Suboptimal IV: Indonesian Insanity

[suboptimal]

Turn 32

Open the save to an uneventful turn. I’m going to make two guesses about the current map situation:

- I’m on a continent with two players, not three. If there were three here then either I’m VERY isolated or I would have met someone by now.
- Given how many times I’ve heard the city-state cash register after hitting “next turn” (I think three), Woden is not one of them.

Internationally Rowain has founded his second city and completed a second civic. Woden & Archduke have completed a tech, Alhazard has finished a second civic.

At the capital the builder farms Yosemite Plains for an extra food and the Craftsmanship inspiration. When going to hit the farm button I noticed that I missed something about the land near that barbarian camp. The camp’s eastern side is cliffs, as is the western edge of the tundra on “my” side of the bay. That camp may be on an island after all.

Up north the warrior continues moving along the coast – I’ll uncover a few more tiles here and then leave it for the galleys to check out. I said last turn that the eastern warrior would sit tight for a turn or two. However, if the camp were to start spawning during the interturn my warrior would probably be dead. I kill the spearman and take the camp, leaving myself at 1 damage. I’ll have a couple of turns to heal before the scout comes raging, so that’s OK. I get 2 era points, pushing me into Normal Age territory, and the eureka for Bronze Working (now two turns left). Eleven points to go (Kampung: 4, Shipbuilding: 3, Galley: 2 or 3, Suzerain Nan Madol: 2, Tier 1 Government: 2 or 3, Meet Someone: 1)

[suboptimal]

Turn 33

There’s going to be a (ever so) slight more to do this turn than just moving a couple of units. Up at Punky’s there’s a third population and the inspiration for Early Empire is in. I set it to work the 1:food/2roduction plains forested hill east of the city center. This will get some more production into the first galley before we start chopping. Of course, this tile is second on the chopping block.

Down at Sound of Silence the builder is complete and moves to the forest SE of the sugar. Two more turns of movement and then I’ll be ready to chop out the first galley. Start a slinger, it’s got three turns left BUT it’s also time to change the city’s micro a bit. I need to up the science rate in order to feed the hungry mouth that is Shipbuilding. The GFH is out and the pearls are in. The net change is -2, +2, +1 and +1. That also slows down the slinger build but moves our yields to 12.6, 11.5 and 5.1 per turn. Not too shabby.

Out east the warrior fortifies in place to start healing. In the north we continue the coastal exploration. We don’t find any sea resources but do re-locate the Carthaginian warrior SE of the sugar.

Cornflakes, as an update to the micro situation:
- we’re on track for chopping the first galley, completing Mysticism and suzeraining Nan Madol on Turn 36
- the second galley will be out on Turn 38
- Shipbuilding should complete EoT 39
- we’ll have our first Kampung and Bronze Working should complete EoT40

[Cornflakes]

First galley goes northeast? 2nd south?

After slinger, are you planning 1x warrior or 2x slinger?

[suboptimal]

I want to send the first galley north. However, the barbarian quadrireme to the south almost requires sending both boats south at once to deal with the threat. Otherwise just sending one boat south would get it killed.

I'm going slinger -> warrior -> settler -> Holy Site at the capital. I intend on sending the slinger up to Punky's so that if the quadrireme comes up there I can shoot it with something. Once the holy sites and government plaza are in it'll be more slingers for everyone with plans to upgrade to archers once I've got a gaggle. The government plaza won't get the discount because Encampments will have been unlocked before I place it.

[Cornflakes]

I want to send the first galley north. However, the barbarian quadrireme to the south almost requires sending both boats south at once to deal with the threat. Otherwise just sending one boat south would get it killed.

Good point. I ran a couple scenarios in my battle sim sheet and the only way you could defeat the quad with a single galley is by attacking and retreating into your city to heal. That would be slow and painful. You can use the first galley to lure it closer, and then attack twice when you chop out the 2nd. One of your galleys takes a hit, and then the more damaged galley can likely kill the Quad while the less-damaged galley heals for a turn and then heads north. Overall delays scouting of the north but I don't think you have a choice.

[suboptimal]

Turn 34

Open the turn, no notifications. Check the galley build at Punky’s, we’re at 51/65 with another 12 coming in next turn. I’ll let it go one more, then spend Turn 35’s production on the builder. Speaking of builders, the builder moves one tile closer to the city. Out east the warrior has been left alone and will stay put to continue healing. In the north the warrior moves to a hilltop and exposes some more shoreline – and finds the first stone resource of the game. I think in smiley speak that goes something like . Both tiles are coastal. I may continue moving around the coast if the Carthaginian warrior gets out of the way.




We remain in first in all categories except Milpower, where we reside at a pitiful 12. Fortunately no one else can see that number right now and CQUI is reporting us at 28 (which is still half of the next closest person). Archduke, according to CQUI, is at 78. This is not a surprise.

[suboptimal]

Turn 35

No notifications on starting the turn. Up at Punky’s the galley is at 63/65. Switch production to a builder. Existing builder moves into position, next turn it chops. Down at the capital the slinger will complete next turn. Eastern warrior sits. Northern warrrior moves towards the furs at the corner. That’s a hill tile so it’ll give me good visibility to the north and east. Once I see what’s there I’ll decide if I continue probing north or bring the warrior back.

[suboptimal]

Turn 36






Culture generation rises from 5.3 per turn to...9.4 per turn. Two era points in the bag. Time for more.






First in the world with a boat! Three more era points tallied, six more to go and those are almost guaranteed – 4 from the Kampung and 2 from Shipbuilding.

Punky’s puts a second galley in the queue to capture overflow from the chop. 63 + 58 – 65 = 56. Time to get Punky’s production down….I move a citizen from the forested plains to the coast. That removes four production from the EoT yield and puts the galley back up to two turns. Next turn I’ll go back to the builder for a turn and move the builder to the next forest. Turn 38 I’ll chop the forest, complete the galley, overflow completes the builder on Turn 39. The copper gets mined and a kampung gets placed on Turn 40 (Shipbuilding completes EoT 39).

Down at Sound of Silence there’s a new population to deal with. It’s been auto-assigned to the GFH tile to the east. I leave it there as the extra science from working the lake is not enough to move Shipbuilding up a turn. The capital starts a warrior. I leave the slinger in the city for the time being. When the galleys come down to deal with the quadrireme I’ll try to get positioned so that the slinger can fire from genius cows.

I start Early Empire and that will complete in 5 turns, just in time to start a settler in both of my cities (well, Sound will get one turn of production without Colonization, but that’s OK). No policy changes right now. When Early Empire completes I’ll put Colonization in, then sit tight until Craftsmanship is done and then get Agoge into play.

Up north the warrior summits the hill and just sees the continuation of Carthage’s river. The west bank is jungle, the east bank is forest. At Punky’s I send the galley due west to the pearls, just to defog the coast. I figured there would be nothing out there but lo and behold…




This bears investigating. Even better, Settlervision shows that both tiles are fresh water – the coastline just visible to the west is a lake. And there’s whales! I have to assume that this is an island, perhaps part of a island bridge between continents, perhaps not. It’s definitely not going to be the main body of the other continent. I’m going to scout a little more while I wait for galley #2, for sure. There might be a change of plans coming...fog-gazing shows that the coast continues south (W-SW of the southern peals) and 2SW of the pearls is coast:




How I explore, though, will be dictated by the barbarian quadrireme, presently SE of the crabs.

Eastern warrior sits tight and continues healing unmolested.

Internationally, Woden lost a population, so he’s got a settler out. Archduke gained a population. We’re the first to a third civic. Next turn I get to see where I wind up in the military score.

Oh yeah, one more picture. Almost forgot that by suzeraining Nan Madol I get full visibility of its scouted area and units:

[Cornflakes]

How much would it cost to levy Nan Madol's military? It looks like they have 2 warrior so it might be pretty cheap. You could skip the current warrior build (not boosted by Agoge) and put that production instead into the Holy Site, bringing 1 of the CS warriors closer to home to guard settlers while the farther warrior continues to scout inland. [EDIT: not saying this is the best way to spend precious gold, but something to think about ... I don't think I've ever been in a position like this with a super early Suzerain]

Even if you don't levy the military I'd still be curious to know how much it costs for future reference. I know it's somehow correlated to the military strength of the CS units. With 2 warriors I'd expect it to be some multiple of 40 ... maybe 160 (2x military strength?)

[suboptimal]

The current cost to levy Nan Madol's units is 80, which is 2x their current strength. I can't find any links on it but part of me recalls something like [Total Str] * 2 * [Age + 1], so Classical would cost 160 for the same two warriors. If we push eastwards with the settlers I don't know that we'd need the units to escort - the eastern warrior would be healed and back at the capital by the time its settler is done.

Unorthodox idea - levy the units now and send both north. A scout costs 120 and starts at the capital - we'd get two more combat-capable scouts for 2/3 the cost. The downside is that when the levy breaks (song pun fully intended) any player that sees the units will know that Nan Madol is around if they haven't found it already. I also don't know if they know the units are levied when they meet them. The cost is....7 turns of gold at the current income. If they find and kill a barbarian camp en route they've almost paid for themselves. Any reason not to do this next turn?

The discovery of land to the west opens up some interesting possibilities...and questions.

- current settling targets are the dyes north of Punky's, the river location and the east coast
- what would count as "good enough" on the island to divert one of the next three settlers (EoT 46, EoT51, T61 purchased with Monumentality) west instead of east?

I am also very cognizant of the fact that once someone meets us our science, culture and gold generation will most likely get us labeled as "formative snowball" and put a very large target on our backs. Our isolated position helps but a land military push after the settlers is in the cards. I'd like to get 3-4 slingers and a couple more warriors around the core and have some stockpiled cash for upgrades if needed.