Turn 100 99 State of the World
Total Scores:
The civs kind of fall into 3 categories right now. At the top are China and Russia, both miles ahead. Russia has 20 extra points in lavras, China 90 extra points in wonders. Further, Russia has a much larger military than China and much better research - China has made good use of its eurekas to keep pace in total techs researched, however. Phoenicia is starting to creep into this tier as well. China surged ahead early with Stonehenge and the first religion and has largely maintained his score lead with timely wonder finishes and buckets and buckets of era score.
In the great swampy middle are Indonesia, Japan, and England, all with almost identical scores. These have middling research, with the exception of Japan, who has world-class science but lags badly in population and expansion.
Finally, at the rear, are Australia and in dead last Norway. Australia has actually closed the gap significantly in the last 30 turns, and has passed up Norway. Norway was strong in the middle but has lately stagnated.
Cities:
After an early lead largely built on city-state conquest and early settlers, Norway hasn't grown in half the game. Phoenicia had a very slow start, presumably researching Cothons, and since has exploded, growing quite as rapidly as Russia albeit from a later start date. Japan, China, and Australia all stagnated for a while and have only lately started settling again, but note that Australia's recent cities ahve brought him firmly into the middle tier of civs.
Population and Buildings:
Here, though, the gap between Russia and everyone else is pretty evident. Russia has a massive lead in total imperial population and buildings, built on work ethic production giving lots of buildings and a maniacal focus on population growth so I can field more districts. My score here is 50% higher than anyone else. Australia lagged badly for a while but the reforms he's been doing the last 20 years are paying fruit, and he is middle tier. Kaiser's gift of his 6th city to Archduke has led to him having by far the smallest pop of any empire. China nad Indonesia are both only about as developed as Australia in terms of pop and buildings, kind of shocking given their earlier leads.
Districts
It's not just lavras. Ljubljana and Archduke both have built as many RNDs and Cothons as they can, they just don't match Russian levels of production. The drop in Punic districts halfway through was a correction to some errors in the data that had crept in - you find a corresponding spike in ljubljana's population above as I re-adjusted which points were where. I'm not at all confident in NOrway's districts and think most of those are in error, he just keeps getting double pop growths. District count is one area Australia still lags in, but this is a trailing indicator, I hope.
Era Score:
While Russia has a 20 point lead in pop, China has a 30 point lead in era score. This suggests that China's top of the scoreboard placement is largely illusory, since era score matters little once you pass the Golden Age threshold, and in fact, getting too much makes later golden ages harder. Phoenicia lately surged to secure a golden medieval age, Archduke should be in a heroic age, and Norway in a dark age.
Science Per Turn and Total Techs:
Our team was doing very well on research until Australia moved Pingala, but that's temporary. Australia was in danger of stagnation, like Japan, due to low pop growth. Archduke, Woden, and sub are all doing kind of mediocre. Ljubljana has two spikes: One where he unlocked Naval Tradition and doubled his Cothon bonus, and then a late wave of multiple Cothons and I believe at least one campus per era score finishing. Japan and Russia have been neck and neck in improvements for about 20 turns.
No real distinction in techs researched, other than that China has more (eurekas?) and England less (rushing the expensive Cartography?).
Culture Per Turn and Total Civics:
Here is a tale of the haves and the have-nots. China has Sacred Places, Choral Music, and the Great Wall fueling hsi culture, Woden has culture from pastures, and Russia has a vast number of monuments finished. Australia is lagging badly and has been for ages, largely due to not many cities to put up cheap monuments in. He will be able to in the near future, hopefully, and his best era dedication is probably Pen, Brush, and Voice to fix this grave area of weakness. This is very visible in the civics, with China leading and Australia trailing, everyone else in the middle.
Total Income:
[screenshots]https://i.imgur.com/eqsDMWJ.png[/screenshots]
Note that the spikes are data artifacts - I don't update income every turn. Woden, Kaiser, and Archduke also all have scrambled colors for some reason. But the two naval civs have spiked incomes, probably running Naval Tradition, China has the Great Wall and Petra, and Russia has Tithe. AUstralia has no gold-generating luxuries and no gold generating districts but has a large number of buildings, which has tanked his income. Learning experience.
Total Faith:
Russian Monumentality broke the chart. Note the lesser Indonesian Monumentality as well, and the growing Norwegian faith pile.
Total Power:
Australia and China trailing, Phoenicia and lately Indonesia leading. Visible is the Battle of Writing On the Wall, Archduke's conquered city-state, and a later spike about 20 turns later, even more vicious and bloody than the initial battle. I guess Archduke made a play to reconquer, failed, and signed peace.
State of the Game:
Here's what I can puzzle out:
- The Central Powers: Japan went for early high adjacency districts - Campuses and Holy Sites, probably leading with HS to trigger the discount, while Archduke did his thing and trained a big navy to go for city-states. This plan was working well, with England an early leader in total pop and Kaiser killing it in science, but they ran afoul of the raider team. A bloody fight for a city-state ensued, which Archduke lost. He burned a ton of production and now is left with low development, while Kaiser has overinvested in districts and lagged in expansion, much like Australia albeit a bit more focused on food and production.
I would say these guys are out of it, except Archduke is the best player in the game and these guys have their choice of peace or war for 30 turns. They could try to pile onto us in 10 turns, or they might try to recover from the earlier fight. I personally think Kaiser is leading the charge to Frigates, with Archduke following behind as closely as he can. Then they'll try and upgrade a decent navy and go ruin someone's day - either us or the raiders. Their weakness is Kaiser's small size - he won't be able to field many frigates quickly - and Archduke's growing backwardness, EXCEPT I think he's going to explode this turn. Archduke will have Free Inquiry, Pen, Brush, and Voice, and Monumentality all at once in the Medieval Age, so he will have RNDs that give gold, science, and culture and quick builders (albeit no faith income). England is going to roar to life here in a few turns and people better watch out.
- The Raiders: Ljubljana did a deep dive on Celestial Nav at the start, got his Cothon down, and started alternating settlers nad ships. He got into a scrap with Archduke, but used his and Woden's UUs to power through to victory, easily replacing the losses. Then he hit a golden age and let his science explode based on Cothons, and with the coming of peace is madly pursuing settlers and districts now. The good news is most of ljubljana's power spike is behind him, I think, with this being hte last age of Free Inquiry and settlers rapidly escalating in cost even with production bonuses. Biremes will be obsolete and it'll be up to his native production to see how many modern ships he can build. Still, I think his navy apart from Russia's will be the most dangerous in the future.
Woden...I don't know. He did an early settler grab, then an early wolfpack to grab lots of city-states, then got itno the fight with Archduke. Since that war he's largely been passive, not really improving much, not finishing many districts, nothing. It's a strangely disconnected game from Woden. But Norway is at present even weaker than Australia, with fewer cities and the smallest navy among the naval powers - as Norway! He has high culture from plantations, but that's about all. He will need me or Archduke to stumble to catch up, really.
- The Sandbox: I have said plenty, but I really do think this team is actually the worst off of anyone here. That's counterintuitive, since they're tops on the scoreboard and are currently no-doubt chortling over their unstoppable jong attack. But you know and I know that that attack is doomed to fail, that it was inadequately prepared for and poorly planned, and that once it fails this team has no backup plan. Sub's cities are very badly placed to contest the sea, he's made erratic choices in development, and China is strong but also almost entirely irrelevant to the larger game, building a wonderful hermit kingdom there in the north. After everyone unlocks frigates, what will this team do to stay relevant? Will they surge ahead in science? How? With what campuses, located where? Will they lead in expansion? They both have decent faith income but it's nowhere near Russia's, and unlike Russia they can't freely settle tundra and make it productive. Will they win militarily? With what fleet?
Guys: This team is doomed. They will not win this game. Calling it right here.
- Us:
I got lucky with lots of good tundra land and was able to properly exploit it since the others let Work Ethic fall to me. We know our strenghts and our weaknesses. The biggest weakness is Australia, which takes ages to produce anything when not at war, and, I think more worringly, has little food, gold, and culture. Most of it stems from the food: Australia still has his first two cities comparitively small, and with no gold generating improvements readily available, he is having trouble getting to the sizes needed for harbors. Frustratingly, we had JUST gotten Marco there and he was on the right track when this attack came and we HAVE to build galleys - if we don't, he just loses the cities anyway and what good does that do?
If we survive, though, I think Australia is about on a level with Japan, and ahead of Indonesia and Norway. Marco will ahve productive cities, will be able to build harbors for gold, and his natural pop growth and some monument builds will rectify the culture situation. The foundations are there for an Australian recovery, we just need time to pull it off. It is my job to buy him that time.
Russia's biggest weakness has obviously been diplomacy. I figured that it was hard to coordinate in a game like this and that most people would follow their own interests, as they have before, but obviously that's not the case. I'm also clearly not making enough use of the deal screen or something, since somehow Woden and ljubljana were able to swing DoFs with both their neighbors, including the neighbors they just stuck their thumbs into the eye of, and Suboptimal was able to ALSO get DoFs with both, maybe intimidating with jongs? I was not. I got one DoF with Archduke in a moment of weakness, which I wanted ot build into a possible partnership, but everything since has met with the cold shoulder - either ignored or, most recently, rejected.
That's obviously a huge problem. It's our biggest obstacle to winning the game.
So, chances?
If we can get a period of peace and DoF with ONE neighbor, I think we should be favorites. Russia is roaring along, I still have excellent prospects to expand, and my potential military power is unmatched. Australia will be able to use peace to get his feet under him and get hsi core set up and then he'll be approaching Russian levels, albeit 50 turns behind. We should be able to defeat any team one on one, IF we can get peace.
If we can never get peace but get stuck in Forever War with a rotating cast of opponents, eventually we'll fall behind and get ground down. My #1 goal is to avoid that. In that case, the winner will be whoever of the Raiders or the Central Powers successfully invades a neighbor first.
Total Scores:
The civs kind of fall into 3 categories right now. At the top are China and Russia, both miles ahead. Russia has 20 extra points in lavras, China 90 extra points in wonders. Further, Russia has a much larger military than China and much better research - China has made good use of its eurekas to keep pace in total techs researched, however. Phoenicia is starting to creep into this tier as well. China surged ahead early with Stonehenge and the first religion and has largely maintained his score lead with timely wonder finishes and buckets and buckets of era score.
In the great swampy middle are Indonesia, Japan, and England, all with almost identical scores. These have middling research, with the exception of Japan, who has world-class science but lags badly in population and expansion.
Finally, at the rear, are Australia and in dead last Norway. Australia has actually closed the gap significantly in the last 30 turns, and has passed up Norway. Norway was strong in the middle but has lately stagnated.
Cities:
After an early lead largely built on city-state conquest and early settlers, Norway hasn't grown in half the game. Phoenicia had a very slow start, presumably researching Cothons, and since has exploded, growing quite as rapidly as Russia albeit from a later start date. Japan, China, and Australia all stagnated for a while and have only lately started settling again, but note that Australia's recent cities ahve brought him firmly into the middle tier of civs.
Population and Buildings:
Here, though, the gap between Russia and everyone else is pretty evident. Russia has a massive lead in total imperial population and buildings, built on work ethic production giving lots of buildings and a maniacal focus on population growth so I can field more districts. My score here is 50% higher than anyone else. Australia lagged badly for a while but the reforms he's been doing the last 20 years are paying fruit, and he is middle tier. Kaiser's gift of his 6th city to Archduke has led to him having by far the smallest pop of any empire. China nad Indonesia are both only about as developed as Australia in terms of pop and buildings, kind of shocking given their earlier leads.
Districts
It's not just lavras. Ljubljana and Archduke both have built as many RNDs and Cothons as they can, they just don't match Russian levels of production. The drop in Punic districts halfway through was a correction to some errors in the data that had crept in - you find a corresponding spike in ljubljana's population above as I re-adjusted which points were where. I'm not at all confident in NOrway's districts and think most of those are in error, he just keeps getting double pop growths. District count is one area Australia still lags in, but this is a trailing indicator, I hope.
Era Score:
While Russia has a 20 point lead in pop, China has a 30 point lead in era score. This suggests that China's top of the scoreboard placement is largely illusory, since era score matters little once you pass the Golden Age threshold, and in fact, getting too much makes later golden ages harder. Phoenicia lately surged to secure a golden medieval age, Archduke should be in a heroic age, and Norway in a dark age.
Science Per Turn and Total Techs:
Our team was doing very well on research until Australia moved Pingala, but that's temporary. Australia was in danger of stagnation, like Japan, due to low pop growth. Archduke, Woden, and sub are all doing kind of mediocre. Ljubljana has two spikes: One where he unlocked Naval Tradition and doubled his Cothon bonus, and then a late wave of multiple Cothons and I believe at least one campus per era score finishing. Japan and Russia have been neck and neck in improvements for about 20 turns.
No real distinction in techs researched, other than that China has more (eurekas?) and England less (rushing the expensive Cartography?).
Culture Per Turn and Total Civics:
Here is a tale of the haves and the have-nots. China has Sacred Places, Choral Music, and the Great Wall fueling hsi culture, Woden has culture from pastures, and Russia has a vast number of monuments finished. Australia is lagging badly and has been for ages, largely due to not many cities to put up cheap monuments in. He will be able to in the near future, hopefully, and his best era dedication is probably Pen, Brush, and Voice to fix this grave area of weakness. This is very visible in the civics, with China leading and Australia trailing, everyone else in the middle.
Total Income:
[screenshots]https://i.imgur.com/eqsDMWJ.png[/screenshots]
Note that the spikes are data artifacts - I don't update income every turn. Woden, Kaiser, and Archduke also all have scrambled colors for some reason. But the two naval civs have spiked incomes, probably running Naval Tradition, China has the Great Wall and Petra, and Russia has Tithe. AUstralia has no gold-generating luxuries and no gold generating districts but has a large number of buildings, which has tanked his income. Learning experience.
Total Faith:
Russian Monumentality broke the chart. Note the lesser Indonesian Monumentality as well, and the growing Norwegian faith pile.
Total Power:
Australia and China trailing, Phoenicia and lately Indonesia leading. Visible is the Battle of Writing On the Wall, Archduke's conquered city-state, and a later spike about 20 turns later, even more vicious and bloody than the initial battle. I guess Archduke made a play to reconquer, failed, and signed peace.
State of the Game:
Here's what I can puzzle out:
- The Central Powers: Japan went for early high adjacency districts - Campuses and Holy Sites, probably leading with HS to trigger the discount, while Archduke did his thing and trained a big navy to go for city-states. This plan was working well, with England an early leader in total pop and Kaiser killing it in science, but they ran afoul of the raider team. A bloody fight for a city-state ensued, which Archduke lost. He burned a ton of production and now is left with low development, while Kaiser has overinvested in districts and lagged in expansion, much like Australia albeit a bit more focused on food and production.
I would say these guys are out of it, except Archduke is the best player in the game and these guys have their choice of peace or war for 30 turns. They could try to pile onto us in 10 turns, or they might try to recover from the earlier fight. I personally think Kaiser is leading the charge to Frigates, with Archduke following behind as closely as he can. Then they'll try and upgrade a decent navy and go ruin someone's day - either us or the raiders. Their weakness is Kaiser's small size - he won't be able to field many frigates quickly - and Archduke's growing backwardness, EXCEPT I think he's going to explode this turn. Archduke will have Free Inquiry, Pen, Brush, and Voice, and Monumentality all at once in the Medieval Age, so he will have RNDs that give gold, science, and culture and quick builders (albeit no faith income). England is going to roar to life here in a few turns and people better watch out.
- The Raiders: Ljubljana did a deep dive on Celestial Nav at the start, got his Cothon down, and started alternating settlers nad ships. He got into a scrap with Archduke, but used his and Woden's UUs to power through to victory, easily replacing the losses. Then he hit a golden age and let his science explode based on Cothons, and with the coming of peace is madly pursuing settlers and districts now. The good news is most of ljubljana's power spike is behind him, I think, with this being hte last age of Free Inquiry and settlers rapidly escalating in cost even with production bonuses. Biremes will be obsolete and it'll be up to his native production to see how many modern ships he can build. Still, I think his navy apart from Russia's will be the most dangerous in the future.
Woden...I don't know. He did an early settler grab, then an early wolfpack to grab lots of city-states, then got itno the fight with Archduke. Since that war he's largely been passive, not really improving much, not finishing many districts, nothing. It's a strangely disconnected game from Woden. But Norway is at present even weaker than Australia, with fewer cities and the smallest navy among the naval powers - as Norway! He has high culture from plantations, but that's about all. He will need me or Archduke to stumble to catch up, really.
- The Sandbox: I have said plenty, but I really do think this team is actually the worst off of anyone here. That's counterintuitive, since they're tops on the scoreboard and are currently no-doubt chortling over their unstoppable jong attack. But you know and I know that that attack is doomed to fail, that it was inadequately prepared for and poorly planned, and that once it fails this team has no backup plan. Sub's cities are very badly placed to contest the sea, he's made erratic choices in development, and China is strong but also almost entirely irrelevant to the larger game, building a wonderful hermit kingdom there in the north. After everyone unlocks frigates, what will this team do to stay relevant? Will they surge ahead in science? How? With what campuses, located where? Will they lead in expansion? They both have decent faith income but it's nowhere near Russia's, and unlike Russia they can't freely settle tundra and make it productive. Will they win militarily? With what fleet?
Guys: This team is doomed. They will not win this game. Calling it right here.
- Us:
I got lucky with lots of good tundra land and was able to properly exploit it since the others let Work Ethic fall to me. We know our strenghts and our weaknesses. The biggest weakness is Australia, which takes ages to produce anything when not at war, and, I think more worringly, has little food, gold, and culture. Most of it stems from the food: Australia still has his first two cities comparitively small, and with no gold generating improvements readily available, he is having trouble getting to the sizes needed for harbors. Frustratingly, we had JUST gotten Marco there and he was on the right track when this attack came and we HAVE to build galleys - if we don't, he just loses the cities anyway and what good does that do?
If we survive, though, I think Australia is about on a level with Japan, and ahead of Indonesia and Norway. Marco will ahve productive cities, will be able to build harbors for gold, and his natural pop growth and some monument builds will rectify the culture situation. The foundations are there for an Australian recovery, we just need time to pull it off. It is my job to buy him that time.
Russia's biggest weakness has obviously been diplomacy. I figured that it was hard to coordinate in a game like this and that most people would follow their own interests, as they have before, but obviously that's not the case. I'm also clearly not making enough use of the deal screen or something, since somehow Woden and ljubljana were able to swing DoFs with both their neighbors, including the neighbors they just stuck their thumbs into the eye of, and Suboptimal was able to ALSO get DoFs with both, maybe intimidating with jongs? I was not. I got one DoF with Archduke in a moment of weakness, which I wanted ot build into a possible partnership, but everything since has met with the cold shoulder - either ignored or, most recently, rejected.
That's obviously a huge problem. It's our biggest obstacle to winning the game.
So, chances?
If we can get a period of peace and DoF with ONE neighbor, I think we should be favorites. Russia is roaring along, I still have excellent prospects to expand, and my potential military power is unmatched. Australia will be able to use peace to get his feet under him and get hsi core set up and then he'll be approaching Russian levels, albeit 50 turns behind. We should be able to defeat any team one on one, IF we can get peace.
If we can never get peace but get stuck in Forever War with a rotating cast of opponents, eventually we'll fall behind and get ground down. My #1 goal is to avoid that. In that case, the winner will be whoever of the Raiders or the Central Powers successfully invades a neighbor first.
I Think I'm Gwangju Like It Here
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about.
A blog about my adventures in Korea, and whatever else I feel like writing about.
Or something. Hey, it's like when everyone dogpiled the Indian team in PB2! Although that at least had diplomacy coordinating it. That team held on, eventually the coalition fell apart, and they won. Well, I guess I'll use that as inspiration. But lurkers. You all know who the underdog team in this PBEM is now. 
Marco and Chev versus the world! 
![[Image: uLOJBz9.png]](https://i.imgur.com/uLOJBz9.png)
![[Image: WjtYSli.png]](https://i.imgur.com/WjtYSli.png)
![[Image: KnzBSA8.png]](https://i.imgur.com/KnzBSA8.png)