SGOTM 01 - Peanut

[DaviddesJ]

I'm fine with building on the grasslands/river just south of the horses, if that's what we prefer. This is the discussion I wanted to have when I said we should figure out where to put the second city, so we can schedule what our worker should be doing. If we're going to build on the grasslands/river, then we should put a pasture on the cows to the south (which are already in our cultural borders) before founding the new city, so it can work that improved space immediately.

I hate to give up the fish, but, it's true that we're getting 4 floodplains, and fresh water, in compensation.

I think the grasslands south of the horses are better than the plains SE of the horses. More forests, fewer deserts---just a generally better location. Only downside is that it makes it difficult to connect the fishes later on.

 

[DaviddesJ]

I am deferring to your experience - let's take out Catherine with WC's, then build our empire unmolested (unless there's someone else behind her.)

I don't have that much experience---most people here have probably played more Civ4 games than me.

I do have an analytical nature so I can work out the consequences of particular decisions. But if other people have opinions from experience with the game (like: Catherine is generally hard to deal with), those opinions are likely to be more well-informed than mine.

 

[Paulk]

Are we going to do an early WC rush?

If yes than building on the grassland river is the best location. It gives us horses way sooner. What we can do is once the settler is complete start construction of a barracks. It will take 3 turns for the settler to reach this spot. 3+6=9 turns for settler to reach this spot. The worker can move N one and prebuild a farm for one turn. Next move to the cows and build a pasture for 7 turns. Next move one NW and prebuild a road for one turn. Finally move one NW, prebuild road for one turn and then start building a pasture for the horses. 1+6+1+1=9 until city built and started construction for a pasture.
Plus the 6+2=8 turns for pasture and road to horses. A total of 17 turns for horses to be connected to Thebes.

In Thebes once the settler is done we can start construction of a barracks. If we work the farm and pasture we will grow in 7 turns and make 5h so thats 35 h+any overflow from the settler. Once we grow to population 3 we will start working another floodplain. Work this flood plain for 6 turns; which will get us to population 4. Once we hit pop 4 we switch from the floodplains to the grassland forest and with the new pop start working the stone. This will complete the barracks in 17 turns.

This will mean that the barracks is completed, Thebes is at 4 population, and the horses are connected to Thebes. This means we can start pumping out WCs upgraged out of Thebes. We will be procucing each WC in 3-4 turns depending on the amount of overflow if we work stone and plains forset. We will also eventually grow to Pop 5 and increase our WC production further.

There is what I would like to do if we are going to do a WC rush. So it will take approximately 45 turns from this point to build a barracks hook up horses and produce 8 WCs. (we might be able to take out Catherine with 7.)

For the worker once the horses are hooked we can have him finish the other cow pasture and then have him build some cottages along floodplains (until we get some more technologies). Also I think we should take our chance with researching alphabet and rushing. If we are only with Catherine we might possibly weaken her to the point of destruction and then get as many technologies as possible. Then 10 turns later finish Catherine off. IF there are other civs south of Russia we will be able to trade with them after the destruction of Catherine. There is my choice for our direction and a few calculations (somebody check my math for accuracy).
Paulk

P.S. we can check to see if there is anyone south of Catherine with an open boarders agreement.

 

[MailMan]

Re: city locations - I still think my proposed dot map is the best we can do with the land we got.

My experience tell me that health issues are of much less importance than happiness issues.
Note that in the long run the coastal locations with no fresh water is better than the inland/fresh water location due to harbor than gain us at least +2 health and 50% increase to trade routes.
According to the current known layout of the map, we will need a strong navy which our coastal cities can provide.

With the proposed city location in the plains on the river I really do not see and good city location that can grab the fish and therefore we will waste the fish.

I think that both the pink and the blue dots will be great city locations (rather than average ones).
The blue dot should be production city, farm all the FP and mine all the hills will let us work all the 4 hills (15h) and maybe watermill on the plains and all the sea squares.

pink dot - GP farm - we can have up to 5 specialists. excess food: fish(4) +cows(1+2) + grassland farms(1+1+1).

orange dot - commerce (at least 5 towns + sea tiles)

light blue - commerce / production

 

[DaviddesJ]

I more or less agree with Paulk, but I haven't checked his math. I like the idea of the grassland river city, because as a single city it will be better than the coastal city (the 4 extra floodplains are worth more than the fish), and it will get going significantly faster, and it will connect the horses faster. Having this city be good quickly is way more important, imho, than whether it can build a harbor eventually. Since we're depending on it to pump stuff out while our capital builds the WCs.

I think it's acceptable to plan to use the fish by eventually putting a city 2S of the fish, with access to fish and cows. The light blue dot on the river, with only one resource tile in its range, isn't particularly exciting, so moving that city to use the fish seems fine, to me.

 

[MailMan]

The city location will affect us for a very long time (i.e. all the game) I really think we should found 2 cities in the north rather than 1.

 

[Paulk]

Since this could be one of the most importnat decisions in this game we need to discuss what the advantages/disadvantges of each choice and what we plan to do with each choice (ie. WC rush, Better Researching locations).

 

[Paulk]

I realize that in the long run the plan you have suggested would be the better choice. But right now I think we need better production and quicker access to horses. With your plan it doesn't seem very productive right now; especially since we don't have fishing yet. Like a GP factory is nice, but with the direction that we are going right now building our second city on the grassland river seems to be the best for an early WC rush.

Here is a potential City dot map.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=127048&stc=1&d=1147875685

 

[DaviddesJ]

Oops! I hadn't noticed until just now that Moscow is on a hill! That's going to make the attack a lot less fun---archers defending at 7.2 against our WCs, right? I always get confused about how the combat bonuses actually combine, but I think they get +40% for culture, +50% for city defense, +25% for hills, +25% for hills defense. Compared to only 5.7 if there were no hills.

I wish they weren't on the hill, but we're going to have to do it sooner or later. Waiting requires more patience than I have.

Anyone have any ideas for how we should make a decision? At some point, should we have a "vote"?

 

[MailMan]

archers on hill get 2 bonuses: 25% from being an archer on a hill + 25% that all the other defense units get (tile defense).

archer in a city on hill with 40% culture bonus should be:
3 * (0.4 + 0.5 + 0.25 + 0.25) = 7.2
on flatland:
3 * (0.4 + 0.5) = 5.7

by the time we get there, the arches might be promoted with city garrison:
3 * (0.4 + 0.5 + 0.25 + 0.25 + 0.2) = 7.8

and do not forget that archers has first strike ability.

We will roughly need 3 WC per archer!

Anyone have any ideas for how we should make a decision? At some point, should we have a "vote"?

I think the general rule in Peanut's team that the one who plays the actual turns gets to choose what to do. I am not sure about that since most of the time we manged to reach a consensus after the discussion.

 

[DaviddesJ]

and do not forget that archers has first strike ability. We will roughly need 3 WC per archer!

WCs are immune to first strikes---this is part of the point of the unit. Our WCs should have Combat 1, which gives us 5.5 to the defending 7.2. Our first couple of WCs should be able to come off the production lines and find a barb somewhere to kill to get a 2nd promotion (which should be Combat 2) while we build the rest of our force. I think a lv2 WC plus a lv3 WC should generally be enough for one archer.

I think the general rule in Peanut's team that the one who plays the actual turns gets to choose what to do.

I'm all for that. No trying to tell other people what to do (I apologize if I've been guilty of that). Nevertheless I think now is a good time to try to form a consensus on one primary plan:

1. Prepare for earliest feasible rush with WCs, unless we learn something that changes our minds.

2. Prepare for a later WC rush, perhaps after building up to 3-4 cities. Expecting to have to face bigger defenders but since WCs are cheap we can just bring a huge number of them.

3. Just play builder for now, and eventually plan on a later attack with Swordsmen or Macemen.

IMHO a good idea would be to try to get everyone to "vote" for one (or more) of these, and see if we can form a general consensus.

I'd vote for #1, primarily because I think it's "more interesting" use of the Egyptian UU, and because I think Catherine is going to be much more annoying than useful if we don't do something early.

But I think any of the plans can work ok, so if there's a consensus for a different plan I'm happy to climb onboard.

 

[DaviddesJ]

Another conceivable alternative is to try to put our 2nd city on the isthmus near Catherine, and block her in. Don't attack her, refuse to give Open Borders, and defend if she attacks. I'm not all that enthusiastic about this plan, but I thought I should mention it.

 

[Paulk]

Eventually I would like to build a city on the isthmus desert square creating a canal (but not for the first city). I wouldn't be suprised if we are on a long snaky continent and ice might possibly blocking off the North. My vote would be for option #1. Paulk

 

[Keith Larson]

I see that mailman played his turn set yesterday. I will try to play mine tonight or tommorrow evening. I will not get home until 8:30 PM this evening, so I can promise that I will complete all ten turns until tommorrow.

Keith

 

[MailMan]

I generally vote for #1, but I would not compromise future city locations for that.
I would settle on the plain square by the sea that gets us the fish, while our capital work on barracks. The worker should aim to connect the horses ASAP (road first and than pasture).

The second city can start on a second worker.
A second worker will come in handy for to reasons:
1. help setting up all the tile improvements faster.
2. road toward Russia to get our forces there faster

I would send the southern warrior back toward Russia in order to pass her using open borders.

 

[DaviddesJ]

I generally vote for #1, but I would not compromise future city locations for that. I would settle on the plain square by the sea that gets us the fish, while our capital work on barracks.

I guess I think the coast is an actually worse location, both in the short and long term. Much worse in the short term, slightly worse in the long term.

[P.S. A significant short-term advantage comes from using our worker to improve the cows that are already within our borders, before we settle the city. So we would want to start doing that on this next turn cycle, as well as the roads for connecting the horses.]

I don't see packing in more cities as very important, if we are going to actually attack Russia. We'll likely conquer the world before filling up our land.

The second city can start on a second worker.

Surely we have to grow to size 3 first, to work the 3 resource tiles? (Not counting the fish, even if we are on the coast, since we won't have Fishing for a while---although, if we do settle there, I'd be happy to prioritize Fishing so we can grow the city while building a workboat.)

 

[Phabuk]

Hi,

sorry for not post sooner but I was on holidays and had no access to a computer.

I am GMT +1

Hope it is still possible to participate

 

[Keith Larson]

I think we are at a very important point here and I would like a little more consensus before I do my turn set. My vote it #1 early WC rush and I am leaning towards the second dot layout map, with the dark blue dot on the river. We might be able to pick up fish from another location and as the map show we can always build on the green dot.

Anymore input before I begin? I can play in about 5 hours or can delay until tomorrow evening. Speak now or forever hold your peace!

 

[ainwood]

I'm keen on the WC rush - and on reflection, the sooner the better. "Overwhelming numbers" will probably be the order-of-the-day - if catherine gets spears, we're in huge trouble - so maybe we should try to grab bronze working?

The other benefit from sooner-rather-then-later (aside from reduced defenders) is that I really like the look of those 3-gems. With a library and an academy, thats (3*7*1.75) = 36 beakers fairly early on.

 

[Keith Larson]

1. 2770BC

Worker moves N and pre-builds farm. Northern Warrior heals. Southern Warrior on Barb patrol, but do move SE to un-fog sea tile.

2. 2740BC

Worker moves to cows and starts pasture. Northern Warrior promotes to woodsmen 1 and heads north. See wolf on hill. Southern Warrior on patrol.

3. 2710BC
N warrior kills wolf, wounded, but will move NE to heal in woods. Catharine has BW and adopts slavery.

4. 2680BC
Nothing new.

5. 2650BC
Nothing new.

6. 2620BC
S Warrior see borders of 2nd Russian city.

7. 2590BC
Settler built and start Barracks. Settler moves…
S warrior discovers St. Pet is on hill S of cows, just north of Moscow.
I have to go to a meeting this evening. You have about 3 hours before I am back.