News: BOTM 06 Pre-Game discussion

[jesusin]

oops -- crossposted with jesusin!

Interesting crosspost. @LC seems to believe that by getting a worker 6 turns later you get your improvements delayed 5 turns. @jesusin seems to believe that he's playing Vanilla, since he has forgetten the expansive bonus in his calculations. What a pair of fools!

Anyway, of the 3 blunders at stake, growing to pop2 before Worker still is the more obvious!

 

[ainwood]

Equalisers & bonuses added to first post.

I'm struggling to get the save files uploaded, as there are problems with connecting to the FTP server. Please bear with me a while....

 

[Ribannah]

Challenger: Replace all the visible forests with jungle?
Adventurer: Free Workboat and knowledge of Masonry?

Ah, crossposted.

 

[ainwood]

Challenger: Replace all the visible forests with jungle?
Adventurer: Free Workboat and knowledge of Masonry?

Actually,
challenger: (some) Forest in starting screenshot removed.
Adventurer: Free archer & worker; game on hill replaced with gold.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Interesting crosspost. @LC seems to believe that by getting a worker 6 turns later you get your improvements delayed 5 turns. @jesusin seems to believe that he's playing Vanilla, since he has forgetten the expansive bonus in his calculations. What a pair of fools!

Anyway, of the 3 blunders at stake, growing to pop2 before Worker still is the more obvious!

Sorry, my post may be a bit confusing, but when I say deer improved 5t later, I mean 5 turns after the worker is built, 1 turn to move and 4 turns to build the deer camp.

When I say 6t later than pop1, I mean that the worker built in the grow-to-pop2 scenario is completed 6t later than the worker in the worker-first scenario.

 

[jesusin]

I'm struggling to get the save files uploaded, as there are problems with connecting to the FTP server. Please bear with me a while....

We all appreciate what you are doing for us!

 

[jesusin]

Well, as Obormot seems a bit busy, how about this BOTM Gauntlet criterium? I propose competition for highest total score (optimally - gold medal) instead of cow.

Since there has been no more opinions and the saves are already available, I withdrawn my proposal for Religious Victory.

Gold it is! Good luck everyone!

 

[Lexad]

I posted the Gauntlet thread. I'd rather leave Religious out until continent-type map, otherwise it looks too cheesy, especially when you can spin off colonies voting for you and thus get aroung non-self-voting.

 

[kcd_swede]

Interesting crosspost. @LC seems to believe that by getting a worker 6 turns later you get your improvements delayed 5 turns. @jesusin seems to believe that he's playing Vanilla, since he has forgetten the expansive bonus in his calculations. What a pair of fools!

Anyway, of the 3 blunders at stake, growing to pop2 before Worker still is the more obvious!

Well, yes, my errors usually are the biggest. Everybody excels at something.

The obvious solution is to take the Adv save and get a worker for nothing. But I won't go there. I should, perhaps, but I won't.

Thx @Jesusin and @Lowthercastle, I am convinced. I will hold my nose those 12 turns and just do the worker first, making sure to get the 4+1 hpt bonus. As for WB... after first worker for me, but before the second. Before settler, too. Chops go to settler tho. And I lean to camps before mines. So you probably want to do the opposite since my judgment is what it is...

 

[kcd_swede]

edit: I was using 'tiny islands' and 'island region separate' settings so there may be different results with '(not tiny) islands' and 'islands mixed in' settings.

edit2: Using different initial settings yielded more varied landmasses and increased the chance of being on an island alone...but overall I'd say 30% chance or less of being alone.

Here we are facing "unpredictable" continent setting and "random" islands. So it could go either way, but that means that there is a greater chance of neighbors than what I originally thought since it could be bigger medium cntinents than what I have come across.

We'll just have to wait and see, and keep strategy flexible enough at this point to deal with either contingency.

Good luck!

 

[BLubmuz]

Not clear why you don't research fishing and build a workboat before the worker.
You'll gain 3 gold when the first seafood will be improved, and with that forest-plains-hill the WB arrives fast.

Am i missing something?

 

[Mastiff_of_Ar]

I've never created a test game before, but I have given it a go. Hope it works.

Thanks, vixafox! That was helpful...

 

[PutCashIn]

Yeah, thanx for the test save!

 

[Nioco]

Not clear why you don't research fishing and build a workboat before the worker.
You'll gain 3 gold when the first seafood will be improved, and with that forest-plains-hill the WB arrives fast.

Am i missing something?

What will you build before researching fishing ? Worker I guess ?
It takes usually 6 or 7 turns to ressearch fishing...so when fishing is available, you will be half the way of the worker...without doing in details the math I would think that worker followed by workboat (17 turns without growth but one improvement and the 3 gold and food to grow fast) is better than half worker followed by workboat followed by the remaining half of worker (~18 turn without growth 6 turns with less production but 3 gold).

Depends if you want to go for early religion ...but then why starting by researching fishing

 

[PutCashIn]

Well, you could grow the city instead of building a worker first whilst researching fishing (6-7 turns), the city will be half grown when the tech is finished, switch to working plains hill, build boat in 5-6 turns. Work crabs with boat, size 2 city in like 13-14 turns working a (4or5 food+) 3 commerce tile. - after fishing you went med/poly, right? Now if you chose the wrong one, youve got a cranking young city to hopefully win the switch-to-another-

Now at this point (the way I intend to play it, at least) my worker is off to Camp the Deer, but then Im not playing for a starting religion, just the shiny wonders (lol, :%).

 

[dalamb]

With that wonderfully food-filled city start and the really nice Adventurer bonuses maybe I'll last to the ADs on this one! Emperor makes me tremble in fear .

As usual the Adventurer bonuses make a big difference to the first few turns, so I attached an Adventurer update of vivafox' test game (thanks, vivafox!). Unfortunately the tile where the warrior starts is 2F1H in the test game and 1F2H in the .jpg; is that tile a forested plain in the official save? That's what I assumed in my modification.

I'm guessing settle in place, mine gold, try for polytheism for the increased happiness, then fishing, bronze working, hunting (don't need the deer immediately so hunting can go second). As for production, I suppose neither worker or warrior is necessary immediately because of the unit bonuses. Does that mean it makes sense to start either a barracks (for better protectors sooner) or perhaps even stonehenge? I'd want to switch to workboats fairly soon after fishing, so SH would probably be overly ambitious except as a way to get a few extra gold eventually as someone beats me to it. I guess if I decided on SH I'd chop the 2 visible forested hills then mine them.

I'm usually timid, but if there is a near neighbour without bronze, can a holkan rush make sense? I know the AI starts with archers at this level, but it has to actually research archery to make more, doesn't it?

After hunting I'm less sure of what to do (not that I was real sure about the opening in the first place). AH eventually but maybe not right away (because the sheep aren't so important initially because of the seafood), though knowing if horses are nearby would be good before planting the 2nd city. I won't go for Oracle at Emperor. Archery for defence fairly early, aim for construction because of ball courts?

 

[siggboy]

This map will probably a lot like Archipelagos maps, so the Great Lighthouse might be worth its weight in gold. I'm wondering why nobody has mentioned it yet.

So I will settle in place (looks good to me), get Hunting, Fishing, AH, BW, Sailing and chop out the GL. Oracle as well, if possible, then probably taking Metal Casting.

Second Work Boat will be sent exploring and hopefully I'll meet at least three other AIs that way. That means I'll still have two trading partners if I chose to go at war with somebody. The gold from the trade routes will carry me very comfortably towards Astronomy. Harbors are cheap, too.

I'm not convinced of the Colossus, as most cities end up working minimal sea tiles in favour of production anyway. The few additional coins you end up with from having the Colossus are not worth it in my eyes. By the time you're working a sizeable number of sea tiles the Colossus is about to obsolete.

 

[Heathcliff]

I'm going for my own Big City Strategy, this start is perfect for it, with lots of healthbonuses + forests + expansionistic.

The tactic consists of getting the worker techs first, then going for Monarchy asap and battle the unrest in the city by building lots of warriors.

Settle the capital in place and around 0AD, maybe the city can be 15-20


But don't forgett to build some settlers too, one city cannot win the game!

 

[Nioco]

Another question...having a forested Deer site instead of plain hill/grassland with Deer gives +1 hammer / Food if I remember correctly.
Can a forest grow if there is a camp ? If not, It may be worth to camp only one Deer and wait a forest to pop in the other to get the forested bonus ?

 

[Kingjester1]

This will be an interesting game. I think using the warrior to check some surroundings is a must to determine whether or not to settle in place. However, since Emperor is way over my difficulty level, I'm probably gonna have to do the Adventurer class this month.