SGOTM 06 - The Real Ms. Beyond

[Compromise]

I plan to run the rest of the opening turnset in 4 or 5 hours. It may not get posted until the morning, though.

My plan is to settle in place, go worker first, research Agri then AH. Barring something unexpected, I'll stop either when AH comes in or when the worker completes, whichever seems more obvious.

If you object or think there needs to be more discussion, post asap!

 

[sunrise089]

Go for it!

 

[Swiss Pauli]

If it's not too late, then pausing after Agri to calculate whether Hunting could be squeezed in without much delay to AH & cows improvement, for the discount to AH and to open up Archery. I think the direct route will be better, but it can't hurt to check.

 

[sunrise089]

I can report after a quick different settings BTS always war Prince game, that my turtling skills were NOT up to the task. I can also report BTS AW longbows by 400AD.

 

[Compromise]

As planned, I plopped London in the starting spot. (For local land layout, see pics at end of post.)

Tech plan was Agri -> AH while building a warrior. (No time for hunting; didn't want to delay the beef harvest. Plus, I'd already played.)

I sent the warrior in a counterclockwise loop starting south a bit. Didn't let him get too far from home. Only encountered AI scouts, starting with this one:



So, I think Hannibal is south of us.

I later killed this scout up north. He wandered onto a neighboring flatland and I had 99.1% odds on him. 2xp for our warrior but down to 0.9 health. I brought the warrior inside our borders and gave him Woodsman I to reduce his heal time to 2T. On the turn that he healed, another Hannibal scout appeared on the *same exact flatland tile* that his buddy died on!



I should've left a sign marking Hannibal's graveyard, but there are too many for TheArchduke as it is. Second time around, no loss in HPs, so I gave him Woodsman II so he can serve as a scout through forest and jungle for us. His first assignment was to verify that there's no quick land route anywhere off to the west.

Mansa's scout shows up on T23, coming from the NE. He may have been eaten by a panther that's roaming off to the east. I saw the panther later, but not Mansa's man.

Also on T23, our worker completes and I send him to dig for gold. I work the river banana while building a warrior because I think we want to get the capital's size up asap.

On T29, AH is in...no horses anywhere. So much for my metagame prediction.

I stop here but have tentatively set the next tech to Bronzeworking. An alternative is the Wheel, but without horses, I prefer Bronze to know if we need Archery asap.

Note that at size 1, the city governor will *not* work the gold mine with all 3 emphasize buttons on. I think we want to work the gold every single turn except for a brief bit when we work the cows to grow from size 1 to 2 as soon as a pasture can be completed there. This is something we'll have to check frequently.

Here's a shot of our immediate environs:



And a zoomed out shot that shows everything we know about the world right now:



I haven't thought about the next build after the warrior too much. Maybe start a settler? The gold mine completed this turn, so the worker needs to be sent to the pasture right away. Then farm the river banana, I think.

I'd like to run just one more turnset before we take a break for the holidays. I want to at least discover if/where copper is. Then, we have enough info to set up practice games. I know I need more experience at AW, and I don't want to make some crucial early error that sets us back from the start.

All those signs on the map are just to record what happened during this turnset and to serve as a visual record for this post. Please feel free to delete them before playing on.

The first save

 

[Swiss Pauli]

My thoughts:

- Tech trading enabled.
- Two FIN AIs , one of whom is the biggest tech whore.
- Looks like Carthage has a strong capital, maybe coastal fish looking at his pop size already.
- Both Carthage and Mali should start with warriors: I wonder whether they were deleted by Gyathaar, or the scouts added, or maybe it was some (planned?) hut luck?
- BW will take 13 at current reseach levels, Hunting=>Archery 12, but these will stretch out as we grow to ~15 turns.

 

[TheArchduke]

Save loads fine, so I can play the next round and I got the save.

In any case, I am a big believer of growing the town before working the gold, even if it means going for the bananas before the cows are hooked up (5 turns later the gold will be worked again by our 2nd citizien.) But I let the team decide that.

As soon as our 2nd warrior is in, I would suggest an exploration south and perhaps harrasing/scouting out the first AI capital that we can find.

Techwise, I don´t think BW warrants any discussion, as we got no horses we need to establish if we get bronze else we have to hurry for Archery asap.

I don´t see any nice terrain for a 2nd city so far, apart from a fish/cow combination, but as we have no Maoi Statues in Warlords, those cities would be quite weak industrywise.

After having checked out surroundings a bit more and established if bronze is elusive as well, a break for the holidays and gametesting sounds like a good plan.

 

[Compromise]

Good points.

You've got me thinking now Archduke: I tend to strongly prefer improved tiles to unimproved ones, but a river banana is kind of halfway there. I'd like a little time to think about the tradeoff between earlier growth vs. earlier warrior production and later quicker (4T instead of 5T) growth from size 1 to size 2.

I didn't think about looking at AI demographic info, Swiss. Could you elaborate on what you're looking at?

Archduke, I wouldn't expect you to run your turnset before Sunday; Monday might be preferable to me.

 

[TheArchduke]

Good points.

You've got me thinking now Archduke: I tend to strongly prefer improved tiles to unimproved ones, but a river banana is kind of halfway there. I'd like a little time to think about the tradeoff between earlier growth vs. earlier warrior production and later quicker (4T instead of 5T) growth from size 1 to size 2.

I didn't think about looking at AI demographic info, Swiss. Could you elaborate on what you're looking at?

Archduke, I wouldn't expect you to run your turnset before Sunday; Monday might be preferable to me.

I am in no haste to play my turn.

The first turns were nicely played, and I doubt that the scenario didn´t provide the AI with 1-2 defenders making an early warrior visit a bad idea.

But under no circumstances I would work a gold tile with 1 citizien. I think that growth to the happ cap, always pays off longterm, so the quicker we get there, the better. But I stand to be corrected.

 

[Compromise]

Hmmm. If we're not going to work the gold mine early, I think I should have gone Hunting -> AH with the worker first opening. That way, the cows could have been improved sooner.

I did some pen and paper calculations. I think you are right that there is a slight growth improvement by working the food first. By working the gold mine for a bit, we can get the warrior off exploring earlier (so earlier geographical intel) and maybe knock a turn off the Bronzeworking discovery (this because working pastured cows to grow would allow us to grow in 4T rather than 5T).

I think it's a judgment call which is more valuable. Since it's only a matter of a few turns and since 3 AI scouts have already found our borders, I don't have a strong opinion either way.

Anyone else?

 

[Kodii]

I would just keep working the gold.

Ding dong, Ragnar (?) at 8 o'clock! (all Financial AIs?)

If so, our AIs are: Hannibal, Mansa, Ragnar, HC, Wang and ? (the other Financial leaders are English)

 

[LKendter]

I personally hate gold tiles. I tend not to work them except close to max size. The growth penalty is brutal.

 

[sunrise089]

I love gold tiles - the early commerce boost is huge. And not every tile can be grassland gems

 

[Compromise]

I'm going to change my vote. I did a quick pen and paper test out to T40. Looks like we'd work 10 improved-tile turns and 7-unimproved tile turns by emphasizing growth versus 11 improved-tile turns by working the gold until the pasture completes. (That's the most reasonable, quantifiable comparison I could think of. It's also subject to error!) I should have gone Hunting->AH and got the pasture out sooner. My mistake.

But given that you can generate a defensive warrior in 4T (less as time passes) by working the gold, you might consider sending the warrior off exploring before the warrior in the queue completes. Note that he can get back to the capital twice as fast as any AI warrior with his stealthy woods/jungle skills if he stays among the trees.

I think I'd just generate warriors for now. A passing warrior might try to encroach on our improvements before too long.

 

[Compromise]

Forgot to mention earlier: Nice work on the cultural fog gazing, Kodii! It does seem like there's a financial AI theme going. Maybe it's a no-strategic-resources map too? On these Gyathaar-special maps, knowledge can be power.

How about if you work the gold hill for one or two turns, TheArchduke, then grow with the banana. That way, the worker investment isn't totally wasted, and the initial warrior is able to go see the world because in a pinch--like if an AI warrior appears near the capital--a new warrior can be generated in 2 or 3 turns.

I don't see a reason to build anything other than warriors during your turnset. Except maybe start a settler at size 4? Not sure.

For worker actions, I'm thinking pasturize the cows, then farms the bananas, then starts mining hills, beginning with ones next to rivers for the bonus commerce. I don't know what to apply the forest chop to yet.

After BW, I think we'll want The Wheel if we have copper nearby, but Hunting->Archery if not.

The discovery of BW would seem to be a logical end to the next turnset, though I guess if things are obvious, a bit more would be fine too.

We should also think about our steady-state capital tile assignments. At size 6 (i.e., without whip unhappiness), we can work the cows (+2F), the farmed banana (+2F), the gold (-2F), and either 3 grass hill mines or 3 river cottages. That gives the worker plenty to accomplish.

I'm not sure when to start our first settler. Do we want to grow to max size first, or do we want to have a settler ready (or nearly ready) when Copper is revealed?

Thoughts?

 

[TheArchduke]

I will try to play the next turnset somewhen today. I will finish the warrior whilst working the gold and then switch over to finally get some growth in as a compromise.

Financial civs, no horses, and if you ask me, no bronze. Seems like we are in for a tough ride regardless of the prince difficulty. I will try to pause if something important comes up (like bronze) in any case.

 

[Swiss Pauli]

I decided to calculate the options of Gold or Banana. I decided that we can afford to delay the warrior for as long as possible in each scenario: according to my calculcations Banana til size 2 is slightly superior but it's pretty close (3 extra food in the basket by T38).

Cows come online in T37.

 

[Swiss Pauli]

- Hannibal has 16% pop from VC screen.

- Looks like we'll need to found 'Ragnargate' on the Cows or Spices to deny him access to us but allow us to get at him.

- I'm guessing there's no Copper nearby, but Iron in our BFC.

- Grow as much as we can until BW, but maybe work the Gold again at size 3 if the banana farm isn't ready.

- On BW we can decide between a Settler or another worker.

- Send warriors to fogbust: Current one should roam the forests to the SE/E but not stray too far, the next one on the jungle hill S of the two peaks, after that up to the north on the plains hill by those cows, then another for the plains hill 1E of the Mansa scout sign.

- Remember to turn on the autologger!

 

[TheArchduke]

- Remember to turn on the autologger!

Autologger?

 

[ruff_hi]

part of the HOF mod - either hit Alt-L when you start the game or use the 'start silent' option under the HOF option screen.