[PB62 Mjmd] Let the Bullgine Run!

[Mjmd]

T10

Faster settler micro. Ya I can't see why that would be needed either. Not like Vanrober would have moved capital and created a super tight space in between us with a gold that was probably supposed to be a midpoint. Kind of wishing I had settled on the cow.......

At first I was like ya one person 9 tiles away, ok. Amica reminded me about PB56, which was 110 tiles / player and we had 1 near neighbor and 1 far (12-13 tiles away) far neighbor. Near neighbor having no tiles contested really, still perfectly fine. Then I kept going around..... YAAAAAA. THIS MAP IS TIGHT!!!! I suspect Vanrober made it tighter. That is 8 tiles way. SKIRMISHER RUSHING IS BACK ON THE MENU BOYS!!! Your micro doesn't have to worry about delaying slavery, because I'm teching BW next after hunting. I'm not sure if I actually will, but nice to have options and I can revolt while settler is traveling. I can spend extra worker turns doing rds to connect for trade and maybe chopping out stuff.

T18 I have to cut out the finish the road part. There is a river there so worker can't actually use to get to rice

Anyways, for the people who did pick analysis too early. YYAAAAA it was pointless. Analysis now that we know how tight it is. In same order as before
Superdeath: Boudicca of Rome - Agg Rome actually wants a slightly bigger map than this. Probably tech IW right away (btw I suspect our iron is under the only jungle I can see on map). I'm sure he is wishing he was Imp or Cre instead of Cha. Still agg isn't bad in these cases. Needs to be careful of chariot rush (which like half the people on the map will probably do).
Fabled: Cyrus of Mongolia - Also wants slightly larger map. However Imp and Cre are good traits and Fable has Imp, so not horrible. Again I suspect chariot rushing over Keshiks is the order of the day for people, but this still be good enough.
Bing Xi Lao: Genghis Khan of Sumeria - Imp Agg with an axe that will get better odds vs chariots and better odds vs archers if can deny  opponents resources. Seems ok.
Mjmd: Vicky of Mali - Imp Mali (hm I lost a trait in there). Well 2/3 of my pick being good isn't bad! Seems like the two most important parts, which isn't bad. 
Vanrober: Zara of China - This hedge worked out a bit better than mine. My civ is better than theirs, but traits seem good.
Tarkeel: Julius Caesar of Spain - This map is sooo tight that the main downside to this pick is the starting techs. Myst seems like a real cost on this map.
Naufragar: Pericles of the Netherlands - Creative good and if they don't get in a early whipping tussle maybe phi helps them bulp or academy to construction.

This is a SUPER tight map. Tightest since PB49. I suspect no one to the north of me as the map has to have space SOMEWHERE to reach 119/tiles per player. Also, haven't seen a scout from the west yet.

I find it funny that no one picked Cathy on most Cathy map. Nor Egypt. Again, maybe a symptom of us jsut not knowing how tight it would be. If I had known how tight, might have been the time to pick Charlemagne for pro skirmishers and good early tech rate.

[pindicator]

BW next will get us the tech at end of turn 24, so easily in time to swap. My only concern is do we want to just start with skirmishers right after the settler? Or do you want to rush with axes? With just 1 worker it's going to take some time to hook up that copper, so I would think being able to start Skirmishers as soon as the settler is done would be more important.

I suppose our worker does run out of bonus tiles to improve to do right when BW would finish, but I think roading to connect our two cities and mining a few hills will be needed. Perhaps you're not envisioning the super-fast skirmisher rush I am, though. Perhaps it's even better to be less all-in and get another settler and a few more workers out first.

Good catch on the T18 road; I didn't see the river extended past the capital.

Cow first on a replay of this would be intriguing, but you wouldn't be able to do a fast settler because it would be too hammer-poor. You would have to grow to size 3 and even then the first warrior wouldn't be done by the time you got to 3. If you could assure me no neighbors within 12 tiles and a peaceful first 80 turns then I would definitely settle on the cow though.

Another idea - and this probably isn't the right one but I like exploring ideas - is to go for an early religion in City #2 and just have that city be a thorn in Vanrober's side while we go other directions. I would like it more if City #2 was on a hill. Also if I didn't think vanrober was an easier meal than civac/tarkeel.

[Mjmd]

I may not want to rush at all, but we shall see what Van does / how I feel. Half my trait and half of mali want peaceful expansion. Current spot is specifically selected both for speed, but because it also actually allows him to plant a city SE of the gold. The actual best spot is probably on the oasis. The hill spot is sadly super far away as well as being super agro.....

It will be nice if religion ends up there, but never a guarantee.

[pindicator]

So after thinking on our situation more I really think we should skirmisher rush hard. There aren't any real great spots around us that scream as something we want to settle. Or rather: there's nothing that I think we would want to grab that would be better than taking vanrober's capital. I think if we can put the 2nd city down, spam out skirmishers, and then hit him with something like 4-6 in very quick order then he won't have any defenses in place to prepare for it.

I understand it's a tougher call to make for you because it's your game, and I don't think it's an awful idea to play it safe. But considering the level of terrain around us compared to what we know the capital is, and taking into account that we're never really going to win a culture war against CRE unless we go 2-techs out of our way to land a religion (and even then it's just going to piss him off and make him want to come after us) ... well, I think it's the best play.

Unless the scout uncovers something great to the west, then I might change my mind.

[Mjmd]

So I think we've been overly reacting to a lush floodplain and a near neighbor. I swear I've never done stupid things for a floodplain valley so I slowed down and thought for literally most of this day lol. Vanrober CAN'T go for the gold first. We would be able to easily skirmisher rush and kill. He NEEDS to settle copper first (maybe horse, but against skirmishers seems like axes better). We know he moved. If he moved onto his copper we find Commodor and hit him in the head. If he didn't move to his copper he moved AWAY from it. You might say this makes it easier to rush. And while I think we could severely damage, I'm not sold that could take the capital and meanwhile it would put us pretty far behind. Here is why I think that might matter more than credit giving it:

PB49 was shortly after I started lurking. My memory of PB49 was that it was tightest map I've seen since then and about 75 tiles per player. I found map and it is 72 tiles /player!!!! HOWEVER, lets take a gander.



Ya that's right, the distance between capitals is right around 12 tiles instead of the 9 (or 8) this map is. The land on current map doesn't look insane, but I have a feeling there is going to be a lot of early warring and plenty of "free" land some imperialistic person could grab. There is more land on this map than there was on the PB49 map, but capital distances are SUPER tight. Example of just getting more cities good is the city I marked NW of me is probably about as good as a floodplain spot (4 three food tiles with lighthouse and a wet wheat on a plains hill and thats assuming there is nothing else there). I also think being financial with all this river is pretty good. Also random cities on coast are pretty good for me.

My instinct is to switch back to original micro and research AH. Just for the overall best start. If we need to we can still pump out skirmishers at less of cost with more road support. Also, I don't think holy city needs to go south (and mind you there will still be a pretty good chance). Even if we end up settling near gold, a library will keep first ring tiles easily as well.

I'll wait for a bit tonight before deciding as obviously this is the turn deciding where to move worker. Feel free to shoot me a message on discord.

[pindicator]

Away from comp right now but I think you're correct in the land assessment. Perhaps I'm being a bit too optimistic in the skirmisher chances. And there is absolutely an appeal to leaning on IMP for claiming land ... I just wish I saw some good quality land worth claiming.

We've got ... 1 rice or 1 gold or 1 gems. Really the wet wheat in the far north is the best thing I've seen for a 2nd city so far.

[Mjmd]

Tanked for a bit. Decided to log in and move scout to see capital. Figured I could skip the 1 turn rd and just move worker to wheat if decided to go that way.

I understand why the moved....... Plains marble hill with river wheat first ring  ....................... So they got faster worker by moving and get to improve a power tile pronto. WTF balance checkers! They can produce infinite warriors, no point rushing. Just try to expand fast I guess. If they warrior us, then we can skirmisher them so neither of us win.

[Mjmd]

T15

I wish this diplo or I could send one diplo message. Vanrober you moved spots and created an awkward awkward situation. Assuming you started 9 tiles away, I'm willing to give up what what would have been the midpoint tiles before, if you let me rex to my little hearts content. We can both then vulture people who got in early wars. See below line 4 tiles from my capital I would like to be border; giving up the gold........ How likely is it? 


I really want to run my original micro and settle south of the rice. That would then force the floodplains city to be on the plains, which I would be totally fine with EXCEPT it would probably tempt van into settling a "no" spot west of it that would obviously be really awkward with creative borders. So thinking of settling grassland spot south of wheat as #2 if Van doesn't show signs of wanting to get into an early tussle then go west with cities 3 & 4. Mainly want 4 to show good intentions of not fighting over the sheep. That would probably have Vanrober settle a sheep spot sharing wheat, which isn't great for borders, but maybe takes the hint (and maybe doesn't have a lot of food at moved capital to split off) and settles south more instead. Even if holy city popped at the grassland spot Van could still grab gold with a mediocre city and farm a floodplains (capital plus city could take away I would think). He could even be nice and not think such a spot is worth settling and give me the gold. He of course might not see any of this the same way. LISTEN BUDDY YOU MOVED SPOTS CAUSING THIS!!! Not that I blame him. I would have moved for that capital too.

Other option is to settle the grassland spot as #3 and settle north of rice first which is nice and safe back there and still gets a new food hooked up. Either way I think its correct to settle the grassland spot instead of plains spot, meaning my micro will go settler > settler instead of settler > worker > settler. 

Doing my best fog gazing ( ) I think I'm going to go W > SW  with scout. W > NW looks like a lot hills, forests, and jungle.

[pindicator]

I would go for the plains tile south of of the rice simply because it's the best spot we have for a 2nd city. Pity we don't have any food to share with a city going northward; have to think that it's going to be equally lush up there and we're all supposed to "fight" over control of the arms. I kind of like it if the map is designed like this: you get the natural tension for conflict just due to the close starting positions so you don't need to juice the borderlands any. Instead put all the good land away from the players and make the conflict be whether to fight neighbors or REX.

Do you think it's worth pulling the scout back to explore north of the capital? I don't see us having any free warriors for scouting for a while and that seems like information that would influence cities 4 and 5 - maybe even city #3

[Mjmd]

So you're not worried about Van planting a "no" city to grab that floodplains / the 65 odd % chance of holy city city? I do agree its a better expansion focused city spot. Again if it was diplo (or you know a map not with us pressed together like sardines to start), I would be more likely to grab rice as new food with city #2.

Other than the slow terrain to NW I think the other reason to move SW and then probably back down and around is three fold: 1) see if Van has other neighbor that way / other good territory to expand to. 2) circle back around to scout out what Van is doing. 3) I think its very unlikely to have 4 neighbors close, so I think that way is 'safe' (at least one city worth lol). It just wouldn't make sense for total tile count.

Edit: I should note I met Bing somewhere. Wasn't a double move, so was just a flash by somewhere. I'm hoping Vanrobers western neighbor.