0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
:Heh, I guess that would worked better if we had Mao...but I'd rather have spiritual than protective and I'm sure that you agree.
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
So, I've got a sim going AH-BW-fishing that gives us a settler at turn 35, with two workers and a warrior and enough overflow to 3turn a workboat, as well as 1t into a farm and 1t into a second mine. Uses all three forests, however. Not sure if that's better. Will try substituting the second worker with a settler.
Edit: Okay, so my best sim so far is really similar to yours, just with a few minor differences. T32 settler with 5hammers of overflow (if only I could finish fishing 1turn more quickly! I just barely can't turn that overflow +turn's production into a workboat), 1f in the foodbox, 7 food per per turn (3surplus), 6 hammers per turn of base production, 1 turn into a farm (otherwise a wasted worker turn waiting for BW. BTW, growth to size 2, production of warrior, and completion of mine all happen on the same turn ). Workboat finishes and moves to fish turn 35 (with chop and gives some overflow to the next build, I forget how much, I think somewhere around 5h), builds fishing boats turn 36.
Also, worker can move to mine or move to the second city instead of going to chop after he finishes his other chop on turn 30 and I just have a warrior as a placeholder for a turn while I wait for fishing; that can be changed, too.
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
(May 14th, 2013, 17:29)Merovech Wrote: So, I've got a sim going AH-BW-fishing that gives us a settler at turn 35, with two workers and a warrior and enough overflow to 3turn a workboat, as well as 1t into a farm and 1t into a second mine. Uses all three forests, however. Not sure if that's better. Will try substituting the second worker with a settler
That's better then mine. I wouldn't worry about chopping all 3 forests, our start is slow enough as it is and we shouldn't be saving them for later wonders in our cap anyway. 2 workers and a settler at t35? That's pretty competitive. I think we should beeline Pottery though, possibly before Fishing.
Some odd civ choices thus far, to go along with some odd leader choices.
About Pottery before Fishing:
Early pottery grants us two things: Extra commerce from growing cottages earlier and extra food from getting granaries in place earlier. However, fishing also grants us food, from the fish, and effective commerce (from the pre-requisite discount on Pottery). I'm not sure what the relative values are right now-we definitely want granaries as soon as possible, but it's not like the capital is going to grow very quickly on just the cow. I'm not sure about early cottages, either; while we are REXing, I think that we can make do with the riverside grassland mines and then start moving off them and laying down cottages once we have an established second or third city to take up the expansion load.
One thing to keep in mind: It's better for us to chop into workers and build settler with foodhammers than the other way around. My first sim does this, but not my second, though my first sim has other issues. I'm not sure which I prefer.
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
(May 14th, 2013, 20:01)Merovech Wrote: About Pottery before Fishing:
Early pottery grants us two things: Extra commerce from growing cottages earlier and extra food from getting granaries in place earlier. However, fishing also grants us food, from the fish, and effective commerce (from the pre-requisite discount on Pottery).
Agree so far.
(May 14th, 2013, 20:01)Merovech Wrote: I'm not sure what the relative values are right now-we definitely want granaries as soon as possible, but it's not like the capital is going to grow very quickly on just the cow.
That's true, the cow isn't good enough to abuse a early granary by itself. If we have another food somewhere then I'll come back to this point, though.
(May 14th, 2013, 20:01)Merovech Wrote: I'm not sure about early cottages, either; while we are REXing, I think that we can make do with the riverside grassland mines and then start moving off them and laying down cottages once we have an established second or third city to take up the expansion load.
I disagree, once we get the fish hooked and a granary built (which at the latest should be shortly after 2nd city since we're EXP), it's easy to work cottages to grow after whipping settlers/workers, and we should really get those cottages down ASAP assuming everything else is even. Although that doesn't help my Pottery before Fishing argument. Looks like Fishing first then.
(May 14th, 2013, 20:01)Merovech Wrote: One thing to keep in mind: It's better for us to chop into workers and build settler with foodhammers than the other way around. My first sim does this, but not my second, though my first sim has other issues. I'm not sure which I prefer.
To make it simpler to understand, the thing we want to avoid doing is building workers with food. The best way to accomplish that is rushing them with production ie chopping now, like you said, and whipping later. That said, settlers are expensive enough early on that we might have to use a chop or two on them to speed them up, hopefully by the time we run out of forests to chop, we'll have a granary and enough food to be in a position to whip workers regularly.
Yeah, I definitely could have made that last point a lot more clear. I've put about 1/2 of our chats into the second post, now, btw.
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
Woah. I mean, I think that Babylon is a little underrated here (below average UU that is decent against barbs, normally useless UB that can help when both unhealthy and creative, but excellent starting techs for normal starts (read: not fishing starts)), but I wasn't exactly expecting them to be picked by Jowy and Q. Underrated doesn't always mean "good." We'll see, I suppose.
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
Alright time for a pregame opponent analysis (Pt 1):
Jowy + Qqqqq - Mansa of Babylon:
Jowy's been around for a while, being a player all the back in PB2, but even in PB9 (which is somewhat of a greens game itself) he isn't doing so well. Unless he gets a lot better overnight, I doubt he'll be able to compete for the top spots this game. I know very little about Qqqqq's player ability, but it probably isn't much better then Jowy's.
Their choices are underwhelming, and probably reflect their player skill (sorry guys). Babylon is an alright civ for 10th, but there were still some better unpicked civs available such as Maya and Rome. Mero did a good job explaining the ups and downs of Babylon. Mansa as 1st pick also seems suboptimal, yes you have FIN for fast teching post pottery but SPI doesn't do anything until late classical, and there's nothing to speed up early game expansion at all. Bowmen may help defend until SPI comes around, but that doesn't really help win more. I feel there are much better choices out there with the first pick.
Pick strength: 2.5/5
Player strength: 2/5
Estimated finish: Not in the top 5
Slowcheetah - Sury of Mali:
Slwocheetah's only played in 2 games to my knowledge (there's so many games there days it's hard to keep up), but in both games he's been a force, at least in peacetime. Perhaps Mero can chime in here a bit, but I think he's a top pre-game competitor if he can stay out of fighting, and has the possibility of surprising me militarily.
EDIT: OK so he's played a lot more then 2 games. In fact, he won 33 so he definitely has some skill.
His pick is also very good. Sury may not be FIN, but he has both early game expansion traits and is the best REXer pick. Mali is also a decent pick for 9th, even if I'm not a fan of them. Decent techs, a very good early UU (if you can afford the detour to archery and lack resources) and a decent, early enough economic UB to matter. The most likely candidate to undergo extreme REXing.
Pick strength: 5/5
Player strength: 4-5/5
Estimated finish: 3rd
Dazed - Vicky of Zulu:
Dazed has been around for a while, his first game being the same as my PB3, and played numerous games since then. I would peg his skill level to be around intermediate level, although I do not know him well enough to know his strengths and weaknesses.
Picking Vicky 3rd was very surprising, and one of the more unexpected moves in the snakepick. Yes you have FIN, and you also have a expansion trait (IMP), but the two don't work very well together at all. You want to be working mines and not whip for IMP while cottages for FIN. Being the only IMP leader may help, but it's just not that good of a trait to be the only one with it. Zulu is also surprising, although it is a decent choice for 8th civ. Impi's are very good for choking, Ikhanda's provide a economic effect very early on for a slightly higher cost, and Hunting isn't as bad of a starting tech since everyone starts with a scout. IMP is certainly better then nothing on the expansion front against the other FIN leaders who indeed have nothing, but I doubt it'll be enough to make a difference, and probably won't tech as fast as the other FIN leaders out there.
Pick strength: 3-4/5
Player strength: 3-4/5
Estimated finish: at least 6th
Gavagai - Liz of England:
Gavagai is a newcomer AFAIK, so I have not idea what to think of him.
His pick is the only restricted one in the lot, but I think it's a decent pairing. Liz is a great pick for 4th leader, it shines when you aim for a early PHI academy to boost FIN cottages after Writing, that alone makes Liz better then Mansa. Having played England before, I think the civ is alright but overrated. Stock Exchange is essentially a more effective bank, but only after Renaissance. Redcoats have yet to prove themselves at all in RB, but they also appear very late. Techs are decent enough, especially with our start, but there are other civs that give the same techs with earlier bonuses (Rome).
Pick strength: 3-4/5
Player strength: ???
Estimated finish: at least 6th
Kurumi - Mehmed of Mongolia:
Kurumi is also a newcomer I think, so like Gavagai I'm only rating the pick itself.
His two picks were quite unconventional. Picking Mehmed when Darius was still available is certainly a move that raises eyebrows, however I don't think it's terrible move since Darius, like Mansa, has no expansion traits, while Mehmed has one expansion and one economic trait. Mongolia is a underrated civ around here, the Hunting starts hurts less with scouts for everyone, Keshik's are great if the map is particularly hilly/foresty/jungley, and the Ger allows the option for 3 promo horses all the way to Cavs. A decent jack-of-all-trades pick, but I don't think it's focuses enough to go the distance. We really have to see what his skill level is before deciding anything, but I'm not holding my breath.
Pick strength: 3/5
Player strength: ???
Estimated finish: Not in the top 5
). Workboat finishes and moves to fish turn 35 (with chop and gives some overflow to the next build, I forget how much, I think somewhere around 5h), builds fishing boats turn 36.![[Image: PB12%20Sim%201.png]](https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/110995178/PB12%20Sim%201.png)