[Spoilers] This Perfect Place

[Mr. Cairo]

What is the best way to simulate fortify bonus? I can't rely on the AI to leave those units in the city for exactly as long as I need to get the right bonus.

The most simple is to give city defense promotions or stars for not full fortify, but if you want everything precise then put units with the most fortify in the city, surround it with rocks, skip turns, then put units with lower fortify. After all remove rocks and simulate your group.

That rocks method sounds pretty good, thanks. I'll sim it out with what's in Ecbatana at the moment later today.

[Mr. Cairo]

So I did some sims of the attack. What would ideally happen is my first axe wounds his axe enough so that his C1 spear defends against my C1 spear, which wounds his spear enough that his immortal defends against my chariot, which wounds it enough that I can mop up afterwards without losing any more units. But it just isn't all that likely, if at any point I don't do enough damage, the cost becomes much greater. Even bringing the archer down doesn't help, as the immortal will always defend vs that, so I can't use it to soften up the axe or spear.

Also, I highly doubt that he'd have only those three units in Ecbatana the turn I can attack.

I may go for it if he doesn't add any more units into the city and doesn't have some more close by. I can destroy the city with what I've got, it would take some terrible luck to keep me from doing that, but it could cost me a lot of units. But that might well be worth it, Ecbatana's borders will pop soon, ending any chance of taking the city before cats arrive, and putting pressure on MoT. Until I get culture of my own in MoT, Ecbatana will take one of its first-ring tiles, making MoT pretty vulnerable to an attack.

With all this in mind, I swapped the oasis for the ivory in MoT, cutting its growth time by 1, but giving enough overflow for a chariot next turn, instead of an archer.

hammer

Interesting times.

[Mr. Cairo]

So, the situation is this: he has 2 more axes in the area, but 1 he moved to ambush my chariot (The Captain, fittingly enough) over there. If he does kill that chariot and doesn't have any other units coming in I may have a shot at the city, but my sims have not been promising. I'm actually hoping he'll see all my chariots (the 3 there now plus the one that's getting built in MoT) and decide to retreat back into the city with the axe on the hill.

I pillaged the horses, and he has build a lot of axes, which is good as I've build a lot of chariots. Even if I don't burn the city, my chariots will keep him from settling up towards me in the short term (eps. now he doesn't have horses), and once I plant Orinoco Flow in a few turns, and the western Gold city (Pax Deorum) shortly after that, I'll be pretty happy with how the border has shaped up.

Ecbatana will always be annoying, but it's not the best city in the world, its only food is the clams and deer it has to take from the capital and a lot of its tiles are currently jungled. Moreover, as long as we remain at war, he'll need a big garrison and he wont be able to improve it much.

So next turn I'm probably going to move back into my territory, staying on the tile 1SW of MoT, so that I'm there when his borders expand. I'll want to keep the pressure up, to prevent him from feeling safe enough to commit workers there to re-pasture the horses or road towards MoT. Once Anywhere Is grows up to the happy cap, it will send a steady stream of axes and spears down there to keep MoT safe.

So it was not the result I was hoping for, in all likelihood I'm going to lose a chariot in exchange for pillaging his horses. However, the larger strategic picture is still positive. I'm #1 in GDP and MFG, and #3 in Food, and I'm starting to get back to rexing after all the military build-up.

I hope to be able to continue rexing and build up my military at the same time once Wild Child and Anywhere Is hit their happy caps. I haven't done the precise maths yet, but I think that WC will be able to get a settler + something else (infrastructure or 1-2 units) every whip cycle. While with 18 hammers/t at size 6, AI will be beast, by itself more productive than some entire civs out there.

If I can get a good number of axes and spears out of AI, while doing other non-war things, then when the time comes for a real attack on Gawdzak, I can focus the output of my entire empire on the important units like HAs and Cats, as the bulk of the army will already exist. That actually reminds me of another tech I need to keep in mind: IW, not just for the swords, although they'll be nice (even slightly nerfed), but to clear jungle, which infests this continent. But hiding underneath are some quality city sites, and if Gawdzak neglects it, I can steal even more land from him.

[Mr. Cairo]

So taken together, what do these two screenshots show? That Gawdzak has made up the power disparity between us, but it is not all focused on me. The fact that he moved the axe threatening my chariot back into Ecbatana means he had no other unit on the way that could get into the city, not even an immortal. I'm assuming he managed to get out more than 1 immortal before I pillaged the horses, and the fact there is still just the 1 immortal in Ecbatana means that the other/s are needed elsewhere. I'm going to keep most of that army on that tile, even though Ecbatana's borders expand next turn, making it an expensive prospect, but I need to keep Gawdzak from re-pasturing those horses. He can road the horses and attack my stack, but he'd need at least twice the number of units he currently has there to do so. Also supporting this supposition is the fact that he has been putting the majority of his EPs into his other neighbor the last few turns.

Memory of Trees is going to grow like a weed until I can whip the barracks, then it will do the same with a library. I need culture in that city asap.

My tech path after Writing + 4t of 0% science will be Mysticism -> Masonry

Once I have Orinoco Flow and Pax Deorum, I'll offer peace. Until then I need to stay at war and prevent any further northward settling by Gawdzak.

[Mr. Cairo]

Interesting turn today.

First, I really need to take a break when going from one game to another. I've been playing Rimworld lately, a game in which you navigate around the map using the WASD keys. Went straight from that into playing civ and I was fortunate that I only lost one worker turn to random misclicks trying to move the map around.

Secondly:


Hello there Dreylin.

My first thought was that this was one landmass, and that Dreylin was the other player that Gawdzak had met, which would explain why Gawdzak hasn't been putting any EP into me, and that despite his power climbing like mad, I've still only seen the same 3 axes, 1 spear, and 1 immortal. War Chariots are pretty scary. But no, it was not the case:



Then I noticed something else new and interesting:



This wasn't there last turn, so somehow, presumably through Adrien exploring, there is a trade route between us, despite not having actually met. Adrien then seems the most likely candidate for Gawdzak's other neighbor. Jaguars are pretty scary too.

This is what greeted me upon opening the trade screen with Dreylin:


Four cities, which I think is average, I only planted my fifth this turn (more on that later). As suspected, he has whales, it seems likely that everyone has whales. the real surprise was the lack of copper. Dreylin has BW, he's been whipping lately. So where's the copper? Perhaps its been pillaged? If that is so, why does he have a War Chariot out exploring, instead of back home where the fight is? <-somehow seems appropriate.

Moving on, here is the latest addition to the Empire of Enya:


Orinoco Flow: decent food, decent commerce and hammer potential, going to be able to switch it up as required, and forms the middle part of my hoped-for border with Gawdzak. Working the ivory right now because Memory of Trees wont need it until next turn, and Anywhere Is needs the pigs for 1 more turn to grow to size 6. Next turn, the ivory will go back to MoT, and AI will give the pigs over to Orinoco Flow.

Starting with a barracks for the culture. I already have three workers ready to chop the forest 1 SW of the city, covered by 2 chariots and a third that can get there next turn if need be. Then, the forest to the NW will be chopped, and the barracks whipped at size two, overflowing into a granary.

After that, those workers will busy themselves cottaging, as commerce is the safest thing to focus on in this city right now, considering that 3 of its 4 possible hammer tiles lie on the border with Gawdzak, and I want to limit my worker's exposure as much as possible.

Once Pax Deorum is planted I'll offer peace to Gawdzak, and use the time to focus on filling in the backline cities and wonders, if they're still available.

[Mr. Cairo]

So why would my GDP be the same at 100% and 0% science while researching Mysticism, but change quite a lot when researching HBR, or Masonry, or any other tech?

Mysticism at 100% and 0%:

Example of other tech while at 100% science:

My GDP is at 33 while at zero science for every tech, and at 43 while at 100% science for every tech except for Mysticism.

Also, 43 seems too low. When I started teching towards Writing I had a GDP of 51 while producing 39 beakers/t. Now I can produce 49 beakers/t and I have a GDP of 43.

Is some weird artifact of the Demos screen? I had thought it was a problem effecting my actual slider because when I opened the game up this turn I saw that my treasury had gone down by about 6 gold and Mysticism was a third of the way along, even though I had set science to 0% last turn. But now, I really don't know.

Any help at would be greatly appreciated.

[The Black Sword]

You probably had a double pre-req on Writing? If you knew both AH and pottery, that's 2 arrow bonuses, giving you a total of 40% bonus. On HBR you only have 1 pre-req bonus, so 20%.

50*1.2=60(beakers) +4(EP) -23(expenses) +2(palace culture) = 43. That number seems correct to me.

[Mr. Cairo]

So since I have no pre-reqs on Mysticism, there's no difference between 0% and 100% on my science because there's no bonus. Would that also mean that I have no bonus from met civs that have that tech?

[GermanJoey]

You gotta close the demos screen, then select a new tech, and reopen the demos for the GNP number to change.

[Mr. Cairo]

You gotta close the demos screen, then select a new tech, and reopen the demos for the GNP number to change.

I know you have to close the demos screen then change the slider then reopen to see a change, but I haven't had to pick a new tech before when I took screens at 0% and 100%, nor did I have to just now.