{SPOILERS} 2metra, Dreylin & OT4E. This is the beginning of a wonderful friendship.

[OT4E]

This is just an idea for brainstorming. If we have a chance to raze city, we must do it imho. It is not like "declare or not to kill scout" question. Dont grow illusions in yourself, the war with dtay is a matter of time. It is good city bringing him like 20 commerce per turn. If we raze it now it will take him a while to grow that city back again, it will get 40% later and will not make extra pressure on our newly-planted front.

[Dreylin]

Oh I'm under no illusions that we'll be fighting with him at some point.

2x shock Axes could be enough if we can catch him by surprise or cover it up while Settling the island. We'd need to know what was in there and that would mean a Spy ... Dio we want to invest in that?

For now I think the plan is probably the same: Trireme - Galley in Los Millares and see where we can get some troops from. I think we may want to chop into these if we have a chance (although the Worker is Farming right now). I'd also like to shuffle the Warrior back for MP duty, but that depends on dtay'so Quechua moves.

[OT4E]

Ok it seems that we need a new planning.

We need to try to get HG. Many players seems to have maths, but we still have stone and cheap aqueduct. I think getting HG in about 15 turns is possible. Or there is an option to try to get forge first. Forge is hard construction since we cant slave it with 4 citizen and forget about all problems. But forge rises our happy limit by 1 and gives some discount in base hammers for HG. Though delaying HG for forge is only reasonable if we manage to get some more cities. I also dont think that we need to build HG by getting maximum possible production. From this view the earlier we start the earlier we finish it. So I think the best way is to combine production, chopping and some kind of overflows.
We need 140 base hammers for HG itself including chops. Corn, sheep, 2 yellow mines and 1 green mine give us right 14 hpt...

For our Wonder city I have and idea to prepare it for building AP. What do you think?
My idea is to get as much religions as possible before founding our own. Hinduism we have already, we also have trade route with plako and probably his religion will reach us quick. Judaism came to dtay somehow. If we are lucky we get our own religion after all. Building monasteries will make our commercial core more powerfull and cheap production from AP will be very useful, because research centers are rarely good in production.

So I see the following tech plan for the next 40-50 turns:
Alphabet --> Currency --> Polytheism --> Monotheism --> Theology --> Calendar --> Meditation --> Machinery --> Horseback --> Priesthood --> Monarchy --> Feudalism --> Guilds

On researching Monotheism me convert organized to build missionary for wonder city, but will not be switching to any religion before we understand if we get our own or not. We adopt hereditary only with serfdorm.

About what to do with GS I have a crazy idea to settle academy on the island to get both food source quick. Remember I promised to use it to pop-up borders. This can turn this city from "just for trade routes" to the one which constructs Moai in reasonable time and will bring decent research.
The other option is to make academy right in Bodmin.

I have realized that we miss one crab on our coast, or at least we will not be able to hook it from our continent. Though island between us and REM seems to be useful for settling. What do you think? In my understanding we need to express our intentions to get it all.

[Dreylin]

Yeah, now is a good time for planning and in that respect the pause has come at a good time for us.

I like quite a few of your ideas, but it feels a bit like there may be too many goals and that we might be better focusing on just one or two rather than trying to chase them all. Notably, I think we'll lose out on expansion - either on land or the islands - if we try to chase everything.

I do like the Theology tech route with a target of AP in "Wonder"; the option I had been considering was MoM after Calendar next, but I prefer AP. I don't think this impacts other goals too much other than grabbing a bunch of Workers. (Oh, and the tech list needs Archery before/after HBR)

HG I am less convinced by. Prioritising in 54 probably costs us 2Settlers and a couple of units from our Settler pump, and I'm not sure where we make those up from. As an alternative, we could go for it from Maryland: whip Aqueduct, Granary, Galley, etc and put the overflow into HG. Potential cost of this would be getting a foothold on that Eastern island.

As far as the GS goes, I see the idea of using it for popping borders on the North Island, but that does leave it more vulnerable in the long run. We can always use a Religion to pop those borders, albeit slower. I agree that we don't have an obvious Academy city candidate, and I was looking last week at whether we could get a decent bulb out of him - e.g. Machinery - but there's too much crap at the top of the tree in the way for that. So here's my silly idea: what if we pop him for a Golden Age? It'd be a trade-off of long-term benefit vs short-term, but it would save us the 2turns of Anarchy for adopting the Religion and Civics, and would accelerate Theo research and/or AP build.

[OT4E]

HG I am less convinced by. Prioritising in 54 probably costs us 2Settlers and a couple of units from our Settler pump, and I'm not sure where we make those up from. As an alternative, we could go for it from Maryland: whip Aqueduct, Granary, Galley, etc and put the overflow into HG. Potential cost of this would be getting a foothold on that Eastern island.

I think we need a comrpomise plan. For example getting one settler out of the cap by delaying HG a bit. Maryland can start bringing decent commerce soon, I dont think it is worth to whip it over and over. Dont want to see this city in unhappyness and still lose HG. So the other option I guess is not to build it at all.

As far as the GS goes, I see the idea of using it for popping borders on the North Island, but that does leave it more vulnerable in the long run. We can always use a Religion to pop those borders, albeit slower. I agree that we don't have an obvious Academy city candidate, and I was looking last week at whether we could get a decent bulb out of him - e.g. Machinery - but there's too much crap at the top of the tree in the way for that. So here's my silly idea: what if we pop him for a Golden Age? It'd be a trade-off of long-term benefit vs short-term, but it would save us the 2turns of Anarchy for adopting the Religion and Civics, and would accelerate Theo research and/or AP build.

Our pop is too low for golden age. We will see though if we can make some suitable plan with GA. In my experience it is not worth to run it so early if you are planning to live till later. But something like running GA when switching to serfdorm can work though. Bodmin is a good city for academy, we will cottage it all. Maryland can make decent commerce soon even without cottages if we build lighthouse.

[Dreylin]

Let's go Settler, Aqueduct (1pop Whip for overflow), HG in 54 then. Because it looks like we're unlikely to get a spot on the Eastern island:


I misclicked on one of the Settler forest chops so that's delayed a turn, but shouldn't delay Settling because we can road the intervening terrain. Did a lot of tile shuffling between cities.

I know it's really too early to grab a GA, but 2t of Anarchy doesn't excite me much... Academy in Bodmin is good.

[Dreylin]

Screenshot for the turn:


Decided to show the Settling Party off to the side of the Power graph. dtay's been whipping a lot the last couple of turns, but it's not units. I'm guessing he'll settle on that spot to share the Corn rather than pushing further, but...

[Dreylin]

And we have a quest:

[2metraninja]

Rubikon had been crossed

[Dreylin]

Rubikon had been crossed

Yeah, but we can't do anything about it immediately....

So how (if at all) do we reprioritise? My first feeling is that we call off the Hanging Gardens push and concentrate of Settlers & Units from 54, Settle the remaining space between us with defense in mind and look for an opportunity down the road. Protective Archers and cheap Walls will make him hard to crack.

Anyway, on with the turn and here's another choice to make:


Settler from 54 due in 5t; I started a Galley in Maryland that could be Whipped or pushed with Hammers after growth, and we can find a unit somewhere to garrison. The Crabs will be covered by Maryland's 3rd-ring pop in 10t, and we have the WB exploring, so we'll be able to supply it with food before the border pop grabs the Cows.

Of course we could send that Settler elsewhere instead:


If we're still going for HG, then we should probably send this Settler towards the front somewhere (either Wonder or northern location).

Also on this screen:

Overlook Pass has started a Granary; forest to SE is being chopped and then can whip it to completion. I considered starting a Barracks instead to try to get a Cultural headstart on the intervening terrain, however if he's working the Corn he'll grow and be able to whip his Terrace in faster and grab control of those tiles. We can still switch this up before the forest chop comes in if you feel it's a better approach.

Stronghold completed its Granary and has started on an Axe. Samarkand's Spear completes EoT and then we can start a Settler, Worker, or another Unit? My feeling is Settler.

Alphabet comes in at end of Turn; plan to start by offering OB to HAK, AI/REM, and Commodore. If we don't get enough routes from them, we'll try plako as well. Then we'll save gold on Currency (as dtay is doing).