SGOTM 01 - Peanut

[DaviddesJ]

I made a few mistakes this cycle. Mistimed some of my worker movements, so it will take longer to connect the silver than it should have been. Built an axeman in Thebes, which probably should have been another WC instead---we could use it now. I may have overexpanded, which is costing us a lot of maintenance. And I overlooked the likelihood of Russian cultural expansion.

At the beginning of the 700 BC turn, Russia's borders expanded and kicked my WCs back away from her capital. I also have a couple that are out of position temporarily. Last I saw her capital, it had 3 archers, but that was many turns ago. Now, with the cultural expansion, it defends at 40% and will be harder to take.

Catherine just finished the mine on the copper. She has a road next to her capital but hasn't connected the copper yet. I think she will spend the next 3 turns building a road on the copper. We have two offensive choices:

1. Declare war immediately, steal the worker, and then spend a couple of turns moving our WCs into position.

2. Wait two turns while we move our WCs into position (most of them on the tile 2S of Moscow), and then attack and steal the worker.

Advantage of plan #1 is that we get the worker sooner, and we can sit on top of the copper to block her use of it, reducing her production (unless she comes out to attack us, which is good for us).

Advantage of plan #2 is that we avoid triggering war until we have all of our forces ready to move in. She can't build spearmen since the copper still isn't connected.

I'm reasonably comfortable with either of these plans. I do think we should probably pick one or the other; I don't want to just leave her alone when we have a good chance to grab her worker and hopefully finish her off. I wish I had grabbed the worker and killed her before she went up to 40% defense.

 

[Phabuk]

We must declare war now ! Even if it is more difficult now, we are far more powerful than russia and war will be a little bit longer, that's all...

 

[civ_steve]

I would declare now and grab the Worker. We might even use the Worker as bait - let it move in to scout Novgorod, then move back away. If an Archer comes after the Worker, that would be it for the Archer!

MailMan, looks like you are up. Phabuk is on deck unless we hear from Keith Larson.

At what point should we be willing to trade Alphabet? The AI will learn it eventually allowing full trading to occur; I would rather take advantage of that trade then to let it disappear for good.

 

[Paulk]

I agree we should first trade as much as possible to Catherine than declare war and take the worker. She will only have archers for the time being so we should be fine. Finish HER!

 

[Keith Larson]

Sorry,

Here is my "I got it." I will play tonight.

 

[MailMan]

I got it.
I will look at the save now, and post a plan of action for discussion purposes

 

[MailMan]

cross posted with KL - you get it.

 

[MailMan]

after looking at the save my thoughts are:

- attack now. there is no reason to wait, we can move the forces while in war. I like CS idea about the worker bait.
note that the last Russian city is not on a hill which will make it a much easier target.
After that city is gone we will need the WC as city garrison.
Prepare for some WW - especially from former Russian citizens.

- trade only after we meet the AI with the purple borders (India?) we may be able to get some more techs.

- I would set us on 100% research in 3 turns (2 more libraries should be built by than).

- tech discussion - what should we get after IW?

 

[DaviddesJ]

I'd personally lean toward attacking in two turns. I'm not sure we gain anything by attacking now vs two turns from now. The worker isn't going anywhere, as I'm almost certain it's going to start building road for the copper. If she tries to protect the worker, that's good for us; it makes it easier for us to attack her archers in the open. Attacking now gets us a bit more unhappiness and perhaps tilts her a bit more into war mode.

But it's not a big deal, and we can go either way, with similar results.

Catherine isn't going to trade us anything, that's not really an issue.

I think we shouldn't trade away Alphabet until we've met everyone we can meet (or if we can get something we really want). Otherwise the AIs will start trading among themselves and that will hurt our own trading opportunities.

After Iron Working, I'd suggest Mathematics and Sailing as the next highest priorities. If we can trade for one or both, so much the better. Switching to 100% research in 3 turns sounds about right, which should give us Iron Working around the end of MailMan's rotation.

Using the worker as lure (put it next to Novgorod but not on the road, so that if she moves an archer out to capture it, then it can't retreat the same turn) is acceptable, as long as we have enough WCs in range to defeat any stack she moves out of the city.

I built one more warrior as garrison, but from now on we should probably only build axemen (to the extent we want to stockpile some for an eventual overseas war), and if a city doesn't have barracks than build that first.

 

[DaviddesJ]

By the way, did everyone notice that Cyrus has five fish/clams resources, at his capital? Seems like a good reason to attack him next (in case we needed a reason!).

 

[Keith Larson]

After much soul searching this afternoon I have come to the conclusion that I am just too busy right now to contribute significantly to a GOTM. I rarely have the time or the energy to even check the progress of the game. Perhaps later on work will ease up, but right now the added pressure of participating in a GOTM has taken all the fun out of the activity. Please humbly accept my apologies.

So Mail Man, you take it.

Keith Larson

 

[DaviddesJ]

After much soul searching this afternoon I have come to the conclusion that I am just too busy right now to contribute significantly to a GOTM. I rarely have the time or the energy to even check the progress of the game. Perhaps later on work will ease up, but right now the added pressure of participating in a GOTM has taken all the fun out of the activity. Please humbly accept my apologies.

We've all been there! No need to apologize, at all. There's no reason to keep doing something when it's not fun. I hope you'll stay on as a lurker and perhaps when relieved of the pressure to "have to" contribute, you'll find a time when it's fun to do so.

 

[DaviddesJ]

It 's true also that it is impossible to micromanage every turnset, and probably it would be less interesting: the aim here is to have a team play and let a little part of random with the different players styles.

Well said. I'll try to support this principle.

 

[MailMan]

I got it. I will probably play tomorrow's night

 

[civ_steve]

Very sorry to hear that, Keith (and in both threads). And very understandable - the game and SGOTM should be fun. Please lurk and provide comments if you have the time and if the load lightens up later, perhaps you can play in for a round or two.

MailMan - it is yours, followed by Phabuk.

I also believe that it's impossible to micromanage every turnset (and any expectation of that will only lead to frustration!) But I am interested in ways to play better and that almost always means paying attention to the details. So I like those discussions and comments (but don't expect anything miraculous!)

Just to be clear, DaviddesJ, you propose we declare, but not attack the Worker for 2 Turns to see if Catherine will place an Archer for defense of the Worker? This prevents the road from being completed, we still gain the Worker, and we might get a shot at an Archer outside of Novgorod's defensive benefit. If so, sounds good.

For research, Math and then Sailing sounds fine.

 

[MailMan]

Math is usually learned early by the AI, I think we should consider follow something else:

- Literature for the great library
- Metal casting for the forges and the colossus
- sailing first and go for the great lighthouse

 

[DaviddesJ]

Just to be clear, DaviddesJ, you propose we declare, but not attack the Worker for 2 Turns to see if Catherine will place an Archer for defense of the Worker?

No, I think we should not declare war at all for two turns. If we declare war without attacking, we get all of the disadvantages (the worker will probably retreat to the capital, we suffer war unhappiness in our cities, we trigger a possible switch to military production by Catherine) with none of the advantages. If we don't declare war for two turns, we can move all of our WCs into position where they can reach Catherine's capital in two more turns. We declare war in 670 BC and grab the worker, then we attack the capital in 655 BC with all 8 of our WCs. This should be a sure win if she has 3 archers, probably even against 4.

 

[DaviddesJ]

Math is usually learned early by the AI, I think we should consider follow something else:

- Literature for the great library
- Metal casting for the forges and the colossus
- sailing first and go for the great lighthouse

I'm hoping we can get Sailing from the purple civ. Otherwise, I agree on Sailing first. We should get Sailing for the immediate trade boost (probably roughly +1 commerce for every city), plus the possibility of building galleys to start moving over to the new world, plus the possibility of building the Great Lighthouse.

After that, I have no problem with going for something else instead of Math. Literature would be great if we had marble, but we don't. Metal Working is ok, but it's awfully expensive, and the Colossus isn't that good, imho. Probably we should just turn research to 0% for several turns, after Iron Working, before deciding what to do next. (When we're about to get Iron Working, turn research to the minimum that turn that still completes it, to minimize carryover.)

By the way, we're going to get some gold from pillaging Novgorod when we take it, so perhaps we should turn research to 100% sooner rather than later. The sooner we get IW the sooner we can mine the gems, of course.

The worker south of Moscow was supposed to be building a road to the rice, before he got booted out. He could resume that plan, then head north to work on the gems. There are also two workers near St Petersburg who should hang around building mines, etc., until IW. Of course, the two workers in the north should first mine the silver and then road it.

 

[DaviddesJ]

By the way, we probably do need to pick up the pace a bit so we don't end up running out of time. We're the second slowest team at this point.

I don't think we'll have to play to 1730 AD (I plan to win long before then), but there's still a lot of turns to go.

 

[ainwood]

I'm back - pity to hear Keith isn't.

BTW - have we thought about going for the oracle?