[Spoilers] Victoria of Korea - Mardoc and SevenSpirits

[SevenSpirits]

Yes. I just thought I'd mention it because it can mess up your micromanagement. In fact, if the game shows that you have just the required food-hammers to complete the settler, the city will grow, you'll lose two food to the new citizen, and the settler won't complete.

Good point, thanks. In this case the hammers are fairly unimportant since it's just overflow into a library that we aren't in a hurry to get.

[SevenSpirits]

I will be out of town from tomorrow (Wednesday) through next Monday, and not sure if I'll be able to play Civ from there. (Internet isn't certain either.)

My last turn report mentions a few important things. You got the rest.

[Mardoc]

Fair enough. Of course at the current rate, that might only be one turn...

But yeah, I think I can handle the situation for the time being.

[Mardoc]

We actually had a turn!

Pretty much just continued as before, although Alert's looking awfully populous and unwhipped. On the other hand, there's starting to be some real development on its cottages, so maybe leaving it at a bigger size makes more sense. We can't, quite, squeeze in Code of Laws at 100%, so I left us at 100% gold for a turn to prepare for it.

Looking at our foes, there are a few at the same size as us, plus several much smaller - Amelia in particular stands out with the Great Lighthouse, but only three cities to use it with. Quite a change from our expectation of Organized Imperialistic Sumerian settler-spam! We may be able to consider her as a prime poaching target down the road.

[Mardoc]

Some...interestiing...diplo news:

I was just wondering- what are your feelings regarding the pace of pbem 11? Personally, I'm feeling really frustrated by how slowly it's going. If there were a way to speed it up, by eliminating a player, would you guys be willing to help out?

It is frustratingly slow; in fact it's become the bottom of my PBEM list just as a result of that. We've gotten down to what, 2-3 turns a week? Which sadly means that I tend to check on it least, and end up holding the save for hours instead of minutes.

Seven's currently out of town, and I certainly won't sign on without checking with him first, but tentatively I'm interested. The trouble becomes all the details, though - getting a large number of coordinated attackers, dividing the spoils, etc. Ancient era warfare is hard, especially since just choking someone is likely to make it slower, not faster, as they lose whatever interest they may have had. I'd kinda want to wait for better units, except that I'm not really sure that can happen in a reasonable real life timeframe .

Anyhow, we'd at least be willing to hear a plan. And can commit to keeping it secret whether or not we sign on.

I'm not entirely sure what we should do with this. On the one hand, every in-game consideration right now screams 'REX, REX, REX!'. On the other hand, I'd kinda like this game to be done in a year. Plus, well, I suspect GES is the target, and he's the closest we currently have to an ally.

[novice]

I think if you go to war to speed things up it's going to get worse before it gets better. But by all means, you should find out who the target is.

Is converting to sequential pitboss with a timer an option?

[Mardoc]

I think if you go to war to speed things up it's going to get worse before it gets better. But by all means, you should find out who the target is.

Is converting to sequential pitboss with a timer an option?

Yes, that's the other problem - then it goes from needing to find 5-10 minutes in a day to needing to actually think about the situation, plot your tactics, try diplomacy, rant in the public thread about how we knew he was busy and this is unfair...

I'm 95% sure that converting is not an option, the last time it was brought up, GES flat out vetoed it, something along the lines of 'I can only do this if I can take a break every once in a while to go snowboarding'. That said, maybe once WW3 is over, he'll have more time. Or, for that matter, once his favorite resorts melt.

On the other hand, I really don't want to be a target or thought of as unhelpful. I honestly doubt that it will turn out to be possible to arrange a fair way to kill someone off in the ancient age and split their ex-lands. I also doubt that it'll turn out to be possible with less than 3-4 onboard, solidly, so making arrangements will be very difficult. Realistically, I don't expect this push to go anywhere, but maybe we can get improved relations out of it anyway.

[Mardoc]

Oh, and a completely separate topic - Ruff, I know that a number of people have lately complained about boring, artificial, blah blah blah Ruff-style maps. I, personally, still think this map is brilliant. It made our initial scouting turns a wild ride of fun and puzzle-solving instead of 'look, ma, we found another plains tile', and assuming the pace ever picks up, it also definitely solves the various balance dilemmas of how do you make a fair map with 7 players.

I guess it's a matter of taste, and some people don't like it, but thanks again for the map!

[Brian Shanahan]

Oh, and a completely separate topic - Ruff, I know that a number of people have lately complained about boring, artificial, blah blah blah Ruff-style maps. I, personally, still think this map is brilliant. It made our initial scouting turns a wild ride of fun and puzzle-solving instead of 'look, ma, we found another plains tile', and assuming the pace ever picks up, it also definitely solves the various balance dilemmas of how do you make a fair map with 7 players.

I guess it's a matter of taste, and some people don't like it, but thanks again for the map!

I'll echo this. Frankly it was a brilliant concept and a very nice map in the looks department to boot.

[Mardoc]

Played the next turn; they seem to have started to arrive quickly now that there's talk of killing someone for not playing . Another reason why the idea might not get off the ground.

Not much beyond the previous plan, except I started a settler in Alert, who should be whippable next turn.