LK76 - AWE - Pangea, No armies, Random Civ

[hotrod0823]

1750 BC (0): 2 vet archers vs. a regular spear on a hill with only 1 wounded warrior in the area. Not sure if I like our chances here but we can't wait too much longer to dispose of this town. I attack, and We lose and have done nothing except promote that lone spear to vet. First archer brought him down to 1 hp and the second failed to kill him and promoted him. swap the Hague to warrior for now but may go back to spear but would rather wait for a baracks before building it. Change Rotterdam to an archer. We need to take care fo that city now. Change to Math over Writing. If this is the way things are going to go we need to get those precious cats sooner rahter than later.

1725 BC (1): Rotterdam and Amsterdam both build archers and start 2 more.

1700 BC (2): Moving units to the City of Death.

1675 BC (3): Archers are heading to Arebla. May wait for more to arrive but don't want too long and see 2 or more spears next time around either.

1650 BC (4): Amsterdam builds an archer starts another. Clearing forest on the way to the Hague. Up lux to 30%. MM Amsterdam to 10 shields.

1625 BC (5): The Hague builds a warrior starts a barracks that will be helped by the chop.

1600 BC (6): Get 2 more archers and start 2 more.

1575 BC (7): Okay now we have 5 archers and 3 reg warriors in the area and Persia has a lone archer heading our way. I suspect there are at least 2 spears in Arebela now.

1550 BC (8): Lose our northern "lookout warrior" to an archer attack. Amsterdam build an archer start a long waited settler. This time wasted on Arebela has cost us time expanding. Sending all 7 available units toward Arebela. Will try avoid attacking over the river.

1525 BC (9): Finally in position to attack with our full force. It better be enough this time our it is going to be a very long game.

1500 BC (10): Well kill the 2 spears, barely, and lost 4 archers and 2 warriors doing it. Only 2 archers remain and 1 is severly wounded. The city has a lone archer protecting it now. Only good thing is we have an elite archer at the ready. More Persians archers are ong the way and we can see their southern boarders

 

[Zwingli]

Looks like this is going to be a tough game . Even if we are able to take Stalingrad next turn our elite archer will probably be exposed to counterattack. Even so, it would be worth it to finally get the city out of the way assuming our luck holds.

 

[Greebley]

Yow, we are really getting poor luck! It might be worth connecting up the iron and trying our luck with swords. It will take 7 turns to do so.

At least we haven't met anyone else yet.

 

[meldor]

Got it and will work on it after work.

 

[LKendter]

What a horrid run of luck at the start. Expansion has been killed, way to many dead units, and I don't think we are ready to start the pre-build for the Library.

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Signed up:
LKendter (on deck)
Greebley
Zwingli
hotrod0823
Meldor (currently playing)

Our general game plan:
1) To target our cities to always be 3 apart tiles. With no armies it is really critical to keep this rule going.
2) Science research must be very aggressive with deficit spending if we can afford it.
3) Try to build the roads before the city to take maximum advantage of the 3 tile city plans.
4) Raze all cities unless they have a useful wonder.
5) We must the Great Library pre-build by the time writing arrives.
6) Our first leader should be for an optimal FP location.

Remember 10 turns per round - STRICT 24 hours got it, total 48 to complete.
Additional restriction: No armies
>> Starting with LK68 the LK series is on patch 1.22.

 

[Greebley]

An archer couldn't kill a warrior.
2 archers couldn't kill a spear.
4 archers and 2 warriors are lost killing 2 spear and fail to take the town.

Thats pretty bad luck.

Our elite archer should be able to kill an injured archer next turn, but then will probably be lost. I think we need to do it anyway; otherwise they will get more archers and spears in the town and we will need another large force to attack.

On the plus, side the number of Persian units coming at us has been small.

 

[LKendter]

I got a chance to look at the game. It is 1500BC and we have just 5 military units, and just 3 cities. To follow the best chance to get the Great Library we must start Rotterdam on a pre-build shortly. However, due to the RnG disasters we could lose militarily with keeping that city on military units. I just hope the RnG warms up to use shortly as we can't win if Persia and the RnG have signed an alliance to destroy us .

To give you an idea how bad the military losses are: Persia would be insulted with a strait peace treaty.

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I have an issue with the turn just played. That map below is from 1750BC. The blue line was the road segment needed to make Rotterdam and The Hague 3 tiles apart. The red line was the road segment built. The #1 target city for Persia still has no support from any other city. Please prioritize road segments that complete 3 tiles connections between cities. IMO the road connects between cites is the most critical piece of the workers actions.

Amsterdam is on emphasis production, and the city is screwed up because of this. The settler completes in 1, but the city grows in 2. If you switch to the grassland you can growth and 2, and settler in 2 saving us a pop point. We are behind for expansion and can't afford to waste any population points.

 

[Greebley]

Amsterdam is on emphasis production, and the city is screwed up because of this. The settler completes in 1, but the city grows in 2. If you switch to the grassland you can growth and 2, and settler in 2 saving us a pop point. We are behind for expansion and can't afford to waste any population points.

I don't think I understand the above point. If you build the settler a turn early you are at one less size, but then grow to the same size on the second turn. The only difference as far as I can see is that you have some shields in the box on the second turn, if you build the settler a turn early. I don't see how building the settler a turn early is in any way a disadvantage.

I am also not understanding why anyone would choose "emphasize growth".

Can you clarify this?

 

[LKendter]

I don't think I understand the above point. If you build the settler a turn early you are at one less size, but then grow to the same size on the second turn. The only difference as far as I can see is that you have some shields in the box on the second turn, if you build the settler a turn early. I don't see how building the settler a turn early is in any way a disadvantage.

I am also not understanding why anyone would choose "emphasize growth".

Can you clarify this?

If the settler is built in 1 turn the city will drop two pop. If you wait the two turns, the city will grow, then drop two pop points. The makes the net population loss just one pop point by waiting a turn.

The reasons to choose: emphasize growth.
1) Hopelessly corrupt cities. Why gain wasted shields? The objective is to get them to size six ASAP and hire the specialist. Emphasize production works against this issue. Most players including myself don't always catch growth in junk towns.

2) The city is a 2-turn worker factory. After each worker is built the city resets itself to light in food and breaks the factory. I have found that sometimes emphasize growth gets the city to correct select 5 food and avoid having to MM the city all the time.

3) Players will have imperfect MM. As you agreed in LK74 - growth is king. Agricultural biggest advantage is growth in 7 turns vs. 10 turns with out a granary. The governors have an annoying habit of setting the city for 10-turn growth. By using emphasize growth you get around imperfect MM and keep the cities growing at max rate.

 

[Greebley]

Ok, I see the reason for emphasize growth. I guess I am used to playing with players who want to eek out the last shield no matter how much MM it takes.

The point on the corrupt towns is especially a good one. No point in ever going for shields.

For the capitol I do prefer emphasize production and doing the MM required in the early game. The extra shields seem worthwhile. Point taken though, that not everyone may pay close attention and allow the city to slow growth. Additionally, it can be easy to forget to check as well.

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I still, however, am not seeing the difference of the first point.

Say a town is at size 5 growing in 2 for both cases:

If the settler is in 1 then:
Turn 1: We build the granary and are size 3.
Turn 2: We grow to size 4 and put some shields into the box.

If the settler is in 2 then:
Turn 1: Growth in 1 and settler in 1.
Turn 2: We grow to size 6 and drop to size 4. The shield box is empty.

The only difference I am seeing is whether there are some shields already in the box or not. I am not seeing why a few extra shields are a problem.
Now if we build a settler in 1, but grow in 3, then that is not as good as grow in 2 and build a settler 2 as it costs a turn of growth. Is that the case you are comparing to? In which case, I agree completely.

Sorry if I am being obtuse/confused. I just want to make sure there isn't something I am missing.

 

[Coffee]

delurk

If I understand mming correctly the intent is to optimize all three values. Commerce, shields & food. Commerce/gold sets the number of research turns. Population generates gold. In case #1 you'd lose the income generated from 1 population for 1 turn. So shields are sacrificed in favor of food in order to maximize commerce and indirectly science.

 

[LKendter]

I signed a peace treaty to avoid any spoilers.

The Amsterdam example was bad. The grassland or forest still results in growth in 2. None of the differences will show up.

I then ran the results using Rotterdam for the test. I am a firm believer that growth is king.

The best is the third example of timing growth with settler. By getting both to hit the same time with using the forest for one turn there is spare shields and foods in the bin.

The second best is the growth in 3, and settler in 4. I would prefer to have food built up over shields built up.

I hope a picture is worth a thousand words and what I am talking about know makes sense.

 

[Greebley]

I think we are in agreement then. My order of precedence is: Food, Shields, Gold, with food being most important by a good bit.

I guess what I was trying to say was that if in addition to the pictures below you could do:
Growth in 3
Settler in 2

then I would do that over the above choices. It costs some gold and gains shields.

I would NOT do:
Growth in 4
Settler in 2

as it is not as good as growth in 3 settler in 3.

Thanks for clarifying.

I must admit I eagerly await Meldor's post to see if we finally destroy that annoying town.

 

[meldor]

1500 BC (0)
Not much to change.
(I) Amsterdam settler->spear, Rotterdam archer->archer

1475 BC (1)
Elite archer goes to 1hp, but razes Arbela. Settler heads for first spot on the coast.
(I) We lose our elite archer.

1450 BC (2)
Settler makes it to the spot. The other archer makes it back.
(I) Nada.

1425 BC (3)
Utrecht is founded. Hire taxman in Rotterdam.
(I) Amsterdam spear->settler.

1400 BC (4)
Spear was headed for the new city, instead I send it towards The Hague.
(I) Two Persian archers attack us. The one HP knocked off because the archers allows us to kill off the two attackers. The Hague rax->spear. We get a palace expansion.

1375 BC (5)
Use our elite archer to kill a reg Persian archer.
(I)Persian archer attacks our elite and dies. We get Math and start on writing, due in 12. Rotterdam archer->spear.

1350 BC (6)
No Persians in sight. We have a 3 archer attack force now. I will hold back for now and build up more. Wake the spear in The Hague and ship it towards Utrecht.
(I)

1325 BC (7)
Not much.
(I)Amsterdam settler->prebuild.

1300 BC (8)
Move the settler and have 2 archers meet up with it.
(I)Two more regular archer appear.

1275 BC (9)
The spear will complete between turns so I won't move either archer back.
(I)The Hague spear->spear.

1250 BC (10)
Kill one of the archers because it is on our side of the river.

 

[hotrod0823]

The unfortunate problem with Amsterdam was that I tried to set to grow as fast as possible and if the governor took the forest over the bonus grass then the settler and population expansion would be on the same turn. As it turned out the gov took the 2 food grass over the forest costing 1 shield. That lone shield would make the differnce. IF you can use all the BG and get growth and enough shield thens you can get a 1 turn growth and 2 turns settler to get the settler on the same turn because that new citizens tile will go towards production. Tried to do that but it didn't work out and hence the slap on the wrist for poor MM.

No excuse for chosing the wrong forest tile to improve . As fars as that damn town I purposely waited a few extra turns to get more units and it still didn't matter. Bad luck I guess. Glad meldor was able to final raze it to the ground.

 

[Tarkeel]

lurker's comment: The main reason for using emphasize production, is that production counting is done AFTER growth. That means the governor will place it on the most shield rich square since you already have so much food. The end result is the same amount of food, you just have to check cities on the turn they grow and switch it back, and more shields.

 

[LKendter]

@Meldor - bad attachment - 22 Bytes, 2 views. Please attach another one.

Good riddanace to Arbela [dance]

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Signed up:
LKendter (currently playing) // Waiting on got it, as needs a good attachment!
Greebley (on deck)
Zwingli
hotrod0823
Meldor

Our general game plan:
1) To target our cities to always be 3 apart tiles. With no armies it is really critical to keep this rule going.
2) Science research must be very aggressive with deficit spending if we can afford it.
3) Try to build the roads before the city to take maximum advantage of the 3 tile city plans.
4) Raze all cities unless they have a useful wonder.
5) We must the Great Library pre-build by the time writing arrives.
6) Our first leader should be for an optimal FP location.

Remember 10 turns per round - STRICT 24 hours got it, total 48 to complete.
Additional restriction: No armies

 

[meldor]

That is very odd, let me try it again...

 

[LKendter]

I can now declare an official got it.

 

[Greebley]

That save works meldor.