Chairmen NobleHelium and Gaspar Demand Your Presence in the Collective

[Mardoc]

I'm increasingly doubtful that we get Stonehenge - I just think it requires more of a diversion than you're willing to throw at it. Especially when competing against mackoti and NoSeven, one with a Mysticism start and the other Industrious.

In addition - looking at the map, I see an awful lot of blue. We could plausibly have 2/3 of our cities coastal.

Suppose we abandon Stonehenge entirely and just focus on making sure the Great Lighthouse is ours? That synergizes better with allowing early growth since we need to tech a fair ways and build more workers to chop it out.

I like the grass site for this, specifically because it takes advantage of Expansive workers.

[Gaspar]

So we've chattered a lot, both in thread and out, about strategy. What early growth path to take, which wonders to prioritize (if any), what type of economy to run long-term, etc. But I think a lot of this is still in the haze. While we can't finalize any of these options right now - we don't know all of our nearby land for one, we don't know the location of copper or horses for another - we certainly can start to crystallize a plan. I'd like to involve the rest of the team in that discussion so it looks like its time for one of my patented episodic posts...



So I'd like really to discuss all the topics in the intro there, but I don't suspect I have enough steam for that tonight. So let's start with the first Boolean decision on our path.

[SIZE="4"]Vertical vs. Horizontal Growth[/SIZE]

Now, by choosing Pottery over Bronze Working as our second tech has largely cast our die towards vertical growth, but its worth discussing. Expansive is great at least partly because it allows you to excel at either - faster worker builds for improving more tiles/chopping production and/or cheaper granaries for faster vertical growth/more efficient settler whipping.

Almost every game I've played at RB I've favored a horizontal approach to the early game. We'll ignore PBEM14 because that opening was on crack, but otherwise getting settlers down early and often has been my typical approach. Mostly because I feel it is generally superior. Early game you are usually happy limited to so going horizontal gets more tiles in play. It also helps landgrab, which can be essential and provides a wider base for the mid-game.

Vertical growth tends to be a newer player crutch - it feels better to have bigger cities, etc. And it can definitely leave you wanting if you're in a game with a competitive landgrab phase. However, if you have the right tiles for it and the right map for it, fewer larger cities will almost always leave you teching faster early which can be important for first-to or nearly first-to bonuses like religion or wonders.

Okay, so I know you guys all understand Civ but I like to get my thoughts out in order. Anyway, we initially planned on a horizontal approach this game but have since meandered to a more vertical approach. We have the capital growing to its happy cap before building the first settler in our current microplan and we don't have single whip lined up in it for the first 35 turns. At the moment, city 2 doesn't get planted until T27 which feels an eternity and at T40 its likely we only have 3 cities or we maybe just got 4.

So why? Well, maintenance is higher on the map for starters. It might be only Prince but it is still a toroid. Not only does that favor a less aggressive settling approach but it also means getting a few cottages down at the capital and working them is important to defray the costs of early expansion. Its worth noting that it appears we have a "blob" to ourselves as well, that means the landgrab is less essential early. We also have no commerce bonus tiles in near reach - Ivory hardly counts and Silver and Gold are both at least 2nd ring cities. Furs can be grabbed at 1st ring and that's information we didn't have when we first drew the plan up, so its worth considering that new information. Also, we seem to be planning on going for 2 or 3 wonders in the first 50 turns. Doing so means saving forests for that push rather than chopping out loads of workers and settlers. While I disagree with the idea that someone is going to be foolish enough to bang out a sub-T30 Stonehenge, there's no doubt more risk when you can't absolutely get what you want.

I'd like to hear the lurkers chime in here, as well as NH. We can still sort of change direction. Is it worth risking a lot to ensure we get wonders or is risking tanking the economy super early to get more land settled a better choice. Make no mistake, either option is a risk on this map.

[NobleHelium]

Yeah, the furs location changes a lot, but we'd still need culture for it.

I'm currently comfortable with our tentative plan. We really need to see where copper and horse are though.

[Mardoc]

I'd like to hear the lurkers chime in here, as well as NH. We can still sort of change direction. Is it worth risking a lot to ensure we get wonders or is risking tanking the economy super early to get more land settled a better choice. Make no mistake, either option is a risk on this map.

Lord Ronald said nothing; he flung himself from the room, flung himself upon his horse and rode madly off in all directions.

I don't particularly care which path we take. I think any of them could work - Stonehenge + GLH is a nice combo, and so is the prospect of having most of the land and resources, and focusing on vertical growth and getting an early tech lead is reasonable too. Heck, if the map is small enough, planning an early war to call someone's bluff on a farmer's gambit may even be reasonable - there's only three opponents, so less need to worry about the typical 'everyone else runs away with the game'.

What I am most afraid of is taking the middle path, resulting in underexpansion and a failgold economy. My general sense from the way you're talking, is that that's where we are currently. I'm afraid asking about a potential change of direction seems like a symptom of the same problem. .

I tend to think any of those approaches can work, but you need to commit to one, wholeheartedly. We can't do everything, especially with the caliber of opponents we're facing. But so far I don't hear any discussion about which tradeoffs to accept - in fact every time I bring up the subject, I hear responses like

While I disagree with the idea that someone is going to be foolish enough to bang out a sub-T30 Stonehenge, there's no doubt more risk when you can't absolutely get what you want.

Responses like this seem to be claiming you can, in fact, get all of wonders and expansion and tech, simultaneously. And then someone else will accept the tradeoff you're not willing to, and they'll beat you like a rented mule.

So what am I looking for? I'm looking for a decision, that I can then help you optimize. And a commitment on what you're willing to give up in exchange for the primary goal, a tradeoff you're willing to make. I'm afraid I'm going to keep sounding like a broken record on the subject, too. I don't think casting my vote for any of the ideas will really help you decide. In fact if it has any effect, I'd expect it to prolong the period of drifting without a clear, realistic plan. So I abstain.


On another subject

We really need to see where copper and horse are though

I thought the plan was to lean on Bowmen?

[Gaspar]

Well, I think we have a clear plan at the moment, but its turn 9 so the plan is malleable. I guess what I'm trying to do is to have considered all options before we commit. I brought this issue of vertical vs. horizontal up because its the first decision we have to make, I'm actually more interested in debating some of the other points I suggested but didn't raise in my post. Seemed silly to do that without considering the first option.

While I agree that you need to commit to plan to execute it - bottom line Stonehenge just isn't important enough to push the whole game aside to do it. Do I think the T34 plan is more likely to be successful than the T38 one? I do. But I like the way our empire looks on T34 without Stonehenge on the current tech/build path than I do with Stonehenge on the other one. I guess ultimately Stonehenge falls into the nice, but not necessary category. The bigger question is the GLH/Pyramids/Other question, but that's still another 10-15 turns after the current microplan ends, so that will be for a future "fork" post.

The reason horses/copper are a big deal is less for the units they provide (though a scouting chariot would be useful) and more because Horse and Copper are high-yield tiles that we want to make sure are getting worked by a city.

[Mardoc]

While I agree that you need to commit to plan to execute it - bottom line Stonehenge just isn't important enough to push the whole game aside to do it. Do I think the T34 plan is more likely to be successful than the T38 one? I do. But I like the way our empire looks on T34 without Stonehenge on the current tech/build path than I do with Stonehenge on the other one. I guess ultimately Stonehenge falls into the nice, but not necessary category. The bigger question is the GLH/Pyramids/Other question, but that's still another 10-15 turns after the current microplan ends, so that will be for a future "fork" post.

Ah, thank you. A clear judgment that early Stonehenge isn't worth the price. So - can I talk you into dropping Stonehenge from the plans entirely, then? I think it's very unlikely we get it at T38, so I'd rather not bend any other portion of the plan toward a goal we can't meet.

The reason horses/copper are a big deal is less for the units they provide (though a scouting chariot would be useful) and more because Horse and Copper are high-yield tiles that we want to make sure are getting worked by a city.

Oh . That should have been more obvious to me. Carry on...

[NobleHelium]

Anyway we played turn 9 last night but were too tired to post about it.



To my great surprise, their scout did not move onto ours and in fact disappeared. Obviously they went to the southwest, but that looks very much like a dead end and there's even a forest there. At my insistence we debated for a while about why they would do that instead of taking the obvious move to the east which reveals the most tiles. Gaspar came up with several mostly terrible theories like "he misclicked" and in the end we didn't really have any idea. It's possible that there's something of interest down there and obviously we don't know now, but it really looks like a dead end to me. Maybe they wanted to thoroughly check out the glacier block. In any event, we then talked about whether it would be more useful to scout the middle or potentially scout N7's starting land. We agreed that scouting their starting land is definitely more useful, partially because if we get sight on their cities we can track their hammer counts via the espionage screen. And if we don't find them (Gaspar thinks they're to our northwest, I think they're to our west), we'll find someone else and get more tech bonuses.

And yeah, we found clams near the forest area. Most likely we'll leave that for the gold island in order to catch all those forests, but we'll know for sure(ish) once we move onto the PH next turn.

[Gaspar]

At my insistence we debated for a while about why they would do that instead of taking the obvious move to the east which reveals the most tiles. Gaspar came up with several mostly terrible theories like "he misclicked" and in the end we didn't really have any idea. It's possible that there's something of interest down there and obviously we don't know now, but it really looks like a dead end to me. Maybe they wanted to thoroughly check out the glacier block.

A couple were less than terrible.

Anyway, I think its most likely that it was either A: A show of passivity towards or B: They came from the north and wanted to see what was in the south.

[Serdoa]

Ok, first:

What do you want to do?

1. Get GLH.
2. Get Pyramids.
3. Expand and forgo all wonders.

The first two both need Fishing -> Sailing as well as Masonry. The third might not need Sailing and certainly not Masonry. All 3 are helped by Pottery, though realistically if you go for Pyramids you will not work the cottages for several turns I think.

Also, if mackoti is the Ind-civ he will go for the Pyramids, I'm sure. I take it he has stone as well, so I don't think you can build it faster then he will. Especially as he (from all I can read from the demos) is the only one settling the other PH, giving him 6 happy without another city (ivory). On the other hand, that also means he probably can't go for GLH at the same time and everyone else has no Ind-bonus, similar to you, right?

Lastly, expanding is nice, but I really miss the great sites which need to be expanded too like right now. Not that expansion in itself is bad, just I don't see it as a winning tactic as the land itself is not good enough to give you enough of an edge - you probably run pretty quickly into the issue that maintenance is too high to bear for rather mediocre sites to be settled.

So, from all that, I personally would try for GLH. If you want that, you should probably settle that (crap) grassland tile below the sheep to your northeast. With T25 border pop from the cap you have 6 forests in the culture radius of that city. And working sheep + PH + GLH should get you 9 hammers a turn. Aided by 78 hammers from chops thats 6 turns for the GLH. Playing it through quickly that should get you GLH by T40. Maybe you can get it earlier if you go for BW before Sailing so that you can accumulate some whip overflow. You'd probably need to get the settler before the T23 I have set it up with, due to the needed time to grow back after the whip.

[oledavy]

What I am most afraid of is taking the middle path, resulting in underexpansion and a failgold economy. My general sense from the way you're talking, is that that's where we are currently. I'm afraid asking about a potential change of direction seems like a symptom of the same problem. .

Seconded. Whatever we do, we need to pull out all the stops. Anything short of that is a losing proposition.

I'd like to hear the lurkers chime in here, as well as NH. We can still sort of change direction. Is it worth risking a lot to ensure we get wonders or is risking tanking the economy super early to get more land settled a better choice. Make no mistake, either option is a risk on this map.

I still favor stonehenge at the earliest possible date, then going into balls to the wall expansion mode. It provides the best synergy with Exp/Pro Babylon imho.

However, if it comes down to Pyramids or GLH, I favor neither and going all out with settlers and workers. I just don't feel like it's viable to get the GLH and especially not the pyramids. We risk running a repeat of PBEM26 and ending up with failgold for our efforts at the cost of expansion.

Granted this comes from someone who prefers horizontal expansion as well. However, I feel like vertical expansion is only superior on monarch difficulty or higher. Even though the map is toroidal, it's also prince difficulty, and we already have pottery to help defray early expansion costs. Founding for furs and gold would also help to alleviate the issues with expanding. We have protective bowmen Let's expand like crazy, slap down some pink-dots and dare anyone to do something about it.

On a related note, if we are not going for Stonehenge we need some way to put culture in our new cities. Building an EXP granary in each right off the bat would be the preferable option.

Any estimate on how far away N7 is?