The Dark arts - C&D Master Thread

[kjn]

So they have more pop to whip the Taj with, third ring forests, similar hammers/turn, access to marble, and the same civic bonuses. It is unknown whether they have whip cascade hammers, but even if they don't I suspect we'll have to whip the wonder.

You forget that Novice set us up with 270+ hammers on the very first turn. That should be worth at least 6 whipped pop into a wonder otherwise. And it's a fourth-ring forest (singular) for them. And they haven't started Taj yet, since it would be 0 hammers invested if they started it this turn.

Yeah, we're in a race, but the worst thing we can do is to panic.

[regoarrarr]

It's the muscle car analogy again. When the turn rolls, we can use the espionage numbers to calculate how many hammers they have in, and project some assumptions from there, and figure out what we need to do

[darrelljs]

Yeah, we're in a race, but the worst thing we can do is to panic.

The worst thing we can do is allow them to steal the wonder through complacency, but I don't see that as likely with this team .

Darrell

[NobleHelium]

IMPORTANT: CFC actually has two fourth ring forests to chop. The forest south of the tundra forest mentioned by Sulla is also fourth ring to Indira.

[kjn]

T132 C&D notes

I'm going to skip the Taj Mahal build tracking and theorising here - see the turn discussion thread for details.

There are currently 5 teams knowing Metal Casting tech, up from 4 last turn. The confirmed teams knowing MC are Apolyton and CFC. I think CivFr researched it T125, and that CivPlayers researched it this turn. I'm a little unclear on the last team. GNP tracking implies it was done T129, which would give it to the Germans.

WPC grew Hill to the Sky to size 9. I currently have 13 score unassigned to them, probably a mix of land, pop, and an ancient tech. WPC has also built a colosseum in Hill to the Sky.

The Spanish grew KwaDukuza to size 7, and received a bunch of land points. They are the rival worst in both land (they had 114 tiles on T112), geometric population (1003k), and total pop (36). Of note is that their two most recent cities still has barely grown, too. Nongoma (founded T118) should be size 2; and Chinook (captured T119) is still size 1.

Apolyton did a surprise move this turn: they moved their capital to Aurora! Given the way they've expanded mainly westwards, this probably saved them some maintenance, and they get the Bureaucracy bonus on their gold. Aurora is their prime commerce city, too. Apolyton the city is more geared towards production, I think. They researched Archery this turn. I have 17 unassigned score for them, mostly pop I guess, with some land. Or they have a national wonder in some city that we don't have visibility on yet.

The Germans grew 4 pop (in Wittenberge, Wanzleben, Weil der Stadt, and Westheim), and they also received some land score. I think the 13 unassigned score is a mix of land and an ancient tech.

CivFr gained 18 score this turn, the rival best in population stayed constant. I think they researched a classical tech and received some land score. With the huge drops in rival GNP from last turn I put them down for Code of Laws. Or they researched CoL on T127, and Civil Service this turn, without any land score this turn. On second thought, I think the latter is the most likely. That would give them 30 unassigned score currently.

CivPlayers gained 22 score this turn. They grew at least two cities (Texcoco and Tzintzuntzen), and I think they researched Metal Casting this turn. I have 47 (!) unassigned score for them, likely a mix of pop, classical techs, and land, and maybe even a national wonder.

CFC 3-pop-whipped the city of Raj last turn (9->6), and with no new buildings it's a settler whip. They also grew the cities of Indira (size 15), their stupid border city (aka Lokapara, size 6), and Hansa (size 4). They built the Moai statues in Abhi. No new techs. They have 98 total pop.

Univers is the lead in pop again, with 14%. This puts them at at least 99 pop (one more than CFC). They have some unassigned score (7) which I think mainly is land.

F8 tracking currently has 21 pop unassigned (50 score), which I think mainly belongs to CivFr and CivPlayers. I also has circa 70 land tiles (49 score), and a total circa 120 unassigned score.

[Ubercannon]

Kjn, is the tech section on the spreadsheet for apolyton up to date? If it is, then they just went ten turns without any new techs, only to research... archery. Which probably means they're sandbagging beakers just like we did for some reason, although I have no idea why they'd do that now with liberalism gone.

[kjn]

Good question, but we have had perfect research visibility on Apolyton since T100, when they researched Alphabet. It is quite likely they did something similar to us, in pre-researching various techs to build up overflow, so they could one-turn Liberalism after Education.

Here are the tech trading screens for T122 and T132. Not shown for Apolyton are Construction and Machinery (and IW on T122):

T122 tech trading screen:


T132 tech trading screen:

Anyway, CFC 2-pop-whipped their stupid border city of Lokapara, going from 8 to 83 hammers. Not sure what they're whipping. It's not enough for a library, a temple would be a 1-pop whip, it's not a theatre (they don't have Drama), and a barracks would make no sense. Most likely options would be a lighthouse (but the city has plenty of land tiles to work and no sea resources) or a monastery. We'll see next turn.

[Ubercannon]

Hmm, seems strange that they would keep on doing it after we already got liberalism though. Oh well. Maybe they just didn't see the notification.

[kjn]

It might be that they're just at the point where they would start their cascade anyway, or they're aborting it by picking up all the partially-researched techs now.

I very much expect them to claim several techs over the next few turns. Education for sure, and maybe another classical tech (IW, Construction, and Calendar are good candidates). Most interesting will be to see what they pick up instead of Liberalism. One strong option for them would be to gun through the the middle of the medieval tree with Machinery, Feudalism, Engineering, and Guilds using their overflow beakers.

[kjn]

I've been busy with going through the new map data that we received from WPC, and while we haven't thought highly of WPC's play so far, here are a few more things to ponder:




Their scouting has been abysmal. The new map info basically consists of WPC's land, the small bit of tundra to their northeast, and the westernmost strip of Univers' land.




This is their city of Southron Shores, founded T105, ie 28 turns ago. It's still size 2, doesn't have a single developed tile - even less a road connection! Granted, WPC doesn't have IW yet, but they can build road and cottage grassland.




Their city of Great Plains, founded T88. It's size 8 with a totem pole, granary, barracks, and library, so it has a nice collection of infrastructure. But note the wheat to its northwest - totally unimproved! Dry wheat is hardly the most exciting tile, but 4-1 is nothing to sneeze at.

One thing I'm curious about is the two extra cities with Hinduism in their land, however. I haven't been able to find a Hindu monastery in their cities, and they're not in OR. I doubt they've bought missionaries from Univers, so I guess they're lucky natural spreads.

Another thing to note is how cramped they are. We are running out of good land to settle, but at least we're up to 18 cities. They have 10, and they're squeezed by the Germans from the west and Univers from the west. They have tundra with some resources to their northeast (deer, copper, and whale) but nothing that will make for at least a half-decent city, and there is room to their southwest too, but that area is jungled and have no resources beyond the banana south of Southron Shores.

This also shows in their expansion, where they allowed Univers to pick up plenty of land:

First they moved westwards, away from Univers.

Second, the only city to their east was Hill to the Sky (T61), until they settled Fields of Color in T101, Southron Shores in T105, Sunrise in T107 and Erie in T108 (and Arctica T111). I really doubt they had the worker labour to support four cities relatively quickly, and it shows.

Contrast this with Univers, who settled Yapamordum in T85 and Bibendum in T92!