GOTM 13 - First Spoiler

[da_Vinci]

You get the use of the fish and the extra hammer from the plains-hill, so in the short run you have a reasonable production/poprushing city without having to build a worker first and later with forests to chop too. I notice it also gives you another guaranteed high-ish food spot north of the ivory that you can also use for some poprushing. The thinking involved there is looking a bit like trying-to-use-every-resource, which again is iffy logic for long-haul games but I can see some logic in the short term if you want a quick high-production civ (eg. for conquest).

Am I getting warm?

Actually quite hot.

Finishing GOTM 13 is now bogged down in a video driver problem, the same one I had in GOTM 11 that earned me my "warning" email. Thought I had updated the driver, but now it looks like the update program failed to achieve the update. But that is for the techical forum.

I have been thinking about tempo, as chess players use the term (losing or gaining a move's worth of time). For those not familiar with this idea, it is described well here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempo_(chess)

The cost of moving the settler is some number of turns, in this case two lost getting to the hill. What is lost doing that? You lose two turns of production of your entire empire. The key is that you do not lose the production of turns one and two, you lose the last two turns of your empire's production.

Example: Compare settling in place, with waiting two turns to settle in place, and then do everything the same. At turn 50, the waiting approach is at the same production as turn 48 of the settle in place, so you have lost the net production (net food + hammers + commerce) of turns 49 and 50 of the settle in place strategy. Think how big this is at turn 400!

So why ever not settle in place? This gets to "city power", or the net production that a city makes. City power is net food (made - eaten) + hammers + commerce (or maybe commerce minus maintenance?). And perhaps with a granary, net food should be doubled as it has twice the effect? But you get the idea.

If moving to settle gets you a higher city power right away or in the near future, that extra city power is a production accelerator, and that can make up for the tempo lost to the settler moves.

So I logged the first 50 turns in the Svelte test map either settling in place, or on the ivory (both turn 0) or on the hill (turn 2). See attached. Production caught up on the hill by virtue of the extra food from the fish. Getting that first WB out in 15 turn instead of 23 made the extra hammer (hill or ivory) in the capital tile well worth it for a fast start. Expected to move the palace to a more central location later.

The hill, with all of its available food, makes a good "whipping post". Hammer poor, grow the pop and then whip to build what the city needs. To me, whipping is like the commodities exchange, where I can trade 1 food for 2 or 3 hammers (depending on city size) after granary.

At the outset, we have no idea how much or little land we have to work with, so after proving that the hill was just as good as the other two known options, settling there kept options open in case this was a tiny island.

Probably old hat to the experienced folks, but might be a useful insight for some newer members.

dV

 

[lroumen]

I just started GOTM13 carried on into the middel ages. What struck me from reading the 'spoilers' from many other players is that they settled on the Ivory, which people adviced me not to do in the prediscussion (I did anyway though).

I built Stonehenge and the Oracle in Madrid and settled four other cities.
2. Near the gold, pigs, gems, rice and silks
3. Near iron to the northeast (1 south of the iron on the hill)
4. Floodplains spot
5. North west of Madrid near the gems, pigs, rice and from the mined hills there I popped silver!


I went for Hinduism and got it with ease, founding it in Madrid. I then teched for Mining and Bronze Working and whilst growing the capital slightly building some warriors and Stonehenge I teched for the Oracle. I pre-chopped the Oracle and happily immediately after my first chop a new forest grew near the capital allowing me to take up the chopper once more and finish the Oracle in no-time.

I was slow on expansion because I wanted to build the two wonders and I built 1 worker too many early game but it became quite a bonus slightly after.

Now having two prophet wonders I soon popped my first GProphet and built the Hinduism Shrine. Shortly after I founded Confucianism as well and a second early Prophet allowed me to found the second shrine as well.

I focused my second city (gems, gold) on commerce at first, but because of the plenty hammers I also used it as a production town building the Great Library. Focusing this town only on scientists I tried to generate the GScientist, but sadly got a Prophet because this town was the focal of Confucianism and I had built the Shrine early on. doh! Bad mistake.

Whilst teching for Iron working I created a settler in Madrid and I was thinking of settling near the floodplains but when I finished research on Iron Working, I found it just to the north of Madrid and went for it. Earlier on, Animal Husbandry did not reveal any horses so I simply ignored prospects on our unique unit. Finding Iron was kind of helpful nonetheless.

Peter wanted open borders and the slob who doesn't want to trade anything came on my east coast with a galley and a settler thinking to nab the floodplains site. I was already constructing a settler at the time and it was a narrow race to the floodplains spot, but oddly the turn I settled my city I found out that Peter had just sailed past and a bit later I found out that he had sailed to the western part of the island(?) and founded a city there when it would have made more sense to just walk there!!(?)!!

Anyways, at 500AD I researched/am researching (not certain at this point) Construction and I'm building (or planning to) Catapults and Elephants to destroy the archer/axemen rich Russians...


Some stupidities.... I missed the Hanging Gardens by 4 turns and I missed the Sistine Chapel by many turns (both I was trying to build in the iron city). I also missed Taoism by 2 turns and Christianity by many... bad timing or just bad researching, bah. The wonders did give me much gold so I could further run research at 100% and later ~80% when I was plundering Peter. Strangely he was still happy with me when I was waging war on him because he was as me.... hindu.

 

[Khalid]

I built Stonehenge and the Oracle in Madrid and settled four other cities.

I was plundering Peter. Strangely he was still happy with me when I was waging war on him because he was as me.... hindu.

I bet he thought that salvation has finally come to his lands.

 

[lroumen]

And I liberated him shortly after

 

[da_Vinci]

Got past the video freeze by using low graphics, but then real life and some intensity in the SGOTM 3 have kept me from posting till now.

As it is after the 15th, no sense in posting it split, so if you are curious how the settling on the warrior hill turned out (see 101 above), see the final spoiler thread.

dV