fun I guess...

[Mardoc]

Anyone got any other ideas?

You could focus on testing the RBMod changes. See if you there's a piece of the game that you can break, balancewise - or a part that's overnerfed, for that matter.

[pindicator]

Obviously chariots are OP

[pindicator]

Well, well, well. What's Mr Commodore up to this turn?



Both axes are aboard galleys. I am very inclined to attack. Odds are we lose 2 galleys and kill 1, and have 50/50 odds at killing both axes. Or if he split the axes between both galleys we kill an axe.