Time for some bullying (or not)

[mlinneak]

well, I know, however, I want to taint the lands with Mansa's blood!

There should certainly be enough of his around to do so!

 

[Gumbolt]

Agriculture would be useful with the lack of food. Flood plains could be irrigated for extra food. Shame we missed out on the extra cow. For me all the grassland below just seemed too good to ignore from the starting screen shot.

Agree with Kossin on whipping. With low growth we'll struggle to regrow cities. Chop chop!! Lets get on with this.

Not sure i can load the save yet. Not tried yet.

 

[cripp7]

PreTurn:
Switch tech to Ag (8)
Hit enter

Turn 20 - zzz

Turn 21 - warrior>warrior
Send our warrior south scouting

Turn 22 - Red Mansu shows up from the NE. In worker news: Phants are now corraled and goes off to work in the mines.

Turn 24 - Worker starts on a mine

Turn 25 - warrior>settler

Turn 26 - Ag>BW (13)

Turn 27 - Worker news: mine done

Turn 29 - Worker news: farm begins on floodplain

Turn 36 - Settler>warrior Worker news: farm done

Found another horse to the east 2 tiles from BFC.
Settler is ready to move, got our warrior fog-busting the horse/rice site.

 

[kossin]

The horses west make for a good city spot I think. There's no reason to settle west beside that city that I can see... we need to keep looking in the fog for better city sites. North perhaps?
Next tech is obviously TW and then Pottery perhaps.

1. Slibluhr
2. cripp7 - Just played
3. Gumbolt - UP!
4. mlinneak - On deck
5. Meerk
6. kossin

 

[Slibluhr]

Please post scrennies for all those of us that can't check the save in our jobs...

 

[cripp7]

 

[Gumbolt]

Still here. I will look at this tomorrow as its 2.30am ish and a bit tired. I will probably settle second city as marked up by Cripps. See how we go.

 

[Gumbolt]

Okay i had a look at save and took a few decisions.

Firstly we only had one worker. We now have 3 workers. We have warriors fog busting although we may need to switch to warrior in capital if that barb warriors heads towards us.


T3 We had BW. Copper in BFC.

I built some irrigation near flood plains to give worker something to do.

T4 Settled 2nd city building monument to grab border pop.

Teched towards TW, pottery and writing.

We have found pigs above our capital and we have a new settler ready to place a new city. Up north looks a bit barren but the pigs and ivory could make a nice city.

Our second city is working on a granary for now. Could of grown capital to size 4 really.

Going ahead I would build another warrior in capital and maybe build a 4th worker/granary and a settler from the capital. Size 4 would allow use of ivory and copper. A production power house.

 

[kossin]

Just looking at the save now.
Workers should connect the 2 cities asap, it will take just a few turns (3 roads to build). Make sure we don't waste to many worker turns here (the one W of Cow misser will be the one to build the road to the SE of Cow misser while that worker moves SE to build a road there.)
If that's not clear here's a turn-by-turn movement: I'll call them WW and WE (Worker west and worker east).

T0: WW goes SE and builds a farm/cottage for 1 turn, then cancel it).
WE goes SE and builds a road
T1: WW goes E and builds a road. WE finishes road
T2: WW finishes road. WE goes E and builds a road
T3: WW can do whatever you want WE finishes road connecting our cities for 2 extra

The horses will be auto-connected with the river so don't build a road there. Once Writing is in, send a few workers to connect to Orange Mansa for foreign trade routes.

I'm not sure where the others are but I think we may have the west to ourselves.
For cities, they need food above all at this point since we have secured the early military resources.
I see three spots at this point:
-cows+banana SW of capital
-horses+ivory+fp's that can be farmed
-pigs+deer - we can always split it in two so the deer can grab the fur for early happy

For the capital, I would switch the Copper to a farmed Grassland and dump the overflow in a Barracks (exactly 50 so it's built in 1 turn)
We can then get out another warrior in time if the barb doesn't detour for our fogbuster.

I wouldn't send the warrior of Tenochtitlan too far away because some barbs can come out of the western fog.
We still need to scout east a bit and also the peninsula to our west. There might be some seafood in the fog.

What do we tech next? I'm guessing Alphabet since we can start harassing a (few) Nerd(s) to piss him(them) off! We'll also backfill several techs this way, most likely IW to improve the jungle/build jaguars. We'll need to keep our power low enough so that MM's aren't too afraid to DoW us. Also, getting a religion (connecting to Orange Mansa will likely yield Hinduism) will add more hatred from the other blocks.

Edit:

1. Slibluhr
2. cripp7
3. Gumbolt - Just played
4. mlinneak - UP!
5. Meerk - On deck
6. kossin

 

[mlinneak]

Got it, thanks

Will look over the save today, play and post tomorrow.

Thanks for the ideas, kossin, I will try to implement them pretty much exactly the way you laid out. Any other ideas from the team are certainly welcome as well

Edit: Especially any input on which of the three proposed city sites are preferred - anyone want to volunteer a dotmap? Perhaps with the sites numbered even?

 

[mlinneak]

For the capital, I would switch the Copper to a farmed Grassland and dump the overflow in a Barracks (exactly 50 so it's built in 1 turn)
We can then get out another warrior in time if the barb doesn't detour for our fogbuster.

At the risk of sounding dumb, I am going to have to ask for clarification on that. I have to say, I was looking to succession games as a learning tool to help me with MM since it's really not something I am strong in or have much experience with, in the hopes of improving my gameplay.
I looked at the save and reread this portion of your post, kossin, and am not sure how to accomplish what you've said.
Should I be switching the current build immediately to a barracks then, or letting the current build complete, with barracks next in queue?
Since everyone was pretty much agreed that slavery would slow our capital too much due to the lack of food resources, am I chopping out more to get that overflow?
I would rather sound dumb now than mess up the game with poor play for everyone else
Please advise -

 

[mjg5591]

Just found thread thanks to kossin. If you guys need another player, I am interested. If not it's ok. I'll still follow this thread for improving my game.

Mike

 

[Meerk]

I don't really have a sense for how easily the AI will DoW on us. Do we think that if we have a low power and make a lot of crazy demands that they will do so quickly? I also like the tension between having low enough power to be perceived as easy pickings while still enough to be safe. It feels like superior tech and production (or heavy whip use) are essential to deploy a quick army after they do DoW.

 

[Meerk]

At the risk of sounding dumb, I am going to have to ask for clarification on that. I have to say, I was looking to succession games as a learning tool to help me with MM since it's really not something I am strong in or have much experience with, in the hopes of improving my gameplay.
I looked at the save and reread this portion of your post, kossin, and am not sure how to accomplish what you've said.
Should I be switching the current build immediately to a barracks then, or letting the current build complete, with barracks next in queue?

I *think* Kossin was suggesting that you may want to build a one-turn barracks right away. We have 21 overflow from the previous building, which can get coupled with the extra 3 hammers from the cow square and 1 from our city square to be 25 hammers, which gets doubled (aggressive leader) and therefore make for a 1-turn barracks.

I believe he was suggesting you then build a warrior (pushing the proposed settler a bit further off.)

Personally, I think the best-looking site we have is the horse+FP+elephant. I made up a crappy dotmap, just to get people's reactions.

 

[Slibluhr]

Meerk, to take screenies of the BUG's dotmap please increase it's brightness from the ctrl+alt+o menu.

I'd say that we should go barracks, warrior and then change to settler when we reached pop 4 to 2 whip it

I know that we have too little food, however that's why I think that we shall get more cities fast. And once we get the third city up and running we can let the capital grow while working on our army.

About city placement, to our third city we shall find a grasslands-heavy location (look at the jungles, being crossed by two rivers get extra points)

 

[Meerk]

Ahh, thanks for the tips about BUG mod and the dotmap.

 

[mlinneak]

Thanks for the input, guys.
I will be playing when I get home from work shortly, and will implement all suggestions given. I agree on the horse+fp+elephant, an extra elephant might be good trading fodder to improve relations with the Orange Mansa as well, if he is the one we try to butter up. Just an idea

 

[mlinneak]

Played until Writing was finished, have some decisions for the group to discuss.

Inherited Turn
1760 started roading to Tenochtitlan
-sent settler in the direction of the horse/ivory/fp site
-switched build in capital to barracks
-revolted to slavery -> being spiritual there was no anarchy, and per thread posts planned to 2 pop whip the next settler

1720 moved fog busters around a little

1680 Teotihuacan founded and under immediate assault

-started it on a granary to aid growth and future whipping

IBT we survive - but barely

-also our exploring, spawnbusting warrior in the north defeats a barb and is due a promotion, he was still at full health so opted to wait on bestowing this until he was threatened or it became obvious he would be useful in a specific manner

1640 sent worker to farm fp at Teotihuacan -> always better to work improved tiles if possible
-Stonehenge BIFL

1600 Cow-misser completes warrior -> begins settler
-our capital has trade with Tenochtitlan

-our city connections provides our capital a horse resource

-the completed warrior is fortified in Cow-misser
-started a mine on a grassy hill by Tenochtitlan while waiting for rice to come available

1560 started farming fp in Teotihuacan
-picked up on the cottage that was started by the capital

1520 nothing noteworthy

1480 whipped the settler in Cow-misser for 2, should give 22 overflow

1440 sent worker to farm rice
-started road towards the cow/dye spot
-queued granary in the capital to benefit from the overflow

1400 started rice farm

1360 writing in

-Red Mansa asked for open borders - declined at this time
-set tech to IW as placeholder -> at our current rate of 50% research yielding 9 beakers per turn it will take 26 turns, alpha was 39. Nothing is invested yet so the next player can switch - fishing might also be good to get to sailing, as sailing would be helpful what with all the rivers in our territory
-started barracks in Tenochtitlan, this can also be switched if desired, no hammer investment yet
-there is a barb warrior by Teotihuacan that has been playing hide and seek with us, he has been in and out of the shaded tile for the last 6 turns or so but has not yet advanced on us

-Red Mansa was the founder of Judaism. Red, Orange and Blue all have negative diplo modifiers due to religious differences

-the warrior in the north still has his movement points available
-the settler is in place and can be settled next turn
-Cow-misser and Tenochtitlan can build chariots now
-we will need roads connecting our new city and Teotihuacan to our empire

-Our three city empire:

And the save ~

 

[mlinneak]

So I did not accept OB with Red Mansa. Since he is one of the ones with a religion, I did not want to get a "You traded with our worst enemies" penalty from Orange Mansa, whom I assumed from the posts that we were going to try to befriend. I thought the group should discuss which Mansa's we wanted to OB with, Orange most likely, but any others? Usually that can be obtained at leisure though, when it is OUR advantage anyway so I didn't think it was necessarily bad to wait.
Also, I wasn't really sure if mining the grassland hill was the best next move for the worker by Tenochtitlan - he probably would've done better to either farm or cottage - please advise what would've been best and why so I will know for next time.

 

[kossin]

@mjg5591 Welcome aboard, I'll add you in front of me on the roster.

Nice set

Good exploration in the north and peninsula, it looks we have about 3~4 more spots to get a city.

There's a few things however. I'm sorry if it sounds harsh but it is not meant to be, I'm just trying to show you the thought process that should be done.

Tenochtitlan is working some very weird tiles: non riverside grassland and a plains grass? Why did you build a mine while we have no to feed it? A riverside farm or a chop would have been better and taken as much time. It also does not need a Barracks now, is it going to build any units soon? Make a worker next (or a chariot as barbs could start really showing up soon I think but it can always be whipped), our land is really under-improved. Switch to the rice and mine.

Teotihuacan needs a Monument now. Put 1 turn in it and then whip it. Once borders pop, it will be connected to the Capital for 1 more It's not your fault but building it where it is now is very suboptimal: we're getting 5 unusable desert tiles and losing 1 fp. A better location would have been NE on the desert hill. You still get all the resource, gain 1 fp and lose 5 deserts.

Cow-misser will need to regrow before using mines, just make sure it works the farm before the mines. Capital makes a library after the granary that will be 2-whipped. Then it regrows and starts running 2 scientists. I think research should go at 0% while we wait for the library as we don't need IW yet, our 4th city will get cows and some riverside forests to chop/farm. We might need to hook up the copper if the barbs show up with spears otherwise don't as building warriors for HR is just too good.

5th city should go around the deer/furs (1 more ) and the pig/silk area to seal off our land. But that's a while off, we need to set up the economy a bit better before thinking that far off. A few fogbusters north would also help our cause but cities are really caught up in other stuff to build right now. Although there's a thing to be said of letting barbs roam so we can get a 10xp unit for HE.

1. Slibluhr
2. cripp7
3. Gumbolt
4. mlinneak - Just played
5. Meerk - UP!
6. mjg5591 - On deck
7. kossin