LotR26 Mounted Mongols

[Arathorn]

Here's the start I was given. I was assured horses were within the BFC of at least one city that would naturally abut our capital, were we to settle in place (not that we necessarily want to settle in place).

Scout not even moved yet. From my recollection of Great Plains, the western edge is mostly hills and it's mostly cow-y plains east, with a tiny lake in the SE corner. But it's been a long time since I've used the script. If we settle in place, we'll probably have more hills than we can use, even with the two wheat. Maybe not. Moving one east would get the wheats in range sooner but might miss something else. I'm not even sure where I want to move the scout first turn, at this point. I'll probably scout south and east, given my map understanding.

Current thought -- get Agriculture first. We want to farm those wheats and Agri cuts down time to AH. So Agri -> AH, once the settling location is determined.

Roster:
Arathorn -- still playing
darrelljs -- on deck
Jabah
Ozbenno
Kylearan

Thoughts on where to scout, where to settle most appreciated! I'll try to play again in 3ish hours.

Arathorn

 

[Ozbenno]

Checking in. Haven't been in a SG with any of you (except darrell, who I've been in many with ) so looking forward to it .

Agricultire --> AH seems logical tech path, then maybe mining --> BW --> HBR?

As for where to scout/settle

If we settle east we loose plenty of production (would end up with 2 grass hills and 1 desert only) but as you point out, can we use all the production we have if we settle in place? In that regard I would move the scout W,NW (ending 1E of the settler) which should expose all the tiles in our BFC. If farming everything will allow working all the hills, I say settle in place.

 

[darrelljs]

removed double post

 

[darrelljs]

What an intriguing start. Irrigated plains/wheat is a five food tile, so pre Civil Service we'll have enough food for 3 grassland hills and 2 plains hills, and if there is a 4th grassland hill in the fog, enough for it as well. I love production capitals, especially when Domination is the goal, so I would just settle in place. I'd actually settle first and then move the Scout, since we really want to explore east (I aggree we are on the West side of the map), but if you do move it then W(x2)-NW would give you the best view.

Darrell

 

[Arathorn]

I took Ozbenno's advice and scouted our immediate area. There's a dyes to the west, on a forested plains hill. Not critical, but not worth throwing away. We'll be able to work quite a few hills even before biology and basically all the squares post-biology. A very strong capital is a good thing and very plausible with settling in place -- stronger than moving, I decided, after much deliberation. So I founded in place.

Scout started scouting. Found a hut quite early and popped it. LUCKY!!!

Spoiler :

Notice the horse in the screenshot. Another is right there, too. We can definitely claim them.

I continued scouting and met some opposing leaders. Charlemagne of India is pretty close to our east. Just south of him is Pacal II of Khmer. Ragnar of Arabia is far to the south. Qin Shi Huang of Ethiopia is around somewhere, as is Peter of Portugal, but we're not sure just where.

Our first scout also discovered a hungry lion and lost. Our second scout beat his lion and got some xp from a hut. He's Woodsman II hoping to get the healing of Wood III. We also got 34 gold from one hut. Not bad, considering all the AI scouts I've seen running around.

Techwise, I went Agriculture (with the lucky AH early) to Mining and we're almost done with Bronze Working (so we can chop forests). Both wheats are farmed, but only just. Karakorum is due to grow to size 3 and pop a scout on the interturn. We can either go quick settler to be sure of horses or try to squeeze in a barracks while growing first.

There's stone to our NE, but it's pretty close to Charlemagne. I'm not sure we can grab it (thinking Great Wall here). I would go Masonry after BW, regardless. Then we might want Writing or Archery or HBR. We need both of the latter two to build keshiks, IIRC. Charlemagne is definitely close enough to keshik-rush, though, so we probably want to aim in that direction.

Hinduism and Buddhism were both founded, Buddhism by Charlemagne (holy city, here we come -- just hope he gets a prophet to build a shrine for us, too). No news of Judaism yet. I played 40 to get us started.

Here's the area closest to home. I've not attempted a dot map yet.

Spoiler :

The top of this map is the top of the world -- no further north is possible. The mini-map also extends to the southern boundaries of the plains. East/west is less well-explored and wider. The stone is pretty close to Charlemagne's borders and Pacal II is close south of that. Ragnar is way south, well beyond the diplayed area.

Roster:
Arathorn
darrelljs -- up now (for 30)
Jabah -- on deck (for 20)
Ozbenno
Kylearan

We'll play 20 per on the first round and then drop to 15. Heavy war or long turns, feel free to only play 10. If we get to heavy warring early, we may need to go to 15 even on the first round.

Arathorn

 

[Ozbenno]

I would go for the settler straight away. Get the horses connected as soon as we can. Start building barracks after in preperation.

Score on the hut pop, lets hope for a HBR pop later (always seem to pop this in games I don't want it).

Tech wise I would go Masonry, Archery and then HBR. Pottery and Writing to follow. We could concievably chop Great Wall pretty quickly in capital.

 

[Kylearan]

Hi,

checking in. It's good to be in an SG again, and with such a fine team to boot! Looking forward to this.

I vote for a quick settler too; brings up the second city sooner. I always like to build a settler at size 3... Great Wall sounds good as well, although founding a city to claim stone just for this is unnecessary IMHO.

-Kylearan

 

[darrelljs]

I assume we are at one Worker. I'd like to build a second Worker before going for the Settler (maybe even a third since this is Epic), with forested hills that we want to mine I believe this is the best way to ramp up. You can never have too many Workers . I can't tell from the screen shot, but the Horsies don't seem to be near a rival civ. The one fear would be barbs smacking the essentially unescorted Settler, and then game over. That to me is an arguement for Worker, chop out The Great Wall, then Settler. I'd have time to build my second Worker while waiting for Masonry to complete.

I'm with Kylearan that the Stone won't be of any use for The Great Wall, it is just too far away to help for this early wonder. The Pyramids on the other hand . Anyway, I'm ready to play now but I think more discussion is needed, so I'll delay 24 hours.

Darrell

 

[darrelljs]

Had a chance to open the save, Arathorn has it nicely timed to finish the Scout and hit size three (as he said). I really think we should roll into another Worker and build The Great Wall before a Settler. Here is a possible dotmap, although Copper and fog make this a guess more than anything else:

Darrell

 

[LKendter]

lurker's comment: Interesting how much variety there is on the map scripts. Compared to the LK game with Great Plains there are hardly any cows.

 

[Ozbenno]

My main reason for settler before Great Wall is that that is the only source of horses we know about, I'd hate for a AI to jump out of the fog and grab them before we could.

 

[Arathorn]

City 3 is going to be right up against Charlemagne's borders, so it's probably a no-go, except as a capture.

Worker settler great wall seems like a reasonable build order to me, but there are lots of options. I never build enough early workers, but they are huge, if utilized correctly. If we go with the early settler, it might found city 2 and THEN we go for the horses, because they are a ways away from anyone else, but not TOO far. City 2 would have to get to settler pretty quickly, if we did that.

City 1 is on a flood plains and one of the best sources of food for horse city. I've been trying to find a way to utilize those resources and not use the fp and be on the river, but I'm pretty sure all 3 together is impossible.

City 2 is going to have 5 bonus food squares. It can be a great whip center, a specialist bonanza, draft central, and/or build a ton of workers/settlers. I'm almost tempted to try for it before city 1, just because it can help so much with future cities.

We might need to just form cities 1 and 2 and then go into full-fledged keshik mode, to get our early war when we can be most effective with it. That would be my short-term strategy, moving forward.

Arathorn

 

[darrelljs]

Hmm...I didn't notice #1 was on a floodplains. That city should be moved one N. Actually, #2 should probably go one N as well, simply because that Wheat might be necessary to make a city to the south viable. Although #2 is a pretty mean city like Arathorn points out. I just gotta think we need to be a bit conservative in the opening. We don't have escorts until the Horse is connected, so we can take too many risks. Might vote remains Worker -> Great Wall -> Settler. Probably if we do it in this order we can make #2 the first city founded, then settle the Horse later.

Ozbenno - I see some Arabian borders at the southern edge of what we've explored. I think it is really unlikely that someone else is in a position to claim the Horse. I know it sounds like I am contradicting myself, but I think we can hold off that city site if we get The Great Wall early .

Darrell

 

[Ozbenno]

I agree that we only need to found 3 cities at first and then go into Keshik mode. I was also looking at the horse city, wondering how to avoid founding on the floodplain and also couldn't find a reasonable alternate location.

 

[Arathorn]

I looked at one north, too, for city 1. Then the city has no bonus food and needs a cultural expansion to get horses, delaying the time when we can start producing real units. We have the techs to build chariots right now, which at least are real units. We just lack the horses. I don't think delaying, what, 80 turns to get horses, is going to be real healthy for our military rating. Delaying 40ish can probably work, but I'm not real comfortable with needing a monument on top of everything else. I am in favor of the current #1 over one north.

Arathorn

 

[darrelljs]

Well, farmed floodplains is actually more food than plains Cow. We also pull in an extra grassland river and a grassland hill. 1N is the stronger city site, BUT I agree that waiting for a border pop to grab the Horse is not a good idea. So dotmap "as is" at least for city #1, now what's the consensus on the build order? Do we go a) Worker -> GW -> Settler, or b) Worker -> Settler, or c) just plain Settler? My preference is obviously a) due to no escort. If we go with b) or c), I will clearly use the about to complete Scout to bust fog.

Darrell

 

[Ozbenno]

I think worker --> settler. Second worker can start roading down to the horsies while the settler is being built.

 

[Arathorn]

Probably too late (which is OK -- don't be afraid to just take your best turns), but I think I'd go worker -> settler -> GW, too. We need horses to even get military police to grow above size 4. Scouts don't keep the populace happy.

Yeah, I'd use the new scout to fogbust the area. And chop the wall as much as possible. But we really need to get horses online pretty much ASAP.

My $.02,
Arathorn

 

[Kylearan]

Hi,

building a second worker is a good idea generally, but then I'd really fear the barbarians taking our cities - regardless whether we go GW-settler or settler-GW after the worker. (When do they start to enter cultural borders?)

I'm more on the cautious side on this, and vote for GW before settler, i.e. option a). I don't mind taking risks normally, but in this case the whole game would hinge upon that...if someone could ease my mind by telling me the barbs won't try to enter our borders until after the GW, I'd vote worker-settler-GW instead.

-Kylearan

 

[Jabah]

Checking in (a bit late, but I had no internet this WE).
Can't see the pictures (on CFC) for now, so no comment until then

JAbah