first turn conclusions

[FrustratedPoet]

Originally posted by Arrian
Regent... hmm, research is gonna fly.

-Arrian

although, for some of us (i.e. Me) it'll just seem like normal.

[nbarclay]

I checked the editor, and Regent is still just two citizens born content, same as Monarch. Warlord is three and Chieftain is four.

If it weren't for disease and the existence of potentially hostile neighbors, I'd go for the flood plains in a heartbeat. It costs production in the short term, but you get it back in the long term. But early exploration and defense are more important in this game than they would be in SP, and in the unlikely event that we would happen to get unlucky with disease right off the bat, it could be crippling with just one city. After we build our first settler (or maybe as we're finishing on it), the risk would be lower.

This is not a situation where we want to use a combination of flood plains and forest because under Despotism, we can get just as much production from furs on irrigated plains as we can from furs on forest. We need to be chopping and irrigating before we use those tiles (at least to the extent that we can keep up).

I'm not too fond of the idea of an early temple. It only pays for its upkeep by avoiding happiness problems when we're at size four or higher (once we get our furs hooked up), and even then, using the luxury slider is just as cost-efficient. Further, with all these furs, the capital will almost certainly get the most benefit from the luxury slider of any city when we do use it. I think we're better off with an early barracks in our capital and focusing our early temples on other cities where they are needed to expand the city radius.

Nathan

[Theseus]

1) The start is even better than we initially thought.

2) Industrious rocks.

3) The talent here is scary.

[nbarclay]

What about the start are you thinking is better than initially thought?

[Dominae]

Originally posted by nbarclay
I checked the editor, and Regent is still just two citizens born content, same as Monarch. Warlord is three and Chieftain is four.

I think I've played Regent once, and Monarch under 10 times (I never even tried anything lower than Regent). So I just assumed that the "citizens born content" increases by 1 for every step down in difficulty. Thanks for pointing this out.

Originally posted by nbarclay
If it weren't for disease and the existence of potentially hostile neighbors, I'd go for the flood plains in a heartbeat. It costs production in the short term, but you get it back in the long term. But early exploration and defense are more important in this game than they would be in SP, and in the unlikely event that we would happen to get unlucky with disease right off the bat, it could be crippling with just one city. After we build our first settler (or maybe as we're finishing on it), the risk would be lower.

Very nice reasoning. This (and DeepO's comment about balanced starts...and, come to think of it, alexman and Arrian's turn by turn "forecast") makes me feel very confident about our Economic Schola (let's just say it was a very hard Schola not to pick!). I like the "no preconceptions" idea though, so expect me to jump in with some overlooked ideas once in a while.

Originally posted by nbarclay
I'm not too fond of the idea of an early temple.

I agree. I think we'd be in a much stronger position with either more troops, better troops (with a Barracks), and more Settlers (hopefully all three). There's still plenty of time to build a Temple after a few Settlers are out, and we won't miss out on too much culture.


Dominae

[Meshelic]

Originally posted by Theseus
1) The start is even better than we initially thought.

2) Industrious rocks.

3) The talent here is scary.

I discussed the talent issue with Panzer32 and a couple of other diplomats on the Apolyton chat (purely unnoficial, as it was a surprise so many foreign ministers were there all of a sudden). From the talks I had there, I gathered from the others there that we are :

1.) VERY intimidating
2.) thought to be likely game winner
3.) probably superior in most aspects of the game

Either we should be wary that the others may gang up on us if they are too intimidated, or we should take advantage of their fears?

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Meshelic
Either we should be wary that the others may gang up on us if they are too intimidated, or we should take advantage of their fears?

Playing with people's fears is playing with fire. We need to make sure there is no ganging up against us going on as long as diplomatically possible. Even with all our talent, there is simply no way we can handle a human alliance against us, especially if we're all on the same continent. Maybe we should start a discussion in the Diplomcay Schola on how best to reduce other teams' fears of our "superiority".


Dominae

[Theseus]

Couldn't agree more... we can't fight everyone, and need to allay any fears that could put us in that position.

nbarclay, re the starting position, maybe it's just me but I had never bought into the power of plains + bonus resource... throw in the diversity of tiles, and I'm pretty happy with what we've gotten.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Theseus
Couldn't agree more... we can't fight everyone, and need to allay any fears that could put us in that position.

nbarclay, re the starting position, maybe it's just me but I had never bought into the power of plains + bonus resource... throw in the diversity of tiles, and I'm pretty happy with what we've gotten.

As long as there's water to irrigate, I tend to view plains and regular grassland as essentially interchangeable in the early game. Either way, under Despotism, the result tends to be two food and one shield. And really, furs aren't anything more than a grassland with shield with an extra gold that you have to chop down a forest to get to. Flood plains are better than nothing for speeding up growth, but cattle, wheat, or game (after some chopping) can provide equal food and some production besides, or can (if irrigated) provide more food. Forests, I look at mostly as potential grassland or plains where I can get some shields chopping along the way. In short, while this certainly isn't a bad start, it's not one I consider great either, unless there's something I'm missing.

[Theseus]

Oh, I guess you're right... not fantastic (e.g., cattle or wheat), but I was deathly afraid of a jungle / mountain / tundra nightmare. I guess what I do really like is the diversity, although I'd trade Nationalism for some hills.

Spoilsport.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Theseus
Spoilsport.

Sorry about the bubble-bursting, but we do need to be aware of the possibility that a neighbor might have a significantly better starting position than we do (assuming they use it correctly). Of course it's equally possible that a neighbor might have significantly worse, or one neighbor one and the other neighbor the other (if we have two neighbors). We'll just have to watch and see what we can find out.

[Theseus]

You are still a spoilsport.

Glory in the GS homeland!!

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Theseus
Oh, I guess you're right... not fantastic (e.g., cattle or wheat), but I was deathly afraid of a jungle / mountain / tundra nightmare. I guess what I do really like is the diversity, although I'd trade Nationalism for some hills.

After our test PBEM you can say that 52,000 times.

[Meshelic]

To better put things in perspective, the views of Panzer32 and Spiffor seemed to sway towards thinking we were possibly too talented. They did not suggest to me that they were threatened by this.

Besides, I made sure we were talking along "unofficial lines" and we all acknowledged that we weren't really speaking for our teams, just personal observations. I told them as well that I was impressed by all the talent on the teams, and hoped that things could get more organized.

[DeepO]

Re: early temple: You all know I'm a proponent of culture, so naturally I'm all for an early temple (and certainly if most of it can be build with forest chopping), but now there is another argument why we maybe need it: If we build it, our culture will rock, and likely be better then any other team (even the builders), for a long time. Which enhances the idea that we are a builder, or at least a balanced team, and not pure warmongers. Deception is everything, so I would definately build the temple asap.

DeepO