[SPOILERS - PBEM29] spacetyrantxenu - Mao of Babylon

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Oddly enough, I think Ron Paul was celebrating we love the Mao yesterday. Crazies started the hero worship early.

[spacetyrantxenu]

T86 - I haven't played a turn in a while so here goes. Boldly beat me to playing the save and wrote out what the workers were supposed to be doing so that helped. I played without looking at the save he sent me so we didn't get an unfair scouting advantage.

City builds:

Rick Santorum - Hindu missionary --> Hindu missionary
2 pop whipped library in Herman Cain 5--> 3. Grows back to 4 next turn. I think a courthouse should be next, we can whip that too.

In looking at worker micro around Newt I went on a long tangent which I subsequently spoilered because it turns out all of this was made unnecessary when Boldly came up with a better idea:

We have a chop coming due in 2 turns in Newt. With CS finishing next turn and an immediate revolt to Bureaucracy + OR, that will give us +25% on the hammers if it goes into a building. We're 2T from finishing a Monastery already, so on the scheduled last turn of that build we'll be in anarchy. When we come out of anarchy the chop will be applied to the monastery with the OR bonus, I believe. Where to send that overflow? In the queue is a courthouse and aqueduct, neither of which are particularly useful for Newt. We want to build a bunch of missionaries in Newt but if we build units we won't get the OR bonus on the chop overflow. What do you think? Just send the overflow onto a missionary? One idea, not that it's particularly great, would be to have the overflow go into the Temple of Artemis. +100% trade route yield would = 6 commerce per turn in Newt right now which is nice and we could build it in about five turns (marble + OR + Bureaucracy):

Plan 1:
Chop overflow = 12 * (50% [Bureaucracy] + 200% [Marble] + 25% [OR]) = 33
Newt base HPT = 16 * (50% [Bureaucracy] + 200% [Marble] + 25% [OR]) = 44

ToA costs 234 hammers, so
T1: 33 overflow + 44 modified = 77 /234
T2: 77 + 44 modified = 121 / 234
T3: 121 + 44 modified = 165 /234
T4: 165 + 44 modified = 209 / 234
T5: 209 + 44 modified = 253 / 234

So we can build the ToA in 5 turns after the Bureau + OR revolt, and that's without taking the mine away from Mitt Romney. If we do take away the mine, it's 19 base HPT:

Plan 2:
Chop overflow = 12 * (50% [Bureaucracy] + 200% [Marble] + 25% [OR]) = 33
Newt base HPT = 19 * (50% [Bureaucracy] + 200% [Marble] + 25% [OR]) = 52.25 --> 52

T1: 33 overflow + 52 modified = 85
T2: 85 + 52 modified = 137
T3: 137 + 52 modified = 189
T4: 189 + 52 modified = 241 / 234

Plan 3:
Finally, we could send another chop into the wonder to save a turn. This is also working the mine from Mitt Romney, but we would have to find a way to get a second worker onto the second forest tile sooner. The only way I see to do that would be to build one now in Rick Santorum which is not what we should be doing:

Chop overflow = 12 * (50% [Bureaucracy] + 200% [Marble] + 25% [OR]) = 33
Newt base HPT = 19 * (50% [CS] + 200% [Bureaucracy] + 25% [OR]) = 52.25 --> 52

T1: 33 overflow + 52 modified = 85 ; worker starts new chop (3t - forest tile is roaded already)
T2: 85 + 52 modified = 137 ; chop 2t
T3: 137 + 52 modified + 55 chop = 244 / 234 ; chop comes in with Rick's worker helping and ToA finishes.

So plan 3 does save a turn, but has us spend 3 turns in Rick Santorum building a worker we don't need right now. Overflow would have to go onto a courthouse. While I was writing up this plan Boldly popped into IM to ask why I hadn't sent the save yet. I told him what I was up to, to which he replied:

Plan 4:

Or, you could take the chop, work wealth a couple turns and put overflow into forges when we tech Metal Casting.

I think Plan 4 is the best plan actually. He pointed out that the ToA on top of being typically a second tier wonder would be better off in a coastal city anyway where we could boost the trade routes more with a harbor and custom house. Given that, I don't know why Sian hasn't built this wonder yet actually. If he had a big (island!) city this would be a good investment for him -- the biggest island city of Sian's I can see is size 6. Anyway, I think I'd rather spend Newt's production more efficiently than on a wonder we don't have to have. At least while we're building wealth there we can get to MC faster. If Sian doesn't bother to build the Colossus by then....

Colossus Plan 1: kidding!

So back to what I actually did this turn, Boldly had already partially automated our worker movements which was probably a good idea. We now have a road in place for the sniper settler to follow to the new spot. Unless Slowcheetah spots the road on his next turn he won't know about us settling the site until he gets the save on T88. By then we'll have the city with an axe and spear in it, with a bow on the way. I think this city will need walls. We have two forests to chop down there. First chop handles the granary, second chop handles the city walls. Add a bow for 3 units and we're reasonably well protected unless Slowcheetah gets really bent out of shape about us sniping the location.

Now, I know Slowcheetah had an engineer born a few turns ago and he hasn't used it for a wonder. I recall he planned to bulb Machinery with it. Very likely he is going to tech CS soon himself, so we don't want to be too coy with him lest he send macemen after us. Our front city definitely needs a good garrison, possibly units in addition to the three we have on hand. As for this turn I left the soon-to-be offending settler on a forest back from the front line where Slowcheetah has a very low likelihood of spotting it. He's more likely to see the worker I mistakenly threw out front. It had nothing better to do while waiting 1 turn for the city to found so I thought I'd scout out and back and realized too late I only had one movement point left.

We should spread Hindu to Jon Huntsman soon because there are three forests that need chopping, may as well get +25% on those into a courthouse.

At the end of the turn I handled setting city builds to wealth to cover our deficit, allowing us to get CS done this turn at 50% research. Number One, you said you were going to build wealth in five cities, I'm doing it in 4! I took Jon Huntsman off its meager 4 hammer wealth build since we didn't need it. Starting its courthouse, those 3 forest chops will go into that.

If we go Metal Casting next, it looks like 3 turns at break even research.

End turn.

[spacetyrantxenu]

T86 - Photo time.

Demographics and Information:

We'll be switching to Bureaucracy and Organized Religion next turn. Boldly sent me an IM earlier: 1T CS. 2T for scientist, 3T academy. Shaping up nicely. I agree.






We have a few techs we need to backfill, but our next priority will be Metal Casting so we can build forges everywhere. Rick Santorum (and then Newt) will be building missionaries as quickly as possible to spread the OR bonus, which will help get more forges more quickly.






Our GNP reading is inflated a bit by the wealth builds, but we're only running 50% science slider so it isn't too bad. We may be close to catching Sian when we get into CS, depending on if he's in a saving or spending phase.


I have little doubt Slowwalk will win the Liberalism race. Bulb, bulb, bulb.




As always, our military feels light. But we're 3rd in power. This world is aching for a war.

Graphs:

Our GNP and MFG graphs show that we're working a ton of cottages and not as many mines right now. The wealth building is inflating this some, though.










Damn zigs.

Rival Territories:

Number One's inadvertent violation of our scouting agreement with Sian has had a benefit to us. I'm actually surprised about the state of the land we've seen. I thought Sian would have done more to develop his land. We haven't scouted everything but what I've seen makes me think he's gone for working a lot of hammers because I see a lot of mines and not as many cottages as I would have expected at this point. I know he was late to tech Pottery, but we're 86 turns into the game. I can only see 11 cottaged tiles, but two of them are new and haven't been worked yet. I'm sure I'll find more when I explore the SW of his core but that total seems low. I don't see any towns yet in his land. Maybe naming his cities for FIN leaders will give those villages a +1c bonus

By comparison we have 28 cottages in various stages of development, 24 of which are being worked (3 of the unworked cottages are at Herman Cain, which was just whipped off 2 of them). We only have 1 town, but 9 villages by way of comparison. I see 2 villages total in Sian's land (but incomplete map knowledge). This gives me hope that we'll make up ground on him, and makes me that much more frustrated that he beat us to the Great Lighthouse early on. Though, if he had missed it he probably would have spammed cottages instead of cities so it's hard to say.


I'm not going to count cottages here, it's farms everywhere. Besides, the chariot is on his way in to the territory so this is an old map anyway.


Speaking of an old map...yeah, we need to scout this ASAP. We have a 30 turn NAP with Dazed but that's no guarantee he'll keep OBs the whole time (though I can't imagine he'd close them with his economy in the shape it is). Basically he's waiting for his cottages to grow. That's the economic plan.

Cities:

Boo, I just noticed I'm working an unimproved grass forest when I could be working a river grass hill hamlet. This is a casualty of my silly ToA planning, I think. I missed swapping the tile back.


Growing onto the hill next turn and then finish off the lighthouse. That's long overdue here. After that we'll probably have Hinduism here so we can churn out missionaries, but first we'll send a Christian missionary to Newt for a second monastery. That should arrive not long after the Great Scientist builds Newt an Academy.


Missionaries and more missionaries here for a while. We'll get out a settler for the site between Gary Johnson and Tim Pawlenty in the near term, but I want the OR bonus everywhere ASAP so missionaries first.


One of the few cottages we're not working empire-wide is that plains cottage at Ron Paul. Once we're past the whipping stage of the game maybe Ron can slowly grow onto those. Or possibly they'll be workshopped so that this city can have high hammer potential when needed.


Hey Jon, thanks for the Scientist. You've done a great thing for your Party! Next up, chop chop chop the courthouse. Those are marginally useful tiles but this is a front city so we can't afford to leave them there.

Right now we're safe in the culture fight over that silver tile (99% Republican), but Dazed built the Great Wall in the "tundra area", so that has to be in the neighboring city of TI-83. That's only +2 culture so we should be safe but it bears watching to see what he does with his culture because we need to protect the silver resource.


Grow those cottages, Rick Perry. We should mine the hill and workshop those other plains tiles to give this city some production capability post-slavery.


Moai due in 6 turns. After that, grow as fast as possible and use as many 2/1/2 water tiles as possible. We'll have +5 food here so growth should be fast enough. When we cap out we'll hand the western crab over to Gary Johnson if it's needed there for growth.


No production here, this has been grow on cottages, whip infrastructure so far. Since this is a front city its long term planning isn't decided, but my guess is that we won't be able to cottage all those nice river tiles. When we seek a draft camp site, this may be it. Farm a lot of river grass tiles, generate massive food surplus, and whip/draft everything possible. We have a hamlet on the sugar tile for now, 11 turns to village, but we'll drop a plantation on it when we research Calendar as soon as we need more happiness.


Borders just popped after I ended turn, hence the unimproved cow. We'll need to generate a lot of culture here to fight back Sian's borders since he has two cities pressuring this one. We'll see if it's necessary, but maybe a Hermitage site later?


Poor Tim Pawlenty has to build his own work boat for the crab tile that just popped inside borders. We should have managed this better but Rick Santorum has been busy lately. We need to get a city on the tile marked C13 soon to make sure we can culturally control its wheat tile.


Boldly built and named this city, I honestly don't know who Buddy Roemer is but we're scraping the bottom of the barrel for Republican candidates. I think this city will be renamed to John McCain in the near future, as we recycle past Republican presidential candidates that people have actually heard of. For now, thanks for the gold. A work boat will improve the fish in two turns.


Roger Gary, you're probably going to become Bob Dole. Wheat will be improved in two turns, wines will come online whenever we research Monarchy.

Minor C&D:

Sian is in a different set of civics than us, so the formula to determine his hammer count in the shown city, his capital Pacal II, is:

Hammers = SabotageCost / InfluenceCivicsCost * 67 (quick speed)

So,

Hammers = 633 / 707 * 67 = 60 hammers in something. Not particularly interesting. His other cities had lower values so have lower hammer counts than this. So he likely isn't close to finishing any wonders right now.



As of this turn Dazed is in the same civics we are, so the formula is different:

Hammers = SabotageCost / CityRevoltCost * 650 / 6 (not modified by game speed)

So,

Hammers (Quadratic) = 615 / 994 * 650 / 6 = 67 hammers.
Hammers (Integer) = 825 / 1040 * 650 / 6 = 86 hammers.

These are probably either settlers (this is Dazed we're talking about) or, more likely, markets. His other cities that I can see have lower hammer investments right now.



Also it's obvious from the shot of Dazed's city list that I need to get visibility on more cities.

One question, Sian has several cities that have no value listed for Sabotage Production. I assume this means those cities could have finished production something on his turn and he has not selected a replacement build. However, what would show if he was building wealth, culture, or research? Nothing?

Cloak & Dagger out.

[spacetyrantxenu]

I could have saved a lot of time by just posting a save and the password

Does anyone particularly care to see anything else, or see the save?

[spacetyrantxenu]

I just had a quick chat with Dazed:

Mao: quick question, have you scouted sian since opening borders? when i signed the 10 turn OB agreement i asked for a no scout agreement with him, and forgot to tell boldly about it when i left for the weekend. hence boldly has been dutifully scouting everything.

Dazedroya​lty: yeah i've been scouting it

Mao: he apologized and told sian he can scout us so we should be square on that point
but my question is about his land development. i haven't seen his entire territory, but going from west to SE along the northern coasts i don't see a whole lot of cottages
does he have them tucked away in the SW?

Dazedroya​lty: no not many cottages at all

Mao: or is his entire economy riding off trade routes?

Dazedroya​lty: he has some cottages
but not a ton
lots of mines

Mao: well some, but not that many and they aren't well developed. he has zero towns that i can see and only two villages
yeah, i saw a lot of production

Dazedroya​lty: yeah i commented on that in my thread

Mao: i don't supposed he's building wealth everywhere? that would be inefficient right? since hammers to wealth doesn't run through markets, etc?

Dazedroya​lty: i don't know
i thought it was just adding base commerce

Mao: i think when our ten turns are up we should close borders again. if you and i are running lots of cottages we'll bypass him eventually
have to get slowcheetah to cooperate with that, though

Dazedroya​lty: do they have OB too?

Mao: another thing i noticed is that (annoyingly) the great Lighthouse city is not on the coast facing you, so you can't boat it.
umm....let me check, i thought all the lines were the same color on the diplomacy page

Dazedroya​lty: no it would need to be slowcheetah
but if he did that'd be great
he has better military tech

Mao: yeah. but i doubt he will
i think he's going to be content to sit and tech, turtle up

Dazedroya​lty: he told me he's planning to go to war for real in 30 Turns

Mao: woot!

Dazedroya​lty: not that it means anything really

Mao: probably not going to happen but that would be nice
i wonder when he's going to start firing off his GS bulbs. i assume when education is researchable
he bulbed machinery didn't he?

Dazedroya​lty: i believe so
but i don't track that super closely

Mao: yeah, my C&D department was fired around turn 5.

So apparently Dazed has drawn the same conclusions about Sian's economy that I have. Lots of hammers and GNP is a function of trade routes (big surprise there). We have to get the boycott going again.

[spacetyrantxenu]

I know I'm spamming the hell out of my thread but who knows when I'll get to update again. More diplo! [SIZE="1"]*stop groaning.*[/SIZE]

This was a chat between Boldly and Sian, from earlier today. Presumably they didn't sign a non-disclosure agreement that I'm breaking. If so, hey, that's inadvertent too!

Number One: Hey, briefly wanted to apologize for the scouting. I didn't have a chance to talk to Xenu in any detail, and we never covered diplo. I thought borders were fully open and just played the save. Feel free to get some scouting. I have visability on 6-7(IIRC) cities on the main continent, and your gold city.

Sian: any chance for cookie points for the name of my newest city?
its named "Mao Zedong"

Number One: lol
we must have, preciousssss

Sian: finished building all Financial, and is currently building all Expansive

Number One: ah, that's good. i was hoping that wasn't indicating the letter M as in 13th city. although I suppose it could be, i'm not keeping close tabs on that. That's Xenu's job, to be my civ accountant.

Sian: quick mental headcount says it is my 12'th city

Number One: Not too shabby!

Sian: built Surya last turn, Mao this turn and ... yet to be named, next turn

Number One: Our Republicans are in a flutter today. It is "Super Tuesday", so many of our candidates are out strutting and preening for the cameras. We expect very little production to occur this turn.
Man, you're pumping those suckers out. I'm wistful for GLH.
We have one founding next turn (I think). I'm not sure what that brings us to
this is a good map. Very playable, balanced

Sian: [COLOR="Yellow"]actually ... i'm not the one with the big export/import, so i'm not the one winning on foreign trade routes
i got a meek +2 Export/import
no clue who it is thats sitting on the +24[/COLOR]

Number One: [COLOR="Yellow"]benefits go to those first in turn order. Or, could be Dazed b/c he's spammed out the most cities
i'd have to look in game[/COLOR]

Sian: sure, i have many domistic that helps support me, but my foreign routes aren't stronger than anyone elses

Number One: would you be terribly annoyed if I renamed all our cities temporarily? I'm looking to mess with Xenu (my brother) b/c he is picking on me in our thread. I might switch them all to liberals/democrats

Sian: knock yourself out
i vote that capital should be Ralph Nader

Number One: i don't want to metagame anyone into thinking we have extra cities or mess up charts
ha at Nader. Arguably he should be in the Republican camp since he cost Gore the Florida vote in 2000, and thus the election

Sian: counting tradeable cities, not new citynames

Number One: i know it won't adjust anything in game, but could mess up anyone trying to track

TL;DR*: I highlighted the relevant section of the discussion. I knew how many cities he had, but I wonder if he's maybe engaging in a bit of misdirection about the trade route income?

Exhibit A:



This is my demographics information from this turn. I'm at -2, so it's possible that Sian is giving us accurate information here. He could be offseting my -2 Exports/Imports with his +2 E/I. That would leave Dazed and Slowcheetah with the large trade imbalance. Dazed would have to be the +24 E/I and Slowcheetah the -24 E/I, just based off city count I would think. But that doesn't account for all of it, does it? Dazed has 14 cities, Slowcheetah has 10. That's a difference of 8 available trade routes, two per city. Are all 8 of those routes 3cpt, making up half of the +24 difference between them?

My 5th and 7th cities are the only ones I have getting 2cpt trade routes (all my later cities have overseas trade routes for 3cpt, that's cities 6, 8-12). That may be the problem, actually. I think Slowwalk were slower to expand to islands than everyone else and have fewer overseas trade routes to go around. Also, even though they have OBs with Sian and can trade with him, their war may be recent enough that those trade routes aren't appearing for them yet, like what Ceil revealed was happening to us when we signed OBs with Dazed. Even now I only have 105% for sustained peace with Dazed, and our war ended a long time ago (what was it, that percentage heals at a rate of 5% per turn?) Between having fewer island cities and therefore fewer of the more profitable (3cpt) routes, AND being unable to trade with Sian because of their recent war, maybe those two factors add up to the balance of Slowwalk's trade deficit?

That's a lot of speculation, and I'm not sure much of it is correct. But I think the trade routes shake out like this for now:

Dazed: +24cpt
Sian: +2cpt
Us: -2cpt
Kitties: -24cpt

I know one thing, I'm in no rush to tell Slowcheetah about this if it is correct. I need him to close borders with Sian to stop his trade route economy. I'm just not seeing the cottages I expected in Sian's lands, and I don't think it's all farmed running merchant specialist. If it isn't that it has to be trade routes right? (He still hasn't built the Colossus so how many 2/0/2 coast tiles would he want to work?) If Slowcheetah knows he's already taking a beating internationally I'm sure he won't want to do anything to decrease his income potential, even if it's helping Sian stay ahead.

In the short term if Dazed and I both close borders with Sian when our 10 turn OB agreements end that would be best for us vis à vis Sian, but clearly Dazed is making out like a bandit here. He's getting 6 towns and a hamlet for free over me. I'm sure much of that income is from his island cities, so well done on the expansion. If Dazed is winning big on trade routes as the last player in turn order, he's done well.

So, is this mostly sound reasoning or have I blown the trade route mechanics again? And can anyone tell what impact the turn order trade route bug Seven found is or should be having in our game?

According to the post, the conditions to trigger the bug are:

if 1) you are playing a multiplayer game and are later in the turn order than at least one trade partner and 2) you have some foreign trade routes, but not enough that every trade route is foreign and 3) you have cities on more than one landmass and 4) some of your earlier-founded cities are on the same landmass as some of your trading partners' cities.

My reading of the Seven's description of the bug is that it should not apply to anyone in this game. City counts as of this turn are:

Dazed: 14
Sian: 13
Us: 12
Slowwalk: 10

I'm pretty sure everyone has Currency, so everyone has at least 2 trade routes per city (Sian has 3 per city except in non-coastal cities, which is probably just his capital and silver city).

So available trade routes should look like:

Dazed: 14 cities * 2 routes per city = 28 trade routes
Sian: 13 cities * 3 routes per city = 39 - 2 inland cities = 37 trade routes
Us: 12 cities * 2 routes per city = 24 trade routes
Slowwalk: 10 cities * 2 routes per city = 20 trade routes

From that, only Sian would be at risk of the bug since he has 37 possible trade routes against 36 foreign cities, and he isn't trading with the only team ahead of him in the turn order anyway (so -10 foreign routes available for a total of 26/37 foreign/total). Is that a correct interpretation?

Dazed has 35 foreign cities available to trade with, out of 48 eligible world cities (49-1 since I assume a city won't trade with itself ). That's 35 foreign routes for 28 available trade routes, so Dazed has only foreign trade routes.

Sian has 36 possible foreign routes, but 10 of those are unavailable because the war penalty has not subsided with Slowwalk. So Sian can have 26 foreign trade routes between me and Dazed and is supplementing his routes with another 11 domestic routes. Sian needs open borders to fuel his economy with more profitable 3cpt routes.

We have the most possible foreign routes out of anyone at 37 and are only able to use 24 since that's all the cities we have. If we closed borders with Sian we would still have 24 foreign routes available. We don't need OBs with him! We may get fewer foreign intercontinental routes and our trade total would decrease as a result, but so would his. I don't have any domestic routes to compare against but I think they would only be worth 2cpt each (unless on an island?) Would it be safe to say each foreign trade route we give Sian is adding 1gpt to his economy? So that's +37cpt each and every turn that we could deny him just by closing borders? I know the modifiers to trade routes change later when we start building harbors and customs houses, but for now it seems that would be accurate.

Slowwalk has 20 trade routes and 26 available foreign routes between me and Dazed so he certainly doesn't need OBs with Sian.

Well this post got really long, maybe there was a point to all that. I'm going to try to ramp up the boycott effort again just because I stand to lose little and Sian stands to lose much more. So there it is.

[SIZE="1"]*I probably broke some convention by posting this much text after the TL;DR[/SIZE]

Edit: This whole analysis is wrong since the Great Lighthouse is giving Sian +2 trade routes per city, not +1. I'm back to believing that he is the player with the huge trade route advantage, which is more sensible, and everyone is feeding the advantage. He said he has a few trade routes with even team kitty, and with the penalty to those profits that shows how far down the list he has to go for foreign routes. Close borders!

[spacetyrantxenu]

Sian: my cities is starting to be very nice for failgold ... +25% religion, +25% forges +100% resource +50% industrious

Mao: are you doing that on national wonders or world wonders?

Sian: yes

Mao: both

Sian: atm only colossus

Mao: lol
how many times have you built it?

Sian: starting first one this turn

Mao: how many times are you going to build it?
i don't have MC so it's not like i can beat you to it, just curious

Sian: probably 3 or 4 times ... depending on how many cities i can do it reasonably fast in

Mao: that's funny. cheeky, but funny. someone is going to have to write an article on the failgold economy.

Cheeky isn't actually the word I want to use. More like cheesy. Good thing we banned the AP victory, even if it was after the fact. I wonder if Sian will use the other AP votes if he gets the opportunity? He did veto banning them, after all, when I floated the proposition. Using intentional fail gold is something fun to do in SP, but I think it's pretty grey in MP. I wouldn't do it personally.

On a related topic, we had already decided that Metal Casting was our next research target, once we do the CS + OR switch this turn. It may be worthwhile for us to go ahead and build the Colossus just to deny Sian the fail gold opportunity. We'll still get a benefit from it, we have enough coastal cities for it to be worth while. That will be especially true in Michele Bachmann when Moai finishes. Then again, we can't go into wonder whore mode just to deny Sian the opportunity to build them all a few times.

[Tasunke]

Is fail gold even all that efficient?

I mean I know it is on marathon (especially with chopping) ... but on faster speeds I would be less inclined to think so.

[Ceiliazul]

Is fail gold even all that efficient?

I mean I know it is on marathon (especially with chopping) ... but on faster speeds I would be less inclined to think so.

Sian is IND, so any wonder failgold is *at worst* like building wealth with a 1.5x multiplier. Forges, doubling resources and OR might bring the payoff up to triple your hammer input!

A plains-hill mine becomes a 0/0/12 tile? Yes Please!

[spacetyrantxenu]

If he can repeatedly do +25% religion, +25% forges +200% resource +50% industrious for a total of +300% production, why not do it? What is the hammers to fail gold conversion rate? There is a definite opportunity cost where he could instead be using his hammers to build something useful right now, so that's one reason not to. Then there's the major problem of not controlling when the fail gold comes in (except in cases where he finishes the production himself). I don't know that I'd build an economy around it on quick speed, you're right that it would be better on slower speeds where you could generate a lot more overflow from whipping, etc. But whether it's efficient or not he's planning to do it and it's cheesy.

Edit: Er. What Ceil said.