[Spoilers] Pindicator accepts his fate

[pindicator]

Turn 071

More friends!



This is OT4E's scout, and I immediately swapped all EP spending onto him. But straight away I can tell that I've been under-projecting his population: F8 tells me that there's 178 total pop in the world and at 15% he has either 27 or 28 total population. For comparison, we're sitting at 17. Even more impressive for OT4E: we're #3 in crop yield. I have no doubt who #1 is. On a more positive note, we're now #3 in crop yield after being #11 less than 20 turns ago.

This is the stretch of land that sits across the water northeast of my starting area. I keep telling myself I need to send the chariot back, but then I can't resist the urge to map out more territory. No, I'm not doing a good job of emphasizing Magellan. I probably should be too: all the snakey lands make for really good boating potential later in the game.

Looking at the diplo screen, OT4E has 7 cities. We're going to settle our 7th next turn:



Work boat is in position to net the crabs next turn. We'll get a second work boat out of Karego-At in time to net the Fish when borders pop from our new city. That also leaves just enough time to whip out a granary from that city. And while I'm not 100% sure that 2p whipping a granary is the smartest move here, I do like that it gets me a granary, a work boat, an axe, and grown back to size 6 all in under 10 turns.

Note that Nyles is due to finish Sailing eot 73. I'm going to lose research visibility on him end of this turn.

City Count & Population Estimates:

OT4E: 7 cities, 27 pop
StarDoor: 4 cities, 18 pop
Us: 6 cities, 17 pop
chumchu: 6 cities, 16 pop <-- I missed one of his cities being founded before, not sure when b/c I haven't been checking the diplo screens regularly
NylesStandish: 5 cities, 14 pop

World's largest city is size 6, so I feel pretty good about my position, especially considering we had a failed military attack just 20 turns ago.

[pindicator]

Turn 072

Despite NylesStandish continued playing of St Peter to LKenter's Lord Parkin's Jesus, we managed to get a second turn in on a major holiday weekend!

And this was a big turn for us.

First off, the gems are hooked up:



I went back and forth a bit on whether I grow for food and only after whipping the granary build, but in the end decided that the gems are just too strong, so we're going to work them every turn. I don't much care for whipping the granary next turn because then we're stuck on only 5 food growth at size 2, so I probably will just wait until whipping will take us 1 turn off the gems at most.

Part of the insistence on the gems comes from the newest city, Atuan, costing a bit more than Kameber did 2 turns before:



This city ended up costing us 7gpt to plant, and makes 4gpt right away. Green dot, when we plant that in 3 turns, is probably going to cost 10 or 11... So yeah, we want to work the gems now. Actually, I might just get the settler out and put it on green dot but not settle until Iron Working comes in or StarDoor shows a settler nearby. With the gems and new city accounted for, we're looking at about 8 turns to finish up Iron Working.

Nyles is hooking up the other plains cow with a spear in tow. Just in case this is a front for an invasion, I moved the new spear out of the capital and towards Karego-At. And as promised, Karego whipped it's granary for 2 pop. The capital may not make a granary for a little while. It depends on if I want to pop out yet another settler for a 9th city on t80. More likely not, considering expenses...

[pindicator]

Nothing like making a PB7 reference and mixing up the names ...

[pindicator]

Turn 073

Well, looks like I'll be settling that green dot straight away



Thankfully StarDoor just settled a city this last turn -- so that settler I saw to the south is likely already used up, otherwise I may be concerned. But StarDoor has shown a preference for the vertical over the horizontal in the growth philosophy of things, so I don't see him rushing out settlers. And if he starts one now, I will beat him to the spot. Just in case things come to blows, I swapped Orandrad to a chariot, so we can whip that out if needs be. I've only seen axes and warriors out of StarDoor so far, and his overall power level is lower than ours. Plus, he does have Sailing already, so we know that he has only Copper and no Horse hooked up.

We should start playing a turn split with him though, until that location is settled. Too bad he has the first half already. But I think our chances are good to land the location.

I moved a worker onto the tile with the axe, and we'll be ready to settle on t75. I'll move the archer south from Orandrad too, and we'll have to make another to defend against any surprises from the fog.

In other news, our 7th worker will be chopped from the capital. With these granaries coming online soon (I'll whip ones at Andrad and Orandrad in upcoming turns) we're going to need lots of worker turns.

[pindicator]

Turn 074

Summing up the whole turn in a single screenshot:



The Green Rectangle is where the main story takes place. StarDoor settled his 6th city this turn, but thankfully it wasn't near the gems. He also moved his warrior north, which unfortunately prevented me from roading the jungled rice tile as originally was planned. We shifted the worker over a tile to the west and planted the settler on top. Next turn the 2 workers finish their roads, and the settler that is also sitting west of the rice will found a new city. I've pulled the archer out of Orandrad, and a warrior can move in next turn for MP duty.

Debated whipping Orandrad's granary this turn, and really it's a tough call. Is 8 food with 12 commerce and 2 hammers? Normally I'd say yes, but in this situation my gut says to stay on the tiles and to whip later when we grow to size 4.

Just missing my green rectangle is a worker working to hook up our second luxury: the ivory camp is half finished.

Not whipping was also what I decided to do at Andrad in the Purple Rectangles. This was originally going to be a granary whip this turn, but a few things changed my mind. 1) I need more workers. 2) I don't want to whip off of good tiles, and Andrad is working all special tiles. 3) If I did whip off Andrad I'd want to do it at a time I could give the copper to Kameber, but today I figured Kameber is better by staying on the deer than taking the copper. So both Andrad and Torheven were swapped to workers. Andrad will spend 4 turns building its worker naturally; Torheven will put in 20h and then whip to finish its worker in 3. These workers are needed because I'm pretty sure the 3 workers I have in Green Rect are going to need to stay in the east, and right now there's only one worker in the Andrad - Kameber - Torheven area to hook up furs, chop trees, and improve tiles. This will bring it up to 3, and that may not even be enough to keep up with my population.

Speaking of Kameber, over at Red Rectangle we just chopped out a work boat. Did some fiddling with my options on growing that city this turn, and the best course seems to be to chop into this work boat, then chop into granary, whip said granary, and have the overflow go into a second work boat. Although we may not use that work boat for Kameber, we may send it farther north to the Blue Rectangle, which is where city #9 will be settled. The worker I just chopped at the capital is headed to the location southwest of the capital to chop that forest, which will come just in time to speed up the settler I started at the capital.

It's about time to start a new micro plan; the one I've been using is about down. Had to do a little improv this turn with worker actions up north, which isn't ideal at this stage in the game.

And while 9 cities does seem a tad of a strain on maintenance, if I'm right then gsorel just hit his 10th not too long ago.

[Commodore]

Agg Zulu feels it more like 7th.

[pindicator]

Turn 075

Okay, farmer push is officially over boys.



Damn, you guys were not joking about NylesStandish. I had started to convince myself that I wanted to push out that 9th city by t80, but now I'm chopping into an axe instead. Actually, I pretty much scrapped all the remaining micro plans and went with this:



I'm moving up the axe that I had in Torheven, on the StarDoor border. StarDoor hasn't shown any inclination to probe my defenses, and that city will have it's own archer finished shortly (swapped off the workers I had started last turn). I don't need to rival Nyles' power, just need to let him know that it won't be easy pickings.

Besides, my farmer push really is over - take a peek:



So we just accomplished all our major goals for the farmer push. I'm actually quite happy. And if we can go 5 turns without being invaded, I'll be really happy because the units I'm building now plus Iron Working will be quite a big power spike.

Iron Working in 5. Big possibility of that becoming 6, but I'm going to try and squeeze it out by t80.


Overseas, gsorel has really slipped from his top spot. DTG just razed one of his cities, and then gsorel responded by whipping almost every other city he had, so this doesn't look like a minor war. And because of all those whippings, we're up to #2



Definitely time to shift focus. Put a round or two of military in, secure what we've got while growing some cities, and then we can start pushing eastward to claim more lands.

EDIT: After posting I looked at Orandrad a little closer and realized it gains me food to whip that granary now but work the Fish & Gems (over working all 3 tiles). Losing that 5 food drops me down to #4 in crop yield, so there is a bit of a group there hovering behind OT4E's top crop.

Agg Zulu feels it more like 7th.

Huh?

[pindicator]

So gsorel gets invaded and then goes AWOL? Hopefully he just needed a little bit of time to clear his head

[pindicator]

Silver lining to this unfortunate gsorel situation: with the extra time I finally got a good The Choson One achievement run going in EU4. Finally got a game over that Ming hump, and it looks like I should be able to easily mop up the remaining territories needed for the achievement before time runs out.

[oledavy]

Silver lining to this unfortunate gsorel situation: with the extra time I finally got a good The Choson One achievement run going in EU4. Finally got a game over that Ming hump, and it looks like I should be able to easily mop up the remaining territories needed for the achievement before time runs out.

I always avoided getting into EU. I wonder to this day if it was the best or worst decision I ever made.

The fact you can play Korea for an achievement called The Choson One inclines me towards the latter