Build Priorities

[notyoueither]

This subject has come up in several threads. I thought it would be good to post the major cities that are working on war production, how they are doing, and where they are at in the production cycle. Maybe we can arrive at generally beneficial targets. There are other cities that are pocking along at 1 or 2 spt towards pikes and or cats. They require no great manipulation.

The war producers:

Cities, 130 AD
Name       FoodBox  FSurp  ShldBox  Spt  Building
EotStorm    24/40     2      39      13   Knight
Hurricane   05/40    -1      32      20   Knight
Cyclone     15/20     5       0       5   Worker
Bolderberg  01/40     0      40      10   Knight
Tempest     02/40     0      48      22   Knight
Tornado     04/40     4      60      10   Knight*
Typhoon     20/20**   0      23       7   Pike*
Arashi      05/40     3      32      14   Knight
Sufa        14/20     1      16       6   Pike
Sandstorm   12/20     3      27       4   Settler*
Monsoon     19/20*    1       0       7   Pike
Whirlwind   10/20     1       8       6   MI
Blizzard    06/20     2       0       5   Cat

[notyoueither]

** Typhoon is max pop without an Aquaduct.
* About to grow or about to finish production.

[notyoueither]

EotS seems likely for pikes or MIs. If we cash rush to 20 from 13 (28 gold) we can do 2 turn pikes. If we rush to 30 from 26 (16 gold) we can do 3 turn MIs. MI's would be the better bet if we want a lot of those beasts.

Hurricane is good for knights. She can maintain 17 spt and grow at +1 fpt. Rush to 20 from 17 (12 gold) and she can do 4 turn knights. Or, she can do 2 turn pikes with no cash required. 12 gold per knight is very cheap though.

Cyclone... workers/settlers.

Bolderberg is perfect for pikes or MIs

Tempest should do knights with a rush to 50 from 44 (24 gold) for 3 turn knights, or MIs for no cost.

Tornado is great for pikes or MIs.

Typhoon can do 5 turn pikes or 6 turn MIs for no cash. Obviously MIs preferred if we do that. However, we can bring it down to 4 turn pikes if we rush to 10 from 7 (12 gold) or to 5 turn MIs if we rush to 20 from 14 (24 gold).

Arashi is a perfect 5 turn knight, or a good 3 turn MI. 2 turn pikes would rush to 20 from 14 (24 gold) not good value for a pike.

Sufa is a good 5 turn pike or galley, the way things are split up.

Monsoon is in the same boat as Typhoon.

Whirlwind, at 6spt, is in the same boat as Sufa, but with no harbour, is the perfect pike city at the moment.

Blizzard should be on pikes at 6 turns per.


This is what I would do...

EotS       MI 3t 16 gold per 3t 5.4gpt
Hurricane  Kn 4t 12 gold per 4t 3.0gpt
Bolderberg MI 4t  0 gold
Tempest    Kn 3t 24 gold per 3t 8.0gpt
Tornado    MI 4t  0 gold
Typhoon    Pk 4t 12 gold per 4t 3.0gpt
Arashi     Kn 5t  0 gold
Sufa       Pk 5t  0 gold
Monsoon    Pk 4t 12 gold per 4t 3.0gpt
Whirlwind  Pk 5t  0 gold
Blizzard   Pk 6t  0 gold

Total cost 22.5gpt for an extra 1.something units per turn. Critically, an extra .5 knight per turn. Cheap!

Damn, I hope I have the rush costs right.

That is just over 10 MIs, 9 k, and 12 pikes in the next 12 turns. Add in what the 1 and 2 pop cities can do and we have a base to proceed from.

[DeepO]

Nice work, nye! The break down of troops looks ok to me, as long as the extra cities are on pikes / cats.

One question, though: it's kind of a waste to have the foodbox of Typhoon overflowing, but if we would build a worker there after the current pike, it would take us 10 turns to get to 4t pikes again (in the mean time we would build 5t pikes, if I'm not mistaken). Is this worth it?

DeepO

[Velociryx]

Looks good to me, NYE, and that does seem to see us start fielding a goodish number of Pikes (thank God, cos we'll need 'em!) This will not be a bloodless war for us, I fear....

-=Vel=-

[Arrian]

NYE, that's exactly what I was hoping we would come up with: an efficient method by which we maximize both our shield output and our gold making machine and turn those into lots of units.

I read your list, and I concur with every one. 3 turn knights in Tempest! Rock on!

-Arrian

[Arrian]

Actually, I'm going through it step-by-step now, and I think I'm actually catching (and fixing) some problems, NYE.

For instance, we don't have anything that costs 20 shields, so shortrushing from 17 to 20 isn't possible. But shortrushing from 34 to 40 is. Same result (4 turn knights in Hurricane), a little more money.

I'm going to work up turn orders for each city so we have order to plug into the turn threads.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

TURN ORDERS THROUGH 250AD:

EotS: I wish we had a 60-shield build we could use to short rush, but I don't think we do...

150AD - 52s, +13/turn.
170AD - 65s
190AD - Knight complete. Begin M.I.
210AD - 13s
230AD - 26s. Shortrush pike (16g), switch back to M.I.
250AD - M.I complete.

Hurricane:

150AD - 52 shields
170AD - Knight complete. Rearrange citizens to stop starvation. NYE indicates this means +17shields/turn. will someone with access to the save make sure this does not require a change in EotS's shield output?
190AD - 17s
210AD - 34s. Shortrush M.I. (24g)
230AD - 57s.
250AD - Knight complete

Cyclone: hmm, what pop is it at right now?

150AD - 5s.
170AD - worker complete. Begin settler.
190AD - 5s
210AD - 15s. City grows. Shortrush city walls (20g)
230AD - 25s.
250AD - settler complete.

Bolderburg: note that if we feel we need it, we can cut a turn off via shortrushing a pike in 230AD (40gold). I'm unsure it's worth it, but if we're loading up a strike force and getting that M.I. out 1 turn quicker lets us hit harder & faster, it is worth it.

150AD - 50s.
170AD - 60s.
190AD - Knight complete. M.I.
210AD - 10
230AD - 20
250AD - 30

Tempest: NYE mentions shortrushing from 44 to 50. What costs 50 shields that we can use for shortrushing in Tempest?

150AD - Knight complete.
170AD - 22s. Shortrush pike (32g)
190AD - 52s
210AD - Knight complete.
230AD - 22s. Shortrush pike (32g)
250AD - 52s.

Tornado: easy one. Same as Bolderberg w/respect to cutting off 1 turn.

150AD - knight complete. M.I.
170AD - 10s
190AD - 20s
210AD - 30s
230AD - M.I. complete.
250AD - 10s

Typhoon: interesting. Can we get a worker over there by 230AD? If so, we can immediately add the worker to the city upon completion of the settler, and boost the pop back up.

150AD - pike complete. Start settler.
170AD - 7s. Shortrush worker (12g)
190AD - 17s.
210AD - 24s.
230AD - settler complete.
250AD - ? Not sure what shield output will be.

Arashi:

150AD - 46s.
170AD - 60s.
190AD - knight complete.
210AD - 14s.
230AD - 28s.
250AD - 42s.

Sufa: I'd switch this to a M.I. for this one production cycle, then to pikes.

150AD - 22s.
170AD - 28s.
190AD - 34s.
210AD - M.I. complete. Start pike.
230AD - 6s.
250AD - 12s.

Monsoon: it's going to grow next turn. To what size, and will it gain shields/turn?

150AD - 7s.
170AD - 14s. alternative - shortrush walls (24g)
190AD - 21s. alternative - 27s
210AD - 28s. alternative - 34s.
230AD - 35s. alternative - M.I. complete
250AD: M.I. complete.

Whirlwind:

150AD - 14s.
170AD - 20s.
190AD - 26s.
210AD - pike complete. begin another.
230AD - 6s.
250AD - 12s.

Blizzard: pike city

150AD - 5s
170AD - 10s
190AD - 15s
210AD - 20s
230AD - 25s
250AD - pike complete

Ok, now I will work out the costs for the next post.

-Arrian, the slightly mad

[Arrian]

Gold expenditure, by turn:

150AD - nada
170AD - 44 gold, or 68 gold, depending on what we do with Monsoon
190AD - nada
210AD - 44 gold
230AD - 48 gold
250AD - nada, or 24 gold, depending on what we're doing with Monsoon.

So, between 136 and 184 gold in the next 6 turns.

How does that look? NYE, check it out, and let me know if I missed something obvious re: 20shield/50shield rush items.

-Arrian

[DeepO]

It has been mentioned before, and said to be too complex to perform, but would it be worth it to pillage our iron, build horses, warriors and spears, and upgrade all at once once the iron is reconnected? I'm not sure if we make enough gold for this, but we sure can build a lot of those units in the mean time...

DeepO

[Velociryx]

The beauty of that would be that we wouldn't need to upgrade them all at once. we could make HORDES of them quickly, then upgrade as we got the money....good point and good plan....we could certainly fill up our trannies quickly like that!

-=Vel=-

[DeepO]

Yeah, but it will require very precise planning, and certainly won't be easy. We're making some 180 gpt, enough to upgrade 2 horses and 2 spears, or 4 warriors and 2 spears per turn. Will that be enough? I don't know...

Other consequence is that we have to work with what we have on Bob for the moment. We can block all invasion pooints on Stormia for the moment, and this will only improve once we build more cheap units, so Stormia is safe. But Bob? I don't know...

DeepO

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by DeepO
Other consequence is that we have to work with what we have on Bob for the moment.

About that, we could upgrade the units in Northern Stormia, then ship them out and replace with horses and new cheap units. That might buy us a couple of turns.

[Velociryx]

true, but if we do it that way, then we can maximize gold outputs....

-=Vel=-

[Arrian]

Cutting the iron will mean several things:

1) Hurricane's production will drop further (but it would still be capable of 1-turn warriors, and *maybe* 2-turn horsies)
2) We need to have workers on standbye ready to reconnect fast, if need be.
3) We need to have a detailed plan, like the one NYE & I sorted out above.

The way I read it, we have 3 1-turn warrior cities, 1 1-turn WC city, 1 or 2 2-turn horseman cities (maybe, needs shortrushing), 2 3-turn WC cities, 4 2-turn warrior cities...

So, tentatively, let's consider cutting the iron for 4 turns. Without accounting for the specific shield buildup in each city (that requires more work, and I've already done a bunch of number-crunching today), that means we would produce:

20 warriors
4 horsemen (of the Apocalypse )
6 war chariots

Of course, it wouldn't work out exactly that way, but it would be close. Let's call it 15 warriors, 4 horsemen, 5 WCs. Note that some or all of the WCs could be spearmen instead.

15 warriors -> med infs = 750 gold
4 horsemen -> knights = 320 gold
5 WCs -> knights = 500 gold (ack, nah, lets do spears)
5 spearmen -> pikemen = 100 gold

That there be a lot 'o gold. But... it also be a lot of troops, FAST. 5 turns after cutting the iron we could have 15 med inf, 4 knights, and 5 pikemen produced. IIRC, it takes 9 worker turns to road a mountain. Our workers are double speed, and thus it takes 4.5 of our worker turns to road a mountain. 5 workers could do it in a turn. 3 workers could do it in 2 turns.

250AD might be a good time to do it, since most of our cities, particularly the big ones will be completing, or near to completing, their builds. Or do you guys think that's too late? I guess we could do it ASAP... so long as we have a least 3 workers ready to re-road (and re-mine) the iron by Hurricane quickly.

-Arrian