Score??? Sheesh, you guys are still talking about score with our current situation... I admire your guys' optimism! [dance] As I said, won't be touching this till tonight, but I'm gonna be bold and say that I'll try to have it setup so that our resident bad apple can destroy Paris :evil:

Greeting gentlemen. Come tomorrow morning (I finished playing just now), you will either like or hate what I'll be reporting :( . Report, save, pics will be up around 8-9am PST (-8:00GMT). If you need to shish-ka-bob me with how the results turned out, don't bother, I already beat you to it :D

WTF, report soldier!

Pre-Turn, 550AD:
Adjust science to 50% for feud in 13 with -25gpt to invest SOME money into our research, hoping it will lower the cost of the tech a bit later. 1 battle [1:0].

IT:
Movement, fighting [3:0], some builds finish, Russians have a new town in the east.

Turn 1, 560AD:
Deal with new town [4:0], change Virconium to a settler to fill the eastern areas up. Elite leg loses to a reg greek archer... :( [4:1] Moved some troops around, Brundisium is in trouble, reinforced it, but we shall see if it holds. [5:1] And yes, we see a border [party]!
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/Galley_sees_the_new_world.JPG

IT:
Lose a leg, killed two muskets off. [7:2], lose our galley to the unforgiving expanse :rolleyes: .

Turn 2, 570AD:
Rushed barracks in Brundisium, getting really hairy there. Gonzonium being harrased by some Greeks. Some repositioning of defenders. [10:2]

IT:
Barracks built, enemy does NOT attack Brundisium, instead heading for somewhere else.

Turn 3, 580AD:
English have astronomy, just from seeing a galley in on a sea tile. Suicidal galley getting ready soon for voyage #2. Plan now is to get horsies for one northern army to send to the French, and for one western army to send at the English. We need to pillage NOW :aargh: !

IT:
Troops definitely heading towards a weaker city in our core. English want our ears to be lended, to hell with that! And doh, we see a French caravel.

Turn 4, 590AD:
Well now, do more troop defense movement, some worker stuff, nothing special, just waiting for a few more turns of healing before I can actually make a MOVE. Also, I want to wait for Virconium's settler before striking Thermopylae so I can make a fast replace [11:2]

IT:
Americans want parley, shyeah right, they start sistines. @#()*$U Lose a leg defending 3 workers to a knight, and yes those workers are gone... :mad: [11:3]

Turn 5, 600AD:
Move 5 cats, northern army, and a horsie towards Paris through the hills. I had just about enough of this, and got some revenge for our lost workers. Stupid me moved 3 legs towards the bab town in our southeast which is a completely useless town which serves no threat to us. I should have sent them towards those annoying Greeks in the south. Will do that next turn. [15:3]

IT:
Come on RNG... lose two [15:5], Russians start Bach's.

Turn 6, 610AD:
Suicidal galley #2 attempts at a new launch point which may be closer to the new world. Will need 2 more turns to hit coast, but maybe I might get lucky and we meet new "friends." MMed between Neapolis and Rome so that Neapolis can be 10spt after corruption instead of 9spt after corruption. [18:5].

IT:
Again the RNG is failing me. Lose fortified 5/5 leg in walled Ravenna (on a hill for crying out loud) to 5/5 sword :suicide: . Suicidal galley #2 lives! [20:6]

Turn 7, 620AD:
Why... HELLOOOOOO!
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/Monty.JPG

We meet the Aztecs, and no guys, they are NOT in the ancient ages as we had all hoped :p . BUT they only have up on us Republic, Mono, Lit, and Feud along with those other contacts. Checked with my DoWs and the current turns (this is turn 177) and shamefully we must declare on Monty after doing some MUCH NEEDED and LONG DENIED trading :D . Communications being priority number 1. Our WM is worth lit, TM, 1gpt and 13 gold. Hmmm... Each individual contact is worth our English contact and WM with the Iroqouis just English Contact. French, English contacts worth more in gpt and packaging in a second contact gives us an upgrade to Japanese contact. I'll bite the bullet and pray for Monty's neighbor's to be NOT too backward. Trade German contact for Iroquois Contact, Lit, 13 gold (all). Great, next up, seeing if I can possibly get Mono or Feud. Any combo of 4 contacts gives us Jap contact, Feud, and TM. He's already furious with us, which I can't figure out why since no they haven't heard of our defiant, barbaric ways yet. Oh wait, selling him the contact instantly gives him knowledge of our bloodthirsty ways? I'm guessing the other AIs are not going to be too pleased with us as well, so I'll save those contacts for them and trade with them instead. And oh yes, we must declare, see you in Hades Monty :evil: ! Dial up Hiawatha now, he really looks regal in that black outfit. He is annoyed. His DoW will be turn 192, which is 15 turns from now, again, I'm avoiding gpt deals. Fortunately he has the same diplo set up as Monty. Trade German contact for Indian contact + 1 gold (all). Dial up Gandhi, and finally, someone is Polite to us. He is our choice partner, since his DoW will not be for another 35 turns. Also trade German contact for 4 gold (all) + TM. They have a fairly nice sized country. Gandhi trading now involves Russian, Babs, American Contacts for Jap contact and Feudalism, done. Tokugawa, annoyed, actually offers us the best deal on mono by just taking English Contact, while Gandhi wants gold and our WM... DONE. Chivalry is available, and it's only known by India! Hehe... I smell alliance bargaining chip. WM + French Contact to Tokugawa for WM. And WOW... That is a lot of Aztec land... And unfortuntely, no short way for that continent to reach ours... But there is a sea route it seems to our east, so... I sell the rest of our contacts, plus our WM to Gandhi to get 100 gold. This will give me embassy cash, but not enough for both India and Japan. Wow, saw the F8, and Japan is numero uno on score and power. I gift Tokugawa German and American contacts, but instead of possibly getting better deal in a different alliance combinations, I actually raised the prices of MAs by giving him more contacts!!!! STUPID STUPID STUPID!!! :wallbash: And here is more NaCl in the open wound, I just checked that we are NOT allowed to establish embassies... sorry... So I stop further pain by just forgetting about MAs. Oh well, forgive me team and M-B. Finish off this turn by changing a lot of builds to knights, kill some more units, sliders at 10.0.0, +30gpt with engineering in 40 turns. Northern Army ready to deal some pain towards Paris. Awaiting the dogpiling that should be coming from the new world. And this sucks, we can't have MDIs... :(

EDIT: I forgot to detail the chivalry trade. I can't recall exactly what I traded for it, but it involved our gpt for sure.

IT:
French complete Leo's. Cascade includes Smiths (english) and Copernicus (german) :eek: ! And yes, after doing its job, suicidal galley #2 fulfills its namesake :salute: .

Turn 8, 630AD:
Horsie to knight upgrade costs 80 while we are at 84, ew... :twitch: skip that. Attacking Thermopylae, lose 1 leg kill 1 hoplite, but still has another hoplite left. I bombard Paris' tiles, going 2/5 on that.

IT:
Movement, [24:7]

Turn 9, 640AD:
Misclicked leg to attacking hoplite, wanted to move him away :rolleyes: ... Wow, how the heck did we go from 30gpt to now 47gpt? Oh yeah, built Lunacantorium right in Thermopylae's eye. And great, game crashes... I load up autosave, recreate the moves to the point, so that misclicked leg that died now has to die again :p ! Call up India and Japan to see what's up, and guess what, India up Engi and Theo while Japan just up Engi. 25gpt, WM, 98 gold (all) for Theo to India, and Theo, 4gpt, WM to Japan for Engi. We are broke, but +17gpt. Jeez India, knows printing press AND invention as well... :eek: HUH?!?! Of course, we can't afford anything anymore. My god... if we can somehow get another MGL, we can rush Sistines.

IT:
Is our foreign advisor EVER the bearer of good news?
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/MA_eng-ind.JPG
Well, we get our money back from India, hehe :p

Turn 10: 650AD:
Ah okay, Japan now has printing press, but worthless to us. I'm looking for invention. Well, some small fights, but that's it. And that is the end of my turns!

Our Roman Empire circa 650AD (hey, isn't this when the real one actually collapsed? :p )
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/650AD_Empire.JPG

Conclusion:
Good news: We finally meet everyone, and we have gotten some techs, the most important being chivalry. AI doesn't have cavalry yet, and they seem to have focused on the top branches of the MA techs. England really needs to go, since it started Smiths and they are probably the tech leaders. I also got the France pillaging campaign underway, so I didn't fulfill my promise to you microbe, but you can at least pillage to your hearts desire. We are making more money than when I first got this (40gpt oppossed to 29gpt, though I still can't figure out how the heck I managed to get up to +47gpt :confused: ).
Bad news: I hit the bottom of the leader well it seemed. Could really use one to deny Sistines from the AI, or make a Knight army. India already declared on us, but at least we get our money back. Kill ratio was less than spectacular as well, lost maybe 8 or 9, killed about 30. A lot of the deaths came about from enemy units NOT approaching our catapult cities and had to fight a lot in poor terrain yet to prevent catastrophe i.e. losing 6 workers. Also, our unit cost is painful, but what can we do right? Stupid me in wasting a few turns of deficit research on feudalism :wallbash: . It made no difference in tech cost.
Ugly news: Please forgive me on that embassy built in Kyoto! And yes, that game crash, and oh yeah, I played this in a fairly sickly condition. Who gets a fever in the middle of summer??? I hope I didn't botch anything too much. I'm just mad that I'm still playing defense, when my true strength is playing pure offense. Sorry also about losing the 3 workers. The Americans made a valiant move in sending to 2 Knights, 1 sword, 1 pike to wreck havoc into our core... Maybe I should approach this game differently. Right now, I felt pinned down and felt somewhat helpless at times, even though I want to go on the offense. I was basically trying to survive. I'm also afraid of making mistakes, and I end up making mistakes that I normally would NOT do. Maybe I should just assume we are going to lose, and just let it all loose. That might do the trick, maybe.

Suggestions:
The much better player up (microbe, ahem) next should just focus on ripping up improved French tiles. A knight army would be HUGE in terms of mobility if we can get another leader. The goal in technology I'm assuming is MT and the ever venerable cavalry. I have 2 settlers out there somewhere that are at your disposal. And please finish what I couldn't and raze Thermopolyae. Their silks could be useful in maintaining higher population, and thus lowering our unit costs.

And ah yes... an updated DoW/turns thingie:
Supposed DoW/Actual/ The Victim
172 / 177 / Aztecs
192 / TBD / Iroquois
212 / 180 / India
232 / TDB / Japanese

I have to read it later as it's quite long, but I quickly went through and you did a fantastic job! In the future please do not scare Barbslinger like that!

I'll play this tonight (12 hours).

Yes, I apologize for the length of it. I really need to compact my reports even more. If you only think about it, turn 7 was long only because a lot actually occurred. There was so many trading opportunities and I wanted to be explicit in how I was thinking so that if I did botch up, you could point out what I could have done better. And, maybe tonight you can figure out how the heck I managed to get +47gpt at one moment in turn 9, and if its still possible to pull out that much more money. After I reloaded from my crash, that was one detail I could not reproduce, so I left it as it is. But please, keep Japan happy. We need Tokugawa for his techs.

Double post...
As for the which AIs have been doing all the attacking, the Americans and the Germans are sending the most at us with their Knights and swords (I still have yet to see an MDI from anybody :confused: ) consistently. Russia sent an occasional knight, but was essentially for annoyance factor, same as French but they also send a pillaging musket. The English held aloof until this last turn, where they have 3 knights, some longbows in the west near the western army and that loaded caravel of theirs in our southwest. Babs are pushing like mad with their settler pairs towards that eastern area, but nothing serious from them. The Greeks were VERY annoying with their god-like archers that will not die. Their attacks are also consistent.

Don't get me wrong - I LIKE long turnlogs. The more detailed the better. I just need time to read it thoroughly.

Double post...
....(I still have yet to see an MDI from anybody :confused: ) .....

Lurker comment:
MDI's were disabled in this SGOTM for the purpose.. MDI as a unit only appears in PTW and doesn't exist in vanilla, so to put everyone on the same page M-B has disabled all units and everything else that is unique to PTW...


... oh and goodluck with the game, you guys really need some knights here :cool:

Lurker comment:
MDI's were disabled in this SGOTM for the purpose.. MDI as a unit only appears in PTW and doesn't exist in vanilla, so to put everyone on the same page M-B has disabled all units and everything else that is unique to PTW...


... oh and goodluck with the game, you guys really need some knights here :cool:

Damn, I wonder what else we didn't know?

But Feudalism is also not in vanilla (and pikes?).

Damn, I wonder what else we didn't know?

But Feudalism is also not in vanilla (and pikes?).

Vanilla has Feudalism tech, it doesn't have Feudalism as a form of government.
and I firmly believe vanilla has pikes

Nice job Empire! In, retrospect, we should have been on those suicide galleys 80 turns ago. Things might be different right now. Nice getting the pillaging units to France. Pike upgrades will certainly be helping.
Knights like crazy now and lets pillage some iron and clean up our South and East. Once that is accomplished, we should have this game in the bag.

@dmanakho
Thanks for the clarification, and those knights will be our saving grace for now.

@barb
Did not mean to scare you last night. I was sick, not thinking clearly, so I really had no idea how to judge my turns. I woke up, looked at my turn log I wrote last night, and I'm thinking, we have chivalry??? :D

@all
So it looks like I don't need to be skewered, yet... :rolleyes:

BTW, nice report. Once our knight production gets cracking and we can get the iron pillaged off our continent and keep it pillaged by keeping a legion army nearby this continent will roll right up. Hopefully all the iron is fairly close. 20 or so knights, build a couple of knight armies and this will be a cake walk.

I want to send an army to pillage the other continent as well, but the route isn't safe. I hope we can get to Astronomy or Navigation soon.

I want to send an army to pillage the other continent as well, but the route isn't safe. I hope we can get to Astronomy or Navigation soon.


Another lurker's comment:

Yes. The original GOTM16 bic and all the SGOTM3 Bics and Bix have the army pillage flag un-checked. Armies cannot pillage within the GOTM mod, which is news to me. I'm sure this nugget is buried somewhere in the spec. :mischief:

But there is a work around, you can find it in maintenance thread

Thanks for the reminder. We discussed that and here is the solution (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=2066184&postcount=195). :)

But there is a work around, you can find it in maintenance thread
It's all about the horsie!

Oh yeah, check to see what Iroquois trade status is like. I kinda neglected them. From what I can see, we still haven't fully uncovered our land yet. Maybe Iroquois could give us a WM? I see two irons so far in Germany (by Berlin and Munich), one in France (Tours), one in America (south west of Washington), one in Russia (Odessa), none in Babylon, and none in England that I can see. Maybe they are getting theirs from the extra German iron.

@ForTheEmpire: That was a nicely played set. This is a different game now. :thumbsup:

Good job. :)

Knights finally, now the AI can taste their own medicine.

I just hope by the time I get to play the game again, you four would have had your fill of AI blood so that I would have nothing left to kill. It's fun to fill the role of relief pitcher to the star closers :p

preturn: I'm happy to see many knights are being built.

I don't think I need to declare on anyone..

There are 3 English knights outside of Byzantium and we only have 2 legions. I move another legion from Neapolis to it.

Shuffle units around. Basically move units from inner cities to the fronts.

IBT we've got our first knight!

(1)660AD: Rome is building knight with 17spt - not good. I MM to get to 18spt. Many knights approach.

@Byzantium:
Cat hits musketeer bringing it to 1hp.
vet legoin loses 4/0 straight to the musketeer. [0-1]

@Cumae:
2 cats hit knight to 1hp.
Elite legion 1/1 kills knight. [1-1]

@Brundisium:
cat hits regular archer.
Elite legion kills it and we get a leader. [2-1]

@Veii:
Things are a little hairy here. There are two knights.
Cat misses knight.
Knight 0/4 kills knight. [3-1]
No unit to take the other knight and we may lose the cat, but we have an army nearby that will deal with this mess next turn.

Short-rush a knight in Neapolis to deal with the English knights.

@Gonzomonium:
cats hit two reg archers.
vet legion 1/2 kills archer. [4-1]
vet legion 0/2 kills archer. [5-1]

We seem to not be able to creat another army. But we can rush Sistine Chapel (not built by AI yet?) or FP. I rush it in Byzantium.

IBT India MA with Iros against us. We lose the elite legion and a spear to knight, but another spear kills a knight. [6-3]

We build Sistine and AI cascade to JS Bach, Copernicus and Smith's.

(2)670AD:

Vet knight 3/2 kills knight. [7-3]
Elite legion 2/2 kills knight. [8-3]
Vet knight 3/3 kills knight. [9-3]

I don't understand why we have 5 cats with the pillaging army. What can they do?

These English knights are annoying, but I don't feel comfortable attacking them in the forest. So let them attack us instead.

IBT we lose 2 horses, legion and a spear but kill a knight. [10-7] England lands a knight.

(3)680AD:
Vet legion 2/2 kills the knight. [11-7]
Elite legion retreats knight, another elite legion finishes it off. [12-7]
Elite legion 1/3 kills longbow and we get another leader. [13-7]

Not sure what to do with the leader. Will save for later.

IBT We lose an elite legion, but kill a knight. [14-8]

(4)690AD:

Vet legion 0/1 kills knight. [15-8]

(5)700AD:

Vet legion 0/1 kills knight. [16-8]
Vet knight 2/2 kills knight. [17-8]
army kills spear. [18-8]
Knight 0/2 kills spear. [19-8]
Vet legion 2/2 kills longbow. [20-8]
Vet horse kills longbow. [21-8]

Japan has Invention. :(

IBT we lose a horse. [21-9]

(6)710AD:

Army kills spear and we raze Chicago. [22-9]
Vet knight 0/3 kills longbow. [23-9]
Vet knight 3/3 kills Musketeer. [24-9]

IBT Russia builds JS Bach's.

(7)720AD: We completely isolated Paris.

Vet knight 1/4 kills spear. [25-9]
Vet knight 1/4 kills spear/settler. [26-9]

I use the leader to rush a granary in Antium - it's 4fpt which could be a good settler city. I'll try to make it 5fpt.

(8)730AD:

Vet knight 3/3 kills spear. [27-9]
Vet legion 2/3 kills spear. [28-9]
We raze Samarra.

Vet knight 1/2 kills knight. [29-9]
Longbow Killer 2/1 kills knight. [30-9]
Elite knight 3/3 kills pike/settler. [31-9]

India agrees to talk and wants 140g for peace. The rule doesn't say we cannot make peace, and we are supposed to declare on India at turn 212, so I make peace and get Education by 43gpt.

I then get Invention+3g from Japan by Education. It's probably our last tech trading.

I start min research on Gunpowder. We have 240g with +gpt.

I hope someone drags Japan into war again. :)

Now we can build LBM. We probably should build some.

(9)740AD:
Elite legion 0/1 kills longbowman. [32-9]
Elite knight 2/1 kills knight and get another leader. [33-9]
2 vet legions kill two longbow. [35-9]
Vet legion 2/3 kills spear. [36-9]

Veii is about to riot, I start a market in it. We barely have any infra. :(

IBT we lose 1 knight and 1 legion but kill 2 knights [38-11]

(10)750AD:
Vet knight 2/1 kills knight. [39-11]

I see musketman in Brighton! :(

Elite archer 1/1 kills spear/settler. [40-11]
Vet knight 3/2 retreats from vet musketeer. [41-11]
Vet knight 2/2 kills musketeer. [42-11]
Elite legion 4/2 loses to regular longbow! [42-12]
Longbow Killer finishes it off. [43-12]

I leave some units unmoved.

Not my best set of turns. I had to deal with constant stream of knights. I did push our front a little bit. One of the problem is those mountains and hills. We should still build some cheap legions to fortify on those locations.


Two armies are in the north. We need some knights over there too to take out Greece.

We have a leader in Brundisium, but we cannot build armies yet. I suggest to use it to rush market in Veii.

We also really need libraries and universities going.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/SGOTM3-750AD.jpg

Rough turns I'm sure. I was using leaders for markets too. It would be nice to knock off Thermop and clear the rest of the south and East. Lokks like we have units down there to deal with it. That will give us on large front to play with and will make things easier. The next few sets of turns will let our knight count rise. The Thermop area looks nice for an FP. More workers are definately needed too. More settlers for a knight army too.

Hair-raising stuff.

I got it and play tomorrow, hopefully. If the daughter invites her friends for that make-up party I have to wait till tomorrow night, my time.

Can you believe how many leaders we got and what we used them for? Quite funny actually, but sensible.

I was always wondering.

Maybe we should rush it now and move our palace later.

Workers: I think we need them to road on those mountains to the north and other front. I couldn't do it without enough escort, though.

We do have one healthy legion next to the bab city in the south. There is only one reg bowman over there, and a knight will heal next turn too, but we can also wait a turn to use those 3 cats.

EDIT: I just noticed Antium doesn't have aqueduct so is not growing! I probably have made a smoking move to rush the granary. Next player can see how to make the best use of it.

I want FP in Thermo-whatever..it's been spoken for by slinger and others for a long time. We surely haven't been without leaders in this game, but I would take a punt in my game and remove that awful city and replace it with ours.

But then, I can't do anything until I open the save, but that's my very wish to stop the AI to walk from all sides. A city over there would give us 2 fronts kind of and a less manouvering game.

Still, as I said, I need to see where we are on the battlefield.

4-1 isn't good enough, how can we increase that. microbe used cats and stuff very intelligently and yet lost too many units.

ForTheEmpire: I can't find that darn RNG-charm, I have to do Wicca. Swirl a cat three times in the air over your head and say the WORDS loudly, while dancing counter clockwise.

If that darn cat just could understand this is for the better good and stopped scratching me!

@microbe
Good work with a hard set of turns. Sorry, but those 5 cats were there to help with the pillaging. Here was what I thought. Let's say we start at tile 0, we have two groups there, (a) 5 cats, army, horse vs. (b) the army, horse. I figured adding the 5 cats makes a better pillaging group than just a horse because, in turn 1, both groups move to the next tile and pillage the tile they finish on (a-1, b-1). Next turn, (b) can move next tile and pillage (a-1, b-2) while (a) can potentially knock out 5 more tiles in it's bombard range (a-6, b-2). The next turn, it's would be (a-7, b-3) because group (a) would now move again and (b) does their thing. Of course, bombarding is a gamble, but it's a gamble that I personally like. Group (a) can still move towards a final desitnation, but bombard whatever tiles are around while group (b) would have to do a lot more movement. The drawbacks is (a) is gambling and can be a slower pillager while (b) is not as dynamic, but a sure thing and better for single target pillaging. I agree, if we are just pillaging iron, then it's better to just head straight for that first and bombard. I was orignally planning to pillage EVERYTHING along the way towards the iron. But whatever, I hope it didn't piss you off too much.

@gozpel
I"m not exactly a cat person, but I try to play with them as if they were dogs. They return my affection by clawing and biting my hands and arms :p .
Also, it is during your turns (turn 2) that you must declare on the Iroquois if they are not at war with us.

@all
About FP placement, I agree with Thermopylae. Even though Paris would be perfect, by giving us 2 solid rings, the Greek capital is better because it is not as exposed. Better late than never I guess.

EDIT: Also, I think we should be pretty liberal with leaders, and not hesitate to use them on improvements in key cities. Libs, markets, granaries, and univs are great for this, since we can't sacrifice too many turns of building civilian buildings.

May I make a suggestion? Let's pick a single military objective, and work towards that goal. Whether it's to hold the line in the north and clean out the south...or drive for Paris... I don't care. One objective.

I think the play among the members of this team has been strong, but I don't think we're playing the same game... strategy wise. I'm as guilty (if not more so) than anybody...

A second core would be nice... the more I think about it, the more it might make sense to go that route rather than putting it where Paris is now...

I vote for clearing out our northeast (Thermopylae and the new French town) and establishing our FP in that region. Of course, in the meanwhile, our north and west pillaging groups should do their things, but the concentration of offense should be in the northeast. That's my $0.02

@ForTheEmpire: you are right about the pillaging cats. I could have used them better.

I agree with one goal. I would like to see us passing those mountains. It's very hard to attack those units coming from mountains. That's why I didn't have a good kill ratio.

ForTheEmpire: "Also, it is during your turns (turn 2) that you must declare on the Iroquois if they are not at war with us."

Affirmative! But if they are at war with us, do I need to declare on someone else? I really hate this Maths-game.

Can I make peace with another civ now, microbe? I wouldn't mind peace with Germany right now, one less to fight and less knights to counter. Then I could concentrate on Thermo...

This is from ForTheEmpire's turnlog:

172 / 177 / Aztecs
<We are at turn 190>
197 / TBD / Iroquois <at war>
217 / TBD / India <peace>
237 / TBD / Japanese <peace>

So we are already at war with iro. We could make peace only if we know we don't have to declare in 20 turns. I made peace with India this way so I could broker Education and Invention.

So you cannot make peace with Germany. You can make peace with Japan before turn 217 if it declares on us.

Just to clarify what I think:

We were supposed to declare on Aztecs in turn 172 but we met it in turn 177. I think this means we were supposed to declare on Iros in turn 197, not 192, according to the rule:

If you are already at war with opponent 6 you ARE NOT required to declare war on opponent 7 UNTIL you have been at war with opponent 6 for 20 turns, or have completely destroyed opponent 6.

So this means:

Turn 217: India
Turn 237: Japan

This is from ForTheEmpire's turnlog:

172 / 177 / Aztecs
<We are at turn 190>
192 / TBD / Iroquois <at war>
212 / TBD / India <peace>
232 / TBD / Japanese <peace>

So we are already at war with iro. We could make peace only if we know we don't have to declare in 20 turns. I made peace with India this way so I could broker Education and Invention.

So you cannot make peace with Germany. You can make peace with Japan before turn 212 if it declares on us.

As I understand the rules, you can't make peace with anyone, ever. Declarations are as follows (I think):
177 - Aztecs
217 - India
237 - Japan

As I understand the rules, you can't make peace with anyone, ever.

This is not in the rules. Or did I miss anything?

3. You must stay at war with that Civ until one of you have been eliminated.
That's from M-B's starting post in the thread.

Yeah, confuse me further. We need to consult M-B.

I'm going to read the frigging rules.

But there is a context:

2. You must declare war on the first Civ you meet before leaving the diplomacy screen for the first time.
3. You must stay at war with that Civ until one of you have been eliminated.

So there are two things:
1. It literally only says you cannot make peace with the FIRST civ.
2. It indicates you cannot make peace if YOU declare on the civ.

This rule is a bit ambiguous and I'm not going to exploit it. So my understanding is that once you declare on any civ according to the 20-turn rule, you cannot make peace.

But it's very reasonable to say we can make peace (20 turns) before the due declaration day, as long as we still declare according to the agenda.

I found the clarification in the maintenance thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=2019327&postcount=50):
You are Xenophobic. If another Civ has the temerity to declare war, then you stay at war until one of you are dead.

Can you state it so I understand it, please?

Who, what and when can I make peace with ???
And who, when and what to declare on?

I really dislike this variant now.

I better just continue bang my head against the knights and get on with it. :(

I found the clarification in the maintenance thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=2019327&postcount=50):

Thanks for the pointer, and I am pissed off.

It's not my responsibility to go through the maintenance thread and read all such scattered "clarification". I refer to the official rule and there is no such thing at all.

The Xenophobic part of the variant runs as follows.

7. You may never own a foreign worker. You must never buy or sell one, and if you capture them they must be disbanded on the tile on which they were captured.
8. All deals must be at face value. No haggling.
9. You will not establish embassies.
10. You will never retain a town that contains foreign citizens. Such towns must be razed and any workers spawned disbanded.


The "Xenophobic" part of the rule doesn't even mention war and peace.

I already made peace with India and I cannot replay my turns.

I don't think this variant will make it into any SG's. This sucks right now.

What Tarkeel said is how I understood it, so our variant is no longer a variant, I guess.

We already made peace at least once.

I suggest we suspend the game and hear what scout and FTE say about it, and Mad-bax.

Never had such a frustrating game, even in the ones that I lost.

I have no problem with continuing the game as it is, and I am afraid I cannot replay the turns.

Let's just go through the motions then, I never abandon a game.

Even if this game particularly sucks.

Suspend != abandon.

Continue when we agree to whether to proceed or correct the mistake, if possible.

@Microbe: Xenophobic has nothing to do with war/peace, just about not being able to own any foreigners at all. No peace is pretty clear from basic NOW in my eyes atleast, m-b just made it more detailed/complicated to avoid sand-bagging (keeping a tundra city/settler alive to avoid declaring on next civ).

I suggest we suspend the game and hear what scout and FTE say about it, and Mad-bax.Okay... let me see if I've got this straight... we slipped outside variant play, and we can't re-play to get back in bounds... and you want me to weigh in on this discussion somehow. Let me first see if I understand our options:

1) See if Mad-Bax can come up with a way for us to get back within the variant.

2) Continue to play the variant as best we can, regardless of whether or not we get credit for variant play...

3) Abandon the variant, and just play a friendly little emperor slugfest game.

Before I offer any opinion, does that sum up the reasonable options? I'm with gozpel on not abandoning the game...I'd prefer we don't do that.

@Microbe: Xenophobic has nothing to do with war/peace, just about not being able to own any foreigners at all. No peace is pretty clear from basic NOW in my eyes atleast, m-b just made it more detailed/complicated to avoid sand-bagging (keeping a tundra city/settler alive to avoid declaring on next civ).

But MB said this which you just quoted:

You are Xenophobic. If another Civ has the temerity to declare war, then you stay at war until one of you are dead.

It's obvious to me that "no peace" is tied with Xenophobic, not NOW.

I never played either variant before, so I have no comment on whether peace is allowed in normal games, which has little to do with THIS game, anyways.

I think that was mad-bax posting in-character, as the audacious roman emperox mad-baximus. NOW is basically a relaxed AW game that allows for opening trades.

NOW is basically a relaxed AW game that allows for opening trades.

And where does it say anything about not making peace ever?

I checked Arathorn's variant guide and there is no such thing. In fact in the sample game (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=61273&page=1&pp=20) they did discuss making peace (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=1192378&postcount=95), and they did make peace (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=1195726&postcount=101).

"Continue when we agree to whether to proceed or correct the mistake, if possible."

microbe, I think you need a chat with M-B on this one. I can only correct it by declaring right away. Otherwise we're done with the variant.

microbe, I think you need a chat with M-B on this one. I can only correct it by declaring right away. Otherwise we're done with the variant.I agree. Let's see if "option #1" above is an option at all. Either we can bring this game back within the variant, or we cannot. Only Maddimus Baximus can answer that question. Once we have his ruling, we will make a decision, and play.

It is not helpful to sit here and go round-and-round about the rules; what's done is done, and there's no sense getting excited about it. I know I stepped outside the variant by squawking about the slave workers, and didn't catch all of 'em... so I don't think any one of us is to blame any more than any other.... and I don't think this game is indicative of the sort of talent that we've got assembled here... this simply isn't going to be one of our better games.

Some days you're the bug, some days you're the windshield. It's our day to be the bug.

And I prefer gozpelodium games, with rules I understand. microbium should agree.

scoutsout: "I know I stepped outside the variant by squawking about the slave workers, and didn't catch all of 'em"

And so did I :)

I'm going to talk to MB. I wish he could say something like "it's my fault, I'll do better next time, do me a favor and here is what I think you might do to correct this problem.."

And I might then be in a better mood to go back and try replaying the last few turns.

The fault isn't ours. We shouldn't be punished for it.

And so did I :)So I guess we're all just a bunch of warmongering fools... and you know what?!?!?!

I'm okay with that. :D

Wow... :eek:
When I first heard about microbe making peace with India, I didn't give second thought to it because I agreed with his explanation. However, since M-B did say (as pointed out by Tarkeel) that if someone were to declare on us prematurely, we can never have peace, I'm suddenly in the "oh well" mode :rolleyes: . We all made a lot of mistakes when it came to following the guidelines towads these rules. I agree with ya'll and that we should hold off playing till M-B can give us a final verdict and go from there.

The whole DoW thing, I based that off of the the maintenance thread in what civ_steve and M-B talked about, and that 20 turns after each DoW is based from the very FIRST DoW made. So I added 20 turns from the DoW of Greece. I had to immediately declare on the Aztecs because they fell on turn 177, but Iroqouis should still be turn 192. But this is trivial since we have a bigger aformentioned issue to deal with.

Sorry for the double post, but I would like to offer a little more of my $0.02 cents of the matter. If we were declare this game as non-variant, then I feel all of our struggles and efforts to this point would be wasted and we basically just tortured ourselves for nothing. I hope M-B can somehow find a middle ground on this, like having microbe (if he's willing) to replay his turnset even though the results will now be dramatically different, just anything so we don't have to be declared non-variant. I would like to finish what we started, and not have our sadism be in vain :spank: for something imho can be corrected.

Since I have been completely unable to make the rules clear, and because the mistake was genuine and makes little difference to the result, just Re-declare war and carry on.

I think every team (including the staff team) have transgressed at some point. It is obvious therefore that it is my fault and not the players. You live and learn I guess.

Oh thank you most benevolent one! But one more thing, am I right about the DoWs, or is microbe's interpretation correct? Please see post #295 (I think, it's around there, on page 15)

EDIT: I changed it to the right post #.

So... the Xenophobic Non-Oscillating slugfest continues... :hammer:

Since I won't play until tomorrow, my time, who am I re-declaring on again?

I just have to laugh, I'm utterly confused :) But drunk.

Thanks Mad-bax, I'm feeling better. :)

For others reference, this is what I got from PM:

So long as you are at war with the civ continuously from the date you should officially declare then you are OK. My intention was that once you were at war with a civ you stayed at war with a civ, but since I have been unable to make myself clear, it would be unfair to penalise you or anyone else for a genuine mistake that has very little effect on the result.

So we carry on and just declare on India in turn 217, and Japan 237. We shouldn't declare on India now, as we still have deals with them.

Oh..... you guys really need to memorize every single message in maintenance thread to undestand the rules :) . We are lucky having Tarkeel in our team and he helped us not to make too many mistakes.

I really enjoy visiting your team's thread.... Everytime I check, there is something interesting going on...
:rolleyes:

@Gozpel: As far as I'm concerned, you can declare on whoever you want to...as long as it's war you're declaring, and not peace. :p

So when is turn 217? My C3C thingie is corrupt.

So we carry on and just declare on India in turn 217, and Japan 237. We shouldn't declare on India now, as we still have deals with them.

Khmm... is next turn 217???
I believe if you made mistake and made a peace with India, you must declare war right away very next turn... and it doesn't matter if you have some ongoing deals with them, you will pay for your mistake with your ruined reputation....
Well, actually i don't have power to make those decision, so M-B will probably have to say something on this when he reads it.

Khmm... is next turn 217???
I believe if you made mistake and made a peace with India, you must declare war right away very next turn... and it doesn't matter if you have some ongoing deals with them, you will pay for your mistake with your ruined reputation....
Well, actually i don't have power to make those decision, so M-B will probably have to say something on this when he reads it.

Check MB's PM reply to me.

And I'm more than happy to redeclare immeidately and get our gpt back. Who cares about reputation in this game? And even with a broken rep we can still make gpt deals by renegotiating peace with Japan.

I assume no purposely breaking deals is the ultimate rule above everything else. That's just inside roots of SG players. If any team took advantage of this, I'd not consider that a valid game.

At last, I stand by my statement that we did not make mistake.

So when is turn 217? My C3C thingie is corrupt.

We are at turn 190 according to ForTheEmpire.

I don't know how to check this in PTW. C3C tells you about that.

As I have last calculated, we are indeed at turn 190, with gozpel up. I'll go along with the way you posted the DoWs microbe, but I sent a PM to M-B just to be sure. I bet he's getting quite annoyed with us by now :mischief: So the next DoW should indeed be 217, which if I can count...
Turns 191-200 gozpel, 201-210 scoutsout, 211-220 barbslinger. So barb, you have the honor of declaring on India.

I'm afraid you guys have me confused once more. The last declaration I can find is on turn 177. I cannot find the date for when you came to be at war with the iroquois. To be fair I did ask for teams to keep a list of contact dates and DoW dates.

My understanding therefore is that you should declare on India immediately and on the next opponents on turn 197. This could be later if the war with the Iroquois started later than 177, in which case it would be 20 turns after that.

Just a quick note... if I should go incommunicado anytime soon, it's not because I'm quitting or anything. Unless something changes in the next 24 hours, there's about an 80% chance that I will experience the eye of a hurricane by this time tomorrow. With that comes a pretty good chance that I'll lose electricity, which might make it hard to play in any SGs.

:eek: Oh crap, that's right! You do live Florida, the fact didn't sink in until you mentioned the hurricane. Yeah scout, do whatever, board up your windows, build a bunker, whatever, forget about electricity and sgs.

I'm afraid you guys have me confused once more. The last declaration I can find is on turn 177. I cannot find the date for when you came to be at war with the iroquois. To be fair I did ask for teams to keep a list of contact dates and DoW dates.

My understanding therefore is that you should declare on India immediately and on the next opponents on turn 197. This could be later if the war with the Iroquois started later than 177, in which case it would be 20 turns after that.

We are supposed to declare on Iro in turn 197, but we are already at war, so we don't have to. But to my understanding that shouldn't affect the date we declare on India.

Or I am wrong again?

177 - Aztecs
197 - Iro (already at war sometime between 177 and 197)
217 - India
237 - Japan

I refer to this post (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=2058182&postcount=73). Not yours, admittedly, but people seem to think that's right.

I think we are all confused throughout the game.

This is the rule.

1. You must declare war on the first civ you make contact with on the turn you make contact.

2. You must declare war on the second civ you make contact with 20 turns or less after you declared war on the first civ.

3. You must declare war on the third civ you make contact with 20 turns or less after the turn you declared war on the second civ.

4. You must declare war on the fourth civ you make contact with 20 turns or less after the turn you declared war on the third civ.

5. yada yada yada ad nauseum.

Things that can change this.

a) A civ declares war on you. This is the same as you declaring war on a civ early. So the next civ in the list has a DoW date twenty turns from this time.

b) You declare war on a civ that is not next on the list. Fine. Then the DoW date for the next Civ is in twenty turns time.

I called it the twenty turn rule because it is exactly that. Every twenty tuns you are at war with a new civ. If you want to declare war earlier, or out of turn then that's up to you. If a civ declares war on you then hard luck.

The intent of the rule is clear - I can no longer suspend disbelief that this team cannot grasp the intent of the rule.

Personally I have had it now. You decide when you should declare on who. If I disagree I will disqualify the team.

That's it for me. Oh, and thanks guys :goodjob:

Now it makes sense...
So whenever the Iroquois declared on us, we just add 20 to that. That will be Japan (unless they declare before hand), and since we will redeclare on the India immediately, that will be it with DoWs. Just need to find out when did the Iroquois declared on us :confused:

The intent of the rule is clear - I can no longer suspend disbelief that this team cannot grasp the intent of the rule.

Mab-bax, I learn new things every time I read your clarification of the rules. Intent? I don't read people's minds. I only read English.

I won't hold my breath that we'll do things up to your intent, so we'll probably be disqualified anyway. But to me the whole SGOTM3 is disqualified.

Gozpel, you probably should declare on India and get our gpt back. I actually like that idea.

I posted this (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=2093080&postcount=167) in the maintenance thread. It says all.

EDIT: I don't mind continuing to play, but I don't think it makes sense to join the "competition" any more. We can just play it as a game according to our own understanding. I would not break the deal just for the silly 20-turn rule.

On the other hand, if people still want to join the competition, I think someone has to replay my last few turns to avoid the peace treaty. I can try to provide the autosave. But I have to resign from the team because I refuse to throw away legitimate turns.

Declare on India and get back the gpt.

Army 9/19 kill Rus knight.
Leg kill Bowman and raze Lagash. [2-0]

760AD - Syracuse barracks -> pike

Rush a couple of legs.

770AD - Antium settler -> knight
Neocalodonium walls -> barracks
Viroconium leg -> leg
Brundisium leg -> leg

Kill French knight and LB
Army lose 10hp killing a stupid reg hoplite, elite leg dies against another
knight kill Greek LB
elite leg kills Rus reg musket with settler
kill 2 american knights [9-1]

780AD - Lose a knight and kill a musket IT.

Rome and Pisae builds knights -> same

kill american knight
kill english LB
kill hoplite

Microbe's 9hp army dies against 2hp american knight! knight kills the stubborn AM. knight.

create another army with Claudius, will fill it with knights

kill Rus knight and english LB, get a leader.[16-3]

790AD - Lose 2 legions IT.

Army kills hoplite in Thermo and raze the city
Leg kill another hoplite and raze Eritrea
Lose a knight, killing 2 german knights

pillage french iron [20-6]

800AD - Missed a settler pair and a babs spear raze Brundisium

Kill greek LB and english knight IT, lose a leg

Kill the babs spear and german knight
kill english knight
kill french LB
kill Rus LB [27-7]

Aesonesium founded on old Thermo spot

810AD - Neapolis riots, set luxes to 10% to give me a chance to concentrate on warring.

Caesaraugusta founded

kill french LB [28-7]

820ad - kill 3 english knights and a LB. lose 1 knights and a leg.
kill german knight [35-9]

Hurry FP in Aesonioum

830AD - Germany finish Smiths.

lose a forted pike against english LB IT.

FP built

kill german knight, rus musket and 2 greek LB's - lose a knight
kill american pike [40-11]

840AD - Kill greek LB IT

kill 2 rus spears and raze Tblisi
kill 2 babs LB's
kill french LB's

Things are getting hairy now, plenty of enemy knights around [45-11]

850AD - Pillage german horses

Palmyra founded

kill english LB
kill 3 rus knights, lose leg
kill 2 american knights
kill babs spear/settler
kill french LB and musket [54-12]

The ratio is BAD! We won't be able to keep this up as it goes, those mountains is our worst enemy.

Continue pillaging, there is an iron close in Germany and then go and remove english horses.

I used our meager economy to rush a knight now and again.

Be prepared to meet cavs very soon.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/rome-map.jpg

Find those horses and pillage them. Hard to beleve you let Brundisium slip to a settler pair. It shall be remembered. Otherwise, we have a knight army rolling, which is nice. Leader luck for armies and pillaging will be key here. Buckle down and hunker. Destroy thier resources and build troops on defense until we can counter. The FP is built now so get some troops over there and roads. Take your time and pillage.

Don't worry gozpel, we're still alive right ;) ? And I see you made great progress in the south and established the beginnings of our 2nd core with the FP built. Is the FP in Aesonisum? Also, I guess no gpt deals for invention huh, due to the redeclare on India... sigh... Whatever, we got enough I think to live on. We're two away from MT (invention and chem), and we're making +63gpt, I think we can start thinking about getting in some libraries here and there, and some markets :lol: ! Like, have only one of our core cities build a library or market at a time, while all other cities produce military. The 2nd core, when up, can help out considerably with this, and maybe then we can afford to build more infrastructure. If the cavs are coming in soon, then I think all leaders need to be used the turn they spawn, because we are going to fight a lot more battles then with elites. So maybe burn some leaders on infrastructure.

Let's hope scoutsout is nice and dry and unscathed from the hurricane.

Pillage!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And yes, PILLAGE!!! Specifically, horses to stop those bloody knights and prevent cavs (I did send out pillaging armies during my turns you know, just wait till you're up so you can have fun with them :mischief: )

Okay - I've got it...but I might not get to it tonight...

Pillage in size=7 bold caps... got it..

Yeah, Brudisium was a slip, I was protecting the settler and moved out an army from the town and didn't see what I did until too late :) Ah well, a pop 1 town with a few shields lost. And a settler is closeby to resettle.

FP is in Aesonesium.

Pre-flight check ...

Cities seem to be in okay shape... change a few pike builds to Legions.

IBT - lots of enemy troops advance... and i have an idea...
English drop off a couple of longbows in our lightly defended core...
Greeks request and audience, and are rebuffed.

Rome Knight>Knight
Veii Knight>Knight
Pompeii Settler>Legion

French start Shakes
English building Copernicus', Shakes, Magellan's
Nottingham completes Copernicus' Observatory
Germans cascade to Shakes

Turn 1 (860) Promote one of two knights whacking the english longbows... move some stuff around, bombards some enemby units...

In an attempt to draw the German Knights out of the mountains and towards Aesonium, I empty the garrison and send the Legion armies north to see if they can do some damage.

IBT - Enemy troops advance... go 1-0-1 against german longbows in the mountains.

Neocaledonium Rax>Legion
Gonzomonium Legion>Legion
Frankfurt completes Shakespeare's theater.

Turn 2 (870)

Lob a rock outside a german city, and the stupid game hangs. :wallbash:

Okay - after rebooting and running spybot, I'm ready for another go at this. A lot of this infernal spyware crap uses ActiveX... which (as it happens) is used by the game too, I believe...

Pillage german Iron and another tile outside Munich

Move some troops around, and try to establish something that resembles a perimeter in the mountains. Gozpel's right...these mountains are our enemy. Time to befriend them.

IBT - German Knights go 1-0-1 versus a legion in the mountains. Greek Longbow attacks a legion and dies outside Gonzo

Hispalis Knight>Legion
Aesonium Rax>Spear

French building Magellan's

Turn 3 (880) whack a German Knight, whack a couple of english muskets...

Found Jerusalem on a horse covered in a rockpile

An elite archer...and no real good use for him...whack a french longbow... no leader... he's cannon fodder now...

IBT - the first English Cavalry shows up... on our western flank. Amazingly, we redline the cav.

Turn 4 (890) Pillage some more stuff in germany..

Wake an elite an elite Legion in Neocaledonium to go after the redlined Cav, and...

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/sgotm3_microbe_scout_ldr1.jpg

IBT- I'll be danged... we did not lose a single unit...

The French request an audience, and are rebuffed. Because they're the French, and we're as Xenophobic, poor war-mongering a bunch of fools as you'll ever want to find. :band: (1 gold per turn to Sir Bugsy)

Rome trains a Knight...as does Antium...and Cumae..and Neaopolis. Pisae Trains a Legion, starts a longbow. Vironicum Pike>Legion

Turn 5 (900) whack a Ruskie Knight... a french longbow... make that 2 French Longbows...knock some HP off some others outside Brundisium...

Here we go... Akkad... 2 Legion Armies versus Bab musket(s)

First Legion Army is redlined killing a musket, second Legion Army catches a new musket flatfooted and kills him. Akkad is now defended by a spear.

Found Caeseara on a rockpile. Kill some bad guys... move some stuff around...

Got 3 fresh knights in a shiny new army. Hey 'slinger...remember "rucksack full of five-five-six and a pocket full of rice?"

Take a screenie...I think I'm rolling 'em back in the mountains...

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/sgotm3_microbe_scout_akkad.jpg

IBT - some german Knights attack...
English request and audience... and are promptly taunted.

2 More English Cav take a shot at us... not good. We retreat another...

Ravenna Knight>Knight. Hispalis Legion>Settler Syracuse Legion>Legion

Turn 6 (910)
This business of whacking Cavalry with Legions at Neocaledonium is a freakin' hoot! But seriously...I think I'm gonna try to get something faster over there...

Pillage some stuff around Marseilles...

Oh yeah! Legion Army versus Bab spear...I've been waiting for this one:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/sgotm3_microbe_scout_akkad_toast.jpg

Shuffle some troops...give some troops a rest...

IBT - Babylonians request and audience (are you guys picking up a recurring theme here?) and are told :p

IBT - the french whack on of our Knight armies with a cav that was under the fog :cry:

Train some more troops...

Turn 7 (920) whack a couple of German Muskets...

IBT- an English Cavalry knocks off a Legion at Byzantium, a greek Longbow dies against a legion at some greek city...

Byzantium Knight>Knight Aesonium Spear>Longbow

Turn 8 (930)

I may be goin' down, but I plan on taking a few AI with me!

...and the stupid game won't advance units properly...

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/sgotm3_microbe_scout_houston.jpg

Reboot, Load the game back up and Houston falls (again)...whack a French Longbow...

Our catapults go 0-4 against the English Cav...Lose an elite Knight against that English Cav... promote a Knight killing that bugger.

Pillaging around Marseilles...and Amiens...

IBT - Japan requests an audience...the only one we'll listen to...wants our territory map...won't trade Gunpowder...

IBT - here come the Cavalry... this is not good...

An English Cav picks off a knight on a hill..

Turn 9 (940) take out that English cav...give some troops a rest...kill a musketeer at Amiens...

IBT - Unbelievable... A German Cav dies to a Legion at Brundisium, an English Cav dies to a Legion at
a French longbow falls to our knight at Amiens...

Palmyra worker>rax

Turn 10 (950)

After killing some enemy, and resting some units, I lose an elite Legion at Mycenae, promoting the fortified hoplite. There was a Greek longbow on the heels of the one I was about to attack with...not even noticing that the Legion was Elite, I decided that 2 Legions was probably not enough to take the city, so I went after the longbow, and...

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/sgotm3_microbe_scout_Holy_Crap.jpg

The new leader is in Gonzomorium.

After action review:

Got us another leader, built a knight Army, got a Knight army killed, got another leader...sacked some cities, pillaged some stuff, killed some bad guys, got some of our guys killed.

There's a French settler pair headed towards that flatlands area where I cleared out Akkad (and Houston)... that settler pair is headed right into the gaping maw of 2 Legion Armies and a knight army...and a settler pair on the way...

Oh yeah @ 'slinger..there's a leader there for ya...

We need to figure out a way to press towards the NW...grab spices and take the fight to England... aside from longbows and the occasional cav, not much out of France this turnset.

If we are out of towns to support army again, we can disband a leg army.

We are seeing cavs..from England only? Got to pillage its horses or saltpeter. Those knight armies could pillage faster.

All in all good job in surviving.

Does not sound too bad. If we can get the horses pillaged we should be fine. Gotta keep the pillaging going. Will play tomorrow. No chance at the gunpowder from Japan yet? Do I have a declaration coming up?

@Microbe: We can build an army. I got 2 leaders during my turns. The first one built an army, and I later got an army killed. :blush:

@Barbslinger: IIRC, you'll see French cav as well. We have a Legion army, a horse, and some cats pillaging near Marseilles. Our other armies are healing on some fresh rockpiles east of the mountains. That next french town to the north is where Magellan's is. Please take a screenie if you manage to sack it.

Some thoughts: pump some legions into the mountains, so we don't have to clear them out again. That's probably the most positive thing I was able to do was clear out those mountains.

I'm glad you guys thought those turns were okay... I was playing "Barbslinger Method"... and the last few turns are a little hazy.

Oh yeah - @'slinger: couldn't buy gunpowder off Japan, and I think a DoW is due in a turn or two...

Does not sound too bad. If we can get the horses pillaged we should be fine. Gotta keep the pillaging going. Will play tomorrow. No chance at the gunpowder from Japan yet? Do I have a declaration coming up?

If our rep is screwed, the only chance to get it from Japan is to reneg peace.

I don't think we care about rep anymore, so when we need to declare on Japan we don't need to keep the deal?

At the end, when should we declare on Japan? According to "the rule that everybody else is playing", we need to declare in turn 237, but according to "the rule that mad-bax gave to our team only", we ned to declare 20 turns after we did it on India, which is next player's turns.

Just declare on him. He won't sell us anything, and he's the last one we're at peace with. After that we can quit worrying about the DoW timetable, and simply sack stuff.

Barbslinger - up
ForTheEmpire - on deck

We are still alive, that's all I care and that makes me happy. The RNG was definitely at your side there microbe. It sounded like the ever venerable legion is proving its worth all the way to the IA :D I think Ision needs to rethink his thoughts on the legion as a UU once he reads our thread. How many sources of horses do the english have? I hope none are under cities.

@Barb
For simplicity's sake, just declare on your second turn. I shouldn't have to remind you, but do try to get whatever you can, even world maps from Tokugawa. And yes, please go kick some ARSE :evil:

I'll have to play this tomorrow. It's to late now. Declare on 2nd turn. Okie-dokie.

My premonition of cavs wasn't too far away :)

Still, it's not lost with pillaging tactics. I think slinger will handle that excellently.

Why the heck am I smiling? It's not funny, just amusing, I guess.

Why the heck am I smiling? It's not funny, just amusing, I guess.Yes it is funny. This thing has gotten so messy, there's no choice but to laugh or cry. And big boys don't cry.

SGOTM03-Microbe-950AD

Preturn – Change Pisae and Rome to settlers to get our new FP going. Titus will be making another army of knights, this time. I plan to secure our FP area, take out Greece and get some pillaging done. Lux can drop a notch and Guns are set to get them in 10.

IT – No attacks as they try to go for the core. A French musket/settler pair are heading towards our FP area. Build 2 settlers and a knight.

[1] 960 – Kill 3 knights and a LB. Start the pillaging boys through the mountains to take out the gems on the way back to France.
IT – Lose 2 units to cavs. France plants and will be raised. More units moving in.
[2] 970 – Kill anumber of units losing an elite knight against a 2/5 cav. Raze the new French town of Cherborg losing 2 hp from the 4 knight army. Can’t even get a WM out of Japan so he gets the finger and a war declaration.
IT – Lose a knight and a legion guarding a mountain. Build a bunch due to rushing the last few turns off of builds.
[3] 980 – Get to work and knock out the cav after using cats that were in the field. Use the new army to knock out a knight, back up to the road and move some other cats to knock hp off a Russian knight sneaking towards the core. Amiens shows a spear to 2 legions moving in for the kill. It’s a future town site. Rheims will be attacked by the legion army next turn. All looks clear, for now. Whoa, just realized the 2 elikes in our FP town can attack Amiens now and it gets razed. Now that group can head to the Greek capital at the end of the peninsula. 3 legions moving on a Greek town in the south.
IT – Greeks come up with some LB’s out of two towns to stall my plans. No attacks but more troops move in to die.
[4] 990 – Kill one musket in Rheims. An army kills a musket and disbands a settler. Kill 2 cavs and 3 knights. Only one LB and 2 reg LB’s in sight.
IT – More troops move in. One of the greek LB’s in the south loses to our legion flawless so that plan continues with 3 legions attacking soon.
[5] 1000 – Kill all threats. I see one Russian knight in the distance near Rheims. 2 E knights near Greek capital. Guns in 4. That will help on defense.
IT – Another knight joins up with the other and they hold position.
[6] 1010 – Raze Rheims and Magellans and disband a worker. The Greek capital holds with 1 kill and one knight retreating. Reinforcements coming. Time to stock up the FP towns. The southern Greek town has one injured hoppy left.
IT – An English cav drops off near undefended Antium. 2 knights were built within striking range and there is backup.
[7] 1020 – Damn we lose the 2 new builds to the damn cav. Kill him with the 3rd pulled from Neocaled… Lose another vet knight flawless killing a knight near Byzantium.
Found Tarentum and Nicomedia and Selucia for the core. All set to walls. French gems are finally pillaged. Guns in 2 at at +12gpt with 72 in the bank. Key up another settler in Veii for the soon to be vacant Greek capital.
IT – Survive a cav in Brund but not in Neocaled…
[8] 1030 – Kill the cav at Neo that was injured. Raze the greek capital Pharsalos. The southern greek town Mycenae stands after a vet knight and a vet legion can’t take down one hoplite.
IT – Guns are in and I kick science to 10% to build some cash for upgrades. The Ravenna forum I started is done. Set to knight. Other knight builds. A 2/4 knight on a mountain that had killed a knight prior beats almost two knights leaving the last one injured.
[9] 1040 – Plenty of saltpeter but none hooked up. Moving on the one near our FP now (closest to workers). Loust RNG again losing an E knight to a 2hp knight on the flats.
IT – My God, our yellow NOT red army gets attacked by a cav and we lose an army. RNG luck continues with another loss.
[10] 1050 – Get a leader near Corinth that heads back to make another army. He is near Ceasarea. Damn, lose a vet legion to a ¼ cav! This is out of hand and our troops are super thin now at the front. I high tail a knight in FP towards the front and shift some others. There is not enough enemy to knock off a city, unless the brundesium army falls.

I have a knight underneath the legion army to disconnect French horses in the NE. there are legion builds coming to hopefully take out the two southern Greek towns. Maybe get some knight backup to guarantee it. Knights are building this turn so it should smooth out a bit after some rushing. Workers in the SE are heading to the salt and check them for movement left. I can’t remember if I moved them.
It started out very nice but the last 3 turns were horrible RNG. Good luck.

A well played set there Barbslinger... this game is getting hairy. Any chance of settling some towns to the NW? Or is that territory too heavily contested?

A well played set there Barbslinger... this game is getting hairy. Any chance of settling some towns to the NW? Or is that territory too heavily contested? Perhaps when our armies can get freed up we can send them in groups to take out the french town, Dijon I think, and the English town, Coventry, I think. That extra lux in Coventry looks nice.
On the game I wouldn't wait to long before getting research going. We need to get to cavs fairly soonish. Building some more markets would certainly help. More workers are needed too when we get a chance. Ravenna could use some irrigation and hill mining.

If we can get up to Paris and get those Englis towns it would provide a thinner front it shows on the minimap. Once Greece is out of the way we can set up some fishing villages and that will provide some income too from unit upkeep. I could not believe when the cav attacked the knight army! Beware!

That's the AI in a nutshell, it knows when to attack and when to win. Ah well, luckily you got another leader straight away, so no great harm done.

Good job whacking and settling :)

My gut feeling is we shouldn't expand withour proper defense. If our defense is thin, I'd keep what we have and just pillage.

The sad thing is that we seem not to have a proper SoD to take AI cities one by one.

The sad thing is that we seem not to have a proper SoD to take AI cities one by one.We could assemble a stack... the problem is that we are literally fighting in every direction. Though I managed to clear out the mountains, it came at some cost...and the armies needed time to heal. Once the mountains were cleared out, the enemy just started showing up in the west.

You guys are going to think I'm nuts, but we're not necessarily out of this thing... at least as far as winning the game goes.... but I think we're going to have to figure out a way to do more fighting on our own terms if we're going to pull this off.

And I'm not sure we know what terms we'd want to fight on.

Hrmm... sorry guys, but the earliest I can pick this up and play it would be tomorrow morning. I have relatives and friends over all day. If you feel like taking a crack at this first microbe if you can't wait about another 14 more hours, then by all means switch up with me.

@Barb
Yay, we TNTed our first AI [party] wonder , now how many more to go?

EDIT: I just noticed this, but since when did India started to collapse (the grey)? Those Aztecs will be mighty tough to budge later in the game if we are destined to cleanse our continent.

Hmmm... alright, I got it. Expect a report within 6 hours.

Pre Turn 1050AD:
Set at 6.4.0 for Chemistry in 18 at +41gpt. I don't understand the temple in Cumae, but I leave it as is. Salt next to Syracuse will get hooked up.

IT:
Kill a cav in Cumae [1:0]
Rome Knight -> Library in 5 (we need more research power, and I'll only do one non military build at a time)
Antium Knight -> Knight, w/ mming to get it to 7 instead of 8 turns
Gonzonium Leg -> settler (stuck at 4 pop, might as well)
Caesarea Leg -> Barracks (regular leg???)

Turn 1: 1060AD
Move leader to our core and load 1 knight into army. Direct our northern pillaging squad towards the French salt. Some worker home improvement. Pummel a Greek galley with some cats. Kill a knight [2:0]. I have no idea where the settler I have been left with was heading towards, but I will fill out our north/east with it. Change syracuse for a settler in 2 with growth in 2. After all my mming for the sake of production, our income is down to +36gpt. Change Byzantium to Cat in 5 opposed to knight in 22, and Neocaledium to worker in 4 opposed to pike in 14. I have an idea... and start to move some units accordingly.

IT:
Lose leg to a knight and promotes [2:1]. Beat back an English cav with our leg, and retreats
Tarentum Walls -> Barracks in 10
Neopolis Knight -> Knight in 5
Viroconium Pike -> Worker in 4
Nicomedia Walls -> Barracks in 10

Turn 2: 1070AD
Kill 1 settler pair, a cav, and a knight [5:1]. Change Jerusalem from knight in 15 to Pike in 1.

IT:
Wow, the Aztecs land... 2 swords two away from any city... Um, that is a lot of French cavalry in one area (3).
Jerusalem Pike -> Pike in 10
Caesaraugusta Walls -> Worker in 10
Hispalis Knight -> Knight in 7
Syracuse Settler -> Leg in 10

Turn 3: 1080AD
Lose 1 knight, but kill a musket with another [6:2]. Lose a knight to an Aztec sword badly and I produce a leader for him... what the hell... :mad: Kill 2 cavs and a knight [9:3]. Remember that lib build in Rome? What was I thinking! Back to knight in 3. 2 more cavs in striking range of Byzantium, which has only 2 knights for defense. No chance of reinforcments, so let us pray.

IT:
Very bad... A Cossack comes out of nowhere and plasters a knight in Byzantium, A french cav eats a pike flawlessly, and an english Cav destroys another knight. We kill a german knight though [10:5].

Turn 4: 1090AD
That Aztec leader btw, is in a galley now. Priorities now changed to take out salt of Russia after French salt (in 2 turns). Kill a cav [11:5], and I upgrade our first musket. Science to zero and hire a scientist for some cash (107gpt) and upgrading power.

IT:
<Insert your favorite expletive> Lose 3 more units and kill 1 sword as a consolation [12:8].
Lugdunum Knight -> Knight
Neocaledonium Worker -> Leg

Turn 5: 1100AD
I'm about to punch a hole into my monitor, destroy my cd, and scream bloody hell to all the powers that be. What is with my RNG!?!?!? I lose another leg flawlessly to a 2hp sword, but I kill it later [12:9]. Seriously, my losses have been nearly flawless victories almost all the time for the AI, and a lot have been in walled hill towns. !@#$. Kill 1 cav pretty easily with a knight army, but then I lose 8 straight hp to another cav dealing only 1 damage... [14:13] 3 knights plus a leader. Kill another knight but takes off 8 hp off another army!!! OH COME ON! That army lives, barely... Rearrange our defense again, and I adjust our science back to 50% to get +21gpt with 145 gold in the bank. Funny how all our pikes died before they can get upgraded :cry: ... Our forces are down to almost nothing and I still have a lot more cavs and knights knocking on the door. Cumae's temple in 3 gets vetoed to a musket in 3. And I change some more builds to adapt to our dire situation. Add in a few more musket upgrades we are down to 15 gold. Finally, I build Artaxata in our FP core -> Barracks in 10

IT:
Kill a knight, lose a knight. This is starting to become a bad theme [15:14]
Rome knight -> knight in 5
Pompeii knight -> knight in 9

Turn 6: 1110AD
Kill a cav and a knight [17:14]. Remember that idea I said earlier? Well, I canned it a few turns ago. I was planning on moving 12 legions, 10 cats, 4 knights, and an army to our western most town to go out and destroy London and whatever else that is in the way. Obviously, that isn't feasible anymore. Sadly, I'm almost tempted to fight a musketeer on a hill with a musket. Build Aurelianorum in FP core barracks in 10. Lose 2 more legs in taking out a hoplite, and there is still one left in the greek town [17:16].

IT:
Kill a knight, lose 2 [19:19]. Those cossacks are pissing me off hardcore, as well as the numerous RoP agreements the AI have.
Neopolis knight -> knight in 5

Turn 7: 1120AD
Kill a longbow [20:19]. This would have been the ideal game to try out the longbow's defensive bombard, but oh well.

IT:
Sigh... sombody just shoot me now.
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/The_Beginning_of_the_End.JPG
I lose total 10 units (7 cats), kill 1, I don't care anymore [21:29]

Turn 8: 1130AD
Well, then this happens
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/Or_not.JPG
and I'm just backed to ambivelency minus the heartache. And wow, we have our cats back [22:22]. Lose another knight in attempt to dislodge a musket on our iron [22:23]. Again money raising must be done, science to zero, forget about the scientist, 141gpt.

IT:
Lose a musket on a forest, being attacked across a river to a cossack and only took off 1hp [22:24].

Turn 9: 1140AD
We do not have the troops to defend four different attack points, even if they are all on the same front. Byzantium cannot be reinforced, neither can any other hotzone. I will lose Veil to that musketeer because it is defended with an 1hp knight. Lose a knight, kill 1 cossack and a knight [24:25]. Also may lose Veil since it only has one 4/4 musket and has to contend with a cossack. Lots of musket upgrading, still need more cash (144gpt at 0 sliders).

IT:
Oh my god... We suffer one pillaged tile, and the musket retreats! However we have a lot more cavs in the area, and omg, we actually win a battle [25:25]

Turn 10: 1150AD
Come on, I'm not allowed to kill a 1/4 musket that moved, on a grass with a my 4/4 knight? That musket still lives [25:26].

The Empire:
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/1150AD.JPG

Good:
2 more towns. Still haven't collapsed, and I pillaged the French salt.

Bad/Ugly:
[25:26] The RNG has left me for good. My own games have went to RNG hell, and now SGOTM. Overall this has not been a good week for me and the computer. I had about 4 different apps not work at all for various reasons, and now this. Seriously, the RNG, while we may accept it as we do when we go gambling, DID NOT go according to form for about 1/2 to 2/3 the time. I lost with good odds. Our cats are next to useless since I hardly landed hits. Fortunately we retook our Sistine's and did not have to raze it since there were no Russian born citizens in that IT. I am at a loss in terms of overall strategy now. Any attempt in me in trying to get something going was lost in the first few turns.

More stuff to say:
We need to talk, now, about how were are going to go about this. We have no game plan aside from staying alive. It's almost like we're playing hotpotato with a 40 megaton bomb, and we're all trying NOT to be the one that starts the downward spiral. Please, let's talk what we need to do. The western four towns are being swamped by cavs every turn, and we can not keep up in replacing our units.

That non pillaging army issue is killing us. In all my AW games pillaging is the key component.

You're telling me. Our armies are nothing more than 12-20hp meat shields that are the only source of deterrent in saving our towns. I hope microbe can salvage my disaster set of turns.

The non-pillaging armies hurt, the inability to keep slaves hurts, and the inability to trade with the other continent hurts. This game does not play like a NOW game, it's AWE.

I do see a potential way ...though it's late. We've got to control the flatlands to the NW. The way it stands now we have to wait for the AI to close with our wester cities before we can do anything about it. Take a couple of armies and use them to protect stacks of workers to get some roads out into those flatlands... then our Knights will be able to do some good before the AI are on our doorstep.

Longer term, if we can finish of Greece and form a battle line from Brighton to Buffalo (after razing and replacing) then we might be able to hold them off until we get cav. But we've got to take those mountains, or we'll never be able to deal with the AI cavalry.

And please, hire a scientist somewhere... we're never gonna get cavalry at zero research...

I'll have to play this later. Why did we turn off research? We need cavs asap.

I agree the biggest problem is lack of game plan. We have had this problem from beginning of the game. I feel guilty as I myself couldn't have focused too well on this game for various reasons.

we're never gonna get cavalry at zero research...

Fund raising was only for 2 turns, and with research at 50%, chem comes in 7 (or 9) turns. I needed the money to upgrade what little pikes we had left. Musket cost 60 gold. One scientist would NOT have made a difference for the few turns that I decided to raise cash.

What have we got up north of Paris? Is that an army?

That is our pillaging army (12/13 leg army, 5 cats, and a horse).

@scoutsout
I read your ideas on the west and thought about it for awhile, and I like them. In general the AI was constantly beelining towards our core from the north, northwest, and west. The English cavs can strike in 1 turn from their town of Brighton in the NW, however the rest of the AIs have no roads to utilize in that entire plains region. If we can somehow get some combat workers to network the roads in our territory, we might be able to skirmish with some positive results, even with our outdated knights. We are researching at either 11 or 12 civ prices (depends on where Greece is) and when I started off, I could have set the slider at 5.5.0 (I think) for chem in 15, but only at +18gpt. 4.6.0 put me in the red. So I'm guessing MT would be around that neighborhood. If we can just hold off for roughly 23 turns till cavalry, and set up our FP core by, maybe then we can think about getting an effective SoD rolling.

And I'm surprised no one has picked up the small details, but yes, the AI is in the industrial ages (examine those AI cities).

preturn: things don't look good. We are very short of units.

IBT We kill a knight and retreat a cav. England lands two cavs in the core. [0-1]

(1)1160AD: We lose a knight but kill two cavs. [1-3]

Knight kills a redlined cossack. [1-4]

I take a gamble and use the only defender in Neocaledonium to kill a redlined cav and promotes itself. [1-5]

I start building longbow as it's cheap and as powerful as knight as offense.

IBT we lose a knight. [2-5] More cossacks and cavs appear.

(2)1170AD: kill two cossacks. [2-7] Kill the French musketeer. [2-8] Knight kills knight. [2-9]

IBT we kill a knight and lose another. [3-10] Germany starts Newton's.

(3)1180AD: Leg army kills musketman in Rostov and reveals a redlined cossack. [3-11]

Leg kills a hoplite. [3-12]

IBT we kill a cav [3-13]. England starts Newton's.

(4)1190AD: Elite knight kills redlined cav. [3-14]

leg army kills 3hp cossack in Rostov and autorazes the city. [3-15]

Longbow kills redlined pike. [3-16]

Longbow loses to cav, but we finish off two cavs. [4-18]

Knight army kills cav. [4-19]

Rush a musketman.

IBT Lose an elite knight but kills a longbow. [5-20]

(5)1200AD: Knight army kills cav. [5-21] Kill 3 knights. [5-24]

IBT 3 longbowmen dies to our musket. [5-27]

(6)1210AD: Germany lands a settler/spear pair in the south tip.

Kill a longbow. [5-28]

IBT cav dies. [5-29] But there are 5 English cavs in sight.

(7)1220AD: Our elite longbow gets a leader [5-30]:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/SGOTM3-1220AD.jpg

Leg army and knight kill two cavs. [5-32]

Knight army drops 7hp and kills a redlined musketman. [5-33]

Elite knight kills injured cav. [5-34]

Legions kill two hoplites and we capture Ephesus. [5-36]

IBT Lots more cavs appear. We lose longbow and knight, but kill one cav. [7-37] Chemistry -> Metallurgy in 10 turns with -5gpt.

(8)1230AD: two knights kill two cossacks. [7-39] Knight army and leg army kill two injured cavs. [7-41]

Elite knight kills redlined musketman. [7-42]

Two legs kill two hoplites and we capture Corinth. [7-44]

IBT we lose a knight. [8-44] Aztecs land two cavs.

(9)1240AD:
We lose one longbow and kill the two cavs. [9-46]
Kill two hoplites and we autoraze Mycenae. [9-48]
Kill cossack. [9-49]
Elite knight kills knight. [9-50]

IBT loses a leg. [10-50]

(10)1250AD: Elite knight kills cav. [10-51] The north is in danger. I rush a longbow.

Note: Greece has only one city now. Get some legs/cats and we should be able to takt it out soon. After that the next player can build some settlers to settle that area.

I have some workers and a settler fortified in Aesonesium (FP city).

Metallurgy in 8 turns. If we can survive the next 20 turns we'll be in a great position to survive longer. :)

The pillaging army has moved to England. It sends the most cavs to us beside Russia.

I haven't loaded knights into the new army - it's in Cumae. With the new army, I think we can do some offense toward Brighton and Liverpool. Need to road to the enemies.

I find longbow is surprisingly effective, with almost half price of knights.

BTW Cumae should build a market as it has happiness problems.

Also beaware of AI landing. I've seen multiple times of landing with 2 cavalry. Maybe we should build some navy.

Barbslinger
ForTheEmpire
microbe
gozpel - up
scout - on deck

Good job microbe! And thanks for salvaging my set. I'm surprised how effective longbows are. I guess you just need to protect them. Maybe the poor man's army may be the way to go.

Let's get our western plains roaded up and make our way towards Brihgton. As scoutsout said, the next ring of cities will extend from Brighton to Dijon and follow along the mountians. This would relieve a lot of pressure off our core cities.

Are we getting the defensive free shot with the longbows? I didn't think that was implemented until C3C? :hmm:

No defensive bombardment.

I absolutely agree to move toward England, but we need some settlers first. During my turns I didn't build a single settler because I had to build units. We are still short of units but at least we've got most cities defended. At beginning of my turns many of them are empty.

We also should put some legs in the north on those mountains. Constantly there are AI trying to trespass and pillage.

Ok, I continue on the same path and try to get out a couple of settlers as well. Got it.

Speaking of pillaging units, during your turns gozpel maybe the advent of AI riflemen, since microbe didn't mention them during his set. Good luck!

EDIT: And it's nice to see we now have a strategy to work for, even though we are still walking a thin line of survival and defeat.

Sorry, I didn't have time to play until now and when I open the save I see we sit on 2 Greece towns, Ephesus and Corinth.

10. You will never retain a town that contains foreign citizens. Such towns must be razed and any workers spawned disbanded.

We just broke the last rule and this is too annoying. I just feel like call it quits.

Of course, I can abandon the towns, but it is as far away from a fun game as I ever been involved in.

What do you say, team?

Sorry, I didn't have time to play until now and when I open the save I see we sit on 2 Greece towns, Ephesus and Corinth.

We just broke the last rule and this is too annoying. I just feel like call it quits.*sigh* That's a rule we shouldn't have broken.

Of course, I can abandon the towns, but it is as far away from a fun game as I ever been involved in.Well...I can honestly say this is not the most enjoyable game I've played... but I would rather not abandon it entirely... let's take stock of our situation:

1) We broke another rule
2) We are completely out of the hunt for any sort of award, other than avoiding the Wooden Spoon. (I'd really like to avoid consecutive W.S. awards...)
3) If we just kept the towns and played, we would not be the first team to abandon a SGOTM variant. IIRC, one of the declared variant teams from SGOTM2 abandonded the variant and completed their game.

The way I see it we have three options:

1) abandon the towns and continue to attempt this variant.
2) abandon the variant, and continue to play the game... either as AW or a straight game.
3) abandon the game.

I would like to continue to slog through it. I think if we survive another 30 turns we will avoid the wooden spoon. So I would be in favor of either #1 or #2.

Now... since we're way out of the hunt for any sort of award... and since we don't seem to be having much fun... I suggest we try to figure out a way to make this game fun, and continue to play it.

Damn it!

I think I am just stupid to not be able to remember every rule. I guess I have to read the rules all over again at the end of every turn.

I am sorry.

My preference to scout's solutions: 1, 3, 2.

I really like to play this to the end with the variant. Not because I enjoy it, but we have already spent so much time on it (and suffered). These two towns are size-1 and didn't build anything useful for us (except for a couple of gpt as unit upkeep).

I play civ because I like it and want to have fun. This game is a total disaster and it feels like going to the dentist.

We could continue in any of the above solutions, but I rather do something more interesting, like picking lint out of my navel or watching shop-channel on 2.

@Gozpel: I understand how you feel. This game has been a bit of a headache. Let's see what Barbslinger and ForTheEmpire have to say as well.

@Microbe: Just to be sure I am clear, you would prefer to abandon the game rather than abandon the variant and continue the game?

@Microbe: Just to be sure I am clear, you would prefer to abandon the game rather than abandon the variant and continue the game?

That's correct. Either give up or play the full variant.

My preference: 1, 3, 2.

Why? Well, I certainly don't like self inflicted pain, and I don't particularly enjoy trying to live through it willingly. However, I felt since that we started this whole thing, we might as well finish it regardless how terrible it is. I understand how you feel gozpel, and I really wanted to just call it quits after my last turn set. But then again, what would that have just gained? If we quit the game now completely, we just wasted time. If we continue the game as non-variant, then we have suffered for nothing. If we continue back to the variant, though we may damn ourselves even further, at least it's honorable. I prefer to finish what I start, and I'm sure there is a silver lining hidden in the fiasco known as SGOTM3 :D

Alright then, let's waste some more time. I continue this tomorrow.

We will have cavs within 20 turns, so it's not hopless. Just painful. :)

Very well then, we shall continue the butt-whipping, even if it is our own butts that are getting whipped. :D

Sorry for the double-post, but for what it's worth:

Based on the score graph, there are several teams that appear to be struggling in this game. I have been in at least one SG with at least one member of each of the other five teams down in the cellar in this SGOTM. There are some pretty good players that appear to be having a rough go of it here.

Team Sesn is done with their game, and from the look of that nasty little downturn in their score line, I'd guess they suffered a conquest defeat. Team Bugsy is just a little above us in score..and I know Gozpel and Barbslinger have played alongside at least a couple members of that team; that's a good crew. Team Akots is right there with Bugsy's team in score...

I guess all I'm saying is that we're not really alone here. There are others who seem to be having a rough time with this variant.

This AW is far from being the toughest I have played. Some of you guys may remember Narcissitic Nehru and our backs were against the wall far worse than this. Each of the team members felt at one point or another like abandoning. We came back from the abyss and got the win. I will say it was aided because we had pillaging available with the armies. If we can get the iron/horses pillaged on this continent and keep it that way we will win this.

Back to the wall.. no problemo. I'm in Bede2! :D Not an AW game...but a Demi-God Defiant game that's a slugfest in its own right.

Urk!

Pre-turn - Abandon Corinth and Ephesus. MM some cities and move stuff around.

Kill american pike

1255AD - English cav dies against our defense

Load 3 knights in empty army

kill 2 english cavs
kill 2 german knights

Find a Greek worker roading tundra, disband.

1260AD - French cav kills musket

kill the french cav
kill german musket
kill english musket with settler and get a leader

1265AD - Aztecs finish Newtons

kill french cav on defense

kill english cav and get a leader, can't build army
kill 2 cossacks
kill german LB

1270AD - lose musket, kill cossack IT

kill cossack
kill 2 german knights

send leg-armies on pillaging missions

kill hoplite with settler
kill english cav
kill russian musket

1275AD - We defend well IT and kill a german knight and 3 english cavs

disband the 5 pults in the pillaging army to save us 5gpt

lose 2 legion, killing 3 hoplites and take Thermopyle. Greece is gone.
kill english musket with new 3-knight army, it lose 10hp against a stupid regular.

1280AD - kill babs musket with settler

1285AD - We lose 2 workers by a sneaking cossack

we learn Metallurgy -> MT

kill the cossack
kill english cav
kill another cossack
kill babs cav
kill american knight, lose knight

1290AD - lose LB, kill cossack IT

kill russian musket with settler
kill american pike

Hippus Regius founded

kill english cav
kill 2 american knights
kill cossack
kill german musket
lose leg, kill Russian musket with settler

1295AD - kill 3 english cavs
kill 2 american knights
kill pike and spear and raze New Orleans

kill babs spear with settler, lose a LB
kill french LB

1300AD - Kill german knight on defense, lose leg

Nicopolis founded

kill english cav, they just keep coming
kill french LB
kill german musket with settler
lose knight and leg, killing 3 english cavs and rifle

Ratio is still lousy 5:1 or something, hope cavs will help.

Military Tradition in 6 turns. When we got that, turn down research and rush stuff and upgrade.

Try to cut the roads between us and England, enemies of all colours comes flowing down there every turn.

To quote the Governator :viking: from one of his classic films "all that matters is that two stood against many, that's what is important." Well in this case, the two should be us five, and we are still standing and fighting [dance] . Nice job gozpel for holding the fort and wiping out Greece. Looks like scoutsout will have the honor of training our first cavalry divisions.

EDIT:
Try to cut the roads between us and England, enemies of all colours comes flowing down there every turn.

Hmm... is it possible to set up a killing zone along these roads? Maybe I'm just hoping for too much.

When MT comes, we can disband one leg army and replace with a new army.

Fight on! Cav+army can pillage much more happily! I would be happy if we do not end up with a military defeat.

Now we have cannons, let's upgrade and build more of them. We still need more arti.

Hmm... is it possible to set up a killing zone along these roads? Maybe I'm just hoping for too much.

Absolutely, if our 2 bleeding knight-armies ever get the chance to breathe and heal. Then they can move N and pillage, but we need strength in defense right now and the great movement of the armies saved our butts lots of times.

Apropos RNG, single cavs comes out of the dark and kill our defenders way too easy, especially as we are behing walls and on hills.

But we have two leg-armies on the move now NW of the FP-city and another knight army sitting there too picking targets. If some army dies we have a backup leader. I would like that one be for cavs.

I got a decent ratio on attack, but lost way too many units on defense (IT)

We have a bunch of pults that will be upgraded to cannons when we can afford it, and cavs will release a lot of pressure.

6 more turns and maybe this will be fun again? :crazyeye:

Really, I didn't mind my turns after I got over my early morning grumpiness, but it is a tough chore to see silly pults miss time after another and then whack what's left with expensive knights and armies. And then see next turn another horde of cavs and stuff showing up.

Btw, our first pillaging army is pillaging around some big english city and never got to the horses, I think it's more important to cut the lines to our territory first.

Yeah, I completely forgot we also get cannons along with cavs with MT. 2x as effective than cats... :evil: I just hope that in 6 turns we have the units around for upgrading.

Hmm... where are you scoutsout? I'm not sure whether he knows he's up or not... All I know is that Bede2 is up there in the realm of near impossible games, and he may lack the energy to pick this up. :rolleyes:

If the team can forgive the delay, I'll get this played tomorrow or Saturday latest. I'm still not used to this stupid thread aging thing, and sometimes one will drop off my radar screen. (1gpt to ForTheEmpire for the PM bump)

1gpt means next player has to pay for your sloppiness too? ;)

Take your time. :)

1gpt to ForTheEmpire for the PM bump

:D Instead of me pocketing it, I think our fellow Romans could benefit better with it. I was out the entire day and night, and I'm VERY tired from driving around CA. :crazyeye:

Pre-flight check (1300): The hard burn to MT is good, but we'll need some cash for upgrades. Take science down a notch, scroll through our cities and hire a few scientists. MT in 7, +7gpt. Move our leader to Rome and build an Army (but don't load it).

IBT - we lose a musket and 2 Knights. Kill 1 Cossack. Aztecs drop 2 cav in the core. French drop off a Knight and a Longbow.

Turn 1 (1305) A few Knights take care of the Aztec Cav and the French Knight. Elite Musket goes after French reg longbow and kills it, no leader.

Checking out our troops...
:rotfl: Which one of you guys named an Elite* Legion "Muffins"?

IBT - A single German Longbow kills a musket and captures Aurelorum.

Turn 2 (1310) Upgrade a couple of cats, whack an English Cav. Kill a German Cav.

IBT - We lose one of our Legion Armies to English Cavalry.

Turn 3 (1315) Retake Aule something-or-other.

IBT - We lose a couple of muskets, but take a few down with 'em.

Turn 4 (1320) Whack 3 English Cav and a couple of German Knights...

IBT - Whack 3 English Cavalry, a French Settler pair (Yes, disbanding the workers.

Turn 5 (1325) Just Killin' stuff.

IBT - We lose a Knight Army to a massive charge of Cossacks and English Cav.

Turn 6 (1330) MT next turn, Science to 10% Whack 3 English Cav, a French Cav, a Cossack,

IBT - We lose a few more troops...

Turn 7 (1335) We kill some more cav...but after a couple of upgrades, we now HAVE some CAV!!!

IBT - Lots of enemy cavalry swarming...a barbarian horse attacks a longbow escorting a settler..

Turn 8 (1340) Whack a settler pair and a couple of English Cav. Two-Horse Cav Army whacks an English Rifleman that managed to slip past Byzantium.

IBT - Russian Cossacks pick off a Musket at Brundisium. Dangit.

Turn 9 (1345) After all the stupid English Cavalry I've picked off with Elite knights... I had some units going to joing our other Legion Army for pillaging duty. I send a stupid LONGBOW after a German Cav ... and this happens.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/SGOTM3_Microbe_NOT_HERE.jpg

Kill some more stuff... Knight Army retreats to Brundisium to heal. Oh yeah... and I founded a city on a rockpile that used to be a Greek town...and I've got a settler pair and some troops ready for a run at the English Spice town.

IBT - Unbelievable. We finally get a Cavalry Army, and a single English Cavalry gets the greatest RNG roll I've seen in at least a week...and kills it. [pissed]

Turn 10 (1350) Kill a couple of American Knights... build a road NW out of Byzantium.

@Team: I am SICK about losing that Cavalry Army...and we now have a leader with our eastern pillaging force. If we want to use the leader, we'll need to pull the pillaging force homeward to escort the leader.

A settler and some troops are headed towards Brighton. If we can take that we can turn the English Flank back a bit. Every single tile around Newcastle has been pillaged. When the horse pillages the tile that it is standing on, Liverpool and Brighton will be cut off from the rest of the English Empire.

Checking out our troops...
:rotfl: Which one of you guys named an Elite* Legion "Muffins"?

That must be me, I'm so bad with names :)

IBT - Unbelievable. We finally get a Cavalry Army, and a single English Cavalry gets the greatest RNG roll I've seen in at least a week...and kills it. [pissed]

Ah well. The way the game has been going from the start, nothing surprises me anymore :) Don't fret about it, at least we have another leader..if we can get him home.

Muffins... sheesh :lol:. Again, we're still alive, we can build cavs and cannons finally [dance] , our offensive against the English is progressing nicely, and we're only bound to have a turn-around in the RNG. Don't worry scoutsout, just believe in the yin-yang and we'll come out on top (hopefully) :rolleyes:

I also managed to clip several annoying settler pairs in and around the mountains to the east. There's an American city over there...if we can raze and replace that, we might be able to consolidate a line along our eastern flank. If we can do that, then it will make it easier to push in the west. The English navy is shipping a lot of stuff along the western coast.

Since microbe is having his ciesta, I'll do the honors

Rotation:
barbslinger - UP
ForTheEmpire - ON DECK
microbe - chillin
gozpel - having fun with gozgram1 and 2
scoutsout - recovering from his headache sgs

Got it. Will play tomorrow, but starting tonight so I may even finish up late this evening or early morning. Sorry about the delay guys but the weekends have been filled up with other things lately. Taking dogs to the beach, Saturday night was a Bunco party. Prepping for fantasy football draft. Painting the bathroom, etc.

SGOTM Mic-1350AD

Preturn – Upgrade one knight to cav and survey the field. F3 shows us to be strong to almost all but Aztecs. That’s a good sign. Change Nicopolis and Aurel… to Moenia. Don’t like the looks of the reg Cossack staring down our hurt knight army in Brundisium. That would hurt. Rush a cav. Turn up the juice on science. The sooner we can get a pillaging force to the other continent, especially the Aztecs, the better.
IT – Lots of boys coming up to play. Especially on our east flank through the valley. I decide to try and get the leader home by swapping Selucia to a galley. I plan to raze the American town on the coast next turn if possible and then be able to get Claudius home.
4 cavs and a musket are built.
[1] 1355 – Take down a rifle sneaking around on the west flank to go pillage. In Brund there are now 3 cossacks heading in. the rest was all defensive moves.
IT – The 3 cossacks move on Cumae and we get 2 promos to elite going 2-1. The English send 2 cavs to take down the musket that was guarding the workers and were now guarding the 3 cannons I had there. Japan drops off 3 horses near our core. Should be able to recapture the cannons. Cumae-Musket> Temple so they can’t attack as easily after expansion. Other builds too.
[2] 1360 – My Buffalo plan falls apart as the legion army goes injured to a 2/3 pike. Our legion razes the town and kills 2 slaves but it is still dicey. The galley is rushed to get him out next turn if he survives. Actually with the town gone Cladius makes a naked scamper towards Selucia. The only unit close is a Cossack guarding a settler. Fingers crossed. The 3 horses are dealt with with 1 retreating but can not walk into a town. 2 cavs and a LB are killed near Selucia. Russia has an IC cruising the west coast.
[3] 1365 - Both the army and the legion die after taking one down with them each. Claudius will make it home and the horse in our core retreats to a hill as expected. NOT HERE sacrifices himself to take out a Cossack. The cats will try to make it home alone. Claudius forms an army of cavs that needs some healing. I hurry the temple in Brundisium for 40g. that expansion buffer should help too. An assault on 3 english cavs yields 3 english cavs and a decision to hit Dijon. This spawns Anthony. Dijon is left with a spear guarding. Brighton loses a LB that came into view and the march forward continues. Adjust some troops and goof attacking that Cossack guarding the settler. He was fortified and swept our cav out 4-0.
[4] 1370 – This time the Cossack makes a mistake and pillages us while covering the settler. I take advantage and kill him and the slaves. I destroy Dijon and kill 5 slaves. Brighton gets a bombing and is showing a reg an conscript rifle. Anthony makes another army. Lugdunum goes to harbor so we can get a caravel to Aztec lands. With astronomy in 2 I’m able to flip a couple scientists to tax.
[5] 1375 – 5 cannons don’t even dent Brighton defenses. Claudius army is formed up and has to heal because he was assembled from injured units. I keep forgetting this is PTW and the armies don’t heal on the IT in a rax town. Lugdunum built its harbor and I just rushed a galley in Pompeii.
IT – England drops off 2 cavs SE of Hispalis. I had 2 cavs patrolling once the boat came into the harbor. Astro is in and I’m going slower on Navigation.
[6] 1380 - Pop another leader that makes another army. Need some units now.

I need to pause here because I have a question for the team. We can go navigation to try and get a pillaging army or wait and get mag after physics. I had forgotten agin that a cav army in Aztec lands WON’T be able to pillage (I hate that part of this SGOTM) so we will need more than the caravel I have coming up. For that reason perhaps we should wait on MAG. However, Aztecs are doing well over there and really need some pillaging done. I have popped 3 armies and if I could ever get some cannon hits on Brighton I would be taking it down. We have 6 armies now. 1 on pillaging, 1 empty, 1 with only 2 cavs in it and 2 cav armies at half strength and a knight army ¾ strength.
On top of that, I’m really tired and will have to continue tomorrow.

the save if you want to have a look-see.

@Barbslinger: Excellent turns! :thumbsup:

My $0.02: I say we focus on this landmass. Let's not worry about optional MA techs. With Magnetism and Galleons we can move 3-unit Armies overseas. If we somehow manage to consolidate this landmass, we would be in a much better position to take on the other continent later. If we don't consolidate this landmass, actions against Aztecs will be moot.

Edit: Just looked at the scores, and it looks like another variant team has bitten the dust... and it looks like my friend Mistfit is in the running for a second consecutive wooden spoon. It also looks like team Bugsy has found something, and they're digging in... much like we are. The score lines for teams Akots, Bugsy, and Handy are pretty close to ours.

Edit: Just looked at the scores, and it looks like another variant team has bitten the dust... and it looks like my friend Mistfit is in the running for a second consecutive wooden spoon. It also looks like team Bugsy has found something, and they're digging in... much like we are. The score lines for teams Akots, Bugsy, and Handy are pretty close to ours.

hey... I'm more then in the running I'm winning that race! I've even changed the tag line under my name. If GK ever comes back I will have some spoon competition but for now it's all mine.

Good game here guys! Keep it up and spank some AI butt for me.

@Mistfit: :wavey: I was sorry to see your team's sudden downturn there. At the moment I'm pretty much treating this like a SG... looking at the comparative stuff just to remind myself that we're not the only team having a rough go of it. Though it's still pretty dicey, I think we've actually got a shot at turning this thing around.

Great job barbslinger :goodjob: . The team consisted of those who don't understand the rules and/or break them (I being foremost head idiot :lol: ) live on for another turnset. I wholeheartedly agree with scoutsout. Logistically, it makes no sense whatsoever to allocate resources to another continent when our home continent is still in much distpute. And yes, if we do decide to dish out some pain to the Aztecs, we would need a galleon to transport a 2 cav army + a cav to pllage in just one ship instead of more than one caravel.

I got it, and tell me if all this sounds good.
a) keep pushing towards our west
b) settle the west mountains
c) pillage
d) focus research on required MA techs (ToG and Mag)
e) stay alive
f) stay alive
g) oh yeah, did I mention stay alive already?

@mistfit
Sigh, this SGOTM will be notorious for taking out some really good players, grs, sesnofwthr, yourself, just to name a few. We will avenge all of your losses :salute:

Rotation:
ForTheEmpire - UP with his rifle being sharpened er... polished :D
microbe - on leave, though sources say he has worked up a rather nice tan.
gozpel - probably ON DECK
scoutsout - waiting ravenously for his next chance at glory, so me thinks :p
barbslingler - gets a nice well deserved break.

Rotation:
ForTheEmpire - UP with his rifle being sharpened er... polished :D
microbe - on leave, though sources say he has worked up a rather nice tan.
gozpel - probably ON DECK
scoutsout - waiting ravenously for his next chance at glory, so me thinks :p
barbslingler - gets a nice well deserved break. If you are that anxious FTE have at it. I was just quizzing the team as to which way to go in tech. Nav is in 11 and waiting for Mag will probably be around 23-24 turns. I was just thinking that getting an army to Aztecs and it looks like we have a 2 turn sea passage and a couple turns to his capital may help tremendously. Cutting his capital, lux and resources will hurt his research capabilities and right now it looks like a run-a-way AI. If we can get the others challenging him over there before we get our continent things will be a lot smoother. Now that our knights are nearly upgraded I would try to get a couple more libs built and keep research rolling as fighting permits. It will be critical to get rubber pillaged someday.

OH CRAP! I didn't realize you didn't finish yet... :wallbash: No wonder the d/l page showed 1350AD still... Sigh... sorry to upstage you like that barbslinger, I have no problems patiently waiting. Besides, I have a bunch of errands to run that just came up so it all works out. Take you time with your last set of moves.

I'll finish up tonight. No problem FTE. I'm sure you saw the save there and made an assumption of completion. I would still like to hear from the others on the tech choice. I know from all the AW experience I have been through there is no greater power than the pillage and getting to Aztecs sooner would be better. I wanted to stop because I knew going for nav, my choice, would have begat some shouts of "optional tech! What are you doing?" I wish Greebley, T_McC or handy were lurking to give us some guidance. It's a really hard choice for me. I will go with the team though. This is a team and we will live or die by our decisions.

Thanks for your forgiveness. Now back to decisions decisions decisions. I already typed my opinions already in a previous post. Paraphrased, I said go for Mag, but logistically it wouldn't make too much sense to send over an entire army to the other continent due to us not having secured our own yet. However, if the Aztecs are becoming the juggernaut we all will fear, and if we can successfully cripple another civ (English) to the point they are a non-threat, when Mag comes around in 11-12 turns, then let's send over that army with the pillaging cav.

But now as I think about this even more, I'm starting to recall your observation of ironclads. Meaning the AIs are already up Steam and one tech closer to destroyers. Even if the defense of a galleon is 3, we will be risking an entire army in open waters. Sigh...

I'm not really helping out by giving my vote, but only laying out the facts. Not sending an army at all will severely kill us down the line by letting the Aztecs run unchecked. Sending one over and we will need to survive approximately 5-8 turns of Ironclad attacks before it can land. :sad:

One possible alternative is to wait for us to have steam power and our own set of ironclads. With proper escort, we can definitely send over that army, certainly with much less apprehension than before.

I never thought I would be saying this since it would have been bad luck to be so portentous, but since the AI is now in the IA and we don't look like we're near death, let's hope the AI will go communistic on us :evil: They already have nationalism, so let's all pray for that.

One question barbslinger, why navigation? IIRC, NAV only provides the ability to build Magellan's and explorers. It doesn't provide sea or ocean travel (that's Astro and Mag respectively), so aside from explorers, I don't see why we need Nav at all. :confused: I know the explorer's pillaging capailities, so maybe you were thinking of sending over explorers with the cav army?

Wow was I off base. Astro gets us there now. My bad. I'll check to see the caravel crossing can be made. It is only, IIRC, 3 ocean tiles and 3 sea tiles to cross to the west. Here comes physics. I think we will need 2 vet caravels and 2 reg caravels. I'll see if it is worth it. I'm still up to my eyeballs in enemy attacks. I have the pillaging forces poised over looking London now though.

Sorry for the double post, but the thought of us entering the IA now being almost reality instead of a fleeting dream is making me concoct some more thoughts. As you said barbslinger, we need to get some libraries up. We've been probably saying this all game, but we may need to seriously consider expanding our research prowess. Researching at 11th civ prices combined with libraries, I think we can roll in the techs in under 10 turns and still make considerable money. Of course, we place libraries in the cities that justify for one. Here is my research priority and order:

1) Physics - prereq
2) Mag - galleon, IA prereq
3) ToG - IA prereq
4) Nationalism - rifles AND mobilization
4a) Steam - ironclad AND coal

Sorry for the cross post. I have a question though, and I bring this up because in another SG this occurred. Does renaming a veteran unit into the elite name e.g. "Veteran Caravel" -> "Elite Caravel" forces this new "elite" caravel to take the first round of defense, even though this "elite caravel" only has 4 hp max? Of course sending actual vet and reg caravels solves that problem, but I'm just curious.

If it is only 3 sea squares and 3 ocean squares, then we will need 2-4 turns to make that crossing depending on the setup. Just keep in mind that Astro allows our caravels to go safely over sea and caravels themselves have 4 movement.

@Slinger: I just thought of something: Go for Navigation! Explorers can be a pillaging terror!

@Slinger: I just thought of something: Go for Navigation! Explorers can be a pillaging terror!

I see we're back to our old games again... :rolleyes:

After some more thought, the potential of using 5-6 explorers under the protection of our Cav armies is too good to pass up. Pillaging with speed is too evil, so I change my vote to finish off Navigation. But please, let this be the last optional tech we research until we hit the IA.

Con’t - Kill both cavs.
IT – Rough break as another army bites it to 2 cavs along with another cav. We now have 5 cavs and 3 cossacks milling around Brundiseum and Cumae. Not looking good.
[7] 1385 – Use the 4/5 cav to kill one unit flawless. Send the 8/8 army over to pick him up. Only get one kill from him, out of movement. The knight army gets another cav and the English LB and cav are left near Cumae. In Brund the cannons go 1 for 2. One elite cav kills one Cossack. The odds are in our favor on defense so I fortify the others. A 65% cav vs a rifle on the Brund/Cumae road wins after cannon fire. So we have rifles pouring in to pillage. 2 cossacks, A german knight and Bab cav that can hit Brund, though I think they will go for juicier targets. I also finally got 2 cannon shots landed in Brighton and nearly lost the army to a ½ rifle. We begin the pillaging of London heading for the horses. Fingers crossed.
IT – Not terrible except losing the knight army. They had a lot of retreats though. Close call in Brund when 2 English cavs came from the fog to attack too. We lost the K army and the cav that took out the rifle. An English cav lands near Hispalis. Lugdunum is also being pillaged by an IC. Brundisium expanded borders so that should help with defense.
[8] 1390 – Lose a 3/5 cav trying to take a 2/4 unfortified cav. Kill a few others.
IT – No attacks but the rifles coming through the mountains look like lemmings.
[9] 1395 – No attacking due to odds. Have to flush the rifles down
IT – German LB and 2 Russian muskets land in our backyard. That will be tough to handle.
[10] Not much I can do but rely on some defense. Rush a couple units in the back. Bring home the 4/18 armies that were healing near Brighton to heal at home and get back to work. The drop offs have only 1 movement so if they don’t pillage it should be OK.
Right now it is a mess. I think I have enough D to hold out at Cumae. Brundisium is tricky. Our pillaging horse is 2 tiles away from English horses. Hold on to your shorts boys. I turned research down to 10% to be able to rush units which I have been doing. There is now an Aztec in our backyard too.

Alright, this time I won't be premature as before

FTE - UP and analyzing the save tomorrow morning
microbe - :sleep:
gozpel - ON DECK
scoutsout - warming up
barbslinger - recovering

We survive to live on for another set [dance] . After the English horses are disconnected and a good number of road tiles near it, where should the pillaging party head to? It should be to the AI that has been sending the most hurt towards us, and I'm guessing that would be Russia.

I'll probably have more questions in the morning. I won't play this till the afternoon or evening so we can work out some details in the meanwhile.

I'm back and glad we are still standing. :)

Glad to see you back microbe, I hope you had some nice R&R. I regret to inform you guys that I need to request a skip this time around. My power supply is out, and I'm actually at my local library's public access terminal at the moment. I can get a new power supply in a week, but it's better to be skipped than swapped for timing's sake. I'll be available every once in a while to keep you posted. Sorry... :cry:

Seems I am up, but I can only play this tomorrow night at the earliest. Still in the vacation mood. Hawaii is fantastic. :)

preturn: I want to raise sci to 50 to get Navigation in 7 turns, but we need some cash for rushing units I think, as we are really thin on units. Many towns are empty just like last time.

IBT: musket fends off knights. Aztec cav comes out of Tepetlaoxtoc, kills our elite longbow and autorazes Longdinium. cav attack Brundisium and kill our elite knight and a musket, leaving only a leg there, and we kill one cav. Our cav is also killed by a rifle. Two muskets move to undefended Gonzomonium.

[2-4]

(1)1405AD: Leg kills a longbow and promotes. Kill two cavs. [5-4]

Gonzomonium will be lost too, as it's undefended and that cav can reach this town next turn.

Rush a cav in Luteria by 200g and our treasury goes zero.

IBT Gonzomonium is lost.

(2)1410AD: kill 3 injured cossacks. [8-4] Kill redlined rifle. [9-4]

Finally pillaged English horses.

Injured army kills cav. Muffin kills redlined cav. [11-4]

IBT we lost a cav and Muffin. [11-6]

(3)1415AD: Gonzomonium has a rifle. Cav kills it. [12-6] Knight army kills 2hp cav. [13-6] Elite cav kills cav. [14-6] Legion kills cav and we capture back Gonzomonium. [15-6] Elite leg kills redlined musket. [16-6] Cav army kills vet rifle. [17-6]

Rush a musket.

IBT our knight army is killed. My mistake - I shouldn't have risked the army to let it in the open. We kill two cavs. [19-10]

(4)1420AD: kill a landed cav. [20-10] elite cav kills cav. [21-10] vet cav kills cav and promotes. [22-10] Elite cav kills another cav. [23-10] Kill a musket. [24-10]

IBT lots of English cavs show up - it's importing from someone else. Gotta pillage all the road around capital.

(5)1425AD: longbow kills rifle. [25-10] Elite cav kills cav. [26-10] Elite cav kills cossack. [27-10]

IBT we kill 3 rifles but lose a leg. [30-11]

(6)1430AD: Kill 3 cavs. [33-11] Kill musket and disband 2 workers. [34-11] Longbow kills a rifle. [35-11] Cav army kills cav and elite cav kills rifle. [37-11]

IBT 6 units die on us but we lose an elite musket. [43-12]

(7)1435AD: Kill 2hp cav. [44-12] Bombard and kill a cav and we get a leader. It forms an army naturally. [45-12] Kill a knight. [46-12] Kill another 3 cavs. [49-12] Kill a spear. [50-12]

IBT we kill a cav. [51-12] Aztecs drop two cavs at Neocaledonium.

(8)1440AD: Lose one cav but we kill the two Aztec cavs. [53-13] We get another leader by killing a knight. [54-13] It forms another army and I leave it empty for now.

Longbow kills longbow. [55-13] Cav kills rifle and disbands 2 workers. [56-13] Kill pike and disband 2 workers. [57-13]

IBT Germany starts Universal Suffrage.

(9)1445AD: Kill rifle in Tepetlaoxtoc, another inside. Cav kills cossack. [59-13]

IBT we kill a longbow and a cossack. [61-13] Aztecs start Universal Suffrage. England lands cav at Neocaledonium again.

(10)1450AD: Isolate Longdon so England no longer has horses.

Kill the landing cav. [62-13]

We found Eburacum.

Longbow kills 1hp rifle. [63-13] Cav army kills knight. [64-13] Cav kills reg rifle and we raze Tepetlaoxtoc. [65-13] Eventually a mediocre 5:1 kill ratio after an extremely hectic start.

Navigation will complete next turn.

Our infra is pathetic. We lack even libraries. But with the constant cav stream, we have to build units first.

Notes:

1. Neocaledonium: Try to take out Brighton. We have a 3-cav army and a couple of cavs nearby, but it may not be enough. Better use the cannon stack next to Neocaledonium, but we are short of musketmen and there are constantly English cavs coming from the north (just now you can see 1 rifle and 3 cav NE to the army. So that's the direction but might need some time to gather the forces. There is also a stack of workers beside the cannon stack.

2. Cumae: the army is protecting 3 workers to road the tile next turn. When we get a chance we should also fortify a musket on the hill west to our injured longbow (which might be killed next turn).

3. I fortified some muskets on the roaded mountains. Better replace them with legions (that's why I've still been building them). We need to block those rifles coming from the north.

4. a cav and 2 longbow are next to the German town. Probably not enough as AI usually puts two rifles there.

5. The pillaging army should keep doing it around London to make sure it won't be able to build cavs. During my turns England sent the most units to us. We have to stop it.

6. Empty army in Neopolis. No enough cavs to fill yet. With more armies we can eventually go offense on England.

7. We should switch some towns to settlers.

Good luck!

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/SGOTM3-1450AD.jpg

Glad to see we're still in this one. When Navigation comes in we should build a few explorers for pillaging purposes. An explorer could move 2 tiles, pillage, and then move 2 more tiles to get back under an army. With 4-6 explorers and an army, we could pillage at speed. There's a War Academy article that describes this strat.

Nice job microbe. BTW, my power supply should come in this coming Tuesday.

An explorer could move 2 tiles, pillage, and then move 2 more tiles to get back under an army.

I don't think the explorer can move 2 more tiles AFTER he moved 2 tiles and pillaged. This is why. The explorer is capable of treating all terrain as roads, and in enemy territory and non roaded terrain, this is 6 tiles worth of movement (or 6/3 is another way to look at it). Each point of movement takes a 1/3 away, and the pilage action takes away 3 1/3 points. So ideally, the explorer would move 2 in a general forward direction (2/3), pillage (3/3), and move back under the cover of the army (1/3) that just moved one tile in the forward direction. This equals the 6/3 or 2/2 movement. And for my personal taste, I use a defensive/1 movt army. Cheaper to make, and speed not required. So this will eventually turn into a glorified horsie/legarmy combo we already got going, except if we put three explorers with this group, we can make have a pillaging range of 3 tiles instead instead of just 1 tile.

That was a bit longwinded don't ya'll think? :lol: BTW, stay dry and safe scoutsout.

barbslinger
ForTheEmpire
microbe
gozpel - up
scoutsout - on deck

I regret to inform everyone that due to my breakup I won't be able to play anymore until I can get an internet connection where I will be moving to. Sorry all, I'll miss this.

I don't know where gozpel has been. Hope he didn't get a breakup too. :lol:

Scout, if you want you can take it, but it seems people are losing interest in this game.

Scout is probably in the process of cleaning up after Florida's last hurricane. Many places received 10-24" of rain over the weekend. Lots of flooding.

Thanks for the info. Now it seems we have to wait while majority of the team are absent..RL kicks in really hard. :)

I had server problems and can finally access to the net again. I can take it if scout's busy, but I can't play until tomorrow at the earliest.

@Goz: I think you're up anyway... I think you were between me and 'slinger... go ahead and pick it up. It'll be at least another day before I get my "game face" on again....

Hurricanes are a helluva time to find a leak in one's roof...

No problems. I got it.

Alrighty guys, my comp is up and running again. [dance] Sorry to see slinger drop, let's hope it's only temporary. goz, just take your time as that will give scout a chance to do what he needs to do. And speaking of RL, I didn't expect the game to last this long, but Oct3rd, I'll be heading to Malawi where I'll be teaching for the Peace Corps for 2 years, so if the game doesn't end by then, I have to be excused. But we still have some time till that day, so play on!

1455AD - We learn Navigation -> Banking

Kill 3 english cavs and a french musket with settler.
Kill cossack. Kill russian rifle with settler.
Kill rifle and spear in Dortmund and raze the city.

1460AD - IT - Lose legion, kill english cav.

Kill 2 english LB's.
Kill 2 german rifles and american LB.
Kill french musketeer.
Kill german knight.

1465AD - Kill 3 cossacks and an english cav on defense.

Kill french cav, get a leader, build army.
Kill american knight and Babs cav.

1470AD - Kill english cav

1475AD - Kill cossack on defense.

Kill 3 cossacks and 2 babs cavs.
Kill english rifle
Kill english cav, lose cav.
Kill french cav.

1480AD - Kill english cav
kill french cav

1485AD - Lose cav

kill french cav
kill german rifle with settler
kill 2 german rifles and a knight

6 cannons fail to take off more than one hp of a french rifle, isn't this a joy.

lose a LB, kill german knight

1490AD - Haha, England have got infantries :)

kill 2 german rifles, lose LB

1495AD - Lose legion

kill 2 cossacks
kill 2 french rifles
kill american knight
kill 2 aztec cavs

1500AD - Kill german rifle with settler
kill english rifle
kill american pike with settler
kill 2 cossacks
kill babs cav
kill babs musket with settler


This won't last long now, with the AI having infantries and soon tanks :)

ForTheEmpire - on deck
microbe
gozpel
scoutsout - up

Do we still want to finish this? With this pace we are not going to finish this game. SGOTM4 will open soon (I won't play SGOTM4).

Do we want to declare the game dead?

Let's see:
1. Barbslinger needs to recover from break-up
2. gozpel pops up every once a while, but most of the time buries himself under sand
3. scout is probably also under water
4. the game isn't fun as we'll probably lose :)

So who wants to continue?

I'm fine with whatever way, but I hate to let a game hanging around.

2. gozpel pops up every once a while, but most of the time buries himself under sand.

What a nice dumbass comment!

I played the last turns! Do you want me to play a double session?

Just ask me instead of insulting me.

How was that an insult???!

See, that's one of the reasons this game is no fun.

And no, after that last remark I have no interest continuing this game.

Scrap it.

I'm funny in the right crowd.

Let's see:
1. Barbslinger needs to recover from break-up - Understandable.

2. gozpel pops up every once a while, but most of the time buries himself under sand - Not understandable. (We don't all sit on IT-super-highways)

3. scout is probably also under water - Understandable

4. the game isn't fun as we'll probably lose - Understandable

I'm fine with ending the game, but I didn't expect it to end in such a way.

That was a joke. Hey, you WAS offline for more than one week before your last turns, and for the past 3 days nobody replied to my inquiry.

I was not accusing anybody as I understand what RL is. I did put a smiliey this time, didn't I?

I don't know where all this anger came from. I never got mad when people made fun of myself.

Being online is one thing and being online trying to open a browser window for days is another.

And put the smilies where they belong. If you jokes with me, then the smiley should've been after the sentence:
2. gozpel pops up every once a while, but most of the time buries himself under sand :)

Like that.

Otherwise it's easily looked at as an insult. And you're not too frivolous with smileys anyhow, maybe time to practise?

I'm not angry with you, just annoyed. I'm sure you're a great bloke and I know you're a good player. Just learn to loosen up :)

We can continue to death in this game if you want to, but what's the point?

OK, I apologize for having made a bad joke.

You and I have played a lot of games and we have made fun of each other for quite a few times. It's not like I was joking with a stranger. What was so different this time?

I don't think smilies are that important as I always assume good intention of other people and assume others do the same, and overusing a lot of smilies looks silly to me (maybe it's a sign that I'm getting old). In this example instead of putting a smilliey at the end of every sentence (that would be 4 smillies!) I chose to put one (it's not like I actually thought or worried about it). I guess I'll have to learn the lesson. :)

We can continue to death in this game if you want to, but what's the point?

Ignoring the exchange in unpleasantries and focusing back on the game and the situation of RL in a good portion of the team, I have no qualms about ending this game. Two weeks ago I would have wanted to finish the game to the death, but after seeing a few more teams lose, there is no shame in giving up I guess. And if anything, this game particular game brought out some negative emotions from a lot of people. I'm no peace advocating hippie, but anytime a game causes these sorts of reactions, then I think we should just end it. It'll save us time and allows to maintain some civility amongst us.

I'm no peace advocating hippie, but anytime a game causes these sorts of reactions, then I think we should just end it. It'll save us time and allows to maintain some civility amongst us.

I completely agree with you. Tension arises from frustration. Let's just end it to avoid unpleasant things from happening again.

3 out of 5. Cool, this is gooooooooooooooooooone. The sweatest loss ever.

Thank you FTE. Welcome in any of our SG's anytime, we would love to have your kind there :)

Grouphug anyone? :D)

I'll PM you microbe about some stuff.

I guess I have to shoulder the responsibility for the way this turned out. I picked the team, and chose the variant, and made the rules (badly).

I thought you guys would get on, and I suspect that if you had won the game easily, as you are all used to doing, then you would have got along.

I don't blame you for quitting, from the point of view of the competition, it's over. You would only be playing for the love of the game, and to test yourself in a genuinely difficult situation.

It was my intention that the variants for SGOTM would be difficult enough that some teams would always lose. But having constructed such a game it is reasonably clear that most people not only don't like losing (who does?), but actually find it unacceptable. For this reason, it will be some time before I provide such an extreme game, if ever.

If you only had let us keep the frre workers....then....

mad-bax,

It's not really your fault. The main reason of quitting was barbslinger had to take a leave, the second person that had to do so in this game, and scout was fighting flood at home. We were just short of players. We could see in the past couple of weeks people were not active and probably losing interest. I personally don't mind losing, but we are in a position that even losing would take some time with this pace. The game just took longer than we expected.

I also want to apologize to you for having made some harsh comments on the game organization. I probably have to skip SGOTM4 but I wish that a success for everyone. :D

Thank you FTE. Welcome in any of our SG's anytime, we would love to have your kind there

Will this offer be good 2 years down the line after I get back from Malawi? :D

Anyway, so even though scout is not present to voice his vote, looks like we are finished. I don't know whether we should be mourning or dancing, but whatever. It was fun when it was fun. Learned one valuable lesson from this game though: whenever you have eliminated only 1 AI out of 11 and behind 10 or so techs, methinks the variant has beaten the humans :rolleyes:

EDIT:
Should have mentioned this already, but it was nice to have played this game with ya'll. What a way to start your sg career huh? :lol:

Do you guys want to play an AWM game? I have never had AW experience except SGOTM1 (regent level, too easy) and this one (I think it's as hard or harder than AWE).

EDIT: I started Mic4 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=100065) for a AWM game.

Sorry I went AWOL team...RL got a little rough the last couple of weeks. I apologize for not keeping you informed.

Are we still in this?

Hi Scout :)

Some of us were getting a little concerned.. it's been a bit quiet around here for a while. ;)

Glad to see you back. :)

Thanks MB. Good to BE back. I see this one's on the brink... @Microbe, FTE, do you guys want to bring this one back to life?

Hey Scout, nice to know you're still up and running. I believe me, goz and microbe all agreed to call this one quits. Sorry if we made that decision with you not present, but judging from the last turn set, all we were accomplishing was postponing the inevitable and thought we leave this one to rest.

I thought this thread was dead. :)

Hi Scout, welcome back. I personally wouldn't have quit if we had had enough players, and now I think with SGOTM4 warming up everybody will like us better if we let it go. :)

That said, Gozpel and I are probably going to play a serials AW games, and you/FTE are very welcome to join. Mic4 has just started and no slot is left, but if you guys are interested, just let me know and we'll reserve a space for you in the next game.

To make sure you all read this I'll PM you guys.