SGOTM 14 - Fifth Element

[BLubmuz]

In all my tests, the AIs went for Alpha very early, compared to a normal game.

But meet some AI with the tech(s) you're researching or you will research is of great help.
You get a discount of 20% for every AI you meet with that tech(s).

Being Emperor this is not a concern, IMO. The AIs will find us. With 4 scouts for any team they won't need much time.

 

[WithTea]

My tests and experience bear out that meeting them won't be a problem. Alphabet will come quickly, but not quickly enough to pin them researching mathematics for us.

I've been trying a different approach on the test, just to see where it leads. Not being super concerned with the Oracle and letting it slide slightly. With that approach I can have three cities up, and found Confucianism in NY, where the Oracle can be built by turn 76 for CS. That gives me two workers, 3 cities, and the ability to decide between Masonry and BW before the Oracle. Also three archers and two warriors.

Not to throw out the work done. I simply wanted to see what a more flexible approach gives us. There seems to be no benefit to swapping around the first three techs Hunting=>AH=>Mining. I'm more convinced that the first, but certainly no more than that, military unit should be a warrior instead of an archer.

 

[WithTea]

The best I've been able to do so far is still turn 76 CS, but hooking up marble, and or BW unnecessary for that date. With that I've pulled Confucianism and used only one of my two GS's (for an academy). The other sat there as I didn't want to pollute the results.

Results : 3 cities, 4 archers, 2 warriors, 2 workers, 2 work boats, 1 academy, 1 library, 1 Oracle (not polluting great person pool in capitol), 1 free roaming GS, and a religion founded.

Not the fastest by any stretch, but much more flexible, and not completely shafted if we don't get the Oracle.

Just putting out an alternative approach, not even endorsing as the way to go. I just thought that we should mull options, and so far we had only mulled BW or Masonry as the best approach.

 

[unclethrill]

The best I've been able to do so far is still turn 76 CS, but hooking up marble, and or BW unnecessary for that date. With that I've pulled Confucianism and used only one of my two GS's (for an academy). The other sat there as I didn't want to pollute the results.

Results : 3 cities, 4 archers, 2 warriors, 2 workers, 2 work boats, 1 academy, 1 library, 1 Oracle (not polluting great person pool in capitol), 1 free roaming GS, and a religion founded.

Not the fastest by any stretch, but much more flexible, and not completely shafted if we don't get the Oracle.

Just putting out an alternative approach, not even endorsing as the way to go. I just thought that we should mull options, and so far we had only mulled BW or Masonry as the best approach.

Those are quite amazing results. Is that going from the T34 plan and moving forward or is that changing everything along? The reason I ask is if you did the first 34 turns totally different then we need to hold off on the first TS (second technically) to discuss our goals further. I can tell you from my extensive testing if we shoot for a T76 Oracle then there is no need to invest any hammers into the Oracle unless we just want fail gold because there is about a 5% chance that we could still get it and the 5% is an optimistic estimate.

At this point we really need to decide what the goal is for the first 100 turns. Do we want the Oracle at all costs or do we want to do an early REX? Those choices are mutually exclusive. If we go half-ass at both then we will again finish middle of the pack. We need to commit and go balls out one way or the other. As my wife would say, its time to put on the big girl panties. We need to make a decision in the next few day about our goals. Are we gonna try to win this or are we gonna play it safe?

I vote for balls out! I want to give the PD a run for their money and playing it safe isn't gonna get us there.

 

[WithTea]

Tried a different run through this time. Same idea as before, slight difference on tech.

Have knocked my flexible approach down to turn 72 turn for Oracle, but, and this is the good part, can get Philosophy with it. A great reduction on the path to Education. Managed to do it with keeping the Oracle in the Holy City. No Masonry, or Mathematics but did get BW. BW after CoL, needed something to tech waiting for the Oracle to finish. BW not utilized to chop down everything in sight. Workers utilized to hook up resources only. Still no Marble used.

Edit: My tests are pulling Oracle at 80%+ through turn 77.

 

[unclethrill]

Tried a different run through this time. Same idea as before, slight difference on tech.

Have knocked my flexible approach down to turn 72 turn for Oracle, but, and this is the good part, can get Philosophy with it. A great reduction on the path to Education. Managed to do it with keeping the Oracle in the Holy City. No Masonry, or Mathematics but did get BW. BW after CoL, needed something to tech waiting for the Oracle to finish. BW not utilized to chop down everything in sight. Workers utilized to hook up resources only. Still no Marble used.

Edit: My tests are pulling Oracle at 80%+ through turn 77.

Interesting. That puts a whole new spin on this situation. I would really like to see the details of the run and try to reproduce it.

 

[BLubmuz]

You can get Philo at any time once you get Medi and CoL and you can bulb it with a GS.
And it's not on the path to Edu but to Lib.

BTW if we can get a GS early enough we can even bulb philo and take Nationalism. It's straight after Philo, no other prereqs.

It's the above an inspiration? Maybe.
edit: no it doesn't work! you need to have Math and Alpha to bulb Philo, those are the GS priorities. Unless after you got Alpha and Math you can bulb CoL with a GS. But we need to renounce to the Academy and to CS to get this. I doubt it's worth.

 

[WithTea]

Been trying different permutations, and can not improve the time. It seems that I really optimized it the first time. everything else comes out at least one turn slower. The major thing I've been doing is NY gets founded next to the northern Oasis. Flood plains and fish and oasis allow for fast growth to utilize hills the best.

Have had moderate success settling next to the pigs. For the same reason. We are already getting AH and we have fishing, might as well utilize them.
That could mean that true game founding NY near the corn-cow would be good. Everything I've seen shows that uber fast growth in city two is going to be the deciding factor on the game itself.

I'm running into a consistent turn 70 for two or more civs approaching me with Alphabet. Trading CoL for Alphabet is decidedly easy. Math can be tricky.

edit: Forgot to mention, yes Philo for Liberalism not Education.

 

[beestar]

COL for Alphabet is a pretty fat trade for the AI ... I would hope we can acquire Alphabet for a mix of small techs.

Nationalism would be hilarious, we can draft Axemen +2 for a Barracks would be pretty good in the early game though.

 

[BLubmuz]

Nationalism is not possible unless we can trade for Alpha before turn 69.
But even if it would be, i don't think it's worth. We're plenty of happy resources after Calendar. draft? maybe. But it was a mistake, forget it.

One thing you guys seem to have not noted is that with my plan i've got a 2nd GS in the same turn i completed the Oracle. Thus, just a matter of few turns to research Alpha and we get Philo.

 

[pnp_dredd]

Philo isn't really a priority tech though, until we have a GP farm established. Pacifism won't be particularly useful for some time, as we'll be focussing on growth rather than specialists from turns 70-100 or so. I agree that bulbing Philosophy can be a good thing, but it's not vital that we do it at turn 65 rather than turn 100.

At this point we really need to decide what the goal is for the first 100 turns. Do we want the Oracle at all costs or do we want to do an early REX? Those choices are mutually exclusive. If we go half-ass at both then we will again finish middle of the pack. We need to commit and go balls out one way or the other. As my wife would say, its time to put on the big girl panties. We need to make a decision in the next few day about our goals. Are we gonna try to win this or are we gonna play it safe?

I vote for balls out! I want to give the PD a run for their money and playing it safe isn't gonna get us there.

I second an all-in approach. Oracle for CS is a great start, and I say we go for it with the earliest Oracle date we can possibly get, even if that means burning a GS on maths. With the gems and an Academy, our beurocracy capital will be able to churn through other important techs ASAP even while we are expanding.

Here's what I propose:

1) Oracle for CS around turn 65ish. Then REX madly until we have 9 cities. No more wonders till Sistine (see (2))
2) Pursue a Cultural VC. (we can still debate this, but I feel that it's a good risk to take in this setting) This means that our second city should be our GP farm, if at all possible given (1). Our 3rd or 4th city should be a second cottagable Legenday city.
3) Found Confucianism (COL) and Taoism (Philo). Tech Monotheism after Oracle if it's still available. If we don't found Judaism then I propose we try to get a 3rd religion spread to us - everything else is too much of a diversion.
4) Explore aggresivally with an early Archer towards the center of the map.
5) Expand agresivally towards the center of the map. Carving out land is nice, but I'd also like to snaffle a religion from someone.
6) Explore, explore, explore
7) Focus on developing our LCs, creating GArtists, and building our Cathedrals while teching through Music and to Education. Once we complete Education we'll hopefully know whether Oxford will be useful, and whether to delay Liberalism. At that point we've essentially won the game, and we just need to eliminate the Wizard.

 

[MeowZeDung]

Just a heads up for you guys: I will be less active for atleast the next two weeks, perhaps longer, due to the fall semester starting up tomorrow morning as well as my daughter starting kindegarten next week. I don't feel I have near as much to contribute anyway, more of a spectator/student really

I will still pop in and give my two cents as often as I can, hopefully a quick post each day minimum. I'm sure things will slow down after a week or two of being back to school. I will definitely be around to play my turnset when the time comes!

On topic: I'm loving all this testing and tweaking you guys are doing! Bulbing philo within a few turns of CS sling puts us in an AWESOME position for a cultural victory with two religions before turn 100, a huge tech lead and mass bpt practically guaranteeing us as the first to music and lib. However, it means nothing if we don't scout scout and scout some more. If the wizard is a big ol badass then cultural is a useless vc.

 

[pnp_dredd]

hmm, just doing some thinking:

Oracle on turn 65 means maths bulb on turn 64.
Is it possible to bulb Maths on turn 64? Two GSs in total requires 100+200=300 great people points (GPP) by that stage [assumes we build an Academy first]
Due to our traits, each scientist gains 6 GPP, or more relevant, 2 scientists gives us 12 GPP/turn.
So we need to run 2 scientists for 300/12 = 25 turns.

Therefore we need to have the Library completed by turn 64-25= turn 39 at the lastest, and have at least 4 population in Washington at that stage.

Most tests so far have gotten the library at turn 43, which will result in a maths bulb on turn 68 at the earliest. Perhaps Mining-AH-Writing results in a faster Library? Obviously bypassing Hunting isn't hugely desirable.

That all assumes that we build an Academy with our first GS.

What if, instead, we bulb Maths with our first GS? This will also improve chop efficiency. That path would leave teching BW/PH/COL as the limiting factor. But if this guarantees a CS sling then it might be worth it?

 

[WithTea]

I would say that Philosophy/Pacifism is not that useful in and of itself. CS is much more useful. I simply thought it was an intriguing proposition. As I said earlier I simply wanted to see where we could end up if we took a different path.

Overall I like Blubmuz's plan the best, but it is hardcore commitment, with no fallback. Blub and UT have been refining it relentlessly. Though I do like the option I came up with of being able to put the Oracle in the Holy City, it is riskier on the Oracle itself. My tests show a very strong turn 75, but it's a gamble. Blub's way is faster, and less risky, though in my opinion not as strong. We do need to remember that early temples are terribly important to a cultural victory. Each of the 3 cultural cities are going to need to divert resources to at least 1 temple and monument, really before anything else (once we have a religion).

Having tried a few (or dozen+) tests, I am convinced that slavery isn't going to get us where we want to go. Though chopping still has its uses. I would like to leave each city at least one forest though.

 

[WithTea]

I just had an interesting test. If you're gamblers I think the payoff is immense. Holding off on GS #2 to free up some resources in the capitol gave me an intriguing turn 73 Oracle. Because I had purposefully spread Confucianism to city #3, instead of the capitol, when Taoism was founded it popped in NY. Two religions, same city, serious cash.

I won't deny that it's a gamble, but it's a small to moderate gamble for a very big payoff. All of those hammers that get thrown at markets and banks can be put in just one city, and we'd be swimming in it.

 

[WithTea]

Triple posts aargh! Sorry about that.

Okay I found the niche that I think everyone's been looking for. Oracle T66 in NY! for Philo. 2 religions founded in Oracle city. A coastal city where we can further Great Prophet concentrate with early wonder by adding a cheap (because we know we have stone) Moai.

Same techs through T34. Different micro. Settler before library.

edit: Also only one GS used. Used for academy. Able to use next GS possibly on CS if we tech/trade our way through the prereqs.

 

[pnp_dredd]

Triple posts aargh! Sorry about that.

Okay I found the niche that I think everyone's been looking for. Oracle T66 in NY! for Philo. 2 religions founded in Oracle city. A coastal city where we can further Great Prophet concentrate with early wonder by adding a cheap (because we know we have stone) Moai.

Same techs through T34. Different micro. Settler before library.

edit: Also only one GS used. Used for academy. Able to use next GS possibly on CS if we tech/trade our way through the prereqs.

This is an interesting alternative, but I'd rather get CS if it's at all possible.

If we are pursuing Culture then we don't really want to encourage GProphets to spawn, as GArtists are of much greater value. We'll probably spawn at least 2 GSs, so I'm fairly loath to plan for any further non-GArtists. A religion-driven commerce-heavy city isn't generally required in the later stages of a Culture game, as a lot of commerce is generated from building Wealth, and from trading away happy resources. If we are heading for Domination or Space then this sort of city will be much more valuable.

 

[unclethrill]

hmm, just doing some thinking:

Oracle on turn 65 means maths bulb on turn 64.
Is it possible to bulb Maths on turn 64? Two GSs in total requires 100+200=300 great people points (GPP) by that stage [assumes we build an Academy first]
Due to our traits, each scientist gains 6 GPP, or more relevant, 2 scientists gives us 12 GPP/turn.
So we need to run 2 scientists for 300/12 = 25 turns.

Therefore we need to have the Library completed by turn 64-25= turn 39 at the lastest, and have at least 4 population in Washington at that stage.

Most tests so far have gotten the library at turn 43, which will result in a maths bulb on turn 68 at the earliest. Perhaps Mining-AH-Writing results in a faster Library? Obviously bypassing Hunting isn't hugely desirable.

That all assumes that we build an Academy with our first GS.

What if, instead, we bulb Maths with our first GS? This will also improve chop efficiency. That path would leave teching BW/PH/COL as the limiting factor. But if this guarantees a CS sling then it might be worth it?

Well I was able to go from our T34 plan and bring in a T65 Oracle for CS. I think with a bit more MM I can do it on T64. I can post more details later but in general it is BW after writing. First GS to bulb math. 4 chops into oracle but I think a 5th is possible to bring it in on T64. The second GS will come a few turns later and can get the Academy. The biggest downside is that we have only one city at this point but I think Pre-Oracle the second city is a drain on the economy.

More to come later today.

Edit: So I will do my best to document step by step what I did and reproduce this. Also I want to play out with a REX strategy to see how many cities I can get placed by T100. I think this test may be the best choice for us but it will need more testing.

On another note; I tried even more permutations of the first 34 turns and nothing will net the library before T41 and that T41 Lib was chopped and whipped and left me with a size 2 city. I think that the BLubmuz/Thrill plan for the first 34 turns is just the optimal solution so I vote to give the green light so that we can get a better understanding of the surrounding to base the next 34 turns on.

 

[BLubmuz]

Well I was able to go from our T34 plan and bring in a T65 Oracle for CS. I think with a bit more MM I can do it on T64. I can post more details later but in general it is BW after writing. First GS to bulb math. 4 chops into oracle but I think a 5th is possible to bring it in on T64. The second GS will come a few turns later and can get the Academy. The biggest downside is that we have only one city at this point but I think Pre-Oracle the second city is a drain on the economy.

Good, and it's a really safe date.
The downsides:
- we're stuck to 1 city and that one will be the Confu Holy.
- lot of chopping wasted if we have marble at hand
- goodbye Philo/Tao or at least more difficult and too much delayed

Please remember that Philo is interesting to delay the Lib race over anything else.
In case we go Culture also for Tao.

In case of Culture, but in any case IMO, Pyramids are important and i managed to built them in our Bureau Capital in less than 9 turns with stone hooked and a couple chops.

I think that my plan is by far the best one, but i admit it's based on marble.
So, since any test demonstrated that until turn 34 it's the best possible under any aspect, i ask again to actuate it quickly and see what our scouting warrior can reveal.

After the team can see what i can discover by turn 34 and decide the strategy, me and UT shall decide together which is the best way to play it out. I mean if the ball will pass to him or will stay on me.

For now, i'm start thinking that an archer can be better than warrior to scout S, so probably i'm changing this thing. In my test i built 2 warriors and 1 archer plus 1 half archer before the library. So i think i have enough hammers to complete 2 archers and 1 warrior before then. Need to test.

 

[pnp_dredd]

Can I just check that what you are proposing is the start from post 211? That seems solid.

For now, i'm start thinking that an archer can be better than warrior to scout S, so probably i'm changing this thing. In my test i built 2 warriors and 1 archer plus 1 half archer before the library. So i think i have enough hammers to complete 2 archers and 1 warrior before then. Need to test.

I also think an archer first, to send out exploring ("We're off to see the wizard, the wonderful wiz...." sorry...). After that we probably want warriors for fogbusting purposes. Better to stop Barbs spawning than to try and fight them off.