[PB81] Lurkers from the Deep

[Tarkeel]

My plan is to make a boat to get the 5F of the fish, a warrior until 2pop, then a Worker, and then go for Stonehenge. I expect to get it for turn 30.  Then a Settler with a whip in T34 aprox.  In this game I will try to take profit of the bonus for Wonders from IND trait. 

Stonehenge first opening? That's a ballsy move. Also not sure if the WB first is the best move here, even if you have that 4h tile to build it on. My gut says you'd want to go worker first, especially as India, and probably even do a two-worker opening.

[scooter]

I think the WB might be defensible? 4T WB is hard to pass up. The basic WB first timings are:

T3: Finish EoT
T5: Net Fish, +5fpt
T9: Size 2, start worker
T14: Worker complete EoT
T16: Begin Pasture at size 2


Whereas worker first completes the worker end of turn 10. That completes the Pasture 4T sooner, but at the cost of 1 pop point and a work boat. It might not be right, but it's close enough to maybe work out?


The Stonehenge thing is another question entirely. I'll forever be skeptical of Henge before settler, even if there exist edge cases for it.

[DaveV]

Now, after Stonehenge, Gira wants to build a city that 1) is safely in his back lines 2) doesn't add any new food. I understand wanting to hook his horse, but his borders should pop over the copper soon if he wants to build anti-barb units.

[Tarkeel]

I misread his post, and though he was going 6 (gold) then 1 (copper). He will be able to hook the copper soon without setting for it though, thanks to Stonehenge culture. Still, 5a looks like a pretty weak second city with no new food and only the horses as a tile it's not taking from the capital.

Note that he also seems to think that Greenline is his closest neighbor, when he's the farthest.

[williams482]

In retrospect, it might have been better to put a narrow land bridge between Nauf and the northwestern part of that continent. I wonder if TBS and co will assume that one exists and that Nauf has an outlet, while Nauf is already certain that the two of them are in a dual to to the death.

[Tarkeel]

Nauf does have pretty good galley access in the north though, and SD in the south.

On the topic of "do no small harm", wacking SD's scout this early probably wasn't a good idea for several reasons.

[Sullla]

I could not agree more. This decision makes no sense to me:




Even leaving aside the potential for bad blood, why would you attack a scout with a warrior at only 65% odds? Early game production is extremely valuable and warriors are great for all kinds of uses: scouting, military police, barbarian suppression, etc. I can't imagine taking this needlessly risky dice roll, and of course it went the wrong way to throw away a warrior for no reason, plus the predictable response from superdeath:

Why. Why give me a purpose so early in the game? Glad i killed a warrior on the defense at least. 2 zulu warriors coming at me would have been a pain. Guess i need to decide if its worth showing him why thats a really dumb idea, or if i somehow manage to outplay him.

Decisions.

I picked this combo BECAUSE i wanted to see how well i could (without sim's/spreadsheets :P ) expand and tech my way to my UU. I was apparently put on the "vet" island over Dreylin... so i guess i help hand the game to TBS by taking out/keeping busy the clear 2nd place/skilled player here? All because they decided to do something really stupid.

This guy is literally infamous on these forums for blowing up over trivial nonsense and holding game-long grudges. Why make yourself an enemy like this?!

[Whosit]

Oh, yeah, I didn't pick up right away that Mjmd actually LOST a warrior to the scout first. I skimmed Mjmd's thread but didn't see a clear reason for it, except maybe just being paranoid about Superdeath?

[Tarkeel]

The scout-kill does make more sense with the added context of the latest turn, but I'm still not sure this is a good idea.

[scooter]

I'm glad others noticed how weird that scout attack was, and also now we at least have an explanation. But I dunno, if your entire plan hinges on needing to kill a scout on a forested plains hill, maybe it's a bad plan.


Also, you're Zulu. Why Chariot rush? I don't totally mind him declaring this is a duel and acting like it as the upside here is enormous if he gets a clean early kill, especially when he's on a continent with TBS and Nauf. I think the logic here in getting aggressive is sound. I just wonder why not do it with Impis instead? If you can block a Copper hook with your warrior(s), you can use IMP to quickly hook yours and then Impi rush/choke. He'll likely respond with Archery and keep you from capturing, but you can reduce him to a backwater while spamming out cities with IMP and then come back for him. If you can keep the strategics unhooked, your map positioning can also prevent other players from meeting and supplying him too.


Mjmd is a funny player to me. He's very, very good at the game, but a few times a game he makes absolutely wild decisions. I think all he needs to win most games is a reasonably smart ded-lurker who says "don't do that" 5x a game.