[SPOILERS] Sorry, we don't post on topic!

[Ichabod]

Déjà vu...







Since I wanted 1NW1NE and Darrell wanted 2NW, I decided to make the obvious move: 2S!

Nah, just kidding, I moved 1NW.

And...






Settling on the cows seems best.

Jokes aside, we probably need to discuss how to play this, Darrell. Hopefully, it'll be the last time we'll need to!

[Brian Shanahan]

Totally agree with you on Real Madrid, Ichabod. Lesser of two evils, and all. But really, eff La Liga. Right now European football as a whole is not very interesting, or at least the major leagues aren't.

You could also take up the following of GAA. Honest sports as practised by the finest specimens of the most backwards and inbred parts of Ireland, the UK and America. Plus you get to see lots of men and women hitting each other with sticks.

[Ichabod]

We discussed the start a bit and we are probably going to settle 1NW of the starting position. If we move, the only way we end up losing regarding food is if there's a 6 food tile down there - irrigated corn (and there's only one riverside grass tile) or grass pigs. While losing a better food tile would be bad, I think the amount of info we have for the 1NW move trumps it.

You see, settling 1NW gives us 2 food tiles that we can improve right away, since we already know hunting. That's big, because it enables us the option of going straight for BW and we'd love a straight BW opening (chopping is really powerful for the EXP/IMP pair). We'll have a really fast opening between the fast worker (the 1/2/1 tile is the best we coulg get for it), the fast improved pastures and the BW beeline (we haven't discussed what to tech first yet, but I think BW beeline is really good, as you can tell).

Besides, if we miss a good food tile down there, we have a pretty good second city spot already, with river connection + strong food tile.

Darrell will move the scout 1NE when the game goes back up (I think moving there will reveal quite a bit due to the lake, but I'm not sure). The tile 1E of the furs is unforested, so maybe there's another food resource there. One can hope, right? Well, now that I look at it again, it seems to be forested, yet strangely so. Probably a second fur then... Well, fur will always have a good price in the markets (= we can trade it for another happy resource) and we can improve it soon enough.

[Ichabod]

Settling 1NW also enables Meditation first!!

[darrelljs]

Meditation first...hmm. You know, I think that's just crazy enough to try. I'd like to run the MM in a sandbox and verify we have enough beakers to get BW before our first Settler is done.

Actually, that's a foolish decision making process. A game like this...let fate take an active hand. I say we let Calvin & Hobbes be our guide...surely there is a strip that tells us what to do ?

Darrell

[Ichabod]

Imagine how big our shrine will get in a game with this many players. It'll be beautiful! And we get bonus on markets and grocers, for even more profit...

Just look at how far I'm going to justify a religion first opening

In all seriousness, if there ever was a time for a religion first opening, it's right now. We have two food tiles to improve with our opening techs, we have a 1 commerce tile to work from scratch. We start with Mysticism. And, we have two decent tiles to improve with a quick tech afterwards, mining - the two unforested hills are pretty decent tiles considering our traits. And mining is on the way to BW...

There are 10 civs that start with Mysticism (edit: 9, Korea got changed), so there's 9 (edit: 8) possible competitors. Considering the nature of this game, I believe there'll be people going for religion first. I think it's highly unlikely there's people with oasis on Capital, so I think we should see how much Meditation will cost in this game and see if a 1 commerce tile will make that faster than a no commerce tile.

Let's see who starts with Myst:

Azza/Washington/Arabia
Old Harry + Fintourist/Victoria/Aztecs
Queeg/Zara/Byzantium
Barry Lyndon/Hatsheput/Celts
darrelljs + Ichabod/Joao/Holy Roman Empire
Hashoosh/Stalin/Inca
Sullla (lurker civ)/Fredrick/India
Nakor/Darius/Maya
BRickAstley + Mardoc/Wang Kon/Spain

India and Maya start with Myst/Mining, so it's crazy to go for religion first, so that leaves us with (besides, Sullla won't be going for religion, I bet ):

Azza/Washington/Arabia
Old Harry + Fintourist/Victoria/Aztecs
Queeg/Zara/Byzantium
Barry Lyndon/Hatsheput/Celts
darrelljs + Ichabod/Joao/Holy Roman Empire
Hashoosh/Stalin/Inca
BRickAstley + Mardoc/Wang Kon/Spain

Byzantium and Spain start with fishing/myst, so I doubt they'll open with religion too. Especially the Mardoc + BRick pair, since I think they don't want to be seen as "noobs" doing this crazy opening...

Azza/Washington/Arabia
Old Harry + Fintourist/Victoria/Aztecs
Barry Lyndon/Hatsheput/Celts
darrelljs + Ichabod/Joao/Holy Roman Empire
Hashoosh/Stalin/Inca

I bet some of these players are new/crazy enough to go for religion first. FinHarry are though to read, I think they are a bit on the "tryhard" side of things, so that probably would make they go for conventional play.

Anyway, I think it'll be funny to see what happens, even if things go badly. I think we can live with it and, if we get the religion, all the better. Hunting + Mining is enough for our first turns and we can get that pretty quickly after the religion.

I say we do it!

---

Besides, it won't be our fault if things go wrong:

[darrelljs]

Sold .

Darrell

[Ichabod]

My curiosity got the best of me again and I did some hacks to log in the game again!




No new resources (though the tile 1E of the furs have a certain "startegic" feel to it). But we got a tribal village 1NE of the scout, on the highlighted tile. I'm not sure if the huts will stay in the same place after a reload, but if that's the case, I'm pretty sure what our next scout move will be.

[Ichabod]

Well, I guess the question is: settle 1N or 1NW? The answer probably depends on a guess regarding the chance of the tile 2E of the furs being another resource. 1N lets us be incredibly greedy by waiting for the borders to pop the hut, denying the RNG the chance of giving us damned experience. There's also a chance of a resource 1N of the sheep, but that seems more unlikely.

I love basing my strategies on guesses about the chances of resources in hidden tiles. Extremely productive!

[NobleHelium]

Huts are part of the map and are not randomized.