LK149 - WM, Indonesia

[Northern Pike]

All these temples should hopefully help with our culture rating, something that often causes us grief.

True, but the negative way of looking at it is that the need to build temples at all is a substantial hidden cost of our island start. Since we're so constrained in where our cities can go, we lose the ability to get free expansions, so to speak, just by founding towns in well-chosen spots where the gaps between them fill in automatically. With an inland start, that sometimes works so well that we don't have to build a temple all game.

 

[Elephantium]

Pre-turn: MM a couple of cities
Tangarang: Temple > Harbor
730 BC - We meet Argentina! They have 91 gold and are down CoL, MM, Polytheism, and Construction. We sell them CoL for their gold.
Lux slider to 20% to prevent riots in Surabaya and Bandung.
Surabaya: Spear > Worker
710 BC - buy a Worker from Egypt for 124 gold.
690 BC - zzz...
Surabaya: Worker > Spear
Medan: Barracks > Spear
670 BC - Our exploring Warrior meets a French Warrior in Siberia
Aztecs and Sioux have Lit now. I sell Construction to Sioux for it + 430 gold. It should be nice trade bait in Asia.
Jakarta: Settler > Worker
Americans complete Great Lighthouse
Australians complete SoZ
650 BC - Batam founded on NP's Philippines site.
Buy a Worker from Persia for 124 gold.
630 BC - put the Settler on a ship, headed for the Philippines.
Jakarta: Worker > Settler
Surabaya: Warrior > Spear
Bekasi: Temple > Harbor
India makes an embassy with us!
610 BC - I notice that the Zulu now have Lit
Medan: Spears
590 BC - Aztecs have The Republic. Should we buy it? We already have lots of trade bait already, and it sounds like we really want Monarchy rather than Republic for our next government...

 

[LKendter]

Republic is ONLY value is trade bait. The goal is domination, so we really want Monarchy.

 

[Elephantium]

In that case, I'll skip buying it.

570 BC - buy a Worker from Russia.
550 BC - handoff time. I left the Bangka holding our second Philippines settler unmoved to give Greebley flexibility in where to land.

 

[Northern Pike]

{Cross-post with Tusker's last two turns, but these points still relevant:}

Agreed--we can ignore Republic unless it opens up some really good trade combination for us.

Literature is a cheap tech which loses its value quickly, so it's usually best to cash it in without delay. Unless LK strongly feels it's the wrong course in this mod, we should sell Lit right now to everyone who'll pay more than 50 gold for it, netting just about 1000g. {In the last two turns we've already lost the opportunity to sell Lit to Australia, so we should definitely do this.}

Our choices for the location of the northern Philippine city all look bad. The town can have the fish (or the whale) for growth, or a reasonable number of land tiles, but not both. I suppose I'd choose the forest tile next to the jungle fruit for the sake of long-term shield strength (eight land tiles plus the centre, three hills), but better ideas are welcome.

 

[Northern Pike]

I gather we kept the Indian galleys plying back and forth in the Malacca Strait.

I don't think we should work the jungle fruit at Bekasi until the tile is cleared. We took one reasonable gamble with disease at Surabaya, and it didn't work, so let's play that issue cautiously from now on.

 

[LKendter]

ROSTER:
LKendter (on deck)
Northern Pike
Greebley (up)
Elephantium (just played, swapped)

 

[Northern Pike]

LK, a technical point: as far as I can tell, all that the batch file to which you directed me does is put empty folders called Anzac, Bef, Dyina, Gaucho, Llanero, and Usmc into my units folder. Is this what's intended, or do we have a problem?

 

[Elephantium]

On my computer, I have those folders with other unit graphics in them (e.g. Anzac holds Rifleman files).

 

[Northern Pike]

Thanks for the information. So it looks as though there is a problem, but we'll see what LK has to say.

 

[LKendter]

Yes, you should get folders with units in them.

 

[Northern Pike]

OK, I've now got what Tusker reports, so we should be all right.

 

[Greebley]

Ya, lets swap. I finally have gotten pas the Steam bottle-neck and have logged in. I am currently downloading civ.

 

[LKendter]

@Greebley - the swap was already done. You are up.

 

[Greebley]

Odd, I didn't see all the posts the first time I looked...

I managed to successfully load the game up on the newer computer so I am good to go. I hope to play tomorrow.

 

[Greebley]

Preturn: Sell around Literature.
510 BC: Notice China is fighting someone - likely India. I cannot see attacker but land is owned by India.
IBT: Souix demand 100 gold. I decide to decline for the War Happiness.
490 BC: Egypt owns Monarchy and doesn't have Construction, but this doesn't help us get it Even with everything (Construction, 33 gpt, 4127 gold) we can't get Monarchy.
Decide to go for Russian Iron while we have a chance. 21 gpt for Iron - do a straight up deal so if we lose the route we don't have to continue to pay.
Switch towns to Swordsmen and upgrade a few. It might stop a war.
India and China are definitely fighting.
IBT: Great Wall completed.
410 BC: Build a town on the Southeast Island. Unfortunately Australia is already there owning the other half.

370 BC: Gave into Egyptian demand for 100 gold. I have also been upgrading some more Warrior. We are at 3479 gold. Egypt also has Construction now - we might as well wait the 10 turns to get Monarchy ourselves.

Notes:
I put the settler in the Northeast on a hill rather than the forest thinking we could add another town to grab the Hill and fish. Decided the extra defense of the hill made it worthwhile for a place we can't defend well.

Capitol isn't still on Settlers, but that can be switched if we want to try to grab more land. I just don't think we will make it for Japan and the rest is getting croweded. There is one settler on a boat if we want to try to grab a piece of Japan.

 

[Northern Pike]

Excellent call on getting war happiness from the Sioux, and good work grabbing the iron deal.

I hate to see Malang delaying its growth with a worker build when workers are virtually free in Jakarta.

The slow builds of regular swordsmen in Semarang and Makassar seem pointless. Those towns will never contribute much except gold, so they should probably switch to aqueducts, perhaps to be used as pre-builds for marketplaces. Semarang could use a temple to get access to its whale, too.

We should try to get two spearmen into isolated Semarang in the next round. It'll be a hard place to reinforce once war has broken out.

We should probably put a third city on Borneo, on the jungle tile farthest east. A town there would be able to work two river hills the other cities miss.

It's amusing that New Guinea is now divided right down the middle, as in RL.

 

[Northern Pike]

Greebley doesn't mention that three civs--the Aztecs, Russia, and China--now have Currency and have entered the Middle Ages. So we can buy Currency for about 1550 gold and then gain 1003 gold back, plus wines and whatever gpt may be available, by selling it to Egypt, Zululand, Australia, and India.

 

[LKendter]

Summary:
The war happy from the Sioux is very scary. If they can get an Asian ally, we are really screwed. This isn't CCM, and IIRC the Sioux can buy people against us already.

ROSTER:
LKendter (up)
Northern Pike (on deck)
Greebley (just played)
Elephantium (swapped)

 

[Greebley]

Sioux didn't have the funds to buy anyone into the war at the time. We can make peace once we can talk to them again if they seem prosperous enough to be a threat.

Our Asian towns should get walls in. It would help in case of a war.