SHAEF

[Old Harry]

Chopping into settler sounds good to me.

One thing I'd recommend though is never moving two workers onto a forest or hill unless you've roaded it - the move is a wasted turn, so getting two workers to do it wastes two turns. If you'd moved one of them to the sheep and the other to the forest the chop would come in a turn later but the sheep is ready earlier and instead of the four wasted turns you only waste two... Of course its always easier to point this stuff out in hindsight!

Have any religions been founded yet?

[TheHumanHydra]

Religions? I don't think so, but I'll double-check next turn.

Good point about the workers. I guess I've wasted a lot of worker turns over the years doing that. What do you think about moving three workers onto such a tile at once to improve it in one turn?

[Old Harry]

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

I mean it's fine if you're India or there is a time pressure, but normally I spread workers out over forests and hills and concentrate them on flatland and roads...

[HitAnyKey]

I was just starting to think about the religions myself as well when I played my last turn (which, btw nothing major happened). My worker finished the farm and my scout continued on his long trek. I'll grow next turn.

As for religions, no one has gotten any. And I was just thinking we might want to think of seeing if we can grab Hinduism or Buddhism next. Either that or go straight for Writing for Libraries.

[Old Harry]

I don't think you need libraries for a little while yet, but getting to maths for better chopping could be useful. Is it still too early for sailing? If so we should try to work out which religion you have the best shot at...

[HitAnyKey]

So I grew at the end of the turn, and I'll grow again in 2 turns (to be working all 3 improved foods). Trying to decide what to do with my worker next. There's 3 options.

Head up to pre-chop those forests for use later (or even immediately for a settler of my own).
Start a road up to my 2nd city spot (does everyone still agree that's the best place for my first settlement?).
Move over to that Plains Hill to make a mine for when I grow to size 4.


I'm leaning towards the chopping out of a settler, since it'll be awhile before THH can make me a settler I'm guessing.

I'm thinking maybe we at least try for a religion before grabbing sailing. No idea how to tell if anyone else has thought about going for one of the religions and which one they may have chosen. So I suppose it's probably just a flip of a coin. Do we go for the shorter one thinking that someone else might think someone is already going for it so they instead are going for the one that will take longer? Or is someone thinking that we may think that so they're going for the shorter one thinking that we might go for the longer one because we'd be thinking they are going for the shorter one? :P

[Old Harry]

So LAM, RMOG and you have Mysticism. Of the basic worker techs LAM are missing The Wheel, (possibly Agriculture, although they might have got this t18) and Pottery. RMOG haven't got Pottery and Hunting (which they don't really need) and should be aiming for the Oracle, so they should go for the shorter tech path. So I think you can beat LAM to either, and RMOG can probably beat you to either.

Normally I'd go for Polytheism with the aim of getting Monotheism at some point. And in this case I'd start on Poly and cross my fingers!

On the settler - If you're going to build it with food then that sounds like a good idea, but you've got great whip potential so it might be worth growing to size 5 or 6 (building a grannary) before whipping workers and roading towards Hydra.

I haven't looked hard at dot-mapping - its still a bit hard to say where is best second city with the unknown territory to the south west...

[TheHumanHydra]

Once again, the second turn I played yesterday was really late, so I haven't gotten to report on it till now:

Goings on around Verrieres Ridge:



As discussed, I moved the first worker over to the sheep. I think I will move the second as well to get it done a turn earlier; as Old Harry points out, this wastes a worker turn, but its turn will be wasted no matter what since it can't reach a forest this turn or road a tile leading to my second city site. After this I think we should set them both a-chopping again: whether into the first or second city or one into each will need to be decided.

The southwest:



Would you rather me send the scout east, or south and clear that area with the warrior?

In response to HAK's post, I think you should chop the plains forest if you're going to build a settler, or mine one of the hills if you're going to grow to size four first - they seem strong with your Exp bonus to worker production. I'm likewise leaning toward building a settler when you hit size three. I'm not sure where it should go: the gold is strong but lacks first-ring food. The grassland forest 5N, 2W of Mt. Loon gets first-ring food and copper, though copper is less necessary for you and it'll be a while before it can reach me. You can get double food south of Mt. Loon with the deer and clams. If you settle west of Mt. Loon, around where you've got that marker, you'll get first-ring food and copper with a borders pop, and if I pop my second city's too, we'll have trade between all our cities. Lots to think about ...

Like you guys, I'm inclined toward Polytheism, and I think now is the time to get it: we've got all our essential opening-game techs down, and it's a bit before we'll need Writing or anything else higher-order. Unless we're chasing the Great Lighthouse, but I'm dubious about that.

As for dot-mapping, HAK and I have laid out some possible city-sites with signs on the game-map; I'll take a zoomed-out screenshot this coming turn so you can see!

[HitAnyKey]

I decided I agree with Harry and that the mine while growing to at least size 4 before starting a settler/worker is best. So I've moved onto the hill to start mining it next turn. After next turn, I'll also grow to size 3.
Also agree that we should grab Polytheism now. I've set that as my next tech in the queue.

As soon as we get Pottery I'll switch to a Granary and whip that as soon as I'm able to (possibly) and have the overflow go into my first Dog Soldier. I need at least one military unit to keep RMOG from thinking they can just send something down to take my city. After that I'll go for the next worker. In that time frame, hopefully THH can make and send over a settler for me after he's made his second city.

My explorations are still going slow through the jungle, but hopefully will begin seeing what the land up by RMOG is like and find where the other half of them are:


THH, my personal thought is that you send your scout south onto the hill to explore that direction and then head SW (to find where they came from) and use your warrior to explore south (with the other one going SE around the lake). If Commodore's warrior shows up near your borders, your warrior can pop out in a single turn so that's of no concern.

[TheHumanHydra]

I officially name this map (probably to my future chagrin) How to Defend Yourself For Dummies - even if you performed the most haphazard scouting ever and basically played the map blind, you'd probably still run into copper somewhere:



Here are those possible city sites we highlighted: