The Quarterdeck - Turn Discussion Thread

[Cornflakes]

I tried the stitching program on the tech screen and couldn't get it to work correctly. For some reason it cut out anything to the left of Civil Service.

I also tried the Stitching program on the map for this game. You'll notice lettered signs in game that I used for reference east/west. I took about 45 pictures and the program stitched them together nicely, but since this was torroidal it required pasting 4 of the already massive pictures together in paint to get a good feel for the wraps (in PB9 I just used 2 because that was sufficient for the cylindrical map). The Paint pasting for the N/S wrap is a bit awkward looking but it's still manageable.

The file is 10MB! I've put it in spoilers, but if you're on a mobile device or a slow internet connection you definitely don't want to click this spoiler!

I tried attaching the photo but it's too large for the forum. You can download it if you want by right-click > save image (It's much easier to zoom and pan around in a picture viewer rather than the browser ... plus it can be marked up in paint)

Here is a link for the Microsoft Image Composite Editor that I used (64bit version linked, but there may also be a 32bit version somewhere)

[Cornflakes]

Ok, I've confirmed that I can get out 2 GP's in the 5-turn caste/pacifism window. One each from Sale and Ile a Vach, and on successive turns by popping the GA immediately and starving a single pop, or a turn or two later if we wait to pop the GA and/or revolt away from Cast. Below are screenshots of the two cities




Barracks isn't a pressing build here. Swap off hill/plains tiles to coast for more food (the extra food starting this turn is important).




Courthouse only saves us 3gpt so can be delayed without much consequence. The extra food here starting this turn is important as well.




Here's my plan for the 2 GP. We can definitely get out a 3rd GP by the end of the GA (EDIT: I can get it out 4-turns into the GA by starving 4 pop from Salem which will quickly regrow). Options to consider are the 2-man GA or 2 more academies. Right now capital gets 80 commerce. For comparison our 2nd and 3rd commerce cities get 59 and 54 commerce respectively. Plus we'll have a few more towns maturing and we ca shuffle tiles for max effect. Plus Free Speech will add another 15 commerce to each of our commerce cities. 2 more academies will be really powerful, but another back-to-back GA will also be really powerful. My preliminary preference is to pop the 1-man GA and then build the academies with the extra GP generated from these 2 cities. By the time the first GA ends we'll have the NE up and running and can generate 2 more GP for the 2-man GA, which will be even more powerful because of the extra academies in place.

I have the revolt counter ticking, starting at it's current 5-turns since we just revolted into Mercantilism. Coming soonis what I think we should do regarding tech path and civics.

[Cornflakes]

1) Finish Literature and then hit Democracy. Democracy should take 4 turns after Lit, which times perfectly for revolting if we want ... but I don't think it's a good idea quite yet. I think at the revolt in 5 turns we go Rep/Bureau/Caste/Merc/Pacifism. We'll be running about 15 extra scientists for 5 turns to get the GP's so I think that Rep is definitely the choice here over UniSuffrage hammers, especially since about half of our cottages haven't fully matured. We have a lot of villages due to mature in the next 20 turns and the cottage civics will then be really powerful.

2) After Democracy we go for Liberalism/Economics. Cost is the same for both and order is irrelevant. These will both be done before the 5-turns revolt timer from Caste/Pacifism is up. After the 5-turns we swap to UniSuffrage/Bureau/Caste/FreeMarket/Pacifism. We can have a 2nd academy up in 1-2 more turns, with a 3rd following 2-3 turns later around the time of the next civics swap opportunity. I think Bureaucracy still is better than Free Speech, but maybe not.

3) After Liberalism we hit Corporation for the extra Trade Routes. This is also a pre-req for Assembly line, which I think should be our next major tech objective after the civics/economics techs.

[Cornflakes]

The next civics swap comes about when the GA ends. I think at that time we drop into UniSuffrage/FreeSpeech/Emancipation/FreeMarket/SomeReligiousCivic. Free Speech because with 3 academies and much empire-wide cottage spam the balance has now shifted away from the capital and spread out. Emancipation because we'll still have 20 villages that get sped up a turn for each turn of Emancipation. We may need Slavery at this point to do a round of whipping, but since we'll still be in the GA I think it's ok. This is 15 turns away though and too far to tell.

What are your thoughts regarding my proposed tech path? Upon further consideration I'm thinking that the tech path should be:

Literature (1) > Democracy (4) > Economics (2) > Corporation (3) > Liberalism (2)

[thestick]

Only question with Free Market is how long we're planning on staying in it before we hit State Property. (Will check how much distance maintanence is when I play the turn in a minute) I think we should go for Railroads before Assembly Line, the hammer boost doesn't require additional hammers and it opens up Cannons/Machine Guns.

Give me a second to check if the +2 commerce per town is worth the ~100 beakers from swapping out of Bureaucracy...

[thestick]

Well, Bureaucracy still comes out ahead over Free Speech at the moment - even discounting the capital's higher multipliers we lose 40 base commerce and gain about 30 base commerce.

Free Market seems to beat out State Property - distance maintanence empirewide is 27 gold. We have 12 cities, Free Market gives them at least 3 commerce per city... of course that's discounting the Workshop bonus.

Since we're staying in Mercantilism for the GA, I think we should go for Democracy and get a head start on the Statue.

Are we planning on making those Specialists Merchants for the raw beakers or Scientists for Academies? Let me check the bulb list...

Hobyo, the iron filler, was settled, bringing breakeven to about 720 BPT.

How about New York for one of the starving cities?



We can swap the southern town and Horse to Maracaibo.

[thestick]

Scientist bulbs Scientific Method and Merchant bulbs Economics, but we're far enough and GAs are cheap enough that we shouldn't be bulbing.

Almost forgot, National Epic in Havana:



(I agree, it's probably a crime this thing isn't maxed out yet)

[Cornflakes]

Well, Bureaucracy still comes out ahead over Free Speech at the moment - even discounting the capital's higher multipliers we lose 40 base commerce and gain about 30 base commerce.

Right, we still only have about 50% of our cottages matured. In maybe 15 turn the balance will be about equal, and if we add another 2 academies the balance will shift away from Bureaucracy towards Free Speech.

We really need health! I think we should offer 10gpt to Gillette for Rice. Rice is multiplied by Granary so it's worth 2 health in every city.

I think we should get 1 merchant and 2 scientists (in that order). Since our beaker modifier is so much higher we can use a merchant to pop the GA. After the first for the GA I think we do 2 scientists from Ile a Vache and Sale. Put an Academy in Santiago for sure, and the either Maracaibo or San Juan. I'll look at New York and see about getting a GP from there. I think we can. After that it'll probably be all from Havana.

[Cornflakes]

Santiago will be getting 80+ commerce if we take over those GREEN tiles. This is another great location for an Academy. It'll get us 80 commerce * 0.75 slider = 60 beakers per turn.




Havana can get to +14 food surplus at size 7 working the GREEN tiles indicated This will allow us to support 7 specialists. We should get those farms built ASAP. I vote we swap that Deer over to Santiago immediately so that we can begin growing (dropping the plains hamlet at Santiago and picking up a soon-to-be-built farm). We'll lose a little food in Havana until we get another farm or 2 built but that is not important because after the NE completes we'll quickly grow a couple more pop once we swap off the hills to farms. We want Santiago to grow 3 more pop quickly so that it can take over the shared-with-Havana towns when Havana goes to specialists after NE.

[thestick]

Just realized, if we're getting our National Epic online by the end of our 1-man Golden Age what's the point of starving to get more Great Scientists...?