Inviting all PBEMers! LIVE network game next week (July 9-12, 2012)?

[Imperator Knoedel]

I´d prefer the "you stay up the night" approach, that´s what I´m doing right now anyway so at least that would be fair. That is if you don´t sleep right now or something.

 

[Nighthawk419]

haha chances are I will be staying up pretty late tonight so... yeah that could work. It looks like its just me and you though for now. Lets just plan on getting together later tonight/today and starting it up and go until it ends. There are usually other people on the gamespy network so we can get some randoms to start with us at least.

just email me and we will figure it out - amatczak1@hotmail

 

[Nighthawk419]

Bump bump - Knoedel and I are starting a gamespy game in about an hour. Settings TBD, but it will be slower paced compared to the normal games on there. Anyone is welcome to join, my gamespy ID is Nighthawk419...

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

My ID is ImperatorKnoedel apparently, I just guessed it and my password since I hadn´t used Gamespy for ages, and guessed it correctly at that.

I´d say Hub, although I wouldn´t mind if you´d rather have another map.

 

[Nighthawk419]

Yes its regular 3.19 BTS, no mods or anything.

I managed to get my buddy to join us, he will be in for a good 4 hours probably, so we have 3 locked in. I also just emailed Eclipse to see if he can get a decent connection to play tonight too.

Hub is fine, although I did a quick game with just my buddy last night and it was Hub, so I'll see if he minds doing it again or trying something new.

I have food that I'm finishing, then calling the wife, so we will be recruiting random players no later than GMT 0100, or good old USA eastern time 8:00 PM.

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

Well I´m already in the lobby and now reading the wikipedia page on GMT as my whole life seems to have been a lie what with me not living in GMT+1 as I always thought I would.

Edit: No wait it´s just because of Sumer (really I can´t let that one go) time that I am two hours ahead of GMT, apparently I live indeed in a GMT+1 zone. (I think...)

 

[D!CK_VII]

well i dont have umpteen hours to commit but what i think would be cool is say a wednesday nite game.

 

[Nighthawk419]

Dick you can start with us... we will get pretty damn far in about 4 hours, most may not survive that long.

 

[shlks]

What's happened here?

Ahah! You're playing right now...

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

Yep we did, but then that one guy whose name I don´t remember dropped because we were ganging up on him and then that phisportsguy didn´t want anymore and then I tried to rejoin the server because of some bug but the game won´t let me, telling me something of not being able to connect to the host. Gamespy being Gamespy I can´t even send Nighthawk a message ingame while he is playing, so I guess he is still waiting for me to rejoin which I gave up because I ran out of options.

In general the game was fun with lots of intrigue, thanks in great part to me who managed to set everyone against everyone which would have led to my domination victory wouldn´t there be this stupid selection bug and my inability to rejoin. Anyway, Nighthawk thought he could sneak away with an AP cheese victory while we were gangbanging that Mayan guy, but as soon I figured this out with my deductive skills (Islamic AP just got founded, Nighthawk the only one with Islam as state religion, Nighthawk bragging about how he will win via the AP) I switched back from Free Religion (such a shame after building Shwedagon Paya) to OR with Islam in 2 turns and showed him the combined power of a huge number of cities and the Hanging Gardens, not to mention the half dozen of missionaries, and voila I had almost double the votes of him. I just love it when someone else´s plan backfires.
Not that there weren´t times of rage however, what with me running two Scientists the whole time in that one city and at the very last turn before a Great Person pops the auto governour thinks it´s a good time to put a Priest in. Guess what type spawned... yeah. At least I found comfort in the fact that Nighthawk tried the whole game long to get a GP for his Holy City and never succeeded while I got my GS finally in the early Renaissance.
There sure would be a lot more of this game to tell about, but I didn´t sleep the night and am kinda hyper right now, so that´s it for now I guess.

Cheers.

 

[rd13]

sounds very nice, i like the way you guys planned it to be with slow turn timer. if i ever get a free pass for a weekend or something, id be happy to jump on this merry bandwagon

 

[Nighthawk419]

It was a fun game, here's a little summary from my perspective, now that I've just gotten up

WARNING: this will be long. But it did give me an idea for a new PBEM, so good for us!

Game started with a small Hub map, 4 human players:

Warlord - Maya - west side
Phisportsfan - Inca - north side
Knoedel - Sumer (of course) - south side
Nighthawk - Russia - east side

Early goings, not much happened. Inca founded the first religion (Christianity - choose religions was on, my favorite option) but Russia founded 4 of the next 5 in the early days. My plan was the cultural victory and expanding into the hub asap to keep the focus there while my culture cities in the back just spammed culture.

Well St. Pete was founded as my gateway city and ended up being the biggest non-culture-bombed culture city on the planet, founding Islam, which I ran the whole game and spammed and 1 other religion. Knoedel even said it was a nice city towards the end, which made me proud

Anyway - I'm walking my archer-settler over to the hub to settle a nice border city and what do I see but Sumerian culture sitting there. I didnt get the spot I wanted, but moved 1N and got up on a tundra hill, losing a little production but basically the same city as I was hoping for. Immediately a culture clash with Knoedel as we were 3 squares apart. I spam ancient and classical era culture buildings (with 4 religions, thats a lot!) and the whole game was slowly winning the culture war there, although progress was slow. I did quickly take "Knoedel's Marble" and he never got it back the whole game

Anyway, with that city founded, Knoedel and I were bickering like an old married couple since he controlled the rest of the hub... I rex out most of the rest of my area, although I told Knoedel - there were gems that I never got just outside the reach of my capital, so frustrating. City planning was admitedly poor on my part, too spread out. I blame it on too many beers and paying too much attention to the hub with Knoedel.

We didn't go to war though, military buildup stopped and I managed to get Knoedel to give me gold in exchange for open borders Another minor victory. Anyway, one thing I learned is that the city governor SUCKS. Always hit the "food" icon along with something else, because I didnt do that and my cities all got capped out at like size 6-7-8 or so. Very efficient small cities, but there was room for plenty of growth and for hundreds of turns the governor didnt grow them. Of course I didnt notice. I hate the governor, thats why I like PBEM.

Well as we are growing and rexing and whatnot, Warlord started running away with it. He founded a city near the hub and culture bombed it to push Knoedel back and threaten to flip his city culturally. The main thing for me was he was running away in tech, he had just gotten civil service and if he had hooked up his iron would have been pumping maces while the rest of us had swords and elephants. We all saw that and decided he had to be taken down, otherwise we would lose. He looked at it as the PBEMers ganging up on him, but from my perspective there was no other choice, he was going to crush us all if we didnt stop him. Thats the problem with a FFA.

Anyway, we came up with a plan that Knoedel and I would go right at his spoke of the hub, while Phisports would pretend to be on Warlords side and be a backup wave if and when we needed it, turning on him in the end. The first wave consisted of Knoedel cats and swords, Russian swords and horse archers. My swords and horse archers ended up being the crackers, Knoedels forces took the city (bad planning on my part.) Well our combined first wave took his culture-bomb hub city, and his counter attack was... well, surprisingly small. He quit shortly after that saying we teamed up on him and the game started falling apart. However things are never as bad as they seem, he shouldn't have quit. He was basically warring with Knoedel alone, because I stopped producing units and was focusing on the AP and wonder spam in my culture cities. The war was going well enough, and I had Knoedel between me and Warlord and Knoedel had a stack left, so I decided to try and focus back on my victory condition and take advantage of my ally. Inca had a stack of elephants roaming the hub and was at war with everyone, but didnt actually attack anything and wasn't needed vs Warlord.

Anyway - with my stack gone and the fact that I stopped producing units left me terribly weak when Warlord quit. I expected him to stick around at least a little bit, and I would send a unit here and there to the front while I blew up culture. I was hoping he would keep Knoedel occupied for a while, but he left and KNoedel didnt care about the AI.

Meanwhile Inca had called me (hes my real life friend ) and had to go to bed since it was about 4 hours later, 1am my time. Ultimately what it came down to was triangle diplomacy never works, someone would team up with the other to take out the third, and most likely it was me bc I was the weakest militarily after my plan fell apart when Warlord left. Since Inca was going to bed and I wasn't he made peace with everyone and decided to quit and leave it to Knoedel and I. Of course I had no military, so I essentially pleaded for peace, telling him that he'd have no one to play with and talk to if he took me out right away

Knoedel ended up making peace but didnt go after the AI (not sure why) and we just built for a little and talked about the game. By that point I had the AP, but like he said, it was obvious what I was doing and he spread Islam all over his cities, which were twice my size because of the stupid governor. I was the AP leader, but couldnt pass anything, we were essentially blocked. At that point I realized the city governor error and started growing cities, but even when maxed out we went from 2/3, 1/3 to 50/50 with votes.

I continued with the culture and wonder spamming, but was light years away from the victory condition. Knoedel was running a nice espionage economy against me and could see everything I was doing. I knew I couldnt keep up with military so at that point it was me playing out the string. Clearly Knoedel would have taken me out whenever he wanted.

I begrudgingly call knoedel the winner, even though the AI Maya was still the tech leader and had guns when he left. We can't have a Noble level AI win Good job by Knoedel, tons of errors on my part, basically when Warlord gave up on fighting it screwed my plans and that was that.

It did give me a fun idea for a PBEM game though - Hub map, always war, but cultural city flips are allowed. Thinking about starting that after my vacation...

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

Hi there Nighthawk, sorry again for just leaving but the server just wouldn´t let me rejoin.

Early goings, not much happened. Inca founded the first religion (Christianity - choose religions was on, my favorite option) but Russia founded 4 of the next 5 in the early days. My plan was the cultural victory and expanding into the hub asap to keep the focus there while my culture cities in the back just spammed culture.

Huh, I actually thought Culture was just a spontaneous fall-back plan after realizing that you wouldn´t win by AP.

Knoedel even said it was a nice city towards the end, which made me proud

Now that´s just out of context, what I meant was that you could have easily given that one fish to a city working the gems you complained about all the time, St. Petersburg didn´t need it because it had two other sources anyway and was surrounded by Grassland.

I spam ancient and classical era culture buildings

Huh, probably I should have done that too instead of working Cottages and building Commerce-multipliers and training troops, that may be the reason you were the tech and military leader. (oh wait )

I did quickly take "Knoedel's Marble" and he never got it back the whole game

You win this time!

there were gems that I never got just outside the reach of my capital, so frustrating.

You easily could have had another nice Commerce city between Moscow and St. Petersburg but:

City planning was admitedly poor on my part

Yep that, although I am not sure mine was that great either, i´m just so dependent on BUG´s map planning tool that I´m kinda helpless without it, but at least I didn´t waste any great resources.

I blame it on too many beers and paying too much attention to the hub with Knoedel.

Now I even sabotaged you without knowing it? Awesome!

We didn't go to war though, military buildup stopped and I managed to get Knoedel to give me gold in exchange for open borders

Now that was just mean! :/

Anyway, one thing I learned is that the city governor SUCKS. Always hit the "food" icon along with something else, because I didnt do that and my cities all got capped out at like size 6-7-8 or so. Very efficient small cities, but there was room for plenty of growth and for hundreds of turns the governor didnt grow them. Of course I didnt notice. I hate the governor, thats why I like PBEM.

Interesting, I always have the opposite problem with the governor when not clicking on the icons under the automation, it rather works an unimproved dry grassland than a plains hill mine on a river. But I complained about that hub city anyway during the game, working Ocean over Mines.
Lust like with the GPs and GSs we always seemed to have the problem the other one wanted.
Yep the governor sucks.

He founded a city near the hub and culture bombed it to push Knoedel back and threaten to flip his city culturally.

Note to lurkers: That is another city of mine, I founded two on the hub, one to the West and one to the East.

Anyway, we came up with a plan that Knoedel and I would go right at his spoke of the hub, while Phisports would pretend to be on Warlords side and be a backup wave if and when we needed it, turning on him in the end.

Honestly I´d preferred to just send Phisports´ troops along with ours, that fake support backup thingy just led nowhere and we could have taken that city already on the first turn had we had his Elephants.

The first wave consisted of Knoedel cats and swords, Russian swords and horse archers. My swords and horse archers ended up being the crackers, Knoedels forces took the city (bad planning on my part.)

Ya know, you could have waited with "cracking" until I bombarded the city defenses down and made some collateral damage, but no, you preferred to suicide while I was picking the catas with the appropriate promotions. What gives?

He was basically warring with Knoedel alone, because I stopped producing units and was focusing on the AP and wonder spam in my culture cities.

I knew it! I really wondered why you didn´t whip some Horsies at least, they could have caught up and we (or I seemingly) could have needed them.

Inca had a stack of elephants roaming the hub and was at war with everyone, but didnt actually attack anything and wasn't needed vs Warlord.

Erm well yes he was needed but you guys didn´t want to support my aspirations to domination out of some reason. :/

I was hoping he would keep Knoedel occupied for a while, but he left and KNoedel didnt care about the AI.

To be honest my stack wasn´t strong enough to take on Maya even just as AI and I feared that you would backstab me as soon as my army was too exhausted in Maya, you were Cathy after all.

Of course I had no military, so I essentially pleaded for peace, telling him that he'd have no one to play with and talk to if he took me out right away

Now that I come to think of it, I actually could have captured that Hub city stealing my marble at least, damn I really overestimated your strength all the time it seems.

Knoedel ended up making peace but didnt go after the AI (not sure why)

I was thinking in my paranoia that you had some kind of ace up in your sleeve and I still needed to replace the losses in my stack, not to speak of my weak defenses, I only had like 3 units in my frontline cities most of the time.

Clearly Knoedel would have taken me out whenever he wanted.

Only my paranoia saved you apparently. lol

It did give me a fun idea for a PBEM game though - Hub map, always war, but cultural city flips are allowed. Thinking about starting that after my vacation...

Uh uh uh I want to join!

 

[shlks]

I wish I participated. I'm itching to play a full civ game right now but I'm kinda reluctant to give the AI a go. Ah, oh well.

 

[Nighthawk419]

Sorry we missed you sohleks... I had chance to play and decided to go for it since there wasn't a guarantee anyone would be available if I'd waited.

If it makes you feel any better... PBEM games are generally better than live games, just too many issues with the internet and people dropping!

Plus a full game would take literally days... I played on a little with Knoedel and even though I was to the just pump culture stage, it would have taken me another 300 turns to get there