Departamento da Administração Interna

[Niklas]

This thread will be the home of the Departamento da Administração Interna, also known as the spreadsheet slaves (not that other departments won't use them, but we'll be the first at least . I'll keep this post updated with links to the latest version of our spreadsheet, and issues currently under discussion that needs input.

I will post initial thoughts shortly. This thread will subsume the Starting Locations thread.

[Niklas]

Here are some numbers for worker first vs workboat first.
Both scenarios assume we settle NE:

Spoiler for Worker first:

Spoiler for Workboat first:

Worker first has quite a few more hammers thanks to faster mines and growth. It also have quite a few more tiles improved thanks to the earlier Worker, obviously. There's also 4 more food in the bin. It is behind 7 beakers though, from working the Fish more when going Workboat first.

Both scenarios assume we settle NE. Worker plan in both cases is: Farm Wheat -> Mine plains hill X2 -> Chop + Mine plains hill

Let the discussions commence (well, continue really). I'll say more tomorrow, but for now it's bedtime.

[oyzar]

I think either skipping the workboat for exploration(until later) or skipping one of the warriors might be better.. Developing faster at the start is very important...

[RRRaskolnikov]

Originally Posted by oyzar

I think either skipping the workboat for exploration(until later) or skipping one of the warriors might be better.. Developing faster at the start is very important...

I too think we can delay the exploring wb until we have some cities settled, as at first a warrior can be used for this purpose, and we won't be settling our first cities too far from the capital anyways (this will obviously depend on the quality of the land around us)... that's my input anyways

Cheers

[oyzar]

The idea of the exploring workboat is obviously that we would need to meet our neighbours in order to talk to them and getting a workboat out might be the fastest way possible. Doing this as fast as possible allow us to negotiate deals faster. However how much benefit this will give us is hard to say, and even harder to compare with the benefit of getting new cities out sooner...

[Renata]

Obviously we'll have to look at the in-game situation when we get that far. But in general, I think we should prioritize exploration very highly.

[PurpleTurtle]

I don't know if anyone has considered this, but it may be possible to circumnavigate without optics. If it is, the exploring wb would be crucial.

[oyzar]

well i don't like to sacrifice exploration for expansion, but sure circumnavigation is a real possiblity...

[Niklas]

I really really really want an exploring workboat out as fast as possible. I would even consider building it before a few of the warriors. I think the team that first manages to contact two or more other teams will have a substantial advantage in having a head start on negotiating for tech agreements. If that delays every one of our other cities by two turns, then so be it. That's how I feel.

[Earthling]

Woah, sorry Niklas, I completely missed this! I actually posted some Screenshot-y versions of the starting builds over on the other thread. You took this a lot further out into turns than I did; however I'm not sure your first premise was quite right. You certainly laid out a strong scenario for worker first, but with workboat first, I think it's better to grow to at least size 2. Obviously I lacked such a nice spreadsheet layout, though. To summarize what is my preferred build right now, we grow to size three at turn 16 (much sooner than either of your builds) and get our first settler turn 27. I think the earlier second city makes up for whatever other difference we're concerned with.

Edit: Here is the info I posted on the other thread (and a second post to follow):

Hello everyone, since I'm not out on a shopping spree for this Black Friday morning (silly American thing, once again) I took some time to make a test game for the starting positions on WB. The settings are theoretically the same; Standard map, normal speed, Monarch difficulty. The save at 4000 BC will also be posted below, of course, for anyone who wants to test anything out. The land is not exactly the same as this is just a test - all the important resources and hills are in place. To preface this: I know it's not possible to have tried every possible starting combination; however I think the ones I played out are the most optimal/likely. Also, I personally did not see a single clear option in the results; I think you'll see that a couple of different starting builds could get us in a couple of different places, both equally good.

So, the first thing I tested was Worker First as per oyzar's suggestion. This is obviously a strong build and so here are how things work out with worker first:

Spoiler:

Attachment 195641
Worker First involves 10 turns of building the worker, plus the first turn where we move the settler. So, the worker is finished and can start farming (we research AG) as is seen is this screenshot.

Now, assuming we build a workboat next, here is how that works out:
Attachment 195642
The wheat is farmed

Attachment 195644
At turn 19 is where worker first strategies would diverge. Here, we are at size 2, with the wheat farmed and a workboat for the fish. Notice that AG is researched but not BW quite yet; however it's one of the solid starts. I'm going to continue with a different start for now, more discussion to follow.

Next, we have Workboat first.

Spoiler:

Here again we simply start off moving the settler, building the workboat is nothing exciting. Here's where it comes out.
Attachment 195645
Next, we have the city grow to size 2 while simply setting production to a warrior. I think this is something important to notice; because with all of the WB first we do get a head start on production of a second warrior.
Attachment 195646

Here, we start on the worker at size 2. This leads into some of the upcoming options (I think in the next post at this point, due to image limit). Oyzar was correct to point out that this worker comes out again at turn 19, the same turn as before. The differences include no improvements yet, but roughly 10c ahead (1 turn) on research. Plus, we have BW first, which allows a couple of chop strategies to be seen.
Attachment 195647
Another option is to grow to size 3, then start the worker as follows:

And at size three the worker builds faster, though, coming out turn 21
Attachment 195648
Attachment 195649

These are the simplest starts; next post I'll show what I think are the strongest options out of them.

Oh, and here's the 4000 BC test save.
This is the updated one that should match our opening Screenshot (as discussion has shown, tech modifiers might not be the same).
Earthling's Test BC-4000 Final.CivBeyondSwordSave

[Earthling]

Here's the rest of these scenarios again - sorry you have to click the links with the screenshots transferring over.

First, I'm going to compare the very similar looking starts at size 2. Again, conditions are very similar at size 2 between Worker First, and WB first; the most important difference is that one techs AG, one techs BW.

Here is Worker First, Two Workers

Spoiler:

It might be tough to see from the screenshot; the worker will actually be ready to go turn 25 (end of turn 24). I didn't see a way to hurry up those couple extra hammer because we're already working fish and wheat.
Attachment 195655

I believe this is stronger than worker-settler; the other alternative is simply to grow to size three (again, from that point at turn 19. Worker settler (slower, I think) below:
Attachment 195654

For comparison, here is Workboat First, Two Workers

Spoiler:

Attachment 195653
Attachment 195656

The difference between these two is that with Workboat first, we use the chop to hurry up our second worker. Thus, we actually get the second worker two turns sooner. Both of these workers need to play catch up then to go farm the wheat immediately (we're also about 1 turn ahead in tech) so there's not a big difference.

Finally, we have what is to me the most interesting start, where we go workboat first and then grow to size 3. This is the fastest way to size three, as shown below, I think it also gets the fastest reasonable settler.
Workboat First, Size 3 Settler

Spoiler:

First, not chopping is obviously bad; this screenshot shows the worker just improving the wheat at first, on turn 26
Attachment 195657

However, if the worker chops this settler, at size three, we get our first settler out at turn 27. Note also that simply while growing to size three, we built an extra warrior, who could be out exploring/fogbust. What we've sacrificed is having no improvements yet, but we get both size 3 with the fish, and our first settler.
Attachment 195658

I really do like the fast settler route, because I think our second city might have very good resources too. So, a summary of these three options (the best ones I thought of) comes down to this.

Worker First = size 2, workboat at turn 19. Wheat Improved
Then, we could grow to size three, or build another worker.

Workboat First, Size 2= Worker at turn 19.
Options: build another worker, get improvements up roughly the same time. A bit more research from fish commerce; also maybe 10 hammers ahead on a warrior.

Workboat First, Size 3= Worker at turn 21. Also extra warrior already out.
Option: Chop a Settler, ready to go at turn 27. (My favorite option)

Both Workboat First research Bronze Working. Worker First researches Agriculture.

I hope these Screenshots give you guys some picture of how things might look. The short answer is that we have a very good start regardless and at most might be a turn or two off whatever we do.

[Niklas]

Great stuff Earthling! I'm not fully convinced that the differences lie in other factors though, and I still think Worker first will be the strongest. But we need numbers!

Here's the spreadsheet I use to plan starts, which I forgot to post last night:
MTDG startup plan.zip

It uses macros and only works in Excel (not OpenOffice). You need to turn on macros to use it.

[Earthling]

Alright, I know there have been requests from folks to summarize chat discussions; I'm just quickly posting my impressions from earlier today. It seems like most of us decided that building a worker first is indeed the best opening. This is followed by a workboat, then warrior to size 3. Building a settler next could finish the settler at turn 28 if we chop or we could continue growing; we also have more improvements in place than workboat first. I think we also generally agreed that the earlier the settlers start coming, the better, but it does depend on the land around us. Also, I agreed with those who thought that we shouldn't chop every forest right at the start just for this purpose- if we could save some for wonders or other needs later that might be best.

Contingencies we are unsure of include the tech modifier of the game (how expensive techs are). We don't know the exact map settings Sulla used so we're not sure exactly what this is. Niklas predicted and I agree it probably shouldn't be more expensive than what we were modeling. However, if techs are more expensive, this would mean it takes longer to get BW because we go with agriculture first. Workboat first had the advantage of earlier chopping by researching BW, but otherwise didn't give quite as much production in the long run; WB first did get a few extra beakers as well. As it stands, we could get both AG and Bronze just fine though, we just need to check the tech at the start of the game to be sure.

We vaguely discussed the timing/use of an exploring workboat (to go meet the other teams) but I don't think that's been decided on yet - more might depend on scouting once we actually get into the game. That's just my opinion though, this topic is one that could use more discussion.

Finally, a number of us were also concerned about the effect of barbarians. Particularly, we suspected that we are at a latitude/climate where we're going to see lots of bears that could kill early warriors; how much fogbusting we'd need for real barbs later of course depends on the land. However, most variations on the opening build could be adapted to deal with a barb situation, so this doesn't have too much impact on our early turns.

[oyzar]

I just don't see how 4 turns earlier settler is worth having 2 less pop... As long as we are building settlers and workers each extra pop is +3/4 yeild(+4 hammers before bonuses and -2 food) and +1 commerce. I also believe we would want a second worker before the 1st settler(delaying the settler another 3 turns)...

[Niklas]

Time to revisit the plan and breathe some life into this dusty department.



They text that I've left in the grey areas are the tiles we would have worked by the plan, but which we lost out on due to PurpleTurtle's misunderstanding. Not to dwell on mistakes, but neither do I want to sweep them under the carpet. I would like us all to understand these numbers I post, so I'm leaving it in hoping that it will lead to better understanding.

The plan as stated has us build (Worker->Workboat)->Warrior x3->Workboat->Worker->Settlers on repeat. We most certainly need to build at least one warrior, though the order of the warrior(s) and the workboat(s) could (and should!) definitely be up for debate.

We also need to decide what to research after Bronze Working is in.

[oyzar]

We certainly don't get third mine up that fast? do we get second up for the correct time too?

[Niklas]

We get the mines up on turns 20, 25 and 33, with a chop on turn 29 in between. So it's all good with the plan there.

[slaze]

Originally Posted by Niklas

We also need to decide what to research after Bronze Working is in.

Connecting cities looks to be a near priority. Looks like we'll have 10 turns between completion of BW and completion of Settler #1 - not to much time to slip another tech in b/n BW and wheel/sailing. Location of city #2 has alot to do with it. if we go to the river we could get away with sailing and even push the city to the extremes of the river. Sheep looks to need wheel. Completion of bronze will tell us which of the two; sheep/wheel or river/sailing.

If no bronze around, how badly do we need archery? In my first MP game I played paranoid and would beeline archery. Experience has led me to believe the strongest (economic) games are played by rushing w/ settlers and fighting don't start til late, late classical at the very earliest. I think if there's no bronze, then sheep needs AH. And whether the wheel goes before or after that is up to the number crunchers.

(I still haven't figured out the connection rules for closely placed cities. Although it would seem like sheep wouldn't be connected, it wouldn't surprise me at all if it was, despite no roads. In that case, AH first for sure.)

[Niklas]

Originally Posted by slaze

(I still haven't figured out the connection rules for closely placed cities. Although it would seem like sheep wouldn't be connected, it wouldn't surprise me at all if it was, despite no roads. In that case, AH first for sure.)

I'm not sure I understand you here. Nothing would be connected without either river or road. Care to explain what you mean?

[slaze]

The sheep will have the tile currently being mined in its BFC, and that will be enough to connect them. I know it shouldn't, as it's not connected to that river tile, but all i'm saying is I've seen situations similar to this, where i wouldn't expect a connection and it ends up there is one. One could set up a worldbuilder test to see. I know they shouldn't be connected, but strange stuff happens when cities overlap so much. Or at least that's what it seems like.