April 28th, 2018, 06:56
(This post was last modified: April 28th, 2018, 06:57 by Old Harry.)
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For the potential Astro bulb we need to be careful what we research.
Let's look at the bulb preference list (it's moved to here now - https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/g...es.140952/)
Great Scientist:
Writing - We'll have it
Mathematics - Need to research it
Scientific Method - Don't research Chemistry
Physics - Don't research Scientific Method
Education - Don't research Paper
Printing Press - Don't research Paper
Fiber Optics - Far future
Computers - Far future
Laser (BTS) - Far future
The Wheel - Got it
Alphabet (BTS) - We'll have it
Philosophy - Don't research Code of Laws or Meditation
Chemistry - Don't research Gunpowder
Fission - Far future
Fusion - Far future
Optics - We'll have it
Paper - Don't research Civil Service or Theology
Astronomy - HERE! This one! That's the one we want!
Biology - Who cares?
Electricity - Why am I still making this list?
Flight - I'll just stop now.
Obviously from this point we need Metal Casting (for our cheap forges and happiness), Iron working, Compass, Machinery and Optics to be able to research Astronomy. On top of that we want to hurry to Currency via Writing and Alphabet (we think that Alphabet-Currency saves about six turns over Maths-Currency, but that isn't set in stone.)
We're hoping (neighbours permitting) to get to currency some time around t100, then IW, Compass, Machinery, Optics is probably 15-20 turns after that, so we have some wriggle-room while we wait for our two great scientists to be born (libraries ready t95ish, so the second will be around t130). Any other techs we want along the way?
Completed: RB Demogame - Gillette, PBEM46, Pitboss 13, Pitboss 18, Pitboss 30, Pitboss 31, Pitboss 38, Pitboss 42, Pitboss 46, Pitboss 52 (Pindicator's game), Pitboss 57
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To continue from OH's post:
The defensive struggle kicked us out of our economic snowball and our cities are struggling for happiness with 30/40+ whip unhappiness turns in multiple places. Consequently, we actually had quite limited options when we discussed and simmed our immediate tech path. MC for forge happiness and alpha/currency are must-haves and in the end we concluded that the optimal short-term path will be:
- Struggle into MC supported by our first island city (whip cheap IND forges that give us +2 happiness and allow us to continue growing a bit)
- Struggle into Writing-Alphabet (I truly wanted to skip Alphabet and go via Maths instead, because it does not feel too likely that we get a nice set of OBs going with our neighbors. However, we simply need the capability to build research at this point or this will be the stop for us. We also considered Maths bulb, but that comes a bit too late and as discussed we will have other uses for Great Scientists)
- Get currency supported by research-builds (Currency does not solve our problems, but additional +10-20 commerce is very much needed and wealth-building is probably a must as well to keep us going
So following the immediate economy fixing we see 3 mid-term options techwise:
- Astronomy bulbs as already described by OH. Based on current scouting we are either totally screwed by mapmakers or there is a lot of astro land up for grabs. At this point we might be willing to bet on the later option. We are speculating that in the perfect world this might give us something to work with and at least partially compensate for the fact that we won't be the ones who get to eat an easy non-prepared neighbor and keep the snowball alive that way.
- Civil Service for Buro capital. This is pretty much the basic tool that we need or our economy won't get to next level: Our capital must carry us.
- Military techs. We have a foodhammer lead compared to Toku and OT4E and we could bet on us being able to outpower and outplay those guys hard and being able to eat one of them within the next 50 turns
The discussion is still very much going and it's not totally easy as the options #1 and #2 are very much mutually exclusive. But we have a while to ponder as we are pretty much set for next 25 turns of economy+infra development as the base case if our neighbors allow that / if nothing amazing comes up..
April 28th, 2018, 16:42
(This post was last modified: April 28th, 2018, 16:42 by Old Harry.)
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Turn 75
The Unnamed Empire declared war and offered another ten turns of peace, possibly whilst they concentrate on Elkad. We accepted. It might have been sensible to stay at war to stop them devouring Elkad, but the ten extra turns of peace will give us more time to get our shit back together. Hopefully Elkad will put up a good fight.
War weariness between Toku and Elkad went up from 2 each last turn to 3 each this turn. I can't remember how this works - anyone got a link?
Down south our scout found another neighbour - most likely Superdeath. I'm tempted to move SE next turn to see if there's anything to snipe, probably better to make a friend though so SW-SW instead?
Back home a barbarian spear showed up. We moved our 4xp axe to the forest next to it, so it'll either suicide or move to flat ground. Either way, after next turn we'll have a 5XP axe which can take woody 2 and spy on OT undetected...
Sailing gives us a trade route to William. If we want to sneak attack OT from the sea we need to be careful not to uncover a coastal route to him and warn him we have that tech. We also need to settle our island city on the forest so that he can't see our culture from Hippo's peak. And we need Hippo not to pop it's borders. I wonder why he doesn't have any gold, silver or gems hooked yet?
Demos and power.
Completed: RB Demogame - Gillette, PBEM46, Pitboss 13, Pitboss 18, Pitboss 30, Pitboss 31, Pitboss 38, Pitboss 42, Pitboss 46, Pitboss 52 (Pindicator's game), Pitboss 57
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Turn 76
Our new workboat moves out and reveals more of the island. I'm still pretty sure it is an island, but it's much bigger than we thought. My camera-flying impressions are drawn on. We'll send the work boat around the northern end of the island to see if there are any nice resources to let us settle off the forest. Also we just noticed that Hippo got a barracks eot69, so it's borders will expand eot80 and OT will know we have sailing.
Axe vs spear - 98%...
FLAWLESS WIN!!! (and the axe has 5XP now and can do some espionage work for us.)
Up north this island is also looking pretty nice. I'd guess that each of these islands is supposed to be contested by the neighbours, and has space for a couple of cities, so that crab-sheep-copper city *should* be ours... And with us about to get Metal Casting for Triremes, I don't see why not. 
Bad news in the south, this isn't Superdeath, it's GermanJoey (IMP/PRO Mongolia), which makes our metagame a lot more complex.  It also leads to some questions about the map - have we got a corner plot while OT and Elkad have edge-starts with three neighbours instead of two? Sounds like we got lucky geographically, if not politically...
He's got seven cities to our nine, but with Keshiks and Gers coming on line soon I expect that to change quickly.
He hasn't fought any of his neighbours yet - I expect him to wait until Elkad is worn out from fighting William and swoop in for an easy conquest.
Demos and power
Completed: RB Demogame - Gillette, PBEM46, Pitboss 13, Pitboss 18, Pitboss 30, Pitboss 31, Pitboss 38, Pitboss 42, Pitboss 46, Pitboss 52 (Pindicator's game), Pitboss 57
In progress: Rimworld
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Completed: RB Demogame - Gillette, PBEM46, Pitboss 13, Pitboss 18, Pitboss 30, Pitboss 31, Pitboss 38, Pitboss 42, Pitboss 46, Pitboss 52 (Pindicator's game), Pitboss 57
In progress: Rimworld
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Turn 78
It's kinda funny that our terrible combat luck haunts GJ instead of us (losing Elite only cost us a settler, two axes, several turns that BG couldn't work it's wheat and a bunch of worker turns chopping into the walls and units). This morning OT used the promotions earned against us to burn Living Mountain - GJ's fourth city, settled nearly 30 turns ago, which was size 4, but got 2-whipped when GJ realised what was happening... OT gets the first great general of the game, so he must have won some fights!
We were a bit worried that Rusten had completed Colossus before we had a chance to get some hammers in for failgold, but he must have taken Aesthetics instead of Metal Casting and he grabbed SoZ - very nice from him, he should be a lock for the great library too if he wants it...
I still don't really understand how war weariness works - I think that GJ suffered 19 and OT suffered 2, but it might be the other way around. We can find out how much of OT's stack survived next turn or we can explore deeper into GJ's territory.
Our spy gets a view of Hippo. Nothing to worry about here. There's some loose talk of attacking but we'd lose 3-5 Immortals to take the city, so I'm not convinced it's a good opportunity just yet.
If we were CRE then settling on the hill would be the best move, as it is I think we're going for the forest. We'll fit another city in to the south though, so that'll be nice!
And it's always nice to see neighbours failing to get along! (They're back at war again.  )
An overview of the OT border for planning purposes.
Demos and power.
Completed: RB Demogame - Gillette, PBEM46, Pitboss 13, Pitboss 18, Pitboss 30, Pitboss 31, Pitboss 38, Pitboss 42, Pitboss 46, Pitboss 52 (Pindicator's game), Pitboss 57
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Turn 79
Our wonder failgold plan starts to pay out. Also there are crabs by the copper, so that's going to be a useful city at some point in the future. Our immortal will find out more tomorrow.
OT settled two new cities this turn. Firstly this one which will have stone hooked in the next couple of turns (if OT has masonry). Get a look at this CR3 axe.  Once our current round of immortals is built we should pre-build axes in case these fellahs get sent our way. Our scouting immortal can move to pillage the sheep and get sight on OT's city, but if OT plays before us on t82 then he could poke it full of holes so I'd rather follow the road to try to get more contacts.
Over here the middle of the map has closed, so we're not going to get any more contacts in this direction. Our immortal will move to get sight on Toku's new city next turn (this turn he's saving us unit support cash by moving into borders.) Also of note - you can see the culture of OT's other new city under the unit tooltip in the bottom left of the screen. Meanwhile OT's archer is heading up towards our W2 axe - I think we want to hide him away, right? And perhaps we can gain our next great general using an immortal (which gets 70% even when the archer is on a forest tile) to hit the archer on t82? 
Demos and power. With the island city next turn our food should go up another 7, and with another ~10 gpt from the island city our GNP should get up as high as average.
Completed: RB Demogame - Gillette, PBEM46, Pitboss 13, Pitboss 18, Pitboss 30, Pitboss 31, Pitboss 38, Pitboss 42, Pitboss 46, Pitboss 52 (Pindicator's game), Pitboss 57
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Turn 80
This turn we settled our island city to see how our demos changed. Hippo's borders popped a turn earlier than I thought they would, so OT *should* now know that we have Sailing. While he's pestering GJ I think we should keep the galley where he can see it, if he stops then we should move it away to make him paranoid about attacking us.
Financial advisor before. 
And after we save 2 gold on unit cost and supply, city maintenance goes up 4 and civics go up 2, so our costs only go up by 4gpt. Our income goes up by 14, so Ivan is worth 10 gpt! And Metal Casting is due in four turns. 
Poor Elkad. Toku has continued to Toku. It does mean our immortal can sneak through the gap and try to find out some more info about the world.
Following the road takes us to another of Joey's cities. I presume we can't slip through the gap to the south, so we'll carry on east.
We've got a trade connection to both Joey and OT4E thanks to the immortal exploring the island and the road linking OT to Joey. Joey's connected resources look pretty sad, has he been fighting someone we haven't met yet?
Demos and power.
And we have another new city!
Game: Ivan 'Ironman' Stewart's Super Off Road
Released: 1990
First played: 1990
Personal rating: Brrrrrrrrrmmmmmmmmmmmmm
It turns out that games beginning with I are a bit thin on the ground. Now I did play this game a lot and I loved it, but I never bought it - I had a free level from an Amiga Power coverdisk, and decided that I'd never be able to afford the actual game and just played the demo to death instead. That counts though, right?
If you've played Micro Machines or Mario Kart you'll have a feel for the breathless always-accelerating gameplay and the number of times you bounced off the walls and opponents ending up facing the wrong way, cursing and losing.
It's not my favourite game of all time, but it's definitely my favourite game beginning with I. I just wish city names could be a bit longer in Civ.
Completed: RB Demogame - Gillette, PBEM46, Pitboss 13, Pitboss 18, Pitboss 30, Pitboss 31, Pitboss 38, Pitboss 42, Pitboss 46, Pitboss 52 (Pindicator's game), Pitboss 57
In progress: Rimworld
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Thank you for the game review. I played that game to death on the Super Nintendo. Never knew the name, or maybe just mistook it for being called simply 'Off Road'.
Good luck with the game. Looking forward to further cities.
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Both OT4E and Toku have now razed cities from their southern neighbors. Let's hope their focus remains in the south for now.. That would be very welcome and definitely something I was not expecting 10 turns ago.