RBPB4 [SPOILERS] - De Gaulle of the Egyptians

[Lord Parkin]

Well, turn 49 arrived, and we settled our third city - Evermore. (Once again, I'm open to lurker suggestions on city names, but no-one else seems to be posting much at the moment. ) It's already connected to our trade network thanks to the river next to it, but I've got a Worker working on a road to the city (done next turn) just in case we need to move military units around in a hurry for some reason.



As you will have noticed, we finished Bronze Working this turn... and boy, is there a lot of Copper around! I count four sources within a reasonable distance of us, two close enough to be appropriate for the next city of ours if we want. Good stuff! (One is obscured to the south in this screenshot.)



The Copper spot immediately east of the capital in particular seems to have a lot of potential. Corn, Fish, Whales and Copper at the same city? Very sweet indeed! We'll certainly want to look at getting that one settled soon... probably either as our fourth (next) or fifth (after the Gems) city. It's simply too good to leave unsettled for much longer - and as a bonus it won't even have much maintenance.

Another great thing is that with this easily accessible Copper around, we don't have to place as much (or any) priority on settling that crappy Horse spot to our NW. That's great news, as a city there early on would pretty much be a wasted Settler, apart from getting us the Horse resource.



Here's a closer look at the two Copper resources to our west. The crappier one to the north is arguably closer to Luddite, but we could still potentially settle it if we get in quick. However, for the one to the south, there's a very decent potential city at the spot I've marked, or 1N or 1W of it. Not that we'll need it for access to Copper - the spot east of the capital will do for that - but with the Copper and food, that southern spot in the screenshot below would be quite a decent city in its own right.



Max has found yet another Whales source at the top of the map, near the Silver site. (Seriously, what's with the lovefest for Whales on this map, Krill? )

Anyway, not much that changes any settling plans. The argument is still between the spot I've marked, and 1W or 1NE of it. I think 1W is ruled out because it's essentially the same without the canal to luddite's territory. I'm not sure about 1NE... it does have a bit more food than the marked spot, but I'm reluctant to settle at the very top of a map. Just feels odd. Besides, it's not really much more food, and it still denies us the canal (unless we fort over a hill).

So all in all, I'm thinking the marked spot is the best place to grab the Silver. Thoughts?



Joe continues on his trek southward. We've confirmed that it's definitely plako's borders we can see, but frustratingly we can't quite contact him at the moment. Let's hope we'll be able to soon, through a border expansion or land bridge or something.



Finally, Bob continues west. Looks like a dead end in the north-west, so I guess heading south will be the best bet from now on. Mackoti mentioned that he'd met someone over there I think, so we should be able to meet them too via land.

[Lord Parkin]

I thought I'd save this discussion for another post. Namely, where do we put the Gems city? I'll go through and analyse each of the marked spots below.



Spot A - a reasonably attractive city in its own right just for grabbing the Ivory. If we want to leave this spot open for a Corn-double Ivory city, we'd need to discard spots B, C and D due to being too close.

Spot B - Same as spot A in the resources it grabs, but a bit further inland. However, this would cause us to discard all other spots except spot H, which I'm not sure is wise. All in all I don't like this one much.

Spots C & D - Deer, Corn and Gems, as well as fresh water and a hilltop... not a bad haul, and probably one of the most attractive options.

Spots E & F - Deer, Pig and Gems, slightly better than spots C & D foodwise. These two spots are the only ones which will completely block off the south with one border expansion (10 turns after being founded). That makes them quite attractive in their own right. Settling either of these spots also leaves spot A open for a later city. The downside is that both of these sites are 1 tile off the coast - not the end of the world, but a bit irritating. On the whole, if we're picking one of these two I'd go with spot E, just because it's got the benefit of +2 health from the fresh water.

Spot G - A possibility before, but probably a silly option now that the location of Copper has been revealed.

Spot H - The most interesting one, since just this turn we've revealed that it would have Copper after a border expansion. This perhaps makes for an argument of whether we should try to go "all-in-one" with our next city (Gems + Copper) and not bother with the spot east of our capital for Copper. However, there are two problems with this: (1) the Copper down south would be a lot more risky and susceptable to pillaging, and (2) we want to settle the spot east of our capital soon anyway simply because it's so good. So all in all, I think the argument of going for spot H just because of Copper is moot. However, the seafood situation to the east is what will really tip the balance here. If there's seafood in addition to the Pigs, Gems and Copper, then it's definitely worth considering this spot. If not, we may want to consider leaving it and grabbing the Copper with a separate city.

So, that's rather a lot of text, but hopefully I've covered most of the pro's and con's of each site. Personally, all things considered, my favourite option for a Gems city is spot E if we're planning on leaving spot A open; spots C or D if we're not. What are everyone's thoughts on all this?

[Lord Parkin]

Hmm, just realised I forgot to put in the options 1N of both spots E & F. 1N of spot E in particular would be quite a good city, keeping the Deer, Pig and Gems, keeping the bonus of blocking off the south with a border expansion, and keeping the +2 health, while no longer being 1 tile off the coast. Actually, the more I think about it, the more this site makes sense. It even gains two forests and three riverside tiles and the hilltop defence, though it loses out on working one hill. Thoughts?

[Lord Parkin]

Out of the few civs we've met, everyone has three cities except Luddite, who has two... so we're no longer at the bottom of the pack expansion-wise, despite rush-building Stonehenge!

I have to wonder though, how in the heck did we manage to beat Luddite to three cities when we have the excuse of Stonehenge and he doesn't? I mean, I know he was planning on building the Oracle, but he wouldn't have been able to start that for some time into the game, and from chat snippets a while ago I think he said something about building it in his second city. Which raises the question, what the heck has his capital been doing all this time? Perhaps building a whole bunch of Workers to chop out the Oracle a few turns sooner? But I really don't think he'll have much competition, in which case that'd be a waste with only two cities. Hmm, bit of a mystery anyway.

Regardless of the why, Luddite's slow expansion is brilliant news for us. If he keeps up that slow pace, we'll easily be able to grab the lion's share of all the land between us. Which I'm perfectly happy about us doing.

[Bruindane]

Jumping in as a global lurker, I'd say most of those spots are nice, though I find it easier to decide after making a dot map especially including the marginal cities that have more obvious placements.

[Lord Parkin]

So, turn 50 is here.

We have 2 Workers that've moved on to forests in preparation for chopping at the capital. That'll give us 40 bonus hammers on turn 53, another 40 on turn 57, and 20-36 on turn 61. I've set up the current build queue in the capital for Settler-Worker-Settler-Worker (rinse and repeat), so with the extra chop hammers they should be finishing on turns 54, 56, 59 and 61 respectively. Not bad... great that we're finally getting that expansion boost from all the chops.

Research is back to 100% on Fishing after a turn at 0% to gather cash. Fishing will be done in 3 turns, the same turn that Magadan grows to size 3 and reaches 5 hammers per turn. That means we can build a Work Boat in Magadan in 6 turns to hook up the Fish at Evermore on turn 62. Alternatively, we could chop out the Work Boat 3 turns earlier to hook up the Fish at the earliest opportunity on turn 59 (the turn that Evermore's borders expand). However, this would mean delaying hooking up the Corn in favour of chopping the forest. All in all, I think slow-building the Work Boat 3 turns later is better than delaying hooking up the Corn to get the Work Boat out 3 turns earlier. Thoughts?



Happily, Joe's found a land bridge further south, so it looks like we'll be able to meet Plako in a few turns.



Bob continues south-west. Hopefully he'll meet SleepingMoogle before too long. I had a brief in-game chat with Mackoti today, and he mentioned that there's a chokepoint (apparently 1 tile wide) he's intending on settling between him and SleepingMoogle in the near future. Hopefully our Warrior gets through before that, but if not then we'll have all the more reason to get Writing for Open Borders soon. Mackoti doesn't seem particularly keen on declaring war to get through even if it's possible, apparently mainly because of a loss of trade route income (the long-term peace multiplier).

[Lord Parkin]

Krill requested a few other screenshots this turn, so here they are.

Parkin City:



Magadan:



Evermore:



F1 screen:



F4 screen:



F5 screen:



F6 screen:

[Lord Parkin]

Jumping in as a global lurker, I'd say most of those spots are nice, though I find it easier to decide after making a dot map especially including the marginal cities that have more obvious placements.

Thanks for the input. I guess spot A should be left open then, especially since we've found no seafood nearby those Ivory resources yet. So that rules out B, C and D for sure. I'm still keenest on 1N of spot E, I think. Still time to rearrange it depending on what we unfog to the east in a few turns with the scout.

[Lord Parkin]

Had long chats with both Luddite and Mackoti today. Will post more later, but one key thing revealed was that no-one seems to have seen any Marble or Stone anywhere on this map so far in their exploration. Now it's possible there could be some hidden away somewhere, but at this late stage you'd expect at least some should have been found.

As a result, I'm hedging my bets that there's no marble or stone anywhere on this map, which (if true) is brilliant for us as an Industrious civ. Basically it means we're guaranteed an advantage on every single wonder, not at all dependent on who has what resources! Very cool. Sounds like all four of us Industrious civs are in a row along the top as well, since Mackoti says SleepingMoogle is to his west. Interesting. Looks like the south might prove to be relatively wonderless in this game.

I've also heard through hear-say (Mackoti and Luddite through Plako) that Sunrise is my eastern neighbour across the sea. Of course, this is basically third hand gossip, so not necessarily reliable - but better than no information whatsoever. This is quite interesting news... if nothing else it practically ensures the Great Lighthouse will be built in the north (either by the Zulu or the Dutch). I can't say Sunrise is exactly the ideal eastern neighbour I was hoping for (I was kind of hoping for Adlain), but at least he doesn't have an easy land route to me. I'd have been a bit worried about being rushed early on if he did.

Anyway, might be worth getting a Galley or Work Boat out there sometime to see if we can make contact. Finding him by land is proving to be ridiculously difficult.

Hey, if Sunrise does build the Great Lighthouse to our immediate east, we might be in an ideal position to take it from him later on. Something to think about, anyway. Maybe I should be rooting for him to get it after all.

[tizer]

about settling, do you have border agreements with your neighbor(s)? or do you plan to sign any?