[spoiler]Pindicator's pb80 thread

[pindicator]

020

Looks like a nice island to my north.




HBR is probably premature in the end, but i wanted to make sure I had something for when the barbarians show up. We are nicely tucked away, however, so it's possible we don't have a lot of barbarian problems this game.

With 5 workers I would normally consider starting my next settler out of the capital next turn, but I still have 2 very good tiles to remove jungle from and improve at Labrador, so I may put another worker out first. We need to claim a metal and there appears to be a nice spot down by the rice & copper. This is where having a micro plan would probably help, but I haven't had the time or energy for one lately.

Met Yuri in the far southeast - why did I allow my scout to go that direction when I needed to uncover lands by my capital? Anyway... all the sepia tones are in one area. That's nice for borders, I'm sure.

Demos looking very good, thanks to the early IW:




Math, and then either Calendar or Currency come after HBR.

[pindicator]

024

Lands south of me are looking more like the desolate hellscape I was envisioning when we were talking about this game.

But the islands north of me? They look just great:




Probably triple whip out the settler from Labrador - except I need a galley. So do I just suck it up and whip the galley? Or try to finish it with overflow while whipping settlers to grab the jungle to my east?

[pindicator]

027

A big strategic change this turn!

Let's look at lands and think about how expansion is going to work:




We have 3 main areas to expand into:

• The rich but distant and jungled east
  
• The barren but strategically necessary southwest
  
• The best island I've had to settle onto in forever
  

The settler coming out of the capital was pegged for the copper because I'm wary of not having a resource to hook up.  And with a pair of workers heading that way it still sort of is.  Then I was going to grow Labrador to 7 and triple whip a settler there to go ... somewhere.  Ideally east into the jungle to claim iron and pig - but realistically that is going to take a ton of worker investment to get going and I don't really have the workers for that.

But look at that northern island!  If only I had a galley then I could just plant a pair of fog-busting warriors on it and develop in such freedom.  Plus it has the best unjungled bonus tiles around.

So I changed strategy: I whipped the galley this turn.  We'll use the Labrador overflow to get a warrior, and the capital will make another warrior - those will be our fogbusters.  Then we can put two solid cities and two fillers on that island - locations are dictated by the 2nd ring fish sadly, but both spots have first ring food still.  We'll want two more cities relatively fast for the copper and second island spots.  Golden Retriever is going to build some keshiks and be our early military pump.  In short, new strategy is to aggressively settle the near island, slowly creep southwest, and then prepare for a big push east (will need to start planting roads and get more workers in general).

[pindicator]

032

City #4 is founded on the island.




Workers finished the second gems last turn and this turn they load onto the boat - next turn we unload into town and get that cow improved.  I started a granary just on default, but was it better to get a Ger and border pop the Fish & Iron?  Probably not - probably best is to hope for a quick religion spread.  If that doesn't work we are building a missionary in the capital ... well, slowly.

In the west, now I'm not sure if we have a second large continent or if our continent wraps around.  In either case this does not look like Thoth's backyard, but an intrepid scout of 30-some turns.  (Our scout is still alive, but my scouting choices with it have been ... suboptimal.)  Still, I think we want to grab as much on this latitude as possible; it looks really lush to the east and west of our new island.

In the south, Commodore is posturing:




Not sure if he's just watching to see how quickly i push south, or if he's looking to settle in the area.  He seems to have a wonderful forest land to chop out things if he's nearby.  But that archer is in an odd spot to protect the next settler.  But I also dont' know how much farther I want to push my archer here.

Swapped the capital to a settler this turn and we're going to chop that guy out - should be eot34 for it to finish.  Labrador finishes a few turns later at eot36.  I think these two cities are going to pump settlers as much as possible.  One goes to the copper and the other takes the second location on the northern island.

We're slowly roading to the east with a single worker - maybe the next round of settlers will go that way?  There are 3 really good spots in the jungle to grab, and it looks like more islands to grab.

[pindicator]

033

Commodore, just how big of a stretch is this for you?




3 workers, multiple defenders ... I'm thinking that might be your only source of metal in the area?

Krill built Pyramids. I recall Krill talking about building early Mids only when he feels forced to. In other words, he probably has awful land. Also knowing Krill, he has probably convinced himself he has awful land no matter what the quality.

[pindicator]

My brain is having trouble remembering that my best way to pop borders in new cities is to build a Ger. Yes, having a missionary in place ahead of time is best scenario, but realistically we're not there yet.

Also, I love exploring micro for discovering edge cases. For example: Basset Hound should not be building a Granary first - it should be building a Ger! I simmed out both ways and Ger first gets you to size four 3 turns faster than Granary first, because it has no second tile to work after the cow. So why promote growing when the limitation is getting good tiles to work.

Monument first I've seen before. Ger first is a brand new thing for me.

[Erasmas]

Are you saving the hut on the island to pop astronomy?

[pindicator]

034

And there's the settler.




I really can't let him get all this. Look at how far that rivered forest grassland goes. It's really freaking lush and has good bonus tiles by what I can see. If he gets all that he's going to eat me up.

Change of plans.




Maybe I'm glad I teched HBR ahead of Math after all.

Are you saving the hut on the island to pop astronomy?

I wish!
No, RtR doesn't let you pop any tech past Classical Era (or Medieval?) from a hut. I'm just waiting until I can safely do it.

[Qgqqqqq]

[pindicator]

036

I almost backed down into a half-measure last turn, when I saw the settler heading for the rice. But now I'm glad I did not, as Commodore planted two new cities last turn: the forward position and the rice position.




I pillaged the road connecting the two cities this turn. Perhaps it can be argued that there's no need to provoke, but honestly I'm a bit tired of being buddy-buddy with Commodore. Also, I really can't just let him have all those forested riverside grasslands for free.

I had chopped a second keshik out of the capital last turn and it moved up to GoldenRetriever this turn. A pity that chariot won't make it to join the party - i know he has an axe - but we make do with what we have.

Next turn I'll either move to the Southwest or Southeast, depending on which way the scout on my border goes. Ideally the first turn he spots my 3 Keshiks is the turn I move them to threaten his city.