[BTS] Jacob's Shadow game

[krikav]

Oh, Bw, tw, ag, pot is standard. Probably nothing wrong with that. Need more map info to know.
My plan at that point would be more "hmm, Bw and The we will see."

 

[Farbulous]

I played a few more turns until BW was done. Lots of scouting accomplished.

Spoiler T25 :

Look at that... bronze in my BFC. Nice!

So far I've met Charlemagne and Tokugawa but haven't found their location yet. Pericles is just to the W of me. I've scouted around the perimeter of his territory, and WOW... that's a lot of beaver. He also has bronze very close by.


In terms of worker moves, I've pastured both cows and am almost done the camp on the ivory. I figure mine the bronze next, and then get chopping???

Three warriors built and sending them to spawnbust on hilltops near my cap. I've started building my first settler.


At this point, my plan would be to settle 1N of the gold. After settler get another worker going. Should I even bother switching to slavery if I'm not going to be doing much whipping? For tech, I'm thinking TW so that I can get the bronze online, and then maybe straight to Writing?

 

[sampsa]

Why are you not growing to size 3, then start a settler? Food bar is nearly full.

 

[krikav]

I played a few more turns until BW was done. Lots of scouting accomplished.

Spoiler T25 :

Look at that... bronze in my BFC. Nice!

So far I've met Charlemagne and Tokugawa but haven't found their location yet. Pericles is just to the W of me. I've scouted around the perimeter of his territory, and WOW... that's a lot of beaver. He also has bronze very close by.


In terms of worker moves, I've pastured both cows and am almost done the camp on the ivory. I figure mine the bronze next, and then get chopping???

Three warriors built and sending them to spawnbust on hilltops near my cap. I've started building my first settler.


At this point, my plan would be to settle 1N of the gold. After settler get another worker going. Should I even bother switching to slavery if I'm not going to be doing much whipping? For tech, I'm thinking TW so that I can get the bronze online, and then maybe straight to Writing?

No save, and the screenshots doesn't cover the entire empire, so feedback might be incomplete:

1.
Once you scouted close to the horses/marble, what was your thoughts?

2.
Mining copper gives you a tile that gives you 4 hammers per turn for as long as the tile is worked. As all 6-tile yields, thats really very good!
A worker continuing chopping non-stop in an endless forest yields how many hammers per turn?

3.
You said you sent 3 warriors to spawnbust the area around the capital, standing on hilltops. This is not how I would utilize my warriors at this moment. Speak more of how you reason, and what your current understanding of spawnbusting is.

4. Switching to slavery is probably best, if there is no urgency one usually does it when the first settler is in transit toward it's location. This has the advantage of not delaying your second city any turn, while also not burdening it with a turn of anarchy once it is up and running.
I think you should bother doing it, since you will most likely do at least some whipping in the capital, but later on you will most definently do some whipping in other cities.

5.
Wheel is probably correct to do next, but not for the reason you mention imo, but for an other reason. Can you guess?


Oh, and not getting to pop3 is a mistake, as sampsa points out.
All that food you have in your bar now, (23/24?) is 23 food that is completly stagnant. You have harvested all that food and now it is just sitting there. If you would just get a little more you would get another citizen and would be able to work the ivory.



I would recommend that you slow down the pace even more. You don't have to do this for the shadow game, but for your own sake.
It could be helpful to set a timer and really force you to spend at least 5 minutes per turn. That way I'm sure you would quickly get rid of such mistakes as that 23/24 food-bar problem.

 

[Farbulous]

No save, and the screenshots doesn't cover the entire empire, so feedback might be incomplete:

1.
Once you scouted close to the horses/marble, what was your thoughts?

2.
Mining copper gives you a tile that gives you 4 hammers per turn for as long as the tile is worked. As all 6-tile yields, thats really very good!
A worker continuing chopping non-stop in an endless forest yields how many hammers per turn?

3.
You said you sent 3 warriors to spawnbust the area around the capital, standing on hilltops. This is not how I would utilize my warriors at this moment. Speak more of how you reason, and what your current understanding of spawnbusting is.

4. Switching to slavery is probably best, if there is no urgency one usually does it when the first settler is in transit toward it's location. This has the advantage of not delaying your second city any turn, while also not burdening it with a turn of anarchy once it is up and running.
I think you should bother doing it, since you will most likely do at least some whipping in the capital, but later on you will most definently do some whipping in other cities.

5.
Wheel is probably correct to do next, but not for the reason you mention imo, but for an other reason. Can you guess?


Oh, and not getting to pop3 is a mistake, as sampsa points out.
All that food you have in your bar now, (23/24?) is 23 food that is completly stagnant. You have harvested all that food and now it is just sitting there. If you would just get a little more you would get another citizen and would be able to work the ivory.



I would recommend that you slow down the pace even more. You don't have to do this for the shadow game, but for your own sake.
It could be helpful to set a timer and really force you to spend at least 5 minutes per turn. That way I'm sure you would quickly get rid of such mistakes as that 23/24 food-bar problem.

Sorry about that! Hopefully this time around will be better.

Spoiler T27 :

I'm not sure the best way to take screenshots for this purpose, so this pic might be a bit too zoomed out, but it does show the entire empire.


I reloaded but followed mostly the same path, attempting to correct mistakes. Sitting Bull's territory starts 2S of the gold.

1. Horses/Marble seems like a good production city, but lacking any food resource. Still seems like a strong position, between Pericles and Sitting Bull. I'm not sure if that means it should take priority over the gold spot as the best place to settle first.

2. Worker chopping is worth 20 hammers (up to 30 with Math)

3. Should I be exploring with the warriors? I feel like my scout is already doing a good job and covering lots of ground. My understanding of spawnbusting is using units to prevent barbs from spawning in the fog of war. Maybe it's too early to be worrying about this, as it's still just animals that won't come inside borders. I was just following some of the recommendations from OldDude's thread, positioning units in areas where that 5x5 radius would be effective.

4. Will do. I'll make the change once my settler is built.

5. My guess would be establishing trade routes.

I'm trying to slow things down as much as possible. Examining the city, checking the advisors, thinking over troop movements. For years I've been playing this game way too fast, so it's going to be hard habit to break. Going to do my best!

 

[krikav]

1. Horses/Marble seems like a good production city, but lacking any food resource. Still seems like a strong position, between Pericles and Sitting Bull. I'm not sure if that means it should take priority over the gold spot as the best place to settle first.
What caught my eye was the floodplains. It looks like there are 2-3 of them?
Immediatly after seeing something like that, I would correct my scouts path to learn more of that location.
Nothing behind pericles place is going to change your plan for the very early expansion, but a floodplain area in your proximity might change your entire plan.
Could be pigs, stone and gems there, or more gold. The gold city is the best candidate so far. Other candidates might be revealed, but not behind pericles!

2. Worker chopping is worth 20 hammers (up to 30 with Math)
Yes, and one way of thinking of it is that your worker enters a forest (1 turn) and then chops for 3 turns, so you spend 4 worker turns getting 20 hammers. Thats 5 hammers per turn.
It shows partly how mediocre a grassland farm is (Yielding 1 food per turn), and how good a grassland copper mine is (yielding 4 hammers per turn). Or how overpowered chopping and BW really is.

I think it's way better to improve the copper mine before starting to chop, at least in theory. 4 workerturns and you get a 4 hammers per turn forever. Compared to tying up your worker to get 5 hammers per turn.


3. Should I be exploring with the warriors? I feel like my scout is already doing a good job and covering lots of ground. My understanding of spawnbusting is using units to prevent barbs from spawning in the fog of war. Maybe it's too early to be worrying about this, as it's still just animals that won't come inside borders. I was just following some of the recommendations from OldDude's thread, positioning units in areas where that 5x5 radius would be effective.
Good, the 5x5 radius is what you need to remember. This is true even if the area is still fogged.
I took a look at your save now, and the warriors are fine.
If it would have been possible, I would have prioritized getting more food earlier and getting to pop3 earlier and started the settler earlier. Possibly not building the third warrior at all, or just leaving him partially built in the queue. Starting settler as soon as we reach pop3.
The area north and east of the capital doesn't have that many tiles for barb spawns, and if we are really unlucky and get a BArcher there, we have enough production to handle it with warriors easily. We can get a warrior out every second turn.

5. My guess would be establishing trade routes.
Yes. your capital is not connected to the river.
It requires only one road, either east or southeast of your capital, to connect the capital with the gold city.
The connection between the capital and your second city is the most important connection, since it gives you two traderoutes (2C, it gives both cities trade routes), where as later cities only yield you one trade route.

 

[lymond]

On this level, I like TW>Fish>POT then Writing. You grab the bonuses to POT and Writing, and you do need those techs. (On higher levels you might streamline straight to writing)

I like the Gold spot first, then the Fish spot (noting that settling next to fish opens up the rice without border pops for either city. Horse would be next and I like settling right on the horse.

Those four cities you should get out asap. You can do so with chops in Berlin and likely without whipping. Look to grow on a warrior at times between chops to get to size 4 to work your power tiles....2 cows, copper, ivory.

First, a new worker after the 1st settler, then new settler with bits of growth to get to size 4. New worker will go improve gold in new city and road to fish. Gold city should be connected for trade routes without a road.

And yes, warriors and even the scout should be spawnbusting. On higher levels this gets even more important as barbs start appearing much earlier.

Later cities are the Crab spot - 1S of crab. A cottage helper city 1E of the plain cow E of Berlin - can eventually get sheep. You can also look to get fishy furs above Pericles if not taken.

edit: Ah yes, as krikav pointed out, Berlin is not adjacent to that river, so you just need one road between Berlin and the river to connect. After worker finishes copper, he can move 2S to start chopping, then place road on that tile for connection to river. (Knowing this is good way to save worker turns on roads.

OH..and make sure Berlin takes copper over ivory once complete.

 

[Farbulous]

If it would have been possible, I would have prioritized getting more food earlier and getting to pop3 earlier and started the settler earlier. Possibly not building the third warrior at all, or just leaving him partially built in the queue. Starting settler as soon as we reach pop3.

This is a little confusing for me. Was it possible for me to get more food earlier? I didn't think so... The third warrior straddled the growth to pop3 - 1 turn before and 1 after. Are you saying as soon as it got to pop3, switch directly to settler?

On this level, I like TW>Fish>POT then Writing. You grab the bonuses to POT and Writing, and you do need those techs. (On higher levels you might streamline straight to writing)

I like the Gold spot first, then the Fish spot (noting that settling next to fish opens up the rice without border pops for either city. Horse would be next and I like settling right on the horse.

Those four cities you should get out asap. You can do so with chops in Berlin and likely without whipping. Look to grow on a warrior at times between chops to get to size 4 to work your power tiles....2 cows, copper, ivory.

First, a new worker after the 1st settler, then new settler with bits of growth to get to size 4. New worker will go improve gold in new city and road to fish. Gold city should be connected for trade routes without a road.

And yes, warriors and even the scout should be spawnbusting. On higher levels this gets even more important as barbs start appearing much earlier.

Later cities are the Crab spot - 1S of crab. A cottage helper city 1E of the plain cow E of Berlin - can eventually get sheep. You can also look to get fishy furs above Pericles if not taken.

edit: Ah yes, as krikav pointed out, Berlin is not adjacent to that river, so you just need one road between Berlin and the river to connect. After worker finishes copper, he can move 2S to start chopping, then place road on that tile for connection to river. (Knowing this is good way to save worker turns on roads.

OH..and make sure Berlin takes copper over ivory once complete.

That is a good plan for research. When should I get AG though, so that the rice can be farmed after that fish city is in?

Hopefully by slowing down my play I can figure out the timing of growing on a warrior between chops. That's going to be a focus for me here.

Good to know about the later cities, but I think there will be more analysis before I get to that point. I'm still not 100% clear on when granaries/libraries should be built.

You responded before I could type out my response to @krikav but that was exactly my idea with the worker - after copper, head 2S to chop and then road. I'm trying to be conscious of worker turns.

Will do on grabbing copper once online.

Thank you both!!!

 

[krikav]

No problem.

I don't know if you could have gotten more food earlier, I would have to play it to find out if there is some such micro oppertunity. (Probably not) but yes, once you reach pop3, you CAN switch to settler even if that means you have a warrior at 7/15 built.

You will have to make that call in many games, and it should not be an automatic answer.
Is there a need to get the warrior out?
Can I get my second city settled a turn earlier if I go for the settler direcly?

Also, if you have been playing at lower difficulties, you will quickly notice (or you should! Look at the economic advisor tab.) that having units can really cost you in higher difficulties since the number of free units you get are way less.

 

[Farbulous]

I should be on the right track here...

Spoiler T35 :

Once copper was mined I switched production immediately to settler, leaving warrior in queue. Switched citizens to work copper.
Chopped forest 2S of copper and now starting to road. Settled 1N of gold and started building worker. Berlin is 1 turn away from another worker and the warrior is still in the queue with 1 turn left to go.

When the new worker is done in Berlin I will send down to mine gold. When 1st worker is done with road, my thought was to send him 1SE to chop (1S of ivory), ideally to get the worker in Hamburg out faster, although I could also assign the tile to Berlin and have chop go towards another settler.

@lymond should I be using barracks as a placeholder to help grow Berlin while waiting for chop? Should I let the warrior finish for the same purpose?

 

[lymond]

Oh ..you could go Ag before POT for the rice and bonus to POT, but I would get FISH first for the better resource. Again, on higher levels some of this just has to be skipped on the way to Writing. Dry rice is certainly not pressing, but on Noble you can do all this. None of these are bad early techs since they prioritize food and growth.

Another way to look at it too..well, situationally..is that if you were Creative, you could go Writing directly since AH is a must and opens up Writing. Then get up an early Library for scientists. Ofc, Berlin is a bit lower on the food scale for that at such an early stage.

(Note: What we are not doing is going for religious techs and things like IW...a common mistake by new players)

Yeah, not sure there was any way to prioritize food early any more than you did. Obviously, before the improvements the grass cow is you best food tile and the city should default to that. The thing to consider is manage the city so that it works the best food which appears to be 2F1H forest tiles until improvement are in. City should default to those but sometimes the Govnah does some odd things with citizen assignments.

Regardless, first settler a size 3 was a no-brainer, but would get to 4 before the next settler but working in a new chopped worker first...then growth,..settler using cows, copper, ivory. With chops, your new settlers/workers will come fast.

I use Imgur which has sizing options, but I believe photobucket must have a way to resize images...never used it though. Imgur is very simple to use.

I think using the warrior for growth for now is fine...

Worker in Hamburg is okay I guess, it can be chopped, but I don't usually like size 1 workers/settlers when Ham could get a bit of growth in before gold is improved. Still not entirely bad. Ham will eventually get a gran chopped in it while working improve gold for some time, then can grab an improved rice later for some growth.

warrior needs to move back toward the horse area for busting. Scouting pretty much done for the time being. once more cities are settled by you..and AI..and area secured, then the scout can go on his merry way..but not for a while yet.

 

[krikav]

How did you move your worker from the copper to where he built the road? I hope you did not waste the worker turn by moving him two moves in one turn!
Better is allways to move one step, and then do something, like pre-roadning for one turn, or making a farm for one turn.

Seeing the newly scouted land, I would really be very tempted to try grab a city by that wet corn, gold and floodplains. Settling 1N of gold on the plains tile.
If I would have played this, I think I would have settled my second city there.

Not 100% sure this would be optimal play though, since it's further away so that it takes longer to get settled, it would be difficult to connect and it costs more in maintenence.
But that spot is way more contested than the gold close by.

 

[lymond]

Great advice, but I believe he roaded in place after a chop, as advised, after moving directly from copper to the forest before. But indeed it is good to make use of half worker moves in cases where the target spot is 2 tiles away, but not a dead stop like a forest or a hill.

Gold/corn spot is good. Corn is likely to be contested by Periculture's borders but still a good spot. I'd say not a priority until closer cities are settled.

 

[Farbulous]

I understand the reason to try to settle the area to the SW, but I think it's more important to keep the cities close to my cap for the time being, as per @lymond 's suggestion.

Spoiler T48 :

After Fishing, I grabbed AG, then POT, now Writing.

Not knowing any better way to grow Berlin between settlers, I built a Barracks and 1 warrior, which timed perfectly for the 5 turns it took to get to pop4. Switched to settler but didn't use any chops to build. Workers were all closer to Hamburg, so I grabbed gold and did a bunch of pre-chopping before Pottery came in. Also pre-roaded two tiles to make sure Munich was already connected when settled, and to move the settler there faster. I pre-chopped the forest 1W of rice but once Munich was founded, moved him over to farm the rice instead. First build in Munich is a work boat. Hamburg has been building Barracks as a placeholder until Pottery, now will switch to Granary. Two workers near Berlin & Hamburg are building cottages.

The granary in Berlin, I figure I can just slow-build because it's only 4 turns, but should I put a chop into the granary in Hamburg? Once granary is done in Berlin I figure another settler, but in this case should I chop? Whip? Once the work boat is done in Munich, straight to Granary? Should I chop to help Munich build either of these once rice farm is done? I've got three workers right now, but I figure I probably need more soon, right?

So many questions! Thank you for all your guidance and advice thus far.

 

[lymond]

Definitely some good here, Farb, but there is one major problem. The workers. You are still very much in expansion mode. Chop Chop Choppity Chopperson.

Yes, it is certainly fine to put a turn here and there for the Berlin granary (not as pressing). Granaries elsewhere are.

So good that you will switch to Gran in Ham. Chop it...now. Gran can complete in Ham from chops and then afterwards start using rice to grow.

1t gran in Berlin fine, but switch to Settler next turn. worker stops cottaging and chops.

Barracks in Berlin is really a waste right now. The logic of finishing Barracks was not good as those turns of production could have been used on something important (fine to start it for growth but you did not need to finish it or just better start a warrior) Same for Ham. Starting a couple more warriors not bad as you will need them later for MP, and better to do before hooking up copper later as you start with Hunting so can't build warriors once Copper is hooked up. I do understand you were trying to grow some, which is good, and sometimes you just don't have something worthwhile to build.

I probably woulda chopped wb for Munich, but might as well finish rice and then 1pop the wb at size two into Granary.

A bit too early for cottages. Berlin worker should be chopping for more settlers.

Cottage in Ham is pointless...this is a city that will need food later (it might indeed share cottages with Berlin to help them grow for that city...but adjacent tiles will likely be better as farmed in Hamburg) Anyway that worker should be chopping.

(Note: Start analyzing your food and production bars in your cities. Understand the concepts of food and growth, and base hammers and hammer overflow. One thing to try to accomplish is finishing Granaries before the food bar reaches halfway. For instance, Hamburg has barely any accumulated food at size 1 while it finish Granary at Size 1, so no issue there. Berlin should finish at some point later before the food bar reaches halfway,or just after it grows a pop. This may seem complex at first but the idea here is that Granaries store surplus food up to half the current food bin as a city grows toward the next population size. Finishing the Granary after food reaches the half way does not give the Gran sufficient time to store food for the food bonus at the next pop. Play around with that..we can certainly discuss it more. But the point here is Granaries can be optimized based on when they are completed)

 

[Farbulous]

Definitely some good here, Farb, but there is one major problem. The workers. You are still very much in expansion mode. Chop Chop Choppity Chopperson.

Got it. I'm still not clear on chopping in terms of what is worth it or not worth it. I always wonder whether some forest tiles should be saved for chopping wonders or other important builds.

Yes, it is certainly fine to put a turn here and there for the Berlin granary (not as pressing). Granaries elsewhere are.

So good that you will switch to Gran in Ham. Chop it...now. Gran can complete in Ham from chops and then afterwards start using rice to grow.

1t gran in Berlin fine, but switch to Settler next turn. worker stops cottaging and chops.

Check and check.

Barracks in Berlin is really a waste right now. The logic of finishing Barracks was not good as those turns of production could have been used on something important (fine to start it for growth but you did not need to finish it or just better start a warrior) Same for Ham. Starting a couple more warriors not bad as you will need them later for MP, and better to do before hooking up copper later as you start with Hunting so can't build warriors once Copper is hooked up. I do understand you were trying to grow some, which is good, and sometimes you just don't have something worthwhile to build.

In a previous post you had instructed to grow, but I wasn't really clear how to accomplish this because warriors are only taking 1-2 turns to build, and I didn't want a bunch of them just sitting around. In the time it takes from pop3 to pop4 I would have had probably 3 new warriors. I guess they are the most worthwhile to build in this situation without having anything better. What does MP stand for? It has to do with garrisoning units in cities to keep pop happy, right?

I probably woulda chopped wb for Munich, but might as well finish rice and then 1pop the wb at size two into Granary.

Food is the first priority, and I wasn't sure which would be faster - chopping WB vs. getting the rice up and running, but I suppose I should be checking how many hammers WB takes to build and figuring out the difference between the number of turns to fish vs number of turns to rice in order to make the decision of which to do first. Since the worker is already in the middle of chopping, I suppose it makes sense to just let him finish.

A bit too early for cottages. Berlin worker should be chopping for more settlers.

Cottage in Ham is pointless...this is a city that will need food later (it might indeed share cottages with Berlin to help them grow for that city...but adjacent tiles will likely be better as farmed in Hamburg) Anyway that worker should be chopping.

Gotcha

(Note: Start analyzing your food and production bars in your cities. Understand the concepts of food and growth, and base hammers and hammer overflow. One thing to try to accomplish is finishing Granaries before the food bar reaches halfway. For instance, Hamburg has barely any accumulated food at size 1 while it finish Granary at Size 1, so no issue there. Berlin should finish at some point later before the food bar reaches halfway,or just after it grows a pop. This may seem complex at first but the idea here is that Granaries store surplus food up to half the current food bin as a city grows toward the next population size. Finishing the Granary after food reaches the half way does not give the Gran sufficient time to store food for the food bonus at the next pop. Play around with that..we can certainly discuss it more. But the point here is Granaries can be optimized based on when they are completed)

This is great detail about when to build granaries, thank you. I'll start taking a closer look at the production bars moving forward. I may rewind back to the previous save and implement some of this advice.

 

[krikav]

Just want to chip in really quickly on the chopping.

If you chop something that you have at least some use of here and now, that is almost always best.
Failure to chop is almost always bad.
So if you are just a tiny bit uncertain, then chop.

 

[lymond]

Basically early you are chopping workers and settlers, combined with whipping depending on the food. Fine if you leave some forest around for later, but you have plenty and sometimes adjacent forests will grow some more. Yeah, Berlin is more production heavy - very nice actually for worker/settler building without whipping - plus chopping. You can expand very quick with that city. Yeah, warriors may come quick with that many hammers and you certainly don't want too many of them. The point was to grow to size 4 after the first settler/2nd worker using something, but not necessarily finishing that something. In other words, you don't have to finish something you start ..just keep it in queue for later.

You could have probably done fine at Size3 with cows/copper for settler worker production, but the idea was to kinda gradually get to 4 for that ivory for more hammers.

But let's look at this another way. Take the Gilgamesh NC game going on (I think you looked at that start but if not ..do). Basically the logical settling spots for that cap give at least 2 if not 3 very strong food tiles. With that cap I would far more emphasize the whip because of food. You would not even see me build a mine in that city for ages. So lots of whipping and chopping. Generally, and hopefully, that is more the case of having more food. So the point is you are playing the map. In your case you have a lower food/higher hammer start, so limited to no early whipping from the cap cause you want to work the best tiles, but aren't going to grow fast cause low food. Chops will speed up everything.

Well, wb is prioritizing the food so it is about how fast you can get it out. 20h chop won't finish it but if you have that chop going while the city works more hammers briefly you can get it real fast. (Conversely, let's say that rice was a pig or wet corn, but there was still some seafood there. I would probably have ignored Fishing for some time.)

MP is Military Police, so yeah, it is having units in your cities later for happiness. Warriors are nice for that, but yeah too many too early can cost a lot. Not big deal on Noble, but the cost goes up a lot on higher difficulties, where you really have to find a balance there.

Lastly, another little concept or rule that may help you is to "always work best tiles..whip the rest). In Berlin, the cows and the copper are the "best tiles"..these are 3 very strong tiles that are at least "food neutral" (copper) or "food positive". Ivory is not classified as a best tile. The ivory is "food negative" and basically the same as a riverside grass mine. In Ham, gold is a best tile...yes gold is "food negative" but the tile has another very important benefit...although you certainly might whip off a gold tile in a city with actually good growth - or the ability to tile share that gold tile with another city. In Munich, the Fish is obviously a "best tile", dry rice not so much.

So the priority is to get up those "best tiles" - generally high food tiles. Maybe sometimes you luck on a grass copper tile which is sweet. These tiles always worked. Workers Chop. Whip off the rest.

So everything else improvement wise other than the "specials" (food, copper, gold, fish) at this stage of the game, for workers, is non-essential. (and just those roads absolutely needed to connect a trade route...we are not even roading copper yet)

This is great detail about when to build granaries, thank you. I'll start taking a closer look at the production bars moving forward. I may rewind back to the previous save and implement some of this advice.

Yeah, another point here, as you analyze and micro your cites more frequently now, start taking a look at food bars the turn after a city grows. How much food is in the bin? Now, once a granary is finished, look at the bin in the city after it grows another pop later and ask the same question.

 

[Farbulous]

I did go back and reload from the previous save, and focused a lot more on chopping. I'm at the point now where I only have a few forests left in Berlin.

Spoiler T50 :

Berlin will finish granary in 2 turns. Both workers near Berlin have been chopping, and I had moved them to the forests where they are now to continue chopping. I figure the next build is a settler, to go on top of the horse.

Hamburg was growing on barracks, but as soon as POT was in I switched to granary. Still 59 turns to go at this point, so chop chop chop, starting with the two grass hills. Is it too early to build mines? When do I start building cottages?

Munich is 7 turns from WB, then will go to granary. When the rice is farmed, should I assign the tile to Hamburg? Build a mine on the plains hill 1S of rice? Am I good to chop all the remaining forests around Hamburg/Munich?

Should I build a fifth city up by the crab? Maybe 1S of crab?

 

[Oblivionyx]

I'm really no gameplay expert, but it looks to me like the desert 1W of the horse would be a nice place to settle. You'd get the of the improved horses as well as the three floodplains with a border pop.

Of course the horses can be pillaged, and you'd need to build a building to get the floodplains... but like I said, I'm not a gameplay expert.

I'm curious as to why nobody suggested monuments. Is Mysticism for the monuments + border pops not a good idea early on?