Improving on Monarch level

[kevtrev]

- Where does the third city go? I would consider somewhere around X2/X3 to block Monty (preferably X2 to secure the sheep?). Or towards East (around X1)? Or maybe in the Southeast around crabs/sheep?
- What should my Worker do next? I'd say a Cottage 1W of the farmed FP or do I need that tile possibly for another farm for Uppsala as I don't see any other option to farm something and improve food supply for this city before the borders get pushed (not soon)? On the other hand I really don't need more food for the capital and would normally prefer a cottage there. Or should I prioritize connecting the cities?
- I guess I should consider whipping a Worker when the capital is at size 4 again as my only Worker starts to get overloaded with 3 cities. During the regrow phase I'd build a Granary (and maybe chop it partially).
- Defense? Is that enough what I have? Can I really wait with Archery until I have Alpha and can trade it?

-Ask yourself how many cities you want and need before you start your elepult. Which cities are going to produce your army? Which cities are going to produce your commerce? Are you also going to try to produce a GS for an early academy in Nidaros? You still have to tech or trade alpha, maths, masonry, construction and HBR. At the moment you have 1 cottagable city with lot of food well placed for sharing (the cap) and one reasonable city that can either work tiles or grow cottages for the capital. You have 1 happy resource meaning happy cap in the capital is 7 and in other cities is 6.

-Who's your first target? Monty, right?

-Which contested sites are available? You can tell from Monty's borders that he's settled on the copper That might get razed and resettled. Mansa's settled his second city away from the gold so you should beat him to it if you still want it.

My plan would be:

-settle 1W (or maybe 2W) of the gold and run tiles. It might lose the fp SE but it has two others and grassland too. Work cottages and gold if you have access to it. Build granary and library.

-send worker with settler to improve 2 fps

-1-whip worker in Uppsala (change production now)

-regrow cap to 4 and whip another settler...

-...and settle at X3. This city can either run cottages or whip troops and in the long term has access to +13 at size 4.

-not to farm any more of the capital's cottage tiles. If the worker has spare turns start the road to Uppsala or start a cottage 1N of cap.

Just my take on it...

 

[pandamancer]

Setlle x2 at 1S.

Settling this spot is also an alternative. this deprives monty to expand. But your next city must be x1 or near x1 to gain copper asap.

 

[Todelotti]

Settling the city there was a mistake when Giggles settles where he was earlier. Like I wrote at least twice...

OK, but I've read and understood your arguments, I believe (or maybe not ) However, I was worried that Giggles might NOT settle where he was earlier but move 1S, i.e. onto the same tile where I would have been. What then? I couldn't have returned in time anymore to the spot where I have settled now. Instead only one tile south and that would have been, I think, an even worse location than now because I hadn't even the FP in reach. OK, OK, I could have followed your first proposal and just waited what Giggles does and not move at all or abandon the Ivory and aim for trading it later with Gilgamesh as Seraiel said. I had to deal with lots of contradicting opinions and had the feeling I must decide now without asking further before it gets annoying as we already had spent a page with a single move.

Think I'd settle 1N of your X1 spot.

OK, sounds better than X1 since the capital's border expansion will happen in 6 turns anyway.

Setlle x2 at 1S.

On the flood plain, right? Because it's away from useless coastal tiles and because of fresh water?

I've uploaded the current game save now.

 

[Seraiel]

I didn't look closely enough and didn't see that the sheep were not available because of monty. With the sheeps gone, I'd also settle x1 and then sheep / seafood and stop afterward's, because Elepult only needs 3-4 cities.

You should use Oracle for Construction btw. imo.

 

[Pangaea]

OK, but I've read and understood your arguments, I believe (or maybe not ) However, I was worried that Giggles might NOT settle where he was earlier but move 1S, i.e. onto the same tile where I would have been. What then? I couldn't have returned in time anymore to the spot where I have settled now. Instead only one tile south and that would have been, I think, an even worse location than now because I hadn't even the FP in reach. OK, OK, I could have followed your first proposal and just waited what Giggles does and not move at all or abandon the Ivory and aim for trading it later with Gilgamesh as Seraiel said. I had to deal with lots of contradicting opinions and had the feeling I must decide now without asking further before it gets annoying as we already had spent a page with a single move.

Not even an AI can move into a jungle tile and settle there on the same turn. If Giggles moved 1S to settle where you had originally intended (1SW of corn), then you could have moved your settler to the river and settled in the same turn. When moving onto tiles like that, non-hills, non-forests, then you can move and settle in the same turn, as a settler has 2 moves. But it's water under the bridge now. Good luck

 

[Todelotti]

Pangaea, I see now that I messed up the different ideas here. Somehow I thought you proposed to move 1N into the Jungle (but that was another proposal), wait what Giggles does and if he had moved 1S then move back to the river (which wouldn't have worked because that's 2 tiles away and I couldn't have settled within the same turn). But your actual idea was to not move at all and wait. Then moving to the river and settling in one turn had worked.

Sorry!

 

[Pangaea]

Yes, that was my idea. There were many different proposals floating about, however, so probably easy to mix them up. Hopefully you'll still do well even if that 2nd city is food starved. It will be a little trickier to whip out an army fast when one of your cities re-grows so slowly.

 

[pandamancer]

Thanks for posting a save, looks clearer now.

• Uppsala should do Granary now (you have many warriors already).
• After viewing your culture rate, I think your should consider 1N of X1 instead of X1 because once the border pops in the capital, the copper is covered. (move your eastern Default warrior back to escort it... not the NE warrior)
• You might want to sacrifice another riverside grassland for farming to hasten the growth of Uppsala.
• Worker steal from Monty by your western warrior
• Put spy points on Mansa.

 

[Todelotti]

Pangaea, is it OK if I go back to turn 38 and replay from there? I know I could still win from the current turn with the help of you all. However, this thread is all about the right early turns and less about escaping from mistakes that I made because I misunderstood a recommendation. I'd really prefer to go back.

 

[Todelotti]

I didn't look closely enough and didn't see that the sheep were not available because of monty. With the sheeps gone, I'd also settle x1 and then sheep / seafood and stop afterward's, because Elepult only needs 3-4 cities.

You should use Oracle for Construction btw. imo.

Why is the sheep not available? If I would settle on the red dot as you proposed the sheep would be in the first ring and for Monty only in the second ring because his city is on the copper. Also Monty isn't CREative, so it's unlikely that he will push borders before I'm there with my Settler. Isn't it rather safe that I can hold the sheep?

 

[Seraiel]

I cannot look well enough from my stupid handy, sry. Yes, ofc, you will get the sheep and it's unlikely you'll lose them because it's very hard to lose tiles in the first ring.

You also don't need to replay, that sheep spot is on par with the ivory /corn spot, So everything is still good, right?

 

[Seraiel]

You btw. have a city-dot tool if you use BUG or BUFFY. Press Alt + X, then you don't have to mark those spots manually via paint, and it's also very useful because it marks the BFC.

 

[Todelotti]

I cannot look well enough from my stupid handy, sry. Yes, ofc, you will get the sheep and it's unlikely you'll lose them because it's very hard to lose tiles in the first ring.

You also don't need to replay, that sheep spot is on par with the ivory /corn spot, So everything is still good, right?

But I have the crappy city 1E of the River-Ivory if I don't replay. My plan would be: Go back to turn 38, DON'T found the crap city 1E of River-Ivory but go instead to the red dot and settle there (basically Pangaea's plan).

 

[Seraiel]

Oh, why did you found that crappy city that doesn't even have food? I wrote go to the next spot, you'll get the Ivory either through trade or throuch your capital.

If you founded that city, ofc, replay. I recently wrote an article on city placement, it's in the strategy's section, maybe you wanna read it.

 

[Pangaea]

You're fine to replay for me too. Founding that city isn't going to help you all that much, particularly as you'll grab ivory any moment with the capital border expansion anyway, and that should be enough to keep them in your cultural border as that ivory is in Giggles' third ring.

Making mistakes, replaying and seeing how different the outcome is, can actually be very good for learning. I did that several times in the Deity learning thread I posted a while ago after making mistakes, and it was quite instructive. So go right ahead

 

[Todelotti]

Oh, why did you found that crappy city that doesn't even have food? I wrote go to the next spot, you'll get the Ivory either through trade or throuch your capital.

If you founded that city, ofc, replay. I recently wrote an article on city placement, it's in the strategy's section, maybe you wanna read it.

Yeah, but you wrote that after I had already made the disastrous turn. Pangaea recommended the same but I misunderstood it. And there were a lot of other ideas. I somehow messed all that up and did it wrong.

Found your article and will read it.

 

[Todelotti]

You're fine to replay for me too. Founding that city isn't going to help you all that much, particularly as you'll grab ivory any moment with the capital border expansion anyway, and that should be enough to keep them in your cultural border as that ivory is in Giggles' third ring.

Making mistakes, replaying and seeing how different the outcome is, can actually be very good for learning. I did that several times in the Deity learning thread I posted a while ago after making mistakes, and it was quite instructive. So go right ahead

Sigh of relief...

One question about the new city 2. I'm following Seraiel's advice here to put it in front of Monty. Seraiel's proposal was the red dot (see my former screenshot). That's on a flood plain. Why settling on this FP? Don't we need it for food at the moment (remember I don't have Animal Husbandry and can't build a pasture on the sheep). Earlier we had the tile 1N or 1E of the FP in mind. I would exclude 1E now because the sheep wouldn't be in the first ring and we already know that Monty's borders touch the sheep. But why isn't 1N better because then we would have the FP for food available? Do we want to avoid having the coastal tiles in the BFC? Do we want to have the forest for chopping available?

 

[Seraiel]

Settling at the lake gives you freshwater, so +2 . You also get 3 more forests.

From my perspective, you can settle on any of the 3 mentioned spots. 1N hives you an additional FP but loses Freshwater + Forests, 2N gives you nice FIN coast but I think 1 less FP and no wine.

I thought, the city might work as a GP farm, so grow large. That's why I valued Freshwater over 1 morw FP. 3 more Forests are also nice when comes to building the NE or the GL.

 

[Pangaea]

Usually don't like settling on FPs, but more forests for chopping an army is useful here, and the extra health is nice too. Wouldn't settle 2N though as that kills the seafood, that you probably want to backfill for later on that little edge in the land in the most recent screenshot.

Edit: With this city, capital and 1N of X1, you'll have three good starting cities. Since you don't have AH yet, probably best to farm the floodplain that is saved in the sheep-city.

 

[Todelotti]

Turn 48 - 2080 BC (Replay from Turn 38)

Sorry for the chaos! After replaying from turn 38 I've now just founded the third city.

I have skipped the Settler turn this time as Pangaea recommended and Gilgamesh settled where he was. So, we don't need to build a city at the Ivory but wait until the capital borders expand over the southern Ivory tile. Uppsala is now in front of Monty (on the flood plain tile) and Haithabu (the 3rd city) is east of the capital.

For some reason I had a Wolf in my Scout's way this time and went a route south around Mansa's empire to run away from the Wolf. On the way I met Ramesses as the next civ (he is east of Mansa). He is able to sign Open Borders so he must have Writing already. Also this time not the Great Wall has been built but Stonehenge instead.

I've put a Granary into Uppsala's production queue as pandamancer suggested (a little late however after I already had spent a few turns on a Warrior). The capital (currently at size 2 after whipping) is building a Granary as well. Also Haithabu as the first build. The Worker is farming the Uppsala flood plain. I've also put more spy points on Mansa following pandamancer's advice. I'm not sure however why on Mansa because he already has the most spy points applied as he was the first one I met. Why more spy points on Mansa?

I'm not sure if Pangaea's fogbuster map is still up-to-date with the current situation. I've placed and fortified a Warrior 1S of the mountain in the north-east direction. One warrior each work as city garrison in Nidaros and Uppsala. The 4th warrior is on the way to the tile 2W of the gold to work as fogbuster there. Or is it better to move him into Haithabu as city garrison? I guess the northern fogbuster is not needed anymore because Gilgamesh settled there.

What are the next steps, especially the build plan for the 3 cities? Do we want to chop the Granaries? Otherwise it takes a lot of turns to complete. Or better build other stuff (a second Worker for instance)? What are the Worker's priorities?

I've attached a screenshot of the current map and a game save.