SGOTM5 - Spoiler 1 Middle Ages Plus Full World Map and all 15 contacts.

Rules for Posting in and Viewing this thread

1. Your team must be researching a middle age tech.
2. You must have all 15 contacts and a map of all populated land masses.
3. A nominated team member must have posted a summary of the teams game to the limit of this spoiler.
5. No discussion is permitted of any Middle Age resource locations.

REMEMBER: Wait until your teams' summary has been posted before reading or posting in this thread yourself.

Discussion points of interest to me include:-
1. How important is the Great Lighthouse in this game?
2. Was catching up in techs difficult?
3. Was it possible to get the capital city to 15spt in depspostism?
4. Did you prefer horsemen or swordsmen for conquest?
5. Which landmass did you decide to conquer first and why?
6. What did you like/dislike about the modifications made to the rules (workers/Heroic Epic/leaders/no settlers from huts etc.)?
7. Was the first 80 to 100 turns just too boring for words? ;)
8. Comparison of the three "tailored" settling locations.

The Jason best date for conquest in this game is 550AD.

FWIW:
The three given starting locations were intended to play differently but be equal in terms of opportunity. Worker turns to connect resources, proximity to the AI and galley movement points, requirement for the great lighthouse etc. were all taken into account. The starting techs were modified to give the opportunity for a 40 turn run to writing and then map making, and was a clue. Originally the game was designed for the English, but then ainwood used them in a GOTM :p

The ability to build wonders from the start, and the likelihood of future palace jumps, coupled with having nothing else to build led to a bit of mischief on my part. How long does it take to get your money and shields back if you build the colossus (considering the despotic penalty that applies, and the fact that all the workable tiles are already at 2gpt since they are roaded and on a river?).

SGOTM 05 – First Spoiler

Xteam: (Kings of the Frozen Tundra – A.K.A Kings of Spam)

Rotation:
AlanH –Finder of Maps
Capt. Buttkick – Goodie Hut Guru
DJMGator13 – Barb Defender
leif erikson – Barb Finder
Mistfit – AI Finder

We start our journey with our band of X-men buried hip deep in snow looking for a place to call home. This, of course, is cause for much discussion. We almost ran into trouble from the start when our scout came down with a case of frostbite on his toes from waiting around for the leaders to decide which direction to move. (49 posts, 11 pic’s, and 62 smilies later a course of action is decided). Our scout heads West to the high mountain and low and behold spots a herd of Yak that has made its home in a semi habitable spot west of the mountain. Smoke signals are sent from the mountaintop to our settler and work crew that a city spot has been found.
In 3750 BC (the year of the Yeti) Moscow is founded.
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/Xteam_3000BC.jpg
After starting a fire in the capital building it was decided that our scout was warm enough and should be out scouting around looking for neighbors and goodie huts.

Goodie Hut results:
AlanH 3700BC – Maps
AlanH 3250BC – Maps
AlanH 3050BC – Maps (no more goodie hut popping for Alan)
Capt. Buttkick 2850BC – Pottery (that’s more like it)
Capt. Buttkick 2670BC – Ceremonial Burial (with Scout)
Capt. Buttkick 2670BC – Maps (with Warrior)

From here we worked diligently for centuries getting Moscow up and running smoothly and efficiently readying ourselves to meet the rest of the world

Exciting Events:

1450BC - Built the Colossus in Moscow
750BC – leif meets the Indians
710BC – Mistfit meets the Egyptians
670BC – Mistfit meets the Spanish
610BC – Mistift meets the Arabic people
590BC – Mistfit meets everyone else

Research:

2850BC: Pottery – Goodie Hut

2670BC: CB – Goodie Hut

1950BC: Writing – Self-Taught

1300BC:Map Making – Self-Taught

1175BC: Warrior Code – Self-Taught

1025BC:Wheel – Self-Taught

775BC: Horse Back –Self Taught

670BC:
CoL – India
Math – India
Masonry – Spain
Mysticism – Spain
IW – Spain

590BC:
Philo – Arab
Lit – Arab
Poly – Aztec
Currency – France

570BC:
Construction - America

670BC:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/Before1.jpg

570BC:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/After.jpg
A very productive Century!

So this leaves our intrepid band of X-men with knowledge of the world and all of its inhabitants. Now, you are going to have to wait and see what we do with this knowledge. :evil:

We started by hitting F10 and learning about 15 other civs. With 25% land, this should be crowded.

Being in the middle of nowhere, we had to explore. Given 3 mountains in 3 directions, we started by sending the scout SE and the worker W. The settler waited for reports. Soon the scout reported wheat and fish and furs and the settler started moving. Moscow was established 3650BC and built a warrior and granary next to grow our one and only city.

We researched pottery, wheel (to build chariots), writing, map making(975BC), col, hbr. Huts gave us ceremonial burial, mysticism, warrior code. They also gave us the money to spend on our research.

Soon we started wondering because only barbarians appeared, but no foreign civ.

Moscow built temple (2390BC), Colossus(1400BC), Great Lighthouse(825BC) and was pop 12 in 1250BC with 16 spt and 28cpt while still in despotism.

The Lighthouse delayed the time till the 1st galley set sail to 750BC, followed by 2 more after 2 and 4 turns.

Our 3 galleys contacted the Iroquois , Spanish, and Japanese in 530BC, Egypt 510BC. We started a fast and furious trading round, getting all techs, contacts, maps, and treasures of the AIs. This put us in the Middle Ages and of course (1.29) we got free monotheism. Since we also learned monarchy, we revolted and after 3 turns of anarchy established monarchy. We decided on attacking the southwestern continent where The Pyramids were under construction, but the actual fighting only started way into the Middle Ages.

We had a combined force of horsemen (we used them to kill the barbs) and warrior/swords.

We had no problem catching up in techs, which was also eased because we had 3 galleys contacting different civs at the same time.

Not having Great Leaders to hurry the Forbidden Palace takes a random element from the game and I think this to be positive.

Without having made an in-depth comparision of the 3 starting positions, ours is very nice because it allows micro-management for shields, food, and commerce, depending on need.

How long does it take to get your money and shields back if you build the colossus (considering the despotic penalty that applies, and the fact that all the workable tiles are already at 2gpt since they are roaded and on a river?).
Furs give you +1 gold even under despo. Also, we settled west and there was a forest that wasn't by the river that we worked quite a lot. That gave us another +1 gold from the Colossus.

Now to answer a few of your other questions:
1. How important is the Great Lighthouse in this game?
1. I think the GLight was a great wonder in this game. There's a few safe crossings from coast to coast and differential ship movement usually makes the GLight less valuable. However, with GLight you can practically go anywhere. Also, with lots of coast squares, GLight's increased movement is more valuable than in most games with differential ship movement.
2. Was catching up in techs difficult?
No :lol:
3. Was it possible to get the capital city to 15spt in depspostism?
Yes, I saw Tao got to 16. We never needed 16, used 15 just barely before switching to monarchy.
7. Was the first 80 to 100 turns just too boring for words?
No, I think the start was good. We'll have great fun catching up now :goodjob:

Team Ivan report

We started by sending the scout west and the worker east. We liked what the scout saw and sent the settler west. Moscow was founded on turn 6. The scout and at start worker explored the map.

The build order was scout -> worker -> warrior -> granary

We got a few techs from huts and an eqWorker.

In 1375BC Moscow completes the colossus. We had decided that cash was to be a problem with only 1 city.

We researched towards iron working to identify and secure iron and then map making as fast as possible. Once we had determined we were alone we get our unit count down to keep costs down. Eventually we learn map making and build some galleys.

In 775BC we contact the Indians. In 710BC we contact the Americans and Spain. In 610BC we trade for the rest of the contacts.

In 410BC we trade our way into the Middle ages.

We make quite a bit of money (10 to 15 gpt) trading WMs every turn.

We build a highway to the North eastern corner of the island to allow us to rapidly transfer troops to the 1st target (India). We went for swords not horsemen. The swords helped with barbarian farming. We did lose 2 swords to the barbarian uprising.

Team Offa:
offa, gozpel, grs (dropped out by now), klarius, Northern Pike, WackenOpenAir

Well, not much happened in our Ancient Age, so not much to report (though I notice that I managed a quite long post anyways).
And the variant even prevented fundamental discussions about empire building in our thread. :cry: ;)

We scouted in three directions with our three units.
The settler headed west.
Because we didn't see a much stronger location, we stayed west and settled moscow in 3700BC.
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/kl_sg5_8.JPG
Early research was pottery, then warrior code, hoping to get better techs from huts.
First builds where 2 scouts for quick contacts and hut popping.
The part with the contacts didn't quite work out, but the hut popping went quite well.
Early in our thread "land bridge" was a much used term. But you all know how it really was.

The huts on our island gave two workers, ceremonial burial and masonry as things to mention.
Then we built a warrior and a granary.

After we found out that we would be isolated, we decided to both build the Colossus and The Great Lighthouse.
So after a archer we started on Colossus.
It wouldn't give much (2-4) commerce in despotism, but every coin counts if you are isolated.
It was also a big helper later with our research projects in MA.
There also was not much else to build at that time.
It was too early for a Lighthouse prebuild and building units would just eat money we needed for research.

Research was set on max affordable towards writing->map making

So Colossus completed in 1700BC and after another archer, we started on the Lighthouse prebuild.
Map making was discovered in 1350BC, with still 3 turns to go on the Lighthouse.

After the Lighthouse completed in 1275BC we made 3 quick galleys.
These were done (as also part of the Lighthouse) with 15spt, to answer one of the questions, but meant starvation by one fpt.
Moscow was size 10 at that time and could do 14spt @ no food surplus.

So our QSC stat looks like this:
1 city ;)
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/sgotm5-offa-moscow-1000BC1.jpg
10 pop
2 archers, 1 warrior, 1 worker, 3 galleys
granary, Colossus, Lighthouse
BW, alpha, pottery, CB, masonry, writing, MM, literature

We were discussing what government to pursue and finally decided to go for republic.

Our galleys quickly found some other land, but it took until 900BC that we met other civs.
But then it were already all:
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/kl_sg5_9.JPG
We met Spain and Vikings on the same turn and traded for all other contacts, maps, techs and all the money.
To answer another of MBs questions: tech catch-up was easy.
We had all the first and second tier techs after the first trading round and were already ahead of several of our neighbors.

Our tech development was then even boosted by some more goody huts off our island.
We got poly, currency and finally construction from them.

After we had the map we started planning our conquest of the world.
We then settled for the easiest plan, just take the nearest cities and build the FP there.
But we were still undecided whether to go for Nidaros or Beijing first.

We discussed also free palace jump.
But for that we should have started building military earlier instead of wonders.
Even if we should still have toyed with the idea, the delay by the massive barb uprise, would have ruled out the idea.

But we didn't get to do anything towards our plan in AA.
In 410BC the first civ entered MA.
As one of thr last actions of AA we started some phony wars and had the AI fight a bit.
Vikings-China and America-India were the opponents.
We would have liked more wars, but had to note after the first two that an one city nation can not afford to spawn a really nice world war.
And even though we delayed trading into MA, the massive barb uprise warning came IBT before 330BC.
On this turn we also popped a hut for construction, so we also entered MA and got feudalism.

We didn't start MA research until 130BC, because we still had some turns to go on republic.

Let's go into MB's questions:

1. How important is the Great Lighthouse in this game?
It was pretty important for us.
Otherwise we would have been limited in our plans to the northern island.
The coastal link is there to everywhere, but it would take very long to get anywhere else.
But, if our decision to go for the western part of the atoll first is good or bad, will only be seen later.

2. Was catching up in techs difficult?
No. ;)

3. Was it possible to get the capital city to 15spt in despostism?
Yes, but only with 1fpt starvation.

4. Did you prefer horsemen or swordsmen for conquest?
What's a swordsman? We never had a single one.
We didn't start our conquest in AA.
We didn't connect iron in AA, only horses.
With feudalism as free tech, we will never build swordsmen in this game.
The conquest is planned with horsemen->knights and cossacks if necessary.

5. Which landmass did you decide to conquer first and why?
Well, we are simple people. We just planned to go for the nearest.

6. What did you like/dislike about the modifications made to the rules (workers/Heroic Epic/leaders/no settlers from huts etc.)?
Workers/settlers: No big problem. In fact the workers were nice to have.
And obviously for this variant a lucky settler would have totally changed the game.

Heroic Epic: No influence on our game. We didn't build it.
Even not after we had army victories (which again doesn't belong in this spoiler).
It seems it hampered the AI a bit. Several embassies showed that they built it early.
But on the other side maybe that's just what kept them peaceful all the time until we hit the scene.

Leaders: we had none in AA.
Generally thinking of equal chances, it's a good thing.
But it hurts to disband a leader for a courthouse :eek:


7. Was the first 80 to 100 turns just too boring for words?

Well as an example a very exciting turnlog from Offa:
2150bc press spacebar
2110bc press spacebar
2070bc press enter for a change
2030bc That was too exciting, press spacebar
1990bc press spacebar
1950bc press spacebar
1910bc Action at last: the workers on the ice complete mining, set to build roads.
1870bc press spacebar
1790bc roads are finished. I make my only real decision: work the final forest and reduce the food surplus to +1 so we will get the Colossus in 2 turns instead of 3. Send workers to the forest game.
1750bc learn writing and commence mapmaking. I haven't started the workers chopping the forest down, but this would be my plan.

That's it. Colossus due next turn.

But we just went quickly over this phase. Not a really big problem.

8. Comparison of the three "tailored" settling locations.
Well, that's to be decided later only what really was better.
We didn't hit the best spot for tiles and resources.
That was the southeastern place.
OTOH we have a short and easy route to our first opponents, thanks to the Lighthouse.
The northeastern place would have the shortest distance to the direct coastal linked areas.

Team Smackster SGOTM5 going for gold
dmanahko, Wotan, smackster, Tarkeel, MjM, tomasjj

In the start location we saw three mountains and we have three units. Now, its tempting to send one unit to each mountain to determine the best location, but we decided that Mad-Bax is unlikely to make the first move based on luck, so that each location would be largely similar.
The instructions were, move the scout to any one mountain, if you even see a hint of green then follow it with the rest of the crew. We moved SE, saw enough green and settled down there.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/SGOTM54000BCST.jpg

Plan was to jump the palace ASAP, so would not develop too much in Moscow. No thoughts about leaving the palace there and building the FP for rank corruption usage, that may just take too long to setup.

We didn't take long before we settled and began to explore. We made a decision early that we would find somebody close by so started researching WC, but soon found its an island and should have gone Writing->MM.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/sgotm53050BCST_copy.jpg

We built another scout, warrior, then Temple. Decided there was no point building the barracks until we were ready to start building the military.
We popped some workers and warriors, and the precious wheel that showed we had horses. We disbanded one popped warrior when unit support kicked in, and dropped some workers in Moscow.

After the temple we started on Collossus, although when it was built in 1750BC it didn't give us much being Despot.

In 1500BC we got MM, and switched Moscow to our galley pre-build, plan was to pump a few galleys and find out whats out there.
We now started research on HBR, and had decided that we would build horses all the way, and didn't need IW.

In 1325BC our first galley made a quick suicide jaunt and we met most of the world. We took all their gold, techs and maps, but they were fairly backward. We could also see that there were more islands north.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/SGOTM51250BCSMM_copy.jpg

When our first galley went north, we found that there was a good route to India, and made them our first target. We also liked the land in Mecca, so the plan was invade India, jump palace, build FP in Delhi, invade Arabia, jump palace to Mecca.
We were pleased at the route to India, as we didn't need the Lighthouse. We now started to mass build horses and send them north, a few galleys went round the coast to the east and prepared for invasion.

We set the target at 6 horses, didn't really think the Regent AI would hold us back.

550BC we had the horses in place and attacked Bombay, with some very unlucky RNG is held first turn, but was soon taken, and India put up very little resistance to the steady flow of horses that was coming.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/Smacksterindy.JPG

During the war our eyes were turning to barb huts at home, but all military was being sent north, things started to look dicey as barbs were coming, and the MA were approaching, I really don't want to be around in Moscow when the revolts come

By 150BC we had India begging for peace they would give us 4 cities for the peace. At that same time Monarchy was affordable and I wanted to get that and revolt before we got too many cities. Republic was not available and we were planning at least two palace jumps so Monarchy seemed overall a better option for us.
So we got Monarchy and a 4 turn anarchy, then took 4 Indian cities and peace.

Next turn it happened, somebody researched Currency and the uprisings happened.
We traded for it so that we could get our first MA tech and put our heads down towards Chivalry.

There were about 3 huts on our island, and we had a warrior and an archer for defence.
Our targetted jump city (Calcutta) was ours and we had peace with India.

Would the barbs come, would we get out in time. You'll have to find out, next time, in the SGOTM5 spoiler thread.



Discussion points of interest to me include:-
1. How important is the Great Lighthouse in this game?
As we planned a palace jump early we did not want to get it. If we had not been able to get across without it, then things would be harder, but we would have shipchained if required.

2. Was catching up in techs difficult?
Not in the least, make this Emperor/Deity and things might go the other way, even Monarch would be interesting.

3. Was it possible to get the capital city to 15spt in depspostism?
Actually we had it 14/16, with a bit of growth every other turn.

4. Did you prefer horsemen or swordsmen for conquest?
We always build horses if we have them

5. Which landmass did you decide to conquer first and why?
Just because we could see a path to India they were first. Our horses would take three turns to get to the pickup point, but once the galleys were up there then that didnt matter.

6. What did you like/dislike about the modifications made to the rules (workers/Heroic Epic/leaders/no settlers from huts etc.)?
I think it adds a very good balance, and should be standard for GOTM.

7. Was the first 80 to 100 turns just too boring for words?
Turns were quick so it didn't matter

8. Comparison of the three "tailored" settling locations.
I would have liked the NE location as it was closer to India, that its.

Team Jeffelammar - SGOTM 5 - AKA Hordes from the Russian Wastelands

A ragtag fugitive tribe of the last remnants mankind finds itself stranded at the north pole of an icy planetoid.

Getting Ready

Banding together they pulled on their long underwear and prepared to remove the other nations from the world. :mischief:

Furthermore, for some reason this intrepid band of refugees seems to have lost the ability to make backpacks, so will have to liberate the rest of the world from their evil masters. No remnant of the corruption must remain.

In a flash of brilliance, the tribe decides to appoint a Pentad to lead this lost tribe back into the light. After discussion amongst themselves the Pentad decided to each in turn take it upon themselves to act a a sort of executive office of the week. :rolleyes:

The opening

The esteemed Denyd was chosen to be the first Czar of the Pentad. After gathering input from the rest, he boldly moved the scout to the southeast, revealing the paradise beyond. Moving boldly, he commanded the team to head for this desireable land, finally founding the town of Moscow in 3750BC on the square southeast of the wheat.

Scouts were immediately sent out to find out where the evil ones resided, and by 2550 BC it was evident that we were alone on a polar icecap. It also seemed that the devious fiend who had sent us here had made sure that any direction would have been valid for the first scout.

The Pentad convened and decided that all priority must be put towards learning how to build boats. The slow coastal movement and the amount of coast to get away from the soon to be constructed Moscow shipyards also made the invention of a great house of light a priority.

With these primary goals in mind, it was time to grow Moscow as quickly as possible. A temple was built to allow higher population AND to accelerate the incorporation of Furs into the economy.

The next several thousand years were spent hunting the rogues that kept popping up. A couple of archers spent time hunting them, one of them becoming elite.

The Age of Discovery - things get interesting

In 1300BC one of our mad-men figured out that pictures could be used to convey directions to the local megamart. We had been building a large pile of rock anyway so we promptly installed a big lantern on top of it and prepared to search the world for tribes who lived in bondage to cruel overlords. The Lighthouse finished in 1275 and several exploratory boats followed.

At this point we were running Moscow on a 14/16 spt cycle, using either the lake or a forest to assure correct cycling.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/Moscow-spt.jpg

Pentad member Grahamiam had the honor of directing the first phase of exploration. In 1100 BC his Suicide Sister Galley reached the coasts of a corrupted nation calling themselves Zulu, soon after contact was made with the Mongols and Chinese. A ferverous trading round ensued in 1025BC. After the dust had settled we had a full map on the long continent and contact with all the residents thereof. We also had aquired a nice little nest egg to prepare for our first purification attempt. We also gained tech parity or superiority vrs all AI nations.

Team namesake Jeffelammar took over and began preparations for an invasion of either China or Scandinavia, chosen because of proximity the availability of a nice safe ocean crossing. In order to muster a large invasion force, it was decided to use swordsmen. Six warriors were built at 1 a turn and then a colony was constructed on the iron mountain. A upgrade was completed and we were off to smash corrupted tribes.

At this time a galley was sent north and discovered what we inventively called "the short island". Contacts and maps were quickly aquired and we knew all of the corrupted nations of the world. Plans for liberation and purification went into overdrive.

The first acts of purification

The valued Pentad member Bed_head7 took over and chose the Vikings as the first victim because they had more pop 2 cities than the Chinese. Unfortunately they also were cruel masters of the whip. In 550BC Nidaros was captured and Ivan the Terrible rose from the ranks of the Archers named Robin. Ivan remained in reserve while we captured more cities and eventually became a Horseman army.

The initial war was slow, but once the Vikings were on their heels we turned attention to the Chinese. At this time every civ on the long island had some workers for sale, so we purchase them and began shipping them back to the long island to build roads there.

At home a couple troops patroled our cultural borders, but no concerted effort was made to eliminate the barbarian hordes.

In 150 BC we traded for Construction and entered the Middle Ages. At this point we had taken Nidaros, Oslo, and Canton and were involved in wars to liberate the Viking and Chinese people and were 5 turns from the discovery of Monarchy. We had narrowly failed to take Beijing in 150BC, losing 1 horseman and retreating 3 more. In retrospect this was a good thing for us, but that is a story for later.


http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/holdings-endAA.jpg

At this point our army consisted of
1 archer
1 spearman
2 swordsmen
9 Horsemen (3 of them in an army)
5 galleys
20 Slaves

I deliberately left most of this out of the spoiler for two reasons.
A. The sake of the narrative :)
B. It was personally opinion, not a team consensus

1. How important is the Great Lighthouse in this game?
Critical. With 9 coast squares to get to the nearest sea square, the 1 extra move was critical, allowing 3 squares of movement rather than 2. Additionally, we probably would not have been able to make early contact if we had not had sea zone navigation.

2. Was catching up in techs difficult?
Nope. We were mostly up to date already. Our exclusive contacts and extensive World Maps were all we needed. We were often able to buy techs for Maps and contacts instead of having to give up any techs of our own.

3. Was it possible to get the capital city to 15spt in depspostism?
I think we hit 15spt at pop 9. The screen shot shows how we got the 14/16 cycle to produce the magic 30 every two turns.

4. Did you prefer horsemen or swordsmen for conquest?
I was pushing for horsemen, but the ability to crank out a warrior every turn made us decide to go with a swordsman rush. Trading provided us the gold we needed to upgrade, so this was the clear path. (Once my teammates pointed it out to me)

5. Which landmass did you decide to conquer first and why?
Discussed a bit in the spoiler. But it really boiled down to accessability. We needed more cities ASAP to reduce our economy crippling military. The shortest path was to the "long island". The choice of landing by the Vikings/Chinese instead of the Mongols/Zulu was due to UUs. We wanted a bigger military before we tried to kill the Impi.

6. What did you like/dislike about the modifications made to the rules (workers/Heroic Epic/leaders/no settlers from huts etc.)?
We still haven't built the Heroic Epic, and may never do so. The armies in PTW aren't strong enough. (Though our horse army was very useful)

We had at least 3 discussions on just what a leader could be used for. It really boiled down to the fact that leaders are good for making armies. Not much else. Until the cost of improvements gets over 120 shields, the disband for 250 shields is mostly wasted and could just as easily be made up by a cash rush.

7. Was the first 80 to 100 turns just too boring for words?
Yeah, it was pretty low key. The good news was that it also went pretty quick :)

8. Comparison of the three "tailored" settling locations.

The three locations have the following.

SE: (1 se of wheat) 5GL (2Bonus, 1 Wheat, 1 Game), 1 Hill, a Lake and a fish. (horses, furs and Iron in the near vacinity)
All offset by 9 coast squares to reach a sea.

N: (1 s of cattle) 5GL, 1 Cattle, 1 Game, Oyster) 2 Mountains
But only 2 coast to get to a sea.

W: (ouch) No way to get all the the cattle and the game without settling on a grassland. (Also no water bonus resources)

Of the 3, N and SE are aproximately equal, while W trails, but is still a valid city.

SE: (1 se of wheat) 5GL (2Bonus, 1 Wheat, 1 Game), 1 Hill, a Lake and a fish. (horses, furs and Iron in the near vacinity)
All offset by 9 coast squares to reach a sea.Our galleys only sailed them once; from then on we loaded them on the shores east of Moscow with only 1 coastal tile to sail.

Our galleys only sailed them once; from then on we loaded them on the shores east of Moscow with only 1 coastal tile to sail.
True, but the lighthouse still saves 2 galley movement turns for each galley leaving Moscow.

Our loading point was actually over to the southwest of Moscow since we went after Scandinavia, but the same priciple applied. Avoid moving through coast.

The sea navigation was huge as well. It is what allowed us to have a safe passage to the long island. It was 2 turns of galley movement from our loading point to our dropoff point.

True, but the lighthouse still saves 2 galley movement turns for each galley leaving Moscow.

Our loading point was actually over to the southwest of Moscow since we went after Scandinavia, but the same priciple applied. Avoid moving through coast.

The sea navigation was huge as well. It is what allowed us to have a safe passage to the long island. It was 2 turns of galley movement from our loading point to our dropoff point.
We never seriously considered the lighthouse as we always had palace jump in our heads. Interesting how this map has resulted in very different strategies, the results should be fun to read.

We never seriously considered the lighthouse as we always had palace jump in our heads. Interesting how this map has resulted in very different strategies, the results should be fun to read.
It should be very interesting.

We also discussed a palace jump very briefly at the beginning of the game. The general feel was against it, so the subject was dropped and never truely debated.

Seeing as our score graphs are practically identical so far, it may very well have been a toss-up type decision. Only time will tell.

It should be very interesting.yep, i look forward to reading many of the teams threads, as it seems we are all taking interesting directions to skin this cat :)

For SGOTM5, Team Peanut is comprised of Peanut, Mathilda, rrau, MailMan, KeithLarson and civ_steve. Turns out we have a multi-national team that spans 5 different time zones. MailMan proposed a team roster that skipped through the time-zones in order, and it worked incredibly efficiently. At times we were doing 3 or 4 turn-sets within a 24 hour period. That, plus the objective of this game was pretty basic, put us on a blistering rate of turnsets! (Perhaps MB should institute a speed based laurel as well!)

Capital site: our primary requirements were coastal, on a river (lake might be acceptable), and preferably with a food bonus. There are 3 sites that fit those requirements, but we came across the one to the West first. Interestingly, there is one bonus grassland there, but the best location for the city is on the BG! This allowed the most production for this site. Moscow was founded in 3750 BC

Builds: Scouting was important, so 2 more scouts were made. Then a 2nd Worker to develop our land. A Warrior for MP duty. Temple next in 2550 BC (using a forest chop of the Games space). A couple more Workers. Then a Granary build that got switched to Colossus. With only 4 unit support, the early game management of units was crucial. Once the scouts finished scouting our island, they were disbanded one by one. Extra Workers were built, but they could be added back to the city later, and were.

Goody Huts: Pottery (just before we founded Moscow; this is when we noticed we had Alphabet); Ceremonial Burial; an eqWorker; maps; Mysticism; skilled Warrior (disbanded on the spot!)

Research: In case we would get to archer rush somebody, we'd need archers! So we researched Warrior Code first, in 2950 BC. By this time we had practically confirmed we were all alone, so Writing was next, learned in 1870 BC, followed by Map-Making (of course!) in 1350 BC. After a quick research of IronWorking in 1100 BC (we were the only Scientific civ, so in addition to learning where a valuable resource is, we might have a unique Tech) our focus was Code-of-Laws, Philosophy and Republic. Map-Making was critical to allow contact with the other civs; we felt Republic was the best early government for us because the extra commerce would support a larger initial army.

Wonders: There's obviously a quandary on whether to build any or not. Early wonders are nice, especially in this game, but that would limit whether you wanted a future Palace Jump or not. However, fast research is most important and there's not much to do with your shields in the meantime - no point in building a big army, you have no where to go and will only delay your research. So Colossus wasn't too hard of a choice to make, and was completed in 1625 BC. After Colossus, we built a Barracks, 2 Vet Archers, and had just enough production to finish our first Galley as we learned Map-Making in 1350 BC. We got 2 Galleys out in the water, build a harbor, and started on Great Lighthouse. Learning IronWorking in 1100 BC caused a bit of a problem - Iron was close by, but we had no Workers to connect it (we'd lost our starting worker to a barb)! And we would lose shields if we switched to another Build (say, Galley for instance.) Not only that, but our army costs would start to climb meaning a delay in learning Republic. We eventually decided to finish Great Lighthouse first before connecting Iron and building an army; this would get us close to Republic, and would give us time to make contacts, assess who we would attack, etc. Also, we felt that having the Great Lighthouse would speed up our eventual invasions, so we forged on and finished it in 610 BC. This pretty much puts the Palace Jump concept to rest.

Contacts: Finally got Galleys in the water in 1350 BC. 2 Galleys, one went North, the other South, around our island. Made initial contact with India in 1050 BC. Continuing on the North Galley met America in 1025 BC and Spain in 975 BC, then traded our IronWorking and WM for Egyptian contact, Wheel, Masonry, WMs and Gold. We now know almost everything about the small continent. Using the fortify Galley technique (which gives you a 3 tile visibility at sea) our Southern galley hopped over to the Rock island to the East, and then over to the big continent making contact with Japan in 825 BC, and they know 8 other civs. Figuring that Map-Making is known or about to be known, use it to gain contacts with Aztecs, Celts, English, Mongols, Zulus, Chinese, Vikings, along with WMs and lots of Gold. Contact Iroqouis in 775 BC, trading for contacts with Arabs and French, WMs, Philosophy and Gold. We now have all contacts, and pretty much all WM's. We learn CodeofLaws in 750 BC; since we have Philosophy already we can do minimum research on Republic, save some more Gold, we finish GreatLighthouse in 610 BC and are ready to start tooling up for war.

So, to answer mad-bax's questions:

1.) We felt GreatLighthouse was pretty important, particularly for the West city site. We'll see how that plays out.

2.) Catching up in Techs was no problem.

3.) Yes, we had 15 spt in Despotism; we were very happy to see that Waste hadn't crept in by that time. Here's a screenshot of our capital

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/Peanut_sg5_bc750Moscow.JPG

With the harbor we can grow to size 12. Without it we can be size 10 and still have 15 spt. Most important was not chopping any of the Tundra Forest spaces; if we chopped the Grassland forest, we could still mine it and occupy one of the mined Tundra spaces. The Colossus adds 3 commerce/turn in this screenshot; roading the remote tundra/Forest would make that 4 additional commerce. Once we were Republic, the Colossus really helped.

4.) Well, that's getting a little ahead on things right now! We actually used Swordsmen and Galley movement to drop them off.

5.) Even more ahead! We focused on the big continent first since we thought it would take longest to pacify. But we didn't ignore the smaller continent ;)

6.) Workers: well, the AI workers should be working from the start ;) ; I disagreed with this mod, really limits the use and strategies available with the initial worker; with 15+ civs in the game, why restrict the purchase of a Worker from another civ?
Heroic Epic - minor in my opinion, but should be done along with leader changes; we didn't build it, but most of the AI did
Leaders - don't think I like this mod either; dilutes the effectiveness of the Military trait, changes the current strategies for the PTW 20K game (which isn't necessarily a bad thing); some additional randomness that can be quite beneficial adds color to the game! If it doesn't happen to me this time, it might the next.
No Settlers from Huts - same argument; also, dilutes the Expansionistic trait a bit; however, is more appropriate for this style of game, keeping the One City concept until conquering has started

7.) It was pretty boring. :) Later on, not nearly so much. :D

8.) All 3 sites look like they can get to 15 spt in Despotism. The SE site has easy access to Horses and Iron from the start, but has tons of Coast to wade through before getting to Sea - a bit more difficult to get to the small Northern Continent. The West site has good access to Iron, and Horses are a bit further away, and easier access to open waters. The North site has about the same access to resources as the West site, and very good access to India and the Northern continent. There is a crossing site over the the big continent so this location is pretty good for contacts. We'll see which one works best overall!

1. 1. I thought it will be important and offer to use Colosus for pre-build. However we built Colosus and have nothing to pre-build Lighthouse. We make contact soon after Mmking and did not have time to build Lighthouse.
2. Not at all. Colosus at republic provides good income.
3. Yes, but we grow up later than get into republic.
4. Swordmen. We did not connect horses at time.
5. North. We were not sure, that south is accessible. Also, India found some Cities
at our continent and declare war to us.
6. I think it is excellent modification! It reduces random factor of bonuses.
7. Yes, but it was time to know each other better.
8. Did not checked. Our location (west) is reasonable IMHO.