Congrats to Ebert on a nice finish despite an unusual round! VicVixvi, I didn't quite make it a race (but thanks for the compliment!). When ebert puts his head down and decides not to war, he's a tough nut to crack.

Shout out to the perennial T10s VicVixvi (at 6) and ashe (At 3)-- I had a St. Feuillien Saison a couple of days ago.

Also, nice farmer finish for NTL, and a nice finish for Aquatic Love (I hope you enjoyed the 1800 acres and 1200 labs from me!)

I'd send some "navajas al ajillo," but it doesn't travel well :)

Thanks for the kind words, everyone! And again, ashe, VicVixvi, and Gerdler were all super helpful with critical pointers to get me on my way. GL to all this next set!

There were 118 countries in the Express server.

Rank Country Land Networth Special
1 navajas al ajillo (#50) Game profile 21,975 $52,253,379 HG
2 Mentha Piperita Oil (#102) 15,528 $44,080,775 DG
3 douchecanoe (#107) Game profile 26,474 $36,050,827 CG
4 Breasts are my kryptonite (#9) Game profile 20,466 $34,942,111 HG
5 Jeg kommer i fred (#40) Game profile 16,556 $29,070,154 HG
6 (#82) 14,220 $25,826,250 HG
7 unholy penance (#8) Game profile 18,426 $25,554,796 DG
8 Henchman 21 (#87) Game profile 24,927 $23,691,476 FG
9 Call (#78) Game profile 26,070 $22,025,143 I
10 Game 7 Lebron (#86) 26,423 $20,351,492 HG

11 InvisibleBully2 (#13) Game profile 9973 $19,457,993 H
12 DeathFromAbove (#1) Game profile 13,797 $19,144,574 TG
13 cod fish bouillabaisse (#62) 25,444 $19,032,777 H
14 STiNKy ChEEsE LaND (#38) 18,301 $17,886,339 R
15 ItWillOnlyBeTheRichAndThefluffed (#3) Game profile 14,214 $15,394,820 CG
16 Pitman (#55) Game profile 14,936 $14,828,854 H
17 Little Blue Bug (#26) Game profile 16,665 $14,381,886 D
18 kAYdEN coming for express (#2) Game profile 17,688 $14,296,113 D
19 (#104) Game profile 17,101 $13,786,495 FG
20 yatgnos (#57) Game profile 19,752 $12,868,944 HG

21 Bot Land Harvest Machine (#11) 18,194 $12,145,042 TG
22 BaDonkaDonks (#97) Game profile 16,821 $11,540,690 HG
23 Trojan (#12) 14,870 $11,402,836 RG
24 Essence of Tumescence (#116) 19,961 $10,530,440 C
25 Baka (#101) Game profile 12,614 $10,329,530 H

Congrats to the top 10! Shout out to Gerdler at 2, ashe at 4, and VicVixvi at 7. Ebert also had a really impressive finish despite a government change and a kill (or was it two again? I don't want to shortchange you!)

I’m a newbie, as celphi will undoubtedly find me and call me (or celphi2/3/4/5), but I know not to quad tap someone, and early on on a peaceful server, no less! I saw you did the same to Doctor Detroit, Blackgold, and NTL too, tsk tsk. Thanks for giving me 122 seconds of joy with missiles ;)

Interesting. First, great job to Gerdler for 80mm+! That is one impressive number… is it a record on Express?

Second, I don’t agree with Celphi. It seems like that of a sore loser/someone who cannot net well—before this set, I managed to finish top 5 (with one win!) in the last 6 out of 7 sets, with my first set being only a few months ago, and I didn’t feel remotely targeted outside of the normal randos (LamChoppy being one of them). If you know what you’re doing, you can finish T10, and even T5, and I played both techer and casher-- the top players are also super friendly and helpful BTW (and don't make excuses or insult others).

Third, this was a fun set—I was going to take it off, but apparently drunkenly registered a country. I considered it my “server integrity” set afterwards, and had some fun fluffing around with the worst of the worst, including the likes of “LamChoppy (regular double or triple tapper),” “Ratski/RatZilla/Ratman (biggest whiner here outside of clintonista and regular duper of accounts),” “blat (quad tapped me),” and in the end, #3, who rudely ruined Riddler early on for no reason, who I’ve found to be one of the most easygoing and nice people on this server.

And finally, let's all brace for a grammar mistake riddled response from Ratski! :)

A belated congrats, Gerdler, on the finish and impressive NW! An impressive homage to the namesake...

It’s only my third month here, but I’ve tried to model my play after a lot of the top players, which is retaling exactly the same number of times I was hit. When I get tapped twice or more though, I reserve the right for war if my set isn’t going well… and if 3x+, then I almost definitely will just resort to war, haha. Nice lesson that VicVixvi taught me during my second set… I was recklessly hitting humans (hit him 3x), and he killed me in short order…

441 will be a fun set! VicVixvi's rebirth, ebert's rejuvenation after the sweet nectar of two kills, kayden playing well, ashe and Gerdler with a focused two-headed rush to 50mm+, and everyone making sure Ratman doesn't get another T25...

Thanks everyone! Just keeping the seat warm for ashe/VicVixvi/Gerdler/ebert

+ thanks for the advice and words of encouragement from ashe/VicVixvi and Gerdler the last couple of months.

I wouldn’t be too excited about what happened today (knocking around Jason Vargas, who should have retired a couple years ago. We are probably still a year or two out for your Braves, but that said, you sure do have some exciting prospects. Acuña probably could have been called up early last season, but they waited til this season to secure club control through 2024. I think multiple pubs (Baseball Prospectus, which I follow closely), Baseball America, and ESPN had him as the number one prospect this year. Even last year, he was in the top 30 or so, before he crushed the minors, Grapefruit leagues, etc. A couple others had him only behind Shohei Ohtani, which, quite frankly, there is less of a sample set for, since the comparison between minors and Japanese leagues isn’t apples to apples. I think the Vegas over/under on projected wins was in the low 70s (78 now, as per Fangraphs). I would expect that some of your hitters will regress (Suzuki, Flaherty, and Markakis have exceeded their ZIPS and STEAMER projections), but Acuña, Albies, and Swanson are all on the up and up, and Freeman is a stud—they will be a solid core going forward. Have some patience on Folty—he had bone chips a couple of years ago, so I’m sure they are trying to be careful. Someone that throws that kind of heat shouldn’t go that deep into games a couple years after being so fragile. Here’s to you guys reviving the 1990’s rivalry with my team (the Yankees…). For all of you haters out there, I’m also a lifelong Knicks fan….

And (3) there are super nice and helpful people on the server. VicVixVi and beerdrinker75/Ashe encouraged me to stay and gave me valuable pointers

It’s cool to see them win. Or ebert. Or gerdler. Bc you keep trying, Clint! You don’t complain.

Kingme-- Interesting-- (1)- I actually didn't know that. (2) Top 10 isn't enough :)

Gerdler-- Thanks for the kind words. It's not so much about beating anyone--- it's about being competitive!! (although it felt good when ebert PMed me and asked if I was you when I was temporarily ahead, haha).

I was under the impression that most bots have their turns used up (almost at all times), so there aren’t “specific times that a bot would log in.” I would imagine that tech purchases or defense purchases are at times where they have cash, which is very random-- it can be after using a turn, or after they sell their own product on the markets, which is variable based on when that happens.

Like many have said, this game isn’t that hard—I started 2 months ago, and with some well-placed advice from the nice guys in the community, have been able to do reasonably well, although I still find myself looking up at the end of a set, haha.

The market doesn’t react all that different than real markets, and sometimes is a microcosm of a real market. For example, the price of any asset (you can view this as price of a stock, or price of a commodity, etc.) isn’t the only component to look at when you are evaluating an investment decision. You also have to look at the depth on both sides—of both demand and supply. On EE, I’m sure a number of players (myself included) may decide to cause short term price disruptions on both sides. If there’s a lot of tech offered low, and you have a lot of stock to offload, you would prefer a higher last/current price to encourage tech not being progressively sold lower, by both bots and humans. Yes, sometimes that results in tech being squeezed higher, only to have a massive price drop minutes later when more tech eventually hits the market. Similarly, you may have standing orders to “protect” your own offered price.

In the end, I’m virtually certain that there is close to 0 collusion/teamwork (other than maybe Ratski and his Ponytail, who the mods have been consistent in chopping off). It’s more likely that those who struggle to understand correct strategy (and thus, are not consistent T20 players) are the ones who are encouraged to try to cheat/collude to end up higher (the whole clintonista thread with screenshots is an obvious example). This is a game—a fun game—and a nice community (for the most part). Instead of decrying players that finish well, it would seemingly behoove players to work through how to finish better. Speaking from experience, almost all of the top players are more than willing to help. I’m not a top player, but I am always willing to as well.

Ratski, is that you (#17?) who decided to attack me 3x? lol

Goodbye. And I apologize it took me a couple of days to kill you, haha, but despite being a beginner, I now know that you're NOT SUPPOSED TO HIT A HUMAN 5x..

Congrats ashe! Nice win

So this is my 6th week or so in...

Just to make sure that I'm compleeeeeetely caught up, when we decide not to net in a particular set, the goal is to identify and hit Clintonista, Temple, and Ratski, in that order, right? (assuming Ratski didn't get banned already from said set...)

Thanks!!!

I'm sad that I was wrong in speculating that Ratski and "his neighbor" would use the same vernacular. One uses random punctuation in the oddest of places, and the "other" eliminates punctuation altogether. Must be "different" people!

All I have to say is that this thread is pretty amazing, haha. I’m just really looking forward to “the neighbor” posting with the same… vernacular (yeah, yeah, we get it’ll be a different IP Ratski….). I can’t believe I only rediscovered this game and its associated drama a month ago.

It will make me feel so much better about being stuck long a ton of tech that I will need to sell for $999 tomorrow…

bonus!

Congrats, VicVixvi! Happy with my 4th, but happier for your 1st!

TEMPLE! Haha

6.5 hours ago
Enemy operatives stole $3,643,154 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,657,785 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,672,475 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,687,224 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,702,032 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,716,899 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,731,827 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

6.5 hours ago
the Temple (#76) attempted to bomb your banks! You killed 13730 enemy spies.

6.5 hours ago
Enemy operatives stole $3,746,814 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,761,861 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,776,969 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,822,658 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,838,010 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,853,424 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,868,899 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,884,437 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,900,037 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

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Enemy operatives stole $3,915,700 and destroyed $0 worth of cash!

#100 had it in for me too... Gerdler--your kill definitely assisted in my top 10, since I would have wasted a lot more time getting my revenge, so I have to thank you.

thank you VicVixvi!

I guess serves me right for not joining GDI, but way to be a ****.

Separately, there are gentlemen here-- would like to specifically call out VicVixvi and beerdrinker75 for giving a beginner helpful advice

ha

sorry. it was my literal second game. if I attacked you, I thought you were a bot... didn't even understand landgrabs since I lost a lot of net worth each time, haha. oh well. not in your league I guess. played a few times in the 90s when it was earth2025, but this might have been my second and last play in the 10s.. don't need the grief, or the offense, if I hurt you!

when you convert, you have to convert and then buy units right? or it just converts? newbie here

hmm

haha