SGOTM 11 - One Short Straw

[shyuhe]

There are plenty of ways Ducks could be slaughtering us. MoM + 2 (or 3) GAs for starters. Don't forget we burned a couple GPs early on and didn't get any GGs. Then there's Aksum, which captured some time ago would have been a GP farm galore, and there's Saladin. I think we did pretty well, but this game could have been won quite a bit faster, if a team had taken some chances or made some pretty obvious assumptions. We made a lot of correct assumptions, but missed the obvious one that we could DoW Zara a lot earlier if we wanted. Worker-farming alone, Zara or Sal, would have given any team a big advantage over us.

I'm not convinced that this game is possible to win significantly earlier than 1000 AD, especially with the constraints. But I guess we'll find out soon enough I'd be very interested to know how a team beats our date since it'll be through the use of a totally different strategy - we only lost a few turns to MM issues.

 

[babybluepants]

T+0 - switch to max cash, start moving galleons to set up galleon chain from Aksum to Devil fort.
T+1 - 2-fish pops GP, send to boat at Aksum. Put cities back to minimal growth and max cash (no starvation).
T+3 - complete UN; Delhi -- missionary, Bombay -- missionary, DevilsGate -- missionary. UN secretary vote.
T+4 - rush buy missionaries. We become UN secretary.

Why wouldn't we start missionaries outside of Delhi on T+1 and rush-buy T+2?

 

[shyuhe]

For no particular reason Good point bbp. Although if we succeed on rush buying the UN, we won't have cash to buy any missionaries...

 

[mdy]

T+4 - rush buy missionaries. We become UN secretary.
T+5 - Delhi missionary to deer, Bombay missionary to incense, DevilsGate missionary to hop on boat near Justinian. GP gets on boat at Aksum and sets sail. Incense -- missionary, rice -- missionary, Delhi -- missionary (back-up).
T+6 - rush buy missionaries.
T+7 - Incense missionary to oasis, rice missionary to gold city. Delhi missionary to any city with failed spread. Assuming we get spreads everywhere, we're done with OR. So revolt to Rep/VASSALAGE/THEOCRACY. Set cities to max growth.

Looks good to me. We should be able to get everything into position in time regardless of whether we win 8 turns or 10 turns after we have built the U.N.

Somewhere around T+5 or T+6, we should re-negotiate the silk and dye trade deals just to be safe. Also, I'm not looking at the map so my transit numbers might be off.

Is there any risk they may refuse to trade them if we cancel our deals? In this situation it does not look like there is any risk of the AI cancelling them by itself.

 

[babybluepants]

Is there any risk they may refuse to trade them if we cancel our deals? In this situation it does not look like there is any risk of the AI cancelling them by itself.

Kinda wondering the same thing...

 

[LowtherCastle]

I'm not convinced that this game is possible to win significantly earlier than 1000 AD, especially with the constraints. But I guess we'll find out soon enough I'd be very interested to know how a team beats our date since it'll be through the use of a totally different strategy - we only lost a few turns to MM issues.

At the very least we could have easily earned a GG for a GA, and there's little doubt the Ducks got at least one. This was an obvious strategy from the start. The only argument we had against DoWing Zara was some fear that Izzy might wipe him out. Aksum anywhere in the mid-game would have given our economy a big boost and provided us our second-best production site. Anyway, we'll see.

Let's hurry up and finish so we can look...

 

[babybluepants]

Ok, the closest I can get to rush-buying UN is still 119g short, and that's with all cities other than Delhi, Ivory, Gold and Incense starving down... Not gonna happen?

Edit: I wouldn't mind just ending this turn tonight or tmr, so we know where we stand with UN. I guess the question is whether we wanna starve most of our cities for an outside shot at the 2t build. Is it even feasible for the AIs to come up with 100+ in trade cash IBT?

 

[LowtherCastle]

If you're certain that getting the UN one turn earlier leads to the victory election 1t sooner, then of course, you go for it.

 

[babybluepants]

Ok. The max I'm getting is +243gpt. Anyone else wanna try it? Maybe I'm missing something.

 

[shyuhe]

Agree - there's no harm going for the UN vote one turn earlier. It's unlikely but possible that the AI will come up with the requisite cash. Having a little starvation won't hurt us later since all we're doing is just rush buying missionaries.

 

[shyuhe]

Is there any risk they may refuse to trade them if we cancel our deals? In this situation it does not look like there is any risk of the AI cancelling them by itself.

If the AI pick up the resource we are trading from within their own borders, I think there's a chance they will cancel the deal on their own. So I thought it'd be good to re-negotiate to trade them a resource they don't have and can't pop from a mine (i.e., not silver, gold, or gems).

 

[babybluepants]

Edit: nevermind

 

[shyuhe]

I got +243 gold as well. If we gift some units to Toku, that should help shave a few gpt but that's about it... So we're still going to be 100+ish gold short.

Honestly, I think we should just go with a 3 turn UN build. We will need the cash to rush buy missionaries anyways, and it's highly unlikely that the AI will generate 100 gold in a single turn.

 

[babybluepants]

Edit: I'm honestly ok with either one. We'd have to get really lucky to pull off that extra turn.

 

[babybluepants]

PRE-PLAY PLAN

Immediate

Max out gpt to +243, starving away 9 pop
Gift 4 units to Tokugawa
Workers around Delhi start farming over grass workshops
Gold galley to 2W of Rice; Justinian galley to 1S of Philippopolis; Aksum galleon to 1NW of Aksum

Assuming 3t UN build:

T+01 Start missionaries in Bombay, Rice and Devil's Gate; last GP born - send to Aksum. Cities to max growth (we have too much cash anyway). Zhou runs artists/culture as needed for 2t pop.
T+02 Buy 3 missionaries; Bombay - Incense, Rice - Gold, DG - Justinian; move 4 workers to fur.
T+03 UN complete - max food and build wealth; spread in Incense - start missionary; Zhou to max growth; camp fur.
T+04 Spread in Gold and Trebizond; start missionaries in Delhi and Devil's Gate; buy missionary in Incense
T+05 GP loads galleon and set sail; buy missionaries in Delhi and Devil's Gate; Incense missionary to Oasis
T+06 Spread in Oasis; Delhi missionary to Varanasi; start another missionary if needed
T+07 Spread in Iconium and Varanasi; most likely, switch to Representation, Vassalage and Theocracy (if all spread successful); renegotiate resource deals with Mehmed and Isabella.
T+11 GP's arrive at fur
T+13 Win

Stop early if Justinian flips or DOW's Toku and captures a big city.

Assuming 2t UN build:

T+01 Buy UN; last GP born - send to Aksum; start missionaries in Bombay, Rice and Devil's Gate; avoid starving and run max cash; Zhou runs artists/culture as needed for 2t pop.
T+02 UN complete; buy missionary in Bombay; take missionary off queue in Devil's Gate; start missionary in Delhi; move 4 workers to fur.
T+03 Spread in Incense - if it succeeds start missionary; buy in Rice; Zhou to minimal growth and max gold; camp fur
T+04 If Incense succeeded, buy in Devil's Gate, else buy in Delhi and take a short break to figure out logistics; send Rice missionary to Gold
T+05 GP loads galleon; buy in Incense; send DG missionary to Trebizond; buy in Incense
T+06 Spread in Gold; start in Delhi; send to Oasis
T+07 Spread in Oasis and Trebizond; buy in Delhi; start more if spread failed; renegotiate resource deals with Mehmed and Isabella?
T+08 Send to Varanasi; buy another if needed
T+09 Spread in Varanasi
T+11 GP's arrive at fur
T+12 Win

Maybe stop early if spreads fail and logistics not entirely clear.

 

[mystyfly]

Looks good - I keep my fingers crossed for a 2t build, hope dies last

Finally got to see the save, looks good. I see a few small things in micro to change: Ivory should work the ivory tile instead of the 1C coast tile (gaining 1g), rice should switch one coast tile and farmed FP tile to rice and marble tiles (2g), switch coast to merchant in sugar (1g), crab to merchant in gold city (1g) and finally switch devils gate from pigs to hamlet (2g) as well as zhou from wheat to coast (2g).

I am aware this probably helps very little but that might just give us the cash... dunno (couldn't participate in the whole money MM discussion since I was without civ access). All MM changes avoid any starvation on this turn (but usually puts the cities very close).

 

[babybluepants]

So, you're a no on starvation? I'd like to get a consensus. LC is yes, you no, me 50:50 leaning yes, shyuhe seems to have flipped to no.

 

[mystyfly]

Well I see that most cities are due to starve in 2+ turns. I thought if we wanted a 2t build we'd need get *much* gold this turn + next turn from AIs to be able to rushbuy. I don't know how much we still need to get but if it's not a big amount I'm all for starvation. We'll have another ~12 turns to regrow our cities should we really need to get more pop.

 

[LowtherCastle]

You're only starving for 1t, right? Once we cash rush, we don't need to starve any more. We can switch to slavery in 5t if we need more misses at the last minute.

 

[mystyfly]

If we need more missies we can buy them. Starvation for more than 1t is very inefficient and I doubt we wanted that in the first place.

edit: Today we have exactly 1 more month till the deadline... I slightly remember some ppl being afraid to finish in time