(hard?) deity Winnie

[soundjata]

Hello deity girls and boys
Could this be the hardcore map you are looking for ?
@Fippy

Leader is Winston Churchill who has been known for getting good deals out of bad wars

Map is fractal and the start looks rich

Played 11 turns and I am already lost on the way forward

Spoiler :

Cottage the desert or what ?

Shadow-players and Coach-advisors are welcome


Adundo (thinking forward):

Spoiler :

AH is obviously a research trap.
Commerce is rather constrained (work the lake).
Hunting is an asset as Deer is available for city #2 and Archery is close.
The great lighthouse looks like the only way to diligent a non asthmatic economy.

All of Bronze Working, Sailing and Archery look appealing right now but we need to get the priority right...

 

[sampsa]

A decent 3-city core and GLH is auto-win.

 

[Major Tom]

7 forests in BFC screaming to be chopped. With marble, failgold could power research. Would go BW/worker now. In the meantime, scouting will probably reveal if iso mode are in the cards.

 

[soundjata]

A decent 3-city core and GLH is auto-win.

you mean desert + sheep is decent ?

 

[sampsa]

I'd go NE and the ph NW.

Of course, "auto-win" might not be so auto-win if there are no good spots to the west.

 

[danjuno]

Is an Oracle slingshot possible this high up? I'd assume not, but I'm kind of curious if anyone's ever pulled it off.

More realistically, what would be the best marble wonder to get failgold from?

 

[sampsa]

Is an Oracle slingshot possible this high up? I'd assume not, but I'm kind of curious if anyone's ever pulled it off.

More realistically, what would be the best marble wonder to get failgold from?

Yes it's possible, but you get monarchy pretty much - a tech that every AI will trade you even if they have a monopoly on it. What is the best marble wonder to failgold depends a bit on what you mean by best. ToA if you can get poly fast enough. Realistically it will be aesth/lit wonders though. Epics are great as you can put into them in every city.

 

[pi-r8]

A decent 3-city core and GLH is auto-win.

out of curiosity, how would you play this if you couldn't build the GLH? It seems like such a massively powerful wonder for water-heavy maps that nothing else even comes close.

 

[sampsa]

out of curiosity, how would you play this if you couldn't build the GLH? It seems like such a massively powerful wonder for water-heavy maps that nothing else even comes close.

Aesth-line for marble failgold.

 

[soundjata]

Oh but hunting does not belong to our starting techs does it ?

 

[Nick723]

Nice map! I’m curious about your playing of the start, did you work things out or was it instinctive to go work boat first and then grow to size 2?

With these types of starts, I would really push to avoid archery, one warrior can block off the land to the west. Bronze working next for sure

As well as the city sites @sampsa has suggested, you could do a 4th 1S1E of where the warrior is.

 

[soundjata]

@Nick723 kind of instinct and a bit of thinking as well. Worker first means much iddle time.
Went WB first with max hammers (6 turns) and then found it was possible to sync size 2 with warrior
(can't remember if it required a switch from 3F to 2F1H when the work boat is on the way...)

Now it's turn 58

Spoiler :

We nabbed GLH this turn.
Tacticts was avoid unnecessary techs (BW>Sail>Mason) and the fogbusting was performed by mister orange and mister purple.
Production included Worker > Settler > Worker at size 2 in the cap.
Then chop LH, partial settler, chop 90% of TGLH, 2 pop whip settler and here we are.
Domestics:

Resources:

Now city 3 @sampsa brown hill still ?

 

[Nick723]

I think you can take the question mark out of the title now!

 

[sampsa]

Yeh I'd still go for the brown hill.

edit: glad that GLH didn't auto-win

 

[soundjata]

Should we beeline Writing now or take a detour through TW and pottery ?

We should be able to establish coastal connection with some AI in the near future, enabling lucrative traderoutes.

Do we still benefit from open border 2 if we don't know writing ourselves?

 

[sampsa]

Should we beeline Writing now or take a detour through TW and pottery ?

We should be able to establish coastal connection with some AI in the near future, enabling lucrative traderoutes.

Do we still benefit from open border 2 if we don't know writing ourselves?

By 2 I suppose you mean foreign trade routes? Yes, it doesn't require writing, it requires OB.

On first thought I don't think writing gives you that much? Probably not the time for libraries really. With GLH rexing is so much better.

 

[Nick723]

Should we beeline Writing now or take a detour through TW and pottery ?

We should be able to establish coastal connection with some AI in the near future, enabling lucrative traderoutes.

Do we still benefit from open border 2 if we don't know writing ourselves?

Just on this, the barb city blocks the path to the north, and possibly also to the south. If there’s a way open south definitely worth keeping that fog busted to avoid further barb cities.

Tech wise I’d really like the wheel, but also on the useful tech list is mysticism which you may also want to throw in before writing.

ps - I don’t think your warrior is placed to block barb movements at the moment and so you’re a bit exposed.

 

[soundjata]

Nice sharing @drewisfat
Indeed the barb city is not blocking against coastal traderoutes in my game.

Sadly I sent my scouting boat north instead of south and met an ice block
Time to delete those precious 30 hammers and get another scout-boat south.

A view of the coastline. We can connect through north and south.

Also mister orange dowed mister purple this turn (T66) and we just met madam pink who's also at war (or plotting)

@Nick723 there's a single barb archer on the peninsula and we are shielded by an orange scout + a purple bowman

Nubian will be expensive to take. Maybe culturalize it ?

 

[Fippy]

Cheers for mentioning me, currently not in the mood for playing much.
I find maps with lots of barb trouble & being in the middle of dangerous AIs more difficult tbh
Nice barb blocking here. I think Nubian plays no role and traderoutes will go thru south.

 

[soundjata]

Update on T75 (1000 BC)

Spoiler :

Still trying to establish trade routes, we are getting close.
A 90/100 settler is queued in London, ready to be dumped in a few turns at "culture city location"
There's a road in progress and a safety axe coming out of "safety axe city", which is the kind of investment Winnie would rather have avoided (@drewisfat early warriors approach)
3 granaries were whipped last turn, as writing was completed.
We prepare a galley to get to the silver.

If Nubian builds a monument we're toast.

Now's maybe time for thinking of a winning strategy.
Here is what we got :

It's not much but it's something.

Culture city has 4 forests. What's the deal? :winston_with_cigar: