[Spoilers] Chevalier Gives You Something to Cry Aboot

[TheArchduke]

Nods, taking over.

Have no fear both, I stick with the consensus and will not try to push us into a rush.

What should be the priority after irrigation? Preresearch Writing?

[TheArchduke]

Could not catch the save as it came in too late and I had a hectic weekend.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 26

C'mon.

[Jabah]

Ouch !
For dry Kings I would suggest having the aqueduct SE to increase adjency of all districts and save the river forest to be lumbermilled (except if chops are badly needed)

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 27

Nothing really happening. Scoreboard is depressing because everyone else is happy with their second cities and their total absence of barbarians and their lands overflowing with milk and honey, while we struggle 'twixt tundra and desert, slinger and scout, the devil and the deep blue sea. Am I the only player who went scout first and that's why I'm getting punished by barbarians? Or did I just roll a pair of snake eyes, with 3 barb camps spawning near me in less than 30 turns? Seems a bit mean of the game, given that we're ALREADY playing Canada and we ALREADY have pretty terrible land in general (I don't mean to channel superdeath, but, c'mon guys, look at what I'm working with here in terms of expansion prospects. A dry aqueduct city is literally our best option for city #2, unless I'm missing something blindingly obvious the lurkers are mocking me for, or would be if we had any lurkers). But the ways of RNGesus are not to be questioned. He causeth it to barb on the righteous and the unrighteous, still will the name of RNGesus be praised.

Well, hopefully falling behind in this stage won't be too fatal. We'll only be a few turns behind, and while I know small advantages pile up, the pendulum should start to swing our way (unless we lose crucial settling races, but I haven't met anyone yet). 






Jabah, it looks to me like the tradeoff between a mine and a riverside lumbermill is about the same, with the benefit that I can chop the forest to get some needed production that I won't get otherwise. The half-adjacency would add 1 science to the campus, but it would also mean giving up a spot next to the GP forever, where I might stick an IZ or something there down the line to get the same adjacency and profit more from the plaza. Heh, now that I look at it, every single hill in that area has a district pinned to it now. Must remember not to go nuts with builders there. 

I dunno, Archduke, Sullla, what do you think? River aqueduct or mountain aqueduct for Kings? We have quite some time to debate it, since Construction is a ways away still.

[TheArchduke]

Phew, dry kings is starved for food more then production. I would go mountain aqueduct.

[Sullla]

An aqueduct placement can be decided 30-40 turns down the road when there's more information available. It's not important at the moment.

I would suggest moving the worker + warrior combo onto the sheep hill next turn. Yes it lets the slinger fire at the warrior but it gets the sheep improved a turn sooner and it will also allow the warrior to start attacking back without having to suffer the river crossing penalty. The capital should be able to 3-turn a Canadian slinger next which might even be able to land the last hit on that barbarian unit for the Archery boost. Hopefully the struggle against the barbarians will start turning the corner soon.

[williams482]

Rivers no longer boost lumbermills, so you're going to be better off keeping the hills and Plaza adjacencies.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Phew, dry kings is starved for food more then production. I would go mountain aqueduct.

Rivers no longer boost lumbermills, so you're going to be better off keeping the hills and Plaza adjacencies.

Whaaaaaat, they changed lumbermills? I missed that update. So production-wise, long-term it'd be optimal to chop the forest and mine the hill. Archduke, Kings has lots of hills, but notice that eventually most of those will be paved over with districts. It's going to steadily lose its production as the game goes on. Food-wise...yeah, not much better either. The rice is the only source of food, really. I wonder if Petra would be viable here, to boost the second-ring tiles? But none of those are really worth working, either, even with +2f1h. It'd take years to pay back the production cost, probably not worth it. Oh well, just an idle thought. 

An aqueduct placement can be decided 30-40 turns down the road when there's more information available. It's not important at the moment.

I would suggest moving the worker + warrior combo onto the sheep hill next turn. Yes it lets the slinger fire at the warrior but it gets the sheep improved a turn sooner and it will also allow the warrior to start attacking back without having to suffer the river crossing penalty. The capital should be able to 3-turn a Canadian slinger next which might even be able to land the last hit on that barbarian unit for the Archery boost. Hopefully the struggle against the barbarians will start turning the corner soon.

No pictures 'coz I'm at work, but last turn the slinger moved NE, pursuing our scout and settler. The way was clear for the builder and warrior, so I stepped across, covering the builder with the warrior - in retrospect should have split them and sent the warrior due E, bordering the slinger, so I could attack next turn. Oh, well. We'll see if the slinger keeps pursuing the colonial convoy or if he comes back to confront the units in the open.

Kings is founded in 2 turns, which is when I'll start marching our wounded tundra warrior back. We need to determine Kings' first build when it does. I see three possibilities:


1)Monument and builder are obvious no-nos. We're purchasing the builder and we are covered on culture via GotOS temporarily. 
2)A granary is most important economically, to lift the housing cap and get a trickle of food in the city center. However, it's expensive and will take time.
3)More urgent is a military build, due to the horse camp present 3 tiles from the city center (threatening camp, worth extra era points for clearing). What build should that be?
a)A slinger is slightly cheaper still, but won't be able to stand up to horses outside the city center and I think will be of minimal use in covering our improvements.
b)a warrior will take 1-2 turns longer, but will be able to fight horses. 

Accordingly, I lean towards a warrior-first build to take advantage of Agoge and get a covering unit in place (Blues' warrior could be shifted up, I suppose), followed by a granary.

[Sullla]

Yes, lumbermills are significantly stronger in Gathering Storm and there's much more of a question about whether to chop forests, especially non-hill forest tiles. All lumbermills get +2 production by default (making them essentially equal to post-Apprenticeship mines instead of being inferior) and they get a further +1 production at Steel tech and then another +1 production at Cybernetics, not that that matters. Lumbermills are also buildable on rainforest tiles now after reaching Mercantilism civic. The river thing simply doesn't exist any more. Definitely important information to keep in mind when planning for cities.

Kings gets the instant builder purchase on the first turn of course to improve the local rice + horses, and then the wines tiles at the capital. It should work the 1/3 forested plains hill tile until the rice + horses are improved, then the horse pasture to size 2 (since the rice + horses grant a point of housing), then the horses pasture plus the 1/3 forest plains hill again after growing. No point in working the rice tile while suffering from the housing penalty. I strongly suggest getting a warrior out of Kings while the empire is running Agoge and then the group can re-evaluate in 5-6 turns when State Workforce civic finishes and Agoge gets dropped. If the capital can get 2-3 units out while in Agoge, plus adding a warrior from the second city, plus the starting warrior once it heals back to full, that should be enough military for the early game.