[Spoilers]PBEM5m Commodore shows the full Monty

[Commodore]

Now this is an indie pick, Montezuma of the HRE. I'm going for the culture win full-bore this time!

[Commodore]

Okay, well, let's start this thing. First of all, if I'm playing, you know I'm not going to have Agriculture. My peeps, I invite you to check it.



Okay, so, not a terrible UB, the UU is nice but just means we'll be seeing lots of archery units in the medieval time frame assuming this lasts that long. My opponent can sweep up all the LKs in the world once he gets to military tradition, so I need to hurt him before then. If we make it to Oxford times we fail utterly.



So, here's my start. Not sure if it's mirrored just EW or also NS-flipped, but our brave Azteco-German scout Runs-With-Sausage will tell us that soon enough. The Combat 1 warrior Dances-With-Beer will circle into shield position, no sense in doing something daft.



I checked demos, Gaspar either settled in place or on the Sugar. As to the best of my knowledge he is not current ingesting any controlled substances, we'll go with "plains hill, researching Agriculture, building worker".



Mirroring his moves exactly would be lame! So let's settle on the PH and make something more useful instead. Nice capital site, actually.



Ag->Mining->BW seems obvious. Then, eh, let's see where we're at.

[Twinkletoes89]

Lets see if you can get as many Landsknechts on the field as I did :P

Mind you, it takes quite a few pikes to jam up a rifle or twenty...

[Commodore]

Lets see if you can get as many Landsknechts on the field as I did :P

Mind you, it takes quite a few pikes to jam up a rifle or twenty...

Heh, I doubt I will ever have that much total commitment to whipping pikes. Ideally I can get him on the defensive enough that I can keep general tech parity, although his bulbs are going to get annoying. Maybe I can force a fast Machinery bulb though, over a 'mids build or something equally nasty.

At least I know more about the field now, played turn 1.



Hope there's some sort of food NW, because that hill/forward/3h plant is looking real nice. Copper is the first city, of course.

[Commodore]

Well, we're on turn 6 already, contact has been made and the first thrilling skirmish fought:

Or not...

Yeah, we kinda waved and moved onward. Counting tiles, I figure I'm safe against a warrior for another few turns, I finish my worker. Gaspar, from the demos, is doing the same.



Dances With Beer, on the other hand, is trying to be a bit sneaky, while also exploring the northern ice area and shmexy marble site. If I can manage it, this way he'll come at Gaspar's cap along the hills, which coupled with C1 should make him hard to dislodge this side of chariots/axes.

What's coming up at the home front? Well, finished Agriculture, now on to Mining then BW. I would not be surprised if Gaspar did the exact same things, actually.



Any requests? Indian/German name suggestions?

[Commodore]

Deet-dee-dee-dee! I give you all, the first worker produced by Montezuma in an RB MP game! It's a heady rush, ain't it?



Next up, sinking hammers into a warrior to help the Sue feel safe at night. Unless something annoying shows up on the borders, though, I think working the flood plain and timing the warrior to come out as the city grows is the best bet. After that, it's the age-old choice between another worker, another warrior, a barracks, or an early settler. Choices!

We're really not taking this seriously. Here's the chat last night where we "decided" the rest of the rules.

[COLOR="Cyan"]NobleHelium: You've been invited to this chat room!

NobleHelium: you guys should decide what to ban btw[/COLOR]

Commodore: Hi, by the way, en guarde
12:01 AM
Gaspar: lo

[COLOR="yellow"]Commodore: WE at so passe, let's ban those eh old man?
[/COLOR]
[COLOR="Cyan"]NobleHelium: so yeah decide what to ban

BAN BLOCKADES OMG[/COLOR]
12:03 AM
Commodore: Nope

[COLOR="Pink"]Gaspar: only thing I think I'm really concerned about

is active espionage

other than that, im okay with everything on[/COLOR]

NobleHelium: GREAT SPY INFILTRATION

[COLOR="Pink"]Gaspar: if you want to ban WE also, thats okay

lol[/COLOR]

[COLOR="yellow"]Commodore: If we can figure out how to float a boat, blockade on.
12:04 AM
I say spies are fine, but missions, not.[/COLOR]

[COLOR="Pink"]Gaspar: WE ARE AT AN IMPASSE

I PROPOSE A DUEL TO DECIDE[/COLOR]

[COLOR="Cyan"]NobleHelium: oh noes

i was about to say that[/COLOR]

Commodore: No biggie if you don't want spies.
12:05 AM
[COLOR="Cyan"]NobleHelium: anyway

i think you should ban WEs because that favors gaspar too much, if ivory is on the map

most likely gaspar will want to get construction soon anyways[/COLOR]

Commodore: Yeah, agreed.
12:06 AM
NobleHelium: unless i put ivory in the icy corner of course :neenernee:

Gaspar: SPIES FAVOR ME TOO CITADELS!!!111ELEVEN

NobleHelium: that's true they do
12:07 AM
Commodore: Oh, yeah, they do.

Gaspar: Everything favors me, Spain is teh uber

[COLOR="yellow"]Commodore:
Ban everything but pikes, axes, and maces.[/COLOR]

NobleHelium: so you should be playing boudica of sheaim?

Gaspar: lol

Commodore: Yeah!

[NobleHelium]

I gave this info to Gaspar after you left, so here ya go.

Gaspar: yeah
did you edit the map much?
or just roll one and check for fairness?

me: i sprinkled some food
made sure copper iron etc were all on the map
upgraded some deserts to plains
rearranged a bit where jungle growths could have a huge influence
added a few luxuries
i didn't pay that much attention so there may be a blind spot without much food
and you may not be 100% happy with where the important resources are :P

[Commodore]

Excellent. Now as I research Bronze Working let's grow a bit while making a warrior, the wheat gets farmed. Ignore the lying numbers, we're getting growth and the warrior in 4 turns with a little help from Mr. Micro.



Meanwhile, I wonder what Gaspar is...son of a gun. I hate mirror matches. For his status, see my status.



Well, maybe I can make things a little more interesting now with my scout. Annoying sitting on wheat, anyone? That's the hope, anyway. If he conservatively kept his warrior at home that's a wash, but I have time to circle around to look into his capital before it's time to bother him.



Here is the world as we know it. Eight turns until we see copper and know where the first city will go, everything else will kind of flow from that. I'm curious to see if down south here there are any seafood places, Gaspar might be biased towards them the way I'd be leaping at a deer spot.



So far, so even. Which one of us hit's Alpha Centauri first?

[Commodore]

[SIZE="5"]Turns 11-15, Divergence[/SIZE]

Well, we've managed to get quite a few turns in. We're up to turn 26 (just played) and things are going pretty well. In general, Gaspar and I started diverging as soon as I reported the last turn. On turn 12, I grew to size 2 favoring farms, while Gaspar built a second worker at size 1 waiting for his first mine to come online.



vs.



This divergence, coupled with the results of our first skirmish, has made the duel a far less mirrored match.

[Commodore]

[SIZE="5"]Turns 16-22, Skirmishing[/SIZE]

As a result of the different plans, Gaspar popped out his second warrior on overflow the turn after his worker. Nailing down both warriors to his home base let me relax my own second warrior build.



Figuring I might as well do some scouting of my own backlines, I sent my scout on a loop checking the NW. A very nice backline city site exists there, once the borders are secure a settler and worker pair needs to be slated for my own analogue site.



Meanwhile, my own warrior continued the northern loop. I'm not sure how much of the tundra area Gaspar has seen...the copper is distant and very far forward, as can be seen.



The returning scout spotted a single warrior probing northward, and so I tried to draw him up to the incoming Combat 1 warrior of my own. Ideally, I could set up a trade to enable my warrior to take shock.



I set up as best I could like this, ideally, Gaspar would take the bait and then I could kill his damaged warrior for the promotion.



Unfortunately, Gaspar declined, moving to the hill and spotting my own warrior. I opted to dangle the scout in better defensive terrain, but Gaspar opted to be cautious and decline engagement again.



I decided to take a risk and look into Gaspar's development again. The two active riverside mines are giving him a big hammer edge this early on. I hopped the scout into the wooded hill, betting on a coinflip.



I lost the coinflip, but the warrior was damaged enough to let me take another risk. I moved my warrior onto flatland, where at worst he'd trade a warrior for a warrior and at best he'd lose both warriors and have to scramble to pump out a couple more.



Again, things were less than perfectly successful, but with only one damaged warrior left Gaspar would at least take time before launching his own warrior probe. I am content, farewell sweet Dances With Beer, may flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.



While fun, this skirmish was at best a side-show to the real interesting part of the game that's about to come, as I aggressively settle for copper and Gaspar will soon begin to get chariots online.