SGOTM 11 - Plastic Ducks

Yep, that's a valid point about the NE completion.
I noticed while typing the 2 micros that the OR bonus wouldn't only be lost for the whip of the Aqueduct but also for the 2 chops... Which start to add up.

I'll edit Delhi's micro to fit Duckweed's plan.


Remain a few differences. I'm willing to change them provided arguments :



And since we're on another page :
Plan ! T146-156 :

Since we're using the W wb for the 3rd clams, start heading back right now. We can see ice 2 tiles from its current position so the odds of finding anything new there are close to 0.

Going to check the rest in a few hours.

- T146: Whip Granary in Pataliputra (right before growth) --> Whip on T147.
- T153: Pali whips Forge --> delayed on T154.

Honestly, I don't know which way is better.

- T151: Calcutta whips Granary --> Delayed to T154.

I said your way could be better.

-T153: Bombay FW 2N1W I&C --> FW 2N2W I&C. I'm assuming that's a typo on your part, here. 2N2W is the tile we farmed and cancel earlier.

Can't check game now, I'm sure there are something wrong in my plan.

-T155: Bombay FW 1N2W I&C --> stays in place and farms. The FW is already by the river, I think... typo as well ?

This FW refers to a new FW from Delhi, the old one goes for Pat and did nothing in this turn. I send 2 FWs toward Pat to do the forest chop to try to finish Part as soon as possible. (Depend on when we want to whip the granary in Fish/Deer city, it's probably better to let the FW chopping the forest do the chop in Pat from beginning. I guess that's a lot of modifications, forget about it)

Click to expand...

Yes, as kossin pointed out, we surely can whip Aqu earlier if we can convert to Confu sooner.

T141 -- Do you want to do some trade with Meh? this can decide now.
T155 -- FW move?

One issue for the next set, Do we want to whip a settler from Pat to settle the whale/silver site before HG done? I think yes.

Heavy edition made the colouring in red much less useful, so :
The plan is black and clean again.

Your comments were taken into account.
What differs from Duckweed's plan is sufficiently clear, I believe (that's the part that's in spoiler. Looks well on its way to be fixed.).


@ Duck :
Alrighty.
For T155 1N2W, I figured it out as well : error on my part. Workers moving all the way are confusing
However, I forgot about that final difference with your initial plan :
"-T155: Vij FW 1S3W" ... but I see you adressed it. Those 2 FW are to chop the Parthenon in the next set.


@ Confu :
Yep, I'll modify the schedule if we can revolt earlier. I'll catch up with cottaging 1N of Delhi and mining the iron.
I doubt it will happen, though.

@ Fish'n Deer whipping :
I would think that letting it work Delhi's cottage is better than whipping it... I'd have whipped it at size 3. But... I dunno, actually.
We can whip it from T152 if we want. Maybe we should do so... *Getting used to granary storing food on a turn per turn basis*

@ T141 : yes, I think the trades with Mehmed you suggested are a good idea. You proposed the fish, but maybe he'll accept clams, which would be (slightly) better for us.

Patali settler:

Yes at some point after Forge is whipped we can do a 3-pop whip of the settler before building a LH and before HG is finished.

We would need to test it *now* however to see the timing, i.e. until when do we delay HG (we can send it in the queue easily but for how long). If it doesn't work well we can always whip Delhi again

The city will be crap but GLH will make it pay for itself (even if it stays at size 3~4 forever) and add some to the empire.

Finally to do this we should check which forests we should chop to Delhi.

I'd like another settler as well
I guess Forge --> LH --> Settler would work.

But :
Why settle on the ice ? The whales are already in our cultural border, and 1 of the silver tiles also is.
We will have 1 food surplus from the whales once we have a lighthouse and that's about it... What do we gain ? Trade routes, yes, and 1 silver. Really, nothing else
How long would it take to get LH+Granary ? We're not done to Optics either...

I mentionned 4E1S of Delhi earlier, the spot is decent with 3-4 grassland farms (most spots 4E of Delhi are decent, but this one is coastal and also gets the last silver on its 2nd border pop).
However, as said Kossin, it takes 4 forests from Delhi. Settling on the southern silver only takes 1 forest from Delhi. --> What exact spot did you envision, Duckweed ?

If 4E1S of Delhi is a bad idea, I'd rather settle 3W1N of Pali than on the silver.
Pali won't work all its tiles, so sharing them with another city can work.

T146:

2-gold city: I think Merchant is a good “tile” to work on (-2F+3G+3B). On the other hand, this city almost reaches its limit at size 3 so granary doesn’t really make much difference. IMO we can delay this whipping and do it when the food bar nearly gets a half.

Pata: 2 pops working on 2 2F2C seems better.

T147:

Delhi: we can delay the whipping of forge by 1 more turn. You can make 2 pops working for 1 more turn without losing anything.

T148:

FW from Bombay: If you want to delay the TGL in Delhi to T153, why make this FW hurry to chop in Delhi? If the forest 1E of Delhi needs no more than 4 turns to chop down as the Test Game indicates, leave it to the FW of 2E of Delhi. This FW from Bombay can goes to 2E of Bombay to chop, making the granary finished at the half of the food bar.

T150:

Varan: I think the overflow can go to Library instead of Forge. In fact the next buildings this city needs will be no more than Library, University and/or bank+port. The forge doesn’t make difference in short term, even in middle term. I don’t want to spend hammers on it given its poor production.

T152:

Tech to Hunting would be fine.
FW 2N4W: road is better than farm.
FW in Fish+Deer city: can start to improve the deer.

Some ideas:

We're quite well in terms of beakers/tech so far. Beakers amount is significant compared to a normal game. But I have no doubt that it will be much less significant by 500AD or 1000AD. SE is not a substantial economy; TE neither if no effort is spent to improve it.

I think it's time to:
1) concern about CE. Varan need Library instead of Forge apparently, and the same for the Fish+deer city and Fish+Horse city in the future. These are good spots for CE and ought to be prioticized earlier than later.
2) think about Compass+Harbor. Harbors have very good value for hammers in this kind of map+playstyle (80H-96H for +4-6C per turn). It's really worthy prioticizing after Libary/University esp in the commerce city.
3) prepare for running some Pacifism. We still need GP even in the late game: GA with MoM is the best propellant in the late game. It would be good to prepare two Hindu Missionaries for Delhi and Pata.

Just tried the plan:

T147
No longer need to work the mine in Delhi... there's already more than enough overflow in NE. Cottage>farm>mine as earlier
I suggest delaying the granary whip 1 more turn to t148. Why?
t147 Patali has just grown to size 5 so it's not the optimal whipping time, plus we gain 1 hammer from the forest. Whipping on t146 is even worse as it loses 1 food.
or... We gain 2 commerce minus some upkeep (0.8) and don't lose food.
Forge whip on t154 vs t155 : we gain 0 hammer on t154 whip (25% bonus on 4 hammers 1 turn earlier vs 1 more turn of forest) but lose 2 commerce (0.8 more upkeep). Whipping later is slightly stronger both times. It ends up as 1 hammer+4 commerce vs 1.6 gold. Waiting longer (1 more turns when we grow to 7 @ t156) is even better as a matter of fact as the forge bonus won't make a difference to our hammer output before we hit size 5 to work the forest (7 vs 6 hammers per turn).

Well this turned out as a wall of text...
tl;dr
Patali whips granary t148 and whips forge t156 seems the best approach I think.

What are the next techs? Hunting>Paper or just Paper?

I'd go Hunting>Paper and as a result...
T153
Don't mine the Iron, we don't need it now, instead head to fish+deer and make a camp. The iron won't be needed for quite some time.

@dingding
t146
Good catch... I guess we don't actually need to revolt to Slavery+OR right away but can wait a few turns to save more gold (whichever comes earliest: T148 or Pleased Toku). The granary can always be whipped the turn when we go Confu.

t147
Good catch again. Definitely delay the whip (this is from my old micro suggestion when we were already in Confu+Slavery+OR)

t148
TGL finishes on t152. However you're right... we don't need 2 forest chops to complete TGL, 1 is enough and that can be done by the lone worker there already.

t150
The forge will pay for itself after 17 pops are whipped... so if we only want Library/University/Observatory/Harbor then it might be fine... however the 3 happy from the forge are kinda nice to have.

t152
Agree with Hunting>Paper
FW move is fine I think

@dingding's other post
1) This depends on how many pop we're planning to whip there. The most important is to have 6 universities done as fast as possible. If whipping a forge delays that then I agree to not whip the forge right away. As I said Forges pay for themselves with 17 whipped pops which isn't that much of a stretch for several cities.
I'm a bit concerned about slow growth in fish+horse which is why I'd add a few farms over there which can be cottaged over later on.

2) Yes but after Universities are done... although a few older cities might benefit from it if they have spare pops/hammers.

3) Yes obviously, however hammers to get the needed infra now are a bit superior atm. In my test I was in Pacifism almost the whole time.

As for CE vs SE: we don't have time to detour to Democracy I think, we'll be running Caste for a while anyway and Bureaucracy in the capital. However you are right that we should consider it.

After all 1 rep scientist is -2F+6B (we can ignore the GPP here because no city other than Delhi/Patali is going to spawn a GP ever)... which is almost the same as 2 coast tiles with Colossus or 2 villages pre-PP (15 turns of cottage and 30 turns of hamlet).

Our land is very green so it makes a lot of sense to cottage a lot...

BUT, I think we have to wait after seeing more of the map to decide. [Paper!]

Interesting. I edited the plan only slightly, time to fully understand your adjustments.
I'll play Kossin's micro for Pali and prolly go with it (irrationnal fear that whipping later we end up with a smaller city ^^).

A few things I'd question :
- Hiring an artist in Agra.
In hindsight, maybe we should have started a lighthouse rather than a granary, there. However... now that we are building the granary, we can hope to grow the city to size 5-6.
The -2F from the specialist is relevant. Not whipping now will eat food and further delay the regrowth to pop3 if we whip in the incoming turns. If we assign a specialist, we want to slow build the granary (which is why a lighthouse would have been better).
- Research Hunting ourselves.
Alright, there are caps on trades with AIs... But what do we really want from them ?
Machinery and Guilds, I guess... Much more ?
--> I'm not sure we should worry about trading too much right now.
(Improving the Deer is fine for the health bonus, but not clearly better than working one of the 5 lake tiles, once Fish&Deer will have a Lighthouse)


Things on standby :
- FW moves : I'll wait for more input.
- Varanasi infra : Intuitively, I'd have skipped the forge as well : going library first puts less pressure on the city to work cottages. I understand the Forge will pay for itself, though, and... now we've got the whole 3 precious metals. Maybe the question shouldn't be about hammers but rather : do we want to 3pop whip it now and again when Education is in ? Or do we prefer to whip it once when Education comes and then as late as possible to boost the happy cap ? (Questions are biased, yes. Always !)
- City by city improvements : I guess we aren't all making the same plans for those cities we have... That's kind of why I provided a "map of improvements" a bit earlier. The question here concerns mostly Calcutta & Fish'n Deer (& Bombay). I don't mind Calcutta's future (I'd have cottaged it like DingDing but farms are alright), but I think the Deer city would be a good host for the Statues Moai.


I'm confident I forgot some things you adressed, but I will read it all again tomorrow

@BIC
Run a test for the issue of granary whip time to answer your question.

- T146: Whip Granary in Pataliputra (right before growth) --> Whip on T147.
- T153: Pali whips Forge --> delayed on T154.

Honestly, I don't know which way is better.

Test1 -- whip in T146 -- result in T156-- 41F, 80H
Test2 -- whip in T148 -- result in T156-- 35F, 85H

Therefore, whip in T146 as my plan is better.

Click to expand...

Replies to dingding's suggestions.

1. Forge whip in Delhi -- I'd whip it as soon as possible since Delhi will gain 25% hammer bonus from tile yield and specialists sooner. Sigh, What do we gain by whipping it later?
2. Research Hunting -- No, as I mentioned earlier, we need to produce many warriors and the Deer tile is no better than lake tiles. Finally, I'd trade it instead of research it ourselves. There's not many techs we need to trade.
3. Var -- Definitely Forge next. We will need forge eventually, why not earlier to save all those hammers? Var has +7F and will grow pretty fast.
4. CE -- Only Delhi and Var apply. We need a Food/Hammer economy to whip all infras as soon as possible and to build an army.
5. Compass -- Yes, for the harbors and early Optics. Although I am really curious about the barbarian city near Justinian.
6. Pacificism -- Yes, probably after OU.

@Duckweed
I figured we were losing some food with later granary whip... I guess we'll be 1 turn earlier at several new pop #s however (gaining further hammers and commerce) so in the long run t146 whip ends up being better - agreed.

Delhi Forge whip: base production after whipping is 12 so forge adds 25% -> 3 hammers, the same as working the mine. However by whipping earlier we're giving up on 1 cottage turn and 1 commerce from the mine. So it ends up as:
1 food vs. 5 commerce (+1 turn of growing a cottage) (I say 5 commerce as when whipping we're left with 41 which goes to 60 with Bureaucracy while 44 goes to 66)... later forge appears to be better.

Bangalore fish+deer
Yes a LH lake ~ deer however the LH is still quite a few turns away and having another food tile will accelerate the LH's completion. We can trade away the copper and not completely road the iron to continued building warriors.

@BIC
Regarding improvements, the optimal path for maximum commerce is grow first, then cottage... so even if we decide to cottage some farms will be most welcome.

@bigger picture
I'm also quite curious about the island by Justinian. Clearly that looks hand-built with almost only green tiles. I wouldn't be surprised if a resource lied there but I'm almost certain it's not the fur now... the fur is probably hidden far north (just had a weird idea of a mountain maze that we need to navigate) on an island requiring Astronomy.

Finally, what are people's thoughts on the silk city north of Mehmed? Capturing it would certainly be good but doing so will be difficult since it's so freaking far.

Tokugawa
NoWarProbs: 0/10/50/90/100
MaxWarRang: 100
MaxNearbyPowerRatio: 100%
MaxDistantPowerRatio: 30% (this is good for us as we're not land targets)
UnitProb: 30
Required Attitude for bribing: Pleased
Maximum Attitude for DoWing them: Pleased
Religion: +4
Share War: +5
Share Civic: +6 (Mercantilism)
Open Borders: Pleased
Trade Techs: Pleased, 100% must know
WFYABTA: 5 (Emperor bonus?) /// Need to check
Trade resource: Pleased (Luxury); Pleased (Health); Friendly (Strategic)
Trade maps: Never!
Stop Trading with us: Cautious
Stop Trading with them: Pleased
Convert Religion: Friendly
Convert Civic: Friendly
Vassal: Pleased
Def. Pact: Pleased
Peaceweight: 2, +2 warmonger respect, -1 Base Attitude
Builds wonders: 20

kossin said:

Delhi Forge whip: base production after whipping is 12 so forge adds 25% -> 3 hammers, the same as working the mine. However by whipping earlier we're giving up on 1 cottage turn and 1 commerce from the mine. So it ends up as:
1 food vs. 5 commerce (+1 turn of growing a cottage) (I say 5 commerce as when whipping we're left with 41 which goes to 60 with Bureaucracy while 44 goes to 66)... later forge appears to be better.

Click to expand...

There is hidden factor, whipping early let Delhi grow back faster, in the extra turn you let 2 citizen work on a cottage and a mine, but whipping earlier put them to work on Farm and cottage. Hence whipping earlier is a pure gain.

kossin said:

Bangalore fish+deer
Yes a LH lake ~ deer however the LH is still quite a few turns away and having another food tile will accelerate the LH's completion. We can trade away the copper and not completely road the iron to continued building warriors.

Click to expand...

Make sense.

kossin said:

Finally, what are people's thoughts on the silk city north of Mehmed? Capturing it would certainly be good but doing so will be difficult since it's so freaking far.

Click to expand...

I have a feeling we need to DOW Meh.

Isabella
NoWarProbs: 0/10/50/90/100
MaxWarRang: 200
MaxNearbyPowerRatio: 130%
MaxDistantPowerRatio: 100%
UnitProb: 25
Required Attitude for bribing: Pleased
Maximum Attitude for DoWing them: Pleased
Religion: +7
Share War: +3
Share Civic: +4 (Theocracy)
Open Borders: Cautious
Trade Techs: Cautious, 60% must know
WFYABTA: 5 (Emperor bonus?) /// Need to check
Trade resource: Annoyed (Luxury); Cautious (Health); Pleased (Strategic)
Trade maps: Friendly
Stop Trading with us: Pleased
Stop Trading with them: Cautious
Convert Religion: Friendly
Convert Civic: Pleased
Vassal: Friendly
Def. Pact: Friendly
Peaceweight: 6, +1 warmonger respect, -1 Base Attitude
Builds wonders: 20

@Duckweed
We lose only 1 food for delaying the whip in Delhi and that comes from working the mine 1 more turn.
Whip on t148: 38/54 food +8 surplus, 2 turns to size 7
Whip on t147: 31/54 food +8 surplus, 2 turns to size 7

On t151 Aqueduct whip we get 35/51 food +7 surplus instead of 36/51 (3 turns either way) unless we swap 1 cottage turn for a farm turn which then gains 1 turn with a t147 whip.

So if we want to micro it this way, t147 whip is fine with me.

OK, let me explain it in this way.

whip on t148 -- cot & Mine

Whip on t147 --
t148 cot + 3H from forge bonus

Hence, we lose nothing but pure gain from earlier whip.

I understand what you mean.

t148 whip:
t147 work 2x corn, silver, gems, farm, 4 cottages (18 prod)
t148 work 2x corn, silver, gems, farm, 4 cottages, mine (22 prod)

t147 whip
t147 work 2x corn, silver, gems, farm, 4 cottages (18 prod)
t148 work 2x corn, silver, gems, 4 cottages, Forge (21 prod)

What you're forgetting:
Forge bonus does not get multiplied by Bureaucracy. Mine gets multiplied by Bureaucracy, resulting in 1 more hammer.

The difference comes at t151-t152-t153 as I said where we'll want to swap 1 cottage turn for a farm or 2 cottage turns for 2 farm turns.

Anyway, I prefer t147 whip if we swap cottage <-> farm on t152.

^^^
This is all based on the test game, if the food is off compared to the actual game then t147 whip might be even better. (need to check)

Mehmed
NoWarProbs: 0/20/70/100/100
MaxWarRang: 100
MaxNearbyPowerRatio: 90%
MaxDistantPowerRatio: 50%
UnitProb: 40
Required Attitude for bribing: Cautious
Maximum Attitude for DoWing them: Cautious
Religion: +5
Share War: +5
Share Civic: +5 (Vassalage)
Open Borders: Cautious
Trade Techs: Cautious, 40% must know
WFYABTA: 5 (Emperor bonus?) /// Need to check
Trade resource: Cautious (Luxury); Annoyed (Health); Pleased (Strategic)
Trade maps: Cautious
Stop Trading with us: Pleased
Stop Trading with them: Annoyed
Convert Religion: Pleased
Convert Civic: Pleased
Vassal: Friendly
Def. Pact: Friendly
Peaceweight: 2, +1 warmonger respect, -1 Base Attitude
Builds wonders: 20