[Spoiler] Pindicator Buys the Farm - Zara Yaqob of Maya

[pindicator]

Portugal was my second choice.

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Reserved for password / opening thoughts

[Cyneheard]

Didn't you choose the Maya instead of Mali?

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Good catch Cyneheard. Fixed that. I'm going to guess that was my subconscious poking through asking why the hell i didnt pick Mali

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So can someone clue me in to why Zara is a target of the banter thread? I feel like I'm missing something obvious...

Also, after seeing AT's response I should have just changed my title to Charlemagne of Mali instead

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Sorry for the lack of updates. I had an idea for how I was going to report this game (it being a more laid back game in theory), but the timing of when the game started really prevented me from getting started. Originally I was going to get away from the "I did this / I'm going to do this / this is why" type of reporting and try to tell a story using in-game events as a prompt -- like an AAR a la CK2 or how many of the Dwarf Fortress succession games are written up -- but I think I got a bit ambitious with my ability to write in such a way and also with other events that are going on in RL. So I may still try to do this, I don't know, but I don't want to keep putting off reporting anything at all until I can start writing. What we've gotten instead is a week of no posts.

What I can give you now is my mentality of this game - since it's a shadow game I see it as a pbem36-esque exercise in casual play. There will be no planned wonder builds or tech paths or other crazy plans; much like pbem36 was supposed to be a quick and easy game. No spreadsheets; no C&D tracking. I may do some turn-by-turn C&D -- like say looking at GNP to see if certain techs have been researched. But I won't be tracking these turn by turn like I am in pbem39, or lining those up with score increases & population changes to determine who researched which tech. To be honest, I won't even place a huge emphasis on winning. I would like to win, and will try to, but I would rather see my tech plan through and see how well it performs than anything else.

Which leads me to the plan: Zara Yaqob of Maya needs to REX. Maya will provide me with a resource-less UU that can help me harass other people to keep them boxed into their cities, which at the same time a quick run to Writing and then Code of Laws (pre-Math, mind you) will then fund my REXing. I may try to land Code of Laws with the Oracle, but I probably won't give two cares about any wonder in the early game. More likely those hammers will go towards holkans, archers, settlers, & workers. We'll try to REX as hard as possible with cheap Courthouses -- and yes, REX is a relative term here. I remember how civs were broke at 3 cities before, so we will need to be smart about expanding.

And that is the plan. Next post will be a recap of the first 15 turns. I need to give an "opponent assessment" post as well.

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Turn 26

Scooter got back from his weekend so I had a save tonight. So far he has not been doing much harassment -- earlier he half-hearted chased my worker around but completely neglected to pillage my wheat. Then he left me alone for quite a bit. But now we have his archer coming back for more trouble:



His archer is in red. This turn I moved 2 warriors (in blue) to the forested hill NW of his archer. If he wants to advance farther toward my capital then he'll need to move onto flat ground and I'll attack. The 2 warriors should be enough to kill a flatland archer, but if they are not then I have 2 workers (in green) that can road by the capital and the capital's archer can finish the job.

The capital itself is building a settler; it's only a 2-turn build because I used a good amount of whip overflow from whipping that 2nd worker out. Wheel came in at end of turn and the workers will have a route ready for me to settle city #2 in an equivalent spot that scooter put his city #2.

After that, I think I'll finish my barracks and chop out about half a dozen chariots to see if I can get a surprise attack and take or raze that city from scooter.

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No pic because my computer wireless is being a pain (stupid toshiba) but the main frustration with this game is that Commodore amd Scooter have both decided to expand / choke in my direction. In other words, you're welcome AT

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Ok, mini update!

We are the first (as far as i can tell) to 3 cities. In a deft display of ego i have named them Pindicator VIII, Pindicator IX, and the newest is Pindicator X. I realize naming cities like this is tacit admission to the other players that i know they are going to be razed but sometimes a running meme is worth a small thing like defeat.

My third city was settled solely to secure my copper. Scooter's holy city on my eastern border makes it too easy for him to disconnect this resource at his leasure so now he has to go through a city on a hill first. Ancilliary bonuses: working the gold does wonders for research, and scooter has retreated the archer he had camped on my furs. So i'm now hooking those up for additional commerce.

Tech is set to Code of Laws and i just started raising gold for that last turn. It's about 10 turns out, aided by the gold and a pair of scientists in the capital. After Code of Laws i plan on getting a pair of cities founded and teching towards construction.

[Mardoc]

sometimes a running meme is worth a small thing like defeat.