Gr10 - 5CC AWE

[Greebley]

We are going to try Always War at Emperor level with 5 cities

Parameters:
Patch: 1.22 C3C
Level: Emporer
Variant: Always War No initial trade
Loose 5CC - we must have only 5 cities when we end a turn
Civilization: Ottomans
Water: 70%
Map Type: Continents
Size:Standard
Age: Random
Temperature: Random
Climate: Random
Barbarians: Sedentary
Rivals: Random
AI Aggression: Normal
Victory Condition: Standard
Culturally linked starts: OFF
Respawn: Off
Preserve Random Seed: On
Cultural Conversion: On
Requirement to play: At least one win in an AWE game.

I will be away this weekend but hope to be able to post and reply.

Roster:
ThERat
Northern Pike
Obormot
M60A3TTS
Greebley

 

[Greebley]

Here are things we need to decide:

1) What Civ do people want to play?
2) True 5CC allows for a maximum of 5 cities at any one time. There is a variant that works well with AW where the requirement is that you must have 5 cities at the end of your turn. In other words you can capture and abandon cities during a single turn. The advantage is a pretty big one - if you capture 3 cities on one turn you can form a second army. If you capture 7 cities in one turn you can form a third army, you would need 11 cities for a 4th, etc.

Trying to grab multiple cities is a lot of fun and adds to the game IMO. On the other hand, I don't know of any AW games that have won as a pure 5CC on Standard Continents (though they probably exist)
So the question is whether we want a slightly easier challenge or a harder one? I like both so it is hard for me to vote. How about the rest of you? Which would you prefer?
3) What % water would we want? My thought it to go for 80% if we play strict 5CC and 70% if we play the looser version.
4) I generally prefer playing AW on continents as it means you have to think and plan ahead. If someone feels strongly about playing pangea we can discuss this as well.

 

[ThERat]

I'd vote for Ottomans (very strong UU), loose 5CC (it's really fun to coordinate those captures) and 70% continents

 

[Ansar]

lurker's comment: Lurking, this shall be good. good luck!

 

[Obormot]

Sipahis rock (and ottoman traits too), but to take real advantage of them we'll need to get MT before AI gets rifles and that means fast research along the bottom branch in the MA, not just relying on TGL. I like that kind of game, but it may be very difficult with 5 cities having to pay huge army support. Maybe we can try india, we'll have another superb mounted UU, but one that comes much earlier. Ottomans are fine with me too though.

I don't know about the variant version. Extra armies is nice and keeping cities for a turn before hitting enter may help with troop movement. But if you want to play strict version that's also fine.

The problem with 80% water is that we might get contacts really soon on that kind of maps. I would go for 70% water.

 

[Northern Pike]

Loose 5CC, 70% water, and continents are fine with me. Regarding our civ, though, I'm concerned that since the game will probably be won or lost early, the Sips might come along too late to matter. Predictable though it would be, perhaps we should choose one of the early-conquest standbys, say the Persians or the Iroquois. [Cross-post with Obormot--not easy to do at 4:36 in the morning. ]

 

[Obormot]

It's 12:45 here

 

[Greebley]

Ok, I am back. Lets try the Ottomans at that seems to be the consensus - we can always try another game if this one fails.

We will go with the Loose 5CC - I agree it is a lot of fun - and 70% water.

It is late tonight so I will likely start this up tomorrow or Tuesday.

Updated first post

 

[drakdan]

I want in if the slot is still open.

What experience do you have with always war games?

None. Is that significant?

 

[Greebley]

What experience do you have with always war games?

 

[M60A3TTS]

If the last spot isn't yet taken...

I do have at least one win in AWE.

 

[Greebley]

I want in if the slot is still open.



None. Is that significant?

Always war plays a bit differently. This variant requires some expertise in getting very low kill ratios. This could also be a difficult game to win and a single player getting larger losses could kill it.

As such I think I do want someone with at least one AWE win. I don't like discouraging new players, but this game is probably not suitable for learning Always War games. I do encourage you to join another such game. AW is fun.

M60A3TTS,
Ok you are in.

 

[Greebley]

The start was non-straightforward enough, that I thought it worth posting the 4000 BC screenshot to discuss the first 20 turns.

I moved the worker (only) and haven't made a decision to settle yet. I am unsure on when is best to cut down the deer forest. It may be that I should have immediately moved the worker on the deer - I thought of that, but that reduces the shields at the beginning which may not be best.

In any case, I will wait until tomorrow to play so feel free to comment.

Note that the worker and the settler are on bonus grasslands.

Here it is:

 

[M60A3TTS]

I'd chop the deer and irrigate. With 4 BGs showing and 4 forest tiles, plus the 3 grass tiles in the fog that may have even more BGs, I don't see production being an issue.

 

[Obormot]

Good idea to post the starting screenshot, i like to discuss some details in SGs

We shoul definitely chop/irrigate the deer, but the question is when is the best time for this. Since irrigated game is exactly eqavilent to irrigated wheat i think we should improve the wheat tile first - same food in less worker turns.

To get wheat irrigated ASAP i would move the settler 1 tile E and settle on the BG so that we can get the wheat tile irrigated ASAP. Wasting a BG is not much of a concern with so many other BGs & game forest that we can use for shields before chopping, but fast early growth is vital.

After that i think we should improve several BGs, and get some production quickly to build some defenses. I think that with all the shields we have and playing AW building barracks early is a good idea (perhaps after 1 warrior) and then we'll be able to build a vet spear to protect ourselves from initial AI stacks.

I don't know if we want a granary in the capital or not, we only need to pump out 4 settlers, but on the other hand with limited number of cities we want existing ones to grow faster the usual. We'll also need some workers.

No sure about science. Played too much gotm and no AW lately so first thing that came to my mind was republic slingshot . Perhaps IW then Literature would be better.

 

[ThERat]

agree with settling one tile east, all the non BG are without river access So, no choice but to waste 1 BG. Irrigate the deer after chopping (chop used for granary or settler).
We need to scout the territory since settling optimal cities will be crucial here.

As for research, I'd say IW then literaure and the GL slingshot? Or do we try a philo gamble?


another comment: I read yesterday a little on the RBCiv forums and they might be right. Civ4 SG's suffer from too little discussions, so let's keep on discussing here about strategies and moves. for showing the starting position for discussions!

 

[Obormot]

I would chop the game forest a bit later and i would either time it so that the chop is completed just before the granary is built, or after a second town that can share the tile is founded. There is no use for one town to work 2 tiles with +2 food and no shields when it is small and has no granary, +6 fpt is inefficent (only a little better then +4 fpt that we'll have from irrigating the wheat only) and we'll loose some production which is necessary for an AW game start.

I think that since we chose ottomans, the best startegy for us would be to get fast self-research to take advantage of the sci trait and the UU. I would still build TGL in an AW game to get techs from the AI, but i would not stop research after building it, it is only emperor and the AI will be slow and we better get to sipahis soon. I would proceed and research techs that the AI ignores like currency to get into MA faster and then beeline to MT. Attempting to get philosophy seems to be a good idea, but then we better get and expensive tech from it. So if we go for philosophy we better research math before it so that we can take currency for free. Math is also good because it allows to build cats. So i would go IW, Alphabet, Math, Writing, Philo, Currency (hopefully free), Literature. If we want a granry we should insert pottery after IW. Before deciding whether to build it or not i would explore the area around the capital a bit.

 

[Northern Pike]

I agree with the emerging consensus--settle where the worker is, research IW, wait a bit before chopping the deer forest. We have to kill a BG to get a river site in range of the deer and the wheat, so there's no use worrying about it.

 

[Greebley]

Ya, I like the move to the east too. The town will have a lot of hills which will make it strong in the long run.

Researching IW first sounds fine to me. I will do some limited exploring of close by. We can be more extensive once we feel we have a solid hold on the capitol. It is easy to lose a game in the first few turns and I want to avoid that.

 

[Greebley]

I was unable to play last night. ThERat, why don't you start us off as I may have to work tonight. I will attach the save. If the save hasn't moved the worker, then move it as in the picture above.

Roster:
ThERat - Up
Northern Pike - On Deck
Obormot
M60A3TTS
Greebley