(May 9th, 2017, 18:21)RefSteel Wrote: I'd like to produce more warriors than we would with Microplan Candidate 1 partly for that reason (and partly because I don't want half our military force to get eaten by a bear or a lucky lion).
If we could have say a third warrior out by turn 35-40, our military would look a bit better. Is there any room for that in the microplan? I really hope we don`t lose any of those warriors to random animals. That would indeed be a blow.
We definitely need to keep an eye on dtay. If he`s our neighbour, he could possibly decide to settle up on us using those nasty impis to claim more than a fair share of the disputed area. Impis would of course eat through our warriors.
And - let`s delay archery for now. Right now I`m thinking of going pottery after bronze working in order to get those cottages up and running asap. We could consider an early granary in Borte as well (maybe fueled by chops).
Pasture complete! Our demos will look a bit better once Borte grows to size 2 working cows and clams. This turn the scout found.. nothing much really. Still no other players met, but surely it can`t be long now. This map really is big.
(May 10th, 2017, 04:39)JR4 Wrote: This turn the scout found.. nothing much really. Still no other players met, but surely it can`t be long now. This map really is big.
Look again. There's something awwwwwfully familiar about the shape of that river and the terrain around it. One tile north or northwest onto the flat grassland will make contact with a neighbor.
Good catch! When compared to the south of Borte, it does look like familiar terrain. The good news is that our northern neighbour most likely hasn`t scouted our way, so we know that this area is resource rich, while he doesn`t. Imo planting a frontier city here quickly should be a priority.
Guess at the map shape: 42 vertical x 45 horizontal. Start tiles are 14 tiles apart vertically, and are 5 tiles offset from a grid horizontally: We're about to meet one of our "near" neighbors 14N/5E of us, with another to our southwest, 14S/5W of us. We have "distant" neighbors 14N/10W from us across a sea and 14S/10E from us (there's some jungle in that direction but it's otherwise largely unexplored). This would also mean we have neighbors 15E and 15W, both across seas by the direct route at least.
(May 10th, 2017, 04:20)JR4 Wrote: If we could have say a third warrior out by turn 35-40, our military would look a bit better. Is there any room for that in the microplan?
Not without giving something up, obviously. There are options though: One is to just delay the Settler (and all subsequent builds and growths at Borte) by one turn, giving up the road on the cows and two worker turns potentially in support of city 3 but gaining a mine that will be used again eventually:
Candidate Microplan 1A
T34: Worker is complete at Borte; it moves SE-SW to the grassland hill and begins a Mine. Borte builds a Settler, working the Cows, Clams, and Rice. Muqa switches to working the Oasis.
T35: The Worker on the Corn completes its Farm. Muqa switches to working the Corn. The Worker on the hill continues to Mine but then CANCELS orders in case copper's location changes everything when the turn rolls.
T36: Bronze Working is complete, revealing Copper. Muqa is now size 2, and works the Corn and the shared grassland forest. If copper's location doesn't completely change the plan, the Worker on the grassland hill continues the Mine. Borte swaps to building a Warrior. The Worker on the Corn moves to the pigs if not needed more urgently for copper-related reasons. Tech Pottery.
T37: The Worker near Borte completes its Mine. Muqa switches to working Corn + Clams. Borte works Cows + Rice + Mine. If there is a Worker on the Pigs, it begins a Pasture.
T38: The worker near Borte is finally available for copper/city-3-related duties.
T39: Borte is now size 4 and its Warrior is complete. It resumes the Settler, working Cows + Clams + Rice + Mine. Muqa is now size 3; it works Corn + Pigs + Plains Forest Hill.
T40: Warrior is complete at Muqa. Muqa starts a Barracks and switches to working Corn + Pigs + Clams. Borte WHIPS its Settler (4 pop to 2) and works Cow + Rice. If there is a Worker on the Pigs, it completes its Pasture.
T41: Settler is complete at Borte with 11 overflow...
Alternatively, we could preserve the plan for Borte and use the whip at Muqa to turn [EDIT: 27-35] food and hammers (mostly food, with the actual numbers depending on whether city 3 shares any food tiles) into two warriors in that timeframe:
Candidate Microplan 1B
The same as Candidate Microplan 1 through T31; then...
T32: Borte switches to working Cows + Rice + Forest (doesn't matter which forest). Muqa swaps to building a Barracks and works the Clams. Set Research slider to 100%.
T34: Worker is complete at Borte; it moves SW to the Cows and begins a road. Borte builds a Settler, working the Cows, Clams, and Rice. Muqa switches to working the Oasis.
T35: The Workers complete their Farm and Road. Muqa switches to working the Corn.
T36: Muqa is now size 2, and works the Corn and Oasis. Bronze Working is complete, revealing Copper. The Workers respond accordingly (TBD based on Copper location) - if not needed more urgently for copper-related reasons, the Worker from the Corn moves to the Pigs. Tech ... AH or Pottery?
T37: If there is a Worker on the Pigs, it begins a Pasture. REVOLT to Slavery. Muqa resumes its Warrior, WHIPS it (2 pop to 1, in spite of the two hammers that will be lost to the overflow cap) and works the Corn.
T38: Warrior is complete at Muqa; Muqa builds another Warrior.
T39: Warrior is complete at Muqa; Muqa resumes its Barracks. Borte WHIPS its Settler (3 pop to 2) and works Cow + Clams.
T40: Settler is complete at Borte with 11 overflow. Muqa is now size 2. If there is a worker on the Pigs it completes the Pasture and Muqa works Corn+Pigs; otherwise, Muqa works Corn+Clams, in which case Borte works Cow + Rice...
(Still more thoughts later, but I figure I should post what I've got so far....)
Demos appear to confirm that dtay got Mining. Also, Coeur did something weird again: He's not teching BW (anymore). My best guess is that this is a super-defensive play: He planned all along to get Hunting before BW, but knew he wouldn't need it until his Worker was produced. So instead of teching Hunting straightaway, he started with Bronze, intending to complete it ahead of Hunting if he felt a threat was coming. With BW, already at size 2, with 2h in a Warrior, he could revolt to Slavery, whip the Warrior, and overflow to complete another Warrior the next turn. Now, with the demoscreen showing that no one's built a warrior, he knows he won't get rushed by Warriors or Qs, so he gladly switched to Hunting last turn; it'll complete just in time for his Worker to pasture the cows. After that, he'll finish Bronze. (Or he could delay it again for Agriculture while his Worker pastures the cows and mines the hill.)
We four Expansive Civs will all working our cow pastures this turn: Dark Savant while teching BW and I guess building a Warrior, CML (and us) while building a Workboat and probably (certainly in our case) teching Agriculture, Gavagai while most likely building a Warrior and teching either Fishing or Mining. The demoscreen doesn't reflect this yet though, except for Dark Savant: Gav certainly, and CML probably, is in the habit of canceling his worker's orders after every turn in case he sees something that would suggest an emergency change. It's kind of pointless this early, but habit is habit, and neither Gavagai nor CML had played yet at the time of our latest look at the demo screen.
Also, Krill is either sandbagging (like Coeur) or teching something ludicrous like Animal Husbandry or Meditation. All this C&D stuff ("Cloak and Dagger" demo-watching) is going to get a lot harder once we start seeing non-mirrored cities from players other than Krill.
Ventessel and GJ, having not yet played their turns, can be assumed to be doing the same thing as before: Ventessel techning BW and building a Warrior while probably working the Clams, and GermanJoey building a Workboat with the forest hill while teching Agri or Mining (or Pottery...).
Having looked briefly at the two alternative microplans, I find it hard to decide which one is better. Both are giving up something, but we are quite low on military right before turn 40. I`ll have a look at them a bit later.
If you are correct in the assumption that we are 14/5 tiles apart from our nearest neighbours that is very valuable information. Our scout should probably make an eastward turn soon (as there is likely to be a sea straight W) in order to find out who is to our NE.
I think Couerva`s play here is typical for someone who has never played MP before. In any case, bronze working is still a good tech when he finishes it, so I don`t think it`s that bad actually. A little bit of safety against early rushes is worth something as well I guess.
Unfortunately civstats say that the uploader is not currently connected. That means no new turn just yet. I was hoping to find out who our northern neighbour is right now, but that will have to wait.
Indeed - it's only a guess so far, but if true, the nearest neighbor to the scout's current position apart from the one it's about to meet would be somewhere to the southeast.
If we're sold on some version of Candidate Microplan #1 and the city site on that forest, we don't have to make a final decision about the continuation (and I can maybe make a refinement or two or propose some other options) for two or three weeks, and by then we may have more information about our neighbors and what they're doing. I should note that in both cases, the location of copper could affect the plan drastically.
Also, if I'm right and we do make contact next turn, it would be worthwhile to see the player's capital tile by moving the Scout to a spot 2SE or 2SW of the tile (on T15 or T16; we won't be able to get there next turn) as we'll be able to track their city size just by looking at the city (plus any buildings they complete when/if we care about that, by zooming in).
Yeah, the server chose a lame time to go down. I'll be aware of my computer for most of the next 24 hours though, so maybe there'll be some exciting news by the time I get back!
(Also: I've written a couple more stories about our developing empire; I'll post them when I find illustrations I like....)
(May 11th, 2017, 03:55)RefSteel Wrote: If we're sold on some version of Candidate Microplan #1 and the city site on that forest, we don't have to make a final decision about the continuation (and I can maybe make a refinement or two or propose some other options) for two or three weeks, and by then we may have more information about our neighbors and what they're doing. I should note that in both cases, the location of copper could affect the plan drastically.
Also, if I'm right and we do make contact next turn, it would be worthwhile to see the player's capital tile by moving the Scout to a spot 2SE or 2SW of the tile.
Yeah, the server chose a lame time to go down. I'll be aware of my computer for most of the next 24 hours though, so maybe there'll be some exciting news by the time I get back!
Still no news on when the server is coming back online. Oh well, just one of those days.. I hope the turn will roll in about 12 hours at least.
The scout will take a peek at that capital shortly. It`s nice to have a small information advantage over that civ anyway.
I am confident that Microplan 1 will get us into a strong position. As long as nothing unforeseen happens that is. Being a rather greedy civ player I would seriously consider sticking with just two warriors to turn 40 in order to get the snowball rolling asap. It`s risky, but some risks have to be taken in order to win, right? If we decide to play a little bit more safe, I still find it really hard to decide which one of 1A and 1B I like the most. Let`s just postpone that decision for a dozen turns or so. If we are really, really lucky copper will be revealed in the first ring of Muqa. That would save us a lot of worker turns.
Looks like we may need to wait for a reload as well, since no one had a chance to pause for Ventessel when the server finally came back up.
One of the things I like about getting warriors out early is that you can't get them out later: Even if we're not threatened by barbs or other players early on, having a few extra early warriors means no need to burn ~twice as many hammers on back-lines MP units. Also, if we don't have warriors out fogbusting and boosting our Soldier Count, we're more likely to be harassed by barbs or other players early on. That said, there's something that worries me more about Microplan 1: What if the only accessible Copper is in Muqa's second ring, or an even further back-lines location?
I started thinking ... is there any way to get first-ring corn in our second city, and both copper and at least one forward city between the first three? And it struck me ... dare we risk planting Muqa where you originally wanted our third city to be? On that coastal riverside plains forest in the northeast with river corn, grassland silver, and grassland sheep all first ring? And then we could found city 3 for copper if necessary.... It probably depends on who's up in the north there, but I did come up with a plan that still gets e.g. the worker T34, Bronze Working T36, etc. Maybe it's too risky; that northern neighbor wouldn't be amused when they spot the city (unless it's Krill and he's already moved way off in the opposite direction, obviously) but I thought I'd put the idea out there, just in case....
