[SPOILERS] Magic Science and Nobody Else in Pitboss 66

[Amicalola]

Fwiw, while I agree it makes for less interesting games (well, until the fireworks start to fly, which is hopefully still coming ), I would think that this is pretty typical for PB games. Something weird has to happen for serious contenders to emerge after long-fought wars with major losses on both sides, because everyone else has to experience the same thing (e.g. PB64) for no one to use that opportunity to pull away from the field.

[Magic Science]

Fwiw, while I agree it makes for less interesting games (well, until the fireworks start to fly, which is hopefully still coming ), I would think that this is pretty typical for PB games. Something weird has to happen for serious contenders to emerge after long-fought wars with major losses on both sides, because everyone else has to experience the same thing (e.g. PB64) for no one to use that opportunity to pull away from the field.

You are correct about the weirdness of premature strong vs. strong wars. Not every game can be as awesome as PB64.

I think the main factor is how boring the strong vs. weak wars of profitable conquest were. They were all 1 vs. 1 wars (with minor exceptions of distant/offshore cities) and they were all handled quickly in 1 round of war.
Dogpiles of multiple strong players against the weak often cause some jockeying among the strong. And multiple rounds of war to grind the victim down mean the victim was not that weak, therefore not that boring.
And I think those more interesting types of strong vs. weak wars of profitable conquest are not so weird.

...

Anyway, Superdeath lost 2/4 more cities, including his 1-tile island, so 6th place by Turn Eliminated seems hilariously likely. The only thing is that rival lowest Power shows more than a million soldiers, which is a lot more than me, which might compensate for Superdeath's inferior defensive position for long enough to out-last me.

Also Plem-adilly is about to discover Physics and therefore Airships! I had forgotten about those weird guys. Amphibious collateral exists for the common non-China man after all!

   
My former capital was is a Top 5 city! .

[Magic Science]

Well, they got me.

My eternal foes, the villains Plemo and Piccadilly of the Roman Empire, cursed be thy names, captured Aphrodite Venus and eliminated me with no warning last thing last turn. .
Meanwhile, Superdeath still clings to life in his last city, "1istheloneliest#".

ELIMINATED: Turn 213, 1515 AD.
RANKING: 7/12.

Well, it was good. My strategy earned me 64 more turns, which was enough to outlast 4 players I otherwise would not have outlasted.
Recently, I hoped that I would outlast Superdeath too, but that's alright.
Now I hope that the capture of Aphrodite sparks war between Rome and Spain, hehe. Even in death, I might have my revenge.

[Magic Science]

   
   
   
   

Goodbye world.

homeo4001.

[Qgqqqqq]

GG MS!

[Tarkeel]

If all these starts are hand-crafted, then why did you decide to include those inaccessible Crabs? Of course you cannot answer that now, but I would love if you could post an explanation of that Crab tile's role in the start balance in one of the lurker spoiler threads for me to see in many months. It is the strangest feature I have encountered in a Pitboss start yet.

Not Krill, but: You basically got a fourth resource that's only unlocked after your second or later city builds a workboat for it. I had a similar lake-clam in PB67, but the prize for weirdest start resource must be this:


Miguelito's start in PB49, with a cow on a different landmass.

(also you are required to make one, there is no “Nobody Null Civilization” to choose. Except Germany. ).

I know you jest, but Germany was actually in high consideration for us on this game.

Traits next. Terse immediately. Thank you Tarkeel.

Not sure what for, but I'll take it. I really liked your take on Uniques.

This Galley, Hera’s Dream, is a sign of stupidity. I built it too soon and there was nothing for it to do. There still isn’t. However, when RefSteel I the Axeman was done escorting Apollo’s settler to its final resting place, he boarded the Galley and went looking for Opportunity. What harm could it possibly do? Maybe Civeel thought of the water as an impermeable barrier and left me an opening. AND THEY DID, HAHAHAHA! .
...
Now the war aim is to stop them from resettling Crushbone on the ruins or 1W. I must be allowed to settle the southernmost point on my side, but I still don’t want to do that for a while. A Phalanx will join RefSteel I soon. And maybe a Settler? I thought that was too aggressive, but maybe that is irrelevant now.

Civac has covered this earlier, but I still don't understand why you'd taint your reputation as unreliable neighbor by attacking without making any gains for yourself. The main effect of this was setting us back by 5-10 turns, which had a huge impact for us later on. The only effect on yourself was that we'd have joined in when Rome attacked if we weren't busy with Egypt, instead of propping you up against the more dangerous foe.

1 Axeman and 1 Phalanx were never going to be enough to do more than momentarily delay Civeel, and since I do not want to settle for the Crabs anytime soon, momentarily delaying them is pointless. So, all that these further aggressive moves achieved was endangering some of my military as well as the region of civilians that they had originally been supposed to defend (Apollo and Artemis had 2 out-of-position Warriors between them for defense during these turns…). Foolish.

Again, I fail to see why you did this when you knew it was pointless?

What a strange little war. There was no combat between units. None. . I gained nothing at all, but Civeel was harmed substantially. They lost their 7th city on Turn 68. Was inflicting that harm worth losing all friendliness along this previously placid amphibian border? What are civac2 and Tarkeel like? Are they vengeful? I do not know.

I don't particularly hold grudges, but I do try to judge peoples behavior. One of the more important parts of FFA game is to know which borders are safe to underdefend, and where you must focus. It's part of why SD collapsed so fast in this game; everyone had to defend against him so everyone was in postion to join on the feeding.

If anything, you did substantial self-harm by focusing on the south instead of the north, letting Rome get the jump on you.

This is only a small matter, even if it is a confusing one. Civeel, are we archenemies or what? . Maybe they are not so vengeful, or maybe city #7 on Turn 68 is not so bad of an insult for them as I thought (it’s no city #3 on Turn 44), or maybe this is a bluff to get me to lower my guard.

Enemies, but we had a higher priority :P

Hera is stunted by that Gold mine, which it has worked every turn for the past 30 turns. It has earned me Sailing and Metal Casting (almost), but at what cost? SIDE NOTE: I think Krill may have given everyone a nearby luxury metal.

Spoiler: He did not. Or rather, our gems were places such that Alhazard could claim them easier than us. Oh, how we envied your gold!

The idea is: I should have Closed Borders with all my neighbors (Plem-adilly, Civ-eel, Mjmd, and GKC) and Open Borders with the neighbors of my neighbors who are my prospective friends (superdeath, Alhazard, Amicalola. Maybe not superdeath for much longer, because his border with Mjmd is minor). But I think it is worth breaking the rule for now to explore the interior of my neighbors’ lands.

The problem with this philosophy is that your neighbors neighbors are already predisposed to being friendly in times of war, but you've just told all your neighbors that you're untrustworthy. Similarly, you'd want your neighbor's to intervene on your behalf in a future war, and not gang up on you.

However, this Peace Treaty offer is valuable information. I think it confirms Option Two: “The best defense is a good offense”, so my cities should be relatively safe in this war.

I believe it says they'd rather fill their backlines instead of having to worry about you.

Oh, and the Civ-eel vs. Alhazard war continues, but with no War Weariness, so it must be a boring scouting war. BORING.

Lack of WW doesn't mean it's boring though.

The situation is grim for my beloved fourth city.

Was Demeter actually your fourth city? I was thinking it was a recent settle, as it was so unsupported by both units and other cities!

The same old 3 players still border Aphrodite and can capture it whenever they want: Plem-adilly, Civ-eel, and Mjmd.

Not quite so. Cracking a one-tile island like that isn't really feasible until Astronomy (you need galleons to bring enough units), preferably with frigates and airships. As for why no blockade? Mainly turnpace consideration. This was a perfect example of why one-tile islands are bad.

Overall, the dogpile on Superdeath doesn't change my mind about this game being boring.

Nearly every war in the entire game has been a war of a strong player inflicting inevitable doom on a weak player at the moment that was most convenient and profitable for the strong player. There were no wars of conquest in which the outcome was in doubt, when the weak player had a chance to hold out. There were no wars between equals. We are past Turn 200 and the 4 big dog contenders have hardly fired a shot against each other all game long.
The most I can say is that Gavagai and Mjmd had 1 small skirmish a long time ago, and Mjmd and Plem-adilly are having a stalemate skirmish now.

Strong disagree. Both of our wars against Egypt was roughly equal strength and tech. Rome's attack on you was likewise.

[Mjmd]

I actually understand the T/C city raze if you thought the islands were going to be contested, the one I'm more confused on was the GCK raze. That one did just seem opportunistic and obviously had consequences for GKC strength down the road.

Also, for all that is holy why did you finish Colossus!

[Magic Science]

If all these starts are hand-crafted, then why did you decide to include those inaccessible Crabs? Of course you cannot answer that now, but I would love if you could post an explanation of that Crab tile's role in the start balance in one of the lurker spoiler threads for me to see in many months. It is the strangest feature I have encountered in a Pitboss start yet.

Not Krill, but: You basically got a fourth resource that's only unlocked after your second or later city builds a workboat for it. I had a similar lake-clam in PB67, but the prize for weirdest start resource must be this:


Miguelito's start in PB49, with a cow on a different landmass.

Krill did answer the question himself at the very end of the map-making thread.
And for the record, I liked that Crab. It was interesting and it made me think, as it was intended to. And of course it was better than not having a Crab.

(also you are required to make one, there is no “Nobody Null Civilization” to choose. Except Germany. ).

I know you jest, but Germany was actually in high consideration for us on this game.

I might have been mocking BTS-version Germany instead of CTH-version Germany because of unfamiliarity with the changelog, but I can't remember for sure. Either way, now after playing Pitboss 69 I agree that CTH Germany is a fine civ and worthy of being picked.

Traits next. Terse immediately. Thank you Tarkeel.

Not sure what for, but I'll take it. I really liked your take on Uniques.

I was thanking you for the idea to capitalize the three letters that usually comprise the abbreviation of the trait even when spelling the full name of the trait. IMPerialistic instead of Imperialistic, PHIlosophical instead of Philosophical, etc. Maybe you got the idea from someone else, but I saw it first from you, and I thought it was worth a try.
And I'm glad another person liked that theory post about Uniques. I still like it too.

This Galley, Hera’s Dream, is a sign of stupidity. I built it too soon and there was nothing for it to do. There still isn’t. However, when RefSteel I the Axeman was done escorting Apollo’s settler to its final resting place, he boarded the Galley and went looking for Opportunity. What harm could it possibly do? Maybe Civeel thought of the water as an impermeable barrier and left me an opening. AND THEY DID, HAHAHAHA! .
...
Now the war aim is to stop them from resettling Crushbone on the ruins or 1W. I must be allowed to settle the southernmost point on my side, but I still don’t want to do that for a while. A Phalanx will join RefSteel I soon. And maybe a Settler? I thought that was too aggressive, but maybe that is irrelevant now.

Civac has covered this earlier, but I still don't understand why you'd taint your reputation as unreliable neighbor by attacking without making any gains for yourself. The main effect of this was setting us back by 5-10 turns, which had a huge impact for us later on. The only effect on yourself was that we'd have joined in when Rome attacked if we weren't busy with Egypt, instead of propping you up against the more dangerous foe.

And I don't understand how you can read those words of mine and reach that conclusion of yours. Do you seriously think I deliberately, knowingly committed a mistake and damaged myself just to fuck with you for no reason? That's absurd.
Let me tell the tale of the Razing of Old Crushbone from the beginning again. It is a tale of two mistakes in a row.

In the beginning, I overrated the value of Pig Island, for two reasons.
One, I misunderstood trade route mechanics. I thought that domestic trade routes with a city on Pig Island would be worth +1 commerce compared to the foreign trade routes available at Writing. This was obviously incorrect, because the +100% from another continent versus the +150% from sustained peace both result in +2 commerce trade routes. I blame this error on rustiness and on mixing up my actual non-PRO leader situation with the pre-game snakepick thinking I had done about the power of PRO on this map with the islands around (because a PRO leader actually would have +1 commerce from domestic trade routes with a city on Pig Island compared to the foreign trade routes available at Writing).
Two, I thought that settling on a Pig for a 3-food city tile could redeem the total lack of other land tiles or resources. I thought I could get away with settling there early without hurting the snowball too much. That was pure, unconsidered .
Therefore, because I overrated the value of Pig Island, I trained a Galley in Poseidon to go settle it early on. However, between the time I finished the Galley and the time I would have sent a Settler to Pig Island, I realized the error of my thinking about the island and decided not to settle it anytime soon. But I already had the Galley.

Then, a little while later, you settled Old Crushbone across the strait from me. The land on both sides was actually on the same continent, so your city blocked me from settling any city for either of the 2 Crabs. I was not happy about being denied those Crabs in the contested zone. Training a new Galley just to try to raze Old Crushbone and get those Crabs would have been questionable, but I already had a Galley from a previous, unrelated mistake, so I didn't have to spend production on a new one, and it was worth a try to raze Old Crushbone. I loaded my Axeman and put my Galley in surprise attack position, and then next turn I sailed forward with it, saw that Old Crushbone was empty, and razed it to clear the way for a city of my own to claim the 2 Crabs. However, those 2 Crabs were at 2nd-ring distance to the only legal spot on my side, and unlike on your side there was no 1st-ring Wheat to redeem it initially. It was a bad spot compared to some other spots around with more 1st-ring food, and I preferred to leave it for later. The only reason to settle it sooner was the competition from you. I tried to get both things (settle better spots first, but still beat you to the 2 Crab spot on the second try) by sending units to your side to delay any resettling attempt. Meanwhile, I would settle the other, better spots and come back for the contested 2 Crab spot later. Basically my units were claiming the spot for me without actually settling an inferior city ahead of schedule. That idea shortly proved impossible because you had plenty of military and really wanted to resettle that spot. I chose to retreat my units and abandon the 2 Crabs instead of settling for them too soon, and you settled New Crushbone.

That is the tale of the Razing of Old Crushbone.
In conclusion, I did not intentionally attack you for no benefit of myself. I attacked in an earnest attempt to benefit myself by claiming 2 Crabs that you took in the contested region, and it didn't work, even in light of already having a spare Galley from an unrelated previous mistake. I did not deliberately commit a mistake to fuck with you. Those words of mine you interpret as confessing to deliberately, knowingly committing a mistake and harming myself just to hurt you are actually what I wrote in as self-criticism in hindsight when I saw what had gone wrong. I should have seen it in advance, but I honestly thought it was a good idea at the time, and I only realized my error afterwards.

And if earnestly trying to benefit myself by attacking someone else and failing to actually benefit myself by doing so means I am tainted with a reputation of unreliability, then all but very greenest and wimpiest among us are so tainted too, including you. 


And by the way, I resent that your word for the negative reputation I have supposedly gained is "unreliable" (or "untrustworthy" down below). I am perfectly reliable and trustworthy. I take my message deals very seriously in this new era of True AI Diplomacy. If I had sent a Fish for Fish to you, then you could have counted on me to leave you in peace for a while. But I never did send a Fish for Fish to you, and that was on purpose. I was only "unreliable" according to this convenient, passive idea of how I should act that you built up by yourself with no input from me. That false image is what I was "unreliable" to.

You can see that I am reliable and trustworthy to messages and deals I actually agree to from my play in PB69. Pindicator and I enjoyed demilitarization to the tune of 1-2 Archers for garrisons for more than a hundred turns across the gulf from each other on the basis of renewed Crab-for-Crab, and Naufragar enjoyed safe passage through my culture and actual military aid to attack Pindicator in the Final Dogpile, despite the fact that he had finished taking half my land and knocking me out of contention for victory not 30 turns prior, on the basis of my dogpile countdown with him.
An entire other game has taken place between the Razing of Old Crushbone and the end of this game, and I just don't see how I have either confirmed or suffered from this reputational taint you say I have.

1 Axeman and 1 Phalanx were never going to be enough to do more than momentarily delay Civeel, and since I do not want to settle for the Crabs anytime soon, momentarily delaying them is pointless. So, all that these further aggressive moves achieved was endangering some of my military as well as the region of civilians that they had originally been supposed to defend (Apollo and Artemis had 2 out-of-position Warriors between them for defense during these turns…). Foolish.

Again, I fail to see why you did this when you knew it was pointless?

I didn't know it was pointless. It seemed like a good idea. See above.

What a strange little war. There was no combat between units. None. . I gained nothing at all, but Civeel was harmed substantially. They lost their 7th city on Turn 68. Was inflicting that harm worth losing all friendliness along this previously placid amphibian border? What are civac2 and Tarkeel like? Are they vengeful? I do not know.

I don't particularly hold grudges, but I do try to judge peoples behavior. One of the more important parts of FFA game is to know which borders are safe to underdefend, and where you must focus. It's part of why SD collapsed so fast in this game; everyone had to defend against him so everyone was in postion to join on the feeding.

If anything, you did substantial self-harm by focusing on the south instead of the north, letting Rome get the jump on you.

The idea is: I should have Closed Borders with all my neighbors (Plem-adilly, Civ-eel, Mjmd, and GKC) and Open Borders with the neighbors of my neighbors who are my prospective friends (superdeath, Alhazard, Amicalola. Maybe not superdeath for much longer, because his border with Mjmd is minor). But I think it is worth breaking the rule for now to explore the interior of my neighbors’ lands.

The problem with this philosophy is that your neighbors neighbors are already predisposed to being friendly in times of war, but you've just told all your neighbors that you're untrustworthy. Similarly, you'd want your neighbor's to intervene on your behalf in a future war, and not gang up on you.

Eh. That "philosophy" was a product of me overthinking every little thing as I got back on my feet in my first game in a while. You can see I already moved on from it in practice in PB69. Though I still think people are too quick and willing to give Open Borders to everyone who asks.

And again, I disagree that I ever told anyone I am "untrustworthy".

However, this Peace Treaty offer is valuable information. I think it confirms Option Two: “The best defense is a good offense”, so my cities should be relatively safe in this war.

I believe it says they'd rather fill their backlines instead of having to worry about you.

I believe I still haven't read their CivForum thread, so I don't know what it meant.

Oh, and the Civ-eel vs. Alhazard war continues, but with no War Weariness, so it must be a boring scouting war. BORING.

Lack of WW doesn't mean it's boring though.

You have to admit that getting an enemy city without generating WW by threatening and causing their defenders to flee, which allowed Barbarians to capture the city on the interturn, and then immediately taking the city from the Barbarians, is a bizarre way to get an enemy city that appears strangely in the Foreign Advisor and PBSPY. Though I still should have noticed Alhazard lose a city in the bottom right.

Also, you did scout through his culture with a Work Boat during the war. .

The situation is grim for my beloved fourth city.

Was Demeter actually your fourth city? I was thinking it was a recent settle, as it was so unsupported by both units and other cities!

That is a plain insult, not an inquiry. You knew and know that Demeter was my fourth city.

The same old 3 players still border Aphrodite and can capture it whenever they want: Plem-adilly, Civ-eel, and Mjmd.

Not quite so. Cracking a one-tile island like that isn't really feasible until Astronomy (you need galleons to bring enough units), preferably with frigates and airships. As for why no blockade? Mainly turnpace consideration. This was a perfect example of why one-tile islands are bad.

I wrote that on Turn 203, when all 3 of you had Astronomy. It was within your power to capture Aphrodite and eliminate me at that time. You (the 3 of you) correctly and predictably chose not to for a little while longer because it was still too expensive, but you could have done it if you really wanted.

PYFT concerns are valid, but by that time my turns were so quick and easy to play that it probably would have been fine.

And I don't see the connection between "1-tile islands are extremely difficult to capture" and "1-tile islands are bad and should be banned from every game, even hyper-random games". .

Overall, the dogpile on Superdeath doesn't change my mind about this game being boring.

Nearly every war in the entire game has been a war of a strong player inflicting inevitable doom on a weak player at the moment that was most convenient and profitable for the strong player. There were no wars of conquest in which the outcome was in doubt, when the weak player had a chance to hold out. There were no wars between equals. We are past Turn 200 and the 4 big dog contenders have hardly fired a shot against each other all game long.
The most I can say is that Gavagai and Mjmd had 1 small skirmish a long time ago, and Mjmd and Plem-adilly are having a stalemate skirmish now.

Strong disagree. Both of our wars against Egypt was roughly equal strength and tech. Rome's attack on you was likewise.

Yeah, you have a point. I wasn't thinking of myself when I wrote that. As for Alhazard, I identified you and Civac as a top 4 civilization fated to conquer him one way or another long before it happened, so I didn't think much of it when it actually happened. But it's true that he had Knights too.
Though in those two cases it was still good players conquering bad players, sharks conquering minnows. Standard operating procedure.

[Magic Science]

I actually understand the T/C city raze if you thought the islands were going to be contested, the one I'm more confused on was the GCK raze. That one did just seem opportunistic and obviously had consequences for GKC strength down the road.

Funny, I see the razes the other way around. . The Razing of Old Crushbone was the one I should have recognized was a bad idea in advance, because it would never work either to settle for the 2nd-ring Crabs soon after (there were much better snowball spots) or to block Tarkeel + Civac from settling that spot without settling it myself for long after (it was more appealing on their side and obviously they had the military advantage there). On the other hand, the Razing of Old New York was a success; Hestia's original spot was reclaimed and it got a Fish and a Stone back. GKC's future strength wasn't something I considered important.

Also, for all that is holy why did you finish Colossus!

Because it was a great Wonder for my land, and at the time I expected to hold off Rome and keep Poseidon?

Actually, I'm not sure I was doomed to lose Poseidon even after I built it, though I had already made many mistakes before then. Demeter was captured on Turn 89, and The Colossus was built on Turn 90. Most of the hammers invested in The Colossus were invested before the Fourth Greco-Roman War began. I was not mostly building it instead of Axemen in the key turns of war between the Battle of Demeter and the Battle of Poseidon. You can read the focus of the reports between Turn 90 and Turn 94. It was all about infrastructure and recovery for me then, not pure survival, but not The Colossus. That was already done; it was other infrastructure. If I had focused on crazy whipping of Axemen and pure survival instead of other infrastructure, even that late, I think The Colossus might have been safe and very helpful for a while longer.

I'm not sure that The Colossus was really the final nail in my coffin. The very final nail was failing to produce military vigorously and exclusively even in those few turns after The Colossus was done. I don't know.

[Mjmd]

Ya getting resources back makes sense.

There is an old quote from maybe Sulla? that you can do 2/3 of the following: expand, build wonders, or build military. You expanded way forward and also your land shape made the blob awful to defend if your empire got split (your land shape in general was probably a T0 loss) and you built a wonder. The problem is this meant the 3rd pillar of military was weak, which didn't pair well both with forward city and against agg Rome. You were already talking war with Plemo when you started it and then just kept building it despite losing a city. I've certainly overstretched this as well. Heck I've failed at doing just 2 pillars.

BTW I'm sure my diplo got lost,but did you ever consider sallying forth with me? I tried a couple times and was trying to signal to bring crossbows, but all you brought was a spear. I really wanted to give you your capital back. SO i could use its culture to raze Poseidon . In PB59 I also made the decision to retreat to an island, but I tried signalling to Charriu that I would help vs Mig, but he never took me up on it while I was still relevant.