SGOTM 11 - Barley Demons

[Compromise]

Your screen name is apt, T-Hawk; nice catch on the ocean tile.

That would certainly be a clever twist from the designers...a connection to the other civs through the cultural border of our nearest neighbor. If it is visible to Zara, it must be an island without a starting civilization; otherwise he would have seen a unit by now and his espionage ratio with us would have changed.

It is possible that this land is not reachable by Zara, but we'll want to get OB with him and find out. This increases my preference for the coastal wheat spot....

Here are a couple more overall screenshots. It looks like I don't have flying camera enabled, but Ruff's Field-of-View slider can help a little:

Spoiler :

The site 2S1W of the cow loses 3 of the river grasslands and so isn't that great a production site. It would need to borrow Delhi's corn quite often.

If we want to share Delhi's corn--at least temporarily--we probably want 4N of Delhi on a plains hill. That has cow and a Delhi corn in the second ring and also has enough non-corn food to work four grass hills. There's probably less time pressure to settle this site since it is further from Zara.

As pocketbeetle said--and I just now read his latest post--I am concerned that Zara's culture might steal away the eastern two farms from the "2S of cow" city site, but it can't use those at our present happy cap anyway. The south farm will be in Delhi's culture soon, and the grass near the cow is all that city's.

Another point is raised by T-Hawk's observation of evidence of eastern islands: Zara might have an over-water route east to settle if we block him in tightly on his west. This makes settling the river between us and Zara more appealing again. If we do this, I prefer 4E1N--rather than 4E2N--of Delhi.

I'm going to run with Adlain's save a little and see how Zara reacts to us settling: a) 4E1N of Delhi, b) coastal wheat on the ph, and c) on the ph 4N of Delhi. In that order....

I am feeling a bit of irrepressible pain at not having a plan for the grass copper yet....

 

[Compromise]

I ran out the save Adlain posted until 1500 BC. I did some reasonable worker assignments and city builds, but I didn't try to optimize them at all.

The first city I settled was along the river 4E1N of Delhi. This allows it to pre-work 2 plains cottages for Delhi. Also gives decent hill production or river cottages, though its eastern borders are pressured by Zara.

The second city was the plains hill by the coastal wheat.

The third city was 4N of Delhi. Again, didn't try to optimize this. In fact, I went back and fortified the settler once he reached the location to see if Zara would try to settle west. In both cases--settling vs delaying settling 4N of Delhi--he founded cities in the following pattern:

Spoiler :

I'm not sure this is the best path to take, but it certainly leaves Zara with some pretty bad land to start with. We drop to about 50% research rate here, but better cottage use will up this.

The only thing I'm sure about for the next turnset is that I want Archibald to move NE and expose the last bit of coast there. (Sure would be nice to find some food...!)

Am leaning toward Writing as the next tech after Pottery, though AH to find horses might be nice too.

 

[Swiss Pauli]

I like the plains hill/cow/shared corn for city 2 and the plains hill/wheat for city three. That blocks in Zara well enough whilst claiming the best available land for the Barley Demons.

@T-Hawk and and for the ocean yield spot.

 

[timmy827]

@T-Hawk and and for the ocean yield spot.

2nd, that's something I would not think to try.

So, there is an obvious tradeoff - we could settle a city on that desert corner so that we get sea access to that place, but it'd be a forever-sucky site.

 

[Jabah]

I am going to lurk your team only and of course I am not spoiled.

One thing I 'learn' from playing a lot in the LHC serie (isolation start) is the extrem value of :
(1) not cutting corner when exploring (you could easily have another 'passage' NNE of the one T-hawk spotted)
(2) a 'sentry' charriot double checking all the coast after once available (need 5XP so farm barb warriors a bit, but easily reachable IF you have horse). Also if needed and when available, board him into a galley when your culture reach the ocean tiles.

Jabah

Also regarding the wheat in the north, if you settle a city N or NW (both flat desert) of the oasis , you will be able to bring irrigation north with CS. It might be worth it to be able to work enough tiles.

 

[Compromise]

I like the plains hill/cow/shared corn for city 2 and the plains hill/wheat for city three. That blocks in Zara well enough whilst claiming the best available land for the Barley Demons.

Thanks for the input Swiss. I think you have summarized the current consensus plan, though it may not be that strong of a consensus. Pocketbeetle for one is likely to de-lurk if we cede Zara the river . I hope not though.

So, there is an obvious tradeoff - we could settle a city on that desert corner so that we get sea access to that place, but it'd be a forever-sucky site.

If optimal play for this scenario is to settle that city really early, then I'm willing to settle for less than optimal play. If further exploration really reveals that we are isolated, then maybe we'll just have to declare on Zara if he controls the cultural/coastal ticket off this continent.

One thing I 'learn' from playing a lot in the LHC serie (isolation start) is the extrem value of :
(1) not cutting corner when exploring (you could easily have another 'passage' NNE of the one T-hawk spotted)
(2) a 'sentry' charriot double checking all the coast after once available (need 5XP so farm barb warriors a bit, but easily reachable IF you have horse). Also if needed and when available, board him into a galley when your culture reach the ocean tiles.

Also regarding the wheat in the north, if you settle a city N or NW (both flat desert) of the oasis , you will be able to bring irrigation north with CS. It might be worth it to be able to work enough tiles.

Good to have your eyes here, Jabah. Chariots are probably a good idea for us for several reason a) mobile barb defense, b) the 'sentry' that you mention, c) they aren't warriors which helps us meet the variant restriction.

I've been wondering about Animal Husbandry vs Writing next. If we decide to found the ph/shared-corn/cow city next, I think it'll need to be AH.

I just worldbuildertested what Jabah said about irrigation. I didn't think a city founded on desert would pass irrigation through it, but Jabah is correct: it does. I still don't think it's worth it for that city though. I'd rather have the extra hammer from founding on the plains hill than the +1F after civil service. The coastal site even without irrigation has enough food to work wheat, oasis, plains hill mine and 3 plains cottages.

Also, administrative action here: It's been too long without comment from regoarrarr, so we'll give him an auto-skip this round. This means that MyOtherCar is up now.

Unless there is objection, I'd like to have him move Archibald NE to reveal the last bit of coast up north. Maybe we'll see something there that makes all our current dotmap-thinking obsolete. An obvious quadruple seafood site would be a pleasant surprise....

I also think we'll want to let the settler finish without a whip--save the whip for a granary.

I know pocketbeetle hates it, but is the team consensus to found our second city--first settler--4N on the plains hill that shares Delhi's north corn? I'm good with that, though I'd like to see a worker plan of action that gives Delhi some improved tiles--river cottages or mines?--to work while it shares corn, grows slower, recovers from whip anger.

 

[Swiss Pauli]

So, there is an obvious tradeoff - we could settle a city on that desert corner so that we get sea access to that place, but it'd be a forever-sucky site.

We'd need to keep the city long enough to get its 3rd ring (I think) in order to get boats to the coast on the other side, but once the boats are out the city could be gifted to Zara.

 

[SilentConfusion]

Just as PocketBeetle is, I too am loath to give up that river cottage site, more so for the commerce than the pushing ZY into a corner. But I will agree that the consensus is to skip that spot because it lacks food. I am happier with the spot 4N of Delhi than I was with 2S of cow, since I'm a big believer in food sharing to increase early growth. The earlier the growth the better, so long as you have enough workers to improve the tiles you're growing onto.

I agree to going NE with the warrior (not that I think we'll find food there), but do we allow him to heal at any time before or after that?

3rd border pop is 150 so it would require a library to get there with any speed whatsoever. I would take Zara's capitol than wait for that crappy desert city to grow. With him pinned in like he is he won't ever have a big enough pop to help us that much in a diplo win. Best case scenario would be to get him to declare on us. Can we just use his culture as a bridge if we get OB with him? From comments I would guess that we can't otherwise that'd be an obvious solution.

Is it better to whip the granary instead of the Settler? We lose turns of growth that way. I will do some tests including worker tests to see about developing Delhi and hooking up our new city site.

 

[timmy827]

We'd need to keep the city long enough to get its 3rd ring (I think) in order to get boats to the coast on the other side, but once the boats are out the city could be gifted to Zara.

Well, either the tile N or E of T-hawk's circled tile must be coast of the other landmass. If it's N that would be accessibly at 2nd ring, E would require 3rd ring. From staring at the water, it sort of looks like E but hard to be sure.

I think 4N of Delhi is ok (if we settle this spot I think it makes sense to settle the desert 1N of the oasis to enable eventual irrigation of the wheat). But I'm not overwhelmingly in favor if that makes sense.

 

[MyOtherCar]

Also, administrative action here: It's been too long without comment from regoarrarr, so we'll give him an auto-skip this round. This means that MyOtherCar is up now.

I'm very sorry, but I have to skip this round. RL is demanding all my attention right now.

 

[Compromise]

No problem, MyOtherCar. Post in the thread here when your schedule clears a little.

That means that sunrise089 is up now.

And it's decision time. We need to decide where to plant our second city. I'm going to throw out four choices and conduct an informal poll of team members, including lurkers.

Choice 1: Somewhere on the river between us and Zara.
Pros: Lots of grassland on a river. Blocks Zara. Some locations can work a cottage or two for Delhi.
Cons: No observable resources (!).
Notes: I don't think we can reasonably expect to take the floodplains or the cows away from Zara's culture. Test indicate that Zara will likely be settling this area first, so if we want it, it should be our next city. I think T-Hawk's ocean tile is a point in favor of this location since it may indicate an alternative location for Zara to settle off our continent.

Choice 2: Up along the northern coast near the wheat. Includes plains hill sites, and desert tiles which could eventually irrigate the wheat.
Pros: Grabs wheat. Blocks Zara. If coastal, can produce workboats.
Cons: Not a very strong city site, but we have what we have.

Choice 3: Production site N of Delhi that grabs "our" cows. Most likely location is 4N of Delhi.
Pros: Grabs cows. Is best use of the hills N, NE of Delhi. Blocks Zara.
Cons: Again, few resources.

Choice 4: Other. Stone? Deer? Wait for more intel?
Notes: We will have a settler in 3T. He needs to go somewhere. Waiting too much past those 3T to decide seems imprudent to me.

There are so many opinions expressed in the preceding posts that I think it's best to ask what everyone's current thinking is. If you can, please post--even brief thoughts--within the next 24 hours or so. That'll give the next turnplayer--and some of our micro wizards!--a chance to formulate a more detailed plan of action.

My vote:
(1) 80%: The river and its insta-connect are great. Blocking Zara is good. Lack of resources is offset because we don't see many better places. I'd make this a commerce city and just work cottages. Monument first build. Is a granary even necessary?
(2) 20%: I like the plains hill SW of the wheat. I'd suggest a monument then a workboat or two, depending on what further scouting reveals.
After this, we'll have more map info and more choices.

Sunrise, maybe you can plan to play in 36-48 hours or so? In the current save, the warriors have moved, but the workers haven't. So if we make a decision about the next city, it can determine what the workers do this turn.

 

[Adlain]

i have uploaded a pic to show the 3 choices as i see them in the test save

Spoiler :

if they are as i see it (which may well be wrong), i like option 1 or 2

1) this is the strongest site imho, even if we lose 5/6 tiles to zara there is still 3 good hills and a bucketload of cottage sites that will keep this city viable in the long run even if it will be slow growing due to no food.

2) if you want a comprimise site, this is it. it will grow alot faster due to the wheat, and at calender produe some happy with the incence. and along with the capital and/ or choice 1 blockes Zara into 1 half of the island.

 

[Compromise]

I'd move "Choice 1" one tile west of where you have it. The floodplain and cows are going to be within Aksum's culture by the time we get a settler there. Palace+Creative=3cpt; third ring is at 150c or 50 turns.

With that adjustment, your map is exactly as I see it. Thanks for the picture, it's very helpful not to have to look back and guess!

 

[SilentConfusion]

I still like the grassland river spot the best. If we are chopping SH in that city out of those forests then I think I'd lean towards the spot on Adlain's map, 5E1N, since with +9 cpt we have a chance to steal some of those good tiles. If not I like Compromise's location for the city of 4E1N. I would definitely say we need a granary in this city, and even more so than in a city with food resources. It will be an issue as it is how to grow it onto cottages quickly (this will involve farming some of the grasslands and prebuilding cottages on the farms so we can switch them to cottages when we've grown on all the cottages we can) so we will definitely want a granary the speed that growth. For this city I'd say monument is the first build unless we're chopping SH there, then a granary and we might want to chop the granary if we haven't chopped all of forests for SH.

My second choice would be choice 3 (I think it is) 4N of Dehli. With the already farmed Wheat that city can grow quickly and be producing a Settler quickly for the spot further North. If we do this we give up the river spot most likely, but this city could build our 3rd settler more quickly than the river city (without chops), possibly freeing up Delhi for a wonder. Going the coastal North city then this one, I think will end up taking longer to get them both established. We lose some turns that we could have had a work boat scouting, but I think it's not worth it.

I don't think we can settle that stone site which is that weak just to speed up our wonders. I think we can still get the Pyramids if we want them if we wait on that city.

To sum up: My vote is for the riverside commerce city, although I would prefer Choice 3 to Choice 2.

 

[Swiss Pauli]

Site 3. It can steal Delhi's 2nd corn when the capital is recovering from the whip (and it can share a cottage & grass hill as well). Add the extra hammer from the plains hill and factor in the cows and you have a decent production 2nd city (settlers, workers) allowing Delhi to go for commerce.

I can't see why people want to settle a foodless commerce city as 2nd city. It will take an age to build any infrastructure and it will grow painfully slowly (which is why chopping the granary is a must), so it'll be a constant drag on the economy.

The coastal site is too weak without seafood to be a successful 2nd city.

Changing subject, sunrise has no home internet at the moment (see Pitboss email threads) so he will likely need a skip. I've got tomorrow off, so I could play a set given we've already had three skips of this round (though I still can't commit to joining the roster as regular team member).

 

[timmy827]

1. Choice 3
2. Choice 2 (perhaps move 1SE to allow eventual chain irrigation)

 

[Compromise]

Sorry to hear about sunrise's internet woes. We'll give him a techno-skip.

So, we'll have Swiss Pauli up for a guest turnset. Awesome!

Considering the recent posts, there seems to be a very slight preference for Choice 3 which is 4N of Delhi. In one sense, this is a gamble that better sites abound to the west. I don't see any evidence to the contrary.

So why don't we have Swiss run the turnset, aiming for site 3. Suggestions: Explore with Archibald and fogbust with Winston. Road to 4N of Delhi. Grow Delhi to size 5 for a 2-pop granary whip. I think we need more warriors for fogbusting and exploring.

With Choice 3, I think we want Animal Husbandry after Pottery finishes. Then Writing after that. Objections or alternative suggestions?

I was going to suggest that you stop if you find seafood up along the north coast, but I don't think we'd really plant our 2nd city up there regardless, so it's probably best to press on. Stop when you come to a decision point.

Swiss, let us know if there's any more input you'd like before running the turnset. And give us a sense of when you want to run it so that anyone who wants to make comments can jump in with them. Thanks!

I don't mind the slow pace in the early going. We're still at the point where we're working with a *lot* of uncertainty....

 

[Adlain]

I can't see why people want to settle a foodless commerce city as 2nd city. It will take an age to build any infrastructure and it will grow painfully slowly (which is why chopping the granary is a must), so it'll be a constant drag on the economy.

One reason, for me atleast is that I HATE having my capital as a border city towards another civ, and if we do not settle the floodplains site it will become that. Yes it will be a slow city, but we can get a second settler out to the third choice city in a short space of time without irreperably damaging our economy IMHO.

 

[Swiss Pauli]

One reason, for me atleast is that I HATE having my capital as a border city towards another civ, and if we do not settle the floodplains site it will become that. Yes it will be a slow city, but we can get a second settler out to the third choice city in a short space of time without irreperably damaging our economy IMHO.

Why do you hate having another civ on the border wiht your capital? By and large, your capital will generate more culture than any AI city. Close borders is a trifling diplo hit. Indeed, a city on the river (which can't claim the FPs or cows because they will belong to Zara's capital) is much more likely to be culture crushed by Zara, especially when it won't be able to generate its own culture to protect its tiles.

Off to do the admin whatsit and install BUFFY before playing a set...

 

[Swiss Pauli]

Played a mini-set until Pottery was in the bag: this is a good time for micro-Demons to analyse whether it's better to chop a granary or a monument first in Bombay, etc and so on.

Set was dull, but in a good way: we now have two road connected cities, and haven't seen any pesky barbs. Aside from roading, the workers have been pre-chopping forests.

Big news of the set: EP ratio with Zara is 202/204 which indicates that he's met someone else, though no-one has chanced upon us.

Bombay:




Overview:



I haven't moved the workers this turn, but the warriors have moved. Winston should move 1N to fogbust because the new warrior is covering both cities in case of barb intrusion (unless we're unfortunate enough to get forked by a barb )

At Dehli, there's 12 hammers in a warrior and Bombay's Monument has two hammers invested.

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm11/Barley_Demons_SG011_BC2650_01.CivBeyondSwordSave

Over to you, micro-Demons