SGOTM 21 - Xteam

[Cactus Pete]

" so let's say 48 final Hammers, which would then translate to 48 / 1.5 (with a 0.25 Forge bonus and a 0.25 Organized Religion bonus) = 32 base Hammers overflowing" Confused by this. 1.5 X 48 = 72. My expectation would be that this would result in 36 base hammers overflowing. Please clarify.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Spoiler Detailed Math that can be ignored :

" so let's say 48 final Hammers, which would then translate to 48 / 1.5 (with a 0.25 Forge bonus and a 0.25 Organized Religion bonus) = 32 base Hammers overflowing" Confused by this. 1.5 X 48 = 72. My expectation would be that this would result in 36 base hammers overflowing. Please clarify.

When I say "final Hammers," I mean the amount of Hammers that you see being put into a build item at the top of a City screen below the Food box, so let's call that the Hammer box.

When I say "base hammers," I mean the amount of Hammers that you get from your citizens or Buildings for that turn, be it from the City Centre square, any square that another citizen is working (a Cow, a Mine, etc), any Hammers from Specialists, any Hammers from Apostolic Palace Buildings, etc.

If you have no Hammer multipliers, such as Organized Religion for a Building, a Forge, a Factory, a Power Plant, Bureaucracy, bonus Resources for Wonders (Stone, Marble, Copper, Gold, Ivory, etc), then the base Hammers get "multiplied" by 1.0 and thus the final Hammers number equals the base Hammers number.

When you whip a build item, the final Hammers show up in the Hammer box.

At the end of the the turn, the Hammers which aren't needed to complete the build item, called the excess Hammers, get reduced by the Hammer multiplier for that build item and thus get converted back into base Hammers.

On the following turn, you earn the base Hammers that carried forward and they get multiplied by the Hammer multiplier for the new build item (which will often be the same Hammer multiplier or may be a different Hammer multiplier if you switched between building a Building and a Unit when running Organized religion).

Generally, all of the overflow Hammers will carry forward.

Noteable exceptions exist, such as when you 1-pop-whip a cheap build item, such as a Warrior, where some of those overflow Hammers will be in excess of the amount allowed to carry forward, so we call those few Hammers "excess overflow Hammers."

Generally, the greater the cost in Hammers for a build item, the more overflow Hammers can carry forward to the next build item.

Also, generally, the greater the Hammer multipliers that you have, the less base Hammers that can carry forward. This fact is somewhat offset by two factors: the excess overflow Hammers get converted into Gold, and with a higher Hammer multiplier, you're still getting the same* final Hammers going into the next build item as you would if you didn't have those Hammer multipliers.

So, as an example:
Put 1 Hammer into a Warrior
On the next turn, 1-pop-whip it and earn 1 Hammer from your City Centre again
That gives you 1 + ( 30 + 1 ) = 1 + 31 = 32 final Hammers
The Warrior costs 15 final Hammers and has 1 final Hammer in it
14 / 1.0 = 14 base Hammers are required to complete the Warrior
We are earning 31 final Hammers aka 31 / 1.0 = 31 base Hammers
31 - 14 = 17 base Hammers are available to overflow
15 (the Hammer cost of the Warrior) / 1.0 = 15 base Hammers can overflow
So, 17 - 15 = 2 base Hammers are excess overflow Hammers
On the next turn, 15 base Hammers will overflow and 2 Gold will appear in your coffers

Now, let's repeat the example with a Forge in the City
Put 1 Hammer into a Warrior for 1 * 1.25 = 1.25 final Hammers, but fractions floor, so you only get 1 final Hammer
On the next turn, 1-pop-whip it and earn 1 Hammer from your City Centre again
That gives you 1 + ( ( 30 * 1.25 ) + ( 1 * 1.25 ) ) = 1 + ( 37.5 + 1.25 ) final Hammers, but at each stages those numbers get floored, so 37.5 becomes 37 and 1.25 becomes 1, giving us:
1 + ( 37 + 1 ) = 1 + 38 = 39 final Hammers
The Warrior costs 15 final Hammers and has 1 final Hammer in it
14 / 1.25 = 11.2 base Hammers are required to complete the Warrior, which means that we end up needing 12 base Hammers to complete the Warrior (we just lost 0.8 Hammers, since you have to round up to the next highest base Hammer value required to obtain the needed final Hammers)
We are earning 38 final Hammers aka 38 / 1.25 = 30.4** base Hammers, which probably counts as 30 base Hammers
30 - 12 = 18 base Hammers are available to overflow
15 (the Hammer cost of the Warrior) / 1.25 = 12 base Hammers can overflow
So, 18 - 12 = 6 base Hammers are excess overflow Hammers
On the next turn, 12 base Hammers will overflow and 6 * 1.25 = 7.5 which floors to 7 Gold will appear in your coffers
Those 12 base Hammers become 12 * 1.25 = 15 final Hammers, so you still get 15 final Hammers to complete the next Warrior in a single turn

* Well, probably almost the same in many cases, although sometimes you lose out on a Hammer or two from flooring of numbers in the calculations.

** I'm not 100% positive if the calculation works this way, but it's something close to this math.


Now, back to the root of your original question: why don't we have to dump Hammers into The Heroic Epic more frequently? Well, as we see from above, when a Forge exists, only 12 base Hammers can overflow when building a Warrior, whether those Hammers were whipped, came from a City with 4 Iron Mines, or came from Forest Chops.

But, if the build item has a much higher total cost, more base Hammers can overflow.

Let's keep the example simple without involving a Forge or Organized Religion to illustrate the point, and thus I'll skip some of the math and will not mention the difference between "base" and "final" Hammers in this example.

You build a Warrior and you Chop a Forest into it for 30 Hammers. You're also making, say, 10 Hammers from the City Centre and other squares worked by citizens.

So, you make 40 Hammers, 15 go to the Warrior, and a maximum of 15 Hammers can overflow, since the cost to complete the Warrior is so low. Thus, 15 Hammers overflow.

On the next turn, you get 15 overflow Hammers and you make 10 base Hammers for a total of 25 Hammers.

If you build another Warrior, the Warrior will cost 15 Hammers and all 10 Hammers will overflow.

But, let's say that we Chopped another Forest, giving us 25 + 30 = 55 Hammers.

Well, assuming that you want Hammers instead of Gold, 15 of those 55 Hammers will be used to complete the Warrior, 15 will overflow, and the remaining 25 Hammers will get converted into Gold.

Yet, what if you built an Archer instead of a Warrior? 25 of those 55 Hammers will be used to complete the Archer, 25 of those Hammers will overflow, while only 5 Hammers will get converted into Gold.

Wow, we just earned more total Hammers overflowing because we picked a build item with the ability to have more Hammers overflowing.

Let's say instead that we had just 1-pop-whipped a War Elephant which already had 30 / 60 Hammers in it and that we whipped away a Cottage, so we are still making 10 Hammers from the City Centre and citizens, and we still have our 15 overflow Hammers from the Warrior, and we still have our 30-Hammer Chop.

So, now we have 60 / 60 Hammers in the War Elephant from whipping. To that we add 15 overflow Hammers, 10 Hammers from our citizens, and 30 Hammers from a Chop, giving us:
60 + 15 + 10 + 30 = 115 Hammers

60 of those 115 Hammers are needed to complete the War Elephant. 60 Hammers could overflow, but we only have another 55 Hammers, so all 55 Hammers overflow.

That's where building a build item that has a higher amount of Hammers which can overflow can allow us to "chain" our overflow values together without convert overflow Hammers to Gold.

Thus, instead of building Warrior -> Heroic Epic -> War Elephant -> Heroic Epic

We can instead build Warrior -> War Elephant -> Heroic Epic

and get the same overflow Hammers going into the Heroic Epic, but also allowing us more turns for whipping over a shorter period of time, since you need 2 turns to whip any build item (1 turn to put more than 0 Hammers into the build item to avoid a ridiculous "cold-whipping" penalty and 1 turn to complete the whipped build item), which translates into more Whipped Hammers going into the Heroic Epic over a shorter period of time.

Spy 2
I'm assuming that Spy 2 is going to move into Willem's territory to uncover the area around The Hague, to help us with spotting Workers for our Woodsmen III Maces to try to capture.

Here's a fascinating thread on how to figure out whether our Spy will get caught in enemy territory:
Spy Detection

The important basics (too long; didn't read the link):
- We have earned more EPs than Willem, which gives us a lower chance of our Spies auto-dying in his territory
- If our Spy ends its turn on the same square as an enemy Spy, we have a greater chance of getting caught. So, ending our Spy's turn inside of one of Willem's 3 core Cities gives us a slightly greater chance of being caught (if Willem builds a Spy, it will sit in his City for at least 1 turn before moving)
- Our Spies can walk along Willem's Roads to get into position more quickly

Summary for Spy 2: Use Willem's Roads, avoid ending Spy 2's turn inside of one of his Cities, and simply do your best to get Spy 2 toward the west side of Willem's empire near The Hague, so that we can get useful info for revealing where his Workers are located

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Forests
Here's what I'm going to suggest:
We save the G Riv For that is SW + W + W of the G Corn (3N of the Lake)
We save the G For that is 3W of the G Corn (4N of the Lake)
These 2 Forests can be saved for a Granary for a City that we can settle 2W of the G Corn later, probably just after we Cease Fire with Willem, so that after we gift him our Workers by recapturing New Amsterdam, Willem will still be alive in the game

Worker 7 can complete the G Riv For Chop that is SW + W + W of City 4 (2SW of the G Corn)
Worker 3 can complete the GH For Chop that is 2W of the G corn
We save the GH Riv For Chop that is 3W of City 4 (SW + W of the G Corn) for later, as we don't need it yet, and thus Worker 1 can do something else. This square has a Road on it, so another Worker can return there later to finish the Chop. In the meantime, we'll have created 2 opportunities for this Forest to spread to adjacent squares by Chopping 2 adjacent Forests

Worker 4 can finish Chopping the TH Riv For that is NW + W of Hippos

We won't Chop any of the Forests near Hippos that aren't yet in our Cultural Borders, so the Forest that is 2NW of Hippos can wait to be Chopped until after our Cultural Borders have expanded over that square. We earn more Hammers from Chops that occur within our Cultural Borders than from Chops which occur outside of our Cultural Borders
Thus, Worker 2, who is 2NW of Hippos, can be used to Camp the Fur... but first, he can help Worker 6 with building a GH Mine for Hippos

This point is probably obvious, but worth saying that we won't Chop any Forest that has a Resource on it, such a Deer or Fur.

 

[Cactus Pete]

"probably just after we Cease Fire with Willem, so that after we gift him our Workers by recapturing New Amsterdam, Willem will still be alive in the game" How do you gift an AI workers by recapturing his city, or how can recapturing a city keep an AI alive?


I read everything that you took so much time to write, but still don't understand this example you used earlier -- " so let's say 48 final Hammers, which would then translate to 48 / 1.5 (with a 0.25 Forge bonus and a 0.25 Organized Religion bonus) = 32 base Hammers overflowing" Confused by this. 1.5 X 48 = 72. My expectation would be that this would result in 36 base hammers overflowing. Please clarify. Please explain how it works in this particular case.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

The assumption is that Cactus Pete will play, but it would be nice if anyone else in the thread shouted out that they may have time ahead soon, as we need to push the game forward in a series of short turnsets, but the shorter the time that we can schedule in between the turnsets, the more time that we'll have remaining to plan our end game.

Suggested PPP
Overall
Keep our Queen Elizabeth Galley out of fights by using its extra visibility to keep it safe

Only Catapults are allowed to attack Willem's Scouts

Diplo Policies (changes in red)
If an AI asks us to Stop Trading with their Worst Enemy, tell that AI "no"

Refuse requests to switch Civics/Religions

If an AI Demands/Requests a tech which is NOT Monarchy and NOT Machinery, give the AI that tech. If an AI Demands/Requests Monarchy or Machinery, then tell that AI "no"

If an AI Demands a Resource, give the AI that Resource

If an AI Demands/Requests Gold:
less than 100 Gold = give it
more than 100 Gold = don't give it

If a tech trade comes available, stop play to discuss the opportunity

If Mansa is researching a tech that we already know which is not Education, sell/gift it to him. Do not sell/gift Education to Mansa if he starts to tech Education

If an AI Demands/Requests our World Map, say "no"
Do not sell our World Map to any AI


T115, 1AD
Select Warrior 1 in Gems City and wake him up so that we have a unit which has not moved

Spoiler :

we can skip his turn when we're done with the rest of the actions for the turn

Select Catapult 7 (he's the last one in the stack NW + W of the G Cow), wake him up, then send him eastward toward the GH Riv Mine Road that is 2S of City 4 and then attack the Scouts there

Warrior 2 (NW + N of Hippos): Wake him up and move him 1SE G Riv Road

Spoiler :

this way he won't be blocking Forest growth on the Tundra square

X-ops: Click on the Forge in the build queue to remove it from the bottom of the build queue
X-ops: Click on the Forge build item to put it at the top of the build queue
X-ops: 1W Cot -> 9th Sci

Gems: Switch GH Mine -> 2N G Riv Farm

Surfin' Turf: Switch NE G Riv Farm -> NE + E GH Mine

City 4: Build the Forge

Piscatorium: Click on the Forge in the build queue to remove it from the build queue
Piscatorium: Shift + click on a Library so that the build queue shows Jewish Temple -> Library

Hippos: Build Chariot

Spoiler :

Let's get it finished before we see Hammer decay and since it is fast it might catch up to the main stack

Sleepy Sheep: Shift + click on a Galley so that we are building Trireme -> Galley


Double-checking:
X-ops: Deer, Crab, Wheat, Fur, 9 Sci
X-ops: 44 + 10 H in Forge
Gems: 2 Gems, G Riv Cot, G Riv Farm
Gems: 0 + 11 H in Cat
Surfin' Turf: Crab, Gems, Cow, Lake, GH Mine, 6 Sci
Surfin' Turf: 23 + 16 H in Forge
City 4: Corn, 1 Farm, 2 Mines
City 4: 0 + 12 H in Forge
Hippos: 11 + 9 H in Chariot


T116, 25 AD

If we got a Great Scientist, Lightbulb Education

If we got a Great Merchant, switch Research to Education

Set Espionage Slider to 20% (the remaining 80% on Gold)

Spoiler :

Relative to stealing Machinery, we have 4 less of a City Culture bonus, so, say 5 less after 2 turns.

We can get 10 more of a Stationary bonus by waiting 2 turns.

We have 3 less of an EP Spending bonus, and although we might increase this discount by spending a bit more on EPs, let's say that this figure will remain constant.

Thus, we have roughly a + 5 - 10 + 3 = - 2 better discount

Machinery gave us just under 43% of the cost, so let's say that the -2 translates to us needing 42% of the cost

695 EPs * 42% = 292 EPs needed

A 20% EP Slider for 1 turn last turn would have given us a total of 287 EPs, and we aren't whipping, so we should make at least that many EPs this turn, plus 4 EPs from last turn, so we should have enough EPs for next turn, as I was a bit conservative in the calculation

Confirm that Willem has Espionage Weight 1 and all other AIs have Weight 0 (on the Ctrl + e screen)

Talk to Mansa and put these items on the trading table:
War with Willem from Mansa <-> Compass
then ask him: "What would make this deal work?" and if he put an amount of Gold on the table, accept the trade

Spoiler :

Whenever I talk with an AI, to be safe, I first open up an F4 screen, such as F4 TECHS, then I right-click on the Leader's icon. That way, there is no possible way of accidentally declaring war on the AI. If we accidentally have the Alt key pressed down when clicking on a Leader's Name in the Scoreboard on the main game screen, we will automatically declare war on that AI with no chance of cancelling the war declaration.

Willem not getting Longbowmen and Macemen, while Mansa not getting Castles is worth any amount of Gold that Mansa can ask

If Mansa asks for our World Map as part of the trade, wait until the following turn and ask again on the following turn

Obviously, if Mansa Demanded/Requested Compass in between turns, and therefore we already gave him Compass, sell him Optics instead of Compass (which is not ideal, as then Mansa will have Caravels running around, but it's better than the two of those AIs trading techs with each other)


Workers:
W1: Move NE GH Road (1W of the G Corn) and Mine the GH Road -> Move 2E G (1N of City 4) and Farm

W2: Move 1SE G Riv Horse and partial Road and STOP -> Move to the GH Road that is NE + N of Hippos and Mine -> Move to the TH Riv Fur (2W of Hippos) -> Camp the TH Riv Fur

W3: Move to the GH For that is 3N of his location (2W of the G Corn) -> We have arrived 1 turn too early, but better that than not arriving on time, as we need this Chop -> partial Chop the GH For that is 2W of the G Corn and STOP -> partial Chop the GH For that is 2W of the G Corn for a second turn and STOP -> partial Road the GH For that is 2W of the G Corn and STOP!!! -> On T120 we must Chop this Forest into City 4's University on the turn after we completed City 4's Library

W4: Chop the TH Riv For that is NW + W of Hippos -> Move 1 E G Riv Horse and complete the Road -> move 1NE G (2N of Hippos) and Farm

W5: Complete the P Cottage that is 1NW of Sleepy Sheep -> We don't need any further Cottages here, so if there is only 1 Archer inside of New Amsterdam, send him 2W P For -> Move 1SW P Riv (NE + E of City 4) and Farm; however, if there is a 2nd unit inside of New Amsterdam, you could kill time by building a Road 2W of Sleepy Sheep then 1SW of Sleep Sheep, just not NW + W of Sleep Sheep (a Road there reduces chance of Forest growth)

W6: Move 2SW to the GH Road that is NE + N of Hippos and Mine -> Move to the TH Riv Fur (2W of Hippos) -> Camp the TH Riv Fur

W7: Chop the G Riv For into City 4's Forge on T117 -> Move to the G Riv that is 2N of Surfin' Turf and Farm

W8 (the captured Worker who is on the "FORT?" square): Feel free to rename him as Worker 8, press Ctrl + 8, then build a Fort on that square. If Willem's unit puts this Worker in danger, he can instad move to the G Riv Road that is 2N of Surfin' Turf and build a Farm there

Military Units
Catapult 8 (2W of Gems): Move to the GH Riv Mine Road that is 2S of City 4 and then proceed to attack the Scouts with this Catapult

Catapult 7: Keep moving eastward to attack the Scouts

We should plan to have 2 Catapults attacking Scouts on every turn possible. No units other than Catapults should attack the Scouts. We need 5 Great Generals (4 for Elizabeth and 1 for Catherine), so gaining 1 XP per turn from a Catapult attack gets us closer to completing our tasks

Fortify Warrior 6 inside of City 4... no more attacking defenseless Scouts by anyone other than Catapults

Spy 3 can head toward New Amsterdam but don't move him into New Amsterdam until after Spy 4 has completed his Espionage Mission (which will happen on T117 or T118)


Our Spy 2 and War Elephant 5 can benefit by boarding our Queen Elizabeth Galley

The Galley can probably stay in place in our Cultural Borders this turn and then next turn can unload War Elephant 5 on the G for that is 1NE of the G Deer and can unload Spy 2 on the P For Road that is 2N of the G Deer... this way, War Elephant 5 can march south-westward, Spy 2 can use Willem's Road

Spoiler :

Our Galley will have 1 movement point to head back toward our Cultural Borders in case Willem has a boat nearby; obviously, don't drop off the Spy so far if doing so would put us in range of being attacked by one of Willem's boats

Horatio Nelson can first promote to Woodsman III, can then move 1SE GH Riv For Road while still having movement points available due to being a Woodsman unit, then can Promote to a Maceman

Spoiler :

In this way, we can take advantage of the fact that a unit can be upgraded as long as it has some of its movement points remaining, but can first move before upgrading as long as it retains more than 0 movement points, so as to advance further for free

I'd suggest that we push westward with Sabutai and the other units that started on the same square as him (2 Cats, War Elephant, and Spearman)... this way, we can get in a turn of Bombarding with 2 Cats while we wait for the rest of the stack to catch up... presumably, we'll attack the Utretcht from the G Riv For that is 1S of Utretcht

I'd suggest that Cat 1, Cat 2, and Cat 4 (SE + E of Sabutai) move to the GH For that is 1SE of the G Deer

Promote War Elephant 1 (on the GH for Road that is SE + E of Willem's Deer) to Combat 1

Cat 5 and War Elephant 1 (on the GH for Road that is SE + E of Willem's Deer) can also move 1W GH For that is 1SE of the G Deer

Chariot 1 can also join the group of units on the GH For that is 1SE of Willem's Deer


X-ops: Switch 9 Scientists -> 9 Merchants (not Artists--I often mix up the two)

Surfin' Turf: GH Mine -> NE G Riv Farm


City 4: Work these squares: Corn, 2 Farms, 1 Cottage, 1 Mine at Size 5
City 4: Build Library for 0 + 12 H

Hippos: New citizen can work the Fur to get the needed Hammer to finish off the Chariot

Double-checking:
X-ops: Deer, Crab, Wheat, Fur, 9 Merchants
X-ops: 54 + 10 H in Forge
Gems: 11 + 7 H in Cat
Surfin' Turf: Crab, Gems, Cow, Lake, G Riv Farm, 6 Sci (Great Scientist should arrive in 2 turns' time)
Surfin' Turf: 39 + 8 H in Forge
City 4: Corn, 2 Farms, 1 Cottage, 1 Mine
City 4: 0 + 12 H in Library
Hippos: 20 + 12 H in Chariot


T117, 50 AD

Espionage Slider to 0%

If last turn we didn't have enough Gold to bribe Mansa into war with Willem, talk to Mansa and put these items on the trading table:
War with Willem from Mansa <-> Compass
then ask him: "What would make this deal work?" and if he put an amount of Gold on the table, accept the trade

Sleepy Sheep should have built a Trireme this turn: it can move SE + S and then while it still have 1 movement point available to it, it can upgrade to a Caravel

Spy 4: Hopefully, he will have the Influence Civics Mission available to attempt to switch Willem into Caste System; if not, stop play and then we can figure out how many more EPs to earn this turn

Spy 3: Only move into New Amsterdam if Spy 4 has already performed the Influence Civics Espionage Mission

X-ops: Food box should not say "STARVATION!," but if it does, switch a Merchant to the 1W Cottage

Surfin' Turf: Cow -> 7th Sci
Surfin' Turf: Build Library
Surfin' Turf: Food box should not say "STARVATION!," but if it does, work a G farm instead of a 7th Scientist

City 4: Cottage -> 2S Mine
City 4: Build Forge
City 4: Should be working Corn, 2 Farms, 2 Mines for 12 + 10 H (12 + 34 H after the Chop)

Piscatorium: New citizen should become a 2nd Priest
Piscatorium: We should be building a Library

Hippos: We should complete the GH Mine NE + N of the City this turn, so we can switch the Fur to the GH Mine

Worker 7: Complete the G Riv For Chop into City 4 (we'll put that 24-Hammer Chop into the Forge)


Double-checking:
X-ops: Deer, Crab, Wheat, Fur, 9 Merchants (or one less Merchant if we see STARVATION! with 9 Merchants hired)
X-ops: 64 + 10 H in Forge
Gems: 18 + 7 H in Cat
Surfin' Turf: Crab, Gems, Lake, G Riv Farm, 7 Sci (Great Scientist should arrive in 1 turn--G Farm in place of the 7th Sci if we see STARVATION! in the Food box)
Surfin' Turf: 0 + 10 H in Library
City 4: Corn, 2 Farms, 2 Mines
City 4: 12 + 10 + 24 from Chop H in Forge
Piscatorium: 3 Fish, 3 Mines, 2 Priests
Piscatorium: Library should take 2 turns to complete
Hippos: Deer, Horse, Farm, GH Mine


T118, 75 AD

Lightbulb Education with the Great Scientist from Surfin' Turf

If we didn't get a Great Scientist 2 turns ago and instead got a Great Merchant, go to a 100% Science rate

If we did get a Great Scientist 2 turns ago, stay at a 0% Science Rate and accumulate Gold until we've build Universities and probably also Oxford before going to a 100% Science Rate

If we haven't yet tried to perform the Influence Civics to Caste System Espionage Mission on Willem, now's the last chance to do so

Switch Civics to both Slavery and Organized Religion

Spoiler :

all of our Hammer calculations are relying on this Civic switch

Make sure that we have Lightbulbed Education before whipping anything

Spoiler :

Lightbulbing is directly related to how many population points you have, so you will get less Flasks if you Lightbulb after whipping... it won't matter if X-ops gave us a Great Scientist but it will matter if X-ops gave us a Great Merchant

X-ops: Steal the NW + N G Riv Cot from Gems City
X-ops: Work Deer, Crab, Wheat, Fur, 7 Cottages, and 2 Merchants at Size 13
X-ops: Build a University for 19 final Hammers ( 7 * 2.75 = 19.25 )

If we have not learned Education yet, DO NOT do this whipping action, but DO whip if we have learned Education: Gems: 1-pop-whip the Catapult just before growing to Size 4
Gems: Work 2 Gems, G Riv Farm

Surfin' Turf: Switch to building the Forge
Surfin' Turf: 2-pop-whip the Forge
Surfin' Turf: Work the Crab, Gems, Cow, Lake, and 5 Farms at Size 9

City 4: 2-pop-whip the Forge
City 4: Work Corn + 2 Farms to maximize growth at Size 3

Athens: Build University

Our Trireme that was upgraded to a Caravel should be able to pick up our Great Merchant... I suggest heading toward Mansa's south-west City of Kumbi Saleh... try to avoid ending our turn on a Coast square inside of Mansa's territory in case of lurking Barb Galleys... once we unload in Kumbi Saleh we'll be able to figure out which of Mansa's Cities will give us the most Gold

Double-checking:
X-ops: Deer, Crab, Wheat, Fur, 7 Cottages, 2 Merchants
X-ops: 0 + 19 H in University
Gems: 2 Gems + Farm
Gems: Only if we learned Education, we should have whipped the Cat. If we did not learn Education, we should not have whipped the Cat
Surfin' Turf: Crab, Gems, Cow, Lake, 5 Farms
Surfin' Turf: Should have whipped the Forge
City 4: Corn, 2 Farms
City 4: Should have whipped the Forge
Athens: University
Piscatorium: 3 Fish, 3 Mines, 2 Priests
Piscatorium: Library should take 1 turn to complete

It's probably a good time to stop play just to ensure that everything is in order and that I didn't make major errors with the calculations... now might be the last time to make corrections if something didn't work out properly

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Spoiler Detailed Math that can be ignored :

I read everything that you took so much time to write, but still don't understand this example you used earlier -- " so let's say 48 final Hammers, which would then translate to 48 / 1.5 (with a 0.25 Forge bonus and a 0.25 Organized Religion bonus) = 32 base Hammers overflowing" Confused by this. 1.5 X 48 = 72. My expectation would be that this would result in 36 base hammers overflowing. Please clarify. Please explain how it works in this particular case.

Let's try something simpler.

We have a Forge and Org Rel.

We have 4 final Hammers in a Barracks, which means that it is a 2-pop-whipping action (it would be a 1-pop-whipping action if we had 5 or more final Hammers in the Barracks, since 1 population point * 30 base Hammers per population point whipped * 1.5 Hammer multiplier = 45 final Hammers, and a Barracks costs 50 final Hammers).

We have 49 final Hammers in a University, which means that it is a 3-pop-whipping action (it would be a 2-pop-whipping action if we had 50 or more final Hammers in the University, since 1 population point * 30 base Hammers per population point whipped * 2.5 Hammer multiplier from Org Rel + Forge + Creative Trait = 150 final Hammers, and a University costs 200 final Hammers).

We first 2-pop-whip the Barracks.

By whipping, we earn 2 * 30 base Hammers * 1.5 = 90 final Hammers

But, only 50 - 4 = 46 final Hammers are needed to complete the Barracks

46 final Hammers / 1.5 Hammer multiplier = 30.67 base Hammers required

We can't give 0.67 of a Hammer, so we must give 31 base Hammers

31 base Hammers are thus deducted from the 60 base Hammers that we added

We also, say, added 1 base Hammer from the City's Centre square and we were working Farms everywhere else to keep things simpler.

So, we overflow a maximum of 60 - 31 + 1 = 30 base Hammers

Will the game allow us to overflow that many or will some of those Hammers be counted as excess Hammers?

Well, 50 final Hammers for the cost of the Barracks / 1.5 Hammer multiplier = 33.33 base Hammers, so the game probably floors that number and says that a maximum of 33 base Hammers can overflow

We had 30 base Hammers overflowing, which is less than 33 maximum base Hammers overflowing, so all of the base Hammers overflow and thus there are no "excess" overflow Hammers

We could build The Heroic Epic next.

But, let's say that we instead 3-pop-whipped the University.

Now we have a 200-final-Hammer University which had 49 final Hammers in it requiring 200 - 49 = 151 final Hammers to complete it

Whipping 3 population points gave us 3 * 30 base * 2.5 Hammer multiplier = 225 final Hammers

In order to get 151 final Hammers, the game asks us to provide this many base Hammers: 151 / 2.5 = 60.4 base Hammers, which means that the game demands that we use up 61 base Hammers

We just earned 3 * 30 base Hammers from whipping, and we had 30 base Hammers overflowing, and we'll earn 1 base Hammer from the City Centre square, and we use up 61 of those base Hammers to complete the University. Summing these:
3 * 30 + 30 + 1 - 61 = 121 - 61 = 60 base Hammers that are available to overflow

Can all of those base Hammers overflow?

Well, a University allows this many base Hammers to overflow: 200 Universitiy cost / 2.5 Hammer multiplier = 80 base Hammers can overflow

60 base Hammers is less than 80 base Hammers, so even though we built:
Barracks -> University -> Heroic Epic, we ended up keeping all 30 of the base Hammers that overflowed from the Barracks, giving us a total of 60 base Hammers overflowing into the Heroic Epic within the span of a single turn, rather than spending 2 turns of overflowing 30 base Hammers at a time into the Heroic Epic

"probably just after we Cease Fire with Willem, so that after we gift him our Workers by recapturing New Amsterdam, Willem will still be alive in the game" How do you gift an AI workers by recapturing his city, or how can recapturing a city keep an AI alive?

If you recall, the plan is:
1. Do not capture New Amsterdam
2. Capture Utretcht, The Hague, and Amsterdam
3. Willem's capital should get automatically relocated to New Amsterdam
4. Cease Fire with Willem
5. Gift another City to Willem to keep him alive, probably with Confucianism inside of it to help improve our relationship with him
6. Obtain Open Borders with Willem
7. Gift 1 + 2 + 2 ( + possibly 2 ) = 5 or 7 Workers to Willem when those Workers are inside of New Amsterdam
8. A new point: We can probably gift Willem a couple of Warriors in that new City to act as new punching bags for our Catapults
9. Declare war on Willem and capture New Amsterdam and our 5 or 7 Workers
10. Willem will still be alive in the new City that we gifted to him, which will probably be located 2W of our G Corn

 

[Cactus Pete]

Let's try something simpler. Please. These calculations are too hard for a game and detract from it.

We have a Forge and Org Rel.

We have 4 final Hammers in a Barracks, which means that it is a 2-pop-whipping action (it would be a 1-pop-whipping action if we had 5 or more final Hammers in the Barracks, since 1 population point * 30 base Hammers per population point whipped * 1.5 Hammer multiplier = 45 final Hammers, and a Barracks costs 50 final Hammers).

We have 49 final Hammers in a University, which means that it is a 3-pop-whipping action (it would be a 2-pop-whipping action if we had 50 or more final Hammers in the University, since 1 population point * 30 base Hammers per population point whipped * 2.5 Hammer multiplier from Org Rel + Forge + Creative Trait = 150 final Hammers, and a University costs 200 final Hammers).

We first 2-pop-whip the Barracks.

By whipping, we earn 2 * 30 base Hammers * 1.5 = 90 final Hammers

But, only 50 - 4 = 46 final Hammers are needed to complete the Barracks

46 final Hammers / 1.5 Hammer multiplier = 30.67 base Hammers required

We can't give 0.67 of a Hammer, so we must give 31 base Hammers

31 base Hammers are thus deducted from the 60 base Hammers that we added

We also, say, added 1 base Hammer from the City's Centre square and we were working Farms everywhere else to keep things simpler.

So, we overflow a maximum of 60 - 31 + 1 = 30 base Hammers

Will the game allow us to overflow that many or will some of those Hammers be counted as excess Hammers?

Well, 50 final Hammers for the cost of the Barracks / 1.5 Hammer multiplier = 33.33 base Hammers, so the game probably floors that number and says that a maximum of 33 base Hammers can overflow

We had 30 base Hammers overflowing, which is less than 33 maximum base Hammers overflowing, so all of the base Hammers overflow and thus there are no "excess" overflow Hammers

We could build The Heroic Epic next.

But, let's say that we instead 3-pop-whipped the University.

Now we have a 200-final-Hammer University which had 49 final Hammers in it requiring 200 - 49 = 151 final Hammers to complete it

Whipping 3 population points gave us 3 * 30 base * 2.5 Hammer multiplier = 225 final Hammers

In order to get 151 final Hammers, the game asks us to provide this many base Hammers: 151 / 2.5 = 60.4 base Hammers, which means that the game demands that we use up 61 base Hammers

We just earned 3 * 30 base Hammers from whipping, and we had 30 base Hammers overflowing, and we'll earn 1 base Hammer from the City Centre square, and we use up 61 of those base Hammers to complete the University. Summing these:
3 * 30 + 30 + 1 - 61 = 121 - 61 = 60 base Hammers that are available to overflow

Can all of those base Hammers overflow?

Well, a University allows this many base Hammers to overflow: 200 Universitiy cost / 2.5 Hammer multiplier = 80 base Hammers can overflow

60 base Hammers is less than 80 base Hammers, so even though we built:
Barracks -> University -> Heroic Epic, we ended up keeping all 30 of the base Hammers that overflowed from the Barracks, giving us a total of 60 base Hammers overflowing into the Heroic Epic within the span of a single turn, rather than spending 2 turns of overflowing 30 base Hammers at a time into the Heroic Epic That's something simpler? Maybe less excessively complex. I think I have the logic now, though. Thanks.



If you recall, the plan is: Yes, but seemed like you had changed it. Why are we planning to chop a granary there if we're going to give it away? Rather leverage the chops now. Our fate may well be decided before we ever get to use that granary.
1. Do not capture New Amsterdam
2. Capture Utretcht, The Hague, and Amsterdam
3. Willem's capital should get automatically relocated to New Amsterdam
4. Cease Fire with Willem
5. Gift another City to Willem to keep him alive, probably with Confucianism inside of it to help improve our relationship with him
6. Obtain Open Borders with Willem Do you have an idea how difficult this is likely to be after all the warring?
7. Gift 1 + 2 + 2 ( + possibly 2 ) = 5 or 7 Workers to Willem when those Workers are inside of New Amsterdam
8. A new point: We can probably gift Willem a couple of Warriors in that new City to act as new punching bags for our Catapults Clever. So save Warriors 2 and 3 for this, and perhaps could use one from Xopolis.
9. Declare war on Willem and capture New Amsterdam and our 5 or 7 Workers
10. Willem will still be alive in the new City that we gifted to him, which will probably be located 2W of our G Corn

I can play a little in about 10 hours, but will try to go over your latest PPP in the next hour or so and post any questions or concerns.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

That's something simpler? Maybe less excessively complex.

It's the same game that we've been playing all of these years, just that behind all of those pretty graphics, we're now exposing some of the math that goes into making the game fun and fair for all.

I think I have the logic now, though. Thanks.

I'm glad. I don't recall having gone through the math to that level of detail previously myself and I don't relish the thought of having to do it again anytime soon.

Yes, but seemed like you had changed it.

Chances are that I did. As new factors occur in the game or as new ideas arise, our plans keep adjusting.

Why are we planning to chop a granary there if we're going to give it away?

I was thinking of Chopping the Granary later, after we eventually recapture the City, but if you like the idea of giving Willem said City and using it to pummel Warriors, then we can simply plan not to get that City back ever, so we could Chop those 2 Forests.

They're only worth 20 Hammers each, though, so I'd still prioritise improvements before the Chops and then Chop them later when we have some spare Worker turns, say, with Worker 3 once he's done Chopping the GH For that is 2W of the G Corn into City 4's University.

Another thought is that if we do settle a City, those 2 Chops would be worth 30 Hammers each in Units (say, 1 whole War Elephant) in the new City.

Of course, 20 base Hammers = 25 Hammers into a Settler in City 4 (after getting the Forge) or 30 Hammers into a Building in City 4 (Forge + Org Rel bonuses).

There are enough other improvements to make before we'll need to make this decision, though, so it's not a concern for now, but we can certainly choose not to save the Forests.


"Obtain Open Borders with Willem"

Do you have an idea how difficult this is likely to be after all the warring?

Willem is -5 Annoyed toward us now, but -6 "This war spoils our relationship" will disappear once the war is over.

Willem Opens Borders at Cautious, so we should be more than fine.

Once we get Open Borders with him, which really should happen the turn after the war is over, we can sneak a Confucian Missionary into New Amsterdam, getting rid of the -2 "Heathen Religion" penalty, as well, and changing that into +1 "Bros of the Faith." Worst case, he switches into Buddhism himself before we can get Confucianism to him and we might use Espionage to switch him into Confucianism.

We might gift him a couple of Resources, to bring him up to +1 for trading Resources with him (that bonus seems to decay but not fully reset when you stop trading Resources with a player for a while).

Gifting him the new City should also give us Liberation credit for +1 Diplo Attitude.

In the absolute worst case, if we somehow totally tarnish our relationship with Willem, we can temporarily Liberate some of his original Cities back to him just before declaring war on him, then immediately recapture those Cities, in genuine Folket style.

In summary: I am not really concerned about being able to get Open Borders with Willem again.

So save Warriors 2 and 3 for this, and perhaps could use one from Xopolis.

I'm not sure if Warriors would try to counter-attack, but I imagine that the first 2 would switch to having the City Defence Mission once the gifted City becomes Willem's new capital, since AIs like to have 2 City Defence units inside of their capital, so I'm hoping that at least 2 Warriors would stay in place and allow us to repeatedly pummel them.


EDIT:

What about a wkbt in Hippos to net the whale?

We'll have to remember to sneak that build item in at some point, probably after building each of the 3 partially-completed build items (Chariot, War Elephant, and Catapult). With a 30-Hammer Chop coming in soon, it shouldn't be too long before we'll get that Work Boat.

 

[Cactus Pete]

"There are enough other improvements to make before we'll need to make this decision, though, so it's not a concern for now, but we can certainly choose not to save the Forests." Understood -- will delay that chopping.

Read over plan -- just a couple of questions:

T115
X-ops: Click on the Forge in the build queue to remove it from the build queue
X-ops: Build the Forge
Are you saying "Remove Forge from the bottom of the queue and put it on the top, then build but do not whip it."?


T116, 25 AD

Obviously, if Mansa Demanded/Requested Compass in between turns, sell him Optics instead of Compass How can I do this without first rejecting his demand, and, once I've rejected it, why would we want to sell him Optics? I'm missing something here. Please clarify.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

T115
X-ops: Click on the Forge in the build queue to remove it from the build queue
X-ops: Build the Forge
Are you saying "Remove Forge from the bottom of the queue and put it on the top, then build but do not whip it."?

Correct. I edited the PPP to make this point clearer.

The goal is to put enough Hammers into the Forge over the course of 3 turns to reduce the number of population points required to whip it.

But, we can't whip the Forge before we put some Hammers into the University, otherwise we'd put too many Hammers into the University, so the Forge will get whipped after we've dumped some Hammers into the University, on a turn that happens after the PPP.

T116, 25 AD

Obviously, if Mansa Demanded/Requested Compass in between turns, sell him Optics instead of Compass How can I do this without first rejecting his demand, and, once I've rejected it, why would we want to sell him Optics? I'm missing something here. Please clarify.

What we've been doing is giving into every Demand/Request with a few exceptions... no to Alphabet, no to Monarchy, (no to Feudalism once we learn it), and no to World Map.

If Mansa Demands/Requests Compass, we will give it to him. The odds of that happening are incredibly low, but it's the things that we don't discuss which tend to give us the biggest headaches.

So, if that happens, Compass wouldn't be available for trade, so I'm saying that we'd still want to bribe Mansa into the war against Willem and we would use Optics in that case, rather than saying "well, the PPP said to sell him Compass, but we already gave it to him, so I guess that we won't bribe Mansa into a war," which could lead to a whole lot of trouble if, say, Willem trades Engineering to Mansa and Mansa trades Feudalism to Willem.

Basically, bribing Mansa into the war is important enough that I detailed that unlikely, but possible, scenario.


EDIT: It seems that all AIs currently know Alphabet and everyone but Shaka knows Monarchy, so we're not going to get Requests/Demands for Alphabet anymore, are we? Are there any other techs that we want to deny giving out to the AIs? Machinery? (Machinery unlocks China's and Japan's Unique Units and leads towards France's Unique Unit.) Feudalism and Engineering once we get them? Those would probably be my picks if any... I can update the PPP to replace Alphabet with Machinery.

Since we don't have Feudalism or Engineering yet, I left that info out of our Diplo Policies, to avoid being confusing.

Elizabeth
Will trade map: Never

EDIT 2: Ohhh, it seems that giving in to Elizabeth's Request for Machinery got her up to Friendly status toward us. It's too bad that she won't trade a World Map even to someone toward whom she is Friendly. "Don't go stealing my colonial sites," she says. But, if she learns a monopoly tech, we'll be able to get it from her, which is a nice bonus to have.

So, it's actually potentially a pretty good thing that we gave her Machinery, if she researches something useful for us.


EDIT 3: Toku has his hands full... he is Pleased toward everyone that he knows, but he is able to plot a war when Pleased toward a player, so anyone whom he has met could be his target, including us.

 

[Cactus Pete]

That answers my questions, so I'll be playing shortly.

Would Toku declare war on us from such a distance?

Any feel for how likely it is now for Shaka to declare on us? If our spy is successful with civics change, thinking of sending him into Shaka's territory for intel.

 

[Folket]

We or William are the most likely targets for Tokugawa. But it will take him forever to get his forces ready and get them all the way here.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

If our spy is successful with civics change, thinking of sending him into Shaka's territory for intel.

That's fine by me.

We or William are the most likely targets for Tokugawa.

Tokugawa doesn't know Willem yet, so Willem can't be the target. Tokugawa knows these players:
Louis
Shaka
Mao
Us


EDIT: As for our Catapult Promotions, we should probably just go City Raider for all of our Promotions. The Drill Promotions won't really be needed now that we have War Elephants and Maces, so even Catapults with Drill II Promotions can just get City Raider Promotions from now on.


EDIT 2:

Any feel for how likely it is now for Shaka to declare on us?

Willem can't bribe Shaka into the war, since Shaka has his hands full.

Therefore, Shaka is going to have to march a stack adjacent to our Cultural Borders before declaring war. If you see a stack of Shaka's units adjacent to our Cultural Borders then the answer is going to be "on the following turn."

Until you see that stack of units, the likelihood is pretty much a zero chance.

 

[Cactus Pete]

Played 'til the end of T118 -- plan is proceeding, but war is going to be difficult, as W now has Engineering (and a bunch of HAs but fortunately no metals). Must trust in the stupidity of the AI.

Notes:

T115: Implement latest PPP

T116:
Turn down a French map trade
Get a GS (and bulb Ed)
Mao now has both wine and spices available
Succeed in bribing Mansa into war for Compass + 125 gold

T117:
Decline E's offer if Drama + 20 gold for Compass
W completes Engineering
Spy succeeds in switching W to Caste

T118:
GS completes Ed
French complete Parthenon
E completes Apostolic Palace (Hindu)
Mansa has completed Feudalism and is now researching Guilds
W advances multiple HA's and reserves others in cities
W also advances a settler, accompanied by a HA and a chariot
Killed one vulnerable HA, but chose not to attack settler party this turn, as that would leave too many vulnerabilities (there are enough as it is, if W concentrates an HA attack) and would make advancing on Utrecht highly problematic.

For discussion:

E has 90 gold available (and Drama) and is Friendly towards us.
What about soliciting funds from Mansa?
Is an Odeon really what we want next in Gems? There's a barracks there. Like a HA to get to the front quickly and help with the cats.
What about picking up Spy2 in our galley next turn and depositing him the following turn on W's horses with the intention of sabotaging them? What about stealing W's treasury? If neither, what about putting spy points on Shaka?


Save:http://gotm.civfanatics.net/download.php?file=Xteam_SG021_AD0075_01.CivBeyondSwordSave

 

[Dhoomstriker]

T116:
Get a GS (and bulb Ed)

That's a major relief.

The calculations that I did for further turns will not go to waste. I can aim to throw that info together into a PPP this evening, so that you'll be able to play through more turns soon.

E completes Apostolic Palace (Hindu)

Unfortunately that fact means that we will have to attack her at some point if we want to easily win via a Religious Victory, as an "AP Cheese" Victory relies on two things:
1. We own the City that contains the Apostolic Palace
2. No player is running Hinduism as their State Religion

We don't have to win via "AP Cheese" and could win without the "cheesiness," but the "cheesiness" makes it so that when the vote comes up, there is only 1 name on the voting ballot: ours.

but chose not to attack settler party this turn, as that would leave too many vulnerabilities (there are enough as it is, if W concentrates an HA attack) and would make advancing on Utrecht highly problematic.

Understood. It's important to lose as few Military Units as possible, since we're going to be busy building Forges and Universities for the next few turns.

That said, we have to watch out for Willem trying to sneak Horse Archers past our units... perhaps Horatio Nelson will be able to help with killing some Horse Archers inside of Forests at some point soon (said without seeing the real game yet).

Is an Odeon really what we want next in Gems? There's a barracks there. Like a HA to get to the front quickly and help with the cats.

The Odeon is there so that we can delay completing the Odeon by 1 turn by not having Hammer decay in the Odeon. We won't need that Odeon for quite some time, so the more turns where the Hammers in it do not decay, the longer that we can delay completing it. Yes, more of that "fun" build queue micro.

The overflow Hammers from the Catapult will actually get put into a University. As I said, I'll be sure to detail this info when I write the next PPP, although a lot of what I write in the PPP is going to come straight out of the calculations listed in message #780.

What about picking up Spy2 in our galley next turn and depositing him the following turn on W's horses with the intention of sabotaging them?

We have to make sure that wherever our Galley goes, it won't be in range of being attacked by Willem's boats.

Also, would we rather have Willem building Horse Archers or Archers? I'm not sure what the answer is, but Archers will hide in a City, whereas Horse Archers will sometimes leave the City and enter the Forest, where our 2 Woodsmen III dudes can kill the Horse Archers easily, and our War Elephants get a bonus when attacking Horse Archers.

If Willem gets Feudalism, Archers can be upgraded into Longbowmen, but Horse Archers will remain as Horse Archers.

What about stealing W's treasury?

That would be best accomplished by a Spy in New Amsterdam. That said, you get roughly 1 Gold for 1 EP, so it's actually a pretty crappy Espionage Mission. Consider that we only paid 142 EPs to steal Metal Casting, which is a tech that costs more than 700 Flasks.

If you think about the ratios, you'll see that the Steal Treasure Espionage Mission is actually a very terrible Mission to run.

Indeed, as your Stationary Spy bonus increases, the amount of Gold that you can steal goes down! Steal Treasury is one of the crappiest Espionage Missions for this reason.

If neither, what about putting spy points on Shaka?

Until we're ready to build Courthouses or we're ready to increase our EP Commerce Slider again, we should only be putting EPs on Willem or Mansa.

The reason is that once you start spending some EPs (even only 4 EPs per turn) on an AI, that AI will start spending more EPs on you. When an AI spends more EPs on you, each Spy Mission and each passive Espionage benefit (such as seeing an AI's Research) goes up in cost.

So, it's actually very counter-productive to put a small amount of EPs on an AI over time... you actually fall behind compared to putting 0 EPs on that AI and then later, on some future date, setting the EP Slider to 100% for 1 turn and dumping a ton of EPs on that AI all at once, thereby "surprising" the AI and getting much cheaper Missions and cheaper passive Espionage costs.

The last that I checked, we still have plenty of EPs on Mansa to be able to see his Research for quite some time, so dumping 4 EPs per turn on Willem is probably our best bet, until we decide to run a turn of 100% EPs on an AI.

What would be FAR more useful is to spread Confucianism to a City or two of Shaka's. Doing so would give us a considerable discount on Spy Missions and passive Espionage costs against Shaka since we own the Confucian Holy City.

Like a HA to get to the front quickly and help with the cats.

Do you mean help our Catapults in attacking Cities because a Horse Archer can retreat or do you mean help in attacking Willem's Catapults because Horse Archers get a bonus when attacking Catapults?

Unfortunately, our Universities take priority for now, so you're probably going to have to make do with our current army plus the odd extra unit that gets built in Hippos.

What about soliciting funds from Mansa?

Do you mean by selling him Optics or begging from him?



Overall Strategy
We need to capture Willem's Cities, since they are good Cities, we're already at war with him, and we have a plan in place for gifting him Workers then getting our Workers back.

We need to capture at least the Apostolic Palace City from Elizabeth and we might as well capture the rest of her Cities while we're at it. We might do something tricky, such as gifting her a City before the war so that we can keep her alive after capturing her core Cities, so as to give her the Queen Elizabeth boat AFTER the war, rather than before the war.

We have a plan to capture Catherine's Cities so that we can relocate her capital... this plan may change if we pursue Catherine #3, but for now, capturing her empire is the current plan.

Other than those AIs, we don't NEED to attack anyone else.

Shaka might be a good choice due to him being close to our Military forces and him not yet having Feudalism, but we don't NEED to attack him. His land isn't great, but owning it would give us more Resources.

Mansa does have The Pyramids, but he's also a great trading partner and we keep feeding him our best techs, so we don't need to attack him and we're probably best just letting him "be awesome" in the game... he won't beat us by going into Space before we can win, so it will actually be good if he becomes a technologically-advanced friend, even one who gets to Rifling or beyond.

The other AIs are just "there"... if we happen to have the means to take them out, we can, but it's probably better to just spread Confucianism to their capitals (except for Isabella, who is always going to be Buddhist) and then later spread Hinduism to a small City of each of theirs, then not waste turns in attacking them.

So, I think that we'll want to focus on:
1. Getting Oxford
2. Capturing Willem's core Cities
3. Spreading Confucianism widely around the world, starting with the capitals of Japan, China, and France, then possibly spreading to other large-sized Cities of theirs so that they stay in Confucianism
4. Warring with Elizabeth to capture the Apostolic Palace and probably most of her Cities (optionally warring with Shaka first if our forces aren't yet ready to take on Elizabeth)
5. Preparing for a war against Catherine where we swarm her with Galleons filled with War Elephants, Maces, and Cats
6. Spreading Hinduism to small AI Cities around the world, if it hasn't auto-spread itself by then
7. Unlocking Tanks, building Tanks, and sending them to Catherine's new capital that exists on our continent
8. Getting 3 Great People to Isabella, or else satisfying a different task for her
9. Winning via an AP Cheese Victory (where no player is running Hinduism but we own the Apostolic Palace)

Nice to have items would be:
i. Capturing Shaka's Cities, if we have the time and the means to do so
ii. Building The Taj Mahal


As for Catherine, the later that we meet her, the less likely she will be to get techs out of us, so the more likely that she'll be technologically backward when we arrive on her shores. There are only so many places remaining on the map where she could be hiding. Thus, it would be better if we don't meet her for a while and only meet her when we're getting close to being able to launch a several Galleons that are filled with Military Units.

Also, the way that AI-AI tech-trading works, when you are technologically advanced, it's often better not to meet an AI such as Catherine. The reason is that an AI who has met her might not trade her a tech as that AI treats the tech as a "monopoly" tech, since Catherine only knows 1 player who knows that tech. For most techs, an AI won't trade away a tech that it believes is a "monopoly" tech in the eyes of the potential trading partner.

But, as soon as we meet Catherine, that tech now becomes known by multiple players who Catherine knows (the other AI and us) and therefore the tech loses its "monopoly" status and thus the other AI becomes far more likely to engage in a series of tech-trading sessions with Catherine and with the span of a few turns she could easily get another 6+ techs in trade from another AI or two simply because we met her!

 

[Cactus Pete]

The calculations that I did for further turns will not go to waste. I can aim to throw that info together into a PPP this evening, so that you'll be able to play through more turns soon. Good. Would not like to foul your plan with a flawed calculation.

Understood. It's important to lose as few Military Units as possible, since we're going to be busy building Forges and Universities for the next few turns. Concur, but it's not a good situation. I'd be pretty confident of our chances in Vanilla, but the AI is better in BtS.

That said, we have to watch out for Willem trying to sneak Horse Archers past our units... perhaps Horatio Nelson will be able to help with killing some Horse Archers inside of Forests at some point soon (said without seeing the real game yet). I'm aware of that threat and chose not to consolidate units partially to deal with it if not done well (and partially in anticipation of W's cats showing up), but just don't have the units to eliminate the possibility and still move on Utrecht. Before we change turns, will consider advancing a warrior or two westward in case we need to upgrade them to spear. If we let W settle his city [Wouldn't that save us from building one to gift him?], wondering if he will keep the HA and chariot (perhaps upgraded to HA) in the city until he builds an archer, and how quickly can the AI do that at this level?

The Odeon is there so that we can delay completing the Odeon by 1 turn by not having Hammer decay in the Odeon. We won't need that Odeon for quite some time, so the more turns where the Hammers in it do not decay, the longer that we can delay completing it. Yes, more of that "fun" build queue micro. So, leave Odeon in the queue IBT, then switch to Uni.

We have to make sure that wherever our Galley goes, it won't be in range of being attacked by Willem's boats. Yes, unloading the spy on the horses can be done without risking the galley. Wondering if keeping that galley in sight but out of range will cause W to keep units in his capital, which at the moment would be extremely helpful?

Also, would we rather have Willem building Horse Archers or Archers? Right now, much rather have him build archers, but, as you suggest, that could change, especially if we can control/pillage some of his roads. Still, would like to have the option of pillaging horses in 3 turns if that's possible.
If Willem gets Feudalism, Archers can be upgraded into Longbowmen, but Horse Archers will remain as Horse Archers.Very true.

If you think about the ratios, you'll see that the Steal Treasure Espionage Mission is actually a very terrible Mission to run. Got it. Thanks for the continuing education.

Until we're ready to build Courthouses or we're ready to increase our EP Commerce Slider again, we should only be putting EPs on Willem or Mansa. Follow that too.

Do you mean help our Catapults in attacking Cities because a Horse Archer can retreat or do you mean help in attacking Willem's Catapults because Horse Archers get a bonus when attacking Catapults? The latter. We're fortunate that he has not already brought cats out of Amsterdam.

Unfortunately, our Universities take priority for now, so you're probably going to have to make do with our current army plus the odd extra unit that gets built in Hippos.Well, it doesn't hurt to ask.

Do you mean by selling him Optics or begging from him? Begging.

What about E's 90 gold?

 

[Dhoomstriker]

If we let W settle his city [Wouldn't that save us from building one to gift him?]

In terms of BtS AIs, we know that the Settler will retreat next turn and that the units standing next with him will remain in place, since that's how AI Settler Parties are coded in BtS.

The only way that the Settler will settle is if we clear all of our units out of the area first so that the Settler feels that it has a safe path to the settling location, which probably isn't a good strategic move, as it leaves Willem the chance to slip Horse Archers toward Surfin' Turf and our Workers.

Willem wants to settle where we have the "FORT?" sign, anyway, which isn't a helpful settling location (we know that from where he parked his Chariot earlier). Sure, it could save us a Settler, if we're willing to let Willem own that City for about 9 turns before it grows to Size 2 and we can capture it, during which time he could be streaming Horse Archers through that area.

Also, in terms of attacking AI units, if there are 2 AI units on the same square as each other, when we attack the first AI unit, if we win, our unit will stay in place.

If, say, we win the first battle against mounted units in a Forest using a War Elephant or a Spearman and then Horatio attacks second, then Horatio will move onto that square (assuming that he also wins the battle) and then he can move to join the unit that just attacked, to defend said unit, using his second movement point.

What about E's 90 gold?

As for Elizabeth, she offers this trade:
Drama + 25 / 90 Gold from Elizabeth <-> Compass

We don't really need Drama right away (it's bad enough that we have to build Universities... let's not add Theatres as well!), so that trade is not helpful.

Instead, we could first try begging that 90 Gold from her and then could sell her Compass for all of her Gold if she refuses the beg, not taking Drama.

We haven't received anything from her via begging before, so 90 Gold is probably a safe amount this late in the game.

chariot (perhaps upgraded to HA)

In BtS, Chariots cannot be upgraded to Horse Archers. AIs build Chariots because Chariots get a +100% bonus against Axemen in BtS, so a Chariot hurts an Axeman more than a Horse Archer would hurt an Axeman, for less Hammers.

So, leave Odeon in the queue IBT, then switch to Uni.

Yes. Unfortunately, it looks like we'll have some build queue manipulation to do in X-ops, too, to avoid some Hammers decaying in the units that we queued up there.

We'll probably also want to build a Harbour there at some point as one of the items to whip into Oxford, since raw Commerce gets heavily multiplied in our capital.

Yes, unloading the spy on the horses can be done without risking the galley.

The Spy could land there, or the Spy could head westward to give us visibility of The Hague and to find out where Willem is hiding his Workers.

Willem has a partial Forest Chop on the G For Road that is 1S of The Hague which wasn't there before, so he's actively Choppping a Forest there. (How can I tell? Hover your mouse over the square that is 1S of The Hague and you will see that it says "Chop Down a Forest: 2 Turns.") There's also a Forest missing from 1W of The Hague. So, maybe we don't care as much about seeing his Workers, as we know what they are up to already.

I'm okay with you trying to drop the Spy off on the Horse Resource, but be smart about it... our Galley CANNOT move toward our Spy this turn (without us risking being attacked and us messing up our Elizabeth Quest royally), so we'll have to pick up the Spy next turn and then retreat the Galley 3 squares away from all of Willem's boats, probably to the same square where you have our Galley positioned now, assuming that Willem's boats stay inside of Amsterdam. If Willem's boats chase us, we'll have to abandon the plan, as we can't dare to risk our Queen Elizabeth Galley in battle... there's no way that we'll be able to beat TSR and PD if we have to go for Elizabeth #3, as they are both ahead of us in warring. Our best hope of defeating them is surgically warring only as much as we need to, in order to complete our quests and have an easy AP Cheese Victory.

Wondering if keeping that galley in sight but out of range will cause W to keep units in his capital, which at the moment would be extremely helpful?

That approach works when you have a stronger unit, but our Galley is just a normal Galley in terms of defence, so if Willem's boats had the "attack nearby boats" Mission, they would probably be coming after us. If anything, Willem is preparing an amphibious attacking party that will consist of 3 Galleys, which is why 2 of his Galleys are stationed in his capital... those Galleys probably have a "transport units" Mission type, rather than an "attack nearby boats" Mission type.

So, hopefully, his Galleys won't move, but if we end our Galley's turn within 2 squares of them, Willem's boats will almost certainly attack and defeat our Galley, just like how a City Defence Archer will sometimes come out of a City to attack one of your nearby weak units, such as your Warrior or your wounded unit, since you present an opportunity that is too good for an AI to pass up, so the AI overrides its unit's existing Mission in such a case.

The latter. We're fortunate that he has not already brought cats out of Amsterdam.

Well, to your earlier point, Mao temptingly offers:
Wine + Spice from Mao <-> Horse

There aren't many spots from which we could build a Horse Archer soon, but if we're going to try to Sabotage Willem's Horse Resource, Willem will be more likely to build more Cats, so it does seem to make sense to hang onto our Horse Resource, especially since while we might not build Horse Archers over the next couple of turns, we'll probably want to build a couple within the next 10 turns, so I'd avoid making that trade, as tempting as it looks.

We don't need the extra Happiness yet. Plus, we should be able to get Spice from Elizabeth at some point... it seems that we missed a chance to get Spice in trade from her (she is trading a Spice Resource to Mansa right now), but she has a 3rd Spice that hasn't been improved yet.

Begging.

We asked for and received Gold from Mansa on T92. I think that the general rule is that you should wait 30 turns after you receive something from an AI, meaning that we'd beg again on T122. If he still has some Gold at that point, we should probably try begging it from him then.

The question now becomes... is it worth it to give Optics to Mansa for 150 Gold? That's roughly 500 Flasks' worth of Research for us, so I think that we have to say "yes."

In fact, we should probably have a more liberal tech-trading policy with all of the AIs.

Shaka has Monarchy, so I would say that if he gets 50 or more Gold, sell Polytheism to Shaka.

If Louis, Mao, or Toku gets 50 or more Gold, sell Monotheism to said AI.

If Isabella gets more than 50 or more Gold, sell her Aesthetics.

This decision could end up seriously impacting our end game date, so let's be on the ball with grabbing AI Gold with older techs that we don't care about them getting (they all have Monarchy, so holding onto Monotheism doesn't help us anymore).


Techs:
Do we want to keep Education to ourselves? Probably, yes, so we should probably add that tech to the list of techs not to give away if an AI Demands/Requests such a tech. We can give it out later after we've learned Liberalism and possibly also Economics.

Mansa seems to be going down the Feudalism -> Guilds -> Banking path, but if he doesn't get Education, he can't beat us to Economics.

Then again, which is better? Roughly 1700 Gold or getting a 2275-Flask tech in trade? Actually, seeing how we can currently make 340 Flasks for 100 Gold, the Gold from the Great Merchant is likely a winner.

Also, do we want Free Market or will it be better to go for Communism for State Property? Grabbing Liberalism with Astronomy puts us only 3 techs away from Communism: Printing Press -> Scientific Method -> Communism

Additional Trade Routes from Free Market will probably be Domestic ones, especially as we start to capture more AI Cities, so Free Market is worth roughly +2 Commerce per City, but it also has a higher Civic Maintenance Cost than we pay now. We'll soon earn more than +3 Gold per City (currently, and even more later, as we capture more Cities) from State Property, and State Property gives us +10 Hammers everywhere, unlocks The Kremlin, and improves Workshops and Watermills. State Property is a very strong Civic.

Are we planning on doing Sid's Sushi? The setup costs are probably not worth it, especially since we don't really need the Culture, and the Food only helps us to hire more Specialists, which might just make up for the investment in Medicine by the time that the game is over.

State Property will be worth it, especially as we start to capture more Cities and if we don't build Courthouses, so Communism is definitely a tech to target.

Levees are hardly worth it on this map, as there just aren't enough Cities settled on Rivers.

Representation would be very helpful, though.

Factories will probably come too late to be of help.

The most help will probably come from AI tech trades. It's a shame that Elizabeth built The Apostolic Palace, but we certainly don't want to wait until she gets Redcoats to take it from her, so we probably won't get many techs out of her and we'll just have to rely on Mansa's help.

It's arguable that if we focus on getting Louis, Mao, and even Toku into Confucianism, we could get some of all of them up to Friendly status and thus gifting them a ton of techs could be a way to play the game. The question, though, becomes which techs that they'd help us out with (say, Nationalism), how long we'd have to wait to get such a tech (it's probably faster to just self-tech it, and we'd also have a better shot of building The Taj Mahal ourselves if we self-tech it), and what problems we'd encounter by enabling them.

One potential downside with enabling France, China, and Japan is that they might get to Democracy and all switch into Emancipation... there probably won't be too many techs that they'd be able to help us out with, anyway, although we could do something like giving away Guilds once we get it from Mansa to encourage them to research Gunpowder for us, if we agree that we won't want to attack them

Another potential downside is that Toku might then be able to launch an assault on us

With Mansa already going down the Banking line, I don't think that enabling those other 3 AIs with a ton of techs will really benefit us.

We also don't want them getting a tech like Theology for Theocracy, which could make it painfully difficult to set up an Apostolic Palace Victory.

Thus, on the whole, I'd say that I'm okay with continuing to enable Mansa, and I'm okay with selling some really old techs to the other AIs, but we probably won't benefit more than it could cost us to enable the other AIs


So, our tech path may go something like the following:
Liberalism (we can probably wait to get a few Universities before learning it) ->
Take Astronomy with Liberalism (there's no real immediate benefit to Astronomy with us only having 1 Galley and already having a ton of overseas Foreign Trade Routes, which is why I think that we can wait a bit to get Astronomy) ->
Nationalism (for The Taj Mahal... maybe to be Chopped in one of Willem's Cities) ->
Constitution (for Representation) ->
Printing Press (a minor help in X-ops and required for Scientific Method) ->
Scientific Method ->
Communism (for State Property) ->
the rest of the techs that we need to win...
We may sneak in Economics somewhere in there, if we get Banking in trade from Mansa
Electricity helps to improve Windmills and Watermills, if we build some
Replaceable Parts helps to improve Windmills and Watermills, if we build some
Physics gives us a "free" Great Scientist but costs us about 3 Great Scientists' worth of Lightbulbable Flasks to research it, so if we can get that tech in trade, it'll be better to let an AI get the Great Person

Military Units:
We could potentially do the following this turn:
Speaman 1 attacks the Horse Archer 1N... there is an 11% chance of us losing, though, so I'm okay if we also don't want to take that risk, as we don't have any units that would follow-up to make the kill

But, what we probably should do instead is:
Speaman 1 move 1SW to guard our Cats along side of a War Elephant
Subutai moves 1NE to where the Spearman was then 1N to attack the Horse Archer that is guarding the Settler


Catapults
Try to only take City Raider Promotions with all of our Catapults, then only start adding Drill Promotions after we get City Raider III.

For example, since Catapult 7 (a Catapult that is farming XP from a Scout) is wounded but has earned 2 XP, that Catapult can promote to City Raider I next turn to partial heal, without needing to stop attacking each turn unlleyss he gets down to, say, 3.0 Health or lower, at which point he should take a break from attacking to heal a bit... or, if he gets up to 5 XP and gets wounded some more, he can heal again by taking the City Raider II Promotion.


Healers
We don't really need Medics since our Woodsmen III units heal better than a Medic II unit can heal, and having a Woodsman III unit plus a Medic unit on the same square as each other does NOT stack.

If anything, we could aim to eventually get Combat I + Medic I on Subutai, since when Woodsman III and Medic I Promotions that are on a single unit, the two Promotions DO stack. The Promotions just won't stack with each other when they are on 2 separate units, and Medic I and Medic II only provide +10% healing, while Woodsman III provides a greater +15% healing.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Other thoughts:
Since the Worker 3 Chop is important, but we want to first build a partial Road and then Chop 2 turns from now, we could have Worker 8 partial Chop the GH Riv For Road that is 1S of there next turn as a backup option, in case of a misclick, so that we'll still get 1 Chop for City 4 (we won't need 2 Chops at that time, though)

We should probably send a Worker toward X-ops at some point to start building Windmills in place of the GH Mines... prior to completing Oxford, the Mines are of use, but after we have Oxford, the extra Food and Commerce is probably going to be more helpful than the extra Hammers... the only other really useful Building that we'd put there after Oxford (assuming that we'll build a Harbour prior to building Oxford) is probably an Observatory, which could be whipped later

In terms of The Taj Mahal, Utrecht looks to be the best spot to put it, thanks to all of the Forests there. This fact may mean that we'll delay putting down our Canal City, so that more of the Chops will go to Utrecht.

For now, building Galleys out of Sleepy Sheep should help with getting Galleys close to Elizabeth, although we'll want that Canal City eventually.


Ideally, once we're done attacking Willem, we'll move on to attacking Elizabeth next.

Shaka can always be conquered later in the game when we have a lot more Military Units kicking around.


We're also going to need to slot in some Confucian Missionaries soon after we get our Universities built, as well as a few Settlers (Canal City, gift City for Willem--probably 2W of our G Corn, gift City for Elizabeth--probably the 3-Clam location).

We'll need Confucian Missionaries to send out to the AIs and we'll need some for Willem's Cities, once we capture his Cities.


We're also going to want more Military Units.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Before we change turns, will consider advancing a warrior or two westward in case we need to upgrade them to spear.

I do like your idea.

How about we upgrade one of our "Heroes of the stories," Warrior 3, who also conveniently has a Combat I Promotion on him, by moving him 1SE and upgrading him this turn.

Also, since Warrior 6 indulged himself a bit much on Scout-slaughtering, we might as well have him join the party, too.

So, we could do something like the following:
Wake up Warriors 9 and 11 in X-ops... Warrior 9 heads to Gems City while Warrior 11 heads to Surfin' Turf

Warrior 9 will replace Gems City's Military Police unit, while Warrior 11 can act as an emergency-upgradeable Warrior inside of Surfin' Turf that will at least have Combat I on it (the Warrior inside of Surfin' Turf, Warrior 15, has 0 XP)

Warrior 1 (in Gems City) will wake up and move 1N + 1NW, then 1NW, then move into City 4

Doing so frees up Warrior 6 to leave City 4 by going NW and then upgrading to a Spearman... I'd give him Combat II

Once Warrior 2 heals (the Woodsman I Warrior that is 1N of Hippos) in 2 turns' time, he can also upgrade to a Spearman

Hopefully, these additions to our Military ranks will help to alleviate the fact that we're going to be busy building Universities for a few turns

I'll capture these moves in the PPP, so that we will have all of our ideas documented in one place


Great Merchant's Trade Mission
Do you know how to check which City will give us the best us the most Gold for our Trade Mission?

Once our Great Merchant is inside of Kumbi Saleh, we must press the Shift key and keep the Shift key held down. Then, with the Shift key held down, we left click on a different City of Mansa's, release the click but keep the Shift key held down, we move our mouse down to hover over top of the Trade Mission icon in the Great Merchant's list of actions, then we press the Backspace <-- key (the Spacebar key doesn't seem to work in this case) to cancel the movement, then we release the Shift key once that movement has been cancelled (if we keep holding the Shift key down at this point, sometimes the game's interface "forgets" that the Shift key is held down and then the next Shift + right click will actually move the unit)

Then, we repeat the procedure starting from pressing and holding down the Shift key again.

If you really don't want to perform this task, you can upload the saved game on the relevant turn (Turn 121) and someone else can help you to check which City will give us the best Trade Mission value out of Mansa's Cities


Healing
Remember that either one of our two Woodsman III units can act as a healer, so if we have units that need to heal a significant amount, be sure to bring one of our two Woodsman III units to that square... the fast movement through Forests should allow for us to get one of these two Woodsmen III units into position quite quickly

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Units on boats
In Vanilla, if you have a unit on a boat and that boat is inside of a City, that unit can act as a defender.

However, in BtS, that unit will not act as a defender and it will automatically die without defending if the last unit which is not on a boat in the City dies.

To be explicitly clear, in BtS, if the last unit inside of your City which is NOT on a boat dies, then all boats inside of the City and all units on those boats will automatically die, without defending themselves.

So, presumably on the turn that after we've captured Utrecht, once we have a reasonably-sized stack of units healing inside of Utrecht, we can load 2 of those units into the Queen Elizabeth Galley and our Galley can stay hidden inside of Utrecht (but, only if we could safely sail into Utrecht in the first place).

On the following turn, or as soon as those 2 units are fully healed, we could unload those 2 units (probably 2 War Elephants or else 1 War Elephant and Horatio) either 1NE of The Hague or 1SW of Amsterdam. Then, our Galley could return to hide inside of Utrecht on the same turn, and 2 more units could also load into the Galley on that turn, with those 2 units able to be unloaded on the following turn if those 2 units are healthy. Once again, I'd probably send stack defenders as the next 2 units, then only send Catapults once we've got a stack near Willem's City.

I'm not sure when we'll capture Utrecht, but it's an idea to keep in mind... but, of course, the idea may not apply if Willem chases our Galley with his boats and the idea won't apply until we have enough units inside of Utrecht that the units who are not on our boat will be able to beat off all attacking units.

If this idea does apply, note that when a unit moves into Utrecht, it will have 0 movement points, but if it's a full-health or nearly-full-health War Elephant, that's the perfect time to have that War Elephant board the Galley when the Galley is inside of Utrecht, saving us a turn due to the ability to load units into a Galley when those units are on the same square as the Galley and the units have 0 movement points available to them


Catapults
If some of our Catapults get wounded (say, a Horse Archer attacks a stack that contains our Catapults and successfully retreats, which allows him to cause Flanking damage to our Catapults), and we still have City Defences remaining to Bombard, then try to Bombard using the healthy Catapults, allowing the wounded Catapults to heal.


Isabella has her own Fish Resource
To the south-east of Madrid, there is a Fish Resource that is close to a Sheep and a Copper. If you hover your mouse over top of that Fish Resource, it will say "Requires Route," instead of "Requires: Fishing Boats," so we know that Isabella has her own source of Fish. So, do not cancel this trade with her:
2 GPT from Isabella <-> Fish

She won't cancel the trade herself, since the amount is so low, but if we cancel it (getting greedy and hoping for more of her GPT), she won't allow us to sell her Fish again. So, just be happy that we're getting 2 Gold per Turn for a Resource that Isabella doesn't need.


EDIT: See the next page of this thread for the PPP.