[PB65] Pinch-Hitting Pindicator

[Kaiser]

Thanks for the explanation, that helps understanding your reasoning

[pindicator]

066

Things getting congested quickly, so that war may come sooner than anticipated.




Bing settled his 5th city and he's started putting full EP into me. One might think these two are coordinated, especially because I can see Bing has met everybody and so certainly does not have graphs on everybody yet.

I've listed my two options for northern settling. The Cow was the original plan and honestly the one I'm still leaning towards (hence why I ended up moving the axe south from Sushi Go). I think the Cow is still the play because of the following reasons:

• No first ring food for the new city so it will slowly develop and will not get much culture going early. In fact, there are only 2 fogged tiles where it could be sharing food at all, so I think there is a good chance the city has no food available to it from the start.
  
• Cow city can still share the Rice and Stone tiles from Dominion, should the Cow ever not be available.
  
• My workers are already there and will be able to start roading/improving the new city a lot faster
  
• After walls and defenders get in, I'm going to feel pretty comfortable in holding this spot

Alternatively, if I think there is any reason to pull me back from the edge here (for instance: antagonizing a neighbor while building a wonder and spamming settlers at the same time is always a winning plan), then the alternative is Purple by the sheep. This city is farther away, but not right up on a neighbor's borders.

Another point to note: I simmed out some of Libertalia's first 20 turns and decided that Monument is better first than Granary. Getting that Fish hooked up is a huge priority and the 10 turn delay on the benefit of a monument means we need to get that in sooner.

Second surprise this turn:




I'm not really sure who this is. This is an economy tech I've been thinking about going for, but regardless we're going to need to think about galleys for our defenses.


Finally, ending turn I have graphs on everyone now. Edit: Look at that GNP drop as people plant their 5th cities!













We also got the food lead back after ending turn, but I forgot to take a demo screenshot.

[pindicator]

067

Quick update since I got in late last night, played late, and went to bed:




Lots went on otherwise I would just skip this turn. Cornflakes has Writing as I can tell from the Open Borders option with him now. Sucksatciv jumped up to 7 cities but Cornflakes declared on him. Hitru, I think I understand some of that reticence for settling farther east, especially if Cornflakes is going to declare on anybody within arm's reach. But SaC seems to be leveraging India + ORG pretty well on this map; I hope Cornflakes can slow him a little.

The screenshot above makes me suspect Bing is going to pop my scout next turn. It also shows what looks to be both of his axes. (Take a look at the power graph posted last turn; there are only 2 jumps in the last 20 turns that could be axes.) This makes me feel better about settling up on Bing because those axes won't be able to come back around east until after my units get into place defensively.

Also, now that we know Superdeath is the Meditation tech and Bing is the Polytheism tech, is going for Monotheism and Judaism still as pressing? It seems we are more likely to get religion off a spread. I know, the whole point was to use the American UB to get an easy shrine, but maybe we tech HBR and conquer a shrine instead? (With Sailing and Writing going in recent turns, I'm thinking about economy.)

Mjmd sent me another diplo message:


This one seems a pretty clear message of division: I go east west, he goes south, and we split Bing. I sent it back to him to show approval.
I haven't really been messing around with these messages or initiating any on my own, mostly just responding when people message me. Maybe I should be trying more here.

Lastly, I whipped the worker at Eldritch Horror. It will overflow into a monument so we can get some border pops in 10 turns, both for getting some culture on our border with Superdeath and to get some better tiles in our grasp. Ironically I had set this city to a worker at first so it could wait off its whip anger, but then I realized I needed the worker a little sooner for the Mids plan. Azul also finished its monument end of turn; it will be nice to get those clams hooked up in 10 turns.




Back to tops in food.

[pindicator]

069

Well everybody has suddenly gotten chatty!

I'm guessing it had to do with turn 68, where Sucksatciv dropped down TWO cities, only he must have put one right beside a stack of Cornflakes' axes - because Cornflakes then declared war and then either threatened him with the city for peace, or SaC saw the writing on the wall and offered peace for the city because by the time it was my turn 68 again the two of them were back at peace and Cornflakes had 6 cities just like everybody else.

So much for IMP, huh?

Now, our #7 moved into position this turn, and I feel reasonably confident in its safety




I first moved the warrior onto the hill 2SW of Corihuayrachina, saw that there were only 2 Quechua present and that the road network was best described as "spotty", knew from my scout in the west that both his axes were far away, and so moved up my settler. The axe I've moved from Sushi Go is 2 turns behind, and I decided to whip Dominion to speed up its axe - and potentially add another if we want to push.

So that's the question: will we push in? If I see nothing more then I probably move up both axes to threaten the city. If I see something that resembles defenses more advanced than clubs then I'll keep my units to my cities.

Of note her as well: this is the first time Mjmd has poked in to look at Sushi Go. Time to get some better defenses there as well.




Cornflakes is gifted the crop lead.

[pindicator]

070

I might have underestimated the costs for this 7th city:




No more units for a while. I'm paying 8gpt for units alone right now.

[pindicator]

072

The east is closed off to us now:




We could potentially grab a spot on top of the sugar now, but with Mjmd being CRE we will have to dedicate a lot to hold it. Now I am starting a settler in Sushi Go to grab the Sheep in the north: It's not much but it's all that's left to us for expansion. We're also still pretty broke but what choice do we have?

Speaking of the north, Bing showed up with a chariot but we have our defenses in place




We chopped out the monument first because culture is going to matter long term. Walls go up in Gloomhaven next. If that chariot moves onto the hill NNW of Dominion then we need to whip that city.

In more cheerful news, the capital hit size 7 and was able to give all the food tiles to more needy cities.




That food stat is depressing. CRE > IMP for this map.

[pindicator]

073

And now the north. CRE (Mjmd) is becoming a pain in my backside.




I could whip the settler for the Sheep city next turn, but the support units are a turn slower so we won't whip until 75. I have 2 axes that are moving over now, and the spear being built in Dominion will need to shift to the east now instead of staying put. I know Mjmd has Impi and I have to assume there are chariots as well. But it feels like we're quickly running out of space for these cities so unless I want to stack even more whip anger at Dominion I'm going to need to risk a few turns of axe-only defense here.

Plan is to whip on 75, move to the spot east of the sheep on 77 and found city #8 on 78.

I pulled one worker from Gloomhaven out east to build a road and start improving the sheep when the city is founded. My other worker is pasturing the cow with a spear sitting on top of him for protection. I would much rather have both workers there and get the cow improved faster, but... maybe I should have done that anyway.

Anyway, the other 5 workers I have are all down at the capital. First chop is in and we are working 4 mines there:




Going to be dicey on the economy when we have to stop working the hamlets on t76.

[pindicator]

074

Changing plans again...




Now we're going to aim south for the last bit of land by Cornflakes. The allure of the sheep was that it wasn't contested - supposedly. Now that it is a contested spot, we might as well try to grab a better contested spot. Unfortunately that made some of my worker turns last turn a bit of a waste, so I had to redo some plans up north for them. We do have a little bit of slack in our workers around the capital so that two workers will build a road NE of Wingspan next turn, and let the whipped settler and axe on screen move Southeast. From there the axe in Libertalia will transition east while the axe by the capital will be the new garrison at Libertalia.

Anyway, no demos this turn because the crop yield is depressing. Mjmd is killing everyone here. Instead we'll look at what may be our advantage: growing taller cities




If we land mids, we'll be able to reach size 10 at our capital - and all those workers that are now moving to chop forests will be planting them all down. I'm going to need more workers.

[pindicator]

076

What do you think Cornflakes is going to do with his Great Sci? And how bummed do you think he is that he didn't get the Great Prophet 50/50?




Bulb Alphabet and start Building Research?

Meanwhile, sucksatciv is playing to his moniker and I wished my scout was a warrior:




Back home, we chopped/mined our final grassland hill at the capital and rearranged tiles for the FINAL PUSH




Yeah, that is painful. 5 more turns to go; next turn all the workers go to their final designated forests to chop. Until then we are pretty broke.

After ending turn, expenses went up again, and we're only making +1gpt at 0%




Yet somehow not last in GNP???

[pindicator]

This is why I don't go for early wonders




Also: now what? Give me a few hours to go cry in a corner and then I'll try to figure out what we do with the 265g we're about to get. (Do we get this turn's production in gold if I stay on Pyramids? I guess I should make sure something is queued after to be sure.)