[Spoilers] SavageMoogle of the Celts

[SleepingMoogle]

It might be all of those really. The thing that's interesting to me is that the vast majority of barbs is coming from the north and west. After scooter finished the great wall, I expected more to come from the south but this never happened in any great number.

[SleepingMoogle]

Some interesting diplomatic developments with scooter; we have finally started negotiating the distribution of the remaining land. Here's what we talked about so far:

SleepingMoogle,

Okay, well this discussion had to come sooner or later, so I'm going to send this now that I have some time. I'd like a port city on the lake in the middle of the map, but I really only have one last chance for one. Timmy has pushed cities very close to me, and attached in this screenshots are two circles as possible sites... It'll probably be the southern one, unless I (fingers crossed) find seafood in that one black spot on the lake. It's a fairly marginal site honestly, but a port city would be very helpful... So the purpose of this message is two-fold - first is asking permission to lay claim to this site. It's not going to be founded in the immediate future, but it's in the top 3 in terms of priority for me right now. If I were to found it now, it would be far away and exposed...

There is a second part, but if you find my city site there on the lake to be unfair, then you can ignore the rest of this, as you will definitely not agree to the rest! I'm guessing you won't have a problem with it though, as I believe it's closer to me, and you still have a (much better) port spot to the north of the peaks that is rightfully yours. Here's part two:

You'll notice some orange lines on the screenshot too... I'm going to officially propose that to be our rough "border" if that makes sense... Meaning tiles to the south of that line I would like to claim as my own, and tiles to the north can be claimed for you. From my perspective, this seems like a fair geographical division, but if you feel it's ridiculous, please don't take offense - as you see in that screenshot I have zero intelligence of what your land looks like, so it's hard for me to propose something like this.

Looking forward in seeing what you've got to say on the matter... You don't have to rush a response back by the way - this isn't urgent... It's more like I felt that now might be a good time to start discussing this, so that we don't procrastinate too long only to find ourselves stepping on each others toes.

Thanks!
scooter

Greetings scooter,

Your request is a fair one, to be sure. From the looks of your screenshot, your proposed coastal city really is the only one that can make use of the inner sea without stepping on another's toes. While I do not have access to my maps right now, our scouts have actually found no seafood so far, despite exploring a fair amount of the northern coast. I cannot say for a certainty whether the tile in question holds a resource until I can compare your map to what our scouts have explored so far, but there is a fair chance that the tile will simply be a generic one. You may wish to have a good look at the resources of every tile, as a fair number seem to be ocean tiles, despite being next to land ones.. the editing hasn't been completely smooth in that regard. In any case, I accept your request of settling the coastal city.

The second request is one that I need a bit more time to consider. While your claim isn't unreasonable, the proposed border would not match well with a soon to be founded Celtic city just east of the Pigs resource. One thing that the Celtic lands have found sparse so far has been river grassland, and this division would cause us to 'lose' an area of fertile, and leave the remainder to a rather awkwardly placed filler city that would have little else going for it. In addition, such a city would contend with your borders as well. I will have a close look at the maps (coastal tiles included) at the earliest convenience, as I remember another river feeding a number of grassland tiles further east, near the edge of the map. Perhaps we could come to an agreement to claim one river each? This would hopefully provide a relatively fair division of the land that is still in between our borders, without causing undue border conflicts due to cultural claims.

-SleepingMoogle

SleepingMoogle,

(first, this is a bit of a rough response as I don't have the game in front of me currently and I won't for a few more hours)

I've also asked Timmy about the port site as he is really close, and (long story short) I might not get the port after all. He was willing to let me have it if I let him have another spot - a spot that I wanted probably more-so than the port. I'm not totally sure how it will play out yet...

Your message was a very fair one, and I believe we can work something out. Can you give me a rough dotmap of the cities you would like to plant for yourself? It was hard for me to come up with my previous email because I don't know what a lot of your land looks like, so I don't know where you plan on placing a lot of your cities. You've been very fair with me so I don't want to pay you back by short-changing you on cities, so I'm trying to balance that with the land that I'd like to grab.

scooter

Greetings again scooter,

Since our last messages I had a look at the maps, but unfortunately that hasn't made the current negotiation any easier. The cultural borders of your northern city had expanded a bit further than I anticipated, and while there probably would still be room for another city to thrive, that would be far more convenient to accomplish for an Ethiopian city.

Attached this message are two maps. The first shows the currently planned Celtic cities in the area around the border you proposed, and the second shows potential city sites in the remainder of the area. I'm guessing that the visible tiles are third-ring ones, and if they are they could potentially allow for another city or two. Looking at the map, it would seem a far more convenient location to expand Ethipian borders. This probably best summarizes the concerns I'm having; all the marks in the secondary map are more or less equally distant to our capitals, and a good distribution would be complicated at best if you prefer the western-most location.

Depending on how your current negotiations with Timmy work out, what would be your feelings on moving the proposed border in the first map slightly south in return for settling the other two areas (the two easternmost marks on the second map)? This would allow for a fairly equal distribution of land, and provides Celtica access to more fertile grassland than is currently available to us. In addition, the requested coastal location in your original message would remain available to you regardless, as we already prefer a more northernly location (potentially marked in the first map). We are of course willing to further negotiate this if desired.

-SleepingMoogle

I'm kind of throwing a long shot here, but let's see if scooter's willing to give up some of the land. Depending on his negotiations with Timmy, the contested tiles may lose some value anyhow. Plus, I can throw in something like spreading Buddhism to his lands for the AP hammer bonus.

The turns themselves have been fairly uneventful, I'll do some catching up over the weekend.

[SleepingMoogle]

Turn 78:



Pocketbeetle's commented on the lack of fogbusting a little earlier, so this here is the beginning first real attempt to establish a sentry net. I just need to dispose of the already spawned barbs. The one in the northwest came out of the fog in between turns, but he's facing a Hillsman 3 archer so that should be no problem. The northern barb will probably move SW next turn. The Archer south of him was on his was to the marked ice hill and uncovered him after moving, so I'm not quite sure how to handle it yet. The Warrior attacked and killed a barb warrior this turn, getting him a third promotion (heh). He'll move back onto the iron mine next turn to heal.

In the south, a concerted effort is being made to flush out the remaining warriors there:



The Settler finished at the end of the turn, and along with the missionary will start moving towards the city site. Hopefully the barbs will be dealt with before then. Tolosa will probably train another axeman or two before other builds to keep a decent garrison force at home.

Bibracte has almost lost it's whip anger again. I'll probably whip a Settler for that southern outpost in the next few turns and let it overflow back into the AP. A Worker has finally started improving the area around the city again so getting more cities out is more of a priority for now.

[SleepingMoogle]

Turn 80 looks to be delayed a little. That's okay really, since I still have T79 to report on. Setting up PBEM7 took up most of my time yesterday, but once the new game excitement goes down a little, this will be my primary reporting effort again.

Anyway, miracle of miracles, I loaded up the turn without being greeted by the marching enemy soundbit, which meant that every single barb attacked my defenders and died.

Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good.



For once, the game agrees with me on the city location. The Settler will reach it next turn, and found the city on T81. The nearby Worker is currently building a road to link up the city with the others, and will then improve the resources.

Here's a neat benefit from having both a religion and Forge handy in Tolosa:



Along with the overflow from the Settler, Tolosa has just enough production to finish the Dun in one turn, which means it can now produce upgraded military units alongside Bibracte. It will probably do so immediately by getting an Axeman or two out to bolster my border defenses. This is one of the first turns I don't have to shuffle defenses around to fend off barbs, and I'd like to keep it that way.

Bibracte has switched to a Settler which will be whipped next turn. The overflow will go back into the AP, which is getting fairly close to completion. Tolosa and Vienne should start on Buddhist buildings fairly soon to take advantage of the bonus hammers. We'll see how fast they can finish with that.

Bibracte's settler will go to that horrible outpost location that I got scooter's green light on. I'd like to have that border established so that it will not be overly pressured by scooter's cities later on.

Speaking of scooter:

SleepingMoogle,

Yes my northern-most city has expanded it's borders quite a bit - which was aided by the Great Wall which was built there. So you know, it looks like I'm going to bail on that port city - so Timmy may or may not settle it. It's still a bit up in the air (hopefully Timmy responds positively so I can wrap that up), which is making it somewhat challenging to give definitive answers with you.

I think your newest proposal is pretty fair - basically I'd giving up the stuff between my northwestern pigs city and the lake in exchange for slipping in some cities between my GW city and your south border. I am a little disappointed to lose out on that corn resource (that I was going to use for the port), but I think I can live with that. Tricky thing for you is you *may* have to race Timmy there if he wants to settle it. I'll try to determine was his plans are for that area - because I'm trying to relinquish my claim to the port in exchange for a southern city that I want. If he says yes to it and rushes for the port, you may have to fight him culturally. That's all theoretical though, as your guess is as good as mine for what he wants there.

I guess you could say I'm leaning towards accepting your newest proposal as the official division of land, but I think both of us should wait to see what Timmy says to me, as that may impact how much of the land in that area is taken.

Thanks!
scooter

Greetings again scooter, hopefully this latest message will have been delivered through the new messengers without problems.

In continuation of the previous message, it was not my intention to deny you the coastal location, so if you can reach an agreement with Timmy to settle it please don't hestitate to. At this point it is unlikely that I'll beat Timmy to the spot if we were to race towards it, since it is quite some distance from Celtica's present border. The proposed idea was more to allow for the settling of a city that would would claim some of the grassland that might otherwise go to waste. In any case, we can hold this discussion until your deliberations with Timmy are finished.

If I may ask, is there a specific reason you look to claim the Corn resource? I mention this because it probably won't be much longer before trade routes between our lands are possible, and at this point we could trade resources for mutual benefits. It's quite likely that we will be able to offer stocks of corn in trade for foods that are not native to our soil. A varied diet will greatly benefit the health of the citizens of both our nations after all. In addition, our merchants are looking for foreign markets to trade excess Furs, and it is quite possible we can create further agreements to exchange missionaries as well. Hopefully this possibility is of interest to Ethiopia as well.

-SleepingMoogle

The first line of the response refers to scooter's recent change in email address. He hasn't responded to the message yet, so hopefully it's not a problem.

Anyway, let's see how scooter feels about possible resource and missionary trades.

[SleepingMoogle]

Turn 81:



City 5 was finally settled this turn. It's late, but I am starting to take expansion a little more seriously now. A Settler is on his way to plant a city next to Gergovia in a few turns. It doesn't gain me much except for a stronger border, but it will help with setting the border between scooter and me in the near future.

Scooter and me had a quick chat, and he basically yielded the area south of my latest city to me. It sounds like he's had to give up his coastal spot during negotiations with Timmy, although the presence of ocean tiles where there should be coastal ones had dampened his enthousiasm somewhat anyhow. In return he'll be able to settle a spot between himself and Timmy that's more desirable to him, and can also fill in the border south of Gergovia with a city or two.

Right now I'm looking to settle a couple of city sites in the near future:

*South of Tolosa (will be settled in a few turns)
*South of the new city with a rather unpronounceable name, although I'll need to settle on a definite position, and pass this by scooter to be sure the location won't cause any trouble.
*A coastal location far west of the new city. Probably not top priority, but I will want to avoid delaying this too much.
*A location northwest of Vienne. It picks up a sheep resource and not much else, but it should help a lot keeping the barbs down, and can serve as a first step towards settling the north.
*And possibly a city somewhere halfway between the previous two sites.

I'll also need more Workers to improve the areas, and get the Buddhist buildings out soon for the AP hammer bonus.

[SleepingMoogle]

Turn 82, and Sandover has declared war on Twinkletoes. This was probably inevitable, but I'm hopeful that TT can withstand the attack, at least for a time. I chatted with Bobchillingworth about it last night, and he mentioned that the bulk of Sandover's army was likely to consist of War Chariots. There's bound to be Catapults with them as well. If that's the case, TT will just need to churn out tons of Spears, and seriously consider training additional units that can flank the Cats. Looking at the demographics, Sandover has more units and cities, so I'm kind of hoping he's not outclassing Germany on military tactics too. I don't want Egypt to gobble up Germany, because I'm likely to be next if that were to happen.

Twinkletoes did request help:

Exalted Brennus,

Apologies for the lack of communication, but RL has been very difficult recently and I have had little time to deal with diplomacy.

Unfortunately Sandover has exploited this in a calculated fashion. He has declared war on me simply for 'not talking to him'. He has pretty much burnt his bridges with me and I am furious with him. He has one chance to apologise and pull back or I will make him bleed as much as I can.

I know you also have had run-in's with the Pharaoh and I am wondering if you may be able to guarantee me some help - or at least agree not to attack me for the duration of the war with Sandover. If not, I understand but would be disappointed as I see your nation as a friend.

Yours in hope,

Chancellor Twinkletoes

Chancellor Twinkletoes,

It is unfortunate to hear that Pharaoh Sandover has used a rather flimsy excuse to try and justify his malicious intent, and we wish you the best of luck in the fighting off this aggressive invader. Hopefully the period of cooled relations will have provided you with ample time to prepare your defenses accordingly.

With regards to your request, at this point we are rather uncertain what form assistance should take. For a certainty, we pledge not to take up arms against Germany, who has been a honored friend and ally of Celtica, especially not to assist a nation we at best distrust. Additional assistance will be complicated though. The lack of trade routes between our nations makes aid in the form of currency or goods rather hard, and any military assistance would take a long time to arrive at the front. If you have any specific ideas or requests, we will of course be happy to consider them.

May the Gods favor your armies,
-SleepingMoogle

I'm not quite sure what I can do at this point though. As noted, there's no trade routes between our Civs, and it would take any military units I commited to his cause a very long time to be useful. I promised not to attack him so that he can focus his efforts on his western border, and am considering if there's anything more direct I can do. If TT still hasn't done anything with his Great Prophet yet, perhaps I can arrange an exchange for that. I'll still need a bunch more for shrines after all.

Either way, with TT focussed on military, it shouldn't be too hard to settle the cities I'm looking to plant. It has the added benefit of bringing our borders closer together (though perhaps not in the way he'd like), and if Germany does go down, I want to be in control of those critical mountain passes. Building forts there and piling in units should make them a tough nut to crack.

Back at home I'm starting to slowly speed up the expansion. Most cities have Forges now, aiding production, and the Apostolic Palace is almost finished as well. A round of religious buildings will go up soon to benefit from the hammer bonus, and Currency tech is on the way to boost my commerce. I'm considering building the National Epic in Bibracte once the AP is finished, to further boost GPP's towards prophets. Buddhism is pretty much spread around now, and will have it's shrine once the second Prophet is born. Once I start spreading Christianity and Judaism around though, I'll want their shrines as well.

[SleepingMoogle]

Ugh.. I was hoping to be able to spend some time to do a pre-pause writeup of sorts, but that's not to be. Main news is that Timmy has planted a city in the area where scooter and I have haggled over, making it impossible for me to plant anything there. I'm not pleased by it, since Timmy had a scout at my borders. He knew he was settling right next to me, and did not contact me about it in any way. I'll have a few days to think about it, but I'm guessing it's time to poke scooter and see what he thinks about teaming up and pushing pack Timmy's eastern borders somewhat. As long as TT is busy with Sandover, my western border should be pretty secure.

A barb city has also spawned on the coast where I was planning to settle a coastal city. Whatever I'll end up doing about Timmy's other city, I'll make it very clear to him that city is mine to take over.

Next tech will probably be construction. I'll need some Cats.

[SleepingMoogle]

So turn 100 has come around. Where do I put myself in the long-term? Well, not anywhere promising to be honest. I probably screwed up my opening enough to make winning this PBEM a dream. At this point I'm fairly sure it will come down to a showdown between Sandover, Timmy, and possibly scooter in the end. Twinkletoes, Bobchillingworth and myself are trailing and will be fighting for the lower three spots.

Still, I am fairly happy with the progress in the previous 25 turns. Back when I made the T75 report, I had an underwhelming 4 cities. I'm up to 9 now, and even though some still need a lot of wortk, and not all of them have the potential to be great cities, at least I have the feeling I did well working on expansion. There's still a lot of work to do before I can graciously accept defeat when it comes around, but at least progress is being made. And who knows? Perhaps my silly attempt at a shrine-powered Culture victory will go largely unnoticed.



Here's what things are looking like in the north. Following the not too subtle hint that my barb issues might be caused by the lack of fogbusting, a couple of Archers ran out and formed a real sentry net. And just like that, barb spawns all but stopped. Figures that.

Bibracte has worked on military units for a while after finishing the AP and buddhist buildings. The result can partly be seen in the lower left, slowly trundling towards the west. Right now, it's building a Worker since that's probably the one thing I'm in desperate need of right now. Just about all my new cities need some tile improvements, and I don't have nearly the Workforce to see them all attended to right now. The one Worker in the area is currently hooking up additional Fur resources so I can trade them with other players later on. Certainly the time could be spent on something more vital but meh, he's commited to it now so I might as well finish it.

Vienne has been training missionaries like mad. The roads towards the west have been thick with Buddhist missionaries for a while, and the city has just switched to training Jewish ones. If I'm to win a culture victory, spreading Judaism and Christianity around (along with any other religion that spreads to Celtic cities) will be key.

Tolosa holds the distinction of being a rather confused city. On the one hand it has a strong focus towards commerce, but on the other one it also generates a decent amount of hammers if need be towards military, and it has a Barracks and Dun to help with it. In the screenshot, it is just finishing the Parthenon which I indeed landed after ending the turn. I'll need a lot more Prophets shrines (and possibly a religious tech bulb) if I'm to build my economy into something respectable.



Gergovia is a city dedicated to commerce, and it finally finished the last grassland cottage last turn. I'm actually not quite certain where to take it from here, so I built a Barracks and trained some Gallic Warriors to help bolster my military. Right now its hammer generation is rather weak, so I'll let the Worker in the area build a mine or two, and perhaps do something with those plains forests to the north. Other than that though, I really don't know where to take the city.

The outpost of Verlamion east of Gergovia is just that. It doesn't have the tiles to really be anything else, so it's just getting out the basic buildings and will then guard my southern border. I don't really expect scooter to attack me, but at least the space is being put to some use.



Ah, the rugged west. My expansion has been mostly in this direction, so the cities here are still just getting started, and in way more need of Worker attention than can be provided at the moment. Camulodunum was the first city in this direction, and the most established one. It has knocked out the basic infrastructure, and is now working on the Heroic Epic to eventually become my primary unit military production city. It's one of the few cities that actually has two food resources to help it grow, so the whip has been applied generously. (In most other cities, I held back the whip as much as possible to let them grow to their caps. In most cases, it's their food that caps growth rather than happiness).

Durnovaria was founded a few days ago north of Camulodunum. It more or less takes on an outpost role like Verlamion does, but at least it has some better tiles to help it along. Some Workers have just arrived to start improving the area. Eventually, I hope to use the city to help claim the area to its west and north. This should definitely be possible if I play my cards right, as there is only one route Twinkletoes can take to reach it, which I have now blocked off.

Isca was originally supposed to be planted where Twinkletoes settled Samba, but I suppose this is what I get for being slow on expansion. Isca doesn't have much hope for longterm greatness, but it will do a nice job of pressuring Samba, and it neatly seals off the area. Now that the map is mostly explored, I know that the route between Samba and Isca is the only one between Twinkletoes and myself. The rest is sealed off by a long row of peaks and a lake or two. So while Isca won't be great in and off itself, it may end of winning me all the tiles north of it.

Finally, Shangian was a barb city that I captured last turn (along with a Worker, woo!). It popped up right where I wanted to build my eventual coastal city, so I sent over some units and captured it after it reached size 2. I'll try and develop it as a coastal trading city (ie, commerce and water-based buildings down the line), and it has the added benefit of further pressuring Samba culturally once it's out of revolt.


Now for the diplomacy: Sandover has been more or less silent since we broke off communications a while ago. He recently requested Open Borders so that he can transport some War Chariots he's selling to scooter through, but other than that there's been a distinct lack of messages. It could be possible to use this event reestablish them, but I'm not going to.

Twinkletoes has fallen silent since I turned down his request for help in his war against Sandover. The war ended a few turns later, and quite obviously they buddied up since. TT had to grant open borders and see those War Chariots go all the way across his land. Something's definitely up. My best guess is that Sandover got what he wanted out of the war, and flipped TT as a peace concession. His power score has been increasing recently, and my gut tells me those units won't be moving towards the west. I will keep a close eye on my western border, but for now there is only one route he can take if he does decide to invade me, which should make it relatively easy to defend.

Things are looking a lot better between scooter and me. We're still in regular contact, and are actually preparing for a war (although I'm hoping my part in it will be pretty minor in the end). Timmy's fast expansion has earned him the ire of both Bobchillingworth and Scooter, as well as myself when he placed a city right next to my border without contacting me. Scooter and Bob are looking to take over some of Timmy's border cities, and I agreed to join in for his border city next to me. Hopefully with a three-pronged attack, taking and holding one city won't be too hard.

Timmy and Bob I've largely been out of contact with, although I'll probably have to get in touch with my near-future war buddy and catch up on the latest. Invading Timmy and stealing one of his cities probably won't win me any favors, but that's what you get for planting a city up against another's border with a rather flimsy excuse.

So, my goal for the shortterm:

*Take and hold Timmy's border city. I have a mixed force of Axemen and Gallic Warriors, along with a some Catapults to accomplish this. At the moment I have no idea what sort of defenses to expect, and I'm trying to figure out a way to get visibility on the city without raising suspicion. Fortunately it wasn't founded on a hill, so suiciding the Catapults and mopping up with CR 1/2 units should be possible. Chances are that while under attack from three sides, Timmy will have to spread his defenses to cover a wide front.

*Improve the newly settled Western area. Worker recruitment posters are being put up all over Celtica as we speak.

*Spread the faith. Judaism and Christianity need to be spread around if I'm to get any benefit from their shrines, and Buddhism needs to be spread to other players so I can benefit from their cities as well.

*Defend my borders. I doubt Timmy will like me very much after I take one of his cities, and I suspect TT will be trying to make a move against me eventually. I will need a sizeable defense in my western lands to be able to react if either makes a move against me.


I'll leave this off with some demo and graph screenshots. In case anyone is wondering, here is what fumbling the open will get you.

Demographics:


Score:


GNP:


Production:


Food:


Power:

[pocketbeetle]

Looks grim indeed, but thanks for the great update.
Congrats on the Parthenon!

[SleepingMoogle]

Thanks! It should be fun trying to make the best of it from here on. And apply the lessons learned in PBEM7 of course. I may be a long way from the top, but surely I can still finish fourth.