[SPOILERS] Woden and ljubljana like boats

[ljubljana]

Actually, wait, I think something's strategically off here on my end. The whole argument for doing builder first was to get the CelNav boost as quickly as possible, but if we don't buy the fish, that builder's going to have to sit around for 10 turns while we wait on the tile picker. It seems like if I'm not buying the tile, I should be going settler first instead, since this wouldn't actually delay the CelNav boost; there's still plenty of time to make that switch if you agree. If boosting CelNav ASAP for the fastest possible Cothons is the critical consideration, though, it seems like we should buy the tile and go builder first. Thoughts?

[Woden]

If you buy the crab for 50 gold and work it, you will get back your gold in 18 turns, by the time you have enough to buy a monument. You also do what to build a 2nd settler before you get a Cothon down, so you are only delaying your 3rd city. If Cartography is the last tech in the Classical Age, then you may need a 3rd before the Cothon. You may also want to consider buying the marble tile too. If you take the camp next turn, you should have money for both the crab and marble and the marble is half a monument and you can start using it right away. Then again, you might end up wasting a bunch of culture because you will get more of Mysticism researched before I can get a pantheon to finish it. Maybe better to hold off on that and grab it naturally. And this is also a good argument against saving for a monument right now. Buy the fish, so we can figure out where Cartography is located.

For my next civic after Mysticism will be Foreign Trade to get a bunch of ships out exploring, then I could hit State Workforce or Early Empire. As for Pottery and Mining, you may need Mining if Masonry is on the path to Cartography and Pottery links to more paths than the other 2.

[Woden]

And are you working the turtles? Even unimproved, it is your best tile at the moment. I don't remember the conversion of production-to-science but it is better than 1-to-1.

Edit: Took a look at your last SS and looks like you are.

[ljubljana]

Yeah, that seems reasonable to me; it doesn't make sense to boost my culture output until we've finished the Mysticism slingshot. I do think I'll go for the fish over the crabs, since working crabs this early represents a pretty significant growth curve hit. If you're doing FT next, maybe I'll plan to go for SW to boost it for you while bootstrapping my culture output? Unfortunately, though, there's no good place for the GP at the capital, with the horse wrecking what looked like the most viable spot SE of the horse tile. Hopefully exploration will turn up a second city that can either benefit from a capital GP or build the GP itself.

Right now I'm working turtles and rice, yeah. I thought about swapping from rice to sheep, but speeding up the builder doesn't do much for us here since we can't speed up Sailing and it'd end up sitting around with nothing to do. I'll probably switch over to turtles/horse/sheep or turtles/horse/marble at size 3 to build the settler though.

[Woden]

Turn 9
Open the save, have 50, bought the pearls tile, started working it. Also grabbed the 4 bananas. Slinger finished and started a settler. I am working the bananas and pearls. City will grow in 5 turns and I will switch to more productive tiles. If I worked the 2/2 tile, I would stay at size 2 all the way through the settler build and regrow immediately but would not benefit from the extra culture and science the extra population would provide. It will also get the settler out quicker. 

   

With the 4 bananas tile, I should be able to regrow fairly quick anyways.

[ljubljana]

You might also want to consider working the bananas for a few turns even after growing to size 3 to partially fill the food box? If timed correctly, you could get the best of both worlds by setting up an instant regrow to size 3 after the settler completes, without slowing the settler much, if at all, compared to building it at size 2.

[Woden]

Turn 10-Woden

Moved my slinger south and found a marble of my own....
   

Scout retreated, so I move my warrior south to look for the camp. I will finish Animal Husbandry next turn.

[ljubljana]

Turn 11 - Phoenicia



Promoted the western warrior before attacking, to save a few HP overall - it'll clear the camp next turn and shouldn't need to heal up at all before continuing south, unless the scout goes after it. The eastern warrior keeps looking for the scout, to no avail. We buy the fish for 50g; once we grow to size 3, we'll switch over to max production to get the builder in what I think will be 6 turns. It can then pasture the horse and embark on either the same turn or the turn after Sailing comes in. Meanwhile, I'll probably invest any extra beakers into Pottery rather than Mining, since it's more likely to be on the Cothon path.

[Woden]

Turn 11-Vikings
Open the save to...
   

Looks like everybody but Marco (who moved before settling) has now finished their 1st tech. I move my units and defog a little...
   

The warrior finds a nice spot for a good Industrial Complex, which we may need since I am not seeing many hills for production. The slinger finds some sea food and what might be a decent city location. Only problem would be it would be vulnerable to sea attack from 3 tiles. Definitely not 2nd city material but maybe 3rd or 4th.

[ljubljana]

Turn 12 - Phoenicia



Western warrior clears the camp, eastern warrior continues to explore.

The warrior finds a nice spot for a good Industrial Complex, which we may need since I am not seeing many hills for production.

I'm getting pretty concerned about this too. Up in my area, I don't see anything even resembling a strong second city site - the closest would be by that cluster of resources on the eastern coast, but all of those sites are either badly food-starved (4E of the capital) or have awful production (any of the +4 Cothon spots). I guess settling on the mercury could work long-term, but the downright terrible first-ring tiles seem to rule it out as a second city. I'm beginning to think that strong IZs will need to be an unusually significant consideration for our city placements in this game. Luckily, the unusual, scattered placement of the mountains on this map will help out significantly on that front, with almost all visible tiles being aqueduct-eligible.

Clearing the camp boosts Military Tradition, which is here:



It's hard to see from that shot, but MT is the one Ancient civic that doesn't lead to anything. Much like in vanilla Civ6, it night end up being delayed for some time as a result.