[no players] Warsighs of the Newb: An Experiment in Lurking.

[teleh]

I don't get it. He doesn't post, even in a game where he could have gotten advice, and then walks a settler up on another player, with no plans. AAARRRGGHH!

Then a conga-line of warriors to the city (road in progress: website coming soon).

But somehow I do think he'll fight to the bitter end.

[Krill]

I completely disagree that Azza had no other choices on where to settle. There are always better options than planting a city right next to your neighbor's capital in an exposed position.

What is azza's aim? Does he want to try and win this game, in which case he needs to ensure he has enough land to expand into, neighbours that he can destroy later on, and keep up in the tech race? I think we should judge everyone's start with these aims in the mind.

How about the desert tile south of the oasis? It's not great, but it does have the oasis, two floodplains, a bunch of riverside grassland tiles, and wet wheat after borders pop. It pushes borders forward, can share cottages with the capital, and is extremely defensible.

It doesn't share a food resource so loses several turns growing to size 2 (and then onwards). He needs to find a way to pop borders, but he can't tech Mysticism early due to having to research AH or Archery, it has no strategic resource which again reinforces an Archery beeline, there is a forest hill 7 that his opponent that went rushed archery can camp so no, it isn't that defensible. This city location doesn't fit well with his BW first approach.

Alternately, a city could go in a backlines location four south of the capital. That's probably not a good choice because it gives up so much control in the center of the continent, but it's still better than the place that Azza chose.

The problems with a southern city are the lack of food until the clams are hooked up, that it doesn't get a strategic resource, nor that it provides a decent front city against Persia. It would be a good third city, as that would give azza time to get Fishing and fit in a work boat, but as a second city it's much more questionable as it requires AH as second or third tech to hook up the cow after going BW. Depending on how tech costs worked out, it might have been feasible to 2 pop whip out a settler and overflow out most of a second settler, using one for this city and the other to claim the north, but we lack enough information form the thread to comment on the benefits of such MM IMO.

Finally, if he insisted on planting that city, it could have gone one tile west on the grassland hill. It still gets the horses and would have been completely immune to archer attack up there, at the cost of trading first-ring wheat for first-ring cows. All of those would have been better choices.

I agree settling on the hill would have been better. However, I can't categorically state that this strategy is simply "bad" when azza is trying to take control of a difficult situation, and he made mistakes in the execution, which is where he normally makes his mistakes. All of his other choices mean azza is relying on someone not rushing him, and as it turns out his neighbour did rush archery...well, it's fair to say I think his other choices would not have been better.

[Serdoa]

It's funny, Kuro bashing on WillPlunder for cottaging the rice while he himself delayed improving his corn and still has not improved his grassland forest deer, but instead works two (!) 0/3/0 PH-Forest. And his explanation for working those is that they have too much food in the capital anyhow. Could have been shared with the third city that is working a 2/0/2 tile instead if he didn't settle on Copper of course... *sigh*

[Bigger]

will cottaging the rice is a silly thing to do, regardless of Kuro's play.

[Serdoa]

I wouldn't call that silly. His comparison with a FP wasn't that far off imo. He is trading 1 food for ~2 commerce (1 for 10 turns, 2 for 20 turns, 3 for 40 turns, sometimes there he'll probably farm over). With the food the capital has, that is an ok trade to make (9 food surplus instead of 10 is doable). When he gets CS he can irrigate it and maybe farm over it.

I would call it silly if he had no other food at his capital.

[NobleHelium]

retep has a pretty awesomesauce Moai spot that he's already signed out. He's making a mistake not popping borders in his second city for so long though.

[Bigger]

I wouldn't call that silly. His comparison with a FP wasn't that far off imo. He is trading 1 food for ~2 commerce (1 for 10 turns, 2 for 20 turns, 3 for 40 turns, sometimes there he'll probably farm over). With the food the capital has, that is an ok trade to make (9 food surplus instead of 10 is doable). When he gets CS he can irrigate it and maybe farm over it.

I would call it silly if he had no other food at his capital.

I think its equally silly. its not a flood plains, its a rice. its not even on a river, so with a cottage its worse than a flood plains.

everyone (I assume) has a lot of food on their capital - why couldnt he found a second city to share the food, as you (rightly) criticize Kuro for doing?

I haven't even read will's thread, tbh, but I can't imagine many situations where cottaging a food resource is the right move.

[Merovech]

I wouldn't call that silly. His comparison with a FP wasn't that far off imo. He is trading 1 food for ~2 commerce (1 for 10 turns, 2 for 20 turns, 3 for 40 turns, sometimes there he'll probably farm over). With the food the capital has, that is an ok trade to make (9 food surplus instead of 10 is doable). When he gets CS he can irrigate it and maybe farm over it.

I would call it silly if he had no other food at his capital.

I think its equally silly. its not a flood plains, its a rice. its not even on a river, so with a cottage its worse than a flood plains.

everyone (I assume) has a lot of food on their capital - why couldnt he found a second city to share the food, as you (rightly) criticize Kuro for doing?

I haven't even read will's thread, tbh, but I can't imagine many situations where cottaging a food resource is the right move.

Cottaging a dry rice is sometimes one of those rare situations. I haven't looked at the particulars in a while, but if I remember correctly, WilliamLP has a lot of non-shareable food (clams, etc.) in the capital. It's similar, in fact, to cottaging a sugar. It's not always the right choice, of course, and might not be in this situation, but it sometimes is.

[Qgqqqqq]

Dry rice is a food resource that only gives +1 food if farmed - so its equivalent to a floodplain in that your not getting any benefit from farming it over cottaging it - its the same trade off (1 food for 1 immediate commerce) that is made for every cottage over farm. Not saying its the right move, but its definitely defensible.

[Commodore]

Gah. Skirmish or Total War, guys...none of this cripple-and-leave stuff.