Suboptimal IV: Indonesian Insanity

[suboptimal]

The delay on Shipbuilding would depend wholly upon whether or not we are able to get the eurekas for Bronze Working and Iron Working. Given our isolated/protected position and the vagaries of resource placement I consider both of those to be iffy. The science "budget" is about 300 beakers as of EoT 42. The starting 3 are 75, sailing & astrology to 60% are another 60, so that's 135. Shipbuilding and the Bronze + Iron Working paths are the same cost - 200 without eurekas, 120 with. The difference is that we fully control the eurekas on the ocean path and need the graces of the RNG for the metallic path. I do see the value in Iron Working but rush defense also assumes having more than two warriors around.

Iron occurs on non-snow hills without features and that aren't river adjacent (generally). The capital has three such locations (two second ring, one first ring) and City #2 has two sites visible as well, so maybe we get lucky. There is enough science in the budget to get Bronze Working to 1 turn below 60% and still beeline Shipbuilding if need be. Then we can make a decision based on barb kills and game status as to which beeline to take.

The culture budget currently works out to 85 as of EoT 42 with no monument purchases. We could buy a monument at City #2 on Turn 35 assuming no other purchases, which is another 14 culture to the EoT42 budget, call it 100. Assuming we have to hard-research Foreign Trade the first three techs are 84 culture. Early Empire with boost brings the total research to 126. Early Empire would be around Turn 50, Magnus could be in place at Turn 55. We'd either need two builders or put the first kampung at City #3.

I think if we're going for era points the Shipbuilding beeline gets us the greater number of points sooner - there's no guarantee that we'd get to Iron Working first and with the Shipbuilding route we control our own destiny. What we could do is chop one galley out for the 3 era points and then slow build the second one for a bit, then chop for some overflow into something else. It's not ideal or efficient but I think getting the chops out before Magnus may be necessary, particularly if we need to locate a 3rd city-state for the Political Philosophy inspiration.

There is a ten-turn warning on the era change, the expectation is that it'll change in the late 50's early 60's. Turn 12 coming up.

[suboptimal]

Turn 12

The interturn has brought no news, so Woden has found a city-state. I’ve been shuffled down to second place in the religious victory category so he’s probably found a religious city state. Archduke is up to 6 science and has grown a population (finally). Alhazard has completed a tech as well. Of the three players that are left in the science category we have the largest tech rate (we’re in 3rd place).

Warrior completes in Sound of Silence, heads east. Settler build is started. Warrior up north continues towards the eastern river. I’ll get to see a little of what’s on the other side next turn when I top the hill.

Fog-gazing to the SW shows something interesting and problematic. The 6-yield Yosemite tile SW of the capital is on the coast, with water to the SW of that tile. That makes the tundra SW of the pearls a 1-tile bridge. I also can’t tell if there’s enough land in the fog for the tile west of the 6-yield to be land or sea:




It does mean that the capital will most likely expand in the N/NE direction.

[suboptimal]

Turn 13

Time to see some new things this turn. In the north, the warrior mounts the hill and finds….jungle.




Holy crap is this corner of the map difficult to get to. I am sorely tempted to give up going east and head back to kill off that barbarian camp. It’ll take 7 turns to get there and I can take my time whacking it while the settler goes to city #2. Of course, we haven’t seen what’s up in the south yet. Warrior there tops the GFH and…




Some tundra forest, open grassland and plains hills. Next move will be 2E then I’ll turn NE with that warrior.

Code of Laws in three turns, tech switch in two, pantheon in 2 or three depending on rounding. Goddess of the Harvest is the current plan.

Over the interturn Rowain and Woden have completed techs. Everything else is quiet.

Cornflakes, one thing I forgot when looking at the tech & civics costs – Rise & Fall changed the tech costs in future & past ages. Costs are +20% per age ahead and -20% for each age behind. For example, Shipbuilding is 240 (instead of 200) and Iron Working is 144 (instead of 120). I’m not sure how the eurekas work in terms of the amount of science they give (is it 40% of the current cost, 40% of the original cost or 40% of the cost whenever you start researching it?). I don’t know that this changes my thoughts on the Shipbuilding vs. Iron Working approaches, though.

[suboptimal]

Turn 14

Switch techs from Animal Husbandry to Sailing to start the turn. Warrior in the north heads west. Warrior in the south heads east over open plains and...runs into a dead end of difficult terrain…




I am beginning to think that spamming archers and crossbowmen with a token amount of melee troops is what’s going to be called for here. Next turn I’ll go onto the hill to the NE. Hopefully that shows me the east side of the City #2 site.

Woden and Rowain have both gone over 45 in military power per CQUI. They’ve probably gotten slingers out.

Pantheon and population 3 next turn. Civ 6 rounding has struck again. I was expecting Code of Laws on Turn 17 and we're getting it, and Urban Planning, a turn earlier.

Hit next turn and hear the sounder for “a scout has seen your city”. Woden’s got problems, methinks.

Happy New Year everyone!

[Cornflakes]

Downside of archers is that the cost maintenance as compared to warriors. They also cost more (either raw cigs or cheaper slingers but costly [relative to later Professional Army] upgrades)

CQUI adds treasury into the military strength category. The rival at 48 MS I’d venture to guess is 45 of units +3 points due to gold.

Civ 6 calculates and tracks everything to 2 decimal places. Your faith should be at 24.95

Happy New Year!

[suboptimal]

Turn 15

Open the save, pantheon is in. Goddess of the Harvest and another 2 Era Points in hand for being the first to get one. Mysticism is also boosted.

The new population is assigned to the dumb cows. It work there for two turns for food then switch to the plains hill. Working the plains hill now speeds nothing up and the extra food from the pastures recovers our settler population faster (3 turns instead of 4) and gets us to Pop 4 1-2 turns faster down the line.

Northern warrior crosses back over the river. Southern warrior mounts the hilltop and….pasturepalooza:




I’m going to move onto the desert hill tile to see what’s N and NE of the river. At least City #2 has some food potential though it looks like the area north of the river could be desert. The 3/1 sheep might make for a good 4th city location.

[suboptimal]

Turn 16

First civic is in. Discipline and Urban Planning go into the policy slots. Start Craftsmanship. Looking at the scores it looks like we’re the second to Code of Laws after Alhazard. Interesting. That probably means if there are any cultural city-states out there no one has found them yet. CQUI says that Rowain has had a jump in milpower – possibly a warrior or another slinger but that seems to be kind of quick.

Northern warrior moves west towards the forest & jungle. Southern warrior tops the desert hill and…




I think that city’s is marked in a good spot – Lots of food to the east, production to the west, resources all around. Probably a good desert location 2nd ring for a Holy Site or Campus that would preserve the plains hill tile (or not). Settlervision remains clear. Next turn I’ll go up on the sheep hill to the east, then across to the other desert hill tile. From there I’ll clear out the fog by the mountain range NE of the city site then start heading back for settler escort duty...not that there’s anything in the area that could take out the settler…

Cornflakes, I’m thinking that the Holy Site at the capital could go just east of the pearls – it would only be a +1 adjacency but given the third ring location I was pondering might not exist that may be the best option. Do you have any thoughts on buying the tile for 50, completing Astrology and placing the district two turns from now to lock in the cheap build cost?

[Cornflakes]

Cornflakes, I’m thinking that the Holy Site at the capital could go just east of the pearls – it would only be a +1 adjacency but given the third ring location I was pondering might not exist that may be the best option. Do you have any thoughts on buying the tile for 50Icon_Gold, completing Astrology and placing the district two turns from now to lock in the cheap build cost?

I say do it. But don’t put any production into building it yet.

[suboptimal]

Yeah, I wasn't planning on building it until the need for the State Property inspiration was on the horizon. I'll pencil it in for the mid/late 40's but will get the plot next turn and finish Astrology on Turn 18, once Sailing is just under 60% complete (which should be after next turn)

[suboptimal]

As I see it we need to get the following moments to get to a Golden Age for T60:
- First Seafaring (3)
- First Classical (2)
- Build a kampung (4)
- Kill the barb camp after city #2 founds (3)
- Meet another civ (1, 2 if we got 2 civs on the landmass)

We would then need to do two of either locate and kill a second barb camp, build a resource unit or suzerain a city-state by T60, unless there are two civs in the area or the second barb camp is within 5 tiles of a city.

I looked ahead at the science and techs to see what Classical beelines work...in all cases we're working the 2 yosemite tile as soon as it's available (T39, I believe).

1) We can beeline Horseback Riding without the Archery eureka, which completes HBR at EoT38 and Shipbuilding around EoT52.
2) We can beeline Shipbuilding without waiting for Magnus and skip the Sailing eureka - that completes EoT45
3) We can beeline Shipbuilding without waiting for Magnus but get the Sailing eureka - that completes mid 50's
4) We can beeline Iron Working, which only completes Shipbuilding before T60 if we get both eurekas for Bronze & Iron Working.

Magnus won't be available until the late 40's or early 50's unless we get lucky with the Foreign Trade inspiration. By the time he establishes we probably aren't the first boat on the water.

#1 should get us to the Classical first and nets the largest science discount (takes 40 off Shipbuilding, 83 off ancient techs). We could have a horse and the holy site done at the capital by T53. Bronze working is 2 turns to completion with the eureka and ancient era tech discount.

#2 might get us the first Classical, might not. We'd also have Bronze Working at 1 turn to completion with eureka.

#3 probably doesn't get first Classical. BW and Masonry/Wheel would be at 1 turn to completion with eureka.

#4 requires some luck with the eurekas just to get there.