NCSG2-Team 2-Lincoln!

Oh gosh! That does change things a bit! I guess it depends on how important tech trading is on Monarch level, if this was prince I would probably carry on with the rush as tech trading isn't so important, but I guess we should let him live in this case. I think Mehmed is going to go down sooner or later.

However if we change plans, shouldn't we settle our first city in an more aggressive position, ie, one of the northern sites?

If we wait for the middle ages to fight Mehmed, I bet we will have quite a furball... in past games, Mehmed generally was the power leader and is quite aggressive. We may not get as far as Trebs before he unloads on us.

Also, a point of clarification... are we using Bhuric's patch or the stock 3.13 load from Firaxis?

I use Bhruic's patch, so I assume everyone else is because all the saves are compatible.

AFAIK Bhruic's patch doesn't seem to affect saves so its optional (tho Bhruic's patch does fix a lot of annoying bugs so its worth having anyway).

Edit: re strategy. We could still go for an axerush. If its just the three of us then we have the option of reducing Mehmed to one city to keep tech trading open and then finish him off when we find another trade partner. It doesn't matter if he refuses to trade with us, the main thing is that it stops Justinian acting like he has a monopoly and refusing to trade.

Sorry, what's REX stand for?

I didn't have Bhuric's patch, and didn't have any problems.
I don't think I have anything more to suggest - is it worth considering settling 2N1W of the copper so we're on the ocean?

REX is Rapid EXpansion.
I like to take the aggressive path whenever possible, so if we think we can pull it off then I say go ahead with it.
I do, however, think this map seems to favor the GLH.

pigswill said:

Edit: re strategy. We could still go for an axerush. If its just the three of us then we have the option of reducing Mehmed to one city to keep tech trading open and then finish him off when we find another trade partner. It doesn't matter if he refuses to trade with us, the main thing is that it stops Justinian acting like he has a monopoly and refusing to trade.

Click to expand...

This sounds like the best option allround, gets my vote.

I am not sure which way to pursue... most of this is because we are hamstrung with no cottages...

If we don't contain Mehmed, he will build cottages and perhaps get a religion of his own building quite a force later on.

If we contain Mehmed, we will gain an unhappy co-resident and still need other source(s) of income.

a. We could go down the GLH route, but it expires with Corporation... not bad, but IMHO not sufficient to go the distance without other sources of income.

b. We could go for one of the later faiths... perhaps Oracle slingshot? However, this seems mutually exclusive with the GLH option at the Monarch level.

If the Oracle is still feasible at this point, I'd vote for Oracle... it gives is Great Priest points early and we get Confucianism or Christianity... both with obvious side benefits as well. The other benefit here is we could spread the word to Mehmed and get him to convert so Justianian likes him less.

On the issue of containing Mehmed, I'd vote for worker-steal / pillage route and just keep a conflict going until we finish the settlers to box him in.

Thoughts?

Hmmm... With regards to our economy which way we should go.

Obviously with a rush against Mehemed we are not going to have a lot of hammers to spend on wonders until weve built our stack and by then its quite possible that it will be a bit risky going for the oracle or greatlighthouse.

I do like the greatlighthouse and traderoute economies however I have never tried one without supplimenting it with cottages.

While the oracle is nice I don't think its much to base our economy around allthough the free expensive tech is nice to trade/catch up in tech.

Looking at all the food we have in our capital and those floodplains (plus I bet mehmed's capital is seafood heavy) I'd be aiming to run a classic scientist/bulbing specialist economy here (we are philosiphical after all), but we'd need the pyramids really and without stone thats alot of hammers, plus I don't know how realistic it is on monarch making a late attempt at it?

We don't need pyramids for a specialist economy, it certainly helps but its not essential.

With philosophical we'll be aiming to produce lots of great people to lightbulb techs.

We can't go wonder hunting and build an army at the same time. I'd rather build an army first and chase Great Library later.

Generally speaking you can get confucianism if you beeline CoL(code of laws) i.e. research meditation, priesthood, writing and CoL almost straight away.

Groogaroo said:

Hmmm... With regards to our economy which way we should go.

Obviously with a rush against Mehemed we are not going to have a lot of hammers to spend on wonders until weve built our stack and by then its quite possible that it will be a bit risky going for the oracle or greatlighthouse.

I do like the greatlighthouse and traderoute economies however I have never tried one without supplimenting it with cottages.

While the oracle is nice I don't think its much to base our economy around allthough the free expensive tech is nice to trade/catch up in tech.

Looking at all the food we have in our capital and those floodplains (plus I bet mehmed's capital is seafood heavy) I'd be aiming to run a classic scientist/bulbing specialist economy here (we are philosiphical after all), but we'd need the pyramids really and without stone thats alot of hammers, plus I don't know how realistic it is on monarch making a late attempt at it?

Click to expand...

For clarity's sake... the Oracle proposal is...

1. Build three or four axes, go north, steal workers, and harass Mehmed
2. Oracle slingshot to Code of Laws, gaining Confucianism and GPPs... ultimately adding income from a Shrine
3. Build Settlers to box Mehmed in after the Oracle.

The Oracle option is not proposing a full rush... just hurt Mehmed enough to slow him down while we box him in. All this is dependent on how risky we perceive a slingshot play is at this point.

Regardless or what bigger picture direction we choose, we need to scout around Mehmed's capital soon to see whether he has metals or horses.

I also am skeptical that we can pull off a pure SE economy on Monarch without an external income stream... even on Noble, a pure SE has been challenging for me once I get to late-middle ages... I just couldn't run enough specialists to keep up with the research, military and expansion costs.

To be honest, I'm pretty easy going whatever way we go with the economy. I was probably jumping the gun a bit starting to discuss stratagies... we havn't even uncovered our landmass yet.

But I think in order to get this game going and let poor old pigswill finish his turnset we need to just get a decision on what to do with Mehmed, so the options seem to be,

1 - Axerush and kill him outright
2 - Axerush and leave him a junk city
3 - build a few axes and choke him
4 - leave him alone but rex towards him with settlers, (settler rush )

I think I like the sound of 2, take his capital and any other cities he might have if they are nice and raze the rest leaving a little junk city which we can dispose of later when it suits us.

I like 2 or 3. I haven't played monarch so can't comment on our chances of wonder-grabbing.

Played 20 turns up to 2000bc.

T7.
Mysticism>Writing (for open borders and on way to CoL (or alphabet)).
New York founded 1N of copper. Starts archer.

T10.
Washington WB>archer.

T16.
NY Archer>axe.

T18.
Washington Archer>worker.

T20.
Mehmed converts to Buddhism (founded by Justinian).

That's it really. WB working second clams. Copper's mined and connected, building road to connect our two cities. New York doesn't have any culture atm. We're about six turns from writing. OB with Mehmed to scout out his cities is probably worth doing.

The south:


The north:


As expected Mehmed's ruining our dot map.

New York is unhealthy due to floodplains (if we'd gone north we'd have had freshwater but more floodplains and health would have ended up the same).
Could do with connecting the cows in Washington. Cows and clams would give NY a health cap of 4. At pop 4 NY could work farmed floodplain, grassland copper, 2 plainhill mines which would make it food neutral and producing 14 hammers/turn which is enough to build some axes.

Here's the save:

Cool! Pretty much expected Mehemed to start settling towards us, won't do him any good. I agree we need to scout out Mehemeds land, see if he has any horses and metals.

Oh yeah and a reminder of the roster,


schwartz > On deck
Groogaroo
aol
pigswill >Just played
GatlingGun > Up Now


I'm going to be away for a couple of days (just to let you know) but I'll try and log on if I get the chance.

Looks pretty much as planned, haven't looked at the save yet though.
Just need to crank out our axes now.
Can't say I love how our land looks, it's very resource-poor.

Got it... I'll post an intermediate screenshot if something interesting requires consultation

A quick round for me...

Executive Overview:

• 
  Connected NY and DC. Hooked up cows
  
  NY Grows to size 3: Finished two axes, built mine, barracks in-flight
  
  DC Grows to size 6: Chopped Barracks, Built mine, Hooked up cows, Settler in-flight
  
  OB with Mehmed, no metals or horses in sight. He has two cities and both are on hills.
  
  Finished researching Writing; Beeline CoL; Researched Meditation; Priesthood in-flight
  
  Goal-line defense at Mehmed's borders in case we see a settler moving south.

Timeline:

Turn 80: Received save from pigswill

Turn 81 (1975 BC): Start building road to connect NY with Washington. NYC grows to size 2.

Turn 82 (1950 BC): Killed a barb warrior south of DC

Turn 83 (1925 BC): Our archer moves north while scouting. Erdine in view, 1NW of cows... on a GrassHill and Garrisoned with 2 archers (1 unpromoted, 1 CGI). Road to Washington finished and NYC becomes healthy.

Turn 84 (1900 BC):
zzz

Turn 85 (1875 BC):
Washington finishes 2nd worker; he climbs the hill to build a mine 1E of Washington. DC starts building a barracks, while the first worker hooks up cows.

Turn 86 (1850 BC):
Writing finished... Start researching Meditation (beelining Code of Laws)

Turn 87 (1825 BC):
NYC finishes axe who heads east of the mountains for goal-line defense... another starts training

Turn 88 (1800 BC):
Sign OB with Mehmed. Our archer starts scouting with a sharp eye for weapons-grade material.

Turn 89 (1775 BC): Istanbul in view, sitting on a PlainsHill... 3 archers and a settler in waiting



Turn 90 (1750 BC):
More scouting

Turn 91 (1725 BC):
Finished road to cows; start building a mine east of NYC

Turn 92 (1700 BC):
Start chopping barracks in Washington

Turn 93 (1675 BC):
Positioning defensive archer west of mountains

Turn 94 (1650 BC):
NY grows to size 3
Washington grows to size 6 (happy cap)... MM'd to maximize hammers ( +14H, +0F )... Governor off.

Turn 95 (1625 BC):
Washington finishes Barracks; queues up settler... MM'd to maximize settler output ( +12H, +4F )
NYC finishes Axe, who goes north to relieve the defensive archer. NYC starts building a barracks.

Turn 96 (1600 BC):
zzz

Turn 97 (1575 BC):
Finished Meditation; now researching Priesthood
Finished chopping a tree in Washington and started chopping another

Turn 98 (1550 BC):
Mine finished east of NYC... worker grabs his chainsaw and heads to Washington. Axe arrives on-station to relieve archer. Archer moves east of Erdine to check things out on that side again.

Turn 99 (1525 BC):
zzz

Turn 100 (1500 BC):
zzz

Turn 101 (1475 BC):
Save starts here... Your call...


Closing remarks:
We can re-MM Washington for 14H after the settler finishes next turn.
Horses are running wild at the moment, but this isn't a big deal since we haven't seen any enemy axemen yet
The axes are in position to whack any unwanted immigrants heading our way.
We need another fogbuster down south... ultimately we need axes instead of an archers for FB duty...
After Priesthood, we could save ourselves 50-odd turns of research towards CoL by popping the Oracle (225H = 4.5 Axemen)... if we go this route, we should chop heavily since other folks may be building it by now.
We need to figure out where we settle the next city... I'd also say we will have an interesting time dislodging those archers from the hills before we get Cats. I've been chopping in a "kill-chute" pattern if we want to be passive-aggressive.
Should we cancel OB now... I'd hate for him to sneak something past us if we forget to keep an eye on him.

Screenshots...

Our land:


Enemy territory:


Meaningless stats:


Two saves below... essentially the same, except "all_axes" excludes barracks and settler builds and includes 3 more axes.

Cheers!

GatlingGun: you've uploaded the wrong save (2000bc not 1475bc).

General comment: The key to success at higher difficulties is to do one thing at a time. So if we're going for an axe-rush we build nothing but axes until we've won the war. This is because the AI get higher bonusses to production as well as research and you can only get an advantage in one area by focussing on it to the exclusion of all the other things you could be doing.

So which of the builds are you complaining about?

1. Settler?
2. Barracks?

If you are seriously complaining about the barracks, we can respectfully disagree as it makes no sense to build 25% more axes when you can spend three more turns doing this once (and we will need it anyway down the road)... and let's remember those 25% more axes cost gold to support...

Settler was a judgment call on whether we block land and get yet another city for production.

If you don't like the Oracle idea, this is driven by our real need for $ when you execute war and capture a new city far from your capital. When you have cottages, different story. If there is some cool trick to go to war and capture things minus cottages, CoL or gold then I'm all ears... in fact, I'll go back and replay the series minus barracks, settler and just pump out nothing but noob axes... I would hate to introduce unnecessary delay through an execution error.