Decisions T44 and onwards to T100

[Provolution]

Gentlemen

We now need to establish our main, overall strategy for the next 50 or so turns.

We can agree to the following constants:

Constants:
Both workboats go around the main continent to meet as many civs as possible, ignore the inlets and head in each direction to meet each other. This will also help the global sailaround in order to get an added 1 movement bonus, if we go for that.

We complete sailing by T44

Variables:

1.
We can develop a joint settlement strategy solely for the island, where we directly research writing, mathematics and calendar, in order to chop forests 50 % more effective as well as building plantations for 6 spices locations.

This means we settle Quatron, Singularity and Horizon


2.
We can develop a joint settlement strategy focusing solely on the silver and wheat on the island, preserving forests for the time being in order to preserve available health, as we got only 1 health resource (wheat), which sets a population cap that is not parallel to our high happiness cap. This strategy also calls for settling the 3rd or fourth city on the mainland, in order to spread there.

This means we want to research iron working and animal husbandry in order to backfill the city grid resource plan and to make sure we can hold the mainland both in terms of neighbors and barbarians. This strategy gives us bordering happiness/health parity, as we get two more clams. We also get closer to Optics and Whaling with this strategy.

Settlements to be built would be Quatron, Resonance and Cape South

3.
We can develop a strategy that solely backfills one of two resources (animal husbandry or iron working). This means we go for writing and mathematics in addition, in order to quickly get up basic structures in our new cities. The main focus is still wheat and silver on the island, not spices.

Settlements to be built would be Quatron, Horizon and Resonance.

2 and 3 options would of course take measure for plotting calendar after iron working and animal husbandry is researched.

 

[Earthling]

Right, I think this is the thread where we should move some discussion, and I know we have some differing points of view among ourselves, though everyone wants a good plan and what's best for the Q.

Here's the start - I agree with our exploration - due to what we've done so far and with Stonehenge helping even more with the map, I think we *know* kind of what the map is like. Getting in contact with other teams becomes just one of the most important things to do, so we sail onward.

What this leads to in the short term - is I'm thinking we make contact with a third team, due to the exploits of the sailors on the Ganges, quite soon. With contact with 3 teams, we really want to consider something with regards to trading, it just becomes really necessary to keep up in technology.

So the first/foremost economic thing, is that we need to be sure that at least one team among three, is researching towards Writing => Alphabet. Trade isn't possible without that, and we do want to trade. Next, we want to avoid overlap if we can and not waste resources on hostility - two teams researching Iron Working or Metal Casting or something is ultimately just a loss for both teams.

That all said, we need to see what actually happens when we talk to people, and be flexible. Two turns till sailing and we can make the best of them, and also the best of turns to follow.

One thing I still think is not so negotiable is that it really makes economic sense to settle three cities on our home island. I would settle #2 as it is of course, #3 by the two southern wheat, and then #4, #5, and possibly #6 overseas. Even if we don't chop much - the third city still has two wheat and some mines it can get regardless of math/calendar/whatever. It's right there, all the worker infrastructure will be up. I agree that Resonance and the Cape city are the first overseas cities we want at least. We'll have to see what pressure exists on the other side but I think we can secure that "Axiom" site no matter what, and from then that other petal seems to have less promising coastal sites, so we'd be pushing inland after that.

So, technology - again I know there are different valid ideas. But I'd propose two things, first being

A) Really try hard to ensure *somebody* techs writing/alphabet as fast as possible. If the Vikings are doing their own thing like going for the Colossus or whatever we hear on that, we would just have to step up to do so. Likewise we don't even know who the third team we may end up meeting soon is. I agree if we see more immediate benefit to ourselves on another path - let somebody else tech alphabet/no immediate gain for them, while we tech other stuff.

B) If we do want military tech quicker, I would get Animal Husbandry first. It's much cheaper and faster than Iron Working and if we unlock horses - and I'm guessing horses are somewhere around - then we can at least deal with barbarians well enough. I personally would be satisfied with accessible horses right now, and thus AH first determines if we even need to research IW yet. If this isn't the case though and others feel we need the melee no matter what then IW first would be ok.

If we have to end up teching Alphabet ourselves I think going through AH at least before writing is good, so I may propose that as my personal default right now. (Sailing => Hunting => AH => Writing). I'd rather get somebody going right to Alphabet and us to Mathematics, but I fully realize that may not be possible, so we'll see what happens in the next 2-3 turns of diplomacy and other news.

 

[Provolution]

GRAND STRATEGY - Turns 100-200

What really matters long term, is to define a containable landmass for the midgame, based on getting enough specialized cities, defensible land and so on.

This map is a hub and spokes map, where the center is comprised of a narrow isthmus, as I see it, with 6 major inlets separating the 6 teams.
I would like to as early as possible, place a fortress city, with walls, barracks and all on that hub from our side, bridging the two inlets in terms of maritime transportation, as well as defending towards a narrow strip of flat land, akin to Fort Wagner in the movie "Glory". 1989, where the assault troops were trapped on a narrow strip of land and shelled down.

The idea is to control the subcontinent east of us with 8 cities, and half of the subcontinent north of us with 4 cities, as this is the best we can hope for in terms of dividing the central landmass with the other teams. The subcontinent east of us has top priority, as more than half of our cities will be there, whereas the subcontinent north of us should only be taken to prevent other teams to surprise the main island from north, as the land is bordering useless (colonized last).

This still calls for Resonance to be the city built directly after Quatron, as our third city, and to make sure we got iron working / animal husbandry and at the minimum archery covered.

 

[Earthling]

Right, grand strategy is important too, and this was somewhat similar to what I was thinking. Though I'm not sure about having to go overseas on a third city, I'll wait for others input on some things like that we still need a majority decision on. As for long term though, most of what you say is right, and I'd mention:

-I agree the Northern island has less valuable land, particularly on our side. Splitting it half and half with the other team couldn't be too much of a problem.
-I definitely want to get *more* of the Viking-side petal than they do. I'm really not sure we can take the whole landmass though, the Vikings could settle a coastal city on their side much sooner than we could ever get all the cities.
-Nonetheless, I am somewhat confident we can get the bottom Cape for ourselves, and along with Resonance/Cosmos, get a city at the choke up on the central hub as well. The central city is going to be pretty useless economically though so we shouldn't have to kill ourselves with it yet though.

I'm also worried about being a target of a Viking attack. Cities on "their" side would be pretty hard to defend if coastal, cause they could storm right out of spamalot. However, if we have our side of the coast/the Cape covered, we would see them coming anytime that matters - before Astronomy anyway but that's quite a ways out. I think holding the actual land if they land an army just becomes a typical game of keeping a strong military which we can do.

In fact, one more kinda-strategic decision I was thinking about - we might do well to get a core of Numidian Cavalry, upgraded to Flanking II. Not immediately, but just when we can afford it - upgraded to knights later or even as they are they do a premier job of taking out catapult stacks through flank damage. And the free promotion (and then we can have two promos with 5 xp) is almost not worth passing up. Though I'm not advocating rushing these guys immediately, early war isn't going to happen much in this game as I'm feeling it too and they are expensive for now.

 

[Provolution]

Spamalot expands culturally within 9 turns, which is why I really want to get Resonance as city 3, as the race for the Petal will begin right there, turn 51.

Turn 50-100 would likely be the first period with a mutual non aggression treaty, where we in the meantime would need to carve up the land in the petal with the vikings. The slower we go there, the slower the monuments of the mainland would work to our advantage, if at all, in case we obsolete Stonehenge too soon.

Animal Husbandry (Numidian Mercenary) and Iron Working (all melee units) are both things we really need to pin down right away, as we frankly have no clue about our military options right now, and I really dont like it and I really dont take those resources for granted. Resonance also allows us to quicker grab the Petal, not just messing around on an island we already got.

Frankly put, Spices and Calendar are by far not half as necessary as pinning down our military options for the main continent.

I also want to mine the hill next to the 2 silvers, in order to produce more and delay the population growth due to the health cap. Resonance would also increase our healthcap by one, removing the need for premature slavery.

 

[Earthling]

Well, the capital could be stuck at size 6 for a while anyway, if it builds basically settlers/workers, but yeah another grassland mine isn't out of the picture, with the 2nd worker perhaps. I still favor the cottage now and then worker to the second city though if that was the concern.

But I want to back up for a second, I'm trying to look at things realistically. And the answer is, we're not going to entirely out-expand the Vikings no matter what we do at this point. At the same time though, I think we'll have enough that we will get at least our own "half" and on balance probably more. While some teching of other stuff is fine, and doesn't come into play anyway in the short term, on our basic economy, it's just too late to be worth it to give up advantages/core cities for trying to cut off land.

And the thing is, we knew this too. It was discussed and tested - why right now, turn 42, we could have had 2 cities on our home island and a galley with barb-busting warriors overseas. In such a situation sucking it up and putting two cities overseas by turn 60 or something would have been possible and might have been worth it, because it would have been early enough. We didn't go with this plan or similar variations, by choice, and now it's simply too late for a mass transition. Getting our third and fourth overseas can't stop the vikings from getting their city right next to Spamalot on their side is the short answer, and it would cost us a lot of growth and development not to fill out a little more on our island.

In essence I'm saying this decision is already made - it's too late for taking hits to the economy to expand more to be worth it, because we already chose not to. If we optimize everything economically now we get the gains we really invested in, and then we'll just have to rely on other means or hoping another team doesn't charge straight for us in land-rushing. I'm also not saying it's the Vikings specifically behind this, because again when we were isolated and knew it by turn 10 we knew it was possible we'd have any team as our neighbors. The Vikings aren't even the Dutch or a team able to push us culturally or out-settle us due to any specific bonuses right now.

That said, again, I feel at the very least we break even, or a little ahead of even because I would make the Cape town a priority too so we'll have that covered. And if we do want to hamper the Vikings from being a threat to us - the best way to do it is not with direct rushing settlers and vulnerable cities. We can do so through trade, by denying them resources and allies, particularly if we find the team on the other side of the Vikings and they are willing to consider so too.

If we really want to go up against the Vikings, not have them as allies, options are out there and at the very least we can be ahead in economy - and that's what will win for us in the long term. Assuming their island is like ours, they top out at 5 or 6 happiness per city, and if we don't trade them resources, and either find a way to blockade or discourage others from doing so, they would stagnate. I don't see a way we can hope to secure all of the land we would want and have the Vikings as allies though. Now, it's possible they do not see the urgency of the situation either, or waste their time elsewhere, and there never is a worry about them settling much of that "petal." But if they want to they will, and we can't stop them from getting a couple cities anyway if they are going to be allies. If we are ready and prepared to have them as enemies we might, but that's a major decision to make.

 

[Provolution]

I think the scenario with Resonance as our third city still holds valid, but I can back down on the main island plan, by having the following build sequence: Quatron-Resonance-Singularity, and at the same time make sure we get iron working-writing and math, then calendar and then Animal Husbandry. We dont even know who will research alphabet in time for us to get the missing techs, and I really dont like not getting military resources we need to identify now, not later.

If Iron Working does not provide us iron, we may need Animal Husbandry as a short term back-up.

I agree to completing the cottage as we do, but would really like to mine the grassy hill right afterwards.

This will not impact loose plans we laid around the time we secured the Stonehenge, and give us much needed clams, as well as quite possibly horses and iron.

 

[cav scout]

Spamalot expands culturally within 9 turns

How do we know this?

 

[Provolution]

I know this from "Victory Settings", where they have 82 culture, and we know Palace got 2 culture per turn, and that a city expands at 100 culture in terms of land coverage. We expanded long ago, thanks to Stonehenge giving us 8 culture per turn, in addition to the 2 palace gave us.

As they most likely settled on turn 0 or turn 1, possibly turn 1 due to them lagging slightly behind the others, we should expect them to get a cultural expansion Turn 51.

 

[cav scout]

Ok cool. Do we know that the culture border we saw is spamalot? I just want to make sure we don't jump to any conclusions when it could be a 2nd city or even the indians.

 

[Provolution]

I presume its Spamalot, it would be too big of a coincidence that it was India, when its the same color, and its near. Also, India, having Hinduism, would have a quicker expansion of their cultural border than CDZ, suggesting we actually do see Spamalot east of us.

 

[Provolution]

Fundamentally, we got the following culture:

Quatronia

Palace 2
Stonehenge 8
Monument 1
Buddhism 5

16

Mavericks

Palace 2
Hinduism 5 (2600 BC or turn 35, 35 more culture than CDZ)

7

CDZland

Palace 2

If the island east of the Petal had more culture border, it would be India. Why so ?

 

[Provolution]

This means, that the Maverick border would have increased ( (82 Palace) + (35 Hinduism) ) = 117 culture

117 - 4X5, 3-4 turns ago.

 

[cav scout]

Well are we sure its a capital city? I can't really tell from the screens what the borders look like.

Also, I think we should hold off on playing the turns quickly. The more time we have to get to know the Vikings and make tech deals the better. If it looks like we are going full steam ahead they may assume we already have an ally and are just leading them on. Tech trades are the big variable going ahead.

 

[Provolution]

Well, you can think or not think so, but this is the way I see it. The extent of the borders is clearly of a capital city, and its mirroring our site.

 

[cav scout]

Well my points really are a.) lets not assume anything until we know for sure (you were convinced it was india at first and treated it as a fact) and b.) more detailed screens are necessary for the rest of the team to follow along.

 

[Provolution]

My points to A)

We need to make qualified assumptions in order to move ahead in planning, and get the ball started on discussions, even if they are initially erroneous. Some intellectual curiosity and consideration should be encourage, not the other way around. I was not alone to assume it was India, most of us did, so I am not to blame for that alone. Lets focus on the fact that 100 culture is the cap needed for border expansion, and the border we see east did not behave as if Hinduism would be there.

B)
There are previous screens on India that clearly show a complete BFC in extent. I was quite sure it was India, until I realized this with the Hinduism/Cultural reach state, the CDZ boat had no direct correlation to this, but giving up their culture level of 82. Hinduism would have changed all this, and its only 7 turns ago it was invented.

 

[Earthling]

I think we'll ask in our opening message, see the embassy thread, we probably want to send that by just a little bit later today. It should be trivial to mention our workboat just caught a vague glimpse of their culture but it hadn't expanded, and for them it should be trivial to confirm - they might not ever even have thought it would be confusion with India. I really think it is "Spamalot" too though, and not India.

As for more management - actually I was just thinking, that perhaps a better idea is to get the "Cape" town - we haven't put an official name there yet, first. Not the city on the very southern end of the peninsula, but the one halfway up, right next to that one clam. Resonance is a good city site, but there's no worry about it ever being contested by the Vikings cities or culture. If we got the Cape first, our borders would expand sooner there, we'd have one clam anyway and that's all we need for the health bonus, and Resonance after that might not be so bad. Since the Cape city would be #4 anyway if Resonance was third perhaps by settling city 3 on our home continent but then skipping over resonance for the Cape at the same time, to block off our borders may be the answer?

Again, I personally would actually go for Animal Husbandry, as a compromise for the team, for stability in case nobody else is able to trade, I agree on that, and I really think we probably will reveal horses. I would hope we can get some trade agreements worked out soon and we should take as much time as we can with the Vikings and any other team we meet shortly. Iron Working I feel is awfully expensive and if we don't have somebody else who is going to get writing/alphabet/ready to trade, it really takes us a lot of time. But AH is just a handful of turns off - if we find horses, would we be happy with chariots for barb busting/military right now, and ready to move on? If we don't find horses, that's also important and we'd maybe know our trade situation better by then too.

 

[cav scout]

We really need to flesh out the tech possibilities with CDZ and the the team we are going to meet to the north ASAP. Our tech path really depends on what deals we can get going. Someone may already have AH for instance. And since our neighbors probably don't have copper either there is a good chance that they are already researching IW (I really suspect the Vikings might be since they need metal for their UU). It would be lame if our future alliance starts off with a bunch of research overlap, could really set us behind.

So I'm still leaning towards the top of the tree for now. It provides multiple paths after writing and could put us in a tech brokering position. Plus it would be nice to get Writing soon for a library in Continuum and trade routes with neighbors (our letter should ask them where our workboat should move to make contact with their borders).

 

[Provolution]

Earthling, if you would go for Hunting-Animal Husbandry as a kind of compromise, before the writing-mathematics gambit, I would support that too. Its after all our UU, with the horse. This also means I would like to call for a support for settling the mainland city, such as the city site south of Resonance. I would suggest it to be named "Asymptote", as its brinkmanship shuts off a future viking border, in line with our science naming.

This would call for the following: Research hunting-animal husbandry-writing, mathematics and calendar

Build settler, warrior 50 %, worker, galley, settler, another warrior, then a few workers and settlers

We settle Quatronia, Asymptote, Singularity, Resonance and then Horizon


We need that clam very soon, as we are quite short on health resources.