SGOTM 12 - Regular

[archphoenix]

this is the save1170 ad

let ensure the sci civ survival.
Ottoman:
2nd city on a island, safe when mainland city remain.
babylon:
2 citys. don't see any danger.
russia:
2 citys. locate on south mainland, don't know.
sumerian:
2 citys. near english(now our land).
Greece:
2 citys. locate on south mainland, powerful.

1100AD
investigate all zulu citys,
Berlin, amazing, 20units!(1 archer, 1 horseman, 6swordmans,8 imps, 4 masketmans)
Zimbabwe:3 masketmans;
leipzig: 2 imps, 2 masketmans.
ulundi: 1 imp, 1 masketmans.

inner turn:
combustion finished, sell france refine and steel for Music+69gpts.
gift france combustion.

1120AD
mass prod cost 5600, we have 1212bpt, too hard for 4 turns,
dow to zulu, land unit near leipzig. units approach zimbabwe.
gift Joan 40gpts.

1130AD
army(Persian Regiment) take leipzig, capture 2 slaves.
army(550AD Regiment) whip 2 masket in Zimbabwe.
combat imp is a un-luck thing, 1 elite AC lost, 1 cav 1 hp left, 1 cav 2 hp left.
(no more combat log)

inner turns:
imps are the best units to pillage tiles.

1140AD
take Zimbabwe.
investigate viking citys, each have 3 pikemans.(maybe basakers are wandering around)
many citys are pop-full, so change Rome from worker city to break-provide city.

inner turn:
iro and Amer sign peace.

1150AD
massive zulu units come out from berlin, we ship a army to steal berlin.

inner turns:
Joan want us leave, we sign a ROP.
massive sumerian units want to take us english land.

1160AD
whip zulu out.
join too many workers, india land need clear-pollution worker group.
anonyed ottoman spear re-appear, what a regret, why I not block the way?

1170AD
sumerian not DOW to us, their units just take a road.
Mass Prod researched, Motor 5 turns. I think we can get it in 4 turns.
not ANY move this turn.

post play conclusion:
we need some units guard england.
I ship 11 cavs to france, I take a look on viking, few guards in citys.
zulu just whip out. how to use these units?
I gift Joan combustion, wish she get flight just 1 turn fast than us.
india land need a worker gang.
rome worker factory was changed.
egpty land need 3 more worker gang to clear hill pollution.

 

[PaperBeetle]

many citys are pop-full, so change Rome from worker city to break-provide city.
...
join too many workers, india land need clear-pollution worker group.
egpty land need 3 more worker gang to clear hill pollution.

See, it's never too late to build more workers!

As for the Vikings; it sounds interesting. I must admit I hadn't really considered attacking anyone who was already industrial. We currently buy the Viking silk. That deal was made in 1020ad mainturn. Does anyone know exactly how and when it will end? In 1230ad it will have 1 turn to run, so does Ragnar come to us in the 1230>1240 interturn saying he won't renew (we bought the silk with tech of course)? Or do we get the 1240ad mainturn in which we can cleanly cancel the deal and then dow? I think it's the latter, but it needs confirmation.
And we still need one more town. America, Celts, Iroquois?

Also I have been thinking about the interturn that we go modern. I guess we start by going through the first big picture option, and gifting up scientific civs until one gets Fission. Then we see if we can buy it. If not, then we keep gifting until until the next one gets it or we run out of civs.
So, if we have bought Fission then the rest of the tech trading is not interesting.
If Fission did not show up, then we have one more chance to get it: ourselves. The only interesting point in this case is that we should not buy Ecology because that opens two more techs, so reducing our chance of getting Fission.
If Fission did show up but we could not afford it then I guess we try to buy the other techs, get our free tech, and go through the second big picture option to have another go at buying Fission.

And if Fission never shows up, then truly we are cursed. Could we delay Kyoto for the duration of our Fission research? If not, we should switch it to docks (only 920 shields lost ) and Constan would do UN, using MASH and SETI as prebuilds. I don't know how long Fission would take, but Constan might be able to do UN in 8 turns, or 9 turns easy. I think that is better than having Kyoto build SETI and no prebuild in Constan?
Edit: research lab is better than docks if we have to drop Kyoto's prebuild.

 

[archphoenix]

re-study my turnset to learn some lesson:
join too many workers. waste a worker's turn is better than join to citys;
join some workers to wrong citys.
when consider change a worker factory, pasar is better than rome in this instance.
most improtant:
prepare more units, whip zulu too dangerous,(see the units' HP in berlin and ulundi)
consider AI's strength, Industrial AI should be tough.

edit:
I take a screenshot on viking's citys. we can look them again before we ship back our cavs, if it still be 3 pikes, maybe viking follow the Zulu...

 

[Kulko]

Well Sorry guys, I have a technical Problem on my Civ Laptop. can't write a letter which is part of my Password after i spilled some water on the keyboard.

Looks like you might just skip me again and finish teh game without me.

 

[socralynnek]

That means, it is my turn again....

I'll look into the save today and make a plan and play tomorrow.

 

[Taxpayer'sMoney]

Are we still on to beat Klarius (assuming they finish the turn after their last save)? Would that put us in second? I wish you all the best of luck and hope to be your official lurker the next time round...

 

[PaperBeetle]

Well Sorry guys, I have a technical Problem on my Civ Laptop. can't write a letter which is part of my Password after i spilled some water on the keyboard.

Looks like you might just skip me again and finish teh game without me.

Ah, the comedy.
For every problem there is a solution of course. Well, apart from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict perhaps.
Anyway, you can always find the missing letter in another document, ctrl-c it, and then use ctrl-v to put it in your typing. Unless the broken letter is c or v...

No, we won't beat klarius or Ivan unless they played final turnsets that were more than a turn or two. And it is likely that teams would save just before going modern, to get their plans straight. On the other hand, if they didn't get the 1000s palace, then they may have a turn or two of delay...
If we manage to get the palace prebuild up to 1000s (and let's not forget that Kyoto will need to find an extra ~60s by the time we go modern in that case) then I think we expect to win in 1270ad.
Nervous isn't it? I can't wait to read the other team's threads. A special prize for the first Regular to read every post in team Spooks.

 

[Kulko]

Well When the PC asks you to enter the password, there is no place to copy from. I am trying to work around this using ASCII-Shortcuts, but there are some other probs too, so itrs just not working stable right now.

As for the place? Did we lose time somewhere? I thought we were actually one turn short on the first tech?

 

[PaperBeetle]

Touche. For some reason I thought you meant the forum password.
If the password is for logging onto Windows (rather than just for powering up) it would already be able to see an external USB keyboard perhaps? As if anyone had one of those hanging around...
My laptop seems to be on its way out too. Both DVD and hard drives sounding very ill, possibly because I leave the thing spinning a C3C disk for hundred of hours on end . I was hoping it would last through until Civ5 was visible.

We switched the order of Steel and Refining. I think their original order gave us a very slightly better chance to hit the broad target of getting them both in 14 turns, as we had an extra turn to do the harder tech. But switching them was better for our Darwin build. Anyway, in the end it took us 15 turns for those two, so we are a turn late. Now without the game in front of me I can't quite work out whether that means we go modern in 1250>1260 or 1260>1270.

 

[socralynnek]

The good thing is, I only have to MM Kyoto and Con really hard...
We have no chance to get MotT 1 turn sooner and I only have to care to get it in 5 turns.

I can play tomorrow, but I'd stop before that interturn anyway, so PB, if you can play tonight, then go ahead, I'd leave the best (and maybe most tricky) part to you in any case...

I don't know about the Vikings. We couldn't get even one city in the first turn of war. They might still have some annoying Zerks somewhere, so I wouldn't take that risk.

 

[archphoenix]

Motor cost 5600, that's 1400 breaks per turn,
and we get some docks in 1-3 turns.
if we hire scientists in minor citys. that we hit 4 turns tightly.

 

[PaperBeetle]

I'm no hurry to play, as there is much we need to agree, regarding to who to attack.

But first the tech. Motors in 4 turns is easy. I can get it just by doing micro on this turn:
- Seoul will never finish that uni, so work 3 scientists instead of hills.
- Kyoto is going way too fast on palace. Cops and the hill all switch to scientists. It is still only 5 turns to complete, and at this stage needs to say 7 turns to complete.
- Tenoch will overshoot food on growth this turn. Two grass switch to scientists.
- Thebes has plenty of food to burn through. For now, just switch the hill to a scientist.
- Pasar can benefit from a look every turn. Priority #1: growth in 1 turn. Priority #2: max commerce, I make it 46 bpt net. Priority #3: finish the worker, but that follows naturally from 1 and 2 anyway.
- Oporto has priorities similar to Pasar, but is more complex because it has a 2-turn phase. The easy way is to leave it working horse + grass + bg + 2 incense + coast, for 7bpt. Slightly better is to work horse + grass + bg + 2 incense + scientist (9bpt) for turn 1 of the cycle, and turn 2 as above. This still runs as a 2-turn worker pump.
- Rotterdam can't really be squeezed for more beakers, but the mountain should switch to hill, and a bit more micro can get that hospital in 4 turns. No point filling the food box before the hospital is done after all.
- Amsterdam can switch mountain to scientist, for 4 scientists total.
- Tarsus can put one plains to coast without delaying the hospital.
- Hattusas can switch mountain to policeman without delaying university.
- Tatu will never finish uni, and will overrun food, so employ 4 scientists.
- Kara has massive food overrun; 5 scientists in here.
That's enough for Motors in 4 turns, by why stop there?
- Veii has a food overrun this turn. Work both hills and employ a cop for 3spt + 3bpt.
- Rome; I would throw the current build into a privateer and have it get back to worker pumping.
- Lisbon can employ 4 scientists and still grow in 3.
- Bombay can switch a cop to a scientist and still get cav in 2.
- Chichen can finish dock in 1 turn by switching scientists to engineers and one cop. We lose 7 beakers from the scientists, but gain 8 the next turn by having the docks working for an extra turn.
- Cuzco can switch 2 mountains to scientists.

I suggest disband an artillery in Leipzig to get the Zulu towns connected by harbour. Nearby galleons can then upgrade to transport as well (2 on the interturn).
The worker gang at Constan can ride the ship chain up to India to get clearing pollution. The worker gang around Kyoto should probably worry first about putting down some irrigation there to slow down the build. Don't forget we need to keep many workers available in this area to speed the build up again just before we go modern.

So on war... I am okay with the attack on the Vikings. Whether we can get Bergen in 1 turn depends on how many units he has in the forts. We can check that with our cavs in France. But I don't think the forts will impede our movement once they are empty, that is what barricades do?
But we have another target too. The MPP between Carthage and France is over. So those Carthaginian towns look ripe for the picking. We should investigate them first of course. And from Utica we could strike directly at Beijing.

So I think the easiest way to get three more towns is to concentrate all our forces for an attack Carthage and China. The downside is that Ragnar is furious with us, whereas Hanni is only annoyed and Mao is even polite, so we would be knocking out potential favourable votes.
On which subject... we have been assuming we would face Joan in the vote, but (a) that would suggest we dow her first, breaking ongoing deals and (b) she is polite to us. We could let someone else that we don't like be our opponent. Abe perhaps? He's furious with us and we have no ongoing deals. To arrange this we just gift him several large towns like Bombay and Amsterdam (not lux towns) immediately after getting Fission and before arranging the final alliances. We can easily make another civ larger than France.

 

[PaperBeetle]

Oh yeah, if all goes to plan (including 1000s prebuild) we would win in 1260ad - at least level with klarius. You know, I'm wondering if we can cane the empire and get Flight in 4 turns .

Edit... I meant Ivan, not klarius. klarius's last save is two turns before Ivan's, at 1230ad.

 

[socralynnek]

You are right, taht's forts not barricades, that's what I thought first.

And I am stupid...I am kind of a mathematician and when I did 4*1350 yesterday, I got 4600 as a result...I can only compute using Greek letters not numbers I guess...

And I think, getting agnar to vote for us is only a matter of price... We should try to get every vote, to have a buffer in case someone doesn't like us enough.

I start laying, MM MotT to 4 turns, make pictures of our potential targets and come back here then.

 

[socralynnek]

I have "played" for an hour...despite moving only one unit...

MotT is MM down to 4 turns.

We have a problem:

So we can't get to Scandinavia going through French territory with our Cavs atm.

So I guess, Carthage and China are next. I have made screenshots of their cities too.

But which units do we transport there?

What do we do with Kyoto, it's still too fast with the Palace, should we starve or turn a mine into Irrigation for a turn or two?

I have uploaded the save in case PB wants to take over.

 

[socralynnek]

And here is China

 

[archphoenix]

I think carthage and china are too far.
so I think build a more transport near viking(disband shields), ship 11 cavs and 6 arts at turn2-or turn3 to iron mountain near viking city trond, take the city and next turn take the other city.

 

[PaperBeetle]

Well, I still like the idea of attacking Ragnar, as he's being so mean to us. We could drop onto that mountain, or perhaps ship around the French troops? Ragnar must be at war with Abe, as he has wounded units in his town, and he is buying in French wool. That means the forts might be empty, or lightly defended.
But there's no point taking the Viking towns alone. We are three towns short of the full prebuild, and I like the look of Carthage to give us two more towns. I say Carthage is actually closer than Scandinavia! Carthage is 2 or 3 turns away for our ships on the east coast of Zululand or in the sea between Persia and Aztec. Scandinavia is 5 turns away because we buy their silks until then.

Re Constan... how about we make one more cav, then a 2-turn coal plant, then 1-turn tanks (the first made by a switching a prebuild on the big picture when we get Motors). When landing on that Viking mountain, a tank would give us two attacks at strength whatever (12? 16?) compared to three cavs giving three attacks at strength 6, plus a tank takes less room in a transport.
And then Constan is ready for the eventuality of building UN if we can't get Fission in 1250>1260.

Re Kyoto... A couple of irrigations ought to be enough to slow it down? If we are confident about getting the extra towns, we can aim to hit 950 shields in 9 turns time.

Edit: I mean at least 950 shields in 8 turns time of course. >950 shields sitting in the box in the 1250ad mainturn. We should be aiming to get a Viking town in 1230ad (and already have Carthage in the bag), so in the 1230ad mainturn Kyoto must still have <900 shields, and in the 1240ad mainturn it can have >900 shields.

 

[PaperBeetle]

Our military looks too thin to prepare for both wars at once. I would suggest we move on Carthage as soon as possible, using the units in our towns if necessary. We can try to leave a trail of ships back from Carthage to Thebes, and from Hattusas to Mount Trondheim. If we decide after the Carthaginian campaign that we cannot get enough units back to Scandinavia in time, then a swift attack on China is a good back-up.

So our transport capacity dictates the pace of the attack. Two transports can leave Zululand next turn to drop units onto the hills south of Carthage in 1200ad. That would be the army from Ulundi (will it heal fully over this interturn?) a cav and a rifle, and maybe also the army in the galleon north of Berlin (the other option for this army is to keep heading to France to park just next to the forts).
What else can we land in Carthage in 1200ad? We can easily get a large number of transports there in time, so what can they carry? I would take at least one transportload of cavs out of France, and add in cavalries, ACs and artilleries from the Persian continent. We can probably afford to draft some infantries there to keep our towns occupied.
The goal would be to attack both Carthaginian towns in 1210ad and ship healthy units back out the same turn or the turn after. With a proper ship chain left in place, we could be dropping units next to Trondheim in 1220ad - the first turn that we are free to attack Ragnar after the expiry of the silk deal.

 

[Kulko]

Sounds like a solid plan for me.

One other question, over at CIV they start a new vanilla SGOTM. Are you guys playing there too, and would you be interested in teaming up. Although Fair warning ahead, my CIV-Experience is even lighter then CivIII.