[PB37 SPOILER] Coeurva, Bacchus -- Cyrus of Carthage

[Mardoc]

EDIT: Mardoc, regarding whether the players would be okay with a spoiler lurker joining in: I actually wouldn't be okay with that. But given that it will probably be the only way not to see this game killed, I suppose I'll have to accept it in the end, anyway.

Maybe I'm using 'ok' in a different sense than you are.  I meant 'ok' as in better than the alternative of no-one, not as though it's a good situation.  If I can get an unspoiled lurker instead I definitely will.  It's just tricky to find people who are interested in a game but not interested enough to at least watch...

Edit: That said, it seems I was overly pessimistic! Yuris, an unspoiled lurker, has apparently signed up. So long as the RtR mod isn't a dealbreaker, anyway.

Still, after destroying two cities and a whole ton of axes, I suspect that even if the worst theoretical option, Krill, were to take over, you could beat Russia from here.

Personally I would blackball CML from signing up to another game, although I think I'd actually be ok with Tectomoc signing up again if he signed up in his own right.

[Coeurva]

Well, we're using different nuances of "okay" but have the same opinion on the situation. Glad to see Yuri being unspoilt and ready to take over.

We'll probably beat Russia in the long run from here, and that was the objective of our attack -- crippling a neighbour -- but I'm still not sure if we could actually take the capital right now, as long as the defending player just whips a few units, even though I'm considering moving in all the more now that CML has dropped to 39,000 soldiers. I suspect dtay is building up an army, by the way; he simply must be smelling blood right now.

And Krill for instance could easily still outplay us, even from this position, if he wasn't killed within a dozen turns.

Won't go as far as saying CML shouldn't play here, but after what has happened now, I know that I'm personally never joining another game with CML on the roster again. I don't know how much you've been told, since I haven't posted the PM, but if Tectomoc told me the truth, he's been roped into what I think is a really raw deal. I've actually offered to play a succession game with Tectomoc some time after this concludes in my reply to him, if he wants to.

[Bacchus]

How far are we from the next general after winning that 21% combat?

GNP is hilariously bad, but probably still recoverably. Not that it matters, we have to play it out and see. The biggest problem is that basically we cleared the path for dtay, and I'm sure he'll take advantage of that. Whether we can actually benefit from our military exploits yet remains to be seen. Nav galleys are pretty cool though, these islands look epic. I'm wondering whether NavI combat 1 might actually be better than NavII for survivability. But then NavII adds to survivability as well, in a way. NavI Sentry is another good one.

[Mardoc]

I don't know how much you've been told, since I haven't posted the PM, but if Tectomoc told me the truth, he's been roped into what I think is a really raw deal. I've actually offered to play a succession game with Tectomoc some time after this concludes in my reply to him, if he wants to.

What he sent me fits with that.  I guess it would be possible for Tectomoc to be lying but all the other evidence (including reliably playing the civ since April) makes that seem quite unlikely to me.

I think you're underestimating your relative performance vs. Krill but going into details would be unavoidably spoilery.  I've been impressed by your performance so far, though.

[Coeurva]

How far are we from the next general after winning that 21% combat?

Will check next turn. I think our XP gain was ~12 in total.

GNP is hilariously bad, but probably still recoverably.

Get this: we're actually ranked in ~5th place right now. Now #8 and #9 must be CML and the moribund Ventessel still keeping Krill at bay (?), but #7 seems to be Savant from looking at the graphs, apparently suffering from some overextension/lack of mature cottages himself.

Besides, we'll add three or four cottages over the next three turns (not even over better tiles), when nearly all our cities will have grown again (even Ignis; only Westward is somewhat shafted on food, but it's doing its job on furs + whale boat hammers).

Look forward to those island trade routes and whales. +12cpt right there. We'll get there within 10t. Just need research builds unlocked.

Not that it matters, we have to play it out and see. The biggest problem is that basically we cleared the path for dtay, and I'm sure he'll take advantage of that. Whether we can actually benefit from our military exploits yet remains to be seen.

Which is why I'd move in now. Even if yuri answers by whipping Cahokia into the ground on spears + axes, we can tech Iron Working (!) and probably get through soon enough. Not to mention, Cahokia is probably his best city.

I wonder if yuris will blame our attack on CML's naming scheme when he sees it. And whether he'll rename those cities.

Nav galleys are pretty cool though, these islands look epic. I'm wondering whether NavI combat 1 might actually be better than NavII for survivability. But then NavII adds to survivability as well, in a way. NavI Sentry is another good one.

NavI sentry is a great idea. Now I think we should take one of those as an explorer, and one NavI + NavII as our designated ferry. I'll sandbox the GG distribution there.

Note that the southern island can't claim the clams without settling on the horse. At least iirc. Could look at the map, but eh.

What he sent me fits with that. I guess it would be possible for Tectomoc to be lying but all the other evidence (including reliably playing the civ since April) makes that seem quite unlikely to me.

Well, Tectomoc could be CML's second account and some kind of long-planned parachute scheme to get out of the game if it went wrong, for all I know. Although I really hope it's not.

I mean, look no further. "Bacchus" and "Coeurva[ntes]"? Who wouldn't see right through that?! Even working those cottages over grass copper/plains cows was merely a false flag in the grand design, which is to see Sulla ("Dark Savant") win a pitboss game against Krill on his home ground (RtR).

Obviously.

[Coeurva]

T78

Savant's power graph is shooting upwards (~94,000?). Could be that he just has a lot of cities to cover and wants insurance, but after the libraries complete at Sicil and Rhapsody, we're building a few units at both cities while they grow.

X8 will be settled on T84, I think. We'll need to settle X9 shortly afterwards -- timing it with Alpha and Academy.

We might have some kind of insurance against him, though, for which he set up himself: his now-founded seventh city, Fountain Head, sits 889 of Whitehall (clams already improved, visible worker farming corn, one warrior inside). I've sent Sicil's chariot there (not needed for MP happiness yet) and since we complete the galley this turn, I'll move it next to his city and have the chariot vanish mysteriously -- either by retreating, or actually loading it onto the galley.

Once Fountain Head pops borders, it can deny us access into the northern seas -- unless our X8 overwhelms its second-ring culture. Savant will whip barracks first there, so X8 probably needs to chop library first. Let's see if we can build another worker somewhere.

Sent a mixed vanguard (4 axes, 1 spear, 1 chariot) towards Yuri (2 axes, 1 chariot are healing). It's costing us 1 gpt in supplies, currently 999 of Cahokia, where Yuri can only hit it with chariots unless he didn't fortify his units inside Cahokia, which I thought unlikely. Aim is to scout, pillage, and disturb workers (there's an unguarded cottaging worker 1 of them, which we couldn't have captured, only deleted at the price of a Shock chariot -- no thanks), and maybe disconnect the copper, if we can afford a galley whip at Lifeblood for a naval operation against his other copper. Depends on what we'll spot. Vermin will churn out chariots from here; I think it can 2t them once the copper mine finishes.

Yuri sent us a peace offer and seems to have reassigned all of his EP to dtay. I still declined. We're 1 EP from research visibility; after that, I'll allocate our EP to Dark Savant. Pretty sure that Yuri is Rival Worst Soldiers (43,000 up from 39,000).

Someone else broke 100f in Crop Yield, and we're only ranked #3 there. GNP is still #5. Savant might be Rival Best MFG at 53; other players are close to our score there. Someone surpassed us in soldiers. Nearly all of our cities grow again on T80, which will improve our demos once more.

EDIT: Great General 26/60. Our extant GG is between Sicil and Ignis, since we don't have two galleys yet, and he might be needed to attach him to our 5XP warrior (moving into Ignis) if Savant attacks.

[Bacchus]

We might have some kind of insurance against him, though, for which he set up himself: his now-founded seventh city, Fountain Head, sits 889 of Whitehall (clams already improved, visible worker farming corn, one warrior inside).

Ooofff. Savant must have realized the strategic importance of the mouth of that bay, that founding also prevents us from isolating Harmondale's port (and its production queue) with Whitehall and the island. Does he have Sailing? This is when one wishes for rigorous tracking of scores turn-by-turn.

I think we must assume that he has it, and that we are in a race for the island settle. Can we get military to the island ahead of T84? Or even somehow speed up the settle? Getting that Galley out quickly is now also enormously important, and I think we should use it to the full -- both to threated an ampibious fork of Harmondale, and to pillage the clam nets when the Galley departs to ferry the Settler. Yes, that's proper war, but I think we are in a very direct conflict situation already due to that overseas landmass.

[Bacchus]

Incidentally, should any galley come out of Harmondale, we can block its advance out of the bay by sitting a galley of our own at 6 of the clam tile. There is some convenient ocean, which won't be in Savant's cultural borders, and which will force the galley to sail around the south edge of the bay.

[Coeurva]

He has Sailing, definitely. We know because he gained a trade route with us before we teched it ourselves. He doesn't seem to have a galley yet, or it wasn't produced inside Harmondale -- our warrior should have seen it otherwise. EDIT: Although he double-moved us this turn (legally), so maybe not.

We can get a chariot to the island on T79 (1-whipped the galley this turn). Speeding up the settle is difficult because 1t is inevitably lost offloading the settler (but same for Savant), but T83 might also be possible. Sicil produces any unit you can ask for within 3t, hope that's enough. Whitehall can help as well, there's even a chop yet to be used (although I'd prefer to use it on the granary).

Didn't see any galley in Harmondale, and I wonder how Savant would manage to produce three settlers in a row, but I guess it's possible. His boats having three movement makes this worse.

[Coeurva]

To make that clear, we could raze Fountain Head and/or capture a worker, if the warrior is all he has for garrison/reinforcements, over the next two turns. But a two-front war is a terrible prospect for us, and I bet that Savant is banking on exactly that (and Civstats telling him that we're still at war).

I'd rather make threats to Savant without declaring war outright. He simply cannot be allowed to settle X8, though -- if that happens, or we can see that it's going to happen, we will have to put this to the test.