SGOTM 12 - Spooks

[Paul#42]

At times, you just have to stop calculating and start it

 

[WackenOpenAir]

Well we need most every tile roaded, and at size 12 we need 15 spt, so whenever that can be accomplished we add em in. +1 for the lux colony.

Edit: Well 5 worker turns for each ivory (road + movement to/from the tile) and 8 for the hill and ivory forests= 39 worker turns not counting what they are working on now. 7 workers? 8? Build warrior to sizes 6 and then another to size 7 to get all 3 mps?

At size 12, we should be using the following 9 roaded tiles:
3 irrigated cows (+10)
1 irrigated BG (+1)
3 ivory plains (-3)
2 ivory forests (-2)
That leaves 6 food for 3 specialists. And the option to use the lake for 2 food surplus so that we can make an extra worker when the box fills up if needed.
Production is 15 spt with these tiles.

Those tiles need to be roaded before we join in the workers. Other tile improvements should be made someday, but there is no hurry. (Jungles, hill, mine on ivory plains)

2 turns from now, the irrigation on the BG is ready and the curragh is ready. We then have 3 workers to build the following roads, and our city has grown to size 6.

BG (3)
Ivory plains (3x4 = 12)
Ivory forest (2x7 = 14)
cow(3)
Total 32 worker turns.
We will be adding a worker every turn, so avoiding real math:
3 (3)
4 (7)
5 (12)
6 (18)
7 (25)
7 (32) (warrior)

So if we produce 4 more workers for a total of 7 and then produce 1 warrior, we would have exactly enough worker turns to finish the roads by the time our city has gone to size 7. (so we have only 2 warriors for mp)
This is exactly enough though, chanes are good that it may not be possible to make it fit so perfectly, with the forest taking 6 turns, we probably need to stack workers there anyway, increasing the needed worker turns to 34. I think it is no problem to use 2 turns for joining the workers though.

With a total of 7 workers, we join 5 in the city, use 1 for the incense and have 1 remaining. We could then make another one at size 12 a little later by using the lake. Using the lake (2 commerce) costs only 1 science per turn, so that is better than delaying the growth and producing an extra 1 turn worker. That leaves us with 2 spare workers.

If you guys think 2 spare workers is not enough, then produce 5 more workers instead of 4 before joining them in. A 5th worker will make things easier like roading the forest in time. However, don't take it too lighly, this most likely costs us a full turn delay on research and thus pretty much our whole game.

So, either 4 or 5 more workers looks best to me. Maybe someone wants to figure out in what order exactly to build the roads.

 

[Andronicus]

Good progress
I note we have horses under Constantinople and the incense to the SW
Once Teotihuacan is ours it can grab the nonBG cow to grow (but that's getting ahead a bit)
I assume the red is Rome and the darker green Japan which would mean Japan sharing an island Aztecs (and ? others) This island is obvious first target so a war between them as soon as we can get an embassy should dispense with the unit surplus allowing a strike force of ? AC / ? swords to attack (I assume not horses as KC's plan to get to next age via HBR is still presumably the plan). Perhaps 2nd curragh should prioritise scouting out this island.

I note we can hire a scientist now and still have enough food to grow and shields to build 2 turn curragh with increased science and decreased lux

I think we want a temple before reaching the unit limit as mp will then cost 3gpt versus 1gpt for temple, however if we plan to build SoZ then the 60 shield prebuild could be valuable. OTOH a temple now would get the incense under cultural borders by time worker tasks finished. (edit - or not under Wacken's plan to complete roading in 7 turns)

Looking at the lux situation, I agree irrigation scheme allowing hiring scientists is quickest way to philo. Ideally we could hire 4 scientists using 3 i cows, m hill, i BG, 2 ivory forests and 1 i ivory pl -> +8 food and producing 15spt. The other ivory plains could be mined to allow for switch to production mode if we go for SoZ or building (switch 2 scientists to work m ivory plains and time mining any other tile for beginning of wonder or pre-build (ie start mining 6 turns earlier) -> 20spt)

 

[Paul#42]

...Japan sharing an island Aztecs (and ? others) This island is obvious first target so a war between them as soon as we can get an embassy should dispense with the unit surplus allowing a strike force of ? AC / ? swords to attack (I assume not horses as KC's plan to get to next age via HBR is still presumably the plan). Perhaps 2nd curragh should prioritise scouting out this island.

Good plan. Should we start building barracks & warriors for upgrading as soon as we finished workers and some more curraghs? We already collected some money and will probably get some more soon.

I think we want a temple before reaching the unit limit as mp will then cost 3gpt versus 1gpt for temple, however if we plan to build SoZ then the 60 shield prebuild could be valuable. OTOH a temple now would get the incense under cultural borders by time worker tasks finished. (edit - or not under Wacken's plan to complete roading in 7 turns)

Isn't it better to invest a worker for a colony lowering lux quickly than waiting for our borders to expand? I'd rather invest the temple's shields in curraghs (and a single worker) and spare the upkeep.

 

[WackenOpenAir]

I don't think we should build SoZ soon. I'd prefer to first build swords and get our attack going.

I think we should look carefully for long term plans on who we are gonna conquer and who we will not conquer. We must also investigate what influence feudalism has in here.

We will need the lux slider anyway, so we should first see if the temple can make a difference in how much we need the slider.

Using 4 scientists has no real use. The ivory plains provide 3 commerce by themselves so that equals a scientist. And with a lib, its even better than a scientist.

besides the workers and curraghs, i think we should first make our 3MP, and then indeed make warriors for upgrading. With 30 AI's, we can check trades every turn and get some gold here and there.

 

[Andronicus]

Should we start building barracks & warriors for upgrading as soon as we finished workers and some more curraghs? We already collected some money and will probably get some more soon.

I strongly recommend against upgrading troops. Our limitation in feudalism wll be unit support costs, shields shouldnt be a problem. We need to save our coins to max our research, those swords (assuming we have iron - no guarentee since we have horses) can be built in 2 turns when doing 15spt

Isn't it better to invest a worker for a colony lowering lux quickly than waiting for our borders to expand? I'd rather invest the temple's shields in curraghs (and a single worker) and spare the upkeep.

You may be right about not building temple - as I mentioned there are pros and cons - however temple maintenance is cheap compared to 3gpt unit support

 

[WackenOpenAir]

I strongly recommend against upgrading troops. Our limitation in feudalism wll be unit support costs, shields shouldnt be a problem. We need to save our coins to max our research, those swords (assuming we have iron - no guarentee since we have horses) can be built in 2 turns when doing 15spt


You may be right about not building temple - as I mentioned there are pros and cons - however temple maintenance is cheap compared to 3gpt unit support

Hmm, you may be right about upgrading there. The gold will allow us to have more forces than we can support without harming research.

We surely will build a temple someday, but i think it is no priority now. After the workers, i think MP and scouting curraghs have priority over the temple.

 

[Paul#42]

Hmm, you may be right about upgrading there. The gold will allow us to have more forces than we can support without harming research.

We surely will build a temple someday, but i think it is no priority now. After the workers, i think MP and scouting curraghs have priority over the temple.

Agreed. Spare the money for upkeep. Build some reg warriors to stay MP for ever. This also lowers the damage if we are without Iron. (I'd rather build horses anyway).
Soon we will have to build a harbor, lib, market (rather then the temple if it helps for happiness).

Do I get this right? We are in Feudalism but still have to research it to produce MDI and Sun Tzu's (not that I wanted to build it )?
Pity, I already saw all AI's capitals building Sun Tzu... Should be quite a cascade in some thousand years...

btw: We have taken over the lead in the postcount-department easily
Some things never change. You guys fit in perfectly

 

[Andronicus]

Using 4 scientists has no real use. The ivory plains provide 3 commerce by themselves so that equals a scientist. And with a lib, its even better than a scientist.

You are of course correct that with multipliers we are better off using 3 commerce tiles.
However my comment was directed at the short term immed after adding in workers to size 12.
We will need to use lux slider and running an extra scientist, whilst not producing any additional commerce than a roaded ivory tile, will allow lower lux slider thus overall improvement in science

Build some reg warriors to stay MP for ever.

Actually may be better not running any mp once over the unit count limit, it depends whether the extra lux slider of no mp costs us 9gpt - perhaps specialist +/- happy buildings will be better (will find out when that time arrives)

btw: We have taken over the lead in the postcount-department easily
Some things never change. You guys fit in perfectly

Yes, I noticed that the new guys are setting the pace

 

[WackenOpenAir]

"the new guys"

Paul, we need swords instead of horses here because of the unit upkeep. Horses require larger numbers to capture the same target and they spend more time healing. With the limited unit upkeep, we must do the best with as little units as possible.

And since we are gonna invest our commerce into research, we may also have no gold for upgrading horses to knights.

 

[Paul#42]

Wacken, You are right.
Not only are MDI cheaper then knights but they (in lower numbers) also are stronger against the defensive units we are facing (up to pikes), because they do not retreat. So let's build swords and later MDI.

We need to devide our rivals in good and bad guys.
I guess we try to keep and feed the SCI civs, maybe even gift them corrupt towns (unless they are foodrich to work as a scientist farm) to speed them up.

Are there any civs extremely important because of their individual research preferences due to traits or UU?

I wonder who will be first to Writing...

 

[Abegweit]

Looknig good so far. Shall I play my turns? I don't think there's much to say about them. Just follow the script.

 

[Paul#42]

Do so. I'm sure you know, when to stop to consult the team.

Have fun

 

[WackenOpenAir]

I think France is gonna be important because they have the colossus.

Gogo play Abe.
By the way, the script is now the last 2 pages posted here. The excel sheet is out of the window.

 

[Paul#42]

I think France is gonna be important because they have the colossus.

France might also make a good target (depends on where they are) for our FP-city.
Paris should be quite a productive town...

 

[killercane]

Hmm internet goes out for 6 hours and I have to play catch up with you guys. Some brilliant ideas here by all. We will be able to make some better calls on everything after Abe's turns.

 

[Abegweit]

Pre-turn
Everything looks good.

Turn 1 2950BC
I don’t understand the script here. Best I can do is 9 food this round. This is a huge waste so I hire 2 scientists to increase commerce, making 2F this turn. 8F next. We’ll slip in a warrior while growing to size 6.
Meet Spain. She’s up Masonry.

Turn 2 2900BC
Second curragh produced,
Switch to warrior to allow city to grow to size 6
Meet Korea. Up TW but Wang has nothing to trade.

Turn 3 2850BC
Warrior2 -> worker4

Turn 4 2800BC
Worker4 -> worker5
Indians start Oracle

Turn 5 2750BC
Worker5 -> worker6
TW to Wang for 20g

Turn 6 2710BC
Worker6 -> worker7
Spain starts Oracle

Turn 7 2670BC
Worker7 -> warrior3

Turn 8 2630BC
Warrior3 -> Curragh3
Aztecs and Indians know writing but want too much for it. We’ll see if the price comes down as more civs learn it. We’re only 8 turns away by self-research.
First worker merge. Hire three scientists and the lux slider goes to zero.

Turn 9 2590BC
Nothing.

Turn 10 2500BC
Curragh3 ->Curragh4
Merge four more workers. Send another down to colonise the incense and find wines! In retrospect it would have been better to build eight workers back at size 6. The last worker is left unmoved. I suggest he should build a second colony. I have set a citizen on the lake. We need another worker and the third scientist is wasted anyway since the last commerce goes to a lux.

Writing is now known by three civs. Through self-research it's due in two. Gandhi will give it to us for 58g. I think we should take him up on it and trade it around.

 

[Abegweit]

We will be able to make some better calls on everything after Abe's turns.

Actually, there's very little new info. The only question is what to do about writing and the last worker. I only met two more civs as well. There are suicide possibilities to the east.

I'm pleased to see that, ignoring the team that settled in place, we now have a slight lead in the score graph. Obviously the first team to reach size twelve. to everyone for the thorough analysis.

 

[killercane]

Good turns. Looks like we need to explore south, east and northeast extensively.

We do need masonry but I will wait to trade it in a couple turns, unless spain will come off Masonry and Iron Working both. No real gold is out there, Aztecs are the only other ones so far with Ivory.

I should reach Philo this turnset. If we trade math, do we take currency? If not, what? If we do not get math in time, there are several options:

1) Stop research.
2) Take CoL or Polytheism
3) Take Math, trade it around.
4) Take MM, start wars between Japs and Aztecs. Join in after they collide their stacks. Of course we would need iron and rax built. And some troops. Aztecs will get GA. Could build SoZ. I would hate to take MM with philo though.
5) Take Lit, build Great Library (just kidding). We will want lit at some point though by self research.

I guess I intend to try to trade for Iron working with writing, if that is possible. If we do have iron on the hill, I will build a Rax and start on some swords once we get another curragh.

Worker move- I dont know, we can turn science up to 90% this way right? We might be at philo before any AI has math.

 

[Abegweit]

Philo cost is 240. We are currently doing 27 beakers (9 turns). With two luxes, we should get up to 30 or 31 (8 turns).

It was remarkable to watch the decrease in the time to Writing during my set. IIRC, it started off at 22. It ended at 2.