[SPOILERS] naufragar is not a number; he is a free man

[naufragar]

Last night, at a quarter past eight, I donned my robe, put on my slippers, and, as is my wont, settled in for a turn of Civilization 4 Pitboss 59. With a light half-smile on my lips, I lifted my wine glass. (I have discovered that playing turns sober these days is a surefire way of inviting in the Nightmares. Oh the Nightmares!) “You know, naufragar old boy,” I thought to myself, “Those gentle people over at Realms Beyond are going to think you’re an unhinged, antisocial rage case, what with your large-font posts, your abundant profanity, and your frankly unkind castigations of the map.” “Hmm. You’re quite right, Other Naufragar. Fortunately for us, internet personas are eminently malleable, and it’s no trouble to construct another that is the epitome of temperate forbearance.” I smiled as I took a sip of wine, a defense against the Terror.

I began my pre-turn ritual but was suddenly stalled. The turn hadn’t rolled. The turn would be paused. What? How? Someone hadn’t played their turn. Was that possible? A chill clung to the nape of my neck. But this player rarely forgot; their turns took only five minutes; they had been on the forum all day. The penumbra of paranoia began to overshadow me. These recent delays were all connected. The other players were conspiring to prolong the game! Prolong my torment! Every delay, every reload was another day in which that infernal game’s inexorable tendrils warped my fraying mind. Fear, the looming threat of more Civilization 4 Pitboss 59, fed my incipient madness. I looked to my plaster busts of Sid Meier and Brian Reynolds for guidance, but their marmoreal faces seemed only to smirk. I felt the floor give way…

But no! A flash of insight came! Whence I do not know, but in that moment I understood. These delays were not damnation but salvation! A few other players had been trying to make us see: yes, we the players were our own jailors, but we were also our own liberators. The cruel, unthinking mass of players kept the smoking engine of the game running, but we could also make it stop. We could grind it down, slowly, by degrees, day by prolonged day, hour by paused hour. More would see. Others would gain understanding. We could end the nightmare, together. There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part. And you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, and you’ve got to make it stop. And you’ve got to indicate to the people that unless you’re free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!

In my paroxysm, I had knocked my glass to the floor. I ignored it. I knew what I had to do. I went to the Pitboss 59 Tech Thread and vowed my support for the Resistance:

I'm traveling from July 15-17. I'll have my laptop and internet, so I don't foresee any problems. Just letting y'all know.

[thestick]

Never thought I'd see a reference to Mario Savio in the wild.

I am being 'wooshed,' like usual. I assume the big story was setting up for a reveal that you would call for the game to be ended, but you subverted our expectations?

[naufragar]

You give me too much credit.  I did have Savio's wikipedia page open to make sure I got the reference mostly right, but my first encounter with Savio is through Battlestar Galactica trivia.  A labor leader in the show quotes Savio almost verbatim, as a bit of an easter egg.

The story gag was just that the naufragar persona in his increasing craziness started seeing the turn delays as noble acts of civil disobedience in which he could take part, because the reality that they were just random inconveniences became too much for him to bear.  I wouldn't seriously call for the game to stop, and I couldn't ask for a sub. I feel I've got a commitment. That's not going to stop me from poking fun occasionally.

Maybe next turn I'll even report on the actual game.

[naufragar]

A lurker should gently ask TBS if he wants to look for a sub. He's pretty clearly unhappy. If he were content to play but couldn't, he'd be communicating in his thread or the tech thread. As it is, his happiness and the happiness of the game at large would probably be improved by a fresh turn player.

[naufragar]

Pindicator, give me back my legions! 


I had moved a handful of horse archers next to Cocoon to help Pind in his attack, but Amica's stack was too strong and obliterated Pind's, and I lost my horses.  All I can hope is that Pind did damage on the defense, but I really doubt it. Any idea why the event log tells me I got damaged by flanking? I didn't have any cats on the tile. I've retreated my units, although I've kept elephants and swords on the hill 1SE of the banana. It would be a complete disaster if Amica researched Engineering this turn. I'm 99% sure he didn't have it last turn. I've just got to hope I get lucky and he didn't get it on the turn roll. Lucky...    

I'm not sure how much help I can be to Pindicoria, but I'll try. If Amica doesn't stack-wipe me this turn with the aid of Engineering, I might be able to defend Pind.

I noticed that Amica put his National Epic in his Great Library city. Yikes. Galleons too, huh? Well, it was inevitable.

I worry that Frozen is sniffing around to see if he can snipe my islands. Annoying, but there's not much we can do. There was never much we could do. That's been my point.



It looks like Pind and Amica are reporting the war, so I might be a bit more slack. I get angry every time I'm reminded that I have to spend time on this game.

[naufragar]

On sad, old laptop, so fewer pictures. Amica got a great general last turn, which makes me think that Pind didn't delete his heavily wounded survivors, and they were a free meal for Amica. Amica offered me a peace treaty in exchange for me declaring war on Mackoti. This wasn't a real offer, I don't think. Rather, Amica was trying to point out that Mack's power (in every measurable sense) was rising, and we as his neighbors would probably need to do something about it. Naturally, I had to refuse. If I gave Amica peace now, I wouldn't be able to interfere or profit as he ate Pindicator.

The Pindicator eating is coming, but slowly:


Not too many units bearing down on Pindicoria yet, but that's probably because a lot of Amica's hitters were busy wiping out Pind's injured cats. Speaking of catapults, by my last count, Amica only had something like 8. Still more than enough when supported by knights, but maybe there's an opening there.

[naufragar]

Is there anything sweeter than peace?


Amica had opened with an offer of peace that would’ve had me declaring war on Mackoti. As with the last, I doubt this was serious. He just wanted me to be aware of the growing Eastern threat. But the next offer was this one. I wasn’t able to get to any of the advisor screens because MJMD was logging in, but I didn’t realize that was the issue. (Sad little laptop.) So I thought I had to make the decision without the military advisor. I remembered I had seen a total of ten knights and eight catapults some time ago. That would’ve been annoying to fight, especially if I were fighting with no prospect of gain.

Which leads us to our next point. On this turn (137), our peace treaty with Pindicator expired, so we could perform something of a pivot. At times during the last ten turns, I admit, I had lost sight of what I was doing and why. The reason I first made peace with Pind was because I could no longer make any gains without risking my army. The reason I supported Pindicator afterwards was because he was drawing blood from Amica. (He burned two cities and hopefully caused a few catapult suicides.) But we were never blood brothers against the Amicalolan menace. My empire still needs to be fed.

So, with that in mind, I tried to maneuver my troops so they would teleport to appropriate places. (I got a few of these wrong, but oh well.) And now our troop disposition looks something like this:


The most salient question is: “Does Amica have engineering?” If he does, he might be able to take Pind’s city before me just by sheer brunt of knights and horse archers. (We’re supposing at least another 8 knights in the fog and whatever horse archers he has lying around.) If he doesn’t have Engineering, I get to take the first swing at the city. I think I’ll have enough hitters to take it. Pind could get lucky, which would be very, very annoying. It would mean that all I did was soften the garrison up for Amica’s invasion. But hopefully I can take it. I can threaten a few other cities, but we’ll see if I can actually take them. I don’t have anything that competes with the speed or strength of Amica’s knights, so if I don’t win a city with the first push, it probably goes to Amica. The secondary objective after capturing (and razing) Pind’s cities is to pillage every tile from my territory to Amica’s. As soon as Amica opens the turn, he’ll understand that this is my goal and we’ll be in a pillaging race. (I know the three way Me-Pind-Amica turn split has been hell on the game pace but this is why that stuff’s important.)

Amica is just plain stronger than I am, so it would’ve been difficult (and profitless) to deny Pindicoria from him forever. After our ten turns of peace, he’ll probably want to fight me again, so hopefully I can turn Pindicoria into enough of a barren hellscape that he’s uninterested in marching an army all the way to my borders.

On the domestic front, I finally got my Great Engineer and used him to pop Machinery. We now burn through the bank that we’ve been building up. When I first hatched this plan, the goal was to grab Optics in time for circumnavigation and then head all the way to Guilds. Unfortunately, I’ll be a couple turns off of circumnavigation and I’ll probably need to head to Engineering instead of Guilds for security. Oh well.

I haven’t been reporting as much because of technical difficulties, not because I’m petulant and a sore loser, although I am that, too. It’s a pity because in the larger ecosystem, my civ is doing fine:


I’m in the top third or better of every metric of a 23 player game (including Soldiers, which makes performance in the other categories more difficult.) But as always, global performance doesn’t matter, and locally, I’m surrounded by Amica and Mackoti and thoroughly screwed. Ick.

[naufragar]

Hmm. It turns out Amica does in fact have Engineering:


Pind emptied his city, rather than choosing to die within the walls. (A theme of this turn will be people making moves I didn't foresee. Oops.) Actually, he sent a couple catapults into my stack for fun, without follow up. Weird, but those cats weren't going to be doing much of anything anyway. (Actually, one got a very lucky withdraw, denying me Great General points.  ) If Pind hadn't emptied his city, I think I could have grabbed it, but once it was emptied, it only took one knight of Amica's to grab it. So I actually found out about Amica's Engineering when he moved up his previously hidden knights. Of which there are lots. 

Amica will get 3 of Pind's 4 mainland cities, but we were able to deny him one:


I also have started pillaging Pindicoria, starting with what should be the high value tiles, but I was getting unlucky. (I got 7 gold for pillaging a village! 7!  ) Amica has lots of two-movers, so he can get a fair share of the spoils too.

But Pindicator is not finished:


As he retreated from Underhill, he hatched a dastardly plot. He's taking his remaining cavalry and trying to slip past my defenses! I moved my garrisons out to race Amica, completely not expecting Pind to keep swinging. As with his earlier attack, in which he declared war and took Hornblower from me in a surprise cavalry raid, I saw this and just started grinning. As with the previous attack, I wasn't happy because this was good for me. I'm going to lose at least two cities, and it's going to seriously complicated any plans to annoy Amica. No, I just love fighters. Where is the Pind I was promised? I was told I'd get somebody prone to demoralization who'd take a couple hits on the chin and then retreat into his shell. Instead, I've got this demon of the pit who refuses to stay down. I love it. Good on you, my man.

After all, I have just one rule:


But losing cities and having to redirect troops will be painful. Pind could be a huge nuisance if he held onto rather than razed my cities, because then there's the danger that Amica could capture back with his knights. Nasty stuff, but you have to applaud the vim.

Before we lose cities, here are our demos:


Again, don't listen when people talk nonsense about "economic traits." Joao's a powerhouse: we're easily above average in a field of 23 living players on a map designed to cripple Joao, after being at war for... let's just say a while. Imagine if this game had had an expansion phase. (We also have to compare ourselves to Amica of the Organized Great Lighthouse. Only 2 players out of 23 have Engineering, and of course one has to be Amica. )

My circumnavigation attempt is taking too long, so I'm pausing research on Optics to get Engineering. It looks like Amica hasn't moved his catapults down with his knights, so maybe he's not interested in immediately declaring war once our peace is up, but I'm not sure and would like to get a round of Pikes out. (Mackoti is also building knights.) I worry that Amica worries that I'm a bloodthirsty lunatic and his only safety lies in putting me down. Don't know why he'd think that, but he might. 

[Old Harry]

I'm loving the salt - keep it up!

A slightly different take on Joao might be that he lets you expand to your natural borders on this map faster (giving you a better economy) and cheaper (meaning you can put more hammers into more units more early). Then it's up to you to leverage that into a economy...

[naufragar]

I'm loving the salt - keep it up!

I'm glad you say that because...

  Stupid, infuriating, unknowable computer game!   


I'm pretty darned sure that on a toroid, in order to unlock circumnavigation, you need an unfogged tile on every latitude and an unfogged tile on every longitude. My screenshot isn't super legible, but hopefully you can see that I absolutely have not fulfilled the longitude condition. Just last turn I switched off Optics because I thought I had a couple turns! Gah, that's frustrating.

Pindicator is taking the apocalypse in good stride. He's burned one of my cities and will burn another. (Actually, at time of writing, he has played, so no doubt Madras is gone.)


I'm moving some horse archers and a great-general-promoted spear to fight these units. Using the great general on a one-move combat unit is a bit of a waste, but there was a teensy chance that Pind could have taken Hornblower if he went for it whole hog.  Plus, assuming the spear survives which it absolutely should, I have a unit that enables West Point.  As I mentioned last turn, it would be a freaking disaster if Pind captured rather than razed Madras because then Amica would take back.

Speaking of Amica, I'm currently building a couple of settlers to resettle my cities. After that I need to put hammers into spears->pikes. I was counting sloppily, but it looks like Amica has over 20 knights and assorted other toys. He hasn't brought his cats down (yet) but 20 knights would require a lot of fighting. I've sent him diplo messages to the effect of "Good work on that fiendish Pindicator. Now I think we should go our separate ways in friendship and fondness, and never trouble each other again. Don't you, mate?" (Amicalola is Australian, hence the "mate.")

You can see in the above screenshot and in the one below that by the end of next turn, Amica and I will have pillaged every single tile in Pindicoria. This has caused Pindicator to retreat deep into the dark under the Misty Mountains:


I might  be able to finish Pind off in a few turns. (Well, quite a few.) We'll see if Amica beats me to it. I'm loathe to pull troops off the frontlines when my peace treaty with Amica expires.

If you can look through the scoreboard, you'll see that I've renamed Pind's former capital of Baggins to The Scouring. This doesn't really work, because in the books, the scouring of the Shire was done by the good guys, and Amica and I are clearly marauding orcs, but I felt it fit. Hilariously, after I renamed the city, I whipped its monument and Charriu's "Where there's a whip, there's a way" easter egg popped up. In certain CtH versions, there's a very rare chance of whipping causing the game to play that song from the animated Lord of the Rings movies. This had never happened to me, and the thematic appropriateness of it caused me to stop playing for a minute because I was laughing so hard.

A slightly different take on Joao might be that he lets you expand to your natural borders on this map faster (giving you a better economy) and cheaper (meaning you can put more hammers into more units more early). Then it's up to you to leverage that into a economy... 

Yeah...  What I didn't mention is that those were my demos at 21 cities, when the natural expansion room on this map is 16-18 depending on how many contested islands one grabs. I had taken 4 cities (5 if you count Hornblower) from Pindicator's allotment, which is what Joao's real advantage is. Assuming I can resettle the two cities I've lost, Amica and I will have pretty much split the Shire in two evenly. This is bad. Amica does more with less land. But whatever. That's about as good an outcome as I could have hoped. Maybe I can take Pind's island. Maybe in six turns Amica retakes all of Pindicoria to Hornblower or even beyond. 

This report's getting long. Let me wrap up. I don't know how Cairo has survived Mack's onslaught. I can't imagine that lasts much longer. Then we have the problem we had at the beginning of the game. If anybody makes a move against anybody else, the dog-piling ensues. It seems like nonsense for Amica or Mack to try to go head to head when they could try and poach me, so once this Pindicator situation gets resolved, I've got to think about my defense. I'll have a caravel out in a couple turns to scout for Astro land but I'm still a good 30+ turns from Astro. I don't think there's anything more I can do to improve my position besides wait for Mack or Amica to make a move and hope it doesn't come at my expense.

Edited because I will never remember which is longitude and which is latitude.