[SPOILERS] Will the Sun(rise) Ever Set on Washington, Mongolia?

[Whosit]

I've got some more talking points, and a lot more pictures, but I have to do some cooking so for now, I think I found out why my economy sucks. I went and counted up all the cottage-type improvements in my Empire:

Turn 147 (740 AD)

Cottage: 3
Hamlet: 13
Village: 17
Town: 7

Total: 40

I'm no expert, but I think that's pretty pathetic. I HAD 8 Towns, but it turns out it got mined over. At my CAPITAL. See, the other day as I was playing, my cat jumped up on my keyboard. I thought she missed anything important so I payed it no mind, but it appears she had set one of my Workers to Automated.... So now I have a grassland Iron Mine instead of a grassland Town at the capital. Lovely.

And, y'know, it's not really for lack of trying, I feel. I'll put the pictures up later, but I compared my core to CH's and John's, and I think I just didn't get as much green space. I've cottaged over as much as I could (unfortunately, several of my piss poor cities needed farms instead of cottages). Johns DID trade me maps, so later I might try to count up CH's cottages. Maybe. So, yeah, I guess my plan now is to take as much of Grimace's core territory as I can and hopefully it pays off because my economy just doesn't have the oomph it needs.

[Whosit]

Oh, and yeah, CH has started to spend a ton of EP on me. That's a good sign. And no way I could even come close to matching it, of course. I only have 5 Courthouses in my whole empire.

[Whosit]

Yeah, CH and John probably have 60+ cottages. No wonder. Crossing fingers that Grimace has a worthwhile number for me to capture.

[Whosit]

OK, here's the rest of the recap from T147:




Lookit all them 'phants. So, I think when I finished off that stack, that was a situation where I should have deleted the victorious HA, because all it did was earn one of those WEs a promotion. I'll have a few Spears in Preston soon, including a Formation one, and right now there's nowhere near enough siege in that stack to be a threat to the city walls.




This isn't really directly relevant to me, but here's what some other stacks in the world look like. I gotta step up my game and phase out all my ancient/classical era trash. Somehow.




I do want to get Viking graphs, not sure if it's really worth it. After that, either full EP on Grimace, or on CH if he keeps spending his truckloads of EP on me. I really don't want CH to get city visibility on me, but not an awful lot I can do to stop him if that's what he wants.




This looks like the city that the Persians took. Going after the island holdings too, hm? No further Korean cities were captured this turn, so either this isn't a full-scale invasion, or the worst is yet to come.










Graphs and demos. I'm wondering what happened there with the Zulu. I guess they had a fight with Rome that didn't go in their favor. I can also see the dips from my recent battle with Grimace. Let's see who recovers it better.













I'm really interested in how geography played a role in things in this game. Obviously, a lot rests on player skill and I'm not the top player in this game, but at the moment I feel my terrain gave me certain advantages and certain disadvantages (namely not as much cottage land as the others). Do you lurkers ever discuss that in your lurker thread? Also, would it be spoilers if you asked the other players to count up their cottages? I'd like to see those figures when I go through the threads when all is over.




Here's that blasted cat mine. God damn it.

I've some geopolitical analysis coming, but a few things I must do first. I'm afraid I can't promise anything as in-depth, articulate, or accurate as what Commodore frequently presents.

[Whosit]

OK, seems I have a little time. I probably should have grabbed more graph pics. Oh well.

Really, all this has to do is with the fortunes of the Zulu. I'm not sure where to place them right now. Looking at score, they've dropped a long ways, but I think a lot of that has been heavy whipping (plus the occasional city loss). They still have as many cities as I do (18), and as I've shown, they have a stronger economic core than I do. However, they appear to be locked in war with Rome, it does not seem like they have made any appreciable gains, and they just had CH snipe a city. The vision I had for our little region was a 2v1 where Zulu and I would chow down on CH, because I think it would take our combined power to do so. Now, though, I wonder if the Zulu will end up in a strong enough position to remain a relevant factor. Will I? I remain increasingly worried that an attack from CH is coming. I'm keeping an eye on my borders with sentry Chariots, but if CH has Engineering that won't help me much. I should probably queue up a Spy somewhere and see if that can stumble upon anything (how likely is a spy to get caught? Since they can only see the square they are standing on, I'd hate to sink hammers into the Spy only to get it caught immediately).

Then on my east is Grimace and Elum/Mack. Grimace is going to die, one way or another, and sooner or later. I kinda wanted to have a buffer between me and Elum, but that doesn't seem to be in the cards.

The Vikings appear to be doing better relatively in the score. They appear to have a sturdy little empire, and I thiiiink they've had a war with Rome in their past, too. I'll have to double check the foreign adviser screen.

OK, so I guess this was geopolitics and more me saying "my pals the Zulu don't look so good lately. I hope I'm not next on the chopping block." CH isn't a slouch, and now is as good a time as any if he wants to attack me. I have precious little to stop him with right now. I've tossed around the idea of offering Open Borders to see if he'll take it. It means he can scout me out, but on the other hand I could maybe keep a closer eye on him, which might be worth it right now. Of course, that assumes he'd even accept the deal, which I am kind of doubtful on.

[Krill]

I'm really interested in how geography played a role in things in this game. Obviously, a lot rests on player skill and I'm not the top player in this game, but at the moment I feel my terrain gave me certain advantages and certain disadvantages (namely not as much cottage land as the others). Do you lurkers ever discuss that in your lurker thread? Also, would it be spoilers if you asked the other players to count up their cottages? I'd like to see those figures when I go through the threads when all is over.

Interesting point this. Most people don't seem to post their number of cottages and in how many cities but it's an important metric for understanding baseline tech rates. It would be much more interesting IMO if people would explain why, where, and when they chose too invest in cottages, especially because of land layouts and borders.

[Commodore]

(☞ﾟヮﾟ)☞

I'm really interested in how geography played a role in things in this game. Obviously, a lot rests on player skill and I'm not the top player in this game, but at the moment I feel my terrain gave me certain advantages and certain disadvantages (namely not as much cottage land as the others). Do you lurkers ever discuss that in your lurker thread? Also, would it be spoilers if you asked the other players to count up their cottages? I'd like to see those figures when I go through the threads when all is over.

Interesting point this. Most people don't seem to post their number of cottages and in how many cities but it's an important metric for understanding baseline tech rates. It would be much more interesting IMO if people would explain why, where, and when they chose too invest in cottages, especially because of land layouts and borders.

This is a good discussion, particularly nowadays. I was going to say "in RBmod" but looking at some of the recent high-skill BtS games too...the old "cottage everything" metagame is long gone, and I don't think that's just due the Financial bans. But you still need to have cottages (I...think?), so the balance is very interesting to see.

[Whosit]

I wish I had the skill level to participate usefully in that conversation. I do recall my plan some few dozen turns ago was to try and stop building new cottages at T150, and then rely on workshops and wealth/research builds to fuel my economy going forward. Unfortunately, I suck at balancing wealth/research among everything else, and I'm stuck in a hot war where I need units from everywhere. I do think you need some cottage because they are available before workshops, wealth, and research.

Also, Elum has taken 2 more of Grimaces cities. I need to get off my butt and try to take some cities or Elum really will take everything from me. I'll be logging in soon to see which cities he took. I think I mentioned this before, but I am worried that Grimace is going to focus defense entirely on me and allow Elum free reign to capture cities.

[Whosit]

I just made one of the hardest decisions of the game so far. Adrien (Rome) offered me his extra Gems for my extra Furs. I debated it while I played out the turn. I could use the extra happy, definitely, but trading with Rome would be a betrayal of the Zulu (since I'm providing them aid). On the other hand, Zulu don't seem to be doing too well, and lacking the ability to communicate, I don't want to tie my fortunes to a sinking ship. In the end, I re-offered the trade, but asked for their Gems and Wines, and offered the Furs and 5 gpt. I really have no idea what the going rate for luxuries are, but they can always negotiate. I'm just hoping they are desperate for that extra happy.

I was hoping to have another source of whales soon, but of course Elum took Grimace's whale city. More on this in a bit. I'll get the pictures together and then put up a better report.

[Whosit]

So, Grimace offered me peace, but demanded 400 Gold from me for it. Fuck that noise. Though it becomes increasingly apparent to me that I'm not likely to make much out of this war, but the least I can do is to attempt to capture the GLH and whatever else I can reach. I'm just going to have to get through Grimace's War Elephant stack. Fortunately, I'll have about a half-dozen Spearmen in Preston soon, the only question becomes whether to attempt an overland push, or a series of landings.



I think Elum gave me maps. So here's the Korean empire in all its... glory. Also, on that island to the northwest, notice that poor sheep pasture which cannot be used by any city. To be fair, the island was juuust too small to fit two cities on, and the placement of Yamato prevents a coastal city being placed to use the pasture. Meh. I'm not sure why Grimace bothered hooking it up. I've loaded up a few Keshiks and will make an attempt on that island, but I'm sure Elum can beat me there if he wants, and he doesn't seem like the type to respect "spheres of influence." If I do get the island, maybe I'll settle a city ON that southern sheep. 3F city center, could work those Pigs, and at least it's extra coastal IC trade routes!

I figure that best-case scenario, I can conquer to Bismarck. Lexington I might have to burn? Chances are that if I tried to capture it, it would just get swallowed up by Persian culture.

Damn, I really should have moved out sooner. I don't want to lose that island to Elum. Anyway, there are a few cottages here for me to take, but it's not nearly as impressive as I had hoped. Grimace got a decent amount of space, but not a lot of food bonuses. Kinda sad to see all that green that won't be cottages.



He's added a Hwacha to his elephant stack, but otherwise not much. Capturing this city is going to be extremely difficult, and I think I'll need catapults to do it (fortunately, several are queued up even now). Question for lurkers, and hopefully this isn't spoiler info: Is it ever a good idea to spend time bombarding a city's defenses? I am guessing that in MP it's just better to send in the siege units to die because dealing that collateral damage pays off more. Grimace could reinforce the city with all those Elephants, though the good news, I suppose, is that they wouldn't get the defensive bonus, anyway. I probably would need.... 8+ catapults? I don't know.

I might have to go in by the slow, slow land route (5 turns). The number of Galleys I'd need to land all the attack force plus siege would be way more than I have time to make. Hopefully, though, Grimace doesn't have much behind his front lines. I might time the overland march with that landing to raze his Ivory city, though.

So I can probably have those 8+ cats built in.... 6 turns, but then it's going to be another dozen turns to get them all to Preston. So that sucks. I doubt I have that much time.



Elum and CH haven't met yet, and I don't know if that's good or bad.



Got a look at the Rome/Zulu war front. I think the Zulu have the stronger stack, but it's slow and I just don't know if he can bust through the Roman defenses. I'm not sure what he's seeking to gain right now, either.

Also, Macemen have started to show up in CH's eastern garrisons, so yeah, lost my window to attack until Knights. Sigh... I'm Still Machinery, Feudalism, and Guilds away from Knights. CH will probably start importing Knights to me in 5 turns.