GK2- The Training Day Experiment

[scoutsout]

...hoping to join the game, but I'll at least join the discussion....Interesting opening! Here's my $0.02:

Movement: I like what that Cunning Old Celt suggested for the scout's movement - towards the southeast. If the capitol is founded on the second turn, maybe he can pop the goody hut for a chance at a settler... but since the worker moved north, and the settler will either plop down or move north, I think it makes sense to explore south...

If the settler must move, I say move him NW. On the second turn, have the settler build a road on that BG tile he just moved to. You'll net a little commerce, and you won't lose a turn when you come back to mine that BG tile...After building the road, the worker can go to the cattle and irrigate first, then road it. That tile should be in good shape when the border expands...

Research priorities: Since Cultural starts are on, we'll probably meet Montezuma and Abe in short order. We should be able to trade for Warrior Code and (if we want it) Masonry. I say we go for Bronze Working, then the "resource locators": Iron Working and Wheel. If we can manage Iron first, we may be able to trade with it effectively. I also say we go for Writing before Horseback riding...embassies should make trading easier...maybe we can put off the GA until late AA and get a foothold on the Middle Ages...conquer after expanding.

Build Priorities: Since both Monty and Abe have "scouts", (Jag warriors move like scouts) I say we build a scout, then a warrior, then set the queue to a pre-build for a granary (barracks or temple). I think a settler factory from the capitol is possible... and it should be a priority.

Victory Goals: Let's go for Conquest/Domination. Failing that, Space Race.

Wonder Priorities: I think we should build Smith's Trading Company, and nothing before that! Seriously - STC does help with the cost of a huge empire but let's not get fixated on building wonders... take 'em!

If the game is still 'open', I'd like to join. I'm a Regent-Monarch level player who just recently made the jump to C3C. Though I will miss the Maya and Inca (and Theodora's scrunchy-pouty-face) I would really love to give a Succession Game a shot.

-Brian
"Scouts Out!"

 

[scoutsout]

Oh man - I know it's probably bad form to reply to one's reply, but I just noticed a little something about this start position...

Consider this: If you move the settler one tile NW one tile, and have him plop your capitol there, you'll notice you'll have a pair of BG tiles right next to the city. The worker will not have to cross the river to work the first BG tile, the Cattle tile, or the BG tile located SW of the Cattle.

Somebody earlier posted something about that worker being the "most important unit"... it seems to me that maximizing the use of that first worker will be key...

 

[Gengis Khan]

Welcome to the club!

Ummmm, excellent first post! Very insightful!

shogun: 2 tiles for hills or mtns, and a hill won't block a mtn(normally). Although, I have seen some instances where it did.

*Runs back to play the other SG he's been slacking off on*

 

[mad-bax]

Although cultural links are "on" sort of... remember that I chose the opponent civs, they were not randomly generated. As the game unfolds you should see the logic behind it.

So cultural linking IS relevant, but you shouldn't try to second guess who they'll be. Go meet 'em.

 

[Sir Bugsy]

Scout - excellent observations. Also on city expansion in ten turns you'll get two more BGs and the cow.

You will also get those same things by settling to the NE. What would make NW better than NE? Or is it?

Edit - it takes me four minutes to type a short response and Gengis and MB slip in front of me .

 

[Sir Bugsy]

So we have two views on what to do with the scout. We have the TJ idea to go SE-S, and the Shogun idea to go N-W. Both have very good points and mostly I think it is a matter of style. If I have a scout (or treasure when I play a conquest level GOTM) to try to use him to answer any questions I may have concerning the immediate area I am going to settle. While that isn't always an option (i.e., non-expansionist civ) it is my preference.

 

[TedJackson]

General notes:
Roading & mining the tile the worker is on will take 9 turns (whichever order you do it ).

The border expansion is 10 turns after settling.

Moving one way will give more shields at a later date but at the expense of food right now.

General questions:
Which is the best way to send the scout?

Is it really a bad thing to settle on a bonus grassland?


Ted

 

[Sir Bugsy]

Originally posted by TedJackson
Is it really a bad thing to settle on a bonus grassland?

Excellent question and one I'm not sure I even have an answer for. My idea has always been to avoid settling on a BG unless it is the best situation. I think in the 10 months I have been play this game I have only settled on a BG once (not counting early Chieftain games) That was so I could get a cow, a wheat, and a river. In general I don't like to waste the shield from the BG unless there is a good reason.

 

[scoutsout]

Originally posted by Sir Bugsy
You will also get those same things by settling to the NE. What would make NW better than NE? Or is it?

There are a couple of potential problems I see with putting the settler to the NE.

First, If you put the city to the NW, there may be room to squeeze in a coastal city with a city-tile-tile-city spacing. A productive coastal city near the capitol can be very useful...especially if we need to do a few 'suicide galley' missions...putting the capitol to the NE might deprive us of that potential spot...(edited after a second look at the map).

Second - Based on what I can see at this point - I think it'll be easier to move settlers and units north and west if the city is on the west side of the river. In time, we should have the road network built up to the poin that a unit moving south out of the capitol can move south-south- and east (back across the river). Since I suspect there is coastline to the east-northeast, anything to facilitate westward movement may prove to be a good thing...

So that wraps my case for moving the settler NW...

MB - I'm going to re-read the stuff on the starting conditions...

Shall I download the game now, or wait until it's my turn? (I guess I should dig through some SG faq's...)

 

[scoutsout]

Originally posted by TedJackson
General notes:
Roading & mining the tile the worker is on will take 9 turns (whichever order you do it ).

Roading the square the worker is on now will take 3 turns. Moving to the cattle on 4, irrigating takes...6 more? So on the turn of expansion (or maybe the turn after) you'd have a size 2 city, with an irrigated cattle producing 4 food, 1 shield, 1 commerce, and a BG tile producing 2 food, 1 shield. Worker then builds road under cattle (3 turns) moves back to BG square and starts mining...

I wonder if we ought to consider an early worker... position it to harvest some forest in time to add 10 shields to the granary build...

Is it really a bad thing to settle on a bonus grassland?

I could be wrong, but I think you lose any terrain bonuses when you put a city on them...

 

[Sir Bugsy]

Patience grasshopper. There will be plenty of time to download saves.

This is a good discussion with a lot left to be discussed. We still need to hear from infoman and maxverve on their thoughts on the situation. Plus we are still answering questions that Shogun has brought up.

If we spend a proper amount of time on fundamentals now, later game play will enable us to concentrate on advanced concepts.

Plus I think there is a lot to be said for taking the time to type out your thoughts good, bad or indifferent. If you can gather your thoughts and make reasoned decisions based on sounds goals, tactics and strategy, you will be a much better player in solo games and SGs.

 

[scoutsout]

Alright Sir Bugsy - this is a shameless jab because everybody else on this thread (myself included) played some Civ tonight instead of kicking this game off

<begin banter>
oooh--- grasshoppa knows he can't walk across the rice paper without tearing it... which is why he brought ... duct tape!
<end banter>

Seriously - I'm looking forward to hashing out 'the fundamentals'. I'm especially looking forward to learning what others consider "fundamental". (Warmongers and builders might beg to differ from each other on that...)

From Murphy's Laws of Combat:

The important things are always simple.
The simple things are always hard.

Sometimes, it's really hard for me to believe that Murphy was an optimist....

 

[mad-bax]

The thing about settling on a BG is quite straightforward. You don't get to use the bonus shield until the town is size 7. Therefore you CAN make use of this shield if you settle on it, depending on how you configure the settler factory. Setting it up on a 7-5 rotation would be a good thing. GK and Bugs will explain settler factories soon I expect. I certainly won't.

Having said that, I am not advocating that the team should settle on the BG. It may or may not be a good thing to do in this situation. The option to settle on it was designed into the start just to allow the opportunity to discuss it.

 

[yoshi74]

Good to know that. So it won't handicap the whole game, only during the first age. Gives some nice additional possibilities

 

[TedJackson]

Originally posted by scoutsout
Roading the square the worker is on now will take 3 turns. Moving to the cattle on 4, irrigating takes...6 more? So on the turn of expansion (or maybe the turn after) you'd have a size 2 city, with an irrigated cattle producing 4 food, 1 shield, 1 commerce, and a BG tile producing 2 food, 1 shield. Worker then builds road under cattle (3 turns) moves back to BG square and starts mining...

Well spotted Scout I was interested to see who would come up with this solution

Moving the Settler 1 tile (in any direction) means that border expansion won't occur until turn 11. You can make good use of that extra Worker turn here

Originally posted by scoutsout
I wonder if we ought to consider an early worker... position it to harvest some forest in time to add 10 shields to the granary build...

Debatable. A more important decision is do you build a Settler then a Granary or Granary then Settler?


Ted

 

[scoutsout]

Moving the Settler 1 tile (in any direction) means that border expansion won't occur until turn 11.

I just knew my math was off somewhere...

Debatable. A more important decision is do you build a Settler then a Granary or Granary then Settler?

It may be a bit early to tell that. If there is a lot of open space between us and the nearest neighbor we may get into "Open Land Buildout" mode, which would require a granary... If we wind up with an agressive civ nearby we may need to make a settler and have a shield/unit factory nearby... I think a higher priority is deciding where to put the first city, and finding the best spots for the next 3.

It'll also depend what else falls in the city radius after expansion, and how fast we can grow it. I'm pretty sure we'll need a granary for a settler factory... So the question appears to me to be one of "do we want to make the capitol a settler factory?". I typically try to put my second city on a good spot for city growth, try to get a granary there too, and crank out a mix of settlers and spears from my capitol and my second city. Also, I haven't yet been able to build a settler factory that can crank out settlers indefinitely. Typically the population will get depleted, and I'll build a spearman while the population bounces back.

Having 2 granary cities also helps pop out workers when I need them... and with a non-industrious civ, we're going to need some workers...

Having said all that, I'm predisposed to building an early granary. (Not carved in stone, but that's my tendency...)

Mad-Bax - good points on settling on a BG. I didn't know that, and it's an example of the finer points that I'm here to pick up. Thanks!

 

[shoguntaka]

Originally posted by mad-bax
Setting it up on a 7-5 rotation would be a good thing.

Wouldn't reaching size 7 depletes the granary?

 

[mad-bax]

I won't be drawn. Bugs and GK will tell you all about it at the appropriate time

 

[scoutsout]

Originally posted by shoguntaka
Wouldn't reaching size 7 depletes the granary?

I believe you're right, it would empty the granary. I think what Bad Max is talking about is reaping a benefit from the extra shield when it hits size 7. It sounds to me like this is something that would need to be carefully thought out, done very deliberately for good reason, and micromanaged to the hilt.

I can't really envision how that helps a settler factory, unless your city is food rich and shield poor... maybe BM would be kind enough to sketch it out for us lesser players.

At Monarch level, we're going to have some happiness issues early on without a temple and luxuries. Finding some luxuries early on will help, but we'll probably need to have our second worker by then in order to hook the luxuries up. Getting settlers to the luxuries will probably be a priority at some point fairly early on... I don't know if it would be a good idea to even have any size 7 cities until we've got several cities and the resources to spare to put 2 units in each of them.

 

[mad-bax]

Okay okay...

In broad terms the point is as follows.
If a town spends a whole turn at size 7 the granary will be emptied. This is usually (but not always) bad. If you are running a settler factory it's bad.

So the question is.. can you get the extra shield from being at size 7 without actually ever getting to size 7? The answer is yes.

The reason lies in the order in which things are calculated.

Let us say for the sake of arguement that the town is at size 6 and will grow to size 7 at the end of the turn, and will be three shields short of completing a settler. What happens?

1. Food is calculated. In this case the bin will be filled.
2. Since the bin is filled we grow to size 7.
3. We have an extra citizen. OK lets put him to work on that forest (say)
4. Since we are at size 7 we are entitled to use the extra shield under the city. Great!
5. shields are calculated. Well, we have the same number of shields as we did at size 6, plus 2 more from the forrest and another one from the city.
7. Wow! the shield bin is full... how did that happen? Lets make a settler.
8. A settler costs us 2 pop. We are at size 7 now, so lets get back to size 5.

...and so on.

EDIT] Because this is all done on the interturn you don't finish the turn at size 7 and the granary is not emptied. The two citizens killed by the governor will not be of your choosing, and it is certain that it will be 2 citizens working grass that will go, leaving the "7th" citizen on the forest. This is why it looks like the governor is moving a citizen on the build turn, when in fact he is adding one and removing two. That is why you have to micromanage on the growth turns to ensure you are making the right number of food units for the pattern you follow.

Depending on where you settle will determine the type of settler factory you will have in this game. One possibility is that you end up with a 6 turn settler factory. The limiting factor will not be shields it will be food. You will find that it is possible to generate 40+ shields in 6 turns by going from size 7 to size 5, and with correct micromanagement (on the growth turns), you will be able to get a settler and a unit (warrior or scout) every 6 turns, instead of just a settler and 8+ wasted shields.

4 turn settler factories are easy. You can either do it or not.
6 turn settler factories where you build 2 units every 6 turns are more of a challenge.

But it all depends where you put your first city.

I really am going to butt out now.