SGOTM 11 - Fifth Element

I plan to play in 4 to 5 hours
If you make the changes according to my last message's suggestions, I have no trouble with you playing forward.

If you'd like to discuss or challenge some of my suggestions, I can also collaborate with you to improve upon them.
 
Session Log

Spoiler :
Turn 269, 1240 AD: You have discovered Radio!
Turn 269, 1240 AD: The borders of Ivory Towers have expanded!
Turn 269, 1240 AD: The borders of DevilsGate have expanded!
Turn 269, 1240 AD: Justinian I has completed The Spiral Minaret!

Turn 270, 1250 AD: You have discovered Nationalism!
Turn 270, 1250 AD: You have discovered Guilds!
Turn 270, 1250 AD: You have discovered Divine Right!
Turn 270, 1250 AD: You have trained Buddhist Missionary in Delhi. Work has now begun on a Wealth.
Turn 270, 1250 AD: Ernest Rutherford (Great Scientist) has been born in Delhi (Gandhi)!
Turn 270, 1250 AD: Grt Person Farm celebrates "We Love the Prime Minister Day"!!!

Turn 271, 1255 AD: Tokugawa has made peace with Mehmed II!
Turn 271, 1255 AD: Tokugawa has declared war on Mehmed II!
Turn 271, 1255 AD: You have discovered Music!
Turn 271, 1255 AD: Grt Person Farm celebrates "We Love the Prime Minister Day"!!!
Turn 271, 1255 AD: Buddhism has spread in Madrid.
Turn 271, 1255 AD: Jacques Cartier (Great Merchant) has been born in Mecca (Saladin)!

Turn 272, 1260 AD: You have trained a Galleon in Three Clams. Work has now begun on a Wealth.
Turn 272, 1260 AD: Tokugawa's Golden Age has ended...
Turn 272, 1260 AD: Mehmed II adopts Theocracy!
Turn 272, 1260 AD: Saladin adopts Free Market!

Turn 273, 1265 AD: You have trained Buddhist Missionary in Grt Person Farm. Work has now begun on a Wealth.
Turn 273, 1265 AD: Atisha (Great Prophet) has been born in Kyoto (Tokugawa)!

Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 2 (Mystic) (4.00) vs Mehmed II's Longbowman (5.40)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Combat Odds: 26.2%
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Plot Defense: +4%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Fortify: +15%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (City Defense: +70%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (City Attack: -100%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Your Trebuchet 2 (Mystic) has caused collateral damage! (2 Units)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 2 (Mystic) is hit for 23 (77/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 17 (83/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 2 (Mystic) is hit for 23 (54/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 2 (Mystic) is hit for 23 (31/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 2 (Mystic) is hit for 23 (8/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 2 (Mystic) is hit for 23 (0/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman has defeated Gandhi's Trebuchet 2 (Mystic)!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Your Trebuchet 2 (Mystic) has died trying to attack a Longbowman!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 3 (Grt Person Farm) (8.80) vs Mehmed II's Longbowman (9.77)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Combat Odds: 25.7%
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Extra Combat: -10%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Plot Defense: +4%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Fortify: +5%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (City Defense: +70%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 3 (Grt Person Farm) is hit for 21 (79/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 3 (Grt Person Farm) is hit for 21 (58/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 18 (73/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 3 (Grt Person Farm) is hit for 21 (37/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 3 (Grt Person Farm) is hit for 21 (16/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 18 (55/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 3 (Grt Person Farm) is hit for 21 (0/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman has defeated Gandhi's War Elephant 3 (Grt Person Farm)!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Your War Elephant 3 (Grt Person Farm) has died trying to attack a Longbowman!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 2 (Riverdale) (8.00) vs Mehmed II's Longbowman (9.41)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Combat Odds: 33.6%
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Plot Defense: +4%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Fortify: +15%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (City Defense: +70%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 2 (Riverdale) is hit for 22 (78/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 2 (Riverdale) is hit for 22 (56/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 17 (66/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 2 (Riverdale) is hit for 22 (34/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 2 (Riverdale) is hit for 22 (12/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 17 (49/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 17 (32/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 17 (15/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 17 (0/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 2 (Riverdale) has defeated Mehmed II's Longbowman!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Your War Elephant 2 (Riverdale) has destroyed a Longbowman!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Maceman 5 (Wheaties) (8.00) vs Mehmed II's Longbowman (5.24)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Combat Odds: 93.6%
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Plot Defense: +4%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Fortify: +5%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (City Defense: +70%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (City Attack: -20%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Maceman 5 (Wheaties) is hit for 19 (81/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 20 (35/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Maceman 5 (Wheaties) is hit for 19 (62/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 20 (15/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Longbowman is hit for 20 (0/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Maceman 5 (Wheaties) has defeated Mehmed II's Longbowman!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Your Maceman 5 (Wheaties) has destroyed a Longbowman!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Pikeman 1 (Crabs) (6.00) vs Mehmed II's Spearman (4.18)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Combat Odds: 88.9%
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Extra Combat: +10%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Plot Defense: +4%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (Fortify: +25%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: (City Attack: -20%)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Spearman is hit for 23 (65/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Spearman is hit for 23 (42/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Spearman is hit for 23 (19/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Pikeman 1 (Crabs) is hit for 17 (83/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Mehmed II's Spearman is hit for 23 (0/100HP)
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Gandhi's Pikeman 1 (Crabs) has defeated Mehmed II's Spearman!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Your Pikeman 1 (Crabs) has destroyed a Spearman!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: You have captured Chinook!!!
Turn 274, 1270 AD: You have trained a War Elephant in Ivory Towers. Work has now begun on a Wealth.
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Buddhism has spread in Seville.
Turn 274, 1270 AD: Buddhism has spread in Ivory Towers.

Turn 275, 1275 AD: The borders of Zhou are about to expand.
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Justinian I will trade Military Tradition
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers) (4.00) vs Mehmed II's Axeman (3.57)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Combat Odds: 80.0%
Turn 275, 1275 AD: (Extra Combat: +10%)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: (Plot Defense: +25%)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: (Fortify: +25%)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: (City Attack: -100%)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Mehmed II's Axeman is hit for 21 (79/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers) is hit for 18 (82/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers) is hit for 18 (64/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers) is hit for 18 (46/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers) is hit for 18 (28/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Mehmed II's Axeman is hit for 21 (58/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers) is hit for 18 (10/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Mehmed II's Axeman is hit for 21 (37/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers) is hit for 18 (0/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Mehmed II's Axeman has defeated Gandhi's Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers)!
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Your Trebuchet 1 (Ivory Towers) has died trying to attack a Axeman!
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 1 (Wheaties) (8.00) vs Mehmed II's Axeman (2.96)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Combat Odds: 99.9%
Turn 275, 1275 AD: (Extra Combat: +10%)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: (Plot Defense: +25%)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: (Fortify: +25%)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Mehmed II's Axeman is hit for 24 (13/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Mehmed II's Axeman is hit for 24 (0/100HP)
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Gandhi's War Elephant 1 (Wheaties) has defeated Mehmed II's Axeman!
Turn 275, 1275 AD: Your War Elephant 1 (Wheaties) has destroyed a Axeman!
Turn 275, 1275 AD: You have captured Izmir!!!
Turn 275, 1275 AD: You have discovered Mass Media!
Turn 275, 1275 AD: The borders of Zhou have expanded!

Turn 276, 1280 AD: DevilsGate has become unhappy.
Turn 276, 1280 AD: Justinian I has 170 gold available for trade.
Turn 276, 1280 AD: Tokugawa won't trade Banking, Gunpowder


Save

Highlights:

Did everything that Dhoom and Mitchum suggested.
Hired all recommended scientists
Changed all queues as directed
Made three way trade as described. Netted enough gold for several turns of 100% research.

Finished Mass Media (yes it is completed)

Took Silk City and City to south of that.

Positioned troops for capture of another mehmed city in a couple turns

Finished all worker suggestions except WS. They are all being worked though.

Started sending Galleons south for GP movement

All warriors are in Zhou along with 1 GS.

GS born in Delhi

That's about all that happened.

Bring it home Mitchum and Dhoom and let's see how well we did!!
 
Great work! So that finished up being Mass Media in 7 turns?! Crazy business.

So... what's left to do?
* We need to build the UN, which won't take long.
* We need to make sure we'll win the SG vote against Toku.
* How many turns do we then have on Epic before the first resolution comes up?
* It sounds like we have Silk, but need to defend it. I gather we still have Ivory, Dye in trade and own the Fur.
* We need to spread Buddhism to all our cities, how many are left to go? I hope we have enough missionaries for this not to be the hold up.
* All AIs are still running a religion aren't they?
* We have the warriors ready, but we need the great people. We have 2 scientists and an Engineer spare at the moment, right? And we're waiting on either a general or a Crabs great person?

This is where we need to do a complete turnaround of our empire. Forget the scientists (except maybe in Crabs) and grow like mad. We should even be working coast and ocean tiles rather than specialists now. We don't need the research slider any more either, although I'm not sure what slider we should use instead.

Excellent effort on this turn set everyone. I'm sorry I couldn't help much with it, but I was struggling to follow what was going on without downloading the save, which is hard to do when my only internet access is at work (the net at home won't be up until Friday).
 
Highlights:

Did everything that Dhoom and Mitchum suggested.
Hired all recommended scientists
Changed all queues as directed
Made three way trade as described. Netted enough gold for several turns of 100% research.

Finished Mass Media (yes it is completed)

Took Silk City and City to south of that.

Positioned troops for capture of another mehmed city in a couple turns

Finished all worker suggestions except WS. They are all being worked though.

Started sending Galleons south for GP movement

All warriors are in Zhou along with 1 GS.

GS born in Delhi

That's about all that happened.

Bring it home Mitchum and Dhoom and let's see how well we did!!

Great job. :goodjob:

Now that UT got us MM in 7 turns, it looks like we're caught with our pants down... :) Building the UN will be our limiting factor. Once it's built, the Sec Gen vote vs. Toku will occur on the next turn. The first chance that we have to propose the Diplo vote is 8 turns later. This will give us enough time to get our final great person from Crabs to the Fur, but I will have to use a Galleon chain to get him there in 1 turn. This should be no issue as UT already has the galleons heading in the right direction!!

We still have three cities that need Buddhism. Chinook, Izmir (1 pop city that I'm considering letting Mehmed take back) and Riverdale (which we're gifting to Zara). Isabella still has 1 city that needs it and she may switch to Buddhism on her own, although I don't think it matters one way or the other.

We still have a bit of diplo that needs to be done to secure Justinians vote and give us a chance to get Saladin's. Once we beat Toku for sec gen, it should be all downhill.

Agree with Irgy that all cities will go into high growth mode.

Izzy looks like she could lose Barcelona. I'm not sure what will happen if she does...

Now, I have to see where we are and figure out the fastest possible way to complete the UN since this is again the critical path. With one GE, three forest chops, several workshops, a mine and some whipping, I think it will take 3 to 4 turns, depending on how many worker actions still need to be done. If anyone wants to spend any time helping, this would be the place to do so. I hope to have a test game for building the UN in Riverdale ready tonight (the rest of the empire will be wrong, but who cares for this test).
 
Turnset Report Comments
Great job! Thanks for playing the turnset!


Made three way trade as described.
Great! That fact should almost certainly secure Justinian's vote for us in the Secretary General election!


Netted enough gold for several turns of 100% research.
Wonderful!


Finished Mass Media (yes it is completed)
WOW! Unbelieveable! 18 turns -> 7 turns... very impressive!


Took Silk City and City to south of that.
I hope that the City to the south of it either has Buddhism or that we are able to get Buddhist Missionaries to the area in time.

Should we capture any additional Cities, this consideration will have to be kept in mind--whether or not the City is already Buddhist or if we can get Buddhism there in time for us not to have to delay our victory.


All warriors are in Zhou along with 1 GS.
Great! Now we just need 3 more Great People to get into position. The beautiful part is that 3 units can fit on 1 Galleon, meaning that we only need a single-layer of Galleon Chaining.


Bring it home Mitchum and Dhoom and let's see how well we did!!
After the blazing-fast rate of research that you had, I might not even need to play another turnset!!! That fact would be fine by me!
 
UN Voting Timing
So... what's left to do?
* How many turns do we then have on Epic before the first resolution comes up?
8 turns after The Secretary General vote's results are announced. The Secretary General vote happens on the turn after The UN is completed. The Secretary General vote's results are announced on the turn after the vote is made.

Special Resources
* It sounds like we have Silk, but need to defend it. I gather we still have Ivory, Dye in trade and own the Fur.
We'll also need to ensure that each City is CONNECTED to each of our Special Resources.

So, if we do capture any inland Cities of Mehmed's, we'll have to be EXTRA CAREFUL that there is a land-based Road-route to a coastal City.


Delhi and Buddhist Missionaries; Specialists -> Food? Hammers?
* We need to spread Buddhism to all our cities, how many are left to go? I hope we have enough missionaries for this not to be the hold up.
Delhi can switch to working Mines and spamming Buddhist Missionaries. We have no need for further techs.

In fact, most Cities can probably fire the Scientists and grow... well... try to grow... I asked UT to nearly starve our Cities, so there might not be much chance to actually grow any of our Cities on time. :mischief:

This is where we need to do a complete turnaround of our empire. Forget the scientists (except maybe in Crabs) and grow like mad.
Hmmm, it seems like great minds think alike... ;)


Which slider to use?
although I'm not sure what slider we should use instead.
The Espionage Slider? Of course, we'd have to pick an Espionage target and change our Weighting (unless Zara is the target). And it might not even matter at this point. And we'd need a Spy or a few of them. And we might risk having them being caught. But it's a thought, although probably not a thought that will matter at this point.
 
Barcelona
Izzy looks like she could lose Barcelona. I'm not sure what will happen if she does...
We get to capture it and keep it for ourselves? Hehe.

Or we to get liberate it for her?

With a lot of players at war with Mehmed, the chances of Isabella becoming his vassal are very tiny, especially if she manages to keep at least 3 Cities.


Completing The UN
Now, I have to see where we are and figure out the fastest possible way to complete the UN since this is again the critical path.
The fastest way possible for us to complete The UN would be to build it in Delhi using 2 Great Engineers. We'd be unable to gift it to Zara, though.

An equally fast way would be to build Whales, complete it there with 2 Great Engineers, and gift it to Zara on the following turn.


I just opened the save to check, but it looks like we're only at 9/30 Great General points. So, we likely can't use either of those "fastest" methods and still be able to generate a Great General within a reasonable time frame, so we'll just have to do our best with 1 Great Engineer.
 
Which slider to use?

The Espionage Slider? Of course, we'd have to pick an Espionage target and change our Weighting (unless Zara is the target). And it might not even matter at this point. And we'd need a Spy or a few of them. And we might risk having them being caught. But it's a thought, although probably not a thought that will matter at this point.

I'm actually leaning towards the culture slider. We can use the happiness to trade away happiness resources for health. Not sure if we need to though? Nor whether there's spare health resources we haven't picked up already?. The culture will mean more land and therefore more population potential, although maybe it won't make a difference in time.

Or maybe we just stockpile cash for gifts, or even research a tech (e.g. towards Biology) to trade as a gift or, in the case of Biology, as a backup plan to pump up the population if something fails with the voting.

All potentially useful, but all more likely to be completely useless.
 
Based on the length of time it takes from UN completion to Diplo victory (10 turns), building the UN is gating our victory date. After the UN is complete, it's a waiting game while we make sure we have good relations with the AI.

Getting Crabs' great person to the Fur will be tight, but with my planned Galleon chain, I can get him from Crabs to the fort on Devil's gate on the same turn he's born. From there, it's a two-turn stroll to the Fur.

Getting a Buddhist missionary to Chinook is easy as he is already on his way. If he fails, I intend to have 2 back-up missionaries on the way ASAP. One may have to be used on Izmir (the 1 pop city we captured south of Chinook) if we can't get Mehmed to take it back. I intend to pull all troops into Chinook or onto the Silk resource. Keeping the Silk is more important than keeping Izmir or continuing our conquest. Getting a Great General appears to be out, so we aren't forced to continue on the war path.

Attached is the test game to see how quickly we can build the UN. I've done my best to simulate the situation in the real game (in Riverdale only). Same overflow hammers. Same food. Same turn. Same partial improvements. Same worker locations. Same GE in Delhi.

Goal: Complete the UN in as few turns as possible.

Hints:

  • Stay in Caste System until you have enough pops to whip. CS gives +1H to each work shop.
  • The chops don't go into the build until the end of the turn, so the sooner we have them, the sooner we can whip.
  • Don't forget about the GE.

EDIT: Be sure you are uploading the T276a... saved game. I had to reassign a few citizens and add another temple such that a total of 3 priests can be hired if desired.

EDIT 2: Use T276b... I gave us Engineering so that the GE could walk to Riverdale in 2 turns.
 

Attachments

I can't figure out how many hammers we get from each pop whip, but it must be between 12 and 14 hammers. It is quite easy to whip the UN on T280 so that the Sec Gen vote happens on T281. That means it's taking me 5 turns to finish the UN with 1 GE (T276, T277, T278, T279 and T280). Is there a way to do it in 4 turns? I can get close, but not quite there yet... I needed 8 pops to whip it on T279 but only had 7 pops.
 
OK, I figured it out. I can whip the UN on T279 for 7 pops. It required having every citizen working a tile with a hammer on it. If no hammer tiles left, the citizen instead became an engineer, priest or citizen specialists. I was 1 food away from shrinking to 13 pops on T279 and I think I had just enough hammers, so I just barely made it.

The question that Dhoomstriker is going to ask is: If we can build the UN 1 turn faster in Delhi, should we? This will improve our finish date by 1 turn, but will mean that we will go up against Toku for both the sec gen and diplo votes (unless we gift Delhi to Zara :eek:)

To, our timeline is this:
Finish UN: T279
Win Sec Gen vote: T280
Call for diplo vote: T288
Diplo victory announced: T289 (1345 AD)​
That gives us 14 turns to generate a great person in Crabs (9 turns) and get him to the Fur (3 turns) with 2 turns to spare.

The main things that still have to be done:

  1. Get Buddhism in Chinook (and Izmir) with 2 more missionaries on their way just in case...
  2. Camp the Fur
  3. Get the great person galleon chain in place
  4. Get +4 fair trade relations with all AI to secure their votes
  5. Consolidate army in Chinook to secure the Silk
Can anyone think of anything else?

BTW, we still have a monopoly on Liberalism and all AI are still running a state religion. I will not trade away Liberalism to avoid an AI being tempted to run Free Religion.
 
Watching from the sidelines...

Good one, UT, you're always great in waging wars.

So, we decided to try the Zara gift option... less safe, but sure we do not need to count on the AI ability to take an empty city.

Don't trade Lib, never.
 
So, we decided to try the Zara gift option... less safe, but sure we do not need to count on the AI ability to take an empty city.

Based on the current diplo situation, beating Toku for the Sec Gen vote should be a slam dunk, so there is no need to toy with building the UN in Mehmed's lands. Plus, we can't afford to use two GEs to build the UN.

Don't trade Lib, never.

Agreed.
 
UN in Delhi
OK, I figured it out. I can whip the UN on T279 for 7 pops. It required having every citizen working a tile with a hammer on it. If no hammer tiles left, the citizen instead became an engineer, priest or citizen specialists. I was 1 food away from shrinking to 13 pops on T279 and I think I had just enough hammers, so I just barely made it.

The question that Dhoomstriker is going to ask is: If we can build the UN 1 turn faster in Delhi, should we? This will improve our finish date by 1 turn, but will mean that we will go up against Toku for both the sec gen and diplo votes (unless we gift Delhi to Zara :eek:)
Actually, no, the question that I am going to ask is: how do we plan to generate a Great Person in Crabs if we are running Slavery?

Crabs has 2 Temples and a Forge. That means 3 Specialists instead of 6 Specialists. Certainly, it's easy math to believe that the time to building a Great Person there will get doubled, since there are no Wonders or other sources of GPP there other than from the Specialists.

Delhi can build The UN start on the first turn, chopping on the next turn, and completing it on the turn following.

Thanks to the Bureaucracy bonus, that'll only use up 2 Forest chops, leaving us a 3rd Forest chop for a Buddhist Missionary on the following turn.


This way, we won't need Slavery for whipping Buddhist Missionaries from Grt Person Farm. We also won't need Slavery for building The UN. And thus our timing of the Great Person in Crabs will be unaffected.

UN in Delhi is the way to go.


But, but, Zara won't take Delhi
Okay, well if the Secretary General vote is unanimously in our favour, then we can win the UN Diplo Victory against Toku.

But, if we are losing, a test saved game shows that if we build Whales, gift it to Zara, and move our Palace, we can gift Delhi to Zara, too.

We can build a Palace in Wheaties within 10 turns, just in time.

So, I'm advocating building The UN in Delhi.
 
Astronomy vs Liberalism
Don't trade Lib, never.
Please show me a test game where an AI has the dominant religion, has 100% of its Cities running that Religion, and has switched to Free Religion.

Then, tell me that the Favourite Civic of that AI was not Theocracy.

Or, that it was not an Agressive Traited AI like Toku who loves Theocracy.


Let's face it. Toku has had the Shwedagon Paya for a very long time. Being in the dominant world religion is too good of an incentive for him to run Free Religion.

The same will be true of Saladin and Justinian, but even moreso, since they won't switch out of their Favourite Civic.


Other AIs are "backwards" enough for us not to even need to decide which tech to trade away just to get the +4 "Fair and forthright trading" Diplo bonus.


ASTRONOMY is deadly in the hands of the AIs.

1. They can capture Barb Cities, throwing off the vote count
AND
2. They can Settle overseas Cities, throwing off the vote count
AND
3. They can sink our Galleons and Caravels! Even if we do not lose a Great Person that is in the Ocean, if we lose EVEN ONE SINGLE BOAT in our Galleon Chain WE ARE DOOMED. Our Galleon Chain, which Mitchum will be relying on for the timing of building The UN, will be broken. The Great Person will not make it to the Fur in time.

We are EXTREMELY vulnerable to even ONE SINGLE Privateer, as all we would need to do is to lose ONE SINGLE BOAT and it's game over.

We'll either have to "throw" the first vote and not vote for a Diplo Victory or we will have to "win" the game in shame, by not completing all of the game's objectives by not having our Great Person in place.


IT DOESN'T MATTER WHICH BOAT gets sunk, but if ANY BOAT in our Galleon Chain gets sunk, we're doomed.


The AIs CANNOT get Astronomy. Liberalism, let them go nuts with it. The worst that we'll see is them switching into Free Religion, in order to push each others' borders back.
 
Since there is so much going on, I intend to play a short, 3-turn mini turnset. This will give us time to correct course should something unknown come up.

Building the United Nations

The UN will be built in Delhi rather than in Riverdale. We cannot run Slavery (we need Caste System for our great person in Crabs) and Delhi can complete the UN in 2 turns. We should easily win the Sec Gen vote vs. Tokugawa. If things look close in the Sec Gen vote, we will build Whales and gift it to Zara. We will build a palace in Wheaties so that we can then gift Delhi to Zara so that he’ll be our opponent for the diplo vote. If we win by a landslide in the Sec Gen vote, then we’ll hang onto Delhi and just go head-to-head with Toku for the diplo victory as well.

To complete the UN in two turns in Delhi:

T276
Switch build in Delhi to UN.
Work all hammer producing tiles.
Everyone else (including those working the corn) becomes a priest, engineer or citizen specialist. We won’t starve Delhi, but we’re preparing to just in case it turns out that we want to gift it to Zara. We don’t want to hand him the keys to a 17-pop city if we can help it.
Burn 1 GE on the UN (1290 hammers)

T277
Chop forests E+SE and E+E+E of Delhi with 4 of the workers near Riverdale.
Hire enough farmers to keep Delhi from starving.

T278
UN is complete and the Sec Gen vote occurs.
Stop turnset here and discuss what to do next based on the outcome of the vote.

Buddhism

At this point, this is the biggest unknown for us. We have one Buddhist missionary heading to Chinook. I can get him there in 2 turns by using the galleons that are in the area as a chain. Galleon 6 -> Galleon 5 -> Galleon 2 -> Galleon 4. This Buddhist missionary will sit in Chinook for 6 full turns to give him the best odds of success (there is already 1 religion in Chinook, which lowers the odds of success).

Should he fail, GP Farm will start on a Buddhist missionary on T276. Delhi will start another Buddhist missionary on T278 after the UN and complete it with a chop. This will give us two more chances should the first one fail.

We will also need a Buddhist missionary for Riverdale since we now plan to keep this city. We can build 2 very quickly near the end of the game in Delhi for this purpose.

Izmir, the one-pop city, is a bit of a wild card. It only has 1 pop, so it really has no significance on the upcoming vote. I will pull our troops out of Izmir on T276 in the hopes that Mehmed captures it back. However, we will have 2 more Buddhist missionaries on the way if Mehmed doesn’t take the bait. Or, we can gift Izmir to Mehmed as a peace offering AFTER the UN diplomacy vote should all else fail.

As a backup plan, our troops in Izmir and the ones to the south will begin to march toward Mehmed’s city north of Cordoba. We will try to capture this city so that we can gift it to Isabella. Once she has this city, she should be willing to accept Izmir in trade as well.

The troops sitting in Chinook will have to be enough to hold on to it.

Setting up the Galleon Chain

The galleon chain will need to be 7 boats long going east from Grt Person Farm, along the southern edge of our continent, all the way to the fort on Barb Island. At no time will our precious great people be on a galleon in the open water. We currently have 3 galleys and 6 galleons. That means that we’ll only have 2 Galleons and a Trireme (upgraded to a caravel) left to shuttle Buddhist missionaries to Chinook.

The locations for the GP Galleon chain are numbered 1 through 7 with 1 being SE+SE of Grt Person Farm and 7 being 3W of the fort on the NW part of Barb Island. There are exactly 5 tiles between each position and they stretch along the southern ice caps to “hide” should Toku build any privateers.. I will build a road SW of Grt Person Farm such that the great person from Crabs can walk onto the galleon in position 1 on the turn he is born. The chain will then transport the three great people all the way to the fort on that same turn.

The Buddhist missionary chain will start at the troop pickup location NE of Wheaties and stretch up toward Chinook. This will be used in case our first Buddhist missionary fails. With 1 caravel and 2 galleons, this chain will be one galleon short of a complete chain. So, I will build a galleon in Ivory Towers to augment this chain by one boat so that we can get a missionary from Wheaties to Chinook in 1 turn.

I also managed to pick up the two macemen sitting outside of DevilsGate to Spain and get the galleon back into place for the GP chain, which needs to be in place in 6 turns.

Finally, I will use our caravel to shuttle our two Confucian missionaries from Buddhist Island to Barb Island as a backup plan should Buddhism fail.

Detailed PPP of naval logistics:
Spoiler :
T276
Galley 1 (near Tebizond): Wake up and move toward fort NW of Devil’s Gate (3 turns)
Galley 3 (near Crabs): Wake up and move 2 tiles SE toward Crabs and upgrade to Galleon for 155 gold. Rename Galleon C.
Trireme 1 (near Ivory Towers): Wake up and move 2 tiles west and upgrade to a caravel for 65 gold. Rename Caravel A.
Confucian Missionaries: Wake them both up and send them toward Trebizond.
All other ships have already moved this turn.

T277
Galleon 6 (Buddhist missionary on board): Move 5 tiles north to same location as Galleon 5 and transfer missionary.
Galleon 5: Move 3 tiles north to same position as Galleon 2, transfer missionary, and then move 2 tiles back south.
Galleon 2: Move 5 tiles north toward Chinook.
Galleon 4: Move 4 tiles south to same location as Galleon 2, pick up missionary, and head 1 tile back north toward Chinook.
Galleon 1: Move to position 2 in the GP chain (3 turns).
Galleon 3: Move to position 3 in the GP chain (4 turns).
Galleon C: Move to position 1 in the GP chain (2 turns).
Galley 2: Move 2 tiles south into Seville, drop off elephant, and head 1 more tile south.
Caravel 1: Move toward Trebizond to pick up Confucian missionaries and ferry them to Barb Island.
Caravel A: Move position A in the Buddhist chain (2 turns).

T278
Galleon 2: Move to position B in the Buddhist chain
Galleon 4: Go to Chinook. Unload Buddhist missionary.
Galleon 5: Move to position 5 in the GP chain (4 turns)
Galleon 6: Move to position 4 in the GP chain (4 turns)
Galley 1: Arrives in fort. Load 2 macemen. Upgrade to Galleon for 155 gold. Rename Galleon A.
Galley 2: Go south to N of Ivory Towers.

T279
Galleon A: Move to clams SE of Madrid to offload macemen (2 turns)
Galleon 4: Move to position C in the GP chain
Galley 2: Move 2 tiles south through Ivory Towers. Upgrade to Galleon. Rename Galleon B.

T280
Galleon B: Move to position 6 in the GP chain (2 turns)
Galleon A: Unload macemen from clams tile. Move to position 7 in GP chain (3 turns)

T281
Caravel 1: Pick up first Confucian missionary.

T282
Caravel 2: Drop off Confucian missionary on road and head back to Trebizond for second missionary.
All GP chain boats are in place, just in time to ferry our three great people, the last of which will spawn in Crabs on T283.
Spoiler :


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Diplomacy

On T276, I will gift the following techs so that we can get to +4 for fair trade relations with all civs:
  • Zara will get Paper.
  • Izzy will get Music. Once she is friendly with us, I will use Divine Right to request that she adopt Buddhism and get her world map and any gold she has. If she is not friendly with us yet, I will gift her Divine Right as well. And then I will use Paper to get Buddhism, map and gold.
    [*]I will trade Astronomy to Saladin for Banking, map and gold. If he is not yet at +4 fair trade, I will gift him Scientific Method on T277.
    [*]I will trade Astronomy to Justinian for his map and all of his gold. That should get him from +3 to +4 for fair trade.
On the turn that we complete the UN (which will happen in my next mini-turnset), I will use Education and Printing Press to bribe Tokugawa in and out of war with Mehmed again. This will give him a -1 diplo hit with both Justinian and Saladin.

City Builds

  • Delhi will build the UN -> Buddhist missionary, as detailed above.
  • Grt Person Farm will start a Buddhist missionary.
  • Ivory Towers will build a Galleon just in case we need it for Buddhist missionaries.
  • Silverado will complete its Airship
  • Sugar Daddy will build an airship.
  • Wheaties will start on a Palace in case we have to gift Delhi to Zara.
  • All other cities will build wealth.
Other Random Items

  • I will starve Crabs starting from T276 from 11 pops down to 6 in order to get the Great Person in 7 turns rather than 9.
  • I will revolt from Representation to Police State on T276. We no longer need the beakers and we have happiness headroom in all cities.
  • All cities will go into growth mode unless it was mentioned above that it would be building something. Even growing into unhappiness is fine since we want as many pops as possible for the upcoming vote.
  • Set research to Communism. We probably won’t finish any more techs if everything goes according to plan, but the free great person could come in handy if something goes bad in our plan.
Confucianism

As a backup plan in case we have trouble getting Buddhism to spread in Chinook, we will try to spread Confucianism to all of our cities.

The missionary in Barcelona will skip its turn this turn to avoid Mehmed’s troops. It will then hang out near Cordoba in an attempt to board a non-existent ferry up to Chinook.

The two missionaries on the Buddhist continent will wait for Caravel 1 in Tebizond and head to Barb Island to spread the love to our two cities there.


Note: Galleon Chain logistics are still being developed, but I wanted to get this up there now so that people had a chance to comment on it sooner.
 

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Delhi--we don't have to go too overboard there
Everyone else (including those working the corn) becomes a priest, engineer or citizen specialist. We won’t starve Delhi, but we’re preparing to just in case it turns out that we want to gift it to Zara. We don’t want to hand him the keys to a 17-pop city if we can help it.
Just so that you know, if we are losing more Food than the amount of Food that exists in our Foodbox, we WILL shrink a population Size.

So, if we aren't going to shrink Delhi until after the Secretary General election, then there is no need to "start" shrinking the City now--it can equally be shrunk in 1 turn at a later date.

Also, with the 2 Forest chops + Bureaucracy, we'll have more than enough Hammers for the UN, so there is no need to run Citizen Specialists or to stop working the Corn Resources.

We should only be losing Food in Delhi's Foodbox if we have a need for doing so, otherwise, if we keep Delhi, we may want to turn around and do our best to grow 1 population point there.

Just working the Hammer-based squares plus an Engineer should be more than enough... switch from Wealth to a buiding (The UN), click on the City Governor, and then click on the Emphasize Hammers icon. You can then remove the City Governor, but that should give you an idea of what configuration to start with...
simply switch two of the GIrr squares to GRiv Cot squares and we're good to go.


Burn 1 GE on the UN (1290 hammers)
That's another great reason to use Delhi, as we'll get more base Hammers out of the bargain.


Buddhism
GP Farm will start on a Buddhist missionary on T277.
Is there any reason not to start on a Buddhist Missionary on T276?

Worst case, Delhi is so fast in producing them that Grt Person Farm can just switch to building something else if it can't complete the Buddhist Missionary in time, but we might as well "go for it" from the start at T276, right?


Confucianism Backup-plan
The Apostolic Palace has been obsoleted by Mass Media. It appears that we did not vote for Zara to be Apostolic Palace Resident, so we didn't get +2 for free with Zara.

So, our Confucian Missionaries SHOULD NOT be spread to the AIs.

That means that we have a Confucian Missionary in Barcelona that can head to Isabella's west coast, to be picked up by one of the Galleons there. Perhaps it can even be part of the units trip of taking the Buddhist Missionary up north, even if it means taking 1 more turn to shuffle the boats into place, just to save us from having to move the boats forwards and then backwards and then forwards and backwards again, overall saving us a turn.

We should ONLY attempt to spread Confucianism in Chinook if our Buddhist Missionary has already tried to be spread, failure or not.


Meanwhile, on T276, you can take the 2 Confucian Missionaries on the western continent (you'll have to wake them up) and send them to Trebizond. We should have a reasonably good chance of being able to spread them to our two Barb Cities there, since both Cities only have 1 Religion, are both large-sized, and are closest to the Confucian Holy City out of all Religions' Holy Cities.

If we fail to spread Buddhism everywhere, we can use Irgy's trick of switching Religions after we've won the Diplo Victory vote.

My suggestion, if you play until that last turn, is not to upload until we've had a chance to comment and ask you questions... it could be that something simple like switching Religion or moving a unit on the turn after a Diplo Victory could mean the difference between us being counted as having won or not under the game's conditions.


Mehmed's Cities
As a backup plan, our troops in Izmir and the ones to the south will begin to march toward Mehmed’s city north of Cordoba. We will try to capture this city so that we can gift it to Isabella. Once she has this city, she should be willing to accept Izmir in trade as well.
Sounds fine to me.


Barb Area's Military Units to help out Isabella
If you can, try to get a Galleon over to the Barb Area to be able to bring in 2 more Military Units for support purposes, either to help with this City to the north of Cordoba (they probably can't get there in time) or more likely, to unload in Barcelona to help out Isabella in the war against Mehmed.


Tech Trading
Justinian will get Liberalism (per Dhoom's suggestion).
Saladin will get Liberalism (per Dhoom's suggestion).
I've rethought my suggestion.

Toku currently has the techs for Privateers, but Justinian and Saladin will first have to manually learn Gunpowder and Chemistry, as Toku won't trade those techs to them.

This way, Toku can have some competition for overseas settling and/or capturing of Barb Cities.

If Toku gets more votes, it'll be just that much harder to face him in a Diplo Vote. If the other two get more votes and if they prefer to vote for us (after the Fair and Forthright trading, that should be the case), then it's better to let them have Galleons, since Toku will already have his own.

This way, hopefully, Justinian and Saladin won't get to Privateers on time, but they will have beefier boats that will cause trouble for Toku's Privateers.

It's a "fine line" as there is a chance, albeit a small chance, that Justinian or Saladin will beeline Chemistry, but if either one of them does, it's 2 techs that they will have to learn but then they'll need some time to start building Privateers from scratch.


Toku will get Printing Press.
We want Toku to remain at war with Mehmed. It also wouldn't hurt to have Justinian get a bit angry at Toku. Why don't we use one of Education and Printing Press to bribe Toku into Peace with Mehmed and the other tech to bribe Toku back into war with Mehmed?

We could even wait until the turn that The UN is built, so that if Saladin likes Mehmed for Shared Religion, he should hate Toku by -1 for having declared on his friend. Once The UN gets built, it will force Mehmed and Saladin to meet each other.

I don't care too much either way as to the timing of this bribery out of war and back into it, so there are two options for you: immediately or on the turn that The UN has been completed.


City Builds
All other cities will build wealth.
If and when a Confucian Missionary gets spread, we should consider switching one of the Wealth-building Cities to a Confucian Missionary, in case we need a backup.

Yes, Confucianism is our backup plan, but it doesn't hurt to have a backup to our backup plan, does it? ;)


Research
Set research to Communism. We probably won’t finish any more techs if everything goes according to plan, but the free great person could come in handy if something goes bad in our plan.
That sounds fine, as we missed the race to Economics. Actually, it happened so quickly that we might not have won that race had we tried for it (Saladin must have had Economics in his targeting sights).
 
Do we really expect we can win the diplo victory vote without Toku's support? Getting to more votes than Toku in the SG election is one thing, Mehmed's abstention vote won't hinder us and we really just need to get one of Justinian and Saladin and have a slightly higher pop. For the diplo victory on the other hand we don't just need to be in the lead, we need to have a certain %age of the vote. The benefit of gifting to Zara is not just that it's easier to make ourselves preferred to him, it's that he doesn't have much population, so the %age lost by him voting for himself is small.

My question basically is, is it even possible for us to get a high enough %age of the votes for a diplo win if neither Toku or Mehmed are voting for us? Even if we can, will we be relying on Zara and Isabella to vote for us? They might prefer us to Tokugawa, but do they like us enough to vote for us in a diplo win rather than abstain - the cutoff for not abstaining is higher for the diplo win vote.

If we are still going to need to gift the UN, I'm a little dubious about gifting it in Dehli and losing all our wonders. Earlier on we didn't build the pyramids in Riverdale partly so that we didn't have to gift it, but now we're gifting it in Dehli.

Just to offer an alternative; if max out and starve Crabs for 2 turns while running Caste System, run 3 specialists for 5 turns of Slavery while growing, then switch back to Caste System and run as many specialists as possible, what turn will the great person come? Can we still get it in place in time? If so, then the only delay for building in Riverdale is the 1 turn longer it takes to build the UN. Are the down sides of the UN in Dehli really worth that 1 turn?
 
Toku or Zara
Do we really expect we can win the diplo victory vote without Toku's support?
The beauty of the plan is that by building The UN in Delhi, we can save several turns off of our victory date.

We will also still have the option to go up against either Toku or Zara, because we'll be moving the capitol.

It's similar to my idea of building a Palace in Riverdale, but just done in reverse.

Anyway, if we built a Palace in Riverdale, we'd have needed to have built a second Palace elsewhere.

The Secretary General election, if Mitchum screenshots the results, will tell us the exact number of votes. Those numbers can be approximated already, but then we'll know how close our approximations match the real numbers and can act accordingingly (gifting The UN or hanging onto it).

Right now, there is no "100% plan" to go against Toku in a Diplo Victory vote. The plan keeps our options open of being able to go up against either Toku or Zara.
 
Buddhist Missionaries
Plus, if Buddhism spread is successful in Chinook, we can whip a Buddhist missionary there for Izmir.
Ummm, we'd have to switch into Org Religion for this idea to work, which probably shouldn't happen if we want to win Diplomatically.

So, it would be ideal if Mehmed recaptured this City, but if he does not, you'll have to put a strong focus on taking his City to the north of Cordoba, so that Isaballa will take both of them off of our hands.

Sure, if we can spread Buddhism there, fine, but we'll need a Buddhist Missionary from Delhi or Grt Person Farm, not from anywhere else.
 
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