RR7 -Big in Japan

[nocho]

2360 BC - We discover how to put food into something else than directly our stomach. Mysticism is next.

2320 BC - Osaka is founded on the copper/cow spot. It starts on a granary. As you guys don't seem to be in a major rush for a rush, getting granaries first can't be too disastrous an option. Hence the capital also goes for a granary after the warrior is completed.


2240 BC - We meet this guy.


2040 BC - And this one.


We get mysticism, masonry is next. Decide to queue a monument in Osaka, to be whipped next turn. With Washington about to pop borders (like Kyoto) the sooner we get some culture, the better.

2000 BC - Monument is whipped in Osaka. Our woody 2 warrior that is exploring towards the north finds a hut. Yay! We get experience. Duh. Well, at least now we have a woody 3 guy and a level 4 unit so HE is unlocked FWIW. However, he end his turn next to a barb archer. Not being able to bare the tension of this cliffhanger, play an extra turn.

1960 BC - He survives, but barely! Obviously needs some healing now.


Osaka has its monument, continues with granary. It has both the cow and the bronze online, so decide to move the worker to a forest to start chopping. Kyoto popped its borders and now the cities are connected, not least because the coast tile 1E of the cows was still in the fog, but no longer.
If Kyoto is MM'd to work a 2 food tile instead of the mine it'll grow next turn and then the granary can be whipped immediately. Given our surroundings and the rather limited and subpar land at our disposal, I'd really like to go for barracks and axes rather soon. Even just getting the city of Washington would give enough breathing space, IMO. Roosey can then still expand from New York to the North East. If we don't want to go have a fight we'll need to settle the pigs rather quickly.


Note we met all AIs but one. Mao of all people founded hinduism, the missing one likely founded buddhism and is very far away or alone on an island (or both), I suppose. Also not many religious freaks out there, nor particularly aggressive ones.

Silu must be up with rolo on deck.

 

[Silu]

Alrighty, it looks like decision time The GLH thingy hasn't been that popular and looking how things are/will be in a short while maybe it's not such a great idea after all. It's pretty darn late for the Oracle as well. So, axes? Taking Washington would be nice indeed and probably not that much of a risk.

So short term, switch to Rax->Ax in Osaka and transition into the same in Kyoto?

Long term, after Masonry, I was thinking something like Monarchy through Poly (before/after writing) and possibly Aesth->Lit after that (TGL, plus the early Marble-powered HE is great). Yeah, too early to decide that far, but can't hurt to have long term plans... The Marble could give us a shot of a mega-late Oracle->CoL/Feuda (after a "bunch of axe"), too. Failure isn't nearly as bad with the resource. So, Poly, Writing or option C (maybe Hunting for Jumbos/Spears?)? Opinions? I'm partial to going towards Monarchy right away myself.

 

[nocho]

^ We seem to be on a (near-) pangaea with at least 5 AIs while there are no islands whatsoever in sight, so indeed GLH doesn't seem as attractive anymore. Apart from near the sea food up north there aren't even half attractive coastal settling options in sight. So, indeed, axes! I'd say in both cities whip granaries when possible and overflow into rax and then *axe for a while.

Going towards monarchy sounds good. As long as we avoid hunting we can even keep on building cheap warriors for garrison... Going through poly and priesthood sounds as an idea, keeps lit path open and the off chance for Oracle. I like that, keeps some options open. Don't know if we should shove in writing somewhere though...

 

[Silu]

But we do need Hunting sooner rather than later because of those Jumbos; they won't work for us (for the resource) even when already camped if we don't have the tech. Could go at least Priesthood before it though. Same for writing, Priesthood->Writing opens up a possibility for Oracling CoL. I don't think we have what it takes to Oracle Feudalism even in the best case scenario.

I don't like either whipping or a granary in Osaka TBH It has great prod tiles, should use those all the time IMO and the Copper tile sucks for growth. For Kyoto, it's good (not least because it's the only sensible way to get a 2pop whip off here). Have to wiggle a little to make the chop timing match but it'll work out.

 

[nocho]

But we do need Hunting sooner rather than later because of those Jumbos; they won't work for us (for the resource) even when already camped if we don't have the tech.

We won't have jumbos until we capture Washington! After that hunting is fine of course. Until that time it's not needed however and I thought in the unlikely case of not having anything better to build we could spam some warriors for future garrison. Admittedly, a rather ignorable brain wave I had there.

Could go at least Priesthood before it though. Same for writing, Priesthood->Writing opens up a possibility for Oracling CoL. I don't think we have what it takes to Oracle Feudalism even in the best case scenario.

If I'm not mistaken priesthood is also one of the prereqs for writing, so if we do that first we can research writing more cheaply as well. So mason -> poly -> priesthood -> writing seems like a good path (to me at least). Build the Oracle while researching writing, if we can spare the hammers... We can decide later what to choose, CoL or Monarchy. All this, if the Oracle is not built before obviously, but with the not very religious folks out there (and the marble ofc) we may have a chance.

I don't like either whipping or a granary in Osaka TBH It has great prod tiles, should use those all the time IMO and the Copper tile sucks for growth. For Kyoto, it's good (not least because it's the only sensible way to get a 2pop whip off here). Have to wiggle a little to make the chop timing match but it'll work out.

Mmm, maybe you're right about the granary in Osaka, it's not that necessary. I plead not guilty however, too much time on these forums have made me think that granary first is practically mandatory always!

 

[Silu]

You're right about the granaries and the forum effect I get a bad conscience nowadays if I'm playing solo and don't prioritize granaries and only have 6 workers for 6 cities or similar...

Hm, I also forgot to say the magic word: got it! I'll play it when a few more people have a chance to share their thoughts.

 

[r_rolo1]

It looks that I was right and that Wash is indeed boxing us ... and , as was pointed above, we are in a landmass big enough to harbour 6 civs, so GLH looks not as atractive ( especially with a Ind leader in town ). So, I guess this is the bunch of axe moment

I guess we can overflow our axes to the Oracle indeed and see if we can grab it ... even if we can't get it ,we would get some $ that is sorely needed ( can we please, please , keep some cash in the vault even if because of those forest fires and such ? 3 g is definitely not enough and 0 even less ), but besides that, it should be axe time after the mandatory granary.

Oh , and I'll try not to comment the need for hunting to make camps for phants we don't have

 

[Silu]

If someone actually read my original tech consideration, it says "Jumbos/Spears", and I mainly meant the scenario where Washy whips out a bunch of Chariots from his back pocket as we don't have vision of his BFC... A single stack defender Spear is better than relying on terrain defense for Axes in that scenario (because of the Jumbos, because they're the reason we can't just endure with pure Axes and ignore Hunting completely for military police easiness later).

 

[r_rolo1]

Sure sure .. Don't go back in anger ...

But anyway chariots only do big damage to axes in attack and I seriously doubt that a AI that don't have a chariot UU will do much of them anyway ( and to be honest I would prefer a chariot and a archer as city garrison than two archers ). OTOH teching hunting has it's drawbacks ( besides the fact that we could have spent those beakers in something more useful, having hunting + BW + metal = no warriors ) ...

To be honest we a little in the dark ( literally ) about wash military assets. We know he has 3 camps of phants (!) because he has them on the diplo screen. We also know that he had teched AH already because he has a cow resource linked ( he doesn't want to buy our cow resource ), but no reference to horses ( in spite of that doesn't meaning he doesn't have them ... he simply doesn't have them for sale ). OTOH he has no copper, so we will not see axes in his side .

This all summed leads me to believe that Wash will only field archers against us. The good thing is that Washington ( city ) is not on a hill

Spoiler :

and that Wash ( leader ) is not protective

P.S To be honest, after the fly by I made to Washington ( city ) area, I strongly doubt that he has horses. Most of the BFC is still forested and the gaps that can have resources are most likely ocuppied by the cow and the missing phant ( and the lake 1 E of Washington ( city ) ). New york seems to be almost completely undeveloped , lots of trees/jungle around both visible and invisible area, so I don't expect horses there as well. if I had to bet, I would say that was has only 3 phants and 1 cow as linked ( or linkable ) resources.

 

[Silu]

Switched Osaka to Rax from Granary, even though the forum might sentence me to death for this.

Put EP on Hannibal, those won't be very useful against Washy I'm guessing and Hannu seems to be the next in line. Leaving them spread around is just a tiny bit more useless than focusing all four of them

Apparently Mao lives up north near our recovering Warrior



Kyoto micro: I didn't want to swap to a suboptimal tile to grow earlier, and whipping the Granary in 2 turns would stack too much overflow combined with the chop. So I built the Granary for 2 turns to the sweetspot 27/60 , catched the chop into Barracks (completing it) and 2pop whipped the Granary next turn, overflowing into Axes. Turned the new warrior back because this procedure spends a turn over the warriorless happy cap at 4 pop Straight up whipping (with the proposed +food micro) would probably have been better had there not been some of the previous whip anger left, to keep the hatin' dissipating at a steady pace

Mighty woodsman looping back to aid in war healing, trying to scout Washy's hinterlands in the meantime.

Masonry done, set research for Poly. Improving the juicy 1/3/3 Marble tile, not sure if straight up mass chopping would have been better. Well, can't hurt to have 4 actually useful tiles and the point is moot I guess since it should be improved in a short while when we're nearing Priesthood.

Sneak peek into New York:



And that's it I guess. I played just 9 turns to match into even tens again, and put this semi-no-brainer up for discussion (seriously, the guy is clearly asking for it ):



Nothing really happened and not much to discuss either I guess... Time for some ! Mr. Feitoria is up, too-lazy-to-check-who on deck

 

[r_rolo1]

Really dunno about that :/ Ok, it is hard to resist the urge to grab that worker, but we only have 3 axes done and that is far from being enough to capture a enemy cap in Monarch, unless mother luck is heavily on our side... this would also make Wash starting spamming archers ( it is the best unit they can make ) and that IMHO is not good now. IMHO again it is too late to think on choking Wash too, so I'm quite wary of starting a war now for such a meansly reward while we are extremely unprepared to push further.

Oh, and GOT it. For the lazy one, Ad Hoc is on deck

 

[Silu]

One worker I would be able to resist, but two... The chopping they can do alone might be enough to offset Washy's increased military production... Well, nabbing them isn't necessary by any means and passing on the opportunity is probably the fastest way to take his capital. Mainly probably just my Fancy Play Syndrome acting up again. Though if we pass now we probably never get his workers, not that it matters that much either.

 

[r_rolo1]

Well, I can live with either aproach. Two workers are a decent prize, but a cap is even a better one ( well, Washington seems to be a somewhat food deprived place, but who cares ). So I'll just let this one on the team

Oh , and my avatar is NOT a Feitoria ( atleast in terms of BtS UB ). For heavens sake, can't you discern between a true masterpiece in stone and that pastiche that Firaxis made for the portuguese UB, that, besides ugly, it is a really bad building for the price tag ?

 

[Thy_Spellcraft]

Good turns Silu..

About DoWing Wash there's still the question, how to ensure his further survival as NY went to the north, staight towards Mao..

 

[nocho]

The 2 workers are nice, but I think I'd also go for a decent bunch of axes first. 7 or 8 should do to get Washington I'd say, especially if rolo's fly-over intel is correct and it's on flat land. And not unlikely some workers will hide behind the unsafe walls of Washington anyway...

 

[r_rolo1]

Well, as the other set behind mine, this one had no history besides making axes ( and my mistimed whip that stacked in our cap, but no one heard that , right? ). We already have 7 joined near Wash cap, one is coming and more 2 will jump of the queues in 3 turns:

Spoiler :

We also have ( another ) possible worker capture if we want to start the war now:

Spoiler :

I also made a little more than the standart 8 axes for the rush because barbs decided to be annoying and planted a city right next to our cap, and worse, in a place where we don't want it

Spoiler :

So, I guess that our army will have something to do after capturing Washington ...

Not much to say besides that. Hannibal gone jewish and New your made a 1 pop whip ( i bet it was a settler ... the city was in size 2 for quite a while ). So, I guess it is time for warfare.

Ad Hoc is up, Cam_H is on deck

P.S Sorry for the laconic report, but I'm on painkillers today and that does not make people very enthusiast about making report of turns where nothing important happened

 

[Silu]

P.S Sorry for the laconic report, but I'm on painkillers today and that does not make people very enthusiast about making report of turns where nothing important happened

Depending on how strong they are, they could help a lot in making an otherwise boring turnset into an interesting report "And then I saw Washington, he had like angel wings and a mohawk and was playing bagpipes... Our Axes tried to hit him, but he was too high up... Then our Axes turned into green piglets and ran away!" Anyway, hope you get better soon

I think we could DoW now (shocker, if I thoght we could DoW 10 turns ago ), I really like worker steals here. Because of our relatively slow start position they would come in handy.

 

[Ad Hoc]

Got it,

Will release the Green Piglets of War tonight

 

[Silu]

Too bad the Marble isn't hooked up, could have whipoverflowed next turn into Oracle while chopping the prechopped forest, would build 2/3 of it Should we abandon the whole thing? Or just hook up the Marble and build it for failure cash / accidental mega-MEGA-late Oracle?

 

[Thy_Spellcraft]

I'd hook up the marble and start orcale at least for the failure money as long as there's nothing else to build than military..