***********Return of the Sword OT4E's spoiler thread***********
- Thread starter OT4E
- Start date
Small explanation for my pick.
At this moment I consider Mehmed one of the best leaders for a any epic game. Exp-trait gives you advantage at all stages because of cheap granaries, health boost and small bonus when producing workers. At this map harbors can be also useful but I dont really take it in account.
Org-trait doesnt give you extra coin output as financial but once your empire grows you cant underrate discount you get for civics and therefore overall. You also get a lot of +100% bonuses for special buildings and can easily expect to be first at courthouses construction.
Small statistics. There are:
4 cre
4 org
3 exp
2 phi
2 spi
and 1 agg leader.
India is no the best choice for normal speed. At quick speed you can feel advantage of India much more because most common action at normal takes 1-2 turns longer than at quick speed. So each extra turn you earn from stepping on the forest or hill and doing action worths less. But whatever.
When you pick India the best strategy is to expand as fast as possible. You have to put each turn you win with worker, settler in your growth and empire output. Exp trait also has some synergy effect with India because you can afford to have more workers up to the same moment. More workers = more bonus. You can also more properly faster add chops to your overall expansion.
Mining/Mysticism as starting techs. At normal speed and higher difficulty levels you have to give more attention to starting techs. I think that Mining and Agriculture are the best because in most cases you can make your workers busy as fast as you get em. But as far as I remember only China has both and you allways have to choose. There is allways some part of the gamble because you can either have no agriculture food avaliable nor mines to mine. Early mining gives you opportunity to rush Bronse working, which I have to be aiming if I want to get my fast chops.
At this moment I consider Mehmed one of the best leaders for a any epic game. Exp-trait gives you advantage at all stages because of cheap granaries, health boost and small bonus when producing workers. At this map harbors can be also useful but I dont really take it in account.
Org-trait doesnt give you extra coin output as financial but once your empire grows you cant underrate discount you get for civics and therefore overall. You also get a lot of +100% bonuses for special buildings and can easily expect to be first at courthouses construction.
Small statistics. There are:
4 cre
4 org
3 exp
2 phi
2 spi
and 1 agg leader.
India is no the best choice for normal speed. At quick speed you can feel advantage of India much more because most common action at normal takes 1-2 turns longer than at quick speed. So each extra turn you earn from stepping on the forest or hill and doing action worths less. But whatever.
When you pick India the best strategy is to expand as fast as possible. You have to put each turn you win with worker, settler in your growth and empire output. Exp trait also has some synergy effect with India because you can afford to have more workers up to the same moment. More workers = more bonus. You can also more properly faster add chops to your overall expansion.
Mining/Mysticism as starting techs. At normal speed and higher difficulty levels you have to give more attention to starting techs. I think that Mining and Agriculture are the best because in most cases you can make your workers busy as fast as you get em. But as far as I remember only China has both and you allways have to choose. There is allways some part of the gamble because you can either have no agriculture food avaliable nor mines to mine. Early mining gives you opportunity to rush Bronse working, which I have to be aiming if I want to get my fast chops.
Starting position
Dream start for quick speed, but it also gives me a lot of doubts. I will be able to get worker in 9 turns after I plant this. It is very close to quick speed capabilities, but unfortunately I will have nothing to do with it.
So there are two ways: tech agriculture and build worker, or spam warriors and try to rush some neighbour. Looks like I am near to the istmus, but it is not 100% defined so far.
Anyway, even considering my worker skipping some turns I will still get 2 extra hammers which will give me a lot of flexibility in build order. For example I can even start with the settler (17 turns). But I doubt it can be good seriously because I waste my expansive bonus and delay hooking corn (most valuable at this point) and chopping first forest.
Anyway I have at least one turn to decide.
Spoiler :
Dream start for quick speed, but it also gives me a lot of doubts. I will be able to get worker in 9 turns after I plant this. It is very close to quick speed capabilities, but unfortunately I will have nothing to do with it.
So there are two ways: tech agriculture and build worker, or spam warriors and try to rush some neighbour. Looks like I am near to the istmus, but it is not 100% defined so far.
Anyway, even considering my worker skipping some turns I will still get 2 extra hammers which will give me a lot of flexibility in build order. For example I can even start with the settler (17 turns). But I doubt it can be good seriously because I waste my expansive bonus and delay hooking corn (most valuable at this point) and chopping first forest.
Anyway I have at least one turn to decide.
3960BC
It wasnt very hard decision thought. 9 turns for worker are too attractive to reject. This will give me opportunity to get first improvement faster than the other players do. So my handicap of 2 extra hammers in cap tile will be increased with significant ammout of +food my corn can give.
Let's look at alternative way. I would have to tech bronse working for at least 13-14 turns. Growth would take 9 turns but I get 2 warriors ready. In this case i cant expect even to start improvent of farm before turn 20. It is not acceptable. All extra hammers I chop would be covered with production I can get from my food.
There is of course small risk because 5 of my opponents decided to get warrior start and only 2 starts with scout. But if I understand map allocation correctly I will search my closest isthmus with my warrior. And there is no reason to think that somebody will be able to reach me from the other because he will have to pass through entire area which I hope is not that small.
So the short plan is the following:
tech: Agriculture (9 turns) ---> Bronse working
build order: worker ---> warrior ---> warrior
worker will start with 2 farms (corn, common grassland)
It wasnt very hard decision thought. 9 turns for worker are too attractive to reject. This will give me opportunity to get first improvement faster than the other players do. So my handicap of 2 extra hammers in cap tile will be increased with significant ammout of +food my corn can give.
Let's look at alternative way. I would have to tech bronse working for at least 13-14 turns. Growth would take 9 turns but I get 2 warriors ready. In this case i cant expect even to start improvent of farm before turn 20. It is not acceptable. All extra hammers I chop would be covered with production I can get from my food.
There is of course small risk because 5 of my opponents decided to get warrior start and only 2 starts with scout. But if I understand map allocation correctly I will search my closest isthmus with my warrior. And there is no reason to think that somebody will be able to reach me from the other because he will have to pass through entire area which I hope is not that small.
So the short plan is the following:
tech: Agriculture (9 turns) ---> Bronse working
build order: worker ---> warrior ---> warrior
worker will start with 2 farms (corn, common grassland)
3920-3880BC
Nothing special. I was right that I am close to 2-tile passage. My warrior found pig there.
Somebody creative who planted on the first turn(LDeska or 2metaninja) has got cultural expansion and only 16000 land squares. That means that he has at least 5 water tiles. The minimal land are occupied by civ is 7000 and 10000 avg. No Idea what exactly does it give to me but I think that I will return to this stats when everyone gets cultural expansion for sure.
Nothing special. I was right that I am close to 2-tile passage. My warrior found pig there.
Somebody creative who planted on the first turn(LDeska or 2metaninja) has got cultural expansion and only 16000 land squares. That means that he has at least 5 water tiles. The minimal land are occupied by civ is 7000 and 10000 avg. No Idea what exactly does it give to me but I think that I will return to this stats when everyone gets cultural expansion for sure.
3840-3720BC
There is not really much resourses around. To be honest my area seems poor at this moment: no lux, only 2 types of food. But I hope for it's western part and seafood around. I also have to notice that passage is quite long and therefore easy to control. I doubt that somebody will decide going through the middle area too. So it is going to be a build-up/develop race.
I will try to conclude some primary objectives of my strategy for the earliest period:
1) Work an improved tile, grow
2) Tech Bronse working to get chops, slavery, and resourse. This is key technology because I am chop dependant due to my unique unit and slavery can give me maximum output from my only food in the cap. The faster I start slaving the more slaves I will be able to afford. I also prefer to plant 2nd city to the cooper thats why you cant see marks for the cities on my screenshots yet.
3) Get pottery. This is the second key tech because pottery greatly increases effectiveness of slavery. I dont have much food but all my food is good (5-6 breads per turn). And I need cottages to save my economy.
The secondary targets:
a) Get religion. It can be usefull if I find no early luxuries because of course monarchy is gonna be primary objective for a middle-early period but I might still get problems with happiness before getting it. 1 turn revolt is not big deal in normal game speed. I also have mysticism but Korea and Byzantium too.
b) Find a way to use stone. I have easy way for masonry (myst + mining gives me 20% of extra discount). At this moment I see 2 possible wonders to build: stonehenge and great wall. I dont think that there will be good race for stonehenge since most opponents are creative, but it doesnt look very benefical. Great wall will give me great spy in future, which I might be able to convert into cheap tech thievement.
Spoiler :
There is not really much resourses around. To be honest my area seems poor at this moment: no lux, only 2 types of food. But I hope for it's western part and seafood around. I also have to notice that passage is quite long and therefore easy to control. I doubt that somebody will decide going through the middle area too. So it is going to be a build-up/develop race.
I will try to conclude some primary objectives of my strategy for the earliest period:
1) Work an improved tile, grow
2) Tech Bronse working to get chops, slavery, and resourse. This is key technology because I am chop dependant due to my unique unit and slavery can give me maximum output from my only food in the cap. The faster I start slaving the more slaves I will be able to afford. I also prefer to plant 2nd city to the cooper thats why you cant see marks for the cities on my screenshots yet.
3) Get pottery. This is the second key tech because pottery greatly increases effectiveness of slavery. I dont have much food but all my food is good (5-6 breads per turn). And I need cottages to save my economy.
The secondary targets:
a) Get religion. It can be usefull if I find no early luxuries because of course monarchy is gonna be primary objective for a middle-early period but I might still get problems with happiness before getting it. 1 turn revolt is not big deal in normal game speed. I also have mysticism but Korea and Byzantium too.
b) Find a way to use stone. I have easy way for masonry (myst + mining gives me 20% of extra discount). At this moment I see 2 possible wonders to build: stonehenge and great wall. I dont think that there will be good race for stonehenge since most opponents are creative, but it doesnt look very benefical. Great wall will give me great spy in future, which I might be able to convert into cheap tech thievement.
Game is rehosted. And I couldnt post before.
4000 - 3720BC
In fact I was so unhappy that we were going to restat that did a wrong move, which costed me 2 turns. I got good start again, but not that good as the first time and I tried to gamble for a better one. But the area I saw when I moved away from the starting tile made me regret about this. Now I see that it wasnt really that bad but still worse plant than the base one.
I couldnt see cow and I didnt see any sign of the coast before I had moved. After this I realized that having half of ocean tiles and no river would make my cap really weak, despite of few extra turn of 2 hammer start advantage. So I decided to go back.
I will continue in one of the later posts.
4000 - 3720BC
In fact I was so unhappy that we were going to restat that did a wrong move, which costed me 2 turns. I got good start again, but not that good as the first time and I tried to gamble for a better one. But the area I saw when I moved away from the starting tile made me regret about this. Now I see that it wasnt really that bad but still worse plant than the base one.
Spoiler :
I couldnt see cow and I didnt see any sign of the coast before I had moved. After this I realized that having half of ocean tiles and no river would make my cap really weak, despite of few extra turn of 2 hammer start advantage. So I decided to go back.
I will continue in one of the later posts.
I moved 1 tile left and away from the 2nd corn to:
- get more river tiles for the late game
- to save 1 hill tile, because i may need raw production
This is arguable decision also, but I think I wont need to use 2 corns at the same time at each special game phase.
I grow up because I cant use exp bonus for worker yet. And after the growth I will get both +1 production from citizen and that extra hammer from trait. I only lose 3 turns for worker but get extra pop which seems to be more valuable.
- get more river tiles for the late game
- to save 1 hill tile, because i may need raw production
This is arguable decision also, but I think I wont need to use 2 corns at the same time at each special game phase.
I grow up because I cant use exp bonus for worker yet. And after the growth I will get both +1 production from citizen and that extra hammer from trait. I only lose 3 turns for worker but get extra pop which seems to be more valuable.
3680 - 3240BC
First blood! Ntenisromeros is at left from me. His scout came from that side but encountered my first warrior. This map really aimed to trick me because my war was heading into the passage. I even changed its direction from right one (to the south) to the eastern because I thought that it wasnt useful to drive into the middle of the wheel that early. That was mistake but at least I explored my area well and got vikings scout. It was only 78% but quite worth to prevent him from taking circumnavigation. Vikings can be very annoying with such advantage.
I decided to waste 1 more turn to finish warrior. I was going to send him west before realized that southern way is the way to the opponent. After this I have to keep him at home because both paths has a blind spot and I wont be able to get war in case of danger in time.
The plan is simple: make workers, probably I will start making 2nd one asap, slave it and then start growing on the fresh-worked corn while chopping forest to the settler. I need strong 2nd city because cap's production base output is quite bad. City placement will be marked after I see cooper. I hope I explored enough to find it.
My land is not bad, I have a lot of food but no luxuries except sugar yet. Stone will be also useful but it is usually avaliable for at least half of civs on green_wheel maps.
First blood! Ntenisromeros is at left from me. His scout came from that side but encountered my first warrior. This map really aimed to trick me because my war was heading into the passage. I even changed its direction from right one (to the south) to the eastern because I thought that it wasnt useful to drive into the middle of the wheel that early. That was mistake but at least I explored my area well and got vikings scout. It was only 78% but quite worth to prevent him from taking circumnavigation. Vikings can be very annoying with such advantage.
I decided to waste 1 more turn to finish warrior. I was going to send him west before realized that southern way is the way to the opponent. After this I have to keep him at home because both paths has a blind spot and I wont be able to get war in case of danger in time.
Spoiler :
The plan is simple: make workers, probably I will start making 2nd one asap, slave it and then start growing on the fresh-worked corn while chopping forest to the settler. I need strong 2nd city because cap's production base output is quite bad. City placement will be marked after I see cooper. I hope I explored enough to find it.
My land is not bad, I have a lot of food but no luxuries except sugar yet. Stone will be also useful but it is usually avaliable for at least half of civs on green_wheel maps.
3200 - 2880BC
I got slavery, and slaved 2nd worker. Cooper appeared outside of my border but very close so I will get it with my next cultural expansion.
I decided to try to get Poly for several reasons:
- I will have to get religion branch to get monarchy, without which game is unplayable with no luxuries.
- I missed 2 turns at start and revolted but I skipped animal, pottery and the wheel
- 1 extra happy from religion can help because even with monarchy I will have to fight unhappiness all the game
Next techs will be: The wheel and Pottery, because I need granaries and cottages.
Unfortunatelly, if any other player will go for hinduism now too he will leave me behinde because I dont have a single extra coin with my pop1, while others have caps with size of 3-4.
I will switch from settler to let city grow and continue chopping using prechop method working for India: I chop for 2 turns and switch to another forest then when I need hammers I chop all in very few turns.
The place for the city needs to be tech-independant, because I will try to delay animal husbandry and fishing for a while to get more important techs. It is also good idea to plant 2nd or the 3rd city near cooper because it will have to be hooked and it is not right to leave such a good tile without having a citizen on it.
And here is the overview picture of my land from the space.
From this point I cant see good place for the 2nd city matching the demands I stated above. But I do hope for having something worth around the cooper. Otherwise I will probably have to change my plans or try to get cultural expansion from the religion of course if I can get it after all.
I got slavery, and slaved 2nd worker. Cooper appeared outside of my border but very close so I will get it with my next cultural expansion.
I decided to try to get Poly for several reasons:
- I will have to get religion branch to get monarchy, without which game is unplayable with no luxuries.
- I missed 2 turns at start and revolted but I skipped animal, pottery and the wheel
- 1 extra happy from religion can help because even with monarchy I will have to fight unhappiness all the game
Next techs will be: The wheel and Pottery, because I need granaries and cottages.
Unfortunatelly, if any other player will go for hinduism now too he will leave me behinde because I dont have a single extra coin with my pop1, while others have caps with size of 3-4.
I will switch from settler to let city grow and continue chopping using prechop method working for India: I chop for 2 turns and switch to another forest then when I need hammers I chop all in very few turns.
The place for the city needs to be tech-independant, because I will try to delay animal husbandry and fishing for a while to get more important techs. It is also good idea to plant 2nd or the 3rd city near cooper because it will have to be hooked and it is not right to leave such a good tile without having a citizen on it.
And here is the overview picture of my land from the space.
Spoiler :
From this point I cant see good place for the 2nd city matching the demands I stated above. But I do hope for having something worth around the cooper. Otherwise I will probably have to change my plans or try to get cultural expansion from the religion of course if I can get it after all.
Here is short analysis of the situation.
Strengths:
- in the following 10 turns I will have more chops than anyone
- many good spots for settlements dispite of harsh restrictions I put on it
- my land fronts will be very close to each other so I will be able to keep stack in one place with minimum scoutings, but control the sea
Weaknesses:
- after chopping all my land will be exhausted, I need to find a sourse of production very fast
- bad sciences for a very long perspective
- I wont see horses for a while, so no chance to rush
- no chance for Oracle, Great Lighthouse, Pyramids, Colossus or any worth early wonder, cant afford it
Opportunities:
- I can try to do Stonhenge in the cooper city if I plant one. A lot of creative in the game might result that it wont be build in a reasonable time
Treats:
- no real defence against rush, so I will need to put wars into the passages as far as possible
Strengths:
- in the following 10 turns I will have more chops than anyone
- many good spots for settlements dispite of harsh restrictions I put on it
- my land fronts will be very close to each other so I will be able to keep stack in one place with minimum scoutings, but control the sea
Weaknesses:
- after chopping all my land will be exhausted, I need to find a sourse of production very fast
- bad sciences for a very long perspective
- I wont see horses for a while, so no chance to rush
- no chance for Oracle, Great Lighthouse, Pyramids, Colossus or any worth early wonder, cant afford it
Opportunities:
- I can try to do Stonhenge in the cooper city if I plant one. A lot of creative in the game might result that it wont be build in a reasonable time
Treats:
- no real defence against rush, so I will need to put wars into the passages as far as possible
2840 - 2720BC
I reevaluated my capabilities and found out that I can try Great Lighthouse too. It is not on my way in techs but this wonder is not often build in caps. My cap is bad at production and I have no res (marble, stone) thats why I might lose race for any early wonder(great wall, oracle, stone), and far from the coast to build GLh but it can happen that I grow strong 2nd city from the production view. Chopping some forests is not a problem also.
The main problem is to get techs in time to compete. I see 2 possible ways:
1) if I get religion in the 2nd city, I can go fishing first because it gives 20% discount for pottery and will allow me to work fish which gives some coins also
so Fishing ---> Wheel ---> Pottery ---> Sailing ---> Masonry
2) if I cant get religion I wont be able to hook fish early. In this case I skip fishing to get pottery as fast as possible and rush sailing and masonry using several cottages
so Wheel ---> Pottery ---> Fishing --->Sailing ---> Masonry
At this moment I have 7 forests in the cap and 17 hammers in the first settler. It will allow me to build 2 fast cities but unfortunatelly I will hardly be able to get them connected to the cap to get a few coins of extra profit. So the cities wont increase my science output early.
Here you can see my plan for early and middle game expansion. First of all I need to plant cities around cap to help it grow cottages, because once I get bureuecracy I expect to have some well grown cottages and my cap is not really able to grow them all fast. Other expansion is allmost tied to the coast because I have mostly half of the food in the ocean and I also have big lake which will give me 3 food if I plant properly. I have cheap lighthouses and great lighthouse will be base of my economy if I get it.
I also have to delay usage of my cows/sheeps/pigs in order to get other techs as early as possible.
I reevaluated my capabilities and found out that I can try Great Lighthouse too. It is not on my way in techs but this wonder is not often build in caps. My cap is bad at production and I have no res (marble, stone) thats why I might lose race for any early wonder(great wall, oracle, stone), and far from the coast to build GLh but it can happen that I grow strong 2nd city from the production view. Chopping some forests is not a problem also.
The main problem is to get techs in time to compete. I see 2 possible ways:
1) if I get religion in the 2nd city, I can go fishing first because it gives 20% discount for pottery and will allow me to work fish which gives some coins also
so Fishing ---> Wheel ---> Pottery ---> Sailing ---> Masonry
2) if I cant get religion I wont be able to hook fish early. In this case I skip fishing to get pottery as fast as possible and rush sailing and masonry using several cottages
so Wheel ---> Pottery ---> Fishing --->Sailing ---> Masonry
At this moment I have 7 forests in the cap and 17 hammers in the first settler. It will allow me to build 2 fast cities but unfortunatelly I will hardly be able to get them connected to the cap to get a few coins of extra profit. So the cities wont increase my science output early.
Here you can see my plan for early and middle game expansion. First of all I need to plant cities around cap to help it grow cottages, because once I get bureuecracy I expect to have some well grown cottages and my cap is not really able to grow them all fast. Other expansion is allmost tied to the coast because I have mostly half of the food in the ocean and I also have big lake which will give me 3 food if I plant properly. I have cheap lighthouses and great lighthouse will be base of my economy if I get it.
I also have to delay usage of my cows/sheeps/pigs in order to get other techs as early as possible.
Spoiler :
2680 - 2240BC
Everything is calm. I have founded Hinduism and on the final step to fishing. My worker will chop boat in 2 turns. May be it is good idea to convert religion while the boat will be running. I will think about this more.
My new settler for the 3rd city is coming. I decided to plant it near corn: the best food resourse I have and independant from Animal Husbandry. Corn will also give me coin which is very important because I am not sure that I will be able to get coin from connecting em to the cap fast.
Next tech is the Wheel most probably since I need pottery and cant delay it anymore. I have few workers and wont be able to make cottages fast, so I need time to make base for my economy.
After this I can think about building wonder or anything else.
Map of my land
Demographs:
I forgot to make a screen of Vikings but will do it in one of the sooner posts. He has a cap of 5 and not even 2nd city. He had just adopted slavery. May be he had started from working fish which is quite slower than worker start usually. May be he has 3 workers but I am not sure what is he going to do with them since he doesnt have much land
Everything is calm. I have founded Hinduism and on the final step to fishing. My worker will chop boat in 2 turns. May be it is good idea to convert religion while the boat will be running. I will think about this more.
My new settler for the 3rd city is coming. I decided to plant it near corn: the best food resourse I have and independant from Animal Husbandry. Corn will also give me coin which is very important because I am not sure that I will be able to get coin from connecting em to the cap fast.
Next tech is the Wheel most probably since I need pottery and cant delay it anymore. I have few workers and wont be able to make cottages fast, so I need time to make base for my economy.
After this I can think about building wonder or anything else.
Map of my land
Spoiler :
Demographs:
Spoiler :
I forgot to make a screen of Vikings but will do it in one of the sooner posts. He has a cap of 5 and not even 2nd city. He had just adopted slavery. May be he had started from working fish which is quite slower than worker start usually. May be he has 3 workers but I am not sure what is he going to do with them since he doesnt have much land
2200 - 1680BC
2metraninja lost his cap to Penny. Penny razed it. Probably we wont see cataphracts this game. I dont think that rush worth at this time of the game since you cant keep cities and you cant even settle your own land, but having a weak opponent is allways good. Now I will have to look at Penny's expansion preciously.
I have 3 cities, slaved granaries in all of them (in cap got it with overflow). I try to sail through ntenisromeros's land with workboat. I doubt that I can get circumnavigation but I will try to do it ofc. So I have to explore as much as possible. Ntenisromeros got lighthouse last turn, but I hope he wont start chasing my boat very fast. And I hope him to start chasing it instead of pillaging my fish.
My 2nd neighbour is Vox[SU], another RUS - player.
Ntenisromeros(aka [rus]grek aka GodsBestFriend) is one of the best online players at this moment but he is not good at long games, but his skill is improving. He can also make good rush, waste much in rush, so I have to keep my eyes opened.
Vox[SU] is more patient player, more skillful in this types of the games, such as pitbosses, pbems and etc.
I exchanged 1 war with him and he is quite close.
I started building cottages . Religion spread into my 3rd cities so it will get cultural expansion soon. I have a pre-build of settler in my top city. This city will be production center. I am thinking of converting religion to make it possible to reach size of 5 with it and build wonder.
Tech plan remains the same:
Sailing ---> Masonry
but may be I will have to switch Hunting. From this moment I cant neglect my defense since I have no information of Vox's plans yet. Contrary, I have seen mosly all actions of vikings and it doesnt look like they are rushing. Ntenisromeros got late 2nd city. His overall expansion looks very slow, may be because of weak resourses ( he got 4-food rice and fish). Starting from fish is allmost never good.
2metraninja lost his cap to Penny. Penny razed it. Probably we wont see cataphracts this game. I dont think that rush worth at this time of the game since you cant keep cities and you cant even settle your own land, but having a weak opponent is allways good. Now I will have to look at Penny's expansion preciously.
I have 3 cities, slaved granaries in all of them (in cap got it with overflow). I try to sail through ntenisromeros's land with workboat. I doubt that I can get circumnavigation but I will try to do it ofc. So I have to explore as much as possible. Ntenisromeros got lighthouse last turn, but I hope he wont start chasing my boat very fast. And I hope him to start chasing it instead of pillaging my fish.
My 2nd neighbour is Vox[SU], another RUS - player.
Ntenisromeros(aka [rus]grek aka GodsBestFriend) is one of the best online players at this moment but he is not good at long games, but his skill is improving. He can also make good rush, waste much in rush, so I have to keep my eyes opened.
Vox[SU] is more patient player, more skillful in this types of the games, such as pitbosses, pbems and etc.
I exchanged 1 war with him and he is quite close.
I started building cottages . Religion spread into my 3rd cities so it will get cultural expansion soon. I have a pre-build of settler in my top city. This city will be production center. I am thinking of converting religion to make it possible to reach size of 5 with it and build wonder.
Tech plan remains the same:
Sailing ---> Masonry
but may be I will have to switch Hunting. From this moment I cant neglect my defense since I have no information of Vox's plans yet. Contrary, I have seen mosly all actions of vikings and it doesnt look like they are rushing. Ntenisromeros got late 2nd city. His overall expansion looks very slow, may be because of weak resourses ( he got 4-food rice and fish). Starting from fish is allmost never good.
Spoiler :
