Rat 09 confirmed that it is much tougher to win by conquest even on prince. The additional restriction of razing all AI cities did not make this easier.
This follow up game would be on prince as well but without the razing condition. Still, it will be a real challenge to win by conquest, since all other victory condition would be enabled as well.

Suggested SG

Level: Prince
Civilization: to be discussed
Map Type: Continents
Size: Standard
Others: all victory conditions enabled, but we need to win by conquest

Roster:
ThERat
reserved
reserved
reserved
open slot

I am keeping some spots reserved for Rat 09 players in case they would like to join again

sweet....revenge! count me in :)

If there's a spot I'll join up. :p Could always brush up on my military tactics.

I am willing to try again.

count me in :)

Looks like the schedule is filled :) Welcome Goraemon! Read Rat09 and you know why we're up for some revenge....

nice to see that you all want to play again and welcome
goraemon...

Now, I was thinking of playing as Russia. What do you people think. Their UU can be quite powerful and we have time to build up our empire. I think it will be important to concentrate on empire building before thinking of too much war. Once we have been established ourselves well, then we can take on the enemy.

Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy
Greebley
goraemon

Thankee:D

Catherine is one of my favorite civs with financial/creative; the early culture expansions help as we don't have to build anything extra to be able to grab resources. Cossacks of course pwn. With the financial trait, we can afford to build up our infrastructure and research early on instead of necessarily going for an ancient-era rush, and make sure that when we eventually go to war, our advanced armies will be well-supported by our economy.

All in all, I'm somewhat familiar with playing her and have no complaints, although to play a completely counterintuitive civ would be a different challenge altogether. :)

Now, I was thinking of playing as Russia. What do you people think. Their UU can be quite powerful and we have time to build up our empire. I think it will be important to concentrate on empire building before thinking of too much war. Once we have been established ourselves well, then we can take on the enemy.


Yeah Russia is good for me..i havent played them yet, so would be a good chance to get to know them :). Yeah the building strategy early on seems to work out fine in DG01 even though it wasn't planned in that game but forced to it :mischief:
Should be interesting to see how this develops. Oh...you sure you don't wanna turn of at least Spaceship? I really hate that victory condition :)

Russia's a fine race, late enough UU(love the UU, btw) so we can work on tech'ing is always good. Fin is good for supporting a vast empire which we will undoubtedly have, though I like Organized better for warmongering. Not a big fan of the creative trait for warmongering, though. I wouldn't be against using Russia, but I'd like to toss in a few more nominees.

1) Japanese. - Agg/Org is a very good warmongering combo IMO. I really like Agg for warmongering because of the myriad of options that free combat 1 opens up, and the cheap barracks is always nice. Samurais are late enough and fairly long lived(provided that you tech appropriately) and in a very convinient spot for tech'ing. Civil Service is a tech you want to get to fairly early anyway (for beauraucracy) and Machinery is just a hop and a skip away from Metal Casting. If you beeline for those 2, you can get some serious mileage out of samurais.

2) Incans - Yeah, the UU is really early, and really only good vs barbarians and extremely early capital sacking (more for small sized maps, but we may get lucky and find a neighbor nearby this time), but it's another one of my favorite warmongering trait combo. Not to mention starting with Mysticism is nice as we don't have to waste as much time scrambling for religions. As for the UU, in the first 40-50 turns or so, there's really not a whole lot to do other than making military/worker/settlers.. and if we happen to find a civ nearby, there's no reason to make the latter.

3) Indians (either) - having fast workers will help boost our start a bit.. and we don't really have to worry about gearing up for war for a certain era either. Starts with mysticism, Gandhi's good if you want to go for wonders and Asoka's good for the Org trait. Not to mention the idea of Warmonger Gandhi....

I was thinking of Japan too, but Tokugawa is usually hated amongst the rest. We need friends to win this, spreading religion for that might help.

So, India might be a good choice too...

Well, I think Tokugawa's just hated amongst the rest because of the way AI plays him :p Refusing to open borders and trade with everyone doesn't really help your relations. I don't recall having any problems with him when I played him, hehe.

I think Tokugawa is mainly hated in the game because of the AI personality...he doesn't want to trade, or open borders... if you play him as human it shouldn't be so bad. I don't think the AI are hard-coded to dislike a specific leader/nation.


**EDIT** Oops, Xarathas just beat me to it :) ** EDIT **

so, shall we play as Tokugawa? I am ok with that

save (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/THERAT_BC-2880.Civ4SavedGame)

Pre-Turn
start as Russia. Also use epic speed to make it possible to win by conquest. Set AI to aggressive

this is our start I called it Garden of Ivory
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat104000.jpg
settle on the dot
we get 185gold from 4 huts, we have now 1 scout and 2 warrior
went for bronze working so we can chop forest, 6 turns for agriculture so we can work the wheat
currently on worker, ready in 10
there is also one more hut and we are alone on a continent which has copper in the south

our land
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat102880.jpg


Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas - up
Dimy - on deck
Greebley
goraemon

since this is epic, suggest to play 20 turns in the first round (I played 30 turns myself)

Alone again on a continent? :lol: You generate some weird continent maps :) But it's a good thing for our new strategy in this game...and the continent is big enough to keep us expanding for a while. :goodjob:

You generate some weird continent mapsI also don't know what is that. But either I get AI gallore with 4-5 on the same continent or those isolated starts.
By the way the southeast/east isn't totally explored, there might be more land and Islands. We should go for sailing also soon.

We have copper on our Island and since we do not want to go fighting immediately, I think iron working has lower priority. Maybe get archery for barb defense and then go for the Oracle, CoL path?

By the way, the reason why I did not select Tokugawa is simple. Right at the same time, there is another SG starting with Toku and a conquest goal. I didn't like the same setup...

Holy Ivory, Batman..:eek:
Unfortunately, aside from those, it looks like our resource distribution across the continent is less than stellar. Add to that no neighbors..oh well, we'll just have to accept that we'll probably be behind technologically in the early going and try to expand quickly, keeping watch for barbs.

Hmm.. war elephants.. *drool*. Never played with Aggressive AIs.. do they trade much?

If anything looks like our capital should be able to pump out some decent science early on with all those ivory. Library should be built ASAP after the oracle.

If Oracle'ing for a CoL is doable, that would be great.

We should make a point to get Sailing early to get a few contacts, though. I have a bad habit of ignoring seafaring techs.

Great Library is always a nice boost to science and usually easily obtainable if we beeline for it.

We could also try for Great lighthouse / Colossus, as it is very likely that we'll have a good bunch of coastal cities.

Monarchy for wine/hereditary rule should be done once we the few early wonders out of the way.

Argh, so many choices :)

once we can work the phants and wheat, our captial will be a shield and commerce powerhouse initially. This will be very good for early research. However, the whole Island doesn't look that great with a lot of desert in the east.
Suggest to get to galleys asap to be able to explore. We need contacts once we get to the alphabet.

Turn 0 IBT - Scout defeats wolf.

Turn 2 Scout pops hut, gets 5 exp.. bleh. Kinda pointless when it's stuck on an island eh. Maybe we can ship him off later.

Turn 5 - Agriculture -> Fishing

Turn 9? (I'm losing track..) worker finished in Moscow, making warriors until we hit size 3.

Gotta love how it takes 8 turns to make a farm on epic..

http://www.fun-soft.com/xarathas/images/Civ4/Rat10_New_Whaling_Station.jpg

Looks like this will be our new whaling station.


Turn 15? Fishing -> Sailing. I'm putting off archery until sailing's done.
Scout finds hut (warrior).. and it seems like there's more land to the east than we thought.

Turn 16 - Looks like there's some fish by the bronze site. There's also some islands(?) to our south.

Turn 17 - Warrior -> Warrior.. quite a few warriors, but they're always good for fogbusters. Being alone on a continent can mean a lot of barbies.

Turn 18 - Farm's finally done...

Turn 19 - Synchronized Moscow to finish the warrior & grow to 3 on the same
turn.

Turn 20 - NW is completely explored. North still needs a bit more work. East side and the little dark spot on the south side also. There may be some kind of isthmus, but I really doubt it as we would've seen a scout by now if there was.

http://www.fun-soft.com/xarathas/images/Civ4/Rat10_World_As_We_Know_It_2000BC.jpg

It seems that our newer city sites are fairly poor, but there are a few decent ones. CopperFish looks decent, and WineCow to the east looks decent too (tad far for 2nd city). I'd suggest either CopperFish for 2nd city, or maybe north for Pig/Wine or East for just the cow. I think we should definately settle CopperFish by the 3rd city at the latest. Could use the copper for Colossus (If we go for it.. and I see no reason not to with the way this map is looking).

Good luck Dimy!

maybe the second site near the copper indeed though a bit far away.
I would like to get a galley out asap to check all those little Island there, maybe something worth down there

we could also settle the site south of our captial catching the fish and another ivory, even though it's a little crammed

I think we should settle cities without major overlaps for now. We probably want to cover as much ground as possible early on, because if we can settle on other people's continents, they can surely do the same to us.

CopperFish is a bit far walking, but it's actually fairly close distance wise (if that's what you're worried about, upkeep). Though I wouldn't be against settling in between the two first.

Hey guys, sorry for the delay, I was hoping to get some turns in today... but it was a collegues birthday today and I ended up in the pub :)
I got no excuses for tomorrow though, so you can expect my report then :)

P.S. Took me 5 minutes to type this message ;-)

Dimy? :bump:

Yeah sorry... I shouldnt go out on weekdays anymore, it messes up my routine :) I'll play my turns first thing tomorrow, this evening I did DG01 and DU1.

Turn 0 2000 BC:
Checking out the map, this is some horrible starting continent….lot’s of desert and tundra, few grasslands.

http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image001.jpg

Anyway here’s some ideas where I suggest our 2nd and 3rd city, the 3rd city on top of Copper, because that way we’ll have more land tiles (3 grassland tiles) to work on plus the fish. If we settle on the grassland to the west we have the fish as well, but only 1 grassland tile to work and lot’s of sea tiles.

Turn 2 1950 BC:
Our scout in the east ends up right next to some Lions… bad luck, he’ll probably get eaten IBT.

IBT:
http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image002.jpg

http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image003.jpg

Our Warriors on a Wood Hill north of Moscow are attacked by Bears and win, they’re Woodsmen so the bonus was sure helpful there. Our Scouts won from the Lions as well!

Turn 3 1925 BC:
Moscow is size 3 now, I start on a settler. This will take 14 turns!

Turn 8 1800 BC:
We discover Sailing, Going for Archery, I think we need decent defence now against barbs.

Turn 10 1750 BC:
Our scout got attacked again, this time by a pack of wolves… once again we win!

IBT:
Our northern Warrior Explorers got attacked by Wolves… we win and I promote them to Woodsman II.

Turn 14 1650 BC:
http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image004.jpg

Our Woodsman II Warrior was attacked by Lions but survived. First barb warriors discovered in the west.

Turn 17 1575 BC:
We discover Archery, going for The Wheel and Pottery so we can connect our resources and build some cottages. I suggest going for Masonry after so we can build The Great Lighthouse. Settler finished in Moscow, starting a Lighthouse.

Turn 18 1550 BC:
Two more barb Warriors around. Our Warriors are fortified on Hills nearby though, so shouldn’t be a problem.

Turn 19 1525 BC:
Barb Warrior attacks our fortified Warrior on Hill and gets killed. Our Warrior need 5 turns to heal.

Turn 20 1500 BC:
http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image005.jpg

St. Petersburg is found on 2nd City Site, starting Lighthouse. Change from Lighthouse to Galley in St. Petersburg, as soon as Wheel comes up we should start roading and connect St. Petersburg with Moscow and building a road towards the 3rd City Site. When the Galley is completed Moscow should hit size 4. So we can build another Settler then. Lighthouse and Barracks are in the build queue as both have got some hammers already.

And here's the savegame. Moscow is a pretty poor site, it's not getting many hammers nor commerce, I think we're in for a tough challenge in this game!
Good luck Greebley!

Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy
Greebley - up
goraemon - on deck

Ok, I got it.

I played to 1000 BC.

We got Wheel, Pottery and started Animal Husbandry. Went for pottery to build Cottages and Granaries.

A barbarian killed our Scout and we killed one warrior.
Finished the galley that is finding many size 1 islands.

We have a settler. Someone marked the Copper as the thrird city site. Not sure if that is the best spot. I would like to settle so we are using pretty much every square. Last time I think we were too spread out. Fortunately, the Tundra in the north has lots of rivers to make it viable. Similarly, we should grab ocean for the commerce and not waste it (where-ever a city will gain more than it costs).

I would settle one west of that copper.. as that Copper, hill, and plains are going to be that city's only sources of production.

I got it and will try to get my time in tonight

Turn 0 (1000BC): Switch granary in capital to worker as we need workers. 4 turns.

EOT Animal husbandry researched. We have horse north of capital:
109069
Along with pig and some hills, looks like a viable spot for a future city.

Turn 1 (980 BC): Seems to me we're not going to try for religions as we've
been researching just about everything else but don't even have mysticism.
So instead of stonehenge or oracle, I decide to shoot for the great lighthouse by researching masonry. 6 turns. Pyramid seems like too tall of an order as we don't have stone (or was it marble?) to speed it up.

Turn 2 (960 BC): :hammer:

Turn 3 (940 BC): Travelling galley meets Caesar!
109070
I belatedly decided the sole current worker is better off working the ivory rather than the cottage. Immediate 3 gold/production boost is beneficial right now; as Moscow grows it'll be able to use that tile immediately.

Turn 4 (920 BC): Worker built in Moscow. Looks like lighthouse had been queued for next. Works with me. Move worker to adjacent forest-hill for chopping.

Turn 5 (900 BC): Settler has been moving all this time into position for 3rd city.

Turn 6 (880 BC): Novgorod founded 1 west of copper. Research begins to hurt at -6 @ 100%. I begin worker at that city to stunt its growth; we've got enough unworked tiles right now and need commerce amongst others, not to mention road network. Also we're going to need more cities soon so to keep the new cities' size in check for commerce to catch up.

Turn 7 (860 BC): Masonry founded. Begin writing (9 turns)

Turn 8 (840 BC): :hammer:

EOT Lighthouse choprushed in Moscow.

Turn 9 (820 BC): Begin Great Lighthouse. Other worker finishes camp on ivory tile. Move both workers to adjacent forest.

Turn 10 (800 BC): :hammer:

EOT: We're a "great" wealthy city. Not for long:p
109072

Turn 11 (780 BC): :hammer:

Turn 12: (760 BC): Worker completed in St. Petersburg. Apparently lighthouse was auto-queued there too. But I try to go for a couple archers 1st. Move worker to build pasture.

Turn 13 (740 BC): Workers action mostly. More chopping, etc.

EOT: Barb warrior alert near Novgorod/St. Petersburg.
109073
Turn 14 (720 BC): :hammer:

EOT: Our fortified warrior defeats barb warrior.

Turn 15: (700 BC): :hammer:

Our empire:
109074
Writing due to finish EOT. Workers choprushing near Moscow. Another round of choprushing by both workers (hopefully not too close to Moscow) should get the job pretty close to done.

Also we should probably get to building a 4th settler (and then a 5th, then a 6th..) while beginning to pay some serious attention to commerce about now. Moscow is ripe to be a commerce/production powerhouse, with those river/grasslands in addition to the worked camps, so as soon as GL finishes cottages should be the prime order of the day. Same with the other cities I suppose, after building up some archer and/or axemen defense. With this kind of start we don't really have to focus on early military (except as to hold off barbs), but rather on cities and infrastructure so we can bring the medieval (or later) can of whoopass.

Galley is still exploring south but has not met any other civilizations besides Julius.
109075
Finally was it 15 or 20 turns each at this point? I played 15 to be on the safer side.

got it...from now onwards 10 turns each I think

by the way, once the borders of Novgorod expands we can work fish, so i rather build a work boat for faster growth than a worker. And yes, we do need some archers urgently. Once the barbs show up with archers, we look very vulnerable.
So, GL and few archers and then next phase of expansion. I will try and come up with a dot map now that we have horses.
I would try and get to alphabet as well as soon as possible so we can trade techs with the AI.

maybe it is benefiscial to have no religion at the moment so we can trade with the AI without the religion rep hit.

well, you could always get the religion, just don't convert to it or convert off of it if you want to avoid the penalty.

You can remove that sign in Globe View, Stategic Layer. I still believe the site on the copper would have been a better location, but we have a bit more production now.

save (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/Rat10_BC-0400.Civ4SavedGame)

Pre-Turn
first thing I do is to change the name of the game
change Novogorod to work boat in 13
wary of the barbs, MM St. Peter for archer in 6 instead of 8

IT what I fear is true, more barb warriors showing up,
writing is in, go for IW next so we can fight them properly

1. 680BC
need to send out warrior to face the barb warrior so we can protect our land
to improve our relations, agree on open borders with Caesar

IT more warriors from the north pouring in

2. 660BC
we need to be lucky now else we are in big trouble
forest chops are done and GL ready in 7 with stagnant growth for now
warrior retreats to St. Peter, chances of survival are better there
northern warrior retreats to forrest for higher chances of survival against 2 barbs

3. 640BC
warrior steps next to St. Peter, either we win this fight or we are out

D-Day in Russia :eek:
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat10640.jpg

IT big time luck as we win all 3 battles, that was close

4. 620BC
we need more archers for now even without a rax
workers at Moscow will start the cottage business, we need that earlier

5. 600BC
we get our first archer and order another one

6. 580BC
MM Moscow back to growth since it can still get GL in 3

7. 560BC
start to work a cottage in Moscow so we get it bigger sooner

8. 540BC
spot another warrior north of moscow where our woodsman 2 warrior is heading
start to chop a forest at St. Peter so we get more archers
then my compuer completely reboots, wow didn't have that for a long time

9. 520BC
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat10620.jpg
warrior next to ours, set Moscow on archer as well

10. 500BC
our warrior wins on defense, play 15 since to get to even number of turns
with the situation a little safer, swap Moscow to settler due in 11

11. 480BC
yet another archer appears in the north
forest chop near St. Peter is done

12. 460BC
and another one appears in the northeast
decide to build one more archer in St. Peter
the Oracle has been built somewhere

IT we get iron working, alphabet for trading next
our woodsman 2 warrior defeats archer on defense :)

13. 440BC
Novogorod has a work boat, set to granary to let it grow first
also find out that we do have iron in a great spot, we should settle there next :dance:
need to reduce science to 90%

14. 420BC
set St. Peter on granry forst an start a cottage there as well
we have also completed the road bewteen St. Peter and Moscow and health is no issue for now

15. 400BC
Moscow is building a settler due in 6 to be sent to a power iron/wine site
let Novgorod grow before going on a worker
after a cottage we could forest chop to help St. Peter finish the granary
I left 2 archers within our borders to keep unit cost down

the galley had hit a dead end in the south and is now sailing counterclockwise around that southern continent
not met anyone else yet
once alphabet is in, hope we can trade techs then

suggested tentative dotmap with the fourth city next to iron and wine
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat10400a.jpg

galley
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat10400b.jpg

Roster:
ThERat - just played
Xarathas - up
Dimy
Greebley
goraemon

I suggest to play 10 turns from now. i would also suggest to go for a different approach this time. We face Romans anyway, so we better don't fight early. I think we should nicely build up our empire, try and go for caravels first to circumnavigate, then after meeting everyone, we should try and decide to pick an enemy and take out one after another.
We should not rush into war like the last time round. If we can manage to get a tech lead, we can take out the enemy easier.

I would try and maintain good relations with Rome and whoever else. Trading will help us a lot.

got it, will be finished tomorrow nite.

Turn 0 - Look around a bit, everything looks good. I noticed that there's Gem down on the Roman continent.. I think we should definately try and settle a colony there before the Romans get to it. It'll also give us a decent foothold on that continent when our conquest comes around. Might give us a negative modifier in relations eventually, but I think it's well worth it.

Turn 1 (380 BC) - nothing much, scouting around that gem a bit more.

Turn 2 (360 BC) - same

Turn 3 (340 BC) - sending Galley back towards mainland. The settler that's about to pop out probably won't be the one we send over, but I think we should send the next one we make over.

Turn 4 (320 BC) - scouting the next city site. I like the Iron/Wines to the east. Although I think I'd settle one spot south of that since it gives you boast the coast and fresh water.

Turn 5 (300 BC) - meh.

Turn 6 (280 BC) - Settler popped. Sending him East. Going to let Moscow finish the Archer in Queue, then start a library. Can't really afford to neglect that any longer. Guess we'll have to find a different city to make the next settler.

Turn 7 (260 BC) - Going to do some chopping in St. Petersburg (the ones outside the workable tiles) to speed up the Granary and the upcoming settler... actually I decided to insert the settler ahead of the granary. It's not like we're gaining food while making settler anyway, so no point finishing the granary first.

Turn 8 (240 BC) - looks like I prematurely pulled the galley back, so instead of leaving him sitting around I'm going to explore the nearby archipelago a bit.

Turn 9 (220 BC) - on second thought.. I'm going to settle at the original spot proposed. Fresh Water for 3 unworkable tiles.. that and it's not really worth sticking another city above that since there's no resources.. I'll live without the fresh water.

Turn 10 (200 BC) - Our tax rate is down to 70% (+2). Let's avoid letting this go below 60%. I think we should get Currency & Code of Laws ASAP. I'm going to leave the settler unsettled for the next person, you can have the choice on where to settle him :)

http://www.fun-soft.com/xarathas/images/Civ4/Rat10_200BC.jpg

I would actually let the galley explore either southwest (there is still a land west of that pig) or that archipelago Islands. We might stumble on sonthing, who knows. After that library we can always slot in another galley to explore and ferry units.

I actually like the idea of planting a settler next to gems/wheat + clams.

We still have a lot of sites to settle.

As for the iron spot, I would try and settle on the original spot, it would avoid the 2 desert tiles.

What does the rest think?

Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy - up
Greebley - on deck
goraemon

I would get more towns up soonish. Only 3 seems low to me.

There is a settler on the proposed spot that can settle even before the IT.
Please Dimy, do so. And don't neglect military units. It will help if we get the copper and iron up soon.

Get another settler out to settle next to the gems in the south next to Rome.

yup.. especially if we do make it to that gem site. Make sure you send a sizable garrison to it ASAP :p Axes and Archers. Caesar's bound to have iron somewhere...

Yeah I'll settle on the spot proposed, definitely better than one south on the river. As for the Gems.. I think the best place for that city would be directly southeast of the Gems and North of the Wheat. We'll have the Wheat, Gems and Clams all in reach.

especially if we do make it to that gem site. Make sure you send a sizable garrison to it ASAP Axes and Archers. Caesar's bound to have iron somewhere..currently Caesar likes us pretty much. As long as we don't adopt the wrong religion we have a nice partner for a start. I rather befriend the Romans in the early game.

Turn 0 – 200 BC:
Change production in Moscow from Library to Galley, I rather use our old Galley to keep exploring and a second one to settle the Gems site. This will delay the Library by 6 turns.

http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image006.jpg

Rostov is founded on the spot and starts a Granary. Science is down to 60% now (+3 Gold/turn). We need courthouses and Marketplaces sooner rather than later. I beeline for Currency/Code of Laws after we’ve discovered Alphabet.

Turn 1 – 180 BC:
http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image007.jpg

Barbarian Axeman discovered in the North!! We’ve got to connect the Iron outside Rostov as soon the borders grow.

IBT:
Our Archers kill the Barbarian Axeman.

Turn 4 – 120 BC:
http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image008.jpg

Barbarian City discovered in the North West

Turn 6 – 80 BC:
Our Woodsman II Warrior defeats barb archer coming from the Barb City (IBT).
Galley finished in Moscow, Library continued.

Turn 8 – 40 BC:
Alphabet Discovered, Mathematics next. Galley with Archer and Settler leaves Moscow and set sail for the Wheat/Clams/Gems location (ETA: 10 turns). Novgorod and Copper are connected to our trade route, Iron and Rostov will be added soon.

IBT:
Our Woodsman II Warrior on the hill near the Barb City defeats another Barb Archer.

Turn 10 – 1 AD:
Our exploring Galley explored some size 1 Islands in the south and is now heading east. The Settler/Archer Galley is 8 turns away from it’s destination. Moscow can still grow 1 pop before it hits the happiness limit, but it’s now configured for high production, Library due in 5 turns, please swap to growth after Library is done and build Military…by then the Iron should be connected as well.

I went for Barracks next in our main cities. We need Axmen for Barbs and such.

We founded the gem town. I just left the boat on auto.

I think we should bring a worker down to the gem town and switch the gem town to a library to get a border expansion. Here is a picture of what I was thinking.

Note that we have already put work in on the worker since I thought of this late after the boat was done exploring.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/Rat10_AD200.jpg

Our cities have +2 Culture because we're Catherine and not Peter. So we don't need a library to grow culture also I think it's better to manually move the boats rather than automatic. I didn't find the auto-explore function very helpful in most cases.

I didn't mean the auto-explore - its not on. I simply meant that the boat that dropped off the troops should continue to cirlcle Roman lands rather than trying to return.

If we get an automatic expansion, then I would continue the worker or start a work boat for the clams.

Roster:
ThERat - on deck
Xarathas
Dimy
Greebley
goraemon - up

I looked at the save, I would switch the gems town back to work boat. And then use a worker to connect the gems for happiness.

Also, please do MM the capital for more shields after it grew to pop 6. It can work those nice 3 hammer 3 commerce ivory tiles. Rostov is working a food2 tiel when it can work better tiels and we could increase science.

And why don't we change techs with Caesar, he would be willing to trade for an almost even trade. We should make use of that. However, we should not trade him alphabet to prevent him from trading with other now. By the way, why don't we send one galley west of our gems colony? We do have th capacity to do that I think.

I know these are details, but we need to be good at MM to be able to win this time, I think.

Well I definitely feel that food is more important than shields. In the long run you get more shields by growing rather than less.

We also need to get our cottages up to town size. I just checked you do have to work them to make them grow. I think we need to work the two cottage squares even though this is less gold than the elephant squares now to make them better in the long run.

Shields should take last priority IMO. as the city grows we will start working more shield squares so we will get to decent production. In the mean time lets get our towns up and running.

The MM'ing you are mentioning - well I feel that is the reason we lost the last game. We went for shields which is most costly in the long run. Working food to grow and cottages to get your income up is the way to go in my book.

So the towns are MM'ed. I just feel shields should be our last priority.

We also need to get our cottages up to town size. I just checked you do have to work them to make them grow. I think we need to work the two cottage squares even though this is less gold than the elephant squares now to make them better in the long run.I totally agree with you on that. We should not stop working any cottage tile. What I meant is that after growing to pop 6, we can then MM to use a phant tile instead of the irrigated tile.

As for Rostov, it is working a 2 food tile when there are 2 food + commerce or hammer available. Again, once we get a cottage there, that tile must be highest priority.

So, I hope that clarifies things, I also saw that one galley is actually going west already, my bad :blush:
Generally I agree with your strategy, Greebley. ;)

just to illustrate what I meant
Moscow after growth
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat10200a.jpg

Rostov
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat10200b.jpg

I hope you dont mind some Lurker Commentary. ;) (If you do, I'll just go back to lurking quietly. Until I find a game at least.)

-Is the gem colony worth the distance and cities maintainance cost? Although the calms may give health, you guys will have aquaducts after mathematics finishes.

-I would like to point out that a good spot for a colony city (once you can support the costs) would be at the extreme north with the three resources (the iron, whale, and crabs). While it probably wont grow beyond a size 6 city (with lighthouse), its important IMHO because it nets you two key resources (crabs for health and whales for happiness).

-Since you have ivory spare and have met no other civs yet, I would consider giving Caesar ivory as a gift. That will net you +4 diplomatic bonus due to trade over the long-run which might be helpful in deterring any invasions in the near future.

-I havent played enough Civ4 to get a feel for the civs. Is Caesar aggressive (militarily and expansively) on water maps as he is on land maps?

Thanks and Cheers!

Oh I see what you are saying now. :blush:

You are completely right. Remembering to stop growth when you hit the happiness limit is very important.

As for the second picture, I remember why I did that. There is a cottage being built there and I was worried the next player wouldn't realize that and move someone to the square. It finishes in a turn or two.

The next player can move it, but I would move back when the cottage completes so it grows.

I think we are in complete agreement here. :D

Giving Ceasar Ivory is a good idea. It may keep him off our backs during the Praetorian years when he has a strength 8 unit and we do not.

We can build those elephant units that are strenght 8 as well... they come around pretty soon too I think, but I'm not sure what tech is required. :)

Thats true. I haven't had ivory before so I didn't consider it. It does mean Ceasar is less a threat. If we are planning on attacking him first, we may not need to befriend him. Or we could make him a friend and go after someone else. Not sure what is best.

I'll take a look at it a bit later today:P

Just a brief synopsis as I'm constrained for time..

Nothing too much happened during my turns and there were no new cities founded or anything. Worker just got moved to the colony via ferry but hadn't started working the gem site (I delayed his move a couple turns so that he could finish working his cottage). Novgorod just exceeded its happiness limit, oversight on my part, so there is one unhappy citizen there right now but i'm building an archer due in a few turns that will rectify the problem (with library queued afterwards). Travelling galley did meet Cyrus as well. I held off on trading either alphabet or mathematics (which we discovered during my turns). Both our neighbors only have mysticism for trade atm so any trade would be fairly lopsided against us, but the option is there if anyone wants to go for a trade.

Running at 70% with profit to boot and gem site still yet to be mined, we can afford another city or two soonish, one by the pig/horse site on the original continent north of St. Petersburg, and the other by the pig/stone site west to our Diamond Colony. That'd give us 7 cities to work off of. We're 5th or something in terms of land mass so that'd help boost our standings.

The barbarian city was left untouched but they aren't an immediate threat. There are only a couple archers there now as I've parked our megapromoted warrior beside it and another archer right behind him. A couple swordsmen/axemen or something like that could do the job whenever. I was in the process of choprushing 2-3 libraries as well, so perhaps someone can finish that at Rostov.

We're #1 in GNP BY FAR (41 while the next highest civ is 21) and a close #2 in production atm despite our relatively small size. Let's cultivate them further. Currency is due in less than 10 turns.

110053

110054

got it,

I think I will still gift ivory to Ceasar. I would like to cultivate our relation with him so we can focus on other opponents first. In this game, I would like to wait for warfare until we can make use of Cossacks. By that time we should be able to travel across the sea to pick a victim.

For now, we should be able to support 2 more towns, I agree. We can even take that barb town. Once we have currency, we should also try and get to CoL for courts since we are founding cities further away.

I agree trading maths and alphabet for a cheap tech isn't really worth it,. But when I checked last time, we did have a cheap tech oursleves to trade. By now I guess we missed that opportunity. :(

save (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/Rat10_AD-0400.Civ4SavedGame)

Pre-Turn
looking at our cities, I doubt we need more workers at the moment. swap Moscow to sword
since we have a worker at the diamond colony already, swap build to work boat

also gift ivory to Caesar

1. 310AD
a barb axe shows up, this could spell trouble

2. 320AD
forest chop speeds up the library in Rostov

3. 330AD
spot 2 Roman galleys, one with a settler pair, we need to monitor those
St. Peter has a library now

4. 340AD
zzz

IT our archer defeats the axe

5. 350AD
promote archer to guerilla II, we get our first sword in Moscow, let it built an axe next

6. 360AD
Rostov now has a library as well thanks to another chop
our finances are in better shape, running science at 80% at -4gpt

7. 370AD
zzz

IT currency is in, CoL next for courts

8. 380AD
spot that Caesar has 200 gold which we need
sell him maths for mysticism and 200gold, Cyrus has CoL already now but refuses to trade
new techs show up which we can't trade just yet
change research to compass which we need to get overseas as soon as possible
increase science to 100% at -19gpt, but compass now in 8

9. 390AD
Moscow finished an axe
this time dial up Cyrus and trade alphabet for meditation, polytheism and 40 gold
he is pleased now as well
but he still doesn't want to trade metal casting or CoL, guess because only he knows the tech

10. 400AD
compass is done in 6 turns, maybe then go for CoL if Cyrus still refuses to trade
I went for growth in Rostov. With gems online in about 7 turns (4 turn for mine + roading)
we can set all cities for growth.
Novgorod is building another settler with the accompanying archer built in St. Peter
I can see that the southern spot is already taken by Rome, so suggest to settle next to horses
We should also aim for monarchy since it will give us the valuable wine

we do have a sword next to the barb city, but I did not attack yet, another axe is arriving soon, but it's on a hill and odds
are only slightly in our favor. We might want to build another sword to be safe to take it.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat10400.jpg


Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas - up
Dimy - on deck
Greebley
goraemon

currently Caesar likes us pretty much. As long as we don't adopt the wrong religion we have a nice partner for a start. I rather befriend the Romans in the early game.

Oh, I didn't mean that we are going to war with them :) but if you make it too tempting for the AI, they may just declare war even if they like you. I know some AIs will and some AI won't.. I haven't dealt with Caesar much so I have no idea.



PS: Got it, will play tonight.

Okay, playing now. To answer the lurker question from before, yes, I think a city with Gem is definately worth the distance penalty upkeep. working the gem itself is already a good amount of commerce, not to mention that it's a coastal city so that it would definately more than make up its money in the long run. Happiness (+2 with forge) also means 1~2 less units you need in every city (since we'll be in hereditary rule for a good portion of the game), even that alone is worth the upkeep.

Turn 0 - City inspection. I decided to delay granary in Moscow by 5 turns for another swords to take over barb city. Our swords have a barely favorable odds and the odds for the axeman is pretty lousy. Would have to heavily rely on luck to take over that city even with the help of the archer nearby.


Turn 1 - Move a worker towards the Horse/Pig site to chop the forest on our City site. It's a bit far, so wouldn't net the full amount of hammers but it's still better than letting it go to waste.

Turn 2 - Ivory to Cyrus for Corn. Normally, I wouldn't do this, but since we're most likely going to be buddy buddy with Cyrus for a while I see no harm in doing this. This should help our relations with Cyrus a bit.

IBT - Barb city gets 3rd archer, and attacks our swordsmen. Sweet, our Swordsmen will now have City attack 2.

Turn 3 - Settler done and on way to PigHorse.

Turn 4 - Gem done, Diamond colony is now making 12 beakers at 100% science, despite being size one :)

Turn 5 - Swordsmen done in Moscow. Moscow's currently making 1 food surplus, but I decided to take one of the ivory square's citizen off and made him a great scientist. Reasoning being that 1) It doesn't change our science output. 2) We're about 35 points from popping our first great person.. and as it is right now, it's going to be a Merchant 100%. I decided to speed that up a bit and give it an outside(fat) chance of getting scientist. Instead of taking another 18 or so turns to get one, we'll now get a great person in roughly 7 turns. Getting scientist will GREATLY help our science output in moscow, and getting a merchant will aid the growth in Moscow (basically, trading the 7 turns of +1 food for 11 turns of +1 food), and give us an extra 3 gold a turn for 11 turns. I think it's a good trade either way. In the case that we get a merchant (most likely), I suggest we sacrifice a different city's production/growth for a while to run 2 scientists so that we can get an academy in Moscow ASAP.

Turn 6 - Compass Discovered, Cyrus still refuses to trade us code of laws. Julius Caesar converts to Judaism. Code of Laws would be nice for courthouses, but I decided that getting Colossus would be even nicer as most of our cities are coastal. It's dirt cheap to make, for one, and getting forges earlier means that we can grow our city one pop more for free. Yaroslavl founded. Turned science down to 80% (-8).

Turn 7 - Gem connected, Avoid growth turned on in Novgorod.

Turn 8 - Our galley down south could proceed no further :( turns back around. Diamond Colony finishes fishboat, worker's was in queue, but I really don't see the point of making a worker down there at this moment as there are very few tiles to work on. We're doing upstairs okay worker wise also. I decided to start on library instead, as this city is already a commerce powerhouse. 45 turns to completion, but with a clam and wheat ready to be worked in the near future it should be easily whippable in ~10 turns.

Turn 9 - St. Pete: Lighthouse -> Harbor. Barbarian city taken without a loss (luckily). Got us a bit more cash to maintain our current science rate.

Turn 10 - Moscow at 149/150 GP point, estimating a 7~8% chance for great scientist next turn(wish us luck). Sending Axemen north of barbie city to do sentry duty.

Regarding the specialist city, if we should need it, Novgorod looks like the best site for it, unless we want to wait 15~25 turns for Gem city to whip a library and grow to size 4 (I don't recommend this).

Good luck.

good call on the specialist, I would swap Moscow back to growth next turn, it looks as if Novgorod is the better specialist city at the moment with it's happiness limit
as for research, would beeline for CoL and optics for caravels

Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy - up
Greebley
goraemon

Got it, not sure if I do my turns today, probably tomorrow.

I read through Rat09 yesterday, and just read this one today. I must say that I thoroughly enjoy reading these games. :goodjob:

Turn 0 500 AD:
Checking out our cities and the AI… seems like Cyrus is running away with techs, we’ve got to stop that, compared to Caesar we’re doing fine though. Novgorod will need to finish the library before I can assign scientist specialists (3 turns).

Turn 1 510 AD:
A great merchant is born in Moscow, I switch Moscow to max food so it will grow to size 7 in 6 turns. I have him join the city for +1 food and +6 commerce. With the extra food the city will grow in 5 turns even.

Turn 2 520 AD:
Phrygian comes out of resistance and starts on a Lighthouse.

Turn 3 530 AD:
Library finished in Novgorod and starting on Harbor. I assign two Scientist Specialists in Novgorod, we’re getting +6 Great Person points there now (Great Scientist due in 50 turns).

IBT:
Barb Axe attacks our Archer in the north east tundra, we win.

Turn 4 540 AD:
Start road to connect Phrygian with Yaroslavl.

Turn 5 550 AD:
We discover Metal Casting, CoL due in 7 turns, I lowered science to 70% as we’re running out of money. I check for any possible trades, but there is none.

Turn 6 560 AD:
Start pastry on the Horses near Yaroslavl. Moscow grows to size 7 and is at max happiness. I micromanage the city and assign two scientist specialists, city growth is stagnant now.

Turn 7 570 AD:
Moscow finished Granary and starts on Forge.

Turn 10 600 AD:
For some weird reason my PC suddenly shuts down… I never had such problem before, luckily I have autosave set to save every turn.
St. Petersburg finished Harbor and starts on Forge. Moscow is generating +8 Great Person points now and has 46/300 points in the bag, so 32 turns left before the next Great Person will be born there…It will most likely become a Great Scientist, odds are currently 47% Great Scientist and 52% Great Merchant (don’t know where that other % went), but from the 8 points/turn 6 are Great Scientist points. Novgorod is at 42/300 points @ 6 points/turn and 100% Great Scientist.

Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy
Greebley - up
goraemon - on deck

I strongly suggest going for optics after we have done CoL. We need to explore the world for the extra movment and more contacts for trading and deciding the strategy whom to attack first.

Ok, I got it.

Ok, Not a whole lot happened. I felt we had stopped growing and that isn't good, so I did something about it. We have courthouses now so can have more cities. Additionally I went for Monarchy before heading toward optics. We have wine and and can use the MP to increase our city size.

I saw 5 sites that looked good for a city in the near future. I built/am building 2 settlers, plus we can build 3 more in a bit. I would rather get our future towns down and growing now than waiting too long. Our total city count still is below the OCN.

Another way of looking at it that we are playing conquest and will need more towns to build units at some point in the future.

Here are the spots I see us settling.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/Rat10_AD700.jpg

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/Rat10_AD700a.jpg

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/Rat10_AD700b.jpg

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/Rat10_AD700c.jpg

I got it, I got it!:) Expect a more focused effort from me this time around as I'm not as pressed for time as I was previously.

Slight change of plan, I'm just going to post my progress here as I go instead of finishing the game and reporting. Might even take some inputs from you folks if I take long enough between turns:p

Here is our situation now as of my turn 0:
110487

I took a look at our demo, and we're still #1 in GNP and now #1 in production as well:goodjob:
110489

We're under hereditary rule aside from caste system? That I didn't realize:eek: This was obviously a recent change too. I'll have to take a 2nd look at our cities and their happiness cap.
110490

Took a brief look at our tech tree. I understand we're currently beelining for optics. Looks like quite a few turns left for machinery. I thought of going for literature (5 turns of research at current settings) first as the GL would definitely help our cause, but it's rather expensive and we don't have marble so I'm hesitating. Aside from the wonders though, literature is also the preferred prereq (I'd imagine - you can either research lit or drama) to music, which in itself is a prereq to military tradition which we definitely want at some point for Cathy's UU. It's a close call but I think I'll just invest 5 turns max for literature now before going back to machinery as it opens up our options more I think. After we are able to travel around the world, we'd need to go for civil service etc. to open up bureaucracy but that's a long ways off.

Good to see we're ahead of both our neighbors technologically.:D

We have only 4 workers!:blush:
110491
with only 3 of them on our main continent to boot. Lots of cities are building forges and strategic chopping could really accelerate that, but I feel we can't really afford it atm with so few workers as there's more pressing needs unfortunately.

Speaking of which, all but one of our cities so far is coastal. So how about going for Colossus in our capital? We already have a great lighthouse there and getting great merchant bonus and Colossus will only add to that. Besides, we get double speed with copper which we have. So it'll probably take less than 10 turns with some MM and chopping. Look:
110492

So I think I'll go for it, eh? :groucho: We're ahead of our 2 known neighbors in tech so although it's not a lock, I surmise we can probably get it.

So that's our turn 0 in a nutshell. Think I'll start playing now:lol:

Turn 0 EOT:
Our culture is "fine.";)
110494
Also got an archer barb moving in from north.

Turn 1:
Move one of our archers to forest adjacent to barb archer hoping to be attacked. We have a couple swordsmen, move them east as well just in case and to help clear fogs. Move a couple warriors north and east for fog-clearing.

As to 2 of our 3 workers main continent, stop their current task and begin moving them in position for forest chopping near Moscow. The other worker plans to chop lighthouse (or something else, haven't decided yet) in another city.

Also last turn I switched a couple of the cities from forges to workers. They'll pay off in the long run I imagine.

Up research a bit, literature will come in 3 turns instead of 4 now.

Turn 1 EOT:

We defeat barb archer. One more barb archer retreating.

Turn 2: Oh yeah, just realized that Colossus requires forge and we don't have that built in capital yet:blush: That's alright, a few turns delay.

Turn 2 EOT: Diamond Colony grows in size. St. Petersburg builds another settler. We have 2 settlers now. Forge was queued for next. Works for me.

Turn 3: 1st Settler is already south of Moscow ready to found a city but I'm holding off on it, thinking whether to settle on hill or forest. Think I'll go for the hill. I gain an extra grassland this way, instead of an ocean square, and I can still grab the nice ocean resource this way:
110496

Sure we lose a mine to work but since this city is primarily coastal I'm guessing this will be more commerce-oriented anyway, plus we've got ivory, a pasture and a hill tile so we can work those anyhow.

As for the 2nd settler just produced, not too sure where to go with him. Anyway I proceed to move him eastwards. Mostly desert there, but there are a couple resources, either cow or crab depending on where we go:
110498

I'm inclined to go coastal by the far east. It seems to me that we don't have a crab resource yet (we do have a cow resource already) so that's a plus. ALso, a majority of our cities are coastal so with our great lighthouse and maybe colossus it fits in better to our overall scheme of things. It's a bit further to get there and will need to be escorted well though. Got a few turns before actually settling so if I can get any inputs before then that'd be nice (I'm about to pack it in for tonight and will play more tomorrow).

Turn 3 EOT:

Someone founded Christianity in a distant land.:eek:
Literature comes in, machinery next.

Turn 4: Looks like Julius Caesar might be the founder of Christianity:
110502

His religion is still Judaism though.

I founded Yekaterinburg south of Moscow:
110503

Income takes a hit at 60% science, not bad though. I'd imagine 50% science is acceptable for a bit as we develop more land. Begin workboat. Borders will grow soon so we can grab that ocean resource.

Turn 4 EOT:
A great scientist is born........in Rome :o

To be continued...

{edit} I'll packing it in for now. If there are inputs thus far I'll listen to them before playing later today.

plans look good to me, Colossus would be nice to get. I agree with the city sit south of Moscow on hill.

As for the eastern settler, go for the coast I'd say. if we run into monetary issues, Caesar seems to have some cahs which we could get for a cheap tech (like litarature)

I would grab the crabs with a city on a tiny Island in the north. That could actually get 2 crabs. I think I indicated that city quaite some time ago.

by the way when I looked at the save, Novgorod had was on no growth when happiness would allow it to grow one more pop. Why not do that?

Yeah if I remember correctly, Novgorod was the city I switched temporarily from forge to worker (it was going to be built most quickly there), then a bit later I saw that it could be allowed to grow 1 more so I switched back to forge. But next turn it didn't grow(??) even though it was 1 turn to growth the previous turn. I'm thinking if there's a worker sitting in queue the city won't grow even if I'm currently building something else? I'll take a look at it later to see if my memory serves me correctly, but I was like ah, screw it and just switched back to worker at that point.

{EDIT} Oh yeah, you see that final screenshot in my previous post? Novgorod is in it; it shows that it's 1 turn from growth and you see I switched it to forge to allow for that growth. By turn 4 {EDIT: meant to say turn 5} though (where I stopped), I don't think the city grew in fact.

Yeah...it seems like we have +1 happiness in all cities since I played my turns... I stopped growth in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Novgorod and put specialists in them, seems like we can let all those cities grow 1 size (and then put back the scientist specialists)

Ya, when I mentioned I went for monarchy, I meant we also revolted and got Hereditary rule (and caste sytem on the side). That was around turn 8. All cities will have +1 happiness because of the unit guarding it and +1 assuming the winery was completed and connected. I also started bringing units back into the cities for additional happiness and growth - the warriors and such are good for MP duty.

Getting Monarchy for Hereditary rule always seems a good early goal. Cities can then grow to arbitrary size - at the cost of a unit per happiness.

OK, playing on:

Turn 5:

Keep moving settler and escort eastwards. As for the capital, I try a little something. Since Colossus gets 100% speed boost from copper, that means that chopping a tree will give 2x as many hammers as it normally would, as long as the city's current production is set to the Colossus. I see that one of the workers is about to finish chopping this turn. Normally, this gives 45 hammers, as Moscow is currently building forge (prereq for Colossus).

But it seems that I can temporarily switch production to Colossus, even though I'm not finished building forge. I won't be able to actually proceed building the Colossus this way (it'll stay at 0 hammers until forge is finished), except I can instantly get chopped hammers in its queue. It's kind of analogous to your not being able to build anything while in anarchy, but you can still chop-rush stuff (I think). So, instead of 45 hammers I get 90 hammers added instantly to my Colossus queue:
110594

:crazyeye: Cool. I sometimes find myself doing this when I'm building something that gets speed bonus either due to having a special resource (stone, marble etc), or due to trait (i.e. double speed university/banks for Elizabeth if I remember correctly?). This is not an exploit or anything now is it? Obviously the chopped hammers were specifically designed to increase in accordance with these factors anyway, so I don't think it is.

Now I'll switch back to forge production and the overflow for Colossus will remain for when I get to it.

Turn 5 EOT:

Phrygian finishes lighthouse with chop assistance. Begin on..erm, er..library. Right now the city is small and its production is completely dismal so it'll need to be chopped. But it'll be decent for commerce soon enough and might as well capitalize on it soon.
Archer barbarian up north chooses not to attack our double-hill-promoted archer stationed on forest-hill, and instead moves himself right onto a defenseless tundra land. Incidentally, that's right next to our swordsman.:lol:

Socrates is born! In...a far away land. :o
Hmm, Julius Caesar converts to Christianity.

Turn 6:
Our swordsman (99% win rate) takes out barb archer.
Another worker is due to finish chopping next to capital this turn again, so use the same switch-to-Colossus-switch-back strategy.

Turn 6 EOT:
Yaroslavl finishes worker. Forge queued.

Turn 7:

Nothing much here. Keep moving military units north to help clear fog, settler moving towards position, worker sets out to work a winery.

Turn 7 EOT:

A barb axeman appears from the north :eek:
Library finished in Diamond Colony. Worker was queued for next @ 6 turns. I think I'll leave it as is and instead ferry the existing worker back to the main continent to help out with terraforming.

Turn 8:
Hmm, barbarian galley...
110582

Move one of our archer on forest/hill, the other archer advances past barb axeman towards the north forest. Swordsman (slightly injured) is not far behind. Barb cannot attack either of our archers this turn as they're 2 tiles away now...he'll need to make a decision as to whether to move north or south.

Proceed to board our worker on colony to galley to transport him back to the homeland.

Turn 8 EOT:

Barb moves north towards our unpromoted archer. Think i'll play tag with him for a bit until he tries to move south.

Turn 9:

Two workers are chopping the final forest tile in our capital. Trying to time it right...

Turn 10:

Another 90 hammers added to Moscow.
110587
That's 270 out of 375 hammers just from 3 chops:lol: Switch back to forge, set to finish this turn.

As for the 2nd settler, I've delayed settling him both for the GNP concern and to achieve a semi-consensus prior to it. I'm inclined to settle right on the desert. Leaving the continent to settle on the little island on the north just became more dangerous with the barb galley, not to mention more time-consuming. Getting two crabs is nice, but the thing is that island has jack for production so we won't be able to build anything there w/o slavery until..uh..we get universal suffrage.
110595

Watch out for that axe barb. I'm going to save the game while leaving that swordsman active so next player gets the option to move him onto the forest/hill together with that promoted archer. Should the axeman choose to attack this turn, odds are in our favor but if he wins, he'll be on that tile with that megadefense bonus making things more difficult. Moving swordsman to the east will at least prevent that scenario.
110592

Our empire at 800AD:
110596

110597

GL & HF:hammer:

save (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/Rat10_AD-0900.Civ4SavedGame)

Pre-Turn
there is a lot to do for our workforce, we have not connected a single winery and have quite a few.
We could also settle a spot in the far north to grab whale and crab
ket our sword heal, as it is we have too many units outside our borders and pay unit support a lot

IT archer defeats the barb axe

1. 810AD
workforce will now concentrate on wine and nothing much else
Novgorod had the turn off growth button activated, switch it off
sell Rome monarchy for his 150gold, we can use it to speed up research

2. 820AD
finally we finish our first winery

3. 830AD
set Moscow back to growth, Colossus still done in 2

4. 840AD
decide to found Yakutskovia in the east, oncome drops for
Cyrus has now 120gold, maybe from sacking a barb town

5. 850AD
we get machinery and we get the Colossus
MM and we can run at 70% science at -11gpt for the time being
Set St. Peter to growth

defeat 2 barbs ion the north on defense

6. 860AD
zzz

7. 870AD
another winery is done

8. 880AD
zzz

9. 890AD
nothing much

10. 900AD
St. Peter and Phyrigian grew again. Keep cities growing until they hit the happy limit

Optics will be done in 3 at some deficit. I would like us to settle that northern whaling station soon.
Moscow and Novgorod should work on caravels so we can sail in both directions to meet others and get the
circumnavigation as soon as possible.
we don't have a single court yet, once Diamond colony has a lighthouse (in 6 turns) swap to court
Yaroslav has a growth problem before we can spread irrigation. It could be our unit pump

as for trades, Caesar now has 4gpt, we could renegotiate ivory and get the money from him.
Cyrus does not have literature and machinery, we can always sell him lit for his 140gold to keep our research up and running

the site where we could plant a whaling city
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/rat10900.jpg

Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas - up
Dimy - on deck
Greebley
goraemon

Goraemon:
You are aware of the "avoid growth" button in the city screen are you not? I had Moscow, St. Peters and Novgorod on Avoid Growth as they were at max happiness when I played. That's why the cities didn't grow even though there was enough food to do so the next turn.

Yeah, I never use them in my SP games (in fact I never use any city governor options, preferring manual adjustments) though so I missed it at the time.

woop.. didn't realize this got back to me so fast :) got it, should be up by sometime tomorrow.

Turn 0 - City inspection, did some minor MM in Novgorod to speed up growth. Sold Literature to Cyrus for $$. Canceled Ivory deal with Caesar, and traded him a wine for 4 gpt.

Turn 1 - I noticed that we can actually bribe Caesar to declare war on Cyrus.. quite costly though and not worth it at the moment, but something to keep in mind. Nothing slows down their teching like a nice war.

Turn 2 - Barb Galley show up to our eastern fishing town. Wish our galley luck. Judaism spreads to St. Petersburg! Time to do some preaching. Although, we should consider trying for Islam. I believe we're only 2 techs away from it and 1 tech (theology) should be dirt cheap if not obtainable from Caesar. Chopping the forest on grassland at Phrygian, that would be our only tile for that city that can make more than 2 food, so going to irrigate it.

Turn 3 - Our Galley is victorious. Optics is done.. Theology->Islam is tempting, but I decided that Civil Service for beauraucracy is better for us. We desperately need a city with good production and we don't really have one atm. Wine to Cyrus for 4gpt.

Turn 4 - Chopping a grassland forest near the river at Rostov too. We could use another farm there to support that Iron mine.


Turn 5 - Hatty sighting (Well, not really). Sheep for Wheat, Ivory for Incense, and Open borders. She wouldn't trade us any techs, her score is between Cyrus & Caesar's. She's also the founder of buddhism... Buddhism spreads to Novgorod, which I assume is what triggered the contact because I sure as hell don't see her anywhere. Come to think of it, we probably could have gotten both the sheep and incense for just the ivory, but oh well, feel free to toy with that in 10 turns.

Turn 6 - Lighthouse done in Diamond colony. I told the scientist there to go fishing instead. The worker there is out of things to do so I picked him up and is ferrying him to mainland.

Turn 7 & 8 - meh.

Turn 9 - Cow to Cyrus for Gold! good deal.

Turn 10 - Caravel done in Moscow, I decided to take a worker off the ivory and put it on the grassland/farm to speed up the growth. We're very far under our pop cap right now.

Okay. Novgorod's caravel will be done shortly. I suggest sacrificing growth (and the cottage tile) on that town until we get a great scientist. We can move the cottage tile worker to work the sea tile for 2 food, and remove that worker on copper to turn him into a scientist. That'll give us 2 food growth & 2 scientists. if you would rather have production, could just leave the worker on copper instead. Caravel near Moscow should be sent west and Novgorod's caravel should be sent east. Settler for whaling station is halfway done. I suggest making one more settler sometime in the near future to settle here:

http://www.fun-soft.com/xarathas/images/Civ4/Rat10_1000AD.jpg

Good site with 2 seafood, and a hill to boot. With colossus this should be a very good income/science city. Could even make this our GP city in the future if we can get the improvements built in it :p

Civil service done in one turn, and switching to Beauraucracy would greatly help our science & production. I suggest giving Theology(check with Caesar) -> Divine Right a shot, or alternatively just ignore religion and go for Paper->Education->Philosophy(tradeable, maybe)->Liberalism.

Good luck.

Got it, might do my turns tonight, but not sure... will definitely play tomorrow if not tonight anyway :)

good progress and we are now #1 in score :). let's hope the caravels will reveal more Civ's and we secure the circumnavigation.

We can run science at 70%, so I suggest to settle the 2 suggested spots soon.

As for techs, I would chose paper/PP ect rather than a religion. It will only give us a negative modifier and does not really benefit us at this moment.

As for wars, I think our UU is a great starting point for a war. By the time we get cossacks, we need to have a good navy to be able to ship our units. We shall see who is the best target, maybe Cyrus using Romans to help us?

Turn 0 1000 AD:
No wonder Moscow isn’t growing…the city is still on Avoid Growth! So I switch that off and switch the city to maximum food to have it grow as quickly as possible. I agree with Xarathas to go for a Great Scientist so we can build the Academy in Moscow asap so run a 2nd scientist specialist in Novgorod.

Turn 1 1005 AD:
We discover Civil Service, going for Theology… Caesar doesn’t want to trade this yet.

Turn 2 1010 AD:
2nd Caravel ready in Novgorod, I’m running 3 scientists there now to get +9 Great Person Points per turn.

Turn 3 1015 AD:
Build fishing boats on the Crabs outside Yakutskovia. Revolt to Bureaucracy.

http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image009.jpg

Our exploring Caravel meets Montezuma of the Aztec, they’re on a continent west of ours.

Turn 4 1020 AD:
http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image010.jpg

The Egyptians have build a city on one of the small Islands of our south coast! I don't know how they got there though... haven't seen any Egyptian Caravels or Galleys... can you even load a settler in a Caravel?

Turn 5 1025 AD:
Settler ready in Yaroslavl’ starting on a Courthouse to reduce city upkeep.

Turn 6 1030 AD:
We discover Theology, Devine Right is due in 13 turns.

IBT:
Caesar is asking Metal Casting from us…no matter how much I like him, I’m not going to give away an expensive tech like that. I do sell him Literature for 110 Gold though. Both Taoism and Christianity has spread in our lands.

Turn 7 1035 AD:
Our Caravels keep exploring… one going east the other west.

Turn 8 1040 AD:
http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image011.jpg

Our Caravel Exploring east meets with Mao of the Chinese, Mao has 4 techs that we don’t have yet…. But we have 5 that he doesn’t. Unfortunately he’s not willing to trade with us for techs.

http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image012.jpg

New Whaling Station is founded in the far north :lol:

Turn 10 1050 AD:
Nothing happens, Novgorod will produce a Great Scientist in 8 turns at it’s current rate, please remove the scientist specialists after the Great Scientist is born so we can switch the city back to growth and production. Moscow is on max food, it’s size 9 now and will grow again in 2 turns, it can grow to size 13 max.

http://www.dgerards.net/img/Rat10/image013.jpg

We're ranked quite low on Mfg Goods, this is because Moscow is currently running at max food to have it grow to size 13 asap and Novgorod has 3 scientist specialists to have our Great Scientist born and build an Academy.

And here's the savegame, gl Greebley

I had a look at the save. Some comments:

I would not let Moscow work a unimproved 2food tile. Either get a cottage there or work a phant instead. growth will still occur in 2. We also need to irrigate the plains there to get faster growth.

Diamond Colony looks like a nice GP city once it hits its happy limit.

Generally I think we need more military otherwise we get sneak attacked. Get at least 3 units up in our Colony otherwise we can't defend it at all.

As for contacts, nobody knows each other except for Cyrus and Caesar. That's why those guys are pretty reluctant to trade. They all believe they got monopoly techs :crazyeye:

Monte seems hopeless in techs and could be a nice 1st victim for our cossacks

Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy
Greebley - up
goraemon

Ok, I got it.

Oops on that halt growth thing :P I didn't realize that it was on.

Since it looks like we are going to be able to grab islam, just keep in mind that we can still spread the religion without switching over to that religion. If we're afraid of pissing someone off, just don't convert to that religion until we're ready to.

or.. better yet, just spread all the religions we got (including islam), and we'll be ready for free religion in 4 techs.

I like the idea of free religion, it will give us the happy bonus as well as 10% research bonus. And we won't aggitate others

----------------------------New entries----------------------------
Turn 240 (1050 AD)
User comment: Novgorod on 3 scientists is non-optimal. I put them all to work and we have 1 less science, +6 food (we can grow 4), and 4 more gold. This is because coast squares are 4 commerce. We can go back to specialists when we grow.

Turn 241 (1055 AD)


Turn 242 (1060 AD)

Turn 243 (1065 AD)
Taoism has spread: Rostov

Turn 244 (1070 AD)

Turn 245 (1075 AD)
Contact made: Mongolian Empire

Turn 246 (1080 AD)

Turn 247 (1085 AD)
Tech learned: Divine Right
Islam founded in Phrygian
Islam has spread: Phrygian

Turn 248 (1090 AD)
Research begun: Feudalism

Turn 249 (1095 AD)
Islam has spread: Moscow

Turn 250 (1100 AD)
User comment: I transported a Maceman into our Colony.

Notes:
I wanted Feudalism for the Longbows to defend our home cities. After that since this is a conquest game, I would beline for Military tradition. A strength 18 unit seems very nice. We can make some progress with that.

There is one settler at the spot I think we should settle. In general, anyplace that has shields, we can make a coastal settlement for decent coinage.

I am building a second settler. I don't think we should allow Egypt to be uncontested. I would build on the given dot below. Hopefully, we can get there before the next border expansion.

We met Khan.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/Rat10_AD1100.jpg

Greeb, it's non-optimal when you only consider the amount of tech we gain & other resources, but you should take into account of how much science an earlier academy would net us. Perhaps 3 scientists is a bit overkill, but I think it's definately worth it to have at least 2 scientists in that city.

Roster:
ThERat- on deck
Xarathas
Dimy
Greebley
goraemon - up

I agree on beelining to mil tradition after feudalism. Since the AI still don't know each other trading is almost impossible.
I would try and get another town for those 2 fishes in the south. After that. we should concentrate to get Cossacks as soon as possible.

Mil tradition needs music and nationalism, but for cossacks we need gunpowder as well and that means feudalism (we get that in 2), guilds and gunpowder. So, in all we are 6 techs away from there.
We should be able to get there within the next round of turns. Then we need to decide whom to take on first.

I see several options:
Monte: he is always a troublemaker
Khan: pretty much backwards
and my favourite Cyrus or Caesar, they don't like each other
Cyrus is ahead of us in score and a threat. On the other hand he likes us more than Caesar does. I would go for Cyrus actually

It was only 9 turns to get the Great Scientist in Novgorod with 3 Scientist Specialists... see it as building a unit or building, it's an investment. :)So I really think we should put those specialists back on.

Oh...and were we the first the circumnavigate?

Yep, we were.

I still would turn them on once we grow some. We have to turn off growth at some point in the not distant future. That seems a better time for it.

We did get the around the world bonus

Regarding war - We should war from the top down as much as possible.

:bump: goraemon, do you know you are up? :D

lol, that was fast :p I'll take a look at it.

Just turn 0 for now as that's what takes most of my time and it's very late...

Bunch of micromanaging. Courthouses are nice and all but for some cities priorities lie elsewhere imo. 7 workers are still woefully short for the no. of cities we have but I'll try and manage for now. City building settler can grow 1 more next turn then maybe resume settler (not sure if we should found another city immediately just to focus on cutting off Egypt on substandard land when they're not yet on our continent). I think Novgorod is better w/specialists atm, it's not far from generating another great scientist. 3 specialists back on there. Workers MM, override some tasks to help out in others. Although other civs have some techs we don't, we have a big GNP advantage right now so we should ride on it. Wow no one wants to trade anything. :lol:

Well, screw them :p , because we're:
111094
FRIGGING GLORIOUS B*ATCH :D

Will play rest of the turns later..

Turn 1: I'm holding off on settler production/founding cities. As a whole they seem to be suboptimal atm. Some cities grow.

Turn 1 EOT: Feudalism is in. Guilds next (7 turns @ current rate)

Turn 2: :hammer:

Turn 2 EOT:{forgot city name} builds lighthouse, begin courthouse.

Turn 3: :hammer:

Turn 3 EOT: Yekaterinberg builds forge, library started. Capital builds monastery, market queued.

Turn 4: :hammer:

Turn 4 EOT: Phyrigian, Whaling Station grow. CHristianity spreads to Diamond Colony.

Turn 5: :hammer:

Turn 5 EOT: Rostov finishes monastery. Begin market.

TUrn 6: Caesar willing to trade Construction now. MEtal casting to him for Construction + 60 gold.

Turn 7: :hammer:

Turn 7 EOT: Guilds come in. Gunpowder next in line. Cyrus requests that we switch to his religion and I refuse. Phrygian builds work boat that'll head for Whaling Station. STart another workboat. GReat Scientist is born in Novgorod:)

Turn 8: Put growth back on Novgorod for now and build an academy there, cuts gunpowder research from 8 to 7.

Turn 9: :hammer:

Turn 9 EOT: Mao Zedong comes demanding something like 130 gold. I check and confirm he doesn't know anyone else yet...and tell him to get lost. Capital finishes market and begins on Knight for now. Phrygian finishes 2nd workboat and starts on...meh, Granary. Diamond Colony grows to 11.

Turn 10: Diamond Colony seems to have reached its happiness limit, so..I now assign 3 scientists to it, with excess of 1 food.

Note I've still been holding off on the active settler, preferring to build up existing infra a bit more during my turns. Besides don't we start getting heavier upkeep penalties once we go beyond our 10 cities? Now I'm going to save the game while leaving the settler idle and leave it up to the next player.

I think it was worth it though; we're so far ahead right now in GNP it's not even funny:

111101

Back to #2 on production as well. We're well on our way to dominating once we get military tradition. Gunpowder, Nationalism, Music (maybe able to trade for it by then? I know Mao has it right now) are all that stand in its way (I think).

111102

good turns, I will play right now...

on to our target tech and then we will rock the boat.

Eh....wouldn't it be better to have build the Academy in Moscow? Or whatever city was producing most beakers?

Curses, I could've sworn I saw the capital already had an academy..might've gotten mixed up w/another savegame :( oh welll, not the end of the world. We'll build more of those specialists eventually :p

save (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Rat10_AD-1200.Civ4SavedGame)

Pre-Turn
it's still the same, nobody knows each other except Cyrus and Caesar
send settler down south so we can found that fish town
set moscow on LB to accompany that settler
generaly emphasis growth again.

I think the academy should have been built in Moscow :(

1. 1155AD
settler moving south
renegotiate wine with Cyrus and get 6gpt instead of 4gpt
do the same stunt with Caesar
give Hatty crabs for 5gpt

2. 1160AD
zzz

3. 1165AD
connect whales for another happy bonus
set Diamond colony back on growth

4. 1170AD
transfer the settler to that Island

IT gunpowder is in

5. 1175AD
found Yakutsk
Mao has music, but won't trade it, sell him HBR for 100gold, it doesn't help, so go for it in 2

6. 1180AD
zzz, Judaism spreads to our new city, I actually think we should later go for free religion

7. 1185AD
Music is in, nationalism next in 9

8. 1190AD
Novgorod goes back to work boat after finishing a court

9. 1195AD
zzz

10. 1200AD
nationalism is due in 5, then we go for mil tradition
keep in mind that we need galleons and astronomy for transporting the units overseas

so suggested research is nationalism, mil trad, calendar (maybe can trade) and astronomy
I would like to hit Cyrus even though relations are very good but we might get Caesar to ally
currently that options is not red for him

currently everything is set on growth, thus we have few shields
Moscow is set on mil units all the way, but we need more cities later on
Novgorod is building work boats for the new town

we might want to set up another city, we can currently run 80% science at -11gpt

the demographics
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/rat101200.jpg

our latest city
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/rat101200b.jpg


Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas - up
Dimy
Greebley
goraemon

Hmm... I don't know if it's a good idea to go for Calvary so early. We really should focus on keeping our tech advantage by going with Education/Liberalism first, which we can then get astronomy as the freebie (would have to get calendar before this too) and or another expensive tech that we need. It really doesn't turn out to be that much of a detour, imo, when you consider the free tech, universities & the 10%/happiness bonus you get from free religion.

I'll do more assessment when I can actually access the game file after work.

there is an alternative I was thinking of. Since Astronomy obsoletes the Colossus, we should maybe delay that.
We could still go for mil trad and build up a sizeable force of Cossacks (at least 10) and other mix like cats + pikes, LB's. Then ship them to Cyrus using galleys (they have capacity 2 instead of 3 for galleons). It would be slow but meanwhile we can reseach to liberalism and get a free tech.

What does everyone think of that?
We might also ask Caesar to fight Cyrus now, maybe that would prepare the path for us.

As for civics, I was thinking we should go for free religion as we already have quite some reiligious spread and once we aquire more cities, this will go up.

I think we're far enough tech-wise that we can afford to push the advantage straight-up. Depending on what the international relations are like later on, I was thinking we take care of Caesar (he's kind of pushing into our Colony) or even Mao. Hell we can probably still be first to liberalism even after prioritizing Mil. Tradition like this

Yup, I definately like that idea better. I'll take a look in game to see if we can afford to military traditions before going down the liberalism route later then decide.

I don't really think we even need galleons to fight Cyrus. As long as we maintain open borders with Caesar, all we need is a couple of galleys shipping units from mainland to diamond colony. We are very likely to be able to maintain good relations with caesar (and thus open borders), and 3~4 galleys tops would be plenty to ship units across the strait especially since we have the circumnavigate bonus. Then, we can just move calvary by land across caesar's lands right up to Cyrus' borders. Wouldn't that put us in a much better position to attack instead of having to land on Cyrus' coast, then attack?

I'm really against warring Caesar before Cyrus, as we really should be warring from the top down barring distance problems. No matter what you do, teching will always be slowed when you are warring because while you're producing military, the nations in peace are making infrastructures and what not to boost their tech. Also, right around where nations get Astronomy/Education/Printing Press is where you'll see a tech jump in many AIs.

In addition, as opposed to completely wiping out the first couple of nations we war, we should just prune them to a point where they are no longer a threat for space race. Spending time to chase down every last city of theirs is too costly at this point. That can be saved for later. Our main goal right now shouldn't be to wipe out nations but to stop AIs from being able to complete a spaceship.

As for Caesar and Mao, they can push into our colony all they want IMO, as we have already took the best spots we can in our area. If they want a tundra city here and there, I don't really mind. those cities would be pretty much cut off from their main forces when we go to war so it'll just be no more than a simple mop up job. The way computer settles those cities, they'll have no more than 1-3 garrison troops and can't really produce units efficiently. Thus they are in no way a threat to our backside.

Agreed, Xarathas.

I feel the top down approach is needed. In the last game we tried the other way round and ended up facing super strong enemies in the end.

We won't make that mistake this time round. It's either Cyrus or Mao. Maybe you can really get Caesar to fight Cyrus now with a cheap tech. this usually helps a lot. Then we can ship our units down south and raze more.

By the way, do you guys know that pillaging neutral land gives the $ bonus as well? This can be very powerful as LoTR18 showed. Pillage cottages to keep the $ flowing for deficit research.

I didn't mention, but the AI is still not knowing each other by now. What are they doing? :smoke:

Xarathas, by Caesar pushing into our Colony, I meant that our ocean resource is actually at some sort of a jeopardy near Diamond Colony, and not that I'm worried about them founding tundra colonies or whatnot. Distance is also a concern when it comes to capturing cities. Still, since we're still a ways off from declaring war we probably can discuss our victims in more detail once we're ready.

Ahh, I see Goraemon (by the way, I don't suppose your user name has anything to do with Doraemon, does it?). I'll take a look at it later. I think we should be okay though, may have to just focus on building culture buildings in Diamond Colony faster.

and yup, pillaging neutral lands yields cash, I've found that out because I've often ended up pillaging an AI's surrounding areas after I take their city (not because I wanted to remove that imporvement, per se, but to take out the road underneath it). Though, applied to the point where you are building your own cottages to pillage, feels like an exploit to me. I wonder if they can fix that by coding the maker of an improvement into the game so that you can't actually get cash yields from pillaging your own improvements.

I don't even know what Doraemon is :lol: I think the Colony is competing with Rome for culture and obviously losing atm:p

Turn 0 - Looks like no one has paper, and only one civ have Philosophy. Should be safe to get Military Tradition before we go for Liberalism... I'll check again once we get Nationalism

Switched Knight in Moscow to Grocer. Don't really think we need to build knights when we'll be getting Cossacks shortly.

Yaroslavl looks like a good site for Heroic Epic. It needs more food though, so the grassland/forest to the east site should be irrigated when we next get a chance. It could also use some Windmills on the plain/hills, as it is better than the plain/forests we're currently working.

I moved one of the sea workers in Diamond Colony to the forest tile. One hammer makes a pretty darn big difference. I also revolutioned back to slavery, seems to be the only way we're gonna be able to get the buildings built in Diamond Colony until Universal Suffrage comes around :P It's not like we're utilizing Caste system atm anyway. DC has so much surplus food, might as well make use of it. Should've probably done it while it was smaller, though. Even though Courthouse is only 4 turns from completion there, I'm going to whip the granary in there first to aid our whipping. Moscow is ways from its happiness limit, so I'll fairy a garrison unit from there over to Diamond Colony.

I checked to see if we can get Caesar to war Cyrus.. we can, but he's asking for 3 techs =/ I'll wait a bit to see if that changes any.


Turn 1~3 Making Grocer/Market/Barracks, basically. Slavery saved us quite a few gold too. We're actually positive gold while running 80%. Granary done in Yaroslavl', and looks like the overflow will take care of the courthouse too.


Turn 4~6 Heroic Epic started in Yaroslavl, will be done in 23 turns. Man, I wish we had some Marble. All those marble wonders to build!! especially Versailles! If only we had a super productive city. Yaroslavl's production may not be great right now, but it has a lot of potential.

Confucianism spreads to New Whaling Station - Yay, another religion for us to spread later on. Please keep in mind to build at least ONE monastery for each religion we got before we research scientific method.

Hatty offers us Calendar and Cash for Metal Casting. Good deal. Now if only she'll trade us Philosophy, too.

Turn 7~9 Nationalism came in. Checked with Caesar again, and he'd take Divine Right & Music for war vs Cyrus. I ended up giving him Divine Right and Calendar (400 beakers less). Before he was asking for Divine Right, and 2 other techs. I think this is as good of a deal as we're gonna get, so I took it.

Turn 10 - Grocer done in Moscow. We're now making +16 gold at 80% science. I started an Aqueduct.. because no one seems to have made the HG for some reason. It only takes about 13 turns to finish it, and probably could be sped up if we did some micromanagement. We may want to consider it.

Taoist Temple is at 20/120 in Diamond Colony. We should whip it when it gets to 30/120 (so it will cost 2 pop instead of 3). We should whip as much as possible there, as it is growing every 4-5 turns with the granary. We're under Hereditary rule (and will be for a while), so if we need more happiness, just ship a few units over. We'll be shipping cossacks over shortly anyway. I suggest building temple/monasteries (and universities when it becomes available) for culture/happiness/science. Either that, or we can go back to producing GP in that city after the temple (and a bit of growing). Running 2 scientist & 1 Prophet would be good, as Scientist and Prophet would be equally beneficial at this point. Saves us the trouble of having to run Caste System too.

Please whip liberally in Yakutsk :) We're in no danger of hitting the happiness limit there and it's growing at an insane rate with 2 fish. I suggest buildling a Granary after the Lighthouse.

Cyrus has 600 gold.. and we're ahead of him by at least 6 techs (5 showing + Nationalism that I'm aware of). If we do sell him something, I'd suggest selling him Calendar or Music, our cheapest techs. Calendar's cheapest by far, but that makes him 1 tech away from Astronomy... Music makes him 1 less tech away from Calvary.. Next person can choose :)

Good luck.

looking good, I hope the war will slow both down further.

I actually think after mil tradition, then liberalism we should go for PP as that will further increase our commerce..
As for pillaging, I don't think we should exploit it but conquered, but neutral land can be pillaged if necessary.
The question will be, do we simply go and raze some cities or do we actually keep them?


Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy - up
Greebley
goraemon

I say we be selective on the cities we keep. Don't keep anything with heavy overlaps, and try not to keep any city that doesn't look profitable.

PP would work, we can also go for Constitution -> Democracy for the SoL, Representation, Emancipation. PP leads to Rifles too, so there's no reason not to get it when we can.

I think we should also finish up settling our home continent. The tundra near the river up north is worth something. We get a lot of commerce for sea squares, a city of size 3-4 will be profitable once it has a lighthouse. Well worth it to build cities in such places.

Irrigated tundra does work for a city as well.

Goraemon, you are up in Nad's game.

Oh yeah lol, thanks for the heads-up Greebley :

Got it, but am probably not able to play until Saturday...I'll try this evening when possible, tomorrow I definitely can't play... friday night :) Anyway...my crashing problem seems to be worse than I thought it was... it's really annoying me as I had no problems at all with Civ 4 vanilla and 1.09, but now with the latest patch it's crashing. I went back to my old graphics drivers, even completely reinstalled the game, but it doesn't seem to have helped :( I hope the next patch will solve this for me again.

Turn 0 1250 AD:
Reconfigure Moscow once again for max growth and still producing a lot of hammers. The city will grow now in 8 turns rather than 13.

&*T%#WD didn’t even hit enter yet to go to the next turn and my game freezes again! I wasn’t even doing anything at the time, this is really frustrating me…I never had any problems with the previous patch and vanilla.

IBT:
Julius Caesar asks us to join him against Persia… I agree, but it will be a phoney war until we got some serious military over there.

Turn 3 1265 AD:
IBT, Hatshepsut wants to trade Cow for Deer, fair trade so we accept. I whip 2 pop for the Taoist Temple in Diamond Colony, before it was 3 pop. Island City Yakutsk grew to size 3 but we still can’t whip the Lighthouse there. I sell Compass to Caesar for 290 Gold, seems to be a good deal. Sell Monarchy to Genghis for 120 Gold. Now we got some decent cash available to us.

IBT:
Caesar wants to trade Corn for our Iron, as he’s weaker than Cyrus, we might do some good in giving him this so he can build his Praetorians… so I agree.

Turn 4 1270 AD:
Harbor is finished in Yekateringburg, going for Courthouse.

Turn 5 1275 AD:
Aqueduct finished in Moscow, starting The Hanging Gardens. I swear I whipped the Taoist Temple last turn, but apparently I didn’t…. so I whip it now as the city was “unhappy” and needed to loose some unhappy faces.

IBT:
Genghis wants Open Borders with us, for now I agree.

Turn 6 1280 AD:
We discover Military Tradition, going for Paper in 2 turns. Still can’t whip that Lighthouse…

Turn 8 1290 AD:
We discover Paper, next is Printing Press to boost our Economy.

Turn 9 1295 AD:
Whipping 2 pop to build the Lighthouse in Yakutsk.

Turn 10 1300 AD:
Dropped a Settler off at Crab Island (good name for the city!) That city will have two Crab Resources in workable range, so with fishing boats it has the same potential as Yakutsk. I didn’t bring a military unit though… our nearby Galley is going to the mainland to pick up a unit and ferry back to Crab Island. Moscow grew to size 14, I changed to max hammer now. The Hanging Gardens are due in 11 turns.

My game crashed once more, just as I was going to save the game at the end of turn 10... :( I really hope a new patch will be released soon and hopefully solve this problem for me. It's not just a crash to desktop, but my entire PC freezes and needs to reboot.

Anyway, here's the savegame.

once we get those infra buildings up, we should try and go for some military builds. after PP we should beeline for liberalism and the free tech.
also since we are heading for free religion, we need a monastery for every religion. They give 10% science boost as well, not such bad investments.


Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy
Greebley - up
goraemon

Dimy, by the way, temperature of your computer could play a role. I had total system crashes as well, but recently no more since the weather here is pretty cooling these few days. I guess when it is again hot as usual, I might suffer them again as well :(

Ok, I got it.

Turn 290 (1300 AD)

Turn 291 (1305 AD)
Vladivostok founded

Turn 292 (1310 AD)

Turn 293 (1315 AD)
Tech learned: Drama

Turn 294 (1320 AD)
Tech learned: Printing Press

Turn 295 (1325 AD)
Research begun: Philosophy

Turn 296 (1330 AD)
Vladivostok founded

Turn 297 (1335 AD)
Tech learned: Philosophy

Turn 298 (1340 AD)
Research begun: Constitution
Smolensk founded
Orenburg founded

Turn 299 (1345 AD)

Turn 300 (1350 AD)

Turn 301 (1355 AD)

Notes:
I founded some more towns. I think we should have founded them a while ago - with 4 gold per water square, a town needs only a lighthouse to be profitable and we had some decent spots left on our island.

Some of these towns need to be paid attention to. We will want to rush the lighthouse to make them profitable as soon as possible.

I started some monestaries. Buddist and Hindu.
Started the FP.

We are MM'd for food to grow and to get towns up and running. I am hoping we can grow into our shield resources.

Accidentally hit enter. No units moved.

We got to trade some world maps. Here is the world as we know it.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/Rat10_AD1355.jpg

I thought we agreed that we want to go for libralism for the free tech, also education gives us some unis and Oxford.

I would like us to start warring at one stage, we need to make use of cossack while they are worthwhile, that's basically now.

So, I would swap research to edu and liberalism, then we can go for RP. Why did you chose constitution, greebley? I just want to know, because maybe there is an issue I missed.

Roster:
ThERat
Xarathas
Dimy
Greebley
goraemon - up

I took a brief look at the savegame. Some things I noticed..

I'm not sure if we can realistically start a serious, conquering war until we're able to travel across sea more easily and that means at least Galleons, or Astronomy (that obsoletes the Colossus however). Either that or go the snail's route with a lot more Galleys (w/movement of 3 they aren't that shabby after all as long as we have a route)

Either way, we're so far up ahead enough in techs now that Cossacks can be expected to last a while.

Virtually every other civ knows nobody but us.

Although we currently share the #1 spot in production, it's not quite good enough which is to be expected with the financial focus we've taken. About 5 of our cities are somewhere near decent in production.

I think there's a point to researching Constitution now. Even if we take a brief detour into Constitution (4 turns), we'll still get education/liberalism first by a long haul. Then I surmise Democracy will be the most expensive tech that we can get by far. It's even more expensive than Scientific Method which is some further ways off. Then we can start rush-buying some cheap, much-needed buildings in our commerce-only cities that would otherwise take 60 turns (we have slavery but some of these cities built in the last turnset by Greebley are already poor in food they can't afford to lose multiple population). That means faster granaries libraries etc that much faster than our opponents which will only cement our tech domination. In some cases it also means faster units.

I think since the theme of this game is war, we definitely should take advantage of our UU. We can get Constitution@4, Edu/Liberalism@around 7-8 each, then Democracy as the free tech, meaning we'll have researched them all with beakers left over by the time ne