[PB78 SPOILERS] GT and Magic Science in the Post-Apocalyptic Wasteland

[Magic Science]

GT, here is the sandbox, if you want to use it. No problem if you prefer not to.
I will post a slightly updated version with the cities settled and the AI Palaces removed on Turn 1.

[GT]

Happy to sandbox a bit..

First: OOPS, we can't work the "forest fish".. we lack fishing after all!

Masonry takes 10T, so easily done before the worker comes online (T12)

T3: Borders extend, now working the elephant, worker down to be ready in T11

T10: Masonry done, I've now decided on Bronze

T11: Worker ready, starting with Great Wall

(Saving here to try different approaches)

1)
-> Farm the maize (alright, alright, I'll go with corn.. damn Yanks ) first. One turn can work on the fresh water tile North of the city on the way there.

Meanwhile, city grows with the non-improved corn first.

T16: Corn is irrigated. T17: Worker can move, walks to Elephants (will start working on them in T19)

City growth in T18 (Corn and non-improved elephant worked)

T22: Elephants are camped, now 6+50%=9 Production

T23: Bronze is discovered. Now we have options: Animal husbandry, The Wheel, fishing...

As the capital will grow in T24, and the settler is movable in T23, we have several options:

Mine one of the hills (this gives only 4 Prod in 5T time..) - Chop down a forest (Will be added to prod in T26, worker available in T27 again)

(Running a forested hill starting T23 to get 3 Prod)

T27: Forest chop is now in the GW, still takes 2T - slavery would NOT help get it faster, as only now it's rushable for 1 Pop

T29: Great Wall is finished

This would be a "Grow to Pop3 while building the GW and improving corn, elephants, then chop" start.

[GT]

Another attempt, I think slightly better:

T11, work the elephant, with overflow prod this is 12 prod in first turn (8+50%)

T12, another save point

2) Continue with working the elephant till the corn is improved
T16: Switch to improved corn, growth in T20, Pop3 in T26 (Run Corn and Elephant on Pop2, +forest hill on Pop3, chop forest after camping the elephant

Great Wall in T28 (one turn quicker than option 1, mainly because of the extra prod from switching to the elephant for 1T in T11..)

3) Work the non-improved corn from T12 onwards (T11 on the elephant for the extra bonified hammer)
Growth in T18 (Same as in Option1), after that Run Corn and Elephant on Pop2, +forest hill on Pop3, chop forest after camping the elephant (same as Option 2)
Growth to Pop3 in T24 (Same as Option1)

Great Wall also in T28

So it seems it's definitely the Elephant in T11 for that extra bonus hammer..

Now Option 2 vs Option 3 is quicker growth vs. earlier prod, and I guess quicker growth is better, as we'll get to the Great Wall at the same turn but with more food stored.. (Option 3: 13/26 in T28, with 2 Prod overflow)

Option 2 has 9/26 food, while 4 Prod overflow - slightly worse than Option 3

So, currently Option 3 seems to be my favorite: Worker first, T11 switch to elephant for one turn, then run the (non-improved) corn, then the improved corn, from Pop2 onwards the (firstly non-improved, but soon is) elephant, then Pop3 a forest hill while chopping a forest.

Now, this is with a Bronze start, and without Bronze popping up nearby, and without stones being discovered nearby..

But I guess the Great Wall in T28 is at least giving us a 50:50 chance, unless Gavagai (or some other player?) has an even faster go at it.

4) Now, I've also run an Masonry then Animal husbandry start, with the same switch to Elephants for 1T in T11, then running the corn, and then going for GROWTH with the pigs instead of the elephant.

The worker could improve the pigs from T18 onwards, but as it stands we'd only get AH in T20.. so we'd lose two worker turns (could farm the grass land North of the city for 2T, I guess...)

The improved pigs can be run from T23 onwards only (Pop3 in T24, as working the elephant till then seems better)

Since we'd not have Bronze in such a path, we'd go to camp the elephant after the pig, without choping trees down..

By T27 we'd be Pop4, but not yet able to slave the GW (still 3 Pop needed, plus we'd still not have slavery anyway, plus 1T anarchy..)

Short: It seems there is no better way than Option 3 - Masonry, Bronze, T11 worker, working 1T the elephant, then working the corn (non-improved, soon improved, Pop2 onwards the Elephant, soon improved, then chop a forest, for GW in T28 with an exactly half filled food storage and 2 prod overflow.

But happy to see your own sand box results

[GT]

I wonder what he meant with "creative capital name"

(The game is live now)

https://civ.zulan.net/pbspy/game/160/

[Magic Science]

Turn 0 – 4000 BC
   
Start and leader look good.


   
Technologies and civilization look good.


   
Settings look good, EXCEPT for No Unit Gifting being Off.

I thought it was worth at least pointing that out in the tech thread, but we could just leave No Unit Gifting Off and be okay. That rule does not need an in-game setting to enforce. And I am sorry if No Unit Gifting is a rule I tried to push through too hastily, like the city trading rule.

I just worry that someday we are going to all forget to turn No Tech Trading On and not notice it until someone discovers Alphabet. . Or something like that. That I why I might be a bit annoying in the setup threads.


Thank you, Scooter. Thank you, Zulan.
This will be a great game. .

I wonder what he meant with "creative capital name"

   
Our capital is named Vault 11 and starts with a Bomb Shelter. Very cute. Before I logged in, I thought that “creative capital name” meant that Scooter would mock us with the name. .

Now for the gameplay, I think the big question is: should we build The Great Wall before a Settler or not? I am not sure yet. The Great Wall will be extremely strong, but building it before a Settler is still a huge sacrifice. And I think Gavagai could 100% beat us to it if he wants to. He is India, so faster Masonry (by 2 turns because of the additional Mysticism prerequisite), then faster Bronze Working, then faster chopping to finish the Wonder. And you guessed that he would want to build the wonder as soon as you saw he picked India. Then he picked an Industrious leader even though we already picked one, so he absolutely wants TGW. He might not commit to it so very hard so very early, but we can’t be sure. His start could be worse than ours, but it could be better than ours too, and we can’t be sure. I will closely observe the Demographics screen.

If we try for TGW before a Settler and fail, we are terribly screwed. The failgold will be of little use right away, and unless we have strategic resources in the capital, then we would need to use Warriors (and maybe Archers) to protect our cities and Settlers and Workers to claim strategic resources while the grace period is over (because the other players will settle their second cities at a normal time) and the human Barbarians are already spawning and attacking in waves, maybe even with Archers. The Barbarians could have superior technology!

I do not want to be in that situation.


By the way, I still feel good about CRE for a trait, but Persia/IND might have been a mistake. TGW is a lot more important than I gave it credit for while thinking for the snakepick. IND should probably have been paired with a civ that boosts progress towards TGW (like India, or at least a Mysticism or Mining civ) and/or a civ that would help if we fail and are left with one city and no strategic resources when the grace period ends (like Inca for the resourceless Quechas).

So either CRE/PRO (or something) Persia, or CRE/IND Inca. Not this muddled middle ground. But it might still be fine. . Don’t let my anxiety get to you.


GT, thanks for trying out a few Great Wall openings. We could also build it EOT25 by working nothing but the Ivory and improving the Ivory first. Bronze Working for the second technology enables a chop to finish the Wonder.

I need to do a few sims of Settler before Great Wall openings to quantify how much we would be sacrificing by going for the Great Wall first, and how much Gavagai could beat us by if he has a start like ours.

With all that in mind, on this first turn I started a Worker, because no matter what else we decide to do, we will still definitely want to start with a Worker.

However, I did not start researching a technology yet. We can delay the decision without losing any beakers for a few turns even in Pitboss. In Pitboss 74, I did not select a technology until Turn 3 and it was fine. But it makes me nervous, so let’s not wait any longer than Turn 1. Either Masonry for a Great Wall plan, or Animal Husbandry for a Settler plan, I think.

And the Scout was named “Buster” and moved 1SW. 2SW to the City Ruins next turn. The Creative T25 border pop will reveal a lot of tiles, and I want Buster to get past the edge of that circle quickly, then go in a wider circle around that. There is a saltwater sea in the west, so it makes sense to start on the coast of that, and I just decided to start in the south rather than the north. .

I did some peeking with the flying camera and found nothing conclusive. Lots of Peaks out there. They could form walls, especially if water is helping them, but I can’t tell for sure.

[Magic Science]

ADDENDUM
   
This is an “exciting action shot” of my flying camera work. I might do more later.


   
Check this out!

All human cities are settled, and there are only 5 of us, so our civ should have 20% of the population, right? But we only have 7.69%. Am I crazy, or does this means that the Barbarian cities count on this screen and we can use this to tell how much population they have right now?

If it is possible, the most important thing is to figure out how many cities they have.

100% / 7.69% per population = about 13 global population.

13 population – 5 human population = 8 Barbarian population.

So if this is right, then they could have at most 8 cities. Could be less. I will try to see how our percentage changes and how the other players’ scores change to see if we can see how the Barbarians’ population grows in these early turns. That could give us an idea where in the 1-8 cities range they are.


And we can do the usual math to get the total land tiles from this screen, of course.

0.83% = 8 tiles.

100% = 963.855421687… tiles.

So about 193 tiles for each human player. That seems like a lot. But the Barbs already have some. And there are a lot of Peaks. .

This is a fun beginning.


...


Also, I have not forgotten the possibility that human Barbarians are already out there on our continent in the wilderness. They could attack at any moment! But probably not, so let’s still go Worker first.

When the borders expand T3, we will have the Ivory tile for a 3-turn Warrior build time, and enough culture vision to see the Barbarians coming with 3 turns to spare. If they come sooner than that, then Buster the Scout could return to defend. So, no matter what, the Barbarians will not be able to attack our empty capital. But again, it is very unlikely that there are any Barbarians roaming like that.

I have spent too much time worrying about this already.

[Tarkeel]

RE: Persia. Don't understimate the value of having a two-mover that gets defensive bonuses.

For tiles, when score is on you can just hover over your score and it will tell you how many land-tiles the map has.

[GT]

Or maybe another player has an “overpopulated” vault with like 9 pop, but rather bad land, where slaving its population into units would be the only sensible thing to do. Who knows what weird setup we are in..

And yes if Gavagai commits 100% to GW first, we don’t stand a chance if his land is equal. Mmmm….

[Magic Science]

Silly me, I forgot something important.

Password: summersia

And GT, I may ask you to play some of our turns next week. I may be without internet access on a family trip then. Probably not, but maybe. I will have a plan to follow by then in any case.

[GT]

Should be possible for me. Having a short trip planned myself, but we will figure it out. Right now I am still some 12km up in the air.. WiFi is good, though