[PB79] Just one more Game

[xist10]

Northern ocean will be the other copper city, I think.




I lost the scout to a barbwarrior. Unlucky



Ricks next tech was The Wheel after AH. I researched Sailing->Masory for the Greta Lighthouse in the capital.
I think I will start after the second settler ? Utica should be able to produce a few civil units already.



The second settler will settle the corn spot SE of the capital. I miss hunting for the wild, but still a good spot and towards Rick, I think.



I don't know where Rick is.
I fear, I retreated the scout one turn to early. I hope I have more than that.



I have the graphs.
I think Rick has a gold/silver mine - otherwise I can't explain the 7c change.
I have produced more c in the moment.



Rick has more pure Production.
I think I have more with the POP2 whip, but woods aren't factored in.

Rick finished the workboat not with a forest plains hill - if he had the possibility.



Food showed, that the use of the forest plains hill seemed to be the correct choice.
I lost 1f in the immediate time, but this I grew to size 3 one turn earlier and finished the farm - I think we have nearly mirrored starts - 2 turns earlier.



Demo is great - partly because 2 players whipped last turn, I think.

[xist10]

What's the general situation ?
I really need to find Rick.
I expect Rick to be in the southeast, but I'm not sure.

Otherwise, I have finished researching Masonry and will begin the Great Lighthouse in a short time.
The GLH got a big hit in CtH - -50%. Still, 1c per coast city is okay. I have 2c thanks to PRO - or 3c if I settle a few islands.




I finished the settler last turn. - Settler to the SE
I got a lot more overflow than expected.

I plan to whip the LH POP2 at 29p for maximal overflow.
I'm not sure how much overflow whipping I will use.
The classic move would be axes (and spears) for 50% overflow.
I think I will use 6->3 with settlers.
Maybe a few times 6->4 for another worker.

Whipping is a whole science for itself.
Generally, you exchange food to production at 1:1 without a granary and 1:2 with a granary. But this gets worse, if you cities get bigger.
In my first MP game, I wrote a which showed, that whipping lose (over longer times, on paper) from a pure production point against mines - even with a granary.
A plains mine exchange 2 food for 4 prod, a grassland mine is even better with 1 food for 3 prod.

But this ignores worked cottages and that you need a few mines to do that - and then you need a few whips till mines are better.


This means, whipping is (with a granary) a very good method to get production in cities. Problem: You can only finish a project, can can't whip, if the sacrificed population can't finish the project.

In this case, Overflow whipping is a solution. The calculation is a bit more complicated, because here, we have to calculate the value of the project, we used to generate overflow.

I can generate no more than 30p Overflow from a whip.
One classic project for that are axemen. 35p means, If you generate less than 5p per turn, you can whip Pop2 after the first turn and get nearly a full pop overflow. -> Overflow whipping for production alone is in the best case half as efficient as whipping.
But how can you value the new axemen you got ?

If you talk about value, I have to add an important thing. Lets say, I have a size2 city with 8p per turn.
When I work 2 turns on a courthouse (16/120p) and then 1 turn on a granary (8/60) and whip the granary POP2 (68/60p), I generate 16p + 8p overflow = 24p for the courthouse.
When I work 3 turns on the granary (24/60) and whip after that (84/60), I generate 24p for the courthouse too.

This preamble besides, I want to discuss the case here.

In this case, the primary point is production for the GLH. I can't whip wonders efficient - Pops should generate 20 baseprod or less for wonders, not 30.
This means, mines are better, or ? Maybe. Problem: I have only one mine in the moment and a happycap of 5. - the happiness will always become a problem, but this means, I can't build on mines.

I have 5 (6 with the sugar) forest I can chop - I need more workers for that to be fast. Still, I have 120/200p here.

A Pop2 axemen whip is the easiest way to do it, but I have 3 good tiles to work. I don't want to whip the city down to size3.
And I have a big food overflow from this 3 tiles.

And here comes an interesting point about worker and settlers. Worker and settlers are built with production AND FOOD. In return the city stops growing while I built a worker or a settler.
You don't really want this when you have a granary, because the granary acts effective as a hidden 100% bonus to your food production.

But for me, I don't have a granary - and I have not a big production in Karthago. So when I want to use a settler to generate overflow, I win, when I built the settler 2 turns and whip with maximum overflow instead of building the GLH first and whip the settler as fast as I can.

I change the worked tile from the mine to the sugar this turn, so that I can whip POP2 next turn.
Still I won't do it, I will change the worked tile to a grassland and invest 4 prod in an axemen.

Why ? So I can whip POP2 from size 5 to size 3. - And I have prepared another POP2 whip after I grow again to size 5.



Utica will finish another warrior. After that, I will produce a few workers at size 3 - I have only 4 good tiles to work and no worker capacity for another improved tile.



The worker near Utica will chop the forest for the GLH.



I will settle the 3rd city next turn.

The 4th should be founded on the silver(ivory spot in the northwest.
And I'm thinking of researching hunting before pottery.

[xist10]

3rd city - I started farming the corn.
The barb was a bit surprising.
I offered a battle on the forest hill - otherwise, the warrior is back fast enough. And if I lose this with +75, I would lose the city fight with +50% too.
But the warrior won.

Rick at 3 cities too.

Karthago started building an axeman with 4p.



I whipped the lighthouse POP2.



And started the GLH.
I changed the mine the farm.

[xist10]

Not many updates here, a few more are in my german thread.

Anyway the "early" GLH has one possible problem: I miss at least 200 prod in my expansion.
Utica can pick up the slack from Karthago, but still, I blockade one city for a longer time.

This is the reason, I thought about whipping settlers.

A short sandbox to that:



I can expect a 10f overflow at size 6.



And 43p overflow in the GLH.

How efficient is that ?



Karthago hasn't enough to work 5 tiles in the moment.

Still I have 2 costs.
1.) I need to grow to Pop6. This is something where I'm mostly neutral. Unhappiness seems to be the limiting factor already, so 5->3 whips aren't that good.
2) I need 35p more (in comparison to an axemen). This is the "big" problem.
Still, I built the settler with food and over the 3 turns, I get ~30f. In other words, I exchange 9p instead of 4p to get a settler insteand of an axeman. - I'm disregarding the food.



I found Rome. Far enough that I don't expect a rush - Rick researched Writing - but still in the neighbourhood.



Not as good as I hoped. Still okay.

[xist10]

I got better data.



This is the Karthago this turn.
I can grow in 3.
I have 2 chops next turn (I need to update c1) and another 2 chops 4 turns later.



Plan, when I whip the settler (Siedler).
GLH in T59. There is a small inaccuracy in the Whip (Peitsche) turns, but this changes not enough - ~ -10 prod.
The unhappy faces don't need food, when I built a settler (new to me, but take a look at the sandbox).



Axe whip this turn means, I got the GLH in T58.
Same inaccuracy here, still enough overflow.

I like the settler variant a bit better.
One turn later, but settler instead of axemen.

[Fenn]

I like the settler variant better also; GLH has slowed expansion so doing what you can to accelerate it is ideal, I think. And T59 is a very competitive completion date still.

[xist10]

I agree.
Settler variant.
I'm building an unwanted spearman, I forget that effect of Hunting.

Utica builds an axeman against barb axemen and to grow.

And I should be thinking about a galley in the near future.



With the 40% bonus to pottery, the demo seems a lot better.



And Rick has stone. The better resource for early wonders.
Interesting: Nobody founded a religion yet.

[Tarkeel]

I'm starting to improve the second city.
Surprisingly, I have a trade connection to the capital.

Trade routes are a bit wonky. The algorithm doesn't check to see if the riverside tiles are actually connected to each other, so trade will jump from one river to the other.

[xist10]

The surprising factor was more, that a river connects the tile behind the spring to the river trade network.

[Tarkeel]

Yeah, but that connection is from the Utica river.