A Record of Joey's Journey to Immortality

[GermanJoey]

Anyways, about my pick here. First of all, I wanted to give the buffed Cha a whirl. It gains +35% to libraries (a minor buff) and half-priced colosseums (hmm...), in addition to +2 happy and discounted XP requirements for unit upgrades. I'm really unsure how strong it'll be here, but I've always found the souped-up versions of Cha interesting. I've played ToW Cha twice, in PB20 and PB21, and couldn't quite make it work, although those were kinda odd games. But this Cha is a little more solid than that Tow Cha. Anyways, I figure if I have half-priced Colleseums, I might as well pick up a good one. So I picked Greece for the Odeon. 2 happy, artist slot, +3 culture, +1 XP, for 40h - pretty interesting, right? Reminds me a bit of Exp, where the trait can kinda gives you a "new" building that other people kinda don't get. So then I figure, what goes well with Cha? Gotta be Pro. Exp is my favorite BTS trait but I haven't played a pitboss game w/ in like 3 years now, and I don't think ever on RB. I also think Pro is nearer the higher end of the RtR trait tiers, below Org but in the tier below that. On top of that, I've been trying to convince Krill to remove Pro's free CG promotion for years, and this game might be a good chance to show him how dumb-broken it is.  Thus, Pro/Cha of Greece.

Unfortunately, this isn't a very good start for Pro or Greece. Shitty wet rice makes you want to avoid Agri, and relatively low food surplus means that growing tall early is a poor choice. High tech requirements mean starting with fishing is a disadvantage. However, when I did a few very basic sims (all I had time for), I noticed that a few convenient coincidences in the way micro works out, as well as the option to take cheap RtR Archery, means that Pro isn't too bad here after all. Also, the clam and the oasis should cut down a few turns on tech timing compared to an ordinary start. Well, we shall see! (very very slowly, that is, because this turn pace is awful and we've already had 3 timer pauses plus a reload in just the first 6 turns!)

Could you enlighten me on just what is so bad about the free CG promo? Its a pain in single player when the AI spams a bunch of archers with it, but I always thought it was a fairly unimportant part of the trait given how static defenders get so easily destroyed by collateral damage. What am I missing?

Pretty much the same reason, actually.  I've posted about this at great length before, but in short the problem is that while all other traits are proactive, this aspect of Pro (just talking about the traditional BTS pro, walls/castle/CG, not the Granary part) is mostly reactive. Or, in other words, all other traits help can help you win by actively exploiting the advantage that they give you, but Pro can make your opponents lose just by passively existing. 

Seige can allow the attacker to still eventually win against Pro defenders, but seiging is very, very slow, and you'll likely still end up trading, for example, 1 catapult per 1 longbow. And a hidden cost of using seige is that the defender has much, much more time to whip in even more defenders. At any rate, your conquest will be slower and more expensive than had your opponent been non-Pro. In a big FFA game, that can essentially result in a lost game despite a nominally successful invasion.

Of course, Pro has a small active component to it too - you can get away with less defenders in an aggressive forward plant - but this aspect could still be retained without free CG. It just has no place in an MP game.

[The Black Sword]

How's it going? Keeping the secrets of immortality to yourself?

[GermanJoey]

WELL, I had planned to do a few updates, its just that life's been so busy for me lately. I've been putting solid effort into the game, it's just that when I think about doing an update, I end up putting it off... and then its like, well, too late now. And then the turn pace of the game has been just AWFUL, maybe the worst I've ever experienced (including PB18) relative to the stage of the game we're at. Gotta admit, my update motivation is a bit lower due to that.

I'll tell you what though, I'll post a bit about the first ~60 turns now, then catch up next to current events next week, then try to do 1 report a week from then on. I think that'll be good for me to do. I've still been enjoying the game quite a bit. I do like the map too; we're gonna have a quiet early game, but I have a feeling that we'll end up with a lotta high seas craziness later on. Should be fun!

Ok, first off, the start. Pretty pleased with both it and my combo. Went settler at size 3, and then used max overflow on finishing the settler (which happened naturally just from working optimal tiles) to overflow into a granary, with pottery finishing on the same turn as the settler. I was able to finish the granary in 3 or 4 turns to a nearly-full granary bin while still working my good tiles. Now, ordinarily an early-granary build can be a bit risky due to delaying BW, especially for a start that needs such a variety of techs like this how. However, working the oasis and clam provided quite a bit of net commerce, which, combined with some extra prereq bonus, helped to accelerate bronze working a good 4-5 turns overall. (got it T44 IIRC) These four facts were the "nice coincidence" I mentioned on the previous page. And I wasn't too worried about getting choked, as Pro Archers w/ cheap Archery are still a thing.

At any rate, the early granary was nice because this is a pretty decent capital to grow up to 6 early, and then whip down that pop once BW comes in. Here's where I was on T38:







...can't believe I forgot to turn on resource icons, arrgh. But my second site was very strong, with two 6f tiles and grass silver first-ring, and whales and clams second ring. (and also a grass copper!)

At any rate, all this other stuff meant that I've had to make due with fewer workers, and as such I've done very little chopping so that I can continue to improve tiles at a proper pace. Thus, I've been slightly behind the leaders in expansion, but not very behind. (and in fact I was #1 in CY last turn, T71.) On the flip side, all this early city growth means that I've been able to make quite a few warriors, and have thus been able to completely spawn-bust my territory for cheap. I've only had to deal with a few barb warriors attacking into highly-fortified positions at 99% odds. (in contrast, dtay, AGG ZULU, was first to 3 cities and then lost one to what must have been a barb warrior. )

Speaking of the game leaders, my northern neighbor, JR4, seems to be one of them. He's got a billion posts in their thread, and was second to 3 cities. Exp/Spi gave him quite an early boost over the competition here. Worse, if he were to get the whammy on me in terms of land-grab, my second city would be quite vulnerable. So, I delayed my 3rd city a bit to plant a spot up here:




A very defensive spot! On a hill and not approachable on the diagonal, very solid. I had to whip my 2nd city pretty hard to make this happen, in terms of getting some Phalanxes to defend it and an additional worker to prechop a forest for an archer to finish 2T after the plant. So Cha was pretty nice for that. I think I only beat him to here by a turn or two, because he followed up by planting on that plainshill 3N2W, yikes. At any rate, this was a very late 3rd city, but my 4th and 5th cities were immediately afterwards, and I think I was one of the first to #5.

I then greedily tried to found Buddhism in their face, but unfortunately, I was beaten to it by a single turn, by none other than JR4 himself. =/




To my south, Ventessel is still stuck on 2 cities on T72, and seems to have lost a good dozen units rushing some other player, which was probably Krill. Fed Cha/Agg with a Great General on like T65, jesus. At any rate, I've got no expansion pressure whatsoever coming from the south. It's kind of ironic, really, because I planted what I thought were aggressive, defensive front cities down there too, but then the only thing I've seen of Ventessel has been his scout.

(p.s. my naming theme is from the chinese webnovel A Record of a Mortal's Journey to Immortality check it out, it's cool!)

[OT4E]

Thanks for update. One post per week is good. Reading which worker goes where is really boring.

[The Black Sword]

Yeah, more strategic updates are the best. I like your combo, interesting to see how it plays out.

[GermanJoey]

thanks guys. i'll do what i can! 

by the way, speaking of turn pace, just to vent a little after watching this guy hop in and out of the tracker nonstop all day every day,

7/12/17 8:26 pm Dark Savant Logged in
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7/12/17 6:04 pm Dark Savant Score increased to 208
7/12/17 6:04 pm A new turn has begun. It is now 1040 BC
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7/12/17 12:10 am Dark Savant Finished turn
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7/10/17 11:44 pm A new turn has begun. It is now 1080 BC
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7/10/17 11:39 pm Dark Savant Finished turn
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7/10/17 10:07 pm Dark Savant Score decreased to 203
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7/10/17 2:28 am Dark Savant Score increased to 208
7/10/17 2:28 am A new turn has begun. It is now 1120 BC
7/10/17 2:28 am Dark Savant Finished turn
7/10/17 12:57 am Dark Savant Logged in

           

[mackoti]

like too.

[GermanJoey]

T59-T85.

The game pace continues to crawl.

I built this thing:




Funny story, I had worked this out to finish a turn earlier, and without the triple whip. But then a back-to-back pair of screwup turns played at 3:30am, attempting to de-stress after baby woke up at 2am and was screaming for an hour and a half (love that teething!), resulted in letting a chop complete that I meant to prechop and also missing completion of masonry by 1g. So, I had to do a bit of dirty work to catch back up; whipped a mostly complete phalanx for extra overflow, chopped a pair of 3rd ring and a 4th ring forest, and triple-whipped for the finish. So this wonder was pretty expensive for me, considering those forests would be worth 24h w/ math and 3rd ring borders, and that I've gotta eat a few unhappiness turns despite being Cha. But, I think it's still very worth it on this watery map. I'm putting my 7th and 8th cities both on the water to maximize my investment here.

Demos:




The top end of CY and MFG are surprisingly very tight. (also note that I'm not working a total of 8f in the GLH city because of 2 unhappiness, which will be rectified in 2 turns). I'm falling slightly behind the leaders in city count; dtay suddenly has 9 (!) cities, and Gav has 8 or 9 himself. I'm at 7 with a settler en-route... gotta focus on 3 or 4 more in the near term if I want to keep up. (and I do!)

Average power is surprisingly high. I guess others aren't so lucky with their neighbor situations as I am; my northern border is rock-solid, with a heavy defensive garrison, a hill, and city walls, while my southern neighbor is the lowest power by a large margin, and still with only 2 cities. (he also has a settler, which he sent to a spot I've already settled ;[)

(I thought I took an overview shot, but I guess I forgot to save it, so I'll do that when the turn rolls... whenever that is. Can anybody temp sub for Ventessel?)

[GermanJoey]

A big decision that I'm still thinking about is my next tech. Obviously, I want to get Writing first, so as to access my discounted libraries, and then I'll want to save up some gold. But what then? Choices, in no particular order:

a.) Polytheism -> Monotheism. This would be pretty solid long term. OR would be great since I don't have any of the major production bonuses that others will get in the Classical era (e.g. Forges, Courthouses, Markets, or even Lighthouses, which are pretty important on this map). Later, a spread religion w/ Theocracy would get me 8 XP Horses w/ a stable, Odeon, and Barracks.

b.) Math -> Calendar. I've got some marble nearby, and a city with lots of trees that could chop into the MoM. I've also got a few Calendar happies.

c.) Aesthetics -> Polytheism -> Literature. As mentioned before, I've got that Marble. TGL will be a top-tier wonder on this map, as the safe mainland borders imply that things won't really heat up until Astro. And the TGL is great for pumping out GS for Lib, Optics, and Astro. Marble is also nice for the NE, which is always good to get early. As for Aesthetics, that would open up the option for the SoZ, which would be awesome for Cha and Pro, and the SP, which would let me skip researching Theology for Theocracy as well as give early Pacifism. Unfortunately, I don't have any Gold, and everybody's probably racing for the TGL and SoZ. So pretty High Risk here.

d.) Iron Working. I've got a fair bit of barracks up, and RtR Swords are pretty awesome. There's also jungle silver and jungle gems nearby, so it would be a decent economic option too.

e.) Metal Casting. I've got silver already and gems nearby. That's +2 happy already. And I always do like to get forges up ASAP. The Ind civ is also really weak and I suspect getting warred on, so the Colossus is back on the table. That'd be a pretty swell wonder to land...

f.) Math -> Construction. Half-priced Odeons, mmm. That gives me double-promos with Cha... and I could go for HBR right afterwards and attempt to just mow one of my neighbors down. But the question here is, do I really need to go to war to get more land at this point? I'm not so sure... there's a lotta islands out there, and I still have a lotta good quality backfill land that I haven't settled either due to my aggressive city placements. So the question is, do I really need to race for war techs?

[GermanJoey]

T91.

Alright, here's my civ:




As you can see, I've managed to claim quite a lot of land without needing to war. Normally I tend to prefer a much more compact setup, but I'm trying to play a little differently this game, with the goal of having fewer but stronger cities in order to maximize the boost to tallness that I get from Pro/Cha. We'll see how it goes.

I just put down my 9th city, Moulan Prairies, in the southeast there, near Donovan. It's ridiculously aggressive in ordinary circumstances, but it's a.) in a very defensible spot, b.) I'm PRO, and c.) Ventessel's civ is ridiculously weak. Which makes his new city of Stitka in the southwest, near Masked Moon, kind of ridiculous; it's on flatland, right next to a city of mine that's about to pop borders.

I've got 2 islands cities now, so the GLH is bringing in an extra +14c. My economy would be in pretty bad shape without that! I see at least 4 more island cities that I want pretty much immediately; two in the west, and two in the east. And that's on top of at least 2 more mainland cities before even counting filler spots. Can't pump those settlers out fast enough! My 10th city, however, will plant in that jungle to the southeast of my capital; the settler is due to arrive there T93, to plant T94.

I'm satisfied that my city pace, despite detours for two wonders. (I also built the GW on T89 up there in State of Zijin, for a.) culture against JR, b.) GS points, and c.) extra GG points when Krill inevitably invades me). I'm not in the lead with city count, but I'm up there. JR and Gav put down their 9th just a turn before me, while dtay, on the other hand, has had 10 cities for a few turns now. However, I'm guessing he has like 4 workers for his whole empire and is pretty much just overcompensating after losing that city early. More importantly, I've been #1 of the CY graph for the last few turns in a row despite not being on top of the population graph!




The one number that might look a bit crappy right now is my power, but that's only an illusion. My power is lower because a.) I can get away with less due to CG2 (and CG3) archers, b.) I built lots of warriors early for spawnbusting purposes, and they now garrison my inner empire instead of the more expensive units that other players were eventually forced to use, c.) Ventessel/Donovan is the lowest power by a hue margin, d.) Dark Savant is a good bit above JR, as is JR, so I don't think that their power margin over me indicates that they're planning on being too overtly aggressive with me just yet. At any rate, I've got a 2 phalanx and 2 archer pair guarding my chokepoint city in the north, and I feel quite safe in the south against that weak neighbor there and on the seas, where I've made a point to only settle on hills where my super-archers will have the most advantage.

The last point of discussion is tech path. I've narrowed down my choice to either MC or Math. It's a very hard decision for me. I feel like MC is the best choice... except for the possibility that Krill starts beating down Ventessel in the near term (within, say, 15-20 turns) and I need to get some real units out before Mr. Greedmeister decides he wants all of Ventessel's land and then some. And no offense to Donovan, but I still remember when he subbed in for Mack in PB22 and then Gavagai just immediately *rolled* him at an unbelievable speed, capturing 3-4 cities every single turn for a half dozen turns in a row while I sat helpless behind a peace treaty. So I can't expect Donovan to put up any reasonable resistance when piloting an even weaker civ. Math -> Construction -> HBR would give me all the tools I need to shut Krill down. Furthermore, Math opens up Currency (which will probably be worth +25 passive commerce per turn at that point) in case my economy crashes, as well as Calendar for the MoM. (I've still got 6 unchopped forests in Yellow Maple's BFC, and Marble is off the coast...)

However, MC would be so good for my long term game... getting early forges up is always great, the Colossus will be worth like a billion commerce per turn on this map, and triremes might be important to secure the seas, which is my chief threat concern other than Krill at the moment. I have a feeling that I'll end up with more island cities than mainland ones, and the best way to get those is to get secure the waters early.

Well, I'll still have a while to decide before I need to turn on the faucet...