Turnplayer Thread #2.

[Sullla]

Ahem. Now, on to the actual report for T77:

- The iron locations aren't quite as awful as the copper/horses ones, but they certainly aren't good either. There are only two sources on the entire continent, unless the Templars have another in the few foggy tiles at their capital (fun thought!) One iron is literally at Mutal, and already connected to the Imperio trade network. The other is six tiles north of Jerusalem, in unclaimed land. I suppose that this technically is up for grabs, but it's clearly in the Templars unofficial sphere of influence. None of the early strategic resources are located in the entire western half of the continent.

Just for the record, Imperio started with cattle, iron, multiple golds, four floodplains, and copper and horses within easy reach. We began with... a single cattle and one wine resource, no strategic resources anywhere close by. This is, hands down, the worst scenario design I have ever seen. I honestly feel we would have done better with a completely random map.

- Moving on. What do we want to do about the iron source in the middle of the map? My initial thought was to move Twin Peaks thusly:



I don't really like this spot, but I couldn't see anything better. It still holds the rice and cattle, and ensures that we eventually get iron with level 3 cultural borders (pictured). With a chopped library or theatre, we could actually reach that mark pretty fast. I don't like the fact that this spot would have four desert and two peak tiles. But... this is the closest I think we can get to the Templars without ticking them off. This spot would also perfectly fit with their city of Constantinople (no overlap between level 3 borders), for what that's worth.

- A related question: do we go for this location with our next settler, or the previously planned marble spot on the coast? The former has more strategic value, the latter considerably better land. Hmmm.

- I don't know what to do with Winston, the worker circled above. Pre-chop forests at the capital for a library, I guess? Otherwise, the best option is building roads towards the next city we intend to found.

- I have us running min science for the moment, to refill the treasury. I put the miniscule overrun into Masonry, since I think that's one we'll want to research ourselves in the near future. If we can somehow trade for Mysticism, Polytheism, and Monotheism with Templars, we can research the uber-cheap Priesthood ourselves and then get a massive 40% tech bonus on Monarchy! Worth thinking about, anyway.

- Based on what PAL told us before, we can expect Alphabet from them in about 4-5 more turns.

- We'll have copper connected in 4 more turns, finishing copper mine + adding road. Damn good thing we grabbed the Cape Town spot, eh?

- Pretty quiet C&D turn overall. Imperio has been pumping the shields pretty heavily recently, up to 25/turn (most in the world; we're second with 23/turn). Either they are building settlers/workers, some kind of wonder, or military units. No cause for alarm as yet, but we'll keep an eye on them.

- In case you missed it before, Zeviz correctly pointed out that Imperio and Templars have Open Borders. Hopefully we can get them too for the economic benefits!

[Zeviz]

What idiot made this map?

I guess some people knew what they were talking about when they voted for a balanced mapscript.

EDIT: Perhaps my intial reaction was overly pessimistic, but I wouldn't be surprised to be attacked by Imperio the moment NAP runs out. And Templar's latest message sounded far less polite than usual.

The big question now is: do we want to launch a pre-emptive attack on Templars before Imperio NAP runs out?

If we do, we have to start preparing for it now. If we don't we should focus on founding and improving cities to be able to out-produce the rest of the continent combined in case of war.

In either scenario, I don't like the proposed move of Twin Peaks. The hold on Iron would be very uncertain, and the resource can be disconnected the moment a war starts. (This is the same problem we have with Copper and Horses, but those two resources are at least right next to a city, rather than several tiles away. And even if we move Twin Peaks, Templars could found a new city right next to Iron, taking complete control of it.

EDIT2: After looking in game, proposed move of Twin Peaks doesn't look as bad. However, Templars have a nice city site to the south of it, which would put Iron into second ring of their city, so new Twin Peaks would likely lose control of it. (I've marked that site with a sign on the map.

[ruff_hi]

Are there any foggy tiles in our land? If so, then (given our map track record) we should expect that our iron is on that tile and bust the fog.

I know, I know - all tiles are already revealed. Gee will we have a story to tell at the end of the game ...

[Krill]

...That just sucks so badly. Honestly, I wish I had offered to look over the map to make sure it was fair now. I think you should try to contact Cybershy and ask him why he ****ed you around so much by giving you this crappy start.

[sunrise089]

Why am I not surprised at this development?

My guess is that Templars and Imperio plan to attack us after the Imperio NAP runs out. It would be interesting to propose a NAP with the Templars that ended considerably after the NAP with Imperio and see if they balked.

If we settle the new Twin Peaks I doubt we'd get the iron at all and I'm sure we won't keep it in wartime. That said, from a military standpoint I'm OK with Twin Peaks if we can prioritize horseback riding in the future. Cape Copper will actually be harder to defend and probably necessitate an axe/spear stack of defenders if the arms race continues. Pink Dot and Twin Peaks on the other hand can be covered by a horse archer stack on the desert between them. Without double-moved (banned) we should be able to cover the cities themselves reasonably well. If we're left to one-movers though, I think all bets are off.

[Swiss Pauli]

Originally posted by sunrise089 My guess is that Templars and Imperio plan to attack us after the Imperio NAP runs out. It would be interesting to propose a NAP with the Templars that ended considerably after the NAP with Imperio and see if they balked.

I wouldn't be surprised if they planned a double-team; it would surely be our undoing.

However, why not propose a military alliance with Templars againt Imperio rather than a NAP? If we offered all Imperio's land except the chicken (knowing they'd waste it) it'd surely trump any offer from Imperio to team up against us.

[sunrise089]

Originally posted by Swiss Pauli

I wouldn't be surprised if they planned a double-team; it would surely be our undoing.

However, why not propose a military alliance with Templars againt Imperio rather than a NAP? If we offered all Imperio's land except the chicken (knowing they'd waste it) it'd surely trump any offer from Imperio to team up against us.

This may be the best option, but I can think of a few problems.

-We may not be ready for military action, and Templars may not want to delay the attack.
-It would be a destabilizing offer - if there is no plan to attack the Templars could disclose the note to Imperio and stir up trouble.
-We may have to offer the Templars too much.

[Zeviz]

While the Templar/Imperio alliance is highly likely, I'd rather work with PAL to be ready for their attack, instead of making a desperate diplomatic offer that could backfire. (We can always review this option if Imperio refuses to renew NAP.)

EDIT: Could somebody more experienced in MP give an assessment of our chances of taking out Templars before Imperio NAP expires? (Once we have Alphabet, we could use a spy to take down defenses of Jerusalem. How much would that cost?)

[sunrise089]

Right, I think a decent play is to offer Templars a NAP and see if they will take it. If they do then use the time to develop a construction+HBR army with PAL's trade help.

I definitely don't think we can defend ourselves without 2-move units though. Remember, a human player will bring massive force to bear on taking cities. Unless we have spies to see where they're going to hit (MP games don't allow spies) it will be very hard to defend ourselves with 1-move units, and I suspect the attacker will generally have the advantage this game.

[Sullla]

Lots of good discussion here. I did want to bring up three things:

- Any recommendations for poor Winston? It's not as exciting as the grand strategy of the game, but I'd like to get some thoughts on how best to employ our worker at the capital.

- What's our settling plan? How does the iron change our thoughts there? Do we want to go for a "central" spot next in the iron region, or stick with the marble/dyes coastal area that possesses superior economic value?

- I'd like to move the grand strategy discussion (who to ally with and the like) to our Metagaming thread, which I've bumped up. The Turnplayer thread is better off left to the tactical movements of everyday turns.

We absolutely should continue discussing the metagame issue though. A strong alliance with PAL is looking like a better and better option.

[sunrise089]

I'd say Marble/dyes for the next city and only settle iron when we can place several military units in the city...but then again I'm the paranoid one here.

Using Winston to road the next city sounds fine to me.

[Zeviz]

I agree about using Winston to road towards next city is good, but where should the road go?

Marble City is an out-of-the-way commerce site, but might still anger Templars if they have illusions of peacefully settling southern part of our continent. However, it will be hard to defend in case of war, and will leave us overstretched.

Twin Peaks (I still prefer the location 1 west of Sulla's new marker) would be the central point of our defense, and would be a minor production center, working plains forests. The downside is that it would be even more likely to be seen by Templars as encroachment into their territory.

Given the current political situation, I favor Twin Peaks, because it would be more easily defendable in case of Templar attack, and we need a frontline production city (that doesn't mind having its tiles pillaged) more than a frontline cottage city.

[Sullla]

That's one vote each way! I'll be curious to hear what others on the team think.

Here's a picture of the marble spot for reference, from a couple turns ago:

[Swiss Pauli]

Before committing to a Settler, shouldn't we try to find out (by inference) what our neighbours are up to? If we think they'll attack sooner, then we should be investing in units. If we think they will wait (for cats?) then we should carry on settling.

I don't think it's worth contesting the Iron (as we can claim Templars Irontown down the line), so we should settle 1W of the Twin Peaks site pictured.

I think fish-marble is a bit out on a limb, and will make us more vulnerable to attack in the short-medium term.

[Sullla]

I had to move Winston last night, as the turn timer was running out. Since I could not in good conscious send him off to build roads towards a city site that we hadn't even decided on yet, I instead had him pre-chop a forest at the capital for future library build. I hope that was OK with everyone.

Now, on to the highlights from T78:

- Airstrip One finishes its barracks, and as discussed earlier, is going to work on military for the moment while we run zero science. Here is how it is currently configured, emphasizing shields:



The yellow box is the pre-chopping tile Winston is working on (chosen because it's the direction enemy units are most likely to approach from). We will finish a chariot in 3 turns, with considerable (9 shields) overrun. Then we'll build a spear or axe in two turns (9+13+13 = 35) and should go on to library post-trade after that. Pretty sweet math, eh?

- Pink Dot squeezes out an extra 2 shields this turn by working the forested grassland hill tile instead of the rice. (It's at max happy cap already.) That allows it to finish a chariot next turn, and start a settler for our next city location (whereever that might be!) I still favor the marble/fish spot because we're weakest economically right now and it's far safer than the twin peaks area.

- Really quiet turn from the C&D, one pop increase for PAL and a new tech for Banana. The only other thing I can report is a new 6000pt. unit for Templars, which I'm going to assume is axeman #2. We should probably send them another message if we don't hear back from them soon.

- We are back in the lead for Soldier points thanks to Iron Working. Hopefully we look more intimidating than we actually are!

- Copper connected in 3 more turns. (One to mine, two to road.)