Realms Beyond Forum

Welcome to the PBEM 9 spoiler thread for Pacal of the Ottomans. Thankyou for taking the time to visit my thread.

Anyone who wants to remain unspoilt or are partaking in the PBEM 9 game please refrain from reading any further. This space is filled for misclicks to allow the reader time to return back before reading any further.

Those of you that do choose to read further, you have my gratitude and I hope you enjoy the thread.

Pegasus




Went on a West Coast of America roadtrip March 2009, San Francisco to LA to Vegas back to San Francisco. This is one of my favourite memories, and what a way to travel.

Ottomans again huh.

Good luck with the game, I will be lurking.

WarriorKnight Wrote:Ottomans again huh.

Good luck with the game, I will be lurking.

Thanks.

I originally wanted Inca, but mackoti picked them, and then again I see you have them in PBEM 8 and didn't want to be accused of copying :neenernee

I will try and give you all some sort of explanation of my choices and my opinions of opponents choices later today / tomorrow.

Now that the selections are in let's take a look at the contenders for PBEM9.

Pegasus Pacal of the Ottomans
Kodii Willem of Mali
Ruff_Hi Mansa Musa of India
Sylon Pericles of Maya
mackoti Peter of Inca


Breakdown of traits:

Fin: 3
CRE 2
EXP 2
PHI 2
SPI 1

No surprise FIN dominates yet again. I was fairly certain that FIN would lead the moment we decided that we were not to ban said traits.


Fellow Contenders

I was going to trawl through the forums postings to see what each of them have posted to get some insight into their relevant playing strength, but in reality I am going to treat each one with equal respect and assume that I am the weakest player within this game. That way any increase from last is a bonus.


Kodii - Willem of Mali

I know Kodii used to post on here before and has returned to the scene recently, or so I believe based on some of his postings. Other than that I have no idea what to expect.

Willem FIN / CRE A very strong pick and was certainly my No. 2 choice for a leader. In fact I nearly went with Willem over Pacal.
Mali UU Skirmisher I don't think anybody will be messing with Kodii early game. An early rush would definately be out of the question. We do need to ensure though that we are not subject to a rush ourselves.
UB Mint +10% Gold on top of Forge. In my opinion I don't feel that +10% is something to dismiss but I don't feel that it is too much of a bonus either, especially as most cities with forges probably don't focus on commerce.
Techs Wheel / Mining 2 good starting techs, I expect BW to be one of their top priorities. Also a Warrior start.

A fairly decent combination, and not unusual from picks in other games.


Ruff_Hi - Mansa Musa of India


Mansa FIN / SPI Again another FIN pick which is always going to be useful for a NTT game. The SPI trait is also going to come in handy to change civics at the drop of a hat with no anarchy turn penalties. Certainly another trait we should not dismiss instantly.

India UU Fast Worker Probably the best UU in the whole game. Available from the start these guys are going to be developing the lands very quickly. Also, when it comes to wars, these guys are going to be worth their weight in gold in terms of becoming combat workers being able to road through forests quickly and efficiently.
UB Mausoleum Replaces the Jail, not a particularly brilliant UB as it is not available to later on in the game, but none the less can become useful for the +2 happies.

Techs Mysticism / Mining Mining is always useful and unless there are no hills there will be something for the UU to complete. Maybe a possible religion early doors, but I am not convinced this is the optimal play. I am no doubt going to be proven wrong here though!

Ruff is probably the one member that I know the most about based on the threads I have read of his in the past. A very strong player in my opinion and I have learnt many things from his threads already. I have also sen his name around other PBEM sites with a 11-0 win/lose ratio, just for this I am placing Ruff as No 1 contender for winning this game.


Sylon - Peicles of Maya

I know absolutely nothing about Sylon.

Pericles PHI / CRE I applaud Sylon for choosing something a little different to the usual traits. PHI is not one of my trait strengths and I will be interested to see how they play this trait out. I certainly expect to see lots of GP generation.

Maya UU Holkan Another early unit that replaces the Spearman. Pretty decent unit for early defending. I don't expect there will be too many rushes on this guy. Again, we need to be careful not to be rushed ourselves.
UB Ball Court Another fairly early UB that allows for a +2 happy. Happy seems to be the order of the day for UB.

Techs Mysticism / Mining I expect to see Hunting / BW to be researched early as this will release the UU. Mining is useful for a worker tech and leads directly to BW. Another Mysticism pick, will religion be high priority? I am guesiing not as I am believe they wll be aiming mainly to release
their UU.


mackoti - Peter of Inca

Again another player I have no clue about strenght wise. Based on their pick, it appears very calm and collected.

Peter PHI / EXP I again applaud mackoti for going against the grain and avoiding the FIN trait. Again the PHI has been selected but the EXP pick also is also very useful. The extra health and the ability to produce workers faster, I am expecting mackoti to play a more peaceful builder game but we shall see.

Inca UU Quechua Useful against Archers but 1 v 1 in a defende city against a Warrior is no great strength.AI build Archers where as I believe Humans get to BW and start developing Axes, which of course this UU would struggle against.
UB Terrace This is the main reason why I think mackoti selected Inca. This one UB basically delivers one of the main features of the CRE trait. The ability to produce Culture is going to be of great advantage from an early start in this game.

Techs Mysticism / Agriculture Another Mysiticism start. Will a religion be priority? I am guessing not, and focus will be on Pottery for the UB and the culture.


And finally me.

My Civ4 experience is probably around 18 months but I only started taking this game seriously maybe 9-10 months back when I attempted my first ever adventure game.
I play at Monarch difficulty and have a relatively comfortable time at that level, but there is still so much of this game that I am still picking up, that I hope it will be a learning experience for us all and hopefully encourage you lurkers to take the plunge and sign up here and have a go, no matter what strength.

I would love to try and do all the micro detail that you normally get on these threads along with all the Espionage intelligence, and I have every intention of having a go, but I have no idea how this is all going to turn out.



Pacal

Fin: +1 Commerce on tiles with at least 2 commerce
Exp: +2 health in all cities
25% faster production of worker
double speed production of Granary and Harbor

In a NTT game, for me to have any chance of winning or coming close to winning I believe I am going to require a significant base for research, and there is no beter way to build up that base than with cottage spamming where possible. The FIN trait should speak for itself as to why this works hand in hand for any intentional cottage spam.

The EXP trait was selected because not only does it allow me to produce workers that few turns quicker, I can sart developing my Civ much quicker and try to get ahead of the game and getting those cottages down ASAP after any resources that can be improved.

The health early game is no big boost but as the game develops, the ability to not be hindered by health in my growth will come in very useful, and really all I need to focus on is happiness, which I am hoping to resolve through either Representation or HR, but we will have to see how that all develops.

The double speed Granary would also come in handy to increase the speed in getting my cities back up to max pop. The Harbor will depend on what the mapmaker (Jowy) unleashes on us, but the extra health and the +50% trade route income will be useful in a NTT game.

Ottoman Empire

Ok, so as WarriorKnight (WK) has already pointed out. I am yet again the Ottoman Empire. What do I mean by that, well I don't post as often as I like but I am part of the Ottoman Zara A4 team in RBP3. It's just that my 3 fellow team members (Ad hoc [Ad] and SockBoy [SB] and WarriorKnight [WK]) do such a grand job in explaining the turns I feel there is little more that I can add to the discussion.

UU: Janissary +25% vs Archer/ Melee / Mounted
Available at GunPowder and replace the Musketman
UB: Hammam +2 Health
+2 Happiness
Available at Mathematics and replaces the Aqueduct

Techs: Wheel / Agriculture

My No. 1 pick disappeared thanks to mackoti who chose Inca. I wanted the Incans for their UB which in effect is an extra trait [CRE] and wouldn't have to worry about expanding borders. Once the selection finally came back to me I was in two minds whether to pick the Chinese (for something different) or go for the safe option of the Ottomans.
I really fancied the Chinese but wasn't particularly impressed with their UB, alhough I felt I could have had some fun with their UU.

As I was last to pick I could assess what my fellow contenders had chosen before making my decision and I felt that they had taken the safer route in some of their picks and decided to follow suit. I think the Ottomans are a far safer bet than most Civ's. The health again is a bonus and I certainly shouldn't be struggling here, but the +2 happiness is huge. Happies are all goooooooooood.

My decision was also based on starting technologies. I want to get to Pottery ASAP to sart laying down these cottages and get to Writing ASAP to start building Libraries for Research and also expanding my borders. I will try and avoid monuments where possible, but we will have to see how the game develops before I completely rule thm out. Stonehenge is not high on my priority either, but again something I should not rule out if looking suitbale to go for.


I like lurker interaction, so if any one has any questions, please ask and I will do my best to answer.

i'll be looking on with interest from one pacal of ottomans to another

sec

Here is your start.
Good luck!

Ok, so the game begins

Welcome to Third Earth.


I first decided to move Cheetara SE onto the Forested Grassland Hill to see what can be revealed further south.



No resources.

Well before I made any further decisions I decided to trawl through the F keys and check tech starts and settings.



Ok, some things to clarify on my unknowns.

Level = Noble
Map Size = Small
Sea Level = High
Game Speed = Normal

Barb Level = Normal?? Can anyone confirm this?

I have runa couple of test games to check the settings and under options the No barbs and Raging Barbs these appear within
settings when selected and nothing when not selected. Therefore I think Normal Barbs are active.


So next question I have is where to settle. Should I settle in place or move away?

Settling in place is appealing but if I move 1W I can replace a coastal 1F tile (pre lighthouse) with a 2 food lake tile. I can also swap a FGH wth a FPH.
Moving also allows me to place a possible filler city to the East once I have revealed what is over by those FPH's.

Moving South will just waste the Fish resource.

I think I am better moving 1W. I lose working the Corn, but that is not an issue as I will be working the Fur for the extra coin whilst starting a Worker.

I moved the settler 1W and settled.



Rice and Spices further West. Looks promising.

Over the next couple of moves I think Cheetarah will swing round to the SW and then back up towards the Spices revealing what other goodie we have in the fog.



Tech path: At this moment in time I am thinking, Hunting -> Mining -> BW -> Pottery / Fishing

My original plan was to cottage spam and so starting with Ottomans to give me the pre requisites of Pottery, but with all this food around, I may look to chop out a work boat. We wouldn't want it to go to waste now

Sorry for the delay folks. Been a little bit of a hectic week for me work wise and then having a few technical internet issues towards the latter.

I decided to move Cheetarah SW on turn 2 and NW on turn 3. I wanted to go SW but felt it may be too risky to wander too far. With it being a small map, we must be close by.



Ok so from the image you can see we have fish, stone and rice (irrigated) to the south. I am thinking that my next site will be SW towards the Rice and Stone.

Ok now for an attempt at some C&D.

I have 1.36% of the land tiles which to me suggests that there are 588 land tiles within the game. Enough for around 5 cities each I think.

I am tracking all the demographics and points on a spreadsheet. I will upload a version after a few more turns as I am still playing around with some of the tabs.

Points wise it looked like Sylon (Pericles of Maya) didn't settle on the first turn but everybody else did. There have been no point increases since.

Land points I was first until turn 3 - which is obvious as the CRE civs will get a culture pop. Which again is Sylon and Kodii.
It looks like me moving secured me that one extra land tile to the others.

My Crop yield is not great compared to others which suggests that maybe the others are working a rice or a corn or possibly a flood plain

Turn 4 is in.

Cheetarah moved NW to reveal more Furs.

On ending turn, Cat's Lairs borders popped and Hunting finished.
Now we can start working some hammer tiles and get my Worker out quicker.

This revealed spices to my West. Nice for happies but it is going to be a while before Calendar comes in.



C&D front

Mackoti has had a points increase of 6 this turn. I think it is tech increase and not related to a border pop. Does anyone have a link to how the points are calculated?

I think this may be Hunting or Fishing. I will cross reference against the soldier count on the next demo's score.

As mentioned earlier, my C&D spreadsheet attached. Critiques welcome, always happy to improve what I have. Just wish I had the time to make head nor tail of all the data and understood it better