SGOTM 14 - Unusual Suspects

[ChrisShaffer]

We already decided against the catapult & elephant war. If we were going that route, we should have researched construction and horseback riding, not currency. My whole turnset was devoted to setting us up for cat/ele war, bit then everyone decoded to expand instead. The AI will have longbows before we start warring.

 

[Deckhand]

I thought we decided that REXing was better than cats/phants vs India a few sets ago and that they might get longbows soon.

We still have room to REX, both on our node and in the Hub.
Yes, looks like the wizard is on an island to our west. We will need Astronomy to reach him (because of our city placement) (or lots of culture...). But we will need much more force to overcome him.

Spoiler :

Consider, island surrounded by mtns with one pass in, guarded by mech infantry

What is chance to trade for CoL soon? If we think we can get it in trade, then Aesth/Lit path now, else CoL first.

kcd or yamps or Xcal, are you available to play?
I can take the following set, but am too busy to play now.

Player Status (latest update Oct 6)
Yamps -- Busy (Skipped for now), on deck
SteelHorse -- UP! Played 2 turns Oct 5, more imminent... played to Currency Oct8
kcd_swede -- Busy (Skipped for now)
Deckhand
ChrisShaffer -- Just played
Jovan Kukic
Xcalibrator -- Busy thru ~Oct 14, limited posting
HardRocker -- Inactive

Xcal - I have lots of experience playing xotm, but not much with winning quickly. I usually go Bureauocracy/Cavalry. I also do catapult wars. I don't have quite the game knowledge that some of you have and my solo play still has some bad habits (e.g. saving forests).
Anyway, I've been reading the thread every day, but haven't had much to add and have concurred with the direction so far.

What is our planned victory condition? Domination?

 

[kcd_swede]

No way for me to be involved until Thursday, and even then I have much catching up on things at home. I might post a comment here or there depending on wifi ranges, but no chance to open civ.

Yamps is on active Captain duty till then, or till he appoints someone else.

 

[SteelHorse]

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.

This is the big question. It seems a bit late for cats/phants as the AI are all 1 tech from LBs and if we go CoL->Constr we are 2 techs from cats/phants (3 if we want stables) [EDIT: make that 3 as phants requires HBR] + army/boat build time. This will be later than then 1AD time that was suggested for an attack. Though Constr+HBR may be tradable.

 

[Xcalibrator]

What's the big deal with longbows? As long as they're not defending in hill cities they're really not that tough, especially when we'll have WEs. Just bring enough catapults. We do, however, need to know what Asoka's cities and units look like before we do anything. Have I mentioned I'd like to scout his lands?

Just to make our discussions more difficult, are we giving up on the Colossus? On a map like this, with all but 1 of our current and planned cities on the coast, it could really be big, and we've already lost out on the Great Lighthouse. We could hope to capture them, but that could be quite awhile. Only 1 AI pair has MC at the moment (do we know when they got it?). If we want to go for it we'd need to switch to MC right now, getting it in about 10 turns. Just for the sake of Wondrous discussion, how about we tech Metal Casting first, followed by CoL. Boston builds a galley for 1 turn, grows, then builds a worker in 3 turns, finishes the galley, starts an aqueduct, after several turns whips it to direct max overflow into the Hanging Gardens, and then finishes it. Meanwhile, NY finishes its settler, then builds a worker, and when we get Metal Casting it builds/whips a forge and chops out the Colossus. Meanwhile, Atlanta or Chicago works on the Moai, directing periodic whip overflow toward it.

 

[Xcalibrator]

Nothing like checking to see if you know what you're talking about. I forgot that we don't have open borders with Asoka, so if we want to check out his lands we'd need to build a spy. The military advisor screen says we have an advantage of ivory and iron over him (and ivory over Ragnar). Situation not well known for others. In any case, I don't think we must or should commit immediately to a war with cats and elephants--there's still time, even if we pick up a few other techs first. And that will give us time to get a spy over there and see what's what. We do, however, need to decide if we want to go for the Colossus. If yes, do MC next. If not, do CoL, even if we want to pursue the Aes/Lit/Music line (after that).

I'm still crazy busy at work through Friday---will probably even work tomorrow, a holiday. But things should let up enough after that for me to take a turn. In the meantime, we haven't heard much from Yamps.

 

[Yamps]

No way for me to be involved until Thursday, and even then I have much catching up on things at home. I might post a comment here or there depending on wifi ranges, but no chance to open civ.

Yamps is on active Captain duty till then, or till he appoints someone else.

Yeah, I have a similar situation. Therfore, ChrisShaffer is our new acting captain.

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We'd get delayed too much with elephant wars at this point and then we'd have more problems to conquer other AI. I'll open the save tonight for more comments.

 

[kcd_swede]

Yeah, I have a similar situation. Therfore, ChrisShaffer is our new acting captain.

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We'd get delayed too much with elephant wars at this point and then we'd have more problems to conquer other AI. I'll open the save tonight for more comments.

There you go, Chris... Unusual Suspects provides a fast-track to management!

 

[ChrisShaffer]

Sorry, I can't be acting captain, I'm about to leave on an 8 day whirlwind work trip. Perhaps Xc can do it?

 

[Xcalibrator]

Sorry, I can't be acting captain, I'm about to leave on an 8 day whirlwind work trip. Perhaps Xc can do it?

Very well. I'm going to whip our cities to the ground to make an army of axes, then march overland to India. If we get there while Asoka still has archers, great! If not, well, at least we'll go out in a glorious battle! (j/k ) I think that even if somebody had time to put together a plan, it wouldn't be worth it with so few of us able to thoughtfully review it.

I think the two main decisions we have are: (1) Do we want to try for the Colossus? If yes, research Metal Casting next, otherwise CoL. (2) Do we want to build the Hanging Gardens? (And we could do both--it's not either/or.) I have a special place in my heart for the HG, and we'll soon have 10 cities to make it significantly more valuable, but I don't know exactly how to value it. Ponder those questions over the next several days.

(BTW, have we kept all our EPs focused on Asoka/Raggie (to get research visibility) since we met the other AIs?)

 

[ChrisShaffer]

I think we should go for Code of Laws, and not divert to Colossus. It's too likely someone else will build it.

I support building an aqueduct in Boston, which can build it quickly and will need it due to lack of fresh water, and then if Hanging Gardens is still available, build it in Boston.

 

[kcd_swede]

Colossus goes obsolete too quickly if we end up aiming for astro. I think CoL sooner does more, plus we don't worry about losing it to AI. We will want a few CH's and to hire many specialists with caste system to get our tech pace up a bit before we can seriously consider war.

Aquaduct in Boston is OK, and re-eval HG after that, if its still available.

Does Steelhorse have a better feel for what we need to do?

 

[Yamps]

Colossus is an easy no imo, I don't see us working the coast with Rep scientists available.

EDIT:

Why are we building cottages? We'd be better off with mines building wealth if need be until we reach CoL. Those cottages will get farmed sooner or later. I'll try to find some time tomorrow to make a PPP. Basically, tech to CoL and settle some cities in the next set.

 

[SteelHorse]

In the short term expansion by settling the cities is the obvious next step. CoL has been in the plans for next tech, are we going to go Caste immediately? Are CHs are needed this soon?

In the longer term, not to beat a dead horse, but I am unclear what the plan is.

I can think of a few options:

1. Continued expansion while searching for the Wizard. Wait until we know what is required to conquer the wizard, build up massive forces, enough to kill AI and wizard and launch large scale attack. May require planes and paratroopers.

2. Take out AI a pair at a time. Determine what is needed for Ragnar/Asoka, beeline to get techs, build army, conquer, rebuild econmony, rinse, repeat.

3. Play it by ear. Optimize 1 tech at a time, pick wonders that may help along the way, trade as tech become available. Learn as we go along. Wait for one AI to make a move on another and jump into the fray.

Are there others?

Feels like we are in #3 at the moment. Not sure if that is optimal however.

 

[Xcalibrator]

Colossus is an easy no imo, I don't see us working the coast with Rep scientists available.

I like that argument. It's good. Done.

In the short term expansion by settling the cities is the obvious next step. CoL has been in the plans for next tech, are we going to go Caste immediately? Are CHs are needed this soon?

There are a few things we should whip before going to Caste, but we can probably have them done by the time we get CoL: (1) If the timing can be made to work well, whip to finish off an aqueduct in Boston to direct max overflow toward the Hanging Gardens; (2) Seattle needs to whip a granary/lighthouse.

In the longer term, not to beat a dead horse, but I am unclear what the plan is.

When you write out #3 that way, it almost sounds like a plan. I'd say #3 with an eye on #2 if the opportunity presents itself (aided by at least minimal efforts at recon/intelligence) and continued emphasis on REX.

 

[Deckhand]

Sounds like a plan coming together.
Next tech? CoL
Build Wonders? No Colossus, Yes Hanging Gardens

I was going to offer a PPP on Friday to play on weekend.
If yamps can do one Tuesday, so much the better.

 

[ChrisShaffer]

I like #3 but I think we will have to switch to #2 at some point. #1 doesn't seem like a good option to me. I think things will become more clear when we figure out if we really need astronomy or not.

Sounds like a plan coming together.
Next tech? CoL
Build Wonders? No Colossus, Yes Hanging Gardens

Agree with above. Where to build Moai? Or is it worth it?

 

[Xcalibrator]

Given Yamps's point about specs being better than working coast/ocean tiles, it does make Moai less valuable. Are there situations where we'd want hammers over specs? Chicago has those 2 lake tiles and fish, so that's 3 we'd want to work in any case. It could focus on hammers for world wonders or a navy--kinda far away from things, but ships move pretty quickly so maybe not a big deal. I think the other option would be Atlanta, but only because we could get ships to the front faster. I vote for Chicago, and think it would be worthwhile.

We need to think about trade and exploration more carefully, and here are some ideas to provoke that. Foreign trade routes are good (make that very good), but we have none. Moving that archer to reveal a coastal path to England should open up that route but we'll still have lots of trade slots to fill. India/Vikings are unlikely to give us open borders so they're out. We can't rely on road connections to/between other civs for a long time so that means it has to be by water. Archers are slow--we should send our future Atlanta (or was it Philly?) galley to explore west and keep going to open up more trade routes in the north. In the south, we probably won't have any connections with AIs there until we settle cities on both the north and south coasts of the hub and connect them by road. Settling a city in that icy/silver/furs/clams/marble spot would let us build a fort and get a galley into the lake there--odds are good that we could get him all the way through with another city and maybe a fort. The galley could then explore along the southern coast and open up more routes. (Or we could build a galley in a southern-coast city but that would probably take longer.)

And/or we could build scouts or spies. The spies are safe from barbs, but run the risk of discovery by AI. We could minimize that by having them only enter AI borders to reveal a city and help open up coastal trade routes. They're just as slow as archers, though. Scouts are faster and cheaper but easily killed by barbs--send them in pairs and hope that the AIs are doing their part to clear out the barbs?

Regardless of which exploration method(s) above we choose, I think we should bring 2 or all 3 of our exploring archers back closer to home to fogbust and protect our cities. The southern one should go west east toward India to find Asoka's borders and act as garrison in a future (soon?) city that we plant there. Another archer should keep the icy site clear and then act as city garrison. Maybe the 3rd--the one in England--could keep on exploring, but mostly to help find a coastal route to the next AI. Sure, we'll want to thoroughly explore AI lands before we attack, but that's quite a ways off (except perhaps for India, which we'll need to explore with a spy since we don't have open borders).

 

[ChrisShaffer]

The Atlanta galley is intended for barbarian fog busting and defence on the NW corner of our hub.

 

[Yamps]

I've opened the save again, but I'll have to think about it some more. Our play doesn't look stellar so far. We have two expensive libraries that we are not using, in NY and Philadelphia. Workers buiding cottages and we have the Pyramids...Well, it's busy RL that's killing us.

Some comments:

• Where are we planning our next two cities? Marble spot is obvious, I'm also thinking 1S from sheep SW from Boston.
  
• HG in Boston (or somewhere else) would be nice.
  
• Moai not right now, it's an expensive investment even with stone.
  
• We could get CoL in 6 turns.
  
• How to specialize our cities? I'm not sure about NY and Philadelphia. In Boston I'd hire scientists later on, for now production.
  
• General idea: tech fast to Military Tradition