{Spoilers}Brian will write something interesting for Dave and lurkers to read

[DaveV]

A turn 18 overview, with a proposed alternate dotmap. My priorities: maximizing first-ring goodness, preserving floodplains, claiming all specials in the long term.




Suggested settling order: wheat+cotton to the southwest, then the floodplains cities.

[Brian Shanahan]

I was very bold last night, I played the turn at about 5p.m. and never reported it. In my defence I am doing a course for my local credit union, and we were having a study meeting.

Anyways I got to doodling and I came up with this excuse for a dot map. Sorry for the crookedness I couldn't draw a straight line to save my life, even on ruled paper:


There are a few differences between us Dave, so I'll have a look at your choices and see what we can do. I've two city 4s North is 4 A and South is 4 B, mainly because I am as yet undecided on where to go.

Next I had a look into The Inner Light, and saw this:


Yeah I'm going to have to put an extra turn into a warrior here, I've exactly enough food to grow to size four (this was taken after eot as with a lot of my info shots), so why waste it.

And demographics:


I'm second in tech because I'm not researching anything, so no beaker bonus. But look down a bit, I'm first in food! And with an extra pop I can go either 2/1/0 or 0/1/4 and keep my food edge or push my research while in both cases upping my mfg by 25%. Of course the settler will demand the food, so next turn is gold, turn after that is settler.

Oh and if you're wondering why I've the governor turned on still, it's simply he hasn't done anything I wouldn't do, yet. So he stays on for now. Don't worry I check.

Finally how many turns can I get AH in?

With overflow from calender and prereq bonus 11 turns is the answer

[Brian Shanahan]

Ok got the save earlier on today, and first thing I did was to shave off my beard. Here's hoping for a sunny summer!

Well actually the first thing I really did was to move my warrior south west along the train line to see what he could see:


Then I got notification of calender coming in, and I revolted:



mmmmm, bread,

And finally the demographics:


GOLD

Lookit all that gold and food and people. We're on a roll here, we going to win the game*, we're dead certs now.

*Legal disclaimer: The above statement is no prediciton of Brian's chances of winning the game, and in fact is simple wishful thinking caused by light headedness due to lack of beard hairs to anchor his head to the ground.

[Brian Shanahan]

Well we've survived this long.

My warrior still high after the flawless victory over some lions, decided he'd test his mettle against a skeleton:


A bit banged up, but he's safe unless there's a two mover in the fog, and he'll be combat 3 next turn, so healing will be quicker. This map is getting curiouser and curiouser.

I've been making a bit of a fetish out of screencapping my capital, so I took another one this turn:

Growing the pop actually saved two turns on the settler (keeping the 4th pop on the gold left it at thirteen turns) so I've gained a turn by waiting one. WooHoo!

And finally the demographics:

Looking good in all the categories, if I can keep this level up throughout the game I'll be doing ok.

I also have an idea for something special every twenty turns. I'll flesh out the first installment tomorrow and post it up, hopefully it'll be as good on the screen as in my head.

[Brian Shanahan]

It was a slow day at the God's Other Head inn when a tall dark stranger walked inn, followed by a loud peel of thunder. Stog the barman looked up briefly before the door closed, "Strange," he muttered, "there's not been a cloud in the sky all day".

The stranger took a seat in the alcove, and motioned the barmaid over, a good looking blonde currently playing darts with the only other customer that day. He ordered the steak for dinner and a pint of something called mead, "Sorry sir," said she "I know not of what you want, but we have a fine selection of wines for your perusal. I suggest the Merlot as it will complement your steak perfectly."

Lugh sighed, and replied "fine, I'll take the best you have." He returned to the dark thoughts that had been plaguing his mind since he had been brought to this world. He should never have trusted that trickster god of the Northmen, Loki when he said he had a way of saving the Tuatha de Daanan, of course he had a way but it was not the way that Lugh and his people needed. Instead of returning the Keltoi back to the continent and restoring sweet Erin to it's pristine glory, Loki instead spirited people of Danu to this blasted rock of a world where nothing worked as it seemed and where the spirits of the dead were let loose to wreak havoc on the land. Worse yet were the gods of this place, hiding themselves away from their people, not participating in the joys and sorrows of their chosen followers but using them as pawns in a nonsensical battle of "good" versus "evil" which never ended, but only destroyed the work of mortals and took the heart out of nations.

In a fit of mischief on parting Loki had also mentioned the other peoples that Lugh and his own would share this world with, the Svartalfar, a breed of Sidhe that Lugh's scouts had already met. He refused to talk to them on principle, because any sensible person knew about the Sidhe;
"Elves are wonderful. They provoke wonder.
Elves are marvellous. They cause marvels.
Elves are fantastic. They create fantasies.
Elves are glamorous. They project glamour.
Elves are enchanting. They weave enchantment.
Elves are terrific. They beget terror.
The thing about words is that meanings can twist just like a snake, and if you want to find snakes look for them behind words that have changed their meaning.
No one ever said elves are nice.
Elves are bad."
as the great sage of the future Terry Pratchett would put it ("Sometimes my partial knowledge of the future is worthwhile", Lugh thought to himself). No he was better off assuming the worst and arming himself against the terror from the shadows.
Next were the Illians, a people who wanted to return the world to a land ruled by ice and snow. Lugh shuddered, knowing full well what it was like to be buried under a mile of ice for thousands of years, not pleasant, not pleasant at all.
Finally his mind turned to the Sianic Vampires, a cult so depraved they drank and bathed in the blood of their victims. It was one thing to take a trophy from the body of your slain victims, Lugh himself had a belt with the heads of his enemies attached, but it was another to take their innocent women and children and sacrifice them to retain your own life and youth. This monstrosity needed to be defeated Lugh knew, as his people would eventually be turned into cattle for the demonic blood feasts of these ghoulish vampires if he failed to defeat them.
"Three implacable enemies, a murder of deities baying for everybody's blood, and a world hostile to our very presence," he said to himself "how do I defeat all that?"

And it came to him then, his people could, instead of being pawns for the gods, use the gods themselves to further their survival. They would sell their services to whomever of the gods currently held the best offer, learn their deepest secrets and discard them in favour of the next god. Once his people, who were naturally gifted in the clerical arts, knew the secrets of all the gods then they could strike against their enemies, and once they had won victory over their enemies, they could turn this world into a garden for the Tuatha de Daanan, and face down the gods themselves.

He saw the waitress return with a second bottle of this wine, a bit weak but nice to taste, and he smiled, now that his troubles had a solution. "Tell me young lady, you seem to be a girl who likes a good time, where is the best place to party? And maybe afterwards we could get to know each other a bit better. You might like, as the saying goes, a bit of Irish in you."

[Brian Shanahan]

Well it was a slow turn today, promoted the warrior C3 and moved him SE onto the forested hill. He'll be healing a small while.

Here's the only screenshot:


Demographics are still looking nice.

[DaveV]

Well it was a slow turn today, promoted the warrior C3 and moved him SE onto the forested hill. He'll be healing a small while.

Or not...

I assume that baby spider to the east wasn't generated against your units? That means someone else was wandering in that area, and that there's a mommy spider somewhere.

Is Pale Moonlight your planned next city? I'm not thrilled with its location: first ring, it picks up two wheat (one of which will be in capital culture anyway) and a sheep, plus an oasis in capital culture. Move it two tiles east and it gets the two wheat, sheep, cotton, and reagents, losing the oasis. Disadvantage: wandering giant spider.

[Qgqqqqq]

Giant spiders don't wander. This is not a feature of their AI, it is programmed separately and cannot be overwritten by mapmaker error as it is not part of the AI that are added. Unless there is a human moving it, Giant Spiders cannot move (if I have screwed up or deliberately changed the AI of a preplaced Giant Spider then it may behave normally whilst inside your borders, but it still would not move of its own accord).

[DaveV]

Technically, giant spiders will move to attack, to escape borders, and to avoid Recon units that they deem to be threatening. What I should have said was: "Disadvantage: giant spider in unknown location".

[Brian Shanahan]

Well it was a slow turn today, promoted the warrior C3 and moved him SE onto the forested hill. He'll be healing a small while.

Or not...

I assume that baby spider to the east wasn't generated against your units? That means someone else was wandering in that area, and that there's a mommy spider somewhere.

Is Pale Moonlight your planned next city? I'm not thrilled with its location: first ring, it picks up two wheat (one of which will be in capital culture anyway) and a sheep, plus an oasis in capital culture. Move it two tiles east and it gets the two wheat, sheep, cotton, and reagents, losing the oasis. Disadvantage: wandering giant spider.

The warrior was killed by a skeleton, so either the hut next to me grew one the IT and he attacked or a skeleton wandered up the railroad and attacked.

Regarding my second city I'm still undecided, the city marked "Pale Moonlight is a 2 wheat, 1 sheep in the first ring, but is really cramped to the capital (the wheet is third ring for the cap). For a half city it will be a strong production site down the line, three food resources, easy irrigation, two mines and workshop the rest.

You previously suggested settling south by the double cotton. I really hate cotton as a special, 2/0/3 is nothing, I'll get that with hamlets. And three mountains make the not special bfc even more meh.

I'm still thinking go west by the corn/sheep/ivory plant, city three in my dot map. I actually think that's the best plant in the short term, expands where I want. has good food, and strong production. It will be a warrior/worker factory. And I increasingly think whoever controls the floodplains controls the tech rate, and that's a big plus. Added to this I have the two desert boni of extra gold and no defensive penalties. I think I have to go west on this one.