first turn conclusions

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by 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.

You wouldn't look at all that culture and wonder if we might be thinking ahead to preventing culture flips when we attack? Maybe your mind isn't as devious as mine is.

With Glory of War in the game playing a civ that can build archers right off the bat, and with us not starting with Bronze Working to build spearmen and not having AIs to buy it from guaranteed if we meet their price, my instinct is that an early barracks is more important than an early temple. Still, it might make sense to game things out in a "clone" single-player game as the time for the final decision approaches to make sure we'll be building enough units in the capital to justify the barracks. If we'd go for a fairly early granary in the capital (a definite possibility if Arabia is a neighbor and is amenable to trading), shields rather than food would be the limiting factor on our settler production capacity, in which case barracks might just sit there eating up gold without really doing us much good.

Nathan

[Shiber]

By all means, let us build an early granary. More citizens equals faster production, more commerce (we can make full use of that river to research faster) and more workers/settlers.
If we want to grab as much land before the other civs do, we need a large population base.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Shiber
By all means, let us build an early granary. More citizens equals faster production, more commerce (we can make full use of that river to research faster) and more workers/settlers.
If we want to grab as much land before the other civs do, we need a large population base.

The catch is that it takes time to research Pottery, and we need to focus on military techs until we have The Wheel and Bronze Working (or establish that there aren't any hostiles around). So it will be a while before we can start planning granaries unless we can trade for Pottery (although trading for Bronze Working could put as a bit ahead of if we have to research it ourselves).

[Shiber]

You're right. What was I thinking?
A granary as soon as we can build one, but right now we should build barracks IMHO. We don't really need a temple in regent so early, and culture's effect on human psychology is debatable.

[DeepO]

Nathan, I know about the culture flips, of course, however I don't know if other teams are going to see it like that. Especially the less experienced teams like Vox, and possibly the legos, could view it as a sign of a builder approach.

Re: the barracks: You are right, in that it has fewer advantage when you don't intend to build a lot of troops there. In most of my SP games, I never built it in the capital, or I'm planning on a archer rush and need the production. Of course, this is MP, and I would focus on BW immediately. But then again, if it takes us 40 turns before we can build spears, wouldn't that mean that we can already have a temple, and a settler build, and queue a baracks somewhere around turn 35?

Granaries: I won't comment much on these. I don't build them often, certainly not in my capital. But in this case, I can see the point in doing so, however it doesn't feel right to start on granaries before at least 1 settler has been built. It takes quite a number of turns before you can buil more settlers with a granary then you would have had without them, certainly if you take into account that the first settlers can have build cities, which are also already building settlers before your granary has finished. I would only decide this once we have a better idea of the situation around us, and whether we need to have a few cities fast, or can start slower, and catch up later on.

DeepO

[Arrian]

If we pop pottery from a hut, we should definitely invest in a granary.

But for now, I like the barracks plan. DeepO, I ran a test (using NYE's scenario of our start spot) that involved the following build order:

warrior
warrior (chop assisted)
warrior
barracks (chop assisted)
settler
spearman (chop assisted)
settler

Note the spearman. BW would take us 27 turns to research from the start, and could be faster if we jacked the science rate, I believe. Actually, since I mistakenly set the scenario to Monarch (IIRC, the PTW Demogame is Regent), it could be even faster.

But it seems you and I are in the minority on choosing BW at the start - it looks like we're going with The Wheel.

-Arrian

[DeepO]

The weel it is, then. A bit riskier perhaps, but seeing horsies early on will certainly be a bonus.

Arrian, in your test, did the settler got built in the fastest possible turn? we're already 1 turn behind because of the movement of our settler, I wouldn't like it if we lose more time. Other then that it seems to be ok for me...

DeepO

[Arrian]

No, but the alternative is wasting either shields or worker turns. Our second settler gets pumped out pretty fast, though, due to the irrigated floodplains plus the irrigated furs.

-Arrian

[DeepO]

Hmm... I'd rather waste some shields or worker turns, if it means you only lose a few shields, or 1-2 worker turns. Especially letting the worker wait seems good to me, but then again, I do that a lot in SP games too.

I'm going to look at your detailed plan to see if I can comment there...

DeepO

[DeepO]

*sigh* Can someone explain why I get DPs when I only hit the submit button once? Strangely enough, more traffic leads to more posts on 'poly

DP edited out.

DeepO

[Arrian]

DeepO, my plan isn't perfect, alexman actually pointed out one or two places where it can be improved upon, but I think it will work rather well. 3 quick exploring warriors, a barracks for vet troops later, and then settlers will come quickly.

I have come to realize that punching out a settler IMMEDIATELY isn't always such a big deal. In fact, we may even get lucky with a hut early on this way. Who knows?

-Arrian.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Arrian
I have come to realize that punching out a settler IMMEDIATELY isn't always such a big deal. In fact, we may even get lucky with a hut early on this way. Who knows?

Strange... this is completely the opposite of my experiences. That second city build time has become crucial to me, and I will sacrifice all I can to be fast. With industrial civs this means that the first worker (after some improving along the capital) roads to the city spot immediately, so that it will take at most 1 turn between building the settler and settling it.

As to the hut-popping: I've had much more luck with popping settlers due to something I already knew, but overlooked: in 1.28f you won't get a settler if you are either building one in any of your cities, or if you have one active. Just avoiding popping huts with an active settler, and switching all settler production to something else just to pop a hut has proven very useful, now I get an average of 1 settler per game on a huge map on Emperor, where I used to get 1 settler each 10 games or so. Definately some tweaking we have to do!

DeepO

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Arrian
I have come to realize that punching out a settler IMMEDIATELY isn't always such a big deal.

The chances that we do get a Settler from a hut are low (as we all know from SP games). Thus we need to show that having more units and stuff in our capital is better than having 2 cities. Other than the fear of not being able to defend two areas at once, I can't think of a good reason to delay Settler production.


Dominae

[Arrian]

It's not much of a delay. I will have a look at the sequencing, though. I agree that expanding quickly is important, I was just trying to be as efficient as possible given the position of our worker on Turn2, when we will build our city.

DeepO, regarding the hut popping for settlers thing, I know about that. It has resulted in a noticeable jump in the number of times I get a settler from a hut. And I play on normal size maps.

-Arrian

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Arrian
DeepO, regarding the hut popping for settlers thing, I know about that. It has resulted in a noticeable jump in the number of times I get a settler from a hut. And I play on normal size maps.

Well, most of us will know this, I just wanted to say it out loud because maybe someone overlooks it. AFAIK, it is not common knowledge to all Civ players, even if it has been posted on the strategy forum.

DeepO