[SPOILERS] Bismark of Sumeria (luddite + Atlas1998)

[luddite]

I had a chat with Lord Parkin about my proposal today. Here's a question for the lurkers- is it worth writing about my interactions with him, here? He posts so much in his thread that I'm guessing he's already described everything there. Anyway, we decided that the map will probably give everyone an opportunity to get gold or gems (he uncovered another gold resource east of the one I saw, and I've found a gems resource), so there's not much point in that particular trade, but he's willing to trade me gold if necessary. And he agreed that the corn is fairly within my territory.

Meanwhile his warrior is next to my capital. I can't say that I like that. It doesn't really matter since I can build a settler in one turn if necessary, and the rules prohibit any double-move BS, but it still makes me uneasy, despite our NAP.


He told me that there's a horse resource where I've marked it on the map. Originally I was thinking of putting a city there. Now I'll have to decide if it's worth moving that city so it can work the pasture, or if it's better to keep it there so that he horses are un-pillageable.


Here's what my warrior has seen down in the southeast. That's much better land than the starting location! Grassland corn, grassland pigs, gold, gems, and lots of grassland river tiles. It looks like this map has put the best terrain far away from any particular player, in the middle, so as to spark conflict. Here's my best guess for what the map looks like:


That's just for my immediate neighbors. It would repeat on both sides of course, since this is cylindrical world wrap.

I'm assuming that the south is a mirror of the north. It seems set up so that each player has his own sea, but expanding around that sea will give a long thin land border with their neighbors that's extremely hard to defend. The middle will be especially hard to defend, but very important for long term growth.

One problem I have with this map scheme is that it would work perfectly for 12 players, but we've only got 10. So either I'm wrong, or it's not totally symmetric. If someone has more or less neighbors, that could make a big difference (having a land neighbor on three sides could be terrible).

Assuming I'm right about this map scheme, I can draw a few conclusions. First of all, I'm really glad that I decided to go for oracle-metal casting. Assuming that I get it- and I think I'm certain to get it, unless someone goes straight down the line for immediate priesthood, and just wants to oracle monarchy. Someone did get Buddhism this turn, so that's possible. But nobody else can beat my expansive-industrious combination for oracling metal casting. Anyway, assuming I get it, I'll be a lock for getting the Colossus, which will be great. Maybe even better than the Lighthouse, actually. We won't have overseas trade routes, so the Lighthouse is just +2 commerce per coastal city, but I'll be getting a lot of costal cities with 3 or 4 water tiles, which should give me a big edge in teching.

Second, that middle area is key. It's got the only 6 food land tiles I've seen, and by far the best commerce potential. The middle strip might be good too, I'll need to check that out. Anyway, the competition for that middle area is going to be FIERCE.

Everyone is going to want to settle there. And, assuming that we do all settle there, it's going to be almost impossible to defend. A long land border, far away from our capitals? Just a few horse archers there would be extremely hard to stop.

Since me and Parkin have been cooperating well so far, I'm considering asking him for a military alliance to take over that center land- especially the center square, but maybe the whole strip. An early force of vultures and war chariots, or horse archers, there, would be tough to stop. And then once we do take it over, there's nowhere for the southern civs to attack, except along a thin strip of land. When there's only one possible place to attack, it's pretty easy to defend. (I guess they could attack with boats too, but doing that with galleys would be a terrible idea). They'd be crushed by catapults trying to advance along the center land bridge, and then fall quickly behind in tech.

By the same logic, I'm not too worried about my neighbors to the west. They'll be busy fighting each other, and any attack from them would be easy to stop. It's the southern civs that I'm worried about.

[Kylearan]

I had a chat with Lord Parkin about my proposal today. Here's a question for the lurkers- is it worth writing about my interactions with him, here?

I'm mainly lurking in your thread, so it would help to read about diplomacy here, if it's not too much trouble for you.

Meanwhile his warrior is next to my capital. I can't say that I like that. It doesn't really matter since I can build a settler in one turn if necessary

To use it as bait to distract the warrior? [SIZE="1"](I guess you mean warrior, not settler...)[/SIZE]

[luddite]

To use it as bait to distract the warrior? [SIZE="1"](I guess you mean warrior, not settler...)[/SIZE]

Wasn't there a cheat code in civ 1 that allowed you to build settlers with a strength of 99? That's what I'm using! But yes... warrior

[luddite]

[edit- I originally wrote this late at night, so I didn't do the calculations very well. It's just my attempt to calculate the output from various city configurations. It's not going to be interesting unless you really like city micro]

This map gives an interesting theoretical problem: how do we maximize city output with few food resources or rivers? Let's assume that I'm successful in getting the Colossus and the pyramids, and I have medieval tech. Also, I'm assuming that I'm going to cottage every available grassland river tile, and that I want to be slaving 2 pop every 10 turns.

The usual rule of thumb is that food = 5 points, hammer = 3 points, commerce = 2 points. That oversimplifies a lot, but it's a good start. By that reckoning, it goes:

river grass hill windmill/river grass farm: 17 points
collossus lighthouse coast/river grass hill mine: 16 points
non-river grass hill windmill/river plains hill windmill: 15 points
non-river grass hill mine: 14 points
engineer/merchant/scientist with rep, or grassland cottage: 12 points

That's a reasonable order, but it doesn't seem totally accurate to me. I think it it overvalues the river grass farm (adding +1 food surplus doesn't really change much), and undervalues the specialists (which can better specialize my cities to take advantage of building % modifiers, and add gpp points). I think it overvalues food in general- you need enough food to regrow quickly after a whip, but you can't have a city of just pure food.

Time to look at a real example. Let's look at the place where I'm planning to build city 3 (this is a sim, so the map is a little different). It's not a great city site, I'm just putting it there because it leads to better places. The lake tiles are the same as lighthouse coast.


Here it's size 4, with a half full granary. It's like I've just finished whipping 2 citizens away. If I work the sheep pasture, and put the rest of the people on food neutral tiles, I can regrow to size 5 in 4 turns, and size 6 another 4 turns after that. Then I could run 2 specialists for 2 turns- most likely merchants, to boost up the research slider.

Alternatively, I could work a grass farm instead of a windmill. In that case, I'[ll have a 5 food surplus, so I can grow to size 5 in 3 turns, and size 6 in another 3 turns. Again, switch to specialists at the end.

Working the farm instead of a windmill loses 1 s: 1 :commerce: for 5 turns. (it's 5 instead of 6 because it grows one turn faster to size 5, and picks up an extra windmill faster). For 2 extra turns, it can run specialists- let's say an engineer and a merchant. It also loses two windmills during those two turns. I'll make a table of the difference between the two options. This represents the hammers and commerce they earn, beyond the stuff that's the same for both.

farm windmill
turn 1 0 1h1c
turn 2 0 1h1c
turn 3 0 1h1c
turn 4 1h1c 1h1c
turn 5 1h1c 2h2c
turn 6 1h1c 2h2c
turn 7 2h3g6b 2h2c
turn 8 2h3g6b 2h2c
total: 7h3c6g12b 12h12c
simplified: 7h21c 12h12c
After turn 8 they're the same.

The "simplified" number means I consider 1 gold = 1 beaker = 1 commerce. By that measure, the farm city gives up 5 hammers to get 9 extra commerce from it's faster specialists. That's a good trade- 18 points vs 15 points from the rule of thumb- especially since gold is probably better than generic commerce. And, since the farm city takes up fewer tiles, I can pack in more cities like that. So overall, I like the idea of working a farm to get every city up to a 5 food surplus.

What are some other options? coast vs. windmills is a situational call depending on whether or not I need production or commerce. non-river non-financial cottages suck- it takes 120 (!) turns for them to catch up to collossus coast. Working mines will prevent me from doing 2-pop whips, which give more production. The other big choice is how big I want to grow my cities.

A size 6 city with a 5-food surplus can grow to size 7 in 3 turns, and size 8 in 4 turns. That would be good. Basically it's the same as in the size-4 example, except we gain 20 windmill-turns and lose 1 turn of specialists. And we can tweak the growth too- an extra farm will grow it to size 8 in 3 turns, or taking away the farm and growing with a 4 food-surplus will grow to size 7 in 4 turns. All of those options are fine, it's just a tradeoff between hammers and gold. I don't think any of those options is strictly better.

A size 8 city with a 5-food surplus can grow to size 9 in 4 turns, and size 10 in 4 turns. Even better! Same tradeoff- lose 1 turn of specialists, gain 20 citizen-turns. And again you can tweak the growth times.

Basically, a bigger city is always better than a smaller city. It's not worth stunting a city just so it can regrow a little faster. However, for a fixed number of available tiles, it's better to distribute them among many smaller cities- faster regrowth and more slavery.

All grassland tiles are potentially useful. Even if a city can only work grassland farms, it can still be good for whipping from size 4 to size 2, and running specialists. The only really weak cities are the ones that have no extra food at all, so it's probably better for any city with a food resource tile to just work that, and give the irrigateable grassland farms to cities with no food resource. I can also switch tiles around between cities, if I get really involved with micro.

So, the upshot of all this is that I should pack my cities in as tightly as possible. Make sure each city can regrow 2 pop in 10 turns, but don't give them too much excess food. Prioritize working coast and windmills, and after that run merchants/engineers. Grassland farms can be good for cities with no other food resource.

[edit- redid a lot of the calcuations, but the conclusion is still sound]

[T-hawk]

Wasn't there a cheat code in civ 1 that allowed you to build settlers with a strength of 99? That's what I'm using! But yes... warrior

In Alpha Centauri, attack strength of 99 was treated by the code as a planet buster (nuclear bomb). So if you messed around with the game rules, you could make nuclear exploding infantry or ships.

[luddite]

The scout reveals that we have gold in the south! Fish, also, and some river. I've moved the location for city 2 southwest to pick up the gold.

[luddite]

We're beautiful and dirty rich
Who's that moving up to the number one spot in score? Oh yeah, that's me!


Pottery finished. My worker has begun building a cowtown. It does feel a little weird to cottage over a food resource, but why not? It's a good location for it, and I need all the commerce I can get right now. And I won't have AH for quite a while. In my sims, building a cottage there got me bronze working 3 turns faster.

[luddite]

Lord Parkin is trying to convince me that I should let him build the pyramids, and use my forge GE for something else instead. I'm willing to do that, but only if he trades me something good like nice city spot on our border. I don't really need the pyramids- the math above convinced me that I wouldn't be running too many specialists, because even with representation they're just not worth the food hit- and it would be nice to have my capital fully devoted to cottages.

Evil counterplan- the "rockthrower's gambit". Agree to let him build the pyramids, and while he's sinking 334 base hammers into that expensive wonder, I build 7 extra horse archers with the same hammers, and take them from him. I think my NAP with him would end about the same time that he'd finish them.

[luddite]

Well this is interesting... looks like there's going to be a party on the peninsula

It's Ioan76/mackoti of the Dutch, yet another industrious leader. It might be time to start a whole new round of wonder negotiations with them...

Here's the email I sent to them:

It looks like my scout has just found your warrior. If you continue north for a while you'll find my capital, so welcome. I must ask you not to move right next to, though. You'll also find that Parkin's warrior is just above my scout- I'm sure he'll want to say hello to you too.

With three industrious civs next to each other, it makes sense for us to discuss which wonders we'll build. Are you planning on taking advantage of your org/ind traits to build the Great Lighthouse? My current plan is to build the Oracle.

Also, I was wondering where you're located relative to me. Since your warrior is coming up from the south, are you located directly to the south? And, is there a direct land connection? I haven't scouted that direction yet.

I really don't want them moving next to my capital, because it would not be fun if they wanted to try and pillage my hill forest camp.

Also, I discovered silver up in the far north. That'll come in handy for extra happiness. With silver, fur, gold, and forges I'll be doing quite well in happiness.

[Mardoc]

Here's a question for the lurkers- is it worth writing about my interactions with him, here? He posts so much in his thread that I'm guessing he's already described everything there.

Well, that's part of why I, too, would appreciate you giving us your diplo information - less to read to figure out what's going on. Plus, of course, he can't tell us anything about your thoughts and plans that you don't tell him first.

If it were just quoting your e-mails, then it wouldn't benefit me as much, but if you tell us why you include any particular clause, or what you're not telling him (like, say, the potential rockthrower's benefit to ceding the Pyramids to him ), then it would add a lot to my understanding of the game despite what he posts.