Good game everyone. The Sleeping Princess of Man is to be the new Generaless of the West and will be responsible for subduing those nations who resist the divine order. Bubbles and his Rishi will help those who wish for peace in re-integrating into civilian life and putting aside their warlike ways.
Juffos, thanks for setting up and running the game.
A quick AAR for those who are interested:
For Shinuyama, this game could be summarized by a single word: humongoluck. A characteristic example of this would be around turn 25, when we discovered the Cedar Pillar (30% enchantment bonus), and then the next turn had a fortunate event which placed a castle on top of the site (this despite taking misfortune 2). More importantly, I had a great starting position, probably the best I've had in any SP or MP game. Of the starting 6 provinces, 5 had between 10000-18000 population, and that sort of pattern continued on through out many of my other initial in indies. My favorite one had 26000 and a gem deposit on it.
Then there was the fact that I had a corner start, that my northern neighbors were literally on the other side of the map, and that I had plenty of water provinces to let my amphibious Pretender and troops shine. All in all, it was a perfect petri dish for Shinuyama expansion.
Early on my main source of anxiety was my Western neighbors of Arcos and Bandar Log. From previous games I've seen JimMorrison and DonCorazon to be very humorous, skilled, and generally easy going players, so I thought we would quickly establish NAP3s and then go about the business of conquering indies and then weaker nations. I envisioned it as an enlightened meeting of the minds, as between the Pope, Mother Theresa, and the Buddha. Instead, it turned into a vicious brawl, as between three drunken and low-class Irishmen. I expanded one province too far to the west, thus nearly starting a war with Bandar, and then they rushed Arco, and then I expanded too far again with Arco when it looked like they were going to be destroyed. After that Arco and Bandar Log made peace and threatened to join up against me, and it was a couple of more months of posturing, pleading, and maneuvering before I could move north again. No one really gained anything from the fighting, though it did at least sow the seeds of bitter dissension that would help prevent concerted action later on.
After that Shinuyama fought its first and only real war against Ashdod. Juffos played them very well, and came close to defeating 4-5 nations in the first 30 turns. Unfortunately, he ran into a tricky, tricky ambush on my part, lost a bunch of sacreds, and was on the defensive after that. I like to believe he hit the ambush due to overconfidence after stomping on both Mictlan and Tien Chi so early in the game.
Ashdod had wrecked his 4 neighbors to varying degrees, so with him on the defensive it left 80+ provinces that were defended only by indies, PD, and AI. I moved through those as quickly as I could, while trying to research spells to break into Ashdod's fortified castles.
It was around this time that people started to notice a problem. Fortunately, Man was still dealing with Ashdod and then Arco marauders, Arco and Bandar Log were still looking to settle scores, and Jotunheim proved no match for the Rishi armies. So aside from the threatening armies of Marignon and an incursion by Machaka's Colossal Fetish, our expansion went unopposed until the end. I'd sum it up with a Simone Weil quote which is the basis of my MP strategy: "Oppression that is clearly inexorable and invincible does not give rise to revolt but to submission."
A few other misc notes:
- Pelthin, please build at least a point of PD. 10 provinces with no PD will tempt even the most loyal allies.
- Ashdod is very, very powerful. I had a difficult time with them even when they were outnumbered and did not have spells; I can't imagine winning against a strong, well played late game Ashdod that can back their troops up with Earthquakes and the like.