RBtS1a - The Thief Economy

[Ozbenno]

Well its always worth trying stuff



The economy is in the dumps (the unit upkeep is as much as the city maintenance). We have no happiness resources or religion. Things are looking good.

Mutal completes worker first IBT, not really mush to build here. uberfish's suggestion of Pyramids looks good, plenty of forests and if we miss it, a nice cash injection.



First action of the new offensive is to pillage the horses.



Here is our first sight of Susa.



The attack start badly with our CR2 axe losing at good odds but picks up with our CR1 axe winning at bad odds

Two more axes die (one good odds one bad) but three holkan all come good and Susa is ours.



We could use the happiness of the elephants and if we don't take it now Hatty or Shaka will, squeezing us out so we take Susa.

I try the Alphabet gambit again on Darius but no cheese again.

Don't know whether to take fishing and archery or to wipe him out. Lets continue on to his last city and see what he has to say.

Hatty wants open borders, why not!

He takes the deal . Of course as I was trying it every turn, the one I forgot to take a screeny was the time he accepted.

I dial research down to 0%, espionage up to 50% (while we can afford it) and select Aesthetics as our research project (in 702 turns )

Now to start some spies.

I stabilise the populations of Pasargardae and Mutal until we can get some happiness.

Wang wants to trade us Iron Working for Alphabet, I explain the variant to him and he withraws the request.

I stopped at turn 135.

We have some issues with the economy . We're currently break even at 10%. When Persepolis' border expands (10 turns) we can work the gold, which will help. I've abandoned the Pyramids so I can work some cottages in Mutal, once the whip anger wears off, we can work the plains cottage as well. If we're still in dire straits in 10 turns we can just redeclare on Darius and pillage/raze him for cash.

We need workers in the Persian territories as well. Cottages, cottages, cottages.

I've got three spies being built to start our reign of (silent) terror. Also, have units heading back to the capital for defense and allowing us to delete the warrior (saving us a precious gold coin).

No one seems to be too far ahead in techs either. What are the rules for trading for techs like fishing, hunting etc? Can we do it or do we have to steal them as well?

We can open borders with Shaka as well (but haven't).

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/88650/RBtS1_BC-0625.CivBeyondSwordSave

 

[uberfish]

Yay we got alphabet. Nice work.

Hmm, why not switch pyramids to Pasargadae since we want to work river cottages in Mutal? Also we settled our GG in Mutal so we don't really want it tied up with a wonder if another war breaks out.

Persepolis can do worker duty for now since we overwhipped it anyway.

 

[darrelljs]

I see it, UPS claims my new video card is "out for delivery", so hopefully I can get to it today. Unable to look at the save but uberfish's advice looks good.

Darrell

 

[darrelljs]

Okay, new video card installed and 15 turns played. We need to allocate our EPs based on target techs. First thing I did on my turnset was look at who had what, and eventually did this:

Sure enough, about eight turns later I can see what tech Hatty is working on and it is Code of Laws. We badly need that. I've put one spy in her closest city already and another is one turn away (go ahead and move it in). As soon as the tech comes in we should steal it, we have 420 EPs and at +19/turn should have the amount needed (make sure we have the 5 turn -50% discount). Iron Working should be the tech we target after that, I would avoid Shaka and probably stick with Hatty or maybe Darius. Speaking of Darius, when peace expired I bullied him out of the last tech we didn't have to steal:

It probably wasn't clear from the rules that that was a legal tech, but I intended it to be .

Let's see, I focused Mutal on commerce for now, we have a GG settled there so it also built units (kind of a weird combo but our cities aren't clearly defined yet). Switched Pasargadae to the Pyramids. We don't really have a lot of things to put hammers in right now, other than units, so this is a good idea even if we don't win the race. I suggest queueing up a Library and two pop whipping it in a few turns when the current whip anger wears out. Make sure as many hammers as possible roll into the Pyramids. Yeah, I know, we don't need Libraries, but in this case it is for the culture to pull that Stone in range 3X quicker, and to battle Shaka's culture. If you really object to this, whip a Courthouse.

Persepolis is buried in whip anger for some time and that city has too much production potential to waste. We should not overwhip without good cause. Not sure, maybe the war dictated an emergency whip, but let's try and avoid that if possible. Anyway, Workers were the target as ubefish suggested. In the end I couldn't stomach not making this a hammer city, so I farmed the floodplain while waiting for Susa's borders to pop. This will happen in 8 turns, have the Workers ready to get those elephants hooked up immediately, then the Pigs I guess (they are already in the area building a Mine).

I sent several units scouting south, to map out Hatty's land and see what else I could find (Korea):

What else? Oh, I had to pay 20 gold to keep a mine and save a happy face. Be sure to keep a small sum around for events, I did not turn them off for this game . In fact, I saw that Persian merchants are selling exotic caged birds as pets, I think someday soon we might be doing the same . Mmm...oh, Buddhism spread into our lands but I didn't convert yet. Feel free to give into any request unless it puts us at odds with Shaka. Shaka did ask for open borders and I gave it to him, if he's looking for a target let's make sure he has other options:

I guess we need to get in the habit of checking this screen and ensuring we don't fall too far behind. Right now Shaka has enough on his hands, be very, very careful. I would not let him take Darius out, despite our crashed economy.

Qwack, you're up.

Darrell

 

[uberfish]

Oh hey, that looks like an iron mine on the grass outside Darius' last city.

 

[Qwack]

If Shaka goes after Darius, I think im going to go in also for some MM modifiers and to prevent shaka from taking darius's cities. Anyone disagree with this?

Also I think eventually, whenever we decide to attack someone, we should go after Shaka instead of Hatty. While hatty will have less troops, I think we should leave the 2 tech-whores alone on our island so we can get ahead of other civs by stealing tech's from Hatty and Wang Kon. And I dont think it is safe leaving shaka alive and unharmed until later on in the game, where he will unit spam absolutely massively. I think its a good idea to plan atleast an initial attack to weaken shaka once we get cats and possibly maceman.

Ill play in 24-48 hours.

 

[darrelljs]

If Shaka goes after Darius, I think im going to go in also for some MM modifiers and to prevent shaka from taking darius's cities. Anyone disagree with this?

I definitely agree, especially since as uberfish pointed out that city has Iron. What does MM mean, is that shared military struggle? Even if Shaka goes after someone else I'd like to take Darius out for happiness boost in his former cities (and Iron).

Also I think eventually, whenever we decide to attack someone, we should go after Shaka instead of Hatty.

Again, definitely agree. Shaka is a terrible neighbor, with normal settings all he does is spam units, and with Aggressive AI on it will suck even worse. It also seems like he has a lot of land to expand into. We need to set him back, maybe take a few cities and raze a few cities when we get to Maceman.

Darrell

 

[ds61514]

As soon as the tech comes in we should steal it, we have 420 EPs and at +19/turn should have the amount needed (make sure we have the 5 turn -50% discount).

Lurker Note: You'll need a bit more than 420 EPs to get CoL, since you'll have to steal meditation and priesthood first .

 

[Ozbenno]

If Shaka goes after Darius, I think im going to go in also for some MM modifiers and to prevent shaka from taking darius's cities. Anyone disagree with this?

Absolutely yes. MM = mutual military struggle

Also I think eventually, whenever we decide to attack someone, we should go after Shaka instead of Hatty. I dont think it is safe leaving shaka alive and unharmed until later on in the game, where he will unit spam absolutely massively. I think its a good idea to plan atleast an initial attack to weaken shaka once we get cats and possibly maceman.

You're probably right. At the minimum, we should keep our troops levels high on the German border as he will come after us at some stage if we don't hit him first.

 

[uberfish]

Agreed on Shaka, war with him is inevitable with aggressive AI on. We should steal some tech from him actually to preserve decent relations with the others.

 

[Kylearan]

Hi,

I've put one spy in her closest city already and another is one turn away (go ahead and move it in). As soon as the tech comes in we should steal it, we have 420 EPs and at +19/turn should have the amount needed (make sure we have the 5 turn -50% discount).

I think you have to put your spy into her capital to be able to steal techs.

I hope you all will make frequent screenshots of the espionage screen. It will be interesting to see how the spy points/cost ratio will change over time. Several times I had started to focus spying on one AI, dropping the cost to ~80%, only to see it increasing to >100% after some time - maybe the AI sees what you're doing, and focuses its spying on you too, as a counter measure? Could have been just coincidence, though. As I said, this will be interesting.

You probably want a low percentage, not only because it reduces cost. I believe this will also help your espionage attempts to come through unnoticed, avoiding negative diplo modifiers. I'm not sure about that one either, though.

When several AIs have a tech you want to have, remember that distance plays also a role in the EP costs.

-Kylearan

 

[·Imhotep·]

lurker's comment:

Hi,


I think you have to put your spy into her capital to be able to steal techs.

No, you can steal techs from size 1 outlier cities as well. Works perfectly fine. I'm curious if the team is able to get the amount of EP needed for later techs without spy (or "pie" ) bombing. Even the medieval techs cost more than a thousand EP...

 

[darrelljs]

I guess since we are getting into the tech stealing part of this SG, I'll post my thoughts. Now, I did NOT play a test game for this variant because I think part of the fun will be uncovering the quirks of the system as a team. However, while trying to figure out how cheesy The Great Wall spy bomb could be, I did take some data that we need to be cognizant of. First off, it seems that the base EP cost fo stealing a tech is a 50% premium over the base cost in beakers. You can get modifiers for:

1. Having your spy stationary in the city (-10%/turn, maximum of -50%).

2. Having "trade routes" with the city. The number I saw was -20%. I believe it is just having open borders with the civ under attack, because I did not have an active trade route with the city I was stealing from. However, I am not sure .

3. Espionage spending, which I believe is the ratio (hopefully not the absolute difference) of EPs between us and the target civ. I had -35% right after a Great Spy bomb, which must be close to the upper bound on the discount, and symmetry would make you think 35% is the lower bound on the penalty. Note this also affects success probability, and hence there is a production and diplomatic aspect.

4. Distance. For a city one tile from my borders, I had an 11% penalty.

Okay, so based on this, what can we conclude?

1. Steal techs in bunches. If we always steal techs as soon as we have enough EPs to do so, our EP ratio will be quite bad so the espionage spending modifier will be a large penalty. Accumulate a large EP advantage and the first few techs we steal will be discounted. For example, if we wait until we have a 2X ratio on someone before we start stealing, and stop stealing when we are at 0.5X, then the average penalty should be 0%. Of course, X grows during the game, so this will get worse every turn. If we find the lower bound is not 35% we could be in trouble.

2. Steal techs from neighbors, especially neighbors with open borders. This one is obvious...we'll need to establish a beachhead on another continent if they are advanced. It might be worth founding a city by Wang Kon just to get this discount, something to keep in mind over the next few turnsets.

3. Keep the spy stationary 5 turns before stealing. Another obvious one, and this one will make a bigger difference than anything else.

4. Use specialists. While the spy slider weights EPs no better than gold or beakers (building modifiers aside), specialists weight EPs like culture. That is a huge bonus, it makes a settled Great Spy worth 2 Great Scientists.

That's it for now I guess, we'll need to pay attention and hone our strategy as the game progresses. I really do expect this game to get very interesting as we get close to the end .

Darrell

 

[darrelljs]

Even the medieval techs cost more than a thousand EP...

Well...if we find things scale badly there is a solution, however it would make the game a lot less fun. I'm hoping the relative EP/beaker cost ratio stays under 1.5X, we can manage our economy well enough to handle that.

Darrell

 

[Qwack]

Turns played.

Well...if we find things scale badly there is a solution, however it would make the game a lot less fun. I'm hoping the relative EP/beaker cost ratio stays under 1.5X, we can manage our economy well enough to handle that.

Ive done some basic calculations and have found that in general, the cost of stealing tech's in relation to researching them when comparing commerce is actually cheaper. This is due to the easy modifiers for spy points (Jail, Intelligence agencies etc). And you do not lose spy points if you fail a mission, you just lose the spy. Ofcourse you will eventually take a hit in relations and lose hammers due to this from lost spies.

Anyhow, now to the turns: I put pasagardae on max hammers. If we are going after pyramids we should seriously go after them, and even if we lose pyramids, at this point in the game, a 100% conversion rate of hammers to gold is very useful. We can generally do this with other wonders also. Since our commerce right now is very low and we have an abundance of hammers, it might make sense to put some extra hammers into wonders and let someone else build that wonder converting the hammers into gold. (Also hammers in wonders never decay).

Shaka shows up with a little stack of 3 archers and 1 axe near Susa. I decide to move some defenders onto tiles our workers were improving incase he declares on us. Also prebuilt a road on Ivory near susa. Stole polytheism with max modifiers for 179 spy points in 260 BC.

We actually lost our spy, but were succesful in the mission. couple of turns later, stole preisthood for 109 spy points.

So 2 succesful missions at 67%. We dont have anything close to enough points for Code of laws yet. Will probably need around 600 spy points to steal CoL. I have no idea where Shaka is sending his mini-stack. If hes going towards Darius, it would have been quicker to go through susa, so not too sure. I also dont see any barb cities anywhere.. Also his stack is composed of 4 archers, not really a stack AI usually declares war with.

I have gathered around a little army near Persopolis incase Shaka declares on darius anyways, we can go in and take the city pretty quick. Anyhow, on my last turn, pyramids were build in a far away land. Which means 278 hammers converted to gold . This should allow us to run max espionage for around 5 turns and accumalate enough spy points to take code of laws. Ive started a buddhist temple in our capital, and I suggest starting a buddhist temple in Persopolis once the barracks is finished, We really need the happiness right now.

 

[Qwack]

Agreed on Shaka, war with him is inevitable with aggressive AI on. We should steal some tech from him actually to preserve decent relations with the others.

Good point, I think once we get CoL from Hatty we should start concentrating our spy points on Shaka. We can probably get some useful military techs from him. (Especially IW and possibly math/construction)

 

[Ozbenno]

Got it. Will play turns tomorrow night.

Hopefully we can get CoL and start up those lovely courthouses.

 

[darrelljs]

Nice turns Qwack, looks like we are setup to get CoL during Ozbenno's turn. Probably worth whipping Courthouses ASAP and getting Spy specialists going. Does anyone know if we can build multiple Scotland Yard's a la the Academy? Also agree with going after Shaka next (he's at least got Iron Working). We might want take Darius's last city even if Shaka gets cold feet (we need that Iron!).

Darrell

 

[blid]

Nice work guys . Didn't think I would miss two turnsets, that was quick. I can take my turn after Ozbenno.

I would send a chariot to explore more, maybe there's still some hidden AI, fractal maps can lead to snaky continents. It's good to map out the whole continent anyway.

We have some EPs against Darius that would probably go to waste if we kill him soon. We can send a spy to sabotage his iron

 

[·Imhotep·]

lurker's comment:

Does anyone know if we can build multiple Scotland Yard's a la the Academy?

Yes, it works like Academies. As long as you got enough great Spies, you can build Scotland Yard everywhere...

Imhotep