[spoilers] Commodore rolls it lolrandom.

[klops]

you really want ALL the wonders...

[Commodore]

you really want ALL the wonders...

Yes, yes I do.

Yuri getting his NAP means he's inevitably going to attack me, so I'll just move my stack into my citadel and watch the borders.

[Commodore]

We've gone on break for so long, I've forgotten what I'm doing.

I remember that I have to guard against Yuri's alpha-strike now, because I'm not allowed to attack...


I also had some plan about Nationalism? I have Taoism now so that's nice, but Nationalism is 4t away, not 2t. I will have the cash to do it in 4 though, don't worry about that burn rate.

So very confused. Screwed up and skewed the pool in the capital a lot more scientist-forward than I wanted, for starters.

[Commodore]

Now I'm an even MORE annoying neighbor.

With Sistine, not only are my borders easier to secure, I need to give CV serious consideration. I have a ton of inland cities, two are going to be absurdly easy. The only question is which one to make Legendary #3, and I have a wealth of options.

Heck, if I can manage a stint in UoS for rushbuying cathedrals, I could even make a no-food city into a Legend:

[Hitru]

How many green cottages you have ? Well played with securing all that land early on. And good use of that green lush area.

[Commodore]

How many green cottages you have ? Well played with securing all that land early on. And good use of that green lush area.

Thanks. Although Krill's scaring me with his 26 cities and clear growth potential. My GNP is a little bit skewed now by the way:


Nationalism in. Because of some past trauma, long Taj builds make me twitchy, but there's nine turns here which is just enough for Krill to snipe me if he sets enough of his economy on fire for it. I'm also going for the rather risky Compass->Optics before slamming out Paper->Education(bulb)->Liberalism into Astronomy. Then it's Constitution if I can afford Representation, otherwise just straight up MilTrad and Printing Press->Replaceable Parts->Rifling. Feels weird to be on the "old-school" line like this but I think for a front-runner with a cottage economy that is still the meaty direction, versus the newer-meta of Chemistry->MilSci/Steel.   


I am a little messed up by the Yuri-NAP. By the time I'm allowed to attack, this enormous military will be hilariously obsolete. I'm going to focus on the long-shelf-life knights and catapults for the next while, and turn my very few ports into churning out caravels. I don't have big dreams for some massive New World out in the fog, but I'd love to at least find 2-3 iceballs to put IC-TR colonies on. 

[Commodore]

Life is much happier here in Luckyland. It was expensive and I’m still painfully missing stone, but +75% for IND/Forge isn’t the worst thing in the world.


The land borders seem to be decently peaceful as well for now. Pindicator’s been castling and pike-massing away like a busy little bee, which would be dismaying if I had ever intended to invade with knights. Cavalry/Rifles/Cannon don’t care, the biggest defense is actually how grim the plains/desert border is.

…or maybe this is the best defense for Pindicator and Yuri, my restive Other Continent buddies. Krill is keeping his head down, nowhere near Liberalism but plugging steadily away at ending his Golden Age in Mercantilism. Thoth though…he’s started spending EP on me, and these caravels are combat-unit-transports now. His economy is second best in the game, there’s a real chance he could scoop me here.


Two people have Paper already, which is…grim. My simplistic Education timing-via-mouseover has Education a 5t, Liberalism a 4t, both are probably dropped a bit with arrows but if Thoth is banking Great Scientists, he’s got this. I’m fundamentally okay losing the Lib race early, just consolation-prize snagging the Economics Great Merchant and then making Astronomy the old-fashioned way. As you can see, I’m front-running but really not comfortable yet.


Regions of Luckyland:
The Core of my empire is this incredible green riverland. Having turned most of the forests into cottages, I’m continually in awe of how much commerce comes rolling in…and I’m really hurting for lack of hammers. Levees will eventually fix this for the riverside cities, but in the meanwhile I’ve had to salt in a few workshops. Not a lot of my military production comes from here, and outside of Poker there’s not much wonderbuilding. Economic core of the world, I don’t think any other region in the world will beat this.

I’m genuinely trying to decide between Pool and Hold ‘Em for the third Legendary City Candidate, CV is more and more what I feel like the win condition (notional) is.

Looking to the right, we have The Eastern Woodhills. I’ve kept a lot more of the forests intact with awesome 2/2/2 lumbermills, I’ve got incoming Steam Power in probably ~20 turns that’ll really make this pop. My heroic epic city is here, as well as my Hermitage site for a culture domination against Creative Yuri’s unpleasant little enfilade. Really would have preferred his three cities along the coast here but it’s not the worst thing in the world that he’s been left a lifeline of hope and might possibly be willing to look at Pindicator’s islands for desperate expansion instead. The no-man’s land of high dry plateau and low desert is utter trash, the city I’m about to found on the border is just a fortress. Even biology and windmills can’t save that mess. Only having a single weak tundra city for my eastern-ocean port is a bummer.


…and yeah, weaknesses. The Dusty West Shore is shows my plus and my minus with the setup. I don’t have much exposure to seaborne threats, which is part of the reason why I’m so sanguine about Thoth’s little adventure party. However, this also means I have very few strong ports to build my own navy, which means that the biggest long-term threat, Krill, is a lot safer than he probably thinks. Bingo’s my only truly strong city over here, the plains need biology or State Property to be able to truly shine. That’ll be a while.

Optics just in does mean I’ll be finally settling that spit west of Bingo. My luxury situation is awful this game, this is only the third one that was naturally “mine” from the get-go. I did just cancel the silver-wine trade with Yuri as I just landed my own reach source here on the border, so I reoffered wines for OB, curious to see if Yuri bites.

Any questions? Trying to be comprehensive here with this really interesting random game.

[Commodore]

Sic Bo/Grand Hazard, founded. It's going to leech off from the good cities to get up to a good size, and then just hang. These things are so cheap with terrace+courthouse.

Two methods of stagnation here, mines or windmills. Being a tiny little size-3 city, Sic Bo can work a farm (terrace irrigation), grass mine, and plains hill mine. Add the city tile and the free forge-engineer, it's 11hpt base. It's a lot harder to hit size-6, but the stagnation is farm, grass windmill, 2x plains windmills, and desert windmill. That's actually one LESS hammer now for +4 commerce, but Replaceable Parts is very very close now...which adds +1h to windmills. Then we're looking at 14hpt base, or 12hpt base if the free specialist goes away with Mercantilism going to Free Market or State Property later.

First Luckyland caravel, born. I don't know how many we're going to slam out here, but at least a decent swarm before galleons come online. Galleons are useful all game long.

[scooter]

Any questions? Trying to be comprehensive here with this really interesting random game.

None, but please try to keep this game alive long enough to actually get to Steam Power. I would like to see screenshots of this river valley afterwards.

[T-hawk]

The Taj Mahal with Poker is fitting, at least