[SPOILERS] TheArchduke blasts into Space as Russia

[Brian Shanahan]

On Russian SF, We, Roadside Picnic, Newest Voyage, What is to be Done?, On the Moon[/i, [i]Voyage to Mars] (both by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky). And that's before we even get to the Sovied era, the golden age of Russian SF.

[TheArchduke]

I quite like those names. Maybe Scifi is the way to go and I take the outlandish names first.

[TheArchduke]

Well, I am glad I stuck with Russia.

TheArchduke: Brazil, Ottomans, Mongolia, Spain

Mongolia I did before, Spain is crap, Brazil is mediocre and the Ottomans only shine with pure conquest.

[TheArchduke]

Oppo Research:

Alhambram:

Difficult to pinpoint. Is rather good at finding weaknesses of the system and exploiting them which makes him highly dangerous.

Cornflakes:

Very good engine builder, rather mediocre war skills. 
Tenacious and analytical.

Kaiser:

Extensive reporting points to analytical planning. Not enough information, off to a rough start, but then again that happened to me as well.

Pindicator:

Good grasp of the game, easily discouraged.

Suboptimal:

Becoming better. Good engine builder, decent tactician. Lacks overall strategy and focus.

TheBlackSword:

No discernable weakness from what I could see. Great economy, excellent grasp of the military game. My main worry.

[Woden]

Confirm: Russia

[TheArchduke]

Aye.

[TheArchduke]

Nothing too suprising:

Play Order/Civs:
TheArchduke: Russia
Alhambram: Australia
TheBlackSword: Cree
Kaiser: Greece/Gorgo
suboptimal: Nubia
pindicator: Khmer
Cormflakes: Rome

All strong picks. I find Khmer a bit lacking and I do not think the Cree are as good as they seem to be. But the rest is a who is who of the strong civs out there.

[williams482]

Khmer is the weird one there. Decent synergy with the happy/housing holy sites pantheon, and aqueducts are better than they used to be, but that missionary relic trick doesn't work on real people. I wonder what Pindicator is planning with them.

[Woden]

Here is your start....
   

[williams482]

That's a pretty nice start (no surprise). First impression is that the plains hill to the south west is the obvious place to put the city, but it obviously depends what the warior reveals.

If we do move to get the hill, we could also consider moving an additional tile south east. The benefit would be allowing us to settle a future city on that river to the west, while keeping the plains hill and the first ring deer. I probably wouldn't do that unless we found something nice in the fog over there, but it's an option.