SGOTM 11 - Who Dat?

[pnp_dredd]

I added that option in blue to the map.

I'll set out an argument for the green site:

I agree that the green site isn't as good as the blue site after size 5, but the green site is very nice up to size 5 (1 surplus food + 11 hammers at size 5). If we were to settle the green site we'd probably chop Pyramids right there, at size 1, before border pops, so we'd use the forests just the same. This will result in much faster Pyramids than settling the blue site, building a road, and waiting for borders to pop.

In that case we'd eventually build HG in the green city too, so that we don't dilute our GE points.

I don't see us using the whip too much. We'll be in Representation and Caste System to make the most of Scientist specialists. Yes we can flip into Slavery easily, but every time we whip we'll lose specialists and hurt our tech rate. I see the green site as a good production city that leaves the capital in particular to focus on growth and specialists.

We'll have some more warriors soon, once we get that first settler out, and we can see what's further west, which will be nice.

 

[Fluroscent]

Yeah we probably want to use caste more than the whip. If no whipping, then we will just run scientists to cap growth instead of whipping. Those decisions will be easier to make along the way though.

The blue site is also better until size5, since it has more food. I don't think the capital can spare the corn that early to make it worth it.
I am still much in favor of collecting the GE points in the capital, since we will want to run scientists everywhere else. Mids+aqueduct+HG+forge is a lot of hammers, even with stone. The green city will be hard pressed to find those hammers in any reasonable time frame. As will any city besides the capital as it seems right now. Corollary: Tech Mathematics before chopping mids. We will have to see how it can work though, with our tech rate set to suffer a bit with three cities (another reason to get coastal with the 3rd, since the 4th may not be economically feasible that early).

A coastal city is an important goal early. Meeting AI to trade with, and get overseas trade routes+ time to grow diplo bonusses earlier is not a small deal. And if we are isolated with Zara, then we will know earlier so we can adjust by going for optics.

 

[beestar]

Thanks for doing the map, pnp_dredd

Is the plan to chop Oracle out of the yellow city? There's very little food/population there until the first border pop. We could build a monument first to get the borders growing, and then work the Wheat and Cow to whip food into hammers and finish the Oracle.

I like the green city because it can start working Copper and Corn immediately and grow quickly (A coastal city does have the advantage of putting out some scouting WBs, and I think we would want to build the blue city later anyyay, to make a nice riverside floodplain cottage site).

We could conceivably stick a later city a few tiles east of Delhi on the coast. This could pick up a seafood, give us naval access to the southern sea, and maybe work some river tiles without contending too much with Ethiopian culture (I'm assuming there is a seafood 2 or 3 tiles east of the seafood). Would be nice to know what's in that fog to the east - we should send a warrior that way to get an idea of what Zara might do.

Exploration, exploration, exploration!

 

[Fluroscent]

Is the plan to chop Oracle out of the yellow city? There's very little food/population there until the first border pop. We could build a monument first to get the borders growing, and then work the Wheat and Cow to whip food into hammers and finish the Oracle.

The plan is to work the PHF and build the oracle at size 1 while chopping the nearby forests (yes, those outside the culture borders too). It is 5 off the bat, which we will have a hard time matching for Oracle speed by building monument/growing first. Oracle will pop borders soon enough.
That is the idea anyway, but we should definitely test it in the testgame once the city is founded...

I like the green city because it can start working Copper and Corn immediately and grow quickly (A coastal city does have the advantage of putting out some scouting WBs, and I think we would want to build the blue city later anyyay, to make a nice riverside floodplain cottage site).

It can only work the copper once either it or the capital pops borders.
The blue site is better unless we steal the capitals corn, which I don't think is worth it. It can get a chopped monument and has two FP farms in its inner ring. We need the capital to grow and work as many cottages as possible asap. And that is after it builds us our early warriors/settlers/workers until the other cities can take over.
Pyramids=farms. Anything outside the capital (because it gets the Bureau bonus) should focus on food to feed specs.

It is all about priority at this point. We want to settle all the cities, but we must remember what we are trying to do here, and that is to grab Oracle-CoL, block Zara off, explore both land and sea and grab stone in time for Pyramids. I have a hard time seeing a 4th city in time to help with any of these goals(detrimental probably, if it delays something like math) -> 3rd city should be coastal with stone.

We may also uncover much better sites when exploring, and it would be annoying to have to build a weaker coastal city just because we didn't do it earlier.

We could conceivably stick a later city a few tiles east of Delhi on the coast. This could pick up a seafood, give us naval access to the southern sea, and maybe work some river tiles without contending too much with Ethiopian culture (I'm assuming there is a seafood 2 or 3 tiles east of the seafood). Would be nice to know what's in that fog to the east - we should send a warrior that way to get an idea of what Zara might do.

Yeah, explore explore, but that is going to have to wait until the capital is done with the settler
The visible seafood S is a whale, so not much help there. Either way, it is going to be hard to beat Zara to any useful spot to the east if it is at earliest the 4th city. Our priority is to make sure we can settle the west at our leisure. Zara getting a few more cities does not exactly hurt our cause anyway.
Still, I am not against sending the next built warrior that way, although we will also need to start fogbusting in earnest by then

 

[pnp_dredd]

I am ok with orb finishing his set following this plan, which means that we can choose Priesthood before AH. Maybe finish the set at Meditation (8T more). Not much should happen, and the worker moves should still follow the earlier plan.

I agree with this. Let's keep the turns rolling. Nothing's likely to change up to Meditation. Pray to the RNG gods. Keep the warriors fortified on forested hills. Once the workers have farmed the corn we'll need to decide which forests to chop. Break at that point even if we haven't finished Meditation.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

A couple things I'd like to point out:

1. How many turns do we lose on oracle by settling yellow 1E? Settling on the plains hill is faster now, but also forgoes irrigation to the wheat forever. Post civil service, we can irrigate the wheat if we go 1E. I'm still leaning on hurrying to oracle to avoid missing it, but it's worth considering our options. Either way, that's IMO the best 2nd city to block.

2. I am with Fluroscent on settling the blue city 3rd if we get oracle to block reliably. When you are dealt bad/limited land, pressing wonders can allow a powerful capitol to alleviate things with GPP and representation (it gives us stone). As he points out, this also opens up chops.

3. We should start thinking about where to farm GPP...I don't see any good spots outside the capitol for that yet, and the capitol is definitely not best-used in that fashion. If we can get seafood along with the triple or quad lake deer, that would be decent...otherwise west.

4. I am not the king of micro so my play doesn't fit 100% well in succession games (though I do try), but I *can* play if needed now, unlike past SGOTMs . The micro planning I am not as good at is also why I am not super active here ATM...but I'm watching.

 

[beestar]

I was thinking about the wheat irrigation problem. Cities transmit irrigation if their tile allows for a farm. A city on a hill doesn't transmit irrigation - does a city on desert?

Why does everyone want to tech Meditation first? Is it actually better than AH first? Having visibility of horses early is valuable, and being able to Pasturize is useful if our 3rd city is settled while we are building Oracle / teching Writing. Meditation does nothing for us in the short term.

 

[Fluroscent]

Correct, a city on the desert is the only on a desert is the only way to irrigate the wheat. We could test it for oracle speed, which is always a bit of an issue on higher levels. I have played some random immortal starts on water maps lately, and oracle has gone pre 1800BC every time, which makes me a bit nervous (I know, this is "only" emperor, but still).
But beating the AI to oracle is not the only issue. There is also that of getting our 2nd border pop before Zara might be tempted to sneak by a settler party, and getting Confucianism properly spread earlier (the missionary, I assume, is best sent to Zara, so we will be hoping for quick autospread to Delhi).
Irrigating the wheat post CS seems like a very minor issue in comparison. But a test is definitely in order, regardless even, to make sure we don't build it faster than we can tech writing anyway

@beestar, medi-PH first is so that the 2nd city can build oracle immediately (or almost, not sure). There will be no pasture resources in any borders before that anyway. Revealing horses is not really that much of a concern, since we will have copper soon enough if needed.
We are getting AH as a prerequisite to writing anyway, so it should be in time for the 3rd city and all anyway.

 

[pnp_dredd]

AH first would be the right option if there are horses on the unforested grassland that we are giving up if we settle Green city 1E!

But I think that otherwise fastest Oracle is the way to go. We do need to test out an Oracle build. I'll have a go at worldbuilderating a test save with the relevant land.

 

[beestar]

If I can make a fine distinction, the goal is fastest CoL, rather than fastest Oracle. I predict we will be in a position where Oracle is built but we're waiting around for Writing to finish. If the Writing branch is the limiting factor, then it doesn't matter whether we tech Meditation or AH first. And given the two, AH is better as it helps us strategically with the horses - we can use that information as early as possible. Meditation does nothing for us early, so we might as well get it later.

Having said that, I'm happy to try to prove it to you guys when pnp_dredd does his worldbuilderating

 

[TheMeInTeam]

If I can make a fine distinction, the goal is fastest CoL, rather than fastest Oracle. I predict we will be in a position where Oracle is built but we're waiting around for Writing to finish. If the Writing branch is the limiting factor, then it doesn't matter whether we tech Meditation or AH first. And given the two, AH is better as it helps us strategically with the horses - we can use that information as early as possible. Meditation does nothing for us early, so we might as well get it later.

Having said that, I'm happy to try to prove it to you guys when pnp_dredd does his worldbuilderating

You can get CoL without having AH at all however, and it might be faster. priesthood ----> writing would limit our absolute early output, but might hike our chances of getting the oracle tech we desire.

And yes, putting the city on desert will allow irrigation spread, and is the only way we can get fresh water there. Whether that's worth it is a micro issue.

 

[Fluroscent]

If we are building Oracle "too fast", we can just save some forest chops instead.
I was thinking that we could do AH-Writing after PH and be done in time for Oracle, but if not, I'd rather skip AH until after writing to speed up Oracle->CoL.
Also looking forward to having a go at it on the test map

 

[pnp_dredd]

ok go nuts with a test save.

This should be pretty close to the current position. I haven't bothered with the stuff directly East because it's not relevant and Zara's land is all wrong too. Can the first person to look at this please have a quick check that everything else is OK? I had some trouble moving warrior2 all the way up to the plains hill, so I worldbuildered him to the right spot. But it did feel like I built the 2nd warrior 1-2 turns slower for some reason?

 

[beestar]

How are you proposing getting to Writing without going through AH - via Pottery? In general AH pays more dividends in the short term, but perhaps there's an argument for starting on cottages in Delhi.

I'm realizing I'm apparently a big fan of husbanding animals

Saving forest chops would slow down the total time needed to complete Oracle + Writing. Ideally we would be chopping Oracle out over the same few turns we finish teching Writing. Getting Writing's prerequisite done early helps to align that synchronization. Well, anyway, off to the test game to prove it ...

 

[pnp_dredd]

priesthood is one of the three possible prereqs for writing!

 

[pnp_dredd]

If we are going to prioritize Maths anyway, is it possible to do a CS sling? COL is obviously the rate-limiting step. Maths (585) + COL (819) is probably too much before we get early techs like pottery and masonry. We can get 23 from the capital just with the silver and 2 scientists, so maths+col will take 60 turns. That's too long. never mind...

 

[Fluroscent]

@beestar Like dredd says, priesthood opens up writing just as well. I forgot this also , not often you go that route

Test maps checks out in my comparison. I checked for beakers/food/hammers/worker turns and they match the real game.
Terrain looks correct too (that which matters for Oracle tests anyway). Good job dredd!

I am going to try out parallel games building Oracle with the Medi-PH path by settling: 1. PH 2. Desert tile 1E.
Also going to note the timing/whether we can fit another tech in before Writing. If AH is too expensive, maybe Wheel instead? Connecting the cities+building a road into Ethiopia is also nice to get started on.

What do you guys think is the latest Oracle date we should consider?

 

[Fluroscent]

It works!

Ok, I had a go at it settling the city on the PH.

T40 - chop+worker complete -> begin corn farm -> begin settler
T43 - farm complete -> begin chop 1N+2N of Delhi
T49 - 2xchop+settler complete -> warrior (lots of overflow)

NOTE - Delhi micro will have to be detailed from here on. I feel a 3rd worker here is best, since we will otherwise just grow into unimproved tiles.

T50 - begin farm 2N of Delhi, both workers. STOP them immediately. Warrior-Warrior(or worker)

NOTE - IF the warrior in trouble survives, THIS warrior should be kept in our borders until Bombay founded or we incur upkeep.

T51 - PH in -> begin AH - Both workers move towards PHF (N of Bombay site)

NOTE - Not only is there just enough time for AH, but we gain a discount on writing by teching AH first.

T52 - Warrior complete, unless we did another worker.
T54 - Bombay founded - Work PHF 5/turn - Begin Oracle. Both workers MINE PHF.

NOTE - Group the workers and we lose a worker turn here...
NOTE - Remember to use binary research to avoid rounding loss.

T59 - mine complete, Bombay 6/turn -Oracle at 29T left. One worker to forest SW of Bombay.
T60 - other worker to forest NW of Bombay, begin chopx2.
T64 - chopx2 complete, workers move back to Delhi. Oracle at 14T, no more chops needed.
T76 - writing complete (unless we incur unit upkeep).
T78 (2050BC) - Oracle -> CoL complete. Border pop in 2T.

I like this result

 

[beestar]

Hey guys, business trip tomorrow and gone for the weekend - will check in on Monday.

If we're keen to keep playing, then orb can keep playing or we can skip my turn.

If we're not in a rush then why don't you guys plan out the entire tech tree strategy, and I'll contribute when I get back

 

[pnp_dredd]

cheers Fluro, that looks pretty good.

If we settle on the desert we'll probably need one extra chop? So the cost of settling on the desert will be 2/turn for lots of turns early on, plus a forest, and the gain is 1 after CS, and an extra 2/turn if we work the mined plains hill (4 from this mined tile, only 2 if the city is on it). I'm a bit concerned that our early hammer output is quite low, particularly if we settle the third city on the coast. However we'll have plenty of warriors and there isn't really anything that we want to spend hammers on outside the Capital (that we can't whip), so that's not a huge problem.

Is there an advantage early on is having both workers farm a forested grassland (i.e. farm instead of chop) around Delhi, then both to chop the second forest? (or the other way round - chop then farm) This gives Delhi an extra improved square to work, but may cost a couple of worker turns. Can we spare the worker turns?

Also, if we are going to tech AH anyway before Writing, then we should tech AH first, so that we can see horses. [edit: just noticed that Fluro's plan has Bombay starting Oracle 3 turns after we get PH, so there's not enough time to fint AH in here]