[PB63 Spoilers] - Pindicator Unlocks 10 Year Achievement

[Krill]

I'm bored and on vacation, going back to work on Monday and trying to keep thoughts about work out of my head, so apologies for the spam.

Ignoring the leaders and civs, how do you play this start? Pigs needs AH right? Clam only gives commerce over the banana for a 30 hammer deficit and it makes more sense to split it off for another city long term given lack of coast. No grass hills to mine that pick up river commerce, and base slavery pushes for pottery and BW.

So go worker first, and hook the wheat. Then what? Do you push to AH with no commerce? Do you go to BW and have no other tiles to work? So settler at size 2?

Settler at 2 is what I was thinking.  Also, with so much food I think either Fishing or AH at the start, which gives some flexibility in picking leaders.  IMP seems really really strong for this start too.

Work boat first seems straight out as the forested banana gives the same amount of food-hammers already.  But perhaps as a 2nd food resource it would let you delay AH a bit.

Looking at the workboat first option (which is absurd but it looks like it may work out given the extra commerce, as it allows working two four yield tiles from T10-T16 whereas worker first grows eot16 with wheat T15 and nothing else to improve), it gives alot of options how to play the start. It can be played with any start techs or traits, just need to go Fishing>Agri, but could then go to either AH for pigs, or  Mining>BW and grow to 4 pop to double whip (or possibly even 6 pop for a triple whip there is so much food? Depends on the start techs how long it takes to reach BW and revolt).

I'm not sure about IMP, but that decision could be made after all of the others have shown their hand. Personally I'm tempted by CRE because it just seems OP for an 8 player game, but then I'm also partial to picking something like Zara of Greece and culture bombing someone on T100 so what do I know.

That's a ton of food. Makes me want to pick Charismatic to work all those tiles faster. CHM Greece?

I don't like AGG (Just pick ORG, saves more money and the cheaper buildings are more worthwhile), CHM (I hate paying for happy and monuments suck at popping borders), or EXP (just pick IMP). I think Greece is fine, but I would not waste a trait on knocking 40 hammers of the UB when you don't want them in every city. Phalanx are one of the few solid counters to WE after all. But you tried the tall idea in PB59 and look where that got you.

The limiting factor on working the tiles is just getting the tech, and there are only, what, 3 good tiles to work? 5 cottageable tiles, 6 if you cottage the banana. Hell, it's worth pointing out that the banana might be there as a capital location, but because of hte forests there is no way of knowing what food resources it would have because a starting scout has 4 options:

1. SE to check the banana but misses 5 tiles (and the coastal tile it picks up could have a fish but you lose access to hammers to build a workboat so it's a bad move.
   
2. NE-SE to check 3 of the outer ring tiles for a banana move. Not much better than above but does alow you to swing the scout around the capital looking for second city sites if the tech path is open RE: AH or BW. This is probably the smarter option
   
3. NE-NW, to check about moving the capital 1N to lose a turn, lose banana for 5 turns, and lose the clam but lose a late game boatable capital. I think this is a bad move akin to building walls in your capital. There might be a reason for it but you've already lost.
   
4. W-NW to see if there is a cottage capital available with another food resource. Optimistic but scout can then swing clockwise around the capital, but misses a city city SW.
   

You know what, all the scouting options are naff for T0 insights, and SiP works.

But if the workboat first starts as well as I think it might, then I'd say just pick whatever looks interesting and has relevance by knights.

Oh, and just because I find this funny: I think this start would allow Spain to go Meditiation first and still get Agri in time to start improving the wheat. Obvious knock on effects BW or AH but has any player managed to pull off religion first in a PB?

[civac2]

Not in a PB but I think Lewwyn actually did the Spain Buddhism thing in Pbem 78.

[pindicator]

I'm at my parents for the holiday weekend, so not a lot of civ time for me, but I did give America more thought and .... black hole might be the right term for them. In a void, getting 3 genetic gp points seems like it would be great for grabbing rare great people (really just getting lots of GEs and using them to grab all the key wonders) in the classical era but when I finally started thinking through the "how" I realized Jrill is correct. Compass isn't all that early of a classical era tech. Could you build a forge, tech to Compass, and build the UB, then wait 9 turns to start the wonder train? It seems like the key GE wonders of Pyramid and HG will be gone by then. Perhaps you can use them to get MoM but why not just rush Calendar in that case? I think if you can pull off Pyramids with this then you're already lapping the field and it's irrelevant.

Great Merchants might be a thing if you can build Colossus or TGL, but you should be setting up your game plan to build those wonders then and not around America.

Now there is one other idea for lots of GEs: using 3 of them to bulb Machinery, Feudalism, and most of Guilds, and then knight rushing someone. I would imagine GE #1 is birthed before Compass, and the other 2 after, which means with PHI it would be.

But all of this I wonder just what it gives in advance. I think it's be better just picking a PHI/IND civ and getting extra great people that way.

Yeah, okay. America sucks

[Krill]

Do you want to handicap yourself?

Boudicca of Zulu or NA.

[pindicator]

Boudicca of NA does seem like a fun handicap. Maybe give myself 1 economic trait instead of AGG though

[Krill]

If by economic trait you mean something which increases productivity so that costs don't eat all output...Fin looks a bit naff here. ORG/CHM? OTOH, NA still have strength 4 axes right? Didn't you play Carthage in PB52 and have that probable with NC? That was partly why I suggested Zulu as giving a economic bump from the Ikhanda.

Also, I think your choice of Greece is legit. Biggest issue is you invite pink dots from every neighbour due to the risk of an artist bomb but Boudicca with 5 strength spears laughs at brawling.

[Krill]

You fucking bastard Cornflakes.

[civac2]

CHA seems overkill to me. AGG alone with an expansion or economy trait is better.

[Krill]

If you get hemmed in, CHM will give you an extra 2-3 whips before the happy cap crushes you and whips are at their base power level. This could be an extra 4 units per city, and AGG stops you going bankrupt in such a brawl.
And then Greece let's you spend a single GP to claim enough land to remain relevant plus an easy way to win border culture wars. I think it is a legit choice if you want to play civ city rather than trying to find that military edge for the late game. Alas, not to be.

[pindicator]

Well, how about AGG/? Greece and go for a weaker version of that? Substitute CHA out for either EXP or IMP for getting cities up faster? CRE for easy border pops (though that seems a bit redundant with the Odeon artists)? Or AGG + PHI to keep the thematic leader and get more GAs for aggressive border pops?