SHWH01 - Iroquois Tree Huggers

[SimpleMonkey]

We still don't have Engineering?? I guess we're gonna play out the GLib for all it's worth. Perhaps saving for some upgrades?

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

the bank is growing like whomp's scalp on rogaine

saving for a steal

 

[gmaharriet]

the bank is growing like whomp's scalp on rogaine

saving for a steal

Ah, if only this were real gold and we'd had it invested in the stock market since we stopped researching hundreds of years ago, we could afford to buy the entire world to fill with trees.

 

[scoutsout]

@AdmiralK: I gotta know... and I want a straight answer. Did you and Whomp get together and decide to play a little "bad apple" on a poor ol' second-hand-warhorse?

I mean... well just... dang. Have a look at my pre-flight.

Spoiler :

Pre-flight check...

Start the turn at 1879g, +164gpt, Theology in... never? Okay... um... minimum research is one thing... but research is shut completely down... and we don't have Engineering yet, which means we can't plant trees...and we need Astronomy to build caravels and conquer save the world!

How are we going to conquer save the earth if we can't plant trees and build Caravels????!?!?!

Okay... it's time to start picking nits here...

English Walnut has 2 resisting citizens...with 2 Elite Mounted Warriors fortified outside the town... and ... how long ago did we take this town? IIRC, I'm the one who took it... do you guys mean we couldn't deal with 2 lousy English resistors in what... 50 turns? C'mon team, we're talking about the civ whose greatest culinary achievements are

1. Fish 'n Chip and
2. Cucumber sammiches.

And we have a .. temple queue'd up in Cottonwood? With a clown on the payroll? Hire a scientist, and start managing the empire.

Something to consider: We own 416 tiles in the game (per MapStat). In-game, F8 tells us we've got 29% of world area. I started counting... but there are over 50 tiles on our continent that could be claimed on our home continent. By my calculations we should be able to increase our total to around 33-34% with the land we have on hand.

Let's see if I can make a dent in that.

Rushes/Short Rushes this turn:
I spend 16g on a MDI short-rush of Ponderosa Pine's Market.
36g to finish Silver Maples Library.
24g on a MDI to short rush Date Palm's Library.
40g on a MDI short rush of Sequoia's Market.
40g on a MDI short rush of Lodgepole Pine's Library
72g to rush the Galley in Sugar Maple, and swap to Library.
Spend 44g short rushing a spear into Pignut Hickory, which gets swapped from worker to Harbor.
Spend 28g short rushing a worker into Joshua tree, swap it to Library.
MM Douglas Fir for food, and swap to settler.
Spend 28g short rushing a worker at Valley Oak, swap to Library.
Rinse and repeat at Palmetto.
72g to rush finish the settler at Dogwood City, swap to Library.
Swap Cottonwood to a Libary, and spend 32g to short rush with an archer.
Does Sumac city need a court? Not so sure...but short rush a settler into it.
16g into a worker short rush for a Library at White Birch.
40g into a MDI at Sugar Maple, swap to Temple.
20g into a worker at Shagbark Hickory, swap to Temple.
36g into a worker at Bald Cypress, swap to Library.
Disband an archer for 5 shields into Joshua Tree's build.

We have a temple at Cocounut Palm. Now that the borders have expanded, I sell that sucker for 15g. Tack on 1gpt for the next...50 turns, and that's a cost effective move. That town can grow to size 6 (supporting 3 scientists) while not utilizing a pair of roaded game tiles that are completely out of reach for any other town. Swap to settler for the moment; we need another town in there.

That's odd... I see a settler in Lodgepole Pine... but I could swear I did not see one in the unit count in F3...double-check, 'tis true. It seems we have a "foreign settler". Take a screenshot.

End the pre-flight check at 1302g, +162gpt, Theology in 17. Who wants to bet I'm spending more than 2gpt on Theology? I didn't touch the slider!

Okay... I scan around the empire and see workers whacking away at all manner of things... if I let these guys finish, we'll be on Alpha centauri by the time we get a tile of trees planted for every tile of jungle/marsh cleared.

Time to check back with the team.

At the risk of sounding like a ... nevermind. Okay... Let's go back over the intent with this variant:

• It's supposed to be fun.
• It's supposed to make us "think outside the box" a bit.
• It's supposed to get a lot harder as the game matures.

Consider these points:

• We just kicked some fledgeling Monarch level AI off the planet in an age (and with a unit) that is uniquely suited to that role.
• In order to have a realistic chance at domination/conquest in this game, we need Caravels. That means we're going to need to invade another continent in the early/mid-middle ages... with outdated units.... that'll likely be facing pikes and MDI.

In short, we don't need to fall asleep at the wheel here people. If we continue to play like this... in a game that is "only" at Monarch level... it will quickly feel like Demigod as the AI build infrastructure that we cannot support in our "green" empire.

Now bear in mind - I haven't even finished my pre-flight check. Thre is still the matter of all these workers hacking away at mother earth. Many of them are hacking away at tiles we'll never really use.

So... having said that...

@Team: You're in the penalty box.

Do you want to get out of the penalty box? Download my pre-flight save, look at what the workers are up to, and ask yourself the following questions:

1. Would Chief Seattle approve?
2. Would Bede approve?

Make some decent suggestions about what to do with the workers, and I'll play the game and we'll move forward.

>>> scout's pre-flight save <<<

Clearing Jungle and Marsh tiles IS allowed, provided it is done in accordance with our "Wetlands Mitigation Plan". For each tile cleared, we must plant one tile of forest.

 

[Sir Bugsy]

Wow! I didn't know I played so badly. Sorry Scout. I'll look at the save and make some suggestions.

Yes sir! Three bags full!

 

[gmaharriet]

Wow! I didn't know I played so badly.

Bugs, I don't think you can take the blame for this. Five of us have had it since Scout's last turn, so we all get a share.

I looked at the saves at the ends of my turn, Whomp's and AK's. I'm mystified by that Spanish settler. There was a lone settler standing in exactly the same spot when I finished, but he was definitely ours. There was a Spanish settler near White Birch at the end of Whomp's turns, and I guess that's the same one we see now. How can you get a Spanish settler after the civ is extinct?

I haven't many ideas for where we should go from here. I guess crank up research, make a dot map of where else we want to settle and set our workers to concentrate on clearing the swamp tiles where we want new towns.

I'm a pretty poor warmonger unless I have a decided advantage over the AI, so I'll leave military suggestions to those more knowledgable than I.

Scout, I apologize for my contributions to the problem.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

I looked at the saves at the ends of my turn, Whomp's and AK's. I'm mystified by that Spanish settler. There was a lone settler standing in exactly the same spot when I finished, but he was definitely ours. There was a Spanish settler near White Birch at the end of Whomp's turns, and I guess that's the same one we see now. How can you get a Spanish settler after the civ is extinct?

Just build a settler with foreign pop (in a captured city for example). You can do the same with workers too, i.e. essentially build slaves. IIRC it comes with slight consequences for attitude though.

 

[SimpleMonkey]

I'm wondering how many sheilds were already invested in Engineering. Is it switch to Theology already a done deal?

Scout, can we get a final clarification on what improvements are allowed, and which ones are going to be mandatory once we learn how to plant trees to heal the earth?

I'll take my beating on this one too. I've pretty much got the pop-rush thing down, but I did absolutely no cash short-rushing during my turnset. Just let everything build one turn at a time. Perhaps a reminder on the technique would help.

 

[Whomp]

Heh...they send me to Princeton and give me a computer. Dangerous.

OK I will take the hit on the resisting citizens. I took all the units out of the English cities since I didn't want units inside in case they flipped. English Walnut did flip on my turns but was taken back the next turn.

I did a lot of rushing and short rushing over my turns almost to the point where I was concerned about our future deficit research rate if I drew it down too much. I guess my thinking is with the Glib why wouldn't we wait till the AI researches while we rush builds and capture cash for the deficit reseach burn? Am I wrong in this thinking?

I will check things out when I get home tonight.

 

[scoutsout]

@SimpleMonkey: You've asked some good questions.

My thoughts on what improvements are "allowed"... it depends on what the empire needs.

If the empire needs culture, and the town is capable of generating a little uncorrupted science, we can build a Library. If the extra science doesn't justify the maintenance cost, the Library can be sold off after the borders expand.

In towns that are hopelessly corrupt, maybe we'll build some (dare I say it?) temples... and again, sell them off after border expansions.

Harbors are something we should build in some coastal towns, as they net us the food we need to harvest the 3gpt you can get from a coastal tile.

Courts are something we need to be careful with. Many of our towns are shield-poor due to lack of terrain improvements, not corruption.

Markets are something we'll need in any town capable of growing past size 6 if we want citizens on the tiles instead of specialists.

I'll post my thoughts on cash-rushing and short rushing shortly.

 

[Ansar]

lurker's comment: Nice pre-flight, scout! It seems scientist farms are not permitted by Chief Seattle, are they?

Marshes are sure to reveal BG's. I've got a question. By Chief Seattle's rules, are bonus grasslands considered resources?

well, good luck team.

 

[gmaharriet]

lurker's comment:
Marshes are sure to reveal BG's. I've got a question. By Chief Seattle's rules, are bonus grasslands considered resources?

No, bonus grass is just grass, though it's alright to road it if it just happens to be on the route to connect cities. I'd asked the same question myself, Ansar...I mean, they even include the word "bonus", right?

 

[scoutsout]

On short rushing: Conceptually it's a lot like pop-rushing; the name of the game is to get the maximum benefit from the expenditure.

The most expensive rush is the one that starts on an empty bin. When the bin is empty, the shields cost 8g each. So a ten-shield worker rushed into an empty bin will cost 80g. Likewise, a 40-shield MDI will cost 320 gold if rushed into an empty bin.

Now here's where you can get creative.

If you've got any shields in the bin at all, the shields are "half-price"; costing 4g each... even if the shields in the bin are from a previous cash-rush.

Back to our 40-shield MDI: If you start with an empty bin, you can rush a worker for 80g (this is the "short rush") and then finish the rush for 4gps, or an additional 120g. So the MDI that cost you 320g when rushed in one fell swoop will now cost 200g.

Bear in mind - this is as expensive as cash-rushing should get.

Now here's where we can take this newfound source of creativity, and turn it into an art form. Any city that's not rioting... even a woefully corrupt city on the edge of your empire will produce one lousy shield per turn. Now let's see how we can leverage that one lousy shield.

A Short-Rush Cycle Scenario, build goal: Library.

• Turn 0 - Empty bin, queue set to library.
• Turn 1 - One shield in the bin. Swap to worker and short rush for 36g.
• Turn 2 - Eleven shields in the bin. Swap to Archer (or Explorer) and short rush for 36g.
• Turn 3 - Twenty-one shields in the bin. Swap to Swordsman/Pike/settler and short rush for 36g. (Are you seeing a pattern here?)
• Turn 4 - Thirty-one shields in the bin. Swap to MDI/Longbow/Barracks and short-rush for (you guessed it) 36g.
• Turn 5 - 41 shields in the bin, and it's starting to get dicey here... I can't think of anything that costs 50 shields. But a Granary/Temple will cost 60. Short rush that for 76g.
• Turn 6 - Now we've got 61 shields in the bin, and the library can be rushed to completion for 76g.

We've just completed our Library at a cost of 296g and a half-dozen shields. If we'd rushed that Library from an empty queue it would have cost us 640g. Waiting on it to be built brick-by-brick... and... well... you get the picture.

Rule of thumb: Short-Rush up to the very next even multiple of ten. This lets you "spread it around" a bit... 9 shields into 2 cities can often be better for empire building than 18 shields into one.

Higher art: Short rushing can also minimize shield over-runs.

On occasion you will find some really interesting short rushing opportunities. For example: a town producing 7 spt with 28 shields in the bin will complete a Market in 11 turns, or a Pike next turn. Spending 8g on the pike now will shave a turn off the build, reduce the number of shields needed for the build to 70, and eliminate shield over-run.

Places short-rushing can be extremely powerful:

• Tundra fishing villages that are producing good uncorrupted gold.
• Floodplain cities that can grow like crazy and make uncorrupted gold (and workers or settlers).
• Anyplace that the empire needs something in a city, but the city needs help producing it... that's a candidate for short rushing.

 

[SimpleMonkey]

Lights are coming on for this monkey like Broadway after dark. Thanks for the enlightenment, scout.

 

[gmaharriet]

Great write-up, Scout! I've often seen you write this sort of thing in your logs, but didn't understand exactly what you were doing, particularly when it didn't complete building what was eventually intended. You HAVE turned it into an art form.

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

Scout, guilty as charged. i was 3 sheets to the wind and was thinking about clearing marsh and exploring. I didn't build the foreign settler. i missed the temple. My thought while I was polishing the tooth was to steal our way to astro.

Re: thinking outside the box

We've got some down time here. How bout we become ecological communists? i have issues (everywhere) but most specifically with taking out tech superior civs. With commie we don't have to. feel free to eject me when the time is right. i have issues

RE: the short rush. i get nervous i'll f something up so i don't do it until I have to. I know I'm not the best at short rush, so I built the bank and left it to scout.

i'll focus next set. just give me some goals.

 

[gmaharriet]

RE: the short rush. i get nervous i'll f something up so i don't do it until I have to. I know I'm not the best at short rush, so I built the bank and left it to scout.

i'll focus next set. just give me some goals.

I'm the same way, AK, not just with short rushing, and especially if I'm not clear on a short-term goal. I'll just do something "safe", hoping I won't cause actual damage. And you've seen me stop and ask a lot of questions, because I'm really looking for guidance.

 

[scoutsout]

@AK: I'm not ejecting anybody - we're all friends here, and I wanted to play this one among friends. We (and that includes me) had some really nice successes in the early goings with this one, and just took our eye off the ball for a round. I'll share in the blame for not reading logs as closely, and not looking at the saves. All of this isn't really a big deal...and I never was upset at anybody. I just though we needed a bit of a 'wake up call' to refocus a bit before this one started to slip away from us.

Having said all that, here's what I propose:

• A soft-burn research cycle towards Astronomy, to get Caravels.
• Cash-rushing/short-rushing needed infrastructure, so we can build troops later.
• Put the pieces in place to start conquering saving the other continent.

I'll try to play this after work tonight, so we can have fun playing it over the weekend.

 

[Sir Bugsy]

I like all three proposals.

 

[gmaharriet]

A soft-burn research cycle towards Astronomy, to get Caravels.

Question... How do you define "soft-burn research"? I know what "hard-burn" is, but have never come across its opposite. Is it a single scientist? slider at 10%? just enough to keep income positive? or variable depending on the situation? I just want to be sure we're all on the same page.