Chevalier Absolutely Knows What He's Doing as Best Korea

[aetryn]

Not that it's going to be a concern any time soon in this game, but since there's a discussion on the mechanics of Alliances elsewhere currently, I just wanted to mention that the mechanics are very different in R&F, and while that probably won't make any impact until the diplomatic situation shakes itself out a bit more, it's worth keeping in mind.

In R&F, all Alliances do include Defensive Pacts - if you get attacked, your alliance partner should be joining the war (except in Emergencies, which ignore Defensive Pacts). There are 5 different types of alliances, you can only have one Alliance of each type, and only one type with a given player.  Alliances start at level 1, and tick upward slowly to level 2 and 3 (faster if you have trade routes going to your ally).

• Military Alliances give immediate +5 Combat Strength toward units of civs you and your ally are both at war with. Level 2 is shared visibility and a production bonus toward units when either civ in the alliance is at war, and level 3 is a free promotion for all new units. This means that, even more than before, you do NOT want to be on the wrong end of a 2 on 1 against people with a Military Alliance, as they will effectively negate DotF. Obviously it's too early to plan, but you probably do want one of these with someone if at all possible.
  
• Research Alliances start out a bit weak - just a bonus 2 science for all trade routes to your ally and a bonus 1 science for all trade routes they send to you, but it comes at a time when you might be starting to send more international routes. Level 2 is a free Eureka to both of you for one tech neither of you have researched every 20-30 turns, which could be amazing or it could be something you were going to boost anyway. Level 3 is free beakers whenever you research the same tech as your ally, or whenever one of you researches a tech the other has finished. If you do end up as research leader, there's a good chance of someone wanting one of these with you. While it doesn't have the combat bonuses of Military Alliances, the free Defensive Pact is still good for you.
  
• Economic Alliances give extra gold to trade routes between allies at level 1, and the later level bonuses don't sound that appealing in a multiplayer game (Envoys and shared Suzerin bonuses when City-States mostly get eaten). Probably not something to pursue unless both parties really need the extra gold.
  
• Culture Alliances make you immune to loyalty pressure from that civ, and again the extra output from inter-ally trade routes, and level 2 gives extra Great Person Points based on trade routes, which could be useful on occasion. Level 3 is extra culture (and Tourism, but that's almost certainly irrelevant) based on how much your ally generates. This feels like a weaker alliance type also, but could be useful if you fall really far behind in Civics and/or need to press right up against someone's territory and have loyalty issues.
  
• Religious Alliances are basically useless unless going for Religious Victory, although there is a little bit of faith generation there. I wouldn't take this in a multiplayer scenario unless the other party clearly couldn't be going for a religion victory (and then I might not take it since they are making a silly play and probably won't be the best ally).
  

Speaking of Emergencies, you might want to avoid triggering them when the world gets tenser. They remind the other players that you are doing well, and they give a free opportunity for anyone that isn't a declared friend or ally already to gang up and stomp you. There are probably three you want to keep in mind:

• Military Emergencies are triggered when a victory type leader conquers a city from another civ (not city-state). The participants will get a movement bonus when in the target's territory and the target has reduced Combat Strength... so it's almost the equivalent of a stacking Great General for every enemy Unit. Since you are likely to be the Science victory leader past a certain point of the game, you should beware of this. Maybe don't go conquer anything until you have at least one Alliance and/or DoFs that won't expire before you conquer the city (like EU4 coalitions, if they miss the start of the war, they can't jump in later, and Declared Friends will NOT be offered a chance to participate in the Emergency) - and keep in mind that your Alliances won't help you defend against these as they don't trigger Defensive Pacts.
  
• City State Emergencies are triggered when city states are conquered. This one is tamer with no bonus to the participants or penalties toward the target. Still, no sense giving people a free chance to gang up on you. Past the opening of the game (when everyone is too busy and too far away), I'd seriously consider a "raze-only" policy toward city states, which would presumably make it impossible for this to trigger (since the win condition is taking/holding the city state).
  
• Betrayal Emergencies are the worst. They are triggered when you declare war on someone you have had a high level alliance with. This is like a Military Emergency, except the anti-Betrayer participants also get bonus production and your Declared Friends (and maybe even allies?) will also get the chance to jump in against you. Basically, try not to ever do this until nobody is left but your ally(s). You shouldn't have any reason to do this anyway as if the game ends with no war you are likely to be first to the spaceship, so someone else will break the alliance and attack you instead (or just concede if it's clear that's not going to work).
  

There are Religious and Nuclear Emergencies, but only people trying to get Religious Victories will see the former, and probably nobody will ever see the latter, since it's SO late in the game and the outcome is unlikely to be in doubt.

I think I like the dynamics of the new diplomacy, and I definitely approve of Alliances that aren't just a DoF+. I just worry that Magnus chopping is SO good/distorts the game so much in R&F that it's going to be unpopular for MP games until that is fixed. One thing you might want to do is prioritize Civil Service a bit more. You don't want Military Alliances to form up in such a way that you can't get one.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Not that it's going to be a concern any time soon in this game, but since there's a discussion on the mechanics of Alliances elsewhere currently, I just wanted to mention that the mechanics are very different in R&F, and while that probably won't make any impact until the diplomatic situation shakes itself out a bit more, it's worth keeping in mind.

In R&F, all Alliances do include Defensive Pacts - if you get attacked, your alliance partner should be joining the war (except in Emergencies, which ignore Defensive Pacts). There are 5 different types of alliances, you can only have one Alliance of each type, and only one type with a given player.  Alliances start at level 1, and tick upward slowly to level 2 and 3 (faster if you have trade routes going to your ally).

• Military Alliances give immediate +5 Combat Strength toward units of civs you and your ally are both at war with. Level 2 is shared visibility and a production bonus toward units when either civ in the alliance is at war, and level 3 is a free promotion for all new units. This means that, even more than before, you do NOT want to be on the wrong end of a 2 on 1 against people with a Military Alliance, as they will effectively negate DotF. Obviously it's too early to plan, but you probably do want one of these with someone if at all possible.
  

This is really useful. I've only briefly glanced at R&F alliances, since they won't come online until Civil Service, pretty late in the game. So, I thought a military alliance was just vision sharing and mutual defense to start with - I didn't realize that it's an automatic GG everywhere! This is pretty good since it combines with a GG to counter Defender of the Faith nicely - I think the game needs something like that (although, check out the pindicator/Alhambram war in PBEM5 for fun times with religious units in a war). I just hope that the Cree/Dutch don't form one against me! 

• Research Alliances start out a bit weak - just a bonus 2 science for all trade routes to your ally and a bonus 1 science for all trade routes they send to you, but it comes at a time when you might be starting to send more international routes. Level 2 is a free Eureka to both of you for one tech neither of you have researched every 20-30 turns, which could be amazing or it could be something you were going to boost anyway. Level 3 is free beakers whenever you research the same tech as your ally, or whenever one of you researches a tech the other has finished. If you do end up as research leader, there's a good chance of someone wanting one of these with you. While it doesn't have the combat bonuses of Military Alliances, the free Defensive Pact is still good for you.
  

Yeah, this one I already glanced at to see if it would let me focus science even harder (I've never been certain whether it's wiser to try to mitigate your weaknesses or accentuate your strengths, but I usually lean towards the latter option most of the time), but it really doesn't do anything for the research leader at all. It's made worse by one of my neighbors being Alhambram, who I don't want to trade with. Japper, on the other hand, I wouldn't mind trading with. I wouldn't be surprised to see Alhambram come sniffing with one of these later - his trade routes would basically always have the Trade Confederation benefit active, which is a not insubstantial boost. 

• Economic Alliances give extra gold to trade routes between allies at level 1, and the later level bonuses don't sound that appealing in a multiplayer game (Envoys and shared Suzerin bonuses when City-States mostly get eaten). Probably not something to pursue unless both parties really need the extra gold.
  
• Culture Alliances make you immune to loyalty pressure from that civ, and again the extra output from inter-ally trade routes, and level 2 gives extra Great Person Points based on trade routes, which could be useful on occasion. Level 3 is extra culture (and Tourism, but that's almost certainly irrelevant) based on how much your ally generates. This feels like a weaker alliance type also, but could be useful if you fall really far behind in Civics and/or need to press right up against someone's territory and have loyalty issues.
  
• Religious Alliances are basically useless unless going for Religious Victory, although there is a little bit of faith generation there. I wouldn't take this in a multiplayer scenario unless the other party clearly couldn't be going for a religion victory (and then I might not take it since they are making a silly play and probably won't be the best ally). 
  

Culture might be good if I'm under loyalty pressure, I agree. I had looked at it because I was worried about my cities' potential loyalty during a Dark Age and without governors. Can you have more than one type of alliance at a time? Or must you choose? A military alliance with Japper and a culture alliance with Alhambram would solve all my diplomatic issues for a long time, if they'd let me get away with that. Then again, they let me get away with Goddess of the Harvest and they might be letting me get away with DotF/Jesuit Education, so who knows? 

Speaking of Emergencies, you might want to avoid triggering them when the world gets tenser. They remind the other players that you are doing well, and they give a free opportunity for anyone that isn't a declared friend or ally already to gang up and stomp you. There are probably three you want to keep in mind:

• Military Emergencies are triggered when a victory type leader conquers a city from another civ (not city-state). The participants will get a movement bonus when in the target's territory and the target has reduced Combat Strength... so it's almost the equivalent of a stacking Great General for every enemy Unit. Since you are likely to be the Science victory leader past a certain point of the game, you should beware of this. Maybe don't go conquer anything until you have at least one Alliance and/or DoFs that won't expire before you conquer the city (like EU4 coalitions, if they miss the start of the war, they can't jump in later, and Declared Friends will NOT be offered a chance to participate in the Emergency) - and keep in mind that your Alliances won't help you defend against these as they don't trigger Defensive Pacts.
  
• City State Emergencies are triggered when city states are conquered. This one is tamer with no bonus to the participants or penalties toward the target. Still, no sense giving people a free chance to gang up on you. Past the opening of the game (when everyone is too busy and too far away), I'd seriously consider a "raze-only" policy toward city states, which would presumably make it impossible for this to trigger (since the win condition is taking/holding the city state).
  
• Betrayal Emergencies are the worst. They are triggered when you declare war on someone you have had a high level alliance with. This is like a Military Emergency, except the anti-Betrayer participants also get bonus production and your Declared Friends (and maybe even allies?) will also get the chance to jump in against you. Basically, try not to ever do this until nobody is left but your ally(s). You shouldn't have any reason to do this anyway as if the game ends with no war you are likely to be first to the spaceship, so someone else will break the alliance and attack you instead (or just concede if it's clear that's not going to work).
  

There are Religious and Nuclear Emergencies, but only people trying to get Religious Victories will see the former, and probably nobody will ever see the latter, since it's SO late in the game and the outcome is unlikely to be in doubt.

This especially is excellent. I've never had an emergency in Single Player fire, I don't know why (I have only played 3 games of R&F, though - Korea, the Netherlands, and the Zulu. I ought to a Mongolian and Cree playthrough soon). Is it a 100% guaranteed chance to fire? Generally Firaxis doesn't go in for randomized events as much as Paradox does, so I would imagine that if you meet the criteria, you trigger an emergency. When do emergencies kick in? Rowain is leading in 2 categories right now, and he's Sumeria. Let's say he takes a city off Archduke. Does that trigger a military emergency...in the Ancient age?

City-states shouldn't be too worrisome. I'm fast getting the military in place to conquer Antioch, which might annoy Archduke, but it shouldn't trigger an emergency, right? That'd be...silly. 

It's also worth keeping in mind that other players might trigger emergencies. It encourages me to at least have a standing army so that I can nimbly take advantage if a good opportunity presents itself...or I could support the emergency trigger-er and cultivate an ally, if that suits me. I'd really like seeing how an Emergency affects worldwide diplomacy. Too bad that probably won't happen, because:

I think I like the dynamics of the new diplomacy, and I definitely approve of Alliances that aren't just a DoF+. I just worry that Magnus chopping is SO good/distorts the game so much in R&F that it's going to be unpopular for MP games until that is fixed. 

Agreed, 100%. I outlined how I plan to abuse Magnus, and I do plan to abuse him, but I don't want people getting the impression that I'm happy about it. Like I said, he's a stupid way to play the game - but he's so gamebreaking that you don't have a choice but to abuse him. Let's say I do my Magnus abuse and Japper does not, for whatever reason. By turn 80 I will be sitting on 8 cities with cheap seowons going down everywhere and a powerful military backed by DotF making sure I KEEP those cities (need to squeeze in a Holy Site asap after the settlers to get missionaries spreading; that priority surpasses even seowon spam), and Japper, if he chooses to build things the "normal" way, will be at 4-5 cities, even with the Ancestral Hall bonus. There's just no way to compete. 

There could be interesting things like WHAT you chop with Magnus - Wonders and settlers, like I'm doing? Districts, like Alhambram is? Military units, like the warmonger civs? The clashing strategies there could be neat. But that's also sort of a fundamentally different game than Civ 6. I'd really like to explore the governor system, specializing cities, alliances, and emergencies - it could liven up the middle and end game quite a bit! But Magnus breaks everything. 

I honestly hate using him this way - but if I don't, someone else certainly will, so I have no choice. :/

[aetryn]

Not that it's going to be a concern any time soon in this game, but since there's a discussion on the mechanics of Alliances elsewhere currently, I just wanted to mention that the mechanics are very different in R&F, and while that probably won't make any impact until the diplomatic situation shakes itself out a bit more, it's worth keeping in mind.

In R&F, all Alliances do include Defensive Pacts - if you get attacked, your alliance partner should be joining the war (except in Emergencies, which ignore Defensive Pacts). There are 5 different types of alliances, you can only have one Alliance of each type, and only one type with a given player.  Alliances start at level 1, and tick upward slowly to level 2 and 3 (faster if you have trade routes going to your ally).

• Military Alliances give immediate +5 Combat Strength toward units of civs you and your ally are both at war with. Level 2 is shared visibility and a production bonus toward units when either civ in the alliance is at war, and level 3 is a free promotion for all new units. This means that, even more than before, you do NOT want to be on the wrong end of a 2 on 1 against people with a Military Alliance, as they will effectively negate DotF. Obviously it's too early to plan, but you probably do want one of these with someone if at all possible.
  

This is really useful. I've only briefly glanced at R&F alliances, since they won't come online until Civil Service, pretty late in the game. So, I thought a military alliance was just vision sharing and mutual defense to start with - I didn't realize that it's an automatic GG everywhere! This is pretty good since it combines with a GG to counter Defender of the Faith nicely - I think the game needs something like that (although, check out the pindicator/Alhambram war in PBEM5 for fun times with religious units in a war). I just hope that the Cree/Dutch don't form one against me! 

It's actually not shared vision until level 2, but yeah. Imagine you and a Military Ally reacting to a Military emergency against the same target. You're +5 combat strength and +1 move in their territory, he's -5 combat strength against you. Thankfully AI Diplomacy makes this hard to abuse (pay off a third player to act as bait, then you and your buddy stomp him when he takes the bait.

• Research Alliances start out a bit weak - just a bonus 2 science for all trade routes to your ally and a bonus 1 science for all trade routes they send to you, but it comes at a time when you might be starting to send more international routes. Level 2 is a free Eureka to both of you for one tech neither of you have researched every 20-30 turns, which could be amazing or it could be something you were going to boost anyway. Level 3 is free beakers whenever you research the same tech as your ally, or whenever one of you researches a tech the other has finished. If you do end up as research leader, there's a good chance of someone wanting one of these with you. While it doesn't have the combat bonuses of Military Alliances, the free Defensive Pact is still good for you.
  

Yeah, this one I already glanced at to see if it would let me focus science even harder (I've never been certain whether it's wiser to try to mitigate your weaknesses or accentuate your strengths, but I usually lean towards the latter option most of the time), but it really doesn't do anything for the research leader at all. It's made worse by one of my neighbors being Alhambram, who I don't want to trade with. Japper, on the other hand, I wouldn't mind trading with. I wouldn't be surprised to see Alhambram come sniffing with one of these later - his trade routes would basically always have the Trade Confederation benefit active, which is a not insubstantial boost. 

The way it's worded, it might help the research leader anytime the partner is researching a tech you have already researched. I will try to spin up a test game to check this out before we reach that point.

• Economic Alliances give extra gold to trade routes between allies at level 1, and the later level bonuses don't sound that appealing in a multiplayer game (Envoys and shared Suzerin bonuses when City-States mostly get eaten). Probably not something to pursue unless both parties really need the extra gold.
  
• Culture Alliances make you immune to loyalty pressure from that civ, and again the extra output from inter-ally trade routes, and level 2 gives extra Great Person Points based on trade routes, which could be useful on occasion. Level 3 is extra culture (and Tourism, but that's almost certainly irrelevant) based on how much your ally generates. This feels like a weaker alliance type also, but could be useful if you fall really far behind in Civics and/or need to press right up against someone's territory and have loyalty issues.
  
• Religious Alliances are basically useless unless going for Religious Victory, although there is a little bit of faith generation there. I wouldn't take this in a multiplayer scenario unless the other party clearly couldn't be going for a religion victory (and then I might not take it since they are making a silly play and probably won't be the best ally). 
  

Culture might be good if I'm under loyalty pressure, I agree. I had looked at it because I was worried about my cities' potential loyalty during a Dark Age and without governors. Can you have more than one type of alliance at a time? Or must you choose? A military alliance with Japper and a culture alliance with Alhambram would solve all my diplomatic issues for a long time, if they'd let me get away with that. Then again, they let me get away with Goddess of the Harvest and they might be letting me get away with DotF/Jesuit Education, so who knows? 

One of each type, but not with the same player. So a Military Alliance with Japper and a Culture Alliance with Alhambram would be perfectly legal. You can't have a Military Alliance with both, or both a Military and Culture Alliance with Japper.

Speaking of Emergencies, you might want to avoid triggering them when the world gets tenser. They remind the other players that you are doing well, and they give a free opportunity for anyone that isn't a declared friend or ally already to gang up and stomp you. There are probably three you want to keep in mind:

• Military Emergencies are triggered when a victory type leader conquers a city from another civ (not city-state). The participants will get a movement bonus when in the target's territory and the target has reduced Combat Strength... so it's almost the equivalent of a stacking Great General for every enemy Unit. Since you are likely to be the Science victory leader past a certain point of the game, you should beware of this. Maybe don't go conquer anything until you have at least one Alliance and/or DoFs that won't expire before you conquer the city (like EU4 coalitions, if they miss the start of the war, they can't jump in later, and Declared Friends will NOT be offered a chance to participate in the Emergency) - and keep in mind that your Alliances won't help you defend against these as they don't trigger Defensive Pacts.
  
• City State Emergencies are triggered when city states are conquered. This one is tamer with no bonus to the participants or penalties toward the target. Still, no sense giving people a free chance to gang up on you. Past the opening of the game (when everyone is too busy and too far away), I'd seriously consider a "raze-only" policy toward city states, which would presumably make it impossible for this to trigger (since the win condition is taking/holding the city state).
  
• Betrayal Emergencies are the worst. They are triggered when you declare war on someone you have had a high level alliance with. This is like a Military Emergency, except the anti-Betrayer participants also get bonus production and your Declared Friends (and maybe even allies?) will also get the chance to jump in against you. Basically, try not to ever do this until nobody is left but your ally(s). You shouldn't have any reason to do this anyway as if the game ends with no war you are likely to be first to the spaceship, so someone else will break the alliance and attack you instead (or just concede if it's clear that's not going to work).
  

There are Religious and Nuclear Emergencies, but only people trying to get Religious Victories will see the former, and probably nobody will ever see the latter, since it's SO late in the game and the outcome is unlikely to be in doubt.

This especially is excellent. I've never had an emergency in Single Player fire, I don't know why (I have only played 3 games of R&F, though - Korea, the Netherlands, and the Zulu. I ought to a Mongolian and Cree playthrough soon). Is it a 100% guaranteed chance to fire? Generally Firaxis doesn't go in for randomized events as much as Paradox does, so I would imagine that if you meet the criteria, you trigger an emergency. When do emergencies kick in? Rowain is leading in 2 categories right now, and he's Sumeria. Let's say he takes a city off Archduke. Does that trigger a military emergency...in the Ancient age?

City-states shouldn't be too worrisome. I'm fast getting the military in place to conquer Antioch, which might annoy Archduke, but it shouldn't trigger an emergency, right? That'd be...silly. 

It's also worth keeping in mind that other players might trigger emergencies. It encourages me to at least have a standing army so that I can nimbly take advantage if a good opportunity presents itself...or I could support the emergency trigger-er and cultivate an ally, if that suits me. I'd really like seeing how an Emergency affects worldwide diplomacy. Too bad that probably won't happen, because:

Emergencies either aren't immediately available or don't always trigger, because I've definitely seen AI eat City States and not trigger emergencies. Some research suggests that only people with envoys in the City State get the trigger. There might be some limitation for Military Emergencies too - presumably you must have met the offending civ (I just envision your leader shouting randomly into the sky: "Hey! You guy I've never heard of on the other side of the world! You're an evil so-and-so and I'm going to come over there and stop you!"). You might have to have a DoF with the victim or some other restriction. Again, I'll try to do some testing in a local hotseat game and let you know what I find.

I think I like the dynamics of the new diplomacy, and I definitely approve of Alliances that aren't just a DoF+. I just worry that Magnus chopping is SO good/distorts the game so much in R&F that it's going to be unpopular for MP games until that is fixed. 

Agreed, 100%. I outlined how I plan to abuse Magnus, and I do plan to abuse him, but I don't want people getting the impression that I'm happy about it. Like I said, he's a stupid way to play the game - but he's so gamebreaking that you don't have a choice but to abuse him. Let's say I do my Magnus abuse and Japper does not, for whatever reason. By turn 80 I will be sitting on 8 cities with cheap seowons going down everywhere and a powerful military backed by DotF making sure I KEEP those cities (need to squeeze in a Holy Site asap after the settlers to get missionaries spreading; that priority surpasses even seowon spam), and Japper, if he chooses to build things the "normal" way, will be at 4-5 cities, even with the Ancestral Hall bonus. There's just no way to compete. 

There could be interesting things like WHAT you chop with Magnus - Wonders and settlers, like I'm doing? Districts, like Alhambram is? Military units, like the warmonger civs? The clashing strategies there could be neat. But that's also sort of a fundamentally different game than Civ 6. I'd really like to explore the governor system, specializing cities, alliances, and emergencies - it could liven up the middle and end game quite a bit! But Magnus breaks everything. 

I honestly hate using him this way - but if I don't, someone else certainly will, so I have no choice. :/

Agreed. It gets a bit diluted when you have a larger number of cities, because it's harder to line up everything he needs to do in a city all to happen in one "governership" pass, and you end up with a number of turns when he's moving. Also, the turns to establish seems to be the same regardless of game speed, which seems insane. If he took 10 turns to establish (say 5 is balanced for Online speed, which seems to be what they design MP for, as much as you can say they spend any time thinking about MP), he'd be a lot more limited. Plus, when you reach the era of spies, he's going to get repeatedly "assassinated" (the AI seems to especially love doing this) so he's out of play some of the time. But it makes the early game really distorted and even further moves Civ away from a tile yield based game. This is almost the opposite of good game design - something that's overpowered at the beginning but gets weaker later in a snowball game. I'd almost rather have a couple good tiles to grow on and the rest forest or stone with Magnus then a city with fantastic yields on 10 tiles. And, of course, this even further affects the map balance since a start without anything to chop is going to be a lot weaker than expected.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Assassinating Magnus sounds like a good tactic to use on my rivals, and I also should probably assign him a spy bodyguard when we get there - it'd suck to have a plan thrown off because the Magnuschops weren't coming than to lose, say, Pingala for 10 turns.

The trouble is identifying which city Magnus is in so you know where to send the spy. Can you identify governors with sufficient diplomatic visibility? Or is the only option bouncing the spy from city to city until you find him, then settling in and making with the stabby? Seems inefficient. I need to research that more, but it's a good plan to have in my back pocket.

[aetryn]

Assassinating Magnus sounds like a good tactic to use on my rivals, and I also should probably assign him a spy bodyguard when we get there - it'd suck to have a plan thrown off because the Magnuschops weren't coming than to lose, say, Pingala for 10 turns.

The trouble is identifying which city Magnus is in so you know where to send the spy. Can you identify governors with sufficient diplomatic visibility? Or is the only option bouncing the spy from city to city until you find him, then settling in and making with the stabby? Seems inefficient. I need to research that more, but it's a good plan to have in my back pocket.

You can always see that a unknown governor is in the city as long as you have visibility on the city center. At Diplomatic Visibility 2 you can identify which governor, but not whether they are established or not, and at 3 you can tell established/how many turns to go if not established. 2 should be enough most of the time for targeting Magnus. Since there's almost no reason to accept an embassy in a pure MP game, reaching Diplomatic Visibility 2 requires some combination of: Researching Printing Press, Have a Trade Route to them, Establishing a Listening Post/or alternatively an Alliance. It's probably reasonable as soon as spies become available, as long as you're willing to commit a trade route to them (of course, after you assassinate Magnus, they may pillage your trade route or otherwise make sure it ends). You're probably going to want to push up Diplomatic Visibility anyway to prevent anyone from getting a combat bonus over you.

[Jabah]

I guess if you have some visibility on a city with still some forests or harvest able ressources and some workers around at that stage of the game you could guess that magnus is a good probabilit?

[aetryn]

I guess if you have some visibility on a city with still some forests or harvest able  ressources and some workers around at that stage of the game you could guess that magnus is a good probabilit?

I think it's probably pretty trackable turn to turn once you once identify where he is, unless the opponent is really careful to move multiple governors on the same turn. It's highly unlikely anyone will be paying attention to Espionage enough in this game for that to happen since it costs you 5 turns on whatever governor you are moving and the destination may be completely unsuitable. Maybe this is the primary use for the Cardinal governor?

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

I guess if you have some visibility on a city with still some forests or harvest able  ressources and some workers around at that stage of the game you could guess that magnus is a good probabilit?

I think it's probably pretty trackable turn to turn once you once identify where he is, unless the opponent is really careful to move multiple governors on the same turn. It's highly unlikely anyone will be paying attention to Espionage enough in this game for that to happen since it costs you 5 turns on whatever governor you are moving and the destination may be completely unsuitable. Maybe this is the primary use for the Cardinal governor?

Heh, I was just planning on sticking him in my highest faith city that didn't already belong to Pingala or Liang, but I could use him for skullduggery too, I guess! 

Honestly, I really need to think about spy use in the Renaissance. Between being Korea and the Audience Chamber my civ will be highly dependent on governors, and a well-timed spy strike could be crippling. Counter-intelligence will be a big deal, if my opponents catch on to that strategy (I remember Dave, in particular, was determined to use a spy in multiplayer to steal a great work in PBEM2, but never had the chance. Good thing he's not in this game!). Long ways off, at least.

Turn 51

This is my last quiet set up turn before we begin the Choppening: Korea edition. I think other players are already in full-stride, judging by their explosive growth on the score tracker. I'm well in last place, but I'm about to net a LOT of points myself in the coming turns. I think the fundamentals of the Korean economy are sound, in other words. 

Let's look at the quiet set-up:




A culture sink while I wait for a Seowon to finish State Workforce. There's no rush on the civic - the two things I want from it are a governor title to promote Magnus, and the government plaza, but I'm not ready to chop settlers until Stonehenge is done and I'm not going to place the plaza for a few more turns yet. Not sure if the plaza should come before or after the Holy Site, or if I should build a Holy Site at the capital at all. I could go with the higher adjacency at OCISLY, but that pushes missionaries a ways down the road. The main concern with delay in spreading the religion around is if Japper, or more likely Alhambram tries to take advantage of my explosion of cities before I can get defenders in place. I'd really like a renewal of our DOFs to continue to build in peace without that worry, but that's not going to happen before the settlers go out. The turn 65 zone will be a real crisis point for me to navigate as a flurry of cities settle and I'm in the midst of infrastructure builds - need to keep a close watch on Domination scores and ensure I make it through that window of vulnerability. 

Mysticism grants me an envoy, and I start working on Military Tradition to enable support bonuses. The envoy I drop into my natural target, Valetta:




The +2 cogs are nice, but my real goal, of course, is suzerainity. I'll get a second envoy when I finish the Seowon and trigger the inspiration for state workforce, Valetta's quest - which, incidentally, makes it impossible to do the 2 for 1 deal on envoys with the city. My third and hopefully final envoy in the immediate future will have to be scrounged up through natural generation or the civics tree somehow. 

Just Read the Instructions twiddles its thumbs one more turn while I finish Stonehenge. A chop wouldn't speed things up, since I need to spend a turn to lock in the production from the slinger (and I'm not going to squander the chop unboosted), so nothing to do there. I do have a tentative idea: I want one high culture/science city for Korea + Pingala, and one theater square for district discounts (and it can take advantage of Jesuit education), so why not JRTI? The TS can be boosted by the Wonder, the city center, and the Government Plaza for a great adjacency. The plaza also boosts the Holy Site. 




It does mean we lose the stone hill to the Plaza and the rice farm to the theater square, but the food is made up by my boosted farms on the other side of the city, and I have plenty of other hills. Can the plaza even be built on hills? Not sure. Probably not. It also means delaying a Holy Site or Commercial Hub until size 13? A long way to grow! Maybe not worth it. 

At OCISLY, I start to improve my chocolates:



My initial goal was 2 plantations and the rice farm, but now I'm wondering i f I need the second plantation. It boosts gold a bit, increases housing, and lets me trade a chocolate for one of my neighbor's excess resources (if they have one), but ought I save the builer's charges for chops? I don't think so - I will need to build a new builder (ugh) anyway, and I'd like the housing at this city, which is already taking a 50% penalty because I couldn't squeeze in a granary. I'm building a slinger and warrior to 1 turn in the meantime, to be finished either in an emergency or to boost a district chop. 

Score and overview shot:





Sumeria is a very front-loaded civilization, so I'm not too worried. I expect to catch up once Korea's abilities come more online.

Medium-term plans apart from settling: Train up to Archery, and save my gold to upgrade all my slingers. Take the combined archer/warrior force to Antioch and 'persuade' them of the merits of joining the Korean civilization, and use the army to intimidate Alhambram into a renewed DoF. With DOTF and my army on his border (and his DOF with Sumeria up soon) he'll probably take the renewed peace. Japper I have a higher military score than, so I'm less worried about him. Hopefully he'll take the DoF renewal without any big stick brandishing on my part.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Big turn today, score report first (which spoils a lot of the turn, but what the hell):

Player Score	Score	Civic	Empire	Great People	Religion	Tech	Wonders	Era
The Archduke	69 (8)	18 (3)	22 (2)	0	0	12(2)	0	17 (1)
Rowain	89 (15)	21 (0)	28 (7)	0	0	16 (2)	0	24 (6)
Japper	70 (9)	15 (3)	26 (4)	0	0	14(2)	0	15 (0)
Alhambram	73 (20)	15 (3)	30(11)	0	0	14 (4)	0	14 (2)
Chevalier	55(3)	15 (3)	23 (1)	5	10	12 (0)	15 (15)	14(8)
Emperor K	58(11)	15 (3)	22(0)	0	0	12 (0)	0	9 (5)

                                                                                                                   

Demographics	Tech|Science	Culture	Domination	Religious	GPT
The Archduke	6|<7.5	??	>108	0	??
Rowain	8 l ??>12.1	??	>108	0	??
Japper	7|12.1	6	86	2	96|6
Alhambram	7|10.3	6.6	108	2	55|17
Chevalier	6|8.4	8.7	86	2	187|16.7
Emperor K	6| 7.5	5.7	102	0	13 l 11

    
 
    
    
    
 

Great People	Gen	Adm	Eng	Mer	Pro	Sci	Wri	Art	Mus
The Archduke	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0	0|0	0|0
Rowain	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	12|1.0	0|0	0|0	0|0
Japper	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	17|2.0	0|0	0|0	0|0
Alhambram	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	8|2.0	0|0	0|0	0|0
Chevalier	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	-|-	0|0.0	0|0	0|0	0|0
Emperor K	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	0|0.0	3|1.0	0|0	0|0	0|0

Total population is really tough to break down from empire score. If anyone can make better sense of this than me, they're welcome to: 
Chev - 9 in 2 cities = 23 empire score. Figure 9 points for pop, leaves 14. Subtract 11 for 2 cities and a palace, leaves 3. Where is that last 3 coming from? Can't be my seowon, it's incomplete and gets 6. 3 points per governor? Per governor title? Needs further testing. 
Alhambram - 3 cities, 1 districts = 19 points, plus palace. Has 10 points left - 7 pop and Magnus? Has a library.
Emperor - 2 cities, 1 district = 14 points (counting capital extra point). Has 8 points left - can't be 5 pop, his second city has 4. 8 pop? Then where are my three extra empire points coming from???
Archduke - 2 cities, no districts. Same Empire Score as me and Emperor, though, so figure 9 pop in 2 cities + Magnus. 
Rowain - 28 points. Figure 3 cities and a campus = 19. Remaining 9 is combination of pop and governor??
Japper - 2 cities, 1 district = 14 points. Has 12 left. Figure on the government plaza for 3, leaving 11. 8 pop and a governor? 11 pop? Who knows? He has a library in his campus. Or two campuses done. 

Research rates are looking good. Culture is highest of my neighbors, and Stonehenge's tourism has put me in 1st on the culture tracker so I can't guess at Rowain/Archduke's culture anymore. Science is middle of the pack, but the highest neighbor - Japper - has 2 campuses/1 campus 1 library and will be passed by my science next turn.

Domination + gold is okay. I am the only player with a significant treasury, and my score has reached acceptable levels - it doesn't count the just-finished slinger, or the two units nearing completion in OCISLY. I think I am safe, since no one can afford archer upgrades at the moment and swords/horses are a long way away still. Rowain and Alhambram (I think) are the first to 3 cities. Archduke and Emperor have other priorities, I was chopping Stonehenge and waiting for State Workforce before beginning expansion next turn, and I have no idea what Japper is up to. 

Turn report as soon as I upload and organize my screenshots.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 52

The turn opens with the expected (but welcome) news that we completed Stonehenge on time (more or less):




Excellent news all around. This guarantees the Seowon/GotH/Jesuit Education combo (I can buy a library in the seowon next turn. I see no reason not to, since I'll chop out plenty more faith for an apostle before I get temples researched). Valetta is a bonus, too! 





John the Baptist emerges in Just Read the Instructions (historical footage of the event), and leads his followers on a pilgrimage out of the city to the nearby Stonehenge. There, he preaches and teaches the way of The Culture:




Naming the religion after Iain Banks' novels seemed thematically appropriate. It might confuse the other players, too, unless they've worked out my naming scheme. It isn't like it's hard, given that Google exists. Anyway, if I can spread this widely, I'll be in very good shape to turtle and tech. If I can evangelize somehow before anyone else founds a religion (unlikely, I know), I'd like to grab Church Property and Wats for gold, science, culture, and military power in equal measure. 

The seowon is duly queued up, and it will have tons of overflow - the Holy Site would be a 1-turn build, so the seowon is going to drop nearly 70 cogs into the next builder I need (for settler chops). It'll also trigger State Workforce, so I swap back to that so I finish next turn and can promote Magnus. 

That was the good news of the turn. Our own building program at both cities is full steam ahead. The bad news comes from abroad. First, the minor bit of bad news, Alhambram.

As I feared, he has settled in the river valley, precluding a Startling Lack of Gravitas:




Alhambram!

Actually, though, I don't mind too much. I have plenty of other city sites, and that city is going to be in an arc from Another Fine Product to Of Course I Still Love You to But Who's Counting. Down the road, I'm going to play with Amani and an entertainment district to try and flip that city - see if it's possible to flip a player's city like that. It's hard, since the Netherlands have loyalty-boosting trade routes, but at least I can annoy my neighbor. :

The worse news is from further abroad. Emperor is under attack from the Archduke! 




I suppose it's possible that Emperor started this war, but c'mon. First of all, it's the Archduke. Second of all, he's Genghis Khan. Third of all, his military score is higher than Emperor's. I'm not sure how high exactly, since I haven't yet met him, but I would bet that Archduke wouldn't invade without a significant advantage. 

How to interpret this situation? Let's go step by step and break it down as much as we can. First, the Mongol motivation:

I can't say without seeing the map over there, but there are three possibilities, as I see it. 

1)This is a minor border skirmish. Archduke wanted to pillage a trader, or builder, or clear away an annoying scout. Hopefully this is the case. 
2)This is a more serious incursion, with Archduke aiming to take or raze an annoying border city. Emperor only has 1 extra city, but if it's as close to me as Japper's second city is, or Alhambram's third, a military response is totally feasible. 
3)This is an attempt at out-and-out conquest of Emperor. It's a very ambitious move - an all-out assault this early into the game. It would mean Archduke would have gambled his entire civ's fortunes on this attack - he'd have no districts, late or non-existent third and fourth cities, low research rates...uh. Hm. Now I'm a bit worried. 

Okay, let's assume worst-case scenario: Archduke wants to add Emperor K to Mongolia. It fits with his personality, it fits his civ, and it's a sneaky way to dramatically improve. How would he do it? He can't possibly have iron working yet, so swords are out. He could make do with Archers, but that'd take a lot of gold to upgrade. Could he have that gold? Not sure - maybe. But thematically, it'd make the most sense for him to attack with horsemen or chariots. Chariots are pretty easy to research and pretty cheap to build, and they benefit from Mongolia's boosted cavalry, don't they? Plus, spearmen need Bronze Working to unlock, and Emperor only has the same techs I do, more or less - so he's stuck with warriors and slingers. 

Emperor has no gold in pocket, very little income, and very limited tech. Uh, the situation doesn't look great. What he CAN do is chop-chop-chop with Magnus as many units as he can. Enough warriors/slingers (or walls) would put a stop to Archduke's attack, at the cost of probably gutting his civ. Walls are a long way off, though, unless he went straight for Masonry. Possible. IF he did, and he can chop the walls, that's our best case scenario. Emperor loses out on Magnus chops for economically useful things, but stops the Archduke, who gains nothing from his investment. The two civs are weakened, hopefully fatally, and we profit. 

Worst-case, Emperor is dead by turn 70 and Archduke has enough land for TWO civs. This isn't catastrophic, though. Archduke and Emperor's lands are both relatively undeveloped so far, I think (1 campus and nothing else), so while two cities is a boost, Archduke isn't ready to run away yet. He's still got to contend with Rowain and Japper, who will be very alarmed by this development, and he still has to fill up that land and defend himself. Meanwhile, this would be a distraction for me to tech away in peace. I can build up, try and get an era or so ahead of one of my neighbors, and then launch my own strike at the right moment. 

So, two bits of bad news, but not terrible, I think. The good of Stonehenge outweighed hte bad on the whole. Here's the score and an overview:






One footnote: Why is there loyalty pressure on this random tile? Is that Japper's city? Did he found another city? Is it his capital? Not sure what's happening here.