Sirp's Training Day Game for Aspiring Monarchs

[ToddMarshall]

Monarch = 2 content
Temple = 1 content
Cathedral = 3 content

Content base = 6

I think you are having a bad math day how did you come up with 5?

It applies content first.

If it did the lux first it would end up making the 2 monarch level content citizens happy, then making 2 unhappy citizens happy for a total of 4, then the temple/cathedral would make 4 more unhappy citizens content, leaving 4 unhappy, which would work out to the same thing for riot purposes, though it would affect your score and we all know getting a high score is why we play right (sarcasm)

 

[Matt_G]

I am pretty sure the way I am doing it is correct, but I'm not positive.
You have me real curious now.
When I get home in about 3 hours I will fire up an old save and do some testing. Sell off a cathedral or market and see what happens. I will post my results about 8 or 9 your time.

Edit: I see that Todd was posting at the same time. Now I am really, really curious!

 

[Renata]

Cathedral's three content citizens? I thought it was two. So a case of misinformation, not the wrong number of fingers and toes, apparently.

Renata <-- always plays for high score. Really. Really really.

*cough*

 

[ToddMarshall]

Actuallly, Matt might be right..... *goes to check*. Note that for riot purposes it doenst matter. What matters is that you have at least one happy face for each citizen, counting the # you have for the level your playing on. It would affect score however.

 

[Sirp]

Ack! All these calculations so early in the morning is making my head spin, added in with the confusion of Matt_g and ToddMarshall having the same avatar. Anyhow yeah, what Todd said is right.....I think

Anyhow, I was only talking about improvements really, not Wonders, so the three we have to play with are temple, cathedral, and colosseum.

The main reason I wanted to bring this up, is to write a treatise on cathedrals. Most players realize that colosseums should only be built if *really* needed. They don't have a good cost/benefit ratio, and are expensive to maintain. Meanwhile, most players feel that building cathedrals is inevitable.

Cathedrals are almost always better to build than colosseums, but don't think they are a must-build for a moment. If I want to go to war in the middle ages, the best way of financing it is to try avoiding building cathedrals, and spend the shields on knights instead. Cathedrals can be delayed until the time of hospitals, or perhaps even never built. For each cathedral you don't build, you can get more than 2 knights. That's going to be 15+ knights for your entire core, and that's *alot*.

It depends heavily on how many luxuries you can get. On a pangea you'd be less likely to get cathedrals, since you can probably trade for more luxuries earlier.

In this game, we've been building cathedrals, but now we have contact with the Ottomans, we might be able to stop. Ocean-travel is just around the corner. If we can get 5+ luxuries online, we can probably avoid it. That would save us many shields, and would allow us to build more wonders, or gear up for a war against one of our rivals.

And ack! I have to go to work now :-/ I might write more on this later (like from work )

-Sirp.

 

[ToddMarshall]

OK, matt raised enough doubits in my mind, I went back to an old monarch level game I had played as the Aztecs. I had a "lovely" start. The "island" civ on a large pangea map. In fact I started on the only land on the planet that wasn't part of the pangea except for one 4 tile island one square off my coast. .

Being religious, and with no access to luxuries, I of course built temples and cathedrals everywhere. (Not to mention Sistine and Bachs in the capital).

Anyway, I loaded up a late save and went to one city I had to squeeze in that was still size 12 as it wasn't worth a hospital.

Noted I had 5 lux including one gems i had managed to secure off the mainland. I found somone to give that away to so I only had 4 lux, then raized the capital to do away with Sistine and Bachs influence. After moving the slider up and back to get the game to recalc happyness, I got the following result

Looks like I was right, though Matt really had me wondering. In the end, all that matters is that you count up the # of happy faces, add 1/2/3/4 for difficulty level, and make sure that comes up to at least the # of citizens in the city. If it does, you are good to go.

 

[Matt_G]

Thanks Todd.
I just got home and had myself wondering to, so I loaded an old regent game. Had a fairly early save and found that you were right and I was wrong.

Looked at my capital which had a cathedral, temple, and market with 3 lux at pop 9.
4 happy, 2 content and 3 unhappy. The way I was figuring it, if I had been correct, it should of had 3 happy, 4 content and 2 unhappy.
Whew! I'm glad we got that straightened out

 

[Sirp]

To continue what I was saying, cathedrals are a must-have for a religious civilization, because they get them so cheaply, and the culture alone is very nice. But if you're not religious, don't assume a cathedral in each city is something you need.

Sistine's vs Bach is a tradeoff that depends heavily on whether you're religious, and the size of your continent. If I can get Bach with a non-religious civ, I love getting it and then *not* building cathedrals in my cities as long as I can, if ever. I will usually build them after I get factories, when they are really needed, and when they take 4 turns to build instead of 14 turns. It depends on the number of luxuries you can get though.

Essentially my message is this: Don't assume that cathedrals are a 'must build'. Marketplaces *are* a must-build in all core cities, and libraries are too if you're doing self-researching, as are universities. But cathedrals aren't. Don't consider it inevitable that you have to build them, you'll save yourself alot of shields if you don't, and during the shield-starved middle ages too. Oh btw, how's the turn coming Renata?

-Sirp.

 

[Renata]

I'm done. Need to do my uploads, be another few minutes. Apologies in advance for any weediness -- I was, and am, extremely sleepy, but I wanted to play my turn soooo bad. At least I'd have to work really hard to mess things up critically at this point. Here's a brief summary:

- we have contact with everybody, and we're so far ahead in tech it ain't funny
- we're pulling in so much money I didn't know what to do with it all
- there was a little 'surprise' at the end of the turn, just in time for Matt to enjoy it


Renata

 

[Sirp]

surprise? My guess: hammurabi up and declared war on us.

-Sirp.

 

[Renata]

Preturn: We have contact with Japan, Russia, Iroquois! Missed that in the turn reports! F8's kinda nice - we're 160 pts ahead of our nearest competition (Japan) on the histograph. Nice work, everyone! As long as I'm here, I put several new additions on the palace.

Time for some diplomacy. So to speak. Peace to the Aztecs in return for Engineering, contact with the Ottomans and 60g. We say hi to Japan. They're broke, and lack *cough* currency. They have monarchy, which I suppose is nice for them. Osman's even more pathetic, also broke, and lacking currency, republic and construction. Russia is, you guessed it, broke, but a bit better off scientifically, having feudalism and monotheism. Iroquois are even with Russia, and also broke. I buy embassies everywhere.

Kyoto is size 7, set to worker build, in anarchy. They have four luxes -- all the ones we don't have. Istanbul is size 4, has the oracle, but is only now building a temple. Think I should ruin their lives by gifting them theology now? Man, are they backwards. They do have an excess iron to sell once anybody gets the necessary techs for trade. 2 luxes. Moscow is size 6 and in anarchy. Really bad worker development, I must say. Just one lux, NO strategic resources. Finally, Salamanca is a more-respectable size 10, building a settler. They have four lux.

I offer Osman 55g for his WM, which clears up most of the black. The other civs are very compartmentalized by natural boundaries. Japan is on its own (riverless) island. Osman's stuck on a dry peninsula - poor Osman. Explains all those mines I saw around Istanbul. Russia's on another peninsula. Iroquois are in the middle, with a lot of jungle. We should be able to do some lux trading when we get navigation next turn.

Quick survey of the cities looks ok; only thing I do is a switch of Athens' and Delphi's defense. (Got burned in a recent game with a coastal city defended only by a warrior, lol. Was in a bad spot and I couldn't get defense there first turn after the treacherous Zulus landed.) Finally, I hit 'enter'.

610 AD. Navigation comes in. Going to Music Theory next, due in 4 at +141. No idea what I'm gonna do with all this cash. Delphi cathedral - bank. Argos cathedral - bank. Rush library in Tlacopan. Malinalco is under a little cultural pressure, switch to library. Switch Tlaxcala to library, too. We do need hoplites, but I'll build them from our productive cities. Each civ on the other landmasses has at least one harbor - kind of them. I ask Japan what they'd like for their fine ivory. Engineering? We can do that. Now go research invention for us, ok? Now Osman - he gets nice new robes and wines for his dyes. We get to turn off our lux tax, now making +203. I'm not going to trade with Hiawatha - he has by far the most potential of any of the civs over there and I'd rather not help him out too much. Wouldn't be enough for WLTKD anyway. I send one of our knights up to Tzintzuntzen just to get a unit there. Our galley heads out into the great blue.

620 AD. Thermo bank - Sistine as prebuild for Bach. Pharsalos builds cathedral - bank. Meant to change that over last turn now that we don't need cathedrals and forgot. Tlacopan builds library - market. Tlaxcala riots, the ungrateful wretches. Working on getting a road over there. Corinth's cathedral switched to bank.

IT. Rome wants to trade monarchy even-up for chivalry. Get me invention and we can talk, Caesar.

630 AD. Sparta bank - hoplite. Rhodes courthouse - aqueduct. I buy libraries in Tzintuntzen and Malinalco. Up to 232 gpt.

640 AD. Sparta hoplite x2. Ephesus university - bank. The libraries finish, both cities set to marketplace.

650 AD. Music Theory - Economics, due in 4 at +159. We're up to 892 gold. Did I mention I don't know what to do with it all? Thought I did. Sparta hoplite - knight. Rush library in Tlaxcala. Diplo check: nothing new.

660 AD. Athens Copernicus - bank. Tlaxcala library-market.

670 AD. Herakleia bank - knight. Thessalonica courthouse - worker. We lose our supply of dyes? Wow. I check - Izmit no longer has a harbor! I didn't know AIs did that sort of thing. Ottomans and Russia are at war with Japan - could Japan have actually landed an offensive catapult? Can't be. At any rate, we're fine to size 11 with just a marketplace and 12 with a temple as well, so I'm not going to do any more trading right now. Next player can consider trade w/ Iroquois; I'm too sleepy. Poor Corinth keeps getting its shields taken away from it, so I rush the last 3 turns of its bank. Likewise Argos.

680 AD. Sparta knight-knight. Corinth bank-hoplite. Argos bank-hoplite. Marathon courthouse-marketplace. Note to next player - marathon will go to size 8 and riot four turns from now (it lacks temple also); the marketplace should be rushed before then. Thessalonica worker - worker. I finally notice that optimized-for-food Knossos was working a hill. I fix that, and also switch it to aqueduct. Urgh, noticed a hill near Sparta that wasn't mined yet. Get to rectifying that.

690 AD. Economics in, set to printing press, due in 4 at a whopping 336 gpt. The AI're gonna get invention eventually right? Right??? Argos hoplite - hoplite. I'm going to send this hoplite and the next toward Tzintzuntzen and its poor lonely knight. Not that I really think the babs are gonna attack.

IT Several Roman offensive units (two horses and a warrior, with a 4-unit mini-SOD backing them up) enter our territory near Ephesus! Hey, Matt, wanna do some fighting?

700 AD. Mycenae temple - courthouse (eminently veto-able, esp with Rome acting up). Argos hoplite-hoplite (ditto). Thessalonica worker-aqueduct.

We have decent defense in Sparta and Ephesus (3 hoplites and 2 knights total), and some backup next door in Tlaxcala, including a knight that can reach Ephesus & attack first turn. So you can decide what you want to do about the situation. I'll leave all military units and a vulnerable worker unmoved.

I think I might've made mistakes with the worker movement. (Since I'm barely keeping my eyes open, we'll just blame it on that, ok?) Except for the four cities that were size 12 at the start of my turn, I've tried to maximize food everywhere. In retrospect (actually about 2/3 of the way through 'spect), I think this was a bad plan. Sure we grow faster, but I've basically wasted the GA production bonus from these cities. Thoughts?

Athens builds bank next turn; my thought was to switch to Smiths after that, as Athens is our best shield producer by a significant margin. I filled up the food box there while building Copernicus and the bank (didn't cost any turns), so next turn the citizen on the regular grass can move to the hill if it helps the turns. We have tons of gold; rush-build as you wish. Markets would probably be best, I'm thinking (to the extent I'm thinking at all right now). Nothing's critical except the market in Marathon.

Have fun with the Romans ....

Renata



the save

 

[Matt_G]

Originally posted by Sirp
Essentially my message is this: Don't assume that cathedrals are a 'must build'. Marketplaces *are* a must-build in all core cities, and libraries are too if you're doing self-researching, as are universities. But cathedrals aren't. Don't consider it inevitable that you have to build them, you'll save yourself alot of shields if you don't, and during the shield-starved middle ages too.-Sirp.

One more thing I have learned in this game.
I realize now there are times when I should not have been building them but did anyways. This is one I won't forget.
Thanks!

there was a little 'surprise' at the end of the turn, just in time for Matt to enjoy it

Renata....you :flamedevi

Matt
Now eagerly awaiting Renata's turn report.

 

[Renata]

Nice guess, Sirp, but wrong.

Renata

 

[Matt_G]

Caesar, Caesar, you look like you are about to make a very....poor.....choice!

I saw that and was all ready to post a got it and say I would have it done by this time tomorrow. I was thinking of how I was going to the piss out of him and then I realized......it's not my turn!
CivGeneral is up. Lucky dog.

 

[Shaesha]

Ok No need for a quiz from Sirp tonight! I have a few questions... hopefully they will get me to a better understanding =o)

1. Renata keeps making reference to the AI learning Invention. Is this because we are more concerned with other techs right now or because we are expecting them to get it soon and it will be quicker/easier to trade for it, orrrr somethin else

2. I know that hoplites are good at defending and that, afaik, we don't have an impending war (necessarily) but should we get some offensive going? Isn't it the boyscout motto to always be prepared =o)

3. Is there a reason that we don't want to have the extra cash? Doesn't it come in handy when we do go to war and war weariness hits? When we get the stock exchange don't we start earning 5% interest?

4. I don't understand where Renata said Corinth keeps losing shields Losing shields to what?

5. I know that rushing costs gold and hapiness ... how much happiness?

Thanks for your help =o)

Shaesha

 

[Renata]

Oh, Civ is up! That's right I was at the end of the rotation so he came in after me. Oops.

Well ---- enjoy, Civ!

@ Shaesha

1. This is my guess, that at least some of the civs will go for the next tech on the bottom part of the tech tree (invention) rather than following us down the upper part of the tree, where we were already several techs ahead. We would then be able to trade for invention. (Whereas if we research invention ourselves there won't be anything to trade for.) But we're already into printing press (which we don't even need, hence me making the comment at that point), and no sign of invention - we may just be too far ahead. If I'd been thinking straight, I'd have gifted engineering to anyone who didn't have it just to help out.

2. Yep I agree. One of the cities I now have building military units is perfect for hoplites (21 spt i think), but the other 2 or three I'd have switched to knights in next couple of turns even without the Romans getting frisky.

3. You could well be right. I'm not used to making such large sums with nothing *urgent* to spend it on and I keep feeling like I should be spending it on somethng. I don't know whether I should or not, really. Stock exchanges are too far away, though (corporation), to be too concerned that factor right now. I don't think we're going to have trouble with war weariness; even once our GA is over we'll have a good enough cash flow to absorb a few notches worth of lux tax, and none of the other civs is strong enough or advanced enough to put too much of a hurt on us that we'd need it.

4. My workers! I wanted Corinth to grow fast, and used all those piles of workers you guys left me to re-irrigate everything in sight around that city and all the other ones that weren't max size yet. I think I overdid it, though.

5. Rushing only costs happiness if you're doing it in despotism or communism, where it costs population points instead of cash. In monarchy/republic/democracy there's no happiness penalty.

Renata

 

[Sirp]

Yes, CivGeneral is up now, although he hasn't been around, so I'm not sure if he's awol. So Matt_g, if you'd like, you are welcome to play a shadow, and if CG doesn't show up it can count as the real thing. If he does show up, then I'll still comment on your turn as a shadow.

We really have left the other civilizations in the dust! Good work all round. Hopefully we'll be able to finish this one quick, ripping through our enemies speedily. In some ways, I'm a little disappointed that I won't get to teach some valuable concepts about trading and brokering, because there's barely anyone worth trading and brokering between! I probably won't make too many comments about minor things like precise city management and worker jobs - unless they're done very badly - from here on out, since such micromanagement really isn't that necessary anymore.

Renata, you make it so much less fun to get the out on you with this "I'm tired" excuse You did a good job trading for luxuries and making peace with the Aztecs. However, you did make one major mistake: researching Printing Press? Why oh why? Printing Press has ZERO use to us. Zilch, nada, none. Why on earth would you pour cash into researching it exactly? So the other civilizations could research Engineering for us? Well since we've taken out the whole of the rest of the top half of the tree without them doing it, it doesn't seem very likely. Even so, you would cut science to 0% and wait for them to do it if anything, not pour cash into a useless technology. However, since we can research engineering in 4 turns, we should just go straight for it. It is true that good players do sometimes give away technologies to the AI to allow them to move the research rate along, however this is generally done in games where the player is going for a high score, and thus the game is not a zero-sum one.

Here we're playing for a win, and that's it. So it *is* a zero-sum game. We want to defeat our rivals, and so we want to be ahead of them as many technologies as possible. We would love to get engineering before they do, and would prefer to keep them from gunpowder for as long as possible. The next player should definitely cancel Printing Press (even if it were due next turn), and go straight for engineering. There is but one word that should be on the minds of our scientists right now: 'cavalry'. -Sirp.

 

[Sirp]

Oh, and I'd imagine you did fine maximizing food Renata, it'll just mean the city has higher population for later in the golden age. It's rare that you don't want to maximize food in a city with growth potential. I hope you see what I meant about Sparta being underdeveloped for production

What to do with cash? If we're in surplus, then store it. It can be used later to buy luxuries, to bribe other civs into war, and when we hit the Industrial Age, tech prices shoot up, and our gold reserves will fund deficit research. (and note that if we weren't nice people we could stick several workers and a hoplite on our iron and road-pillage every turn, getting lots and lots of real cheap knights ) Your other responses to Shaesha were great

Oh and it was a real toss-up between choosing the Hammer or Julius. Hammurabi has always impressed me as being a bit uhh...let's say unbalanced? Julius seems a little more civilized. In fact, I don't think I've been sneak-attacked by Julius before. We'll have fun taking him out

-Sirp.

 

[ToddMarshall]

Other reasons you might gift technology would be to pull somone who is scientific but hopelessly small and behind up to get them to draw a free tech at a new age either to trade for it cheaper from somone else, or to trade for it yourself. This may find a tad more use with the newest patch making the free tech pull really random.

It can also be useful sometimes on the higer levels to do to help you win a close space race by stimulating them to reseach somthing for you down a particular path (or again, the free tech thing).

Annother obsure reason would be to trade military techs, particularly nationalisim, replacable parts, and computers to a war ally who you don't want to collapse for whatever reason.

Trading Communisim to an AI that has been at war to try to drag them into that may be useful on rare occasions.

There may be other reasons to do it, but none I can immediately think of.

But Sirip is very right in that you don't want to speed up the tech pace in a game where you are planing on doing a lot of waring any time soon. The slower you can make the AI's get new techs, particularly techs that give them new units (yeah, even longbows, which the AI has no clue what to do with mostly) the better off you are, especially if you have the tech lead and allready have those better units.

Remember also, the Hammer's UU is the bowman, which upgrades to Longbows, so he is one of the civs you would like to delay getting this tech as long as possible because he will likely have a mass of bowmen to upgrade.

Note when I say trading here, I mean taking whatever they'll give, even if it is nothing.

 

[Sirp]

Yes, in a zero-sum game, the only time you want to give an advantage to a rival is if the advantage given to the rival will inflict more damage on a third rival. An example of where you might give away a technology is if you're behind in techs already, but you want to pull other civilizations that are even further behind up to your level with the hope that they'll research and help you catch up to the front runners.

But indeed, the times you would do it are rare indeed for cases where you're not going for the fastest-finished-that-needs-tech

-Sirp.