[PB63 Spoilers] Ginger and Lazteuq find a way to peace

[El Grillo]

You can use the [ screenshot ] tag to resize your pictures.

[Ginger()]

Thanks El Grillo, I’ll try that out.

I seem to have noticed a bug, the numbers don’t add in my expenses screen I posted in my last post. My total expenses including inflation and foreign trades reaches a maximum of 226, where my income is 231, but my total gpt is -10? What. Interestingly that 15 gold difference between expected and real is the delta of my foreign trades, but why would it get counted twice? Have I done my math wrong is the display broken, or am I losing 15gpt for nothing?

[Amicalola]

My PB59 income started to get pretty wonky compared to the finance advisor later on. I should have reported it as a bug but I had too much else going on. I'm not sure what causes it though.

[Tarkeel]

In PB62 we discovered something was wrong with the unit cost. If you hover, you should get the correct number.

[Ginger()]

Hmm, so I’m paying much more for units that I thought I’d be. Well I’m not about to delete anything so I guess I gotta pay up. As long as “we’re all playing the same game” then it doesn’t matter, that’s the argument I use for things like difficulty levels and AH resources.

How does that interact with Agg? and I wonder if Charriu’s record keeping for Agg’s performance might’ve been affected by that bug.

[Charriu]

As far as I remember that is only a display bug. I worked on a bugfix for that and will test that before releasing the next version

[Ginger()]

   
Look me in the eyes and tell me that this is okay and balanced.
I know this ranting of turnsplit is a bit of "haha newbie discovers pitboss", and I'm not passing judgement on Mjmd for using the tools he has available to him to win, but he absolutely knew stepping on a 7 hammer tile would delay Bing's production, and I'm sure that was part of the calculus, along with scouting. 
And let's not kid ourselves, this is an exploit, as much as being able to right-click scry for culture with a settler or for cities with a defensive unit, except unlike the latter two examples, one player gets a monopoly on it. 

And there's just no counterplay to that, it's total bullshit. I'm sour because the truth of turnsplits is nice guy loses. My problem is I'm eager to check out the new turn when I get that turn notification, but If I keep playing in front of Mjmd then I put myself at a crippling disadvantage in a possible war. Being nice in how you run the game costs you in game which is a terrible incentive system.

Yes, the way this war is swinging has colored my perceptions, I'm a flawed human like that, fuck me if Bing cannot read a power graph or at least do C&D if that graph is denied to him. Bing's game has been a little bit hilarious for me because I swing between "he's a genius"  and "wtf" . Like he got probably the best pick for this map, along with Fabled, Org Sumeria is fantastic, I've mentioned this before, but FDR of Sumer is probably my favorite simcity combo in a vacuum, but I think Mjmd flubbed it with CHM, which I find pretty useless on Sumer since you're right next to Monarchy anyways on their standard tech path. Going Hammurabi and stacking cheap mil police would've been the way I would've played it if "early war happiness woes" was my concern.
—I digress—
Bing gets Zara of Mali which is just an excellent solid combo, no synergies to distract, just great individual components, and although Org is anti-synergistic with Mints, who cares, Skirms and Cre/Org are just very very stable traits and should lead to a solid midgame no matter what. Then he stagnates on 3 cities for a long time and I discount him as overly cautious building early military. Then he jumps up to 5 then to 9 cities in the blink of an eye, and whips GLH, and I think "wow, major contender to win if he wasn't stuck between the two best crop yield empire", then I rope him into this war because I think to myself: well I want to bring additional pressure on Mjmd to force concessions (which worked almost perfectly if I hadn't lost Neapolis   stupid   fucking  turnsplit  ). So that plan sort of works and I peace out. I think to myself "well at least Bing can fend off Mjmd as he has nearly every city on a hill, and Skirmishers, and has shown a tenacity and the Will to Whip in past games.", but nooooooo, for 15 turns leading up to the war that we had timed and counted down with gold messages, HEWHIPPEDMARKETSINEVERYCITYGGGAAAAHHHHHHWWWAAAAAAATTTTTTTTTHHHHHEEFFFUUUUCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK
I think "okay, maybe he's tricking me" 
Nope, he faithfully joins me in the war.
I think "wow okay so he'll use the Markets and Mints happy boost to whip more" 
Nopenopenopenope.
   
Here's a pic I took from last turn, he saw this coming. 
I think to myself "okay now that he sees the threat he's gonna whip"
Nope. fires a golden age, and his cities increase sizes. 
I think to myself "what a wonderful world"

[Ginger()]

You know what would make me feel better?
   

More cities 

[Ginger()]

Cornflakes has stables y'all, and has been hard-teching for 20 turns powered by a great merchant. This can only end poorly. I might have to ditch Civil Service plans and shoot for Knights of my own, or Pikes at the very least, the difference between the two is about 1500 beakers, whereas CS is 1200 beakers just extra on top of everything. Otherwise I won't be able to really influence the events. It's a bit too meta to say this out loud, but I also think this might have some unfortunate interactions with Fabled needing a replacement. As a general rule in all 4x or wargames, when players don't want to play anymore, it coincides with suspiciously quick and total conquests. I'm not saying this to pass judgement, but because I like to make written predictions and compare them against what will actually unfold when it does.

Edit:
On a side note if Cornflakes is building stables, he probably has set his sights on Theology as well, otherwise why bother, just run Vassalage. As I write this, I realize maybe he wants to keep running bureaucracy... Idk, I think I go for Theo directly after CoL, need to be quick. Saving gold, I should be able to one turn it. My 100% tech rate is the world's highest GNP... pity I have a 10% breakeven.

[Ginger()]

Civ isn't good for my blood pressure, I feel tense logging in each turn, wondering what horror is going to greet me. Looks like Mjmd took the first city with no casualties.

And elsewhere CF is on the march, probably plans to launch a cripple attack with maces then follow up with Knights.
   

I canceled my fish for fish with Cornflakes and resent it to get a more a recent confirmation of our arrangement. 
Then I turn around and try to warn Fabled , but he seems checked out poor guy.
   

You know I realized Fabled and Cornflakes share the same green contentious border that I share with Mjmd, this conflict was inevitable, and Fabled has not even popped borders in the city about to be attacked. 

Here I am making a questionable decision, but I have to do something, so I flash Mjmd my stack. I'm doing it early because I want to see how he responds. At the least I'm going to force a status quo war/peace to give me 10 turns of peace of mind. At best maybe I slow his conquest by distraction. 
   
Time will tell if aggravating him further will be worth it