[SPOILER] Victoria of Babylon - Greens - seifer_md

[Ilios]

What is the reasoning behind claiming the Hub now?

[seifer_md]

Thanks for the response Ilios. The Hub is the best city position to my west that I can achieve, at least peacefully. To the east and south I will be able to settle later on since Jowy's preoccupation with a resolute Strike will likely leave them available for some time. I also think after Malakai has sent his scout through my territory and seen all that I do have available to me, he will then look to claim more land in between us. I wouldn't blame him (I'd likely do the same) but settling now rules that out.

I also wanted to settle this spot ASAP because Malakai was very keen to settle the adjacent spot and would hope to claim the corn resource that splits the two sites. I can win the culture war by founding now (and should since I've made it a priority), and subsequently turn this otherwise mediocre city into a good one with 3 solid food resources. The Hub is also the best coastal location I have access to, and will unlock foreign trade routes for me once I get Sailing. I'll look to plant another city between my capital and The Hub so it is more defensible, but hopefully this gives you some reasoning behind why I have settled The Hub now.

[Ilios]

Thanks for the reply!

I asked about the reasoning, because I couldn't spot any workers improving the city.

[seifer_md]

Haha yeah good point! At the moment all of my workers (3) are busy chopping forests to speed the wonder building as well as connecting happiness resources. After the chops they'll for sure be heading west to improve the city and connect it by road.

I haven't quite mastered the use of workers yet and determining how many I need or should have. They say roughly 1.5-2 per city in the early going so I'll need some more if that's the case. I just seem to reach a stage where all my workers are doing is mindlessly roading tiles and it gives the impression I have too many. Either way I'll try and get one or two more out to start.

[seifer_md]

Turn 51.





A shot of Jowy's impending doom. No no, I fully expect Jowy to recover from this little assault (thanks to my intervention), but there will be a lot of wasted production for more or less no gain by either party. This certainly works well for me. Jowy has only two cities at present, and he cannot safely expand until Strike is well out of his borders. Strike only has two cities as well so he doesn't fair much better. He should really use this opportunity to re-plant his lost city and defend it with his sizeable army. You can see the three bottom players (on score) all have/or will have been affected by stupid wars.





Lastly here's a shot showing perhaps more of what Ilios expected to see from me. Malakai has 3 undefended workers here which I am capable of stealing. He really is pushing the friendship barrier here...

[Ilios]

I'm afraid you won't be culturally controlling that Corn tile any time soon...

[seifer_md]

That wasn't exactly a pretty sight, but hopefully they're just roading to connect the city to his capital. Unless he chops I'm going to have a monument complete before him (at the very least one turn sooner by my calculations). Naturally my borders will expand first and by then my own workers will be at the Hub improving tiles. I'll keep an eye on what he's building, and if it's culture producing/greater than 40 hammers, I'll move chopping a library to the top of my to do list. All in all I think I can manage taking that corn resource, and if he does chop... watch me change my strategy to adapt! =P

[seifer_md]

Turn 52. Not so good...





Malakai has four workers and this turn he moved one of his workers over to the forest, so it now looks like he's going to chop after all. I guess I should have given him more credit, but with his worker sitting on the wheat tile last turn I thought it was likely he would focus on improving his resources first. Still, he could be chopping out a granary!

In terms of culture producing buildings we are in the same boat (it's either a library or a monument at this stage). If he chops out a monument it'll be done a turn before mine. If he chops out a library I'll have control of the corn first but will be quickly superseded. If he decides to focus on building both straight out then I can't do anything about losing that corn until Drama or Jowy sends some missionaries my way. The Hub won't necessarily be a bad city, it just won't be (for some time) as grand as it could have been. At least I have comfort in knowing there's so much more land for me to make use of than Malakai has available.

On another note, all of Strike's forces have disappeared from my warrior's view. I'm not quite sure what's going, maybe he has reconsidered his attack?

[Ilios]

Malakai is playing Inca, right?

[seifer_md]

#%&@!!

I went over each Civ's pros and cons at the start of the game back in April and it seems it's completely slipped my mind that Terraces are what I'm up against here... You see that's what happens when I stop playing this game for large periods of time, and it doesn't help when we have players who hold the game up for weeks at a time. I haven't played much BTS so I still have to remember all the UBs. Hopefully I don't make this mistake too many times throughout this game.

So first off, thank you Ilios for helping me see the light again. I can safely dismiss getting that corn within my borders for at least the short-term. Fortunately this doesn't harm my game in any great sense. I needed that monument to get me clams anyway, I just didn't need to shun my growth to get it out as rapidly. I'll finish it and then move on to a workboat. I'm just glad I hadn't heavily invested in a library before realising it was futile and I had jeopardised the city's growth for the sake of some sweet sweet corn.