[SPOILERS] Serdoas thread

[Serdoa]

scooters getting an extra-post.

[COLOR="Orange"]Serdoa,

Great! Glad it was helpful... And I agree - I don't see much benefit in NAP's... I never signed one in PBEM3 until very recently (peace agreement) and don't plan on signing one here. What I wrote in that test email to Twinkletoes is pretty much exactly how I feel about NAP's. Backstabbing you would be stupid as you are the only one who's proven to be trustworthy so far, plus we have lots to gain from working together.

My settler finishes this turn and will board a galley... Next turn he will land on the island, and the turn after that he will found my 5th city. Also a barb city popped up on the west coast (SW of Dazed's cap), and I have two axes that will hopefully capture that. There's a chance I may raze instead though, because I think it's placement misses a fish resource, which would be bad. Either way, I will likely get my 7th city from there. It should be defended by only warriors.. There is also a barb city on the island defended by three warriors, so whenever I get a chance (not sure when that will happen), I will take that with a couple axes and probably make that city #8. I hope to fill out my island rather quickly because I need the happy resources.

So thanks for the offer, but for now I'll probably skip the settler offer only because I don't plan to build one at the moment. I'll keep it in mind though for sure.

Thanks!
scooter[/COLOR]

So he plans to expand quickly now? I somehow doubt that. I probably should tell him that his 7th city will be expensive if only to not have to wait forever till I get my gold.

[Serdoa]

So, I decided to let scooter know of the 7th city issue and also remind him on SleepingMoogles rising power

[COLOR="Pink"]Hey scooter,

I think I'll get difficulties with TT sooner then I thought. Our NAP goes till T75 but I have to plan ahead it seems. Now, I think you did scout out his lands previously and as I do not want to make him suspicious, I would rather not go right now and scout it on my own. Do you still have a Quechua in the area? Or if not, do you know where his cities are placed? If so, please let me know and use the rivers as reference point.

One other point: Construction should come in within some turns. I already hoped to get it done this weekend, but it does not seem like we would get two turns per day in like previous weekends and right now I hope we will get at least 1 turn per day - not to sure about that to be honest.

Anyway. Regarding your planned cities, take in mind that your 7th city will have higher maintenance costs then those before. I'm not sure if I told you so already, but if not, it was a jump of 9gpt when I tested it. I think that might very well also be the reason why SleepingMoogle has not expanded to more then 6 cities.

Speaking of him, his power is still climbing and that either means military techs or military. He does not need more military for garrison purposes (he did not revolt to Monarchy, if he even has HR already, I think) and there are only so many military techs one can discover right now. Not that all of those would make sense with better techs to get on the horizon. He is also clearly leading in GNP as well as food and I assume tiles owned as well. Be aware of him. And yes, I might be overcautious here, but to be honest, there is a reason for that. If you look at the numbers, it is pretty clear that he is the only one which is jumping ahead of the pack. I am holding out in score for now, but only because of the Oracle and the free tech it brougth with it. Without, I would have 28 points less. And still, even with that large amount of points (right now around 10% of my total) he is right behind me without ever having built a wonder at all. Now, I know that score can be misleading, but that together with his high crop yield and GNP makes me feel uncomfortable. Especially seeing that his GNP does not have many spikes down - so he is pretty clearly able to sustain that I would think. And if he is - well, guess what, in 50 turns we will be already behind 5 techs or more. And that can very well doom us.

I might be overreacting here but I hope it is understandable why I am worried. I have also switched my espionage over to him after reaching 44 points with you. That seems to be around the treshold necessary that both can see the demos of the other.

On another note: Do you have any ETA for getting Currency already?

Kind regards,
Serdoa[/COLOR]

I am really worried on SleepingMoogle. He played a completely different game then what I had thought of him first. He expanded fast and in the right direction, managed to get a lead in both GNP and food and the only stat he is lagging a little bit behind right now seems to be production. But not by much and honestly, thats probably more because I cannot grow my cities beyond pop6 without unhappiness whereas he can.

I will have another commerce city running at turn 60 though, so I hope I can rival his GNP then. For food I should also around turn 60 rival his graph (if he does not expand till then that is). Still, if he is expanding as well (and I would say he absolutely must and am really wondering that he did not already) he should easily hold his current leading position.

I might have been able to rival that, but only if I would have completely ignored the catapults needed for Dazed. That would surely be a possibility and I guess most lurkers would agree that this would have been the right way because honestly, why should I care about Dazed? He is behind scooters borders, down to one city, producing archers to save himself. But the thing is, if I do not get cats over there (hoping that scooter is using them well) scooter will for a long time to come be unavailable for other duties. So I might have gotten a lead but only for throwing away scooter. That would probably come back and bite me. Especially as I hope that I can get scooter to enter SleepingMoogles territory when Dazed is gone and take 2-3 cities.

[Serdoa]

Next turn played and Dazed and scooter both sent an email. Before I go into my thoughts on that, I'll present you those. Dazed first:

[COLOR="Yellow"]Serdoa,

Well, despite your great efforts in attacking me, you and Scooter have come up short as I have a fortress remaining with city walls and numerous archers on a hill. The city will stand at least until the advent of catapults. My plan is simple: since I cannot win, I will harass those who have attacked me. However, I am willing to discuss peace with your nation, allowing me sole focus on Scooter, the backstabber, and giving you freedom from threat of any potential harassment that might come from me. If you're interested in securing peace and having all my energies focused against one of your prime opponents, I'm open to hearing your proposals.

Dazed[/COLOR]

scooter:

[COLOR="Orange"]Serdoa,

I'm crunched for time right now so this will be a bit brief, though feel free to catch me on chat tomorrow. I'll try to stay logged in as much as I can.

First off, my knowledge of TT's land is actually extremely limited, I agreed not to scout out his land early on (stayed away from his border). Also, I don't have a Quecha nearby (or even within 20 tiles), and even if I had one nearby I had to promise to not scout his land without permission as a part of our open border's agreement (purely for trade routes). I only have visibility on one city of his, and it's one of his northwestern cities. If you want the exactly location of that at least, let me know and I'll count it out.

Currency is due in 4-5 turns. I founded my island city and it actually *improved* my finances by 1 gold/turn. Hooray for Great Lighthouse! Granted, that'll change as the city grows and I found more, but it made me laugh. Once Currency is in, I plan to drop to 0% research and plow through my debt ASAP before turning research back on. Hopefully it'll be pretty quick...

Honestly, I'm slightly less worried about SleepingMoogle for two reasons:

1. My soldier count is actually higher than his
2. Great Lighthouse will let me expand across the water at a much cheaper rate than he can

GIven that this message is badly rushed, I'm sure I missed something, but catch me on chat tomorrow or email me about that. GOtta hit send now.

Thanks![/COLOR]

And my email to scooter

[COLOR="Pink"]scooter,

as I am about to go get breakfast, that email is rushed as well .

Thank you for the information provided and that you let me know how you feel about SleepingMoogle. Please let me know TTs northwestern city location. Might help

I have got an email today from Dazed, telling me that he wants to harass us but - for whatever reason - he sees you as the backstabber and therefore is willing to sign peace with me if I am offering him something. Did you get a similar email?

Kind regards,
Serdoa[/COLOR]

Honestly, I am not sure what Dazed wants from me. Does he really think I will gift him anything? Or that he can harass anyone with his archers? I right now would hope that he does exactly that, move them out of his city. I will happily kill them with my axes which produced in my cap can get cover (I think thats the name of the promotion) for having 5+35%, so 6.75 strenght against archers - even if he has them on a hill I should have odds.

Anyway as you can see I informed scooter. I will also have researched in 3 or 4 turns construction. So around 8-10 turns till cats are in front of his city.

Much more important for me is that scooter told me that he will have Currency in around 5 turns. He owes me right now 170 gold. In 5 turns that will be 190. I can get around 34 gold if I go down to 0% research so for now I assume he can get those as well. So he'll probably need 6 turns to get me my money. And as it costs me 31 gold to go 100% research I'll be able to go 6 turns to 100% with that. Thats pretty much Poly, Org.Rel and Monarchy. And as my second commerce city will be up and running that should be maybe even a little bit more.

Therefore I will go Construction -> Archery -> HBR probably and get some suprise for someone together.

[zakalwe]

Hi Serdoa,

I have no real input for you but I'd just like to say that I'm following your thread with great interest. For some reason you keep surprising me, which is always entertaining. I'm no expert but I get the impression your playstyle is slightly unconventional and unpredictable, but it certainly seems effective.

Zakalwe

[Serdoa]

Thanks zakalwe.

But I would really like to know how you think my playing style differs? Is it only because I attacked Dazed? Twice. In BC years?

Btw: I looked again at score and stuff, obviously SleepingMoogle is again right next to me (304 to my 308 ). Thinking about it I know

Wonders: +16 for me

Land Area: turn 40 I had 48000 and he probably 56000 (we are at turn 59, but at EOT I think the points for turn 40 are given out) so +11 for him.

Pop: Thats harder. I have 7,7,6,5,3,2 for a total of 30. He has two cities with 7 for sure (top cities) for a pop of 464000. His total pop is 773000. I assume that is him because of his high food yield. So, that leaves 309000 to distribute among 4 cities.

6 = 150000
5 = 90000
4 = 48000
3 = 21000
2 = 6000
1 = 1000

So, thats probably 6,5,4,3 (150000+90000+48000+21000=309000).

Gives a total of 32 pop. Two pop more then me for a total of 7 points.

Techs: As he has 16 for wonders, 112 for pop, 75 for land area that is a total of 203 points. Missing 101. That is exactly 17 times tech points. Now, Monarchy counts double, so 15 times missing.

We have for him

Fishing
TW
Agri
Hunting
Myst
Mining
Sailing
Pottery
AH
Poly
Masonry
Writing
Mono
BW

Either Medi or Archery as well. As Medi doesn't make any sense, I assume Archery.

[HTML]So we have
Serdoa SleepingMoogle
Wonders 32 16
Land Area 64 75
Pop 105 112
Techs 107 101
-------- ---------
308 304[/HTML]

Nice, now I know his techs. And that when I only wanted to know where our scores differ. :D

The nice thing is, that I know now also that I am leading in beakers by 185 right now. Given that is the Oracle. But I am not that much back in expansion (looking at the number of cities and pop) and I am actually leading in land area.

Ok, enough of SleepingMoogle, quick look at TT: He seems awfully slow with expansion (got his 6th city right now) and honestly, from the graphs, TT is not doing the best job as he is back in several categories. He had the lowest GNP last turn as well as the lowest production and nearly lowest food (only scooter being worse and both are considerably behind SleepingMoogle and myself). He also has the lowest military.

He did not have any war (like scooter and myself), he did have agreements with both neighbours and had a barb city to take. He even was the first one to a cottage (though that probably was one of his faults, as cottages at that time were in my opinion a waste of worker turns). I am not really sure what happened there.

edit: Does somebody know a better way to make tables then what I've done here? Like, a table tag or something?

[zakalwe]

Is it only because I attacked Dazed? Twice. In BC years?

Hehe, I guess it's mostly that, yeah. But you also keep coming up with moves I somehow wouldn't have thought of.

[Serdoa]

So I was some days out of town. I'll shorten the diplomacy and do not post the emails. Basically scooter and I got both an email from Dazed stating that he would harass one of us if the other is giving him an incentive for doing so. He did not know that scooter and I have an alliance.

Scooter and I agreed that we are not interested in that deal (obviously) and therefore scooter proposed my idea to Dazed which basically evolved around him attacking SleepingMoogle.

Unfortunately for whatever reason Dazed doesn't want to do that. I had hoped for it, but do not care if he does not to be honest. I had already plan B set up with scooter, which is our plan A, getting rid of Dazed.

That leads us to the now played turn (61 I think). To get rid of Dazed (well, and say Hello to someone else but to that we come in a minute) I have finished Construction this turn. I have also finished the Colossus. Guess that gives me now a slight lead in score points, though SleepingMoogle is still leading in food, pop, gnp.

Anyway, in around 5 turns there will be some catapults going into Dazeds direction. I am not to happy to put 100 hammers into that war right now and might speak with scooter if he could wait for that some more turns. If that is the case those catapults will not be build right now.

Instead (thats now the point I stated we would come to in a minute) there would be 2 axes and 2 chariots be build which will show up next to a city of TT which is not according to our agreement. At least I think there is a city looking at the borders. I'll know next turn. If this is the case, well, they will show up with 2 promos. If there really is a city, it should not be on a hill and probably does only have a unit or two as defense. Therefore it will be razed and a city of mine will be build.

Do I hear some people screaming "You have a NAP with TT"? No, I do have an agreement including a NAP. IF this agreement was broken by settling a city where he should not, then I do not care for the NAP any longer. To be honest I see the spirit of it broken already with the lying regarding the horses. But that was not part of the inital deal and he probably will tell me that I asked if we have them on our landmass, what we do not. Not sure if I really did ask for our landmass though. Maybe he told me there are none on our landmass. But I do not care either way - he WILL suffer for that misinformation.

Oh, and my gold city will be up in 2 turns and the gold will be improved and connected in around 5. And forges will be build in all my cities as well in that timeframe probably.

[athlete4life10]

Meh...I wouldn't really worry about what lurkers are thinking...I kinda paved the way for you there!

If he did found a city in violation of your agreement I would also consider the NAP null and void.

Athlete

[Serdoa]

Ok, seems it was only my misunderstanding of border expansions (I have never looked carefully how the borders expand after the 2nd pop and thought they would expand the same as before).

That means I do not have to attack TT. That is good. Because even that he has to pay for that horses-thing, he is right now not my greatest worry. No wonder... wonder... there was something...oh, yeah - SleepingMoogle constructed the Hanging Gardens. I had thought that he would do so but I had not thought that he would build two more cities before as well. Nicely done and we are now again on equal score. I would guess he is leading considerably on pop now, while I am leading slighlty in wonderpoints and tech.

Anyway, thats bad. He is outexpanding me (and that is all my traits are good for basically) and I have right now no means to stop him. He is really lucky because there is nobody who wants to fight him. Well, I haven't asked so I do not know that for sure (except for Dazed) but I assume it. So, what to do?

1. Build more cities: City 7 was planted and City 8 follows in 2 turns
2. even more cities: City 9 and 10 to follow in around 8 turns
3. Swap to Org. Rel and Monarchy - in around 4 turns, maybe 3 if scooter sends me enough money
4. Build infra and some troops
5. Don't forget the "horse-man"...

[Serdoa]

I don't like SleepingMoogles warrior looking around in my borders. Told him that in a nice way (I think). Lets hope he answers that positively - I do not want to close borders with him only of his warrior but I also do not want to have somebody looking around and telling potential enemies where my troops are.

SleepingMoogle also finally has a higher score then I do. Given only 2 points and score is not really that important but still. Well, and he has highest crop yield... I think I told that already some times? Nothing changed it seems...