Lizzy's rise to greatness

[Dinner]

Well, CoLs will certainly be a massive improvement once we build those courthouses.

[Ben Kenobi]

but this is after some reconfiguration. when i finished microing with this turn our stats will be lower again. we do some sarifice for future benefits.

Well, that's much better. There's always more we can squeeze out, and that little bit makes a difference. Let's hope we can get those 12 turns to Philosophy. We are quite vulnerable right now.

[Dinner]

What are we currently building in our cities?

[mzprox]

our production is low, we focus on growing then slaving. also we are busy generating two great scientists.
In the west we are building a new settler (eta 5-6 turns), in the south we just finished library next project is a hammam. Aurora finished the hammam, it's building axemen. North city has finished libray and lighthouse, building hammam. Capital is building the hanging gardens but focusing on great persons and commerce right now. copper city has finished library and now builds a lighthouse to get more food.
In the newest city we are building a granary (with the exception of this new city every other has granary and library by now)

i think aurora should keep building soldiers..we are very weak now, but so far it works out. (more soldiers would mean more maintenance)

[mzprox]

Everything is fine, we just got alphabet, currency is coming in 3 turns.
Since we got alphabet we can see the others' tech (if you look at the third picture, the civs in order: zulu, Inka, aztec, Holy-rome)
few notes: we are the most advanced among them, only the aztec has a good tech (CoL) which we don't but they got that from the oracle-however we have mathematics, alphabet, fishing, sailing that they don't)
poor incas don't even have writing..


One important thing: In the fist picture we can see that our chariot will probably reach a HRE coastal city soon. in about 6 turns we will build a coastal city connected to them.
We need Open Borders!
However if they are not stupid they won't just give it us for free, because they wouldn't profit from it. Since they have 10 cities we would potentially benefit 10 extra commerce/turn from this trade, so I believe we could offer them up to 5 gold/turn and it would still be good for us.
it's better to start the negotiation soon and see how it goes (first we could try to see if they accept it without hesitation, if necessary i think we hould offer them gold, even ofering them friendship and remind them that realmsB. is getting away in points so it would be better if we helped each other.)

one other thing that worris me is the Inca, they are poor and backward, but have a huge military, and we are close to them..
we can1t concentrate on both science/development and war however if they attacked us not it would have a catastrophic effect.. (losing cities, losing the wine, forced to slave/raise an army etc).

[Dinner]

Tech wise we seem to be ok with only two civs ahead and one of those is just barely ahead. One though does have two techs more than us including CoL which is a big one. We're on track to at least match that though and maybe surpass if we get philo first plus an academy in our civ will really help the science rate. Is that our plan? Bulb Philo with one and build an academy with the other?

[mzprox]

at this turn our gnp is no. 1 (mostly because we are getting 40% for researching currency). in 6-7 turns we will have both currency and CoL. (btw aztec is not ahead of us, simply they have different techs, RP wise we are leading on them. RB team on the other hand is surely ahead of us, we just haven't met them yet.)
And yes the plan is to use the next GP to build an academy in the capital and with the next we should bulb philo.

[Dinner]

Why not use the 1st great scientist to bulb philo as it would get us a religion that much fast? Would philo not be possible to bulb at that time? We could still use the second to build an academy.

[mzprox]

it was planned this way a long time ago. it was hard to estimate when we would get Col which is necessary to bulb philo. But in any case we are quite set on this path, the Gs in the capital will born next turn, and 9 tuns later we ill have an other (CoL will come in 7 turns). So if someone bulbs it in 10 turns -before us, then we won't have a religion this way, we may need to find an other way (getting from the Aztecs for example). The real danger is the RB team.. the others not that much.

[Dinner]

What can we bulb with the first one in lieu of an academy? Also what do you mean it was planned? Other than you who planned it? Also we have two days before the next turn move is due so let's talk about this a little before we take any action.

[mzprox]

anyone could make plans and present it and we can think about it how to make it happen and compare it to others. I do the mikroing part. The idea that we use the second GS for academy in capital and third gs for bulbing was aroud since november and was mentioned many times, no one objected and i microed the production toward this goal. (I even delayed the GS growth in Istanbul by one turn so it's 100% that the next will be born in Apolyton) (still better than using like 4-5 turns to get from Istanbul to Apolyton). The reason it was planned this way because it was calculated the we would get the third scientist and a prerequisites of bulbing about the same time.. but it only could had been an estimate. Our research was a bit better so currently it seems: we will get the prereq in 7 turns, the third GS in 10 turns.
Not using this 2nd GS for Academy but waiting to do the bulbing asap would make us lose like 100-150 research.
so basically by sacrificing 100-150 research point we could get the bulbing 3 turns earlier. I think we should risk the delay.
we can lose this race in the next ten turns anyway, but only if RB or maybe the maya decides to use their first GS fo bulbing, but usually the first GS is for Academy.
if we lose we can still try to ruh for theology or geta religion from the aztec.. realisticly we won1t hve aholy shrine anyway since we are producing many other types of great persons.

before having col we can only bulb aesthetic. Btw it's also an option that we don1t bulb anything but settling this gs in Aurora. Aurora will be our oxford city, eventually this GS would give about 30 research/turn + some hammers.

[Dinner]

I'm wondering if there is another religion which we can bulb using the 1st Great Scientist. That may actually help our economy more than an academy though building an academy is a strong option for sure. Failing a religion maybe there is some other tech listed which would get us access to a wonder, a new government type, a new unit type, or a new building type which would be helpful.

That's why, before you plant the great academy I would like to know exactly which tech we'd get if we bulbed him instead. It's likely we'll still prefer the academy but let's at least make an informed decision about this.

[Dinner]

Hmm, aesthetic would get us access to three wonders but it's kind of a low cost tech so it would be a waste of a bulb plus our build ques are already going to be full with courthouses, markets, and god knows what else. If aesthetics is the only option then, yeah, using him for an academy in the capital would be better. I feel a little uncomfortable letting the religion just hang out for more turns but I guess the way we've organized things precludes moving faster. I just hate to see delay after delay after delay on getting a religion and will be pissed of if someone else grabs it a few turns before us because of all the delays.

[Hercules]

I am still in favour of the research / bulbing plan for a religion but I am concerned about the length of time involved. I want it to work. On a more positive note our research capability with another academy should mean we get other techs quicker, including CS, IW and Aesthetics, which opens opportunities.

[Dinner]

After philo maybe we should consider back filling some of the techs we bypassed (iron working and archery come to mind) we could research those quickly even if we turned research down (after philo) so that we could save enough money to upgrade some of our warriors to better units (axemen or swordsmen). This could be done while we are building courthouses in every city which should absolutely be the priority as soon as CoL is discovered.