[SPOILERS] Laconic plakonic

[plako]

Bizarre things going on. I can't log in to check things out better, but it seems like middle of the pack nations are fighting. Old harry did lose lots of points while only dtay was logged in. However no score increase visible for dtay. My best guess is that dtay captured and razed a city so fast tha civstats didn't spot the point increase. After this it seems like commodore took a city from dtay.

Btw. There has been some defensive pacts signed and I've been also offered one. I'm not accepting any of these deals. I've no idea how the defensive pacts work. However assuming it enforces you to declare war based on actions of others that feels pretty stupid to sign these. Main point could be signalling good faith.

My enforced peace with Mackoti ended. Everything seems peaceful so I'm using this time to build mainly infra and wealth.

[plako]

Dtay is getting a beating from Commodore and Old Harry. At 1st turn of war he razed Old Harry's capital, but then it has been a downhill for him and he has lost several cities. The war is probably pretty insignificant for winning race. Mackoti might want to grab some land from Old Harry when their enforced peace ends, but it shouldn't have much impact to the end result. We're getting close to the end of the tech tree.

Mackoti is still #1 and has been teching lately landing Industrialism, Radio and Refrigeration. Scooter is #2 and fired a golden age few turns back and has now very impressive Demographics and most land and MFG. He has lots of gold to use for teching or upgrading. I'm solidly on #3 position and Commodore #4 not that far behind me despite of having significantly less land. In practice the race is between Mackoti and Scooter and as said many times my best chance is still hoping for the leaders to fight it out.

I've been trying to figure out where to go from here to improve my chances. Should I try to tech at full speed and build space ship? That does not feel like a winner. On a peaceful tech/production race I will lose to both Scooter and Mackoti. Another problem is that I wouldn't have anything to take advantage of military weaknesses of others. So this means I'll be focusing on military and leave the space race for the others. Short term goal has been Industrialism and I'm soon there. I'll probably also try to land 3 georges dam that would be significant boost to my production capabilities. I need Platics though so that means it will be my last big tech goal 1st to bonus I'll try to grab. Aftyer that I'll follow the tech leaders foot steps and maximise my "known civ bonuses". I might occasionally taking so me not widely known tech to give military boost.

[Zed-F]

So this means I'll be focusing on military and leave the space race for the others.

Any plans for what to do with said military?

[plako]

So this means I'll be focusing on military and leave the space race for the others.

Any plans for what to do with said military?

To be prepared, if an opening to win the game comes up. Without an army I'm totally in the mercy of others stopping the frontrunners. With the army I can be actively affecting to the outcome. This could mean attacking Mackoti or Scooter in case they're occupied elsewhere or in case I can't find anything else useful to do with it attacking WilliamLP. The last one is just a backup to find something useful to do with my army or generate couple of GGs. I'm not gonna win this game attacking strong middle of the pack nations.

[plako]

Mackoti and Scooter has signed up defensive pact. I guess they're going to let space ship decide the winner. As said I can't compete with them in pure science race. Nevertheless I converted my nation towards max economy. Now that desicion feels like a mistake so I'll change it towards military/production when I next time log in. If they want to tech it up in peace, I'm still better off having a strong military presence. That would allow me to takes some secondary goals and maybe there arises unseen opportunities to win this. Currently I think Mackoti is still slight favorite, but Scooter is not far behind. The land he got from his last war is just so good and there are plenty of it. My chances are low.

btw. Mackoti hasn't got a new tech for a long time while his GNP+no gold accumulation+no new military indicates he has been teching all the time. That almost certainly means he has just invested beakers on various techs to prevent known-tech bonuses from the other front runners. It doesn't affect me much. I'm so much behind in tech and taking the monopoly tech Plastics also means I've couple of research goals Mackoti already has.

Not sure if I have any dedicated lurkers anymore, but just in case I do info from front that is very likely well documented elsewhere. Commodore+Old Harry has really been beating up dtay really badly. He has lost most of his coastal and island cities.

[Ceiliazul]

plastics you say? whats the plan there?

[plako]

plastics you say? whats the plan there?

Mainly 3 Georges dam. It is pretty good investment.

[Ceiliazul]

what are the city counts of the main competitors, and how many of yours are contiguous?

[plako]

Counting cities. That feels like a lot of a work . Makes me happy to see active lurkers though, so here we go:
Plako 57 (over 40 in my main land. Not all of them worth a factory though)
Mack 65
Scooter 61
Commodore 39
William 26
dtay 18
Old Harry 31
2Metra 20

btw. Late game strategic resources are totally unbalanced. Luckily all the frontrunners are big enough to make it not matter much. e.g. my closest Aluminium is here:

[plako]

Couple of other shots:

National Epic + Natonal Park cities. National Epic city is leisurely accumulating GP points so that National Park city can generate next one. I'm still hoping for a 4 man GA and need Artist + Scientist. This is 1st game in ages when I'm very happy about the positioning of my national Epic city. I stupidly run Merchants at some point in my National Park city so risk of generating unwanted Merchant will be few percents.

Demographics + graphs (yes I'm pathetic in Espionage. This is side effect of Aggressive is that I've way less incentive to build Courthouses than rest of the players):

Also noticed that I lack graphs of Old Harry. So I'm gonna invest to that a little.