[Spoiler] RB Pitboss #2 - Shaka of Rome

[LiPing]

If you're playing in this game, please press 'Back' now and click on your own thread. Otherwise, I welcome your input, questions and thoughts, will attempt to respond; and hope that your time here will be interesting and/or entertaining.

With that out of the way...

Hello, I'm LiPing, and I have the dubious distinction (according to Sullla) of being the first person to require a thread to be deleted in RB history. My apologies for being so disappointing
Okay, more seriously. I've avoided botching up the thread title this time (I hope), so here we are, as Shaka of Rome.



From Turn 17 on, Whosit is the new ruler

[LiPing]

Mortius of Zulu (Dead)
(+2) There is strong evidence that you honour your deals and commitments.
(+2) We have a long term, mutually beneficial agreement in place.
(+1) We share the same trait (Aggressive)

NAP - Broker/Plako of Korea - T67
(+1) There is evidence that you honour your deals and commitments.
(+1) We have an agreement in place.
(-2) You declared War on me!
(+2) ... Right, I asked you to.
(-10) I feel that I am required by necessity to eliminate you.
(-3) You made several unreasonable demands.
(-2) I know you think I am unreliable.

Kodii/Iamjohn/Zeviz
(-2) You declared war on our Ally!
(-2) You eliminated our ally from the game!
(-1) I am wary of you as a looming threat.
(+3) ... Well played.

[LiPing]

Civilization/Leader Choice
I was reasonably satisfied with the slot I drew, I was hoping to be down the lower end of the "U", and I was 9th of 10, so I thought I'd have a good chance to get things that could work reasonably well together, and that I'd be reasonably comfortable playing.

I'm not really surprised how many Financials were picked with no tech trading, but I am slightly surprised at how highly it was prioritized, five were out by the time for me to pick, and only one pick was used on Civilization. I felt that I'd like to try something that's not going to be in the majority, go for an early-militaristic Civilization and see what I can do with it.

I was tossing up between Rome and Zulu, and decided on the former. I'd rather the Civilization I'm playing has a colour I like, since I'm going to be looking at it for awhile to come, and I happen to like purple.
More seriously, although I feel Zulu are more solid, I have very strong doubt that I'd be able to do enough with them in a 10 player game to get a good position. I'm also not really comfortable with the Zulu starting techs; I do really like starting with Mining no matter who I am, and I don't like starting with Hunting at all, especially with no Huts.

My leader choice was between Kublai Khan (Creative) and Shaka (Expansive). I also considered Alexander (Philosophical) to have some sort of economy support, but one thought put me off it, although unfortunately it's a very metagamey thought, based on the last game's gimmick that I don't expect to be repeated, and that we have a very large mapmaking team (thanks to all of you, by the way ) that'll be working on the balance. I decided to take Expansive over Creative, firstly because Ruff already did that previously, and I am not particularly fussed with the idea of planting a bad city or two early, or attempting to operate with 1-ring cities for longer periods of time, so I am hoping that Expansive will let me get a faster start.

Other Players, and Picks
Of the other players, I am expecting (in no particular order), Mortius, Sullla+Speaker and Sunrise+Regoarrarr+Darreljs to be the strongest, based on my perception of player strength. My apologies if anyone viewing this later is offended, and you can laugh at me later if it turns out that they all die early on

Trait breakdown is like this:

Financial - 5
Expansive - 4
Organized - 3
Aggressive - 2
Philosophical - 2
Creative - 1
Imperialistic - 1
Spiritual - 1
Charismatic - 0
Industrious - 0
Protective - 0

Creative sure fell out of favour since Pitboss 1, huh.

Picks that surprise me a bit are Kodii's team taking Mehmed over Bismark, which would guarantee the only Industrious civilization, and Jowy's team taking Greece, I think there were better unique units available to them if that was the intent.
I am a little disappointed that Sullla's team didn't end up picking Elizabeth of Korea, I was hoping to see the combination played by him because of a comment/discussion about it around the time Pitboss 1 was starting up.

Pregame Plan
I do not consider myself to be a good player, and tend to go for a lot of number-crunching plans, which may not necessarily be any good. I have very little experience at all beyond the early to middle game. (In SP, the outcome is usually decided before then and I get bored, and MP doesn’t tend to involve that either. Not that I’m particularly good at MP either!)
I believe that my diplomatic ability could be accurately described as "Abysmal beyond belief". It's why I was worried about playing with someone else initially, I was worried about starting a civil war
I am hoping that the percieved threat of the civilization/leader choice will help run some of the diplomacy for me, and maybe pick up some allies, I do have every intention of keeping my word on any arrangement I make, and (if I get any with others) hope others will do the same to me, however I realize this could just as easily backfire and have everyone nearby decide to gang up against the Big Bad Evil Guy.
Overall, I expect to lose very badly, I don't really think Rome is a good pick for winning the game, but I hope to at least be entertaining.

My pre-game plan is, if possible, to avoid getting in a corrosive war of attrition with Mortius (the only other person with Aggressive), or… getting wiped out or crippled by Mortius’ Zulus. Beyond that… well, it’s pretty straightforward, I guess. I am the only person to have no economic bonus (I suppose, Dantski and Kodii+John+Zeviz's situations are similar, (perhaps I'm greatly undervaluing Organized) but they have something, and I have absolutely nothing on that front) so I don't think there's any real option for me to go for a long game. I think, if possible, it makes most sense to me to attempt to work together with one/some of these three teams against the better economies. I begin to see why the Civ 4 AIs have a 'Warmonger's Club'.

Well... I guess that's all from me for now, so over to you all lurking out there, any questions or comments?

[novice]

Thanks for the update, and for planning on entertaining us lurkers :-)

As you edited previous posts with your update, your thread wasn't bumped, I think? Anyway, it is now...

[LiPing]

Thanks for the first reply. I will try, but I can't make any promises and/or guarantee that what I think might be entertaining will suit

Also, before we start, open question to everyone reading, what do you expect or would you like to see in the content of updates?

[Krill]

Pictures are good, as is all diplomacy. General overview of the situation as you see it is also useful for us spectators to understand who the game is progressing "on the inside".

[LiPing]

Just posting this up before going to work, the start looks something like this:

[LiPing]

I attempt to fog gaze...



Initial thoughts:

I guess, this is at the south end of the map (snow on trees).
So far I can see a Crab, a Plain-Forest Fur and a (Dry?)Rice. This isn't really what I was hoping for, that rice isn't adjacent to the settler, and I'm not creative, so if I decide to grow to size 2 first, it'll take an extra turn. [edit]That was wrong, we are not playing on quick and it takes 10 culture, not 5, so creative wouldn't have helped anyway.[/edit]
There's also no 1-turn-move plains hill nearby to settle on (I kinda expected this one though), or forested plains hill to work, so I can't take advantage of Expansive to get a faster worker out, or build a 8-turn workboat.
The position looks a bit production poor, I can only see 2 hills (Normally, I think the game guarantees you three at the start location?) so overall, I'm very tempted to move.
If I couldn't see the rice, I would automatically move the city 1N, as it'd add 5 choppable forests, and trade 3 useless water tiles for the grass hill and two extra grasslands. It might actually still be OK to walk away from the rice, if it's dry, it's unlikely to be used at the start, and I can pick it up with another city later.
Alternatively, I could think about going 2W... It'd cost a turn, but I'd get to grow the city to size 2 a turn earlier, so that cost isn't so bad, but if that is a dry rice, and there's nothing else, then the food will be quite ugly. I don't think it's possible for a river to be adjacent to it, or I should be able to see it, but there could still be a small lake to the NW.

[LiPing]

Warrior-SW


So, the rice has water, and another crab. I can also now see the bare minimum every tile the 2W spot would have (2 grasslands, 1 plains forest, 1 grassland forest in the fog), which is excellent, because now I can sit and compare the two. No hammer improvement over the in place spot, which is disappointing, but it has 6 forests vs 3 (one doesn't count) and 3 water tiles vs 8 and has 8 grassland vs 4 (one doesn't count), loses the fur, but 1/2/4 (or 1/1/5 if I chop it) is not a good tile early on anyway. The rice becomes adjacent, although the crab does not, but the former is more important anyway.

Now, over to Bunbunmaru news...

Sullla moved without settling.
Dantski, Mortius and Athlete have settled. One of them has 7 land tiles, and the other two have 11 between them. Most likely then, all are coastal.

Soldier count:
athlete4life10 + kalin - Willem (Cre/Fin) of the Ottomans (Janissary/Hamman)
Wheel(4000), Agriculture, Warrior (2000) = 6000
Broker33 + Plako - Gandhi (Phi/Spi) of Korea (Hwacha/Seowon)
Mysticism, Mining(2000), Warrior(2000) = 4000
Jowy + Yazilliclick - Pacal (Exp/Fin) of Greece (Phalanx/Odeon)
Fishing, Hunting(2000), Scout = 2000
DMOC + Nakor - Darius (Fin/Org) of the Holy Roman Empire (Landsknecht/Rathaus)
Mysticism, Hunting(2000), Scout = 2000
Iamjohn + Kodii + Zevis - Mehmed (Exp/Org) of Inca (Quechua/Terrace)
Mysticism, Agriculture, Quecha(2000) = 2000
Speaker + Sullla - Elizabeth (Fin/Phi) of India (Fast Worker/Mausoleum)
Mysticism, Mining(2000), Warrior(2000) = 4000
Mortius - Ragnar (Agg/Fin) of Zulu (Impi/Ikhanda)
Hunting(2000), Agriculture, Scout = 2000
Dantski - Julius Caesar (Imp/Org) of Mali (Skirmisher/Mint)
Wheel(4000), Mining(2000), Warrior(2000) = 8000
Regoarrarr + darrelljs + sunrise089 - Peter (Exp/Phi) of Byzantium (Cataphract/Hippodrome)
Mysticism, Wheel(4000), Warrior(2000) = 6000
/9 = 4000

3 Scout starts, 1 other person with Fishing, 5 Mysticisms (3 Financial), so the possibility for a lot of slow starts out there.

I'll be back later... (Girl is now planning)

[LiPing]

Well, I've been trying to compare various starts.
Just to give an idea of what I'm up to and my methodology, here's a sample.



I'm going to spare you the deluge of bad plans which probably have errors (as an example, I didn't bother with the health since there's going to be "enough"). I have a lot of them, and I don't think (m)any people would be interested in looking at pages of not-very-different comparisons which won't get used.

In other news... the map is standard sized, according to the info screen, and backed up by the tech costs, so it's probably going to be quite squashy. Also Jowy has settled and according to demographics, has 5 land tiles.

[edit] Regoarrarr settled afterwards, they have 6 land tiles.[/edit]