SGOTM 15 - Unusual Suspects

SteelHorse · May 2, 2012

Great work on the joint war :goodjob:

Finally AP comes into play.

If Liz was going to DoW us, would she have done it before entering our border with stack? I am not clear on the mechanics here. Is the AI smart enough to move to a city like Agra - then declare war. Given she is at war with Hammy, logical for her to pass through to get to Hammy. We just need her to have a new worst enemy once Hammy is dead.

Plan looks good.

Do we have a plan for a BFF? How do we handle the team. Since different religion try to instigate a ware against them after they are infected? Make them, post Hammy, the poor step child? And definitely find a place to gift an infected city. Do we only need 1 of the team infected?

EDIT: Do we risk pissing Liz off sending spies her way and stealing her techs? Is a tech or two worth it?

Xcalibrator · May 2, 2012

T181 (1210 AD) continued--Get OB with Shaka and ask him to attack Borsippa. Ask Liz to attack Nippur. Move archer onto Egyptian plains hill and see Satsuma to SE defended by LB and sword. Hatty's stacks outside Lahore comprise 2XB, 4HA, 7WC, 1treb, 1WE--not as bad as it first seemed, but we might as well take peace. I try offering our map+100g but have to give her Tokyo.

T182--I breathe again. Liz does not DoW us. And for some reason I don't understand, we now have trades with everyone with whom we have open borders. Breakeven is now nearly 50%. We got a Prophet in Bolly. I save him for now (in case we want to run a Golden Age?). Tech stealing is now up to 322 EPs in Agra. I put the EP slider to 100%. Hatty will sign OB! I take it and start sending missionaries east.

T183--We are WE of Mansa/HC. Feudalism done, start DR at 0% (26 turns). Tech steal down! to 306. Our spy has 20% discount and we can now steal Aesth(238) or Calendar(278) with our 524 EPs. We might be able to steal Guilds next turn. Hammy has 2 caravels threatening our western explorers. I trade our new whales to HC to 13 gpt.

T184--We lose 1 caravel, kill another--lost a missionary. Liz now has Redcoats. Her big stack appears to be moving past Agra. Steal tech continues to decrease at 294. With 30% discount we can now get Cal @237 and Guilds @678. I'll wait for Guilds. Turn slider back to 0% to save up gold to research Banking. I start moving units toward Nippur, which is defended by only 2 LBs (with 100% culture). Shaka's units have been sighted in the area. 5 turns to next AP vote. No more Hinduism spread.

T185--Hinduism spreads to Canterbury (17 more votes). Taj is built. 40% discount on Guilds means 631 EPs--I can't wait. 67% success odds...we get it! Start Banking--done in 2 turns!

Nippur has been reinforced by several maces. I do not advance--need more Xbows and trebs. Hatty is sending a large stack through our territory, presumably toward Hammy.

T186--Banking is done! I do not yet revolt to Merclism because we are raking in the commerce with all our trade routes. At the moment, only M/HC are running Merc'lism. Hmm, the tech screen doesn't show anybody wanting it--Genghi and Hatty don't have Guilds yet. Liz does have it--not sure about the others.

Oh darn. Our eastern missionary has now shown that HC is not accessible by land. It looks like our best bet is to capture (from Hatty) Satsuma, which is coastal. We can see HC's borders from there, although he may be ringed by mountains for all we know. Still no idea where Mansa is--same place? About 1/3 of the English lands have been explored by spy now--maybe Mansa is in there?

I never got the Glance/Worst enemy business to show up--checked BUFFY setup, too. But I just now discovered that if you hover on a tech in the "Won't Trade" column it will sometimes say "..never trade with our worst enemy." By that reckoning, we are WE of Hatty, Mansa/HC, and Liz. Hammy doesn't have any techs in that column but I think we can assume we're also his WE. I think some of our gifting goodwill has worn off. We have some techs they don't, and we can get DR soonish if we want. I'll leave all this diplo stuff for kcd to sort out.

We have a pretty good stack that could now advance on Nippur. Liz's stack is about 3 turns behind us. Hatty's stack is about 3 turns behind that. We have 3 caravels (one almost dead) ready to sally north again, carrying 1 spy and 1 missionary. Another miss is with the Vijay stack, the other is in easternmost Egypt. Our Agra spies need to sit a bit more and we need more EPs to steal good stuff, although we could get Calendar ans Aesth now. Cal would let us plantation our bananas--not a big deal.

I'll upload the save shortly. I could play some more but would prefer somebody else to take over.

Spoiler Upload log :

kcd_swede · May 3, 2012

Here's a brain-fart for ya: Move a caravel with a missionary into HC's cultural borders (3 tiles SW of carvel/Hmiss present position) and gift them both to him. Will that work? Anybody want to try a quick test in WB?

He might know how to get it home (and we can build another HMiss). He at least won't have to fight through Hammy to get there. He might even see fit to infect his teammate for us? That team has OB with exactly nobody, however.

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I'd adopt Merc and then use spy to get Liz into Merc. Right away. Then I would use a spy on Hatty to get her into Merc. Then I would use a spy on Ghengis and get him into merc. Then I would use a spy on Cyrus and get him into merc. Assuming those don't choose to do so on their own before our spy can do it for them. This will get us on the road to happiness, and probably save us somne unwanted wars.

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I'd hope all Hatty's stack ends up in Babylonia, because I'd start making contingency plans to take Satsuma, and maybe even to take one of Shaka or GK's coastal cities if needed to get to Mansa. All this could take a while. :lol:

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I'd move the spy towards Babylon (on the way to where he can scout and alter Shaka civics)... if Babylon is worse defended, just bypass Nippur.
--
Votes: 206US-21Liz-13Shaka-5Hatty vote in 2t. lets consider what to do. I think we should cause AI-AI agitation by forcing embargos against infidels. Cyru/GK/HC-MM are the eligible non-members. Only problem is that we need to get in and get them infected somehow... so maybe this is a bad idea for the moment. Lets be careful and hold that thought for now.
If vote to get Tokyo or Lahore back comes up do we want it? Hatty only needs to have one of them. :mischief:

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Liz is 4t from Nippur, and will only need not even 1 turn to reduce its defenses to zero. If we can't take it by then, we can't take it. Go straight to Babylon with our stack, but have that settler standing by near the forest tile 2W/3N from VJ, which is the only tile that can be settled when the city is in revolt.
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If Liz makes peace before taking Nippur, we could cause revolt with spy and do it ourselves during peacetime.

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Which reminds me, lets look for a spot to do that on the coast in freindly territory. Memphis and/or Thebes in revolt would give us a forest tile we could settle/infect/and likely be able to gift to HC. We couldn't keep it long enough to get a caravel out of there... and we probably only need one caravel in that sea (assuming a blockage betwee GK/Babylon in the sea).
--
Theres another spot North of Gordium that could get a coastal city if we need access to that water to reach Mansa. Note, I'd only want to keep one of these devious cities long enough to get a single caravel there. How many turns would that take with a whip?
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Liz used a culture-bomb.

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Maybe we should stop building seige units and build spies and EP for removing culture borders instead, when applicable.

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any other ideas inspired amongst our team???

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kcd_swede · May 3, 2012

Tested: gifting a carvel inside closed borders with a Mish on it gives only the caravel... the mish still shows in WB but not in the game. I don't think this will work.

Xcalibrator · May 3, 2012

I have Holy Cow set up to give our next GP in 9 turns--you might be able to shave it to 8. Great Sci odds should be about 96%--use to double-bulb Education. I slowed down Kyoto because Holy Cow was much more pure Sci--you can run more specs in Kyoto now--just don't let it pop before Holy Cow.

Don't switch to Merc'lism until you've successfully made Liz do it--we don't want to give up all those lovely foreign trades routes for nothing. But yeah, we need to get out of WE status. :eek:

We have some techs that could be gifted to various AI right now--I think we probably should. I'd bulb the Prophet toward DR and finish that next, quickly. Then we can gift that to everyone when we're about to finish the Minaret. Otherwise our research should just consist of stealing things from Liz. I'd recommend military techs so we can push around Hatty and the others if necessary.

It would be good if someone else--gee, kcd comes to mind--could take over with fresh eyes. Should probably put more cities on building wealth, run specs, or build spies as you suggested.

Speaking of spies, as SH noted, if they're caught then our diplo relations suffer so we should try to keep them to a minimum. E.g., when our spy in England has finished exploring we should delete him unless we need him to mess with some other AI. And the spy in Egypt should probably be deleted right now. It just occurred to me that we could be using non-Hindu missionaries for exploration--they're twice as fast as spies, can't get caught, and we can build 9 of them (not that we need that many). The only drawback is that they require OBs, but we (will) have those with almost everybody.

Bummer about the caravel gifting idea not working--but very clever, regardless. With two full-strength caravels, though, we should be able to bully our way through Hammy's waters (and discover that it was pointless because of an impenetrable mountain range).

I'd move the spy towards Babylon (on the way to where he can scout and alter Shaka civics)... if Babylon is worse defended, just bypass Nippur.... Liz is 4t from Nippur, and will only need not even 1 turn to reduce its defenses to zero. If we can't take it by then, we can't take it. Go straight to Babylon with our stack, but have that settler standing by near the forest tile 2W/3N from VJ, which is the only tile that can be settled when the city is in revolt.

Yup, I was thinking that, too.

Votes: 206US-21Liz-13Shaka-5Hatty vote in 2t. lets consider what to do. I think we should cause AI-AI agitation by forcing embargos against infidels. Cyru/GK/HC-MM are the eligible non-members. Only problem is that we need to get in and get them infected somehow... so maybe this is a bad idea for the moment. Lets be careful and hold that thought for now.

If vote to get Tokyo or Lahore back comes up do we want it? Hatty only needs to have one of them.

Yes, let's not jeopardize our OBs--gotta get those Hmiss's in first. Can our miss in Egypt get to one of them quickly? Getting Tokyo back is tempting. It doesn't really add much to our economy--mostly gives us "strategic depth," but do we really need that when Kyoto is so much easier to hold?

Which reminds me, lets look for a spot to do that on the coast in freindly territory. Memphis and/or Thebes in revolt would give us a forest tile we could settle/infect/and likely be able to gift to HC. We couldn't keep it long enough to get a caravel out of there... and we probably only need one caravel in that sea (assuming a blockage betwee GK/Babylon in the sea).

Theres another spot North of Gordium that could get a coastal city if we need access to that water to reach Mansa. Note, I'd only want to keep one of these devious cities long enough to get a single caravel there. How many turns would that take with a whip?

Very clever. :goodjob:

Whip would take too long--need to grow to at least pop2. I'd settle S of Thebes, chop a forest, and work that 4-hammer mine. Triremes are 50H, caravels 60H; we could build a trireme and then upgrade to caravel (30 gold) to save time, which will be critical. 4 turns would build the trireme--how long would Hatty's cities be in revolt? We'd need one more turn in our territory to do the upgrade. (Galleys do not upgrade to caravels, so it would have to be trireme-->caravel.)

(Edit: Infect our temporary city and prepare to gift to HC, as you suggested, as backup. If the revolt time for Egypt's cities is only 1 turn, we could have 3 workers chop the forest in one turn and have a big stack of units in our city to keep it from revolting long enough to finish the ship.)

(Edit2: Or... if HC would accept the city--he might not because of so much cultural pressure--we gift him 1 or more Hmiss's in the city. If/when the city flips back to Egypt, the miss's teleport to HC's land because Egypt/HC don't have OBs, right? Of course, we would need OBs with HC in order to be able to move in the miss's and gift them.)

Liz used a culture-bomb.

Where?

Xcalibrator · May 3, 2012

Did you try gifting the missionary (on the caravel in HC waters) by itself?

kcd_swede · May 3, 2012

Xcalibrator said:
Did you try gifting the missionary (on the caravel in HC waters) by itself?

I don't get the option to do that. (Yes, I tried).

Xcalibrator · May 3, 2012

Just another wild thought: If we take back Tokyo via AP resolution, then Egypt would only have Lahore as a Hindu city. We could then DoW her a couple turns before the next AP vote, capture Lahore and leave her without any Hindu cities (and making her a heathen in the eyes of the AP), then start a holy war against her with the AP vote. Liz et al beat her up while we capture Satsuma (and other cities?) and build a caravel to infect HC (and Mansa if accessible from there). By the time an AP victory vote comes up, we'll have gifted Lahore or other Hindu city back to her, or let her capture it. This is more convoluted (maybe?) than causing revolts in 2 of her cities, plopping down a new city, and chopping out a caravel, but it would give us another convenient common-war enemy, since Hammy may not be around as a whipping boy.

kcd_swede · May 3, 2012

OK, I'll summarize a PPP but we can still have more discussion. If AAA or someone else (Vra?) doesn't show up and yelll "I got it" then I'll plan to play it tomorrow (24hr after posting PPP that gets green lights).

Some comments, first: Spies can only change civics to ones that we are already running. So I'll change us to merc immediately before the attempt to put liz in her fav civ.

Spy in England will go north to look for alternate rout to Cyrus, or maybe even find Mansa.

HMiss in Egypt will go to Tabriz, unless he can get to Cyrus too. Faster than caravel from there. Second HMiss to Tabriz by land route in that case.

Spy in Egypt worth the risk of trying to get Hatty to in Merc too. GK would be better but he don't even have guilds yet. Build cheapest 2-move units to speed scouting now that we have OB a long way.

We can safely change Liz to Hindu for a short while if we are still WE after the merc switch- risk that she stays in hindu is almost non-existant since she's the bhudist founder.

When HC/MM dow someone, if it isn't us, we can dow them too and get OB. Note, we don't dow FT's no matter what, unless a more important FT asks. With luck, the target is dogpile on Babylon and we get OB for free. Still need to figure out how to get there.

If AP vote comes up after infecting more civs, we have them join the war too.

--------------
PPP:
Prime directive: Scout OB and Spread Hinduism to all.
Secondary directive: Make friends (carefully); especially Liz.
Monitor:
EPs needed to steal tech and convert to merc
Each AI's AP voting weight
Everyone's WE status (adjust BUFFY setting for exotic advisor?)
Sign OB with Shaka.
Convert Liz to Merc in 2t - after AP vote and when spy has -50%
Convert Hatty to merc as well.
Spy from Babylon scouting will try to get all the way to Cyrus for his conversion to merc, another spy can get to Shaka (shorter distance take last).
Ask Shaka to attack Hammmy city (not Babylon).
Ask Liz to attack Hammy city (not Babylon).
Spread Hinduism. If we can't go west, try the long way by land if possible.
Have settler/Hmiss ready in north to give Hammy a city if we can't take/infect/gift one of his (or kill him completely).
Try to found cities near M/HC to gift with Hinduism.
Have 3 miss's at all times, actively (so far as possible) seeking new civs to infect.
Give/sell CS to M/HC if/when OB would be useful (and before they become someone's WE). Or bribe/ask them to join Hammy war.
Build up forces to attack Hammy, and defend against Hatty if she gets nasty.
Use a missionary or explorer/scout (our only 2-mvt unit) if we get OBs, and try to infect M/HC.
Pump spies into Agra for tech stealing - aiming at military techs (bottom of tree).
GPs: HC pops in 8-9 turn. 93% GSci, if so use 2 to bulb edu. Save GArt for discussion if we are unlucky (pause). DR needs 1700 more beakers and we get 1200 from a GPro bulb. Bulb him too when it will get us to 1t to DR.
SpMin in Bolly. Gift DR to FT's when 1t to SpMin.
Research:
Finish DR(0%+bulb) then build EP on those we will convert, mainly on Liz for tech steals. Probably stop no later than DR for discuss.
Hire some spies to help with EP.
Try to take Babylon. Don't bust a gut to do so, more important to settle sneak-in city at Nippur and infect. It can gift to whoever... peace offer to Babs if he's not eliminated - then force his borders open with the AP later if needed. No peace before our FT's make peace. Note, right now he's offering Aesthetics and map and 60gold :eek:

the only thing that might interest me is the map, actually. :lol:

Pause conditions:
significant changes in diplo or geography expectations that affect strategy not discussed in PPP.
Divine Rights finished. Should be about 8 turns at 0% research with 1200 beaker bulb (we make 68bpt at 0%, need 500beakers more - thanks UoS!!!).

Please make additions and advise if we are missing any opportunities.

Note, spy negatives degrade over time, so we can live with them if need be.

Things we can't live with: UN built ends our game unless we can put folks in Hindu before its VC votes. As does an attack by liz. We can probably manage anything else with some creativity.

Xcalibrator · May 3, 2012

Duh, yes, scouts are excellent units for scouting! And right, gotta be in Merc'lism to swtich them to it.

I'd go ahead and bulb the Prophet right away so we don't waste hand-built research beakers. We get a 1.4x beaker discount from having 2 prereqs so it should come sooner than you think.

We're currently in Caste+Theoc. Gotta stay in Caste to run all the specs we currently are. OrgRel might be more useful than Theoc, but probably not. Adjust all specs when you switch to Merc'lism. This will also reduce our commerce, so don't be shocked. Hmm, but it'll speed up Holy Cow's GP pop, too.

Don't sail around with our Hmiss on a boat once/if it becomes obvious we can't get through to the west. Delete him so we can build another somewhere else or dump him on shore quickly.

AAA · May 3, 2012

The only thing I would add is this - some units or even the whole stack to shadow Liz's stack and attempt to get cities she has bombarded or attacked but not taken. The AIs are very predictable on how they attack, they bombard then attack even when it isn't necessary, and you can often swoop in and get the prize while they are muddling about.

ChrisShaffer · May 3, 2012

SteelHorse said:
How do we handle the team. Since different religion try to instigate a ware against them after they are infected? Make them, post Hammy, the poor step child? And definitely find a place to gift an infected city. Do we only need 1 of the team infected?

Good question - anyone know the answer?

Xcalibrator · May 3, 2012

What AAA said, but you knew that. I dunno about infection requirements for teams. And let's not overthink getting a caravel/Hmiss to the team--it might be simpler to do it the old fashioned way, by stomping on Hatty with Liz-enabled riflemen.

vra379971 · May 3, 2012

Mhm. Set-up a test game?

Deckhand · May 4, 2012

ChrisShaffer said:
Good question - anyone know the answer?

I do not know. But I believe that both Civ's need to be "infected".

vra379971 said:
Mhm. Set-up a test game?

Good idea.

Plan is green from me. Good luck.

kcd_swede · May 4, 2012

vra379971 said:
Mhm. Set-up a test game?

Quickly tested... the Relig victory vote does not come up unless BOTH AI on a team have at least one city of the AP religion.

kcd_swede · May 4, 2012

PPP:
Prime directive: Scout OB and Spread Hinduism to all.
Secondary directive: Make friends (carefully); especially Liz.
Monitor:EPs needed to steal tech and convert to merc
-Each AI's AP voting weight
-Everyone's WE status
Convert Liz to Merc in 2t - after AP vote and when spy has -50%
Convert Hatty to merc as well.
Spy from Babylon scouting will try to get all the way to Cyrus for his conversion to merc, another spy can get to Shaka (shorter distance take last).
Remind Shaka to attack Hammmy city (not Babylon).
Remind Liz to attack Hammy city (not Babylon).
Spread Hinduism. If we can't go west, try the long way by land if possible.
Have settler/Hmiss ready in north to give Hammy a city if we can't take/infect/gift one of his (or kill him completely).
Try to found cities near M/HC to gift with Hinduism - quite a longshot
Have 3 miss's at all times, actively (so far as possible) seeking new civs to infect.
Give/sell CS to M/HC if/when OB would be useful (and before they become someone's WE). Or bribe/ask them to join Hammy war. Or join their WHEOOH war and get OB.
Build up forces to attack Hammy, and defend against Hatty if she gets nasty.
Use a missionary or explorer/scout (our only 2-mvt unit) if we get OBs, and try to infect M/HC.
Pump spies into Agra for tech stealing - aiming at military techs (bottom of tree).
GPs: HC pops in 8-9 turn. 93% GSci, if so use 2 to bulb edu. Save GArt for discussion if we are unlucky (pause). DR needs 1700 more beakers and we get 1200 from a GPro bulb. Bulb him too when it will get us to 1t to DR.
SpMin in Bolly. Gift DR to FT's when 1t to SpMin.
Research:Finish DR(bulb asap the 0%) then build EP on those we will convert, mainly on Liz for tech steals. Probably stop no later than DR for discuss.
Hire some spies to help with EP.
Shadow Liz's troops and try to take city if she weakens for us. Try to take Babylon. Don't bust a gut to do so, more important to settle sneak-in city at Nippur and infect. (It can gift to whoever... peace offer to Babs if he's not eliminated - then force his borders open with the AP later if needed. No peace before our FT's make peace. Note, right now he's offering Aesthetics and map and 60gold the only thing that might interest me is the map, actually. )

Pause conditions:
significant changes in diplo or geography expectations that affect strategy not discussed in PPP.
Divine Rights finished. Should be about 8 turns at 0% research with 1200 beaker bulb (we make 68bpt at 0%, need 500beakers more - thanks UoS!!!).

I'm interpretting the comments so far as greens since nobody said "stop" and the comments have been adopted, and were fairly minor. I got it. Here we go.

kcd_swede · May 4, 2012

Turn log

Spoiler :

t187: 50%Esp 2Liz/1Hatty
t188: 2LB/1mace/1cara in Babylon
t189: AGRA REVOLTS for first time.
Liz and US are in Merc. DR bulbed, 5t to DR/5t to GSci
Shaka goes to Merc on own initiative, will trade Cal + Aesth, but we have nothing to give.
IBT: AP Resolutions available: OB for all members, Stop trade GK, Dow Hammy (again?), Lahore back to Ghandi, Kago back to Ghandi, Agra back to Ghandi (I choose DOW Hammy thinking maybe somoen else got Hindu).
t190: Tabriz is infected with Hindu by Indian missionary! GK is a member.
Borsippa at 22% under slow bombard by Shaka, even though he has overwhelming stack sitting around on their hands.
t191: -50% spay in Agra FAILS to steal gunpowder at 67% odds. No negative diplo with Liz.
t192: War on infidels succeeds! GK joins the war on Hammy.
t193:Borsippa at 11%
Hatty converted to Merc by Indian spy; had to sell her banking for 280gold to make that work. Despite the bargain, we get no fair trade diplo bonus, and are still her WE.
But we are WE of ONLY Hatty and Hammy now.
t194: Borsippa captured by Shaka. Edu bulbed, DR complete, Sp Min in 6 turns.
t195: Played half of one extra turn (with beakers into Philo, thinking about Lib race, but Liz will beat us most likely) in order to enjoy capturing Babylon. Stop there... some units have movement left, some don't.

Scouting: as we feared... mountain barrier across map. Worse than feared, ice barrier prevents access to Cyrus as well. Probably only land routes possible to HC/MM. MM not found yet. Cyrus and GK are at war, btw. We have an AP res in 4 turns and I think we make Cyrus a whipping boy, and just eliminate Babylonians... though Hatty, Shaka and Liz will be the ones to see that unless we exert ourselves. In case they don't, we have settler and hindu miss ready, and there are no WE's on the board yet so we can force full peace in 4t and then just gift it... assuming Nippur falls before the vote comes up.

Then we just have Cyrus, HC, and Mansa to reach. Cyrus should not need warring... HC/Mansa we will have to hope we get enough +diplo in other ways to open borders and infect... missionaries have a long journey though.

Forgot to mention that the next steal attempt on Gunpowder at Agra was indeed sucessful. Now that civic-shifting is essentially done and the walls of Babylon have come down, the esp can once again be fully focused on catching up in techs, before Agra flips. Might be nice to get rid of close borrder with liz, actually.

kcd_swede · May 4, 2012

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ChrisShaffer · May 4, 2012

What do we do if the land route then requires a ship at the other end? Should we send a settler along with the missionaries to plop down a junk city long enough to whip a caravel for the missionaries to ride?

SGOTM 15 - Unusual Suspects

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Jag är Viking!½

Jag är Viking!½

Ultraviolet Catastrophe

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Warlord

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Deity

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Jag är Viking!½

Jag är Viking!½

Jag är Viking!½

Board gamer

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