Discussion at 1619 AD

[Oldbus]

My last turnchat was fairly uneventful, but I think there are a number of things to discuss.

I posted a number of screenies, including possible trades and a tech tree in the Turnchat Summary thread.


Great Scientist

We have a Great Scientist in New Port City. Without instructions I left him there. He will get us Education if we cash him in now, but I think that will be a waste of beakers. We should wait until we have Education.

Or maybe send him to Fort Impervious to build an Academy. Or, if we add another specialist to Fort Impervious, we will be 23 turns away from a Golden Age


Happiness and Health

We do have some problems with this. Peter cancelled a wine trade and I had to boost city garrisons to cope. We have quite a few resources to trade. We need to make an effort to get Astronomy - whether by researching, using our GS (if we can) or trading. We have quite a few resources now (including another clam and corn).

Bismarck is willing to do some trades - can we investigate that?


Settling another continent

There is a smallish continent that appears to only have barbarians on it (at least as seen form the coast). It appears to have free land as well. I think it would be good if we could settle it before anyone else.

Clearly this will involve quite an effort - building a settler, possibly a worker and sending a number of troops to defend against the barbs and possibly take their cities from them. It may also cause our economy to start to dive again.

This could give us an advantage if we get it, but do the advantages outweigh the disadvantages?

Can we build a Forbidden Palace either on the new continent or in Old Sarai to help with city costs?


Open Borders

I agreed to Open borders with Germany - please review that. I made the mistake of not sending a horse archer or knight on a scouting mission as soon as the borders opened. If we do want to close borders again, perhaps a quick tour of Germany first is advisable.


Religion (and alliances)

We now have Islam and Confucianism within our borders - do we want to convert? Would we want to build religious buildings to help with happiness and culture?

One thing to consider is the diplomatic aspect. Mansa Musa and Monty have recently been at war. I resisted demands to stop trading, but the decision about Confucianism would put us against Monty.


Science rate

Our economy is picking up and we can increase the science rate to 50% and remain in the black. Should we?

 

[dutchfire]

GS- Next thing he can lightbulb is Printing Press, we should do that IMO.
Settling- We don't have Galleons.
Science Rate- As high as possible.

 

[donsig]

Anyone else on our continent (besides the Germans) convert to a religion?

 

[DaveShack]

Score: 3rd (Mansa Musa, Bismarck)
GNP: 100, 4th (best has 185)
MFG: 118, 5th (best has 161)
Food: 221, 4th (best has 277)
Soldiers: 360K, 5th (best has 514K)
Land: 270K, 3rd (best has 319K)
Population: 6287K, 5th (best has 9113K)

The margins on all these categories are huge! We need to figure out why, and do something about it as soon as we possibly can.

Science -- we are down the following:

• Divine Right (Greece, Germany)
• Gunpowder (Germany)
• Music (Mali, Greece, Russia)
• Education (Russia)
• Astronomy (Russia)

We are up the following:

• Aztecs: Theology, Guilds, Philosophy, Paper, Engineering
• Germany: Paper
• Mali: nothing
• Greece: Banking
• Russia: nothing
• Arabia: Paper

Research is currently set to Education. We are in 2200 beakers of 4500, with 12 turns to go. The options are:

• Education (12, current) [University, Oxford University]
• Music (7) [Cathedral, Culture]
• Divine Right (18) [Versailles, Spiral Minaret]
• Nationalism (24) [Nationhood, Taj Mahal, Hermitage]
• Printing Press (21) [Village & Town +1 ]
• Gunpowder (15) [Musketman]

Nationalism and Printing Press would be new, all the others are known to someone already. The primary benefit of Education is that it opens up Liberalism. It's entirely likely that Russia already has it.

Foreign Relations:
Mali - Cautious (-2) Confucionism
Germany - Cautious (-1) Islam
Russia - Pleased (+9 !!) Islam
Aztecs - Cautious (+3) Judaism
Arabia - Cautious (0) Hinduism
Greece - Pleased (+6) Hinduism

Leading Cities
Hammers: BW 24, Abydos 16, Const. Falls 13
Beakers: BW 40, NPC 21, Auda City 15
Gold: BW 51, Basilica 25, 4 tied at 24
Culture: Ft Impervious 25, BW 18, Abydos / MG 12
GPP: FI 10, NPC 8, BW/Auda 3

Unhappy: none, for now
Unhealthy: Ft Impervious

National Wonders:
Globe Theater (Ft Impervious)
Palace (Boaring Wallow)

Available NW's:
National Epic
Forbidden Palace
Heroic Epic

Economy:
Research 40%, 149 beakers
Taxes: 60%, 184 gpt
Foreign Income: 12 gpt (5gpt from Russia, 7gpt from Germany)

Expenses
Unit cost 24
Maintenance 45
Civics 48
Inflation 39

High maint cities:
FI (6)
NPC (4)
Toot Uncommon (7) needs courthouse, 36 turns
Auda City (6) needs court

We have 1023 gold

Civics:
Hereditary Rule +1 happy per garrison (no options)
Bureaucracy +50% +50% in capital (Vassalage +2exp +14 units)
Serfdom workers +50% (Slavery pop rushing, Caste System unlimited artist, scientist, merchant)
Decentralism (Mercantilism +1 specialist per city, no foreign )
Paganism (Organized Religion, Theocracy, Pacifism but need a religion first for all 3)

Religion:
No state religion, one city each has Islam and Confucionism.

We have a great scientist who can lightbulb Education, join as a super scientist (+1 +6 ), build an academy (+50% )
Cities which would benefit from Academy: NPC has one, BW has one, Auda City is next best choice, gets +7 right now from academy, and the benefit increases when tech rate increases. Lightbulb nets us 2100 beakers on a tech known to only one opponent.

So, there's the raw data, now we need some discussion on what to do about it.

 

[dutchfire]

I'd say we should be the FP soon, it will lower our upkeep a lot, but where?

 

[Oldbus]

I think we need to invade the island with only barbs on it. Possibly with a settler as there appears to be some room.

As for FP, it has to be OS or CF - I think OS.

 

[GeorgeOP]

Trades:
I think (and have put it as orders unless people think I should change it) we should trade Fish to Germany for Incense. It will give us the happiness we lost when Peter stopped trading with us.

Also, we can get Music from Alexander for Banking and the World Map. Most other advanced people (ie not Monty) already know Banking. Should we make that trade?

 

[donsig]

GeorgeOP's trades sound good to me. Using the great scientist to finish off printing press sounds ok. What about convertng to Islam? How about adopting organized religion and spreading Isalm? How about adopting theocracy later to build experienced units?

 

[dutchfire]

The GS couldn't be used on PP. We shouldn't trade for music, we don't need it anytime soon.

 

[donsig]

The GS couldn't be used on PP. We shouldn't trade for music, we don't need it anytime soon.

What can thw GS be used on? Just because we don't need music soon isn't enough reason not to make the trade now. Won't trading it help improve our relations a bit? And what if we don't trade it now and end up getting nothing for it later? Music is a tech we'll need later so let's snag it now.

 

[dutchfire]

The GS could be used on education, but I decided to use him as a superspecialist. (Dave's orders came too late, I didn't see them until I was finished).

Later on, Music will be worth less, and we'll probably get it cheaper.

 

[donsig]

So much for discussion.