ALC Game 21: Zulus/Shaka

Abegweit said:

that doesn't make much sense on a doughnut map.

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It's Cylindrical wrap, not Toroidal, so there is a centre of this map, and it will be important.

But I don't think we should risk spending 40 turns in the wilderness trying to find a better spot.

Winston Hughes said:

It's Cylindrical wrap, not Toroidal, so there is a centre of this map, and it will be important.

But I don't think we should risk spending 40 turns in the wilderness trying to find a better spot.

Click to expand...

I thought that Inland Sea was the map which has a big lake in the centre. On looking it up, I see that it actually has tundra in the centre Just one more reason to settle on the spot.

Abegweit said:

I thought that Inland Sea was the map which has a big lake in the centre. On looking it up, I see that it actually has tundra in the centre Just one more reason to settle on the spot.

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Erm, I think we're both getting confused here.

Inland Sea is just solid land with one massive lake in it (I guess that's what you meant by 'doughnut' - sorry, my mistake).

With a Flat world wrap the lake is in the middle of the map, while with a Cylindrical wrap the centre of the map is land and the lake is at the sides (though since the map is continuous on the horizontal plane, the position of the lake on the minimap has no practical effect on the game). The only place you'll find tundra here is at the very northern and southern edges.

I'm not sure what it is you've been looking at, although I vaguely remember having once seen a map with a single ice-cap in the middle and ocean around the edges...

Ah. My memory is better than my reading comprehension. Inland Sea is indeed the doughnut. The other one is called "Hub".

So settle in place then.

Round 1: 4000 BC to 2750 BC (50 turns)

This looks like it's going to be a tough map.

For starters, I decided to settle in place.



There were no extra goodies in the fat cross, at least none that are visible yet.



Still, there's another hill to the south of me, so that's something, I guess. As you can see, I started off by building a Worker, using the wooded plains hill to make the most of Expansive's hammer boost for that unit.

It didn't take long to start meeting nearby civs:



Huayna is to my west, and as you'll see, he's the most likely candidate for an Impi rush--if I can manage one.

To my north, you see, I have a Protective leader:



I researched along the recommended path, towards Bronze Working.



My Worker first irrigated the wheat. I was still researching Bronze Working, so he couldn't chop forests yet, and all the hills had 'em, so no mines. The only thing to do was to farm some more. So how many farms do I need?



I used white for food surplus, yellow for deficit. This city will need seven farms to reach its maximum population size. Well, there are eight plains tiles that can be easily irrigated post-Civil Service, so that's what I'll do. The flood plains and grasslands can be cottaged to take maximum advantage of
Bureaucracy--assuming I don't move the capital by then.

Also, I don't thing moving the capital 1N would have done me much good. I'd have traded a grassland hill, a plains, and a grassland for a flood plain, a lake, and a desert hill. 1E might have been a little better, trading 2 plains for a riverside grassland and a grassland hill--but again, that's not a substantial difference. And I'm still hoping for a strategic resource on that spot anyway. Iron, specifically.

Next tech:



I changed civics...



So... any copper for early Impis? I'm afraid it's not lookin' too good on that front:



I did eventually find some copper, but unfortunately, it's to the west of Huayna's capital. So it looks like the Impis will have to wait until Iron Working, which means an Impi rush might be out of the question. Nevertheless, I think I can still get some use out of them for pillaging and stifling.

Oh yes, and as you can see, I am, as many of you feared, pushed up against the edge of the map.

I decided to research Animal Husbandry next, to see if I had horses anywhere nearby. Being that close to the map edge made me nervous about barbs, so I want to get at least one half-decent military unit available to me soon. Once my second Scout was finished, I started building a Settler to claim whatever strategic resources I find.

Next, from the east...



See what I mean about Huayna being the only real early war target? I've got Protective Wang Kon to the north and Hammy with his Bowmen to my east. Go west, young man!

I finished researching my next tech...



So... any horses? Yeah, and they're not too far away, to my southwest:



Again, the map is pointing me westward, towards Huayna. I can found a pretty decent city 1W of the mountain that would claim the horses, corn, and sheep on its first border pop. So should I research Mysticism next for monuments, or The Wheel for roads?

The Settler's ready and waiting in the capital. I was thinking of building the UB next. Should I build another Warrior or a Worker instead?

So our dreams of early conquest have been nixed. I'm not surprised; as I recall, the map scripts were changed in Warlords to make copper more rare and thereby nerf the axe rush a little bit. Still, it is a little disappointing, as I was looking to make full use out of the Impis. It' will now be a little more challenging to exploit them, since they're not going to come along until much later.

I feel your pain about copper, out of my last 5 games only once did I get copper anywhere close, my current game, I didn't get copper, horse or iron in the BFC.

anyways good luck this looks to be a challenging map

Re: Next Build Worker vs. Warrior

I'd compromise. If you're going to grow in 4 turns, but the warrior for 4 turns while your worker chops a forest between Ulundi and your first expansion city. When Ulundi reaches size 3, switch to a work and work your production tiles to get the expansive bonus.

I don't know if you've played many Inland Sea maps. They have a lot of extra space, and you only have 1 neighbor that I can see.

As for the expansion, horses seem like a very good idea. Get some chariots up and running. We might not get to see an ultra-early impi rush but we could see some mixed stacks of chariots and impis, which aren't bad. Chariots can attack axes, which are the main weakness of the Impi.

I'm not sure which Tech to go for next. Do you want to chop a monument in the new city? Would you be happy to wait and whip it? Wheel could be useful to connect your cities as well as get roads to the resources for when you finally do pop borders.

Finally, you might consider settling N-NW of the horses, (NE of the sheep). It would put those sheep in your inner ring to work right away and would still get you the horse and corn. You could backfill later and use the Eastern sheep (closer to your capital) to work some of those fur tiles.

Wow, pretty fertile land. You sure you don't want to go for a cultural victory

But seriously, there are three powerful city sites that pop out to me (and they are all nearby):

1) The horses site you mentioned, which could also be moved 1W to leave that eastern sheep for fur city. Only problem of 1W is it loses a hill.

2) 1 NE of the gold: Has Ivory, Gold, Grassland Cows, Grassland Corn and 3 floodplains. And it is already connected to your capitol by that long river.

3) 2N of the stone: A powerful commerce site with 5 floodplains. It is on the river for health, and should have ample hammers with plains cows and the stone (I can't tell, is that grassland 2E, 1N of the proposed city site a hill or not?).

I think you should settle the horses first before Huayna snags it, while building a warrior, warrior, settler in the capitol. I would want the gold city settled quickly for a nice boost toward researching IW.

BTS and it's damned No Copper Syndrome. I'm sure you'll find Iron in the capital's BFC, but that'll be pretty late for a "rush". Looks like it'll be the Horse Archers/Impi army after all.

I like the corn/horses/sheep spot, so it's got to be Mysticism for a monument there. 1 NE of the gold also looks very nice for a commerce city to finance your army.

Hopefully HC will be nice enough to found a religion and/or build a wonder or two for you ...

How about a city 1NW of the stone? Research wheel, masonry, and mysticism while building another worker, then build Stonehenge and/or the Great Wall? I know you weren't planning on being Wonder Boy, but the Impi rush just ain't gonna happen as hoped.

I don't understand your food calculations... don't you have 8 surplus, rather than 5 (meaning 4 farms) - 2 from the city square, 3 from the wheat and 3 from the flood plains?

Sisiutil said:

So how many farms do I need?

I used white for food surplus, yellow for deficit. This city will need seven farms to reach its maximum population size. Well, there are eight plains tiles that can be easily irrigated post-Civil Service, so that's what I'll do. The flood plains and grasslands can be cottaged to take maximum advantage of
Bureaucracy--assuming I don't move the capital by then.

Click to expand...

Nice little description here, this is exactly what I do with city planning early on. However you've made a mistake adding up your surplus: 3 flood plains + wheat is 6 surplus food, not 5! So you can make do with one farm less.

Also, excellent idea about not farming up now. It will be a while until the city is large enough to even consider working the plains tiles, so as long as you've got enough surplus food to work the hills (you need 4 surplus, which you've surpassed) you will be fine.

As for the next move, I would strongly urge you to research Iron working in the hope that one of those unforested tiles reveals it. Horses are nice but I wouldn't settle your second city until you get Iron Working down - having 2 cities will start to drain your nonexistent funds meaning you'll lose research power; tech to iron working BEFORE placing your second city, please!

I would be tempted to restart if you don't get Iron nearby, if not for the fact that you'll be struggling with just horses then for the fact that we'll have an ALC where we cannot truly witness the power of the civilization you are playing. Your capital isn't too bad with those flood plains but you've been dealt a tough hand, and if you are truly going to REX then you will suffer for your capital's location unless you expand in all directions at once; I would consider a late game move of the capital, but that can wait.

First impressions: V. bad starting position. Not the worst possible, but pretty awful nonetheless.

Forget the rush for now. Conquering HC won't open up decent expansion options. He's started south of the sea, and you'll end up very strung out if you expand that way right off the bat.

Archery or The Wheel are the only choices for next tech imo - anything else and you could well be barb-fodder. Can't risk waiting on IW.

After the pony city, expand north-east along the river. Under no circumstances allow the unrushables to box you into this crappy corner of the map!

Once you've carved yourself a space (and, we-beg-you-oh-mighty-RNG, got some iron), you can think about taking HC down.

But don't let Shaka's bloodlust divert you from the strongest course. If that's war, then great. But this looks like too tough a start for Role Playing, so be prepared to play peaceful for a while if that seems the safer option.

Chariotrush Huayna, settle his copper site (well he'll probabely do that for you). You'll be left with lots of land with even more food to backfill. And you've got your Impis. But no target Maybe Chariots and Impis vs Hammurabi?

Chariot-rushing Huayna's definitely an option, but it'll be an expensive one.

If you do decide to go down that route, I'd settle on the grassland between horses and sheep, since you can't really afford the delay waiting for your borders to pop. You'll want another couple of workers to speed things along, and to research wheel next. Ulundi has 7 very choppable forests (3 for mines and 4 riverside ones that can eventually be replaced by cottages) which will help to get you a sizeable stack of chariots very quickly.

If you find time to sneak out a settler to claim gold, jumbos, corn and cows too, so much the better. Those 2 early happy resources will be huge, not to mention the commerce from a riverside goldmine.

The alternative is to wait until IW, in which case expanding peacefully to 3/4 cities and picking up wheel, mysticism and pottery first to speed research along is probably the wisest move. If you're going to do that, you'll be best off settling the gold site first to get that mine online soonest, which means you either want to chop out another for the horses fairly quickly, or leave that marginal city site to Huayna for now and rely on Impis to nerf any chariots he decides to build.

go for IW, you NEED those impi (making only chariot is non-sens, you UU moves faster and can get cover & CR promotions, just use chariots to put axemen down).
IMO, you'd better expand north, along the river, try to secure the whole river with 2 or 3 more cities (so many FP there that food shouldnt be an issue, the idkandha + the connection through the river will allow you to sustain those cities) :


and rush incas with impies to block West, you might need plenty of them, but taking an early second capital site is quite important, and this would give you a huge landmass to grab.

Shoot the Moon said:

Wow, pretty fertile land. You sure you don't want to go for a cultural victory

But seriously, there are three powerful city sites that pop out to me (and they are all nearby):

1) The horses site you mentioned, which could also be moved 1W to leave that eastern sheep for fur city. Only problem of 1W is it loses a hill.

2) 1 NE of the gold: Has Ivory, Gold, Grassland Cows, Grassland Corn and 3 floodplains. And it is already connected to your capitol by that long river.

3) 2N of the stone: A powerful commerce site with 5 floodplains. It is on the river for health, and should have ample hammers with plains cows and the stone (I can't tell, is that grassland 2E, 1N of the proposed city site a hill or not?).

I think you should settle the horses first before Huayna snags it, while building a warrior, warrior, settler in the capitol. I would want the gold city settled quickly for a nice boost toward researching IW.

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My sentiments exactly. Horse city, stone city, gold city. Hopefully you'll also have acquired some iron in the process to go pounding with horses and impis. Squeezing in the GW or Stonehenge would be useful. The latter particularly because many of those city positions will only become really beneficial after the first borders pop.

ese-aSH said:

go for IW, you NEED those impi (making only chariot is non-sens, you UU moves faster and can get cover & CR promotions, just use chariots to put axemen down).
IMO, you'd better expand north, along the river, try to secure the whole river with 2 or 3 more cities (so many FP there that food shouldnt be an issue, the idkandha + the connection through the river will allow you to sustain those cities) :

Click to expand...

Sis wrote that the nearest copper is W of HCs cap. HCs second city will claim that copper for him. Then there will be axes. And Impis and Chariots can't crack cities with Archers and Axes. And HC will surely have both in his cities. He just can't start building Impis after he researched IW. This is too late.

It's ALC 21, and you do the food counting (with a double mistake : counting to 5 surplus instead of 6, and forgetting the central tile's food) now?
come on, we know (well, those of us who can count further than 5 ) this, and we also know that on emperor level, you'll be hard pushed to get to a size where it matters.

To be more constructive, I vote for chariot rushing too.
Who wants to wait for iron?

I see some good citys around. the one you want to settle is mediocre but needed. you shold reserch mystesism now when your settler is ready and bring your worker to choop a forest in to a monument. menwhile you can build one more worker to improve whatever title in your capital. road after mystesism to conect city and horses. then pottery, Writing or IW. If your economy is bad i whold sugest Pottery for cheap granarys and cottages. I often tend to reserch wrighting after pottery so you can build a library and run a scientist or two to healp reserch IW.

Reserch

Mystesism -> Road -> pottery -> writing or IW

The map included tell about posible city sites. I belive many will argue about the pink dot to be placed 1E. Me however think that settle one from river is a bad choise when that city will have a great production boost with a levee. the shared floodplain titles will be able able for pink city after biology, red city needs evry floodplain at the moment, good prod city however. if you want to settle agresive you have brown and "brown red" dot. Brown dot is the best GP farm in this area, "brown red" looks like a production city and have the last granary bonus resource. light green dot is a mediocre prod city. you have many black dots the most eastern dots whold grab cow corn and gold. the city i like most of the eatern black dots is "black white" dot, this city can healp pink city to work cottages and have enough of food to work gold hills and cottages to him self. It will be a lame hybrid but all city's can't be great.