Emulating Sir Robin: How to run away on Horseback

[Square Leg]

There isn't really too much to say at the moment so apologies for not having commented too much!

I have a question though - Do the Hippus have any particular religion that you feel suits them?

[Rawkking Goodguy]

Well the kilimorph/order priest buffs can travel with the hippus horses, something that no priests can without slowing the horses down a great deal.

Empyrean also gets the ratha which receives the horselord buff for being mounted (does it?)

So conveniently the three good-aligned religions in FFH have uses for the hippus, something that will be nice if I still plan to summon Basium.

On that note, do all rathas have the empyrean state religion by default (IE: will they all make angels on death?)

I'm still not going to exclude the overlords or the veil (will probably ignore esus unless I really want to deny the clowns gibbon), as they are all useful for the hippus. But for now I'm leaning towards one of the above.


Will be catching up with turn reports either tonight or sometime tomorrow.

[Rawkking Goodguy]

Tech thread:

Hate to do this so early, but I have to hold the turn a bit over a crucial negotiation. I will play as soon as it becomes possible. Sorry everyone.

Interesting.

I think the only other civ besides the Hippus that could make Gaspar have to hold the save outright is probably the Sheaim? Since both the elves and the Sheaim spoiler threads have recent activity I'm gonna assume so (metagame ho!)

Might as well make a post about it so that others wonder if its the Hippus being bullies :P

[Heisenberg]

Elves start with 2 scouts instead of warrior and scout lol... Guess someone -else- forgot to leave his capital garrisoned...

As "useless" as Esus feels sometimes... An early Archmage as support can't hurt lol... Not to mention you're probably going to hit Warhorses eventually giving access to Shadowriders.
Though undoubtedly other religions probably give much better, earlier benefits.

[Thoth]

On that note, do all rathas have the empyrean state religion by default (IE: will they all make angels on death?)

I'm 90% certain that units that require a specific religion to be built (like rathas) will have that religion assigned to them.

[Rawkking Goodguy]

Turn Reports up to T11

Some people get all the luck. Namely, the clowns

I've been moving the scout these past few turns, researching Calendar, and finishing off the worker.

The first lizardman paid us a visit!

Turn 10

The next turn the lizard promptly suicided on my capital, granting Sir Lancelot 1 XP. The first of many of those troublesome beasts dispatched of.

Turn 11

The graves event. I think this one improves the chance of getting good things from visiting a graveyard? I could have had the worker pop the graveyard but I wasn't sure just *how* much better the event was. Would have been worth it if there was no chance of creating undead, I suppose. Does anyone know how long it lasts?

EoT screenshot

Two turns of a scout in, which may have been a bit risky. I'm taking what is probably the one and only chance for my worker to get that wheat improved, but I'm also worried that the next lizard will be around before I can get the incense plantation up. Let me know if I should rush for the plantation, I assume food > commerce for worker improvements at the beginning but 5 commerce is a lot of extra commerce.

Diplo:

Well, a couple turns ago I noticed the clowns had their power spike to 20k. I didn't think anything of it

Anyways, Kyan has talked to me and apparently he received the lizards vs. dwarves event...and proceeded to win against all three dwarves that spawned! As such he has two lizardmen he can promote to shock. Bob and Krill have been demanding that Kyan choke me...which would probably have been the right move for him to do, to be honest. He might even have managed to succeed in taking the capital since I stupidly ignored the power spike and have 2 turns of production in training a scout instead of a warrior

I'm lucky that Kyan wants our mutual NAP to merely be *fair* instead of horrendously in his favor.

Here's what he proposed.

[COLOR="Orange"]NAP Proposal between Balseraphs and Hippus

- NAP until and including turn 150
-Heroic archmages have their own personal NAP extension which prohibits them from offensive action until turn 160
- Balseraphs, with at least ten turns notice, must be willing to lend marble to the Hippus if at all possible.
-Neither civilisation must *ever* use Sol Pass for any action that could, in any way, be deemed aggresive to the other party without express permission.
-Balseraphs, with at least ten turns notice, must be willing to lend Sun Mana and at least one other mana type (of hippus choosing) to to the Hippus if at all possible.
-The Hippus must, with at least ten turns notice, be willing to lend two mana types (of Balseraph choosing) to the Balseraphs if at all possible.
- Both parties will warn of hostilities or aggresive diplomacy/actions from third party nations towards the other involved in the treaty.
-Both parties will keep the strength of their relationship secret from the other nations.

first draft so let me know if things need to be added/edited/removed.[/COLOR]

Two other things:

1. We also agreed on extending our current NAP to T30 for the time being. (phew)
2. We didn't discuss fuchsia dot but I can pretty much guarantee we lost it

Apparently he can get Gibbon around T120 (according to Bob). Kinda wondering if I should extend it or consider a game long NAP. He'll have a super strong archmage on T160 and I might only have Mercurians. Should probably ask what he thinks of a T200 NAP...that's pretty much gamelong so I'm hesistant to ask.


Technology/Economic Micro

The Hippus finished researching Calendar this turn. I finally ran some simulations with the following three tech paths, playing up to turn 48:

1. Animal Husbandry -> Exploration -> Ancient Chants -> Education -> Code of Laws
2. Exploration -> Ancient Chants -> Education -> Code of Laws
3. Crafting -> Mining -> Exploration -> Ancient Chants -> Education -> Code of Laws

(I probably should test out an early mysticism tech path as well)

The first two seem superior to the mining path, the production of settlers is about the same for paths 2 and 3 and while overall production will be increased thanks to mining I don't think it's worth the even greater delay of getting agristofarms.

Here are the differences between paths 1 and 2. Surprisingly Path 1 only reaches code of laws about 3T later than path 2...getting that second settler out really pays dividends.

-36 extra beakers for path 1 (path 2 gets 9 extra hammers during these three turns before aristofarms as well).
-The third settler is 4t slower as such in path 1 vs. path 2.

(The second settler is of course also slower but the sim has already factored in that difference in tech rate)

Anyways, I think that makes animal husbandry the superior tech. 36 beakers is nice but getting the third city up even earlier is really going to pay dividends. Please tell me if you disagree.

[Iskender]

The mana exchange obviously favours them, if they want to get Gibbon. They'll be able to stack Air mana for free promotions and get Vitalize from Nature and make a little paradise out of the area around the fuchsia dot. At least the 'no Sol Pass' clause seems to benefit the Hippus more, sealing your capital from the SW.

I'd say the offer looks good considering the circumstances.


Maybe you could skip Exploration to get CoL a few turns earlier, is there a good reason for building roads before 2nd and 3rd citiy are founded?

Have you decided for a 2nd city spot now that the fuchsia dot might be out of reach?

[Rawkking Goodguy]

Turn 12

I am of course greeted with the Calendar splashscreen.

I immediately revolt to Agrarianism.

Our scout Sir Robin's path is blocked by a wolf.

At 90% odds I decide to risk it.

He gains 3 experience for his efforts and continues the slow march north. Due to researching animal husbandry so early I'm planning to promote him to combat 1 for a chance at getting an early scout with subdue animal. Just need 2 more experience and the tech to reach it.

A forest has grown just south of Camelot, taking away a river grassland from us until mining. Of course by the time the city's happy cap is high enough for this loss to matter I will have researched mining regardless.

Also the Grigori have had another score increase. After the blitz I need to either get down to C&D or pretty much give up entirely in that regard.

Maybe you could skip Exploration to get CoL a few turns earlier, is there a good reason for building roads before 2nd and 3rd citiy are founded?

Have you decided for a 2nd city spot now that the fuchsia dot might be out of reach?

With expansive settlers I'll actually have comfortably finished the settler for my third city before CoL is even researched.

On city sites, I haven't found a better site than here:

I assumed this was my second city in all my sims. It can grow to its happy cap quickly by stealing the wheat and the grass hill reagents are a nice enough tile at this stage of the game, getting the financial commerce bonus.

I can get this city founded around turn 35 (36 without roads from exploration). If I ignore exploration it'll be about 5 turns from education and some 18 turns from the eventual goal of code of law. Thus I'd be giving up 36 commerce since that city won't get trade routes from cultural borders (I still don't get how this works...maybe rivers, coasts, and oceans under culture can be traded through without the requisite techs, but not land apparently). Plus exploration is always nice to have as I'll be running out of useful actions for my worker turns, especially if I'm not getting mining till after CoL.

Edit: Though perhaps most importantly, my third city is probably going to be a good deal more distant from my capital (perhaps that unexplored river area to the southeast?) and I'd like to have started roading to it before CoL is finished. On that note the 36 commerce above is conservative, I haven't factored in the research time for exploration after CoL and the time it will take for my workers to road to both cities after that.

[Rawkking Goodguy]

Turns 13, 14

The worker manages to improve the plains wheat without some nasty barb appearing out of the fog 1T before completion

Assuming no other barbs appear, next up is getting that plains incense improved. I'm going to try to get the extended NAP signed with the clowns before then so they can't have second thoughts when our GNP spikes.

To the west, things aren't as great for Sir Robin.

With nowhere to run to, Sir Robin goes against his nature and fortifies in place. The hill, fortification, and healing is only going to do so much unfortunately.

Hitting enter brought Camelot to size 2 and tied with with the top crop yield player.

Demographics:

It seems like the elves still haven't managed to build a warrior? Clowns have popped their third ring of borders from the creative trait.

[Heisenberg]

It seems like the elves still haven't managed to build a warrior?

Yay~ looks like I guessed right~

If only they were right next to you.......