[Spoilers] Dreylin's short visit to a late Era

[Dreylin]

t287 -

Gaspar played a 10min turn with 1 whip; I almost feel bad about this.


Ugh, I'd forgotten / didn't know that the GSpy would lose road movement once we are at war. That interferes somewhat with viewing & early warning.

So the Rifle moved in and the Worker moved out, but he didn't move either of the Workers at Robert Bentley. Gren appears 1E of Tiger Woods and I'm pretty sure that this is the city that was whipped.

Taking out the Rifle went OK:

Gren vs. Rifle 34% - Loss, but redlined his Rifle
1xp Rifle from Horses 99.8% - Win

And captured Geese without loss:

(because it was empty)

Here's the overview after juggling everything:


I used the two injured Cavs to grab both of the Workers. I ummed and ahhed about putting additional units on top of the one E of the Copper, but decided to keep them all hidden. If he wants to move his new unit out of the city to take a cheap shot at the injured Cav, I'll happily kill it outside the city.

Meanwhile, in a very similar screenshot:


BGN has switched up his ships. I put 1h into a Gren in Guinea Pigs incase we want to whip that instead of the SotL.

Builds:


Goat & Llamas have space under the cap to grow, while Rabbits loses 1 Whip anger in 3t, so I've timed growth for that and stored the overflow in Wealth builds. Also needed since expenses are through the roof with everything out of borders. Llamas will Draft next turn at size6 for an MP unit.

I queued a Settler in Chickens since the overflow was large. Not certain of the numbers, but we can either 3-pop whip it next turn or grow again & 4-pop it. Barracks in Donkeys seemed the best for overflow there.

I also checked the tech screen:


So we're starting to fall a bit behind here.

I also confirmed that we're able to switch civics again; pending the Settler whip at Chickens, we could take a stint in Serfdom and still rely on UniSuff for emergency needs.

[OT4E]

Here's the overview after juggling everything:

2 grens from G#1 could be already on hill 1N from horses near Tigerwoods. In this case they would be able to attack TigerWoods on T289.

Gren appears 1E of Tiger Woods and I'm pretty sure that this is the city that was whipped.

Gren came from the former barbarian city. He whipped it before the war. May be he had to kill 1 Rifle in that city, Barbarians got Rifling recently and they could upgrade warrior. I cant find other explanation to Gren.

I put 1h into a Gren in Guinea Pigs incase we want to whip that instead of the SotL.

Do not rely much on grenadiers. They are only effective against small groups without cavalries. In long term they are useless. Army must consist of Rifles, Cavalries and Catapults.

[OT4E]

Time to think about economics.
We had an early burst of techs given by GPs, but now our research is stagnated and we will start being backwards soon if we do not make appropriate measures. Keep in the mind that all other nations are in representation and have at least 1 free specialist in each city providing them science points, something like 30-40 science points each turn. Also nobody spends basic commerce on hurrying production. For us I agree it is very attractive to use gold to increase our advantage in hammers and I do not say we need to refrain from it because for example buying granaries in new conquered cities is must. But we need to think about long perspective too. Here are my thoughts.

Initially I was thinking about Oxford and cottages, but there are many obstacles:
1) Cottages require Emancipation and even with it, it takes 4/8/16 turns to grow. In 28 turns game will be different and I do not believe we can afford to stay out of Slavery or Caste for more than 10-12 turns.
2) Cottages make you not use workshops, watermills instead which give much more especially on the first stages.

In the addition I can say that it seems that nobody went this way.

So right now I dont think that we can use cottages effectively. It demands much extra population which we simply dont keep.

I think we must try to focus on specialists since we have got some extras in food, buildings since we have cheap slavery and base commerce given by coasts, wind and watermills. Oxford is still good in this situation, but we need to find a place for 6 universities and do it pretty quick. Those cities must much food to be able to put specialist and grow to high population partially because much commerce comes from trade routes.

Here are some information about our cities
Goats:
pig (6 food)
clam (+3 food)
3 watermills (+1 food)
flood plain farm (+2 food)
3 windmills (-3 food)
gems (-1 food)
gold (-2 food)
4 coasts
---
14 pop +6 food

Chickens:
sheep (5 food)
cow (+2 food)
deer (+2 food)
whales + 2 lakes (+3 food)
4 windmills
2 coasts
---
12 pop + 12 food

Guinea Pigs:
fish (7 food)
corn (+4 food)
3 lakes (+3 food)
1 watermill (+1 food)
2 windmills (-1 food)
6 coasts
---
14 pop + 14 food

Chameleons:
bananas (5 food)
deers (+2 food)
watermill (+1 food)
2 windmills
8 coasts
---
13 pop + 8 food

These cities are my candidates for emphazing on growth and commerce. Others I think will come from Gaspar's territory.

Food extras after we work most of base tiles can be spent into specialists. I didnt take in account that we can make some farms. We will probably use farms temporarily to grow and then turn them into workshops while building other infrastructure.

Oxford + Observatory allows you to put 6 scientists, other cities can still have 3 scientists but we can also use merchants as economy drivers. As you can see Goats is not very good for specialists because it has many base food consuming tiles. We will be only able to set 6 specialists after Biology and if we farm heavily.

[OT4E]

Well, looking at this picture I start thinking that we cant wait for Gaspar's city to recover from our conquest before building Oxford. We need to start it immediately, so we will build Library+University in Lhamas and Rabbits also, though those cities have less extra commerce and food.

Lets stay on Slavery for 5 more turns, but switch on Org Religion. It must be enough to make some missionaries and whip libraries and universities. After this whips we turn into Serfdorm and start growing even if will make us keep drama on a constant rate of 20-30%. May be we will find some overflow for workers. In Goats we shall not whip university, but build it by its own production and let it start growing earlier.

For emergency cases we have gold and draft. While growing we will start building some catapults.

My only concern is that we dont have settler. I mainly worry not about grabbing extra locations, those we have too much anyway. But we might need settler to set borders instantly with REM or scooter. But let's see, may be we buy some or find a place where to whip it without delaying Oxford.

[Dreylin]

Ah, I don't think I even thought about pushing that pair of Grens forward; I was probably a bit too focused on keeping the bulk of the stack hidden from Gaspar to delay realisation by a turn.

The Settler from Chickens I'd thought to use to set our Northern borders with Scooter and/or secure our land Oil, but that's probably not a priority and we can send it East to plug a gap of needed. OTOH, I think Gaspar has a decent Northern border defined in Tom Brady and the SE with REM depends on how quickly he gets involved and which of us gets to the Capital first. Maybe the SW border with Scooter is the most open, but also maybe least important.

For Research, Oxford Specialist plan sounds good. I agree that we can't wait for Gaspar's cities to exit revolt and have to use what we have, since even Ducks and Geese will be small and behind on improvements. Actually maybe we should think about Ducks since it has Fish, Corn, Sheep & Lakes and will exit revolt in a turn?

Another option for the Settler would be to grab the Silver offshore Goats. It's a more secure spot than the Silver on Goldfish's island and the Silver would give us a much-needed happiness boost. We have our Galleons and a bunch of Workers in the area to get it set up quickly...

[OT4E]

Ok lets try to have everything Settler, library and university in chickens. Though I am sure we need 4 pop for settler at last. 4pop = 240 hammers and settler costs 332. So we might need to grow it or use library for more overflow.

Ducks will have to focus on basic infrastruckture like granary and lighthouse. We wont stop on 6 universities, but I want us to start Oxford ASAP because it will give us the most boost in tech and will also bring us closer to Physics.

Settler for island with silver seems to be good. I thought about improving our presense on islands after we get rid of Gaspar, because I doubt anyone will be willing to deal with us in seas. Buy we can start it earlier and I like having better sight of islands.

Btw do not hesitate to send a spy there. Spies in many cases are better than explorers. People see explorers and try to conceal their intentions, but with spies everything is different.

I do not worry about our land oil. I doubt scooter will dare to settle so aggressive. If so we make him regret about it.

[OT4E]

Scooter planted 2 cities, last turn and this turn. Interesting where?

Hmm... He ran that golden age to hurry those settlers.

Also it is interesting where the Statue of Liberty goes. In espionage I never seen anybody building it yet. Thats strange, may be we need to consider going for it some day. Though I do not understand why nobody with GEs builds it yet.

[OT4E]

Draft of the development plan:
1) 5 turns - 6 Libraries and Universities
2) 10 turns - Oxford
3) 17 turns - Physics
4) 20 turns - Biology

[Dreylin]

We can get a pair of Missionaries for GP & Rabbits out of Chameleons, since it already has the Library. Chickens has the most pop at the moment so should be able to get all 3 out in our 5t window. You're probably right that we'll need to overflow from the Library into the Settler before we can 3whip it, or grow & 4-whip it.

The other thing we need to plan for is the Globe. We're missing 3 Theatres; maybe we use the new cities - Goldfish, Donkeys & Ducks/Geese - to put them up while the Unis are going up in the core, then we can put Globe up in Chickens or Llamas. Llamas has good food surplus if it can keep the Wheat away from Rabbits.

Oh yeah, and we have a Golden Age available any time we're comfortable that the GSpy is no longer needed....

[OT4E]

Lol, you logged in 1 second before me. I made mistake in password and found that the civ already picked.