[SPOILERS]The 3 Muscateers playing Ragnar of Rome!

[spacetyrantxenu]

I just got a PM from Waterbat, I hope he doesn't mind me sharing it:

subject -- oh no - was hoping you were away on vacation or something
message -- man - im really interested in what your last post contains. Im thinking something about long lines of dog soldiers marching over thin mountain passes.

Kinda funny, but that's pretty much what I posted here -- we have to keep 'em coming as they roll out of our build queues.

I'm going to reply something along the lines of "I'm not at liberty to discuss these matters."

Not sure what he's worried about with me lurking here, people reading my threads for my two MP games so far have been polite and kept their snickering to themselves for the most part. I was out of PBEM29 before the war happened but my tactics in PB7 were probably all . I think he'd be licking his chops for a chance at us.

[Catwalk]

Brief update:
1) Change of plans again, surprise! I'm not going to invade Waterbat anytime soon. I did complete IW this turn and will build a few Praetorians, believing that to be enough to keep him on the defensive and crank out a million axemen. I will settle both the marble and the tundra hill location soon, expecting to be able to hold both.
2) The hidden island can be accessed from multiple locations, including a site 3E of DD where we previously considered a weak filler city. I went ahead and settled it, as 2nd ring culture will give immediate access to the island. So there is no need to pink dot Xenon after all, which is probably a really good thing considering we're at war with Waterbat.
3) GLH finished as planned, and AA gets 4 foreign trade routes!! Will need a library here soon, can't ignore that much commerce.

[Catwalk]

Making so many mistakes they're too embarrassing to report...
1) Turns out I can get island access from my capital as well with a 4th ring border. Due to GLH, that will happen in in 17t. I don't want to waste a city just to speed that up a little, so I'm leaving it be. The bad news is that this means other players have easy access too So there goes any chance on monopolizing the islands, crud. Creative Civs almost have a 4th ring border already, and Azza also has a wonder in his capital. I'll be competing with Superjm over this island group first and foremost, he will get visibility in a few turns (or got it already, if he has a library up).
2) I'm settling up on Waterbat very soon, and cranking out Praetorians. I hope to keep his silver pillaged, don't want him getting too much happiness. He already has two fast workers and an axeman on the tile, sending an axeman their way to intimidate a little.
3) I decided to go for a library in DD rather than a monument, won't delay trade routes much at all as I can get it 5t later with whipping.

[spacetyrantxenu]

How much did the last city we settled cost us in maintenance per turn (empire-wide, not just the new city's listed sticker price per turn)? If we're close to the point where new city maintenance costs begin to take off then maybe you're right and we shouldn't settlle the junk city to get to the islands sooner. But getting up early (and lots) of ICTRs could pay for a junk city quickly. I don't remember the map around the junk city but maybe it could build wealth eventually to help pay for its miserable self? Will it produce enough hammers for that?

Two other points: at the Praet builds, and at your screen shots...why did you stop cropping them? Use snippingtool to take your screens, it crops and grabs in one go. Start menu / type snippingtool in the search box. I spend as much time looking at your desktop as I do looking at the civ window, I'm easily distracted.

[Catwalk]

The junk city would need border expansions, so I'd need to get a monument first rather than a granary. I'd much rather secure the two sites by Waterbat right away, as there are culture battles to be fought. However, with bonus trade routes I can pretty much REX like crazy now. I get 5 base commerce from each new city (9 when we get our first island city). If I'm lucky, some of the other players might not know that they can travel within their culture on ocean tiles.

As for screenshots, I switched to the windowed version and had trouble cropping in Paint. Thanks for the tip, I will make sure to use that from now on (and make sure to start making proper updates again).

IW came in this turn and Praetorians are underway, teching Mathematics now and will go all out trying to grab MoM. CC is an excellent candidate for it, with 5 forests that can be chopped and 14ish base production. I will have 3 workers available to chop. I am most likely in a race for it (Waterbat had Mathematics 5t ago), so there is a large probability of ending up with failgold.

[Catwalk]

I'm busy with work and wife these days, so I can't say for sure when I'll get back to making proper reports. I'm building up forces against Waterbat, and I plan on using them for at least limited warfare. Objectives:
1) Settle both sites on the border. Difficulty: EASY. I already have two settlers underway, and I can't imagine Waterbat stretching that far.
2) Denying Waterbat Silver and Furs. Difficulty: MEDIUM. I think he'll have a hard time defending those resources as well as Candace, especially once I start adding a chariot or two.
3) Denying Waterbat Copper. Difficulty: MEDIUM. It's not easy to hold a location without defense bonuses, and I'll be threatening two cities at the same time. I will also be able to tear up his roads pretty fast. If he can't retrain Axemen he'll be in trouble, unless he's made Construction a priority.
4) Capturing Candace. Difficulty: HARD. I might luck into him not defending it properly, but I assume that he'll be stationing a good amount of his forces here. It does get 25% hill bonus, but chariots would be able to defeat axemen easily.
5) Capturing Ferb (by the gold mine). Difficulty: HARD. Since I can boat him, it's really not that far away. I might luck into some master plan to divert or tie up his forces elsewhere, then land an invasion party there. Denying him Stone won't matter much at this point, but denying him a big gold city with lots of FP would be sweet.

I'm still going for MoM, noone has Calendar yet based on tech cost C&D.

[Catwalk]

Still nothing much to report. HOWEVER! I should have time to make a proper update later today (anyone heard that before?)

Things are proceeding according to plan, both settlers en route to settle up on Waterbat. Praetorians and axes will be guarding them, and I'm still planning on harrassing Waterbat soon. Mathematics finishes in 1t, noone has Calendar yet. Everybody is building new cities, and Azza has been ahead of me in population last few turns. I'm whipping pretty good though, so I'm not too concerned. I now have graphs on Arch, Waterbat and Superjm. Superjm has very low MFG but good GNP. His CY has spiked the last 5t or so, and the curve reveals frequent whipping. I'll readd him to the last of major rivals. I'm certain Xenon is the one who's behind in GNP, although that is partly due to lack of culture. He has some pretty big cities in good locations, though.

[spacetyrantxenu]

I just looked at the save from the start of the turn as I haven't looked at it in quite a while -- the last time was two months ago! From what I'm seeing on the map, maybe offensive use of our Praetorians isn't the best plan. We are FIN, we have the Lighthouse, and we have a TON of cities that need to be settled. We also need to work on our exploration close to home...roll back that fog!

Every hammer that dies in a Praetorian rush is one hammer less available for settlers and workers to spam out cottages everywhere. And with so many 4 TR coastal cities to build, we really should be focusing on that instead of beating Waterbat over the head, as much as it pains me to say so.

With that said, I think we will get a good ROI by building up our power and getting these Praetorians out into the field (especially as long as we're at war with Waterbat--any chance of getting peace for now?), but I think they'd be better used as a deterrant and for garrisoning our forward cities. We just have so much good land to settle that we should be focusing on our efforts there first. It may be a waste of your AGG/Rome pick, but I think that it will be stronger for us over time to get these cities founded and growing onto cottages, just as soon as Currency is in. At breakeven research that should be around 9 turns from now.

Current production:



Expenses:



Our Military - are those settlers headed out soon? I'm guessing they're waiting on escorts (well, one settler just finished this turn).



Research:



Religion - Could use a few spreads and a revolt. Swapping into OR would be nice, too...are you waiting for a GA or just not ready to spend the turn in anarchy yet?



Victory Conditions - We're behind in land area but we're tied for the lead in city count so no worries there. I wish we could boost our happy cap a bit though, we're behind everyone on population and I don't think it's just from a heavy whip hand (5 whip unhappies empire wide).



Demographics:



Overall I think we're doing well, but I think we'll improve our position if we can REX hard when Currency is in, getting all we can out of our Lighthouse trade routes and spamming cottages on every green tile.

[Catwalk]

xenu advocating for peace?? If I end up being our foremost warmonger, we are in a sad state That said, I do intend to use Praetorians primarily for securing a generous border grab near Waterbat. And I think it's perfectly realistic to both force him to build up as well as harrass his resources for a bit. I note that he still hasn't revolted into Rep, a full 6t after constructing Pyramids. I'm going to optimistically take that as a sign that he feels pressured and can't afford the revolution yet. There are no religions anywhere near his techs, and OR will hardly be worth waiting for without a religion. Could be that he got a random spread, of course.

I do have a full tally of pop counts, I will make a diagram of it today if I have the time. We have been #1 in pop most of the game, and we still have more than 1/6 of the pop. As for whipping, 5 whip unhappies empire wide means every single city has been whipped within the past 6t. Most of those are double or triple whips, so I do think that whipping accounts for most of the pop difference. Azza still has only a single happiness resource + religion, allowing size 7 in the capital and size 6 in other cities. We have 2 happiness resources, will grab another soonish (Wine, needs Monarchy) and another two with our next expansion spree (Gems to the south, Silver over by Azza). We don't even need to wait for Currency, as we have a very strong economy at present. The real economic catalyst will be our first island city, we will get cultural access from the capital in 13-14 turns.

My low worker count has worked out okay for me, I haven't chopped all that much but I have been able to supply all cities with improvements in a timely manner. Whipping aplenty has been helpful with that, lowering worker requirements a little bit. Getting another one now, and probably another one very soon.

My current religion plan is to get Monarchy after Calendar (unless I decide I need MC first) and then do a double revolt into HR and OR. I will then become a revolting Jew shortly after, probably won't be able to wait for a GA. That is highly tempting, though. Saving two full turns has huge value, makes a GA far more valuable. Should I spend an early GM or GS on this instead? I find 600 gold from a trade mission to be excellent value early on, and we can produce the GM on t87. Possibly a little sooner if I corrupt the pool with scientist points, since a GS wouldn't be bad either. I suppose waiting even that long would not be sustainable, though. If I build MoM in CC, that could be a nice place to breed a random great person for a GA, to make use of the artist points.

And yes, the settlers are en route for the two locations by Waterbat. One just finished this turn, and another came from BB. It took a detour through the FP site N of BB, then went back after I changed my mind.

[spacetyrantxenu]

I'm not completely unreasonable all the time. If we build out a better economy now we'll be able to cover more of the map in blood later. Which is better, some death now or lots of death later? (OK, more death now and later would be great but we're not playing against AIs here).