SGOTM 14 - Kakumeika

bcool said:

In general I agree. I wouldn't give the northern witches or western witches philosophy however if they demanded it. I think the diplo hit we can deal with better than giving the AI quicker access to liberalism.

Click to expand...

I agree about philosophy. I didn't realize we were getting it so soon.

shulec said:

Is it even possible that the game be saved at that point without making decision so it can be discussed on the forum? I have never tried this.

Click to expand...

I don't think it ever will be a problem. For example, bcool is always around.
Moreover, if a controversial demand is occurring, I simply will reduce the windows and wait for later.

Nonetheless, if someone comes up with a solution, please go on.

Kaitzilla said:

Tachy's PPP is looking very polished. It looks like it meets all of Bcool's goals very well .

[...]

Not much else. I approve of the PPP if it incorporates Bcool's latest suggestions. Thanks for the hard work Tachywaxon!

Click to expand...

:suicide: Man!
Only bcool knows what he is doing, that what you meant...
He is the leader. True. And I totally respect that.
He is very good at decision. True. His fast space victories are one indicator of a good long term plans maker.
He has truth. Not necessarily.

You may hate what I am going to say but I feel deep in my heart a sophism called "appeal to authority".

Few are making opposition. bcool, you were aksing why I wanted to produce the PPP alone, well, I somewhat refused to be influenced in order to have different opinion. It was a failure, unfortunately.

I have to admit you often had the end word because I noticed it was more justified and the benefits were more appealing.
It is just the lack of opposition that bugs me...I don't understand.

I may be an idiot, but I want to be an idiot who understands the situation.

There is one thing, though, I wish to excuse, is I don't have much authority to decry anything...I am like 6 months old around here (on CivF). Not counting I was away for 1 month.

EDIT: And yes, I had a terrible day.
EDIT2: Bcool, this post isn't a disrespectly one. I respect you. technically, the amount of work in my PPP is in respect to your goals.
It is the atmosphere I feel...bizarre.

I wish others would argue with me more too. I respect you wanting to do it on your own and we need multiple people looking for what is best.

Some of my ideas have been rejected, so everyone doesn't say okay to everything I suggest.

I'm not sure my ideas about the galleys for example are really better than a lighthouse.

People are free to argue with me and I want them to do so.
For example, several people convinced me my golden age idea was bad. Sorry I was being so stubborn about that by the way. So there has been debate. I expect the others agree that's why they don't say much. Or everyone gives what they can.

I've benefited from a lot of what the other contribute, shulec for example clearly knows more about begging then I do.

mabraham is better at micro than I am

Not everyone has the time. I have the time (perhaps at too great expense of other things) so that is why I contribute to fine details.

I thought a lot of your PPP was good, for example I think your cottage plan for washington beat what I attempted or imagined was possible.

And while I'm the team captain, I don't think that by itself is a reason to accept my ideas. I only want my ideas to be accepted if we as a team decide they are the best.

And no I'm not around all the time... I do sleep.

The PPP is almost completed; will attempt to add missing parts tonight if I can fetch some forces.

Ideally, according to reducing turnset project, what should I do now?

Wait for more agreement, then emit date of official playing.

Tachywaxon said:

The PPP is almost completed; will attempt to add missing parts tonight if I can fetch some forces.

Ideally, according to reducing turnset project, what should I do now?

Wait for more agreement, then emit date of official playing.

Click to expand...

There's been a good window for comment and we seem to have reasonable agreement on most areas. I think you should pick a time and play!

Post the final PPP and let us know when you want to play. tonight isn't out of the question assuming you are making agreed upon changes. If tonight doesn't work then let us know when in the next 24 hours works for you.

and Tachy, are you using an internet translator for your posts?

Hehe, I understand what Tachywaxon is saying, but Bcool is just very convincing. that is all. A lot of the stuff he suggests seems very reasonable to me and is honestly what I would do when not warring.


If you want disagreement with him, I'm sticking with my whipping and more military out of Isengarde opinion. I've seen Justinian and Surveyman send armies across the entire map to backstab me when I least expected it.

What if our scout axeman dies to a lucky barb? What if our low power rating and close borders with North and West Witches triggers a 2nd mobilzation against us? A dogpile would be a disaster for fastest finish time. I think the AI power rating is both of the individual ones combined. Our demographic screen says we are last in soldiers.

In short, I'd really like to see a few units garrisoned in Isengarde so we can't get caught with our pants down. All my intincts say that we are too economy heavy and too military light with these random unpredictable paired AI.

Do we know what turn the southern witches went into war prep mode?

We must have at least 15 turn warning right, since the stack wouldn't be sent until they are in war prep mode right?

I'm not sure exactly when it happened but it seems to be some time after T100. Post #1572


That fist lasts until their stack of doom reaches the borders of their target and war is declared, or until they change their mind and call it off.
I'm not sure if war prep mode starts when their stack starts moving or not.

That fist lasts until their stack of doom reaches the borders of their target and war is declared, or until they change their mind and call it off.
I'm not sure if war prep mode starts when their stack starts moving or not

Click to expand...

My understanding is the fist appears when the AI go into war prep mode. So there is a period of building military units, then a check, are we powerful enough? then a war declaration. I can't imagine the stack starts moving on war prep mode appearance, there must be at least a 5-10 turn war buildup phase as I understand it.

I just opened the T103 real game save and it was there, so they went into war prep mode as early at T101.

If we assume the worst case scenario, the stack was prepared before they went into war prep mode (seems highly unlikely) and the stack left their borders the turn they went into war prep mode, then there is still an absolute minimum of 15 tiles from any conceivable Shaka or Mansa's culture.

The earliest the stack could conceivably get to us is T116 then in the unbelievably worst case scenario. By T116 we would have at least an axe and a spear and would be in slavery revolt.

I think the military yes, but I would rather build the courthouse and chop a forest for an axe and spear (and skip the lighthouse).

The courthouse is big for us. Those espionage points are easily worth 3 times their value in science. I think it is worth the very very small risk it puts us under. The courthouse with spy specialist would produce roughly 22 science per turn (6 espionage * 3 + 4 raw science from the spy). Not to mention the at least 3 gold savings from the courthouse itself.

If we really are worried about this, send the great spy to find the edges of Mansa and Shaka culture.

Finding the northern borders of Gandhi's lands is not a big priority if we really think there is a stack of doom risk.

Sending the great spy costs us a lot less than forgoing the courthouse.

I'm not sure of the mechanics when an AI goes into war prep mode.

I do have some memories of making it to 1AD with no real military to speak of on Emperor. I found out which AI were militaristic



If the South Witches turn out to be aggressive with war, then perhaps the North Witches and East Witches have more peaceful peace-weights, since they had annoyed relations with the South Witches when they first met.

Meh, I don't like the idea of diverting the Great Spy. It is finally on some roads and revealing city after city of the West Witches which we get vision on.


If you are really that adamanent about Courthouse first, I'll stop complaining if our barb hunting axeman keeps an eye out for any South Witches Stack of Doom and we put Isengarde onto making military units after the courthouse is complete.

I concur with your worst case estimate. I only envision something worse in the event a South Witch chariot rolls up to Isengarde's borders and decides to kick off a war all by itself Can't say I recall that ever happening to me before though.

We can compromise.

whipping the chariot only loses 1 hammer in whip overflow and gets the courthouse to finish end of T109.
Then Isengard grows to 6 pop on T110 (and can run a spy specialist)
Then an axe can be started on T110 and finish T112 (to be able to move T113) (with an option to push it to T112 if we don't run the spy one turn)
A spear finishes T113 I believe with a chop, then we have options... lighthouse or more military units depending on if the threat is real or not.


Seems better, Tachy was right about the whip I think.
(the cost might be a little less research from isengard since it won't be able to run a scientist during the currency run, made up slightly by the earlier courthouse)

(and no diversion of the great spy)

bcool said:

We can compromise.

whipping the chariot only loses 1 hammer in whip overflow and gets the courthouse to finish end of T109.
Then Isengard grows to 6 pop on T110 (and can run a spy specialist)
Then an axe can be started on T110 and finish T112 (to be able to move T113) (with an option to push it to T112 if we don't run the spy one turn)
A spear finishes T113 I believe with a chop, then we have options... lighthouse or more military units depending on if the threat is real or not.


Seems better, Tachy was right about the whip I think.
(the cost might be a little less research from isengard since it won't be able to run a scientist during the currency run, made up slightly by the earlier courthouse)

(and no diversion of the great spy)

Click to expand...

That sounds ok to me.

mabraham said:

There's been a good window for comment and we seem to have reasonable agreement on most areas. I think you should pick a time and play!

Click to expand...

That sure was fast agreement! Unless Walter_Wolf PPP broken in parts caused more discussion, it looked like it brought far more discussion. Anyways, I haven't play yet; something may surprise us during the real Thing.
Today is out of question; I can't take another day far into night. Tomorrow is wednesday, the sh*tty day for me as I start at 8:00 A.M. and arrive at home around 7:30 P.M. Considering the "trifles" I have to do, 9:00 P.M. is the minimal time I can start something.

I will see. It not necessary to play all 10 turns and the half may bring us more decision maker information.
I'll see...yeah.

bcool said:

I wish others would argue with me more too. I respect you wanting to do it on your own and we need multiple people looking for what is best.

Click to expand...

I will try to gainsay from now on, but that style of play is so unnatural to me. The espionage aspect is hieroglyphic to give an example. Only in BOTM44 I used spied to trigger revolts in cities to take down fast defenses.

bcool said:

And no I'm not around all the time... I do sleep.

Click to expand...

No, you're not. To be serious, you seems noctambule (night owl), or have shrunken periods of sleep. But still, while you are at ~9:00 right now, I am at 00:06 A.M. I tend to forget time zones shifting.

bcool said:

Post the final PPP and let us know when you want to play. tonight isn't out of the question assuming you are making agreed upon changes. If tonight doesn't work then let us know when in the next 24 hours works for you.

and Tachy, are you using an internet translator for your posts?

Click to expand...

I guess almost exactly 24 hours later I can play a bit of the game. It is just so bad this times with the worst day of the week.

Internet translator? Do I write so bad? While I am actually french speaker, I didn't know my written english was so broken. Sure, some posts seem awkward, but this is for the best. Here, I have to speed up to be productive. And yes my english is quite unnatural. Mixing of different types of english words (slang, colloquial, archaic, sometimes literature word), lack of use of phrasal verbs, bad grammar I guess, etc.

Bon alors, quelle est cette raison pour une telle étrange question, mon cher Bryan?

Okay, from now on, any changes, additions made on the same PPP post (difficult to miss with all these colors) will have notes stacking up at the bottom of the PPP. That way, no need to read it all repetitively.