[PB65 Mjmd] Off to Sea Once More

[Ginger*]

I’m strongly of the opinion that the Madrassa is superior to the Carnegie library in most games. Yes it comes with terrible starting techs (doubly so if you pair CRE, Mys becomes a waste of space), but the Camel Archer is better than the Minuteman.

As far as fishing civs, Rome and Vikings come to mind, although I admit Portugal got badly nerfed by the latest change to circumnav (devaluing Optics as a tech target) and England was always irrelevant. Carthage, well ppl have strong opinions about their uniques and I can’t decide personally

Edit: Netherlands as a PHI-pairing fishing Civ deserves mention as a direct competitor

The biggest argument I see against the Carnegie library is that it can be a very free and lazy bonus if you choose not to do funky plays with it. But lmao there’s ORG

[Mjmd]

First while its top of mind, for Sequential do HA upgrade in queue to knights the turn you research guilds?

[Ginger*]

They do in singleplayer and singleplayer is sequential.
Research triggers before production (Replaceable parts bonus turn)

[Mjmd]

I'm super thankful I rolled the merchant instead of the scientist. Merchant was 48% odds.

So I'm not in the game anymore, but the ONLY reason I was was for a bit, is that I rolled a merchant. With American UB A) I would have gotten 3 turns sooner and B) the merchant chance would have been higher.

Do I wish my cities had been 3 turns more developed, you bet! (as a reminder I was literally working cottages over growing). Also, having to win an under 50% didn't feel great.

What do you like about the Madrassa? Sure the extra culture is nice and has been annoying, but one of the key skills to up your game is GP planning. Mine was ruined thanks to Pin, but it takes work to get two GAs in a reasonable time frame (and I got free artist to help me!). To get 3? Its a huge effort. When I was asked about my GA planning you'll notice I responded with a lot of vagueness and general hope for the 3rd. And a lot of that hope was centered around getting wonders. Now if I had a 3rd city that had been tooling some random GP points for most of the game hanging around, it would be A LOT easier. A note for the other GP slanted UBs early. You have to WORK specialists (IE sacrifice more pop that could be working tiles or whipped away).

BTW what the hell has Cornflakes been doing with all his prophets? I thought he had shrine, but nope. Has he been settling them for the lolz? I was trying to figure out how many of the merchants born were Pins. I'm pretty sure Pin has gotten two plus a scientist, but maybe he has gotten more.

Lets say you build two Carnegies early and for sake of simplicity you produce two merchants by T150. Lets say 1st is worth 900 and 2nd is worth 1100 (I think its size 11 not 15 btw). That is 2,000g. Obviously you COULD do other things, but I'm using the easiest comparison. Zulu which I rate as a good UB civ has saved me approximately 1,100g (VERY rough math I just took average 12g across 75 turns; I was saving 10g on T100 with 8 of them, but I figure with city size ect just add 200g, maybe Charriu has better numbers). Point being its a sizable chunk of change difference. Now over a 250 turn game that might shrink, but T150 is a good check point.

And obviously there are other things you can do than produce merchants. As a reminder the MAIN reason I pushed block picking for this game was America.

Mjmd

So the reason I was KIND OF* pushing block in set up thread for this is that I think specifically the American UB is probably overpowered. It almost certainly should be at courthouse still at +2 gp. So you might say "but Mjmd random snake pick is the same as random block to determine who gets". AH, but you can't pick the combo to pair with it that you want. I'm POSITIVE Cornfllakes for instance has thought of something stupid to do with it.  Best I've come up with is Cre/Pro America. Skip the religious tree to try to get a fairly fast HG for an early engineer to do MoM (probably not fast enough for mids)

But ya just compare it to the GP list of unique buildings and its clearly out of place. Compare the economic potential and it blows out any of the top economic UBs. Also enables cheesy strats. Ya sounds like a clear "should be changed". Again, if Charriu was going to make changes I would make this argument in another 3 games time, but gotta try for last change log.

I will say I'm not sure Pin has used well this game. Its possible he wanted to wait on 2nd GA until Bing conquest has more pop. He could also be setting up 2nd GA directly into a 3rd.

[Tarkeel]

There's one big flaw in your Ikhanda vs Carnegie comparison though. The savings you've got are extra, while the Merchants from Carnegie are just earlier and possibly a different type. It's still a good UB though. Probably the most busted UB (in the right game) is the Viking Trading Post.

[Ginger*]

Madrassa 4 culture is pretty big deal bc it often doubles to 8 when built fast

Also ability to run two priests is very nice, Priests are good GP, shrines, some mid game bulb paths, and can GA with the scientists.
12 base GPP beats 8, even if it comes at an extra 4fpt cost, because big problem for non PHI civs is the sheer time it takes, outside of SPI shenanigans or Nat Epic, there’s a hard cap on how fast you’re getting your golden ages and it can take a lot of time.

[Mjmd]

I mean the extra 4fpt is a big deal. Things you could do with your extra turns from faster GP: Whip units or infrastructure, split off food for a new city, or just simple work more tiles. The food, opportunity cost, difficulty of types, and sheer time involved is why a lot of people never reach a 3rd GA. The American UB helps with all of those; it may be you get an extra 1-2 targeted type GP in a game. Again, just compare it to the  other GP focused UBs if you don't want to compare it to the economy UBs. The next closest is Forum and that requires producing 8 to break even with Carnegie. Its not like you can't research priesthood and turn your first Carnegie specialist into a prophet if you want (if I'm not America I just prefer to fight for one of the early prophet wonders than dedicate that much early food to specialists). 

I don't know if its because I'm an accountant, but I tend to favor the early money UBs over things like extra culture. Sure the extra culture has been good this game, but I would also have been in strike without the Ikhandas / had to majorly delay cities and lose spots. That is worth quite a bit to me. Also India . Obviously UUs ect are also a consideration in picks, but other than India I tend to value UBs higher than UUs and poor India starts with myst so I can't pick it as much as I want.

[Mjmd]

T151

Pin after backstabbing his ally and then watching Cornflakes peace out, launch an impressive GA, and go after the obvious food.



If only I had sent him a signal that we should eat SaC and then go to war vs Cornflakes. Again a situation that heavily favors him. IF ONLY!!

Anyways, I do have plans in this war other than to just sit around. Sometimes you spend some time on the sure thing vs the random charge (which was my original plan).

I also am going to be whipping some knights next turn. Sure  I have two turns of GA left, but at this point WHY NOT!!!!

[Ginger*]

Do you see any possible lines that end in victory?
Now that you've hit Guilds, what's your next tech target?
What is your choice of military composition and your military goals?

[Mjmd]

Listen to this until about 50 seconds in. I've never seen this movie, but I have to assume everything worked out like my plan will. Listen it was the best I could find when I should be sleeping.

Do you see any possible lines that end in victory?
Now that you've hit Guilds, what's your next tech target?
What is your choice of military composition and your military goals?

That would be telling.

Listen its real slim now. Pin basically destroyed my 15% chance. Instead of building org infrastructure (with some military) this 2nd GA I've had to whip and build all military. But I do have a plan.

Civil service - got to get that irrigation goal done.

Stuff I've built plus mainly knights. That would be telling.