Gandhi of France II - Assuming Direct Control

[oledavy]

[SIZE="7"]Turn 21[/SIZE]

So, here are those ugly yellow borders I spotted last turn:



(The squares marked 'X' are ones I uncovered this turn and had to fill in for my WB save).

At any rate, he's really close by:



The jungle should dissuade him from pursuing an offensive action against me. After I move my warrior up to his borders next turn, I'm going to send Kaiden Alenko away; hopefully Commmdore will take it as the sign of good will I intend it as. While he's quite some distance away from the stone and my planned highway, he could still crank out a couple chariots and screw with me. Provided I do land the pyramids, I wonder what course of action Commodore will take. He has a history of attacking the holders of the Pyramids, so I can't help but worry that he'll try it again here. We'll see what happens, but I'm going to do my best to be prepared for that eventuality.

However, in settling my stone city, I'm more concerned about my neighbor to east, who I have yet to meet. While the stone is in a bit of a contested area between me and Commodore, I'm betting it's right in the middle between my and my eastern neighbor. Whenever I do meet them, I'm going to try and butter them up as much as possible and stay on good terms. Here's hoping it's not Mistaphracts, though Gaspelium would be just about as bad. If I'm lucky it'll be Yuris.

I originally envisioned my Stone City as a throwaway location, but this turn I revealed more of the tiles around it, and....



Holy Food Resources Batman!

That's a pretty strong city spot - especially for a location purely designed to hook up stone for the pyramids. Just look at all that production potential! I need to consider using an artist bomb here to lock it down ASAP.

You might notice the horses in the picture, one of two which appeared after I researched Animal Husbandry last turn. I certainly hope they're not intended for someone else. 'My' source is pretty far to the west.



It looks like Plako and Novice conspired to put the kibosh on early chariots by putting horses a fair distance from the starts. That is nothing but good news for me, Chariots would really screw with my Pyramids play.

On the home front, I whipped The Citadel a couple turns ago for a settler, and founded the city of Thessia this turn:



I managed to make unworkable a clam 1N of the mountain with it's founding. However, more long-term food potential wasn't worth destroying the city as the short-term worker producing plant it was designed as. I'm first to a second city btw, though I expect Izzy of China isn't too far behind.

The city is working the cows, which I will have improved in a couple more turns. First build is a warrior, followed by two more, then workers.

I funneled the whip overflow from the settler into a worker, but stupidly forgot to change the city to building a warrior this turn That may end up costing me a couple hammers in the future. I have yet to sim out the consequences of my error.

I was divided for awhile on whether to go Pottery or Mysticism next, ultimately deciding on Mysticism. I'm not going to be sinking any hammers in granaries for awhile, and would like to make a play for one of the three early religions. It'll also give me double pre-reqs on Masonry when I research it.

So, that's where things stand as of Turn 21:



Lastly, for Shoot:



I remembered to turn the Resource Icons on :neenernee

I've marked all my preliminary city locations. Any input on my current dotmap would be welcome

Lastly, for any curious souls out there, I've attached the latest WB save.

End Turn.

[Tankra]

I like the dotmap, but have you considered perhaps moving the pig/flood plains city 1N? It gets the same amount of FPs, deletes a useless desert tile and saves you from losing a forest and a potentially good hill, all while hooking up that Marble. You won't be able to plant a city on the Marble, but let's face it, it's a pretty bad spot. You only had it planned there in the first place to build the Oracle ASAP, but that won't be happening anymore.

On the other hand, I really like the "throwaway" Stone city. It being such a sweet spot makes your crazy bid for it all the more awesome.

[oledavy]

I like the dotmap, but have you considered perhaps moving the pig/flood plains city 1N? It gets the same amount of FPs, deletes a useless desert tile and saves you from losing a forest and a potentially good hill, all while hooking up that Marble.

That's a good point about saving the hill for a mine. The site is pretty production poor so it would be advantageous to be able to work the time.

You won't be able to plant a city on the Marble, but let's face it, it's a pretty bad spot. You only had it planned there in the first place to build the Oracle ASAP, but that won't be happening anymore.

The reason I still have a city placed there is to pickup the dyes and sugar. I would prefer to grab them before Commodore does, as they're the only sources of the luxury currently revealed. Moving one west to share the rice with Thessia may be the best move, I'm not sure at this point. I'm a little reluctant to move the city farther north for fear of rubbing Commodore the wrong way. Of course, grabbing the dyes and sugar may already push him to the point of going to war.

At any rate, I got another turn in and actually met Commodore:



I've marked the hill between us and Commodore that I intend to garrison, it gives me visibility on all the avenues of approach. The priority for right now, however, is keeping tabs on that warrior of his. Hoping he stays north of the jungle, I would hate to have an incident.

In the east, I've found another flood plains bonanza-land:



I'm guessing that it belongs to my eastern neighbor and is equivalent to my own fp location, putting the stone almost exactly halfway between us.

[oledavy]

Reworked my micro plan. Going to pop Judaism in my stone city to get the borders out ASAP. This will put the horses in my culture pretty quickly so I can crank out and emergency chariot or two if need be. I'll have a couple axes on hand to forestall any aggression. Lastly, I replotted the road so it would swing south - far away from any potential pillagers.

I should have my final micro plan for building the Pyramids up sometime tomorrow. I think I'll probably be able to complete them by Turn 50.

[oledavy]

[SIZE="4"]Turn 50 Pyramids[/SIZE]



[SIZE="4"]Now with more military![/SIZE]



Also of note in the top picture, Thessia is the Hindu holy city, and Palaven is the Jewish holy city. I screwed up my micro in the sin I ran, but had I gotten it right; the Great Wall would have completed in Sur'Kesh on t49, and the borders would have popped.

Pros of current plan:

- Pyramids.
- The Great Wall.
- Shot at 2 Religions.
- Organized Religion Civic.
- Nab the stone city location.

Cons of the current plan:

- Only 4 cities by Turn 50.
- No Granaries
- Huge target on my back.

[Tankra]

The reason I still have a city placed there is to pickup the dyes and sugar. I would prefer to grab them before Commodore does, as they're the only sources of the luxury currently revealed. Moving one west to share the rice with Thessia may be the best move, I'm not sure at this point. I'm a little reluctant to move the city farther north for fear of rubbing Commodore the wrong way. Of course, grabbing the dyes and sugar may already push him to the point of going to war.

The way I see it, it's true that letting those all go to Commodore is wasteful, but on the other hand, you'll have representation. It's not so much of a big deal if you lose a few happies.

Also, I was just looking at your last screenshot and noticed something slightly weird:



Why is Commodore De Gaulle? I thought he was Darius, no? What manner of trickery is this?

[Nicolae Carpathia]

That's the worldbuilder file

[thestick]

Still like the picture updates. This one seems a bit forced, though. Not sure why...

I wouldn't bet on the others not attacking your city for fear of game-long hate. If I'm your opponent, would I trade an easily broken friendship for burning down my enemy's third city and delaying my enemy's most critical wonder? Uh, yes. Sure it embitters them for life, but who cares? I'm stronger than them and have shot their specialist economy into the ground.

[Tankra]

Shoulda known there was a perfectly reasonable explanation

It seems my noobishness has squelched our illustrious poster, though. What's the progress on your stone highway? Has your presumably rage-filled opponent done anything particularly aggressive?

[oledavy]

It seems my noobishness has squelched our illustrious poster, though.

Hardly :neenernee Just had a crazy busy weekend. I should get Turn 31 at some point later today, at which point I'll write an update to bring everyone up to speed.

What's been going on? Not much, just been following my micro plan to a tee. The biggest news has been that someone, presumably Yuris, landed Buddhism. It wasn't Commodore, and Mistabod already landed Hinduism, so that really only leaves Yuris. Plus, it matches up well with his preferred play for the Oracle.

The other news is that I found the borders of our eastern neighbor! .....And it's the team with Phracts

So it's official, I have the two worst possible neighbors in the game - the guy prone to ancient era wars, and the guy with a OMFGHAX UU. Going to play REALLY nice with Mistabod, especially since I'm about to fling a pink dot in their direction. I'm hoping Mist and I can pick up where we left off in Civ5 PBEM1 - we give each other a safe border and he goes after someone else when guilds come online. While en route to the Byzantine borders, we met an Ottoman warrior coming from the northeast. So, it seems Mistabod's other neighbor ir Yuris, and NobleGaspar are in between Commodore and Yuri. This is actually a rather nice stroke of luck. Whenever they go on the warpath, Mistabod will have the choice between coming after me, or going after the guy with the best leader combo who will probably be leading the game by then with his wonders and FIN cottages. Here's hoping Yuri makes himself a nice appealing target so I can build in peace.