I played this game last night. It's standard-size continents, with all standard settings, 7 civs, random opponents, normal speed, temperate etc., with all victory conditions enabled. I'm a monarch player but have been wanting to give emperor a shot for a while now and chose Catherine because I've had a lot of success with her at monarch. I didn't have a specific victory in mind - I would've been happy to get any victory.

Starting position looked somewhat fair, less than stellar:
111243

I don't want to give too much away atm because I'd like to know how some of you would play out this start...but I will say I found myself with some irritating terrain and was dead last in score all the way throughout the middle ages and beyond. Didn't even attempt any early wonders as I kept getting messages upon messages of other civs getting them and pumping out GP's.

I'd appreciate it if some of you experienced in higher levels could play out this start for a bit (as long or short as you want) and kind of explain your strategy/progress, maybe post a savegame to compare and discuss. I think it'll be an educational experience. Thanks and good luck :)
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Always like a challenge :) , but for the sake of comparing savegames later it's nice to have a few dates to compare:

2000 BC (50 turns)
375 BC (100 turns)
for starters?

I also look forward to seeing other player's games/strategies...

This looks like it could be a good production city. Found the city on the plains hill where you started and leave the plains forest and the one not next to the river for the health bonus. Farm everywhere else. Starting city locations pretty much always have at least two resources, so some should show up when the borders expand or you get the techs to make them visible, so you'll have even more help out of this city.

Send your scout out and find a place that would make a good commerce city, since your beginning one is focusing on production, so that's going to slow your research down and you need to get that settler out quickly to have that city up and running.

For research (I forget what Catherine starts with), you have corn, so you'll want Agriculture early. Also get Animal Husbandry and Bronze Working to see if you have horses or copper in the area. If you have horses and no copper, it's worth it to get Horseback Riding for the Horse Archers, which are a deadly early unit and upgradable to your Cossacks later. Pop/chop rush a few units for protection. I find that 5 Horse Archers are generally enough to attack a neighbour and kill one of his small cities and pillage his resources to keep him in the backwater and this lets you have a weak guy guarding one of your flanks.

Make a beeline to Literature and get the Great Library - I find that's the only way to not get too far behind the AI in tech on the higher levels. Ignore all the other early Wonders, since you won't get them anyways (except maybe Stonehenge). Don't try and get a religion, either. Get 4 or 5 cities of your own and then focus on military and expand through the AI.

I'll try your save game this weekend and see how my strategy there works.

Oh, I guess anything before and up to 1AD is good for starters..personally I didn't start saving the game until much later than that but have a rough memory of how my early games went (not good). :p Look forward to your and others' trials..

I've played out the first 100 turns of this game (roughly, I forgot to save so I'm up to 325BC), and I doubt I'm in a winning position, but here's what I did:



I founded Moscow on the starting spot, and went exploring. I got some gold from a few huts, and found out I was alone very quickly, which meant that I'd have to lean heavily to commerce to stand any chance at all of keeping up with the other AIs, which meant that an early wonder was probably going to be useful, to get my economy going. The Oracle wouldn't give too much benefit in that position, neither would Stonehenge. The Pyramids would be very useful, but are also a huge gamble, without being industrous or having stone.

So I settled for the Great Lighthouse, having an extra two commerce from internal trade routes would help keep the science slider up, and with the size of the island almost all of my cities were likely to be coastal. So after finishing Agriculture/BW I went for Sailing and Masonry. I completed it in 850BC, with some chopping involved. One mistake I did make was leaving getting Pottery too long, and not having enough commerce from cottages early on, and that might be impossible to recover from.

Because of the lack of iron and horses any sort of military victory is probably going to be very hard, unless an AI is willing to trade them, so I'd probably end up going for a SS win from here, and once all the jungle's cleared thbly be a lot of commerce available.

http://img75.imageshack.us/img75/787/russia325bc6xr.jpg

I tried this start position, and I think it is particulary bad :-)
I managed to get 3 cities + 1 settler on the way, stonehenge (which isn't very useful for cathy, since she is creative, but I like it for the early great prohet, which makes a very good citizen), 3 workers and almost every resource hung up and the jungle mostly cut, and the great libray starting in a few turns (which i doubt I will finish) until 375 BC.
And I think I am loosing.
But, it's a small island (continent?), covered mostly by jungle, some wood in the captial for rushing, only 2 food and 1 luxury resource. This is not enough to last til astronomy, so you will have to conquer cyrus nearby, which will be not easy, since you lack iron and horses. And even if you manage that, you will be far behind in tech, when you met the others, which will have been trading a lot, no doubt. I'm not saying, it is impossible to win, but surely it's impossible for me :-)

You seem to be playing on the same level as I do, I usually manage to win in monarch, but get beaten on emperor. For me, there seems to be a huge step between those 2 difficulties. I suspect, the starting positions for your capitals get worse as the difficulty increases, and this is a good example.

Yeah I heard somewhere that the starting positions tend to get worse as the difficulty level increases and wouldn't be surprised if it were true.

Thanks to those who tried (and plan to try) it out. I was underwhelmed by the starting position, and it didn't get that much better as I explored onward.

I found myself researching fishing pretty early on to explore my surroundings with a workboat and also made iron working somewhat of a priority..I built a few settlers, neglected all early wonders, and tried to settle, clear fogs, and clear the myriad of jungle from the ground up. A lot of turns were spent just to be able to develop workable resources because most of them were entrenched within the jungles, so not only did I have to research the resource-specific techs, but also iron working, and build an army of workers to both do the clearing...and developing...and connecting...and it's not as if there were plenty of different resources to begin with. And every other turn some civ was building wonders or pumping out GP's.

I did meet a couple civs via workboat towards the west but could not get to the eastern portion of the world (ocean distance was too great) and I felt that early war was out of the question. Let me know, though, if someone disagrees and pulls it off :p :D

Here's my attempt. Played up to 1100AD without thinking too much; initial scouting says I am isolated so I think building a core empire is crucial, then going to war a little later with maybe the lesser powers to expand. Doing OK up to this point; any criticism or pointers welcome. Probably going to lose in the long run to space race (Cyrus) but it's that kind of map. Maybe I should warmonger with Cyrus hmmm.

Just played up to 700AD


I met Hatshepsut off to the East, and Cyrus and Mao to the North-West. I also got a message in the last few turns I played that the Indians had actually been wiped out:eek: . The tech situation when I met the other civs wasn't too bad, although if I was playing again I'd have made sure to send out work boats sooner (I didn't notice that I could reach theother islands for a while:blush: ).

Mao and Cyrus are at the same tech level, and currently have Construction, Machinery, Code of Laws, HBR and Compass, and IIRC Monarchy too, although that could be wrong. All I have to offer them is Alphabet (both), Meditation/Priesthood (Cyrus) and Metal Casting (Mao). Taoism has been founded too, but I don't know who by yet. Hatshepsut has Theology/Construction/Monarchy/Music and maybe Compass. All I have to trade with her is Metal Casting, except that she refuses to trade anything anyway. Mao and Cyrus will trade, but only with very one sided deals.

ATM I'm building the Great Library in Moscow, as I need the science, but I might not even get it. I might end up going for a Diplo victory, after an invasion of Egypt with Macemen/Catapults (I dread to think of how many galleys I'll need for that though) to boost my pop. I doubt I'll be able to pull off a SS victory, simply due to a lack of practice at it. The general tech speed does seem to be quite slow though, for the AIs I've met, so there could still be some hope of a win.


You seem to be playing on the same level as I do, I usually manage to win in monarch, but get beaten on emperor. For me, there seems to be a huge step between those 2 difficulties. I suspect, the starting positions for your capitals get worse as the difficulty increases, and this is a good example.

I'm stuck between the two levels as well, Monarch is generally too easy (unless I start on an isolated island), and Emperor is very tough to win on. To me the gap between Monarch and Emperor seems to be massive compared to the same jump in C3C (It seems more like moving to Demi-God from Emperor to me personally).

I'll try this out when I get home from work tonight.

I can tell you already that I'll settle in place, and if one of those two unrevealed river tiles to the south is open grasslands without jungle/forest, I'll research Pottery first through Agriculture (for that wheat, rather than through Fishing which is the faster route I think?) and then Bronze. Build warrior, worker and chop/cottage those river tiles right off the bat (probably even the riverside hill). If both of those river tiles aren't already bare, it'll be Bronze first to clear that river.

Err unless there's a coastal resource, then fishing instead of agriculture. ;)

We should start a club I figure,
for players stuck in limbo between monarch and emperor.
Ever trying to paddle upstream we go,
yet only maintaining the status quo. ^^

--> The Stuck In Limbo Between Royalty Club

We should start a club I figure, for players stuck in limbo between monarch and emperor. Ever trying to paddle upstream we go, yet only maintaining the status quo. ^^

--> The Stuck In Limbo Between Royalty Club

Probably be a surprisingly popular club as well. 3 members of it already:p

Actually I think the increase in difficulty I have is mainly caused by only being able to get to size 4 in your capital before you get unhappy citizens. Maybe I need to start using the whip more.

I whip whenever I am over the happiness cap in my early game, quite useful for getting that barrack, granary, forge up fast, and pumping out extra soldiers. Of course, I also wait until the unhappiness goes away first before I whip again. Listen to the whip, you lazy bum slaves, get to work. :whipped:

Stuck in limbo between Prince and Monarch here, but I will give this start a try.

I should be able to give this a try on saterday / sunday.
From the looks of it , the capitol looks very nice for a emperor start , with 3 hills and fresh water it will be a great production + commerce city in the early game.

Probably be a surprisingly popular club as well. 3 members of it already:p
Make that four.

Actually I think the increase in difficulty I have is mainly caused by only being able to get to size 4 in your capital before you get unhappy citizens.
I agree completely. With that population cap, you just can't work enough cottages to keep up in the Classical Era. My games seem to go OK in Ancient Times - it's somewhere around turn 100 where I start to seriously fall behind. By far my best games have been those where I build the Pyramids to overcome that, but I don't think that's always possible. And even if it is, I'd like to not be totally bound to a single strategy. Early Monarchy or Drama seem to be the next best way to go, but I'm still experimenting there.

As for this particular start, it does look pretty ugly. At least there are a few breaks in the jungle - I was playing a map last night where the jungle made this map look open and breezy. But even so, that jungle is a big pain. I think coastal strategies are going to be the way to go here. Build the Great Lighthouse, get early Sailing, and save on workers and worker moves by not needing too many early roads. Cover the edges of the island and backfill the jungle-y center later.

But at the moment I'm focusing my energies on playing "traditional" continents maps where I have neighbors on my continent, so I'll sit this one out. Looks plenty challenging, though...

Actually, the map is not bad, rather playable. I have played it so far to 25AD and am at tech parity more or less, may be slightly behind. Philosophy had just been discovered and I'm a few turns away from music. Terrain is rather good and there are extra resources and AI is rather cooperative, willing to trade both some techs and resources. I've made a few wrong moves but overall, it looks very nice. There is no chance for a military win because of lack of iron and no available trades (horses can be traded though) but otherwise, very playable map for Emperor. For details see attached save at the bottom.

I have mostly built cottages and did not found religions. No wonders as well. Only viable plan for military win might be in the industrial age. Trade now for horses, build chariots, catapults and warriors/axemen in numbers, discover gunpowder/chemistry and military tradition and then upgrade a few units to cavalry/grenadiers. Probably would be battling against riflemen but still quite possible to win. Cultural victory seems like the most reasonable one despite the lack of religions if there would be possibility to grab Eiffel tower.

up to 2000 BC

Settled on the starting spot and went for Agriculture -> Wheel -> Pottery to make iimmediate use of those grasslands river tiles.

Got 102 gold from a hut (scored!), then a map in 3720 BC which pretty much revealed I was on an island. The most obvious course of action upon discovering this seemed to be making a play for the Great Lighthouse and settling all around the island's coast.

After Pottery I went Bronze Working, Writing, Fishing, Sailing, Masonry (still in progress)

I first built a Warrior, then a worker at size 2, then 4 more warriors for sentry duty to keep barbarians away.

After the Warriors I began to chop a library.


375 BC

My worker chopped the library, then lighthouse then great lighthouse in Moscow.

AFter the Great Lighthouse, I chopped my first Settler, then finished a granary.

Founded St. Petersburg along the river, on the coast, next to the 3 gem sources.

Research went Masonry, Iron Working, Mathematics, Currency (7 turns left)

Gems are hooked up, and Moscow is going to pump out settlers/workers. Right now I"m finishing a work boat for the next city, while Moscow grows to it's new happyness limit (from the gems). The next new city is going to build a ship first, then pump out warriors to garrison.

Switched to Slavery so my new citiess will be able to whip out a lighthouse, library, market as well as some more workers.

The save is 350 BC, since I was in Anarchy the turn before. I put labels with numbers where I plan to settle my island.

To be honest, I don't think this map is bad at all. Once those jungles are cleared, you'll have loads of grasslands, which can be liberally sprayed with cottages for fast research. There are also a few hills around and after you get workshops as well it won't be hard to have a decent production city to kick out military.

Hey this map gets good just before 1AD. :goodjob:


Cyrus showed up from the northwest with a settler. I wasn't expecting visitors until Optics!

I was lucky to have just placed my third city on that corner of the island, to pick up the fish. My borders pushed him back. If those fish hadn't been there, I'd be going nuts right about now. :crazyeye:

Yeah it's possible to meet Mao and Cyrus to the NW before they come to you, I did it with a workboat early on and traded for tech once I got Alphabet. I couldn't meet the others until later. I got no religion and no early wonders, but tried to focus on cottages instead which took a fair bit of time. So although scorewise and landwise I was way behind I started to catch up in tech during the Middle Ages through careful trading and research of unique techs. I'll discuss the Middle Ages, and what I tried to do to stay in the game later :D

Colony:

Holy sh*t Gandhi was wiped out?!? Must've been his neighbor Montezuma. In my game he was small compared to Monti but lasted throughout the game, and I even helped him in his war efforts to keep Monti from becoming powerful. Damn, if he wiped out Gandhi he could get crazy powerful with all that land :eek:

Let me join the club too, emperor is a huge jump. Although immortal players reckon it's even bigger. And deity is ridiculous. With emperor you have to have some luck, in a game I played this week, I had consistent losses of musketmen vs their knights (even lost fortified on a forest hill) - and when you lose 10 musketmen midgame (and then your knights poked by tons of pikemen), and they take back their captured cities, it tends to lose you the game.

Also, if anyone can play into renaissance it would be nice. For me this is where it's make or break, I tend to keep up until education, and then half the time they seem to accelerate, while I slow down building universities etc. and if I don't build universities then I stagnate bigtime and lose to space race.

Did a short survey of the island and decided that my normal approach to a start like this would be to restart a new game (*blush*). I'll sign up for the club as well: we need another thread :)

Since I'm beginning to get comfortable at monarch, I decided to try your start as my very first emperor game. I played to 1550 AD sofar. My report is a bit long and detailed, but maybe someone might learn from it (me for example :)).


I started researching bronze to get out some quick settlers to get prime locations before opposition. When my two scouts (I popped another from the goody hut near moscow) finally reported we're on an island, I considered abandoning BW right away. However, since it was almost done and my almost finished worker needs something todo, I continue anyway. After bronzeworking, I research agriculture -> the wheel -> pottery -> iron working. In retrospect, agrculture i-> the wheel -> pottery first would probably have been best for this starting location. The production of my capital was focused on warriors, with the objective lift fog from the island, which was succesful. Not a single barb ever set foot on my island.

I found my second city to get all three gems within its area to be my future commerce city. I will build Oxford Uni there. I think chopping the settler and settling it around 2500 BC was my first big mistake, and it had no useful tiles to work on (2 river grasslands was all). I should have postponed until pottery, which came in around 1920 BC. This being my first emperor game, I didn't know that even the second city would have such a penalty. If this wasn't stupid enough, I also found my third city immediatly after pottery in the upper-left corner to grab the fishies. It dropped my research to 40%.

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While my economy was emproving due to cottages, iron working came in at 1000 BC. I was prepared: I already made 4 or 5 workers (which, for me, is insane for only 3 cities, but with that much jungle you must adapt) and the gem mines were created quickly. By now I had a severe hapiness problem. The island is lacking luxuries, so I needed a plan.

Plan one was to meet other civs to trade my gems to. For this I researched fishing (since my commerce was booming now this took only 2 or 3 turns :)). I used workboats to meet cyrus and (much later) mao. Unfortunately, Cyrus didn't have any luxuries to trade. However, plan two was already on its way: religion. After fishing I researched writing to get libraries ASAP. While building these, I bee-lined to CoL. I admit it was a bit of a desperate move and I didn't really believe it would work, but since my research was fast, it took only 19 turns to research mysticism, meditation, priesthood and CoL. In 325 BC Novgorod became confused, making my desperate move rather brilliant in retrospect ;) (although actually I was probably just lucky). I immediately start building a temple in Novgorod for the priest specialist (I wanted a Great Profit, fast). As you may have noted, I lack the wonders to get it for free. It is here that I make (arguably) the biggest blunder: since my capital has nothing better to build, I start putting some shields into the Chicken Itch for cash (with no hope of building it, it takes over 70 turns) and forget about it for about 50 turns, that's a lot of wasted shields.

After researching alphabet and trading to get skipped techs, I switch to happiness plan three, four and five (metal casting, monarchy and calendar). At 1AD exactly, I found my fourth city to get four sugar, pigs and wheat for massive food. This placing may have been a mistake, I'm not sure. I had already cleared the jungle (and already built a cottage) to make the location immediately viable.

111407

From here I'll speed this report up a bit.

My next goal is to meet the rest of the world ASAP, so I bee-line to optics. While doing this, in 375 BC the indian civilization is destroyed.

While my first caravel is meeting various civs across the globe, I discover I'm about even in tech but the clear number 1 in BNP. This makes me decide to bee-line for liberalism, which I succeed to get first (I choose astronomy, as it is most expensive, allows galleys and most importantly: allows observatories to further exploit my only edge on the opposition). I also succeed in circumnavigating the world first. Meanwhile I found the remaining spots on my island. Well, almost all... Cyrus beats me to one, which is rather pathetic given the time I had to settle my island, but it's the worst spot anyway. I also built the confused holy building and started to spread the word. Unfortunately only mao and hatty share my religion right now.

1550 AD: I just discovered economy first and am currently in doubt about what to do with my Great Merchant. I usually lean towards adding as super specialist to my holy city, but it's already fairly late in the game, so it might be more profitable to let him travel around the globe. I'm tech leader, but only with a 2 tech lead on all except cyrus (only 1) and monty (7 or so). I'm dead last in score, population, culture and size. I figure right now space race is the only viable option for victory (although I am a bit worried about the lack in production). Just the previous turn my pal Mao decided to attack Cyrus, and it might be a good idea to join in the fun to get some more living space and some better production spots. Unfortunately, I have neglected military sofar (I have 3 longbowmen, 8 archers and a bunch of warriors). Building up defence is currently my primary goal.

Building up an attack force to get some cities from Cyrus might be a good idea (I will bee-line the UU tech next). If I manage to get a bigger population this way and my good friends mao and hatty vote for me, diplomatic victory might just work but hate putting my victory in the hands of the unreliable voting system.

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Note that one of my competitors manages to have a -5 GNP...
111405

Most of the techs in my list are missed by monty, the only two I own exclusively are printing press and Economics...
111408

Goreamon:

Monty might have a lot of land now, but he's so far behind in tech I doubt he'll be a threat to me. And he's more likely to attack Hatshepsut first anyway (I hope, my military is almost non-existant). I still think diplo victory is my only option ATM (Cyrus, Mao and Roosevelt are all pleased with me, Monty's likely to be the other candidate)

A note about the midgame and to dimebolt:

Looks pretty good. I see some similarities in that I also circumnavigated the globe and got to liberalism, and generally focused on commerce/peaceful building. Cyrus also managed to build one crappy city on the corner of my continent (but I absorbed it culturally later on). Mao and Cyrus also warred pretty often, and my land area was also limited to that 1 continent. The prime difference between my game and yours thus far is the fact that Gandhi was not destroyed in my game. He and Montezuma shared a continent and while Gandhi was clearly the weaker and smaller of the two, he later ended up playing a part in weakening Montezuma's dominance, along with me and Roosevelt in a 3v1 attack :p Now despite Gandhi, Monti had the biggest population and largest land size for most of the game.

In your game, with Gandhi gone, it's very likely that Montezuma has an easy #1 in land area. I don't know if you have the world mapped out yet but I'd watch for Monti because although he's way backwards right now, he may well catch up very quickly due to his sheer size and power (in my game I dismissed him for a long time only to be surprised to find out he's made very quick strides technologically towards the end-before I got the world to turn against him that is). This is doubly true if Monti has the whole continent to himself without having to war constantly with Gandhi. In my game Monti was my only consistent enemy (I made myself friendly or pleasant with all other civs) so that might be something to watch out for.

What are your foreign relations like? You can probably think about a diplo victory if your relations with all but 2 of the civs are/can get to 11+ but otherwise it's going to be very tough (I once got to within 30 points of the needed diplo victory but stopped pursuing it in favor of SS). It's safer to go for SS at this point because you're not going to take over the world, and once your cottages develop to towns and you (rush)build all the requisite production-enhancement buildings you'll be competitive in production too.

colony:
That's what I thought in my game and dismissed Monti for a long time only to be sneak-attacked by him somewhere around midgame. Luckily I had been building riflemen/grenadiers and fought him off but had he attacked like 20 turns earlier it would've been tough. And that's with Gandhi not having been destroyed in my game. I don't know maybe your relations with Monti are better than mine was, but I'd keep my guard up since Monti's even bigger in your case.

As to diplo victory - it's very possible to pull it off. Although it was kind of frustrating when I attempted it because Monti was the other candidate (he'll almost definitely be the candidate in your game too) and I got Roosevelt, Gandhi, Mao to vote for me but Cyrus and Hatty both abstained even though both were pleased with me. I was something like 30 votes short of victory. I might've gone for defensive pacts with all civs and that might've pushed it over the edge but I didn't try it and went for SS instead.

Dimebolt, can you post your save at 1550 AD? I'll post mine at the same place tonight when I continue, as I'd like to compare where we're at (I stopped at around 1500AD last night).


It's interesting looking at your tech screenshot. In my game, where Ghandi was not wiped out by Montezuma, all leaders are significantly ahead of yours on techs, with Nationalism, Gunpowder, Astronomy etc...and that's in 1500AD.

You are ahead of me in techs, so settling first and going with Bronze before Pottery obviously didn't hurt in the long run. Although, I also spent a few turns on the Great Lighthouse before settling.

I totally forgot about Liberalism, since most games I've already started falling behind at this point and never get it first. I think I've started researching Printing Press right after Education, while building my Universities.

It looks like Diplomacy is going to be the best bet, so here's where I'm at
* I already have a Defensive Pact with Roosevelt.
* Cyrus is Friendly, and I'll sign a D-Pact as soon as possible.
* Mao is getting ticked, because I wouldn't cancel my trade deals with Roosevelt (he's giving me Iron, yeah I'm really going to cancel that). After he made that demand, I cancelled all deals with Mao. I'm hoping to annoy him enough that he eventually attacks and I can dogpile him through Cyrus' ports with American/Perisan allies at my side.
* Montezuma has made one demand and I gave it to him (I'm still with archers in many cities), which gave me a negative mod with Gandhi, Hatty. I'm hoping he wont make too many demands, hurting my relations with Gandhi/Hatty, before I can get some gundpowder units defending and I can start telling him to shove off.

Damn, I thought I could hold out until the end, but obviously not...:(


Everything was going well until just after I'd discovered rifling. I'd been heavily beelining towards Mass Media, when I was attacked about halfway to discovering Electricity. Surprisingly it wasn't Monty that declared war though (I'd kept him away by giving him tribute twice, Music and Sci. Method), it was Cyrus and Mao (both friendly before they declared).

Cyrus sent over some knights and catapults first, and a turn later Mao dropped off 2 stacks of rifles/knight/catapults (about 12 units in each) on the west side of my island, near the gems. The turn Cyrus declared I switched to Nationhood/Theocracy and drafted riflemen in most of my cities, which unfortunately wasn't enough to hold off Mao, and he razed my second best production city, at the cost of most of his invasion force, which continued to pillage all my towns.

Cyrus then dropped another 2 galleons of troops, rifles and cannon this time, on the northern shore. With towns being pillaged, and massive unhappiness from drafting, as well as missing luxuries and health resources, my cities were rapidly starving and would have soon fallen (Most had lost 4 or 5 pop points by now), especially as no one else wanted to go to war with either of them.

Well I've learned something from that at least, that the AI isn't useless at Naval invasions anymore:rolleyes:



It was definately an interesting game anyway, despite all my mistakes

Ouch tough luck colony,
when Monti attacked right as I was getting rifles and grenadiers, I was caught by surprise but fortunately I bribed Mao into declaring on Monti that same turn (Mao will do anything for $$ it seems :D) and I didn't have to face any serious stacks of doom. "Fought" Monti a couple more times after that but nothing serious, I never even set foot onto his continent. Had no wars with any other civs throughout the game once I focused more on keeping my military updated. That's strange that friendly nations would sneak attack you like that.

I win. :king:

I went for a Diplomatic win, as I mentioned in a previous post. First time for me...not really my cup of tea, but it seemed the most obvious choice. I just didn't think there would be enough production on that island for much of a military play or space race.

I thought all was well, as I reached Friendly status easily with Hatshepsut, Roosevelt, Cyrus and Gandhi. However, things did not go as smoothly as planned.

Montezuma, despite having fallen behind in techs, began to overun my pal Gandhi. So, I bought off Roosevelt and Hatshepsut into war with Montezuma. This wasn't enough and Gandhi was still losing fast. I was also at war with Montezuma and he kept sending galleys of cavarly. They were trivial, as I had Infantry and artillary, but a nuisance nonetheless.

To make matters worse, Mao also declared on Cyrus and was taking over Persian lands.

I had thought I was already set up for an easy win, and was just running turns to end it, so I wasn't exactly prepared for this. As I saw my votes dwindling, I began desperately building tanks and marines to aid Cyrus.

By the time I had built the UN, Gandhi was all but extinct and Cyrus' lands were pillaged, and he was down to 3 cities. I was able to take back a couple Persian cities with my tanks and gifted them to Gandhi. Gandhi was not at war with Mao, so this not only kept him in the game, it gave me a safe place to heal my tanks where they could not be attacked.

I also had to rush supermarkets and emphasize food, in order scrape enough votes. I believe I had 7 rounds of voting before I won, each time the required votes moved up as my population increased and I was beginning think I'd never catch that carrot.

Fun map, thanks Goraemon! :goodjob:

That's strange that friendly nations would sneak attack you like that.

I'd been expecting a war coming for a while, my power graph was about 1/2 the size of Hatsheput's, roughly 1/3 of Cyrus/Roosevelt's/Mao's and just tiny compared to Monty's, but definately not from an alliance of the Chinese and Persions (we were all friendly to each other for most of the game). I simply gave Monty anything he asked for, it just wasn't worth it over a couple of techs, which kept him away. I'd personally have expected it to come from Hatshepsut.

What most surprised me was that I've never seen Cyrus sneak attack me before at pleased or better. I think I should've just signed a defensive pact with Cyrus or Mao straight after Nationalism to give me some protection.

Is is possible that Mao paid Cyrus off to attack? I don't think I'd ever trust Mao even with a Defensive Pact. Although, I've had Cyrus attack at Pleased, when he was my only neighbor. So I don't really trust him either.

Part 1.
I gave the game a try and it after reading the pages it seems we definatly went a other way , i made plenty of mistakes who might possible cost me the game in the future but it doesnt look that bad atm.

The starting position was awful with only 2/3 cities you could actually place early on that would be profitable so after scouting my island i just stayed with 2 cities going mass cottages untill i had IW comin in (after watching the map more closily i could have gotten a decent city east of my capitol but didnt see it at the time.

My tech research went BW > Agri > The Wheel > Pottery > Fishing > Archery ( failed to get all the fog off my island in time and lost 2 warriors vs archers on a forest hill :mad: ) followed by Sailing > IW then a beeline for Monarchy followed by writing and alphabet .

part 2


So in the mean time i was settling my continent , however i lost 2 cities (actually 3) because both Mao and Cyrus got a city on my continent around 100 AD i think didnt really check the date. At this point i actually looked at the map and saw how good the spot was directly east of my cap , cyrus founded his city there cutting off the fishing city directly east of it also .
Mao got a small city with 1 of the pigs.

After researching Alphabet i traded around a bit but was around 5 techs behind both cyrus and Mao but had a way higher gold income , things got even worse though since Cyrus managed to get the great lighhouse and collusus , things really dont look good.

I managed to catch up in tech pretty fast .
Beelined for optics for caravals and after that a beeline for liberalism , i managed to get both the circumnavigent and liberalism and took astronomy and got a lot of very good trade deals.

Is is possible that Mao paid Cyrus off to attack? I don't think I'd ever trust Mao even with a Defensive Pact. Although, I've had Cyrus attack at Pleased, when he was my only neighbor. So I don't really trust him either.

Cyrus was ahead of Mao in tech, so it might've been the other way round, with Cyrus paying Mao. I think I could've held one of them off until they offered peace, but with both of them in there I didn't have much hope of being able to hold on to my main cities. Or maybe Mao just saw the opportunity and decided come for me the turn after Cyrus declared.

At least I learnt not to neglect defence even if I control a whole island (one more Civ3 habit gone I hope:) )

Il post the rest of my game together with screenshots and saves when my new comp arives on monday / tuesday , i keep getting a page not found / bulletin error whenever i try to post a long post / post a SS / save file , im sure its my comp but cant find whats causing it.

Cyrus was ahead of Mao in tech, so it might've been the other way round, with Cyrus paying Mao. I think I could've held one of them off until they offered peace, but with both of them in there I didn't have much hope of being able to hold on to my main cities. Or maybe Mao just saw the opportunity and decided come for me the turn after Cyrus declared.

At least I learnt not to neglect defence even if I control a whole island (one more Civ3 habit gone I hope:) )

I had a horrid experience in another island game, getting tag-teamed by Tokugawa and Montezuma. I was playing Qin, and I waited until caravels started showing up before building a military. At that point I figured I'd have time to finish researching Grenadiers before they'd show up with galleys.

I only had about 1 grenadier per city when both of those nutjobs declared on the same turn with 2-3 galleys each of knights/grenadiers. They also had 2-3galleys each full of reinforcments arriving 2 turns later. To make a long story short, I had several cities razed. :mad:

Does the AI plan these things out together, or is it a coincidence?

In my experience Mao does almost anything for bribes, even attack a nation he's pleased with. I've gotten him to do it a couple times in a couple different emp games now :)

Congrats Oggums! :D

I'm going to discuss the later part of my game below so if you're planning to try or in the process of trying out the game you might want to put off reading. It has screenshots and a savegame too.


Throughout the game I never left my original continent except I circumnavigated the globe early on with a caravel/world map trading. I never set foot on another continent except for a couple explorer units. I had 6 cities for most of the early/middle game, founded a 7th city later, and absorbed an 8th city on the edge of my continent from Cyrus (he founded a crappy city on my continent earlier) towards the end. Essentially I operated on 6 cities for a long time.

I had no iron, no horses, and no aluminum. As Catherine, I never even got to use my Cossacks.

I ended up winning by SS around the 1950's.

I did it by always focusing on research early on, with lots of cottages and requisite buildings, and trying to prioritize techs that further improved research. I missed all the early wonders/religions like I said but got to education/liberalism first and my research pace took off nicely. Some of my cities sucked in production initially but that was to be expected with my approach. I tried to keep the other civs pleasant or better towards me and I was able to trade for a LOT of different resources (I didn't have a variety of resources on my continent but some of the ones I had, there were multiples of them) and a fair number of techs. Only exception was Montezuma with whom I warred 3 different times - with the 1st one happening when he sneak attacked me around the middle of the game (my riflemen/grenadiers fought him off my continent).

On the other continents, Mao was periodically warring with Cyrus (I think I bribed Mao into fighting Cyrus one of those times, don't remember) towards the west, and Gandhi/Montezuma were struggling with each other on the east continent, with Monti having the clear advantage (for most of the game). Roosevelt was cruising along nicely on his own continent, and Hatty had a couple of smaller continents to the east and was coming along as well.

Cyrus was cautious during the middle ages but I managed to keep Mao on my good side and traded lots of resources with him. I eventually got Mao to give me iron so that problem was alleviated. Eventually I got Cyrus to be pleasant towards me as well. I cultivated a good relationship with Roosevelt and he was friendly to me. Hatty was pleasant, and Gandhi, initially annoyed, got friendly to me later on due to trading and my helping him in a war with Monti in the late game.

Around the early 1800's, I was considering possible routes to victory. At that time, all civs were pleasant or friendly to me except for Cyrus who was still cautious at the time, and Monti who was furious (around this time I was warring Monti for the 2nd time, along with Mao who I bribed to also fight him). Monti was the largest civ atm and nobody really liked him. I looked at the possibility of a diplomatic victory since I had no aluminum. I built the United Nations and sure enough, Monti was the other candidate. I got voted Secretary-General unanimously :eek:. Cyrus got pleasant to me due to the trading etc. I decided to try for a diplomatic victory:

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Even though both abstaining members were pleasant to me at the time, it wasn't enough to get their votes. So I was considering I should either shuffle the population a bit or get Cyrus/Hatty further on my side which wasn't easy. I didn't really want to go to a real territory-grabbing war with anyone because that might upset the delicate diplomatic balance I had. Mao was barely able to vote for me and another -1 modifier might make him abstain.

But then something else happened. I suddenly found out Roosevelt had obtained another source of aluminum and was "friendly" enough to trade it to me. What's that, you want 3 of my resources plus 30 gpt? Sure, sounds fair to me...:D

I had not been letting up on research at all and was still ahead in tech so I considered shifting my gears to a SS race. I was competitive in production despite all my cottage spamming because I had built the Kremlin earlier and rush-bought all factories and built the Hoover Dam or whatever the wonder is called now. Although I only had 7 cities at that point, I preferred a SS victory if possible, so I went for it while keeping the option open for a diplomatic win.

During this time that pesky Monti warred again with Gandhi. Gandhi asked me for help. I...accepted but didn't actually lift a finger. Not a single transport of mine went over to Monti's continent, and vice versa, because in my effort to slow down Roosevelt (#1 in score at that time and rival in SS construction), I bribed him into attacking Monti. :) Monti finally found himself on the losing end and began to lose some cities, and his population went down enough so that eventually Roosevelt took his place as the candidate for Secretary-General. :( Once that happened, my chances of a diplomatic victory went down the tubes (although I could still get voted to SG).

Still, due to my edge in tech and the Space Elevator, I was able to complete all the parts before the AI by 1952 AD. During this time Roosevelt kept upping the price on aluminum and I paid an arm and a leg for it but was strong enough in commerce that it didn't matter. Due to my late boost in wonder grabbing, I also got a lot of late great people, so I got myself two Golden Ages (yeah, 5 great people including the late great engineer via Fusion) which really helped with SS building. I culture-absorbed Cyrus's city as my 8th and final city but it didn't contribute to SS building much.

A shot of my empire and the world 1 turn before the win:

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Demographics:

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#6 in land size but #1 in population :D

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This shows I was hovering at the bottom in score till around 1200AD. then the slow, painful ascent began, finally overtaking Roosevelt in score at the very end. Cyrus lost some wars against Mao in the midgame, and you can see how Monti lost his latest war near the end.

Overall, it was a fun game. Despite the lack of resources, I survived through trading and keeping good relations, and focusing my few cities to produce commerce. I was also aided by some of the other civs slowing themselves down due to war and keeping Roosevelt friendly all the way was very conducive to the SS win. One would think he'd stop trading me Aluminum altogether at some point but he never did, just kept raising its price like 3 different times. Thanks Roosevelt, you've been a true friend :D

Savegame 1 turn before my win is attached if you want to take a look.

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This was my first ever win at emperor. I always like to play all default settings and standard continents (at least initially) because I feel that all other kinds of wins are...non-standard :D Right now I'm trying out another standard emperor game with Elizabeth, and it's a completely different game because I've got a pretty large continent with 2 competing neighbors - Napoleon and Mao. :)

When I first saw starting location i thought it will be hard, but once I realized I´m lonenly on big island it was easy. With financial civilization you can go easily for cottage spam and skip military and have minimum production without problem. My plan was going just for knowledge – library, than literature, then build only ancient wonder – Great Library for great Scientist and then straight for printing press and democracy. Even all that jungles get me bad start I manage to be tech leader around 1500. Than I rushed for Kremlin and bought all missing buildings in few turn, with income about 800 per turn. After that it was only time to choose path to victory. I have no military, was second worst in score and don’t have industrial cities for space race, so choice was go for diplomatic win. So I rushed for UN and also for Hollywood and Rock and Roll to bribe for some votes. I have about +9 score with all peacefull leaders (Rooswelt, Hepeshut, Cyrus), Gandi was eliminated and other leading candidate was Montezuma that was hated by all other nations. So position was good, but I was preparing Manhatan Project anyway just in case I did not get enough votes to reduce world population a little. With 1400 income and Kremlin you can buy lots of nukes each turn. At the end, it turns out I get votes from all friendly nation and managed easy Diplomatic victory from first voting to my surprise.

Here are few saves attached, but I there was lot of mistakes at the beginning. But this cottage strategy is pretty easy. There are only 2 easy wins on emperor: play Caesar on one continent map (preferably small) for easy Conquer victory with Praetorians or play any leader with financial trait on islands. Any other setting is real challenge.

So far we have 2 diplomatic victories, anyone manage another type of win? SS or (gulp) dom/conquest? I don't know if the latter is possible.

So far we have 2 diplomatic victories, anyone manage another type of win? SS or (gulp) dom/conquest? I don't know if the latter is possible.
I'm pretty sure that domination is possible, but I'm not too excited about spending 10+ hours on mindless clicking. I'd start by bribing Mao to fight Cyrus and attacking Cyrus with plenty of catapults backed by longbowmen. By that time, the cultural bridge to the south-eastern island should be ready and it will be an easy target for conquest (AI is particularly bad at defending overseas colonies). After that beeline for Steel and upgrade all catapults to cannons, get some grenadiers with right promotions and go conquer another AI (preferranly tech leader, unless he is too far). At that stage we can have about 3 times more land and population than anybody else, so just keep cranking out military and conquer everything in sight...

I gave it a try and, of course, things didn't go as planned. The major thing is that Cyrus is too valuable trade partner to declare war on. Besides, losing open borders with Cyrus will also mean losing trade with Chinese. So my plan got revised and I've attacked the south-eastern island (it as mostly populated by Egyptian with one barbarian and one Persian city). Cyrus is actually quite annoying, because he has planted a city on my home island, and then, on the south-eastern island as well.

Anyway, by 1070 AD, I've conquered the south-eastern island (except one persian city). Cyrus's 2 city on each of my islands, perhaps, isn't a bad thing after all - they don't hold any valuable resources and I don't mind letting persians grow those cities for me :> - I have enough cities to stress my budget. Egyptian cities are not very good (2-4 pop with no buildings), but the land is good. I'm in lead in production and commerce, technology-wise it's more or less parity, perhaps I'm slightly ahead, but some civs know some technologies I don't.

The next step is to conquer Egyptian homeland - my units got plenty of extra promotions and Egyptian have no iron. I think I'm on schedule to the dominance victory here. Just few turns away from getting Astronomy, and then I'll be able to attack anybody I choose...

Alexti2 please post some savegames. Didn't think that island was conducive to a production lead. More or less what was your early tech choices up to the point of iron working? (to get to those jungle hills)

Barbs (combined with an angry RNG) nearly did me in, but I think I've got it under control now. Here's my 1st 100, and the 50- and 100-turn saves:


0, 4000 BC: Moved scout SW-S to see what I can see. I see gems. Sweet! I'll need IW though since they're in jungle. Actually, seems to be a lot of jungle, so I'll need several workers + IW fairly quickly. Starting loc looks very hammer rich, although food won't be great unless there's another food bonus besides the wheat. Settle in place. Initial build = worker; Initial tech = agriculture.

1, 3960 BC: scout SW-NW; there are 2 gems there

Turn 2, 3920 BC: Scout N

Turn 3, 3880 BC: Scout N, Moscow expands

Turn 4. 3840 BC: Scout NE - pops GH; I get a map of the ocean to the NW - there's at least 2 islands up there, + fish I could work

Turn 5, 3800 BC: Scout E-SE

Turn 6, 3760 BC: Scout SE

Turn 7, 3720 BC: Scout SE-SE - we've got 3 sugars here as well

Turn 8, 3680 BC: Bhuddism founded; scout E

Turn 9, 3640 BC: Scout NE - see my first animal, a panther.

Turn 10, 3600 BC: panther attacks my scout and dies (0.5/1); fortify scout to heal.

Turn 11, 3560 BC:

Turn 12, 3520 BC: worker complete; Moscow worker -> warrior; Agriculture -> fishing (8); worker moves to farm wheat.

Turn 13, 3480 BC: Worker begins farming wheat; a jungle grows in Moscow's fat cross - quite annoying.

Turn 14, 3440 BC: ANOTHER jungle grows near Moscow - I'm getting overrun here

Turn 15, 3400 BC: Scout SE-SE

Turn 16, 3360 BC: Scout E

Turn 17, 3320 BC: Moscow warrior -> warrior sent 3S to scout there. Scout W; wheat farmed - Moscow now working wheat tile.

Turn 18, 3280 BC: worker sent to grass/hill to mine; scout SW - there's a bear there (ouch)

Turn 19, 3240 BC: Bear eats scout

Turn 20, 3200 BC: Moscow grows (2); Fishing -> Bronze Working (21); worker begins mine; This has got to be another island start, doesn't it?

Turn 21, 3160 BC: warrior pops GH and gets a map, which contains a continent/southern part of this continent.

Turn 22, 3120 BC: Moscow warrior -> warrior;

Turn 23, 3080 BC: worker completes mine - now working mined hill + wheat in Moscow.

Turn 24, 3040 BC: worker moves and begins a grass/farm on a river tile.

Turn 25, 3000 BC: Moscow warrior -> barracks; Moscow expands borders;

Turn 26, 2960 BC: warrior pops a hut - gets 'The Wheel'; man is that lucky. Move my 2nd warrior and there's a lion *AND* a bear there. Sheesh.

Turn 27, 2920 BC: Bear eats warrior - I'm really starting to hate that bear - I was favored, had the bear down to 18 hp, but it won 4 rounds in a row.; Hinduism founded far away; Moscow grows (3)

Turn 28, 2880 BC:

Turn 29, 2840 BC: worker finishes farm - citizen assigned; I'm able to raise science to 90% thanks to the commerce the tile is producing. worker moves to mine plains/hill. There's that bear again.

Turn 30, 2800 BC: Bear attacks warrior and dies (yes!) warrior 2/2. worker begins mine.

Turn 31, 2760 BC: lion attacks warrior and dies (1.4/2) - warrior promoted to woodsman I and moves onto a jungle/hill.

Turn 32, 2720 BC: I've got a barb warrior W of London. I pull London from barracks to warrior and move the warrior in the city SW to intercept him. I also cancel my worker so I can move him next turn if I need to.

Turn 33, 2680 BC: barb warrior moves away - that was lucky. worker finishes mine. I decide to go ahead and move the warrior in the direction of the barb; since London will be unhappy if it grows next turn, I move a citizen from the farm to a coastal square - this slows growth for 2 turns (when the warrior will be finished) and increases research.

Turn 34, 2640 BC: worker moves to wheat to begin road; barb warrior is back - I move my warrior onto a jungle tile right beside him.

Turn 35, 2600 BC: Barb warrior attacks and dies (1.0/2); Moscow grows; Moscow warrior -> barracks (finish)

Turn 36, 2560 BC: worker moves to a forest for a chop.

Turn 37, 2520 BC: Bronze working -> sailing; Moscow barracks -> warrior; no copper in sight (ugh!); worker begins chop.

Turn 38, 2480 BC:

Turn 39, 2440 BC: Moscow warrior -> worker; worker finishes chop.

Turn 40, 2400 BC: worker moves for another chop.

Turn 41, 2360 BC: worker begins chop.

Turn 42, 2320 BC: Moscow worker -> settler; 2nd worker moves to chop; My new 4xp warrior moves onto a hill S of Moscow, there's a barb beside him.

Turn 43, 2280 BC: Barb warrior attacks and dies miserably (2/2); I promote my warrior to Woodsman2 - now that's a scout. 1st chop completes, worker begins 2nd.

Turn 44, 2240 BC: worker begins road.

Turn 45, 2200 BC: 2nd chop complete.

Turn 46, 2160 BC:

Turn 47, 2120 BC: Moscow settler -> work boat; Sailing -> Masonry;

Turn 48, 2080 BC: Settler moves into position.

Turn 49, 2040 BC: St. Petersburg founded, begins lighthouse; worker begins chop to rush lighthouse.

Turn 50, 2000 BC: Research drops to 70% IT. 50-turn save made.

Turn 51, 1960 BC: Barb warrior attacks my warrior and dies (1.1/2); Moscow workboat -> warrior.

Turn 52, 1920 BC:

Turn 53, 1880 BC: Moscow warrior -> work boat;

Turn 54, 1840 BC: St. Petersburg expands; work boat moves onto fish and builds net.

Turn 55, 1800 BC: workers finish chop & mine

Turn 56, 1760 BC: Masonry -> archery (yuck!); St. Pete Lighthouse -> workboat; another $%^$% jungle grows near Moscow.

Turn 57, 1720 BC: Moscow workboat -> lighthouse;

Turn 58, 1680 BC: I see blue borders on the NW islands! I'm not completely alone after all.

Turn 59, 1640 BC: See my first barb archer - that's definitely not good.

Turn 60, 1600 BC: Barb archer attacks my warrior and wins - I'm having pretty bad luck with the RNG :( ; Finally explore the southernmost part of the island - there's copper down there (yay!) but also a barb archer who's going to kill my warrior next turn (boo!); My work boat sail over and meets Cyrus.

Turn 61, 1560 BC: barb archer kills my warrior, as expected.

Turn 62, 1520 BC: St Pete grows (3); St Pete work boat -> barracks; Moscow lighthouse -> archer. barb archer is just outside my territory.

Turn 63, 1480 BC: Moscow archer -> archer; I move the archer onto a hill beside the barb archer;

Turn 64, 1440 BC: Barb archer attack my archer and dies; Moscow archer -> Great Lighthouse; I'm sending both archers out to take up fog-busting/barb interception duties.

Turn 65, 1400 BC:

Turn 66, 1360 BC: Here comes another barb archer - I'm getting swarmed here.

Turn 67, 1320 BC: Barb archer attacks my archer and dies (2.8/3); barb archer attacks my archer and wins. He's 2 tiles from Moscow and I have only a warrior there for garrison.

Turn 68, 1280 BC: Stonehenge built far away; I'm so glad barbs are stupid - this one heads for my 2nd archer instead of Moscow (I hope);

Turn 69, 1240 BC: Barbs are stupid, thank goodness. Barb archer @ 0.8 strength attacks my guerilla II archer on top of a jungle hill and dies.

Turn 70, 1200 BC: Moscow archer -> back to G. Lighthouse.

Turn 71, 1160 BC: I have trade routes with Cyrus now. St Pete barracks -> archer.

Turn 72, 1120 BC: I meet Mao.

Turn 73, 1080 BC: Sigh, another barb archer.

Turn 74, 1040 BC: This one isn't quite as stupid - moving towards Moscow.

Turn 75, 1000 BC: archer moves up onto a mined hill - looks like he's going to pillage.

Turn 76, 975 BC: Give Mao OB's, archer pillages my mine;

Turn 77, 950 BC: archer attacks my archer on an adjacent hill and dies (1.0/3)

Turn 78, 925 BC:

Turn 79, 900 BC: St Pete archer -> archer;

Turn 80, 875 BC:

Turn 81, 850 BC: Oh look, another barb archer.

Turn 82, 825 BC: This is just unreal. The barb archer was a 98% underdog, yet he defeated my Guerilla II archer on top of a jungle hill.

Turn 83, 800 BC: The Great Lighthouse comes in - cha-ching!; Moscow GL -> archer; St. Pete archer -> archer.

Turn 84, 775 BC: archer + a warrior move in towards Moscow.

Turn 85, 750 BC: Moscow archer -> settler. Iron Working -> writing.

Turn 86, 725 BC: archer pillages a section of road, warrior moves in towards my archer fortified S of Moscow.

Turn 87, 700 BC: barb warrior attacks my archer and dies painfully - promote archer to guerilla II.

Turn 88, 675 BC: archer pillages another section of road.

Turn 89, 650 BC: barb archer attacks and dies (3/3);

Turn 90, 625 BC:

Turn 91, 600 BC:

Turn 92, 575 BC:

Turn 93, 550 BC: Research drops to 60%; Writing -> alphabet (21);

Turn 94, 525 BC: Moscow Settler -> library;

Turn 95, 500 BC:

Turn 96, 475 BC:

Turn 97, 450 BC: Cyrus completes the Pyramids; St Pete worker -> worker; Novgorad founded near gems, production set to library;

Turn 98, 425 BC: Cyrus adopts Representation.

Turn 99, 400 BC:

Turn 100, 375 BC: Moscow expands - whew, that'll help a ton with barbs;

Here're my saves. They're a bit embarassing - I've played quickly and sloppy :(

I think went Agriculture-Bronze Working-Wheel-Pottery to get wheat exploited and start building cottages (not sure exactly where Bronze working was). Then I got fishing, settle another city in north-western corner and send another fishing boat to explore, continued to sailing and masonry to get Great Lighthouse. Then I went for Writing and Iron Working (not sure in which order). Somewhere about that time I've settled third city (copper+wheat) in the south. Then I got alphabet, did some trades, currencies, more swaps. At the same time I put 4th city in the west to grab gems and 5th in the middle to make it into GP-farm. I've researched code-of-laws,monarchy,feudalism,metal-casting and spent great merchant for civil services. I did some tech trades in the progress. There is a lot of luxuries in our corner of the world, I was trading with Cyrus and Mao and I had little problem with city capping. I've used north-western city to build galleys, and the capital, southern city and western city to build units (catapults with some support from spearmen, longbowman, axemen and later macemen). That was enough to take over the south-eastern island.