SGOTM 16 - Fifth Element

[Shaandore]

Okay, votes so far:
Blubmuz 1N
BSPollux 1N
Folket ?
Mastiff of Ar ?
MeowZeDung ?
Shaandore 1SW
Unclethrill 1N
ZPV 1SW

I will wait a couple hours for Folket, Mastiff and Meow, but if 1SW doesn't get a vote, then 1N is in majority, so that is what I will do. (Other reason being that I won't have time to play until then.) I guess I can omit the 1-move PPP now

A couple "I'm fine with 1N, go on" post would be nice before I proceed.

 

[BLubmuz]

I will wait a couple hours for Folket, Mastiff and Meow, but if 1SW doesn't get a vote, then 1N is in majority, so that is what I will do. (Other reason being that I won't have time to play until then.) I guess I can omit the 1-move PPP now

A couple "I'm fine with 1N, go on" post would be nice before I proceed.

Actually i'm fine with anything.

 

[BSPollux]

Something else I'd like to ask:
To those experienced with this kind of game: Hows the ammount of communication so far? I see that some teams have twice our 'pages' allready, thats why im asking. I guess it will go up once theres more to do, but nevertheless, our activity is it allright? Are we missing important things we should have done?

 

[BLubmuz]

Something else I'd like to ask:
To those experienced with this kind of game: Hows the ammount of communication so far? I see that some teams have twice our 'pages' allready, thats why im asking. I guess it will go up once theres more to do, but nevertheless, our activity is it allright? Are we missing important things we should have done?

There's not much to discuss now. Personally i find pointless discuss the grand strategy, even in details when we don't even know how the land is, if we're alone or else. I prefer to discuss things near the time they should happen. I think that wait at least to have the first turnset completed is the best thing to not have interesting ideas buried by 100 posts.

 

[Mastiff_of_Ar]

I think I already voted SW, but it's a soft decision... It's not going to send me into a tizzy if he goes north. I just think the more we see on the first rip, the better.

I'm also sold on SIP. I see the logic in it, unless the warrior finds something extraordinary...

MF

 

[Shaandore]

I think I already voted SW, but it's a soft decision... It's not going to send me into a tizzy if he goes north. I just think the more we see on the first rip, the better.

I'm also sold on SIP. I see the logic in it, unless the warrior finds something extraordinary...

MF

I'm sorry, I only checked the posts for votes after Blubmuz's let's vote post. It is a tie now.
I will move SW if nobody objects in the next 30 minutes, since Blubmuz said that he is fine with either moves and that active player should decide.

Edit: Hurray! post no. 100!

 

[Shaandore]

Moved the warrior 1SW. One clam visible but it is far away.

I will update the test game later tonight.

 

[BLubmuz]

My guess on the hill seems to be confirmed by the screenies.
At this point, with 3 hills and a FP, SIP seems to make for a decent Capital. Being this a long game, it also let us build a levee, which is not bad. Provided we survive until then.

At this point, if i'm not wrong, SIP is the clear majority, if not unanimity. Try to move the warrior in a big circle CCW. Do your best to keep him on the forests.

But we need to decide the research before you start, and this is the point where to start to decide what to take from the Oracle, provided we agree on that wonder.

I think that CS is out of reach, so MC can be a good choice, mainly being Industrious.

Thus the path can be AH or Pottery - or both - BW - writing, then the path to priest, then Alpha to build a spy.
Another thing we need to remember is to concentrate our EPs on the nearest AI, at least until IW is stolen. Let's pray to not be alone.

 

[Shaandore]

I think that having two unforested hills, an fp and a riverside grassland means that BW can wait after pottery, if we want pottery before oracle. If not, then BW is a solid choice because we have many forests to chop.

I agree that CS and Currency may be out of reach, but CoL could be done. Question is, would it be better than MC? After all caste artists are not needed since we are creative, and until we see solid food (for now it looks more like a great plains map ), spamming great people is not an option.

So the plan is to settle in place, end turn without selecting tech, move the warrior 1S, take some screenshots, (demographics included), and post them. I believe that we can postpone selecting a tech for 5 turns, and get multipliers on those beakers if we meet someone with that tech. See Kakumeika SGOTM 15 thread for details

So PPP style:

t0:
SIP
start on worker, working any tile since all of them has 3 yield before border pop

t1:
select Pottery, then deselect it by clicking research bar
move warrior 1S
take screenshots, save, report

 

[unclethrill]

Great Job Shaandore! As expected, we really gain no insight from the move. 1N I'm guessing would have been equally useless.

Looks like SIP is the best choice at this point. Now we have a couple things to focus discussions on:

1. Where to settle? SIP, 1W, 1NW, 2SE, 2E, any other suggestions?
2. Are we going to chase the Oracle and if so, what tech are we going for? CoL, Currency, CS, Sailing, ...
3. What are the first few builds going to be? Worker>Warrior>Warrior, Warrior>Worker>Warrior, Settler, Settler, Settler, ...
4. What is our tech path going to be? I know this is highly dependent on the answer to #2. Pottery>Writing>Alphabet, Mining>BW, Myst>Poly>Priest, Fishing>Sailing>Hunting, ...
5. Where do we send the warrior? Semicircle SW>NW>N>NE around the settler to map out the terrain, continue due south since we already are moving that way in a hope to meet our neighbor sooner to start espionage for stealing IW, ...

 

[unclethrill]

Looks like I took too long to type up my list but I think that I have formalized all the statements and question we have so far.

 

[BLubmuz]

1. Where to settle? SIP, 1W, 1NW, 2SE, 2E, any other suggestions?
2. Are we going to chase the Oracle and if so, what tech are we going for? CoL, Currency, CS, Sailing, ...
3. What are the first few builds going to be? Worker>Warrior>Warrior, Warrior>Worker>Warrior, Settler, Settler, Settler, ...
4. What is our tech path going to be? I know this is highly dependent on the answer to #2. Pottery>Writing>Alphabet, Mining>BW, Myst>Poly>Priest, Fishing>Sailing>Hunting, ...
5. Where do we send the warrior? Semicircle SW>NW>N>NE around the settler to map out the terrain, continue due south since we already are moving that way in a hope to meet our neighbor sooner to start espionage for stealing IW, ...

1. SIP
2. Oracle MC
3. worker - warrior, enough for this TS
4. writing has to be prioritized thanks to our cheap libraries, but i think we can't wait for Alpha to trade for AH and see horses. Since both pottery and AH are prerequisites for writing, we have a 20% discount on it by researching both, thus i propose AH-pottery-writing. Pottery is also a prerequisite for MC, so it fits with #2. in my plan
5. after writing the path to PH, then BW while building the Oracle, then Alpha to build spies and try to trade for some tech
In case, we can skip AH, or set BW before the PH path.

And here the discussion starts to be interesting

 

[ZPV]

Many of these questions we can't answer until we see our BFC. Another resource makes a bigger sling possible, and lets us test out our lines out properly. I'm sure you know where my vote to settle goes (in place and worker first).

I still don't see the value in a MC sling. Ok, it's better than nothing, but forges without gold, silver or gems aren't really worth all that much during our expansion or early tech. If we do have a couple of those, that changes things a little bit, and the + can be quite powerful. The production bonus just isn't much help until your hammer needs start ramping up (either for an army or infrastructure). It's not a tech you plan to slingshot, just one you fall back on when you realize you can't unlock anything else in time. If we can get something more powerful we should, but that needs the full BFC to be visible.

I'm split between Mining and Pottery as first tech, but leaning towards Mining. I don't think it's worth teching Fishing until after Writing, and even more so AH, without any visible pasture resources. The wildcard is Bronze Working. I'm fairly sure it pays for itself, but the question is when to slot it in.

The warrior should explore the clams site now, since there are no forests in the area and animals will spawn and make that much harder soon, and then it can circle around our capital on safer terrain. We definitely do want that warrior alive in 20 turns, if possible.

 

[unclethrill]

1. SIP
2. Agree on MC. We will need Forges as early as possible
3. I also like Worker>Warrior.
4. I'm okay with AH and Pottery then writing but I prefer Pottery>AH>Writing because if we want the worker to build a farm on corn then move to the FP and build a cottage, we will waste one worker turn waiting for pottery after we arrive on the FP so Pottery>AH>Writing is my choice
5. Agree on the Semi-circle exploring, something like SW>SW>W>W>NW ... sticking to forests as much as possible.

Remember: This is very important!. As soon as we meet an AI, on that same turn, set Espionage to 1 for that AI so that all spy points go to that AI and we can steal IW as fast as possible.

Also, All, please be aware of the direction any scouts of AI come from so that we can know which way to direct our exploration.

 

[Shaandore]

Many of these questions we can't answer until we see our BFC. Another resource makes a bigger sling possible, and lets us test out our lines out properly. I'm sure you know where my vote to settle goes (in place and worker first).

I agree. As I said, we can postpone selecting a tech for 5 turns. Until then, we could explore quite a bit of our land, and make better decisions. The only thing we need to decide is exploration and first build.

I have never seen an inland start where warrior first is better than worker first. The alternative could be settler first, but we are not imperialistic.

Exploration wise I attached a plan. The numbers are the turn number when the tile becomes visible (I assumed that we SIP). The warrior path will reveal the most tiles without leaving any tiles in fog. The path reaches the forests on t5, which is safe I believe. The red alternative is even better, but might be more dangerous.

 

[BSPollux]

That plan seems well done

 

[ZPV]

Exploration wise I attached a plan. The numbers are the turn number when the tile becomes visible (I assumed that we SIP). The warrior path will reveal the most tiles without leaving any tiles in fog. The path reaches the forests on t5, which is safe I believe. The red alternative is even better, but might be more dangerous.

That path looks good to me.
No animals spawn after we press enter on turns 0, 1, 2, 3, 4.
When we press enter at the end of turn 5, animals spawn (but don't get to move), and any unassigned tech progress is lost.
Because they only spawn outside the 5x5 square surruonding our warrior, lions and bears won't actually be in range to attack on turn 6, although panthers or wolves could be.
Interestingly, even though they can't move onto them, animals can spawn on resources.

 

[BLubmuz]

I agree. As I said, we can postpone selecting a tech for 5 turns. Until then, we could explore quite a bit of our land, and make better decisions. The only thing we need to decide is exploration and first build.

No reason to postpone research: better start with a well thought and shared plan.

Good job the scouting path!

ZPV, i see you know deeply the mechanics of the game.
Aside that, what do you think we can try from the Oracle provided we don't find any precious metal? MC is the cheapest in terms of prerequisites and it fits with our cheap forges. ATM i really don't see many more options, but if you got some idea, better you post it.
I ask just this: please assume we can't find any gold or similar in range of our Capital or of the 2nd city. If we do, we will revise our plans.

 

[ZPV]

No reason to postpone research: better start with a well thought and shared plan.

Good job the scouting path!

ZPV, i see you know deeply the mechanics of the game.
Aside that, what do you think we can try from the Oracle provided we don't find any precious metal? MC is the cheapest in terms of prerequisites and it fits with our cheap forges. ATM i really don't see many more options, but if you got some idea, better you post it.
I ask just this: please assume we can't find any gold or similar in range of our Capital or of the 2nd city. If we do, we will revise our plans.

Yes, I'm only assuming what we can see right now. No resources, foreign trade routes, tech trades, etc. All I assume is that we can keep the warrior alive to play as military policeman for a city later on. At the moment I think Currency via Alphabet is just out of reach without relying on tech trading (say for Mysticism) or an extra resource (I can only manage t70-71 although it feels like I should be able to shave a couple more turns off that), though simply adding a plains cow somewhere could be enough to swing that in our favour.

If we have no other options, I'll take MC over nothing, but at 1300BC Forges a pretty measly prize because you have almost no population. We can still try to plan for a harder tech, but take MC when it becomes clear we won't get trade routes, or that we'd rather ReX because the land is lush.

If there are no happiness resources, Monarchy might be more valuable, even though it costs significantly less - raising our happy caps is just that much more powerful.

The other option is just to take CoL on our way to fast-ish CS, but if we do that we have to focus on setting up our Bureau Capital. I don't think much of Aesthetics, or bulbed-Mathematics slings for this game.

One reason to hold off on tech for 3 turns is to see if our border pop reveals corn/wheat/something for our second city. If it does, we can ignore Fishing and that moves tech timetables up a few turns.

 

[BSPollux]

On Page3 I posted two tests, one of them was this very simple CoL via Oracle thing:

Spoiler :

Now SIP
(chopping like mad)

Warrior - worker - warrior - worker - Stonehenge(48) - worker - settler - Oracle(63) -Library(64) -Settler(68)

Pottery - Myth- mining - bronze - meditation - priest - writing - Code of laws (free) - whatever

First great person: Turn 75 (with scientists points from Library it leads to 80%GP 20%GS)

It would give us (most likely) the confuzianism shrine by turn 75 as well as two worker, two settlers and the library before turn 70. The forrests would fall, most of them, but the capital would provide quite a nice commercial output with all the rivers and the shrine.

The two settlers could each be accompanied by a worker and be developed nicely, given theres just some usefull land around.

Last time I posted this it didnt get any attention. If you think this start is useless please give me a short explanation why, else I'll end with suggesting things that you hate all over again.