The Tale of the Years 1853 - 1863.

[cavebear]

1863File:

[cavebear]

Originally posted by Bloody Monk
And the save?? Please don't forget the save.

Posted.

Did you explore along the coast from Killdeer to Utica??

The immediate coastline is explored. Rather than repeat the exploration, I thought I had a request to find larger cities to trade with, so I went east.

I can't believe you set all those cities building white goods all at the same time.

While I won't do anything suicidal, I did have clear instructions for the colony cities: "Temples, Colosseums, Settlers". So the places that had Temples were set to build Colosseums. I take my guidance from the Ministers very seriously.

It usually works better, especially when other things are on the build list, to build major white goods one or two at a time; and only where there is enough cash to rush build them after a turn of regular building. If disaster strikes and our cities get jumped, we will have to switch to mil-units and half the accumulated shields will be wasted. Hopefully, all will be well.

You have some conflicting desires there. I was supposed to get gold below 50 and it takes a lot more than that to buy Colosseums. So I could never accumulate enough Gold to buy an early-stage Colosseums anyway (usually about 150G. I bought Temples when I could. Further, you have already pointed out (and I agree) that if our cities are attacked, we are doomed anyway. We have no defense that will stand up to any real attack. With Crusaders and Musketeers, that may change (if we want to build them immediately). And I will remind you again of the general build order I received.

It usually works better, especially when other things are on the build list, to build major white goods one or two at a time; and only where there is enough cash to rush build them after a turn of regular building. If disaster strikes and our cities get jumped, we will have to switch to mil-units and half the accumulated shields will be wasted. Hopefully, all will be well.

You have some conflicting desires there. I was supposed to get gold below 50 and it takes a lot more than that to buy Colosseums. So I could never accumulate enough Gold to buy an early-stage Colesseum anyway (usually about 150G. I bought Temples when I could. Further, you have already pointed out (and I agree) that if our cities are attacked, we are doomed anyway. We have no defense that will stand up to any real attack. With Crusaders and Musketeers, that may change (if we want to build them immediately). And I will remind you again of the general build order I received.

[cavebear]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Awesome!

Now we have crooks, that can actually defend our cities.

Thanks, Ben. I thought it went very well. I'm glad we have both Crusaders and Musketeers now; it gives us options. A Musketeer and a Crusader for every city and we have flexibility and the possibility of building an army to take some enemy cities.

[cavebear]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Let's keep an eye on that GNP. If we are doing well, we should start to see that climb up from 6th.

We're not likely to improve the GNP much soon. Our productivity is #1, but our population is (I think) low. It takes both to improve GNP.

[Bloody Monk]

**"I take my guidance from the Ministers very seriously. "

Really?? This was the guidance...
For the Colony...
Build more cities got the most votes, with adding Colosseums when necessary second, in one poll. In a second slightly different poll, 4 of 7 voted for the Consensus Plan...

--Keep building Settlers until we get a workable mass of cities
--Add Temples and Colosseums as needed
--Keep a force of Settlers on hand for roads, etc

Notice the words, 'when necessary' and 'as needed'?? How about, 'Keep building Settlers'?? Is this taking guidance very seriously?? Oh, and wink wink.


**And then there is this..."I was supposed to get gold below 50 and it takes a lot more than that to buy Colosseums."

The suggestion was for 1 Colosseum and 1 Barracks both in Utica. Not everywhere, now, all at once.

Do you really and truly not understand the difference??


**And then there was this..."And I will remind you again of the general build order I received. "

How is blatant disregard and subsequent misrepresentation of the Polls and ACTUAL orders you received cool??

I think I do not understand this game format.

Monk

[cavebear]

Originally posted by Bloody Monk
**"I take my guidance from the Ministers very seriously. "

Really?? This was the guidance...
For the Colony...
Build more cities got the most votes,

I built more cities. There was discussion of problems resulting from building too many until we had potential happiness problems under control (as in might be redheads demanding Temples upon establishment)

with adding Colosseums when necessary second, in one poll. In a second slightly different poll, 4 of 7 voted for the Consensus Plan...

--Keep building Settlers until we get a workable mass of cities
--Add Temples and Colosseums as needed
--Keep a force of Settlers on hand for roads, etc

Which is exactly what I have done. I got a workable mass of cities (10). I made sure there were Temples in each city (or being built). To build population, we can't keep building new Settlers (lowers population and gets our city-count to automatic unhappiness)

We can't build Settlers and increase our city population at the same time.

We wanted Colosseums to allow city-growth, and the Colosseums take time to build, so they have to be started early.

Notice the words, 'when necessary' and 'as needed'?? How about, 'Keep building Settlers'?? Is this taking guidance very seriously?? Oh, and wink wink.

You don't get something you need by starting to build it when you need it. It takes time and you know that as well as I do. Especially when I was told to keep the gold supply below 50 to avoid tribute demands (and we had such a demand). If you have a plan to rushbuild whitegoods when you are told not to keep a gold reserve, I'm willing to listen! I can't buy stuff with gold I'm not to have available!

**And then there is this..."I was supposed to get gold below 50 and it takes a lot more than that to buy Colosseums."

The suggestion was for 1 Colosseum and 1 Barracks both in Utica. Not everywhere, now, all at once.

Do you really and truly not understand the difference??

Oddly, yes, I do. It's a good thing I didn't rush the Barracks; it would have just been sold as obsolete when we gor Gunpowder. And I've started the Colosseum in Utica. What is good for one Colony city is generally good for the others. It will be best in the long run. We deliver trade goods to large AI cities and we will have the gold to rush the Colosseums and the Colloseums will allow celebrating in the colony cities once we get their population to the required size.

OK? (type "yes")

How is blatant disregard and subsequent misrepresentation of the Polls and ACTUAL orders you received cool??

I followed the sum of the orders and the general discussion as best I could. If you disagree, vote against me next time. Actually, I think you would be a fine President for the next term. I could use a break. I don't want ANY office in July.

As far as your claim of "blatant disregard and subsequent misrepresentation of the Polls and ACTUAL orders" goes, I just disregard that as inaccurate. Sorry. I followed *everyone's* general guidance more than you seem to think I did.

I think I do not understand this game format.

That is correct, but you are catching on fast. I'm actually pretty impressed. But you are getting along only on your knowledge of the game (which is considerable) rather than quite connecting to the idea of negotiating the competing views of many people when it comes down to the final instructions to the President on how to play the next session.

There is a lot I don't know about the game. But I'm generally good about balancing the desires of the various Ministers and Citizens. Just like in real life, it takes more than technical ability/skill to balance the desires of multiple participants in a democracy game.

Food for thought...

[Bloody Monk]

cavebear,

You want food for thought??

You "claim" that you balance everyone's wishes and strictly follow the polls and directives, and that I have a lot more to learn concerning this. But, there was a specific poll question that got zero votes for stopping the building of cities when the first redhead appears. Vox populi was to keep on building more cities. So isn't it true that you did not actually follow your instructions on this??

You are running a Republic with a 7g/turn surplus with a group of size 1-2 cities for which you are everywhere slow building white goods that are, for the most part, currently unnecessary. Received wisdom suggests this is not an efficient way to play. It is usually thought best to build them in one or two cities at a time as available cash allows, by building one turn then rushing the rest of the shields. (Had you done it that way, the Barracks would not have been built and lost in Utica --as you claimed-- but the Colosseum would have, which would have resulted in a lower cash demand for Gunpowder.)

I was just pointing out something that I thought you would want to know. It has been my impression that learning about better/different ways of doing things was one of the features of this format.

Your response to this proffered help, however, especially your usage and placement of smilies, seemed sarcastic (with ) and smug ( ) and generally defensive; and the blaming me for offering bad polls and Minister Reports is very strange. At least I offered something. And I worked very hard trying to think of all kinds of permutations and points of view for the many polls and suggestions that I offered. I shouldn't have bothered.

But, hey, I am the new guy here and I don't need to be right. It's just a game after all. You can play it any way you want; and, I feel sure you will.

Good luck, and thanks for all the bananas.

Monk

[cavebear]

Monk -

First, I should mention that the "cool" smiley at the end of my posts is a sort of signature (a personal joke that I have to wear glasses to see the computer screen), not a comment. You had no way of knowing that, and I now realize that the smiley could be misinterpreted.

Second, the "wink" smiley was not meant to be sarcastic; I guess it should have been a regular smile.

Third, if I made some errors in play, you are right to point them out. I do not take that personally, nor were my comments to you meant in that way. I followed the various Ministerial recommendations as well as I could collect them and as closely as I could. There were some conflicting desires (that's normal). We want Settlers for new cities, but we also want our cities to grow large enough to celebrate them to size 8. We want enough gold at one time to rush infrastucture, but we also want to keep our gold below 50. We want Caravels to explore, but we also want them busy carrying Caravans for gold and beakers. I'm sure you would have played out the recommendations differently, as would anyone else. That's OK, too.

Fourth, I don't think I criticized your polls. I thought they were good ones.

Fifth, You are quite correct that I should have spent down our gold faster and that the Gunpowder would have cost us less. I wish I had. That was a mistake.

Sixth, I hope your last sentence doesn't mean you are leaving. I said I was impressed and I meant it.

Now, let's take the situation as it stands and go on from there. If starting the Colosseums in so many cities was a mistake, help me get us out of it. Perhaps some of them should be switched to Barracks. Perhaps there are other solutions.

[Sparrowhawk]

Cavebear,
There is a lot to comment on in this thread, but one immediate question that I have is where were the Zulus (Destroyer) and the Persians (Explorer) encountered?

Also, does anyone know what Civ we are likely to encounter with the exploring Caravel/Caravan? I don't recognize the name 'Rhayader'.

[cavebear]

The City.txt file says Rhayader is a Celt city (the 20th on the list, BTW).

Caravel/Destroyer:

[cavebear]

The meeting of Explorers:

Our Explorer was actually 1 tile north at the time. The Persian Exporer was evidently walking the south pole ice when it found us.

[Sparrowhawk]

the Zulu "destroyer" look suspiciously like a "Cruiser" to me, which means the Zulus also have steel in addition to this many other techs which we lack.

And as for the Persian Explorer, I think we should send our Exporer back to the point they met and move east alone the Pole, it should encounter whatever land they came from I would think. (and if we do build a Caravel in either Two Whales or Panama or one of the other Southern Coast Cities (as I suggested ) then we could also explore with that and possibly discover Persia?

[Bloody Monk]

Originally posted by Sparrowhawk
the Zulu "destroyer" look suspiciously like a "Cruiser" to me, which means the Zulus also have steel in addition to this many other techs which we lack.

And as for the Persian Explorer, I think we should send our Exporer back to the point they met and move east alone the Pole, it should encounter whatever land they came from I would think. (and if we do build a Caravel in either Two Whales or Panama or one of the other Southern Coast Cities (as I suggested ) then we could also explore with that and possibly discover Persia?

And we still need to discover what is asociated with the irrigated tile west of Killdeer and the other 'dark' tiles in the coastal area in our direction.

But before sending the explorer on a polar jaunt, mighten it be good to rehome it away from Apoly' first??

And I seem to recall someone previously mentioning that the Celt homeland was to the West of our Colony.

Monk

[cavebear]

Sparrowhawk - Sorry, I can never tell the darn things apart (Destoyer/Cruiser). You are correct, that was a Cruiser.

I considered moving the Explorer along the pole, but its mission was to reveal the landmass the colony cities are on. That can be changed though... The Explorer's western mission is completed and it is free to be redirected as the Citizens desire.

[cavebear]

Originally posted by Bloody Monk

And we still need to discover what is asociated with the irrigated tile west of Killdeer and the other 'dark' tiles in the coastal area in our direction.

Agreed, it is what I was trying to learn with the (sadly) ambushed Caravel.

But before sending the explorer on a polar jaunt, mighten it be good to rehome it away from Apoly' first??

The Exporer is currently 2 turns from Two Whales, though Cartenna can afford the shield loss better if we want to go that far (if to explore east toward the Egyptians).

[QUOTEAnd I seem to recall someone previously mentioning that the Celt homeland was to the West of our Colony. [/QUOTE]

I recall that, too, though I wonder how it was known. IIRC, it was because we sighted a Celtic ship heading east through Apolytonia waters.

BTW, glad to see you are still here, Monk. Your earlier post had me concerned.