Gotm20-Spain Pregame Discussion

[ControlFreak]

Originally posted by ltcoljt


The min research writing gambit is in doubt this game. I have run 3 games up to writing. Twice the French beat me to it. Once it did not matter as I had an extra contact to parlay to tech parity. But only 2 of 3 games worked out.

As for wonders, the combination of civs I am playing with are cascading like crazy. I do not expect to get a shot at the library.

I'll add my experiments to these.

Four attempts at writing. First game, I met two civs, neither had alphabet, and traded to parity before getting writing first. They went to IronWorking. Second game France sneak attacked me and took my undefended capital. Playtime 15min. (Guess I won't be leaving my capital undefended in the GOTM.) Third and fourth time, I had met one and two civs, both beaten to writing by 3 turns.

Never tried any wonders but did have the chinese build the pyramids in 1950BC (presumably a leader).

Other bad things that happened:
Disease struck 2 of the 3 turns that lasted longer than 15min. Both times, it happened during my settler build.

(Note barbs set to raging just in case)Barbs prevented my settler from leaving town until defender could be built. AI had 8-10 cities to my 2.

All these starts were random map looking for floodplain with no BG. (BTW it took me forever to find a start like that. Every map I generated had bonuses, cow or luxuries in the start position. How did Cracker get so lucky?)

This is not going to be pretty. I'm hoping my GOTM19 submission brings be down to 50% so I can use the advantages of CONQUEST.

 

[ltcoljt]

Originally posted by Moonsinger
I had a weird dream about this game last night. I saw the Egyptian Empire in just about 7 tiles NE of my starting position, the Japanese Empire was just a few square to the East and Persia was on the South and South West. My Spanish land was so tiny that I had to place most of my cities 2 tiles apart. It was really a nightmare! Wave after wave of Egyptian War Chariots, Persian Immortals, and Japanese swordmans were coming toward me from all direction...then I waked up.

"Moon Singer"

Moon Singer, wider than a mile,
I'm crossing you in style some day.
Oh, dream maker, you heart breaker,
Wherever you're going I'm going your way.

Two drifters off to see the world.
There's such a lot of world to see.
We're after the same rainbow's end --
Waiting 'round the bend,
My huckleberry friend,
Moon Singer and me.

http://www.geocities.com/lyricalmusings/lyrics/moon_river.htm

 

[scubagtr]

Wierd !!! I had the same exact dream !!!!!!

 

[denyd]

A few thoughts:

Tough decision, try to grab as much land as possible in the early game, then back fill the land with cities (takes a while to get those cities up to speed) or pack them in tight early (build a small, but highly productive empire, then use war to expand)?

Is the a game to try an archer or horseman rush to knock of the nearest AI and get an extra chunk of land?

If SirPleib looks at the victory options and thinks the easiest is going to be hard, even at conquest, I'm toast.

Do I have a shot at getting the GLib, if I start a palace in my second city and go full science for Lit. (maybe even save my chests for the wonder)?

Is this going to be another deity game, where just being on the map at the end is a 'victory'?

Is ltcoljt going to get stomped into meadow muffins by Moonsingers stampeding cattle

 

[ltcoljt]

Meadow muffins? Are those the same thing as cow pies?

Ewww!

At the rate the AI built wonders in my practice games I think folks trying to build wonders brick by brick are gonna be crying.

 

[scubagtr]

Denyd,

For this game, I am going to build my cities very close together, closer than ever before (for me). I think a tight, well protected, high productive area will be my starting thought.

Of course, once I find out where the other civs are, I will try to settle near them and close them off as best i can.

I have always been one to build non-overlapping or very little overlapping cities, but based on past observations, I will try to pack them in and work the workers beween the cities on the same tiles.

I have nothing to lose, well expect for my 4th GOTM in a row

 

[ltccone]

Originally posted by ltcoljt
At the rate the AI built wonders in my practice games I think folks trying to build wonders brick by brick are gonna be crying.

I bet there is no way you can build a Great Wonder in a diety level game unless you have a GL. I bet it won't be easy to capture one either.

This will be my first diety game. I'm just hoping to survive...

 

[ltcoljt]

Originally posted by ltccone


I bet there is no way you can build a Great Wonder in a diety level game unless you have a GL. I bet it won't be easy to capture one either.

This will be my first diety game. I'm just hoping to survive...

I did a little browsing and in the last diety GOTM (#14) could find only one player, the great CB, managed to get an early wonder. It was the pyramids. He did that by generating a great leader. He and Moonsinger appeared to use the same tactics in that game, stockpile warriors and cash to do a mass upgrade to swordsman. Now, in that game they start on a land mass with the Persians only.

Moonsinger has mentioned a chariot gambit this time and it would probably be wise to pay attention to what she says.
She did win the last diety game after all, not to mention all the others.

Pardon if I got the facts wrong re #14. I didn't have time to download the games and really study them.

Edit: to add that in #14 Moonsinger appeared not to have researched at all during the first 80 turns.

 

[ControlFreak]

Originally posted by denyd
Do I have a shot at getting the GLib, if I start a palace in my second city and go full science for Lit. (maybe even save my chests for the wonder)?

Warning: I don't think chest will help wonders. I think they act like disbanded units and I didn't think disbanded units help production on a wonder.

I will definitely NOT try to hem in the AI. That would just make them feel trapped and you know what they say about a cornered animal.

I'm planning a tight or even ICS type build pattern and hoping to get enough resources to be some competition to my nearest neighbor. It is a blessing that we will be able to see the horses from the beginning.

The early archer/horse rush would have two disadvanges, the AI starts with 2 settlers so you at least have to kill two towns at once, and they start with a bunch of extra military.

Based on my practices I learned two things. 1)Getting an explorer going early is very important. 2)Disease kills.

My early strategy will be to sacrifice food for sheilds (work the forests) until my worker has FP (and hopefully a wheat) irrigated. Then switch to all food to get to size 3. Then all sheilds to avoid FP to finish settler. This does two things: gets faster explorer and minimizes the risk of disease at pop 2.

Pop 2 was the worst for disease because you can't see it coming. Disease at pop >= 3 you can at least switch builds and pop rush the remaining extra citizen into a spear/barracks/temple before the second round of disease kills him too. If we get to pop 3 and then stop working the floodplains, the settler will complete fairly quickly, leaving us at pop 1 again and out of danger for disease. For this to work, I don't plan on building barracks or temple until disease strikes. It is also important to get bronze working from a neighbor ASAP so the spear can be pop rushed if disease strikes again.

 

[Jove]

Mateys! Another Deity level game. The last one set me to shame, and I will Definitely not use the same strategy for this one. I had just begun to have deep thoughts about the power of the Palace Jump and how to pull it off, and I thought that might be a way to get a leg up on the Persians. But on Deity, there just isn't the time to voluntarily destroy your most productive city in order to reduce corruption elsewhere in the empire. The Persians saw my capitol go up in smoke all by itself, and next thing I knew they were moving in like the rent had been cut in half. This time, it will be ruthless civving toward victory. I don't know about the chariot gambit- it's expensive to upgrade those guys compared to swordsmen. And I'm not so sure about moving the settler around before getting the first city. I feel confident that there are some bonus tiles just beyond our vision range, and that the start position won't be so bad. It'll take longer to get that first settler out, big deal, I'll have a few extra warriors, maybe a lucky goody hut, a single pop-rush early on for the first produced settler and Spain will be on it's way. The second city however Must be capable of producing a lot of settlers, probably with the help of workers Joining it frequently from the capitol.
Sorry, I'm thinking as I'm writing. Here's what's going to happen, barring strange circumstances:
Forget the granary. Build a few more warriors than usual, get the Capitol pop up to 4 or 5.
Pop rush the first settler, forget the consequences!
Second city founded with plenty of warrior support. Set it to settler right away, Join workers to it from the capitol to produce at least a few rapid settlers.
Cities 3-5 focus on military. Cross fingers, avoid being attacked too early.
After this, the crystal ball is fuzzy because so little is known about the outside world. This much I do know for sure: If I Abandon my capitol, they'll slaughter me. Etc.

 

[RocknOats]

Ok, now I'm scared. I wish I hadn't shot my mouth off earlier in the conquest preview thread. . . Now I wanna run crying back to Cracker and the Conquest Class! "sniff!" Anyhoo, here is what passes for my gameplan: I will settle in spot and research writing at 40. I will trade, and research the techs they're not(I saw a good plan in a reply earlier that sounded good-can't remember who sent it in). I will quickly produce some brutish ambassadors and then try to crank as many cities as I can. I will head north after seeing that starting pos. in the world map. Clearly the best land will be up there. I will try to eliminate at least one neighbor early as I am very warlike. I'll look around for something that fits my style. . . Oops! Did I forget to mention the finger and toe crossing and deals with the devil, etc. etc.???

Just the fingers crossed for now, saving the toes for the 1st,

RocknOats

 

[Moonsinger]

My plan for this game is very simple: Mininum research, maxium commerce (after all, Spain is a comercial civ). Since we are given the Wheel at the beginning of the game, I have every intention to make good use of it. I will definitely try to build a lot of chariots for later upgrade to knights. My tech trading thread was a good practice in preparing me for this game because I'm going to use trading extensively in order to gain tech parity while saving enough gold for my units upgrade. To win this game, I think I must first win the economic war (bankrupt the AIs first), then lure them into killing each other (when I'm rich, I can pay the AIs into dying for me), then finally I will unlease my knights and cavalries to mop up the wounded civs one at a time. Other than that, I have no other plan except to build a lot of cities very close to each other.

 

[DaviddesJ]

Jove: the idea of the palace jump is that you don't make your capital your "most productive" city; you avoid building stuff there.

Personally, I don't like it for other reasons. Getting a leader to build the Forbidden Palace far away is my hopeful plan.

I'm playing a practice game as Spain/deity near flood plains/wheat/incense and that one is going great. No doubt I'll do worse in the real thing.

 

[Snaga]

Early discovery of Monarchy or Republic will be particularly beneficial in this position as
a/ Being a religious civ, Spain suffers just 1 year of anarchy
b/ With all the flood plains and some hills in the start position, a larger than usual amount of extra food and production will become available to our core cities with a change from despotism,
c/ Under Mon/Rep the bonus wheat flood plains will make 2 turn growth with a granary possible without requiring more than 1 citizen to work the flood plains. This would provide a way of maximizing growth while minimizing the chance of disease.

I will probably aim for Monarchy early as with 10 civs and faster rival expansion it is unlikely that luxuries will be as readily available as in GOTM19, at least not without some blood letting. This research branch may also provide some valuable techs for trading, as the AI does not favor Polytheism.

The Spanish UU is more of a distraction than a serious contender for warfare. With medieval infantry available in this game, I think it is likely that the best opportunity for taking out rivals will lie with the tried and tested warrior to swordsman upgrade in the mid to late ancient era, with the later option of upgrading to MI. Hopefully this will provide enough momentum to wage later wars based on superior production, as we are unlikely to gain a technological lead until late in the game if at all.

The starting location, and the hill to the NE both appear to be strong options for building Madrid. Moving the worker NE first should provide enough information to chose between them. Moving the settler away from the floodplains in order to avoid disease does not seem wise as it throws away the early growth advantage this position offers. I haven't done the math, but my gut feel is that the extra flood plains growth should more than compensate for any losses from disease (especially if the bonus wheat is really there.)

Under PTW the AI tends to have a fondness for sneak attacking poorly defended core cities, without demanding tribute first. It will be a fine line balancing early growth with enough military units to put off rivals from attacking. I'm sure a few players will fall victim to early sackings, I just hope I'm not one of them.

My first few cities will most likely be built within 3 tiles of Madrid to maximise growth from the floodplains, minimize corruption, allow developed tile sharing and provide better defensive unit/military police sharing.

 

[Txurce]

In my practice games with India, I have been researching writing, mathematics, and currency, and getting there first in most cases. (Currency could be switched with polytheism, depending on the civs with which you have contact.) However, given that we also start with the Wheel, there's an argument to be made for researching HBR first, which allows not just for a sure trade, but also for an early horseman rush. One way to do this is to build chariots, then see if your first target has iron before deciding whether to hit them with horses or swords.

 

[Level1]

Is there any consideration of moving West? You would most likely be on a coastline (good for Harbor and possible fish, not to mention earlier galley-ing) and you'd be nearer the Incense for quicker happy help. There is still enough Forest and Hill to play with, and the worker can run the road toward the grassland for the 2nd city. Just a thought...

 

[Stone Wolf]

Originally posted by Level1
Is there any consideration of moving West? You would most likely be on a coastline (good for Harbor and possible fish, not to mention earlier galley-ing) and you'd be nearer the Incense for quicker happy help. There is still enough Forest and Hill to play with, and the worker can run the road toward the grassland for the 2nd city. Just a thought...

One problem I can see with that is that unless there is a bonus food resource in the initial nine tiles from the tile to the W, you won't have any tiles with a food production of two. Granted, the worker can irrigate quickly, but that's still a few turns gaining only 1 extra food per turn instead of two. I don't know if the more experienced people would think that's a problem, but it worries me. Now, if there is some game in the forest W/SW, or fish in the water, then it would start looking rather good.

 

[gozpel]

I whinged before about the disease, when in my 3 tries I got hit all three times before I could build a settler. This annoyed me so much I had to do another research.

I did 10 tries, clicking new game until I got floodplains (not too hard with random settings)
Now I succeeded to build my first settler 7 times and missed out 3 times. Although I got diseased twice when building second settler. Just looking at the first settler, it seems to be very random being close to 50/50 chance.

As said before, just having floodplains in your cityradius seems to trigger the effect, worked or not...but I won't try again to see if that is the fact. We probably have to wish for luck and as I suppose cracker and the team already tested the game, I'm not worried too much about being stricken by disease too early.

Only a day to go, I better keep on working on my lousy mm-skills I will need it on deity!

 

[Ribannah]

I'm hoping that Cracker had the insight to remove the possibility of disease, which is after all a more significant random element than those huts.

 

[Jove]

in a fast-paced game, your first city will get used, and burning it down is a rotten loss, DaviddesJ. Maybe the Palace Jump is a viable option at around 1200 if you think you got it under control and can survive that kind of transition. I suppose I wanted to go for it that time just to do it. Sometimes I just screw around with these civs, yknow.
I have a feeling Moonsinger will go to Republic to max commerce. I feel more comfortable with the military police, the support bonus, the happy workers all over the tiles that you get with Monarchy in a depressing Deity game. Anyone done the math on this? Under what conditions is Republic better?
ICS? I think some coastline will modify that. Chariots? It'd be cool to set the first city on a convenient horse... Defense? I never seem to have enough pikemen at Deity. Impaling their guys on fortified pikemen/musketmen is a Blast... Conquest victory in the open format? How quickly can it be done?