The Way of the Civ Player - Ichabod and Wetbandit's PB13 Spoiler Thread

[wetbandit]

Yeah, an extra 2 happy affords more production and commerce along with the cushion to absorb an extra whip.

[Ichabod]

Well, I don't like critiquing other players, but someone will have to help me understand why would anyone settle this city:




Is it just to annoy me? Are they planning to attack me? Is it just for the silks? Damn, it's a no food city... They have 2 other sources of horses...

Well, that city doesn't invalidate my proposed spots, but it hinders Stray Geese and makes the whole area turbulent. Not that it's any of my business, but I think FinHarry should focus on settling up on dtay, who, as you can see, is really making big progress with the game. I'll try to settle the rice city soon, but I have a feeling FinHarry will settle there too before I can make it... I think those two are a bit overeager and that'll be their demise in this game. Let's see, maybe I'm wrong and they'll let me have the rice spot. I'll be a good boy and change my dotmap to place that city 1W of the intended spot. If they go and settle a first-ring rice city to steal it from me... Well, than it's certainly war.

Oh well, guess I'll have another destination for my troops, after we attack Slow... Maybe taking all that island can be a good profit...

[Ichabod]

Some good news, some bad news this turn.

The very good news is that Slow captured dtay's annoying little West City!! That means we won't have to deal with dtay, that means Slow likely lost units and that means some of Slow's power is galleys!




He kept it, which is not optimal for us (what do you think, bandit, if we capture that city we raze or we grab for us?). A city 1S of that spot gets a second clam, that can be seen through the tile yield in the picture. But a city further down south could also grab that and I expect that we'll settle that whole island.

The bad news is that YuriMack are laying the hammer on m_h... FinHarry also decided to joing the party to split the dead man spoils...




And, while Mackoti rampages through the world, FinHarry are busy settling on my face on the southern island...




Yeah, I know. FinHarry are probably going on in their thread about how Stray Geese and Spring Breeze are agressive plants against their beautiful island and yadda, yadda, just like I'm doing. But, well, those cities are a boat's distance of my Capital, I can't afford not having them. I offered them a map trade to make them realize that. So, why settle that damned horse city? I can understand the rice one, is a sort of no-man's land, especially since they settled it from the east. But the horse city is pure disrespect and an agressive gesture. I may not be quite as famous as other warmongers around this site, but I'm a pretty agressive player, all things considered. In my first game (FFH IV) I conquered one opponent and vassalized other (Sciz and Dantski). On my second game (FFH VI), I conquered Sciz yet again. I conquered Team Rome in PB7, I conquered Azza in Civ 5 PBEM 2 and so on. I won't let that city stand and, since a war only for that is dumb, I'll conquer the whole island. I know I can't keep France, but Islandwana is a good city and I'll just resettle what's needed inland.

But, that's in the future. We need to take out Slow first. So, our first measures against FinHarry will be mercantilistic in nature. We are currently trading Ivory for Silver with them. That can't stand. So, we made quite a bit of different offers to try and get a replacement happy resource while we work to get our own Silver source. If we can manage that, we will cancel the current trade, before they can start fielding Phants (I'm positive they can't do it yet, will be sure next turn after checking).

It's what Alfred says in the Batman movie (sorry for the lack of a better quote): There are people that just want to watch the world burn. That's my stance in this game. Settling unreasonable cities at my face is a bad idea. I can understand WLP settling on us for the good terrain, but FinHarry won't be excused. I gotta meet YuriMack soon... I think we'll want to be working very closely soon...

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Deserted Prophet after the Academy:




Birth of Musashi in the full hammers configuration:




The Great Bridge at Gojo Avenue managed to get a second catapult from the 2-pop whip. We will have 10 catapults in 3 turns. We have more than 10 units already to make the invasion and we'll be getting some more phalanxes, swords and Ellies. I think 20 units + 10 catapults will be more than enough. I guess the best attack plan is going East to Old Sarai first, trying to kill Slow's army, that I think will be there due to dtay's city.




The Port is a meh city, but a two pop whip at 18/50 next turn will give us at least 2 units. That's nice.




I need to start thinking about city specialization, more specifically, what buildings we want build in which city. Forges are good in all cities, obviously. But what about markets, libraries and grocers? Especially considering we are going on the warpath for a looong time... Gotta think, gotta think.

[wetbandit]

Re: Fin/Harry, I think they are just establishing a defensible border city. If we had a city S or SE of those horses, that's a strategic problem for them as an attack and almost insta-fork could be achieved with an attacked launched from there against their other cities on that island. So while their stance appears aggressive, I think they are just trying to protect their land by getting a defensible border and not a necessarily give us the finger; although that's a side effect.

Re: West City: 1S looks like a better location, pick up an extra LH bonus lake. If slow was able to take the city though, we're looking at needing at least 3 galleys to take the island, considering that he has at least 1 to ferry troops which might win a 33% shot against a naval unit. It's not a high priority though.

[wetbandit]

We're going to end up with Markets in most important cities because they are half-price and we have 3(?) happy from them. Grocers might end up the same way because they are also half-price.

Speaking of war...ready to hit slow yet?

[Ichabod]

It's a bit annoying that I have limited time on the day to play my turns and everytime I try to enter, I get bounced by Old Harry and Fintourist. Why do they have to log in so much times during a turn... Yes, I know, they have all the right to do that, but it is a bit annoying.

[Ichabod]

In foreign news, FinHarry accepted the World Map trade I proposed and, with a cooler head, I ended up agreeing with wetbandit: their city plant seems more like a defensive move than anything (his more defensible island cities are even lacking defenders right now, I wonder what that means) and his rice city, while annoying, is also a defensive plant. For now, we'll have peace. Hopefully... Maybe they want to attack... Well, either way, I'm Mr Number 1 in power right now.

Despite all this, I ended my Ivory -> Silver trade with FinHarry. Reasons being that I managed to make a Gems -> Silver trade with WLP. Interestingly enough, I sell gold for gems to bacchus and I sell my gems for silver with WLP. International trade is one messed up business...

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dtay has another annoying city in the "West City Island". That's actually good -> if Slow wants to defend his newly captured city, he has to keep units on the island, having less on the mainland! That dtay city is obviously not going to be held for long, it's way closer to Slow, FinHarry and me than from him...




My current units. We just finished HBR and we'll make a round of 1-pop WE whips in three cities, while the Capital slow builds one (2 turns with the 21 overflow from a 49/50 catapult). That'll be the end of my build up (there are some more cats and stuff finishing).

Our initial attack will have a stack composed of:

*8 Catapults
*3 Swors
*6 Phalanxes
*3 Spears
*1 Chariot
*(There are 2 phalanxes and 2 spears defending DP and GtG that I can, if needed, add to this stack)

Afterwards, there'll be WE, cats and other units reinforcing the stack from time to time.

The initial wave will reach the marked spot on turn 128:




If I understand the LoS rules well, Slow will only spot my stack on turn 128, but I think I ought to test that before commiting to the plan. We want to take Old Sarai as soon as possible, which will deny Slow his horses. Well, that's what's supposed to happen, since I just realized that some annoying team might very well give Slow horses, just to mess with us. If that's the case, so be it - luckily Slow doesn't have that many contacts.

I think I'll move the stack 1NE on turn 129. After that, I move one unit to scout 1SE on turn 130, to see how many units are needed to take Old Sarai, maybe we can affor to split the stack and make part of it move 1N on that turn, getting ready to take Ning-hsia. After that, we mix the stack with a smaller stack that will have pillaged the copper and we march to take the remaining cities in the continent.

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We'll finish MC in 2 turns, since we got quite a bit of overflow from HBR. Forges will be started on quite a lot of cities, since they are very good buildings for us. Any thoughts about this, wetbandit? Maybe I'm overestimating the forges here.

[Ichabod]

We could go for Meditation next. Build a Buddhist Monastery in HP and spread Buddhism around. Start with DP, so we can get the 10% science there. After that, Calendar (or maybe before that). What do you think, wetbandit? I think we need to start caring about religion soon, otherwise we'll spend the game without it.

Do we want a GA with our next GP to change Civics? I think we do... Bureaucracy should be a target, it'll be good in BoM due to production and it could be good in DP, if we build the Palace there. Do we want to build the Palace there? We could very well build the HE in BoM (those cottages will probably be buldozed for workshops, maybe keeping the developed ones), which will already give it plenty of production to the most significant stuff (military). Besides, we have plenty of hammers, we need more commerce. So, I think we should go Forge -> Palace in DP, growing non-stop (maybe a monastery in between). Aim to place HE in BoM and NE in... BGA, perhaps? It has (soon to be irrigated) wheat and clams and we could irrigate it more... NO! NE will go in Slow's Capital, with the 2 fish, deer and corn.

And where do we get the needed GP for now? MoK doesn't have that potential anymore, too low food, I guess... I think we could steal the FPs back to HP, get a market there and run 2 Sci and 2 Mercs there. We need it at size 9, working rice, cow, fp cottage, grass cottage, spices plantation and 4 specialists. Could grow more, obviously, if we have the time for it.

But if we configure HP to get a GP, it can't get a monastery and missionaries. So, BGA will go Forge -> Monastery -> Missionaries. Since it'll take a while for the forge to be ready, we go Calendar -> (Literature - not sure if we'll start the HE so soon, since I also want a forge and market at BoM) -> Meditation.

Hm... Quite a lot of plans here...

[wetbandit]

Sorry Ichabod, been too busy lately to comment that much.

Re: war plans, you decided to hit East versus getting the core cities. Curious that you went

Re: Bureau/CS - I think moving the capital to DP makes sense if you want to prioritize Bureau because we need the commerce. I think bottom half of the tree might be interesting because vassalage might save a ton of money given how many troops are in the field. (Vassalage: now provides free support for military units as well (meaning Pacifism is cheaper), and is Medium Upkeep.)

Definitely think GA should be used for religion plus civics. Even though it will be a pain to settle, we do have wine nearby so Monarchy, with HR by extension, will be at least +2 happy. Plus OR and Vassalage/Bureau (whatever ends up making more sense) benefits. GA can be used to jumpstart another GP if you end up getting CoL for a revolt into Caste, that might be a better way in the short term to pump some GPs out.

Don't think Calendar should be a priority with only the 1 happy, but Lit for HE and NE would be useful.

[Ichabod]

Some interesting things:




Techs we could go for. We still get calendar in 1 turn with the gold we have. My thinking regarding calendar is that it'll give "passive" benefits to our cities, while the other techs would give "active" benefits that we won't be able to use. Calendar would give us 2 spices right now (probably equates to +2 happy with a trade), which allow us to grow some cities that are currently stagnating. It also allows a banana plantation in the island city we are about to settle.

Soon we'll also have silks from Slow's land, but that doesn't matter to the question of getting Calendar now or later. The literature route would give us monasteries and the Epics, but I just don't see us building this before forges.

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So... Dyes for Ivory is off the tables, I don't want to give a powerful opponent the means to build Phants while we only get a single happy in return. We could demand two happy for it or a happy and gold... Happy and gold is probably better, since I don't want to depend too much on foreign trades for happiness.

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This is awesome news. DP got the third ring borders and we are about to get control of that peak tile, which will give us awesome vision in Slow's lands! DP gets 10 culture per turn (hooray for Odeons), so we are probably getting 5 times Slow's culture in the tile. It wen't from the 37% above to 45% in the next turn. Being able to scout that land for free is very valuable, we will even be able to see inside Turfan. Awesome!

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These are the last military units for Slow's invasion. Now, we grow and build infra. Hopefully getting Slow's land will be a worthy investment. Our demos are suffering a bit from the war effort.