[SPOILERS] Woden and ljubljana like boats

[Woden]

Don't freak to much out about Square Rigging, you will still be able to build quads after you finish it. Just have enough to upgrade using all your niter plus enough to upgrade to keep your stock pile low enough to build a round of quads. Then upgrade those quads to keep you stock pile low enough to build more quads. Plus, we are in a team game, so you can send some niter to me. If you keep your niter below 20, you can continue to build quads.

[ljubljana]

oh really! Okay, that makes me feel much better. So that means I only really need like 4 quads before it comes in, being that 3 niter sources * 15 turns is definitely not more than 80 niter.

[ljubljana]

Okay, after agonizing over this for a good two hours...I think the fact that we can still build quads after SR comes in means I'm going to keep doing what I was doing and do builders + lighthouses, then make a wave of quads in 10 turns so that just enough come out in time to upgrade when Square Rigging comes in and we can start using our niter as it comes in. All of my cities except Demotic and Oracle Bones are currently stagnating at the housing cap and for lack of food, which will only be fixed with lighthouses and traders. I don't think that can wait unless it absolutely has to, and if I can get out 3 or so quads at Linear A or wherever in the next 15 turns, it doesn't absolutely have to. With 2 sources of niter, I can't upgrade faster than one quad every 5 turns anyways, so I'm not sure there's much need to produce quads any faster than that.

I also think I want to still buy the lighthouse, because if I hand-build it I'm giving up a full city by not building a settler instead at +150% hammers + zero food cost and that doesn't seem like a good idea. My income will be at 70 gpt with the TAD TR next turn, which means even after doing that I'll have around 1000g when SR comes in, more than enough for the 3 or so discounted frigate upgrades I'll need to do immediately. I do now need to buy the niter tile, but that's only 150 gold which is just two turns of income.

I'm going to pass the save off so I don't hold things up any more, but does that plan sound basically okay to you?

[ljubljana]

Turn 101 - Phoenicia



I get a Medieval Golden Age, with which I pick Free Inquiry (obviously) - without it, my beaker output would drop down to 32, apparently. I expect TAD to do the same with their Heroic Age, and to have a bpt roughly approaching mine next turn.

After the lighthouse buy, Cuneiform goes from growth-in-infinity to growth-in-6. With the TAD TR, I'll be at 3/4 TRs next turn; Linear A's plan is to do the fourth trader starting next turn while I wait on Serfdom to come in for that builder. Linear A will then have time for a 5-turn lighthouse and at least one 3-turn quad before SR comes in. How far away do you think you are from having Machinery done? I'd like to wait on the eureka if it's at all practical, but obviously if it isn't practical then it isn't practical .

CMF and MPF have 45 niter between them, a substantial stockpile. Pretty sure we can expect to see a few frigates incoming in the not-too-distant future - they're probably just waiting on the last few turns of the tech and maybe for gold/Mercenaries as well.

Oh yeah, and...



Ouch! If CMF is relying on frigates to keep sub from doing the same to their homeland, they can't come soon enough. I think I'm not as convinced as you are that CMF can hold this off at the straits with galleys - they can buy a little time like that, but every turn will see the Jongs murder a galley and then a suboptimal galley can move one tile forwards towards the bottom of the strait. At no point in that process will the sub galley then be vulnerable to worse than a double-attack in return, so CMF probably can't kill the galley on their turn if it's at full health, so if sub has enough galleys, they may be able to just keep advancing like that, one tile at a time. Sub will also do much better than CMF in the attrition war, since CMF's galleys will be taking a ton of free damage every turn from the Jongs and have no way to heal other than taking the long way back to Russia. I wouldn't be shocked if CMF abandons these sites and tries to make a stand closer to home, especially if they are just a few turns from frigates.

[ljubljana]

Oh, right, this thing:



I admit I am deeply ignorant of the mechanics of how this thing works and how it translates multilateral votes into results - luckily I have negative a billion diplo favor and therefore no real ability to influence the outcome. Unfortunately, I think the most likely thing to emerge from this is no Great Admiral points for the next 30 turns, which is certainly what I'd vote for if I weren't Phoenicia or England. I thought about voting for no Great Scientist points, which is what I'd want if I could hand-pick something to pass, but I decided to vote for double GA points instead to avoid adding a vote to the option B crowd.

For the mercury, I'm not really sure what the right thing to do here is, so I just voted for the thing that would benefit me in particular. Hopefully everyone else will do the same and nobody will spend diplo favor on this, in which case I assume the passing resolution will be picked randomly - in that case, my hat is now in the ring at least.

We should probably hold the save and take some time to coordinate our votes the next time this comes up, though, which I imagine is what the other teams are doing. Future votes could be much more significant than this one, and I'd hate to miss out on a preferred outcome by accidentally voting at cross purposes.

[Woden]

Mercury doubling is right call but not sure about the admiral one. What are your points compared to TAD? If there is a significant difference, he might be able to get one then pass you again and get the next one.

[ljubljana]

TAD's at 8/turn and I'm at 6/turn now with the lighthouse, and I also had a bit of a head start since TAD got two classical GAs and I got just one. TAD will get the next one, but I think I should get the one after that unless they really start pumping out Dockyards.

GA bonuses don't still stack, right? If they do, I probably did make the wrong call here, since TAD will then have 2 Medieval GAs to my 1 when they declare. Well, hopefully my vote won't end up mattering in either case...

[Woden]

GA bonuses don't still stack, right? If they do, I probably did make the wrong call here, since TAD will then have 2 compared to my 1 when they declare. Well, hopefully my vote won't end up mattering in either case...

GA and GG bonuses don't stack.

[ljubljana]

Okay, yeah, then I'll probably be able to get away with just one for the defense of Akkad since my front line in that area is pretty compact. I'm only 10 or so turns out from one at my current pace anyways, so I don't think there's much chance of TAD locking me out even if the doubling passes. The doubling might even give me an outside chance at a second GA (probably a Renaissance one) before TAD attacks, whereas without it I think one is the best I can reasonably hope for.

[ljubljana]

Wait, I'm dumb, nobody else has voted yet but me since I'm first in the turn order, so it's 100% on me for playing my turn before discussing vote coordination. Sorry about that, it won't happen again!