SGOTM 14 - Unusual Suspects

kcd_swede · Oct 7, 2011

SteelHorse said:
OK. Played 1 Turn and will check in the game.

Unfortunately no trades for Alpha, not sure if we want to gift to potentially get diplo points.

Math is tradable for IW + poly with Mansa.
Gandhi offer only IW for Math.

Looks like S and W witches have poly, mono, theo.

Thanks SH! :goodjob:

OK, the trade for IW+Poly appeals to me. With the team aspect, its like trading math to Mansa for IW, and math to Shaka for Poly. So its not as wonderful as all that... but its two tech we want. OTOH, math could send the AI to research currency, whereas we'd want them to research Code of Laws for us. They'll need math before we can trade currency, though, so might as well get something for it now while we can. I'd like to hear what others think, though, since this is not a strong aspect of my play-style.

As for alpha, I would not gift that for diplo points. Just trading 1 for 1 in techs gets us good enough relations (and negatives from worst enemies). If the demand Alpha, we could give in to that... no negatives from worst enemies and a bonus +diplo for giving tribute.

Lets save as much tech advantage on everyone we can to net us the CoL trade when it comes up. Has Confu been founded yet? If not, it won't take long for someone to get it, since the pre-reqs are already owned.

Note, if we make the IW+Poly trade, we could consider switching to Aesthetics, which is usually good trade bait, plus on the way to a Parth/GLib path if we still think wonder-spamming is a good idea (I'm thinking that getting cats/WE's and killing someone is probably a more sure path to faster victory, but what do I know? :lol:

).

OK... lots of options here to discuss before SH will finish his turnset. So we're on an inddefinite hold while we wait for ideas. SH could update the PPP with his own ideas might help keep the discussions more concrete.

ChrisShaffer · Oct 7, 2011

I support trading for iron working and polytheism.

I think we have to keep gunning for code of laws, since we decided not to build catapults and elephants yet. We have to start running more specialists. I really prefer getting either currency or code of laws, and not detouring for wonder spam. Parthenon in particular isn't that great for us, since we're already philosophical. We're philosophical and in representation - more specialists is our key path, diverting is not good.

Yamps · Oct 7, 2011

We won't get CoL in trade, we have to research it on our own.

Xcalibrator · Oct 7, 2011

I also vote to trade for IW+Poly. We might then be able to trade for Priesthood, giving us another prereq research bonus toward CoL. I still want to stick with Currency first, though, even before CoL, unless something interesting about tech trading options turns up. I'd also like to repeat what kcd (?) said: do NOT trade for Meditation yet. If we get Med then that opens up Great Sci bulbing to Philosophy. If we do NOT get Med then that leaves the Optics--Astronomy bulbing path.

So... do the trade, see where the iron is, finish the turn, and then see what new trade options we have. By the way, is there any reason not to go to 100% research right now?

ChrisShaffer · Oct 7, 2011

Yes, Please switch to 100% research.

SteelHorse · Oct 7, 2011

OK.

Mansa IW, Poly for Math
100% Res
Rest remains the same
Hit Enter and discuss?

Not sure what other trades would exist besides Theo and doubt that we would have enough to trade for it. Am I misreading the tech trade screen. Edit: And I guess Mono/PH. Would we want that in a trade? If so, what would we pay.

How about we continue down the planned route until:
1.) A new trade is available.
2.) If iron makes new city choice a discussion topic after settler is produced
3.) Anything else interesting happens.

Unless we think a discussion on Curr v CoL is needed.

Just trying to keep us moving.

EDIT: And do we want to settle the GE?

ChrisShaffer · Oct 7, 2011

Yes, make the trade, settle the GE in Boston, stop if PH available or iron location interesting or other trade available.

Green light from me.

Xcalibrator · Oct 7, 2011

I second that.

kcd_swede · Oct 8, 2011

OK by me, and that makes three. Greenlight.

SteelHorse · Oct 8, 2011

Played to Currency as trade for PH was not being accepted.

All according to plan. Iron galore including Washington.

See screens and save checked in. Not much to add. Got Mansa to Pleased with trade.

Did not get the foriegn trade route to York, I think we need to defog the coast to get, probably
should have walked the archers up the coast instead of playing safe taking forest path. There is a turn left in one of the archers to send back. Worker turns left for discussion.

Spoiler :

ChrisShaffer · Oct 8, 2011

Time to split up the archers. Must de-fog that trade route.

SteelHorse · Oct 8, 2011

Yup and the English have probably cleared out most of the barbs anyways to the north.
Didn't have a great plan for the southern archer, sent him SW to leave options open. Probably best to begin westward migration.

Interestingly York has 2 settlers. Happy to be close to horse city settling.

ChrisShaffer · Oct 8, 2011

Hmmm, the southern archer was supposed to fog bust 2S of the horses. I guess he's exploring instead? The copper city site is now unprotected. I suppose we'll have to send the warrior forward and pray...

Errr... why aren't we hiring scientists in New York and Philadelphia? Surely that would have been better than working a plain forest and a lake?

Forgot to cancel the fish gift to Asoka, should do that now.

Xcalibrator · Oct 8, 2011

Will SH play more? If not, who's up? Some thoughts after looking at the save:

Techs: Reasonable options are Metal Casting (720), Calendar (546 beakers), Construction (546), Aesth (300), and CoL (546). If we switch citizens in NY and Philly to sci's then we'll have CoL in 8 turns at 35% breakeven. MC opens up triremes, forges (and Colossus), workshops, none of which we really need yet. Some AI already hve MC so it might be tough to beat them to the Colossus. Calendar gives us MoM and plantations (2 silks, 1 spice, 1 sugar--plus incense [not in a BFC] and eventually dye). Not a big benefit and we're still doing pretty well on happiness. How useful is MoM? (Less than HG, I'd say.) Construction opens up cats and war elephants (with HBR)--too early. Aesthetics opens up several wonders and is on the way to Lit (for Gt Lib) but that would require us to go after wonders to make it worthwhile, which I don't think is a good idea. CoL has already been discovered (Zulus founded Confusion) but gives us Chouses and Caste.

Courthouses would be nice to have for our growing empire but take quite a few hammers so some cities won't get them for quite awhile. How useful is Caste? Our main cities (other than Boston) already have libraries so we don't gain much--we would probably run 1 or possibly 2 more specs in Wash after some near-term growth. Boston has lots of extra food to run specs but that food is also very useful for fast worker/settler production--we could run 1 or 2 specs and eventually more when all the mines there are ready to take over on production. Atlanta, Chicago, and soon Seattle will all have pop to spare for specs. So I think CoL should be the next tech. (No surprise.) Maybe put some thought into what we might want to whip before switching to Caste, e.g., Seattle doesn't have many hammers.

Workers: We have 7 right now and could use a couple more for the new cities. W3 by NY should finish up the NY cottage and go north to help Chicago. W6 mine that hill for NY. W5 by Boston either move ASAP to new copper city or first build a road on the hill to the W to save time for a later worker. I'd grow Boston (1 turn, maybe put it toward a galley) and then build another worker (3 turns) to work around Boston--still lots of hills to mine. NY will finish its settler in 3, then should build a worker for the marble city.

Cities: Boston and NY as above. Wash needs some mines for hammers. Atlanta--finish monument and then maybe (?) build a worker. Chicago--probably a granary next to grow and then run specs when we get Caste.

Units: I believe that warrior3 can move 1W and still fogbust properly now that Boston's borders have popped. Warrior4 should move SW to see if it's safe for our settler, then continue farther SW to fogbust since the city's culture will take over on fogbusting there. Archer3 (in the hub)... go south? I'd like to see what's in India but we can crank out a galley (Boston?) and ship over a scout or spare warrior. We have 1 settler en route to the copper site, 1 hatching in NY for marble, and another under construction in Wash. How about plunking the Wash settler on India's borders--Seattle's borders will pop soon so we can row across--so we can use it as a beach head for later invasion? We can gradually accumulate units there without out-of-border costs and also scout widely before attacking. One possible site is on the NE coast of India with fish and (eventually) wheat. Others are near the river over on the western side, either on the desert with iron/cow/clams or on the river grass with cow/clam/corn. (Of course, I'm not sure if all those sites are more than 2 tiles away from another city, hence the need for scouting.) We should move fast on this if we're going to do it. Otherwise I vote for that settler to take the icy fur/silver, etc. site in the hub.

Misc: Wash will pop a GP in 6 turns with 75% odds for Scientist. Sci's will bulb Compass (then Calendar and Metal Casting). Given the lack of trading opportunities I'd say settle for the beakers and hammer. [Edit: Oops, forgot we don't have an academy yet--do that.] Do we really need to worry about barbs to the NW? They can't cross the ocean tile unless their borders pop, which doesn't usually happen very fast. Eh, the Philly galley will eventually be useful.

Edit: Forgot wonders! How about Boston building an aqueduct and then the Hanging Gardens? The AI now have Math so the window will close soon. 10 pop is worth 300 raw whip-hammers plus all the other benefits of faster growth. And it gives Boston Engineer GPPs. We could keep it pure Eng by building a forge and running more eng specs.

Xcalibrator · Oct 8, 2011

Where go the Moai? Atlanta, Chicago, and Boston all have 4 hills (eventually mines) for good production and at least 2 forests so it wouldn't take long to build. Chicago and Boston have lake tiles, which is a plus. All have quite a few water tiles--more than they'd work for a long time even with Moai. Chicago is far away from anything, though, so units built there would waste significant time traveling. It could concentrate on building World Wonders, but how important will those be, and what are our chances of beating the AI (or at least putting in enough hammers for useful amounts of failure gold)? Atlanta could become a shipyard. Boston has that settled Engineer and will likely be our Heroic Epic because of its location. It has only 6 water tiles (one of the a lake, one with clams, so we'd definitely use those) and given how much food we have we could work quite a few workshops for the hammers. It would be quick to build the Moai here, though, and eventually we'll have enough happiness and health that we could work almost all its tiles. On the other hand, we'll probably want to run engineer specs here once we get a forge. :crazyeye:

What does everyone think?

For something completely different, we could whip a lot in Seattle (which has good food but very few hammers) and maximize the overflow into Maoi, giving this otherwise hammer-poor city good production. But we won't be running Slavery for long, so forget that idea... In any case, we ought to build the Moai somewhere soon.

SteelHorse · Oct 8, 2011

ChrisShaffer said:
Hmmm, the southern archer was supposed to fog bust 2S of the horses. I guess he's exploring instead? The copper city site is now unprotected. I suppose we'll have to send the warrior forward and pray...

Errr... why aren't we hiring scientists in New York and Philadelphia? Surely that would have been better than working a plain forest and a lake?

Forgot to cancel the fish gift to Asoka, should do that now.

Missed the Fish cancel as it was not cancellable on the first turn, then in all the stop and go missed it.
On the Archer, it was not covered in the plan and I missed the fog bust.
Mea Culpa on those two.

The plan was worker, settler in NY. Used the PF and Oasis for those instead of the Sci. There was no discussion on Phili growth.

The turnset was to end on Currency. Next up

SteelHorse · Oct 8, 2011

On the techs. If we are planning to eventually war with Cuirs, then we should be thinking how do we get there the quickest. Not sure that diverting just for the sake of Wonders makes sense.
To get there we need: Aes, Lit, Music, CoL, CS, Med, Nat, MT, Philo.
Which should we trade for? Which should we research?

Perhaps Aes->Lit-Music is best trade bait path? And we could get the Artist for Golden Age usage.

ChrisShaffer · Oct 9, 2011

I can't support wonders or tech path diversions. We need CoL and we need it now.

Yamps · Oct 9, 2011

uh, can't keep up right now... :run:

the plan I had in mind before this set was CoL->Currency-> Music line.

Xcalibrator · Oct 9, 2011

Fascinating.

I really think we need CoL (even with Currency) to keep our expanding empire from collapsing under its own weight but after that... I assumed we were still planning to attack the neighbors before long, going for Construction and HBR for WEs and cats. I've never played a game where I skipped cats|trebs and waited until cuirs before warring. Not saying it's a crazy idea, but I have no experience and it makes me nervous. kcd, I know from xOTMs, loves to blitz with his horsies (and is very good at it)--what sayeth he? Deckhand, SH, you have experience, too, yes? If we went that route I assume we'd still want to REX and build up infrastructure. And I still like the idea of boxing in India, or at least establishing a launch base, with our cities.

BTW, wouldn't we need/want HBR, too, at least for stables?

So, it looks like the big question is when do we want to have our first war? If sooner, we'd use cats, WEs, axes. I think the main constraint there would be production--probably need to do a fair amount of whipping. I assume we'd quickly take India but would have to wait until a bit later (trebs, maces) to go much farther because the AI will soon get LBs and Xbows. If we waited until later, we'd be relying almost exclusively on our 2-movement cuirs, with no seige (except for closest neighbors), and would lose a lot of units so we'd need a very good production base to sustain the war. I think we'd also be counting on a fair degree of tech superiority--is that a safe assumption?? My gut feeling is that one can war with seige and decent defenders pretty well even when the AI have similar or even a bit better tech. So unless there are compelling arguments and experience in favor of waiting until cuirs, I'd vote at this point for a soonish war with cats and WEs.

SGOTM 14 - Unusual Suspects

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