CLV01 - Movin' On Up

[dalgo]

OK - so no bg and no resources and we could have limited land too. But that's all right, it just means a bigger challenge. The NE start means Mecca will pop the hut and we are due a bit of good news.

The expansionist advantage is mostly during the AA so certainly get our scouts out there. I suggest scout/warrior/settler then a couple more scouts. Since the worker is already on a forest we could even start with a chop to get the next scout out quicker. It would burn 4 shields though, but save a move since the worker could then irrigate the plain under the forest.

As for tech, I suggest pick WC before building (I'm pretty sure you can do that) then if there is a tech in the hut it will be a better one as you can't get the tech you are researching.

What barbarians did we start with?l

 

[Own]

I would research CB instead, you don't want that one.

 

[Tatran]

OK, Arabia it is. And the start...

I would research CB instead, you don't want that one.

 

[Own]

You can't pop a tech from a goody hut if you're researching it, so you guys should research ceremonial burial, pop the hut, then change to whatever without any science turns wasted.

 

[dalgo]

I'm never quite sure what determines the tech you get. I'm usually so grateful I don't ask any questions I know you can't get the one you are researching and I assume you can't get any tech that you can't research (ie can't get monarchy before you have mysticism etc). What about the rest. Do you automatically get the cheapest available tech, in terms of number of turns to research? In this case it would be WC or BW as we already know CB.

 

[Beorn-eL-Feared]

You get the cheapest tech you are not researching, so it is usually "exploited" by, given you research a tech that is not the 2nd cheapest, changing to the cheapest tech you still don't have DURING the turn, popping the hut, getting a more valuable freebie, CHANGING BACK to your tech and then end the turn in whichever way you want. That way, no research is lost and you get the 2nd cheapest tech.

 

[cleverhandle]

Here we go...

4000BC: Moved settler NE as discussed

3950BC
-Switched to WC, settled Mecca, received 25 gold for the trouble
-Mecca's culture borders show unbroken plains. Bleh.
-F11 shows Carthage, Rome, Byz, Dutch, Russians.
-Tech->Wheel. We can actually get this in 30 turns at max and it usually trades decently, so I go for it.
-Mecca->Scout
-Worker crosses river to N. Let's save those forests for now - it's looking like they'll be limited.

3900BC: zzz

3850BC: Scout finds furs S of Mecca

3800BC: Scout sees some game E of Mecca - a bonus tile, amazing!

3750BC
-Scout spies more decent land E
-MM Mecca to pick up the plains irrigation next turn

3700BC: Scout continues E since new scout is almost done and I want to see what's here, finds GH!

3650BC
-Switch back to WC, pop hut - Hooray! Got BW!
-@Beorn: While this trick avoided us getting WC, it does *not* conserve the research - we're back to 30 on The Wheel. Still the right thing to do in this situation - basically we just got a six turn tech.
-After popping the hut, the scout spies more land across a coast tile. Maybe we've got some kind of fjord thing going on.

3600BC: Mecca Scout->Warrior

3550BC: zzz

3500BC: Bump lux temporarily for growth in Mecca

3450BC: Deserts to N, also another fur NE of Mecca

3400BC: Flood plain river beyond the deserts

3350BC
-Mecca Warrior -> Settler
-Lux back down, Sci back up - Wheel in 16
-Scout1 sees Carthaginian Warrior and red borders (crap, right next to Rome!)
-Carthage has Masonry, Alph, and WC, but not CB. He is unwilling to trade any of his techs for any combo of gold, gpt, or CB. Not a good feeling.
-Scout2 sees Ivory N of the Flood Plain - a long ways off

3300BC: Approach Rome, but not close enough yet - looks like he has incense

3250BC
-Contact Rome, Caesar has same techs as Carthage, but he's willing to trade either WC or Masonry for CB.
-I take the Masonry trade. It's better trade bait if we find another civ, and WC's easier to get.

3200BC: Some nice land up above the ivory

3150BC
-Wetlands to the north
-Worker finishes 2nd road - end mid-turn

That's on turn 18 right now, but I'm going to call it a round - the pending worker move will determine where the second city goes. The settler pops in 6 turns - I couldn't see any way to MM it out any sooner. We have several possible sites, none of them particularly strong. At least it doesn't look like our neighbors are much better - both Rome and Carthage are still at only 1 city even with their growth bonuses, though Rome is showing 1pop so it just created a settler. No brown borders have been spotted yet, just the warrior.

Here's a dotmap:

The NE sites would be paired - either red/purple or blue/white. None of them are on the river. I'd lean towards settling blue next to get the sugar (we need food!), then white a little later to get the Fur - with our slow pop growth, I don't think connecting luxes is of very high importance.

Yellow is decently placed (on the river) and provides a natural expansion to green.

Finally, there's still the site 3 SW of Mecca - nice spot with some grassland, forests, and hills. It's also not clear whether the continent ends at that point - after Mecca shrinks, it may be worth sending the warrior over for a look (we have Roaming barbs, BTW).

Hardly an explosive start and not many luxuries within reach. I'm thinking that tech-wise we're going to want to head towards Monarchy, try to build enough to hang in there until Ansars, and then bust out. Given that we only have about a half dozen hills around, we'll need some real luck to get iron for swords for an earlier offensive. I pray that we have Horses - we certainly have lots of plains for them to prance around in.

Here's the save.

 

[dalgo]

Wow. I said we wanted a challenge but didn't expect this. I had a look at the save and we don't have a single bg in sight for any of our core cities. Never mind, we'll just have to work with what we've got.

As far as the dot map goes, I don't like packing cities in too close but this time we have no choice as we'll have to make the best use of the limited territory. I'd suggest white dot for our first city to get quick use of the fur, but rather than pair it with blue go 1 tile NE from blue to be on the coast. However that city can wait, we should go SW of Mecca for our third build as that has better potential. It looks like we can fit in a total of 7 cities on our side of the desert.

I've got it, I'm out tonight but will play tomorrow.

 

[cleverhandle]

Yeah, good point on blue - besides the coast, you'll still get the sugar and then be CxxCxxC for Mecca-2ndCity-3rdCity without having to cross the river, and you're going to be roading the fur anyway. That's nice. Still, I really think we're hurting for food - it will have taken us 24 turns to pop our first settler. The NE-of-blue spot is the only immediately available spot we can get a city with 3fpt. And the only other 3fpt site anywhere is green, and that would require chopping and irrigating the game. Perhaps we could settle NE-of-blue first and then white? Not ideal for movement, but a unit could still move between the sites in two turns along roads. Even if you go white first, I'd still suggest NE-of-blue before the SW site - while that site is greener and prettier, it won't actually get any faster growth until we're out of Despotism.

Perhaps we can find some way to profitably whip ourselves a granary in Mecca?

 

[dalgo]

I don't think we can get any more food out of the sugar. If we irrigate it we lose the extra food to despotism, and the game is too valuable as it is to chop. There is plenty of food to the north (flood plains and cattle) but it'll be a long time before we get there so we are probably stuck at 2 fpt for a while.

When we go SW it might be better to cross the river and settle on grassland. If we settle on the forest we not only lose the chop but also a potential bg. We have one more tile to uncover there which could make a difference, I'll check it out with our warrior as you suggest.

At least I've worked out a way to get the settler a turn earlier. If I leave it the way it is for 3 turns then switch one plain to forest, I think the extra civ on turn 5 will grab another shield and build the settler.

 

[cleverhandle]

I don't think we can get any more food out of the sugar. If we irrigate it we lose the extra food to despotism

Gah... I wasn't thinking. Of course you're right.

...and the game is too valuable as it is to chop.

I agree.

When we go SW it might be better to cross the river and settle on grassland. If we settle on the forest we not only lose the chop but also a potential bg. We have one more tile to uncover there which could make a difference, I'll check it out with our warrior as you suggest.

Interesting point about the potential BG. Still desperately hoping, aren't you? I don't think that crossing the river should be a problem in that location either - that site should be safely away from any military fronts to the NE. And it should still allow us to squeeze in a few more cities in the south.

I still think there's something out there, though. If you haven't already, notice the coast stretching out SW across the southern sea. Could just be a crappy 1 or 2 tile island. Could be a useful little peninsula filled with BG's, cows, and huts.

At least I've worked out a way to get the settler a turn earlier. If I leave it the way it is for 3 turns then switch one plain to forest, I think the extra civ on turn 5 will grab another shield and build the settler.

Right! I wasn't thinking of the last citizen for some reason. Good call.

 

[dalgo]

Pre-Turn:
3150 BC – Move worker to plain.
Settler in 6, should reduce to 5 with growth.
Carthage and Rome both up Alphabet and Warrior Code. No trades available.
Researching The Wheel at max.
Hit Enter.


Turn 1 – 3100 BC: 2 scouts move, worker starts to irrigate.

Turn 2 – 3050 BC: Scouts move.

Turn 3 – 3000 BC: Scouts move. Change labourer to Forest, growth in 2, settler in 3.

Turn 4 – 2950 BC: E scout spots orange border, presumably Carthage. Growth next turn should pick up the extra shield needed to build settler.

IBT – Mecca: Settler => Granary

Turn 5 – 2900 BC: Worker completes irrigation, starts on road. Settler moves to white dot and a warrior appears out of the fog. Fortunately Carthage not Barb. Send our warrior south. No change in trade status. The Wheel due in 7 at max (making 0gpt).

Turn 6 – 2850 BC: Medina founded, starts warrior. Northern scout finds coastline and starts back. Eastern scout visits Carthage.

IBT – Cartage is annoyed and calls my brave scout a drunkard. We’ll pay back that insult with interest at some future date.

Turn 7 – 2800 BC: Warrior climbs hill south of Mecca to scan new terrain. One solitary forest tile is revealed.

Turn 8 – 2750 BC: Worker completes road and moves to grass square south of Mecca. No trades available, The Wheel in 2, move slider down a notch.

Turn 9 – 2710 BC: Slider down to 50%. Northern scout slowed by jungle.

Turn 10 – 2670 BC: The Wheel comes in – and we have horses SE of Mecca. I can’t see any more on the map either, maybe our luck has changed. Both Rome and Carthage will trade their two techs (Alphabet and Warrior Code) for The Wheel so it was a good choice. Rome is broke so I trade with theim first which means I can sell The Wheel to Carthage for all of their 80 gold. I go for Horseback Riding next, 16 turns at max.

I’ll play a couple more to level up the turns.

IBT – Medina: Warrior => Worker

Turn 11 – 2630 BC: The northern scout finally sees the end of the jungle.

Turn 12 – 2590 BC: E scout sees yellow border. Worker finishes road and moves to forest for a chop to help granary.

Screenshot and dotmap to follow

 

[dalgo]

Red next then yellow for horses, gets game on expansion or when green is built. Purple has sugar and orange has the fish after expansion. This is my first dot map so these are suggestions only.

 

[dalgo]

This has been a very slow start but the AI haven't done any better, Rome and Carthage also have only two cities. I thought we had to build a granary in Mecca. We can speed it up with forest chops. Currently it is due for completion in 23 turns. One chop plus growth will reduce that to 13, two chops brings it down to 9 turns, but can we spare the forests?

The worker from Medina can road the fur. However it will be a bit of a wasted tile as the extra shield is lost to despotism. The road takes 6 turns, if we chop/irrigate/road that is 11 turns but leaves us with a 2f/2s tile to work.

However we can't continue this game unless we get some more players. Do any of the lurkers want to join in and help us out? It's not a bonus start as you can see so help from more experienced players would be appreciated.

 

[cleverhandle]

All right, at least we're keeping pace tech- and city-wise. I think the dotmap looks good. We could conceivably squeeze in another city by shifting green, yellow, and orange NW a bit. But I don't think the extra city would do a whole lot for us until much later in the game, by which time we should be able to acquire some new cities.

I agree on needing a granary in Mecca. I don't know about the second chop - I hate to lose the forest, but we do seem to be in a bit of bind shieldwise. However, Red will have plenty of forest even after chopping two for Mecca. And Mecca would still have two left as easy production land for a while. If Mecca gets big enough that two forests aren't enough, we can always mine a plain - by that point, the worker crunch should be smaller. I think it will be long time before Mecca gets big enough to worry about that anyway. So, yeah... sounds like the second chop will be OK.

Come on, lurkers...

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

lurker's comment:

dark orange (red) goes one NW to the other side of the river
orange goes to the hill where it can pull the furs and the fish
yellow goes w, NW of the ponies
green goes 2 NW, giving you room on the SE tip of the peninsula for another city and placing it on the river
blue goes 1 SE on the forest

as you move up, tighter spacing is importent. if you do this right, you probably won't need hospitals (if you want the rant about why hospitals are usually bad, let me know)

If you want me to shut up and stop lurking, let me know...

 

[dalgo]

Like this?

 

[dalgo]

lurker's comment:
If you want me to shut up and stop lurking, let me know...

By no means, that's just the kind of advice I need. I usually build hospitals everywhere and consider a city a failure if it can't build a bomber in one turn. Which is no doubt why I have trouble at higher levels

I think Cleverhandle was heading in the same direction with city placement.

The next question is, how much of the city core would we build in this situation before expanding towards the other civs?

 

[cleverhandle]

Yes, that was more or less what I had in mind in my last post. Though I would move blue 1 NW - that would give it a bit more land to work with, be CxxC from Medina, and still be coastal.

The white dot was exactly the extra site to which I was referring earlier. In my experience with spots like that, you don't really get much out of them shield-wise because there's just not enough land for them to work. But they can be excellent for commerce if you don't mind paying to speed up the occasional improvement. If the game continues past Mass Production (Commercial Docks) those sites can be huge - in my last game my four biggest research centers were my capital and three sites like the white dot. But early on they can be a pain, because you'll basically have to flat out buy them at least a harbor, market, and aqueduct. If we settle white, we may have to let it sit for a while at pop 3 or 4 before we can afford those things.

@dalgo - I also used to be in the Hospitals-everywhere camp, but kicked that habit last game when I really crunched the numbers and saw what a huge money and shield pit they were. Much better to create one big metro out of a central city by taking all the extra tiles from the surrounding 12pop's than it is to have a bunch of 14 or 15pops everywhere. That way you're only building/maintaining 1 Hospital (and usually several other big-city improvements) rather than a slew of them.

@AdmiralK - You (and any other lurkers) are always welcome to comment. Like I said in the beginning, I love talking about positions and strategy in this game. And we're still looking for a third player, of course...

 

[cleverhandle]

The next question is, how much of the city core would we build in this situation before expanding towards the other civs?

I think it would be nice to get one city settled in the desert to get us closer to Rome, but I wouldn't do any more than that for now. At this stage of the game (no rails) and without being Agri we'd just be throwing away population by sending settlers to the desert. Much better to use them in more productive sites. Let the AI improve the desert for us for now - we'll have Ansars before we need Saltpeter.

I'd get most of that core settled before going to the desert. Maybe everything but orange and white, though I'd hate to have a galley drop off a settler pair on the white spot because we dilly-dallied too much.