[Spoilers] Pindicator's Nice Thread

[Krill]

Now the decision has been made what was the cost of growing to three and whipping to size 2 for the granary? I count 4 turns not working the clam for 8 food and 8 commerce left in the table plus the quicker regrowth, but what was the upside? How many turns on the settler and the improved copper?

[pindicator]

We actually end up 8 food behind and a turn slower growing back to size 4 if you hold off on whipping, because we don't get the granary efficiency while growing from size 2 to 3. It also delays the whip cycle by 3 turns (capital is currently at 10 anger now, the turn after the whip, still was working off the first whip for the worker). I didn't look much into the commerce, considering it negligible considering we are FIN and have a lot of commerce in our start already.

[pindicator]

036




My memories of David the Gnome is that my brother and I discovered it the year I started Kindergarten. I was so upset that he got to watch it with my mom while I had to go to school. I couldn't tell you anything about the story or the characters or anything else today, just that I didn't get to watch it because I had to go to school.




How in the world am I the second person to city #2? Behind AGG/SPI Spain of all players.

I just had a thought: is it better to do the worker first and 3-turn my next warrior with a completed copper, or get more growth by doing the warrior now and only having the worker take 9 turns because I'm only building it when working an improved copper? So efficiency versus immediacy? I'll test it out before the turn rolls.

[pindicator]

039

Why must you be so obviously anti-Mali, game?




Copper is mined. I decided to stay with a worker first out of David the Gnome because this gives me enough time to move and chop out the granary after. DtG will 3 turn a warrior right after the worker, and then the chop comes in for the granary, and then the sheep is improved.

These next 10 turns are a little dicey with military; I'm running it right up against the line, having just one warrior to use to get the MP happiness at the capital on size 4 and then using the same warrior to escort the settler for city 3. But after that the copper comes online and then we get warriors and skirmishers out.

[pindicator]

The event reminded me that the War Chariot event is out there. I searched for the rewards and it seems like you are supposed to have a state religion for it to trigger. Did CtH change that requirement, or did that never work as intended? I am very ignorant about events and quests in this game having not played single player in some time.

In any case I don't see myself going out of my way to build this quest. I'd rather put 240 hammers into skirmishes than get a free C1 on 8 chariots.

[Tarkeel]

The only trigger for the quest is to have The Wheel, which is why you got it so early. State Religion is required to claim the other option, which is spreading religion to 5 of your cities.

[pindicator]

Looking at settling my next city out west to lock down my border with Gav right away. My workers will spend a lot of time building roads, but then agian they will be well positioned to help improve city #3. On the other hand, the city in the west is not nearly as good a site as the city in the east, but the city in the east seems like it is safely "mine" at this point. Another downside: I settle a turn later (or risk moving a worker into the fog undefended for a turn).

I don't see Gav reaching so far as to block me from settling where I want to , so really this would be to speed up how fast I turn my attention south to establishing a border with Commodore. I feel like that is where the border friction is going to be this game.

[pindicator]

Did Commodore reach for the center with his second city?




I was looking in the game for where I would want to settle to aim for, and this spot stuck out for how it gains control over the center of the landmass and gets all the important resources. Trying to decide where city 3 goes because that will determine next steps. But then I remembered it took Commodore 4 turns after whipping for him to settle his 2nd city. And it just so happens that you can path out 3 turns of movement onto that central hill I marked.

I'm not sure how I would have been able to beat him there, and really it would be the smart play by him. The more I think about it the more it feels like the play Commodore would make. I'm a little upset at myself for taking this long to see it but at the same time relieved that even if I had there was nothing I coudl really do to stop it: the terrain on my side is even worse and it would have taken me too long to get down there. All the food is on his half of the line.

If he did reach this far then this city will take a long time to get up and running. So I'm going to have to lean on it to keep him from getting that time.

So the question to ask myself now is: do I need to connect that copper and start chopping axes instead of building settlers?

[pindicator]

So my next thought was "How can I counter this?" Well, I can put my next city 3 tiles away from that spot, which would be a horrible spot: it would be non-coastal and only have a crab for food. But if I got a quick library there then perhaps I could culturally pressure him. And then I realize I can't do this: because if Commodore did plant there then he is going to be going for religion to pop the borders, meaning he is teching a religious tech right now. We know Commodore whipped on t33, so he could have religion by t50. I have to think he goes for Wheel first but maybe he wants to get it so bad he goes ahead of Wheel? Either way, my 3rd city is just going to be starting up, so being 3 tiles away from his holy city would be a very bad idea. He'd take over my first ring before I could get any culture generation myself and then probably get his 3rd ring before I could even get a monument going.

So settling a scrub city in the south just to block him off is a bad idea. Now what? I think I need to go for the best city spots first still, and then leverage my advantage: cheap granaries. chop out granaries and then at the point I have my 4 planned cities I make the decision whether or not I whip everything and go after Commodore.

We're not on death duel island here - the one benefit to Commodore getting this spot is he won't feel boxed in and will see an avenue to take over Gavagai. I will also have an avenue to invading Gavagai. Need to explore more. But getting my cities down faster than him and then leveraging that to go after him is my default play.

All this to say I'm scrubbing any plan of settling the far west next (because it's a slower growth city). So we're back to settling by the Fish with our next spot.

[pindicator]

041

I might be over-estimating Commodore's research rate here.  Took a peek at graphs this turn:













Takeaways:

• Commodore's 2nd city shows in obvious bumps in crop yield (+4) and mfg (+6). This suggests he grew to size 3 improved a tile in his capital the same turn he settled on a plains hill and worked a 2f1h tile, probably completing the copper mine. But I cannot find a way where this fits with Commodore settling the central city spot I had him pegged for. It could fit with him settling 1N of the marble.
  
• Commodore just gained 6000 soldier points. However his copper is not yet connected so he must have finished Wheel the same turn he completed a warrior.
  
• Gavagai had founded his 2nd city on turn 38 and shows +6 food the same turn. This suggests sharing a 4f tile with the capital. I'm hopeful this means he settled away from me but I can't really tell one way or the other.
  

Demos are still poor, but we haven't started growing our 2nd city yet: