[SPOILERS] Suboptimal Goes Waltzing Matilda

[Sullla]

Nope, not dedlurking anyone in this game, just had one comment to make. I'll ask you a question as well: now that you've met a neighbor, what are your long term plans for TheArchduke?

[suboptimal]

Turn 19

Things continue to be quiet. In the west the warrior stays on the west side of the river since the settler appears to be unthreatened. Find crabs in the west with the settler, wheat and the barbarian scout in the southeast with the slinger and learn that the jungle belt is only 2-3 tiles thick instead of the expected 4-6 tiles. That last one is good to know as it directly impacts the speed with which Archduke can get down here. Speaking of Archduke the barbarian camp is still around.

I am heavconsidering settling on the NE horses for a few reasons:

- I still only need to buy one tile (the intended Campus tile) for city improvements
- There is better food availability and more potential food & production in the 2nd ring
- I start developing the city four turns earlier and the better yields get a stronger city quicker.
- It gets space between that site and Irukanjdi into a city that would otherwise be open
- I can now put a city on the hill NW of Red Dot Lake which gets me the jade & coffee first ring

The downsides and other knock-on effects:

- If/when I get around to building some Outback Stations (at Guilds) I’d lose a +1 bonus since I wouldn’t have a pasture on that horse tile.
- Blue Dot shifts two tiles east. This is a stronger tile location but eliminates the ability to put a city directly in the chokepoint to the NE. (The coffee is 3rd ring to Kandy).

Question for the Lurkers: Does settling on a plains horse make the city center 2 / 1 , 3 /2 or something else (ie does it get the full strategic resource yield above and beyond the city center yield)?

[suboptimal]

Nope, not dedlurking anyone in this game, just had one comment to make. I'll ask you a question as well: now that you've met a neighbor, what are your long term plans for TheArchduke?

Phew.   Here's my expectations and my "plan", as it were.

Archduke will probably build up and attempt a rush sometime in the T60 to T80 time frame.  The timing will depend on what combination of units he aims for and whether or not he tries to come down with one or both uniques.  If he doesn't attempt an attack before those units are obsolete he's lost more than half the point of his civ.  He's also shown himself to be aggressive early in land wars (PBEM 2) and I'm his closest neighbor.  He also has zero reason to declare peace in the event of a stalemate unless I were to threaten complete destruction of his army and/or threaten one of his cities.  He also has tactical experience against skilled opponents and I have...less than zero (my one engagement in PBEM 3 earns me a negative score in that department ).

The main challenge posed by his uniques is that archers are not that effective against them -- 25 vs 36 on the Hypaspists (25 vs 41 if they are next to a district) and he'd probably use the free promotion on the Hetaroi to gain the +7 CS on ranged defense (making that 25 vs 42).   If there's a Great General in the area then archers are just flesh wounds.  So, what to do?

Tech: I'll have two Campus districts completed for +7 by Turn 40.  I'm planning on teching to Masonry and Horseback Riding as the primary goals, though I'll need a diversion to Irrigation at some point.  Those techs get me walls and horsemen, which are two parts of the puzzle.  The third part will be if I can stall Archduke to the late 70s by maintaining military power parity or, preferably, as a slight excess.  If that happens I might be able to leverage the higher early tech rate to Machinery before he invades. The only eurekas in question on the Machinery path is the iron mine and killing three barbarians (they've been kinda quiet so far ).  I'll have all the other eurekas on that path by Turn 40.

Economy: Barring a military buildup by Archduke that starts in the 30's I'll be getting a settler out from irukandji in the mid-30's.  That city will be focused on first, second and probably be SE of Irukandji to get plantations on the citrus to that end.  My first trade route will go to Grenada for an envoy and Mysticism's envoy will also go there.  The suzerain bonus will allow me to build a few Alcázars for increased culture at both Irukandji and City #3.  Gold generation will be a must since I won't get to Mercenaries for some time.

Military: Irukandji will start producing military units once the settler is out, with a builder for City #3 thrown in.  At population 4 Irukandji would have 15 per turn for units so that buildup could be rapid (Warrior every 3 turns, Archer every 4 turns, Horse every 6).  If iron is gettable by City #3 or a possible City #4 I'd be able to upgrade warriors.  Once war is declared I'd use the ten turns of double production to crank out units to try to make it a war of attrition.  Any military engagement will be strictly defensive on my part and attempt to inflict maximum damage.

A little help from my....friends?: Even if all this is pulled off flawlessly (a tall order for me, heh) I still need a little luck in the form of help from my opponents.  My expectation is that all three of my opponents are going to be competing hand-over-fist for that first Great General (which is one reason behind me sitting out that race).  Emperor K might even be able to grab the first and cause a race to the second if he's hyper-agressive about it.  The other factor is when the world enters the Classical Era and raises GP costs.  If the era change happens right around the time a GG is taken off the board and Archduke is the one left facing an expensive GG, that's better for me.  That all involves luck, but sometimes you need it to get by.

The reality is that if he shows up with a Great General before I have crossbows I will have no effective ranged attackers.  Yes, I am fully taking on a builder/tech gambit here by skipping building an Encampment and racing for a GG myself.  However, it's my belief that if I can survive any initial onslaught relatively intact I'll be able to gradually pull out ahead.  Australia takes time to get going, the question is how much going can I achieve before Archduke comes calling?

The only other option would be a first strike if I can get far enough ahead in techs and "advanced" unit production to take a rush to him before he gets a lot of his uniques built.  That's not "Plan A" but more of a plan of opportunity.

The course of this game will be determined by the ability of Emperor K and myself to withstand (and defeat) the initial military assaults by Alhambram and Archduke.

[Cornflakes]

Settling on a resource gives you the higher of (1) default 2/1, or (2) the current un-improved yield which from your screenshot appears to be 2/2 for the horse

[suboptimal]

Settling on a resource gives you the higher of (1) default 2/1, or (2) the current un-improved yield which from your screenshot appears to be 2/2 for the horse

Thanks for the info!  Even at 2/2 that is still a better city site than Red Dot 1.0.

[suboptimal]

Turn 20

I start the turn by deleting most of my dot map pins and putting a few of them back.  With the settler safe for the time being the warrior begins to retrace its steps.  A waste of time, perhaps, and possibly cost me an opportunity or two to the west, but better safe than sorry.  I do want to check out the coast line by Valetta and then head a little further east.  The scout in the north finds more grassland and a lake, but no Macedonia yet.  The slinger continues to pursue the scout and finds tundra.  There’s fresh water 2 east of the wheat.  Depending on what’s north of there that might be a spot to go to – I’d like to get something down here solely to plantation the citrus, get a Commercial Hub on the river and throw down some Alcázars.  Yellow Dot may work out OK for those limited purposes.



Now for the settler.  I move to the horse tile and found Cassowary. I buy the tile for the Campus, put said Campus in place to lock in the cost at 63 and start work on a builder.  Cassowary is going to go Builder → Campus.  



Over at Irukandji I also place its Campus.  The warrior is showing 1 turn to completion, which is ahead of schedule.  Given where I am in the tech chart I’m going to go Campus → Builder at Irukandji.  The Campus would be complete for the start of Turn 28.  Settler would follow the builder unless Archduke starts to go full military.  I am the first player to place their second city, so that’s something. 

Irukandji also pulled a fast one on me.  It culturally expanded this turn and….took the other 2nd ring citrus tile.    The tile picker never showed that tile but it was the one that I had scored the lowest.  It’s now back on one of the rice tiles.  I don’t know if that’s a win, a loss or a GUI blunder as far as my picker study goes.  We’ll score that as a partial success, I guess.  Cassowary’s scoring will be done in the next post.

Internationally Alhambram has grown to size 4.  Archduke’s military score is down to 19.  His warrior must be damaged heavily and the scout must have gotten injured as well.

[suboptimal]

Cassowary Scoring



The tile marked "Harbor" is also scored at 225.  

The picker order should be:
1) Jade.  Note that when the Jade is picked the two tiles next to it they lose the -1 adjacency influence and rescore to 199.
2) Either of the 1/3 hills adjacent to the horse.  When the horse is pastured those tiles will be absorbed.
3) Either of the 198-scored tiles not adjacent to the jade.  The picker should flip-flop between these two.

[suboptimal]

Turn 21

Up in the north the scout moves to a hilltop and Settlervision indicates a city to the north.  



This is probably Macedonia but I’ll find out for sure next turn.  The scout still had an MP left and moved to the west after this shot, revealing another 3rd ring city tile.

Down by Irukandi the slinger rounds the end of the river to see where the scout is going and find its camp while the warrior heads NE towards the barbarian camp.  It’s still there and I figure I’d go pay it (and Archduke’s warrior) another visit.  With the warriro finished Irukandji starts on the Campus.

Internationally Alhambram has completed a tech, Archduke is now population 4 and Emperor K’s population went down to 2, so he’s getting an early settler out as well.

[suboptimal]

Turn 22

Just a bunch of unit movements this turn.  Two things of note.  First, the scout has located the Macedonian capital:



It’s 18 hexes north of Irukandji.  The second development is in the southeast:



Depending on what’s NE of the lake things don’t look too bad down here.  I think the stronger play remains to settle Blue Dot next (for another Campus and strong Commercial Hub location) then get a fourth settler to either Yellow Dot or somewhere near the lake.  Yellow Dot would be better economically speaking as there’s a good location for a Commerical Hub and both citrus are 2nd ring.  However, the lake district looks like it has better food and production availability, plus a sheep to pasture.

Internationally Alhambram has gotten his settler out as well.  I wonder if Archduke is building a settler and if he has an escort around (it’d have to be his scout).

In other news, the tile picker at Cassowary has selected the jade as the first expansion target while Irukandji is continuing its flip-flopping ways.

[suboptimal]

Turn 23

Start the turn, Animal Husbandry is done and I start Mining.  The tile picker’s vagaries with the citrus have actually caused me a bit of an issue at Irukandji as far as Craftsmanship and Irrigation.  There won't be any farmable resources for the builder to work and there really isn't much room for tile improvements, either, unless I just want to farm the tile E of Irukandji to get the inspiration.  I was planning to do a harvest, pasture & chop at Cassowary to get the Campus out quicker but will have to figure out if I want to skip the chop, buy a tile at Irukandji or just cold-research Irrigation once the Campus districts are complete.

Nearby Archduke has finally cleared out that barbarian camp.  The scout that my slinger has been chasing stopped right next to it, so I attack.  One more and I should get the Archery eureka.  I also move the warrior to a hilltop position but don’t reveal Archduke’s warrior.  Up in the north I move the scout to the northeast and find



Looks like Archduke went scout → builder → slinger.  I’ll circle Luthadel to the NW then head west.  I’d like to locate more city-states and try to find the continental border.  

In the west the warrior moves to the swamp and will top the hill next turn to see what’s on the other side of the mountain.

Emperor K has founded his city but everything else seems quiet internationally.