[PB58] Tarkeel and Amicalola's rule through fear

[Amicalola]

This is definitely Jowy's game to lose. It looks from PBSpy that Ruff just lost 2 cities, one of them major, but he still hasn't whipped anything...

[Tarkeel]

This is definitely Jowy's game to lose. It looks from PBSpy that Ruff just lost 2 cities, one of them major, but he still hasn't whipped anything...

Ruff's still in slavery, so that's not the issue. The cities he's lost so far are the two marked here and the island, but next comes some of his core cities:


I've moved some of our defense in the west over to perhaps snipe the border city there, which has silver.

But the main takeaway regarding future plans is that if we are left alone, our demos are going to continue to suck until about T155-160. After that, if we're still left alone, we're going to explode. This Taj plan is my baby, and the most invested I've ever been in a game of Civ. If it plays out that way, the next 30 turns are going to be a lot of fun.

The Taj-plan is all Amica, I'm only barely following it. Our current issues are clearly visible in this graph:


The war with AT is clearly visible, as first his line drops, then ours stays flat for a long time.

[Tarkeel]

I've updated the index post.

[Tarkeel]

Turn 151-152 (840 AD)
The turns are flowing along nicely. We're mapping out SD and keeping an eye on AT, but his forces seems to be moving southwards. MrC has a nice stack of horse archers just outside Ruff, but they're stationary.

Meanwhile plans are in motion. Our merchant is closing in on his mission, Coruscant will grow just as he does it, and Kuat tries to build the Great Library. Fondor is pumping out Heroic Epic in 4 turns before returning to unit duty.

We got research vision on everyone except Ruff after acquiring SD this turn. Anyone who can guess what he's researching gets 5 bonus points!

HorsebackRiding, after T150, as Mongolia

[Tarkeel]

Turn 153 (860 AD)
Our Great Library caper didn't last long, as AT built it this turn, but we did get some gold out of it. We also spotted MrCairo's army, heading down towards Ruff.

[civac2]

Why did you want to build the Great Library? It's not difficult (in fact too easy in many situations) to hatch some scientists. If it were GPP of some other type it would be better.

[Tarkeel]

It was mainly a case of "it hasn't been built yet, we're IND and have marble, let's see what happens." It was obviously not a high priority, and I must admit I actually wanted the failgold more than the library itself.

[Tarkeel]

Turn 154-155 (900 AD)
We offered the last of our wines to AT for dyes; he currently has wines, but Wakeelmui is going to reclaim those soon so he might take us up on the offer. Meanwhile Ruff is crumbling under Jowy's assault, and has lost three core cities including the capital. MrCairo is poised to join the fray, but I'm not sure he'll make it in time:


We're moving some forces to snipe the bordercity that has silver, as Ruff is currently trading that to us. In other news, our first great merchant went on a trade mission to Miko, netting us 1100 gold:


Our other great merchant fired off our golden age:

Pre-launch economy and demographics:

Post-launch economy and demographics:

We're waiting for Feudalism to come in next turn before changing civics. The plan is to first swap into OrgRel and vassalage, having MonCal convert our empire to hinduism while pumping units. We need slavery to complete the Taj Majal, and will pump some theatres in border cities, but after that we're over into vassalage, which should further enhance our economy. The research plan has some uncertainty in it, worst case is that both CivilService and Nationalism are delayed by a turn each:

T156: Feudalism completes
T157: Drama completes
T158: CivilService completes
T159: Meditation completes
T160: Philosophy completes
T162: Nationalism completes

We plan to build TajMahal the following way:
2 turns before Nationalism, whip the baray in Hoth, then spread hinduism there.
1 turn before Nationalism, whip the market in Hoth and move workers into position
The turn Nationalism comes in, chop 7 forests

[Tarkeel]

Turn 156-157 (940 AD)
We changed civics on T156 and I managed to give myself quite the scare. Swapping into hereditary rule, vassalage and OrgRel changed our costs from -240 to -244 gpt, with the higher civic costs being offset by the free units from vassalage. After changing into hinduism as well our costs were suddenlu -285! It took me a while to figure out that I'd also changed MonCal from wealth to missionaries inbetween. Ooops.

We have research visibility on MrCairo, but the last two turn he one-turned techs and played after us so we didn't see what he was researching. He's currently saving gold on gunpowder, so he's not too far away from annoying Oromo-warriors. Jowy on the other hand is researching meditation, which should mean he's our competition for TajMahal.

We're probably attacking Ruff, or KillMeNow, next turn to secure that silver that he's been supplying us with since the war with AT. I really appreciate Ruff as a trading partner in this game, so I hope you won't hold it against me that I'm vulturing that border city in your final days.

[Tarkeel]

Amica mentioned how satisfying it was watching us catch up in crop yield:


We're still at the back of the pack, but we're keeping up, and are actually closing in on Superdeath.

I want to take a moment to analyz Superdeath's game so far: I stand by my verdict that his leader and civ choice didn't make much sense. I still think Sury was a very strange choice, especially for first pick, but I think he's managed a brilliant play around the Mongols: Instead of actually building any units, he's leveraged the combined threat of his reputation as a player and the Keshik hordes to keep his neighbors away while effectively running a farmers gambit the entire game. Just image what he could have done with a leader with economic traits!