[PB60] Lurking the Final Frontier

[Thoth]

I actually think nearly any attempt to conquer with praets is a trap.  Play the early game as though you were playing England, with the caveat that IW does function as a military tech when/if one is needed, and then let the praets' advantages strengthen your gameplan with their extra utility instead of bending your game around using them the way most Rome players seem to do (There are exceptions to everything, but "don't restrict yourself to a one-dimenstional gameplan before you even start exploring the map" is a good rule of thumb generally.)

Pure prat rushes are a mug's game. Cats, Prats and Wellies are virtually unstoppable and Prats are very very good for a very long time. 45 hammers for a st 8 unit that's buildable until Rifling is excellent value.

[RefSteel]

Pure prat rushes are a mug's game.  Cats, Prats and Wellies are virtually unstoppable and Prats are very very good for a very long time.  45 hammers for a st 8 unit that's buildable until Rifling is excellent value.

I think I sounded more down on Rome than I intended to; my comment was about misplaying Rome, not about Rome's strength: I definitely agree that praets are very very good for a very long time! But I also think nothing is (even virtually) unstoppable against a well-prepared enemy. In a situation where a well-played England would have conducted a costly but successful war using cats + [some combination of wellies, axes, swords, and/or horchers], a well-played Rome might win a much more successful and less-costly war by swapping out some of the hitters for Praets, and even be set up for a follow-up conflict when England would have had to regroup. If a well-played England would have considered such a war but rejected it as too risky, Rome could still gain more by fighting it and winning than England would by building up for something else instead (and a lot more than England would by fighting it to a stalemate or worse). If a war would be a terrible mistake for England (e.g. against an equally-skilled rival at tech and production parity) fighting would still be a mistake for Rome, but even then, Praets make it possible to maintain cheaper and more effective defenses while either invading in another direction or building peacefully (and forcing your neighbor to build adequate defenses to count as a well-prepared enemy). Praets are great, but like everything else, you have to use them correctly.

[Tarkeel]

Re: Circumnavigation. The dimensions of the map is 36x60, and there are 756 land tiles for a water ratio of 65%. That should be well clear of the threshold to trigger, so maybe the delay bug is still there?

(I consider the above information public and will give it to any who ask for it)

[Charriu]

Before you give the information just test it in singleplayer. Give yourself full map view and Optics and see if you get circumnavigation. Just to make sure we don't give out false information. The delay comes from the fact that tech is processed after the circumnavigation check. Do due the structure of the code it would require a bigger change, which could have more severe bugs. I think the delay is unfortunate, but definitely a smaller issue compared to unforeseen bugs caused by restructuring the code. I make a mental note to add that fact to the notes in the future.

[Miguelito]

Mjmd's attack seems to benefit Amica more than anybody else. Everybody's worrying about Jowy, but he's already pretty far behind in city count, and probably just out for revenge for GKC's troll attack.
I'd give Amica something like 70% as this point.

[Tarkeel]

I just ran a small test, giving myself three cities, the tech and map vision on turn 0. Circumnavigation kicked in on turn 2.

[Tarkeel]

One thing for future mapmakers to think about: The distribution of gold, silver, and gems will influence how good forges are. This map and PB59 both make it pretty easy to get all three, so a forge is a decent investment even if just for the happiness. I'm not sure if that's a good thing.

For this map it was intentional, and did cause a minor balance issue on gold vs silver. One of the things I tried to do was use the map to even out the traits, and using metals to boost forges would increase the value of IND. It also made for early metal trades to cement friendships, and conflict over the gems. All in all I think it worked out well, in particular because furs and ivory are not present (at the start of the game).

[El Grillo]

I'm leaning towards 'play on' in response to Amica's reload request. Players seem more laid back overall about granting reloads for misclicks these days, though.

[Tarkeel]

I think this is similar to what have been granted reload for in the past.

[Ramkhamhaeng]

I think this is similar to what have been granted reload for in the past.

Alright, then I will reload it.