RBP3 [SPOILERS] - Friendly Kittens (Ragnar of Maya)

[RefSteel]

(well, I have no idea where Chimeee comes from, Ref named that one, but going forward, I'd like to stick to disney cats if that's ok).

Chmeee is the lesser-known Kzin name of Speaker-to-Animals, from the Ringworld series, by Larry Niven. [EDIT: Here's a portrait from an old scifi magazine.] You can rename him if you want; we didn't have a worker theme back then.

In regards to that micro plan... it makes my head hurt because I'm tired and can't make heads nor tails out of it right now.

Don't worry about it. It has a completely arbitrary starting point because I don't know where our workers will be, so please don't try to follow it! It was meant as an illustration only.

According to my micro plan we WOULD have a farm waiting for the new city, but the chop would be a turn or two late. If it's that important i can probably drag a worker down from the capital.

Not that important, unless you say it is - it all depends on when we'll have workers available and how many. Better to delay the border pop a bit now and have workers available to chop/mine/plantation when the borders do pop than to rush the border pop and lack workers to improve the second-ring tiles the pop brings in.

There ARE other forests we can chop towards a grainery, actually, but they are all 2nd ring.

Exactly. Our workers are going to have other things on their minds than chopping firewood (whether for a gran or a lib) when that city's second ring pops, I think. The spice forest will get chopped into the new building, whatever it is, but I expect it will be finished by the whip.

I think we should just put both chops into a library and whip it. It's going to be doing 1hpt, so I'm not going to sweat it being exactly on time. If we could have both chops done by the time it grows to size 2, that would be wonderbar to me.

Sounds good. Whatever works for your microplan. Again, please ignore mine, which was merely meant as an illustration!

BTW, we should have math.

We do. (Per CivStats)

I guess what I'm saying here is if it's only a turn or two difference to pop the boarders, I'd rather not waste a forest on a monument, and need convincing as to why we should.

I agree. The reason to start with Mon+Gran instead of Lib is to get the granary sooner. I even thought about chopping the granary first and then whipping the monument, but that would delay the border pop for too long, I think. (~5t delay over either of the other plans) and really would want both chops to start by the turn the city is built to be at all worthwhile.

[FINAL EDIT: All that said, the limiting factor is really Worker availability, and in the opposite way from what I said several posts up. As long as two chops will come in before the city grows to size 2, and the spice forest chop will complete by the time the city grows BACK to size 2, and workers will be in position to hook up all three happy resources in a timely manner, I think Library First is best. Mon+Gran is only better if we won't have enough workers (and defenders) in the area to accomplish all of that.]

[Maniac Marshall]

The city should have 2 full time workers assigned to it at the beginning, as should Kilrah, which should be founded just half a dozzen or so turns behind it.

City strategem:



Pride Rock will soon have 2 "full time" workers working on it as well, as we'll be up to 7 workers soon, (and really need an 8th) 2 working on FS, 2 on PR, 1 on Temminck, and 2 working between the capital and Kilrah. That's 1-2 short of what we'd really need, but I want to get kilrah planted so it can start growing. We'd get it a worker soon enough.

I'm in the process of converting Pride Rock to a useful hammers city, with the option of also having food to whip if needed. Soon it will have the following tiles available to it:
Cows: 4f2h
Horses 1f4h
FP Farm 4f
Grass Mine 1f3h
Grass Mine 1f3h
FP Cottage 3f4+c
Grass Cottage 2f3+c
Plains Mine 4h
Multiple Grass Farms 3f1c


Ideally, it will soon work Cows+Horses+GrassMine+GrassMine+FP Farm+FP Cottage for +4 fpt/13HPT and make an Archer every other turn for city garrison, OR with the addition of the plains mine +2fpt/17hpt, which is virtually an Axe/Holkan every other turn. Once we start using the plains mine, we'll farm up the grass around it so that it can keep growing.

[Maniac Marshall]

Nevermind. That forest only exists in the sandbox. It must have grown at some point.

[Maniac Marshall]

We've met HRE and have open boarders. I have not hit them up for HBR yet. I'd prefer to catch them in chat about it, but will do so in email if I have to.

Mali had a chariot named Lucky Maya near Temminck last turn, but it's moved off this turn. They tried to chat with me while I was asleep, I assume about the chariot, but I dono. They are away now.

The only other known techs missing are

Mediatation, Priesthood both of which we should ask for from Mali. Maybe I'll send them a letter sometime this weekend to the effect of : Hey, can we get them? You'll be getting Metal for calendar from us shortly.

Monotheism which is a Krill only atm and not something we likely need, so I'll defer to you on when to ask for it Ref

HBR - HRE is the source.

Once we get HBR, I'll feel a lot better about things.

[Maniac Marshall]

Turn 79 is in the books. No barbs in sight currently. Once our chariot and holkan get healed, we can probably send one of the chariots down to meet Ruff and JANK.

I opened up the game the previous turn to see Mali offering Priest and Meditation, which I accepted of course. We're only missing Monotheism and HBR at this point. I'm going to try to get HBR from DIM later. I'm not sweating Monotheisim really.

[Maniac Marshall]

Don't panic that T80 isn't fully played. I'm messing about with the worker plan. It'll be played before the timer runs out.

[Maniac Marshall]

Well, here come the barbs for another round:



The extreme damage we took at ridiculous odds has finally caught up with us. We just whipped the library at Temminck last turn, and unless someone has a grand idea, we're going to have to whip Temminck AGAIN this turn for the emergency chariot. There is no other way to protect both the cows and the gold. The charriot outside PR was trading places with the gold one between turns, and it's only at 2.5. I suppose I should have left it sit in retrospect =/

I cant see sense in taking what's likely 50/50 odds at saving the cows. Unlike the mine at the capital, this IS an urgently important tile.

Maybe I should have left the axe SE of Temminck over by the gold, but I was attempting to bust the barb spawning area over there since we'll have a settler headed in that direction next turn.

As I see it, here's what we need to do this turn:

Whip the Chariot at Temminck
The Chariot Next to Temminck needs to move to the jungle tile south of PR
The chariot SE of PR needs to fortify/heal
The axe needs to kill the barb south of Fierias.

Here's what we need to do next turn, assuming the barbs move where we expect.

The chariot just popped in Temminck needs to attack the warrior on the gold, which unfortunately is only 95.6% to win, so we'll probably lose.
The chariot in the jungle kills the warrior on the cows
The chariot SE of PR heals to full, next turn can kill the warrior on the horses.
The axe needs to move back towards the road network.

We really seriously, honestly need more units so we can station some out in the fog so we don't have to fight emergiency battles on our most important tiles. =/

Unless I hear from one of you that there is another awesome way to defend both those tiles, I'll play the turn as I've suggested tomorrow.

[Maniac Marshall]

Turn 81
------
Fierias builds settler, works Corn, sheep, Silver, and SW Cottage
Pride Rock builds Barracks, works Cows, Horses, Farm, Shared Cottage
Temminck grows to size 3, Whips Chariot. Works Gold and Rice.
Marie Roads (complete)
Chimeee and Toulouse Farm (Complete)
Everyone else chops

Turn 82
-------
Fieries finishes settler! Starts axeman still working Corn, sheep, Silver, and SW Cottage
Pride Rock builds Barracks, works Cows, Horses, Shared Cottage, Grass Cottage
Temminck builds barracks, works S Cottage and Rice,
Settler moves 2S to a hill
Chimeee moves 2N to a forest
Toulouse moves 1E to a forest
Everyone else chops

Turn 83
-------

Fieries grows to size 5, starts settler (axeman on hold) works Corn, Sheep, Silver, and 2 mines
Pride Rock grows to size 5, starts worker Works Cows, Horses, Farm, Grass Cottage, Shared Cottage
Temminck grows to size 3, builds barracks, works Gold, Rice, Farm.
Settler moves to Feng Shui sign
Everyone chops (Dutchess, Berlioz, and Thomas complete)

Turn 84
-------
Fierias builds setter, works Corn, Sheep, Silver, and 2 mines
Pride Rock builds Axeman, Worker on Hold, Works Cows, Horses, Farm, Grass Cottage, Shared Cottage
Temminck builds barrakcs, Works Rice, Copper, S Cottage.
Feng Shui founded, starts grainery, works Farm
Dutchess moves 1W and farms
Berlioz moves 1SW and Farms
Thomas mines
Marie Chops (complete)
Chimeee Chops
Toulouse Chops

Turn 85
-------
Fierias builds settler, Works Corn, Sheep, Silver, Hill, SW Cottage
Pride Rock finishes Axeman, Resumes Worker Works Works Cows, Horses, Farm, Grass Cottage, Shared Cottage
Temminck grows to size 4, builds barracks, works Gold, Copper, Rice, S Cottage
Feng Shui builds library (to receive chops), works farm.
Dutchess and Berlioz farm
Toulouse chops (complete)
Thomas mines
Chimeee chops (complete)

Turn 86
--------
METAL CASTING HITS!
Fierias finishes Settler, Starts Axeman, Works Sheep, Corn, Silver, SW Cottage, Farm
Pride Rock finishes worker, starts Holkan or Archer or Forge, works Horses, Cows, Farm, Shared Cottage, Grass Mine?(depends on what we build)
Temminck finishes barracks, starts archer, works gold, S Cottage, Copper, Rice
Feng Shui resumes grainery, works Farm.
Worker Actions TBD

OK, this plan isn't quite as efficient as the previous one, but we have to try to save the cows imo. The issue would be that we'd have a turn of unhappyness on turn 89 in Temminck, however, we just got Monarchy, Construction, and Monotheisim this turn so we can Revolt to Monarchy/Org Religion at the end of this turn, which is perfect timing as all 3 cities finish builds this turn.

[Maniac Marshall]

Here's a look at our current situation with the barbs.





The chariot on the gold just slayed a barb this turn and won flawlessly fortunately.

He'll likely get round 2 in a turn or two.

Just east of there you see an axe who was on the jungle hill fogbusting for all of one turn. He's now headed back to protect the rice.

Near Pride Rock, you can see that one of the barbs eschewed a milk run for the safety of a forest. Instead of taking high eighties odds, I thought it best to park on the cows and hope the barb likes his 0.9% odds to kill us.

Just north of there, you can see another barb who almost surely will move to the horses next turn, threatening both pillaging of the horses and slaying of the worker on the hill... The chariot assigned to him is unfortunately not going to be completely healed. He's currently at 3.1/4, so he'll be ALMOST fully healed next turn for his assault.

At the capital, there are two barbs in the NE. We'll have a Holkan and an Axe to deal with them.

I moved the warrior towards Temminck, because he MIGHT be needed to provide a happiness garison there shortly, whereas the capital would be happy at size 5 with no garrison.

Pride Rock finishes its barracks next turn finally, then on turn 85 will complete an axe via chop, and on turn 86 a worker via chop. It can then crank an every other turn archer for 4 turns, and then, it can make an axe/spear every other turn, which is even better.

Cross your fingers we can hold out that long.

I'm leaving in about 10 minutes for a gaming convention in Chicago Friday, Saturday, Sunday/baseball game in Milwaukee Sunday night, so I'll have just about enough time to play the turns and little else till Tuesday night.

Will try to update if something really catastrophic happens, however.

[Maniac Marshall]

OK, here's a barb update before I head off to play some board games (or maybe an RPG, I haven't decided...)



You'll note I'm only showing the north. That's because ALL of the barbs in the south are dead.

The one in the forest Suicided into the one I parked on the cows, and didn't scratch us. (Finally a bit of RNG luck). The dinged chariot took out the one on the horses at 97ish% odds, and is still at ~2.4 with a promotion due. I think we want to make this chariot sentry, but I'm asking for input...

The fully healthy chariot also has a level 2 promotion pending. I have not used it. I'm thinking maybe this guy should be a medic, but, again, no rush and am waiting for input.

Farther south, the warrior near the gold moved off the hill, so we pounced him at 99.1% odds, and wound up somewhere near 2.4/4. The chariot is at 4/5 and again has a promotion pending. I did not use it. Again, I'm thinking sentry path. We need that fog busted!

The axe also won a battle on the rice, I believe flawlesly.

Now to the north. I moved our axe that's supposed to be defending Fend Shui over in the hope that he'd get suicided o by the barb. At worse, I hope that barb goes for our settler and does not move onto the hill to threaten the worker. That would upset the applecart of our micro plan as it's right next to a tile the workers are meant to be farming next turn. I can not move the axe south to cover that square... he's needed to kill those other three barbs.

I moved the warrior bac into the capital. We'll garrison Temminck with a chariot temporarily now that I know one will be free to do so.

Our fully healthy chariot is headed towards the capital to assist with the barbs.

I have not been able to decide what to do with the Holkan. Should I leave him in the capital and react next turn to where the barbs move? Or should I move him onto the hill, where he should be almost certian to win... but might get attacked by TWO barbs? For now I've left him in the cap, and not ended turn, but I might run some sims in a bit if I have time before I head off to game tonite to see what's best.

Oh, and here's a running tally...



I'm REALLY glad this game was not played on Deity now...