GOMAW 28 AWM wheel

[T_McC]

I don't think I agree. We get to use the lake for an additional food, but who cares? The city itself is surrounded by junk and loses at least 3 squares due to being too close tot the edge of the map. I would rather have the stronger city with sheep corn and some good land squares.

So no it isn't a weed IMO. Grabbing the 3 food lake is simply a poor location that gains us little.

Let's review, with pictures ...

We'll begin with the blue dot, since that's the tile we're speaking about.

(A) Just because the tiles are in the fog doesn't mean they don't exist. The three "wasted???" tiles are coastal tiles under fog.
(B) The blue dot works netted Clams, a pair of 3-food lake tiles (with a Lighthouse), the Corn, 3 Grass Hills and a Desert Hill at size 8, which is probably about where we can go without straining for Happiness.

So 13 hpt/10 cpt at size 8, with a 5 fpt surplus. After that it's either water tiles or cottages.

Now let's address the red dot. Also needs a Lighthouse and culture, but then ...

Works the netted Clams, a pair of 3-food lake tiles, the Grass Sheep, 3 Grass Hills and the Plains Gold Hill. So at size 8 (again) it generates 15 hpt/20 cpt, with a 4 fpt surplus. After that it works the Silk Forest, the Desert Hill, or some water tiles. Yeah, the three missing tiles (that would have been Ocean) really hurt this site.

I think we'll take this kind of junk any day. Not taking advantage of coastal locations with lake access is like missing a food bonus. The difference between a Fish tile and a regular coastal tile is 4 fpt. Exactly the amount of food lost by settling inland.

The site we settled works Corn/Sheep, then Grass hill + 2 Desert hills. The next three are maybe lake tiles for 11 hpt/11 cpt with a 2 fpt surplus at size 8, or maybe three forests for 14 hpt/2 cpt with a 2 fpt surplus. So not appreciably worse than the desert tile, depending on how much you value Hammers relative to trade. But the city that would be comparable to red dot, given this existing city ...

Oh well, the red dot is still a legal location for settlement.

 

[Bezhukov]

I good general goal in locating/configuring cities is minimizing farms, as they produce no commerce/production. Lighthouse fueled lakes are great ways to allow other tiles to be cottages instead of farms. I'd like for us to take our time a bit more to make sure we can take advantage of every team members insight, at least regarding strategic decisions.

 

[Greebley]

You can still build your red dot town if you so choose.

Looking at your picture I do agree your blue dot is better but it is not necessarily clear cut. I didn't notice the clams for example.

However, Blue dot does waste a plains and two 2 grasslands when space is scarce. Is plus a few food worth losing 3 squares? It is a close call for me. I don't think we want to waste any good land squares and should plan appropriately.

 

[T_McC]

However, Blue dot does waste a plains and two 2 grasslands when space is scarce. Is plus a few food worth losing 3 squares?

Alright, last thing I'll say about this. Blue dot also doesn't have tiles of overlap with the capital.

I think Red dot is too good a location to pass up, so we should build it. I haven't opened the save yet to see what we can do east of Nanjing, so it may not be much of a problem to cede all contested tiles to red dot, Nanjing may still be a decent city. If it has a Corn and a couple of hills it can do a little production and may be able to cottage most of the other tiles.

 

[Greebley]

Ya, the discussion isn't really relevant since we can't abandon towns. Whats done is done.

I am serious about wasting good squares however. We are short enough on land we really should use all of them. Even if we have some overlap. I realize that is a "civ3 concept" but I think it perfectly valid here. We are not going to hit high city counts for a LONG time I suspect as expansion will be difficult.

Whatever dot map we eventually use, I think we should aim for this. The reason why is as valid here as it is in Civ3.

 

[ThERat]

The Grumpy Old Roster
ThERat
Bezhukov - up
knupp715
romeothemonk
T_McC
Greebley


Well, the city discussion isn't all that important now, I think we have an issue with defending. The AI willeventually come at us in numbers, we need some variety in defenders and numbers. I think we shoudl go for archery after IW as a short detour. They can help to defend cities against all those axes we will face.

 

[Greebley]

Probably a good idea. Archers are pretty decent when you give them city promotions. They only have to win a single battle to get 2 promotions.

 

[Bezhukov]

The twist that CivIV adds is that tiles with just farms are pretty much useless, especially pre-biology. The key is getting cottages on them.

As we're still learning, I think such discussions can be useful. I won't be able to play until Sunday evening if someone wants to grab the game before then, go ahead.

 

[knupp715]

Alright, last thing I'll say about this. Blue dot also doesn't have tiles of overlap with the capital.

I think he's talking about the grey dots in the picture below.



I can swap with Bez and play today. I've got it.

 

[knupp715]

Hmm. I just opened the save. I thought you guys were arguing about the founding of Xian and I didn't understand what that had anything to do with the red and blue dot. I'm going to have to say I don't really like where Nanjing is. I would have rathered stuck to T McC's planned dot map. But as stated nothing we can do about it now.

I don't think I'm going to play right now until some more discussion is thrown around. I'll play later tonight. What is the plan for our next city to be founded? Red dot? Maybe more dot maps are in order.

 

[Greebley]

The problem was I didn't go looking for a dot map. It seems they are rare in Civ4. That was the real weed of my turn - not checking to see if a dot map existed. I still feel the current placement has some merit even if it may not be optimal, but changing the dot map without discussion wasn't so good.

 

[romeothemonk]

I would say red dot, then straight military.
Someone with lots of ideas should find a place to put a good city or 2 connecting to our chokepoint on the rim.

We are finanacial, so getting up some cottages quick is very very key.

 

[Bezhukov]

Straight military is suicide in CivIV, especially in AW, where maintaining a tech edge is essential to survival.

Short-term we need at least half our cities getting their cheap forges built. We need a city to whip/build a library and then start running scientists to get an academy up in the capital. We need to get a boat in the water to found our marble city, which might make a good GP factory long-term. Being industrial, I think we should also go for the Great Library once marble is secured.

Finally, Civil Service (for bureaucracy) and Machinery (for our UU) are also high priorities. With no tech-trading, we should be able to score a late religion if we maintain a solid tech infrastructure.

 

[Bezhukov]

The biggest problem with Nanjin is it requires a border pop to be non-sucktastic, which will take a while to obtain.

Pls also get some culture in Xian - building walls before culture is just silly. Once it has a food bonus, it should have a granary whipped too to facilitate further whips.

 

[T_McC]

Alright, another opinion offered ...

I agree with building culture first in Xian because we want to claim the food bonus. Had the food bonus been in the first nine, Walls were the correct play. Once we have that we can whip the walls more quickly. And since Xian is a canal we can build the workboat in Shanghai.

We have established our Eastern and Southern borders for now, so the name of the game is consolidation. We are woefully thin in military, so another unit/city is in order. Axes are good, but we should research Archery after IW to give us a cheaper option for defense.

There are a couple of city sites to grab towards the Roman choke, and that should be our first priority. The red dot will be there for a while and we're likely to see action to our east fairly soon. For the next 10 I wouldn't expect to have another city settled.

Once a round of military is complete it seems fairly natural to divy up our three real cities into 1 infra, 1 Settler/worker, 1 Military and rotate until everyone has a Forge/Granary/Library. By the middle of that the other three cities we have already founded/captured should be contributing so it may be possible to put 2 cities on infra.

Looks like the best plan for Nanjing is chopped Obelisk (since the food bonuses are outside the first nine) and then a whipped Library at size 3/4. That is the only city we have that can afford to be running specialists, and even then it basically completely nerfs the city.

We will likely get a Great Prophet in Beijing as our first GP, so we have a decent shot at founding a religion that way.

The Marble city can wait unless we're really itching to build The Great Library, and until the military situation is stabilized we shouldn't be. We could research Sailing fairly soonish since it would give the pigs city another 1/2 a food bonus.

 

[Greebley]

Didn't meen to post twice. See the post below

 

[Greebley]

The biggest problem with Nanjin is it requires a border pop to be non-sucktastic, which will take a while to obtain.

We should build an obilisk there and chop a forest if one exists I am usually not a big fan of those, but this city needs it.

 

[knupp715]

(1) Iron Working comes in. Start research on archery for cheap defensive units and as we learned in the last game volume.

(3) Beijing--> Axe--> Axe

(6) Archery is researched. I think about going to sailing so we can set up marble city and so that our research on it doesn't decay. However, I decide that we need to get courthouses ASAP. Our research is at 50% at -2. Therefore I start research on writing on the way to code of laws.

Kill a Roman chariot outside Pisae.

Nanjing--> Obelisk (chopped)--> Archer
The archer it is building will free up the axe gaurding the city so it can go to Pisae. Early on in my turns I used an Axe to scout out what was in Ceasar's city just east of Pisae. He had 6 units in there (2 archers, 1 axe, 3 chariots) and it will only be a matter of time before he starts sending more down en masse.

(7) Shanghai finishes worker I started. Start building forge.

(9) Beijing--> Axe--> Archer
Guangzhou--> Barracks--> Worker




We are at 40% Science and only gaining 3gpt.

Beijing will grow and build an archer in four turns. It could build a settler then. I'm not sure we want to start expanding just yet though.

The worker near guangzhou should chop the worker guangzhou is building. After that we need a road up to Pisae.

A Roman chariot is near Pisae but we have a stable military there and will be fine for now.

Our worker situation is good and we shouldn't need to build anymore until we found 1-2 more cities.

The Save:

 

[T_McC]

Militarily we look fine, at least until Huyana shows up from our west.

The worker actions need a close look. I really don't think we want to be building a cottage on a tile we will have to build a Plantation on later, and our first priority should be extending a road to the Roman front. We also have a forest available to chop to finish either Walls (or preferably) an Obelisk at the southern choke. We also need a border expansion to claim Iron.

 

[knupp715]

Militarily we look fine, at least until Huyana shows up from our west.

The worker actions need a close look. I really don't think we want to be building a cottage on a tile we will have to build a Plantation on later, and our first priority should be extending a road to the Roman front. We also have a forest available to chop to finish either Walls (or preferably) an Obelisk at the southern choke. We also need a border expansion to claim Iron.

I figured the cottage on it would be a great way to get some gold short-term. Our economy isn't too great at 50% and we will probably be wanting to get the western choke up sometime soon. Perhaps it's not worth it though, depends on when we will get the tech to build plantations.

I agree with getting the road up to Pisae. This is why I have one worker chopping another worker out at gangzhou so they can get a road up ASAP.

I think we need a city built in the west. We are fine south and east right now but like you said, once Huayna shows up I think we will be a little stretched thin unless we have a choke over there.