Shadow game

T7:
Yes, I think Charlies peak inside his culture fogbusts all tiles except the one SW of the Banana.
I would gamble on it being cool, while scouting abit further west with the scout.
If you have time, it can be nice to jump up that hill to gain visibility of Charlys city, that way you can do espionage on it, and see if he is building a wonder... or gain intell on what turn he builds a monument, so you know when his borders will pop.

I would leave it to a warrior to scout west of the lake, in the forest/jungle.

City spot 1W of the silk? Might be awkward to push borders with Charly... he is nice to get to pleased as he doesn't plot then. But if we get border tension thats harder.
But alternatives seem to be lacking.
In a pinch, a second city could be laid down 1S of the wine, and those cities would both live a bleak existance working cottages and taking turns borrowing the floodplain-farm to grow. :)
I would want to postpone fishing, after mining I suggest either TW (to get to city#2 spot faster and connect) or BW to have some hope to grab some spots.

2 warriors and growth to pop3 should be roughly synced here.
After gems... perhaps worker should waste turns to go directly to ivory?
Farming the grassland 1E of gems is also an option if going BW, Spi means no turn lost to revolt, and even w/o granary a farm is about as good as a mine/camp. Doing a 2pop whip of the settler might work out.
But have to wait and see how research/workerturns/growth syncs up first. :)
 
It's annoying but i would fogbust at banana (until a scout - warrior switch can be made).
When barbs have no space they can attack culture borders earlier than normal, especially with a worker close at Rice.
Think we have seen that disaster happen in one of Lain's games too :)
 
A much longer turn set as most of the key decisions have now been made and we're just waiting for worker to come out and no chance for exploration whilst fogbusting.

Spoiler T14 update :

Hinduisum and Buddhism founded T9. Charlie converts to Buddhism T10 and his second city pops borders T11 - I think this means pigs city is the Buddhism holy city and I should probably avoid settling anywhere near it if I don't want to be engulfed by his culture. On the plus side having followed Fippy's advice not to lose the early game by fogbusting the tile SW of banana, my scout is free again!

Agriculture in T12 and I go mining as planned.

Worker out start of T14. Obviously going to improve the farm rice. No opportunity for half an improvement on the way to rice. Will then go straight to gems, again no opportunity for half an improvement on the way.

Scout is moving one tile per turn and will hop on the wine this turn unless advised otherwise.

Capital is going to build a warrior for now. Settler first would probably be fastest in terms of getting the site next to the rice but would sacrifice many turns of working the gems and if I lose the rice site, I think a city on the wine wouldn't be a disaster - could potentially farm the floodplain NW of wine (better luck on my fog gazing this time surely!) and eventually the one 3N of capital.

I think delaying beyond size 2 for settler would be too slow.

Tech decision after mining I think needs to wait until mining is in and a bit more exploration is done. Likely to need a military tech before too long with that jungle to the west.

Micro discussion:

Capital could grow for 5 turns at 3:food:/turn = 15:food: after which the rice would be improved. Two more turns growing at 5:food:/turn for at total of 25:food: at size 2 which is 3:food: more than is needed to get to size 2.

In the mean time, warrior would have had 7 turns at 2:hammers:/turn from the city centre and would need 1:hammers: and another turn to complete.

Mining is coming in 7 turns which appears to be the exact turn the worker will be stood on gems ready to mine i.e. no pressure to work an extra :commerce: to get to mining in time.

I think one warrior and the scout should be enough fogbusting for the first city which should be settled around T33 i.e. before barbarians likely to enter borders.

So, assuming starting settler ASAP at size 2 is top priority and :food:>:commerce:>:hammers:, I propose to work grassland forest for 1 turn and then grow on rice until reaching size 2. By my calculations warrior should be out on same turn city grows and I can start settler straight away at size 2 working rice and gems producing 8 net :food::hammers:per turn giving a 13 turn settler with 4 overflow. Worker probably farms a grassland tile in the interim.

Improving the ivory and waiting to size 3 would allow a second warrior out but the tile wouldn't be improved until quite near completion of settler. If going this route, I should acknowledge that it might end up as a grassland mine NW of gems as ivory might well be under jungle before I get there.
Spoiler T14 screenshot :
Civ4ScreenShot0003.JPG

 
I'm a little confused. You want to use one warrior and one scout to fogbust for your next city, which you are planning on putting 1E of the rice? Why do you need any units guarding that area, it's almost totally safe from barbs and you'll have plenty of advanced vision/warning before one can get into the region.

I think I'm seeing some floodplains west of the wine, in which case it might be worth having your scout move 2W1S onto the hill next turn to get a peek at that region.

Longer term it's looking like you might be a little crowded for space here if that jungle to the west doesn't let up, in which case the ivory for a breakout becomes really important. I'd be tempted to just plant my first warrior on top of that tile until I got around to improving it, remove the small 1-2% chance of the game falling to pieces because of an unlucky jungle growth.
 
0% chance of jungle growth on the ivory. Jungle can't grow on plains.
And even if it would grow there, you can still camp elephants that are jungled and gain access to ivory. The tile is simply worse.

When moving from rice to gems, there IS opportunity for half-improvement, and you should do it! :D

I would almost certainly go for pop3 and get 2 warriors out. Once nearing pop-growth I would try to get the warrior to 14/15 and then stall on SH while waiting for food and then work rice+maximum hammers for entering pop3 with minimum of food in the bar.
Even if you go settler at pop3, I think the third improvement will be done before settler is done, and then the population to work it will be lacking.
If it where a race for the pigs, I would understand the rush.
But if you rush the first settler, second settler will be slower, so paradoxically rushing it might lose you a city.
 
Sorry for the ambiguity.

Warrior would go around the wine. As you say, no need to fogbust rice now.

My thinking on not going settler yet was work the gems and lack of complete certainty about sharing the rice especially given border tension with Charlie.

I think even if jungle does grow on ivory we can still build a camp but overall elepult is looking really attractive with high happy cap, ivory, crowded area and a likely shrine to capture.

Scout 2W1S sounds tempting but I worry about possibility of it dying to barbs - have we reached the stage where the information gained is more valuable than ensuring scout stays alive?

Krikav, I could put a turn into a farm on the way but when I move onto the gems it will use 2 worker turns as on hill, so don’t think it helps…


Even if you go settler at pop3, I think the third improvement will be done before settler is done, and then the population to work it will be lacking.
If it where a race for the pigs, I would understand the rush.
But if you rush the first settler, second settler will be slower, so paradoxically rushing it might lose you a city.

This is a new and very helpful thought process for me. Pending any further input I will do the 2 warrior, pop 3 settler approach. SH= Stonehenge for failgold?
 
Ofcourse you are right...You can't half-improve farm since the gems are on a hill... Sorry.

Yeah, SH for failgold, but I do the same process in many games just stalling on a barracks instead.
It's only worth it if it actually speeds up some subsequent build though, if the warrior overflow speeds up the settler build (or a worker build after that).
But more often than not, it does, and it almost always beats having stagnant food in the bar for ages afterwards.
When I'm in the mood I calculate it, but often I just do it and hope for the best.
Worst case scenario, you have abit less food in the bar and screws up the growth to pop4 later on, but thats much much later.

I think settler at pop3 is best here, there is no stellar second city spot that make a very early city attractive, no PH with an oasis next to it or such things...
Still, would be good to have a second opinion on settler @pop2.

@sampsa You usually favour very early settlers, you want to chip in with an opinion here? :)
 
I also like 3pop settler because I’d want to scout a bit more to the west first. Available sites so far are underwhelming.

If going 3pop settler, is it worth building a mine NW of gems rather than camping the ivory. You get the mine a turn earlier than the camp and the only difference is one coin? Might be worth some maths to see if the extra two hammers shave a turn off the settler. If not, I guess the camp is better because that extra commerce will add up over time even if not super important atm.

Not sure I’d be going for a specifically military tech any time soon. The jungle pushes me in the opposite direction. Makes it a lot easier to defend with warriors alone. You also look so cramped for room, I don’t think barbs will be a big problem.

Hopefully Pacal missed both those religions and is off down a religious tech path with a view to crippling early expansion with some less than useful wonders. I guess he’s north west of you given where you met his scout and the jungle to the west. He currently looks a much more appealing target than Charlie.
 
Another thing to add to the priority list, road to the piggies, or to the silk if there is no time. (Charly will road and connect those resources.)
That will make you have a connection to the holy city prior to sailing, increasing chances for religious spread, which should be high since the holy city is so close.
Charly might be quick to sailing too though, which spreads religion just as good as a road.
 
I think settler at pop3 is best here, there is no stellar second city spot that make a very early city attractive, no PH with an oasis next to it or such things...
Still, would be good to have a second opinion on settler @pop2.

@sampsa You usually favour very early settlers, you want to chip in with an opinion here? :)
I think you nailed it - no good second city spot so no real point in rushing it. Perhaps there are some decent city spots by the river, or food N of stone.

Charlie will be a massive pain to elepult, so maybe you need to play a long game.
 
Scout 2W1S sounds tempting but I worry about possibility of it dying to barbs

If you had a great second city site in mind, or a good but exposed one that you absolutely needed to keep barbs away from, I'd be taking zero risks with the scout.

But at this point, personally I'd be prepared to take some very small risks in exchange for better scouting just because the land so far is kind of bland. You're weighing a shared-rice + clam + grasslands site, or a wine + a few floodplains site. They aren't awful, and with ivory there's some potential for mid-game if you do end up stuck with them, but I'd be hoping for at least one city a little better.
 
Flank1+Flank2 elephants can dent even protective longbows in hilled cities since they are immune to first strikes.
But yeah, nothing one wants to venture into if there is a choice...

Thats why it's kind of important to build relations with Charly asap too, he is a very nice buddy if you keep him at a distance. Easy to get to friendly and doesn't plot at pleased.
Pacal on the other hand, i forsee a future where he is trampled down by elephant hoves!
 
Spoiler On the hill and update to T17 :

Sorry the updates have slowed a bit - real life getting in the way a bit!

I gambled the scout and it reveals a stellar second city spot on the jungled hill. Dry corn and floodplains. There may be potential for another city north of that somewhere with what looks like 3 floodplains in the fog north of the scout.

I meet Hannibal T17 with his scout coming from the NE. Pacal's scout is moving around the jungle to my west. Pacal is worst enemy of Isabella whom I'm yet to meet. Nobody has open/close borders so still some ambiguity about where everyone is. Charlie is building a road onto that grassland hill next to the pigs which probably means he's about to mine copper opening the possibilty of him plotting.

I've kept my points on Pacal as I've invested 52 points into him at the point I meet Hannibal but in my experience Hannibal is usually a better techer. It's likely I'll change my points to Mansa when I find him. Given I very rarely actively acquire EP, if I find an opponent is putting their points on me and outspending me I usually switch to the next best techer who doesn't have loads of points on me. Is there a consensus on when it's a good/bad idea to switch who you're putting points on in the early game?

I was going to follow the advice to go for settler at size 3 but now I've found the corn city, I had second thoughts about whether to go there at size 2 - losing the spot would be very bad.

I think growing to size 2 to 3 could be done in 5 turns including getting out a second warrior. At size 3 with a grassland mine (not ready immediately) and carefully managing overflow from warrior a settler could be produced in 10 turns. If I start settler at size 2 it will take 13 turns so delaying to size 3 would gain an extra warrior at the loss of 2 turns slower settler. I find it really difficult to work out exact tech timings with bonus commerce and overflow and discounts but I think the the timing works out on TW that it finishes the same turn as the grassland mine so I could build a road to the corn site enabling the settler to arrive there 2 turns earlier making size 3 settler a draw but with worker in place to improve corn, connected second city and the extra warrior. This approach commits me to TW which differs from my standard approach of very early BW at this stage but we have enough production for more warriors and to get started on another settler and looks relatively crowded from a barb spawn perspective.

Roading to second city would quite significantly delay roading to Charlie to get his religion and boost relations but I think getting the second city online is higher priority.

Scout is just going to fogbust on that hill until a warrior can take over.

I've paused here as I need to start microing the hammers if comitting to size 3 settler. I'm now pretty certain this and TW are my choices but the purpose of this thread is to challenge my assumptions :)

Spoiler T17 screenshot :
Civ4ScreenShot0001.JPG

 

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Woah! Nice city spot!
The only way to be really sure about size2 or size3 is to calculate.
If size2 gets that spot earlier it can be worth it, I follow your reasoning there.
Was sure of pop3 first, but the sight of that spot made me unsure. :)
I would for sure camp the ivory rather than mine a grassland hill that extra hammer isn't absolutely crucial, worker is unlikely to have time for both, and that would land us stuck with a 1F3H tile instead of a 1F3H1C tile for a very long time, so that extra hammer for getting the mine done a single turn faster is very costly.

Not sure why Charly is roading the hill, maybe to get to the banana?
Did he swap into slavery? If he has BW now that tile would have yeild 1F 2H, but it's still only 1F1H.

Espionage points... I think I would keep them on Pacal, it's nice to see what your target does, and it does open up the possibility to build a few spies and sabotage walls, making catapult bombardment much quicker.
But OTOH it's abit annoying to kill someone you have alot of points on.
I like to go with points on a neighbour/target most of the time though.

I would for sure go TW before BW. Mainly because TW makes city2 faster but also for roading to the holy city.
The commerce from connection is nice, but not crucial due to the gems.
If it where not for the gems, I think TW would be necessery.
In any way now, if you go TW, Bw won't be long after.
 
That wine/floodplains/stone region looks like one the AI would be fairly happy about; the fact that Pacal didn't drop his second city there makes me wonder if maybe his scout had already wandered a ways by the time you met it on turn 4 and you have some breathing room (other than Charlemagne, who probably isn't going to walk past your capital to contest that corn).

On the other hand, hitting the jackpot on that corn would make me more conservative - if need be, corn + FPs city, capital city, and clam + shared rice city by themselves are enough to get to construction and go elepult without falling too far behind. It'd certainly be nice if you could grab a decent fourth city somewhere before the land fills up, but you'd be fine without; whatever the fastest way of getting your next settler out is what I'd go with.
 
Size 2 settler has 8:hammers: per turn and size 3 10:hammers: once Ivory is improved.
Size 2 prolly needs a forest worked for 1t to get your warrior completed before growing.
Afterwards 13 settler turns.

Size 3 would get an additional warrior out (bit more safety in case a barb archer appears near your scout).
I doubt that enuf warrior overflow can be created for a 10t settler, quiet some time until the worker gets done with Ivory.
So i think you would be stuck with 11t.

If growing from 2 to 3 takes 5t, size 2 settler should be 3t quicker.
 
Maybe more time to road cuts the difference to 2 turns.
Still probably worth it though.
It's a very good spot!
 
Spoiler Turn 26 update :
Met Zara T24.

I should have included my working out this morning but at size 1 I worked plains forest for a turn to sacrifice 2:food: from rice for 2:hammers: which meant second warrior was 14/15:hammers: when growing to size 3 giving 3:hammers:overflow. I hope it's not a mistake but I'm mining the grassland hill instead of camping the ivory. Thus 3 turns x 9:hammers: per turn = 27/100 settler production + 3:hammers: overflow from warrior = 30/100 and then 10:hammers:/turn towards settler once mine is done. Gives me 7 turns to complete the road to the jungled hill the turn the settler is produced - I think! It's working so far...

In other news now that first warrior is fogbusting the jungle hill, scout has moved north and found Pacal. An option (that would scupper all my careful micro above) may be to put a city on that forest 1W of the scout to claim all the floodplains depending on when and where Pacal goes for his third city. The option may well disappear before it can be taken just like the pigs city. It's the kind of move I'd do in my offline games just to gain some cottageable land. It seems unlikely but not impossible someone will take the corn spot if I settle the floodplains spot. Losing the corn spot would be very bad though. Overall I think I favour playing conservatively and claiming the corn for second city on the basis there's hopefully still the rice city +/- another OK ish spot for a fourth city to set up a construction attack.

I'll pause here for advice. Probably won't be able to update again until about this time tomorrow.

Amazing how Charlie can waste his worker turns aimlessly roading hills and forests...
Spoiler T26 screenshot :
Civ4ScreenShot0002.JPG
 
I'd agree re not risking the corn spot. I also find floodplain areas quite underwhelming for construction attacks. A lot of worker turns for four food tiles and not a lot of trees to chop. Let Pacal build some cottages there for you :lol:

Where did Zara come from?
 
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