RB Pittboss #1 - SPOILER - Washington/Carthage

[ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF]

Glad to see your two civs make contact! I think it will be very interesting watching how you and dsplaisted handle things. Obviously the relationship could go a lot of different ways, depending on what the two of you choose to do.

Well, I'm not going to get too friendly with him, although an arms race wouldn't help either of us either.

If he settles a city provocatively, I'll have no qualms about razing it, but an early offensive war would be too expensive for me, if he has more than a couple Skirmishers.

As for where our borders will end up - I expect they will follow the coastline. This will make things very interesting with regards to naval invasions - either of us can stockpile galleys in a city (but only mine would be undetected) and then declare war and land on the other landmass in one turn.

What the implications of this are is unclear to me - if there is lush land across the channel, then it is probably to my advantage; otherwise I'll just need to clear the forests on my silks a little earlier than I would otherwise.

I'll see if dsplaisted will tell me anything more about that segment of land (he says it is a peninsula), to better inform me of my options.

[ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF]

Two things happened today: I finished my first scout in Carthage (and started a 2nd one), and I spotted a light blue border. That must be shadyforce, although I haven't met him yet.

There is a conveniently unforested plains tile which I suspect contains horses nearby, so I'll have to be on the lookout.

I sent this feeler out to dsplaisted regarding the map, the question about northern exploration is somewhat loaded, because I believe Shadyforce is directly north of dsplaisted:

Hi dsplaisted

I just have a couple of quick questions about the map:
Have you explored to your north? If your land does extend more than a few tiles to the north, then we probably are on the same landmass, and thus we won't get 3-commerce trade routes early on. Otherwise, it might be worthwhile to found a city on the coast near me, so that our cultures touch and we get trade routes without Sailing, I believe.
From what I can see of your peninsula, there are no resources and lots of forests. Is the entire map like this? Is there anything down there that I should know about?
Thanks,
ZPV

[ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF]

Well well!

Shadyforce has moved a warrior next to mine, and we have contact! He has not met dsplaisted yet.

Hi,

Pleased to meet you. Our exploring warriors have crossed paths. I assume you are off to the west. Am I the first person you have met? Have you travelled far?

shadyforce

Hi shadyforce,

I'm pleased to meet you too. I am indeed in the west, far far away (and a long, long time ago ).

You are the second player I've met. Have you met anyone else yet?

Have you explored to the south? I'm particularly interested in that area, because there is some land across the water from my capital, and I'd like to know if it connects to our continent.

Any thoughts on the map? Looks like those mountains near your capital make for some defensible terrain - I wonder what Sullla's intentions were.

Regards,
ZPV

Here is a screenshot of the area near his capital, for interested viewers:


I suspect the river plains tile has horses on it, which means he will have to choose between the cow and the fish for a city containing it. It's too far away for me to consider it, but if I were to try and agressively settle a city up there, it would definitely use fish+plains tile, simply because the fish is harder to pillage and the city can be on a hill.

[ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF]

Time for a progress report!

I've finished my 2nd scout, grown to size 3, and started a 2nd worker.

Here is the latest demographics screen:



Working two improved resources means that I am #1 in production, #2 in food, and #3 in GNP - that puts me in the lead for science, since sunrise with his religion is ahead of me, as is shadyforce with CRE.

Since I now have two scouts exploring my immediate surroundings, I will soon have enough information to make a firm dotmap. Here is a provisional one:




Red Dot will be my next city (I will build the Settler after the worker), and it will give me instant trade routes and be an excellent early game worker-pump. At size 3, working Cows, a plains hill mine, and spice-forest, it will produce a worker every 5 turns! It can also borrow a couple of tiles from Carthage and work cottages there while Carthage has other things to do.

After that, I will look to settle Green Dot quickly - this will be a hybrid between Specialists for GP generation and mines for production. I will generate my first Great Scientist for my Academy here, and it can quickly switch to building troops if I want or need some.

Beyond that, I think Yellow Dot will be a unit-pump, Blue Dot will be a cottage city if it's not a border city, and Purple Dot will claim Clams and Wine, and try to make use of them.

I'd be quite disappointed if I can't get at least this area, and hopefully a little more - on a Huge map one would expect at least 8 viable city sites to allow for National Wonders, and these are fairly dense dots.

If someone settles a city too close to me, and there is a risk of getting boxed in, I won't be afraid to take the military option.

Since all of these cities are coastal, I might make a late run at The Great Lighthouse, although I'm not going out of my way to research Masonry, so I don't expect to take this option.

[ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF]

As for my current plans - here is a screenshot of my city:



After Bronze Working is known, I will research The Wheel and Pottery, and stagnate growth at size 3 until I build a cheap Granary. I've farmed the open grassland tile to speed growth as much as possible when once I have the Granary; I hope to be at size 7 before 2000 BC.

Projected tech path: BW - The Wheel - Pottery - Animal Husbandry - Writing.

You might notice that I can work the plains hill forest instead of the silk, to get a bonus hammer on the worker.

However, the difference between 12bpt and 13bpt is quite large, and actually ends up as a two-beaker difference due to rounding errors. A hammer is not worth 2 beakers when hammers are as plentiful as they are here.

[Sullla]

Looks like you're off to a good start so far.

One thing came to mind: you mentioned avoiding one extra shield, since you'll have to give up two commerce due to rounding errors. However, one extra shield actually gets you TWO extra shields in this case, because it takes you to 8 shields base and 10 shields total with the Expansive worker boost (7+1 to 8+2 overall). My guess would be that 2 shields/turn are more important than 2 beakers/turn at this stage of the game... right?

[ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF]

One thing came to mind: you mentioned avoiding one extra shield, since you'll have to give up two commerce due to rounding errors. However, one extra shield actually gets you TWO extra shields in this case, because it takes you to 8 shields base and 10 shields total with the Expansive worker boost (7+1 to 8+2 overall). My guess would be that 2 shields/turn are more important than 2 beakers/turn at this stage of the game... right?

Indeed, if I had to give up 2hpt at this point, I would be much more hesistant to do so - although I might be willing to do that anyway, because tech is the limiting factor on my growth due to having cheap Expansive workers and lots of forests to chop.

However, it is not a two hammer (or shield!) difference. It's 8h + 4food or 10h + 3food

[McClure]

After Bronze Working is known, I will research The Wheel and Pottery, and stagnate growth at size 3 until I build a cheap Granary. I've farmed the open grassland tile to speed growth as much as possible when once I have the Granary; I hope to be at size 7 before 2000 BC.

Why stagnate at size 3 waiting for the Granary? Post-Worker it looks like you can work the irrigated Grass to grow to size 4 in 3 turns (which should also align with a Warrior build) which would net an extra commerce/food/hammer (or some combination) to every other build (and the Grass Forest would give you two hammers towards subsequent Workers).

Or have you already run the numbers and know that an immediate Settler build wouldn't complete until after Pottery research? (Maybe 12 turns??)

[ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF]

Why stagnate at size 3 waiting for the Granary? Post-Worker it looks like you can work the irrigated Grass to grow to size 4 in 3 turns (which should also align with a Warrior build) which would net an extra commerce/food/hammer (or some combination) to every other build (and the Grass Forest would give you two hammers towards subsequent Workers).

Or have you already run the numbers and know that an immediate Settler build wouldn't complete until after Pottery research? (Maybe 12 turns??)

With chops, the settler takes just 6 turns, so that isn't it. I get time to build a thrid worker before Pottery is done.

Each extra pop I grow before the granary is done costs me half the food bar in the long run. So, if I'd grown to size 4 before the granary, that would have cost 13 food. Compare that with the ~9-10 food-hammers and some commerce I would have gained by growing earlier.

Another way to look at it is, I need to build a certain number of settlers and workers in the next 20-30 turns. This prevents growth, so there is no point doing Granary-Settler, etc. So instead I want to build as much in the way of workers and settlers as I can before the granary is done, and then grow as quickly as I can to my happiness limit (size 7 at the moment).

[ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF]

Now it's time to update you on my progress:

I've completed the Wheel, and started on Pottery, which is currently due in 6 turns (although it may end up taking 7 turns due to maintenance from my new city)

My Settler is due in one turn, after which I will build a worker, and micro-manage to give maximum overflow into a Granary.



My exploration of my subcontinent is nearly complete; here are my new proposed city sites:



I've noticed that Green Dot has the most production potential of all my cities, so I'll probably build Moai Statues and Heroic Epic there, and instead designate one of the Black Dots as a specialist city.