I settled 1S to get more riverside. The capital is looking good with 3 pigs.
Research goes AH. City starts on a worker. Warrior goes scout North.
We discover close by furs and bananas.
The furs are appealing for city 2 to compensate for the lack of commerce in the capital. Conceivably, that city could work a rice tile after IW and share a pigs from the capital before that.
Rome is met from the north.
After AH, I went for The Wheel. With a single hill to mine, Mining seems extremely costly to research.
The Wheel gets trade routes if city 2 goes to the NE. And unlocks Pottery.
Further exploration reveal all jungled resources. So I set to research Hunting next. The furs are the only additional tile I can reasonably claim.
Iirc, Tokugawa found us from the SW (not sure).
The scouting warrior is now following the river to the south, so as to circle the land around the cap. Finding city spots is what matters.
At size 3, the capital starts on a settler. Growing 1 more size would only take 2 turns but it would also only add 1hpt towards settlers. So, there's no reason to wait :
With Hunting done, the tech choices are :
- Pottery ;
- Writing ;
- Mining --> Bronze ;
- Sailing ;
- Mysticism.
As I mentioned in a post above :
- RExing isn't really an option : we can't see very many early city spots ;
- infrastructure requires Bronze.
So, for now, BW has little use : can't REx. And we can't afford infra.
Mysticism might be fine for some gambit. Sailing/Writing have more marginal utility.
Pottery we go, so as to develop the land and make use of the high happy cap.
City 2 will borrow a pigs, so it will grow fast and hit size 4 in a reasonable timeframe : we can't get Granaries but we can get cottages.
Settler is out, in position, guarded by the warrior, worker will complete the road before it settles. Washington completes the second warrior with overflow :
Now we get a a nice little micro problem that requires solving.
But first, city two is settled and works the pigs. It will grow in 4, then work improved furs, then grow in 4 again, then work a weaker tile.
So, what's the tough point ?
Deciding on Washington's build order, that it is.
Namely : the city wants to train another settler. Question is how.
There are very many options.
- starting on the settler this turn, it takes 9 turns. City can work either a lake or a forest. 9 turns either way.
But the city can also grow to size 4 in a single turn. So it can :
- grow to 4, and work 2 forests, to do 13hpt for a 8 turns settler --> growing allows to get the settler out in the same 9 turns. There would be 4 overflow hammers, so a lake tile could be worked for 4 turns. Note that this option comes out behind in commerce from the above one, working a lake for 9 turns. It does come out ahead in food and hammers, however. A single growth turn for food. Irrelevant hammers for now (decay in warriors ; useless in barracks). Eh ? See ? Not so easy.
- and it can grow to 4 and do 11hpt working 2x lakes. That's 99hammers over 9 turns. If the city works a forest for a turn, that's 100 hammers over 9 turns. Plus a turn for growth : the settler can be out in 10 turns and we'll have worked 20 turns of lakes. That's about 20 more commerce than what we get in the first scenario. I think, justifies the 1 turn delay on the settler. Especially so since we cannot see, yet, a profitable location for city 2 and that city will, likely, borrow another pigs tile from the capital.
So it goes like this :
Now, with Pottery done, another conundrum is offered to us.
Writing ? Bronze ?
If we want infra, we need to go Mining + Bronze. *Whistles* That's expensive. We can't mine much, we can't chop much, we can't REx much. It took me a little time to figure that out but for you I make it brief.
Writing has no immediate benefit BUT with our lowish maintenance we can :
- grow cities on cottages ;
- research Alphabet and backfill stuff.
So, actually, we're skipping Mining.
Oh... I cannot remember when, but also met Elizabeth (nice) and then Mansa Musa (very nice).
Settler is out ! We've found another tile that we can improve
Here it is, can you see it ?
So we get a horse city and will share another corn from the capital. The capital is getting increasingly weaker with each of these cities. So settling, really, isn't a rush.
The good point is that Wash can still grow on 1 pig and we have the tech to develop the flatland (cottages).
Boston has produced its warrior. It switches over to a worker. We can grow. We need the workforce.
And, while we're at it, Washington will produce a worker, too.
There's no real use for settler at the moment.
Also, the maintenance from city 4 would make it a drain on the economy. Currently, reaching Alphabet asap is the main objective.
You can see from the surroundings that not much can be done without IW and Calendar. Calendar, however, would unlock some most excellent city spots.
Settler gets in position. We're preparing some nifty tile swaps to complete the workers :
Tile swaps ! Both workers will complete with 0 overflow.
Meanwhile, we'll keep the number of worked lake tiles to their maximum, as long as they do not delay the workers :
With our lowish maintenance and focus on commerce, the science slider can be raised again. Also, exploring warriors find a couple of barb cities. Metal would be nice to have :
So, at 2000 BC, we have 3 cities, sizes 4, 3, 1.
3 workers, two of them tasked with cottaging, starting with the shared tiles :
And a third worker tasked with roading into Hindu Mali.
Will get us trade routes, maybe a blocker city and maybe even religion for culture & happiness :
We've been first to Writing, so chances are good we'll be first to Alphabet as well.
Only 4 AIs were met. 3 remain. However, I cannot really hope to go greet them. Don't have the military. I probably barely have what it takes to protect my surroundings.
Archers might be nice to have. Swords would be better.
Once Alphabet will be know, we'll need :
- settlers ;
- military.
Wonders situation :
- none built. An Oracle gambit could have worked nicely, although I'm happy with the early cottages development.
Religions :
- Judaism not founded.
Likely, AIs have a difficult time dealing properly with jungle maps. You need many more workers than usual.
This is it ! I won't get into that much detail over the next updates.
This has almost been turn by turn. The early game is the time when turn by turn can make sense.
