[SPOILERS] Mardoc's Magical Mystery Tour

[Mardoc]

Oh, it wasn't intended as a criticism. More as a self-reminder about assume = ass u me .

[Qgqqqqq]

He did not threaten my worker, in fact his scout disappeared entirely. So we continued to develop, second civ to size 2 (after the Lanun). Probably we're just a turn ahead, since Industrious saved us a turn on our worker, but I'll take anything I can get. I'm not quite sure why Jalepeno is growing instead of worker-first; he can't be growing on a workboat. Maybe he decided that a workboat ASAP was more important than half a worker, and swapped as soon as he finished up Fishing?

Isn't that the normal approach on the forums? Especially considering he may have moved from useful areas, and that the Worker would only be able to road for a while.

[Qgqqqqq]

An unfortunate thing to note is that I accidentally held the turn for two hours just now, forgetting to check my RB e-mail account.

Also, you know you're in a good game where two hours is considered a regrettable delay. I'm getting PB15 flashbacks, here.

[Mardoc]

Isn't that the normal approach on the forums? Especially considering he may have moved from useful areas, and that the Worker would only be able to road for a while.

Mmm, true, if he went Fishing first then he didn't have much use for an inital worker.

Anyway, next turn (of course ).

DaveV is the only one to join us at size 2 . I can't think of any excuse for Aurorarcher or Molach - maybe perhaps they went for non-Agriculture tech, but if they did that, why bother with worker first?

The polar bear is back, again we had the option of a 5.1 equiv vs 5.0 fight, so I stayed put.




I think I would do it again. Should have had ~55-60% odds, which would have gotten me a promotion, even on defense. And it would have cleared out an animal, leaving more room for warriors to spawn later. Ah well. Maybe the bear will harass someone else, or maybe we'll kill it with Divided Souls later.

[Mardoc]

Nothing particularly exciting yet. The scout saw a polar bear, but doesn't have enough bonuses to try fighting it. Other than that, we just keep growing. I'm debating at what point to stick the next worker in the queue - and the next settler too. We just hit size 3 and are three turns from having an improved tile to work, so I'm thinking nowish might make sense at least for the 2nd worker.

Of course, the downside is we still don't have an escort, and we don't have that many tiles that can be improved at the second city location. Maybe growing onto our plains forests while we keep teching and warrior-building is a better plan.

[Mardoc]

After mulling on it some more, we need at least a couple warriors before we expand. So I'll swap from the unimproved floodplains to an unimproved forest. We'll still grow pretty quick, so I'll keep sticking our workers on the forests. That should give us warriors faster, hopefully fast enough that we can still swap to worker/settler production once we hit max size.

[Mardoc]

Hmm. Anyone remember the various formulae for barb spawning? Here's what I remember:

• Lairs can spawn from T0 - but irrelevent here without lairs
  
• Animals can spawn from T5.
  
• Barbs do not spawn within two tiles of an existing anything. That includes culturally controlled tiles and other barbs. I want to go kill animals for this reason.
  
• Something about when average # of cities is 1.5 or higher - but I don't remember whether that's 'barb cities can spawn' or 'barbs will spawn' or 'barbs will enter borders'
  
• Barbs can only give you XP up to 10 - or is this BtS only?
  

I'm trying to decide when to despair about my civ choice, basically .

[Bobchillingworth]

Barbs give up to 100 exp in FFH.


The first really big waves seem to start once everyone has their first expansions down. The reason we saw so many so early in the no settlers game was because we started with two settlers.

[Mardoc]

Barbs give up to 100 exp in FFH.

Thank goodness!

In retrospect, I shouldn't have doubted, I'm pretty sure I would have discovered that in the no settlers game. I don't think *all* my XP came from Serdoa. Not even all my Wanables. Of course, I don't recall actually getting much usable XP from you, you were too good at laying traps .

The first really big waves seem to start once everyone has their first expansions down. The reason we saw so many so early in the no settlers game was because we started with two settlers.

I remember that was a big breakpoint, just wasn't sure if it was # of barbs or barb cities. Maybe it's both. In any event, I shouldn't be shy to settle my cities - make sure I'm not the cause of any delay of barb. Just so long as I ensure I have units produced who might actually benefit, of course.

Did have a turn, and I managed to pass it within about 2 minutes, so there's the vaguest chance of it going around again tonight. Not hugely likely, it is a weeknight, but there's a chance.

Sadly, I put my scout in the way of another bear, on the second move, so turns will be boring for a while.

Here's what all he found before dying - not that it will matter much to us since it's on the far side of Aurorarcher:



We're going to be focused at home for a good long while, though. Swapped to the forested hill as I mentioned. Worker will finish this farm, then should be able to plantation the dyes just as Calendar comes in...then will be pretty much done until we get more tech or more cities. So I guess there's no point in a second worker just now



Speaking of cities...I'm going in circles as to what to found, in which order.

One option is the south. I'm debating a little as to which spot makes the most sense, but realistically we probably want C2. Plains hill, first ring resources. It makes the furs harder to claim, but I think it's worth it to make the city itself stand up faster.

That said, other than the plains hill and the two resources, there's not much to recommend this site. The gold isn't even worthwhile until we make it to Mining - currently four techs away! Really strong once we have it, but the city itself would be really sad with just a plains wheat farm.


We could alternately head north...um, somewhere. I don't see any great spots with just farms, either - maybe perhaps the hill 1SE of sheep? Has some grass farms, at least, and could steal the dyes. Enough to maybe get out an Elder council and work a Sage for some decent empire-output? Build some workers and/or settlers with food, as well. Gets better once we have AH and Edu, but surprisingly decent as it stands. Biggest lack is hammers - even a Phi elder council will be painful to erect.


Or we could head east. Pretty much have the choice of c3 for no additional tech, but stranding the clams, or c4 for a much better long-term city and strongly encouraged revision to our tech plans: really want AH and Fishing for this city, on top of Mining .



All things considered, I lean toward going north first. It's the least impressive city long term, but the best with limited tech. Even with the Inspiration and the soon-to-have Dyes plantation, I don't think we'll have the tech to do justice to the other city options in the timeframe we're likely to have our settler. After that...well, it depends on how much 'after' we're talking about. I'm not yet sure how long things will take. I actually lean toward east first, honestly. I think food + hammers will be more valuable than the gold tile, at that point. There's also something to be said for pushing the barbs back to flatland where we can afford to attack out.

[Qgqqqqq]

I don't think I'd get a second worker before settler. We only have 3 tiles at the Cap we can improve with the techs we'll have, and they'll be nearly done by the time he could come out.

Looks like you decided that on your own, though.

I remember that was a big breakpoint, just wasn't sure if it was # of barbs or barb cities.

Barb cities actually reduce number of barbs that can spawn (by 20, iirc), and take ages to build kill teams, so aren't very reliable there.


I agree with c2 over c1, largely because of defensibility and the ph. Harder to reinforce the cap from there, but that shouldn't matter much.

Probably not north. Best way is taking the capitals corn, and there's nothing good up that way pre-fishing. The corn is too far away too, IMO, ot be used.

Yeah, no to east as well, especially as the rough terrain will take a few turns off settling time.

[reaches end]

Uhh, okay, we were on different trains of thought

Let's compare to c2, then. It takes 4 grass farms, two that can be preimproved, with border pop, as well as the dye that can be shared. So faster development. Connected instantly, without roads, where c2 needs three road tiles. If northern site gets those three roads it can found instantly, or in 1 turn with a single road, c2 can found in 2 turns with three roads. C2 gets wheat, but still inferior growth. More hammers compared to north. Decent commerce with unimproved gold tile so probably gets a slight mid-term commerce advantage, even with extra tile distance.

...dammit man, my 5 second impressions are supposed to be superior to your considered dotmapping

Okay, definitely north. I think you can probably get away with delaying Exploration if you want it, too, though not sure if it would be worth it.