[SPOILER-PBEM14] Bismarck of Maya

[Gaspar]

For the record... I'm aware that this little bit of diplo could completely blow up in my face. If I have to cast my lot this early, I'd rather cast it with the Egyptians as A: I think Sandover is a stronger player than scooter and B: Sandover can turn around and kill me. I've given him all the ammo he really needs to do that, honestly, basically giving him a straight up "Hey, we're not really doing anything over here but building stuff, so if you build some military, I'm super weak."

Basically, I have to keep scooter entertained so that he isn't interested to get in Sandover's ear too much and convince him to come kill me. And honestly, it isn't in Byzantium's interest for me to be dead - If Sandover has a whole sub-continent to expand into, he'll be unstoppable. Sandover, on the other hand, its more about encouraging him to jihad against more "interesting" opponents. Honestly, that band of jungle is the only thing making us anything less than dead certain for conflict - if he starts expanding south, I *have* to fight him, there's just not enough room otherwise. And that landbridge that scooter and I are on - closer to Sandover's capital than mine. The map has really boxed me in here. Its not an issue now, it just means my diplomacy has to be razor sharp. Sandover's too savvy to agree to a settling agreement, so rather, I need to convince him that there are more interesting targets, and then, if we manage to ally sufficiently, get him to agree to let me get the majority (really all) of the land south of the jungle. If I can manage that, we can probably stay friendly a long time. If I cannot - well, let's just say I'm going to need to tech down the military line. I probably won't build a single axe this game - my nearest neighbors unit completely eats them. Probably going to go Holkans as a base defense and then hit the mounted line hard, and use HA's as my mobile defense. By the time I have to worry about any Civs other than Egypt, we'll be in Medieval at least, if not early Renaissance.

Anyway - we're going to start building some settlers and getting more workers out and go from there. But I suspect I'm going to need to improve the power number, if for no reason other than show in the near future.

[Gaspar]

Turn came around, a cottage completed at the capital. We'll finish a warrior and move on to a settler. Priesthood completes in 2T, we'll do Oracle after the Settler. Haven't really made up my mind beyond that.

Here's the capital on T32.



Have to work a bit to figure out the next move, diplo coming up in the next post.

[Gaspar]

Gaspar,

First, a word of congratulations on landing Buddhism! I was debating between Buddhism and Polytheism (I'm about to land Hinduism), and I ended up choosing Polytheism. If I had chosen Meditation, it would've been awfully close, so I'm happy to know we didn't race.

I completely agree with your statements about this game not being boring... I was quite happy with the signups for this game, as I think pretty much every player has at least a few aggressive bones in their body... I might have the least, so I took Byzantium to hopefully compensate a bit . I don't necessarily have some big huge plan for immediately rushing Cataphracts at someone, but it's certainly nice to have that option should conflict arise. Serdoa and Sandover are definitely not shy about war, and from reading his PBEM6 thread it sounds like he has a bit of a warmonger streak as well. Should be a very fun game.

scooter

This came in from, ahem, "His Dark Lordship"

Prophet Gaspar,

Oh, I definitly kept an eye on GE in that PBEM. It's just that when I told him to not build a barracks he built a barracks, claiming the promoted units would be super nice to take a city from Whosit. Sure enough the city fell, and the economy crashed. "Build more cottages" I said, followed by the city being gifted back to Whosit and even more units being trained. He's a nice guy but what's the point of electing a mentor if you're not going to listen to his advice?

Keep me updated on those prophets. If nothing else comes out of it I'll at least still be interested in hearing what they end up doing.

You should come across a marble tile in the desert I saw Ron Burgundy walk into. From there I think it's about 7 tiles to Lewwyn's border in a rough NE direction.

What do you think of the land you've explored so far? How are your prospects for expansion NE looking?

His Dark Lordship, Pharaoh Sandover

So a couple of issues in there. Firstly, the scooter point, he clearly read my reticence to cooperate correctly, completely dropping the thread in his follow-up email. Roland, might need your help here. Clearly, as PBEM12 showed, I cannot be trusted to do diplo on my own. He also implied I might have lost Meditation had we competed for it. His research rate was basically the equal of mine, so if we started the same turn, he might be right, as he's before me in the turn order. I'd have preferred Hinduism, but I didn't feel like I could risk failing. Nonetheless, by that logic, he'll be landing Polytheism next turn. Have to watch for that.

On Sandover, I enjoy the first paragraph, where we commiserate about nothing important but build goodwill. I'd like it if we get through an email exchange without me having to tell him everything short of what color socks I am wearing. The issue with the last question about NE expansion - the route he refers to appears to be my only avenue to it. Its much closer to his capital than mine. This is not good. I think very soon I'm going to have to have a conversation with Sandover which basically says: I need you to give me an eastern outlet and we can be friends. Otherwise, I'll have to be your enemy. Not sure how to go about that, however. I'll see if I can compose something soon to reply to this however.

Lastly, to the lurkers out there, as my 2nd city is in the offing finally - I'm intending to name my settlements after songs, books or movies about the end of the world. I had intended to go somewhat alphabetically, but for fun (and participation) I thought I might see if you all could throw some suggestions out there for city names on topic. I'm also going to name units after famous "doomsayers" so if anyone has suggestions there, I did just complete a warrior. Any help will appreciated, and rewarded with, um, appreciation!

[Roland]

On Sandover, I enjoy the first paragraph, where we commiserate about nothing important but build goodwill. I'd like it if we get through an email exchange without me having to tell him everything short of what color socks I am wearing.

Not going to happen. Make peace with it now, or plan for war. There is no grey area here.

The issue with the last question about NE expansion - the route he refers to appears to be my only avenue to it. Its much closer to his capital than mine. This is not good. I think very soon I'm going to have to have a conversation with Sandover which basically says: I need you to give me an eastern outlet and we can be friends. Otherwise, I'll have to be your enemy.

Be direct. Don't pussyfoot around the subject. Tell him you're concerned about being boxed in, and you'd greatly appreciate an eastern outlet. Make him and offer in exchange for it - perhaps the resource(s) in the jungle to your north? Leave it open-ended so he can offer up his own ideas for what he'd want. Remember: you don't know all of his lands - he may have more room than you think, and thus might be able to absorb the loss, IF you make it worth HIS while.

Not sure how to go about that, however. I'll see if I can compose something soon to reply to this however.

Whatever you do, be up-front and honest, but do NOT make demands of him. Stay on his good side. Keep up the informational exchanges. Offer up info that he hasn't asked for but that may be pertinent to him. Stroke his ego, and his lust for knowledge, and you shall be rewarded.

There's nothing to say you can't make allies elsewhere in the world. You just need to be very careful about who, and when. You may want to think about asking him what his thoughts on the other civs are. Give him a rough idea of what you're planning for diplo with the other civs, and see if it jives with him. He'll appreciate the gesture, even if you two are on opposing sides with regards to potential allies.

This can be a cakewalk if you handle it well. It can be a nightmare if you screw it up. Don't play games, and don't give him reason to dislike you - he will NOT forget. If you can pardon the misogynistic overtones, treat him like a woman - a fiercely independent woman. Be honest, direct, and forthright, but do not give him reason to scorn you, and be sure to dance the waltzes he wants so long as it doesn't harm you. Cajole him in his desires, and you shall be rewarded - even if the rewards being given mean more to him as a gesture than they are of use to you.

[Gaspar]

hey Roland, if you're still around, I'd really like a quick opinion on this. I can't be slow in responding to Sandover after I did so for a while, but I don't like this at all. I tried to take your advice, however:

Your Dark Lordship, Pharaoh Sandover,

I dig the new title. I assume its gleaned from the postgame discussion over in PBEM3. One can always count on you to entertain.

As far as GE is concerned, I haven't read the thread yet, as the game left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth, but in discussions with the other players, we gathered early on he wasn't following your direction. I find it especially amusing in my chats with Kyan that Kyan indicated GE was basically asking him to make his decisions for him in their discussions. As though he thought he was trading up or something. He's an odd character, but I'll give him credit, the little bit of entertainment that went on in the game was mostly from his absurd actions.

As soon as I have a definitive plan for the prophets, I'll let you know what it is. For the time being, I just need to get another couple cities planted and get the Oracle bit taken care of. Beyond that, I'm pretty malleable. Appreciate the directions to Lewwyn, I'll head in that direction.

The early returns on my scouting are... not great to be frank. I have room for a good first round of expansion near home, but unless that peninsula I discovered connects to the mainland, that landbridge that spokes off the marble tile you mentioned is my only outlet off our initial areas to the rest of the world. Unfortunately, that area is a lot closer to you (and Lewwyn according to your exploration) than I was hoping. It would seem that if I'd like to "get off the island" so to speak, we're going to have to discuss a way to make that happen. Its still early enough that I don't really need to figure out something specific just yet, but I thought I'd rather be up front about that with you than try and be vague and deceitful later. Obviously, I still have additional exploration to do before I'm sure of the lay of the land anyway.

The only other thing of note is to say that my initial diplomacy with scooter seems to have gone a bit sour. He sort of hinted at some sort of intel sharing deal similar to the one you two had at the beginning of PBEM3, but after seeing how that worked out for you, I was less enthusiastic. I wonder if I should have gone along a bit more just to see what could be found out down the road. I dunno, I didn't really get along with him in the werewolf game either, so maybe its just not meant to be.

Prophet Gaspar

Even a quick opine would be helpful.

[Roland]

Not much to comment on. It's a good enough start, I suppose. I'm not unimpressed with it, so don't fret - it's just 2 AM and I've little to say. I've been reading PBEM3 and it's been giving me huge insight into the mind of Sandover. He IS an opportunist, so the best thing we can do is a) stay ahead of him, and barring that b) make sure we make any deals that only very mildly favor him, and be the first to the table with the deal. We can extract much more from him by offering up front what he's going to want in the future, so long as we do so from a position of power - but not too much power.

I think your main goals right now should be 1) exploring that eastern portion, and finding a way out of this pickle without diplomacy, and 2) opening up discussions about borders. If you strike early and are reasonable you should have no problems striking a favorable arrangement for both of you. I shouldn't think our ultimate goal should be bowing to Sandover's will, but he can be a powerful ally - for as long as he feels it benefits him. Power is everything, and he'll not shy away from any attempt to gain it - including knocking someone who threatens him down a peg. I don't know what his plans are for this game as I have zero knowledge of the mechanics of the game, but I still say our best short-to-medium term goals should be expanding relations with Sandover while trying to ply from him the possibility of a secondary ally that you both find suitable.

As for dealing with anyone else, try not to piss them off. Especially Lewwyn, and you'd probably do well to get in touch with him ASAP so you can start on diplomacy with him, among other things. You need to prioritize expansion away from Sandover. The delays in that regard are pushing your diplomacy into a corner, and it's going to cost you if it doesn't get reigned in somewhat soon. I should think that within the next... 10? 15 turns? you should be well on your way outward.

Keep the communication lines open with Sandover, and be up front about what you desire. He'll respect that, regardless of whether he agrees with your position / goals or not, and that means almost as much. We can navigate these waters so long as we're careful. Get yourself into a more solid position, and you'll have less to worry about - although how you're going to do that is entirely upon your shoulders. I have no real knowledge of how to play the game, which is why you have me around solely for diplomacy.

Best of luck to you.

[Gaspar]

Ok, so I caught Sandover in a chat instead, and tried to take your advice. We came to an agreement around that landbridge where he's happy with me planting there so long as I share the marble with him. I take the disadvantage there twice, as the city site is terrible, and he'll get marble. As industrious, huge advantage to control marble though, it means I maintain the advantage. If other civs get marble and stone, that part of the trait is basically worthless for wonder races. Not that I expect to have a lot going on in that realm after the early chases, but its good to maintain options.

Other than that, basically Sandover admitted that he likes the idea of aligning with me, but wants to make sure I'm not so inept as to be a liability. That's fair enough, my body of work here is not terribly impressive. We'll see what happens. Nonetheless, I think I'm just going to let scooter dangle. I didn't like his response, so he can stew.

I agree that I need to meet Lewwyn soon. The longer it takes, the more likely he's already completely in bed with someone else.

[Gaspar]

Turn still hasn't come round, but I thought I have a bit of a decision to make with our scouting unit, whether I want to move NE and meet Lewwyn (and conceivably, Serdoa eventually) or whether or not I want to go SE and see what's there. My gut instinct says the contacts will come, so it might be better to get eyes on land I can potentially claim. Any thoughts from anyone reading? I'll get a picture up when the save next rolls around.

The other question - how to respond to scooter? If I've already decided to cast my lot with Sandover, how much to I want to dance there? Either scooter or Lewwyn will be the first jihad target, based on geography. Its really a question of how much I want to get via diplomacy.

Well, I responded anyway, here's what I wrote:

Hey scooter,

Thanks. I actually had originally intended to go Polytheism rather than Meditation, but I had determined you were the likely competition for either, so with you first in the turn order, it made more sense to me to go for the less desirable of the two. Not sure who would have won, but I too, am glad we didn't race. Nothing sucks quite like wasting those early beakers.

Speaking of your rivals in the north, anything interesting going on up there. As I've said, Sandover and I have had pretty amenable relations thus far, though I'm not silly enough to ever let my guard down on that front. As I said in my last mail, I think I'm an unlikely target for a war chariot rush, between Holkans and the jungle between us, would make more sense for him to target ... probably Lewwyn if I'm reading the geography right. I'm moving Mortician in such a fashion as to hopefully run into the Turks shortly, so I'll have to ask him how he's doing on that front. Anything else interesting going on up there? I'm sure there's been some spice in the politics up there already - Serdoa and Lewwyn are both anything but boring. Whether you or I are boring or not, my starting position and your Cataphracts should certainly ensure we contribute to the flavor. Kinda wish I was lurking here rather than playing, actually.

Sorry I don't really have much else to share but some platitudes and questions, but I've already told you just about everything I know. My isolated start and focus on building stone circles rather than scouting means I'm a little in the dark on whatever else is going on.

Gaspar

[Gaspar]

Here's the chat with Sandover from last night by the by. I redacted some spoilers and some babbling at the end. Suffice to say, I think so long as I can stay competitive, we've tamed the beast a bit. I'll figure out how this lets me win later, but it definitely helps me survive in the short term.

Gaspar: Your Dark Lordship (love it by the way) - you have a couple minutes to chat?
Sandover: sure
Gaspar: I was just drafting you a message and saw you were on. Basically, I have two issues I wanted to discuss with you. One is scooter, and the other is my expansion options.
Sandover: shoot
Gaspar I'll start with expansion first. I haven't fully explored the area, but it appears that the only peaceful way "off the island" I have is through that desert landbridge that contains the marble tile you referenced in your last email. There's a lower peninsula that could form a connection as well that I haven't explored, but from what I can tell from tile bleed, I don't think it connects to the east
Sandover: ok I noted the continent isn't very wide east of where I am
Gaspar: Well, I get the impression from bleed that the area extends SE from the marble as well, so that's the area I'd like to get eyes on before I figure anything out long term. I guess ultimately I don't really have anything finite to say as my scouting is still a bit subpar, but clearly that area is closer to your capital than mine, so I wouldn't want to do anything there without talking to you about it first.
Sandover: referring to the desert area, yes?
Gaspar: Yeah. I only bring this up because my read on the map is that we're all going to bunch up a bit, and I'd really rather have options. My next 3-4 cities will all be very close to home.
Sandover: so basically you're saying you want that desert?
Gaspar: Well... I'm saying I'd like it if we can at least keep that desert neutral, so I have an outlet to the mainland. Whether I want a city there, I haven't seen enough of it to say. But I respect that you have a much better claim to that area than I do, based on relative proximity
Sandover: It's a desert though, so it's not like I intend to settle there anytime soon (if at all)
Gaspar: Right, that's why I figured we could work something out. Unless there's fish or something in the fog, a city there would be terrible, and only serve as an outlet for me (if, for example, I wanted to attack Lewwyn, or more peacefully, expand SE)
Sandover: yeah I get that. There's a small lake north of the marble. Don't know if you've seen it yet, but so far all I'm planning is to settle above that
Gaspar: I haven't seen it yet, probably will next turn. My thought would probably either to plant 1 SW of the marble which would get a few usable lake tiles, or just plant on the marble, get nothing, but have the outlet. Either way, I just assumed it easier to discuss it with you rather than just doing it.
The way the map is designed, I think I'm naturally supposed to come into conflict with you once all the borders are settled. I personally much prefer the idea of us both working together in a jihad against the financial civs. Its obviously too early to commit to anything, and I'm sure to some extent you're waiting to see if I'm at all competent before you make any decisions.
But anyway, I'm not much of one for dancing, I'd rather just say what I'm thinking.
Sandover: regarding the marble, if you'd be willing to share it with me for build projects then I don't see any reason to not let you have that location
Gaspar: Yeah, I'd have no problem with coordinating use of the marble.
Sandover: we have ourselves a tentative deal then
Gaspar: Sounds good.
Sandover: regarding the jihad, I very much like the idea of it. It basically comes down to two things:
1) that I can trust you to not back out and turn on me, because then I would be in a very precarious position
2) that you're competent enough to not be a liability
Gaspar: Perfectly reasonable. Obviously, the one advantage I have right now is that I only have one front. I imagine my friendship would be in high demand with the other teams because I'm the only one who can create a 2-flank situation for you.
The main advantage you have with me is that you can expand south and box me in. As far as my competence, there's not a lot for you to go on. <spoilers snipped>. And now I'm wonder-grabbing like a complete novice who's enamored with his Industrious trait. Where as I have pretty compelling evidence that you're a good civ player.
I can't do much to prove anything to you on that front until the game goes on a bit more.
From my end, I just want to know that I'm not trusting you foolishly, assuming I can have your confidence, I can tell you that scooter offered me the same deal you two had in PBEM3 before the falling out. I'm not inclined to engage in that, because I saw how well that turned out for you.
Sandover: yeah, scooter can be quite a ruthless opportunist while making it look like he's been playing nice all along. My take on from reading your posts is that you know what you're talking about but I need a bit more "evidence" you can turn that knowledge into proper play
Gaspar: That's fair enough. <more spoilers snipped>
I think the PBEM12 experience, even though the game was a total farce, was good for my decision making overall. What we did right was expand harder than anyone else, especially considering we weren't expansive in a game where expansive was king.
What we did wrong was give a potential runaway time to runaway because we were too enamored with our UU. Fortunately, my UU here is garbage, so no worries on that front.
Sandover: if we're going to go on a jihad, how would that look?
friends forever?
friends until they're all eliminated?
or what's your take?
Gaspar: Well, I figure either a situation where we stay friends until its just us, and then can fight it out from there, or where we just agree to do space after everyone else is gone works ok with me. Whatever we did, I think so long as we agreed to it ahead of time I'd find it fair. I'd like to win, but I'm most interested in having an interesting game. If we conquered the world in a jihad and then you turned around and annihilated me, it'll still be a pretty interesting game. Space does seem to be fairest though if we did take that route.
Sandover: ok
don't think we'll have trouble working something out then

[Gaspar]

I wonder what I need to do to get some lurker action here. Is scooter's thread really that much more interesting than mine? Damn you, Bruindane!

Anyway, another turn came in. One of the things I neglected to mention was Stonehenge centering the world map. I'm more and more convinced we are playing on an Earth script, between our relative congestion, our global positioning, and the overall number of land tiles. This has a great many implications which I'll discuss shortly. First though, the turn itself. Scooter's warrior seems to have continued to our landmass, and then turned around. I'm guessing he thought about exploring our landmass then decided he'd rather save on MP needs, since he's met everyone.

Scooter landed Hinduism. I would have beaten him there, for what its worth. I'm happy enough choosing Buddhism, since I'll complete all Oracle pre-req's next turn, and can get to work on AH, so I can finally improve those sheep at the capital, as well as the sheep at city site 2. Sandover also revolted to slavery this turn. Warrior (Nostradamus) completed in I Feel Fine, onto a Settler, due in 8, that I'll whip at max overflow into Oracle.

This screenshot shows the Marble area Sandover and I discussed in our last chat:



There's a few things going on here. First, I need to make a decision with Mortician - do I move NE and meet Lewwyn and presumably Serdoa, or do I move SE to discover the ???. Secondly, you can see the marble site Sandover and I agreed on. Ideally, I'd like to settle 2SE of the marble tile, and found a city that gets crabs and gems and some usable grassland. That misses the Marble, however, and more importantly, doesn't cement my incursion into the rest of the world. I could settle 2 cities, 1 SE of the marble, and one on that little peninsula, noted by the circles. That would let us share the crabs, get the marble in BFC, and get a second city site that grabs 2 wine tiles and gems along with those crabs. The only issue there is that Lewwyn could settle a city in the area and compete culturally. (In fairness, with Henge and religion, I shouldn't have any culture issues anywhere anytime soon, especially as there are no cultural civs in this game.)
The most strategically valuable site is right on the Marble. That however, gets nothing but some crappy 2F2C lake tiles in 2nd ring. Tactically, however, it allows me to both incurse to the mainland, and gives me a settling priority on whatever lays to my SE. So let's talk about what lays to my SE.



The key points to note here. If you dream a bit, this landmass looks like Africa. My warrior is leaving the continent to enter a desert, which could easily be the Middle East. We know that Sandover is north of me (Egypt) and there's water north of him (The Mediterranean) and scooter north of him (Byzantium, the only European-ish Civ in the game.) We know that Lewwyn lies east of my warrior (Turkey, though techincally, Lewwyn and Byzantium should occupy basically the same tiles) and that Serdoa is east of scooter (Mongolia.) While that's not exact, you have to juggle a bit to get it to work so everyone has a room to expand. More important, however, is the mini-map. If you'll forgive my crappy not-to-scale drawing, the Prime Meridian and Equator fall just about where you'd expect them to, if this is Africa. So going forward, I'm going to assume this theory is in fact correct, since almost all of the information I have supports it. What does this tell us about the rest of the map?

1. There's a whole lot of land wasted in the Americas that will never get settled. Apparently plako never read the Apolyton Demogame. Why get a Galleon over to the New World and build cities up from scratch when its much quicker to win by smoking your neighbors.
   
2. Nobody is winning by domination, for reasons mentioned above. Conquest would in fact be quicker, and basically means if Sandover and I don't backstab each other, we'll be racing to space.
   
3. WTF *is* to my warriors SE? There shouldn't be land there. Perhaps plako added a "wonderland" that Lewwyn, Sandover and I could compete over? I think that's a priority to scout, whether or not I go there next or not is entirely debatable, but I'll definitely need to go there soon. Perhaps I'll punch over to Lewwyn, and then move back that direction.
   
4. The major reachable land masses in the Eastern Hemisphere are the British Isles, Japan, Scadinavia and Australia. Of those, Australia is clearly the biggest prize, but if plako made no major edits, its decidedly easier for Lewwyn to get to than anyone else. Will definitely want to get a galley out soonish. The nice thing about settling Australia is that it gives options. If my African holdings somehow get compromised, I could turtle in Australia, tech to Astronomy, and relocate to the New World. All conjecture of course, but fun.