Freeciv LongTurn (LT57 report)

[HansLemurson]

Is SAY_WOW_PLZ a reference to the Dota player from times of yore?

I remember wonder shenangigans (prebuilding, disbanding units) from SMAC.

Probably a reference, don't know it myself.

And if you like disbanding shennanigans...

Using supply crawlers to finish Projects in SMAC was very effective for sure, but also seemingly an intentional part of the game design given the fact that they are specifically designed for that purpose (as well as harvesting resources).

Yeah, and Caravans will take that role here of wonder-building.  Building a wonder = stockpile a ton of caravans.
This was a clearly intentional game mechanic in Civ2 and AC, but also conspicuously absent from later games.  We've discussed toning Caravans down a bit since they trivialize wonder construction into simple "stockpiling + tech race" without the need to plan production locations.  The game C-Evo had its Caravan/Freight unit supply 2/3 of its production cost, so you could spread out the manufacturing load, but effectively raise the total price.

But without further ado, here's the show you've been waiting for...

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Turn 7

Top 5 cities:

I show off this information at the beginning not because it is all THAT enlightening, but because it's the only fully-public intel report!
I'm glad to see Ireland growing as well, and we can see a new contender: the Arameans!  Did they just now get a size 3 city?  Or did it only just make it to the top of the queue?  Who knows how this works?  Probably somebody.

Demographics:

11 Citizens now only puts me at rank 3!  Clearly the pack is diverging.  Expect this to drop soon as I build my first settler.
23 Production is also no longer considered 1st place any more!  And because I can't see who is first place, that means it's somebody on the enemy team.  I wonder if I'll be able to reclaim it?

City Spotlight:

Disbanding an Explorer will let the Hypogeum be completed in next turn, the very same turn the city grows to size 3 and the wonder becomes useful.
There is a slight cost to this:  The production in the box is now 24/20, which means an overflow of 4, which is tied to the "Small Wonder" building class.  This means that unless the next item in my queue is also a Small Wonder (which it won't be), I will lose half of the overflow.  So in truth I'm only disbanding the Explorer for 13 production.
The city's native +5 production though will be applied without penalty.  I think.  We'll see how things shake out next turn.

Note that the city is working the famous Wheat Tile this turn, which is what will allow it to grow that extra turn early.

Empire Overview:

A: Irrigation project continues.  Notice that the Oasis is now producing 4 trade due to the newly built road.  I have enough development in this area to spare a few worker-turns to more ambitious projects like preparing a hill for a mine.  I'm using a Tribal-Worker to build a road there (cost: 4 WP) because it will waste the least worker-power making the road, since it has to waste a turn walking there.  Once the road is complete on t10, then other workers can rush in and build the mine quick.  This mine will be useful in building the Pyramids, since a mined hill yields 3 production, which after the despotism penalty...
will be...
just 2.  
As good as a normal forest, which I already have plenty of.

B: Moving on, Meideborg is actually going to be building a Settler rather than a worker.  Cities sooner = better!  The worker it does have in the area is preparing the ground for that city site.  After the road, it's job will be to irrigate the Buffalo just in time for the city to be founded on t10, letting it be a strong production-city from the start.
...
Far in the west, a Tribal worker has begun clearing the jungle for another city site.
C: Bronswiek should produce a settler for that city on the same turn as the jungle is cleared, allowing it to be settled immediately.  
Nearby, a worker prepares to make a road through the forest to help enhance future connectivity between cities.  Further east, a Tribal worker kills time building a "why not?" road while it gets into position to assist with further development of the land around Mount Vectron.  Maybe mine the Gold?  Iron? River Hill?  Irrigate more grassland?  So many useful things to do!
D: Mount Vectron is now scheduled to both grow next turn AND complete the Hypogeum.  Next will be either another worker or a Settler, depending on how the Food Surplus and Production balance out.  We'll see.  Gotta think on this one.
E: Lübeck was scheduled to complete a settler this turn, but could not because it was only size 2 and settlers cost 2 population to build.  Rather than disbanding the city, the production was postponed.  Fortunately, it just accumulates, and so it will produce the Settler this turn, with extra production available for its next project.  This city will go at the marked tile between the Whale and the Silk.  It won't be an amazing city, but it will be useful.  And most importantly: it will be built SOON.

Research Report:

Acquired Alphabet for 15 bulbs last turn, and the 1 extra bulb plus the 9 I produced that turn puts me at 10/30 on Masonry.  Masonry is a pretty useless tech at this stage, since there's no need for early walls, but it leads to the Pyramids, and isn't that what really matters?  I hope the cost will go down as other people players rushing for the Pyramids beat me to the tech.  But it's possible that the reason Alphabet was so cheap was because everybody wanted it as a prerequisite for Map Making, hoping to get out some early ships.

What exactly they intend to DO with these ships is unclear, since nobody can afford it yet to send their settlers off on long sea voyages to settle high-corruption cities on distant islands.  I plan to settle lots of early cities on my island first, and then use the production boost from the Pyramids to pay for the shipbuilding scheme.  That's my hope anyways.  I have to admit there's a chance that I'm taking a foolish risk on an islands map by not immediately investing in boats.  But we'll see.

[civac2]

There is always the option to take their islands away from them with extra production.

I played a SMAC game where crawler rushing was banned and we still disbanded other units for certain Secret Projects at a 50% discount. I think the wonder race is much more fun if a single city has to build it on its own.

[HansLemurson]

There is always the option to take their islands away from them with extra production.

 

I played a SMAC game where crawler rushing was banned and we still disbanded other units for certain Secret Projects at a 50% discount. I think the wonder race is much more fun if a single city has to build it on its own.

Agreed.

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Turn 8

Traveler's report...

Belarus strikes again.  Biggest city in the world!  First to size 4.

Demographics:

Down to 10 population? Oh no!!!  Where did all my people go?

They decided to...pack up and leave? 
Ungrateful wretches.

It also appears that 22 Production is no longer enough to "play with the big boys".  I'm not even #2 any more!  
I suspect that the front of the race is tightly packed.
My research is decent though.  I'm surprised that I can be #5 in Econ, yet #4 in Research.  
Maybe it's a difference in how trade is assigned within cities?  
Maybe somebody is a fool and NOT running max science?  Who knows.

City Report:

Mount Vectron completed the Hypogeum, and you can see that two of the citizens in the upper left are green, the city itself is rated at "happy", and the city is generating 5 Luxuries.  Why 5 and not 6?  I'm not sure.
Next turn, the city will Celebrate, and unlock the full yields from all its tiles.  The first advantage will be in getting larger food surpluses, and the second will be the ability to leverage this extra food to work low-food tiles without having to sacrifice growth as much.

Infrastructure discussion:

But how best to maximize the city's future potential?
I discussed this with my team.

Some people have no respect for emoji art. 

We decided that working the Gold would probably be the best plan.  The way things are going, Research is the most likely bottleneck for getting the Pyramids out, and so working a high-trade tile will increase my science and get it just that much faster.

Empire Overview:

A: Making the deserts bloom!  The irrigation project has now reached the Oasis.  Great surpluses will be mine.
B: Preparing a future city site.  Buffalo should be irrigated just in time!
C: Clearing the jungle is also proceeding on schedule.  Check back on t13
D: Forest road on t10.  Bronswiek making its settler.
E: Workers start mining the Gold Mountain.  A mine there will give it +2 production.  Won't enhance the money output, but the mine will turn the tile from "ok" to "great!".
F: So those citizens DID have a plan after all!  City to be founded on t9.  Settler is building a road so that its one turn in the field isn't wasted.  Settlers have 3 movement points, and getting to the city site requires 4 MP.  Also note that Lübeck is ready to grow back to size 2 again.  When it shrank, the size of its food-box decreased, but the accumulated food remained the same.  The city is at 11/12 food, and so is actually working the silk right next to the F for the extra money since extra food won't help it grow.

Neighbor Report:

I'm not the only one to build settlers this turn.  The two Irish fruit-cities have each produced their own settlers.  We'll see where ilkkachu wants his new cities.  They haven't moved yet, so I think he'll be able to found both on T8 and become the city-count champion.

Research Report:

Masonry at 20/30. and with +10 science, I'm scheduled to get it next turn.  Then it'll be a straight rush to Mathematics.  That'll be Turn 18 if my science stays at 10/turn (which it won't), so likely sooner.  t16, or maybe even t15 if I'm really lucky (or good).

Game-Mechanics Spotlight: Corruption and Waste

Corruption and Waste were replaced by "city cost" mechanics in Civ4 and later, but they are alive and well in Freeciv.
Small production values don't lose anything because the rounding is in your favor, but Bronswiek is far enough away from my Capital and has the "fortune" of having plenty of Production and Trade thanks to the buffalo and the whale.
What this means though is that the second citizen, working the Plains tile is contributing literally nothing.  It grows enough food to feed itself, and then its production and trade are lost to waste.  I might as well be working a barren grassland.  However, this is just because the rounding finally kicked in at this level.  Future citizens in the city will have their work recognized and appreciated.
Courthouses and the Trade technology will improve this, and ensure that cities will continue to be profitable even as they are founded further and further from the sacred mountains.

[HansLemurson]

Looking back through this thread, it appears that the Turn 3 report got mysteriously truncated.  I wonder what happened?  Maybe I'll fix it later.

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Turn 9:

Top 5 cities:

Cities worldwide continue to grow.

Demographics:

My 3 city growths last turn bumped me right back up to the top population ranks.  I expect to climb higher due to more growth and my new city.
I'm also back to the top ranks in production.  Is this due to me getting stronger, others dropping off as cities shrink from Settlers, or the field being so packed that minor changes cause major changes in rank?
Also watch that research, it's about to get a boost!

Empire Overview:

A: The major irrigation projects now completed, my workers start building a road.  I plan on planting a city at X, so building a road there will ensure I can settle it sooner.  There's also an oasis there that will likely be irrigated too.
B: Meideborg's gonna build a settler!  There are some fancy shennanigans going on with that city, which I will detail in the next section.
C: Mining continues near Mount Vectron, and a worker prepares to build a road to Iron Mountain which will facilitate its future mining.  This should be a strong city in the future.
D: Hamborg founded!  I have 6 cities now.  The Irish may end up with 7 cities, beating me to the #1 slot, but that's ok.  If neither of us is at #1, then I have concerns.  Hamborg is working Whales, which will help my research effort.

City Spotlight:

Why in the heck am I working a 0-food undeveloped gold tile when cities need to be growing at max speed?
Because of wheat, corruption and excess food!  
When the Settler is built, Meideborg will drop to Size-1, and its food box will shrink to 12.  This means that I will only need an additional 4 food to grow back to Size-2.
Mount Vectron doesn't need the wheat this turn in order to grow, and Danzig is fine with its own wheat and Oasis.  That means that if Meideborg doesn't use the wheat, it will go to waste!
But I can't possibly make use of +3 food two turns in a row.  Why produce 6 food when I can only use 4?  So I'm trading in that food for a rather extreme tile: Mountain Gold.  
Why?  Partly because I can, and it's available now (but won't be next turn), but mainly because it supports the timely acquisition of the Pyramids.  I've estimated that the bottleneck in getting the Pyramids is likely to be research rather than production.  I'm accustomed to regarding money in the early-game as an afterthought compared to real solid production, but when you really need something that you don't have the tech for, all the production in the world can't buy it.
This will raise my research rate for this turn to 14/turn, which will probably bump me up to #2.  This rate should continue as next turn Mount Vectron will be ready and able to use the Gold Mine.

[HansLemurson]

Turn 10


It looks like I'm back on the charts!

Demographics:

6 cities now, tied for 1st place with whoever else founded a second-generation city last turn (like my neighbor Ireland).
Production is solid and growing.
Science is less than I'd predicted last turn.  But I'll more than make up for that soon...

Research

16 bulbs/turn?  Wow!  How is this possible?  You'll see.
The important thing though is that it'll get me Math by about Turn 15.  14 if I push it, but I'm not sure if I can build the Pyramids any faster than that, and I might have to sacrifice growth that I'd rather not.
Then again, the Pyramids represent a HUGE boost to the nation.  About +2 food/production per city, and then +5 for Danzig itself.  That's a gain of about 17/turn, which basically makes the Pyramids pay for themselves in 5 turns.
I'd rush them even if they had twice the price.  If getting them one turn earlier gains me more than it cost me to do it, there's no reason not to.

City Spotlight

Look at that!  A gold mine in operation.  And with working 3 food surplus tiles in the city, I'm still growing even while working a zero-food tile.
I'm building a settler in 2 turns, so I'll be able to work that gold for one turn longer.  The settler is going to settle near an Oasis, so I think it should offset the temporary loss in trade revenue while the city regrows the population.  But maybe I should change plans if it can get me the Pyramids sooner.  Will have to think on this.

The basic plan here is to grow 3 food this turn, and then 1 food next turn so that the food-box will be at 14/14 after the settler is built, allowing for an immediate regrowth.  Hopefully this will avoid disrupting the celebration.

For those interested in math, you may be wondering: how is Mount Vectron generating 16 units worth of Trade Products (5 Gold, 6 Lux, 5 Sci) when it's only generating 8 Trade?
6 Luxuries of course come from Hal Salfieni.
5 Science represents 60% of 8 Trade
40% of 8 though yields just 3 Gold.  But Despotism has a special feature: any gold generated by the capital gains a 75% bonus!  That generates me an extra 2 gold.  If I can get just one more gold, I'll hit the optimal ratio and get a +3 bonus.

Empire Overview

A: This is where I plan to build a city using the Settler that's due from Mount Vectron.  My workers are building a road so that it can arrive with minimal delay.  It should be able to found the city on the second turn after creation.
B: My new city, working the irrigated Buffalo.  No food bonuses, so it has the standard growth time of 6 turns to fill up that 12 food for the first time.  The upcoming road there will add a welcome trade bonus.
C: Bronswiek after growing is due to build its settler a turn earlier than expected.  Unfortunately, this will do me no good, since the jungle won't be cleared in time to let it found a city on the same turn its built.  I've contemplated delaying this settler to the original schedule, so that Bronswiek can stay large for one turn longer, but this would also mean delaying its regrowth.  But maybe I could squeeze some more Trade out of it?
D: With the gold mine completed, the worker team now prepares to mine a hill.  A river hill is nice because it provides the necessary trade to a tile that otherwise couldn't get it, making it even more valuable for governments like Republic which give trade bonuses.  I had intended to do this to the river-hill S of Mount Vectron, but the workers would have been unable to reach due to the "Mountain Move Penalty".  Any unit starting its turn on a mountain loses 1 MP if it did not already possess a road.  This was intended to make it harder to station raiders on mountains in enemy territory to harass them.  Some people just hate being conquered...

Extra tidbit:

The settler that founded Duorpm, here pictured emerging from its coccoon. See how the intelligent construction of roads lets it be founded on the same turn it was built!

Overall my position looks good, and my main dilemmas right now seem to be debating whether to do something cool or doing something awesome.

[HansLemurson]

Turn 11



Demographics:

I hit #1 on the charts in several categories.
I expected Cities and Research, but was surprised by Population, Production, and Econ.
In fact, I hadn't realized I'd have such a big bump in Production.  28->35 is quite the jump.
Several of these, I'm tied for first.  I know Ireland has 7 cities, and my team-mates didn't see me listed as #1 for Population, so the "champion" must be on the other team.
Let's hope I can sustain this momentum.

Science:

Science is advancing at a goodly pace.  With just 1 more research per turn, I could get Pyramids in 3 turns.  However, such a research rate would not be possible without slowing growth and settler production, and the Pyramids would require extra unit-disbanding in order to complete, which puts the additional costs higher than what I'd gain from getting it a turn early.  So I'll just accept T15 Mathematics followed by T16 Pyramid completion.

Overview:

A: Both tribal workers here are now Veteran (though it makes no difference for their assigned tasks).  The road is done enough, and now it's time to irrigate a freshwater oasis with sweet sweet ocean nectar.
B: Why is a worker building a road in the middle of the desert?  Because this will allow Mount Vectron's settler to travel and found its city on T13!  Danzig is working 3 food bonuses at once to generate +5 food, which is what will allow it to grow from 10/20 food to 20/20 and Size-5 in just 2 turns.  Then all 5 citizens will work maximum production.
C: Mount Vectron gets one more turn of work out of the Gold Mountain before building its settler.  If all goes according to plan, it will have 14 food in its granary when the settler is built, allowing the city to immediately regrow to Size-3 after the settler is built, and hasten its recovery to production.  There's also going to be a ton of production overflow which will be received by the next unit, whose future will likely involve being sacrificed for the Pyramids.
D: Bronswiek also prepares to build a settler.  Maybe I'll have it build a road while it's waiting for the jungle to clear?

[civac2]

There are some messed up font tags in your last post.

Wouldn't speeding up the Pyramids by one turn also increase the likelyhood that you get it at all?

[HansLemurson]

There are some messed up font tags in your last post.

Wouldn't speeding up the Pyramids by one turn also increase the likelyhood that you get it at all?

Hmm...whenever I paste in the imgur links while not in the "view source" mode, it tries to add in font information too. Most annoying.

Pyramids are a "Small Wonder" that can be built once by each nation.  In fact most of the standard wonders are National, not Global.  There are still a few true "Wonders of the World", but these are often expensive and/or have mild effects so that there's not TOO much of a snowballing advantage from winning a Wonder race.

How do people feel about the style of my posts? Do you want more images? Less images? More commentary? Or just keep things to the point?
Also how are the spoiler tags working out? They certainly compress the post sizes, so they don't take up much room, but they also make them all seem rather "samey".

[mackoti]

There are some messed up font tags in your last post.

Wouldn't speeding up the Pyramids by one turn also increase the likelyhood that you get it at all?

Hmm...whenever I paste in the imgur links while not in the "view source" mode, it tries to add in font information too.  Most annoying.

Pyramids are a "Small Wonder" that can be built once by each nation.  In fact most of the standard wonders are National, not Global.  There are still a few true "Wonders of the World", but these are often expensive and/or have mild effects so that there's not TOO much of a snowballing advantage from winning a Wonder race.

How do people feel about the style of my posts?  Do you want more images? Less images?  More commentary?  Or just keep things to the point?
Also how are the spoiler tags working out?  They certainly compress the post sizes, so they don't take up much room, but they also make them all seem rather "samey".

I just love your post. Disband units to get wonders was common in CTP as well. TY for posting.

[NobleHelium]

The reports are good, but things are still really hard to follow because I can't glance at the map and instantly understand what's happening like Civ4.