SGOTM 14 - One Short Straw

[ZPV]

Do barb cities count in the number of cities calculations? In LC's last test game, there were 29 cities controlled by either us or the AI at 1000 BC. I think we should plan on barbs being able to enter our culture around 1200 BC or so to be on the safe side. We can monitor it as we go, but this will give us something to plan for.

Barb cities don't count for these - just ones owned by non-barb civs.

 

[ZPV]

EDIT: Better yet, just leave that warrior there, heal him, and put him on the forest hill on the SW spoke. Then Washington builds a warrior or archer for the NE stone area, either before or after the next settler. The settler can simply move to the corn, then move east to see if the coast is clear. If it is, he settles 1t later than planned, but safely. If it's not, then he backs off and life sux and then you die.

Good idea. That's better than anything I've come up with.

 

[Mitchum]

Better yet, just leave that warrior there, heal him, and put him on the forest hill on the SW spoke. Then Washington builds a warrior or archer for the NE stone area, either before or after the next settler. The settler can simply move to the corn, then move east to see if the coast is clear. If it is, he settles 1t later than planned, but safely. If it's not, then he backs off and life sux and then you die.

The wounded warrior really only provides spawn-busting coverage for a turn or two as he moves east, so we won't lose too much by moving the settler there naked. Delaying the city settling by a turn doesn't sound like a major issue.

I think we should build a WB in Gems and a warrior in Washington after the marble settler. Although, Marble can't start a LH until after Sailing, so delaying Marble by building a warrior first probably isn't a big deal. I can catch the overflow and chops into the settler but have the warrior come out first.

EDIT: So the settler goes to the corn on T0. on T+1, he goes 1SE to check for barbs. If none, 1SW and settle on T+2. If barbs, punt.

 

[ZPV]

Washington: worker -> settler (for marble) -> worker -> library (chopped)
Gems: WB -> warrior -> wkr or library?
Marble: what have you been building first ZPV? Do you steal the corn right away? -> LH -> GLH

Yes, steal the corn right away. There's no point part-building a unit for a few turns, since the hammers in units will decay after 10 turns. I've put a few placeholder hammers in a Library.

Masonry before Wheel makes the GLH build easier, but that decision is some turns down the road.

Worker 1: finishes chop at Washington-1N -> chop Washington-1NW -> mine gems -> farm wheat
Worker 2: chop Washington-1NW-> mine gems -> mine PH at Washington-1NW

Will we ever work a PH mine? Well, if we build the pyramids in washington I guess so. On the few tests where I've mined one of the river hills, I've only worked it for a handful of turns, so I don't think we want to spend the worker turns on that mine.
We also need the gems research sooner than that - sending Worker 1 there straight after its current chop should be better.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Come to think of it, if there is a barb warrior at marble, then our 1.0HP warrior can't protect Marble when we settle it and the barb warrior wouldn't teleport, iirc, so he'd be 1 tile from Marble and could attack next turn if there are 19 cities, which by the way, we'll be able to know at that point anyway, if we follow that as we go. It's always possible there will be a laggard AI or two and we won't hit the 19 threshold for a while.

I suppose it's alos possible that the 19th city would be settled in the IT before the barbarians take their turn...

 

[ZPV]

Worker 2: chop Washington-1NW-> mine gems -> mine PH at Washington-1NW

Please leave the PH forest intact for now. We can build a warrior in 2 turns, working the corn one turn, and the PHF the next - giving two extra food-hammers over any other way of building it.

Come to think of it, if there is a barb warrior at marble, then our 1.0HP warrior can't protect Marble when we settle it and the barb warrior wouldn't teleport, iirc, so he'd be 1 tile from Marble and could attack next turn if there are 19 cities, which by the way, we'll be able to know at that point anyway, if we follow that as we go. It's always possible there will be a laggard AI or two and we won't hit the 19 threshold for a while.

I suppose it's alos possible that the 19th city would be settled in the IT before the barbarians take their turn...

A barb would attack the city if it had a unit in it, regardless of the number of cities there are. It's only an undefended city that a barb can ignore before 19 cities exist.

One possibility is to slot a warrior in while the settler is built, delaying it 2 turns instead of 1, but allowing us to kill/defend against a barb warrior or animal, and scout the area before the settler has to move, letting it go up to the safer pigs area instead.
I don't think I like this, but raise it in case someone else does.

 

[LowtherCastle]

ZPV, can barbs spawn on resource tiles?

 

[Dhoomstriker]

I was a little bit lost in the discussion about which Warrior was where and how healty etc until I took a peek at the real game.

Here are some screenshots of what we see, just to make the discussion easier:

This way, we can see which unit has moved and which hasn't, which has how much health, and just how long it would take to get from where they are now to a potential destination.

It is worth noting that our capital will finish its Worker next turn, so a Warrior built there afterwards would be able to spawn-bust the Marble City area as fast as or faster than any of our two existing Warriors could do so, but would be able to so while being at full health.

Until Turn 50, when we get our border expansion, we risk a Barb unit spawning on any of 4 possible squares in the SE.


Also, Warrior 2, which is in New York, would heal as fast as it possibly could by healing inside of New York. A wounded Warrior is as good as dead meat.


Further, in a worst-case scenario, defending in a City gives a 25% bonus against Barbs (although I don't know if that bonus applies to units other than defending Warriors).


I am really concerned about our Corn in the SE--in one of LC's test games where there was a Barb Warrior right next to there, the Barb Warrior moved to pillage our Corn on the following turn. Attacking with our Warrior at the time only gave 50% odds of success and in that case, our Warrior died without stratching the Barb Warrior--yes, it is a worst-case scenario, but we really only need a spawn-buster in the SE temporarily if we plan to found Marble City.


Also, can we rename New York to Gem City?

Spoiler :

It's a lot easier to refer to the Cities according to their purposes. It may not matter now, but when we have 5+ Cities, it will help us in communicating a lot better.

Why not just call the City "Gem"?

Well, it would be infinitely more readible in the Event Log to see what happened to "Gem City" than to "Gem." You can still call it "Gem" in the thread if you prefer to do so and are sure that you aren't being ambigious with the Gem Resource in your sentence.

 

[LowtherCastle]

One possibility is to slot a warrior in while the settler is built, delaying it 2 turns instead of 1, but allowing us to kill/defend against a barb warrior or animal, and scout the area before the settler has to move, letting it go up to the safer pigs area instead.
I don't think I like this, but raise it in case someone else does.

My hunch is that delaying Marble a turn or two doesn't matter much as long as the Gems wb arrives on schedule, but you could test it.

 

[ZPV]

ZPV, can barbs spawn on resource tiles?

Yes. It's just animals that can't.

 

[shyuhe]

I haven't tried this at all, but is it worth working the silk in Gems instead of the deer while we build extra warriors/WBs?

@Dhoom - we should probably rename the cities. Hopefully Mitchum will remember to do so when he plays his set

@ZPV - I don't think there was any mention of seeing animals to the SE near the marble. Is this correct?

 

[ZPV]

Further, in a worst-case scenario, defending in a City gives a 25% bonus against Barbs (although I don't know if that bonus applies to units other than defending Warriors).


I am really concerned about our Corn in the SE--in one of LC's test games where there was a Barb Warrior right next to there, the Barb Warrior moved to pillage our Corn on the following turn. Attacking with our Warrior at the time only gave 50% odds of success and in that case, our Warrior died without stratching the Barb Warrior--yes, it is a worst-case scenario, but we really only need a spawn-buster in the SE temporarily if we plan to found Marble City.


Also, can we rename New York to Gem City?

Yes, all units get a 25% city defence bonus vs barbs. Warriors have an additional 25% city defence vs all units.

A barb warrior won't move next to the corn until there are 19 cities, and likewise it won't chase the corn tile from further afield until then either. Slotting in the warrior before the settler delays the settler, and doesn't fogbust the stone area any quicker. If there's a tough barb down there, we can't settle it yet, warrior or no warrior.

On the other hand, if an animal spawns down there (and moves into view), that can be managed quite easily.

I have no preference between automatic city names, functional city names and fun city names.

 

[ZPV]

@ZPV - I don't think there was any mention of seeing animals to the SE near the marble. Is this correct?

I haven't seen any. I didn't mention any either.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

One possibility is to slot a warrior in while the settler is built, delaying it 2 turns instead of 1, but allowing us to kill/defend against a barb warrior or animal, and scout the area before the settler has to move, letting it go up to the safer pigs area instead.
I don't think I like this, but raise it in case someone else does.

Well I guess then I will say that I officially like the idea of building a Warrior after Worker 2 and before Settler 3.

A barb warrior won't move next to the corn until there are 19 cities

But, where else would a Barb unit down there move to? I mean, it may not be enticed by an improved Resource, but the odds of it walking next to one would be pretty high, seeing as how there is very little room to "randomly wander" in the SE, while 3 of said squares are adjacent to the Grassland Corn Farm.

Slotting in the warrior before the settler delays the settler, and doesn't fogbust the stone area any quicker. If there's a tough barb down there, we can't settle it yet, warrior or no warrior.

Slotting in a Warrior DOES, however, spawn-bust the Marble area.

Yes, alternatives exist, such as sending the wounded Warrior from Gem City (New York) to there or such as delaying 1 turn in settling and hoping that there is only a Barb Animal or no Barb unit.

What happens, though, if the Barb Animal is in the wrong position? Bam, we just lost the 2 turns that it took to build the Warrior, if not more than those 2 turns.

What happens if it is a Barb Human? Well, we not only won't be settling Marble City anytime soon, but we will also have lost several turns committing our Settler to move down there in a direction where it can't settle.


If the thinking is that we'll probably just plan to lose 1 turn in settling Marble City to avoid potential Barb Animals, in the very best case, then why not commmit to spending 2 turns and average out our luck considerably compared to a lot of the potentially bad options?

I don't mind finessing our spawn-busting using only Warriors, but it seems to be quite risky to not even spend the few Hammers that it takes to build a spawn-busting Warrior.

Toto died. There is a price to pay as a result of that fact. I'd rather pay that price up front as a relatively fixed cost, rather than potentially paying a much higher cost later.

 

[Mitchum]

OK, where do people stand on the warrior situation so that I can plan my set? Build warrior now in Washington, delaying the settler? Build warrior now in Gems? Continue as planned with WB in Gems and settler next in Washington?

I vote for building a warrior now in Washington but catching any overflow/chops into the settler. If no barbs show up in the SE, the settler can walk naked to settle Marble while treading carefully. This new warrior will head NE to the stone area to spawn bust. If a barb does show up in the SE, pause to get input.

EDIT: xpost with Dhoomstriker.

 

[shyuhe]

Sounds fine by me Mitchum. I think it's better to be safe here, as I had a barb archer spawn in the SE when I was testing before.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Btw, Mitchum, the worker that gets built first should chop Wash-1E because his job is to then escort the Marble worker settler and build two mines. But building the warrior before the settler ignores this worker's wasted actions. As it is, we're going to waste one, the warrior adds another. Nothing for that worker to do. Furthermore, building the warrior for 2 turns instead of 3 is a bit silly because Washington grows to pop5 in 3t.

So here's a suggestion. An MM-on-Steroids plan (Mitch, this turnset is a bear--every turn every city does somersaults).

Wash: worker2-settler(1t)-warrior(2t)-settler(1t)-warrior-settler-worker3-library(MM lib for max hammers)

(the settler captures chops 2x)

Worker1 finishes the current chop, then mines the gems, farms the wheat, chops Washington-1NW, chops Wash-1NE(e.g.)
Worker2 chops Wash-1E, then mines the river-ph !!!, then mines Marble-1SE...

Gems builds wb-lib(2t)-worker

The above scenario needs to be tested by ZPV to see how it works out in Marble, but I'm pretty sure that the river-ph mine helps the library get done at most 1t later than ZPV had igt before.

-------------------

More MM warnings while I"m at it: Watch out for Gems!!! You'll need to switch the citizen to the gem mine when the worker finishes it. LIkewise, you'll have to switch the citizen from the deer to the wheat farm when finished. In both cases, the governor will be turned off most likely. (Unless you turn it on at pop2.)

Then you'll have to switch the Gems build from lib to worker at pop3.

In short, MM heaven (or hell)...

 

[ZPV]

Well I guess then I will say that I officially like the idea of building a Warrior after Worker 2 and before Settler 3.

But, where else would a Barb unit down there move to? I mean, it may not be enticed by an improved Resource, but the odds of it walking next to one would be pretty high, seeing as how there is very little room to "randomly wander" in the SE, while 3 of said squares are adjacent to the Grassland Corn Farm.

My point was, the random wandering has tiles adjacent to owned territory given such a huge penalty that it will never choose them unless there are no alternatives (and there are)

Slotting in a Warrior DOES, however, spawn-bust the Marble area.

Yes, alternatives exist, such as sending the wounded Warrior from Gem City (New York) to there or such as delaying 1 turn in settling and hoping that there is only a Barb Animal or no Barb unit.

What happens, though, if the Barb Animal is in the wrong position? Bam, we just lost the 2 turns that it took to build the Warrior, if not more than those 2 turns.

What happens if it is a Barb Human? Well, we not only won't be settling Marble City anytime soon, but we will also have lost several turns committing our Settler to move down there in a direction where it can't settle.

If the thinking is that we'll probably just plan to lose 1 turn in settling Marble City to avoid potential Barb Animals, in the very best case, then why not commmit to spending 2 turns and average out our luck considerably compared to a lot of the potentially bad options?

Toto died. There is a price to pay as a result of that fact. I'd rather pay that price up front as a relatively fixed cost, rather than potentially paying a much higher cost later.

The longer we can delay it and keep it a comparable fixed cost, the better for us, since hammers now > hammers later.

If I was playing this SP, I'd just move the settler down to settle t45 as originally planned, and risk getting eaten, because the chance of a barb spawning down there is quite small.

Since that is an unacceptable risk, I look for the best option in the likely case of no barb there, that has only an acceptable risk, and that's the settle-1-turn-late option.

I just can't find a nice way to get the warrior built quickly - we could simply put all the overflow from the worker and the chop into the warrior, generate a little overflow gold, and be done with it (this hurts in terms of food), or else try and get it in the two turns after dumping the overflow into the settler (this doesn't actually spawnbust for many turns before the settler arrives), or build it in three turns, delaying the first chop and growing (this delays the settler a third turn, and we won't have a fifth tile to work after founding the city, and also doesn't help much with spawnbusting).

I'll try and work out what the cost of delaying Marble city is. If it doesn't matter, then not building a warrior yet doesn't make sense.

 

[Mitchum]

OK, here is my updated plan through completion of the Marble settler. I will stop any time a barb is seen to get feedback.

T39 - Warrior 1 takes Woody I promotion and heals (1T). Warrior 2 heal in Gems (3T). Wkr 1 completes chop at Washington-1N

T40 - Washington completes Wkr 2 and starts Settler 3 to catch OF hammers (1T). Warrior 1 moves W onto GForHill. Wkr 1 and Wkr 2 move to PForHill at Washington-NW.

T41 - Switch from partial Settler 3 to Warrior 3 in Washington. Warrior 1 moves NW to the GHill, completing exploration of the western area. Wkr 1 and Wkr 2 move to the gem tile and mine it.

T42 - Warrior 1 moves 1SE to GForHill. Warior 2 moves to Gems-1W. Washington will grow in 2 and finish warrior in 2 by working the corn. Stick with this as opposed to getting Warrior 3 out one turn sooner but without growing to 5.

T43 - Warrior 1 moves E if the coast is clear to spawn bust at pig-2NE. Warrior 2 moves SW. Move Gems citizen from deer to completed gem mine.

T44 - Washington grows to 5 pops and works improved tiles plus silk and spices. Warrior 3 completes and Settler 3 continues. Warrior 2 moves W to GForHill at Gems-3W1S to spawn bust. Warrior 3 moves to Washington-1SE. Wkr 1 farm stop at Gems-1N. Wkr 2 move to PForHill at Washington-1NW.

T45 - Writing -> Sailing at 0% research for 1 turn. Warrior 3 moves SW to spawn bust the SE while waiting for the settler. Wkr 1 farms the wheat. Wkr 2 chops PHillFor at Washington-NW.

T46 - Research back to 100%

T47 - Wkr 2 completes chop.

T48 - Washington finishes Settler 3.

EDIT: xpost with LC and ZPV. Let me re-evaluate.

 

[ZPV]

In short, MM heaven (or hell)...

I'll try it