Jorissimo's opening training shadow thread

[jorissimo]

Ironically I found some time to play today. T100:

Spoiler :

I have:
- Sailing, Agri, Metal Casting, Iron Working, Hunting, Pottery, Masonry, Mysticism, Writing
- 5 cities
- 27 pop
- 4 warrior, 3 axes, 5 workers
- 14 cottages, 10 mines, 5 hamlets, 4 villages, 2 farms, 2 fishing boats, 1 camp
- 137 bpt at 100%

Rather sloppy play this round I admit (time pressure is a b*tch), but 137 bpt is actually right at my existing record for t100 (with Pacal). The GLH got built on this turn, so I should get a bit of failgold from Utica (iron silver). Carthage grew on cottages while finishing the granary, then went settler in 6 turns (Kerkouane). After that, it went for a library while working at least 1 mine. Slider to 0 for most of the time it was building the library (I needed to finish MC because a barb galley had spawned). Then monument (mistake, should have been an axe as I had 'fear for our safety' unhappiness). Then an axe, for which I needed to divert population points to work those plains forests because I was starving, really not ideal, I know. Now working on a forge. Kerkouane borrowed the corn for a bit, now Carthage has it back. Unhealth is an issue, meaning I could go for the rice spot (aiming for a size 10 capital at 1 AD). Most cities went granary - lighthouse (those with seafood) - library - lighthouse (cities with no seafood), whipping whenever possible (except Hadru, which was working that mine to get the library out faster). When Kerkouane was settled it finished the granary on the same turn because the forests had been pre-chopped and the workers were in place. Hippo mixed in a trireme, but the galley wasn't pathing for some reason so it was a waste. It will serve to upgrade to a caravel later. Now both Carthage and Hippo are running 2 scientists each. If Carthage spawns a GE, it could bulb Machinery à la @Fippy , but I'm not sure about that. I would need to get an additional GS from somewhere.

Something else I realized is that I should have built some scouts to prevent galley spawns.

 

[Nick723]

Hard to tell from screenshot but do you have the deer roaded? That’s one extra health.

Personally I don’t like the machinery build and would stop running scientists in Carthage and instead run them in Hadramentum. But not sure if too late to avoid…

 

[jorissimo]

Hard to tell from screenshot but do you have the deer roaded? That’s one extra health.

Good point, forgot about that

Personally I don’t like the machinery build and would stop running scientists in Carthage and instead run them in Hadramentum. But not sure if too late to avoid…

The problem with Hadru is that it has to be working those silver mines. Utica doesn't have enough food for that.

 

[jorissimo]

And shadow opening 1 is a wrap! 25 AD Optics:

Spoiler :

That's it. Optics has been reached. One trireme has been upgraded to a caravel. If I were to continue this game, I should ideally have another caravel ready or whip one in Hippo. Astro must be single-bulbed, as the first GP was a GE that I'm saving for a GA. I would also probably start a settler whipping round for 5 more cities, bringing me to 10. I'm GNP leader by a wide margin. Thanks for all of your input! Will do a post looking back on the game and lessons learned.

 

[jorissimo]

Just gathering some thoughts here. The most contested decision points in this game were 1. early tech path, 2. where to settle the second city, and 3. whether to go early Mids or not (a bit moot because I ended up building them anyway).

Tech path
@chinemol suggested Agg - Hunting - TW - BW or Agg - BW - TW (more or less)
@a pen-dragon suggested Agg->BW->TW->pottery(->hunting?)
@Fippy suggested Agri - Hunting - TW - Pottery - BW (more or less)
@soundjata agreed with Pottery before BW, and later pointed out that Hunting before Pottery was better, which led me to switch.

I ended up following @a pen-dragon 's suggestion (except for switching Hunting with Pottery later), which netted me high early production but a lack of commerce that would eventually motivate the silver settle for C2.

C2+ location
By far the most contested decision.
My original idea was to settle a city on or next to the stone, initially 1W of the stone before revealing the fish and after that 1NW of the stone.
@soundjata questioned this, claiming stone/fish and early Mids were a trap (more on this in the next point), instead suggesting the silver settle. I ended up following this advice.
@Fippy defended stone and Mids, claiming the discovery of fish made it a valid settle.
@sampsa went C2 on the stone and C3 east by the rice, citing fast connection between all 3 with a single road.
@drewisfat suggested C2 on the ph 2N3W from the capital, citing low maintenance, fast connections, ph hammer, no worker turns.

Looking back I'm intrigued by @sampsa 's and @drewisfat 's suggestions. Under normal circumstances, I would have gone TW before BW in a situation where I need it to connect the second city. Not so sure what made me go BW first this time. If I replayed this, I would have gone TW first. Close cities with fast connections and early Pottery would have been the fastest way to set up this empire, given we didn't know about the copper.

early Mids
Most people were against early Mids, considering it a distraction. @Fippy was a strong proponent after fish was discovered near the stone. @sampsa 's opening vibed with this idea as well, settling on the stone. I initially went with the Mids-skeptics, but eventually ended up getting it anyway even though I would have been content with fail gold.

 

[jorissimo]

It's time for shadow opening 2. I rolled another Fractal with a random leader and took the first start I rolled. We got Wang Kon (Fin/Prot, starts with Mining and Mysticism):

Spoiler :

Now look at that. A textbook case of SOG^TM

Probably warrior 1E or 1NE to check for seafood. But then, SOG anyway

But what then. Hunting - AH seems obvious. Build a settler at size 3 working pigs, ivory and a mine. After that, TW and then Pottery before BW because we have the floodplains. Will the worker be idle? Not really, it can mine. The only question is how to get to Pottery, which requires either Fishing or Agri. If we find an agri resource for a second city, it can be justified. Otherwise Fishing, which is cheaper. In any case, BW will come quite late with this tech path, but with the gold city tile and the ivory, we have strong commerce so it shouldn't take that long.

 

[jorissimo]

T1, after settlement:

Spoiler :

After settlement. Ignore the capital building a warrior, that's supposed to be a worker (brainglitch). The rest of the plan lined out above stays the same.
Also, somebody has 21000 soldiers. Mansa or Hammy?

 

[soundjata]

I think agri > bw is a fine opener (farm a floodplain > chop everything)

 

[sampsa]

I'd guess agri-BW is better than hunting-AH, but you should take a look at it.

 

[jorissimo]

Hunting - AH:
worker done: t13
Hunting done: t6
AH done: t19
camp done: t17
2 turns to walk to pig, arrives there t19, timing nicely with the discovery of AH. 2 power tiles, settler at size 2? but maybe we'll have grown to size 3 by that time? Don't know how to calculate that.

Agri - BW:
worker done: t13
agri done: t9
BW done: t22

worker farms fp for 6 (?) turns? A farm is 5 but I don't know how fps affect improvement time. Done t19. Put 1 turn into another farm. Then move onto forest (t21), and start chopping on t22. That should be enough time to grow to size 3 on 2 fps, right? In this case, the settler won't be sped up by any power tiles but will benefit from several chops. The first chop will finish on t25.

 

[sampsa]

fp farm takes 7T.

 

[jorissimo]

It's basically the difference between having 4 + 6 + 3 = 13 food-hammers per turn on t23, or 4 + 3 + 3 = 10 food hammers per turn and a one-off 20 hammers on t25 and then again on t29 and t33. Basically another 5 hammers per turn while chopping, so essentially 15 food-hammers per turn. Not such a big difference.

 

[jorissimo]

T15:

Spoiler :

I have:
- Mining, Myst, Agri
- 1 city
- 1 pop
- 1 warrior
- 1 worker
- 12 bpt

Decided to give Agri - BW a shot, because it's different from what I'd normally do on this map, and the discovery of corn to the immediate north gave a further justification for Agri, as it can be used by a second city. The warrior explored around the capital and is now rushing north to secure the corn spot before barbs spawn. Capital went worker while working the floodplain, and is now building a warrior while growing on the fp. Brennus is to our west or south. Depending on barb troubles, I might briefly switch to a hammer tile at size 2 to get more warriors out. I will start on a settler at size 3. Any chops before that will go into the settler though.

Outside of our immediate vicinity, the land looks rather bleak. I would not mind Brennus settling some trashy spots though. For city 2, there are 2 serious candidates: the corn spot and the sheep spot. While both are auto-connected by the river, the corn spot is much stronger because it will immediately benefit from Agri - and can later share the pig - while the sheep spot needs AH to become strong. In total, 3 decent helper cities are available. I feel like cottaging all river tiles in Seoul, including hills, to make it into a strong bureau capital.

Since we won't need TW for a while and have plenty of commerce and low maintenance expansion planned until about T50, we could actually go Hunting - AH right after BW, and only then TW - Pottery.

For the diplo situation with Brennus, afaik he is problematic but also a religious fanatic, so as long as I adopt his religion I should be good right? Maybe a gifted desert city could be worth it.

 

[jorissimo]

T35:

Spoiler :

I have:
- BW, Myst, Agri, Hunting, AH
- 2 cities
- 4 pop
- 3 warriors
- 1 worker
- 19 bpt at 100%

Capital built a warrior while growing on the fp, then went another one while growing to size 2, which it didn't finish. It went settler at size 3, working fps. Before reaching size 3, I had put 1 chop into the settler. After starting the settler I put another chop into it. Then I finished the warrior I had started before the settler, working the unimproved ivory to get it out faster. The capital is now building another settler. After chopping its second forest, my worker made its way up to be in a better position to serve C2. It camped the elephant (this might have been a mistake, perhaps it was better to just keep chopping around the cap) and is now in position to start chopping the forest 1S of Pyongyang to put into the second settler. I switched to slavery while the settler was on its way. Pyongyang will grow to size 2 and then whip a worker. Seoul will also go worker after the settler.

I discovered horses and copper nearby, which we are guaranteed to get eventually. I will probably settle city 4 1 NE of the 'c' to grab both the horses and another ivory (C2 will still go south next to the sheep). I don't think barb pressure will be strong enough to force me to beeline those strategic resources. I also discovered Qin close by to the east. Depending on further expansion options, which right now seem quite limited (I had hoped that the east was a peninsula just for us), this could easily turn into a construction rush as we have good commerce and ivory.

 

[soundjata]

I was commenting on T15

Spoiler :

I thought bronze would be earlier (and the worker could farm > chop) but there is a lapse of 2~3 turns apparently so what to do (micro business is serious business)

Another farm 1S could make sense before chopping commences, because:
- The Korean empire (with its various happiness resources) will enjoy growth anyways in the future.
- Right now we can try to sync up growing to size 4 and producing 3 warriors (17 turns growth overall)

Once capitol is size 4 and 4 warriors are guarding the area, you can focus on expansion for a while.
I would do it BIC's way meaning second worker before second city (there are so many chops waiting)

Now to your question
I like hunting > AH better than pottery. (production > commerce this early on)
On deity you would not be able to afford it (tech cost, maintenance cost are higher) and would be forced into pottery pretty much (or maybe SOG + Ivory + Sheep would be just enough?)

 

[jorissimo]

I was commenting on T15

Spoiler :

I thought bronze would be earlier (and the worker could farm > chop) but there is a lapse of 2~3 turns apparently so what to do (micro business is serious business)

Another farm 1S could make sense before chopping commences, because:
- The Korean empire (with its various happiness resources) will enjoy growth anyways in the future.
- Right now we can try to sync up growing to size 4 and producing 3 warriors (17 turns growth overall)

Once capitol is size 4 and 4 warriors are guarding the area, you can focus on expansion for a while.
I would do it BIC's way meaning second worker before second city (there are so many chops waiting)

Now to your question
I like hunting > AH better than pottery. (production > commerce this early on)
On deity you would not be able to afford it (tech cost, maintenance cost are higher) and would be forced into pottery pretty much (or maybe SOG + Ivory + Sheep would be just enough?)

That's frustrating, sorry about that. I could still go for a worker now, I don't think I put even a turn into the settler. And just chop before improving the next food resource.

 

[a pen-dragon]

I discovered horses and copper nearby, which we are guaranteed to get eventually.

That copper is very much contested. If Qin settles right next to it you will have difficulties getting it.

 

[CarpoolKaraoke]

I ignored the silver(s). My 2nd city went on the stone and 3rd east by the rice. Stone failgold seems better than silver, neh? One tile needs to be roaded for all these to be connected (coast and river).

@drewisfat and @CarpoolKaraoke I'd love to hear your comments if you are around!

Oooooh, I am late. Depends entirely on how much food there is for whipping vs a burst of tech early! I love playing openings and not endings - this thread is great.

 

[jorissimo]

Kind of wondering whether I should replay the last 20 turns. Feels like my worker was kinda all over the place. I guess my main question is when to *stop* chopping and start improving the resources.