[Spoilers] SleepingMoogle's thread, better late than never.

[SleepingMoogle]

Yeah yeah, here's my spoiler thread. I hope you're happy with yourselves now. :neenernee

Obligatory picture to prevent accidental spoilage below. Given the nature of the game, I thought an artist's impression of Itkovian's ultimate fate in the Malazan Book of the Fallen series would be appropriate. Also, go read it if you haven't already and looking for an epic, gritty fantasy series to sink your teeth into.

[SleepingMoogle]

Starting position. I'll think about the options at work and do the first moves tonight. And if you're good, I might share some thoughts as well!

[regoarrarr]

Interesting decision between a 3 hammer plant and wet corn.

[SleepingMoogle]

So..

Given that a lot of the game's setup is random, it certainly feels like I got dealt a good hand so far, both in terms of leader/Civ and starting position. Unless every start was similar of course.. we'll find out soon enough.

Peter and England don't have a lot of overlap, but both the leader traits and UU/UB are solid in and of themselves. Both Redcoats and Stock Exchanges are far away, and may not arrive in time to really impact the game, so for now lets focus on leveraging the Expansive and Philo traits. England doesn't start with Mysticism so landing an early religion sounds unlikely. Investing in those techs early to try and leverage that Marble for the Oracle feels like a bad idea as well. If anything, I should focus on the top of the tree, getting Writing early to generate a GS for an Academy, and making a play for the Great Library.

There's a big river east and north of the Settler, with a nice combination of grassland and floodplains. Settling the capital NE of the Settler's current position will get a large amount of tiles in the BFC, and get rid of some of the mountains at the same time. So I think my first moves will be to move the Warrior SW to see if there's anything hiding in the fog that makes settling in place more attractive, and moving the scout SE-NE to scout the terrain to the east. If that doesn't come up with anything noteworthy, I'll move the Settler NE and settle the capital next turn. Early tech is probably going to be Agriculture while training a Worker. Moving means there's no triple hammer tile in range until the borders expand, but the position feels strictly superior.

This probably won't be the thread to follow if you are hoping to see meticulous micro-plans and spreadsheets keeping track of everyone. I might do a bit of simming to determine my starting moves, but mostly this will be done by gut instinct and whatever I feel like doing. It has served me pretty well in the past, and there's no reason to change that.

Also, keeping that Warrior at the city is for wimps when there's huts out there to be popped. He won't explore as far as my scout will, but I won't cower in my capital for fear of pulling a Mortius (another award there by the way).

And with that, the game's afoot.

[SleepingMoogle]

Interesting decision between a 3 hammer plant and wet corn.

Potentially, but as Krill aptly demonstrated in PBEM4, the best way to win an Always War game is to not go to war until the very end of the game.

[regoarrarr]

Potentially, but as Krill aptly demonstrated in PBEM4, the best way to win an Always War game is to not go to war until the very end of the game.

Well a 3 hammer plant is good not only for a warrior rush, but for, you know, getting 3 hammers from your city tile

[SleepingMoogle]

There's no doubt that a 3-hammer capital would be beneficial, certainly. A commerce-heavy capital utilizing all those lovely river tiles will probably do more in the long run though. And depending on whether or not there's food in the fog, all those hills would make for a very neat site to place a production city later on.

[Krill]

Potentially, but as Krill aptly demonstrated in PBEM4, the best way to win an Always War game is to not go to war until the very end of the game.

Wow, someone was listening!

[SleepingMoogle]

Scouting last turn revealed some more floodplains, so the capital plant was slightly adjusted.



Two teams already got a free tech from a hut. My scout uncovered just uncovered the first one, so hopefully I'll get lucky as well. Also, that coast is actually fairly beneficial, as it gives me one less border to worry about for the immediate future.

Tech was set to Agriculture (11 turns) and a Worker has been queued up (12 turns). I'm thinking about letting both my scout and warrior move in counter-clockwise positions to reveal the area around the capital.

[SleepingMoogle]

Also, in standard SleepingMoogle fashion, I'm looking for a temporary stand-in as I'm going on holiday for a week at the start of Februari. :neenernee