[SPOILERS] Commodore, Mist and the Weed. A Farce in three acts.

[Ilios]

I know Bananas is a pretty shitty tile to have/work in FFH, but even in a decently lush map like this one, I think it would be a shame to lose that five-food tile. I'd move Gogol one east, getting you two good food tiles right away.

I don't get MacDonalds. I'd remove it altogether, instead founding it on the Incense, so it can share the Crabs (+1 food with Lighthouse), and can share a lot of mines with the capital as well. It can work 6 mines from the start, adding two more once borders pop. Come on, what's there not to like, this is a monster city!

I'd found Trollope on a stratigically defensive place (ie a hill), maybe on the jungled hill SE of the plains Sheep.

To make room for the Incense city, I'd move Dosto either one NW, or 2N.

Rest looks ok.

[Commodore]

I know Bananas is a pretty shitty tile to have/work in FFH, but even in a decently lush map like this one, I think it would be a shame to lose that five-food tile. I'd move Gogol one east, getting you two good food tiles right away.

I don't get MacDonalds. I'd remove it altogether, instead founding it on the Incense, so it can share the Crabs (+1 food with Lighthouse), and can share a lot of mines with the capital as well. It can work 6 mines from the start, adding two more once borders pop. Come on, what's there not to like, this is a monster city!

I'd found Trollope on a stratigically defensive place (ie a hill), maybe on the jungled hill SE of the plains Sheep.

To make room for the Incense city, I'd move Dosto either one NW, or 2N.

Rest looks ok.

Ah, looking now I can see that Trollope/Gogol are illegally close anyway. Thing is, Trollope is right now the most monstrous city available, with Wet plains corn, sheep, dry wheat, and a FP that must be farmed if the wheat is ever to be irrigated. The purple dot is on a plains hill, actually, and defended by a river, so is about as close to impregnable as we can get. Thing is, on a map this lush with an early happy cap so low, sharing is caring for these super-food spots.

MacDonald is where it is to share the oasis and mine with Bronte, the crabs with Verne, and the sheep with Trollope, plus being another plains hill plant. Then Gogol moves 1NW to the plains hill next to fish, and Dostoyevsky gets to stay still and share Gogol's fish and Verne's deer.

[Commodore]

Well, looks like that SW Pink dot is a very important settlement, gang. Who likes a border city on a plains hill with six forests, plains gems, forested deer, and fish? Let's lock this down before the neighbor there (scooter?) pushes north. Also, let's push north.



Seven wins points for being less evil than he could have been at EoT, copper is in the mine and thus hooked up next turn. Which will also be when we revolt to slavery, so speak now or forever hold your peace about MacDonald. Mist, you have a vote between incense or plains hill? In a perfect world I think incense's monster would be best, but I'm thinking the ICS net might be wisest here.



We are now equipped with a whopping fifteen cities marked out for settlement, by the way. Ideally, we make nothing but workers, settlers, missionaries, and cataphracts for the rest of the game.

[Commodore]

So fairly dull turn today, brought on by discovery of Bronze Working. After this turn of anarchy, though, our people rejoice in the new management. Now we have slaves! Ironically, due to the growths, BW coming in, and the last warrior being built, our power jumped incredibly fast.



Lacking tiles to micro, the action was all in the scouting this turn. Close to home, Bronte’s warrior poked his head over to confirm the town is indeed where it ought to be in the mirror. Next up, moving 1S searching for food.



Our scout is to going to find out who our ENE neighbor is. Which I guess is also who our SW neighbor is. Lewwyn, you think? Hard to be sure.



Othar, slayer of Lewwyn’s quecha, cheerfully pokes around the northern neighborhood, seeing that most sad of sights, a winery without wine. Aesthetic or something deeply, deeply evil?



Next turn: George MacDonald.

[Commodore]

Yes my friends, one turn, bronze working. The next, copper online and we're Lewwyn-proofing our little empire.



So, a very good turn. Firstly, of course, we settled the beautiful city of MacDonald. She's just squatting there on the oasis for the moment, but once she hits size 2 we'll start up another worker to whip, then it's finally getting to grow with crabs.



Speaking of seafood, our other potential offshore trade route city is looking nicer now, although it'll probably have to share with someone on the plains hill. Such lush land.



Speaking of which, I think it's gone to Scooter's head a bit. Dude, you do need some GNP...like, try not to crash pre-Pottery. He must be settling some huge reaches now. Silly Joao. Serdoa is beating us slightly, but that's okay, my sang is still froid.



Okay, we've got a plan here to get two workers in three turns, and then two settlers three turns after that.



In Bronte, we're going to work both mines the next two turns, then hand over the railroad mine to Verne for a turn as the chop comes in. Then it's back to mines (going a bit hungry in the first turn to squeeze out another couple of hammers) and the settler gets out EoT 33 for settling Dickens in two more turns.



In Verne, it's pretty obvious, stick with the current configuration except dipping down one turn to pick up the mine, then once the worker is done move from the FP to the forested PH to pick up the lat coupla hammers. Then it's off to Kipling for the settler, and oh by the way we're 36/67 on the metal casing bulb. This is all timed to finish the same turn Priesthood does, so it's a calm seven-turn build on the Oracle after that.



Micro-plans aside, things are looking good thus far in Byzantium. We're neither the most populous nor most advanced, but we have an assured religion and the ICS grid pattern means we can keep up 100% research for at least ten more turns even with the new settlements in eight.



Now let's welcome a Lewwyn chariot rush...

[Commodore]

So this turn, we traded ten hammers to be able to check from sabotage costs what Serdoa is building. Lewwyn with Hinduism and Serdoa with Phi are the two biggest threats for the Oracle, way I figure it. I'm move than a little curious where that settler is going, obviously we're all dotmapping very differently here.



At home, all things are going according to plan. Note the net +2 gold from the merchants, settling like adults for the win. The current wonder I have is whether or not to make another worker at the capital and two-pop whip it for overflow into the Oracle. If threats appear, you can substitute "an axe/spear" for the worker, so that's all to the good

.

One other note, about happy caps; obviously the capital is about to spawn a settler for the gold, and once the MC bulb is out a forge is next, raising the cap to 8 (with preserve, and I'm actually hoping the preserve will spawn us more forests so it stays), and then we're beelining the gems pick dot (Stowe) for another +2. The capital needs to be working at least four cottages by that point, ideally five.

[Commodore]

So, vacation is over, and I'm already looking sadly towards work in the morning, but I did keep the save moving on the flaky hotel wireless. Turn 30, almost literally nothing happened, although the plan gave us two more workers at the end of turn, which is almost a sane worker/city ratio.



Of course, we're screwing that up with two more settlers incoming next. Bronte went a little bit hungry for the settler being a 3-turn build. All a fair sacrifice for the glorious land grab, right?



Speaking of glorious land grabbing, met Mr. Scooter. Our warrior is nicely plugging scout's options, although he might risk the fight on the decently protected jungle. I'm sure he is most curious what is going on in Victorian Byzantium.



The biggest project ongoing, of course, is the MC bulb -> Oracle Machinery scheme, which will be awesome if indeed it works. Verne is going to manage to keep the deadline for the 3-turn settler, and again, barring incoming chariots, will next proceed on to a worker to whip for Oracle overflow and because frankly we need a lot more workers.



Looking pretty good thus far, eh?

[Ilios]

Which cities will be founded next?

[Commodore]

Which cities will be founded next?

Current plan is Dickens (fish/windmill/pigs) and Kipling (gold/pigs), which is why it's nice that we could fit AH in before making the Priesthood run. Trollope, Thackeray, and Melville all follow in the wave after.

[Commodore]

And for reference, here are the two hog-heaven plants we're looking at in three turns. Dickens is a lovely site, needing a workboat whipped in as soon as it hits size two, and then a granary at size 4. After that it's foodhammers and cottage working, with the whip applied as often as they smile at us.



Kipling, the other pig-worker, has a similar plan except for the foodhammer tax of working the Fin river gold...which will be totally worth it. Before too long it'll want to push out a galley for the town site, which we'll pillage and then settle for trade routes and eventual Moai goodness.



I think the westtown location will probably be settled first and become the Moai spot, but unless I'm wrong the east is going to be pretty attractive to Mr. Zerker. Hill towns on this this side are the rule for coastal.



Demos are looking okay, but we need to catch up a bit in the important two...again, Scooter, what the heck are you doing to your GNP?



Colossus might be reachable, actually, with our forges able to come online sooner rather than later. We still've got to move on it, though.