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Unless Vox moves out of our way, they have us in a box. They can share research with someone, and we can't. There are two basic ways out of that box. One is to conquer Vox, which, if Vox turns into a porcupine behind their chokepoint, would be a lot easier said than done. (See DeepO's suggested Vox strategy in the "Vox's point of view" thread.) The other is to go for Map Making and do an end run around the chokepoint to get contact.
If we want to use the Map Making approach, I think we're best off getting Warrior Code (in case of a minor incursion not worth blowing a GA over) and then beelining for Map Making. Against any serious attack, we use WCs, and we focus on building cities in locations WCs can defend. That overcomes the problem of only Vox having contact with the rest of the world as early as possible, a lot earlier than we'd be able to mount a military assault with any realistic chance of victory if Vox plays well. Not being able to settle safely in areas we'd need swords to defend effectively would cramp us a little if disease doesn't slow us down, but not too badly. We could also try trading to Vox for some military techs and hope their greed for playing tech broker overcomes their fear of trading anything we could use militarily. (Note that trades don't necessarily hurt us relative to Vox so much as they help the overall tech pace go more quickly. A fast tech pace in our area is a bad thing if we're counting on defeating Vox before they get pikes, but may actually be a good one if our long-term plan is to use trade ourselves to gain an advantage relative to the rest of the world.)
If we go the military route, we have to dedicate ourselves completely to conquering Vox as quickly as we can. That would be expensive, and would set us back considerably both in research and in city improvements compared with other teams, but doing the job halfway would hurt us a lot worse. The more I think about such an approach, the more I hate it because even assuming we can win against Vox, we'll probably blow our chance of winning the game. That's especially true if Vox decides to die fighting rather than give us anything of significant value in return for a peace treaty that would leave them in a hopeless situation anyhow. (In other words, don't count on getting anything through extortion.)
I'm starting to lean heavily in the direction of a beeline to Map Making (probably with a detour through Warrior Code first) and trying to maintain peaceful and constructive relations with Vox for the time being. The military risk should be small given that they don't have barracks yet and have so far to travel to reach us (not to mention the apparent total lack of warriors in their cities waiting to be upgraded at present), and I think it's by far our best chance of winning the game (as opposed to just beating Vox and then finding ourselves horribly behind the rest of the world).
By the way, in a test run I just did, even with disease striking shortly after building the third settler, Map Making came in 1425 BC. That's somewhere in the neighborhood of 35 turns from now if my calculations are right, and long before we could mount a credible attack. A detour through Warrior Code (which I skipped) would add about three turns.
Nathan
If we want to use the Map Making approach, I think we're best off getting Warrior Code (in case of a minor incursion not worth blowing a GA over) and then beelining for Map Making. Against any serious attack, we use WCs, and we focus on building cities in locations WCs can defend. That overcomes the problem of only Vox having contact with the rest of the world as early as possible, a lot earlier than we'd be able to mount a military assault with any realistic chance of victory if Vox plays well. Not being able to settle safely in areas we'd need swords to defend effectively would cramp us a little if disease doesn't slow us down, but not too badly. We could also try trading to Vox for some military techs and hope their greed for playing tech broker overcomes their fear of trading anything we could use militarily. (Note that trades don't necessarily hurt us relative to Vox so much as they help the overall tech pace go more quickly. A fast tech pace in our area is a bad thing if we're counting on defeating Vox before they get pikes, but may actually be a good one if our long-term plan is to use trade ourselves to gain an advantage relative to the rest of the world.)
If we go the military route, we have to dedicate ourselves completely to conquering Vox as quickly as we can. That would be expensive, and would set us back considerably both in research and in city improvements compared with other teams, but doing the job halfway would hurt us a lot worse. The more I think about such an approach, the more I hate it because even assuming we can win against Vox, we'll probably blow our chance of winning the game. That's especially true if Vox decides to die fighting rather than give us anything of significant value in return for a peace treaty that would leave them in a hopeless situation anyhow. (In other words, don't count on getting anything through extortion.)
I'm starting to lean heavily in the direction of a beeline to Map Making (probably with a detour through Warrior Code first) and trying to maintain peaceful and constructive relations with Vox for the time being. The military risk should be small given that they don't have barracks yet and have so far to travel to reach us (not to mention the apparent total lack of warriors in their cities waiting to be upgraded at present), and I think it's by far our best chance of winning the game (as opposed to just beating Vox and then finding ourselves horribly behind the rest of the world).
By the way, in a test run I just did, even with disease striking shortly after building the third settler, Map Making came in 1425 BC. That's somewhere in the neighborhood of 35 turns from now if my calculations are right, and long before we could mount a credible attack. A detour through Warrior Code (which I skipped) would add about three turns.
Nathan
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