[spoilers] FT's attempt at social distancing

[The Black Sword]

Thanks. This is now the first pitboss I'm playing in which you are not one of the opponents (PB13, PB18 and PB38). We have never been neighbors, but in the last two you were a key opponent nevertheless.

So I'll use the opportunity: Looking back at those games, on general level, what would you consider as our team's strengths or things that we should definitely keep up? And on the other hand, what would be the weaknesses or areas where you have felt that we could do better?

Well, I don't know about weaknesses, but the one thing I remember being in my head was that you'd always be looking for some way to improve your position. That sounds a bit vague but I think a lot of people can go on autopilot too easily, especially when something goes against them. I always got the sense you were playing the game actively, looking for any edge you could find, and that I'd have to do the same to keep up.

[Fintourist]

Thanks TBS.

So here we go:




650 total tiles, bit more than 70 tiles per player and that should include islands. So this will indeed be a tight affair and with almost every player running around with early UUs and fast or aggressive traits.. So this game could be something else. Definitely something else than what I've tried before.

Looks like I'm in the SW corner. Fingers crossed that the plains hill 3 tiles north of my capital has first ring food. I would love to settle there due to shareable rice and immediate trade routes.

[Fintourist]

Turns 1-5

Turns have been rolling nicely and after checking backlines and getting the border pop I finally found some food...




  Ref ist most definitely forcing me into a bunch of tradeoffs with the dotmap and I'm for sure having enough mountain tiles in my starting area..

If somebody knows how to get rid of constant stream of BUG error reports that would make my playing more enjoyable and future screenshots a bit better.

[Charriu]

Start Civ with administrator permissions

[Fintourist]

Thanks Charriu!

Turns 6-8

I met my first neighbor:




Superdeath, AGG/IND of Rome (Praets, whatever, Fishing/Mining)

I have only played against superdeath in PB38. I think that was his first pitboss here and at that time he was pretty clearly in the "food" category of players. Since then it seems that he has participated in more or less every game at RB and surely improved along the way. Someone else is better to judge how much he has improved, but I will treat him with respect until proven otherwise.

Character-wise he seems like someone, who might role-play Aggressive Rome here. He is not a timid newcomer, quite the opposite. 

I guess I would prefer not to be his neighbor as superdeath feels like the most probable kingmaker in this game. In the positive outcome he will screw someone else's game, build me useful wonders and make this game an easy affair. In the negative case he will make this game a struggle and force a costly military build-up.

My scouting priority is finding reasonable locations for my 2nd and 3rd cities so it might still take a while before I will find superdeath's starting location, but so far nobody has built (with high likelyhood) a warrior in this game so I'm not getting too paranoid. (I considered 3-turning a Quechua to start the game, but decided that this is not the way I want to seek success..)

[Fintourist]

Turns 9-12

Found Superdeath:




Western silver tile is the exact mid-point between us, 6 tiles from both capitals. Let's see if it's possible to split those silvers peacefully. It kind of should be as the land between us is otherwise of limited value.

Early micro will be a total mess due to that crazy sheep tile, large amount of hills and immediate superdeath border, but let's come back to this when I know if and where I have copper. At the moment the pigs tile is the only accessible land tile that has value so copper is guaranteed to impact the early expansion heavily.

So far the map looks quite interesting with my weird mountain start while quite a few players are starting with work boats. Land quality is much lower than in the last two pitbosses I have played, but there is nothing wrong with that. Bitching won't commence until I scout somebody with a stronger start 

[Fintourist]

Turns 13-18

BW is in and I have scouted most of the immediate surroundings so here are my "top 3" thoughts about the map/my corner so far:

1. [As already said] the map is less lush than what I've played in my previous PBs (18 & 38, in 13 we really had a short straw). Assuming balance between players, I kind of like that. How to make the most out of limited resources can be a fun challenge.
   
2. In the immediate future I'm really suffering from the fact that there is simply not a single spot, where I could settle for food while sharing food with the capital. This might have been done on purpose by Ref though as all my capital food has been placed in the first ring.
   
3. In the mid-term I'm a bit worried that the mountains and deserts to my east/northeast limit my ability to capitalize my potentially fast start with EXP and my share of the land is pretty much pre-determined. Let's see. It's too early for that conclusion
   

I could write a wall of text about this micro puzzle, but in the big picture it simplifies to 2 decisions

1. Will my dot map include city A or B (see screenshot)?
   
2. Do I prioritize AH for deer (and hopefully horses to my west?) or Pottery for my 45-hammer terraces?
   

[Fintourist]

Turns 19-22

Scout survived double-lions with ease and found a new neighbor:




Elkad, IMP/EXP of Khmer (Ballistaphant, Baray-Aqueduct)

Do you ever really want to start next to Joao? Not really, but it seems Elkad is playing some sort of "size 1" challenge as he still has not grown his capital. I'm having hard time imaging a start where that would be the way to go, so I'm crossing my fingers that Elkad is somehow screwing things up.. 

We fought Elkad in PB38, but I think that's already distant enough that there is no bad blood from that conflict. As a player Elkad has not truly convinced me based on what I have seen in the past, but I don't recall anything super dubious either. I guess the same approach as with superdeath applies. I assume that Elkad has become stronger until proven otherwise..

***

At home we enjoyed Isabella's SPI and EXP traits and whipped our 2nd worker:




We also met Ruff's tracker-scout to my east. Maybe he is located to my northeast? Based on tech thread Ruff is apparently having some sort of a double-move situation. Superdeath built the first warrior of the game 10 turns ago. That has not appeared at my borders so here is the hoping that those guys would already have a conflict.. 

[Fintourist]

Game is progressing without super noteworthy events so I'll proceed with opponent introductions..

Ruff_Hi, AGG/SPI of NA (Totem Pole, Tracker)

I've only spotted Ruff's scout to my east so I don't really know whether we are close neighbors or something else. With no early traits, but AGG I would have bit of a mixed feelings of Ruff as a neighbor.

If you have played in PBEM1, you are the definition of a RB Vet. I've only played Ruff in PB18 where Ruff had a fairly quiet showing - maybe he did not have the best neighbor luck. Honestly, I know very little of Ruff, my gut feeling is that he will play the early game pretty casually and might struggle to keep up in development, but if he manages to stay relevant, he has the required experience to make good decisions later in the game.

[Fintourist]

Turns 23-27

Scouting brought in useful, but worrisome news:




The potential of this area trashes anything that I have at my starting area. This little jungle has more food than all my surroundings combined. I don't have spots where I could feasibly have two food resources in the same city and my basic dotmap includes settling 4 cities for pigs, fish, sheep and crabs respectively. (see the map couple of posts earlier)

I'm still dreaming that I could at least have the southeastern rice, but that's 9 tiles from my capital, 6 from Elkad and he can pretty much block me with a simple cows+rice city.

So what does this probably mean in practice: Unless I have some amazing backline islands, my land quality is unfortunately not good enough that I can compete in the long term. To be frank, I don't think I can be competitive even in the mid term so we are very unlikely aiming at T120 knights for expansion.. The timing that I need to hit will have to be a lot earlier. Well, let's keep intel rolling in before making any real decisions or judgements.

***

In global news:

• Miguelito founded an early 2nd city and grabbed Hinduism. Good for him and his SPI leader. I can't see a scenario with this start where I could have delayed worker techs enough to compete for that. Fingers crossed that I can get a religion later..
  
• Cornflakes is enjoying his Babylonian granary UB. He spent a turn in anarchy, whipped a garden and has now grown his capital quickly to size 4. This could be strong in addition to being a fancy play 
  
• I think Cairo researched Archery (could be fake news). Let's assume that others are feeling the tightness of the map as well..
  

 
Domestically:

• My first settler will be born at the end of this turn (EOT27). The plan is to stay low and get the 3rd worker finished EOT29 and second settler out at EOT35.