Dave Leads the Thousand Nations of the Persian Empire

[oledavy]

black sheep wall?

What?

I'm really interested to see how your frigates do. When I played the game after it came out, sea units were hopelessly weak- like, often they wouldn't even damage the unit they attacked. I seem to recall that sea units got their attacks strengthened in one of the patches, but I have no idea what they're like now.

That makes two of us

I have never used navy against a human before, so I'm not quite sure how this will work out. Whenever I was going against AI units with navy, the key was always to mass your forces. 1v1, a crossbow will generally beat a frigate - mostly because of the crossbow's ability to heal wherever it is. However, if you get a few frigates going and focus their fire, you can shred anything your opponents are foolish enough to put in range.

This will only work so long though. Once a civ researches Dynamite and starts deploying artillery, the gig is up. Those things will one shot a frigate straight to davy jones' locker and take 3-5hp off of a destroyer In my experience with Civ5, no unit is quite as game-altering as artillery.

[luddite]

Yeah, I agree with you about artillery. it's just ridiculous how one well-promoted artillery unit in a congested area is almost invincible. (at least, against the AI. I've never used it against a human)

[NobleHelium]

black sheep wall is the Starcraft map reveal cheat code. It's rather famous.

[oledavy]

black sheep wall is the Starcraft map reveal cheat code. It's rather famous.

Ah, was not aware of it. Need to give Starcraft a spin one of these days....

Oh, and regarding Yuris in The Denouncement Thread

we shall view it as an attempt to sow seeds of distrust between us and our Aztec friends

Come on man! This will end up being the third game you've played Seven's dutiful ally. Buddying up with someone who is stronger than you is a always a bad idea, period.

I'm blaming fire&ice for this. His pink-dotting of Yuris and determination to drive his civ into the ground probably drove Yuris into Seven's camp, and made it easy for him to be seduced by the dark side. At any rate, turn report upcoming, but I'm going to try my best to woo Yuris. I do not want this game to devolve into an unfavorable 2v2 - Seven and Yuris versus me and Mist. What I would like is for Yuris to take on Seven with those longbows of his, or at least stay neutral while Mist and Seven go at it. In the meantime, I'll tech away in the background and provide naval support.

[oledavy]

[SIZE="7"]Turn 83[/SIZE]

So, as you may have already gathered from the Denouncement Thread and my earlier post, we met Yuris this turn. Our triremes encountering each other on the high seas:



He was actually the one to capture the American capital and take control of the Hanging Gardens, contrary to my earlier statements. He has taken all five Liberty Policies and finished off the tree - so everyone in this game opened with some variation on Liberty.



In addition to his capital, Yuris has four cities; with 16 population between them. Not all that great, really. Seven probably has more population in his top three cities than all of Yuris' combined. He's bleeding gold, also. Probably from unit upkeep costs. Also, his happiness is in the gutter, as evidenced by the Demographics Screen.



I believe 51% puts him at -8 or -9 happiness. I need to go look up the formulate at some point. At any rate, he needs some courthouses, bad.

At any rate, his present situation should hopefully make him responsive to the following deal:



This diplomatic package represents my major overture of friendship to Yuris. The deal is heavily in favor of Yuris in terms of happiness, as I only have one source of dyes. He'll get 8 happy, while I'll get 4. Additionally, I chose Dyes over Marble because it's more likely that he can acquire a source of Marble - which is generally distributed all over the map - than a source of Dyes; which is usually regional. In return, I get a research agreement that is 50% more valuable to me than him. Hopefully, he doesn't declare war to break it.

I expect he'll accept, purely because of his happiness situation. He probably didn't request a deal on his turn because he has another outstanding diplomatic offer out that precluded him proposing another (bad design right there - can only have one outstanding deal at a time).

I got the message at the beginning of the turn that my offer to Mist was no longer eligible, yet he still had enough gold to sign it? Provided Yuris signs my offer, I'll begin to approach Mist again in seven turns after I get the Rationalism Opener for +50% more beakers from RAs. Of course that begs the question: why was/am I trying to sign ones with Mist and Yuris now? For Yuris, because it's important to establish a diplomatic repore with him ASAP. I have him over a barrel at the moment because of his happiness situation, and need to take advantage of that. In Mist's case, I was pursuing it for diplomatic benefit of establishing a quasi NAP sooner. Then he shot me down



With Mist's acquisition of Monaco, he could probably really use some more happy. In a couple turns I'll have another source of gems hooked up. We'll see how Mist reacts to that.

In domestic news, Auropolis finished its University this turn, check out how many SPT I'm getting now!



The order of the day here is growth, to further capitalize on the Science buildings in place. Current build order is:

1. Granary
2. Watermill
3. Colosseum
4. Market

At some point, I need to slip in a three-turn settler too. I would like to settle the barbarian island north of Seven with the whales as soon as possible. It will serve as a staging ground for my navy, and will be happiness neutral as soon as I improve the whales. When I finish a Harbor in the city, it will be positive.

To settle it, though, I need a few untis:

A Settler
A Pike (To disperse the encampment and kill any barbs)
2 Workboats.

Going to start collecting those forces in the next couple turns. Astronomy coming online in two turns will make its settlement possible by allowing embarked units to traverse ocean tiles (in addition to speeding up their movement).

Overview of the empire:



Everything is still looking solid

With the last barb killed, my trireme is exploring the Misty Isles in the frozen north. I'll be boating past Vienna next turn.



Have more to say, but the turn just came around again, so will type it all up in my next report. Currently debating whether or not to build another scout to go explore the center of the pangaea.

End Turn.

[oledavy]

[SIZE="7"]Turn 84[/SIZE]

Yuris accepted my offer, and the acquisition of Silver and Ivory sent Auropolis and Thermopylae into 20 Turns of WLTKD.

Perfect timing, since I'm focusing on growth right now.



With any luck, as few of my cities will get a hankering for dyes while I'm trading my source to Yuris. If it all works out, when I get them back I'll have a few more cities go into WLTKD. I'm also hoping a couple of my cities decide they want whales. Here is the city I'm planning on settling.



I started a Pikeman in Thermopylae this turn, that will be my ground unit for actually taking cities, and will disperse the barb encampment in the meantime. I'm debating whether or not I need another unit on my border with Mist. I'm definitely upgrading my archers to Xbows when I get to machinery. An additional melee unit would be nice; just in case Mist starts to get frisky.

However, I doubt I'll have to worry about anything from him:



Seven can now field Knights.



Found a sword from Yuris headed for some Ancient Ruins, and found some Aztec borders and a worker improving some silver.



Made peace with Vienna at long last too.

Surprised Seven hasn't founded a city here yet, you could build a pretty awesome city on that Marble:



Maybe go for it myself? :rolleyes:

I mocked up a quick city comparison of the four civs that matter. I really wish the capitals were included in the list.



Population Totals:

SevenSpirits: 38
Me: 24 (31 if you include my Size 7 Capital)
Mist: 19 (27 if you include his Size 8 Capital)
Yuris: 17

As a side note, Yuris founded the new city of Fokker this turn.

I now have 5 surplus happy, and have micro'd my cities to grow a grand total of 5 population next turn.

Next turn, I'm going to hook up my fifth and final sugar. I'm planning on gifting it to fire&ice. Why? Well, I have sugar trades to everyone else, so there is nothing else I can do with it. So, no opportunity cost, and it might win me some favor provided fire&ice actually hangs around. I'm currently wondering whether it might be worthwhile to gift fire&ice enough gold to sign an RA then try to sign one with him. Of course, if he dies before the 25 turns or up, all the gold would go to waste. I also now have an additional gems I need to decide what to do with. Need to check who does and doesn't have gems. I know Mist does.

As a side note, with Yuris happiness problems largely solved, Mist is the new rival worst, at 51% Unfortunately, there is not a whole lot I can do to help him with his happy issues.

So, questions off the top of my head for my ded-lurker to weigh in on:

1. Should I build a scout to go check out the interior of the pangea?
2. What do you think of trying to sign an RA With fire&ice?
3. Who should I approach for the next RA? fire&ice, Mist, or Seven?

End Turn.

[Injera]

I'm guessing the invalid deal thing with Mist probably had something to do with the turn processing.

So, questions off the top of my head for my ded-lurker to weigh in on:

1. Should I build a scout to go check out the interior of the pangea?
2. What do you think of trying to sign an RA With fire&ice?
3. Who should I approach for the next RA? fire&ice, Mist, or Seven?

End Turn.

1. Exploring is good, but there's slight chance Seven just kills it, even with the lux deals in place. You might send it along the southern coast, though, that could probably scout a lot safely.

2. Sounds too risky to me, if he has one city. Then again, with happiness troubles yuri might wait a bit to finish him off. Hell, someone might see the deal and take him out just to deny it to you. Still, with your GA's you're going to have a lot of gold it's not trivial to convert that into beakers. High risk, high reward.

3. If you decide to go with f&i, get him first to minimize the risk of him dying and losing the extra gold. Otherwise, go for Mist. Maybe offer him the 4gpt and the gems when they come online and you have the gold? After that Seven is a possibility, but if you give him more than a flat deal and have to declare for whatever reason (or he does) then it's a net loss for you.

[T-hawk]

I'm going to try and grow all six cities excepting my capital to the next size on t87 and flip into -5 happiness

Does that work? I'm not yet an expert on Civ 5 production and growth mechanics, but if cities are processed one at a time, it would seem that you'd go into unhappiness as soon as you grew to -1 meaning that later cities in the production order would incur the food penalty. Or are you planning precisely enough that the growths will happen even with the food penalty?

[MJW (ya that one)]

Does that work? I'm not yet an expert on Civ 5 production and growth mechanics, but if cities are processed one at a time, it would seem that you'd go into unhappiness as soon as you grew to -1 meaning that later cities in the production order would incur the food penalty. Or are you planning precisely enough that the growths will happen even with the food penalty?

Cities grow at the same time in Civ5; at least when we are talking about happyiness.

[Injera]

Does that work? I'm not yet an expert on Civ 5 production and growth mechanics, but if cities are processed one at a time, it would seem that you'd go into unhappiness as soon as you grew to -1 meaning that later cities in the production order would incur the food penalty. Or are you planning precisely enough that the growths will happen even with the food penalty?

Yeah, MJW is right- this will work as happiness is not adjusted during the city processing. I'm not sure why that is, as happiness is adjusted dynamically at other times (e.g., if you do a mid-turn luxury deal, found a city, etc), except that it just appears to be how the game was written.