Gaspar, Lewwyn, et al go full Sartre

[spacetyrantxenu]

Your start:

[NobleHelium]

That's probably the best capital since 24.

[Gaspar]

That's probably the best capital since 24.

Yep.

Quick initial thoughts:

• That capital is fantastic.
  
• No really, I mean gimme.
  
• All that food means maybe I should rethink Imperialistic. You tend to build your biggest chunk of settlers in the cap and that cap can build them pretty reasonably with foodhammers. You can't go BW first to get a super quick second city in play because you've either got to have Agriculture or research it first and the only Civ that does that and can go BW first in that scenario is China, which is banned. Its great for expansive, though.
  
• Zulu's works nicely for the start with techs for two of the three food resources and double discount on AH for the 3rd resource. Only downside is either BW or Pottery ends up waiting a while, but that can't be helped with an AH resource.
  
• There's a few dead tiles but really there's nothing at all to complain about here.
  

I'll need to give a rethink to the leader situation but gun to my head I think I want Zara of Ottomans or Kublai/Shaka of Zulu as first pick.

[Gaspar]

FWIW, $10 paypal for anyone who builds my lazy ass a sandbox.

[Krill]

I gave you the tech costs you can do the rest in your head.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

By the way, I guarantee that Gaspar's actual game reporting will be much better this game. What normally happens is that I make him talk about every minor detail until he can't talk any more, so he generally doesn't have the energy or inclination to write about everything we've just argued in detail about. So the details of what we're actually doing every turn are generally not reported. Not so in this game.

This sounds like me talking to my wife. I'd be a more willing participant in communication with her if she didn't talk all of the time.

FWIW, $10 paypal for anyone who builds my lazy ass a sandbox.

Lazy bastard. What are the map settings?

[Gaspar]

This sounds like me talking to my wife. I'd be a more willing participant in communication with her if she didn't talk all of the time.

Lazy bastard. What are the map settings?

Standard/Monarch.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

I skimmed through the tech thread and didn't see specific map dimensions. If you're going to build a sandbox, you should build it properly on the first go. X&Y dimensions will matter for calculating things precisely (maintenance or whatever) later on.

I asked Xenu if he had specified the exact dimensions publicly yet and he has not. I'm guessing he is using torusland to make the map and that's the easiest way to set specific X&Y dimensions. If he's not, I'll just have to wring out of him which script he used for the specified settings and then tell everyone.

Or, he could just tell us.

[Gaspar]

Alright, going to spitball a bit here before we get to serious simming...

I think I'm nearly dead certain that I want to play a Creative leader or an Organized leader here. So let's narrow seriously down to the only options to consider as Zara, Cathy, Kublai, Julius Caesar. So in terms of the early game sim the only real variety is going to be Cre or No Cre and Imp or No Imp. Cre factors because we can get the 3/1 Deer tile in play faster. Imp factors because we then have to decide if its worth trying to get out a super fast settler.

In terms of start techs, if you're not rushing a settler, you want Agriculture, Hunting, Animal Husbandry as your first three techs, then debate as to whether you go Mining -> BW or Wheel -> Pottery. If not Imp, Wheel -> Pottery is probably the stronger play because getting a Granary in play will be pretty important. In the non-Imp scenario, Ag/Hunting is probably strictly the fastest start, since although Hunting is cheap to research, this allows you to go AH first with double arrow which means you can get all three food resources improved after your first tech, allowing maximum flexibility. Also, non-trivial, lets you plant a second city for Horses (which are usually not an "at capital" resource) and then maybe ruin someone else's day with two quick chariots. The only Ag/Hunting Civs are Zulu and Persia and Persia is garbage, so this is probably the Kublai of Zulu play.

If not Ag/Hunting, then your next choice is Ag/Wheel which is Ottomans or Babylon, so Ottomans. (Bowmen have some value, but much less in our MP maps where Copper is almost always at the capital and if it isn't, its 2nd city material.) Ottomans are nothing special either, but that's neither here nor there. If you go Ag/Wheel you tech Hunting first, then follow with AH. You can get AH done before you need to improve the Cows, so this choice isn't strictly worse. There is in fact little difference between the two, really.

The settler rush Imp scenario sort of requires Mining/Hunting. All the Mining/Hunting civs are terrible - Khmer has a banned UU, Ethiopia has the terrible Stele and pretty terrible Oromos, Germany essentially has null for UU/UB, Russia has the decent Cossack if you don't mind waiting until t150-175 to get anything interesting out of your Civ. I'd probably take Russia or Ethiopia here. Anyway, in that scenario you tech BW > Agri > AH and improve Deer, chop forest + whip settler at size 2. This scenario has a lot more value when land is scarce, which I believe to not be the case. I believe we're working off a modified Lakes map with ~200 tiles per player.

So before we get to serious simming, my current feeling is Zara of Ottomans == Kublai of Zulu >> Cathy of Russia > JC of Ottomans. I have a hard time reconciling between the first two options. Primarily because I think playing Kublai could be fun but also because I think Zulu is pretty clearly one of the two best unbanned Civs (Mali is the other.) Zara is a strictly stronger leader, though, and Ag/Wheel is still the best longer-short term play, as it always is. Also, there's something to be said to just play Cathy of Russia because screw you, I took Cathy of Russia.

Thoughts?

[Ichabod]

I'd pick Wang Kon and settle on the wines for a 3 commerce city center. You don't even need to waste a turn to do it and it's coastal.

By the way, isn't this Capital similar to Gavagai's in PB16? Hopefully Xenu trolled you by giving you your opponent's better Capital from last game while making your opponents in this game get way better 5 food Capitals with early commerce resources.