I think at this point it's worth discussing the decisions already made in this game, because there are some interesting points. I think the crux of the issue, is I don't think moving the capital was the best idea after all. The whole point of moving was to be able to grow the capital vertically onto cottages to power research, but it is patently obvious that we aren't going to be able to do this in a time frame that matters.
We now have a capital that we can't easily grow without teching to Pottery, or spending way too many turns growing to size 5 delaying horizontal expansion, whereas if we had settled in place we would have had enough food resources to ignore pottery, grow the capital to size 5 and then split off the pig to the copper city permanently.
As it is, I think we are going to get kneecapped by the happy cap limit whilst OH blows right past it, and this is why:
OH has just settled his third city and has Hinduism. I don't think we are getting Oracle, he could slow build it before we could one turn chop it. He has no interest in Colossus or Forges, he would take either HBR or Monarchy IMO. And if he fails to get Oracle, then it's only because someone spent way too much to get it, but that doesn't help us with out happy cap. I'm wondering if each player had a three food start (and we were knobbled by the third food resource being a plains hill sheep? Not sure. I'll forward to scouting the map out more).
(oh, and no seafood to the SE, it's bare coast and ocean all the way)
Our tech rate is really poor (or at best, average due to tech prerequisite bonus). We will be able to improve it a bit, but we are going to hit happy cap troubles when we start using cottages, and we don't have the ability to get more than a library or two anyway if we head to writing to sink food into beakers. We are going to give OH a window to rush us, which ever way we play this out either going for Oracle>Monarchy or not.
Sufficed to say, I think the plans we have for Oracle are the best we are going to make them. Priesthood eot59, Oracle eot60. If we did not research Pottery we might shave 2-3 turns off that at the cost of crippling the capital (no cottages and slow growth to size 5 and a very late copper city). I think we are going to have to explore the route we take if we don't go for the Oracle, and I think we have to get Sailing and AH (researched after saving gold, after Pottery is completed), then Writing>Alphabet and build research to Currency. We fit in Archery wherever we need, and after Currency we back track for all the happy techs we can grab. We will have to manage expansion to not go bankrupt, at least until Alphabet, but we will also have to expand north to the furs. We'll have to settle a conservative front city against OH and try to shut out any window of opportunity he has of rushing us. I think we can do that, but if he takes Oracle to Monarchy I don't think we are going to be able to not leave open a window between Alphabet and the happy techs: We may well have to grab HBR at an expensive time.
We now have a capital that we can't easily grow without teching to Pottery, or spending way too many turns growing to size 5 delaying horizontal expansion, whereas if we had settled in place we would have had enough food resources to ignore pottery, grow the capital to size 5 and then split off the pig to the copper city permanently.
As it is, I think we are going to get kneecapped by the happy cap limit whilst OH blows right past it, and this is why:
OH has just settled his third city and has Hinduism. I don't think we are getting Oracle, he could slow build it before we could one turn chop it. He has no interest in Colossus or Forges, he would take either HBR or Monarchy IMO. And if he fails to get Oracle, then it's only because someone spent way too much to get it, but that doesn't help us with out happy cap. I'm wondering if each player had a three food start (and we were knobbled by the third food resource being a plains hill sheep? Not sure. I'll forward to scouting the map out more).
(oh, and no seafood to the SE, it's bare coast and ocean all the way)
Our tech rate is really poor (or at best, average due to tech prerequisite bonus). We will be able to improve it a bit, but we are going to hit happy cap troubles when we start using cottages, and we don't have the ability to get more than a library or two anyway if we head to writing to sink food into beakers. We are going to give OH a window to rush us, which ever way we play this out either going for Oracle>Monarchy or not.
Sufficed to say, I think the plans we have for Oracle are the best we are going to make them. Priesthood eot59, Oracle eot60. If we did not research Pottery we might shave 2-3 turns off that at the cost of crippling the capital (no cottages and slow growth to size 5 and a very late copper city). I think we are going to have to explore the route we take if we don't go for the Oracle, and I think we have to get Sailing and AH (researched after saving gold, after Pottery is completed), then Writing>Alphabet and build research to Currency. We fit in Archery wherever we need, and after Currency we back track for all the happy techs we can grab. We will have to manage expansion to not go bankrupt, at least until Alphabet, but we will also have to expand north to the furs. We'll have to settle a conservative front city against OH and try to shut out any window of opportunity he has of rushing us. I think we can do that, but if he takes Oracle to Monarchy I don't think we are going to be able to not leave open a window between Alphabet and the happy techs: We may well have to grab HBR at an expensive time.