I was on a long winning streak on Noble mode, when I decided to try being Philosophical and Organized for a new strategy I was contemplating.

I started off on a fair sized continent with Washington and Montezuma. Montezuma was acting freaking crazy the whole game, and Washington was waaay behind on tech. I worked/chopped, so I was ahead of the three. Then all a sudden Montezuma is threatening me one turn, and I dont give him tribute. A few turns later he declares war on the Amercians, and instantly asks me for support. I decided to join in, for the following reasons:

1) I was going to expand at somebody else's expense anyway

2) Might as well make a war buddy out of Montezuma

3) Washington is weak and will be killed off anyway...might as well make sure Montezuma doesnt get ALL that land and then try to push me around some more.

So I go ahead and ally with Montezuma against Washington.

I have only enough time to assemble an offensive army on his border when Montezuma randomly declares war on ME. His ALLY. What the hell?

So I pull back, and decide to deal with Washington later because he is the smaller threat, and I am mad at Montezuma and I decide he is crazy and not to be trusted, so I will kill him now.

They are both on my eastern border, so I end up taking two Aztec cities and 2 American cities before they start asking for peace. Barbarians have started attacking my western border, and I can see black lines, but that is ok I will send my leftover army after the war to come deal with them.

However the AI is stubborn and wont give me the kind of peace terms I want, meaning no technology. I see Monty only has 4 cities left in his trading screen anyway, so I decide to take one or two more to see if that will make him more aggreeable.

I make peace with Washington for now.

Suddenly, waves upon waves of Horse Archers come rolling over me.

How did Monty suddenly get an army? How did he get the resources FOR an army, all his cities are around tundra! Ahh, the mysteries of the universe.

I start building spearmen to counter them, but they come too slow and the horsemen are too fast...and they destroy my Axemen and Swordsmen army.

Monty eventually razes the two cities I got from the Americans, and takes his 2 cities back. I am still not quite sure how he suddenly got the army to do this, but I fight on because I am PISSED.

Suddenly, the barbarians send over an archer to come and attack my city, guarded by my own archer with THREE RANKS of City Defender, and WINS. I lose maybe my 3rd best city.

I defeat the Aztec swarms a few times, but I cant gain any ground and it is a stalemate, and now I am behind in techs vs the other civs, and probably no longer in a position to win the game. Not even my UU, Cho ko Nu crossbowmen do me any good.

I concede.

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I am certain the AI had to have cheated, but I thought that it didnt cheat on Noble difficulty?

And to think, BEFORE the wars began I had a score of around 1100, Monty had about 600, George about 350.

I think the point is not wondering whether the AI cheated but rather you should have built at least a few spearman to counter the horsemen.

Also the score's got nothing to do with military power. ;)

I think the point is not wondering whether the AI cheated but rather you should have built at least a few spearman to counter the horsemen.

Also the score's got nothing to do with military power. ;)

The thing is though, he only had 4 cities left and if he HAD an army, it was sitting somewhere I couldnt see for the entire war to that point....then all a sudden he gets a huge army of horse archers...