(November 23rd, 2013, 17:09)TheHumanHydra Wrote: Okay, so after looking at everyone else's plans I had another go at mine. I like this one much, much better.
So I kept the principle of the plan because I'm a Tier 6 player but modified it to incorporate the banana start, the western corn location, and the need for more workers. I'll walk you through it again:
So I settled on the bananas t1 and started a settler:
Bronze Working first again (-> Wheel -> Fishing -> Pottery -> Writing).
The combination of bananas and ivory allowed me to found the second city one turn earlier than in my previous plan, t11:
Both cities started on a worker, Shanghai getting the ivory to cut two turns off the build-time.
Beijing's worker went here, which is important; I had to preserve that forested plains hill tile to work later, and I couldn't do the micro from the eastern grassland forest:
Note the grassland hill tile 1N of Beijing had a forest-growth in my run-through; I avoided chopping it because that growth wouldn't be replicable in other people's sims.
A turn later, Shanghai's worker went here; in this case it didn't matter too much which forest it went to. Both cities started on another worker:
At this point I gave Beijing back the ivory; Shanghai had used it to get its worker in eight turns - eot18 - with exact hammers; now Beijing would use it - with a chop - to get a third worker eot21 with exact hammers, then Shanghai would get it back to get out a fourth worker - with a chop - eot24 with exact hammers!
Beijing's workers had moved like so while the city started on another settler (this is where I worked the forested plains hill briefly):
Meanwhile Shanghai's workers moved to continue their anti-environmental mission while the city started on ... another settler:
As a side-note, I had settled Shanghai for the monster copper tile, but after repeated run-throughs found it was far more efficient not to improve it till after the sim. However, I couldn't find another second-city site that allowed me to reach the same benchmarks in the same time-frame. Shanghai basically became a chop-funnel; down the road it would have to become a production city due to its low food-potential.
Anyway, as you can see, the workers at Beijing finished the corn-farm and forest-chop the same turn; this may seem odd but allowed both cities to have the highest-yield tiles possible available at all times.
The rest is explicable in pictures; from here the worker-micro could actually differ if you had different goals in mind: one run-through had the copper improved and hooked but the fourth city settled t31, for instance. I opted to cram everything into the t30 window and cottage it up; from here on out no city worked an unimproved flood-plain, while roads sped the settlers' movement to their assigned locations:
Beijing squeaked out its settler with exact hammers, and Shanghai one to spare.
Here I was able to group all the workers together for fun and profit:
Actually, I spot a mistake: I should have cottaged the more southerly flood-plain last, so I could move a worker or two to cottage the roaded flood-plain 1SW of Shanghai the turn after. Oh well.
From here all the cities build granaries (Nanjing nets its crabs first), Beijing continues on its seemingly-infinite two-turn growth curve, Shanghai hooks its copper and becomes a production-city as I said, etc. Workers disperse to improve all the cities.
Eot30 I have four cities, four workers, four improved tiles plus two roads, five total population, and the techs you saw above. Much improved over my last run! Thank-you very much for the settle-on-bananas idea, all those who posted it, and for the settling-west and skipping-Animal-Husbandry pointers; I incorporated them all. And thanks again to Seven for the challenge; I've now had two afternoons of enjoyment out of it!
My comments
Strategic thoughts
In terms of the cheeky settler opening, again, you can do better by going worker-settler or worker-worker-settler, and improving corn first. (Why didn’t you learn this from my previous feedback? )
In terms of settling choices… well, it doesn’t really matter where you plant your cities if you don’t improve any resources.
Shanghai seems pretty poor as a second city to me. It’s not worth going for quickly.
For Guangzhou, I don’t see the appeal of settling N of the coal instead of on it directly. On the coal gets points for being riverside.
Again, needs more warriors.
Nanjing is a case where a chop would be extremely appropriate to get that workboat out sooner.
Going for writing before hunting and AH is a very bad idea. With such a low slider you won’t benefit much from writing, while hunting will be essential for the happy cap increase, not to mention the increased yield and the imminently important ability to build spearmen. And AH will be necessary for settling further cities.
I want to mention one thing for comparing this to other plans. Most plans will have revolted to slavery by now, which is almost a 1t difference. This means it would be more accurate (though a bit unfair to this plan) to compare your t29 with other plans’ t30.
Micro thoughts
The tile swapping and chop timings seem pretty well thought out.
Not improving the corn first can’t possibly be right.
While the micro optimization is very good, the broader choices you’re making give the impression that you are overvaluing number of workers/settlers and undervaluing natural city output (food, production, commerce). I think if you re-calibrated your valuations of things, and avoided doing something different for the sake of it, you would get a very pleasing result.*
*I found this sentence on a fortune cookie** and it seemed applicable.
Seven: thanks for taking the time to comment on both my plans. In particular, you're the first person to ever compliment my micro (partially because I always thought it was too tedious to report in my threads) - that was very encouraging. But the last thing you said really struck a chord with me - "if you re-calibrated your valuations of things, and avoided doing something different for the sake of it, you would get a very pleasing result." First of all, it does explain why I did what I did in these sims - I didn't believe there was any way I could make my micro in any way noteworthy without doing something drastically different, even if I knew it wasn't the best option ("the only way to win is not to play" - or rather, to play a different game). Also I wanted to see how it would turn out (in the end, not the worst that could have happened, if far from the best). Second - to your comment about valuations of things, and overvaluing settlers and workers - this is 100% true. The truth is that I don't know how to evaluate a strong start - or a strong position in any phase of the game, as I showed repeatedly in PBEM 46. To be able to compete effectively in the challenge, I had to conjure for myself some sort of tangible framework to measure my progress by - in this case, number of cities settled, followed by number of workers to improve those cities. With a tangible goal in mind, I was able to drive all my actions toward that objective, and everything fell into place mechanically of necessity - down to forebearing improving high-yield tiles to get the chops in sooner that would allow me to reach those benchmarks on time within the 31-turn limit. Without that four-city standard (the maximum I realized was realistically achievable) I would have been mucking about aimlessly, with nothing to micro towards - one of my great failings as a player. This is a big-picture area-for-improvement in my play that you've allowed me to see clearly for the first time, and for that I thank you. (The humour was also appreciated. ) A first step might be, next time I play, to get a dedlurker who can help me keep track of the big picture - "do improve that tile now - if not, you'll regret it later ... don't raze that city now, you'll regret it later ..." Anyway, hope all that made sense; I'm writing this way too late at night after finally learning who Red John is!
tl;dr What an intriguing challenge and quite insightful comments; I learned something way bigger than I was expecting.
(November 24th, 2013, 15:10)The Black Sword Wrote: Alright, here's my plan, so I can finally read all of these spoilered comments.
It's such a nice map to roll btw, there seems to be so many options.
T0-1: Move + found on the banana for that 7t worker and all round excellent city location. Start researching Bronze Working.
T2-7: Building a worker, switch to the Ivory when the borders pop, finish worker EOT7.
T8: Start farming corn. Put 1t production into a Settler working the Ivory, 8/65.
T9-10: Set build to warrior(2/10), grow on FP(8/14)
T11: BW in, revolt to slavery.
T12-14: Move worker to GFH to chop. Grow on farmed corn+FP to size 3(1/17), hammers into warrior(5/10). Research The Wheel.
T15: Chop comes in, put it into the settler, work Ivory, Corn and silk forest for 41/65. Silk forest allows The Wheel to complete.
T16: 1-pop whip Settler, road the Corn. Research Hunting. Work Ivory+Corn for 83/65 at EOT and 12h overflow.
T17: Finish road, move settler 3W1S to riverside GH. Hammers into a worker, 22/40.
T18: Found city 2, work Corn, grow on warrior. Start farm on FP adjacent to city. Whip the worker in the capital(46/40).
T19: Capital starts a settler, working the Ivory, 20/65. Both workers farm.
T20: Capital takes back corn, growing on warrior. City 2 grows on the completed FP farm(2/16 size 2).
T21: Hunting complete, research Pottery. City 2 starts worker on farmed FP + FP (6/40). Capital grows(1/16) Move 1 worker to Ivory and start camping, the other to forest 1E of the capital and chop.
T22: Capital takes both farms(10/16). City 2 continues worker(11/20).
T23: Capital works FP farm+FP (16/16), warrior is at 9/10. City 2 starts warrior again, works corn and FP(9/16).
T24: Chop comes in, camp complete. Capital works Ivory, Silk forest and plains hill forest for 53/65. Second city grows (17/16).
T25: Capital works Ivory, silk, FP for 65/65 settler. Second city works 2 farms +FP for 21/40 worker. Pottery complete, start research on Animal Husbandry. Ivory worker puts a turn into a cottage on the FP SW of the capital, second worker starts road NE of capital.
T26: Complete road, settler moves to jungle W of Ivory. Other worker moves to forest 1NW of that position. Capital puts 1h into a Granary, grows on both farms + FP, 10/17. City 2 whips the worker, working FP + forest(46/40).
T27: City 3 founded, starts worker. New worker from city 2 moves toward dry corn and roads. Worker on forest roads also, last worker moves into city 3(wasted worker turn, but completing the copper mine 1t earlier, means the worker completes 1t earlier). Capital works both farms +Ivory, switches back to warrior (14/10h, 18/17f). City 2 works 2 FP, putting overflow into a worker(11/10).
T28: Workers: start corn farm, finish road, start copper mine. Capital works FP, Ivory, silk, PHF for 20/65 into settler. City 2 grows on corn+FP farm(9/16)
T29: Animal Husbandry finishes, start Writing. Both workers in the East complete the copper mine. Capital and City 2 exchange the FP farm for a FP. Capital settler 35/65, city 2 grows 16/16.
T30: Whip settler in capital, work Ivory, silk, phf. City works both farms+FP, 22/40 into worker to whip next turn. Workers on copper mine move to the roaded forest and chop. Note the worker in city 3 comes out next turn as the chop is completed.
My first instinct was to go pottery first, double worker and get the flood plains cottaged. That was ahead on gold and developed cottages, behind on hammers obviously. It doesn't seem easy to judge which is better but there are no really pressing techs next I think, so I think the extra development here wins out.
My comments
Strategic thoughts
Settling on banana, that’s great.
Fast second city which shares most of the relevant tiles and still claims another resource and has minimal maintenance and an automatic trade connection and is only 1t away, that’s great.
Third city which claims copper and a food resource, that’s great.
Ending t31 with 6 pop, a settler for a fourth city and 5 workers? That’s great.
It looks really good. Only three things which one would wish to improve upon. 1) No warrior built until t27. 2) No cottages yet. 3) Hooking of new resources going a bit slow.
I wonder if the city #4 settler should be a worker instead so you can really start laying down cottages as top priority after city #3.
Micro thoughts
Your plan is filled with delightfully optimized numbers. The amount of tile-swapping and build-swapping is ridiculous. I really enjoyed reading it. It seems redundant to describe every move, so just read/try out the plan, guys.
There is a small drawback of cutting every number in your plan so close. It gets more easily disrupted if you have to change plans. So, for example, it would be nice to finish a warrior sooner, or you might find yourself with an enemy unit nearby, and you have to put 1t into a warrior just to be safe, and it has cascading effects. Not the end of the world of course.
It’s unfortunate that you can’t cottage those FP tiles sooner. You wouldn’t see the effects in the first 30t of course, but it would be very valuable to start on those, as there are no great inherent commerce tiles around and maintenance is going to go up fast.
Farming the FP looks bad initially - you want a cottage on that tile more than a farm. But it then becomes apparent that this extra tile with slightly different yield than the other FPs gets used for all kinds of micro shenanigans. Nevertheless, it’s important not to forget that you spent 5 early worker turns improving a tile to a mere 4 yield. The lack of additional food resources claimed by t30 is a mild weak point of this build. But you give a good demonstration of how much value can be extracted simply by sharing existing tiles.
You give some nice examples of how to use early chops effectively - in a way that immediately accelerates the chopped-into item by multiple turns.
I am curious: where did you plan to put city #4?
Overall, this plan is extremely well-thought-out and polished. Great job.
City 4 was planned for the sheep/pigs/oasis/plains hill site. I have 3 workers in the vicinity over there too, while the other 2 should focus on cottaging my centre 2 cities. That's my pretty vague continuation. I felt that city is too good delay long, and I'd probably focus a bit vertically after that. There is some flexibility at the end of the plan though, since the settler in the capital and the worker in the bronze city are built almost entirely with hammers, it's possible to exchange them for Granary/worker/settler if that seems more useful.
Certainly the lack of warriors and late cottages is a weakness though. The Cre borders might help give a bit more notice than usual if anything threatening was incoming.
In case anyone cares, I am still hoping to submit a plan, and remain unspoilered. Guess based on 7s feedback, I better figure it out by the end of day today
Move NE. Settle on Plains Hill. Work PFH, spam out 2 turn warriors and send 3-4 each at all of my opponents to ruin your perfectly planned farmer's gambit. hopefully nobody has already used this joke - I asked novice yesterday and he said I was in the clear
Plan take 2
T0: move SE to PHF
T1: move SE onto banana, settle, 0/14, 0/40 in worker, work unimproved corn, 5 f-h/t, 11cpt, 0/56 in wheel
T2: 0/14, 5/40, 11/56
T3: 0/14, 10/40, 22/56, swap to ivory
T4: 0/14, 16/40, 32/56
T5: 0/14, 22/40, 42/56
T6: 0/14, 28/40, 52/56
T7: 0/14, 34/40, 62/56, wheel ->BW => 7/114
T8: 0/14, 0/10 in warrior, 19/114, swap to unimproved corn
T9: 4/14, 1/10, 32/114, worker moves W, farm
T10: 8/14, 2/10, 45/114, farm
T11: 12/14, 3/10, 58/114, farm done
T12: 5/16, 0/65, 71/114, 4/10 in warrior, swap to settler, work corn + ivory, 6fpt, 4(6)hpt = 12f-h/t, worker moves 1S and roads
T13: 5/16, 12/65, 84/114, road
T14: 5/16, 24/65, 97/114, worker moves N-NW to GFH
T15: 5/16, 36/65, 110/114, worker roads, cancels
T16: 5/16, 48/65, BW->Hunting, worker chops, revolt
T17: 5/16, 48/65, 9/76, chop, whip settler->5/14, 78/65, 8 f-h/t
T18: 5/14, 14/40 in worker, 22/76, chop comes in
T19: 5/14, 35/40, 35/76, Shanghai founded, works corn, Beijing works ivory, 50% science
T20: Beijing 5/14, 4/10 (+1 overflow) in warrior, works corn Shanghai, 6/14, 1/10, works FP, worker mines, cancels, 50% science, worker B to ivory
T21: Beijing 12/14, 6/10, Shanghai 9/14, 2/10, swap Beijing to FP, Shanghai to corn, 100% science, worker A's mine done, worker B camps
T22: Beijing 2/16, 7/10, swap to settler, work GHM and ivory. Shanghai 1/16, 3/10, swap to worker, work corn and FP., Hunting->Pottery
T23: Beijing 2/16, 11/65, Shanghai, 8/40, worker A SW and farm dry corn, camp done
T24: Beijing 2/16, 24/65, Shanghai 16/40, worker B 1W, road, stop
T25: Beijing 2/16, 37/65, whip to 2/14, 67/67. Shanghai, 24/40 in worker -> whip, work corn. Worker B 1SW, road. 0% science
T26: Beijing 2/14, 7/40 in granary, work corn. Shanghai, 1/14, 11 overflow into granary. Settler SW-S-S. Worker C 1E, cottate. 100% science
T27: Beijing 6/14, 8/40, work corn, Shanghai 6/14, 11/40 work corn, settler 1S, founds Guangzhou, work ivory on granary. Worker A move NE-SE into Shanghai, worker B SE-E onto copper, 50% science
T28: Beijing, 13/14, 9/40, work corn, Shanghai 12/14, 12/40, Guangzhou 1/14, 5/40, 100% science, worker A 1E, finishes cottage with worker C. Worker B mines
T29: Beijing 6/16, 10/40, work corn + GHM, Shanghai 3/16, 14/40 work dry corn + FP cot, Guangzhou 2/14, 10/40, workers A+c SE and cottage
T30: Beijing 12/16, 14/40, work 2 FP cottages, Shanghai 9/16, 15/40 work 2 corns, Guangzhou 3/14, 15/40, cottage and mine finishes
I feel like this is solid but probably not enough to win. There were enough things in here that could be optimized better but I just ran out of time
Wasn't sure if this was supposed to be ON T30 or at EOT 30. If it's EOT, then it's Beijing size 3, 1/17, Shanghai size 3, 2/17, Guangzhou, 4/14, 21/40
Stream of consciousness ramblings, which include many incorrect assumptions based on trying to do this without civ
Notes:
Catherine (Cre/Imp) of China (Agriculture / Mining)
Quick Prince Standard Toroid no barbs
huntin 38, myst 47, wheel 56, BW 114, AH 95, pottery 76
Initial thoughts:
We definitely don't want to settle in place. If we go worker first, we can move up to 2 turns if we pick up an extra food-hammer (8t worker instead of 10). There are a few spots we could do that, including settling on the banana for a 3 food capital.
One option to consider might be SETTLER-first, since we are IMP. I actually rolled a start like that in a SG I was playing with a buddy. We were IMP and spawned on a 3h (plains hill stone I think) tile, and had another PHF in range. So we went with a 12t settler first (Normal speed). Not saying it's necessarily the best option here but it is *A* option to consider.
Next thoughts:
Options to consider
A) worker first
b) settler first
c) grow to size 2 then whip a worker or settler
d) Grow to size 3 in 8t on the banana
e) don't forget to explore for a super awesome settling spot far away
With Ag and Mining, and no really compelling pasture resources, BW is the overwhelming first tech choice, with Wheel->Pottery a secondary plan to consider. We make 10c from 8 palace, 1 free and 1 center square. So that's 12 or 13 bpt towards BW, depending on if we work a 1c tile or not. So BW (114b) will take 8 or 9t (+1 if we don't settle on T0).
=============
Option 1:
Settle on the banana, worker first, working corn.
We put 5f-h/t into the worker, which means 8t worker, Worker born at EOT8, BW at EOT9.
At this point, we could go into a 1a) move to a forest and chop it into a worker or settler, or 1b) farm the corn
1a) T9 worker moves to forest, EOT9 BW comes in
T10-12 chop, comes in at EOT12
T9: 0/14, 0/67 in settler
T10: 0/14, 5/67
T11: 0/14, 10/67
T12: 0/14, 15/67, chop comes in at EOT, 5f + (1+13h)*1.5 = 26 f-h
T13: 0/14, 41/67
T1
1b) T9 worker farms corn, work corn, build warrior
T9: 0/14, 0/10, farm 1/4
T10: 4/14, 1/10, farm 2/4
T11: 8/14, 2/10, farm 3/4
T12: 12/14, 3/10, farm done at eot, 7fpt, 1hpt
T13: 5/16, 4/10, worker moves NW to GFH, work corn + FP, 8fpt, 1hpt
T14: 13/16, 5/10, chop
T15: 5/17, 6/10, chop, work corn + 2 FP, 9fpt
T16: 14/17, 7/10, swap to settler, work corn + PHF + ivory - 4fpt, 6hpt, chop comes in - 13+6 = 19 *1.5 = 27 hammers, plus 4 food
T17: 14/17, 31/67, swap to corn + 2 FP and warrior, worker moves SE to corn and roads
T18: 6/18, 31/67, revolt to slavery, worker roads
T19: 6/18, 31/67, swap back to settler, 2-pop whip for 60h => 6/16, 91/67, work corn + PHF, 7fpt, 4(6)hpt, yields 104/67 or 37h overflow / 1.5 = 24h
T20: 6/16, 24/40 in worker, settler moves W-W-W to grass hill 1N of coal, work corn + FP, 9 f-h/t
T21: 2nd city founded
So that one is not bad, and could continue, but a few things I don't like is the "wasted" food with no granary, as well as several hammers of wasted overflow due to rounding. So let's try out whipping directly at size 2 and compare
2) whip settler at size 2
T9: 0/14, 0/10, farm 1/4
T10: 4/14, 1/10, farm 2/4
T11: 8/14, 2/10, farm 3/4
T12: 12/14, 3/10, farm done at eot, 7fpt, 1hpt
T13: 5/16, 0/67, worker moves NW to GFH, 4/10 in warrior, swap to settlerwork corn + PHF, 7fpt, 4(6) hpt
T14: revolt now? 5/16, 0/67, work
T15: 5/16, 13/67
T16: 5/16, 26/67
T17: 5/16, 39/67, 1-pop whip settler => 5/14, 69/67, work corn to 77/67 or 10h overflow / 1.5 = 6h
T18: 5/16, 6/X, work corn, settler moves W-W-W to grass hill 1N of coal
T19: 2nd city founded
So clearly that approach looks better. Questions at this point would be a) overflow to what (settler / worker / grow), what to build at the 2nd city, and possibly where to even put the 2nd city (maybe there's a better spot?), d) make sure the tech order works out.
So it looks like if I can spare the extra turn to road the FP south of the corn instead of the corn, and then settle on the coal instead of north of the coal, then I can get my cities connected to each other at the time the 2nd city is founded. This is pretty important, as 2cpt in the early game is a big deal.
So let's examine plan 2 to figure out beaker amounts
T0: 0commerce stored
T1: 11c (which would be 13b in BW)
T2: 22c
T8: 88c
T13: 143c, now at size 2 so 12cpt
T14: 155c
wheel is 56b, BW 114, which is 56 + (114/1.2) = 151 total commerce. So, barring rounding errors, seems fairly certain I can have them both done by T14. So since we don't need to revolt till T17, let's tech the Wheel first, or we'll end up with wasted worker turns. Going that way does waste a beaker in overflow as we move Wheel->BW but I'm not sure if it's possible to fix that.
I'm going to have to wait until tomorrow to submit my plan. My apologies.
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.
(November 26th, 2013, 08:22)regoarrarr Wrote: My plan:
Move NE. Settle on Plains Hill. Work PFH, spam out 2 turn warriors and send 3-4 each at all of my opponents to ruin your perfectly planned farmer's gambit. hopefully nobody has already used this joke - I asked novice yesterday and he said I was in the clear
Plan take 2
T0: move SE to PHF
T1: move SE onto banana, settle, 0/14, 0/40 in worker, work unimproved corn, 5 f-h/t, 11cpt, 0/56 in wheel
T2: 0/14, 5/40, 11/56
T3: 0/14, 10/40, 22/56, swap to ivory
T4: 0/14, 16/40, 32/56
T5: 0/14, 22/40, 42/56
T6: 0/14, 28/40, 52/56
T7: 0/14, 34/40, 62/56, wheel ->BW => 7/114
T8: 0/14, 0/10 in warrior, 19/114, swap to unimproved corn
T9: 4/14, 1/10, 32/114, worker moves W, farm
T10: 8/14, 2/10, 45/114, farm
T11: 12/14, 3/10, 58/114, farm done
T12: 5/16, 0/65, 71/114, 4/10 in warrior, swap to settler, work corn + ivory, 6fpt, 4(6)hpt = 12f-h/t, worker moves 1S and roads
T13: 5/16, 12/65, 84/114, road
T14: 5/16, 24/65, 97/114, worker moves N-NW to GFH
T15: 5/16, 36/65, 110/114, worker roads, cancels
T16: 5/16, 48/65, BW->Hunting, worker chops, revolt
T17: 5/16, 48/65, 9/76, chop, whip settler->5/14, 78/65, 8 f-h/t
T18: 5/14, 14/40 in worker, 22/76, chop comes in
T19: 5/14, 35/40, 35/76, Shanghai founded, works corn, Beijing works ivory, 50% science
T20: Beijing 5/14, 4/10 (+1 overflow) in warrior, works corn Shanghai, 6/14, 1/10, works FP, worker mines, cancels, 50% science, worker B to ivory
T21: Beijing 12/14, 6/10, Shanghai 9/14, 2/10, swap Beijing to FP, Shanghai to corn, 100% science, worker A's mine done, worker B camps
T22: Beijing 2/16, 7/10, swap to settler, work GHM and ivory. Shanghai 1/16, 3/10, swap to worker, work corn and FP., Hunting->Pottery
T23: Beijing 2/16, 11/65, Shanghai, 8/40, worker A SW and farm dry corn, camp done
T24: Beijing 2/16, 24/65, Shanghai 16/40, worker B 1W, road, stop
T25: Beijing 2/16, 37/65, whip to 2/14, 67/67. Shanghai, 24/40 in worker -> whip, work corn. Worker B 1SW, road. 0% science
T26: Beijing 2/14, 7/40 in granary, work corn. Shanghai, 1/14, 11 overflow into granary. Settler SW-S-S. Worker C 1E, cottate. 100% science
T27: Beijing 6/14, 8/40, work corn, Shanghai 6/14, 11/40 work corn, settler 1S, founds Guangzhou, work ivory on granary. Worker A move NE-SE into Shanghai, worker B SE-E onto copper, 50% science
T28: Beijing, 13/14, 9/40, work corn, Shanghai 12/14, 12/40, Guangzhou 1/14, 5/40, 100% science, worker A 1E, finishes cottage with worker C. Worker B mines
T29: Beijing 6/16, 10/40, work corn + GHM, Shanghai 3/16, 14/40 work dry corn + FP cot, Guangzhou 2/14, 10/40, workers A+c SE and cottage
T30: Beijing 12/16, 14/40, work 2 FP cottages, Shanghai 9/16, 15/40 work 2 corns, Guangzhou 3/14, 15/40, cottage and mine finishes
I feel like this is solid but probably not enough to win. There were enough things in here that could be optimized better but I just ran out of time
Wasn't sure if this was supposed to be ON T30 or at EOT 30. If it's EOT, then it's Beijing size 3, 1/17, Shanghai size 3, 2/17, Guangzhou, 4/14, 21/40
Stream of consciousness ramblings, which include many incorrect assumptions based on trying to do this without civ
Notes:
Catherine (Cre/Imp) of China (Agriculture / Mining)
Quick Prince Standard Toroid no barbs
huntin 38, myst 47, wheel 56, BW 114, AH 95, pottery 76
Initial thoughts:
We definitely don't want to settle in place. If we go worker first, we can move up to 2 turns if we pick up an extra food-hammer (8t worker instead of 10). There are a few spots we could do that, including settling on the banana for a 3 food capital.
One option to consider might be SETTLER-first, since we are IMP. I actually rolled a start like that in a SG I was playing with a buddy. We were IMP and spawned on a 3h (plains hill stone I think) tile, and had another PHF in range. So we went with a 12t settler first (Normal speed). Not saying it's necessarily the best option here but it is *A* option to consider.
Next thoughts:
Options to consider
A) worker first
b) settler first
c) grow to size 2 then whip a worker or settler
d) Grow to size 3 in 8t on the banana
e) don't forget to explore for a super awesome settling spot far away
With Ag and Mining, and no really compelling pasture resources, BW is the overwhelming first tech choice, with Wheel->Pottery a secondary plan to consider. We make 10c from 8 palace, 1 free and 1 center square. So that's 12 or 13 bpt towards BW, depending on if we work a 1c tile or not. So BW (114b) will take 8 or 9t (+1 if we don't settle on T0).
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Option 1:
Settle on the banana, worker first, working corn.
We put 5f-h/t into the worker, which means 8t worker, Worker born at EOT8, BW at EOT9.
At this point, we could go into a 1a) move to a forest and chop it into a worker or settler, or 1b) farm the corn
1a) T9 worker moves to forest, EOT9 BW comes in
T10-12 chop, comes in at EOT12
T9: 0/14, 0/67 in settler
T10: 0/14, 5/67
T11: 0/14, 10/67
T12: 0/14, 15/67, chop comes in at EOT, 5f + (1+13h)*1.5 = 26 f-h
T13: 0/14, 41/67
T1
1b) T9 worker farms corn, work corn, build warrior
T9: 0/14, 0/10, farm 1/4
T10: 4/14, 1/10, farm 2/4
T11: 8/14, 2/10, farm 3/4
T12: 12/14, 3/10, farm done at eot, 7fpt, 1hpt
T13: 5/16, 4/10, worker moves NW to GFH, work corn + FP, 8fpt, 1hpt
T14: 13/16, 5/10, chop
T15: 5/17, 6/10, chop, work corn + 2 FP, 9fpt
T16: 14/17, 7/10, swap to settler, work corn + PHF + ivory - 4fpt, 6hpt, chop comes in - 13+6 = 19 *1.5 = 27 hammers, plus 4 food
T17: 14/17, 31/67, swap to corn + 2 FP and warrior, worker moves SE to corn and roads
T18: 6/18, 31/67, revolt to slavery, worker roads
T19: 6/18, 31/67, swap back to settler, 2-pop whip for 60h => 6/16, 91/67, work corn + PHF, 7fpt, 4(6)hpt, yields 104/67 or 37h overflow / 1.5 = 24h
T20: 6/16, 24/40 in worker, settler moves W-W-W to grass hill 1N of coal, work corn + FP, 9 f-h/t
T21: 2nd city founded
So that one is not bad, and could continue, but a few things I don't like is the "wasted" food with no granary, as well as several hammers of wasted overflow due to rounding. So let's try out whipping directly at size 2 and compare
2) whip settler at size 2
T9: 0/14, 0/10, farm 1/4
T10: 4/14, 1/10, farm 2/4
T11: 8/14, 2/10, farm 3/4
T12: 12/14, 3/10, farm done at eot, 7fpt, 1hpt
T13: 5/16, 0/67, worker moves NW to GFH, 4/10 in warrior, swap to settlerwork corn + PHF, 7fpt, 4(6) hpt
T14: revolt now? 5/16, 0/67, work
T15: 5/16, 13/67
T16: 5/16, 26/67
T17: 5/16, 39/67, 1-pop whip settler => 5/14, 69/67, work corn to 77/67 or 10h overflow / 1.5 = 6h
T18: 5/16, 6/X, work corn, settler moves W-W-W to grass hill 1N of coal
T19: 2nd city founded
So clearly that approach looks better. Questions at this point would be a) overflow to what (settler / worker / grow), what to build at the 2nd city, and possibly where to even put the 2nd city (maybe there's a better spot?), d) make sure the tech order works out.
So it looks like if I can spare the extra turn to road the FP south of the corn instead of the corn, and then settle on the coal instead of north of the coal, then I can get my cities connected to each other at the time the 2nd city is founded. This is pretty important, as 2cpt in the early game is a big deal.
So let's examine plan 2 to figure out beaker amounts
T0: 0commerce stored
T1: 11c (which would be 13b in BW)
T2: 22c
T8: 88c
T13: 143c, now at size 2 so 12cpt
T14: 155c
wheel is 56b, BW 114, which is 56 + (114/1.2) = 151 total commerce. So, barring rounding errors, seems fairly certain I can have them both done by T14. So since we don't need to revolt till T17, let's tech the Wheel first, or we'll end up with wasted worker turns. Going that way does waste a beaker in overflow as we move Wheel->BW but I'm not sure if it's possible to fix that.
I’ve already sung the praises of settling on the banana, second city going on the coal and third city claiming copper somewhere. Nice choices.
Regarding the specifics of the Guangzhou location, it’s pretty good but I prefer the plains hill SE of ivory. The main reasons are that it’s a plains hill for +1h, and that it claims horse, which otherwise would require settling a second no-food-resource city. Your Guangzhou has the advantage of only needing one road to hook it to your network, as opposed to the plains hill location which needs one road for that and also another road in order to accelerate the settler. Yours also has the advantage of claiming another FP - and you can farm that one instead of the southern capital FP. So maybe that’s worth more something. I’d still rather claim horse, though.
Tech path looks not ideal to start, maybe due to a mechanics misunderstanding. I think you missed that Beijing is already connected to the coal river by virtue of the lake it borders. Therefore you can safely research BW first and not have to spend a turn building half a road. On the other hand you use this road later to accelerate the settler for Guangzhou, and you take advantage of the fact that the worker is on the hill post-chop, so maybe I’m misunderstanding the justification for the way you did it.
I’m pleased that you got some cottages down already. It’s an easy thing to leave out which has no discernible impact on development by t30.
I would want to build a couple warriors. Not only is it good for safety but you’ll want to hook up copper soon and then you can’t build warriors anymore. It’s nice to get a couple for military police.
I think you’re building too many granaries at the end. Granaries are really good but in my experience it works better to be building a mixture of granaries and workers/settlers at any given moment rather than going hard for one or the other. In particular, I don’t think Guangzhou should build a granary right now. It’s a really big investment in this stage of the game and it will only pay off a small amount that’s proportional to how much you grow Guangzhou (and it’s not like you’re going to whip that city). Since I think Guangzhou could stand to build workers and settlers for a while before growing much, I don’t like starting a granary there.
Micro thoughts
I had a hard time playing through this plan accurately as I think it wasn’t translated perfectly from execution into writing, and there are no pictures. Discrepancies seemed to result in my playthrough doing better; e.g. I finished a cottage and got a city growth 1t sooner than noted. I won’t comment on these parts as I think it’s just transcription error, which unfortunately doesn’t leave much to say.
The slavery revolt before settler wasn’t very helpful and I wonder if it could be better arranged revolting afterwards, chopping the settler and whipping the subsequent worker. Honestly, though, I doubt we can do better than what The Black Sword did for this part of the run.
I appreciated your attention to detail regarding slider rate and beaker efficiency.
This scenario seems to have certain rules associated with it. They are:
Tech Path had two points. Pottery before AH was preferable to enable earlier cottages which help significantly with not going broke and being able to research following the immediate end of the scenario. This limited a lot of the optimal expansion sites quite significantly to western and northern cities for the corn. The second point was that rushing to BW was actually counter productive due to the inefficiencies of quick speed chopping; Hunting>Wheel>BW generally outperformed different early paths because getting a road down sped up the founding of the second and third cities.
Two workers before a settler tended to be a bit better by T30 because this allowed roads to go down to speed up the founding of the second and third cities; Seven's run through shows how little chopping is actually needed and that it is the effect of roads that made the start quicker. This ties in with the tech path point: forests are a finite resource, but roads aren't, so if they give similar outcomes it's better to go with the roads and save the chops for later.
No one likes building warriors. The lack of warriors severely limits the options on city sites without risking losing a settler to a wolf like Commodore has in the past, but there are ways to still play out the start as quick as some here without needing to build additional warriors. To give an example:
Settle for the southern plains hill first, and then for the western city (on either the hill, or 9 of the corn).
The turn the first settler is complete (so on T21) the starting warrior is on the copper tile. This gives vision on almost everything that can threaten the plains hill including 2 movers.
T22 the settler moves onto the plains hill thanks to roads. This uncovers any potential 2 mover that can attack the plains hill. If nothing present warrior moves 7 onto grassland. If something is in range, warrior protects settler and change production. eot T22 finish second settler as well. If settler not due to eot T23 this still works.
T23 second settler moves to the tile 99 of the western corn if settling adjacent, or onto grass hill if settling there.This settler is only at risk of a W2 unit attacking form the tiles 11 or 14 if on grass hill otherwise safe (no G2 units available at this stage of the game, so if 99 of the corn it is safe from everything). The warrior moves onto the plains hill tile.
T24 if settling adjacent to the corn you can play the turn at any point, settle the city and the warrior will be in range of protecting the city from everything except a chariot, provided the settler does not uncover a barb adjacent to it. A players units will be bumped back by culture. So long as double moves banned, the city is safe from humans (if warrior v warrior battles considered safe etc due to +25% city defense). The plains hill city is safe as well because it can take the ivory to 2 turn a warrior the turn it is settled so is not at risk to other players unless they somehow managed to have horses at capital, and at that point you might have lost your capital instead.
but modified it to incorporate the banana start, the western corn location, and the need for more workers. I'll walk you through it again:
)
) A first step might be, next time I play, to get a dedlurker who can help me keep track of the big picture - "do improve that tile now - if not, you'll regret it later ... don't raze that city now, you'll regret it later ..." Anyway, hope all that made sense; I'm writing this way too late at night after finally learning who Red John is!
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