[PB 55] Miguelito and Mjmd help Amicalola avoid a repetition of last time

[Amicalola]

Still considering Oracle, but not what I wanted to talk about in this post. In brief, I'm not sure Oracle will be available by Math finish. We need sailing, writing, iron working, and math before then, minimum.

I am increasingly worried that SD is totally checked out. His food and production are both appalling (like, half of some players for both), his power is nothing special, and he has 4 cities still (we are about to have 7). He is barely reporting, and his turns are by far the shortest on PBSpy. Maybe something critical happened in his Lewwyn war that we missed?

The reason I am concerned is that this gives Lewwyn a 'free' route of expansion. Nice on one hand, since they will leave us alone temporarily, but also means they could grow unstoppable. If I'm right, I think it is on us to harass Lewwyn from the other side, kind of like what you tried to do to Pindicator in 52 during his own SD wars. Just want to throw that out there, because I am growing increasingly concerned that it is the reality we face, and I think we should start to mentally prepare.

My main hope is that he's just been really busy due to election season, so he may pick back up again in the next week (though the damage is partially already done).

Edit: Here is the food situation, for example.

[Amicalola]

Jowy resent a clam for clam offer, which hopefully means we can be friendly.

In your PB52 thread Mjmd, Old Harry said something that really resonated and stuck with me. If we are in a central position, we need to somehow neutralise 1 or 2 of those directions.

I see two ways of doing that; we kill someone early (not happening), or we try our best to make some friends.

I am going to 100% offer Jowy open borders in 4 turns when it completes. Neither of us wants to fight any war for a considerable amount of time, and I am optimistic we can have a long-term mutually beneficial relationship. This is especially true after the clam-for-clam acceptance. No one else we know has writing either, which means we should be able to get in first with that deal.

The next question is whether or not we offer it to Ruff/Civac, Lewwyn, or neither? I'd rather have Ruff as a friend than Lewwyn, given that Ruff is further away, has higher power, more cities, and Lewwyn is in our desired expansion direction. However, Ruff may be upset if we capture that barbarian city. He may also be unreceptive to the offerin general. Lewwyn on the other hand would give us more immediate benefit (we won't have trade routes to Ruff until sailing), and allow him to focus on SD, but then we'd have nowhere to go, so I lean towards offering to Ruff if we get the chance. The argument for neither is that until currency, just Jowy would entirely fill our trade route quota, so we'd be basically giving away free money. Ultimately, whether this is worth it depends on if Ruff/Civac or Lewwyn are trustworthy allies, or if they will enjoy the free commerce for 30 turns and then turn on us anyway. Do either of you know anything from their past games?

I lean towards just sending OB to Ruff too when we get sailing, and accepting that we'll get a bad deal commerce-wise for a little while. If we don't make friends with Jowy + one other player, the only long-term outcome I see for us is being torn apart from 2 sides, and that's an even worse deal.

[Mjmd]

So I agree ish that Lewwyn is probably going to be the direction to expand just because a war between them and SD is incredibly likely and we can try to backstab. There are some very important differences in maps though. It is important to learn things from past games, but also important to notice what is different. Pin in PB52 got to expand along his more exposed borders. Your exposed borders are both west and south. You also still have plenty of natural expansion room (we don't even know about how good the islands north are). I would definitely prioritize taking as much land as possible naturally first. South in particular feels like Jowy will prob consider anything south of that river his (very close to his capital).

How is the worker count feeling? Do you think you can make due just producing workers out of pig floodplain city? In order to push south (and maybe west if Civac keeps avoiding). Oracle would be nice and I really don't think its bad to slow build it. Also need IW if you want that jungle rice city (I still like my spot better than migs from a defensive stand point fyi, but that is probably the last of the jungle cities to settle anyways). Sailing and open borders to Civac would help tech rate a bit as well as building libraries in capital and pig floodplain city.

[Amicalola]

Superdeath offered OB this turn as well (he just discovered writing). He has it with Jowy now too. I am hopefully the three of us can work together to lower our directions of threats. SD and us in particular can basically entirely wrap around Lewwyn, and we seem to functionally have an unspoken MPP against him, which is also pushing me in a 'he's the one to attack eventually' direction. . Everything you say is correct of course; I think we can hit 15 cities comfortably, maybe more but less than 20. I am not confident we can get all 3 of the jungle ones, since Jowy willl surely head up there too once he has IW (Jowy has very good GNP at the moment).

I decided I like your spot better IF we decide to be friends with Jowy. Your spot is debateable but not offensive if we take, whereas Miguelito's is 5 tiles from his cap and 8 from ours. We can't forward settle everyone!

Worker count is currently 7 workers for 7 cities, soon to be 8 workers and 8 cities in maybe 5 turns (9 cities if we get the barb one). So there is still a shortage to some extent, and we will probably whip a few more from the core. We need currently sailing-iron working urgently, with priesthood/masonry nice for Oracle slow build. Right now my inclination is to blast through masonry, sailing and priesthood (will have marble under culture in 15 ish turns), then either slow build or chop while researching iron working and bulb mathematics, or MAYBE currency if we get lucky. Capital and Flood/pigs will both build libraries starting in 2-3 turns, after flood/pigs whips a worker and capital whips a settler.

I will post a demos shot sometime around maybe T75 or T80 when our heavy whipping starts to actually pay off in the numbers. From PBSpy, we are whipping far more than anyone else.

[Mjmd]

Can you post an overall empire screenshot with order of next spots your considering settling? I'm assuming your settling the fish silver city soon? If Civac keeps ignoring that floodplain spot I'm kind of reevaluating stealing it lol. They obviously do not consider it there's / have better spots to settle? Although I do agree that Jowy is likely to also be on the move soon.

[Amicalola]

Can you post an overall empire screenshot with order of next spots your considering settling? I'm assuming your settling the fish silver city soon? If Civac keeps ignoring that floodplain spot I'm kind of reevaluating stealing it lol. They obviously do not consider it there's / have better spots to settle? Although I do agree that Jowy is likely to also be on the move soon.

Ask and ye shall receive! 

Current Overview Post:



Blue dot (south-east) is going to be settled next turn, with the work boat timed to be netting clams the same turn (I am learning micro!  ). It will have a monument chopped, which should help us get a foothold in the jungle without needing to have iron working just now. I would like to settle either 8 or 9 after that (if 9, chop a monument, if 8 whip one) and use that to get the marble for the oracle. Leaning towards 9 for the silver, although I could definitely be persuaded either way. Let me know what you think on that one. 

After that, I am strongly considering the floodplains spot near Ruff for the next city, to be honest. It neatens our borders up a lot, because our barb city is actually a little isolated if we don't get that. Miguel what do you think about this? Then, we settle the other two jungle cities IF they are available. If you think they will be gone sooner, we could prioritise these two over the Ruff floodplains one. Finally, we backfill whichever 8 or 9 we didn't do earlier, and grab whatever islands we can. 

I thought about settling various islands sooner than that, but I actually don't know if there's a point, since we'll have trade routes with SD and maybe Jowy. Are islands worth anything if we are full up on foreign routes?

I agree about the floodplains spot. It would also be nice to have to make our borders a bit more defensible if (when?) we take the barb city. Civac (is Ruff even playing anymore?) has an axe on the way to that, but with our 2 chariots and our own axe, we should be able to scare him off. Civac is on 9(!!!) cities and high power, so he must have a pretty grim economy. 

Demos are poor right now, but were good a couple turns ago. We have whipped at least once per turn for the last 5 turns, and will again next turn at Aperol Spritz. Then again at Daicquiri. Then again at Negroni. Then again at Aperol!   I think when that cascade of whips stops, we will have prettier demos again, so I'll keep you updated on how they look periodically for sure.

 

I am planning to start a library in Aperol Spritz (3-whip at size 6; it grows absurdly fast, either 1 or 2 turns per size) and Negroni (slow build, perhaps with 1 or 2 whipped settlers as it goes), while Daicquiri keeps worker duty for another 10-ish turns. Then Aperol Spritz will become the most important city in the empire, shitting out workers every 4-5 turns while also being an economic powerhouse, and a cultural pressure against Civac. That city is going to be a mid-game MONSTER. 

For techs, it depends slightly on our Oracle preferences, but my current path I lean towards is finish writing -> sailing -> priesthood -> masonry -> iron working -> Maths (oracle) -> Currency. Any other questions?

I'm actually feeling surprisingly optimistic. I was worried that by this point we'd be dead, dying, or hopelessly behind, but I think we're actually doing ok? The demos aren't great right now, but once Aperol Spritz really gets going, and if we can claim the jungle to some extent, I think we might have a real shot at this!

[Amicalola]

Looking at our empire, the other wonder that jumps out to me is actually the Great Lighthouse. Maybe we should go for that instead of Oracle. We could totally slow build + chop it out in Moscow Mule.

[Mjmd]

Are we actually getting any international trade routes atm btw?

I would rather settle 9 even though its slower. Fish and silver is just better than dry corn, although 8 city can share the pig so maybe.

BTW early especially I think one of the units being produced in Negroni and wiskey sour should have been a spear. We aren't worried about a large stack of slow movers atm. Just keep in mind for next build queues.

It is possible the presence of your warrior on that hill has kept them from settling lol, which means we should reinforce that feeling and settle asap. In any case I am all for a blitz on all remaining land cities and screw more workers for now (one in Spritz is fine). Other than libraries mentioned everything else should be military atm that isn't basic a granary / monument if needed.

Edit: mig thoughts on GLH? My main concern is worker turns needed. We do have a nice chunk of forests for something.

[Amicalola]

No trade routes this turn, SD signed OB this turn so I think we get them next turn? The scoreboard says we have connection so I assume it has to wait 1 turn to connect up. Hopefully I haven't misunderstood that.

You're right about spear. Have one queued up in Whiskey for after that axe; maybe another one after that too. Instead of mining that stone hill with Daicquiri's upcoming worker I could isntead chop the forest 1NE into a settler at size 4. Send that one over to 9, while the Negroni upcoming one heads to Ruff city. Or vice-versa. How about that?

[Amicalola]

Hang on, I might be a moron. I think we'll need sailing to get international trade routes. It just shows that we have a connection right now.