[SPOILERS] TheArchduke blasts into Space as Russia

[TheArchduke]

Looking good so far.

I am not sure what Cornflakes is about. It may be that he lost his interest in an early war thanks to the last PBEM.

I think the builders will be need for 2-3 iron mines.

So:

Turn 64

   

3 iron in good locations. Very nice.
We take care of the horseman and start to shuffle settlers into position.

In any case, it seems our competitor is up to 7! GS points. He clearly is gunning hardcore for Hypatia, so we take her away for 200 faith. 3 turns for the next settler, 5 turns overall.

   

The next GS is a weak one, Aryahabata. Maths and a random tech. Really sore deal.

I also think that I should do 2 more builders as I need mines, improvements for the new cities and farms for Feudalism.

   

Funny stuff, an iron mine near Funky would cost us 4 faith!

I try to provide a more extensive analysis next time.

[Sullla]

I think you made a good call on Hypatia in the end. Assuming that it's Alhambram chasing after the Great Scientist, you've managed to slow down a rival and boost your own situation at a modest total cost. The other two Classical era Great Scientists are definitely weaker than Hypatia, and you've even set yourself up to double back and claim a more useful Medieval or Renaissance era Great Scientist down the road. (Small question: is it Aryahabata or Euclid up next? Euclid is the one who grants the boost for Mathematics and a random Medieval era tech, Aryahabata is three random Classical/Medieval era techs. Hypatia is way better than either.)

Sounds like more builders are upcoming next, that makes a lot of sense from Hell March while waiting for growth to size 7 and planting a Commercial district. For the builder finishing next turn, I'd sugget moving over to the Timermist region. There are three very good tiles there to improve: the rice for food, the truffles for gold, and the iron for production. I would not mine the iron tiles at Hell March and Funky since either one will cost you -4 faith, but I would mine the iron tile at Timbermist. That should be sufficient on iron for the moment.

I don't know if it's worth trying to get 6 farms for the Feudalism boost. I believe you only have 1 farm at the moment (at Hell March), and Feudalism is coming down the pipeline pretty rapidly. While I don't like wasting culture on civics research, I don't know if sinking that many builder charges for a single boost is worthwhile either. Best to think about this now since you'll have to start investing a lot of builder charges into farms if you plan to land the Feudalism boost.

Overall position looks very solid, right there with TBS and Cornflakes for the beakers/culture per turn lead. Four cities established with two settlers out on the map and another one due to be faith-purchased in three turns. Hypatia just needs one turn to teleport to Funky and then insta-build the library at the Campus district. With Hypatia + Natural Philosophy policy, Russia will be at about 45 beakers/turn very shortly. Plus, you have fantastic Campus district spots to plant at Just Do It (4 beaker adjacency site) and Act On Instict (5 beker adjacency site) for tons of science down the road. Start thinking about what forests can be chopped for districts because Magnus will be available in 3 turns and you should put him to work. I think Atreides will be the long term spot for Mahabodi Temple, 3-4 forest chops with Magnus in place equals the wonder. In the more immediate future though, you should try to identify some place where a forest chop can be put to work. Maybe that one random forest Southeast-East of Funky? That could be a shrine or most of a temple with Magnus in place there.

Last question: what is the current city count for the players you've met? It's hard to know how strong they are without that knowledge.

[TheArchduke]

Turn 65

Turn continues to be slow. I took the time for a general overview of the opposition, analysis of our own position and general strategy.

First the opposition.

Cree played by TheBlackSword

   

The Cree to our south. City count 5, all scouted out. Arranged by date of foundation on the diplo screen. Theme is Stormlight Archive, I approve.

Bondsmith has 7 pop in all likelyhood a campus and a gov plaza.
Windrunner has 5 pop and a campus and several improved ressources. His second city was planted south thus we encountered him quite late.
Lightweaver has 4 pop and 2 ressources improved and seems to be built towards Rome.
Skybreaker has 4 pop and has blocked Spice Melange, only a farm.
Dustbringer has 1 pop and has been recently founded.

Yields are 35 28  
Income is 22  with 97  in the treasury
Faith income is 2 with 26 stored up 
Milpower is 146 which is starting to go into worrying territory.
Cree has a Horse and Iron Stockpile.

1 envoy in every scouted CS.

DoF is halfway done, expiring turn 82, until then we need to have a small military as our territory is not awfully defensive. More on that later.
Yields point towards double Pingala, maybe a science CS somewhere beyond his borders and excellent micro. I would like his chances if he was not stuck with me as a neighbor. 
Current relations point towards an uneasy friendship and thanks to geography and his being a serious contender, if we want to expand militarily he is our main target.

Skybreaker is in a terrible spot for tactical purposes. Supportive tiles W and SE are on floodplains and one hill can most likely shoot into the city. Its overall location is utilized correctly is better though. There is only a two tile approach and 2 isthmi west and east, the western one easily blocked and the eastern one not much better. Either I rush him straight after the DoF where he has no encampment yet or I need a serious tech advantage, GG or UU advantage. As Cornflakes so nicely demonstrated having a UU is not a "I win" button. CIV VI is actually a great military game. Suprise, determination, tactics count for something. 
Theblacksword has an impressive military score, although I am unsure what for. It bears watching. If it breaks 200 points we might need to adjust our tactics.

My current recommendation? Reoffer a DoF and outgrow him with faith settlers. My expectation? No DoF and an attack in about 25 turns. We will see if he builds a 6th city or not.

Onto Cornflakes, Rome.

Rome is tucked away between Greece and the Cree. Already at 6 cities, it probably needs to expand militarily in the future. Best case we divide someone up. Worst case he eats Greece.
 
   

Rome has 6 pop is building an encampment which is curious. No visible districts.
Aquilea has 5 pop and the gov plaza and several improved ressources. A plant towards Greece and Akkad.
Lugdunum has 4 pop and some ressources and is nowhere to be seen. Likely to the west or maybe south of Rome.
Ravenna has 3 pop and no ressources.
Ostia has 2 pop and has 2 cotton.
Cumae has 2 pop and is west of Rome, a filler city. One stone improved.

Yields are 26  30  
Income is 21  with 67  in the treasury
Faith income is 5  with 52  stored up 
Milpower is 113.
Rome has a Horse and Iron Stockpile.

I fully expect a legion powered attack on either Greece (likely) or Cree (unlikely). Cree is too good a buffer to be assaulted lightly. I have more information thanks to the OB but I also gave much away of my own position. I am scouting out Rome mainly atm.

DoF expires turn 90, military action between Russia and Rome is unlikely. My best hope is for an incompetent attack on a neighbor. Cornflakes can crunch out a big army with his excellent micro and good production, using it is another matter. We will see. Only 1 envoy in 3 CS next to him. Both my southern CS seem unknown or unenvoyed so far.

No tactical considerations necessary as conflict is improbable and unlikely given the distance and logistics. I fully expect Cornflakes to be a BIG problem down the road.

And now the odd man out.
 
Greece played by Kaiser
 
   

The Greece are some distance east of us. Current situation is 4 cities.
 
Vignette has 5 pop a gov plaza and holy site over an iron which are akwardly placed. All 4 yield tiles have to for districts for that gov plaza.
Rycroft has 4 pop and a soso campus with 2 and a holy site. I am not sure I agree with going for Holy Sites as Greece.
Fleury has 2 pop and 2 ressources improved and seems to be built towards Rome.
Darius has 4 pop has 2 ressources improved and a decent campus under construction.

Yields are 16  13  
Income is 18  with 116  in the treasury
Faith income is 5  with 33  stored up 
Milpower is 117.
Rome has a Horse and Iron Stockpile.

To be honest, I am not impressed by Greece. Somehow Kaiser seems to lack in every category and is now making a belated push to religion which really only serves to push him further into a hole. He would be an EXCELLENT target for military expansion. Unfortunately not for me but for Rome. For any attacks I would have to cover 2 rivers and rough terrain. Fleury is in a mediocre spot to defend against Rome but Darius is wide open to be taken by me. I would have to immediately contend with a roman attack when I conquer Greece and would have long supply lines.

Greece definetly is not a target for military expansion for me. I expect no aggression from him either, he will be busy with Rome. 3 envoys, noone in Yerevan.

[TheArchduke]

Overall situation:

Score:

   

The only one missing is Alhambram. Kaiser, pindicator and suboptimal rank under have beens.
I know that Alhambram is our GS contender thanks to the 5 GP points he has in score. This leaves Pindicator and Suboptimal in a serious hole.

   

The picture painted by the score screen is clear. Alhambram is ahead of everyone in science. Culture is misleading. I lead in tourism.

The other three players that we do not have met yet all have higher domination scores. Suboptimal before Pindicator before Alhambram. Likely a hot war between Suboptimal and Pindicator although it seems to have stalled. I seem to remember that Suboptimal had more empire score some turns back. 

What is unlucky is that Alhambram has a high military undisturbed by this his science at least has to be fantastic. This is grave news as Australia can easily get high adjacency with districts.

Alhambram also got the mediocre GS although I was sure Mathematics eureka was next.

   

[TheArchduke]

Tactical situation south. In the event of a Cree Invasion I assume hopefully to have Spice Melange settled. We look wide open on a first look, but actually we can defend quite easily. Both shield sites are easily defendable with a third fallback site.

The river is a nightmare for an attacker, because he has to stop on the floodplains except for ridiculous speed and I can defend one tile behind the river taking advantage of some hills.

   

The area south of the River is a killzone. This also advises me that the desert city is a deathtrap. One that should only be settled in a new DoF or as push inside the Cree.

[TheArchduke]

Analysis city by city.

Hell March

   

I still have to slap myself out of the idea of building the Temple of Artemis in Hell March. A PBEM is serious business not place for fooling around.

I micromanaged Hell March for a tad quicker growth to hit size 7 and immeaditly get started on a commercial district.
This is the second worker of the batch and it might be an idea to farm the wheat tiles west for Hell march and Fogger with the worker out of Funky. The current one goes over to Timbermist, whilst the first worker out of hell march is already enroute to Timbermist.

Overall I like Hell March, after the commercial district we get some military and a market.

Fogger

   

Fogger got seriously shafted by that volcanic eruption and we can be thankful this did not happen before we could establish a gov plaza. I still think the city location is decent but we lost some faith thanks to the burnt forest near the volcano. It will keep building an ancestral hall and buy a settler with faith on reaching size 3 for Spice Melange.

Funky Swamp

   

I lean towards a second worker out of Funky as well (plenty of stuff to do with Just do It and Act on Instinct. I still want a farm triangle SW of the city and I am tempted to use the second worker for it. After that it will build our second commercial district as soon as it is able to.

Just do It

   

A bit on the slow side, we want to establish that lavra ASAP as it gives +5 thanks to adjacency and the GP points. The undocumented passive bonus of +1 faith per lavra is really nice. A no appeal ruining mine is a good fit next to volcano, a farm W and a plantation. We also want to work the Crater Lake.
I still think we are better off using this city for 1-2 settlers instead of Funky or Hell March.

Atreides and Timbermist (Cities # 5 and #6 respectively)

   

Timbermist settler sees far enough so nothing should snipe him. To be safe the N archer will turn south next turn and the warrior will take over the escort duty for Atreides (if I cannot settle thanks to the scout). The worker of hell March follows the Settler and immeaditly mines the iron, camps the truffles and farms the Rice. I think I will establish the lavra 2 tiles NW of Beyond Timbermist.

[TheArchduke]

Misc. stuff.

Appeal map of Timbermist:

   

The lavra NW of Timbermist should boost 3 tiles to breathtaking appeal. The Rice has 2 faith. Does the mine also incur -1 on its own tile on appeal?

Great Persons. Cree has 2 GS, Pindicator or Suboptimal (Pindicator likely) has 2 Great Prophet points. Alhambram is likely the guy with so many GS. No idea who has +2 GG points. Someone running a  card. Still very few districts compared to us around.

   

[TheArchduke]

I think you made a good call on Hypatia in the end. Assuming that it's Alhambram chasing after the Great Scientist, you've managed to slow down a rival and boost your own situation at a modest total cost. The other two Classical era Great Scientists are definitely weaker than Hypatia, and you've even set yourself up to double back and claim a more useful Medieval or Renaissance era Great Scientist down the road. (Small question: is it Aryahabata or Euclid up next? Euclid is the one who grants the boost for Mathematics and a random Medieval era tech, Aryahabata is three random Classical/Medieval era techs. Hypatia is way better than either.)

Sounds like more builders are upcoming next, that makes a lot of sense from Hell March while waiting for growth to size 7 and planting a Commercial district. For the builder finishing next turn, I'd sugget moving over to the Timermist region. There are three very good tiles there to improve: the rice for food, the truffles for gold, and the iron for production. I would not mine the iron tiles at Hell March and Funky since either one will cost you -4 faith, but I would mine the iron tile at Timbermist. That should be sufficient on iron for the moment.

I don't know if it's worth trying to get 6 farms for the Feudalism boost. I believe you only have 1 farm at the moment (at Hell March), and Feudalism is coming down the pipeline pretty rapidly. While I don't like wasting culture on civics research, I don't know if sinking that many builder charges for a single boost is worthwhile either. Best to think about this now since you'll have to start investing a lot of builder charges into farms if you plan to land the Feudalism boost.

Overall position looks very solid, right there with TBS and Cornflakes for the beakers/culture per turn lead. Four cities established with two settlers out on the map and another one due to be faith-purchased in three turns. Hypatia just needs one turn to teleport to Funky and then insta-build the library at the Campus district. With Hypatia + Natural Philosophy policy, Russia will be at about 45 beakers/turn very shortly. Plus, you have fantastic Campus district spots to plant at Just Do It (4 beaker adjacency site) and Act On Instict (5 beker adjacency site) for tons of science down the road. Start thinking about what forests can be chopped for districts because Magnus will be available in 3 turns and you should put him to work. I think Atreides will be the long term spot for Mahabodi Temple, 3-4 forest chops with Magnus in place equals the wonder. In the more immediate future though, you should try to identify some place where a forest chop can be put to work. Maybe that one random forest Southeast-East of Funky? That could be a shrine or most of a temple with Magnus in place there.

Last question: what is the current city count for the players you've met? It's hard to know how strong they are without that knowledge.

Yeah, I do not have any regrets with Hypatia. We really do not want Alhambram to further run away with science.
More builders, yes. After that Horseman and/or archers for a bit of a defensive reserve.

Yeah, the Mahabodi plan in Atreides has merit. we want to chop something somewhere anyway. We can not keep all the forests.

Your last question should be more then answered in full.

I will switch to diplomatic league to doubleenvoy Akkad and switch back afterwards. I also think we want to keep Ilkum and toss in Natural Philosophy. I would keep Urban planning for one turn until we have theology.

Then switch to Charmismatic Leader, Natural Philosphy, Scripture and Maneuver in 3 turns when we hit Theology and get out 2-3 horseman. After that Games and Recreation and 3-4 archers. We should be good then.

I also think we will get most out of Magnus as a next governor in 2 turns and establish him in Atreides. We can chop the 3-4 forests west of the city and keep those in the east on the dyes.

My only worry is still the lack of a navy and contact with that CS west. I think I will go for Spice Melange before Act on Instinct and stick with that decision. And chop out a navy there.

[williams482]

Appeal-reducing improvements affect all adjacent tiles, but not the tile on which they are placed. A four appeal hill tile will still have four appeal after a mine is placed on it.

I'm not sure which tle you are recommending for Timbermist (the PFH 1NW of the city center pin has the same appeal as a completed Lavra), but I would strongly suggest the tile the Settler is currently standing on. That's a +3 adjacency and bumps the silks, which we will always be working, up to breathtaking. 1SW would be an alternative, minimal adjacency but boosting truffles to breathtaking while adding enough of a buffer to the city center and the rice that we can mine the Iron and quarry the stone without dropping below four appeal on those tiles.

Lavra placement for Atrides is awkward. The two best options look to be 1NW or 1NE of the city center. Each has +1 adjacency that would be +2 with another district, and each boosts one tile (Copper or Silk) that we will likely want to work.

It's too bad City Parks are buried so deep, because a few of those would make a gigantic difference for us right now.

[Sullla]

Wow, that's quite an overview summary. Thanks for posting all of that information! It definitely makes it easier to follow what's going on in the game for those of us just reading in the forums. I think that I'll try to use this post to comment on the immediate turn and hopefully do another post with longterm thoughts a bit later. Thoughts from reading through the current turn:

* I definitely approve of microing Hell March slightly to speed up growth to 3 turns. You are very much on track to finish the builder and then immediately go onto a discounted Commercial district (Russia has exactly enough districts finished to qualify for the discounted cost). This is one point where Classical Republic's policy slots are going to line up nicely, since you can run Urban Planning + Ilkum + Natural Philosophy in the Wildcard slot for triple Economic policy cards. Future needs for Hell March include the Commercial district, the market, and a temple in some order. The temple is the most expensive at 120 production cost but also has the highest value: +4 faith and +4 culture thanks to Choral Music. The whole Russian civ only makes 26 culture/turn right now so a temple would represent an increase of about 15% without even counting the faith. There's a lot to continue developing here and fortunately Hell March has some distance to go before hitting the housing cap (it still doesn't even have a granary, much less an aqueduct).

* Regarding builder charges: you floated using builder charges to farm the wheat tiles to the west of Hell March. This is a solid use of the builder charges for three reasons: 1) tiles can be shared between Hell March and Atreides 2) the tiles get up to an excellent 4/1 yield with a later watermill and 3) farms help lead towards the Feudalism boost. I wrote after the last turn that you need to decide right now if you're committing to chasing after 6 farms for the Feudalism boost. You have 1 farm at the moment and would pick up 3 more from the rice at Timbermist and the 2 wheats along the capital's river. That would leave you 2 farms short which could be picked up at Funky's two excellent tiles (the 5/1 and 4/1 tiles). I would not build any more farms at the moment beyond those; I'd use the last builder charge coming out of Funky for a Magnus-boosted forest chop, which could instantly become another builder or a shrine. Right now, a normal forest chop is worth about 55 production and a Magnus chop would be worth about 80 production. I'd be continuing to think about which tiles can be chopped without hurting the Earth Goddess bonus.

* Fogger: will be working on the Ancestral Hall for some time to come. I personally do not like the idea of purchasing the next settler out of this city and heading for Spice Melange. The main reason is that the Act On Instinct site is *FAR* superior to the Spice Melange site, and I also think it's better to take a population point away from the weak, immature, unimproved Just Do It as opposed to Fogger. Fogger has two excellent tiles to grow onto (the cows and the horses) so it really would be nice to get it back to size 4. This has been a longstanding point of disagreement in this thread, but it feels highly counterproductive to settle such a weak spot along the coast when the outstanding Act On Instict terrain can be claimed. Why not Spice Melange for city #8? It looks like all of the other players are pretty landlocked - surely they don't have navies to worry about at this point, right?

* Funky: builder for now followed by some combination of shrine/temple and military while growing to size 7? Note that at the moment you'd have to purchase two tiles to place a Commercial district at the assigned spot (definitely not worth it) so that may have to be reassigned down the road.

* Just Do It: I would work the same tiles that you have picked here since the Lavra is worth a ton of faith when it finishes and the 1/3/3 tundra tile is clear the best available choice along with the 4/1 high food tile. This is a city that badly wants to get to size 4 as it can build a Campus district with +4 adjacency bonus (Southeast-East of the city). For the same reason, I want Act On Instict to be the next city since it has an even better +5 adjacency Campus spot nearby. Those districts will take a little time to build but will be awesome when they finish, and the sooner they get started, the sooner they'll finish. Quick thought: would it be worthwhile to purchase the 3/1 tile west of the volcano for Just Do It? That could be swapped to Act On Instinct later as needed and it would certainly help Just Do It grow faster. Alternately, you could commit a builder charge to farming the wheat tile to unlock a 3/1 tile that way.

* Atreides: needs food and will otherwise be a fine city. There's a very strong case for purchasing or chopping out a watermill here (since you also need a watermill for the Construction boost and Atreides would benefit enormously from a pair of farmed 4/1 wheat tiles). Longterm this should be the spot for a Magus-chopped Mahabodi Temple so make sure that the Lavra is placed next to a forest tile (would be pretty hard *NOT* to do here!) The Mahabodi requires a shrine and a temple to be in place before it can be constructed though, so it won't be happening right away.

* Timbermist: going to be another great city with the 2 production center tile, a 5/0 rice tile for food, and an iron tile for production. Just give this place some time and let it develop. I completely agree with your suggested builder charge usage and Lavra placement, this city is going to be a strong contributer.

* Research: you might want to stop researching Iron Working. Mining the iron tile in a couple of turns will land the boost and remember that finishing Iron Working will prevent you from training warriors in the future, it might be better to build them and upgrade them with gold. At the very least, I'd swap over to something else and wait for the tech boost to arrive rather than wasting beakers. What's the next tech here? You could hit the top of the tree and go for Sailing into Shipbuilding potentially. Sailing is very cheap and not worth delaying for the boost (it's only worth 20 beakers), whereas Shipbuilding would let your units embark and finally meet that Scientific city state. It would be better to have the boost there but waiting on 2 galley to be produced is going to take forever. I'd think about settling Act On Instinct next (with its far superior terrain compared to Spice Melange) and biting the bullet on researching Sailing/Shipbuilding without the boosts. This would buy some time while waiting for the boosts to come in on Iron Working, Construction, and Engineering while still making useful strategic progress by getting a couple of units out on the water.

* Civics research is easy: Recorded History into Theology into Games and Recreation since there's no other choice. No real choices to make here at the moment.

I will switch to diplomatic league to doubleenvoy Akkad and switch back afterwards.

Ummm, why do this? Akkad is a Militaristic city state, was the plan to invest the envoy simply for the +2 production in the capital when training military units? Surely you don't want extra production from barracks/stables or Akkad's unique ability of "Melee and anti-cavalry units' attacks do full damage to the city's walls". I'd save your envoys for something more useful. Getting 3 envoys with the Scientific city state would be worth +6 beakers instantly (+2 from base ability and +4 from the pair of libraries) and that would be far more useful. You're going to pick up an envoy from Theology civic, and that plus the one in hand is enough to get up to 3 envoys instantly using the 2 for 1 Diplomatic policy card. Why not save the envoys for city states that actually matter?

Thanks again for writing so much.