[49 spoilers] Miguelito, pindicator and Adrien take Shiva by the hands

[Miguelito]

t36 - 40 (!) - left just two days out and boom, 5 turns to report on. It's going to be a bit condensed.

We can see Commodore's borders:


I hope this is the tile SE of his 2nd city, and not his capital, otherwise we may get in serious conflict with that 3rd city plant.

Speaking of, there's that situation:


1. It's a pity Comm has his scout around just now, and sees what we're doing.
2. that warrior of Cairo's appeared t39, and is now fortified there. Does he want to settle there? I don't think we could live with that? I am tempted to whip the axe right now (already ended turn and stop, would that actually constitute a turn order violation?), although I decided against that initially so as not to whip off the copper again. But it will be whipped next turn. Trouble is just, if I send the axe that way, it can't defend the third city. Might need another axe right afterwards instead of the granary . And a spear, because Persia...  I also think his axe is probably coming just behind, he's had his second city with copper first ring for 9 turns now.
3. due to the Commodore border, I was even thinking about founding on the desert hill between the sheeps (teal (?) dot). Gets the western sheep (though Comm may contest that) and a gold 2nd ring, hill plant, and the peaks are good watchtowers. But it has a forest less, and more importantly is one further tile away from our core. Really unsure if it's wise to found on flatland and hills outside what might become our border city to Commodore. At least we'll have Masonry and stone (ok that's not really great...)  

More foreign news, city tally:
Elkad           28    
Cornflakes    33    
Rasko           32    
us                25    
MrCairo        31    
Fintourist      31    38
Commodore  31    
Ruff-Hi         34    
superdeath   35    40
That's right, FT and Superdeath (Stalin, without any whips!) already have their third down. I do feel bad.

Whips:
Elkad           35 (1)    39(1)            
Cornflakes    23 (1)    28 (1)    30 (2)    35(1)    38(2)
Rasko          28 (1)    37(1)            
us               22 (2)    25 (1)    32 (1)        
MrCairo        38(2)                
Fintourist     22 (1)    37 (1)            
Commodore                    
Ruff-Hi        40(2)    40(1)            
superdeath                    

Also as I said above, Buddhism was founded t39. Elkad, Ruff, SD, FT, and Raskolnikov got score increases. My suspects are FT (myst start) and SD (IND on his way to Oracle).


Gotta decide on the 3rd city location next turn (not strictly, I can also move on light blue and still found dark, or the desert hill). 

Edit: I forgot our first martyr:


maybe it was an error to leave borders, I wanted him to look out on the hills to secure the plant, but could have waited to cover with the scout on t40. I built another warrior at Mahadeva (had one prebuilt with 12h that I wanted to queue upgrade to a spear  ), as I didn't feel like securing the third city plant with the scout only. The scout has avenged him now.

All the demos that I saved, and latest graphs (power twice, as Ruff somehow has started spending more EP on us and we lost his this turn.

seriously, what's all that power? They didn't even have copper until quite revently. Why are we so far below there? (our last increase is Hunting. We don't have AH, that's some power, right?)

[Miguelito]

questions I'd appreciate a quick answer for:

• If Cairo does found next to our pink dot, do we go to war, and how seriously?
  
• your opinion on the 3rd city spot on the desert hill (teal) vs. the flatland spots
  

[AdrienIer]

I'm against going to war so early personally, there are better avenues of expansion currently and all the military (which isn't a lot) is going to have to defend the spots like blue dot. That city spot (assuming he plants on the warrior) leaves open a plant W of the rice for us (S of the sugar) that will make a fine border city.

Can you take a picture of the two spots again ? I can't find them anymore.

[Miguelito]

Can't take a new soft atm, but the three dots ate in the second picture In post 101, and you can see the resources in post 95

Edit: I'll likely take a double turn tonight, so going to settle then (or move onto desert hill), like 11 hours from now


My trouble with Cairo's city is how it can 1 turn fork our capital and holy city with boats. I don't think that's sustainable. We'd have to engineer a way to signal with AI diplo that we could live with it somehow as long as he doesn't get boats in there. If he settled off coast I'd be ok with that.
I'm also annoyed because he has great spots to the north, so I feel we're getting strongarmed there. Our holy city will pop borders on t45 and take those FP. Might be an option to walk in with 3-4 axes and a spear around t50

[AdrienIer]

Can't take a new soft atm, but the three dots ate in the second picture In post 101, and you can see the resources in  post 95

Oh sorry you mentioned flatland but I thought the other possible spot was the PH ? I think I prefer the PH because it has an instant TR, a 2h plant, and early access to gold (because of the river connection religion has a better chance of spreading there than on the northern spot, so gold will likely be accessible there earlier). With our UB we're less starved for happiness but it's still nice to get a higher cap.

Fake edit : or are you talking about settling on the plain tile 2SE of the desert hill ?

[Miguelito]

Can't take a new soft atm, but the three dots ate in the second picture In post 101, and you can see the resources in  post 95

Oh sorry you mentioned flatland but I thought the other possible spot was the PH ? I think I prefer the PH because it has an instant TR, a 2h plant, and early access to gold (because of the river connection religion has a better chance of spreading there than on the northern spot, so gold will likely be accessible there earlier). With our UB we're less starved for happiness but it's still nice to get a higher cap.

Fake edit : or are you talking about settling on the plain tile 2SE of the desert hill ?

No... I see that my colour scheme for dots is creating confusion here. The 3rd city goes down in the north. the settler and workers are already on the way, and I think it's the right choice strategically and for max foodhammers.
In post 101 you see three blueish dots in the north,  two of which we have discussed before.  The new one is on a desert hill,  one tile farther.  I'm considering it because of the defensive position, because w may get or border with Comm here and I feel uncomfortable settling on flatland.  it also gets the sheep and the cow in the BFC, plus one gold.
The main downside is that it's really far. it also has one less forest, and the eastern sheep could likely be taken over by Commodore, if he settles for it first ring.

[AdrienIer]

Ooooooh, ok. The desert hill spot is much worse IMO. More forests on the flatland alternatives, the western sheep is probably never getting hooked, more mountains on teal.

[Miguelito]

turns 41 + 42

The third city was founded as Pashupati, Lord of the Animals:




I went for light blue in the end, which picks up both golds in second ring. I may come to regret it, if Commodore sees it as too aggressive a plant (and I can only imagine the questions he'll pose on my sanity in his thread in that case), but I was feeling that we should take a risk to catch up.


The pasture gets finished next turn. Afterwards, one worker goes to chop the granary, while the other builds the missing road and then improves the sheep in time for
when the city grows.
Mahadeva got its axe whipped and will now finish the granary, as you can see behind the UI. Overflow will go into a spear (to have that whippable), then it'll switch to an axe. The southern worker, having finished the cottage, will now move to improve the stone.

Also Cairo is snooping around:


There's still no settler under that warrior, maybe he is just there to watch us? I've actually considered declaring on him and immediately offering a ceasefire, but the message would be too vague. I also decided against moving up the axe because I wanted to have it in range to defend the 3rd city if need be. Not sure if that was smart. Putting the axe in Cairo's face next turn could have been a clear warning that I won't accept that plant. With the scout I will be able to look out towards Commodore, which can free up the axe to move in that direction, but likely too late.

I've kept graphs in spoilers before, but I'll post power now and repeat my question:

seriously, what's all that power? They didn't even have copper until quite revently. Why are we so far below there? (our last increase is Hunting. We don't have AH, that's some power, right?)

Ruff is now top power, his two whips on turn 40 seem to have been axes. It would make little sense for him to come after us, as he seems to have settled in the other direction, and the land between us isn't that awesome. He also has mentioned turn splits with superdeath in the tech thread . As mentioned, supedeath founded his third city on turn 40, and he's Stalin, with whom you would expect a slower start. Maybe he's run really low military (we have), and Ruff wants to punish his farmer's gambit? SD also rushed Ruff in PB47, maybe that influences too. If he does come our way, we'll at least have the holy city borders to watch further. Two chariots would be nasty, but really unlikely.

Demos and other graphs. The third city hits hard on our costs. Let's hope we get that gold online at some point.

[Miguelito]

Also long time no opponent analysis, let's do Fintourist:

Isabella (EXP/SPI) of the Inca: Agriculture/Mysticism. UB: Granary replacement: Terrace, +1 culture, cost 45 hammers, No trait production modifier. UU: Warrior replacement: Quechua. +100% against archery units.
Little to say on the pick, it's very strong*. I had the feeling that there's a slight antisynergy between SPI and the Terrace, as the latter reduces the motivation to go on the religious line in the tech tree early. But there's no doubt he has a plan for that.
Fintourist is a veteran and the original half of the Finharry dreamteam (they were around in the first game I lurked here, PB13, where they also made fun plays with SPI). Fintourist has been inactive due to RL business for some years I think, but the team's up again, together with Old Harry's new better half hitru, who have just won the PB46 flagship game. OH really seems to enjoy Inca, whom he played i nthe mentioned PB46 and is dedlurking in PB48, teamed with superdeath (I haven't read their picking process, so it should be no spoiler but just my speculation that it's no coincidence that this is the one game where superdeath didn't pick Boudicca of the Barbarians). So how do they not win this game?
First option is that Hitru and OH enter a new game which keeps them occupied, while Fintourist gets increasing RL pressure (I somehow have to include Coronavirus in that analysis) and starts playing sloppy. Nah, I don't think these are the guys who abandon a game that they're winning.
Another might be that Commodore, who is overtly wary of them, makes them the target of his inevitable early Samurai (crap I've just settled towards Boudicca of early Samurais - gotta dust off that Machinery bulb plan), and they get set back sufficiently.
Map wise this may work actually: Differing from my overview in post 95, Cornflakes and Raskolnikov are now reporting their turn splits in the tech thread, so Rasko must be somewhere in the south, hence Fintourist might be located in the north rather, where we've seen Comm already.

*All the granary civs got picked during the first half of the snake pick. I do think that's one of the details about the mod that should be addressed. I don't see why the terrace (and the Indian granary for that matter ) should be cheap. I think Krill did it to prevent pairing them with PRO for a power combo, but what he did was to put half a PRO trait on top of already strong UBs. Keeping the Babylonian granary cheap is debatable, although Cornflakes is showing us its potential here impressively - 8 pop whipped already (1 again on t41)

[pindicator]

One thing to keep in mind about borders is that you want to have only a single city border if at all possible. One problem with the white & pink dot setup you have is that if Cairo were to invade then he could threaten both cities with 2-movers from the hill N-NE of pink dot. That is my biggest reasoning for proposing settling on top of the sugar before. Other options might be settling on top of the rice (river defense on all the relevant sides) or N of the rice for better claiming of bonus resources.