SGOTM 19 - The Shawshank Redemption

[Mitchum]

From LC in the social group. Note, I think all posts should go in this thread going forward. I spent the better part of an hour formatting the stuff from our social group to put it here and I rather not have to do it again...

There are only so many strategies that get used in top games. I'm not talking about specific details, I'm talking about the general strategy. Obviously we need horses for HBR, but if we get them, will it make sense to plan HBR early on? You said you prefer to let AIs grow, but then where do the coins for research come from? FailedGold?

If we don't get horses, does it make sense to plan on maces, since machinery and CS are both on the Democracy beeline? If so, does that mean we should grab MC instead of CoL since its raw beaker value is greater. We could even simply beeline machinery and use that as trade bait. And where do the coins come from?

What if there's no stone? What if there's stone inside a nearby AI?

So, in general, if there are contingencies what are our strategy variants?

The problem I see is that the Constitution beeline seems like a lot of beakers for a beeline and I'd like to get some sense of how that's going to happen. Your wait-and-see approach leaves me uncomfortable.

 

[LowtherCastle]

To summarize our strategy discussion, I recall three basic thrusts:

1. Sushi/(Mining) beeline, then Democracy
2. Constitution/Democracy beeline, then whatever
3. Domination limit beeline while researching whatever tech path

Sub-strategies included:
1. GS bulbing
2. War economy
3. Failed Gold economy (marble/copper wonders)
4. Massive REX
5. Specialist economy + Rep (either Mids or Constitution beeline)
6. Both slingshots
7. Worker slaving
8. Axe rush
9. Tech trades
10. Espionage tech stealing

Dangers observed:
1. Early barb axes and spears (spawning T20-25)
2. Early Oracle completion by AIs

Possible settling locations:
1. SIP (best Oxford site)
2. 1S on the corn
3. 1SE
4. 2S (only site with marble in FC)
5. 2S+1E on the ph

Peculiarities of this scenario:
1. Start with worker and scout
2. Start with most Ancient Era techs
3. Cannot DoP/CF before capturing AI city
4. Can build granaries, libraries, etc from start
5. Can axe rush from start
6. Can build all ancient improvements from start
7. Start with 200g

Other factors:
1. Imperialistic: 50% settler bonus; +100% GG growth
2. Charistmatic: +1 in all cities; +1 for monuments; -25% XP for promos
3. No-wrap map (half cheaper city distance costs)
3. Aggressive AI means 3X more value CF/DoPs for us

 

[LowtherCastle]

Spoiler :

To summarize our strategy discussion, I recall three basic thrusts:

1. Sushi/(Mining) beeline, then Democracy
2. Constitution/Democracy beeline, then whatever
3. Domination limit beeline while researching whatever tech path

Sub-strategies included:
1. GS bulbing
2. War economy
3. Failed Gold economy (marble/copper wonders)
4. Massive REX
5. Specialist economy + Rep (either Mids or Constitution beeline)
6. Both slingshots
7. Worker slaving
8. Axe rush
9. Tech trades
10. Espionage tech stealing

Dangers observed:
1. Early barb axes and spears (spawning T20-25)
2. Early Oracle completion by AIs

Possible settling locations:
1. SIP (best Oxford site)
2. 1S on the corn
3. 1SE
4. 2S (only site with marble in FC)
5. 2S+1E on the ph

Peculiarities of this scenario:
1. Start with worker and scout
2. Start with most Ancient Era techs
3. Cannot DoP/CF before capturing AI city
4. Can build granaries, libraries, etc from start
5. Can axe rush from start
6. Can build all ancient improvements from start
7. Start with 200g

Other factors:
1. Imperialistic: 50% settler bonus; +100% GG growth
2. Charistmatic: +1 in all cities; +1 for monuments; -25% XP for promos
3. No-wrap map (half cheaper city distance costs)
4. Aggressive AI means 3X more value CF/DoPs for us

What jumps out at me from the above summary is that this scenario is very favorable for REX+warring. Almost every factor is highlighted in red for that reason.

.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Oh yeah, maybe Monuments will be good after all. As such, we probably will NOT have early access to a Stone Resource, so as to prevent any one team from pulling ahead significantly by building Stonehenge with very little cost to the Wonder. Either that, or Stone will be "just around the corner," say, by the Rice Resource to the north of our starting area, so that all teams will have a fair shot at building Stonehenge and The Pyramids.


Also, Charismatic + Imperialistic do push me even more toward wanting early Cats.


Settling 2S or on the PH are the only capital locations (which we have discussed) that allow us to improve the Pig Resource right away. For those capital locations, it makes sense to move the Worker to the PH For square, since the Pig Resource is adjacent to that PH For square and we will actually see some extra squares by moving the Worker there.

That said, I am not expecting to find any new Resources in the fog there, since you don't tend to get a lot of Resources near a Pig Resource and because kcd_swede already went out of his way to reveal the nearby area to help us with deciding where to settle. So, the odds of finding anything but another Calendar Resource down there in the fog are very small.


We also start with The Wheel, which can potentially affect Worker micro.


It is also worth noting that the "Lake" to our west appears to be salt-water-based, since the Coast squares only provide 1 Food each.

 

[WastinTime]

early Cats, to start racking up the XPs.

I've read something similar to this twice now. Explain please?

 

[LowtherCastle]

One reason I'm so focused on our general strategy is that it affects our initial decisions, imo. For example, do we start by quickly cranking out a scout? A second scout would allow us to send one along both the southern and northern latitudes while the warrior scouts near home and can garrison when we're about to exceed the happiness cap.

If the scouts succeed in finding all AIs quickly enough, we would even be able to determine if any of them are building the Oracle and how fast and how far along.

 

[ZPV]

One reason I'm so focused on our general strategy is that it affects our initial decisions, imo. For example, do we start by quickly cranking out a scout? A second scout would allow us to send one along both the southern and northern latitudes while the warrior scouts near home and can garrison when we're about to exceed the happiness cap.

If the scouts succeed in finding all AIs quickly enough, we would even be able to determine if any of them are building the Oracle and how fast and how far along.

In my testing, unless I really really pump it out quickly, the second scout just gets eaten before seeing much.

 

[Jastrow]

How would a scout finding all AIs tell us if they are going for Oracle? I only understand that if a scout uncovered all AI major cities (which is obviously not happen in time) so that we could tell from "sabotage production"

Personally, I am still not ready to commit to a grand strategy, and would like more information if possible...As near as I can tell, the only 3 grand strategies under serious considerations are those outlined by LC:

1. Sushi/(Mining) beeline, then Democracy
2. Constitution/Democracy beeline, then whatever
3. Domination limit beeline while researching whatever tech path

I would think all 3 of them include an Oracle slignshot (all be it for different techs), so I am wondering how much they differe before that. It is obvious that we will need to pick one before we choose the oracle tech, but do we really need to chose before that?

Well, I guess we do need to choose a bit before that, because the Oracle timing will be a bit different depending on the techs, but other than that...

The starts I saw from Seriel and WT for example, looked perfectly fine (modulo Oracle tech choice) for any strategy...

So, if we all agree on Oracle first (I think we do?), then it seems to me that all we need to agree on right now is:

-Settling position?
-Which path (Meditation or Poly)
-Optimum build micro to grow the capital to happy limit quickly.
-General exploring pattern

I would have expected that the solution to all of those would be the same, at least up to the end of the first tech, and likely even up to the end of Priesthood, independent of the grand strategy. Am I missing something in this assumption?

If this assumption is correct, then we could make a grand strategy choice with significanly more map information than we have now.

 

[Mitchum]

I just ran a quick test:

Meditation -> PH -> TBD
Settle 2S (I'm not a fan of settling on the marble unless it turns out that it's a good city with it's own food resource).
Pigs -> copper (just as it comes into our cultural borders) -> corn -> marble
Granary (2 popped on T14) -> OF into settler -> warrior (JIT to avoid ) -> settler -> Oracle

I had to build the Oracle for several turns without access to marble. Oracle would complete on T29 = 2840 BC (pick free tech on T30) with zero chops.
City #2 settled ~3000 BC depending on where it goes.
One way to speed up the Oracle would be to build a worker instead of a settler to hook up the marble sooner. But, it would be really nice to have city #2 settled so that we found our religion there for a "free" border pop + a missionary for city #3.

 

[Mitchum]

BTW, the early granary in the capital is VERY powerful, so I would much rather build a granary before barb bait (e.g. a scout).

 

[Seraiel]

Seriously, why are my posts getting eaten...

1. Granary in capital is the way. Be careful to stop the growth of the city early enough so the city doesn't exceed half-full Food-bar before the Granary really can be seen in the city.

2. Warrior NE

3. Possible settling locations:

-> SIP (gives a good size 10 capital)
-> 1SE (gives an ok size 8 capital that is stronger in the beginning because 1* Pigs > 2* Sugar)
-> Settle on Plains-Hill (imo no good move, because missing out on Freshwater in the Capital I really don't like, but I'd be willing to listen to arguments like i. e. "we're gonna have so many resources and the capital will stay so small that it doesn't matter)

Possibility: Move Worker to Plains-Hill first to take a look if there's something great, if not, go with move 2.

I think I captured all options there. Simply vote 1, 2 or 3 asap plz so Lowther can begin to play. I think she can move the Warrior NE already, because I really see no better option there.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Chopping into the Granary
If the early Granary is so powerful, will it maybe make sense to put a 20-Hammer Chop into it, rather than 2-pop-whipping it? At that stage of the game, it's not about maximizing the number of population points per whip, but maintaining the population points to be able to keep working improved squares.

Early 2nd Worker
Especially with a willingness to Chop a few 20-Hammer Forests, an earlier 2nd Worker isn't that bad of an idea, either.

EDIT: It has been said that "a 20-Hammer Chop now can often be better than a 30-Hammer Chop later."

Two early Workers can often accomplish the same as three Workers when two of those three Workers get built much later. I.e. You save Hammers overall due to your earlier investment in building Workers, so you can afford to build less of them. Also, doubling-up Workers, say, to improve the first improvement for City #2, can also net you gains on the early second Worker, helping to make up for the delay in settling the other City. The same can be true about setting up a faster Trade Route between your first two Cities, assuming that no River exists to do so.

I.e. You earn +2 Commerce earlier from the faster Trade Route connection between your first two Cities and you earn, say, +6 - 2 = 4 Food per turn instead of +3 - 2 = 1 Food per turn (4 times as much, in this example) for a couple of extra turns by improving a G Pig Resource for a second City that much faster. I.e. Some of the Food + Hammers + Commerce that may be lost from the delay of getting out your second Settler can be made back by having the extra Worker turns available sooner.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Settling Location
@Seraiel
It sounds like you are pushing for settling 1SE on the G For Riv. A few others seem to be pushing for 2S on the G For, which was an option that you didn't list. So, it seems like we still need to do some comparative testing.

I recognize that there are benefits to settling on a River that cannot be seen immediately, such as the Fresh Water bonus and the ability to build a Dike later. Once we have an opening set of moves that we like, we can compare the two settling locations and then can do an additional qualitative analysis on these extra factors.

If anyone is entertaining SIP (the best spot for trying to found Buddhism), then we really do not want to move the Worker to the PH For, as we'll need the extra turn of 5-Food from the Corn to help compensate for the loss of the Pig Resource in the capital's big fat cross. Thus, we're probably going to have to decide "blindly" (without moving the Worker) where we're going to settle, based on testing results.

EDIT: I don't see this concept of deciding where to settle solely based on our test game being a problem, since kcd_swede went out of his way to reveal the Resources (and lack thereof) in the nearby area, so we really should be able to make the decision with just the test game.


Warrior Move
Why does the Warrior have to move 1NE? Couldn't he also move 1NW?

What's the plan with the Scout? Send him 1NW while the Warrior goes 1NE? Or, shall we send the Scout southward, which means moving for 1 square on Turn 0 but 2 squares at a time for the next few turns?

Do we want the Warrior to come back to garrison the capital by a certain date? Do we want the Warrior to be in place to spawn-bust? Or, are we okay to send the Warrior out exploring?

All of these decisions are inter-related and will need to be decided, preferably before we move the Warrior and Scout.


The Real Game
Unless we want LowtherCastle to perform the moves in the test saved game (which we could do as a team-based exercise, if you really want), LC won't be able to make any moves until Feb 7th, when the game gets released.

 

[Jastrow]

I just played around with the test save a bit, and my results look pretty much like those of Mitchum above (settling 2S). My favorite of the starts I have heard described so far is that of WT (Turn 25 Oracle, city two on Marble.)

 

[Jastrow]

Settling Location
@Seraiel
It sounds like you are pushing for settling 1SE on the G For Riv. A few others seem to be pushing for 2S on the G For, which was an option that you didn't list. So, it seems like we still need to do some comparative testing..

I prefer 2S ONLY if we are not willing to settle on Marble. I personally favor settling on the marble (for city two), and with that in mind, I would prefer S-SE for the plains hill

I recognize that there are benefits to settling on a River that cannot be seen immediately, such as the Fresh Water bonus and the ability to build a Dike later. Once we have an opening set of moves that we like, we can compare the two settling locations and then can do an additional qualitative analysis on these extra factors.

I think a dike is too close to the end of the game (maybe after it ) to be a significant factor in the decision of where to settle the capital.

 

[ZPV]

I prefer 2S ONLY if we are not willing to settle on Marble. I personally favor settling on the marble (for city two), and with that in mind, I would prefer S-SE for the plains hill

Some hammers and a couple of cheap techs are worth it for an Oracle-classical tech.
Throw in a whole city that won't do very much? That's one steep price - one that I'm very wary of paying except for a heavier slingshot.

 

[Mitchum]

My favorite of the starts I have heard described so far is that of WT (Turn 25 Oracle, city two on Marble.)

I like WT's test run as well. Two things I don't like about it are:

1. We're almost forced into settling on the marble for city #2 regardless of what other resources would be in said city's BFC. Like LC said earlier, ideally every city, especially our early ones, are strong as opposed to be forced to settle somewhere "just" to get marble.

2. The marble tile is a pretty good tile for production AND commerce is we settle 2S.

So we get a 4-turn sooner Oracle plus and a +1H PH capital at the expense of the items listed above. It's possible that those 4 turns is the difference between getting the Oracle or not although T29 seems relatively safe to me.

EDIT: xpost with ZPV. It appears that we're in agreement.

 

[Jastrow]

I dont feel safe with ANY date, quite frankly...

AI can start building the oracle on turn 1... Any industrious AI needs only 75 hammers. Imagine a basic city with say rice an copper... By turn 10, he will be working copper for at least 6 hpt... That is 12 turns or so for the oracle, so turn 22. That is without even assuming anything particular amazing about the start.

I think any oracle is a gamble, but one we have to take to compete (Since I assume many teams will try it, and likely at least a couple will succeed), but I think every single turn that we can save should be saved.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Messages (aka Posts) getting eaten by the Forum Monster

Seriously, why are my posts getting eaten...

I find that the absolutely safest thing to do is to open up your favourite text editor, such as Notepad, then save a new document to a temporary file, say: c:\temp\junk1.txt

Then, type to your heart's content and press Ctrl + s occasionally to save your typed message.

When you are ready to reply in the thread, click on the Post Reply button. Using the Quick Reply textbox at the bottom of the page often fails due to one's session having timed out in the background since the last time that you loaded the web page.

Yes, you still have a cookie that says you are logged in to CFC, but the web page itself seems to have a session timeout that is independent of your browser's cookies.

 

[Jastrow]

BTW, on marble would not be "just" to get the marble, in that it is also well positioned as a Helper city for the capital. For teching games, I routinely settle such a city as early as city 4 or so (tho admittedly not likely as city two).