25-12-2002 23:15									#61
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Hmm... all of this new information certainly does make that isthmus a vitally strategic spot. While I agree that we need to put a city there soon, I think that for the moment, we should assign a military unit to blocking it about 1 or 2 tiles up.

I say this because I think the city site near Howard Hills needs to be set up as a production center quickly, so that it can be up to full speed all the sooner. I don't think GoW would start a war simply to get through the isthmus, so a blocking unit would be effective enough until we can get our second settler ready to go.

	25-12-2002 23:16									#62
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By the by, did the RPers just give us the GoW minimap voluntarily? I guess they really are becoming a minimap repository.

	26-12-2002 04:21									#63
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The did not give the mini map they told me where the GoW is.

	26-12-2002 21:58									#64
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Hmm our turn again already and we really haven't made any decisions for this turn yet.

My worry about NOT trading minimaps with GoW is that they will be ticked off when they find out that they are right beside us. However, it is very likely that RP may have told them where we are already....

I may be naive in this, but I see only 2 possibilities:

a) GoW will try to attack us immediately hoping to get to us before our Numidian Mercs are up.

b) That they realize that any attack would likely lead to a stalemate that would benefit neither of our teams and benefit everyone else.

Our completely opposite strategies make us the perfect allies - they concentrate on military techs and trade them to us, we concentrate on peaceful techs mostly and trade to them.

So I say trade the maps and try to get as friendly as we can with them, pointing out (if necessary) how we can help each other greatly. We should trade minimaps before the 2nd city (we REALLY need to name this!) is established so that GoW wouldn't initially know where it is.

As far as the movement for this turn goes, the land discovery by Howard just reinforces the need to move up the ithmus soon.

Right now, Conan would reach the ithmus in 4 turns, Howard in 8 turns. Currently, I don't see why we can't wait another 4 turns for Howard to reach it.

Another question is: Do we keep our plan for the 2nd city? My view is yes. If GoW do declare war immediately, a western city will fall quickly while the eastern city wouldn't.

	27-12-2002 00:00									#65
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quote: Originally posted by Sharpe My worry about NOT trading minimaps with GoW is that they will be ticked off when they find out that they are right beside us. However, it is very likely that RP may have told them where we are already.... I may be naive in this, but I see only 2 possibilities: a) GoW will try to attack us immediately hoping to get to us before our Numidian Mercs are up. b) That they realize that any attack would likely lead to a stalemate that would benefit neither of our teams and benefit everyone else.

I believe GoW is unlikely to attack us this early. They would have a very hard time against our defenses and they know it. Also, it is unlikely that they would have already been hired by someone to make our life more difficult - and attacking on their own, without being paid for, is kinda not in line with their merc strategy... I think they will be friendly and until we set up a solid defense, we shall be friendly, too. I would trade the minimap with them just before founding our second city (or even after that, if we opt to go for the West Hill City), the reason being that we need to move at least one unit into the isthmus area to prevent any GoW scouts penetrate into our part of the world.

quote: Originally posted by Sharpe As far as the movement for this turn goes, the land discovery by Howard just reinforces the need to move up the ithmus soon. Right now, Conan would reach the ithmus in 4 turns, Howard in 8 turns. Currently, I don't see why we can't wait another 4 turns for Howard to reach it.

I agree. Conan shall keep heading southwards, Howard shall follow the west coast to the isthmus (right now, he should move SW). Anything else and we would be seriously lagging behind in the jungle exploration.

quote: Originally posted by Sharpe Another question is: Do we keep our plan for the 2nd city? My view is yes. If GoW do declare war immediately, a western city will fall quickly while the eastern city wouldn't.

Yesterday, I did quite extensive calculations, examining various scenarios combining different build orders and city placement orders until 2000BC. The results weren't very conclusive, so I didn't post them immediately... but here is what I found out.

Scenario A1:
Legopolis finishes the settler, builds a merc then, another settler, and yet another merc. We first found a city on the east coast and only later another city close to the isthmus.



Scenario A2:
Same as A1, but our second and third cities found in reversed order - first the one in the west, the east coast city later.



The interesting thing is, that by reversing the city placement order, we increase our total production quite a lot - we manage to build the same four mercs, but for A1, we would be 5+5+12=22 shields into anything else we decide to build later, while for A2, we would be 5+10+24=39 shields into future builds. That is a difference of 17 shields! Not mentioning the fact that we seal a strategic point very early, securing the isthmus entrance into our lands and that we get two mercs built exactly where we went them to be - guarding the isthmus.

I think the key to this is the forest game tile combined with the coastal forest tile. These two are actually like a mined bonus grassland plus mined plains - and they are already there, we would not need to waste our worker on any improvements (that could be destroyed in a war conflict) - he could focus on preparing the third city site so that it runs full speed once founded.

Thinking this over several times, I now believe we should send our first settler, escorted by the Legopolis National Guard, to the West Hill site, establishing a stronghold there - even with no improvements, this city will be able to produce 3 shields immediately and 5 shields 10 turns later, when it jumps to pop 2.

I also tried the Merc-Settler-Merc-Settler and Settler-Merc-Merc-Settler builds, but they do not seem to bring any advantage in. If you wish to have a look, here is the XLS spreadsheet I used. I would be grateful for any corrections - I am almost sure I do not have everything correct...

Oh... and I have discovered, that we produced 6 (six!) shields between 3400BC and 3350BC, even though the production capacity of Legopolis was only 5! Any idea??

	27-12-2002 11:36									#66
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Wow... nice calculations, vondrack.

But did you factor in corruption? With despotism's horrible waste, I but we'll lose at least one of West Hill's shields. (BTW, I think we have to name it that; it's such a nice, catchy name. )

	27-12-2002 12:19									#67
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quote: Originally posted by Kloreep But did you factor in corruption? With despotism's horrible waste, I but we'll lose at least one of West Hill's shields. (BTW, I think we have to name it that; it's such a nice, catchy name. )

Actually, no, I did not factor in the corruption and waste - someone else would have to run a sim to check it (I am on friendly terms with Excel, not with the civ editor... ). However, as the cities will be at approximately the same distance from Legopolis, the waste will probably be 1 shield - and that, IMHO, further favours West Hill city, since losing 1 out of 3 shields is way better than losing 1 out of 2 shields, which would, for some time, be the case with East Coast city.

EDIT: As for the city, an idea crossed my mind... what About Panama or Panama Hill? The city will actually be like Panama Channel, joining the two oceans... would be easy to remeber...

	28-12-2002 03:35									#68
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Ok, sorry for the delayed update, I have had a tough day today. Just played our turn in a haste after waking up (moving the scouts and cutting the research budget down a notch) and then, I had to focus on my business RL.

BTW, Jack, can you explain why you did NOT play the turn when you appeared to be online? We almost missed our 24 hour window - on such a trivial turn...!

We have a crucial decision to make now. On the next turn, our settler will be ready to leave Legopolis. Based upon my earlier calculations, I would - should I happen to play this turn - move him (escorted by the Legopolis National Guard) north and then continue NW along the hill range to the West Hill (Panama) site. Conan would turn SE, heading for that mountain over there, and Howard would go southwards (his ultimate target being the isthmus). Legopolis would be ordered to start building a Numidian Mercenary.

Well, that's it... be so kind and leave at least brief comments, so that whoever happens to play the next turn, has some idea what the team will/desire is.

G'night!

	28-12-2002 04:45									#69
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I just ran a sim to see what the corruption and waste (for shields) would be in each city. (As it turns out, they're identical.)

Time for another table.

Shields Gathered (before corruption)	Shields Produced (after corruption)
1	1
2	2
3	2
4	3
5	4

So... tough choice here. East coast makes the best size 1 city (2 shields and 3 excess food as opposed to 2 shields and 2 excess food) and has better food in general. But West blocks the isthmus territorially (though only by borders; it doesn't sit on the gap itself) and can break into producing 3 shields/turn at size two. However, at that size, it will go down to 1 excess food/turn until a plain is irrigated.

So, I say East Coast city. Cows are nice, and will allow us to expand faster. West coast should be saved for the next settler.

	28-12-2002 06:13									#70
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Some observations:

Our friends the Roleplayers beat us in building a settler as Madrid dropped from 3 to 1 this last turn. It is also interesting that their Madrid reached size 3 at 3250bc while the rest haven't yet. Definitely means that they have a food special (probably in their outer ring) and probably irrigated it as they grew from size 2 to 3 faster than we did.

A question about both the eastern and western cities is what they would look like at size 2 and 3...

The western city would, unless the plains is irrigated, lose 1 of its excess food at size 2, and would definitely lose 1 of its excess food once it reaches size 3 (would have to use the other forest) - as far as terraforming goes, it would absolutely require irrigation of the plains square and the game and forest would take much longer to road.

The eastern city would be less productive initially at size 1 but would have more food but less shields (unless they are mined) than the western city at size 2 and 3. As far as terraforming goes, the grassland would be faster than the forest to terraform, but the eastern city would also require more terraforming to make it better.

The thing that worries me is that it looks as though we couldn't build another settler until 2450bc from Vondrack's analysis - that is 16 turns away! A lot can happen during that time. It seems certain that Glory of War is beyond that ithmus, though from their comments about being on an island it is possible that they haven't found the ithmus yet....

The western city would have to build mercs immediately - and given its decent shield production it would be able to do that in just over 10 turns. It also seems that there might be land to the southwest of the western city's location.

The best position for the eastern city appears to be the square directly east of the middle grassland shield square. That would give us the cattle and perhaps 1 of the dyes. The food problem with the western city as it grows would hurt us in using the 2nd city to build settlers eventually while the eastern city wouldn't have that problem.

The eastern city is a better position long term to settle, but we can't afford the risk of Glory of War settling in the western city's location.

I totally agree with Kloreep , it is a very tough decision.
Perhaps the best option is for the eastern city to be built but to use Howard to block the ithmus until our 2nd settler is nearly ready...

	28-12-2002 11:15									#71
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That was my suggestion. I don't think that GoW would attack a military unit blocking the isthmus, and that would give us a blockade to keep things clear while we ready the next settler. I support the settlement of the Eastern shore (heh, there is a local Maryland joke in that sentence, but it's really only funny to me ).

I will set up a quick poll so we can have a decision ASAP.

	28-12-2002 12:14									#72
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I also support settling East Coast first. It has much more growth potential, and I wouldn't like it to be even spotted while empty (we can force other teams not to explore within our territory)

EDIT : Sharpe, I think the Roleplayers didn't want to lose any turn before building their settler. We had some lag between Legopolis reaching pop 3 and the settler being produced. They didn't.
I think they simply have a cattle in the extended radius of Madrid (as they didn't get to pop 3 as fast as us). They might have irrigated it, but we must keep in mind that we chose not to produce the settler as fast as we could, by producing 3rd warrior.

Last edited by Spiffor on 28-12-2002 at 12:20

	28-12-2002 14:00									#73
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Seeing others are mostly in favour of the East Coast scenario, I focused on improving it a bit. I have realized that even though I used to think of the northernmost jungle tile, Sharpe thought about the grassland tile... That is, we are not even sure what place exactly we should build the east coast city on.

Now, what about the northernmost tip of the Howard's Range, just SW of the sea cow? According to my updated calculations, that would be optimal! Great growth due to the sea cow, great production potential, and defense bonus! Plus, such a city would cover a good deal of The Sandbox. We would need just one more "lost/hopeless" city on that hill just south of where Howard currently stands to completely cover our barren lands on the North.

Here is the spreadsheet, updated with the Kloreep's waste and adjusted for the east coast HILL location:



And just to be able to see the difference, here is the same done for the reversed order city placement:



The east coast hill option is almost equal shield-wise to the west hill first scenario (loses by 1 shield only)! Here is the updated XLS file.

	28-12-2002 22:12									#74
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Nice continuing analyses guys!

Actually Vondrack, I was originally thinking like you that the 2nd city site should be on the most northern jungle square; however, with the lack of sites available in the north - it looks like that we should include the cattle in the 2nd city site.

Admittedly I just noticed that my suggested city site would not have the cattle in the original 9 squares, making it useless.

However, Vondrack's hill suggestion would. The only thing I am worried about for that location would be the number of good food sites as a lot of the city would be desert and hills. We would also overlap Legopolis by 2 squares.

Another problem is that only the jungle site would include the dyes in our boundries immediately. However, now that we have a garrison unit in Legopolis, the dyes aren't immediately needed as much, and they will eventually be included in our boundries eventually anyway (baring any unforeseen circumstances)

Despite some weaknesses, I think that probably Vondrack's hill site would be the best location for our eastern city site.

	28-12-2002 23:55									#75
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quote: Originally posted by Sharpe Admittedly I just noticed that my suggested city site would not have the cattle in the original 9 squares, making it useless.

That was my main problem with your suggestion, exactly.

quote: Originally posted by Sharpe However, Vondrack's hill suggestion would. The only thing I am worried about for that location would be the number of good food sites as a lot of the city would be desert and hills. We would also overlap Legopolis by 2 squares.

Well, for the foreseeable future, the city will be using the sea cow plus the tiles south of the hill range (currently four self-sustained/2-food tiles, one more after we clear the jungle), maybe occasionally using one hill. When the time comes and we need more workable tiles... there is almost one high-food (grassland) tile per one low-food (desert/hill) tile. That should help us have a very finely balanced city. The overlap covers one hill and one desert - that should not be a problem, as these tiles get usually worked last.

quote: Originally posted by Sharpe Another problem is that only the jungle site would include the dyes in our boundries immediately. However, now that we have a garrison unit in Legopolis, the dyes aren't immediately needed as much, and they will eventually be included in our boundries eventually anyway (baring any unforeseen circumstances)

I agree - since we are going for expansion right now, the military police should be all we'll need to keep our population content. Having the sea cow inside the inner ring of our second city seems to be crucial (I was not realizing this very well before... but it really is very important, as we will effectively have two high-growth high-production cities).

quote: Originally posted by Sharpe Despite some weaknesses, I think that probably Vondrack's hill site would be the best location for our eastern city site.

Unless Jack appears and plays our turn in a different way, I will start moving our escorted settler to the hill location below the sea cow. This is a major change to what I previously announced I would do - but my tables show (at least I believe they do) it is the right thing to do. The warriors will move as described, Howard SW, Conan SE.

	29-12-2002 00:23									#76
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As it is we are 17 hours into our turn thanks to Trip's usual late night playing (wonder if he is doing that deliberately - well at least he isn't bragging about his fast play anymore!), so unless Jack shows up soon, you will have to play the 3150bc turn.

Agreed on the exploration pattern - too bad we don't have an extra unit to explore southwest of Conan, as there could be extra land there (mostly jungle admittedly).

I am worried about the slowness of our turns - isn't entirely our fault thanks to the fact that Trip sends the file when most of us are sleeping grrrr! With that timecounter the others may start to complain about it unfortunately.

I have been recording the length of turns since 3950bc using the times in the Game Save thread but I have no plans to release this info to the general forum.

Legoland about 128 hours to 3200bc (15 turns)
Lux Invicta about 129 hours to 3150bc (16 turns)
Roleplayers about 83 hours to 3150bc
NeuDemogyptica about 80 hours to 3150bc
Glory of War about 77 hours to 3150bc
Gathering Storm about 55 hours to 3150bc
Vox Controli about 36 hours to 3150bc

Admittedly Lux has had 3 or 4 times where they didn't post when they finished their turn meaning that Lux and us have estimates for those turns.

Last edited by Sharpe on 29-12-2002 at 00:32

	29-12-2002 00:42									#77
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quote: Originally posted by Sharpe As it is we are 17 hours into our turn thanks to Trip's usual late night playing (wonder if he is doing that deliberately - well at least he isn't bragging about his fast play anymore!), so unless Jack shows up soon, you will have to play the 3150bc turn.

I think it is only 13 hours, not 17 (the savegame arrived at my mailbox at 6:46 GMT and it is now 19:46 GMT...). The bad news is that I will have to stay up late for the 18 hour breaktime - once I go to bed today, I would be unlikely to wake up early enough to play the turn within our 24-hour time-frame, should Jack not have played it before... sigh...

	29-12-2002 00:47									#78
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Sorry, of course you are right only 13 hours so far. Guess I am so used to reading my Apolyton times as GMT as I do on the computer at work, while my home computer is EST.

	29-12-2002 02:53									#79
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Hi!

I'm back (a little earlier) from my Xmas trip and will be around for a few days.

I think that in the lights of the new info we have, the new location proposed by Vondrack is a good one. Actually a very good one for a few centuries and later, when it comes to work the desert tiles, a moderately good one. It'll have shores, a sea-cow, bonus-grassland, wow! I like it!

I think the worker should move and build a road on the grasslands in the direction of the new city (name?) and later on mines (after connecting the 2 cities).

For Legopolis I agree with the Merc-Settler-Merc build queue for now. We should build a second worker in the near future, too.

	29-12-2002 03:05									#80
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Welcome back, Tibi!

I have just updated the Chronicle thread according to the save I got from Jack. It's getting late here and I still need to do something business-related today, so I will not comment in details right now.

Just one quick note... is there anyone else surprised to see our settler with no escort?

	29-12-2002 03:24									#81
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Radek, it's Saturday evening and you're working ?! Take a break, man! Have a wine, relax and browse a little (like myself )

Well, first of all, an escort for the settler wouldn't have hurt. It is better to lose some production or money to the barbarians than a settler, IMHO. Other than possible barbs, I don't think that there are other dangers in the area.

Next, I hope we will change the building order in Legopolis from settler to a Mercenary soon.

Cowa...ahhh, sorry, Howard (nick names and old habbits die hard ) should move toward the istmus, methinks.

I was a little surpised that Conan went west instead of the SE hill, so I hope he will move south next turn (on the mountain) and then probably east-SE to explore the southern jungle and see if it's possible to "walk" in the direction of the roleplayers.

That's it, for a first look.

	29-12-2002 03:48									#82
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I should have noted what my city sites were. The east coast city was on the hill SW of the seacow; the site vondrack's suggested.

A city S of the seacow would work as well; it has the same shield corruption (loses one production shield starting at three shields gathered) and has the cow in its first ring; this site would also have a dye in its second ring. But I'd prefer SW; it has more protection, and S would still require a temple to reach the dye - expensive for us non-religious types.

	31-12-2002 19:59									#83
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OK, the Chronicle has been updated with the 3100BC entry. I am happy to see that everything is now just the way it should be. There are two things I would like to mention:

1) The new hut: this is good news, but I would not pop it until we found our second city (to allow for a settler to be popped from the hut) and discover Pottery (to improve - by temporarily setting our research to one of the two cheapest unknown techs, Mysticism & Wheel - our chances of getting a beaker-costly tech from the hut, should we get triple lucky...). This suggests that Conan moves south in 3050BC and then perhaps southwest in 3000BC, popping the hut only in 2950BC, after we build our second city.

2) Legopolis National Guard: since we sent our settler unescorted, I believe we should now make the best use of the idle National Guard in Legopolis. Aside from guarding the city from barbarian raids, the warrior over there is quite useless. Considering the area we can "see", I believe it would be perfectly ok to send N.G. (what about calling him Angus? Like N.G. --> Angie --> Angus) to do some exploration? I would start with sending him to climb the Poor Twin (the northern one of the Twin Peaks), as he can get there in one turn, possibly revealing a good deal of the jungle in that direction. Should barbs or someone else show up, he would be close enough to come back and take care of the Legopolis defense in time.

There is also another possibility that prefers making our settler safe from a possible barbarian attack. I am a bit worried about the possibility of our Settler finishing his turn next to a barbarian village (which could happen if a barb village emerged on the sea-cow tile). By moving Howard East and South-East (order does not matter), we would be able to prevent that from happening, as Howard would be able to check whether there is a barb village there or not, prior to our Settler moving to the site of our second city. Howard could then continue southwards, exploring the jungle beyond the Dyes. Angus could take over Howard's current assignment of securing the isthmus. He would be there one turn later and would make Legopolis vulnerable to outside attacks for a certain period of time, but I would consider this a safer way of handling our current situation - as the production in Legopolis can be switched to a Warrior, should we run into an emergency situation.

	31-12-2002 22:22									#84
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Vondrack: Both of those plans look great. However, as a note, I don't think we'll ever get a settler out of the hut, as we look to be the 1st or 2nd to found a second city. If I understand the way the system works, you have to have below or equal to the average # of cities to get a settler, which we do not qualify for. But, waiting for the technologies is still a very good idea.

I agree that the area around the Twin Peaks needs to be explored, and N.G. seems the best for the job. Howard would do well to run protection for the settler around the sea cow, and Conan can mill around near the hut until the proper time.

	31-12-2002 22:58									#85
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quote: Originally posted by ZargonX Vondrack: Both of those plans look great. However, as a note, I don't think we'll ever get a settler out of the hut, as we look to be the 1st or 2nd to found a second city. If I understand the way the system works, you have to have below or equal to the average # of cities to get a settler, which we do not qualify for. But, waiting for the technologies is still a very good idea.

Very good point. I completely forgot about this. Although I do not think we will be the first ones to found the second city (see the F11 screen - we are listed as second in area...), we will undoubtedly be among the first. Thus, we can forget popping a settler out. This will actually help Conan make less "pointless" moves... he shall go southwards once and then pop the hut, if I count right (in 3050BC, Pottery will be 1 turn away, in 3000BC, it will be done, allowing Conan to pop the hut).

quote: Originally posted by ZargonX I agree that the area around the Twin Peaks needs to be explored, and N.G. seems the best for the job. Howard would do well to run protection for the settler around the sea cow, and Conan can mill around near the hut until the proper time.

Well, unfortunately, I do not think we can have both. We can either take the risk with our settler, keep moving Howard towards the isthmus, and have Angus look around the Twin Peaks, OR have Angus go to the isthmus and have Howard cover the settler. If we divert Howard towards the settler and use Angus to explore the Twin Peaks area, we would leave the isthmus unguarded. And that is something I would strongly oppose.

	31-12-2002 23:37									#86
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quote: [SIZE=1] Originally posted by vondrack [/SIZE Well, unfortunately, I do not think we can have both. We can either take the risk with our settler, keep moving Howard towards the isthmus, and have Angus look around the Twin Peaks, OR have Angus go to the isthmus and have Howard cover the settler. If we divert Howard towards the settler and use Angus to explore the Twin Peaks area, we would leave the isthmus unguarded. And that is something I would strongly oppose.

Yes, yes, very true. I overlooked that aspect of things. Well, given that situation, I would suggest moving Howard over to cover the settler, and postponing Angus' exploration long enough to get the city settled safely, at which point Howard could move south-easterly through the jungle, and Angus would be available to cover the isthmus as Conan continues south.

	01-01-2003 00:15									#87
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quote: Originally posted by ZargonX Yes, yes, very true. I overlooked that aspect of things. Well, given that situation, I would suggest moving Howard over to cover the settler, and postponing Angus' exploration long enough to get the city settled safely, at which point Howard could move south-easterly through the jungle, and Angus would be available to cover the isthmus as Conan continues south.

As much as I dislike every turn we leave the isthmus with no guard, I believe this is currently the safest way.

Actually, thinking this over again, there may be one better way to do it. Once Howard moves SE+E to the easternmost hill beyond The Sandbox checking it's safe for the Settler to move onto the hill SW of the sea-cow, he may turn back, reaching the isthmus site in the same five turns (W+W+SW+W+W) Angus would need to get there (NW+NW+NW+NW+NW). Angus would wait for the first two turns and then set out exploring the Twin Peaks area (and later the southeastern jungle), being able to cover the capital long enough to allow the Merc to be completed (note: the Merc will take not 9, but 7 turns from now, thanks to the pop growth in Legopolis).

Following this plan, we would have our isthmus guard (Howard) in position in 7 turns, plus we would be able to ensure we do not lose our settler to barbarians, plus we'd have Angus start exploring the Twin Peaks area in three turns from now. Anyone having a better plan?

	01-01-2003 01:08									#88
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Sounds good.

	01-01-2003 02:57									#89
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Well, I just got the GoW minimap, and have passed it along to Vondrack. Looking at it, things are not quite as we thought. But, I'll wait until V posts it before discussing it further.

	01-01-2003 03:20									#90
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quote: Originally posted by ZargonX Well, I just got the GoW minimap, and have passed it along to Vondrack. Looking at it, things are not quite as we thought. But, I'll wait until V posts it before discussing it further.

OK, here is the minimap Zargon received from GoW:



And here is a merged minimap comprising all the minimaps we know:



Looking at the minimap merge, I believe we should change our plans quite a bit. As we now know there are not RPers, nor GoW behind the isthmus (and we can guess that it's not ND, nor Luxes either - as these two reportedly had contact, while GoW has a contact with ND, putting all of them on the "other" landmass), we may expect Voxes or GS. I would be afraid especially of GS - they are known warmongers and their starting position was far from favourable (judging from their current score). It may be tempting for them to try stomping upon us (triggering our GA at the least appropriate time).

Thus, here is what I would do:

1) immediately send Angus to the isthmus site. The sooner he gets there, the better.
2) have Howard cover the Settler, later continuing southwards along the east coast, looking for a route to RPers.
3) change the Legopolis production to Warrior, to have our capital at least lightly guarded. A Merc would follow only then, with a Settler coming next.

This should delay our second Settler production by not more than two turns (2x5 shields = 10 shields for the warrior), making us as safe as we can currently be.

Also, Map Making should be our priority now, as it seems quite likely we are on our landmass either alone or with one other civ.