Border expansion does not give full value chops. That's math with border expansion. I don't see what's so urgent to waste the chops and worker turns now.
We need the roads if we don't want to rebuild the improvements all the time or have a million troops around, so I don't think we have so many worker turns to spare.

I'm not sure we need a monument at all and for sure don't want to rush it for 1 pop in a city which easily can manage much more valuable pop-rushes by just getting the granary up (and doesn't even need border expansion for that).

I think we shouldn't be too hasty to kill our neighbors. If we get them under control we can still catch their settlers and maybe let them build some wonders. But first we should know where they are. And what land they have.
Alex will anyway not be that easy. We think we know that Athens is on a stone hill. Pretty sure there will be 3 units when we get there and he probably will be able to build a 4th while we approach (though he might do a tactical masterpiece and just send a settler with 2 escort when we come).

I think Oracle is not a good option. Only way to get it would be to chop it in Timbuktu soon. But if we should still need a bunch of scientists (astronomy ?), then the prophet points hurt more than 1 pretty cheap tech (we will not make it all the way to CS).

It would be nice if we could chop the library instead of whipping it, so that we can run two scientists from the beginning. This speaks in favour of Mysticism.

I'm pretty sure you get slower to 2 scientists by chopping a library after first researching mysticism. We need to go full steam towards pottery-writing to be able to pop-rush granary and library right away in my rough calculation. And then Timbuktu is size 3 only a few turns away from having 2 scientists at 4 (or could even have 2 scientists at 3 at slow growth).

Hmm...Do we want Timbuktu for military production, commerce, or GP farm? I think it's best for commerce, okay for mil. prod. and mediocre for GP farm. Mil. prod. requires connecting to copper, which requires 3 roads (unless the S river connects up) or sailing and some exploration. Commerce doesn't require Mysticism and monument and avoids a dead-end tech if we're not going for Oracle.

Full value chops requires, Maths, forge, coal, Ironworks, Org. Rel. state religion, Heroic Epic, Police State... ;)

I think Oracle is not a good option. Only way to get it would be to chop it in Timbuktu soon. But if we should still need a bunch of scientists (astronomy ?), then the prophet points hurt more than 1 pretty cheap tech (we will not make it all the way to CS).Athens will probably a great GP farm. Prophet in Timbuktu is easy to avoid if we get a library elswhere soon enough.

Can you guys describe the vision you've got in your mind that you're using for your decisions, please? I think this might help our consensus a whole bunch.

For example, I'm currently thinking this way: We need to explore but probably need astro so we need to get there asap, ready to conquer or dominate immediately thereafter. At Prince level and AW, we have to research it all ourselves. We could take advantage of 5-6 (Astro-2; Optics-1; Compass-1; Calendar-1...) or more GS's in the process. We also need to stone-age any AIs with in reach, asap. Athens appears to be GloryLand, so we might want to capture it asap.

My Conclusion: 1) Inhibit Alex and hannibal; 2) get up cottages and other gold mine asap; 3) Explore; 4) Kill off Alex and Hannibal.

Can you guys describe the vision you've got in your mind that you're using for your decisions, please? I think this might help our consensus a whole bunch.

For example, I'm currently thinking this way: We need to explore but probably need astro so we need to get there asap, ready to conquer or dominate immediately thereafter. At Prince level and AW, we have to research it all ourselves. We could take advantage of 5-6 (Astro-2; Optics-1; Compass-1; Calendar-1...) or more GS's in the process. We also need to stone-age any AIs with in reach, asap. Athens appears to be GloryLand, so we might want to capture it asap.

My Conclusion: 1) Inhibit Alex and hannibal; 2) get up cottages and other gold mine asap; 3) Explore; 4) Kill off Alex and Hannibal.

With two golds within reach I don't think we need to rush off to get a great science city up and running. We also have stone visible, so we might want to consider a Pyramids-enhanced specialist economy. Production rules the early game. I don't think we will be able to take e.g. Athens for quite some time if we have to rely on London to build the units for it. If Timbuktu can pitch in with some mines this might happen much sooner.

I'm not interested in a great GP farm in the distant future (and I don't see why Athens should be one, I would rather bet on Hannibal's capital with some sea food). We know exactly one location that can get us a few scientists pretty soon and that's Timbuktu. I don't see a city location with more food (pre jungle chopping), even if we had a settler available.
I don't think we are talking here about scientists to support a space ship launch, do we? :p

OK, crosspost with LC:
I don't know what we need, but a scientist soon (for academy in the capital BTW, which is a natural good commerce city), will for sure not hurt. The capital will not go 2 scientists, period.
Timbuktu can easily go 2 ways with some cottages and still have 2 scientists (or even go military pop-rusher, if our neighbors turn out tougher than I think). I don't think we will go Caste System and full fledged GP farm anytime soon, if ever.

With two golds within reach I don't think we need to rush off to get a great science city up and running. We also have stone visible, so we might want to consider a Pyramids-enhanced specialist economy. Production rules the early game. I don't think we will be able to take e.g. Athens for quite some time if we have to rely on London to build the units for it. If Timbuktu can pitch in with some mines this might happen much sooner.Okay, so how soon do you expect to have copper connected?

I don't see that we need a GS soon necessarily and I doubt that an Academy will make such a difference, but I'm going on gut feeling. I just think we can blow Alex and Hannibal off the map way sooner than we can get to Astro, so Astro becomes our Critical Path (the single longest necessary path to our goal), right?

This is our minimum tech path, right?
- Astronomy (2 GS's)
- Optics (1 GS)
- Compass (1 GS)
- Calendar (1 GS)
Machinery
Metal Casting
Iron Working
- Mathematics (GS)
Sailing
Writing
Pottery
The Wheel

So how soon will we finish Machinery?

EDIT: Additionally, relying on GS's for thos last techs also allows us to hoard cash for galleon upgrades. And let's not forget that usually (non-AW) we only need 3-4 GS's because we can trade for Calendar and maybe Compass.

OK, one more remark about Timbuktu. A granary in about 15-16 turns with rice is a lot more food than a culture expansion in more than 20 turns just to get some then still not irrigated bananas. And we can and should then also irrigate a grass tile in the inner 9.
Doesn't matter for what we want Timbuktu, food is needed.

For the tech path, I think one shouldn't waste scientists on the cheap techs like math. Academy in the capital will pay for that amount of beakers (535, but note the academy beakers profit from the prerequisite bonus also) in a very short time. London should soon hit ~20 beakers, so 10 bpt from academy (more after calendar).

BTW, scientists can also bulb metal casting and machinery, if done in the right sequence.
Needs otherwise unneeded alphabet before, but as alphabet is much cheaper than either of those ...

I agree on Maths, just had the (GS) there because it's possible. EDIT: LC asks himself, why do I throw in little details like that so other people avoid the main point I'm trying to get across...

So my point is, we could use a lot of GS's, and our fastest asroonomy-based conquest may require a bunch of GS's and lots of commerce, with less mil. prod. COmments on that?

Ok, I see the point since Mysticism isn't on any tech path that is useful to us right now. But how about researching Writing first then? This will take about 14 turns during which we farm the rice and (pre-)chop the forest. We then need 15 more hammers before being able to whip the library for 2 pop. This can come either from working the two forests for 5 turns or from chopping the second forest. Library finished t19, border pop t27 which is only 4 turns slower than whipping a monument.
We also get a library up much earlier in London which might compensate for the fact that we need to research Writing with one less prerequisite.

The bad part would be that Timbuktu doesn't get copper or gold for a while...

So my point is, we could use a lot of GS's, and our fastest asroonomy-based conquest may require a bunch of GS's and lots of commerce, with less mil. prod. COmments on that?

We may or may not need a lot of early military production. Once we neutralize Alex and Hannibal (and maybe also use the stone to build the great wall :) ) we for sure can concentrate on teching to Astronomy. Until that happens we should at least be prepared for all eventualities. Remember, this is Gyathaar's map... :eek:

Hmm...Do we want Timbuktu for military production, commerce, or GP farm? I think it's best for commerce, okay for mil. prod. and mediocre for GP farm. Mil. prod. requires connecting to copper, which requires 3 roads (unless the S river connects up) or sailing and some exploration. Commerce doesn't require Mysticism and monument and avoids a dead-end tech if we're not going for Oracle.

Full value chops requires, Maths, forge, coal, Ironworks, Org. Rel. state religion, Heroic Epic, Police State... ;)

What's wrong with making Timbuktu a GP farm, Doc? We can swap between mines and farms => excellent, yes?

Full value chops may also requires access to strategic resources. :lol:

What's wrong with making Timbuktu a GP farm, Doc? We can swap between mines and farms => excellent, yes?Howz bouts you tell me how you're planning to feed 6 scientists? (not including the 2 GLib freebies)

But how about researching Writing first then?Are you trying to get teh GS so fast to use for something immediately or so we end up with more in teh end, or what?

Are you trying to get teh GS so fast to use for something immediately or so we end up with more in teh end, or what?

No, I am more interested in getting Timbuktu's borders to expand as fast as possible...

Howz bouts you tell me how you're planning to feed 6 scientists? (not including the 2 GLib freebies)

Howz bouts you tell us how you plan to build the GLib without researching Mysticism? Huh? :lol:

No, I am more interested in getting Timbuktu's borders to expand as fast as possible...
But, what does the border expansion help w/o population to work tiles and scientists...

Howz bouts you tell me how you're planning to feed 6 scientists? (not including the 2 GLib freebies)

Rice : +5:food: => 2.5 :gp:
Banana : +2:food: => 1 :gp:
Banana : +2:food: => 1 :gp:
Farmed grasslands river : +1:food: => 0.5 :gp:
Farmed grasslands river : +1:food: => 0.5 :gp:
Farmed grasslands river : +1:food: => 0.5 :gp:

Pop 12 required.

Not very realistic perhaps, but do you really suggest that we're going Caste? No :whipped:? What, no whip-MM?? You're surely jesting, no???? :lol:

This is how I view the future:

Skip mysticism, no bells, no whistles, go Wheel, Pottery, Writing. Whip granary in Timbuktu, grow to size 6 and whip library.

Timbuktu will never be a military production center. Workers & Settlers & Great Scientists.

We need construction and astro. We rely on GP to lightbulb astro.

We inhibit Hannibal and Alex by denying them resources. We want them to expand and populate their part of the continent.

There is one matter that keeps me awake at nights: what if Doc is correct with his REX ideas? What if we build our two axes and a few warriors, and then only produce settlers and workers? Settlers in London and Timbuktu, and workers in the new cities? What if we keep research effort high enough to get us to construction, and then just pour out units to conquer the world? We will surely find cities that will be suitable as GP farms...? Perhaps founding a city close to lots of forest and chop the GLib?

Timbuktu is a high food city with calendar.
Banana plantation - not farm is as good as rice farm. So I see no problem in the long run if it should get to that.
But anyway, just for the way to astronomy you shouldn't go out of the way to generate a lot GS.
And, BTW, if there should be the other perfect location, it's not forbidden to generate GS in more than 1 city.

The capital has to produce some more military, so I doubt we would want to start the library in 12 turns from now (the 23 turns I get for writing via pottery looks more realistic to me). We still don't know anything about our remaining neighbors and currently couldn't even defend well against a random bigger barb attack. Timbuktu cannot help short term even if we forfeit the infra.

Timbuktu getting granary first still lets everything open. The time we could have 2 scientists @ size 4 is about the same as with building library directly, but then we have granary already and are much more flexible.

But, what does the border expansion help w/o population to work tiles and scientists...Even I can answer that one...the sooner we pop the borders, the sooner we can mine the hill tiles for the upcoming citizens to build the upcoming copper-connected axes...Timbuktu is a high food city with calendar.
Banana plantation - not farm is as good as rice farm. So I see no problem in the long run if it should get to that.That means we had better act like an AI and research Calendar early on, or act like a Spoon Award and finish in the loooong run.But anyway, just for the way to astronomy you shouldn't go out of the way to generate a lot GS.How many would you make in this game?
And, BTW, if there should be the other perfect location, it's not forbidden to generate GS in more than 1 city.Of course. Which is why I could understand Gnejs wanting to get that started sooner than later. When later on we conquer a well-developed city with lots of food, then we can dovetail 2-3 cities to pop some more GSs asap.The capital has to produce some more military, so I doubt we would want to start the library in 12 turns from now (the 23 turns I get for writing via pottery looks more realistic to me). We still don't know anything about our remaining neighbors and currently couldn't even defend well against a random bigger barb attack. Timbuktu cannot help short term even if we forfeit the infra.

Timbuktu getting granary first still lets everything open. The time we could have 2 scientists @ size 4 is about the same as with building library directly, but then we have granary already and are much more flexible.I think klarius and I are in basic agreement for this turnset. Research Wheel>Pottery>Writing. London continues building axes and growing, doing the micromanagement we've discussed to maximize things. In Timbuktu, it looks like we have no choice but to chop 1 of the two forests for 2 turns, then farm the rice. Then road and/or farm until Pottery is done. THen we can either make a cottage, build more roads, or continue farming. Build warriors till we switch to Granary.

DO we really need another grass farm in Timbuktu? WOuldn't cottages be Choice Grade A Angus Beef?

I think our decision-making process goes like this:

1a. How much production do we need?
1b. Do we need astronomy?
1b.1. How soon do we need to have an answer on Astro?

Answers:
1a. Enough to neuter Alex and Hannibal for the short term.
1b. Better explore our landmass and get 1-2 workboats out asap.
1b.1. After we have reearched Sailing, minimally (or less conceivably), and maybe Construction and IW.

Since we have already eliminated 33% of our short-term AW problem, it seems to me that our research pace will dictate our victory speed, if we can neuter the other 2 in this turnset.

One other strategic thought:

If we're going to use this continent as a high-commerce research center (which is implied by klarius approach of not needing too many GS's), then it may be possible to win faster by dominating, especially if the AIs elsewhere are fairly advanced militarily when we get to them.

1b.1. After we have reearched Sailing, minimally (or less conceivably), and maybe Construction and IW.

Construction prevents the light-bulbing of machinery (the only full value bulb before astronomy), so one shouldn't research it, if it's not needed for local wars urgently and one needs astronomy.

And I really think we should make calendar a priority (independent of needing astronomy). Obviously we cannot trade for it, but we have lots of banana and dyes around.

On the GS: Academy+Optics+Astro=3 total.

We are not in a hurry to get Astro yet, we are in a hurry to explore for more land reachable by galley. And we are in a hurry for military now. Once the AI are dead, we won't need units anymore for a long time.

I see Timb as a no-NE-GPFarm if Astro is needed or as a settler pump if not.

If Astro is needed, is it better to beeline? Or is it better to go CS-Education? We have stone, so X*1.5*2 in the capital.

We have something that we think the other teams may not have yet, a second city and an extra worker. I think we should try to leverage this advantage in the best possible way. We need one or two extra coastal cities soon to send out the exploring workboats/galleys. Forget about libraries and techs, what we need to find is the optimal strategy for getting those two settlers out of Timbuktu while London builds the axes for harassing the AIs and defending our land.

Another weird idea :crazyeye:.
Hinduism isn't founded by now (no real religion nuts in this game).
Research mysticism-polytheism. If Hinduism is founded in Timbuktu, chop and pop-rush settler if not chop complete (the previously started) monument.

Hi guys !!

I'm here after a four-days tour in Kerala as Christmas hollyday. Try to read all posts and ... starting with tommorow I'll be able to play my turns.

Regards all and Merry Christmas ( Craciun Fericit in romanian ;) ) !

Mîtiu, can you please confirm that you have read (and understood ;) ) all the posts so far? At least those that affect the upcoming 15 turns :lol: ... If so, can you please provide a pre-play-plan and give us an estimate when you can play? I would prefer if your turn set can be played tomorrow to allow for a mid point review, or worst case on saturday. If this is not possible (i.e. does not suit your RL :) ), please tell us and we will either swap your turn set or skip it. The upcoming turn set will reveal terrain that will help us plan the future much better.

Mîtiu, can you please confirm that you have read (and understood ;) ) all the posts so far?

Yes - I read ( almost ) all posts and just now I'm trying to dowload the save too to take a closer look to situation ... ;)

Regards

Well, nice that Mîtiu understood the plan, I don't.
Are we now heading for settler(s) out of Timbuktu, or do we want to get library and scientists up.

I think for settlers we could take the crapshot with trying for polytheism and falling back to culture expansion with monument if it fails (and chop settlers).

For library I would take the pottery-writing route to have the population available shortly after the library completes.

I think 4 GS is enough. Machinery, Optics and 2xAstronomy. I doubt an academy in London will pay off. We won't run 100% science, and if we're going to expand, I doubt we will reach above 70%. An academy will generate less than 10 bpt. It will thus take >100 turns to break even.

We need the GS rather late in the tech tree, so we are not in a hurry to generate them. That is why I think we shall focus on expanding.

With the risk of repeating myself, his is how I view the upcoming turn set:

Research Wheel & Pottery

Timbuktu shall not build axes. A few warriors while growing, but then settlers and workers. Whip granary when suitable. Skip library for now. It's better to switch to caste when we're in the GP-phase. Pre-chop forest, farm the rice, road towards river (all according to previously posted MM-plans).

Build axes in London and MM according to previously stated MM-plan. We need one axe as (active) garrison, and two axes to search for the two AI. Then we need one more warrior as (passive) garrison, and a warrior to scout west peninsula.

Send one warrior at Timbuktu north, and the promoted one south. Send the London-axe south when axe is close to completion.

Now, I know this violates LC's scouting plan, but what if we send the scouting units along the coast line? Timbuktu warriors go along eastern coast, while the axe(s) go along the western coast. This will delay detecting the AI, but will give as a valuable indication where to send the first wb. If we need one at all?!

WIth the warrior going N of TImbuktu, I definitely agree with scouting along the coast, because that may open up connecting copper with Sailing. WIth the first axe coming out of London, the path I showed kind of follows the coast to the SW anyway and it's important to not miss an AI there or miss a Mountain/blocked landmass.

With the promoted TImbuktu warrior going S, I think it's important to 1) see if that river connects back to London, and 2) find an AI asap (which could be following the coast). Going S is likely to be coast pretty rapidly anyway, but I wouldn't prioritize the coastal route with him.

By the way, the path on my map is not THE REQUIRED PATH. What it shows is how to not miss an AI city between the path and London.

I agree with Gnejs about leveraging Timbuktu. We got a quick city, pop3, and a worker. I don't think we want another city on the East side of the continent just so wwe can send out a workboat. TOo much of a maintenance hit. Yes, a city on the coast near teh second gold.

Since we will send the next axe south, we need to know where to send the next next axe: north or south. At that time, we need to have met Alex and Hannibal. If both are south, they will most probably not be located in the center of the continent, but rather SW and SE. In that case, it will not cost us anything if we go along the coast. Revealing coast with land units will save us a LOT of turns with work boats.

I see the point with revealing tiles in the center of the continent to ensure we don't miss an AI, and to unfog the river. However, I think that revealing coastal tiles will save us a lot of turns when it comes to exploring the seas and will speed up the point when we know we need astro. If we find an island on the east coast, it may be suitable to settle an eastern coastal city. Else we can skip such a city. The strategic value of revealing the coast line will thus be higher than finding the last AI quicker...

LC, did you just agree with Gnejs that we shall skip the library in Timbuktu and focus on building settlers instead?

klarius, I'm not too eager to gamble on Hinduism. If we fail, we have delayed granaries a lot. And if we don't fail, what have we gained? A replacement for monument?

And if we don't fail, what have we gained? A replacement for monument?
Hinduism would come in 14 turns by my calculation. That means a lot faster border expansion in Timbuktu than by any other method and by that really beating a granary to a limited amount of settlers.

Edit:
And the fall back. Mysticism-monument (switch away from poly when Hinduism is FIADL). Chop 2 forests in every settler isn't bad, if the goal is really to get 2 settlers fast.

Hinduism would come in 14 turns by my calculation. That means a lot faster border expansion in Timbuktu than by any other method and by that really beating a granary to a limited amount of settlers.

Edit:
And the fall back. Mysticism-monument (switch away from poly when Hinduism is FIADL). Chop 2 forests in every settler isn't bad, if the goal is really to get 2 settlers fast.

Fair enough. But the fall back relies on whipping the monument, yes? And then pre-chop/chop the forests into the two settlers?

So we then delay roads but quicken up the settlers? Fine with me :lol:

Well, I'm still just asking :lol:.
If we want the library and scientists it's clear to me that granary-library gives us the scientists first. And then we can still grow and improve the city further.
But if we want the fast settlers mainly, culture expansion does about the same for us as a granary.
If we can get culture expansion fast (with luck :D) that cannot be beaten by any other MM method I could imagine.

I haven't exactly calculated what's best for the fall-back (either completing the monument with the chop or whipping and put the overflow in settler), rough estimate is that it is about the same.

Well, nice that Mîtiu understood the plan, I don't.
Are we now heading for settler(s) out of Timbuktu, or do we want to get library and scientists up.


I also have the same opinion that this is something left "in the air" ... :rolleyes:


I think for settlers we could take the crapshot with trying for polytheism and falling back to culture expansion with monument if it fails (and chop settlers).


Trying for Polytheism sounds good - but I belive that we could decide for a path after, let's say, 10 turns. :)

Meanwhile - I'll try to play until Timbuktu will be out-of-anarchy using some guideline from previous posts and after this I'll try to upload some picture.

Regards

Later edit - live report :

Inherited turn - nothing to do, just press ENTER.
T1 - Move worker to NW forest tile near Timbuktu. Move south warrior 1 S - found 1 Hanibal scout. Press ENTER.

Interturn - A pretty bad message appear : "Alexander had adopted Slavery" - that means that he just researched Bronze Working. :(

T2 - Change from Wheel to Mysticism ( I should do this at beginning :( ). Move second warrior toward a northen hill for a better perspective ... ;)

T3 - Timbuktu out of revolt - start to work the rice. Some "scout-fest" around it - check the first picture :

Revealing coast with land units will save us a LOT of turns with work boats.Imo, we MUST inhibit the AIs ASAP. This is a higher priority than saving a few turns mapping the coastline. This priority is 10 notches higher than our next priority. ALEX WILL BUILD PHALANXES AND AXES as soon as he hooks up copper and that will be a MAJOR pain the butt. We're not done leveraging our early axes. Let's not get gleeful and forget we're in AW.

The promoted warrior should follow my path inland first. Then, if needed, loop back going S then E. The warrior coming out of Timbuktu can follow the coast starting NE and looping around to the S. The axe from London can follow the coast after he gets down there but should hop inland as needed to thoroughly verify the inland possibilities. Thusly, we will scout the coastline thoroughly.

LC, did you just agree with Gnejs that we shall skip the library in Timbuktu and focus on building settlers instead?No, not necessarily. I'm against a settler on the East coast (right now), but your question goes beyond Mitiu's turnset anyway. After Mitiu finds out where the AIs are, we'll have a better idea of what our settling needs are.

I agreed with Gnejs that we want to leverage Timbuktu. But how? Maybe by poprushing/building stuff, that is by 1) improving its tiles, 2) building the granary, then 3) using it for axes or settlers. Maybe by using it as a :commerce:/:science: center and making lots of cottages fast.

But if we want the fast settlers mainly, culture expansion does about the same for us as a granary.Granary>library is a Power Move. It provides us reasonably fast border expasnion, faster growth, GS points, roads and cottages for our worker to build, and is not off our strategic path. The other two research paths
do not provide us all that and are off our strategic path unless we want the Oracle.

The Oracle is :hammers: for :science:. I wish someone would figure out how to determine what balance of :hammers: to :science: we need.

I also have the same opinion that this is something left "in the air" ... :rolleyes:



Trying for Polytheism sounds good - but I belive that we could decide for a path after, let's say, 10 turns. :)

Meanwhile - I'll try to play until Timbuktu will be out-of-anarchy using some guideline from previous posts and after this I'll try to upload some picture.

Regards

Later edit - live report :

Inherited turn - nothing to do, just press ENTER.
T1 - Move worker to NW forest tile near Timbuktu. Move south warrior 1 S - found 1 Alex scout. Press ENTER.

Interturn - A pretty bad message appear : "Alexander had adopted Slavery" - that means that he just researched Bronze Working. :(What are you researching? What do you mean nothing to do on the turn Zero?

YOU HAD A BUNCH OF STUFF TO DO!!!

WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?

Mitiu, ERKON ASKED FOR A PLAN. WHERE"S YOUR PLAN? WTF?

Mitiu! Switch the TImbuktu build to a warrior! I don't think we want Mysticism. omfg

Mitiu! Switch the TImbuktu build to a warrior! I don't think we want Mysticism. omfg

Timbuktu just went out of anarchy that turn - so I could change to it, no problem.

Bad news - my Windows crashed :cry: when tried to get the second picture ( with the exploring south warrior which found absolutely nothing even he reach a jungle-hill in south-east :( ). I'll take the autosave in the evening because now I need to go to work in ~20 minute.

Okay. Patience on the exploring warrior... ;) He'll find the AIs sooner or later. Just be sure to very carefully check all of the fog to find AI borders.

Listen, Mitiu, please check with the others to get a clear consensus on what we want to do before you continue. I'm flying to Slovenia in the morning so I'll be off line. Good luck!

EDIT: If you decide to change the tech we're researching or change the barracks to warrior or anything else, be very careful to only make changes after the point where your computer crashed. We don't want to give ourselves any re-load advantage.

Revealing coast with land units will save us a LOT of turns with work boats.


Why?

A WB sees 1 tile further than a unit on the coast. Even if all the coast is revealed by land units, we will need to go all around with a WB anyway, won't we?

Bad news - my Windows crashed :cry:

Oh!
Do you have a save?
Or do you need to replay a turn (or part of a turn)? If this is the case, I think we should PM @ainwood about it.

Oh!
Do you have a save?
Or do you need to replay a turn (or part of a turn)? If this is the case, I think we should PM @ainwood about it.

I'll check right now. :blush:

Later edit : The generated autosave is exactly at the beginning of the last turn ( when uploaded first picture ). could I continue to play it that condition ?

In the event of a crash, load up the last autosave. This should normally be the one created at the start of the current turn. If you previously made any moves between that point and the crash, then replay them exactly as you did before, and then continue the game.

If you have a repeatable crash then please let me know, as we shall need to investigate.

Wooot! :woohoo: Party is on! [party] :dance: :beer: :cheers: :xmascheers:

Team: Please disregard anything that I or Erkon posts for the following 6 days. We will obviously be intoxicated and incapable of coherent thoughts (yeah, whats new? :lol: )

Mitiu, unless klarius signs in and makes some recommendations, I think the most important changes you need are warrior instead of barracks in Timbuktu. If you decide to continue Mysticism, then you might as well switch to monument immediately when it's done, work both forests, and finish the chop when the rice is farmed. I would do Wheel after Mysticism, so the worker can work, but klarius talked about the possiblitiy of Polytheism (but onjly until someone else discovers Hinduism).

If you switch back to Wheel now, then connect Timbuktu to the river after the rice farm.

Your choice, I guess. No one seems to know which is better. Wheel keeps the worker working better.

Watch for AI stacks or barbs.

Does that Southern river keep on going?

Imo, we MUST inhibit the AIs ASAP. This is a higher priority than saving a few turns mapping the coastline. This priority is 10 notches higher than our next priority. ALEX WILL BUILD PHALANXES AND AXES as soon as he hooks up copper and that will be a MAJOR pain the butt. We're not done leveraging our early axes. Let's not get gleeful and forget we're in AW.

Buah pah pah pah pah <insert favourite chicken sound>
...
Granary>library is a Power Move. It provides us reasonably fast border expasnion, faster growth, GS points, roads and cottages for our worker to build, and is not off our strategic path. The other two research paths
do not provide us all that and are off our strategic path unless we want the Oracle.

The Oracle is :hammers: for :science:. I wish someone would figure out how to determine what balance of :hammers: to :science: we need.

I think we shall skip libraries and switch to caste when it's time for creating GS. Doc - you told us so, and so it will be!

If we're going for a specialist research, it is clever to aim for the Oracle. Then we can fully focus on production (and REX). Yes, massssster.....

And with pyramids we can fuel all our research with scientists. Very clever. Yes, yes.

BTW, please ignore anything that Gnejs writes!

Why?

A WB sees 1 tile further than a unit on the coast. Even if all the coast is revealed by land units, we will need to go all around with a WB anyway, won't we?

A WB does not see 1 tile further than a unit on the coast... does it? :confused:

Exploring the land with land units is cheaper than with the work boat if you compare WB cost with warrior cost. So, with two warriors, it is possible to reveal as much coast as one WB.

The point with exploring the coast line with warriors on the east coast is that it's much faster than sending a WB there. And the quicker we know what is needed, the better. And perhaps we can skip settling on the coast until much later, so that we can found our early cities on really good sites...

...

Later edit - live report :

Inherited turn - nothing to do, just press ENTER.
T1 - Move worker to NW forest tile near Timbuktu. Move south warrior 1 S - found 1 Hanibal scout. Press ENTER.

Interturn - A pretty bad message appear : "Alexander had adopted Slavery" - that means that he just researched Bronze Working. :(

T2 - Change from Wheel to Mysticism ( I should do this at beginning :( ). Move second warrior toward a northen hill for a better perspective ... ;)

T3 - Timbuktu out of revolt - start to work the rice. Some "scout-fest" around it - check the first picture :

This looks as an POST-play-plan :eek:

Mîtiu, my idea with a pre-play-plan is to reduce the risk of "unfortunate" mistakes ;) :


The warrior next to Timbuktu had one movement point left at turn 0.
Switching to Warrior AFTER revolt lost us 3 hammers. It's better to switch before...
Delaying Mysticism delays Hinduism as you noted your self.


One more thing: did you work the tiles that LC suggested in London?

What is done, is done. But please, PLEASE, write a pre-play-plan first (this goes to everyone in the team).

This is what I think is important:


Replay the last turn EXACTLY as before. With potential mistakes...
Switch to Warrior in Timbuktu. Keep building Warriors until Hinduism is founded.
Keep Mysticism, then Polytheism. Don't switch to the Wheel unless Hinduism is Founded In Distant Lands.
If we miss Hinduism, switch to Monument, and next turn you whip (don't whip the same turn you switch to Monument).
Upload save at turn 7 or 8 for review.


Good luck!!! :D

PS: how come both you and LC have "AM" in your screenshots? Are you playing in the mid of the night!? :eek:

The warrior next to Timbuktu had one movement point left at turn 0.
Switching to Warrior AFTER revolt lost us 3 hammers. It's better to switch before...
Delaying Mysticism delays Hinduism as you noted your self.



:blush:
Too late for point (2) - unfortunately I didn't know this. :(


One more thing: did you work the tiles that LC suggested in London?



What is done, is done. But please, PLEASE, write a pre-play-plan first (this goes to everyone in the team).


Well ... LC guideline from some ( dozen ;) ) of posts before sounds good for me in the condition in which anyway we didn't have so much units to move/cities to micromanage. :mischief:


Replay the last turn EXACTLY as before. With potential mistakes...


I did so - not switching to warrior before and move existing ones on the exact same paths.


Switch to Warrior in Timbuktu. Keep building Warriors until Hinduism is founded.
Keep Mysticism, then Polytheism. Don't switch to the Wheel unless Hinduism is Founded In Distant Lands.


100% agree.


Upload save at turn 7 or 8 for review.


I'll update a picture right now because 2 things happened in the next 4 movement :
- Mysticism researched ( just this turn, didn't switch yet to Poly from Wheel ) - without anybody founding Polytheism yet.
- More important - I found Hannibal ! :crazyeye:

Do you want to update the save right now and to pass the turn to the next player ?

Our axeman from Timbuktu could arrive ( as you see ) in 11 turns. I belive that the one from London could arrive in similar time. In London just finnished another axeman and queued another one - but this could be switched of course. Please take a look to attached picture !


PS: how come both you and LC have "AM" in your screenshots? Are you playing in the mid of the night!? :eek:

No - I'm in Bangalore now, but hour of my computer is still on GMT+2 hr or so ( anyway date&time are messed ), if I play in morning it will appear ~midnight. :)

Regards and I'll await your opinions/critics/comments ( personally I'd vote for an attempt to atack Hannibal with 3 axes + 1 warrior ). If you need more pictures please announce me - I saved properly the game this time before saving the taken picture with WindowsPaint tool in order to prevent any other crash. :p

I'll update a picture right now because 2 things happened in the next 4 movement :
- Mysticism researched ( just this turn, didn't switch yet to Poly from Wheel ) - without anybody founding Polytheism yet.
- More important - I found Hannibal ! :crazyeye:

Do you want to update the save right now and to pass the turn to the next player ?

Our axeman from Timbuktu could arrive ( as you see ) in 11 turns. I belive that the one from London could arrive in similar time. In London just finnished another axeman and queued another one - but this could be switched of course. Please take a look to attached picture !


Mitiu, that is great news!! :) :) :)

It is a bit difficult to get the full picture from screenshots, and you finding Hannibal so close could potentially open up a whole set of new possibilities. Would you mind uploading the save so we can have a look at it and discuss this new development a bit?
You can then play the rest of your turnset when we have all reassessed the situation.

Really great news that you found Hannibal!

...
Do you want to update the save right now and to pass the turn to the next player ?
...

Please upload, and then we will take a look & provide advice. How many turns have you played in total? Eight? If so, you have another seven turns to play. I think it's a good time for the rest of us to present thoughts, since we didn't really plan for the complete turn set.

1. Let's go for polytheism (unless it is founded elsewhere)
2. Don't send the axe from Timbuktu, since we need it as active defense. The first warrior shall stay in the city as stationary defense.
3. Use the warrior next to Hannibal to reveal tiles, but don place it next to the capital if there are archers, since they may attack, and may win. The warrior is much more valuable as scout than pillager.
4. It's hard to give advice on where to send the London-axe before looking at the save :)

O.K. - I'll upload the save here then. :)

Anyway - personally I'm in favor to research Polytheism and for an attempt to wipe out Hannibal - even by letting Timbutku defended only by 1 warrior and with the second possible to be whipped in any moment. But please, everybody take a look and share opinion.

MM from unimproved cow to copper in London.

I don't see that we should do a very risky attack on Hannibal now. First I would like to know where Athens is.

Hannibal's capital is very far away, even if we could take it, it's doubtful we would like to keep it this early in the game.

MM from unimproved cow to copper in London.


O.K. - I'll do this.


I don't see that we should do a very risky attack on Hannibal now. First I would like to know where Athens is.


My wild guess is somewhere in the north ... but I'll try to find out in my remained moves. :)


Hannibal's capital is very far away, even if we could take it, it's doubtful we would like to keep it this early in the game.

O.K. - let's wait for other opinion and I'll continue. :)

Regards

My wild guess is somewhere in the north ... but I'll try to find out in my remained moves. :)

Regards

LC and I got the impression that his scouts came more often from the south. So he might be directly south or even southwest if the land swings that way. If we move everything from the capital SE we might get surprised by a pillager coming from the south (or north if he is there).

General remark:
This is always war with some neighbors. And human barbs are due any turn now. That's not the time to leave all cities undefended (1 warrior is undefended, IMO), unless one has units in every direction for early warning. And even then our capital is vulnerable to a naval invasion also (a little early for that, but a thing to keep in mind for later).

Ok, if we want to pursue the poly crap shot, we should try to make up one of the lost turns.
That's max commerce everywhere. London gold-copper-lake (@ slight starvation, but food will suffice), Timbuktu rice - lake - river grass. That brings down poly to seven turns, but we really need every coin as this gives an even 25 beakers (30 with prerequisite bonus).

If not, switch Timbuktu to monument and rush next turn. I'm somewhat reluctant to give more complicated MM schemes to Mîtiu ;).

If not, switch Timbuktu to monument and rush next turn. I'm somewhat reluctant to give more complicated MM schemes to Mîtiu ;).

He he ... I should admit that fanatical micromanaging isn't my strong point. :(
I finnished my turns.

Bad news : I didn't found Athens yet. :mad:
Good news : We are Hindu now ( or at least after converting to it ) ! :)

Some other aspects - despite scouting with the first London axeman quiet deep in the south ( trying to use any hills to get a larger view ) I found almost nothing usefull. However - in 10 turns it could be near Carthage if we decide so ... ;) The axeman near Timbutku was left unmoved - it could both came back to defend the city or go to south for a possible attack on Carthage.
No barb/AI warrior/archer was seen. Anyway - please notice both the copper and horses ( unimproved yet ) near Carthage. Guys - Hanniball could really be a pain in the future !! :eek:

Later edit - I uploaded the save on submission page.

Ok, if we want to pursue the poly crap shot, we should try to make up one of the lost turns.
That's max commerce everywhere. London gold-copper-lake (@ slight starvation, but food will suffice), Timbuktu rice - lake - river grass. That brings down poly to seven turns, but we really need every coin as this gives an even 25 beakers (30 with prerequisite bonus).

If not, switch Timbuktu to monument and rush next turn. I'm somewhat reluctant to give more complicated MM schemes to Mîtiu ;).

Poly in 7 turns sounds like a great approach.

Once the warrior at Hannibal moves one SE to the plains hill, we will know more about the lay of the land there. A rush doesn't seem feasible right now, but what we should try do is determine if Hannibal has copper or horses. If neither, the first axe out of London should go S looking for Alex instead. If Hannibal does have either of these strategic resources it is important to deny him the use of them. It might be enough to keep the warrior close so that his worker doesn't venture out. However, if he has already connected one of the resources we need an axe there asap.

He he ... I should admit that fanatical micromanaging isn't my strong point. :(
I finnished my turns.

Bad news : I didn't found Athens yet. :mad:
Good news : We are Hindu now ( or at least after converting to it ) ! :)

Some other aspects - despite scouting with the first London axeman quiet deep in the south ( trying to use any hills to get a larger view ) I found almost nothing usefull. However - in 10 turns it could be near Carthage if we decide so ... ;) The axeman near Timbutku was left unmoved - it could both came back to defend the city or go to south for a possible attack on Carthage.
No barb/AI warrior/archer was seen. Anyway - please notice both the copper and horses ( unimproved yet ) near Carthage. Guys - Hanniball could really be a pain in the future !! :eek:

Later edit - I uploaded the save on submission page.

WTG Mitiu! :goodjob:

Have you seen any worker in or near Carthage? If not, I think we can rely on the warrior for now while the axe continues to look for Alex. Something tells me that Athens is close, there is a certain symmetry with the rivers and capital locations that would suggest that Athens is due south of London.


Oh, and "got it". :D

Poly in 7 turns sounds like a great approach.


I succeded ( and without starving London ... ). ;)


If neither, the first axe out of London should go S looking for Alex instead.

Unfortunately I couldn't found Alex - nor in north nor in south ( but Athens could be located somewhere on the coast SW from London ... check attached picture ).
What's strange - Carthage is a size-5 city, but no worker was seen and it has only 1 archer and 1 warrior as defense ... probably Hannibal researched Sailing and built already 1 galley togheter wit 1-2 workboats for his sea-resources ? :rolleyes:

Later edit : If we will not aim for conquest of Carthage I'm in favor of settling asap our third city - in a location like the marked one ( which is on a hill - with acces to both horses, rice and stone ... after first border-expansion ... I know that this is a drawback ... )

Regards and good luck to the next player !

Move the warrior SW and fortify. That should be enough to keep Hannibal from connecting either copper or horses, while it's not in the danger zone of the city, so he will not build extra attackers (and probably anyway not attack a fortified promoted warrior with archers). That takes care of Hannibal for a while

But find Alex. He's the one we have to look after, with his monster capital.

A first attempt at a plan:

London: Work copper instead of banana for 1 turn faster axe but delaying growth for a few turns. Worker mines the grassland hill, done in 8t. London can then work cow, copper, gold and mine at size 4 for 14 hammers per turn and zero growth. This means one axe every 4 turns which could be very useful if we wish to rush Athens. Perhaps we throw in a warrior after the next axe for scouting the w peninsula.

Timbuktu: No idea. It is a little early to chop/whip a settler as we have no escorts or fog busters. Perhaps build a second worker? There will be many tiles to improve and roads to build. Edit: Move back axe to Timbuktu.

Carthage: Warrior moves to forested hill on coast to get a good view of Hannibal's sea tiles. Second axe out of London moves to Carthage.

Athens: First axe continues to look to the south and southwest, going out to the coast. Northern warrior checks to the NW.

Research: Stick with the original plan of Wheel->Pottery->Writing. Or should we rethink this?

London will be unhealthy at size 4, so the most urgent action is to get a health resource hooked up, if we ever want to work the grass hill also, but that should anyway rather by at size 5 only, IMO.
This could either be the cow or connect to the river and let the Timbuktu worker connect rice to Timbuktu and this to the river. As this all needs the wheel, we can as well let the worker now finish the farm, so we can do a rapid growth phase later.

Timbuktu could build a fast settler, but then the axe has to stay/fog bust ahead as escort.

Research, I see still as wheel-pottery, but then it's the question, if we are ready to build libraries. We could still fit in priesthood also, if we think we want still a shot on the Oracle.

Research, I see still as wheel-pottery, but then it's the question, if we are ready to build libraries. We could still fit in priesthood also, if we think we want still a shot on the Oracle.

Exactely - after wheel-pottery I favor an attempt to grab priesthood and to build Oracle in Timbutku ( having first generated GP a prophet isn't so bad for a Holy City ... :rolleyes: ) - a slingshot for Code Of Law is very good on a forecasted empired with some cities conquested from AIs ... ;)

Regards

Mîtiu, great play! You are forgiven your minor mistakes at the start of your turn set since you grabbed us a Holy City! :clap: :lol:

Gnejs' turn set:

London: switch from banana to copper. Complete farming the dye, then road towards the cow. Switch back to maximum growth so synchronize growth to size 4 when cow is connected. Then grow to size 5 asap, and whip a granary. Build one warrior to scout west. Then axes.

With granary, we need 42 food to grow two pop. A 2-pop whip generates 90 hammers. The farmed dye thus generates 6 hammers, which is superior to the mine. Notice to every reader: Gnejs is ill and evidently his delirious writings cannot be trust! Behold, I am the foundation of truth!! Give me another beer, b1tch!!!

Timbuktu: Build a bunch of warriors. One warrior and the axe stays in the proximity of the city, while the other warriors explore (and eventually garrison new cities). Then build a settler (or perhaps whip a granary?). Worker farms the western banana, then road the tile 1SW of city to connect to river. As soon as the rice is connected (and our cities are connected), we can grow London to size 6 even with whip unhappiness.

Carthage warrior stays three tiles away from the city to prevent unit builds as soon as the coastal tiles are revealed.

Axe from London searches for Alex to the south / south west.

Research wheel => pottery

I would rather suffer the unhealthiness for 4 turns more and directly connect to Timbuktu with the added benefit. Also rice will get us another health with a granary we should build, so size 5 is covered also.

The idea of rapid culture expansion was to be able to whip w/o the need of a granary first. I would still go for the settler with chop/whip and let it off with the axe (or be met by axe from London depending on where it goes). We still can whip a warrior pair in an emergency.
With Hannibal under control :confused: and Alex probably nearer to London (and London having more resources) than Timbuktu, the only problem should be barbs and that shouldn't be a big problem with culture expansion.

Hi guys.

I'm baaackk! :)

I just spent the past week with a lot of beautiful women and now I feel great. :mischief:

Looks like Ioan had a fairly good turn set.

It'll probably take me a bit to catch up.

Well done, Mîtiu.

A WB does not see 1 tile further than a unit on the coast... does it? :confused:

I went and tried it... only to find I have had this missconception for 2 years...:blush:

check attached picture
Thank you!!!:)



If we have chosen Myst+Poly, then we should try to grab Oracle. I'd prefer to get cottages and granaries first. Are we in danger of losing Oracle if we research Wheel-Pottery-PH?

klarius, you are probably right.

Murky, did we ask about those pretty girls? No we didn't! :mad:

jesusin, I think the Oracle is a bit risky. A simple estimation gives us Priesthood in 15 turns. London can build the Oracle in about 15 turns, leading to completion at around 1200 BC (give or take a few turns by clever MM & extra maintenance costs). Metal Casting is one candidate for the slingshot.

I am not sure if we should build any cottages :confused:. With a specialist economy, we will get enough research anyway...

#&*^()&%$#@^&*&

Tried the save and got this rhyming bs:

The save file you have selected
is protected
to ensure the assets i your mod folder have not been changed.

I tried fixing but had no luck
f.ck

@LC
You need vanilla and warlords patched to the latest patch.
On top of that either BtS patched to 3.13 or the dlls from here. (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/civ4games/Civ4_BtS_DLLs.zip)
Both of them :).
Now if you didn't mess up any of your assets you should be ready to go.

Assets checker now gives me this:

Warlords: Assets\CvGameCOreDLL.dll <--Error: Files do no match

How do I fix that?

Assets checker now gives me this:

Warlords: Assets\CvGameCOreDLL.dll <--Error: Files do no match

How do I fix that?

Download the updated DLL as explained in post #1 :p

Not working for me. I have BtS and I'm stil getting that message.

Do you have BtS, upgraded to 3.13 and not swapped out the dll at some time to play an old game?

Anyway whatever the reason the right dll is in the download mentioned above. Just use it.

Okay, thanks klarius. I replaced both of those and it works.

Gnejs' Plan
Makes sense to me that we use London to take out Athens.

What do we want with Timbuktu? Settler pump? Oracle? Too bad we lost a half a dozen turns exploring with the SW axe. It would have been nice to know if we're not in a hurry with the settler. In any case, I lean toward Gnejs' idea of worker next, simply because I dislike the idea of sending the settler on a 7t journey. Where would we settle anyway? NW of cattle? We need a warrior out of London asap to epxlore the W peninsula. Maybe there's a food-rich spot there.

How do we plan to connect Timbuktu to London?

What's our strategy now?

LC, the obvious plan is to use Timbuktu to generate settlers to spam the continent with cities. The first settler is accompanied with one worker. The cities start building another worker for the next city. When we have built enough cities, we switch to Caste and employ scientists.

First city is close to the one Mitui proposes. There are a couple of alternative sites in that region. We want stone in the inner circle, so that we can start building the Pyramids => Representation. We thus run specialist economy, and ignore cottages.

Research path: the Wheel, Priesthood (for Oracle). Then Pottery (for Metal Casting with the Oracle), Writing, Mathematics, Calendar.

London produces a couple of axes/warriors and then builds the Oracle. The axes inhibit Alex and Hanni.

We postpone workboats until our warriors have explored the coastline so that we know on which coast we need the coastal city (perhaps with a cultural bridge). I can't fathom the Viking to generate a map that can be reached by galleys as the previous succession game.

Apart from MM, the only thing I'm not sure about is how much we will whip/chop in Timbuktu.

Are we going for domination or conquest? City spamming is usually done with domination towards the end of the game.

First city is close to the one Mitui proposes. There are a couple of alternative sites in that region. We want stone in the inner circle, so that we can start building the Pyramids => Representation.


I would rather settle 4 w of Timbuktu, but fast (Timbuktu to pop-rush settler in 5 turns). This city can borrow a banana from Timbuktu to get a quick monument. And it should have a good chance :crazyeye: to catch religion for even quicker expansion (next worker job connect Timbuktu to river).

klarius, what's your vision for that city? Build pramids?

klarius, what's your vision for that city? Build pramids?Maybe pyramids, maybe something else. The main idea is to get another decent city between London and Timbuktu quick. And don't require worker turns or culture expansion for a decent growth rate (as the locations next to the stone). It can be connected to Timbuktu right away and by that pay for it's maintenance.

I see still the alternative to walk to the capital for the coastal gold location. Position the axe w of Timbuktu and let the next axe out of London walk a few steps east. That should be good enough for a save walk.

Okay. I'm looking at the idea of Pyramids. If we beeline them and we want 4 GS's, we're talking 1500 GL points * 2:science: per GL point = 3000 :science: (w/o libraries). We need another 6400 :science: not including the 4 GS's for Astro, Optics, and Machinery. So the question is, how soon can we take advanage of the Pyramids? Do we want to have the capital farther north so we can chop it faster? ANd what do we want to research? Because we need CoL>Calendar to take FULL VALUE (;)) advantage of Representation. But we would also need Maths for the chops to make sense.

EDIT: In addition to Masonry, of course.
EDIT2: I can see 3 sites where we can work 6 scientists for 45:science: and Athens is probably another. So maybe the goals are some prioritized version of Capture Athens/Build pyramids/Spam 4+ pop10 cities asap. Cities are: Timbuktu, Rice/bananas/cattle SE of London, Floodplains/wheat further south. Hopefully, we'll find some more.

Gnejs: SW axe on the SW diagonal is optimum until you know where the Antarctic coast is (better than SW NW to desert hill). The diagonal doesn't give you quite as much on T2, but has a somewhat higher likelihood of getting you closer to his city center, which is at least 6t away.

We don't need CoL (for caste system) for a long time, if ever. You first need the population to run a lot of scientists.
We still not even know if we require astronomy. We need calendar (for food,happiness and health) and metal casting (production and happiness). Before big cities are a pipe dream.

Of course we don't know if we need astronomy. I don't see any reason to build a city near the stone, fairly far from our capital, unless we want the stone to build the Pyramids. Half-priced Pyramids make sense if we are planning to work scientists and save money for upgrading to galleons.

Pyramids take a long time to build. In klarius City for example:
T5 Settler
T7 klarius City
T18 pop2 (or a bit sooner with farmed bananas)
T19 Monument done
T29 pop2
T34 fat cross
T42 pop3
T43 Stone quarried
30t @8:hammers:/turn = 240:hammers: + 135 :hammers: for 3 chops w/math
T73 Pyramids done = 460bc

Is that what we want?

Meanwhile, after settling Floodplain/Wheat City with 1 wkr:

T8 24f, fp1 farmed
T10 pop2
T16 pop3, fp2 farmed
T21 pop4>2 poprush granary
T25 pop3, fp3 farmed
T27 pop4
T29 pop5
T31 pop6 (could be 4 scientists already)
T33 pop7
T34 wheat farmed
etc.

I've updated post #4, please comment.

Gnejs' Plan, cont.
1. Exploration: Almost useless job of defogging up north. If we're not planning to build more warriors now in TImbuktu, maybe the N warrior should go SW W W and then loop back around to the NE and thoroughly defog that coastline all the way around to Timbuktu (2 turnsets)? Then the Timbuktu warrior could go E and do that area down to Hannibal? And build a warrior in London next and send him W?

2. Research: We have ~19turn of 100% research left. If we poprush another city, less. Then we'll drop to 70% or so.

3. Builds: The new city will also require its own axeman, so the current London build should be designated for that, not for Carthage or Alex? We're going to need 6 axes for 2 archers on an Athens hill. That won't happen in the next 20 turns, so maybe an axe/worker pair in London to road toward Alex makes more sense before building the axe stack? (unless our axe gets lucky and traps an Alex worker) EDIT: ~22wkr-turns saves our axes 3 turns...:crazyeye:

4. Settler: We need to find out if there's a good place to settle to the west. The floodplains down south would be a great settler pump (and then GP farm) and the Alex road is useful for that too (but not this settler yet). The first settler could be NW of London cattle, work the gold and make workboats?

Spent half the day in the local emergency ward. :( Erkon's hospitality sucks. ;) Enough said.

Will try to summarize my thoughts later today, as Erkon is very eager to see me play my turnset tonight.

Okay. I'm looking at the idea of Pyramids. If we beeline them and we want 4 GS's, we're talking 1500 GL points * 2:science: per GL point = 3000 :science: (w/o libraries). We need another 6400 :science: not including the 4 GS's for Astro, Optics, and Machinery. So the question is, how soon can we take advanage of the Pyramids? Do we want to have the capital farther north so we can chop it faster? ANd what do we want to research? Because we need CoL>Calendar to take FULL VALUE (;)) advantage of Representation. Why? We need health, not happiness. Representation gives us three happy faces, monuments one more, religion+temples two more. But we would also need Maths for the chops to make sense.

EDIT: In addition to Masonry, of course.
EDIT2: I can see 3 sites where we can work 6 scientists for 45:science: and Athens is probably another. So maybe the goals are some prioritized version of Capture Athens/Build pyramids/Spam 4+ pop10 cities asap. Cities are: Timbuktu, Rice/bananas/cattle SE of London, Floodplains/wheat further south. Hopefully, we'll find some more.

I think Timbuktu would be the best place to build the Pyramids. We could work three mines for 10 hammers per turn. In addition there are 6 forests in the fat cross that could give us 180 hammers (270 post-Math). As we need 375 hammer with stone it can be finished in 11(!) turns with Maths. That means that Timbuktu can basically produce settlers/workers until we have researched mathematics while we pre-chop all the forests.

How far away is Mathematics? Wheel-Writing-Masonry-Maths currently takes 5+10+5+24 turns, but then we would give up on the Oracle.


An alternative is to chop the Oracle in Timbuktu. In any case we would need a bunch of worker turns mining the hills and prechopping the forests there, so I think it makes sense to produce an additional worker in Timbuktu.


Potential tech paths:
Wheel-Pottery-Writing-Masonry-Mathematics
Wheel-Writing-Masonry-Mathematics
for the Pyramids

Priesthood-Wheel-Pottery-Writing
for the Oracle

Potential city sites:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/86920/Civ4ScreenShot0025.JPG

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The northern site can work rice+2 gold and is coastal. there could be a hidden seafood resource that would make this an exceptional city.

Next spot is 1 E of the stone. This site is on the river, can get 11 hammers per turn from stone+cow+grassland hill and has six forests for chopping.

Rice/banana/horse site gets us a strategic resource and can give us good production or even decent food if we farm some grassland. This city needs IW to be developed.

Fish/cow/gold is great for production/commerce.

Wheat/FP site has five 4 food tiles + ivory. We could run 6 scientists at size 11.

I haven't considered our original coastal gold since we probably need to scout the peninsula first.

Priesthood is 5 turns of dead-end research, while masonry+stone potentially also gets us the Great Wall and the Stonehenge if we can just get a couple of production cities up. I am therefore slightly in favour of the Pyramids track.

Besides, we will only be wonder-competing with the three unknown AIs since we will make sure that Alex and Hannibal won't be able to compete with us. :)

klarification of my view on this game

This game can be considered to consist of four phases:


Early exploration - find neighbor AI's and choke them to reduce threat
Expansion - settle a healthy chunk of cities which will constitute the majority of our production & research capability during the game
Race to Astronomy - employ scientists
Dominate or Conquer the world


We are currently in phase 1, and will soon enter phase 2.

Phase 2: the main focus in this phase is to settle as many (good) cities as possible, and prepare for Phase 3. Research in this phase is not important, and generating great people is also not important at all. Focus is production (workers, settlers, garisson, wonders). Working gold mines is very good, working cottages is not important. Both the Oracle and the Pyramids are suitable wonders to build. Target research: Calendar and Code of Laws.

Phase 3: this is when we employ scientists. All cities are built, calendar and Code of Laws are learned. We enter this phase when we switch to caste. Libraries can be build in key cities. The best effect is achieved if we run Caste System and Representation. To do this, we want a bunch of cities with lots of food. Example: the fourth GS costs 600 Great People Points (GPP). This takes 34 turns and generates 1224 beakers if 6 scientists are employed. It will probably take longer in reality. In this phase we research minor techs, such as construction, Iron Working etc to enable our production cities to prepare for the invasion, and building a bunch of galleys that can be upgraded. It will take a bit of planning to ensure we don't overshoot the necessary research, i.e. we need to start saving gold just in time to complete the final hand-researched tech. Potentially we can complete Feudalism with excess beakers, for quicker conquest/domination. Since we rely on specialists, and we don't need to research after this phase, we don't need need cottages. Target research: Optics for Caravelles, Astronomy for Galleons.

Phase 4: There are two strategies to win the game. Either we defeat all AI for conquest, or we spam cities to get land. Caste is more effective than Drama to get quick border expansion. I don't consider this phase to be very difficult, we just have to agree on the tactics :D

Ok, here is a pre-play plan for the next five (undisputed?) turns:

1. Research the Wheel
2. London works copper instead of Banana, delays growth but gives 5 more hammers per turn. Finish Axe (2t), build warrior (2t), start on another axe.
3. Timbuktu finishes warrior (1t), starts on worker (12t), chop goes into worker. After border expansion work both bananas+Rice and worker will be finished in 7 turns. Worker finishes chop in 2t, then does something else for 3t (prechops? farms nana?) Axe returns to Timbuktu, new warrior does some preliminary scouting to the E.
4. Explorers. Following LCs advice, Athens axe goes SW-SW then improvises, N warrior westwards to the coast then doubles back, Carthage axe goes to coastal hill then returns to the forest as klarius suggested.

Edit: Expect to play these 5 turns in ~4 hours from now...

I think the London worker shall complete the farm, then road the rice => jungle => jungle hill to connect to Timbuktu. This will take approx 16 turns. Roading the two tiles further SE take one turn less, but cost more turns to go back. Then the Timbuktu worker can road the rice and connect to the river in this time and London can grow without unhealth.

Are we going for domination or conquest? City spamming is usually done with domination towards the end of the game.

This was not the kind of city spamming I had in mind. What I meant was proper rapid expansion, not mindless land grabbing. Sorry for the vague writing.

Ok, team, we need to decide on the strategy for the upcoming turn set, and mine afterwards. What shall we do? Please voice your opinion!


Build the Oracle (if so, what tech shall we choose? MC?
Build the Pyramids
Expand like he11
Kill the infidels
Something else?
A combination of the above, please suggest.

2. London works copper instead of Banana, delays growth but gives 5 more hammers per turn. Finish Axe (2t), build warrior (2t), start on another axe.


Why not a barracks after the warrior will be built ?
I still hold as distinct posibility a rush to Alex or Hanibal in relatively short time.


Edit: Expect to play these 5 turns in ~4 hours from now...

Good luck !! And Happy New Year to everybody ! :)

One more remark :


We thus run specialist economy, and ignore cottages.

I found out ( from my experience ) that even when rely on specialists - the so-called SE-strategy - is still a good ideea to mix this with some cottages, at least on rivers grassland/floodplains ... :rolleyes:

Regards

...
Good luck !! And Happy New Year to everybody ! :) Thanks!!! The same :)
...
I found out ( from my experience ) that even when rely on specialists - the so-called SE-strategy - is still a good ideea to mix this with some cottages, at least on rivers grassland/floodplains ... :rolleyes:
...

Mîtiu, the experience you refer to, what kind of games was that? Long term it is essential to start cottaging before switching to Cottage Economy, to enable a smooth handover. My basic idea is that we will never switch to CE, apart from a small amount of gold generating cottages. So, yes, you are right, we probably need a couple of cottages, but I don't think we need as many as you normally need in a culture/space race game.

This was not the kind of city spamming I had in mind. What I meant was proper rapid expansion, not mindless land grabbing. Sorry for the vague writing.

Ok, team, we need to decide on the strategy for the upcoming turn set, and mine afterwards. What shall we do? Please voice your opinion!


Build the Oracle (if so, what tech shall we choose? MC?
Build the Pyramids
Expand like he11
Kill the infidels
Something else?
A combination of the above, please suggest.


My vote goes to:

Settle stone city
Build the pyramids
Suppress or even rush Alex/hannibal
Expand a lot
Pick up some of the other stone wonders (GW, SH) in our secondary cities
Maybe give the Oracle a shot if it is still unbuilt when we have achieved our most important objectives.

klarification of my view on this gameThis appears to leave out the critical: Explore to make sure we need Astronomy.Ok, here is a pre-play plan for the next five (undisputed?) turns:

1. Research the Wheel
2. London works copper instead of Banana, delays growth but gives 5 more hammers per turn. Finish Axe (2t), build warrior (2t), start on another axe.
3. Timbuktu finishes warrior (1t), starts on worker (12t), chop goes into worker. After border expansion work both bananas+Rice and worker will be finished in 7 turns. Worker finishes chop in 2t, then does something else for 3t (prechops? farms nana?) Axe returns to Timbuktu, new warrior does some preliminary scouting to the E.
4. Explorers. Following LCs advice, Athens axe goes SW-SW then improvises, N warrior westwards to the coast then doubles back, Carthage axe goes to coastal hill then returns to the forest as klarius suggested.

Edit: Expect to play these 5 turns in ~4 hours from now...On London: Imo, only work copper as many turns as you gain a turns on the first axe and a warrior, at most, then focus on growing to pop4.

On Timbuktu worker build: klarius is pretty enthusiastic about the settler. Do we want to delay it? I think for stone wonders, it's better not to delay too long. Anyone figure out how soon we get the settler going worker>settler?

Mîtiu, the experience you refer to, what kind of games was that? Long term it is essential to start cottaging before switching to Cottage Economy, to enable a smooth handover. My basic idea is that we will never switch to CE, apart from a small amount of gold generating cottages. So, yes, you are right, we probably need a couple of cottages, but I don't think we need as many as you normally need in a culture/space race game.

Agree on this. Mitiu, if we think the game will be finished before Printing Press/Liberalism then developing cottages doesn't make much sense. We will be looking at 4 commerce (5 on a river) as the max output compared to 6 beakers from a scientist. There is a difference of two food of course but on the other hand the cottage doesn't reach its max output until very late, so the accumulated output of a Representation scientist is very much superior in the early-mid game.

On the other hand, if we are aiming for a later victory then Free Speech and Printing Press adds another 3 commerce to the fully developed cottage. Then it is very nice to have a bunch of these as we get a huge boost from these techs/civics.

Build the Oracle (if so, what tech shall we choose? MC?
Build the Pyramids
Expand like he11
Kill the infidels
Something else?
A combination of the above, please suggest.
My vote goes to:

Settle stone city
Build the pyramids
Suppress or even rush Alex/hannibal
Expand a lot
Pick up some of the other stone wonders (GW, SH) in our secondary cities
Maybe give the Oracle a shot if it is still unbuilt when we have achieved our most important objectives.
I think thereare some logical combinations:
Combination 1: Only inhibiting Alex and Hannibal combines well with stone wonders and/or REXing.
Combination 2: Oracle in London or Timbuktu combines well with Pyramids in Stone City (We need to hurry for Oracle).
Combination 3: Axe-rushing Alex from London combines well with somewhat continued 100% research, Oracle in Timbuktu and Pyramids in Stone City
COmbination 4: Axe-rushing Alex from London combines well with somewhat continued 100% research, pyramids in stone city and REXing from Timbuktu.

Why not a barracks after the warrior will be built ?
I still hold as distinct posibility a rush to Alex or Hanibal in relatively short time.



Let's keep this possibility open. The barracks costs about 1.5 axes in production. If we assume that it increases the strength of our axes by 15% we reach break-even after building ten 3XP axes. So it all depends on how many axes we think we need for a rush. Les than 10 and barracks might be a waste, more than ten (not likely in my opinion) and barracks will be a good idea.

We will know better once we find Alex and see what we are up against.

I think Mitiu is just saying it doesn't hurt to also have some cottages and he's right, especially since we're going to have a bunch of maintenance with our cities spread out so much. Inaddition to our gold mines.

I think Mitiu is just saying it doesn't hurt to also have some cottages and he's right, especially since we're going to have a bunch of maintenance with our cities spread out so much. Inaddition to our gold mines.

Yeah, but we could potentially work 5 gold mines which should pay most if not all of that maintenance.
Besides, once we get calendar there are a bunch of dyes that can be developed for another instant commerce boost.

I think if we properly farm our AIs for settlers (don't rush them and don't stay in their danger zone), we don't have to build any workers. It just takes a bit time.
That's why I like to plop down a city now which doesn't need a lot worker attention and can grow w/o border expansion. Either west of Timbuktu to take advantage of the expansion there, or the coastal gold hill and not even bothering about the farm (which means it could as well be banana-gold instead of rice gold). Just mine the gold and let the city work gold and unimproved food tile while it builds work boats.

slow server duplicate

I think if we properly farm our AIs for settlers (don't rush them and don't stay in their danger zone), we don't have to build any workers. It just takes a bit time. We'll need an axe N-NE of Carthage for this. We don't need to decide on Alex yet, but if we're not going to do a rush, then we might as well build the gold settler in London after we build the warrior and a couple more axes.That's why I like to plop down a city now which doesn't need a lot worker attention and can grow w/o border expansion. Either west of Timbuktu to take advantage of the expansion there, or the coastal gold hill and not even bothering about the farm (which means it could as well be banana-gold instead of rice gold). Just mine the gold and let the city work gold and unimproved food tile while it builds work boats.Well, getting our third city now would be awesome, since we've been warmongering rather than REXing. If we build Stone City, we keep that option open, but it will need an axe defender. If we go Gold, I say do the rice and farm it. It can also share cattle with London. This also helps with our Astro question.

In any case, Stone city either needs the bananas or the N rice, imo. Foodless cities svk.

I think Mitiu is just saying it doesn't hurt to also have some cottages and he's right, especially since we're going to have a bunch of maintenance with our cities spread out so much. Inaddition to our gold mines.

Exactely - having such a "extremist" statement as "no-cottage, only specialists" is something which I didn't felt appropriate. :)


If we assume that it increases the strength of our axes by 15% we reach break-even after building ten 3XP axes. So it all depends on how many axes we think we need for a rush.

Don't forget in you calculus that the second promotion for our axes will be at 4XP - that mean after getting only 1 XP point ( from killing an animal or a barb warrior on way to the AIs land ) ... ;)


I think if we properly farm our AIs for settlers (don't rush them and don't stay in their danger zone), we don't have to build any workers.

Very good observation !

Mitiu, I have to tell you this. You're epxloration in the North with the warrior was really not very effective for our current goals. You left a fog-bank in the NE.

We don't know if ALex is in that fog bank.
We don't know if there's seafood N of the gold, which means we don't know if we can spare that rice for the Stone City.
We haven't defogged the coastline so that we can connect our cities with Sailing.

In 2 turnsets, yours and Gnejs, we probably could have defogged the entire North. Now we will need a whole extra turnset. What's done is done, but it's important you learn from this.

By the way, the way you explored was not wrong. It just served different goals, such as exploring inland for REXing or something. In some games that might be important, but not so much in this one, at this point in the game.

Mitiu, I have to tell you this. You're epxloration in the North with the warrior was really not very effective for our current goals. You left a fog-bank in the NE.

We don't know if ALex is in that fog bank.
We don't know if there's seafood N of the gold, which means we don't know if we can spare that rice for the Stone City.
We haven't defogged the coastline so that we can connect our cities with Sailing.


Except the last aspect ( IMHO Sailing will be a little be long-away - and the two cities will be connected via roads before ) I accept and admit your critics. :(


By the way, the way you explored was not wrong. It just served different goals, such as exploring inland for REXing or something. In some games that might be important, but not so much in this one, at this point in the game.

Correct. Somehow I was tented to belive that Alex could be near the 2-gold location considering the fact that this is a manually-edited map. But I was wrong from the begining in this assumption as it will be too close to Mansa initial location ... :sad:

Don't forget in you calculus that the second promotion for our axes will be at 4XP - that mean after getting only 1 XP point ( from killing an animal or a barb warrior on way to the AIs land ) ... ;)


Your are correct. But even if we assume 25-30% strength bonus from the barracks it is still not a sure decision. 25% would mean break even after 6 promoted axes (7.5 unpromoted ones). I would assume 6 unpromoted to have a good possibility to capture Athens together with one or two of the ones we have already built.

I would assume 6 unpromoted to have a good possibility to capture Athens together with one or two of the ones we have already built.

I hope so - but a barracks could increase significantly the number of axemans at our disposal after we will rush Alex - and which could be turn against Hannibal. :rolleyes:

Didn't matter - it was just a suggestion, proceed as you feel apropriate !

Good luck. :)

Gnejs is starting his turn set now and will play 5-ish turns. He claims that he is considering all advice from you, although I doubt he is able to do that due to his excessive intake of beer, wine and medicines. He is probably violating all my directives, and thus I have to spank him in FIFA06 later! :lol: Lord, please don't let him screw up.... :please:

klarius, how will Alex react if we kill his scout? Will he change into some kind of unit-building-panic-mode? Or will he just ignore the loss? Will he replace the scout?

Erkon is afraid to kill a scout with an axeman? puh puh puh baaaahh ;)

Mîtiu, I think your advice is valid. We're just trying to find the optimum play forward. I withdraw my "no cottage" statement and replace it with "a couple of cottages", alright? Ok, here we go...

Erkon is afraid to kill a scout with an axeman? puh puh puh baaaahh ;)

SHUT UP! I'm not afraid! I'm not a chicken!!!! :aargh: :aargh: :aargh: :aargh: :aargh: :aargh: :aargh: :aargh:

It's actually Gnejs who is worried that Alex enters some kind of strange military mode instead of building us workers.







I am not afraid :mad:

I've updated post #4, please comment.Thanks. Nice effect on crossing out Mansa... :cool:

(Masonry is also required for Construction, right?)

Gnejs turn report:

2110 BC - turn 64 (turn set turn 0)

Move London axe 1S. Hanibal scout will not see us, so hopefully he will move into the rice (sweet kill).

Alex scout dies.

London works Copper instead of Banana.

Worker completes Dye-farm.

2080 BC - turn 65 (turn set turn 1)

Kill Hanibal scout that moved onto the gold mine, earned 1XP (also 1 General Point :D)

Timbuktu: warrior complete, start worker. The idea with this is that there is lots of improvements to do. Delaying the settler 7 turns costs us 14 :food: and 7 :hammers: in stone city. This will be compensated with the worker doing activites while we build the settler (roading, farming the banana or pre-chopping monument), and the cow can be pastured at once.

Alex seams to have started working a gold mine.

General scouting: there is an island east of Carthago that requires a cultural bridge to reach. Hint hint.

2050 BC - turn 66 (turn set turn 2)

Barb warrior show up north of Timbuktu. Border expansion. Chop => worker in 6 turns.

General scouting:
ALEX FOUND!!!!
South of London. :cool:
EDIT: Athens has two archers, and can be attacked without crossing river. Shall we rush?
Carthago has warrior, archer and worker. How can we steal it?

EDIT: after graph glaring, we deduct that the worker was completed this turn, and Hannibal switched tiles since there was a 2 :commerce: drop without increase in hpt or fpt.

2020 BC - turn 67 (turn set turn 3)

Athens is located on STONE-PLAINS-HILL! Comment by Erkon: my god, didn't someone predict this????
Athens has 6 coastal tiles, 1 of them clams (improved) and one gold-river-hill. Note to self: must pillage gold...

London works copper, gold and cow. It is possible to grow faster. This will cost us 20 :hammers: and gain us 1 fpt. Boo!!!

Timbuktu worker mines hills S-SW of city.

1990 BC - turn 68 (turn set turn 4)

Carthago warrior moves into klarius-forest and detects another Greek city! This leads us to believe that Hannibal has one more city as well, since he is leading in score.

1960 BC - turn 69 (turn set turn 5)

Wheel completed. Current plan: Timbuktu worker mines hill, completes worker, then builds settler. London worker roads rice (will have protection from garison axe before moving into NE jungle and will eventually connect London to Timbuktu river. West warrior scouts west. East warrior scouts east. Hannibal warrior goes back towards Carthago. Athens axe pillage gold.

Revealed tile count for continent = 361 tiles. Estimated tile count of continent > 460 :confused:

We have arrived at a crossroads. Please advice.

Shall we send axes to Hannibal and take his city/cities? (London builds axes)
Shall we send axes to Alexander and take his cities? (London builds axes)
Or shall we build the Oracle in London? (Muahahaha, only jesusin is mad enough to suggest this, right? :lol:)
What shall we research? Pottery or Priesthood?

Save uploaded.

Alex is dead meat.

Save uploaded. Thanks for the help with the blow by blow account, Erkon!:goodjob:

Session log:
Here is your Session Turn Log from 2110 BC to 1960 BC:

Turn 63, 2110 BC: Churchill's Axeman (5.50) vs Alexander's Scout (1.60)
Turn 63, 2110 BC: Combat Odds: 100.0%
Turn 63, 2110 BC: (Extra Combat: -10%)
Turn 63, 2110 BC: (Extra Combat: +10%)
Turn 63, 2110 BC: (Plot Defense: +50%)
Turn 63, 2110 BC: Alexander's Scout is hit for 35 (65/100HP)
Turn 63, 2110 BC: Churchill's Axeman is hit for 11 (89/100HP)
Turn 63, 2110 BC: Alexander's Scout is hit for 35 (30/100HP)
Turn 63, 2110 BC: Alexander's Scout is hit for 35 (0/100HP)
Turn 63, 2110 BC: Churchill's Axeman has defeated Alexander's Scout!
Turn 63, 2110 BC: You have trained a Warrior in Timbuktu. Work has now begun on a Barracks.

Turn 64, 2080 BC: Churchill's Axeman (5.00) vs Hannibal's Scout (1.35)
Turn 64, 2080 BC: Combat Odds: 100.0%
Turn 64, 2080 BC: (Extra Combat: +10%)
Turn 64, 2080 BC: (Plot Defense: +25%)
Turn 64, 2080 BC: Hannibal's Scout is hit for 36 (64/100HP)
Turn 64, 2080 BC: Churchill's Axeman is hit for 11 (89/100HP)
Turn 64, 2080 BC: Churchill's Axeman is hit for 11 (78/100HP)
Turn 64, 2080 BC: Hannibal's Scout is hit for 36 (28/100HP)
Turn 64, 2080 BC: Hannibal's Scout is hit for 36 (0/100HP)
Turn 64, 2080 BC: Churchill's Axeman has defeated Hannibal's Scout!
Turn 64, 2080 BC: The borders of Timbuktu have expanded!

Turn 67, 1990 BC: You have discovered The Wheel!




Autolog:
While defending in the wild near Timbuktu, Axeman defeats (4.45/5): Greek Scout (Prob Victory: 0.0%)
Timbuktu finishes: Warrior
While defending in English territory near London, Axeman defeats (3.90/5): Carthaginian Scout (Prob Victory: 0.0%)
Timbuktu begins: Worker (12 turns)
Warrior promoted: Combat I
London finishes: Axeman
Timbuktu's borders expand
London begins: Warrior (2 turns)
A Farm was built near London
London finishes: Warrior
London begins: Axeman (5 turns)
Tech learned: The Wheel
Research begun: Pottery (5 Turns)

Fantastic! Looks like we have successfully stifled Alex and Hannibal. Onward!

We could easily ambush any settlers coming out of Athens. On the other hand, Athens could serve as stone city for us. Carthage is worthless. In fact, the whole northern hemisphere is pretty useless.

I think we should spam some high-value cities, mostly to the south. For instance:

5 floodplains/gold mine (settler/wkr pump and later GP farm deluxe)
gold/rice (and/or something better to the W)
fish/cattle city could produce galleys and give us +1:health:
Rice/horses SE of London
2Fish City to the N if we want more galleys or for one of the GS's
Dyes City after IW
By settling S asap, (maybe FP City quickly), we'll also have a production capacity to take out Alex and Hannibal as desired. We could spam a settler or 2 from London and use Timbuktu for Oracle and/or Pyramids.

Fantastic!

I love it. 5 turns worth of effort and I get this praise. ;)

Off to spank Erkon in whatever we chose to compete in... :lol:

Behold! My scouting scheme, known as the GREAT CROSS would have revealed all river tiles between London and Timbuktu AND detected both AI. All hails to me! Ok, let's play deity-co-op with Gnejs together with another beer...

Great news - congratulations ! :)

Even if a little bit disapointing that both Alex and Haniball have 2 cities.
I have some preliminary doubts/questions like :

- how much will cost us maintenance of Athens if we will succesfully rush it ?
- could we effectively harrash both Alex & Hannibal with existing ( limited numbers ) of axemans at disposal ? I don't belive so but ...:rolleyes:

Regards

A rush of Athens looks very attractive. London builds an axe every 4 turns. We connect Timbuktu, do a 2-pop whip and chop two forests for 150 hammers = 3 axes. In 16 turns we will have 7 more axes to go with the 2 free ones we already have. Kill 'em all! :aargh: :aargh: :aargh:

Welcome to the

1st Annual Murky Waters BC Astro Challenge

The rules of the challenge ar easy: Starting from right now, devise a plan to complete Astronomy before 1 AD (98 turns). Are you up to the challenge?

LC accepts the challenge. Here is his BC Astro Challenge Plan.

Using the CoL-Oracle-Slingshot-Pyramids Gambit:

Research Preisthood>(Pottery, if possible)>Writing>Masonry

London: Switch from copper to bananas. Send next axe to Stone City location. Build Oracle when Priesthoood done. Worker roads to connect TImbuktu, then chops N forest into Oracle. After Oracle, London poprushes Floodplains City, then builds axes to rush Athens.

Timbuktu: Finishes wkr, then chops/poprushes Stone City settler, then axe>worker>axes. Worker mines hill then roads to connect river. New worker chops forest. Then workers maybe build other mine or road to Stone City or whatever (haven't looked at that yet). 3rd worker chops/poprushes library when appropriate, so 1st GS born before T64.

Stone City: Starts building Pyramids asap. Wkrs road to stone in advance, quarry stone as soon as Confuciansim-border expansion allows. Along with 3rd worker, pre-chop (or just chop if Math too slow) 6-10 forests.

Floodplain City: Worker from London improves 3 fp tiles with farms, then chops for granary. Poprush granary at pop4. Improve 4th and 5th fps. Builds monument if necessary for 10th :). Grow to pop10.

~T50 Pyramids done, Athens captured
T64 Floodplain City starts working 6 scientists. Athens and Timbuktu also working scientists, timed to finish 2nd and 3rd GS before FP City gets to 300/450 GS pts.
T98: Gnejs, in his next turnset, completes Astronomy.

Or shall we build the Oracle in London? (Muahahaha, only jesusin is mad enough to suggest this, right? :lol:)


It wasn't me who suggested going for Hinduism. I don't think a silly religion is important enough to compensate for the lost research. Going for Oracle and taking a religion while doing so could have more sense.

In general, I miss consistency in our game (no wonder, since it is a SG): first we prefer hammers over food, then we realise we could grow faster if we emphasize food, then we realise we could have more chances at a religion if we emphasize gold...


General scouting: there is an island east of Carthago that requires a cultural bridge to reach. Hint hint.


I say take Carthago now, pop its borders and build a WB there to see where that island leads to.

1990 BC - turn 68 (turn set turn 4)

Carthago warrior moves into klarius-forest and detects another Greek city! This leads us to believe that Hannibal has one more city as well, since he is leading in score.


This is AW. 2 civs in our continent have 2 cities. This is AW. They could be connecting copper right now. This is AW. Let's keep on exploring and let's take some of their cities.


EDIT: LC challenge version 2.0: Let's win this game without Astronomy!

In general, I miss consistency in our game You mirror my thoughts.

EDIT2: Actually, my Astro plan is very carefully thought out to integrate what we have done so far, where we are at now, what we need to do, and the layout of our continent. No, we don't know if we need Astro. The only thing my plan does not do is get us workboats fast. My plan sets us up well for nice production if we don't need Astro. FP City can quickly spam a few more cities and we go to town. I'm open to any other plan, but I would, like you, like to see something consistent. Beelining Poly just to pop borders faster was, imo, a big lost opportunity (see my post somewhere above). But we are where we are now, so what's the Plan?

EDIT3: There are alternatives. London: Axe rush. Timbuktu: wkr>Oracle. Athens: Pyramids. This is safer in terms of not needing Astronomy. The reason, I chose the first was that it gives us the 3 grown cities for the 4 GS's without a mixed gene pool.

This is AW. 2 civs in our continent have 2 cities. This is AW. They could be connecting copper right now. This is AW. Let's keep on exploring and let's take some of their cities.

EDIT: LC challenge version 2.0: Let's win this game without Astronomy!If this game does not require Astronomy, I'll be very disappointed in Gyathaar. What makes it interesting, as AW, is having those other 3 AIs develop a lot before we can meet them. Otherwise, it's just child's play.

EDIT: Even if we don't need Astronomy, we'll need galleys, so my above solution doesn't take us far off the path and gives us turbo research to Sailing, Construction, IW and MC, if that's all we want. THis map is not good for fast, early research even with all those gold mines, because they're so spread out.

LC accepts the challenge. Here is his BC Astro Challenge Plan. <snip>


LC, this is a beatiful plan! :bowdown:

It might even work :eek: Erkon and I spent some time this afternoon going through the requirements on beakers and Great People Points, and we didn't find any obvious flaws.

I love how it makes all our research choices so far appear to be parts of a coherent strategy instead of the random and haphazard process that it really is... :lol:


Some quick questions:
1. How many axes do we produce for Athens and when are they ready to strike?
2. When and how many scientists do we need to run in other cities than Floodplain city in order to pop GS #2 and #3?
3. What about of skipping the Pyramids and settling a couple of more cities using those chops instead, like the northern 2 gold city or the 2 fish city.

There are three possibilities:
1. We need Astronomy
2. We need one or more culture bridges to cross the oceans
3. We can "island hop" over to another continent (not likely, IMHO).

Going directly for Astronomy keeps us in the race in scenario 1, may or may not mean a delay in scenario 2 (depends on how many culture bridges are needed and how soon they can be settled etc), and is probably a poor choice in scenario 3 unless Gyathaar is in a really evil mode. (Imagine an island chain snaking its way 50 tiles before striking land...)

Galleons are also twice as fast (even more with the circumnavigation bonus that we probably won't get with galleys) and can travel the most direct route. I think Astronomy in the BCs can really make this a competitive strategy in all scenarios.

I think Astronomy in the BCs can really make this a competitive strategy in all scenarios.I was kind of thinking the same thing.

LC, this is a beatiful plan! :bowdown:

It might even work :eek: Erkon and I spent some time this afternoon going through the requirements on beakers and Great People Points, and we didn't find any obvious flaws.


Only AIs activity could alter it probably ... :rolleyes:

about
1. How many axes do we produce for Athens and when are they ready to strike?
2. When and how many scientists do we need to run in other cities than Floodplain city in order to pop GS #2 and #3?
3. What about of skipping the Pyramids and settling a couple of more cities using those chops instead, like the northern 2 gold city or the 2 fish city.If 4 scientists in each of 3 cities, they all start on T48 and finish on T73, T86, T98.
5 scientists: Starting on T58, finishing on T78, T88, T98.
6 scientists: Starting on T64, finishing on T81, T89, T98.
Since they probably wouldn't all have the same number, we'd have to MM carefully to avoid a screw-up. However...

I ran into a major hang-up: How do we produce our flotilla and attack stacks during those turns? Maybe it would work between Stone City and London from T50-100, I don't know. But basically we're short one city--a settler pump. Now I'm thinking that Gyathaar put Flood Plains City in between Alex, Hannibal and us as a free-for-all. First one there gets the settler pump. We need to settle it asap,