[Spoilers] RFS-81 - Anubis? More like A-noob-is!

[shallow_thought]

EDIT: CivFanatics says that it's the sum of your units' combat strength, but how did I have a score of 24, then?

Injured units count for less, and I think our warrior has a scratch on him at the moment.

[RFS-81]

But it only has 20 base strength, and I've been sitting on 23-24 for a couple of turns now. The scout clearly isn't included in the score yet, then I would have around 30.

[Cornflakes]

I think CQUI includes gold into the strength calculation somehow (base game used to include gold)

[RFS-81]

Thanks, Cornflakes! So let's see... My scout still isn't included in my score on turn 10. Suboptimal has a strenght of 33 so he probably has an eagle warrior and some gold. The other two... A warrior, a scout and a pile of cash from barb camps? They have too little strength to have gone warrior first.

This turn, I finished both Mining and CoL. I selected the usual starting policies of Discipline and God King to start the long slog towards a pantheon. My next tech is Astrology. Since I don't need Animal Husbandry or Pottery at the moment, I might as well make extra sure that I have a district to build for State Workforce.

A barbarian scout showed up near the capital and I attacked him with my scout. Because of my scout's zone of control, I think I can kill him if he advances towards my capital. If he runs off, that's also fine, I just want to get out my settler before building military. Maybe a builder too, but that might be pushing my luck.



The barb scout I attacked with my warrior last turn ran off. I plan to move my warrior north around the Pantanal and back towards my city to take out the barb camp that must be nearby. I think I spotted a river in the fog to the north of Pantanal, so that's nice!

Suboptimal's score went up to 9 due to discovering a tech.

EDIT: It took me a while to find out what music it was, but I was hearing a Kongo ambient track near the Pantanal. Was that a bug, or is Japper nearby? I don't think I heard another civ's music before officially meeting them before.

[RFS-81]

Turn 11:

I move my warrior around Pantanal and discover a nearby lake.



The grassland SW of the lake would be a good place for a city, I think. It's got deer and a forest in the first ring, two more forests in the second ring. I'm not going to build any wonders here due to the lack of a river, so that should be enough to get a couple of districts. And then there's Pantanal for lots of culture, of course. I could place a holy site with a +2 adjacency bonus NW of the center of Pantanal.

At my capital, the barb scout retreats and I move my scout to cut off his way towards my city.



Looking at the scores, subotimal must have built a second Eagle Warrior. Rho21 still doesn't have a tech. Well, it takes a while to update the score, so he probably has one, but he still was later than suboptimal and me, even though he found a scientific city state. What's going on?

[shallow_thought]

He could be sandbagging, particularly if he's also going settler before builder. Not sure how much value that has... cheaper tile buying in a few turns time? I'd need to look up the formula.

I like Pantanal as  a wonder early game, but it doesn't scale that well as far as I can tell. Bit far for a second city plant, even a bit of a stretch for a third. We'll see as scouting uncovers more.

FWIW, I don't remember hearing another civ's music before meeting them, and I can't find anything online about music and natural wonder tiles. Hmm.

[RFS-81]

That certainly makes more sense than my idea that he might be researching Sailing or Astrology without the boost.

I've also just played another turn. The barb scout is out of sight, but I found his camp!



Beta Colony is growing in 2 turns and will add another grass-hill-stone tile next turn. I'm thinking about which tile to work with my third citizen - plains-hill-forest for producing the settler faster, or grass-hill-stone for faster growth. I'm leaning towards more production, but I'll have to look at the actual numbers to decide. What do you think, shallow_thought?

[shallow_thought]

Off the top of my head I'd prefer production, but - you say - precise numbers matter. There's enough barb presence to make some early military necessary. The scout is tied to blocking duties and the warrior will be needed back home to escort the settler, and you still need a bunch of scouting-related inspirations...

[RFS-81]

Turn 13 was uneventful, so I did some planning.



The floodplains-wheat + floodplains + grassland triangle would make a nice place to build a feudalism farming triangle down the road. It's not likely that I get the floodplains tile by natural expansion before my first builder is out, though. The next pick is a plains-hill-jungle tile because it's the only 4-yield left in the second ring. After that, there are four 3-yield tiles to choose from, so I've got a 1 in 4 chance of getting the floodplains.

I planned out the locations for my cities, and I don't think that Pantanal is too far for a third city. It's barely far enough from my prospective second city. Maybe it was not clear from my previous screenshots how close it is. Of course, I'll always keep looking for a better 3rd city site.

[shallow_thought]

No, your screenshots made it clear how far the Pantanal site it is - it was me not being clear. It's effectively "second ring" from cap, and I was think that you'd probably want to settle 2-3 "first ring" sites, partly to make things more defensible. That might not be the case. These steam-based screenshots are working nicely for me, so far BTW.

I like the farming triangle - it's really annoying to _not_ think about these and then realise you've messed up later. I find the downside is that I cover my screen with pins and then can't see basic stuff. Unfortunately, I don't think there is a way to temporarily hide them, even with CQUI.

Do you have numbers for the turns on which you'd get the settler / grow working the different available tiles? I'm sure it can be calculated in advance, but I'm lazy and tend to just use the interface (even the Civ VI one), and do some basic linear interpolation. Options are 2/2 and 1/3, right?

On another side note, I like CQUI (despite the fact that I keep meaning to change production and instead add to the end of the queue), but it does seem to increase crashes and freezes for me.