[Spoilers] Commodore as Washington of the Mongols

[Ceiliazul]

If you could manage to settle the center first, you gain space to backfill and push his cheap settlers toward the other guy. And anyway, what better production site were you hoping for??

ETA: I realize this is super aggresive, but I agree TT has all signs pointing toward the desire for a peaceful REX game. You planting a city on the northern central hill doesn't paint him into a corner, he'll just rex somewhere else (toward the West, hopefully). Even if the E/W mirror line is a similar super city, would you rather settle toward a Gaspar/Mackoti, or a peaceful REX'er?

As for horses, point taken. But copper (hopefully on that bare hill) will make better defenders anyway, and you won't have the tech for keshiks until much later. Anyway

[Commodore]

If you could manage to settle the center first, you gain space to backfill and push his cheap settlers toward the other guy. And anyway, what better production site were you hoping for??

Well, there's got to be green hills somewhere around here. I hope. I still plan on taking the supercharged valley, no doubt about it. Like Ceil said, Bob, complaints will be steady but it really is an interesting tactical map.

Frankly, the best production site is due south of my capital, clad in yellow. Now how would one settle that city?* Maybe with a horde of mongols or something. Next thought, whither stone for walls? I need to ensure TT never gets them up.

*cart is so far in front of horse at this point it's not even funny

[Ceiliazul]

*cart is so far in front of horse at this point it's not even funny

Ah, but that's the joy of ancient-era civ. Like NFL pre-season dreams, everyone's a winner, and anything is possible.

Next topic, where to build Taj Mahal...

[Commodore]

Well, not to make cynical commentary about the map, but...uh, this isn't Fall From Heaven mod. In FFH, Calendar is really close, and so an excellent post-calendar food set for a second city is an amazing thing. As it is...that awesome site next door is a long way away from being perfect.



I sent my new warrior scouting NW in the hopes of finding better ground. Here's hoping something screams "settle me", because right now my options are fishing (presumably), AH, or OCC unit IW/Calendar. Ah well, camp is coming soon anyway. After camping/roading, I'll want to mine the bare hill and cottage the FP, probably cottaging first.



Demos, while making my second worker. I'll be at it four turns, and then it's granary -> settler(s).



Here's a nice big overview image of the lands in-between me and TT. One thing that jumps out is that there are precious few sites that don't require culture pops quickly. Another thought is that it's hard to place another city on the river area without hurting other sites.



Need more map knowledge.

[Commodore]

The answer is yes, naturally. So does the leader of computer-game people have the right to slave some into death and terror, while nurturing others in cultured great person farms.



Granaries, nice as they are, will wait 3 more turns for maximal efficiency here...I'm thinking finish this worker first, which has the same ETA as the deer camp. Then, grow wilst making the granary (second worker cottages flood plain in time for population #4).



...and it's a fishing city site to the west! Ding-ding-ding! Okay, and also a fairly promising river that I'll be checking out on the childlike faith that this mirror is perfect. Let there be...corn. Or a ton of flood plains, I'm a simple guy, pretty easy to make me happy here.



Demos. Gaspar is researching...AH? At size one? Going for a rapid second city? Sees something nice I'm missing?



Boy, all this happy everywhere. Makes me glad I'm not trying to leverage Charismatic or anything.

[yuris125]

2 turns today. Scout met a bear, but somehow survived



Warrior found the food resource you asked for. Note that the perfect symmetry is broken: you have wheat, TT has corn

[Commodore]

Thanks for taking this weekend, Yuri. Good stuff! I opened the second turn to poke around a bit.

2 turns today. Scout met a bear, but somehow survived.

Well, that's a couple mysteries solved. Note the damage on the bear. He's already eaten a scout for breakfast, thus why our own Joe survived the attempted fangorous devourment. And thus why TT's got a warrior poking about, I suspect he's hard to build one. Again, would be nice if he'd post a spoiler thread for these things.



Gaspar, I note, still refuses to do that whole "grow" thing. His settler should be plunking down very soon, actually, need to turn my higher-population GNP and MFG into an advantage sooner rather than later.



Given Kyan and Lewwyn as his dedicated lurkers, I suspect the micro to be flawless and the barbarians to be annoying for them. How many sandbox hours do you think that team has put into this game thus far?

[Commodore]

Well Mackoti picked a good leader for this map. Even the best second-city site thus far really needs quick culture to go into the right place. I'm thinking of either sharing the fish with a southern site (remember, map mirror), or going north with seafood/resources to be found along the outer coast (weird inland sea map...navy will be important.



Worker was born (but not named yet...who's your favorite founding father, other Americans?) and sent south to cottage the flood plain. Ben Franklin is cheerfully roading the deer tile, and will join the new worker to assist with cottaging.



...which will be perfect, as the cottage will complete just in time for the fourth citizen to work the tile. And a turn later, at 1/2 a food box (yes, I know, not that it matters anymore in Civ IV), the granary will complete and I can start on a 6-turn settler.



I love it when a plan comes together. As you might have noticed from score, Gaspar has joined us at the size-2 club! As it's no longer special, I left the club at the end of turn, growing to size 3.



Coming along nicely. Ceil, care to take a C&D stab at Gaspar/Mackoti here? I'll have TT's graphs in a few turns for a more complete picture of our closest vict...er, neighbor. Need to know if can do the always-fun plant-and-found trick with either Hinduism or Buddhism.

[Commodore]

Have yet to research the tech, but that's no reason not to go fishing:

[COLOR="DarkOrange"]Hey TT,

Just a quick note, took vengeance upon a bear who had eaten a scout or warrior. Was that yours? Otherwise, you had another player almost make contact only to be stopped nearby.

May your Romans be holy,
-Commodore [/COLOR]

Wherever city #2 goes, I'll definitely be escorting.

[Commodore]

Curse TwinkleToes! He's using the patented "say nothing" defense! It just makes me less guilty whenever I do try to royally screw over his entire game by conquest. And oh, by the way, a CII Shock Keshik gets odds on a spear in a town.

Meanwhile, I'm still poking around his SW/my NW with the mortally wounded Mr. Buckley, finding a lot of nothing, plus nothing, then carrying the nothing gets...yup, still nuthin'. I'll go 1NW, 1S next turn and then try to heal up enough to fend off a lion or wolf or something.



My warrior advanced east again to find a truly awesome city site once I get about a dozen more worker techs. Calendar makes those spices 3/0/3, Animal Husbandry makes those cows 3/3/0, and Fishing + Sailing makes those clams 5/0/2. Nice? I reckon. Anyway, growth in two more turns, which, handily, is also when the cottage will be done.



Finally demos. I'm the first to size three, and will be the first to size four. Three cheers for charismatic happy caps, I reckon. We're all working the deer and the wheat tiles, and all have those improved. I'm fuzzy by this point what exactly everyone else is researching, though.



Coming along nicely. Now I just need to get BW and start pumping out settlers, although my high happy cap is going to have me doing this at a much higher population, I think a 7->5 whip cycle will actually be best. Stonehenge is probably a capital build, with a pair of chops going into it. First GP bulbs Theology, maybe? The AP would be a nice snag away from Spiritual Gaspar.