[SPOILERS] SevenSpirits and The Black Sword - Baguettes and Circuses

[SevenSpirits]

OK, let's compare the best we have for a size 4 worker-settler build to this, which I think will be hard to improve on in terms of a plan where we get granary before settler:

Summary: Two workers, granary at 4, grow to 7, whip settler. t29 second city.

Switch to granary as soon as pottery is done.



At size 4, build a worker, taking care to put the warrior second in the queue so it only decays 1h and not 2h. But when the worker is done, finish the granary first over two turns, using a plains forest. When slavery is available, revolt immediately so we get +1 turn of the second FP being cottaged.



Grow to size 7. Tiles 5 and 6 are 2/1 forests. We grow exactly and finish warrior #3 exactly.



1t into a settler, then whip it.



Overflow completes worker #3. We could finish meditation this turn, or delay it to land the religion in city 2 if desired. Or maybe we aren't researching meditation at all.



Second city down and the capital can start growing back.



I should have put 2t into the cottage SE of the capital instead of roading the wheat already. Then on t31, one worker finishes that cottage so the capital can work it, while the other one starts roading the wheat.



* Both FP cottages are worked every turn from t23 (right after granary + slavery revolt) onward.
* We have 3 warriors.

In any case, for the moment we know what to do. Pottery and improve cows and grow to 4.

[SevenSpirits]

Over the course of the day, thinking about what we get from going granary before settler, I'm becoming ever more convinced that it's good. I think an approximate evaluation of it is that we get -3 turns of city #2, but +2-3 turns of city #1's food and production. That's a great deal.

I also had another thought: we could skip the plains river cottage from the plan I posted above, which only gets worked for one turn anyway, and in exchange road the target plains hill. That means that we can found city 2 on t28 already, and immediately start improving the wheat. (Not much benefit from settling the city before we can start improving the wheat, but here we can fit both.)

[The Black Sword]

Very nice plan, I really like how you use each tech almost immediately after discovering it.

I'm pretty busy today, I'll post my worker-settler plan when I get a chance tonight.

[SevenSpirits]

t8

Gained lots of info about the shape of the land this turn. Water is abundant. I think we go SE with the scout next?



Ichabod got a tech and 2k power. I guess... hunting or mining? The timings haven't made sense for him (fishing earlier was a turn later than it needed to be, too). I guess he is switching around what he is researching. Or we are somehow wrong about what's going on over there, but I can't think of anything.

Here's a shot of the demos. Why not post one this one time. Looks like Yuri switched to a 2/1 forest. He is probably building a worker, and this gives him the bonus hammer for a total of 9hpt into it.

[The Black Sword]

Sz4 -> worker -> settler -> 1-whip Granary.

The two plans first diverge on T13, where I finish the warrior before starting the gran:


Then it's up to size 4, we leave the granary in the queue and get a worker:


Worker 1 has went Sheep -> FP cottage(T19) -> FP cottage(T23). Worker 2 puts a turn into a road then chops a forest into the settler:


Complete road and revolt to slavery:


Put the 10 overflow into the Gran:


Then 1 whip and use Avoid Growth, throwing away 1 food:


Finish the 3rd warrior, improve the wheat and start growing:


T28 is probably the easiest comparison point, a bit more map info would be useful in deciding what to do next. Capital can grow to 7 before whipping something just as the anger wears off. Second city could grow to 2, work the plains forest for 2 turns and 1-whip the granary.

[The Black Sword]

Ichabod looks like Fishing(4t) -> Mining(4t) to me. He's after us in the turn order, so it shows up on our T4 and T8.

Agreed with SE for the scout.

[SevenSpirits]

Hm, I guess I was looking at the wrong tech cost speadsheet, without the cost adjustment to fishing. That explains it.

[SevenSpirits]

So what's the comparison, then?

* For settler-first, second city is ahead 2-3 turns (the turn without workers improving the wheat is not as strong).
* Capital is something like a turn ahead (due to the forest chop speeding up the settler).
* We are down a worker.
* Down 1 grass forest.
* Down a plains hill mine, but the workers are 2t ahead improving the wheat, so that's pretty much a wash.

So: how good is that extra worker? Our capital can currently pump out a worker, settler, and 1.5 warriors every 6 turns. A worker is neatly a third of that. So a capital-turn is about 20h at the moment, and +1 worker is about +2 turns for the capital (but it's not quite that fungible - if we actually want to produce an extra worker at that point, the opportunity cost is higher than 2t). Meanwhile I would estimate the output of city 2 to be worth about 10-12h per turn currently. So in terms of total value, it's unsurprisingly pretty close.

I think I favor getting the extra worker out. The granary-first plan feels really efficient to me: we get 36 extra hammers during the 5t settler build by building the granary first. I also place some value on that capital forest that we have to chop in the settler plan. We only have 4 of them and the capital doesn't have much production and we're planning to get Math really soon. And because we have all that available happy cap, I place some extra value in shifting some of our output into workers.

What do you think? I can certainly imagine a case for the settler first plan. I think it gives slightly faster expansion.

[SevenSpirits]

t9

Nothing worth screenshotting this turn. The scout moved SE and revealed water.

Ichabod grew to size 2. So I guess he went WB first, with his 1/2 forest and no plains hill plant.

[The Black Sword]

I think I'd probably go with granary too.

-We might be able to 3 whip a settler again in the granary plan, 4 workers for 3 cities is workable. I really doubt we could support a settler whip in the other plan, so our next whip would have to be a 2-whip instead.

-Can't really turn down an extra forest.

-We don't really need the 2nd warrior out so early. The scout can take the north coast, the first warrior the south, and that's our first ring dealt with.

-Doesn't look like there's anything else amazing that the second city is grabbing.