[SPOILERS] Bacchus and India's many gods

[Bacchus]

Oh yeah, P is Petra and the entertainment district for Colosseum will go somewhere, probably on the Coffee (let's face it, i'm not going to work a flat forestless coffee, not unless I pick goddess of the festivals and I won't).

[Quagma Blast]

Oh yeah, P is Petra and the entertainment district for Colosseum will go somewhere, probably on the Coffee (let's face it, i'm not going to work a flat forestless coffee, not unless I pick goddess of the festivals and I won't).

Can't build districts or wonders on luxuries or revealed strategics, only on bonus resources and unknown strategics.

[Bacchus]

Oh yeah, that inexplicable rule exists. Will have to go on the stone then.

[Bacchus]

T29

I found a city, and I'm the first to do so, albeit Ichabod and Suboptimal may do the same this turn. I haven't been following scores, but I think Ichabod has a settler out for a couple of turns already.




Hello Rowain.

[Bacchus]

Washington is exactly 13 tiles due NW, and potentially in Gondwana, which is very unpleasant. Should have taken the screenie with a continents lens, but the divide that I can see runs basically north-south two tiles west of Hattusa. Rowain has military score, culture and science than me, which is nice but unsurprising, as I have more pop, an envoy in Hattusa, and he maybe has a settler en route. That river that flows out of Washington is obviously key for controlling the area between us. I hope he just plants E of my scout, and I plant between the peaks and we settle at that. But it will probably get much more messy, especially if Washington is in Gondwana.

In other news, the Battlecry warrior is returning for zone defense of the core, whilst the unpromoted warrior is making his way south to the camp and southern river to earn XP and guard settling locations.

I am waiting for Astrology to drop to increase the chop yield into Agra. Discovering Rowain also gave me Writing, further boosting that. Agra has a 3-mountain spot in the second ring, which I will probably buy and place a district. Still not quite sure whether it should be a holy site or campus.

Finally, Kaiser gained his second domestic tourist, meaning he has accumulated over 200 lifetime culture. I still haven't got even a hundred, and most people just got their first tourist recently. Crazy. I hope that's a gain from some weird inspiration, need to think about it.

[Bacchus]

My scout advances and finds that, as lurkers will already know, Washington is in Kazakhstania. Good news.

A damaged barb scout appears close to Agra, right next to my builder. Thankfully, he is on his last charge and disappears in a chop yielding 32 cogs into the Monument. The impressive stone phallus will now complete in <=5 turns to join the one in the capital which completes next turn. Appropriately, my culture rate will nearly triple.

I prevaricated a while on whether I want to research Currency (commercial hub) or Bronze Working (encampment). In the end I went for Currency, even though it's not Crassus up for grabs among the Classical merchants. Crassus is sick, to which I was previously oblivious, as I thought he only has 1 charge. In choosing Currency, the biggest factor was that I don't really have anywhere to place the encampment besides the harvested rice, but sitting over there it's about as useful as nipples on a breastplate. Also, trade-economy-snowball, and all that.

I do want a general though. My thinking is that great-generaled Varus would be enough of a deterrent to basically see me through ~t150 tourism victory. Of course, maybe that's a reason not go that route, because if I don't manage to squeeze a culture victory in time, I will be eaten by Cavalry, Woden-PBEM2-style.

[Bacchus]

Capital completes monument, starts Trader for the Currency Eureka and more gold. Not a builder, because the only tile I really want to improve, the marsh rice, is not going to be within borders for a while, and even then it's not guaranteed. Also, trader cost scales with tech/civic progress, so the earlier the better.

Cities will grow to 4 and 2 pop the turn after next, triggering the Early Empire eureka.

Rowain and Suboptimal still lack second cities, Rowain also hasn't added any power. Around Washington, scout has to make a momentous decision -- go back east to reveal the contested area to my north and Rowain's east, or keep going west for further contacts. Now, existing tiles around the contested area show nothing on the settler radar, so I don't think there are city states there, at least not for a while, so I go west. Not quite sure it's the right thing to do, but we'll see.

Rowain has a farm to pillage, but I won't, hopefully he appreciates the gesture. He also has a pretty cool plains forest hill dye tile in the first ring, explaining his faith output from the early game.

In the south, green warrior proceeds towards the camp, which is on a forested hill, so before a promotion it's 37 vs 35 not in my favour. Clearing will take a while, I will have to pick up battlecry, but that's not really a problem.

[Bacchus]

Important note to self: don't finish currency before completing the Brussels quest (farm something).

I will post an overview next turn, when my scout hopefully reveals something of note. Otherwise these coming turns are likely to be very boring. Get Early Empire, slot in Land Surveyors to buy any tiles I need (at worst the Henge tile, marsh rice, Agra's Holy Site), farm rice, get Craftsmanship, replace Land Surveyors with Colonization, spam settlers.

You will note that I did not yet place the holy site in Agra, despite having Astrology. This is because getting Early Empire won't actually increase the district cost above what it already is, because of my large science rate, it's the techs that determine the cost, not the civics. I do need to place HS before Currency though, but that's definitely doable. Land Surveyors will save me about >35 gold from tile buys, which is important as without Land Surveyors I will not potentially even be able to afford the three tiles I need. I will only run surveyors for <3 turns, during which the build queues will probably be devoted to slingers.

[Bacchus]

State of the world:



Hattusa is growing fat and tasty, but it also forms a pretty convenient buffer between me and Rowain, so I i'd rather invest my efforts elsewhere.

Terrain around Washington is awful, my scout is slowly crawling forward. In big news of the turn, Rowain declared war on suboptimal. Explains why neither of them has a city yet, Rowain is leveraging his American exceptionalism into Arabia's face. Rowain's military is two warriors and the slinger that you see, mine is the same plus a scout. I would imagine the warriors are somewhere around Mecca. Domestically, as you see, it's all economy, all the time. The completion timer lies, the Trader is actually coming out in 4 turns.

I have been very lucky with barbs, there are no new camps in the vicinity. The bulk of the benefit is being provided by the CS which wing me very conveniently, it also helps that I took the time to fogbust major adjacent areas that are not CS-covered.

[TheArchduke]

Looking really good here.