The Devil is Six

[FlyingSwan]

As we cant realy afford to lose any units to barbs,and this bieng IMM would it be wise to switch to hunting/archery then AH?I,d camp the warrior 1SE on FH as a spawnbuster.this game is going to be tough,losing a warrior is potentially like losing a mechanized infantry!!

I like the 2N of cow site,but stone is always good.A jungle rice city to the east could be interesting,it would have 11 grassland hills.

 

[Ororo]

There are two possible tech paths now. Hunting -> Archery, which is the safer option. The Wheel -> Pottery, which will pay off greatly if we manage to defend with just warriors until Archery. The question is which one do we choose?

I agree with 2N of the cow as our 2nd city.

 

[nocho]

I also think 2N of cow is a good spot, only not sure yet whether it should be the first spot we settle. If indeed the closest AIs are to the SW and SE maybe we should first try to settle in those directions. Unless of course there's an AI close by due west/NW.

With the gems I think we can afford to do hunting/archery. We want archers anyway and supposing we have horses we'll want to build our UU as well at some point. Wheel/pottery/AH are also high on the to-do list. Then we can start to think of going for Oracle, we at least want myst for monuments anyway.

I'm also thinking that relatively early monarchy could be beneficial. HR with our large standing army could make a lot of sense, in order to grow our cities big soon and in a way make that army pay for itself.

 

[woopdeedoo]

lurker's comment: Will be lurking this thread with much interest!

 

[FlyingSwan]

After seeing that Isabellas on the map coupled with Immortal level,an oracle is starting to look less attractive.Nocho is going to have the best idea of which direction to settle first from scouts he met.My hunch is south and north west 1st as settling priority.A city to grab the stone maybe and 1 to block the cow /gold site.All depends on Ororos scouting.

 

[shyuhe]

The stone/rice spot is a pretty marginal until civil service. The corn to the west is more attractive to me.

 

[FlyingSwan]

The stone/rice spot is a pretty marginal until civil service. The corn to the west is more attractive to me.

Yes,very true,but the stone would give us options on wonders.The cap is going to make a great beauracracy city,which means oxford,also the Hanging gardens Id prioritise over the mids in this game looking at the land,our game restrictions,and FIN leader trait.

Dillema,dillemas,too tough to call until Ororo,s done his turn.

 

[Ororo]

Ok I've played my short turn set.
Tech path went Hunting -> Archery -> Animal Husbandry -> The Wheel (1 Turn invested).
Our starting warrior killed an archer (he was on a forested hill so I took the risk) but also got sniped by a panther. He somehow managed to survive! We now have a woodsman 2 guy. Worker stealing should be considered.
Our new warrior went exploring south and managed to found both Arabian and Spanish borders. There is also a horse resource between us and these 2 civilizations so I think we should settle towards them.
Otherwise I built a second Worker and an Archer. A settler is queued next and the two workers are positioned to chop it out. (They will clear riverside grassland so we can start cottaging these tiles as soon as Pottery is finished).
A city near horse would have a second benefit: It wouldn't require a road to connect it to our capital. This saves precious early worker turns as we can build improvements instead of roads.

Screenies:

Land with resources:

Land with culture:

EDIT: Proposed city site:

Note: You can place it 1E to grab the Stone too, but such city would have almsot zero short-term value as we'd have to wait for a border pop to work our specials.
One more thing: If we settle it 1E Sal is likely to put down a city of his own which would grab gold+horse.

 

[shyuhe]

That looks like a good city spot. We will probably want to build a barracks and a few archers soon to deal with barbs. It's nice that we have a big backyard but that also means... barbs.

For cities, I'm thinking:

#2: horse to the south
#3-5: cow/gold to the north, horse/pig/gold on the coast, and gem/rice to the east.

I think Izzy will grab stone/rice and the gold/stone is a pretty crappy city.

 

[nocho]

Looks fine, it would look even better with a save!

 

[r_rolo1]

lurker's comment: The variant is only hard if you don't try culture or cheesy diplo wins. And I can only wonder what mischiefs you can do with Vassals

P.S Too bad I haven't grasped this one in time ... it is indeed a interesting variant theme

 

[nocho]

lurker's comment: The variant is only hard if you don't try culture or cheesy diplo wins. And I can only wonder what mischiefs you can do with Vassals

P.S Too bad I haven't grasped this one in time ... it is indeed a interesting variant theme

Dear lurker,

The variant states we should win by conquest.

And I'm okay with a number 7 on board if you're that interested. I'd be glad to provide you with an "interesting variant" instead of vice versa for a change. So if you wish you can delurk and be put on the roster.

Yours truly,
6

 

[r_rolo1]

Conquest with 6 tokems of each unit ? Impossible Or maybe not it definitely does not look easy ... ( I predict extensive use of vassals , but it might look hard to get the first one, given the necessarily low power ... ). You can't even play the nuke card easily , with only 12 nukes avaliable ...

If you want a nº7, slot me in ( someone has to be god after all )

 

[Ororo]

Looks fine, it would look even better with a save!

Oooops. Here you go.

r_rolo1 welcome on board

 

[nocho]

Conquest with 6 tokems of each unit ? Impossible Or maybe not it definitely does not look easy ... ( I predict extensive use of vassals , but it might look hard to get the first one, given the necessarily low power ... ). You can't even play the nuke card easily , with only 12 nukes avaliable ...

If you want a nº7, slot me in ( someone has to be god after all )

Impossible, maybe. As you've guided me through several losses in the RR-series, I'm happy to turn the tables on this one.

I just hope that we'll be able to make enough cash to upgrade heavily and be okay on the power-charts. An early assault on Izzy or Sal might help too. Can't help thinking of Oracling construction to that end, though I share a certain worry with FS that Oracle may be difficult with 3 zealots around (but no IND civs...). Still our tech pace must be good enough to at least reach PH reasonably early, even with some previous small detours (like archery).

Anyway, roster now is as follows:
nocho
Ororo - Just played
FlyingSwan - Up
Sengir - On deck
shyuhe
Cam_H - Low on time
r_rolo1 - Wants to act God, though the roster despises the Divine

I switched FlyingSwan and Sengir because of the current short holidays of the latter. Cam_H expressed concerns about his time schedule, but well, you can check in any time you like but you can never leave.

 

[shyuhe]

We can easily win the oracle if we chop. The AI can't beat our double gem tech pace. It's really more of a question of if we want to give up the hammers in the early game for the oracle.

 

[Ororo]

How about Feudalism from the Oracle? With a capital like this we should be able to make it...

 

[nocho]

Feudalism certainly has appeal, also because it goes through monarchy. HR and vassalage are both pretty good civics to have for us, so we may switch to both in one go if we Oracle Feud. With a rax that means double promo units of the bat, which may be good for an early-ish attack. Still, I'm open to other options.

I think we can afford some chops into Oracle if we get some settlers out before, preferrably settling towards the AI. As we can't build more than 6 settlers anyway and we seem to have reasonably secure and good land to our backs up north, we can settle there later. That makes me think, maybe we shouldn't spawn-bust too much so that the barbs build us some cities.

 

[shyuhe]

Feudalism locks out archers so we would want to build 6 archers before completing the Oracle.

 

[nocho]

That's true, although maybe we don't have to build 6 of every single unit available in the game... Earlier access to certain civics might outweigh not being able to build some units, dunno. However, in general obsoleting units is certainly an imporant consideration as we advance the tree.

In any case, Oracling something all-purpose like currency or construction wouldn't be bad either.