Intersite Game - Turn Discussion Thread

[NobleHelium]

Er, mh, I did not mean that the worker wastes a worker turn on the eastern shore before loading. The worker wastes a worker turn unloading from the galley because it's not unloading in the city.

[mostly_harmless]

Er, mh, I did not mean that the worker wastes a worker turn on the eastern shore before loading. The worker wastes a worker turn unloading from the galley because it's not unloading in the city.

Yes, what I mean is he could be put to work on the eastern shore that extra turn.

mh

[Sullla]

OK, some of this talk is getting a little out of hand. I'd like to suggest that we back up a bit and think more about the situation with that stone location.



Here is the situation over there after ending turn. (I swapped Mansa's Muse to a 3t scout as requested.) The stone location either requires a transit by galley (and we will not have Sailing tech until eot78 by current estimate) or a fairly lengthy walk through the wilderness. That spot is eight tiles away from Gourmet Menu by land through the southern route. That's a long way away.

Remember, this isn't Single Player. Planting a city a long distance outside your borders is an invitation to have it taken away. We just saw that happen in this game. If the stone city is to be our next city, we would have no real way to defend it. And while I do want that spot eventually, I don't favor these plans to rush over there as quickly as possible.

What does that location really offer us at the moment? Think about it:

* Horses are paramount, but we don't really need that at present. We have NAPs with all neighbors. We have sufficient axes to hold off the barbarians. Yes, I would also like to be able to build war chariots, but it's not that pressing of an immediate concern.

* Wines are a resource we won't be able to use for quite a long time. We specifically chose to go down the Calendar path to make use of the bananas, spices, silks, and Mausoleum. Wines are useless to us until we research Monarchy tech, and that will be at least 15 turns away. (Longer if we go Currency before Monarchy, which we might.)

* Stone only helps us if we're building a stone-enabled wonder. That means Pyramids or Hanging Gardens at the moment. I feel pretty strongly that Pyramids would be a giant waste for our team, as our goal should be focused on rapid expansion, with little interest in running specialists for Representation. Let someone else build it and invest all that production. Hanging Gardens is a wonder that gains more and more value the longer you wait to build it. I would rather see us keep expanding at present and then go for Hanging Gardens if it's still sitting there in 20 turns. If someone else wants to rush the wonder early, well, they'll get an extra pop point in 5-6 cities. Big whoop. Let's get out to 10 cities and then re-evaluate Hanging Gardens.

* We certainly don't need wheat for health any time soon, as an Expansive civ with corn + rice + cheap granaries everywhere.

So again, what's the rush? That stone site is useful strategically, but it's not a particularly good economic location. The wheat is dry and the terrain is mostly plains/desert/peaks/coast. We should indeed settle this spot, but we shouldn't be rushing to do so. We've still seen no one over there to the west. We can probably settle that location more naturally in 15 turns, rather than bending over backwards to settle it in 8 turns.

Here is my suggestion for expansion in the next dozen or so turns. We've just gone from 4 to 6 cities, so we can indeed push back the settler whip in Adventure One a little bit. Let's try changing that from a triple whip eot 74 to a double whip at eot 76 or 77. This will give our workers a little more time to finish up at Tree Huggers and then rotate over to the bananas/spices location in the east. We'll also triple whip a settler at Focal Point when it hits the happy cap, so that settler will probably finish eot 79. We can send the Adventure One settler off to the southwest, and the Focal Point settler to the desert hill spot in the east. This will look much like our previous move, with a double expansion taking place roughly T79 and T80, one in the southwest and one in the east. Then we can follow that up with another double expansion about ten turns later (~T90), which will claim the stone and probably the corn in the southeast along the CivFanatics border. We'll be in a much better position at that point to expand out to the stone area.

I see the path to success in these games as being one of calm, staggered, continous expansion. Each city is close to an existing city, each one pushes out our borders a little bit more. Each one adds to an already-present network of tile improvements, rather than seeking to make a bold claim in the wilderness. Settlers should rarely spend much time in transit. I think that by now the verdict is pretty clear that aggressive "Pink Dot" moves are very poor strategy. They only work against incompetent teams, and cities founded far out beyond your borders require too much worker investment to become productive. Better to found strong cities right along our border that can contribute immediately. My hope is that we can find a good location in the southwest near the mouth of that river, which will serve as a natural stepping stone over to the stone area.

Slow, patient, boring play is what will win the day for us. It might not be flashy, but it will work.

[waterbat]

One more thing: I like the idea of getting a scout to get some idea of CFC's land. We can hopefully use it to get some idea of the realms beyond CFC afterwards.

agreed with the scout with the idea of getting valuable C&D data on CFC from the hammer-in-box math. Also to see what is on the other side. If we were primarily concerned about a CFC-led dogpile, it would be good to know their other neighbors. With the glacial pace of the game, teams that have met will have a long time to establish diplomatic ties. Lets get out there and meet the other 5. Have we determined that we can do so with a scout or do we have astronomy-limited exploration?

[kjn]

agreed with the scout with the idea of getting valuable C&D data on CFC from the hammer-in-box math.

Much more than that, really. Having city tile visibility with the buildings is very good, and so is having visibility on their resources.

Also to see what is on the other side. If we were primarily concerned about a CFC-led dogpile, it would be good to know their other neighbors. With the glacial pace of the game, teams that have met will have a long time to establish diplomatic ties. Lets get out there and meet the other 5. Have we determined that we can do so with a scout or do we have astronomy-limited exploration?

No idea, really. I just checked the ratios land to water here, and the map should have 2868 land and 1500 water tiles. We have so far claimed 92 land tiles, and say uncovered 150 more. That's somewhat shy of 10% of the total land area. But I think we've only uncovered 40 or so water tiles, less than 3%.

So there should be some major sea or seas out there. More than that I can't say. But it seems CFC knows about most teams by now, either first- or second-hand.

[mostly_harmless]

Sullla, I can only assume that you are not aware of the last incarnation of the plan, which has the stone city settled on T83 with the help of a galley after we settled the spices spot.
Plan
If you were aware of that then your post does not make much sense in some parts.

Edit: More polite.

mh

[Gold Ergo Sum]

I thought I was on board for the quick rush to the stone site, but I think Sullla convinced me. The stone site is super important, but if we are really in a settling war, we are disadvantaged due to the lake. I would prefer to only expend the resources there in 15 turns when we can defend it. My vote is for that to be city #9, founded somewhere ~T86. And I definitely favor doing it by galley (and ideally getting a quick missionary in there to expand borders and get cultural defense). Walking around in the wilderness when there are 4-5 teams we haven't met, let alone NAP'd, is just asking for an opportunistic steal.

We have set ourselves up well, and I think we can outplay all the other teams. So no need to go doing crazy stuff.

That said, we must secure horses somehow and getting a defensible city on those horses is MEGA important, because nearly any attack we are going to make in a MP civ game is going to be utilizing 2-movers on horsies. I also have a feeling that city will end up being our western outpost, with most every other city going somewhere back to the east towards our core. So if that is our western outpost, we should probably plan to have a good deal of military stationed there eventually.

[mostly_harmless]

The plan under discussion has the stone spot settled on T83, with a galley.
That is 12 turns from now. Nothing rushed there, nobody bending backwards.

Edit: Corrected to be more polite.

mh

[Gold Ergo Sum]

Nothing rushed there, nobody bending backwards.

Here is what I feel like we should have before we plant there to avoid losing it or getting off to too slow of a start:

1) Galley
2) Two axes (the one scouting, and one more by galley). That way one can garrison and the other can serve as a western sentry net
3) Two workers

What kind of time table can we have that available without stopping us from getting more rapidly productive cities developed?

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Assuming mirroring, could our horses be to the east, and they've been stolen by CFC? Best to use a scout to find out, so we can make a decision on whether this kind of Bold Play is necessary.