Prince Build/Wonderaholic cure New SG'ers welcome

[UNCpenguin]

I think the great lighthouse is a good choice, it will help boost science in coastal cities for a long while and it looks like we will have several coastal cities which seems to make it the definate choice.

Once we found pink/yellow dots almost all of the fog on our part of the island will be cleared removing most of the immediate barb threat, leaving hatty all by her lonesome on the target list.

Medina eventually should build a barracks possibly after a few precautionary axemen are built to handle barb axes, then the immediate extr experience boost from the barracks will make dealing with hatty come out much better in our favor. Do you think we wait for siege or just hit her with axes? I guess scouting her territory/resources will help decide that and if she comes into our future area (other than her being there already) that would make me want to remove her sooner rather than later.

@Atlas - Good point putting the costs into perspective, and I do go to unc.

 

[Lobsterboy]

I don't think we should be in a rush to build any wonders. Either the Great Lighthouse or Colossus would be nice, but right now we need Mecca to produce more fog busters.

As for our next city, I think we should go for Pink dot. With that site colonize, we'll probably only need one fog buster in the North. With an axe on defense few more 'busters south of the city, the barbs shouldn't be a problem.

Yeah, we are almost certainly alone on a mini continent with Hatty.

 

[Atlas]

I think the great lighthouse is a good choice, it will help boost science in coastal cities for a long while and it looks like we will have several coastal cities which seems to make it the definate choice.


@Atlas - Good point putting the costs into perspective, and I do go to unc.

Great Lighthouse is a good choice IMHO.

I go to UNC too.

 

[idle]

First of all:

We don't HAVE to build a wonder. We could drop it and wait (save forests) for the greatLib or even Hanging Gardens (I always think of The Cure when I build it. man, I'm old ). It all depends on Hattys aggressiveness in settling our lands, we can't afford to build the Überlighthouse if we're in early war.

Besides that, the lighthouse is IMO the best choice (we need a regular lighthouse first, right?).

I want to settle pink dot first. As Ralph says it's better right off the bat, and with all the seafood it has great -potetial. And worker production is gonna be great! We'll need a ton of them to clear the jungle.

Barb defence will soon(ish) cease to be an issue, and as Lobsterboy says, pink will reduce the need to fog bust more than yellow.

Good turn plan. Can't wait for my turns

Edit:
Ooh, better build some cottages as soon as pottery comes in. Gotta make some green! But I recon you've already thought of that. We need more workers. 2-1 worker/city is about right.

 

[Ralph_Jackson]

OK I will play and post tonight. I doubt I will start the Wonder this set so a final decison on that can wait. I will settle Pink Dot once I can safely get the settler out there!

We will struggle to take Hatty with Axmen, but Swordsmen could do the trick before catapults, though we may need to hold off while our economy grows.

 

[Lobsterboy]

We will struggle to take Hatty with Axmen, but Swordsmen could do the trick before catapults, though we may need to hold off while our economy grows.

Axemen might struggle to take her capital, but any colony she establishes should be easy to take out with a few City Raider axes. Afterall, she can only carry one defensive unit + settler per Galley. I doubt that she will arrive in force this early.

Looking forward to the report!

 

[Ralph_Jackson]

Well having dutifully set my goals for this turnset as soon as I started playing realised I must have been

when I set some of them !!

This one is a doozy

next city, I think we should go for Pink dot.

Without Iron working Pink dot would just kill our research. Basically we need Iron Working imminent before we settle any of our dots to be able to make them productive. The good news is I puzzled this out before settling.

So anyway

Turn 1 start by moving Warrior to South of Mecca out beyond our borders as thats where he needs to be to remove Fog of War bor Anti-Barb-Spanwing duties. In a couple of turns he will get to his ideal spot (see screenshot below). Additionally move the healthy warrior out of Mecca to Join our warrior threatened by 2 Barbs. Although he will easily kills the first (being Woodsman 2) he might have needed help versus the second.

Turn 2

Turn 3 Now with the copper mined I queue up an Axe ahead of the Obelisk in Medina. (why . I want to chop the forest north of Medina for another mine - we need hammers)

Turn 4 So Pottery learned and decision time. I had been said I would go to to Animal Husbandry next due to cows near Mecca. But Mecca has tons of food producing tiles at the moment so actually go to Iron Working. The sooner we get that the sooner Pink / Red Dot will be productive!!

Turn 5 Barb Watcher from first turn has reached an ideal spot , this one person is clearing a lot of fog all by himself, and much more efficient here than inside our borders.

Turn 6. Now Mecca has reached a sweet spot. Now some view this as excessive MM or a bit of an exploit. What it means is if you need slightly over a multiple of 30 hammers at Epic Speed (e.g 61 - 89) to complete a project then you actaully get much better value for Money. In this case 2 population nets me 90 hammers as opposed to the normal 60. A bargain and with our difficult start one I gratefully accept. These 90 complete our lighthouse and make a big dent in the Granary (remember to queue up the next building before ) we will need the Granary as I predict another for a libary / temple at some point.

Turn 7 Barb watchers doing a sterling job sitting in woods and letting the barbs come to them when they are easy meat.These two warriors are making it safe for unescorted workers to build paths out towards Pink Dot

Turn 8 The chop in Medina comes in and simultaneously completes its Obelisk. WHoever queued up Obelisk it was a good choice as we need the Border pop later for the cows (when we have AH of course)

Turn 9 - 11 (Meant to take 11 turns to take us up to 900BC as it seemed a nice round number ) Then of course hit enter and stuffed up

Turn 12 So as you can see we are now ready to move the settler out and Build Pink Dot (see below)

So where are we at:

Mecca needs a little carefull MM to maximize commerce / research. Currently Iron working in 18 , this will drop as it regrows population with the right tile assignments. Keep an eye on it 'cos the City Governor won't hack it!!
Watch the happiness limit in Mecca, it wants a military unit (they are coming free). After the Granary it should prebuild a Work Boat for Pink dot. Note don't settle it until Iron working is fairly close

Medina has good production for churning out more axemen than we will need. When it gets big enough : whipped: A worker has just been freed up there and should go for a cottage or two.

Once Pink Dot settled it will need an Obelisk for a quick Border pop. there are lots of useless trees out side its big cross we can chop to speed it along

Research post Iron working I guess AH is still the priority. I didn't manage to explore Hatty's land but we seem to have largely eliminated the Barbs wihtout lsoing a unit so far !!

 

[idle]

Ralph wrote:

After the Granary it should prebuild a Work Boat for Pink dot. Note don't settle it until Iron working is fairly close

Once we whip a library in Mecca I think our research will at least stay the same even after we settle pink dot. Numbers, anyone?

On the MM/whipping:
I thought you got 45 hammers/pop for whipping on epic speed instead of the 30 on normal. Like chopping. Hmmm *runs off to strategy section to study *

Findings:
- Whipping is not affected by forges, factorys, power or ironworks
(spiceant) : http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=157667
- On normal speed 1 population will produce 30 hammers
- Normal game speed is the standard game speed, quick goes 50% as fast, epic goes 50% as slow and marathon 200% as slow as normal game speed. (concepts like slavery/great people techs get scaled with speed so a unit that costs 2 population will always cost 2 population)
(Mutineer) : http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=163885

Mutineer could be wrong, although I doubt it.

Good job! Especially on finding the fog busting sweet spots. Looking forward to my turns

I'll be off for the rest of the weekend, back and ready to play on monday afternoon.

 

[Lobsterboy]

I downloaded the save and should have some time to play today/tonight.

Without any hills in its fat cross Pink dot (soon to be called Damascus) will never be a very productive city; it's a commerce city all the way. Actually, with several forested grasslands, it's early production won't be horrible, and with the fish, early growth won't be too bad either. Anyway, DO NOT CHOP ANY FORESTS WITHIN PINK DOT's FAT CROSS! Not until the jungle around it is cleared.

If I found Damascus during my turns, how much of a research hit are we going to take? (I could do the experiment, but that might be cheating!)

 

[idle]

Pink dot is supposed to be our GP-farm, isn't it?
Nevertheless, I agree on not chopping in Damascus' FC.

If you want, you could check the Strategy forums on city maintainance to avoid cheating.

Good luck!

 

[Ralph_Jackson]

I was probably being over pessimistic about the hit on Research from founding Damascus and feel that if you move the Settler across now we shouldn't take too much of a hit. Both Mecca and Medina will start growing and producing a little extra commerce to balance up the higher city Maintenance from Damascus so go for it.

As far as chopping trees for Damascus' Obelisk I was referring to those NW of Pink dot which will never be in a city's FC, Haven't double checked but worth looking to ensure they will go to damascus not Mecca.

So on balance I think you should feel free to found Pink Dot fairly quick.

A library will help a lot in Mecca but we are still a fair way away from that. There should certianly be enough Pop for a when we can build it.

Lastly as far as the Whipping sweet spot goes this I believe this is a genuine difference. A detailed analysis can be found here

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=145687

Ralph

p.s. I guess you might as well play through to iron Working coming on line as my turns were certainly not time consuming!! In the mean time you may struggle to keep the workers gainfully employed - once it arrives they will have stacks to do!!

p.p.s Now about to rebuild my PC having had a HDD failure so may be out of the loop for a bit

 

[Ralph_Jackson]

Well computer fixed.

Ever spent an hour fiddling with Broadband connection router etc only to discover that the reason why it has suddenly stopped wokring, whilst ones PC is in bits is. Yes the dog has chewed through the Co-Ax outside the house, yes the Cable Company was right ("no problem at our end!!).

Anyway fixed, so when are the next turns getting played ?

Roster
Lobsterboy in the chair
Idle On deck


Seriously for those of us enjoying Prince I heartily recommend the Prince Level Game set up by Sirian over at http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/showthread.php?t=840

 

[Lobsterboy]

Played a little under 20 turns - to 400 BC (seemed a nice round number at which to stop).
Through all of that, I didn't manage to anything.

Turn 97 (860 BC)
Granary not needed in Mecca; switch to Warrior for happiness control.
Mecca begins: Warrior


Turn 98 (840 BC)
Mecca grows: 4

Turn 99 (820 BC)
Medina finishes: Axeman
Barb War. appears S of easterly FB and is defeated.
Warrior defeats (1.74/2): Barbarian Warrior

Turn 100 (800 BC)
Medina begins: Axeman
Warrior promoted: Combat I (already has Woodsman I & II - he's been a busy boy!)

Turn 101 (780 BC)
Tacitus rates us #2 in culture.

Turn 102 (760 BC)
Mecca finishes: Warrior

Turn 103 (740 BC)

Turn 104 (720 BC)

Turn 105 (700 BC)
Medina finishes: Axeman

Turn 106 (680 BC)
Medina begins: Barracks
Mecca begins: Work Boat
Medina's borders expand
Stonehenge built in Persia.

Turn 107 (660 BC)

Turn 108 (640 BC)
Mecca grows: 5
Another Barb shows up - same place as the last one - and is defeated.
Warrior defeats (0.80/2): Barbarian Warrior

Turn 109 (620 BC)
All fog busted except for "The Cirque"

Turn 110 (600 BC)

Turn 111 (580 BC)

Turn 112 (560 BC)
Damascus founded
Damascus begins: Obelisk
Used a worker to chop the forest under Damascus before settling - yielded all of 7 hammers!

Turn 113 (540 BC)
Mecca finishes: Work Boat

Turn 114 (520 BC)
Medina grows: 3

Turn 115 (500 BC)
Tech learned: Iron Working

We are Iron rich! No less than THREE resources. Mecca is the Iron Capital of the world!
One of our resources is already mined:



Unfortunately, Hat also has iron too :



Turn 116 (480 BC)
Research begun: Animal Husbandry
Moved fogbusting Axe to entrance of The Cirque to intercept barbs. We might as well use the Raging Barbs setting to get some upgrades, and better an Axe gets the upgrade than a Warrior.

Turn 117 (460 BC)

Turn 118 (440 BC)
Mecca finishes: Granary
Medina finishes: Barracks

Turn 119 (420 BC)
Mecca begins: Worker
Medina begins: Axeman
Mecca's borders expand
Judaism founded in a distant land

Turn 120 (400 BC)

Unfortunately, Hatty has sealed us off to the south, so there wasn't much more to explore in that direction.
Since our iron is already hooked up, we should discuss building some Swordsman to take out Hatty early. Another Axe is queued up in Medina, but feel free to switch to Swordsman. A Worker is queued up in Mecca, but might want to switch to Barracks, if we decide on the Sword-rush.

According to the demographics screen, we are 3rd to 5th in almost all categories. In addition to Hatty, other civs (as yet uncontacted) in our world include: 'Belle, Cyrus, America and China.

Here's the save:

 

[idle]

Nice turns, Lobsterboy!

Ralph, didn't know about the "exploit". Seems like a bug. Should we use it? It may be fixed in the next patch.

A couple of things:

1. I'll be concentrating on gearing up for war against Hatty. How many units will we need? It may take a while to build an army if Medina is the only military city. I'm thinking 5-6 axes (axes are cheaper) and 3-4 swords, plus a spearman or two if hatty has war chariots. This should be enough to take her out completely in one fell swoop (my usual tactic). Medina will of course keep reinforcements coming. Will this be enough?

2. I think Mecca should concentrate on workers until Damascus is size 3 (and working both seafoods and the rice). Then it should take over as worker builder, so Mecca can build a wonder.

3. Our level 3 warrior (woodsman II + combat I) should be upgraded when we have the cash. Probably when we fail to get a wonder...

4. Why are we building cottages around Medina? We should be specializing it into our (temporary) military production centre. I can see that our worker has nothing better to do until AH, but we could be clearing the jungle to the north of Medina. The grassland cottage is ok as it pays for itself food-wise, but the one on the plains will probably not be used for thousands of years...


I should have time to play my turns tomorrow night. Until then, discussion is most welcome. Feel free to correct me if I've missed something.

 

[Ralph_Jackson]

For Invasion we need swords not Axes. Hatty is lilkely to be defending with quite a few archers (especially as we snagged the Copper?).

A swordsman can take an archer in a city whereas an Axeman really struggles.

I would say 6 swordsmen + 3 axes. It will take a little while to build the force


Re whipping normally I wouldn't but when the RNG give me a difficult start it can be difficult to resist.


The plans for Mecca and Medina sound sensible, we have lots of work for workers!! Library + specialists (particularly in Mecca / Damascus sound like the medium term goal to be progressed alongisde gettin ready to take Hatty down (High priority and fun!!)

you are right about only building cottages we can foreseeably work (Grassland) as there is a lot of jungle to be cleared round Damascus / The other two city sites.

Have fun; as we are still mainly building for action play a number of turns that feels right

 

[Lobsterboy]

1. I'll be concentrating on gearing up for war against Hatty. How many units will we need? It may take a while to build an army if Medina is the only military city. I'm thinking 5-6 axes (axes are cheaper) and 3-4 swords, plus a spearman or two if hatty has war chariots. This should be enough to take her out completely in one fell swoop (my usual tactic). Medina will of course keep reinforcements coming. Will this be enough?

I think Ralph's estimate - 6 Swords, plus a few Axes and a Spearman (for defense) - would be better. By the time we get to Woodstock... er, Memphis... the units inside may have +40% defensive border from culture pops. Even Swords with City Raider II will have trouble vs. Archers with that.

2. I think Mecca should concentrate on workers until Damascus is size 3 (and working both seafoods and the rice). Then it should take over as worker builder, so Mecca can build a wonder.

I don't think we need more than one or two more workers for the time being. I'm thinking that we should whip a Barracks in Mecca and pump out a few military units to speed up the military build up. None of our cities is suffering yet from the effects of the jungle, and production in Mecca is pretty good.

I forgot to take a screenshot of Damascus, but there is a Worker improving the land there. With another Worker there, and another to chop the jungle around Red Dot City, this should be enough for the time being. (In addition to the seafood and rice tiles, Damascus has 2-3 forested grassland squares it can work.)

4. Why are we building cottages around Medina? We should be specializing it into our (temporary) military production centre. I can see that our worker has nothing better to do until AH, but we could be clearing the jungle to the north of Medina. The grassland cottage is ok as it pays for itself food-wise, but the one on the plains will probably not be used for thousands of years...

All of the cottages around Medina and Mecca were built prior to Iron Working; there was nothing else for them to do! The worker outside of Medina is currently building a road (I think.)

Looking forward to your turns!

 

[idle]

Ok, I agree on the number of swordsmen, but I think we'll need more axemen than 3. For defense at least, Hatty might have 3-4 cities. If she's built a couple of axemen (she has iron, but does she have IW?) and keep them in the city, we'll need two axes just for that. The RNG hates me Plus, she may have copper as well...

- An unpromoted archer in a city with 40% culture defense is str 5.7 (7.2 if on a hill). An unpromoted axe has 7.
- A swordsman (with city raider I) has 7.8 (6 +10% +20%)

Does anyone know which promotions the AI prefers?

Medina at size 4 (working cow, iron and 2 mined grass hills) have 13 hammers/turn. It will definately take a while to build an army.

I won't be in a position to attack in my turns, so feel free to build more if needed.

Edit:
Ok, so workers can wait for a bit. I'll play that one by ear. That jungle has a tendency to grow like the weed it is (in this game anyway), so maybe I'll build a couple.

 

[Atlas]

Lurkers comment

Guys check out the last picture by Lobesterboy, the city with iron, take that one first. There is a nice forested tile that will be right next to the city that you can move your stack into. This provides does two things it will take cut Hatty's iron on the first turn of the war (by taking her iron city) and provide cover for your stack on the first turn of the war.

Just a thought though.

-Atlas

 

[Lobsterboy]

My thoughts exactly, Atlas.

Hatty doesn't appear to have build a road to the iron, so it is unlikely that she has Iron Working. If she does start building a road to and then mining that square we might want to start the war early, even if our invasion force isn't fully assembled, just to prevent her from doing so.

 

[Ralph_Jackson]

The reason we need swords is in the below

- An unpromoted archer in a city with 40% culture defense is str 5.7 (7.2 if on a hill). An unpromoted axe has 7. An axe doesn't gain its melee bonus versus archers so isn't Strength 7 this is why it is in trouble. (I think if not correct me)
- A swordsman (with city raider I) has 7.8 (6 +10% +20%). This is what swings it, Without City Raider 1 it is fairly tight but the swordsmen is ahead, with City Raider it beomes a fairly easy battle.

As far as tactics goes as Hatty has Iron so she will have some good quality defenders when we invade but she may not have hooked it up via Iron Working yet as we beelined straght for it. This suggest time is of the essence as our Swordsmen vs Archer advantage won't last for ever.

Barracks

The above (time is of the essence) is one reason for not going for a Barracks even with , The other reason is by not whipping the barracks in Mecca our pop there will continue to grow while we build swordsmen and research towards library. This means we can quickly whip the library and assign specialists when the research comes in. This will help us out of a research black hole from the costs of taking Hatty's cities.

So for me the way forward is .

1. Build Swordsmen + Research towrds libraries(once AH comes in).
2. Clear jungle!!

3. Chop woods NW of Damascus (as they won't be in any cities FC) to get the obelisk + crucial border pop sooner.

4. After that pause, invade , then establish Red Dot, (could be a good hammer city which we need)

Thoughts? Have fun idle again take it what feels like a natural break but we will soon be doing 10 turns each !