SGOTM 11 - Fifth Element

[Dhoomstriker]

Zara and Confucianism

Spoiler :

Zara settled Lalibela E-E-E of Wheaties on T123... Zara built a missionary and spread Confucianism there on T130.

Confucianism spread to Zara's second city (Gondor)on T124.

Well, the good news is that Zara will solidly be Confucian. If we end up gifting him the Confucian City with the United Nations in it, at least he won't have any conflicts as to which religion to choose.

Watching Zara

Spoiler :

Zara has a galley in Aksum, which was there the entire turn set. I have not yet seen a settler built in Aksum, but I watched for one every turn.

Were you able to watch him without moving a unit or did you have to move a unit, such as the Warrior defending Riverdale (is it still Warrior 5?) every turn?

Zara's Techs

Spoiler :

Zara learned Iron Working on T129

That's useful, but not as good as him going after Alphabet.

and started research on Masonry, which should be learned on T134.

Sigh. It sounds like he'll be going for Monarchy via Monotheism (which, of course, requires Masonry), meaning that he is unlikely to research Alphabet for us.

Oh well, at least he'll likely be good for trading some of the following techs to us:
Fishing, Sailing, Hunting, Archery

Spoiler :

which we may want to grab if we haven't met many AIs, as grabbing "cheap" techs is GOOD to do when you hardly know any AIs, as it is only the AIs that you know at the time of trading who increment their counter for the number of techs you have received in trade

, Animal Husbandry, and Iron Working.

With only 3 Cities and us having crammed Zara in on the west side and him with not much room on this continent unless he settles somewhere towards the SE, do you think that he might enter Wonder-building mode? Perhaps trading him Christianity might still work for convincing him to build the relevant Wonder

Spoiler :

The Hagia Sophia you mean, right?

.

Although, there's a risk that he would trade the tech away before he's met a lot of the other AIs in the game. For your info, 30% of "known Civs" is Zara's listed tech-trading refusal threshold.

Using a Great Artist--if we even do so--we might not--I'm just suggesting how to use one if we do

Spoiler :

I don't think we'll be able to win the culture battle over the cows unless we really focus on it, maybe even bombing a Great Artist there (4th or 5th great person?) if we really think it's important.

We would likely gain more by settling, not bombing, our Great Artist, should it come to the situation that you describe.

Not only would we gain more culture over time, but AIs are very sensitive to Culture Bombs and will suddenly start building a lot of Cultural Buildings if you Bomb them. A settled Great Artist doesn't seem to have that effect on them.

Plus, unless your City can output a lot of Culture per turn, a bombed Great Artist really won't give us a ton of cultural control of the squares that we desire. If we somehow have a lot of cultural buildings built and have enough population to work several Cottages, then sure, we can bomb the Great Artist, but even then, without any Cathedrals to augment the effects of the Cultural Bomb, it's usually better to settle than to bomb in terms of cultural control.
during his turnset.

 

[Mitchum]

Here are some of the main decision that have to be made:

1. How many settlers to we want, when do we want them, and where will they be built. We need to start settling the west.

2. What type of great person do we want to try for in Delhi?

3. What do you want to accomplish with the four workers?

4. What do we want to build next in Delhi?

5. What civics do you want to run, when and why?

Many of these things have been discussed in the last couple of pages, so it shouldn't take you to long to read those pages and formulate a plan that answers all of these questions.

 

[Irgy]

Great work Mitchum! Now, we just need to work out whether we want a GPro or GSci. Or the secret third option of working 2 priests and a scientist, to speed up GPro at slight risk of GSci. It sounds like we want to grow faster and build a settler faster though instead of working more specialists?

Yup, that about sums it up. If I were going to throw someone's computer out of the window, though, it wouldn't have been mine...

That'd be mine right I've been being a bit of a pain in the neck lately. It's a laptop, so you wouldn't have much trouble.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Batter up, unclethrill!!

Mitchum,
Do you have any recommendations for the next player (Unclethrill) for him to "start off from" as his PPP?

Spoiler :

For example, there was mention of Caste System, of building Settlers in different Cities, a few possibilities of what Delhi would build next...

If you also have ideas for what the Workers should likely do in the next few turns, that might help us in getting a discussion going. For example, if we built another Grassland River Cottage in Delhi, would we be able to use it anytime soon? If yes, should we plan to have two improvements soon (such as 2 Cottages or a Cottage and a Mine) in Delhi soon?

If not soon, then by approximately when relative to the end of Unclethrill's turnset do we think we'll get our 3rd Great Person and will likely want to (at least temporarily) switch away from working some Specialists to Cottages or Mines? With Bureaucracy going, I'm thinking that we'll want Grassland River Cottages, so it would help to plan backwards if we know approximately when we'll get our 3rd Great Person.

Yes, many of you may be aware of the answer to some or all of these points, but it wouldn't hurt to have some of these main points summarized so that they don't get lost in the shuffle.


Riverdale
Also, what's the deal there? If we're switching into Caste System, will we be whipping the Library in Riverdale? Will the two Forest chops plus manually building it be sufficient to complete it? If not, are there plans to switch from Caste System to Slavery at some point before obtaining our 3rd Great Person?

Would it even help to get the Cow by temporarily running an Artist Specialist? (Okay, I admit that you might not have an answer for that one).

 

[Mitchum]

Were you able to watch him without moving a unit or did you have to move a unit, such as the Warrior defending Riverdale (is it still Warrior 5?) every turn?

We have enough espionage points on Zara to see his capital, so I didn't have to move any units to see what he was doing. Whoever is playing should be watching his cities every turn, looking for settlers.

With only 3 Cities and us having crammed Zara in on the west side and him with not much room on this continent unless he settles somewhere towards the SE, do you think that he might enter Wonder-building mode?

He could settle to the NE as well as there is land in that direction. In our test game, he's building the Moai Statues, so he may well ender wonder-building mode in our game too.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Settlers and Cities

Spoiler :

Here are some of the main decision that have to be made:

1. How many settlers to we want, when do we want them, and where will they be built. We need to start settling the west.

Can someone give us a dot-map screenshot with the proposed City locations?

I ask because of the following point: if we, say, plan for an AI to steal one of our City locations, what can we do about it?

For example, if we settle 2 Cities before an AI settles a City, which locations would we rather not lose to an AI (and thus settle first)?

Is it possible that their City might culture flip to us, based on them being limited in where they can place it? If yes, then maybe we'll settle other locations first, even if other locations are less desirable.

Without a screenshot, I'm only guessing on the following points, but I think that:
a) We absolutely want the Great Person Farm, whether by Settling or culturally stealing it from an AI that beats us to it
b) If an AI settles a City, it may not be where we want it. If we settle a different City that might "block" them from settling in an undesired location, then they may end up settling in a spot that we would like to have. For example, if we don't settle the Great Person Farm early on, an AI might settling it but might not settle in the spot that we want for the Great Person Farm; however, by settling the Crab location, we might then "force" the AI to settle in our preferred Great Person Farm location. Then again, we'd also want to make sure that point a) of culturally-stealing that City location (in this case, the Great Person Farm location) is also a possibility
c) The AIs will be less likely to settle a location that already has a lot of squares that are culturally owned by us. That's why I'm thinking (again without seeing a screenshot) that the Three Clam location is going to be relatively undesirable for an AI to settle at

Great People

Spoiler :

2. What type of great person do we want to try for in Delhi?

I thought that you guys had already worked out the thinking that we want a Great Prophet for our 2nd Great Person and a Great Scientist as our 3rd Great Person, both coming from Delhi.

What seems to be a more important discussions thus become:
a) What level of risk of getting a Great Scientist for our 2nd Great Person are we comfortable with--0% or more than 0%?

b) Can we benefit from a partial-Great-Scientist risk, such that part of the time we run 1 or more Priest Specialists and part of the time we run 1 or more Scientist Specialists?

Some info to collect that might help us in deciding then above points would be:
a) If we do get a Great Scientist for our 2nd Great Person, how soon will it be before we can research Alphabet and Lightbulb Philosophy for Pacifism? How much of an impact with Pacifism have on speeding up our 3rd Great Person

Spoiler :

for example, will we already be halfway through getting our 3rd Great Person by the time that Pacificism could be available to us?

b) Can we time our Flask input to come in useful multiples based on our current Science Rate? For example, in Delhi, with a Library, the ideal multiple would be 4n, as 4 * 25% = 1 bonus Flask from the Library. We can get 4n when we run 2 Scientists. So, perhaps it will be good to run 2 Scientists when we have a Science Rate of 0%.
At other times, when we are running a Science Rate of 100%, we may get better values from:
1 Priest + 1 Scientist = 9 Flasks = 4n + 1
OR
2 Priest = 6 Flasks = 4n + 2

If we have a situation where it makes sense to have Speciliasts generate 4n Flasks, such as when at a Science Rate = 0% or else at a Science Rate = 100% when it gives us 4n Commerce from Delhi, then we can also run 2 Priests + 1 Scientist for 12 Flasks = 4n.

Worker Tasks

Spoiler :

3. What do you want to accomplish with the four workers?

In no particular order:
1. Get the Wheat improved and possibly irrigated via a Plains square if we get Civil Service
2. Get enough River Cottages for Delhi such that at the time that Delhi is ready to work them, they are built
3. Get a Road to the Wheat City (whatever you guys decided to call it)
4. Possibly build Roads towards new Cities, if we can do without disrupting too many Forest regrowth possibilities and we don't have unimproved squares that our Cities are working or will soon need to work due to City growth
5. Possibly pre-improve a City (I don't know if we can--it's just a guess that we might be able to do so), such as put a Cottage down in Bedrock's radius that a Rice City might be able to work
6. Probably complete the chops into Riverdale's Library (one of those "chops" is a Cottage--unless we've already Cottage-chopped it?)
7. Chop out a Settler? Only Wheat City really seems like a primary option, as we could probably chop 2 to 3 Forests to this cause if we wanted to. However, Delhi could also have a Forest or two chopped towards this cause, especially if we want to grow the City for a bit and then chop into a Settler or two
8. Maybe more things based on what other ideas get thrown out there

Delhi Builds

Spoiler :

4. What do we want to build next in Delhi?

Rather than just talking about 1 item at a time, I think that we need to figure out how much we want Delhi to grow before starting on a Settler.

Irgy mentioned that we could get 2 Settlers just as fast by growing first. However, do we really want to get 2 Settlers from Delhi? I'm thinking not, if we want The Hanging Gardens. So, if not, then getting 1 Settler a bit faster after some minimal growth might be a better plan.

If we can complete the Missionary or Temple (or whatever) that gets built next before we are "done" growing Delhi, what should we temporarily switch to building (partially build) while growing to the next population Size? An Aqueducts?

Civics

Spoiler :

5. What civics do you want to run, when and why?

Okay, I admit that hiring SOME kind of a Representation-based Specialist in Wheat City sounds far preferable to working a Plains Forest square, based on its total basic Inputs. As long as Unclethrill remembers to switch to Representation, that is!

However, can we still complete a Settler in a reasonable amount of time if we do so? If yes, how many chops will we need to put into said Settler?


Do we even bother to entertain the idea of running an Artist in Riverdale? I would only say yes if we can get the Cow soon (within 1 turnset), otherwise we'd be stunting our growth needlessly.


Will the timing of whipping a Library in Riverdale mess up Caste System too much?

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Specialist Timing in Delhi

Spoiler :

Great work Mitchum! Now, we just need to work out whether we want a GPro or GSci. Or the secret third option of working 2 priests and a scientist, to speed up GPro at slight risk of GSci. It sounds like we want to grow faster and build a settler faster though instead of working more specialists?

We can't both grow faster and build a Settler faster at the same time, as building a Settler stops all growth.

If we had to pick between one of the two, I'd say grow faster and then be willing to build the Settler a bit slower. Thus, I'd be okay with running more Specialists during the time that the Settler is being built, since we'd already emphasized growth a bit in order to support having an additional Specialist.

Turn-by-turn testing may have to be run when we are at a Science Rate of 100% to see which would be the best option out of:
4n (2 Priests + 1 Scientist OR 2 Scientists)
4n + 1 (1 Priest + 1 Scientist)
4n + 2 (2 Priests OR 1 Scientist)
The Library bonus isn't the only bonus, so you kind of need to replay the turns in a test game to see if the hidden bonus Flasks (from tech pre-reqs and other AIs knowing the tech--the latter part which should be 0% for Civil Service) are able to be obtained with slightly different Specialists being employed. We can also consider swapping an Artist to a Scientist in Wheat City for a turn if we find that we'd get a bonus Flask from the tech-prereq bonus by doing so.

 

[Mitchum]

Mitchum,
Do you have any recommendations for the next player (Unclethrill) for him to "start off from" as his PPP?

OK, here is what I recommend after having played forward until T150 a few times (and doing so again as I write this). I’m sure that Irgy will have some suggestions as well.

Since we’re worried about expansion, we could switch the build queue in both Bedrock and Wheaties to settlers, leaving the partially completed granaries in the queue. The settler in Bedrock freezes the city at 3 pops, which means the 3 cottaged flood plains tiles will be enough for some time. This frees up a worker to head to Riverdale to start chopping the library. We need to start increasing our culture there because the cultural pressure from both Gondor and Aksum is adding up and will get worse with the next border pop from Aksum in about 18 turns.

I think our second great person should be a Great Prophet. Delhi is currently working 1 priest and is set to grow in 1 turn. I suggest letting Delhi grow on T133 and then hiring a second priest on T134. This will get us our next great person on T144

I also suggest revolting to both Representation and Caste System right away on T133. Hire an artist in Wheaties for 4 turns for a border pop. You can probably revolt out of Caste System (or possibly into Slavery - see below) on T138 to save some gold. We won’t need it again until T145 when we want to run a bunch of scientists in Delhi. Delhi’s citizens (other than the 2 priests) should work the 2 corn, copper, cottages, GRiv Farm, GHill mine and PHill mine in that order. You may want to hold off working the second cottage until two turns after it’s finished – T136. This allows Delhi to grow size 8 on T138 and size 9 on T142 with 0F to spare. If you switch to the cottage right away on T134, you’ll grow to size 8 on T139 and size 9 on T143, both 1 turn later.

Workers 3 and 4 can start building the road to Wheaties. On T133, they can chop/stop the GFor Hill N-NE of Delhi so as not to waste a worker turn. Even though the actual save says to build a road on the Oasis tile (4 turns), I suggest building it on the plains tile W of the Oasis (3 turns). The borders of Wheaties should expand just as your workers have completed the road. They can chop/stop the plains forest just north of Wheaties on T137 and then start the wheat farm on T138. Don’t forget to move the artist to the newly acquired wheat farm to speed up our settler and revolt out of Caste System the next turn (T138). Once the wheat farm is done, chop (speeding up the settler to T152) and farm (once Civil Service is learned on T145 – they can build a road on the wheat while they are waiting) the plains forest N of Wheaties. By the time these workers are done with these jobs plus building a road to connect the wheat (+2 health with granary), we will be one turn from Alphabet (and Animal Husbandry). These two workers can stick around for 1 turn pre-chopping something so that they can start improving Wheaties cows on T151 when we learn AH.

Workers 1 and 2 can finish the cottage NE of Delhi.

Worker 1 can start building a road to the GP Farm (I assume this is where we want to settle next). I suggest having the road start SW of the copper (GFor), go through forests to support forest regrowth, and through the Cow resource.

Worker 2 will go to Riverdale, either building a road/stop or chop/stop along the way. Chop the forest W-W of Riverdale and possibly the one N-NW of Riverdale before we lose it to Zara. When Riverdale grows to 3 on T138, you’ll have to decide whether to work the farm or the cottage (see below, where I suggest that you actually start working the farm 2 or 3 turns sooner). I chose the farm (as did the city governor) since we’ll need the pops to whip the library soon. I’m typing this as I play. As it turns out, only 1 forest and a 2 pop whip is needed to complete the library. Maybe worker 2 can start heading back towards Delhi after one chop to either start pre-chopping the Hanging Gardens (will give all of our cities another pop) or improving one of our soon-to-be three new cities.

In Delhi, if you planned the food properly, you should have grown to size 9 and completed the missionary on T142. The settler from Silverado is due in 1 turn, so the missionary can sit near the edge of our cultural borders, waiting for GP Farm to be settled. Unless, of course, we chose not to build a missionary or instead want to spread him to Silverado to be our Confucian Missionary pump. After the missionary is done, we can build a settler at size 9 or start an aqueduct. We should have 3 settlers (Silverado T143, Wheaties T152 and Bedrock T158) in the next 16 turns, so I prefer the aqueduct.

On T144, we should get a GPro at 85% odds. You should have turned up the research slider to 100% on T142 (it’s been 0% up until now with ~ 300 gold in the bank). Fire the priests and hire 2 scientists for now. Bulb Civil Service, which won’t be completed until the end of T144 (i.e. T145).

One thing to check: On T144, Riverdale is 3 food short of being at population 4. Maybe it makes the most sense to switch a citizen from the southern cottage to a farm three turns before growing to 3 pops (which will actually make you grow to 3 in 2 turns). Then, you should have enough pops to whip the Library on T144 for 2. That would require you to stay in Slavery until now.

On T145, revolt to Bureaucracy and Caste System. Hire 5 scientists!! Citizens will be working 2 corn, copper and 1 cottage. This allows us to get a Great Scientist in 12 turns on T157 @ ~79% odds. It will also allow us to learn Alphabet on T151!! In fact, I suggest that you play a few extra turns until we learn Alphabet since this is a logical stopping place.

Unclethrill, make this PPP your own. And, if anyone else has any suggestions, changes, debates, etc, please address them to Dhoomstriker!

 

[Mitchum]

Can someone give us a dot-map screenshot with the proposed City locations?

I had posted on already here, but here are the screen shots again:

Spoiler :

In my test game, we could settle three of these locations by about T160 without tying up Delhi with building settlers at all.

 

[Mitchum]

I thought about it on the way home, and I think both Riverdale and Delhi should prioritize food over commerce. So citizens should work farms before cottages in all cases. We need these two cities to grow.

 

[havr]

Saw that the TS was played.
Good job!

Enough said. 3am. Going to sleep.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Riverdale should aim to be taking in 3 Food per turn--and all Cities should, really

Spoiler :

When Riverdale grows to 3 on T138, you’ll have to decide whether to work the farm or the cottage (see below, where I suggest that you actually start working the farm 2 or 3 turns sooner). I chose the farm (as did the city governor) since we’ll need the pops to whip the library soon.

Okay, I've said it before and I'll say it again:
A City is best off when it brings in +3 or more Food per turn. That's 3 Food in addition to the Food being eaten by citizens, in case it wasn't clear.

Riverdale makes:
2 Food from the City Centre
3 Food from an Irrigated Grassland square
for the cost of 1 population point
That's 5 Food - 2 Food = 3 Food. That's our minimum desired surplus Food value.

Unless we have a specific (and temporary) reason to work other squares

Spoiler :

such as temporarily hire a Specialist or temporarily work an extra Cottage to squeeze out a crucial tech

, we should aim to always have +3 or more Food coming in each turn in our Cities.

So, we should be aiming to always be working the Grassland River Irrigation square in Riverdale, while also only working 2 Food squares for the other squares

Spoiler :

preferably Grassland River Cottages, followed in preference by Grassland Cottages, followed in preference by Grassland Forest squares

A noteable exception would be when we want to hire a Specialist. In that case, if we have less than 3 Food coming in, it's okay. Still, in Riverdale's case, I'd rather swap a Grassland River Cottage for a Specialist so that we're still growing (slightly) at a rate of +1 Food per turn instead of swapping our Grassland River Irrigation square for a Speciliast and COMPLETELY stagnating growth.

Thus, unless we manage to score a Flood Plains or Cow square in Riverdale, we should be working the Grassland River Irrigation square there at almost all times,

Spoiler :

with the only possible exception being when we want to get an extra Commerce or two for a turn by working an extra Cottage, say, if a crucial tech is about to be learned and can be learned 1 turn sooner by doing so

Silverado

Spoiler :

Silverado will eventually need to follow this pattern of growing. That'll happen once both of these conditions are met:
a) The Settler in Silverado is complete
b) The Granary in Silverado is almost complete, such that if we switch from the Silver to a Corn (or Deer) square, the Granary will be complete on the turn prior to the turn where we will have 15 or more Food in Silverado's Foodbox.

The exception to Silverado taking in less than 3 Food per turn might also extend to it being at Size 2, if we work the Corn instead of the Deer, as we'll probably prefer to work Deer + Silver instead of Deer + a 2-Food square, which would only net us +2 Food per turn but would be a suitable compromise since we'd still get to work the Silver square.

If it turns out that we manage to complete The Hanging Gardens before Silverado completes its Granary, then the above two conditions will hold, except that the condition b) will be altered to say "on the turn prior to the turn where we will have 18 or more Food in Silverado's Foodbox."

Bedrock Worker

Spoiler :

Since we’re worried about expansion, we could switch the build queue in both Bedrock and Wheaties to settlers, leaving the partially completed granaries in the queue. The settler in Bedrock freezes the city at 3 pops, which means the 3 cottaged flood plains tiles will be enough for some time. This frees up a worker to head to Riverdale to start chopping the library.

A thought: I haven't tried it out, but can a Worker get from Bedrock to the Wheat faster by going directly there

Spoiler :

possibly by putting partial Roads down along the way or possibly skipping making them

instead of going SE towards Delhi and then NE towards Wheaties?

I'm a bit confused, though, as I thought that all of our Workers would currently be near Delhi, from having chopped, so I'm not sure what you mean about taking a Worker from Bedrock. If someone could throw up a screenshot of the current Worker locations, doing so would help me out, as I don't have access to opening a saved game and I don't have the time to decipher where the Workers went by reading through the PPP and trying to track their every move.


Another thought: while we won't need an extra Cottage for Bedrock to work for quite some time, once we do put down a Settler for the Rice City, we may want to have a Cottage already placed that the Rice City can immediately start to work. So, we may need to plan to get a Worker back to the Bedrock area prior to the time that the Rice City's Settler sits down.

0% Science Rate--Flasks from Specialists and how to Leverage said Flasks

Spoiler :

I think our second great person should be a Great Prophet. Delhi is currently working 1 priest and is set to grow in 1 turn. I suggest letting Delhi grow on T133 and then hiring a second priest on T134. This will get us our next great person on T144

I will suggest a slight change--the first turn (T133) should have us hiring a Scientist Specialist in Delhi and an Artist Specialist in Wheaties--read below for more info.

A Library at 0% Science will benefit us if we make 6 Flasks by giving us a free Flask, but will not benefit us Flask-wise if we only make 3 Flasks.
SOOOOO, when we have a 0% Science Rate:
If we are at a point where we can only work 1 Specialist in Delhi, then I recommend that we hire a Scientist in Delhi.
If we can work 2 Specialists and want to keep trying for a Great Prophet, then hire 2 Priest Specialists.

In both cases, we'll get the bonus Flask from the Library.

Also, while researching Civil Service, we have a 20% bonus on Flasks gained from knowing its pre-requisites (Code of Laws and Math).

So, if we make 5 Flasks total, we will get 6 Flasks.
But, if we only make 4 Flasks total, we will still only get 4 Flasks.

If we make 10 Flasks total, we will get 12 Flasks.
Again, if we only make 9 Flasks total, we'll just get 10 Flasks.

If we make 15 Flasks total, we will get 18 Flasks.
Yet, if we only make 14 Flasks total, we'll just get 16 Flasks.

Thus, there's a big incentive to try and get 5 Flasks, 10 Flasks, 15 Flasks, or just over these values, as that one extra Flask pushing us over the limit actually counts as two Flasks.


How would that work?
1 Scientist in Delhi + 1 Artist in Wheaties + 1 minimum Flask per turn = 6 + 3 + 1 = 10, a magic number
2 Priests in Delhi + 1 Artist in Wheaties + 1 minimum Flask per turn = 2*3 + 3 + 1 = 10, a magic number

If we're at a 100% Science Rate, then different Specialist combinations might actually net us better bonus Flask values, so numbers would have to be calculated based on our total Commerce and a tiny bit more math

Spoiler :

or, for the lazy person, saving and reloading using different scenarios and writing down the Flasks obtained each time

 

[Mitchum]

Riverdale should aim to be taking in 3 Food per turn--and all Cities should, really

Agreed, which is why after posting my suggested plan that I altered it by saying we should prioritize farms over cottages, even in Delhi which is at +7 food or something rediculous like that. Having the extra population growth a turn sooner (or more) will pay for itself. Plus, the more population we have in Delhi, the more scientists we'll be able to hire.

I'm a bit confused, though, as I thought that all of our Workers would currently be near Delhi, from having chopped, so I'm not sure what you mean about taking a Worker from Bedrock.

I'm sorry that I was not more clear. All four workers are still standing near Delhi on the squares of the forests they chopped for the Pyramids. Currently, Bedrock has 3 citizens and 3 improved tiles (cottaged flood plains). The point of my comment was that if we let Bedrock grow, we would need one worker to head up there to lay down another cottage or improve the marble since the city grows fairly rapidly with +5 food. If we stall growth in Bedrock by building a settler, we will no longer need a worker to head to Bedrock and can instead use him to go to Riverdale and chop the Library.

Another thought: while we won't need an extra Cottage for Bedrock to work for quite some time, once we do put down a Settler for the Rice City, we may want to have a Cottage already placed that the Rice City can immediately start to work. So, we may need to plan to get a Worker back to the Bedrock area prior to the time that the Rice City's Settler sits down.

Agreed. The two workers up near Wheaties should be available shortly after T155 (when we learn AH and have the cows improved). We may want to keep one of them up there to build a mine, but the other worker should head immediately toward one of our new cities (Rice might be good), to start an improvement.

I will suggest a slight change--the first turn (T133) should have us hiring a Scientist Specialist in Delhi and an Artist Specialist in Wheaties--read below for more info.

I understand your reasoning, but in this case, I have to disagree. Sure, we'll get 2 exta "bonus" beakers (library + 20% pre-req bonus) by working a scientist. However, running a scientist, even for 1 single turn, will reduce the chance of getting a GPro. It may only be a 2% drop (6 gs points / 300 gpp points needed for next great person), but 2% is 2%. In my opionion, lowering the chances of getting a GPro as our second great person is not worth the extra 2 beakers, which are not critical at the moment or we would be working cottages instead of farms, right?

Note: an artist gives 1 beaker and 4 culture, so a Representation-powered artist gives 4 beakers, not 3.

 

[unclethrill]

OK, here is what I want to do .

Since we’re worried about expansion, we could switch the build queue in both Bedrock and Wheaties to settlers, leaving the partially completed granaries in the queue. The settler in Bedrock freezes the city at 3 pops, which means the 3 cottaged flood plains tiles will be enough for some time. This frees up a worker to head to Riverdale to start chopping the library. We need to start increasing our culture there because the cultural pressure from both Gondor and Aksum is adding up and will get worse with the next border pop from Aksum in about 18 turns.

I think our second great person should be a Great Prophet. Delhi is currently working 1 priest and is set to grow in 1 turn. I suggest letting Delhi grow on T133 and then hiring a second priest on T134. This will get us our next great person on T144

I also suggest revolting to both Representation and Caste System right away on T133. Hire an artist in Wheaties for 4 turns for a border pop. You can probably revolt out of Caste System (or possibly into Slavery - see below) on T138 to save some gold. We won’t need it again until T145 when we want to run a bunch of scientists in Delhi. Delhi’s citizens (other than the 2 priests) should work the 2 corn, copper, cottages, GRiv Farm, GHill mine and PHill mine in that order. You may want to hold off working the second cottage until two turns after it’s finished – T136. This allows Delhi to grow size 8 on T138 and size 9 on T142 with 0F to spare. If you switch to the cottage right away on T134, you’ll grow to size 8 on T139 and size 9 on T143, both 1 turn later.

Workers 3 and 4 can start building the road to Wheaties. On T133, they can chop/stop the GFor Hill N-NE of Delhi so as not to waste a worker turn. Even though the actual save says to build a road on the Oasis tile (4 turns), I suggest building it on the plains tile W of the Oasis (3 turns). The borders of Wheaties should expand just as your workers have completed the road. They can chop/stop the plains forest just north of Wheaties on T137 and then start the wheat farm on T138. Don’t forget to move the artist to the newly acquired wheat farm to speed up our settler and revolt out of Caste System the next turn (T138). Once the wheat farm is done, chop (speeding up the settler to T152) and farm (once Civil Service is learned on T145 – they can build a road on the wheat while they are waiting) the plains forest N of Wheaties. By the time these workers are done with these jobs plus building a road to connect the wheat (+2 health with granary), we will be one turn from Alphabet (and Animal Husbandry). These two workers can stick around for 1 turn pre-chopping something so that they can start improving Wheaties cows on T151 when we learn AH.

Workers 1 and 2 can finish the cottage NE of Delhi.

Worker 1 can start building a road to the GP Farm (I assume this is where we want to settle next). I suggest having the road start SW of the copper (GFor), go through forests to support forest regrowth, and through the Cow resource.

Worker 2 will go to Riverdale, either building a road/stop or chop/stop along the way. Chop the forest W-W of Riverdale and possibly the one N-NW of Riverdale before we lose it to Zara. When Riverdale grows to 3 on T138, you’ll have to decide whether to work the farm or the cottage (see below, where I suggest that you actually start working the farm 2 or 3 turns sooner). I chose the farm (as did the city governor) since we’ll need the pops to whip the library soon. I’m typing this as I play. As it turns out, only 1 forest and a 2 pop whip is needed to complete the library. Maybe worker 2 can start heading back towards Delhi after one chop to either start pre-chopping the Hanging Gardens (will give all of our cities another pop) or improving one of our soon-to-be three new cities.

In Delhi, if you planned the food properly, you should have grown to size 9 and completed the missionary on T142. The settler from Silverado is due in 1 turn, so the missionary can sit near the edge of our cultural borders, waiting for GP Farm to be settled. Unless, of course, we chose not to build a missionary or instead want to spread him to Silverado to be our Confucian Missionary pump. After the missionary is done, we can build a settler at size 9 or start an aqueduct. We should have 3 settlers (Silverado T143, Wheaties T152 and Bedrock T158) in the next 16 turns, so I prefer the aqueduct.

On T144, we should get a GPro at 85% odds. You should have turned up the research slider to 100% on T142 (it’s been 0% up until now with ~ 300 gold in the bank). Fire the priests and hire 2 scientists for now. Bulb Civil Service, which won’t be completed until the end of T144 (i.e. T145).

One thing to check: On T144, Riverdale is 3 food short of being at population 4. Maybe it makes the most sense to switch a citizen from the southern cottage to a farm three turns before growing to 3 pops (which will actually make you grow to 3 in 2 turns). Then, you should have enough pops to whip the Library on T144 for 2. That would require you to stay in Slavery until now.

On T145, revolt to Bureaucracy and Caste System. Hire 5 scientists!! Citizens will be working 2 corn, copper and 1 cottage. This allows us to get a Great Scientist in 12 turns on T157 @ ~79% odds. It will also allow us to learn Alphabet on T151!! In fact, I suggest that you play a few extra turns until we learn Alphabet since this is a logical stopping place.

I'll use this as a guideline and see if I can get a turn-by-turn PPP tonight before I go to bed.

 

[Mitchum]

OK, here is what I want to do .

Wow! I couldn't have said it better myself...

 

[unclethrill]

T133
Worker 1 & 2 build Cottage NE of Delhi
Worker 3 & 4 move to Forest NNEof Delhi; Chop/Stop
Switch Bedrock and Wheaties to Settlers
Revolt to CS and Rep
Hire Artist in Wheaties
Research 0%
Tech CS

T134
Hire 2cd Priest in Delhi
Move Workers 3 & 4 to Cows SW of Wheaties and road
Research 0%
Tech CS

T135
Finish Cottage.
Worker 1 to Forest 1SW of Copper
Worker 2 1SE onto GLH Road/Stop
Worker 4 move to Plain 1N and road. Worker 3 is not movable this turn
Switch Riverdale to farm
Research 0%
Tech CS

T136
Worker 3 move 1N and road
Worker 1 road
Worker 2 move 1E and road/stop
Research 0%
Tech CS

T137
Put Wheaties artist on Wheat.
Workers 3 & 4 move to forest N of Wheaties and chop/stop
Worker 2 move 1E road/stop
Riverdale will grow. Work Cottage again.
Research 0%
Tech CS

T138
Move Worker 2 1E and chop
Move worker 3 & 4 to wheat and farm
Revolt to slavery
Delhi will grow; Work new Cottage
Research 0%
Tech CS

T139
Worker 1 NW and Road
Research 0%
Tech CS

T140
Nothing happens
Research 0%
Tech CS

T141
Worker 2 finishes chop into Riverdale Library
Research 0%
Tech CS

T142
Delhi Size 9
Missionary Finished
Start Aquaduct. (needed for HG)
Worker 2 1W road/stop on way to GPF
Worker 3 & 4 finish wheat farm. Move 1S and chop
Worker 1 SW and Road
Missionary to worker 1 square to wait for GPF.
Research 100%
Tech CS

T143
Silverado Setler move towards GPF (2 turns to get there)
Finish chop into wheatie's settler
Worker 2 W road/stop
Worker 4 Road to connect wheat
Research 100%
Tech CS

T144
Worker 2 W road/stop
GP Hopefully Prophet. Bulb CS. If not, stop and regroup
Whip Library in riverdale
Move GPF settler into place
Fire priests and hire 2 scientists
Research 100%
Tech CS

T145
Finish CS
Revolt to Bureaucracy, CS
Hire 5 scientists. Delhi works copper, two corn and S cottage
Worker 2 move to SW copper to get to GPF ASAP
Worker 3 & 4 farm N of wheaties
Settler GPF. (We need a name)
Move missionary into GPF
Start granary in GPF
Start Confused Monastary in Riverdale
Worker 1 to cows and road
Research 100%
Tech Alpha

T146
Worker 2 to cows and Road
Spread Confusion to GPF
Research 100%
Tech Alpha

T147
Worker 1 & 2 E and chop
Research 100%
Tech Alpha

T148
Nothing happens
Research 100%
Tech Alpha

T149
Worker 3 & 4 N and road wheat
Finish chop into GPF Granary
Worker 1 move 2S of cows and farm
Research 100%
Tech Alpha

T150
Worker 2 join worker 1 on farm
Worker 4 to cows and wait
Research 100%
Tech Alpha

T151
Finish Alpha, save and submit save!


Hopefully there won't be any major heartburn and I can play in 24 hours or so.

 

[Irgy]

Since we’re worried about expansion, we could switch the build queue in both Bedrock and Wheaties to settlers, leaving the partially completed granaries in the queue. The settler in Bedrock freezes the city at 3 pops, which means the 3 cottaged flood plains tiles will be enough for some time. This frees up a worker to head to Riverdale to start chopping the library. We need to start increasing our culture there because the cultural pressure from both Gondor and Aksum is adding up and will get worse with the next border pop from Aksum in about 18 turns.

I agree with most of this. We should compare whether improving and working the marble will speed up the settler though. It provides an extra 2 hammers per turn on top of the measly 4 that Bedrock produces otherwise, so it should save time on the settler overall and get us some extra commerce and growth (by growing to work it) in the process. We don't need to send settlers to chop out the library yet, it won't be finished soon anyway. In my tests, I sent a worker down from Wheaties to do those chops, although reading what you've written those workers will now be busy.

I think our second great person should be a Great Prophet. Delhi is currently working 1 priest and is set to grow in 1 turn. I suggest letting Delhi grow on T133 and then hiring a second priest on T134. This will get us our next great person on T144

I still want to compare the benefits of early alphabet from researching Alphabet and going for a a GSci first. Does Zara have the right techs in the test game?

I also suggest revolting to both Representation and Caste System right away on T133. Hire an artist in Wheaties for 4 turns for a border pop. You can probably revolt out of Caste System (or possibly into Slavery - see below) on T138 to save some gold. We won’t need it again until T145 when we want to run a bunch of scientists in Delhi. Delhi’s citizens (other than the 2 priests) should work the 2 corn, copper, cottages, GRiv Farm, GHill mine and PHill mine in that order. You may want to hold off working the second cottage until two turns after it’s finished – T136. This allows Delhi to grow size 8 on T138 and size 9 on T142 with 0F to spare. If you switch to the cottage right away on T134, you’ll grow to size 8 on T139 and size 9 on T143, both 1 turn later.

I agree with all of this.

Workers 3 and 4 can start building the road to Wheaties. On T133, they can chop/stop the GFor Hill N-NE of Delhi so as not to waste a worker turn. Even though the actual save says to build a road on the Oasis tile (4 turns), I suggest building it on the plains tile W of the Oasis (3 turns). The borders of Wheaties should expand just as your workers have completed the road. They can chop/stop the plains forest just north of Wheaties on T137 and then start the wheat farm on T138. Don’t forget to move the artist to the newly acquired wheat farm to speed up our settler and revolt out of Caste System the next turn (T138). Once the wheat farm is done, chop (speeding up the settler to T152) and farm (once Civil Service is learned on T145 – they can build a road on the wheat while they are waiting) the plains forest N of Wheaties. By the time these workers are done with these jobs plus building a road to connect the wheat (+2 health with granary), we will be one turn from Alphabet (and Animal Husbandry). These two workers can stick around for 1 turn pre-chopping something so that they can start improving Wheaties cows on T151 when we learn AH.

The workers should chop&stop the forest 1N of Wheaties the turn before the borders pop, to be ready to improve the wheat straight away. This will mean moving 3 spaces and not working a tile the turn before that. I know how much Dhoomstriker likes to give the workers an action every turn, but it's worth getting the extra 2 food from farming wheat a turn earlier.

Workers 1 and 2 can finish the cottage NE of Delhi.

If we plan to stagnate at 9 population working 2 specialists, we don't have a spare citizen to work this cottage. Not saying don't do it, and not saying don't prioritise it over one of the mines, just pointing this out. If we're building settlers in Bedrock and Wheaties then maybe we're not planning to build one in Dehli too anyway? In which case we can afford to work the cottage and grow to 10.

Worker 1 can start building a road to the GP Farm (I assume this is where we want to settle next). I suggest having the road start SW of the copper (GFor), go through forests to support forest regrowth, and through the Cow resource.

Worker 2 will go to Riverdale, either building a road/stop or chop/stop along the way. Chop the forest W-W of Riverdale and possibly the one N-NW of Riverdale before we lose it to Zara. When Riverdale grows to 3 on T138, you’ll have to decide whether to work the farm or the cottage (see below, where I suggest that you actually start working the farm 2 or 3 turns sooner). I chose the farm (as did the city governor) since we’ll need the pops to whip the library soon. I’m typing this as I play. As it turns out, only 1 forest and a 2 pop whip is needed to complete the library. Maybe worker 2 can start heading back towards Delhi after one chop to either start pre-chopping the Hanging Gardens (will give all of our cities another pop) or improving one of our soon-to-be three new cities.

I think we've never had such a good time to build the gardens, every city could use an extra population.

I agree with the worker moves, other than possibly improving the marble first, as I've already mentioned.

In Delhi, if you planned the food properly, you should have grown to size 9 and completed the missionary on T142. The settler from Silverado is due in 1 turn, so the missionary can sit near the edge of our cultural borders, waiting for GP Farm to be settled. Unless, of course, we chose not to build a missionary or instead want to spread him to Silverado to be our Confucian Missionary pump. After the missionary is done, we can build a settler at size 9 or start an aqueduct. We should have 3 settlers (Silverado T143, Wheaties T152 and Bedrock T158) in the next 16 turns, so I prefer the aqueduct.

Personally I'd forget the missionary and just get started on the aqueduct for the hanging gardens. But I'd have to check whether that's a good idea or not.

On T144, we should get a GPro at 85% odds. You should have turned up the research slider to 100% on T142 (it’s been 0% up until now with ~ 300 gold in the bank). Fire the priests and hire 2 scientists for now. Bulb Civil Service, which won’t be completed until the end of T144 (i.e. T145).

I expect we can do better bulbing all of Civil Service, but it would be the last thing to experiment with as any other changes will muck it up.

One thing to check: On T144, Riverdale is 3 food short of being at population 4. Maybe it makes the most sense to switch a citizen from the southern cottage to a farm three turns before growing to 3 pops (which will actually make you grow to 3 in 2 turns). Then, you should have enough pops to whip the Library on T144 for 2. That would require you to stay in Slavery until now.

Whether we whip or not, Riverdale should work the farm. The timing for Math was very tight, and it was worth the extra commerce in the short term. The timing for beakers now is not as critical, and it's worth getting the extra growth.

On T145, revolt to Bureaucracy and Caste System. Hire 5 scientists!! Citizens will be working 2 corn, copper and 1 cottage. This allows us to get a Great Scientist in 12 turns on T157 @ ~79% odds. It will also allow us to learn Alphabet on T151!! In fact, I suggest that you play a few extra turns until we learn Alphabet since this is a logical stopping place.

Seems reasonable to me.

 

[Mitchum]

I could completely visualize what you were doing in your PPP having just played through this yesterday. As usual, I have a few comments:

T133 – What are the citizens in Delhi doing? What about Riverdale? Did you move the citizen from the cottage to the farm for faster growth? It looks like you moved the Riverdale citizen to the farm on T135 as I had originally planned. I now think growth is more important than commerce in all cities.

Did Worker 2 pre-road the same tiles on his trek east and west, completing 2/3 of a road? Were they all forest tiles so as not to disrupt forest re-growth?

For Workers 3 and 4, I wonder if they could farm the wheat tile 1 turn sooner (i.e. the turn the borders pop rather than the turn after) if they road/stop each turn on the way up there? That way, the wheat will be improved 1 turn sooner and the workers can complete the final 1/3 of the road on their trek back south.

It may be a while before we get another worker over to Riverdale. Does it make sense to make one more cottage while worker 2 is still over there? I know that we could use him in the GP Farm, but it could be many turns before we have a worker in the vicinity of Riverdale again. Plus, the extra worker won't be useful in the GP Farm until T151 when we've learned Animal Husbandry.

Speaking of workers, we’re going to have 3 brand new cities very soon and we’re going to need a lot of worker turns to get them up to speed quickly. I wonder if it makes sense to build a worker in Delhi after the missionary and before the Aqueduct. How many turns would it take to complete the worker considering that we will soon be working 5 scientists?

I assume that Silverado starts the granary in the queue once the settler is done. I just want it to be clear to everyone that this is what we’re building there next. We also have a courthouse in the queue with hammers that will begin to decay before the granary is complete.

You should be able to spread Confucianism to the GP Farm on the turn it is settled. We may have to pay 1 gold in unit supply, but it makes sense for two reasons. First, the borders will pop 1 turn sooner, giving us access to the fish (we’ll likely start a work boat in Silverado once we know Fishing) and the pig. Second, there is a chance that some other religion will spread to the GP Farm IBT T145 and T146. This would make it a bit harder for the Confucian missionary to successfully spread his religion. If you do it on T145, the odds of success will be 100%.

Again, on T145, it MAY make more sense to work the farm than the cottage in Delhi. We’d be giving up 2 commerce for 1F, but at least the city would still slowly grow while working all of those scientists.

I started a monastery in Riverdale after the library as well, but wasn’t sure that this is the best thing to build. Does anyone have any other suggestions?

The forest you’re chopping on T147 is currently outside the cultural borders of the GP Farm, right? Or does it connect via Delhi? I just want to make sure that we’re getting the full 45 hammers for that chop.

I don’t think we’d ever work the farm you’re building 2S of the cows. The GP Farm will likely just work the 2 fish, cows, pigs and specialists. Maybe it would be better to build a cottage that could be shared with the Crab city. This would be 2W of the cows. With that said, if you keep worker 2 in Riverdale to build a cottage, worker 1 will just barely finish the chop before it’s time to start improving the cows.

Possible discussion points:

Do we want to build settlers in Wheaties and Bedrock? I do, but I’m not sure I’ve heard approval from everyone.

Do we want to build a worker in Delhi after the missionary? In fact, do we want to build the missionary at all? I think so, but no one else has really commented on it.

Good going on the binary research. Dhoomstriker and Irgy can set down their swords for this turnset!

EDIT: Cross post with Irgy. We said a lot of the same things, only he said them sooner! I must be a slow typer...

 

[Mitchum]

I agree with most of this. We should compare whether improving and working the marble will speed up the settler though. It provides an extra 2 hammers per turn on top of the measly 4 that Bedrock produces otherwise, so it should save time on the settler overall and get us some extra commerce and growth (by growing to work it) in the process. We don't need to send settlers to chop out the library yet, it won't be finished soon anyway. In my tests, I sent a worker down from Wheaties to do those chops, although reading what you've written those workers will now be busy.

The workers are quite busy and getting a worker up to and then improving the marble will take a long time. Even if this does get a settler earlier a) it steals a worker from doing something else and b) can we afford to get the city much earlier anyway with respect to our economy and the workers needed to improve it sooner?

I still want to compare the benefits of early alphabet from researching Alphabet and going for a a GSci first. Does Zara have the right techs in the test game?

I did not mess with Zara's techs in the test game. I don't know exactly what he has, so it would have been tough. We know the last few tech he got and we know he has sailing, so we should be able to make a good guess. Feel free to change his techs when running your test.

The workers should chop&stop the forest 1N of Wheaties the turn before the borders pop, to be ready to improve the wheat straight away. This will mean moving 3 spaces and not working a tile the turn before that. I know how much Dhoomstriker likes to give the workers an action every turn, but it's worth getting the extra 2 food from farming wheat a turn earlier.

We can improve the wheat sooner and get a worker action every turn as I mentioned above. The workers could partially build the road as they move north toward Wheaties.

If we plan to stagnate at 9 population working 2 specialists, we don't have a spare citizen to work this cottage. Not saying don't do it, and not saying don't prioritise it over one of the mines, just pointing this out. If we're building settlers in Bedrock and Wheaties then maybe we're not planning to build one in Dehli too anyway? In which case we can afford to work the cottage and grow to 10.

In general, the priority has shifted from commerce, food, production to food, commerce, production in Delhi. That means that we should work, in order of preference: 2 corn, copper, GRiv farm, cottages, GHill mine, PHill mine. Of course, we'll be working 2 priests while trying for the GPRo and 5 scientists when going for the GS, but this is my opinion on where the citizens should be.

Personally I'd forget the missionary and just get started on the aqueduct for the hanging gardens. But I'd have to check whether that's a good idea or not.

I considered this too, but in order to get our GP Farm going, we're going to need a quick border pop to gain access to the 2 fish and pig. We could hire an artist for 4 turns, but BLubmuz doesn't like the gpp gene pollution. Plus, it stagnates growth for those 4 turns...

I expect we can do better bulbing all of Civil Service, but it would be the last thing to experiment with as any other changes will muck it up.

Yes, we could get CS one turn sooner, but it could mean the loss of many beakers. We would have to calculate how many beakers we'll be short with the GPro bulb and then try to get as close to the right amount as possible. It's tough to do because you alway end up getting more beakers into a tech than the number of flasks you generate in a turn. It should just be the 20% pre-requisite bonus as no one else will know the tech. Maybe it's worth trying to do this since we'll be able to a) get bureaucracy 1 turn sooner and b) hire our 5 scientists 1 turn sooner.

Whether we whip or not, Riverdale should work the farm. The timing for Math was very tight, and it was worth the extra commerce in the short term. The timing for beakers now is not as critical, and it's worth getting the extra growth.

Agreed. Work the farm.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

T133
Worker 3 & 4 move to Forest NNEof Delhi; Chop/Stop

Just a minor comment, because it's been at the back of my mind, but why not Mine/Stop instead of Chop/Stop? Since it's a Forest that we plan to leave for a long time, we'll probably eventually Mine it around the time that we'll be ready to Chop the Forest.

One can actually BOTH partially Mine and partially Chop a Hills Forest square, and it can work out to be the same in the end, but it gets hard to keep track of the number of turns invested in each task if you do so.