SGFN-06: Skull session - what next?

[Spoonwood]

I think you guys should go for an 80% pangea with England for the spaceship launch. Why? It sounds like just enough of a challenge. You don't need any "real" wars to launch. I did a 5cc standard-sized map spaceship game with Persia and only had one battle to launch my GA... an immortal vs. an American spear (they got conquered the very next turn). I think I had aggressiveness at maximum, but I don't recall and forgot to note it. http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=283144&page=2

If you do play pangea on Demi-God, seriously consider the Great Library. Maybe it slows things down at this level (sounds more like an advantage to me on Demi-God)... and surely people get by without it... but when I haven't built it, early on I usually have a poor economy from Demi-God on up. Once it turns off, outpacing and/or keeping up with the AIs comes as much more economically feasible (especially a bit after the AIs have Banking). So, I'd say go inf on Writing then sup on either Philosophy or Literature. Oh... I mean min on Writing and max on Philosophy or Literature. Trade for Masonry if you want a good sized pre-build or just build The Great Library without it, almost surely in your first ring if not in your capital. Maybe add in some workers to that city for more production when building The Great Library.

 

[Othniel]

There's been enough setting suggestions thrown out, so I'll pipe up and give mine. You can ignore my "noise" if you wish.

For landform, I think standard, 80% water, Pangea makes for a really interesting Space game. You might have one continent, you might have two closely spaced continents since we all know how reliably the map generator makes true Pangeas. But everyone meets everyone quick so it acts like a Pangea.

What is nice about this landform is that there is not a ton of available land for specialist farming. This means you are often better off leaving 2-3 "powerful" AI civs with some decent land space so they can help you research. The process of cultivating your research partners, perhaps gifting them some land, and then reducing the other civs to OCC is an interesting process.

I would suggest having all your opponents be SCI civs. I see you all have chosen England, which is a good civ for Demi space, but being a SCI civ yourself is tons of fun. Of course, if all your opponents are SCI civs, that's why you want to leave even the weaklings alive as OCC for their free techs.

With lots of SCI civs, the age change turns in these games are simply awesome. Figuring out the puzzle of who to gift up, and when, is addictively fun (or at least to me ). You have to use all "the Big Picture" tricks in the book: make all scientists temporarily into taxmen in the F1 screen to boost your available gpt, hold back optional techs from the gifting process, first gift up weaklings that need your lux and strat resources the most, yada yada yada. Tons of fun! Not to brag...too much since I'm sure others have done the same thing... but in a recent solo Deity game, I was able to secure 7 Modern Age techs in one turn from this process with the help of a nicely timed ToE build. It was like a geek cocaine rush.

These settings are not optimal for fastest possible victory. PrinceMyshkin is right that a larger map is faster. But I really like how these settings play out.

I think if you used these settings, taking the first generated start with fresh water adjacent to the settler--no pimping the start too much--you guys would have a fun, challenging, do-able Demigod game.

BTW, great progress with the SGFN series. I'm proud to be an original member.

 

[TheOverseer714]

Thanks for the input, Othniel, you are always welcome to throw in your 2 cents in this series. I generated 10 good starts at 70% water and random opponents, but settings are easy to change, and starts are easy to generate. So far, I think we have consensus on a Pangaea, so general settings are next on the agenda. I like Othniels ideas to make things more interesting.

 

[Optional]

I like the lurker's input. What I'm missing, however, is any mention of the amount of civs we should go with. If we are considering 80% water, I would adjust the amount of civs downwards. Maybe it goes without saying and I'm being too much of a schoolteacher here, but I'll still put this forward: having 20% of the map as land instead of 30% means you've knocked 1/3 of the landtiles off. To still have the same about of land per civ you would also need to knock 1/3 of the civs off. Otherwise it's going to be very crowded, and more difficult on this level.
A standard 80% water map, like Othniel suggested, is going to have so much less landtiles, that the available landmass comes closer to that on a tiny map than on a small map.
My experience is that an early - Ancient Age - war is difficult to avoid on Demigod, as the AI will box you in early, but the AI will even be more in your face on 80% water maps, unless you adjust the amount of civs.

 

[anaxagoras]

I'm not much for manipulating starts, so I'll just go with whatever you folks decide. Othniel's suggestion are fine, or since you have already generated starts, I'm happy to go with those settings, too. I expect to be challenged either way.

 

[Optional]

If you've got a couple of starts that you like, you might as well post them, Overseer. Some of us are a bit quiet, and some of us hardly have an opinion, so putting up a few starts might liven things up a bit.

I prefer random opponants. Most of us are hardly used to the tech pace and trade mechanics of an ordinary game on Demigod. To highlight the turn-of -age trickery may be a bit like showing how to stuntride to someone who hasn't learnt how to drive properly yet.
Although the techniques benefit an ordinary game as well. To trade by using the 'Big Picture' is a very good habit that I only learnt about recently. Are we all aware of the benefits? Like if you've just researched Philosophy, you get the option to go to the big picture, from there you can go to the foreign advisor, and from there you can do diplomacy by double clicking on the leader heads, and make some trades before you choose you optional tech. The scientific slingshot at the turn-of-age moments works much the same way.
I think we should know about these mechanics, I'm just not a fan of manipulating things for just teaching these mechanics while an ordinary research game on this level is still fairly new territory for most of us.

I'm forgetting to mention: my computer can't run civ just now. I think the hard drive is not up to the task anymore. I expect to get something sorted sooner or later, though.

 

[PrinceMyshkin]

Well, I agree the starts Overseer has already rolled should be given a chance. If they were with 10-11 rivals we'll likely get to use the "big picture" with scientific civs on the age change anyway as there's likely to be several. The random factor of our opponents is appealing to me and something I don't usually get to try in my own games. As Othniel states 80% pangaea maps are often not pangaea, anyway.

What was the aggression level of the ai's in the starts that were rolled? At least normal, I hope, and not least aggressive.

 

[anaxagoras]

Ready when you are, Overseer. Lay some starts on us.

 

[TheOverseer714]

Before everyone loses interest in this, here are some choices for us to start from.

Spoiler :

 

[Rodent]

Start 1- The Fish and Cow on a River gives us an explosive food start, and the forests gives us the shields for a Settler Factory, The goody hut is a bonus- 4 Stars

Start 2- A luxury straight away is nice. 3BGs and forest gives us shields, a great shield start but not much going for it in food- 3 Stars

Start 3- The Wheat and the whatever-that-thing-is is nice.-3.5 Stars

Start 4- 3 Wines, that is almost a Monopoly. Little else though. -2.75 Stars

If I missed anything, please do mention

 

[Northen Wolf]

1. Fish and cow - not bad. Also nice location on World Map.
2. Could be powerful due lots of food (grassland) and hills/mountains. (start 837)

3. gives us control of possible chokepoint. But not realy productive.(881)
4. I'm not fan of plains, as they can't support working on hills. Having 3 grapes is nice tho, but I doupt they'll help us much.(842)

BTW:
$Is victory condition space ship or has it even been decided? (I've been AFK due health so I don't know).

 

[PrinceMyshkin]

Starts 2 and 4 have a lux, but lack the food needed to expand or grow with the despotism penalty. Commerce would be nice in start 4 and the capital looks like it would make +5 food in republic.

Start 1 isn't quite +5 food either as the fish is only 2 food under despo. Border expansion in the capital also grabs a lot of fairly useless sea tiles. The goody hut is nice and overall this start looks pretty good.

Start 3 looks like it could be +5 food as it appears there is a plains wheat on the river to the SW, although I can't quite tell for sure from the picture. It also has two bg's and another bonus tile, maybe a sugar, to the SW. More land tiles in the capital upon expansion is nice as well. I would probably vote for this start.

@Northern Wolf--I think spaceship is the victory condition we're going for here.

 

[TheOverseer714]

Space is the definite chosen VC. The starts that I picked were the 4 best of 10 generated, England seems to get lots of so-so starts. I think overall that start 881 is not the most glamorous but is the one that might be easiest to live with. It has the least sea tiles, and those are only good for extra commerce and require a Harbor to even be worked, even as a Republic. I'm going with that as my first pick, then the 2 Wines, then the cow and last the Spices.

 

[anaxagoras]

I had this half-posted, but I've been too busy to complete the post. I would vote 881, 888, 837, 842.

With wine, 842 acts like a few BG with a lux, but there is less total food than the spices start. But even that is well behind the other two.

I like the cow start (888) a lot, but I agree that there is a little too much water in the fat cross. On the other hand, there's lots of BG and plenty to trees for chopping and shields. In 881 I can't tell if the settler is on the river. If so, I would favor that. My fog-gazing is not up to PrinceMyshkin's standards, I guess, but if he is right about even one more bonus food and if there is one more BG around, then we'll get a four-turner.

 

[Hynsterider]

I haven't got my Optional log in handy, but I would prefer start 881 as well. It looks like there are more decent settle spots around there. I'm sure it's on the river, Anaxagoras.

 

[TheOverseer714]

881 will also give us a decent core, looks like itis in a deep ocean inlet rather than out on the outer coast of the continent. I think we are about in agreement that thats the best start overall.

 

[Rodent]

O.K, The start and civ have been decided, Shall we begin?

And I refuse to be last on the roster

 

[TheOverseer714]

I guess it is time to decide on the roster. Rodent can be 3rd this time Here is a preliminary roster, note that it is subject to change.

Preliminary Roster:

1: TheOverseer714=> up
2: PrinceMyshkin=> on deck
3: Rodent=> warming up
4: Northen Wolf=> waiting
5: Anaxagoras=> waiting longer
6: Optional/Hynestrider=>twiddling thumbs(waiting longest)

 

[Sashie VII]

Watching this. Good Luck.

 

[Optional]

How are we gonna start out? Researching Writing at 10% seems a no brainer; with a large map we wouldn't get Writing faster than 50 turns anyway, would we?
What about the builds?
* warrior -> curragh -> granery?
* warrior -> warrior -> curragh -> settler -> granery?
* other?
I really don't know what's best, and I wouldn't favor discussing every build for the whole game, but it seems worthwhile to try and get some some discussion for at least the first round of turnsets to start with.