BB-01 open succession game--fast space race

[brasilbear]

Depends how you want to win. Engineers are great for getting out one culture building in hopelessly corrupt cities.

hey LKendter, you got an opinion on our decision above? second settler move or settle as is?

 

[Lanzelot]

Oh, I forgot. I guess you can count me in.

Excellent!

When you're one turn away from discovering a tech, the most accurate play is to see how many scientists you can turn temporarily into taxmen without extending the time to two turns.

Sometimes I keep the scientists also in the last turn and instead reduce the science rate as much as possible. Often this yields more gold output than switching to taxmen. (If marketplaces and libraries are evenly distributed. Once Universities are built, it may be different.)

Ok, so we have two votes for red-x (brasilbear, Elephantium), one for settling on the spot (Lord Emsworth) and one undecided (myself). I'll continue now.

 

[Lanzelot]

Spoiler :

T000: Settler 1E, worker irrigates.
The good news are: two more BGs get into sight! The bad news: the eastern coast appears in distance 3. That'll be very tight for our first ring...

T001: Settler 1SW

T002: Found Babylon, work forest in the first turn for 3s. (The town will grow in 6 just the same, as the irrigation will be ready next turn.)
Start a warrior. Research Pottery at 100%.

T003: Switch to wheat.

T004: Irrigation finished, start road.

T005: Nada
T006: Nada

T007: Road finished, worker moves to river-BG.

T008: Babylon grows, picks up a forest for an extra 2s, and the warrior finishes cleanly with 10s. Worker starts a road for extra gold. I think I will now build another worker while growing in 5 turns, and for this the mine is not yet necessary. We have a total of 5 BGs to improve and forests to chop, while no other food resource became visible yet, so an early settler does not appeal to me that much. With two workers we'll have the granary set up in no time and then can start cranking out settlers.

Warrior 1E. It will explore the area counter-clockwise E -> S -> W and then either return for military police or go south for meeting our continental neighbors (hopefully).

T009: Warrior 1E, reaches the coast and sees lots of plains.

T010: Warrior 1SE

T011: Road finishes, worker starts mine. Warrior 1E.
We have 8 beakers left on Pottery and are currently making 7. I reduce the science slider to 60%, netting 3gpt.

T012: Our first culture expansion reveals another cow:

Good luck that the worker is not yet finished. I guess now there can be no discussions: we need an early settler! And it also shows that we should have listened to those who wanted to move the settler 1SW on turn zero...

Warrior 1S discovers furs.

T013: Pottery finishes. Babylon grows and picks up another forest for 2s. Switch the forest to a river BG. Set science to 90% and luxury to 10%, start Alphabet, which is currently due in 19.

Warrior 1S discovers a second beaver.

T014: Warrior 1S

T015: Warrior 1S. I think we know our next town sites well enough for the moment, so this one can start its journey to the neighbors now. New warriors will be built soon in the core.

T016: Warrior 1SW

T017: Mine finishes, worker moves 1SW-1S on the forest. On the way to the cow we may as well chop a forest into the granary.
Warrior 1S.

T018: Babylon grows, picks up a forest and the additional shield finishes the settler just in time. (Unfortunately one shield wasted.) Babylon starts granary. Settler 1S.
Worker starts chopping. Warrior 1S.
Science rate back to 100%.

T019: Settler 1SW, warrior 1S. We can see gray borders.

T020: Settler 1SW, warrior 1S.
Contact Ghandi: I can buy Alphabet (11 turns remaining) for Pottery and 13g. Switch research to Writing.

The next player has the option to settle in place on the BG or move one more tile SW. But I think, if we settle in place, we can get another second-ring city on the river, and the BG-shield will be recovered at size 7, so I would settle in place.
Unfortunately the spot 3SE of Babylon turned out to be not on the river...

 

[templar_x]

in my eyes the 2nd town would have had to go on 1W1SW. it would have become the obviously stronger pop factory, becoming a 4-turner and sharing the wheat with the cap every other turn.
t_x

 

[brasilbear]

I'll take it.

Things I'm going to do:

(1) move the settler to the SW grassland. In theory, this should allow us to mm tiles in order to give the coastal city a better shot at a good 12.

(2) use a second warrior to explore around our cities to clear away some of the fog.

(3) get the settler factory set up

(4) use Ur for a worker factory.

So:
Babylon--> works on settler factory
Ur--> warrior/worker/worker-factory

 

[brasilbear]

in my eyes the 2nd town would have had to go on 1W1SW. it would have become the obviously stronger pop factory, becoming a 4-turner and sharing the wheat with the cap every other turn.
t_x

thats close to the cap isn't it? I don't know a lot setting up sites closer than CxxC but i think i need to add that to my game play.

I'm thinking of moving the settler 1SW, setting up CxxxC for a worker factory.

I'll hang on for more comments i think.

 

[templar_x]

if settling 1 town CxC allows me to create a better SF, i will do it. this does not mean that i typically settle my core CxC. but yes, it even happened once in a GOTM that i settled 3 core towns with only 1 tile apart! it all depends on the circumstances, and i try not to have the "ideal picture of a core" in my mind, but just to work best with what i have got.
the big advantages for a pop factory other than the capital with distance 2 are
- most of the tiles will lie where you would want to have your early worker turns spent anyway
- minimal corruption (and if you are really lucky, only the 10th shield becomes corrupt - will that be the case here? i think it should with these settings)
t_x

 

[brasilbear]

if settling 1 town CxC allows me to create a better SF, i will do it. this does not mean that i typically settler my core CxC. but yes, it even happened once in a GOTM that i settled 3 core towns with only 1 tile apart! it all depends on the circumstances, and i try not to have the "ideal picture of a core" in my mind, but just to work best with what i have got.
the big advantages for a pop factory other than the capital with distance 2 are
- most of the tiles will lie where you would want to have your early worker turns spent anyway
- minimal corruption (and if you are really lucky, only the 10th shield becomes corrupt - will that be the case here? i think it should with these settings)
t_x

OK, so you've just exposed a major flaw in my opening game thinking, worshipping at the feet of the 'perfect core.' Thanks, thanks a lot 11

but this point, i don't want to move the settler back, so maybe I will just settle in place. '

I'll wait for someone else to check in

my options are:

settle in place
move 1 SW

 

[Lord Emsworth]

To help you decide:

I'd say, settle on the spot, because otherwise there isn't enough overlap.


ETA: Is that acually a river in the mountains 3S, 1SE ?

 

[brasilbear]

As i've started at the screen this morning

(which reminds me of a scene from friends:

joey: ross, are there naked chicks on that paper?
ross: no.
joey: i've never seen anyone stare at something so much that didn't have naked chicks on it.)

i'm leaning toward settling in place. gets us a second city up and running, cow will either let us set up a second settler factory or a worker factory. we will need workers to keep up with our growth.

Looks like a river, a city there will have high shields from the mix of mountains/hills.

 

[Elephantium]

It's definitely a river. I just opened the save, turned off "Show food and shields on map", and still saw the hint of blue on that tile!

I think we should move the Settler 1SW.

Also, I think our city site on the coast should be on the hill, not on the grassland.

 

[Northern Pike]

Sometimes I keep the scientists also in the last turn and instead reduce the science rate as much as possible. Often this yields more gold output than switching to taxmen.

Yes--what I wrote was meant strictly in the context of specialist management. Of course reducing the science rate comes first, but then it may be possible to re-assign some scientists too.

 

[brasilbear]

ok, did my 10

short summary--Portuguese and french found us, next player should have some trading fun.

Portuguese--UP: wheel, wc, myst DOWN:nothing
French --UP: masonry, wheel DOWN: pots, cb
India -- all even

we get writing in 13

Babylon will finish its granary IBT

Long version:

Spoiler :

writing @100% in 31 turns

Babylon-->granary due in 18, chop done in two

(01) 2950 BC

Nineveh founded-> warrior due in 5 (2nd explorer)
warrior 1 enters India

IBT-chop completes 9reveals grassland) Babylon granary due in 13, grows in 1

(02) 2900 BC

worker starts road
warrior climbs mountain next to Delhi--marsh to the south

(03) 2850 BC

warrior south
Babylon grows-->lux to 10%, writing in 21
Babylon growth in 5, granary in 9

IBT India expells us to the west

(04) 2800 BC

warrior still moving south

IBT Portuguese scout from the east. They are up masonry, WC, and myst

(05) 2750 BC

road finishes, mine next
warrior south

IBT warrior finishes, start worker

(06) 2710 BC

one warrior moving south, one moving west

(07) 2670 BC

warriors go west and south

(08) 2630 BC

Babylon grows to 4, granary in 4, next growth in 5
lux to 20%, writing in 15
explorers south/west

(09) 2590 BC

pop a hut, get a map of south of India

IBT Ninevah completes its worker, start granary due in 30
France pops hut to our north, gets bards, they are up Masonry/Wheel and are down pottery/CB.


(10) 2550 BC

Nin-worker to cow
explorers west and south

map/save in next post

someone say "got it" and take it! who wants to be next??

 

[brasilbear]

save

 

[Elephantium]

Got it.

 

[Elephantium]

Pre-turn: Things look good.

IBT: France offers a trade: Masonry for Pots. She's also willing to trade the Wheel and 36 gold for CB and Pots. I take that deal with the intention to trade for WC to Portugal.

...and Portugal dials US up next to ask for the Wheel. Unfortunately, he's not willing to let go of WC, so we end up with Masonry instead. He tosses in 43 gold, too.

Babylon: Granary > Worker

2510 BC: W1 moves to BG N of Ninevah; W2 starts a road

2470 BC: W1 starts a road

Babs: Worker > Warrior

2390 BC: W2

Southern Warrior sees an Incan Scout. They're up WC, down Wheel.
Unfortunately, they want 70 gold plus the Wheel for Warrior Code.

Babylon: Warrior > Settler. I also MM to pull citizens to forest tiles just for this turn.

2350 BC: Move Warriors again
2310 BC: Re-MM Babylon to be more food-heavy. Southern Warrior attacks a barbarian village and dies
Portugal has Iron Working now.
2270 BC: A barbarian appears in the tundra
2230 BC: Zzz...
2190 BC: Exploring Warrior discovers Gems to our south!

Babylon: Settler > Settler

2150 BC: Move Warrior to protect our Worker from the barb.

I'm going to leave the Settler unmoved, pending discussion of our best 3rd city site.

 

[brasilbear]

nice, i'd say the hill by the river delta and get a few boats out paddling around. i'll check the save and post a map later if possible.

 

[templar_x]

i would not settle the hill but the grassland there. probably this will become your only potent seaside production town.

any town to the NE will merely become a tundra fishing village anyway.

and settling on the hill would make it necessary to found this fishing village early so you can work those two off-river bonus grasses. would not be my choice probably.

this start will not make a good science game all too easy, that is for sure. even the two luxes are not easy to connect. but if you do not want to move the capital, i guess a plan for an early FP might fit. i looked on the map for a bit, and you may want to consider 1S2SW from Nineveh for that. or maybe 1SE from there. this one and a town on the hill inside the floodplains may even allow to some day work all those semicore mountains...

t_x

 

[brasilbear]

Guess I'm still thinking incorrectly about city placement. The grassland would have a tundra in its expansion, but I shouldn't need that tile in a size 12.

How does this dot map look? Letters are to let us discuss city sites. FP are possible locations. I like the southern one my self. (of course its most likely not the best site.)

 

[Cyc]

bb, your pic is from the 2550bc save. Please make another map (with possibly new locations) using the pic or save E has posted. -> 2150bc.

Also, FP normally stands for The Forbidden Palace small wonder. You might want to find a different letter combo for future possible locations.