Joey/Parkin get up and slam

[GermanJoey]

Oh, well thank you Krill as well!!!! I owe you a neck.

[Krill]

Oh, well thank you Krill as well!!!! I owe you a neck.

[GermanJoey]

[Grimace]

What's the news, man? You've been quiet for weeks!

[GermanJoey]

Well, I guess I should do an update for this game, huh? I actually started to a few turns ago, but I had a lot to say so it took a few days.

So, this game is weird as hell. Suttree, I guess ragequit because people asked him to stop spamming those for me, although I don't know why that was so insulting to him. I've been thinking about it a lot, and these are my theories of what he was thinking:

1.) He really did just want The Blackjack somehow, and was trying to figure out a way to buy it off me without doing an explicit illegal city trade. Because I kept refusing the trade, he thought I just couldn't figure out the price from the message, and thus kept sending it. Hence the boat swords; he wanted me to empty the garrison and take the city, I think. Unfortunately, this kind of deal just doesn't work without diplo.
2.) He was desperately and honestly trying to communicate something else to me - but what? I've read a lot of RB threads but I've never seen one where a player offered all their cities plus random resources and random amounts of gold and gold per turn. What the hell was I supposed to make of this? What could he have wanted?
3.) He truly was trying to pull a feint in order to get revenge for my earlier "aggression," forgetting that he was the initial aggressor at the USS Maine. I mean, we did have OB for quite some time afterwards, he had to have realized how close that barb city was to me. His actions were so weird. I had a chariot sitting right across the border, watching his city fill up with swordsmen and then watching the swordsmen seemingly disappear, with a galley nearby. Three galleys full of them, forking my island and the border city that was the subject of all these stupid diplo messages! There's also his GG to consider, which I haven't seen a whiff of. Could it have been on the galley that I sank? He could have also settled it, for 3 promo swords... I wasn't able to see how he upgraded them.

Anyways, what's clear is that I did not react the way he wanted me to react and got increasingly frustrated both with me and the fact he wasted so much effort on me, and quit. Maybe he had some other stresses in his life and though the daily frustration of PB21 was not worth it. Between the constant aggression and greed, the game-long turnsplit, and the nonstop diplo spam, I am not sad to see him go, and that's all I'll say about that.

WilliamLP has taken over for suttree, and has thankfully not continued his baffling city and unit naming schemes. His first turn into the game he sent me a sheep for a sheep, which I couldn't accept because I was locked out from diplo by a pause. I resent it to him and he didn't accept, so I sent it again the next turn and he did. So, tentative peace, what a relief. I have a chariot keeping a very close eye on our border; we still have fairly large garrisons nearby, but pulled them back a bit. He's also noticed that that he has two enormous islands (small continents, really) flanking his already huge mainland. He's been spamming cities onto them on pace with me, and is tied for the city lead with me at 18. (as of t130; he's up to 19 or 20 now, as of t132, I think)

I think Org, Imp, and Cre, in that order, turned out to be the three best traits for this map, and that reflects somewhat in the standings, with Gawdzak (Cre/Org) and WilliamLP (Cre/Imp) the two game leaders as far as I can tell. Divine Julius (Org/Imp) would be the best leader on this map I think, especially if he had landed Stonehenge. That said, everyone is actually pretty close together, at least in terms of demographics. For example, I'm 3rd in CY, but only ~20 total food behind the leader (varies turn by turn, ofc, depending on whips) - about 1 food per city. Power is a similar situation, where the top 4 or 5 of us are within 20k troops or so of one another. The big differentiator this game, which is kind of a big demotivator, is in land area. Those with more land will eventually outpace those without it. As much as I'm keeping up in other areas, in addition to being #1 in city count, I have only 60% of the land area of the land leader, 25% less than the land average, a number that includes Azza, the one player with less land than I. Azza I think is at or near the bottom of every category in the demo charts. Add another 80 points from that, another 40 for the ancient-era religious techs I skipped, and I'm the same score as everyone else. Score doesn't mean anything this game.

Gawdzak is doing very well, the leader in score and probably the objective leader as well. 16 cities and a big MFG and GNP lead, due partly to a recently fired golden age. He was at almost +200 gpt before that though, almost double what I was at the time. His espionage per turn is WAY higher than anyone elses', so he's got lots of courthouses. In contrast, my city expenses are completely ridiculous, totally almost 150 gpt (I think it breaks down to like 39/115 for distance/number) - Org is SO good on this map. I really wish Parkin hadn't fought so hard for Ind over Org. WilliamLP is in my estimation in second place, with 18 cities and huge growth potential with those big continents available to him. Barteq is possibly still in third, but I think wasting his potential somewhat. He was 60+ CY ahead of me a couple dozen turns ago, after he built the HG, but I've recently passed him. One p He has the most land, almost twice as much as me, but has been stuck at only 16 cities, of which only one is on an island. Instead of expanding onto islands, he's started putting down fillers like this, which you'll note cleverly avoids sharing any food in its second ring:




I think I successfuly blocked him off from our islands to the west, and he's got a city on the middle island/continent adjacent to WilliamLP. Hopefully that gets them into a war!

Retep had a big lead earlier, but sort of... stagnated somewhat. He's whipped a bunch recently, presumably courthouses and/or forges. He was at 13 cities for forever, keeping up pace with pre-war suttree, but then took forever to get anything on an island. He's still at 15 cities. I assume he has a big backfill territory like I do, but my scouting over there is abysmal so I don't really know for sure. He recently finished a golden age, but then revolted into Bureacracy two turns AFTER IT. Very poor planning on his part! Azza is in last place and his demos look kinda bad. I think he's at 12 cities; I don't remember. He just finished the MoM last turn, to my great relief. I think, when I met him like 30 turns ago, he already had Calendar resources AND marble hooked. I didn't even think I had a chance at the MoM given this, especially as I got calendar at least a full dozen turns after him. Big egg on my face here; I could have slow built it easily before he finished, he took so goddamn long with it. As it is, I put a few turns into it for failgold in my crappy lvl 5 horse city, netting a cool 140 failgold - enough to do a 3T Bureaucracy run starting next turn. Zanth and Gavagai I still haven't met, because I pulled back my scouting workboat from Gawdzak's lands in order to net a fish. (production has been tight; more on this later). I have another workboat almost back over there, so hopefully I meet them soon, before they get a big pile of Cataphracts dumped in their face. I assume they're over there somewhere, at least; finding out that Gawdzak is on an island by himself would be kind of infuriating. Gavagai got the pyramids, I think, and one of the two, probably also Gavagai, got The Great Library this past turn. (t132)

Speaking of Bureau, I, unlike retep, will be switching into it DURING my golden age, to be fired a few turns from now. A very, very late golden age, started by a GP generated in my crappy, crappy capital simply because everywhere else has been whipping out settlers, workers, and boats workers as fast as possible. Here it is:




This is maybe one of the saddest capitals I've ever had. It was just whipped SO heavily, working so many mines, with barely any support from satellites... we're deep into the AD years and I don't even have it fully cottaged yet, much less have all of its cottages being worked. It just is what it is, y'know? Crap.

RMS Lusitania is looking a little better, with the Colossus and a wharf pulling in some serious raw commerce:




Here's my Moai, also late, growing onto all that coast. This is one of suttree's former aggressive plants. Outside of my capital and my colossus, the two cities I took from suttree are the best in my empire, heh.




Overview screenshot. As you can see, I have the best potential in the world for shitty iceball fishing villages that generate no production. I've even explored some more of the black since I took this screenshot, and all I can say is, clam and crab futures have never been more bullish.




My insane city expenses. I have lots of forges and wharves up now, so the next priority is courthouses.




Demos:




Power chart. You can see that retep has really benefitted from suttree and I's constant bickering; he's barely needed to build any military at all. I presume, due to his relatively low city count and early GA, that he's got a lot of infrastructure built up.




Any questions?

[Grimace]

Thankfully that crap with suttree is over. I'm sure he was trying to communicate something, but the point of an AI-diplo game is to NOT do that. If you want a woman...you take the woman. If you want a city...you take the city (to paraphrase Three Amigos).

It looks like war is going to really be the only way to effectively expand now, but building a military machine does hurt economic growth. And it doesn't sound like there are any obviously weak (and thus juicy) targets. If retep has a lot of infrastructure by a weak(er) military...

I wouldn't go so far as to say you have bad land, but you definitely have had to work hard...perhaps "sub-optimal" is a good choice of words. One of things I'm quickly coming to realize in MP is that land truly is power; but not just in quantity, in quality as well. If you have the same amount of land as someone else but they have 50% more food resources than you, you fall behind. And you can never have enough workers! How many workers do you have?

What's your cash flow at 0% science?

[GermanJoey]

retep is on the other side of the world, unfortunately. The map wraps North-South, not east-west.

I think I have 13 workers now; the problem here isn't the quantity, its shipping them around. I have at least a dozen boats but its still not enough.

Cash flow at 0% science is around 120 gpt without wealth builds; I think Gawdzak was pushing 200 before his golden age. Like I said, Org is a big deal on this map!

[Grimace]

Well, at least you're not in an unwinnable position. A tough one, yes, but so long as you can keep yourself from being a target and can jump on any opportunities that pop up, you could make a jump. You're desperately in need of Courthouses. Do you have CoL? If you can get a courthouse in some of your cities that would be a major economic shot in the arm. What's your tech tree look like right now?

[GermanJoey]

Between Classical/Medieval techs, IIRC I've got CoL, CS, IW, Compass, Math, Currency, and Calendar.

Retep has Alphabet, so you can compare us directly:



He's up Meditation, Alphabet, Polythesism, Monotheism, Priesthood, Monarchy, and Machinery (~ +2700 beakers). I'm up IW and Compass (~ +1100 beakers). So, we're pretty close, and he's already spent a full golden age. At this rate, I will pass him soon. He might have some pretty significant beakers invested in something else though, for all I know.

My +gpt at 0% was 142 this turn without wealth builds, which is lower than my total city expenses BEFORE inflation, 152 gpt, heh.

[GermanJoey]

Gawdzak has some Cataphracts showing up... good luck Gavagai and Zanth.