I think someone will do so and fairly soon unless my bizarre lucky streak continues. All of the wild and wacky things I’ve had happen have kept my fighting on the edge of elimination which means I haven’t had time to do things like, say, magic research. Heck, I barely have any mages at all since I had to dump all my gems into Archbishops so I could reanimate and bless enough undead to hold back the giants.
I have a lot of provinces but they are split into two chunks with no interconnection so I can’t bring my forces together into one big army. A split empire is a defensive nightmare and the lack of research is going to cripple me in the late game phase. I’m still not a contender in this game, but I have been promoted from minor nuisance to serious nuisance and I’m quite happy about that.
I’m already working on my nuisance tactics too. Last turn Rlyeh lost an ocean province at the heart of their empire to me. I’m sure the Rlyeh player (ron_debry) was thinking, “Why build PD? Who has stealthy underwater units to raid my backfield?” Well that answer to that one is Ermor baby! SPECTATORS FTW!!!
TheRock
1742
You think Mr. Chick can stop playing with his Wii Wii for a few seconds so we can get Shirley rolling…and sorry, my office’s power was out the past few days.
gruntled
1743
Lucky for me you only had the 1 spectator - that could have been far more than just a nuisance.
As for my take on diplomacy - different groups have different norms. I played several dom2 games with the Shrapnel forum crowd. Over there, NAPs (non-aggression pacts) are pretty standardized, and I can see where one might think in terms of “unwritten rules”. And I’m perfectly willing to play that way. Heck, even here, where the norms are different, if I have an agreement that says “I will not attack you without giving 3 turns notice”, I’m pretty much going to scrupulously stick to that agreement (I cannot recall having ever broken such an agreement in a QT3 game). But I can play either way - over at Shrapnel I will not jump the gun and attack without giving due notice. Here, I might; but rarely, and only when I stand to gain a major, game-altering advantage from doing so.
I played some Diplomacy (that board game) by email - there’s a huge online community. Even though lying is an integral part of the game, the best players tell fewer lies than the worse players. They stick to a basic rule - tell any one oppenent at most one lie per game. And its not because of any cross-game reputation - nearly all the online games are anonymous.
I detect a problem here. McCrank played Kalaisa, which I think was eliminated from the game last turn. I thought the server would just remove him from the list of players, but apparently not as the game is stuck in limbo.
Anyone have a solution for this?
If the game is still waiting for him (perhaps he has some remnant forces or isn’t 100% eliminated?) the best thing is for the host to log in as Kailasa using the master server password and set the nation to AI.
I’m guessing he has to log in and see the ‘You are eliminated’ screen. It seems a shame to hold the game up until this happens though.
Yeah, sorry, I’ve been neglecting both my games over the holiday break. I’ll do my Shirley turn today.
Actually, does anyone want to take over for an early game T’ien Chi or somewhat healthy Rl’yeh (albeit with two staled turns)?
-Tom
Marcin
1748
Interesting.
My web doohickey (which reads the server output) had McCrank as “pending”.
My app doohickey (which pings the server directly) had him as eliminated.
The server itself seemed hung up, oddly.
So I force-hosted. Now both web and app are in agreement that McCrank is no longer on the list of active players. Here’s hoping that was all that was needed, as I’m not sure what index # Kailasa is :)
That’s my take on “non-binding” treaties too, and in practice the difference between the two camps isn’t so great. Those who like the “unwritten NAP rules” often mischaracterize the “Diplomacy” camp as untrustworthy vermin who’ll stab you in the back as soon as they can. While I don’t treat agreements as law, finding a strong ally is the key to succeeding, and that requires a certain degree of trust.
I’ve actually been burned more often by the “sure, we’ll have an alliance with a 5 turn out” crowd, as such agreements often seem to mean someone’s preparing to invade, but just isn’t ready yet. I’m thus inherently suspicious of anyone who offers me an X turn treaty – either we have common cause, or we don’t. In my experience people who follow the “common cause” principle of diplomacy typically mean it when they say they suggest an alliance, and treaty breaking is reserved for backstabs that directly change who wins.
One game of Colonial Diplomacy I played really highlighted my dislike of the “unwritten rules”. Another player and I dominated through a strong alliance, but he gained much more from it than I, and the only person that could stop him from winning was me. He assumed that I would just let him win, but I instead stabbed him, bringing him down to the level of everyone else – I had no intention of throwing the game. I did it in a way that left him still strong, but gave me a defensive position from which he couldn’t retaliate. He was still in probably second place, with plenty of chance to win. What was his response? To play kingmaker, giving all of his holdings to another and letting him win, explicitly to punish me for not following his “unwritten rules” and letting him win.
This is intended, so eliminated players get a chance to see their last turn. It’d be pretty lame to get eliminated after a big battle, and not get to watch it.
Well, since you decided to attack me, I will do my best to remake your nation soon…:)
Hetzer
1752
Ah those are sore loosers… At least you know now never to play with him again …
The Giants are the scary!
Also, I didn’t scout first and had no idea what appears to be your main base was right there… Or at least a very strong one. Tactical redeployment might be called for… :P
Johan_O
1754
I can do this, but to do so I need you credit card number, social security number and one note or paper containing your signature.
That’s just an underpowered outpost…
That’d be one way to get an ally for Kailasa in bandar. Though I don’t R’lyehians make any poo.
Clark
1757
I already tried and failed!
BTW, anyone want to comment on what is going on in the qt3 Lictor game. I still haven’t run into anyone other than Ermor. It almost seems like I am playing in one of those post-apocalyptic stories where everyone is dead.
Rollory
1758
I’m finding indies. Lots and lots of indies. I’ve got several armies of Rangers that I basically just sent off into the wilderness to go as far as they could in straight lines in various directions and see what they ran into. One of them finally ran into C’tis. I’m wondering if I might run across Nick’s ghoul outpost in another area, though I’m not seeing ANY hostile dominion.
BTW, is it some cunning lizardoid plan to keep hiring the mercs even when they’ve got just a handful of soldiers left, to prevent the rest of us from getting usage of full-strength units?
It’s a decent sized map and we don’t have a ton of players, so we are going to see some big empires before we really need to fight to expand.
Rlyeh appears to be holding the whole northwest of the map. Looks like he took a Wyrm thug pretender and has just been steamrolling indies and mega expanding. That’s a darn good strategy for Rlyeh on a big wide open map, so my hats off to Mr Debry.
Wait, really?
If I’m your only neighbor in Lictor then why the heck didn’t you kick me when I was down? That last counterattack I threw at you was every unit I possessed with the exception of my pretender and one mage. All you needed to do was come back with 60 giants instead of 30 and you could have wiped the floor with me.
I assumed you begged for peace because you’d ran into another expansionistic neighbor and needed to defend your turf on another front.
