This is a Spoiler thread - Dreylin, PB28

[Krill]

Well. Do me a favour and empirically test how that mechanic works please.

[Dreylin]

Ugh. Now I bet we'll have to wait another 24hrs ...

[Dreylin]

Whosit's power is spiking, and he has Horses connected. I have dialed up up some Spears in the NW.

[Dreylin]

Whosit's power is spiking, and he has Horses connected. I have dialed up up some Spears in the NW.

To expand on this; some of his increase in undoubtedly population increase, some is likely Barracks in his new cities, and I think that he got a new tech in the last few turns (although that in itself would be worrying), so probably little enough of it is mobile. But those Horses in themselves mean I need some Spears, and I have been skimping on new military builds for a while now. So Greywacke and Breccia will start to pump a mix of Spears & more Axes, while Arkose will continue to work on the best defense - 3rd ring borders...

All that aside, it's really not an easy border to assault (old picture):


Regaining the Sheep tile blocks the only fast attack route on Arkose, and even assaulting Greywacke requires a turn's warning to hit from the NW, otherwise across a river. Maybe pushing straight through to Breccia is the way, but I'm busily clearing those forests to prevent Jaguar shenanigans and actually neither of us have put many roads on the border, so he'd still have to slog across the hills to even reach it.

So I'm probably just being paranoid again.

In foreign news: Jowy has spent the last turns of his war building the Colossus in his one(!?) coastal city. Meanwhile Adrien/Mardoc have spent their time building Settlers - 2 new cities planted in the last 3turns. However, they have just proceeded to lose 2 cities to Jowy over the last 2 turns, so maybe those hammers should have been invested in troops instead. I guess Jowy doesn't need to build his own Settlers if Adrien/Mardoc are doing it for him.

Confucianism was founded last turn. I wondered if that was Fenn using his 'Henge Prophet from a few turns earlier, but when I checked the map I didn't see the icon next to any of his cities (of course what I should have done is check the Religion screen ). For that matter it doesn't appear to have been anyone on Island #3, so that means all Religions so far have been founded on Island #2. Oh, and I think that Judaism is still available ... I'm tempted to divert for it, but really can't afford to.

I'm also kind-of tempted to start the Great Lighthouse in Serpentinite, but it has a Worker to finish and then a WB to build for the coming Western city. I guess once that's done I'll take another look.

[Dreylin]

t90 -

Or I'm misremembering:


That definitely needs countering. I considered 1turning Archery, but have no build slots for Archers next turn, so in the end I did not proceed. I will reconsider that on the coming turn, though, as there will be queues available the following turn.

Here's what we have been building instead of an army:


With 4 chops incoming and a little creative starving, I could complete this on t93, but the 2 Settlers I have in production are not due to found their respective cities until t94 at earliest, so at least a turn's worth of delay is in order. Adding a fifth chop on t94 means that I can divert to 1turn a unit this turn and still plan to complete eot94. (t94 is also incidentally the turn that the Ivory comes online)

Of course if it looks like Whosit is coming this way then I'll have to put HG on hold and put the chops into additional units as fast as I can ... although at least I'm lined up to do so. Or I can just turn the HG pop into units via the , but that may be too late.

Another consideration floating in my mind is whether I should make an effort to get the Horses online faster than the current plan of 15+ turns from the Obsidian Border pop....

[Dreylin]

Actually, what I should be doing is engaging in diplomacy!

There's no noticeable uptick in power from Grimace, so it doesn't look like they are allied against me at this stage so maybe I can divert / direct Whosit away from me and against Grimace. How to do it with the limited tools available is the question...

In the absence of Currency direct financial brides are difficult, and with resources balance/duplicated pre-Calendar, happiness bribes are out as well. Therefore I think the text will be:

War with Grimace (in 5t)
Open Borders (in 5t)
Dreylin gifts ??? units to Whosit

Wrapped in a map trade so that acceptance could be verified - and also to show trust and/or that there's lots of land available off-island.

Knowledge incentive in the Map trade (he doesn't know how much incentive, but then neither do I); financial incentive in the Open Borders (which also let him go for Currency) and the "please don't attack me" incentive of offering additional units. I might be going overboard, but I think that I'm definitely the more logical target for him (non-AGG) and I don't think I am currently in a position to defend myself adequately. I guess we'll see.

If any Lurkers think the above text violates the written or unwritten code of diplo for this game then please let me know.

[Dreylin]

As for fast access to Horses, with most of my Workers up in the North right now, I think the only way to have them connected in a timely manner would be to settle on them:


Even the "split Mega-city" option 1SW would take 1 additional turn to plant the city and 6Worker turns to get up and running - I'm sure I can get 2 Workers there, but maybe not 3, so let's say a total 4turn delay.

Founding on the Horses would sadly lose the use of that tile for Obsidian, but it wouldn't require a change in the rest of the dotmap, while only divorcing a single Grasshill tile. I'll see how things stand in a few turns when the Gneiss Settler pops out.

[Dreylin]

[Dreylin]

t92 -

A diplo-tastic turn, but not what I had expected:


Well that's not much use on it's own ... oh, so the World Map trade was in a second window I guess I'll need to think about that.

Oh, and a Peace Treaty offer from Adrien/Mardoc along with their World Map ... that's awfully generous, but I'll need to make certain there's no more cities between me and the linking Island.

First business was advancing the WB - OK, looks clear so I'll sign Peace ... but for my WM for your trouble.

Now on to Borsche:


Well I didn't expect him to be showing up from this direction! I wonder if he's met anyone else:


Guess not; so my trade routes would be his first off-island. Also checked and no-one I have met so far has Currency. He has 8 cities so wouldn't fill my routes, but I don't think I can pass up the trade even if it does put Circumnav at risk.

Although I do think that risk could be quite small: 1) he hasn't met anyone from Island #3; 2) his Galley has to have traveled West from his main island. These make it a high likelihood that he has the me/Fenn or Whosit/AM position on his island, and therefore has likely not explored past whomever is in the Grimace/Jowy start position. Or basically, I think it unlikely that he has the bridge across the Western edge of the map, whereas my Workboat is about to start that way from the other side.

Summary: I reoffered OB & WM trade in the same window.

So much for inter-island politics, what about intra-island? Well, Whosit has not played his turn yet - given his usual windows, that comes across as a strong suggestion of waiting to claim second half of the timer - so he hasn't seen my diplo. Equally, that means there's still nothing suspicious going on at the border, so I decided to put my 3 pending chops into HG this turn - still on course for end-t94.

I whip the second Settler from Gneiss, and another Axe out of the East. I'm also going to 1t Archery for the Soldier point bump as much as anything else. I did finally get Whosit's research, so know he's saving on Currency. I re-sent the diplo offer, but ticked down the OB offer to 5t. That may not be possible after spending for Archery, but with Borsche routes coming in then maybe it will. (Of course Borsche routes dilutes the value of Alphabet for me, but if the promise of OB with Whosit incentivises him to attack Grimace instead of me then, then it's definitely worthwhile.)

Will I be at war next turn...?

[Dreylin]

Well it seems like no-one wants to play this turn. Maybe it's Friday night, or maybe it's that the turn roll was ~4hrs later than usual since Whosit crashed out and left it to expire and we just extended the Timer. OK, so Grimace has played (6min turn incl. 1whip after hitting End Turn), but no-one else.

I'd really rather wait for Borsche to have played before I go in, so I can see the results of the map trade with him before playing my turn, but I also probably can't guarantee being able to play tomorrow if that's when he does get to it. Oh, and as I speak Fenn goes in...

Anyway, once he's out I'll go in and see what has transpired with Whosit - whether he accepted the Map trade - and maybe I'll retreat out to think overnight.