The Antisocial Team

[mackoti]

Wow lot of writing and nice sumaries here.About courthose: are even beter with HRE(25% expenses, yes please), and strange when pleople talk about organizat , remembers just the half courthose but there is more:half civic upkeep which its worth more then a shrine, and the civic upkeep its getting more and more expensiv as the game is going and more cities are builded, for example in pbem 29 i was paying at the end near 90 gold turn for civic upkeep, so there i had 90 gold saved per turn(what kind of shrine do you need to compensate that?).And there is more half lighose and if game its long enough and with this power reserch factories will be very fast online.And i didnt talk here how cool it is to see other people cities , research becasue you get fast col and fast courthouses.So in my opinion if the empire gets larger than 10 cities organizat beats idustrious any day.The beautiful thing about organizat its that gaves bonus and you don't depend on slider.

Just ask Parkin what expenses he has in PB7 and see if you finacial gave more than his organizat:neenernee

[Ichabod]

Wow lot of writing and nice sumaries here.About courthose: are even beter with HRE(25% expenses, yes please), and strange when pleople talk about organizat , remembers just the half courthose but there is more:half civic upkeep which its worth more then a shrine, and the civic upkeep its getting more and more expensiv as the game is going and more cities are builded, for example in pbem 29 i was paying at the end near 90 gold turn for civic upkeep, so there i had 90 gold saved per turn(what kind of shrine do you need to compensate that?).And there is more half lighose and if game its long enough and with this power reserch factories will be very fast online.And i didnt talk here how cool it is to see other people cities , research becasue you get fast col and fast courthouses.So in my opinion if the empire gets larger than 10 cities organizat beats idustrious any day.The beautiful thing about organizat its that gaves bonus and you don't depend on slider.

Just ask Parkin what expenses he has in PB7 and see if you finacial gave more than his organizat:neenernee

Thanks for the comment and the analysis, Mackoti.

I didn't say anything about organized lighthouses because I believe a lakes map won't have any salt water, but I may be wrong. Factories I forgot about, but it's indeed a good bonus.

I didn't realize civic expenses could get so high. Guess I should start taking closer looks at the Finance Advisor. 90 gold is definetely a high value. What I can use as a counter-argument is that financial gives benefits sooner, helping the snowball effect, while Organized really starts shining after you have a big empire.

Another thing that bother me about Organized is how Corthouses work: they are best built in the cities that can't really afford them. I explain: building a courthouse in your capital won't give you much benefit, the 2nd to 4th cities are also likely to be close to your capital, making the maintenance cut not that useful. So, the newer the city is, the furthest it is (usually) and the more value it gets from a courthouse.

But can I afford a courthouse in a new city? I need a granary and a forge, most likely, before anything else. Then a Courthouse? I have a lot of difficulty to know what should I do with newer cities, after the first 5-6 ones.

Do you have a standard build order for newer cities, mackoti? Granary, forge -> something? Or do you plan regarding on the placement of that specific city and what you want from it for the empire?

[Mist]

I feel that my main problem in civ games is not planning things well after the early game. I play mostly by gut, so it's enough when you have few cities. But when you start to get more, it gets difficult. Then I end up stopping expansion, losing focus, not making objectives and eventually, failing.

Ah, and then here I am - schemer extraordinare, the grand design player that can't be bothered with mundane realities of worker management, tile assignments and microplans Which usually makes my plans fall apart late game from not enough attention to basics See Ichabod? Told you we'd be a good fit

That being said, I always need to have objectives.

Objectives? Here's few for a discussion -

We want early religion and OR.
We want Colossus?
We wan to tech all the time, no crashing the economy into the ground.
We really want MoM, if only for denial.
Some chariots early to break people's farmer gambit thingies?

Up for discussion - how about *not* going for cathaphracts? Use them as a phantom threat people can't ignore and have to secure against and clear top of the tech tree instead?

[mackoti]

But can I afford a courthouse in a new city? I need a granary and a forge, most likely, before anything else. Then a Courthouse? I have a lot of difficulty to know what should I do with newer cities, after the first 5-6 ones.

Well here its the beauty of organizat, you get a granary with chop ,slave, grow and fast get the courthose and you can start this after city 4-5 , depending on how the expenses are.

Always its hard to decide , but what I usualy do its that, I grow the city , getting a granary ASAP,choping if posible and after get farms and whip city when its small to get a beter conversion, and if the maintenace its high(over 6 in my book) first building after granary and of course border pop if necesary, will be a courthose(and again if organizat..).Of course you can have a religion and OR which its very nice.

Example of game: In pbem 29 Gaspar said they had better improved land, because they were working more cotages , but they had 3 libraries empire wide,no courthose(at 200 ad),some forges.Did there land looked beter improved yes,was theyr civ management good: No.You have to do sacrifice to obtain things and usualy you build the best by whiping and whiping you sacrifice cottages.Becasue of that you didnt seen me picking a financial leader in any of my games, because i have small use for cottages just for maximum 4-5 cities.

About your leader victoria you can call her no bonuses leader and i love bonuses for building and discounts and cheaper stuff.What i like about imperialist its not the slaving setler thing but the flexibility,let me explain :for example you have 2 food and plain hill which can be mined and one food can be shared with a second city , you can gave second food to the other city and still get max from capital by working those hils and if them are places to cotage you can go potery before Bw(yes i do ttah many times) and your growth its not afected.

[Ichabod]

Ah, and then here I am - schemer extraordinare, the grand design player that can't be bothered with mundane realities of worker management, tile assignments and microplans Which usually makes my plans fall apart late game from not enough attention to basics See Ichabod? Told you we'd be a good fit

Objectives? Here's few for a discussion -

We want early religion and OR.
We want Colossus?
We wan to tech all the time, no crashing the economy into the ground.
We really want MoM, if only for denial.
Some chariots early to break people's farmer gambit thingies?

Up for discussion - how about *not* going for cathaphracts? Use them as a phantom threat people can't ignore and have to secure against and clear top of the tech tree instead?

So, let's have some discussion:

1. Early religion, in our current situation, is more of a "we can" thing, than a "we really want", in my opinion. We start with Mysticism and that's a big deal. It's just like the Phracts: we have the advantage here, even though the other players don't know if we are going to use it or not.

I considered to go for a religious game, trying to get the AP by bulbing Theology with a GPro from one of the early wonders. What scares me about this tech path is:

a) Possibility of Losing the early wonders - Yuris and Commodore have similar, if not better positions than we do to get them.

b) Possibility of falling behinf the expansion curve.

c) Like mackoti pointed out, our leader doesn't have a single discount building. A religious economy is based on buildings. So, we may fall into a trap of having too much to build and not enough resources for it all.

But, in a differente focus, point c) makes Org Rel a very good deal for us. We really want help while bulding buildings. So, yeah, I'd be up for gunning for Buddhism or Hinduism, but the religious line is sounding a bit dangerous besides that. Org Religion can be teched when we decide to go for HR.

2. It depends on the map. Too soon to tell. At a first thought, Yuris makes it a lost cause for us.

3. How do we do that?

I like the idea of sharing cottages between capital and second city. I remember having my best results in SP when I did it. i don't see it being done a lot in the games here, but I think it's a solid strat. Maybe I'm just missing things.

4. I'm guessing we'll have strong competition here from the SE teams, due to the strong sinnergy. But we can get there faster and going for Calendar delays CoL. So, maybe we can do it.

I bet they'll try to go for Calendar -> Philo -> Nationalism, for Phract protection with the draft + Taj - MoM sinnergy. So, yeah, denying them this can be big.

5. Yes, good thinking. I'm afraid we can be early targets, just like Commodore was in PBEM32 (?), so maybe we want them more for defense than anything else. Luckily, there's no early UU around.

Well here its the beauty of organizat, you get a granary with chop ,slave, grow and fast get the courthose and you can start this after city 4-5 , depending on how the expenses are.

Always its hard to decide , but what I usualy do its that, I grow the city , getting a granary ASAP,choping if posible and after get farms and whip city when its small to get a beter conversion, and if the maintenace its high(over 6 in my book) first building after granary and of course border pop if necesary, will be a courthose(and again if organizat..).Of course you can have a religion and OR which its very nice.

Example of game: In pbem 29 Gaspar said they had better improved land, because they were working more cotages , but they had 3 libraries empire wide,no courthose(at 200 ad),some forges.Did there land looked beter improved yes,was theyr civ management good: No.You have to do sacrifice to obtain things and usualy you build the best by whiping and whiping you sacrifice cottages.Becasue of that you didnt seen me picking a financial leader in any of my games, because i have small use for cottages just for maximum 4-5 cities.

About your leader victoria you can call her no bonuses leader and i love bonuses for building and discounts and cheaper stuff.What i like about imperialist its not the slaving setler thing but the flexibility,let me explain :for example you have 2 food and plain hill which can be mined and one food can be shared with a second city , you can gave second food to the other city and still get max from capital by working those hils and if them are places to cotage you can go potery before Bw(yes i do ttah many times) and your growth its not afected.

Good points all around. I have some commentaries too:

1. If you use only 4/5 cities for cottages, what kind of benefits can you get from the other cities? I hope I'm not sounding too stupid with this question, but I have some kind of point.

You see, apart from Graanry/Forge/Courthouse, that give benefits that don't rely on commerce produced by the city, what can a non-cottage city give to the empire? I'm guessing:

1. Unit production, which is situational upon your objectives in the game at the time.

2. Specialists. They can increase your (science/gold) output without cottages.

But, how do this work without philosophical or the Pyramids, i.e. with nerfed specialists? Can this strategy still hold its ground? Would you rely more in cottages if you happen to lost the Pyramids?

Maybe I'm being too theorical (probably, becuase I don't have much experience) and maybe my assumption would lead to other conclusions like "you shouldn't build cottages without financial". But I really have a problem with mid-game empire management.

2. Yeah, our leader doesn't have a single doubled building. That makes Org Rel a more important target and require us to really think about what buildings are indeed worth their cost.

3. Very nice points about Imperialistic. A plains hill mine = an irrigated corn for a Imp leader while getting a settler. Seems obvious, but it's not easy to realize.

The same way, a IMP forest plains = a grass mine, so delaying BW is possible. You don't lose hammers, while getting more cottages.

I know that's the same thing you said, Mack, but writing it down is a good way for me to fix it into my head.


And here's another question: what's a good rule of thumb for food surplus while growing a cottage city? I think I've heard 6 surplus being mentioned, but I'm not sure. I know there's a lot of theory behind it, but I just want the easy rule.

[Mist]

1. Early religion (...)

I considered to go for a religious game, trying to get the AP by bulbing Theology with a GPro from one of the early wonders. What scares me about this tech path is:

I don't care for priest economy with us being Fin, what I do care about is exactly this :

c) Like mackoti pointed out, our leader doesn't have a single discount building.

We need all the production boosts we can put our grubby royal hands on, OR is a very early and a very good one, if a tad on the expensive side of upkeep. But OR needs us to have a religion and actively work to spread it from early on. That's why we really want a religion. And it does solve border popping dilemma.

2. It depends on the map. Too soon to tell. At a first thought, Yuris makes it a lost cause for us.

True, but even if the map has no water MC has forges, OR+forges = 50% production boost. And we could always give him a run for his money

3. How do we do that?

With stringent application of bookkeeping And seriously, we should probably never drop below 40% breakeven, because digging out of the mire like that leaves us with no flexibility to react to problems. Tight settling pattern with cities able to grow cottages for each other should help.

4. I'm guessing we'll have strong competition here from the SE teams, due to the strong sinnergy. But we can get there faster and going for Calendar delays CoL. So, maybe we can do it.

I bet they'll try to go for Calendar -> Philo -> Nationalism, for Phract protection with the draft + Taj - MoM sinnergy. So, yeah, denying them this can be big.

Exactly my line of thought.

5. Yes, good thinking. I'm afraid we can be early targets, just like Commodore was in PBEM32 (?), so maybe we want them more for defense than anything else. Luckily, there's no early UU around.

He was one of them people that operated happy-go-lucky, no military, farmer gambit despite my urgings to the contrary. And besides, if we're the one messing with people, they will be too busy to mess with us

[Ichabod]

I wonder what is happening... Is the map being made already?

[Ichabod]

About the naming scheme, I thought we could use the name of players that were awesome in CM and FM editions, but never did anything right in real life. Since Mist and I play this types of game, it could work. But I think it's too hermetic for the general community, so maybe we use it for unit names.

City names could be the name of books that we liked. I choose one, than Mist chooses one. And you have to write a bit about why you liked it. We should try to choose not so famous books, if that's the case.

[Ichabod]

I'm eager to see this game starting. I really want to give these guys a run for their money. With FFH X ending and considering I spend like 10 minutes top at PB7 each day, I'll have some time for this.

I'm reading Krill's PB5 thread and it really helps to understand what's behind some of the Civseis decisions. But I need to practice. It's the only way to internalize the concepts. I need to get past the mere play by the rule of thumb and understand the game as a whole.

It'll be a long, long journey...

[Mist]

Regarding naming theme : a lot of my favorite books would be absolutely cryptic to a wider audience, literature in my native language is neither widely translated nor popular in the wider english-speaking world. So how about player attributes from FM? There's enough of them to last for all the cities we'd ever need.