[PB67] Charriu promotes the arts

[Charriu]

Well in that case the trick didn't work

[Charriu]

The song



Music: Games&Symphonies - Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney 'Ending Theme'

I would think the Professor Layton series as well as the Ace Attorney series are famous enough to be known or heard of by quite a few people here. If not then you definitely have some catching up to do. Especially the Ace Attorney series is excellent. Probably the best visual novel game for people, who don't like visual novels. And of course the music in both game series is amazing for these kind of games.

This piece is more of a medley of famous tunes and themes from both games or better phrased this game in particular is a cross-over between those game series, which of course contains music from both. Have fun identifying each tune in the arrangement. I won't spoil it for you. Games&Symphonies is a spanish based orchestra doing all kinds of game arrangement as the name suggests. So that might be an option for people out of Spain to attend such a concert. You can find more stuff on their youtube channel and links to all the other information about them.

T67:

---

Did you notice? It is getting hotter in here. Conflicts are brewing around the world. First the conflict, which I'm least involved in between Ginger and Mjmd.



There's a settler in Mjmd's stack and I can only hope that they don't fall into an turn split shenanigans like we just had. They talked about settling that region and both can probably expect the other to rush a settler there. So they should observe a turn split even though they haven't seen the others settler.

But now for the main course, which is the brewing conflict and maybe soon war between Tarkeel and Superdeath. You probably know by now about the turn split issue between those two. It's all about this region:



Both wanted the spot 1SE of the wheat as a good defensive position against the other. I had quite some interesting diplo with both sides. Tarkeel reached out first to me.

Tarkeel: Le sigh. SD is seeking out conflict, and is going for the midpoint between us instead of settling backlines or metal

Charriu: OMG really? Is he crazy? Without metal? I saw your settler last turn, did you see one of his settlers?

Tarkeel: Yes, it's on the hill [1SE of wheat]. One turn before mine, and he double moved to be first in turn order as well

Charriu: I can't believe how ludicrous this is. First dropping Stonehenge on one neighbor and now messing around with the other and all of that without any metal units. Yes he does have horseback riding, but that alone won't save him

Tarkeel: He doesn't have archery yet, and the horse is exposed

Charriu: The audacity!

Tarkeel: Not logged in, but think I can have IW in less than 10 if needed

Charriu: I still can't believe how crazy that is. There aren't even any important resources in your direction. The only thing of worth there is the river.

Tarkeel: IW in 8, and I have the gold for it. Possibly 7 with TGL completing

Charriu: I think you can beat him or at least take the border city on the river. Thinking more about it that's probably what you want. Don't want to give Mjmd all the spoils in SDs core.

Tarkeel: I was wrong, he does have Archery, so he can build horchers. and yes, I could most likely recruit Mjmd into the fight, but then he'd get all the spoils
the border city will fall, I have metal escort just a few turns behind

Charriu: Well I think Mjmd will join even if you don't ask him.
I think there is just one logical step for SD to do next. Pinkdot Bing

Tarkeel: if I were him, I'd either settle the copper/furs city, or the pig/deer/silver/horse city

Charriu: Of course, I was a little bit sarcastic

Tarkeel: the thing is, SD is usually pretty bad at scouting, so he doesn't know how good his land actually is, and thinks it's horrible compared to previous maps

Charriu: Maybe giving him the map information about his east or north would have swayed him that way

Tarkeel: the funny part, that's the direction he has scouted
so he knows what's there, and it's uncontested

Charriu: [insert face palm meme]

Tarkeel: exactly

Well at this point I was very happy that I did not agree to any Defensive Pacts with Superdeath, which he asked me a few turns ago. I also only learned about the silver north of this spot after all the diplo and after I scouted it this turn. I honestly think this is a bad move by Superdeath. He already must be on bad relations with his southern neighbor thanks to stonehenge-culture-bombing him and now he starts another issue with his western neighbor. All of that without copper even inside his border. Add to that Superdeath reputation and we could look at a disaster incoming. My hopes aren't high for Superdeath. I can only hope he drags out those conflicts and weakens both Tarkeel and Mjmd in the long run.
It also provides a nice contrast between me and Superdeath. We both share the same neighbors. Now I admit that I have the easier border situation with Mjmd, but still I found a peaceful solution with both, while Superdeath chose the aggressive one. We'll see how that will turn out.
You may also have noticed that I wanted to convince Tarkeel not to crush Superdeath, but he already saw that that might be a bad idea longterm. Tarkeel and I continued the next day

Tarkeel: I offered him T90 for backup spots (which I believe is mine by right), or T150 for ceding the city spot he wanted, which I think is being more than generous, given that any NAP with SD is onesided. He declined.

Charriu: "T90 for backup spots (which I believe is mine by right)"

I did not understand what you meant by that.
But if you want to sign NAPs I'm open to them ?

Tarkeel: The only reason he beat me to the backup spot is the double move, which I believe is illegal, which is what I meant ?
I don't like the idea of NAPs in general, I think they turn into a wardate too easily
I much prefer ongoing cooperation and communication

Charriu: Ah I think I understand it now. I also understood our cooperation and communication as a pseudo NAP.

Tarkeel: yeah, but without a specific enddate

Charriu: That sentence felt just appropiate for the moment ?
Well in any case, I have your back in that conflict.

Tarkeel: If I'm stuck with him settling that city, I think that foreverwar is my only option. that is the only good city left to me, and it will deny me the two cities to the north, which again gives him access to my capital by sea

Charriu: But you should have the advantage right now, right? No metal for him, another conflict for him in the south, praets on the horizon, support lines via the baltic sea

Tarkeel: he does have pro-archers, and unless Mjmd cuts the horse, Keshiks
The only winner in that war is Mjmd

Charriu: That's true but praets should be able to punch through pro-archers and you more or less only need to hold the border right now. He has nothing that can beat your praets defending.
Mjmd also has another neighbor and I'm not talking about me.

Tarkeel: yep, but gearing for war wasn't what I wanted to do
all of this is assuming that I have iron somewhere not stupid

Charriu: I plan to have Iron Working by T94. I might be able to do it earlier and provide you with Iron if it is easier to reach for me then you.

Tarkeel: it's also very far from what I wanted to do in this game, but such is playing with SD
nah, I'll have to just burn to it, can get it in 8 I think.

Charriu: Of course, but let's say you discover Iron on a remote far away island, but see mine directly in my capitol, then I may be able to provide you with iron faster then you could

Tarkeel: that's true

Charriu: That's what I meant

Tarkeel: This comes to mind: https://suntzusaid.com/book/7/36/

Charriu: Doing Iron Working earlier I could have it by T88
Yep, always leave an out.

I understand that Tarkeel does not like this situation. It pains me a little that I am so happy about this upcoming forever-war between them, but it's just good for me. My fear of praetorians at my border have almost evaporated. Tarkeel also made a good point about NAPs in general. I didn't want to insist on any formal NAP as I do believe our cooperation is better then any NAP right now. NAPs are for people with whom you dealt less. That sentence just felt like an appropriate joke at the moment. Another great thing about this. Because Tarkeel will go for Iron Working sooner he may share the iron position in my territory before I can get the tech, which is nice for my settling plans.

Now I was expecting Superdeath to show up at some point and he did:

Superdeath: Good old not knowing we are in a settler race. If I had mentioned to him I was sending a settler that way, he could have declared war and made it a real bitch to settle there. (Or vice versa) so, Tarkeel should have said something imo, especially for a city he apparently was planning to plant on my side of "midway" named PINKY..

What are your honest thoughts on this?

Charriu: I honestly haven't looked that much into how this situation evolved. I realized at some point it must be a "classic" unclear settler race situation. Yes war declaration would have made settling there more difficult for you, but what is stopping him from war after you settle?
I obviously don't have a clear picture of the area, but I know your border with Mjmd isn't looking that peaceful with Stonehenge on the border. Because of that I would have tried to avoid other conflicts. But that's me

That's a bit cruel telling you that his planned city is named PINKY.

Superdeath: I offered a NAP and he can settle all his other planned cities without worry.. but he really doesn't like NAP

Charriu: Good to know. About that midway area between you two. It didn't look worth fighting over from what I have seen

Superdeath: Got a hilled city with riverside wheat. Beats most of my cities outside of capital

Charriu: Ok so good defensive position.

Superdeath: So many plains, and sheep.. feels like pb64 :/

Charriu: I have all plains to my south, but I don't find it absolutely terrible. Don't you have gold in your cap? That's why I called you the golden horde the other day. From what I have seen it didn't look so terrible there

Superdeath: Had to move to it, and I'm still pretty full of sheep :/
But yeah, it IS nice.. but I don't think it makes up for the giant wasteland

Charriu: Haven't seen that wasteland of yours yet.

Superdeath: Wanna trade screenshots of our land?

Charriu: I can do one next time I'm logged in. What are you interested in.

Superdeath: Wanna trade screenshots of our land?

Charriu: I can do one next time I'm logged in. What are you interested in.

Superdeath: Figured could do a general lay of the land available to you, and I can do the same? I won't be off work for another 3hrs or so

Charriu: I'm open to that. Like I said will do one next time I'm logged in or is it that urgent?

Superdeath: Just next time u can login is fine ?

Charriu: To my south are just plains as I've said

I know I am Superdeath natural ally and he is probably complaining about me not being a good ally for him in the future or already. Unfortunately I don't see a reason to go to war with any of my neighbors about conflicts that Superdeath brought upon himself. He has enough land to settle to his east and north-east, which also isn't too bad.
I also find it interesting that both Tarkeel and Superdeath both offered the other NAPs, but they did not find an agreement. Tarkeel doesn't trust Superdeath to uphold the deal and Tarkeel doesn't like NAPs. Both are somewhat true. Well good for me anyway. I just have to maneuver the diplomatic field careful enough not to antagonize both. I would prefer that both survive and Tarkeel keeps being my northern neighbor as I have a good working relationship with him. Not so much with Superdeath, but in case he does become my neighbor somehow I do want something to build upon. That's the reason why I accepted screenshot-sharing. At the same time I made sure not reveal too much of my land to him, especially not the interesting things like the existence of the Mediterranean sea, the choke points with all my other three neighbors. He can find that out himself. Superdeath might be my natural ally, but that doesn't mean he has to prosper from that. Surviving and weakening my neighbors is all I want him to do for me.
Between all of that Superdeath also had something to say about my civ:

Superdeath: In other news, how r u liking the UB?

Charriu: I absolutely hate it. ?

Superdeath: Needs buffed, gotcha

Charriu: The American UB will be looked at after PB65, 66 and 67 gave me enough information.

People are getting envious about me. Noted. Now what he doesn't know is that I skipped Wheel and Pottery to get a great scientist that early. But knowing him he will probably complain about my insane GNP next turn, when he has graphs on me. For those interested I try to do a comparison by T100 of how different the GPP situation would be with a generic civ.

Now one interesting thing in that diplo with Superdeath is right at the beginning. How could he know the proposed name to Tarkeel's city: PINKY. As you can see I tried to get that information from him unsuccesfully, so I hooked up Tarkeel about that.

Charriu: This should not surprise you, but I'm also in contact with SD. He knows that your planned city on the river is called Pinky. How can he know that?

Tarkeel: Because in an effort to sway him, I showed him my map of the area
It's on the midline, and pinky and the drain was a funny name, but I think he misread it. silly me
thinking SD could be reasonable

Charriu: Ah good I was afraid someone shares screenshots from third parties

Tarkeel: Nah. I was showing him that by settling that city, you ruin my game, but I guess he didn't believe me
I'm now down to three cities with food, one of them being the oasis/clam by your border

Charriu: Three? I thought everyone of your current cities has a food of their own.
Oh I get it you mean future cities

Tarkeel: yeah nm, I forgot the island city, so four. still.

Charriu: But even if SD keeps the border city I still think you could grab cities in Scandinavia. I would try that. Like the silver city.

Tarkeel: worst part right now; I thought SD would be reasonable, so I've mismoved my workers, delaying the attack
blergh

Charriu: Well don't take it too hard. Shit happens

Well good to know that Tarkeel gave that screenshot to Superdeath although I would have loved to sow distrust between Tarkeel and other players with that information. I notice that diplo isn't good for me as it turns me into an evil, scheming bastard.
Now Tarkeel came up with an important question next

Tarkeel: Could I ask for your scout to help out collecting intelligence? I think SD might have a Keshik built

Charriu: Should I enter SD territory and spy with my scout?

Oh boy. I don't know how I should react to that. I don't want to get Superdeath on my bad side. Have to think about that. At this point I also logged in and noticed the silver north of Pinky as seen in the screenshot way above. That made that region more important for Superdeath, which he didn't tell me and neither did Tarkeel, who thought he gave me all the map information from there.

Now that's a lot of diplo. I think this all to my benefit so far. Farmer's Gambit here I come. Nothing much interesting happened at the home front, but the game provided me with a little mystery. As you know I settled Mitsuda a few turns ago. That city is not connected to my road network, but still it got a domestic trade route last turn with Uematsu. I could not explain how this happened but I think I figured it out now and I found it hilarious. The trade route goes this way:

Down south across the sea from Mitsuda to Bings capitol
Over land from that capitol to his second city
Up north across the sea all the way on the west coast of Amafrica, which I just unfogged last turn.
Up north into Tarkeel's copper city over land to Valencia
Crossing the Mediterranean to the Nile
Through the road to my capitol
Up the river to Shimomura
Up the road to Uematsu

Or like this if you prefer visuals


I love this game for weird stuff like this. Oh and writing this I think the step up the Nile was unnecessary as Uematsu is on the Mediterranean. One last bit I also noticed at that moment. I am the only player having open borders to anyone. In fact to everybody.

[Miguelito]

I still don't really understnad what happened. SD double moved and planted a city in Tarkeel's settler's face, and there was no reload, so probably SD couldn't actually see the settler...?

But in your first picture there seems to be a Roman city SW of the wheat, which also seals off Scandinavia? But then SE of wheat is illegal, so further east? So Tarkeel wanted to push more in that direction? Well that seems greedy...

Well, what I understood is that there's beef between other players, and that's good for us, so yay

Ceterum censeo settler race turnsplits are bullshit, we should really agree to do coinflips. I forgot about it in the PB66 setup, and thankfully it didn't come up during the game, I hope to remember it if/when I'm part of a game setup again.

[Charriu]

I still don't really understnad what happened. SD double moved and planted a city in Tarkeel's settler's face, and there was no reload, so probably SD couldn't actually see the settler...?

But in your first picture there seems to be a Roman city SW of the wheat, which also seals off Scandinavia? But then SE of wheat is illegal, so further east? So Tarkeel wanted to push more in that direction? Well that seems greedy...

Well, what I understood is that there's beef between other players, and that's good for us, so yay

Ceterum censeo settler race turnsplits are bullshit, we should really agree to do coinflips. I forgot about it in the PB66 setup, and thankfully it didn't come up during the game, I hope to remember it if/when I'm part of a game setup again.

That's pretty much it. Both wanted to settle that Wheat spot. SD double moved Tarkeel after playing always after Tarkeel for quite some time. That double move allowed him to settle there. At least according to Tarkeel. The screenshot is from after the whole turn split issue was resolved. Tarkeel planted that city in the screenshot after he didn't get a reload and the same turn I think Superdeath planted on the wheat spot.

But the important summary, that you already provided. Beef between other players to our advantage.

[Charriu]

I think this PB is probably dying before Christmas. SD declared war on Tarkeel last turn and Tarkeel send me this:

So, as I've been complaining in my thread for some time, this is not the game I signed up for. Ancient era war was supposed to be the thing this game did not devolve into. Seriously considering withdrawing from the game, and have been working on a 5-player map as compensation

We already know that Mjmd and Superdeath are unhappy with the map too. Ginger also said something in that direction. Bing as always is a mystery. The problem that I see. If this PB is called early to make a new map, it probably will never go up again as I think Ginger and GKC will probably leave this PB as the already appear to be drifting away from it due to real life.

Still if this PB goes up again with a new map I want the worst start like I said. Gotta show the others that you play what you get.

[Miguelito]

Pity, this was a promising one. Well played, if too little

[Charriu]

I still think it sets a bad example to end a PB early because you don't like the map. It's somewhat unfair und ungrateful towards the mapmaker and also towards other players that enjoy the game and are heavily invested in planning.

I only pushed Tarkeel to post it because I don't want to lose anymore of my free time that the majority of players want to end as soon as possible. 
Still I will do the T100 GPP comparison. I'm not sure I will do the songs for the next PB as I already used some songs here and I don't think I have enough for a second one.

[Charriu]

My disappointment with the other players handling the map topic continues. Now they are talking about rolling up a random Torusland or Pangea and dropping our starts in there. If I were Commodore I would never do a map again. So ungrateful

[Charriu]

Well the setup for the next iteration of PB67 is dragging along just like the setup for this one. I didn't want to push it or get involved so much this time as I feel I was forcing people to play PB67 already. Superdeath and Mjmd are ready to join the new iteration. Bing is happy with PB67 and joining the new iteration, but remains silent as ever except if you poke him. Ginger grumbles his way into joining the new iteration of PB67. Always good signs. I expect a slow turn pace like with this game. We are most likely doing this as a new PB69. Happy times.

Just a quick question. Do you want me to continue the songs thing in a PB69?

[Magic Science]

Just a quick question. Do you want me to continue the songs thing in a PB69?

Yes! The songs were a nice touch for your reports.