I logged in to put the spearman in the build queue after the work boat. Every little bit helps! Especially if dtay were to attack us. It will feel a lot better once that axe is ready.
I agree that the axe we are currently building in Borte could act as a zone defender, staying in the city until needed elsewhere. And, yes - we`re settling that NW spot now. It just can`t be delayed much longer. My thinking is to build a settler in Borte at size 5, maybe with the help of a chop. The question is - when do we build a granary in the city? Of course you know the advantages of growing quickly. At the other hand, building those border cities with Joey are so important to us as well.
A chop only shaves one turn off a Settler at this point; I have a feeling we can find a better way to speed things along. I'm also inclined to pursue IW or Myst before Sailing - the former to reveal iron, get access to the jungle gems, and maybe start hacking our way through the jungles; the latter because we'll need it to pop borders at several cities and barracks are expensive builds for us. Nevertheless, I definitely see merit in your plan. Here's a first, tentative, possible plan-in-progress to support what you described:
This plan is pretty incomplete, especially toward the end, and doesn't include military unit moves past the first few turns - I'm just posting what I've thrown together so far. Also, as always, bear in mind that I will be in no way offended if you ignore this! It's mostly just a bunch of ideas in microplan form. [EDIT: Also, if you do follow this, definitely double-check to make sure it's not insane. For example, if Borte is already at its happy cap right now, don't move the Warrior out of it as it will trigger a point of "we fear for our happiness" anger. I think we'll have a point to spare thanks to the Silver being hooked this turn though.]
T49: Work Boat is complete at Muqa, which is now size 3 and resumes its Axeman, working Corn + Sheep + Silver after the Worker on the Silver completes the Road. The Worker on the Horse completes the Road. The Workers on the Furs and forest each begin a Road. The Work Boat moves to do a little scouting, e.g. 2E or 2SE. The Warrior from Borte moves 1N to the roaded grassland.
T50: Pottery is complete. Tech Sailing? (Myst and IW are among the alternatives to consider.) Borte's borders expand to its 3rd ring. The Worker on the Horse WAITS for the Worker on the Furs to complete its Road, then moves SW-SE to the Furs and begins a Camp. The Worker on the Forest north of Borte completes its Road. The Worker on the Silver moves 1E to the Corn and begins a Road. The Workboat scouts a couple of tiles further. The Warrior north of Borte moves 2NE to the roaded grassland just short of the Sheep. This (finally) ensures that if we log in next turn to find a single Impi already standing 2 tiles from Muqa, we still won't lose the city. Set research slider to 0%.
T51: Axe is complete at Borte, which starts a Settler (delaying growth by a turn to receive the overflow from the Axe). Muqa is now size 4 and works Corn + Sheep + Silver + plains forest. Toregene now has a trade route and it is now working on a Spearman (upgraded in the queue from a Warrior). The Work Boat moves back to within 1 tile of the Fish. The Worker on the Corn completes the Road. The Worker on the forest North of Borte moves S-SE to the floodplain and starts a Cottage. Both Workers on the Furs continue the Camp. Set research slider to 100%?
T52: Toregene is now size 2 and switches to building a Granary, working Rice + Furs. Muqa's borders expand to its second ring. Work Boat moves to the Fish and Nets them. Muqa works Corn + Sheep + Silver + Fish. Borte switches to building a Granary. The Worker on Muqa's Corn moves 1NE to the Cow and begins a Pasture. ONE of the Workers on the Furs completes the Camp; the other moves S-SW to a grass forest hill in Toregene's first ring.
T53: Axe is complete at Muqa, which starts a Granary. The Worker on the Furs moves 1NW to the "river" grassland between the furs and city, starts a Cottage, and CANCELS orders. The Worker on the forest hill begins a Chop.
T54: Borte is now size 5 and resumes its Settler. Muqa is now size 5 and starts a Settler, working Corn + Sheep + Fish + Silver + Cow. The Worker on the "river" grassland moves 1N to the floodplain, where both Workers complete the Cottage. Borte works Cow + Copper + Clam + Horse + Cottage.
T55: The Worker on the Cow completes the Pasture. The Workers on the floodplain move NW-N through the roaded river grassland to the roaded forest directly north of Borte and begin a Chop. The Worker on the forest hill completes its Chop.
T56: The Worker on the Cow moves 2SW to a plains forest. ONE of the Workers on the forest north of Borte completes the Chop; the other begins a Cottage but then CANCELS orders. The Worker on the hill south of Toregene begins a Mine.
T57: Settler is complete at Borte, which resumes its Granary. Toregene is now size 3; it WHIPS its Granary (3 pop to 2) and works Rice + Furs. The Workers on the forest north of Borte move 1NW to the grassland between the pigs and oasis; they begin and complete a Road. The Settler moves 2N to the roaded river grassland between the forest and oasis. The Worker on the forest begins a Chop.
T58: Granary is complete at Toregene, which resumes its Spearman. The Workers WAIT until the Settler moves 1NW to its city site and founds Oghul Qaimish, which starts a Granary, working the Oasis. Then the two Workers sharing a tile with each other move NW-SW through the city to the Corn and begin a Farm.
T59: The Worker on the hill completes its Mine. The Worker on the forest completes its Chop. Muqa WHIPS its Settler (5 pop to 4) and works Corn + Cow + Sheep + Fish.
Another alternative is to switch Borte to building a Chariot this turn, as soon as the road on the horses finishes. The Chariot will be complete by T52, with enough overflow that the axe will complete the following turn, just as the city grows to size 5. (Alternatively, we could finish the axe by T51, start the Chariot then, and have it by T53, but the Chariot covers more ground as a zone defender and gives us a more diverse military.) This would delay the Settler by at least one turn, barring a whip (and independant of whether a chop is used, as in the plan above, to speed the Settler up by a turn too.)
More generally about granaries: We ideally want a granary in each city before it next gets to a ~half-full bin. This isn't feasible though if we're going to get more military out (and would require some contortions that would be decidedly non-ideal in any case). I'm inclined to start Toregene and the northwest city on granaries very early, but with Borte and Muqa, it's a much more complicated question. One thing I've noticed is that I don't think we want any Workers out of Muqa unless and until we build cities to share its food; those are (very generally speaking) better produced from Borte, where we don't have a barracks and have much better production now that the copper and horses are visible and improved.
A new micro plan! I`m happy to follow it. Right now we are about to build a couple of axemen, so I don`t think that extra chariot is strictly necessary as it would slow down our next city a bit. The question of when to build granaries is a difficult one. We`ll see when Borte and Muqa can slip in their granaries. We can`t wait too long, but delaying them until we have a solid front line against Joey makes sense. Dtay`s window for taking Muqa is about to slam shut. From turn 50 we`ll be (relatively) safe from his impis.
The work boat finished, and is sent on a scouting mission for a few turns. Our warrior down SW didn`t find anything exciting this turn, but there is a lot of land down that way. Maybe we`ll go one tile further and then move back.
Muqa now has only two turns left on the first ten turns of whip anger. So it could soon be whipped again. Good point about Muqa wanting to build other things than workers.
Hmmm, going for an early Iron Working could be an option. It`s a quite expensive tech, but we gain a lot from being able to chop down all that jungle. I could be talked into Mysticism - IW next. Mysticism is very cheap, and the ability of building those monuments has some value for us. If we are in desperate need for more happiness, sailing could be prioritized instead.
That land to the Exploring Warrior's west makes is going to make our front against GermanJoey even more complicated. Any definite plan on where to plant our fifth and sixth cities? (Realizing it could change based on what GJ and dtay do in the meantime, obviously....)
I don't think we'll be desperate for another luxury in the immediate future since we need lots of Settlers and still have to build our granaries. I think our next tech depends on where we want to settle next though, and on our mid-term strategy.
(June 16th, 2017, 15:07)RefSteel Wrote: Gotta say, I love your attitude toward this game!
That land to the Exploring Warrior's west makes is going to make our front against GermanJoey even more complicated. Any definite plan on where to plant our fifth and sixth cities? (Realizing it could change based on what GJ and dtay do in the meantime, obviously....)
I don't think we'll be desperate for another luxury in the immediate future since we need lots of Settlers and still have to build our granaries. I think our next tech depends on where we want to settle next though, and on our mid-term strategy.
Well, for now MP civ is exceeding my expectations! We`ll see if it`s still fun when I have to micromanage 60+ cities later in the game..
My thinking is planting city 5 E of the river and city 6 on that fish/sheep/silver site. I think we have to risk it actually, as we don`t want to give up the silver to Joey without a fight. It`s 5 commerce to us compared to 5 to him, which means a swing of 10 commerce. There is quite a few roads needed to both sites, I guess we`re just going to spend the necessary worker turns. The only alternative I can see is to build a more defensible city on that plains hill north of the other spot giving up on that silver tile. Would it be a bad idea to send down an axe down to the border with Joey? We don`t want to start an arms race, obviously, but a little showing of strength might dissuade him from settling too aggressively.
Quote:Well, for now MP civ is exceeding my expectations! We`ll see if it`s still fun when I have to micromanage 60+ cities later in the game..
See, one of the things that's so great is your confidence: If we have 60+ cities to manage late in the game, it'll mean we've acquired several civs' worth of land! Really glad you're having such a great time though, no matter how the game goes after this!
Quote:My thinking is planting city 5 E of the river and city 6 on that fish/sheep/silver site.
Okay; I'll try to update the plan accordingly. We're planning for the E-of-the-river site instead of the hill plant then? [EDIT: If so, we probably do want Myst within a few turns of planting it (would also have been true of the hill) and IW ASAP, but I don't know the numbers off the top of my head, so I don't know if we can afford to delay other techs to tech it ~immediately. I'll try to look into that sometime tomorrow.]
Quote:It`s 5 commerce to us compared to 5 to him, which means a swing of 10 commerce.
Remember that we're not in a duel against GermanJoey though. dtay won't get that 5 commerce tile, and neither will our other opponents across the seas.
I think we can handle building the roads; my main concern with those sites is their vulnerability. The sheep/silver site in particular is on flatland, and GJ's fast-movers will be able to one-turn it out of the fog indefinitely, which means we'll need to watch his power and keep the place stuffed with defenders, while also keeping units positioned to defend the river site five tiles away. The plains hill would definitely be a safer plant, though it obviously doesn't claim as much territory. More information from the scouting warrior will tell us more about what makes sense here though.
On moving the axe southward: I would say only if it's useful to protect a worker or the like. I'd rather keep our axes in position to respond to threats as needed, and refrain from giving GJ any information about our forces that he doesn't have already. He's not going to be intimidated, but remember that to him, an axe won't be a warning: If anything, it'll look like a possible attack against which he needs to defend. (It won't be a real attack obviously; we know he can defend against a lone slow-mover without any serious trouble.)
The work boat found two new food sources. A city on that eastern island (I`m pretty sure it`s an island) would be very good. It would probably need a MP unit as well as a worker to improve that wheat. Down SW our warrior found a new luxury - an incense. Sadly, it`s very inaccessible for us right now. It looks a bit barren down there actually.
As Borte expanded its borders, we got a good view of our NW. Still no barbarians in sight. Actually I`m a bit disappointed about the barbarians` performance so far! I`m obviously not complaining. We`re still waiting for Muqa to expand its borders, only two turns left now. The warrior from Borte moved to within two tiles of Muqa to act as a back up in case of emergency.
The question of which border cities to settle in our south is a really difficult one. I think we have to settle E of the river. It all boils down to whether we valuate a safe border (planting on that hill next to the sheep) over a bit more land. Assuming we plant on that hill, there still is room for another city between our city and Seven Mysteries. If Joey were to plant a city there, we`d still have a very awkward border. How often do people build border cities with minimum distance to their neighbors? We`ll have a few more turns to decide.
Nice! I should be asleep (and will be shortly) but this looks quite exciting (and maybe provides an incentive to get Sailing soonish after all - although we have a lot of places for Settlers to go...)
I'll try to offer some more coherent thoughts tomorrow, but in the meantime, it's great to see things coming together this way. I guess the workboat goes 1N and then 1W back toward the fish next turn?
