[SPOILERS] Magic Science and Mr. Cairo in Pitboss 40

[Charriu]

Hey, I now had time to read through your thread. Great reporting, it was a real pleasure to read and I must commemorate you for keeping at it after you lost your third city to Superdeath. Great job.

I also find some small things I wanted to add

Turns 135 to 140 – 500 AD to 600 AD

Jem found Sandworm, which I would like to call false advertising on. Two deserts in the BFC, not even in the first ring, and you call the city “Sandworm”? Really, Charson? I don’t think so!

My naming scheme was bosses from Final Fantasy 5 and this boss was next on my list

I have found it interesting recently to think about how the game has gone for me in comparison to how events have played out for Charson.

I would say that many turns ago, maybe 50 or 60 turns ago now, our civilizations held fairly similar positions to one another. Mine was a little weaker because I had lost Geneva in the One Turn’s War while Charson had not yet suffered a disaster of similar magnitude, but in general, we both held roughly similar positions in terms of technology, Crop Yield, etc. Then we went down different paths, which is how we have ended up in our respective very different situations today.

I committed to Astronomy, ignoring standard medieval military and economic technologies in favor of the hope of island colonies. I also entirely ignored workshops in favor of cottages for tech power, and I didn’t fire another Golden Age because I needed my scientist to bulb Astronomy. Meanwhile, Charson apparently took the more typical route, obtaining Civil Service and probably some other technologies that I haven’t been able to keep track of, building workshops all over, and entering another Golden Age. For a while, these different strategies did not produce too much obvious difference between us, but when you look at how we fared in the dogpiles against us, the differences become clear.

When Charson was attacked, he performed impressively when you take into consideration the fact that he was facing the combined might of three stronger civilizations. After being reduced to a mere three cities, only two of them mainland, he counterattacked, rebounding to five cities, burning one of Elkad’s, and securing peace with all of his attackers. The Interdimensional Rift remained in semi-intact shape after the first round of invasion. For my part, you can read the past few reports to see the chronicle of my easy defeat when I was attacked. I never made a successful counterattack or won a defensive battle. This is despite having twenty more turns to prepare than Charson did.

However, successful execution of the Astronomy plan has granted me a second lease on life in the form of my island colonies. Meanwhile, the second round of attack is probably going to push Charson off the mainland for good in the next ten turns or so. If Superdeath doesn’t finish off Liquid Flame, then I’m sure Elkad or shallow_ru will. Then, there is only the one-tile island city of Magissa to retreat to. Therefore, despite the fact that Charson’s route produced a far more impressive defense of the mainland than my Astronomy plan did, I think that the Astronomy plan turned out to be the right one to take.

(Side note: there is a decent chance that I would be cursing my Astronomy plan from exile in Quebec City right now if Elkad had attacked me on Turn 160 instead of Charson. Maybe I could have raced to Astronomy in time to start colonization before being pushed into the sea, but it would have been close. The Astronomy plan was by no means guaranteed to turn out to be the better way)


Of course, the island colonies aren’t going to be a safe haven immune to attack forever, just for now. My fellow Northern Ocean inhabitants can research Astronomy too and chase me down, and Moncacht-Ape’s sighting of a Traumhaft caravel makes me afraid that such an eventuality may not be as far off as I want. I hope that Elkad simply researched Optics because he wanted a better ship to secure his coastline against my raiders in the event that I didn’t make peace, or in the event that I come back after peace, but there is also a decent chance that he is pursuing Astronomy to take over my colonies. Luckily, I at least don’t need to live in uncertain fear, since I can use the pillage gold to fund espionage so I can see his research again. Report good news, spies, I want to keep playing in my sandbox.

You are right, this is really interesting to see. I think this all comes down to you loosing your third city and the feeling of not being able to win this game anymore. This gave you the freedom to think about unconventional strategies.

Turn 199 and TURN 200!
“Hmm, Civstats shows that Charson lost score while was shallow_ru was logged in, I guess that the Orphans pulled off a crazy knight blitz attack or something and took Liquid Flame on the turn they declared war. Poor guy.  At least he can live on as a spectator in Magissa…

…but wait a second, what just happened? Charson still owns Liquid Flame? But he lost score when someone else was logged in! This must mean…

…THE ORPHANS CAPTURED MAGISSA! ”

The text in quotes is an attempt to illustrate my thought process as I looked at Civstats and then logged in to look at the game itself. In case you couldn’t tell, shallow_ru captured Magissa, and I was very surprised. For a while now, I have been working under the assumption that the one-tile island cities are practically invincible. Despite what happened, I still think that belief is correct. The low war weariness of the Orphans indicates that they did not fight very many battles, which leads me to the conclusion that they were only able to take the city because Charson left it with a carelessly low number of defenders. The greatest fortified position in the world won’t save you if you don’t have the units to defend it. Maybe I shouldn’t leave the defense of Quebec City to only four archers.

For Charriu and Zalson, this event spells death. They can’t hope to hold Liquid Flame for much longer, and now they have nowhere else left to retreat to, so that’s it for them. Of course, last time I predicted something like this the civilization I was talking about lasted for more than fifty turns as a city-state, but I think that it will be different this time. This time, the attackers already have many collateral units built, and there isn’t any open space left for them to focus on peacefully building settlers to claim instead.

Well at this point I only had two cities left and death was imminent. Yes, these island cities can be defended better, but would you like to play on for another 100 turns on a one-island tile, with no production? I am glad that I had my last stand at Liquid Flame and went out with a big battle for this city.

[Hollybombay]

City overview? Tech plans? War plans? Whos winning?

[Magic Science]

Hey, I now had time to read through your thread. Great reporting, it was a real pleasure to read and I must commemorate you for keeping at it after you lost your third city to Superdeath. Great job.

I'm glad you enjoyed my reports. I look forward to reading your thread when the game is over. I am particularly interested to see what you other players thought of me after I lost Old Hong Kong and then later when I started my colonization spree.

You are right, this is really interesting to see. I think this all comes down to you loosing your third city and the feeling of not being able to win this game anymore. This gave you the freedom to think about unconventional strategies.

That is a good way to look at it, I think. What the best strategy is changes a lot when your perspective on the game changes like that.

Well at this point I only had two cities left and death was imminent. Yes, these island cities can be defended better, but would you like to play on for another 100 turns on a one-island tile, with no production? I am glad that I had my last stand at Liquid Flame and went out with a big battle for this city.

I can understand that view of things, especially now that I have been stuck in my colonies for so many turns. I do enjoy having a firsthand view of the game, and I am proud to still be alive, but less of my turns have something very interesting to think about or decide on than in the past, and it would of course have been worse for you with only a one-tile island instead of a seven-city colonial empire.

City overview? Tech plans? War plans? Whos winning?

Coming soon...

[Magic Science]

Magic Science’s Grand Turn 225 Report
What Happened?
It was the calm between the storms. The sharks devoured their prey, and then they needed to digest before hunting again. [INSERT PREFERRED METAPHOR HERE]. Whatever you want to call it, the past few turns have been a time of global peace following a long period of war around the world. As far as I can tell, all of us players have been occupied mostly with routine building tasks. Still, there were a few notable things that happened, and I suppose it would be a good idea to report the background information before starting discussion of the present and future.

   
The last act of violence before the start of the peaceful time was this. Elkad was indeed the player to finally capture Liquid Flame and finish of the Interdimensional Rift. This means he can now build ships on both the Northern and Southern Oceans (note: Superdeath can too). I was worried that this might convince him to research Astronomy, since that technology now allows settlement in the south as well as conquest in the north for him, but there is still no sign that Elkad is interested in it.

   
The next event of interest was the conclusion of the Liberalism race, with Superdeath as the winner. Though it wasn’t really much of a race this game, since Elkad didn’t even have Education yet, and the Orphans just finished Education a turn before Superdeath was done with Liberalism. Superdeath claimed Economics and its Great Merchant as his free technology. Nice, but not very dramatic, and the military playing field was left unaltered.

   
Then Quebec City reached fourth ring borders, which reclaimed a few more mainland tiles, including Sofia’s crabs. This obviously wasn’t as important as the Liberalism race, but I still found it notable because it’s a good example of how badly Elkad came away from the Partition of Incaland compared to shallow_ru. Both attackers captured three cities, but Elkad paid a far greater price for his than shallow_ru did for theirs. The Battles of Cuzco and Almaty were massacres for me, but they still cost him a lot of collateral units and a few other unlucky attackers, and shallow_ru was never forced to fight such a battle at all. I do feel a little bad about causing that imbalance, but I still think that my reasons were good in hindsight. Also, Elkad’s conquered cities aren’t as good for him as shallow_ru’s are for them because his are more culturally constricted than theirs.

   
Meanwhile, I finished researching Gunpowder thanks to my Great Merchant trade mission and started a wave of musket construction. This completion date actually isn’t that far off the pace of the other three, though of course I am hopelessly far behind them in the top and middle sections of the tree. shallow_ru had already finished researching Constitution by this time, and Superdeath set his research to Rifling on Turn 217.

   
Then, the war began and Superdeath razed Evil End (it’s not in his city list). Although shallow_thought was the one to declare war, I’m pretty sure that Superdeath is actually the aggressor here. I think that Supedeath moved his attacking army into their view, then shallow_ru declared war and offered peace to force him to reveal his intent. Evidence for this is that the Orphans still haven’t captured a MarvelDC city in the turns since this screenshot, and their war weariness is too low to account for significant fighting in foreign lands. Besides, it doesn’t seem likely that Superdeath would be able to assemble such a strong counterattack that fast, but obviously if he was the attacker, then he would have been able to assemble his forces in advance.

After this, Elkad declared war on the Orphans as well and razed Quigley Q (formerly Golden Void, RFS-81’s capital). Superdeath just captured and kept Tench (formerly New Hong Kong ) on Turn 225, the last turn of this report. All three players have high enough war weariness to show that there have been some big battles. That brings us to the present situation. Now what?

[Magic Science]

Now What?
I lost the game on Turn 43. After that, I decided to make survival my principal goal. At the time, and for a while after, I did not think that my chances were very good. However, looking at the situation now, I think that my survival is all but guaranteed. I still can’t afford to be careless with Elkad only a few turns away from Astronomy at the best of times, but I can build muskets and castles, I am on the verge of unlocking frigates, I have more than 70 population points to turn into those units with Slavery if need be, and there is always Quebec City to fall back on. Survival is covered.

That leaves the same question as before, what now? Well, if I can’t win but I don’t seem likely to die, then I should instead focus my energies on improving my placement. That is, finishing better than fourth. I do not think that I can grow my own civilization enough to overtake someone else and become third in line. My island cities are very nice, but there is not much more room for them to grow, and I am still a long way below where I would need to be. I might be able to capture a mainland city or two if I spent a lot of resources on the project, but I don’t think that I could take enough, or hold them for long. No, I can only reach third if someone else is torn down a long way.

Luckily, that is a plausible eventuality. No one, not even the Unlucky Orphans of ten turns ago, has enough of an edge to be confident of victory, and definitely not enough of an edge to force concession. All three contenders must be looking for ways to improve their position, not just resting on their laurels and defending what they have. And unlike earlier, there are not any weak civilizations or unsettled lands in easy reach to grow, so I think that large wars with many cities changing hands among the three mainland civilizations are a requirement before someone wins. Rather or not such a war would play out so brutally that someone is reduced to a state worse than a seven-city exiled civilization’s status is still uncertain. I want to try to make it certain.

   
My ability to project power to the mainland is limited in range (only the northern coast) and strength (not that strong), but it is still there. Currently, I can pillage seafood, starve the one-tile islands, render Moai useless, tie up units in coastal cities, maybe burn some coastal cities, and maybe pillage some land improvements adjacent to the water. Once I have Chemistry, I can send frigates to bombard the defenses of coastal cities too. Superdeath has no ability to fight back, while Elkad’s limited ability to fight back will almost completely vanish as soon as I finish Chemistry and build a few frigates. The things I just outlined aren’t enough to tear someone down the needed amount on their own, but as assistance to a land campaign conducted by (an)other civilization(s), I think that it could make a difference. Also, if someone were aware that those things would occur to help them if they attacked a northern coast civilization, that might help convince them to start an attack in the first place.

What Next?
With all of that in mind, what will I actually do? Well, I have a few plans and ideas.

   
I already mentioned that I finished Gunpowder, but I also have Engineering now, and Chemistry is not too far away from completion. Quebec City just produced Christopher Columbus, and his gold should see the tech finished. After that, I think that I will research Military Science. None of the economic techs within easy reach appeal for my weak civilization, and the fun upper-tree stuff like Rifling is locked behind too many expensive things I don’t want. Military Science is close enough for me to finish it in a reasonable time, and it has a few things that could be useful for achieving my goal of orchestrating the downfall of someone else. Grenadiers will allow me to compete with the riflemen that the others will soon have for coastal defense despite my primitiveness in other areas, military academies (I decided to save both generals from earlier) and Police State will help my small, low-MFG island nation to close the army size gap with the mainland a little, and Commando allows some cool tricks that I might be able to use to extend my threat range a few tiles inland.

   
Now that battles are being fought, I need to have a better view of the mainland, so I am building explorers to see what is happening. Only one is under construction right now, but a few more are in the queue behind the muskets who are almost done. There should be four explorers on the mainland in about five turns, and they should be right in the thick of the action before long thanks to Engineering-boosted roads.

The city screen also gives some indication of the interesting Great Person situation that the Incan League will have for the rest of the game. Up to now, every Great Person I have produced was intended to be a specific type and to serve a predetermined part in a plan. That won’t be the case from now on. From now on, it will be a crapshoot between scientists, merchants, engineers, and even spies as the cities reach their maximum sizes and work all of their specialist slots. I will have to wait and see what Great People are born before deciding how to make use of them.

   
I think that the current dogpile configuration, Elkad and Superdeath against shallow_ru, is the worst of the three possible configurations for my purposes. I think that the Orphans are the most likely to survive a dogpile in a position intact enough to still be better off than me. That is because they have been the strongest civilization for a while, and still are. Despite losing three cities, they still have nineteen and are tied for the most with Elkad, while Superdeath still only has sixteen, including Tench (New Hong Kong ). Their demographics have been hurt, but they still have the best Crop Yield and GNP and aren’t far behind Superdeath in MFG (they’re still better than Elkad in that category). Also, as the graph shows above, they have not yet lost many units. That, combined with the fact that I can’t join in the fight against them, means I would prefer one of the north coast civilizations to be the target of a dogpile instead.

   
To that end, I am considering declaring war on Superdeath in the next few turns. If I harass him by threatening and pillaging, then I could help set him up to be the next dogpile target. And I do think that the Orphans will not be the last dogpile target of this game, since it seems to me that the alliance against them is quite fragile. This dogpile alliance is different than those from earlier in the game. The earlier dogpiles were of the strong against the weak. There was little incentive for an attacker to defect, make peace with the defender, and fight one of the other attackers instead, because they could gain spoils more easily by continuing to fight the weaker player. Also, earlier dogpiles were more stable because the attackers didn’t need each other to win, since they were each stronger than the defender individually. If one made peace, the others could continue.

That is not the case here. As I explained, shallow_ru is actually stronger than their attackers separately. If shallow_ru can convince one of their enemies to make peace, which they could plausibly do by counterattacking one of them painfully or stopping someone from capturing more cities, then the second player will not be strong enough to continue winning the war against the Orphans, so they will probably make peace. Then, a little while later when the three mainlanders have recovered and are looking to improve their positions again, they might consider the guy who already has a thorn firmly planted in his side as a target.

That’s the plan.

Wow, I think that was the longest report of this thread so far. To anyone who read through that: thanks for taking the time, I hope you enjoyed it. Oh, and sorry for such a long delay.

[Magic Science]

   
Nobody expects The Spanish Inquisition.
Also: :    
 
    



PS. It may come up that on the turn before this one I logged in before Superdeath and was in-game when he logged in. This shouldn't be a problem, because I hadn't done anything besides look around by the time he logged in (it had only been a minute), and then I logged out right away when I noticed he had joined the game. Despite the odd order of logins, I have played after him both this turn and the previous one, and there have been no double moves.

[Charriu]

Nobody expects The Spanish Inquisition.

 

What are your next plans to world domination?

[Magic Science]

That was a very fun turn for me. One of the best of the game. Let me try to explain what the lead-up to that moment of glory was like…

Turns 226 through 231 – 1580 to 1605 AD
   
After I decided that my general idea of what to do going forward was to declare war on Superdeath and cause him problems, I started thinking about what the detailed plan to meet that vague goal would be. At first, I thought that the campaign would revolve around pillaging and setting up the blockade as quickly as possible, like the brief clash at the start of the Partition of Incaland, not dramatic amphibious surprise attacks on cities. But on Turn 226, I sent in a galleon to scout inside Superdeath’s borders, and what I saw changed my mind a little. Two longbows and an impi were a weak enough garrison that I decided it was worth delaying the war a few turns to see if I could set up a surprise attack.

   
Then, on Turn 227, I sent in Christopher Columbus to conduct a trade mission in the most lucrative city within my reach: The Flash. In the process of earning his 1300 gold, he saw the garrison: only one longbowman and two axemen! It was at this point that I decided to try my very hardest to set up the most effective amphibious sneak attack I could to start off the war. It would delay the war a few turns, but the rewards for doing so were high, and a few turns delay would not be much of a problem even if nothing came of it.

   
By Turn 230, everything was ready. The island garrisons had shuffled around and been enlarged a little bit so losing access to Superdeath’s gifted luxuries wouldn’t cause much unhappiness. Galleons had brought in troops from all three main islands (sorry Quebec City, you know it’s true), some of them built just in time, so there were ten musketmen and two veteran swordsmen in range to attack The Flash. It even turned out that there was enough time for the explorers to reach the mainland and run to safe places away from Superdeath’s troops as well. They saw Superdeath’s units running every which way, but with only one turn of his left before I attacked, still none of them had seen fit to reinforce The Flash…

   
My fifth and final galleon was involved as well, but I was worried that Superdeath would get suspicious if two galleons were sailing through his territory at once, so I only sent the muskets from Uzbek and Kabul instead of the swords and the muskets. That worry is also why this galleon over here is lurking back out of sight. It may seem like a small thing, and maybe it is, but I had seen enough of Superdeath’s army to know that he could end the threat to his mainland in an instant if he realized what was about the happen.

Then, on Turn 231…

   
VICTORY! The Spanish Inquisition captures The Flash and burns it to the ground! It took 170 turns, but the Incan League has the final world about the barbarian city of Hittite! I had the bad luck of losing flawlessly against an axeman with one of my muskets early on in the battle, and I wasn’t able to send in a swordsman to deal the last blow like I wanted to, but overall, combat went well and I have no cause for complaint. I lost just as many units as I expected to lose.

Before he was tragically deleted to deny Superdeath XP, the heroic musketman saw that there was a reinforcement longbowman one tile short of The Flash, which I find amusing, and also fortuitous. The marines still would have captured the city if that longbowman made it, but it would have been bloodier, probably bloody enough that I would not have enough units left to execute the next stage of the plan right away…

[Magic Science]

   

What are your next plans to world domination?

Charriu, I am glad you asked. The next step of the master plan for third place world domination is to capture Aquaman. By next turn, I expect all of the mainland coastal garrisons to swell enough in size that I will not have any hope of capturing them, but I’m almost certain that I will still be able to capture Aquaman. As of Turn 231, its garrison was still only two longbowmen and one impi, and that shouldn’t change. There will be no reinforcements coming in from elsewhere, and the chance of it having produced another unit on its own at the turn roll is incredibly low. It would take absolutely atrocious combat luck for me to not take the city next turn.

After that…well, we will see. There will certainly be some pillaging and blockading, but I still have a few other tricky plans that may or may not come to fruition.

[Bobchillingworth]

Great report, congrats on getting some payback!