Chevalier Makes Do

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Quick update before work:




Slinger attacked my scout, but the rough terrain meant he didn't accomplish much. I cover him with my warrior, who should be able to kick the slinger around next turn.

Bit of a precarious situation here. The warrior is the entirety of my military - and all I have available to escort the settler. The camp is nearby and is spawning units, so more warriors are probably on the way. I need, therefore, not to over-commit. I think a fighting retreat is best - maybe hit the slinger once to redline him, then play things cautious and pull back towards Manticore itself. If I have to delay settling long enough to churn out some support slingers, well, them's the breaks. 

Worst-case, I'd lose my warrior entirely and then watch most of my shit get pillaged while I train up a new escort unit for the settler. I took a risk going settler before slinger, and it's on the verge of backfiring. Fingers crossed.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 19




Slinger didn't attack? At least, I didn't get a notification for it. Interesting. The slinger is crippled now, so if it continues to leave my warrior alone, I'm thinking I might heal up before attacking - OR, if I'm close to promoting, I'll attack, then promote. 

The main hesitation, again, is that the barb camp is so close, and units are gonna be spawning. If a warrior spawns, for example, and my own is injured, I'll have to retreat all the way back to the cap to be safe to heal - which in turn prevents the settlement of Gryphon. I COULD send the settler east, I guess, but the land doesn't look to be quite as good out that direction. 

Well, we'll see. Anyway, I'm second to Craftsmanship, and I'm pretty sure I slot in foreign trade for Maritime Industries. My thinking is for my first settler chop to be a +100% galley chop using that non-improved stone in the cap. That can happen AS SOON AS I RESEARCH MASONRY DON'T FORGET THAT PART CHEVALIER BECAUSE YOU NEED MASONRY TO HARVEST STONE, so actually probably no rush. Might swap over to State Workforce instead. 

I'm also realizing I forgot to slot Agoge.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 20

Oh, hell with it, this slinger needs to die:




If he's gonna keep plunking away at me. I'll heal with a promotion and fortify, then wait for my second city in ~8 turns. 




Overview:




Alhozard is leading techs, makes sense since he's got a science city-state. Alhambram finished Foreign Trade, and I believe a settler. Wasn't he at 8 empire score a few turns ago? That's a fast settler, so either he went settler before builder or he's got a militaristic city-state. 

Anyway, everyone's naturally neck 'n neck.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 21

I promote the warrior and then click next turn. I hate early game Civ:

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn Somethin'




What do I normally do to make these early turns fun? 

I guess I theory craft or talk about unrelated subjects. 

Eh. Maybe I'll have somethin' fun for you guys tomorrow. For now, have a score report:




PS

where the HELL are my neighbors? I'd've expected to meet someone by now. Maybe I am on an island. ._.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 24

Houston, we have contact! 




...or we will, next turn. Looks like my nearest neighbor is The Black Sword's Russia, if I'm reading those borders correctly. No idea how near the city-center is due to wonky Russian borders. I plan to beeline there to get a glimpse of his capital, so I can keep total track of his population and districts and whatnot. I was THIS close to meeting him with my warrior, but I wandered off into the desert instead. He's either had better things to do or he also thought that this narrow land-bridge was land's end. Glad I got to Vilnius before him, now let's check him out and then go find more city states (and a foreign continent). 

Scores:




Alhambram and TBS both settled city #2. My settler is out next turn, Gryphon is due turn 30. A little slow compared to my neighbors, but I work with the tiles I'm given. 

Research plan: Pottery -> Irrigation (for bananas) -> Masonry (to begin stone->settler harvests). 
Civics: Research available techs until Eurekas are met, then start burning through non-Eureka'd civics in a beeline for PP. As cities go down, I'll lose my Culture edge - already lost it to Alhambram. 

Anyway, onwards and upwards!

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

it's late and the wild card game is still not over go away

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 26-27

No big news. I met Russia:




And settled Gryphon, but unaccountably forgot to take a screenshot. Oops. 

Loose plan: Find a new continent, take Maritime Industries, chop a galley into a settler, and then go settler nuts.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 28

The camp spawned a new warrior, and the spearman zerged into me, killing himself:




I've done a poor job capturing this game so far- keep playing the turns nad passing without taking shots! 

Anyway, right now I'm taking advantage of the lack of barbs and my isolated start to crank out a pair of builders, one from each city. I need to research pottery, Irrigation for my bananas and because the plantation-culture pantheon is my backup choice if some jerk grabs GotOS (can only be Grotsnot or Alhambram - I'm hoping for a Divine Spark/GotH/God of the Forge combo from them), and then Masonry.

Once Masonry is in, I should have Early Empire. Then we slot colonization and stone-chop a settler (or we may do a galley and overflow into the settler). I want to get by with a skeleton military and build as many settlers as I can, as fast as I can. So far TBS is the only neighbor I've met, but the rough terrain - all forested hills - has limited my ability to make progress in the north. He...may not realize that there's a land bridge down here. He might think that I'm off to his south and west. I'm fine with that, but eventually he'll meet Vilnius and figure things out.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Huh.