Turn 100, 570BC

[nbarclay]

Unless the other teams have all discussed the trick internally, it seems almost certain that not everyone involved with the game knows about it. And I'm almost positive that feelings are mixed over whether this is an illegitimate exploit or a legitimate workaround for a an idiosyncrasy (if not outright flaw) in game design, namely, being able to finish something during the turn only if you bring in enough workers new to the task to finish it.

[asleepathewheel]

I will leave the debate over this to the main forum.

[notyoueither]

That looks good Nathan. To be honest, I would only consider using it if other teams have been to date. And then only if Vox has.

I think it should be banned from the game and 'Poly rules' in general because it obviously is not something the designers intended, and it gives a movement advantage to the forces of the Road-to user. Does that mean don't use Road-to? No, just do not cycle through the units to get the road finished before advancing on the newly built road.

[nbarclay]

If we'd rather no one use it, I'd rather not worry about it this turn, and I can rework the post to reflect a GS preference that no one mainipulate the mechanism to their advantage. Vox may surprise me, but it seems to me that if they were going to use it, we would already have seen the evidence by now.

[notyoueither]

I am agreeable to that. We should just get the turn done. What's left?

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by nbarclay
I can rework the post to reflect a GS preference

Just to let you know, I will probably argue against you on the main forum.

[nbarclay]

I went ahead and went through the rest of our moves, ending up with our northeastern galleys where they started. (I had the second one move 6-6-4-4 to probe for a possible crossing for lack of anything better to do, but didn't find anything.) I also took the liberty of moving our newly healed WC from Sandstorm to Arashi since that gives it a wider range of places it can hit.

The big outanding issue is that I'd like to get a settler started in Cyclone with an eye toward either Inchon or Grog's Shadow. If we don't get started now and Vox's attack disintigrates, we could easily find ourselves needing a settler before we have one if we wait.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by nbarclay
The big outanding issue is that I'd like to get a settler started in Cyclone with an eye toward either Inchon or Grog's Shadow. If we don't get started now and Vox's attack disintigrates, we could easily find ourselves needing a settler before we have one if we wait.

I would rather build a unit. We have enough gold that we can rush a settler someplace when the need arises.

[Theseus]

Units for the moment, please.

Sorry I couldn't participate, but I did check in during the day, and would have shouted out if needed.

Good job.

[alva]

NM...

[alva]

Gathering Storm is considering using this technique, but we do not want to do so if other teams have objections, and we certainly would not consider it fair if we use it while other teams may not even know about the possibility. Also, we want to avoid the possibility that some of the other teams might know about and use this technique while others do not.

I like the message, but will this last part not make us sound arrogant (again). (The part in italics especially).

[Theseus]

I would prefer to indicate that we do not want to use it... I'm in the exploit camp.

[nbarclay]

If we start a settler in Cyclone now, it will be able to load on a galley for Inchon six turns from now. It seems to me that that will probably be almost perfect timing, if not a bit late, for Inchon or Grog's Shadow. Since food is a major aspect of timing settlers correctly, the most logical alternative would probably be to rush a settler in Sandstorm (which is a lot better at food/growth than at production). But I'm starting to get sick of spending gold on units and getting almost no investment out of our golden age, and now that we're officially even with Vox in military power and unofficially probably a lot more powerful (not to mention the difference in production capacities), I think we need to be moving away from that. Another turn or two is okay, but I don't want to make commitments to keep spending gold on rushing units beyond that (which essentially is what "we can always rush a settler" thinking would demand).

[notyoueither]

Set to a settler. We can always judge results and needs during the production stage and switch if needed.

Also, keep in mind that Vox is still building warriors and cash upgrading, right? No iron in cap? That must mean they have gold still, or a steady stream of it, to continue doing the upgrades. I would say our cash rushing days are over when they no longer show as needing iron at TheVoice.

[nbarclay]

Vox is getting enough gold in conventional income to upgrade about one warrior per turn. I would expect them to want to have at least five warriors for future upgrade, maybe more, before they reconnect The Voice. Alternatively, they could leave only The Voice disconnected and keep it building one-turn warriors for upgrade while everyone else builds other units.

Also, unless Vox has a truly massive foreign income, they are highly unlikely to be working on a force of pure immortals. To whatever extent they're building spearmen, that cuts into their ability to get ahead on warrior production as a prerequisite for reconnecting their iron. So I'm not ready to assume that Vox has a massive foreign income for upgrading immortals just because they haven't reconnected their iron to their capital.

Our most flexible option would be to stockpile a few hundred gold as an emergency fund. Then if Vox shows up with a major unexpected strike force, we can rush a bunch of units in our small, outlying towns, while if they don't, we can use the gold for something else once we're sure the military situation is under control.