[SPOILERS] - Tredje and Mardoc are Sheelba of the Clan of Embers

[Tredje]

Turn32:

Balseraph have been spotted to the SE, quite close. I will get a screenshot next turn. I have positioned our Wolf Rider so that should a Worker be in the outermost ring next turn we can steal it. Chances are he won't have any Workers there, and that I won't do it.

[Tredje]

Due to Square Leg's wife cutting her hand on some glass we had to call it a day after only two rounds played. So besides locating the Balseraph to our SE there is nothing major to report. Like I said, they are close. It looks as if our success in this game will be determined by how well we can settle the river locations to our Northeast and Northwest.





We will need to send the Wolf Rider back for when the Settler is produced, so that it can help with guarding it safely to its destination. But I want to move it one East to meet Bob before I send him back. Do you agree Mardoc?

[Mardoc]

Due to Square Leg's wife cutting her hand on some glass we had to call it a day after only two rounds played. So besides locating the Balseraph to our SE there is nothing major to report. Like I said, they are close. It looks as if our success in this game will be determined by how well we can settle the river locations to our Northeast and Northwest.

We will need to send the Wolf Rider back for when the Settler is produced, so that it can help with guarding it safely to its destination. But I want to move it one East to meet Bob before I send him back. Do you agree Mardoc?

I was wondering why last weeks' blitz went 15ish turns and this one went 2, but that makes perfect sense. C&D wise, nothing noteworthy happened in these two turns - no techs, population, etc.

Absolutely we should meet Bob officially - I might go 1 SE instead to see more land, but I can see the argument for trying to make it less obvious we have a wolf rider already. But we get the bonus on techs, vision on his graphs, potential advantages on diplomacy, and not much cost that I can see - as long as the rider can catch up to the settler before he leaves our borders, we should be safe. I'll admit, given the choice of raiding Bob or raiding Sareln, I'm definitely inclined toward Bob, but only if we can do so for a minimal investment, because you're right, those nice river valleys are too close to our opponents as well for us to tolerate any delay.

And in general, yes, I agree, the efficiency and speed of getting the nice land claimed will make all the difference for us. It might be worth grabbing the cow/rice/floodplain site early to make sure we have a defined border with Bob; this areas, aside from the mana, looks pretty low value, so I imagine he'd either leapfrog it or be willing to call it a border.

[Tredje]

Turn 33:

Moved our Wolf Rider closer to the Balseraph border. This is what I saw. Not a whole lot:





Thereafter I ordered our Wolf Rider to get back to Clan lands. I will send Bob a small greeting in-character later today. I love how we manage to spot our neighbours without them being able to see us. Hopefully it gives them a slight claustrophobic feeling. "The Clan is watching us." Regarding Bob his score increased from 153 to 191 during the last turn, so I am assuming he got a tech + maybe something else. Also note that "Dain the Caswallan" adpoted Agrarianism this turn. Is that a common thing to do? Change your name while switching civics to make it harder for others to know who did it? I guess we could look at the Food numbers to see who had a sudden rise in Food grown. I have located Iskender as well. Next turn our Warrior will establish contact.

Also I agree 100% that we should try to make the Cow/Oasis/Rice site our border city with Bob.

[Mardoc]

Vaguely PBEM1 spoilerish:

I haven't seen that name switching trick before, except a few things that Pocketbeetle did in PBEM 1. And we do have three of the players from that game here who might have been...inspired. I have to admit, I had been assuming that was Sareln because I was thinking 'Amurites' - let me check...ok, the Amurites did have a big jump in food at the right time, and none of the others we've contacted did, so it was either Sareln (and either a bug or being creative), Iskender, or Serdoa. Or, I suppose, a switch from someone we did know coupled with a tile rearrangement. I don't think we find out about civics changes for people we don't know yet, so I think it's got to have been the Amurites (went back and checked, this happened on T24/25,btw. I wish the FFH event log listed dates like the BtS one).

On the current C&D front, the Balseraph point jump is entirely due to their 3rd ring expansion 20 turns ago, just land points. The Sheaim jump, however, is definitely a tech.

From the perspective of keeping us low on score to not trigger the Barbarians, we're fortunate that there's a Creative leader in the game. Planting our capital close enough to the coast to pick up a bunch of coasts instead of land also will help. For this map, it works out as 2.415 pts/land tile, 6.72 pts/pop, 11.18 pts/tech, and 17.2 pts/wonder. So Bob grabbing an extra ring of land per city ought to compensate for quite a bit of tech and population for us, once we really get rolling

I hadn't really thought about this before, but even without Aristocracy, Agrarianism is a pretty darn good civic to run, especially if you happen to, say, be Organized, emphasizing food, and building mostly workers and settlers. Sound familiar ? That means I'm going to go back, mostly, to my previous recommendation of a tech path, something like Mining -> Masonry -> Calendar -> Ancient Chants -> Exploration -> Education -> Code of Laws. I can't decide if PBEM is an advantage or disadvantage here; I think we've switched tech paths 5 or 6 times while still researching Mining - does that mean we're indecisive, or that we're converging on the right answer?

[Tredje]

So, this is what I wrote Bob:

It was a lovely Sunday morning.

Queen Keelyn, having spent all Saturday in the arena, was incredibly bored.
She gathered her advisors around her and asked them to come up with something for her to do on such a grand day.
The first advisor, a balding man with a worried look on his face, was urged to step forward.
His lips trembled. It was obvious that he knew the consequenses of failure.

"Perhaps the Queen would wish to visit the Zoo? I have been told that we have received some fresh elven specimen."
"NO! Elves are boring! Even dwarves are more interesting than elves. Guards, off with this man's head!"

The advisor threw himself to the floor, begging for mercy, but to no avail. The guards decapitated him on the spot.
Then the second advisor was called upon. He was a younger man with his hair colored pink and he wasn't wearing any pants.
He was Keelyn's most trusted advisor.

"The Queen must bathe! In the ocean! And we must bring carrots, lots of carrots! And we will throw them into the ocean.
And then, when the seals come..."

Queen Keelyn waved her hand and the trusted advisor was removed. Then she stated: "Yes, I will go swim in the ocean."

An hour later Queen Keelyn and her retinue had arrived at the coast. After enjoying her favourite snack of deep fried pigs ears,
Keelyn exclaimed that it was time for her royal higness to go for a swim. No one was allowed to be closer than a hundred yards from her,
because although she was crazy as a loon, she was still a young girl and very insecure about her own body. She made sure that she
was alone and jumped into the water. It was so refreshing, and she giggled delightfully as she practiced her breast strokes. But then, suddenly,
she heard squabbling voices in the bushes not far from where she was swimming.

"Let me see pretty lady! You already see much! My turn!"
"No, you wait. I not finished."
"I hit you if you not move. I serious."
"If you hit, I... Oh, she notice us! Run!"

Quen Keelyn, now in full panic, called for her royal guard. When they searched the bush from whence the noise had emanated, all they could find
were footprints in the mud. A speedily assembled search party could not locate the culprits. Queen Keelyn went home feeling angry and slightly violated.
She knew. She knew that someone had watched her practice her breaststrokes.

To which he replied:

Hehe, well done. That's now totally canon. Maybe Sareln can make it Hafgan the Purger's civiliopedia text if he adds him to his balance mod :P

Did we get contact outside of my capital or did you meet one of my units?


Hit me up on Google chat sometime if you want to discuss the map / other civs / whatever.


-Bobchillingworth

I will tell him that we made contact outside his capital. I must admit that I am somewhat disappointed, I had hoped for a witty reply.

And techincally I would say that we haven't actually decided on a tech path yet, which allows me to say that all our indecisiveness can be interpreted as caution against making a rushed decision

[Mardoc]

Impressive diplo so far. I'm inclined to suggest we keep Square Leg alive for diplo purposes, but the rest of them can go hang

Took a look at the save (not playing unless you actually miss it, Tredje), and the only apparent change from a C&D perspective is Serdoa growing to size 6. He must therefore have either made a mistake and overgrew, or more likely, has hooked up a luxury resource already. With three techs, that seems reasonable to assume. I'm surprised the Luchiurp still haven't grown to size 6 themselves; they must be training a settler as well.

No screenshots cause I'm sure you'll reveal something when you move the units; at least Sidar lands.

With the current info on people's locations, here's my revised guess at the map:

Code:

Sidar    Luchiurp      Sheaim

Amurites     Clan      Balseraphs

It suggests that the Sheaim are beyond the Luchiurp; next time we have an extra scout, it might pay to go find them and confirm. Since Sareln hasn't met them yet, that suggests there's no world-wrap connection to the Sheaim; the continent probably ends not too far from them.

So, that means we know the locations of 4 of the 5 fellow travellers; the good news is, Serdoa's Pyre Zombie rush will therefore almost certainly target someone else . Maybe we can coordinate with him on a target once we're ready to hit someone ourselves.

And, I was thinking about tech... Just kidding, this time anyway.

[Tredje]

Haha! I actually have something to say about tech, but let us get diplo out of the way first.

I had a longer chat with Bob and Square Leg today. If I were to describe their attitude I would say that Bob is probing more for information, while Square leg is rather open. Both appear friendly towards us for the time being.

So, to summarize:

• 1: The Sheaim are to the East (and a bit to the South) of the Luchuirp, about 13-14 tiles.
  
• 2: Square Leg actually managed to make the game glitch and got to see all the Unique Features on the map! He said that he didn't see the Letum Frigus anywhere. Also he said that I am the only person he has shared this with. Not sure if that is true, he might be saying it to try to create the atmosphere of a special relationship. Notice that we can also see his land on the minimap. To his north there is water, so he will be coming south sooner rather than later. Here is the screenshot:
  
  
• 3: Square Leg proposed that we work together, and specifically mentioned the Sheaim/Balseraph. I definitely think that the eastern front will experience action. But with whom do we align ourselves? I suppose we will see later.
  
• 4: Bob thinks that we are on a Terra map.
  
• 5: Bob has the Pool of Tears right next to his capital, with the Standing Stones nearby.
  
• 6: Bob inquired about our World Spell, I told him that was classified. He also mentioned that he wasn't sure about the Dragon Hoard spawning, and if Sons of the Inferno would spawn without it. Something to keep in mind when firing For the Horde.
  
• 7: Bob reported that Sareln is having some barb troubles. So bad in fact that he couldn't build a Settler. Again, not sure if this is correct, but if it is, great.
  

Now for the actual turn. The Wolf Rider is moving home, while the Warrior marched up against the Sidar border. Here is what he saw:

Not that much of interest, but there are two Lizardmen and one Skeleton moving in on his capital. Did I mention I love barbs? I do.

And now for our obligatory tech discussion. I was actually thinking of postponing Code of Laws for a bit, and instead go for Mysticism and God King. Why? The way I see it our early commerce will come from Gems+Dragon Bones+Calendar Resources. We will want Aristocracy, but we might be able to postpone it for a while. Instead we could adopt God King for the production and commerce boost. With a Warren+God King our capital will be able to produce units at a very high rate, which could prove beneficial in settling the fertile river regions. What is important is not our immediate GNP, but if we can settle the most land while reaching Code of laws at an acceptable time.

[Mardoc]

The Sheaim are to the East (and a bit to the South) of the Luchuirp, about 13-14 tiles.

Alright, my guess was right!

Square Leg actually managed to make the game glitch and got to see all the Unique Features on the map! He said that he didn't see the Letum Frigus anywhere. Also he said that I am the only person he has shared this with. Not sure if that is true, he might be saying it to try to create the atmosphere of a special relationship. Notice that we can also see his land on the minimap. To his north there is water, so he will be coming south sooner rather than later.
Square Leg proposed that we work together, and specifically mentioned the Sheaim/Balseraph. I definitely think that the eastern front will experience action. But with whom do we align ourselves? I suppose we will see later.

Hmm. On the one hand, we do need an ally. On the other hand, do we really want a Financial ally, who blossoms late game? I'm not sure, I'll keep thinking about it. Regardless, if we do ally with him, we ought to insist the target be someone else than the Sheaim, so we can get some land out of the deal.

Bob thinks that we are on a Terra map.
5: Bob has the Pool of Tears right next to his capital, with the Standing Stones nearby.
6: Bob inquired about our World Spell, I told him that was classified. He also mentioned that he wasn't sure about the Dragon Hoard spawning, and if Sons of the Inferno would spawn without it. Something to keep in mind when firing For the Horde.
7: Bob reported that Sareln is having some barb troubles. So bad in fact that he couldn't build a Settler. Again, not sure if this is correct, but if it is, great.

Hmm, interesting news. Definitely good if the barbs are slowing our neighbors; that makes Barbarian not just a penalty. I see there's two barbs grouped up with our Sidar scout, as well And there is Standing Stones in the game, just not where originally expected

On the subject of the worldspell - I'm inclined to suggest the optimal time might be about when everyone else is settling their second cities, if the goal is units. There's not really that much wilderness on this map. Of course, that would probably jack our unit costs through the roof, so maybe continue waiting for that reason? Oh, I don't know.

And now for our obligatory tech discussion. I was actually thinking of postponing Code of Laws for a bit, and instead go for Mysticism and God King. Why? The way I see it our early commerce will come from Gems+Dragon Bones+Calendar Resources. We will want Aristocracy, but we might be able to postpone it for a while. Instead we could adopt God King for the production and commerce boost. With a Warren+God King our capital will be able to produce units at a very high rate, which could prove beneficial in settling the fertile river regions. What is important is not our immediate GNP, but if we can settle the most land while reaching Code of laws at an acceptable time.

Hmm. Well, on the one hand, if we had Aristocracy this instant, it would double our GNP. On the other hand, I can definitely see the argument that in the early game, the food might be more important than the commerce. I think I'm inclined to agree that it's not the most urgent goal - but at our current rate, we'll probably be done with the settler-spam phase about when we get to Code of Laws anyway, I think. Probably the best thing to do there is to keep it in mind and adjust as we get closer.

The other very important note is that God King does not boost commerce - it boosts gold. Assuming we plan to run a high research slider, it won't have much effect on our finances except increasing maintenance costs. It might be worth it for the hammers in our first Warrens city, but it would be explicitly a tradeoff from gold to hammers and food.

If we were to rush someone with warriors/For the Horde, God King would be excellent - plenty of warrens doubled hammers and the gold to pay the unit costs - but we keep coming back to the conclusion that a rush isn't really worth it, right?

[Tredje]

Yeah, I am not considering a rush right now. Better try to cover the map with our foul orcish presence. And what you are saying regarding Aristocracy/God King makes sense. I think I am going to have to run a test game and see what I like better. For now I can agree on not heading for God King any time soon.

On the diplomatic front I wrote Iskender a short story today. Here it is:

It was a peaceful day in the Sidar palace. Everyone was busy contemplating how they could please their ruler Iskender by being Great.
In fact, that is all the Sidar ever think about. Even housewives and stableboys in their quite moments sit down and ponder how to achieve greatness.
But suddenly the calm was broken when a wounded scout came running through the courtyard.

"Master, master!" he shouted. "Lizardmen and Skeletons are converging upon our fair city. "And they are looking for blood!"

Iskender, not one to be frightened by news of a couple of barbarians, climbed up on his balcony to get a good view.
The scout was right, Lizardmen and Skeletons were marching towards them. But behind the great number of Lizardmen he thought that
he for a second spotted a orcish looking creature spurring the barbarians on. Then whoever it was vanished.

Iskender returned to the courtyard to organize the defence. At the same time an Orc messenger approached him with a parchment covered in
crude writing. It said:

"Daboo. We are Orcs and Goblins. We come say hello to the Sidar. We friendly."

I enjoy being friendly but also hinting at our true, brutish nature.