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(April 6th, 2018, 16:59)Chevalier Mal Fet Wrote: John the Baptist emerges in Just Read the Instructions (historical footage of the event), and leads his followers on a pilgrimage out of the city to the nearby Stonehenge. There, he preaches and teaches the way of The Culture:
Stolen footage of the reaction of the high shamans of the other civilizations.
Quote:The worse news is from further abroad. Emperor is under attack from the Archduke!
I suppose it's possible that Emperor started this war, but c'mon. First of all, it's the Archduke. Second of all, he's Genghis Khan. Third of all, his military score is higher than Emperor's. I'm not sure how high exactly, since I haven't yet met him, but I would bet that Archduke wouldn't invade without a significant advantage.
How to interpret this situation? Let's go step by step and break it down as much as we can. First, the Mongol motivation:
I can't say without seeing the map over there, but there are three possibilities, as I see it.
1)This is a minor border skirmish. Archduke wanted to pillage a trader, or builder, or clear away an annoying scout. Hopefully this is the case.
2)This is a more serious incursion, with Archduke aiming to take or raze an annoying border city. Emperor only has 1 extra city, but if it's as close to me as Japper's second city is, or Alhambram's third, a military response is totally feasible.
3)This is an attempt at out-and-out conquest of Emperor. It's a very ambitious move - an all-out assault this early into the game. It would mean Archduke would have gambled his entire civ's fortunes on this attack - he'd have no districts, late or non-existent third and fourth cities, low research rates...uh. Hm. Now I'm a bit worried.
Okay, let's assume worst-case scenario: Archduke wants to add Emperor K to Mongolia. It fits with his personality, it fits his civ, and it's a sneaky way to dramatically improve. How would he do it? He can't possibly have iron working yet, so swords are out. He could make do with Archers, but that'd take a lot of gold to upgrade. Could he have that gold? Not sure - maybe. But thematically, it'd make the most sense for him to attack with horsemen or chariots. Chariots are pretty easy to research and pretty cheap to build, and they benefit from Mongolia's boosted cavalry, don't they? Plus, spearmen need Bronze Working to unlock, and Emperor only has the same techs I do, more or less - so he's stuck with warriors and slingers.
Emperor has no gold in pocket, very little income, and very limited tech. Uh, the situation doesn't look great. What he CAN do is chop-chop-chop with Magnus as many units as he can. Enough warriors/slingers (or walls) would put a stop to Archduke's attack, at the cost of probably gutting his civ. Walls are a long way off, though, unless he went straight for Masonry. Possible. IF he did, and he can chop the walls, that's our best case scenario. Emperor loses out on Magnus chops for economically useful things, but stops the Archduke, who gains nothing from his investment. The two civs are weakened, hopefully fatally, and we profit.
Worst-case, Emperor is dead by turn 70 and Archduke has enough land for TWO civs. This isn't catastrophic, though. Archduke and Emperor's lands are both relatively undeveloped so far, I think (1 campus and nothing else), so while two cities is a boost, Archduke isn't ready to run away yet. He's still got to contend with Rowain and Japper, who will be very alarmed by this development, and he still has to fill up that land and defend himself. Meanwhile, this would be a distraction for me to tech away in peace. I can build up, try and get an era or so ahead of one of my neighbors, and then launch my own strike at the right moment.
So, two bits of bad news, but not terrible, I think. The good of Stonehenge outweighed hte bad on the whole. Here's the score and an overview:
This kind of thing was always in the cards with Archduke leading a military-oriented civ. At least you weren't the target! I don't think it's necessarily a game-winning move even if he succeeds, though obviously it will be in his favor. Even if he does wipe out Emperor, he's only getting two free cities out of that. Surely he's not going to be able to fight a hot war and also aggressively prevent forward settles by Sumeria and/or Cree. Last I remember he didn't have a DoF with Sumeria - does he have enough strength to protect against a Sumeria war cart attack AND fight Emperor? Even if he got all of the "natural settle land" of both himself and Emperor, it's not as big of factor. Getting the extra "settle land" isn't nearly as critical in Civ 6 as it would be in 4, since the increasing cost of settlers means you're still practically limited to a certain number of self-founded cities. At some point the only option would be chopping out settlers. Actually, I think his best play would here would be option 1 or 2 - some kind of smaller scale raid that eats up a few forests in chopped units - while allowing Emperor to push out a few more cities for Archduke to scarf up when the war does happen. I wonder if Emperor did do something to provoke Archduke?
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(April 6th, 2018, 16:30)Chevalier Mal Fet Wrote: Big turn today, score report first (which spoils a lot of the turn, but what the hell):
Total population is really tough to break down from empire score. If anyone can make better sense of this than me, they're welcome to:
Chev - 9 in 2 cities = 23 empire score. Figure 9 points for pop, leaves 14. Subtract 11 for 2 cities and a palace, leaves 3. Where is that last 3 coming from? Can't be my seowon, it's incomplete and gets 6. 3 points per governor? Per governor title? Needs further testing.
Alhambram - 3 cities, 1 districts = 19 points, plus palace. Has 10 points left - 7 pop and Magnus? Has a library.
Emperor - 2 cities, 1 district = 14 points (counting capital extra point). Has 8 points left - can't be 5 pop, his second city has 4. 8 pop? Then where are my three extra empire points coming from???
Archduke - 2 cities, no districts. Same Empire Score as me and Emperor, though, so figure 9 pop in 2 cities + Magnus.
Rowain - 28 points. Figure 3 cities and a campus = 19. Remaining 9 is combination of pop and governor??
Japper - 2 cities, 1 district = 14 points. Has 12 left. Figure on the government plaza for 3, leaving 11. 8 pop and a governor? 11 pop? Who knows? He has a library in his campus. Or two campuses done.
Research rates are looking good. Culture is highest of my neighbors, and Stonehenge's tourism has put me in 1st on the culture tracker so I can't guess at Rowain/Archduke's culture anymore. Science is middle of the pack, but the highest neighbor - Japper - has 2 campuses/1 campus 1 library and will be passed by my science next turn.
Domination + gold is okay. I am the only player with a significant treasury, and my score has reached acceptable levels - it doesn't count the just-finished slinger, or the two units nearing completion in OCISLY. I think I am safe, since no one can afford archer upgrades at the moment and swords/horses are a long way away still. Rowain and Alhambram (I think) are the first to 3 cities. Archduke and Emperor have other priorities, I was chopping Stonehenge and waiting for State Workforce before beginning expansion next turn, and I have no idea what Japper is up to.
Turn report as soon as I upload and organize my screenshots.
Don't know if this helps, but working on a sandbox hotseat game for testing some mechanics and noticed that near the beginning when everyone had a size 2 city, Trajan had one more Empire point than anyone else. This suggests that the Monument or the Trading Post must be counting for Empire Score - my money is on the Monument. I'll check Governors when I get that far.
April 7th, 2018, 09:26
(This post was last modified: April 7th, 2018, 09:34 by Chevalier Mal Fet.)
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Hmmm, good to know. I will run a quick game and see if the Monument explains things - I have a monument and a granary in JRTI, no buildings in OCISLY yet.
A monument would make more sense, since trading posts are found in foreign cities, too - but I guess that'd be trivial to program around. Interesting if Empire score lets you know everyone's buildings, too!
(I was looking forward to a turn when I woke up, but Alhambram hasn't passed on the save yet. I'm so anxious to see my shiny new seowon! I'm gonna put a library in it right away 'cuz I can do that).
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Turn 53
It turns out we can't build a library this turn because I am horrible at math:
Darn. If I'd bothered to use my brain before speaking, I'd've known that libraries are 180 faith (2 x 90) and not the vague 150-160 faith I had in mind. But by this point we all know that I scarcely ever use my brain, so no worries! It's not a big deal - I lose out on 2 beakers and 1 GS point for the three turns it'll take me to walk over and chop the stone into a settler. If I miss Hypatia or something by 3 points I'll be miffed, but what are the odds of that happening? :D New ETA for the library is t56.
Anyway, the big news obviously is my seowon finishing, and I get a nice historic moment for it:
This sucks. The era ends in 7 turns. I don't have enough time to scrape up 6 more points for a golden age, and I've vastly overshot the mark for a dark age. So those are 4 era points I shan't see again, down the drain. Okay, so let's scrap the heroic age plan and work on getting a medieval golden age. There's scouting to be done. I can still get a handful of points from natural wonders and circumnavigating the world (edge to edge, in this case), I can clear barb camps, and become suzerain. I'll look at the available dedications and see the best way to boost points there, too.
We finish Masonry, finally allowing stone harvests:
At the same time, the seowon inspires State Workforce, which triggers Valetta's quest and finishes the tech for us:
That, in turn, unlocks a Governor Title, which we accordingly spend on Magnus:
Now we can chop settlers to our heart's content without penalizing our population. I guess this is what Civ 6 IS in Rise and Fall: Get to Magnus, then line up as many boosts as you can and get as big a snowball rolling down the hill, as early as you can. I mean, it sort of feels empowering, but it's not exactly rocket surgery, is it? Hopefully I'm doing as well as my opponents are abusing the early production. Gotta get settlers out before Japper and Alhambram forward settle me any more.
Score overview:
Now my score is super-inflated with great person, religious, and wonder points. I hope the other players see that, too, and don't view me as a threat (not likely, playing Korea. Them's the breaks). Weirdly, the Seowon was worth 4 empire points, not 6, like a unique district normally is. Is it equal to your Era score? R&F changed around so much of the formula that I'm not confident at all that I can keep track of what the other players are up to with score alone. I think the first/second/third place is mostly useless, unless someone has a commanding lead, but the details of where points are coming from are helpful, I think - I know Rowain has really strong culture and science just from his score, even though we haven't met yet.
Speaking of, my own science jumped up to pass my neighbors again. Japper is close, with 12.5 points. He's already got a library though, and I have yet to build mine. Alhambram should be getting great river adjacencies with his campuses (campi), but is still a little ways back.
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Turn 54
Turn came back to me in only 3 hours, dang. Most of the stuff will be familiar, so I looked at some aspects of the civ at the moment instead.
Builder finished, just as planned, so I was right about overflow carrying over between builds. I was pretty sure it did, after many of my RND chops in PBEM7 let me also build a trader, but I wasn't 100%. Good to know. We're on course to start chopping out settlers starting on turn 56.
I use the last charge on my 3rd builder to build a mine next to the former deer tile:
This takes the tile to 1/3/1 tile, pretty nice at this early stage of the game. Right now, the loss of the deer has put a crimp on the capital's food (or it will, once I build over the rice with with a theater square down the road). How to feed JRTI? I think the former deer tile and the plains tile next to it are worth farms. Later, I could set up a farming triangle on the other side of the city (near the rice) without disturbing my dot map, but unfortunately on the near side I can't do that. The seowon will make both farms 4 food tiles anyway, and it could boost a farm on the far side, too, if it came to that. Basically, seowons make me worry a little less about food resources. It leans the calculus towards early harvesting a little more, I think, to get pop up quickly.
At OCISLY, I finish the second plantation and lift the housing cap a bit:
That gives me quite a bit of gold from these chocolate tiles. I need to shop around and see if I can trade this chocolate to anyone, but so far no one has 2 copies of a luxury yet. I took the second improvement mostly for the housing - it lifts the housing cap temporarily, and gives me a bit more time to get a granary here. I also debate buying a monument, but I need to not be so spendthrift with my gold - I want to save for Archer upgrades, in order to capture Antioch. Eyes on the prize, Chevalier.
Anyway, with all the plantations, it's interesting to look at the different strengths of my two cities:
Of my 18 gold per turn, fully 14 of it comes from OCISLY's chocolate plantations. By contrast, 11 of my 13 science and 7.5 of my 9 culture comes from the capital. Magnus is definitely in the right city at the moment.
This raises the question. Who do I want my second governor to be? Liang, or Pingala? Pingala would boost the capital by a further 20% - so an extra 3 beakers and 2 culture per turn, roughly. Liang, though, can make a great builder pump. Later on, I'll need one high-production city to set her up in (I'm thinking In One Ear, with all its hills, for that), but in the meantime 4 charge builders before Serfdom is hard to pass up. Given how in demand builder labor is, I'm leaning towards Liang. You don't want too much research, I think, crazy as that sounds - if you research without developing proper infrastructure, your district costs will spiral out of control, and it does you no good to have modern units unlocked if you can't afford 'em. Gotta be balanced. I think I'll grab Liang first, and then Pingala second. Magnus will continue to bounce around, of course, as needed.
Military units are fanning out. I send one scout towards Japper, one towards Alhambram's latest plant, and two south. Goal is to get visibility of cities, meet the city-state in the south (a religious one), and then regroup for the attack on Antioch. I'd like to have a missionary ready for that, to quickly defend against any intervention from the Dutch.
Score and civ overview:
Emperor K hasn't lost a city, and his military power is holding. I really wish I had contact with the Archduke to see how much power he had.
My own score has unfortunately doubled in the last two turns. I hope no one gets too alarmed by it. Go look at the scary Mongols! Pay no attention to me in my corner!
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Oh, I just realized, with Alhambram's trader going to Antioch, I need to send a trader back to one of his cities after I take the city. He'll get a +3 combat bonus against me otherwise thanks to diplomatic visibility.
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Hey, aetryn (or skanar, you're welcome, too but as I understand it you do not have R&F), would you be up for playing my turns for about 5 days in a few weeks? I posted about this in the organization thread, but I'll be chaperoning a bunch of 8th graders to Jekyll Island from May 5-10 and won't be able to make my turns in that time.
Also, let me tell both of you guys that I'm so glad to have you along. It gets lonely in here without you, and I enjoy both your contributions immensely. <3
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(April 7th, 2018, 16:11)Chevalier Mal Fet Wrote: Turn 54
Turn came back to me in only 3 hours, dang. Most of the stuff will be familiar, so I looked at some aspects of the civ at the moment instead.
Builder finished, just as planned, so I was right about overflow carrying over between builds. I was pretty sure it did, after many of my RND chops in PBEM7 let me also build a trader, but I wasn't 100%. Good to know. We're on course to start chopping out settlers starting on turn 56.
I use the last charge on my 3rd builder to build a mine next to the former deer tile:
This takes the tile to 1/3/1 tile, pretty nice at this early stage of the game. Right now, the loss of the deer has put a crimp on the capital's food (or it will, once I build over the rice with with a theater square down the road). How to feed JRTI? I think the former deer tile and the plains tile next to it are worth farms. Later, I could set up a farming triangle on the other side of the city (near the rice) without disturbing my dot map, but unfortunately on the near side I can't do that. The seowon will make both farms 4 food tiles anyway, and it could boost a farm on the far side, too, if it came to that. Basically, seowons make me worry a little less about food resources. It leans the calculus towards early harvesting a little more, I think, to get pop up quickly.
You could also think about moving the Government Plaza one hex east and the Theatre District to the hex the Government Plaza is on now. That would preserve the rice tile and let you build a farming triangle including the rice, if you think that's at all useful.
Quote:At OCISLY, I finish the second plantation and lift the housing cap a bit:
That gives me quite a bit of gold from these chocolate tiles. I need to shop around and see if I can trade this chocolate to anyone, but so far no one has 2 copies of a luxury yet. I took the second improvement mostly for the housing - it lifts the housing cap temporarily, and gives me a bit more time to get a granary here. I also debate buying a monument, but I need to not be so spendthrift with my gold - I want to save for Archer upgrades, in order to capture Antioch. Eyes on the prize, Chevalier.
Anyway, with all the plantations, it's interesting to look at the different strengths of my two cities:
Of my 18 gold per turn, fully 14 of it comes from OCISLY's chocolate plantations. By contrast, 11 of my 13 science and 7.5 of my 9 culture comes from the capital. Magnus is definitely in the right city at the moment.
This raises the question. Who do I want my second governor to be? Liang, or Pingala? Pingala would boost the capital by a further 20% - so an extra 3 beakers and 2 culture per turn, roughly. Liang, though, can make a great builder pump. Later on, I'll need one high-production city to set her up in (I'm thinking In One Ear, with all its hills, for that), but in the meantime 4 charge builders before Serfdom is hard to pass up. Given how in demand builder labor is, I'm leaning towards Liang. You don't want too much research, I think, crazy as that sounds - if you research without developing proper infrastructure, your district costs will spiral out of control, and it does you no good to have modern units unlocked if you can't afford 'em. Gotta be balanced. I think I'll grab Liang first, and then Pingala second. Magnus will continue to bounce around, of course, as needed.
I definitely like Liang here better. With all the chopping to do, and the desire to build improvements next to Seowons to take advantage of their bonus yields, plus the ordinary business of improving resources, builder labor is going to be tight before Feudalism (and possibly even after). I agree that, especially this early, too much science just ends up getting wasted on non-boosted techs and obsoleting military units you want to build a bunch of while they are cheap (and maintenance free). I'd even consider Reyna before Pingala, though that only pays off if you've got a good CH to boost and are willing to commit the extra promotion. Still, money is a very flexible resource in this game and is especially important for maintaining military parity. I'm a little worried Pingala in JRTI is going to make you look a bit too scary.
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(April 7th, 2018, 16:49)Chevalier Mal Fet Wrote: Hey, aetryn (or skanar, you're welcome, too but as I understand it you do not have R&F), would you be up for playing my turns for about 5 days in a few weeks? I posted about this in the organization thread, but I'll be chaperoning a bunch of 8th graders to Jekyll Island from May 5-10 and won't be able to make my turns in that time.
Also, let me tell both of you guys that I'm so glad to have you along. It gets lonely in here without you, and I enjoy both your contributions immensely. <3
I'm very nervous about screwing something up, but I'm willing to do it to keep the game rolling.
April 8th, 2018, 11:04
(This post was last modified: April 8th, 2018, 11:06 by Chevalier Mal Fet.)
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(April 7th, 2018, 18:44)aetryn Wrote: (April 7th, 2018, 16:11)Chevalier Mal Fet Wrote: Turn 54
You could also think about moving the Government Plaza one hex east and the Theatre District to the hex the Government Plaza is on now. That would preserve the rice tile and let you build a farming triangle including the rice, if you think that's at all useful.
The issue that I have with that set-up is that it forfeits the boost the Theater Square gets from being adjacent to the city-center, while the government plaza does nothing to boost the city center at all (if I'm remembering how they work correctly). As I understand it, a theater square at the rice will get +2 culture from Stonehenge, +1 from the City Center, and +1 from the Plaza. It could just be a +3 culture square, though, the wiki gives conflicting information about theater squares and I rarely build the things myself so I don't remember their adjacencies off the top of my head.
I can make up the food output with a farming triangle north of the city, and with farms around my seowon. It's a little more builder labor, but I get more culture out of it, and some era score for a +4 district. I'll run a test in a few minutes.
(April 7th, 2018, 18:45)aetryn Wrote: (April 7th, 2018, 16:49)Chevalier Mal Fet Wrote: Hey, aetryn (or skanar, you're welcome, too but as I understand it you do not have R&F), would you be up for playing my turns for about 5 days in a few weeks? I posted about this in the organization thread, but I'll be chaperoning a bunch of 8th graders to Jekyll Island from May 5-10 and won't be able to make my turns in that time.
Also, let me tell both of you guys that I'm so glad to have you along. It gets lonely in here without you, and I enjoy both your contributions immensely. <3
I'm very nervous about screwing something up, but I'm willing to do it to keep the game rolling.
Ha, what's to worry about? I'm obviously no great shakes at this game myself. You and skanar are talking with me, you know our strategy and intentions. When I leave, I'll leave you a note of my goals and let you pursue those as you see fit. I trust you. 
Turn 55
Bronze Working finished this turn, and it was actually the most exciting thing to happen. I'll show you why in a minute.
First, my warrior has resumed exploration in the southwest, and he has found, well, to use the technical phrase, a shitton of jungle:
Actually, with Magnus, Engineering, and a lot of builders this might not be a terrible location down the road. If I plant 1 tile sw of the warrior, you get 3 chocolate tiles, 3 hills in the first or second rings, and 7 jungle chops. With 3 plantations also needed, that's a 2 or even 3 builder job, even with Liang. The jungle chops give a ton of production, an aqueduct helps the city grow, and then I can specialize it either for commerce to take advantage of the chocolate or faith, to take advantage of the mountains. We'll need to come back and take another look at this spot in the medieval era.
Alhambram is sniffing around OCISLY:
I'm not worried about him poaching my builder, thanks to the DOF. I think he just wants intel on the terrain - as far as I know he hasn't scouted much this direction yet. I need to grab Another Fine Product before ANOTHER Dutch settler appears there.
With that taken care of, let's look at why Bronze Working was exciting. You can guess the reason. What does Bronze Working do? It enables encampments, but I don't need one of those yet. It enables spearmen, but ditto. It enables jungle chops, but Magnus is at JRTI for another 5 turns, which has no jungle to chop. What's the last thing that Bronze Working does? Why, it reveals iron, of course! And the bottom line from the iron reveal is that the northern half of my dotmap is a lot better than the south:
There are three sources of iron to the north, and every one of them is second-ring from one of my dots. It improves every one of those sites by a ton. By contrast, the south has one source, in the dry plain between Antioch and Alhambram. None of my dots there is a high priority.
Let's look at each site in turn now. First, I Blame the Parents:
I really love this spot, guys. We settle on the wheat, for lots of food. We have 2 1/3 tiles first ring, we have diamonds, horses, and iron second ring, and we have a seowon to boost three mines and a farm! This spot will be crazy good at science and production, it has food to grow large, it has fresh water. I must have this spot before Japper. This is where the settler next turn is going. I can get him here and settled by turn 64.
Another Fine Product From the Nonsense Factory:
It appears next to one of my seowon candidates. A seowon and mine combo there makes for a 1/3/2 tile, then 1/4/2 at apprenticeship. The site has bananas for growth, a great spot for a CH or Harbor (no point building both, I suppose), and lots of forests for chopping (or lumber-milling, along the river). This spot is priority #2 after I Blame the Parents. Need to keep Alhambram out of here. Settler is here on t63.
In One Ear:
Other than the bananas, In One Ear has terrible first ring tiles still. But a seowon in those hills boosts no less than three mines, including the iron mine for another powerful tile, it has a farming triangle, and lots of flat land to the south for chopping and districts. This place needs a monument as soon as I can manage it - maybe one of my first Valetta purchases. Need one more envoy there. This is the last site that I will settle out of JRTI. Settler here is due about t68.
So, we know where all our settlers for the next 5 turns are going. I hope I'm in time. These sites are really good.
Let's look at my cities real quick, too, since there isn't much action at the moment:
Just Read the Instructions is growing like a weed, and is a fine capital. Even at 6 pop every one of my citizens can work a 4 yield tile. I'll lose the stone next turn, but my next builder here will have mining that hill and lumber-milling the two hills south of the capital as a priority. The mills make those 2/4 and 1/5 tiles respectively - something that mines can't pass until the late game. There is still more forest available for chopping to the north, or I swap it to In One Ear and let it chop. The city is responsible for virtually all my cultural and science output. The seowon on the outskirts of the city provides a quiet place of contemplation for Korea's scholars, wide rice paddies line the road out to Stonehenge, legendary site of John the Baptist's preaching, and the placid Yalu River arises in the city and runs south to the sea.
Priority here after the settler finishes ~t64 is the government plaza, then the Audience Chamber, then probably another builder. From this point on, I'm going with unpromoted governors, to get into my cities and boost them. Once I have all 6 in place, it's time to promote.
In contrast to JRTI's stately orderedness, Of Course I Still Love You is a wild frontier town. Jungle crowds up to the banks of the Yalu, broken only by the wide royal road back to the capital and the numerous cocoa plantations scattered around the area. Days are long and hot, and the city itself is still mostly a collection of houses and drinking establishments with muddy streets. Very little infrastructure, but the capital is reportedly considering sending a special bureaucrat down here to take charge of the city, drive back the jungle, and turn it into the shining colony of Korea it is meant to be.
OCISLY mostly contributes gold to the empire, but it will also be our base for settling the southern basin here, and later on might be a good home to a commercial hub and holy site in addition to its seowon.
Score and overview:
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