Emperor Cookbook Shaka

[Gumbolt]

Only 20 votes Kossin where are the other 27 that voted in the poll.

Overall vote for the save you think will be most interesting or best save to go forward with. Fact someone has gone the wonder route shouldnt go against them although we may ban the GLH next map.

Perhaps Soirana could just world builder it in our capital on the coast next time.

 

[mc-red]

@maxpain

Spoiler :

Appreciate the summary.
Just want to point out that i have 160 gold in my save and a library in capital partially built. This will allow me deficit research on any techs I lack at a very good rate.

On roads don't forget rivers. Once the blocker pops borders next turn only 2 roads are needed to connect to giggles and two more to have all three cities on trade network.
[edit: 3 roads to connect all cities]
Alternately a deficit run on sailing would do the same.

Also I have scouted a lot more than most saves.

I feel the main problem with my save is lack of workers

An observation about cookbooks as this will be my first.
I think scouting efforts are greatly discounted by observers as everyone will have benefit of the scouting for whatever save we start with next.

 

[WFU03]

A couple of comments on the recap and one on my save in particular:

Spoiler :

1. Excellent job on the recap...it definitely helps to see some numbers on this
2. It would have been helpful to also have the number of cities each save had as well. Some have 3 and some have 4.

3. One HUGE difference in my save is that it has another luxury resource. I had gold pop up in the BFC of the capital in the last few turns of the round. I just want to make sure people realize this (either for good or for bad) when they are voting.

 

[mc-red]

@smitskoo

Spoiler :

Very interesting observation about not settling on wine.
I will go back and look at this.
Was this knowable at the start though?

 

[Gumbolt]

Theres no need for spoilers now voting is taking place!!!

One advantage we do get from doing these series is seeing what land the Ai has from all the saves. We know we have at least 2 Ai on our continent.

Question is are we going for a rush or a peaceful sciencegame till later techs? What to do next????

 

[mc-red]

Theres no need for spoilers now voting is taking place!!!

One advantage we do get from doing these series is seeing what land the Ai has from all the saves. We know we have at least 2 Ai on our continent.

Question is are we going for a rush or a peaceful sciencegame till later techs? What to do next????

Good question. I was definately angling for the peaceful bulbing approach with HR and hopefully but not necessarily religion to keep giggles happy.

Your choke of giggles though has pretty much reduced him to a non entity and all that land seems too good to pass up.
Successful handling of the cleanup and then the economy would pretty much mean game over. Still a lot to do and learn in the next few rounds from that process.

 

[cabert]

hey I'm here!

Too late for a submission?

Here it is anyway, although I saw other games better than mine without even having to compare really hard.

Spoiler :

First step : I think win is a weak tile, and I saw green tiles to the east so I settled on the wine = I missed the cow to the west .
I wanted an impi rush, so tech to BW straight, then saw where the copper was and got a bit disappointed.
Too late to change, so I settled on the copper, built a road towards it.
Next steps include AH for the sheep and potential horses, no luck there.
Then mysticism for monuments, although I didn't build one yet then fishing (duh!) and pottery.
Now going for sailing, because whatever we did in another game, it's the only way to go now.

 

[Gumbolt]

hey I'm here!

Too late for a submission?

Here it is anyway, although I saw other games better than mine without even having to compare really hard.

Spoiler :

First step : I think win is a weak tile, and I saw green tiles to the east so I settled on the wine = I missed the cow to the west .
I wanted an impi rush, so tech to BW straight, then saw where the copper was and got a bit disappointed.
Too late to change, so I settled on the copper, built a road towards it.
Next steps include AH for the sheep and potential horses, no luck there.
Then mysticism for monuments, although I didn't build one yet then fishing (duh!) and pottery.
Now going for sailing, because whatever we did in another game, it's the only way to go now.

I can add you to the vote if you want Cabert. No one has voted yet!! Not sure why.

 

[/solar/]

You forgot me.

I think its fairly clear which save is the best. In order to do well we have to go on the offensive. There isn't enough land to just sit back and tech. If we don't have any iron then we'll probably have to wait untill gunpowder which seems way to long a time for shaka to turtle for with only about 6 cities. The best situation to be in is to have done as much to gilga at this point as possible.

I'll vote tomorrow when I've had a chance to look at all the saves.

 

[mc-red]

I can add you to the vote if you want Cabert. No one has voted yet!! Not sure why.

too many saves

 

[smitsk00]

@smitskoo

Spoiler :

Very interesting observation about not settling on wine.
I will go back and look at this.
Was this knowable at the start though?

Spoiler :

Settling on the wine would definitely have seemed like a good idea. No one could have known that it would crunch city sites. Just bad luck.

 

[cabert]

I'll vote if you let me, but I agree there are too many saves.
I DLed all of them, but won't go into detailed analysis of each game.
I'll just give a little more thoughts to the one I'd be willing to play from.

I'll vote in a few minutes if we're not waiting for more games.

Here is my short list, with spoilers although I don't think it's necessary anymore.

I found 4 games I'd be willing to play from.

Gumbolt

Spoiler :

good expansion, copper ready
building axes from there sould lead to a quick eradication of gilgamesh.
Not sure impies are going to help a lot, maybe 1 or 2 for further copper denial, but axes will do better vs creative cities.

Dualmaster

Spoiler :

close to GLH, need I say more?

Huerfanista

Spoiler :

good block, stonehenge providing a great prophet soon to fund further expansion

Kossin

Spoiler :

ready for an axe rush
+ best capital placement

If I shall vote already, I'd give
3 votes to kossin,
2 to gumbolt,
1 to dualmaster.
Of course if other games are submitted, I'll check further.

 

[mc-red]

Ok I'm going to vote. I looked at every save to do everyone justice but its still a little overwhelming.
My basic criterion was the focus of the game plan. How is the civ placed to deal with giggles. Either a peaceful or aggressive. Some saves looked like more generic starts and I think the start calls for extremes. Gamble you can keep declare at pleased giggles pacified or take him out as threat.

1. Gumbolt - aggressive - great choke
2. Kossin - agressive - elements of rush in place
3. WFU03 - can be played peacefully at start IMHO

 

[dualmaster]

So here's my thoughts:
There's two ways to go:
1.) Early rush on Giggles.
2.) Focus economy and tech to Construction+IW for a sword+cat war (IF we have iron).

Unfortunately our land is not that great for an economy. We have some cottage land but not enough happiness to work a lot of it. Meanwhile we know Gilga has gold in his BFC to tech ahead fast. Some people have also mentioned specialists, but again we don't have a ton of happiness so our cities will be small. So I think we'll fall behind on tech quickly UNLESS we have the GLH. But since many people seem to dislike that, I think the only good option remaining is to rush Giggles.

Thus, when looking through the saves, my requirement is that copper must be hooked up (or close at least).

3 points - Gumbolt - Nice choke. Settling 5th city would hurt more than help, as we already have cities working unimproved tiles. With Ikhandas in all cities and granaries in two, this has best infrastructure to build/whip an army. Combined with a choke to slow Gilga+deny copper and two stolen workers this probably has the best chance for a successful rush. Particularly with Gila's city setup in this save, even if we just take Uruk we can get an awesome city (serious production and the gold will pay for itself) without having to worry about cultural pressure (in other saves he has a city to the north which would encroach on Uruk).

2 points - Kossin - Nice setup for rush. Ikhanda in all 3 cities with 2 axes, 1 impi and more on the way. Should be teching writing not myst though. Copper city is in a lousy location but oh well. Best capital location (and lets me try to build the GLH )

1 point - Huerfanista - Stonehenge is nice to have, though far from critical. Has "best" location for copper city, however copper is not connected and won't be for a while. Severe lack of workers. Would have to be a late rush.

 

[oranje willem]

Why so many votes for Kossin, his copper city is really crappy and Gilgamesh is one of the hardest AIs to rush fast (culture bonus from creative and protective and powerfull early UU). I'm not sure if it's the best way to go, but maybe i'm wrong.

 

[huerfanista]

Here are my votes:

1. Gumbolt - I think pinning Gil early is a good approach, and no other save can possibly accomplish this before he has his metals hooked up and becomes too big to handle. Also, the most cities and workers, copper already hooked up, no need for a blocking city.

2. Dualmaster - doesn't have a blocking city (but can get it soon, hopefully before Gil gets a settler there), GLH will be extremely powerful on this very tough map, poor teching but lots of gold for defecit research and GLH will help, best economic potential for a peaceful game.

3. WFU03 - has copper city founded, can get it hooked up in a reasonable time (~34 turns if monument is whipped @ size 2), good blocking city, 1 turn to writing.

 

[Nares]

Edited

 

[mc-red]

Nares,
I do like the production site idea. For me I think I settled by the river for:
1. Easier trade route
2. Was planning to share the corn with blocker.
3. Was planning to help grow cottages for the capital
4. Freshwater

The only thing I usually do with plains early is farm them.

 

[pawelo]

Alright,

I'll be going on with voting, however there is one big winner afaik : Gumbolt.
Your worker-capture, attrition war crippling Gilgamesh eco is the way I was planning to go around 1000 AD. Also you have managed to block Gilga up to only three, making him a fairly easy target.

So:
3 pts - Gumbolt
2 pts - Huerfanista for the Henge - a cool way to fight creative borders + prophet to get Confu or Tao later (Mongols are unlikely to found a religion methinks)
1 pt - WFU for luck and early gold - it will do good to size the cities up and will finance the rush a bit

Most people has already commented upon other games - I'll just add my 2 cents on Kossin - I don't think the capital is revolutionary better where you placed it rather than in place, and although you have a good war machine running, teching monuments only now is pretty late for me.

 

[Nares]

Edited