EOC2 - Ruling the Waves

[Tallanas]

Pre-flight check...

Coming into a game this developed means I have a *lot* of catching up to do! Also have to do some intelligent guesswork about opponents and short-term military plans - even reading through the last 50 turns or so of turnlogs can't really give me the insight into the game that you all have from playing from the start... However! Things are looking good, and there are some basics that are easily guessable - ToE/Scientific Method, Industrialization, Replaceable parts, finishing off the Dutch... More than enough for 10 turns, methinks!

IBT - Electricity arrives, start on Scientific method...

Turn 1 - 1430

Some little bits of MM, begin preparations to eradicate the Dutch. Lots of workers, lots of RR

IBT - Dutch and English make peace... Looks like Lizzy is keen to volunteer herself as the next victim!

Turn 2 - 1435

Lots more worker turns, if only they could be relied upon to act intelligently on their own! Checking diplomatic situation, discover that Byzantium would pay 120g plus 131gpt for Steam Power... Tempting, as we are a little low on cash, but we can't go divulging all our secrets, can we?

IBT - Portuguese Ancient Cavalry lands near Delft...

Turn 3 - 1440

Capture Delft with Elite Sipahi, no leader Didn't even wait for the cannon support, since you just *knew* that Portugal would capture it with the AC

IBT - nothing to report

Turn 4 - 1445

Quell resistance in Delft, start planning for next victim... Move transports, artillery etc with a view to an invasion of England (which can occur in the next set of turns)...

IBT - The Byzantines want something! How intriguing... They offer us an MPP/ROP for 6 gpt... On a side note, they will now pay 141gpt for Steam Power... English embargo versus Dutch expires - frankly, I wonder which Dutch Lizzy wants to trade with, the galleon full of Sipahi is almost there!

Turn 5 - 1450

More military movement, lots of worker turns... Byz up to offering 188gpt for Steam Power. Carthage's Offer? Furs and a World Map...

IBT - nothing to report

Turn 6 - 1455

More of the same... Theodora's offer for Steam Power up to 300g + 205gpt... AI has Nationalism...

IBT - Spain draws Byzantium into an alliance vs the Dutch. Barcelona builds Shakespeare's Theater...

Turn 7 - 1460

Spices deal with Spain expires - they want Steam Power, wines and incense to renew... Nothing else will do. War against Spain or Rngland would net us some much-needed luxuries right now. In fact, war against Spain would get us spices and gems... The gathering forces of Sips and cannon in the ships bound for England may just get to go to Barcelona instead

An empire-wide rebellion threatens to kick us where it hurts... Must get luxuries! The only ones available are dyes from Portugal. The options are Saltpeter or Medicine. Seeing as he is the only guy who doesn't know about penicillin, I decide to enlighten him. I would rather he had hospitals than guns...

In other news, Gouda falls to the Sipahi onslaught. One down, one to go!

IBT - Dutch sue for peace. I laugh.

Turn 8 - 1465

Ramp down the science rate, as Sci Method arrives in one turn, change Bursa to Military Academy from Shake's Theatre...

Tillburg suffers fearsome bombardment and then a Sipahi charge... Au Revoir, William!

IBT - Saltpeter deal with Spain expires...

Turn 9 - 1470

Change Bursa to ToE, best we can do is 11 turns. Start researching Industrialization, although this can be changed to RP if we prefer...


And that is where I am saving the game and handing off to the next player. Having destroyed the Dutch, researched Scientific method, and assembled one hell of a force to go plunder another unfortunate foe, i feel I have had quite an eventful first set of turns, and it seems a nice clean break-off point

Tal

 

[Tallanas]

Poor William!

 

[scoutsout]

Nice turns Tal!

 

[SesnOfWthr]

Indeed. That's really jumping in with both feet, huh?

Also, only Bede and I have been here from the beginning and the plans have changed so much that it feels like I just joined as well.

Also, how is our rep? Did all the deals exopire before William breathed his last? I think they were due to end before your eigth, but I'm not sure .....

IIRC, we're a republic, so those happiness issues should go away rather quickly with William gone.

That's not to imply that I wouldn't like to grab another lux or two though....

 

[scoutsout]

I liked Tal's idea of getting 2 lux from Spain. We might want to think about building some footsoldiers to free up those (expensive) Sipahi in our newly acquired Dutch holdings...

 

[Tallanas]

Actually we're a monarchy. I imagine that if we were a Republic, we'd have been brought grovelling to our knees a while back by endless protest marches through the streets of Istanbul

Also, how is our rep? Did all the deals exopire before William breathed his last? I think they were due to end before your eigth, but I'm not sure .....

Occasionally I have dim moments - partly due to inexperience, but partly just ignorance! What deals would have affected our rep? Deals with whom?

As for our rep, everyone is annoyed apart from Portugal, who are cautious, but Carthage and Byzantium were annoyed from turn 1, and England grew annoyed when they signed a treaty with the Dutch, so I don't claim responsibility for that!

Spain was polite when I started, though, so it does look like I've turfed our rep somehow.

If it's any consoaltion, this was through sheer ignorance rather than carelessness or malevolence!

 

[SesnOfWthr]

We had initiated a dogpile on the Dutch. Although a couple civs made peace with the Dutch and dirtied their own names, we still had some 2 or 3 deals left with 6 or 8 turns each for MA's. While I believe the deals were expired, I don't know if the "always renegotiate" option was turned on, so the deals may have still been in effect. Thus, when William was destroyed, that would have canceled the MA's and hurt our rep.

You should always check for "active deals" before making peace, or eliminating a rival, especially in SG's where it's easy to miss a note like that. In case you were'nt aware, eliminating a rival in the middle of a MA counts as breaking the deal, since the MA can no longer be honored. In that type of situation, you should wait for the deal to expire, or get your partner to eliminate the rival, giving them the rep hit.

This whole discourse was basically for informational purposes, as at this point our rep is basically irrelevant. The only thing it might matter for is luxury deals, and we can just as easily (and more inexpensively) go take those, so it doesn't matter.

EDIT: you're absolutely right, scout, we certainly don't need to be using our lovely sipahi for MP's, there are much better uses for them.

 

[scoutsout]

@Tal: IIRC, Bede organized a "dogpile" on his 4th turn (basically signing the world against the Dutch).

This is one of those really fine points that doesn't make much sense, intuitively. If you have an active Military Alliance, and you take the last city of the target civ, it counts as breaking a deal. This is an aspect of the game that I don't particularly like, but have learned to live with.

The first 20 turns are 'locked', the only way to get out of it is to sign peace (which also breaks the deal). If the 20 turns have expired, but your ally is still at war, the alliance still stands, but you can open up diplomacy with your ally (allies), take the alliance(s) off the table (ending it) and then finish kicking the target civ off the planet.

In GOTM31 I let a war drag out an additional 14 turns with a stack of knights next to the last Iroquois city (on a 2-tile island), just so I could end a MA honorably and not take the rep hit. (I went for a diplomatic win...)

I suspect you could have taken the MAs off the table and avoided the rep hit, but it's no biggie. If we go after Spain, the world is going to stay good an annoyed with us. I suspect they'll each get a chance to get good and furious with us in due time. :devil2:

Edit: Cross-posted with Sesn; and I'm no longer sure when the dogpile was formed....

 

[SesnOfWthr]

haha - beat you to it Scout.

Edit: If the deal was past the 20 turns, but not canceled, do we still take the rep hit, as we fulfilled our end of the deal, and then some?

 

[scoutsout]

Edit: If the deal was past the 20 turns, but not canceled, do we still take the rep hit, as we fulfilled our end of the deal, and then some?

If the MA is active and you kick the target off the planet, it's a rep hit; however - if it's past 20 turns you can open up diplomacy with the ally, go to "Active Deals", click on the alliance and withdraw it. This doesn't mean that your ally is at peace with the enemy, but it ends the formal alliance.

I did this in Bugs1 at the end of a war with the Zulu, ending an alliance with Spain against Shaka to do a little "pointy stick research".

Edit: part of the problem with MAs is that they don't end automatically. They end one of 3 ways:

1) Sign peace (rep hit)
2) Kick AI off planet w/ standing alliance (rep hit)
3) End alliance while at war (no rep hit)

Does that make it about as clear as mud?

 

[Tallanas]

Hurrah! On my very first set of turns, I am revealed as being more ignorant than a bus-load of village idiots!

As you say, Scout, it's certainly unintuitive to make an alliance to destroy someone, but actually achieving the aim breaks that very alliance in an unamicable fashion...

Bah! Ah well, you live and learn. Thanks for the explanation guys, next time, I'll be more careful when kicking someone off the planet...

Tal

 

[SesnOfWthr]

I wouldn't sweat it Tal.

As stated:
1. It doesn't make any sense
2. It doesn't matter at this point in this game, at least not much.

It is much better for you to find this out in this fashion than to completely hamstring another game by doing it much earlier and sullying your rep in the AA, or something.

 

[Tallanas]

Thought I'd go back and check an auto-save to see what the exact situation was. Now see if this makes any sense

1460 AD: Spain is polite; Portugal is polite; Byzantium is polite. Carthage and England are annoyed. Alliances are still current with Spain and Portugal ( :grimace: ) and I have just done the Dyes/Medicine trade with the Portuguese...

1470 AD: I've killed the Dutch; Spain annoyed and the the Saltpeter deal ends; Portugal cautious, Byzantium annoyed (presumably fallout from my rep hits with the others?); Carthage and England still annoyed...

 

[SesnOfWthr]

The curious part of that is the Byzantines canceled the MA on their end during my turns, IIRC.

As scout said, yep about as clear as mud.

 

[Bede]

The monk chimes in onthe debate:
Attitude and reputation are not the same, though frequently confused...

As an example go look at GK1, a non -oscillating AWE game. Throughout the game we were always at war with one or more opponents, sometimes everybody but one, and consequently the other nations' attitude was always "Furious". Yet we had preserved our reputation so that we could make gpt for tech or resource deals for cash with anybody.

The only way to tell if a rep hit has occurred is to attempt to trade a resource or a lux for cash, or buy a tech for gpt. If the counter-party is insulted and then mentions the betrayal of themselves or some third party during the negotiations, then the trading reputation is shot, even if their attitude is gracious.

So the only way to tell is to test the waters with a deal meeting the parameters above.

A trading rep hit is a problem but not a disaster as you can always drag the other party to the peace treaty table and force the deal down their throats. That only works, of course, if you are perceived as at least as strong as the other party.

All that said, a rousing introduction to the game, and much in keeping with the overall aproach of this seafaring, finally, aggressive nation-state. Way to go!!!

And, yes, Spanish luxuries would make a nice addition to the Ottoman treasure chests.

 

[Tallanas]

Bede's Knowledge

Thanks to all for the pointers... There's nothing like playing in rarefied company to help the old learning curve!

I only hope it won't get too much to take in After trying to work out what on earth would possess them to design a game that punished successful alliances... well -


Tal

 

[SesnOfWthr]

Actually, i wasn't convinced that our rep would be hurt, as the deals were past the twenty (no offense Scout).

I made a couple inquiries and have yet to see a definitive answer....

Anyhow, I've found that most times a single transgression can be overcome.

 

[scoutsout]

Anyhow, I've found that most times a single transgression can be overcome.

Yup! In this case, we shall overcome at the point of the bayonet and the hoofbeats of the Sipahi...

...too bad we're not the Ogallala Sioux, or we could get "Man Afraid of His Horses" as a Great Leader....

...that's an abbreviation... his full name was:

"Man who is so fierce, his enemies are afraid even of his horses"

Soo...on to more important questions: who are we gonna next?

...and hey Bede, wanna build some Paras and/or Marines?

 

[SesnOfWthr]

A picture is worth a thousand words, right?

We all could agree this game is essentially won now, might be fun to build some less popular units for the end like clads, marines, and paras as Scout suggested.

Edit: i thinkthe roster now stands:

Bede
SesnOfWthr
Tallanas - just played
Planetfall - up now
Scoutsout - Licking his chops

 

[Tallanas]

Interesting picture there... If the lovely Theodora is to be believed, we may have more than just the one stain on our reputation! I still had alliances with Spain and Portugal, but England had already opted out on me...

Have you guys been bullying Lizzy?

On another point, I think boats full of marines has a lot going for it... Will be a change from the regular tank corps victories... Let the grunts do the hard yards this time!

Tal