[SPOILERS-PBEM15] Mansa Musa of the Ottomans

[spacemanmf]

Research set to Calendar, as planned. Due in 6 turns. I switched the capital to a worker since I think more worker labour is needed, particularly with Calendar coming up, and it would be growing into unhappiness in 5 turns anyway.



Istanbul switched to a riverside cottage. The forest chop will be completed next turn. Meanwhile, a third worker moved to the grassland hill for some mining action, to speed production of the granary and lighthouse.

Morpork completes a worker at the end of the turn, switching back to a workboat for Istanbul's clams, during which it should be able to grow to its happy cap.

The western city is now working farmed sugar and horses, and will complete the monument shortly. The worker has part-completed a road to potentially hook up the road network.

[spacemanmf]

You could do with a military unit or two, and probably a settler too, but I didn't start those being built yet.

I spread EPs around since you now have everyone's graphs, although nothing on TI since you have lots of EPs on him already.

Here are the graphs.

Score. Jkaen has taken a dive.

GNP. You need more external trade routes. :-)

MFG. Looking good.

Crop yield. Also looking good. See Jkaen's drop.

Power. Iron Working has boosted your score. No evidence of a big war but it's hard to tell.

Demographics. Still 1st in the top three.

[Piet]

Checking in after a looong train ride today.

I certainly did enjoy reading these turn's reports :-). Thank you very much for stepping in and doing such a good job.

Will look into details tomorrow.

[spacemanmf]

No worries.

[Piet]

First - diplo update :

Mark sent me this at the weeks start, after Ioans declaration :

> So that's an early NAP-stab from Ioan. Awesome. He's going to take my
> westernmost city next turn with a chariot. No message or anything.
>
> I guess you're about as thin as I am in terms of military? I might not
> lose
> the city, but it'll be close.
>
> In the meantime, I'm teching archery and hoping he doesn't have too many
> more to follow.
>
> Mark

My reply

Hi Mark,

thats bad to hear, and I was really surprised to see Ioans declaration when I read through the week.

As I have seen, at least you did not lose the city until now - this sounds like you have managed to stave Ioans first attempts off, or he was after something else. Perhaps you can enlighten me about the current situation in this conflict.
I also spotted a warrior of Ioan NW of Morpork between our territories.

Best regards,

Peter

And Mark again :

Hi Peter,

(just quickly as I'm at work)

We came to a moderately amicable conclusion in the end -- in essence, he has argued that the NAP was never formally signed, and because of that he assumed my intention to steal his gold site, and armed himself accordingly. I'm not entirely sure I believe him -- I think what he did really was an opportunistic worker-nap and attempt to take my city.

In any case, the war is just about over, if he is to be believed -- he says he wants to keep an official state of war for the next 5-6 turns until he founds the gold city, whereupon he will sign a NAP. His soldier count is not too impressive, so I don't think he's trying anything very dastardly, and I'm quite happy to let this state of affairs run its course.

One thing is fairly clear though -- Ioan is not to be trusted!

Thanks for the heads-up on the warrior -- I now have archers in cities, and copper being hooked up very soon, so I shouldn't have much more to worry about. Fortunately he wasn't able to take my westernmost city.

All best,
Mark

[Piet]

And with Ioan, who sent me this after his declaration

> Hi Peter,
>
> As you may noticed already I just declare war upon HolyRoman Empire.
> As you probably guess the main cause of this declaration is just to check
> v8mark's settling-progress towards important gold-resource.
> Normally I don't intend to transform it in to a full-scale war which to
> destabilize the power balance in our region - and I bring in the contested
> area just a small military force.
>
> Please feel free to comunicate any opinion regarding these current
> development of situation ...
>
> Best regards,
>
> King Ioan II the Whipper

Hi Ioan,

so it was a declaration with the intention of scouting v8marks territory, if I am getting this right.

The only problem I have with this is v8mark claimed you broke a NAP there, which is worrying if it is true. Of course, if you did not attack something, you technically did not break the NAP - it is a quite aggressive interpretation nevertheless and a close call - I know I would be really pissed if you did something like this to me.

Perhaps you can enlighten me about the current situation - it is a few turns after your declaration and I am surely not up-to-date right now, having gone through this weeks events just recently.

Best regards,

Peter

[Piet]

Allright, T56 done.

First, a screenshot of the core.



I decided to stay at breakeven research for now, to not irritate the others too much. At 100% science, I am doing 57 beakers and have a GNP 10pts above second place.

First preparations for calendar are on their way, with a worker heading to the southern bananas to chop the jungle there. Forest chop into monument is done at quirm, the working probably heading back south next turn to prepare the spices at Pseudopolis.

New worker from Morpork will chop the forests at the border first, starting with the easternmost one.

Workers near Sto Lat will finish the road to the capital and prepare the sugar patches for calendar.

City plans :

Ankh : Worker > Settler(s)
Morpork : Work Boat > 1-2 Axemen (one of these will be whipped probably) > Worker while unhappiness fades away.
Sto Lat : Monument > 1-2 Chariots (as advance guards) > Worker
Pseudopolis : Whip granary next turn, scouting Workboat while regrowing, running GSses then. At happy cap, Settler/Worker
Quirm : Monument > Granary > Galley

Tech plan :

Calendar > Currency > CoL, with Hunting thrown in if I need it (its a 1T tech now, if I do not drop too much in money).

Settling plans :

Up next will be the rice/sugar city near the border to TT (southwestern (X) on the map), to get trade routes to TT and seal off the land bridge.

Next three cities will probably be (not necessarily in this order)
Pig/Iron (northern X) to claim Iron
Sugar/Rice/Clams (southern X) as a commerce city
5-resources city in the south (next map) as outpost in the south. Probably this will have priority, since it also claims Iron - but I will have to finish a galley first to ferry settler & garrison.
Island city - for trade. Will obviously also require a galley :-)

Map of the south, with possible city spots :

[Piet]

Demos :



First in the big three, which is nice. Power graphs are ok (keeping an eye especially on Jkaens graph atm, since he whipped a lot last turns, as Spaceman pointed out. If it was military, it should be visible very soon).

[Piet]

and a few words with Jkaen :

> Welcome back, grats on the GLH

Thank you. Hope things are running fine in Zululand as well.

Still searching for your homeland to open up trade possibilities - there seems to be quite some distance between us. Hope I will manage to reach your borders before my scouting warrior dies of old age :-).

[Piet]

and a few more words with Jkaen - caught each other in chat

jkaen.onl​ine: waves
Ich: Hi Jkaen
jkaen.onl​ine: Hi there, still hoping to catch Squareleg here, not seen my ded lurker for about 2 weeks now, and I really like having people to bounce things off
Ich: yeah, its very good for the games pace
i am rally glad that spaceman could take over last week
*really
jkaen.onl​ine: Well done on the GLH, was just about to consider building that when I noticed you had it all finished
yup turns seemed to fly by
Ich: thank you, I hope it will be good on this map
was a little bit worried about you trying for it, since TT told me you had sailing early
jkaen.onl​ine: should be, you near the coast up in your NE?
should have gone for it quicker, but was focussed on trying to expand quickly. that said Ioan is still ahead on 5 cities now
Ich: yes, I am on the east coast of our cntinent
jkaen.onl​ine: seen your western border, but dont know what its like behind you
Ich: theres not so much more land in the other direction
room for 2 good cities and a filler or two
jkaen.onl​ine: Thats what I guessed. How you getting on with the other players btw?
Ich: for me it was really nice neighbourhood until now
unlike v8Mark and Ioan, as it seems
still trying to make up what happened there
jkaen.onl​ine: yes, seems ioan just wanted to kick terror out of builder mode from what he has said, just to keep him honest
Ich: yeah, terror was expanding like mad
how is it going with TT ?
must be nice to have only one direct neighbour who is not exactly known to be aggressive
jkaen.onl​ine: so so, he is wanting far more in diplo than he is giving, so its not that friendly. Plus to be honest, the way the map is looking the only person I am going to border is TT, so things may be a bit difficult
Hence why I am looking elsehwere for good firends and trade partners
Ich: yeah, if there is only one direction to expand
it is difficult to make friends there
Gesendet am Montag um 11:28 Uhr
jkaen.onl​ine: He still has not scouted out my lands, so please dont pass this info through to him, but from what I can see we have a bit of an old world looking map here. Ioan has Europe, TT is Algeria, I was South Africa, Terror Russia, you India. I am just trying to explore around the middle east right now to get trade routes to you
Gesendet am Montag um 11:29 Uhr
Ich: My warrior is currently treading along the east coast, to the south
but it is a long way
I think we will have to rely on coastal trade for quite a while
jkaen.onl​ine: yes that is what I assumed too, there is no way I will get a road over there for quite a bit, and as I said any land route would have to go through TT I think
Ich: yeah, could very well be
jkaen.onl​ine: Do you have any NAP in place with TT yet btw?
Ich: there may be another land connection in te area my scout is currently in
Yes, we have a NAP till around T85
Hes really a somewhat difficult neigbour - peaceful but difficult to make traes with
jkaen.onl​ine: The only land connection I have to you 3 is through 'egypt' and I think TT may claim that soon
Yes, he does seem very peaceful, but as you said difficult to get any agreements with, so I have almost given up
Ich: we have kind of a border agreement in the Egypt area, an interest line just in the middle of our caps
which means I will probably control at least one land bridge (the diagonal, easternmost one) to the south
there is a small land mass around the "Arabian sea"
which may have a land connection to you
jkaen.onl​ine: If you look at this picture
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/24016610/T44%20TTLand.JPG
There is a land bridge just SW of the stone
is that the connection you meant?
Ich: SE of the marble
?
that would be the one
jkaen.onl​ine: SE of the marble goes down what I think is a peninsula I am calling the middle east
SW leads to 'Africa'
Ich: yeah, that my arabian sea
I will found my next city approx 3E and a little bit S of the marble
to get access on that land connection
the marble is right in middleof TTs and my capital
E/W-wise
so there is no land connection between you and this middle east ?
jkaen.onl​ine: no, other than through Egypt no
Ich: hm
hoped to get the trade connection via this area
jkaen.onl​ine: It depends on how big it is, I have routes at the moment down its west coast and am defogging, hopefully I will see the south/east of it soon
Gesendet am Montag um 11:44 Uhr
jkaen.onl​ine: I have a galley defogging around the south of africa too right now, and I seem to have madagascar for 1 city, may settle yemen in the not too distant future which will help with routes
Ich: should be ok
I will settle in the dubai area soon
so we might want to agree to split this thing
jkaen.onl​ine: Ok, didnt realise you were looking that far south
Yes, thinking the same, when my next turn comes round I will take a shot of what I have explored so far
Ich: yes, this will be good
the north coast is not to far from my capital
and its southwestern coast seems to be near yours
jkaen.onl​ine: Its pretty near yes
Ich: so lets scout a little bit more and then divide this thing
but it seems that I will also have to send some kind of boat down there to get trade routes
thats good to know
jkaen.onl​ine: think my culture hits the coast of the middle east already, so if you can defog to there, you should be ok
Ich: thats good
my warrior is currently at the spot which is probably the Yemen area
whales sheep silver
so I should spot your borders in a couple of turns
jkaen.onl​ine: not got a screenshot of that area saved atm, so cant remember whats there. I may have a scout a couple of tiles above you in that case
Ich: could very well be
did not scout the middle atm
just hugging the coast
Gesendet am Montag um 11:56 Uhr
jkaen.onl​ine: Ok, I guess I should get back to work and stop chatting soon. Has proved helpful though. I guess its too early for you to be thinking of who your first target may be?
Ich: for the moment, yes
beeing right in the middle, it is not so easy
Gesendet am Montag um 12:00 Uhr
jkaen.onl​ine: fair enough, would appreciate it if you keep me up to date on anything TT is thinking/planning
Ich: allright, if I hear something I will send a note
ok, see you later then

Seems he will be gunning for TT in the future, since TT is his only land neighbour. He would surely like to have me step in - only, if I do this - I will be his only land neighbour afterwards :-).

If we manage to get trade routes up and divide "the Middle east" fairly, I think he could make a really good friend.