[SPOILERS] Will: Thread title to be decided

[WilliamLP]

So I think it's reasonable that if we have a lurker around, he could now play for TBS and Elkad. And even if not we should probably unpause now/soon.

I wonder if he'd still say that if he knew Elkad was OT4E's and my idle neighbor. 

Actualy was paused for Donovan becasue he was in a turn split obvious.

I don't think "obvious to Mackoti" actually means "obvious"!

[WilliamLP]

Just a bit of a map gripe, what else is new? Here's a map of the food values of improved resources (not including Lighthouses)

So look at all the 5 food tiles right next to OT4E and Elkad's outskirts! And not even in the directions they're settling first! And I get two nice food in the capital, but basically everything else is close with the obvious wasteland to the NE.

Ok done ranting now. I'll try to make the best of what I've got.

Also, note to future self: Include escort warrior moves in my sandbox in the future. I forgot to do this and the plan I want has a chance a worker could get eaten by a barb in the fog, ugh. This will slow down my third city growth a bit and I'll have to put a couple of worker turns into cottage pre-builds and stuff.

(Quick disclaimer, I accidentally clicked on Dark Savants thread, literally leaned on the button while moving the mouse. I quickly closed the tab, saw nothing.)

[WilliamLP]

Harry dropped 4th city, on turn 42! He's IMP of course, but the bonus is only 50% so each one is still 67 food-hammers. At this point in the game, that has to be a rather significant hit to maintenance cost. My style of play has been to plant cities a little later, but do so when they're in strong positions to grow, e.g. workers in place for improvements and chops, pre-built roads. But the meta of strats the experienced players are running definitely suggests I may be doing it wrong. (Of course, traits make a difference, including the very high cost/benefit of the granary for me.)

Harry got another tech as well. I think it has to be Archery since nothing else could be that fast with the expansion rate he's running.

I still haven't contacted OT4E. I should have thought a lot more about my scout micro, including giving more consideration to scouting around him the long way to see if there might even be more players overland to the south. And I should think about getting my scout home soon, since it could just be free XP for someone by now. He's quite valuable as a mobile fog busting unit, maybe even Medic 3 GG someday. Btw, I'm surprised there are still animals on the map!

There is jungle between Elkad and OT4E, which makes Elkad's natural settle path go directly north. I need to be careful of this. I'll get Elkad's graphs in a couple of turns, and I can get a much better read on where he stands. The natural separation between him and OT4E may be great for me, since if I can swing a conquest it might be tough for OT4E to intervene. And, as with all strategy planning, new revelations can suddenly change everything...

Nobody has built Stonehenge, still!! Let's see who started with Myst here... Dtay (Celts), Rusten (Arabia), DZ (Maya), Dark Savant (Byz), 2metra (Aztec), plako (Inca), Aretas (HRE). It's mostly not the stronger players other than Plako and Dtay, and Plako is Inca so he doesn't need it. All these others though, I bet a few are kicking themselves for not pulling the trigger on it. Especially the two who got religions...

I'll be squandering a few worker turns on things like dubious cottage and road pre-builds, sigh. I really needed to include warrior moves in my sandbox planning.

I'm really really considering a bold plan of going straight for Judaism now, and delaying AH. Meaning Myst -> Masonry -> Poly -> Mono. This is a large cost, especially losing the happy cap bonus from my 'phants. Furs too, but I haven't planned to expand culture into them for quite a few turns yet. And no vision on horse or two-movers is a limitation. I suspect I have a decent shot of winning this race if I go for it immediately. But then I have to run a lot of turns happy capped at 3-4, with only spears and axes on defense. But I could perhaps make this work, even if suboptimal. Either of less tension on Harry or a stronger player in Elkad might get me to rule this out, but as it stands, hmm....

[WilliamLP]

I've really messed up my scout planning in this game - with more thought I could have had many a chunk of extra moves for the same information I have now. But I went out of my way to make safe contact with OT4E:

He has 3 cities. And he hasn't met Elkad! One of their scouts died young for sure, but perhaps both of theirs did...

Their EP spend is 48 for OT4E vs 43 for Harry. So reconstructing the history:

- I met Harry, we went full EP against each other.
- Harry met OT4E somewhere.
- I spent 52 EP against Harry, vs 45 to me (exactly enough to get graphs, surely).
- OT4E spent 48 EP against Harry, and then met someone else I don't know!
- I've spent 36 vs Elkad, for a total of 88.
- Harry spent 43 against OT4E. His total of 88 is the same as mine, so Harry did not meet another player before me. He doesn't have graphs yet vs OT4E but will next turn.

So the interesting part is I can rule out the square formation, there is at least a fifth player around!

I'll know soon enough if Elkad knows someone else too, as long as he's interested enough to switch his EP spend at 43. And I'll also know if Harry has another contact.

[WilliamLP]

DZ eliminated Dark Savant eliminated on turn 44!! Probably a Holkan rush. Well, that's one way to do early expansion!

[WilliamLP]

100% in Mysticism means I'm committed to the nutty charge for Judaism before AH. This game is nutty enough that it just might work!

Heck, if Henge is still available in 4 turns maybe I'll chop that badboy. Why the heck is it still open on T45?

I finally got my warrior over to defog the potential barb hiding places, to get my worker over to the copper to road and hook up when my third city is planted in a few turns.

I thought OH was getting Archery, but apparently not. His tech was probably Fishing then. This relieves me, since I don't want to see a fortified archer of his on a hill ready to take an aggressive forward site.

OT4E put 2 EP on me, not sure what that means. Maybe he just crossed the threshold to get graphs on player X, or maybe it was a default, don't know. I'll have graphs on Elkad next turn, it should be telling.

[WilliamLP]

Double-whipped a settler, which will plant the copper city (copper pre-roaded) on T48. I wanted a couple of forest chops ready to kickstart a work boat + granary, but barbs interfered with my plans...

Elkad put 42 EP on me, so he definitely knows someone else! 42 certainly proves he isn't advanced at Civ mechanics. I can see 43 or 44, but 42 just tells me he chased the number in the ctrl-e screen and didn't know the magic 43 value that I somehow remember. Now watch him go to 46 vs my 44 and we'll play eternal leapfrog. I saw nothing alarming in Elkad's graphs. He's on par with me on food with two cities, but since I have two granaries that isn't really on par at all. I scouted a wounded warrior of his, 2W of the marble between us, (0.8 / 2.0, has been healling for 1 turn) but there's nothing I can do to exploit that. This seems like a scouting warrior, not a pre-settlement stake out.

Minor suboptimal moves remind me that I should re-learn how to play this game rigorously - I should have moved my scout before warriors instead of vice versa. Right now I'm pretty sure I'll play another PB game after this one. Civ 4 is not a perfect first strategy game, but it may be the best _last_ strategy game.

Just looking at scores, nothing is too surprising. The four CRE leaders got their retroactive border pop points from T25. I have no idea where Rusten's score comes from, possibly a very early settler (before worker even?) I don't remember but I think he may have been one of the players who grew to size 2 before a worker.

[WilliamLP]

My little empire:

I just planted Untitled this turn. Copper will be hooked up T51.

I'm about to get Myst, and Stonehenge is still open. I think I could theoretically swing it by T53 but the plan would have to be extreme, like moving the worker off copper right now and aiming to swing 40 hammers in it with a whip overflow and then a quadruple-chop. The trouble is, the upside isn't that great even if I'd get it that way. It would put me even more behind Harry economically and free monuments probably wouldn't be enough to dig my way out. (Of course I have the 30 hammer barracks already as a monument replacement.) The Prophet points would be great though. Obviously, the downside is a complete disaster - fail gold this early without any multipliers would put me near the bottom of the pack for sure.

So I think I can safely discard the idea as totally insane. But I _really_ hope Harry doesn't find some way to get it.

Elkad's wounded warrior (1.0/2), position marked, spotted mine on the desert hill after a peacetime double move. With the oldest trick in the book, mine is waiting behind the peak hoping he moves diagonally to scout! I could promote shock and almost certainly take him out if he falls for it. I'm going to respect turn order with him next turn, just in case!

My scout is doing a delicate dance to get back home safely, one square at a time, since I saw a bear last turn that could be in one of those fogged forest squares. The animals should be systematically dying now though.

Next up in tech will be Masonry. It's not horrible to get, since I do have the slight synergy with cheap walls. Polytheism will be the one that is a lemon though, if someone else grabs Judaism first. Although it would leave open a nutty plan to spawn a prophet with ToA and bulb Theology perhaps. The theme of this early game is my experimentation with that path, for sure now!

I will have a fairly early copper hookup. I'm also thinking about the merits of whipping out a few axes and sending them somewhere, probably south. With the barracks finishing EOT, I could have 1-2 with immediate Shock promotion. I think Harry now has Archery, not sure about Elkad. Next game I play I'll probably have to do a proper spreadsheet on my neighbours' score changes, pop growth, and probable techs.

C4 is still the site I'm looking at for my next settle. I could take it rather soon if I were to double-chop into double whip on Placeholder, but I think I can afford to get it a turn or two slower to let unhappiness cool down. And I'd rather one of the chops went into a WB for Untitled.

[WilliamLP]

Well this just got interesting!!

- Harry planted Dragon age last turn, on stone. It's 7 turns from my capital, 7 turns from his.
- My hand is forced. War is the only choice here, even if I weren't role-playing Tokugawa. That city is too stifling to live with and it is best to fight something when it's small and I have an advantage (AGG).
- I declared immediately to completely remove the possibility of turn order shenanigans.
- I promoted my wounded warrior to Shock for the healing. I could have invaded last turn but my odds of winning the fight would only be 46% at 1.7/2 health and I'm hoping to do better so I'm taking the turn of healing.
- Going to invade with 2 shock warriors next turn, and see if he can get more defense there.
- I'm speeding up the copper hookup by moving a second worker on it, off a forest that was to be chopped this turn. So it will be hooked next turn.
- My worker who finished the wheat is now a combat worker. I'd prefer to road the square 1N but I can't be sure what's in the fog.
- My scout is also a combat unit now, potentially to gain intel or even block a reinforcement.
- I'm eating a turn of unhappiness in Placeholder to advance a warrior W, vs using it for garrison. This is total war at the moment.
- Harry is going to have to deal with a stream of axes now.
- I'm going to grab archery. Interestingly Elkad has a warrior 3 squares away and still hasn't met Harry! So I he doesn't see the war dec. But when he does I have to watch for opportunism.

With a move like that, Harry now has to prove to me that it was a profitable play. Good luck dude.

[WilliamLP]

Harry is "obviously" in a turn split with OT4E. I thought about this, and what I'm seeing is consistent with him whipping last turn and using overflow to chop out Stonehenge this turn! I thought he was going Fishing -> Archery or something but his tech could be Myst -> Masonry.

After thinking about this, I moved the 1.7/2 shock warrior in to invade. Alt-click shows a 45% chance of victory, but that will go down with a turn of fortification.

My thinking was probably out to lunch though! I was thinking along the lines of making him consider what happens if he chops and I take out his resource multiplier, but if he chops the wonder this turn it doesn't matter anyway. So I was probably better off with turn of healing in neutral lands vs enemy lands. Oh well!! There's still a potential upside: I could scout his reinforcement path next turn, and if nothing is coming it might make sense to take the coin-flip, with the follow up Shock warrior getting a near certain victory the turn after.

Another consideration now, if he chops Henge and gets a culture point in Dragon Age, I could very seriously consider keeping the city where it stands.

Considering my warrior placement very carefully during micro planning is a big space for improvement in my game compared to how I've played this one.