125 BC

Our warriors keep revealing new tiles. No sign of that barb axe we saw a fe turns ago.

All our trade deals were accepted. We have iron working now and can get started on those jungle tiles especially the pigs near Polynesia. Epsilon's tech lead is only Monotheism and Currency and they only have 20 points on, not so tough now are they? Loco has just passed us though and we are back in 3rd place.

No attachments again, sorry. I'm not at the limit but close so I'll clean up then retry.

Remember when BCLG mentioned the big joke that would be revealed when we got Iron? well as you may have already guessed its not funny.

Here are some pics

Yes, the iron is placed in a 'fun' location... but we don't really need iron. By the time we have it hooked up we'll be close to macemen which can be built with copper.

How many turns are we appromiately from founding the next city?


(btw, I wondered why there were two turns 100-109 threads but it seems to have changed now... :mischief:)

How many turns are we appromiately from founding the next city?


6 more turns to build and 2 to settle.

Epsilon completed the Great Library... *sigh* all this work for nothing ('cept the gold compensation off course).

Well at lease it wasn't close, then I would have been kicking myself thinking what might have been if I had squeased just a few more hammers.

Well the choices now are Parthenon or National Epic.

Parthenon will take something like 20 turns without rushing, give 50% boost to GP production but obsolete with Chemistry.

National Epic will be about 13 turns and give 100% boost.

I think National epic would be fine considering how many GP points Parthenon would really be earning for us.

Well, we don't need to build wonders. ;)

But actually, if we decide that WheelVille will be official GP-farm where we contrate our efforts then NE is a good choice. I don't think we have the basis for spreading out our GP production, plus the fact that we might lose out on the parthenon as well, making us complete losers in the wonder game...

I'd do NE in Wheelville, and we will need iron for xbows.

Yes our bid for the GL is over, but 94 hammers converted to 94 gold isn’t all bad, we can bump our science rate back up.

Wheeleville has begun National Epic (about 15 turns) to boost great people production (next one in 17 turns or so, probably a scientist).

Ploughland finished the monastery and will now make a few missionaries; Chowderton finished the Barracks and is now producing axes so we can keep our rapidly growing populations happy.

The axe at the quarry is on his way to Site 3 to escort the imminent settler (6 turns). Our southern explorer has spotted some barbs and is now forted on a forest hill with the Epsilonians. Our eastern explorer appears to have eluded the barb axe.

Iron will be needed for Swords, Pikes, Crossbows, cannons, frigates and Ironclads so we may want to settle it some day and if so the sight isn’t as bad as I first thought.

Finished Monotheism, but can’t have a revolution for 3 more turns. I’d like currency next (9 turns). It could give us a big gold boost considering how much our trade routes with Loco are worth.

Aloha has Calendar but evidently can’t trade it to us, can someone explain that to me?

Epsilon’s GNP is really something, they’re also first place in MFG and respectable in every other category.

... and is now producing axes so we can keep our rapidly growing populations happy.
Out of context, this sounded really funny. :lol:

Aloha has Calendar but evidently can’t trade it to us, can someone explain that to me?
Either they traded for it the same turn or we traded for one of the prerequisites this turn. Obviously the first one is the case here. :)

What about paper? How much time will that one take?

Oh right, they just traded it from Piffle.

Paper would take about 14 turns but since we have already explored all the tiles we can use right now I don't think mapo trading is very valuable for us just yet.

Don't start researching currency, what about Feudalism? Going towards guilds + uu.

Just noticed Epsilon's huge tech lead in the other turn thread (haven't been keeping up with this too regularly lately). That's kind of scary. I believe their GNP is about doubling ours, plus they're probably trading away with everyone they can. They have obviously not been reserved with their cottages, and we should remember to try to build as many more cottages of our own if we can, if we haven't already.

This should be treated as a firm reminder that we should not trade with Epsilon for any deal remotely to their advantage while they hold the tech lead (which is what will be the case for almost any gold-for-tech deal). The good thing, however, is that most of the other teams no doubt feel a bit the same way towards them, so an anti-Epsilon alliance should be easier to arrange. ;)

Don't start researching currency, what about Feudalism? Going towards guilds + uu.

Guilds (34) requires Machinery (20) and Feudalism (20) and even then our UU will require Archery (2) and Horseriding (7).

Currency could give us quite a bit more gold as it doubles our trade routes, which keep getting more valuable, and allows us to trade gold to make up the difference is some of our tech deals. So I think it will pay for itself in time saved on future research.

With Iron Working now and maybe Calander next turn I think we may want to invest in another worker. Polynesia would probably be the best place to build one right now.

We accepted Calendar for Civil Service from Aloha and will trade Meditation for Machinery when they finish researching it.

We also finished Monotheism and started Currency (6 turns). We will switch to Organized Religion as soon as we can (2 turns). The extra trade routes from Currency will be worth about 11 gold per turn so I used the cash from our Great Library to put science back to 100%. Treasury is 134 gold -17 gpt.

Magadan: the recent acquisition of Iron working and calendar have greatly increased the utility of workers so Magadan has started our 5th (9 turns).

Chowderton: nearly at happiness limit and still growing rapidly so I rushed a granary with 2 pop. By the time population recovers the silk and sugar will make room for more and health benefits of granary will be needed.

Wheelville: 2 scientists will make a great person in about 15 turns, just about when we finish Nation Epic.

Ploughland: Workers are finishing another cottage. Monastery all done and started a missionary for our new city. This is becoming quite a valuable science city and may build a library next.

Polynesia: borders will expand in 5 turns and let us put a pasture on those pigs. After that this city will grow rapidly and become very valuable if we can improve those tiles in time.

Sinsburg: Settler in 5 turns. Now that we have a line on Machinery maybe we should consider if we want to settle site 4 so we can access iron and build crossbows. I still really like sites 1, 2, and 3.

Also the Incense across the bay would be nice but who wants to send a worker way out there and are we going to have to build a road to access it?

I would also like to know if the northwest is passable by ship, but I’m not sure when it would be practical to explore that.

Our warrior out east is still cruising along, but major trouble in the south may force us to retreat. It looks like Loco already has an Axe working on that barb city.

more workers is good

The eastern warrior has located that barb axe, hopefully it keeps going east.

The southern warrior is running for his life.

I've offerd pigs for Loco's gold.

Epsilon has just discovered Construction and got a large score boost, how did they get that GNP? We have Calander which is the same cost but our agreement with Aloha was not to trade, right?

Switched to organized religion but wish I hadn't. It costs 3 more gold per turn but only speeds up construction of National epic by 1 turn. I was hoping for much more. So sorry about that but we can switch back in 4 turns.

nothing else is going on so lets think about our next tech because currency is due in 4.

Drama - can build theater
Feudalism - vassalage and serfdom civics
Theology - nothing we need
Music - free great artist
Philosophy - pacifism, a good civic for us
Paper - map trading
Archery - will need eventually, takes only 1 turn
Horse riding - will want eventually
Compass - explorers could be very useful
Construction - don't need catapults just yet
Machinery - will get from Aloha some day

Feudalism - Machinery from Aloha - Guilds

How about Archery (1 turn) then Feudalism (11 turns). Archers will give our army a little variety and is required for longbows and camel archers.

And we could probably trade it around easily too.

At this stage of the game, Archers are useless units except for happiness-maintaining and barb-quashing, just so you know. ;)

Switched to organized religion but wish I hadn't. It costs 3 more gold per turn but only speeds up construction of National epic by 1 turn. I was hoping for much more. So sorry about that but we can switch back in 4 turns.Have we spread our religion around in many cities? If so, I disagree with your analysis. To me, the extra hammers from Organised Religion are far more valuable than the minuscule amount of GPT lost.

nothing else is going on so lets think about our next tech because currency is due in 4.

Drama - can build theater
Feudalism - vassalage and serfdom civics
Theology - nothing we need
Music - free great artist
Philosophy - pacifism, a good civic for us
Paper - map trading
Archery - will need eventually, takes only 1 turn
Horse riding - will want eventually
Compass - explorers could be very useful
Construction - don't need catapults just yet
Machinery - will get from Aloha some dayI disagree with Theology having 'nothing we need'. Theocracy is an extremely powerful wartime civic. I'm not advocating that as our research path (although it's tempting if Christianity hasn't yet been founded), but just pointing that out.

Personally, I dislike Pacifism and favour Organised Religion and Theocracy, but perhaps that's just my playing style.

Horseback Riding is useless to us unless we actually want to BUILD Horse-requiring units. Camel Archers don't require Horses, so really we don't need it until at least Military Tradition (Cavalry).

When is the 'some day' for Machinery? Soon?

Construction should be a #1 priority tech if we ever enter any war. Catapults are invaluable units.

Compass is also handy if we've got Machinery and want to go for Optics (Caravels, to meet new people).

Are you sure the free Great Artist from Music hasn't already been claimed by another team?

Just a few thoughts for you, anyway.

Well we can revisit the tech tree in about 10 turns unless you disagree with Archery then Feudalism as our next research. We will need garrison units to keep our populations happy and archers will be very good for that.

That is about the time I'm expecting Machinery, although Aloha have not told us how long it will take for them to finish researching it.

Polynesia's border grows in 2, Ploughland in 10

It's starting to bother me that Loco and Aloha keep lurking around our borders. Haven't they seen everything yet? Sheesh.

Also a settler and missionary will be on their way to site 3 in 2 turns, make your last complaints now or forever hold your peace.

Ploughland has finished the missionary. What should we build next? It's a good science city so a Library might be good or maybe we should build another missionary.

Sinsburg is done with the settler. I don't really know what to build there except to rush a granary. I wouldn't mind another settler either.

Polynesia's border has expanded and population has grown. It can now work those pigs and will really start taking off now.

Epsilon has discovered Archery, so we are only 3 turns behind them in tech.
Aloha just traded for Currency, which we will have in 2.
Loco is way behind.

I'd say another settler in Sinsburg and another missionary in Ploughland.

Also, we should think about a name for the city that'll be founded soon.

:agree: with Theoden.
We should go a bit easy on the whip to work our cottages and other tiles.

Perhaps check with Aloha to see that they aren't also having the wool pulled over their eyes by Epsilon and their compulsive trading streak. It's all very well if we're not funding Epsilon's research ourselves, but if the other teams are then it could spell trouble in the future.

Just a thought, anyway. I haven't completely kept up with the diplomacy so I may be a bit behind the times here. :)

We may regret creating a coalition against the tech leader, after all we may be only one great person away from that position ourselves.

But if we make a coalition against the tech leader we can keep the focus on them, even though we might surpass them in tech. The image they've created of themselves should make this easier. And as long as the other teams keep thinking that Epsilon is the greatest threat we'll be fine.

It would be a difficult task just to mobilize everyone against Epsilon because of their dangerous tech lead when it is already pretty slight. It would be even more difficult to keep that unity while we surpass all our allies.

It could be too soon to show our hand in this way, after all the other teams want to win also and so will eventually find their own reasons to conspire against each other.

Epsilon is also the leader in wonders, score and GNP, these are positions we are not likely to occupy for the foreseeable future and so may be better characteristics to build a coalition against.

You're probably right... but wonders, score and GNP are still good reasons to make a tech trade embargo against them, if we wanted that.

We'll settle site 3 next turn, that is where I sent the missionary too. 11 turns until our next settler and lots of choices on where to settle.

Things have changed much since we last discussed this subject. Tech trading has brought Camel Archers within reach and we are further from the other civs than I had hoped. As a result I'm less concerned about grabbing those horse. Site 2 now looks like the best spot to settle. It has good growth and production and will let us put galleys on the eastern ocean. Many other sites to consider though, I've marked a few but please feel free to sugest better sites that I may have missed. (Also I didn't include a screenshot but Site 4 would be an Iron city way up north.)

Also Wheelville's pop has grown and In addition to 2 scientists we can have a bunch of priests. Even without any more priests our next GP will have about 20% chance of being a prophet.

I'd settle SE of the Banana's in you're second screenshot, it'll block the land bridge on the first border pop, it will have rice and banana's, and will grow fast. And it has some hills (I count 3 or 4).
Site 1 one south later to block that landbridge, and backfill after that?

edit: if we're going to do that, we might want to use some more workers.

You mean right between the bananas and rice? Hmm...yes that is quit a good spot but I'm not sure if I like it more than Site 2. I suppose I can now consider moving Site 1 but am not yet convinced we should.

Some observations I made in the 50AD save (when I started writing this post, the new save came in :D):

Chowderton is near it's happiness limit, we might change it to making workers/settlers
Polynesia could work the hill to get that library finished earlier, but do we need that library anyway now that hinduism is providing culture?

WE NEED MORE WORKERS
We need to clear the jungle south of Polynesia to settle some cities there, the jungle east of Chowderton for another city, we need roads, we need to hook things up.

Some screenies for possible future sites:

http://img154.imageshack.us/img154/7550/civ4screenshot00914kc.th.jpg (http://img154.imageshack.us/my.php?image=civ4screenshot00914kc.jpg)
146480

146481

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Order I would found them in: Delta - Dzeta - Alpha - Epsilon - Beta - Eta - Gamma

We should lower our science slider a bit, and should use ploughland and wheelville to build settlers/workers too.(wheelville when the NE is ready)

75 AD turn 118

Our warrior in the east has met Piffle’s warrior.

We finished Currency so get a bunch of new trade routes next turn.

We get archery next turn so we can produce some cheep units to enforce happiness in our more crowded cities.

Feudalism is after that. It will allow us to adopt serfdom, +50% worker speed.

Have not had time to look at all those city locations but Delt looks like a good next city.

Hope you will forgive me if I skip the screen shots this turn, but its one of those days.

Could anyone get us the diplo screens?

How about if I just describe it for you?

Piffle has not met Loco but has open border with Aloha and Epsilon.

We have Monotheism and Literature, they have Archery and 83 gold.

We'll finish archery next turn right? Seems a bit of a waste now.

First off, a barb axe near Mecca, our new city, has made me realize how shabby our defenses are. Ploughland and Chowderton will build 4 (5 turns) to get us back in shape, but in the mean time I hope to confuse the AI with some nice bait (undefended worker near Mecca) while all available units rush to the area. Now we have to hope that nobody shows up near Polynesia or Magadan in the next few turns.

There is good news also though; we are in 1st place for manufacturing and 2nd for population.

Polynesia(grows in 3) has put the library on hold for now to build missionaries.

Wheelville (stagnant) now has 2 scientists and a priest so the next GP is 7 turns away. National Epic will finish in 9 unless but we can rush with 3 pop and finish immediately. How about a civics change; drop slavery and pick up caste system. 2 more gold per turn but unlimited artist/scientist/merchant.

Magadan finishes worker next turn then returns to granary, Sinsburg's settler (9 turns) is planning to settle site Delta, between bananas and rice south of Polynesia.

We need more happiness if we want to keep our population growing, but its 5 turns still until we connect our first resource so lets try to make some deal with Loco we can trade our extra pigs for their extra gold. But it will be a hard sell since we are way ahead of them in tech; CS, calendar, currency, hunting.

We have Monotheism and Lit on Piffle, but they already have Machinery.

Aloha is still working on machinery to trade for meditation and now we have archery too.

Epsilon has everything we do in addition to construction and compass. What the hell do they want compass for?

Lastly, should our eastern warrior go north or south?

Compass is a prerequisite for Optics, so that's why Epsilon would be getting it.

I heavily dislike Caste System, personally. You hardly ever need the extra specialists. Work out for yourself exactly how many of the 'free specialists' you'd actually be using, above the allowed limits anyway (eg 2 scientists for a Library), and then see if you think it's worth it. ;) Slavery, on the other hand, allows us to respond to a crisis by whipping population. Sure, this should be a last resort, as whipping is never good for the economy, but a whipped city is far better than a razed one, for instance.

I agree with Lord Parkin that we shouldn't use caste system. Instead I think we should switch to serfdom as soon as we get feudalism, as a 50% increase in tile improvement capacity is exactly what we could use now. Then we can take advantage of our spiritual trait and change back to slavery once in a while to whip stuff and then change back.

About "Mecca" I think we should give it a name other than the default. How about Glassport (glass was an important innovation).

Keep slavery
I'd move the warrior SE
Our fortified axe in a city should have decent odds right?

Glassport is a cool name and SE it is. I'll make it so. But why would Epsilon want Optics? Are they going for a blue water navy?

As for Caste System; I think its worth the money to be able to decide precisly what sort of GPs we make. As it is our next guy has only a 50% chance of being a scientist. Also after 4 turns we could switch back to Slavery at any time and whip that same turn. Still I guess there is no rush, we might as well wait and see what kind of GP we get in 6 turns.

Optics -> Astronomy - Observatories
That's the only thing I could think of, but they could've just taken Education for Universities instead.

They could be aiming for astronomy early to launch a naval invasion which would be devastating for anyone who hasn't seen it coming.

Or perhaps they just wanted compass for the harbours to increase their commerce even more.