Dr kossin #38

kossin

Deity
Joined
Dec 4, 2008
Messages
9,572
Location
Canada
Welcome to Dr kossin #38.

Dr is an acronym for Daily Round. Yes, I mean to get in an update every day to the games I will be playing. Of course there might be some days where I can only play a little or not at all, but I will make up for it those other days when I do have extra time on my hands.

Since the 21st edition of this series, the difficulty level has been cranked all the way up to Deity. I'm not at the point where I can win every game thrown at me on Deity level... I probably can't even win every game thrown at me on Immortal but it is getting a bit boring. My goal is now to achieve competitive skills on this level which should hopefully help me improve more.

You, the reader, can help me achieve this goal by pointing out where I got astray, give suggestions on how to proceed, use complex abstract mathematical analysis to argue, curse at me or anything that you may like. Please note that you must respect the Terms of Service of CFC in any case :)

You may shadow this game and post it here if you please, but I kindly request that you put it in spoiler tags and that anyone reading the report abstain from using information found there to help me out.

Should you want more clarification about something I've done, just ask for it and I will try to answer as best as I can.

Enough talk, on to the game.

Dr kossin #38​

Round 0 Warrior move
Round 0 Analysis Settling possibilities
Round 0 Settling
Round 1 So much for analyzing a start

Game settings
Deity
Normal Speed
Fractal
No Events
No Huts
Fractal
BTS 3.19 with BUG 4.4 in CustomAssets and BULL 1.2 mods - >>>Get Them Here<<<
No isolation - thanks to .pakje for verifying this.
Everything else is normal.

The leader, this time, is:


Please refer to the Ottoman Civ IV wiki for more information on this leader/nation.

The start:


Forest spam! There are 3-non forested tiles we can see in the fog... hopefully those are all resources.
Not much to say before the city is settled, we could move the warrior somewhere East (SE,E,NE) for some more info on settling. We might consider settling on the bananas so checking SE with the warrior is probably not a bad idea to see what we'd lose (losing un-irrigated Rice is acceptable, losing pigs isn't).
 

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I'd just settle in place. Definitely looks like a cottage spam cap. Hope that something around you reveals the best use for the forests (ie. stone for pyramids, marble for Oracle/GL, lots of land for settlers, or a close neighbour for the army of axes wonder)
 
Settling on the Bananas is tempting, but you'd be giving up 3 river tiles and your only source of commerce pre-bronze (barring flatland gems on one of the 2 bare tiles to the west). Can you get the techs you need with only 9 commerce pre-bronze? 1 extra commerce from the bananas isn't much but ATM it's all you've got. Longer term, you would also be giving up 3 commerce/turn from the loss of the 3 river tiles to the south and west. You'll gain a few worker turns by getting that first worker out earlier. I'm not sure if it's worth the tradeoff.

I'd move the warrior SE and see what is on that bare tile to the south and re-evaluate.

I only see 2 hills in the BFC? I thought the map generator always ensured three hills as a minimum?
 
I would move warrior SW and go from there. If you see nothing from the warrior move settling on bananas would be something to consider.
 
Goat: it looks to me like the tile 2S1W is a hill. 3 hills are guaranteed.

I would move the warrior SE and probably SIP. Since it is all forest, you are almost certain to have 4 resources. It is possible for uranium to hide under trees (though they must be initial trees, I think, not map-generator placed ones). Other than uranium, all resources must be on unfeatureful land. So if you move to the bananas you'll lose whatever resource is 2S1E. As you say, an unwatered rice is not a huge loss. But most other resources (or an empty grassland, meaning strategic resource!) would be.

Incidentally, given the pure grassland and the bananas, my guess is that your site is a "forest oasis" in a jungle. So you'll find jungle on your east and west, and either north or south. So, you'll want to find the edge of that. Hopefully there will be gems you can get to.
 
Banana farm looks like it might be a non-trivial part of the food! Bit early to say without moving the warrior but settling on it seems like a gamble. It would take 5 random BFC tiles to the north and potentially no BFC food special at all :)eek:) in exchange for 5 visible grasslands (= pretty good for capital) including a definite bonus tile of some kind to the south.

(Looking forward to janissary action here too!)
 
There is a chance the unforested southern tile is blank until a tech reveals it.

Why not move the warrior 1NE to the hill for farther visibility? Wouldn't that reveal more tiles? Either way I'd vote settle in place (weak prince player fwiw) and hope that unforested tile has iron for a nice production site or horses.
 
Thinking a bit more about the start, it's becoming more likely that I'll SIP so scouting NE with the warrior is probably better to see more tiles.

I'll ponder a bit more on this and perhaps scout+settle tonight... first round tomorrow.
 
Warrior NE first. I am afraid that 1-2 more calendar resources will pop up. And propably a strategic resource. Settling in place looks ok with river, all grassland for heavy cottaging and farming the bananas to have a little food going. Thx for the game in advance. Will be following this again (just as all the other DR's).
 
Since it is all forest, you are almost certain to have 4 resources.

I've seen people say this before. But why exactly is that? Start with lots of forests means 4 resources? What determines 'lots of forest'?

For the start i'd also scout NE and go from there.
 
Ooh, that is tough. 1N gains a gem, 1 NE gains 2 gems (although 1 not usable until IW), and you know you get 2 food sources. But you lose the river and freshwater.

1N definitely looks like a good option now, although you still risk not having a food source.
 
Round 0 Analysis

From what we see, there are 4 interesting settling spots. There's always an infinite number of settling possibilities but you only want to consider the best ones.

Option #1: The Greedy Player
Spoiler :


We grab all that we can see.

The good:
-1 gem and 1 germ
-2 bananas

The bad:
-jungle spreads possibility

The ugly:
-2 bananas
-no river access
-only 1 known hill
-low health capacity
-is the worst possible move one can do here. While having the capacity of yielding the best commerce capital by t50, it can also end up as the worst with a jungle spread... you'd be stuck with 2 bananas (one not irrigable), 1 grass hill and a bunch of forests


Option #2&3: The Compromised player
Spoiler :



Both attempts try to grab 1 gem, some of the hidden resources we think we have and we trade an extra bananas for river access in one for the other.

The good:
-less jungle spread chances
-better chance at food seeing has we keep some of the suspect tiles
-decent production

The bad:
-lose river access or 1 food resource
-both lose some hidden tile

The ugly:
-1 turn lost for settling East
-could have 0 food for settling 1N (assuming 2S1E is the only other food)


Option #4: The Careful Player
Spoiler :


SIP - we get to keep all our 'hidden resources'

The good:
-no turn wasted
-minimal jungle spread chances
-most likely the best production site
-more river tiles
-can always grab the gems with the second settler

The bad:
-slower initial research... which is often the limiting factor early on (I mean, look at all those trees!)

The ugly:
-If we end up next to Cathy and she settles her second city to steal MY gems!


I'm hesitating between #2 and #4. Need some more time to reflect on this.
 
I'd go 1N. It uses the banana immediately. It keeps two of the three hidden resources, gets one gems, and keeps the river for health. This city will need health because you'll be running into that limit soon after monarchy. It's a great bureaucracy cottage site. It is fairly likely that one of the resources from original BFC is a corn (that's what the startsite procedure would add if there were not enough resources in step 8). But even if there is no food out there, just having a 2 food surplus is tolerable for an all grassland site. You won't be whipping at all, of course. But you make up for it with tech rate.

You will get both gems eventually, but obviously the jungle one is unusable for some time anyway. You will eventually pair it in a jungle city with the other banana -- which is also unusable until higher tech.

Durak: see this thread:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=359383
 
Great analysis! I wouldn't do #4 - you don't start with Mining, and Bronze Working is expensive, so you need help to get it fast enough for your capital to be of use early on.
 
Could burn a turn to take a look W with the settler (warrior can get a good view N from the hill too). Then if one of the western non-forest tiles is food (seems like a 2/3 chance), hope to settle banana with confidence on turn 2. (Shaves 3 turns off the worker anyway).

If no food is revealed though, ouch. Settle back in place with 2 turns wasted? :(
 
The more I look, SIP looks like a fine choice. Imp can get settlers out fast, so you should be able to beat anyone else to the Gems site. If lucky, you'll find corn and copper in the 2 non-forested tiles.
 
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