GAVAGAI

[Gavagai]

Naufragar is fucking insane.

[Gavagai]

So, this is contested territory. Naufragar, apparently, wants to settle a city 1E from Deer. I asked him not to do it and in response, HE DECLARED WAR AT ME. Think of it, over THIS city spot. Never mind that he needs my help against Amicalola who just kicked his ass; never mind that we had trade routes and resource deals; never mind that I have a larger army and he really cannot hope to gain anything from this war; never mind that the city is tactically indefensible as I have my HAs nearby and he, I think, has no HAs at all (at least, I do not remember seeing any and also no elephants from him despite having Construction for a long while). I think this is the most ridiculous bullshit I saw in my civ career.
He offered peace but I am not taking it until the situation with this city is resolved. I want to see either see his settler moving away or burn the thing to the ground.

[Gavagai]

My fucking god, what is he smoking!?

[Gavagai]

As I started reporting, some thoughts on what is happening in the game. Both Amicalola and Naufragar are actively reporting, so I'll assume lurkers are aware of the main historical facts about the war. I will just supply my perspective.



First and foremost, since the moment Amicalola gave me two cities in peace I was constantly losing money at 0 percent science. My early game was economically catastrophic because I took two extremely expensive cities from SD and Ginger, paid loads of money in maintenance, and eventually gave them back without getting any profit. It already has put me behind in the sense that I did not have a chance to tech towards Currency. And after that two new cities from Amica put a further dent in my treasury: distance maintenance cost here is horrendous.
For that reason, I never really wanted to capture anything from Amicalola, even though I could probably be seduced by the idea of receiving Get to Heaven for free. My main purpose was to raise the city to the north of Alexander III and liberate the wet Corn. I stayed for a few turns in war after that because I wanted Amicalola to damage himself by whipping out units. In that I succeeded and the end result of his fighting with Naufragar was just fantastic for me:



This city formerly belonged to Nauf but now is Amica's and pretty much guarantees that these two would only be concerned with each other for the foreseeable future (or so I thought). This is good for me - but the more I am thinking about it, the more I realize that it is also bad.
I am very much afraid of Ginger. I cannot fight him, his army is a tech tier ahead of me and I think he will soon get knights. The main idea on which I was banking so far was that if he attacks me, most of my territory would go to Amica/Nauf and Ginger does not want that. But now they both are so crippled that it might be no concern for him. So, I think I will try to get out of the war with Nauf as fast as possible: I'll just raise the stupid city and be done with it. And move my army to the west.

[Gavagai]

Overall, my main desire is peace. I think if I am left alone for a long enough time, I have a decent chance to win the game. I have the most land that is mostly crappy but can be made profitable if I am allowed to grow my cities and cottages in peace. It will take time because I have little food here but it will happen and with the serfdom all the tiles will be at least decent.
Unfortunately, the chances of being left alone are slim. I border four other civs, three of them pretty powerful. I believe that the probability of each of them attacking me is relatively low (well, assuming the current war with Nauf is not going to be a real war but I just cannot see how it is) but if you combine all these probabilities, you still get a decent number. And I am very vulnerable to dogpiles as my territory is vast and I cannot really maneuver my forces quickly.
Amica and Nauf are locked in their own conflict (see above). Ginger is the most risk (also see above) but I still believe Commodore is a more natural target for him. SD cannot do anything by himself but will be absolutely willing to join a dogpile. In fact, I am rather shocked he did not attack me during the war with Amica. My border was completely open at that time, as matching Amica required me to assemble everything I had, and I kind of just had to risk it. On the other hand, allying with Ginger would make no sense for him, as they both would want the same thing from me. But he still can ally with Ginger anyway, if any player here can do all kinds of ridiculous things out of pure spite, it is SD.

[Gavagai]

[Gavagai]

Btw, Pyramids turned out to be an absolute life savior in this setup, it is due to them I can limp towards Currency instead of being forever caught in a poverty trap.

[Gavagai]

Naufragar is the worst.

[Gavagai]

Can anyone explain how he plans to hold it?



Like, why? Why settle a city you cannot hold against the warning of your neighbor who does not want your city here? Why go through all these motions with the inevitable result at great cost for yourself? On one of the previous screenshots you can see he has another city at my border that is cut off from any land reinforcements and also cannot sustain a dedicated assault? I am moving my main axe stack there just to make future peace negotiations easier. Not that I am going to actually attack with it because I am not an idiot or jerk but still? Why pick a fight with someone whose friendship you need and to whom you are so vulnerable?

[Mjmd]

Naufragar is the worst.

   Edit: nvm you already posted.