the adventures of cool guy boak

[boak]

hello!  welcome to my thread. here's my start:



we've typically played on rtr 2.0.8.3 so i still need to go over the changes in this version before I figure out who I want to play but my favourite traits are PRO, CRE, SPI and sometimes FIN and my favourite civ is probably the Dutch.

as I mentioned in the startup thread, this will be only my second realms beyond pitboss and my first was where i subbed in for someone halfway through, so please let me know if there's any critical meta information i've missed!

[boak]

ok so here are my initial thoughts after reading through the changelog

Nothing hugely stands out in the traits, it seems reasonably close to what i'm used to with 2.0.8.3.

Civs:

- America: armouries seem like insanely good value? assuming the bonuses listed there are in addition to the +3 XP of the base building.
- Babylon: really cheap granaries seem extremely useful if it were paired with a strong rexxing leader. will definitely consider this.
- Dutch: dikes are basically extra finance instead of hammers and replace customs houses... not sure how i feel about this
- England: free amphibious rifles sounds insane and picking them kind of forces everyone to pay more attention to their coastal cities... this seems an interesting pick
- Ethiopia: i can't even count how many times having even one unit with sentry has been a life saver for me in previous pitbosses. having a whole bunch get it for free should mean nothing catches me by surprise
- Germany: strength 14 grenadiers with formation feel like it'd keep you super safe in the rifle/cav era when lots of people are at war
- Holy Roman Empire: this looks like the ultimate pairing for a PRO leader with either CRE/EXP/IMP to just rex like crazy and turtle up. my last pitboss I played (and won with) CRE/PRO and felt like i was impenetrable so this is a pretty attractive choice
- Japan: maces at machinery would be a pretty devastating play
- Khmer: not sure if i'm reading this right, but they will always attack mounted units first outside of cities, and can be used to create barays? does this consume the unit?
- Native America: seems kind of underwhelming. also same question as above, does creating totem poles consume the unit?
- Sumeria: cheap courthouses at writing are another really solid rexing tool
- Vikings: only a subtle change but i really like it. amphibious attacks are always really fun to pull off

civics appear unchanged from 2.0.8.3

[boak]

GeneralKilCavalry has decided to join me on this adventure, which is good because it'll force me to document more about what i'm doing and what my thought process is.

i've been thinking a little more about picks and i think i've narrowed it down to a few choices, however all of these choices might (or will) change after seeing some of the other picks.

I think my fallback/safety pick will probably be HRE with PRO/CRE or PRO/IMP. i really enjoyed my last pitboss as PRO/CRE netherlands and i feel like this would be a super safe pick. However, I do like to try and mix things up and try something newish each pitboss, so i'd like to try something else.

England is definitely up there pretty much solely because it will force everyone to really pay attention to their coastline. First instinct was to go FIN/x but I think in this version of RTR Fin won't get a bonus to the UB. So instead i was thinking pairing AGG with something else. Vikings are also on my list for the same reason.

I've always wanted to play AGG/CHA in a pitboss, and if I decide to do this it'll likely be with america or japan for ridiculous XP units

if all of these get picked or aren't [practical for whatever reason, i'd still be happy with any of sumeria, ethiopia, germany or babylon

[Krill]

All banks and the SE should get the fin bonus.

[GeneralKilCavalry]

Glad to be joining.

I have no experience with RtR whatsoever, so I decided to fire it up and test a few things out.

Khmer, Byzantium, Korea, all seem very powerful right off the bat. constructing buildings with units is strange, to say the least. Wang Kon's Hwachas feel like the ghost of civ 3 past - very scary. Byzantium seems to be king of medieval warfare - those trebs will absolutely obliterate invading stacks.

Judging by that start, any combination of agri, hunting, mining seems to be what we need in terms of starting techs. Love the huge amount of forests.

Reading your thoughts, Boak, Holy Rome/Japan look decent (HRE courthouse maybe not as important on monarch as on immortal/emperor). The Khmer UU does get consumed, but effectively you can pump out the unit in 5 cities for 60 hammers each and spread it around, instead of building the building for 80.

I'm not a fan of the creative trait, and if anything the lack of 100% bonus on libraries makes it feel nerfed. The granaries make protective a decent enough choice, but nowhere near first pick zone.

Expansive seems great, however. 35% worker AND workboat production? Sign me up. Working 2 hammers + base hammer gives a bonus hammer on any worker or work boat production, compared to needing 4 in base game. Very nice stuff. Cheaper Aqueducts makes me want a synergy with IND to rush Hanging Gardens. Exp/Ind with Rome, Ottomans or Inca (Always inca) would be great.

A first impression trait tier list for RtR.
Top: EXP, FIN
Good: PHI (As if it wasn't pretty good already), ORG, IND (because marble/stone are less overpowered now. depends on how many civs are IND- the fewer the more powerful)
Mediocre: IMP, CHA, CRE (2 extra happiness is huge early game)
Meh: SPI, AGG, PRO


My perception of the game is geared towards "what do I need for when I hit civil service and code of laws". I feel like you tend to look at the game 40 turns after that. In any case, my picking is heavily skewed by only ever playing base BTS, so more than likely my suggestions are pretty inaccurate.

[boak]

so it's our pick, i want to pick a civ first and leave our leader pick until last. I'd forgotten to consider starting techs when i went over the change list, but if we want Agri/Mining/Hunting, here are the civs that have two of those:

China, Ethiopia, Germany, Khmer, Korea, Native America, Persia, Russia and Zulu - of these, Germany and Korea are the standouts for me.

Of the civs that only have one of those techs (pretty much all of the remaining civs), I'm liking America, England, Japan (already picked) and Vikings.

So it's really down to whether i want to pick an obviously aggressive pick (Vikings, America and sort of England) to pair with something like AGG or CHA, or start with two immediately useful techs. I feel like two useful techs aren't super important, our first worker won't be idle either way (unless we go EXP, maybe... i still need to sim). After my previous pitboss being very "turtley" i did want to play something a little more aggressive... so I think i'm going to go for either America or Vikings...

I'm going to take another 15-20 mins to think about it before I lock it in. GKC let me know if you have any thoughts?

[GeneralKilCavalry]

I think if we decide to play more aggressively, vikings are a perfect choice. Big and small is unpredictable, and there will be island fighting. However, I do think that since the vikings do not confer any economic advantages, we need to lock in some powerful dev traits.

[boak]

I think if we decide to play more aggressively, vikings are a perfect choice. Big and small is unpredictable, and there will be island fighting. However, I do think that since the vikings do not confer any economic advantages, we need to lock in some powerful dev traits.

yeah definitely. i was thinking exp/org or something. i'm guessing (hoping?) the exp bonus to work boats stacks with the trading post

[boak]

or even agg/exp. also since we pick near the end we can maybe grab an IND leader if nobody else picks one

[boak]

ok so the leaders picked currently are

Kublai - CHA/CRE - MSCC
Sury - CRE/EXP - superdeath
Mehmed - EXP/ORG - Borsche
Willem - CRE/FIN - Mr Cairo

three CREs is kind of unexpected but two EXP sounds about right, i think that'll be pretty strong. I was heavily considering Mehmed for our pick but looks like Borsche already snapped him up (the coward). So here's what i'm thinking:

Washington - CHA/EXP
Bismark - IND/EXP
Napolean - ORG/CHA
Roosevelt - ORG/IND

Bismark seems like the ideal leader to expand really quickly and make a play for an early HG for a bunch of free population before teching to berserkers and murdering someone. Washington would set us up for a pretty powerful early game and if we actively invest in the extra XP from CHA we could be really threatening later on. Napolean and Roosevelt both give us cheaper Trading Posts on top of all the other bonuses of ORG.

Overall, with this many CRE leaders in the game I feel like I really want to have EXP to ensure if I can have plenty of workers chopping out settlers and if I do lose out on land then i'll be able to maximise the yield from what i've got. If someone had already picked IND that'd make Washington a no-brainer, i think, but s ince it's still open i'll have to think about grabbing it...

I'll lock in a pick in 20 or so. Let me know if anyone has any feedback on my thought process thus far?