Mooooooo.... wait, wrong animal. Neeeigghhh

[Square Leg]

[COLOR="Lime"]> We have encountered a variety of barb animals ~5 tiles north of your borders
> including an elephant, scorpion and Lion. There is also a goblin fort 7N1E
> of the Pyre. Fortunately Pedigree can run like a mofo and managed to avoid
> them all! The Illians to your east is... for want of a better phrase, a
> real shitter for you. Do you have contact or at least know who is the other
> side of them?[/COLOR]

[COLOR="SlateGray"]We have a scout that's just passing Serdoa's land from the south. If
he survives we should be able to tell that.[/COLOR]

[COLOR="lime"]> We have yet to meet our eastern neighbour since we have only
> scouted south since stasis forced us to huddle up in our capital for
> warmth. If you have any directions to meet Serdoa, or know of any barbs in
> the vicinity of our scout, I'd really appreciate that help.[/COLOR]

[COLOR="slategray"]Serdoa is 18 tiles east from your scout at the moment. No animals
around your scout, there was a scorpion about 10 turns ago but it must
have be the one you passed on the way here. Eastwards there are mostly
goblins and bears.[/COLOR]

[COLOR="lime"]> With regard to aiding you against the Iliians - we will have to see where we
> are in 20t. To be honest, we're not entirely sure what we could do in that
> timescale that wouldn't just make us the next target... This isn't a no by
> any means, more just that we need to know the bigger picture at this stage.
>[/COLOR]

[COLOR="SlateGray"]I'm afraid it might be too late for the next target bit, what's
easier/faster/more efficient - take the the PoWs on the long trek back
to hit Serdoa's other neighbor or carry on round the lake and kill
whoever is next. I think there are good odds on Serdoa having a NAP
with his other neighbor and planning a general sweep round the sea
clockwise. We had a chance to be the other neighbor, btw, but Ellimist
was late answering Serdoa's probing email while I was on holiday and
the contact dropped dead after that, so I assume it's gone.

I don't expect miracles, I know the PoWs will come early for either of
us to have anything of significance, but 6-8 scourge horsemen striking
out of the fog while he sends his Ice elemental to pound us could do
some real damage against a pure PoW stack ( or maybe PoW / hunter
stack, I doubt he'll have anything else since it would slow the
priests down by a lot ).[/COLOR]

[COLOR="lime"]> Oh - and we take the red pill... ;-)
>[/COLOR]

Really... Agent Smith shall make a friendly, morning time visit to
your house shortly

[Square Leg]

Ten years ago, a crack commando horse unit was sent to prison by a bovine court for a crime they didn't commit. These horses promptly escaped from a maximum security stable to the Erebus underground. Today, still wanted by the cows, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire... The H-Team.

Better add this bit on the end too:

Jokes aside, we will see if we can get some horse based units down to your borders post haste. In return we ask that you do not disclose our whereabouts to the Illians. If we are to strike a blow to them, it will be under the cover of darkness. Pedigree will return from where he came and nothing further will be said of meeting.

[Square Leg]

and here is the chat that led to our response:

15:27 Square Leg: Afternoon
Iskender hey
Square Leg: work sucks today... too tired for it
15:28 Iskender it's almost friday
Square Leg: almost!
got a message back from the Sidar
in 12
15:29 He seems to think that serdoa is napped up to the east and that he is the target of the PoW rush
15:30 Iskender could be right. there's still 33% chance that serdoa has no neighbour to the east
15:32 Square Leg: there is a line in his response where he says that they "could have been that neighbour" that makes me think that Serdoa has disclosed that he has a neighbour in the east to mist. dunno - I might be reading it incorrectly. Regardless, it puts pretty good odds on us being the 2nd target.
15:34 Iskender maybe sareln's dying robbed them of that chance
to be the napped neigbour
Square Leg: yeah - i guess we'll find out
Iskender they say the illians are 18 tiles east
15:35 plus 25 tiles north, it'd take PoW 20+ turns to just reach our borders
assuming they'd make 2 tiles every turn
15:36 Square Leg: which they won't - and on top of that they will have animals and the Sidar to fight on the way. I think it is safe to assume that it will be at least t90 before they can get to us.
15:37 Iskender and we can get to them earlier
Square Leg: yes - fight them in the field
Iskender or threaten their core
unless they move the pow back
15:38 horsemen would make the distance between us and them twice as fast
15:39 Square Leg: The priests aren't quite like the sons of the inferno, but the principle is the same. If we force him to use them as defence then they are neutered.
15:41 If he is moving them around in the open and not covering them with ice elementals, we have a chance to kill them, if we keep a band of horsemen within range - remembering we have a world spell


5 minutes

15:47 Iskender ha. we have 1 range on them. PoW can't take spell extension
Square Leg: I on't think we can do anything more for the sidar at this point except say good luck, and move on
so ice elementals don't get boosted
15:48 Iskender i'd rather not tell the Mists that, otherwise they might change their goal for the game and do something like vassalizing to the Illians and letting them pass through
15:49 maybe promise to get horses there asap which we'll do anyway
Square Leg: good point. we want them to fight the sidar - even if it only takes a few turns
15:50 ok - that sounds like a plan. I'll draft something and pop it in the thread.
15:53 do we want to meet serdoa?
15:54 Iskender i guess
Square Leg: we could send our scout back and prepare a very surprising horse attack
Iskender sending him back might be tricky
Square Leg: I know, but think about this.
15:55 Iskender i doubt we'll be able to surprise them if they have hunting
Square Leg: If we ask mist to not to disclose who is to his north we can prepare a stack of a few horses to dash in and raid on him as he attacks the sidar, or just after...
15:56 If he doesn't bother to bring a hunter hawk it will be
I don't know if he will tbh
Iskender hm, crazy but might work
Square Leg: thse things are often rushed
especially rushes!
15:57 the thing is, he will likely use the IE's to soften up the city leaving the priests exposed. If serdoa doesn't know we are there we have a massive advantage.
15:58 we could potentially have 6 moves too
and +1 muscle

Iskender 5 base str. not bad vs a priest

My thinking is this:

It is logical for Serdoa to carry on around the ring with his priests rather than turn back and head to his eastern neighbour. I shouldn't think it would be very difficult for him to get a long nap based on the fact that he is Varn of the Illians. So, signa nap on one side and then march around the lake in the other direction. That would mean that we would be next in the firing line. We don't want to have PoW and ice elementals running around in our lands now do we? so, there are 2 options:

- Fight them in the wilderness, we have a huge mobility advantage on the priests especially as Iskender astutely pointed out, the priests cannot take spell extension. Also, it is likely that Serdoa will use the Ice Elementals to do the dirty work for him, especially while the priests are immature and vulnerable to bad rolls. This will leave the priests vulnerable to raiding from highly mobile horses.

- Threaten the Illian core with horses forcing him to return hom with the PoW. The PoW don't exist if you have no cities.

[Iskender]

Turn 38 report

Heey!

Double gold. Maybe a compensation for starting next to the Illians?


Where would 2nd city go?

I like the red spot - it can immediately work FP and Gold.

[Square Leg]

tempted to move to the regents next with the scout assuming the elephant doesn't get in the way.

And in answer to your question - Blue

[Square Leg]

I played 2 turns over the weekend but was responsible for holding the save up a bit... Sorry about that to the other players.

Iskender has gone awol but I'm sure he will be back soon.

The most recent debate we have been having is whether we waste a worker turn so that we can put a chop into our next worker. We decided that it probably would be worth it in the long run but our worker management has been less than optimal so far.

I did send the message I posted back a few posts to mist last night. I didn't see the harm. Pedigree has been dodging animals like a superstar but he has ended up next to a lion this turn. The odds will be in his favour so hopefully he can get some xp. Ideally I would love to get him to 5xp for subdue animal so he can be upgraded into a super, hippus hunter with 4 moves!

[Brian Shanahan]

Well if you need an occasional substitute turn player, I'm still around, but unfortunately my internets are not as good as they were when I was in Cork, so I can't be as committed as Iskender.

[Square Leg]

Well if you need an occasional substitute turn player, I'm still around, but unfortunately my internets are not as good as they were when I was in Cork, so I can't be as committed as Iskender.

Hey Brian,

I may well take you up on that at some point!

Will do a better turn report next turn. Pedigree survived the Lion attack and promoted to C1. He isn't in direct danger and has 1.7 hearts from memory. Of course a griffon could end him with ease at any time... Mining will complete next turn and I'll start chopping the forest. I am concerned at how few warriors we have at the moment and I am seriously considering getting another one before the next worker... But we need that worker to improve stuff... grrr...

Ok - we have been lucky with barbs so far which makes me think that we haven't got any ruins or barrows nearby. We still haven't encountered our eastern neighbour either.

meh - Let's see what the time is like on that worker. (20 - 8) = 12 food and 4 hammers would be the most input we could get - add in a chop and it will be a very quick build - 3t in fact.

That makes me want to build the worker more than the warrior.

[Square Leg]

Turn 42

The settler completed at the end of the turn and we dumped a *lot* of overflow into our next build:

Yes - a worker. But that is actually going to be a 2t build with the 8h from the chop going into it too:

29 + 8 + 16 = 53 production. We will then pump out a couple of warriors whilst growing to size 6 - Silks will be online for +1

So, after mining finished at the end of last turn do we have copper?

Yes we do! It isn't in a bad location to be honest. I am considering founding a city on that grass hill 1N of the copper actually. It is a nice defensive position with desert to the east to mop up any attackers.

Tech-wise we are going to finish Mysticism next - I would like to get into God King asap since I plan on throwing up a few mines at Ascot. It will get a stables and be our main Horseman pump in the early game. At size 7 (silk and gold online - needs exploration) it can work the following tiles:

0/1/8 - palace
2/2/1 - city
7/0/1 - wheat
1/1/5 - silk
5/0/1 - fp farm
0/4/0 - ph mine
0/4/1 - ph mine
0/4/1 - ph mine
1/3/1 - gh mine

16/19/19 total

Add god king and nationhood to the hammers and that is 30.4hpt for military. That is 3 horsemen every 4t. That would get us into a position of safety!

In the meantime it is a case of researching the techs... Mysticism -> AH -> HBR -> Exploration is my plan. With the silks and Gold coming online we should be in a decent enough position to get that done in a reasonable timeframe... Perhaps not in time to save the Sidar, but even so, enough time to save our own asses. I think we are the civ best placed to defend against the PoW.... once we get our horsemen in the field.

[Square Leg]

Turn 42
Yes - a worker. But that is actually going to be a 2t build with the 8h from the chop going into it too:

29 + 8 + 16 = 53 production.

Yay - 2nd worker will finish next turn and get on with connecting those silks finally. I really think that getting the food online earlier and pumping a worker/settler was the right choice. I absolutely have to get some warriors built asap since Orthus will spawn end of T50 and if he is near by, I need to be ready.

That chop also enabled city 2 to be founded 1t sooner by speeding up the settlers path south. Pedigree has found more mana nodes and some gems not too far away. I'll update on his progress again soon.