Hi all.

I cannot find a winning strategy for russian empire in 1000AD scenario. The biggest problem is initial agression from technologically superior civ (Biz. Empire) combined with no iron in the starting cities. I did manage (by early 18th century) to take them out - with heavy losses. However, this created problems:

Most of their cities are useless, they flip to either Saladin or Fred (this is just ridiculous, I build theaters, created artists and even used a culture bomb - they still flip)

I am out of tech race(7-8 techs away from europeans and Saladin) since I built military for most of the game to hold off the invasions and grab the cities I thought will be useful.

Starting cities are not very research-friendly either - if I chop the forests to put cottages down, my production goes down the drain and Biz. empire overpowers me.

I managed to keep in the tech race for a little while by pawning techs between eastern civs and europe but at some point they made contact and became even in tech.

I cannot fight to expand - I am wedged in between Saladin and Fred., they both out-tech me and their militaries are superior.

None of my european "allies" are much help, they will not give anything for free (even while being "friendly") and they will not fight Saladin for me to weaken him. If I declare war on him first, I get slaughtered almost instantly. Going to war in europe is just as disasterous.

I can settle to the east but its just forest/grassland/tundra. Even Mongolians seem to be reluctant to settle in there.

I am not a newbie player, I can do military wins on prince and space wins on monarch in regular came.

There's gotta be something I'm missing here... Or was russian/byzantine situation in 1000AD scenario an oversight of designer?
I understand historical reasoning for russians being inferior in tech at 1000AD (no iron in starting cities and no guilds tech line - this does make sense), but putting them in "always at war" mode with Byzantine empire is silly.

Are you talking about CivIV?

he's talking about 1000 AD Scenario where u get rolled over as Russians.

I admit that scenario is pretty much broken for some civs. Hahaha imagine playing aztecs with quechua when everyone is riding knights. lol

I think the scenario was built unevenly. Obviously, some civs at the time were more technologically advanced and stronger, so thats the way its built. I'm not sure if you can even win with some civs except at the lower levels, especially the new world civs, and possibly also Mali.

I played the Incas in that scenario and had a blast. You start off alone on the west side of the Andes, with about 12 useful land squares in a little strip, and no way to cross the mountains to the east.

Usually I play immortal, but Noble was challenging with that start. Unfortunately the game slowed down too much toward the end and I stopped playing, but I'd managed to achieve tech parity, and had some very nice land, including several cities with room for 8 watermills and 8 workshops, all on grassland.

Sounds like I should try the Russians for an even bigger challenge.

What difficulty are you playing on? edit: Nevermind I see you mentioned it in the title, but not the body of post. I'll give this a try and see what I come up with.

again, I have NO PROBLEM with tech disparity, it's starting city tiles and relentless aggression from Byzantine empire that make russians basically unplayable.

(Edit - For those that don't want to read a silly story about the Rise of Russia, let me skip right to the conclusion. The Byzantines have a wicked advantage at the beginning - they have knights. But pillaging their horses south of Kiev allowed me to win easily on noble.)

Just started on Noble as the Russians. While their initial position is poor, I'm loving the beautiful grassland to the east. There's iron nearby and copper to the north.

First priorities:

Longbows! The Russian cities are defended by archers, and the Byzantines have knights.
Settlers - there's a lot of open land to the East.
Culture - Novgorod and Kherson only get 1 per turn, while both Louis and Fredrick are creative.
Security - must pacify the barbarian hordes!

Forewarned about the Byzantines (apparently I'm stuck with war with them, they don't even show up on the diplomatic list), I pillage their horses with my horse archers. Peace with Saladin should be easy, and is. I give him 55 gold to leave me alone for a while.

The Byzantines attack quickly with knights and pikemen, but my upgraded longbowmen shrug them off. The bastards pillage my roads! Fortunately, they don't know about the soft chewy part of my empire.

I build Moscow near the cows, horses, rivers, and 7 grassland hills - what a monster that will be! Once the city develops, it will produce all the military I need.

About the same time, the Crusaders arrive and take a barbarian city to the west. Will the Templars save me from Basil? (the Byzantines). Update - nope, they never took a single Byzantine city. The AI just isn't made for fightin'.

As of 1600 AD, the Byzantines have given up on attacking me, after one wave of knights and pikemen, one "wave" of two praetorians, and one ripple of two catapults. Pillaging their horses was the key, I think. They still haven't rebuilt pastures. The AI is much too timid about using it's workers in war zones.

Technology is still a problem, I chop rushed the Oracle, and as longdaddy said, I traded techs between Europe and Asia for a while, but that's not working anymore. New priority - cottages!

I burned Constantipole to the ground in 1775 after losing a total of four knights, three catapults, and one longbowman against the Byzantines. Almost all of those died in a premature attack on Constantinople, but the Byzantines were too annoying to live any longer.

I probably won't finish this game (I almost never do), but I'm currently in fifth place and second only to Saladin in land area. I'm not the tech leader at the moment - my underdeveloped cottages are holding me back - but once those grow Russia will become the world's only superpower, no doubt.

I think I did well entirely because I pillaged the Byzantine's horses immediately, and turned research down to 0% for the first 20 turns to upgrade all my archers. Once the Byzantines ran out of knights, they were no threat to anyone.

Upgrade and build someone Longbowmen asap. Pillage Byzantine's horses first turn. Settle near the iron that right near your starting position. Try to expand into Scanadavian area quickly, before Louis/Fred can (those cities can turn into production monsters). I just let Khersa be taken, didn't waste units even defending it. Quickly conquer the long Barb city to the east on the river to make life easier. Make friends with the europeans and try to get them to attack the Byzantine cities so they will leave you alone. When I did this, I managed to get Fred/Louis to attack Constanopple and I ended up stealing the city with 2 horse archers. This proved key for my future war endeavors.

Then I beelined for Kossacks, built up an insane war party with about 20 catapults and bum rushed Saladin. My main targets were Juresalem (which will give you a good 60 GPT, more with buildings) Cairo, Mecca and Bagdad, in that order. After I had a firm hold over the Persian Gulf, I made peace with Saladin eventually which bought me some time to bolster defenses. I then concentrated on expanding Mother Russia eastward from Moscow.

This is what I did on Noble difficulty and won a time victory.

In the beginning:
Drop Research to 0% Trade whatever tech you can, keep in mind to leave Machinery alone (explained later). Periodically upgrade your archers to longbowmen with the gold you made, it's 100g per upg.
Have Kharsov and Kiev produce nothing but workers. and abandon the city. Right before the Barbarian / Byzantines capture, gift it to Saladin for peace treaty or give it to your fellow Crusaders.
Chop rush any forest within Kiev & Kharsov to quicken the worker production, I managed to get 3-4 workers this way before they fall.

Take your settler to the east river right next to the Iron square. Your choice to place Moscow next to iron hill or right on top of it. Once you get it going, proceed to Chop rush a couple of pikemen / longbow. Absorb the attacks for a few decades till Moscow & Novgorod is solid enough to churn out settlers.

Remember machinery tech? Forget about it for a while since you want to rely on quick archer production and upgrade to longbow with money. I like doing this since archers are 50% quicker to make. 5 units in garrison is enough 2 Pike 2 Longbow 1 horse archer. etc. Build walls to make sure.

You 'Should' survive to rebuild your empire. I foudn Byzantine AI is stuck on Kiev & Kharsov since i rendered their surrounding area useless with the clear cutting. But they still garrison troops there. Just maintain your defence till you're comfortable enough to resume research. I managed to stay 90% research.

Prioritize cottages on several back line cities & libraries. basically you're playing catchups for a while till you unlock Cossack tech.

Once you get military tradition, open up defensive pacts with all your Crusaders allies, so Saladin the infidel would be too afraid to declare war on you, leaving you free to assault the vikings & byzantine. I chose byzantine. You don't even need catapults except for those tough towns, you will recapture Kiev and Kharsov easily. Then work on Byzantine's major town till you can't cap anymore (REMEMBER TO build COURTHOUSES or you'll go bankrupt) or they disappear to the pages of history.

This is where I saved game and take a break to make this post ^^
Saladin still has a major lead thru expansion in my game, as well as Louis, followed by Chinese. I'm no.4 currently, Frederick is being sandwiched and can't expand, as well as the other civs...so these guys are the big 3 probably.

Next game plan would be to assault Saladin's empire probably, leaving Louis the Vikings to the north. It's probably worthwhile for the oil in Iraq ^^

To slide up the difficulty level, anyone has luck winning as the Incans or the Aztecs in this scenario?

Already posted :

I played the Incas in that scenario and had a blast. You start off alone on the west side of the Andes, with about 12 useful land squares in a little strip, and no way to cross the mountains to the east.

Usually I play immortal, but Noble was challenging with that start. Unfortunately the game slowed down too much toward the end and I stopped playing, but I'd managed to achieve tech parity, and had some very nice land, including several cities with room for 8 watermills and 8 workshops, all on grassland.

Sounds like I should try the Russians for an even bigger challenge.

I massed all my horse archers together and moved em around as needed.
They can all beat fredrick to Danzig and take it. Then move down and destroy Byzantines horses. Move over and take the southern barbarian town and hope back about the same time byz tries to start sending in knights.
Gotta go to longbowmen as soon as possible. Danzig and St petersburg can have archers for awhile. Only people that bother them are fellow christain states that will be favorable to you because you been at war with saladin.