[PB70] The Cartographic Correction Committee convenes

[Tarkeel]

Part of is that because of his reputation, everybody will keep forces on that border.

[scooter]

Holy mama that is a 17 city Hanging Gardens. This is going to be A Problem. I did say I thought something like this was about to happen based on whips, but this even exceeded my expectations.

[scooter]

Also I didn't expect to kick up so much Superdeath discourse . I've definitely read a few of his games so I definitely get where some of it comes from. But that version of him has been totally absent so far. He seemed concerned via diplo about this Mjmd play though, so maybe there's something there.

[scooter]

I’m at a sort of fork in the road here as it relates to Mjmd. I have a few routes I can go here, and it’s time to commit.

1. Play my game plan economically. I have a plan lined up over the next dozen turns to do a few economic things simultaneously. Namely, build a shrine, either pop a prophet to bulb Theology or a Merchant for a trade mission (then build AP), and get a wave of libraries and hire around 8-10 Rep scientists for a tech burst. This would mean remaining smaller than the leader, but it would set me up with a really strong foundation and allow me to reap some bonuses for getting to techs first. Most of this is already underway.
   
   
2. This is a sort of corollary to #1, but if my Great Person luck were to go sideways and I get Engineers, there’s also a world where I burst tech a couple prereqs and then bulb my way to an early Guilds. I could feasibly get a bunch of Knights an eternity before Bing gets longbows and run him over. This is still on the table even if my primary great person plan works, but this would be accelerated if plan A goes off the rails in any way.
   
   
3. Pause and use Triremes and CKNs to make Mjmd miserable for awhile in order to buy some time along with Superdeath if he’s game.
   

I’m still leaning towards #1. I did throw the idea for #3 out to Superdeath, but he hasn’t responded yet. I think it's only a serious consideration if Superdeath wants to outright attack Mjmd. One thing I’m definitely hoping to do is continue painting Mjmd as the runaway, which he’s certainly on the verge of. This play from him was really flashy and should take some of the attention I’ve gotten for wonders away from me.

[scooter]

Mjmd got lucky I was 1T too late. Figured I'd document this for after the game and he can tell me whether he was worried about this or not.





The other night I noticed this. Namely, a tile that previously had jungle that no suddenly longer had jungle. You'll notice down in the corner my Galley is sitting on a "here by T93" sign. The point of that is the Galley is supposed to return to Stone Island by a certain date to pick up the worker. So I had a few turns to scout the fog, which was the whole reason I was headed this direction. But at the sight of this change and knowing Mjmd's power levels, I figured there was a good chance this city was empty. So I threw my Spear from Marble Island on board and took a trip. I also happened to have a scout in his core, so I would have the chance to peek first on the exact turn my Galley came in range.





Well, that looks like a freshly whipped Chariot as he's been whipping his pop away. However, an amphibious Spear gets 90% odds. Sadly, his borders popped this very turn. That sign marked "declare here?" was out of his culture last turn. This meant there was no way to declare and reach it this turn. Declaring now would bump me out of range and delay by 1T. I might still be able to burn it, but he would be free to take a 30% shot on my Galley and/or reinforce, reducing the overall success levels by a lot.

My plan was actually to try to extort him via diplo if I had a free shot, but sadly I packed up and went home. On the diplo front I've actually been trying to organize a trade embargo against him. Superdeath is receptive, but Charriu getting sick has slowed diplo progress down. I haven't talked to Bing about it because if I can't get Superdeath and Charriu on board, there's very little point.

[scooter]

I’m continuing to work on an Mjmd trade embargo behind the scenes. It seems like it will happen, but we’re going to need to wait another 8-9 turns because Charriu feels uncomfortable doing so until he gets a few more units on his Mjmd border. But there is interest for sure.




Beijing and Shanghai are continuing on Operation Prophets. I think the end result will be a 93% Prophet or 7% Engineer in Beijing. Prophet would immediately build a Shrine in Shanghai, while an Engineer would likely be put on ice for a bit. There’s several things I could do with one (save for Apostolic Palace, bulb towards Guilds, Golden Age), but I’m not absolutely sold on any of them, so I’m just not going to worry about it further until it actually happens. From there, Shanghai is looking at odds around 70% Prophet or 30% Merchant. This is improved from 60/40 where it was trending when I first looked at it. I’ve also managed to speed it up considerably. The motive for speeding it up is doubly useful - one, it reduces the Merchant odds, but two, it gives me time to run a trade mission and then use that gold to burn towards Theology to prevent someone from sniping AP should I actually get a Merchant.

The other project Operation 10 Rep Scientists by T99 is also in full swing. Libraries are complete in Guangzhou and Chengdu, and scientists will be hired there very soon. Beijing, Tianjin, and Xian are all whipping theirs in the next few turns. I’ll use this to burn towards Currency as fast as possible which I badly need, and then we’ll see from there. I’m also squeezing out another settler pair from Nanjing and Guangzhou. At times it feels like I may be trying to do too much at once, and I definitely might be. Practically, it feels like Apostolic Palace is absolutely essential, so that’s what I’m gearing goals around right now.





I briefly considered Alphabet-> Currency instead and using the ability to build research to speed Currency. However, that’s really only important while researching Currency, and the gains from that are mostly washed away by the known tech bonus on Math. I don’t care about anything at Math, but eventually I’ll care about Civil Service, so Math-> Currency it is. The other rationale for considering Alphabet was to keep open a possible Merchant Guilds bulb by blocking Civil Service, but I ultimately decided that was too cute and not really compatible with what I actually needed in the next 25 turns.





Here’s the damage from Hanging Gardens - and this is after he whipped away a ton of it. It’s not pretty.

[scooter]

Quick update this morning. Scientists are coming online.





City that can run 2 scientists with a 6f surplus is cool. It'll whip-complete that settler at size 8.





Chengdu's Scientists are also now online. This'll grow onto the mined hill and then probably just whip whenever it grows beyond that. Competing the Forge first and then just pumping military indefinitely is the longer term plan here. Barracks then CKNs until further notice, whipping whenever we need more than 4 improved tiles.





0% tech rate up to around 40bpt, break-even more like 70. Break-even was a grisly 25bpt a few turns ago. Currency should really make tech go vroom. I have two more cities planned up here in the north by T100 marked by signs. Beijing is getting a pair of mines which is prep for an Apostolic Palace build - plus one of them can and will be used by Nanjing which is continuing to be a pure hammer utility engine. Finally, Beijing picks up its Engineer for next turn and will run the Priest/Engineer duo for turn 96-98, popping a 93%/7% Prophet/Engineer dice roll for EoT98. Fingers crossed.

[scooter]

Thinking a little bit about what other players are doing and targeting tech-wise.






Bing is the simplest one. His tech is barely there. I estimate his break-even rate to maybe be around 10bpt? So I expect he'll be limping to Currency for the forseeable future, and overall I'm not going to worry about him too much tech-wise. He's not beating us to stuff.


Superdeath has followed a quite similar path to me. He also does not have Currency and is absolutely headed there now as the owner of GLH. Like me, he detoured for Iron Working as he's shown a willingness to settle jungle. He hasn't done much with Great People yet despite being PHI, so I expect that to speed up soon. He's a little bit of a Theology threat should I miss on my 93% Prophet. I don't think he can beat me there due to my ability to burst tech with Pyramids, but GLH + Currency will give him a hefty boost. Worth monitoring. He does have Polytheism and Masonry already, so he'd just have to tech Monotheism and pop a prophet (Obelisk + PHI). However, he just popped a Merchant, so there's some breathing room.


Charriu has first choice of all tech paths given his early Currency, Academy, settled Scientist, etc. I would be shocked if he's going for anything other than Literature right now. Great Library makes too much sense for him as CRE/PHI with an Academy. National Epic obviously has some value for him too. Given that he'll surely get to Lit first, it probably also makes sense for him to go one step further and claim the Music Artist. Past that, I imagine he may be interested in Civil Service to amplify a capital that already has some nice modifiers in it. Also keep in mind he lacks Iron Working (I think??) and Metal Casting.


Mjmd is what is left, and I saved him for last because he's the most interesting set of choices. He has sort of second choice of tech paths here, and there are a lot of routes he could go. I assume he'll do the above analysis and not race Charriu to Lit-Music and cede that path entirely. That leaves some interesting choices.


* Iron Working: Obviously he'll want this, but it's a question of when to slot it in. I can see his Iron is unimproved, so he hasn't gotten this yet. Given that he's out to 17 cities, he's now running out of expansion options, and getting jungle island and such online has to be a priority.

* Calendar: This has to be really high on the list. He doesn't have the happy abundance some people have, so while he's expanded quite well, he is pretty capped on city size currently. Calendar would unlock a lot. It would also unlock MoM, which is an obviously top-tier wonder for a large empire. He also hasn't done much with Great People yet, so there's a lot of room for him to make a play here.

* Code of Laws: Maintenance is high here, and he is Organized. He's obviously going to grab this before long, the question is just about when to slot it in. His city maintenance costs are likely huge, and this would quickly resolve that. It also has the dual benefit of piling up some EPs and getting tech visibility on opponents quicker, which is genuinely helpful in the mid-game. Nabbing a religion may be of interest to him too.

* Theology: He could just straight up try to race me to AP, especially if he senses any slowness on my part. I don't think he can beat me there, but if I roll a 7% Engineer and he's willing to use some great people of his own, it could get dicey fast.

* Metal Casting: Can only delay Triremes so long. One card I have the ability to play is just to go zero sum on him and pillage his east coast with Triremes. There would be very little he could do about it. Of course, he could just get Metal Casting himself, but the larger point is doing so is time he's not teching more valuable things listed above here.


The purpose of this exercise was mostly to see if any of the prizes seem likely to slip through the cracks. I think the answer on Great Library and Music is a resounding no. Calendar/MoM is a bit more of an open question I think. I'm not quite as hot on this wonder in CtH because the Nationalism expiration numbs it a bit, but you can still get a ton of mileage out of it. Will be watching tech completions closely, but I'd be shocked if Mjmd left an opening there. It's making me think more and more about harassing him with Triremes to derail his tech plans. If I can pair that with a trade embargo, I could tie up a lot of his tech time for awhile as at some point he'd be forced to tech Metal Casting which has much less value to him and is a big commerce sink.

[scooter]

Time for a big dice roll.





BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD.

[scooter]

You have two questions, one of which I sense you may be afraid to ask.

Why did you take this risk in the first place ya big dummy?

I would do it again. This 7% odds improved my odds in Shanghai by like 30% and also decreased the odds of losing the Apostolic Palace by quite a bit by speeding it up. But this was the downside.


So uh, what are you gonna do with that Engineer?

That’s what I have to figure out today. There are 3 options, going from simplest to most complex.

Door number one: save him and push as hard as humanly possible towards Theology then rush the AP. Hope the existence of the Engineer dissuades anyone from trying to race me. This is sort of the default option in a lot of ways. My break-even with scientists running is pretty healthy now, and I’m about to pick up Currency which will rocket me further as well as allow Forge-boosted wealth builds if I want them. I can still get to Theology pretty fast and then build it instantly.


Door number two: pop a Golden Age either now or soon and use that to get a couple more Great People dice rolls. I’m not in the ideal position to run several Golden Ages now, but it wouldn’t be insane to run one to speed me into the mid-game, especially with the happy cap and Colossus - I can now just keep growing onto good tiles unconstrained by happiness in much of my empire. It’s not an insane choice, but it requires a lot of juggling.


Door number three: F the religion game, let’s get Guilds. Swap off Math and go Alphabet-Currency in order to block an Engineer from bulbing Construction-Engineering, which leaves Feudalism-Guilds as the top two priorities. Maybe I get lucky and pop a second Engineer from Guangzhou (I will have a > 50% chance I think) and then double bulb both techs and get Guilds ages before anyone can do anything about it. CKNs can come via sea to crack stacks while Knights run over smaller cities that are defended by like Skirms or Axes or whatever.


As of right now I rank the doors 1 > 3 > 2. 3 sure sounds like fun though. I’ll definitely look into the viability of it.