srad
King
Worker, wb, finsh worker or when did you built the worker?
SGOTM 13 - Plastic Ducks
- Thread starter AlanH
- Start date
checking in
i´m against settling in place btw. on the corn or the brown hill. something to consider too: settling on the hill we will loose a forest we could need for chopping. in total, settling on the corn will give us 5 hammers 3 food (including the hill) and 30 hammers from chopping, so a total of 8 a turn (9 for 30 turns). settling the hill will give us 7 food and 3 hammers, so a total of 10 a turn, but we will be very short on production forever in the capital loosing the hill...
first turnset should be:
warrior should move on the hill to see a bit more... ...then we should decide where to settle
and i´m rel. confident that it should be possible to get settler + galley out around turn 60 with proper planning if settling the hill
and i´m also against going for the oracle (right away), cause it will move us off from the needed techplan very, very far and will slow our beginning really down...
...
did a short test, settling on the hill, growing as big as possible (5 i think it was) and whipping 3 times with the goal of always working the 2 clams + corn for commerce and growth:
in turn 61, we have 3 wbs (1 for scouting / next city, 2 for capital), 1 settler, 1 worker, 1 galley + innitial warrior
techpath:
fishing, mining, bronze (whipping) sailing.
we might experiment with the techpath a little, maybe sailing before bronze is better, and with the build/whip-order. also, we should test this with the other 2 settling locations (on corn and in place)
next settler in turn 73 with above settings. maybe it might be worth getting a lighthouse befor the second settler (then next settler comes turn 76), simply for faster regrowing rate and cause its cheap...
squeezing a turn or 2 out for the first oversea city might be worth the try...
edith adds:
it might also be worth to consider the option of whipping ov right after the first settler + lighthouse into the moai, simply because early moai would really help with our capital (goal might be a colossus/moai super-capital with monarchy for happy (health might be an issue)... ...if we have bronze, we really might consider this, crazy as it sounds...
i´m against settling in place btw. on the corn or the brown hill. something to consider too: settling on the hill we will loose a forest we could need for chopping. in total, settling on the corn will give us 5 hammers 3 food (including the hill) and 30 hammers from chopping, so a total of 8 a turn (9 for 30 turns). settling the hill will give us 7 food and 3 hammers, so a total of 10 a turn, but we will be very short on production forever in the capital loosing the hill...
first turnset should be:
warrior should move on the hill to see a bit more... ...then we should decide where to settle
and i´m rel. confident that it should be possible to get settler + galley out around turn 60 with proper planning if settling the hill
and i´m also against going for the oracle (right away), cause it will move us off from the needed techplan very, very far and will slow our beginning really down...
...
did a short test, settling on the hill, growing as big as possible (5 i think it was) and whipping 3 times with the goal of always working the 2 clams + corn for commerce and growth:
in turn 61, we have 3 wbs (1 for scouting / next city, 2 for capital), 1 settler, 1 worker, 1 galley + innitial warrior
techpath:
fishing, mining, bronze (whipping) sailing.
we might experiment with the techpath a little, maybe sailing before bronze is better, and with the build/whip-order. also, we should test this with the other 2 settling locations (on corn and in place)
next settler in turn 73 with above settings. maybe it might be worth getting a lighthouse befor the second settler (then next settler comes turn 76), simply for faster regrowing rate and cause its cheap...
squeezing a turn or 2 out for the first oversea city might be worth the try...
edith adds:
it might also be worth to consider the option of whipping ov right after the first settler + lighthouse into the moai, simply because early moai would really help with our capital (goal might be a colossus/moai super-capital with monarchy for happy (health might be an issue)... ...if we have bronze, we really might consider this, crazy as it sounds...
@Snaaty
Your testing seems to reflect mine. It does seem that following cities will come out faster but I didn't test extensively enough to figure out when to grow the capital (I left it at size 2 for too long).
I'd like to see where a size-3 settler approach vs PH approach will compare after maybe 80 turns.
Of course, if moving the warrior reveals no seafood, then settling the PH seems almost like the only choice.
The red tiles will be revealed. The green X is the only tile where seafood could be present which we would be unable to use by settling the PH until a 2nd city is up (compared to SIP and settling a 2nd city 3E). Keep in mind that any seafood in the second ring for the city 3E will need a border pop to be used (Mysticism+45H+15 turns)... there are 3 such tiles.
OTOH, I'd wager there's copper/iron really nearby, possibly the GH 2W of the settler (to make up for the lack of production for the people that do SIP). We can settle a city there regardless and have less overlap and easier access to the resource if there is indeed one.
The forest is 30H, which equals 30 turns of settling the PH... obviously not an issue.
Lastly, there is the possibility of copper/iron 3E of the settler, meaning the PH would be even better for settling.
Your testing seems to reflect mine. It does seem that following cities will come out faster but I didn't test extensively enough to figure out when to grow the capital (I left it at size 2 for too long).
I'd like to see where a size-3 settler approach vs PH approach will compare after maybe 80 turns.
Of course, if moving the warrior reveals no seafood, then settling the PH seems almost like the only choice.
The red tiles will be revealed. The green X is the only tile where seafood could be present which we would be unable to use by settling the PH until a 2nd city is up (compared to SIP and settling a 2nd city 3E). Keep in mind that any seafood in the second ring for the city 3E will need a border pop to be used (Mysticism+45H+15 turns)... there are 3 such tiles.
OTOH, I'd wager there's copper/iron really nearby, possibly the GH 2W of the settler (to make up for the lack of production for the people that do SIP). We can settle a city there regardless and have less overlap and easier access to the resource if there is indeed one.
The forest is 30H, which equals 30 turns of settling the PH... obviously not an issue.
Lastly, there is the possibility of copper/iron 3E of the settler, meaning the PH would be even better for settling.
BornInCantaloup
Agent of Chaos
Hi guys !
I have a little free time right now so I can join the discussion. I'll be "fully" available from monday. At least, I won't be moving between friends' places.
1- Moving the warrior, then uploading the save : agreed.
2- SIP :
An opening we could test is :
- Set research to Fishing ;
- Start Barracks, work the corn ;
- When Fishing is done, maximize hammers and complete the workboat at size 2.
It would delay the worker but grant us a faster workboat, hence better commerce to research through Bronze Working and Sailing.
3- PH : Seems much easier to find a satisfying micro. In that case, Sailing > BW, I guess, since we wouldn't have much to overflow into without Sailing.
4- Early Moai Statues in the capital : I find the idea very attractive. 250 hammers is a lot, though (or is it more ? I've seen references to Epic speed... I'll check). Stone would help.
The map probably isn't an exact reconstruction of the European continent but, for reference :
I have a little free time right now so I can join the discussion. I'll be "fully" available from monday. At least, I won't be moving between friends' places.
1- Moving the warrior, then uploading the save : agreed.
2- SIP :
An opening we could test is :
- Set research to Fishing ;
- Start Barracks, work the corn ;
- When Fishing is done, maximize hammers and complete the workboat at size 2.
It would delay the worker but grant us a faster workboat, hence better commerce to research through Bronze Working and Sailing.
3- PH : Seems much easier to find a satisfying micro. In that case, Sailing > BW, I guess, since we wouldn't have much to overflow into without Sailing.
4- Early Moai Statues in the capital : I find the idea very attractive. 250 hammers is a lot, though (or is it more ? I've seen references to Epic speed... I'll check). Stone would help.
The map probably isn't an exact reconstruction of the European continent but, for reference :
Spoiler :
Moai:
Yup, Epic speed -> 375H without Stone is a major bummer.
I have a feeling the wb first approach doesn't give that much more commerce but I'm talking through my hat here.
While we're around Elba, maybe we should look for the island of Montecristo, uh ?
Yup, Epic speed -> 375H without Stone is a major bummer.
I have a feeling the wb first approach doesn't give that much more commerce but I'm talking through my hat here.
While we're around Elba, maybe we should look for the island of Montecristo, uh ?
madviking
north american scum
I think Capt. Yossarian would be happy if find Pianosa (which, irl, isn't big enough for an airbase).
Checking in - a little later than everyone else. Sorry about that as I was away from my computer for the most part during the long weekend.
Anyway, looks like we have some pretty sound thoughts already about the start. Here's another vote for moving the warrior on the hill first. I'm not sure I'm seeing any scenarios where SIP would be preferable to the plains hill. Production seems like our biggest concern with the islands, and the extra hammer right off the bat will be useful. Would be great if we picked up a hill from the move, but looks unlikely.
Even if the green X is seafood, we'd still have an opportunity to settle the other nearby landmass to claim it, so it wouldn't be completely lost. Clearly we're going to be looking for food and trade routes to fuel the economy. If we have copper, colossus becomes extremely appealing, because we're going to be working a lot of sea tiles in this game. Unfortunately, we're also going to want to prioritize Astro, which is why island games always frustrate me - you want colossus for the commerce, but you want to obsolete it as early as possible for many other reasons.
Having said all that, colossus plus ORG should allow for us to expand like crazy - if we could pull off colossus/Moai after at least getting a couple settlers out, we could then use the capital to rex out settlers everywhere.
I assume we're thinking fishing/mining to start? BW and Sailing next is my guess - not sure yet what order, and i guess it's situational from there.
Anyway, looks like we have some pretty sound thoughts already about the start. Here's another vote for moving the warrior on the hill first. I'm not sure I'm seeing any scenarios where SIP would be preferable to the plains hill. Production seems like our biggest concern with the islands, and the extra hammer right off the bat will be useful. Would be great if we picked up a hill from the move, but looks unlikely.
Even if the green X is seafood, we'd still have an opportunity to settle the other nearby landmass to claim it, so it wouldn't be completely lost. Clearly we're going to be looking for food and trade routes to fuel the economy. If we have copper, colossus becomes extremely appealing, because we're going to be working a lot of sea tiles in this game. Unfortunately, we're also going to want to prioritize Astro, which is why island games always frustrate me - you want colossus for the commerce, but you want to obsolete it as early as possible for many other reasons.
Having said all that, colossus plus ORG should allow for us to expand like crazy - if we could pull off colossus/Moai after at least getting a couple settlers out, we could then use the capital to rex out settlers everywhere.
I assume we're thinking fishing/mining to start? BW and Sailing next is my guess - not sure yet what order, and i guess it's situational from there.
concerning moai:
if we decide to build it, we wouldnt really build it but overflow whip settlers + workers into it. that would delay every settler/worker by 3 turns (2 turns more building it, 1 turn of ov into moai) and give around 43 hammers for moai for each settler or worker (41 ov + 2 production in my test)
so after a total of 8 workers and settlers, we should have moai up (best is using only workers and settlers for ov whipping, cause you can convert food into production that way. whipping other building we can do also, but there it doesnt make sense waiting for max ov cause we could as well put the hammers directly into moai)
edith did a short test with settling in place:
turn 67 is the best i could do with settler + galley combo, so now favour the brown hill even more... ...after digging a little more into the ov whipping of moai: we could have it up and running around turn 140 (500 BC), using ov to build it
if we decide to build it, we wouldnt really build it but overflow whip settlers + workers into it. that would delay every settler/worker by 3 turns (2 turns more building it, 1 turn of ov into moai) and give around 43 hammers for moai for each settler or worker (41 ov + 2 production in my test)
so after a total of 8 workers and settlers, we should have moai up (best is using only workers and settlers for ov whipping, cause you can convert food into production that way. whipping other building we can do also, but there it doesnt make sense waiting for max ov cause we could as well put the hammers directly into moai)
edith did a short test with settling in place:
turn 67 is the best i could do with settler + galley combo, so now favour the brown hill even more... ...after digging a little more into the ov whipping of moai: we could have it up and running around turn 140 (500 BC), using ov to build it
My guess is that ~1000AD victory is desirable, stronger units come late and are expensive to gather in time. Moreover, we need to transport units to oversea so that mount units' major advantage is greatly decreased.
If Astro is needed, then we need to produce 4~5 GSs for academy, 1 for Phi, 1 for Optics and 2 for Astro. A Golden age is significant. Music is also necessary for faster border pop after conquering new cities.
@kossin
Good tests. I'm in short of time this week. Will run some tests after getting the real save to reveal more tiles after moving the warrior. Could you do the comparison based on the overall food, hammer and beaker yield of all cities after playing to ~1500BC? also including the Oracle date, which is a critical factor for the opening. I'm not optimistic about the the Oracle this time. The AI getting GLH could be a big menace, also ourselves don't have good commercial tile to start. GS producion is the key to drive our research in this game, again if Astro is needed, we need a careful plan for them. IIRC the semi-isolated game dingding played was a good reference to do so.
Good tests. I'm in short of time this week. Will run some tests after getting the real save to reveal more tiles after moving the warrior. Could you do the comparison based on the overall food, hammer and beaker yield of all cities after playing to ~1500BC? also including the Oracle date, which is a critical factor for the opening. I'm not optimistic about the the Oracle this time. The AI getting GLH could be a big menace, also ourselves don't have good commercial tile to start. GS producion is the key to drive our research in this game, again if Astro is needed, we need a careful plan for them. IIRC the semi-isolated game dingding played was a good reference to do so.
Great Scientist - bulbing preferences to Astro
If we skip Civil Service (after all, we don't have a strong capital location atm), we can bulb Astronomy pretty early. Unfortunately it's pretty hard to say if it is required unless we send a wb or three out really fast.
However, to me it is pretty certain that we have access to at least a few AIs so we really don't have to rush to Astro right ahead - but we should be farming GS in preparation for it.
For domination, it will be faster to completely wipe off AIs so even if there are overseas AIs (GLH dude?), we still have a continent or two to clean up before needing Astro.
@Snaaty
re Moai: if we find lucky stone, I'd say overflowing into the Moai is certain. However, without stone, as you noted, each following city is delayed 3 turns...
1st city...3 turns
2nd city...6 turns
3rd city...9 turns
It quickly escalates to 24 turns delay on the 8th city... still we need to work on something while growing the city back up... I am undecided on its actual usefulness in a "short game". If we finish ~1000AD and we build Moai in ~500BC, that's a bit less than 130 turns. 475/130 = 3.65H, meaning we have to work ~4 water tiles for a gain in pure hammers. We could also build 5 catapults instead of Moai which might end up being more useful here. Time will tell! (I would like Moai as well, just looking around alternatives)
@Duckweed
Sure, I'll try to do that today.
Spoiler :
If we skip Civil Service (after all, we don't have a strong capital location atm), we can bulb Astronomy pretty early. Unfortunately it's pretty hard to say if it is required unless we send a wb or three out really fast.
However, to me it is pretty certain that we have access to at least a few AIs so we really don't have to rush to Astro right ahead - but we should be farming GS in preparation for it.
For domination, it will be faster to completely wipe off AIs so even if there are overseas AIs (GLH dude?), we still have a continent or two to clean up before needing Astro.
@Snaaty
re Moai: if we find lucky stone, I'd say overflowing into the Moai is certain. However, without stone, as you noted, each following city is delayed 3 turns...
1st city...3 turns
2nd city...6 turns
3rd city...9 turns
It quickly escalates to 24 turns delay on the 8th city... still we need to work on something while growing the city back up... I am undecided on its actual usefulness in a "short game". If we finish ~1000AD and we build Moai in ~500BC, that's a bit less than 130 turns. 475/130 = 3.65H, meaning we have to work ~4 water tiles for a gain in pure hammers. We could also build 5 catapults instead of Moai which might end up being more useful here. Time will tell! (I would like Moai as well, just looking around alternatives)
@Duckweed
Sure, I'll try to do that today.
Won't we need to build other stuff in between - I'm guessing things like galleys or military escorts for the workers/settlers. We'll need to regrow the population consistently to be able to do overflow into Moai.
Since I don't micro closely enough to maximize overflow, do we also run the risk of hammer decay by waiting for all the workers/settlers we need to whip into Moai?
If we think it's realistic for the game to end near 1000AD, maybe we're not going to get a ton of benefit out of Moai after all.
srad
King
1. About bulbing Astro:
Skipping CS means we don't unlock Paper (and Education, PP) but we also need to pay attention to Philosophy which is very high on the bulbing list. So no Meditation?
2. About Moai
Building it without Stone seems really debatable and I see it like michmbk: We need Galleys, Triremes, military, Granary, Lighthouse, Forge(?)
Skipping CS means we don't unlock Paper (and Education, PP) but we also need to pay attention to Philosophy which is very high on the bulbing list. So no Meditation?
2. About Moai
Building it without Stone seems really debatable and I see it like michmbk: We need Galleys, Triremes, military, Granary, Lighthouse, Forge(?)
If we want to consider a really early Astro bulb... then yes. However, I think we will not need Astronomy that early, should we even need it. Getting Philo means access to Pacifism (unless we get gold and S. Paya?) which speeds up GS farming along.
How did you get this conclusion?
The game description told that we will be against Europe, if we could access 1 AI, then we are able to reach all AIs in Europe. My guess is that we are more likely isolated or semi-isolated with England, only this kind of map deserves Emperor+ difficulty. Requirement of Astro is more meaningful for a SG as it involves not only the warring skill, but also the tech race. Moreover, galleon has double movement than galley, which could speed up war pace a lot. Getting contact with other AIs so that we can trade for some techs instead of researching them ourselves. Therefore, I'd say Optics->Astro as soon as possible is very likely the way to go.Judgments of whether certain wonders are worthy.
1. Instant effect wonders as Oracle and HG, their value can be judge by beakers or hammers per hammer. The value of these wonders is less affected by the life of a game. Oracle will greatly speed up the time to achieve some critical techs -- not only the free tech itself.
2. Effects gained by turns. Most wonders belong to this type including TC and Moai. For this game, if we aim for 1000AD victory, then any wonder's effect will be gone ~800AD, TC is worse, it will be gone once Astro is done in early AD. For example, if TC is completed ~1AD, then for 375/2 (assume access to copper) raw hammers, we gain ~20C per turn (considering that we are running a bunch of scientists). At this stage, I rate 1H=2C since it's the time for infrastructures. so it is going to take ~20 turns before it starts to be beneficial. Then it's 300AD and it's obsoleted by Astro. Of course you can argue that we can focus on it and get it done earlier like what Snaaty suggested about Moai, then I have to double the cost of hammer investment since early hammers are more precious if invested on settlers and also we have less citizens working on water tiles.
1. Instant effect wonders as Oracle and HG, their value can be judge by beakers or hammers per hammer. The value of these wonders is less affected by the life of a game. Oracle will greatly speed up the time to achieve some critical techs -- not only the free tech itself.
2. Effects gained by turns. Most wonders belong to this type including TC and Moai. For this game, if we aim for 1000AD victory, then any wonder's effect will be gone ~800AD, TC is worse, it will be gone once Astro is done in early AD. For example, if TC is completed ~1AD, then for 375/2 (assume access to copper) raw hammers, we gain ~20C per turn (considering that we are running a bunch of scientists). At this stage, I rate 1H=2C since it's the time for infrastructures. so it is going to take ~20 turns before it starts to be beneficial. Then it's 300AD and it's obsoleted by Astro. Of course you can argue that we can focus on it and get it done earlier like what Snaaty suggested about Moai, then I have to double the cost of hammer investment since early hammers are more precious if invested on settlers and also we have less citizens working on water tiles.
I'm just assuming 
We are exiled to islands... does not mean isolation. Presumably, we can get traderoutes via a border pop.
I'm sorry to say so, (to you DS if you read this), but unless there's a lot of room for expansion while we are isolated or semi-isolated, the game will be boring for a while.
Being stuck at 6 cities for 200 turns and no AI to interact with would be a long wait...
We are exiled to islands... does not mean isolation. Presumably, we can get traderoutes via a border pop.I'm sorry to say so, (to you DS if you read this), but unless there's a lot of room for expansion while we are isolated or semi-isolated, the game will be boring for a while.
Being stuck at 6 cities for 200 turns and no AI to interact with would be a long wait...
as it is, we need more info about the map. we are speculating on way to many things which leaves planning and a strategy very luck dependend and therefore is bad. so we basically need 2 things:
1. as scouting wb out asap
2. a landbased scout once we have our first galley (warrior will do i would say, since there are no huts and he lives longer then a real scout)
i will try to include these 2 things in a next test i might be able to do this we and document it a bit more in detail (but im very sure it means bronze before sailing to get the additional wb + additional warrior out in time)...
edith
on a side note:
if we would go for moai, we also should go for the colossus and rex our capital asap after building moai to size 15+ running hr, working all seatiles to make it worth the efford (which also would make ignoring cs a bad idea. 120 turns with +1 hammer +1 commerce + around 100% boni running the right civcs + buildings in captial alone still must be calculated, but might make up for the investion...)
else our capital simply would suck all along the game...
1. as scouting wb out asap
2. a landbased scout once we have our first galley (warrior will do i would say, since there are no huts and he lives longer then a real scout)
i will try to include these 2 things in a next test i might be able to do this we and document it a bit more in detail (but im very sure it means bronze before sailing to get the additional wb + additional warrior out in time)...
edith
on a side note:
if we would go for moai, we also should go for the colossus and rex our capital asap after building moai to size 15+ running hr, working all seatiles to make it worth the efford (which also would make ignoring cs a bad idea. 120 turns with +1 hammer +1 commerce + around 100% boni running the right civcs + buildings in captial alone still must be calculated, but might make up for the investion...)
else our capital simply would suck all along the game...
Hey everyone, the official save is now up!
You can find it here:
http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm13/Plastic_Ducks_SG013_BC4000_01.CivBeyondSwordSave
From what I've looked into so far, there are no shenanigans besides the GLH being given to an AI already.
The person moving the warrior will be the person playing the first set. (As we need the same person to do so). Therefore I suggest Duckweed goes ahead and does it as nobody else posted interest in playing the first set.
EDIT: I am working on Rolo's Flying Camera Trick, trying to estimate some things about land in the fog. So far I've found 1 island to the north and proof that the island to the NW has 3+ tiles.
You can find it here:
http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm13/Plastic_Ducks_SG013_BC4000_01.CivBeyondSwordSave
From what I've looked into so far, there are no shenanigans besides the GLH being given to an AI already.
The person moving the warrior will be the person playing the first set. (As we need the same person to do so). Therefore I suggest Duckweed goes ahead and does it as nobody else posted interest in playing the first set.
EDIT: I am working on Rolo's Flying Camera Trick, trying to estimate some things about land in the fog. So far I've found 1 island to the north and proof that the island to the NW has 3+ tiles.
