[SPOILERS] Suboptimal Goes Waltzing Matilda

[suboptimal]

Turn 12

Quiet turn. Warrior begins moving back towards Red Dot. Scout crosses the river and finds the start of the jungle belt. Looks like I’ve got a space about 7 x 8 or so east of the mountain range. Settler due in 4 turns.

Tile picker is back to the wheat tile. No changes internationally.

[Ituralde]

Really interested in your tile picker studies, maybe you can decipher it completely and at the least it is valuable data to make more sense out of it. I look forward to your updated tile picker adventures!

[suboptimal]

Turn 13

I start the turn by having the scout head east along the jungle.  That gets me some good news and some bad news.



I’ve met The Archduke, which means I’ve got Macedonia to the north.  My closest opponent has no-resource swordsmen with support bonuses and +5 combat strength when “besieging” districts (what, exactly, does that mean – adjacent to, city under siege, attacking?), no-resource free-promotion horseman that effectively double the bonus from a Great General and no war weariness at all.  

Based upon his science (4.1/turn), culture (1.9/turn) and gold (5/turn) rates he hasn’t met any city-states of those flavors and his faith rate (2/turn) indicates he’s only met Kandy.  His military score (30) shows that he’s also gone scout-first.  I’ll have to keep an eye on his score to see when he gets a settler out.  He’s already gotten to 3 population so unless he can disguise it at the next population growth I should see it happen.

On the upside I’ve gotten the Eureka for Writing.  That’ll be done in 3 turns but I’ll hold off on putting down the Campus until Red Dot is settled.  No need to let our incoming guest immediately know our starting tech path.  Though he didn’t see it move hopefully he’ll go west to see where the scout came from, rather than directly south.  That’ll slow him down in terms of locating my capital.

The tile picker is now on the SW rice.  I’ve got the three tiles scored the same, just need to figure out what is going on with the citrus.  The good news is that I won’t need to buy one of the food tiles for the added growth and the Irrigation eureka.

[suboptimal]

Really interested in your tile picker studies, maybe you can decipher it completely and at the least it is valuable data to make more sense out of it. I look forward to your updated tile picker adventures!

Thanks!  In addition to figuring out the (in)sanity of the picker's whims it may have some minor strategic value in terms of city planning.  Except for the citrus tile, so far, so good.

[suboptimal]

I've seen several cases where a 2nd ring water tile with a resource is either picked over a 2nd ring land tile with a resource. According to your list, it looks like the land tile would always beat out the water tile due to the +25 to water tiles (for an example see my round 2 duel vs. TheArchduke for an example where both 2nd ring Fish were picked over 2nd ring Rice).

I just took a look at that and scored out the tiles - based on the working procedure the order should have been Stone (93), Rice (94), Fish (110), Fish (110).  Even if the water tile penalty is unused the order is unchanged as the fish both scored 95.

Curious. 

[suboptimal]

Turn 14

Open the save, Archduke’s warrior has disappeared. Best guess is it went south. That’s OK. Scout goes north. There’s a city or a city-state east of the scout’s position in the jungle. Archduke probably got the first meet bonus for that one but I’ll check it out in a turn or two (when the scout gets there).

Warrior is going to return by going south of the Red Dot Lake, just to clear out some Tundra fog.

Emperor K is up to 3 population. Code of Laws in 1, Settler in 2, Writing in 3. Hopefully I can get the settler out before Archduke arrives at Irukandji.

[suboptimal]

Turn 15

Code of Laws is finished, slot Discipline and God King. Start Foreign Trade. Settler due next turn, the plan remains to get to Red Dot. The issue will be the barbarian scout that was wandering around. It’s still out there, somewhere to the west/northwest. This may be a situation in which I slow-walk the settler until the slinger is done, though that would present Archduke with an empty capital. OTOH the settler and warrior can meet in the middle in 4 turns.

In the east the scout relocates Archduke’s warrior. He hasn’t moved that far. The Kandy River snakes all the way over here and he’s staying on the opposite side of the river from where I am. That bodes well as there should be enough room to park a city east of those mountains and use the river for defense.

Emperor K and Archduke have both completed Code of Laws as well. Alhambram is lagging just a tad.

[suboptimal]

Turn 16

Settler completes and the barbarian scout shows up to the southwest as if by magic:



Irukandji resumes its slinger. Warrior from the west continues its return. In the east I find Zanzibar, whom Archduke has already found. Zanzibar would like me to recruit a Great Writer. I’ve found his warrior and a barbarian camp, probably the one that the scout came from.



I have two options here. Continue scouting or hang around and attempt to poach the barbarian camp out from under Archduke. I’d rather find Archduke’s capital than try a less-than-likely poach. The slinger can give chase to the barbarian scout and try to kill that before it gets away.

As for the settler, I move it across the river to the designated Campus tile. Moving over there prevents the scout from getting to it this turn and only delays Red Dot by one turn. It also gets the settler moving away from Archduke’s warrior.

I switch Irukandji from working the 2 / 2 forest tile to the citrus tile. That speeds city growth by a turn and with the overflow from the settler the slinger still completes in 2 turns. Writing will complete next turn but I’ll hold off on putting the campus down for a bit – its cost won’t go up while I do some more research. I’ll probably go slinger → warrior → builder and then debate the merits of completing the Campus or building a second settler without Colonization.

[suboptimal]

Turn 17

Writing is in. Start Animal Husbandry. That’s due in 7 turns so I’ll switch to Mining one turn from completion.

Warrior and settler continue converging. Archduke has stopped to try to kill off the barbarian camp, maybe I’ll send my slinger over if he has to stop for healing (slinger due next turn). Scout heads for the jungle to start the slog north towards Macedonia.

Everyone’s now completed their 2nd tech.

[suboptimal]

Turn 18

Slinger completes, moves east of the city and attacks the barbarian scout that’s moved up next to the city. I’ll be trying to kill that scout to get the Archery eureka as well as scouting out the area southeast of Irukandji. I figured that the barbarian scout I’m dealing with was from the camp that Archduke is attacking, but I don’t think that’s the case any more. A wounded scout showed up in that area. Hopefully there’s a camp SE of Irukandji that I can clear out for some boosts.

Scout continues north, warrior continues east, settler continues west. Going to take the settler all the way to the coast to see what’s in the water (if anything) before going to Red Dot.

Uh oh. Went to post this and see that Sulla stopped by Emperor K's thread. Hope he's not dedlurking there as well.