[Spoiler] Kaiser has a plan

[Ioan76]

Hey Ioan,

There is a question for your playing window in the organization thread.

Did you use PYDT before? I recommend housing the app.

Nope - what this stands for?

[Kaiser]

Hey Ioan,

PYDT stands fpr Play Your Damn Turn, it is a website based support for CIV 6 (and other games) to facilitate playing PBEM with multiple players. It basically offers you to check any time whose turn it is and it can send you an email whenever your turn starts (the person before you finishes their turn). They also have a desktopp client which helps downloading and manging the save which I can highly recommend using.
Here is a link

As you were not answering in the organisation thread when asked for your best playing window, the others have decided that I should be the player. I am hoping that you will dedlurk me (just read my thread and then we try to organize in a way to decide together).
This will help my reporting efforts as well, as I will be sure that at least you are reading the reporting and will hopefully have some good discussions about our stratgy here or via other means.

This brings me back to the question of your availability, so we can find a good way to communicate for this game. We can use this forum but also other means which are a bit more direct such as discord.
I am situated in Europe and can best play in between 17:00 GMT and 21:00 GMT. I might catch a turn outside of that window but this is the only timeslot I can guarantee daily.

[Ioan76]

More or less this is the same time-frame for me but I may enter in the morning after my wife went to work.

[Kaiser]

That sounds good, i would then try to set up a direct communication eihter via Steam or Discord so we can discuss about the turn and try to decide together on it.
Please PM me your Steam name, I will then add you to my friendslist so we can see when the other gets on.

So you are also in Europe, where are you from?

[Kaiser]

Ok player picks and order are in, even though there still is some discussion about replacing Archduke with CMF (probably shifting his position in the order as well, though I am not sure what CMFs best slot would be as he sits in South Korea at the moment

Ichabod - BRAZIL
Suboptimal - ENGLAND (ELEANORE)
Woden - PHOENICIA
TheArchduke/CMF - CANADA
Kaiser - EGYPT

In any case we are last in turn order which helps with some C&D but is else unpreferable

[Kaiser]

Let us have a closer look at the picks:

Woden
Phoenicia (4) 7/8
- water focussed CIV with Harbour special district, settler production bonus and very quick settlers on sea. Anti-Synergy with Pangea but would be an acceptable/good pick when starting on coast



If there will be a coastal start for him, I believe Phoenicia is actually the strongest CIV in this selection due its various early game boni.
There are some which are good in any case
- early additional trade routes (Government Plaza and Ancestral Hall, two things you basically want to build anyway as early s possible)
- 50% district construction bonus for the city with the government plaza (even emphazising the above importance further)
- Writing Eureka for early acces to Campus districts without the need of finding another player

This is already a good early game oriented bonus, however if Phoenicia gets a coastal start, I believe they are the strongest CIV for this PBEM as they get some other important boni.
- Special harbour district (which comes relatively early and helps for district reduction shenanigans) to further increase trade routes and gold income, can be leveraged nicely into science around the renaissance era (as shown by TBS)
  - 50% increased production for settlers in a city with a Cothon. I believe the timing should work out to become relevant roughly around a rushed GP with Ancestral Hall meaning Phoenica can execute a very strong production based expansion (I guesstimate this to be possible around T70)
  - 50% increased production for naval units, we have seen in many other games that the importance of Naval units was underestimated, this is a strong bonus if the map allows it to become important. I hope this Pangea does not even if Poenicia should start Coastal
  - full healing for all naval units in the city with a Cothon means you can only navally attack Poenicia when eradicating their units on the spot (numbers or technological superiority)

- +2 movement and +2 sight for embarked Settlers, no embarkment penalty for Settlers is actuallyl quite strong when coastal as it allows to send out unescorted settlers early to quickly settle new spots. This is a potentially huge gamble but I remember setting up a duel for Archduke and Alhambram where I tested the Phoenicia start and embarking the Settler was the best play. The vision range is huge and allows for safely scouting with the Settler. I am curious to see if Ichabod tests this and goes for it after the game as it is a weird but strong move if coastal
- Biremes are straight up improved Galleys (35 vs 30 strength, 4 vs 3 moves) which protect trade routes around them. I doubt they will come into play heavily as they should be outdated when, if at all, naval combat becomes important. However they are a good way for Phoenicia to get era score for a golden age as the special units give 4 and the first naval unit also gives 3 points iirc.

His start will strongly depend on starting coastal or not, assuming his Capital is a non-coastal start, I expect him to:
- get a 2nd coastal city if possible
- rush a Goverment Plaza (even a bit more than the rest) preferably in the production heavy coastal city (+1 trade route)
- build a quick Campus in the capital 
- build a Cothon in a coastal city (preferably GP city)
- get Ancestral Halls (+1 trade route)
- try to get into a settling spree with 50% from Cothon, 50% bonus from Ancestral halls and 50% bonus from Colonization

I expect a strong opening leveraging the early game boni from Poenicia and just hope that his capital will not be coastal as this would make the above execution far easier and quicker (the Campus then needs to be build in his 2nd city but his capital will be probably strong in production.


Suboptimal
Eleanore (England) (4) 8/8
- same stupid bonus but England is better for late game dominance due to production bonus. Also has a unique harbour district for easier access to trade routes (the movement bonus will probably be irrelevant on a Pangea, but the Dockyard can be placed in lakes). Due to quicker stockpiling of resources early wars are easier to execute



An exected pick as well, I already said earlier that I dislike the loyality mechanic implementation of CIV 6 it basically only restricts settling and conquering but does nothing for competing about tiles. I highly prefer CIV4s mechanic and while it can be tedious, it offers another aspect to consider when having a close neighbor.
That being sad, the CIV6 mechanic is not only tedious but also difficult to manipulate as there are not enough tools, especially early game to leverage it. If Suboptimal manages to get any significant value out of Eleanore'S ability, like switching a city, I will be impressed.

England however has been changed to be late game production powerhouse (around factories so Industrial era).
Early game they can count on:
- increased Iron stockpiling for an early Swordman rush/attack
- a special harbour district (like Phoenicia) which helps achieving district discounts, getting trade routes and stabilizing gold income. The district gets better when on a different continent but I do not expect anybody besides Eleanore to try to leverage the loyality mechanic, so it is a small +2 boost
   - the Naval Dockyard also gets early naval units at least on the movement side on par with Phoenicia
   - it also increases the resource stockpile by 10

Mid game:
- the Sea Dog is potentially game changing unit as it comes at the right time in the game and can capture enemy units creating a naval snowball, let us just hope that the Pangea map script makes naval warfare senseless. I could see a potential concession forcing pus here if the map allows for naval dominance to translate into enough razed cities to demotivate and achieve a significant science, culture and production lead
- increased Coal stockpiling mostly transfers into Ironclads
- cheap and efficient military engineers allow for building many dams and channels (if the terrain allows it) to increase adjancency boni for industrial zones, this is the first step to production dominance

Late game:
- the second step are factories (which are faster to build) and the increased production when these are powered. I hope the game is already won by then

A slower starter than Poenicia, I expect England to also try to settle coastal for their Naval Dockyards. I think besides this preference we will see a vanilla opening with a potential for a Swordman rush if there is a good target (city states for example)
The longer the game goes, the more difficult of an opponent Suboptimal becomes, hopefully he contains Phoenicias naval power.

Ichabod
Brazil (3)



One of the CIVs I did not quickly analyze before due to being spoilered that Ichabod will take them. I would rank Brazil probably more on the stronger side of the available CIVs but a little less powerful than Eleanore or Phoenicia, definetively above Canada roughly like Kongo. 6.1/8

Brazil has a similar issue than Phoenicia, it actually needs its starting bias to execute its boni the best way but it basically has none if it does not have its starting bias.
- 20% refund of GP points when acquiring a GP can become relevant early game, but will more relevant in Mid game (~T70-T100)

if Brazil has sufficient rainforests available (its starting bias) then:
- it can easly achieve good adjacency boni for Campus, Holy site, Commercial and Theatre districts
- Earth Goddess can be a good pantheon for them

Mid Game:
- Copacabana and Street Carnival help Brazil improving their amenity situation and playing a strong GP game by acquiring points for Great Engineer, Great Merchant, Great Writer, Great Artist, & Great Musician
- this can be executed already late Early game (roughly T70) and I expect Ichabod to go for this play

Late Game:
- The Minas Geraes is a late game naval unit which comes at the end of the Mid game, as with the other Naval units I hope that the Pangea Map will be decided on land and that Naval warfare can be avoided

His start will highly depend of the availabilty of rainforests which is not a given on a balanced random map with shifted starts. He will have to execute a vanilla opening and try to find some good adjacency spots for his districts to then leverage his GP generation around the time he can place down Street Carnivals.
I also need to keep in mind that it was him who roflstomped me out of PBEM 3 with England, so he knows his starting game and can read weakness well. Personal goal: not be eliminated before turn 100 by Ichabod

Archduke / CMF
Canada (4) 5/8
- Tundra can basically be used similar to plains, camp resources in Tundra become quite good. Other boni come in late and he cannot declaore surprise wars nor can he be declared on. The later gives a 5 turn information puffer but it is not enough to make this relevant, especially on a handedited map where a Tundra start is unlikely



Another CIV with a starting bias bonus.
Canada can basically improve tundra tiles to create the worst farms of the game and use improved tundra hills/forests like plains hills/forest, which is ... underwhelming.
The only real advantage here are camps (Deer can be found frequently in Tundra) which can further be improved by the Godess of the Hunt pantheon to be crazy good tiles early game with a somewhat big investment (pantheon) and a potential bad starting spot (nearby non-camp, non hill tundra tiles)
Due to the map generation method I do not expect Canada to have to use this ability.

More important is the 100% increased strategic resource accumulation on Tundra, i have never seen Horses in Tundra but frequently Iron, Coal, Oil and Uranium. This is a comparable opportunity to Englands bonus only that you have to have a tundra Iron resource to benefit, which probably also means there are some bad tiles neraby (at least you can build some nice districts without using better tiles)

Early game bonus:
- none

Mid Game bonus:
- none

Late game bonus:
- if you made it until here, Tundra will finally become good with Hockey Rinks
- you also can finally leverage the Tourism based bonus for a cultural win (extremly unlikely against players) with the Hockey Rinks
- this will also help Canada gaining more diplomatic favor (well actually you were able to get 100% increased favor from emergencies before, but the value of diplomatic favor does not justify fighting for this imho)
- you should build a couple of National parks so your mounties get stronger

Well this is a single player CIV, whoever of the two plays it has to execute a strong vanilla early game to survive until Canada can utilize its benefits. When they finally can, I find them underwhelming and would probably revise my ranking to place Canada at the bottom (1/8)

Did I mention that they cannot declare war on city states or surprise wars?
When meeting them we could either denounce them immediately to keep our options open or keep the status as it is to have a 5 turn warning before they can attack.

[Kaiser]

let us hope for inland starts for all and a Pangea where we can avoid seetling on coast at all cost

I have tried some openings and currently I favor:
- Builder
- Settler
- Warrior
- Builder -> best case 2 Sphinx one in each city
- Campus or units with Agoge
- Goverment plaza as quick as possible

This will certainly highly depend on our starting location (will we have floodplains?) and if we can right away improve some of the nearby resources with our first builder.

Sadly this strongly neglects again scouting which did not turn out to good last game so I need to see the start to finally decide if we go for a Scout first slowing the rest a bit

[Cornflakes]

Your starting screenshot:

   

Good luck!

[Kaiser]

Thanks Cornflakes !

I am looking forward to play this map

[Kaiser]

First of all, we have floodplains, i believe the two wheat are also floodplains, let us hope for a flood

All in all the start looks to be foodstarved but has a strong tile with the PHJCoffee. The north is flat with rivers and the south are PH with different resources and some forests, a production heavy site.
We are likely on the East cost of the Pangea and there are the Nile River and the Damietta River to the NW probably flowing together.
There is a potential Campus spot benefiting from Iteru SW - SW from the Warrior with at least one adjacent mountain.

We need to wait for the turn to come by to check appeal view and move the Warrior before the final decision but my first thoughts are:

1. Settle in place (tile picker probably picks PHSheep, PWheat, Crab, PHJ [I would actually prefer this to be the 2nd pick after the PHSheep] or PHF)
2. Move 1 SW on the PH with 3 2 and 2 tiles and closer to another 2 and 2 tile
3. Move closer to the assumed river junction

Option 2 and 3 lose us minimum one turn so we need really good reasons to go for them.
In order to decide this we can move our Warrior first and I see two options here:

a. Move the Warrior SW on the PHF, this should at least uncover the potential Campus site
b. Move the Warrior NW - NW, this will uncover more tiles and give us a better impression of the Damietta river and the area up there to decide

Due to uncovering more tiles, I tend to prefer scouting b and will likely settle 1 (SIP) but we have to wait for the save to turn around to decide this finally.

@Ioan: let me know your steam name so we can discuss while playing the turn tomorrow (if you are available on Sunday)