RR7 -Big in Japan

[nocho]

If we capture or raze NY then the site near the rice will get problematic in the sense that Boston with its magically appearing new palace will capture the rice, a Sushi resource no less! That and the Boston area with all the rivers looks better to me than NY. NY indeed will steal some tile from Wash, but it still has decent other ones. Well, whatever. Why did the variant designer have to include a rule about keeping all AIs alive?

If we attack NY, the decision whether to keep it or not for me would depend on the exact intended spot for rice-pigs. It could be positioned so it picks up the 2 resources from NY (edit: I'm saying this from memory, might be mistaken though..). Or more south on a plains hill, but then without that calendar stuff in the BFC. If we go for NY I'd be inclined to raze it, settle pig-rice to include NY's current resources and quickly settle along the coast. NY as it is now will merely be a maintenance drag without adding much. If Washington in due course wants to settle another city in that resourceless neighbourhood, that would be fine with me! The more useless cities he has, the more chance he survives...

Maybe the city of Washington should get a library quickly so it quicker gets to pop its borders twice for the gold. It should be quicker than Boston, I hope.

 

[Silu]

Thing about razing and letting Washy get it again is, even the new city will screw with Washcity's tiles. Frex the Cow tile has huge amounts of his culture and we could easily lose it to a craptastic American backwater and their crappy Monument for some time. I'm not a fan of razing cities we have to replant in the near future; I think TRs and 2 capital spots are enough to keep us afloat until we get a "proper" economy going

I mentally placed the Pig city 2W of the Pig, which would be in range of the Spices (not the Silk, obviously) but it wouldn't really be needed - IMO that city doesn't interfere with NY placement. There could be a better dotmap with a moved ~NY site though, but I didn't see one with a quick look.

 

[r_rolo1]

The question is not if we want to raze NY. It is more if we want to afford a city there at this stage when there are far better spots nearby ....

 

[Silu]

On the "affording" department, I think our future is quite secure because of MC. We can easily expand on the brink of strike (of which we are still quite far away from) for a while here if we want and not have longer term consequences We are also going to get a bit more allowance from the 2 cities we're about to take.

 

[nocho]

Okay, okay, let's keep NY then, maybe the omniscient AI settled it next to iron or something...

For the sake of discussing city locations I took the best screenshot from the surroundings from a previous report, which coincidentally was mine.


I think 2W of the pigs looks ok, it will have those calendar resources (of which only 1 is in NY). Then I was wondering how to settle the coast to the north (Mao permitting). At first sight a city 1E of gems at the river picking up fish, clam and gem looks very natural and finally gives a good commerce city (Osaka, Wash, pigsrice are all production oriented). However this city exactly misses a rice and a cow (2NW and 2SE respectively). So maybe it should be fish/cow/gems just south of the river bank and another one more north that takes rice/clam and the same gem. What do you think?

Anyway, seems there are at least 4 prospective places to settle, so I'd say Osaka and Kyoto both go on settler duty quickly after their forges.

 

[Silu]

Okay, okay, let's keep NY then, maybe the omniscient AI settled it next to iron or something...

Sorry if it feels I'm shoving my propositions down your throats, I just like to supply them with all the arguments that pop in mind, expecting most of them to get shot down That's how I usually learn new things in SGs

However this city exactly misses a rice and a cow (2NW and 2SE respectively). So maybe it should be fish/cow/gems just south of the river bank and another one more north that takes rice/clam and the same gem. What do you think?

This is pretty much exactly what I think

 

[Cam_H]

Before I go and do something wacky, can I please have someone confirm the plan;

• Attack and keep New York - then agree to peace with Washington.

• After Forges in large cities, chop out Settlers.

• Raze the Barbarian city after New York is captured.

• Settling plan with X being the spot, with the Rice-Gold to the west a priority;

• Technology-wise, go for Monarchy albeit Maths, Aesthetics, Archery and Iron Working each have appeal.

• Osaka to work the Elephant Camp, forest chops, and eventually Farm.

• Washington to build a Library.

• Consider building Spears in case of horseback unit attack.

• Open Borders with China and Carthage.

 

[nocho]

Sounds like a plan to me! Might still be wacky, but at least that makes two of us!

Tech wise, I'd prioritize monarchy and aesthetics. I'd hope to get math and IW in trade at some point and bypass archery permanently.

Maybe getting some cottages near the capital is not the worst of ideas. And don't know what our worker count is, if low that would be another priority.

 

[Thy_Spellcraft]

I agree to the plan! Keep NY and than we should take peace with wash. Getting the gold spot should be next as well. But in that case I'd rather start on CoL than monachy..

 

[Cam_H]

Not quite as much progress made as hoped, however stuck closely to pursuing 'the plan'. I played 11 turns to round off the game turns to 90.

Opening Turn : Turn 79

With the view to improving trade route yields;





Rearrangement of Worker and Citizens around Osaka as discussed by the roster.

Turn 1 : Turn 80

New York is taken, but sadly a brave Japanese Axe falls in battle. All combat went with the odds.



The city is kept following much debate. A Forge is initially queued.

The one tile where Barbarians could spawn near Kyoto sure enough spawns a Barbarian Archer. Kyoto is poorly defended with a single Warrior, and can ill afford having the Barb’ plunder its rich tile improvements. An Axeman is put to the top of the queue in front of the existing Forge build.

The City of Washington completes its Monument and begins work on a Library.

Turn 2 : Turn 81

Hunting is in. The Ivory camps bring some joy to the somewhat whip-weary citizens. Monarchy is pursued.

The Barbarian Archer spends little time meandering, and begins its trek towards Kyoto.

Turn 3 : Turn 82

Following the triumph at New York, four Axemen head easterly towards the largely unknown Barbarian city spotting both American and Chinese Archers in its vicinity. There is some concern that the Americans and/or Chinese may be throwing Archers at the Barbarians who may be well experienced with battle by the time our invasion force arrives.

There is little to be gained by the ongoing conflict with the Americans, yet committing to ten turns of peace may cause future plans to become hamstrung, so therefore;



Turn 4 : Turn 83

The roaming Barbarian Archer bypasses the Marble Quarry south of Kyoto. The Axeman will come on stream simultaneously with the prospective Barbarian Archer attack.

A Forge is whipped in Osaka.

More is learned about the Barbarian outpost; Hittite holds three unpromoted Archers, and has a city population of two.

New York comes out of revolt.

Turn 5 : Turn 84

Hittite is attacked, and like New York, the battles go with the odds, and another Japanese Axeman falls in battle.



As agreed by the roster, a more appropriate city site has been earmarked, and Hittite is razed.

One turn of Forge production is discarded in New York, and a Monument is dialled up instead.

The Barbarian Archer opts not to attack Kyoto, and instead moves to the Corn Farm. With good odds, Kyoto's new Axeman dispatches of the nuisance, afterwards heading westerly to fogbust the pending Rice-Pigs site.

Turn 6 : Turn 85

Zzzzzzzzzz

Turn 7 : Turn 86

Osaka completes its Granary. Despite the city’s population being below the happiness cap, the urgently required Settler is placed at the top of the build queue.

Turn 8 : Turn 87

A Forge is whipped in Kyoto.

Turn 9 : Turn 88

Kyoto dials up a partial build on a Spearman for one turn in order to improve the population prior to swapping to a Settler.

Hannibal has Alphabet. He will trade Archery for Priesthood, however this option is not taken up for the time being.

Turn 10 : Turn 89

Kyoto’s population grows, and a Settler is placed at the top of the build queue.

Turn 11 : Turn 90

Little to report other than two forests are chopped (one Washington, one Kyoto). Settler due next turn out of Osaka. Washington’s Library is also due next turn.



The Gold-Rice spot is still open to us, however it will be close to both Carthaginian and American cultural borders. Mao has also settled a city south of his northerly borders.

 

[Silu]

Nice going I guess we can focus on getting stuff built instead of destroyed for a while now. Some thoughts that popped in mind:

1) Hannu would trade Alpha+Mono for MC+Priesthood. Since there are 4 Alphaless nations (2 won't trade with us without some gifts first though), I think we could capitalize on that and open the tech trade possibilities ASAP. Sitting on MC won't do us that much good and Hannu won't broker it as long as we're the only 2 that have it. He's also getting Math in 4 turns, coincidentally we get Monarchy in 4 as well

2) How are we going to tech? Making Wash a prod powerhouse is enticing, but we already have 3 strong prod sites in Kyoto/Osaka/Pigrice so I think we could cottage that FP (also in the soon-to-be nearby city).

3) Prod options in Kyoto make my "Ooh, shiny!" meter go off; ToA 11 turns, Colossus 8 turns. ToA is a crapshoot this late but Colossus could perhaps pay for itself, and the Merchant GP points wouldn't hurt. There'd surely be time to finish the Settler or two before it even if we trade MC away already. Whad'ya think?

 

[r_rolo1]

Just for the laugh , GLH is still open Mids as well ... so if we want we can wonderwhore To be honest, I like the idea of trying ToA in our cap: it gives both GM points ( remember, we need a GM ) and also adds to the GP GPP of Oracle ( we might want to try to get Theo from a bulb after all AP power FTW ). And to be honest again, besides GM GPP, the usefulness of Collosus seems extremely limited in this map... But as said by Silu, ToA should probably not be there for long... but failure cash is failure cash and we have a strong hand on Colossus even if we trade MC now ( they would still need to build a forge in a coastal city before even thinking on trying it ). So, how about trying ToA in cap and if/when it fails we change for Collosus?

And continuing speaking of wonders: as we have strong prod sites and marble, i guess that going through the Lit line might pay off ... if we can make some bucks trading for our techs that is. I like the idea of trying to get Alpha + Mono and then broker a lot while going through the lit line ( and with some luck, bulb theo with our incoming GP and make the AP )

About Wash ( city ) : true, Silu, we would probably want a cottage city given that we already have good prod sites. But wash ( city ) in not as suited as that for a cottage city with that ammount of plains hills ( BTW why are we working a plains forest and stagnating the city? I know that it is on hap cap, but even if we want to keep the city at size 5 for now we can swap between a FP farm and a forested plains hill ... that give us more buck from the food investiment ) So it would be probably better to reserve the paper of cottage cities to the cities we aim to found in the jungle area .... Obviously i don't discard the option of making a cottage or two in wash ( especially in the tiles shared with the gold/rice city ), but that city simply won't cut as a cottage center IMHO.

That leads us to the big issue: settling. We are running out of space fast, so i guess this is the time on thinking on marking our territory, This means atleast two settlers fast ( that we are already doing ) and maybe one more, to settle against the Chinese ( not so sure of that, jungle cities are so crappy ... ). We can let our ex-barb area unsettled for a while ( as long as we put a unit there to prevent a respawn ( hint: the axe we have there will not prevent a respawn unless we move it to 1 E ) ) if we want, and to be fair, I don't see how we could pay 3 more cities without Currency and CoL.

Oh, and Thy is up BTW Nocho is on deck

 

[Silu]

With just a couple of cottages, failure gold/Colossus and trade mission/settled GP/GM, we can easily settle 4 cities here without striking ourselves, I don't think that's a problem. IMO we could well settle the 2 jungle cities right after taking the Rice/FP spot, at least they give TRs right away.

There's a big chance to get Math with Monarchy (or sth else like with Alpha from Mao/Biz) here for sped-up Currency right after Monarchy so we can even have Currency before we have time to settle the next 3 cities... Though I also advocate the Lit route and think we can well afford that even if we crank out straight Settlers here. In either case Currency will be fast to get after that.

Wonderspam! Let's unleash our inner obsoletes! I'm fine with ToA, though I also like the GLH, now that you mentioned it The lighthouse wouldn't hurt, either, and GLH can go quite late especially on pangaea-ish maps such as this. ~1AD GLH isn't uncommon on Immortal on this type of map so I think we'd have a good shot even later. Failure gold for it is much worse of course and our plan only has 4 coastal cities so maybe it isn't that hot after all. Maybe after ToA/Lolossus(/TGL) shots? Oh, and Wash would be a great place to dump those artist wonders (Parth+SoZ in that order as both are sped for us); would push the possibly annoying American culture away very fast while securing the border against Hannu. Building a few 99% instances of SoZ for massive failure cash is another possibility of course.

Thinking about it, a WE/SSE style approach kinda makes sense since our land is much better suited for production than science. Constitution is also on the fast track towards Sushi, which is obviously also great for centralized GPP production... but now I'm getting a bit ahead of myself again


EDIT: For the third immediate Settler I think we could queue one in Wash and 2pop whip it, that takes 5 turns. Faster than even the Kyoto one considering the distances.

 

[nocho]

I'm all for marble wonders, or generally, those where we have a discount. I'm even more for settling a good chunk of land, but if that should be financed by failure cash, I don't mind...

 

[r_rolo1]

A got it from Thy would be nice Well, if He doesn't get it until tomorrow and if nocho is not too busy wearing a mask, he can pick it

 

[nocho]

if nocho is not too busy wearing a mask, he can pick it

You mean this one?

Spoiler :

Nah, usually don't wear that on Mondays.

If there's no word from Thy I'll take it tomorrow or Wednesday, although I haven't actually looked at the save yet.

 

[Silu]

Wondering what I've got myself into... Soon someone says "oh yeah, didn't we mention that in the RR SG's you are obliged to to send to your teammates a picture of you wearing a scary mask every now and then".

P.S. Kinda looks like a monday mask to me, I often feel like I was wearing something like that on monday mornings...

 

[bestsss]

P.S. Kinda looks like a monday mask to me, I often feel like I was wearing something like that on monday mornings...

I say: legalize siesta. If one day my brain tricks me and I enter politics that would be the cause: legalize siesta throughout Europe. It feels unfair only few selected countries to enjoy the benefits...

 

[Silu]

I say: legalize siesta. If one day my brain tricks me and I enter politics that would be the cause: legalize siesta throughout Europe. It feels unfair only few selected countries to enjoy the benefits...

Man that would be awesome... I mean, it wouldn't quite serve the same purpose here as on the Mediterranean (avoid working in blistering heat) but it would be perfect for winters so people would actually see the light of day as all the daylight is during work hours

 

[r_rolo1]

I was being innocent and was talking about the festive holiday that is also celebrated in Spain by this times

On siesta: strongly against If take a nap, I get sleepy for the rest of the day And OFC I prefer to get home earlier ....