PR01 An OCC Diplomatic Excursion

[Rex Tyrannus]

A little warning. That "start" I posted up in post #37 proved to be rather interesting.

I founded the first five religions. Somehow, Toaism FIADL when I had about 4 turns left on Philosophy. Head scratcher. I can't imagine how anyone was anywhere near Philosophy.

Anyhow, Great Prophets were coming in like crazy thanks to Stonehenge and the Oracle. Pop was size 9, and I had (I think) four temples and three monasteries.

I had one Great Prophet incorporated into the city because I really didn't need another shrine. (I wasn't planning on spreading all the religions until much further in the game.)

One worker, but no improvements thanks to raging barbs. I almost built a road to Alex. It kept getting pillaged somewhere along the line, and I'd have to keep patching. Never did get the trade route.

100% science with a +8 gain per turn.

Should have built more archers, but I was expecting to bring religion to everybody....

Alex shows up and asks me to cancel OB with Cyrus. No reason. They weren't at war. I said no, because I wanted to spread the Good Word.

Few turns later Cyrus has three axemen and two spears in my territory and the horn sounds. My culture was so huge that I think it took about six turns for it to get to Mecca. By the time he got there, Alex has a stack of horse archers in my lands with another freakin' horn.

I had one archer, three warriors, a holed-up worker, and the free missionaries I'd gotten from founding Christianity and Confuscianism.

Brave little arrow-slinger took out the two axes and died on the first spear. (60% defense and on a hill). Next two spears took out one warrior and wounded another.

Chicken Itch came in IBT, but I had one and a half warriors. I lasted one...more...turn when Cyrus' second stack arrived to mop up.

Three archers with some garrison promos might have held it. Also, raging barbs prevented me from spreading any religions. Some + modifiers might have prevented the war with Cyrus. Alex probably not.

 

[pholkhero]

A little warning. . . .

All the more important to try and implement my strategery ~ and, it's a good thing our UU needs no resources! That's pretty sweet.

Okay...so, if i didn't mention it, i ended @ 500 AD. I took some turns, so what, wanna fight about it?! After a brief crisis in the government, the Empire of the Knuckleheads began to right the ship of fools . . er, state. The ascention of Pholkhero the Phirst (his stubborn addherence to Ancient Greek spellings is why he uses 'ph' rather than 'f', as the new Emperor is wont to tell anyone who'll listen about his strange and bordering on unhealthy obsession w/Cyrillic writing. The rumor is that he sleeps on a pillow stiched into the letters of his fraternity [his as in HE founded it]. It's name: Sweet Potato Pi. He laughs to himself about this several times a day)....

anyway, it was the best of times, it was a medicore of times . . .

 

[pholkhero]

let's revise that, it was a medicore of time all around, but has the potential to be the best of times pretty soon, if we play our cards right.

On the military front, as I mentioned, we lost the thrice-kinged Knucklehead Smith, as well as Ken, the Barby Beater. However, we have only lost one archer since, in a number of barb battles.

in 425 bce, an archer defeats a warrior, and this is the last time barbs will get this close to mecca.

**Do you think it's the hat? This hat angers alot of people." (Bonus points for ANYONE who can name that movie.)

I sent out two archer pairs, one to the north of the city, one to the south. They were each stationed just a square or two away from the barb city that had set up in each location. The survived every attack but one.

Archer-pairs on the loose,
archer-pairs on the loose.

Archer-pairs on the loose,
archer-pairs on the loose.

Archer-pairs are gone,
they're goin' wild!

hackin' up axes,
doin' it in style.

So, all in all, a fair thing, we lost 3 (2 warriors and an archer, and we defeated probably around 8 or 9 barbs. Again, note the barb axes that are appearing in the south. In the north, we are merely sitting on a forested square, while the south is a forested hill. I'm a big believer in first strike promotions, esp. for archers that are on duty like this, and they don't have Wood promotions. They automatically get one first strike, and a lot of time, up against another archer, this is quite decisive, imo anyway.

Coming up. . . Religion.

 

[pholkhero]

Okay, religiously, some setbacks, but, as i've been harping on, I think there's a good path to victory available to us still, esp. on the Prince level. So, Confucianism fell some half-a-dozen turns before we got CoL. On the up side, Mao founded Confucianism so that's broken up the Buddhist bloc. AND, as they've each discovered their own religion, there's NO chance of converting them, i believe. [After Alpha, we should head to theo and DivRight (we've got one priest working for now in mecca.)]

However, I spread the one true faith to the godless heathens that populate our land. On the down side, Taoism was also FIDL. I believe it was Gandhi b/c no one else converted once it came in.

600 bce (also, notice I show my intelligence, tolerance and magnamity by using the much more couthe 'bce' abbreviation for quote 'bc' times.)

450 bce (Fox has revealed my "War on the Gregorian Calendar" w/an explosive expose):

200 bce (SEan Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, and Rush Limbaugh all ask "Why does Pholkhero hate Jesus?")

25 ce (letter arrive at my home, dealing me to leave Jesus alone and stop my assault on religion.)

100 ce (Severed horse's head arrives in my bed in the morning.)

225 ad (Johnnie Fontaine gets the part in the movie, just like he wanted)

Here's the religion situation at this time:

 

[pholkhero]

It happened in a blur. No one knew where the frozen fish came from. The emperor never stood a chance. And so endeth the reign of Folkhero the First (ph-ck him, he's dead!)

[Once Alph comes in, let's trade w/our buddies (FDR first) and then see if we can get a war started btwn Monty and one of the heathens for a tech or two. Same deal with Nappy, as there's one more missionary on its way there to set up shop in Lyons, their Hindu city. He should convert soon. I have a missionary in America, just exploring, and I think we should send one to Azteca and France too. After, Alph, as I said, Chistianity and Islam should be next and more Priests in Mecca. Also, once the ship gets righted a bit more, more GP-wonders will be pursued.]

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

Johnnie Fontaine gets the part in the movie, just like he wanted

Someone has to answer for Santino, Carlo.

more GP-wonders will be pursued.

Why? We got two busted-ass, go-nowhere religions no one wants. What good is a shrine that brings in 3 GPT? Though there certainly is merit in blindly adhering to a plan that unraveled 3000 years ago. You definitely get your propers there, Pholk.

Moving On...

Okay, so Pholk has taken control of this SG. I've no recourse but to follow orders from here on out. Thank God (Budha, whatever) I never was any good at following directions.

 

[pholkhero]

more GP-wonders will be pursued.

As it always seems to be, you are the pessimist, I, the realist. Our city's going to rapidly pick up steam; our buddhist monks ARE going to spread over the world, and we ARE going to bribe Monty and Nappy into eliminating Gandhi and Mao, w/a little help from our resource-less Camel Archers.

When I DO bring up the prospect of another wonder, we'll laugh into our biscuits b/c OF COURSE we should build another wonder, we're doing so well already and are in the tech lead to boot. So there ~

You broke my heart, Baldy, you broke my heart. . . oh, and g'morning!

edit: also,

Okay, so Pholk has taken control of this SG. I've no recourse but to follow orders from here on out.

check out the title. I AM the Decider, after all. and i SHOULD probably decide when to build wonders and when not . . . i mean, i guess, right?

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

Got it. Playing now. Wait, 500 AD ? You played from 900 BC to 500 AD? Holy game-hogging jackass, Batman! Guess I'll have to finish it in my turn, huh?

 

[pholkhero]

You played from 900 BC to 500 AD?

Hey, I needed to redeem myself and really wanted to see if we got Confucianism, and then it was just one ...more...turn...my most humblest apologies...

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

A note:
I was writing my write-up as I played and actually had a good bit of verbiage going when I noticed "issues". I used to get these before I used Autolog. I'm a programmer and I use a Java-based programmer's editor (JEdit) because I need the same editor for both Linux and Windows. THis is what I usually make write-ups in. Anyhow, my J2RE on windows seems to have quirks with memory management when RAM gets low.

I was running Civ, Photoshop, Firefox, and JEdit when it started bugging out. I'd type, and the characters would trail about four keystrokes behind. "Uh oh," exclaims I to no one in particular. "Better quit some stuff and restart in case I have a memory leak."

Und I did. But JEdit hung on quitting. Ctl + Alt + Del got me out of it, but on restart, my file was 0k. Empty! I had saved right before quitting the app, but it somehow over-wrote the file with zeroes. This has happened once before on a very large PHP class definition (PHP Class definitions must include the functions within the class brackets--stupid. No .h files in PHP). I should have found a new editor (or J2RE) then, but I didn't. Anyway, lost the write-up and I'm piecing it together from the game log (not autolog) and my screenies.

Sorry...



Inherited turn 500 AD
I pick up the save and realized that my predecessor had played from 900BC to 500AD aparently all that "attack on the Gregorian Calendar" crap must've noodled with his noggin. Here's a hint, whether you're talking common era or christ, 1400 years is still a little over 10 turns, Pholk! And besides, it's 500 AD and we still can't work bronze? What kind of short bus are we riding here, Pholk. Damn, maybe the F9 screen will lend a little optimism here...

We're sixth place in every single category??? "Blah, blah, blah pessimist. Whine, whine, blah, whine realist." Here's some realism for you, Pholk. We're last in EVERYTHING! Okay, to be fair, we're not last. I f-ed over Mansa in 3860 BC!

Moving On...

I do a little M&M on our town to work some cottages. We need money in a bad way.

We also get an announcement that Roosey's Golden Age has ended and Socrates was born in Tenochtitlan. Fair enough. Press enter.

Turn 1 520 AD
Roosevelt adopts Orgasmic Religion. Good for him, huh?

Turn 3 560 AD
Nappy adopts Organized Religion, too.

Turn 4 580 AD
Knock, knock. Have you found Jesus? No? Well, me neither because someone else did in some damned distant land.

Turn 5 600 AD
where's the "we're screwed" smiley? Oh yeah, here it is :suicide:. Montezuma converts to hinduism.

Turn 6 620 AD
Budhist Missionary spreads Budhism in Lyons

Turn 7 640 AD
Another Budhist Missionary spreads the Word to Teotihuacan

Turn 9 680 AD
Changed my daughter's diaper. Lost the screenie, sorry.


Turn 10 700 AD
Note, I lost the build order, but somewhere in the previous turns, I had bulit a missionary, a library, and a monastery. That got me thinking about spreading religion, and that made me realize the biggest move of my life. When I MMed up in turn one, I must have removed a priest or two and put him on a tile. I didn't realize we had 0 Great People Points (GPP) without specialists. We've been stuck on 66/100 GPP for my entire set! I don't know how I managed it, but I'm now actually dumber than the dumbest man alive! I was going to end my set here, but I can't on a move like that!

Damn. I set us up with a priest. We're now making 6 GPP per turn. /dumbass.

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

/***************************
* Intermission *
***************************/

So I've gotten to know Pholk pretty well, I think. I've lately come to realize that very few of my moments actually occur without having some form of Pholk's particular brand of taint on them. Most really has its seed in a Pholk turn somewhere and, after the iest move of my life, it just gnawed at me whilst I continued play. A lingering, nagging doubt just grew and grew. Then grew some more. Before I knew it, I had to check.

So I saved my game as it was and opened up the save Pholk posted. It's there for everyone to see. Sorry...

...Pholk, you played what, 56 turns in your last set? (I actually did the math before I lost the write-up). How many of those 56 turns were like this?

It may be your personal goal to get all the great prophets you can, but it's kind of a tough variant to do it with 0 GPP per turn!!!

Maybe after I've stopped laughing long enough to clean up the milk that shot out of my nose and all over my laptop, I'll come up with some cheeky comment about that. Until then...

/***************************
* End Intermission *
***************************/

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

Turn 11 720 AD
Mao adopts Serfdom and Vassalage
Here's an honest weed moment for you. I realized that I had let Mecca grow to Pop 10 with only 9 happy. Looks like that happened a few turns ago, too. So I turn on an extra priest to starve the ungreatful bastard more quickly. /

Turn 12 740 AD

Forgot I put that one in there. Always sounded dirty to me. Like where Superman went to "think" about Wonder Woman.

Turn 13 760 AD
Writing came in. I chose fishing for the moment. The tech screen might tell us something else.

Maybe we're not that far behind, huh? Time to go hookin'

Traded CoL to Gandhi for Math and Fishing.

Crap, my wife's home. I have to stop playing and mow the lawn, now. Maybe you can finish the tech whore portion of the program, Pholk? Sorry for ending so abruptly.

 

[pholkhero]

to be fair, we had 66/100 GP points, so I had a priest on their for about 22 turns...wish i had the log still to see how long in i bult my first temple, but either way, what can I say? It's called: Knuckleheadia. I mean, c'mon, our territory is considered to be: "100% Knuckleheaded."

Might be able to play later on today this afternoon ~

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

Sorry Pholk. Philosophy == +100% GP rate. Each priest is worth 6 GPP per turn. That's 11 turns of good Pholk, 45 turns of 100% Knucklehead.

And BTW, I'm loving this. I'm only sniping you to live up to the SG Ettiquitte as posted in post #1. I suggest you do the same.

 

[pholkhero]

That's 11 turns of good Pholk, 45 turns of 100% Knucklehead.

I think you've got it backwards ~ the knucklehead IS the good pholk...maybe that's why your expectations are so high??

also, I dont mind you 'taking the micky out of me' b/c I realize that all your anger is merely transferred from your horrendous blunder of allowing Gandhi to beat to Hinduism. I thought taking it out on me was making you feel better...was i wrong?


got it.

edit: okay, but first why the trade to Gandhi of all people as our first trade??

Traded CoL to Gandhi for Math and Fishing.

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

also, I dont mind you 'taking the micky out of me' b/c I realize that all your anger is merely transferred from your horrendous blunder of allowing Gandhi to beat to Hinduism. I thought taking it out on me was making you feel better...was i wrong?

Really, I'm angry at God (err...Budah?). It's just not fair that I'm six-foot-four and hung like a baby.

okay, but first why the trade to Gandhi of all people as our first trade??

Because a) he's lowest in points and b) I usually just go up the ladder to whore out the tech and c) he's not anyone's "worst enemy" so we won't get any diplo hits.

Oh, and d) I didn't really think much over it. I was pissed at having to rewrite my log.

 

[pholkhero]

Okay, rather than endure another Rexineer diatribe about missed oppurtunities and moves of Pholkhero the Great, i only played 5 turns or so.

Here's the skinny from the fatman:

Also, traded Monarchy next turn to Nappy for Sailing and IW.

and:

(cue "2001" theme music) Zoroaster is born!

Also sprach Zarathustra:

edit: uhh, that's the Mahabodi for those that can't interpret the meaning of holy light ascending to the heavens. Idiots!
Also sprach die Archer-pair

let's anxiously await Rex's reply (preview: Pholkhero is so bad at this game )

 

[Rex Tyrannus]

I also played five (wait, was that six?) turns and took loads of screenies. Just look at them all.

860 AD Inherited turn.

Jeez, we're still at pop 10 and unhappy? How long does it take to starve out a red dude? Methinks a whip is in order! I'm very pleased to see we have trade routes with everybody. (Good job, Pholk.) Maybe now we can make some money in this place.

Interesting. We have iron in the BFC. Cool!

I decide to take a look at the civics. If I want to whip, it might help if we were in slavery. Rrrr? We can use Heriditary Rule? Sweet. Revolt to HR and Slavery (never know when we'll need it). We now have 11 happy to work with. Suppose we could have done that five turns ago, but the kinder, happier me has just eaten a fantastic steak and drunken three beers. It's all good.

A scan of the F5 screen shows that FDR and Nappy are both +5 with us. The others ain't so happy. Mao and Gandhi are -3. Monte is even 0. Also, Mao is lightyears ahead in tech.

A little MM removes one of the priests in favor of a cottage. The Mahabodi is making us 9 gold per turn and, at 30 beakers per turn, literature is due in 4.

900 AD

A barb archer cleverly circumvents Pholk's nearly un-runnable southern blockade and aims to take out our rice patty. I move a city defender onto the rice. He wins with 0.2 strenght left. Also, we finished another missionary and I begin an aqueduct. We've had those green stink waves for about 1000 years now.

920 AD

Bud spreads for free in Xochicalco and another missionary infects Texcoco. At 31%, Budhism is now the most dominant religion on the planet. Hinduism comes in at 28%.

940 AD

940 is a very good year for the Empire of the Knuckleheads. Literature comes in. We can trade it to Roosey and Monte. I next go for drama, as no one else has it. Roosey builds the Sistine Chapel and ....

... Monte converts to Budhism!!!

Literature, as it turns out, is a pretty low-rent tech. Monte will give us 130 gold for it and Roosey will give us 20 gold. Gold, we have. We're at +11 per turn and 100%. Why can't the shrine money count toward science? Anyhow. :shrug:

960 AD

Iron is hooked up and I'm sending our worker down to hook up the gems. We can't work them, but the extra happy will be good. A missionary failed to spread his obnoxious verse into Tlateloco (Monte's only city without Budhism). I don't get that. It only had Hindu in it already. I thought the first two religions were given. Guess not.

 

[pholkhero]

Here's a thought since i won't be able to play tonight...let's convert some of those cottages to farms and get a few more specialists working. Since we have the shrine and the positive income, perhaps that might be better use of a few tiles. Your thoughts, O Lightly Toasted One??

 

[omni_paul]

Uncle Buck. What do I win?