SGOTM 21 - Misfit Gypsy Nuts

I want to talk just a bit about the progress page. PR starts posting saves fairly frequently from the beginning of the game. At T30 their rate increases to a save uploaded every 2 turns on average.

Why would this happen?

Meeting some AI might explain a little. I think they had some unexpected issues maybe. Maybe barb incursions. Something seems a bit out of order there imo.

I would just advise a bit of caution maybe as we move through the next 30 turns.

they did the exact same last SGOTM

Turnset played, pretty much as planned.

No food in the right location to reassess Corinth, so that went ahead. The NE is actually a small peninsula with a sheep.

We've met a lady, who still looks contemptuously at us, but we know that'll change.


All builds and worker micro as per plan. We finally built an extra 2 warriors from Athens. One is in the city still and has movement left. The other is heading to Sparta, where the previous one (that also came from Athens after gems were connected) headed north with the idea of fog busting around corn.

I'd build a 3rd one to grow to size 6 in Athens and serve as MP there and then build settler; then the one now heading to Sparta can go look due west while the current one in Athens can go MP Sparta. Still following?

Anyway, sailing and AH are in. There's horses visible, but not within our borders; it's due west from Sparta, that's why it's probably a good idea to send a warrior there.

Our scout is still alive, actually saw just one barb warrior (indicated with a sign). We've found Willem's borders, but at first look he seems to be accross a pond. Shaka seems to be doing some fogbusting for us in the west.

Game paused, the worker at Sparta has movement left, it can either go pasture the cow or mine another hill.






Score-wise we're significantly ahead of PR, so it ain't looking too badly.

how did we meet her? ah by workboat ...

Willem this close we dont want to be fighting him in a war, think we will need to stick a blocking city in his face sooner rather than later

I would think about that settler about now imho it kinda looks overdue allready

Nicely exrcuted turns it looks like

namliaM said:

I would think about that settler about now imho it kinda looks overdue allready

Click to expand...

Don't think it's overdue, if we wait for the galley to finish naturally with the 2nd chop, at size 6 a 2-pop whip (not even 3-pop ) will time perfectly well for the settler to embark.

It just occurred to me that when Corinth grows to size 3, we better give back the wheat to Athens. Athens can use that tile for settler and for regrowing faster, while for now Corinth doesn't really have better tiles to grow into. In fact, galley will finish a bit sooner working a forest than the wheat.

Oh, and I would settle fur first. That happy is useful for Sparta and the GLH.

Looks good nocho!

Won't take much effort to fogbust the east.

Definitely want to settle the plains hill island, doubly so if we succeed in getting the GLH.

Need to explore the horse area for sure! YEA HORSES!!!

We want an exploring boat imo.

Do we beeline MATH for the chop bonus at the end of the GLH run?

Definitely agree on another warrior from Athens then settler.

nocho said:

Don't think it's overdue, if we wait for the galley to finish naturally with the 2nd chop, at size 6 a 2-pop whip (not even 3-pop ) will time perfectly well for the settler to embark.

It just occurred to me that when Corinth grows to size 3, we better give back the wheat to Athens. Athens can use that tile for settler and for regrowing faster, while for now Corinth doesn't really have better tiles to grow into. In fact, galley will finish a bit sooner working a forest than the wheat.

Oh, and I would settle fur first. That happy is useful for Sparta and the GLH.

Click to expand...

Athens can steal the Wheat back next turn. The warrior completes on time and it puts us up the food bar more for the upcoming whip.

Definitely settle Beaver isle next for all the reasons you state.

We don't know if Willem is even on our continent for sure.

I would almost consider working the scout back east. He can effectively fogbust in the east and stay relatively safe I think.

I think the game description stated somewhere that we were on the same continent, but in that case it must be oddly shaped, as we haven't seen a single unit of his yet (at least not on my watch, I think neither before). Maybe he's blocked by a peak or something. His territory we see looks like the other side of a water body indeed.

So maybe it's Shaka rather than Willem in whose face we want to settle. A run for those horses might be in order depending on Shaka's distance, possibly as city #5. Even if it has no extra food.

Looks like a solid turnset, nocho.

"Oddly shaped" is certainly correct. We will have to land on/sail around the fish/plains hill island to make sure there is no coastal access farther east. But it looks like our future expansion will have to go through Shaka and/or Willem. Horses will help against barbs, but not against Shaka's impis.

I think we need to continue our push for the Great Lighthouse, and then presuming we get it we will need to REX hard to claim as much space as we can before we get boxed in. We definitely need to know more about the area around the horses, particularly whether there is any food nearby. We will almost certainly want to settle it even without, but any food at all would certainly boost the priority of the site.

Some fogbusting of the east and north will be important, hopefully to be replaced fairly rapidly by cities. We could end up with a nice large backlines area requiring minimal defense, allowing us to focus our military efforts on Shaka (or others).

I will note that Pollux and Deckhand have done a nice job of making worker stealing rather unimportant, without having to actually make specific rules about it.

Edit: Start of post threads updated.

Updated test game please?

Sorry, the earliest I might update the map is tonight or tomorrow night, 16/40 hrs from now, I'm afraid. If somebody has time though, moves and micro from the set are exactly as in PPP.

Looks good Nocho.. all going nicely to plan.

I do think a city near the horses is a pretty high priority as well.

Also good news we have plenty of potential trade routes with both Wil and Liz close(ish).

OK, looked over the latest save. I like our position so far. A couple thoughts:

- We should trade Elizabeth our wheat for her corn. No direct gain for us but it does not cost us anything, either, and it starts accumulating resource-trade-turns for future +diplo.

- There are pre-existing diplomatic factors ("past events have shown") between the various AIs, as well as with us. So some relationships are not likely to ever get too good (or too bad). Elizabeth and Willem are +5 (not surprising given the scenario), but there are some negatives with Shaka. Note that we are Shaka's worst enemy already, despite being completely neutral at 0 relationship. Given Shaka's aggressiveness, this could be a problem down the road.

- I am assuming we plan to whip a settler from Athens, which will take the galley from Corinth to settle Beaver Isle? We will need to get a work boat for the southern crab, preferably sooner rather than later. I think we do need the warrior currently queued in Athens, so the current one can head towards Sparta (allowing Sparta's warrior to check out the horses). But maybe after that (and the settler) we need to get a WB from Athens?

- The lands around us are looking remarkably bare of resources. I detect the influence of the map makers being evil. We do have a collection of food resources, which break down nicely to feed one city each: island fish, sheep, northern fish, corn, deer. Add Beaver Isle, the horse site, and our current cities and that gives us 10 cities if we can claim all of them. After Beaver Isle next (more happiness!), we probably want to push for the horses and deer sites to try to block off the rest as backlines for future settlement. Elizabeth could be a problem if she uses galleys to send settler parties into our north, but going for corn city soon-ish should hopefully block that.

Of course, I am talking about a whole lot of settlers! But most of the land is pretty green (sheep and island fish excepted) so we can improve the food at each city and then just start throwing down cottages.

- Tech: We want Masonry so Sparta can transition straight to TGL. Four turns needed, including one cash turn. After that I think we need Wheel and Pottery for granaries and cottages, linking our cities, and hopefully chariots once we settle the horse site. Wheel and Pottery are quite cheap, so this should not take long. But after that...Writing? Cheap creative libraries, open borders. Math for better chops? Alphabet for tech trading? Not sure we know enough AIs yet for that to be a good goal. Mysticism -> something -> Priesthood for a late try at the Oracle? I am skeptical that we could get it in time, but maybe? Needs some thought.

- Either of island fish or sheep sites could make for a strong Moai city. Island fish would have more hammers from plains hill mines to build it, plus plenty of water tiles. 1W of sheep would get 11 coastal tiles, no ocean tiles, also a potentially strong Moai site and would give it something better than plains tiles to work. Something to keep in mind for the future.

Assuming willems culture is a second city or worse third is it worth gettin a city 1NW or 1N of the deer, chop a library and try and steal that 6 commerce? Or play it safe and settle 1W of the deer? I would be tempted to send our settler there now for blocking and grabbing reasons, mid term with all that wood the deer city will help us a lot with chopped Granary and Library.
Combined with those river tiles for bonus commerce... Offcourse if he is on our lands, settling 1NW of the Deer is out of the question? Unless it is the third border pop of his capitol in which case maybe it still isnt a good idea given the amount of culture already there....

Maoi 250 hammer, lets assume we gain 6 hammer/turn.
takes 40 turns to pay off after being build. lets assume 4hammer/turn for build time is 60 turns... 100 turn roi is verry long

I would skip oracle

Is that trade to Lizzy smart? she is Worst enemy of shaka, could make him hate us more

namliaM said:

Assuming willems culture is a second city or worse third is it worth gettin a city 1NW or 1N of the deer, chop a library and try and steal that 6 commerce? Or play it safe and settle 1W of the deer? I would be tempted to send our settler there now for blocking and grabbing reasons, mid term with all that wood the deer city will help us a lot with chopped Granary and Library.
Combined with those river tiles for bonus commerce... Offcourse if he is on our lands, settling 1NW of the Deer is out of the question? Unless it is the third border pop of his capitol in which case maybe it still isnt a good idea given the amount of culture already there....

Click to expand...

Willem is creative, so I don't see any point to trying to push him culturally. Better to just concede the tiles he already controls.

namliaM said:

Maoi 250 hammer, lets assume we gain 6 hammer/turn.
takes 40 turns to pay off after being build. lets assume 4hammer/turn for build time is 60 turns... 100 turn roi is verry long

Click to expand...

Stone would of course make Moai a lot more attractive. But it is not as bad as 100 turns. We would almost certainly want to use whip overflow to help build the small wonder, so build time would likely be closer to 35-40 turns. And with time the city would be larger and would get more hammers/turn. Even if ROI is 80+ turns, if we found the city soon enough I expect it would pay off before the end of the game. It seems likely this game will last a while, from the hints Pollux has been dropping about needing more advanced tech, the quests, etc.

Still, it will depend on what else we need/are doing at the time. I was thinking of the sheep site, since it has little to work except plains tiles and coast tiles anyway. But we shall see.

namliaM said:

I would skip oracle

Click to expand...

I would not mind having it, but as usual the cost is not just a bunch of hammers but delaying other much-needed techs. The only thing that really makes me even consider it is that we see only the two luxury resources (gems and furs), so pushing toward Monarchy early-ish could be worthwhile for happiness and growing our cities.

namliaM said:

Is that trade to Lizzy smart? she is Worst enemy of shaka, could make him hate us more

Click to expand...

We are the worst enemy of Shaka, not Elizabeth. Shaka is her worst enemy, but that does not impact trades with Elizabeth. Of course, she could be the worst enemy of AIs we have not yet met, especially if the three queens do not like one another. So maybe it is best to hold off until we meet more AIs. In a normal game without pre-set diplo effects I would not worry about worst enemies just yet, but since we see that Pollux and Deckhand have been pre-setting the diplo it is probably better to be careful.

We are just as creative, will probably beat him to Writing and certainly a chopped Library can bring some fast culture...

Maoi build, probably some whipping done yes, but how much?
Sheep city will be stuck at 2 hpt getting an average of 2 hpt whip overflow every 10 turn for 20 hammers... requires 40 food surplus as well as investing atleast more hammers into non-Maoi build as well.... Really dont think it will be much faster, bar the two chops that are available there (60 hammers). But we also want/need a Lighthouse and/or Granary there adding another 120 hammers as well.

I pushed the test game to our current turn, should be pretty close though not perfect.
Didnt update the lands though

If we start the settler THIS turn it builds to 68/100 before the galley finishes we can then grow one turn for near max food at the 2 pop whip.
But we also need to grab back the Wheat this turn, Corinth is also already at size two for working the two gems.
Would have personally prefered to be at max food size 6 to preserve the power tiles in use... But if we want to settle Beaver isle (or fish or Deer) asap...

In the test game one Archer just tore thru 2 warriors on a forrest grass hill and still had 2.8 health I hate RNG

Thanks for updating the test game!

If we're not gonna settle beaver first, I'd run to get the horses. Beaver, fish, sheep, corn (sadly we can name cities by just 1 resource ) are all secure from the AI. A couple of turns more scouting might reveal how close (or far) Shaka really is. In any case, wouldn't want to miss out on horses. Then again, if we'd be sure about iron, woldn't matter that much either. Anyone fancy a cat+archer rush?

Thanks for the updated test game MM!

Mind you save isnt perfect, think we have a few more hammers into the warrior @ Corinth, but it shouldnt matter to the course of the game.

Also beakers (overflow) to masonry may not be exactly the same depending on what techs the AI have in the respective game(s) + I didnt make us meet a third AI.
At now 34 beakers/turn if one AI knows the tech, we would get a free additional beaker.... the one or two beakers still add up so be carefull with assumptions about tech progress.

And obviously the land and units are somewhat different as well