[SPOILERS] LogicalTautology is Pindicator's DD

[NobleHelium]

Commodore is prickly by default, unless you're giving him tribute or something. Tagon already has a barracks.

[pindicator]

Sorry, I thought I had posted this yesterday but I guess not

Turn 051

Commodore planted 2 new cities this turn, which solves the mystery of What Commodore Whipped, taking place back on turn 49. Commodore did also jump up 6k in power, but I already know 1k was from population, and he has no hooked up resources, so the rest has to be a warrior and an archer. Nothing to get worried about there yet.

In the rest of the world, wetbandit joined the 3-city club on t50, and yuris125 finished a tech on t51 that I have yet to place. Still not a whole lot going on.

Here's us:



I let Commodore's scout live, because I still suffer from that fatal fallacy that if you treat your neighbors nice they won't stab you in the back at the first moment it's convenient for them. (Anybody want to play a game of Diplomacy sometime? ) I did shuffle tiles a little bit after the screenshot was taken, giving up the newly made flood plains cottage at Amnesia for the capital's plains hill mine, to speed up a Granary that I mistakenly thought would gain me 10f for getting done a turn earlier -- my math was wrong; it's only 5. But it did let me grow my capital to size 4, which in turn lets me start and whip a settler there earlier. We'll have city #4 planted by turn 60, off east where the fish, wheat, and stone are.

The settler for City #5 will probably be made in Amnesia, although I'm still figuring out how to do that. It has more good tiles than the capital, so I may grow it to size 5 before whipping it. Dunno. City 5 is going south, likely SW of the pig to get another city that is somewhat close to Breakside and can help reinforce it.

And as for where to settle after that -- how about we fill in this nice shiny dotmap?



Lurkers, I'm happy to subcontract this work out to you. I should let you know that the pay is terrible and the hours are long. Line starts to your left.

And then we ended turn and got graphs on wet bandit. That's everybody but Yuris125 now!

[GermanJoey]

Nice update! Got any plans for that stone??

[pindicator]

[pindicator]

Suppose I should stop putting off the last one of these

Commodore is...



Genghis (Aggressive, Imperialistic)
of China (Agriculture, Mining, Pavilion, Cho-Ko-Nu)

Leader Ranking:
Civ Ranking: hammerhammer
Synergy Ranking:

I kind of feel like I should give this max rating in Synergy not because the traits go well with the civilization, but because the traits go well with the person playing them. If ever I was to pick two traits to describe a player, Aggressive and Imperialistic would be the first two that come to mind for Commodore. Hell, if I were to pick two words to describe the man I might still pick those two words.

Aggressive is every bit as good for fighting wars as it was before, and now has added bonus of decreasing city maintenance costs by 25%. It turns out this isn't quite as strong a boon as the 25% reduction Org gives to civic costs, but it does give Agg a bit of an economic edge. Any military advantage in the hands of Commodore is something to keep an eye on, and Aggressive means it would be foolhardy to try and tangle with him early in the game before we're prepared. (Oh wait, that's what we're doing?)

At the same time, Imperialistic does about the same thing as Aggressive but in reverse. It's main benefit is the +60% hammer boost to settler production, something we've already seen Commodore take a shine to with his game-leading 5 cities. Imp gives a minor but noticeable enhancement to warfare by increasing Great General production. So with this pairing you really can go in either direction: use Imperialistic to spam cities and take advantage of the cheaper maintenance costs, or use Aggressive to fund early war and have Imperialistic take the benefit in added Great Generals. Both ways love having lots of production, but hey - we're playing RtR which has brought the importance of having strong production back to relevancy (or was that the RB meta moving past cottage-uber-alls?) by decreasing whip efficiency and increasing the power of workshops.

The only pitfall here is expanding too rapidly, past the capacity of your cottages to fund the new cities. Aggressive is nice, but it isn't a license to spam cities, and it is quite possible if Commodore continues at the rate he has been we could see his economy falter too much for him to recover. Having 30% more cities than your opponents in the middle ages is great. Losing a third of your empire to a knight rush when you're still teching Feudalism is less so. There may be a hint of that already - Commodore is working a gem mine and still his GNP is considerably less than ours. I know we have religion inflating that a bit, but it's still pretty noticable in the tech count. Still, once Commodore gets to Currency his research problems should largely be solved, and when he gets to Caste & Metal Casting he could potentially have the best economy in the game. After PB18 I'm pretty certain that cottages should only be used at a minimum - gone are the days of cottage spam, simply because you cannot build the defenders needed to hold off workshop-economy based armies.

And then we get to China, with arguably the best starting techs in the game (RtR Korea says hi), and a very above-average medieval era UU. China works with the production needs of Aggressive and Imperialistic because it allows your workers to start mining hills and chopping trees sooner than other people - you're usually just one tech away. The Chinese UU is fantastic on defense, has the niche use of being the only sea bombard to work in the game. It has a forgettable UB in the Pavilion (PB6 says hi) but who cares? It's China.

Starting Ranking:

Everything I've talked about already points to a strong start for China. Considering the starting tiles, the only tech out of the ordinary that Commodore would need to grab is Fishing, but after that a quick Bronze Working and then Pottery and he can go any direction he wants. We've already seen him go for the early land-grab. Although I think his early cities were not the best choices (better would have been to grab the food-rich sites up north and then attempt to plant front-line cities), he still has the best starting techs and traits for playing the opening out of any player.

Recommended Beer Pairing:



Total Domination IPA by Ninkasi

[pindicator]

Turn 053

Last turn (52) we finished the granary in Amnesia and whipped the monument in Breakside. This turn we followed that Breakside whip up with a chop and a finished cow, and voila!



The city even ends turn with 11/22 in the bank, so 2 turns of working the corn and then watch the food totals lift off!

The capital hit size 4 and started a settler on t52 as well. This turn we finished a cottage that Pelican and Amnesia can share, and our workers will next hook up the copper before roading towards city #4.

We picked up Writing at the end of the turn. That now makes 12 techs for us, and everybody else is sitting at 8 or 9. That's a pretty large advantage only 50 turns in. I wonder if Commodore is going for Writing as well or if he's trying some kind of CKN bee-line with IW or Metal Casting here. But his expenses are probably somewhere around 13gpt, so there still could be a few turns on the writing window.

And borders at Amnesia popped at eot



There's a barb that appeared in the south that could make things interesting. He's at 1.2 strength and has a C1 promotion, so let's hope he ate Commodore's scout.

Also, a shot of the far west, which our scout has mapped out:



Looks like we could have some islands to fight over, even if we don't get a good chunk of hte lands to our south.

[pindicator]

Turn 054

This is probably just a fake war, but I've included it so I can show where I think Commodore planted his 4th and 5th cities:



The sheep and cow by each sign was pastured this turn (4 turns after the founding of each city). Wetbandit's city on the front popped borders this last turn too.
Edit: Actually, Com City 4 is probably 1NW of where I put the sign; that would get the rice first-ring.

Back home Amnesia's unhappiness was placated with the warrior MP. And the city will grow to 5 just as the whip anger wears off:



Tech to Masonry, but 0% science to save some gold.

Started hooking up the copper too. In Breakside I started a Barracks, but that will just be 1h put into it this turn, and next turn we start an axe when the copper finishes being hooked up. That will finish t61, right before growing to size 5.

[pindicator]

Turn 055

Flug settled his 4th city. After being the last person to get 2 cities down, he's done pretty quick to catch up and pass the rest of the pack. Commodore is at 5, Flug is at 4, and the rest of us are sitting on 3.

Whatever the wetbandit-commodore war was about, it ended this turn. I did also get a map request from wetbandit, and since he is also a neighbor of Commodore I decided to share. Again, if they know I am settling up on him and making things uncomfortable, hopefully it will make it easier for them to do the same. I got to see a little more info about Commodore's lands too -- he has uncontested horses in his north:



Hooked up our copper turn 55, and switched Breakside over to an axe.


Turn 056

A barb came up from the southern jungles and threatened to make off with our crops. But he was already wounded from killing somebody's scout, and was able to finish him off with an archer out of Breakside and return to the city, only losing a little damage:



Both workers by Breakside moved to start mining the grass hill. The mine isn't needed until t58, so next turn I can split one of them up north towards Amnesia, to help road towards our 5th city by the pigs. Alternatively I can keep both workers to finish the mine, then split one off towards Amnesia; this would allow the last worker to have time to road the corn, road the jungle SE of the corn, and then farm the corn all before Breakside builds a settler for the 6th city by the horses -- granted that city is about 15 turns away and very tenative.

What isn't tentative is the 4th city:



Whipped the settler out of Pelican this turn for 2 pop. The two workers that completed the copper mine moved SW-SE and put a a turn each into a cottage. The next two turns they'll extend the road from the gold mine SE to the wheat/stone/fish location. Right now a warrior is fog-busting that area, and there is a very small chance that a barbarian will come in from the south and huge the coastline -- but i think that is unlikely. Barbs usually bee-line cities at this point; especially since I know there is at least one barbarian city in the wide world from watching population totals. So additional military shouldn't be needed.

I think I want to tech Sailing after Masonry finishes, get another settler onto a galley built out of the stone/wheat city, and settle those elephants on that island to our east. But that will be like city #7 I think, because the galley won't finish until around t75.

After the stone city, the pig city will be #5:



EDIT: All these turn dates are 1 too late. I'm actually settling on t64, and the workers can still do the same actions; they just happen a turn earlier.

It isn't possible to not waste a worker turn moving a worker up from Breakside, but the grass hill mine down there finishes on turn 57, so we have from 58-64 to get a road finished on the tile NW of the pig. Then when the city is founded on turn 65 both workers will get the pigs pastured so the new city can start growing right away.

I am going to need a military unit in the area to defend these workers from barbarians, and there are a couple of options. The spear in Amnesia will finish at the end of turn 58. There's an axe finishing at Breakside at end of turn 61. The capital is going to overflow from the settler I just whipped into completing an archer next turn, though that really needs to stay in the capital for MP happiness.

It probalby is going to have to be the spear, at least at first while we wait for the axe to come from Breakside. Or the axe just might want to unfog the tiles south of Breakside; tentatively city #6 is going to claim that horse, sometime around turn 68-69.

[pindicator]

Turn 057

Commodore grew 3 pop to a game-leading 14 total. I've got my settler for city #4 out and heading east.

In the south, decided to move an archer out to take a peak at what is south of Breakside:



Probably going to move onto the plains hill next turn and then head back to Breakside.

[pindicator]

Turn 058

Finally some techs were discovered. Flugauto finished Mathematics and Commodore finally teched

... Sailing?

It's true; we now have trade a trade route



There's no way it took him all of 12 turns to research Sailing; something else must be half-done. But I imagine he's going to use it to settle that nice-looking island south of his capital and get some ICTRs going.

There was also the question of how to settle the southern jungles:



The order is going to be A - C - offshore island to the east - D - G. G is actually less than halfway from where I surmise Yuris125's capital to be. If I get really ambitious I'd put that city spot 2 to the south. But there is a lot of good land to be had here, if I can keep Commodore blocked out in the west.


Turn 059

Our fourth stop on the this pub crawl, Coalition Brewing:



Also notice that the capital is building a work boat. That work boat will finish end of turn 63, and then take 6 turns to come along and northern coast, hooking up the fish at Coalition on turn 69. Coalition will have it's farm finish in 2 turns, grow to size 2 and then whip it's granary. The turn that Coalition grows to size 2 after whipping it's granary? That would be end of turn 68, right in time to work the fish on turn 69.

Out west, Commodore is being a nuisance



After the axe finishes in Breakside the plan is to switch to a settler and then 2-whip it to completion. The settler finishes end of t66 and will move and plant at location C on t67. In order to move and plant in 1 turn I need to add roads on the corn, and on the tile marked C itself. I have a 4 turns before Breakside's borders expand and I can improve the corn; those are going to be used by putting 1 turn of road into the corn tile, and then moving onto the jungle and roading it. Then the borders pop, I farm the corn most of the way, and complete the road the turn the settler moves to tile C.

And of course Commodore is nosing around with his warrior right in time to see it all happening.

From the picture I moved the worker onto the corn and started roading, and moved the archer to cover. If Commodore moves his warrior onto the tile next turn, the answer may have to be to move to the jungle tile and then declare war. This keeps his warrior from pillaging any road tile I put down in neutral territory.

Alternatively, I might as well just 1) finish the road with the worker 2) move the archer 1N onto the mined hill 3) declare war 4) kill the warrior with the archer.