Serdoa's SPOILER-Thread: I am legend?

[pindicator]

I have noticed a distinct lack of map complaints from this thread. Management has asked me to follow up as we have not yet reached our quota.

[Serdoa]

Ok, so I am back with a post. Sorry for being quiet, but we played nearly 35 turns now and really, there has not much happened. Right now things might heat up, as I have a warrior next to the borders of superdeaths second city, which is not defended by anything. He might have a warrior in the fog or maybe he is building one that pops out next turn, but he should feel threatened. Not that I intended that, it just happened by accident while I moved away from Rustens next city - I assume it is his third, but I don't know for certain, I haven't done C&D as I should have and I don't think I want to go back and do it for 30 turns. Well, we will see. 

Anyhow, Rustens next city will be I think 4 tiles from superdeaths diagonally. SD did imo slightly overextend with his placement, but I might be wrong. If he did, it is mostly by a tile or two, not really wrong to do so. It also is done so in order to secure his copper, so it makes sense. Still, it might lead to a fight between the two of them down the line, so I intend not to upset SD any more than my warrior most likely does already. 

Besides that, my own expansion is going on. Slowly but surely. I didn't realize how much ORG would have helped, but especially with my quick detour to Bronze Working and therefore Slavery I could have already settled a least one city more with it. Though I would miss workers, so who knows how good that really would be. 

As for the map: pindicator, I think you did a good job. It is smaller than expected though - by far. That it my own fault, I did interpret what Noble wrote without clarifying it with the group or you. I would have preferred if I was told that I was acting on a false understanding, though I can understand if you deemed that too much involvement on your part. If I find out after the game that you gave others more information in their threads I might be a little upset though

[pindicator]

Thanks Serdoa, I appreciate the feedback!

[Old Harry]

Besides that, my own expansion is going on. Slowly but surely. I didn't realize how much ORG would have helped, but especially with my quick detour to Bronze Working and therefore Slavery I could have already settled a least one city more with it. Though I would miss workers, so who knows how good that really would be. 

Did you mean to say ORG here? If so I'd love to know how it would have helped your start - would it have an effect on costs already?  

[Serdoa]

Good catch. I did mean IMP, there are just enough hills around and I have also two 5/1/x tiles, which means I would have gotten it's bonus in any case. Though obviously the big thing would have been chops and especially whips. 

On the matter of ORG: It would have started being noticeable within the next 10 turns I reckon. I should be up to 4 cities then, with the 5th on its way. Not that any of that matters, I'm next to NoGas, so I will get trampled. I might luck out if I can tech quickly enough to deter aggression, simply by it being too costly, but I'm not certain that there is much too be done as the map is so small that we will already have touching borders when Guilds comes around. Also my teching is awful, I'm clearly last by virtue of small cities, no Mysticism and no Fishing either.

[Old Harry]

IMP has always been one of my favourite traits, but I hesitate to say it out loud in case it gets nerfed.

What are you going to do about your teching?

[Serdoa]

What I am doing about my teching is a great question. My current answer is: Nothing, at least short term. I can not increase it in any considerable amount without at the same time stunting my growth, which with this map-size I don't think I can let happen. I looked at the demos and I am (at 100% tech) at 20 GNP, with the best player at 31 and the worst at 21, average 25. So, lets analyze that:

First, what do we know? The best has 31, the worst 21, with a total of 5 players that are ranked here and an average of 25. If we take that average times 5 we get a total GNP for all other players of 125. Minus the 31 for the best and the 21 for the worst we get to 73 for the remaining 3 players, or ~24 per player. 

I myself would sit at 20 if I researched at 100%. I am researching Fishing, which means I get no bonus. If I would research AH (having Agri and Hunting, giving me a bonus) I would be at 23. I don't know how (switching between 100% and 0% or adjusting to a value in between) and what the others research of course, but given the state of the game I think assuming that most are assuming a tech which receives a bonus is fair. My position might insofar be better than expected. Culture might play a role in the 31 number, Lewwyn has 200 in his capital against my 68. I think that has to be from his religion, but I actually can't remember when you got what kind of bonus. It does not seem to be his state religion, at least it is not shown on the point-counter (which I think it is as soon as you adapt it, if that has not been changed). Buddhism was founded BC 3640, that would be Turn 10 I believe. Another 25 turns have elapsed since then and he has 132 more culture in his capital. But he plays the turn after me, so 24 in his case. Which would work out to 5.5 more culture each turn... which is impossible. So... 4 culture for some turns and then 6 because he built a monastery? I have no clue... What I do know is that he does have so much more culture than I do, that he has to have a GNP at least 5 higher than me if we would have an equal commerce output. Which would mean I am at worst 3 GNP behind, so basically 1 pop and Mysticism.

Yeah, so maybe it is good that I did not plan to do anything about the GNP difference as it seems to mostly stem from a few points that will be corrected shortly.

While looking at these things, I also found out that Rusten is the only one with 3 cities right now and everyone is in Slavery. At least of those I have met, which is everyone except Bob. As I will settle my third city myself in 3 turns IIRC I don't seem to be much behind the IMP-civs right now. Lets see how that looks in like 10 turns.

[pindicator]

IMP has always been one of my favourite traits, but I hesitate to say it out loud in case it gets nerfed.

What are you going to do about your teching?

Absolutely. I do not think it needed the Stable buff that CtH gave it.

[Serdoa]

Just a short update: I moved my scout last turn next to a warrior of NoGas, assuming that nothing would happen. But they decided to kill it - and had the audacity to offer me peace afterwards. I will not accept. I know this is not the way to win this game - or even stay in it till the later game, but hey, if they think it is somehow sensible to kill a fucking scout on T39 for no reason, I think it is sensible to kill their game as well for no reason Axe Rush, Chariot Rush, I don't care. It won't let me win either (I assume a long and bloody stalemate), but it should given Rusten and Lewwyn enough time to put themselves into a winning position.  

I mean honestly, what the fuck NoGas? That attack makes no sense at all. A scout is not threatening to start with, but it also was not next to a city and on top of that the only way to interfere and move into your territory was already blocked by your warrior. That scout had already seen everything there was to see about the land in an earlier pass (which you should know simply due to our espionage numbers and that it should have been visible to you) and the city is newly planted so has no buildings or anything to see (and was visible anyway over water). Your power numbers also clearly show that there is no force that needed to be hidden. So what was the point? Even if this was not me, you must expect that this will upset the other player - which is maybe not that smart considering you want to tech in peace towards Guilds. But you know me, you know that I get pissed off by such illogical attacks. I hope that 1 xp on your warrior was fucking worth it... 

Also I was sitting on a jungle, so it was 2 attack vs 1.5 defense, 78% odds to win. That means in nearly 1/4 of all cases they lose their warrior - of which they have 3 by my counts. What.the.fuck? You gain nothing at all by that attack, not one bit. The only thing you gain is getting me to not concentrate on winning - but that is not something you want to happen if it instead means I concentrate on fucking you over...

[Serdoa]

NoGas will settle a double gold-spot that is pretty much equidistant from our both capitals. It could easily be shared, 1 gold for each, the geography would make that easily possible, but they obviously decided to put everything towards getting that spot, probably to fuel their research till Guilds. And that spot might very well do so. Though my third city has raised my costs considerably - and it is closer to my capital by far - that gold spot is I think 10 tiles from their capital and in their south, directly towards me. I feel a little bit unlucky with my map placement to be honest. Having the guy needing to get to late game placed next to the one that will stomp one neighbor mid-game... 

Also: I get what you wanted to do with these spots pindi (there is another with double-silver on the other side and I guess double-gems will be available for the third "pairing"), I'm just not a big fan of these things. Players compete for the land anyhow, but these "landmarks" make it nigh impossible to actually find a amicable solution for both parties, especially without diplo. It's forced conflict, when we actually have enough conflict already anyhow. Certainly fun for the lurkers I suppose, but for me as a player it takes decisions out of my hands. In this case, even if they had not killed my scout, I could not stay friendly with them after that settlement. But not because it actually is so far forward, but because of how the resources were deliberately placed to make it very certain that one player will try to get both and the other will be fucked over...

This gold spot also is really crazy. One side water, the other a river, itself on a hill... that shit will be close to impossible to take without Catapults and even with it will be hard as long as we are on tech-parity. And due to the spot it will be them in front technologically as well... the silver spot on the other side is at least not that defensible. I really think, no matter if you do a double-gold spot, you should not also make it easy to defend, put several good food resources on top and so on. That spot basically changed the game from developing a strategy to "scout in the right direction -> win". I didn't, so... bad luck I guess?