AUSG101 - Domination team DAR 1 - Page 3

Beta · September 16, 2003, 07:33

C6 - good start. What were Mecca's builds?

Arrian · September 16, 2003, 09:37

I was under the impression (I'm pretty sure, actually) that mining a cow on plains under despotism does diddly squat.

-Arrian

Harovan · September 16, 2003, 09:47

Let's see... 1 shield by plains, 1 provided by the cow, 1 by mining makes three, minus the third shield for despotism. Result: It does diddly squat.

Theseus · September 16, 2003, 11:00

Shouldn't your nick be "charlie_five"?

charlie_six · September 16, 2003, 19:12

All: Yep the mine does diddly squat ..oops. Thanks folks didn't really realize that

prolly lost a settler for that error. Ill do a re-try and see what woulda happened.

Beta: Builds for mecca were: warrior, granary, temple, warrior, spearman, settler, barracks, spearman, and finally a archer in 2 turns. There is a regular warrior and a conscript warrior in mecca atm, (found the conscript in a goody hut).
The other warrior went scouting S, (it looked like it was mostly jungle so building a scout for that didn't seem advantagous)
The regular spearman was escorting the settler that made Medina, and was the one that destroyed the Barb camp next to it. There is a veteran spearman on the way there.

I usually put 2 military units in a city as fast as possible for protection, and it keeps em happy until pop 6 so I don't have to fiddle with luxuries.

Thesus: Yeah but charlie_zero_five was too big. went for the leader callsign of charlie 6 instead

Konquest02 · September 16, 2003, 19:58

I think, as an exp. civ, it's your duty to pump at least one other scout. This additionnal unit will be able to make contact with other civs much earlier and to steal some goody huts from the other civs.

Theseus went with 2 scouts (i.e. one additionnal) and got 7 huts.
MZ - 1 scout/ 4 huts
Me - 3 scouts / 6 huts
Arsenal - 2 scouts / 4 huts

charlie_six · September 16, 2003, 20:03

Tried it again using same builds/etc and irrigating instead of mining. A goodie hut I found up by the japanese yeilded a new town instead of a tech, so I wasnt able to get iron working, (6 turns yet), and mecca pops in 3 instead of 5, and no one has horseback riding yet.

I'd stick with the original one tho, just from luck of the draw of getting a tech over a town way up by a rival civ. The cow can get irrigated by the worker on the hill.

Same kinda deal production wise with building a road and mining the hill, but the main reason for building a road on that hill by mecca was having a defensive fall back position on a S road if carthage goes crazy and breaks thru the choke point.

Scouts:
-Yes I am guilty of scout neglect

Reason being is I usually play aztecs, and you get the jaguar warrior off the bat with 2 moves AND can pillage and kill.
-It's just sooooo hard to conciously build a scout, who can't pillage or attack....Seeing all those juicy settlers out there with warrior escorts....just calling out for you to enslave them heh.

Master Zen · September 16, 2003, 22:35

Kon: I had 2 scouts

Beta · September 16, 2003, 22:45

I had 4 scouts - and got 6 or 7 huts - I can't recall. 6 I think. I know I got four techs from huts. Also - I have not studied the saves but I believe the four scouts discovered the most territory. There is also the benefit of now having a decent mobile recon corps.

Rhothaerill · September 16, 2003, 23:56

Well it is almost midnight EST so I'm going to go ahead and officially declare the first turn block over. Now we can start the process of deciding which saves will begin the next turn block. As seen from the poll in the other thread it has been decided to have one other team decide on each team's turn block. Therefore the domination team would choose for the opportunist team and in turn the spaceship team will choose for the domination team

In the opportunist DAR thread please post your preference for the next turn save for the team you have been assigned. It is also encouraged, though not mandatory, to discuss and critique the individual saves while posting your preference. The time period for discussing and posting your preference will last until 23:59 EST Thursday, and the next turn block will begin on Friday.

Please note that in the event of a tie by the end of the decision process either myself or Nuclear Master will break the tie if I am not around on Thursday (unlikely).

Tarquinius · September 17, 2003, 08:03

So, I understand humble me is to judge these games, let's get started then

This is really tough, there are many good choices here.

Beta and Konquest: Your games are really a lot alike, and I think you are in a good position right now. You are both ready to expand quickly, and become a great power. A downside from your games is I think you are not really preparing for war, so your first attacks will be quite late.
There are some differences between your games. I slightly prefer Konquest's game over Beta's, because Konquest built the Granary before he built settlers, and Beta after, which is less efficient. Both good, solid games though

The_arsenal: As was already mentioned by Beta in this thread, you built too many spearmen in this block. That slows down both your expansion, and your war preparations. (compare Dominae's comments in the Spaceship thread on my game, he thought even warriors weren't needed so early!)
And going away from your capital also cost you some turns, because you didnt have the wheat available immediately.
One final point: you really should try to make your worker actions worthwile. You irrigated a grassland, and mined a cow. Both yield no extra food/production under despotism. Still I think your game is very playable, only others have done better

Charlie_six: Very nicely thought out game, only a bit slow. When you build a granary somewhere, you should try to make the most of it! You built a lot of units there, while you could have made more settlers and expanded quicker. I really like your plans on how to expand and play the game further. If you learn execute them a bit quicker you will become a great player, I am certain of that

Tarquinius · September 17, 2003, 08:21

Master Zen: Very aggressive set-up! You really are the one (together with Theseus perhaps) who really tries to achieve his goal as quickly as possible! I like that. To achieve that you place your cities close to each other. Your game is great for an archer rush, you just have the bad luck of having the civs far apart from each other.
All in all, very well played block.

Taian: Wow, a super early granary! I didn't think of that, I built two units before the granary, you did only build one. Perhaps it should have been a scout though, although you did scout your surroundings nicely

I will discuss your game more (and compare it with the others) in my conclusion.

Theseus: Your game will allow a great horseman rush, and the early settler fits in nicely with that! (less time to spend on founding cities!) By placing your cities fairly close to your capital you don't need many improvements built. One minus to your game is you didn't spot Carthage.

Well, now it is time to decide. Because there are games here who are really close to each other it was very difficult. I have to say it went between the three games I mentioned last (Master_zen, taian and theseus)
I am finally choosing for Theseus' game, because I really like the aggressive horseman rush he intends. I think it will help your team the most to a quick conquest victory.
Taian's game would be great in the oppurtunist' game, but I think there are better warmongering options here. Nevertheless, very well played turn block Taian

The reasons I didn't pick Master_Zen:
1. He has one less city than Theseus. (although this difference hase come because of him being less lucky than Theseus)
2. i think the horsemen rush works well here: the civs are far apart, and the horsemen will upgrade nicely into the unique unit of the Arabs.

My vote:
Theseus

Comments on my comments are welcome of course, it is not like I know it all, I am not a professional player, like you can see when you view my own game

I just commented the games so you could see why I prefered one game over another.

Konquest02 · September 17, 2003, 11:36

Great critic Tarquinius...

I wish everyone's would be as copmlete as yours....

Regarding my game: I'm not used with ultra-early horseman rush, therefore my game is not really adapted for this. But I gotta agree that it's probably the best strategy in this game...

--Kon--

Rhothaerill · September 17, 2003, 11:39

Quote:

Originally posted by Konquest02
Great critic Tarquinius...

I wish everyone's would be as copmlete as yours....

Regarding my game: I'm not used with ultra-early horseman rush, therefore my game is not really adapted for this. But I gotta agree that it's probably the best strategy in this game...

--Kon--

Truly.

A well thought out and presented critique of the games. Nice job Tarquinius.

Master Zen · September 17, 2003, 13:46

EDIT: Turned from vote into simply a critique

First of all, both games were very well played. From the military point of view, Theseus' horseman rush is probably the soundest military strategy. However, there are two aspects of Kon's game which I believe are a bit superior IMHO. These are city placement and money.

Regarding money, it's amazing the amount Kon managed to raise up, by the time that game gets iron connected there'll probably be enough for 10 swordsman upgraded! With city placement, I like his 4-tile approach (o-x-x-x-o) because there is enough space to fit in two military camps in that scheme. In fact, if you look at Kon's map as well as my map, you'll see that you can fit in the two camps that I built perfectly within his placement scheme. That's why I like 4-tile for the first ring of cities, with 3-tile for all the rest.

For those that have never used camp strategy, trust me, it is the best. You can have most of your cities dedicated purely to improvement building while these camps mange the unit production. Two barrack-equipped camps will soon crank out warriors pretty darn quick, and with all that money, I see a massive swordsman attack against the American infidels! (yes, I prefer swordsmen to horses regarless of distance). Theseus using 3-tile in 2 of his other 3 cities has to have that tradeoff between improvemnt and militrary units.

Dominae · September 17, 2003, 14:22

Master Zen, by popular vote we decided to judge another team's blocks. As part of the Domination team, you get to critique the Opportunist team.

Dominae

vmxa1 · September 17, 2003, 14:26

Quote:

Originally posted by Konquest02
Here are my game notes and the save. Feel free to look at them.

Maybe I mised something, but I only found a wrod doc in the zip.

vmxa1 · September 17, 2003, 14:28

Quote:

Originally posted by Beta
And the save:

It was empty and so it Arsenals. So I could not find a save in any of the zipped files??

Konquest02 · September 17, 2003, 14:37

Here is my save... I thought I put it in the save, but vmxa1 proved me wrong...

Renamed the save. It's the same file though

Konquest02 · September 17, 2003, 14:41

Quote:

Originally posted by Dominae
Master Zen, by popular vote we decided to judge another team's blocks. As part of the Domination team, you get to critique the Opportunist team.

Dominae

Can I take MZ's vote anyways...?

Theseus · September 17, 2003, 14:42

We can still discuss the games!!

MZ, thanks for the critique. I forgot to include the thought in my DAR, but I have been playing with the long-term idea of treating the cities placed at 3-tile as camps, and build the cities beyond them at 2-tiles further out, thus 5-tiles from Mecca. Unorthodox, I know, but this way we get off to a blazing start for a Horsemen Rush, and, if we do in fact later pull an Abu Bakr Deception, we can build mofo huge cities at the core and still spread out for a large number of cities. Just idle thoughts in the back of my mind.

Master Zen · September 17, 2003, 15:08

ARRGH!!! I though we could vote on anyone's game.

Must read poll thread, must read poll thread, must read poll thread....

Sorry bout that! Guess my vote doesn't count!

Theseus, interesting idea. I think it would be great idea to post long-term ambitions for each save because some things might not seem obvious with the turns played, but suddenly look much more sound in the long run. That's the reason I put the "X"s in my screen shot because anyone who saw how close my cities were would probably think me a madman!

vmxa1 · September 17, 2003, 16:25

Konquest02 that works, I renamed it to include Roths format, so I could keep them straight.

Rhothaerill · September 17, 2003, 16:46

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
Konquest02 that works, I renamed it to include Roths format, so I could keep them straight.

Yes, please if you can try to rename the save to the format I specified in the first post of each DAR thread. With 17 or so savegames floating around for this turn block alone it will get confusing after a while whose save is whose.

The format is name-team-turn (i.e. rhoth-domination-2150bc). Thanks all.

Konquest02 · September 17, 2003, 16:58

Edited my post to rename the save... Problem fixed!

Rhothaerill · September 17, 2003, 16:59

Thanks Kon.

vmxa1 · September 17, 2003, 17:13

Well here goes nothing.
I won't repeat the step by step evaluation here. I think the games I have seen come down to three big concepts and how the individuals view them. I am ignoring the MP and other minor points.

1) Research rate and starting selection.

It seems to come down to 100% or managed. By that I mean you start at 20 and drop it after the first bump and then adjust as you grow.
I am not opposed to either, but at this level, I would be inclined to manage. Especially since I will probably have to change my selection a few times as I hit a hut or get a trade.
Selection of the tech seems to be a nit, but not invalid point that has been made by Dom.

2) Granary

Well I am not sure what is best on this pick. I am not going to view it as wrong or superior, until I see the out come. I felt in this setting, I would rather get some things done first, but that may be an error. I am hoping to see an discusion to be convinced. It is likely an error for a domination attempt, as I would think camps makes sense then.

3) City spacing/location

Now I feel less qualified to weigh in on this as I have done so little with RCP and really nothing with camps.
I have been sort of picking at it an observing to see what makes sense and how to approach it and when.
I will say that some goals are more suitable for camps than others. I think close spacing is more important as you move up and especialy in a domination attempt.

Now on with my perspective on the games posted. I felt it was not my job to select one based on how they got to where there are. I mean if game A is better situated than B, I don't care if A did not make all his moves the way I would. I figured I will pick the game that I would prefer to pick and play at this juncture.

So my first cut was down to MZ. Taian, Kon and Theseus.
I felt they were in stronger position to move forward.
The next cut was harder as I liked all of them.

MZ I really wanted to see the camps and how that would work out, but I had to give the edge to Theseus for the strong units and non threatening bars suituation.
I like the connected cities and you have a good capitol, but no temples and may have a problem with the barbs, if things do not break well. Probably nothing you could not handle.

Kon, I think it looks great, but I was curious about the jump to build Colossus. Is this a place holder or a real attempt to get the wonder? Not a criticism, just a quest for understanding the goal.

Taian, this was the hardest one for me. I like HBR and IW already learned, 4 cities. This means horse rush or swords. I much prefer to have a few swords to deal with barbs as warriors are not a lock to win. Ultimately I felt that the barbs looked ominus and you have a settler heading off with no escort and only 1 worker. I am not saying these things cannot be dealt with, but in the end you have another game that does not face those problems. I had to have some place to hang my hat to pick one.

So I came down with Theseus's game. About the only thing I could say is no contact with Cath and that part of the map not exposed. If that is the cost of being in such good shape with Vet Horses coming soon, I guess I can live with that.

Nice work by all and I am not sure I am up to making these choices. I look forward to everyones next batch.

Konquest02 · September 17, 2003, 17:24

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
Kon, I think it looks great, but I was curious about the jump to build Colossus. Is this a place holder or a real attempt to get the wonder? Not a criticism, just a quest for understanding the goal.

I think it was what I sometime call a "Pathetic Attempt" TM at a wonder. I saw the deadline approaching (2 turns) and figured that nothing could be built in that span. So I've put the Colossus a bit like someone who finishes a tech on that turn. So yes, it's a placeholder, but having this wonder could do great things to our research rate in this city.

The more I think of it, the more I come to think that it's a leftover from my builder tendencies... I really like to have a science city in the Ancient Age and Damascus is just great with the river and the grassland. However, it may not "fit" in the domination goal.

Gotta build to destroy...

--Kon--

TheArsenal · September 17, 2003, 17:30

Not sure my ego can withstand too many more of these critiques.

vmxa1 · September 17, 2003, 17:44

Quote:

Originally posted by TheArsenal
Not sure my ego can withstand too many more of these critiques.

I look at it like this, it was a photo finish and there were no nags. In the vernacular of the day, "its all good".