[SPOILERS - PBEM17] novice and spaceman - Suryavarman of India

[spacemanmf]

Tech screens.





I checked all foreign cities on the espionage screen and this one had by far the greatest invested in it (pindicator had nothing - sorry!).



I've yet to apply the magic formula.

I'm guessing that Dave got a Great Engineer from the Hanging Gardens.

[spacemanmf]

I think that means no new techs have been discovered from what I can tell.

EP formula is:

TheirEP = Their Espionage Point count against us = 84
SabotageCost = Cost shown for the Sabotage Production mission = 2,351
InvestigateCost = Cost shown for the Investigate City mission = 507

Hammers = (SabotageCost * (TheirEP + 100)) / (3 * InvestigateCost)

So: 2,351 * 184 / (3 * 507) = 284 hammers

And MoM is 301 hammers, so don't be surprised to see it fall later this turn.

[spacemanmf]

Ok turn sent. Just noticed your plan was for a university in Hostile Takeover (it auto-switched after ending turn and completing the forge). We should build more than 6 given our use of science specialists (universities don't enable more scientists to be hired?).

Whilst I know you must have built 6 universities to build Oxford University, do you have to build it in a city which has already built one of those universities? It says "required to build" on CivFanatics, but does that mean the 6 total, or 1 to start it off?

The reason I ask is because it would be nice not to have to whip Capital, and it might be slower to build it manually in there than whipping it in other cities (then again, with those hills and Bureaucracy, maybe not), so one option, if needed, might be to switch to OU before the university is complete to get it done as soon as possible.

[novice]

Tracker still shows us having the save.

I'm pretty sure we need a uni in Capital, anyway it can slowbuild one just as fast as the other cities can whip one, I suspect.

[novice]

I'm not sure I like our long-term prospects. We need a profitable war. Maybe we should ally with Darrell against Rego or Dave? We provide Rifles and he provides boats?

I think our only possible allies are Rego and Darrell due to time zones. Attacking Darrell is awkward due to the MDP with Shoot.

[spacemanmf]

Tracker still shows us having the save.

Good catch - I was too busy reporting the turn to send it on. Then disappeared out for a bit.

[spacemanmf]

I'm not sure I like our long-term prospects. We need a profitable war. Maybe we should ally with Darrell against Rego or Dave? We provide Rifles and he provides boats?

I think our only possible allies are Rego and Darrell due to time zones. Attacking Darrell is awkward due to the MDP with Shoot.

Rego is a bit far away to attack effectively, and we have him (seemingly) as a reasonably decent ally. Shoot and Dave are the ones that are, in my mind, a little behind. If we're going to attack someone without suffering economically too much we need as soft a target as possible.

Shoot falls into that category given his tech deficit and the fact that we can threaten multiple cities. (That said, he can threaten lots of our cities too.)

The issue with that is, as you say, the MDP with darrell. We need to subtly get that out of darrell. I will give it a try.

Incidentally, darrell has mentioned once or twice about us not having an NAP with rego. I haven't yet corrected him but, in any case, a 3t cooldown isn't much of an NAP. As rego mentioned, we don't really need one.

[spacemanmf]

Some fairly interesting chats with Dave & darrell from before. Darrell is fairly closely allied to Shoot & Dave, but he didn't confirm whether the MDP was still in place or not, despite me mentioning it several times (but not asking outright).

Chat with Dave.

15:14 David: Hey, is this Novice or Spacemanf?

me: space

just sent - sorry had forgotten to send it

15:15 David: lol, it's all good

would your civ be interested in trading world maps by chance?

15:16 me: not at the moment

i mentioned the possibility to novice, but he wasn't keen

15:17 David: okay - I got ya'

me: do you know whose that recent Great Engineer was, by the way?

David: your civ is the last part of the map that's still fog of war for me

me: ah right - have you exchanged with others?

David: if you do decide you're interested, I have the other three player's maps

and the GE was mine

15:18 me: ok thanks for the info (re maps)

i thought so re GE

i had guessed it in my thread :-)

hanging gardens city?

David: yes, w golden age boost and specialist

me: nice

15:19 we'll get a great person in about 7 turns or so i think

could be anything though!

David: lol, watch it be a Great Spy :P

I sincerely hope its not

me: except that

i think it's GM, GS or GE

15:20 we've not hired any spies or artists

15:21 David: lol, avoid the worthless Great people

me: indeed - you'll have that risk with the great wall, but you can hopefully dilute it out

15:22 David: am trying, nabbed that thing mostly because it took only three turns to build, lol

low oppurtunity cost

stuck it in my GP farm

me: yeah, stone hooked up, may as well i suppose

15:23 David: I'm half expecting the RNG to give me that great spy though in a couple turns, just to spite me, lol

me: heh

15:24 David: would kick myself for ever building that great wall

me: just think of the EPs

15:26 David: lol, would rather an academy :P

me: hmm close call

15:28 David: I almost wish we could use active espionage in this game

annoying I know

but fun when you're the one swinging the great spy around

me: indeed

15:31 right, catch you later

15:32 David: see ya'!

Chat with darrell.

15:07 me: oops, played the turn but forgot to send error

now remedied

15:09 Darrell: figure out your tech path?

me: eh?

space here

Darrell: you or you alter ego were sayting you ddin'

oh

your alter ego was saying he wasn't sure where to tedch next

econ was my sugestion

me: well yes, that's on the cards - don't want to take any chances

lots of choices, nothing obvious after that

15:11 given that we have more farms than cottages, biology would be nice as a long-term aim

Darrell: yeah

as non FIN and mids it seems like you made the right choice

too bad sid's isn't allowed

me: oh did we ban corps?

Darrell: bilology is a nice pickup along that path

rego posted someting in the IT thread about it

me: ah ok

Darrell: I think the conlcusion was theyw ere banned

15:12 I like that in SP though, get the econ GM and then beeline medicien for sid's

me: but yeah we have no real long term aims now

15:13 still somewhat wary of the world

and our two immediate neighbours are joined at the hip

Darrell: eh

less so with the NAP I guess

me: yes, we have some leeway

Darrell: we were afraid of you

me: i'm flattered

:-)

Darrell: no not quite so fearful, with the nap

15:14 I think ou should get a bunch of military techs and attack rego

me: well you would

Darrell: he's mad at me, so I'm happy

me: how have you maddened him?

Darrell: beating him to lib

15:15 and then getting his tech and knowing he was going for nat for the taj, and beating him to the taj

me: have you landed that then?

have you got an engineer?

we were trying to figure out whose it was

Darrell: That is an excellent quesiotn...I think it wa rego's tbh

but I don't believe he can tech nationalism fast enough to beat me

15:16 not 100% sur eon that, but I kidn of doubt it

I saved some forests

right now it looks like it will take him at least 5-6 turns to get Nationalism

15:19 me: well if you can build it inside that then you've got it nailed

Darrell: Well...if someoen who has that GE is closer to Nationalism...

15:20 Its not in the bag I would say

me: i think shoot is close to MoM

Darrell: oh yeah?

he's building it?

me: well he's building something

Darrell: that shouldn't surprise me I guess

me: he was first to calendar i thought

are you going for that too?

or assuming rego will grab it?

15:21 does shoot not tell you anything - i thought had an MDP and stuff

Darrell: we thought about it, but it is damn expensive

me: 301 hammers

chunky

15:22 Darrell: with marble it wuld be a nice build

actually without its a nice build

but we live by the whip

and that's a painful thing to whip overflow build

me: aye

so what's your long term aim?

15:23 other than to irritate rego

Darrell: grow pop, grow cottages, tech as fast as I can

me: whilst living by the whip?

Darrell: yeah

I'll store pop on caost, and whip that away while not touching the cottages

15:24 me: i guess you have close ties with shoot & dave now, so rego or us might be longer term targets

or is everyone just going to turtle to space

15:25 Darrell: it would be very unlikely we go to war with dave or shoot unless something changes, that is correct

so if we decided to expand, it would be either you or rego

not giving anythign away there, you already knew that

me: well yes, i said it above

:-)

Darrell: yeah...anyway the open ended nap with the cooldown gives both of us plenty of time to react to impending hostilities

15:26 me: it does

well we can't attack either of you or shoot without triggering the MDP, dave will have EIs and dikes soon, rego is a bit far away

so science it is!

15:27 Darrell:

me: rego's got an impressive GNP with no golden age

Darrell: I was telling Krill I woulnd't mind a space race, but I don't know if all teams would sign a pact to that end

yes he does

Im not sure where its coming from

if its just a lot of coast tiles, I'm not that concenred

me: a space race would be a bit boring for the lurkers

Darrell: yeah

me: could be known tech with two pre-reqs i suppose too

Darrell: krill had the same opinion, but I say screw the lurkers

me: plus UoS

15:28 Darrell: yeah he's doing the LP thing I guess

15:32 me: right, catch you later

Darrell: later

[novice]

More scheming. Me chatting with Darrell and Dave. The chats were done by phone, hence the terse phrases.

First, a chat with Darrell from some days ago, since I'm already copying chat logs from my phone. This one's pretty contentless though.

[COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]Grats on Lib!
Nice work messing with Rego
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
Thanks
He took it well unfortunately
The best part was he thought he was messing with me
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Yeah, I read the chat logs
You're now ahead of us in tech
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
How intriguing
Won't last long
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Why not?
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
Have some loans to repay
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Ah yes
Looks like you got Rego to tech Paper before CS at least
Haven't seen that before
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
Yes
Many things to chuckle about
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Do share
What was Krill's "you suck at micro" complaint?
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
He was in a position to get funding from me but turned me down
He had been disengaged from the game so I asked him to find me a good micro plan for oxford
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
What were your terms?
Pretty easy when you're Phi
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
I think he tought I could not do one myself, but really I wanted to get him back into the game
Three turns from education
Yes
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
You have more dedlurkers don't you?
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
I told him just worry about oxford not the unis
Yes
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Need to find out what to tech now
I rarely play this far in SP...
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
econ for sure[/COLOR]

[novice]

Next, chatting with Darrell today:

[COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
No save today?
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
did krill not play it?
hmm
he's offline
I am unable to play in the short term
I can play tonight but you will be in bed by then
hopefully krill can get to it before then
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Yeah we haven't received the save at least
Gives us more time to plot Regos downfall I guess
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
good!
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
You supply the ships?
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
against rego?
let's get dave to do that
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Ok
So are you thinking 4v1?
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
no, not really
If everyone else was joining in I would, but I am not organizing anything like that
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Well we might need to "cull" rego's empire a bit
Judging by his demos
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
yeah
I suspect he's pretty vulnerable
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Right now or in general?
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
I have some visiblity on him too, been sending my EPs that way long enough to get tech visibilty, and have workboats poking around
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
He has an awesome Moai city
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
I think it would be easy to fork him with magellan powered galleons, if that's the direction you were gong to go
indeed
everything he has needs galleons
that city is hard to get to for me
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Yeah I've been looking at forking
Moai and shrine can be forked
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
I think he has issue with reinforcement too
I guess we all do for that matter
but he doesn't appear to have engineering yet
and naval reinforcement pre-galleons is not simple
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
No eng, we have alpha
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
yeah I saw you got alpha...that's a smart move its my next tech I think
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Well it cuts both ways
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
true, everyone knows what yo uhave
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
But we need it for PP anyway
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
but its advantage, because I for example don't know what shoot has but you do
right
its on the one to an important tech
for us
not as important for farm boys like you
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
No
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
you have the best production potential in the game though
I really enjoy running farm based economies, because its so easy to rip out an army
typically
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
I have no idea how we're going to compete with fin cottages
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
build a lead that can't be overcome?
or get more land
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Ding ding ding
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
honestly, a rep sicentist is 6 beakers
we don't compete with that until towns with free speech
by that point...
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
But you have more towns than we have specs
By that point we need more land?
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
one biology farm feeds one specialist
althoug pop is a problem
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
Hence the city spam
We need you to coordinate due to time zone issues
[/COLOR][COLOR="Yellow"]
blech
honestly, after the way the game progressed I lost my appetite for it
I went from spending 30+ minutes a day to about 3
I don't have the enthusiasm to coordinate something like that
Krill might though
I will talk to him
[/COLOR][COLOR="DarkSlateBlue"]
I'm sure Krill will help
Crosspost[/COLOR]

Basically I'm sharing my dim views of India's long-term prospects, and we discussed the pros and cons of a specialist economy. Then we mused on Rego's vulnerabilities and a possible joint effort.

Darrell wants us or Krill to coordinate and Dave to provide the ships, though.