[SPOILERS] scooter - Zara Yakob

[Dreylin]

Yay, replying to my own posts ... but in someone else's thread!

Here's the C&D thread from the 'poly demogame, where I got most of my "experience" with reading the tea leaves: http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?t=177396

[scooter]

Thanks Dreylin, I'll have to dig through that thread and see what I can learn...

A few things of note for the turn I played last night... First, SleepingMoogle founded Buddhism. This wasn't too surpsing, since he was the only civ starting with Mysticism.



I also discovered I'm up against the right edge of the map:



Well that means we're definitely on a flat map. This is important because Noble + flat map = nonexistant city maintenance. The right move then is probably to be aggressive in claiming land, which makes chariots even more important to me in helping to defend them against barbs (cheap + speed). I'm guessing the map is layed out something like this:

X -- X -- X
X -- X -- X

At least this would be the easiest way to do it... My next question was if I'm in the bottom right or top right corner... With a Highlands map, the north edge of the map is usually a strip of tundra/ice, the bottom half is fairly green and fertile. So I think that means I'm in the southeast corner... But now that I think about it, I think you can get the tundra strip at the top or bottom. I'll have to generate a few maps later today to check.

Either way, I'm happy to be in the corner. Hopefully I can fly under the radar and tech in peace and become one of the tech leaders.

Edit: Oh and thanks Dreylin for the suggestion on scaling the screenshots, I tried that this time and it's much better, though I could probably bump it down a little bit more still.

[scooter]

Couple things of note happened this turn, though it's only "interesting" because there's absolutely nothing else going on besides move scout and hit enter. First, I was greeted by this upon starting the save:



Animal Husbandry will be done in 3 turns. I added the turn and scores so you can see what things look like right now. Sandover finished a second tech, so he's first to have done that. I also moved my scout again and finally found a food resource... Actually two of them. Here's a picture of all I've scouted:



I was going to form up a preliminary dotmap, but Animal Husbandry will be done in a couple turns, so I'll wait to see if I have horse (fingers crossed) before drawing things up. I think I'll actually split up that cow and the corn into two cities, just because of the lack of food resources up to the north of the cow. I admit I'm not quite sure how to split up the north with the total absence of food up there, so I'll have to think about it.

[scooter]

So I've been logging these point changes, and now with the lull in the turns I found some time where I can try and make sense out of it... Here goes:

Twinkletoes
Let's start with an easy one. He moved his capital, founding it on turn 1. He starts with Mining and Hunting, and is the only player to have not yet discovered a tech... Makes me think he's going Bronze Working first.

Sandover
The only player to discover two techs so far. He starts with Agriculture and the Wheel, and added techs on turn 4 and turn 8. 4 techs would fit on that timeframe (I think) - Mysticism, Mining, Fishing, and Hunting. Mysticism doesn't make a lot of sense, as he would've gone Hinduism next. Fishing seems highly unlikely on a Highlands map, so I'm going to guess he grabbed Mining and Hunting.

Timmy
He starts with Hunting and Mining. He didn't found until Turn 1, and got a tech 5 turns later. 5 turns fits with either Agriculture or the Wheel, so I think it's probably safe to say he grabbed Agriculture.


The next two are a little less straight-forward:


Bobchillingworth
He founded his capital on the starting turn, and started with Fishing and Mining. His next tech came in 6 turns later, and I'm not really sure what fits in here... The only one that seems to fit is Masonry, but that just seems kind of odd..? I'll have to take a little more time to figure this one out.

SleepingMoogle
So the tricky one. He discovered Mediation, founded Buddhism, and (I believe) grew his capital to size 2. His starting techs are Hunting and Mysticism. I think the points add up properly, but I'm going to have to double-check when I get the chance.


So that's my rough guess at where things stand right now... I've been dumping stuff into a really rough Excel sheet, so that's what I've got so far.

[DMOC]

Any plans on what to do with that stone of yours?

[scooter]

Any plans on what to do with that stone of yours?

I'm not sure yet - it's something I'm still rolling around in my head. Stonehenge would be a waste (Creative). Great Wall sounded good for about 10 seconds with Raging Barbs, but it seems kinda pointless for a Great Spy. Thing is, I want my first Great Person to be a Scientist for an early academy + commerce happy capital. Hanging Gardens is definitely something I"ll keep in the back of my head but that's a long ways away.

Of course, there is this cool thing called the Pyramids. I'm just not sure how much benefit I'd get out of Representation because I'm a lot more likely to be running cottages than specialists. I'm kind of leaning towards skipping all the early wonders and focusing all my hammers into expanding as quickly as I can. Any thoughts/opinions from lurkers on this?

[scooter]

Am I insane to start thinking that maybe there was in-game contact already? I've noticed the last couple days that Sandover and TT especially have had skyrocketing posts, which makes me think the two met each other and are corresponding. It would also especially explain why TT especially has been posting a lot in the last couple days even when the turn hasn't gotten to him yet. Something to think about... If someone does stumble upon me with a warrior, I've definitely got my pants down (scout start + worker first), so let's hope I won't be making an early exit to this game.

[scooter]

Hopefully I'll be doing a bigger update later tonight with pictures, but a few important things happened:

1. My worker completed at the end of last turn, so I began mining the gems.
2. Animal Husbandry finished after I hit enter... Upon skimming over the map I found that:
3. I have horse! Better yet, it's actually in a good spot for my second city. New goal is to settle that city, connect horse, and have 1-2 chariots out by Turn 40.

[scooter]

Okay let's get some pictures in here. First, here's a look inside the capital, just for reference sake:



I really should've taken this shot at a lower resolution, so if it ends up looking terrible on the forum maybe I'll re-open the save and take the picture at a more screenshot-friendly resolution. My worker just started mining the gems, so that will finish in 3 turns, and then worker will farm the wheat. The warrior will probably go ahead and do some exploring, probably to the west. The scout out east will continue down the edge of the map down south of me, where I'll either make contact with someone, or I'll hit the southeast edge of the map. Or maybe something I haven't thought of yet, like a big lake or a ton of peaks just to screw with me .

Next is a shot of the land I've revealed so far, complete with my (rough) first stab at a dotmap. Here it is:



Okay so horse/cow will be my next city, but I'm just not sure where the best place to stick that city is. As I was setting that spot, I was gritting my teeth at the thought of wasting those three tiles to the west, but I'm not sure how else to do it. The spot I would really like would be to place it 1 south of that, but... there's a peak there. The only other possible spot that gets both cow and horses is 1 NE of the dot, but that just seems too far from my capital. I might be able to use those 3 tiles with a city on the west side of that peak chain, but I just don't know yet. Does anyone have a better idea that I'm not seeing here?

Yellow dot would be a nice, safe third city. That tile 1 south is a floodplain, but it's hard to see in the picture, so I marked it. It's kind of tentative with my limited map knowledge, but it seems like a solid spot for a third city. It might waste some of those hills to the NE of it though, is there a better way to place it? Problem is I don't see a better spot that doesn't lose the ability to work the stone, although that wouldn't be the end of the world.

[scooter]

Turn today was pretty uneventful, but here's a picture of my scout exploring and the first barbarian that I've seen so far. I kept the yellow circle as the spot that I'm thinking will be my third city.



Pretty sure you auto-win your first barb fight on Noble, but besides that the odds would be well in my favor anyways. Next I'll either heal from the attack or I'll move SW-SW most likely.