[SPOILERS] ARRR Ye Scurvy Dogs! Hannah the Irin

[Mardoc]

Finally, there's me. The Lanun. You probably know all about them already from Amelia's thread, but for those who haven't bothered or are forbidden, I'll explain below.

The Lanun are a seafaring, pirate people. They have uninspiring unique units (Boarding Parties - weakened Champions who can capture ships; The Black Wind - an excellent ship, on a map unlikely to be determined by naval warfare; and Guybrush Threepwood - Str 7, can use weapons and capture ships, and sing) and not much of a world spell (damages everyone near the ocean but me).

To make up for this, they have a trio of excellent ocean bonuses - +1 food on every water tile - coast, ocean, and lake, and the ability to build Pirate coves, which consume a workboat, are limited to one every three squares, and improve over time. Also +1 movement for ships, and the only civ that can see or use the Pearls resource. They start as simply +2 commerce, but then go to +1/+1/+3, and finally +2/+2/+4 - that means a lighthouse, coastal Pirate Port is a 5/2/7 tile. That also acts as a Citadel, as an added bonus. Finally, Hannah the Irin has perhaps the two strongest traits in the game - Financial for even more commerce (especially beneficial with the emphasis on coasts) and Raiders for extreme mobility during wartime.

If I'm lucky and this turns out to be a water heavy map or even islands, I ought to be able to use Octopus Overlords and the Sirian Doctrine to dominate anyone by the sea; my worldspell would help, of course, but is unlikely to make much difference in the end.

With a Financial civ that likes to work the coasts, and the Ports, I expect to start with the highest GNP, and maintain that for quite a while. Production will obviously be my weak point, which I'll have to remember not to neglect - it may make sense to go to Arete, Conquest, or Slavery to turn food or gold into production. If I can parlay my early tech lead into more land (well, ocean), I ought to be able to stay ahead.

Important wonders - the Heron Throne, of course! The Guild of the Nine. Free buildings wonders, like Guild of Hammers and Librarium could let me save my limited production.

What's my strategy here? Well, at the moment, to build a strong base and remain flexible. Like the sea herself, constantly in motion, rushing in to fill holes. Having probably the best GDP in the game (and certainly the earliest), I ought to be able to take any of the standard paths to victory and excel with them. Probably I'll depend in the mid-game on a religion (OO, AV, or Order all seem potentially strong, depending on the map and my neighbors. Perhaps I'll switch to Basium and/or summon Hyborem, perhaps simply powering my way through the tree and rolling everyone up with Arquebusiers. (or building a Tower of Mastery before they have a chance to crush me). A lot will depend on my neighbors; a strategy that's strong against one won't work so well against another.

If I can, I'd prefer to go for a nonviolent victory, probably the Tower, building a strong ally or two, and using my mobility and tech lead to handle anyone who wants to compete.

[Mardoc]

What do I expect from my foes? Well, it's hard to know, especially since we're nearly all newcomers to Realms Beyond. Irgy joined on Dec 30th, Thoth July 5th, Nyktorian Jan 1st, 2011, Mr. Yellow Nov 22nd, WarriorKnight Jan 1st 2010, and me of course on October 18th. I've been a lurker for quite some time (played in a Training Day game with Sirian back in Civ 3); perhaps the others have been around but quiet as well.

Regardless, WarriorKnight's the only one with a history to judge by. WarriorKnight seems to be doing pretty well in PBEM 8, although it's hard to tell for sure in a no-diplo game where several threads have gone dark. He was Philosophical there, as well, so I expect him to know everything he needs to know about running a specialist economy and transfer that skill to Einion.

From their posts in the setup thread, I expect Irgy and WarriorKnight to be my main competition, since they seem to have the best grasp on game mechanics and implications.
But that's an awfully thin reed to hold onto; Mr. Yellow and Thoth are both very quiet, which could be inexperience or could be carefully hidden brilliance. Certainly they both chose powerful civ/leader combos.

So, I think I'll just have to discuss the stereotypical gameplans the civs push in the direction of, and hope that's accurate or close enough.

Irgy's Sheaim - there's really two options I see here, possibly sequential: a Pyre Zombie rush could be absolutely devastating, or a Arcane Summoner Magic war, with Gate units and summons leading the way. In either case, I expect him to raze more often than normal for the AC bonus, and I don't expect him to have any particular other military plans. To unlock the Gate units, he's got to go all over the tree, but after the Arcane tree, there's nowhere he needs to be. Gotta remember that him merely discovering a tech can lead to new units the very next turn. Probably he'll summon Hyborem, and even maybe switch, assuming I don't summon him first. Hyborem is a good way to get a lot of AV cities into the world, though, plus turning the world into Hell would be murder on anyone trying to expand without being AV and running Sacrifice the Weak; both help boost Armageddon. Since he starts with Death Mana, I'd expect his summons to be mainly skeletons and spectres, boosted by as many death nodes as he can get his hands on. Finally, as a naturally magic civ, he may elect to build the Tower instead of conquering everyone.


WarriorKnight's Elohim - I'm really not sure what makes sense. He could play a strong builder's game, with Sanctuary around to bail him out of any trouble. He could rush for Monks, which seem to be quite strong for their era, and then attack us with them. He could plan on capturing Sheaim or Malakim cities for their potentially strong UU's (I don't think he'd want Lanun, Elven, or Bannor UU's, but of course he wouldn't turn down a city if the opportunity presents). He's done some strong warring moves in PBEM 8, but I think if he intended a war victory here he'd have chosen a different civ. All in all, I'd expect him to be most likely to go for an Altar, Tower, or Cultural victory - that ability to withstand a dogpile and calmly finish the last piece of the victory could be quite strong. Sanctuary is an obvious deterrent to anyone declaring war on him early, as well, so he might not even have to use it.



Nyktorion's Ljosalfar - the obvious ploy here is to rush for Fellowship of Leaves and archery, play defensively while he sets up his forest economy, then attack with a mage-heavy (Thessa's Arcane) force. A second possibility is to play defensively all game, same FoL/archery, but then build the Tower - using Arcane Mages and Forest Elves to defend against any incursions. Economy, both production and GNP, will start slow, but end immensely strong.


Mr. Yellow and the Bannor - keep a low profile while building lots of towns, head toward Fanaticism and the metal line, then crush someone or several someones with a Crusade. Nothing else is forbidden by the Bannor, but he's got an uphill struggle going for any other victory type than conquest/domination. Although they start Good, there's no particular reason for them to remain so; we'll have to see what he decides. As Selrahc mentions upthread, depending on his choice of religion, he can produce either Manes or Angels, so a final option would be to set up the Crusade, then switch to Hyborem or Basium, using his AI or Cull-controlled civ to feed him. As a slow techer (I think) this option can be denied, but it won't happen by accident. I may want to summon Basium and Hyborem and not switch, just for denial purposes.


Thoth and the Malakim - not sure. He's probably nearly as flexible as I am. A religious approach would be strong with a Spiritual leader and his worldspell, but I expect him to adapt to circumstances. Of course, being Adaptive as well, and having the extra +1 gold in deserts, he's quite capable of competing in tech with me if there are deserts to be had.


Of all these, we have no early game rushers, and only two mid-game potential fighters - Malakim and Sheaim. Everyone else wants to build up for a while. Perhaps I should also be a mid-game warrior, to take advantage of people's setup time - frankly, the Bannor seem like the best target mid game, although not the biggest threat.

That said - the Elohim and me are the only civs that need to telegraph a war. Everyone else has either the production or free units or both to be able to go from nearly nothing to a massive force in a matter of turns. So I should attempt to maintain a strong army all game, and the world may be strangely peaceful for eons. Malakim and Bannor especially can declare war, launch their world spell, and have a strong force where last turn they had nothing.
If I do attack one of those two, I should wait for them to burn their worldspell, or hit them before they can get to it. Or bring enough force that I can deal with their army multiplying.

[Mardoc]

Turn 1 starts out well

That's right - just in case crabs, pirate coves, rice, wine, and pigs aren't enough, now I have truffles to go with them! I guess those pigs were doubly useful!

The truffles appeared in the grass 1 E of Innsmouth. Anyone know if I can build a town on top of them for a 3 food town, or would that destroy the truffles?

Now, I need to come up with a more creative naming scheme! Any suggestions? My first thought is to name my cities after famous pirate ports and regions, and units after pirates themselves. But that might be a tad predictable. Any better ideas out there?

[T-hawk]

The truffles appeared in the grass 1 E of Innsmouth. Anyone know if I can build a town on top of them for a 3 food town, or would that destroy the truffles?

I don't know how FFH behaves, but in standard Civ, any tile change caused by a random event is permanent and unaffected by any subsequent development on the tile.

[DaveV]

Nice first turn event 8).

naming scheme ... suggestions?

Hackers and computer viruses? For example, you could call your capital "Captain Crunch", which would keep people guessing.

Random comments on civs:

Malakim can build 10XP lightbringers with the right setup, then upgrade them to mages via savants. They also have life mana, so they can be the bane of pyre zombies once they have any life 2 adepts.

Don't underestimate your world spell - I'm pretty sure it can kill units, which makes it very useful after some coastal cities have been softened up by, for example, tsunami or the Sheaim world spell.

The Ljosalfar hero, Gilden Silveric, comes pretty early and is quite powerful for his time. The elves can build a decent offensive around this guy.

[Bobchillingworth]

The truffles appeared in the grass 1 E of Innsmouth. Anyone know if I can build a town on top of them for a 3 food town, or would that destroy the truffles?

I think the way it works is that if the event puts of visible feature on the map (mushrooms or penguins are the two that come to mind), then any improvement on the affected square will destroy them and their benefit. Anything else should be permanent regardless of what you do to the tile.

[Mardoc]

Hackers and computer viruses? For example, you could call your capital "Captain Crunch", which would keep people guessing.

That could work, except that I know maybe one name in the area. I like the webpirate theme, though, so maybe I'll go with Napster, LimeWire, Kazaa, etc... Or, well, any other suggestions? Or a list of crackers and viruses somewhere?

Malakim can build 10XP lightbringers with the right setup, then upgrade them to mages via savants. They also have life mana, so they can be the bane of pyre zombies once they have any life 2 adepts.

I always forget about that crossover between the Divine and Mage lines. It looks like we're going to have lots and lots of magic flying around, then, between the Malakim, the Sheaim, the Elves as all obvious magic users, plus of course us remaining three may go that way too. Although...I haven't seen any mana nodes yet, so maybe that'll be a limit on how bad it can get.

Assassins are the obvious counter to a mage-heavy army, plus fast-movers - maybe that's the direction I should focus on, especially since I'm also Raiders.

Don't underestimate your world spell - I'm pretty sure it can kill units, which makes it very useful after some coastal cities have been softened up by, for example, tsunami or the Sheaim world spell.

That's true. And even if it doesn't kill because I can't schedule it properly, knocking down everyone by 75% right before my ships sail in from out of line of sight and unload an amphibious wave would be quite valuable in itself.

Which raises another interesting question I'll have to experiment with - how Drowns and Stygians work with ships; last time I played the Lanun/OO I was frustrated at how slow walking along the coast was, but if I could sail them up to a city then kick them overboard, that could be quite the nasty combo - fast movement on both land and sea, plus the near immunity to counterattack from being underwater! I can't think of any reason they couldn't get on a ship, but the real question is whether I can disembark waterwalkers without being in a city.

The Ljosalfar hero, Gilden Silveric, comes pretty early and is quite powerful for his time. The elves can build a decent offensive around this guy.

Yep. I'm going to mostly rely on Nyktorian being less aggressive, but it wouldn't do to neglect military and give him too good an opportunity.

Anything else should be permanent regardless of what you do to the tile.

Excellent news, then! I think, given the absurd amounts of food To-Be-Renamed has (well, will have), the best thing to do with this tile is to build a cottage eventually - more commerce is always handy.

I've been debating if it makes sense to run Agristocracy, when I should have plenty of food/commerce from the sea and be short on hammers. My first instinct is to say no, to go with other civics, and not plan on building or relying on many farms.

[DaveV]

That could work, except that I know maybe one name in the area. I like the webpirate theme, though, so maybe I'll go with Napster, LimeWire, Kazaa, etc... Or, well, any other suggestions? Or a list of crackers and viruses somewhere?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_con..._criminals

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_com...uses_(all)

[Selrahc]

Which raises another interesting question I'll have to experiment with - how Drowns and Stygians work with ships; last time I played the Lanun/OO I was frustrated at how slow walking along the coast was, but if I could sail them up to a city then kick them overboard, that could be quite the nasty combo - fast movement on both land and sea, plus the near immunity to counterattack from being underwater! I can't think of any reason they couldn't get on a ship, but the real question is whether I can disembark waterwalkers without being in a city.

It works. Using ships to move waterwalkers around faster doesn't have any problems.

[Mardoc]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_con..._criminals

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_com...uses_(all)

Alright, we have a naming scheme! Looks like the known viruses list is much longer, so that'll be the units (plus it makes more sense for the crackers to produce the viruses than vice versa).

It works. Using ships to move waterwalkers around faster doesn't have any problems.

Glad to hear it. Now I just have to be lucky in the water fraction on the map, and it'll be time for 'Ia! Ia! Cthulhu fhtagn!'

Since I think I see ocean to the west of my explored territory, I'm definitely keeping my fingers crossed that haphazard decided to go with just coastal connections - that would make a Lanun Octopus Overlords play very strong. At least, I don't see anything to contradict that theory so far except my desire for it to be true.