[pb40 spoiler] Götterdämmerung: Destruction Is The Masses' Entertainment

[Coeurva]

That part about regretting is just about superdeath drawing first blood and possibly being about to draw some more; not meant seriously

Somewhat meandering thoughts:

superdeath must have seen the 8,000 increase on the power graph and thus know we've teched Archery (or finished two axes, which would be even worse for short-term attacking prospects). I'm assuming he'll know that the impi rush window is over as soon as graphs do show the archers. It could help that barracks also give 3,000 soldiers and we finish one by whip eot, which he could confuse for an archer, although the Victory screen might give this away, but then at least one archer will finish next turn -- thus he'll have to respect our power graph from T57 at the latest. They can't all be barracks.

Yeah, demos can take a few hits from here. Funny that we might have increased our chances at landing the Oracle just by ignoring the Oracle at first, to take what appears to be a slight early lead (shared with shallow_thought, I'm sure demos don't tell the whole story and e.g. we're working two plains mines right now, which we're not whipping because we need the citizen for the Oracle build (Canoel) or because we're actually whipping the granary off that next turn (Rungholt)). Due to this, other teams might now be more concerned with catching up in city count (public because of Civstats) than chasing a religion. Speaking as a newbie myself, that's easy to overrate (and maintenance easy to underrate) in importance early. Don't have 3 cities on T70, sure, and get your second settler out as early as feasible because he's much cheaper (in gpt) than all others and your fh units come out faster, which cascades; but don't necessarily worry if you have 7 to someone's 8 or 9 -- your strategy might just demand such a trade-off (ironically, this is a rare lesson that you can carry over from Immortal / Deity SP, but I failed to do just that in PB37). Similarly, not building a granary first usually means you "lose" food, but that's only a mistake if this food isn't effectively traded for something more valuable. Here that would be 6t earlier fp cottage growth -- at a point when getting out more settlers is easier than supporting those cities financially.

Given the apparent turn split, I think it's most likely that Magic Science is now attacking superdeath's impi/warrior garrison in some front city with PRO archers, to which superdeath whipped several axes in response (archers aren't easy to dislodge, even when they can't take cities). If so, I reckon that they've setttled towards each other, as surely MSci would not trundle across the map for 8t or whatever with 3str 1-movers. The main indicator is that superdeath hasn't settled his X4 yet when he was pretty quick about his X2 and X3; this could be why.

[Coeurva]

While we're not yet at T55, some more thoughts about upcoming projects:

* We need Priesthood by the start of T65 (not negotiable) but bpt is by far our weakest area. The sandbox is more lenient on gpt than reality (due to # of land tiles not being the exact same; I'm slightly negligent about box maintenance) -- of course we end up with 77g by T63 running a constant 50% sci in the sandbox (in the game, I will obviously go with binary to ensure we can react to an early loss in the Med race). Should be more than enough. But if not, we need to cottage the floodplain at Munsalvaesche instead of farming it, which would fix its food surplus at the notoriously underwhelming +4. We can make that up with a grass farm after popping borders, though, which should at least save a worker turn (5+5 instead of 7+4), and the granary will come early here, so I think it's viable.

* I think we should actually overflow the (unmodified) 34h we'll get next turn into a 2t worker at Venusberg, and just chop the archer / granary afterwards using the other forest (whatever works). I've run it through Zulan's combat sim, and actually even three BtS impi (two Cover, one Shock) can't break Munsalvaesche stuffed with archer + Shock warrior + warrior more than 12% of the time (average defender loss 1.6, attacker loss 1.3 units). So I think we don't need the second archer until we stake out the gold city. Obviously, another worker is very useful at this stage, and Venusberg has no inspiring tiles to grow onto past size2 (121 jungled ivory? no thanks) before borders pop, so why not use the time to leverage our trait and make a fh unit.

[OT4E]

Why would someone attack with archers? Even pro ones? Even when facing impis you will more likely choose common axes. But the idea is interesting . You have uncommon mind.

[Coeurva]

Some reasons:

* the archers will already have been built, so why not use them?
* if superdeath pillaged MSci's copper (no information), he might have been screwed on axes for a few turns anyhow
* if superdeath might have chosen Shock on his extant impi to whack fortified warriors, then MSci's non-AGG axes should have worse combat odds than archers, at 10h higher cost
* even when archers make no offensive progress, have fun actually dislodging an archer stack in the Ancient Age -- unless you have immortals or such... so MSci might be able to pin defenders to cities nonetheless, and the duel has already been initiated between the two

That said, indeed Drill I isn't the most scales-tipping promo and I can't recall an archer skirmish in any game I've read about. Also it should be a mixed stack with some axes, so as to anticipate superdeath's most likely reaction (and the "stack" is probably not especially large to begin with, MSci even built another settler, just enough to contest some area or threaten a raze back). All this assumes, of course, that I'm reading the situation right at all. BUT THAT'S WHY WE'RE BUILDING THE ORACLE, RIGHT

[WilliamLP]

You guys should have played Mali.

[Coeurva]

T55: superdeath has sent us crab/crab but I saw no reason to accept. He sees our power graph, he knows we're not an offensive threat to him, and if his intent is to "trick" us into not building up defenses because of the presumed sanctity of seafood, then accepting only makes him more likely to attack. What this shows is that he's likely fighting someone or planning to, because why else would top-power Zulu come asking for non-aggression?

Rival Best Soldiers went up to 61,000 (that's at least four impi or axes added since his 39,000 flatline, I'm quite sure he only built his third ikhanda after that) after another superdeath whip last turn. But he's still on three cities.

[OT4E]

I agree. I never liked those deals. If you are attacking someone, why would you tell your other neighbor that you are vulnerable.

But people make demilitarized zones this way pretty effective. I am sure we can live without it. Also unlikely he thinks in the way "they didnt accept fish2fish then I'd better attack them".

[Coeurva]

I don't know, if we fish/fish superdeath we should be free to attack Charriu with our massive 1 archer stack.

T56 demos


shallow_thought (don't think that can be anyone else) has been growing a lot of pop and taken a foodhammer lead over us for the moment -- nice going. Third in soldiers despite a small military is reassuring, despite the AGG Zulu maverick.

Tech rate is looking solid; we should reach Priesthood just on schedule. We currently make 20 gpt at 0% sci and can finish Med with 3t @ 100% sci, 28bpt, -8gpt (with some overflow from Myst, I think we have ~20b invested already); breakeven rate is shown in screenshot but we're actually doing as promised and saving gold. The founding of X5 on T60 should cost no more than 5gpt, for which our cushion will be more than enough -- might be possible to finish Med eoT59 via 90% sci, in fact.

Micro: capital set to avoid growth for extra food in the granary (will finish the turn at 26/26f working our new cottage on the riverbend instead of sugar farm, thus the -2 CY drop). I'm mentioning this here mainly to make sure that I turn this off T57. The worker at Venusberg appears eot and can help make the ivory camp and then second cottage faster, or we make the fastest possible granary (at this point). I'm not yet sure what's better, although I'd guess it's the latter. (The ivory can be sped up by 1t regardless of the plan, though.)

The visible archer is covering our worker btw. superdeath could strike this tile from the fog otherwise. Damn the Mobility promotion.

[Coeurva]

superdeath also sent us copper/copper this turn (just saw that when I logged in to pause for the Persians); I declined.

[Coeurva]

We come up ~5b short otherwise, but working the plains spice for 3t carries us to Meditation eot59 (one turn at 80% sci); 30bpt being divisible by 5 without remainder is a nice touch (prereq bonus).

We might be able to research Priesthood by T63, which should mean a faster Oracle -- eot70, I think -- if and only if we can forgo garrisoning Ravenna with a metal unit for a while, but it's far from Zulu territory, there'll be lots of chops flying around in an emergency, and Rav grows quickly enough. Who knows what plans our competition could work out even if they should reach Med 1-2t later. I'd still want to meet Magic Science soon (but not fish/fish him; no reason to annoy superdeath).

No religion fell this turn; we're 2nd in GNP and Rival Best is Superdeath, who seems to be going for Writing with a 40% discount (spike in graphs). Fingers crossed...

Also cleaned up signs after screenshot and turned off Avoid Growth in the capital again. e: And looks like Charriu settled what should be named Siren right as I was writing this. Will Forza and Magissa be separate cities, I wonder?