SGOTM 9 - Smurkz

ControlFreak said:

I am still thinking we could make better use of ganged workers. We need to have the BG's mined and irrigation brought to the deer ASAP. With a new town every four turns, we're going to need at least one improved tile every 4 turns. We're not acheiving that right now. We may have to build some workers from Smurkzheim to help keep our new cities productive.

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Maybe after the next settler we could do a couple cycles of warrior/worker, warrior/worker. Or can it do archers and maintain the same pace? We should be seeing some barbs soon anyway... and the MP's wouldn't hurt.

ControlFreak said:

...where do we want the FP? I doesn't seem like we're going to use one of the inner ring cities to build it so we need to settle the FP city as one of the first second ring cities and start developing it. One thought I had was in the Picture at #0. The site is on the lake, can share the cow and get the olives.

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I think this is a good site. Assuming we settle the other towns in Methos' plan (which magically reappeared!) we'll have 31% waste at this site (or 20% with a court or WLTKD, or 14% with both), which is not too bad. For example at size 6, we could work the irrigated cow, three forests or mined plains, and two irrigated plains/olives for 8 (11 before waste) shields, for an FP in 25 turns. As this town gets a free aqueduct, it can be grown even more, as long as we provide for happiness.

Possible roles for existing or soon to be settled towns:
Smurk - settler factory.
fish town - military. Needs rax.
incense town - military. Needs rax.
deer town - worker/settler factory. Needs granary, can then probably do 6 turn settlers, as it has only 11% waste.
whale town - military. Needs rax.
FP town - FP . Needs quick growth, perhaps worker mergers?

incense town and deer town could use temples as well, because of the cultural pressure.

WarDance said:

Maybe after the next settler we could do a couple cycles of warrior/worker, warrior/worker. Or can it do archers and maintain the same pace? We should be seeing some barbs soon anyway... and the MP's wouldn't hurt.

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I think we can do warrior/worker every two turns.

Size 5.5, cow, lamb and 3 bg_m = 9s +2 on growth -> build warrior
size 6.0, cow, lamb and 3 bg_m and 1 Plain_i/Grass_m = 10s -> build worker, back to size 5.5

Archer would slow the cycle by a turn.

I am afraid the barbs are due any minute. I am also hoping to find out more about the mountain range to the SW. Therefore, I would like to build at least 1 warrior from Smurkzheim before going back to settler mode. After that, I agree that the other towns will start producing enough units for us.

With that said, needing some MP/defense in the near future seems prudent. I would build some quick, regular warriors before going for the barracks in the other towns. Map Making may not really be that far off and I'd hate to "give" Smurkzheim to the evil Indians this early.

Appologies for my low input, and it will get worse. Lecture upcoming, thursday morning, after that I'll be back in again.

I agree with the FP analysis, the suggested site seems like the perfect fit, covering both the core we are building now and the river area in the north. That town should probably start building FP as soon as possible.

I'm not that afraid of barbies, but then again I never seem to give them due attention. Feel free to change the spreadsheet if you like.
However, any scheme better take into account our current position in the sequence, we can't start a two-turn warrior-worker pump unless we are at size 5.5 to begin with.

Keep up the good work team, and see you again thursday!

Until our minimum run on Writing is over, I don't mind paying for happiness. With that said, we can make a little more money I think being a size larger and paying more lux. So I still contend that Smurkzheim should switch to a warrior due next turn. That puts us at 4.5

Starting at 4.5 we can either:
1) Build settlers every 4 turns from 4.5-6.5
2) Build a warrior in 2 turns (wasting 8shields) to get to 5.5 and then warrior/workers every 2 turns (We need 4 mined BGs for this.
3) Build an archer in 2 (wasting 6food) and then settler in 3 from 4/5-6.5


My vote is #1 for three more settlers until we have all ring one and the FP, then #2 or #3 depending on how the other towns are supplying the support units needed.

Any way you go, I'll be fine with it. Good luck CB!

CF said:

I am also hoping to find out more about the mountain range to the SW.

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I’m curious what’s down there as well. It may be nothing but I’d rather know for sure.

ControlFreak said:

Any way you go, I'll be fine with it. Good luck CB!

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Right now CB is in a lurk and learn mode. All the discussion gives me a much clearer idea of what to do.

I am eagerly awaiting the day to switch from lurk and learn to lock and load !

Most Important City Name

We are the Vikings! How could we not have a city named thusly:

CommandoBob said:

Right now CB is in a lurk and learn mode. All the discussion gives me a much clearer idea of what to do.

I am eagerly awaiting the day to switch from lurk and learn to lock and load !

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Well, now would be as good a time as any to lock and load, so... Go play those turns already!

EDIT: Oh, and I agree with CF. An initial warrior followed by 4-turn settlers at 4.5-6.5 (work cow, lambs, mined bgs, and the lake tile) with slightly higher lux rate.

Niklas said:

Oh, and I agree with CF.

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That puts me at about 50%. Yay me!

CB, if there is anything in particular you need help with feel free to ask. Otherwise ... lets roll.

Brief check list (others can add all the things I forget)

1. Trade for Bronze and Masonry, see what else shows up (Ironworking?) and see what deals can be made for Mysticism. If we can get it, I would pass it around.
2. Switch build to warrior and set to 5food per turn. You can use the lake as well for more commerce as the warrior only needs 3spt to finish.
3. Settle our next town where the settler stands.
4. When warrior completes, start the next settler and make sure you're still at 5fpt, 7spt. Smurkzhiem should grow every two turns and make settlers every 4 turns. Just make sure you're using 5fpt and at least 2 mined BGs.
5. Send the warrior to check out the Mountains to the SW.
6. The worker in the south that's roading should NOT build a mine there. It should be part of the irrigation canal towards the deer. The other workers should try to get the BG's mined. If you get to the point of chopping the deer forest (I don't think you will) make sure we're ready to settle the Oyster town before the chop finishes. The chopped shields will be wasted on Smurkzhiem.
7. Watch the luxury slider as we grow every other turn.

Anything else? Get to building!

ControlFreak said:

That puts me at about 50%.

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I have to ask, what does this mean? Not being native to the language sometimes shows I'm afraid.

ControlFreak said:

When warrior completes, start the next settler and make sure you're still at 5fpt, 7spt. Smurkzhiem should grow every two turns and make settlers every 4 turns. Just make sure you're using 5fpt and at least 2 mined BGs.

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Actually, I would say always work the cow, the lambs and the lake, and then fill up with mined BGs. Makes for less maintenance needs (only need to reassign someone to the lake once the sequence is done. Or perhaps the governor could be set to emphasize commerce, would that solve it automatically in this case?).
That sequence will make 7+9+9+11=36 shields, clearly more than we need for the settler, but as we noted earlier we're one shield short on the first turn for the warrior-settler combo. Instead the surplus means you can skip working some BGs if other towns can make better use of them.

End of Previous Turnset Stats:

Science: Writing, 24 turns
Treasury: 66 gold, +1 gpt, 5.2.3
Trades:
Cities:

• Smurkheim (4) settler in 4, grows in 2, culture expansion in 33

Military:

• 01 settlers, 01 in production
• 01 worker, 00 in production
• 02 scouts, 00 in production
• 02 eqWorkers, 00 in production

Allowed units 04; current units 06

001 2550 BC
002 2510 BC
003 2470 BC [IBT] India wants peace! I kick the pacifist Gandhi out.

004 2430 BC
005 2390 BC [IBT] Smurkheim riots. #@#@!! Last time I checked Luxuries was 3 turns ago. Sorry.


006 2350 BC
[IBT] Smurkheim settles down and builds settler. Now size 4, grows in 2, settler in 4.

007 2310 BC
008 2270 BC
009 2230 BC [IBT] Hannibal is frisky about Scout2. We promise to move him.
Smurkzadelphia Warrior -> Warrior, due in 4.

010 2190 BC
Current Turnset Stats:

Science: Writing, 15 turns
Treasury: 116 gold, +5 gpt, 5.2.3
Trades:
Cities:

• Smurkheim (5) settler in 2, grows in 2, culture expansion in 24.
• Smurkzadelphia (1) warrior in 4, grows in 1, culture 0.
• Smurkzgrad (1) warrior in 3, grows in 8, culture 0.

Military:

• 00 settlers, 01 in production
• 01 worker, 00 in production
• 02 scouts, 00 in production
• 02 eqWorkers, 00 in production
• 03 warriors, 02 in production

Allowed units 12; current units 08

And the mighty Smurkz Empire at 2190 BC:


And the save is here.

Good discussion gave me the guidance I needed, especially on the trading. Thanks, all. I needed that hand-holding.

Smurkheim rioted once, I am sorry to say. It is back on track as a settler factory. It will grow in two and produce a settler in two. But I had to tweak the citizen assignments to do that; the remaining assignments will need to be checked after it builds the next settler.

Trading went well at first and then ran into a snag. Traded Alphabet to the Ottomans for BW, Masonry and 17 gold. Now they are broke, as is Hannibal. Could buy Mysticism from Khan, but no one to sell it to.

Once Khan learned Iron Working the price for Mysticism went down to Alphabet and 1 gold. But for IW price was Alphabet, Masonry, all of our cash and cash per turn. This was too rich for me, so I passed. I could have gotten Mysticism, but still passed. We do not have a pressing need for Mysticism at the present time since we are heading for Republic. Plus, if we wanted to pay his price for IW, trading Alphabet now would kill that deal.

Oddly, as the Mongol price of Mysticism decreased, the Ottoman price increased, from Pottery and 41 gold to Pottery and 52 gold. Not what I expected.

I am sending a warrior to Smurkzgrad to explore the north side of the Indian Ocean. I think this is landlocked sea, at least from what Warrior01 tells me.

Below are two RCP charts. One is for us at RCP of 3. The other is for India at RCP 4. Sometimes these overlap. But do we really care?

Smurkz RCP 3:


India RCP 4:

Nah, we don't care one bit.

Looking good on the tech deals, I think you've made the right choices so far. We're not in any hurry to learn those techs, except to spread them around, but that can wait until after writing if need be. In any case we shouldn't tax our own economy unless there's a real gain.

Too bad about the rioting, but nothing we can't recover from. But really, you should use CivAssist II to warn you of these things. Do you have it installed? If not, go check it out here! EDIT: Doh, I'm just so stupid... how else did you get those RCP pictures? :suicide:

It sounds like a good idea to scout around the Indian Ocean, but don't leave the core unguarded. If you have a warrior to spare, fine, but I doubt that's the case at this point. I would suggest waiting for a while longer, and perhaps build a scout for the task in Smurkzgrad?

Nice and detailed turnlog! Great that you check for the trades every turn. You probably played only 9 turns, btw. No worries, means I get 11 turns .

Good decisions on trading! Alphabet + 1 for Mysticism is a toss-up, but you're right that we don't need the "smoke-some-mushrooms"-tech and can afford to hold back. Once we get writing we can probably scoop up a bunch of techs for that, so we're good there.
I think the Ottomans are researching pottery which is why the deal gets worse and worse. The Khan's price for Mysticism lowered because Ottomans got the tech on that turn. Apparently the Mongols are not researching Alphabet, so this tech keeps its trade value until they contact India (which may happen soon btw, they have a scout nearby).

I agree with Niklas on the scout-warrior issue. Another scout will not hurt. Switch Smurkgrad to scout?

If you promise not to have any more riots, I'll pretend this one didn't happen . Not only would I use CivAssist or Mapstat, but in this early stage also check the F1 screen. That will catch riots due to moved MP's (the two utilities don't, because they check the autosave), and it's easy to do if you have a smiley mod.

In the early game I also check the cities every turn for micromanagement (MM). For example, in the 2190BC save, Smurkheim should have worked the lamb tile last turn, so that it could have grown this turn. Fortunately it can be managed for +3 food, and settler in 1. Smurkzgrad can use a bonus grass for an extra shield.

How does the team feel about building/whipping/chopping temples in Smurkzgrad and Deertown? It will at least push our total culture over India's (local culture will not catch up until we get libs).

Ah, I didn't realize you had finished already.
Looking good then, though I would like to see a bit more detailed spoilers EDIT: the rest of you on the team do just as detailed turn logs!

I won't have time to check the save now, but unless zyxy's in a real hurry I'll check the save and join the discussion tomorrow.

Niklas said:

Looking good then, though I would like to see a bit more detailed spoilers.

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Scroll up a little, Niklas. I think you missed Commando's actual turn log. I thought it was great.

WarDance said:

Scroll up a little, Niklas. I think you missed Commando's actual turn log. I thought it was great.

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You're absolutely right. I can't believe I missed it, I should lay off work for a while... or hanging on the forum maybe...

@CB, my sincere appologies, that's a great turn log!
And you played really well too, only too bad about that riot.

Niklas finally passed me up in spam count. Not that he actually posts spam but... well, you know.

Something I was thinking about and thought I'd throw out there for discussion: I hate going to war against a civ that has a strong UU and fighting them in their Golden Age. I was wondering what you all might think about setting Carthage's golden age off early while they don't have many towns to get it out of the way. It could also serve to speed up their research a bit here in the early AA. We would just need a few warriors to make the trek up there. Not a very large investment but it would take some time for them to get there. We're far enough away that I imagine we would see little in the way of retaliation. They might even be able to build a nice wonder for us. Drawbacks: 1)shield investment of course
2) they might research something we're researching and spread it around, making it useless in terms of trading with the other civs. We will finish writing before the suicide squad gets there though so at least we should have that to work with.

CommandoBob said:

Smurkheim rioted once, I am sorry to say. It is back on track as a settler factory. It will grow in two and produce a settler in two. But I had to tweak the citizen assignments to do that; the remaining assignments will need to be checked after it builds the next settler.

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It happens to the best of them, too, so don't beat yourself up over it!

Niklas said:

I have to ask, what does this mean? Not being native to the language sometimes shows I'm afraid.

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When I said I'm at 50%, that meant that half the time you agree with me (and half you don't). I'm pleased that you neither agree with me all the time, nor disagree with me all the time. It was sort of a joke, but probably not that funny if it needed explaining. FWIW, This was the first I noticed that english is not your native language. I'm always impressed by the multilingual people here.

@CB, Looking good aside from the one riot.

MicroManagement
I looked at the save and I see how you're trying to fix the factory. You shorted the food from 5fpt to 4fpt last turn. I wouldn't have done that. When possible, Smurkheim should be on 5fpt every turn to grow as fast as possible. The exception being if we're running the archer/settler combo.

Anytime 'heim isn't using the food tiles, let our other town use the food bonuses rather than just letting them sit idle. Right now, 'adelphia is set to grow next turn anyway so it won't benefit from the lamb. I recommend shifting 'heim to use the lamb plus lake and BG to finish the settler in 2 at +3fpt. We can run from 4.0 to 6.0 for two more settlers before switching to archer/settler mode (the first archer can be adjusted to put us back on 4.5-6.5 track). Then 'grad should use the cow for faster growth. Also, make sure that you leave one of the mined BG within reach of 'adelphia since it will need a 2shield tile when it grows.

Tech Values
To answer your questions about why one civ's tech cost when up while the other down, the two factors of tech value to a civ are 1)how many civs they know WITH the tech and 2)How many beakers they've invested in the tech. Since you're trying to buy a tech with a tech, the net difference that you have to make up in gold is changing by how much less we value their tech and how much less they value our tech. (Tech values never increase, only decrease.) So if you have to add gold to make a tech-for-tech deal, then they are starting to value our tech less. If you can take gold out of the deal, then we are starting to value their tech less:

Ottomans - Adding gold to the deal
One option is that the Ottoman's have met someone else that has Pottery so the cost would go down. However, that would be a one time increase. Your turn log notes a slow and steady devaluation of Pottery so I'm pretty sure they're researching it.

Mongols Reducing gold in the deal
Mystism was devalued not because they learned Iron Working but because the number of civs that we know that have Mysticism increased when the Ottoman's obtained the tech. So the value of buying the tech from the Mongols decreased because we have someone else to buy it from.

Planning to play
zyxy, any idea when you plan to play? I'm trying to figure out when I'm going to need to plan for my turn.