RMOG: Renaissance Men of Genius

[WarriorKnight]

I'll chime in with more thoughts on cities later, but wanted to touch on something real quick:



Jungled Fish? Really Mardoc? First whales on a lake, then icy floodplains and now this?



I first thought it was a map error, but sure enough everyone has a jungled fish in the same spot.

After testing it appears we can't chop the jungle, not even if we load workers onto a boat. While it does remove 1 food from the tile and forces ships to spend 2 moves to move onto it, I don't think it will affect much. Still WTF?

[WarriorKnight]

So we're going to have 2 settlers around t210 with 4 potential spots to settle. I've had a chance to look over them now so let's rank them starting with the least likely:

W isthmus:



City strength: 1/6
Aggressive plant: 2/5
Minimal worker labor: 4/4
Resources: 2/3
Naval options: 1/1
Dotmap: 1/1

Total: 11/20

The main advantage of this city is minimal worker investment required. We just connect the banana and that's all the workers really need to do. It'll also give 2 new health resources and open up the SW ocean but it's just not strong enough to be worthwhile right now IMO.

Mack border:




City strength: 4/6
Aggressive plant: 3/5
Minimal worker labor: 3/4
Resources: 0/3
Naval options: 1/1
Dotmap: 1/1

Total: 12/20

After thinking about it I don't think this city needs to be a priority either, although despite the numerical rank it is closer then W isthmus. mackoti is not really in a position to contest this with us as I believe his 3rd city went for the corn/whale. It is a decent city that opens up 2 equator lakes, but the biggest problem is that we claim no new resources with it. Still, it is a decent mfg site so maybe...

Uber city:



City strength: 6/6
Aggressive plant: 1/5
Minimal worker labor: 2/4
Resources: 3/3
Naval options: 0/1
Dotmap: 0/1

Total: 12/20

I won't deny that this city would be very nice to get, but there are a few issues. First off while none of the resources are jungled it will take quite a bit of worker labor to improve everything. Secondly it does mess up the dotmap, while manageable in most cases we do end up isolating the stone until we hit 500 culture or waste a settler. That said I agree that this site is awesome, we can definitely get it up and running before we run out of land. Is it worth the costs though? I'm not sure...

Scooter border:



City strength: 4/6
Aggressive plant: 5/5
Minimal worker labor: 1/4
Resources: 3/3
Naval options: 0/1
Dotmap: 1/1

Total: 14/20

I think this is No.1 priority. There is a decent chance scooter will snip this spot if we don't act quickly and we could quite frankly use the calendar resources in the area. We have a LBow nearby to secure the area so we should be able to settle here if we act quickly. The exact location is debatable and the worker labor required will be substantial but I do think we should lock this down ASAP.

So it looks like I favor the scooter border city and the uber city. Unfortunately that combination requires a hefty amount of worker labor that I'm not sure we can provide atm, plus there is resource overlap with sugar/cow so that combination may not work out great. IMO probably think scooter border should be 1, and either mack border or uber city should be 2.

[oledavy]

I think we could stretch and do both the plant towards Scooter and the uber-city, sending the settler from DR to the uber city and the settler from PC/KND to the Scooter location.

I do think we should revisit moving it to the hill though. It would make a big difference in the event Scooter attacks us, which I think is likely. My reason for this being that they will eventually seek to expand via conquest, and at that point will have the options of Mack/Plako/Nic/Ourselves. Nic and us are significantly more likely to be the target due to player skill. Of the two of us, the territory from us will be easier to integrate. With this in mind, I'm inclined to value a defensive plant over a slightly higher quality city. Moving onto the hill still is riverside for a dike It does get one less food resource (2 vs. 3), but we can even pick up the rice later with another city. Any city Nic or Scooter found for the rice will be swamped by our culture. I have not counted the tiles, but just spotting it doesn't look like the tile quality is dramatically lower, the biggest downside is having a few unlighthousable coasts.

Mack city is important but low priority, Mack will not race us to such an aggressive spot.

My bigger overall concern with settling forward is that we forego plants that get our snowball rolling faster (whales, etc - which I think is the most important thing at the moment. At the same time, waiting on the spot towards Scooter, for example, might mean its not there when we want do get around to it.

It's a fiendish tightrope that I'm not sure how to walk.

[WarriorKnight]

While I agree we should prioritize planting defensively, I do not think the hill is the best way to accomplish this. Reason being that if we resort to founding another city to claim the Rice we will have another border city we need to protect which can't be made up for by being on a hill (since we have to split our defenses). I currently favor the W marked spot, while it does mean we miss a few tiles in our dotmap we have the advantage of not having crap tiles in the 1st ring, still being a very good city as well as the river bonus for defense once we need to use it as a border.

I do not know if scooter is planning to settle forward just yet, but I am super paranoid that he will try. I would move the LBow in the area N to try and catch a settler if it wanders into our continent. I doubt he would go for an aggressive plant without backup, but our own Longbow in the area can serve as insurance in case he does not protect it. I am still undecided on whether the strength of the uber city make up for the costs, although I do think I'm leaning towards going for it right now. I just don't know how we will get the stone or more importantly, the worker labor to keep up with both cities.

[WarriorKnight]

Nic apparently rushed the AP this turn. I didn't think that wonder would fall before ND, even if we ignore the temple/monastery requirement 2 happy surely beats 4 hammers in the long term right? plako hasn't used his GE either, I wonder what he is saving it for?

We've located both of mackoti's cities and they are both backline. No threat of him settling forward on us atm. Also mackoti and scooter are at war apparently, although I don't know why. We might have goofed trading maps with mackoti, as we were only his 2nd/3rd contact and we gave him map info of everyone, oh well.

plako and Alhazard have yet to settle any additional cities. While we will probably be 4th to a 4th city (scooter almost certainly will settle his momentarily, and REM/mackoti already have 4th cities) I hope we can be 1st to a 5th.

[WarriorKnight]

Here's a crazy idea, do we want to work a Scientist in Plains Cow for 2t to make a play for ND? plako doesn't seem interested in chasing early wonders, Nic has already spent his on the AP, Alhazard seems to have specifically avoided GE's by running citizens (at least, that's the only explanation I have as to why he doesn't have a GP yet) which just leaves mackoti. I don't know what mackoti plans to do (he is in pacifism so it is certainly possible he wants to make a play for the GE) but if he doesn't claim ND then I'm tempted to race scooter for it by pushing out a GE faster than he can (remember we're behind due to the extra anarchy turn).

Of course, scooter could speed up his GE by working a Spy (which is only sane if he anticipates this very move) or we could pop a GS at low odds (which I would take over a GE anyday). But the only thing we need to do is work a scientist for 2t between now and t215 so the opportunity cost is fairly low, and if mackoti does take ND between now and then we have lost nothing.

[oledavy]

I think we would have to research GP next instead of Astro, but yeah, I'm down. Grow 2, put the first pop on the mine and the second on the scientist? Or would we have to do the scientist right away? Also, see the email I sent you. There are 12 hours left on the turn so my wifi should be up by then, but if you have the time, go ahead and play the turn just in case.

[WarriorKnight]

Not convinced we have to research GP next, but either way the scientist can wait until after t210 so don't worry about changing the current microplan.

[oledavy]

205-209

A flurry of turns + guests over the weekend + no internet last night means I will be condensing a number of turns here. I know how interesting early turns are for lurkers, so I'm sure the lack of detail will bring much lamenting in the lurker thread

I do want to lampshade something that has probably been obvious for awhile but I have not spoken personally about here. Yes, I know we fucked up with our second city. Getting everyone else's maps has really hit that home to us. We're doing our best to deal with the situation and overcome our self-imposed handicap. How did we end up placing Dry Rice in such a bad spot? Well, we spent the majority of our time debating our capital city location, and the location for our second city was a decided afterthought. Additionally, our very central capital location meant it was already going to be hard to settle a second city in a decent location without more exploration.

So, we did get I think, the best capital spot out of the deal. Will that be enough to make up for our gimped second city? I don't know. We perhaps would have been better served splitting off resources from the capital to make two cities of similar quality, but we opted for the strong capital route. DR will be a hell of a worker pump in the turns to come, on the plus side, but the lack of a strong food bonus until we spread irrigation means it will forever be harder to turn a profit with than our other cities.

While I'm on potential errors made to date:

- Two turns of anarchy, not convinced this was an error (I'll take an extra turn of anarchy now over one 40 turns down the road/a really early wasted GA any day), but this is also worth noting as a reason why we might be slightly behind Plako/Sullla.
- Not whipping the first worker until late. This was my fault, I didn't have time when we were kicking this shindig off, but I might have caught this had I checked WK's micro - I just have a deep abiding hatred of spreadsheets. Both of us are also coming off a long hiatus (+2 years) from Civ4.

I say all this not to be self-pitying, but simply to clear the air before moving forward. These are things WK and I have discussed in GChat, but have not made it into the thread. I expect our mistakes long-term will even out with other teams's errors. The unfamiliar start guarantees people will not make optimal moves. Moreover, I believe that beyond a threshold of competency, micro does not win games. Having the right neighbors, the right pick, and the ability to make the right macro moves wins or loses games. Excellent micro creates more opportunities, but at a diminishing rate of return beyond competency. Despite our early missteps, I believe the opening 25 turns have not been immaculate, but have been competent.

With the early game starting to move to the rearview mirror, I'm very optimistic about this game based on our immediate neighbors and combo. I honestly could not have asked for a better map than the one we have for the Dutch. There's a lot of time to decide on what our overarching attempt to achieving victory will look like, but I dream of settling four defensible border cities, then controlling all the water around us. I would like to try to play defensibly on land, and aggressively at sea, taking as many islands as we can and forking opponent's cities endlessly. As far as conquest, I think neighboring Alhazard may prove to be a boon long-term, as his opening has been slow to say the least.

Based on the temple in his cap, our best bet is that he didn't run Engineers to keep his pools pure, and is trying to generate a great prophet for something. Actually, looking at the bulb list, the only techs available from this point forward that a GP can bulb are education, printing press, liberalism, and future tech. How exactly he plays that bulb out, I'm not sure. He might also want to get a GP for a shrine out early, since that will be very difficult later on without Angkor Wat. I'm unsure. The bottom line remains the same, out of the field, he's most likely to be lagging when we want to try to conquer someone.

Meta thoughts aside, here's what we're actually doing:

EOT 210, we'll finish chopping out two settlers. They'll be securing the border against Scooter in the west, and planting on the southeastern coast, respectively. After much wrangling, we decided on a defensively-placed plan on our side of the river towards Scooter, should be a killer city though (thinking about Aggressive Jungle for its name).

The southeastern city will have 3 forests in the BFC and a grassland wheat and plains cow. The plan here is to get it up and running quickly and build: culture -> size 3 -> worker -> whip - grow on galley -> settler -> chop to completion/whip. That settler will go to the gems isle to the east. And no, I don't know that's what's there, but it's logical based on the lack of gems elsewhere on the map.

In sum, we're looking at having 5 cities by the end of 213 or so. Those 5 cities will give us enough of a good food bonus that we can really start leveraging IMP after that. Once we get cities 4 and 5 down, we'll probably pump out another round of workers before settling into a rhythm of whipping out settlers. We'l also shortly be growing our capital onto cottages.

I'm trying not to neglect military in all of this, and currently have two half completed pikes in the works. I'm more than a little terrified of a knight appearing out of the fog and us not being ready for it. We should be set to staff all of our border cities with a couple contemporary military units the turn they are settled though. Thankfully, demographics indicates nobody has built anything substantial yet though, so we're good for the time being. I'd like to get a pike/longbow into each of our border cities, and add to that later if we really need to. That should be enough to stop a random raze though.

We do connect to our neighbors in the south, given mirrored sides. I am moving the warrior and longbow back now since I'm not that interested in defogging tiles I know are ice. I do eventually want to get longbows onto the deep southern hills to serve as sentries against sneak attacks.

It would be super fun to send our own cavalry sneak attack against Alhazard that way.....maybe someday. I expect he and Nic will put their own sentries up though.

No though, almost at the point where it begins to feel like you're running an empire instead of being the mayor of a couple cities. I really like WK's plan to run a scientist in PC. Either GP result is acceptable to us, and I would love to land ND. The wonder is okay, but we can research GP with double pre-reqs (and potentially known civ from Plako). With it promising not to be super hard to research, I'm more amenable to rushing a wonder with our engineer.

I'm really glad we did Education first, or it would take us forever to get to Oxford. The discovery of Stone in the south means we should be able to complete it pretty quickly too. That's still quite a few turns away though.

The land around us has an abundance of riverside tiles, which is so great for financial. I'm thinking we generally want to cottage all the riverside, but otherwise (barring the capital and maybe one or two more commerce cities), will be work-shopping all the grassland. Why would you work anything else when you can work a 2/4/0 tile. Those SP workshops are still a ways away though.

I'm vaguely considering settling a spot for Mack's calendar resources that is equidistant between our capitals. It would be a super-nice city, and not indefensible - but worth pissing off the guy with Phracts....probably not. We do not have eyes on Mack's 3rd and 4th cities on the plus side, and our explorer is headed towards Plako's territory.

Scooter offered us a map trade this latest turn, but I don't see a compelling reason to accept it. We have a complete may, minus Nic's 3rd and 4th cities, and Scooter's 4th. I don't think they have everyone's maps yet. They're also going to attack us or not regardless of the AI diplo between us, so building up goodwill isn't really worth it. Besides, it's more likely they would think us more vulnerable if we did accept a disadvantageous map trade.

I'm checking everyone's cities and techs every turn. It's really intriguing to see the opening infra builds. Scooter is really committing to the SA economy, with one in his first 3 cities already. Plako and Mack also went for early libraries. Alhazard has a temple. Nic built an AP buffed temple and a library. I think Nic has had the strongest opening of anyone so far, and his monk economy has a lot of potential to be really strong on this map.

And.....40 minutes of writing later. I can't think of anything I haven't really mentioned. I'm super excited to get to the islands, but we do have a few more border mainland cities to get down first. One upcoming thing we're going to have to debate is if we want to settle aggressively towards Nic to prevent our Scooter border plant and western ismus plant from being potentially forked.

And Mackoti just logged in. Turn 210 coming up, this one with pictures

[oledavy]

Turn 210

Whipped two settlers! Here's an overview of our core.



Both cities will get settled on 213.

Here's our military screen for anyone wondering how much military/workers we have tooling around.



WK, here is the aggressive plant towards Mack I was considering. Probably not worth, but I thought at least worth entertaining.



In depressing international news, Nic settled his 5th city this turn, and Al settled his 3rd and 4th. We are now tied for last in city count with IMP brother, Plako.

But not for long