rbd23 - c
- Thread starter smegged
- Start date
Conquest is very simple -- eliminate all other civilizations from the map. DESTRUCTION is the key.
Domination is a bit more difficult. To win by domination, 67% (75%?) of the land/coast squares on the map have to be within your cultural borders. On a map like ours, with TONS of coast squares, that's a lot of squares.
Our map had a lot of unsettled islands, which meant there were lots of squares without the Japanese culture influencing them. That cuts down on the domination victory condition. It was thus easier/faster to win by conquest, because we didn't have to try to settle out all the remote islands -- check the "b" game for that direction.
On a related note, score is also related to # of squares controlled, but it appears (from what I've read) that SEA squares also count for score, along with coast squares. And ocean squares do not. <Shrug> Such is the game as designed. And one of the reasons "score" as a measure of game quality is problematic, at best.
This game has a lot of feel of a lot of my games -- not optimal city placement but tactics and military take the cake. With enough infrastructure to keep up strong the whole game.
Arathorn
Domination is a bit more difficult. To win by domination, 67% (75%?) of the land/coast squares on the map have to be within your cultural borders. On a map like ours, with TONS of coast squares, that's a lot of squares.
Our map had a lot of unsettled islands, which meant there were lots of squares without the Japanese culture influencing them. That cuts down on the domination victory condition. It was thus easier/faster to win by conquest, because we didn't have to try to settle out all the remote islands -- check the "b" game for that direction.
On a related note, score is also related to # of squares controlled, but it appears (from what I've read) that SEA squares also count for score, along with coast squares. And ocean squares do not. <Shrug> Such is the game as designed. And one of the reasons "score" as a measure of game quality is problematic, at best.
This game has a lot of feel of a lot of my games -- not optimal city placement but tactics and military take the cake. With enough infrastructure to keep up strong the whole game.
Arathorn
Good job, folks! 
I think we did pretty well, though we could have done a better job in the following areas:
- city placement (e.g. Izumo, area NW of Berlin, area N of Kyoto)
- worker management (focussing on most important regions to improve 1st)
- FP construction time (clueing in on Zimbabwe being a poor choice, being about the same distance from Kyoto as Frankfurt, which was tragic; making it a priority and rushing it through ASAP)
But, overall, I think we had the right priorities on infrastructure vs. military, and that's the key to getting the victory quickly. See my post in RBD23-b for more details. I'm not going to post it all again here!
I think we did pretty well, though we could have done a better job in the following areas:
- city placement (e.g. Izumo, area NW of Berlin, area N of Kyoto)
- worker management (focussing on most important regions to improve 1st)
- FP construction time (clueing in on Zimbabwe being a poor choice, being about the same distance from Kyoto as Frankfurt, which was tragic; making it a priority and rushing it through ASAP)
But, overall, I think we had the right priorities on infrastructure vs. military, and that's the key to getting the victory quickly. See my post in RBD23-b for more details. I'm not going to post it all again here!
Gotta keep the post count UP!!!
It's a good thing Zed and I weren't directly next to each other in the rotation. With his builder/infrastructure mentality and my warmongerish tendencies, we'd've exploded like a matter/anti-matter collision.
Seriously, though, it worked out very well to have both sides balanced. We built some (enough, apparently) infrastructure to support everything else. Without SOME brake on Grey Fox and I, we'd've probably not had the steam to keep things going. Lovro and Charliehoke got the difficult transition periods and handled them flawless, progressing from one to the other very smoothely.
And I built some infrastructure. And Zed prosecuted some war. And EVERYBODY (that I could tell) cooperated very well and played very soundly -- both war-wise and infrastructure-wise. Any weed people would like to point out? I've reread our whole thread to get ideas, but nothing is sticking out. Of course, I'm not necessarily the most ... objective ... observer.
Boy, howdy, those Aztecs folded fast. I never got to see much of them. Lovro wiped 'em out.
Chemistry before Education from the GL mattered absolutely zero.
Workers? One of these years I'll learn the benefits.... I keep saying I need more -- just about every game (except RBD13, OY!) -- but I rarely make the effort to build 'em. Thanks to all who did.
Arathorn
It's a good thing Zed and I weren't directly next to each other in the rotation. With his builder/infrastructure mentality and my warmongerish tendencies, we'd've exploded like a matter/anti-matter collision.
Seriously, though, it worked out very well to have both sides balanced. We built some (enough, apparently) infrastructure to support everything else. Without SOME brake on Grey Fox and I, we'd've probably not had the steam to keep things going. Lovro and Charliehoke got the difficult transition periods and handled them flawless, progressing from one to the other very smoothely.
And I built some infrastructure. And Zed prosecuted some war. And EVERYBODY (that I could tell) cooperated very well and played very soundly -- both war-wise and infrastructure-wise. Any weed people would like to point out? I've reread our whole thread to get ideas, but nothing is sticking out. Of course, I'm not necessarily the most ... objective ... observer.
Boy, howdy, those Aztecs folded fast. I never got to see much of them. Lovro wiped 'em out.
Chemistry before Education from the GL mattered absolutely zero.
Workers? One of these years I'll learn the benefits.... I keep saying I need more -- just about every game (except RBD13, OY!) -- but I rarely make the effort to build 'em. Thanks to all who did.
Arathorn
Yet again, I get undeserved credit
IIRC, I ended my turn with 1 turn left on chivalry and 10 horsemen overall. When I next picked up the game, the Aztecs were down to one city, the Zulus down to three.
Actually, Arathorn, you would have been the terminator of the Aztecs, had you been able to play your last turn on schedule.
EDIT - tenses...
Yeah, the Aztec war was pretty much taken care of by myself and Charlie. I started after Lovro, got Chivalry, upgraded our horses, got attacked, triggered a Golden Age, took about half the Aztec territory, and left the other half for the next player.
As for
, I didn't see anything I'd flag as that. Lots of sub-optimal moves, but that's par for the course for succession games, and probably regular games too for that matter. We could have gotten done earlier if we'd done things slightly differently, but not by any huge amount. 10-20 turns, maybe?
That's why the whole city placement issue is in some ways a red herring in a quick-finishing game -- not that it's not better to have optimal city placement, but that the difference between a well-placed city and a poorly placed one is magnified not only by when the city is founded, but also by the length of the game, and in a short game like this one it matters a bit less. For instance, conside the area N of Kyoto: yes, we could have gotten another city in there, and yes we would have gotten more gold and score as a result. BUT, (a) the cost of that is 2 pop and 30 shields from one of our other cities, when we're trying to build military (as Arathorn said earlier, larger is better short term, spread is better long term... and this was a short-term focus game), and (b) we really wouldn't have gotten a lot more production out of that extra city anyway, since we had the same number of useable land tiles, and that's where all the production is! This is not to say that better city placement wouldn't have helped -- it certainly would have been nice to have Osaka on the coast where it was put in the other games, for extra food squares, ability to build boats, and less corruption, and to let us build Tokyo closer in for better access to quality land and less corruption itself. But, as for an extra city... sometimes trying to squeeze blood out of a turnip isn't worth it. If we had been expecting to get to Steam Power and Electricity, it would definately have been worth it, but that wasn't on the agenda.
The same goes for the Berlin area; we could have built an extra city down there to snag some of Berlin's grass, allowing us to better use that prime real estate and also getting us another less corrupt support city down there -- that would have been a good move. In fact, building Nara a bit to the east of where we did would have done the job, so we dropped the ball on city placement there. But, I think we made the right call on Germany otherwise with respect to city placement, and that was to not build any! With no FP, it was better for us to ignore all that desert east of Konigsberg and south of Berlin than to settle it ourselves because it would never be productive for us and the pop was better used elsewhere, and because in a fast game like this pop+territory pales in comparison to finish date. Hence, the only cities we ever got in former Germany were those we captured (leaving aside Nara.) And as for building the FP there -- when that one good patch of grass is surrounded by water, desert, and jungle that would take a long time and lots of workers to clear? And when Leipzig and Konigsberg were already reasonably close to Kyoto to begin with? It would have gotten us more cash, but it would have practically forced us to settle all that desert, and it wouldn't have increased our production (shields) count by all that much -- probably not enough to justify building it there, even with being able to start it earlier.
As for
, I didn't see anything I'd flag as that. Lots of sub-optimal moves, but that's par for the course for succession games, and probably regular games too for that matter. We could have gotten done earlier if we'd done things slightly differently, but not by any huge amount. 10-20 turns, maybe?That's why the whole city placement issue is in some ways a red herring in a quick-finishing game -- not that it's not better to have optimal city placement, but that the difference between a well-placed city and a poorly placed one is magnified not only by when the city is founded, but also by the length of the game, and in a short game like this one it matters a bit less. For instance, conside the area N of Kyoto: yes, we could have gotten another city in there, and yes we would have gotten more gold and score as a result. BUT, (a) the cost of that is 2 pop and 30 shields from one of our other cities, when we're trying to build military (as Arathorn said earlier, larger is better short term, spread is better long term... and this was a short-term focus game), and (b) we really wouldn't have gotten a lot more production out of that extra city anyway, since we had the same number of useable land tiles, and that's where all the production is! This is not to say that better city placement wouldn't have helped -- it certainly would have been nice to have Osaka on the coast where it was put in the other games, for extra food squares, ability to build boats, and less corruption, and to let us build Tokyo closer in for better access to quality land and less corruption itself. But, as for an extra city... sometimes trying to squeeze blood out of a turnip isn't worth it. If we had been expecting to get to Steam Power and Electricity, it would definately have been worth it, but that wasn't on the agenda.
The same goes for the Berlin area; we could have built an extra city down there to snag some of Berlin's grass, allowing us to better use that prime real estate and also getting us another less corrupt support city down there -- that would have been a good move. In fact, building Nara a bit to the east of where we did would have done the job, so we dropped the ball on city placement there. But, I think we made the right call on Germany otherwise with respect to city placement, and that was to not build any! With no FP, it was better for us to ignore all that desert east of Konigsberg and south of Berlin than to settle it ourselves because it would never be productive for us and the pop was better used elsewhere, and because in a fast game like this pop+territory pales in comparison to finish date. Hence, the only cities we ever got in former Germany were those we captured (leaving aside Nara.) And as for building the FP there -- when that one good patch of grass is surrounded by water, desert, and jungle that would take a long time and lots of workers to clear? And when Leipzig and Konigsberg were already reasonably close to Kyoto to begin with? It would have gotten us more cash, but it would have practically forced us to settle all that desert, and it wouldn't have increased our production (shields) count by all that much -- probably not enough to justify building it there, even with being able to start it earlier.
