RBPB4 [SPOILERS] - De Gaulle of the Egyptians

[Lord Parkin]

To my mind, a great engineer is surely destined for that most expensive of early wonders, the pyramids. You talk about it as a reason to avoid the library, but I'd see it as a reason to avoid the pyramids much more. Anyway you can always talk to him about it.

Normally I'd agree with you, but having talked with Luddite, I'm reasonably sure he's not going for the Pyramids with his Great Engineer (and definitely won't if I ask him not to in return for another wonder). So basically it comes down to how highly we value the hammers, and that's pretty high right now during our big expansion phase.

As far as Polytheism goes, I'd say it's definately worth it as long as you think you have a decent chance of getting it. One question is, who else has Mysticism at the moment (at least one team does, who were competing for Stonehenge)? Everyone who does will be tempted. Is Buddhism gone?

Civs that have Mysticism to my knowledge - luddite, mackoti, us. Not sure if anyone else does, but I think most people are still without it (from a quick flicking through of the score increases due to techs - which is admittedly less reliable now that people have extra cities and uncertain beaker outputs). I guess it might be a bit more of a risk to go for Polytheism in that case. Still, I would have thought most other players would have other priorities at this point in the game... but then they might be willing to make sacrifices for Hinduism like us. Hmm.

Buddhism is long gone - Adlain got it quite early on.

At least it's not a wasted tech either way if you have plans for the Library, which I think is something worth having plans for.

Me too. I guess I'll have to have another chat with Luddite and feel him out on this one. Aesthetics + Literature is quite an expensive path early on if we don't get the Great Library for our troubles.

Iron working can wait surely, there is so much land around there's no need to settle the more difficult jungle for a while yet.

Yeah, that's my thinking too. After the Gems city, it's time to start backfilling. That'll take us a good deal of time as there's quite a lot to backfill. We also want to continue a fast settling pace to ensure luddite can't settle much (or at all) to the east of the chokepoint.

[Lord Parkin]

Fishing in 2 turns. If we go for Pottery after that, it can be done on turn 58 at a push (turn 59 without going out of binary research). If we go for Polytheism, it'll be done on turn 62. Assuming we go Polytheism/Pottery in some order, the second tech of those two will be done on turn 66 or 67. One tech out of Sailing or Writing could then be done around turn 73-75, with the other being done around turn 78-81. (Our research speed will be starting to seriously speed up by this point due to 2 Gold, Gems, Furs, and a settled Great Prophet.)



Here's an in-depth analysis of my intentions for the next 20 or so turns. One of the key things revealed in my sim is that the eastern Copper will actually be acquired by the capital's border expansion on t68, so we don't have to build the Copper city in order to claim the resource. However, it's a pretty decent site anyway, worth settling early. What are peoples' thoughts on the matter? One possibility is that we could found the Fur city before the Copper city, since Copper will be hooked up regardless. Opinions?

Parkin City's build queue:
[t53: +40 hammers from chops]
Settler (t54) -> Gems city
Worker (t56)
[t57: +40 hammers from chops]
Settler (t59) -> Copper or Fur city?
[t61: +20 hammers from chops]
Worker (t62)
Settler (t66) -> Fur or Copper city?
[t68: Borders expand at 500 culture mark, encompasses Copper]

Tentative options beyond t66 at Parkin City:
Keep building Settlers every 5 turns for a while (~40% break-even slider at this point with 6 cities, becomes ~50% when Gems come online at t69, 50-60% when Furs come online at t73, and 60-70% when Great Prophet is settled on t76-77). Next logical settlements seem to be Horse city (on the way to Silver), then Silver city. Thoughts?
Or...
Worker (t69) (or Granary t70)
Granary (t73) (or t70 with one less Worker)
[t75 or t72: Growth to size 6]
Keep growing, ideally while building a wonder. (The Pyramids? Need Masonry by this time if so.)

I think I prefer settling the Horses and making our way towards the Silver, and further increasing our GNP. We shouldn't even drop below 50% break-even research by heading there (even with 8 cities!).

Magadan's build queue:
[t52: Borders expand]
[t53: Grow to size 3, work grassland-forest, switch from Warrior to Work Boat]
Work Boat (t59)
[t59: Grow to size 4, switch to working two Priests]
Warrior (t60)
Warrior (t62)
Warrior (t65)
[t71: Copper hooked up at Copper city]
Barracks (t73) (can finish t70 if we skip one of the Warriors)
Axes/Spears from here? (5-6 turns apiece)
[t76: Great Prophet born]

Evermore's build queue:
[t55: Corn hooked up]
[t56: Grow to size 2, work grassland-forest]
[t59: Borders expand, work Corn-Silk]
[t60: Gold hooked up, work Corn-Gold]
Warrior (t60)
[t61: Growth to size 3, Fish hooked up, work Corn-Fish-Gold, switch from Barracks (placeholder before growth) to Worker]
Worker (t67)
[t70: Chop completed]
Barracks (t71)
[t71: Copper hooked up at Copper city]
Axes/Spears from here? (9 turns apiece, quickly improving to ~4-5 as the city grows at super-speed with Corn+Fish)

Gems City's build queue:
[t58: Founded, work Deer, start Warrior or Granary?]
[t62: Connected by road to rest of empire]
[t64: Deer hooked up]
[t65: Growth to size 2, work Deer and grassland-forest]
[t68: Borders expand]
[t69: Gems hooked up]
Warrior (t70) (if chosen instead of Granary)
[t73: Pigs hooked up]
Probably build Granary next (Warriors will be unavailable from t71 due to Copper being hooked up anyway)

Copper City's build queue:
[t62: Founded, work grassland-forest, start Work Boat]
[t64: Corn hooked up, work Corn]
[t66: Connected by road to rest of empire]
[t68: Growth to size 2, capital's borders expand to Copper, work Copper-Corn]
[t70: Copper mined]
[t71: Copper connected to the empire] (could do t70 with some sacrifices, namely delaying the Corn or the road connection)
[t72: Borders expand]
Work Boat (t73)
[t74: Growth to size 3, Fish hooked up, work Fish-Corn-Copper]
Build Granary or Worker next

Fur City's build queue:
[t67: Founded, work Deer, already connected to rest of empire, start Granary]
[t71: Deer hooked up]
[t73: Furs hooked up]
[t75: Growth to size 2, work Deer and Furs]
[t77: Borders expand]
Continue building Granary

[Lord Parkin]

On second thoughts I wonder if building a Granary instead of a Barracks in Evermore would be more appropriate. That city has an enormous amount of food and a huge happiness reserve (7 happiness right now, 9 happiness available by turn 74, potentially 10 happiness a dozen or so turns later with the Silver!). Plus, I'm not sure we'll need all that many Axemen/Spearmen this early on - just a couple for emergency defence in case someone tries anything funny. Magadan can easily take care of building the number of units we need, in that case. Meanwhile, Evermore can quickly grow to become an early super-city. I like that idea.

[Lord Parkin]

Here are the rest of the screenshots for this turn. You'll notice I've now settled on a reasonably complete dotmap. Feel free to speak up if you disagree with any (or all ) of the marked future city sites.

Here are the ones to the north of the capital:



Here are the proposed sites south and west of the capital:



Plus of course the Corn-Ivory-Ivory spot slightly off the edge of the last screenshot:



In the far south, Joe continues on his trek to meet Plako. Should only be a couple of turns (at most 3) left until contact now.



Bob continues trekking west. I'm hoping that he'll just manage to sneak through before Mackoti blocks him off from finding SleepingMoogle.

[Lord Parkin]

Hmm... you know, with a potential 8 cities planned well before turn 100, the Hanging Gardens is starting to look like quite an attractive option. Of course, it'd likely mean sacrificing the Pyramids and the Great Library. Is it worth it? Not sure. Mathematics puts us on the way towards Civil Service and Bureaucracy though, so that could fit in quite well with our plans.

It's just possible we could build both the Pyramids and Hanging Gardens, but it'd rely on our Industrious buddies delaying the Pyramids. We'd have to build them in two separate cities, probably no getting around that - most likely Evermore and Parkin City. Food for thought anyway.

[Lord Parkin]

Realised I forgot to put the growth times in the Copper City analysis. Updated now.

Copper City's build queue:
[t62: Founded, work grassland-forest, start Work Boat]
[t64: Corn hooked up, work Corn]
[t66: Connected by road to rest of empire]
[t68: Growth to size 2, capital's borders expand to Copper, work Copper-Corn]
[t70: Copper mined]
[t71: Copper connected to the empire] (could do t70 with some sacrifices, namely delaying the Corn or the road connection)
[t72: Borders expand]
Work Boat (t73)
[t74: Growth to size 3, Fish hooked up, work Fish-Corn-Copper]
Build Granary or Worker next

[Lord Parkin]

One side benefit if we manage to get Hinduism, of course, is getting yet another happy face in the cities with that religion. That's in addition to the happiness from the Gold, Gems, Furs, Silver, Charismatic trait and Stonehenge... potentially 11 happiness in all our cities (12 in the capital) well before turn 100. (An additional happy face from Silks when we get Calendar too.) All this without even bothering with the Pyramids or Monarchy. Not at all bad!

[Lord Parkin]

Message from Mackoti:

hi,
I think if you go SW,SW,SW you'll be able to escape from my lands .I dont know if i told you that i met Warior knight anf Plako.
good day,
Mackoti

Well, that's good news about not being blocked off by Mackoti's Settler. Let's hope it works out in practice.

Not a surprise that Mackoti met WarriorKnight as we know he's to the east of Plako. Presumably fairly close to the east, since those two warred pretty darned early.

[Lord Parkin]

Sent a reply to Mackoti:

Hi Mackoti,

Thanks for the news. Hopefully it'll work out, as it'd be nice if our Warrior didn't get trapped before meeting SleepingMoogle. Maybe on the turn you're planning on settling the city you could wait to play until after us so we can get through, if it looks to be close.

I'm just about to meet plako myself (I can see his borders). By the way, thanks to some information from Nakor, I can share with you the complete setup for players on this map. It is as follows:

--- SleepingMoogle --- Mackoti --- Luddite --- (Us) ------ Sunrise ------
------- Adlain --------- Locke ----- Nakor --- Plako --- WarriorKnight ---

Hope that's useful to you.

Regards,
Lord Parkin

[Lord Parkin]

Sent a similar message to Luddite too.

Hi there
Thanks to some info from Nakor I think I've got the complete picture now
--- SleepingMoogle --- Mackoti --- Luddite --- (Us) ------ Sunrise ------
------- Adlain --------- Locke ----- Nakor --- Plako --- WarriorKnight ---
Hope that's useful for you