[SPOILERS] ALWAYS PEACE? What will Lewwyn do?

[Lewwyn]

Been awhile, only 1 turn update though.

I was watching Cyneheard's settler and decided that I would do a bit of dotmapping/planning about where I would settle next.

First lets look at Cyneheard's settler:



I've put a bunch of white circles where I think Cyneheard might possibly settle this city. You can also see I've marked in blue my current settler and where he is, for the moment, planning to go. I don't mind giving Cyneheard that triple flood plain as long as I can steal the corn and keep my sugar at the bottom there. The light blue possible city sites are great for blocking Cyneheard off and stealing that corn resource+a couple flood plains. I 'm not planning on being too aggressive with the Blue settler since that land west of the blue site isn't THAT good. Either way I think I need another settler down here pronto for light blue after dark blue if I want to complete my corn theft.

Here we see the north border with Cyneheard:



I mentioned before that I wanted to steal his gold there. Corn and FP too! It's just a nice city that also coincidentally progressively blocks off Cyneheard. I think that this, while usually is a pink dot, has been elevated to Magenta status. I think this is where my next settler goes... It's terrible in terms of concise dotmapping, but that's not what this city is about. This is about blocking/stealing/border wars... and pissing Cyneheard off.

Towards Nakor has been neglected, but here's the plan for the next 3 NE cities:



Red, Orange and Salmon. The spacing is good with a couple of over laps. Salmon actually is a perfect fit with Wolves to its south and Zebras to its SW. I've noticed here that I'm spreading out just a bit on these cities since I think the land is a lot less valuable, just a lot of plains tiles. I'm wondering if the Salmon dot is the right call not being on a PH, however, settling on a dry plains tile is nearly as good in terms of eating up bad tiles with city plots.

Also, notice how far from the Meridian with Nakor I am. He simply hasn't been planting cities with enough speed for me to really be concerned about him planting over the border. I also just don't believe he is particularly aggressive unless aroused(even when he is too), and I haven't been planting any cities in his direction that have been threatening beyond my most recent pig city. Meanwhile he has Scooter on his other border and I have NO doubt he's been aggressive towards Nakor. He's the type that sees blood and wants to capitalize. In this case I think it may be causing Nakor to be more concerned about Scooter than me.

Also, I have tentative plans to settle cities in a similar area on Nakor's border that Cyneheard is settling on mine. Thing is right now its fogged a bit so I'd rather not put up a dotmap until its free and clear.

Workers. I'm Building/Slaving/Chopping 5 right now. 5 of them in 3 turns. That will bring my total to 24.

Settlers... No plans for making any right at the moment. I think I'll start 2 after the workers are built. Then have those two plant on Cyne's border after I finish teching MC. Magenta and light blue I think, maybe have those two planted around 10 turns?

Let's hit up the demos:



I am pleased. Let's talk about GNP last today.

Crop is murdering. 63 up on the top rival, up 78 on 2nd place, and then there's Nakor.

MFG is nice up 11 on Cyneheard there.

Soldiers I mentioned in the last post is a function of growing my cities and building MP Qs. I'm ahead in that department even before the HR guys. I'm at 2 unit cost right now. I can't imagine what the unit cost will be for my opponents if they actually use Qs for HR happiness in many of their cities.

Land is really starting to beast up and I have 5 cities that haven't popped their first borders yet.

Pop? I'm almost DOUBLE my rival! Not sure why my opponents cities haven't been growing up. Are they whipping more than me? I'm not sure.

So back to GNP discussion. That top rival isn't Cyneheard or Scooter, it's Nakor. Check it:



I had that monster spike and then I settled 6 cities. My opponents settled about 4 ish? Nakor settled maybe 2-3. Notice how Cyneheard and Scooter are dipping hard on GNP. I settled more cities and actually took less of hit.

At 0% (except Nakor who I think is running break even)
Me - 146
Nakor - 109
Cyneheard - 106
Scooter - 79

I believe that I have the order correct here. Something to note is that these numbers are inflated by culture. But then I think everyone's should be affected by culture of terraces/libs. Scooter doesn't have a religion so his numbers are closer to the actual gold production, and when you look at the GNP graph Cyneheard is very close to him. Man, I am curious to see their land. I checked at EOT and I have AT LEAST 8 cottages growing next turn.

Hmmm, I should probably give a big update of all the cities so you can see what they are looking like. Overview as well.

[Lewwyn]

So I was thinking about things that I may have done differently. I thought about Nakor and his road to nowhere. Roads? My road network is atrocious. It's practically nonexistant. The only roads I've actually made (excluding the road from Noah north to Zebra and the 4 tile road from Elephant south) are 1 and 2 road segments that connect cities to rivers beyond that my cities are pretty much unconnected. If my opponents have spent any time connecting cities by roads, that's time lost building cottages. I'll have to wait till the end to confirm my suspicions, but I suspect that's one place I've gained a great deal of traction in terms of developing my civ.

[Lewwyn]

Quick. I'm buzzed.



Scooter planted another city. He's getting 13 gpt. Has his economy crashed?
Cyneheard's getting 33gpt.
EOT I'm getting 66 gpt.

[Lewwyn]

Okay an update ago I promised to do a full on everything update. It's EOT 103. I've got 37 pictures, lots of stuff in Spoiler tags.

First let's see a bit of the war between Scooter and Cyneheard:



Scooter has settled on their meridian in this picture I believe. That pink city's borders haven't popped yet or it would mean that Scooter planted the city on top of a FP. You can also see Cyneheard rushing a settler down to block off. In my overview pictures you'll see where Cyneheard finally planted that city on my border.

One note, you can see at EOT I got a free Hinduism spread which is awesome.

Let's do the Info Screens next:

Up to 22 workers and 2 missionaries are moving with a 3rd done next turn.

Lets go with the Empire over view now:

I went North>East>SW here.

You can see all the cottages. Yay.

Note where Cyneheard eventually planted that city. I disagree with the plant. It's less aggressive then I had anticipated as well as not great on the dotmapping for the city north of it. I'm going to push a settler out of Platypus again ASAP and go for my light blue site. I also plan on growing Beavers to 4 (2t) putting 1t into settler and then 2pop whipping it. That means Settler for the Magenta land grab in 4ts.

Let's do all my cities now.

These (I believe I did it right) are all the cities in order of when they were settled. Even my newest city Sloth, planted this turn, has a terrace. Nearly all, besides some of the more recent plants, are working only improved tiles.

Graphs and Demos:

I checked my opponents gpt. Cyneheard is at 30. Scooter is at 18. I planted a city this turn and I still got +66 this turn and I'm at 72 EOT.

I checked tech rates and I can get MC done in 2 turns at 100% tech. That will cost me 208 per turn. So, 416. I'm at 356 right now +72 is 428. I need 1 more turn of gold then I finish MC in 2 turns. So 3 turns till I get MC.

Small note, I added the top 5 cities in there because I thought it was an interesting comparison. Apparently I'm the only one with a size 9 city, though that may not be accurate.

[mackoti]

From your screenshots looks like CoL its a realy good investment.

[Lewwyn]

From your screenshots looks like CoL its a realy good investment.

Yep, its one of the reasons I wanted it earlier, but I still think that grabbing MC for forges before the courthouses is going to end up being the more efficient maximizing play. Still CoL is probably next followed by IW>fish>sail>calendar.

Also if you notice Wolves has grown this turn so next turn I'll start running a scientist as well as a priest and I'll pop the GP in 8 turns. Maybe Shrine up in 11 turns?

[Lewwyn]

Turn 104 in.

2 libs and 2 more workers completed. 2 more workers next turn. I will have a GP pop in 7 turns. 80% odds for priest and my shrine. I am starting to run 2 scientists in Giraffes. I will also run 2 scientists in Rabbits as soon as it grows to pop 9 in 2 turns. I want to pop two GSs. One for academy and one for bulbing education down the line. I'm just gonna start them now. The beakers aren't bad either.

No real movement or things of interest atm. Just workers doing worker things. My happy cap is at 10 for cities with religion now. I spread Hinduism to Racoons and I have 2 missionaries moving to Zebras and Noah. I'm chopping another one out of Baboons.

Demos:



GNP, I'm getting 79gpt at 0% tech. I have 431 now.
Both Nakor and Scooter are running at deficit right now(12 and 15 respectively).
Cyenheard is still on gold at 30gpt. He's got 121 saved up.

Broke 300 in Crop which is cool.

Land and Pop I'm WAY ahead now.

2 turns for MC. Then maybe 2-3 turns of gold and then 2 turns for Col.

[Lewwyn]

105 missed a turn this last day.

Cyneheard's settler went here:



It's the same spot that I'm going to use to block him off. My city will be settled t113. I will also have the Magenta land grab settled t111.

Almost finished MC though it looks like I'll have to knock the tech rate down to 90%.



Here's the reason. I broke 300GNP when I turned the tech rate up. I'm generating 357bk at 100%.

Tech path: MC>CoL>IW>Fish>Sailing>Calendar>CS>Alpha>Paper>Machinery>PP>Feud>Guilds>Banking

MFG almost even. Crop is basically ridiculous. Soldiers good. Land good. Pop still double. My approval rate has increased thanks to furs, wine and spreading religion. I got another free spread at the EOT and I spread Religion to Zebras via Missionary. I have a second missionary spreading to Noah next turn.

If anyone's curious about worker micro I'll post some. But I've got 26 workers now and they're all doing something. Just let me know.

[Tredje]

If anyone's curious about worker micro I'll post some. But I've got 26 workers now and they're all doing something. Just let me know.

I don't have any specific wishes, although I'll say that I do enjoy reading your updates. It's interesting to see big gaps appear between players even if they have the exact same civ/leader and starting locations. Definitely a testimony to your skill.

[Lewwyn]

I don't have any specific wishes, although I'll say that I do enjoy reading your updates. It's interesting to see big gaps appear between players even if they have the exact same civ/leader and starting locations. Definitely a testimony to your skill.

Thanks, I'm going to keep up the updates. I hope that we get a few more updates from Cyne, Scooter and Nakor. Very curious. Good thing Scooter and Cyne appear to have updated today.

Onto my update.

I have a couple of things to look at today. Not much is occurring on the border fronts. At home I've made plans to chop another settler out of the border city with Nakor (Pigs). So that should be done and moving before T110. I may send it to settle the Salmon site from earlier. If I really wanted to be a dick I'd steal Nakor's furs and corn. I should probably just go do that anyway. It's a nice site and I have no reason to coddle him. Maybe it will push him to grab Scooter's furs.

These last few turns I've been working on Spreading religion as you may have noticed. I've gotten 1 free spread and 3 missionary spreads. I got another missionary built at the end of turn in Baboons. 20 overflow! yay. That overflow will go straight into a forge which I will then 3 pop whip>overflow into another missionary with a forge accelerated forest chop. But back to the Religion:



Looking pretty good. Now I don't know if the world % is really giving me any indication of whether I've spread my religion more than Cyneheard given my cities are larger. Still makes me happy to have religion spreading the turn I get MC for forges.

And yes I did get MC this turn. I could apparently research CoL in 1 turn if I kept my research at 90%. Unfortunately, I'm out of gold right now. Still. Unless Scooter is racing for CoL right now, I'll probably beat him to it and take Confucianism.

Also about religion. My GP will pop in 5 turns(EOT). It's at 90% Priest so I'm feeling fine about the odds versus a Scientist. Speaking of Scientist, I've started 2 Scis in Giraffes and that will pop a GS in 17t atm. Probably 34 once the first GP pops. I think that the GS may go straight to Elephants to build an academy. That's where the Hindu Shrine will be and the gold is there, plus cottages. One of the reasons I don't want to build an academy in Noah is that I probably won't be switching into Burea.

Civic Plans:



My final Civics are circled in red. The only civics I might use beyond those are possibly Rep and Merc. I'm going to have to check closer to Banking to see if Merc is worth more or less than the +1 trade routes.

I simply don't see any need to swap into HR or Police state. No need for Nationhood(not building barracks) and Vassalage as I'm only at 3 unit cost. Burea is simply not worth the anarchy to switch into. It only helps my capital which truthfully is just slightly above average and many of my cities are close to par with it.

Slavery is just more important than Caste or Serfdom. I sincerely considered Serfdom, but Slavery is just too powerful on this rather hammer starved map.

Merc is a possibility since we're talking maybe 35 cities or more by that point. Esp if I get into rep as well. 35x3 = 105 rep beakers + possibly another 105 if all the free specs are scis. That's pretty awesome so I can't ignore it. Problem again is anarchy to switch into it. I hope I can grab the GM from economics or the GA from Music to grab a Golden Age to facilitate such a switch.

In religious civics, I'm not going to war, I don't feel the need to push my GPs. Free Religion is actually a bit tempting especially if I get Confucianism + Taoism + Islam or Christianity. Anytime one of my bigger cities gets to the happy cap I throw on another religion and throw up a temple. SO yes I may switch from OR to FR at some point. But only if the happy cap gets a bit tight I think. I'll play it by ear.

Demos:



Cyneheard the Miner has taken the MFG lead again. But I'm simply destroying in Food and GNP. That GNP stat is 90% tech with no tech being researched. Land and Pop as usual.

Cyneheard is still collecting gold at 18gpt. He has 157 now. Scooter I believe to be continuing tech at breakeven. As is Nakor.

My approval rate is rising, maybe the religion spreads? My opponents growing vertically?

Things are progressing.