Intersite Game - Turn Discussion Thread

[NobleHelium]

Yes, we should avoid growth and keep working the farm. Although I'm not sure we should be whipping ED at all.

[kjn]

If we do use avoid growth, we can work the coast a couple turns to avoid losing excess food, and gain a bit of commerce.

The Germans has connected their gems resource, so we should cancel our gems deliveries to them now (perhaps with a polite message to them). We can also send off a message to WPC about that, and should also ask them about their Calendar ETA. I'd be happy to send off gems to them early, to secure dyes.

[SevenSpirits]

There still isn't a good reason to work coast in a national epic city while leaving spec slots and a farm unused. Just do 2t of farm and 1t of spec, for every 3t of coast you were thinking to work.

[Ceiliazul]

PLAKO HAS BEEN VOTED ISDG GAME ADMINISTRATOR!
(pending his own acceptance)

[Sullla]

Turn 142 - 640AD

Fairly quiet turn overall, a few minor things to discuss.



This is from our exploring chariot in German territory, and we've basically found where all of their units are hiding. Right there on the border with WPC as expected, sitting inside the city of Willhelmshaven. Their army is extremely heavy on axes; this particular tile has 9 axes, 4 chariots, 3 catapults, and 1 spear. They also have 2 axes on the pigs tile northeast of the city, and 2 axes + 1 spear inside Wismar. (Note to anyone reading: this force is too axe-heavy. It's just asking to get torn apart by horse archers or another type of mounted unit. They need more spears in the army composition.) Needless to say, an army made up mostly of axes is not likely to fare very well against maces and knights.

It also suggests that the German team is expecting to fight WPC in the near future, but has no idea at all that we'll be attacking them. Their whole army is off on the opposite border. I genuinely think that they've forgotten about our NAP ending on Turn 150, and of course we've been trading resources and acting like a friendly neighbor. They are not going to be pleased come T150 at all.

We'll have to keep back a small part of the second drafting force in the area around Simple Life to protect against a possible counter-attack from this German army into our territory. Since we can easily whip city walls (and castles once we have Engineering tech), plus draft maces and whip knights, I think we'll be reasonably safe from them mounting a counter invasion. Have to see how they choose to play it, let's hope that WPC can tie up much of that force.



We also picked up vision on a CivPlayers city this turn in the deep southwest as our Sentry chariot begins returning home. Like all of the CivPlayers cities that we've seen, it has a lot of infrastructure inside: granary, forge, sacrificial altar, Buddhist temple and monastery. CivPlayers has very low costs by virtue of being Darius (Fin/Org) and having their UB courthouses everywhere. Their biggest weakness is that they were horribly squeezed on territory by starting next to us and CivFr. I agree with what many others have said that CivPlayers would make a good ally to have on our side. We don't really want to fight the Apostolic Palace civ, all that religious unhappiness would make fighting them a nightmare, and we have bigger targets to go after amongst the game leaders. Apolyton, for example, would be a very tempting target in a post-German war. But that's getting too far ahead.



Here's the western part of our core territory. We already had a question about the capital, so let me explain there: like many of our other large cities, the capital needs happiness. It's only staying happy-neutral right now by virtue of stuffing extra military police units inside. We need to move those units up to the front line soon, and that's to say nothing of war weariness down the road from fighting (which is going to SUCK, we really need to settle for silver and hopefully trade for CivPlayers sugars to combat that). The forge will not complete in Adventure One for quite some time, not in time to combat our unhappiness. So I'm suggesting we break off from the forge for now, complete the barracks to solve the happiness problems, and then go back and finish the forge. It's an inefficient way to do things, but the forge is simply going to take too long, and with all of our drafting plans it's not as though the barracks is a waste of a build.

Elsewhere, Ditchdigger gets drafted next turn after it grows. Brick will grow back to size 9 next turn, where it gets 20 base / 25 modified with forge production. We'll get a few elephants and probably a couple more catapults there while waiting for Guilds. Focal Point finished its forge this turn, it gets 15 base / 18 modified production for 3t catapults. Sadly, we need to farm another plains tile up there before it can reach 16 / 20 production.



Horse Feathers has reached the magical size 14 target, and can now 1t war elephants and 1.5t knights. We get a base of 27 production here, and then we add on to that another 27 production from Heroic Epic and 6 production from the forge for 27 + 27 + 6 = 60 production/turn. Very nice for this stage of the game. When we've sorted out some of the capital's various happiness issues, we can grow this city another size by borrowing the corn and working an Engineer specialist at size 15, which gets us to 29 + 29 + 7 = 65 production/turn. And of course, super lategame with Railroads and Biology farms can do better yet.

I know that other spots can theoretically produce greater outputs for a Heroic Epic city, but I believe we made the right choice by choosing Horse Feathers. Timing is everything, and having such a strong location up and running this early in the game will be a tremendous difference. Case in point: by Turn 165, we will have produced roughly 15 knights out of this one city alone. Just like an early Forbidden Palace in Civ3, it's better to get a good Heroic Epic city running on Turn 150 than a great Heroic Epic city running on Turn 200.



Here is the eastern half of our core. Cutting Edge is whipping its forge next turn when the missionary from Tree Huggers arrives. Mansa is finally growing now that we could give it the deer from the capital. Eastern Dealers is working the resource tiles, the two farms, the grassland hill mines, and 2 Scientist specialists, as we worked out last turn. And at Simple Life:



I think that we should go ahead and whip the city for its forge. There's no whip unhappiness at present, it's a 3 pop whip with a lot of overflow, and the city will grow back to size 4 next turn. Yes, a little bit brutal in the short run, but the stronger play for the long haul. Any thoughts on this?



Here's the south, finally starting to develop nicely. Let It Snow's work boat is ready to complete, and another worker is chopping into a likely lighthouse for its next build. French Riviera finishes its library this turn with help from a forest chop, it also will be drafted this turn. It should finally get religion from Seven Tribes in a half-dozen more turns. The settler is on its way to the deer/crabs spot in the southeast, should found the spot T146.

This is the turn where we have to decide next what to build in Catherine. How about we do this: lighthouse first, then theatre next after that? We don't necessarily have to work Artists either, we could simply rely on the passive culture (5 per turn with monument, religion, and theatre) to pop borders in 15 or so turns. Then we could bring irrigation over from French Riviera as I wanted to do. One forest chop gets us the lighthouse, and the second one should finish a theatre. How about it?

Overview:

Here's the overview picture. We caught a break with CFC researching Feudalism last turn, which cheapens the cost for us. Min science strategy was a winner in this case. I was looking at the numbers on this today, and I think that we can turn on 100% research next turn and then get Guilds at the eot 146. We'll be running 100%, 100%, 100%, and then something like 70% research on the last turn. I think we might have to squeeze out a Wealth build here or there, but I think it's worth it to start building knights a turn sooner. Good idea, or just run one more turn of 0% research next turn?



Demos for the turn, CFC is now out of their Golden Age. They made extremely good use of it, getting a Great Engineer and two Great Scientists during the 8 turns. Unfortunately, they look like our top competition to win right now, and you know that means more rules-lawyering ahead in the future.

GNP is pretty sad at 0% science, although it does go up to a value of 600 (3rd) at max research rate. Production is hard to evaluate with CivFr still in their Golden Age. We of course dominate in Food, Land, Power, etc. Still no one building much of an army. We will have graphs on CivFr next turn, for what that's worth.

[Shoot the Moon]

Definitely get guilds as soon as possible. Nice to see so much of the German force by WPC. Hopefully WPC have enough to hold that force down.

[NobleHelium]

Uh, religious unhappiness comes from having their state religion inside our cities, which we don't have. It has nothing to do with the AP.

Lighthouse then theatre in Catherine sounds fine.

[Oxyphenbutazone]

I think Sullla was referring to the "The world considers you a villain" unhappiness that comes from defying AP resolutions. And whoever has the AP religion will obviously select the option to end the war every time it comes up for a vote. Though if none of our cities have Buddhism, then I'm not sure.

[Ceiliazul]

Timer FIXED! - (pending execution of admin order)

Admin decision: During war time timer is 36h. During peaceful times 44h timer is used (I presume 44h is the current timer. Please correct me if I'm wrong).

[scooter]

Guilds ASAP definitely.