[No Players!] PBEM14 Mapmaking & Lurking Thread

[MJW (ya that one)]

There has to be a better use for 160 gold than (temporarily) levying two warriors from a city state, right?

It's actually 80 gold (ancient era). Probably worth it because it allows you to stall for horsemen and archers, so your not spending the production anyway.

[MJW (ya that one)]

Sub still has 13.5 gpt so maybe you don't pay maintenance? That's 60 gold.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Warriors don't cost maintenance anyway, though.

Still, if for the cost of 120 gold his rented army can capture a city-state or take out a Macedonian city, that seems worth it to me. It's a situation that would pretty much only come up right now - when rentals are still cheap and city-state units are still powerful enough to actually threaten a city.

If he's just going use them to get some more map knowledge, that seems like a poor investment.

[MJW (ya that one)]

Do you think suboptimal can take out a city? It would be worth it then.

[Sullla]

I do not think they can take a city off Woden, no. Warriors are pretty terrible units for offensive operations, and they get slaughtered in particular by archers since archers are shooting them for 25 damage each turn (while taking no damage themselves) whereas warriors can only attack at 20 strength versus 15 strength while taking self-damage in the process. 1 archer and 1 defensive warrior will easily stop 3 attacking warriors - I've done it against the AI in Single Player many times before. Heck, I held off 3 warriors with a warrior and a slinger pretty easily in this Russia game on my website:



Of course, that was the AI and suboptimal will move more intelligently but there's still a limit to what you can do with warriors as your attacking units. As long as Woden is even semi-competent, he can shut down this attack by putting an archer in his city (where it can't be directly attacked) and shoot away at the incoming city state hordes. To be clear, I don't think Woden is a great tactician and he's playing a mediocre to poor early game here (weak city locations and tons of wasted gold on tile purchases - think how much stronger he would be if he could upgrade even 1 warrior into a sword instead of spending himself into bankruptcy) but I think he's still got this one without too much trouble.

A Turn 50 warrior rush on a target 15 turns walking distance away is just not a good move.

[Sullla]

Rowain did not block the tile SW of Babylon which is a HUGE mistake. He could have prevented a siege or delayed me by quite the bit. Now he is doomed to look upon whilst Scotland annexes another city into its empire.

This, right here, is the difference between TheArchduke and Rowain as players and the reason why TheArchduke is always one of the favorites to win in these PBEM games. TheArchduke is highly proactive: he's always looking to better his position, using timed aggression repeatedly against city states and against human opponents. His timed attack on Germany in the PBEM11 game was just perfect and turned him from an also-ran into one of the game leaders.

By contrast, what does Rowain do in these PBEM games? Sit quietly in the corner and complain about the map. Rowain's been in a bunch of these games by now; has he ever initiated conflict even one time? It feels like he runs an ineffective sandbox performance each game and waits around for other, more active players to eventually defeat him. Reading the two threads from TheArchduke and Rowain in this game is a highly insightful look at their respective mindsets. One player is constantly searching for ways to accrue advantages. The other player complains about how everything is unfair. It's not hard to see which mindset is more effective.

Also, Woden will have archers and his unique Macedonian swords ready by the time that suboptimal's attack arrives, which means that it looks very doomed right now.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

My only real regret with the map at this point is suboptimal and Woden's starting positions. I placed the northern start first, and I quite liked it, so I tried to place the other start relative to that. I didn't consider that Yellowstone would be visible via settler's enhanced vision from the start, and anticipated that it would be that start's second city, which would compensate for the somewhat cramped coastal area otherwise. In retrospect, placing the Indonesian start in the neighborhood of Nan Madol and placing Macedonia near where Hattusa is would probably have been a more effective set-up for that continent. 

For the city-states, I have no regrets. I was pretty transparent in my logic in placing them, and Alhazard/Rowain both scouted the center of their continent after the Archduke, letting him scoop up both contested city-states there. Rowain failing to meet Babylon first - which was loosely "his" city-state - was a couple of factors; mostly the geography of that peninsula kept me from sticking Babylon in the "safe" tundra, so I placed it laterally. Archduke's move south, sending his warrior due south, and Babylon's warrior scouting east where it met Archduke's is the only reason Rowain wasn't first to meet. 

In the long-run, Rowain is overreacting. Archduke got 1 extra envoy, which winds up being 2 points of science (or a 4-point swing from Rowain to Archduke) in the short time Babylon will survive. All of his first-meet envoys combined add up to a minor edge for Scotland, but nothing at all to compensate for Rowain's double-yield natural wonder. 

I'm a bit frustrated with Rowain now and trying to avoid posting publicly, since I'll very likely give vent to my irritation.

[MJW (ya that one)]

I'm a bit frustrated with Rowain now and trying to avoid posting publicly, since I'll very likely give vent to my irritation.

Rowain has successfully attacked someone, Civ5 PBEM4.

[MJW (ya that one)]

Hi Rowain,

I looked at your games and ether there's nothing you can do (Not getting help from Japper in PBEM 8 to stop the Mongols) or you attacked someone (PBEM11 attacking Aztecs over Nan Madol).

However, I side with CMF and Sullla about the map.

[Rowain]

In civ6 PBEM 3 I attacked suboptimal and later wiped him out . From that game a little end of game talk:

I don't think it pays to be overly active on resource balance. The CS-placement is IMO the most important thing. Depending on type and closeness you get early science and culture and have easy-to-capture developed cities for the taking later.

If this map had absolutely equal resource distribution the result would still be the same. Ichabod would still steamroll Kaiser and capture 2-3 CS. Even if he doesn't declare war on me he can easily capture Genoa, Stockholm and La Venta and have twice as many cities as anyone else by using far less settlers or hammers for development.

He didn't even need to finish off Japan. He could as easily sign peace with Kaiser and let him and suboptimal fight for Kikyo while he captures the CS in his vicinity. At the end he would have 10 cities while everyone else sits at 5 and that for exactly 2 settler built.

Don't take this as diminishing Ichabods skill. He played his usual strong game with very effective wars. He chose the right pantheon for it and executed the attacks in great way.

That was true then and hold true through all our games. The one who gets free cities wins. Talking that a map where one payer has 4 CS near him to capture is fair or balanced is like trump talking about climate change.