CHRONICLES

RBCiv Epic Thirty

After having to buy Astronomy straight up, I managed another 2fer with the Hammer. Barely.

And then again, in 780AD, when my gpt obligations spent on the original 2fer expired. Industrial Age, here we come!

Of course, now being one sad broke mofo, I won't be doing much of squat until 980AD, but you know how that goes.

OK, so I did train that poachy settler out of Nagoya as planned. He took a bunch of turns to march to the coast, then I forgot I did not have any ships and had to wait for one of those cities to finish its project, then wait on the ship, a hefty 60shield galleon, then cross the channel, land and march inland.

Would the spot still be open after that long? Blah, surely not. No, but wait! It's still there. Still there. Still there. ... Still there. My settler pair is approaching and it is STILL THERE. Ah, nope. Mongols settle there. Crapola.

But wait! The Mongols settled on the coast? They left a Nagoya-size patch of pure jungle. The city might flip away and would be under heavy pressure, but I DID focus my civ on culture and I did bring three pikes with me. And what else was I going to do with the settler anyway.

The turn I arrive on my destination tile, I managed to buy in to Steam Engine @last civ price. HAHAHA, CHECK THIS OUT!

Whoa! Never seen that message before. I guess I've never gone all the way into the industrial age without hooking up even a single strategic resource! The players are going to love this map. :) This thing is going to redefine "poor resources". We'll be using Epic Thirty as the yardstick for measuring resource-poor starts for years to come.

What baffles me is why the Mongols founded their city where they did, with the coal NOT in range. I still don't have an answer for that one.

After dreaming since the early game, I finally landed a city on "that island" over there. Ha! And poaching coal right out from under their noses, the thing is actually going to be worth the effort I put into it! Erm, once I get it connected, that is.

Oh yeah, we've come a long way since 1550BC!

I bought one round of coal and iron and started building rails and training samurai. (Just now training samurai? What use are they? Well, I can still land a golden age off one, and they can be promoted to cavs later, if I ever get horses and saltpeter).

Oh, and you are looking live at the new Japanese democracy!

Note that that blight of a city, Inch'on, has finally passed my cities of Edo and Satsuma on culture and stolen two tiles. I would get the one at Edo back, but the one at Satsuma... crap.

Note that Korea took over China's cities east of my capital. Now they have signed India up to war with China, too, and Gandhi is gobbling up Chinese cities. Just what I need: these stupid AI's to be fighting one another instead of uniting against Mongolia. I've got a baaaaaaad feeling about this!

On the other hand, must be ready to poach. I start peeling settlers off my size 12 cities here or there.

Uh huh, yep. When Korea captures Beijing, I slip in there and nab me some dyes at Nagasaki.

Oh, China collapsing like house of cards. Gaps open on the northeast peninsula, amongst the walruses. I grab another site and should be able to land two more.

Mao makes his exit from the game, the first to go.

Anybody care to take bets on who goes next?

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