Help Me Not Suck: Professor Shaka's War Academy

(In this round, we start to seriously question whether or not an early rush is worth it!)

The new generation of Shaka's proud warrior-miners were sent from their warrior-wives and warrior-children to mine this new metal--which Shaka had named "Copper" after his old bloodhound--from the earth. It was strong and viable, and the warlord knew that great weapons could be crafted from it.

By the time Ulundi's scholars had finished inventing The Wheel, presumably by experimenting by rolling various pentagons down the city's many hills, the mines were ready to ship this new metal to the settlement:



(A little glimpse of our micro here, which is an area where I'm sure you guys will have good advice. Ulundi was near its happy cap here, but I could get the Ikhanda out quickly enough just by switching off of the food. By the time it was online, I whipped out the city's first promoted unit: an Axeman for city protection because, well...)

Ulundi was a proud city, but Shaka knew that more settlements would be needed. Intrepid warrior-chiefs, eager to make their way out in the world, begged Shaka to allow them to establish a satellite state in the north. The warlord thought about this and relented, and the chief founded a new village high on the cliffs north of Ulundi. He named this settlement "uMgungundlovu," which in the Zulu tongue meant "we have tremendous contempt for our tourism industry:"



(uMgungagungungameeyamacarena went Worker first while we looked into what to do with all of those fish up there.)

And with the honor-guard of Ulundi setting off for this new settlement, Shaka sought to recruit new guards... by force.



(First use of the whip! As you can see, we've got lots of food in this town and can regrow our population without much trouble, so I put Pottery on the backburner this round. This will probably end up being a stupid decision that will get me killed, but--as you can see--we don't have many places to put cottages, we're building to war, and the tech will coincide nicely with our first commerce city... whatever it ends up being.)

By the time the warrior-fishermen of uMgungundlovu had determined how to properly use their battle-spears to murder the cowardly fish of the sea, Zululand had transformed from a hearty settlement to a thriving little empire:



By far Shaka's proudest warriors were the Impis. Equipped with dreaded battle-spears, the Impi's experience dwelling in the hilly woodlands made them fleet of foot. When Shaka's Scout met his end at the hands (and club) of a wild hermit of the jungle, one of these Impis set off to the south to find what bounty he could.



He traveled and traveled, eager to find the chief of the madman who had butchered his countryman, but--as Shaka was soon to learn--no such chief would be found.

When the Zulu language was codified with a series of glyphs, the vainglorious Willem came to Ulundi with a proposition:



Shaka refused for now. He would wait until a time that such an arrangement would be strategically beneficial. Best to keep Willem in the dark for now...

(OB came right as we finished Writing, so we beat Willem to it, presumably. Probably for the best--Libraries will only help him multiply that troublesome Financial trait of his.)

And as the Zulu people finished a brief foray into the way of the Spirits of the Mountains (a quick dip to grab Mysticism for cheap border pops!), Shaka turned to his advisers with a new conundrum...



The warlord was vexed. The warrior in him yearned to harness still more powerful metals with Iron Working; however, they would likely not be necessary. Pottery, it seemed, was the secret of civilization, with its ability to store the grains of the field and establish smaller satellite villages on the shores of the Bloodkilldeath.

(I think I may have put off Pottery for too long; on the other hand, we have two cities more than capable of regenerating their population after the whip, so Granaries haven't really been necessary. With our first commerce city likely the next settlement, I think we're ready for it now.)

Shaka welcomed his advisers to his nascent empire...



...and showed them the production of his two cities.




(Growth is slowed a little bit in uMtown while we work off some whip angst. As you can see, it's kind of a production monster even in this mode. Willem's got two cities now, and I'd like to beat him to three, and--as you'll see--it may be necessary to cut him off just so we don't have to chase him all over the place.)

Shaka reviewed his nation's military...



(Lots of Impis! I'm thinking we choke Willem off while we build some Axes and maybe Chariots to go in for the kill, and, as you can see, it won't take long to put together a second wave.)

And while his bloodlust led him to a desire to smash Willem's head into the ground, Shaka laid out his maps, which revealed that future military targets were... tragically lacking.





(That's a lot of easy land to settle! We could play peaceful builder for a little while, try to get Willem up to Friendly, and then smash him with Maces and Catapults once we've gotten to Optics and found other neighbors across the ocean. That seems like a waste of our early production, though. We've got a definite military edge at the moment, and that might not last. We don't know what's on the other side of Willem's land; if he's boxed in, we can easily keep him confined, but I really hate having Creative neighbors breathing down my neck that way.

So the Settler's almost ready to go in Ulundi. I've got a villager building a road toward the Silk; I'm thinking that's our next city to get some commerce up in this piece. Another advantage is that we're building toward Willem; having a network of roads in place will make the invasion go much more quickly and will allow our second wave to shuttle itself to the front in no time. Of course, I'm willing to be shouted down about that second site because--as you can see--we've got some pretty nice land that we can basically settle for free.

Going to slow it down a while to let everyone pontificate since we've got a few options. I sort of rushed this round out, but the next city seemed pretty obvious, and my early goal--get a second city and start growing enough muscle to do some damage--wasn't too hard to do given what we had on hand. For the first time, I'd say we're really at a tricky crossroads, so I'm going to let it simmer for a little bit.

Here's the save. As I said, we've got a really interesting scenario on our hands, and I'm eager to see which direction you guys think we should take it!)

lol, from the looks of it, if you get him to friendly, he might peace vassal to you. Just make sure you pack your cities in tight ~2X the number of his. I'm still trying to figure diplo out myself, but should be doable via giving in to weak demands, religion, and/or the junk city gifting technique. One thing is for sure, though. Open borders and scout him.

If you settle that plains-hill gold + deer + marble city, then just build some wonder there to give it some culture, Willem will never be a problem. Even if he declares on you, you'll have a high-culture hilltop city you can just sit in and let him kill himself trying to take it. And he'll only have maybe 3 cities, so it's not like he's going to be producing that many units.

The Oz-Man said:

Into the Wastelands

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A billion out of ten for the table of contents.

The Oz-Man said:

A little glimpse of our micro here, which is an area where I'm sure you guys will have good advice. Ulundi was near its happy cap here, but I could get the Ikhanda out quickly enough just by switching off of the food. By the time it was online, I whipped out the city's first promoted unit: an Axeman for city protection because, well...)

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The first rule of micro club is... don't.

You violated two prime rules here
1) Always work your best tiles (you're not working the rice?!)
2) Don't whip off great tiles (you abandoned the copper?!?!?!?!?!?!?!)

It's possible that you made a strong play, but "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". It looks for all the world to me that you got your priorities tangled, and then gimped yourself trying to optimize them.

Impi are cool, but you sure don't need a barracks yet. So you ought to have dealt with your happiness issue the normal way - slow build a warrior to act as city garrison.

The Oz-Man said:

(uMgungagungungameeyamacarena went Worker first while we looked into what to do with all of those fish up there.)

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Not a big fan - I normally prefer to train warriors in the new outposts, workers in the capital.

The Oz-Man said:

I think I may have put off Pottery for too long; on the other hand, we have two cities more than capable of regenerating their population after the whip, so Granaries haven't really been necessary. With our first commerce city likely the next settlement, I think we're ready for it now.)

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I disgree - it looks to me as though you did OK. Pottery vs Writing depends much on when you can actually use it. Normally in a peaceful expansion opening, I'm not in a hurry to build a library (because other things are more important), so it makes sense to go pottery first for the discount.

The Oz-Man said:

(That's a lot of easy land to settle! We could play peaceful builder for a little while, try to get Willem up to Friendly, and then smash him with Maces and Catapults once we've gotten to Optics and found other neighbors across the ocean. That seems like a waste of our early production, though. We've got a definite military edge at the moment, and that might not last. We don't know what's on the other side of Willem's land; if he's boxed in, we can easily keep him confined, but I really hate having Creative neighbors breathing down my neck that way.

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I think you're giving him too much credit here - he can't breathe down your neck without paying the cost of a city in those lousy mountains, which is an advantage for you.

If you feel like you need to practice war, sure - you can crush him in hammers, and then claim the southern lands from the barbarians.

I would expect it to be better to claim the land first, and give Willem a chance to build shiny trophies for you to capture.

VoiceOfUnreason said:

You violated two prime rules here
1) Always work your best tiles (you're not working the rice?!)
2) Don't whip off great tiles (you abandoned the copper?!?!?!?!?!?!?!)

It's possible that you made a strong play, but "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". It looks for all the world to me that you got your priorities tangled, and then gimped yourself trying to optimize them.

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Looking at it again, yeah, it's pretty bad. In the first picture I was trying to slow the city's growth in preparation for whipping out an axe--had I kept the citizen working the rice instead of the plains hill, it would've been closer (the Ikhanda was going to take ten turns working the rice, and I didn't want it to grow past the cap before I could use the whip). The result, of course, was the pop not quite being at the happy cap when I first whipped, which led to the city being down to 2 pop working only the two food tiles. Much better would've been to let the city grow to pop 5 and then whip again.

So yeah, it was a miscalculation. I was pretty good about monitoring the happy cap and adjusting the whip accordingly for the rest of the round, so I can say in all honesty that's not really a representative screenshot of the whipping I was doing for the round.

I'll start next round scouting Willem. If we're alone with him, I'll likely cut him off at the mountains and let him rot on the other side of the valley while I take that choice land to the south. If the continent goes on, though (this is Fractal, so long, snaky continents can definitely be a thing), I'm much more likely to squash him for fun and profit. I can't remember ever having this much easy land to work with on a normal-sized map, though!

Let him found the junk, seriously. If it's still there once you have gotten all of the pigs and fish, then, whatever. Pushing borders hurts diplo. If it's just you and him(espionage screen can be a hint), he will not trade until friendly. Get him there, then take all his techs, cities, and gold. Or you could go culture. You have Marble, right? You have room for nine cities, right? O chit, you have copper too Oracle Code of Laws and bulb Philosophy, game over.

VoiceOfUnreason said:

If you can sneak Fishing into your early plans, there's a nice two step available; drop a city at fish + pigs, and use the pigs to get a workboat out. Then drop your Gold Silk Pigs city into place, and put the pigs back where they belong. There are enough interesting tiles in the first ring of Fish/Pigs to put it to immediate use.

10/10 on narrative.

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I looked at the dotmap for a while, and I did not see that brilliant move.
Bringing tiles alive with one city, and then giving them to another one, is a tactic that I have alot of learning to do in still.

I agree completly with the narrative! 10/10
Very entertaining!


The Oz-Man:

Keep up the good work, you are learning at breakneck pace here, and you are supplying studying aid and entertainment for everyone else.

A remark that I don't think has been adressed yet.
About the opening. I'm not sure why you did mining -> AH -> BW.
If you go mining in such a opening, you go all the way to BW direcly.
The only purpose with mining, is to mine that plains hill, and I don't think you will have enough workerturns that early in the opening to pull that off.

AH -> Mining -> BW, or
Mining -> BW -> AH would have been superior imo.

well, glad to see I'm generating some sort of energy on the forums

I'd supply some sort of feedback, but I really don't feel comfortable giving advice, seeing as I myself am not too skilled at this level. I would suggest scouting Willem's territory and checking your level of isolation, then steamrolling him with impi/Horse Archers later on if he's the only one on your continent. You've got ample room to expand even if you decide to disregard his presence, so I wouldn't sweat it too much.

Good luck, and great narrative!

If you don't plan a rush start chopping away the forest for settlers and get IW for the gem city.

You need to start chopping workers/settlers. 3 cities by 1500bc is fine for immortal level. On Noble you can easily afford to rex without too much worry.

Like most people are saying, the next task is to answer the question 'am I semi isolated'? If you can spare the hammers a scouting workboat may be a sound investment. Many games I have thought I was isolated only to see a workboat show up 50 turns later.

If you are find another AI I would not kill Wilhelm. He will tech well and having a trading partner is huge.

If you find no one else and are semi-isolated with him, I would likely kill him off in a series of wars trading tech for peace. If he settles the marble soon and starts to build some wonders for you to steal so much the better!

Getting him to friendly without a religion is hard. He may found one but I dont recommend you change your tech path to assure that you get one yourself. If you do naturally great but if not then not.

Settling the horse/cow city as number three is a reasonable approach and it will be a solid city.

City number four should get the gold, happiness resources are too good to ignore for that long.

Here's my concern. You've built 2 Ikhandas, 5 Impis, 1 axeman, and a warrior. That's too little military to kill someone, but too much for any other purpose. If you're going to choke Willem, 2 Impis and 2 warriors would have been fine - and those Impis should already be camped out in by Willem's capital hoping to steal workers and/or make him build military. If you're looking for barb defense, 2 axes and 2 warriors, or axe + impi + warrior. If you were planning on rushing Willem, it's more like 1 Ikhanda, 2 warriors, and 12 axes.

The result of your half-hearted military buildup is that you have 2 cities by turn 61, and are likely to have only 3 by turn 70; with the sort of land you have available here, you could have been settling your fifth city by T70 easily.

Generally speaking, the important principle is to never waste a hammer early in the game. If you're going to build something, you should know exactly why you're building it, and why you can't afford to put off building it until later.

All right, sounds like I need to commit to either REXing southward or taking out Willem, and my decision will rest on what--if anything--is on the other side of Amsterdam. First task of next round will be to open borders and scout (and, fortunately, Impis are good at that). I don't particularly care for an Oracle slingshot since we've got hammers that would be much better spent on other things (expanding to fill our surplus of land in particular). Let's see how this goes.

Echo on the misuse of your cities.

uMgungundlovu is very food heavy -- for the moment it's great for a worker/settler pump. If you need other things, use whip overflow! Do a 2-pop whip for your settler or worker at the last moment, and you get enough overflow to build an Ikhanda or a Granary in one turn! And then before you get to size 4 -- you start another worker or settler while the whip anger wears off!


If you really need to build lots of things, I would have done it in the capital -- and prioritized mining those grassland hills. Do that, and you'll see something closer to a *true* early game production monster, producing a whopping 15 per turn, and still having a 2 surplus! 19 once you get the gold and take the plains hill back.

(Still at size 5, you can manage 16 if you take the plains hill. Bump that to 16.5 hammers average if you additionally swap the pigs to the last grassland hill (mined) as needed to work off food surplus)

In fact, you really don't want to whip Ulundi, especially pre-Granary. Even with a granary, all those grassland hills are just as good -- probably better -- than whipping, and are a heck of a lot easier to use.



I would suggest replaying these turns -- if not now, at least some time in the future -- to try and see how much better you can do. It can be a very useful exercise to take a single start and replay it a bunch of times to see how well you can optimize it!

(Let's start with an analysis of my own play decisions coming into this round since I took a bit of a calculated risk. I think it paid off big-time, though.

I'd put the Impis together at first as an attempt to choke Willem. Then, when I saw the land I had, I changed my mind again. Then, coanda said this

If you're going to build something, you should know exactly why you're building it, and why you can't afford to put off building it until later.

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(I've got Impis. I've got an annoying neighbor who is either choked by mountains or has possible diplomatic partners on the other side of his land. I've got a mountain to the east that is, conceivably, blocking access to a much larger continent. I've got a military advantage. Willem has floodplains and is Financial and has the serious potential to cramp my style and tech like mad. Finally, I'm freaking Shaka!

I started the round with too few cities and a production advantage. I decided to expand. By the end of this round, as you'll see, we'll be on the verge of tripling our current city count.

Enough talk about my bad play; let's get back to the part you guys seem to enjoy!)

The wastelands to the south were tempting to the war-chief. The beasts and grains of the field could provide food, while opulent gems and strong marble glistened in the sunlight. However, Shaka knew that Willem's scouts also coveted this new land. Shaka could settle it quickly, of course--choke off his arrogant rival with new settlements along the Deathbloodkill Mountains. However, he had better plans.

Willem's strengths were in his love of his people's poems and stories, their proud oral traditions, and the wealth that their desert kingdom afforded them. Shaka had spears. He would see Willem's head atop one of them.

"Go forth," he growled to his Impi Warriors. "Ravage his lands. And when the time comes... he will be ours."



(Yup. We've got the soldiers to choke out Willem, they've got the mobility to seriously cramp his style, and I've never actually tried sending in an Impi raiding party anyway. Let's have some fun!)

As Shaka's warrior-warriors dashed west, his newest scout discovered a Barbarian settlement nestled at the outskirts of the jungle:



They were wild men of the wood, owing allegiance to no lord or nation. Perhaps they could be useful in the future. For now, they were squatting in land that Shaka had rightfully claimed.

In the meantime, his new Settlers marched to the northwest. The warrior-scholars of Ulundi were irked by their master's emphasis on wartime exploits; they longed to seek a new haven of knowledge and learning. They founded the village of Nobamba where the mountains met the sea.



Shaka allowed the defiant scholars their town. Knowledge, so far, had proven to be power, and this new forward base would hasten his troops' march to the Netherlands.

In 1360, it was time...



(FREE WORKER! Very yes!)

In the south, the Impi of the forest suddenly turned from the Barbarian encampment toward his Dutch counterpart...



...and was victorious!

(So think I learned this round: Impis own Warriors. Even in forest cover. They're a really, really nice Barb-busting unit. I didn't do a lot of fogbusting at all, but I didn't get pillaged at all thanks to my ability to shuttle spear guys to the front in record time.)

The Impi Warriors descended on Willem's capital of Amsterdam, licking their chops at the prospect of destroying him once and for all...



However, the city's defenders made their stand--advanced warriors capable of firing spears from afar! The war-chiefs of the Impis instead sent them to scatter throughout Willem's lands, razing cottages, smashing pastures, and doing everything possible to destroy whatever advantages the Dutchman enjoyed.

The scout, meanwhile, had better luck with the Barbarian encampment:



The little village was razed to the ground.

In the Netherlands, meanwhile, a detachment of Impi raiders found something very useful...



(Awwww, no Copper yet, Willem? Utrecht--founded late last round--clearly was meant to pull the copper in. Looks like we got to it just in time!)

Willem's cowardly subjects retreated back to Utrecht, hiding behind the spear-casters. Shaka allowed himself a smile when he received the news that the Dutch would not enjoy the metallurgical advantages that his warrior-miners had unearthed!

A similar fate befell Willem's personal stables:



(So I know I'm getting some readers who are also Noble players. Let me say this: if you have never done an Impi choking raid as Shaka, YOU MUST DO THIS THING. It was LOADS of fun, and it was nice to be able to leverage their production in a way that worked.)

While the homeland drafted vicious Axe-wielding warriors to cut down the spear-casters, Shaka sent his finest warrior-emissaries (that is, also warriors) on a mission to further explore the seas and perhaps meet new chiefs.



(Without Sailing, a Fishing Boat seemed like a relatively low-hammer alternative. Given how strong a production base we have, I figured it wouldn't hurt to send an expedition beyond that mountain to the east.)

In the west, Shaka's Impis continued to make a mess of things:



Willem begged for an end to the conflict, sending his own son, Willem van Indygo, to the enlightened nobles of Nobamba to plead for a return to normalized relations. Shaka allowed him to plead his case before shredding his body with an Axe and sending the remains along with the new soldiers marching to the front lines.

The diplomatic mission at sea, meanwhile, paid off. At the base of Killblooddeath Mountain in the east, Shaka met an opulent retinue from the other side of the mountain. These men, unlike Willem's nobles, were no scholars or storytellers. They were mystic warriors equipped with fine axes, and their chief spoke with a wisdom that implied to Shaka that he must understand the way of the Spirits of the Mountain. They called themselves the Byzantines:



(Score! Additional allies! As you can see, ol' Justin isn't the founder of Hinduism, so I felt confident I'd have some more diplomacy fun to come!)

As Shaka supped on sushi and pork with his new friend, in the west, the Axemen were ready to make their stand:



Several of the raiding Impis rushed headlong into battle first. They stood little chance against Willem's spear-casters, and many brave soldiers fell. However, their purpose--to weaken the garrison at Amsterdam--was served, and the Axemen were able to rush into the city with minimal losses:



Amsterdam was allowed to stand. Its grumbling populace cried out in protest of the Zulu conquerors, demanding a return to Dutch governorship. However, Willem himself had fled the city, retreating south to the village of Utrecht. Until he was brought to justice, Amsterdam could not know peace.

So as the west burned, in the east, another emissary from across the Mountain arrived in Zululand. Like the Byzantines, these were a pious people; indeed, the faith that Justinian held had its origins in Spanish lands. Spain was led by a beautiful priestess who promised to educate Shaka himself in her people's strange faith:



(See what I said earlier? Zealots, I say! No wonder the two early religions went so quickly; however, I haven't found Buddhism's founder yet.)

To commemorate this new friend, uMgungundlovu's warrior-fishermen set off to found their own new home at the base of the Mountain, which the Zulu people now knew to be sacred:



Shaka allowed this: trade with these new lands was beginning to flow with the advent of Sailing, and he knew the scholars' new research of Mathematics could be a tantalizing secret to these people. Indeed, Bulawayo soon proved to be truly blessed:



Shaka himself traveled to the new port city and was baptized by Isabella herself in a strange ritual involving human sacrifice. Isabella offered one of her own capital's Untouchables, while Shaka offered his own sacrifice:



Utrecht burned--Shaka could scarcely afford such a far-flung settlement, and he knew greater cities could be founded in its stead. Willem van Oranje himself was ridden on horseback (very clumsily thanks to our lack of knowledge of Horseback Riding) through the streets of Amsterdam, across the mountains, and to the city of Bulawayo. Ever-silent, ever-despondent, ever-proud, he found himself before the war-chief Shaka, and his blood sanctified the bond between the Zulu and the blessed people from beyond the mountain.

Years passed. The Zulu people mastered the science of Mathematics, and the desert-people of Amsterdam came to accept their fate as Zululanders. Shaka found himself at a crossroads and turned to his advisers...

(...in the next post because I ran out of picture space!)

State of the World at 600 BC:



I think we're going to need Currency sooner rather than later to get the economy up and running; after all, it's pretty obvious that we're about to build a LOT of cities. I gave up on a chance at the Oracle given that we've clearly got some people on the map who are prone to pursue religious tech, and I was busy devoting hammers to Settlers, Workers, and a second wave of Axemen that it turned out I didn't need. My hope is that Maths and Munnies will be good trade bait for whichever of Justin or Izzy gets Alphabet first--at this point, neither of them seem to have it. Even so, we've got a lot of good tech options: Currency for economy? A quick dip to Masonry to develop our multiple sources of marble? Alpha to get tech trades going?

The goal of the next round's going to be peaceful Settling, which is why I think Currency is our best option; however, with Marble on the board, I'd like to see if we can't swing by Literature and nab the Great Library.

Here's what we won from Willem:



Zululand proper:



A look at what we know about the east:



I'm thinking I get a Galley out there early next round and send some scoutin' Impis to see what they can see. I've got OB with both Justin and Izzy, and I suspect they'll both be up to Pleased in no time as our old buddy Brothers O'Thefaith shows up.

Here's Nobamba!



Lighthouse is sort of a placeholder for now. Amsterdam is so far afield [and not roaded yet] that I didn't want to start cranking out a Settler--as you'll see, I've got another one in the hopper that's ready to come out.

uMgtown!



...should be working that green mine, which came up not too long ago. Lighthouse is probably needed here. I'm thinking this could be a good Moai city to nab another coupla hammers and keep it going production-wise later on.

The city that won the war, Ulundi...



Probably going to put a city between east and west just to keep things congruent; on the other hand, the better land is--obviously--to the south. We've founded our best interior cities; I think it's time to start establishing our borders. Not much has changed in that direction, so the above maps still apply.

And finally, a look at Bulawayo:



It's taking a little while to get that one up and running--moving those Workers through the mountains to get those mines going tied up a lot of their turns, and I wanted the Horses up quickly just in case I needed them. This one has some serious commerce potential, I think.

So thoughts? Next round's goals will be to establish the empire, so we'll have lots of Settlers to build. The big question is where to put them. We've got five cities right now; I'd like to double that pretty quickly, and we shouldn't have much problem doing so.

The save is attached to the previous post. Tell me how badly I'm doing!

The Oz-Man said:

State of the World at 600 BC

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OK, point the first: you recognize that the game is in the bag, right?

I probably would have swapped the order of the axes and the impis when attacking the cities; it might not matter much (see point the first).

Good call on razing Utrecht. You've got good tiles there - where do you think the cities go?

The Oz-Man said:

The goal of the next round's going to be peaceful Settling, which is why I think Currency is our best option

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That seems pretty reasonable. Are you going to plan it first?

Before you start the next turn, you should have a clear plan for where you are going to put cities, and how they are going to contribute. A "dot map", though being that fancy with technology isn't necessary - signs will do.

The Oz-Man said:

however, with Marble on the board, I'd like to see if we can't swing by Literature and nab the Great Library.

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You've got time. You might also consider the Shwedegon Paya; you have the gold, and the production capacity, and Aesthetics is on the way.

The Oz-Man said:

Here's Nobamba!

Lighthouse is sort of a placeholder for now. Amsterdam is so far afield [and not roaded yet] that I didn't want to start cranking out a Settler--as you'll see, I've got another one in the hopper that's ready to come out.

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The lighthouse builds that you having going on the north shore - those are kind of drunk. Lighthouses are important for the Great Lighthouse, and if you are working lots of sea tiles. If you are working fish and mines, that's not a lot of return. You should be able to do better.

Same problem with Moai statues - they make the water tiles you aren't working better. Yay?

Don't overlook the idea of training more workers - you've a lot of land to improve.

The Oz-Man said:

uMgtown!

...should be working that green mine, which came up not too long ago.

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Two, actually. There are two green mines here. One of them is grayed out because Ulundi is working it - but Ulundi has another green mine it's not using. So swap the tiles.

The Oz-Man said:

And finally, a look at Bulawayo:

It's taking a little while to get that one up and running--moving those Workers through the mountains to get those mines going tied up a lot of their turns, and I wanted the Horses up quickly just in case I needed them

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You're jumping at shadows there, I think. What's the threat scenario?

Anyway, these reason this city has been slow to get going? You took the workboat that should have improved the fish, and sent it off exploring. Or if you prefer, you forgot that you would need a replacement boat as soon as the city was founded.

Ok, I think it's official now. You do not suck!
Time to go up a level.


Lighthouse in the gold-city is a bad investment, you don't need to work the coast for a long time (if ever).
Build workers/settlers, or if you want to grow workboats (there are seafood around, you will need them sooner or later) or units to garrison, or for monarchy.

I also want to point out what I thought was a slight mistake... You razed that barbarian city. It was in a good location!
You should have left it alone to grow to pop2, then you would have been able to capture it.
With abit of luck, the barbarians would have built a worker for you as well, and maybee improved some of the land.
That would have been preferable to the 11 gold you got from crushing it, imo!

sending his own son, Willem van Indygo

Click to expand...

All right, here's my attempt at a dot map. This is going to take a few pictures strictly because of the shape of the land and the sheer volume of stuff we can found:



Utrecht, I think, gets broken up into two cities to do what it was built to do. 1W of the clams ropes in them, the copper, and the corn, while another town between the stone and the horse should be able to work both and feed itself with the flood plains (which should probably be farmed in this case). Newtrecht should probably be cottaged over; the other one is basically just to nab resources and will probably be a tertiary unit pump if I can get some Workshops on that green land. It should be pretty good during SP.



Marble Cow, I think, is the next city. It's got some crappy desert going on, but it ropes in some good tiles (including the marble) and can work the one flood plain that Amsterdam can't. Eat Your Wheaties kind of sucks, though. I tried to rope in the green hills, which resulted in it being one off the coast. 1N might be better, especially since the lake can be worked with a lighthouse. The two filler towns will be optional if we haven't won the game by that point.



The two cow/fish towns are priorities; Additional Wheaties really isn't. All three will likely be cottaged.



I hate wasting marble on a GP farm, but this one should be able to do the job, plus it's fairly easy to irrigate. Old Barbtown can work the corn while it grows, and it and Gemtown will likely be commerce centers. The full name of that town to the south is "Stupid Low Food Town for Jerks" because I hate it and it falls in miserable territory and is basically filling in our borders. It should be fine post-Biology, but it's low-priority.



You can't see it in this screenshot, but Poseidentown also works a fish 2S of the city--it was basically the only tile that could work it. The one thing I don't like about this one is that I can't work the flood plains thanks to the shape and size of the land. The plains hill 1SW of the dot is pretty good, but it'll have some dead coastal tiles. On the other hand, it's only two tiles, and I don't think I'd really plan to work them. Hmmm.

So there you go. Yeah, the game is basically won at this point--it would be ridiculously easy to turtle up and just go into space in particular. What I'm hoping for is a decent second military target on the other side of the continent. I'm going to court Izzy and Justin for a little bit for some early tech trades, but they'll likely be backstabbed once I get a clear lead.

Priority cities for the next round are, in roughly this order...

1. Marble Cow
2. The two Surf 'n Turf cities
3. GP farm
4. Barbtown
5. The two Utrecht replacement cities
6. Gemtown

Ulundi is probably our best Settler pump for now, while the other cities will hit us with some workers. Tech path will be Currency -> Masonry at first, then we'll see if anyone has Alphabet online since I'm hoping to grab Poly and Meditation by tech trade. Once Poly's in hand, I'll hit Aesthetics and Lit quickly to get the Great Library, then probably start on the mid-game military techs (Construction, CS, Machinery, Engineering) and use GSeses for the Lib race, which shouldn't be a big problem given our current position.

Thoughts?

Nice job taking down the Dutch but for a axe/impi rush to finish by 600bc is a bit late. You won't get this lucky on higher levels where the AI start with archers and expand much quicker. For me a 15 tile rush is too much without mounted units.

You still seem to be dead set against chopping forest for hammers!!!

Overall you had plenty of land to expand into naturally and perhaps could of taken the Dutch cities with some wonders/buildings later on. You certainly need 1-3 more cities before 1ad and to focus more on the economy and make sure you have enough workers.

Remember upkeep is higher the further away from your capital new cities are.