Lionised and Vilified

[lymond]

Good TS, Cabert.


A few general comments:

1) 2 AIs have Lit so I think TGL is a lost cause. We may conquer it later. Maria Teresa may be a target. Hopefully she will build it.

2) We are in dire need of more workers. I recommend that Munich build 2 workers straight up now. The worker farming next to Munich can move to Essen now.

3) Note that there is a worker building a useless road next to Dortmund. Please cancel that action and put him on the cows.

4) If we are going to attack a barb city, please make sure we have enough units. We really need to take out that city before Cathy or Nappy does. Otherwise it will be a pain in the ass.

5) I say we go ahead and tech Med in 1 turn to setup Philo bulb. Not sure if we need Math first or not or if Med will open the bulb outright. We do need Maths though. It would also open Shwegon Paya should we care to build it - kinda part of variant. We do have the bonus and could chop it out in Berlin.

6) I assume we will raze Chinook(crap) and settle 1S of the Iron

 

[Cam_H]

Thanks for the turnset cabert.

I agree with lymond that more Workers would be great - still tons to do. Munich looks as good as anywhere for being their source.

I also am happy to go along with Meditation for the Philosophy bulb - esp. in light of our 'must get first to Liberalism' variant. Code of Laws has appeal ... nice to be able to get out 'cheap' Organised-trait Courthouses in light of 'mild REXing' (if that isn't too oxymoronic). On 'mild REXing', I also like pigswill's proposal that we settle down in the tundra to pick up the Marble and Deer in some fashion.

That south west city can go in a few different spots: If founded on the Plains Hill the city will get the extra in the city centre. 1S of Gold makes available some extra Grassland tiles. The coastal spot 1S of Iron looks fine too with access to a Harbor in time.

nocho <<< Up
Sengir <<< On Deck
vranasm
pigswill
lymond
Cam
cabert​

 

[vranasm]

checked the save.
Thanks cabert for the TS.

Gustav and Theresa both lack math so they can't go for music, we lack math too :-(.

I checked our gpt at 0% slider (28) and I don't really think we should go for CoL.
The nontradability of math is big obstacle though :-(.

I still have the feeling we should hunt the free GA from Music and do some GPP hunt with GA.

I am not sure we should "almost stagnate" Berlin on size 8 with happy cap of 11. I am a little bit surprised with the cottage 1E of berlin ;-).

I agree with general thinking about med, but then I would like to see going for Math (opens music and somewhat CS too).
But I could go with whatever else we decide

As for the west city - place it where you want.
The south deer city... I would offer something else and that is position 1E of deer, gets iron, silver and deer, not spectacular, but gets us another forge happy source...

the land looks a little bit unimproved, so some cities could instead of growing into bad tiles build workers ;-).

 

[nocho]

Math is 2nd on the GS-bulb list, so we should get it out of the way for a philo-bulb. Hence med->math is the way to go, unless of course soon somebody would trade maths to us. Being organized CoL for cheap courthouses makes a lot of sense with our widespread empire, but I'm not unwilling to make vra happy by going for Dvo&#345;ák. I'm also hearing the call for more workers.

 

[vranasm]

Math is 2nd on the GS-bulb list, so we should get it out of the way for a philo-bulb. Hence med->math is the way to go, unless of course soon somebody would trade maths to us. Being organized CoL for cheap courthouses makes a lot of sense with our widespread empire, but I'm not unwilling to make vra happy by going for Dvo&#345;ák. I'm also hearing the call for more workers.

you would be surprised probably that here in CZ is more popular Smetana then Dvorak ;-)
but would be probably pretty close call for everyone.

 

[cabert]

What's the deal with music?
it's not in the variant is it?

And the cottage is just normal play IMHO. you should cottage the capital when going SE, isn't it the usual thing?

 

[vranasm]

What's the deal with music?
it's not in the variant is it?

And the cottage is just normal play IMHO. you should cottage the capital when going SE, isn't it the usual thing?

well I want the music for the free GA and pump out some GPP's through the GA should easy the entry to win the Lib race.
We obviously need CoL too... I had a little bit hoped we could backtrade for currency and CoL as it seems I could be completely wrong ;-)

as for the cottage... i don't want to start any kind of flame wars regarding cottages, but imo the capital doesn't have enough food to run cottages effectively and we kind of (me and Cam) agreed not going with cottages... as this was not more discussed and opposed I am just surprised ;-)

we even have rep so each GS we run means 6 bpt which is a bit stronger then non-financial towns.

 

[lymond]

Yep, I don't think cottages will work in Berlin. As V mentioned, it is just too food poor. I do think we could cottage up Hamburg though, but most cities can emphasize food and hammers. Might consider a Palace switch later. Maybe Hamburg or a good capitol we capture later. Although I like SE, and Freddie is a strong SE leader, I tend to like to have 1 or 2 strong cottage cities for the extra commerce. Sure doesn't hurt.

 

[nocho]

Looked at the save. I'm frankly a bit shocked by the state of our infra. Despite having known pottery for 2000 years we don't have a single granary yet. Outside of our capital the only things we have are monuments. That's not a specific criticism of the last TS but we badly need to work on that, as well as on our worker count as mentioned.

I'm inclined to research math first to get the chop bonus asap in light of that infra. After that meditation, which should be on time for the philo bulb. What if we pop a GE? We could rush the Parthenon maybe.

Frankly I'm not sure if we should settle now. We're nowhere near the happy cap so no immediate need for happies. Sheep/iron/gold looks good, but we'd first have to dislodge the barb city, assuming the idea is to settle 1S of the iron. If we hold off from settling for now we save a bit on maintenance. As said, I don't see a spot with needed immediate gains anyway while at least our turf seems to be secured for now.

Note by the way Mother Teresa is in WFYABTA already.

I'd sell PH to Gustav for 60g. He has more, so shouldn't be a problem with Cathy, as Gustav is her WE.

Finally, I'll give the farmed spice to the cap as the cap has better multiplyers than Hamburg.

 

[pigswill]

Its also an argument that shortage of food makes Berlin a poor city for running specialists. Once we've got the next GP (either GS or GE) it might be better to sack the scientists and work grass cottages until we hit happy cap. With bureacracy a 4C tile is the same as 6C tile (or scientist) elsewhere. Munich with 4FPs is a better bet for running scientists while still growing. With a bit more development eastern doublefish is another GS factory.

edit: @ nocho (crossposted). Its a bit difficult to build pyramids, expand and fogbust at the same time as building infrastructure. I guess the question could be is it time to keep rexing at the cost of infra and research or is it time to consolidate. I guess this mainly depends on how likely AI are to settle down south in the next 20-30 turns.

 

[nocho]

edit: @ nocho (crossposted). Its a bit difficult to build pyramids, expand and fogbust at the same time as building infrastructure. I guess the question could be is it time to keep rexing at the cost of infra and research or is it time to consolidate. I guess this mainly depends on how likely AI are to settle down south in the next 20-30 turns.

Surely those are the reasons for the lack of infra and as said, it was not a specific criticism of last TS or any other TS for that matter, but still, not often have I reached the ADs without a single granary built. I think we should focus on infra/workers for now. I don't think an AI will slip by in the near future, but even if it would happen, it'd be easy pickings later and nothing really essential would be lost for now.

 

[nocho]

Went ahead and played. I think it went fairly well. I was playing thinking that the variant required being first to philosophy, which I just found out isn't the case (first to lib it is). That's some sigh of relief, as we didn't pop a great scientist, but a great engineer... Not that anybody else has philo yet, though 2 AIs can research it.

Anyway, I was rather pleased with dislodging Chinook. Had the sword accompanied by 2 chariots. The city was defended by 2 archers. At the first attack the sword had a 27% chance which wasn't that much, but it survived with still 4.8/6 health left and with a next promo to CR2. So I decided to wait a turn for the other archer, as that sword would have better chances than our chariots. And indeed:

I was pretty happy with the result, cash, 2 workers and somehow our sword unlocked HE! Still scratching my head over how come it jumped to 10XP here though... Anyway, the settler nearby settled Stuttgart south of the iron.

So the next turn I was ready to bulb us philo, but we popped an against the odds GE. Parthenon was BIDL by now. I was seriously thinking of stopping the set here, but kept on hearing Cam's mantra of rushing GLib in my head, so decided to check out the feasibility... GLib wasn't built yet, so that was good, obviously. Lit-owners aren't industrious, good. We could self-research literature in 2 turns, but needed some extra cash. Okay... Who has some spare cash?

Decide to try my luck. Before you all bash me for irresponsible, I think with this 2 turn margin it was an "educated gamble" worth taking.

I'm also glad it actually worked out!

After holding my breath for 2 turns, we rushed GLib in Berlin. Decide to maintain the 2 hired scientists as now next great person obviously comes quite a bit faster than the 25 turns without GLib.

Play 2 more turns until CoL is in. Here's the tech situation.

Note Cathy and Teresa could research philo. To self research it, we need about 10 turns right now, next great person is also due in 10. Chances for GS are higher now... Maybe we can go for music now in the hope of a GA. Or CS, which is always good.

From the infra-front, we got lots of granaries and some libraries done, or about done. We got 4 extra workers (2 captured) and 3 more are in the queue. Queueing the one in Hamburg was a mistake, should have been growing the city, but when I noticed decided to let it just finish. I think Cologne can perma build workers until we get chain irrigation up there. Munich should maybe build barracks and HE. We could use some extra military anyway. Had to say no to the Ottomans twice for a double diplo-demerit.

 

[vranasm]

judging from SS's it looks excellent. The TGL steal was certainly worth it, good job on it!

even if I am a bit sad I don't get the Dvorak or Smetana, I am afraid now we are late to the Music party and I think I wouldn't risk heavy beakers into that tech.

CS has a little less value to us due to us not able to have good commerce site, but spreading irrigation and the hammer bonus can be always welcome and it's on path towards Paper->Edu which we should definitely aim for with Philo (tech), bigger "income" of GS's on the way and the variant we play.

I can't check the save yet, but if we have "couple" of +- 9 size cities we could definitely try with next GP (whatever it would be) start GA and try to milk at least 2 (better 3) GS's back, with philosophical leader it should be doable.

 

[cabert]

why don't we trade currency for monarchy?

 

[nocho]

We don't really need monarchy right now, so I'd wait a bit with trading until other stuff comes available (construction, calendar, MC).

If next great person is a GS I'm inclined to just bulb philo with him. Apart from Berlin, all our cities are rather small still, so we wouldn't profit that much from a GA. Besides, not sure how many GSs we could milk. To speed up GPP we probably want NE soon in Berlin, maybe we should quickly spit out a settler and get the marble online (also for HE).

 

[vranasm]

why don't we trade currency for monarchy?

I agree with nocho on this... we have mids (that covers HR) and i don't think we have wine...

the only thing that would be useful for us then is if we want to get Feud through trades, but for that is a bit too soon.

 

[Cam_H]

nocho
Sengir <<< Up
vranasm <<< On Deck
pigswill
lymond
Cam
cabert​

Thanks for the turnset nocho - and good not only to be building Workers, but to capture some and get to Heroic Epic status is very welcome!

Personally not 100% sure on the roster's broader thinking from here ...

I'm pretty inclined to turtle up for a while and just focus on getting our Liberalism variant 'in the bag'. I can see three or four cities along the south - nothing too great, but working the Furs and the Silver, plus our cheap Organised Courthouses, these cities shouldn't be too burdensome. Leaving this whole area bare, I fear does run the risk of somebody - possibly Catherine - from sneaking in Settler parties with a Galley or two, which could become a bit of a p.i.t.a. to later dislodge. Maybe gear up for eventually breaking out with Cuirrassiers?

I must say that I'm leaning a little toward gambling on Music's Great Artist > Golden Age, swapping into Caste and running tons of Scientists (possibly even running the diplo' risk of taking up a religion {Buddhism?} during the Golden Age and running Pacifism once we've bulbed Philosophy?). As pre-req' to Military Tradition and opening up Sistine (should we want to have the option of a Cultural win, or to a lesser extent; denial, or just for helping us get that 20,000 city done with less difficulty), Music could be quite handy.

Agree that Munich could work well as our Heroic Epic city.

Micro' point: I'd free up that Chariot in Eseen and send him east.

 

[cabert]

music is necessary whatever we do because of the variant, so beakers invested aren't lost
I'd try to get there now.

 

[Sengir]

Haven't had access to the internet in a couple of days, but should be able to look at the save today and play tomorrow. So this is a got it.

 

[Sengir]

If I'm reading the comments correctly, the plan is to research Music, and bulb Philo?
Munich gets HE
Build a settler for the icy south, other than that, focus on infra. I'm not sure if we should build 3 cities down there; there's not a lot of food to be found in that area.

Should probably try to get rid of Thracian as well.