[SPOILER] Asoka of the Vikings (Nakor & Gaspar)

[Gaspar]

I'll have to take a look next time I log in, but things are going to be awfully cramped in plako's direction. If we're as close to the Civ to our West are we are to him, we're going to want to move aggressively to settle that way, since it seems like plako will be our "good neighbor." I also think our scout is going to be forced to U-turn at plako's capital.

On aside, he sent us a SS of area we've already uncovered. Not entirely sure I want to show him the horse location in exchange for that, though I'll let you make the decision there.

[Gaspar]

Nakor, I don't think I'm going to get a chance to hit the turn until close to the end of the timer, so if you can get it, super. I'll take some SS and try and suss out a dotmap tomorrow. Still a few turns on the settler before we have to make a decision.

[Nakor]

I played the turn. Our scout in the west moved 2 west and found the borders from Locke. Send him an in-game message. Should we return and defog or keep moving

I put some signs regarding our horse city on the map. I don't see a reason not to tell Plako about our horses. If he tells us where copper is...

[Gaspar]

Took a look at the save, didn't really do anything, because we have a few decisions to make.

Here's the look specifically at the horse site:



I think the Orange location is probably the best fit, it gets clams north of the peak tile as well. The problem of course, is that this site loses the gold, and gold does more for us in the early game than horses do, so I'd think that a better priority. If we settle one south, we lose the clams, and both the gold and horse are second ring, and we're still many turns away from even having the option to build anything that pops borders. Probably more than that. Let's see, at our current tech rate it would be 60T to Writing. While obviously we'll tech faster than that once we get more cities down and more tiles improved, we won't tech a lot faster than that. Now we could slip Mysticism in before BW, but that is largely a garbage tech for us otherwise. So I think we have to sort of focus on first ring only for our first few cities. With that in mind, here's this:



I don't love this, but it maximizes the quality tiles we can use right now. Blue is clearly the best immediate site, but I think we need to settle up that bit of coast towards the horses. We could go Orange, Pink, Blue, Purple in this set-up.

The last alternative is to keep our current Pink Circle, which is still the strongest site, and then settle on the horses. That location would still get the clams, but wastes the horse tile. It does however make them much easier to defend in case of war, particularly since they are what I would call a reach. I'm beginning to think this is the best option.

Last but not least, after making all those SS, I moved our Warrior, revealing Corn. I did not move either Scout yet. I think we should probably move one of the scouts on to meet more Civs and the bring another home to defog the rest of the nearby lands. The alternative is move both on and then build another scouting unit for the areas closer to home. Not sure whats the best option, but I think there's going to be a serious land-grab phase here, as both plako and Locke/Cervantes are very close. I had a brief in-game chat with Cervantes, but we discussed nothing of import. They're in slavery already, for what its worth.

[Nakor]

I like your second dotmap the best, I think.
Settling pink - blue - yellow looks good, but we might want to settle E and W first...

Finished the turn, keeping both our scouts moving E and W. I suggest we let our W scout continue west and let our E scout move south and then return defogging.

[Gaspar]

Not much to say, turn hasn't flipped over yet, but we've exchanged some extremely short messages with Plako and Locke. Plako thanked us for showing him the location of horses. Locke hasn't met anyone else and wants to be friends. I am neutral on the topic, really depends on what the map looks like. If Locke and Plako are the only reachable neighbors, we can't be friends with both of them forever, not with this cramped a start position.

[Nakor]

Ok, going blue first is an option, but we don't have a warrior there. Don't know if we should gamble that, think we can.
If not, new pink is the best option.

Settler will be done next turn. Onto another worker?

[Nakor]

Ok, Settler done. Put a 1t warrior as placeholder, but feel free to change it to a worker.

Moved the settler 2N, but we need to decide where to go first. Blue or new pink. Next turn we move the settler that way.

Gaspar?

[Gaspar]

Sorry, little busy irl. Let's go blue, since we're 100% sure we want that site. I think there's still plenty of room for discussion in the north, particularly as we uncover more of the terrain. I really don't like new pink, as we'll basically grow to size 2 and then sit there not growing for a very long time until we have a way to make borders pop. We really need to settle sites with food in first ring until writing, mysticism or religion.

[Nakor]

Ok! I'll let Greenland build a warrior before a worker then.