Cornflakes Goes Classical ... or Quantum?!

[Old Harry]

Wow! I was sure you were done for a month ago! Great work!

[Tarkeel]

Well played! I also thought turning on scooter (and by partial extension, me) was the wrong move, but you made it work. Kudos!

[Qgqqqqq]

Congratulations, very well done!

[yuris125]

well played, gg!

[scooter]

Well done!

[Cornflakes]

Thanks everyone! This was an incredibly fun game, even while in the midst of fending off the double team. At one point I'm pretty sure that Yuri came within 1 healthy unit of eliminating me.

I'll post some more thoughts on key decisions and turning points from my perspective later. For now, many thanks are due to Commodore for turning on Scooter at the exact moment of Scooter's greatest vulnerability on the turn that Yuri was eliminated, and for following through with the elimination to get us into the duel. The 10 turn enforced peace gave just just enough time to complete the kill and reposition back into a defensive posture for the subsequent duel.

Overall I was surprised at how aggressive the game turned out in the middle ages. I was expecting a more peaceful builder game. I expected that the vulnerability to backstab while invading would act as a greater deterrent, to avoid the exact sequence that played out in the game: Scooter hits Yuri while off to war, and then gets hit from behind while also off to war. Obviously my ill-advised Spices city that Yuri razed was the flash point that set it in motion. And Commodore's piling on to the leader in a time of vulnerability makes complete sense.

[Cornflakes]

Some key points and decisions that I want to highlight:

Classic plains cow/wines start

I had to laugh when I saw the starting screenshot. Plains cow/wines could be a meme start for a random map. But they were very powerful. I love the base production from plains cows, especially when there is another food resource to provide for growth. In this case, there were 2 additional food resources! On a classic era start, the wines make an excellent early commerce tile with a bonus hammer. Add in HR available on the same tech that unlocks the Winery, and I was immediately drawn to Spiritual for a quick civics swap. I feel like Philosophical was a miss here. I ended up with front loaded GPP without a good use. I built a 2nd academy in a mixed commerce/production city which was not ideal. Even the capital's academy although nice with Bureaucracy was still not game changing. Don't get me wrong, I did get high value from the Golden Age when I launched it and the Engineering bulb ... but I could have achieved both of those anyway by skipping the academies (which did nothing for the last 50 turns of the game while my slider was at 0% research).

In the end I settled on Greece, because of the Phalanx’s longevity. Phalanx soundly beat Knights, and can make do against Cuirassier. Enough at least to “outrun your friends, not the bear”. An extra happiness on the UU makes the colosseum situationally valuable, and the artist slots might be valuable, on a mainline defensive tech instead of researching up to Drama. (Discounted though since I’m SPI and can more easily run Caste). I value the UU highly though for the land grab.

Greece is not broken in an absolute sense, but for defensive purposes in the Medieval era their Phalanxes are wonderful. I'm thoroughly pleased with that choice. I would likely be dead to the Commodore/Yuri attack without Phalanxes, and they certainly made the final duel vs. Commodore in their era of maximum efficiency a much more manageable task.

   

Here are the graphs with Scooter and Commodore. I'm still 4-5 turns from getting Yuri's graphs. The main takeaways are that Scooter is prioritizing commerce over production, and I have several extra military units compared to the competition ... probably due to my higher natural production, but also Commodore has Forges in the two cities that I have vision on, and Scooter's culture rate suggests that he has Carnegie Libraries online.

However, my largest-in-the-world-by 18,000 soldiers army (aka, +2 chariots AND +2 axes more than the nearest rival) is none too large! ...

   

... because I have 3 axes, 2 archers, a spear, and a warrior incoming! And I can't switch to slavery for another 2 turns due to recent swap to Serfdom. Thankfully with my high military I'm completely safe here.

All-in-all I'm pleased to have the large military on hand. This would have been very uncomfortable if I'd been sitting at the rival best military. I wonder how the other players are doing with respect to barbs.

I feel like I managed the barb thread well this game. I read the tundra/ice as a real threat in the turn 40-50 timeframe, and responded by pre-emptively building up military. This in turn let me continue vertical growth and maintain Serfdom instead of requiring slavery. I also feel that barbs did a good job of balancing the roomier southern starts vs. the more cramped but less barb-infested northern starts.

Slight change of plans with my research: I paused research for 3 turns after Currency in order to finish the Great Scientist for an academy (worth 18 bpt now, and 30 bpt by the time I reach Bureaucracy). I decided to skip Code of Laws in order to hit Civil Service via Feudalism for a couple reasons:
• I'm not planning to run Caste System any time soon
• CoL is not on the line to Guilds or Rifles, which I'm prioritizing, and which will therefore save me 500 beakers.
• Skipping CoL blocks Philosophy on the GScientist bulb tree, thus opening up Paper and Chemistry [and later Astronomy and Electricity].

I have 7 lumbermills now and more on the way, so Machinery is actually an economic tech (I'll have 8 at Aether which will get Bureaucracy + Academy boost).

The decision to skip CoL turned out to be far more impactful than I imagined at the time. The trade off was essentially a couple turns slower to Bureaucracy through the more expensive Feudalism, and losing out on Caste System (except that I was running Serfdom already and had no Workshops to boost). The 500 saved beakers means that I was able to get Engineering at a critical point in the Yuri/Commodore war, and then squeeze out guilds on a horribly whipped down and exhausted economy. If I'd picked up CoL I'd be dead now, I'm 100% confident in that assessment.

Machinery spiked us up to 118 max tax from 88, so net +30. Breakeven research is now a 150bpt.

Also the fact that I'd focused on Lumbermills early on made Machinery a nice tech target, which had the follow-up consequence of putting me just 1 tech short of both Engineering and Guilds. That was an unplanned synergy with my strategy this game. Overall the CtH Lumbermill changes are great. Machinery gave me more of an economic boost than Currency

Commodore bulbed Machinery which neatly counters my Maces. He then chopped MoM in his tundra border city. Overall I concur with his choice. He is commerce constrained due to his lack of rivers so it makes sense that he would convert the Great Engineer to 1000 beakers and then spend the hammers for the wonder.

This was a nice move by Commodore

We founded Christianity and I carried a full turn of overflow into Apostolic Palace making it a 6-turn build. Meanwhile I’ve now completed HBR and Iron Working which gave a nice boost to the power graph, along with a couple more Phalanxes a dna longbow for the newest border cities. Unit expenses have climbed in recent turns along with supply for the garrisons of the newest cities, but that is temporary and just means when the two new cities are settled they will be net positive for the economy.

Paper is scheduled to complete on the same turn as I finish the AP in the capital, so it can roll right into UoS. I will have enough time to pick up Construction before Paper. Got to keep up with the neighbors in military tech and not just get lost in economy! I’ll have my first HA completed next turn which both Commodore and Yuri will be able to see.

Here is where things started going south. I had build up a great MFG and GNP engine in the early game, but Scooter also played to his FIN strengths and had now equalized his economic output and beat me to Hanging Gardens by a turn while jumping up to 11 cities. I was feeling pressure on the economic front and the expansion front. I tried going for both at the same time, only to provoke ...

   

Oops, I upset Yuri. I upgraded an archer to a longbow so I have 1 archer, 1 LB, and 2 Phalanx on defense (across a river and on a hill). With 3 catapults he can definitely capture although it should cost all the catapults and hopefully a sword or two. But I also offered peace for 84 gold + 30 gpt. It's a lot, but he is really behind in tech and will only fall further behind with a hot war. And I have a very healthy economy. And that location will make an excellent border fortress for the long term.

I also swapped into Slavery and whipped 9 pop (mostly unimproved tiles waiting for watermills, or specialists). 7 HA completed EOT, and another 7 units can be completed next turn off of overflow.

Wavelength was an unnecessary provocation, and an example of not being flexible to the game state. I recognized early on that Yuri was squeezed for land and decided to give him the entire jungle belt uncontested, and I had planned that Wavelength location as my northernmost border city. But I didn't adjust my plan when he popped the border there. At the very least I should have sent a scout into a few turns in advance to sniff for units. But really I should have adjusted my border city to one of the hills on the west side of that mountain range. I still would have claimed Spices, and I would have had a comfortable culture cushion along with the mountain vision deep into Yuri's territory. Wavelength was an unforced err on my part, no question about it.

Out of time for today so I'll have to cover the Long War debrief later.

[scooter]

Overall I was surprised at how aggressive the game turned out in the middle ages. I was expecting a more peaceful builder game. I expected that the vulnerability to backstab while invading would act as a greater deterrent, to avoid the exact sequence that played out in the game: Scooter hits Yuri while off to war, and then gets hit from behind while also off to war. Obviously my ill-advised Spices city that Yuri razed was the flash point that set it in motion. And Commodore's piling on to the leader in a time of vulnerability makes complete sense.

Yeah, strongly agreed here. I thought this game would be quiet peaceful. I think one thing I underestimated was the "blood in the waters" effect. When you or Yuris lost a city, suddenly the incentive to take another one rises significantly. Also, a lot of conflict was kicked off by the same thing that kicks it off in any other game - border disputes.

[shallow_thought]

Belated congratulations. Very, very nicely handled - you managed to stay so calm as everything, everywhere caught fire, and then you changed mindset to focus on patiently waiting for that game-ending chance.

It would be interesting to see more games with similar settings, see if they all devolve into bloodbaths. Certainly a new spice.