[SPOILERS-PBEM14] Sandover(phi/spi) of Egypt

[Sandover]

Turn 25: Soothsayer's Blog

Scooter

The Wheel
Mysticism
Agriculture t5
Animal Husbandry t12
Mining t16

Worker into warrior. Researching bronze working and building a settler? (Capital size 3.)

Correct. Just founded his second city, and gained a t25 tech (has to be bronze working).

Current standing:
- Size 3 capital.
- 1 size 1 city.
- 1 worker.
- 2 warriors.

Gaspar

Mysticism
Mining
Bronze Working t8
Agriculture t15
The Wheel t20

Warrior into worker using a 1-pop whip. Building another warrior while researching pottery? (Capital size 2.)

Looks about right. Gained a t25 tech, which should be pottery according to his own saying.

Current standing:
- Size 3 capital.
- 1 worker.
- 3 warriors.

Lewwyn

The Wheel
Agriculture
Mining t4
Bronze Working t13
Animal Husbandry t18

Worker into settler? Researching pottery? (Capital size 1.)

Current standing:
- Size 1 capital.
- 1 size city.
- 1 worker.
- 1 warrior.

Serdoa

The Wheel
Hunting
Fishing t5
Mining t10
Bronze Working t16
Mysticism t20

Warrior and work boat? Currently building a worker? Heading for a religion? (Capital size 3.)

Not touching this one just yet.

[Sandover]

And for comparison purposes:

Sandover

The Wheel
Agriculture
Mining
Bronze Working
Pottery

Current standing:
- Size 3 capital.
- 2 workers
- 1 warrior

[Sandover]

Ok, I'm surprised. My predictions are way off this game.

Sandover,


Well that's certainly one of the more interesting greeting messages I've gotten. I'm not one for dancing I must admit, so perhaps we should settle this like men and play a game of Civilization.


Given your message, I'll respond in kind and skip the formalities. Should I give relations a serious shot in this game or should I just assume that you've marked me as an enemy already?


scooter

Scooter,

Man, that's the second time you make me look bad this game already. Stop it!

Yes and no.

Pharaoh Sandover

[Rowain]

Ok, I'm surprised. My predictions are way off this game.

At least it looks like you can reach him this time

[Gold Ergo Sum]

Gaspar has 3 warriors? Umm, I would say your reputation proceeds you.

Scooter's start seems pretty solid. Based on your estimates, I would say you two are in the lead.

[Sandover]

At least it looks like you can reach him this time

Yeah, he might be my eastern neighbour actually. Time will tell.

Sandover,


Second time? Care to share what the first one was or is that top secret?


Well that's good to hear. I'm guessing it's more like I'm starting with a -2 hit maybe? I came into this game wondering whether or not I was already labeled "worst enemy." If you've already declared vendetta on me, I can live with that, however I'd like to know it before I bother spend time trying to avoid it, if that makes sense.


You are the third person I have met this game... I met Serdoa first, then I recently met Lewwyn. The only person with whom I am missing contact thus far is Gaspar. Have you met him yet? I'm fairly sure you haven't met Lewwyn or Serdoa yet, so I'm curious if I am your first contact or not.


scooter

Scooter,

I had you pegged for getting a religion by now. Not doing too hot on the predictions this game.

Honestly, I haven't really decided how to label you. I was going by the assumption you'd try to convince me to give you another chance, and figured I'd just react to that effort. So the ball's basically in your corner (oh the irony!) unless you want me to sleep on it and get back to you tomorrow.

I've met Gaspar, so you're second.

[Sandover]

Gaspar has 3 warriors?

First he started with.
Second because he grew his capital early and did a fast 1-pop slave.
Third because his capital started growing again (after building a worker) and then stopped growing (while building a settler?).

I'm not checking soldier points (just score and the top 5 cities screen) so I'm not even sure about the third one, but it makes sense. Could also have placed hammers into Stonehenge for all I know, since I didn't use his power graph to confirm (yet).

Scooter's start seems pretty solid. Based on your estimates, I would say you two are in the lead.

My gut feeling is that he's behind, because he's already short on workers. Hard to say for sure though since I don't know what his start looks like.

[Sandover]

Here's that screen shot I couldn't upload this morning:

[Sandover]

Sandover,


Well I think this is the second day in a row I've managed to screw up your C&D, although I don't think I did anything unusual like swap techs like I did last game. Whoops.


Well I'll be honest and say your post-game reaction in PBEM3 was certainly sharper than I expected... I hadn't expected you to (seemingly) take offense quite like that, otherwise I probably would've just not shared it in my thread and been done with it. I think I even remembering emailing you at that time saying that that day of posts would be a very interesting read for you post-game. So I will say that your sharp reaction caught me off guard, and I hadn't expected it to bother you quite as much as it did... Perhaps it was naivety, I don't know.


So I'd say I'm more in the situation where I'm not sure how to approach things. If you thought it was so dishonorable/untrustworthy that you'd just like to immediately declare war on me in this game, then... ok? However, it seems foolish to me, first of which is because you don't even know where to find me quite yet :P, but there are definitely other reasons.


I have always been one to keep all games separate from others. [pbem16spoiler-dont-post-this-in-your-thread]*censored*[endspoiler] SleepingMoogle and I got along quite well in PBEM3 and we were on opposite sides in PBEM7. So in general, I try to completely separate diplo between games.


Problem is that if I'm not sure that you will do the same, then it's hard for myself to trust you without the fear of you getting in a revenge strike. So we can either choose to allow past baggage to remain (and let diplo unfold around that), or we can start this game fresh, and let diplo unfold naturally like any other game. It's honestly up to you, and I'm fine with either route. Again, I honestly *was* surprised by how much it seemed to irk you, however given that it apparently did make you think of me in an unfavorable light, it does affect this game... So I guess I'd request some transparency from you as to how much it's going to affect your approach to this game. I certainly have learned since then, and I definitely wouldn't repeat something like that, however if you just don't believe me when I say that, I'd like to at least know that much.


So I guess the ball is back in your corner now.


scooter

And after this we chatted for a while, since formulating an email while watching fotball wasn't really my thing (looking back it was a crappy game anyway, but I didn't know that at the time). I'm not about to clean up 300 words, so here's a summary:

- I explain I'm not upset with him and decide to separate this game from PBEM3 for the sake of a better gaming experience.
- We talk about PBEM3 a bit.
- Scooter is north of Darrell Lake. Serdoa is northeast of him, and Lewwyn is very close east of Darrell.
- Serdoa and Lewwyn doesn't have contact, but Serdoa could have a warrior heading for Lewwyn's land.
- Scooter claims he's not really talked much with either of them.
- Serdoa apparantly has a gold at his capital, and a fairly large amount of land.
- The three of them is going to be in hard competition for land.
- Scooter's second city was coastal and trade routes may not be that far away.
- The continent is scattered with lakes in the east.
- Scooter is researching a religion.
- We agree to stop EP spendings at graph visibility per my suggestion (haven't made this deal with Gaspar since I don't know when he'll be able to swap off me).
- Get some confirmation on stuff I already knew.

That should be everything reasonably relevant.

Current thinking? Expand hard eastward while scooter, Serdoa and Lewwyn tries to claim the better part of the land between them. This will probably give me a long border with Gaspar down the line, so I'll need to manage that. Cataphracts could become an issue. The sooner I get contact with Lewwyn and Serdoa the better, so I can get a grasp on their situation through direct sources.

[Sandover]

Pharaoh Sandover,

Good to hear all is still well in Sandoria, even with the recent arrival of the Byzantine corner-dwellers. Hopefully your conversations are as entertaining as last time. It makes for better post-game reading. Certainly Sailing will be a higher early priority tech as there's a lot of water on this map. I am quite interested to know if there are any islands out there. Both of my current games don't have a lot by the way of opportunities that way, so I'm looking forward to messing around with a navy in this game.

My explorations haven't been especially exciting, as I've mostly been making my way back across the continent in hopes of discovering where precisely my eastern connection exists. Any hopes of anything exciting out west will have to wait for boats. I did get the pleasure of discovering that I am definitely at the southern tip of our sub-continent, and there's a furs resource there which will help with the happiness. Unfortunately its placed in such a way that I'll have to settle a crummy half-city fishing village to work the tile, but I'm not going to complain too much.

I haven't spent a ton of time on C&D, though my guess for Serdoa was that he recently whipped a settler and has 2 size-1 cities. I could be wrong, but it certainly is a peculiar opening if I'm right. Scooter also has 2 cities by my guess, pop-3 and pop-1, though I suppose you can verify that by the trade window now. I suspected Serdoa for a possible Henge run, but I guess I was wrong there. Honestly, a lot of the reason I went for it in the first place was denial - as you stated, most of the other leaders here have a strong reason to go for it. It'll be a little disappointing if I land it and nobody else has wasted hammers in it.

That's about it on my end. I'm just improving tiles, trying to figure out the fastest way to get a few settlers out, and find the time to get some units out exploring. Anything else interesting up the Nile? Do you have a good read on scooter's position relative to ours? To be honest, I wouldn't mind not meeting anyone else for another dozen turns or so. I don't want to lie about anything, but I'd quite like it if some of the dirty Financial civs wasted some hammers unsuccessfully chasing wonders. No need for them to know my plans if we haven't met, yet.

Prophet Gaspar


P.S. By the by, I'll be a lot quicker in the response rate in the future. I was trying to be a bit slower to allow my other dedlurker time to feel more involved in the game, but I don't really think that's going so well. So hopefully no more 72 hour waits for a reply, I appreciate your understanding in that to this point.

Prophet Gaspar,

I managed to get some information out of the byzantine leader, Mr. Cornerboy, yesterday. I got the impression he's located E N/E of my position, near the northern coast behind a lake. NE of him is Serdoa, and Lewwyn can be found somewhere east of us. I gave away our positioning and some general knowledge in exchange for information, so scooter is sending a warrior in your general direction. He's currently researching a religion (I'm not sure which) but also made it clear wonders aren't on his mind right now. I did not say anything about your wonder plans.

Scooter and Lewwyn are up to two cities for sure. Serdoa apparently has gold at his capital so I'm going to look into his numbers more closely with that in mind. It looks like the three of them are going to be in competition for the same land, which can potentially spark conflict.

Sandoria's border pop revealed ivory at the end of last turn, to my east. Other than that I don't have anything new to say regarding the domestic situation. Have you begun constructing on Stonehenge?

Long response time can certainly put a dent on coordination so it's good to hear that will improve. We're going to be hard pressed to communicate in order to remain on the same page due to our close proximity. No harm done so far, as there really haven't been much to say.

Pharaoh Sandover

I should make some more comments. However, I'm not feeling well today, so I can't quite motivate myself right now.