41 Vice: Commodicator/Pindore

[Commodore]

Now let's micro out the timing attack. Beginning Guilds next turn.

Will you have the plan ready in time for a big T150 report? 

Yes, I think so. Might even begin moving around then.

The golden age draws to a close, and I'm overall pretty happy with how things look:

Two dozen cities, lots of mints, galleons coming out, finally free of all happiness shackles, and vassalage giving good promotions. Let's see the demo damage when we pop out next turn.

[Mardoc]

Let's see the demo damage when we pop out next turn.

I'll be especially curious about your demos compared to eight turns ago right before entering the GA.  How much have you managed to boost your stats by boosting your happy caps and adding in multipliers?

You still have a settler in production: where to? Are you going to continue to build settlers or have you switched focus to acquiring land by ?

You still have Hindu missionaries in production.  I take it you feel you have a decent chance of getting that shrine yet? Or that changing course would be too expensive just to deny income to Donovan/Gavagai?

Why the caravel at Morton?

[pindicator]

I can take a stab at some of these:

As Commodore can confirm, i am constantly hounding him to push out more settlers. Personally i wish we had just taken a round and pumped out like 6 or 7 right before the GA, but our empire has lots of demands and we've had to juggle that need against several other things. Now we're really going to want to put our more mature and productive cities on Galleon and later Longbow and Knight production (maybe a few swords even). With that reality to contend with, Commodore and i had a good talk today about moving the settler burden over to the more marginal cities. Breckinridge is going to change from its Wealth to slowly building a settler at 7hpt,but only after it grows another point. Wilson, our poor double gold city that's been at size 3 for like 50 turns, is going to abandon the futile lighthouse and use its last forest to chop a settler out. The settler in the screenshot is being built by a city on Silver Island to fill in one of the cheap locations near the FP site of Stevenson. And Clinton has a settler almost finished in its queue that we'll send north to claim the Barbary Islands on the way to DZ (but after that we probably turn Clinton into a unit pump).

So the answer is that we will continue to settle, but at a reduced pace because the emphasis is to be on the upcoming invasion of DZ.

We are still staying Hindu. It isn't clear if we'll be able to grasp the Hindu Shrine or if Gav will beat us to it. I'm not sure if we don't want to dedicate a more productive city to missionaries or not though. Some of that is going to depend on which cities are building units and which cities still need OR for their infrastructure.

Caravel at Morton is because we don't trust naufrager and don't want to spend as many hammers if the unit isn't too travel far / don't want to alarm any more than us jumping ahead of 2nd place by 200pts already has.

[Mardoc]

Thanks, pindicator!

So the answer is that we will continue to settle, but at a reduced pace because the emphasis is to be on the upcoming invasion of DZ.

So your war expansion is getting in the way of your peaceful expansion.  I can see how that's a tradeoff open for debate .

Four settlers in the current plan: how does that compare to the number of sites you have dotmapped?  Are you going to have to keep the debate alive or does that finish off the peaceful sites?

We are still staying Hindu. It isn't clear if we'll be able to grasp the Hindu Shrine or if Gav will beat us to it. I'm not sure if we don't want to dedicate a more productive city to missionaries or not though. Some of that is going to depend on which cities are building units and which cities still need OR for their infrastructure.

Yeah, was just curious given that this was an earlier debate.  

Caravel at Morton is because we don't trust naufrager and don't want to spend as many hammers if the unit isn't too travel far / don't want to alarm any more than us jumping ahead of 2nd place by 200pts already has.

So it's a sentry?

[pindicator]

The 4 settlers plus capturing the two barbarian cities will bring us up to 30. After that we have 3 more good spots and 4 filler locations that probably aren't worth grabbing until we get into Mercantilism.

I think the debate needs to stay alive because Donovan Zoi's Wonderland is just so much better than anything we can settle. But in addition it is going to bring us in direct contact with Gavagai this game and we do not expect him to be a good neighbor.

And yeah, the Caravel is going to effectively be a sentry

[Commodore]

Here's a bit of illustration of our current thinking:

Pindicator:Once we get Guilds how fast can we get a dozen knights together?
We definitely don't want Gav getting that entire landmass
Commodore:Sounds like we need it.
Pindicator:Well alternative is taking the islands and El Pindore Norte then coming in with frigates after Chemistry
But oof, that canal Christian city gives him direct access to our seas
We could burn DZ cities if things start to look bad
This is all backup planning in case we can't take the DZ core, that's still the main goal
Maybe we need to send a galleon between DZ and Gav to spy
Commodore:The trouble with that canal city is that it's always just one settler away from being a thing.
Looping the chariot north to spy on the Gav/DZ front.
I'd rather neither one think about our galleons until we start hitting DZ
Pindicator:Ok, then the defensive move is to take the canal city ourselves
If it looks like Gav is making progress by land that will complicate the war for him and make him approach by water
Commodore:Which means we want CG3 longbows.
Pindicator:Yeah
I suspect he'll approach by water anyway.
He should with EI
But we want to control that city regardless.
Commodore:Lake Commodicator needs security!
Pindicator:Exactly. My thinking is in our pole position we want to minimize threats
Let's put Breckinridge on a slow building settler. I think that's a better investment than wealth
I was going to do that after it hits 7, seemed a waste not to have it hit that.
Commodore:Ooh
Routing the galley south, it's snag a Wallace worker to chop those forests.
Pindicator:That would be great. A workshop would help that city a lot too
Commodore:Yup.
Then the worker can get to poor Steve
Pindicator:Oh definitely. Maybe Breckenridge should even do a worker first. That's a lot of work for just one worker
Commodore:Enough forests are at Curtis to chop another settler, although I was thinking mint, that's going to be a nice production site.
Pindicator:Do the mint. We'll get settlers out of these lesser cities
Like Wilson. Settler is probably better there than a lighthouse that gets us to 1fpt
Commodore:If we're in a hurry, though, maybe chop a knight, couple that with some out of Dallas for a couple of galleons' worth?
Pindicator:Next turn when we're out of the GA we'll have to calculate how many knights we can get out after Guilds. If we don't like that number then we chop units I think
Reading Krill's reports, he does a good job of getting settlers out of marginal cities. Easier with the whip, but it got me thinking about how to get settlers for us
Commodore:Yeah, we are at 24 cities now.
Looks like 7 more good to settle, 2 barbs to capture, 4 fillers.
Pindicator:So that gets us to 37
Commodore:4 in green El Pindore Norte
3 in the Wonderland
1 in the Hidden Island
Pindicator:Atlantis, that one
Commodore:I like it.
Pindicator:I have had more fun naming things in this game than most lol
Commodore:Except for the weirdness of Superdeath's location, this has been an excellent map.
Pindicator:I'm looking forward to seeing more of it
Commodore:Me too.
Also morbidly curious to see what the CIty of Grass there on Barbary looks like. Next turn.
Pindicator:I hope these spots are at least size 2 by now since they haven't popped borders
Commodore:Both are foodless. Man that's a sad island.
Pindicator:Yeah. Actually if they are still at size 1 do we just let them sit until they grow or we have a settler ready?
Commodore:West is at least 2
Pulled Wilson to settler. 12t
*with a chop
Pindicator:That seems like a good timetable for a filter city
Although I wouldn't put it past us to find a bigger need and reroute it lol
Commodore:Awkward to reroute.
Pindicator:Yeah. I think Wilson just keeps making settlers until Gold Island and then the southern filler cities of the mainland are all settled
Commodore:20t per settler.
Pindicator:Huh, maybe workers then
Commodore:Lighthouse, then grow, then 9hpt
Pindicator:That actually makes it more realistic at 11t
Maybe we pump missionaries there after the settler is chopped out?
Commodore:Sure, while growing
Pindicator:That's going to take 13t to grow anyway so we should be able to get a couple out
Commodore:It's such a nice little corner pocket place
Pindicator:Do we try to get an observatory at King next? Or keep pushing Galleons for now?
Commodore:I think Observatory
Pindicator:Ha, I had just convinced myself Galeon
Commodore:We can slam them out very fast in Hamlin, Burr, and Gerry too
Pindicator:That's good then
Commodore:Not as nice as +100%, but still very nice.
+85% with OR/mint
That's well worth it.
Pindicator:Well, maybe we still hold off because this is our big unit push for the war. Then after things kick off we slot in the infra
Commodore:I was just wondering if we should do that
Gerry's halfway done
But get those knights prebuilt now.
Pindicator:Yeah, but there's also a need for longbows and maybe a few swords
Commodore:Once we pop out of the GA, we'll have all the timing we need to completely map out our attack and subsequent defense against EIs.
If we take DZ's capital, is there a world where Gavagai is ever at peace with us?
Pindicator:Ha, I think you could also just ask that question without the qualifier
Commodore:Well, this world exists.
Pindicator:I think once we're neighbors Gav is going to be hostile at peace at best
Commodore:Think if he's in Wonderland that he'll be at least defensively set?
Pindicator:If we can grab Atlantis and Pindore Norte he's going to have to commit a lot to defend those cities
Commodore:Feels like maybe we need to plan to conquer or at least beat down Gavagai savagely. Unless we can negotiate a tense MAD.
Pindicator:Well, if Gav ends up leashing in Cairo I don't want to stop that
Commodore:Right. Wherever Cairo is.
Pindicator:Has to be between BGN and Gav, no?
Commodore:They share enough of a border to have been in a turn split a long while back.
So if we "give" him Wonderland but take Atlantis and El Pindore Norte...we think he stands down during the EI window?
With that standard assumption that he hates us but he won't throw away his game if there's still a chance.
Pindicator:I think we may just get to Frigates by then anyway. It's going to take time to capture all that
Commodore:Really?
Pindicator:20t still the mark?
Commodore:Because I wasn't joking when I said I expect DZ to be dead by 160
Pindicator:Ugh, well I don't see it being a good border unless we control that canal city
Commodore:If we're going gangbusters on units, Chemistry is going to take a while.
Atlantis threatens Wonder City really well.
Pindicator:I still think we try to take it.
We hit the canal city and Atlantis at the onset and if we can get Wonderland then great. Otherwise dig in and go for Pindore Norte
Commodore:Yeah, should be easy to claim Pindore Norte anyway.
Small cities, hard to whip a lot.
Pindicator:Are knights it swords better for attacking off the boat? Especially since we get 2+ swords for every knight
Commodore:12 strength
Vs. hard-to-say.
Probably best to go C2, so 7.2
Pindicator:What happened to that Cyneheard combat spreadsheet
Commodore:Basically, knights freaking annihilate the low-base-strength ancient stuff DZ is rocking.
Once you get to classic stuff and longbows/crossbows, swords might be more efficient.
Pindicator:That Holy City is at 60%?
And that makes sense, I think that's what I've been thinking
Commodore:So, gritting teeth and bearing it.
EIs aren't frigates.
We can 2:1 them fairly reliably.
We just need to have twice as many galleons as Gav builds EIs.
Pindicator:Yeah, we should be able to out produce him
Commodore:2:1 very prettily with flanking.
Outproduce? Easy. Challenge is 2:1
Protective muskets would make me a lot happier…
I was going to ask about Rusten, but Gavagai as a prayer will dogpile, Rusten wont.
Pindicator:If I thought that DZ could hold his own I'd suggest we leave him as a buffer... But that isn't likely

tl;dr, we're extremely aware of World #2 Power Gavagai, who's entering his last best era of potential motion. Until we have Frigates, we're outclassed pretty badly; good thing that we're going to be double-bulbing Chemistry on a beeline. Think the game is pretty much down to between Rusten and us for the win...but Gavagai isn't going to be easy to pacify without rock-solid borders stuffed full of Pro muskets.

[Lewwyn]

If you conquer everything, you have no borders. 

[pindicator]

Economy still needs some work... but demos look really good.




Guilds in 7, or there abouts. We're losing cash at 30%, so instead of observatories perhaps we really need to be sprinkling in markets and courthouses? Or perhaps we just want to take a detour to Banking?

Nobody else has Guilds yet. We might be the first. So conquering DZ also seems like a great way to get the economy going.

[pindicator]

Observatories vs Markets:

Assuming a city with forge and OR...

Market is 150h at 150% or 100 real production.
Observatory is 150h at 185% or 82 real production.

So at what point in the slider is a market better than an observatory if we're going on a strict hammer to GNP gained conversion? Solve for x, which is the slider percentage of science:
[code]
x / 82 = (1 - x) / 100
100x = 82(1 - x)
100x = 82 - 82x
182x = 82
x = 82 / 182 = ~45%

So if our slider is under 45% we should emphasize markets, if it's over then observatories. In general.

EDIT: In fact, if you substitute in libraries you find that we should be building marketplaces over libraries. Library at 90h and +85% production translates into 49 real production. If you substitute 49 in for 82 in the above equation then it comes out to 33% being the threshold. We're not too far off from that right now but we're somewhere around 27%

[Zed-F]

That’s mostly relevant for your 4-5 main commerce cities, right? How do markets compare to courthouses in cities that don’t yet have them?