PH08: The People of the Deer

[pholkhero]

(for BtS)

I'm not sure if Imhotep will mind if I use up a number in the Deviant Mind series, but I AM sure i don't care

This game won't be as whacky as Immy's, but should provide some unique challenges in its own right.

She closed her eyes. “The people I Learned the Law of Life from, Louis, are the people who actually gave the law that name, the Ihalmiut Eskimos, who lived in the Great Barrens of Canada, inside the Arctic Circle. Theirs was a strange life by our standards, but its strangeness makes it very easy for us to comprehend. The Ihalmiut were the People of the Deer. They were this because deer was what they lived on. They were completely dependent on the deer, because other animals were rare, and vegatation that’s edible by humans is practically nonexistent inside the Arctic circle. It’s hard to imagine living entirely on meat—never a piece of bread, never a piece of chocolate, never a banana or a peach or an ear of corn—but they did and were perfectly healthy and happy.

“They’d never have to explain who and what they were to their own children, but if they did, they’d say something like this: ‘We know you look at us and call us men ad women, but this is only our appearance, for we’re not men and women, we’re deer. The flesh that grows on our bones is the flesh of deer, for it’s made from the flesh of the deer we’ve eaten. The eyes that move in our heads are the eyes of deer, and we look at the world in their stead and see what they might have seen. The fire of life that once burned in the deer now burns in us, and we lie their lives and walk in their tracks across the hand of god. This is why we’re the People of the Deer. The deer aren’t our prey or our possessions—they’re us. They’re us at one point in the cycle of life and we’re them at another point in cycle. The deer are twice your parents, for your mother and father are deer, and the deer that gave you its life today was mother and father to you as well, since you wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for that deer.’ ”

(from The Story of B, by Daniel Quinn)

Leader: Sitting Bull of the Native Americans


Rivals: 6
Difficulty: Monarch
Map: Boreal
Mapsize: Standard
Starting Era: Ancient
Speed: Epic
Victory Conditions: All enabled, but we can only win by Culture. Also, we will be borrowing the "Honorable" ruleset from Realms Beyond (w/a few modifications)

Spoiler :

Originally Posted by RB Website
1. Every civ has a right to defend itself. A just war is one in which you are not the aggressor. If any civ attacks you unprovoked, you are entitled to remain at war with them and to take retaliatory action upon their units and lands for as long as you wish, up to and including their unconditional surrender.

2. You are not allowed to become a Police State, a Vassalage, or a Theocracy. You must adopt Emancipation (and stay there) once you have the option.

3. You are allowed to refuse tribute demands. You are not allowed to issue demands of your own.

4. You are allowed to sign Defense Pacts.

5. If a friendly civ requests your aid in time of war, you are allowed to join them in the war.

6. If you joined an ally in a war, and they have made peace with the enemy, then you must also make peace with that enemy if the enemy requests peace (unless they are demanding compensation for peace -- you do not ever have to submit to tribute demands.)

7. You may not choose to raze a captured city that the game would allow you to keep. (This includes barbarian cities!)

8. Giving away captured cities is only honorable if they are given to an ally who owned them when the war began. (If you "liberate" an ally's city, you MUST offer to give it back!)

09. Your Spies are only allowed to observe or conduct counter-espionage, not to sabotage or carry out other aggressive missions.

10. Pillaging land improvements in neutral territory, to deny them to a rival or enemy, is dastardly. No bandits on the highways, please.

Finally, we will be using DM SG etiquette, so please familiarize yourself before signing up:

Spoiler :

Alpha: The quality of your report outweighs the quality of your play. We’re here to have fun, and, of course, winning is fun, but losing in style is preferable to a boring win. Remember, your report should be a new reply to alert other players.

Bravo: Reports should be detailed, with plenty of screen shots and player commentary, explanations, musings, etc; an auto-log dump will not suffice. Shots of the F9 screens and overview shots of the empire are nice too, once in a while.

Charlie: Punctuality rocks! “24/48” means post a "got it" within 24 hours of when the last save was posted, and play within 48 hours of that ‘got it.’ Waiting 47 hours to ask for a skip is lame. Punk out two times in a row, and you’ll be dropped from the roster. Skips and swaps are fine, but try to let us know sooner, rather than later.

Delta: Major game decisions (war/peace declarations, religion swaps, city placement, etc) should be arrived at via group consensus.
1. If the team disagrees with you, either argue your case better, or do it their way. Do NOT just blow them off and do it your way because it's your turn.
2. However, if there’s no consensus and you’re up, do it your way and explain why. Conversely, if someone else is up, don't whine when they do it their way.
3. Similarly, overruling techs or city builds is rude and should be done via consensus, barring an emergency.
4. In extraordinary situations, sometimes an opportunity presents itself that the group didn't foresee. If the consequences of it are great, players should stop, and refer the question to the group.

Echo: Being a better player does not give you the right to belittle anyone else or their play. Other people are going to disagree with you on major decisions; get used to the idea, and play nice. If not, take your ball and go home.

Foxtrot: Thread spam is good. Trash talking, poking fun, gentle ribbing, virtual noogies, and generally horsing around are all encouraged, but don’t be rude.

Golf: Automate sparingly.
1. Workers should almost never be automated, except perhaps late-game or building a trade network. However, if you have to, set your game options to “disallow automated worker forest chopping” and “keep previous improvements.”
2. Use of the “Emphasis” buttons is fine, but let the group know and explain your reasoning (specialization is a major game decision). If you prevent growth in a city, let the group know and remind them to take it off. Do NOT let the governor select build orders.
3. Sending units on go-to routes that last beyond your set is acceptable only if they’re heading for a rally point or if you otherwise inform your teammates. NEVER fortify Great People.

India: Sign spamming is rude. Signs can be helpful reminders, but too many signs makes them easily ignored. Once a sign is no longer valid, delete it.

Here's the start:


And i'm looking for 5 other intrepid players, first come, first served:

Roster
Pholkhero
Pigswill
Njorls
Imhotep
Trieste
OPEN

 

[pholkhero]

Wow, no one?!?

 

[TheLastOne36]

there tends to be a pattern. Most players are playing in 3-4 different games right now. in a few weeks or a month from now, most of them will be finished, which means that alot of people will be joining new games. That is when you should Bump or make a game.

 

[pigswill]

I struggle with monarch, I struggle with deviance, I certainly struggle with honourable but what the heck: "Can I join your game, mister?"

 

[FuRRie]

I've got exams, so i'll be lurking this one.
Looks like you'll be playing a very defensive game.

 

[njorls]

I'll sign up. I've read a few DM games and would like to be a part of one.

 

[pholkhero]

I struggle with monarch, I struggle with deviance, I certainly struggle with honourable but what the heck: "Can I join your game, mister?"

Sure. Timmy, do you like Gladiator movies? Ever been in a Turkish prison??

I'll sign up. I've read a few DM games and would like to be a part of one.

and done, too. Welcome aboard and good to meet ya!

I'd like to wait until we have at least another person or two before starting it off, and I've got a set to play in DMI4, but it looks like we'll get the necessaries.

I agree, the game will FOR THE MOST PART be defensive, but we'll need to worry about religions, and getting at least 9 cities (since we can't declare war of some living room) if we want to go the traditional route.

I'm also open to non-traditional routes, as well, if anyone has any ideas ~

edit: roster updated.

 

[·Imhotep·]

As you grabbed the title of my game series (I hope it was an accident for otherwise I'll have to roast you in hell - oh wait, you are already married with kids) I'll join this one. Only had one cultural victory so far and I clearly want to do another one. This is however not DMI V - it's DMP I...

Imhotep

 

[pholkhero]

This is however not DMI V - it's DMP I...

I noticed

i thought maybe the "MI" was german shorthand for Mind, rather than another word

also, it's good to see you have more time and go beyond your "1 SG at a time" rule. I think you're in jsut about every SG going on now, no??

back to the game, though, since we've got four players for now, i'll play some turns probably later tonight as I'm waiting for some input before continuing the Grand Line SG.

I think settle in place is the best move, but wonder if we should try for a religion run, esp as we need Mysticism for our Totems. Another downside is not starting w/hunting for all the Deer that abound on this map, but . . .

so, as I see it, we've got 3 opening lines that we can try: Mysticism>Religion though there's no guarantee we'd gain one, Hunting>Archery though besides the food aspect, is a dead end, or Mining>BW for chopping, whipping, Dog Soldiers ~

Has anyone been following Ozzie's "Many Leaders" game ~ i wonder how the use of the NatAmer is going there? Maybe I'll check that out in a bit.

 

[·Imhotep·]

No, the "I" in DMI clearly stands for "Imhotep". But never mind. I have some spare time now that my exams are finished, so I'm somehow making up for the time I couldn't play that much. Things will get worse in October anyway when I start my practical education at court. Until then I'm just savouring any Civ IV time I can get...

As for the game I think we should definitely go with Mysticism => Polytheism and try for grabbing Hinduism. If we have a financial or spritual Civ in the game we might not get it, but anyway it unlocks our UB and the techs are required for the Alphabet line anyway. Hunting is cheap enough to get after Polytheism.

Imhotep

 

[pholkhero]

Things will get worse in October anyway when I start my practical education at court.

come now ~ we all know you'll be in the back of the courtroom playing your turnsets for DMIPXYZ 17

I was actually thinking that we should head for mining > BW, as lame, trite and "played out" as that path is, so I would be in favor of trying something else. since there's only four of us, I'll take us two as a consensus, and try that route.

 

[njorls]

I think Mysticism, Poly is a good gambit. If we don't get it maybe we can get lucky with Judaism a little later on. We're going cultural and the 3 religions we need won't found themselves!

Is this a cylindrical map or a flat map? I rolled a Boreal map to look at in World Builder (never played one before) and the default setting was flat.

 

[pholkhero]

The map is flat, and we're in the lower-left corner.

I played 30 turns to start us off, and so far, so good . . .

4000 bc: I founded Cahokia on the spot as there didn't seem to be any good reason to move.

I started working the Grass tile by the river for 2f1c to hopefully net us our first religion. I also started on another warrior so that we could explore this map. I'm guessing it's about as large as highlands map perhaps . . .

3800, our borders popped, and a few turns later, Mysticism came in:


Also, our warrior ran into a bear in the wilderness:

His name is now "Bear-Clubber" (though he had to heal for quite a long time!).

IN 3675, the first religion dropped:

(yes, i've got choose religions on, as well as Aggressive AI ~ should I've mentioned that? ) I quickly became worried that whoever it was went after Polytheism

I could not find out any way I tried, so I simply clicked the tech bar at the top of the screen:

Notice, the gold coin? We're still in the running!

3575 bc: We met a dear neighbor:

And we hit Pop2 at Cahokia. I kept working that 2f1c grass river, and added a 1f2c sea tile. Slow growth and esp. production, but it was the best commerce yield we could get. Polytheism is now due in 9. (I was originally going to work the 1f2c sea tile first, but Poly would've taken 29 turns; this way, it only will take 26!)

A hundred years later, our warrior finally healed up and was able to leave the grove where he was attacked eons ago. Next turn (3450) our new warrior was completed, and I sent him to the north to explore more in that direction (the other warrior is heading east). I also started a worker at Cahokia, too.

3400: The treacherous Mongols stole a hut right out from under us!!

I'll show him!

I re-jiggered our tiles at Cahokia the turn before Poly dropped to get a head start on the worker a bit (w/o slowing research of course!). And so, in 3350:


And we get religion:


Also on that same turn:

I guess I really did show them

Nothing much happened after that. Our warrior in the north killed a wolf and is now healing, and T30 was 3250 bc (what an ugly number to stop at!).

Here's the immediate lands:


It's not much, but as I said, our explorer was waylaid for about 10 turns healing. We're about 5 turns from Hunting, and 10 from the completion of the worker. I think we should go Mining > BW next so that our worker will have some things to do (for now, he can camp those deer, maybe farm the grass, and once mining is in, plop one down on that stone ~ oh, uhh...Stonehenge anyone??) ~

 

[pholkhero]

Roster
Pholkhero >> Just played
Pigswill >> UP NOW for 25 turns
Njorls >> on deck for 20 turns
Imhotep >> waiting patiently for 15 turns
OPEN >> wondering if they'll ever get to play their 10 turns
OPEN >> ditto

 

[Kodii]

lurker's comment: A moderator can probably rename the thread if Imhotep gets fussy

Oh, and this game looks mighty interesting.

 

[Ozbenno]

A note from a lurker:

I notice you named the save PH08.

I think DuMp01 would be good myself.

Haven't been brave to tackle a Boreal map myself, they look mighty ugly. Good luck.

Back to the lurk

 

[pigswill]

Got it.
Brrr,its a bit nippy out there.

If we went for stonehenge and oracle in t'capital it would give us a decent supply of prophets to bulb theology and DR.

But a bit more exploring first. Maybe start on mining/bw trail.

 

[pholkhero]

A moderator can probably rename the thread if Imhotep gets fussy

Imhotep was born fussy

I notice you named the save PH08.

I think DuMp01 would be good myself.

Haven't been brave to tackle a Boreal map myself, they look mighty ugly. Good luck.

The save is PH08, the original thought for the game, but I wanted to draw notice to DM and such, and as I said, i thought the "I" was superfluous (still smarting about that mistake!)

and DuMp01, eh? I see you've been following my SG career the map looked interesting when I was tooling around once i got the game, and once I saw all those deer, the idea just came to me What else are SGs for except trying out that which we're not brave enough to do on our own?

At the very least, I think Stonehenge should be something we aim for, and oracle if we can. I have no idea what sort of wonder pace the AIs set on Monarch in BtS . . .

 

[njorls]

Stonehenge would be great for free UB in all cities, when Astronomy obsoletes them you don't make archers anymore anyway. Oracle is always nice too. Mining, BW, Masonry sound good. Were you thinking of putting a mine on the stone? Can you do that?

So, hills are few & far between in this map. And lumbermills are a long way away. Do we chop for production now or save them for later?

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

No, the "I" in DMI clearly stands for "Imhotep".

Since I still refuse to acknowledge Timon of Athens as [stupid dot] Imhotep [stupid dot], the I must stand for "Intelligent" as in, "DMI: This game is either for Deviant Minds or (I) the rest of you."