[SPOILERS!] Grimace and wetbandit hope to stay on their side of the DMZ

[Grimace]

Turn 54

Another interesting turn. Found Elum:


He's fairly close. I have a feeling we're not going to get the banana/spice city, and we'll have to settle east quickly or lose some of that territory. It also makes city placement for the second city down there interesting. I think we might just want to settle right on top of the elephants.

On the other hand, to the SW where Whosit came from (I think I mistakenly said it was Dreylin in my previous post), there's a nice chokepoint:


If we can get a city down there, depending on how far Whosit is from there, it would serve as a very good border city/chokepoint.

I threw some tags into the map to indicate what order I thought we should settle the cities. Silver first, and now seeing how close Elum is I think we might want to settle Gold second and put off the island for our next settler. Thoughts?

The work boat is heading back towards the pig island to explore around it and see if there's a way to make it more useful.

[Grimace]

Turn 55

Big E completed the settler and started on a galley. Settler started moving towards silver city location. Yamato will finish its settler EOT and will begin a lighthouse. Yamato's settler will wait for the galley. We'll know next turn if there's anything near the pigs, and will be able to make the final decision on island city placement.

Nothing else exposed on the map this turn.

[wetbandit]

Settling the Gold becomes our next priority. It would be nice to get a warrior or unit over there to scout and monitor the area, but that's too much of a strain on the current military. Would we be able to whip/chop a settler from Bismarck reasonably soon to adjust?

I think the island city does more for us to speed growth and add commerce than the gold city at this point, but if Elum is close, settling for the gold makes sense to block off our land.

[Grimace]

We can chop a settler out of Big E using the forested plains hill after we whip the galley. We could do a settler out of Bismarck, but it'll be much slower than letting Enterprise do it. I'd rather produce military out of Bismarck as it has the most hammers aside from Yamato. The first axe produced is going to go to the island, but the next can stake out the gold city location. I think we have a little bit of time because he's not THAT close yet.

As far as the silver city goes, should we farm some of the river grasslands for growth initially? That seems best to me since we only have a dry rice to share between Bismarck and the new city. Speaking of which, what are we going to name this city? The Brits aren't represented yet, so maybe Prince of Wales? Then the next one can be the Nevada.

At what point do we start building Monuments? Elum has Stonehenge and a religion, so his culture is going to be a concern down the road if we're not prepared.

[Grimace]

Turn 56

Well, found some land west of the pigs, but it's nothing to write home about yet...


Maybe something we can't see yet would make it worthwhile to settle there to grab the pigs. *sigh*

Also found Whosit's borders:


Going to be a rush to see who settles that arm of land. We may get one city there, but it's not a high priority.

Galley was whipped in Enterprise this turn, so it'll be built next turn. Settler was produced in Yamato and moved to Big E to board the galley next turn and head over to the island. Overflow from the galley whip (14h) is going into an axe, which will take 4 more turns to produce -- exactly how long it will take for Enterprise to grow back to size 3, when it will produce another settler. Big E is working the pigs and a mine. Bismark is working the corn and the copper (and will grow to size 3 EOT).

Silver city (now named Prince of Wales) was built and the worker started mining the silver this turn (road was already in place). Right now it's working the rice and building a granary. Next turn a worker will move over and start farming a riverside grassland as Enterprise will need the corn back when it hits size 3 and then Bismarck will need the rice back..

Yamato started on a lighthouse this turn and is working the fish, sheep, and a mine. Next turn it will switch from the sheep to a second mine which will slow its growth enough for the warrior to arrive and increase its happy cap so when it grows it won't have any unhappiness. It also gets it the lighthouse built at the same time Masonry finishes.

Unfortunately the building of new cities is going to slow down our tech, so we could lose a turn on Masonry when we plant the island city (we already lost one with Prince of Wales). On the other hand, the trade route will help in general, but I don't think it will help enough to knock a turn off of the tech.

[Grimace]

The more I think about it, the more I think we should settle 1W of the deer on the island, getting the deer first ring and the fish/sheep 2nd ring, and just ignore the clams as a BFC resource (they're less useful than sheep). We can still get them for the health benefit after the 2nd border pop, and it would let us put a city right here:



This gets us shared fish from Yamato and another fish 2nd ring, a lake for fresh water, plus lots of cottages and 3 hills for mines. It allows us to move ships between the two bodies of water (or even put them in the lake for protection), and it pretty much locks in our territory from Whosit. I'm not sure we'll have a chance to settle any closer to Whosit before he starts moving closer to us, so that's a pretty good spot, I think.

[Grimace]

Turn 57

Well, there is definitely another land mass west of the pigs:


Not sure how feasible it will be to settle there any time soon, which means we'd probably lose it to someone else, as I suspect it's part of a big piece of land and not an island.

So what are your thoughts on the deer/sheep/fish city? The galley is transporting a worker and a settler to the island right now -- they'll debark next turn -- so we need to figure out what we're going to do. My instinct is to place the city on the riverside plains and chop a monument. I think Fish/Sheep is a better combination than Fish/Clams, and a city near Big E just to claim the sheep just seems wasteful as it will not be a net benefit for a while. That gives the workboat a little bit more time to explore before needing to come back and net the fish. The city won't grow rapidly until we get AH or its borders pop (not sure which would happen first right now), but it'll give us the trade routes immediately.

Plan for the rest of the cities is to produce a settler out of Big E when it hits size 3 (at the same time it completes an axe build...3 turns). Bismarck will switch to a worker after its axe finishes. PoW is building a granary right now, but may switch to a worker once it grows a bit. Silver should be mined in 2 more turns. Yamato will complete its lighthouse at the same time Masonry comes in, though I think I will 1-pop whip it beforehand to get some overflow hammers. It'll grow back very quickly and my sims show me that cuts the GLH by 1-2 turns, depending on a lot of other factors during the build.

[wetbandit]

I realize that each city spot on that island has drawbacks.

I am loathe to settle on the riverside plains because it has no first ring food tiles it can work/improve at the moment and it orphans those clams. The clams is a decent long term tile, as valuable as the sheep as soon as the city gets a border Pop and a lighthouse. As far as we can tell, those clams can't be worked by any other city of we settle plains riverside.

The filler city west of big e to claim sheep is not a priority and ultimately a minor city. Any city with a food resource is viable, later on, especially coastal if we land GLH. This also gives the alternative of settling on the sheep later, if that proves to be worthwhile.
The math is most important. What do your sims look like for grassland hill versus plains riverside?

[Grimace]

In the short run, the clams city is better for growth...even long-term it's not bad. I think you've convinced me. We'll go that way. TBH they're very similar, as we're just giving up a grassland sheep for a clam, and a grassland hill for a riverside plains. Which I guess is what concerns me...we're giving up a 1f3h1c tile for a 1f1h increasing commerce tile. Just not sure if the hill would be more useful than the extra commerce. It makes planting our next city towards Whosit more difficult, though, if we're leaving that spot to grab the sheep open. What's your thought on a city that direction? I think we definitely need some defensive depth that way.

[Grimace]

Turn 57

Landed the settler + worker on the island. Also used the workboat to scout just a little more before he heads back. And it was definitely worth it, because now we now that opposite the island is another piece of our continent.



The work boat will not be able to net the fish until 1 turn after the city is built, but I think learning this was worth the wait. Settling opposite the island is definitely not a great idea as any city over there would be really isolated on foreign soil. So we'll focus on our neighborhood.