Civ6 SG 3 - Stingy Hojo and his cheap districts

[Ichabod]

Roster:

Ichabod
TheArchduke
Bacchus
Emperor K
Quagma Blast

Variant:

*We play as Hojo Tokimune of Japan.

*We can only build districts with a discount, never at full cost (clarification: Japan's half cost districts are always allowed, since they are already discounted).
*By the end of the game, we need to have built at least one of every district that exists in the game.
*Spaceports, aqueducts and neighbourhoods don't receive discounts and work in a different way than the other districts. They are allowed without discounts.
*We must achieve a peaceful winning condition.
*We can't keep captured enemy cities with districts, since we don't know if they were properly discounted or not.

Settings:

*Emperor difficulty
*Small map
*Continents map

District Discount Formula (by Cornflakes):

C = total number of completed districts (regardless of type)
P = placed districts of the specific type in question (e.g. Commercial Hub), this includes the sum of completed and uncompleted districts of the specific type
A = available districts to build, which is based on techs discovered. (e.g. Astrology + Writing + Bronze Working = 3 available districts)

For a specific district type, the discount is available only if both of the following are true:
1) C>=A
2) C/A > P

Trivia:

*The literal translation of the expression that means stingy in portuguese is "Hard Bread". "Hunger Nail" is also pretty common.

[Ichabod]

This our settings:



And this is our start:



Or it would be, if the game didn't go crazy on us with the start bug.

Anyway, I rolled another map, which gave us this:





I already moved the warrior to where it made more sense (it started 1W of the settler and there's no fresh water to the north). I think we just settle in place. It has enough food and a lot of first ring hills, which is pretty nice. The other option is settling on the rice, I think, which is a one turn delay.

Some things to remember: we can't go straight into apprenticeship to make those hills better tiles, as that opens too many districts and screw up the costs. So, settling with second ring hills might not be as bad as it seems.

Considering our variant, going for a cultural victory or a religious victory makes more sense, since the main districts for those victory types are discounted naturally for Japan. The district discount formula requires us to have a main district type and our variant requires that district to be a discounted one (so HS, TS or Camp), so it makes sense to gear our empire in one of those directions, rather than going for science. So, we can consider district placement on the Capital based on that.

Also, if we want to fill the State Workforce inspiration, we need to build either a HS or a Camp... Or could we go for Drama and Poetry before PP, in order to build a quick TS. That would be new...

Opinions?

[Quagma Blast]

SIP seems fine to me. No 4-yield tiles in first ring, but there aren't any visible at all unless you want to go on a pilgrimage to the forest hill deer far to the south. If you are going for the rice settle, better to move to the forest to the east before moving directly onto the rice.

We're going to be building Holy Sites anyway, so it makes sense to do that early and gun for a religion. As a bonus, if we build two of them (and refrain from Bronze Working for a bit) we can then build a Campus to get our science up.

[Alhazard]

Will watch this thread for sure. I only know how to win space victories so maybe I can learn something.

[shallow_thought]

Looking forward to following this. What would the impact of the City Patron Goddess pantheon be on your rules? Would the first district in every city count as discounted?

[TheArchduke]

Are we sure we do not want to move SE, there is a very sexy 2F3P tile over there, a lot more worth then settling the rice or our mediocre SIP.

I would move with the settler 1 SE, we can always settle there in the worst case, but my spidey sense tells me that we should move.

I agree with cultural and religion, not sure which one is better with the stingy variant. Maybe ascetic Hojo and his pennypincher religion.

[Ichabod]

The problem with moving near the deer is that there's no fresh water there. Moving 1SE to only get the deer in range is not worth it, I think, because it's third ring and will only be avaiable after the early game is already over.

It's a hard start, anyway you cut it. No 4-yields, subpar production, bad luxury (bad yield and requires irrigation). Going to the rice can prehaps reveal some new good tiles, but 1SE gets us very few new tiles, so the situation doesn't improve from SIP.

If we don't plan around this start, we'll end up with a city with amenities deficit and still very little production.

I have to say I'm a bit lost. I guess I'd move into the forest, as QB suggested, and reasses on the following turn, if it was just a SP game. But SIP is also decent. Anyway, I want to wait for Bacchus and Emperor K before doing anything.

[Ichabod]

Looking forward to following this. What would the impact of the City Patron Goddess pantheon be on your rules? Would the first district in every city count as discounted?

Good question. Since it's a production boost rather than a discount, I'm inclined to say it doesn't count. Probably inconsistent with how the Japan boost work, but otherwise the variant can become too easy.

It's up to the team.

[Jabah]

lurking with interest

Wouldn't settling SE on hill at least make the city center a 2/2 tile which might help a bit. ?

[Quagma Blast]

I'm with Ichabod on City Patron Goddess, it doesn't change whether a district counts as "discounted" or not.

It might help settling decisions if we got to see the settler view, unless the river is the only known source of fresh water.

lurking with interest

Wouldn't settling SE on hill at least make the city center a 2/2 tile which might help a bit. ?

City centers generate the yield of the tile they're on (after subtracting forest, rainforest, floodplains, and improvements), with a minimum of 2 food and 1 production. If it were a plains hill, the 2 production would carry over to the city, but because grassland hill is only a 1-production tile we don't get a free hammer for it.