News: BOTM 101 --Starts Feb 10--

[Jastrow]

You can find out how much food is on the map as soon as you open the file. Hover over your score, and take the denominator of the population score and multiply by two. This will tell you how many natural loafs of bread there are on the map (it assumes removing all the forests, but not building worker improvements.)

I dont howver have any idea what is typical on this map type, so have no base-line to compare to. Someone could check a couple of tests game, I guess.

 

[Deckhand]

What about just marching the settler to the NW (assuming we are in SE corner) - so we could put our capital on the coast and get to the island quickly for some pork chops?

 

[LowtherCastle]

What about just marching the settler to the NW (assuming we are in SE corner) - so we could put our capital on the coast and get to the island quickly for some pork chops?

I entertained the same idea. I prefer settling the best known site first while exploring for the best coastal site, as a second or third city. That's what concerns me with Rusten's plan, almost forces you to settle your 2nd and third cities on the gems and silver.

If we knew there were a second fp tile, then 1W with two fp cottages is about as good as having the silver tile for commerce, maybe even better. Otherwise, SIP seems fine because it gets the silver after border expansion.

1NE is still powerful to me. It's like a normal gold river tile and a gold non-river tile at a cost of only -1f. More than doubles the early tech rate. Plenty of forests to pump out an early settler for a settler/worker farm. Build the granary asap and a couple farms and just keep growing to pop7 and beyond, taking advantage of the early +2 happies, +4 with a forge. Use philosophical for an early academy and half-priced university. Save some forests for Oxford and be sure to find and settle stone. BUt the same is more or less true with SIP. That's a commerce strategy. Rusten's is a hammer strategy.

Otoh, Rusten is a superior player and lays waste to Deity maps with cold-hearted savagery. An early, massive REX plan on Immortal can be a very powerful strategy and might be the best solution for all players other than Rusten.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

What about just marching the settler to the NW (assuming we are in SE corner) - so we could put our capital on the coast and get to the island quickly for some pork chops?

It might work. But there are lots of risks. Are we certain that we are in the SE corner? When we reach the sea, will there be a decent capital site to settle there? Can we really afford to divert hammers away from settlers and workers to build galleys and armies to settle offshore before we have 3-4 cities? And will we have enough techs to build units powerful enough to defeat whatever monsters lurk on the islands so early in the game?

Here's a radical idea? How about settling 1SE on the dry corn? I realize that means you lose being able to farm that tile (and you also lose the ability to build levees later on), but look what you gain ... With 3F on the city tile, you build your worker 3 turns quicker than settling anywhere else will get you. You get the wet corn and the silver in your BFC. You don't get the gems in your BFC, but since they are near floodplains, it looks a reasonable bet that you'll be able to claim them with a 2nd city (more so than the silver). My main worry is that Rusten said he didn't recommend that, and given that Rusten is quite a good player ... that suggests maybe I'm missing something important

 

[LowtherCastle]

Here's a radical idea? How about settling 1SE on the dry corn? I realize that means you lose being able to farm that tile (and you also lose the ability to build levees later on), but look what you gain ... With 3F on the city tile, you build your worker 3 turns quicker than settling anywhere else will get you. You get the wet corn and the silver in your BFC. You don't get the gems in your BFC, but since they are near floodplains, it looks a reasonable bet that you'll be able to claim them with a 2nd city (more so than the silver).

What sort of a capital do you get? (Hint: crappy) How does that 3t advantage help you win on Immortal? There are 5 regular AIs spread around a standard map. Probably fairly far away. Can you win fast enough that the crappy capital doesn't matter?

What does the silver tile give you? 1f 2h 6g. 2 grass river cottages start at 3g+3g.

This start has so many river tiles that doing the Rusten/BIC start with 3 quick cities and some cottages and you could quickly being teching at 40-50bpt or so, if you wanted.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Another thought is that without any basic food tiles except corn, rice, and wheat, there would have to be more of those nearby or no useful place to settle. My guess is more of them.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Then notice there are few hills. Where will the hammers come from with only 2 corn tiles between three cities for whipping? Might make sense to settle to include as many hills as possible. Whipping will only carry you so far and we'll need units to beat the GMO animals on the island.

 

[LowtherCastle]

One option for the search for inland lake approach is T0: settler moves 1NW, then maybe 1NW. See what turns up. In particular we find out if there are more fp tiles there. If nothing good, there's still T1: return to gems-2S and settle there or settle original SIP.

Multiple advantages if we are in the SE. 1) capital is more centrally located to island cities. 2) capital closer to or even on lake. 3) second city for the two corns is our settler/worker pump.

 

[Jastrow]

I am about to open the file, move the warrior, and unless something by him or in the demographics changes my mind, settled towards the shinnies... Looks like I will be in the minority. It will be interesting to compare results.

 

[Seraiel]

@ DynamicSpirit:

Settlint on the corn is absolutely ok. The benefits of the Silver are minor as LowtherCastle already layed out, because Silver is just the weakest of all metals while FIN are the best of all Cottages, but a 3 centre and wet Corn is defintiely worth missing out the fresh-water. I'll probably still SIP because I want to have that FP and especially the Gems and more river-tiles. It'll depend very much on the type of victory I'll go for though. I. e. Space would want one definitely want to get the best while researchfor domination isn't that important, so chosing , Forests and hills would be adviseable then.

 

[WastinTime]

I am about to open the file, move the warrior, and unless something by him or in the demographics changes my mind, settled towards the shinnies... Looks like I will be in the minority. It will be interesting to compare results.

Agree, how often does a GotM give you 2 shinies? Try something different (if that is different than your normal start). It's a huge difference in early research.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Agree, how often does a GotM give you 2 shinies? Try something different (if that is different than your normal start). It's a huge difference in early research.

But does the difference matter?

The gems 13t earlier is 91-104. That's most of TW+Pottery, right? Not sure how soon the silver is mined in Rusten's plan. That might be another 100 or less. That's Writing, let's say, or some of the Oracle techs.

Or with all those chops, how much earlier Math? Or maybe an Alpha beeline but can we meet the Ais soon enough? And do we want to accelerate their teching? Now that would be WastinTime at his most evil. Astro 100t earlier than everyone else?

 

[WastinTime]

But does the difference matter?

No, I wasn't saying it would result in a better game, just a different opening than the GotM crowd is used to. One special tile is pretty much as good as the next. Although you could argue that 3 special tiles is better than 2. Anyway, my point is playing this particular game without using the 2 commerce start given by the mapmaker is like playing it without exploring the island. Those are 2 things you don't normally get. The island being the most unique/fun feature.

 

[LowtherCastle]

No, I wasn't saying it would result in a better game, just a different opening than the GotM crowd is used to. One special tile is pretty much as good as the next. Although you could argue that 3 special tiles is better than 2. Anyway, my point is playing this particular game without using the 2 commerce start given by the mapmaker is like playing it without exploring the island. Those are 2 things you don't normally get. The island being the most unique/fun feature.

My question was more brainstorming than otherwise, as in, how to benefit from the extra 200 early beakers? Is there a play for a really fast Alpha, even skipping BW? That could lead to a really fast tech pace. Problem with that is typically out-running the AIs so that you slow down later waiting for them (so the Rusten crowd accelerates past with the better REX). On Immortal, giving the AIs an early Alphabet might give them the turbo-charge that the Rusten gang wouldn't get and never catch up.

Then assuming the island is heavily protected, a much earlier maceman, for example, might open it up sooner.

That's just one brainstorm.

Another might be to use the AIs to get to knights asap, since we'll own the horsies...

 

[WastinTime]

My question was more brainstorming than otherwise, as in, how to benefit from the extra 200 early beakers? Is there a play for a really fast Alpha, even skipping BW? That could lead to a really fast tech pace.

Yea, skipping BW is exactly what I'd do in most of my 2-commerce HoF games. Might as well get a granary up first before you whip anyway.

 

[Seraiel]

@ LowtherCastle:

200 BPT may sound like it's not much, but if one gets Alpha 2200 BC by beelining it and then oracles Currency it's a lot more already.

 

[LowtherCastle]

@ LowtherCastle:

200 BPT may sound like it's not much, but if one gets Alpha 2200 BC by beelining it and then oracles Currency it's a lot more already.

Excellent point. On Immortal, currency should pay great dividends and we'd have the tech rate to score a lot of coins. Domino effect.

Hey, maybe we should just play this one as a one-month SG! Takers? See informally how we do against the rest. I'll surely never finish it, playing by myself. I start them, play a half hour and that's it.

 

[Seraiel]

Excellent point. On Immortal, currency should pay great dividends and we'd have the tech rate to score a lot of coins. Domino effect.

Hey, maybe we should just play this one as a one-month SG! Takers? See informally how we do against the rest. I'll surely never finish it, playing by myself. I start them, play a half hour and that's it.

Play it completely on your own Lowther . If we play as a team that's at least 3 competitors less in this GOTM, if Wastin', you and me play on ourselves though, that'll make a great competition for Rusten and all other players . You can find additional motivation once you reach 1 AD in the spoiler thread, it has a lot of posts already so there seems to be some good discussion. You also have won enough golden laurels already and I'm very sure that I'm not the only one that would like to see how well you do when playing as Team LC and not as TSR or Anti-TSR . When I seek motivation to play on, I also write towards my friends, you can write to me, Wastin or even try to get "the broken clock" (Mitchum ) into the competition. If the game isn't interesting enough anymore for you by itself, maybe you can find a way to make it more interesting again . For me, getting an Ephtalon was a good motivation and once I played the first two GOTM's, I found joy in the challenge of adapting towards settings I'm not used to and compete against players that play competetively very long already and that I didn't know yet . Maybe you'll find something while playing that you don't know yet!

 

[LowtherCastle]

Yeah, I woke up thinking that a private SG was not in the best interests of BOTM. Maybe I'll just upload my incomplete game, if I remember.

We're assuming we're in the SE corner because of the river flow, right? Rivers tend to converge toward the inland lake, right? Almost could be NW too. Hard to know for sure.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

@ DynamicSpirit:

Settlint on the corn is absolutely ok. The benefits of the Silver are minor as LowtherCastle already layed out, because Silver is just the weakest of all metals while FIN are the best of all Cottages, but a 3 centre and wet Corn is defintiely worth missing out the fresh-water. I'll probably still SIP because I want to have that FP and especially the Gems and more river-tiles. It'll depend very much on the type of victory I'll go for though. I. e. Space would want one definitely want to get the best while researchfor domination isn't that important, so chosing , Forests and hills would be adviseable then.

Thx! And to LowtherCastle for the replies.

So as I see it there are four choices to settle:

• By the two corns to get max. food
• On the dry corn to get quick worker build, a bit less food, and silver (but might not be as good a capital long term)
• In place to get less food again but the very powerful grassland-gems
• 1NE to lose a turn but get gems AND silver.

What a choice! They all look tempting in different ways, and I still have no idea what I'll do when I open the save. This has to be one of the cleverest starting areas I've seen in a long time.

Normally I don't play immortal - I regard it as too hard. But I think the imaginative scenario and clever start is likely to tempt me this time.