[SPOILERS] Magic Science and Nobody Else in Pitboss 66

[Magic Science]

("RefSteel I" certainly seems to be leading an interesting life!)

It gets more interesting. .

An event as exciting as this deserves a full report, and it will receive one, but I worry that if I wait any longer then another player will post the news in their thread before I can, so:

 I RAZED NEW YORK!  
And RefSteel I the Axeman did the deed! This guy is the greatest Axeman ever.

RefSteel, I admit that back when I first read this:

I would be honored!  (No matter whether I get a victorious hero responsible for overthrowing the terrible oppressive rulers of [insert name of doomed civ here] or a hapless speedbump crushed on [insert name of winning civ here]'s road to inevitable and total victory!)

I was pretty sure your unit would meet the second fate. But Civ IV is a complicated and surprising game.

[Magic Science]

Turn 78 – 925 BC
Part 1: The Battle of New York
   
STEP 1: Declare war on GeneralKilCavalry BEFORE moving Hera’s Dream into his culture.
We have shared profitable Open Borders for more than 10 turns now, so this was the most important step. . Shame is worse than death.


   
STEP 2: Move Hera’s Dream into his culture and evaluate New York’s garrison.
The garrison is only 1 unit, so I have a chance, and that unit is a Warrior, so it is a good chance. .


   
STEP 3: Move Hera’s Dream adjacent to New York.
I wonder, why is that Worker still there? GeneralKilCavalry saw Hera’s Dream approaching on his half of this turn, and he responded sensibly by whipping New York for 1 population. Why not evacuate the Worker to safety as well? It is perfectly safe because I only have 1 land unit in this attack, but he cannot know that.


   
STEP 4: ATTACK! .
RefSteel I had a 78.31% chance to win, which is absolutely good enough to try. His chance to win would have been better than 90% if not for the Warrior’s free Combat I promotion. AGG/CRE is the perfect trait combination for desperate Warrior defenses, isn’t it?


   
STEP 5: WIN THE FIGHT AND RAZE NEW YORK! HAHAHAHAHA.
I am amazed that this trick worked twice in a row. Incredible. Incredible.

Now I must seize the opportunity to settle a new city in the cleared land. Last time (still amazed this exact thing happened TWICE IN A ROW ) I failed, this time I will succeed, but how?

Stay tuned to find out!

[Magic Science]

I swear that this Part 1 / Part 2 structure I keep writing is not about artificially inflating my thread’s post count (2nd place ), but rather about being too lazy to learn to use an image hosting service. The forum itself will only let me attach 5 screenshots per post.

This little post, however, IS about artificially inflating my thread’s post count. It could be included at the end of the previous one, but no.

[Magic Science]

Turn 78 – 925 BC
Part 2 – Of Hestia’s Race and Other Matters
   
I will settle on the jungled hill between Wheat and Fish, just like I wanted to originally, and I will use this Settler to do it.

This Settler’s problem is that it is out of position, but its advantage is that it already exists. No other Settlers are even in the queue at the moment, so this one is effectively the closest to the jungled hill anyway, and this is a race. Using this Settler instead of a new one does mean not settling Ares here or anywhere nearby for a while, and just having one fewer city for a while, but that is fine for two reasons.

ONE: Something I should have realized last turn but only realized this turn is this: the peaceful fate of this mountain and lake region had already been decided by Plemadilly. The Barbarian city in the region was placed by them, so it is located exactly where they want. When they capture it back soon, they will not raze it to clear room for a new city in an uncertain nearby place, but rather keep it where it is.
So: if the city is located on one of the 2 tiles that DOES block Ares, then of course I cannot settle Ares, and there is no chance of that changing. But if the city is located on one of the tiles that DOES NOT block Ares, then of course I can settle Ares, and there is no risk of that changing. Ares is either lost to me, in which case there is of course no harm in sending the Settler somewhere else, or it is guaranteed to be mine, in which case there is no risk in delaying it.

TWO: My economy is nearly crashed, so it is preferable to settle only 1 new city instead of 2, and the city on the jungled hill is more bitterly contested and better anyway.


   
This is how I moved the Settler and its party in North Animalia. The Worker must build a road on the plains to barely speed the Settler’s progress by one turn.

I will use a Work Boat to learn where the lost city is located later.

And don’t worry, the Roman Chariot is harmless because our Peace Treaty lasts until Turn 85.


   
This is how I moved everybody near the front on The Blob.

The Workers will build a road on the jungled hill and the adjacent plains to speed the Settler’s progress by one turn. This will delay the development of all the other cities in the region, especially Hermes, but I think it is worth it, and I think it will not delay the construction of the Colossus (one of those 2 Workers was supposed to go to Poseidon to chop this turn).

naufragar I the Phalanx is now garrisoning Hermes, the city that Civeel can see inside with just their culture. They have no Chariots but many Axes, but a Phalanx is still better than nothing. This leaves Apollo undefended, but it is farther away, and it has 6 hammers invested in an Axeman just in case.

I thought about sending naufragar I and maybe some other rushed units to the ruins of New York to help delay GKC from settling New New York, but decided not to. They could only arrive on the second half of Turn 81, which is probably too late to matter.

So RefSteel I is still alone in the land war, just like before. He does not have enough health to be favored against even a single enemy Axeman, but he will still pillage the road on that hill or perish in the attempt. This is the only measure I have available to delay New New York, so I must try it.


   
This is the situation in The Core.

2 Workers have arrived to chop forests around Poseidon, they should have been here sooner, and more will come later. Metal Casting will be mine at the end of this turn.

Zeus is building a Work Boat that is useless now without Ares, but I need to finish it with a whip despite this to construct the Forge on schedule.


   
And this is the Power Graph. Mjmd just appeared on it this turn, finally, and GKC is next. I need to get to class, so for now I will let it speak for itself.

Other than to say that it makes me nervous.

[Magic Science]

Hmm. It seems that Team Ginger() + Miguelito is now in a turn split as well. Is this connected to the Mjmd vs JackRB situation or is it independent?

Maybe I just haven’t met the right people in this game yet. Sorry for doubting your warlike nature!

[Magic Science]

Hmm. Now Mjmd has captured and kept another JackRB city. Just what sort of war is happening out there in the dark fog?

[naufragar]

I've been lurking in spurts, so I'm just now seeing that naufragar I is acting as a garrison. Garrison units lead nice long lives.

Gotta be honest, this map looks like a paranoia-inducing naval nightmare. Guess it's better to be the paranoia inducer rather than the induced.

[Magic Science]

Turn 78 to Turn 81 – 900 BC and 850 BC
   
The southern theater: The Blob
The First Greco-American War is almost over. Next turn I will settle my 9th city on that fateful jungled hill, and there is nothing anyone can possibly do to stop me. Then I will offer GKC a Cease Fire to bring the conflict to an end, for now.

Overall, it is a quiet war. GKC has done almost nothing within my vision. He evacuated his Workers, and then he advanced, but did not attack, with a lone Archer. But that was all.

HOWEVER, for lack of anything else to do, Hera’s Dream moved forward to look around, and she found 1 Axeman and 1 Settler in the city of Washington this turn. So I guess that GKC was doing something in the fog, but it was too slow. In fact, he was so slow that RefSteel I will actually live to be evacuated by Hera’s Dream next turn even after pillaging the city ruins and the road. Incredible. If I still see no Axemen next turn, maybe I could even delay the Cease Fire and try to pillage the cottage as well. GKC is playing quick turns, so maybe?

Also, Hera's Dream discovered where Amicalola lives, and that New York and Boston are only connected to the rest of America by a little neck where Washington is. So maybe I cold wage a limited war and take the whole area for myself someday.


   
The northern theater: Animalia

(yes, this screenshot is from Turn 80, but I moved after them on that turn and before them on Turn 81, so everything is nearly the same)
(and as I type this I realize that I just double-moved Plemadilly! We have a Peace Treaty until Turn 85, but to them this must seem like I just double-moved them during a Settler race! They cannot know that my only Settler, which they just saw in this region, has ran away to a totally different region! But they will win any race they want up here, so I think this should not matter. I will try to let them double-move me back before playing on Turn 82. Sorry!)

So: in this theater we have a binding Peace Treaty () until Turn 85, but it is still tenser than the southern theater, or at least it causes me more worry. . There is a new city on the Horse, and there is another Roman Settler over towards the Silver. Oh, and the Roman city that was captured by Barbarians, which is still controlled by the Barbarians, is where I labelled with the sign, so I cannot settle for the Fish on my side of the peaks. A Work Boat confirmed this.

They are taking land that is supposed to be mine! Demeter was supposed to be the ultimate chokepoint fortress that locked down this region all on its own until I was ready to settle it! Obviously, that idea did not work.

I think there were 2 errors in my thinking that caused this wave of Settlers to catch me by surprise:
ONE: Just stupid wishful magical thinking. Of course the pretty imaginary lines drawn on my mental map will have no effect on my rivals. I should never have let the vague feeling that “it would not make sense for them to settle forward like that, look at how it would trespass over the invisible line that passes through Demeter’s culture” lull me into a false sense of security. Silly.
TWO: I should not have made a dotmap (signmap?) for this region only for me, but for them as well. That is true for all regions, always, I think. I did something like this, trying to take the perspective of the enemy, in the region I share with Mjmd, and it worked! He left me Hephaestus just like I thought! So of course I should have tried the same thing in this region as well. That mental exercise at least would have stopped the Horse city from catching me by surprise. There is no good place for a good city for the Horse in my signmap, and I foolishly extended that conclusion to them as well. But that was wrong, because they have that Clam that I do not have. Our situations are different. Enough rambling, I think the key insight it: You and your rivals are NOT actually competing for the same cities, but rather for the same tiles and especially the same resource tiles. The best city site for YOU to claim that tile with is NOT the best city site for THEM to claim that tile with. So keep that in mind and think about where the best places for them to settle would be, then you will not be caught by surprise when they do something that would be foolish for you to do.

Now what should I do in this theater? Unfortunately, I think the answer is “nothing”. I have no more Settlers, they have 4 more turns of peace to prepare their units, and they are Tokugawa of Rome, and they have Horses. Their Power is slightly higher than mine. Overall, they can probably keep their new cities safe, and even if they could not, I cannot afford to keep them. Look at my economy, +4 GPT at 100% gold. So Plemadilly will claim all this land without a fight from me.

But I must at least stop them from claiming the Sheep and the flood plain, somehow. That spot poses too much of a naval threat to the Core, just like South Daggerland does. Maybe I can just send an Axeman to camp there for a while? And that spot is so close as the crow flies to Zeus, my economy does not need to grow much to afford it.


   
The Core is not a theater, it is peaceful.

Things to note: Civeel has sent a Warrior to scout my land. Demeter is building an actual Scout so I can scout their lands soon too.

There are Barbarians in Daggerland, but so far only Warriors.

The Metal Casting construction projects continue. In Zeus, the Great Engineer will be born Turn 98 for sure. In Poseidon, the Colossus will NOT be done Turn 85, more like Turn 90, maybe. Metal Casting was delayed too long, and then the construction projects themselves were poorly planned, so I am not optimistic. I desperately want the Colossus. Desperately.

Soon I will train a Trireme in Hera. I will use it to keep Civeel away from Pig Island until I am ready to claim it, like I planned so long ago. Surprisingly, my foreign trade routes are already worth 2 commerce, so the islands are not as important as I thought, but I still need them to make a proper last stand. Plan ahead! .


   
Here is a better screenshot of the islands. The Archipelago is an interesting place for a last stand, so I want it too. That region needs a Trireme too, probably trained in Apollo.

[Magic Science]

It seems that I am incapable of writing a quick turn report ever.

I've been lurking in spurts, so I'm just now seeing that naufragar I is acting as a garrison. Garrison units lead nice long lives. 

He is a Phalanx, and his job is to defend my forwardmost city against the entirely Axe-wielding army of an enemy I already pissed off, all by himself, and the enemy can see all that. So don't get cocky. .

Gotta be honest, this map looks like a paranoia-inducing naval nightmare. Guess it's better to be the paranoia inducer rather than the induced.

I think that razing cities with amphibious attacks is just what I do now. It's my thing. I always find a way and I always find a reason. So this is a good map for me. .

[Magic Science]

Also: Plemadilly met GKC from across the water with their Scout, so now they know all about our war. Their Scout can even see RefSteel I and the city ruins and the Settler! I should never have signed that stupid Peace Treaty, from now on it will Cease Fires forever.