S-05 Beat the Clock

[Swiss Pauli]

Had to pop home at lunchtime anyway, so had a look at the save.

One dilemma is that Bronze will take 23 working plains forest and 18 (I think) working the lake. On the latter the WB will take longer to produce (I assume), if we plan to grow to size two then work 2 plains forest. Anyone care to calculate the relative strength of each option?

Also, I'd send the warrior west in a normal game, but given our first target is north, should I not send him in that direction?

 

[sooooo]

When building a work boat it's nearly always better to favour production over growth. The earlier we get the work boat, the earlier we can work the crabs which is a 3-commerce tile. Then while growing we can work commerce tiles like the lake and build some warriors.

 

[Sweetacshon]

The conservative play is

Did you have something else in mind?

• Working the forest gives a wb in 15, it's functional by 17, and if, at this point, we work the clams we pop at 21, with BW at about 21 also, and 10/22 into a warrior.
• Working the lake gives pop in 17, BW in 18, and if we work the forest at pop 2, a wb at 26.
• So, at turn 21, lake first brings 4 extra food, 9 extra gold, and 25 less hammers.

... or something Bah, I'm just doing this in my head, but it seems to me you get more benefit by working the more productive tiles for longer ie get the wb asap, but if we want to get more of a start on research, we'd go for the lake. All of that to state the obvious.

Yes to sending the warrior north, possibly even around the lake to give us just a little idea of what is down there.

 

[Immaculate]

I say focus production to get the workboat out first. High growth is usually always a good move and the fastest way there is a quick workboat.

 

[Swiss Pauli]

Played as planned. Not a great deal going on. I don't like what I see at 12 o'clock:

Hoped it'd be Julius, seeing as CRE is overpowered and Praets are hardly feeble...did I mention I could see three FPs in Rome's BFC?

On turn 14, we hutted some XP. We might just want to upgrade this boy so I left him unpromoted. Next turn, the WB is done and the Gov switched on. He assigns our citizen to the lake, which is fine by me. Hinduism FIDL and we start on a warrior.

We cast our nets over the crabs on turn 17 and on 20 we learn Bronzeworking, but don't revolt to Slavery yet. We have Copper:

Our warrior is wandering back when, just as my turnset is coming to a close, we meet Sal, who's come from the east.

I've marked a couple of possble cities on here, but I've a feeling 'city2?' might cop a whole lot of cultural heat from Rome (assuming Augustus doesn't plop one down there before us).

Warrior in eight, growth in ten. Remember to revolt to Slavery, now that we have enough pop to use it.

 

[stuge]

Ok gang, time to start betting on the remaining civs. Wasn't Mali pretty powerful somewhere in 1200 AD - 1300 AD? :shudder:

Can we tech up to catapults before 0 AD? Trying to rush Augustus with axes and swords would be a do-or-die and very bloody in any case. Better yet, who says we have iron.

 

[sooooo]

Swiss Pauli
Sweetacshon - UP for 20 turns
Immaculate - On Deck
stuge
sooooo

Sweetacshon is up. Guess the plan is to grow to size 4 and then whip in a worker. Sailing looks a good tech to me, what do others think?

In terms of a future city site, I agree expanding towards Augutus is a good plan - we have grasslands at least up there! City 2 may be a little ambitious - I think the tile 1N of the spot marked "city 3?" is more reasonable. That city would get both food resources in the first ring and would not need a monument for a while.

 

[Sweetacshon]

I played my 20 turns, and I thought it would be so uneventful that I took pics of the the advances, but I'll spare you that.

Salad was the one with Bhuddism, and he converts first turn. At least in this game, there shouldn't be groups of religious freaks thirsting for our blood (fingers crossed).

Soon after, the wheel is invented, we begin sailing, and the next turn, a warrior is completed, to be followed by a second warrior. Then in 2830, Carthage grows to pop 4, so we revolt to slavery, whip a worker, and then it's back to the warrior, who is completed on the final turn. The worker was sent to the deer; even though we need to hook the copper, the 4f1h will be more valuable right now. I followed with a lighthouse, but it has no hammers in it yet.

Near the end of the TS, sailing was discovered, and I ummed and ahhed about the next choice. After discarding a few useless choices, I thought IW would be nice, but too expensive right now, Masonary was discussed for GLH, but we aren't quite ready for that yet, so I chose AH, for the link to writing, the pasture for our most probable 2nd city, and the possiblilty of the horse, which will be invaluable for pillaging Rome's copper.

Which brings me nicely to scouting. I sent the northern warrior around Rome's borders to find that he has copper to his north, and considering his revolt to slavery mid TS, he'll be onto that like the English 11 onto the plane home after The Ashes. For fear of getting trapped up there, the warrior didn't continue to the NE, but returned to the isthmus.

The second warrior went east toward Salad, but only found a fork in the road, where he is resting now after an altercation with a panther.

Meanwhile, Roosevelt turns up to our west. He is the point leader, of those we've met.

Short log:

Spoiler :

1 - 3070
Salad converts to Bhu

2 - 3040

3 - 3010

4 - 2980
The wheel > Sailing

5 - 2950
warrior > warrior

6 - 2920

7 - 2890
Augustus adopts slavery

8 - 2860

9 - 2830
Carthage pops to 4, slavery and a worker
Aug has copper close.

10 - 2800

11 - 2770
Whip the worker

12 - 2740
worker > warrior

13 - 2710

14 - 2680
worker on deer

15 - 2650

16 - 2620
Sailing > AH

17 - 2590

18 - 2560
Meet Roosevelt

19 - 2530

20 - 2500
Warrior > lighthouse
Eastern warrior defeats panther
deer camp complete.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/85909/Beat_The_Clock_BC-2500.CivWarlordsSave

 

[Immaculate]

So, we have some time to prepare before Zero AD.

At that point, i think we DO need to make sure that we can get catapults involved. Zero AD is much too late to be fighting a creative civ without being able to bash down their walls.

But besides that, we need to decide on what our priorities are. We can either try for a few wonders or we can REX like crazy. I am in favour of the second option; i would like to try to found cities throughout the isthmuses in an attempt to grab happy/health resources. One of the Isthmuses may have elephants and i have not given up getting some jumbos involved in our first war. If we are worried about the cost to our economy of trying to REX, we are not limited to the old currency and courthouse choices. I have recently used the great lighthouse to pay for expansion in a game i have posted online (see Spain take the low Road in my sig if you really want the gory details), and i was running 70% science with 6 cities in 1AD without courthouses or currency. My take is that we get 3 warriors (or axemen), 2 settlers and the great lighthouse, in that order. We try to make one of the 2 cities we produce a GPP center (early GPP centers are always good) and one a production center (for our army). Once the great lighthouse is done we try to get 2 or even 3 more cities, specializing them in production as much as we can in this rather mediocre land. I am not sure how feasable this all is (i haven't downloaded any saves), but thats my 2 .

 

[Swiss Pauli]

I agree that catapults are essential for our attack on Rome.

As for Wonders, we need to get a city or two more going before deciding. To his end, I'd like our Eastern warrior to move back toward Carthage, scouting the coast as he goes. The interior is pretty inhospitable but some seafood might make up one or two locations into decent cities. So far I'm not wowed by any of the possible locations; this extends to Carthage when it comes to Wonder building.

But it's early days yet...

 

[sooooo]

Carthage is pretty good for wonder building. Tundra copper is 5 hammers, we have plenty of hills to mine, a bunch of plains forests and the food to support them. I think we should build a settler and an axeman before any wonder-building though. Barracks can wait too. The new city, if we put it 1N of the "city 3" sign, can build our workers and settlers with its 2 food resources while the capital can build wonders and military.

Immaculate is up.

 

[Immaculate]

Builds
I set Carthage to build a settler once it hits size 3. We need to expand so we can make efficient use of our central starting location and that means more cities. Once it completed the settler, it continues work on a lighthouse while growing. When Utica is founded, I set it build an axeman. We will want to spit workers/settlers out of this high-food area but first we need population.

Foreign Affairs
We meet Victoria and sign a peace agreement. We met her scout directly west of Carthage. Same goes for Ragnar. We met his scout at the 4 o‘clock position. Lastly we met Isabella, who is the founder of Hinduism and running organized religion so probably the founder of Judaism as well. Her scout was found to the south of Carthage.

Religious Landscape
Judaism has been founded.

Research
Animal Husbandry is completed and we set upon agriculture which will be an important tech for our second city. Once that was completed, I set research to masonry so as to allow the great lighthouse.

Battles
We fought one battle with a barbarian warrior on defensive terrain and overcame the smelly club-wielder.

Founding Cities
Utica was founded at the site suggested by ‘Sooooooo’ and started work on an axeman. Our worker is currently involved in improving its terrain

Lay of the Land
We have uncovered some more terrain but nothing that absolutely stands out as a potential city site. The eastern scout went a little further east but is now returning to look around our capital city for future sites.

I may have played the wrong number of turns (2 or 3 too many). My math was off (no turn counter without HOF mod?). Sorry about that. Don’t worry though, I don’t think you missed anything too interesting.

And here is the save.

 

[stuge]

I think Utica might be better off building a worker when it hits size two. Carthage can build a couple of axes and a settler before the Great Lighthouse.

So, I'll look for a city site that's least bad and set us on the course towards construction. Can we afford to make a detour to alphabet? It would allow us to trade for iron working.

 

[sooooo]

I think Utica might be better off building a worker when it hits size two.

Agree.

Can we afford to make a detour to alphabet? It would allow us to trade for iron working.

Yes, definitely. We can trade alpha for mathematics and iron working.

 

[Swiss Pauli]

I had a look at the save this morning and have the following thoughts:

1. Switch to Pottery from Masonry, so we can get Granaries;
2. Emphasise food/commerce so we can tech more rapidly;
3. By when do we think we need to build the Great Lighthouse? I rarely build it in my own games and I can't remember whether Blake's change to get the AI not to hate coast made it in to 2.08.

 

[sooooo]

I had a look at the save this morning and have the following thoughts:

1. Switch to Pottery from Masonry, so we can get Granaries;
2. Emphasise food/commerce so we can tech more rapidly;
3. By when do we think we need to build the Great Lighthouse? I rarely build it in my own games and I can't remember whether Blake's change to get the AI not to hate coast made it in to 2.08.

Yeah we can afford to get pottery before masonry. I think the lighthouse comes shortly after the pyramids, so around 500 BC or something. EDIT: that's 500 BC, not AD

 

[stuge]

Okay, I've played my 20, but since I'm suffering from what the Germans so descriptively call durchfall, I'll take the rest of the evening as sick leave and post the report tomorrow.

 

[stuge]

The Carthaginians are being looked down to by other nations. Mostly because they don't have elephants and their balls are freezing off. But they shall rise.

Hopefully.

Masonry -> pottery -> writing -> alphabet. That was the tech path. Alphabet has only the overflow invested and 25 (eep) turns to go.

Borders were opened with the other civs. Let's hope they have at least some coastal cities. One of them built the Stonehenge in 1360.

Utica built a worker. I think that it's role for the next millenia will be churning out workers and settlers.

Carthage finished the lighthouse and built almost two axes. Perhaps one axe more before the Great Lighthouse?

Unfortunately, our exploring warrior got killed by a wave of three barbs, but I knocked up a dotmap nevertheless.

Those are sites with at least some production potential. The way I see it, our best bet is to draw our commerce from the conquered lands and use the iceball cities to pump out units. They will pay themselves back to some extent with the three trade routes.

Here's the save for soooo...o...o?

 

[Swiss Pauli]

I reckon we can whip a settler out of Carthage for Clam-Deer-Fur then start on the Great Lighthouse.

Not sure about Alpha. Will the AI be willing and able to trade us Maths by ca BC 500? We'll need a whole bunch of cats for the Roman campaign, so I'd be tempted to go to Construction directly. Sure, we can trade in IW, but don't *need* it and we should plan for Rome having some anyway.

 

[sooooo]

Swiss Pauli - On Deck
Sweetacshon
Immaculate
stuge
sooooo - UP

I'm really not sure about mathematics before alphabet. I can't remember the last time I've researched mathematics by myself. But maybe it is the best plan, who knows. Will have a think before I play my turns, any input would be appreciated. Will start the great lighthouse methinks.