Do not move Warriors 3 and 6
First, what do you think about having our two northern spawn busters take one step east?
Moving east with our 2 northern Warriors is not only unnecessary, but it is preferred that you do not do so.
I intentionally put Warriors 3 and 6 in "the right places" so that the next player would have an easier turnset.
Here are the relevant points
1. We can see all of the land to the north. There is a bit of a hidden square that, via fog-gazing, is only covering Coast. Thus, we see all of the land area there.
With Warriors 3 and 6 in their current locations, plus with Zara's cultural borders, we have 100% Barb unit spawn-busting.
2. Barb Cities can still appear in spawn-busted land if it is not also fog-busted. The BEST location for us to also fog-bust is from the two Hills squares on which Warriors 3 and 6 are currently located. There is not better place to put them, so they should stay where they are.
If you don't believe me, do the same test that I did: open up the World Builder, destroy Zara's City (erase it) and then put your own City there. If you don't know how to place a City, place a Settler there, exit the World Builder, settle the City, and then re-enter the World Builder.
Use the Edit City button (the bottom left World Builder icon, I believe) to Edit the City and increase its culture until it had the same level that Zara's City had (probably somewhere under 750 Culture). Then, exit the World Builder. That way, you'll see the area that Zara's Cultural borders are fog-busting because they are now your cultural borders.
Once the barb suicides on Riverdale, another barb will spawn.
Perhaps, but not in our area. The west and north are 100% spawn-busted without needing to move our Warriors around. Even the south by the Ice Silver Resources is fog-busted (which gives visibility of the area and thus fog-busted implies that an area is also spawn-busted).
The only spot for a Barb unit to spawn could be to the SE of Zara. Even the south of Zara will be fog-busted (and thus also spawn-busted) by his southern cultural border. We are 100% safe from Barb unit spawning at the moment.
The only potential gap is if we aren't careful where we move Worker 1.
My plan had been:
Move Warrior 7 into Delhi. On the same turn, wake up Warrior 8 (gaining is one "free" movement with our Warrior spawn-buster) and send him towards the area that Worker 1 is now spawn-busting.
If you would rather use Warrior 7 to scout for Zara's Settler, that's fine, but he won't build another Settler until he settles. Now that the Barb unit to the south is going to die when Zara gets its turn before the Barbs get their turn and attacks (or after the Barb Warrior captures our City, for the unbelievers in our crowd), the south of Zara will be fog-busted for Barbs and only the SE should Zara have to worry about, where the continent probably snakes away, where one could meet the other AI or AIs that he met (remember, we don't want to meet those AIs yet, though!).
Thus, we have some time. I would instead suggest: Warrior 7 goes into Delhi. On the same turn that he arrives, wake Warrior 8. Send Warrior 8 to spawn-bust the west. That way, Worker 1 can build more useful improvements sooner, such as a Road on the Stone (if Stone City has yet to be settled) or such as Cottages for Stone City.
We SHOULD be able to get 2 Cottages down with 3 Workers at Stone City prior to needing to improve the Stone, since we're making another Settler, but at MINIMUM, we should get 3 Workers building a Cottage as soon as Stone City is settled. One Worker can arrive 1 turn later, by perhaps partially Chopping the PFor 1N of the GCopper for one turn. Yes, we want to save that PFor and not chop it completely, but eventually we may chop it, so it's better to gain that free Worker turn now than to spend all of the Worker's turn on moving, when he could instead both move and perform an action within the same turn.
We want 3 Workers on the task of making that Cottage, as EACH TURN that we delay the Cottage costs us 1 Commerce now and between 4 to 6 Commerce later.
Plus, Mitchum is right that 3 Workers improving the Stone will help you with the timing of being able to get 1 Cottage for sure and possibly at least partial work on additional Cottages at Stone City before improving the Stone.
Every turn where Stone City grows and it doesn't have an improved Cottage to work is yet another 1 Commerce forever lost now and forever lost for down the road between 4 to 6 Commerce. Each turn.
I would recommend using the Christian Missionary to spot-check whether Zara's got a Settler coming. If you've built the Roads properly, you'll be able to settle 3 turns after you whip. That should be enough time to get over there. If not, then you can use the Warrior 5, to pop out of and back into Riverdale every couple of turns, to see what you can see of Zara's capitol.
Be careful when moving extra units outside of our borders not to incur a Supply Cost of 1 Gold per Turn or more--there shouldn't ever be a need to do so on your turnset, but if it happens, be prepared to move back without our cultural borders the next turn (a test game where you watch our Gold per Turn gain or loss at the top left of the screen every time that you move a unit out of our borders would tell you ahead of time, so that you won't put yourself in a Gold-losing situation in the real game.
Worker Movement
Remember, if a Worker has a long way to travel, count his movement points. Try to perform an action along the way, but be sure to stop the Worker's action immediately, so that it doesn't accidentally complete instead of allowing you to keep moving the Worker to where you want him to go.
If you don't understand this concept, then perhaps you'd better get this concept fully understood before you play the turnset. I'd rather that we delay your turnset by a few days, if that's all the time that you have, if it means that you'll understand better how to fully leverage our Workers.
Walking in Forests, on improved squares, and on squares that cannot get Forests
Why do so? Well, think about how useful it is to chop one Forest. Imagine we could get another one of those for free? All we have to do is try our best not to walk in unForested squares that are horizontally or vertically adjacent to a Forest square.
If you walk in those squares, you disrupt the chances of a Forest growing (think of it like mowing the lawn when new seedlings are growing--if you don't mow, you might get trees growing and thus you might get a new Forest).
That said, squares with a Forest already on the square can't get another square, so you won't mess up Forest-regrowth chances by walking on an existing Forest.
Similarly, a square with an improvement on it, such as a Mine, cannot get a Forest growing on it, so you're safe to walk on that square without messing up the chance of geeting a free Forest.
If you walk on a square that CANNOT GET a Forest growing on it, such as an Ice square or a Desert square, or even a square that has no Forest to the 1N, 1E, 1S, and 1W of it, then you're also not messing up our chances of getting free Forests.
I don't mind if you "chain" goto movements, such that you hold down the shift key for Warrior 7 and then pick his route one-square-at-a-time, adding more and more squares to the "goto chain" of movements until he is 1 square away from Delhi. However, you should manually move him into Delhi, so that you don't forget to wake up Warrior 8 on that same turn, otherwise you'll lose the chance to move Warrior 8 to the north-west for one extra turn worth of movement than Warrior 7 could have gotten there.
IIRC, if the warriors both moved east, they would cover the entire NE desert. Worker 1 would cover west of warrior 6? (the western-most northern warrior), giving us 100% coverage of the west, north, NE and south. If a barb appeared out of the fog in the desert, both warriors could retreat back west. However, I don't think there is a barb out there yet, but there could be one next turn once the barb by Riverdale dies.
I suggest moving him manually. Keep him in our cultural borders as long as possible to save support costs. Only walk on forests or improved tiles. If worker 1 stays up by the stone until Stone City is founded, then I'm fine with sending him NE, but would prefer that he stay closer to Delhi as he heads north.
If you're going to chop now, then I would suggest switching to OR and Confucianism. This will give us 25% more hammers. Hammers are scarce in Riverdale, so we could use the bonus. If you're not ready to revolt until after Stone is settled, can worker 2 build another cottage instead?
Very nice use of the settler to fogbust.
When safe to do so, keep as many units inside our borders to avoid unit supply cost.
I don't think we want to spread another religion to Delhi just yet. What will this gain us right away? It would allow us to build another temple, but we haven't built the Confucian temple yet.
I was thinking that we could use him to help fogbust the west.
While I agree that we can use the Christian Missionary to explore the east for spotting Zara's Settler ahead of time, he comes out a bit late, meaning that Worker 1 is dinking around for longer than he has to--instead, he could be building a Road on the Stone, for example. I'm not sure of the exact timing of when Warrior 8 can get to the north-west compared to how many turns Worker 1 would not have to spawn bust. I can't remember that detail, but if it's even 1 Worker turn, then that's one more Worker turn that we won't have to spend building a Road in the middle of nowhere.
For now, though, Worker 1 is probably best off finishing the Flood Plains square's Road where he is currently standing.
Later, once Stone City is up and you have completed your first Cottage there with 3 Workers, you might send 1 Worker to the Stone and the other two can do the following:
1. Move to the Flood Plains square where Worker 1 is currently standing and partially Cottage the Flood Plains square there (1S of Stone City)
2. Move 1NW Grassland 1SW Flood Plains and partially Cottage the Flood Plains square in the same turn as you moved 2 squares
3. Keep partially Cottaging this square
4. When it's almost time to go and Quarry the Stone, because Settler 5 will soon be complete (check out the exact timing with a test game, please, so that you'll know exactly on what turn to "go back"), you reverse the process: go 1NE Grassland, 1SE Flood Plains square, partial Cottage
5. Then move to the Quarry and help out
The keys will be: 3 Workers improve the first Cottage, then 2 Workers SHOULD be able to get in a few more turns' worth of Cottaging the other Flood Plains squares before having to help out with the Quarry. Then 1 to 2 Workers can continue with the Flood Plains squares.
THERE IS NO RUSH TO pre-Chop. I had plenty of extra Worker turns to do the pre-chopping later on.
In fact, I planned to pre-chop the GHFor Riv square E + E of Delhi exactly 6 turns BEFORE The Pyramids were due, so that we didn't have to waste turns moving onto and off of that Forest.
Similarly, Worker 2 will move onto the PHFor NE + E + E of Delhi 6 turns prior to when The Pyramids are due, so that we don't have to waste Worker turns moving onto and off of that square.
As a result, there are only 3 Forests that can be pre-chopped, and each of those squares already has some pre-chopping performed on them.
Far more important priorities, after completing the Delhi Cottage are:
1. Get a Road on the GHFor NE + N of Delhi, as well as on the GCornRiv 1N of Delhi
2. Get a Road going towards the NW, on the squares indicated in the actual saved game or as seen in my screenshot in my Thread Message # 1460. The image can be seen "big-sized" in my last spoiler tag in that Message.
3. Get 3 Workers (you may not have time to fully complete the GCornRiv Road for now) to the Flood Plains square for Stone City as soon as Stone City is built. 2 Workers must start immediately, but 1 Worker can start 1 turn later, if he's still Roading around the Corn area. "On his way" that Worker (who is probably Worker 4, according to my earlier suggestion, as I was sending Worker 3 NW to complete the Road to Stone City), can partially Chop the PFor 1N of the GCopper, just to get him a "free" Worker action along the way there. "Along the way back," any Worker moving along that Road, say, to complete the Road on the GCornRiv square, can also partially Chop on that same PFor, as long as the Forest won't be fully chopped by doing so, as you don't want to fully chop down that PFor 1N of the G Copper.
Before actually doing this, I suggest that it be tested to see if it actually does speed up the Pyramids or save the fifth forest. Whipping pops in Delhi is like killing our priests and scientists!
Plus, that axe will cost us 1 gold/turn and we don't really need him. Maybe if we do whip, it can be a temple instead...
I don't really see the need to whip pre-Pyramids, either. We will want to work Specialists ASAP. At most, we should whip 2 people into the Granary, but as I said, I only tested whipping 1 person, so you'll want to ensure that you test out this scenario before you do so.
Remember to do so in a test game. It's very important that you do. Why? Becuase the WHIP OVERFLOW MUST BE STONE-ENHANCED. So, you must plan in advance when you need to Quarry the Stone. You can best "plan things in advance" by trying them out in a test game first and then writing down what you did. There are no "take-backs" in the real game, but you can redo your actions a million times in the test game until you feel that you have the timing correct.
How much food is the food box in Riverdale right now? The ideal time to complete the granary is when the food box is half full on the turn it is completed (actually, half full after the whip since the amount of food required to grow will drop by 3F for each pop you whip). There's a bit more to it, but I don't have the ability to run a test game to provide the exact details. Doing it when the food box is half full is a good approximation, and it ensures that the granary will be full (i.e. food box will be half full) when we next grow.
In order to maximize the effects of the above fact, we will likely need to whip the Granary on the last turn possible for us to be able to whip it for 2 population points WHEN ORGANIZED RELIGION IS ENABLED, ALONG WITH CONFUCIANISM AND SLAVERY. But how will you know, because switching into Organized Religion plus Confucianism changes the timing of when you should whip?!?!? That's what the test game is for!
Test is out until you're happy with your timing and only then should you be playing things out.
If you find that the Food box is almost empty in order for you to whip for 2 population points, then we may just have to get The Pyramids on turn 135 with a 1 population whip into the Granary.
You shouldn't "speed up" The Pyramids if doing so requires you to whip more things than the Granary, as getting The Pyramids faster by 1 turn won't help us if we don't have the population points to immediately hire Republic-enhanced Specialists. Make sense? That 1 turn won't make a difference in completing The Pyramids--either an AI will have Stone or be Industrious or both and will beat us, or they won't beat us. That Turn 135 date is safe for "regular" Emperor-level AIs and getting The Pyramids any sooner due to extra whipping (beyond 1 to 2 population points into the Granary) will NOT help us out but WILL hurt us.
