RBC11 - Cultured Communist Comrades variant (Byzantines/emperor/archipelago)

JMB: although I fully agree with the fact that Education should be our preferred tech, I want to say that I myself also was thinking about 100K (our only goal) when asking you all what to do now: the loss of culture build-up when the temples go which we built with ToA. Otherwise the choice would have been very simple, now it is a bit harder...

Ridgelake's ' got it' :

" I think that it makes a lot of sense for us to go Education soon. Actually, by going Metallurgy, we take out our AC production. So no more new ACs. But JMB is right, our main cities have their cathedrals now and can readlily work on universities. And most of all of our other towns have libraries too. So having smaller shield items to whip (like temples) will keep allowing us to do that without burning obscene numbers of people.

I think the tech pace of this game has been a direct result of the archepelo setting. I haven't looked at the save yet, but I am fairly certain that many nations havent met one another yet. Our early contact with everyone was the critical component in our ability to get a tech lead. That tech lead allowed us to get most of the wonders. And the whole thing has snowballed. It also probably doesnt help that the AI is so bad at naval invasions.

I keep thinking (hoping) that the AIs will all gain contacts, speed up the tech pace, and make a game of this. Time will tell on it though. I can definitely see the Aztecs, Iroquois, and Vikings getting into the swing of things. They have enough critical mass.

Anyway, I see that I am up. I will try to play on Saturday. The wifie and I are celebrating Valentine's Day tonight. "

It's too late for the AIs. Even if they all had contacts right now it wouldn't speed them up enough to make them a significant factor, especially when you're going to run out of Medieval techs to research fairly soon. Once you hit the Industrial Age, you'll take yet another quantum leap ahead of the AI. Plus at some point shortly thereafter, you will run out of stuff to build other than military, which often leads to an itchy trigger finger...

Grabbing Education and building temples right now would probably be a good idea. Every temple you can complete by 750 AD will get the doubling for the big time slowdown in 1750 AD...

I'll take the opposite angle (not surprising, as I chose Metallurgy instead of Education)... actually read the whole post first, you might be surprised by how it meanders!

In the middle of my reign, most core cities were still working on a culture building, and some of them still had one more (colloseum or cathedral) to finish AFTER that, or lacked a marketplace. The non-core cities definitely had 2 buildings to go, and the newly founded cities were still working on their first library.

In such a situation, expiring the ToA to have the opportunity to build universities is foolish! If all culture bldgs were built and it were a question of pushing military or universities next, then yes, Education is the way to go for our variant.

With other culture buildings still needed however, and with our *total* culture proportional to our total number of cities, again it's silly not to push to get as many cities as possible instead of adding a second or third building to the stack of items in the queue.

Now perhaps things have progressed far during Dwip's turn, but with the GA over I doubt it. There is NO TECH that will do better for us in gaining cities right now than Mil Tradition. Even a small number of cavalry will swallow up whole islands -- we can crank cav from core cities with all bldgs built, settlers from high-food settler farm quality cities, and continue working on cathedrals and colossea in others. Now the ToA will NOT help island cities, but/so they have/get to build their own temples anyway.
I would view the choice of Mil Trad as supporting the overall goal, not going against it (to address JMB's comment)

That said, I'll point out what does support the choice of Education!
Not only is it not a small factor, it just about invalidates everything I said above.

It's the rapid approach of the year 750 AD!

Time starts contracting quite a bit in the year 1750, so as far as the 1000 yr bonus is concerned, any building completed in the year 700-750 is worth a fair bit more than one finished in 900-1000 AD. So the question becomes one of math - and let's take a quick look. No Education means 2 cpt per turn for all homeland cities, while getting Education means 0 cpt per turn until the temple is built, plus 4cpt per turn instead of 2 cpt for the years during which the 1000yr bonus applies, for as long a span as you delay Education. In my reign it was closer to 600 and the above discussion was more appropriate than now.

Negative short-term effects of getting Education:
For any city done with all their other goods, you lose 2cpt only for as long as it takes to build the temple.

For any city still working on a cultural building, you lose 2cpt from now until your last culture bldg is done. (Not just the temple, since it will cascade and you will delay getting done every subsequent building by the cost of the temple shields) The actual loss is a difference between getting now or delaying, so it's capped by a max of the number of turns delay.

Negative long-term effects of delaying Education:
For any city done with other bldgs, delaying education will cost 3cpt for the duration of the delay, for delaying the University. It will also cost 3cpt extra of 1000yr bonus per later turn, which in the 750+ range is quite significant.

For any city still chugging on other goods, you don't delay the University since there are other ones to build, since you have to build them all anyway, there's little impact 1000 yrs from now.

In addition, all cities lose 2cpt during the span from now+1000yrs to finishing Real temple+1000yrs.

Let's look at delaying 20 turns, ie two player reigns from 700-900, or 85 turns from 1700-1900, for a few conditions:
- If every city still had things to work on, getting education now loses about 40 culture per city now, and saves about 30 culture later. (how's that? Let's say a city just finished it's library and could now work on a cathedral or a temple, and say it can grow 3 units in 20 turns, that's a temple now vs. a cathedral in 20 turns. The cathedral delay costs 60 culture but 1000yrs from now you get an extra 45*2 or 90 culture back)
- If every city had everything completed, getting education now would cost about 16 culture now while the temple was built, but would get back about 57*2 or 114 culture later.

A brand new city and its temple now (pushing Cavalry) versus getting it 7-8 players turns later costs about 150 culture per new city, or if it's just a 20-30 turn delay, would cost 50 culture.

So... for each city still lacking a cathedral you save about 10 culture per city by holding off on Education, while on cities done with their bldgs, you lose about 100 culture per city by delaying. I thought the trade off would be closer to equal, but the conclusion is...

If more than about 20% of our home island cities have their libraries done and are working on cathedral or colloseum, we definitely want to get Education and *now*. 750AD is really a magic year for getting the library/temple done.

That was a roundabout post, now wasn't it?
Charis

Thank you for the insight Charis!

Ridgelake the inaccessible writes...


Education NOW!
Heya Charis, that was an interesting analysis. That tells me to swap over immediately to Education and work on some (any) prebuilds possible for unis and temples. We don't need metallurgy now and it will stop our AC production. So the first thing that I will do is change our research to Education, even before allowing metal to finish.

I'm glad that we at least have 70 shield knights for pre-builds.

Ridge


I think he drew the right conclusions, and I would agree. I forgot too that Metallurgy will expire our very useful AC's

Charis

RBC11 – Cultured Eastern Roman Empire

700AD (0) We are far more cultured than the masses of stinking foreigners. We are researching metallurgy and will have it soon. But the team of culture advisors suggest that we try to learn this thing called education and research it with all haste. So, swap over and go to 90%, due in 5 turns.

Cities are looked at for MMing and build orders. Make sure that nothing big is due in less than 5 turns.

We are up Chemistry and Theology on our closest competitor, the Romans. Buy an Incan worker for polytheism. Sell ivory to Ragnar for 7gpt. Sell the Romans horses and Ivory for silks and 4gpt. I wanted their incense as well, but that would have cost us 22gpt.

710AD (1) Lose a dromon attacking an Iroquois galley.

IT Monte demands Chivalry. I don’t want a distraction from claiming the Iroquois-shared island, so I give in. They would likely take several of our lightly-defended towns, including our fur town if we didn’t give in.

720AD (2) whip a couple of libraries. Move some troops on Caughawaga.

730AD (3) Ditto

740AD (4)

750AD (5) Education comes in, start on Astronomy. Many, many people are whipped to get culture buildings made this turn as well as next turn. I would never have whipped people this hard if it were not for this variant.

I am realizing that we have made some mistakes by mining everything in our north and east. We have limited our growth due to lack of irrigation and replaced it with mines that end up corrupted. I am going to start bringing water both north and east. Of course, by the time these projects are done, it will like be time to go to communism and we will be able to use the shields again. But oh well.

With all this whipping, we have happiness problems. I send our iron to Rome for Incense and 4gpt. Our second iron will be hooked up in a few turns.

IT Vikings start Sistene. It will come to us next turn

760AD (6) We complete Sistene. Many, many culture buildings complete. More started.

Capture Caughnawaga

IT Aztecs declare war on us. Vidin, our furs town, is captured despite fortified spears behind walls losing to regular archers and warriors. New Varna is also captured. This was the undefended town on the western island. I am not sure who founded this one without an escort, but there was nothing that could be done to support it more.

770AD (7)

780AD (8) Found a new Vidin on the island that we are pushing back the Iroquois on. It will have a cow and wheat in first ring and is on fresh water.

We really cant afford to build 60 shield muskets right now. We just need troops. So I sell our salt to Ragnar with 2 gpt for gems. Drop luxes down to 0%.

790AD (9) Capture Centralia on our new island. The Iroquois have been vanquished from it now.
800AD (10) Whip a couple more things. Move some troops around. Keep an eye on Dyrrachium, it can be whipped soon.

After we get libraries and temples on some of our corrupt areas, think about switching them over to pikes. They can be whipped after 10 turns and provide some base defense.

Astronomy is due in 3. Constantinople is on a bit of a pre-build for Cops. It’s the only major shield producer that has both temple and uni.

One thing that the team needs to decide is how much further we push the Iroquois war. My feel, based upon the below picture, is to take Akwesasne, Oka, Chondate, and the town NW of Alesund. Then make peace. I have a dromon near Centralia to help move troops. Another dromon is at our mainland to pick up a settler to grab the spot SE of Centralia where the templar-knight is. I would also suggest a spot on this island east of Ravonna.



The second picture is of the non-main Aztec island. This is where we lost our undefended town. My thought is to take this island after we push back the Iroquois. I would be tempted to claim revenge for our fur town, but that might be harder to capture given that its their mainland.

What does everyone think of these ideas?

Culture Mongers

I agree with Ridgelake that we can end the Iroquois war soon. Akwesanse is the only town we need to capture though. The other one comes with the peace treaty. I also agree upon going after that Aztec island now.

Constantinople is the ONLY place where we should build Copernicus and Newton IMHO. Other wonders may be built elsewhere, but our only real science city is Constantinople.

Aggie <-- On deck
Charis
JMB
Dwip
Ridgelake
LAM <-- Up

Got it

edit: actually, looking at the save, I'm beginning to think I'm a bit in over my head here. It's not that I'm bad at this game, far from it, but my warmongering skills are not really up to snuff with our current sitiuation. Regarding reports and observations from other players in the roster, it appears we're going to be in this state of play for the rest of the game; so instead of making a fool of myself with poor military handling, I think I'll just withdraw from the roster if you don't mind. My sincerest apologies.

Lord_all_mighty, sorry to read it Thank you for your efforts. But we as a team are doing a great job! I personally don't mind an error or two (I am not a perfect player myself). Please do not consider my (our?) remarks on your playing as critisism. I always comment to provoke reactions and to learn things.

Aggie <---- Up
Charis <--- On deck
JMB
Dwip
Ridgelake
LAM (withdrawn)

EDIT: I'm just recovering from a SP deity game. I'll play tommorow night CET. I haven't played a lot of culture games (apart from 20K's). Is it clever to whip a size 8 city in several stages to build a university in 1 (first a worker, then a bigger unit, etc...)?

I don't think any of us in either game has experience with a 100k victory in only population-rushing governments. As a rough guess, I'd say that given that the 750/1750 AD time slowdown is past now, there's no need to be in a huge hurry to rush culture; probably better to let the cities stay larger and build more normally. On the other hand, crash-rushing culture in 800 AD still gets the 1000-year doubling at what should be a useful date, and whipping a city down to the size 6 threshold gets the next growths faster at a smaller size, and a bit more unit support while still in Feudalism. Your call.

L-A-M, I am sorry to see that you need to withdraw. You definitely showed some skill in this game. More importantly, you showed class. I hope that you can join us again in another game.

I hope that you understand that I'm a bit tired after two SG's today, including one with a modern age war. I can take it tomorrow.

IHT: So we are at war with the Aztecs and Iroquois. I will try to take one more town from the Iroquois and then focus on the Aztecs. I will not whip the cities to death, but only here and there to for one citizen.

IT: The Aztecs land a MDI near Alesund, which is defended by a spear and warrior The Iroquois land 2 spears and two archer near Centralia and the Americans land 2 archers near Centralia as well

Turn 1 (810 AD)

-2 vet AC's take out Iroquois spears and are redlined
-Vet AC retreats from Iroquois archer
-Regular AC redlines vs Iroquois archer

I pray that our city Alesund survives and also don't ask America to leave yet, we haven't got the troops to kill those archer there yet.

Science to 50%, Astronomy in 2.

IT: Aztec MDI kills spear in Alesund and Jag Warrior joins him. The Americans declare war Two American archer are killed by defense in Centralia
We love the ... day everywhere.

Turn 2 (820 AD) Nothing much except for troop movement.

IT: The Aztecs take Alesund We discover Astronomy and Colosseum switched to Copernicus. Research towards ToG. I'm beginning to think that we don't have enough military to push Aztecs back while at war with at least one other civ. America drops a spear and warrior near Vidin.

Turn 3 (830 AD) The Amrican spear is wounded, but our vet AC retreats. The American warrior is gone! Two crusadors land next to Akwesanse.

I sell the Vikings Chemistry for 94 gpt, Republic and 20 gold. So now I set science to 100% (+1 gpt), Physics in 5. The Vikings and Romans are almost as advanced as we are. They only lack Astronomy and the Romans also Chemistry, for which they can't pay. The rest is pathetic.

IT: Archer lands next to Centralia. The Hittites declare war on the Romans.

Turn 4 (840 AD) Two vet Crusaders kills regular spears in Akwesanse. An archer remains. Elite AC retreats vs wounded American spear.

IT: Wounded vet American spear can't kill our redlined elite AC

Turn 5 (850 AD) Vet knight kills archer and we take Akwesanse. I make peace with the Iroquois for Oka and 7 gold.

Turn 6 (860 AD)

Turn 7 (870 AD) I succesfully bombard an American galley with a Dromon and it sinks Fond memories come up of an OCC where I had 20 Dromons and 30 AC's

IT: Physics comes in. Next tech is Theory of Gravity. Getting Copernicus and Newton in one city (Constantinople) build be awesome

Turn 8 (880 AD) The magnificent force to conquer Aztec land won't come soon. We have too many culture buildings and markets to build.

Turn 9 (890 AD) The Vikings are willing to pay a lot of money for Physics, but I won't give it. We can research at max already.

Turn 10 (900 AD) If it were me I would make peace for now and first build all culture possible we can, before we focus on an army to conquer to Aztecs. I would also make peace with America, although we have war hapiness from them. We will have ToG soon and I recommend building Newton in Constantinople, after Copernicus. I would also wait with selling Physics before we have ToG, to have a good shot to being first to get Magnetism. The Iroquois have wines, but we are at 0% lux as it is. Our culture lead is growing.

900 AD save

Aggie
Charis <--- Up
JMB <------ On deck
Dwip
Ridgelake

The Aztecs are going to pay, and pay thru thr NOSE! The only question is when. I'll take a close look and see, but if folks here are correct that might be 'later.'

"Got it"
Charis the Feasting One

First, thanks to LAM for coming on board and playing, but also for pulling out on
seeing the game wasn't heading for his strongsuit. (As you read this turn you'll note things get 'worse' )

> Lose a dromon attacking an Iroquois galley
Egads, how can this be? With the speed advantage I just bombard them and chase them,
but if you thought it full of troops, right call to 'attack'. Good job on the 'great
whipping of 750' Ridgelake Regarding new Varna, it had an escort, but it died
when someone sent it running off chasing barbs.

Constantinople can make 25spt if it takes the choice tiles, and to hit this threshhold,
it does.

Tis 900AD now, and if something isn't built in the next 10 or so turns it can wait
another few centuries. We're now at peace with Iro, war happy with Americans,
and ambushed by the feisty-Aztecs who will one day be CRUSHED. We're double Aztec and Iro
culture, but not for long - they're gaining. Based on power though, the Aztecs are
definitely the main foe for a long time to come.

We just have no army with which to invade, and could do so much more effectively
after Mil Tradition, so I don't think I'll actually push the war with Aztecs or
Americans, but will keep them 'alive' for WH reasons and to smack anything that lands
on our shores. It would however be nice to recapture Alesund, so that will be kept in
mind. We do however have two settlers (plus one more already in position)

[0] 900AD - Hattusha is brutally whipped for the glory of the nation. Smyrna almost
is, but instead borrows a hill for a few turns. Akwasasne gets the whip too.
Add Iconium, New Adrionople, New Nicaea, and Somasata to the list too
IBT Romans srart Copernicus. (BTW, I'm not looking to trade our techs this reign,
as I wish to slow down our foes and the cash benefits of selling are too minor)


[1] 910 - Whip New Constantinople, partial whip Brusa.
IBT Three units land outside Oka. Rome wants to end/renegotiate silks deal, and
shaves odd 1gpt. He's only down Physics. Vikes start Copernicus.


[2] 920 - Whip Vidin, Partial whip Smyrna. We win twice at Oka.
IBT - Darn, WW has gone up a notch with Aztecs, must fix ~8 cities.

[3] 930 - Theory of Grav complete, we start Magnetism. Whip
IBT - Aztecs trade cav for Dromon, one each.

[4] 940 - Movin'. IBT - One jaggie lands next to Oka.

[5] 950 - Scratch one jaggie. IBT - Two Americans land next to Oka.

[6] 960 - Scratch two Americans. Whip Caughna.
IBT - Good news and bad news. We complete Copernicus in Constantinople
Newton's due in 16. The bad news... Aztecs land two *Knights* at Oka.
Other poor news, they whipped poor Alesund back to size 1 this turn.

[7] 970 - whip New Caesarea. Poor timing at Oka - we have 4 good units near but
not yet in range of Alesund. So we go on offense vs Knights. The extra hp do
the trick, and we win one. They can't take city in one round now
IBT - Better than not losing city, our defending elite AC wins, and Oka is safe

[8] 980 - Magnetism arrives - Metallurgy or Music Theory for Bach's?
MT can be done at surplus in just 4, so I try that.

Good news! Alesund, defended by a lone spear is defeated, and captured! We must
have succeeded with an earlier lib whip to give it culture. Another lib is ordered.

New Smyrna saltmines is founded on Alesund island.

IBT Vikings yank our supply of gems. They want 25gpt for it, ouch. Or Physics.
For Physics they will pay 63gpt, Monarchy (useless but pricey), and 130g ??
Alas, I can't well do this on their turn, and must let gems lapse.

So instead they move zerkers right next to our new city?! No wonder they would
pay heavy gpt for tech. Sneaky jerks! I scroll ahead and actually, the gems
weren't doing a whole lot for us.

[9] 990 - Ragnar, get the #^#%@ off our cultured land!! Hrmm... we have an RoP
with him??? Cancel THAT right away. We can't give him the boot msg. That means
we take a WW hit, or let him get a first swing sneak attack IBT. That's one
painful first hit too. Happiness is a good thing, especially w/o gems. I brace up.

IBT - In the no-surprise of the year category, the Vikings declare war.
In more pleasant news, we do win one (reg zerk) and lose one. Dromons also held off
an American ship.

[10] 1000AD - Movin'. We'll need a few more defenders all around. There are enough
fast units to react to most (non-amphib) assaults I think, but we're exposed.

Notes - We actually have two distinct extra forces available -
i) On Alesund island are 2 crusaders, 4 AC and a Knight, if we want to take over
the whole island (alas, Iro, Inca, Viking, Roman all have a stake)
ii) Next to Septium, NINE good attackers, a settler, 4 workers, can go claim a
stake somewhere. Two towns nearby are working on Galleons.

We're in good shape to capture the two Vike cities on Alesund island in the next
few turns. But beware a berzerk amphib invasion and take peace as soon as possible!
It's 1000AD and the age of 'brutal' whipping is definitely over. As we approach the
communist era we'll need to make sure that: i) courthouses are *everywhere*, and that
most cities are grown to a decent size.

Keep up the war vs America for happiness. Vs Aztecs, could do same, or stop soon.

Aggie
Charis
Dwip <-- UP
JMB <-- On Deck
Ridgelake

RBC11 Save file 1000AD

Good luck, Dwip,
Charis

EDIT@Aggie - you're right, I remember now we had a distininct "uptick" in weariness from Aztecs after they attacked Oka, so peace with them would be smart.

I see it, but I'll need most of my 48 to complete the turns. Instead of slowing things down, why don't I swap with JMB this round?

OK, Dwip and JMB are swapped

I can't imagine that we have war hapiness from the Aztecs. They took cities from us. If it were me, I'd go for peace with them asap and do a retry when we have cavalry. The Vikings are tough enough with their berzerks. America is just too weak to be a big risk, so I'm all for staying at war with them.

Regarding music theory: good idea!

Aggie
Charis
Dwip <-- On deck
JMB <-- Up
Ridgelake

I see it and will attempt to play tonight...

JMB