The Hills Send Back The Cry [SPOILERS]

[El Grillo]

T65&66:

Screenshots as promised:



According to my friend's sims, it's going to take 3 Galleys' worth of Swords/HA to reliably storm Marham, or waiting until Knights. It's unfortunate that I can't rely on either withdrawal chance or collateral damage, but that's the price we pay for not being focused. Our tech path is still undecided, though the time for a decision has come:



It turns out the second set of chops were wildly mistimed (spending a turn moving really highlights how inefficient these 4t chops feel), but I've successfully built the Pyramids at what feels like a late date (I wonder if and when 74B builds it). I can use the overflow on a Library.



Elsewhere, we settled Continuity at the Red site, which will pop borders at size 1 to hook the three good food resources. The Pigs will bootstrap the Settler en route to the Green site, and then our next Settler will head to the unnamed Gold/Fur site.



We whipped in another Courthouse this turn, and will whip a third next turn before swapping out of Slavery. The extra EP mean we'll get tech visibility on Khan in 5t, and then I'll aim to get tech visibility on Adrien as well. Khan's jumped out to 10 cities, matching us and outpacing both Adrien and Ginger, but without Currency, Code of Laws, or FIN, his economy has to be pretty close to crashed.



My friend turned tech on to 2t HBR. He feels more suspicious toward Ginger than I do, especially now that there's a lucrative wonder sitting on the border. I can definitely agree with that. Having the option for HAs seems decent, even if both of us are leaning towards delaying an attack until Knights.

Graphs:

[El Grillo]

T67:

I played the turn in a bit of a rush in hopes of getting it to Ginger in time for another turn today. Ended up missing his playing window by 10 minutes, but it is what it is. I whipped a Courthouse at Sproul Steps, bringing the total to 5, with another finishing next turn in Onramp. That means we get research visibility on Khan EOT next turn. We'll settle the Green site next turn, with another Settler finishing from Silent Walk EOT next turn.

I then revolted into Representation and Caste System, which doesn't have a ton of population to play with just yet, but that will change as Stuntsheet One, Tossing & Turning, and Sproul Steps each work their double food resources. We rehired Artists at Marchup Cadence and Continuity, and hired a few Scientists elsewhere in cities short on tiles. We'll finish HBR at EOT, and I set the next tech to Civil Service - it seems like the most immediate payoff, and would likely accelerate the next step in any plan that followed. Initial 64 currently has the food, but not the Cottages or infrastructure, to serve as a power capital, but with two Workers assigned to it, and a filler city in the works to help grow Cottages, it should become one soon. The downside is missing out on the prereq discount from Monarchy->Feudalism, but I'm starting to think that we can live without Serfdom, and Representation/Bureaucracy crowd out the other civics those two techs offer.




Graphs:

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

T67:

I played the turn in a bit of a rush in hopes of getting it to Ginger in time for another turn today. Ended up missing his playing window by 10 minutes, but it is what it is. I whipped a Courthouse at Sproul Steps, bringing the total to 5, with another finishing next turn in Onramp. That means we get research visibility on Khan EOT next turn. We'll settle the Green site next turn, with another Settler finishing from Silent Walk EOT next turn.

I then revolted into Representation and Caste System, which doesn't have a ton of population to play with just yet, but that will change as Stuntsheet One, Tossing & Turning, and Sproul Steps each work their double food resources. We rehired Artists at Marchup Cadence and Continuity, and hired a few Scientists elsewhere in cities short on tiles. We'll finish HBR at EOT, and I set the next tech to Civil Service - it seems like the most immediate payoff, and would likely accelerate the next step in any plan that followed. Initial 64 currently has the food, but not the Cottages or infrastructure, to serve as a power capital, but with two Workers assigned to it, and a filler city in the works to help grow Cottages, it should become one soon. The downside is missing out on the prereq discount from Monarchy->Feudalism, but I'm starting to think that we can live without Serfdom, and Representation/Bureaucracy crowd out the other civics those two techs offer.




Graphs:

I love piling up EP... Always useful from the courthouses.

[El Grillo]

Yeah, it's hard for me to put the advantages of passive espionage in numerical terms, but something about having an edge in information just feels so satisfying. My friend argued in favor of putting EP into Ginger, not Adrien, next - even if Adrien is stronger, he's also far less likely to come after us, whereas Ginger would have a lot more to gain from an attack (perhaps targeting Titanic, Tellefsen Hall, and Stuntsheet One).

Also, our Missionary is going to reach Ginger's borders next turn. I think that this could only be interpreted as a friendly act, since we've banned all of the things where having religious leverage gives me an advantage (active Espionage missions, AP votes), but my friend is a bit more paranoid. We'll see if he declares war just to kill it, for instance. That would mean that I've rather gravely misread the situation XD

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

Yeah, it's hard for me to put the advantages of passive espionage in numerical terms, but something about having an edge in information just feels so satisfying. My friend argued in favor of putting EP into Ginger, not Adrien, next - even if Adrien is stronger, he's also far less likely to come after us, whereas Ginger would have a lot more to gain from an attack (perhaps targeting Titanic, Tellefsen Hall, and Stuntsheet One).

Also, our Missionary is going to reach Ginger's borders next turn. I think that this could only be interpreted as a friendly act, since we've banned all of the things where having religious leverage gives me an advantage (active Espionage missions, AP votes), but my friend is a bit more paranoid. We'll see if he declares war just to kill it, for instance. That would mean that I've rather gravely misread the situation XD

I do value EPs more than most here, although I also like courthouses more than libraries! Place them well and you will never be taken by surprise.

[El Grillo]

T68:



I didn't realize that some of the extra EP was coming from an auto-assigned Spy specialist, so no tech visibility until next turn. I did take the opportunity to bump Marchup Cadence to 40% borders with a turn of starvation at my friend's recommendation - apparently I'll have control of his tiles sooner than I thought, and I can deny him visibility into Marchup Cadence altogether by gaining control of the two hills.

Elsewhere, I realize it's more effective over the long run to grow to max size on food-neutral tiles, then hire specialists, instead of hiring them one by one as the city grows more and more slowly, so I'm moving Workers over to chop in Lighthouses so that my coastal cities have Coast tiles to grow onto - for now, I think a Scientist is better than a 1-food Coast or Forest.

Khan's Power has continued to rise, so I've moved the two Axes off the Galley and back towards Marchup Cadence. I'll also have Onramp start a Stable and Horse Archers, though I'd really like a Jewish Missionary for the capital at some point as well.



To the south, my Galley and Missionary are scouting Ginger. I decided to not land the Impi as a sign of goodwill, though this may be moot (the Galley itself could be seen as unfriendly, and he does have a Chariot in our land, as opposed to a Scout). I could be convinced to offload it next turn.



Our finances look great, enough so that I'd like to build some more Settlers from some of my larger cities for some filler spots. Then, once I have some respectable 2-promo Horse Archers, I can start settling towards the middle and possibly even towards Ginger. Tech-wise, I can finish Civil Service in 6 turns without too much exertion, or in 5 with some extra Scientists/Wealth builds. Note that this screenshot was taken at EOT, when some cities grew and the governors assigned them Spies automatically - the real number is 16 ept.



Demos reflect that I'd love to have 4-5 more Workers, but I'll settle for a frighteningly high GNP.

Graphs:

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

Plot culture is much different to city culture. It's a ball ache. The outer ring is the cpt of the city, the next ring is cpt+20, next cpt+40 and so on. So if you boost the culture but then create no culture after, in all save the outermost ring of culture you still gain plot culture.

So there in his first ring you are now both getting the free 20 cpt onto that tile, and then whatever culture the city makes naturally. It's why borders are quite difficult to shift off the first ring without super cultural pressure. Quick makes this harder too.

[El Grillo]

I agree, it'll be tough. My best bet there would've been the keep running the Artist to get to 40% borders ASAP, but I needed Slavery whips elsewhere a lot more. I might not be able to wrest control of them immediately, but every turn he's getting +20 culture on me makes the task down the road that much harder.

[El Grillo]

T69:

After some rough calculations, we decided it'd be best to configure most of our smaller cities for growth this turn, then have them hire as many Scientists as possible next turn to tech through Civil Service. We're going to slot in two Missionaries for the capital ahead of schedule, as well. Initial 64 will be hammer-rich for quite some time, while Tellefsen Hall might honestly be the better commerce capital over the long term. Perhaps a move is in order, but I'm not sure it's worth the cost.




Do I get a prize for what I'm pretty sure is the first Town in the game? I'd feel tempted to use Initial 64 as a source of specialists as well, but I do need at least some steady production cities, now that the opportunity cost of Slavery is higher.




My friend convinced me to drop off the scouting Impi - it's basically the equivalent of a Chariot in this role, and he set that precedent, so I can comfortably follow it. The Missionary will head straight to where I think his capital is, and the Impi will loop around and try to get city visibility everywhere else.




This is our CY/GNP ratio when we're focusing on growth and don't have many specialists hired.

Graphs:

At EOT, we gained research visibility on Khan, who's 5t to Alphabet at 0 gpt. We'll put our EP on Ginger next - if that land between us remains unsettled for too much longer, I think we'll have enough leverage to place more strong cities there.

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

I always like being top GNP whilst on full gold. Note your EPs and culture are added to the GNP don't forget though.