ALC 27: Churchill of England

RRRaskolnikov said:

Some testing:

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Nice posting, could you make few of these type in our SGOTM?

Dirk1302 said:

^There's a minus before 27
Informative discussion about the Granary Ras and LP, was always too lazy to look it up/test it myself.

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I see. It appears green on the screenshots. I was beginning to wonder if this is why I still can't handle immortal and deity.

Looks like there's been plenty of good discussion going on! I won't be able to post another round until October 10th but I'll comment on whatever you guys have to say.

ABigCivFan said:

Nice write up.

Given the heavy forest/jungle map, I would have choked/attacked GW much earlier. All we need here is 2 prod cities. Capital + Copper/Cow/Corn (settler 1N of the 2nd copper). hook up copper in Capital ASAP, send in the Woodsman Axe to choke GW, steal workers and etc. Killing 1 barb worrior will get your Axe to WoodsII. A rush on Deity really needs to happen very early.

Your support cities lack either food or production, a near future war looks unrealistic. Also i am afraid by the time you get construction, GW will have Longbows/Phants himself, a war will be very tough then. A costly war will leave you further behind the leading AIs.

I agree with some other poster here to grab all the nearby barb cities first to get 6 cities, possibly go peaceful until Rifling given your decent research rate.

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Going peaceful might be a good idea in this case, but an early war is much more exciting for me.

Washington's tech pace isn't fast this game so I'm pretty sure he won't have longbows by the time we have a war. I'm only aiming to get his capital, San Francisco, and one of his other bordering cities.

Lord Parkin said:

Hammer decay occurs after 10 turns of not working on a unit, whether those turns are sequential or not. So you couldn't build a Barracks after the Settler without the Warrior hammers decaying.


I wouldn't bother. If neither Zara nor Shaka are sending anything at you at the moment, it's probably better not to give up the tech for peace. I'd only sign peace when/if you see a large stack heading your way. For now, just let it be... this will also hopefully lower the price for when you do eventually make peace.


If you want to ensure you get the Great Library, I'd recommend going for Literature first. If you wait for Construction and HBR, you could well lose the Great Library.

All in all I think you should decide on a path and stick to it. Do you want to go to war? Then research Construction/HBR and don't waste any time building wonders. Do you want to improve the economy first before a war? Then go straight for Literature/maybe Currency and don't waste any time building troops first. Personally I'm not sure which option is preferable, although I'm leaning towards making a shot at the Great Library if you can.

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Interesting note about hammer decay, I did not know that.

I'll uphold your tip on holding off peace. It makes sense since they can waste their time building up military instead of teching. I don't think it'll lower the peace cost unless I kill another soldier of theirs.

Dirk1302 said:

I don't know the marble situation, will we get it peacefully? If so there's nothing wrong with going peaceful . I'd take the nearby barb city and settle some of those islands in that case. Try to build Parthenon somewhere near San Fransisco get some tiles back.

Ftm Washington doesn't have med/poly so he's some way from longbows. Your research is ok so no problem to reach construction/HBR in time, production is another matter though. There's not much natural production but there's food surplus in most cities. So units can be whipped. I think you'll have enough production this way to build a sizable army but your economy will suffer. This is not a problem if you can win the war against GW convincingly since you can just lean back and catch up with some 12 cities but if that war stagnates you'll probably be left with some culturally pressed cities and no real gain whatsoever.

Agree with Lord Parkin, if you go to war it'll have to be an all out effort with all cities building/whipping units. Building wonders and taking out a deity ai is just not on. I think you'll need an initial stack of at least 15 units preferably more to begin with and you'll have to reinforce during the war. If you feel such a stack can't be built before GW getting longbows i'd go peaceful. Warring with cats is the exception, not the rule on deity. It's an exciting idea but in the end i think i agree with ABCF that a standard renaissance war set up will be safer even without marble (think we'll get it peacefully though).

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I'm fairly sure I won't get the marble peacefully, which points towards a war with Washington to get it. It's in the BFC of Washington DC.

You're right about Washington not having Meditiation or Polytheism, which is another fact that supports an early war vs. Washington.

Ok no wonders + war at the same time ... ok

RRRaskolnikov said:

I would try to go peacefully too, grabbing the sea foods in the west before Zara. Researching HR instead of Aesthetics would have been more in the path of a rush (you can trade for alpha with it). As the previous posters said, I would try the Parthenon/GL, to leverage your marble city and your tech path.

Also, it seems to me that finishing a granary the turn before the growth is not the best deal you can made... to say the least Best moment for that is half way through the food bar, as that's when the granary starts to accumulate food

Good luck on this, it's a nice read!

Cheers,
Raskolnikov

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If granaries start to acumulate food halfway through the food bar, then wouldn't it make even more sense to finish it the turn before growth, since the turn after, the city will instantly have a food bar that's half-full?

I'll think about founding some of the sea islands. My issue with them is that they're always vulnerable to an attack and rarely prove to be essential cities.

Thanks for enjoying the read!

Lord Parkin said:

Actually, I believe neither you nor DMOC are right on this. Granaries start accumulating food from the moment they're built. So if you build a Granary half-way through growth when you need another 12 food to grow, then there'll be 6 food stored upon growth. If you build a Granary just before growth (when you have say 4 food to grow), then there'll be 2 food stored after the first growth. If you build the Granary just after growth (when you have say 24 food to grow), it'll store 12 food upon growth.

So basically, there is no "optimum" time to build a Granary (unlike in Civ3). It no longer makes a difference at what stage during growth you build the Granary... that bit of micromanagement has become redundant in Civ4.

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This made me remember that I need to understand what granaries really do.

RRRaskolnikov said:

Yes there is... If you manage your chops or arrange your tiles so the granary completes one turn before growth (I exagerate, but anytime after half the food bar is filled), you are effectively loosing food. The way you describe the granary is the way I understand it (but you write far better than me ), but for me there is a difference starting the growing phase with 2 foods or 12 in the bar.

edit: I reread your post more carefully... if you need 12 more food to grow on a food bar of 24, and you complete the granary, it will store all the 12 foods remaining, not 6. Before the half of the bar, you will have a full granary after growth, after you will miss the food accumulated between the half bar and the point where you complete the granary. That's where the difference comes for. So the first half is acceptable, the half is the best (from a food point of view), after that is sub optimal.

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RRRaskolnikov said:

Some testing:

Growing without granary from size 1 to size 2 on a 3 food tile (3*8= 22+ 2 food overflow):

Same with a granary from the beginning, now the final food is 24+11 =22+13 overflow

Same with a granary included at 11 food (worked 3 turn a 3 food tile, then one turn a 2f1h tile, then 4 turn a 3 food tile), result is the same (at least the 11 food stored in the granary): 23 +11 =22+12 overflow:

Finally with a granary included two turn before growth, final food is 8*3 + 2*3 (from the granary) =22+ 8 overflow only:

So i guess you want to finish that granary before half the food is filled

Cheers,
Ras

@DMOC: sorry being OT, but I think it's informative

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It's definitely informative to me.

I still am a bit unsure as to why building the granary at the halfway point is optimal, but I'll reread your posts until I get it. But anyway the granary's already been built in the capital so I think that future cities should try building granaries halfway through, or whipping them asap.

stuttrboy said:

So what are you doing that let's you run 100% science with 27 gold overflow? You don't have currency so you can't be building wealth or trading gold with the AI.

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Dirk1302 said:

^There's a minus before 27
Informative discussion about the Granary Ras and LP, was always too lazy to look it up/test it myself.

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Yep.

stuttrboy said:

I see. It appears green on the screenshots. I was beginning to wonder if this is why I still can't handle immortal and deity.

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Nah, that's because BUG sets the gold amount to be green even if I'm losing gold. It's only red if I'll be going to negative gold in my stockpile.

DMOC said:

If granaries start to acumulate food halfway through the food bar, then wouldn't it make even more sense to finish it the turn before growth, since the turn after, the city will instantly have a food bar that's half-full?

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In short no. I have no idea why they programmed stupid way they are programmed, but if you have more than half [even 1 more] you get less afterwards.


I also saw on early shots what you did grow on size four and into one unhealthiness just to work unimproved FP [egfectively+1gold]. Clearly way to go

Soirana said:

In short no. I have no idea why they programmed stupid way they are programmed, but if you have more than half [even 1 more] you get zero after growth.
Anything bellow half gets transfered.

I really believe people learn this arround monarch not at diety level although.

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In this game with so many little tricks (and few of them critical to winning in of themselves), it's not surprising that someone might miss a detail or two. You tend to learn these things as you come across them either in discussion or through trial and error.

I guess in terms of the food stored while building a granary, the better move would be to starve the city back to half-way and then finish the granary, right?

The granary is easy to understand: it stores food. It may seems presumptuous to say that, but that it exactly how it works.

Let's say you have a city with +4 food per turn. Without a granary, you will have a food bar growing 4 by 4: 4, 8, 12, 16...
If you have a granary, it will grow in parallel: 4(4), 8(8), 12(12), 16(16)... Not sure if it stops at half the full bar, but the idea is that, when the population grows, it will fill the food bar with as much as it have at the moment, capped to half of the bar obviously.

The trick is when you build the granary half-way: then you have something like 4, 8, 12, 16(4), 20(8). So if the city would grow at this point, the granary would give the city 8 food to begin with. Not half of the bar, only the food it has accumulated so far.

I believe the reason why they programmed it this way is to avoid micro managing: if if functioned like DMOC thought, players would try to build it just before growth and micro manage. This way, you can build it any time and it will work, but the faster the better. Of course, you can still micro manage, since it will not change if you build it after city growth or when the bar is half full

RRRaskolnikov said:

Some testing:

Same with a granary from the beginning, now the final food is 24+11 =22+13 overflow

Same with a granary included at 11 food (worked 3 turn a 3 food tile, then one turn a 2f1h tile, then 4 turn a 3 food tile), result is the same (at least the 11 food stored in the granary): 23 +11 =22+12 overflow

Finally with a granary included two turn before growth, final food is 8*3 + 2*3 (from the granary) =22+ 8 overflow only:

So i guess you want to finish that granary before half the food is filled

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Am I missing something? It looks like all you've proved is that it's better to have the granary sooner rather than later. Filling the granary is independent of city growth.

Coffee Mug said:

Am I missing something? It looks like all you've proved is that it's better to have the granary sooner rather than later. Filling the granary is independent of city growth.

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For sake of being total clear -
once granary is made there is check inside game
once a city grows next time that check cames into action - food you get gets penalty for being over half [on check point] actually [i think you get something like remaining part untill growth but not more than half or something like that]

In our case it was better to work pig instead of fp and grow one more population point. this would get more food and hammers now and after growth.

I was probably a bit rude on DMOC since this is not the very basics [honestly i needed a bit sorting myself]. although i did consider this being very general knowledge.

p.s. isn't it best to build granary with empty food bar actually? Or did they changed something in last path?

Coffee Mug said:

Am I missing something? It looks like all you've proved is that it's better to have the granary sooner rather than later. Filling the granary is independent of city growth.

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Filling the granary is about when does it start storing food. A granary does that after half the food is filled. So If you finish your granary after that point, you will be lacking food after the growth (that's what my 4th pic was about, you lacks 3 food compared to the situation of the 3rd pic)

Soirana said:

p.s. isn't it best to build granary with empty food bar actually? Or did they changed something in last path?

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That's the difference between 2nd and 3rd pic. It was patch 3.19 and the food stored was the same in both case (11 food). There won't be any difference, so it's prolly better to grow faster and finish the granary halfway through the growth to next pop if you can make that happen.

Cheers

I think you also have the choice to conquer eAryan, that barb city to the south.
That can be used for training during buildup or as your 6th city on mainland, and then settling the islands? dunno if there are resources on them, but traderoutes may be good and then renaissance war.
But in thinking more about that matter, I suppose attacking GW is better. he will still have some time to chop the jungle and build plantations for you ;-) At least captur Washington, NY, Boston and SanFran (maybe raze and resettle further east?)!

Well, I ended up playing the next round up to turn 171 (35 BC). Suffice to say, this third round is probably the best round I've played in my entire CIV career. In fact, things went so well that I'm kind of glad I lost the Music race to Peter by 2 turns - I would have been embarrassed had everything gone my way!

London (if managed correctly) can generate 104 beakers in the BC era. Without bureaucracy.

Sneak Preview.


Yeah, stupid Joao II decided that he didn't want 15 cities so he gave some to his colony. But seriously, how the heck did Joao II manage to get 15 cities while everyone else was stuck at 5-10??

I'll post the round soon, maybe tomorrow.

Soirana said:

p.s. isn't it best to build granary with empty food bar actually? Or did they changed something in last path?

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Granaries start accumulating food halfway through the food bar on a 1:1 basis. So for every 1 food you produce from 11/22, you get 1 food in some magical breadbasket.

There's some specific micro in there, such as the sweetspot might be 12/22, and when the granary starts storing food in relation to when it's complete. But, that's essentially how the granary works.

EDIT: Am I like the 50th person to say this?

Nares said:

Granaries... So for every 1 food you produce from 11/22, you get looose 1 food in some magical breadbasket.

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Fixed your statement. i suggest looking at Raskolnikov pictures to figure out truth.

Soirana said:

Fixed your statement. i suggest looking at Raskolnikov pictures to figure out truth.

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You lose food for each food over 11/22 you are when the granary starts collecting.

You actively collect each food from 12/22-22/22, putting 11 food in your basket (+overflow from working tiles) when you hit the next pop.

EDIT:That is exactly what RRR said.

However, it's not entirely true.

After doing some digging and some testing, I found this.

The granary threshold isn't 50% of the current food bar. It's 50% of the current food bar -food overflow at growth. An overflow of 5 food at 23/24 (pop2) can complete a granary at 16/24 instead of 12/24.

The overflow is added to the granary before growth, and again in growth. First, you would gain 6 going from 16/24 to 23/24, plus 1 going from 23/24 to 24/24, plus 5 more from overflow, for a total of 12 in the basket. You would then pick up an additional 5 of overflow into 0/26(pop3), for a total of 17/26 (5+12).

This means that the 50% value is relevant only in relation to your food surplus in the turn of growth. There are some cases where you'd still want to target 50% (or just under it), but I feel the vast majority of cities will have some surplus greater than zero to accommodate a later completion date.

DMOC said:

Yeah, stupid Joao II decided that he didn't want 15 cities so he gave some to his colony. But seriously, how the heck did Joao II manage to get 15 cities while everyone else was stuck at 5-10??

I'll post the round soon, maybe tomorrow.

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Because he's is THE Joao If there is 1 leader that is capable of doint it it's Joao the master rexxer.
Looking forward to your update!

Round 3: 750 BC to 35 BC [42 Turns] - The Fall of America


Time to get moving here.

I finished Masonry, and researched Construction next.



In order to gain some gold, I went around begging AI's. I tried to beg 40 gold from Hannibal (that was all he had) but he refused.



But onto more important news ... the barbarian city (Aryan) to the south fell. To me.



This city was defended by 5 archers and had 2 workers. So how did it fall to my lonely 3 axemen?

Washington suicided 6 units. That left 2 archers in the city, and both were somewhat wounded. The extra workers were nice!

As I mentioned before, Joao II split off his cities into a colony, Napoleon (Organized/Charismatic).



I immediately made a technology trade with him (I think it was for Currency, but I'm not sure).

...

Soon, my troops were in position. My cities were really whipped and I had to stack unhappiness at times, which explains my 0% tech slider. Here's the stack for Washington DC. Another group of axemen and catapults were going to attack San Francisco. Both cities were, fortunately, on flatland.



So did Washington have longbows? Nope.



WAR!

I first decided to attack this swordsman who was outside of a city and guarding a worker. I like to eliminate troops who are outside of cities since they don't experience a defensive bonus. My first axe failed but the next one won at 99% odds, and I moved the stack onto that tile.



The city of San Francisco also fell. It was guarded by 5 units, but only 2 were archers! This city used to have about 8 units in it but Washington obviously suicided at least 4 units vs. barbarians.



Washington outdid my expectations by sending a moderate stack of units to attack York. Good thing I was protective. Just to be safe, though, I upgraded a warrior to an axemen (ouch!). It was pricey, but the city held. I had 2 archers and that axe defending the city. Both archers perished (how does the AI do that??) but the axe won his battle by flying colors.



Meanwhile, Washington itself fell.





I was a little disappointed at the lack of a counter-attack. I've noticed that when the AI is in a war, it doesn't send enough troops to counterattack. Why, for instance, isn't Washington attacking London at the moment?



I got my first Great General and settled him in Nottingham.

Boston was the next city to fall. I had a stack of 11 units attacking a 4 unit stack(1 was whipped the turn before I attacked), but it was on a hill. Too many casualties. Fortunately, Washington decided that he wanted to hole up 10 units in New York and leave a stack of 1 axe and 1 spear in my territory doing nothing.



The stack that had captured Washington then went to Philadelphia. The stack was definitely not as powerful as it was, but it was still enough for Philadelphia. Isn't it great that Washington decided to found his cities on flatlands?





[To be continued in next post.]

Round 3: 750 BC to 35 BC [42 Turns] - The Fall of America

[Continued from previous post]

Seriously ... taking the seventh derivative isn't that hard (see the discussion on page 9).

Example:

f(x) = x^7
f'(x) = 7x^6
f''(x) = 42 ^ 5
f'''(x) = 210x^4
f''''(x) = 840x^3
f'''''(x) = 2520x^2
f''''''(x) = 5040x
f'''''''(x) = 5040

Come on that wasn't too hard, wasn't it? The eighth derivative of f(x) is actually zero.

I hope that the nasty function I posted cancels out somewhere. I have yet to attempt it, actually.

------------------

Anyway the war with Washington was increasingly yielding poorer returns. The cities I captured were of lower quality, and Washington started to have about 5-6 defenders per city, and my troops were getting worn out. Furthermore, I was suffering from +1 unhappiness in London.



Not bad for a "little" war. And Washington immediately became "cautious" with me afterwards.

I renegotiated my resource deals with Hannibal to increase the potential size of my cities.



At this point I decided to go on a really weird gambit ... I noticed that no one had researched Music! So I cranked up research to 100% with my new empire. My empire is now capable of producing >200 consistently, in the BC era.



Unfortunately, Peter beat me. I guess that's good ... this whole round went into my favor (winning some lucky battles, that barbarian city, etc.) that I'm glad I hit a setback.



I had plenty of overflow from last turn, so I put it into a 1-turn archer for an extra hereditary rule happiness. Note the overflow: 37 hammers + 2 hammers = 39 hammers which equals the archer cost. Anything more (or would it just be if I got 40 hammers of overflow?), and I would have wasted production because overflow is capped at the build cost.



I later finished Music, and thus, the round. Music is an excellent technology because of (1) the trading factor, (2) building culture in cities, and (3) the free great artist, which I sadly didn't get.



Next technology: Civil Service so that my capital can produce >100 beakers without building research (at the time of the screenshot, it produces around 86-90 beakers - not bad, although I'm sure players better than me could improve on my research rate).



The Map: With and Without Resources



Individual Cities - In Depth Analysys - (Not all cities are featured)



Technology:



Resource deals:



Glance:



Domestic:



GNP:



Demographics:



Top 5 Cities & Wonders: Interesting ... looks like Hannibal and Tokugawa are the wonder-hoggers.



Aargh ... all of this work and I'm still in the bottom third of the score.

Joao II still has the most amount of cities even after splitting a colony ... hm ....

can't wait for this next part! great game/discussion so far

Thanks.

I have a ridiculous amount of calculus homework to do so this round won't be updated until tomorrow at least.

These ALC's usually have more activity than this. I know DMOC is busy but there's usually more discussion. I've been gone a while is this normal?