So, I figured I should go ahead and create a long-term strategy thread, since it doesn't really fit into Metagaming. Please feel free to post your ideas!
My initial thoughts: As Pacal of the Vikings, we are going to be able to settle islands much quicker than other teams and will get a not-horrible 3c out of coastal tiles. In addition, we are likely to be relatively far away from our opponents to start the game and barbarians are off, so REXing might be a very good idea, even with toridal maintainence.
I think that we should, however, prioritize settling our main continent over settling islands, with the exception that a really good island site is better than a decent mainland site and taking into account islands will give better trade routes, because the mainland is likely to be much more contested. Prior to seeing the map, I don't think there is any reason to Pink Dot; for instance, we are not dependent on stone like (PBEM 38 spoiler)
OleDavy as Ghandi of France
but aggressive settling is not inherently a bad thing, in my opinion.
I think there is only one early wonder that we really, really want: The Great Lighthouse. With galley-accessible islands and a decent priority on sailing anyways for trading posts, etc. The Great Lighthouse will be incredibly powerful, allowing new cities to payback their cost much more quickly and boosting established cities as well. In addition, TGL has no doubler, so we won't have to settle for stone or marble if we don't want to do so. However, this does mean that Team Menagerie's IND bonus is more effective. If they beeline it and we don't, they probably will beat us. In my opinion, we should not stunt our growth to make sure we get TGL, but I would not be upset if we slightly reduce our expansion to grab it, as it will allow better and easier expansion later.
Anyways, it's quite possible that our initial scouting completely changes everything; maybe, for example, we start quite close to another team, so it's best not to set anything in stone, but please post your ideas for discussion as well!
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
If we have good sites for go cotage crazy near by , its not worth going for GLH, and i would prefer to not buld it, but depends what map offer us.I dont think there wiil be island recheable by galley or i am wrong?
mackoti Wrote:If we have good sites for go cotage crazy near by , its not worth going for GLH, and i would prefer to not buld it, but depends what map offer us.I dont think there wiil be island recheable by galley or i am wrong?
Commodore said there actually would be some islands reachable by galley and then some more reachable with galleons.
I do think though that GLH value will depend a lot on what we actually see. If this is still primarily a continental game, I'd be less hyped about GLH because of it's tendency to be a diplomatic isolater. Other teams might freak out about it despite the fact that it's less likely to be strong if this thing is land-heavy with fewer coastal spots.
I think Commodore had mentioned there would be galley access to some lands/islands, as well as some needing Astro. So a fair bit of water and some galley-accessible islands seems like a reasonable expectation.
I agree with Merovech that if we are in position to settle some islands early, it is useful to do so -- at least enough island cities to fill out internal trade routes for our continental cities. The Great Lighthouse is a bit more situational and depends on how many coastal cities we have, which will depend on how our dot maps develop. We will just have to wait and see on that, although we should make certain to settle at least a couple coastal cities to make sure we have access to naval units later.
Hmm, I did make the assumption that there will be lots of galley-settleable island spots. This might not be true, which would devalue the Great Lighthouse, although I feel it will still likely be very important.
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
Glad someone brought up the stone/marble thing. Map design as of late has tended towards including stone/marble, but making it difficult to reach. We've had too many games decided by nearby stone, so the operating design principle tends to be that you place stone/marble, but require sacrifice to reach it. I don't think there's any early wonders that we NEED so bad that we should sacrifice for either.
Stonehenge is the early one that would be really quite nice to us, as we're going to need border pops from somewhere. However, I do expect Menagerie to target it, and I have a hard time thinking we can beat them without paying too much for the wonder. Menagerie really is the wildcard here - figuring out their wonder intentions is key. Trolls is easy - they'll want Pyramids and nobody is really likely to seriously contest that. I do think TEAM is a lock for Oracle as has been said already.
I don't think Prince/Toroid is enough to prevent us from pushing expansion pretty strongly. The main problems I see us running into is border pops and happy cap. Border pops are important because we'll want to push expansion (EXP trait), happy cap because we'll want to work lots of cottages (FIN). Borders pops we'd want either religion with OR, Stonehenge, or something along those lines. Happy cap could of course not be a problem depending on resources - it really depends on what we see in scouting the first 15 turns or so - but if it IS a problem, we'll likely want early-ish Monarchy or even an Oracle->Monarchy.
In a vacuum, I tend to guess Henge would be most valuable to us - of course I say that without seeing the map. However, I'd also bet that's going to be the most difficult one to grab considering we have Huayna in the game. Also, factoring in this comment:
Merovech Wrote:Hmm, I did make the assumption that there will be lots of galley-settleable island spots. This might not be true, which would devalue the Great Lighthouse, although I feel it will still likely be very important.
If you ARE right, then something like GLH or Colossus would indeed become more valuable. Again, all of this is highly subject to change if we get some surprises on the map.
I agree completely. Henge would be brilliant for us, but unfortunately, we really shouldn't go for it. Team Wonderspam with IND will almost certainly go for it and they know it's brilliant for us too. They won't hang around too much. Going for it and missing would be awful, going for it at the expense of expansion would be defeating the entire purpose.
However, if we meet them before they've built it, I would heartily encourage discussing the wonder and informing them how near completion we are. Let them whip the fecker.
Kyan Wrote:However, if we meet them before they've built it, I would heartily encourage discussing the wonder and informing them how near completion we are. Let them whip the fecker.
YES.
Also, Hanging Gardens is the kind of thing that's useful for us too if bypass the very early wonders in favor of expansion. Downside is we're unlikely to need the health (EXP), but still, that's likely to be a strong wonder for us.
I'd be careful about using diplomacy for such maneuvers, especially if they can later confirm we were pulling their leg. 1 or 2 strong backstabs should theoretically work much better than a number of smaller ones.
Xenon Wrote:I'd be careful about using diplomacy for such maneuvers, especially if they can later confirm we were pulling their leg. 1 or 2 strong backstabs should theoretically work much better than a number of smaller ones.
Of course, if it's worth it... go for it.
You can subtly hint that you may or may not be pushing Stonehenge or any wonder without lying that "we will finish on Turn X"... Anything to make them nervous and make them pay more for it is a bonus, and it's just not possible for them to easily tell if you're being honest or not (not early anyways when you can't see hammers invested).
