Chevalier Rides Again: A City Lights exploration

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 4

Open the turn to the boost for Writing. The culprit is at Hattusa:




The Dutch scout is piloted by Grotsnot, who appeared before at RB in PBEM13, fighting a valiant defense as Japan against an Alhambram legion rush. The Dutch will be strong on the water map, though thank God the 7 Provinces hopefully won't be relevant as they are a bear to fight in the Renaissance (I'd think of something if I had to). The polder, though, benefits from the farming community and so he can slap those down on the coast to get oodles of gold. With the cramped map, too, and snaky terrain he will have lots of good polder terrain. The trade route bonus doesn't seem so useful to me, though, since loyalty is hardly ever an issue (guess it allows him to pink dot me? Except not until the mid-late game when he has trade routes to run) and culture needs foreign routes. 

If I can find Amsterdam before next turn finishes I could run my trader here instead of to Hattusa. 

Two more consequences: 

1)We can abandon all thought of settling to the south. This starting scout means that his capital is roughly a two-three turn march from Hattusa's borders. Never get a settler down here. Ponyville should be similarly in our camp, however. 

2)The invasion of Hattusa will need to be a higher priority, since Grot knows well that city-states exist mostly to be murdered. I might be able to bring it off with warriors only, we'll see. I'll keep my warrior in the area after pushing south to scout his capital before borders close. 

On the other side:




Bologna is a tight squeeze, too, with room for only one city on the coast between us. I'll plot it later, no thoughts as yet on how to best exploit the tangled nest of mountains and rice paddies. Hopefully I have more ground to the northwest - and I'll need a harbor somewhere on the south or east coast to capture Bologna, as it's invulnerable from the landward side. 

It's looking like most expansion will need to come via overseas. Shipbuilding is accordingly a high research priority, and monumentality will be a must to try and get ahead of the race for overseas land.

[Amicalola]

On the bright side, you being quite cramped will probably make the game a lot closer/more interesting.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

I might have room for 1-2 cities in the northeast, but dollars to donuts there's another CS/civ up there, too. Darned map was SUPPOSED to give each civ its own island to explore/settle, with extras out there in the fog, ala PBEM4 or PBEM12. Instead it's squeezed us all together (Grot has already complained in the chat of another city state, possibly two, to his south).

If I can get 5 cities on the mainland here and ~5 overseas, then I'll be well-satisfied with my expansion in this cramped space.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 5

Finish Pottery: 




As the Cree, we get a free trader to use right away. Interestingly, we're first to finish a tech despite settling only 3 turns ago. The city-states make a difference, I suppose. I order Sailing as our next tech - I intend to go Sailing->Irrigation->Astrology->Animal Husbandry, in a bit of an unconventional move. I don't want horses showing up at the capital and screwing up my dot map, I won't be able to pasture them for a bit as is. 

I shall plant fishing boats, then as Irrigation comes in I will chop the rice and place a holy site as Astrology unlocks. It means a miss, potentially, on Craftsmanship but I think I want the food boost more than the culture gain, and I should be able to get a third improvement quickly from Ponyville if all goes as planned. 

Meet barbs to the east:




The Oki might be on guard duty until I scout Amsterdam and recall the warrior. 

Send the trader to Hattusa to establish a road and a bit of extra gold and science. Hoarding my gold as much as possible for Monumentality, I think.

[ljubljana]

8 BPT might honestly be the record for turn 5 science production at RB - it doesn't get much better than 2 science CS right next to the capital. Are we going to do Shipbuilding right after AH? Seems like a strong lever for converting that into long-term snowballing, since you should get there first by a mile, but the tech may come in so fast that you won't have the settlers in place to really take advantage of it.

I wonder if it might be worth delaying some of the eastern spots on the mainland, once the loyalty pressure out there is strong enough to deter Grotsnot, to free up settlers to push for any contested islands ASAP? I guess it depends on what's out there. When do you plan to make the first galley, right after the Holy Site?

Presumably that first galley will come out on the north coast absent a major reformulation of the dotmap, which is awkward as far as Bologna-murdering is concerned. Any chance that 2 galleys + 2 warriors will be enough to take the city if you only get 1 galley + 1 warrior attack per turn and have to rotate them out? I am pretty worried about losing that spot to Grotsnot depending on where they are, as their southern avenue for attack is much cleaner than ours... Hopefully we can figure out where their capital is soonish so we can learn if we're in a race for Bologna in addition to Hattusa...

Weird question, but do you know what latitude we're on, or at least what hemisphere we're in? I have this vague impression that there are sometimes ways to derive this at start-of-game via fog-gazing, especially if we're near a pole, and it could be pretty useful information for efficiently scouting for productive islands once we get some boats out.

edit: Alternative plan to holy site-galley: holy site-3 warriors and go for Hattusa ASAP? That's what I would do in Grotsnot's position (well, I'd skip the holy site and just go settler-warriors as the Dutch), but you would probably want the Craftsmanship boost for fast Agoge to pull it off. Without the need for an early builder to inspire Craftsmanship, some VERY fast CS conquests should be possible under this setup compared to the RB standard. I worry that if Grotsnot found a culture CS (looks like it from the ribbon!), goes straight for Agoge, and is paying attention, even the holy site build could leave us too slow to compete for Hattusa...

[ljubljana]

Crazy idea: what if we make a second Oki before the settler and throw everything at Hattusa immediately? In theory, the Oki should be a great CS-rushing UU in the extreme early-game, since the free promotion that it starts with makes it effectively a 150 HP warrior in an attack like this. We can recall the eastern scout to help out too, since even if the camp activates your position is very safe vs barbs from the east. Are 2 Okis + warrior + scout enough to take a CS, with the free healing available from the Oki promotions? We'd need to be careful about what tile the warrior is on to make sure we get the city under siege (I forget if Okis have ZoC), but I think it should be doable, right? The ROI from a third, strong city this fast would be insane if we can pull it off, and it could open up a route to more settling in the south as well.

edit: Could swap to mining and buy + chop the GP tile if we want to speed the second Oki or add insurance via a third Oki, no idea how much it's worth this early in the game though (reddit suggests ~20 = one full Oki on online speed?). Also, another nice side effect of this attack is that it frees up your trader ASAP to bootstrap growth in the conquered city instead of being stuck making 3 GPT for the forseeable future.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 6

Ugh, more neighbors:




We meet Eltargrim's Germans, and Aachen's loyalty pressure is already visible. There's space for perhaps a single layer of cities between us and them, but only if we act fast. I'm not sure what to do here - Ponyville is a great expansion to get the capital up and running quickly with the possibilities for the Government Plaza and big trade routes, but delaying these areas for settler #2 is a risk with Germany. 

I think the solution is aggressive military posturing with what units I have. The warrior, oki, and scout can make a decent show of force and require Eltargrim to muscle us aside, and I have left open the possibility of war for territorial adjustments. But yeah, no elbow room at all. I really do want Ponyville first and to go Farm Community -> Plaza -> AH -> Monumentality snowball, since that offers the best prospects of rapid growth. Tough choices! 

Overview and rough dot map:

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

8 BPT might honestly be the record for turn 5 science production at RB - it doesn't get much better than 2 science CS right next to the capital. Are we going to do Shipbuilding right after AH? Seems like a strong lever for converting that into long-term snowballing, since you should get there first by a mile, but the tech may come in so fast that you won't have the settlers in place to really take advantage of it.

I wonder if it might be worth delaying some of the eastern spots on the mainland, once the loyalty pressure out there is strong enough to deter Grotsnot, to free up settlers to push for any contested islands ASAP? I guess it depends on what's out there. When do you plan to make the first galley, right after the Holy Site?

Presumably that first galley will come out on the north coast absent a major reformulation of the dotmap, which is awkward as far as Bologna-murdering is concerned. Any chance that 2 galleys + 2 warriors will be enough to take the city if you only get 1 galley + 1 warrior attack per turn and have to rotate them out? I am pretty worried about losing that spot to Grotsnot depending on where they are, as their southern avenue for attack is much cleaner than ours... Hopefully we can figure out where their capital is soonish so we can learn if we're in a race for Bologna in addition to Hattusa...

Weird question, but do you know what latitude we're on, or at least what hemisphere we're in? I have this vague impression that there are sometimes ways to derive this at start-of-game via fog-gazing, especially if we're near a pole, and it could be pretty useful information for efficiently scouting for productive islands once we get some boats out.

edit: Alternative plan to holy site-galley: holy site-3 warriors and go for Hattusa ASAP? That's what I would do in Grotsnot's position (well, I'd skip the holy site and just go settler-warriors as the Dutch), but you would probably want the Craftsmanship boost for fast Agoge to pull it off. Without the need for an early builder to inspire Craftsmanship, some VERY fast CS conquests should be possible under this setup compared to the RB standard. I worry that if Grotsnot found a culture CS (looks like it from the ribbon!), goes straight for Agoge, and is paying attention, even the holy site build could leave us too slow to compete for Hattusa...

We're going to be in the northern hemisphere, certainly. Grot has jungle near his start to the south. 

Basically, I think the only expansion to the west is Ponyville, and that's in no danger. Hattusa might be in danger from Grot, but I don't think it is. He's got other city-states to the south and most of his attention seems to be that way. I want it, but I'm not going to distort the early game plan for it. I want to get at least Ponyville and the 3 - hoped-for eastern expansions down and then we'll move to Hattusa and think of Bologna.

[Ginger()]

You can find precise latitude by placing pins longitudinally on the map and using them to extend the range of your panning

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

You can find precise latitude by placing pins longitudinally on the map and using them to extend the range of your panning

Fascinating! Never heard that trick before but it makes sense - once I accidentally made a pin visible to all in multiplayer and blew up everyone else's maps. 

Turn 7






Sailing is in, putting as at two techs when a few civs haven't even finished one yet. Next is Irrigation->Astrology to harvest the rice and get the holy site down right after the settler. Then we'll pick up Animal Husbandry and Mining so our rural community units will have stuff to do. I need one improvement for Craftsmanship, and also need the Mekwekap down for the 4 era points it provides, which will be an important piece of securing a Golden Age. I also want to be the first to put a ship in the water - after the Holy Site, is the plan. Those things together SHOULD do it. 

Eltargrim's Germany is helpful:



We go north instead of my instinct of east. Find a foreign continent and Aachen's borders:




Overview. Sorry my pins are cluttering, this will become more clear as my cities go down and the plans vanish:



Those 5 cities - Ponyville, Canterlot, Manehattan, Seaddle, and Baltimare - are probably all I'll get in a best case scenario. I'm still torn as to where to send the settler (presently due in 10, but we're growing a pop next turn and that will bring the ETA down some. Not sure to what, haven't looked at the micro) - Ponyville is the best first expansion in terms of snowball, but strategically the river valley to the east might be contested by Germany. If I can get Baltimare down, I think that will lock in Manehattan for sure, and Seaddle is closer to me than it is to Germany. 

best of all, the barb scout LOOKS like it's on Aachen's borders, per Eltar's pin, which means he'll be dealing with a barb eruption between him and the river valley. I don't know. My heart says Ponyville, my brain says Baltimare.