RBW5 - Deity Micromanagers

[Jabah]

hunting for deer, that will be our strongest tiles for a while.

Poping hut with warrior, isn't that too risky on deity with your only military ? (it is not even in a forrest, which means poping 2 barb warriors = almost garanty to lose your warrior).

 

[KinesongPayaso]

Im not sure about this, but when a city's cultural border pops a hut, is it guaranteed safe (like scouts?) or is there a chance that it'll be aggro?

Maybe our settler could pop that, when we settle for that deer-lake

 

[regoarrarr]

Lots of good comments again!

@Jabah / Kinesong: I looked at Civ4HandicapInfo.xml and it appears that we have a 30% chance of strong barbs, 10% weak barbs, 5% of experience, healing, scout, warrior or map, or 25% of low gold. So 40% bad and 60% neutral to good. Also, IMO there is no way that hut is going to last until we are ready to have a city over there (unless we're isolated). The good? news about getting barbs is that even if they kill our warrior, while of course it's not a GOOD thing to lose your only warrior, I believe the barbs don't come into your cultural borders this early. And if I'm wrong about that then hey at least it will be a quick death and we can start over .

@Sun / Wastin: Victory conditions / strategy - my initial strategy is to expand / land grab 3-4 cities ASAP to try and block the AI from settling "our" land as much as possible. As I'm teching to Alphabet / Literature to build the Great Library. Also generating many scientists through GL / NE / Pacifism for Academy, Philo, Paper, Edu, Lib. Take Nat from Lib and go to war.

@Wastin - I agree I don't think we're going to have copper, especially with all these forests as you pointed out. Though I am suspicious over that one hill (N of wheat) that is unforested - often times like that you'll have a strategic resource there (though it could be iron or even coal / uranium / aluminum). Same with the unforested plains tile SW of the settler - maybe horses or iron?

@Sun - Sorry about the lack of yields on the screenshot. I'm not at home currently, but I believe that a regular plains hill forest would be 0/3/0. A deer resource gives +1 food so currently it should be 1/3/0, and when improved (+2F) it should be 3/3/0, similar to a plains cow and one of the best tiles in the game. It looks like it's on the river but since it's forested I believe it loses that 1C.

@All - I will update my spreadsheet to check the difference in working the fur / corn or wheat first and post back. Any more thoughts on the warrior and whether or not to pop the hut? I'm downloading the SDK to check and see if there is any kind of respite for early game on popping barbs. I've been playing some on Immortal / Deity lately just as test games and popping the few huts I do see in the early game seems like not even close to 40% barbs.

 

[regoarrarr]

Okay - I think I found the answer on the barbs from a goody hut. From CvPlayer.cpp, in the canReceiveGoody() method, it appears to say (spoiler just for readability - not really a spoiler)

Spoiler :

if (GC.getGoodyInfo(eGoody).getBarbarianUnitClass() != NO_UNITCLASS)
	{
		if (GC.getGameINLINE().isOption(GAMEOPTION_NO_BARBARIANS))
		{
			return false;
		}

		if (getNumCities() == 0)
		{
			return false;
		}

		if (getNumCities() == 1)
		{
			pCity = GC.getMapINLINE().findCity(pPlot->getX_INLINE(), pPlot->getY_INLINE(), NO_PLAYER, getTeam());

			if (pCity != NULL)
			{
				if (plotDistance(pPlot->getX_INLINE(), pPlot->getY_INLINE(), pCity->getX_INLINE(), pCity->getY_INLINE()) <= (8 - getNumCities()))
				{
					return false;
				}
			}
		}
	}

So what I believe it is saying is that you can't get barbs from a hut if

a) the game is set to no barbs
b) if you have no cities
c) if you have only 1 city that is less than or equal to 7 plots away. Diagonals are handled kind of weird but in our case it does not matter as our hut is 5X and 1Y away and clearly that is less than 7. So warrior will move W-NW over the next 2 turns. And if it pops barbs then don't shoot me

 

[KinesongPayaso]

Great news on C

c) if you have only 1 city that is less than or equal to 7 plots away. Diagonals are handled kind of weird but in our case it does not matter as our hut is 5X and 1Y away and clearly that is less than 7. So warrior will move W-NW over the next 2 turns. And if it pops barbs then don't shoot me

Hey, if we get killed - it will save us months of playing this silly slow game .

Do all Deity players have this positive disposition?

 

[ruff_hi]

well - pretty much trying to be accurate. Much better than ...

"These AIs are babies, pathetic, worst than noob - we are going to give them a good whippin"

Anyway, I think hunting so that we can get those beavers up and running - we need commerce.

 

[Methos]

it should be 3/3/0,

Just checked and this is correct. The tile will yield 3 3 0 .

 

[regoarrarr]

Okay, I popped some numbers into my spreadsheet and this is what I came up with. All scenarios started with working the 1/3/0 deer while building the worker, which appears at the start of turn 12. All simulations were run to turn 28.

The 2 main alternatives were:

A: Worker going Fur-Wheat-Corn, working the unimproved corn until size 2, upon which we worked the furs as well until the wheat was farmed, at which point we worked the wheat and furs until we grew to size 3, at which point we worked the farmed corn. Research was Hunting->Agri.
Total Food: 68, Hammers: 108, Commerce: 321 - city is at Size 3 with 4/26 in the food box.

B: Worker going Wheat-Corn-Fur (research Agri->Hunting). Working the unimproved corn till the wheat was done, then working the wheat, then the corn (unimproved then improved), then the unimproved deer then the fur once it is improved.
Total Food: 108, Hammers: 119, Commerce: 292 - city is at Size 4 with 19/28 in the food box.

So to me option B is the clear winner. Early commerce is important for sure. But an extra 29 commmerce is not worth 40 food and 11 hammers. Though one thing that option A has going for it is that once we hit 15 commerce (which in our case pretty much means when we're working the furs), we get an extra beaker out of the 20% pre-req bonus (14 commerce * 1.2 = 16 beakers; 15 commerce * 1.2 = 18 beakers). That's an extra 7 beakers over the timeframe (until Option B also works the furs and gains that extra bpt)

I also tried a few other options like trying to camp the deer first (much worse), worker going corn-wheat-fur (104 food, 115 hammers, 289 commerce - similar but worse than Option B), and working the unimproved wheat rather than the unimproved corn first in Option B (103 food, 120 hammers, 297 commerce - arguable)

Thoughts on this? Can anyone think of any other permutations to explore?

 

[ruff_hi]

All simulations were run to turn 28.

What is so special about 28? I know that I have been promising to put together a mock up game - I have a flight today and I will really (really!) try to do this.

To me, the early goal is quickest to Alphabet - other items (hammers and food) come second ... or 3rd, 4th or 5th - anyway, well done the line.

 

[regoarrarr]

Nothing magical about turn 28 - it's just by then, all 3 tiles (corn/wheat/fur) were improved, so I was assuming that the tasks after that would be fairly equal.

Everything I've learned about the game says that in the very early game food == power.

 

[WastinTime]

If I were doing an OCC (which I do a lot), I would work the Fur as soon as it is camped (so while the city is still size 1, but close to size 2). There's really nothing to build but a couple warriors this early, and as I said, food is useless once you grow to your happy cap. So you'd have a bit more commerce then you show in option A.

However, this is not OCC. So the only argument I see for choosing option B is because you want to build settler, settler, worker, worker, etc. once you get to max size. This is probably a good idea. Staking out 2 more cities right away is important. I probably wouldn't push it any more cities unless you see a really great location.

 

[regoarrarr]

You are correct that I am going to go with a worker/settler pump once we get up to the happy cap and a few defenders.

This shapes up as a pretty awesome capital for that. The improved size 5 capital (plains hill city center, fur, corn, wheat, deer, marble) will have +8 food, 11 hammers and 20 commerce. The 19 food-hammers is nearly a 3 turn worker or 5 turn settler.

So I'm going to settle the city, move the warrior and pick agriculture and work the deer and will have the post up here in a few

 

[regoarrarr]

Definitely looks like the map script really had to modify our territory - everything besides the original BFC is pretty poor. Seems we're in the south of the map and will want to move to the north with our expansion.

Warrior will pop that hut and then move to the north to see if the tile 2N of the western hut is the west coast.

 

[WastinTime]

Ouch. I've never seen so much unforested tundra.

Deer on a PH is also quite rare.

If I didn't know better, I'd say you used WB. What's the map again? continents?

EDIT: Your size 5 city will work the mined river/hill, not the marble (no masonry)

 

[Methos]

I hope the fog hides better terrain.

 

[WastinTime]

Warrior will pop that hut and then move to the north to see if the tile 2N of the western hut is the west coast.

Move him NE (heading to the East hut) It still reveals the (likely) ocean. The AI will grab all the huts soon.

 

[regoarrarr]

Yes map is continents and you are correct - no WB

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

For Maximum Growth:

I'd be inclined to improve the Corn before Wheat for the extra +1F. It may not seem like much, but there's a lot of growing to do to get to 5P, which is the limit of the happiness Cap, until the improved has a Route (6P).

It's hard to beat the strategy of increasing Population to the Happiness Cap at maximum speed. Growing faster with more Citizens working more tiles sooner usually beats growing slower with fewer Citizens working the best tiles.

For Earliest Possible Alphabet:

If the goal is getting to Alphabet fastest, then skip Agriculture. Research Hunting -> Animal Husbandry -> Writing, build Library -> Alphabet.

Alternatively, an Alphabet sling shot (via The Oracle) may make sense, especially with Masonry and connected Marble. It probably makes more sense to use the The Oracle to get a harder to research and more useful Technology like Metal Casting or even Civil Service (which may be hard to do on Deity).

For Alphabet sling shot, the Technology path becomes: Mysticism -> Polytheism -> Priesthood, The Oracle (Alphabet) -> Writing

Victory Condition choice:

After I learned to play Civ4 reasonably well, I've never started a game without having already being committed to achieving a specific Victory Condition.

It is especially not a good idea to start a Deity game without having a single Victory Condition in mind and a good strategy for achieving it.

Barbarians:

I would advise against selecting Barbarians for almost any Deity game.

Wonders:

Stonehenge is usually useful to have with any leader that lacks the Creative attribute.

As WastinTime mentioned, The Parthenon would be a good choice for +50% GPP, especially with Marble.

For increased happiness (+3 ) in the top five Cities and Research bonus (+3 ) for Specialists, The Pyramids are hard to beat.

Stonehenge is reasonable to build without Stone, but building The Pyramids without Stone is questionable at best. It may be easier to allow an AI to build it and later conquer it.

For Deity, one generally wants to build only 1-3 Wonders that are key to a specific strategy and that goes back to the choice of Victory Goal.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[WastinTime]

On most maps, Deity barbarians are not hard to manage. The AI will fill in all the space and barbs can't spawn. Since you're down in the snow, you may have trouble with barbs after all. The AI won't swarm the ice tiles. A couple of well placed fog-busters should keep you safe.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

On most maps, Deity barbarians are not hard to manage. The AI will fill in all the space and barbs can't spawn. Since you're down in the snow, you may have trouble with barbs after all. The AI won't swarm the ice tiles. A couple of well placed fog-busters should keep you safe.

OK, there are ways to deal with Barbarians. But unless the strategy calls for significant numbers of military units, one needs to spend more Hammers on more expensive military units to defend all Cities against Barbarian invasion. At least until nearby Barbarian Cities are captured or razed.

So, do the Barbarians help achieve an earlier victory or hinder it? In my opinion, Barbarians are more trouble than helpful in achieving an earlier victory.

What percentage of your games ranked #1 in the main HOF table have Barbarians, other than Timed games with Future starts?

I'm implying that Barbarians will cause the Player far more trouble than the AIs, since the Player must use all raw materials far more efficiently than the AIs to achieve ultimate Victory. This becomes harder to do while fighting off Barbarians.

Sun Tzu Wu