Auro is playing with fire [SPOILERS]

[Aurorarcher]

Actually, that's bit of a lie. Tha plan is not to use PZs much of at all.

[Aurorarcher]

Settled in place.



This map is lush, but Bob had double bonuses turned on. On purpose of course.

Agri -> Calendar -> Crafting -> Mining seems very obvious.

With start like this it's possible to get Witches out as early as T60. But only if I want to...

[Aurorarcher]

This is quite tricky start to play actually, so much room to grow. Usually you get 1st settler out about at size 5 but here producing settler is going to get delayed quite a bit as it's just smarter to grow to good tiles. But for that I need two workers.

Currently I think my best play will be about this:

- Start 2nd worker in cap T15, 2nd worker is ready T22
- Calendar is done T22 as well -> Revolt to Agrarianism/Religion
Worker actions: -> Planitation T23 -> Banana T25 -> Another farm T27 -> 2nd Banana T29
- T29 Cap is at 5, use double bananas, silk + two farms (note to self: don't work 3 farms + 1 banana or you'll delay hitting size 7 by 1 turn)
- T31 Crafting -> Wines T32 -> Start settler T32 at size 7 like this:



Worker actions: Farm for 2nd city T34 -> another farm T36 -> move to gems T38
- Mining done T39 -> mine ready T40
- Settler rdy T40 -> Settle 2nd city T42 1E of Mana
-> Exploration is done T42, TRs rdy T44

[Aurorarcher]

So I found Dave, then moved north and found something interesting.



The map is full of jungle, looks like Bob loves jungle. But this is something different. I think that each player is on the edge of the map (well, I'm sure of that) and then there's a lot of jungle around (poor land), but then on the inside there's some very good land that we all need to contend for. Not sure how he put all 5 on the edges to make that equal though. I think I'll figure it out.

I could do analysis of how my opponents are going to play their civs if anyone is interested. I know already that mack is the one I need to kill early, I hope he is my neighbour to the east.

Also a lurker question: Mobius Witches are unable to spawn with meta I, right? I don't remember ever getting one at least.

[Miguelito]

I could do analysis of how my opponents are going to play their civs if anyone is interested.

I am!

[Mardoc]

I could do analysis of how my opponents are going to play their civs if anyone is interested.

I am!

Me too.

Also interested in how you're going to play your civ. Any effort toward gates and AC, or just Witches, or what? I keep feeling like there's more potential in the Sheaim than has been demonstrated, but I'm not sure exactly where that potential is.

[Aurorarcher]

Let's start with my opponents.

Cairo: Arendel of Ljos (SPI/CRE)

This was actually my #5 pick. Not a bad pairing. But considering the map I know so far... well, good luck with the trees of wrong kind! I would expect the traditional FoL + PoLs play. The traits are perfect for that.

Dave: Kandors (AGG/FIN/ING). I won one EitB game with this leader. Vaults play? Maybe. With the map around being quite crappy (before BW) I can see a builder here. No magic (well adepts) sucks though. Going RoK for sure, pretty much traditional Khazad game, melee units + Trebs. Around that era they're very good. But once opponents have mages... not so much.

superjm: Cassiel (PHI/IND). My #4 pick. superjm has been fairly passive in the games I've seen but I predict aggressive game this time. He gets his first hero out T17. 2nd around T60. The land doesn't favor fast rush though so I predict that the early rush won't be successful and he'll fall behind quickly, possibly making someone else also fall behind. Hopefully not my neighbour. Had I gotten the civ I'd have used the WS (resets GP counter) with PHI + sage specialist to get to mages quickly.

mack: Sandalphon (PHI/IND). I knew mack was going to pick this civ before the game started. Pretty much going to do similar things as I did last game. PHI/IND are good to help even faster growth + makes the farmer's gambit play very attractive. Getting shades won't be quite as easy as with ARC but still. I hope I can attack him before he is getting Ghosts. With the jungle/mountain map his Recon units are going to be even better than with flat land. I predict a very strong game from mack with two decent economy traits. If I ever get in trouble with invisible units I need to remember my special unit: Revelers (Currency tech), they can see magically hidden units.

Auro: Tebryn (ARC/SUM). Okay. I think the traits tell the kind of game I am going for . Yeah, no economy traits. The plan is to get to Witches very early and build them. I have simulated the started and I can get first witches out around T60 (with lucky spawns) and T65 with building. You heard that right, T65 mages, that's crazy. With summoner that can give me an army out of nowhere. No need to build warriors. Even with just 3 Witches I can send 6 spectres at strength 4 + C1 + 3 moves + Stigmata to harass my opponents. The plan is to make someone grow an empire for me and then take it. Of course, to make this play worth it, we must be close. And not 15 tiles away. More like 5 tiles away. Skeleton spam is also a good option, especially on defense. 

Those T65 mages can be achieved by getting Agri (done), Calendar, Crafting, Mining, Exploration, Mysticism and KotE in that order. The question is, do I need to hurry this much and kill someone that early? No, if we're not close. I need to find that out. I have already found Dave and Cairo already, and there's 13 tiles between the caps of me and Dave. I don't want to attack Dave though, his cities are super hard to take (C1 + 20% city defense). Cairo is further away from me. If mack is to my east I really want to attack early. If it's superjm then hmm... tough. It is also very hard to attack superjm early if he uses his heroes well. We shall see.

I think the #1 trap with Sheaim is trying to play a builder game and build an empire with good big cities with a lot of tiles apart from each other... it's just not going to work. Actually, just smaller cities closer together are good enough. We don't care for buildings much other than MGs + Planar Gates. Also, if you try to build and build... you'll skip the era when Sheaim can really have the edge, when nobody else doesn't have mages or anything too scary to match them.

I think the #2 trap with Sheaim is actually with Planar Gates and their units. It's so easy to keep going for many different type of buildings to get more units but... the only ones that really matter are Witches. Don't get me wrong, the others aren't bad either by any means, but they won't make me win this game. They're just waste of hammers for how a game with Sheaim should be played.

Raising AC is a bit of a trap too IMO. It's not quite easy to do... Prophecy of Ragnarok is there (335h) but I'm not going to build it. I'd rather build 3 more Witches (300h). Razing cities is an option of course if I can't kill my opponent. But if I get to do that too much I'm not doing the war the right way... so I don't see that happening too much either.

For reference:

AC	Spawn Chance (%)	Max units/gate
0-9	5	2
10-29	10	4
30-39	13	8
40-49	17	10
50-59	20	12
60-69	23	14
70-79	27	16
80-89	30	18
90-99	35	20
100	40	25

[Aurorarcher]

Someone has 85 GNP as of T51... That is obviously mack with Shades. For comparison, my GNP is 49 (3rd place).

I just settled 3rd city. Next turn KotE finishes, then I'll build fast MG and Planar Gate.

[Aurorarcher]

Met Mack and his warrior (that run away next turn) so he must be close. Then next turn I moved my warrior forward...



Wow, already two Divided Souls. Great. He has only 2 cities, but it seems he is playing for one super city. His GNP is very impressive, around 125 but he has Academy. Still, to achieve that before T60 is very well done .

He killed my warrior on T61 and offered peace. I accepted.

Here is the GNP and Power situation (power drops can be Shades). 





Looks like he got his first Shade around T40. Not sure how, barbs started to spawn around T40 as most people got their 2nd cities at that time. Mack got his 2nd T34... maybe he attacked the animals and got lucky? Also, he probably got his scout as a Shade too. To me, it looks like 3 Shades at least, the GNP suggests even more.

So what to do? Mack is going to run away with this game at this speed. I can't just keep settling new cities quietly, I need to stop him. First priority is to locate him. He can't be very far from the spot where he killed my warrior. I already have 2 Mobius Witches (I got one from gate) that can both summon Spectres. With 3 movers it shouldn't take a long to find him. After I've found him I can make a plan to hurt him.

[Aurorarcher]

Interesting. Mack emailed me:

I supose 10 turns of peace remains 10 turns of peace and not use other way to end it.

Our peace ends T71, it's now T69. I replied:

Of course. I don't think there's a way to break it even, it's a forced peace treaty for a reason.

He knows I'll attack, I have been showing quite strong signals. He even settled his 3rd city close to me with settled great bard (shade).

But then I do remember that some spells cause war even with forced peace... I think at least Air II. Not that I'd use that anyway (at least in this case as mack proposed 10t peace a while ago). I think it's against the rules? Not sure what others think. At least in the current situation.

But on T71 it'll begin...