SGOTM 14 - Team TNT

[justjohn]

Nicely retold, Keath, thank you!

I don't know how much we can read into the story, but maybe it is possible in the world builder to give an AI say +10 or -10 towards us. That way they would be "good" or "bad witches" from the moment we meet them.

 

[Keath]

--- 'There are good witches, and wicked witches out there, so watch out.' ---

Nicely retold, Keath, thank you!

I don't know how much we can read into the story, but maybe it is possible in the world builder to give an AI say +10 or -10 towards us. That way they would be "good" or "bad witches" from the moment we meet them.

Good idea, jj! That's the kind of thinking that might give us that 'edge up' or keep us in the running.

Now why would we have been gifted Archery? The only gift Dorothy got was shiny red shoes taken from the feet of the Wicked Witch of the East.

Is this a 'hint' to build some archers early and take out 'The Wicked Witch of the East'?

Does having archers available immediately make this feasible?

Would the WWofE be our closest neighbour?

So should I catch the tornado, move the warrior 1se or wait for the late comers?

 

[justjohn]

Good idea, jj! That's the kind of thinking that might give us that 'edge up' or keep us in the running.

Oh, I wouldn't use such strong words, hehe. But the truth is that I am not sure how much we should read into the pregame story. Is it there just to provide some spice and context to our game (i.e. the game itself is not altered), or should we expect a non-standard game in some ways? In the last game we speculated if the rest of the AIs where together on a continent like mainland Europe, but as it turned out, it was an almost normal archipelago map. I just don't know.

Now why would we have been gifted Archery? The only gift Dorothy got was shiny red shoes taken from the feet of the Wicked Witch of the East.

What I wonder about concerning this gift, is that Archery is a tech that is not difficult to either research ourselves or get in a trade later on. So why give it to us? Do we really need to *that* early? Could we be surrounded by preset barbs? I hope not, and I don't want this to affect our strategy until we have scouted a bit with our warrior. Who knows, maybe it is just a glitch by the map maker (quite understandable since there are so many things to plan and fix for a busy map maker).

Is this a 'hint' to build some archers early and take out 'The Wicked Witch of the East'? Does having archers available immediately make this feasible?

As dima pointed out, an archer rush at this level is very difficult. I would be surprised if the map is altered to make the AI easier to take out early with a simple archer rush.

So should I catch the tornado, move the warrior 1se or wait for the late comers?

I think we can make our first move now.

 

[Keath]

Warrior is moved and we have marble nearby but no new food resources so check the pic. I see no reason not to settle 1w.

Comments....

 

[dima42]

Thanks for the warrior move.

Please don't settle 1W just yet. I'm 95% sure this is the way to go, but let me play out some alternatives .

 

[Keath]

I wonder how much of an advantage it is for us to have Archery? Normally, we'd have to start with hunting and research archery or research both. It might be a gamble to go for an early war with archers but it is maybe our only chance to win if there are no other good city sites with Cu, Fe or horses.

Kansas looked pretty resourceless (black and white) in the movie and Oz looked pretty fruitful (early colour movie). But first Dorothy had to kill a witch!

If there is good land worth capturing, should we consider it?

If we settle 1w I'd move the warrior (Dorothy) se to see if there's seafood for a second city. Build worker -->

Please post any ideas. This is the time to be creative, before we commit to a common start. It looks like most teams so far have settled turn 1, likey 1w.

Time to do some tests.........

 

[justjohn]

I notice we've reached the end of the world!

That seems to be another reason for settling 1W, but we wait for dima to do his thing.

 

[dima42]

1n has an early research advantage on 1w, in exchange for a fair amount of production loss.

Numbers this evening, but basically we can get a faster library and bw at 1N, but are in worse position to field an army. Assuming we don't see any resources across the lakeshore, there is also three squares to possibly find resources on to the north. Lastly there is some chance of horse/copper/iron 1w.

I am still slightly leaning 1w. I am also pretty sure that there is nothing worth considering other than 1w and 1n, so it would be fine by me to move settler 1w and if there are any bonus resources across the lakeshore settle there immediately.

 

[fizbankovi]

archery could speed up our time to a horearcher rush....

 

[justjohn]

1n has an early research advantage on 1w, in exchange for a fair amount of production loss.

To me there is another reason I prefer 1w to 1n, and that is the fact that our warrior found the edge of the map. Settlng 1w gives us more choices for settling other cities.

 

[The Dude Esq]

Hello, look what the cat dragged in ...

I was looking at the starting shot looking at 1W, thinking why is everyone gunning for 1W? Then I realised I was looking at 1E. (The plain hills.) I wouldn't go for 1E so much. This is going to be quite a long game if I can't tell the difference between East and West.

We will lose the cows with 1N. So just by eye 1W does seems better. (I'd say quite a nice starting position really. Once we get some river cottages going for our capital.) Let's see what the test games come up with.

 

[Keath]

Welcome back, dude!

I tried an early archer rush against Monty with poor results. Our archers never made a dent against fortified archers in a city. I wouldn't recommend it but I did steal a worker. If we want to start off warring would a barracks be worthwhile?

If we could somehow leverage having Archery early into an advantage that would be super. Maybe a horse archer army as fizban notes if we have horses.

If jj's idea of a +10 good witch and a -10 bad witch is a possibility then we might need archers early. Settle 1w or 1n if it's better and build an archer for a worker theft. Get the pop up while building archers. Research Mining --> BW for slavery, then AH in time for the captured worker. Have Dorothy explore looking for that first target.

Chop and whip a settler if no early victim while continuing growth. Second city near marble if there's some seafood? I too am in a quandry about just what direction to go tech wise and plan wise. Plan for conquest seems the most flexible.

What if I moved the settler 1w and posted a screenshot to help us decide?

 

[justjohn]

What if I moved the settler 1w and posted a screenshot to help us decide?

Please do.

My money is still on settle 1w, build worker first and research AH while warrior explores a bit. Then think again.

 

[Keath]

Settler moved:

 

[justjohn]

About the 1N (now 1ne) settling alternative: 2 of the 3 tiles we get has a forest on them, seriously limiting what kind of resources they may contain. If we want to see more before settling, then I would move 1NW (onto plain hills), but my vote still goes to current position.

 

[Keath]

Okay, what about settle on the spot, while growing to size 2 build an archer for worker steal and make the first three techs - Min, BW, then AH. Revolt to slavery and decide what's next based on what we find. Having BW, we can chop forests for settlers or an army.

Alternatively, and more logical is to build a worker and go AH first - probably the best but I really think we should test these variants.

Is anyone else testing some options? A second test game might be good to get a handle on other situations/AI. Or in World Builder, set nearby AI to +10 and -10 to see how that plays out. If I can fit it into today's schedule, I'm going to try this to see what happens with a couple of witches nearby.....

 

[dima42]

upon seeing the silk (as tiny as its advantage is), i'd go ahead and settle right now. but i can run tests with dates on 1w and 1n if you want me to. and i'd start a worker build, research AH, and run your set until either AH is done or you meet an AI. be sure to explore very conservatively with the warrior starting in 4 moves. (end turns in forests, and shy away from combat with animals except on forested hills.)

 

[Keath]

I tested again but don't know if my +/- attitude worked. There seemed to be little difference in attitude after turning the attitude full up/down. I was able to capture a worker and this might be our only advantage to having early archers. I think the team that takes best advantage of this 'gift' will be first out of the gates to capture a lead.

We are going to be fairly restricted for builds at the beginning. If we build a worker in 15 turns, we'd have AH and be able to start developing land. What would we build next? In my test it wasn't until 3040bc with Washington at size 4 that I captured a Spanish worker.

Any other testers? Ideas to try? Tech routes? It would be cool to try something a bit different but we don't quite know what to expect until Dorothy starts down the yellow brick road. Maybe the most obvious path - settle now, build worker, research AH is best.

What do you all think?

Edit: And by 3000bc Issy had 3 cities and only one archer in Barcelona.

 

[justjohn]

I tested again but don't know if my +/- attitude worked. There seemed to be little difference in attitude after turning the attitude full up/down.

When you bring up the AI modifier panel in World Builder, on the very left it sayd towards which player these changes are used. You might expect it to default to the human player, but it doesn't. So you first have to switch it to TNT, and then you can change the attitude of the AIs towards us.

I was able to capture a worker and this might be our only advantage to having early archers. I think the team that takes best advantage of this 'gift' will be first out of the gates to capture a lead.

We usually dont need Archery to capture Workers (unless you want to take the city itself down). But not building a worker ourselves and planning on a worker steal is a big gambit, too much for me i think.

 

[Keath]

***TEAM ALERT***

I think that the most important display on the Progress and Results Page is the post count. Ours is right near the bottom. We need to discuss. Everybody needs to contribute. We won't come up with any good ideas if we can't or don't talk it over.