Mr. Cairo Thread (spoilers)

[Jabah]

They don't enter border but could be trappes inside border after founding cities...

[Mr. Cairo]

Barb spiders sometimes spawn babies. AFAIK they don't enter borders but it's been awhile.

It wasn't a baby spider, it was a full one.

They don't enter border but could be trappes inside border after founding cities...

Yeah, there's already one by Avelorn that came out of a dungeon I popped. I knew about that one and I have had a scout there looking at it ever since. But then a new one appeared right next to Avelorn. I assumed it was one of Dave's that he never revealed the nationality, but now I'm not so sure. Possibly I should have just left it a turn to see if it moved. Oh well.

[Mr. Cairo]

As expected, I lost the injured Centaur. I scouted a bit to look at his capital. As he indicated in the diplo thread, he's just packing Warriors in, so it looks like it'll take Catapults for sure.


If you're wondering why I crossed out the Spider sign in that screenshot when the events show I lost that Centaur to a Giant Spider, it's because the combat log shows a different story:


I'm assuming that Dave doesn't know that the combat log works in this version of EitB. He also commented earlier in the diplo thread that I "barely" burned Crow, when the Centaur that retreated had a 70% chance to win. He renamed his scout to "Giant Spider" then killed my Centaur, then probably deleted it. I did a peek at Bat and saw no scout around there:

I'm pretty sure between my two scouting Centaurs I saw every tile his Scout could have gotten to if it still had movement after attacking. So he must have deleted it.

I guess the lurkers will have to debate among themselves over whether to let him know that the Combat Log works. I had a look through the planning thread, and the post with the download link to this version states that the combat log was fixed, and that it was a fix from the last PBEM, so it shouldn't be a surprise to Dave.

Looking at all three cities, he currently has (at least)
13 Warriors
3 Scouts
1 Polar Bear
1 Wolf

Once I hit end turn I had
12 Centaurs
13 Warriors
3 Scouts
1 Thane of Kilmorph

I might be able to brute force Bat before Catapults, but it probably wont be worth it. And Catapults aren't far off now anyways.

[RefSteel]

I'm assuming that Dave doesn't know that the combat log works in this version of EitB. He also commented earlier in the diplo thread that I "barely" burned Crow, when the Centaur that retreated had a 70% chance to win.

Wellll ... since you do have a combat log, you might want to go back and check that, actually. I'm not sure what your chances were, but I believe they were well under 70%. I base this only on the screenshot you showed here in your thread, and a fact that sometimes catches people off-guard: Civ4's combat odds predictions don't take river crossings into account unless your attacker is already adjacent to the tile it's attacking. You can see that the 70% odds it reported on that screenshot didn't include the river-crossing penalty, and the combat log (if the battle can still be found there) should show the actual odds you faced. Of course, the withdrawal chance was consequently higher, since it's a straight percentage of your chance of not-winning the fight.

[Mr. Cairo]

I'm assuming that Dave doesn't know that the combat log works in this version of EitB. He also commented earlier in the diplo thread that I "barely" burned Crow, when the Centaur that retreated had a 70% chance to win.

Wellll ... since you do have a combat log, you might want to go back and check that, actually. I'm not sure what your chances were, but I believe they were well under 70%. I base this only on the screenshot you showed here in your thread, and a fact that sometimes catches people off-guard: Civ4's combat odds predictions don't take river crossings into account unless your attacker is already adjacent to the tile it's attacking. You can see that the 70% odds it reported on that screenshot didn't include the river-crossing penalty, and the combat log (if the battle can still be found there) should show the actual odds you faced. Of course, the withdrawal chance was consequently higher, since it's a straight percentage of your chance of not-winning the fight.

Oh, I didn't know that, thanks. I'll check next turn.

edit: is it acceptable to reload old saves to test stuff like that? If I opened the turn I attacked I can move the Centaur next to the city before attacking and see the win and retreat odds that way.

[Erasmas]

I would be very careful reloading old games, especially after the drama a couple of games ago. It is very easy to get information you are not entitled to, even if it was unintended.

[Mr. Cairo]

I would be very careful reloading old games, especially after the drama a couple of games ago. It is very easy to get information you are not entitled to, even if it was unintended.

Yeah, that's why I don't do it as a rule generally, and I'll stick to that.

What was the drama a couple of games ago?

[Mr. Cairo]

This turn I checked the combat log:

So turns out I had a 28% chance to win. It doesn't show retreat chance, but I would guess it was probably around 20-25%. So not as good odds as I thought, but also not terrible, that's basically a 50/50 chance of my Centaur surviving.

Not much else happened this turn. I moved units up to take (and keep) Eclipse. I'm finishing Construction and my Capital will be able to 1-turn the Siege Workshop, and then start on Catapults right away. Once the overflow builds up I'll be able to 1-turn them.

I also do have WW in my cap, but only because I let it grow to 14, which triggered it (or there was enough of it to cause a single unhappy face, idk how WW actually works). Although no doubt it will get worse before the end.

My power has now eclipsed where I was at the start of the war.


After Construction my next tech target will be Bronze Working, which will let me get Centaur Chargers. I think they will be better (for now) than Adepts.

[Erasmas]

I would be very careful reloading old games, especially after the drama a couple of games ago. It is very easy to get information you are not entitled to, even if it was unintended.

Yeah, that's why I don't do it as a rule generally, and I'll stick to that.

What was the drama a couple of games ago?

Someone was found guilty of cheating by reloading attacks in Erebus in the Balance PBEM LVII.

[Mr. Cairo]

I would be very careful reloading old games, especially after the drama a couple of games ago. It is very easy to get information you are not entitled to, even if it was unintended.

Yeah, that's why I don't do it as a rule generally, and I'll stick to that.

What was the drama a couple of games ago?

Someone was found guilty of cheating by reloading attacks in Erebus in the Balance PBEM LVII.

Huh, I guess I'll have to go have a look.


In this game, I attacked Eclipse. I lost 2 unpromoted Warriors to soften the defending Warriors up, then won the rest of the battles at around 75-85% odds using my promoted Centaurs. I was able to get one Centaur up to 10xp and a C2 Warrior finished off the fighting against the Wolf and got up to 11xp. I even got a Slave out of the action, presumably captured from one of the sacrificial Warriors.

Also, I realized I had been under a misapprehension regarding Chargers. I don't need Bronze Working to build them, I think I got that assumption when I saw they could use Bronze weapons. I think I'm going to upgrade at least some of my promoted Centaurs to Chargers.

I saw Coldrain had posted for the first time in a bit so I was briefly concerned but his power has been flat the last turn or two. I'm keeping some Centaurs in a central position just in case, but I'm not expecting an imminent attack from that direction.