[SPOILERS] The Wild Card

[The Black Sword]

Check out West City, top left, seems slowcheetah is having more success than us vs dtay. Best of luck to him.

Think I'll give a full update next turn T130, partly because most of my current mini-plans have finished and I really should make sure the GA is properly set up.

[Jowy]

Wow MH already eliminated. That was fast work by mackoti.
We didn't place last!

[The Black Sword]

Here's the long delayed T131 update.

First, some foreign affairs, Old Tourist's army is near the mackoti border.


He's got a couple more mini stacks around here. We also met Mack himself:


See how long that scroll bar is at the side? Yeah, he's going to win this. I'm not all that cut up about it, better him than dtay. In the more immediate term, more open borders would be great. Our island cities have ran out of Old Tourist's mainland cities to trade with.

As I was logged in, I also got a front row seat to slowcheetah's demise at the hands of Ichabod:



Which is unfortunate, because I'm sure dtay gets that little island to himself now.

Anyway, let's go on a little tour of our own cities. It looks like we don't need an additional happy for gpt loan btw, if we don't want to force out Captain Trip's GP during the golden age then it's not necessary. So, the golden age is aimed to start on T138, where we immediately revolt into Bureau, Caste and HR. Additionally, Ivory comes online T138, Whales T139. So, cities should try to be right up against their happy cap T136 and grow T137. Possibly use Avoid Growth on T136 to grow T138/T139 also.


New Tachyon is where we will get our GS during the GA. We put 3 turns into the library in this configuration, then swap a coast for the plains cottage, shared with the capital for 2t, to get 36/36 on T135 with Avoid Growth. Swap mines for 1t of 2 sci when the library is in then go max growth, 1 unhappy face on T137, ends that turn at size 9 at 36/38. Then work 7 sci + pigs +clam for -5fpt x 7t should get the Great Sage out with 300gpp(50 golden age GP turns) exactly.


Peregrine will complete the Moai T137 if we can keep the stone. It will grow right up to the happy cap, then give a fish back to the capital and grow again T137.



Jetboy gets the GP out T137 in this configuration. Probably will give that cottage over to New Tachyon when it retakes the fish, should be able to get right up to the happy cap to grow on T137 also.


Will grow in 2, then pick up the mine and finish the LB before another cottage comes online, should just about grow again T138 I think. Might be a better idea to cottage/workshop one of those plains tiles for the GA instead of that extra grass cottage actually. The Longbow will probably go south, to garrison that copper island if we can grab it.


Next turn we 1-whip the settler, to steal Sleeper's clams. Overflow back into that LB. 3t to regrow to 7, won't get to 8 in time for the GA.


Will get up to size 6 for the GA. I guess Bagabond and Sleeper will just keep on LBs, not sure there's anything better.


We'll settle a new city to steal the clams T134. I stopped HA production to get 2 Sentry chariots out, though my knowledge of the vision rules is pretty bad, that probably won't get us vision into New Xerxes either. Anyway, I'm thinking just continuing HA production here. There's also an argument for some LBs, but I don't think it's a good spot for econ buildings. Should grow to size 11 on T137 and have another workshop ready too.


Our final really important GA city. Will detail the plan tomorrow, a bit tired. Essentially, work Merchants during the GA, whip in a Library to join the market at the end and work 4 specialists for ~10(yeah, that slow ) non-GA turns to finish the high odds GM.


Can actually steal the sheep from Trips a few times here, since we're not growing it into an extra pop point. We can get up to size 6 for the GA. Wealth build is because I currently haven't a clue what to do with the hammers. It will probably be an economic site long term, so maybe Library/Market during the GA?


I see this as our Long term NE site, so we want Library/Market eventually for the specialist slots, again, maybe a better idea than wealth builds. I'm not sure whether to work coast or specialists during the GA. It doesn't represent any extra efficiency over the NE and they will likely sit there unused for a long time. Getting our NE up and generating a new one will be slow going after this though. You can also see Nakor settled right beside us, so it's tempting to run artists to pop 3rd ring borders. He doesn't seem to have any great form of culture generation though, so we should be ok. Should grow to size 9 on T138 I think.




Water Lily's Granary is being chopped, then avoid growth to get 8/11f benefit from it. Yeoman's just used that trick to get 10/11. Haven't worked everything out fully down here yet, but Yeoman wants to get out our Settler for the copper island. It'll probably stay low to do that since I'm not sure how many improvements we can get into place.

Our not terrible looking demos:


That rival best GNP is Pindicooter in a GA IIRC, I reckon our GNP is keeping up there.

[The Black Sword]

Success!



Our soldier numbers have been steadily improving over the last few turns and we've managed to catch up with dtay in power.



Looking at the map we also have a nice possible mounted fork on New Xerxes and Riole. Stage on the grassland 1NE of Popinjay, out of his vision. Then road the river plains 1NW of that and move the mover stack 1E of the lake in range of both cities. We certainly don't have enough HA yet but it might be an idea for the future, I'm back to lacking clear goals after researching bureau though.



Our tech should be pretty good during the GA and I expect we should do a fair amount of gold saving there in preparation for the Academy on the final turn. No techs seem especially appealing economically though, particularly with the cost increase of later techs, things like Education just seem far too expensive. Machinery -> Guilds still seems an ok tech path, for a few watermills and +1h workshops. Do we want to whip out an army of knights when we get there though? Back to the question of spiting dtay or building up our own civ I feel. I think we might be better bee-lining for Cuirs/Cannons or something like that if the plan is to hurt dtay, because it wouldn't take him too long to pick up the cheapish Medieval techs to get a counter to knights. We will actually have the production this time to whip out an army at least. On the subject of building up our own civ I'm really not sure what tech is cost-effective. One of the (economic!) ideas I had was actually to research astro, try to control our ocean and pick up some more islands from Nakor and Azza. It also unlocks observatories too of course. I really need to think about the tech after bureau. Any ideas here Jowy?

Back to pre-GA planning.



So, the plan in Captain Trips is pretty similar to New Tachyon. Get to 36/36 food with avoid growth on turn 135. Then go on the full +10 food surplus to get 28/38 EOT136 and suffer 1 unhappy face to get to 36/38 EOT137. During the GA, work fish and sheep and 7 specialists for -6fpt for 6 turns, starve on 8 specialists on the final turn with Caste system for 300gpp again. New Tachyon's scientist comes out first because it is ahead in the city order. Then we immediately whip in the Market and Library and work those specialists for a GP 9t later.



In the south, Yeoman whipped in the WB this turn, it will overflow into the settler, grow and whip in another WB and then 2 chops come in T139 to complete the settler. I should be able to get a new galley out of Water Lily as well in that time frame. Drop the settler off on the copper island T141. Spend the last 3 turns in Caste system T142-144 running artist specialists to pop the borders and Yeoman has already got the WB for it of course.

I think it's important to get this city in time for Caste. I'm looking at options to get the last fish/stone city on the island in place for T142 as well.

Also, Pindicooter declared war on us to bring their boat home:

He didn't pillage our first net and I noticed he left dtay's final net alone as well so I didn't whip out a Trireme. Managed to keep 2 units per city so far, but that won't be true when he moves past the island, Kid Dinosaur might actually be empty. But I don't really believe they have a unit on it either.

[Jowy]

I'll have to think about this and snoop around in-game. Btw all this Golden Age preparation is a learning experience for me, I've never bothered..

[The Black Sword]

Glad someone finds it interesting! It's mostly just the usual grow and lay off the whip I suppose.

Regarding tech, I think for the moment, we can probably pick up Calendar and Iron Working and delay the decision a bit more. I'm leaning Machinery -> Guilds ->Banking after that but still not sure. Might be best to use the GM for bulbing in that case, if we're getting access to lots of half price gold multipliers.

I'm probably going to be away on Monday and Tuesday btw, could you pick up the turns on those days Jowy?


Dtay is in Caste/Pacifism, researching Paper, presumably going to bulb most of Education, get started on Phi Universities and take Liberalism. And mackoti is keeping his neighbour's army distracted. I again wonder whether we should try do something and see only about 6 HAs.

We settled Modular man:

Will use Caste artists to pop borders and hope for a free Hindu spread.

I figured out what Hiram is going to do with it's GA pop:

It's a shame to whip 7->4 just as the GA begins, but it's only whipping off coast at least and it gets the fish/stone city settled in time to use the Caste artists to get the fish/silk/stone in borders.


I'm thinking of just holding the LBs of Popinjay and Bagabond 1t from completion and build a Barracks in each first during the GA. Most other places will just build a market, which will soon be worth +3 with their GA production. Also, when the GA begins, I should figure out if it's efficient to use Caste artists to retake the farm 2N1W of Bagabond. Of course, dtay will always have the diagonal to attack from, so it would purely be a platform for an offensive attack.

New Tachyon and Trips are ready to go:

[Jowy]

Yeah I can play those turns.

[The Black Sword]

Thanks Jowy, I was going to finish off the current turn but looks like you're already in. Be careful to turn off the avoid growths in New Tachyon and Captain Trips, there might be one on Water Lily as well to fill up the Granary, I can't remember. Also, the 2 Longbows in Captain Trips were going to head south to garrison the copper island.

I'll be gone for roughly the next 36-48hrs, though I'll probably have some internet access.

[Jowy]

I should wait until T137 to turn them off, right?

[The Black Sword]

Nope, turn 136. We'll have 1 unhappy face T137, which disappears T138 when we revolt to HR, but we need the extra food to starve out the GP. All the other cities should try to grow on T137.