[SPOILERS] Dark Savant leads the noble Inca as half-noble Churchiill

[Dark Savant]

Turn 80 (875 BC) - Part 2

Charriu's 3rd city must be somewhere in this area.



He's developed both the coastal crab and the freshwater clam.

Here's my attack stack, such as it is (there's another axe two tiles to its south).

[Dark Savant]

Turn 80 (875 BC) - Part 3

Core overview:

• King's Landing completes a settler, which moves into Oldtown.  I was going to have it overflow into a 2-turn archer, but now I'll instead produce a 2-turn chariot.
  
• Highgarden is about to grow to size 2, and swaps to a chariot.
  
• The chariot and spear produced by Castle Black move towards Charriu, though they'll take a while to get there.  No sign of whatever recently whipped in his border city.
  
• Both work boats at Winterfell improve seafood.  I'll put a turn into walls there just in case.
  
• The two workers at Highgarden are now going to complete a road towards Taixue next turn, so they don't really have anything to do this turn other than build a random road on the cow tile.
  
• The sheep is finally online at White Harbor; I can whip the terrace there in 2 turns.  wetbandit hasn't whipped a barracks in his own border city.
  
• Sunspear now has an improved crab.  Silver is due to be connected in 2 turns.  Still no sign of our ocean neighbor.
  

[Dark Savant]

Turn 80 (875 BC) - Part 4

Our scouting work boat starts taking a look at WilliamLP's southern shore.  That should also give us a trade route to him.



The archer I land on the southern island finds -- some land to its west?



I'm guessing that's a spur of the hypothesized isthmus connecting to our ocean neighbor to 's southeast.  Though it may be an island too.

I'm not sure if the best plant tile is the one it's on (it can eventually work that banana), or the forested plains hill two tiles to its south (which may not even be better for defense, since it'll be harder to defend logistically).  I'll need to have the archer scout more.

[Dark Savant]

Turn 80 (875 BC) - Part 5

Even though we improved and started to work multiple food resources this turn, we're still only #2 in food.



That's by a large margin too.    I'm not sure how that's anything other than JR4.

I'll also need to look into just who is trading with JR4, which I didn't think to check.

JR4's Great Lighthouse of Dadaejin shows up in top 5 cities.



It's his second city, and probably has better tiles than Oldtown, our second city.

Oh, and I was mistaken about wetbandit increasing in power.



Those shades of brown aren't even that similar.    Not even as bad as the two shades of green Gavagai and I had in PB37 (which doesn't seem bad ... until you try to look at the graphs).

So that power spike is WilliamLP's, not wetbandit's.  He's probably gearing up to assault Charriu himself.  Charriu's low power is also starting to go up.

In other news:

• We have a trade route to WilliamLP now.  He has a lot of food resources, but only copper and ivory connected besides that.
  
• Charriu can't have had Iron Working for long.  He probably had it already connected when he discovered Iron Working.  That increases the urgency of attacking immediately, rather than waiting for more chariots; his connected Iron might actually be at Taixue.  He also just planted his 6th city this turn.
  
• just connected the horses (the one in his northern peninsula), and also is the first to 10 cities.
  
• WilliamLP planted city #8 last turn, and city #9 this turn, so now he has to be hurting on GNP.
  
• yuris125 planted city #6.  I'd think he'd have built the Oracle by now if he's expanding this slowly.
  

is probably upset he's next to JR4 and us.  I bet he has an isthmus to his southeast, and will plan to attack whomever is there.

superdeath hasn't been mentioned much lately.  He expanded to six cities fairly quickly, then hasn't done much since.

edit: I can't play t81 yet (both no time, and Charriu hasn't yet played), but just whipped four times this turn.

[Dark Savant]

It's rather strange yuris125 only expanded to seven cities (planted another this turn, after #6 last turn).

WilliamLP probably isn't building the Oracle; he just spent a pile of resources on expansion and that power spike.

There's a good chance yuris125 is aiming at building the Oracle and grabbing Currency with it.  It doesn't look like anyone will contest that.

[Dark Savant]

Dang, two other players have already beaten me to posting about what happened. 

Turn 81 (850 BC) - Part 1

Did Charriu bring any extra defense into his city?



Nope.  Also, check out who opened borders with JR4.



Well, here's one way to work on cutting into the game leader's income. 



Other reasons to declare war, which I'll recap (mostly for Charriu's benefit, if he eventually reads this):

• That frontline city claims more than its fair share of land, as its first-ring borders expand beyond the halfway point between our capitals.
  
• You can do that if you back up your claim ( did exactly that), but one axe does not a strong border claim make.  wetbandit also has one axe in his border city, but he'd be much more difficult to attack.  (I may have attacked wetbandit if Charriu hadn't made for an easier target.)
  
• I know that Charriu purposely expanded in my direction rather than either of his other neighbors.  That's decidedly hostile strategy.  I'm well aware isn't doing so (he's expanding everywhere, like Genghis Khan of the Zulu should).  wetbandit, I'm not sure about.  
  
• Charriu recently connected Iron, which isn't a peaceful move, and I need to move before he does.
  
• If I don't attack Charriu in force, WilliamLP probably will.
  
• Also, that tall scout that forced an axe whip.
  

Normally, you attack with more than a  SINGLE-CHARIOT ASSAULT FORCE , but this is likely to actually go well.



Will I actually win a ~70% roll one-on-one combat in my favor this time?






The  SINGLE-CHARIOT ASSAULT FORCE succeeds, and plunders more cash than I thought I would.

It pushes me into negative income even at 0% science.  Oy.  This is going to sting economically, isn't it.

Two axes and an archer move in behind the chariot.

Let's look at what we've uncovered.

• The borders show where his third city is.
  
• That isn't an isthmus to the southeast (good to have that confirmed).
  
• Charriu has a worker clearing jungle on the gems tile.  I didn't see that before I attacked; I wonder what he'll do with it; I can't capture it this turn.
  
• Charriu can't recapture Taixue next turn with 1-movers.  If he doesn't have a chariot of his own already in position, he'll have a lot of trouble retaking Taixue.
  

[Dark Savant]

Turn 81 (850 BC) - Part 2

was quick to post to his spoiler thread.  I presume he noticed me attacking Charriu, which I'm sure he saw coming.

and wetbandit are no longer in their not-really-a-war.



He moved his impi away from our border city.  I'm going to treat that as a sign he's interested in demilitarizing, presumably so he can assault whomever is to his southeast.



I'm still finishing those walls, though!



That's an artist's depiction of a shockingly cheap 300-mile-long 700-foot-high magical ice wall. 

is also apparently thoroughly dedicated to Aggressive/Imperialistic Zulu settler spam.



Where are these settlers even going? 

[Dark Savant]

Turn 81 (850 BC) - Part 3

just completed Writing this turn.  I move research to 80% on Writing.

also performed four whips this turn.  I'm not going to withdraw any forces from Castle Black for a while until I'm sure I know that isn't intended for us; I'll pull back behind the 300-mile-long 700-foot-tall ice wall that I'm finishing next turn.  (In the TV show, the producers made it not nearly so high.  George RR Martin is Not Good At Math Or Science.)

Oh, Castle Black just produced a chariot.  That's heading east.  Oldtown also finished a work boat and will produce another chariot, and Highgarden also 1-pop-whipped a chariot.  I'm not sure how many more of these I can use.  Maybe Charriu will actually produce a spear, I don't know.

My empire is straining against the happy limit, but I'll finally have silver online next turn.

JR4 planted city #9 this turn, so we're matching each other in city count.

Charriu already played, but I'm going to try to go to bed early tonight for once; I'll get in the turn tomorrow morning.

[OT4E]

Well done! You should let charriu chop gems and get ready to steal worker but still nice

[Dark Savant]

Turn 82 (825 BC) - Part 1

Charriu was alert enough not to leave his worker on the gems.  (It would have finished clearing the jungle if he weren't.)



He moved his worker towards us to scout, but didn't disband it as he should have, so I captured it.

There is a hostile unit approaching Taixue.  (I may rename it once it comes out of resistance.)




Oh, it's not Charriu's.  One of the axes needs 1 XP for a promotion. 

I'm going to spend this turn moving units towards this front before I think about approaching Charriu's next city.

I do have enough chariots now to rename them.  I'm not exactly a New York Giants fan, but George RR Martin is, so I'll draw upon the 1986 Giants ... especially as it turns out they had a George Dwight Martin.    Our lead chariot takes that name.