SGOTM 07 - Unusual Suspects

[marconos]

Not able to look at things today / tonight. I'll dig into the save and such tomorrow and post my thoughts.

Sucks to loose you Acid, I was learning a lot.

The main things that I'm actually not comfortable as to why decisions are being made at this point are the techs that are being researched and how you propose to manage the trades. I always seem to come up just a little short in trading in my games (and I only play prince). I'll look at the game and see what I think.

VRA as captain is fine for me (not positive actually what a captain does ).

BTW: I don't want to be doing a set of turns where we expect to be doing a bunch of tech trading, just not comfortable with my skill level there yet.

 

[vra379971]

Impossible The next SG will probably be a BtS SG so I'll be with CFR again; I am here now to train you as a captain who will lead his team in the future games.

And, you are right. The captain's job ain't loads of fun. When volunteering for captain, make sure you know what you're getting yourself into. Incidentally, may I ask you what are the responsibilities of the captain?

Darn good question.

I've run SG's before, so I've a good idea how to keep the ship moving effeciently and effectively. The only thing to add is being the liason between the team and AlanH.

So, unless there are complaints, I'm going to suggest:

1) We move foward to Alphabet, at which point we will halt for a review of tactics and strategies from that point forth.

2) While we don't need to, I'd like to know what Smurkz did to change their score trajectory so significantly. If anyone would care to hazard a well-founded guess, that would be great.

 

[Yamps]

It is simple, really. You add up the hammer costs of everything you have produced across the empire; the beaker costs of all the techs you have researched; and the food costs of all the population you have grown. Don't forget also to add those invested in the projects currently under construction.

Ok. I was wondering if you used some other methods. But what about tech discounts? Are those numbers for tech cost really correct ?

Darn good question.


So, unless there are complaints, I'm going to suggest:

1) We move foward to Alphabet, at which point we will halt for a review of tactics and strategies from that point forth.

2) While we don't need to, I'd like to know what Smurkz did to change their score trajectory so significantly. If anyone would care to hazard a well-founded guess, that would be great.

1) There are so many turns to Alpha! We should stop much sooner. We haven't decided in what order will we build things and what tiles we are going to work.

2) We were stagnant on size 3 when we were going for The Pyramids. Maybe they are skipping them.

 

[shikhee]

Should we really bother wasting our energies and essential time worrying what Smurkz have done ? Because whatever it is, its already irrelevant to our game - and its possible they are doing something that isn't as useful as what we are doing, but nets them a greater line on the power graph! They might have pumped out a couple of warriors and destroyed a civ for example which is alien to our current directions.

Also I'd like to also say Thanks to Acidsatyr - not sure what has happened, but in the past week my civ skill has already doubled at least because of your, VRA and Yamps tactics discussions, and I have a feeling Baldes is going to push that even further, even though what he is talking about is already a bit daunting to me

I think a question needs to be re-raised before play continues... What is our earliest winning goal ? What type of victory are we aiming for. Don't forget the laurel's go to the EARLIEST victories. While I think we are extremely capable of space race victory, I think it will be way to late for a laurel... it's possible getting our PA will come dangerously late as well (in my last test game I got PA with Saladin but it was just before I had infantry in the 16 or 1700s).

As for current strategy, beelining tech's to Alpha and Literacy sounds very solid to me... once we have Alpha we need to fully discuss trading possibilities and tactics (I am very weak and unsure here like Marconos... I am never sure if you will benefit from refusing another civ a tech or getting 2-3 early ones for your advanced one).

The build and city management order sounds like the big things we need to discuss as tech sounds like its 75% agreed upon. What I always struggle with, and I think Balbes would have great advice here, is how much growth vs. production do you go with ? Do we want to maximise our city size before maximising our production or is that too late already ?

Anyone care to make a new test map with our neighbours and saved however many turns in we are ? (I have no idea how to do this, I've never made maps before)

 

[shikhee]

To bring the convo back to the next 20 turns (nothing final, just trying to pick up the threads from a few pages back)...

TECH
to go for :
alphabet (trade ASAP for missing techs)->poly (unlikely to be tradeable)->literature

missing techs to trade for (in approx order of importance) ? Mysticism (for Poly > Lit), Archery (defense), Bronze Working (for chop, and if we get copper greater defense with an Axe or 2), Sailing (+1 Foods for our crabs super growth), Animal Husbandry (Sheep + Cow, not so much for working but trading?). To my eyes the rest don't seem 'urgent' enough to trade for unless we need them for techs beyond Lit (which I think gives us another burst of tech trading ?).

BUILD
finish barracks, (1 or 2?) workboats, archer (x2, possibly after granary depending on tech discovery), granary, library, GL

WORKER
once the deer/stone/fur/marble is worked, build roads to other civ's (if not already done), then work sheep + cow with roads (worth trading?)

CITY RADIUS
city size 1 : Deer
city size 2 : Deer, Stone
city size 3 : Deer, Stone, Fur
city size 4 : Deer, Stone, Fur, Crab
Switch to Crab once worked (could be in size 3)
city size 5 : Deer, Stone, Fur, Crab, Crab or Marble depending on production

Please edit

 

[Yamps]

I think a question needs to be re-raised before play continues... What is our earliest winning goal ? What type of victory are we aiming for. Don't forget the laurel's go to the EARLIEST victories. While I think we are extremely capable of space race victory, I think it will be way to late for a laurel... it's possible getting our PA will come dangerously late as well (in my last test game I got PA with Saladin but it was just before I had infantry in the 16 or 1700s).

We can deside later about that. Based on some testings, I think it is very important to be the first civ with Military Tradition so we can ask the strongest civ on the continent to join us! That of course depends on diplomatic relations. Acid also stated that avoiding wars is very important for PA. We need 40 turns of DP to be able to ask for a PA.

I also believe that space will be fastest.

Anyone care to make a new test map with our neighbours and saved however many turns in we are ? (I have no idea how to do this, I've never made maps before)

It isn't that hard, try it! I've never made any maps before this SGOTM, too.
Old test map is also very good for testing. Hey, if we don't get attacked by Napoleon, Kublai and Cathy, do we fear Asoka and Washington?

My latest calculations show that building granary as ealry as possible will eventually net greater overall output, seemingly putting pottery much more important than AH is.
But before I continue.. if are not interested in this conversation, please freely say so. If you are, contact me by PM.

Please consider the strategy I've posted, I believe it is a good thing to build the granary early. Hey, even Acid agrees

I'll try to post some exact numbers, as Balbes suggested.
ETA: 7h (Well, RL you now...)

 

[classical_hero]

So should we wait a bit and see what is going to happen about the situation we are in?

 

[Morganknight]

Just a refresher on who should be getting ready for their turns...


1>classical_hero up
2>kcd_swede on deck
3>marconos
4>Melior Traiano
5>Morganknight
6>shikhee
7>vra379971
8>Yamps

I think from here on out turn sets should max out at 10 each. Though, feel free to play less if a reasonable stopping place appears and continue to alt-tab for discussion purposes as the need arises.

 

[vra379971]

1) There are so many turns to Alpha! We should stop much sooner. We haven't decided in what order will we build things and what tiles we are going to work.

As getting to my CIV4 comp isn't happening today, could you fill me in on exactly when we are expected to reach Alpha based on the current situation.

 

[Balbes]

I've run SG's before, so I've a good idea how to keep the ship moving effeciently and effectively.

Very good! Then I believe we can trust you to:

-Keep in contact with every player and ensure everybody stays active and participating.

-Maintain the roster and see to it that turnsets are played in order and on schedule. Create and maintain that schedule.

-Make sure that any obstacles to the progress of the game, such as hardware/software problems, are quickly cleared.

-Draft some guidelines on how decisions are made within the team.

 

[Balbes]

Ok. I was wondering if you used some other methods. But what about tech discounts? Are those numbers for tech cost really correct ?

Yes. We are talking about efficiency of the different paths, and if you are able to make use of the discounts, it means your research order is more efficient.

 

[Balbes]

I think a question needs to be re-raised before play continues... What is our earliest winning goal ? What type of victory are we aiming for. Don't forget the laurel's go to the EARLIEST victories. While I think we are extremely capable of space race victory, I think it will be way to late for a laurel...

Domination/Conquest are usually the fastest. BUT, if our continent is not big enough for Domination, it will start to look a lot less appealing because AIs are quite inept at intercontinental warfare.
Diplomatic comes next, not very much later than Dom/Con. Then, Space a few centuries later, and Cultural is usually in the same timeframe as Space but a little later.

In a typical game, you can expect finish dates like this:

1100-1200AD - Domination/Conquest requiring Astronomy. (The latest tech you need is Astronomy.)
1200-1300AD - Diplomatic. (The last required tech is Mass Media.)
1600-1700AD - Space. (You need almost the whole tech tree.)
1700-1800AD - Cultural. (You stop research at Nationalism-Printing Press, but you need roughly as much culture points as there are beakers in the rest of the tech tree.)

You can see how the dates correlate with how far you need to go up the tech tree.

is how much growth vs. production do you go with ? Do we want to maximise our city size before maximising our production or is that too late already ?

As a rule, it is better to grow the city first. For example, if your plan is to hire several specialists under Caste System, for the biggest total output, you should run 0 specialists and let the city grow quickly to its planned max size, then hire them all at once.
This is true usually but not always, so a quick calculaition is recommended.

 

[Yamps]

As getting to my CIV4 comp isn't happening today, could you fill me in on exactly when we are expected to reach Alpha based on the current situation.

We are now at T40 2400 BC.
ETA (based on the last test game posted):

Alpha: T63 1440 BC
GL: T75 1000 BC

Lot of micro management in those turns. I suggest we do this in 3 turnsets (at least)

Yes, and I've also traded for Polytheism as well. Also, I've went strait for Drama and it will be done 2 turns after the GL.
Happy cap is 7/7 on T75 in my game, Globe will be nice to have.

@Calculating-evaluating food needed for growth with granary

This is not simple:

Spoiler :

Example:
Without granary
to size 4: 26
to size 5: 28
to size 6: 30

One might say half everything down and that gives the food needed with granary, but it doesn't work that way!
You have to know exactly what was the food statistics when the granary was built and food increment every turn!

The Inner Mechanics of Food, Growth, Granary and Whipping by MestreLion

 

[Yamps]

In a typical game, you can expect finish dates like this:

1100-1200AD - Domination/Conquest requiring Astronomy. (The latest tech you need is Astronomy.)
1200-1300AD - Diplomatic. (The last required tech is Mass Media.)
1600-1700AD - Space. (You need almost the whole tech tree.)
1700-1800AD - Cultural. (You stop research at Nationalism-Printing Press, but you need roughly as much culture points as there are beakers in the rest of the tech tree.)

Well, this isn't a typical game, right?

Domination/Conquest so early with deity OCC? Don't know how.

Diplomation: Tried it in a test game. PA partner doesn't really care about his relations and you can't make him change civics!
Diplo alone, now that would be cool!

Space: Just playing for that in the same test game. Since we are not starting the real play yet, I might as well finish that.

 

[marconos]

I have been doing some calcs and I keep coming back to we need to get those crabs into production. Improve they are a 7 power tile 2nd only to the furs.

Here is what I am thinking for our game plan
Worker
1 -- finish hooking up the furs
2 -- connect up the sheep via road and start roading all our tiles

Research
Continue with our plan to dive for alphabet, noting that this is going to cost us some tile power with the crabs but since happiness is an issue we are okay waiting on that.

Production
Barraks -> Archer -> Granary -> Workboat -> Library -> Workboat
My thoughts are here we need to make sure that we do not get war declared on us, that is very critical and that 1 warrior sitting there isn't going to cut it IMO. The archer further helps solve that then we pop right to the granary to cut down on city growth then workboat to speed up that growth farther.

Tiles to be worked
Keep working the Deer and the Marble and use the stone as our variable tile. IMO we should switch between the stone and the Fur to prioritize production -vs- slight growth but a larger research. IMO we need to get to globe as quickly as possible to really get our cities growth going.

Research
Current research plan is currently fine with me.

Questions
How do you guys handle modeling the city. I put together a spread sheet and looked at how some things would work. Until we get either the sheep going or the workboats out I don't see how we can really kick up population, course without some additional happiness I don't see how we can grow too much either. Essentially it appears we are limited until we get to the Globe Theater.

 

[Melior Traiano]

Looks to me like we should switch to HR and leverage the Crabs to grow some. Representation is only worth +2 , so HR is overall better until GT does away with the cap.

 

[marconos]

I looked in the Civlopedia and Representation didn't say anything about +2 happy -- is that a BTS only thing?

 

[vra379971]

Yeah, it's just +1 in Vanilla.

I'm a tad hesitant about going the HRoute. We're not growing much as is and with the Libary we are planning to build The +3 beakers from all specialists we are hiring will be rather useful.

 

[shikhee]

From my tests I was happy going straight to Rep (so happy to civ size 7) ... rather than going HR - is it worth getting Slavery at this point ? If we can grow past 7 that easily then we're probably better of whipping everytime we get close to 8.

In my games I didn't go slavery, because we've got great production and units are all under 3 turns to build and buildings (from memory) 5-7ish. But I'm not that practiced in egregious whipping!

Winning conditions - seeing as Domination/Conquest are probably out of the question (at least as early as normal) in OCC I'm voting we aim for Diplomatic (I think the likelyhood of Space Race is possible, but unlikely as early, and we'd have to have our PA building as well otherwise theres too many parts for 1 city). Any suggestions as to the best civ leaders for us to pair up with in a PA (considering their usual civics traits) ?

 

[vra379971]

I'd like to keep aiming to space, but take diplo if we can have it. The fact is, either way we're going to have to play nice. I will say though, winning MOST of the hearts of the civs in this game will be damn near impossible, short of world war.