Ok, so, we have a very interesting setup as every starting techs has a malus attached while every trait has an additional bonus. Those changes though were so that the desirable starting techs got changed around heavily while the desired traits didn't get changed all that much - and what was changed was mostly due to the improvements we start with and less to the attached bonuses. Anyway, lets look at Sevens starting post:
SevenSpirits Wrote:[Rules/tracker/etc will go here later.]
All right, here's something to ponder while we finalize the player order. These things are unlikely to change, but I won't make any guarantees until I randomize who starts!
You have a pre-placed city with 5 culture; a scout; and a worker one tile south of the capital. Note the village at B, the workshop on the flood plain, the railroad at D, and the Forest Preserve on the tile two south of the capital.
Depending on your civilization's starting techs, certain things will be changed about your start:
Fishing: Your city loses its 5 starting culture. The Wheel: The village on Tile B is removed. Agriculture: The Corn is moved to Tile C (where it is forested). Hunting: Tile A loses the forest. Mysticism: Tile C becomes plains. Mining: Tile D becomes flatland.
Additionally there are three civilizations with effects should you choose them:
If you are India, you start without a worker.
If you are Inca or Byzantium, you start without a scout.
Depending on your traits, you will additionally start with two free items (in your capital, in case that's not clear):
Aggressive: Library Charismatic: Granary Creative: Courthouse Expansive: Hospital Financial: 1 gold Imperialistic: Grocer Industrious: Castle Organized: Supermarket Philosophical: Airport Protective: +2 Population Spiritual: Warrior with the Sentry and Leadership promotions.
Clarifications:
a) Yes, Financial starts with a buck. Not 1gpt, not a gold resource. $1.
b) If your civ has a unique unit/building version of a starting unit/building of yours, you'll get your special version, not the regular version.
As I have choosen my leader already, lets look at traits first:
PRO: +2 pop sounds nice at first and might get you in the lead shortly - but I don't see how you would stay there. PRO is just the worst trait and +2 pop at the start won't win you the game.
ORG: Starting with a supermarket basically means starting with +1 food. Thats pretty nice tbh in regards to early growing. But would I take ORG over FIN or PHI or EXP for that bonus? Especially when I look at the bonus attached to PHI, I quite certainly can say: NO WAY. If this would be the same map as PBEM25 with its ridiculous maintenance, then I might reconsider. But then again, probably not.
IND: Starting with a Castle means +1 trade route and +25% EP. Well, 5 instead of 4 EP is interesting but nothing I'd really care about right now. EP will certainly be more important this game (get rid of defenses with spies instead of slow collateral units - or use those collateral units to deal collateral instead of bombarding... not to speak of the use of spies in case of culture battles in border regions) but that one EP won't make it for me. And the trade route is simply +1 cpt as soon as we have 3 cities. Not that exciting.
Now, IND itself of course is interesting for the wonderhog I am (finished two more in PBEM25...) but we can see Stone already and so I am sure Marble will be available as well, making IND much less desirable imo.
CHA: I don't want CHA. The granary of course is a nice bonus but I don't want to whip the cap early and that means the granary loses some of its benefits. I mean, it still is great, I have tried that with my spreadsheets. But to grow from 2 to 4 you need 33 food. You'll get 15 as bonus from the granary. Well, I didn't want to take the supermarket, which would have provided that amount in 15 turns (and more afterwards), so why should I take the granary? Of course, CHA is better then ORG, especially in an AW game. But I don't like it. Sure, you can get 3 promo Knights with it with Vassalage and Theocracy. But I got burned by focussing too much on one bonus in one era already several times. I don't know right now if I ever will go to war with Knights - nor if they will need 3 promos. So, no CHA for me.
EXP: Hospital as bonus is not interesting. EXP itself is really strong as always of course. Not much more to say.
CRE: Again, I don't care much about the Courthouse. Sure, pair that with the Aztecs and whip yourself from 4 to 2 all the time. But when would I do that? As stated, I simmed starts already - many... like 6+ hours of simming with my spreadsheet. And I never came around to research BW and whip my cap all that much. I want to work the deer, corn and RR hill as all of those are 5 or 6 yield. I have 2 more grassland hills available, I probably should work over whipping the pop away (I still need to study some documents on whipping, even on quick it seems...). I mean, sooner or later I surely could use it. But for the start that courthouse would only provide 2 EP. Nice bonus, but thats it. Of course, again CRE itself is pretty strong. Popping borders is always an issue. But there are other ways to do that, like religion, SH and later building culture or working artists.
AGG: Library at the start? Thats nice. But not for the possibility of an early academy. I mean thats also great - but the bonus of the library itself can already be really helpful to get some techs faster AND to pop the borders (if you start with Fishing) on T1 already, making the Crabs available to work over the corn. So, interesting at least. And AGG itself is great for early wars. Honestly it is. PBEM14 showed me how strong it is when you can field Shock-axes as soon as you have a barracks. Thats crazy. And in the late stages of the game? Well, I think Munro it was who showed how important it can be even then.
FIN: No real bonus and FIN itself does need no words.
SPI: A warrior at the start is nice. Sentry is nice. But we start with a worker so the first build probably is a warrior anyway. Of course, if you have your scout and your warrior, you can discover more lands earlier then the others. But that alone is certainly no reason for me to take this trait. But again, the trait itself is strong so no big bonus was needed. Especially in AW you can surely do crazy things with it - certain games on this site show already how much an economy can get boosted or shafted depending on your civics. But I tried it once and did never get to the point that I actually could make use of it. Because thats the biggest issue with this trait, it misses early game punch.
IMP: Starting with a Grocer? That means +25% gold and 2 merchant slots. Someone knows how long it takes to generate a GM when you work 2 merchants as PHI? 6 turns... 6 fucking turns. The second one? 11 more turns. 17 turns to get 2 GMs? And which techs to we need to research for Civil Service and therefore Bureau? Well, the following seems to work: Agri -> TW -> Pottery -> Writing -> Maths -> Currency -> CoL -> Civil Service. You need to get Mining and Alphabet as well (bulbing preference before CS) and you need to avoid Fishing (or get Sailing as well) and BW. In AW no BW... yes, crazy. I am known for being crazy. But if you get it, you can bulb MC - there are worse things then bulbing MC. Oh, and one could think about a Library and running 4 specs (6 food corn + 4 food deer + 2 center = 12, 4 for the 2 citizens working the tiles, leaves 8 for 4 specs). CS at T45? Lets see!
Oh, and to top it off, you can get settlers faster and GGs as well. Thats pretty great with that cap. We will have 8h/turn really quickly and go up to 14 = 21 for a settler. 3 turn settlers.
PHI: I talked about the trait itself in the IMP-section. Double GP-points is great but till now I had often the issue that it came to late for me to give me an edge over the opposition. Thats obviously my fault though, so we have to see if I can remedy that this game. But apart from the normal bonus, we will have an Airport in our city. I simmed a start which lets me have my second city by T15 or T16 and finish the second worker in the cap at that point as well - which can be lifted to that new city immediately. Thats great to save some turns. However, realistically... this won't be game-changing at all. Neither will one unit make the difference if an enemy is honest in taking a border city nor will it be enough to strenghten an attack force. Especially as the unit can't move after being lifted. Still, maybe an opportunity will present itself in the game. Don't count on that though.
So, thats the traits and my thoughts on them. I finally took PHI/IMP. I was pondering with EXP/IMP as well as FIN/IMP. But I feel that a SE, changed to a workshop economy is more viable in AW then cottages. Especially on a toroidal map which means sooner or later I will be bordered on all sides (look at PBEM25 for an example). PBEM4 and also PBEM8 made defense much easier (though I fucked it up still...).
To understand how I came to that decision we have to look what one loses depending on the starting techs:
Fishing: Your city loses its 5 starting culture.
The Wheel: The village on Tile B is removed.
Agriculture: The Corn is moved to Tile C (where it is forested).
Hunting: Tile A loses the forest.
Mysticism: Tile C becomes plains.
Mining: Tile D becomes flatland.
First thing being obvious is that Mining should not be one of our starting techs as we would destroy a potential 5 yield tile. That already makes many civs unavailable. Also obvious is that Mysticism and Fishing have basically no influence on the start. Mysticism only a slight one if coupled with Agri and Fishing never because either you have the tech but not the crabs in your culture or you have the crabs in the extended culture but not the tech - either way, no 3/0/2 tile before T3.
Then it gets interesting. Agri moves the corn under a forest which means you don't get it into play until BW but you do have another 4-yield-tile available. I thought this to be really bad, not getting your 6-yield-tile asap in play. But I didn't have time to test it - the other players were already yelling at me for taking so much time with my picks. So, lets see:
Start with Hunting / Agri, improve your Deer, research Mining. Go road the RR PH, then the GLH. T10 you should have all improved. Gives 4/1, 3/1, 0/5, 1/3 + 2/1 center = 10/11 yield. EOT10 you are also at 4 pop. So T11 you can start a settler. With IMP you'll get 2 food and 16 hammers per turn. So EOT14 you can have the settler finished with 9 overflow (6 after correcting it for the IMP-bonus). And before you have produced 31 hammers. So at EOT14 you have produced 3.7 warriors and a settler. My start will yield a settler at EOT13 already but with no overflow and only 2 warriors produced. On T14 I have enough production for another warrior. End result at EOT14 is:
Agri:
1 Settler
3.7 warriors
0/18 food
150 commerce total (171 beakers w. Mining -> Archery -> 76/104 BW)
Non-Agri:
1 Settler
3 warriors
1/18 food
161 commerce total (174 beakers w. Agri -> Mining -> Archery -> 27/104 BW)
I would say Agri wins here imo. Of course I win one turn of production from the second city, so that partly will help offset the hammer advantage of the Agri-start. Anyhow, to late to go back on that.
The Wheel is simply removing your village. I don't see why you would work it anyway so I don't think it really is negative. Especially as this will never be a commerce-super-city anyway.
And lastly Hunting. Takes away the forest, making it a 2/1 unimproved respectively 4/1 improved tile. And is the only way your worker can improve anything at the start, otherwise he will sit around 3 turns just waiting for you to finish a tech. Therefore it seemed you had to take it. I think I was not the only one thinking like that.
So, back to our starting question. Why the Vikings? Well, Hunting was obvious wanted as starting tech. Agri I unfortunately mistakenly got rid of. The same for Mining (only not mistakenly). That left only a few civs available to pick from and scooter had taken Mongolia by then. So what did I had to choose from:
Greece
HRE
Vikings
Celts
Greece as a Colisseum-replacement as UB. Nobody builds Colisseums anyway. And the UU is for me only secondary as you normally don't use it all that often if at all.
HRE has the Rathaus and the Landsknecht. Rathaus of course is nice for -75% maintenance. But the Landsknecht is on the wrong part of the tech-tree and overall not very useful. Sure it is still only secondary to my decision but when the UB doesn't impress me and the UU is shit there is not much reason to choose it. Oh, and it is a Mysticism / Hunting start - I need Fishing to work the Crabs to get Agri on T4 instead of T5 and still grow on T5. I would reconsider that IF the UB would be great - but it isn't.
Celts next. Those were actually the competitors together with Vikings in the end. Why? Well, the Dun. You can get Guerilla 2 on your archers. In a hill city that is
+25% hill
+50% city
+50% guerilla 2 for being on a hill
+50% for walls in the city
+25% fortify
----------------
+200%
or a str 9 archer on defense. That would have kept me safe for a pretty long time if I settled on hills always and made sure to be able to build a wall if necessary (though 7.5 is still pretty good).
Of course they also start with Mysticism and the UU is again not that impressive - though you'd probably could put G2 on it and settle it on a hill in enemy territory just to be obnoxious.
Lastly, my pick, the Vikings. Seven said we would have water on this map and boats would be needed. So the Trading Post might actually be handy to have ships which can come from out of the fog to attack. Additionally we have the Berserker. Not only amphibious but also +10% city attack. Oh, and my bulb path leads me to them pretty early - and makes it that getting MC and bulbing Machinery (don't get Feudalism to keep Guilds of the bulb-list) is actually worthwhile. And I don't need to keep BW unresearched as well. Great :D
So, according to my current micro, I'll settle T15 the incense spot and T21 the gold/pig spot. Both on the PH, in case of the incense 1S of it. I can then build a WB there and finish it T18, working 3 turns the crabs, so that I can work at T22 the incense and the crabs. Also T22 I can start working the gold.
I haven't worked all of it out till now, but a quick test showed that I can get CS by EOT35. Teaser!
scooter: 6000 for tech, 1000 for pop, 2000 for warrior
Commist: 6000 for tech, 1000 for pop (my table is missing those I see)
Lewwyn: 2000 for tech, 4000 for 2 warriors
Brian: 2000 for tech, 1000 for pop
Obviously for scooter he could have researched Mining instead and finished a scout last turn. Heck, for all I know Commist could be the one with 9000 soldier points. But I am pretty sure to be right on my numbers. Simply because going Agri first makes sense when you start with Hunting.
Apart from that we can also see that Lewwyn is his normal self, already building a second warrior and working the village. Surely because he is Fin. But honestly, delaying growth for it? Maybe, I certainly understand trying to get Hunting as quickly as possible (but in that case, go Fin/Agg, get 17 beakers per turn and have Hunting at EOT1...). Still, working it even after he got Hunting seems silly. He will have his Deer online next turn. Thats 4 food per turn. He got till now 5 food stored. That means 9f at EOT5, 13f at EOT6. He could have grown at EOT6 if he had worked the FP WS this turn. I first thought he needed that to get Mining in time, but he had 56 beakers total till EOT3. Working WS this turn would make that 67 and Deer next turn 77. He needs exactly 77 for Hunting and Mining (34 and 43). So, he could still have mined the RR hill without delaying his growth. And he can reinvest this one turn earlier growth by working the village with the new citizen if he really needs the commerce that badly to get BW (yes, his tech-path is pretty obvious when you think about how to play a start with forested corn).
Anything else? Well, Brian likes to jump around on tiles. I am not sure what the reason was for that. Trying to get Agri in time it seems. Maybe hoping to throw people off in regards to C&D. If so that surely was Mists idea
edit: Uh, yeah, and actually Mist is on another team - nevermind, I am sure he still is responsible :neenernee
Same map as last post but with some city planning included
Blue (Incense-city):
Will be planted on T16, one turn later then by my former micro. I had 3 commerce more in my spreadsheet then I'll get in the game, so TW can't come in before EOT13 without also delaying the settler to EOT14. And it simply makes no difference - either he is finished EOT13 but has no road to move in 1 turn to the settling spot (settling T16 therefore) or a road is ready on T14 to move threw to the spot in one turn, but the settler only completes EOT14 (again settling on T16). But the latter will late me grow to size 5 as well. Anyhow, I'll explain my micro later (if anyone actually cares) in more detail.
T16-T20: Work crabs, build WB. Grow EOT20 to size 2. Keep working crabs on T21,T22 while also working the forested PH. That finishes the WB at EOT22. T23 onwards work crabs + incense.
I could obviously try to get the WB asap by working the PH from T16 on. That would complete the WB at EOT19 and working the crabs then would lead to size 2 at EOT22. Same as in my micro but 8 commerce less.
Anyhow, I will grow to size 3 at EOT26 or 27, depending if I switch or one turn from the incense to the village. I will lose 3 commerce but win 3 by having the pop one turn earlier and being able to put it on the village. Probably depends on what is in the fog.
Red (Gold-city):
Will be settled T21. Gold will be improved T22 and worked from then on. Yes, that will delay growth heavily. No, I don't intend to get AH for the pigs. Yes I might regret this decision. Yes, I even might go back on it and change my micro to include AH in the plan. We will see. IF I get AH, I will work the pigs on T21,T22, switch to the improved gold T23, T24, work the improved pigs T25 and grow at EOT25. Of course I lose 14 commerce + ~90 for getting AH. So 100 more commerce to get. Still, I probably do that and delay CS to T40.
White (Silk-Sheep-city):
Well, not my 3rd city I think but one to plant sometimes.
Orange (Deer-Fish-Gems-city):
Again, not sure when to settle, but food in first ring and depending on other settlements I can get a WB from somewhere else probably. It does need a border pop though to be worthwhile, so I have to see how to manage that.
Played T7. Nothing important found scouting. Warrior finished last turn, second one started. Grow to 3 at EOT.
As for C&D, again nothing special happened. But lets try to add the food numbers, just for fun and see who will have growth this turn:
scooter:
0 4
1 4
2 4
3 6
4 9 - growth, worked deer, real food produced 6
5 8
6 8
The first 5 turns we can deduct each turn 2 food to feed the citizen. Leaves exactly 14. Then we can deduct each turn 4 food to feed two citizens. That makes 8 food in his box right now when he starts T7. The most he can produce is 9 (center 2 + corn 3 + deer 4), deducting the 4 makes that 5. So he can finish with 13/16 food in his box at most. Though I assume he works the FP WS again for 12/16 food. Next turn the same and he grows to 3.
Commist:
0 5
1 5
2 5
3 4
4 7 - growth, worked corn, real food produced 5
5 6
6 8
Same as with scooter regarding the deductions. So 3+3+3+2+3 = 14. Exact growth at EOT4. T5 and T6 add 6 food to his box, having him currently at 6/16. No growth there, no matter what he does.
Lewwyn:
He is still at 1 - should grow this turn if he works again the deer. Still don't understand what he is doing. I guess he will realize that he is behind in 20 turns and will start plotting to go to war with someone.
Brian:
0 5
1 3
2 5
3 6
4 9 - growth, worked deer, real food produced 6
5 9
6 9
Same as before in regards to deductions. Gives 3+1+3+4+4 = 15. Growth EOT4 with 1 overflow. T5 and T6 add each another 5 to his foodbox for a total of 11/16 at EOT6. He could grow this turn and I expect him to do exactly that.
Played another turn, no C&D done as I was already late this morning.
However, while sitting at the dentist I was thinking about my plan. I CAN get CS at T35, I know that. I have simmed it. But that also leads to the point that the question is no longer "CAN I do it?" but instead "SHOULD I do it?". And that actually is a pretty tough question for me. I am lacking experience in that regard. So, lets try to look at it from a sole economic viewpoint:
Gains:
+50% hammers
+50% commerce
for ~40 turns. Obviously I have no clue if 40 turns is correct. I certainly can do it quicker but playing along normally I think that might be around the time we should reach it. Now, from all I can see, I expect to work in my cap:
Food is not of interest as of now. For hammers I won't obviously have that yield at T35 if I go for CS, so we will deduct 8 hammers each turn for 10 turns. Also commerce I won't have that available, so we will calculate with 10 commerce for the first 10 turns and increase that slightly afterwards. Like so:
My investments though are 80 hammers for the Oracle. So I am left with a gain of around 240 hammers and 260 commerce. But I also have delayed settlers and improvements. Now it gets blurry. I have no clue how to value those.
Well, whatever, I won't find a solution this way either I feel. Anyone wanna help me and give me advice? Does it make sense to delay settler 3 and 4 by around 10 turns (and all others as well of course), just to get CS?
While I wait for some lurker insight, I go on with my C&D work:
scooter:
Size 3; Hunting, Wheel, Agri, Mining; 2 Warriors
Commist:
Size 3; Myst, Wheel, Hunting, Agri; 2 Warriors
Lewwyn:
Size 2; Myst, Agri, Hunting, Mining, Fishing; 2 Warriors (probably finished another scout or is building a worker)
Brian:
Size 3; Myst, Hunting, Agri, Mining; 1 Warrior
I am sure on techs for everyone. Due to the GNP they cannot have finished other techs (not that other techs would make much sense anyway). I am also sure on production for everyone but I am not sure what Lewwyn is building right now. As written I expect he has finished a scout. He could have started a worker as well but that would mean he has 5 hammers in something (warrior or scout) and does not finish it and grow. Doesn't make sense imo as he has a 6,5 and 4 yield tile available. Plus another 4 yield if he mines the GLH. So he should grow to 4 probably before he starts a settler/worker.
Brian should finish a warrior / scout EOT9 (this turn). scooter and Commist have used up their hammers for 2 warriors each.
Ok, so much for that, someone wants to know how much overflow they all have in the next tech?
![[Image: pbem32startshot.jpg]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1116194/pbem23pics/pbem32startshot.jpg)
My start will yield a settler at EOT13 already but with no overflow and only 2 warriors produced. On T14 I have enough production for another warrior. End result at EOT14 is:![[Image: T3Overview.JPG]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18761275/Civ/PBEM32/T3Overview.JPG)
![[Image: T5CandD.JPG]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18761275/Civ/PBEM32/T5CandD.JPG)
- nevermind, I am sure he still is responsible :neenernee
![[Image: T6Overview.JPG]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18761275/Civ/PBEM32/T6Overview.JPG)