Suboptimal IV: Indonesian Insanity

[suboptimal]

I did some evening commute pondering.  I'll get to that after I go through this....

Here's the Great Person roll for this game:
General: Sun Tzu - The Art of War
Engineer: Bi Sheng - Eureka for Printing, and allows city to build 1 more district than the limit 
Merchant: Colaeus - 100 & 1 copy of Luxury 
Scientists: Euclid - Eureka for Mathematics + 1 random Medieval eureka 

First governor titles are State Workforce and Early Empire in the ancient era, and then Defensive Tactics and Recorded History in Classical era. So it will be a long time to #3 and #4.

There is also a governor title from building the Government Plaza and for completing each tier of building in that district, so #3 and possibly #4 could be earlier if we pushed for them.

Moving 2 turns is certainly painful but not the end of the world. I suspect that half of the other players will move on the first turn so you will only be 1 turn behind them. And your quicker growth/science/gold will quickly catch up compared to settling in place. I think you can do better though for the initial capital micro. If you're going to buy the 2/2 GFH (and I think that is the right choice given the current info) then might as well buy it as soon as possible. The additional gold yield will allow you to purchase the tile on T6, perfectly timed with growth of your 2nd pop. Therefore:

Work genius cows. Grow to pop 2 on T5. Buy and work 2/2 GFH on T6 until growth to pop 3 on T13. Work cow + 1/2 PH + 2/2 GFH at 3 pop starting on T14. Warrior out on T12 and from there either ...
A) Settler T23 > Builder T29 ... Settler at T23 (with enough food in the box to remain at size 2) > builder T29.
B) Builder T19 > Settler T27 ... Builder at T19 (improves genius cows T20, mine PH T23, possibly save 3rd charge for 2nd city or improve other cows which may not be worked for a while) > Settler at T27
C) Potentially some other build order after seeing all of the surrounding terrain upon founding. Of particular note is the 5/0/0 Sugar that should be claimed on T8 but is not being worked. We could possibly forego the yields on another tile for a couple of turns in order to speed growth if that makes a big difference. Too much missing information to evaluate at this point.

All of your turn times are backed up by two because since we don't settle until Turn 3 we won't generate any yields until then. Pop 2 happens on Turn 7 and go from there. I agree that buying the 2/2 GFH tile early is the better approach. The sugar will not be claimed on Turn 811 because the probable 2nd ring Yosemite tile will be taken first. The sugar would then go next unless there's a 5-yield tile west of the genius cows.

I'm skeptical of the ROI of early holy sites as anyone but Japan and Russia. (EDIT: but you do need 1 district early for State Workforce, and with Campuses not needed maybe HS really is the best option?)

Science is going to be rocketing ahead early on. How can you best leverage Science into a snowball in other areas? You pointed out not needed a Campus early and I agree 100%. I hope we do not find a scientific CS because balance is better at this stage of the game. You'll be hard pressed to hit the eurekas as it is. Animal Husbandry > Mining is obvious for the first 2 techs. I could see Astrology if you want to go that route and start GProphet points generating. Faith yields from a HS will not pay back for a very long time but that's OK if you are playing for that long game. How do you envision using the faith that you generate from coastal adjacency, HS, GotHarvest, etc.?

This one's easy, but maybe easier said than done. Gitarja's ability allows us to buy naval units with at any point during the game. 2 = 1.

Taking Bronze Working to 60% awaiting 3 barb kills would be another option. BW revealing Iron might be critical if you find yourself neighboring Macedon. "Wasting" an early district slot on a 0 yield encampment has less opportunity cost when Campus is unnecessary and Commercial Hubs/Harbors don't do anything until their tier 1 building is completed. If you find Horses at City 2 you could potentially hard research through Archery into Horsemen and rush a neighbor (). Or blast straight to Shipbuilding for a coastal fishing empire 

I don't like Encampment first in this situation. My reasoning is below.

Buying Settler #2 (I assume for city #3) is probably not in the cards. You'll need 50 to purchase a 2nd ring tile + 440 = 490. Generating gold at 8/turn that's 60 turns. Subtract 5-10 turns if you clear a barb camp or three still puts you well into the Colonization timeframe where it makes more sense to take advantage of the production modifier. Better I think to boost your culture early on with Monument purchases at 2nd & 3rd cities. Culture = policies + governments + governor titles << Considering the value of culture ... God of the Open Sky with the 2 pastures that you can already see at the capital? It really goes back to the question of how do you envision yourself using the accumulated culture from God of the Harvest if you go with that pantheon.

Yes, the start does lend itself to GotS to make up for the lack of immediate culture. I agree that monument purchases are probably the way to go with the excess cash.

Now for the ponderings.

First off, we earlier dismissed the distric discount mechanism under R&F. I now disagree with that assessment as we forgot about Gathering Storm. When that is released this game (and any other active PBEMs) are going to have a Nuclear Nerfhammer dropped on them as all overflow chops will no longer work as they do now. With escalating district costs the discounts will be very important, not irrelevant. Assume a Feb 20th release and one turn per day starting tomorrow. The expansion and the patch drop somewhere in the late 50's or early 60's, max. That's barely enough time for 3-4 district builds. One thing I haven't figured out and will need to playtest -- is the Government Plaza included in the formula and, if so, how badly does it mess with things?

Tech-wise we'll be able to finish all three of Animal Husbandry, Mining and Astrology before the first builder is out. We will get the eureka for Astrology in the first 3 turns of the game. My new thinking on techs is to do Astrology first and dump a cheap (58) Holy Site north of Yosemite, build a second one for +2 adjacency just east of the copper at City #2 and then use the district discount for either a Government Plaza or a Harbor at the capital. That's another 4-5 per turn and could have us a Great Prophet around Turn 70 or so. I don't like an Encampment because it will be more expensive than a Holy Site, it will be significantly delayed compared to a Holy Site (need to complete Bronze Working to even place it) and I'd need to get two of them down to get a district discount.

I'm going to load the save and look around at the lenses and whatnot and continue to mind spew in a couple of hours.

[Cornflakes]

You are correct on the timing I started at T1 when I ran the numbers instead of T3.

For some reason I was thinking that Indonesian Jongs only could be bought with faith not ships in general. Due to the 100% ship policy though it’s actually the equivalent of 4/1roduction, right?

You make a good point about tech pace able to unlock all those early techs by the time the builder completes, but the district cost lower with Astrology first. The only hiccup might be the gold for buying another tile. But you can delay both AH and Mining by taking them to 1 turn short of completion while waiting for the gold to accumulate for the 2nd tile purchase.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

The government plaza IS included in the formula and it IS a headache. It's cheap to build - I think only 40% the cost of a regular district? - but it throws all the math off for everything else since you can only ever build 1. Ultimately it hurts more than the reduced price helps.

[suboptimal]

You are correct on the timing I started at T1 when I ran the numbers instead of T3.

For some reason I was thinking that Indonesian Jongs only could be bought with faith not ships in general. Due to the 100% ship policy though it’s actually the equivalent of 4/1roduction, right?

You make a good point about tech pace able to unlock all those early techs by the time the builder completes, but the district cost lower with Astrology first. The only hiccup might be the gold for buying another tile. But you can delay both AH and Mining by taking them to 1 turn short of completion while waiting for the gold to accumulate for the 2nd tile purchase.

You are correct about the faith conversion when Maritime Industries or other such policies are running.  However, in general terms I think it's correct to consider to be a supplemental production source for naval units, particularly since we won't always be able to run the policy and the yields will be lower. 

Looking ahead having a couple of holy sites and faith generation going early may also pay dividends later if the game develops into a stalemate situation and we're still around -- religious victory could wind up on the table.  The other thing is that a missionary could be a good way to scout out the other continent as it ignores borders.


Regarding the government plaza it's going to mess up the discount formula but I think getting one built early rather than none still gets us closer to getting the discount.  Besides, the discount would also apply to the plaza, making that much cheaper than normal. 

Time to load the save and poke around....

[suboptimal]

Turn 1 Pre Move Look Around

First off, the opening screen with the civ & leader abilities:




Second, a view of the start on the appeal lens:




Any green tile would yield +1 if the Earth Goddess pantheon were chosen. Most of the early tiles we’d work at the capital would get that bonus. At city #2, not so much. The question becomes what pantheon would produce more faith over time, Earth Goddess or Goddess of the Harvest? I think the latter scales through the game better and would be more useful, especially boosted by Magnus. The start does lend itself to God of the Open Sky as well as Oral Tradition.

My thinking for pantheons is Goddess of the Harvest first then either Earth Goddess or God of the Open Sky if someone manages to beat us to GotH.

Moving on, and as reference for later, screenshots of the promotions for Magnus, Liang, Reyna and Moksha:










I think Liang should be the first governor we get in order to get the +1 builder charge going at one of the cities. Magnus, obviously, is in the #2 spot.

Liang: if she gets a promotion it’d be for the +30% bonus for city-center buildings. That could synergize well with Limes chops later on when we need walls or help get some monuments out. Fisheries are not worth it with Kampung available. Later game the Zoning Commissioner promotion might be worthwhile as every bit helps.
Magnus: The Provision promotion might be useful for some mid-game settlers. It’s more useful on the way to Black Marketeer, which would be of major use if we find ourselves without something like niter or coal.
Reyna: The initial ability is meh. Harbormaster could be useful if we get a high-adjacency harbor up and running. Tax collector could also be useful once we grow a large enough city.
Moksha: Religious pressure from cities is underwhelming. However, I’m looking at Divine Architect. That might be useful in terms of getting down Holy Sites early and then leaving them unbuilt until later, using the +20% bonus to speed things up a bit.

I think with the faith and religion play the “correct” approach is going to be get the groundwork early (a couple of Holy Sites for district discounts elsewhere and a Great Prophet to found) and then build out late.

[suboptimal]

Turn 1

I moved the settler to the hill to reveal some more tiles to the east and south. Here’s what we got:




Heh...first turn of the game and we’ve got the Astrology boost, +3 era score and found horses. We are a bit further south than I first thought: there’s wisps of tundra bleeding into the plains east of the lake. The horses would be second ring to the City #2 location up by the dyes and copper and third ring to the capital. The fresh water there is being supplied by a river that starts on the NE edge of that plot. Looks like expansion will most likely be north and east unless there’s a spit of land jutting out west of Yosemite. There is a land tile W of genius cows.

Moved the warrior NE and it didn’t reveal anything extra because of all the heavy terrain. We’ll see new stuff next turn.

First decision to make – do we try to do the Dark Age → Heroic Age catapult or do we try to shoot for successive Golden Ages? Regarding the prior faith discussion note that one of the dedications (Monumentality) allows civilian unit purchases with .

Sat down with the city micro spreadsheet, played with some numbers. Here's what I got:

Turn 3: Found capital, work genius cows, start warrior
Turn 8: Grow to pop 2, purchase 22roduction GFH, work genius cows and GFH
Turn 13: Warrior completes, start settler
Turn 15: Grow to pop 3, buy sugar tile, work genius cows, GFH and sugar
Turn 20: Grow to pop 4, continue working those tiles + hill E of capital
Turn 25: Settler completes, pop back down to 3. Capital stops working sugar tile.
Turn 29: Back to pop 4, resume working sugar tile
Turn 31: Builder completes, pastures genius cow, start holy site (having bought tile W of genius cows earlier)
Turn 32: Builder to other cow
Turn 33: Pasture cow
Turn 34: Builder to hill E of city center
Turn 35: Mine hill, boost Craftsmanship
Turn 37: Holy site completes, +2 to +3 faith
Turn 38: Capital to 5 pop, working genius cows, cows, mined hill, GFH and forest NW of capital, growth slowed 50%

Alternatively we can not start the holy site and build a combination of two military units - 2x slinger, 2x warrior or slinger+warrior for Turn 39, quite a bit earlier if Agoge is slotted.

[Cornflakes]

Alternatively we can not start the holy site and build a combination of two military units - 2x slinger, 2x warrior or slinger+warrior for Turn 39, quite a bit earlier if Agoge is slotted.

I think this depends on prospects for a city state capture. If you have a close CS that you don't want to keep long term then military for the capture might be better. (By the way, was there any rule in the setup thread about capturing/keeping/razing city states this game?)

I think for my part I've had about as much to say about the start as I can until you get a few turns of scouting in and I'll have a busy weekend so I may go silent for a few days.

[suboptimal]

The only rule that seemed to be agreed upon was no DoF blocking, but that's only relevant for whichever continent has three players starting on it. The use of CQUI, city-state capture/keep/raze and other "house" rules were not discussed or not affirmatively approved or denied.

I forgot to mention in the last post that the micro assumes completion of Code of Laws and slotting Urban Planning at Turn 17.

[suboptimal]

Turn 2

First off, let’s see who’s settled and who besides us has moved…

Woden: No
Alhazard: Yes
Archduke: No
Rowain: No

Rowain seems to have done something on the first turn to get 3 era score, he must have had a natural wonder by his start as well. Alhazard is the only player to settle on Turn 1, as evidenced by his empire score. I expect to see the other three settled when I get the save next. I’m not sure how Alhazard has 7 empire score, though – he should have 6 or am I missing something with R&F scoring?

Settlervision shows no change in my surroundings, so no city-states started thisclose to my position. Warrior moves NE, revealing more mountains to the east, jungle to the north and the end of the river. Tiles to the W & NW are coast, the GFH to the NE is not by anything, so that’s the current target.

Settler moves southwest and….




the map script ignored the placement rules for Yosemite and parked it right on the coast. This is interesting as it means the city is completely unassailable by land from the west and southwest. I also got what I wanted out of the lake – a multi-tile lake with a resource. A kampung in the tile SE of the capital will make that northern lake tile a 2121 yield once the pearls get a fishing boat (which will make them 2211). This does complicate things, though, as now there’s no good spot for a holy site up here unless I spend gold to get a third ring tile on the far side of the wonder. The tile that gets +2+2 on the far side of the wonder will come into view next turn when I found the capital. I may be buying that tile after the GFH and then perhaps putting down a holy site in the third ring west of that. While I would have preferred land to the west of genius cows and the land SE of the capital is meh, I think moving down here was still the correct move.

[suboptimal]

Turn 3
Hello lurker, my old friend
I’ve come to torment you again
Because my posting gently reading
Hurt your brain while I was sleeping
And the shaking of your poor head caused a sprain
Sulla strains
Within the


Capital founded, citizen works the genius cows and we’re finally underway on techs and civics.  Start building a warrior, who will head east from the capital.  The placement, being within two tiles of a natural wonder, gets me another 3 era points.  It’s going to be hard to stay out of a Dark Age at this rate.  Yields are good, CQUI shows my science at 6 which is going to get noticed by everyone else real quick.

A quick look at the score shows that we’re the last to settler our capital.  Also looks like population count for 2 points (or a city counts for 6 point) under R&F scoring.  Anyone have any ideas on this?

Cornflakes, my inclination is going to be to buy the 2 tile to the south and then park a Holy Site to the west of it.  I want to keep that 2 tile around for future use.  That’s going to cost ~120 for the two tiles, plus another 50 or so for the GFH in 5 turns.  I’m inclined to research all of the first three techs to 1 turn from completion and then blitz them all out over three turns to keep costs down.  It won’t be until Turn 23 or so until we can afford the third tile buy.  

Warrior in the north finds coastal dyes and a GFH, along with possibly the top of the mountain chain over here.  No sign of city-states yet.