Huayna Capac of Khmer

[Mortius]

[SIZE="4"]Current plan:[/SIZE]

[SIZE="4"]Plan - excel format[/SIZE]


- just look at the number of turn to the left and you should know the production, workers action, and what tiles should be worked that turn (before hitting the end turn button!!!)






[SIZE="4"]Huayna Capac[/SIZE]

[SIZE="3"]Financial + 1 coin on tiles with at least 2 coins
Industrious +50% World and National Wonder production and cheap forges (60 hammers instead of 120)[/SIZE]

[SIZE="4"]of Khmer:[/SIZE]

[SIZE="3"]Hunting, Mining[/SIZE]

[SIZE="3"]Balista Elephant - our special Jumbo with "targets Mounted Units first in combat outside cities"

Baray - aqueduct with +1 food on it[/SIZE]





[SIZE="4"]Huayna Capac[/SIZE] is a prime pick here.

[SIZE="4"]Financial[/SIZE] trait is The King .
The longer the game takes, the bigger the gap should be between Financial and non Financial leaders. The more rivers and the more water heavy map the better for a Financial leader.
Rivers makes cottages start at (2,0,3) instead of (2,0,1) - it's a HUGE bonus. It TRIPLES!!! a cottaged tile commerce
The more water heavy map the better, because coasts (2,0,3) become a viable source of commerce, and sea food, becomes the best possible food with +3 commerce on top of them, with Fish being the King here (6,0,3 with a lighthouse).
And you know what? We heave a long river, and a coast with a fish nearby

[SIZE="4"]Industrious[/SIZE] is one of the best traits for a longer game. It's not like Expansive - starting with a big fire but burning itself fast. It's more like a fire that starts small and grows higher and higher every turn that's passing by. If we can hold our economy high early on and grab Metal Casting with Oracle's help, we WILL ROCK!!! With cheap forges, we will be a production powerhouse (both for military and economy) and if we use some of that advantage to build cheap wonders we will be powerhouses in other areas too. It's a snowball

[SIZE="3"]How to leverage our strong points and cover the weak ones?[/SIZE]


[SIZE="5"]The strong points:[/SIZE]

- [SIZE="3"]Economic boost every time +1 coin financial bonus kicks in. [/SIZE]
We should ensure it happend as much times as it is possible. It shouldn't be so hard having the only land food (Sheep) that can benefit from the Financial trait, a long river with a floodplain, and the best possible food (coast Fish) nearby


- [SIZE="3"]Production boost with cheap forges. [/SIZE]
A Forge is the only building that gives production multiplier in that game (I assume we will not get to Industrialism in a one continent, no tech trading game )
It's a Very Good Building, everyone would love to have. Now a two pop whip gives 74 hammers instead of 60, and you can easily whip things you otherwise will struggle building, like Libraries and especially Courthouses.
But Forge is not without it's drawbacks:
First - it's at Metal Casting - at the most expensive early tech. It's like Metal Casting 643 vs Pottery 114 beakers - almost 6-times more expensive.
Second - it's a BIG building - normally it costs 120 hammers. It's like Stonehenge So it's a big constrain to build it.
But we have no such drawbacks here
- For us it comes at a special price - 60 hammers , and now from a World Wonder's size we step down to a Granary size
- We are the civ that can probably build Oracle the fastest, so we can have forges almost from the start instead of mid game.

With such a production boost we will have better developed cities and larger military than our opponents.


[SIZE="5"]The weak points:[/SIZE]

- [SIZE="3"]No build-in pop up borders mechanism. [/SIZE]
We have to address that problem, as building monuments first in new cities is the worst possible option to pop their borders. It slows down their development considerably.
But fortunately we have a very efficient way to cover that problem - Stonehenge. And with such opponents we are probably guarantee to have it

- any others?


[SIZE="5"]Priorities???:[/SIZE]

1. [SIZE="3"]LAND ORACLE!!![/SIZE] - it's such a HUGE boost, we should ensure we do everything to make it happened.
At Metal Casting we have 60 hammers Forges that are so essential to our economy, and as a cheery on the cake we are guarantee a Colossus grab. A wonder that will make our coast tiles = riverside grassland hamlets right from the start, both (2,0,4) Not to even mention about triremes for anty-Vikings defense and the workshop improvement.
It's so huge boost to production (cheap forges) and economy (Colossus) we just can't pass it by.

2. [SIZE="3"]Land Stonehenge[/SIZE] - It shouldn't be a problem in our situation , but nonetheless it's a very big boost to the early new cities development. Now we can start with a Granary, and whip it very fast with a help of just one worker, for an accelerated growth. Instead of a struggle to quickly erect monuments all around our empire.


Now it's time for our civ [SIZE="4"]Khmer's[/SIZE]

The longer I look at it the more I like them

Not because of UU or UB which are weak by them-self, but because of the fact, we will have Jumbos as the only civ, and this is a really big thing.

[SIZE="3"]Elephant - 8 Str, 1 move, mounted unit with +50% against other mounted units.[/SIZE]
Jumbos will make us safe against pretty much everything mid- and even late-game

1. The most obvious attacking unit midgame is a Horse Archer, who just have no chance against Jumbo at all. With modified str 6 vs 12, it's a 100% defeat probability.

2. But Jumbo have odds vs ... everything, even against the mounted units nightmare - the Spear. A Spearman has the modified strength of 8, the same as Jumbo, but at the second level (5xp) we can give our Jumbo anty melee - Shock promo, and Spear's anti mounted - Formation promo is at the third level (10xp). Not even counting, our Jumbos will start with 5xp and 2 promos (thanks to a Stable), and their spears with 3xp and one promo. So they will not even have the second promo, not talking about the third

3. With such a high base strength Jumbos potentially can be a very good attacking unit, because it will crush almost all defenses, but fortified in a city spears. Unfortunately with 1 move, attacking frontally we would give our opponents time to amass spears and sieging such cities can be unprofitable (Jumbo cost 60 hammers vs 35 of Spear).
But if we can catch them unguarded, like boating their backdoor coastal cities Our Jumbos would wreck havoc there . Boating Jumbos can be almost as good as boating Viking's Berserkers, but it's possible a waaayyy earlier So we should remember about a potential circumnavigating bonus for the speed 3 galleys, that could deliver our Jumbos fast


[SIZE="3"]Baray[/SIZE] - an aqueduct (100 hammers) with + 2 health and a bonus of +1 food.

1. It's a very expensive building for what it is doing. The early constrain is the happy bonus, not the health one. So we will have a very few occasions to see it appearing. It can be viable on a very health deficit map scripts, like Arboria, Boreal or Rainforest, but I doubt we are on any of that, but lack of crop at the start is striking . If we have no crops in our surroundings, our UB can be viable midgame.

2. With our Jumbos, we will hurry to Construction tech, and Mathematics is on the way. We can have a shot at Hanging Gardens sitting there, and with aqueduct prerequisite and being Industrious we have more incentives to try build Hanging Gardens than other civs.

3. Baray can also be good in some special circumstances, like our whipping Globe Theater farm. +1 food bonus can mean really much there.

4. If we have the Organized Religion civic on top of a Forge bonus we will have +50% building bonus, and our Baray steps down to around 70 hammers building. I am not sure but it can be viable at such price, at least at some cities.

[Mortius]

[SIZE="3"]Simulation - Excel format[/SIZE]

[SIZE="3"]Starting save for anyone to try[/SIZE]

[SIZE="3"]Turn 47 save[/SIZE]


[SIZE="5"]I. Turn 0-11. First Worker.[/SIZE]
No-brainer decisions here.

Working tiles: First we move our settler on the riverside plain hill, and then 10 turns working Deer for our first worker.

Production: Worker

Research: We start teching towards Animal Husbandry.

IMO we just don't have any other option here.


[SIZE="5"]II. Turn 11-18. First Growth.[/SIZE]
No-brainer decisions continued.

Working tiles: After our first worker, we need to grow a bit to work that new just improved tiles. There is only one way to go to size 2 - ... as fast as we can. And it means, working Sheep (3,0,1) until Deer is improved (4,2,0) and cruise with it to size 2. We just don't have anything viable to build to sacrifice our development for some additional hammers.

Production: Warrior.
We need to grow, so can't build workers or settlers. Apart from a warrior we can build only:
-a scout. We have one, and need no more. We don't have goody huts here.
-barracks. We don't need barracks so early, but we definitely need warriors.

Research: continuing Animal Husbandry => Bronze Working.
IMO the only viable choice here. We have Mining from the start, we already hooked our food, so what is more tempting than the best early tech: Bronze Working? IMO nothing. With Bronze Working we will know where we have our Copper, we can chop our Settlers and Wonders, we can revolt into slavery at the best possible moment - when the first Settler is in transit to a city site.
I don't see any tech better than that. Pottery is miles away (=>Wheel=>Fishing=>Pottery) and we still don't need it now. At the start the capital's main duty is to produce workers, settlers and military, and it means food and hammers, not coins.

Worker's actions: I would love to start with pasturing Sheep instead of camping Deer, but we just can't stay idle with our first worker for 2 turns, waiting for Animal Husbandry. So, the only path is camping Deer => pasturing Sheep.


[SIZE="5"]III. Turn 18-28. Heading to size 3.[/SIZE]
Still easy decisions.

Working tiles: Camped Deer, Pastured Sheep. No other option

Production: Worker, when hitting size 2 =>Warriors.
Why building a worker, and not a settler here? Because building a settler here means we will have 1 worker for 2 cities, and it means we can't further improve our capital, still chopping other settlers and wonders, and still improving the second city. We just can't do all the staff with a lonely worker. And it means a slow start for the second city, underdeveloped capital, and very slow next workers and settlers.

Research: continuing Bronze Working => Wheel.
Easy decision here. We need Wheel for Pottery, but we need Wheel for roads above all. We need to connect our second city and any strategic and happy resources we would have. Wheel will hit on 32 turn, exactly when we need it. It's 3 turns before our first settler. It's enough time to build some roads for a settler transit and future city connection. We receive +2 coins/turn from a trade route between our cities, hard to miss that.

Worker's actions: Mine riverside Grass Hill, Mine Plain Hill, start chopping.
At that stage, we can't do anything else These mines will soon be in high demand


[SIZE="5"]IV. Turn 28-35. Cruising towards the Settler.[/SIZE]
At last some interesting decisions here.

Working tiles: Camped Deer, Pastured Sheep, floodplains from size 3.
It's the place for our first not so obvious decision. Would we build our first settler at size 3 or at size 4?
Building the settler at size 3 means, we will have him 2 turns earlier (33) then building it at size 4 (35). Is it worth to delay our first settler by 2 turns. IMO it is.
1. Eventually, we need to go to size 4, and earlier we do it, earlier will we be working 4 improved tiles instead of 3. Building a settler at size 3 means we delay our growth by 5 turns, and it means 10 hammers lost (2 a turn). At the same time building a settler at size 4 means we delay our second city by 2 turns and it means 8 hammers/food lost (one hammer from the second city centre and 3 food/hammers combination from a tile a turn). So it's like loosing 10 hammers in our capital vs loosing 8 hammers in our second city. IMO hammers in the Capital > hammers in a second city. We need our capital to quickly build wonders, and we need that hammers.
2. We are not ready for a settler on turn 33, we have just discovered Wheel one turn before, and we can't connect two cities on time. In case we don't work any +coins tile in the second city, we loose two coins every turn the cities are not connected.
3. Chopping a settler at size 3 means our second worker have no time to mine the plain hill.
Summarizing all of that IMO means Settler at size 4> Settler at size 3.


Production: 2 Warriors, and then 5 hammers into barracks. Settler at size 4.
Why building barracks? Because we will have no time to finish the third warrior before hitting size 4. At size 4 we will be occupied over 15 turns with a worker, and a settler production and any hammers invested in a unit will rot to the ground. Hammers invested in a unit start roting after 10 turns, while hammers invested in a building start roting after 50 turns. The only building we can build at the moment to save the hammers are barracks.

Research: Wheel => Fishing
Why? We still don't need Mysticism yet, so we can cruise towards our second target after BW => Pottery and if the second city needs agriculture or fishing for it's food, we can address that issue too. I went the Fishing route, but if our second city would be in a different place, we can go Agriculture route just as well. Going the fishing route I still had 4 more turns to spare before we will need Mysticism for our Stonehenge, so we would have enough time to finish Agriculture.

Worker's actions: 2 chops for the Settler, and then roading towards the future city size, both to shorten the settler's transit and to connect both cities for trade route bonus.
Do we need to chop our first settler, or should we save the forests for wonders? Even at size 4 chopping the first settler speeds it up by 3 turns, and it's a lot, because it speeds up everything after it by 3 turns also, like our third worker, and the second settler, and the Stonehenge too.

Forgot about Revolution to Slavery We should revolt on 35 turn. Just when we have finished our first Settler. That way we don't delay the settler production (if the revolt is earlier) and at least will not lost production in our second city (if the revolt is later). The revolution hit when the settler is in transit to a city site


[SIZE="5"]V. Turn 35-47. Grabbing our first Wonder.[/SIZE]
It's a little tricky, but that's the place where the fun begins.

Working tiles: camped Deer, pastured Sheep, mined grass hill. And in exchange mined plain hill and a floodplain.
Working Deer, Sheep, and both hills we build workers and settler with the speed of 15 hammers/turn. It means a 4 turn worker and a 7 turn settler. But to prepare a big overflow we need to hit the magic number 69/100 with our second Settler, to do that we have to exchange a plain hill to a floodplain for 6 turns. In that time we earn one additional coin per turn, and the plain hill is used by our second city to build a work boat as fast as it can. And guess what. The second city needs the plain hill for that 6 turns I love where different things fit together

Production: Worker => Settler => 2 pop whip with overflow => Stonehenge.
Why building worker? Because if we build our second settler before the worker we would end in the same spot I described earlier. We would have more cities than workers, and it doesn't work well. Besides, after the whip we will need to grow a little from size 2, so it wouldn't be a time to build that missing worker. We can't do it while growing.
After the worker we produce the second settler for 4 turns and at 69/100 we 2-pop-whip him with exactly 40 overflow for the Stonehenge.
The beauty of this build is the fact, that we don't invest even a single hammer into Stonehenge until the very last turn when we are sure we will land it.
We are higher in turn order than our only Stonehenge competitor (Gillette Team), so in case we both build a wonder at the same turn, ... we will have it And thanks to a whip we still will have 2-4 forests (it depends on forest growth and the fogged tiles) for the upcoming Oracle.

Research: Fishing => Mysticism => Pottery
As I described earlier we can go as well Agriculture => Mysticism => Pottery, if our second city has some crop instead of Fish.

Worker's actions: We only need two chops for our capital here. So it means, all the other 20 worker turns we can use improving and chopping our second city and for roading to a third city location.



So, that's the end of my a little to long simulation I could be more brief here, but I like to cover every possible situation.
It has no sense to test it furher, as beyond the second city, to much depends on city locations we don't know yet.


If someone wanted to best it, please do it, I am pretty sure we can make some improvements. The starting save is included above.

[Lord Parkin]

Nice analysis. Couple of very minor corrections:

cheap forges (60 hammers instead of 120)

Actually it's +100% build speed, which is not necessarily the same thing. For instance, running Organized Religion would add to the bonus, making Forges cost ~54 hammers rather than 60. Still, much the same.

Rivers makes cottages start at (2,0,3) instead of (2,0,1) - it's a HUGE bonus. It TRIPLES!!! a cottaged tile commerce

Actually it's +50% relative to a non-Financial civ river cottage, and the percentage gain decreases as it grows... but it's still nice. The main point is that with equivalent land it pretty much equates to +1 commerce per tile throughout the entire game, which across a lot of tiles adds up to a lot of bonus beakers. Given that almost everyone is Financial the benefit will somewhat cancel out - but still, wouldn't want to be non-Financial when all the other teams are. Team Troll might have a little harder time keeping up... then again Sury of India is a pretty potent combo, so we'll see.

[With a Forge] a two pop whip gives 74 hammers instead of 60

Actually it's 75 hammers for a 2-pop whip with a Forge... the partial hammers (37.5 per citizen here) add up.

(Jumbo cost 60 hammers vs 35 of Spear).

Indeed, which is a key point... our opponents can produce (almost) 2 Spears in the time we can produce one Ballista Elephant. Still, if your opponents are forced to build more niche units (i.e. Spears) then they're not building as many general purpose units (e.g. Axes), which is good.

Boating Jumbos can be almost as good as boating Viking's Berserkers, but it's possible a waaayyy earlier

Not that much earlier, but certainly a bit earlier. Incidentally, we'll want to be watching out for a naval invasion from the Vikings. Fortunately we should be one of the least attractive targets for them, with our UU of equal strength to theirs but costing less hammers to produce.

So we should remember about a potential circumnavigating bonus for the speed 3 galleys, that could deliver our Jumbos fast

I'd just assumed circumnavigation will probably not be possible until post-Optics... but sure, if the map is arranged for it and we have a shot, we may as well go for it. If only to deny it to the Vikings.

[The Baray:] It's a very expensive building for what it is doing. The early constrain is the happy bonus, not the health one. So we will have a very few occasions to see it apperaing.

Agreed, it's not a UB we'll want to put particular focus on building. Still, it's a nice bonus if we decide to go for the Hanging Gardens, or in the Globe Theatre city later.

Priorities???:

1. LAND ORACLE!!!

Agreed! Possibly we could chop it out in a second city, rather than limiting our early chops in the capital... we should be able to tell whether or not this is viable after exploring the map a bit. The Oracle is a 5 chop build with no hammer input from the city; less if the city is contributing significant hammers of its own.

Wouldn't want to plan on an Oracle any later than about T60, as it usually tends to fall very quickly after that (or sometimes before).

[Mortius]

Agreed! Possibly we could chop [Oracle] it out in a second city, rather than limiting our early chops in the capital... we should be able to tell whether or not this is viable after exploring the map a bit.

Yeap, we can, but it would be lovely if we can build it in our Capital for GP points. Both Stonehenge and Oracle grant us +2 Great Prophet points for a total of 4. If we grab an early religion on the way to Priesthood, we would need a Great Prophet for a Shrine.
I am pretty sure, we can build the Oracle in our Capital the same time we can build it in the second city. 3 forests (90) and an overflow (45+) with some base hammers should be enough to build it at the next turn we discover Priesthood, or one turn later in the worst case scenario.

[kjn]

Wouldn't want to plan on an Oracle any later than about T60, as it usually tends to fall very quickly after that (or sometimes before).

That means we need to research Bronze Working, The Wheel, Agriculture OR Fishing, Mysticism, Polytheism OR Meditation, and Priesthood by T60.

That's 726 beakers (including AH) using the cheapest path. Checking my current sim (not the most efficient one), we have 359 on T32, getting 13 base beakers per turn, and have only researched techs with multipliers so far, and are quite a bit from Pottery. Doable, but tight. Maybe we should aim to do Pottery before BW? We have 11 hpt in our capital with just mines and the deer.

Also, do we want to do the Oracle BW -> rush Forge -> run engineer -> hurry Pyramids gambit? If we want to do that, then we have to avoid Stonehenge, I think, or have three cities to split our GPP around.

[Mortius]

Also, do we want to do the Oracle BW -> rush Forge -> run engineer -> hurry Pyramids gambit?

The lonely engineer can gives us 3 Great Engineer points a turn. So, he could spawn the Great Engineer after 34 turns. Taking into account we need at least 65 turns to go for the Oracle and build a forge. It means around 100 turn Pyramids. Not too fast, I am afraid

[Sareln]

The lonely engineer can gives us 3 Great Engineer points a turn. So, he could spawn the Great Engineer after 34 turns. Taking into account we need at least 65 turns to go for the Oracle and build a forge. It means around 100 turn Pyramids. Not too fast, I am afraid

Is there another wonder we'd want around T100? Say MoM? Though with IND I think w/ proper planning we don't need a GE to rush reasonably costed wonders. Maybe if we wanted to go full Monk we could use it to rush the AP...

[Elkad]

- [SIZE="3"]Production boost with cheap forges. [/SIZE]
A Forge is the only building that gives production multiplier in that game (I assume we will not get to Industrialism in a one continent, no tech trading game )

I've played more no-trading games that got to Industrialism, than those that didn't. Diplo is still on, people will make peace deals. I'm currently in a Pangaea game with 4 civs at Industrialism, 3 minor civs still alive, and wars with giant (200+ unit) stacks on multiple sides.

Not saying your analysis is wrong, just don't expect the game to be over early.

[Mortius]

I've played more no-trading games that got to Industrialism, than those that didn't. Diplo is still on, people will make peace deals. I'm currently in a Pangaea game with 4 civs at Industrialism, 3 minor civs still alive, and wars with giant (200+ unit) stacks on multiple sides.

Not saying your analysis is wrong, just don't expect the game to be over early.

I think ... we will see

[Lord Parkin]

Yeap, we can, but it would be lovely if we can build it in our Capital for GP points. Both Stonehenge and Oracle grant us +2 Great Prophet points for a total of 4.

Fair point, this is quite a nice aspect of getting both wonders in the capital. Though then it makes an early Great Scientist trickier (which is vital for an early Academy).

If we grab an early religion on the way to Priesthood, we would need a Great Prophet for a Shrine.

I would not expect there to be any early religions available by the time we start heading for Priesthood. It would be nice if there were, of course, but I wouldn't plan on it given that there are two other civs which start with Mysticism.

A Great Prophet would let us bulb Theology though, for instance, so we should be guaranteed a religion at some point regardless. Or if we're generating them quickly then we could settle the first one for a very nice early 2h/5c benefit.

I am pretty sure, we can build the Oracle in our Capital the same time we can build it in the second city. 3 forests (90) and an overflow (45+) with some base hammers should be enough to build it at the next turn we discover Priesthood, or one turn later in the worst case scenario.

Yeah, if we time a whip well then we should only need 3 forests, 4 at most to build the Oracle. Whether in the capital or another city.

That means we need to research Bronze Working, The Wheel, Agriculture OR Fishing, Mysticism, Polytheism OR Meditation, and Priesthood by T60.

Maybe we should aim to do Pottery before BW?

Possibly. I'll test some early Pottery variants soon.

Also, do we want to do the Oracle BW -> rush Forge -> run engineer -> hurry Pyramids gambit? If we want to do that, then we have to avoid Stonehenge, I think, or have three cities to split our GPP around.

Fair point. Generally Engineer-rushing the Pyramids takes longer than someone with Stone building them from scratch though, so I'm not sure we'd want to go this route. T100 is 375 BC, and from my experience the Pyramids usually fall earlier than that.

Is there another wonder we'd want around T100? Say MoM?

Bit early for MoM on Normal speed I think; usually it comes in ~T120 or after.

Though with IND I think w/ proper planning we don't need a GE to rush reasonably costed wonders. Maybe if we wanted to go full Monk we could use it to rush the AP...

Probably not necessary... if we bulb Theology and get it early, we can build the AP normally and beat everyone else due to no-one else having the tech.

I've played more no-trading games that got to Industrialism, than those that didn't. Diplo is still on, people will make peace deals. I'm currently in a Pangaea game with 4 civs at Industrialism, 3 minor civs still alive, and wars with giant (200+ unit) stacks on multiple sides.

Not saying your analysis is wrong, just don't expect the game to be over early.

I wouldn't be surprised if we're still going into the Industrial age. Only question is whether the game will still be balanced at that point, or whether one nation will be far ahead and everyone will just about be ready to concede.