[PB79] End of the beginning?

[Dreylin]

So no-one went Worker-first? Interesting!

Are you planning on using Warriors to finish scouting the immediate neighborhood, or do the barb settings support a second Scout? SE does look a good first location right now.

[coldrain]

Going for a scout after the worker would be too risky I think. I'll probably make warriors and explore the immediate surroundings with those.

[coldrain]

Turn 18

Not much special occurring since previous report, finished worker T15 and rice farm has been completed. Capital will grow size 2 next turn. Researching bronze working, worker will mine the hill while waiting. This turn I found Miro in the west:

I was last to play my turn, so to avoid obscuring where my scout came from, I logged out without moving anything. Or could I have moved and just sent a PM to Miro, telling where I made contact? Not sure about peace time double moves not involving a settler race.

[Dreylin]

We had this conversation in ‘78; consensus was that a double-move & PM is acceptable - but only necessary if the unit ends turn in view as in this case. During ’78 the scout dancing around Superdeath never ended turn in view so we didn’t need to inform.

In future, I would recommend keeping the scout closer to home for longer and defogging another ring of tiles around the capital; as-is I don’t think you have enough visibility to know where to settle next. The Warrior(s?) will help but be slow and you may need to delay the settler. Maybe go for a second Worker first and then chop out the settler?

[coldrain]

Turn 29
I’ve been meaning to update, but procrastinated until I scouted a bit more and finished BW. Here’s an overview of potential first expands:

Halfway point between China and me is around those pigs. Fastest expands to start contributing are on the coast, where I can send chopped workboats? Or share the cow from capital? Otherwise that rice/sheep/copper site looks good too.

Worker just finished first chop, will go for another one next to the cows. One warrior is fortifying near site B to fog bust the area, second warrior just moved to the PH near site C. I will keep these units close for now, there are a lot of lions and bears roaming around. Capital will build either WB or worker next depending where first expand goes to.

[Dreylin]

Interesting. I have a couple of ideas, make what you will of them.

1S of "C" could be a viable alternative; yes the Copper is second-ring, but so is the Ivory and you get the FP first ring to make up for the Rice. Also a plainshill plan for the extra hammer.

On the other hand that would mean you couldn't settle 1W of the Ivory which looks like a good chokepoint city - or are you thinking of pushing past the Pigs/Copper in this area?

A does look good for the short-term boost from sharing improved tiles, but I wonder if it caps out too quickly - it doesn't seem like it will be more that a filler longer term once the food is redistributed.

You could consider sliding B 1W onto the Sugar - especially if A is planted first and pops border to enable the first Clam. The Sugar tile is never going to be great, and planting on it opens up another range of hills that would turn all the seafood into a production powerhouse.

I'd also be looking at how early you can spare a Workboat to loop around those islands; getting an intercontinental trade route going would juice things up. Maybe send the Settler to some variant of C with the Worker, whip out a second Worker and then regrow on a WB for exploration and loop it back in time to found A?

I assume next couple of techs will include Wheel & Archery for Roads & Totem Poles respectively?

[Dreylin]

Also meant to mention that the integrated BUG dotmapping tool is on Alt-x, and can be helpful in visualising city coverage/overlap, etc.

[coldrain]

Turn 32

Settler moved inland towards “C”. I decided to not revolt yet to slavery, as AH will complete and maybe horse location might influence final position. I really like the idea to delay monuments (archery) in favour of wheel -> pottery first, but this means that founding for first ring resources is more important. View of slightly more scouting:

In the end, if no horses appear to alter the plans, I want to get all of rice/sheep/copper in first ring. On “C” or 1N of it should be fine. As you mentioned, I want to leave the choke point settle between ivory and pigs open for later expand (possibly next). Worker will finish chop next turn, I will revolt to slavery after second worker is done. Southern warrior defeated a bear while fortifying on forest and behind a river. In other news, Miro founded second city on previous turn.

[coldrain]

Barb lion won a 3% fight against my scout LOL. To be safe, I stayed with warrior on "C" and founded first expand there. Capital built second worker (chopped), which will go for the new city and start improving there. Slotte danother settler in build queue, but now I'm thinking another warrior would be useful for more fog busting.

[greenline]

Every game with barbs on, a bullshit combat roll like that happens. The Civ 4 random number generator is incredibly pseudorandom, no one can convince me otherwise. Best way to be safe is to always play with barbs off.