RPB3 SPOILERS Bismarck of India (regoarrarr, darrelljs, sooooo, sunrise089)

[regoarrarr]

With a 4 person team (or really anything more than 1 person), one of the main problems is coming up with an appropriate separation of duties. While we value and expect to hear everyone's opinions on every facet of the game, it can be hard when there is nobody who is "the man" and has the authority to make final decisions. It can really lead to somewhat of an "analysis paralysis"

We talked about that a bit, and when I say we talked about that "a bit", we exchanged 21 emails on the subject. So, in the interest of thread spamming some more (and you KNOW that's what I like! ), stay tuned!

[regoarrarr]

You fell into my trap completely...how can I be the fall guy if you ignored everything I said ? I have to admit I sure do look stupid showing no love for India when pretty much everyone else thinks they are the cat's meow.

I have a request for the lurkers. I'm dying to start this game and begin the slow process of repairing our reputation (sooooo, you also suck now by association)...can you in a non-spoilerish way tell us if the map is almost ready?

Darrell

No no no you're the fall guy for LAST game. If (when?) we win this game, the reason will be a tie between sooooo joining us and us not listening to you any more

[regoarrarr]

Okay so most of that 21 post email thread was talking about our votes on the various polls. I AM a thread-spammer for sure, but I'll leave most of those out unless they are interesting going forward

Keep in mind that most of these emails were sent before the ones that I posted earlier talking about our leader selection. So some of the thoughts in them might have been over-ruled by later choices


me:

Hi guys,

Thought I would send out the first introductory email. If any of you have a better email address / form of communication that you would prefer, speak up now.

So, I have spent the past day or so reading up on some of the threads and have a few thoughts.

We may want to intentionally "sandbag" things. Starting with Byzantium gave everyone ANOTHER reason to fear us (Besides our inherent awesomeness, of course). Now, I don't know that we want to pick up Celtia or America, but something more tame. Inca would be a great choice since it's awesome, without being that fear-inducing.

In fact, we may even want to play that into our diplomacy. In some chats with Krill, he says that he is fearful of beign "ganged up" on, and has said that he has come up with a strategy that is "suboptimal" (his words) but still fun. We could tell people that we know we won't win, so we are just playing to have fun. WHICH WILL MAKE IT THAT MUCH MORE SWEET WHEN WE DO, IN FACT, WIN :-D. (Yes, I realize Krill could be doing the same thing). I just think that we shouldn't play to get that much of an advantage, whether it be UU / land / tech. We should count on the fact that we (and by we I mean you guys) are probably the most skilled team, and that in a "fair" fight, we should have odds.

Also, in chats with sunrise, we were thinking it might be a good idea if each of us had pre-determined "roles" to play. Obviously we'll all chip in doing whatever but this way it's easy to know who should be doing what. I made a tentative assignment as

sunrise: turnplayer
regoarrarr: c&d
darrell: micro / planning
soooo: diplomacy

I kind of would like to not be the face of the team as I was in PB2. I feel like I need to take a break from that, though I am happy to provide drafts / email compositions for review. Not sure how you guys feel about this so if you want to swap the roles up that's fine too. I think it could make sense to swap periodically throughout the game as RL / interest change. Another thought I had on diplo is that we set up a separate account, and then we just don't sign with one of our names (rather something generic name that we make up), making it so none of the four of us is the "face". Then we either don't chat with other teams, or we all say someone else is doing the diplo. I know sunrise has one of the polls set up to be potentially an "anonymous" game so that might get interesting too.

Dunno, just some thoughts.

darrell

I'm okay with skipping Byzantium, bad karma and all that :-). Although if the situation sets up the same with a snake pick and both Peter and the Big B are available again, it might be fate telling us to try again!

I think this is a good idea, although TBH I had wanted to
be the turnplayer for a least a little bit having never
done it in MP. Maybe I can start off and then swap to
sunrise at turn 50 or something like that? Also, modesty
aside I'm pretty good at micro but sooooo is better. I
think if we use sooooo for diplomacy it won't be
leveraging him nearly as well. So I would say for that
it would be better for me to handle diplomacy and
sooooo the micro.

I can chat on AIM while at home and on g-mail at home
or work. Do we want to setup a time? I'd really rather
the forums get set up early and we start using them
but I understand that might not happen in the near term.

me:

I'm fine with soooo on micro and you on diplomacy. I'm also able to help out with diplomacy too but just don't want to be the frontman. One idea that we might steal from Kalin / athlete is using a separate gmail account and then anyone can log into it and create draft replies. That allows multiple people to be able to aid in diplomacy, although I do think that it is important to have one person who is "the man" on diplomacy. Otherwise, responses can get bogged down and delayed, which isn't so great.

I also have no problem with you being turnplayer either.

[regoarrarr]

soooo

Having a team email account sounds good to me. It lets everyone check
it and so we don't rely on just one person.

I think we can all chip in on multiple aspects of play. I'm fine
helping with diplomacy, workers and cities etc and can serve as backup
turnplayer too.

I think it would be strong to pick up a financial civ, since cottages
seem to rule multiplayer. So I'd suggest someone who also has a good
early-game trait, like Willem, Pacal or Ragnar.

me:

Agreed that we can all do multiple aspects and I think that we should. I was just thinking that it could be useful to have one particular person who is "in charge" of each area. I know from experience in pb2 and other games, whenever you have a lot of people, sometimes it can be hard to reach consensus and so it can be useful for one person to drive things and if they don't hear from other folks by the time the decision needs made, they just make it.

For instance, we need to reply to another team by such and such time - the diplomat asks for opinions, maybe writes a draft, and then when the time comes, if they don't hear anything, they go with what they feel is best. Or if the turnplayer stops because there's a barb warrior and wants opinions on where to move, they solicit opinions but if the timer is running down and there is no consensus, they just play. Otherwise, what tends to happen is that everyone waits around for other people and things can get delayed. Just my 2 cents....

sunrise

I agree with regoarrarr about having collaboration but having one
person who is pseudo-in-charge. Since darrell wants to take a shot at
playing turns, how about:

*regoarrarr - C&D
*sunrise - diplo
*darrelljs - turnplayer
*sooooo - micro

Honestly, I'm not sure the turnplayer/micro split works in practice,
but the important thing here is that we have one player responsible
for tracking the power levels and one player making sure diplo
messages get turned around quickly.

darrell

Looks good to me. Obviously early the turnplaying is
pretty much scripted. As the game moves on we will surely
want at least a second set of eyes to log in and scan
the many cities of our glorious empire.

[regoarrarr]

Okay so I think the latest that I have seen from anyone (and subject to change with discussion here in-thread now that we have it), we have tentatively assigned

*regoarrarr - C&D
*sunrise - diplo
*darrelljs - turnplayer
*sooooo - micro

While I enjoy doing diplomacy, and (in my OH SO humble opinion) I'm pretty good at it, I wanted to take a break from it since I felt like my reputation had taken a bit of a hit from PB1 and PB2.

I think it's definitely possible that some of the hoopla from PB1 negatively affected other folks' opinions of our team in PB2, since I was kind of "the face" of the team. Even though we ALL know that it was darrell (yes, DARRELL) who was the reason we lost that game.

So I wanted to take a break from doing that. We also discussed that we will set up a team email and try to create a "team persona" so that individually we won't sign our emails, but instead have the team do it. This is not to try and get away with anything or anythign shady, but it will hopefully a) make people forget how awesome we are and b) allow us to phase people in as needed

It may be that in 50-100 turns, we'll swap things out and I can slide into diplomacy and someone else can do c&d or turnplaying or something.

Or we may just keep these roles for most of the game, if they're working for everyone. I definitely wanted to keep up the C&D. I did it pretty well in PB1 for the early game, but dropped it in PB2 after awhile and I think that really hurt us (well, that and darrell of course). Had we been up to date on that info, I think we would have had more of an idea on what kind of threat we were under from the Ottomans and possibly survived the initial onslaught.

I have a spreadsheet set up that I am going to post using Google Docs - more on that later

[regoarrarr]

Ah one other thing from emails. This was after sunrise, darrelljs and I had agreed to repeat from PB2 (by this point it was pretty clear that we were headed for an early exit)


darrell

Did we really land sooooo as a free agent? Sunrise for GM of the year!

sunrise

Hell yeah!

I actually had Soooo figured as actively avoiding playing with us,
since we're all pretty established RBers but he didn't post any sort
of signup until Swiss signed up as well. But when I saw Broker had
heard favoribly from Swiss I figured Soooo might be available and PM'd
him.

We need to find some way to stay alive in this game. If we can just be
city/land competitive...well I'd take darrell+soooo over any other
active pair of civ players for micro play

[regoarrarr]

And just a warning to anyone that thinks they can compete with us for thread spamming (though, in a twist of irony, the people we're competing with can't even see this)

[sooooo]

I'm dying to start this game and begin the slow process of repairing our reputation (sooooo, you also suck now by association)

Heh - I know you guys only recruited me so you can sign your emails to people you pissed off before with my name

[darrelljs]

No no no you're the fall guy for LAST game. If (when?) we win this game, the reason will be a tie between sooooo joining us and us not listening to you any more

So you are saying that to maximize my rep we have to lose this game worst than the last, basically meaning the first to go down? My, my, my...it seems I am the turnplayer...

Darrell

[regoarrarr]

Chat with sunrise, soooo and myself

sooooo: hello
sunrise: i know we can communicate in the thread, but this is faster, and we all know regoarrarr will post it anyways
regoarrarr that's right
1 line at a time
sunrise: so I view us as having 4 options: 1) Not going for henge, 2) guaranteeing we get it by chopping it IMMEDIATELY, 3) chopping it right after we hook our food, or 4) getting it into our second city
sooooo: hmm
sunrise: I don't think 5) slow-building it in the cap makes sense because in tthat time we could chop a settler and get it in the 2nd city
sooooo: i like either not going for it or going for a risky henge
regoarrarr few thoughts - my first thought is worker/BW to start
(obviously not having seen our start)
hopefully we can get a pfh for expansive bonus
sunrise: well if risky henge means slow building it in cap then see above. If it means just chopping it late, well is the opportunity cost worth loosing the wonder?
yeah, def worker first if we have a 3 hammer tile or a 2hammer cap
sooooo: the other option is religion, but I don't think that makes sense with an expansive civ
regoarrarr yeah - not to mention 6 other civs that start with myst
we can always try it down the road if everyone thinks that way (a la pb2)
or bulb theo
sooooo: and given we're not creative, it's monuments or stonehenge for our culture
regoarrarr right
i think we need henge
soooo when you said risky henge you meant delaying it some?
sooooo: i meant after at least 2 workers and maybe a settler
but i did mean chopping at capital
regoarrarr ok
sunrise: but if we have 2 fast worker and a settler, and we're not founding a religion, then why not chop it in 2nd city?
sooooo: i don't see anything wrong with that, but what's the advantage vs capital?
regoarrarr i think that one of if not the most important thing for our early game is meeting everyone
sooooo: are you thinking GP pollution?
regoarrarr getting into a tech bloc
sunrise: soooo, no, cultural domination for 2nd city
so nice to be able to quickly get the third rin
regoarrarr because we've done so well with planting an aggressive 2nd city with high culture
sunrise: well lets not plant it aggressive
regoarrarr yeah i know
sunrise: but lets put the culturaly powerful GP poluting wonder in the 2nd city
IF we make a settler of course
sooooo: great prophet points are very annoying and building SH in a second city is good enough for that reason for me.
sunrise: I just dont see the draw to putting it in the cap - by the way, tactically better to have the forests in the 2nd city chopped anyways
also, soooo, help me understand the most annoying anti-synergy in civ - we're Indy and going to get Henge, BUT oracle is also appealing, esp if we can take MC. BUT oracle is reached via religions techs, which we DON'T want because we got Henge
BUT we get a GP from henge and/or oracle which suggests we DO want a religion
so i find myself beelining religious techs even when i landed henge
am I overvalueing oracle because it will fall too fast to get MC?
sooooo: well, priesthood is on the way to monarchy (not that I've decided either way on oracle)
sunrise: (oh, and of course if we delay henge and loose now we really regret not getting a religion)
regoarrarr seems like huayna would also want to oracle->mc
colossus is very strong for them
2/0/4
sunrise: regoarrarr, we start with a warrior?
regoarrarr yes
2 civs don't
sunrise: and we start with mining and myst?
regoarrarr yes
Sent at 1:44 PM on Monday
sunrise: ok, i agree 100% with worker+BW to start....but I think we want to chop an additonal worker then a settler
regoarrarr well once we see our start we can run a few plans
sh first, sh in 2nd city, etc
sunrise: what about a tech path of BW, food tech, hunting, archery, and a build of worker, worker, scout, archer, settler
ok, i'm probably over-planning pre-start, you're right
regoarrarr but yeah i like that as a tentative plan
we should have our start soon right?
sooooo: i think something like worker, warrior x some, worker, archer, settler should probably be doable
Sent at 1:48 PM on Monday
sunrise: I'm not sure about building any additional workers....regoarrarr points out the value of scouting, so for the same hammers we can have a more useful scout, and if we're getting scouts then archery is 1 tech away
(of course I'd keep the warrior at home)
regoarrarr workers->warriors, right?
sunrise: i think soooo like that, I don't
sooooo: ? i'm confused
regoarrarr me too
i think sunrise meant he wasn't sure about building any additional warriors
and instead building scouts
sooooo: oh ok, yeah a scout or two should be good
regoarrarr we really need to meet as many people as possible
i think an ideal diplo situation is for us to get into like a 10 person tech bloc
the more the merrier
sooooo: can you remind me of the difficulty level?
sunrise: emp
yes, sorry, i guess i mistyped
sooooo: ok, so barbs are an issue. we should get archery quite soon then
sunrise: i was saying i dont see a point in making any additional WARRIORS ever, since scouts will let us catch up and then surpass them in scouting
regoarrarr if they don't die to barbs
sunrise: right - I propose archery as the 4th tech
regoarrarr guess it also depends on copper loc
sunrise: well scouts are as good versus animals, and vs barbs we have the luxury of 2 movements to either scout the tile or prioritize plains hills
plains hills = forest hills, sorry
regoarrarr right - i was with you
i'm channeling you this afternoon
sooooo: also we should aim to whip a lot of workers after we get BW

Talking about our short-term plans, and specifically how much and where we want stonehenge.

The basic thoughts are:

1) Not do henge
2) Do it ASAP
3) Do it in the cap after a few workers and maybe a settelr
4) Do it in the 2nd city

Probably a bit too early to decide on that w/o actually seeing our start