Standard 20k Demigod

Pacioli and I have decided to play a 20k Demigod game. We'll play on an 80% archipelago with no barbarians, warm, wet, 3 billion settings with the Zulu, Mongols, Aztecs, and Japanese as our opponents. My initial and proper turn log and notes got eaten by an error of the old version of Firefox, and I had the whole thing written up and only wanted to post some related thread links. No more of that, from now on I'll use Opera. Anyway, here's Sanabas's guide to a 20k victory and the Beta gauntlet.. Here's our start:



http://i370.photobucket.com/albums/oo146/Spoonwood792000/1265761755.jpg

I think we'll go 10 turns each for one set (I just took mine), and then 5 turns after that.

The worker moved to the 4 spot (that's the spot where you go if you hit the number 4), irrigated, then roaded, then moved to the other cow on the river and irrigated.

If you left the click the worker with the mouse, then take your hand off the mouse, you can see the worker will finish in one turn, then use the arrow keys to say "No. Carry on." to changing the worker's orders. If you combine this with opening the city screen and "false swapping" squares that increase your commerce or food you can see what changes by the time the worker finishes. E. G. I have had a road about to finish and the luxury slider stands at 40%. I "false swap" a 1 commerce tile to the coast, exit the city screen, then push down the luxury slider to 30% and I have as many happy citizens as unhappy ones. Then I go back to the city screen, swap the citizen on the coast back to the square we had it at before. The city may LOOK like it has 1 happy, 1 content, and 2 unhappy citizens, but since the road finishes (and we've checked the effects of 1 increased commerce), we'll actually have 2 happy citizens before the city's box gets calculated.

The capital will grow to size 3 and need readjustment on the next turn due to the simultaneous culture pop, as will the luxury slider. We can get 7 fpt next turn for 3 turn growth. We want the settler in at exactly 30 shields if possible to maximize growth and commerce (the "false swapping" technique can help, as can remembering we'll get extra production every time the city grows... here it's just 1 shield when we use a BG for a while, as we don't have any forests). I don't micromanage my cities like this usually. But, in a 20k game I pretty much always micromanage my capital until it hits size 12. It's just one city, and it doesn't last all that long, so it never really gets old to me. So let's do that. Open up the capital's screen every turn for a while and see what we can do.

We can either irrigate all three grassland cows and the wheat for 10 fpt, or go with 7 fpt and mine the non-river cow and wheat square. What do you think Pacioli?



Do you think we have a strong enough start? Do you think we have enough shields? How many do we have? I strongly suggest you think and reply to this yourself before reading my spoiler.



I don't know where to throw the settler yet. Definitely close, either at a CxxC spacing or on the corner square which the capital can't ever use at CxC, so that warriors for MP duty and workers can quickly travel to the capital. You'll see the culture pop. Next to a cow somewhere can work well if we can see it upon the culture pop. The coast spot south on the coast and river near the fish would have extra commerce for us, perhaps an early harbor, and could potentially put out another curragh if the first one ends up in trouble somehow. A spot next to a BG can work well to produce a warrior, then a worker, then another warrior and another worker in 20 turns to help develop the capital. Then again, as Carthage we can work faster and perhaps create our own production if say the coastal spot doesn't have any.

Sorry for not having a proper turn-log, but it got eaten by the old fox.

I got the 3550 BC save last night. I'll play the next 10 turns, prepare my first ever turn-log, and post it and the save tonight. After tonight, work and family will keep away from any significant time on my computer until Saturday night.

Quite the start there! Hope you don't mind comments.

With that abundance of cows around, I'd probably be irrigating everything except one cow, with a mind to keeping the capital at 5 fpt (wheat + 1 cow) and donating the other cows to nearby cities (growing at 4 fpt). You don't have enough forests around to allow the capital to grow super-fast because the food growth will outstrip the production capabilities, and you'll eventually find some major unhappiness problems in the capital (or raise the luxury rate to compensate). If you can balance your city growth a bit and have three really productive starting cities, I think that'd be a better way to go.

Of course, you might have something lurking off to the west that makes THAT site an ideal settler factory (just a couple of forests and BGs would be great!), and then you might be able to go for two sites at 5 fpt (capital: irrigated wheat, mined cow to the southeast; city 2: irrigated cow, mined cow).

I guess you could just go no granary in the capital and settler-factory that way, irrigating up to 10 fpt, but you're only up to 8 spt at size 6 (using three cows, a wheat, and two mined BGs). I think the investment of an early granary is well worth it. Two turn workers at 5 fpt should be easy (capital, mined cow, irrigated wheat, one mBG) and would probably be the way to go, making your second city a settler factory. Or vice-versa, I suppose.

They are playing for 20K, so there is no way they'll be sharing tiles or building a lot of settlers.

CKS said:

They are playing for 20K, so there is no way they'll be sharing tiles or building a lot of settlers.

Click to expand...

They'll still have to get a number of settlers out. In fact, without seeing anything other than what's there, I'd say that a spot roughly CxxC from the capital, to the southwest, would make a fine 20k site. Later on the capital can be abandoned (to another site) to free up any extra tiles. Immediately, such a site would have a river, two cows, a coast, and obviously a whole lot of unknown--but if there were a couple of hills yonder, that would be a great 20k site. The capital would still have everything to its east and north to use for settlers and workers (to fuel the 20k city, of course!). That would allow the two cows to get mined quickly, providing more production to the 20k site.

Interesting thoughts DWetzel. First off I don't see any benefit to putting out lots of settlers until we the 20k site at size 12 or near size 12. This *will* require that we use the luxury slider significantly. So, CKS's response made sense to me. Your second comment gets a little more interesting.

There does exist a river site to the south which has at least three hills and could use both of those cows. Unless we have another food bonus though, that's only 5 or 6 fpt instead of 7 or 8 fpt with the capital. For a Sid 20k game I would almost surely go with that site, as the slow research times almost require A LOT of palace pre-building. I hadn't planned on that though, and even though it's admittedly a pretty close call here, I think it still works out better to use the capital as the 20k site here.

We've got free culture from the Palace, and after the settler the capital can go either Pyramids as a Colossus pre-build immediately, a worker, or two workers to develop the area. It also has a guaranteed 7 fpt for 3/6 turn growth... we'll raise the luxury slider, while the other site takes 4/7 turns so far as we know right now. Growth to size 7, in my opinion, helps more in the 20k than ultra-early production. Past size 7 production helps more as then you more add in workers... though not as much for this start than others.

The capital also will drop only to size 2 and quickly get back to size 3, while the new city would have to start on size 1, so the capital almost unquestionably *will* get a better build time on the Colossus (try getting the Colossus on Sid, it's fine on Deity, but not Sid) and probably also the Oracle or Pyramids, as getting workers added in before those finish comes as usually too earlier even for Carthage. The capital also has no corruption, so that's potentially a faster build on early wonders in Despotism, and probably a tick lower or two needed on the luxury slider.

That said you did comment

DWetzel said:

You don't have enough forests around to allow the capital to grow super-fast because the food growth will outstrip the production capabilities, and you'll eventually find some major unhappiness problems in the capital (or raise the luxury rate to compensate).

Click to expand...

, which might seem to imply the other river site as the better 20k site since it has at least three hills, while we only have a mountain. But, I would still guess the capital as the better 20k site in terms of production, or they will at least equal each other. Check the spoiler for details.

If you want to take the 4000 BC and try it with some of your ideas, be my guest. In fact, it might prove interesting to compare notes with what we do with what you would do. Such a comparison might even prove more interesting, because we didn't plan on it, and most HoF games don't use such a strategy. And it would probably work as the better strategy at Sid.

But, it's demi-god.

I might just give it a shot. I'll even try to keep fairly detailed notes. I won't spoil anything though--if you don't mind me chiming in with "and, in the alternate universe" as you go along, I'll try to do that.

Remember that IF you have a second city supplying the workers to keep the second town growing (and here, you do), the food growth in the second town is relatively less relevant. I think you get off to a slightly slower start while getting things ramped up, but over the course of the game it has to be a good thing.

I admit to not playing a lot of demigod 20k games, so I could be off base here, but another subtle plus to the second city is that you have the palace prebuild available.

I've had the second city sometimes hit size 2 and need more luxuries than the capital in the early stages to keep happy. I've often used a scientist there instead of raising the luxury slider in this sort of game (even if that means that the city stops growing at size 2, as long as it grows at size 1), to help ensure the Republic slingshot. The other way might potentially work better though as long you get the slingshot, as settlers might come as more quickly produced from there later.

I've rarely run out of builds/pre-builds even at Deity standard, though some at Deity Large and Huge. I once tried it even on a Huge Deity map where I thought using another city might work out as most profitable and my non-prebuilding capital on another map seemed better at the time (though I didn't do a full analysis). Sid works as another story. The more I've played, the more I start to think that if you run out of cultural builds and pre-builds below Sid, it works as better to have the capital pump out settlers in the early game or barracks and military to fish for that MGL to build the Heroic Epic, possibly even in the early game.

I played my 10 turns just after work today. Just recently typed my notes.

This is my first turn-log. Let me know if you would like to see less or more details. I would think less of what I written here and more bigger picture details as we get further into the game. I’m relying on Spoonwood for the overall strategy as I’m the student and he is the teacher.

3500 BC - Turn 1
See 2 more wheat in the west and 1 cow in the northwest. Changed new citizen from entertainer to scientist to give us Writing in 25. Worker will road tile it is currently on. Moved curragh 6-6-9(using key pad).

3450 BC - Turn 2
001 grows in 4, settler in 6. Moved curragh 8-9-9.

3400 BC - Turn 3
Moved worker 9-6. Moved curragh 8-8-8.

3350 BC - Turn 4
001 grows in 2, settler in 4. Changed tile worked so that 001 grows in 4, settler in 4. Worker will road the tile. Moved curragh 7-7-8.

3300 BC - Turn 5
Moved curragh 8-8-8. Dyes appear northwest of 001.

3250 BC - Turn 6
001 grows in 2, settler in 2. Will have zero food overrun but will have 1 shield overrun.
Worker will mine tile to increase shield production. Moved curragh 8-6 and see our first border. Should have used the curragh's last movement to move to 9 and get a better look at our neighbor but mistakenly moved to 8. Wasted move.

3200 BC - Turn 7
Moved curragh to 3. Looks like the Japanese are next door. If we stay put, next turn we can safely move our curragh to a coastal tile near the Japanese. Decided to do just that.

3150 BC - Turn 8
We have a settler! Changed tiles worked in 001 so it now grows in 4, settler in 10. Where to move the settler? Tough choice for me as I prefer CxxxC spacing for my first ring of towns. Decided to move the settler to the coastal spot to our southwest. Let’s build some more curraghs to go exploring.

The Japanese are on a narrow strip of land so far. I can see 1 settler, 3 workers, 3 warriors, 1 diamond, and the outlines of 2 towns. Their capital appears to be southeast of our curragh.

They have BW, Wheel, CB and 10g. We have Masonry, Alpha and 10g. We will not sell or trade Alpha. Traded Masonry for BW and 10g. Changed build order of 001 to the Colussus.


3100 BC - Turn 9
Continued moving our curragh north up Japan’s coast

3050 BC - Turn 10
Founded 002. See another cow south of us. 002 grows in 5, worker in 5. I’m uncomfortable with the overlap created by founding 002 so near to 001.

Here it is:
http://s928.photobucket.com/albums/ad123/Pacioli/Civ%203%20Screenshots/?action=view&current=3050BC.png

Comments and advice are always appreciated Spoonwood.

Turn-log looks good. Hopefully we don't have any one else on our island, because it looks like we have A LOT of food. The scientist in the capital comes as interesting. It probably slowed down the capital's growth and slowed our production a bit, although we might become a Republic earlier. I wouldn't have done it. From now on, no more specialists in the capital except possibly during the revolution. Just use the luxury slider. Other cities might want specialists though, so it's actually a pretty good idea in its own way.

I wouldn't have mined the BG, I would have just roaded it and developed the cow first. But, you may have actually made the better play here. We now have a square that the capital can use upon growth for extra shields that way. Also, we can go both irrigated cows and the mined BG at size three for one turn, then two turns of using all three cows. I also like how you have the 2nd city using the cow for the moment. The overlap works as fine! The only "problem" for our start comes as that 002 doesn't have any extra shields yet. So, once we get the second worker out we'll probably want to move it to the 8 spot, mine it, then use that tile for a while to get warriors out also for MP in the capital.

Pacioli and I talked about this in a PM, but I wouldn't have traded Masonry away *this* early. Instead I would have used the Pyramids as a Colossus pre-build until it ended up about halfway through the 5th line, traded away either Masonry or Alphabet for Bronze Working, and hopefully other techs by having multiple contacts by that point, and then finished the Colossus a turn or two later. Still, what he did works out as fine, as on some maps (such as Huge maps) you either have to have tribe that start with Masonry or ones that get it soon enough.

The overlap works as fine. It's actually allowing us to get a little more growth and production by using 001's cow right now. We might need another curragh, we might not... it's too early to tell.

For Dwetzel: if you use the second site, it has 3 cows and a wheat like the capital in addition to 4 hills. But, it has no bonus grassland. It has a potential 24 or 25 uncorrupted shields in The Republic, in the ancient ages, then 30 or 31 in the low middle ages, and then 32 or 33 shields I think post-Shake's. So, this might actually make for a good comparison between using the 2nd city vs. the capital in a 20k game.

1-3000 BC Curragh head up ishtmus and back, as it leads to a dead end as I would have guessed. Worker mines the cow.

2-2950 BC Swap worker in 002 to fish. Swap 001 to both irrigated cows and the mine. Consider using wheat so 002 can pump out 2nd worker faster, but realize we'd lose a beaker that way and decided against it. 6 food in the capital this turn. Maybe not the best idea. Raise luxury slider to 20%. Writing reads 15 turns.

3-2900 BC 001 swaps from BG to cow. That's 7 food this turn and the next for 20 food into the box. Writing again reads 15 turns.

4-2850 BC Curragh sails, and that's about it. Japan gained a single gold piece.

5-2800 BC Lux to 30%. Worker roads. Spot yellow borders on what I think of as the same continent as Japan. If they don't have Masonry, they might get it soon from Japan, so we might want to trade them Masonry to get what we can from them, as I'd guess it only a turn or two before they meet each other.

We probably want to develop the BG near the worker currently and then the wheat. Mine and then road, or road and then mine, not sure which works better for this start. The worker from 002 should move to the 8 spot. It can then mine. With one turn left on mining, we'll swap the fish to that square for a warrior from 002. Then we can road that square with that worker, and then move it to the BG to develop it. Carefully watch the luxury slider every turn. Once we complete the Colossus we'll probably have the ability to drop it (the Colossus actually has to completely finish, unlike worker jobs which just have to say one turn left to get the benefit.).

You could swap the citizen on one of the irrigated cows in 001 to the wheat next turn in 2750 BC and swap 002 to that irrigated cow square next turn also. 001 will LOOK like it would riot at 30% luxes, but since the worker roading the BG will finish in 2750 BC we'll get the commerce before happiness gets calculated, and it wouldn't riot. Then we'd swap the wheat back to the irrigated cow the turn after and use the fish again in 002 with it going for a warrior, until the mine had one turn left to finish. We'd get our second worker out faster this way. I don't know if I like this better or not changing anything. I'll leave it up to you.

We'll want to hang on to Alphabet as long as we can really, as well as Writing. We might want to use the Pyramids as a pre-build on the Oracle and trade for both CB and Mysticism with hopefully just Alphabet. The Pyramids costs 400 shields and has 10 lines in box and the Oracle 300 shields. So, we would want to wait until we have 7 lines filled in the Pyramids box, but no more, then swap the Oracle and finish it soon after. Then again, no one might get the Oracle for us in time, as Japan ends up the most likely to get their first and they look like they have a start full of junk. We'd then hopefully finish the Pyramids first, even though that would probably give us a despotic golden age. Not all bad with this start actually. Or maybe once we finish the Colossus and have 40 or so shields in the box, we trade away Masonry for CB with someone else and put in the temple first. That sounds like a better plan, but BOTH really work as too theoretical all this point. We'll have to play that by ear.

I got the 2800 BC.Sav. If time allows, I'll play the next 5 turns tonight. If not, tomorrow night for sure.

We can no longer move our curragh in an unexplored direction and end safely on a coastal square. I found the following article: http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3/strategy/sinking_chances.php

Seafaring-75% of survival, regardless of difficulty level, terrain, ship, or turns spent in water.

There are sea squares to our west that I would explore. Going in this direction might allow us to get a look at some of our northern border.

What do you think?

Sure about that? Did you double back around all sides of our island? Where we had large patches of sea (like where it ended up in the 2800 BC save), did it move JUST ITS FIRST MOVE onto the sea square to see if another coast lay two more squares away (move back to a coast if nothing there, if another coast seen 2 squares away go there)? Sorry, but I doubt you exhausted everything in all directions in just 5 turns with the curragh yet. We really don't have an idea if anyone lies continuing in the same direction the curragh has gone so far or on the other side of the world... specifically to the other side of our home island. I guess that helps explain why you can't retire and then submit a game in the HoF or XOTM competitions. And it implies we shouldn't risk a suicide run yet... especially with two contacts and two wonder builds at our disposal (Scandinavia with no contacts and about to finish a settler pre-build may work out differently, or Spain for that matter with its 40 shield barracks pre-build, but Carthage in the right hands doesn't usually have to take such risks for a long while).

On another note I've tried Sanabas's strategy that he used for the Beta Gauntlet (playing as Byzantines against Ottos, Persia, Babylon, Russia, and Germany and the Mongols for my map, to get Theology as my free tech) for a Large Demigod game and it more-or-less has worked, though I think I had another game where I didn't get Theology as my free tech before that. Anyways...

I've double-checked, and there's no mathematical way that in 5 turns the curragh could have made it back to our home island and checked out the other side of it. So, let's do that first if the Japan/Mongol? island has no other spots to check.

Your right. I have not doubled back to our home island. I'm looking at unexplored water tiles north of Japan's cities and west of the Zulu's. I have no problem doubling back.

I should have said: We can no longer move our curragh in an unexplored direction and end safely on a coastal square... without ending our turn in the Zulu's territory. Instead of annoying the Zulus, I would move our curragh in another direction. Since every unit at this point is very valuable, you're telling me not to risk losing the curragh by moving to a sea or ocean tile. Correct?

Don't worry about moving over Zulu territory. The attitude may drop a little bit for a few turns, but we don't plan on keeping the curragh there, so it usually gets better a bit later, and it doesn't seem to cause all that much damage. We also have the AIs at least aggressive, which makes their default happiness setting better towards us. In fact, if you can safely move the curragh through Zulu territory, I'd advise doing that before doubling back. Do NOT end the turn in a sea or ocean tile, but the curragh can pass through a sea or ocean tile before it takes its last movement of the turn. The third number under the curragh label should tell you how many turns the curragh has left.

Sounds good. I'll continue by moving through the Zulu territory.

1-2750 BC We meet the Zulu. They have Pottery, WC, CB, 0g, and 4 cities including their capital. We offered 20g. They offered nothing in return as expected. I liked your idea to get our 2nd worker out faster and made the suggested reassignments.

2-2710 BC Reassigned citizens in 001 and 002 as suggested. Moved 002 worker to 8. 002 will build a warrior. Moved 001 worker to BG. Assigned 001 newest citizen to BG.

3-2670 BC Lux to 40%. Both workers mine.

4-2630 BC Curragh continues exploring.

5-2590 BC Zulu are building the Colussus. 001 grows in 1, Colussus in 17. Lux to 50%.

As I typed my turn-log, I realize that I left the wheat unimproved. Not good.

The wheat not developed comes as fine. We have a worker on the BG mining it right now, so that's the best we can do for the moment. We could have put out another worker after the settler, and then started the Colossus, but what we have going will still work well.

Pre-turn Drop luxes to 40%, which leaves 001 with 2 happy, 1 content, and 2 unhappy citizens.

1-2550 Raise luxes to 50% as 001 now needs it to have 3 happy and 3 unhappy citizens. Swap 002 from fish to spot about to get mined.

2-2510 Both workers now road. We'll get the warrior in 2 turns and it'll move into 001 at the same time it hits size 7 in two turns do the new road.

3-2470 Japan and the Zulu both have Pottery, The Wheel, Iron Working, Warrior Code, and Ceremonial Burial on us at least. I don't really care at this point, just thought I'd point it out.

4-2430 002 warrior-worker. After this it can go for another warrior, then another worker, then we'll see what we think best. Japan starts the Colossus. 001 hits size 7. The warrior moves to 001. I swap 001 from the mountain to the wheat. Luxes lowered to 40% for 3 happy, 1 content, and 3 unhappy citizens in 001. 1 worker to the BG, another to the wheat. Writing dropped from 5 to 4 turns upon science slider increase.

5-2390 warrior fortifies. Both workers mine.