[SPOILERS] William discovers a source of horse. FDR of Mongolia

[WilliamLP]

This space has been reserved to respectfully tell *cheaters* to kindly get out.

In case someone needs it, the password is:

horsies

[WilliamLP]

So my first roll was Sitting Bull (Protective, Philosophical) of Byzantium (Myst, Fishing, Cataphracts).

I was a little torn because the leader is one I'd like to try in RBMod. Protective is good! I'd get the good part of Expansive (cheap granaries) and for a game like this, the CG1 promotion on archers would be a major reason to keep a peaceful border with me. After PB13, I'd really like to play a game where I can settle a couple of cities without needing an army to fight in multiple simultaneous hot wars at the same time!

Philosophical is now buffed to +150% GPP. So two scientists would generate a GP in 7 turns instead of 17. This could be a pretty nice mid-game trait to go with the early game bonus of the granaries.

The dream would be landing an early religion! This, because it's guaranteed to be adopted and spread by multiple other players, and Phi also gives a fantastic tool to generate the shrine itself which can be painful otherwise. (15 turns with a temple and a priest, as opposed to 34.)

It may even be possible to spain-on-a-lake it, going religion first and hoping the first worker can have enough techs to keep busy. Such a move is normally pretty poor but in a game like this who knows.

At the end of the day though, without seeing the start, Fishing and Myst is an absolutely horrible pair of starting techs. Not only are they the two cheapest possible to start with, they could be essentially dead techs for a very large number of starts, in fact even worse than the BtS Wheel and Myst combo.

Also factoring in is that in my only 2 PB games, I've had the world's most dominant religion, and it would be fun to try something else.

So this is a re-roll.

[WilliamLP]

Goals for this game:

The one thing I really want to improve on is micro planning, and in particular planning out worker moves more than one turn in advance, trying to get closer to the ideal of having new cities grow as fast as possible. E.g. a new city (if possible) should be able to work an improved food tile the turn it is planted down, or second best is having a couple of workers that can start the improvement on that turn. And also (if possible) a granary should finish in time to get its full bonus while the city is still size 1. These things probably require both more workers than I'm used to building, and also a lot more planning to make sure they're moving to the correct places at the correct times.

I have a city simulation tool in progress to help myself with this. It's along the lines of Furungy's C++ tool, but it's written in JavaScript and HTML. Maybe I'll share it with the public at some point.

I'm going to oversimplify and say there are two schools of thought for Civ openings. There's what I'll call the Seven / Krill style - basically expand horizontally to the very teetering edge of stagnation, keeping an army of horse archers to make sure that nobody can challenge you on this. This leads to the next phase which is consolidating that land lead and coming out (eventually) on top. The other style I'll call the Mackoti style, which is to slow down a bit on early expansion, but dominate in tech, and use that advantage to conquer a weaker neighbor or two.

The way I want to try and play is more like the first way, fast expansion. And I'd love to play a peaceful game as much as possible. Hopefully I showed enough in PB13 to prove that there are easier targets around if you want to pick on a nooby neighbor early on.

[Ceiliazul]

Goals for this game:

The one thing I really want to improve on is micro planning, and in particular planning out worker moves more than one turn in advance, trying to get closer to the ideal of having new cities grow as fast as possible.
...
There's what I'll call the Seven / Krill style - basically expand horizontally to the very teetering edge of stagnation, keeping an army of horse archers to make sure that nobody can challenge you on this. This leads to the next phase which is consolidating that land lead and coming out (eventually) on top. The other style I'll call the Mackoti style, which is to slow down a bit on early expansion, but dominate in tech, and use that advantage to conquer a weaker neighbor or two.
...
Hopefully I showed enough in PB13 to prove that there are easier targets around if you want to pick on a nooby neighbor early on.

In reverse order:

You definitely proved your thorniness to this lurker. the field is a bit watered down, probably more likely an attacker would choose you out of ignorance instead of knowledge.

I havent seen that spelled out so clearly, i like that analysis. Plako is an interesting mix of the two, probably more flexible to the game situation than the others mentioned.

TBH, while micro always helps give more options, your limiting factor in PB13 has been misunderstanding the macro. I've seen your explanation of macro factors get better as that game has developed, but that's still a fruitful field for you.

[WilliamLP]

TBH, while micro always helps give more options, your limiting factor in PB13 has been misunderstanding the macro. I've seen your explanation of macro factors get better as that game has developed, but that's still a fruitful field for you.

Certainly getting more small advantages through micro has to help all macro decisions and make more of them viable, or that's how it works in every other strategy game.

The problem with your advice is that surely this game will be well underway before the PB13 lurker thread and other threads open up! So if there's any clue there what my big unknown unknowns are I won't be able to see it. It's relatively much easier to quantify micro, at least.

There's also game-macro, how well large decisions fit the specifics of the game engine, the map, the civ, traits, and so on. And also people-macro, reading and anticipating how others will behave and react and changing accordingly. I don't claim to be good at either.

[Ceiliazul]

It's relatively much easier to quantify micro, at least.

haha, true story! Good luck, keep up the good reports... no sign of Mindy this time?

[WilliamLP]

I gave Mindy the invitation to join here, but I'm also very pre-disposed to wanting peace in this game as long as is realistic! So there may be ded-lurking gigs elsewhere more amenable to warrior chokes, pillaging, and hitting things with ancient sharp implements?

[Ceiliazul]

so permanent multiple war isnt the plan for this one?

[WilliamLP]

Second roll is FDR (Organized, Industrious) of Mongol (Wheel, Hunting, Keshik, Ger).

The civ is fine. Hunting is close to Agriculture in RBMod. Keshik's are a scary unit, and +2 xp for mounted units out of stables is good too. (Though, in practice, the difference between +5 and +7 probably isn't going to work out to be amazing.)

ORG is a great late game trait. It also starts to shine when you get CoL and start getting courthouses before most others, and the lighthouse is a nice perk.

The big problem is IND. Yes, metal casting is cheaper now but the bottom line is the entire effect amounts to saving a flat cost of 60 base hammers per city from the forge. And this appears fairly late in the game, when those 60 hammers aren't such a big deal. The value of the trait is, of course, the wonders themselves. But I see them as fools errands in a 33 player game.

So sadly, this is a reroll too, this time from sub-par traits instead of starting techs.

[mackoti]

Second roll is FDR (Organized, Industrious) of Mongol (Wheel, Hunting, Keshik, Ger).

The civ is fine. Hunting is close to Agriculture in RBMod. Keshik's are a scary unit, and +2 xp for mounted units out of stables is good too. (Though, in practice, the difference between +5 and +7 probably isn't going to work out to be amazing.)

ORG is a great late game trait. It also starts to shine when you get CoL and start getting courthouses before most others, and the lighthouse is a nice perk.

The big problem is IND. Yes, metal casting is cheaper now but the bottom line is the entire effect amounts to saving a flat cost of 60 base hammers per city from the forge. And this appears fairly late in the game, when those 60 hammers aren't such a big deal. The value of the trait is, of course, the wonders themselves. But I see them as fools errands in a 33 player game.

So sadly, this is a reroll too, this time from sub-par traits instead of starting techs.

When i seen you got roosvel i wnatd to dedlurk you,as is one my favourite leaders.I think you vastly underestimate INd:
Cheap fats forgerge(MC cheaper)
-modifiers get just 50% now if i understnd corect.
-you dont build just great wonders, you build NW as well(national epic, heroic epic,OU,Maoi)
- from experince wonders dont get builded that fast eve game is large and with modifiers getting just 50% people will build less.
So with ind and a forge you have 75% multiplier right there.

About ORg i know is vastly underestimate at rb, and the trait is stronger then almost every single others you just need to play a litle diferent.Many cheap buildings counts , becasue a great civ is builded by small saves verywere were is posible.