SGOTM 13 - One Short Straw

Hinduism still hasn't been founded yet, suggesting that only 1 civ started with mysticism, so our odds of getting it should be better than normal.
 
True. I think it's worth at least considering.

Quick calculation:
If we went Myst-Masonry after Sailing (before Pottery-Wtg) and went with the no happy people move (settle on stone and use that city to build it, with 2hpt CC and GH mine), we're looking at about 1750 BC. This is at a significant cost, since there's no Granary available for building in Paris and we potentially lose a lot of international TR income later. It's also dependent on the stone site having some food to make it a decent second city. If we went Pottery first, then Myst-Masonry, we wouldn't have stone hooked up until about T85 at least. At that stage, Paris could build it in 11t, for 1600 BC. Is that a safe date?

We'd also presumably need a way to avoid a GP or two later, with both SH and Oracle contributing points. That probably means really rushing a library in non-wonder city right after and having two citizens to commit to this continuously.

Edit: Seems like a stretch to me. We've been agonizing over the production limitations, so adding an early wonder is a bit much, no? More importantly, this forces a radical change to early tech, if we wanna utilize stone.
 
North: <screenshot snipped>
Since when did you start playing wargames in French? :lol:


Hey it's the magical fish tile!
It is... never trust a Map Maker! ;)


I'm fine with settling on PH.
Me, too. Even a single Magical Fish won't be worth re-running all of those tests for. LC's latest PH run was pretty good, let's stick with it.

On that note, do we know for sure how to reproduce it? I tried but couldn't quite get it last night before I gave up and went to bed.

I mean, it's great to pick a test run based on the good results that we got, but if we can't mimic those results, then we didn't really "pick" that particular test run... we picked something else that may or may not be as good.

Okay... maybe my concern comes too late... there are like 10 million messages since I went to bed and it seems that the turnset has been played... let's just hope that it matches LC's test run. Let's just make sure that we have it correct for the next turnset.


Here's a tentative order
Maybe you should push me down the list a position or two... I'm still recovering from being sick and am in a heavy coughing stage. I'm fine to play test games because I can always reload if I goof up, but I don't want to be responsible for coughing my way into a mis-click.

If you would rather keep the order but don't mind waiting a few days for me to play, that approach can work, too, but if you want to keep the game moving, then we should swap my place in the playing order.


With stone I don't think we will have any trouble getting either the Oracle or the Pyramids-they tend to go fairly late. I was thinking that it might be worth going for Stonehenge as well.
We're talking about Stonehenge again, huh? Well, quarrying a Stone square and Roading it takes a very long time. I think that we'd probably have to settle on it in order for it to "be in time" to help with Stonehenge (and even then, it probably won't be fast enough). The plus side is that the base Stone square gives 2 Hammers, so settling on it gives our City Centre 2 Hammers. The downsides are that we'd mess up one production square on a production-poor map and we might also not have any Food Resources to partner with it. The other downside is that, at least in our test game, Stonehenge was gone about 2000 BC, so if it is built early, we'd still miss building it... I'm not sure that any failure Gold that we got would make up for the loss of the early-game Hammers invested.

Certainly, the Hammer cost of building it in either the capital or City 2 early on is going to have a big effect on our game, too. The advantages of Monuments are that although you may pay more total Hammers overall, you will:
a) Pay the Hammers later. Early Hammers are more valuable than later Hammers
AND
b) You can 1-pop-whip a Monument but you probably won't use any people in whipping Stonehenge... there's the possibility of whip overflow but since you are already racing to get that Wonder, you probably don't have the luxury to do so. On a Food-heavy map, where the whipping Unhappiness would get spread out across our Cities, Monuments are definitely favoured over Stonehenge


If we went Myst-Masonry after Sailing (before Pottery-Wtg)
If getting Stonehenge would require us to delay Pottery, which was kind of the main theme of our chosen test run, then I'd be against building Stonehenge. I'd say that the Stone is a trap for the unwary and I'd prefer to stick to our chosen tech path, at least until after Pottery and Sailing... whether we will delay Writing is certainly a valid option, but let's not throw our solid test run to the wind over a possible Stonehenge.


Don't forget that early Stone gives us early access to MOAI STATUES. I think that this Wonder will be of far more value to chase after than Stonehenge will be.
 
On that note, do we know for sure how to reproduce it? I tried but couldn't quite get it last night before I gave up and went to bed.

I mean, it's great to pick a test run based on the good results that we got, but if we can't mimic those results, then we didn't really "pick" that particular test run... we picked something else that may or may not be as good.

I got VERY close in post 343. I actually had more food and about the same hammers. Whoever plays next (Ras?) should be able to use my instructions to come up with something better than both of our tests with a little tweaking.

I'll start working on updating the test game now.
 
Here is the test save... NOT. Dhoom, I'll e-mail it to you. Can you post it please?

I didn't do too much fog gazing when creating the map. However, it does look like tundra up north above Crab Island, which would imply that we're in the northern hemisphere...
 
Both crabs and fish will be in our culture T77, so we're flexible in settling them. Hopefully another resource is nearby. Paris would be a good bureau capital with Moai and a good war producer with HE. Maybe we should plan for a super-capital, with surrounding cites for producing GSes. If we slingshot MC and then research Machinery, we'll be able to trade for Alpha, if we've met the AIs already. If not, we don't need it anyway.

In any case, we should study the demo screen to fully understand our AIs and monitor when they build their cities. That might help us with wonder production.
 
Agreed about evaluating the demo screen and the possibilities of stone. Cheap Moai is really nice - that is a pretty big consideration since it may be worth dumping whip overflow into it once we get stone hooked up.

As for swapping in the roster, I'm fine waiting a few days but if Ras is around and wants to start kicking around the next PPP, we can go with that. Ras?
 
I'll send the demo data to LC and bbp, two that have asked for it and for whom I have email addresses. It will be later tonight though. Drop me a PM if anyone else wants it.
 
Getting caught up--great job with all the testing!

It's hard for me to see how we go for SH--it's a costly detour at a critical time.

If we miss it--we're screwed big time. Mids is another story.
 
The screen shots and saves have been e-mailed. They are still in my outbox. I have a bad connection at home, so it may take a while for them to upload. Check your junk mail folders. :)
 
Seems great job Mitchum :thumbsup: I will send u my email as I 'd like to check the screens too!
I like SH but we do have to do some planning regarding great people, not sure an early priest is what we need (though oracling COL might be a good shot).
I like many of the suggested slings too!

As for swapping in the roster, I'm fine waiting a few days but if Ras is around and wants to start kicking around the next PPP, we can go with that. Ras?

My GF lost her grand dad yesterday and the funeral are tomorow (have to leave town for the occasion). I won't be able to focus on the game till saturday. If the team doesn't mind the delay I can handle the next set, otherwise swap me :)

edit: tx for updating the test game!
 
Ok, Rusten or ungy - do either of you want to take the next set? Otherwise I think we'll just wait for Dhoom and stick to the original order. It'll give us some time to consider the stone a bit more fully too.
 
CULTURE:
  • GLH leader has 13 land tiles in BFC (border pop T2).
  • 1 CRE leader, with 9 land tiles in initial radius and 19 in BFC (borders T4 for +10 tiles).
  • GLH didn't found Buddhism, but is also CRE (borders T15). Gets only 6 more tiles after second border pop - so a very watery start.
  • Buddhism founder isn't the other CRE leader (borders T30), has 14 land in BFC and only 21 in second borders - also kinda watery.
  • The other CRE leader has more land - 19 in BFC and further 10 in second pop (borders T38).

Code:
		Rate		1st	2nd
Base		2cpt		8t	75t
CRE		4cpt		4t	38t
GLH		8cpt		2t	19t
GLH+C	10cpt	2t	15t

With Buddhism (T11):
		Rate		1st	2nd
Base		2cpt		8t	30t
CRE		4cpt		4t	23t
GLH		8cpt		2t	16t
GLH+C	10cpt	2t	14t

Edit:
Possible 6th Coalition leaders:
Code:
Cath		Cre	Imp	Hun	Min
Vick		Fin	Imp	Fis	Min	
Biz		Ind	Exp	Hun	Min
Fred		Phi	Org	Hun	Min
Rag		Fin	Agg	Fis	Hun
Izzy		Spi	Exp	Fis	Mys
Joao		Exp	Imp	Fis	Min
Char		Imp	Pro	Hun	Mys
Only one CRE, whereas we have two in game. Other CRE Europeans are Willem, Louis (not), Pericles (doubtful).

We have only two with Mysticism on the list, but only one in game - probably Isabella.

Members:
Russia, Prussia, Austria, U.K., Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Sicily, Sardinia, Saxony, Bavaria, Wurttemberg

That's all I can gather from culture. Not very interesting, except that Cathy with GLH sounds kinda nasty. Will look at other data later today.
 
Ok, Rusten or ungy - do either of you want to take the next set? Otherwise I think we'll just wait for Dhoom and stick to the original order. It'll give us some time to consider the stone a bit more fully too.
I need to fix some comp issues before I can play a set--I get the message "game can't be submitted".
 
One more detail, bbp: The Buddhist has to be spiritual or else the 2nd would be 31t, which rules out Karl. Are we sure it can't be Brennus or the Byzantine?

WHy not Louis for Cre?
 
Good point on revolt.
Brennus is CHA - it doesn't work with Approval Rate numbers (all have 5 :) 1 :mad: except for us)
Justinian works, I just knocked him out based on 6th Coalition list.
Louis is French, as are we. (Our city is called Paris, too)
 
There's also the huge mystery of the AI power. At least one AI starts with 11?!? That's impossible, unless the mapmaker removed something:
Code:
2 archers = 6
hunting   = 2
archery   = 6
(mining  = 2)
So even the max of 14 is impossible for any leader with mining, which is 5 of 8 on bbp's list. :crazyeye: The average power is 12.666*6=76. Max = 14, min = 11. That could be:
Code:
14 14 14 12 11 11
14 14 13 13 11 11
14 14 13 12 12 11
14 13 13 13 12 11
Something has to give. At most 3 AIs could have started with vanilla Emporer equipment. What was removed, an archer or two? Were the archers replaced by warriors? Is this a temptation for an early rush? Maybe a trojan horse for the demo screen analyzers? :cool:

Solution 1: AIs started with 1 archer or 2 warriors. That's 11 or 12. Add mining and you get 13 or 14. This satisfies the set of choices most easily. (EDIT: Or 1 archer + 1 warrior = 13.)

Solution 2: AIs started with 1 or 2 archers. That's 11 or 14. Add mining gives you 13. No 12 is possible. Only two AIs could have started with mining.

Solution 3: AIs didn't start with archery or hunting. Doubtful but who knows what lunacy lurks in the minds of mapmakers?

--------

The power stats also tell us that no AI has researched BW yet (deltaPower>=4pt), which is also odd for a handful of AIs starting with Mining.
 
Top Bottom