Turn Discussion Thread

[grant2004]

Sounds good to me. I'm happy to see the maceman finished more quickly so we can grab that barbarian city.

[pindicator]

I prefer to see the macemen finished so we can take the barb city sooner rather than later. I'm not too worried about growing into unhealthiness out of Sirius because it has great growth rate now and we can also add health buildings fairly cheaply now with Beaurocracy + Org Rel in place.

How many maces do we want to bring over to take the barb city? We can probably expect to see 3 barb archers in the city, more if AMAZON has been harassing it with troops.

[AlphaShard]

There are two Warrior barbs in Carib.

[Trystero]

Originally Posted by pindicator

I prefer to see the macemen finished so we can take the barb city sooner rather than later. I'm not too worried about growing into unhealthiness out of Sirius because it has great growth rate now and we can also add health buildings fairly cheaply now with Beaurocracy + Org Rel in place.

Whipping the maceman in Canopus gets her done slightly faster. Some of the timing advantage is lost since it takes 3 turns for her to get from Canopus to board the galley, but this is still a turn faster than building it in Sirius.

I did some more micro and posted the plan in the micro thread. Sirius grows pretty rapidly, and this times with completing the cottages pretty nicely.

How many maces do we want to bring over to take the barb city? We can probably expect to see 3 barb archers in the city, more if AMAZON has been harassing it with troops.

As long as it's just the 2 warriors, one maceman should easily handle them.

Edit: Looking at the demo screen AlphaShard posted, we are currently #1 in GNP, manufacturing, and land area, and #2 in food. Nice.

Also, I made a dot map for Bode:

Spoiler:

[grant2004]

I like the dot map, lots of good cities there. Maybe one at 3 south of the southern most pig to grab the incense. That one may interfere heavily with Maverick culture though and wouldn't be a huge priority.

What are you thinking in terms of settlement order? I'd assume the city at the tip is the last of the three shown unless we're in need of those whales. The one south of Arcturus would be a good city that could develop fairly quickly, but it would be slow to get a workboat to it from elsewhere. The city to the east requires more work to get it running, but could grow quickly with the help of workboats built elsewhere.

The other thing I notice looking at this map is the potential for a canal through Vega. 2 forts would allow us to connect to the sea on the other side, cutting transit time by a few turns. I'm not sure how worthwile this would be, probably not very much unless we're in a race with Quatronia to take the Maverick home island when Astronomy is completed.

[Trystero]

Originally Posted by grant2004

I like the dot map, lots of good cities there. Maybe one at 3 south of the southern most pig to grab the incense. That one may interfere heavily with Maverick culture though and wouldn't be a huge priority.

What are you thinking in terms of settlement order? I'd assume the city at the tip is the last of the three shown unless we're in need of those whales. The one south of Arcturus would be a good city that could develop fairly quickly, but it would be slow to get a workboat to it from elsewhere. The city to the east requires more work to get it running, but could grow quickly with the help of workboats built elsewhere.

Given what we now know, I would settle the pigs/copper city next. It will have good production (although not as much food as Arcturus), and would be at a strategic location if we attack the Mavericks home island. Since Mavericks have no cities on Bode, I'm much less worried about settling the pigs/clam/clam city. I would wait on that until our workers have improved Arcturus and Vega.

The other thing I notice looking at this map is the potential for a canal through Vega. 2 forts would allow us to connect to the sea on the other side, cutting transit time by a few turns. I'm not sure how worthwile this would be, probably not very much unless we're in a race with Quatronia to take the Maverick home island when Astronomy is completed.

I don't think forts work the way you suggest. You can use them, like cities, to bridge two bodies of water separated by a single land tile, but you can't string them together to form a canal. I tested this with Vega in World Builder to make sure I was right about this.

Lastly, on the diplomatic front: Shouldn't we tell Amazon that Merlot has a Holkan wandering around Bode?

[Irgy]

Originally Posted by Trystero

Given what we now know, I would settle the pigs/copper city next. It will have good production (although not as much food as Arcturus), and would be at a strategic location if we attack the Mavericks home island. Since Mavericks have no cities on Bode, I'm much less worried about settling the pigs/clam/clam city. I would wait on that until our workers have improved Arcturus and Vega.

I agree with settling the other copper first, it's the city we're much more likely to miss out on otherwise.

Originally Posted by Trystero

I don't think forts work the way you suggest. You can use them, like cities, to bridge two bodies of water separated by a single land tile, but you can't string them together to form a canal. I tested this with Vega in World Builder to make sure I was right about this.

I thought it worked as long every fort was adjacent to a water tile (including possibly a lake)? I guess your test shows that a city doesn't count as a water tile. So, you can make a canal two tiles wide but can't use a city to make it three (or maybe you can if the city is the middle tile rather than one of the coastal tiles, but then you've got a one-off-the-coast city).

Originally Posted by Trystero

Lastly, on the diplomatic front: Shouldn't we tell Amazon that Merlot has a Holkan wandering around Bode?

Well they'll no doubt whine about it if we don't. Maybe it will prompt a reply from them. At the moment it's looking like we might as well wait for paper to finish the negotiations over Anjennida.

[Trystero]

Originally Posted by Irgy

Well they'll no doubt whine about it if we don't. Maybe it will prompt a reply from them. At the moment it's looking like we might as well wait for paper to finish the negotiations over Anjennida.

I would send them a brief PM saying something like:

Just wanted to let you know that we have spotted a Merlot Holkan on Bode (the spoke to our south). Their unit is in the area corresponding to the location of the lake on Anjennida. It is currently 1 tile west of that lake on Bode. We will keep you apprised of it's movements.

I could PM Sommerswerd, since I'm a turnplayer, and he's contacted me before for in-game developments.

[grant2004]

Ah, you're right about the canal, I rememberd that the limit was two forts, but I forgot that the city counted as a fort in this case. One of my friends from college tends to build crazy fort chains, taking advantage of any little lakes he finds. If he were here he would've suggested moving Vega inland in order to make that fort chain work. Which of course would've been a horrible idea.

As for mentioning the Holkan to the Amazons, I think it was mentioned in one of the ETTA comunications, but if we think it may be heading over to threaten Anjenida, or see it move out of our field of vision generaly in their direction, then we should mention it to them again.

[Trystero]

Originally Posted by grant2004

As for mentioning the Holkan to the Amazons, I think it was mentioned in one of the ETTA comunications, but if we think it may be heading over to threaten Anjenida, or see it move out of our field of vision generaly in their direction, then we should mention it to them again.

You're right we did mention this in an ETTA report. I might just PM them an update anyways. It couldn't hurt to be neighborly.

Since there have been no objections, AlphaShard and I are following the micro plan I referred to above. The short term goals here are get more workers out and to develop our cities (Sirius and Vega mostly, for the time-frame of my micro plan). The plan, specifically for this turn is:

Turn 87:
Sirius grows to size 7, works forested plains hill (+3 hammers)

This is for one turn, until the cottage is completed next turn.

hell hound finishes pasture in Vega, starts road

We build a road on the hill while waiting for our border to pop so we can improve the stone.

Alpha Centauri finishes Granary, starts worker (6 turns)

We need more workers to improve Alpha Centauri and Canopus. Also we have not spread Confucianism to AC for the OR bonus, so I'm building the worker at size 2, using high yield tiles.

Canopus switches from a fish tile to a forested plains hill (is now working 2 forested plains hill tiles)

This puts enough hammers into the maceman that we can whip next turn.

[Trystero]

A new turn is up. We are still following the plan outlined in this post:

Turn 88:
Worker (AlphaShard) done in Arcturus, start Granary, worker moves 1W to green hill
Cottage done in Sirius, switch from forested plains hill to cottage, caveman1917 moves 1SE to cottage riverside grassland.
Canopus whips maceman for 2 pop.

A barb warrior appeared 1E of Hebe:

Spoiler:

She has 99.9% combat odds against the barb, I recommend we attack to pick up the XP and a promotion. Also, the Holkan has moved 1SE

I also think we should move Pallas 1S of her current position to spawnbust, as this will give us some sight over the water:

Spoiler:

And I didn't take a screen shot (see AlphaShard's post), but I think we should move Astraea (the archer) 1W to scout out the coast near Mavericks, then have her move to the hill 1S of the copper to spawnbust.

Finally, Paper is done next turn. Quatronia will finish Optics in 2 turns. I think we should switch to 0% research to save cash for researching Astronomy. We can lower the slider to 10% this turn and still finish Paper next turn. I think we should do that to accumulate cash.

What should we put our beakers into while we wait for Optics? Philosophy (for Angkor Wat)? Aesthetics? Something else?

There is also the matter of what we put the overflow hammers from whipping in Canopus into. The plan I outlined puts them in a worker, but we could also put them into a missionary for Alpha Centauri, or another maceman, among other possibilities.

I haven't committed to anything yet, so let me know what you think.

[Irgy]

Overflowing to a worker is good in general, the less turns spent converting food to hammers at 1 for 1 the better.

I've lost track a bit, have we told the rest of the ETTT that we're going to do the research on Astronomy?

Also, we should examine how many turns away Astronomy is, and account for the fact that our food and health caps will shortly after rise astronomically (sorry).

I'd normally wait for the barb to attack me, which they often do even with bad odds, but >99.9% odds is good enough really.

In other news, my internet at home is apparently now working, so some time soon I might be able to contribute a little more. Although I'm also going away for a few days next week...

[Trystero]

Originally Posted by Irgy

I've lost track a bit, have we told the rest of the ETTT that we're going to do the research on Astronomy?

Nope. That's another thing I meant to get around to proposing. Do we need to tell them what we are going to put minimal beakers into in the interim? Does it matter for one turn?

Also, we should examine how many turns away Astronomy is, and account for the fact that our food and health caps will shortly after rise astronomically (sorry).

Astronomy costs 2000 beakers, and we are currently producing 165/turn, so about 12 turns. (Our current cash burn rate is -19/turn, and likely to go up. So we'd need at least 228 gold.)

I'd normally wait for the barb to attack me, which they often do even with bad odds, but >99.9% odds is good enough really.

We could wait a turn and see what happens. I think we'd get the XP, regardless. I just don't want it to get past the axeman.

In other news, my internet at home is apparently now working, so some time soon I might be able to contribute a little more. Although I'm also going away for a few days next week...

Great! It'll be nice to have your regular contributions back.

[AlphaShard]

I'm up for attacking the Barb and not letting it get past the axeman to our city. I just hope there isn't more barbs in the fog.

If Pallas moves 1S won't that put three land tiles above in fog?

I think Philosophy would be good, it leads to Libralism.

We only have two workers on Sol so I think we need at least two more. Though we do need to build our army up as well. We also should make sure we have Barracks for any city that will be a primary Military builder.

[grant2004]

If we're that close to astronomy shouldn't we be producing a few galleys to upgrade, and a whole heck of a lot of macemen to capture the Maverick home island with? Or are we going to delay for a more dominant attacker?

[AlphaShard]

Just a reminder that the Mavericks have their horse hooked up with Chariots out there.

[HUSch]

I don't understand the situation in Canopus, what did you win with not working on both fish. If you change a woodhill to them Can grow in the turn. Then the mace will be ready the same time, if not earlier. Additional there is a floodplain cottage ready this turn and we have no people for working on it.
We get there some good tiles near Can and AC also, so the towns have to grow.

Btw the growing in Can would also better if you want to whip the mace as I read in microplan, I would like working all good tiles after whipping.

[Trystero]

Originally Posted by AlphaShard

If Pallas moves 1S won't that put three land tiles above in fog?

They will be in the fog, but Pallas would still spawnbust them. Barbs will not spawn in a 5x5 tile area centered on a unit, even another barb. Pallas spawnbusts the peninsula fine where she is, but moving 1S will do the same thing and allow us to see off the coast.

Originally Posted by AlphaShard

I think Philosophy would be good, it leads to Libralism.

Yes, The only point to going down the Aesthetics > Lit line now would be for culture buildings or the free Great Artist from Music. We're running Monarchy, so we can build units to deal with unhappiness currently. Not that this matters much, since we won't put many beakers into whatever we choose.

Originally Posted by AlphaShard

We only have two workers on Sol so I think we need at least two more. Though we do need to build our army up as well. We also should make sure we have Barracks for any city that will be a primary Military builder.

The current plan is to build two more workers on Sol, and I think we should build a barracks in Arcturus after the granary and then start pumping out units.

Originally Posted by grant2004

If we're that close to astronomy shouldn't we be producing a few galleys to upgrade, and a whole heck of a lot of macemen to capture the Maverick home island with? Or are we going to delay for a more dominant attacker?

We are teching far faster than we can actually make use of the techs. The major attraction of Astronomy at the moment is that it opens up resource trading. To date we focused on developing research, and then expansion. We have done well to catch up in expansion, but we need to better develop the cities we have. We really need to develop production centers in Arcturus, Vega, and Canopus before we seriously commit to military activity.

Let's say, hypothetically, that we want to invade the Mavericks home island. What would we need? I'd say, minimally, 9-12 maceman, 9 cats/trebs, 3 archers/longbows to secure the captured cities, and about 8 galleons. Additionally, we need units to defend against possible counter attacks on Bode. We really need more production. This might be an argument for grabbing the southern pigs/copper site soon. Settling on Anjennida would give us commerce, but not much production.

Originally Posted by AlphaShard

Just a reminder that the Mavericks have their horse hooked up with Chariots out there.

With all the hills on Bode, I'm not that worried about chariots, but I do think we'll need better defenders than warriors soon. We should have Feudalism for longbows, and Engineering for pikes, shortly.

Originally Posted by HUSch

I don't understand the situation in Canopus, what did you win with not working on both fish. If you change a woodhill to them Can grow in the turn. Then the mace will be ready the same time, if not earlier. Additional there is a floodplain cottage ready this turn and we have no people for working on it.
We get there some good tiles near Can and AC also, so the towns have to grow.

Btw the growing in Can would also better if you want to whip the mace as I read in microplan, I would like working all good tiles after whipping.

I'm not the best at whip micro, but I wanted to whip the mace for 2 pop in Canopus the turn before it grew to size 5. This way we get 1 pop back immediately after the whip. To have enough hammers in the maceman to whip this turn, we needed to work the forested hill for one turn. After the whip we'll work both fish again, along with the gold and the FP cottage.

I agree that we need to improve and grow Canopus and AC, which is one of the reasons I proposed building more workers now. I hate building a worker in AC at size 2, but I want to spread Confucianism there for the OR bonus before we start putting hammers into many buildings, and improve more tiles. If anyone see's ways to improve my current micro plan in this regard, let's discuss it.

[Trystero]

Turn 88 - 675 BC

Astrarea moved 1W to reveal culture from the Maverick home island to the west. Hebe attacked the barbarian warrior and survived with 2.6 hp. Unfortunately, there is another barb warrior 1SE.

Spoiler:

Pallas moved 1S to spawnbust and watch the coast. The new worker (AlphaShard) moved 1W from Arcturus to start mining the hill.

Spoiler:

On Sol, we whipped the maceman in Canopus. caveman1917 moved 1SE and started to cottage another riverside grassland.

Spoiler:

We also decreased the research slider to 10%. This will allow us to finish Paper next turn and accumulate gold.

Diplomacy:

Spoiler:

Note that Mavericks are still running Police State. And CDZ now has Aesthetics. Aren't they supposed to be researching Feudalism?

Next turn:

Turn 89:
Canopus grows back to size 4, is now working 2 fish, FP cottage, and gold mine, overflow hammers to worker (4 turns)
Maceman moves to Enterprise, 1E of Sirius (3 turns)
Cottage done in Alpha Centauri, HUSch moves to plains hill 1E of Canopus
Whip Granary in Arcturus for 2 pop, to size 2 (works clams and pigs)
Border pops in Vega
Lord Parkin finishes road in Vega, moves 1S to mine green hill
hell hound finishes road in Vega, moves to stone tile
AlphaShard starts mining green hill in Arcturus

And hope Hebe survives. (She still has more hp than the barb and is in jungle.)

Question: Is mining the plains hill the best thing for HUSch to do right now? He could also build a plantation on the silk, or chop to speed up a build in AC or Canopus.

[Irgy]

What tiles is Canopus working post-whip? Going by the screenshot, it seems to be fish, gold, floodplains. I would say fish-fish-gold was be best.

Good work though by the way.