AUSG101 - Opportunist Team DAR2

[GodKing]

Originally posted by alexman
Godking is closer than anyone for a Horseman attack. But his looser city spacing seems inconsistent with that goal. If you plan to destroy your neighbor immediately, you don't need to grab all that land by REX, as you will have it by force anyway. A tight city spacing would have been more effective as a production base for units.

I agree.
I hate RCP. I understand it, even the FP bug. Just doesn't mean that I like it. I prefer to follow the lay of the land, and that is what I did. If I miss out on a few shields and gp, so be it. With conquest, this should be fixed anyways (I know they were working on it). So as it wasn't until recently that I understood all the stuff about RCP, and why change my normal pattern to only have to change it back in a couple of months anyways.

To be honest, I would have prefered to have around 20+ horse units prior to going to war, and a gradual build up is what I was preparing for. Right now I only have 8 chariots and japan just moved a warrior into my territory. Oops. Bad AI. Bad. Go to your room. Anyways, my goal was to take all these horses, wipe out japan if they still have anything worth giving me else jut take them out, the do the same to America. Once done with both of them, I should just be entering the middle ages, and ready to take on carthage. I was debating about actually attacking carthage now, triggering their GA to help them out in their rex and a wonder or two, then making peace with them ASAP. So that by the time I was ready to deal with them with pikes, ansars, and cats, they wouldn't be getting their GA and make my life that much harder.

The question is, what is closer to the goal for this team? If the victory goal is culture, I have to go with Dominae. If the goal is to win big, I have to go with Nor Me. Maybe it would be better if this team votes for a goal before the next save is chosen.

I agree. However, I would be playing different if going for culture. Right now, I am probably going to go domination, and efficiency be damned... . I say that our unofficial goal is to get to any kind of a victory ASAP.

Oh ya, I am playing with 1.21 not 1.27, so that probably accounts for the different RNG's I am getting.

[korn469]

did any of you pop rush in this set of turns? maybe that's what my problem was

[Nor Me]

That you did or didn't?

I pop rushed one temple. I think I should have pop-rushed the granaries but didn't. I was going to point this out as one of my mistakes.

[Dominae]

I'm still hazy on when is a good time to poprush a Granary. I guess it's when you've got way too much Food on your hands (Flood Plains start and few Forests).

I poprushed three times in my game, all for Temples. Other cities were either producing 2+ Shields per turn and/or were going to benefit from a Forest Chop, so there was no need to poprush in those.

The only things I like to poprush are Temples and Harbors (if Religious or Militaristic, respectively), unless I'm in some sort of immediate military trouble (quite rare as I play the diplomacy game). But again, I have very little experience in poprushing for a Granary.


Dominae

[korn469]

I didn't poprush at all

I haven't poprushed in a while, early on before PtW came out pop rushing seemed like a great thing to do especially if you were on a conquering streak, but then it seemed like it wasn't something good to do after some patches, so I've avoided it, maybe a little bit too much

[Tarquinius]

alright: voting time

From the great position Dominae had put you guys it is no suprise all the games have good positions
So it is quite tough to choose.

I agree with Alexman about Godking's game, it's just too loose, and the game also lacks temples (the luxury slider needs to be upped because of it)

Arrian: You had a very interesting game It is not your fault your final result is worse than the others, just a stroke of bad luck

Korn: Wow, you sure do like workers It did slow your expansion though, and you don't have many improvements up. Still very nice game though.

Nor Me: Well, you plan is clear-cut The super tight spacing is just not my taste though, but you are in a great position to stomp the other civs soon

Dominae and BRC: I like these games the best, because of the balanced expanding. They got a healthy number of cities and temples up. I don't agree with you Alexman BRC's game is inferior to Dominae's. Dominae indeed has more workers and culture up, but BRC has three more settlers running around and has three granaries built - against two of Dominae. I think these games are about equal, and for variety's sake I pick BRC (next time do write a report though! BTW, thanks Defcon for the screenies!)

My Vote: BRC

[BRC]

Defcon: First, thank you for posting that. I'm sorry guys, the last few days have been hell. No time for anything but school. It should get better after this weekend.

As for the game, I tried to just keep the expansion going. That last settler up top is for the furs. I figure that with those secure, (along with the iron and horses), pounding Japan and America will not be too hard. Our production should also skyrocket, as we really only need to pump out workers now. I haven't even glanced at what the others on my team have done, so I can't tell you what part of my game falls behind theirs. I'm sure something is, but that's the way it should be...

Thanks Defcon.

[vmxa1]

Another fine kettle of fish you got me into. How to cast a vote here? Several of these are very similar and all are good. I have only a few comments (mild ones to be sure) or questions. Korn's game has a town (Fuskot?) that has a barb right next to it and no defender. I am way to cowardly for that, but it seems the barb chose to move on and ignore the free pillage. I would never have that kind of luck (altough I did get four deuces in my first four cards at the casino last night). Your game looks very good and has the highest score (293). I was not fond of the iron colony, as it required lots of roading and the loss of a worker.

GodKing and BRC are in very strong position as well.

Maki's game, my first thought was about the research for Republic. I have not played religous civs much, but I would think spending time to get to Rep first is not optimal. You have to learn too many techs that you can't use right away, such as courts. You could get to Monarchy sooner and the swithces are painless for you and you get the boost from Monarchy quicker. I could be missing something here, but that is what I thought.
I really think Najran is too far out and misses spice and fish in the early going. It is vulnerable.

Now I came down to Nor Me and Dom's games as the finalist. This was hard and I will say I may be flying in the face of some very good logic here.
In many ways Dom's game is extra strong. It has lots of cities and more coming, it has lots of temples. If this was to be a culture win, I have to go with this one.
Why I actually picked Nor Me is that I just know I would not be comfortable playing with so thin a military presence. I know Dom can handle it and will do it with great adroitness, I would be like a fish out of water.
Two civs are at cautious and I know I would soon be at war with at least one, like it or not. With two more settlers in play and more coming, I would be paniced. I would normally be wanting to do some damage about this time to one civ or the other.
Dom's 2150 game gave you a great start and I think a lot was done with by the team.

[alexman]

Since my vote seems to be counted for Nor Me in the first post, does this mean that the opportunist team is NOT necessarily aiming for a cultural win, as suggested by Dominae in the main thread?

Just curious...

[Arrian]

I'm not really in favor of it. I thought the whole point of the opportunist team was that we didn't have 1 particular victory condition. But it's up to the team.

-Arrian

[korn469]

i'm not really in favor of it either, I think we should be the victory ASAP team

[Rhothaerill]

Originally posted by alexman
Since my vote seems to be counted for Nor Me in the first post, does this mean that the opportunist team is NOT necessarily aiming for a cultural win, as suggested by Dominae in the main thread?

Just curious...

Oops, I had some text about that in the first post and then deleted it when I added vmxa1's vote. Sorry alexman. Assuming the goal of the opportunist team doesn't change I will leave your vote the way it is though.

[Nor Me]

Dominae appears to be the only person going for culture. I'd assume the rest of us have voted with our saves.

I'd be tempted to rule out Diplomatic victory and go for the fastest win by any other condition. That way we'd either be comparing with one of the other teams or be at a disadvantage.

[Dominae]

Actually, I tried to leave my game open to either goal we finally agree upon. True, I do have a large Culture presence, but I'm not exactly committed to a Culture victory (yet). From my save at 1250BC, any course of action is still readily available (although this may have to do with the relative strength of our position on the continent): for instance, I had plans to wipe out the Americans when/if they complete the Pyramids.

I admit that a Culture win would probably be pretty boring here. So I'm changing my vote back to remaining the Opportunist team (instead of switching to Cultural).


Dominae

[Rhothaerill]

I think that was the general consensus of the rest of the team as well, so the opportunist team will remain opportunistic.