Commodore David the Fifth of the horsie dudes.

[Commodore]

So shenanigans are now unlocked, lads. This little friend needs to sneak into somebody's front line. Right now I'm thinking of making an interdiction zone before Jkaen's vines, might as well choke him as we're planning on making him Victim #1.



Better news will be reported next turn. Anyone care to guess what's happening?



Life is good in horsie-land.

[DaveV]

Anyone care to guess what's happening?

The horselords get religion?

If you're trying to maintain plausible deniability on the spider, don't move it inside anyone's borders. Watch out for recon units and other spiders, who can attack you themselves or direct other units to attack you.

[HidingKneel]

I think that we're in need of warriors even more than workers, if we're about to settle past the vine.

As for that spider... I'm not sure that choking Jkaen will lead to eliminating him much sooner. Especially since he seems to be opting to settle protected coastal cities first (I'm not sure how this PYFT war is supposed to work, with the tech levels everyone's presently at...) I'd send it to vampire territory, instead.

[Commodore]

I think that we're in need of warriors even more than workers, if we're about to settle past the vine.

As for that spider... I'm not sure that choking Jkaen will lead to eliminating him much sooner. Especially since he seems to be opting to settle protected coastal cities first (I'm not sure how this PYFT war is supposed to work, with the tech levels everyone's presently at...) I'd send it to vampire territory, instead.

Unfortunately, the PYFT war isn't going to work, given the current tech levels. Maybe when we have flanking II horses to catapult down the vines a bit, but right now, the only quick option is the one Mist banned, water-walking Drowns. Pity because we're well set up for that if we could use them. The vampires...yeah, I could send it to them, the DMZ is fortunately "within one turn of the vines" so a slow spider can wander all over the place.

More warriors is the plan, but for now the veteran lizards are going to guard Raider's Retreat while healing. Diamond Shoals (the gems/pig/crablake site) will wait for a bit more support from both workers and warriors.

[Commodore]

A couple slow turns have crawled past since the last update, with one nice thing happening in particular. Woot! Now we have 2 culture per turn, and if we care enough to spend a Prophet on it, Water Mana! /trying not to be depressed about the water walking ban.



We're going to be exploring the forest's ways in two more turns as well. Raider's Retreat will be working the pirate port, a mine, and Fin lakes for the forseeable future, all well and good.



I like this game, it's genuinely sad how slowly its going.

[Ilios]

Woot! Now we have 2 culture per turn

Four per turn actually.

[Commodore]

Four per turn actually.

We're both wrong, it's 4.40! Okay, that's because we're in Religion, but still. Nice to have a solid city here, and we need to get these horses online stat, that's a dang good tile. Once we grow to size four it'll stagnate a bit working a sage until the deer come online, which will be ~9 or 10 turns with Hunting as our next tech.



I do love me some hunters. I somehow neglected to mention, got the spider-infested mine event near Return. I figured if the game was going to give us a free toy, why not accept it? I did wince a bit at the odds this turn for Fiirkan's attempt at capturing the bloody thing.



Fortune favors the us, however, and we now have not one but two spiders to play a merry hell with someone. Oh, and also, Fiirkan is at 19xp, just seven more from varrious and sundry barbs and we'll have FotT unlocked.



Looking pretty good here in horselandia, unless we get really unfortunate in the next turn, Way of the Forests and city #4 are founding next turn in the same spot. One more settler is due in roughly seven or eight turns for the Great Wastes spot and then we'll be pushing hard for Aristogarianism.



Not that, strictly speaking, we need the boost right now. Demos are looking really really good, which makes me a bit nervous about what Thoth will do to redress things. It's a really good thing Jkaen's terrible, terrible turn pace has pissed off the vamps, otherwise I'd be thinking a tag-team was incoming.



Here's the empire, circa Turn 57. I'm pretty happy with how things are going, although I'm also aware that I'm milling around slightly directionless. Solid civ-play and lucky events =/= winning, particularly given the odd King of the Hill setup. Still, pretty nice start isn't it?



Looking for a bit of dedlurker support here. I'm thinking before we push to the hill(s), we will be killing Jkaen, hopefully with vampire support. Two of these rich cores, with a set of pirate ports too, ought to see us pretty well off for the hills, plus with the Lanun gone our circumnavigation ships ought to rule the waves and make Charlie Hill our own personal bailiwick. Thoughts?

[HidingKneel]

Looking mighty nice. But as you say, frontrunner is always a target. Especially since we may be the first to settle past the vines. I think we ought to tech HBR as soon as possible, and start getting xp on some horsemen.

[Commodore]

Looking mighty nice. But as you say, frontrunner is always a target. Especially since we may be the first to settle past the vines. I think we ought to tech HBR as soon as possible, and start getting xp on some horsemen.

Absolutely, that's the next tech after Hunting. If Murphy is right, we'll definitely be able to unlock FotT/get XP on horses soon too, as I expect most of the nasties to come gunning for the new settlement.

[DaveV]

Looking for a bit of dedlurker support here. I'm thinking before we push to the hill(s), we will be killing Jkaen, hopefully with vampire support. Two of these rich cores, with a set of pirate ports too, ought to see us pretty well off for the hills, plus with the Lanun gone our circumnavigation ships ought to rule the waves and make Charlie Hill our own personal bailiwick. Thoughts?

Sorry, I was going to respond to this and then the server went nuts.

My question: what's the goal of this game? Holding the objectives. I think that should be your goal: get there with a decent force and start accumulating the king of the hill points. You're uniquely able to mount an early offensive, and I think it should be against the objectives instead of one of the other players.