[SPOILERS] Rusten prepares to face the music

[Rusten]

Weekly graph post:

[Rusten]

dtay is making friends all over the place. At this rate I should count myself lucky not to have met him I guess. 

[Rusten]

I'll be travelling again starting tomorrow and in case something gets in the way here is the plan for the next few turns. Please play my turn if it's about to roll. I should be able to get to it without trouble, but just in case.

Sorry for the painfully thorough instructions, but it's all carefully planned to Oracle so it has to be correct. Hopefully noone will have to step in.

I'll play T43 tonight:

T44:

Cities:
Kaputt: Unchanged
Windborne: whip wb
Leitmotif: Change build to warrior

workers: finish copper road, the other 2 move to silver
settler: move to silver:

T45:

Science slider as low as possible while still finishing hunting in 1T (should be 60% if tiles are assigned correctly).

Cities: 
Kaputt: switch to flood plain tile 1W of city
Windborne: improve crab and set build to warrior
Leitmotif: take fp from Kaputt and work it with the 3rd pop.

Settler: move 1SW of silver (settling will pick up pigs+silver 1st ring and deer 2nd ring).

Workers:
Road silver together. 
Copper worker moves to hill 1E of Kaputt.

T46:

0% slider (for 1T) and research set to pottery.

Cities:
Kaputt: whip worker (removing fp)
Windborne: take fp tile from Kaputt with the 3rd pop
Leitmotif: Unchanged

Settler: Settle city in place and set build to axe (settling should pick up pigs+silver 1st ring and deer 2nd ring)

Workers:
Improve pig together.
Other worker moves to river forested grassland hill 1W of ivory.

Warriors and scout can probably stay where they are.
If an enemy unit (chariot/axe/spear) approaches, then stop for a consult, but I have it set up so that I can whip a spearman if needed.

[Rusten]

Interesting development -- I can see Aretas' 2nd city.

It is beautifully placed as far as I'm concerned. I can still settle my desert hill and I'll grab all the resources thanks to the extra culture from Madrassa. He might not be happy though, so a conflict should arise. No need for me to go on the offense in the short term as the city won't bother me at all. Just settling my city is quite aggressive.

Implications: Might have to look at T58 Aesthetics instead and settle this city ~5 turns sooner. It is pretty important to get there first. I should have both an axe and a spear near when doing so.
It is only Aretas' 2nd city so he'll probably go in a different direction next, but I still want to get there ASAP.

[Rusten]

SH has not yet been completed. I'm not sure if that is good or bad for my Oracle ambitions TBH.

I've thought about it and I think I will stick to the T57 timeline. It's very unlikely that Aretas will settle that spot next. You don't expand all in one direction, that's terrible from both a maintenance and positional point of view. Surely the mapmaker has given him goodies in more than 1 direction. So I should still have time to get there. Furthermore the city has less value for him than it has for me (he already claims marble+gem with other city).

Now there's always the risk of someone else showing up (BGN?), but I'm in love with the Oracle idea now. We all play this game for fun, and in Civ the most fun is had when you hit the jackpot and everything lines up perfectly. I'd rather risk some minor setbacks while chasing true greatness. If I get the Aesthetics slingshot and SoZ (guaranteed if I get Oracle) +early GL/NE/HE then I don't see how any of my current neighbours can stop me honestly. It could be a bloodbath.

[Rusten]

The ultimate greed would be to also grab the MoM. It's the final wonder I'd want and it would secure my late game further. In which case tech would go Aesthethics --> AH --> Mathematics --> Calendar --> Literature (--> HBR?)

While extremely greedy I can definitely see it working out in some scenarios. Pros include:

-Calendar is a must have tech in any case for the luxury resources nearby.
-Mathematics is a must have for chopping (will get this before (or just before) starting on the SoZ.
-Marble is available (Not only to me though. It seems widely accessable).
-There seems to be a lof of room to expand.
-My neighbours are slow starters.
-My empire saves a lot of hammers on settlers/libraries. With solid micromanagement I feel I can build these wonders while keeping up with my neighbours.
-I have a city site in mind to build it (settled 4th with forests available)

To touch on the neighbour part so far I've found:
-Julius/Germany (IMP/ORG)
-Ragnar/HRE (FIN/AGG)
-Boudica/Khmer (AGG/CHM)
-Churchill/Native (PRO/CHM)
None of which scare me that much in the short term. Naufragar (Julius) seems very intent on settling cities (correctly) and superdeath (churchill) is the furthest away of the bunch I believe.

The next 15 turns will be very exciting. This could be glorious. Are you excited? I'm excited.

[Rusten]

Seems it was more than just a poking holkan from Donovan. 2240 BC elimination! Yikes!

Remains to be seen who gains the most from this, but as it appears he kept 2 cities (weren't auto-razed) he might be in a decent spot. The region as a whole should benefit from -1 player though. Not what I want.

[Rusten]

Settled SheDontUseJelly this turn. It's a strong contender for the MoM if the Oracle plan succeeds. Several forests and some plains hills. The latter you almost never want to work, but for wonder production they are quite nice. Two workers are already in place to pasture the pigs.

She Don't Use Jelly is one of the more lighthearted entries on my list. It's one of the first songs I actively listened to off of my older brother's mixed tape. The much younger me became an instant fan.

Demos starting to look quite good. This is a turn of 0% science too and next turn will have pigs up and running.

[Elum]

It could be a bloodbath.

The next 15 turns will be very exciting. This could be glorious. Are you excited? I'm excited.

Very excited, quite the spectator sport this one 

[Rusten]

Aretas now has 90 EP on me. Not cool.
To compare he has a measly 4 on naufragar. Actively chose to put them all on me. I guess he wants to be my first target.