RBD5 Succession Game - French Musketeer Artillery Variant

Artillery. BOOM? I've not been using that element effectively at all.
So what to do when I'm lousy at something? Force myself to use it
I've been wanting to do this since seeing how some other folks were using
artillery to great effect in a succsion game, but Sirian's "Infantry" game
prompted some of the specifics of the 'extra rules' here. (The game play is
envisioned as quite different, I just wanted to have an artillery focus game
where Musketeers play a key role)

Basic premise: No city may be taken without the direct support of artillery.

Civilization? What is needed for the catapult? Alphabet and Masonry to reach
Mathematics. Who starts with those? Commercial industrious. Ah, the French.
Some would find it appropriate that the French play a game in which they are
scared for their infantry to fight without first have their foes softened up,
but I leave such judgements to the reader. The workers extra speed will help
make roads, which are required to move artillery in rough terrain.

French? Well there's a UU I've never used, even in my two French games! This
must be corrected too. Simple: for Cannons and later, a Musketeer is required
to operate and coordinate fire! Plus what better companion for these vulnerable
units than these Musketeers. While we're at it, might as well let Paratroopers
(the other worthless unit) have a special role.

Game parameters: Large Map, Continents with large land mass, 3 billion, warm, arid.
Leader: Not Joan this time but D'Artagnan (one of the musketeers, along with Athos,
Porthos and Aramis) to set the tone. He names the first three cities after his friends :P
Civ: French, # of opponents: only 6, (not max 11, to be sure to get to muskets
before all the fighting was done). Barbarians are restless. Opponents were chosen
to have UU of same era or same strength: Japan, Rome, Russia, India, Greece, and Persia.
Difficulty: Monarch (due to the added self-restrictions)
Victory conditions: Diplomacy, Cultural, Conquest. (No space or domination)

Turns: 40-30-25-20-15 then 10 for each turn. #players: 5 would be good, +/- ok.
(These long turns in first round due to size of map, and the first turn in
particular to found 3 musketeer cities. We may need to adjust those.)

Normal rules:
- No reload
- No automation of workers
- 24hrs to post "Got it" or "Pass", and 48 hrs to post new zipped save file
- Use 'Save', not 'Autosave' to recover from crash until Autosave bug is fixed

*** Extra rules ***
- No city may be attacked on any round until artillery support has fired on the
town (catapult, cannon, artillery, radar artillery, cruise missile or any bombardment)
- The only exception is that Paratroopers do not require artillery support.
- Paratroopers are suggested to be made and used, and should pillage key supply
lines and special resources as a key part of their mission.
- Cities need artillery garrisons. For a captured city, one artillery unit must
remain as garrison. For a built city, an artillery unit should be produced or
imported (AFTER that city builds/gets an infantry defender)
- For cannon, artillery, radar art, a Musketman is required in the same square
to operate the equipment. (This goes for city garrison as well)
- Note that a Marine attacking a city after naval bombardment is another
option opened up nicely ;P

A side effect of these rules is that we won't get to crush the AI in massive
blitzreigs due to the artillery movement speed (further making paratrooper
deployment behind enemy lines more useful).

ROSTER (in order:)
Charis
Jaffa
Sirian (unless he's got too many irons in the fire already ;p)
Ionpure
Zed
Cy (?? pencil'd in, let me know)
(If any slots open up or if some listed as tentative can't make it, I'll post the opening)

So Jaffa, you're up. I had to guess on right length of 2nd turn,
so close it out after 25 or 30 turns as seems appropriate to you.

Charis
http://www.network54.com/Hide/Forum/60822 - Realms Beyond Diablo

PS I think the patch changed the paratrooper range to 6, up from 4. Nice?

PPS I wonder if Helicopters can carry artillery? (Airlift)

RBD5 Succession Game - French Musketeer Artillery, Round 1, Turn 1

4000 BC (1) - We start on a river, with a goody hut and two cattle nearby. Perfect! :goodjob:
The worker hit the hut for maps (ew). We see moving one spot puts us on a nice
defensive hill, on the coast, and in range of wheat, fish and game too (wow!)
Poor hut, but great site.

3950 BC (2) - The French Musketeer civilization starts with the founding of
Athos. With a site like this we can crank out lots of settler units (or gambit
and go for Pyramids.) Have to irrigate the Plains next to the city to bring water
to irrigate the wheat.

3750 BC (6) - A portly but adventurous man, Jacques Pierre, is trained as a Warrior
and sent out to explore.

3550 BC (10) - His brother, Jean Paul, also decides to become an exploring warrior.
Mathematics is being investigated in the meantime. Jacques and Jean wish to never
face a full strength opponent!

3350 BC (14) - Jacques sees a goody hut and game to the north, and another river.
3250 BC (16) - A tribe at the hut teaches us pottery.

3150 BC (18) - Settler pops out, heads to a narrow land bridge to east. (An ideal
location for a Port city named Porthos which will allow us North-South passage there)

3000 BC (21) - Angry jute tribes disturbed (eep) from one hut and from another,
Ceremonial Burial. Next turn (2950), fortunately, the barbarians turn Jean Paul into
an elite fighting machine. News of this spurs their brother, Pierre Olivier,
to take up warrior training. So in 2950, Porthos is founded.

2750 BC (25) - Several quiet turns of exploring and growing. Considered a temple start
at Athos, but wanted to get one more Settler out first to finish the Three Musketeer
theme. A Temple will let Athos grow nicely to a more profitable size for settler pumping
(maybe even reaching size 6 first, where it can crank= them out almost continuously).
An alternative, a bit of a gambit would be try for quick Pyramids.

Jean Paul has found what may be a 'choke point' of sorts to the SW. East of him is
either the bridge to the other half of the continent, or the end of our 'island'
(too early to tell yet, it might have another bridge just above it).
Jacques is heading North to investigate a river and game area as a potential future
city. Looking at the mini-map, with seven civilizations total, we're likely many many
turns and 1.5 to 2 screens away from contact with our first neighbor. Future leaders
will have to decide how much land we want to grab, and settle in, or to try for a
more consolidated start (perhaps going for a wonder asap).

(Note to self: this is 25 turn mark, could stop here, but with this large and sparse a
map, I'm going to press on to found our third city)

2710, 2670, 2630, 2590, 2550 BC (30) - 25 gold from hut (bah)
2470 BC (32) - Hut to river above gives a skilled warrior (well, not SO skilled)
2430 BC (33) - First moving barbarian attacks the elite Jean Paul (bad choice).
2390 BC (34) - Hmmm... two decent choices seen for our next city Aramis, one
on the coast with cattle, the other on hilly rivers. Other squares near cattle
are poor, so lets get good production in river hill zone.

2350 BC (35) - Temple chosen next for Porthos to let it expand boundaries quickly.
When it reaches 38 or 39 shields needed, might want to whip just once.
2310, 2270 BC (37) - Ah furs sighted over the hill. In fact, three! We can
ensnare all 3 in our boundaries, or 2 and some game and forest. I pick the latter.

2190 BC (39) - Aramis founded on a hill with TWO rivers on its square, game and 2 fur
near. A temple is started there - may want to whip when it needs 39 to finish (?)

2150 BC (40) - Last turn. Barbarian camp spotted.

Lots of options available for the next leader, and a lot of exploration to do.
Keep in mind as soon as Mathematics is researched, the variant rules require
us to build or get a catapult in each city as soon as possible (queue'ing is ok
rather than having to switch production unwisely).

I leave the city founding plan to more capable hands, but wish luck to Jaffa and those following :goodjob:

Charis

Ah, reusing the RBD1/2 players? Ok, but I may have to skip my first turn or 2 until the Mother Russia game winds up. I'm already going in Sirian's Infantry game, as well as RBD4, so I may be a bit overcommitted right now, will let you know. Keep me in tentatively, but be aware I may have to bow out.

0) 2150BC Science rate turned down a notch to save 2 gold! Yippee!

1) 2110BC Athos size 3. Our brave explorers find ... nothing. With the discovery of mathematics, our military strategists realise the potential defensive abilities of devices throwing large rocks onto the heads of attackers, and demand these be constructed in all French cities. Research into writing begins.

2) 2070BC Our lone worker completes the road from Athos to Porthos, starts on road to Aramis via hill picked for next city. Explorer finds rich grasslands with cattle to north. 25 gold from barbarian camp. Endless jungles to east. Athos finishes temple, starts catapult.

4) 1990BC Find the edge of the purple culture to north (India, presumably).

5) 1950BC Athos finishes catapult, starts on a settler.

6) 1910BC Contact with Indians. Indians have bronze working and warrior code. Hmmm. Buy an Indian worker for 25 gold.

7) 1870BC Exploring warrior reaches the other side of endless jungles. Gems spotted in mountains. Our warrior spends too long in Indian territory and they become annoyed. Ooops :P

9) 1790BC Rich wheatfields on far side of endless jungle. Athos finishes settler, starts Pyramids.

12) 1700BC Paris founded.

13) 1675BC Porthos completes temple, starts catapult.

17) 1575BC Goody hut produces three barbarian warriors! Ack! 25 gold from barbarian camp. Regular warrior becomes elite defending against the three barbarians.

19) 1525BC Institute 10% luxury tax to deal with unrest in Athos (ooops). Whip temple in Aramis -- need to get furs on line. Porthos finishes its catapult.

21) 1475BC Worthless map from goody hut. Paris gets its catapult.

22) 1450BC Porthos produces a warrior to go to Athos, starts on worker.

23) 1425BC Finish writing, start mysticism (to have Oracle available if we miss Pyramids). Establish embassy in Delhi.

Only 25 turns since I need to get to bed :)

We've done lots of exploring. Now need to go and settle some.

Be careful with Athos - it's on the edge of unrest.

:beer:

Researched Mysticism, Bronze Working, Iron Working. Set up the Wheel for next project.

On my first turn, the elite warrior on the plains in the south was attacked and slaughtered by a barbarian horseman, doing no damage in return. There went half my long range scouting force.

Set new labor group from Porthos to chopping down forests.

Increased food output at Athos without lowering shields.

Mined grassland with worker near Aramis, then began a road to the de Winter estate in the hills. Yes yes, I know she's an awful deceitful woman, but I will try to woo her into supporting the French crown.

Paris decides "screw work, let's eat!" and increases food output. There's a lot of, erm, business going on there now and we expect the population to swell quickly.

Sent the settler from Porthos (their, uh, travois construction effort aided by chopping down the forest, us not having wheels yet, we can't exactly build wagons) eastward, into the forest, to search for Robin Hood and His Merry Men. (Oops! :eek: Wrong story!)

Athos swells in size, and swells some more. The whole city is busy busy busy building huge stone pyramids.

Settler from Porthos persuades Cardinal Richelieu to support the French crown, and not to be left out, Lady de Winter then throws her, uh, corset into the ring as well. A celebration is held at the planned site of the great iron mine to be built in the north, wherein the Musketeers (why they are called that, with their stone axes, is not yet known) gather and chant "One for All!"

The complete lack of goody huts in the south is disconcerting, but we have not made contact with anybody new yet.

Pyramids completed, and Milady de Winter demands a huge bronze statue be built to commerorate her beauty, and not wanting to get onto her bad side, the Musketeers comply. A new great project is underway in Athos.

Uh... there are barbarians coming up from the south. We had to roll out our Royal Catapults from Athos to prevent them from reaching the farmlands, and also send out our warriors to finish off the battered remnants and temporarily increase luxuries as a result. This incursion was easily repelled, but future problems of this nature are sure to plague the next leader, as I took no action to remove the threat. Beware.

Milady de Winter is bold and brassy, mean and sassy, and the Musketeers fear that unless she is given special attention on a continuous basis, that she may betray us to the Indians. Consider yourself warned!

Did not use up movement for the new settler from Aramis, so that the next leader may decide best what to do with them.


- Sirian

Sorry .... I don't have any free minute until saturday afternoon :( ... please decide if you want to skip me or if you want to wait until than :confused:

Ionpure, no problem. The rules for this game are to keep the ball rolling as much as possible, so we'll bump it along to Zed. Since it's first round, we'll try to switch you and he in the order. (If Zed can't take, Cy, hop right in)

We look to be in good shape. Colossus is a good bet to finish. Being commercial that might kick off a Golden Age -- if so that city can go straight for next wonder (Great Lib or Lighthouse). A little early, but we'll take it if it comes. Hopefully we can hem the Indians in and avoid trading folks communication with them. (Keep them in the dark principle ;p) The settler yet to move might help plug that gap, or you may have a better use.

Good luck,
Charis

According to Civ Fanatics info page, Colossus is Expansionist & Religious, so no worries there. Even if it were commerical, we need to build both a Industious and a Commercial wonder in order to kick off a Golden Age.

Check out this page (http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3infocenter.shtml#wonders) for more info...

I have already booked RBD4 for tonight, but I could potentially play tomorrow. Cy, please go ahead of me for this round.

Alrighty... Cy, if you're around, gogogo :P

Expansionist??? A wonder that sits still and produces one
extra commerce on most squares?? Hmmm.... ok, a later
GA is better. BTW, we *have* build and industrious wonder
already, the Pyramids, so a Commercial one could trigger.

:D
Charis

erm, got it. gonna get me a giant coke and try to read the backstory and get in the swing of things.

i had a really bad day personally, but i'll try to get it going.

really.

sigh.

--cy

Hey all. Just couldn’t get interested last night, but I have today off, so here is the next installment.

Overlooked by the scribes of previous rulers was the assimilation by glorious France of the peculiar tribe of the snail. In the year 750, their leader decided that France needed his own particular brand of leadership, and, in a bloodless but painful coup (involving lots of hot garlic butter), assumed the seat of power, and declared himself Despot Cy_Escargot petit-gris.

Upon looking at the map, he briefly considered slithering off into the night with his tail in his shell. Sacre bleu! We have no military! Why has India not already put us to the sword? I sent an emissary to chat with Ghandi and pay my respects. Snicker. No wonder they have not put us to the sword—they do not know what a sword IS! What a backwards folk. I put my tail back out of my shell, and instructed my advisors as to the future of our people.

(1) I sent a settlement party north to found a new city to help create a border against Indian ignorance.
(2) I sent a war party south to seek out the root of the barbarian insurrection and to show them the awesome power of the mighty French catapult.
(3) While my advisors counseled building up our military before India overwhelmed us, I chose a different, less sane course of action. While I would build a few more defensive units (and more glorious catapults, of course!), and see to the establishment of barracks in crucial spots, I would rely more on keeping India backwards than in a military buildup, and attempt to use this time to build infrastructure and establish our southern border.

690. Barbarian horsemen from the south attack our war party. The power of the French catapult destroys them.

650. An Indian warrior is found wandering to our south. Tabernac! They are out!

630. Our scientists perfect the wheel and advise us to seek out horses. Despite preferring to produce slime and crawl on my belly, I follow their advice and instruct the people to look for horses. They are found running wild through the very streets of Paris itself! Quelle bizarre! There are also reports of herds of wild horses near where our new city is due to be founded. In the south, yet more barbarians assault our war party. This time, the Indian warrior is in sight range when our glorious catapult assures victory. He is so astounded by our science that he freezes to the spot, never to move again (?). I start a settler south with a warrior to found a southern gateway city. A people known as the Greeks are rumored to have completed something known as an Oracle. Bah! Our Pyramids dwarf such undertakings. Besides, if the Greeks need a database to keep up with a pitiful ancient age civ, their brains will explode in the modern age.

610. The port city of Orleans is founded in the north. And there was much rejoicing 8-).

590. The Irresponsible Indians start construction of the Colossus. What a silly people. We will be done long before them. Still, it would be wise to remember that they will have shields saved up…

550. Contact with the Romans! Our southern explorer has finally found another great people! At an absurd distance, too. At this point Cy_Escargot petit-gris has a crisis of confidence and strategy. He slimed up the floors, walls, and yes, even the ceiling of the great palace with his, erm, “pacing.” The Romans have more techs than us, but not math. They also have communications with all but one of the remaining civs. What to do? I do not want to tech trade with the AI. But I also don’t want to give them communications with the Indians. Once India can trade with them, our tech lead over them will be gone, and they will roll up our undefended nation and turn us into Gibelotte. Yet the only way to avoid both is to do nothing with the contact, and the entire point of sending a warrior off on a 50 turn exploration is to USE the contact to our advantage somehow. After much sliming, I decide to keep India in the dark a few more turns and to blow our current (I was about to say “temporary”, but that is a judgment based on Emp diff not Monarch diff) one-tech advance over the Romans to meet some people and make some deals. I won’t detail each trade or the number of times around the circle it took, but, in the aftermath of brokerage turn from hell, our net loss is math, our net gain is contact with Rome (duh), Japan, Greece, and Russia; warrior code, mysticism, map making, and philosophy; and a gain in gold (which was good as I am running a deficit to get to Literature).

530. Bring Ivory on line. And there was much rejoicing 8-).

510. Colossus completed, kicking off a golden age. Production shifted to Lighthouse as a placeholder for Great Library.

490-450. Somewhere in here I finally tracked down the barb settlement, and, after a strong attack by our mighty catapult, razed it. End notes to follow.

I quit after 15 turns because it “felt” right. I had enough time to get some things done, but was about to have to make some big decisions that would hve a large impact on our civ. I wanted new blood to place the next two cities and to allocate precious production during our early GA.

Notes: Literature comes in next turn. Athos can be either switched over to the Library wonder, or can just make up all the improvements that have come in since it went into wonder generation. India is still isolated, and still does not have ironworking. When they get that, we’re going to have to bulk up our military at once or get mauled. All the other civs I have contact with have map making, so expect to see galleys sniffing around real soon. If they head north up our coast, don’t forget to sell communication with India to them all and communication to them with India for as much as we can get before they meet. The settler should reach my choice for our southernmost city in 1 turn. It is a harbor on a hill on fresh water on a choke point, but the land is poor and it is a pretty good ways south. I like the city location, and it will keep the barbs off our rears, but if I had a “do-over” I’d have used this settler up north and one of the ones about to come online down here. To recall him now would cost longer in movement than to produce a new settler, though. C’est la vie. It will need two cities to link up well with our northern cities, one west of Athos and one south down the peninsula, but that is probably not a priority right now. I have a couple of units on the way to 2 possible city spots to help keep this area in our “vision” and not allow any more barb villages to spawn. We need to be able to swing our entire military force east to hold off India without southern distractions. There are two settlers coming online. Paris will produce in 1 turn and Aramis in 7. India is starting to sniff around with settler pairs—we need to control our north asap. There are conspicuous voids east of Orleans and east of All For One. It would also be just like the AI to plop one down in the hole between Milady and Orleans, but if they do that they’ll lose it to culture eventually. Until then, it would be a real pita, though, giving them a jump-off point to Aramis and requiring us to staff Aramis as a “border” city and increase our miltary drain by 1/3. Japan is revealed to be on our continent, but fortunately is still a ways away. Porthos is about to produce a catapult which needs to go to Athos to replace the one sent south with our war party, as that one will stay south with the new city and not return “home”. Oh, and a surmise: since it took India this long to start looking to expand into our territory, I expect they have a considerable amount of land back there…

Good luck to the next leader, you have some work to do 8-).

--Cy

Cy, well done, and glad it was while you were fresh (sorry to hear yesterday was a bummer day)

*** Upload the save file *** :)

Sounds like a good deal with the Romans (minor nit: we already had Mysticism). Recent games have been showing the major advantage of working to keep your isolated neighbor 'in the dark', and definitely a good strat for this game.

So the Colossus did kick off a Golden Age? (Now I'm confused! Could the manual be wrong? Is the Colossus in fact commercial in nature? Can any mod-maker lurkers check this?! :P)

Thanks too for cutting the turn length to what felt right. With each new size/land type those first round turns are a guess.

Glad to see the catapults are wreaking destruction on our foes. In another game I'm using musket-longbow-cat*4 and two man-o-war to siege a city rather than what I would normally send: two musketet and five knights. I was surprised how well it worked. It took four turns to capture, but with no losses, and the city pre-shrunk a bit.

As far as the 'border' gap... where the Indians could sneak in and settle... could that be fixed with a temple rush or if the area is small, occupying it with warriors? (random thought)

Zed -- if you can slip a turn in tonight, you're up. If not til Sat afternoon, then Ionpure would be back. Either way, post "got it" or "bump" :)

Good job (well, judging from the report anyway)
Charis

It's very possible that the Colossus is Commercial and the Lighthouse is Expansionist, rather than vice versa, as indicated. Minor documentation bugs happen all the time, and it makes more sense that way...

Err... Cy...

Where's the save game file? :crazyeyes

Ok, we'll try it again...

Well, the last one bombed, here is the third try....

OK, another bomb.

bloody board.

OK ... I am back :) ... will take the turn after Zed :yeah:

Ok, then got it.

Sorry, not an in-character post this time...

430 BC (1): Finished researching Literacy, start Code of Laws. Science reduced to 70%, still done in 5 turns. Milady de Winter needs a Courthouse to remind her of the consequences of defying French Law! Greeks start building Great Library. Athos switches to Great Library, and should beat the Greeks; they ought not to have any shields saved up as they recently built the Oracle. Paris builds settler, starts another.

410 BC (2): Porthos builds catapult for Athos, starts another. Bastogne founded at our southern border; there is an Indian warrior exploring nearby, and a barbarian horseman to our south! Bastogne starts building a temple to seal our border.

390 BC (3): Our warrior fights off the barbarian horseman and retreats to Bastille to heal up. Our 2nd warrior at Bastogne moves out to go exploring. Since the Greeks already have Literature, sold it to the Romans for gold, gold per turn, and Code of Laws. Code of Laws and Literature sold to Japan for gold, gold/turn, Horseback Riding, and their World Map. While it is certainly desirable to keep the backwards Indians out of the loop as much as possible, it seems worthwhile to get their world map for trade with the other civs... we sell them Philosphy and Mysticism (which they can't do anything with) for their map and a pile of gold, plus gold per turn. India doesn't really seem to have much land in their territory, and it's all settled already...

370 BC (4): Various troops move around... We start researching Construction, which will be done in 15 turns.

350 BC (5): Porthos completes catapult, starts worker. Milady de Winter whips a temple!

330 BC (6): Milady de Winter completes temple, starts courthouse. Paris completes settler, starts another. Ville de Balaines founded east of Orleans.

310 - 270 BC: We trade maps with the world (except India); otherwise, nothing much happens. Unfortunately we come out on the losing end of the gold exchange, but it's nothing we can't afford.

250 BC (10): One for All founded east of All for One.


We have a settler about to arrive at city site west of Athos, and Paris is about to produce another settler. Most everyone other than the Indians are building the Great Library. The latter still seem to be isolated in their little peninsula and anything they might settle now won't be close enough to their capital to avoid being culture-flipped. For the moment our military is on par with theirs, although it's certainly worse than that of the most of the rest of the world.

There may be a couple temples ready to be whipped -- the last couple turns I had to rush a bit & wasn't paying attention to every city.

got it :) ... quite late here ... playing tomorrow morning

Looks like good turns, guys. The territory, the earth... it looks pretty nasty. Tons of mountains and jungles. It will take so long to move the artillery the distances involved that our musketeers might not see real action until railroads ;p

We'll want to see the India border sealed before long, glad to see a temple there -- a good whipping candidate. One choice for future leaders will be to enforce our territorial rights -- do we tell India "get out" if they come across our border with a settler. Now if it were Persia that would mean instant war, but I'm thinking Gandhi would back off. They can still sail across i guess, but no need to let them waltz down whereever they like. (With our GA going on I'm not particularly scared if that does end up provoking them.) So I'm hoping a settler push is coming as well, to stake as much territory as we can. With ships coming soon wouldn't want to see our eastern island see one russian and one greek city, for example. That jungle to the south... doesn't seem like a great area to rush too now, but there might be some good resources there. Any iron yet? If not (didnt see any connect) we might want to found on the shore-river spot right next to the iron and get that online soon. We have no offense whatsoever if we do end up fighting India soon. Conversely don't let them get iron under any circumstance :P

It's nice not to start next to Zulus or Persians for once. Don't worry though, we'll have our share of fighting later.

Good luck Ionpure,
Charis

(PS Minor point - could push luxury one to avoid the entertainer in our wonder city)

Bleh .... forum was down all day :(

Very late here ... I still would play, but that girl next to me says "NO", and I don't want to risk any real life bombardments :o

Have to skip my first turn since I am out of town for my job the next two days :(

Hope things work out better in the next round ...

Good luck to you :)

Got it. Just started turn, but wife wants to watch a movie. Will finish this eve and post ;0

Charis

Jean Paul Charis, gunny seargeant who rose to a top rank, is asked to serve
an interim term as despotic leaderJ. Whip in hand, he takes the reins, as
France is in the middle of a Golden Age...

250 BC (0) - JP surveys the realm and finds things . 11 cities, borders forming
to the north, and lots and lots of sprawling jungle to the south. India,
their nearest neighbor, has so far been peaceful and slightly backward.
Athos, he notes, is working on the Great Library, and likely to get it in
about 11 turns (8 after some micromanagement!). Luxuries and science are both
high, but still a surplus. Aramis, with no barracks, is switched from Spearman
to Settler. All-for-one is whipped for its Temple. Ville de Balaines set to
Warrior instead of Spearman (crowd control more than defense, with no rax)
Likewise One-For-All. Richelieu is whipped for a harbor. He's got a worker
and settler to get cracking on!

230 BC (1) - A boat from Porthos sets to explore the surrounding shallow lands.
Paris settler heads for the whale spot, and the Aramis settler to the Hills
river square on the coast next to the iron. Orleans has a temple whipped.
India is strolling through our territory up north, with spearman/settler
pair. I intend to let them go as they can as long as their "nearest square"
in their territory is back on their land, not 'forward' -- this should
result in a half dozen wasted turns for them ;P (or if they declare war,
those units that far forward are toast.) Still, if they're that into
settler mode, they might land somewhere we don't like.

210 BC (2) - Lyons founded on the coast where previous leader sent settler.
This as city#12 triggers the "people want the forbidden palace" message.

190 BC (3) - Much micromanaging, with good results. Centralized Paris sends
its warrior and catapult south, to help quicken our settling/border
management down there.

170 BC (4) - A second Indian settler/spearman pair enter our territory.
Either us or them is due for a surprise in a few more turns.
Jean Paul notices we have **no** barracks in all the land. He wrings
his hands in disbelief. Surely we must have One making for All?!
"No, no, whip me!" cries All For One. With temple already in hand, and
size 3, he offers himself to be whipped. Far South of Bastogne, our
intrepid explorer finds somewhat of an abundance of dies. (More settlers!)
"Bane of Bombay" is founded... as it stares fiercely across the shallow
sea at its sister city. Winter lady not only whips a courthouse, but she
rather enjoys it! (She'll start on Barracks next, as our front line of defense)

150 BC (5) - All For One takes its whipping for the Barracks.

130 BC (6) - Orleans expands borders as the temple kicks in! This "seals"
are Northern border, and makes it good timing to ask/tell the Indians
to "get out!" Do they?? Phew, yes. Back to Madras they go.

110 BC (7) - Construction is learned and currency started. That will bring
us to the Middle ages, and leaves our next governor to pick Monarchy or
Republic (or to stay Despotic a little while longer to whip temples in all
our new towns and get them from the library)

"Sea currents" to the east of our eastern penninsula, and coast visible
within reach. Rheims is founded next to the iron.

90 BC (8) - Tadaa... Great Library is finished, JUST as our Golden Age
finishes. Good timing. Sucre bleau! (sp?) An Indian boat is seen approaching
Bane of Bombay. Our troops in the area try to block their landing! A
settler is close, and hopes to found a city to hook up Bane with Bastogne.
Greeks and Russians start Great Wall, and Rome the Great Lighthouse.
Our dyes explorer runs into a barbarian horsemen, which beats the other
way around. We engage and... win!

Ugh! Our post-GA production rates look torpid!

70 BC (9) - Bastogne is whipped for a temple. Tours is founded on the
eastern Penninsula. Our shore troops shift down to try to further cut
the ship off. Alas, there's ONE spot left can't get to, if he chooses
to land there.

50 BC (10) - The Indians dart down south to avoid the blockade. Perfect!
Stay OUT of our territory, do you hear?? Phew! Our settler is now in
a good spot to settle or the next leader can move as he likes.

Diplomacy status (pretty much neglected during the turn...)
Greeks - tech parity, more cash
Japan - behind, cautious. One nation is yet to be discovered.
Russia, Rome - parity, polite and cautious

The reign of Jean Paul Charis will be seen as the workings of an
imbecile, or something approaching genius, for he did not go middle-of-
the-road. It was pure expansion, leaving cities naked, and using warriors
and workers as sandbags to fend ships away :P If we're attacked soon, he
will be shown to be an imbecile, but if not, we might have salvaged uncontested
growth up to Bastogne. Yet even here diligence is called for!! We must
shore up gaps, founding cities on the right side of the Bastogne passage
(where, now in fog, there may even be barbarians living!) We must settle
the southern part of the eastern penninsula, AND there is seen to be a nice
island to our east which has horses, whales, and wheat. A stake MUST be
claimed, and claimed fast. Jean Paul has hoped that the mere presence
of the mighty artillery units would strike stark fear into the hearts
of the Indians, and has sapped their resolve. After this last 'settle'
phase, whole hog efforts must be made with military, or our gains will
be for naught. (Some nervous folks would take this step first ;p)

There are moves left for the settler and his warrior and catapult friends.
My plan was to keep warriors on coast where they are and continue sandbag,
and move cat, settler, warrior, each one square south, and found the new
city there (one down from where he is now). Likely keep the shoreline
defense in place until one more settler gets down there and "seals" the
area. Otherwise that ship might just return full ;p Sirian, feel
free to look at and analyze the situation!

Roster as it stands at this start of round 2... (10 turns each)
Charis
Jaffa
Sirian
Ionpure (if needed let us know if you need shifting from this slot)
Cy
Zed

Good luck, more fun turns ahead! (Jaffa is up) :goodjob:
Charis

Below is a picture of the shoreline, at 90BC. The warriors were doing there thing building roads, and I had the warrior and cat in town and one square off shore, ready to react. Next turn the ship went south and everyone shifted a square down. I was glad to see that rather than take the one square they could have landed on in 70, they turned South. Smart for them actually, whatever city they found north of Bastogne will with certainty fall to French Artillery and Musketmen!

Analysis: the situation will be placed into Jaffa's capable hands. And thank goodness, because I spent too much time writing up report for RBD3, and need some zzzzzzzzzzzz's.

Nitey nite. :sleep:

The night after the mysterious disappearance of beloved leader Charis, J'fa the Insomniac wandered into the French court in Athos. "Monkey," he muttered, obscurely, "Monkey!" Politely, the French courtiers wined and dined him, and accidentally granted him absolute power over the French nation.

0) 50BC Micromanagement. Retrain entertainer in New Orleans as a tax collector. Take the one citizen in Bastogne and set him to doing some useful work in the fields, instead of his so-called entertainment act (!) The citizen of Rheims is taken off the grassland-with-shield square it shares with Lyons (the shield is just being wasted, anyway) so Lyons can use it. No iron supply has been connected yet? Trade ivory for Indian spices. Trade furs for 120 Indian gold, their pathetic world map, and 2 gold/turn.

Establish embassies. Kyoto is building a courthouse (why?), Rome building worker, Athens building colosseum. Moscow is 15 turns from Great Wall.

Switch Athos, the cultural center of the world :) , to Great Lighthouse (don't see any reason to let the Romans have it). Might get Art of War instead, anyway.

Trade RoP to Japan for their entire treasury (13 gold) and world map. Rome gives 12 gold. Greeks and Russians won't pay.

Indian settler heads SW into fog. Romans start building Great Wall.

1) 30BC Marseilles founded as per plan of beloved leader Charis. Why do we have governor on by default? The Russians have a city on the island with the horses, our galley returns towards Richelieu to pick up forthcoming settler. Whip barracks in Paris.

2) 10BC Start training vet spearman at new barracks in Paris and Milady de Winter. Greeks finish Great Wall in Sparta.

4) 30AD Our warrior exploring south is ambushed and killed by barbarian horsemen.

5) 50AD Iron is connected to our road network. Indian settlers (three teams) encroaching on our territory up by Milady, again.

6) 70AD Whip temple in Lyons. A fourth Indian settler team sneaks into our territory.

7) 90AD Japanese request world map trade. I think not.

8) 110AD We learn about currency, and enter a new era! Swordsman created in Paris.

9) 130AD We request the Indians leave our territory. Fortunately, they fear our catapults (*cough*swordsman*cough*) and do so :) La Bastille penal colony founded on the island.

10) 150AD The French courtiers, realising their terrible mistake, arrange for J'fa to be accidentally locked up in the new penal colony while on an official state visit. "Vive La Republic!" they shout, a little prematurely.

Notes: Indians have not yet contacted the rest of the world. They will eventually. We should try and arrange to sell communications before they do so :) They only seem to have one galley, and it's busy transporting settlers.

Two settlers are heading to likely city sites east of Marseilles, with warriors to meet them.

Consider sending a settler south to grab dyes in the jungle.

You can whip at 40 shields remaining, don't have to wait for 39 :)

And we still need *lots* more military...

Another excellent job, Jaffa :goodjob:

Despite your insomnia you caught several things to change on
turn 0. I knew the iron wasn't connected, and hoped it (and cough swordsmen cough) would be connected soon. It doesn't occur to sell RoP to distant fools yet, good reminder. It looks like one more quiet turn would work very well for us consolidating and switching gears.

Wow Sirian, no kidding on the rbd3 write up! I saw it just as I was going to bed around 2 and didn't have time to read it, so I've got a fresh cup of coffee and will look for a donut to work through it. I may finish by lunch! :crazyeyes:

Charis

The Reign of Siris Louis began with a peaceful restructuring of some projects. Then in the first year of his reign, a settler group to which he had issued orders to found a city near Athos continued moving ON THEIR OWN and poor Louis went simply mad. Mad, I say. In a fit of rage, he decreed that these disobedient, upstart rogues of a band of people should be henceforth sent south into the most barren desert to live. None should so defy the emperor of France and not suffer. So let it be known. The city would indeed be founded where Louis ordered, but after his passing, they did deign to name it in his, uh, "honor", that all should know of his enraged proclamation.

Having been rendered mad, he disbanded all research efforts and demanded that everything (well, except that needed to pay for his favorite luxury goods) be collected in his treasury. He is said to have spent hours at a time just crawling through large piles of gold in the treasury room, cackling gleefully. He was so enamored with the idea of hard currency that he sold the concept to the rest of the world for everything they could afford. Fortunately for France, the scholars at the Great Library soon learned the secrets of Monotheism, from distant Russian and Greek lands, and are expected to remain privy to the breakthroughs of other nations for the being, so Mad King Louis and his coin baths did not quite spell the complete ruination of France, though it sure did entertain the nobles.

Siris Louis (that's pronounced Loo-Ee, for any barbarians in the audience) continued with a frothing reign, whipping courthouses out all across the land, and sending forth a settlement group "in search of tender white filets". Said group located a rich pod of cod off the island coast southwest of La Bastille, and so plunked down there near a native village, which sadly turned out to be abondoned.

All the while Louis and his line were on the throne, Milady de Winter did pretty much as she darn well pleased, and what pleased her most was having lots of strong, handsome young French warriors under her spell. She now has nearly as much army on call as half the rest of France. (Don't piss her off, Okay?)

Cardinal Richelieu, ever mindful to work his machinations behind the scenes, ordered Paris to outfit a number of work parties with the intent of bringing irrigation to the parched lands of the priest's home city (some forests will have to be cut down) and now backed by Monotheism and his devotion to the One Deity, Richelieu set his plan into motion. He also managed to initiate the Royal French Mounted Regiment, which has begun and should continue to train mobile warriors out of the Paris region, for while Milady de Winter assured all of France that she and she alone will protect us all from the Indian threat, Richelieu, being wise in the ways of naval affairs (as befits his home region) is quietly preparing France for the apparently overlooked threat of the Indians invading from the bay, right past our stronghold in the west, to the heart of our land. Only a strong contingent of mounted troops could have the mobility to respond to this sort of threat on so wide a front as spans our western coastlines.

Louis the Mad, so engrossed with his beloved golden coinage, did foolishly sell technologies to India for more coin. His advisors struggled valiantly to dissuade him, but one of their heads on a pike at the palace gate dissuaded THEM from any more dissuading. It is said that Louis would have sold them the entire Great Library, but they ran out of coin to pay, and Louis gives nothing away for free. Nothing! (The nobles were even forced to pay for the "privelege" of the Royal Fartings whenever Louis was a guest at dinner in their mansions. A Four-Crowns Gassing :eek: could be grist for the gossip mill for an entire season).

When it was suggested to Louis that France might PAY its citizens rather than whip them to labors, the poor scholar so suggesting was gutted and stuffed with gold coins and mounted over the fireplace in the Emperor's Own Personal Treasury (aka, the treasury of France). Science became an out-of-favor profession, and even the Librarians kept a low profile, lest the Mad One decide the Great Library was too costly to maintain and shut it down. The army certainly also postponed their planned request for military pay. Postponed, locked away, and forgot all about it. For everyone knows that all of France lives to enrich the royal treasury! Right? :rolleyes:

Well that's about it. Finally, the Mad One and his line passed away, (too greedy, in the end, to trust wives not to spend too much of the Personal Treasure on frills). Some have said that, ironically, the Mad One's greed may have been to the good of France in some regards. The Great Library kept us up to date on knowledge while we conserved our own funds. What use such a grand wonder of information if we ignore it to do our own research? Wasn't the reason we built such a thing, that we not need to spend so much on science, but reap the rewards of information gathered from all parts of the world?

The Great Lighthouse is almost complete. France still needs more military, and Louis did nothing about trying to get a settlement going down into the jungles, to secure precious dyes. He always scoffed and said "Plenty of time for that later. I must first recount my treasury." Some disagreed with him, and say it truly was vengeful foolishness to send those settlers into the desert instead of the jungle, but no one dared question the Mad One.

The next leader finds much work to be done in France.


- Sirian

Originally posted by Sirian
The Reign of Siris Louis began with a peaceful restructuring of some projects. Then in the first year of his reign, a settler group to which he had issued orders to found a city near Athos continued moving ON THEIR OWN and poor Louis went simply mad. Mad, I say. In a fit of rage, he decreed that these disobedient, upstart rogues of a band of people should be henceforth sent south into the most barren desert to live. None should so defy the emperor of France and not suffer. So let it be known. The city would indeed be founded where Louis ordered, but after his passing, they did deign to name it in his, uh, "honor", that all should know of his enraged proclamation.

Ummm. Is this all dramatic licence, or did I mess up with picking city sites?

Note to self: got to get me one of those graphics programs for my gaming computer, so I can get screenshots and do the proper dot-map thingy :)

Corruption is already plaguing us pretty harshly, for a large map. We've got a lot of cities, but only one is actually running strong. I thought it would be best to use those two settlers I inherited as close to our capital as possible, but I find to my dismay that they were on auto (goto) and moved past one of the sites I would have used. Arrgh. :) Rather than turn one around, I just sent him on to the third site in the area. Not an indictment of your site choices, just dramatic license and a little bit of grumbling about use of "goto".

Goto is somewhat like automating workers. It is an automation of orders. That the AI gives the workers such dopey orders is the main problem with that, but also there is no way to intervene in those orders or even to know who is or isn't on automation. I've ended my turn a few times with a unit or two on goto, but I try to warn the next player. Usually, instead, I just explain what I was intending and let them handle it or veto. Lately in my RBD turns (and after following any number of players, who have all been increasingly doing this) I am finding more and more units with inherited orders. I think that's a negative trend, and this was just the rant. Don't mind me too much. You know how it is. :)

The desert spot is one I believe we want anyway, and having decided not to turn anybody around, I settled in the next two available sites. (If you planned for one of those settlers to go all the way to the dyes, they should have been on the road -- or did Goto take them off the road?) We've done a lot of expanding, and should not fail to secure those dyes and most of that swamp area, but we are also overextended, and all of us seem to have played a wee bit loose with the "foot soldier and artillery piece in every city" rule. I think that rule needs some clarification, or more definition. Should it be a hard rule? As in, these units never ever leave the cities? If not, then under what conditions is it OK to send them elsewhere, and how long can they be away, and if they aren't coming back, how and when must they be replaced? We have way too many nonvet warriors running around. They're almost all going to need to be replaced with better troops. I've still not seen a good site for the FP. Our land is pretty good, actually, but on the other hand, our cities as a whole are in pretty bad shape. The need far outstrips the production rates at the moment, and anything farther out than what we have now (except one more city at Athos and one below Richelieu) are going to single-shield cities for quite some time.


- Sirian

On the artillery, yes, it's tough to keep up with so many needs in this early stage. Basically....

Every city must have an artillery unit...
... garrisoned there
... or being built
... or have one on the way (via goto) from another city

The 'leeway' is in the second point. "Oh! I'll build one just as soon as these walls are done". I wouldn't mind having the artillery in a queue as next, just not ten queue-spots deep or changing the build instructions yet again when its turn comes up.

With no concept of "veteran" catapults, it seems a good idea to have a non-barrack city with medium (or med-low) production value just keep cranking the artillery pieces out, while a better and barracked producers churns out spearmen or swordsmen (and one day musketeers)

I would say compliance so far (from what I've seen) has been good, with only minor slips.

Charis

PS to Sirian... 5:36am for one of your earlier posts?? Get some sleep man!!

Originally posted by Sirian
Goto is somewhat like automating workers. It is an automation of orders.

Kind of, I guess. I would view 'goto point x' more as a single order taking multiple turns, like 'build mine', and not like the worker automation which takes them out of player control for ever and eternity. If I inherit a worker who's got six turns left on building a mine, he's just as much not under my control as a warrior on a six-turn goto action. Admittedly with the worker you can at least find out what he's doing and when he's going to be finished, which you can't with a unit on goto.

I've ended my turn a few times with a unit or two on goto, but I try to warn the next player.

That was what I meant when I said there were 'two settlers heading to likely city sites east of Marseilles'. Next time, I'll try to be more explicit :)

If you settled on desert you missed the spots I was going for anyway, which were both hills. If I had my gaming computer set up to grab screenshots, I'd have posted a map with the destinations marked, which would have given you better information for deciding if you wanted to cancel the goto orders.

all of us seem to have played a wee bit loose with the "foot soldier and artillery piece in every city" rule. I think that rule needs some clarification, or more definition. Should it be a hard rule? As in, these units never ever leave the cities? If not, then under what conditions is it OK to send them elsewhere, and how long can they be away, and if they aren't coming back, how and when must they be replaced?

I spent a lot of my turn building catapults for cities which didn't have them yet. My reading of Charis's rules wasn't that every city must have an infantry defender, but that we're allowed to put an infantry defender in before the artillery (since just having artillery isn't any defence at all). It seems reasonable to me that we should be allowed to take the artillery from a backline city to install in a frontline city which has more urgent need, but then the backline city should get a new artillery piece as soon as possible.

Do we have Feudalism yet? I think getting Art of War would be really helpful, considering how many barracks we don't yet have.

--
Jaffa

Charis: I'm not missing any sleep. As a writer, I typically bend my schedule to the work, not the other way around. Often my most productive hours are through the night, when its quietest, fewest distractions and interruptions, no glare to contend with. There have been some days, for example, where I've gotten up, had breakfast, jumped into a team variant event, then got down to business when that was over, my "day" just getting started rolling at midnight. A post at 8AM could be first thing in the morning for me one week, middle of my day a couple weeks later, and right before sleep the following month. What it almost never is, is me going short on sleep. I have done that a time or two with Civ3, but not something that should worry you. :)

- Sirian

We're over the 24 hours so I'm getting it.

--Cy

err... I think I'm after Ionpure, not you Cy. But, that's ok, take your turn anyway -- if we still haven't heard from Ionpure after your turn, I'll take mine then. :)

Sorry :(

My girlfriend flooded my computer with wather while trying to repair the radiator - she also flooded the rest of my apartment :cry:

Will take a few days to get back to normal business, so I have to quit this game :(

Really hope I can take part in a later game after the computer is back up and I cleaned up all the mess here :aargh3:

Good luck for you :)

ok, will take the game after Cy posts his turn then...

Zed: I was going by the turn roster posted by Charis near the top of this page.

In the year 300, our fine French people, tired of the relentless whipping by previous despots, cast aside their oppressors in favor of an ancient clan of rulers known as too lethargic to whip. Amid chants of “Gastropod!,” “Gastropod!,” the Snail clan resumed the mantle of absolute power. He promised the people (1) and end to the whipping, (2) a better form of government, (3) a strengthening of our military, (4) to use our small but capable navy to carry the Snail Ensign to the four corners of the world and, (5) more catapults! In this way did Cy-Bigomeau assume power.

Pursuant to item (2), the first royal decree was to establish a Commission to Investigate the form of Government known as A Republic. When CIGAR explained that they needed funds to perform their function, Cy_Bigomeau suggested they prepare a RFP, make 7 copies, affix the proper tax stamps, and deliver them to him in a few years or decades or so. Until then, it would be unwise to waste money on spurious research, so all funds would be saved for their glorious project.

310. The Great Lighthouse is completed! Une bonne idee! Our navies are instructed to strike out and explore the world, to seek out new civilizations, to boldly go where no snail has gone before! The indigent Indians contact us, seeking to end our Ivory for Spices deal. They ask for Ivory and Horses to continue the trade. Bah! Is that all, I ask? Why not the keys to my palace while we are at it? I have no greater desire than to see your horsemen galloping through our territory. Mon dieu! Instead I give them Ivory and 40 gold. Perhaps they can go to Wal*Mart and buy themselves a new bowling shirt with elephants on it.

320. Zzzz.

330. Chartres founded. Why, I am not quite sure 8-0. Our intrepid explorer, far to the southwest, espies an Indian galley prowling about. Zut! India’s days in the dark are to be short-lived. I keep and eye on the galley.

340. Zut Alors! A Japanese warrior wanders near the galley. It is time to finally tell the world that a civilization as putrid as India exists. The information is so shocking, that the other civs give us gold to go away and not tell them any more horror stories.

350. Shocked by finding out how insignificant they truly are, the curried-elephant-eaters crowd our border with bowmen and spearmen. I upgrade all warriors in barracks cities to swordsmen, and start the curly shuffle with the rest to get them upgraded. Barbarians attack a warrior I have wandering the area around the dies to the south.

360. The idle Indians decide to send their troops on holiday in another part of the country, and they leave the border area.

370. Zzzz.

380. At last! One of our galleys finds a galley from a new civ! Contact is made with the Persians! They have luxuries to trade, and this galley sails off to (try to) establish a sea route. Much other wheeling and dealing is done with the other civs 8-).

390-400. Zzzz.

At this point, Cy_Bigomeau paused to review the outcome of his promises to the people.

(1) No whipping. I had a couple of cities that were locked in no-growth because of entertainers needed because of unhappiness over whipping. We’ve about hit the limit on this. That being said, one night while he was asleep, Cy_Bigomeau’s evil twin brother Skippy slipped out and did some whipping of his own…
(2) CIGAR’s research is still, tragically, bound up in red tape and our research budget remains at 0. No techs were found in the Great Library, either. Our production sucks. I sincerely hope that by my next turn, the Snail Party wins a peaceful, Democratic, election.
(3) Military. We’re starting to get there. Paris is popping out horsemen and Athos, spearmen, every 4 turns, continuously. All warriors have been or are moving to barracks for an upgrade (except for Bastogne, where I htough it prudent to wait for relief first, and not leave a border city vacant). As we get spearmen moved into cities being held by swordsmen, that will free the swordsmen up for offensive operations. We’ll have a flying squad of horsemen that upgrade all the way to Cav, and and two squads of 6 swordsmen for offense. This is just a short-term goal (no more swords being made by me as they obsolete). What I was actually working towards is to have, post feudalism, 1-2 Pikemen in every town and 2 flying squads of 6 knights each. Current army is 12 spearmen, 9 swordsmen, 6 warriors still, and 4 horsemen. Oh, and 18 glorious catapults 8-).
(4) Navy. We finally found the other civ! That galley is on it’s way to a Persian harbor trying to get the damned game to admit we have a clear line of sight-sea route. What does it take? I never build ships, so I am not sure of the requirements. The manual says line-of-sight sea route, but we already have that. Does the galley have to physically go to one of their harbors? The other galley is heading south down the west coast of the only unexplored continent—ours (gulp). Personally, I think it is time to build another one for home-waters operations, but that is up to future rulers.
(5) Catapults. I think I’m in compliance here 8-). The only cities without are Point du Hoc and Cod Piece, both of which are still building their first ground unit and will go for catapults next.

Other notes:

Our western island. I am making a worker in Bastille. There is water on the southern part near Cod Piece, and resources to road up. The AI tends to suck at developing these kind of areas for a looooong time--with a worker we can get a jump. OTOH, Greece has Russia penned up as badly as we have India, so Russia might put more emphasis on this island. If our two cities here get a good jump (or if our worker finds something cool in the interior) a third city tying the two together would be worth it, IMHO, but is definitely the absolute lowest priority right now 8-). It is always amusing to get these games and go “I see what they were doing, but WTF didn’t they put the city 2 squares X direction instead of where they put it?” Heh.

Dyes. I have a settler in the jungle, a warrior on the way to meet him, and a worker building a road in. All are moving turn-by-turn, and I haven’t picked out a city spot. I just wanted a city, and the dies online, as trading lux is about to kick into gear (finally). We’re also going to have some lingering happiness issues (I think) over the whipping when we swap governments, and a few native lux never hurt 8-).

Goody huts. There are two on the map. I’d send a horseman after the one south of the dies, but the one on the island west of Louis the mad is going to take a galley to get to 8-). I would NOT turn around the galley near it, as it is on the way to the only dark coastline left on the map, but, again, it is up to future rulers to decide.

Workers. I have some useless irrigation giong in on to get water moved around, and it is time for some useful irrigation (and other improvements) near Bastogne once we can shake a worker loose.

Treasury. 2,066 gold and +58 per turn.

Athos and Wonders. We have none to build right now, so I was alternating settlers (the pop is already to 12 and Sanitation is, to put it mildly, a loooooooong ways off) with basic city improvements that this powerhouse can turn out in 4-6 turns. Its Library will come in next turn, when the next ruler can pop another settler in 2 turns or get a chathedral put in. As to wonders, we have a bunch of barracks already, so Shih Tzu’s Kennel of war may not be a good deal. The Sistine is coming, but pre-building might be problematic, as our good city (Athos) can’t do a palace, and the drop off is rather severe after that. No one is building a wonder at all right now, my feeling is to let it (it equals pre-building, in this case) ride until some other civ commits or something changes. Another problem for future rulers.

Grumpiness. Did someone use an autosave? If not, the bug is more insidious than is known. The bloody AI is trading during my turn, which makes me quite grumpy.

Want a good laugh? At first sight on the map, the Persian Empire is terrifying. Go take a look at their land. HaHa! Eventually, it won’t be funny, as they will have 9 billion shields, but right now it is a hoot. Kinda gives you a new perspective about cursing our starting spot, eh?

Good luck to future rulers of Glorious France!

--Cy

We have the catapult! Vive la France! India wears purple underpants!

Note to Cy: No problem, I wasn't quite ready to take my turn then anyway. The revised turn order was posted by Charis on Jan 22, if you care to look at it.

Incidentally, I bet the Great Lighthouse doesn't help for trade, meaning sea squares won't do until we get Navigation or Magnetism; thus we still need a coastal route.

Nit: The Lighthouse definitely does mimic Astronomy, bringing sea squares online for trade path.

It might be that both sides in the trade agreement need "revealed map" squares along the path of the trade route. We could try selling everyone our world map, that ought to bring Russia online, if we ourselves can see a path to one of their harbors. Now that India contact has been made, there's no more good use for holding back on our map.

- Sirian

Well, I was just guessing on that one, but I find that a mite surprising. That's good news for us anyway... :)


Ok, got it, will play tonight.

410 AD (1): Athos builds Library, starts Settler. Porthos builds Spearman, starts Aqueduct.

420 AD (2): All for One builds spearman, starts worker.

430 AD (3): Athos builds settler, starts Cathedral. Tours builds spearman, starts Harbour. Aramis builds spearman, starts Library.

440 AD (4): One for All builds spearman, starts catapult for Point du Hoc. Marseilles builds Courthouse, starts Temple. Monte Crisco builds Catapult, starts Temple.

450 AD (5): zzz

460 AD (6): All for One finishes worker, starts another. Greeks start building Art of War in Thessalonica (size 4.)

470 AD (7): Bane of Bombay completes Barracks, starts worker.

480 AD (8): We get Republic, Monarchy, and Feudalism out of the Library! We initiate the French Revolution!

490-500 AD: Lots of cities in civil disorder pending end of revolution. We have a warrior about to hit a goody hut, and a swordsman on the way to another. We should have put warriors on our Galleys, we could have picked up a couple other huts. :)

Well 480 was a banner year for the French scientists! :goodjob:

Lots of cities in civil disorder pending end of revolution

Hmmm.... What do others do? I thought that cities under disorder do bad things like flip, start tearing down city improvements, etc. When I start a revolution I always go through and redistribute to keep the folks content and avoid disorder. Shields are the first to go because there is no production at all.
We'll be in anarchy for what, 3-4 turns? With that many cities in civil disorder, chances are decent something unpleasant could occur.

Fast way to do it: hover cursor over "center square", click to redistribute in a way that will 'fix' the mood and emphasize food. Use your *KEYBOARD* right arrow key, click again. You can do an empire of dozens of cities in about 20-30 seconds. Repeat when coming back to a new government, and if needed 'adjust' workers for better shield output.

Is this a great idea... common knowledge... or dumb?! :love:

Charis

Jean Paul's artillery regiment saw there was anarchy sweeping through the
land, and sought to impose military rule to protect and serve the people.
Louis Charisse thus came to power...

500 AD (0) - Stationed troops (uh, and hired entertainers, to be honest) to
calm down the people! One LONE Scientist, oddly enough in the town of
Louis the Mad, kept the torch of research going! Well done Dr. Loius!
He takes a Sabbatical in Porthos :P

Wowza! Look at that treasury!! You guys left this for me?! (Almost 2400!)

510 AD (1) - Japan feels urge to start on some Gardens. That and SunTzu by
Greeks are the only current wonder projects in the world... The 'goto'
Warrior wakes up angry barbs.

520 AD (2) - So much for no projects, Greeks start Hanging Gardens, Russians
and Romans start both that and Sun Tzu, and Persians start to Hang.
Wasn't there much discussion to avoid this -- folks will cascade into
Sistine, which we wouldn't mind getting, and we're not only not building,
we have no placeholders or plans.

530 AD (3) - India is squeamish about our Silk - Ivory deal. We add 2 gpt to renew.

540 AD (4) - Viva Le Republique!!!! The time of anarchy is over :goodjob:
Hmm, what about those wonders? Athos is a powerhouse with 21 shield rate.
We're halfway (4 turns) from Cathedral, but they're happy enough for the
moment there without it. So we switch to Sun Tzu, which might instead become
Sistene later. (Theology due in 19) We put Paris on Hanging Gardens, since
it looked basically like nothing more than a city of stables for horses!
Major Charisse surveyed the artillery situation and found all up to snuff!

550 AD (5) - 570 AD (7) - Takin' care of business...

580 AD (8) - Greece makes an outrageous 'request' for tribute, world map and
100 gold (see! that's what having a fat treasury will do) I tell him
"That will be all" and see he's bluffing. On my turn I take a look at him
in trade. He's broke, large number of cities, no extra luxuries or
resources. Equal in tech. We have nothing to offer each other. I toss
him a silver dollar.

600 AD (10) - Those 'goto' swordsmen on a long trek got... 'maps' :(
Running a small deficit on science, so that Theology will arrive
before Sun Tzu gets built (by us or otherwise).

Consider carefully the wonder situation. Also, there's a settler in Porthos
who just popped out with no plans and with full movement left.
It would be nice, but too unlikely, if no one else researched Theology
before SunTzu and Hanging were complete. Athos might be strong enough to
snag a current one and Sistine right after it. Education and Music Theory
next? Or Astronomy? Paris will finish (unless beat) Hanging Gardens BEFORE
Sun Tzu in Athos. The other way around would see Sun Tzu opponents switch
to the lower-shield-cost Hanging and snatch it. Sistine is also a 600 shield
wonder, and it's hard to see Athos getting beat out, even starting a few
turns behind. It's even got five excess food! Could change some irrigates
to mines for even more production.

Roster/order:
Charis
Jaffa
Sirian
Cy
Zed
(Poor Ionpure has been plagued with problems, and we wish him luck ;p
If things clear up and on his request we can reinstate, but for now
go with the above list of 5)

Good luck :P
Charis

How about we ride the Great Library for all its worth, let the AI's continue to go broke at first-civ research costs, get their gains for free until such time as they deign to educate themselves, pray they have a fascination for gunpowder (I've seen it happen), save our treasury (and continue to grow it), then run 100% science (or less, if we reach the 4 turn breakthrough rate) at whatever insane deficits once the Library goes obsolete as we race ahead on the back of all our stored gold and rushbuilt (with cash) improvements, like courthouses and libraries?

Just a thought. :) Don't mind me, I'm over here in the corner mostly being quiet for this game. :)

:sheep:

What's enabled again? Cultural? And what else? What kind of endgame vision do you have in mind? What direction would you like to see things take? You wanted artillery practice, and for that, we need to gear up for some war. Do you want to attack somebody with knights and catapults? Cavalry and cannon? Or wait for the Full Monty and roll over them with genuine artillery? Or try some of each? Or just build artillery for show, and roll them around between our cities? :lol:

Or... what? And why (in this situation) are you preferring Sistine over SunTzu to such a degree as to research Theology (which we WOULD get for free... eventually)? Lead us! Tell us what to do, oh brave Fourth Musketeer! :) Reveal your visions to the masses.

All For One, and One For All! :king:


- Sirian

Pre-building note: I left Athos on Cathedral precisely because I knew it would take longer to complete than my turn, so if we wanted to switch it to a wonder we could. :)

Note that de Winter was being seduced at the end of the turn by the Indians cultural expansion -- I started a Library there to help offset it and try to get our borders back up but we may need more than that.

The advisor to the king had a chilling dream one night, as the ghost of Arthos spoke to him...

"Pasteur, listen my friend. The people are happy, and the world has been at peace for so long some have forgotten what it is to be at war. Peace is fleeting, and alliances are deceptive. There is power in but one element... artillery! Diplomats may see gain, and pikemen may hold a wall, but it is only the daunting pyschological and kinetic power of artillery that will carry the day in the end. D'Artagnon did not believe me at first. What need does a musketeer have for 'backup' ?? And yet... the art of the musketeer is lost, and must soon be found again!"

"In my own day, I too had a vision. It was a vision for the greatness of France. I saw monsterous birdlike machines vaulting up to the sky, and them causing our destruction. I saw armies go to war who would not finish the job, which led to our destruction. I saw diplomats and the arts leading us to a peaceful supremacy, but one in which the hearts of the people found no meaning, for all came too easy to them. Then I saw a vision where the musketeers of France spread throughout the WHOLE of the earth, and did conquer lesser foes. This though, was not with malice, but for self protection. And once we reign in all lands, a *true* peace of contentment came about for all..."

"Train, Pastuer. Train Musketeers. Build Cannons. Prepare for war. Finish studying the ways of the ancient of days and theology, and turn yourselves toward him. After that... turn your selves to the ways of musket, bore and bombardment."

----

'Plain' answers to Sirian's questions:

> How about we ride the Great Library for all its worth, let the
> AI's continue to go broke at first-civ research costs, get their
> gains for free until such time as they deign to educate
> themselves, save our treasury (and continue to grow it), then
> run 100% science (or less, if we reach the 4 turn breakthrough
> rate) at whatever insane deficits once the Library goes
> obsolete as we race ahead on the back of all our stored gold
> and rushbuilt (with cash) improvements, like courthouses and
> libraries?

Given the non-Civ-2 way of dealing with Education, this is worth a shot -- I can't say I've tried it this late before (it HAS worked well in late ancient period).

> What's enabled again? Cultural? And what else? What kind of
> endgame vision do you have in mind?

Diplomacy, Cultural, Conquest are enabled. Conquest is preferred unless we just want to see the defensive power of artillery :P Having a cultural city timed to win as a backup around 2040 would be good too, and we'll need to build the UN to avoid sudden loss due to diplo.

> What direction would you
> like to see things take? You wanted artillery practice, and for
> that, we need to gear up for some war. Do you want to ...

> Or just build artillery for show, and roll them around between
> our cities?

The latter is definitely NOT the plan ;)

I would really like to see artillery take a BIG role with weapons of most eras. With our peaceful start the cats didn't do much. To go there we would need to go full bore NOW and crush India before the invention of gunpowder. Even better is we get it JUST before they do and we see Musketeers take the OFFENSE in this first war. Musketeers, Knights and Cannons will see the brunt of late Medieval action, with Cavalry coming in at the end.

Artillery shows up with Replaceable Parts and Infantry. Tanks, Marines, Paratroopers and Battleships show up not long after that. Haven't fought with Marines or Para's in Civ3, and only used them maybe twice in Civ 2, so a major surprise campaign dropping a huge army on their coastal cities would rock.

After that, no new guns until Radar Artillery. I *definitely* want to see a war prosecuted with Radar Artillery and modern weapons including missiles, I've never seen that in action and don't know if I ever would again :P

Six opponents, should give us a chance for a good variety of war. One difficulty with artillery based conquest might be its speed, and the lack of a big blitz. That means we can't wait til 2045 to discover Robotics. We'll want a very strong science rate to get to modern quickly, once it comes on the horizon.

> Or... what? And why (in this situation) are you preferring Sistine
> over SunTzu to such a degree as to research Theology (which
> we WOULD get for free... eventually)?

SunTzu is nice, probably more important than Sistine, but artillery do not benefit from barracks ;p Actually, considering all this upgrading we'll need to do to fight through modern times, we shout REALLY try to get Leo's, shouldn't we? (As to why Theo... I guess I still have a mindset of 'you don't get much medieval techs from GL and "Sistine is the best", combined with getting to my turns at too late an hour ;p)

So yes, SunTzu and Leo's seem like they should be top priorities, and I would like the team's thought on whether to go high-hog on military unit production and go after India with Knights and Cats ???

Also, input from the team on the garrison artillery rule -- I realize now that if we start cranking knights and musketeers, our artillery support will be sitting at home defending attacks that are not coming. The question is: do we need a rule-shift allowing our masses of catapults to leave garrison duty and head towards Milady and the Indian homeland for offensive duty, re-making ones for garrison after the war is over? I think between the low cost of cats and the ability to send what we have and "queue" up a replacement catapult, we'll be ok -- I just don't want to see us start world war I with 18 catapults sitting at home doing absolutely nothing.

Speak up, musketeers... thoughts on wars and wonders?! (And on late late modern conquest goal)

Charis

PS If we can, pre-war, get roads built in those Northern mountain passes or our artillery will never be able to get up there.

Hmm. We should try to get Sun Tzu, Leo's, and Sistine. :)

Seriously, if we're going to be trying to get to the Modern age we will need research once the GL expires, which means we really ought to be in a Republic government... which means oscillating war. Sistine (and/or Bach) would be of great help in combatting war weariness. Right now our larger cities are managing to keep enough people happy only by running 20% lux, and even then it's barely enough to let them max out at 12 without other contributors to unhappiness.

My vote would be, let's try to concentrate on:
- (priority 1) infrastructure and wonders that will help long term growth of our cities or with waging a war (e.g. aqueducts, cathedrals, above-mentioned wonders)
- (priority 2) support units that we can build now
- (priority 3) other less vital infrastructure.

Then, when we get Gunpowder, we switch over to musketeers, build up a large force, and go on the offensive! Conquering enemies in the early middle ages with Knights is so... conventional. :)

I agree that the garrison catapults should be allowed to be mobilized -- the rule ought to be (IMO) we should *own* x number of artillery units per city, regardless of where they are used/garrisoned. By the time we get our rail net put together, we will probably have *so many* that we will definately want to stack them all in one city to keep track of them all...

As for modern conquest, let's head in that direction but just see where the road takes us. If the road goes all the way to the modern era, fine, but I wouldn't want to delay victory simply to see those shiny new units. Proliferation of units to move, pollution to clean up, etc. tends to make the game bog down in the modern age (if not before!), and we're already on a large map which will exascerbate the issue.


EDIT: If we disabled Space & Domination, doesn't that mean the AI can't win by those means either? I mention it because in the story you have visions of those scenarios causing France's defeat.

0) 600AD Settler sent to fill in the gap between the dye town (Avignon) and the rest of our empire. Trade furs + 24 gold for Japanese wines, and get 10 gold back to renew RoP. Cancel RoP with Rome since they have nothing to pay us with.

Tried to renegotiate the furs deal with India, but they weren't having any of it (apparently they have their own furs now, and were just paying us 5 gold/turn for no reason. So we lost that. Ooops).

Turned off the science budget to let the GL do its stuff. With just 10% entertainment, we're at +61 gold/turn.

There are an astonishing number of unused goody huts. Are we saving them for after the GL expires?

1) 610AD A new wing is built on our royal palace, in a strange mixture of architectural styles. (Huh? I didn't know you could mix-and-match?)

4) 640AD Entertainment back up to 20%.

6) 660AD New island discovered to the south. Cows and iron and fish and goody huts.

7) 670AD India complains about our galley in their water, so we complain about their galleys in ours.

9) 690AD Rouen founded. Japan wants to trade world maps. The trade screen shows that the furs for wine deal I set up at the beginning of my turn has vanished. WTF? Theology pops out of the Library :) Most of the rest of the world starts building Sistine Chapels.

10) 700AD Indian settlers are sneaking in past Milady. Again. Unload a conscript swordsman from a galley onto a goody hut, and it vanishes. Merf? Was it empty, or do goody huts not work if you unload onto them?

I haven't yet told the Indians to get out of our territory. Again.

The settler in Bastogne still has movement left this turn. I was aiming to grab more of the jungles (where the swordsman is waiting).

There is a catapult en route to Rouen. I sent all our extra catapults to Milady.

:beer:

Looks like a decent turn. Poor Indians, they're so confused :P Now if you see a swordsman stack or elephants, be worried, but the AI just doesn't send a settler wave to fight a war. Keep an eye, but don't panic.

Back to wonders discussion...

I see Paris is rather close to Hanging, and Athos not far from Sun Tzu's. Also available to go for is Sistine. In our earlier discussions we seemed to pick SunTzu and Leo's as top priorities. Sistine was ok if we got it, and Hanging near useless due to early obsolescence.

A) Finish Hanging and Sun Tzu. We'll get those unless there's a big surprise lurking. Everyone and his brother will go for Sistine. We can even set Athos after it, but it will take around 23 or so turns after it starts. I rather doubt we'll get it, given that how many folks have been going after hanging and suntzu. At zero research, Athos will have NOTHING to switch to. If Paris instead may as well consider a placeholder, he doesn't have a chance.
IF no one else researches Invention by then, the cascade ends and Athos can get Leo's at will (when we research it or get it from Library)

B) Finish Sun Tzu, switch Paris to Sistine. This punts on the Gardens, someone will get it soon after, methinks. Again everyone is then gunning for Sistine. We'll have Paris due to finish it in 22 turns. (Having Athos start it would take 23ish turns from then, or 29 turns total) This might quite close, although less so than 'A'. If we make it BEFORE Invention is discovered, the cascade ends and Athos can build Leo's.

Summary: :hammer:
A- Get SunTzu and Garden, target Sistine 29 turns from now in Athos. Being beat loses 300-600 shields (unless we research invention before we lose the race)
B- Get SunTzu, target Sistine in Paris 22 turns from now. Being beat sets Paris on Leo placeholder, achievable 22 turns from now or when we learn Invention, whichever later.

If the top non-Garden opponent for these and reaches in...
< 22 turns -- we're toast in A, and hope no one has Invention by then.
22 to 29 turns -- the pain is even worse, same outcome, and more time for them to come up with Invention
>= 29 turns -- if Invention is not discovered, a clean sweep of Garden, Sistine, Sun AND Leo. If it is (and that's a LONG time), we'll get Sistine but lose Leo.

Which means- if they don't research Invention in 22-29 turns, we'll get Leo no matter what. If they research it we'll lose it in A, and have a got shot at it with B.

So, upcoming leader, (Sirian?) how bad do you want Leo's? How many turns do you think it will take for AI to get Invention? Will the top contender finish <22, >29 or in between? The latter you can find out for sure by Embassy action :rolleyes:, if you check out the top contenders: Athens, Moscow, any powerhouse cities that might announce in next half-dozen turns, and possibly Delphi if we do complete Gardens.

If we wanted to take matters more into our own hands, we could
research Invention on our own in, oh, 12-15 turns and about 800-1000 gold.

A final comment, if need be, Paris can be speeded up by 2-3 shields per turn by mining the undeveloped grassland square (and possibly mining one of the irrigated grasses temporarily) shaving one or two turns if investigation showed the race to be THAT close.

Good luck!! :goodjob:
Charis

I'll probably try for A. I'll see what I think in the game and decide from there. And I can always remind myself that no matter how bleak this SEEMS to look, we've got it way WAY WAYYYYYYYYYYYY the Heck better than some other succession games (*cough*7*cough*).

:sheep:

A? A! A there. F'in A. AAA. An A for an A. Good A, mate! A A, sir. A!

Inherited turn: Everything looks good, almost no changes made. I am disappointed to see that my "irrigate Richelieu" project was abandoned after my last turn and vow to correct this.

710AD: Swordsmen heading for Greece are recalled. Milady de Winter dials me up and informs me that she "shall have gems heaped upon her" or else defect to India. Grrr. Saucy wench. I tell you, she is pure evil. But... better OUR evil woman than India's, so I cave to the demand and send our closest settler and pikeman pair on Goto toward the gems in the far south, just beyond the jungle. Our swordsman wandering the jungles is dispatched in that direction, too. Our workers are now in one of three categories: many are heading south, cleaning up jobs along the way. We should have a bunch of them reaching the jungles on next players' turn. We have a pack of them in the west, finishing up there. We have scattered others doing small local jobs. I order our ships at the ends of the earth to start returning home. Mass of Indian settlers ordered OUT of Milady's territory. She is COMPLETELY LIVID and wants Ghandi's head on a pike, but when we offer to get it for her "in lieu of gems", she shuts up for a while, and India is spared an invasion.

720AD: A Charis agent broke into the treasury. Something about "Sherwood Jungle" and the next thing I know, three temples in the far south have been completed, including at that ridiculous desert outpost founded by the King of Currency. A better lock has been put on the treasury room. Swordsmen on the recall make a pit stop on mountainous island to extort 50 gold from a minor tribe there.

730AD: India has wised up. They are now sending their settlers AROUND our land on all kinds of galleys. Look for Indian settlements to be popping up all over the world in a couple of centuries.

740AD: Hanging A, people! The A Gardens have been completed! All for A, and A for One. (Sirian, dozing at the wheel, fails to take Codpiece and Bastille off of taxmen, but he'll probably catch on to this overlooked move by the end of his turn).

750AD: I sell off all our barracks. Recalled swordsmen have landed on mainland, attack a hostile minor tribe and carry off their wealth (25 gold), then head eastward to meet up with Lady de Winter's gem merchants.

760AD: SunTzu's completed.

770AD: Our vet galley in far FAR south attacks and sinks a barb galley, losing another health. Second barb galley attacks us, loses, our ship promoted to elite. Loius the Mad seems to have completed a harbor! How that happened is now under investigation.

780AD: Maginot founded on border with India. Musketeers declare "cross the Maginot Line at your own peril".

790AD: Richelieu Irrigation Project, Stage One completed.

800AD: Galley mysteriously constructed at Mad King Louis. SCANDAL! The Prime Minister himself has been ordering all the government projects for this city. He tries to explain "there's a Persian galley threatening to grab the goody hut" but nobody is listening. Every city in the empire wants "some of that pork barrel" for themselves, and Charis agents are seen to be crowing that the Petard has been caught in his own Hoist. :spank:

Out goes Sirian, and in comes some other leader.


Notes: tried to wait on ships coming home to deal with goody huts, but it's taking too long. Board a sword onto new ship and go get them, while we still can. Watch out for barb ships along the way, I cleared the ones I could see but there may be more.

I mostly built infrastructure in the north. In the south I built more settlers. There is the one heading for Milady's Gems. It is on goto and will arrive in 3 or 4 more turns. The location of choice is a hill on the river directly northwest of the gems. Rushbuild a catapult to comply with the rules, then rushbuild temple and walls and fortify all the areas in the unit in that town, as it will have big fat target painted on it.

There is a second settler at the end of a river just behind the first one. It has no military escort and is on a good city site right where it's at. A third settler is moving into the region. We ought to be able to grab everything this side of those gems. My only request, please build ON the rivers. That will save us 400 gold apiece in not having to rush aqueducts someday. There is another good "front line" location directly under the fortified conscript swordsman. This region, if it sees a lot of development and troop buildup (our troops) could someday be a candidate region for leader-rushed FP. India being the other region (if we go and conquer them).

As for wonders: Sistine will surely be lost. So it goes. NO TECH was researched by anybody during my turn. I have Porthos on placeholder, with ~150 shields stored up. It can hold out another 50+ turns, so that should be no problem. Depending on what and when the AI's research, I see these options:

PLAN A: If the AI's research Education next, and cancel out our library thingie, we should top-rate it to Music Theory and grab Bach's.

PLAN B: If the AI's research Engineering next, we should put one scientist up to make sure we get Invention within 40 turns after that, but hope they research it for us before then. Grab Leo with the project.

PLAN C: If the AI's research Printing Press or Chivalry next, just hold out and see what happens. Unless we get within 20 turns of Palace completion with no signs of progress toward a wonder tech, I'd say not to panic, just hold out and follow Plans A or B.

PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE: do our own research.

All of these involve the AI's getting Sistine, and the cascade ending there. If for any reason it takes them another 20+ turns for someone to finish Sistine, I'll eat my hat. :crazyeyes They all had the tech before we finished Gardens, and every AI civ has cascaded its best project to Sistine now. Surely someone must finish it before they get Leo online. Surely!


- Sirian

I've got it, but it will either be late tonight (after Summon Team Game) or tomorrow before I can play/post.

I think I'll devote our entire economy to researching Vinification. How can France not know how to make wine?

--Cy

In the year 800, the people of the Glorious Republic of France grew weary of the predictability of their recent run of stable, efficient rulers, and, in what was surely to be a silly move, turned to the infamous Snail Party to interject some random events. In this way did Cy_Cargolade assume power. The name of his house was prophetic, as, indeed, his term was to be a mixed bag. In fact, the regency of Cy_Cargolade was such a mixture, that his library did not keep the history of his reign in tidy chronological order, but in large piles, organized by subject, and spanning all the years. These piles were much-favored crawling spots for the pet snails.

In no particular order, here are the actions and issues.

Burma. This is Cy’s name for the southern jungle cut off by mountains. I founded 3 cities in Burma. Grenoble is at the mouth of the river where Sirian had left a settler, Dijon by the gems, and Amiens in the heart of the jungle dead west of Avignon. The roadway is pushed through Grenoble and on its way to Dijon to link up the gems. Dijon got a little rush money, and already has walls, a temple, and a catapult. Glorious catapults are taken care of in the other cities as well, with an extra one for the area still trundling down a road. Neither Rouen nor Avignon have troops in them at the moment, but some are on the way in the great troop shuffle (more on that later). Two more settlers are created and on their way to jump-off cities in Burma. They should just about fill in the area. All is not well in Burma, however. This leads me to…

What the hell are the Japanese up to? First off, they are building very aggressively straight at Dijon. Secondly, they had an odd bag of units prowling around. I’m used to military/settler pairs from the AI, and to random military units acting as scouts. I am NOT used to what I saw. As I started to settle cities, shift troops, and have short-term exposed workers, settlers, and cities in Burma, I rotated two horsemen out of Paris to keep an eye on things. A turn before I founded Dijon by the gems, and as the Amiens settler was on the move, a warrior/spearman pair of Japanese was sniffing around the gems. The turn after Dijon was settled, a stack of 4 Japanese bowmen showed up, as well as two horsemen, and all headed past Dijon and into Burma. As I was absolutely wide open (open cities, workers, settlers) I found this quite alarming, and rotated two more horsemen out of Paris, and grabbed every loose military unit that was not on the Indian border and sent it scrambling south. In a way, this was even MORE alarming. I had checked the numbers on the military screen when I took over, and they looked fine. When I went looking for units, I discovered that the numbers were deceiving, as we have an enormous amount of cities and all our units are tied up in garrison work. I started pumping out some pikemen (soon to become glorious musketmen!), but the effort is a bit feeble. Anyway, my first two horsemen met the first two Japanese units at the edge of Amiens, and they stopped and fortified. On the same turn, a number of Japanese units turned around and left Burma. I still kept the troop rotation coming, moving everything forwards and south. The rotation created 3 empty cities, but they are well screened, and troops are on the way. Now, for future leaders of our great Republic—WARNING Will Robinson! Danger approaching. Admittedly, the AI being the AI, it will muff its chance to cause us no end of grief and nothing nasty will happen. All the same, note that BOTH India and Japan have both Monotheism and Feudalism, and that BOTH only need Chivalry to get their UU’s. (Japan is currently out of Iron, but, judging by our last World Map, they can get it). Yep. Starting any turn we could be facing BOTH War Elephants in the north and Samurai in the south. Not to mention we are stretched thin and our country is looooooooong and no rail. I think a move of our own to Chivalry and production of a couple of dozen knights ASAP might do wonders for our outlook. I would also pay 1k gold to start a nice 100-year war between Rome and Japan right now…

Research. Sigh. Education was learned via the Great Library in 850 AD. The gravy train is dead. C’est la vie, non? I cranked up research on Music Theory beyond rational limits (but not too completely irrational ones) and it will come in in 3 turns. We are running a 55 gp deficit to do this. We could get it in 4 turns at –8. No one has completed the Sistine yet. Oh, and Chivalry next, right?

The galley follies. I mounted a two-pronged expedition to destroy a few goody villages in order to save them (this also left Louis the Mad open; a Pikeman is in production in Marseilles to garrison Louis). Anyways, the first ship hit the small Island west of Louis first, only to disturb some angry tribesmen and fight them off. He re-boarded, and was dropped off on the northern coast of the promontory east of Dijon to trek across to the next hut (will take 4 more turns, and two Roman units are also wandering around here) while his galley went the long way around. This way, if the galley were sunk, the Swordsman would still be in operation (so far the galley has beaten off 3 barb galleys and a 4th is about to attack). Galley number 2 is trailing the empty one, letting it beat off the barbs, and is on its way with its own swordsman to the next island south with 3 huts.

Good luck to all future rulers 8-).

Zzzzzzzzz.

--Cy

As thin as we look, we do have an awfully large number of catapults. :) This may sound crazy, but the last thing the AI likes to encounter is a stack of artillery. Elephants, Samurai, and cavalry run when wounded (when the AI is controlling them). I'm not much worried about India over land, although they could prod us quite nicely with a few galley's full of ships across the bay.

Japan could probably own us down there, but it's just as much a reach for them as for us, or nearly so. This is why I coralled all the units I could on my turn and migrated settlers, troops and workers in that direction.

We definitely need MANY more troops for an empire of this size, and we're going to start feeling lack of a forbidden palace soon (No, I mean WORSE than we do already). All the other RBD games, we've paid attention to the FP and gotten it fairly to very early. This terrain never quite offered a sensible location).

While the idea of knights does sound militarily prudent, we can make do on horsies a while longer, I believe. Considering that we might possibly see the AI's build Sistine too slowly, and cascade to Bach/Cop, we may want to rush the research to Invention (and our glorious Gunpowder!) next. In fact, we probably want to do that anyway, since even if we do get Bach, Leo is still important for all the ENDLESS catapult upgrades we'll be doing. We can't upgrade to a UU, though. All our Musketeers will have to be built from scratch at the whopping 60 shields per.


- Sirian

First off, a "BUMP" to Zed, you're up!

As thin as we look, we do have an awfully large number of catapults.

They LUST for action! And yet... the timing... is not great.

I'm scratching my head over FP too. Perhaps Delhi :hammer:

I certainly like the Invention and Musketeer idea, theme wise :cooool: Leo's would make triple upgrades on 124 catapults a little more palatable! (It does rot that current
pikemen are trapped, upgradewise. But UU's do get to upgrade. We'll need to keep M'eers around a loooong time for fire control (gunny sgt! :rocket3:) Remember, if you wan't to fire a cannon without a Musketeer at the helm... :nono:
With that in mind, there should be some war not too far in the distant future, where the obsoleting pikemen are with the catapults in our first campaign.

The knights, or cavs, would be 'typical', and prudent, but... we're variants here! Let the artillery (which can't blitz anyway) do the work for you and even a Musketeer can deal the final blow on a city :p It's going to be a long haul, deliberately but effectively taking apart the world, one civ at a time, over several era's.

Saltpeter! They need it don't they??? We absolutely, positively, 100% NEED to control one or more saltpeter supplies! The better we learn where those are, the better off we'll be.

Charis

Hrm. Ok, got it... not sure why I didn't realize it was my turn, but there you go. Thanx for the reminder! :splat:

I probably could have gotten a turn in today too, but now I expect it will have to wait for tomorrow.

EDIT: Note we will be able to upgrade our Pikemen to Riflemen, eventually...

EDIT: I see why I didn't realize it was my turn -- I normally go before Cy and after Sirian, not after Cy. Unless we want to change the posted turn order. :)

Seems like what we need right now is more military... only higher priority is to ensure all cities have growth potential. Future thought for FP - once we clear out all that jungle it could be a reasonable spot for one. We really won't be able to do it until we get rails, however, 'cause otherwise it's just too hard to defend to put any serious commitment down there. That's far in the future though... I suppose it depends on how well the war with India goes, that might be a better spot since it's harder for the AI to assault.

900 (0): Some changes in city production based on revised focus. Porthos is going to grow in 2 turns, but is almost ready to go into unrest. Will an extra pop be able to generate enough extra trade to give another lux? Experimenting with moving workers around the city reveals the answer is yes, if it's on a coastal square. Orleans has a tax collector and a cathedral, but no aqueduct? :crazyeyes Tax collector sent to the mines! Several of our best production cities, Milady de Winter, Aramis, All for One, One for All, and of course Paris are on Horsemen and Pikemen, or soon will be. Most of our other cities are working on Aqueducts and/or Marketplaces (for happiness more than for money, since markets are cheaper than Cathedrals for us.) I leave Athos on University placeholder though as we stll have a number of Great Wonders to grab. Science set to 40% to get Music Theory in 4 rather then 3 and run -11 instead of -58.

910 (1): Paris (stuck at 12) builds a worker, starts horseman. One for All builds Library, starts horseman. Amiens builds catapult for local defense, starts worker.

920 (2): Milady de Winter completes Pikeman, starts another. Moscow completes Sistine Chapel. No hat-eating for Sirian this time; and that should end the cascade! India starts moving troops into our territory -- not settler pairs! If it were settlers, I would let him wander around for a while, but since it's not, we ask him to remove his troops, and he agrees.

930 (3): India moves more troops in to our territory, not out! Fortunately most of the troops they are sending our way are archers and spearmen. :lol: Looks like our first war will not be on terms of our own choosing. Paris completes horseman, starts another. One for All does the same. Lyons hurries a marketplace so it can get moving on war materiel. Orleans swaps aqueduct for Pikeman. Several of our forces heading for the south (those that are not already there) turn around and start heading back north. Our swordsman on south isle gets gold from a goody hut.

940 (4): More Indian troops move in... Aramis completes Pikeman, starts another. Richelieu completes marketplace, starts horseman. All for One completes Horseman, starts another. Lyons completes marketplace, starts horseman. Tours completes aqueduct, starts marketplace. Point du Hoc completes courthouse, starts aqueduct. India still has not declared war, but is still moving troops in. Once again we ask him to leave, and once again he agrees to do so... and his troops leave this time! Guess that frenzied troop building rush convinced him to back off. :) We offer him a spare dye for free to keep him happy until we can get our army built up again. (Maybe :smoke: but WTH, we weren't using it anyway.) We trade Education and Furs plus 80 gold to the Japanese for Engineering. We also complete research on Music Theory and start Invention, which we will get in 10 turns at a slight deficit. I figure as soon as someone discovers Chivalry and trades it around a bit we can buy it off them, and we need to get to Leo's and then gunpowder ASAP. Orleans swapped back to aqueduct before Pikeman finishes. Athos swapped to JS Bach's cathedral - it'll be done in 18 turns. Porthos would be done in 15, but then we would not have anyone building up for Leo since Athos would be done University placeholder long before then. Porthos can build Leo once we get Invention, or we can swap Athos and Porthos at that time if it's important. Our swordsman on north isle wakes up some barbarians in a goody hut!

I'm pretty sure the Romans and Japanese troops wandering around in Burma are simply exploring. Has anyone traded them a world map? Once we get a couple more settlements in the area so they are out of places to go we could probably see what we can get for a world map and ask them to leave...

950 (5): Our spices for gold plus ivory deal expires... and now they want 7 gold per turn. Well, ok, we need those spices. Next time around, after our dye gift expires, we can maybe give them dyes and ivory for spices. Our swordsman that woke up barbarians defeats them all without a scratch and becomes elite. India starts moving their armies into our territory again. Paris completes horseman, starts another. Milady de winter completes Pikeman, starts another. Bescanon completes harbour, starts aqueduct. Maginot hurries temple so it can start on walls.

960 (6): One for All builds Horseman, starts another. Maginot completes temple, starts walls. Once again we ask Ghandi to get his troops out, and once again he complies. This will give us enough time to hurry walls in Maginot. Our swordsman visits a goody hut and gets... maps. :p

970 (7): India once more marches its troops into our territory... they also have a lot of triremes sailing around our shores. Paris completes horseman, starts another. All for One completes horseman, starts another.

980 (8): The Greeks want Engineering or they will go to war, or so they claim. I laugh in their face, and find that they're bluffing. :) Our relations go down to cautious, so I give them 50 gold to keep them polite. We've got enough worries right now with all these Indians wandering about our territory... Aramis completes Pikeman, starts another. Richelieu completes horseman, starts another. Milady de Winter completes Pikeman, starts another. One for All completes horseman, starts another. Lyons completes Horseman, starts another. Are we seeing a pattern here??? :hammer: Maginot completes walls, starts... umm, courthouse?

Ok, Maginot now has walls as well as 5 veteran Pikemen. The Indian attack force has 5 archers, 5 spearmen, and a warrior or 2. Shall we *not* ask them to leave this time and see if they attack? Or maybe they'll try to move further into our territory, in which case I can just ask them to leave again...

990 (9): Well the Indians didn't attack, but they didn't withdraw either. They're now advancing towards Rheims, but we can outmaneuver them easily enough since we have roads in our territory and they can't use them. They also have a couple horsemen menacing our borders. Nevertheless, we ask them to leave and they comply. A territory map swap reveals they only have 5 cities larger than size 6, and their largest city is size 9; as well our military advisor says we have a strong military compared to the Indians, and an average military relative to everyone else. This brinksmanship with the Indians is really to our advantage since we can surely outproduce them, but it's not without a cost since we can't develop infrastructure while it continues. We can probably afford at least another 10 turns or so of buildup if necessary, however. Paris builds Horseman, starts worker since it's pop-maxed. Our swordsman opening up a goody hut finds more barbarians! We're 0 for 5 in finding useful stuff in goody huts on my turn and I don't recall seeing any more around...

1000 (10): Paris completes worker, starts horseman. All for One completes horseman, starts another. We trade Engineering and Furs to Russia for Astronomy. We trade Engineering and Horses(!) to Persia for Banking. I would sell Engineering, Banking, or Astronomy to Japan, Rome, or Greece, but they all seem to be broke. :lol: We're still the only ones to know about Music Theory, so most likely no problems getting Bach, and we're 4 turns away from Invention. No-one's started the Observatory yet. No-one's researched Chivalry yet either.

If all of India's mobile forces are on our border, we should have enough troops now to start an offensive if we don't want to wait for (more of) a tech advantage, so long as we keep up with the reinforcements. Once we have our gems online (got 4 workers on that starting next turn,) we will no longer need Indian spices. We could also trade for Russian wines or Persian incense now that we have Astronomy.

Several improvements that were needed in the mainland are nearly ready so we can start shuffling more workers down south. Keep in mind that our forces down there are mostly for show since the bulk of our army is in the north, however, so don't send too many unless we can afford some troops to escort them.

EDIT: A thought... perhaps the Indians are trying to move their stacks of troops through our land to their southern colonies? If so that's a laughably inefficient (not to mention dangerous :) ) way of reinforcing those cities...

EDIT: Another thought, there are a couple wonder-able techs about to be discovered (esp. Economics, but also Navigation) so we probably want to start Paris prebuilding another wonder (and move a horseman back into the city since it's empty right now.) We can start it out on Copernicus and swap to something else as we discover it, or just keep it on Copernicus if we so desire; I'd guess that the other wonders are more valuable however.

Up next: Charis!

Monseuir Charis... mon ami there are problems. The Indians are showing utter
disrespect for Milady, and wipe their muddy boots all over our land in
a way unbefitting all that is good. We must either wage war, or make preparations
to be ready to do so as soon as possible!

The son of Athos demanded that an immediate census be taken...
Throughout the land, 31 cities (12 cities and 19 towns actually).
The unit support cost could fund several third world countries, 128/turn.
That's OVER four units per town, really quite impressive. Composed of
24 workers, 1 Warrior, 2 Spears, a bloated 33 Pikes, 14 swordsmen, 18 horsemen,
4 galleys, and... our glory... 32 Catapults! (One per city and one extra,
very well done)

What does our Military advisor think?? We're strong compared to India, and
average compared to Greece, Japan, Russia, Rome and Persia, *all* in Republic.
Pasteur science says we're technologically advanced. India's best unit is
the Swordsmen, everyone is quite polite with us.

"But sir... doesn't India's being BEHIND us in military and science AND
being polite with us mean they mean us no harm? Aren't they surely just
passing through?? Shouldn't our efforts go to colonizing that wonderful
gold/game/iron/cattle/fish Island to the south of glorious France??"

The military advisor points out that where you can eliminate the threat of
a second front, you do so. Period. With Indian territory in French hands
we have no fear of dual fronts, and key... we can then focus all of our
glorious but SLOW artillery on ONE front. If we must shift them or react
fast, this is not good. He cynically noted that even if casualties were
massively high, that would just jettison the old (warriors, pikes, swordsmen,
horsies) and make room for musketeers and knights and cannons.

This is the plan put before the King's desk for review and acceptance...
1. From Milady stage a MASSIVE attack on Madras and Delhi, and if possible,
take the whole area.
2. Kick the Indians off the west coast of OUR jungle
3. Send