The short version first. The Cothon provides +1 trade route, and Castles provide +1 trade route, and Mao discounts them both. With PRO and islands, those are all 3c routes. They can get to 4 post-circumnav in CtH I believe. I expect maintenance to be an issue on Small with no FIN/ORG, and PRO lets us push through that.
As for the longer version, well there’s also a lot of other useful things. Notably, we’re the only Expansive leader. EXP discounts Granaries of course. This is noteworthy because outside of the capital I expect chops to be harder to come by, which means a lot of cities will have go grow to 4 the slow way just to whip a Granary. I think that’s going to be painfully slow but very common in this game. We sidestep that entirely with Expansive. Super cheap Aqueducts also mean we have the inside edge on Hanging Gardens, which is a small side perk, but not a huge deal. We also get various discounts on Walls and Markets, which are marginal benefits. Basically, our cities will pay for themselves faster commerce-wise, come online faster with Granaries, and they get a bunch of cheap buildings of varying importance.
It’s also worth noting the weird dynamics around Protective and trade routes. I had a thought the other day that in small games, PRO is the inverse IND in that the more players who take it, the more necessary it feels. In this case there’s only 2/5 of us, but that means the other 3 have just 2 players with which to get routes with. And what if one of them gets conquered? Or what if one declares a petty war and trashes the peace modifiers? I felt this massively in 76 in a way I didn’t really discuss much, but in that I was regularly at war with 2 players, so those routes were often ineffective. Another player was getting conquered, so him losing cities cost me commerce. And the 5th player was Protective and didn’t always sign OB with me, and could have stopped at any time. Protective insulates me from all that, and on a map where opportunistic strikes could be common, I’m hoping that non-reliance on international peace will help a lot.
There’s some real downsides here of course. Churchill was the other leader we were eyeing, and as I tempt fate pre-writing this post, SD just finished taking our entire backup combo. I suspect happy will be an issue in this game. Charismatic I think is great here, and I think many are grabbing it with double promo boats in mind. That will be the biggest challenge to deal with. It’ll be important to get to each naval tech spike first to counter-act that. Philosophical I think is great too, for a couple reasons. One, there’s the old Engineer path to Pyramids, which on a presumably hammer-poor map (plus unknown Stone status) is probably the fastest path to it. In addition, it makes the Astro bulb the easiest by far. This is surely where Ginger’s head is at, FWIW. I will miss Chm in this game, though the Wine presence does push me towards HR anyway, so I ought to be able to make do on the happy front eventually. I did realize at one point I don’t need PHI or SPI at all to do the Astro bulb path at all. Plus I’ve just played those traits a bunch recently, so I didn’t really want to do it again.
The bigger thing for me personally is I wanted to play a more normal game this time around. In my last few games I played 1) a CS bulb + Music gambit opening, 2) a GLH + Circumnav Vikings opening, and 3) an inherited PHI/IND wonder-heavy opening. Mao of Carthage has a rough gameplan, but at its core it’s much less on-rails than any of those games. That appealed to me here.
Carthage is Fishing/Mining which is neither great nor terrible, especially with Agriculture being cheaper in CtH. I haven’t simmed this extensively, but I did test this briefly today. Agri-BW is more or less mandatory, as Agri-AH is simply too slow and leaves the worker with little to do. So the open question is when to slot AH in.
There’s basically two options that I can see. Door number 1 is the obvious Agri-BW-AH. Unfortunately, this does idle the worker 2ish turns, and AH comes in late enough that the worker more or less needs to go Farm-Chop-Chop. Door number 2 is delaying AH much longer and doing something like Agri-BW-Wheel-Pottery-AH. This makes the worker(s) useful faster as well as opening up an earlier Granary. This is doable because the Lake makes it possible to farm the Sheep, which also solves the Worker idles. It’s a little ugly, but I think it’s going to come out ahead. Of course, it does mean having to re-improve the Sheep at some point. The main thing is the Farm can complete long before the Pasture, so while it’s -1F less than a Pasture, it’s +1F more than nothing. It’s weird, though.
Anyway, Settler can come out ballpark T30ish in either plan. Give or take 2-3 turns depending on how hard I want to squeeze. That was enough to make me comfortable picking it, and now I’ve got to figure out the timings a little better.
Here's a stab at opponent analysis, in picking order:
Yuris: DeGaulle (CHA/IND) of Japan (fishing/wheel/mace/forge)
Japan was one of the civs we discussed, as amphibious samurai are quite easy to mass-produce with AGG/IND Stalin. We discarded it (just as Yuris picked it) because we expect this combo to fall of drastically after gunpowder units arrive on the scene. Yuris surprised me by swappig AGG for CHA and picking DeGaulle, but I think it's actually a stronger leader. Yes, you're further away from amphibious but you get some acceleration on your start. It's still a pretty slow pick that doesn't have much economy behind it.
Bing: Pericles of America (CRE/PHI) of America (fishing/agriculture/library/marine)
America has been picked in ever single game since got the latest version of it's UB, and Bing is the latest to take it for a spin with the expected optimal leader: CREative to discount the building and PHIlosophical to make the most out of the free great people points. Is this the game to showcase it's a broken pick? I doubt it.
Ginger: Lincoln (CHA/PHI) of Spain (fishing/mysticism/cuirassier/castle)
Spain is probably one of the best naval civs that remain unbanned in this game, but their start is very slow and awkward if you don't start with fish or freshwater seafood. I'm not entirely sold on the traits he's paired it with; while PHI is good for the expected astro-bulb and CHA is good to make the most out of the bonus naval XP, I still miss PRO to make the most out of the traderoutes. Main issue I see with this combo is you want several different tech paths all at once.
Superdeath: Churchill (CHA/PRO) of Native America (fishing/hunting/axe/monument)
For once SD picks a combo I'd be happy to play. While most of the value comes from the leader, the totem-pole has very good synergy with CHA; both discounted culture and two-promo gunpowder units without any civics, and three promotions if you run both vassalage and theocracy. On paper the pick has both economy and early boost to do good.
Scooter: Mao (EXP/PRO) of Carthage (fishing/mining/horcher/harbor)
Scooter summed up our pick prety well, although I'm not as sold on the castles as him. It's still a very economic-oriented pick
In conclusion, every single civ that got picked was one we considered. It's slightly sad that Inca didn't make the cut this time either, but I think it's a pick that could have had value. Traitwise, CHA is for once the most picked trait (3/5), with PRO and PHI the only other repeated traits (2/5). CRE IND and EXP are singulars and (unsurprisingly?) nobody picked AGG, IMP or SPI. Yuris is the only one without an economic boost, and Bing is the only without a military boost.
I like Superdeath's choices the best which shouldn't be very surprising since that was the other combo I was considering. It just has a lot going for it. PRO and CHM both synergize great with the UB while also providing both easy commerce and boosted happy cap. Super well-rounded. The extra XP on melee/gunpowder gives these picks some longevity that really helps.
The other 3 all of really good things going for them, but they come with questions. Does Ginger have Fish? If so, it's ok, but if we're semi-mirrored like it sounded, it'll be tough. Citadel is great, but he's going to have to pay full price for it because he passed on PRO. Bing's pick looks like another exercise in "America looks fun to play" more than being particularly scary in this game. And Yuris's pick looks really strong for a very specific slice of the game, but it doesn't have as much oomph before or after that.
t0: start worker and agri
t6: agri in, start BW
t12: worker in, 1N, farm sheep (1/5), STOP, grow on WB
t13: worker begins farming corn
t17: finish corn, swap cap to corn
t18: 1S, farm sheep
t20: BW in, start Wheel. cap sz2, pickup sheep
t21: sheep farmed, grow to sz3 eot
t22: sz3, pickup pfh, move worker onto forest
t23: begin chop forest
t24: net crabs, corn/sheep/crab on warrior, worker chop 2/3 and STOP
t25: worker idle 1t, grow sz4 eot
t26: sz4, start settler, chop complete
t27: worker onto forest
t28: begin chop forest
t30: chop completes settler
t31: settler out
Results: Cap sz4 9/28F, warrior 4/15 in queue, some overflow available, 2 forests chopped Issues: no warrior, only 1 WB, second city more or less must use corn
Wheel/Pottery don't directly figure into the first 30T, but this opens up the possibility of getting the Granary quite soon. It could mean that city3 could be done with a 6 -> 3 whip potentially, as an example. I'm comfortable going warrior-less here given no barbs, scout starts for everyone, and the real chance we're Galley-separated. At the very least the likely snakier nature of the land means any funny business should be noticeable well in advance.
And for a more "normal" start.
Agri-BW-AH
t0: start worker and agri
t12: worker out, move 2n
t13: worker start farm
t17: farm finishes, AH in, start BW
t18: worker 1s, pasture sheep
t19: sz2, corn/sheep
t21: pasture complete, grow to sz3 eot
t22: worker 1sw onto pfh. corn/sheep/pfh on WB
t23: worker onto plains hill
t24: net crabs, corn/sheep/crabs, sz4 eot. worker mine hill
t25: sz4, swap settler
t27: mine in
t28: worker onto plains forest
t29: worker se-e onto grass forest
t30: bw in, chop forest
t32: settler out, chop into 1T WB
Results: cap sz4 3/28F, warrior 2/15 in queue, 1T WB out EoT, 1 forest chopped Issues: no warrior, whole plan hosed if plains hill gets a forest growth, settler 1T later
So, this actually works out ok, but the forest growth issue is a major one. Not being able to Mine would technically only slow the settler by 1T, but it would result in the Worker idling for quite a long time and net out as -1 improvement. Of course, there's a real chance there's Iron or Coal or something under that hill, which would dissuade forest growth IIRC. This one generally leaves the capital in a slightly better place, but we have to hope we can last 26T without a forest growth on that hill to make it work.
Tarkeel, any strong feelings here? Both plans have a few tweaks that could be made, but this is a decent ballpark of what it looks like to me. T0 save attached.
(April 22nd, 2024, 11:59)scooter Wrote: Tarkeel, any strong feelings here? Both plans have a few tweaks that could be made, but this is a decent ballpark of what it looks like to me. T0 save attached.
The power of the early granary is heavily dependant on how large the initial island is. If we can only fit 3-4 cities, there's not as much value in whipping. I like the AH opening, not just for the food on the sheep but the commerce as well. Agree that warriors are much less essential than usual here, but one for MP will be needed at some point.
I suppose I should do some opponent previews. I'm not quite sure I can duplicate the roast format for this one. It fit the last game much better. It will return at some point, though. So I'll try to be insightful instead this time. I'll use Tarkeel's analysis as my base and try to piggyback off them.
(April 22nd, 2024, 06:54)Tarkeel Wrote: Yuris: DeGaulle (CHA/IND) of Japan (fishing/wheel/mace/forge)
Japan was one of the civs we discussed, as amphibious samurai are quite easy to mass-produce with AGG/IND Stalin. We discarded it (just as Yuris picked it) because we expect this combo to fall of drastically after gunpowder units arrive on the scene. Yuris surprised me by swappig AGG for CHA and picking DeGaulle, but I think it's actually a stronger leader. Yes, you're further away from amphibious but you get some acceleration on your start. It's still a pretty slow pick that doesn't have much economy behind it.
Yuris up first, a player everyone is always happy to play with because he's the PYFT king and never creates drama. I think this pick is great, and it was definitely on my radar. I think both traits are great, and they match the civ just about perfectly on the surface. My general suspicion from generating M&S + Islands maps is that there won't be a ton of early aggression, and the age of Samurai is right about when drama is most likely to kick off. The Samurai are interesting here. In general I tend to be pretty dismissive of the unit because their whole shtick is the first strikes, but 2-movers nullify that. However, this is the rare game where 2-movers are not likely to heavily feature. In general, invading stacks will be amphibious or dropped next to cities, so you'd naturally expect 1-movers to be more prominent. I think that's a minor boost for the UU.
Metal Casting will be a big tech in this game, and that's more true for Yuris than anyone. He'll therefore be difficult to raid early for anyone because he's likely to have Trireme access quite early. His biggest weakness will be raw expansion. Cheap Forges are great, but they are an investment, and if you're already behind on growth curve by the time MC comes online, you feel that "payment" even more. There's also a small strand of anti-synergy here in that I often think of Forges as a building that quietly trades health for happy given the metal doublers (and the fact that 1-2 metals are often available in these games), but he has a leader that will be more health than happy constrained. It's not a huge deal, but it may be a limitation in leveraging the discounted Forges.
There are a couple issues bubbling under the surface here. To begin, I think it's reasonable to expect based on leader/civs that Yuris is in roughly 4th place by the time Samurai are on the scene, and I wonder if he can really conquest on the back of that. There's not a lot of easy food in this game I don't think. He's also gotta find the Commerce somewhere, because he's gotta tech all the way to CS + Machinery to unlock Samurai, but if he wants to start getting double promo boats - which CHM is all about - he's also gotta tech Theology and Feudalism and get in a revolt. Those 4 techs represent like 3.5 lines on the tech tree. That's really expensive! It seems very likely other players would get Optics by then to stop Galleys/Triremes, so now add another line of techs that he would need for Caravels to protect his raiders. And by the time he does all of that, I bet someone has Astro. I just wonder whether Yuris has a hard time hitting the perfect window for Japan, and as a result he will likely have to settle for an imperfect window. That doesn't mean the pick is bad at all, but it does mean it's harder to execute. Side note: Industrious is also a sneaky tough trait to play because so much of the value derives from good national wonder usage, and in my experience that's an afterthought for a lot of players. I think if you can stay a half step ahead on naval techs, you can deal with the mid-game power spike he's going to get and be OK.
I think it's a good pick, but I wonder if he'll be able to fully maximize it due to the tough execution bar here. I predict neighbor luck will be very important for him.
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