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PBEM5(Q) Everybody Wang Kon tonight!

btw - should any of my 34s opponents be reading this, any thoughts I have about not continuing with MP after these games are over shouldn't be taken to mean that I'm giving up on 34s or will be mailing it in or anything.
Completed:  PBEM 34g (W), 36 , 35 , 5o, 34s, 5p, 42, 48 and PB 9, 18, 27, 57

Current:  PB 52.  Boudicca of Maya
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I wouldn't go giving up at all. You can learn a ton from getting smacked around a bit. In fairness, I would by FAR prefer to be Catherine in this setup, so I do think you were at a slight disadvantage coming into it. However, play your traits and civ. I've seen this in a couple of your duels. I think you seem to play your game regardless of your civ/trait, which is the thing I'm still trying to do properly after countless MP games/duels here. For instance, in this picture:

[Image: 63empire.JPG]

I count 4.5 cottages (counting the one being built as .5) for 5 cities on T63 (and 6 mines!!!). For a FIN leader, this is really bad to put it simply. Tead Hall has 2 mines and a farm and 0 cottages, for instance. Why? It even has 3 riverside grassland tiles which are just awesome for FIN and all are unimproved. When you are FIN, working grassland cottages and whipping for production will always beat farms + mines, no question. I'm also wondering if you underbuilt workers. It's hard to see in this picture, but I've only been able to spot 2. I'm sure there's more than 2 (right?) but with the need to chop, cottage, combat road, etc, something more like 7-8 is more natural for this setup, though I wouldn't take that number as gospel as it really depends on tile growth needs. But the point is, you're FIN, work as many cottages as humanly possible. Grow your cities high by whatever means necessary and work cottages everywhere. If you have 12-15 cottages at this point instead of 4.5 then Tatan could be in some sort of trouble.

[Later edit: wow, I just realized Tead Hall is your capital, I just assumed it was Watership. 0 cottages in a FIN capital on T63 is illegal in several states]

Also, you're PRO with Bowman. That's a pretty meh UU, but some protective Bowman on hills in Tatan's land can really slow him down, but it doesn't seem like you've made much effort to do that. I could be wrong on that and I just haven't seen it. There's a reason I asked this question in your PRO Mali thread:

scooter Wrote:Why delay PRO Skirmishers for so long?

Your thread title was "... gets Protective Skirmishers!" but you totally ignored them early on. PRO is usually called a null trait, but in a duel that's not completely true. PRO Skirmishers in a duel are actually really nasty to try to dislodge if you can get them on defensive terrain. You had a narrow window to get them into his land before he deforested it, but you skipped it. Seems similar here. I don't think this is nearly as big a mistake as skipping FIN cottages, but it's still worth thinking about. PRO can be an asset in a duel if you use it, but if you ignore it then yeah, you only have one trait. It still sucks, but 1.5 traits are better than 1.

Anyways, that's my attempt at some constructive advice. Getting knocked around is the best way to learn, but you need to examine the mistakes in order to learn. Hope this helps. smile
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*nods* Scooter's advice is good. Self-deprecation aside, Tatan actually has a fair bit of MP experience, with a lot of the experience apparently in the "getting ass kicked educationally" department, so I wouldn't feel too bad, and Catherine will have a faster start than Wang Kon, it's a given. Pro has two windows of quality...in the early archer stage, where you can instantly take shock and own face, and in the Gunpowder stage where you can get Pinch with the first promotion (and, oddly, Pro/Theo/Barracks two promo muskets and rifles do well against horses...drill first strikes are ignored, but Formation is a key promotion). It's only in a duel with zero-sum warfare rules so very different from a FFA that this is in effect.
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Well, not building cottages in the cap was on purpose, since it's not very good for cottages.

I should have settled Manor Farm 3rd and waited on Redwall Abbey for later. And not sending bowmen in to choke was just dumb. As was sending them in AFTER he had chariots up and running or without have barracks up.
Completed:  PBEM 34g (W), 36 , 35 , 5o, 34s, 5p, 42, 48 and PB 9, 18, 27, 57

Current:  PB 52.  Boudicca of Maya
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AutomatedTeller Wrote:Well, not building cottages in the cap was on purpose, since it's not very good for cottages.

I think you may be undervaluing cottages a bit here. It's always nicer to have your cottages on rivers, but with FIN it's not completely necessary either. Nonriver grassland is still great cottage land. To my sight you have 3 great cottage tiles (3 riverside grassland) and 9 good ones (8 nonriver grass, 1 riverside plains). More importantly, nearly all of them can be shared, so you can use satellite villages to grow them for the capital. Totally agree that Manor Farm should have been settled early and Redwall delayed for exactly that reason. (Redwall is actually sort of a trap settlement pre-IW in my opinion as the gold pays for the city but just barely due to maintenance I'm guessing.)

Back to the capital, I would say any of those tiles cottage'd for a FIN civ is still significantly better than a plains hill mine. The grass hill mine is still a bit weaker IMO, but that's much more defensible. This is a very green map, and I think you would be surprised how awesome FIN + green + cottages + whip can be. Mines really suck at small city sizes especially and only really come into their own when city sizes begin to prohibit whipping. Strategically, you're never going to out-expand Tatan here, but you can get significantly far ahead in commerce and once you're stable in military and happiness, burst out some cities & workers and zoom past.

All that to say, I think you're underestimating the classic FIN cottage spam. It's awesome for a reason. If you play this way though, FIN goes from best trait in the game to pretty so-so. This actually tempts me to play some sort of shadow duel to try this start out myself.
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I didn't say it was smart, the way i did it. Just said that I did it that way wink
Completed:  PBEM 34g (W), 36 , 35 , 5o, 34s, 5p, 42, 48 and PB 9, 18, 27, 57

Current:  PB 52.  Boudicca of Maya
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AutomatedTeller Wrote:I didn't say it was smart, the way i did it. Just said that I did it that way wink

I was mainly disagreeing with your statement "since it's not good for cottages" because I look at that city and internally say "I WANT TO GO TO THERE AND COTTAGE IT" wink.
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well, his researching alphabet has caused him one problem - I could see when he picked up HBR, so dialed up a turn of spears a couple of turns ago.

he showed up with a 3 HA and a chariot to take 100 acre wood and i finished off the spear and he bounced off.

I doubt I would have dialed up the spear without knowing that.
Completed:  PBEM 34g (W), 36 , 35 , 5o, 34s, 5p, 42, 48 and PB 9, 18, 27, 57

Current:  PB 52.  Boudicca of Maya
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then I got lucky and killed an C1 HA with a regular HA and then wacked a jag with an axe. Guess he didnt' realize I had HA. Guess he does now wink

And I got my GG out of it, so here we go Literature, here we go!!

gonna go get that marble, too - HE, here we come! Mebbe GLib, too, not sure.
Completed:  PBEM 34g (W), 36 , 35 , 5o, 34s, 5p, 42, 48 and PB 9, 18, 27, 57

Current:  PB 52.  Boudicca of Maya
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Tatan showed up with a WIII jaguar, which I assume means he settled his GG, which I think is a mistake, unless he has a level IV unit.

me, I'm going to give several units XP and unlock HE (I know how aesthetics and get lit next turn). I think that's a better use - getting more units is better than getting better units. I think.
Completed:  PBEM 34g (W), 36 , 35 , 5o, 34s, 5p, 42, 48 and PB 9, 18, 27, 57

Current:  PB 52.  Boudicca of Maya
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