[SPOILERS]PB46: (In Search of) Fine Foreign Dining, by Hannibal of England

[Krill]

Turn 053




Maybe it's tunnel vision, but I want the barb warrior dead so I can fog bust the entire south and then only have to deal with one avenue of barb invasion. I think I can fog bust the entire south with these two warriors and the scout, if that barb warrior doesn't get a lucky win.

I'm going to have to double whip the settler at size 5 though due to carrying an additional whip unhappy (there is 1 unhappy face that will not work a 1/1/1 unimproved grass river hill) and then I can get a warrior eot61 from overflow, and then whip the lighthouse T63. Also, now paying 1gpt for units outside borders.

[Krill]

Perfect game broken!

Libraries need 6 hammers invested before being double shippable, not 5. This delays fish hookup by a single turn.

[Krill]

Turn 054

As stated above, the whip rounding error seems to appear this turn. This mistake is entirely avoidable: I built a warrior last turn and should not have. OTOH, despite this being a known bug, it is still a bug IMO: A double whip gives 50 base hammers, and there are +35% production modifiers on libraries for FIN and CHM. Therefore the 50 base hammers becomes an adjusted 85 to complete teh library, and with 5 hammers invested it should be whippable this turn. So I think it's fair to say it's a bug, but if I had ran an accurate simulation this far in advance I'd have seen it and avoided it.

The cost is 4 lost food on T60, but it's slightly more complex than that. WT will regrow to size 4 eot58, and I have to double whip a worker because I do not have enough hammers invested to whip a lighthouse, and whilst I could go straight into a settler (ie grow to size 6), I would have no workers in place to support the new city.

That means I would have to build a worker on T59 and T60 anyway, so in reality the delay seems to cost hammer overflow into that lighthouse, but the hammers that I would dump into the lighthouse would in fact be dumped into a further build once the lighthouse is whipped, so I'm not even sure when the hammer cost is realized: it would not become apparent until I was something like 4 hammers short of finishing a build. As it is, on T61 I will hook the fish, whip 2 pop and finish the worker at 71/60 rather than 75/60 and then on T62 dump the hammers into the lighthouse; so long as I can get the lighthouse to over 10 hammers and make it double whippable it's enough. There is another idea of growing straight to size 6 and triple whip a lighthouse. FWIW, in this scenario it is a 4 food loss and would delay growth to size 6 by a turn, and the whip counter resets to 0, so..I'll look at this more closely, but I need the workers.

I will lose 3 commerce on T60 though, due to not working thee fish. Frankly this is nothing more than a rounding error to me: I'm paying 1gpt due to having an additional warrior outside my borders due to barbs, it's just a cost that has to be paid. I don't see the commerce loss as anything more than incidental, luck with barbs would save more gold than not using the fish for one turn.




Forgive the bare grassland being worked. It was not expected to be.





I'm taking the 10% chance of a loss, but I'll have a warrior in place to clean up if the barb wins. If my guy wins, then the northern warriors heads to the western fish location, the damaged warrior heals in place until border pops (or there about) and then moves onto the plains hill forest to stop barb galleys spawning, and the scout just...scouts and barb busts as the terrain dictates.

I'm not certain about this though, but barbs move at the start of thee turn, so theoretically if that barb dies next turn, a new barb can't spawn until the turn rolls into T56 so I do have a little leeway in resetting the barb busting to affect that spawn. Ideally it would spawn a long way away from me but you never know...

And a wheat! A 6 food WHEAT! That plains hill location looks pretty decent, if there is any food to the SW of that scout then there will be an easy two cities crammed in down here I'm counting 4 decent city locations (1S of copper, 2E of sheep, 1E of wheat, something around the hill 2W of the wheat) and a filler 1W of the sheep (it can pick up 2 unneeded lighthouse lakes and the sheep and would have an easy 5 land tiles and some coast worth working, so not a shabby location).





Granary going down, library next. Avoid growth T55, grow eot56, take wheat T57, growth@3 eot59, Library whip T60. I already have 9 units (2 scouts, 4 warriors, 3 workers), and I'll finish a work boat and two further warriors in the next 7 turns. I'm still of the opinion the border pop is going to be helpful in pushing out the fog busters and make it safer to settle the horse city, and I will want to beaker modifiers: I am going to cottage the 4 grasslands and work them.

I reckon a 2 pop whip of a worker, dump the overflow and then 1 pop whip a further worker, and regrow to max size is an acceptable play here: grow on an axe or three, which is only useful against barb warriors and archers. Possibly triple whip a settler depending on how the happy timer works out, compared to the mines being complete: I am most probably going to give the wheat back to Westminster and then trade the fish over to the City 6 location, and I need Owlthorpe capped out and working three grass mines (oh look, precisely three grass hills available that can't be shared).

There are too many moving parts at the moment. Whips T60, T66 and T71 but then it's about how we get the 16 worker turns worth of cottages and 49 worker turns worth of hill mines (and two forest chops) down with...6 workers. See the problem?





Oh yeah, and Judaism fell. Rusten, Borsche, BeardBeard or Elkad, the only players to get a tech. That means GKC and Pindicator are not in a position to contest the Theology bulb. Might we find ourselves with the first turn order enforced by a potential bulb? In reality, BeardBeard could be the troll here, but whilst it would be hilarious if he had a double holy city and then a third holy city, all to pop borders, I don't think it is him, he got a tech 6 turns prior. Rusten got his tech in 5 turns, Borsche in 8 turns and Elkad in 5.

Borsche seems about right, but Rusten has been getting techs fast: techs eot43, 45, 47?! And he was one of the players that might have gotten Polytheism, and he is SPI, so he could swap between religions as required to abuse OR, use the happy and pop borders depending on what spreads passively. If he already had Polytheism, then there is no indicator form the previous techs: he could have researched Archery to overflow into Monotheism. Borsche feels more like a slow tech of Writing on the way to Currency, Rustens' play feels more like grabbing religion at an opportune time because he just grabbed the techs he needs.

[Krill]

Lurker question: Please can a lurker confirm if barbs move before or after production resolves, ie if a barb is adjacent to a city that finishes a unit at turn roll, does the unit get built before the barb can attack, or does the barb walk into an empty city?

[RefSteel]

Lurker question: Please can a lurker confirm if barbs move before or after production resolves, ie if a barb is adjacent to a city that finishes a unit at turn roll, does the unit get built before the barb can attack, or does the barb walk into an empty city?

In simultaneous pitboss, production completes at the end of turn, and only afterward do barbs (and any AI-controlled civs) move - at the beginning of the new turn. So the unit completes before the barb has a chance to attack.

[Krill]

Turn 55

It looks like this game does not want me to build libraries. First off all that production and whip bug, now a new barb warrior has turned up NW of Owlthorpe.








I wanted confirmation regarding the order of resolution, because if it was barb movement before production I needed to whip a warrior and I’d lose 10 hammers, and I’d be stuck with a size 1 city working a plains cow. As it is, I can retreat Cavendish and I will finish a warrior in Owlthorpe immediately before the barb warrior could attack, so even with only 30% odds of victory against my warrior I will still have the opportunity to dry wipe a further warrior if needed. I would much prefer the barb suicides into Warrior2 on the forest, but as the city is empty I expect it to beeline Owlthorpe. There is another weird potential, which is the barb could move NE, because next turn I will have a worker on the copper, and ultimately this is why I’ve left Warrior2 fortified in place: I may need to use him to defend the workers. Theoretically a fourth move is that the barb wanders back into the fog, if this happens Warrior2 ends up “Chasing” him as I would be readjusting the  barb-busting next turn as the workers barb-bust the north.

Owlthorpe is probably still going to whip a library, but…I can’t make it whippable until Owlthorpe reaches size 4 if it has to finish the warrior first, but I want to start the whip counter sooner: if the barb crashes into the city, it doesn’t matter what I want. I’ll have to review this on a turn by turn basis.





The southern barb warrior managed to get 3 hits in and then died, so I’m quite happy there. Moving the warrior down ASAP, as I forgot it already had 1XP so it can promote heal next turn and cover more tiles for barb-busting purposes. The scout will have the entirety of the south that can be mapped by a land unit discovered on T57 and then a full barb-busting net should be in place by T59. It might look weird that I'm dedicating more units down south, but the reality is I will need to use real units to clear barbs to the west and north, and I will also need units in those areas to deal with real people later on anyway. I've just got to get from this point to that point without significant cost.

I’ve already discovered a grass sheep, so I know there is enough food for two cities down here. I’m not worried about scouting the tiles that may contain seafood: the dot map will cover them anyway so it’s not like I’m neglecting that potential. It’s a little bit sad that this is an area that I have no competition for, yet it has such good food potential, but I look forward to the challenge of trying to balance expansion into this, hopefully perfectly barb-busted area, against expanding towards TBW’s Rome with unstoppable Praetorian and axemen (you see the point of needing real units to the north rather than just fog busters?), and also grabbing the western isthmus.





The micro for the capital is a bit painful now, but…it’s the barb payment. Eot55 OF 4 hammers, work boat complete for WT fish (1 turn too fast now). T56, size 5 with 1 unhappy pop, build settler, 14fhpt gives 18 hammers. T57 give over the wheat and work fish/rice/2 forests for 11 fhpt. Same output T58, T59 workers chop city 4 location giving 8 hammers to Westminster and lose an unhappy face as whip anger wears off but no tile to work, therefore eot59 settler 59/100. T60 whip settler, 119/100. T61 build warrior, 22/15 and settle city 4. EoT62 build lighthouse 10/60 and growth@4, T63 whip lighthouse. Copper is hooked T62, so the warrior has to be built with overflow hammers.

Looking ahead, this puts Westminster at size 2 with a food box around 15/24 with a food surplus of +8 once the lighthouse completes eot63, so growth back to size 4 occurs eot64 still (just about, I’ve run the numbers with minimum food needed to grow to size 5 this turn it just about works out). But at that point, despite having a warrior to sit in the city for happiness there will be 3 whip unhappy (wears off eot58, eot68 etc). I think ivory is hooked around T67 as well, so on T65 I’m looking at a capital that is at the happy cap and would actually grow into unhappiness just as the ivory could be hooked. I’m also unsure when I could even get the silver hooked: ignore getting a settler, just the worker turns would take until T71 just to get the roads down with a single worker. So I reckon I have to plan for a happy cap of 4 then rising to 6, and Westminster would get there eot68 and then be stuck with…a dry rice, lighthouse fish and nothing else other than coast but I could get a further 3 hills mined pretty quickly. Or maybe chop another worker? I don’t need to decide now, I have a further 12 turns to work out how to use Westminster appropriately.





Discussed yesterday. Just double checking happiness situation: I think I need a warrior at size 5? But it doesn’t matter if I’m building a worker at size 4, and I could theoretically overflow out from the worker to complete the warrior anyway (I think I’m missing a few hammers, and I want it building to stop hammer decay). Doesn’t matter too much. 6 turns building the library, 3 turns on a worker, hammers shouldn’t decay at all. I can’t see a settler out of here before T70 (rough calculation: lighthouse whip T65, settler whip T74…I really don’t want to whip that worker, the happiness is a massive issue.

Really, I need to find a way to shove a settler out by T70 and manage the worker needs. The obvious play is settler instead of lighthouse at Westminster, but I don't know how I feel about that. There is a possible solution involving forest chops though, but...I need to time that with Maths coming in. I can see a shape...





Maths is 17 turns at present, but that will change. 415 beaker tech, from T57 I will make 25 base bpt, which will be 30 adjusted beakers. T61 that will go up to 27 base with city4 settled (need a name) and easily available lakes at WT. Would I be able to restart tech on T57 with 60 gold in the bank and make it last? I doubt it. Probably need a further turn of saving gold, especially with moving workers out of my borders to prep city 4. OTOH, two lighthouse whips would suggest that in the late T60's I should be pushing past 40 base bpt if I wanted, so from T66 to T70, at max tech I should generate over to 200 adjusted beakers. I reckon I could force Maths by T70? That worker from WT would be able to mine the grass river hill and chop/mine the grass forest hill to land perfectly, and I could also land the other chop as well...hmmm. Yes. This can work. 4 workers at the capital to mine what I need, and two workers from Owlthorpe in position to road to horse site. And the Westminster able to build a galley for an island city from WT whip central.

[Krill]

Jesus sometimes the paranoia about barb movements is completely justified.

[GermanJoey]

Turn 051

I was rushing the last turn report, so I don't think I explained myself particularly well. Then again, I've been trying to write a short passage that explains the point I'm trying to make succinctly for the past week and failing, so being rushed isn't the true reason I was fucking up.

Basically: the demographics are only a measure of whom has the best land, and has, IMO, very little to do with skill.

There is no way for me to have any idea of who is playing well or not. I can only judge my play with hindsight. I think I've played the map as well as could be: so far, whilst I've made mistakes, it has only been in unit positioning and has not been measurable in output so far.

The reason I think this is because, well, the map is the map. There is no reason complaining about anything, just focus on the map and how to overcome whatever obstacles it throws up. There are no reasonable complaints that could be made, with one exception.

I think it's just not as applicable to compare to players in the world on a big map like this because every player will end up with different challenges. Like, on one hand, our start is insanely slow. On the other hand, it looks like we have a ridiculous amount of land to expand into, and, IIRC, from the number of tiles per player here, I'm guessing we're above average in this regard. So, we might be slower early, but it's a hell of a lot cheaper to expand via settlers than expand via knights. Likewise, although demographic stats at T50 will not correlate with player skill, I think it's much more likely that demographics at T115 will, at least more-so. IMHO, much like lusher maps are more naturally self-balancing than sparser maps, bigger maps are more naturally self-balancing than tighter maps. (the tradeoff, of course, is that 9 months from now you'll be needing to spend two hours to play every turn).

The one place where huge map self-balancing doesn't apply so much is with stuff like wonders, religions, and Liberalism. There, the players with faster starts have an advantage that we can't really match.

Good job we picked Hannibal of England then...

BTW Joey, you got any thoughts on great people usage? I keep on coming back to double bulbing Astro just because it's the highest beaker output and should buy us the time to grab Banking afterwards.

Hmmm, good question. Considering up to the end of the medieval era... T150 or so?

First of all, what non-GA Great People do we want? I think at least 1 for bulbing into Astro, maybe 2 depending on the tech situation. Let's call that 1 to 2... which could be pumped via Serfdom/Caste mass-hired scientists during the second GA. Do we need an artist for a bomb? No, with this land, that seems highly unlikely. A Great Prophet? Again, unlikely. Even if we land a religion somehow, it wouldn't be spread very much to make an early shrine worth it. (maybe later) An Academy? LOL, hell no. A Great Engineer... well, if we could get one by, lets say T115-T120 or so, I think rushing the TGL would be great. However, that would mean we'd need a forge online by about T81 or so, which seems unlikely. Another very good wonder for this land would be the AP. I think we could bet on the AP falling a bit later than TGL, perhaps T125 or so? A forge by T90 seems a little more do-able here.

We'd also want about 2 GAs by the end of this era. Call this 2 more scientists and 1 more of something else.

IMHO, due to our slower growth and the fact that we need to settle so widely, I think we'll want to throw the first GA relatively late in order to get anything significant out of the GA tile bonus... perhaps even throwing GAs 1 and 2 back-to-back. Perhaps beelining Machinery to get mass windmills up ASAP would be a good idea in that case? And then time the first GA so that we can switch into serfdrom before it ends? A later first-GA does align well with an early GE, FWIW.

Assuming a GE for a first great person, the best possible timing would be something like:

T90: start GE
T124: GE ready, GP1, GP2, and GP3 at 99/100
T136: GP1 ready (via mixed pool), throw first GA; GP2 and GP3 at 198/200
T142: GP2 ready, GP3 at 297/300
T144: GP3 ready, throw second GA
T145: hire a billion scientists to prepare for Astro bulb

Looking at this timing, although I don't think having three cities with GP pools at 99/100 by T124 is too difficult, considering we'll have cheap libraries, T136 is pretty late for a first GA... get rid of the GE (or just gamble with a mixed pool), and we could reel the timing back in by about 10-12 turns, which feels better. 

What do you think?

[Krill]

I'm not sure that we want two GA back to back. Without religion the only civics we drastically want are Vassalage and Serfdom, so I think we want to try for one late GA and plan to get into Merc at the end of it, and we do backwards from that.

[Krill]

Also, assume Maths eot70. We lack any city that could build a forge other than the capital, but that could build a forge in 6 turns but I think Currency beeline is too good to ignore and by T70 we should be pushing 50 adjusted bpt, so Currency by T85 should not be difficult.