SGOTM 9 - Bede

[crazybeard]

On city expansion, I'm with Bede on keeping India bottled up for the moment. If they get a foothold on or near Bede's proposed "New City 3", we could find ourself aced out of the Incense, which might incense the population (sorry- that was too good to ignore).
I'm in the middle on the war issue. As Bede says, we need other civs researching and selling to India (and acting as conduit to India for stuff we want them to have). But I'm for taking out neighbors as they get inconvenient. Perhaps one per technological age.

Fair warning - if Literature is researched, I will start the Great Library somewhere - I could hold off breathing longer than I could hold off building the Great Library.

I don't have access to the Civilopedia ATM, but could someone check if Gandhi needs Ivory to build his Elephants? Crakie has found the Ivory, but we could be in a position to deny a neighbor his UU.

 

[Marc Aurel]

I sense a bit of frustration there, Alan. Well, probably rightly so. I am an idiot and I apologize.

Whatever; you are not alone. Same happened to me. I had to restart twice until I got it right set up with the resources. As a newbie I was so concerned not to be the one who makes my team suck, that I missed the business mechanics.
And I recall Bahz also got mixed up with the subject. Maybe if we ever lose our captain (what will hopefully never happen) we should rename us to something like "Alan's Illiterates" or let's say we just discovered Writing and still don't know Literature. So what can be awaited?

 

[Bede]

First things first, I think.

We should have at least two towns at all times building a settler We have two other near neighbors we need to claim the best land we can out of what is available. The sequence can probaby go capitol builds granary, while the other towns build settlers. When they finish their settlers one of them can start its granary while the others build settlers and so on. The towns outside the three with food bonuses can build warriors for escorts for settlers then build barracks for training archers. Squeeze out a worker from a granary town every so often so we have at least one worker per town. Try to keep at least one worker inside each town's workable area. That way improvements finish more or less on the same cycle as a new citizen is produced. Later when we get to mining hills (in Monarchy) we can gang them for faster completions.

If in doubt what to build in a town build a settler!!!

India needs no resources for the War Elephant, but will need boats to get them off the island. Some catapaults in the right places with galleys in hte inland sea will do much to keep Gandhi on Fantasy Island.

I am not averse to building the Great Library so as soon as we know Masonry let's start a pre-build somewhere. The town should be a near frontier town probably to our NW. Getting it into India's hands will require careful timing. And taking it back after it has served its purpose. Trondheim might work but then we don't have a prebuild....

 

[Marc Aurel]

Now I can see Bedes dot map on my office PC - strange it does not work at home. What kind of graphics are these maps? No matter - Good work your dot map Bede, BTW How do you create the planned cities?
One single comment : I think move New city 7 one tile SW! (edited : sorry was this position due to get the dyes?, if so, I didn't say anything.)
I think you didn't mean the number of the city as order of build. I think the closer the city to the capitol the earlier we must build it, so I would wait for city 5,6,7 to be the last. If you want to keep peace they have more priority to claim the land before the neighbours do so - but as I wrote before we need to fight in any case to get our Great Leader, so we can conquer the areas later on. They are so far from the Mongolian capitol, they will be no economical benefit for them.

 

[Bede]

A picture of the further north. Note I moved the site as Mason suggested as it works better this way.

The choke point in the jungle is really important for us.

And there is another choke point to the west that will be important as well.

We also need to settle around the North of the Inland Sea to prevent India from taking our incense away. Any towns up there will need big garrisons to prevent involuntary conversion however. Don't hesitate to settle inside India's borders if it makes sense.

@Mason, sometimes your browser settings limit the graphics you can view from different sites. I use Photobucket.com to host the pictures, not the civfanatics sites so your security settings may limit your access. I don;t remember which one you have to change.

If you guys are not using CivAssisst II downloaid and install ASAP. It is a utility written by ainwood that gives a lot of information on the state of the game that is really useful but can only be gathered with great difficulty in-game. It has a World Map layout the features the ability to place planned cities and then export pictures to a graphics program. Really handy for quick dot maps.

Its biggest feature is that it tracks the cities for you and lets you know when a riot is about to occur so you can fix it before it does. Not really needed when you only have ten towns but really useful when the town count is 60 or so. It also keeps track of the state of trade in the world and will alert you when there are techs or resources available.

 

[Crakie]

I obviously agree on Bede's expansion plan, it is in fact what I was setting up during my turns.

Note that we already have masonry, so a palace pre-build is already an option. We should start one asap in a city not too far away, one that can be reasonably productive, though not a real core town.

Next turn-player: PLEASE take notice the fact that we can trade IW + HBR for writing to Carthage, but probably not for a long time anymore (the mongols started it). I think it's worth the risk.

 

[AlanH]

@Crakie: Marc is quite right - you are not alone. It seems I have to remind players to RTFM on a very regular basis, and sometimes it wears a little thin. As newcomers you have a better excuse than many I administer this advice to. Sorry if I let my feelings show.

 

[Crakie]

@Alan: no apologies necessary, you handled it quite graciously considering the number of SGOTM n00bs around

 

[madviking]

Im playing now.

 

[Bede]

The GOTM site server is down right now. I've notified Thunderfall, and I hope it will be restored shortly. If you need to keep your game moving then pass the saves on via a post attachment.

Don't try to use the forum Upload Files option, as Uploads10 is probably down as well. It's on the same physical server.

When the server is restored please upload your saves.

FYI to Team Bede.

 

[madviking]

turns 0-5 mostly barb hunting, exploring and granery builds
turns 6-10 got two elite archers, founded Oslo
turns 11- 15 founded Birka and Stockholm
turns 16- 20 we got Philo first, go to monarchy, get it! start revolution, only 5 turns!!

A) There is a settler near Birka, going for this site
B) map of home
C) more cities

PS, change the spear build to a worker or something

I'll upload the game save when the server is online

 

[Bede]

Roster check:

crazybeard - up
Bede - on deck
classical_hero - on holiday
Marc Aurel - got us started
Bahzell - found the sea
Crakie - got the deals done
madviking - made us kings

Some very nice turns here, gents, let's keep the momentum going.

@crazyb, I'll be around most of the night tonight, so if you play let's consult. I'm looking at the save right now to see if there are any obvious recommendations.

 

[crazybeard]

Roger that.

I won't have access to the Civ III computer until 11ish (ET), but I do expect to have many, many questions

Just from looking at the pics, I'll keep the "Birka" Settler headed for "New City 5", but I'm leaning towards the next two cities being "New City 10" and "New City 6".

The Archer near Crazybeard's Crazy City (!) doesn't seem to serve any purpose where it is, so I propose to send it down the long mountain chain towards the gap in the southern ridge.

 

[Bede]

I'll be listening in.

And here are some directives, err, suggestions....

You have four turns of anarchy to get through so the best you can do for each town is maximum food. Just monitor happiness so nothing gets out of control.

One thing I would consider doing is let the worker at Crakie Lake finish the road, then move him over to chop the forest to the northwest of the town and set it to train a settler. It will waste a few shields but the head start to get a settler to the NW will be worth it.

We need to get the populations of Bedeville and Mason Canal to at least four and keep them at no less than four.

We need more workers, even more than military.

Another thing, switch research to Literature, some AI will research Map Making for us.

The curraghs should take advantage of their movement points and reduced chance for sinking and start exploring the seas to the SE and to the east of the island.

Follow the dot map for any settlers produced.

Move military up to the two chokes in the west and the east. In fact the settler now at Birka could just march right on up to the western choke (either the jungle or the hill, if on the hill be prepared for a little cultural pressure from Carthage).

Here are some settlement suggestions for the west:

When in doubt as to what to build next build a settler, or a worker.

 

[crazybeard]

And here are some directives, err, suggestions....

Directives are fine with me.

When in doubt as to what to build next build a settler, or a worker.

What if I'm in doubt as to whether to build a Settler or a Worker?

Oh, and for the record, got it!

 

[Bede]

If you have more workers than towns, build a settler!

 

[crazybeard]

You're not goona like this. In a mere 5 turns, I have managed to lose an Elite Archer, lose a Settler, and have a town ransacked, all by the same barb Horseman.
On the positive side,we are out of Anarchy and the Mongols sold us Iron Working and Horseback Riding, plus 10 gold for Polytheism.
We have some Iron next to Crazy City, and Workers are heading that way now. There is also Iron on the small island.
Situation at 850 BC:

core cities

Eastern chokepoint: (why not let the Mongols do all the fighting?)

Western Chokepoint: (yes, that is Iron the Warrior is sitting on)

Holding for orders lest I do any more damage

 

[Bede]

Can you attach a save?

 

[crazybeard]

Hopefully, I can get that right

 

[Bede]

@cb, not to worry. Barbs are a fact of life and they come around when you least expect them, but with two strong settler producers we should do just fine.

Looking at the save now.