ALC Game #7: Frederick/Germany

[Eqqman]

I was about to suggest swapping the tiles and founding Berlin to the left, in the hopes that the city founding would reveal some food and save you turns of sending the Scout back that way. But not having the Cows in the first city ring will delay production of the first Worker by 2 turns (despite the 'fast pop' of the culture border) so that's probably not wise.

Some good news, there will be at least 105 hammers not going into Oracle production. Some of these need to go into either nearly finishing an Obelisk or Barracks, the rest can be used for Scouts/Warriors. So there will be some units left over to find goody huts and explore like you were wanting to do.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Don't you mean 1P and 2P for your commerce and plains hill examples?

Yes for commerce (it should have been 2F/2C/1P. I played a game recently where I settled a commerce resource by a river on a plains hill, which is 2F/2C/2P, so I may have been thinking about that, but more likely I just typoed).

A plains hill without a strategic resource becomes a 2F/1C/2P city, as does a flat plains tile with a strategic resource. A plains hill with a strategic resource becomes 2F/1C/3P, because the value of the original plot is 0F/0C/3P.

I don't think you quite answered my question. Does a financial civilization gain the extra commerce if they settle on a commerce resource thats not next a river?

No. A plot with a commerce resource that is not next to a river is 1C. When you settle on it, it is still one C.

The easy hint - look at the plot with the FPC layer enabled. If it doesn't show up with 3C before you settle, it won't have 3C after you settle.

Does that help?

Hmm, if that control is really called FPC, I should make a habit of sequencing the values of my plots the same way.

 

[Eqqman]

Pottery isn't researchable at this point. See previous comment to Sisutil.

Wow, good catch! I totally forgot about that. So I rescind my earlier comment when I said this was a 'favorable' start. I've reworked my plan replacing Animal Husbandry with Agriculture as the starting tech, and the Pyramids are then finished in 950 BC. I make no judgements on whether or not this is worth it. I'm curious if anyone else can work out a Metal Casting plan faster than this from the given data.

I think this is the worst opening I've seen in an ALC game. It certainly hurts the MC plan to not have an Agriculture-based bonus tile, and this map layout is completely sub-optimal for meeting the 1000 BC goal or earlier. The only way to even get into the 900s is the fact that there are barely enough trees to make up for not being able to work a pastured Cows. 1-2 less trees and MC would without question be a non-starter.

 

[Gnarfflinger]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't a Specialist based economy require a butt load of food? Therefore the River would allow the farming of a number of Grassland tiles which would facilitate that, and with Slavery, you can whip a little more regularly and recover faster.

I got Warlords today, so I may be less helpful in the ALC for a bit...

 

[cabert]

thanks malekithe for writing down exactly what i meant for the settling on the wine.
If you settle on the wine, you'll get a 2F2P1C, so exactly the same amount you would get for any plain hill = 100% loss.

About settling the capitol, now that we see that a city on the hills to the west of the cow will have a hard time to feed mine workers, i vote for settling in place = using a plain that would be poor anyway, fresh water, can use the cow straight away, no risk to settle on copper or iron.
About tech, i previously voted for straight AH, but i now see that it would be a bad move : you WILL NEED AGRICULTURE.
Since Agri will give a bonus to AH, the best tech path seems to be :
agri->AH->
BW->wheel (maybe wheel before BW if you have horses) ->
masonry ->pottery (need granaries for whip recovery)->writing (need library for scientists)

(i don't like the oracle, because you don't need those religious techs, you also don't need the prophets it will give you)

 

[Eqqman]

(i don't like the oracle, because you don't need those religious techs, you also don't need the prophets it will give you)

If you're only getting the Oracle for the Metal Casting - Pyramids, you'll end up never getting a Prophet, the Engineer production will outpace it and later on the Great Scientist production will outpace both.

 

[cabert]

If you're only getting the Oracle for the Metal Casting - Pyramids, you'll end up never getting a Prophet, the Engineer production will outpace it and later on the Great Scientist production will outpace both.

yes? there are still odds (not that small!) that you get a prophet. Read ALC 6, and see what i mean. Your prophet isn't going to build a pyramid!

how many turns before the forge is built? If you want the Oracle soon, you have to chop it = not much forest left to chop.
All the turns before the forge will give prophet GPP, and only prophet!
Being philo means you get a prophet in 25 turns from the oracle alone. So if you want more engineer GPP, you need to build the forge in less than 7/8 turns. And then you have something like 50% odds to get a prophet.

 

[Eqqman]

You're correct that you have to move fast, but it is easily doable to build the Forge early enough to prevent the spawning of the first Great Prophet. The Oracle is finished in 1680 BC, the Forge in 1600 BC and the Great Engineer appears in 950 BC, a turn or two ahead of the Great Prophet. The only chance of the Great Prophet is if you get nervous and finish the Oracle too soon. 1680 BC might be pushing it for the Oracle on Monarch and above, I'm not sure what the average Prince times are for the AIs. Because the window for preventing the Prophet is so slim, I wouldn't recommend starting the Metal Casting - Pyramids plan unless you already know how you're going to pull the whole thing off. The only thing that should ever come as a surprise is the AI beating you to one of the Wonders.

 

[malekithe]

yes? there are still odds (not that small!) that you get a prophet. Read ALC 6, and see what i mean. Your prophet isn't going to build a pyramid!

how many turns before the forge is built? If you want the Oracle soon, you have to chop it = not much forest left to chop.
All the turns before the forge will give prophet GPP, and only prophet!
Being philo means you get a prophet in 25 turns from the oracle alone. So if you want more engineer GPP, you need to build the forge in less than 7/8 turns. And then you have something like 50% odds to get a prophet.

You have 6 turns to complete the forge (we've been over the calculations elsewhere), and you do it in your second city so as not to mix the GPP. Beelining the whole thing does require lots of trees, which is why, at this difficulty level, I'd reign in the beeline a little and focus a bit more on developing a more robust economy first. Then, you may be able to get the forge with minimal chopping (grow the second city to 4 so you can whip most of it).

If your second GP is a priest it's not so bad. He can grab you a religion, or maybe even get you the shrine for a religion you've already founded. Generally, though, I like to get a scientisit as my second or third GP so he can grab Philosophy for Pacifism.

FWIW, I say settle on the hill 2W. If you're lucky maybe there's even another resouce in one of the three unrevealed tiles there. Then, assuming nothing else interesting, I'd lead with Animal Husbandry and a worker. Getting the pasture on the cow is very important. It may delay the pyramids by a few turns, but the benefit to your economy before then will be enormous. Again, I really don't see much point to commiting yourself to the fastest pyramids possible at this point anyway. I'd be very surprised if you couldn't safely let the pyramids' completion date drift to around 750BC or so. Of course, I haven't actually played at Prince difficulty since GOTM06...

 

[cabert]

You're correct that you have to move fast, but it is easily doable to build the Forge early enough to prevent the spawning of the first Great Prophet. The Oracle is finished in 1680 BC, the Forge in 1600 BC and the Great Engineer appears in 950 BC, a turn or two ahead of the Great Prophet. The only chance of the Great Prophet is if you get nervous and finish the Oracle too soon. 1680 BC might be pushing it for the Oracle on Monarch and above, I'm not sure what the average Prince times are for the AIs. Because the window for preventing the Prophet is so slim, I wouldn't recommend starting the Metal Casting - Pyramids plan unless you already know how you're going to pull the whole thing off. The only thing that should ever come as a surprise is the AI beating you to one of the Wonders.

did you play this or is it just calculation?
the first great people takes only 100 GPP.
even if (through chopping and whipping) you manage to get the forge out in the 2nd turn after the oracle and then put an engineer into it, you'll have:

8 GPP prophet flavour before the forge is built,
then 4 prophet and 6 engineer GPP/turn for 10 turns.
meaning 52 prophet points
and 60 engineer points.
For me, it's far from sure to get an engineer.
Unless you build the oracle or the forge somewhere else?
in this situation, you have 16 turns to wait for the GE, while the other city has 4 GPP/turn = 25 turns. So you need to build a forge in less than 9 turns in a distinct city. Doable, true.
Meaning you could have the mids some 24 turns after the oracle, if you didn't forget to research the techs

OK, worth a try. What you need is a high food second city though, and the ability to whip hard.

If you build the pyramids in the forge city, you'll end up with only engineer, since the prophet points won't catch up. You then could have a second engineer 20 turns later. just in time to build the hanging gardens and give yourself another push towards engineers
Next GE can build yourself the national epic in the GE factory, to be sure you only get those
After a while you could build the hagia sophia there too = you used all those engineers to build useless wonders in order to get more GE

Edit : malekithe gave me the explanation i missed, and was faster than me I leave my post because of the follow through GE generation thing

 

[malekithe]

you used all those engineers to build useless wonders in order to get more GE

That's the exact reason I never try too hard to create a GE farm. You often end up using the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd engineers just to create the 4th and 5th ones faster. That's not always the case, mind you, but most of the time, when I see people mention a GE farm, this is how they do it.

 

[Eqqman]

OK, worth a try. What you need is a high food second city though, and the ability to whip hard.

Not true, you may be surprised to learn. Hamburg only needs a 3F tile, since no 3F unimproved tiles are currently revealed, a Worker will need to farm one of the grassland plots for it, which there is time to do. Three forests will be chopped for the Oracle in Berlin and 4 for the Forge in Hamburg. Both cities only need to reach size 3 but both will whip 2 pop thanks to queue swaps (maybe this counts as 'whip hard'?)

The Animal Husbandry route will delay building the Pyramids via an Engineer into the 600s BC at least I think (I haven't run the numbers to check, but it's at least a 10 turn delay over the 950 BC finish). It would help if there was a second nearby Animal resource we can't see, but with an AH start I'd probably recommend direct production of the Pyramids over Metal Casting. The MC start is there if you want it, I offer no opinions over the efficacy of doing it over any other opening. BTW- After finishing Pottery in the beeline start I would then do AH and Masonry to convert the farmed Cows to pasture ASAP.

 

[cabert]

Not true, you may be surprised to learn. Hamburg only needs a 3F tile, since no 3F unimproved tiles are currently revealed, a Worker will need to farm one of the grassland plots for it, which there is time to do. Three forests will be chopped for the Oracle in Berlin and 4 for the Forge in Hamburg. Both cities only need to reach size 3 but both will whip 2 pop thanks to queue swaps (maybe this counts as 'whip hard'?)

The Animal Husbandry route will delay building the Pyramids via an Engineer into the 600s BC at least I think (I haven't run the numbers to check, but it's at least a 10 turn delay over the 950 BC finish). It would help if there was a second nearby Animal resource we can't see, but with an AH start I'd probably recommend direct production of the Pyramids over Metal Casting. The MC start is there if you want it, I offer no opinions over the efficacy of doing it over any other opening. BTW- After finishing Pottery in the beeline start I would then do AH and Masonry to convert the farmed Cows to pasture ASAP.

Ok, you could bring it to a 1 pop city running an engineer for 16 turns. But that's pretty lame, if you ask me.
Luckily, 4 hammers production gives you 1 hammer bonus with the forge lol.

That's trully something new to play. Not for the winning, but for the beauty of the move

 

[Eqqman]

You're right that it would be great to have a high-food second city that could grow while running the Engineer. I haven't read every ALC thread but this has to be about the worst start imaginable! I guess this is punishment for the Victoria opening... but 950 BC for the beeline seemed pretty remarkable under the circumstances. There are still some nearby tiles that could save the day with Corn and Wheat, have to keep our fingers crossed...

 

[cabert]

You're right that it would be great to have a high-food second city that could grow while running the Engineer. I haven't read every ALC thread but this has to be about the worst start imaginable! I guess this is punishment for the Victoria opening... but 950 BC for the beeline seemed pretty remarkable under the circumstances. There are still some nearby tiles that could save the day with Corn and Wheat, have to keep our fingers crossed...

yep!
so we're back with agri first tech, and scout first build

edit : and about scouting "around" capital, remember how fast your cultural borders are going to expand = no need to go checking the nearest tiles, you'll see them fast enough.

 

[malekithe]

The Animal Husbandry route will delay building the Pyramids via an Engineer into the 600s BC at least I think (I haven't run the numbers to check, but it's at least a 10 turn delay over the 950 BC finish).

I highly doubt getting Animal Husbandry first will really cause the pyramids to slip into the 600's. There's bound to be a workable 3 food tile somewhere within range of the second city. Additionally, what if there's stone nearby? In that scenario, it'd be much better to start with AH. I just think there's little reason to set the sights so squarely on the Oracle>Metal Casting beeline. Doing it slightly more lazily (building up a better economy or military in the meantime), in my experience, typically only costs around 1-2 hundred years.

 

[Eqqman]

Just to possibly save time later, I thought I'd take the time to write out the exact plan to use to finish the Pyramids via Metal Casting in what I think is the shortest possible time. If anybody can think of a faster way to get the Pyramids out via the use of Metal Casting I'd love to discuss it. Note that this plan assumes founding Berlin on the hill west of the Cows and Hamburg on the hill two over and one up from the Cows.

Spoiler :

Tech Research:

• Agriculture
• Wheel
• Mysticism
• Bronze Working (do NOT switch to slavery yet)
• Meditation
• Priesthood
• Pottery

After Pottery, you can evaluate the length of time it will take to research the techs that are available. If the cost of Animal Husbandry is now low enough, you may be able to research it before Masonry. This allows you to get the Cows properly pastured. If the research time of AH + Masonry >= 17 turns, then research Masonry first to be safe.

Build queue (Berlin):

• Worker
• Settler

After the Settler, you have ~60 hammers of production to play with. So, you can either start a Barracks, or build two 15 hammer units in a row and then begin an Obelisk. Allow either the Barracks or Obelisk to get as close to completion as you can without going over. By the time you get to the point where they are about to finish, the Oracle should now be available to go at the front of the queue. The Oracle should be ready to go the turn after you have 58 hammers' worth of post-Settler production accomplished.

Berlin will start working the Cows. At size 2, it will work the riverine grassland for 2F/1C to keep up tech speed and maintain city growth. At size 3, it works these tiles as well as the plains hill which will now have a Mine on it for 4P. As soon as Pottery completes, switch to the slavery civic and put your previous building back in the top of the queue. Next turn, whip 1 pop to finish this building and collect the overflow into the Oracle. The city will hit 26 food in the same turn you enter Anarchy so it might have grown to size 4. Whether it does or not, as you whip make sure you continue to produce 6 hammers a turn from working tiles in Berlin. Once the Oracle is out you can do whatever you like with the city. You pick up Metal Casting in 1680 BC and switch Hamburg to producing the Forge.

Build queue (Hamburg):

• Worker
• Anything you want until Forge is ready (you will produce ~40 hammers)
• Forge, the instant it is available

Hamburg starts with no food tiles available. A grassland plot will have to be farmed in order for it to be able to grow quickly enough. This will be handled by the Worker from Berlin. After founding Hamburg will work this farm tile, then after growth to size 2 will work this tile plus the forested plains hill to the north. When the Forge is being built, you must maintain 5 hammers per turn even if this means the city runs at a food deficit for the next two turns (it should actually have a 1F surplus).

Worker turns (Berlin):
For the explanation of the Worker turns, turn on the gridlines. Imagine that the grid is labeled horizontally A-G, and vertically 1-6. The gird is centered such that the Cows lie on tile 2D. Berlin, one tile to the west, is on tile 2C.

• Move to 2D, start Farm on top of Cows.
• Move to hill on 3C, build Mine.
• Move to 1D, build a Road.
• Move to 1E, build a Road.
• Move to 3E, build a Farm.
• Move to 2F, build a Road.
• Bronze Working is now done. Move to 2G, pre-chop, then build Road.
• Move to 2F, pre-chop.
• Move to 1E, pre-chop.
• Move to 1D, pre-chop.
• Move to 3D, build Road, then chop the woods completely. By this time the harvested trees should be going right into the Oracle.

Worker turns (Hamburg):

• Move to 3F, pre-chop, then build Road.
• Move to 1D, cut the tree for Oracle.
• Move to 1B, cut the tree for Oracle.

When the Workers are done with these tasks, they have several turns' grace before they are needed to finish the chops for the Forge. Do whatever you like, so long as they are each in a position to cut a tree the minute you have the Forge in Hamburgs' queue. They must be standing in a spot allowing them to move and cut a tree in 1 move the subsequent turn. With the roads, this should not be a problem. Forge is done, Hamburg is then a size 1 city running only the Engineer until 950 BC. Voila... do these things and you will have the fame and ovation of the people forever.

 

[Quotey]

The GE rush will definetally be difficult. If you have to delay the Oracle for MC (>_<) you need to pause everything else, giving the AI a chance to rush ahead of you. I can't recall the AI on Prince though, so, I could be wrong.

 

[Eqqman]

I highly doubt getting Animal Husbandry first will really cause the pyramids to slip into the 600's. There's bound to be a workable 3 food tile somewhere within range of the second city.

The limitation I run into that makes it take so long is that if there is no second animal-based food source for use in either city, you are forced to research both Animal Husbandry and Agriculture (and maybe no AG resource is available either!). Having to get both of these techs in delays your progress enough so that research, not production is the bottleneck. You either start Oracle too late, or if you boost up the religious techs to correct for it, you are getting something like Pottery too late. Of course, make whatever plan you like if there are better goodies off screen that we can't see. All I've said is that based entirely on what we can see in the picture, this is what you can do.

 

[cabert]

great job eggman, nice to see it's doable

But i don't think it's something to be done.
I'd like a city to grow bigger to have a chance to work 2 scientists asap.