SGOTM 13 - TNT thread

[2metraninja]

Yeah, good job, Dima. Very strong turn set. We are going as strong as we all hoped for.

And for me, the idea of building The Collosus with overflow from wipped axes is new one or at least I only heard of it - never saw her in action. Clever

I am only unsure if we need to build barracks while not being aggressive. At least in MP it is considered somewhat a waste of hammers for the early rush.

And I am reading the thread, only sparse at commenting, as I generaly lack the MM skills it seems you guys have. I am more eager to comment and propose action on the big picture and stretegy. Also I can help with an ideas when it actually comes to the war

 

[2metraninja]

BTW, it is normal that when the initial enthusiasm cool down a bit, from the numerous group som epeople just to drop off. From my experience from the Multi-Team Demo-Game2 from a teams with 20-30 players when stabilised the teams looks more like 3-4-5 core players who participate on dayli basis and 3-4 more who are somewhat regular. I guess with our team the situation will be identic.

The role of the Team Captain is very, very important here, as he is the uniting person. I think you Keath are doing this part OK so the team is going to be OK too

 

[justjohn]

Tech
* Currency (as fast as possible, but we are short on cash, hence first some turns at 0%)

Trades
* Gift Fish to Catherine (we don't need it for at least 10 turns, and we get another Fish soon)
* Open Borders with Isabella and Cath.
* Gift Hunting to Isa and Agri to Cath.
* Maybe gift/trade IW to Isabella and IW + Writing to Catherine (in return for Monotheism from one). There is little point in holding IW back. The AIs will have it long before they can become our targets. And gifting Writing opens up Math and Aestetics, which we hope she will research for us. But Cath is the Worst Enemy of Isa, making me a little uncertain how much we should trade to her.
* We can also gift Polytheism to Victoria and Ragnar, but this can be postponed since they are less likely to research it at present.

Elba
* 1 turn Lib while growing to size 4 (current max size), then switch to Settler or Worker
Corsica
* Finish Settler, then continue Barracks
Orleans
* Build LH while growing to size 4, then 2-pop whip Granary
[ Grow to size 2: 2 turns
Grow to size 3: 6 turns (1 turn Clam->Forest to get +2 prod)
At size 3: produce LH in 2 turns, then grow in 4 turns and whip Granary ]
Lyons
* Build Trireme(?) Another possibility is some defensive military. We also need more MPs.
Reims
* Grow to size 2 and whip Monument, then build Granary + LH (or some military).

Workers
* Our current 2 workers are busy improving Lyons (Copper) and Reims. We could use another (convert Stone mine to Quarry and build another mine outside Corsica, and improve gold for new city). So maybe Worker first in Elba.

Questions/notes
* Russia/Cathrine has the GLH. If she is fairly close, we should consider making her an early target.
* Where were the barb Galleys last spotted?

-jj-

 

[justjohn]

My last post was the plan for my turnset (not a report), and I was kind of hoping for some comments.

Otherwise I might start playing tomorrow evening (CET).

 

[dima42]

Barb galley by the workboat in Vikingland was last seen a turn ago 1 square SE of the workboat. I don't remember any other barb galley locations, which means they were probably not notable.

Yeah, another worker in Elba sounds good. Or maybe worker in Corsica and settler in Elba for the lower transport times. Can't remember whether I actually put in any hammers on the Corsica settler.

Some warriors in Lyons are a possibility for the cheap hammers and while copper isn't hooked up. I'm not so sure about investing in archery units this game: given the size of our upcoming fleet, if we are letting enemies land on our shore, we've already screwed up . The only use I see for archers is defending recently captured cities.

Regarding trades, I'm not sure how much inter-AI warring, and when, we want to support. My gut feeling is that we will want AI's to be at war closer to when we are warring Ragnar, so their economy stagnates at a comparable time to ours. Earlier seems unnecessary since we have a tech lead, and later seems dangerous because they will build up units to make them harder to attack. We probably want to support some warring after our Ragnar war, but in much more limited amounts. And yeah, GLH is obviously huge in this game.

Galleys need to do some exploration so that we have trade routes with someone else when we declare on Ragnar.

 

[2metraninja]

Will need to look at the save, but it sounds god to me.

Only my suggestions would be to build a couple more workers and the issue I already raised - that I doubt the usefulness of a barracks when we are not even aggressive to have the bonus building it and the second promotion which we will achieve with Aggressive+Barracks.

 

[justjohn]

Barb galley by the workboat in Vikingland was last seen a turn ago 1 square SE of the workboat. I don't remember any other barb galley locations, which means they were probably not notable.

Noted. In other words our Galleys are free to explore a bit (those that are not needed for transportation).

Yeah, another worker in Elba sounds good. Or maybe worker in Corsica and settler in Elba for the lower transport times. Can't remember whether I actually put in any hammers on the Corsica settler.

If I remember correctly, the Settler in Corsica has 33 hammers (3 turns of production) put into it. But it might still be better to switch to Worker there first, and only then finish the Settler. We would need more than one more Settler anyway.

2metraninja opens up the question whether we should produce Barrakcs or not, and I'm not sure about this myself. We have several cities that will not produce much in any case, which makes Barracks an expensive and possible not wise choice. Corsica on the other hand will have some production, so maybe a Barracks there is good. Over time we should probably designate a military city with Barracks/Heroic Epic/etc. Btw the Barracks in Corsica already have some hammers put into it.

Some warriors in Lyons are a possibility for the cheap hammers and while copper isn't hooked up. I'm not so sure about investing in archery units this game: given the size of our upcoming fleet, if we are letting enemies land on our shore, we've already screwed up . The only use I see for archers is defending recently captured cities.

Yes, I was wondering about producing some Warriors for MP duty. And I agree that we want sea control rather than defending on land, making Archers less usefull (except as you say maybe a few for front line defence).

Regarding trades, I'm not sure how much inter-AI warring, and when, we want to support. My gut feeling is that we will want AI's to be at war closer to when we are warring Ragnar, so their economy stagnates at a comparable time to ours. Earlier seems unnecessary since we have a tech lead, and later seems dangerous because they will build up units to make them harder to attack. We probably want to support some warring after our Ragnar war, but in much more limited amounts. And yeah, GLH is obviously huge in this game.

I don't disagree with what you say here, but I'm not sure how that affects the current tech trades/gifts that I suggested.

 

[dima42]

I don't disagree with what you say here, but I'm not sure how that affects the current tech trades/gifts that I suggested.

It doesn't . I generally think they are sensible, and I also think that you know much more about this stage of the game than I do, so I would prefer to have you figure that out anyway .

 

[Keath]

BTW, it is normal that when the initial enthusiasm cool down a bit, from the numerous group som epeople just to drop off. From my experience from the Multi-Team Demo-Game2 from a teams with 20-30 players when stabilised the teams looks more like 3-4-5 core players who participate on dayli basis and 3-4 more who are somewhat regular. I guess with our team the situation will be identic.

The role of the Team Captain is very, very important here, as he is the uniting person. I think you Keath are doing this part OK so the team is going to be OK too

Thanks, 2metra!

I hope I"m not being a pest by trying to get everyone engaged in dialogue. We don't want to lose more players. If you're keeping up but feel you have nothing to contribute, just state the obvious, or ask a question.

We are very lucky to have two experts on our team, dima42 and justjohn. It's as if we were a Sunday golf team and by the luck of the draw, have Tiger and Phil on our team. This is a wonderful opportunity to learn a ton of things, to bring your game up a level or two just by watching the action and asking questions.

It would be a long post to list the innovations I've seen so far but the thorough planning, precise MM and the way the turnsets are reported is first rate. This is a great model for what we can strive for as a team.

@jj and dima -- I really appreciate your taking the interest to explain the advanced techniques and why certain things are done the way they are. I know I am learning a lot.

And the way you debate a subject even when you might disagree on a point or two is commendable. So on behalf of all the team, thank you both. Our future looks bright with your continued guidance.

***To The Team***​

1. If you haven't reported in for awhile but are reading the posts, keep us informed.
2. The SGOTM is a contest and TNT is a contender! Check our presence on the Progress and Reports graphs. Lookin' good!
3. This is a great opportunity for all team members, whatever your skill level and I hope we can all make the best of it. We all have something to contribute.

 

[Keath]

At one point there were two barb galleys, one headed sw the other showed up near our clams, iirc. Unless that was the same one, there might still be a barb around. Funny how our clams weren't pillaged. Maybe Willem or Ragnar defeated the barb? Are there any wounded galleys?

The barracks discussion is a good point and 2metra's suggestion about not building them is a good insight. I can see having Corsica build one and dedicating this city as a military production centre. We'll need more units, of course, but the elite units we produce in Corsica will put us on the way to getting that level 4 experience unit to build the Heroic Epic.

Now for a little speculation -- we have one more AI to meet, likely Germany. The fact that the AI we know have few cities suggests they are on small islands with limited space. The mapmaker surely wouldn't put all the AI on small islands as this might be too easy a conquest.

So what about Germany? Could there be a larger continent like Europe, where the German state started off inland? Maybe he is isolated but has resource rich land to develop. He isn't exploring the surrounding oceans because he's too busy building a large civilization. In other words, he could be a gorilla monster.

This would make our task a little more difficult, especially if we need Astronomy to find him. If he had just enough land to avoid a domination loss then we would have to engage him. We might run into Panzers.

So I suggest we dedicate two units to explore. One goal to find the missing AI, the other to locate the Russian lighthouse. Then we might be lucky enough to circumnavigate. But if we find out we need Astronomy that would be good information and we could/would have to set up a research city. This is why I think exploration should have a priority now.

What does everyone think about a 'Magellan expedition'?

 

[dima42]

Keath -- thanks, but I'm actually only a second-rate player. You can scroll through recent GOTM results if you don't believe me . (Then again, I usually play through the GOTM's in one sitting and often without thinking and/or drunk .)

That being said, I would be astonished if we were actually that competitive in the SGOTM competition. The level of games of OSS, PD, etc. is probably still an echelon above our play. They don't make mistakes like forgetting to turn research off for a turn while researching Mysticism like I do . I played on a team in SGOTM 11; it was a bit of a weaker team, but it still had myself and two more Immortal+ level players, and it was fascinating to be beat by ~100 turns.

So while I certainly plan on playing hard, I'd be quite pleased to finish in the top half of the field.

 

[dima42]

At one point there were two barb galleys, one headed sw the other showed up near our clams, iirc. Unless that was the same one, there might still be a barb around. Funny how our clams weren't pillaged. Maybe Willem or Ragnar defeated the barb? Are there any wounded galleys?

The barracks discussion is a good point and 2metra's suggestion about not building them is a good insight. I can see having Corsica build one and dedicating this city as a military production centre. We'll need more units, of course, but the elite units we produce in Corsica will put us on the way to getting that level 4 experience unit to build the Heroic Epic.

Now for a little speculation -- we have one more AI to meet, likely Germany. The fact that the AI we know have few cities suggests they are on small islands with limited space. The mapmaker surely wouldn't put all the AI on small islands as this might be too easy a conquest.

So what about Germany? Could there be a larger continent like Europe, where the German state started off inland? Maybe he is isolated but has resource rich land to develop. He isn't exploring the surrounding oceans because he's too busy building a large civilization. In other words, he could be a gorilla monster.

This would make our task a little more difficult, especially if we need Astronomy to find him. If he had just enough land to avoid a domination loss then we would have to engage him. We might run into Panzers.

So I suggest we dedicate two units to explore. One goal to find the missing AI, the other to locate the Russian lighthouse. Then we might be lucky enough to circumnavigate. But if we find out we need Astronomy that would be good information and we could/would have to set up a research city. This is why I think exploration should have a priority now.

What does everyone think about a 'Magellan expedition'?

Didn't we analyze at the beginning that one civ started out landlocked from the demographics screens? That makes sense for one of them to not have contacted us yet.

I doubt we will get circumnavigation, but I agree that it's worth exploring Magellan-style.

I agree with metra that barracks anywhere aside Corsica and maybe Elba is a waste. I think Heroic Epic needs to go inland, possibly somewhere in Ragnar's land, and possibly after we have established a mainland presence. (Is Ragnar on edge of mainland, thematically? Only time will tell.)

 

[Keath]

Keath -- thanks, but I'm actually only a second-rate player. You can scroll through recent GOTM results if you don't believe me . (Then again, I usually play through the GOTM's in one sitting and often without thinking and/or drunk .)

That being said, I would be astonished if we were actually that competitive in the SGOTM competition. The level of games of OSS, PD, etc. is probably still an echelon above our play. They don't make mistakes like forgetting to turn research off for a turn while researching Mysticism like I do . I played on a team in SGOTM 11; it was a bit of a weaker team, but it still had myself and two more Immortal+ level players, and it was fascinating to be beat by ~100 turns.

So while I certainly plan on playing hard, I'd be quite pleased to finish in the top half of the field.

Yes, finishing in the top half would be a very respectable showing for a new team. I was originally hoping we could just avoid the wooden spoon. I wanted to point out to the silent members of our team that we do have some knowledgeable players and there is much to learn when you play with better team mates.

Besides executing the turns without a blunder, the very best players seem to have a way of cutting out the unnecessary builds, make every hammer count and find the best path. Regardless of the odd execution error, finding the right path to success should be our intermediate goal. The more we know the better.

This is the time where our knowledge of the map could influence that 'right path'. By the way, your last turnset suggests a 'better than second-rate player'.

 

[2metraninja]

Knowing the bigger picture is very important and worth dedicating 2 vessels to try and find boundaries of the world we are supposed to play and win in.

 

[justjohn]

About production: Remember that we will hook up stone soon, and the city where we choose to place the Moai Statues will become a very productive city, maybe even the best we will get. Even more so if we place it in our capital and use bureaucracy (but we might want to use our capital for different national wonders, I don't know yet). Al I say is that our most productive city might turn out to be a waterbased one.

About exploration: This is indeed important, and when we started I had hopes that we at this point had explored more using early work boats, but now we need sturdier vessels. I will try to get one or two Galleys going. (Triremes might be safer, but I don't want to wait anymore if possible.)

 

[enKage]

***To The Team***​

It is really excellent when players add a few comments. It lets the rest of the team know that you are engaged in reading the posts and it supports the plans even if all you comment on is agreement or positive encouragement.

I think commenting, asking questions and debating is all part of the fun. BUT, it can't be a lot of fun if your turn is approaching and you have pages and pages of posts to read. Then it can be a chore. I hope, like The Dude and fizbankovi, that other players would post a comment even if it's just so we know we're all on board.

I'm on the board all the time :] more observing :]

 

[justjohn]

OK. I think I've left enough time for comments, so I'll go ahead and play my turnset. But then I realized I'm not sure how many turns I'm supposed to play. We've been flexible so far, and looking back at previous turnsets confirms that they have varied quite a lot. Are there any specific goals for my turnset, or should I simply play about 15 turns?

-jj-

 

[dima42]

You should play however long you feel like . If I were playing this turnset, I'd probably go until finishing Currency.

 

[Keath]

OK. I think I've left enough time for comments, so I'll go ahead and play my turnset. But then I realized I'm not sure how many turns I'm supposed to play. We've been flexible so far, and looking back at previous turnsets confirms that they have varied quite a lot. Are there any specific goals for my turnset, or should I simply play about 15 turns?

-jj-

It seems that about 15 turns is workable. There has been a lot of variety, for sure. The main criteria has been a convenient stopping place so you decide when a good stopping turn arrives.

Great to hear that you've been following along, enKage. You are up next. And good luck, jj!

Edit: cross post with dima.

***About turnset length -- we have a wide variety of skill levels but I think that each player should play a set that ends with a new challenge for the next player - like when a new tech is built (in this case Currency) or after a major build involving lots of MM. For new SGOTM players, they too should choose a point that works but they may choose to play less turns as The Dude did. For myself, I'd be happy with 10 turns. When the wars start, and there's a lot of troop movement, the turnsets will take longer and 10 turns might be enough.

The main thing is to pass on a save to the next player that doesn't leave a lot of 'things to remember' or unfinished tasks from the previous set. And before the save is uploaded, there should be no units on auto move. I know that some teams even go the route of pausing workers but a note of what's happening should suffice. And of course it's a no-no to automate workers, as everyone knows, I'm sure.

 

[2metraninja]

I am thinking about something practical - with the current speed of playing, do we have the time to finish the game in time? we already played few turnsets and can tell how much roughly one is taking. Then see if the time left to actually finish the game will be enough? I did not checked the numbers, but I feel we will be pressed on time. One possible solution is to lenghten the turnsets. Maybe for the second round?