The Dance of Civilizations [Diplo Game] [Organization Thread Pt1]

[OzzyKP]

And yes, although its vain because I'm one of the people involved, I think it is great that the so called 'vets' have not actually dominated either BtP or DoC. Good because it means that even when anon wears thin (i will stop laughin Mz!) the game remains fluid and exciting because Miss Unknown is likely to crush us all regardless of our interest in the people we know from the past.

You guys are now vets too!

deity and I have been playing together the longest. CS played one or two diplogames very early on, but then was gone for a while until Civ4 came out. Then in the second big Civ4 diplogame Toni came onto the scene. No one knew him or expected much from him at the time either, but he surprised us all when he almost beat me. (but didn't )

Now Toni is securely in the upper eschelon. It is very good to have you and mxproz join the ranks of the top players. Now if only we could get Frank & Drake back, that'd be a hell of a game.

deity
Frank
Toni
CS
The Priest
mzprox
Me
LzPrst
Hera
Pinchak
Drake

That'd be a true royal rumble.

[mzprox]

I(i will stop laughin Mz!)

Nah, don't do that

[OzzyKP]

Ok, since now all names are slowly being revealed anyway we can give in to deity's request anyway:

India		mzprox*
Byzantium 	The Priest
Persia 		Robert Plomp
Natives 	?? (Hercules?)*
England 	Toni
Korea 		Rasputin (turns played by deity)
Mali 		?? (bamf226?)
Rome 		Jeroen Schweitzer*
Orb 		?? (suspect Black Knight 426)
Ottomans 	BranksDilly
Russia 		LzPrst (org. Heraclitus)*
Inca 		St Jon
Egypt 		Rempedaalops
Greece 		Hendriks de Infiedielen Dooder / deity*
Arabia 		WarningU2*

* = tmp subbed by OzzyKP at least once during the game

Real surprises should be:
- LzPrst playing Russia! (nobody knew he was in the game! He arrived shortly after or before the 1st Persian/Russian war)
- deity playing (partly) the Koreans

I also subbed for Byzantium & Egypt.

Russia had an interesting history. The original player was supposed to be Hera, but I'm not sure he ever played them. I actually started them and did the first 50 or so turns myself (and was the top civ at the time!). I think I handed it over to Lz at that point, and soon after they got invaded by Persia.

I think I subbed for them later on too. I also provided some advice to Russia & Rome throughout the game.

[Byzantium (DoC)]

I'm glad that Deity has in the end come round to seeing that there was no Byzantine terrible crime and that if any nation undermined the attempt to bring down India it was Persia. Obviously I disagree on Deity's pronouncement of my untrustworthiness, but hey people can make up their own minds and I'm content that those I have made alliances with know the truth. In my mind that points to the fundamental point here - some - Korea, Greek-sub and England - got into thinking that what this game was about near the end was 'stopping India' - and had collapsed all thoughts into "India vs the 'allies'". Others of us just didn't buy into that black and white view - Persia and Byzantium for example (and to be honest pretty well every other nation). Byzantium wanted to see Indian brought down, but from its point of view was never 'one of the allies' as some permanent set, thus e.g. we refused all suggestions of England and Korea to 'go after india's allies', to destroy their cities one by one etc. We refused all talk of alliances, just kept talking about one goal to bring down the shrine. When it failed, our co-working was at an end, and yes we reacted pretty quickly to the new situation, but hey sometimes speed is important. I can see how if you were in the mindset of 'we three, Byzantium, Korea and England are in a long-term alliance' then Byzantium's actions look bad, but well that is the difference of persective. So for me the point is not 'don't trust your allies' but 'don't assume you have some great alliance when all someone has done is agree on one point'.

Where I do agree with Deity though is that in retrospect at least it is clear that India could only have been brought down by some long term dedicated alliance of a seizeable group of nations. That alliance just never did form - whether that is a failure of some of us (like Byzantium and Persia) to buy into that idea, or a failure of diplomacy in those trying to build it, or more likely a mixture of the two.

Toni/England's point about England's expenditure on science and gold to upgrade is right, and I think it just highlights the more how far ahead India was. Byzantium did continue researching so we could use marines and tanks against India. England stopped so it could upgrade lots of old troops to infantry and artillery. Definitely a difference in tactics there.

In the end, while I don't agree with the 'India was certain to win' line, I do think that by the time we reached the last phase, there was actually nothing we could do. Yes in retrospect those of us trying to attack India could have done some things better, we could have juggled things differently - more espionage at the expense of fewer troop upgrades, pursuing flight not tanks etc. but I guess we would have failed just the same. But then there is always that luck element. By all accounts the Persian army attacking the Indians that same turn had terrible luck, and so lost desipte the odds. The same could have happened at the shrine (particularly given that we had succeeded in one deception - the fact that we still had 30 troops on board ship when India thought they were empty) and we might have seized it. It seemed worth the gamble, given that with 15 turns left there was never going to be time for a plan B. Immediately afterwards we all thought that; though I know Byzantine's then exploiting the situation it left has caused some to rethink.

Regarding BtP comparisons - yes I was Rome in that. In BtP Portual became dominant partly because Rome stood beside it for most of the game - at least from teh moment I took over from Hereclitus, and its military strength and the geography allowed Portugal space to grow strong. Quite a few people criticised that, saying that Rome should have been attacking Portugal. In the end because Rome grew through the Mayan and Greek wars, it ended up outgrowing Portugal and winning a space race (well got to that point before the game fell apart). Nevertheless I was left with the sense that alliance with Portugal had allowed it to grow faster than I (because I think Toni is a better builder than I am), and it was only luck which meant Rome actually got past Portugal at the end. So I was clear I was not going to follow the same path (also wanting a change) and so throughout there was no Portugal/Rome type alliance between England and Byzantium - I wasn't going to fall into the role of supporting a neighbour become dominant. Instead, as soon as I could have a fighting chance of winning (tricky since they were always stronger than I) I was going to do what everyone in BtP had urged and attack, but as I mentioned earlier timing and fate stopped the two earlier moments.

And yes Mr India - the irony of the bombers was not lost on me. In BtP Greece's surprise attack on me (storied if I remember by a story of an assassination blamed on the Russians - I seem to remember within 48 hours about 6 nations proclaimed that their leaders had been assassinated, in order to facilitate a change in their policites) they had build up superior forces but were destroyed by bombers. What my research path will focus on next time will be no surprise!

And yes, although its vain because I'm one of the people involved, I think it is great that the so called 'vets' have not actually dominated either BtP or DoC. Good because it means that even when anon wears thin (i will stop laughin Mz!) the game remains fluid and exciting because Miss Unknown is likely to crush us all regardless of our interest in the people we know from the past.

[mzprox]

- deity thought he was ATTACKING Toni

Raz called me Tony many times, in pms and in the org thread too

I could easily identify Priest, Tony and Robert (Priest: good player, leaders always laugh at their enemies , Tony: good player, posts not so much and mostly pictures, Robert: good player posts a lot.. this was enough for me to get you. First I thought St Jon was Persia, but then I had to give to Robert as I couldnt see any alternative for him.. I belive in the second voting period Robert announced that Persia is late to vote so due to a penalty.. that got me thinking, but my conclusion was that it must be a trick )

of course I could had been wrong, I didn't know half of the players at all, but as it turn out I was right in my guesses

[Robert]

Ok, since now all names are slowly being revealed anyway we can give in to deity's request anyway:

India		mzprox*
Byzantium 	The Priest
Persia 		Robert Plomp
Natives 	?? (Hercules?)*
England 	Toni
Korea 		Rasputin (turns played by deity)
Mali 		?? (bamf226?)
Rome 		Jeroen Schweitzer*
Orb 		?? (suspect Black Knight 426)
Ottomans 	BranksDilly
Russia 		LzPrst (org. Heraclitus)*
Inca 		St Jon
Egypt 		Rempedaalops
Greece 		Hendriks de Infiedielen Dooder / deity*
Arabia 		WarningU2*

* = tmp subbed by OzzyKP at least once during the game

Real surprises should be:
- LzPrst playing Russia! (nobody knew he was in the game! He arrived shortly after or before the 1st Persian/Russian war)
- deity playing (partly) the Koreans

The biggest hit was of course deity teaming up with Toni against India.
- deity and Toni have a long history of being very competative
- deity thought he was ATTACKING Toni
- Toni didn't knew he was teaming up with deity
- it all turned out that long sworn competitors deity and Toni were teaming up together against an enemy the both of them could not even contain

Anyway, it has at last been shown that the 'vets' are not the one that always win or lead the game.
- The Priest one BtS and 2nd (in score) in DoC
- mzprox wins DoC

In fact the only question that remains is: when will a vet win a pitboss diplo game

My applause goes to players who weren't among the top-civs but kept on playing and rating through the entire game! That's really amazing. I hope that all of you have very good starts in the next game! You deserve it! Thanks for your participation there.

Games like this can only be a success if there are players who are willing to lose till the end.
I hope you guys had fun nonetheless, and many of you already expressed that!

[Robert]

Good old Japan, with whom I did this ultimate war against Rome.

[Toni]

Great Game mzprox

[India (DoC)]

Yes, I joined quite late and my first action had to be to accept the capitulation to Sparta to be able to protect the piercian cities. (since now you could check anyway my non-anon name here is mzprox )

[Toni]

And you did promise that you would join in our war against Rome.. but the 'time' was never right.

Sorry about that, but i had Khmer as my target. That war was a must between me and my mate Deity

[Toni]

LOL sorry but so who played the Japs?? we are still nowhere here

U did join the japs later on right?

[India (DoC)]

yep

[Toni]

Man you lost me . I still have no idea who you are!!

Greece/Robert attacked rome
Also russia attacked rome if i remember (but i do not remember who was Russia)


There was also Pinchak/Maya

Stating to forget who else

I suggest you tell me getting old here

P.S Oh s..h.it you were the Japs????

Oh so i get the joke the vassal thingy with DoC Persia now. Japs were a vassal of Greece then right?

[India (DoC)]

I was talking about what happened in DoC by the BtP players. And you did promise that you would join in our war against Rome.. but the 'time' was never right.

and I meant in our conflict (Sparta and me against Rome, Russia, the Natives, and the vikings only Rome had air force and used it to destroy our army)

[Toni]

Second, using a massive air force advantage against the BtP roman player (He defeated us then mostly because only He had any airforce)

Wait Portugal and khmer had the biggest airforce in that game.

Or did i miss anything?