[PB25-SPOILERS] The Lunacy of the Reign of HAK Continues

[HitAnyKey]

Ok, I'm kind of spamming posts, but it's easiest for me right now unless you have time to go into the googledoc to chat.
I just logged back in. First, Monarchy does not help us for getting a cheaper CoL. It's one of the prereqs for Feudalism. But Priesthood (on the way to Monarchy) is a prereque for CoL.
With research on 100% right now (though we'd run out of gold first) we'd get Meditation in 1T, then Priesthood in 1T, and then Monarchy 3T after that.

But I have just put us back on Construction. I'll be able to put 2T into it (treasury at 237, with currently -101gpt) and then we'll see whether I can manipulate slider/wealth builds to see if can actually get it at the end of the 3rd turn. Then will need to save gold again for whatever tech is chosen next.
But in either case, we don't get our GP until 9 turns from now (7 turns if I add the Scientist specialist to the mix and stagnate Happy from being able to grow). So we can get Construction and then start saving up gold for the Golden Age....if we decide to go that route rather than bulbing MC (or using the Great Scientist for an Academy). Personally I hate the idea of using a GS to start a GA...but I suppose in the early game it's ok, since it's easy to get another GS later on. And kicking of a GA before Grimace could be a nice great thing to help us roll over him while also defending out borders with GJ & Comm.

Commodore's cities that I can see are sizes: 13, 11, 8, 7, 7, 5, 5, 2. And then there are 3 cities that I cannot see (the ones that he has settled across in retep's backyard, etc).

[MindyMcCready]

Ok, now you're confusing me and I'm trying to figure out what to do....and have a short time to do it since only Donovan left to play his turn.

So you're saying to not switch to IW and keep on the Construction path? I would still like to push for my UU kind of as quickly as possible. If Commodore picks on us first, I don't think there is much of anything we can do to stop him....but if he picks on someone else first and I can get to the UU....that'll keep him from coming at us too quickly. That was my thought there.
But getting out some WE's will also be good. And some Catapults in the meantime while getting other techs we need. So maybe I should log back in again and switch back to Construction.

I'm currently having a lot of trouble planning ahead with the techs. And don't really have much time to think it through this week, and with my being on vacation next week, that'll make it even tougher. I haven't had time to try to build the sandbox, and I doubt I will have time before I leave on Thursday.

Machinery might not dissuade Master Commodore. CB don't get the city defense bonus that LBs do and FS don't matter against Knights. So I'd attack the one that didn't have LBs double so if they also didn't have WE. So if we can't get credibly close to Engineering (and I don't think that we can) then we've self selected ourselves as the soft target.

We need WE. That means we need HBR and Construction.

Recommenation:
1. Construction
2. HBR
3. COL for economics.

Sorry, I'm also confusing myself. T120 is not far away.

Now whip a spear in our border city because that WB means trouble.

[HitAnyKey]

Super quick update with the one image I took last night. Myself & Elkad were both logged in as last to play, so the turn rolled and then we both played our next turns as well. I'll be logging in again shortly to grab the rest of the screenshots of T105 but lots of news from last turn....




First, from T103 into 104, GJ completed the Pyramids while in his GA. So on T104 he was able to adopt Representation.
Then Gavagai, declares war on Bosche taking one of his cities. This is the first real war of the game.

And as you can see just from the screenshots....I'm starting Settlers....just for you.

Stressed will finish it's settler in 4 turns (maybe less since I'll be chopping that forest in it's north...but it might not be done in time to really change much). Sore was about to start one as well, but since it could grow once more this turn I decided to put a turn into an Axe (EDIT: switched it to WB to benefit from the 12 overflow...this will be for the Crab for when get the next island city) and then it will start the settler next turn.
I'll finish the rest of the update when I log in shortly to take all the other screenshots of this turn. Also just realized I never took the demos & graphs images from last turn.

[HitAnyKey]

Ok, here's the update now for this turn:
First the Demos and a couple graphs.

Here's the status of all the cities and then the financial advisor since I haven't shown it yet this game.





For down on the island, I now have it fully uncovered. If I put the cities where marked, that leaves the tile the Axe is on as one not able to be worked by any city, but it's not a great tile so may be ok to do it like that. Since keeping the ice city on that marked tile it gets to share the Crab. Also if I move it 1E, there will be a coast tile 1S of the crab which would be not in the BFC of any city. So either I lose out on a coast tile, or I lose out on a tundra river tile. Which tile do you think is more valuable?



Last bit of update, I figured I'd give you the city counts for everyone since I just realized....I'm in the lead in that regard:
Us: 13
Commodore: 12
Gavagai: 11
retep: 11
GJ: 10
Borsche: 10
Elkad: 10
Grimace: 9
Donavan: ? He's the only one I haven't met. I can see 7 cities on the map from trades, but I'm sure he's settled across one (or both) of his water spots. So he's likely up to at least 9, and probably a good amount more than that.

[MindyMcCready]

Some points:
1. Is Happy making walls? If so, why? We have culture defense and hills and should have time to react. That's a zero return build that we can't afford.

2. Borsche,...he's going to have a tougher time putting resources into our landmass. It's notable that Gavagai kept the city rather than raze it. That could mean a larger war.
-If Borsche has a small garrison in either of those cities we should consider taking/razing it.
-Alternatively, we could try to land that last location south of Borsche's 2 cities. It's got a seafood resource and would sit on a hill. Our archers would be of use there.

3. T101 you had an axe sitting outside of Bedazzled. Since a chariot will eat an axe for lunch, we're not protecting anything and should move it into the city and fortify.

4. Thank you for the settlers. I want them so that you stay alive. It'll be the gift that keeps on giving.

5. I'm somewhat surprised to not see a DOW from Master Commodore. Doesn't mean that we won't see it next turn. What's that workboat doing? If it's still there we should chase it away. It's there strictly for attack not for defense. He's protective with walls so I don't think that he's that concerned about defense.

6. Is it possible that Master Commodore skipped Construction on his way to guilds? That would change our defense strategy. The real risk for us is that he can batter through our chokepoint with cats and then unleash Knights into our vulnerable core. If he hasn't teched construction then our defense strategy would shift over to more spears/(swords) and less elephants.

7. WE vs Knights is an unusual matchup.
-On the attack Knights have odds
-On the attack WEs have odds.
-So generally we'd rely on spears/swords for defense and WEs to attack a knight stack.

8. Retep made a post which is unusual for him. Hopefully it wasn't complaining that we didn't offer anything back for the OB. We could think about a small token of appreciation, say 3gpt since we benefitted greatly from the OB offer.

[MindyMcCready]

9. In my old spreadsheet sim once you can grow beyond Size 10, not whipping outperformed. The compound growth did better in other words. I'm not sure that staying at size 10 is better however.

10. An exercise for you. As we spam cities, many of them are crowded such as that southern iceball. We should start thinking about specializing our cities or at least designating them large cities or small cities.

Small size cities should grow to size 6 and whip(/draft) continuously and only have a lighthouse, granary and later a Rathus. Larger cities should get more infrastructure and should produce via size rather than whip. Can still whip if efficient or the 30H produces something with a good return.

We should consider a hammer economy. Workshops get +1H with Caste and +1H with Guilds which would make a grassland better than a mine. We produce hammers, lag but use KTB to not be too far behind and try to get more land after we secure our landmass. That's our only way to keep up with Master Commodore. Hmmm, caste probably isn't good for us given how many small size cities we'll have that will benefit from the whip.

11. If I was Master Commodore I would be thinking very strongly about invading us. We're well below Retep in score. We're rather fragile right now, but if left could become a problem. We might interrupt his Grimace conquest. Grimace is weak now but will still be weak later. Grimace will probably pile on to us, but that won't stop Master Commodore from eating him later.

12. South Island: one wasted tile means nothing. If it was a wasted corn it would be differen. Recall the fact that you basically need 2/0/1.5 or 2/0/2 to break even on a tile so that tile isn't going to be a positive return until much later in the game. We need to share the crabs, grow to S6 and stagnate/10T whip cycle.

13. Gah! Where is that galley going? Do you have a spare 2-3 galleys for naval supremancy?

14. As discussed 2S4E of Belligerant is probably the more secure location if we can't navally choke Grimace. If you see a galley coming from that straight/choke you should consider a DOW.

15. It doesn't look like Master Commodore is the top power. Probably Gavagai since he's on the war path. That's a bigger indication that Borsche will probably be unable to react to an attack near-term. If he still only has a single spear in that corn city we could think about taking it. Grabbed at Size 2 would be best.
-Given the mountain he'll see anything coming from the south.
-Also, once you chop the forests he'll be able to see inside of Ranting.

[HitAnyKey]

1. IMHO Happy does need those walls. If GJ desired to do so, it's one he could drop units at on the second turn of an attack. It's only got a single Archer in it right now. Yes, more units would simply be better in certain ways but I kind of wanted to get the Walls done and out of the way while I definitely still have my Stone and before GJ decides to take Bedazzled from me. So I don't consider it a zero return build.

2&15. It'll take me awhile to get something over there to look around, but I think Borsche might have already settled that southern spot. I've lost track of when I've seen him get score increases from sett I'd been concentrating on getting my military on my other three borders (GJ/Grimace/Comm). So right now I only have an Archer down that way as the MP for Sad. Last I saw he has an Axe/Spear in that city. So not an easy conquest for it.

3. That Axe outside of Bedazzled was protecting the worker that just finished the chop this turn. Next turn the Axe will move into the city with the Archer and the Worker will board the galley to head back to the mainland. I have no intention of improving any of the 3 Grassland tiles around that city. It will work coasts & mainland tiles. Probably won't even bother with any more infrastructure there (EOT it'll have Lighthouse/Granary/Walls), but instead likely just keep building units for it's own defense.

4. They'll come out pretty close to each other, but do you think I should send the first settler to the island or have the first on settle the Moai city south of Sore? I do think I've fully decided that'll be the Moai city. I should be able to chop it out pretty quickly.

5&6. There's no way to know if Comm skipped Construction. So I think we just have to keep with our strategy of getting WE's. I'll get Construction EOT and can start building some Catapults...not sure where yet, but I will. Hungry will definitely be cranking them out as soon as it finishes it's Market (it really needs those happy bonuses). Sleepy will start Catapults in 2 turns when it's Market is done.

8. Retep got himself OB with 3 empires. I don't think he cares what benefit we got, since he's gotten the benefit from 3 OBs. He got them all on the same turn (I believe), so I'd guess he offered free OB to all 3 of us.

9&10. Right now I'm putting a hold on whipping. With the likelyhood of us kicking off a GA in 7 turns or so....I want every city growing as high as it can. I am currently leaning that direction, regardless of whether we get a GM or GS. I think the GA right now may be the best benefit for us. Though many of our cities are kinda small (from a lot of whipping lately) so I'm also half tempted to try to figure out when we might get a great person after this one. But won't know that until after this one pops out and I can play around with a few cities to see which one can utilize multiple specialists. As for trying to figure out which cities should specialize in something while others become whipping machines....that'll be tough for me, but I guess I'll see what I can do. Most of that analyzing will need to wait until after the 31th when I come back from my vacation.

13. That galley was just going over to get visibility on Gavagai's city. It's turning back this coming turn so that it will be able to pick up the next settler for the island. It just did a quick stint of exploration. After Belligerent finishes it's Granary it'll build/whip out another Galley for those waters.

14. That 2S4E spot also makes better use of the land tiles. It puts the city on the dry plains tile and opens up a dry grass tile. I'd much rather have the grass tile available than the plains tile. It's too bad that Peak is there. That would be the best spot for the city. LOL

[HitAnyKey]

9&10. Right now I'm putting a hold on whipping. With the likelyhood of us kicking off a GA in 7 turns or so....I want every city growing as high as it can. I am currently leaning that direction, regardless of whether we get a GM or GS. I think the GA right now may be the best benefit for us. Though many of our cities are kinda small (from a lot of whipping lately) so I'm also half tempted to try to figure out when we might get a great person after this one. But won't know that until after this one pops out and I can play around with a few cities to see which one can utilize multiple specialists. As for trying to figure out which cities should specialize in something while others become whipping machines....that'll be tough for me, but I guess I'll see what I can do. Most of that analyzing will need to wait until after the 31th when I come back from my vacation.

Returning back to some of these points, right now the decision of whether to kick off the GA in 7 turns (or holding onto the GP for few turns to then do it) or do something like bulbing MC or planting an Academy (or bulbing Alpha) may just come down to what the city sizes are at that time. Since I can't visualize it right now (and haven't had time to rebuild the sandbox...don't know if I ever will at this point), I basically have to wait until we get closer. Basically I need my cities to GROW GROW GROW to make kicking off the GA jump to the top of the decisions. What will also help is if one of these two religions spread to a second city. Then I can actually finally pick which one to adopt while in a GA. I'd also like to be at a point to be able to reach a tech during (or before) the GA that I'd want to swap to a Civic for. I don't like the idea of kicking off a GA and not being able to capitalize on the no-anarchy for these swaps.

[HitAnyKey]

And onto the next turn already.

I didn't take any other screenshots yet, because I got stuff to do right now. But quick summary of a couple new things.

1. Commodore got another great person already...a GE this time.
2. Playing around with tiles and looking at things in the spreadsheet tab I've been using to track all the cities, I'll settle the Moai city in 2 turns. Next turn a chop comes in and that'll be enough to finish the settler out of Stressed. And I just finished a road on the hill that city will go, and with Construction now in, the settler will be able to move there and found the city on the same turn it completes. The settler out of Sore would then be done in ~5 turns. That one will go to the island.
3. Got Happy starting a Catapult this turn (this will be a slow process while it works tiles to grow due to working the two merchant specialists). Sleepy will start it's Catapult next turn, with Hungry starting one the turn after. Hungry will just keep building Catapults (and then WE's). Sleepy might build a Lighthouse after this first Catapult, but will see how things look when that time comes.
4. That Clams along my southern coast get hooked up next turn, so that'll also start helping a bunch. Dancing will use it next turn, but then it'll likely get used by the new city until iceball city gets founded.
5. Both my new Spears are on the hill 1N of Hungry to flash their mighty anti-horsey prowess at Commodore. Next turn I'll probably pull then back into being part of the stack fortified inside the city.

[MindyMcCready]

I'm going to put together a defense strategy guideline for tomorrow.

In the meantime I would like to suggest a couple of things:
1. Give Retep 3gpt for the OB. It's a pittance compared to what he's given us I suspect.
2. Send Retep a gift for 40 gold. This is to indicate that we want to buy a spy from him. Hopefully he'll understand and provide one quickly. That could be the single biggest thing for us in determining our defense strategy. The 3 gpt helps to say that they're separate items as well.

Keeping Retep happy allows us to forego teching alphabet. As one of the 3 civs he has OB with, he doesn't benefit nearly as much as we do.