[Spoilers] What, no fireballs?! Team FFH: we're not in Erebus anymore

[Ichabod]

I agree, northern scout is better.

I really hope we can found somewhere without popping that hut, so we have a chance of a free tech!

BW first seems mighty tempting...

It'll be very difficult to not settle in a way that pops the hut. We would need to move south or east, and that looks pretty suboptimal.

Agri first vs. BW first will be our major opening doubt (besides where to settle). Nospace had the same doubt in PBEM 17 and they ended up going Agri first. And they were playing as India, with the fast workers uber chopping ability. So, without doing sandboxes, I'd say agri first probably wins.

I'd say yes. Another possibility: move the scout onto the gold hill, to see whether there's any seafood lurking just offshore. I'd hate to settle in such a way that we end up blocking a potential fishing village.

On BtS noobishness: I think we should use one of Ilios's reserved posts to summarize the starting techs, UUs, and UBs of our opponents. I remember some of the units and buildings, but I'm drawing mostly blanks. And I'm completely clueless on starting techs.

Having coast to the east is a blessing. That means we aren't on the center of the map and that we won't need to defend all our flanks.

I'm not that bad at BTS. I mostly play FfH because I'm afraid of the opposition in the BTS PBEM's. :neenernee

With charismatic and gold we are looking at a pretty good happy cap right from the start. Gold also means that going for our UB (the mint - replaces forge with a +10% gold bonus) will be nice, since it doubles the happiness. Nice!

I'm going to read Spulla's PB 2 thread to help me. They play a more conservative style then most here (no openings with 15 cities in the first 50 turns - hello, novice ) and I think it can be a good way of playing this. Conservative, for the win!

Since we are financial, I also like the idea of trying to setup a crazy good bureaucracy capital, by using the 2nd or 3rd city to help grow cottages. Centralizing our research capabilities means we won't suffer so much losses if we happen to lose a non-capital city. I'm getting ahead of myself, of course, but, well, might as well start discussing a bit.

[Ilios]

Looking at the map again, it looks like we won't be going Worker first, unless there are some forestless tiles hidden in the northern fog.

I'm tempted as well to move the scout on the Gold.

[Ichabod]

Looking at the map again, it looks like we won't be going Worker first, unless there are some forestless tiles hidden in the northern fog.

I'm tempted as well to move the scout on the Gold.

Well, worker first is almost always the best idea. Even if we have to road tiles waiting for BW it'll be better then going warrior first. We need to properly test this, of course, and theres no point in discussing without seeing the full map, but I find it hard to see a strategy better then worker first.

And about the scout movement, I think the best use we can have of the scouting movements in the first turn is finding the best capital spot. A good capital spot is way better then a future fishing village. We aren't moving east with the settler, since that would mean a 1 off the coast capital. So we need to decide wether to settle in place, move north or move west. Since getting the gold in the capital is our biggest possible advantage, scouting north is very important and the 1NE, 1NW scout moves is the one that reveals the most tiles.

We could also move the scout 2W or 1W, 1NW. If there's something good to the west, settling 1NW or 1W (and gambling there isn't a resource there - unlikely, since it really seems to be a strategic resource placing) could work too. Seems to be a lot of grassland tiles there (and no chance of ruining fishing villages).

[Ilios]

Heh, forgot we have The Wheel...

[DaveV]

Earlier post eaten by "server too busy".

I guess I agree with Ichabod's scout move. Couple that with a warrior NW move, and we expose a fair number of tiles. Setting N for gold seems like the best plan.

Stonehenge would be nice to have with a CHA civ, but I don't think it's worth stunting our early growth. Settlers and workers are the best early units; Archery should be fairly high on our tech list so we can get our UU on the board to protect our cities.

Edit: actually, we can scout the gold hill on our second turn, since our settler is somehow lacking the starting settler promotion...

[Ichabod]

Earlier post eaten by "server too busy".

I guess I agree with Ichabod's scout move. Couple that with a warrior NW move, and we expose a fair number of tiles. Setting N for gold seems like the best plan.

Stonehenge would be nice to have with a CHA civ, but I don't think it's worth stunting our early growth. Settlers and workers are the best early units; Archery should be fairly high on our tech list so we can get our UU on the board to protect our cities.

Edit: actually, we can scout the gold hill on our second turn, since our settler is somehow lacking the starting settler promotion...

It's too risky to go stonehenge. There are quite a bit of Charismatic leaders (also industrious ones - I bet Mackoti and SevenSpirits will go for it) and there are civs starting with Mysticism. That's the big "no, no" with Stonehenge, having to tech an early mysticism while needing a ton of worker techs. And if we went for it and lose it... Well, almost good game right there...

I believe you mean the 1SW move with the warrior. We really need to reveal that possible resource tile. It'll be very important for the settling discussion.

Anyway, we have a crazy good combo and a very nice start... Hello "most underachieving team prize".

PS: Why do the mapmakers always take the settler bonus off, damn!

[DaveV]

I think we should use one of Ilios's reserved posts to summarize the starting techs, UUs, and UBs of our opponents.

Or, see this post

[Ilios]

Second post updated.

[Ilios]

It's too risky to go stonehenge. There are quite a bit of Charismatic leaders (also industrious ones - I bet Mackoti and SevenSpirits will go for it) and there are civs starting with Mysticism. That's the big "no, no" with Stonehenge, having to tech an early mysticism while needing a ton of worker techs. And if we went for it and lose it... Well, almost good game right there...

Agreed.

I believe you mean the 1SW move with the warrior. We really need to reveal that possible resource tile. It'll be very important for the settling discussion.

Yup, that's where the Warrior needs to go.

Anyway, we have a crazy good combo and a very nice start... Hello "most underachieving team prize".

Screw that, I'm a Pitboss veteran, we're going to win this! :mad: ...

... and have fun doing it! :hat:

PS: Why do the mapmakers always take the settler bonus off, damn!

[Ichabod]

Oh man, that's a lot of players. I think the game will be over already when we finish doing all the players/civs analysis.

By the way, the game hasn't started yet, has it?