SGOTM 12 - Plastic Ducks

[kossin]

We can't eliminate any AIs, they must remain alive by endgame - those cities will always be stuck with motherland unhappiness. Easily solved with whipping.

I like the idea, I just think it's too early while we'll only have 2 cities to do anything.

 

[Duckweed]

We are going to adopt HR, so happiness won't be a problem with so many happiness resources available. With ~10 units, we can start conquering. Our capital is an extremely strong productive monster.

 

[kossin]

I guess we should run a few longer tests to get an idea.

Do you want to attack with just Macemen or include Catapults?

 

[BornInCantaloup]

It won't be very hammer efficient to go with maces alone if we face archers + 60% cultural defenses, let alone against a hill city (Paris).

But, if we don't go for a naval invasion, I guess we can start the war with maces and then reinforce with catapults.


Hmmm... Would it make sense to use Caste System to bulb Machinery ? Or would it be cute and inefficient ?

Great Merchant preferences :

Spoiler :

Great Merchant:

Currency
Banking
Economics
Corporation
Metal Casting
Code of Laws
Mining
Constitution
The Wheel
Alphabet (BTS)
Pottery
Sailing
Paper
Railroad
Industrialism
Monarchy
Civil Service
Guilds
Fascism
Mass Media
Agriculture
Writing
Mathematics
Printing Press
Flight
Machinery

EDIT :
@Machinery bulb.
Say : Currency --> Litterature --> Music + Philo bulb --> Golden Age --> Metal Casting --> Paper --> Machinery bulb.

I guess it would take much longer than a Machinery beeline, but there are marble benefits.

 

[Duckweed]

I guess we should run a few longer tests to get an idea.

Do you want to attack with just Macemen or include Catapults?

Cats for sure, the first few macemans need combat promotion for battles in the field.

@BIC
The spirit of beeline to Machinery is to send our SOD to the French front as soon as possible. The choice between war route and peace route can be described in this way -- ~20 turns earlier of ~5 mature cities conquered from 2 AIs vs 20 turns of the gain from TGL and NE plus ~3 new cities surrounded by fallouts.

 

[kossin]

@BIC
You forgot Alphabet, Paper, Monarchy so it's not going to happen - even with a GS. EDIT: nm misread, you included some of them, but it's still a hassle.

@Duckweed
As we need Catapults, we should probably tech HBR soon as well to include War Elephants in the SoDs as they're cheaper.

BTW Literature detour is not completely exclusive to the "Macemen rush", it gives more time for the other cities to mature for contribution, and it's definitely not 20 turns longer.

I'll try to compare 2 runs after dinner.

 

[kossin]

2 tries.

1- Machinery skipping Aesthetics/Literature/Poly 5 cities, 50BC
2- Machinery after Poly/Aesthetics/Literature 5 cities, 150AD

My micro wasn't perfect as I played in a hurry- and I'm pretty certain it wasn't the same in both cases too!

It's 8 turns after... but the 2 later mainland cities are much closer to being able to contribute some units. I suppose we'll use those 2 cities for whipping catapults anyway... however they won't be ready in either case to whip very much.

I don't know how Gandhi's land is in the real game but he could very well make a grab for TGL... if we want to use it then it'll be risky to delay it for a long time.

I'd estimate it as ~8 turns earlier per captured city vs 20~30(or more) turns of TGL. Naturally, it's certain that option 2 is weaker in hammers but it's stronger in beakers for certain (despite GLH traderoutes, we'll have to check the maintenance of cities which will be through the roof for far away cities).

Regardless, I think the time dates for the first SoD is not when we first research Machinery, it's when the later cities can start contributing as well... Moscow can't build everything even if we somehow were to do 1 unit/turn, it'd take a good 20 turns to mass sufficient numbers.

 

[Duckweed]

@kossin

HBR -- I don't think it's necessary when we are not facing knights. The major reason is that WE's promotion is not very good, while CR macemans are more effective and last longer.

We really don't need a sizable SOD to deal with DG, 2 cats plus ~5 macemans is enough to take his capital (sending 2 cats and 2 macemans to bombard his capital and 3 macemans follow).

However, we can postpone this issue to next set. let's go for Currency->MC for the next set. MC before Lit also let capital finish forge before TGL is available, we can chop the 4 forests into TGL.

Where's dingding? Or kossin can just go ahead, dingding can always jump in when he feel that he can commit with enough time.

Edit: It seems that FE and T.. also completed Oracle, guess what did they take?

 

[dingding]

War plan:

It's a efficient way to pay low cost and obtain high return. Mature city without fallout + workers captured is cool.

Tech path: if war plan is considered as a priority, so as Machinery. Thus I will think that Currency is not major in the path given that we have GLH bonus. OTOH, Esth+Liter is not contradictory with the war plan: TGL = 2 free pop focused on Liber beelining (and be built in St Petersburg, later be a GP farm); HE is +66% bonus on unit-spamming in the cap. (Will try the tech path this afternoon)

Expansion: The marble is necessary for the Liter-line, if it's the way to go. In this cas the southern part of the continent can be "borrowed" to DG. How is an offshore city? I think it would be a 7th - 8th city. But need worker prework on the island.

I have the whole day afterwards and will update the tests later.

 

[kossin]

@Duckweed
Hmm, in that case I guess it makes more sense to go right after them after a straight Machinery beeline. However there are a few things that could work better with a slightly larger force:
-capture cities faster because of long time to bombard
-capture bigger cities due to less whipping from AI

Even if we capture size 1 cities, it is still worthwhile but I'd prefer capturing larger cities

I believe FE Oracled Civil Service with a GS bulb of Mathematics. Their score is good and the difference to ours is probably small techs like Sailing, Masonry + less developed secont city. A quick test in WB yields just about their score. (242 vs 238... maybe skipped Agriculture?)

T'... went for something else I think, their power graph is all over the place... Construction? Currency? MC? They definitely got BW and possibly even Archery (maybe IW too).

 

[Duckweed]

@dingding

I mentioned 2 ways of tech path before, the benefit of Currency->Machinery is to make friend with Gandhi and also gain BW and Pottery from trade, the disadvantage is that this speeds up Gandhi's research and introduce more risk on our future plan. The other way is the same as you want -- research to Machinery all by ourselves. I don't have a stronger preference of one to another. We can vote for this issue.

@kossin
Yes, I also want bigger city 1st and I only mentioned French capital. We should be able to take Paris with the small initial stack. Reinforcement will take care of the rest. There won't be 20~30 turns delay of TGL, it's the turn of research needed to Lit since we can time the chop of forest and finish TGL in 1 turn.

BTW, AI won't whip archer when he feel his defense is safe. There isalways a trick to kill archers in the open field when we move forces near 1 city, macemans can accomplish this easily.

 

[kossin]

@dingding
Offshore cities are really great on the economy due to GLH, it's about 10 extra science/gold per turn without Currency. I don't really see any reasons to delay those... as a result in my tests I usually had St-Pete build GLH>wb>wb... First wb explores island north (and look for another further north - see this post about island possibility). That first wb can then come back and net the Clams for the health. Second wb should head south to the island we spotted there to investigate. Another settler should claim that island when possible.

The whole area to our south is so fallout full that we'll need to dedicate a large worker force before settling it (like 10 workers for 8 turns maybe). Moreover there's going to be quite a bit of culture pressure from DG for as long as Paris stands.

The other area I'd consider settling is north west where there's a corn available.

 

[dingding]

Tech path:

From my tests, I prefer Aest=>Poly=>Liter to Currency.

Comparing Aest=>Liter=>Currency to Currency=>Aest=>Liter, I may delay 10 turns of Currency/BW, but I gain 7~8 turns of GLH + NE (I built it in St Petersbourg). Currency can allow us to make friend with Gandhi, but Aest+Liter will do as well.

OTOH, I don't have any doubt to tech Currency, sooner or later. We can gain some trade + relationship improvement from it.

Vote:

I may want to know your preferences before making the plan:
1) Tech path (next tech)
2) Where to settle the 3rd city? (issue linked to the tech path, if prioritize GLH, I may choose to settle in the 2 deers site)

3) Where to build TGL? (this vote isn't for this set, but we'll need it later as well. Yes, in St Petersbourg.)

 

[kossin]

@Duckweed
TGL = 350H
Bureau+Forge+Marble
chop = 30*(1+.5+.25+1) = 82.5H
1 pop whip = 52H+marble = 104H

So it's 3 forest chops + a max OF pop whip to 1-turn TGL... if we time all 6 chops available then we have enough hammers to 2-turn TGL+NE... not a bad investment but it means -3 health... we're going to have to clear 7 fallouts around Moscow = 49 worker turns to avoid unhealthiness. Combined with 24 for chops, that's 73 worker turns !eek!

Alternatively, we can leave some of the forests and do another whip to OF into NE to reduce the workforce required.

Checked the math and we can get TGL done 12 turns after the test I did with Currency>...>Lit>...Machinery...
~8 turns earlier captured cities vs 12 turns TGL - you are correct again, the former is better.

@dingding
Definitely against giving Aesth+Lit to Gandhi... we'd be forced to tech Music right away to avoid losing the GA.

I haven't tried MC>Machinery without Currency yet - usually the capital has spare hammers so I have it build wealth while growing.

I'm pretty certain we won't get trade routes with Gandhi as he's probably behind all the AIs on this big landmass... therefore I think we shouldn't accelerate his teching now in exchange for Pottery+BW.

->No gift to Gandhi

I'm undecided between Currency>MC>Machinery>Construction and MC>Machinery>Construction *(may require IW as well if no copper)

I'm guessing Currency>...>Machinery is probably about as fast as straight to Machinery... maybe 2 turns behind?

Look at the rough math I did in the first part of post, I think TGL can be postponed to start war earlier... war is just so much more profitable and the resources especially.

1) Currency>...>Machinery no gift!
2) 3rd city: silver+deers We've already begun to clean it and the silver will add to total commerce
4th city on marble... there isn't anywhere else that's as easy to setup
3) Do you mean Moscow or really St-Pete? (Capital=Moscow - name is wrong in test game, I need to fix that )

 

[Duckweed]

@kossin

IIRC, capital still has 1 extra health atm. Chopping forests lose 3 health, which can be compensated by the 2 new health resource and granary. We only need to clear 2 fallout to enable the capital grow to size 7, which is the size to work all 6 improved tiles and 1 for copper or iron if available. I think growing capital furthermore is less important atm as those farms are not very good to work on. I prefer to pump settlers and workers from capital continuously and aim to settle 2 island cities as soon as possible.

@ the vote
1. Currency->beeline to Forge, whether to gift can be decided after currency.
2. 3rd city on the ruin (just cleared), 4th city on Marble
3. Capital

@BIC
vote and then we can move on. We have spent 3 days on this set without getting the plan up.

 

[dingding]

@ All:

OK I'll make the plan within today.

 

[kossin]

Looking forward to plan

Kinda sad that we're stuck as a 4-horse team
Stop being busy and play civ 4

 

[BornInCantaloup]

Sorry for the few quiet days on my part.
I've read the thread but didn't post due to... having only little to say. I'll have to run longer tests, I guess, to have a strong opinion.

Vote:

I may want to know your preferences before making the plan:
1) Tech path (next tech)
2) Where to settle the 3rd city? (issue linked to the tech path, if prioritize GLH, I may choose to settle in the 2 deers site)

3) Where to build TGL? (this vote isn't for this set, but we'll need it later as well. Yes, in St Petersbourg.)

1) Currency -> Metal Casting is fine with me. Straight MC would be ok as well but, as far as trading is concerned, I prefer to trade Currency to MC. Currency may speed up Gandhi, right, but is it that bad ? Having trade partners is a good thing.
2) 3rd city on the city ruins : 2 deers + silver. 4th city... depends on copper location.
3) In capital : we already have an academy, there. And if we go for the NE in St Pete, there wouldn't be any problem, right ? We can get GPs from 2 different cities...

 

[Duckweed]

^
1) The problem of Gandhi is that he might force us to research Music and finish Liberalism earlier than expected. However, I still lean toward trade with him.
2) 4th city can be settled in ~10 turns and only the marble site can be available. Capital can produce a settler in 3~4 turns, so there's no problem to grab the copper in short time, the limited factor is the worker force to clear the site. There's good chance that copper is already in our culture border if you take a look at the T... team's power.
3) NE should be with TGL in capital since it will add 12 GPPs right from the bat. It's obvious that capital will build many more wonders than SP and hence a major GP farm before Sushi. After Sushi, basically any city can be a GP farm. Moreover SP will be busy at producing galleys and Colossus.

 

[kossin]

What do we gain from gifting Gandhi Currency? Pottery? BW? In exchange for what?

Do you only want to do it to build OB bonus?