Gaspar, Lewwyn, et al go full Sartre

[Gaspar]

I'd pick Wang Kon and settle on the wines for a 3 commerce city center. You don't even need to waste a turn to do it and it's coastal.

By the way, isn't this Capital similar to Gavagai's in PB16? Hopefully Xenu trolled you by giving you your opponent's better Capital from last game while making your opponents in this game get way better 5 food Capitals with early commerce resources.

I hate you so much.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Alright, going to spitball a bit here before we get to serious simming...

I think I'm nearly dead certain that I want to play a Creative leader or an Organized leader here. So let's narrow seriously down to the only options to consider as Zara, Cathy, Kublai, Julius Caesar. So in terms of the early game sim the only real variety is going to be Cre or No Cre and Imp or No Imp. Cre factors because we can get the 3/1 Deer tile in play faster. Imp factors because we then have to decide if its worth trying to get out a super fast settler.

In terms of start techs, if you're not rushing a settler, you want Agriculture, Hunting, Animal Husbandry as your first three techs, then debate as to whether you go Mining -> BW or Wheel -> Pottery. If not Imp, Wheel -> Pottery is probably the stronger play because getting a Granary in play will be pretty important. In the non-Imp scenario, Ag/Hunting is probably strictly the fastest start, since although Hunting is cheap to research, this allows you to go AH first with double arrow which means you can get all three food resources improved after your first tech, allowing maximum flexibility. Also, non-trivial, lets you plant a second city for Horses (which are usually not an "at capital" resource) and then maybe ruin someone else's day with two quick chariots. The only Ag/Hunting Civs are Zulu and Persia and Persia is garbage, so this is probably the Kublai of Zulu play.

If not Ag/Hunting, then your next choice is Ag/Wheel which is Ottomans or Babylon, so Ottomans. (Bowmen have some value, but much less in our MP maps where Copper is almost always at the capital and if it isn't, its 2nd city material.) Ottomans are nothing special either, but that's neither here nor there. If you go Ag/Wheel you tech Hunting first, then follow with AH. You can get AH done before you need to improve the Cows, so this choice isn't strictly worse. There is in fact little difference between the two, really.

The settler rush Imp scenario sort of requires Mining/Hunting. All the Mining/Hunting civs are terrible - Khmer has a banned UU, Ethiopia has the terrible Stele and pretty terrible Oromos, Germany essentially has null for UU/UB, Russia has the decent Cossack if you don't mind waiting until t150-175 to get anything interesting out of your Civ. I'd probably take Russia or Ethiopia here. Anyway, in that scenario you tech BW > Agri > AH and improve Deer, chop forest + whip settler at size 2. This scenario has a lot more value when land is scarce, which I believe to not be the case. I believe we're working off a modified Lakes map with ~200 tiles per player.

So before we get to serious simming, my current feeling is Zara of Ottomans == Kublai of Zulu >> Cathy of Russia > JC of Ottomans. I have a hard time reconciling between the first two options. Primarily because I think playing Kublai could be fun but also because I think Zulu is pretty clearly one of the two best unbanned Civs (Mali is the other.) Zara is a strictly stronger leader, though, and Ag/Wheel is still the best longer-short term play, as it always is. Also, there's something to be said to just play Cathy of Russia because screw you, I took Cathy of Russia.

Thoughts?

Sounds like a good, well reasoned plan. Do what sounds like the most fun.

I'd pick Wang Kon and settle on the wines for a 3 commerce city center. You don't even need to waste a turn to do it and it's coastal.

By the way, isn't this Capital similar to Gavagai's in PB16? Hopefully Xenu trolled you by giving you your opponent's better Capital from last game while making your opponents in this game get way better 5 food Capitals with early commerce resources.

If I wasn't posting from my phone I would post one of those super redneck Calvin Pissing on Something pictures here.

[Gaspar]

Ok, so I've simmed a bit and talked a bit with Lewwyn. Here are the conclusions:

1. There's no avoiding burning a worker turn moving from Deer to Cows.
2. The first 3 techs are Agriculture, Hunting, Animal Husbandry in some order, followed almost as certainly by Wheel, Pottery.
3. You don't need AH til t23, so Agriculture/The Wheel is strictly the best choice of the available Civilizations.
4. That's followed by Agriculture/Hunting and Hunting/The Wheel. This makes the relevant Civs Ottomans > Babylon > Zulu > Mongolia > Persia. If all five of those are off the board due to bad rolls, I'm just taking America or Germany for the lols.
5. I think the leader power order given my preferences is Zara > Cathy > Kublai > Caesar.
6. The main question in the sim comes with what you do at size 3 - Settler or 2nd worker. Because you won't have Pottery yet for a bit, Settler is slightly preferable but that's entirely down to where the 2nd city ends up needing to go. Non-Imperialistic has the Settler complete on t28. This leaves only time for two roads between the Cows being pastured and the city being planted, most likely. This probably means we need a 2nd worker, but that decision doesn't have to be made until we have some more map unfogged - precisely speaking it needs to be made when we grow to size 3. Essentially, the choice is t26 worker and t32 settler vs t28 settler. Is the 4t saved worth it? Depends on where the city goes.

Anyway, we'll finalize a list shortly.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

What is the approximate date for bronze working if your tech path is as you've described? What turn would your second worker complete if you go worker/settler? If the second city has an improved tile ready to work, that four turn jump could be very good for you, but you'll need to have a second worker quickly to let it keep working improved tiles.

Did I just backdoor ded-lurk by giving help? Damn.

[Lewwyn]

We need them to lock down the rules of the pick so we can actually pick most strategically...

[Gaspar]

What is the approximate date for bronze working if your tech path is as you've described? What turn would your second worker complete if you go worker/settler? If the second city has an improved tile ready to work, that four turn jump could be very good for you, but you'll need to have a second worker quickly to let it keep working improved tiles.

Did I just backdoor ded-lurk by giving help? Damn.

Sort of stopped after the first settler because you really struggle to keep going at that point, but Pottery is on t28 and we haven't researched Mining yet, so assume something in the early 40s for BW. That is late.

Second worker would be roughly t32. Build path is worker/warrior/warrior/settler/worker or worker/warrior/warrior/worker/settler, I think.

I do think the inclination is that I prefer the one worker before settler provided we can share food with the cap and get TR with minimal roads. All of that is going to require more map knowledge than we currently have, however.

And welcome aboard, Boldly.

[Gaspar]

We need them to lock down the rules of the pick so we can actually pick most strategically...

I think we probably just throw caution to the wind and don't duplicate too deeply. If we go with the current rules, I think something like this for a list:

Zara of Ottomans
Zara of Bablyon
Catherine of Babylon
Catherine of Zulu
Catherine of Mongolia
Kublai Khan of Zulu
Julius Caesar of Mongolia
Julius Caesar of Persia
Justinian of Persia
Hatshepsut of Russia

That needs some tweaking, but here's the logic: I can't imagine Zara lasting past 3rd pick or Ottomans past the 2nd pick. My guess is that the most likely ones for us to get there are Zara of Babylon, Cathy of Babylon, Cathy of Mongolia or JC of Persia. I like Zulu but I think they're probably gone in the first round. It feels strictly wrong to just rattle leaders with the Civs you like for four straight rounds because if you do that, you can lose your second choices for the reasons suggested in the tech thread.

I put Justinian and Hatty in the last two spots but I don't really love either. I think Cre is the most important trait here but we don't want Pericles because Lewwyn will explode and there's no way Louis lasts to round 8. That leaves us with Hatty as the last remaining eligible non-Pro Cre leader. Since Hatty is terrible synergy, I put Justinian ahead of him, even though I think Justinian is a pretty mediocre choice. Also, I didn't put Joao anywhere in the list to troll Krill.

Thoughts, fellas?

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

We need them to lock down the rules of the pick so we can actually pick most strategically...

I think we probably just throw caution to the wind and don't duplicate too deeply. If we go with the current rules, I think something like this for a list:

Zara of Ottomans
Zara of Bablyon
Catherine of Babylon
Catherine of Zulu
Catherine of Mongolia
Kublai Khan of Zulu
Julius Caesar of Mongolia
Julius Caesar of Persia
Justinian of Persia
Hatshepsut of Russia

That needs some tweaking, but here's the logic: I can't imagine Zara lasting past 3rd pick or Ottomans past the 2nd pick. My guess is that the most likely ones for us to get there are Zara of Babylon, Cathy of Babylon, Cathy of Mongolia or JC of Persia. I like Zulu but I think they're probably gone in the first round. It feels strictly wrong to just rattle leaders with the Civs you like for four straight rounds because if you do that, you can lose your second choices for the reasons suggested in the tech thread.

I put Justinian and Hatty in the last two spots but I don't really love either. I think Cre is the most important trait here but we don't want Pericles because Lewwyn will explode and there's no way Louis lasts to round 8. That leaves us with Hatty as the last remaining eligible non-Pro Cre leader. Since Hatty is terrible synergy, I put Justinian ahead of her, even though I think Justinian is a pretty mediocre choice. Also, I didn't put Joao anywhere in the list to troll Krill.

Thoughts, fellas?

FTFY. #nobled. In for a penny, in for a pound.

Regarding the list: I'm too drunk to figure out this astrophysics shit you guys are doing picking leaders. What's wrong with an old fashioned snake pick? Everyone understands and no one has to do any math. Youth... BAH!

[Gaspar]

We need them to lock down the rules of the pick so we can actually pick most strategically...

I think we probably just throw caution to the wind and don't duplicate too deeply. If we go with the current rules, I think something like this for a list:

Zara of Ottomans
Zara of Bablyon
Catherine of Babylon
Catherine of Zulu
Catherine of Mongolia
Kublai Khan of Zulu
Julius Caesar of Mongolia
Julius Caesar of Persia
Justinian of Persia
Hatshepsut of Russia

That needs some tweaking, but here's the logic: I can't imagine Zara lasting past 3rd pick or Ottomans past the 2nd pick. My guess is that the most likely ones for us to get there are Zara of Babylon, Cathy of Babylon, Cathy of Mongolia or JC of Persia. I like Zulu but I think they're probably gone in the first round. It feels strictly wrong to just rattle leaders with the Civs you like for four straight rounds because if you do that, you can lose your second choices for the reasons suggested in the tech thread.

I put Justinian and Hatty in the last two spots but I don't really love either. I think Cre is the most important trait here but we don't want Pericles because Lewwyn will explode and there's no way Louis lasts to round 8. That leaves us with Hatty as the last remaining eligible non-Pro Cre leader. Since Hatty is terrible synergy, I put Justinian ahead of her, even though I think Justinian is a pretty mediocre choice. Also, I didn't put Joao anywhere in the list to troll Krill.

Thoughts, fellas?

FTFY. #nobled. In for a penny, in for a pound.

Regarding the list: I'm too drunk to figure out this astrophysics shit you guys are doing picking leaders. What's wrong with an old fashioned snake pick? Everyone understands and no one has to do any math. Youth... BAH!

Snake pick sucks. It has the inherent believe that the best civ is as good as the 7th best leader, which we all know to be false. Snake pick actually shines best in a smallish game with no bans, where there is say, 10-deep of similar quality.

I don't think this system really works any better, though. Maybe Boggle-style would have, I don't know. But this is just down to rolls, same as snake. Anyway, I at least somewhat fear that I'm holding things up, so I'm sending my list in.

[NobleHelium]

We need them to lock down the rules of the pick so we can actually pick most strategically...

I think we probably just throw caution to the wind and don't duplicate too deeply. If we go with the current rules, I think something like this for a list:

Zara of Ottomans
Zara of Babylon
Catherine of Babylon
Catherine of Zulu
Catherine of Mongolia
Kublai Khan of Zulu
Julius Caesar of Mongolia
Julius Caesar of Persia
Justinian of Persia
Hatshepsut of Russia

FTFY. #nobled. In for a penny, in for a pound.

O RLY?