SGOTM 06 - Xteam

[DJMGator13]

That would only give us 1 warrior at home. I think we need two minimum if we want to protect our improvements/workers and avoid having to whip an axeman when we're trying to grow to Pop3 soon.

If we stay on the copper hill instead of the banans warrior3 will complete on Turn 31, but at the cost of 12 foods towards growth. Once we start working the copper we only add 1f per turn so growth to Pop3 will be slow. This doesn't slow the first axe but no doubtable slows growth. But if it enables us to grab an AI capitol by having an axe and warrior it might be worth the risk. By then Warrior1 should be drawing the attention of the CARTs. So there should be no one coming after our core. One warrior this early maybe enough.

EDIT: Crossed with post of turnlog -

 

[leif erikson]

Nice start Shannon, way to get us going!

And nice discussion thus far.

Roster:
Frederiksberg - UP
rrau - On Deck
Cactus Pete
Jimmy Thunder
Leif
ShannonCT
Gator - Good luck with the surgery on the 19th!

Time to go look at the save.
Before we decide how many turns, I think we need to discuss Tech and other goals. I think that can determine the length of the turn set? Suggestions?

 

[DJMGator13]

Thanks leif. I've got 1 more day to play for a little while.


On Mansa - I don't think I've seen a mfg graph like that. The power side would make you think he has his UU but pop size adds to power, but does the mfg side indicate that he is working all food tiles? Coastal city squeezed out a few workboats? So maybe nothing more than a warrior or two. Unless Gyathaar has been busy.

However, 3 AI means we need a second city and some unit production up pretty soon.

 

[Jimmy Thunder]

Excellent turnset ShannonCT! You really set the standard

Flawless warrior vs animal victories - the lion tamer!

I am confused about Mali's graphs, very low manuf and high power like you said. I've never paid too much attention to those graphs before, who here can make sense of it?

My thoughts about next strategies:

Set up aggravation parties for each AI on continent (so for now this is Mali, Carthage and Greece). 2 axes 1 warrior makes a great team and can keep the AI in a loop of endlessly producing archers that come out to kill the warrior but get killed by the axes everytime.

Settle city with cows, rice and gold in initial 9 squares.

3rd city for horses and heaps of forests.

Do we need a preferred method for growing borders? (For city 3 and beyond)
We can built/chop/whip an obelisk(or library) (the easy option)
Build Stonehenge (but i think we need our early hammers elsewhere)
Found confuc (possibly with Oracle sometime before 1500BC?)

For techs after wheel...
I like IronWorking, swords will be our first real city taking units of choice. Our axes are more for retarding AI growth. We have lots of jungle to the south that can be cleared for a 4th city. Also to locate iron near the AI borders.

Aside from IW, I think Writing > Math is fairly important.
Pottery normally would have a high priority, but I don't think we will whip that much in our first two cities because of the resources we have. We also don't need cottages right now with our gold coming online soon.

We could make use of Oracle, either for Construction or CoL. Don't think we would consider any other world wonders. (Great Library could help if we find ourselves bulbing to Astronomy - but old fashioned libraries would work almost as well).

Production is still more important than our research rate and we can focus on building settler and military units (more warriors at first). Getting barracks up in London can happen in the lull after our settler is finished.

 

[leif erikson]

Thanks leif. I've got 1 more day to play for a little while.

You're welcome. Hang in there.

However, 3 AI means we need a second city and some unit production up pretty soon.

Yes, Alex showing up raised my eyebrows!

My thoughts about next strategies:

Set up aggravation parties for each AI on continent (so for now this is Mali, Carthage and Greece). 2 axes 1 warrior makes a great team and can keep the AI in a loop of endlessly producing archers that come out to kill the warrior but get killed by the axes everytime.

Two Axes and a Warrior times three is an awful lot of hammers and, perhaps, support costs for troops away? We may have to focus on Mali, unless we get lucky and boot them, and Carthage? Alex must be a fair distance away?

Settle city with cows, rice and gold in initial 9 squares.

3rd city for horses and heaps of forests.

A dot map, this is a succession game after all.

Do we need a preferred method for growing borders? (For city 3 and beyond)
We can built/chop/whip an obelisk(or library) (the easy option)
Build Stonehenge (but i think we need our early hammers elsewhere)
Found confuc (possibly with Oracle sometime before 1500BC?)

Churchill gives us a smilie face for Monument, as well as the culture. Myst is a 9-turn research project at present, but I think it can wait a bit?

For techs after wheel...
I like IronWorking, swords will be our first real city taking units of choice. Our axes are more for retarding AI growth. We have lots of jungle to the south that can be cleared for a 4th city. Also to locate iron near the AI borders.

Yes, I like The Wheel and Iron Working as well. Let's hope there is a source of Iron around. I have this funny feeling we may have to fight for it?

Aside from IW, I think Writing > Math is fairly important.
Pottery normally would have a high priority, but I don't think we will whip that much in our first two cities because of the resources we have. We also don't need cottages right now with our gold coming online soon.

I think getting to Construction after IW is key to both victory and survival!

We could make use of Oracle, either for Construction or CoL. Don't think we would consider any other world wonders. (Great Library could help if we find ourselves bulbing to Astronomy - but old fashioned libraries would work almost as well).

I don't think we will have the spare hammers for any wonders. One of my favorite sayings that I read around here somewhere is that Wonders won are always sweeter than Wonders built!

Production is still more important than our research rate and we can focus on building settler and military units (more warriors at first). Getting barracks up in London can happen in the lull after our settler is finished.

I'm not so sure of this. Expansion and research rate are important. Expansion to provide a capability to produce units and research to give us the tools we need to defeat our enemies. Cats are going to be very important in this game, I think.

If we get lucky enough to take out Mali, that would be a huge boost for us. If not, we are going to need Cats, lots of Cats!

 

[rrau]

As far away as the Mali capital is, and with the associated maintenance costs for distance, is the plan to raze it?

[edit] I think I like both city B sites better for long term development, but if we have to use the whip for units, and I'm betting we will, A sites have the food in the initial city square, so I'm thinking they might be better for this game.

 

[leif erikson]

As far away as the Mali capital is, and with the associated maintenance costs for distance, is the plan to raze it?

This is up for discussion. I have the same concerns, as well as connecting it and maintaining that connection. We'll have to see what resources are nearby as well.

[edit] I think I like both city B sites better for long term development, but if we have to use the whip for units, and I'm betting we will, A sites have the food in the initial city square, so I'm thinking they might be better for this game.

You broke my code. The A's are for immediate use and the B's are long term. I'm thinking the A's at this point, especially since we have no immediate means of cultural expansion, atm...

 

[rrau]

Hm.....I don't see my edit anymore in my last post. Oh, well, you apparently saw it.

[edit] Went to put it back in and I see it when the edit box comes up but not in the display box

 

[leif erikson]

Hm.....I don't see my edit anymore in my last post. Oh, well, you apparently saw it.

[edit] Went to put it back in and I see it when the edit box comes up but not in the display box

I saw it when I hit "QUOTE", it showed up on my screen. I still can't read it in that post!

There is more mysterious here than just the game!!

 

[rrau]

I went back and hit the save edit button again. Hopefully it's now visible to you. (I can see it) (we need a now you see it, now you don't smilie here)

 

[leif erikson]

Yes, it is now up and visible...

@Shannon - Almost forgot to wish you well on your trip. Hope it is to someplace warm with no snow to shovel, or, if it is cold, nice skiing!!

And thanks for getting us off to an excellent start!

 

[Mad Professor]

Finished!
Notice Mali's high power graph but low maufacturing graph. Hmmm...

Save has been uploaded.

He started with a present from Gyaathar?? Or studied the right tech? Techs make a significant differeence to the power graph. He's almost certainly not coastal though sitting there, so expect him to be at least on the way to a skirmisher.

 

[leif erikson]

He started with a present from Gyaathar?? Or studied the right tech? Techs make a significant differeence to the power graph. He's almost certainly not coastal though sitting there, so expect him to be at least on the way to a skirmisher.

Hi MP!!

Gyathaar must have been in the Christmas spirit, no?

 

[Mad Professor]

Gyathaar must have been in the Christmas spirit, no?

Those were my thoughts when I first saw our own starting area a few pages back...

 

[Mad Professor]

By the way, the culture graph at the SGOTM progress page as it currently stands gives an account of which teams (out of those who have started) delayed settling a turn or two. Gypsy Kings, Geezers and Smurkz all have slightly less culture than hte others. The only reason at this stage can be that they didn't settle immediately.

 

[Jimmy Thunder]

We have to consider our approach to war with these first 3 civs.

Option1: the Leap Frog
Focus all our attention on one civ and destroy them ASAP and then move onto the next.

Option2: the Boa Constrictor
Work hard to shut down all civs simultaneously and and then destroy them one by one at a later time.

Option3: the Egg Balance
Concentrate primarily on one civ and destroy them fairly soon, while paying some attention to slowing down the other civs that we can reach.

I favour the Boa Constrictor. If you keep them busy then they aren't sending any units toward you. We have axes at our disposal at the moment, these have good odds against archers in the open but you will need to suicide quite a number to take out a capital with three archers in it. Ideally, our raiders only fight battles at high odds and slowly accumulate xp, making them even better at their job. We use our hammers very efficiently since we aren't losing units - remember we do have to offset a 3v1 ratio of military units being built. With the AI pegged in we are much more able to mount an offensive front, where otherwise we might be killing one civ and losing half of our early fighters on them, while archers (or worse) come in a steady stream from the other nearby civs.

Also, the AI does not use smart military movements. We can exploit this weakness vs multiple civs at the same time and give ourselves the edge.

Or thats the plan anyway! ALWAYS WAR!!

 

[Mad Professor]

We have to consider our approach to war with these first 3 civs.

Option1: the Leap Frog
Focus all our attention on one civ and destroy them ASAP and then move onto the next.

Option2: the Boa Constrictor
Work hard to shut down all civs simultaneously and and then destroy them one by one at a later time.

Option3: the Egg Balance
Concentrate primarily on one civ and destroy them fairly soon, while paying some attention to slowing down the other civs that we can reach.

I favour the Boa Constrictor.

I agree that we can't afford to just ignore anyone. If we do, it won't be long before a steady stream of units comes our way from that direction. If we can have war on their ground instead of ours, so much the better for our economy, and the slower for theirs. This makes Options 2 and 3 better than option 1 IMHO.

 

[ShannonCT]

Flawless warrior vs animal victories - the lion tamer!

I was not happy to run into a bear, but at least I was in the forest.

I am confused about Mali's graphs, very low manuf and high power like you said. I've never paid too much attention to those graphs before, who here can make sense of it?

Power graphs are certainly not all about units. Anything that gives you the capacity to have a strong army could be factored in.

My thoughts about next strategies:

Set up aggravation parties for each AI on continent (so for now this is Mali, Carthage and Greece). 2 axes 1 warrior makes a great team and can keep the AI in a loop of endlessly producing archers that come out to kill the warrior but get killed by the axes everytime.

In the near term, 1 axe per enemy would go a long way in keeping them backward.

Settle city with cows, rice and gold in initial 9 squares.

3rd city for horses and heaps of forests.

I think this is a good plan. City 2 can grow quickly by sharing London's cows and will be useful more quickly than any other city site. City 3 could be a place to potentially chop the Oracle for CoL (waiting to finish writing, masonry, and math to Oracle construction is more iffy).

Do we need a preferred method for growing borders? (For city 3 and beyond)

Oracle -> Code of Laws. Quick border pop for City3, and maybe for City2 also if Confucianism is founded there. Free missionary. No unnecessary monuments/libraries in production cities.

For techs after wheel...
I like IronWorking, swords will be our first real city taking units of choice. Our axes are more for retarding AI growth. We have lots of jungle to the south that can be cleared for a 4th city. Also to locate iron near the AI borders.

How about Wheel -> IW -> Myst -> Poly -> Preist -> Writing -> Math -> Construction. And hopefully CoL with Oracle. If we can hook iron, swords can take some of the easier cities and then the tough ones can be dispatched with cats.

Production is still more important than our research rate and we can focus on building settler and military units (more warriors at first). Getting barracks up in London can happen in the lull after our settler is finished.

Agreed. With two gold mines in our first two cities, and with some early city captures, research is going to be moving along well in the early game. Longer term, we can cottage the jungle and build/capture a GP farm. Barracks are not needed in London until we are ready to start building our city takers (swords hopefully). Warriors for fogbusters and axes for harrassers are much more useful if they can come quickly.

I don't think we will have the spare hammers for any wonders. One of my favorite sayings that I read around here somewhere is that Wonders won are always sweeter than Wonders built!

Except for Oracle of course...

I'm not so sure of this. Expansion and research rate are important. Expansion to provide a capability to produce units and research to give us the tools we need to defeat our enemies. Cats are going to be very important in this game, I think.

If we get lucky enough to take out Mali, that would be a huge boost for us. If not, we are going to need Cats, lots of Cats!

CRI swords (and CRII with just one easy kill) will be good for taking easier cities, for instance an AI's second city that has no culture defense. We should be seeing some elite swordsmen quickly with our Charismatic trait.

As far away as the Mali capital is, and with the associated maintenance costs for distance, is the plan to raze it?

Hmm... but AI capitals are usually very powerful. We can figure out what the maintenence will be, but I think razing an AI capital is rarely a good idea.

I think I like both city B sites better for long term development, but if we have to use the whip for units, and I'm betting we will, A sites have the food in the initial city square, so I'm thinking they might be better for this game.

Site A for City 2 is defintely superior in the short term and not much worse in the long term.

By the way, the culture graph at the SGOTM progress page as it currently stands gives an account of which teams (out of those who have started) delayed settling a turn or two. Gypsy Kings, Geezers and Smurkz all have slightly less culture than hte others. The only reason at this stage can be that they didn't settle immediately.

And you can also see that we were the first to revolt to slavery.

 

[ShannonCT]

Option2: the Boa Constrictor
Work hard to shut down all civs simultaneously and and then destroy them one by one at a later time.
the other civs that we can reach.

I favour the Boa Constrictor. If you keep them busy then they aren't sending any units toward you. We have axes at our disposal at the moment, these have good odds against archers in the open but you will need to suicide quite a number to take out a capital with three archers in it. Ideally, our raiders only fight battles at high odds and slowly accumulate xp, making them even better at their job. We use our hammers very efficiently since we aren't losing units - remember we do have to offset a 3v1 ratio of military units being built. With the AI pegged in we are much more able to mount an offensive front, where otherwise we might be killing one civ and losing half of our early fighters on them, while archers (or worse) come in a steady stream from the other nearby civs.

I like this as well. Do you recommend going for the first kills with swords alone or waiting for cats?

 

[Cactus Pete]

Well, SCT has certainly gotten us off to a fine start and posted a clear and concise report.

Others have already brought up most of what has occurred to me, including no clue about MNFG graph. It is a situation with many options. I'll be interested to see what Frederiksberg proposes.

What hasn't been mentioned:

Possibility of the third city 1 tile east of B to get stone.

Produce a workboat in the not too distant future (the sooner to learn the need for Astronomy and before the AI's have galleys).

Better to grow city to size three and get gold mined than to go all out to get second city founded ASAP, but once to size three, second city takes precedence over fighting (but perhaps not harassment) unless there is high probabilty of significant success (probably --certainly, if no iron -- will need cats to win without great losses and with multiple promotions, hopefully of swords, and we need second gold mine to speed to Construction). I know I may be at odds with JT and probably others here, so we need to hash this out.

Not only do units cost hammers, but we need to use some restraint in the number of units we have to supply for harassment, so that our research is not greatly slowed.