[Spoilers] Suboptimal - Welcome to the Tlachtli of Blunders!

[suboptimal]

Milpower of 64?

Someone is totally oblivious it seems. I would go full monty on him soon.

It spiked to 106 on his Turn 46.  I think that's archers, though Chariot Archers are a slight possibility (would explain the lack of units).  Something, however, seems to be slowly eating his forces and the only thing I can think of is barbarians.

[suboptimal]

Turn 47

State Workforce completes, Political Philosophy is started with 8 turns to completion.  Let me lower that time a little bit.  Marsh is harvested at Harborcoat for 36 and grows the population to 4.  Over at Cant the bananas have a plantation installed.  The other bananas will be acquired next turn.  Looks like that all shaved a turn off the civic, it’s now down to 7 turns.  

At Welcome the spearman has moved out of the camp to approach my slinger.  Well, that’s not nice.  Slinger attacks for 18 damage.  The scout has also showed up, parking on the yet-to-be-built Encampment.  Let’s give it something to do.  Builder chops the forest for 36 x 1.5 = 54 .  The Eagle Warrior takes 9 of that and I set the city to build the Encapment, which will get the remaining 45 plus the city’s 6.3 from the end of the turn.  Brand new Eagle Warrior attacks the scout for 71 damage.  I think the barbarian problem here is under control.  

Down in the south the wounded slinger moves back to the city center and takes the volley promotion.  It’ll stay put as city defense for the time being.  The Eagle Warrior moves north and will loiter at Cant until the battering ram completes in 5 turns.  The Eagle Warrior at Cant moves E-NE, finds the warrior from Brussels and another warrior from Valetta.  



They want me to train a galley.  Two unmet players have envoys here, one has two and the other just one.  Oh, look, their warrior is wounded, as is the Brussels warrior.  I smell more builders in my near future.  Now for my other barbarian...situation...



I think they're getting back at me for the first 40 turns of relative quiet.  This is good to know, though – looks like enough people have Archery completed that the barbarians are spawning archers. Bad luck it spawned over there but I think camps always spawn to their NE. Guess I’ll see a couple from the city-states as well in the coming turns.  The archer would attack me at 25 but with the terrain I’m in I get +6 for terrain and +10 for Tortoise, so I’d be defending at….44.  For now that’s OK but I may have bitten off more than I can chew right now.  The spearman could take two more turns here so I may have to retreat or deal with the archer first by luring it into open terrain.

Begin the Begin starts a scout and I leave my policies in place to end the turn.  The scout will head west to clear out the fog over at the coast.  I want to make sure there isn't a city-state hiding out over there.  I'd also like to get a better idea of what my settler(s) will be in for when I start building those.  

Internationally, I’m the first to five civics.  RFS-81 has gotten his power up to 106, he’s gotten a couple of archers out.  Might be chariots but based on the increase it's either one of those or two archers.  Barrayar’s garrison strength is up to 13. The DoF will be over when I play my next turn. Japper looks like he’s got another settler out as his empire score went down one.

The Eagle Warriors at Harborcoat will be fully healed and start heading east next turn.  I’m going to go south of Pantanal with them so they can form up with the other units.  The Eagle Warrior currently healing in Welcome will be the third melee unit while the just-built EW will handle the barbarian camp and catch up with everyone else.  On Turn 49 I’ll chop out the first slinger, the second will overflow complete on Turn 50 and I’ll complete Archery on Turn 51 for upgrades.  The invasion force moves out on Turn 52.  

Builders Captured: 5
Value: 290
Improvements Made: 5
District Boosts: 0
Chops: 54 , 36
Craftsmanship Inspiration, Irrigation, Masonry, Wheel, and Iron Working Eurekas (20, 165)

[TheArchduke]

Hmm, with Tortoise you could easily ignore that archer and clear the camp.

[suboptimal]

Hmm, with Tortoise you could easily ignore that archer and clear the camp.

I ran the math after I exited the game (my computer doesn't like handling spreadsheets and Civ 6 at the same time).  The archer will do about 15 points of damage per shot.  It will take three attacks on the spearman to clear the camp and the archer will shoot twice.  I'll accumulate enough damage where the 3rd archer shot might kill the Eagle Warrior on the interturn after I take the camp.  If the spearman attacks out during any interturn then I will most certainly need to retreat. 

My current plan is to move to the ice SE of the camp.  The archer will be forced to cross the river, at which point I'll kill it, heal up for a turn or two and then kill the camp.  If it doesn't pursue I'll take out the camp and retreat to the ice to heal (or bait the archer out).

I'm actually curious about RFS-81's military power and gold balance when the save comes around.  Dunno if he'd try something funny or not to be pre-emptive at the end of the DoF or if he'll try for another one.

[suboptimal]

Turn 48

The DoF has expired and I’ll see if RFS-81 offers to renew it next turn.  His military power is up to 111 while mine jumped from 149 to 213.  He’s also completed his Holy Site. No signs of walls or other city infrastructure.  I’m assuming he’s doing unit builds right now.  Since we’re on international news Japper just finished his fifth civic and sits in last place in terms of military power.  I'll have to get a second scout built somewhere and send it east to see where he is.  If he's in the northeast he'd be the next target.


Domestically, Writing has completed.  I start Wheel.  In looking around the map I see that the barbarian spearman at Welcome has done nothing important.  The scout has moved away but not out of reach of the Eagle Warrior.  Down at Preslav the barbarian archer did not attack my Eagle Warrior.    I think the archer spawned with some sort of “raid Preslav” mission as it’s moved in that direction.  Less trouble for me.

bEagle Warrior at Welcome attacks the spearman, killing it.  Builder moves to the tile to chop next turn.  Slinger advances towards the camp and will clear it next turn.  Other Builder advances to the pillaged farm and will repair that next turn.  Northern Eagle Warriors begin to move out.  

Down south I attack the other camp.  It will be cleared next turn. At Cant the builder moves to the bananas and the Eagle Warrior moves northwards.  A bit east of there the Brussels warrior has fortified across the river from my Eagle Warrior.  That’s a stalemate situation….I also have no way to cross the river at this position.  I decide to move onto the rainforest hill, defog a little bit and get some high ground.  This will give me the choice next turn (if no one moves) of which city-state to declare on.  



Ordinarily this would indicate declaring on Brussels is the better option as it's an isolated unit.  However, attacking the archer would kill it in two turns and most likely get me a builder because of the higher capture chance.  If no one moves I’ll declare on Valletta, move to the cattle and attack the archer.  By the way, that warrior has the Tortoise promotion, so if it attacks across the river I don’t mind that so much (it would be 23 attacking my 31-ish).  It would be fantastic if the archer moved closer.

[TheArchduke]

Let´s see if he is smart enough to resend the DoF and get a warning that way. If not, even better.

[suboptimal]

He did not send a new DoF. Full turn report layer but I've got vision on one of rho21's warriors by Valleta. We haven't officially met yet.

[suboptimal]

Turn 49

Open the turn and there’s no DoF offer waiting.  I also see a notification about barbarians attacking my Eagle Warrior.  Turns out that the spearman attacked out of the camp.  The Eagle Warrior has 20 health and if it were to be attack by the archer it would die.  The archer hasn’t moved off yet so if I take the camp I’d be exposed to ranged fire.  I move the unit to the ice next to the camp and fortify to heal.  Looking over at Preslav it has finished the granary and started to build walls. Begin the Begin starts an Eagle Warrior and the scout moves to the western edge of that capital’s territory.  

In the north units continue moving around.  Slinger clears the camp and the farm gets repaired.  The builder at Harborcoat moves to the stone.  It only reveals coastline.  I’ll move it to the end of the peninsula next turn to see if there’s anything interesting over there.  Welcome’s Encampment is at 56/78.  The builder charge I’m going to put into it should complete the district.  I resume the slinger and the chop the forest to complete it.  The overflow will complete the next slinger next turn and any leftovers will be fed into a granary.  

Over at Cant I plantation the bananas, using up the builder.  Valletta’s warrior has crossed the river.  Someone has also attacked the city-state as it is now showing a health bar with 199/200 garrison strength. I move east one hex into the forest and reveal a damaged Grecian warrior.  



We don’t officially meet (not within our units' 2-tile vision range), but at least I’ve found someone else.  It also means that rho21 is probably in the northeast and Japper is in the southeast.  Based on the envoy count Japper is the one with two envoys in Valletta.  My plan here is to try to capture one or both of Valletta’s units.  If the city-state hasn’t fallen by then I’ll go pillage a farm to heal and perhaps evaluate whether or not I should go “full Monty” and try to capture a couple of rho21’s damaged units.  Of course, I could also try to grab the city-state out from under him if he messes up the attack. 

Builders Captured: 5
Value: 290
Improvements Made: 7
District Boosts: 0
Chops: 111 , 36
Craftsmanship Inspiration, Irrigation, Masonry, Wheel, and Iron Working Eurekas (20, 165)

[suboptimal]

Turn 50

So, did we officially meet rho21 this turn?  Open the save and…yes we have.  Let’s see what’s going on:



The interesting thing here is his paltry gold per turn rate.  One.  I’m guessing he’s got a few archers around somewhere.  He’s got one city, Euclid, population 3.  Guess he’s going with Greek Mathemeticians?  He’s got 12.8, 4, 137 military power and 2.1.  His warrior has disappeared from view at Valletta, which is fully healed.  OK, that just leaves Japper to meet.  With one player to go I check Brussels and see that it’s Japper’s envoy there, not rho21’s.

For the time being, back to Azteca.  In the south the barbarian archer has disappeared into the fog.  I use the opportunity to clear the barbarian camp.  Unfortunately for me I’m now back in range of the archer:



Whoops.  Hopefully my position in difficult terrain will cause the archer to do less than 20 damage.  Here’s hoping….

Scout continues heading west and look what I find north of Preslav:



Good thing Begin the Begin will finish an Eagle Warrior in two turns!  That’s also 20/119 power well away from his cities.  He also still hasn’t found my capital!  Likewise, up in the north there’s a promoted Egyptian slinger on the other side of Pantanal.  This leaves me with a decision – continue marching east or head northeast to attack & capture the slinger?  He can only see one of my units right now.  



I decide to send the eastern, Tortoise-promoted unit into Pantanal and the trailing unit will continue down to Welcome to form up with everyone else.  If RFS-81 ends a turn with the slinger next to my Eagle Warrior I’ll consider an immediate DoW to try for the capture (it'll take two hits).  The three Eagle Warriors at Welcome will be the main force.  Down at Welcome I move the now-healed Eagle Warrior out of the city center and bring the slinger back into the city’s territory.  Switch out Wheel, put in Archery.  One builder goes to the incense, the other the tile NW of the Encampment.  I don’t charge the Encampment to complete it this turn because I’ve got about 20 or so overflow production and I’m not sure if I’ll lose it if I charge the district.  I start a Granary and switch around the citizens there.  Remaining slingers stay put.  

At Harborcoat the builder gets to land’s end and finds...crabs.  It also appears that there’s a blob of coast out there which might lead to an island.  Maybe when my science rate goes above 12.5 I’ll finish that tech and take the builder for a swim.

Back east at Valletta…



With the warrior unable to attack immediately and the archer a sitting duck I declare war and attack, taking the archer to under 10 damage.  Provided it doesn’t run to somewhere I can’t get at it I should be able to capture it next turn (82% chance).  With that the turn is over.

Turn 50 review is next.

[suboptimal]

The Turn 50 Overview & Look Back Report

The current stats:



Japper’s science and military power are from CQUI.  All other numbers are from the score displays or from my own tracking.

rho21 got an early jump on science I have to assume he’s got some combination of a scientific city-state somewhere near him and/or a science-providing natural wonder.  His Campus district must also be a high-adjacency one as he’s only generating 4.2 science from population and 2 from the palace.  The extra 6.6 is coming from somewhere.   Japper is also in the same situation – he’s got ~7.6 coming from population, so he’s got an extra 2.4 coming from a city-state.  

Early on I was behind in culture – rho21 has a culture-providing resource and RFS-81 was first to Vilnius.  The capture of Vilnius was a major setback to Egypt, which has yet to recover.  The fact that I could get a quick monument via repair helped boost me into the culture lead and I haven’t looked back.  I’m now generating more than double everyone else and will be the first to Political Philosophy.  

Military-wise I’ve generally been at the top of the heap or flip-flopping with rho21 every couple of turns depending on who built what.   However, that lead has widened over the past several turns and I've firmly got the advantage here.  Speaking of military, here's my current force composition, courtesy of CQUI's reports:



Why does all this unbridled optimism sound familiar?  Hmmmm.....flashback, perhaps?

Eagle Warriors have certainly shown their might, allowing me to capture two city-states by Turn 43.  In a typical PBEMs it seems the city-state assaults wait until the 40’s and generally require a larger force in terms of numbers and sheer production cost.  The fact that I could easily roll over two city-states this early in the game has paid it’s own dividends in terms of overall output.

The captured builders also provide an immense benefit:

Builders Captured: 5
Cost to Build: 290
Improvements Made: 7
District Boosts: 0
Chops: 111 , 36
Craftsmanship Inspiration, Irrigation, Masonry, Wheel, and Iron Working Eurekas (20, 165)

I’m willing to bet that most of my opponents have built no more than two.  I’ve yet to build one myself, but that might change in 20 turns or so.  One other indirect benefit of the Eagle Warrior – ungarrisoned cities defend at a base strength of 18 instead of 10.  That is a huge difference from a defensive perspective.

The Oral Tradition pantheon hasn’t really gotten going yet, though with a settler eventually headed for the City #2 spot and it’s citrus & bananas that should change.  It has definitely helped, though, as it currently accounts for just over 20% of my current culture output. 

So far this game has felt like one of my 50-60 turn test games.  Beat up a city-state or two, capture a builder or two and it’s Turn 50.  If this was a test game it’d be towards the top of the heap – 5 builders and 2 city-states captured with 12, 9 and 9 per turn.  That feel will change as my focus shifts from abusing the AI to going after humans.

One more note - I haven't had any war weariness issues.  Two of the wars ended quickly and zeroed out the WW, while my battle with Preslav has largely been a paper tiger for the past 20 or so turns. 

Cities

Here’s the current regional view as of Turn 50. 

The Northwest



The South Central



City Stats



Begin the Begin

It was a bit of a food-poor start, with the wheat providing a good portion of the start position’s food.  I moved to the gypsum to improve the capital’s yields and gain the +1 combat strength bonus to all units.  With the wheat starting to be acquired by the city I’ll start getting some farms up to try to speed growth.  From a production standpoint this location is a powerhouse.  At 4 population it’s generating 14 intrinsic and it will only go up as population grows and mines get put in.  Defensively this is in a good spot – approaches from the east are over rivers and rough terrain and the northern approach is mostly cut off by Cant Get There From Here.

Cant Get There From Here

I like this spot better than my capital as it has good food availability and reasonable production.  Of my four cities this is probably the strongest in the short- and long-term.  Geographically the spot turned out defensively stronger than expected.  The eastern approaches through the mountains are each 1 hex wide and through hills.  Any hostile forces coming through here could be easily be bottled up by a couple of melee units and several ranged defenders.  The city growth should pick up now that the second bananas are on-line.  The next tile grab should be the cattle for yet more food.  I may purchase the 1/3 tile in the second ring if I need to get production going here.

Welcome to the Occupation

The former Vilnius.  Poor city placement but that’s the start location script for you.  Good food availability, limited production potential (three hills, one of them not usable in the dotmap, within the first two rings) and not on fresh water.  I can’t even get a farm triangle going with the wheat because the third tile is desert.  Once the Aqueduct is in I’ll run food-heavy to grow the city, using builders to complete a Campus here at some point in the future.  The Encampment will be completed by a builder next turn.

Harborcoat

The former Lisbon.  Plenty of food, not so much fresh water or production.  It’s in a good spot defensively unless a navy comes calling, in which case it’s probably toast.  I’m going to preserve the stone for sustained production, the flatland forest may see a lumbermill and I might buy that grassland hill to the NE for a mine.    I was considering putting a Campus district here but after some more thought I think that’s a bad idea.  It’d only be a +1 adjacency and the city lacks the production capacity to build any buildings in the district.  For the time being I’m not going to put any districts down.  Maybe if I’ll get a Harbor and follow it with a Commercial Hub.

Short Term Plans

Civics & Governement

Political Philosphy will be in at Turn 53.  I’ll switch into Oligarchy and stay there for the duration of the Egyptian campaign.  Depending on the situation afterwards I may switch to Autocracy for a little more flexibility in the policies.  I’ll finish Military Tradition and put one turn into Mysticism.  I’d like to keep that on-hand for a policy swap situation around the time that Games & Recreation completes – I might need to put in Land Surveyors as part of the Colosseum plan. Once G&R is in I’ll try to work the top of the tree for a bit, then go back for Drama & Poetry.

Techs

Archery finishes over the current interturn, Wheel finishes on the next.  Currency and Iron Working are the next targets, order to be determined, though I need a trader to get the boost for Currency.  After that I’ll take care of Horseback Riding and then continue along the bottom of the tree.  I don’t know that I’ll get Construction completed in time to get the inspiration for Games & Recreation.  Gonna try, though I don’t want to hold off on that civic too long.  I also need to start considering some chariot builds in order to gear up for knights, just in case.

Cities & Development

I’m at a loss as to where to put a second Campus.  Begin the Begin might work as it has the production but I want to get other things built down there...because it has the production.  Even the Egyptian lands, once conquered, present no good options for anything better than +1, though Beta Colony would support the production for a Library and University.  My only real hope is that something good is available at City #1 or City #2, probably the latter as there are mountains nearby.  Right now what I can see is not promising from a science standpoint.

A Commercial Hub is on tap for Cant and probably City #1.  I might also build one at City #2 and at Harborcoat.  I’d like to get a discount on one or two of them and I’ll chop/charge the others.

Begin the Begin is going to get out a settler after the Eagle Warrior in order to get City #1 settled.  Whether or not Cant will build a settler after its Campus depends on what happens both with Egypt and any developments in the east.  The Egyptian cities, once captured, will probably be the source of my next couple of settlers.  I do need to scout out the lake east of Beta Colony.  With the pearls and horses there that could be a potentially strong city spot

The “Stretch Goal” of landing the Colosseum in the center of my dotmap is still in play.  I’d try to found the city and get walls and a few units prebuilt as close to completion as possible, then go on a chop-overflow spree to pump as many into the Colosseum as possible.  That won’t complete it but I could get about ¾ of the way there.  If I get two horses hooked up I could get a bit closer.  Once that’s done, though, the city would have very little production left.  I’d need three builders to reasonably pull that off, I think. I would flip-flop the position of the district and wonder in my original dotmap, though, as I’d have the city slowly churn out a Monument and a Theater District after that.  Given the game situation, though, I doubt I'd be challenged for it.

War

Egypt is on the chopping block shortly.  Just have to get organized at Welcome to the Occupation and then I get get moving on that.  His military power is 119 – he’s got at least 35 strength of it away from his cities.  Barrayar has a garrison strength of 19, so he’s got a unit in there.  Beta Colony is at 15, no units there.  Neither city has built or started to build any city center improvements or walls.  

In the east Valletta is under declaration by myself and rho21.  I’m just trying to poach some builders and perhaps get a farm pillaged to heal up afterwards. rho21 appears to have stopped his invasion, if that’s even what it was. The units outside the city can’t retreat into it because there’s already a warrior garrisoned.  Valletta only has farms so there’s nothing good to pillage.  It’s also not a good city location as it’s located one tile away from a river.  Gotta love the AI

Once Begin gets its first settler out I'll build out a couple more units to act as a southern defense.  I don't know that Japper has the forces to come at me full strength without leaving himself open to rho21 (or vice versa for that matter).  One possibility would be to bring the Egyptian invasion force forward and take Valletta and/or Brussels, then mass-upgrade most of the Eagle Warriors to swords (most, not all...still want to capture some units, you know).  With a large army in the middle of the map I should be able to hold their attention there.

Meta

If I take out Egypt I will need to be on my toes.  That would give me a large enough of a lead where a 2v1 situation immediately comes into play.  Whether or not rho21 & Japper would be able to coordinate effectively in that case would need to be seen.  As for RFS-81, either he's expecting an invasion and has realized it too late or he truly has no idea what's about to hit him.