[Spoilers] Noble Intentions: Thessalonica of the Elohim starts her quest!

[Northstar1989]

OK, so I now have Code of Laws:



And the world (I assume these events apply to everyone) got a Burn Wings astrological event- which has the effect of randomly turning some Grasslands into Plains tiles for a limited period of time. It didn't affect anywhere important withing my borders, but maybe it could slow down the growth of my opponents?



I decided to start on a Thane of Kilmorph next at my capital... He will help to protect my Worker(s) as I improve current tiles and build a 2nd Worker soon (by the way, did I mention my Workers are reduced-price with Industrious? This is actually one way the starting setup worked to my disadvantage, since my rivals would have had to pay more than me for their free Workers- so it accelerated their starts much more than mine, especially that of the Dwarves with their faster Workers...)

I also decided to move a citizen from working a Forest Plains to a lake tile- in order to help boost Commerce production as I'm going to switch off the Incense next turn, for a couple turns, in order to get a 2-turn rather than 3-turn growth of my capital to size 7.



After that I'm going to start on another Settler- so that extra population point is really going to pay its dividends the entire time my growth is halted for that Settler... I will also need to tone down the Science/Gold slider soon after I found my next city or two- so this will help pick up the slack that is going to cause in reaching Orders From Heaven (my next goal after Philosophy- once again mainly for the free Disciple unit) and then proceeding to other useful techs (Empyrean, Military Strategy, etc.)


By the way, the Orc Warrior continues to chase my Scout. I intend to lead him at least a little further on this goose-chase before giving him the fight he so clearly desires (while defending a Forest Hills tile, of course) such that I get a little more terrain-knowledge out of this bargain in case he manages to win the fight (my Thane of Kilmorph will track him down and kill him before he can heal if that happens...)



I also discovered that this map is setup with narrow choke-points guarded by Lizardmen held on Ruins before. This seams to be the general pattern, and I doubt there is any way around it to my rivals without fighting them... Once again, this is a feature of the start that works to my disadvantage- it makes my World Spell of Sanctuary a lot less useful (normally it helps to avert early rushes, but those are apparently a non-issue on this map).

If not for my extremely fortuitous early Mushrooms event and later Desert Scrolls discovery, I would actually have a lot of reason to complain that this start placed me at some kind of unfair disadvantage- especially considering that the Elohim are already currently considered a weak faction and Q has announced intent to buff them through improvement of Reliquaries (he discussed having it additionally give a free March promotion) in the next update to Erebus in the Balance...

But the fact is I *DID* get extremely lucky, TWICE- and so unless my opponents got even luckier with random events (which I have no way of knowing about until the end, and find somewhat unlikely) what do I have to complain about really?


Also, here is a screencap of my coastal city. Notice that I moved my city dot-map around a bit, as can be seen in both this and the previous screenshot. New knowledge by my Scout and Thane of Kilmorph has convinced me that founding my city near the Pigs on the ocean coast is a good idea (thanks to the Clams resource that would place immediately adjacent to the city). It would also help with long-term growth potential (with a Lighthouse, Harbor, etc. being enabled) as well...




Finally, the Demographics. My opponents control an alarming amount of land, population, and food production- but at least I know their growth will be capped in the log run by the Ruins choke-points, whereas I can keep happily growing for a bit longer thanks to my current smaller size...



I also am doing things now that will improve my long-term growth potential, such as nabbing holy cities (although Shrines are, honestly, rarely a good idea in competitive multiplayer as I understand it- and just make you more of a target for your opponents, who will always know when you built one...) and gaining enough of a tech-lead to also hopefully grab me a few more things like the Military Strategy Great Commander (MS requires Philosophy- so I can count on the magically-minded Amurites who are my main tech-competitor probably not going for it, or the more metal-minded Dwarves... The Clan is actually my most-likely competitor for it, but they should hopefully be starting to feel the pain of their Barbarian trait by now...) which will hopefully all pay off in the long run...


By the way, a couple rankings calculated from the Demographics...

Rival GNP's (in order)

45 (probably the Amurites), 44 (me), 40 (probably the Dwarves), 39 (probably the Clan)

Rival Food Harvests (in order)

83 (probably the Clan), 65 (probably the Dwarves), 33 (me), 27 (probably the Amurites)


Kind of scary that both the Clan and Dwarves (the obvious front-runners in food-production) harvest more food than both my empire and that of the Amurites PUT TOGETHER... Still no idea how the Dwarves could have managed to do that so quickly given this map (the Clan has an obvious answer- their Warrens with lots of Settler and Worker spam), although at least it makes a LITTLE sense as the free starting-Worker which would have given the Dwarves the largest head-start of all... (as their Workers build faster and can move further over Hills than anyone else', and cost much more to build per/Worker than mine or those of the Clan)


Regards,
Northstar

[Mardoc]

I decided to start on a Thane of Kilmorph next at my capital... He will help to protect my Worker(s) as I improve current tiles and build a 2nd Worker soon (by the way, did I mention my Workers are reduced-price with Industrious? This is actually one way the starting setup worked to my disadvantage, since my rivals would have had to pay more than me for their free Workers- so it accelerated their starts much more than mine, especially that of the Dwarves with their faster Workers...)

Wait...you have one worker for three cities? I build one worker/city, more if I'm in expansion mode, and it still seems like barely enough.

[Northstar1989]

Wait...you have one worker for three cities? I build one worker/city, more if I'm in expansion mode, and it still seems like barely enough.

Well that's good to know considering you're currently one of my opponents in the tournament.

Seriously, though, you shouldn't have told me that...


Anyways, I've not built any additional Workers because with my pattern of growth I haven't NEEDED more than 1 with my current pattern of growth. That's about to change soon though- actually I'm now considering swapping the Settler queued right after the Thane of Kilmorph for a 2nd Worker, and *THEN* building a Settler...


Regards,
Northstar

[Northstar1989]

I feel this is a rather appropriate video clip considering my new strategy:



From Sid Meier's Alpah Centauri: probably the best Civilization game EVER! (except for Civ 4, as it allows Fall From Heaven )


Anyways... First step in my strategy is to build up my coastal city a bit more...



While that's going on, my 2nd city continues to defend itself against the Orcs...



Quite successfully so far...




My Scouts continue to explore, and lead that Orc Warrior on a goose-chase...



My 4th city will soon be planted...



My Worker will soon connect up my capital to Incense and get a trade-route going between it and my coastal city:



That road will also prove extremely useful for defense if I should build my 5th city west of the Marble- with a single additional tile of Road my Zealot can defend the city from barbarian attacks as well as my 3rd city until I can churn out another Warrior to defend it at my capital...


And my rivals continue to vie for power and rank as always...




Now, what exactly is this brilliant plan of mine?


Well, it involves naval power if the video didn't clue you in...


You see, I've been thinking about the terrain of this map. And the presence of Forest Hill choke-points guarded by Lizardmen makes land-warfare extremely unappealing...

Naval power, on the other hand, is just as good as ever... Even the mere *threat* of a naval invasion will constantly keep my opponents on their toes...


So, while Dwarves dig and the Amurites study the arcane, the Elohim will sail the seas!


Early on, this will take more of a naval-raids approach: I intend to also prioritize Ride of the Nine Kings and mounted units, so I can unleash mounted raiders (Horsemen with Commando and lots of Flanking improvements) on my rival's coastlines...

Later, I can switch to an approach of true naval superiority- large ships I can use to bombard coastal cities and legions of Cultists and Drown to terrorize unprepared islands...


Of course, this is all theoretical- I'm really just speculating what will happen here. "No plan survives contact with the enemy." What *IS* for sure is that I at least want the economic benefits of the naval Wonders- the Heron Throne (which I can niftily scoop up with my Industrious trait- especially if I make my 5th city west of the Marble, as Heron Throne builds at double-speed with Marble...) and Great Lighthouse.

The Great Lighthouse might have to wait a good bit longer though- although Sailing is only a single tech off my path of claiming as many religions as possible, and I doubt any of my rivals would be silly enough to waste the hammers on it without having the Industrious trait (even WITH the trait, it is still quite expensive), I will really want to wait until I can churn out some Soldiers of Kilmorph with a Heroic Epic, a Forge, Temple of the Order, and God King (and a Command Post from the Military Strategy Great Commander, if I can manage it) in my capitol to hurry the construction before I will even want to *consider* building such an expensive wonder... OK, maybe that's overdoing it a little- but I think you get the point, I probably won't be building it tomorrow...


Going this heavy on buildings and wonders would be suicidal in any "normal" multiplayer game- but I *am* playing as the Elohim, and this map *does* have natural barriers against rushes, so it should actually be possible to pull off a few key wonders without endangering my survival if I'm aggressive enough with my micro-management and expansion...


Regards,
Northstar

[Mardoc]

Well that's good to know considering you're currently one of my opponents in the tournament.

Seriously, though, you shouldn't have told me that...

C'est la vie. Losing in the tournament is not the worst thing.

[Ellimist]

Building on Mardoc's point, the issue is that working unimproved tiles is bad. If your cities are working unimproved tiles, you probably don't have enough workers.

[Northstar1989]

Building on Mardoc's point, the issue is that working unimproved tiles is bad. If your cities are working unimproved tiles, you probably don't have enough workers.

Depends on what your improvement options are. My capital is working lake tiles- which are unimprovable but decent sources of early commerce and food, for instance (there would be no way to get the same combination of commerce and food from land tiles w/o waiting for a cottage to mature). My coastal and second city are both working a combination of water and Forest Plains tiles- where a Worker can't improve (a Work Boat is needed for water tiles) and a Lumbermill is a fairly marginal improvement (without a river it's only +1 hammer- hardly worth the opportunity cost of not having a city grow while I complete another Worker...)

Like I said, a second Worker will be coming relatively soon. Since I would have had a several-turn head start on the other players in completing my first Worker (and thus getting my capital back to growing) with a normal start, though, having a starting Worker really was a significant disadvantage to my empire... (as I am the only Industrious leader)


Regards,
Northstar

[Northstar1989]

OK, so the next turn went without incident...



You'll notice my capital has now out-grown its happy-cap. Next turn I'll be switching to Runes of Kilmorph, and using the Thane of Kilmorph to spread RoK to my coastal city... (the alternative was to make Octopus Overlords my state religion and miss out on the free gold from RoK, as well as using my Zealot to spread OO to my capital, leaving the Thane of Kilmorph as the new garrison- not going to happen...)


The Orc Warrior also hasn't attacked yet...




My capital has started work on another Settler. I'm still indecisive about whether to settle him west of the Marble (providing an immediate new trade route, reason to exploit the Marble earlier, and eventually a free religion-spread) or southwest of the Corn. The location southwest of the Corn would also require me to re-purpose my exploring Thane of Kilmorph to garrison-duty, whereas my Zealot could do double-duty defending the city near the Marble until I could get another Warrior out at my capital...




Also, a glance at the city-board:



And Demographics:




Finally, last but not least, my second city is almost done with its Reliquary. In the short run it will just produce some free Great Person points before I need to start work on a Pagan Temple to raise the happy-cap (without a religion there or easy access to my trade-network, building a Pagan Temple is the only thing I can do to raise my happy-cap there). In the longer run it will provide Spirit Guide promotions to military units I train there, and provide cultural bonuses to defense and my borders...



I don't actually NEED the border-pop there, as I can productively employ 5 citizens (which is the happy-cap) without a second-ring of tiles. However my next priority after the Pagan Temple will probably be a Warrior (who will benefit from the Reliquary' free Spirit Guide promotion) or two and then a Worker- and having access to the additional lake-tiles will allow the city to reach size 5 much sooner...


Regards,
Northstar

[Northstar1989]

My turn started off with a surprise:



I turned them down of course- no sense in giving the Clan free access to my borders when I have nothing to gain in return... (we have no trade connection, and Lizardmen block my reaching their empire)

Apparently the Clan has come in contact with my civilization. I had a pretty good idea how, but first...



Awesome, a trade route! Let's see the big picture:



As you can see, I've already got an unhappy citizen in my capital. Better do something about that... (I promptly revolted to Runes of Kilmorph)

Also, time to see how the Clan came in contact with my civ...



So, after all the hard work I went through leading off that Orc Warrior, the Clan fired off their World Spell and converted it to their side! Now I kind of wish I had just left my Scout in place and let the Orc attack it earlier...


On the bright side, the Clan seem to have over-expanded their power base a bit this way...



Not shown here: the sudden drop in their GNP from unit-maintenance costs!


I'm not particularly intimidated by a single Clan Warrior, so I decided to go ahead and send my Thane of Kilmorph to spread his religion to my coastal city...



Then I ended my turn, and was presented with another Lizardman!



Well, my growth is coming along nicely anyways. The Work Boat was completed at my coastal city, and will soon be busy fishing the nearby Crab for food and a health bonus...



Next in line there- Heron Throne. With the new state religion happy-bonus and soon an additional one from a Temple of the Overlords, I'll have a long period of growth where I won't need any additional facilities- perfect for working on a Wonder. I'll also get a Marble Quarry up before it's done, so it shouldn't take *quite* as many turns (15) as shown on the city queue...


Also, it appears 2 of the top 5 cities belong to the Clan. So at least that solves the mystery of who was growing so quickly earlier...



Last but not least, the Demographics:



It appears I'm #2 in land area (the Clan is probably #1), as well as Approval and Life Expectancy. And I've finally caught up in hammers. So it appears I might be actually the fastest-expanding empire after the Clan- which bodes well for my empire in the long run... (especially with 2 new cities on the way!)


Regards,
Northstar

[Mardoc]

Depends on what your improvement options are. My capital is working lake tiles- which are unimprovable but decent sources of early commerce and food, for instance (there would be no way to get the same combination of commerce and food from land tiles w/o waiting for a cottage to mature). My coastal and second city are both working a combination of water and Forest Plains tiles- where a Worker can't improve (a Work Boat is needed for water tiles) and a Lumbermill is a fairly marginal improvement (without a river it's only +1 hammer- hardly worth the opportunity cost of not having a city grow while I complete another Worker...)

If you don't want advice, stop asking for it.