[SPOILERS] Blut und Eisen: Deutsche Einigungskriege

[spacetyrantxenu]

T209 - I goofed a few turns ago and misclicked my medic healer off the boats and onto shore. I thought I was unloading one of the 7XP knights and ended up moved the medic on shore where the 7XP knight was supposed to go. CH killed it and the units I placed on top to cover it up (something like 3 cats and another knight or two), oh well. I cleaned up all the knights he used to kill my six units except for one that was safely defended across a river, so it lived to tell the tale of their great and costly victory against General Gebhard von Blucher. Although it wasn't the way I planned it (giving up my medic) it may have worked out somewhat to my advantage in this campaign by reducing the number of knights CH had available in the area.




T209 Power graph -- The pain plako inflicted on CH at Jeff is apparent, and somehow HAK barely has more power than I do (despite the fact that he has been researching for the last 50 turns and I haven't):




My units were positioned along the SE part of Greece at the end of T209. The next city, Pierce, presents with a garrison of two rifles and what appears to be the entire Greek navy in port. My expectation is that the four galleons were not loaded, not since the Greek misadventure into Mali several turns ago. Hope upon hope would be to capture the city the next turn and burn the navy in port. Obviously, CH would try to keep that from happening. Right? Or would he think I'd spent my attack in razing Annie before and would, therefore, now only be trying to divert forces away while plako attacked? This is something I'll look forward to finding out when the game is over -- but for now apparently he thought it was a diversion, because:

T210 - He didn't reinforce the city! Plako helpfully blasted down city defense again with his frigates, I further reduced with an additional bombardment from my frigate, and unleashed the equine torpedoes into the awaiting city.




I lost four knights (I don't have a battle log but I think three of them were C2/Amphibious, the 4th was probably just C2) and then mopped up the two badly wounded rifles to capture the city. It lost a ton of infrastructure but would have still been a nice city to capture, if I was in this war to capture cities. But whatever, this city is a shell of its former glory -- probably 15 turns ago it was still size 17.




Now it's size zero. Plako, do you have your settlers ready?




Given the size of the garrison in his capital this was obviously a preventable loss. So, again, either CH assumed I was trying a diversion and that my boats weren't sufficiently loaded, or he didn't want to risk his capital by drawing off forces to bolster the defenses at Pierce. Meanwhile, plako's stack near Abed is just hanging out, tying down most of CH's army.




But that's not plako's entire force, nope.




Looks like it's time to push things in the west, since the east is going quite disastrously for CH. Plako is massing units in Strasbourg, within CH's visibility. But he's so stretched at this point it's kind of hard to do much about it. He's virtually written off defending the west and has been pulling units east for a standoff around his capital. I'd have tried to send a quick knight force to the west to kill cities over there, too, except...those were cities I settled so razing would be impossible and capturing would be suicidal. If plako has been patient with me by not killing me despite the cultural pressure my lone surviving city has been putting on him, I can't imagine he'd continue to be so understanding about letting me recapture two of my old cities and instantly crushing all of his cities in the region with my latent culture. That would instantly lead to war, so there's no point even going down that road, it's a fight I can't win. So...I'll just help in the west however I can to make sure CH dies as quickly as possible while focusing on cities I can burn in the east.

For reference, the signs on the map are pretty much up to date with CH's unit numbers. It's pretty stark everywhere that isn't his capital. And highlighted are the defenses of the next city I can reach in the east, Dean. A maceman and a phalanx await. Will he reinforce? Or does he think, surely, that I'm out of units? Or does he not care?




T211 - I logged in thankful that the game wasn't paused:




I can't understand why he offered. Hopeful I'd misclick and accept it? I think I've sent off exactly zero peace vibes since he declared war on me forever ago. Just now that I have things how I want them (his civ bleeding on the operating table, doctors brandishing chainsaws), no, no way in hell would I accept peace for any reason. To the pain!

Speaking of pain, plako launched his western offensive. I'm guessing because he was ready to do it, not because I was beginning to bring my own units to the area. But it's hard to know. I'd like to think the possibility of me poaching is speeding up the timetable a little, but I doubt it. Anyway, good news everyone!




I don't understand the monastery whip though. Dry whip a unit, any unit.... Here's CH's map from T211. He's still sending basically all the units he produces toward his capital to make his final stand there:




My map, for one turn at least not building a unit, but only because I don't want to waste hammers. I had enough overflow to put in 200 modified hammers for the next knight, so I dumped the overflow in a market. If you'll notice now that I've built a grocer and lost a bunch of units I'm no longer in danger of negative cash flow at max tax. The market will be swapped for another unit next turn though, I'll finish it later when I'd otherwise be wasting hammers again.




T212 - Having city visibility is quite handy. Here's the last east coast city at the start of the next turn:




So much infrastructure. I'm not sure why those cottages aren't all towns 212 turns into the game, but it's still all very nice. And now guarded by a rifle (upgraded mace) and a phalanx. Wait, haven't we just read that same story...twice now? To put myself into CH's thought process...well, if Xenu has already amphibiously attacked and burned two cities, this fleet is DEFINITELY only a bunch of empty galleys now. No way he can attack another city, right? Those boats can't carry enough units. So there's definitely no reason to add any more units to defend Dean, just in case....?

After plako bombarded three times with his frigates and I bombarded once with my frigate, we have: City @ 21% defense with a C1 Rifle and an unpromoted Phalanx (apparently with available promotions?!), on a hill.

1. C2/Amphibious Knight vs. C1 Rifle (no fortify) - 0.7% : LOSE, 1 hit
2. C1/Pinch Knight vs. C1 Rifle @ 12.2/14 - 1.2% : LOSE, 2 hits
3. C1/Pinch Knight vs. C1 Rifle @ 8.5/14 - 15.1% : LOSE, 3 hits
4. C1/Shock Knight vs. Phalanx (full fortify) - 69.2% : WIN
5. C1 Knight vs. C1 Rifle @ 3.1/14 - 91.2% : WIN, flawless victory, raze city (and take available 2 promotions)

All I can say is I'm looking forward to reading his thread and finding out why he didn't boost defenses in any of these three cities. That's three razes by a guy fielding knights against rifles, sailing along two tiles at a time against what should be mobile land defenses (with Engineering mobility, so 3-6 tiles possible). I completely understand that plako's huge stack is pinning down most of the area defense in Abed, but at least put some knights in these coastal cities, they're going to get murdered by plako's rifles anyway. Move a stack of 4 or 5 knights along where my galleys go and save your cities. Why not at least do that??

Anyway, here's Dean before I lit the torch:




Viva la Resistance indeed. Burn it down.




At this point I'm running out of healthy attackers but hell, why not make a run for Shirley? Plako could have it captured before I get up there, but it could also turn out that the lone longbow defending it now could be the only unit there in five turns when my galleys finally creep up that way. Maybe I'll surprise CH, or maybe he still won't care. It's impossible to know.

Here's the current Greek map.




Plako finished off the west this turn, so all of my former cities are now under French control. That's not great but at least they've been liberated from the vile Greek, who are obviously vendetta number one. Plako has moved another big stack forward. Looks like next turn he'll fork Britta and Troy. Troy is CH's HE city, also where my spy has been stationed for ages. (That spy has been running around Greece for like 40 to 50+ turns. He must be a ninja). Anyway, whichever city plako decides to take first will be helpless to withstand him. My guess is that plako will opt for Britta, or maybe he'll take both. That would leave Chang and Duncan (reborn) to wither on the vine and await capture at plako's leisure. At this point the greatest threat to plako in the area is Jojo, if he decides he wants to attack those cities. If I were Jojo I'd raze Chang and Duncan pronto.

Oh, and lest I forget, I'm also still at war with HAK.




Not without reason, I want him to die before me, too. Just to increase my final standing, nothing more to it than that. But he has a galley nearby and I'm curious to know whether or not plako will do me a favor and declare war on HAK to kill the galley, or if I'll have to do it myself. I'm building a caravel in case it's needed -- I gifted my other caravel that was down here to plako before because I thought I wouldn't need it (couldn't kill galleons/frigates with it) and because I was almost broke anyway. Ah well, if nothing else I can use a caravel down here to watch for more lonesome galleys to attack, whoever they may belong to.

Power graph from T212. I'm taking losses but when you're attacking amphibiously it's not always going to be inexpensive. I don't mind, that's why I built these units.




T212 MFG graph. Why am I showing this?




Because I've passed CH in MFG output!




He still has six cities. For reference, HAK has eight. I don't know how the dogpile against HAK is going but I can't imagine it's going well for him. Jojo, AT, and BGN and (I feel like I'm missing someone?) are at war with HAK, and his power is not going to withstand that for very long. So...who dies first, Greece or Mali?

Elsewhere on the game board...ha, really? Who cares! They don't concern us!

[Cheater Hater]

Oh boy, we've got a lot to cover, and not even in that many posts--I'm doing these in order, as I read the posts: (also, there may be minor PB23 spoilers in here as well, though it's mainly general strokes on strategy more than specifics)

Post 55:
I still don't get why you started directing all your angers from the mapmakers (who clearly cut some corners between all the peninsula starts--my original start was one as well, for instance--as well as the sandwiched civs like you) to me instead of plako. I actually got a subtle hint about the undefended city from Celiazul in retrospect, but as you correctly deduced I was on a peninsula and thus didn't really have a choice. I didn't have a navy at all (one Galley maybe?), and my thoughts about a naval assault were shot down by BaII. Instead, BaII was already building a much of Knights before I joined in, and was probably going to end up attacking you eventually, even if I don't join up.

Post 56:
Okay, I'm starting to understand a lot of where you're coming from: You're mad at Oxy/BaII for abandoning the game (even though BaII didn't really abandon it; he's been an advisor for me the whole time, at least until plako invaded), and I just happened to use the club I was handed and paid the price for it. You figured out everything that was going to happen (and honestly, I could tell that even before my conquest of you was finished, once plako gobbled up most of your land) and you couldn't do anything so you decided to accept your new role.

As for your complaints about my warring: don't ascribe to malice what can be explained by stupidity. In case you haven't noticed from my PB23 thread (or if you read PBEM58), war is not my strong point. You mentioned my plan being to burn a couple cities and make peace; while I can't accurately remember my plans from six months ago, I think that basically was my plan overall. I don't remember all the peace deals I tried to make (my thread says the first one was on T153), but I remember you never proposed a counter-offer--I don't know if you could have defended against plako at that point, but it certainly couldn't have hurt.

After just reading those two posts, I have a big question: If I never declare war against you, do you ever declare? Do you ever declare against plako? Do those answers change if I decide to build 500 galleys and attack one of my naval opponents?

(to be continued)

[Cheater Hater]

Post 59:
Interesting to see that you're already considering the evacuation scenario even as early as T151--though I don't know how you can say you don't have enough boats even though you had way more than seems reasonable even at the start of the war. Speaking of, why the heck did you found FS in the first place? Is that city on a separate island than wetbandit? It still seems like that city is an unnecessary drain of resources (presuming you had to funnel all those hammers into naval units to supply/defend it.

Post 62:
Yes, my naval combat/awareness sucked horribly--this is jumping ahead by a lot, but when you killed my GG, I almost quit the game right there, and let out an epic rant of my own in my thread. Honestly, I should have quit the game right there (and quit multiplayer entirely; I think that was before I joined PB23, but I'm not certain), but I'm too stupid/stubborn to do so.

Post 64:
I wasn't attacking because my power was flatlining while yours skyrocketed--not to mention I wanted peace (though I don't think I offered peace for a bit after the T153 offer, since BaII was against it). As for why I finally decided to move in on T160, this quote from my thread sums it up nicely:

Edit: Screw it, I moved in--we aren't winning this game if we wait for plako to devour xenu, and right now we've gained nothing from this war except a spot for a city we haven't even founded yet. I didn't join this game just to try to keep the game moving (even if it was my primary motivation ), I want to try to improve our standing, if not win

Honestly, I got bored, and knew I was losing if plako ate all your cities. As such, I decided to do something rather than turtle forever.

Post 70:
Yes, this is another place where I just needed to put down the game for a while--I had lost the game with my stupid move earlier, though it turns out you probably wouldn't have ever given me peace anyway due to your qualms with both Oxy/BaII leaving the game and the mapmaker giving you an impossible-to-defend position. My horrible tactics just compounded the situation, and part of the reason I never want to get into another war that lasts more than a turn or two ever again. Your accusatory PM certainly didn't help matters either.

Post 71:
Here's the best post from my thread so you can get the idea of my mental state during this breakdown:

I did finally play the turn, pictures are here, but I'm really checked out of the game at this point. I even contemplated just sending one final PM to BaII finalizing my resignation and never posting in this thread again. I mean, what's left? I revolted to Nationhood in an attempt to salvage anything, I probably will still take Krabbe (and there's no reason not to keep it with plako's troops standing guard--if plako turns on us there's no point in even this meager defense), but it's not like it matters--my one hope left is that xenu loses more troops than average at Jeff (he does only have 2 Cats, and my defenses aren't god-awful, especially the two Pikes), and then he stumbles around enough that I can suicide my Cat stack into it and clean up with my various drafted Maces.

Again, we get to the "what's the point" part of my analysis--there's no way I could have salvaged this situation I walked in on! I mean, yes I slipped in a couple defensive builds and let Duncan get razed, but that doesn't really change things--having ~5 more units isn't going to stop Jeff from burning, and using the whip any more aggressively than I did just puts us farther behind in the upcoming economic race (to Curaissiers/Rifling/Astronomy/whatever else we need to make more gains). Can I not be next to opponents that clearly overbuild military (to their detriment long-term) in one of my games? Of course, it doesn't matter, since I'm not playing any games for a long time (if ever)...

Obviously the "threats" not to play in a game ever again are clearly not true, and I rebounded after I took Krabbe--a lot of it came from the resignation that my position was doomed from turn 1 of the takeover (I'd post a really good post I made in response to Celiazul's encouragement, but it still feels really spoiler-y since you're technically in the game--it's post 145 when you eventually get eliminated) and just realizing that nothing mattered other than me pressing enter for the rest of the game.

I've got one more post in me that's more overall stuff than responding specifically to your posts.

[Cheater Hater]

(or not, since you have more long posts to make )
Post 76:
I left the GG's around because I didn't know what to do with them, and I certainly didn't care at all by that point. That's where the rant comes in, and I still don't appreciate you clearly kingmaking to **** me over--obviously I wasn't winning at that point, but my entire point was to try to survive. You could have destroyed anyone's hopes of winning (I'm pretty sure there was a point where you could have burned three of GJ's coastal cities at one point, at least, and you clearly weren't against screwing over other civs since you invaded HAK once, and you still have a ton of units remaining on the Galleys presumably). I won't post the rant itself, but I will post the follow-up:

Obviously I used a lot of hyperbole in that rant--you should have expected it once you saw the paragraph of all-caps. However, it's still an important matter of perception in such a tight-knit community like this--look at the garbage in the ISDG thread for example. First impressions matter, and since my good contributions in the demo-game (and PB14 to a lesser extent) we mostly hidden, my flame-out in PBEM58 became the standout moment in most people's eyes. Everyone who doesn't perform perfectly and/or as expected gets roasted over the coals, hidden from view for months, and unless you put up results and/or improve significantly in people's eyes, you get stuck with that perception forever (look at Jowy for a long-term microcosm of this). Heck, part of the reason I decided to post the rant (and not delete like a sane person, though I did spoiler it) was because I figured it had to be better than a fit that would been the "third strike and you're out"--I don't know if this was better, but at least it was different

The biggest problem with my Civ play (and most of my competitive play in general) is that I only like to play when there's hope. The problem (especially in Civ) is that there rarely is hope, and when I lose that hope/the majority of that hope and I have to continue playing (either because of social convention or because some hope, no matter how little remains and I'm a "Nuts and Bolts Spike" who never wants to give up any possible edge), it stops becoming fun. I really could go into depth on this topic, but:
A: I'd want this discussion out in the open, where more than BaII and Celiazul can comment on it
B: I should go to bed soon and I've already typed a lot for a Wii U post

I still believe a lot of that post, and my biggest problem is that I wear a lot of emotion on my sleeve, though obviously I've toned down a little since then (a lot of that being I actually am doing meaningful things again). Still, while your appearance of the situation is of the new person being handed a club to screw you over, my perspective was trying to save a game I didn't want to see die, trying to win, and being rewarded with an endless blood war. I think both perspectives are valid in the end at least--seeing your posts has certainly calmed me down a lot from where I'd thought I'd be while writing this stuff.

Yes, the GM went to GJ--I'm certainly not that stupid
I also learned to at least try to defend my coastal cities as the war went on

Everything else:
I offered peace because I assumed you were reasonable at some point--there were a lot easier targets for you to take, but you enjoyed your kingmaking blood war too much for that

I whipped a Monastery since it was the only thing I could whip, and I knew plako was taking the city next turn.

I can't defend everything at once, and I kept assuming you would be rational at some point--and honestly, if you're burning the cities, it means plako has to invest more to take them, and the only reason I'm still defending at this point is to make plako pay for every single city he captures.

I don't know why my production has been so bad this entire game--I guess it's just that I haven't been building any workshops, and I haven't had many cities.

Well, that finally covers everything, except one big question: who the hell gifted you that ****ing Frigate?!? That is the only reason why you have been able to do anything after I got Astronomy and a decent number of Galleons out. Whoever gifted you that is guilty of a far worse crime than most of the things you have done by yourself.

Other than that, if you have any questions for me, let me know--I hope I've covered everything (and it still isn't as nice as it probably should be, even given everything), but I'm trying to be diplomatic here, since you've certainly done the same to me outside of this game.

[spacetyrantxenu]

Thanks for the replies, it will take me some time to reread them and make my own responses. I'm supposed to be working.

The main thing you need to know about my threads, if you haven't read one before (and I don't know why you would) is that I get very attached to my little empires and overly emotional when people start taking them apart. I've tried harder than normal to be vicious only in game and to try leaving unpleasant things out of the thread, but without going back and looking I'm sure I didn't succeed all the time. There are, I'm sure, a lot of posts or comments that may have been rude or sarcastic, but hopefully I stopped short of being offensive. That would be a step up for me.

When I get time I'll go back and reply to your posts because they were really very thoughtful and deserve a thorough reply. To continue the conversation until then, though, I'll just ask the question that has been lingering the longest because I really never understood: Why did you attack me instead of HAK? I get that you and I shared the landmass and attacking by land is more direct, but HAK was woefully behind in both economy and military tech if I recall correctly -- he was defending with ancient age stuff for a looooong time -- I think if you'd built a bunch of galleys you could have probably overrun him fairly quickly before he modernized his army. I say that with incomplete information, but I've had his graphs, and his GNP and power did not inspire confidence in his long term health. I think you could have taken him. At least that was land that you could have probably kept for a while. Another reason to attack HAK instead of me would be that I'm actually not a terrible neighbor to have (I don't think, anyway... ). Maybe you will disagree, I think most people would rather be my neighbor than plako's. Most of the time if you're plako's neighbor, you're food. For the most part if you're my neighbor and leave me alone to do my sandbox empire building thing, you won't have too much trouble (as long as you defend your cities!!! I can't resist cheap shots, I'm sorry--To Wetbandit, Qgqqqqq, etc., those were opportunistic razings that wouldn't have happened if the cities were guarded). When provoked I'm the worst kind of neighbor to have because I already have a high disposition to build lots of units and I go on tilt easily when my sandcastles get knocked over. Maybe that shouldn't be part of the calculus when deciding who to attack but I know I'd rather fight someone who has proven to die easily in the past than someone who is too stubborn to die or give up.

I guess I went on a bit longer than I intended to, but the question remains, why not attack east into HAK where you could have probably held the land? I'm not really debating the choice to fight someone, I know Oxy had left you with an ungodly amount of units (and the wtf stack of catapults), maintaining all that stuff was expensive so it had to be used. I'll be curious to read your thread later and see what he was thinking with that, but I kind of think he was on autopilot and just building stuff for a long time.

I'll post an actual update soon, hopefully, to clear out the rest of the screen shots I'm holding on to and respond to your posts. I just don't have time to do it properly right now. Thanks for reading and again, sorry for any of the less kind things I've said, I usually write when I'm still, uh, highly motivated from playing a turn. And I've had plenty of frustrating turns in this game to write about.

[Cheater Hater]

Thanks for the replies, it will take me some time to reread them and make my own responses. I'm supposed to be working.

The main thing you need to know about my threads, if you haven't read one before (and I don't know why you would) is that I get very attached to my little empires and overly emotional when people start taking them apart. I've tried harder than normal to be vicious only in game and to try leaving unpleasant things out of the thread, but without going back and looking I'm sure I didn't succeed all the time. There are, I'm sure, a lot of posts or comments that may have been rude or sarcastic, but hopefully I stopped short of being offensive. That would be a step up for me.

When I get time I'll go back and reply to your posts because they were really very thoughtful and deserve a thorough reply. To continue the conversation until then, though, I'll just ask the question that has been lingering the longest because I really never understood: Why did you attack me instead of HAK? I get that you and I shared the landmass and attacking by land is more direct, but HAK was woefully behind in both economy and military tech if I recall correctly -- he was defending with ancient age stuff for a looooong time -- I think if you'd built a bunch of galleys you could have probably overrun him fairly quickly before he modernized his army. I say that with incomplete information, but I've had his graphs, and his GNP and power did not inspire confidence in his long term health. I think you could have taken him. At least that was land that you could have probably kept for a while. Another reason to attack HAK instead of me would be that I'm actually not a terrible neighbor to have (I don't think, anyway... ). Maybe you will disagree, I think most people would rather be my neighbor than plako's. Most of the time if you're plako's neighbor, you're food. For the most part if you're my neighbor and leave me alone to do my sandbox empire building thing, you won't have too much trouble (as long as you defend your cities!!! I can't resist cheap shots, I'm sorry--To Wetbandit, Qgqqqqq, etc., those were opportunistic razings that wouldn't have happened if the cities were guarded). When provoked I'm the worst kind of neighbor to have because I already have a high disposition to build lots of units and I go on tilt easily when my sandcastles get knocked over. Maybe that shouldn't be part of the calculus when deciding who to attack but I know I'd rather fight someone who has proven to die easily in the past than someone who is too stubborn to die or give up.

I guess I went on a bit longer than I intended to, but the question remains, why not attack east into HAK where you could have probably held the land? I'm not really debating the choice to fight someone, I know Oxy had left you with an ungodly amount of units (and the wtf stack of catapults), maintaining all that stuff was expensive so it had to be used. I'll be curious to read your thread later and see what he was thinking with that, but I kind of think he was on autopilot and just building stuff for a long time.

I'll post an actual update soon, hopefully, to clear out the rest of the screen shots I'm holding on to and respond to your posts. I just don't have time to do it properly right now. Thanks for reading and again, sorry for any of the less kind things I've said, I usually write when I'm still, uh, highly motivated from playing a turn. And I've had plenty of frustrating turns in this game to write about.

Hey, I care about my empires too--obviously I haven't started losing cities yet in PB23, but if you look at PBEM 58 you can see the disaster that was my mental state there (though PB18 was certainly a step up in some respects--but a step down in others ).

I didn't realize quite how bad HAK was doing right when I took over--heck, I didn't even have his graphs for a turn or two
I honestly didn't think I could perform the naval attack, since I've never done one before--it's easy to just charge units into a land based neighbor, but the naval attack requires me to think a lot more (in addition to all the Galleys I would have to build--one thing that wasn't clear was that my production in all my military cities sucked a lot, and I didn't want to whip them at this stage since I wanted to grow all my cottages (as you noted at my NE city; the SE one was bad as well), as well as keep the GP farm running.

I also really didn't like splitting my forces while you were at parity with me--I didn't know that Jowy was HAK's neighbor (not only was I not paying attention during my Zulu life, OxyBaII had left me with almost no scouting outside the immediate area--and I'm certainly not going to invest hammers that could be going into military units). I also have no reason to trust you when I just showed up--the barely-defended city looks like something a player playing on autopilot would do rather than a sign of peace. I don't like the prisoner's dilemma of AI diplo, and I always feel like all my bases should be covered at all times, which leaves me with too few troops when I actually do attack--BGN's trying to wean me off this habit in PB23 at least, but I still don't like it.

Yeah, OxyBaII were mostly on autopilot, or at least not reporting--there's a pic at T32, two Parkin reports at T107 and T109, then my first report at T143.

That is the important stuff I can gather from your post (though you still haven't answered who gifted you your Frigate yet, and I won't stop asking until I get an answer), if there's anything else just let me know
(P.S: My last combat result was karma )

[spacetyrantxenu]

Yeah, the lack of information you had coming in as a sub was really to both of our detriment. I had worked hard to have stable relations with Oxy although I really wanted to punish him for a spiteful move early in the game. I had basically let it go, to both of our benefit. I also abstained from razing Chang (where you made your final stand) for who knows how long. I could have razed it at any time for probably dozens of turns at basically no cost, since he had only one archer defending it and I controlled the diagonal. After I teched Engineering he couldn't have even seen it coming, but I resisted, trying to send peace vibes. Obviously you had no way of knowing that and when you took over (I think it was?) Chang was reinforced with a proper garrison.

When you attacked me at Banana Castle I thought for sure you were just warning me to leave you alone, because you put your stack in full view. I thought at the time there was no way you were going to attack because there wasn't any point in showing me the units before attacking. I was obviously delusional on that point. Anyway, if you had gone on an adventure in HAK land it's hard to say what I'd have done, but most likely I wouldn't have attacked because at the time plako's power was way above mine (I was working on forges everywhere, some really bad timing). I didn't want to give him any indication at any point that my units were busy anywhere besides on his front, given my central location on the continent. I had already worked out by then that there were only three of us and that I was the chicken in the biscuit, so I had no desire to fight on either front. That probably also explains why I went raiding against Wetbandit and Qgqqqqq, for fun and profit--there was none to be had by fighting at home. (My war against TBS was justified, I think, I didn't want to allow him to have a port near my core. I think he finally understood my predicament later on when he settled his city inland and didn't contest the coast anymore, but that's another topic).

I strayed off topic there, but yeah if you had gone to attack HAK I'd have probably been quite happy about having a safe eastern front and would have piled even more units west than I already had. When you attacked I think most of my units were in the west...they traveled east to fight you and then plako attacked the reduced western defenses. It worked out pretty terribly for me all around, leading to my strategy of trying to "delay" the war instead of trying to "win" the war, because it was obviously going to be hopeless.

Briefly on your economy, you did some of what I did and built too many cottages. Your research economy was good from what I could tell, especially for your size by the end game (compared to the big contenders). Some of that is immense KTB but I think you were genuinely pulling in good beakers off all those cottages. The tradeoff, then, was that you were low on MFG tiles, like workshops or mines. When the war started I was just beginning to hit my stride on full grown cities beginning to work lots of workshops, and caste was coming soon I think. I was transitioning...and got hit at about the worst time possible. Even if the two front attack had happened later when I had more of my MFG up and running I'd still have lost, no doubt, it probably just would have cost you and plako more to do it. Anyway, circling back, I think the point was that Greece needed fewer cottages and more workshops, but that was largely Oxy's work and not yours. I think by the time you took over most of the land would have been fairly well developed, but I don't know, I didn't have full visibility back then.

It's a shame to hear he didn't report a lot though, he was doing very well in the game before he ran out of land. He was the game leader in demographics as far as I could tell early on. I thought I was doing well myself but in most regards he seemed to always be ahead of me, which was discouraging. If you wonder partly why I built so many units, it's because I thought I had to to keep up with him. Meanwhile plako ran fewer units and smartly played the long game, and look where that got him. He's the sole survivor of our continent. Regarding kingmaking, though, at best I've made a prince, plako isn't winning this game either so I don't think my picking a winner in the continental war is of major consequence to the game itself. I've played much less of a kingmaker than other players, for sure (cough, krill, cough). Ultimately I wanted to kill you because you knocked over my sandcastles, and that's the real casus belli for my grudge war. And I wanted you to die before me just to secure a higher place on the scoreboard, that was my goal for all these turns. It's the same reason I'm helping HAK to die any way I can, to climb over him too. And I guess Ruff should be looking to the north....though I don't get the impression that krill and BGN are going to help kill him for me. And I also get the impression from Wetbandit's troop positioning that I'm not long for this world.

I'll get to the unit donations when I run the credits at the end of the show.

Edit: On your last rifle surviving, it's OK. It was something like a 65% battle, I wasn't guaranteed to win that. I don't think I ever really had great luck but I didn't get sucker punched by the RNG that many times either, as I can remember. I mean, I had one spy running around your territory the whole time and he never got caught. It got to the point where I was wondering if some bug was keeping him from being detected.

[Cheater Hater]

Yeah, the lack of information you had coming in as a sub was really to both of our detriment. I had worked hard to have stable relations with Oxy although I really wanted to punish him for a spiteful move early in the game. I had basically let it go, to both of our benefit. I also abstained from razing Chang (where you made your final stand) for who knows how long. I could have razed it at any time for probably dozens of turns at basically no cost, since he had only one archer defending it and I controlled the diagonal. After I teched Engineering he couldn't have even seen it coming, but I resisted, trying to send peace vibes. Obviously you had no way of knowing that and when you took over (I think it was?) Chang was reinforced with a proper garrison.

When you attacked me at Banana Castle I thought for sure you were just warning me to leave you alone, because you put your stack in full view. I thought at the time there was no way you were going to attack because there wasn't any point in showing me the units before attacking. I was obviously delusional on that point. Anyway, if you had gone on an adventure in HAK land it's hard to say what I'd have done, but most likely I wouldn't have attacked because at the time plako's power was way above mine (I was working on forges everywhere, some really bad timing). I didn't want to give him any indication at any point that my units were busy anywhere besides on his front, given my central location on the continent. I had already worked out by then that there were only three of us and that I was the chicken in the biscuit, so I had no desire to fight on either front. That probably also explains why I went raiding against Wetbandit and Qgqqqqq, for fun and profit--there was none to be had by fighting at home. (My war against TBS was justified, I think, I didn't want to allow him to have a port near my core. I think he finally understood my predicament later on when he settled his city inland and didn't contest the coast anymore, but that's another topic).

I strayed off topic there, but yeah if you had gone to attack HAK I'd have probably been quite happy about having a safe eastern front and would have piled even more units west than I already had. When you attacked I think most of my units were in the west...they traveled east to fight you and then plako attacked the reduced western defenses. It worked out pretty terribly for me all around, leading to my strategy of trying to "delay" the war instead of trying to "win" the war, because it was obviously going to be hopeless.

Briefly on your economy, you did some of what I did and built too many cottages. Your research economy was good from what I could tell, especially for your size by the end game (compared to the big contenders). Some of that is immense KTB but I think you were genuinely pulling in good beakers off all those cottages. The tradeoff, then, was that you were low on MFG tiles, like workshops or mines. When the war started I was just beginning to hit my stride on full grown cities beginning to work lots of workshops, and caste was coming soon I think. I was transitioning...and got hit at about the worst time possible. Even if the two front attack had happened later when I had more of my MFG up and running I'd still have lost, no doubt, it probably just would have cost you and plako more to do it. Anyway, circling back, I think the point was that Greece needed fewer cottages and more workshops, but that was largely Oxy's work and not yours. I think by the time you took over most of the land would have been fairly well developed, but I don't know, I didn't have full visibility back then.

It's a shame to hear he didn't report a lot though, he was doing very well in the game before he ran out of land. He was the game leader in demographics as far as I could tell early on. I thought I was doing well myself but in most regards he seemed to always be ahead of me, which was discouraging. If you wonder partly why I built so many units, it's because I thought I had to to keep up with him. Meanwhile plako ran fewer units and smartly played the long game, and look where that got him. He's the sole survivor of our continent. Regarding kingmaking, though, at best I've made a prince, plako isn't winning this game either so I don't think my picking a winner in the continental war is of major consequence to the game itself. I've played much less of a kingmaker than other players, for sure (cough, krill, cough). Ultimately I wanted to kill you because you knocked over my sandcastles, and that's the real casus belli for my grudge war. And I wanted you to die before me just to secure a higher place on the scoreboard, that was my goal for all these turns. It's the same reason I'm helping HAK to die any way I can, to climb over him too. And I guess Ruff should be looking to the north....though I don't get the impression that krill and BGN are going to help kill him for me. And I also get the impression from Wetbandit's troop positioning that I'm not long for this world.

I'll get to the unit donations when I run the credits at the end of the show.

Edit: On your last rifle surviving, it's OK. It was something like a 65% battle, I wasn't guaranteed to win that. I don't think I ever really had great luck but I didn't get sucker punched by the RNG that many times either, as I can remember. I mean, I had one spy running around your territory the whole time and he never got caught. It got to the point where I was wondering if some bug was keeping him from being detected.

Really, you don't think plako has a shot to win the game? Granted, he's at the bottom end of the "possibilities to win" spectrum, but I don't know how many of the contenders have their own continents by this point--I think BGN probably does, FinHarry might, GJ probably doesn't, dtay and Krill/novice are neighbors, no clue on TBS.

Really, you don't think you can survive for a while yet? You have a million troops left in your city, in addition to the infinite troops on your Galleys (how many do you have left at this point?), even if they're way behind in tech (does wetbandit have Infantry yet?).

I wasn't talking about my Rifle surviving; I was talking about my last Rifle attacking your Knight (after a freshly-whipped Cat weakened it a bit) and winning at 4% odds

[spacetyrantxenu]

Really, you don't think plako has a shot to win the game? Granted, he's at the bottom end of the "possibilities to win" spectrum, but I don't know how many of the contenders have their own continents by this point--I think BGN probably does, FinHarry might, GJ probably doesn't, dtay and Krill/novice are neighbors, no clue on TBS.

No, at this point I think we're down to the game being Old Harry/Fintourist's to lose by any conventional means (space, domination, concession etc.) with TBS's cultural victory attempt putting Old Tourist on the clock. I think the only other credible contender to win would be BGN, with his ridiculous MFG, but he has two problems that will keep him from winning. First, and foremost, he has triggered Krill's grudge mode so Krill is from what I've seen doing anything he can to cause BGN problems. I've seen evidence first in Ruff's lands where it's now a neutral zone neither side can safely attack, and more prominently everywhere else I've seen Krill deposit units. Krill has defended at least two cities in HAK's land that I've seen, making it so that BGN would have a second stack of units to wipe in those cities that other combatants don't have to encounter, like Jojo for instance who has gobbled the west of the island where I could see it. It looks like Krill just moves his units to defend any city BGN can attack, compounding the existing difficulty of making gains at war. I don't know if it's sporting or not but it's a definite hindrance to winning when someone is devoting their full output to harassing you. Takes one to know one, I can say in this case.

Anyway, beyond that, Krill doesn't have the tech rate, dtay is now behind thanks to OT's earlier war. I think in that one dtay took some land from pindicator only to have OT and krill knock him down a peg. After that I don't know what happened but I haven't seen dtay really show up a lot in the event tracker since then, and he's been playing much shorter turns. That doesn't put him in the winner column. Who else does that leave? Jojo -- no, he's done well but he neighbors TBS and didn't have enough other neighbors to eat apparently. He got through Bacchus and then Yuri (with AT getting some of Yuri IIRC) but AT is still alive and Jojo is still fighting HAK, not AT, so it doesn't seem like he's expanding much more. Plus he's way behind the conquest pace set by OT, TBS, and BGN, so he's not big enough to compete with those guys. And plako is behind all of those players, so no, he's not winning the game. He's winning our region and that's it. The smart money is to never count plako out, but in this game, he was too slow to get big, whether because he didn't have enough land or because I was hard to digest, or whatever. But he just isn't big enough even now to compete.

Really, you don't think you can survive for a while yet? You have a million troops left in your city, in addition to the infinite troops on your Galleys (how many do you have left at this point?), even if they're way behind in tech (does wetbandit have Infantry yet?).

I have a lot of units in my city but Wetbandit has about 60 units nearby that obviously aren't needed for defensive purposes against me, unless he is preparing for some invasion in the west by plako that I'm just not seeing (and I have all my EPs in plako right now, so I see everything). Wetbandit was probably being nice to me and letting me finish my grudge war, but he's probably bored and looking for something fun to do. I can't blame him. Plus, those nine cannons he's going to use were free so it doesn't really cost him anything to spend them on me.

As for what to do now, my main goal from the last zillion turns has been met, just outliving you, so I'm kind of directionless now. I can fall back on the secondary goal of just living as long as possible (see also: PB8) but been there, done that I guess. I'm hoping HAK will die soon so I can climb one more spot but I don't have high hopes that BGN and krill will bury the hatchet and get back to killing Ruff, and I don't think Wetbandit will give me enough time to do anything meaningful down there anyway. Then there's the matter of Ruff's MFG massively exceeding my own, given the number of cities he still has. And last time I had graphs down that way I think he was rebuilding power since he is a speck in between two huge armies. So he's probably spending all his MFG on units, which I can't hope to match. If I were to attack him I could maybe get lucky and snipe a city or two, but I'll never be able to eliminate him and there's no other weak neighbors I can reach by galley in this part of the world. And surely everyone but me has Rifling by now anyway, so knights are only going to become less and less effective over time. I think my pirate days are just about over, then, so I'm wondering what else I have remaining to play for? I can try to say I lived to the end if TBS really has the game on the clock, but that's another few months of spending 30-45 minutes per turn looking for things to do when I'm really only shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic at this point. There's probably a lot of other fun things I should spend that time doing instead.

Anyway, on that point...I did pass on an opportunity to engage "cop assisted suicide" last turn:




So I guess I'm conflicted. I don't have a lot left to do in the game but I didn't invite death by razing a city from plako when I could have (that opportunity has been there for a long time, btw, the window is closing soon because he'll gain cultural control over the tile the knight is on in that picture soon). I think my interest is waning so I'll kind of start playing shorter turns and wait to get active again until someone attacks me to finally be rid of me. Then I'll try to kill as many units as possible while dying. Something like that. I'll be a pain in the ass to the end.

I wasn't talking about my Rifle surviving; I was talking about my last Rifle attacking your Knight (after a freshly-whipped Cat weakened it a bit) and winning at 4% odds

Well that's a bit of a pisser, I haven't played my turn yet so I didn't know it. Doesn't bother me though, I sent all those units up there to die, I'm OK with losing them because the Mission has been Accomplished. The only thing that chagrined me was that I didn't land the killing blow, but honestly plako did all the heavy lifting so he deserved it anyway. I was just hoping to (maybe?) be the first RB player ever running a OCC to eliminate another player. I don't know if it's happened before, outside of someone being Munro'd in the early game, so that would have been cool. Anyway, plako avenged me by killing that rifle so we're all square!

Apparently having active participants makes this thread better. Thanks.

[Ceiliazul]

CH, now that you're spoiled you should check out the big three threads. I think youll be surprised by the sizes of those empires ...

Xenu will catch up shortly, I suppose.