Here's the thread I was saying about in the Own7 thread.

It's AWD Small Continents, should be a little harder than AWDG standard continents.

Anyone on the team can roll a start, play 30 (because it takes a lot of turns to see if an AW start is worthwhile).

Roster-
Own
Smart- confirmed I think
BEF- please confirm
nerovats- please confirm
vmxa- please confirm

For everyone not interested in playing on, there will be an open spot,

:salute: Reporting for a war duty :crazyeye:

I will roll something tomorrow, what settings do you prefer? What civ?
I really don't like to see 4 cows on start :mischief:, maybe all random?

I would like a food bonus in the start. You can choose the civ and settings other than continents and small and deity. I would prefer agri and early UU.

This should be well worth watching.

Will be lurking

I
L
L

L
U
R
K

i

I found a pretty good start. I used the iroquois. Played thirty.

I met the Mayans, declared war. First research was BW, then masonry. Build order was warrior, warrior, warrior, granary, settler, spear.

and questions. Spearmen before barracks? Is the assumption that the AI is going to attack with enough units that you'll promote quickly enough? Advantages/disadvantages to placing Niagra Falls in its current location instead of in the forest 1NE? That would have kept you on the river and gotten you coastal tiles, but taken away one forest chop and possibly a BG unerneath. Is there less premium on coastal towns in AW? This monkey is trying to improve his play and has many questions. Let me know if this is being intrusive.

glad you're interested :)

Spears before barracks, because it'll promote very quick, and forty shields is way too expensive. If I was militaristic I might have considered it.

The city spot is exactly the reasons you stated. I'd rather not waste a chop, and a grassland tile. I have enough plains in that area, so I want as many grasslands as possible now, and they could be BG's. Coastal cities are valued less in AW, since shields are valuable.

Will roll my start some morning this week, probably thursday. I might have some busy times around, but the # of SG's I'm in has dropped so it shouldn't be all too bad.

We did pretty good with a non-mil last time so I'll go for that too. Not sure what to pick though. Egypt? Mayas? We'll let the RNG fairy decide ... Russia? PORTUGAL ?!

Own I am not much of an SG player, I just hate to wait for my turn. I like to start a game an play it 12 hours or so every day till it is done.

I have been retired for years and have all day to do what I want, so it is not uncommon for me to get up and start right in on a game and play till I am ready for bed. Especially now the she who must be obeyed went back to work and is gone all day.

It was nice to jump in for a spin, but I think I would go nuts trying to wait for so long.

So that leaves one more open spot.

Any lurkers?

Been nice having you on board, vmxa :hatsoff:

Count me out for this one. Have played several AW lately, prefer to fill the HoF for now. Just couple more game to be Quatermaster or something like that, and ofcourse submitting all those games.

This is a little too difficult for me, so i'll just lurk :)

I've rolled few starts with Persians, I think it is good AW civ: startting with two very important techs - Masonry and BW, also have nice UU - ancient age "Medival infantry", Immortals (4.2.1).
I've lost on the first start with FP wheat because of 3 early contacts :eek:
Ottomans have captured my capital, should I do IT now? :crazyeye: :crazyeye: :crazyeye:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_chief.JPG

I will roll more later :mischief:

So that leaves one more open spot.

Any lurkers?

I would like to try this, a bit over my experience though. But I might have a couple of other things to throw in the mess.

Actually, I think I'd like to try this too. Will roll a couple of starts tonight to be considered as my application. :p

This start was good enough :)
I played first 35 turns, because I met Aztecs and declare only on turn 34 and thought that we are alone on island.
Research order was Pottery >> WC >> Alpha
Build Order: spearman >> spearman >> spearman >> granary (choped, found BG under forest) >> Settler >> spearman >> Archer >> Rax (choped)
Queued worker and settler in Persepolis to minimize food waste.
Persepolis can work in 4-turner SF mode, or 6-turner archer/spear-settler factory mode.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9sm_Start.JPG

Save: http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9sm_2350_BC.SAV

Been nice having you on board, vmxa :hatsoff:

Thanks, I enjoyed it. I love the constant battles. I will try to keep up with the reading as it plays out.

Welcome goz and simple monkey :) .

I like my start better, at first glance. I'll wait for some more though.

I rolled several starts, three best were those - yeah, I have crappy luck. One of them looks good though, 2 cows FP BG's and a gold hill for 2nd city. War is on in all 3, against the celts, chineses and iroquois in that order.

http://archimede.mat.ulaval.ca/~fbolduc/B/Own9-1.jpg

http://archimede.mat.ulaval.ca/~fbolduc/B/Own9-2.jpg

http://archimede.mat.ulaval.ca/~fbolduc/B/Own9-3.jpg

All in all, I'd go for Smart's start, then my 1st, then Own's.

Here's the start I rolled as the Aztecs:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/monty4000BC.jpg

Played 35. At war with the Arabs. Good old Abu threw about 10 warriors at Tenochtichlan, killing two archers, promoting two to vet and elite, and leaving himself with one redlined warrior writing home to mama on a hill outside our capital. Also at war with the Koreans, who have done absolutely nothing but fortify a spearman and warrior out in the mountains somewhere. Current situation is this:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/monty2350BC.jpg

Tenochtichlan (or however you spell it) as a baracks and a granary (chopped) and a recently decanted settler ready to move to the hill at the end of the road that the worker is mining. That would get fresh water but the wheat would be out of reach. We know Bronze working and are working on the Wheel at max.

Deity is fun. So many AI to kill! :ar15:

This would be the <<SAVE>> (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Montezuma_2350_BC.SAV)

Wow lots of starts for you guys to choose from. Looks like this will turn out to be an awesome game.

I think I'd take Smart's start, then Own's. Beorn's second also has potential.

lurker's comment:Good luck with whatever start you go with, will be lurking. Hoping to pick up a few pointers to improve my own game.
(Is there an actual button for the lurker's comment thing?)

I'd choose Smarts. Any open spots left?

Thanks for chosing my start :) Lets hope that iron is somewhere near of our capital...
Can we start the ball rolling? Beorn is up according to the roster in the first post.

@Ansar: two players were dropped, and gozpel with SimpleMonkey filled those spots. Maybe Own will add extra slot for you, but are you sure that you want it? It is an Always War Deity game, which is even harder then normal one ;)

@DWY: yes, you can use [ delurk ] [ /delurk ] tags, and you can also push Thread Tools >> Suscribe to this page (at the top right corner of the thread) if you just want a subscription.

I can take this tomorrow if we have a get go post from Own.

My order is Smart's, mine. Simple Monkey's doesn't have a river, and is a huge waste of the agri trait, and Beorns has three opponents this early.

I'll lurk. This will probably teach me some skills in AW.

In fact I am at war against 1 civ in each, but yeah what you just said, I'll play Smart's tomorrow.

I think the Persians should be a good civ, whether we find iron soon or not. (We can smoke the Aztecs with archers.) I'm guessing that since Smart went for Alphabet instead of IW that we're going to attempt a GL strategy, in which case we may want to start an early prebuild. I'm also guessing that the AI is going to research too fast at Deity for it to be worth trying for a Philosophy slingshot to anything. My other thought is that Persipolis should run on a 6turn spearman/settler rotation so our settlers have escort.

Which direction did the Aztecs come from, BTW? Barb setting?

I am a curious monkey after all! :lol:

Settler/spear indeed, that's a no-brainer IMO. I would've gone IW first as the persians, but alpha isn't thrown dead in the water: it's thrown curragh-eously in the water (must be the 100th time I throw that pun, sorry). Alpha for contacts is good, IW is next, catapults and GL after.

Philo can be done on Deity, even Sid. It just is very risky and not a good one in an AWD. You do not have to be first to Philo to get the GLB as usually the AI will not beeline for Lit.

The big issue is them making trades and popping tech to make getting to Lit more possible. The shelf life of the GLB is often short at deity, but with the wars, it could last longer.

Settler/spear indeed, that's a no-brainer IMO. I would've gone IW first as the persians, but alpha isn't thrown dead in the water: it's thrown curragh-eously in the water (must be the 100th time I throw that pun, sorry). Alpha for contacts is good, IW is next, catapults and GL after.

Well, do we want contacts soon so we can start a world war and slow down the AI (sorta like the strategy the Handy used in Theodora's Excellent AW Sid Adventure?) Or do we want to avoid contacts for a while? We won't need them for trading, after all. :crazyeye: Just for keeping the GLib at maximum efficiency.

I made a couple of feeble attempts with the Celts, no luck though.

So I vote for the Smart-start too, if anyone care. :)

Of course mr couch-fortified, we care :)

Wartime scientific settings for the AI is indeed what I had in mind, Monkeyboy. The slower they research, the more likely we are to get TGL and the more advantageous the researching paths becomes for us, since they might eventually *gasp* drag. Like they did in Own8: they were ahead, but were in a totally different scientific curve than we were post-TGL and post-farming.

Those questions are rather far ahead though, what we need to agree on now is "to curragh or not to curragh" in Parsagadae, where and when should we start TGL pre-build, what do we pick as necessary techs prior to Writing/Lit (horses if no iron? catapults?), and how agressive do we go against the first enemy.

My stance: 1 or 2 curraghs away, start TGL after 4-5 cities are built, go IW, (WC if no iron) catapults then lit, and gamble on the opening with a more offensively open warfare for the continent.

I'm guessing that since Smart went to Alphabet instead of IW that we're going to attempt a GL strategy
Yes, GL will help in AW game, but I went to Alphabet for catapults, because we may not find iron nearby. Archers/cats is good combination to take iron from Aztecs.
But we can research IW first and then Math if team decide so...

I'm also guessing that the AI is going to research too fast at Deity for it to be worth trying for a Philosophy slingshot to anything.
With GL we don't need a philosophy, because we will get it from other AI's anyway. We started without alphabet, I'm not sure that we could get it first on deity.

Which direction did the Aztecs come from, BTW? Barb setting?
They were coming from the Wild West :)
Barb settings - random :mischief:

Well, do we want contacts soon so we can start a world war and slow down the AI (sorta like the strategy the Handy used in Theodora's Excellent AW Sid Adventure?)
Handy have played non-restricted AW. It means that you can make peace for one turn and make some deals. We can't do it, also we are playing on continents and have to avoid early contacts.

Pre-Turn: BO is what I had in mind - except for the settler, stuff looks good, MM one more gold, hit enter.

T1.
Increase tax, rotate the guard to send a spear over the hill, worker to road the path.

Barracks >> Worker

T2.
Worker >> Spear

T3.
Aztec uprising in sight, all able troops sent back hom, all unable ones moved to improve backdoor tiles.

Settler changed to a spear build.
Push growth faster to be size 7 when the attacks come.

T4.
Spear >> Archer

T5.
The RNG takes pity on us and (presumably) puts a barb camp NW of Persepolis. This will delay the Aztecs and allow us to expand a bit.
Bhorse shows S
Now size 7, 10spt.

T6.
Too good to be true, they (4 archers 6 warriors) climb mount Persia

T7.
Road network established for 1T exchanges on both sides.

IT:

http://img480.imageshack.us/img480/4307/own946ds.th.jpg (http://img480.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own946ds.jpg)

T8.
The attack goes so-so: we lose 2 archers and a spear defending but we take away the bulk. All that remain is 3/4 archer, warrior, and 4/4 warrior.

T9.
2nd wave is out and does no damage.

T10.[11-3]
Send an archer out to pick on the last remainders

Spear >> Settler
http://img480.imageshack.us/img480/6625/own953oc.th.jpg (http://img480.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own953oc.jpg)

We've faced the first aztec wave, so now I wouldn't oppose a 2nd settler going out there. We'll need some caution planting cities though, but we definitely can make something good out of the land at hand.

I've been lucky to feel paranoid today because we'd have died off of those archers. More will come though, along with jags, so take special care for the workers.

Could we have a roster, Mr Own?

Nice start, and nice city spots.:goodjob:

:bump: Do we have a roster?

no...

Here it is!
Smart- started us off
BEF- Continued
Simple Monkey- UP!
Own- On deck

Haven't gozpel signed up :hmm:

The Monkey has it. Will try to play my ten tonight.

Priorities:
1. Send settler to red dot.
2. Que up another one.
3. Build archers in Pasargarde once rax finishes.
4. Fend off Aztecs.

Any other suggestions? I'll check to see if we have any spare troops for exploring a bit. There's gotta be iron in those hills and mountains, right? :lol:

So long as they don't show up with a lot of spears, and if we have enough rest time for that, a good stack of archers would make for a better defense and leave our capitol free to just pump settlers without concerns about size vs defense. Watch out of jags too :mischief:

Careful with settlers; we can leave Parsagadae with just say one spear one warrior, but a frontline city needs walls and spears on Deity. That means a lot of units produced for each city to be safe, and kindof breaks the spirit of massing settlers.

Last, I've made sure there was a 1-turn passage on either way for Perse-Parsa, having one ready for any new town to be settled isn't a luxury, it can save us a load of trouble.

Of course, how could I forget goz?

I'll put you after me.

Smart
BEF
SM
Own
Goz

Preflight: take look around. One 3/4 archer is all that remains of the Aztec stack, and he's likely take one in the chest from the elite archer and then get impaled on the regular spear. We'll see. :mischief: We're up Pottery and Warrior Code in addition to our starting techs, with Alphabet due in seven, Math and IW in line after that. We could run a deficit and pick up Alphabet in four, but I'll leave the science slider where it is for now. Beorn left things all ship-shape, so I hit enter.

IBT: The Aztec archer fortifies rather than suffer Persian wrath. Three little Zulu warriors show up on the hill intended for the next Persian city. Let's see what Shaka has to say.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Shaka.jpg

1910BC Well, that's not such a good start. Shaka thinks he's oh so fancy just 'cuz he has Alphabet, the Wheel, Ceremonial Burial, and Iron Working. Plus Gems and four cities. I remind him that his job for the next few centuries is to build up his cities so Persia will gain many new slaver workers.

I declare war.

Move the injured elite archer back into Persepolis. Move the workers that have finished mine building over to connect the road to new city site, right under the Zulu cannon fodder. Three spears to protect. Oh, Alphabet just dropped to four turns.

IBT: Shaka must also have literature, 'cuz he's starting the GLib. :cry: Two more Zulu warriors show up from the west. Oh well, could be worse. Could be impi.

1870BC Finish road to new city site. Fortify spearmen for one turn, with one on our precious irrigated cow. Cross fingers.

IBT: Interesting. Zulus walk past our spears and head north. One more shows up from the south.

1830BC Settler pops and I take chance and move him to designated hilltop. Shift some troops. Cue Persepolis up for an archer in two.

IBT: Zulus shift around some.

1790BC Found Arabela, cued up to build an archer.

The good news -- we have a luxury in sight! :dance:

The bad news -- we also have even more Zulus to deal with. :(

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/oh_no.jpg

In case anyone was counting, that's 11 Zulu we now have in our neighborhood. So it's either lots of promotions all around for the Persians, or oblivion.

I shift troops back to the capitol and remember to bring down the science to 30% to still get Alphabet in one turn. Lux slider can't budge.

IBT: Yet another stack of Zulu warriors shows up from the west, making for a grand total of 10 warriors and four archers. :eek: Gee, we must have really made him mad. We get Alphabet and another archer. Oh, and a barb pops up in the east, just for fun.

1750BC Shift troops. Cross fingers.

IBT: Aztec warrior comes to say hello. He's the least of our problems. Zulus move all their troops against Arabela and try to crash the party. Final disposition: 3 dead Zulu archers, one dead Persian archer, one Persian spear promoted to elite. And a Zulu stack is perched on top of our connecting road, so I can't move reinforcements. Here's how things look right now.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/even_worse.jpg

I've only played five but I'd like to solicit some opinions before I continue. I don't want Persia to go down on my watch!

Here's the save (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_1725BC.SAV).

Looks like we'll need some overtime shifts worked by the spearmen.

TGL :eek:

Capturing it sounds good, getting there doesn't. This start might be a dead one, 2 mil civs around with fast UU's within turn 50 is a serious PITA.

I say try what we can, send all available troops to intercept/fortify against the stacks, whip walls and roll anew if that fails.

[delurk] Looks you guys are in a situation. Just a lurker suggestion: You should try to send out a defensive unit, spearman to search for some of those civs, once you get a break from fighting. A defensive unit because dont attack let them attack you.

I think its because Shaka was so happy to meet you(polite), and you just suddenly tell him that you dont like him and you declare war on him.:p

Looks you guys are in a situation. Just a lurker suggestion: You should try to send out a defensive unit, spearman to search for some of those civs, once you get a break from fighting. A defensive unit because dont attack let them attack you.

:lol: I don't think they'll get much of a break from war considering they are playing Always War with deity AIs. Besides, more contacts just means more units to fight.

One of the tough things about pangea AW maps at deity and sid is they soon get around to sending in some serious numbers. If you cannot find a means to get them to attack you in a location that you can have a lot of help, it tends to go real bad.

You do not even have enough towns to try to lure them into a tail chase. At least in a straight deity game you can get peace to send them away while you try to find another way to get ready.

Hope the rng is very very kind to you guys.

1725BC Move workers out of the way to Pasargadae. Maybe they can be bait for a turn. Let's see.

IBT: The troops in Arabela do what they can, but it is not enough. Wave after wave of the Zulu savages storm the city. (Hey, sorta like in that movie Zulu.) A spear and two archers do what they can, but it's not enough. Arabela falls and the Zulus set their sights on the capital.

Oh yeah, and another Aztec warrior shows up.

1700BC Settle troops in for a hard siege. Persepolis produces an archer, and I que it up for a settler. Hey, looking to the future, right?

IBT Zulus march towards Persepolis, barbarian warrior pillages a roaded hill, and a barb horseman shows up. Come join the party. :mad:

1675BC I move a worker into Pasargadae and disband him, then move a second one in and pop-rush walls. Not going down without a fight.

Oh, and I crank research up to 70% to get Math in 16 at -3gpt. Figure there's not much sense in saving money at this point.

IBT: Zulus trash our irrigated cow but don't attack the city. Aztecs attack Pasargadae, killing a spearman but losing an archer (1-1). I don't think we got the bargain that time. Persepolis gets another spearman, bringing our total defenders there up to three spears and an archer, all in perfect health.

1650BC: I decide to play defence for a turn. Hold the fort, boys! :salute:

IBT: Two Zulu warriors attack Persepolis, and two Zulu warriors find an early grave. One spearman goes elite. :banana: At Pasargadae, the Aztec warrior does us the favor of killing the barb before he could trash our intercity connector. Thanks, pal! :lol:

1625BC: There are now not enough Zulu attackers to take Persepolis, so I switch production to an archer. I think we might survive this. :p Oh, and Pasargadae gets its walls.

Okay, that was exciting. I leave it to the next better player to survive the final assault and dig us out of this hole. Here's what the wreckage looks like.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/1625BC.jpg

We may or may not want to switch production of an archer back to a settler, depending on when we think the next Zulu wave is coming. Hope I didn't screw this up too much.

Here's the save (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_1625BC.SAV).

It's not called screwing up, simple one, it's called doing a respectable job out of a crazy azzed setup. Going out to settle might be a questionnable move, but not a plain bad one, considering it had a better tactical position.

I take it most of the bars under the units are workers, so I'm all for a few more archers/spears before we go settling back. We'll need 2 roads, it wiould have helped you to have an alternate route to Arbela when the attack came and they occupied the primary one.

Own up, Goz on deck.

SimpleMonkey: I played next turn and survived. Archers are better as offense then defense, especially against warriors.

I killed 2 war's with archers and one with the ready spear and lost nothing ibt.

@B I suspected it was questionable to settle a third city with the Zulu around, but at the time there were only three z-warriors present and I figured I could handle them. Didn't know that 11 more troops were in the neighborhood. :( As it was, it cost them to take the city. I suspect all of Shaka's free starting troops are used up now. The big mistake, as you pointed out, was not having a second road set up. I really should have done that instead of irrigating for a turn. :cringe:

I also used up two workers in getting walls for Pasargadae, so it's going to take us some time to get our improvements back to what they were.

The best thing I can say is that making the third city pulled Shaka's troops away so they had very little with which to swarm our capital.

Let's see what Own can do with this.

SM: What I was trying to explain, was that you had 2 archers fortified in Arbela. Kill something with them and the threat is lessened.

I can't see in your turnlog that you tried that?

@goz -- I didn't attack on my last turn because at the time there were not only three zulus outside of Persepolis, but another handful the next tile over. I was playing cautiously with our troops, wanting to leave our boys at maximum numbers/health for what at the time looked like a sustained assault. Seemed reasonable at the time.

Gee, the more I look back at it, the more things I wish I'd done differently. :(

You are correct SM, that it can be a hard choice. The consideration I use is in that scenario is that if I have say 2 archers and 1 warrior and they have three warriors next to the town, is this:

if i can attack with a 2A Vs a 1D, I probably win. Now I have killed 2 out of 3. The third one will probably die if it attacks as my archers will not be put up on defense, unless they took no damage and got promoted.

Now I get to ding them with an archer and my warrior probably wins. Else they fort the warrior and wait for the next wave or they pillage.

If I do not attack I have a fair chance that I will take losses. How much worse off am I if I let them hit my 1D archers and maybe kill them?

Basically I want to attack with archers and not defend, unless I know no other atackers will be coming for some time. IOW if I have more defenders than attackers and cannot lose the town unless I attack and have bad luck.

By killing 2 up front, I may even get the Zulu to call off the dogs. They may decide they would rather not risk more at this time.

Got it. I'll see what I can do, but not today, will only be home for another hour, and that hour I've got HW.

SM: What vmxa said. I was only curious why you didn't use the archers, they are good enough against warriors.

We still have a 2-turner for units in P-Polis, so this is not lost yet. And if it is, we know how to roll new maps. :)

Played and lost Arbela. Goz, you must have gotten better luck. Would it be cheating to continue off your save, considering you played it first?

:( I was being too conservative with troops. In hindsight, maybe I should have rolled the dice, put everyone I could muster in Arabela, and hope that Zulus would suicide taking a hilltop city. I decided not to attack the next turn from Persepolis since there were still more hostile troops besides those outside the walls and I didn't like thought of a screwing by the RNG and loosing any of the few troops I had.

I'm thinking of picking up the old save [edit - at the begining of my turnset] before the Zulu showed up and see if there's a way to take out his 14 attackers and keep our stuff intact. Doing that would mean a quick move to go on the offense before he fielded a second wave.

Oh well, wishful thinking, I guess.

edit -- xpost with own. I'm not sure where Goz played from - the begining of my turnset or the end when we'd lost Arbela and the Zulu were down to just a handful around Persepolis.

Anyway, I feel a little better that I wasn't the only one to take a pasting from the Zulu. Thanks, Own.

Here is a start I had in my "File of Good Starts"
80% Continents, sedentary barbs, wet, warm, 4 billion, seed: 4006778

Opponants:
Byzantines
Sumeria
India
Celts
Mongols
Japan
Hittites

Ivory NEE and NETwo cows, one on plains, another on grass, two wheats, both grass in the 21Ponies! And India and Byzantines as neighbors











































































no iron...

Start:
http://img112.imageshack.us/img112/3448/own918kg.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Save attached:

I played from where SM had 5 turns left and it took me 2 minutes.

I wanted to clear the road between P-Polis and Arbela and killed a war with the ready spear, then 2 archers killed 2 more. A spear from Pas intercepts the barb. Some changes in MM (scientist in P-Polis) and barracks in Pas will finish next turn.

Then you can see for yourself what happens:

goz's moves sound reasonable if Own wants to pick up from there. I'll gladly disown the way I played the last 5 moves. :blush:

madviking's start is certainly tempting, though. :lol:

I made a mistake about my start. The original statement was two a's on plains and grass. It is now, 2 a's on plains (not in 21) and 2 a's on grass (in 21). ;)

I like madviking's start too, except weren't we supposed to play small map. That is standard with 7 rivals. :)

I made a mistake about my start. The original statement was two a's on plains and grass. It is now, 2 a's on plains (not in 21) and 2 a's on grass (in 21).

Huh? :confused:

a=cows ;)
...

We're playing a small smap goz...

i'll continue

Turnlogs are what slows me down, not actually playing, so I did without one. Two pics though :) .

Summary: Got a leader! I admit I was disappointed because I don't know what to fill an army with. Survived, cleared out units, we're doing good.

If I understand this correctly, it'd make the roster:

Smart - UP
BEF - On Deck
SM
Goz
Own - Leader!

And now we need to find iron ASAP. Otherwise, I'd be much undecided as to wether an archer offensive army or a spearmen pillageing army would be best.
My wild guess on pillaging the aztecs: Zulus are bigger for now, but it's because of the expansionnist early-game boom. Aztecs need a nerf for their AGR trait, which I would gladly give to them.

Suggest filling the army with spears and going on a pillaging spree. Seems like a good way to get a better view of the world. While it would be good to take the wind out of Shaka's sails (and I have a grudge :spank:) the Aztecs may be closer and easier to take out. Can we be up to 8 cities by the time we get iron? A second army of immortals would truely be a thing of beauty. :ninja:

Spear army sounds good, but we can't send it out too quickly, that's a loss of three spears. We should keep him until we get some more spears to make up for his departure.

Indeed, make it, use it, and I'll send it around the mid-end of my set

Wow, I moved 4 units a MM-ed 2 cities during my turn (I only finished SM's 5th turn.) and you call that a turnset! :eek:

I'm fine with it though, I only try to find logic everywhere. :hammer2:

A spear-army will be very useful, they won't attack that in the first place. And pillaging is so nice.

Got it, playing NOW ;)

Pre-flight
Loaded two spears into an army.
Parsagrade producing spearman.
Science to 60%, Math in 9, 0 gpt.

IBT
Conscript warrior suicides. [1-0]

Turn 1
Meet Rome :eek:

Turn 2
Killed two Jags and sent settler with army to Sugar [3-0]

Turn 3
Gordium was founded.

Turn 6
IBT
Defeat one jag [4-0]

Turn 7
IBT
Killed three archers with one lose [7-1]
Math >> IW (7 turns)

Turn 8
Killed two archer by army, spearman in it was promoted to elite. Kill 1hp retried jag with spear [10-1]

Turn 10
Killed one Roman warrior [11-1]
Antioch have only one spear and three roman warriors are ready to take it (or no :rolleyes:)

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_1250BC.JPG

>>SAVE<< (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_1250_BC.SAV)

Awesome kill ratio, Smart! :banana:

I'm away on my laptop so I can't open the save. Are there any moves left on the army or the archer outside of Antioch? If so, they could help defend it. Or it's possible that the roman warriors will go after the lone archer or the undefended worker and leave the city alone.

I'm gonna guess that the roman archer is going to pillage in place and won't be a problem this turn. Next turn he will be fertilizer.

I probably would have put Gordium 1W to be on the river or maybe on the hill where the jag warrior is standing. Just an observation.

Also, maybe we should road the dyes west of Arbela and get another city out there. We could use the lux and I would bet that it would also work as a dandy killzone for the AI. They'd come to pillage and stay to get carved up by troops stationed up in the hills and mountains.

Five turns to IW and then :ninja:

Help !! I'm being dogpiled by the SG's !!!

Request a single swap, will have more time in the 2 week-end days coming real soon.

Nice job Smart; what's up for next town? the hill spot due S with a river and mountain beside it?

I can trade with Beorn and pick this up tomorrow afternoon and hand it back for him to do with what he will.

Could I get a dot-map with the proposed settler spot?

Also, how did we end up on a small continents map with three militaristic civs on the same land mass? :eek:

S-S-E from Arbela is the one I propose, though I'm not sure where Rome is at this point. Perfect if we can swap.

Consider this a "got it," unless Own objects for some reason. I'll play it this afternoon (Friday).

A few questions and observations before I start.

I'm going to assume that Rome is now our biggest worry. Jags and impi I can deal with. Roman legions are, on the other hand, a major PITA. If Caesar gets iron hooked up, we've got problems. I'm going to prioritize building cats and archers until I pop IW, and then see if we have the precious ore in our neighborhood.

I'm also guessing that research after IW is going to be a beeline straight for Monarchy. Any opinions to the contrary?

lurker comment: As soon as reasonably possible get that army out pillaging Rome (after IW comes in so as to ID the iron). Fingers crossed that you guys some, if not, it could be adios.

Research should include a ressource (if there's no iron nearby, go for wheel) and catapults before going monarchy. To literature or not to literature before monarchy is a good Q, but since shaka popped it somewhere (no way he researched it THIS early) it might be way too late...

Turn 0 Take a look around. Minimal Aztec troublemakers in the west. Some grumpy Roman thugs in the east. I can leave the army in Persepolis for one turn and let it heal to full health in the barracks. Or I can move it to Antioch for one turn and let the Roman warriors suicide against it.

What will the monkey do?

We keep the army in place and let Caesar do his worst.

IBT: The result? Two Roman warriors are now landfill, and our brave solo defender of all that is rightous in Antioch is now elite. With walls on a hill, he should be relatively secure.

Some more Aztec came to visit.

1225BC Antioch builds walls and is set to building an archer. Pasargadae builds a spear and is set to build another. Switch Persepolis to a settler.

Our elite archer in Arbela smacks a jag and sends him running away redlined. I shift our army out of Persepolis and use it to take out an Aztec archer on a hill. Army gets dinged doing it, so I shift a healthy spear out of the city to cover it for a turn. Do some other shuffling around of troops.

IBT Romans do us the favor of promoting an archer to elite. Thanks, boys!

1200BC Beat up some Aztecs. Shuffle troops. Enjoy myself thouroughly.

IBT Aztec seem to be doing well for themselves -- they're building the Great Wall. They send some more jags to Persia to celebrate. Our settler pops in Persepolis and I set production to an archer.

1175BC Dispose of the last of the Roman troops in our neighborhood. Send our settler south with 2 spears for company. Move workers to road to the new town. Kill a jag. Shift the army to Persepolis to heal. Jiggle the sliders to still get IW in 2 but now at a whopping +1 gpt.

IBT Doh! :cringe: Moving a spear out of Pasargadae results in a riot. I jiggle the lux slider again.

1150BC Moving an archer back to Abela via a hilltop reveals a Zulu archer and swordsman headed our way. Do they look happy? I don't think so. Let's hope we see ore when IW arrives next turn.

IBT Persepolis gives us an archer and I set it to archer. Oh, and the Zulu now have a big building full of books. And may I present to you all ...

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/iron.jpg

1125BC I send some workers over to exploit this natural resource.

Also, moving our settler to his hilltop reveals this piece of good news as well.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/spices.jpg

Set research to the Wheel in 4 at -3gpt. Couldn't hurt, right? I also think it's time for our army to fulfill its destiny as the ruiner of all improvements. I'm gonna take a gamble here and send him west to Zululand. The Romans have been awfullly quiet lately. Of course, if we see legions in the next few turns, we may have to rethink this strategy.

IBT More friends come to visit.

1100BC Shift troops. Found Bactra.

IBT Two dead Aztec archers. A few more Zulu now in the neighborhood. :( I count a sword and two archers just outside of Arbela, a pesky warrior drifting towards Bactra, plus two more swords and an archer about five turns away. Not too bad yet, but Shaka needs to be relieved of some roads and mines, I think.

1075BC Move troops to defend Arbela. Keep army moving west. I rush the archer in Arbela.

IBT Shaka would like to talk. :lol: He's not medieval yet, which is good. He's also willing to give us Ceremonial Burial and the Wheel if we'll spare his life. Poor Shaka. What's interesting is that he now has five cities to our five. And he appears to only have one source of iron hooked up. I read this as good news.

I hack the head off of Shaka's envoy and send it back by Federal Express.

Shaka then attempts to take Arbela. He loses a sword and an archer. Monty also would like to take Arbela. He loses an archer and two jags, and I send another one home to mama with a redlined butt.

1050BC Kill some wounded jags and get an elite archer out of the deal. Pick off the last Zulu archer outside of Arbela. Everyone should be all healed up by the time the next wave arrives. Oh, and our traveling army now sees gems off in the west. No sight of Zulu borders yet. Wheel next turn.

IBT And now the words we've all been waiting for ...

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/connected.jpg

Oh, and the Aztecs are building the ToA.

Wheel comes in.

1025BC No horses anywhere I can see, so I set research to CB in 4. Might as well become monarchs sooner rather than later.

Persepolis is set to build our first immortal next turn. :dance:

In other news, our army sees something interesting headed our way as it heads west.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/legions.jpg

That just one legion and two warriors along for the ride. By the time he gets to Persia he'll have some immortals to dance with. :goodjob:

IBT Not much. Hittites build the Colossus.

1000BC Persepolis and Pasargadae are now both set to build immortals. Traveling army reveals some scattered Aztec archers headed our way. Doesn't look like Monty has iron, does it? :lol:

I've left some troops in Gordium and Arbela with some moves, as well as our first immortal in Persepolis. The world now looks like this.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/1000BC.jpg

Think we have a winnable game? :)

Here's the <<SAVE>> (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_1000BC.SAV)

Iron means it's possible. All the oppponents should be a challenge, but definately doable.

The only move I made that might be questionable was sending our army off to pillage instead of keeping it at home. As long as it stays healthy, no-one should touch it, so it won't need support. And we now have enough troops at home to defend without it. And it looks like all our friends live out west, so we're not committing it against just one opponent. Hope this makes sense.

It makes plenty of sense. I'll see to it that the TGW city is thoroughly pillaged, and then head further west for Rome.

I don't think I'll have that kind of luxury, but being able to scout over the S mountains certainly sounds good to me.

I really love Arbela: hill/river/wall, what can I say more?

Playing. Spices and dyes: are either worth a colony? It might be rather early to go take the dyes tile right now, but it might be feasible to defend the spices...

My thought would be to build on the hill west of Arbela, exactly west of the dyes and north of the second iron, where we could hook up both. I suspect Monty is sending a settler that way anyway. We don't want him to get the iron (or the dyes) and it would be a good place to set up a kill zone.

Not sure how to hook up the spices -- city or colony?

City, a colony would last 1 1/2 turns.

Wow. AW eh? Man why did you make an army of speamen? Just wondering.

To go pillage Rome's iron, and core. Legions are PITA

Legions are about as much of a pain as Dromons, conquer dude.

Got it, will settle when/if I get an opening, will try and scout the immediate surroundings beyond the mountains to be able to establish a dotmap beyond 1st ring.

Pre-Turn: 2 spears dispatched for scouts, an immortal sent to Arbela - renamed Hilltop.

IT: 2 successful kills for our elite spear in hilltop

T1.
http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/4909/own962hj.th.jpg (http://img100.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own962hj.jpg)

Immortal kicks our GA in, 17spt in the capital for 20 turns :borg:.

T2.[4-0]
The peacekeepers reach the first Aztec city and the greens want to talk :nope:
Find the first horse source yet, just outside the Aztec borders.

5 more green marksmen come up near Gordium (renamed Arrow Valley) so I back the scout in.

Lose an archer on the pre-offensive at Arrow Valley, kill 2

IT: 2/2 defense at Arrow Valley, 3 more archers enter our lands, 1 leaves wounded, 6 total in sight.

T3.[6-1]
CB >> Myst in 4 at +4gpt

IT: defense goes 1/2 this time, 2/3 archer defeats an elite spear.

T4.[7-2]
Aztecs are all scattered so I can't pre-strike at them with immortals. Patience grasshoppa.
Arrow Valley Barracks - Walls

IT: 2/2 defense, Impi shows up headed towards hilltop.

T5.[10-2]
Finally 2 archers up on top of one another, so the first one tastes our steel.
Aztec galley shows up north, probably a scout but I keep an immortal in parsagadae.

South Scout spots yellow borders, near 2 huts and a barb camp.
http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/4049/own983jr.th.jpg (http://img100.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own983jr.jpg)

IT: 1/1 defense, Zulus found a city on the gems

T6.
Find Tenochtitlan

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/8703/own975mx.th.jpg (http://img100.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own975mx.jpg)

IT: For a reason that beats me, defense goes 3/4, but the loss is of an archer defending where we had an immortal ready. Oh well.

T7.[15-3]
2/2 attack on the archers at Arrow Valley, the roman legion and its 3 hairy lil brothers reach our shores near Hilltop.

Persepoli makes a settler, it will go west after we're rid of the romans.

Myst >> Poly

IT: Arrow Valley holds.

T8.[17-4]
Lux up for parsagadae
Impi goes down, but we lose an archer attacking another one at Arrow Valley

IT: Lose a spear to the legion and another one to an archer

T9.[18-6]
Take out one hairy one bowman
Pillage the Aztec dyes

IT: They're running away !!

T10.[22-6]
Impi bombed and taken out by an immortal

Now is a good time for me to leave this one because I'm about to go jackass with the workers :nope:

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/7791/own9103yo.th.jpg (http://img100.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own9103yo.jpg)

Arrow Valley and Hilltop both have their share of pressure but it's nothing we can't handle. We're a bit short on bronze weapons so Parsa is set to make some spears. Steel works but it's more expensive. There's a settler in hilltop awaiting a cease fire to go plant a handful of citizens in the hills W.

Not many elites Goz, you'll have to work some up on your own :p

Roster:
Smart -
BEF -
SM -
Goz - UP
Own - On Deck

Looks good. Next goal should be 8 cities and immortal army.

I've got it.

Pre-turn - No immediate threats, but there are 5 green, 4 red and 2 yellow enemies in sight. Plus stupid barbs.

Move out the settler so I hopefully can claim another spot.

730BC - Aztecs completes the Great Wall and starts ToA.

P-Polis immortal -> ditto
Pasargadae spear -> ditto
Bactra walls -> barracks

3 more greens show up NW of Arrow Valley.

Kill roman legion, archer and warrior.
Kill aztec archer. [4-0]

Army continues pillaging around Aztec capitol.

710BC - Aztec archer dies against our spear. [5-0]

Hilltop builds immortal -> the same
Antioch pult -> ditto

I won't mention every unit I build from here on.

Kill 5 aztec archer and a spear without losses. [11-0]

690BC - Legion dies against elite spear. [12-0]

Zulu planted a town near where I wanted our town. Plop Sidon down there anyways, now we only have to figure out how to road those dyes.

Only 5 enemies in sight atm.

Pasargadae starts a settler, so we can claim spices.

670BC - Zulu finish the Great Lighthouse.

Legion dies against spear in Sidon. [13-0]

Kill 2 roman archers and a legion plus an aztec spear. [17-0]

650BC - 5 Zulu swords and an impi shows up near Sidon.

630BC - 2 Zulu swords dies against immortals. [19-0]

We learn Poly -> Monarchy at 70% for now, due in 19 turns.

Pasargadae builds settler, move him towards spices.

Aztecs must have an assembly line for archers, our army sees a lot every turn and quite a few are near Arrow Valley.

Kill 3 green archers and a yellow sword. [23-0]

610BC - 2 Zulu swords suicide against our defense. [25-0]

Massive uprising near Bactra, we still have a long way to go before we get to MA!

Kill green archer, try to kill impi, but he runs. [26-0] 4 legion are approaching.

590BC - Kill 2 green archers and a spear. [29-0] Move units out of Hilltop, I want romans to go there. But the clean record will probably go soon.

Settler is near the spices, I don't want to found a town next to the volcano, so we will have to road the lux.

570BC - Quiet. Found Tyre near spices.

550BC - Defend against legion. [30-0]

FP message.

Kill aztec archer, a whole stack shows up on the mountains NW of Arrow Valley.
Kill 4 legions, lose my first immortal. [35-1]

It's a very defensive game, but I couldn't afford to go out and meet the enemy. Hopefully next player will get the chance to do so, as I would like a few immortals on the mountains NW of Arrow Valley. We need to go on the offense, but it's hard when they come pouring in.

Also, the army should go S and start pillage Rome and Zulu, I think we can deal with aztec archers and spears. I should've done that already, but I forgot.

We have 8 cities now, so another leader would be nice, so we can get that immortal army. :)

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own_550bc.jpg

goz! :goodjob: Looks like we have room to expand south and west (though the western marshes don't look so inviting). Chop the forest over the dyes north of Sidon, road it, and we have a lovely spot for immortal death to come pouring down from the hills. I also envy the player who gets the pleasure of razing the Zulu city next to the iron. :)

I'd keep an eye on the Aztec galley off Pasargadae.

35-1!

A leader will make things even better :) .

Not to spoil the joy of thinking about a MGL, but I'd have much more fun seeing the volcano burst under the legion's feet :lol:

Sweet job mr Goz :hatsoff:

Roster:
Smart - AWOL
SM - On Deck
BEF -
Goz -
Own - UP

Summary:
Bad kill count, 48-14. I'm very disappointed in how many units I lost. I had to defend our tiles with immortals from a huge legion stack, but kept doing it. By the time I realized I was just laying them under the bus, the damage was done. Ah well. No leader, but I'm getting a lot of elite wins, so it will happen. I didn't expand, because there's not much room, and we have a lot of countries to fight. Once we get an army...

I wouldn't feel too bad about that kill count, Own. 48 enemy dead is not so shabby. :)

If Smart is still AWOL I can pick this up and play it tomorrow (Tuesday) night while the wife is out. :mischief:

With that many elites hanging around, we should pop our second leader soon, I hope. I'll remind myself -- legion vs. immortal = 3 attack vs. 2 defend, immortal vs legion = 4 attack vs. 3 defend. Offense whenever possible.

Looks like someone is going to have to whack a barb camp in the east as well.

What's the group's opinion about popping another settler and expanding either south or west?

Defense is better. It's more like 4 vs. 3.3 and 3 vs. 2.2. ;) .

I'd be fine with that. It would help our unit support.

Going south wouldn't hurt. We might get a few zulus but all in all they aren't quite the current threat. I suspected they and rome are at war during my turns.

MonkeyMonkey up

Monkey gots it. Play tomorrow night unless Smart returns from the beyond and would like to whack some Romans.

We could settle on the hill directly south of the worker outside of Sidon (next to a volcano that's shot its load), or on the coast SE of Tyre next to the bananas. Or maybe directly east next to the Aztec territory. Any suggestions?

Volcanoes can shoot and shoot and shoot again, on different activity periods even. The likelihood is of constant probability if I'm not mistaken, so anytime, we risk it.

I wouldn't oppose a slightly looser placement, but we'd need workers to extend the road networks and make sure we can move all around easily. I think w eneed them anyways, so that could be a short-term goal.

Playing now.

Let's see what the world looks like.

Prelude (350BC) Our army has been busy in the west. The Aztec lands look swept clean of roads, irrigation and mines. This is a good thing. We're poised outside of Ulundi, ready to disconnect the Zulu iron supply. :D The Zulu lands are also rich in gems, which will one day make our Persian citizens very happy. Interestingly enough, our wise general informs us that the Aztecs are currrently enjoying life as a Republic. Wonder what kind of war weariness Monty is coping with right now.

Own has left the monkey with some units that have moves. Time to tidy up our lands a little.

Whack two Aztec archers outside of Arrow Valley and redline an already injured legion with our catapults. (2-0)

IBT Enemy troops shuffle around but no attacks. Zulu are building Sun Tzu's. And a Roman galley does us the favor of sinking a barb galley offshore from Antioch. Landlubber barbs there are headed our way.

Persepolis pops an immortal. I set it to build a settler.

And look what shows up in the south. :hmm:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/purple.jpg

Purple borders. Wonder who's going to be joining the party soon.

330BC There's an Aztec stack just north of Arrow Valley, heading towards our interior. This is unaccptable. They must go. Immortal tries but fails to kill the veteran Aztec spear guarding the stack (2-1). Second immortal finishes him off, leaving a stack of two archers. Figure they'll try to assault AV next turn and leave their bones to dry in the sun. Immortal whacks another Aztec archer outside of Hilltop. (3-1)

Moving cats to Sidon. This seems like a reasonable place to launch a true offensive. But not yet.

IBT Roman legion attacks our archer guarding a mountain outside of Sidon. Fails but redlines our guy, who loses to the next legion (4-2). Lots more enemy moving into Persia.

310BC Our cats in Sidon redline the offending Roman legion, as well as an impi whose looks we didn't like. Take out a barb horseman moving on the workers in Antioch. Switch production from a cat and rush an immortal there, as we have a Roman and an Aztec galley ready to offload troops next turn.

Not much else to do.

IBT Romans jump over the river and kill an immortal guarding two slave workers (4-3). Aztecs try yet again to assualt Hilltop and lose another archer (5-3). Oh, and we've spotted our first Zulu Medieval Infantry. :(

290BC We send an elite immortal to swat the one legion in our territory (6-3). Whack another encroaching barb horseman. The Aztecs and Romans decline to land on our shores. Do some housecleaning outside of Sidon (8-3) and Hilltop (9-3).

IBT Nobody attacks. Lots of bad guys surrounding Sidon, though.

270BC Bombard Zulus outside of Sidon. We're going to have to take out Swazi right next door -- wounded Zulus are spending their weekends there drinking beer and watching ESPN. This is not acceptable.

Assorted Zulu and Aztec whacking (12-3). We have a settler, but I'm not sure where to place him, and we don't have the defense yet to cover a new city. It looks like there's a hill in the fog just northwest of Arrow Valley that might be suitable. I move the settler to AV to await developments.

There's Romans outside of Hilltop and Zulu's outside of Sidon. Let's see.

IBT They don't manage much (14-3).

250BC Aztec and Zulu housekeeping (17-4).

IBT Romans lose an archer outside of Hilltop (18-4), but don't assault it with their legions. Yet. They have seven of them waiting.

230BC Shift cats towards Hilltop, as it looks like that's where the Romans would like to set up a vacation home. This is not acceptable.

Assorted skirmishing (19-4).

IBT Three Aztec dead outside the walls of Arrow Valley and five dead Roman legions outside the legendary battle-scared walls of Hilltop (27-4). No losses on our part. :dance:

210BC Our maurading spear army outside of the Zulu capital has this to report --

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/horses.jpg

Nope, we're not happy that the Zulu have pikes and MedInf. But they've had horses this whole time and haven't made a SINGLE FREAKING HORSEMAN???? :crazyeye: It boggles this monkey's mind.

I suppose, though, that this means we could have been seeing Zulu knights soon. Let's hope that this is their only source of horsies.

I'm going to pause here and let the next best player take my remaining 3 turns plus their 10. (Some serious decisions need to be made soon that may be beyond my monkey mind, plus I have a midterm tomorrow that it would be good to study for.) It seems to me that we need to go on an offensive soon. I didn't pop us a leader, but we have numerous elites healing up and ready to pounce on some Aztecs or impis to earn their promotions. Monarchy comes online in 2, but I suspect we're going to want to wait a bit before we revolt -- CivAssist says it's not time yet.

Lots of troops with full moves. The Aztec seem focused on Arrow Valley, the Romans like Hilltop, and the Zulus are all over Sidon like monkeys after potato chips. I moved the cats towards Hilltop thinking they'd be needed to drive off the Romans, but the Romans killed themselves without too much help from us. We should at least take out Swazi right soon so they lose their vacation home.

No sign yet from Mr Purple in the south.

Here's what the world looks like where the action is. There are two Zulu MedInf in those stacks, BTW.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/210BC.jpg

And here's the SAVE (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_210BC.SAV).

BTW, I think that it's now:

Roster:
Smart - AWOL
SM - played and survived
BEF - UP
Goz - on deck
Own -

My .02 that the purple borders are from someone overseas who just planted a town. Like the pesky portuguese or something. I guess we had to expect something like that from the zulus, with TGL they'll be growing pretty fast.

Will read, comment and play my set tomorrow most likely.

My .02 (and what I would have done if I'd had time to finish all ten turns) would be to sack Swazi in the next turn or two, whack the settler pair in the neighborhood, and plant a city in the nonbonus grasslands 1 south of where Swazi is now. That should close off our southern border (well, yes, it looks like there are some Romans taking up unnecessary space there for the moment) and then make a major offensive push to the west. With the Aztecs fairly effectively pillaged, we should be able to put them out of business. Expanding that way would also give us horses. Eventually. :goodjob:

Or how about a city in grasslands next to the river 2 north of the Swazi iron? Riskier, but we want to expand that way anyway. :hmm:

It may also be time to build Heroic Epic in Pasargadae. And maybe think about getting a Forbidden Palace online.

Alright, playing. I'll make a few spears prior to revolting, losing good UU blood on defense is way way not ideal IMO. Will do my best to take Swazi, not sure if I'll go for 8 or 13 yet.

Pre-Turn: Military is average vs the Zulu [party]

All catapults towards Sinop, what troops I can manage for Arrow Valley.
Take 2 aztecs who were enjoying the sun too much - the sun is a decreed property of Xerxes' older daughter, who wanted it for her 12th birthday.

IT: No casualties to report, business as usual

T1.[8-0]
Hilltop riots :blush:

IT: 6-1-1 defense, mostly at Sidon

T2.[14-1-1]
Revolt is on ! 5 turns.

IT: 1-0 D GOGO
Roman MDI and Zulu horsemen spotted afar.

T3.[21-2-1]
Lose an immortal and get a redline off one another attacking archers outside arrow valley :dubious:
Clear the mountains around Sidon

IT: Quiet, just moves

T4.[24-2-1]
We have the zulu settler cornered on a mountain, best he can do is fall back, and we'll catch up on him.

IT: Well, it looks like there was another hill. No zulu chops for our immortals tonight.

T5.[28-2-1]
Did I mention the legion stack over a mountain by Sidon? 3 of the 7 were scratched a HP off.

IT: IT of doom, we lose 2 spears 2 immortals against the romans.

T6.[35-8-1]
We're needing troops badly so I pull MP's out of backdoor towns. Will try and manage replacements before I pass it on.
Fortunately we have good men left and the offensive goes roundly.

IT: Quiet

T7.[40-8-1]
Looky here !!

http://img58.imageshack.us/img58/2244/own9110np.th.jpg (http://img58.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own9110np.jpg)

IT: 2-0

T8.[48-8-1]
Kinda lost track of the turns.

http://img58.imageshack.us/img58/1988/own9138dp.th.jpg (http://img58.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own9138dp.jpg)

Short version is we've found a roman iron but they have been busy using it, 2 to 5 redhats show up every turn.
http://img58.imageshack.us/img58/8379/own9126qw.th.jpg (http://img58.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own9126qw.jpg)

Rough part being a 9 MDI, 7 archers, 2 legions push on turn 128

Killcount is roughly 60-10-2, not ideal at all.

I stopped 1 turn short of a round number, so you'll have 11 to play and there is room for some discussion right here. I've saved the very beginning of the turn because I'm clueless about what's top priority and what's not.

http://img58.imageshack.us/img58/6696/own9144ud.th.jpg (http://img58.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own9144ud.jpg)

There are 3 impis sneaked in, 4 aztec archers wanting our capital down, 2 impis and a horse on a mountain, a nasty roman stack at Sidon ... too much for us to handle an outgoing offensive; the settler has basically been a gpt drain so far, which is bad.

Well, now you know that the purple are the Iroquis(sp?)...:)

I believe it's imperative that we go on the offense soon. If we have an immortal army, we can go on a razing rampage in the pillaged Aztec lands to the west and start settling there. There's horses up there we can use. Don't let the Romans or the Zulu reconnect their iron. If we don't get traction going, we're going to stay on the defensive until we eventually get swamped.

I also noticed that the Zulus have longbows. :(

Also, are we playing by original or modified AW rules? I'm all for avoiding contact with the Iriquios for as long as possible, but once we do, are we allowed to buy a cheap tech from them before declaring?

Yes, leader!

My turn?

are we allowed to buy a cheap tech from them before declaring?

What does Own say?

Latest roster says it's you, Goz. That's as much as this monkey knows. :hmm:

Alas, it does. :)

I've got it, will play tomorrow my time.

No internet connection all day yesterday.

Pre-turn - Ouch, lots of enemies inside our core, need to get rid of those 3 impis at least.

Vet immortal dent the first impi, who runs away. Then I muck up and send a 3hp elite immortal against the next, but he wins and:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/leader.jpg

That's skill. :blush: I save the leader for now, I want to create another immortal army and I have to drag the spear army home. Rome lost their iron btw.

Kill the 2 remaining impis with the army. Lots of units with moves left, so I better take care.

1 of 10 catapults hits. :rolleyes: Can't do anything with thos legions yet.

Kill 4 aztec archers and a zulu sword. [8-0]

I have a feeling we're in some trouble the next few turns.

50AD - Kill 2 impis with the army. Pults go 7/10 this time, kill 4 roman MI's. [14-0]

70AD - Zulu sword and MI suicides against our defense.

Great, another dozen roman MI's shows up, this will be tough.

Kill impi and 4 roman MI's/legions. [21-0] Those numbers doesn't mean anything, there's too many enemies around.

90AD - We need another army at home or this is history. Spear-army pillage romes wines and then I disband it. Too bad, those 100 shields would've been useful somewhere. But now we have another immortal army at home.

Kill 2 yellow archers, an impi and a aztec spear.

Pults dents half the roman stack. Our newest army kill one MI. [26-0]

Settler out to poach a spot, we need more cities.

110AD - Rome starts Leo's :lol:

Aztec archer dies against spear in Arrow Valley.
Rome stack attacks army in Sidon :wow:, it goes 3/13! 4 MI's dies and we lose nothing.

Kill aztec spear, zulu horse and archer. Finally I lose an immortal [34-1]

Stupid barb near Antioch, need to divert an immortal over there. I rather fight the AI.

Dent the red stack again and kill 3 MI's, lose another immortal. [37-2]

130AD - Lose elite spear in Sidon, kill red MI on defense.

Kill 3 roman MI's, lose immortal. Kill 2 zulu MI's and 2 green LB's, which I've been calling archers. [45-4]

Sardis founded.

150AD - Kill 2 green LB's, a yellow one and a red MI's. [49-4] Get rid of barbcamp.

170AD - Aztec LB kills elite immortal on a mountain and across a river?

Kill him. Army kills 2 impis in Swazi, kill another yellow LB and a red MI. [54-5]

Iroquois learn about our existance, another foe.

190AD - Army dispose of the 2 last impis in Swazi and take the city. :bounce:
Kill zulu LB, the last 3 roman MI's and a green LB. [62-5]

210AD - Hiawatha finish Leo's.

We learn Writing -> MapMaking.

Kill 2 aztec spears and a LB. [66-5]

230AD - Quiet, kill a zulu LB. [67-5]

250AD - Kill 3 aztec LB's, geez, they spawn quicker than we can kill them. [70-5]

We have a settler on the volcano N of the dyes, it's quite impossible to do anything with him right now. He should settle 1W, maybe with help of an army?

If we can get control over the area where the aztec town is, it would look much better. With a bunch of pults there and an army we can counter most of what the AI dishes out.

The kill-count is because of those catapults, we need more of those if we can afford it. And of course 2 armies help heaps. So we need more towns, basically we need more of everything. :lol:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/own250ad.jpg

:worship:

All for settling ASAP, but I think W-NW would be more prudent for the volcanic activity. Good move on the army, Rome was the big threat though, so if we can manage another army (or a push :mischief: ) that's where I'd send it.

My guess is that the south is a peninsula to which Julius and Shaka sent boats to settle, else it would've been populated much faster. So going there would probably be a waste of time. Unless the Aztecs get the pyramids, their land is now swept clean and they'll take time to recover, so they shouldn't be too hard to handle. They haven't been thus far.

So I think that if we can control those 2 mountains S of Tula, the armies could lead an offenseive through the undamaged zulu territory and get rome by the guts. Or perhaps I'm getting megalomaniac after seeing what you did from my save ;)

Roster:
Smart - AWOL
SM - On Deck
BEF -
Goz -
Own - UP

Are you guys gonna pop that hut by the roman city and hope it pobs barbs to sack the city? :p
You better also hope that those roman soldiers walk into the volcanoe and it erupts. :lol:

Smart - AWOL
I'm back. :yumyum: I can take it tomorrow if Own will not do it before

IMHO you've waited long enough and grabbing it should be a shameless decision ;)

70-5!!! :banana: :dance: :banana:

Two armies!

Bold move disbanding the spear army. :eek:

Time looks right to push hard westward before they can recover from the pillaging. I haven't pulled up the save yet, but it looks like the interlopers have been pushed back and we've pushed forward.

And yeah, Smart should grab this bronco and ride it. :)

As I said, those numbers are funny.

At least 10 suicided against the defense and another 20 was killed by the armies. Then count in the heaps of archers/LB's killed by immortals, it's not that fantastic. Add to that red/yellow-lined MI's, killed by armies ahnd elite Imm's, nothing is spectacular in my turnset. Catapults that was created by the mates here, made the difference. Without them, we would looking for a new game to play.

You have to play by the numbers, pults redline a stack or at least yellow the first ones. Then you know an army can take out at least 2, then 2 elites sitting on mountains can take more.

Don't waste forces. 45-14 or whatever is not bad, but it tells me that it was a lot of chancing there. Play on the defense, nick what you can with pults and then whack. If not, hunker down and let your elites save the day.

I still want the spot by the volcano and I want to take Tula. Then we have 12 towns!

And another leader will give us another army.

You never won an AW game by being chicken. We need to control those mountains as Beorn said, if we got that, we'll be unstoppable.

And for last, I really really wanted to drag the spear army home, but it's a strait over there. So all offense (except galleys) will come from the north.

It's looking great, we're finally going on the offensive. As long as we're making progress we still have a chance.

It's looking great, we're finally going on the offensive. As long as we're making progress we still have a chance.

That's right. Expanding our territory will give a huge impact on our economy, it is awful atm.

To get a foothold on that "choke" up north, will give us a great advantage. Armies can scurry around there and keep our core safe.

But do NOT forget galley landings! We can't let Iro's or anyone else just pop in and take a town. So defenses need to be strong at the coast-lines as well.

My objectives was to keep the core clean and I think I managed to do that. Now Smart has to try to push on, if only to get us to 12 towns and maybe another army. We have a bunch of elites, so that's just a matter of time. :)

Takling about elites, what do we do with the next MGL's? With the kind of unit count we see, it may not be paramount to get HE, but OTOH if we have a 1/12 chance of getting leaders we might get really easy armies/FP/Pentagon, mighty quick, with minimal effort.

My vote would be HE-Army-FP, in that order. Make the pentagon when we're short on cities vs armies.

We have no place for FP right now, maybe if we can grab some land up north it's a good idea.

HE is over-rated, I'd prefer another Imm-army before that, just to be on the safe side. We're still getting swamped by enemies and soon they will come with knights. Another army could go and pillage.

Pre-flight
Changed production in Parsagrade and Antioch to Immortals. Decreased lux to 20%. Everything else looks good.

IBT
LB from Tula killed spearman, another LB was died. [1-1]
Romans completed Sun Tzu.

Turn 1
Killed two spearmans with army in Tula. Killed last 2hp LB and captured town. [4-1]
There are 2MDI and 3LB's near Tula, and army haven't movement points left :(
I abandoned it...
Killed one impi [5-1]

IBT
Roman legion suicided against immortal on mountain. Aztecs killed immortal, which I have used to raze Tula [6-2]

Turn 2
IBT
One LB died attacking fortified immortal on mntn, another killed it [7-3]

Turn 3
Lux to 30%.
Killed 2 spears and 2 LB's. [10-3]

Turn 4
Romans brings more and more units. Whacked MDI, LB and pike in one stack and the same units in another one [16-3]

IBT
Lose two elite Immortals in Sardis. :(
Bad luck, all my loses were on IBT's... [16-5]

Turn 5
Finally I have built new city - Samaria, and we will get two settlers in three turns. There is one spot for city N from fish, marshes will be cleared in three turns.
Killed roman LB on mntn, only one hp left on immortal [17-5]
Lose Immortal to 2hp longbow and promoted him to elite! :mad:
Then I killed him with elite immortal, no leaders yet... [18-6]

I'm bored and I will stop here. Next player must have better luck.

>>SAVE<< (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_300_AD.SAV)

I'm guessing that the updated roster is:

Smart - just played (welcome back!)
Own - UP
SM - On Deck
BEF -
Goz -

Got it.

10 chra

The pressure seems to big for our leader, someone should pick this up.

Execute decision.

Roster:
Smart -Backed out after 5 turns.
SM - Is UP
BEF - Twiddling thumbs
Goz - Just played
Own - Went to grandma (skipped)

I can pick it up and play it if Smart will post the save. :hmm: Otherwise I'll have to go back to Goz's save and try to replay Smart's turns. Not a preferred option.

I can pick it up and play it if Smart will post the save. :hmm:

check out the save at the end of Smart's last post :mischief:

Am I missing something?? :crazyeye: Monkey does not see a save.


http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/where_is_it1.JPG

Am I missing something?? :crazyeye: Monkey does not see a save.


Here ........ thats odd - cant see it in your screenie:confused:

Is the monkey sure he is logged in ? Had the same problem once when I did not notice that I was logged in as a guest.

Yep, logged in and everything. Smart (or Andronicus), can you repost?

Possibly some antivirus software or something is hiding the file from you.

He did post a save, look again.

Just in case:

Sorry I couldn't play, I did look at the save and attempt to play twice, but I got scared. I didn't have much time anyway.

Got the save from vmxa's post. Thanks! :hatsoff: I've looked at it and it is as terrifying as Own suggests. :eek: I'm civ'ed out for for this evening, but will make my best effort when my monkey brain is clear tomorrow (unless Own would like to pick it up and play it tonight). Wish the valiant Persians luck!

It doesn't look bad, I'm just afraid I'll mess up a pretty good situation.

Pregame It is with no small trepidation and concern that a monkey takes up the scepter of the mighty Persian empire. Our enemies are numerous. They are advanced. And they're angry. So angry. There is much for a monkey to do.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/A-Monkey-King.jpg

All seems to be in good shape, except that an impolite impi threatens the worker that's about to connect the defeated Swazi and Sidon. (Monkey almost forgot that impis are fast little monsters.) A thoughtful immortal gives him cover. Looks like Rome is mostly attacking with pikemen. :hmm: Great defenders, but not so good on the attack. Wonder what kind of shape Caeser's defenses are in right now. We shall see soon enough.

Hit enter.

IBT Some Iroquois galleys sail by and just wave hello. A fresh stack of Roman pikes and Zulu longbows and MedInf move in to the Persian killing grounds.
Build a settler and an immortal. (Won't give turn by turn of our builds unless I do something dramatic. We're basically going to build military. :rolleyes:)

310AD Smack some bad boys around. No major stacks in range yet. (3-0)

IBT Aztecs land a couple of longbows up north near our undefended capital. :eek: This will not do. More red and yellow troops show up as well.

Swazi decides to be a happy Persian city.

Romans decide they need the Knights Templar.

320AD Assorted smacking. Lose one immortal taking a piece out of the Zulu stack. (6-1) Rush walls in Sardis, since it looks like the Zulus would like a piece of it. Oh yeah, and we get our next leader. :woohoo:

IBT Think the AI won't attack a healthy army in a city it really wants? It will. (12-3)

330AD Here's where I have to make a tough choice about what to do with our leader. Rush the Heroic Epic? Rush the Forbidden Palace somewheres? And then monkey thinks to call up the domestic advisor and asks how many cities currently make up the mighty Persian empire.

We have 11. And we just popped a settler in Pasargadae. Think we might hold on to Darius for one more turn and then build a third army?

I thought so.

Nobody dies this turn.

IBT Zulus try to take Sardis and fail. Various Aztec annoyances. RNG is against us and they take out two spears in Arrow Valley. (15-6) Romans decide to abandon the attack on Samaria and march south instead.

340AD Kill some more Aztecs and move the army out of Sardis, on its way to kill some cities in the west. Miscalculated when the marshes would be ready to build our newest city in the east, so no third army this turn. :( Whacked what I could. (21-6)

IBT Romans take the bait and leave off city assault to take away a stack of workers building a road. Workers were covered by an elite spear. They ultimately killed the spear and got the workers, but their invasion force is in pieces. (28-7)

The Zulu's have built the Sistine Chapel for us. How nice.

Oh, and this isn't pretty.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/ouchie.jpg

350AD Definitely not pretty. Our defenses are mighty thin behind the lines, where the Romans have also landed a longbow and pike. I shuffle troops, redline one mounted warrior, and hope for the best. Thin the herd of redcoats a bit more. (31-7)

IBT RNG gods are still not pleased. All our cities hold, but it costs us. (38-10)

360AD Our army takes down Teayo, which gives us the magic count of 12 cities. We get our third immortal army. Abandon Teayo, since I don't want to fool with trying to defend it. Kill some interlopers and try to hold on. (42-10)

IBT Samaria is surrounded by enemy and the army there is pretty hurt. It falls to the vile Aztecs and they carry away 5 catapults along with the body of our fallen army. :cry: On the other hand, the valient defenders of Sardis give us yet another leader to take his place. :banana: A mounted warrior sneaks past our back lines and takes away Arrow Valley. :aargh: This will not last. (45-12)

370AD Our newly formed immortal army restores Arrow Valley to its rightful owners. Our walls and barracks are only mildly defiled by the brief Iroquois intrusion. Hey, it's not like we had any culture buildings there. :crazyeye:

Kill what I can. (48-12)

IBT Romans move in on Swazi. MW pillages by Tyre. Nobody dies.

Gotta stop here after 7 turns. (Wife wants us to go out to dinner with friends. Doesn't she realize I have a WAR going on here?) I've quickly built Hamaden in the west and Ergili in the east with no defenders, just to get back to 12 cities again. Cyrus is in Sardis, now ready to build a replacement army. They army that killed Teayo is there too, healing. The other new army with two immortals in it is at full health in Arrow Valley. Intruders lurk behind the lines. It might mak sense to abandon Swazi rather than let the Roman stack have it. On the other hand, if it costs them to take it, we can pick off the wounded with the healthy troops and remaining catapults in Sidon. I leave it to the next better player to keep up alive.

Here's what things look like.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/380AD.jpg

And here's the <<SAVE>> (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_380_AD1.SAV).

Oh, and BTW, CivAssist says that Iroquois are currently a Democracy. And we've seen our first Zulu knight, so they have their horses and iron hooked up again. :cry:

Ok, so the iroquois are mighty scary. If they went up the tech tree to democraty in that kind of timeframe, though, I suspect they are far from cavalries. Or I hope so. Well, Can't I fancy it anyways?

Choices, now, choices ... 3 immortal armies and a too thin handful of defenders. So we'll need to use the armies at home for defense and try, somehow, to keep it all in one piece. We'll need to increase our men count before going further out expanding I'm afraid.

Is the idea of sending 2 armies out for a TGL capture total insanity? Now that we know the Iroquois it'd be of great benefit. We just need to make sure we have enough men to hold the fort.
Whatever happens, I'm sending one out to pillage again. Rome is way, way, way too healthy. They should be more like the Zulus. Build stuff for us and lay low.

If we are to mount a counter-offense on the troops at Swazi, we might benefit from moving a lot of units to the iron hill so that they don't have it. It sounds like a risky business though because of the exposure to the stack for a turn. I'll need to crunch some numbers before venturing there.

About the units that roam within our borders, would it be tough, self-discipline-wise, to label and use a small stack of like 2-3 pults/immos/spears to patrol inside the borders and do that kind of job? If we spend my 8 turns building troops up exclusively, I'm confident we can amass enough. But then again that's with the armies counted as in-land help ...

Lots of questions, I talk too much again. So yyeah, I'm up, I can play it anytime 24/7 for the next week, but I'm not venturing there until we have a few better defined plans for defending, crippling, maiming, capturing and, hopefully, dominating.

Holding Swazi is going to be tough. We currently only have one immortal holding the fort there. We could pull him back and hope to rip up the current Roman stack defensively with the remaining cats and the troops we still have around Sidon. As I recall, Swazi is on flatland, so we could abandon it or leave it open for the AI to take and then counterpunch them from the iron hill. The green and yellow boys up north of Swazi are pretty torn up and scattered, and we should be able to mop them up. Our biggest problem, IMO, is the behind the lines landings. Our defenses are almost non-existant in the core. And we're hurting for fast units there. Without horses our response time is limited. Especially now that the AI is throwing knights and MW at us.

My thought would be that we should pump out spears for defense at home, try to replace the cats that I lost, send at least one army back out to pillage and/or maybe even raze our way through to the horses in Aztec lands. I know, hard to imaging holding a supply line all the way out there, but we need to get some mobility as well as firepower.

Snagging the TGL from the Zulu has got to be in our gameplan. Of course, the longer we wait, the more worthwhile it'll be for us. But too much longer, and we'll have to try to take it from muskets. Well, unless the Zulu just don't have enough territory to have any salt. We can hope, right?

My only regret is that I didn't rush rax in Samaria. That would have kept our troops alive long enough to hold out against the multiple stacks against them. [EDIT -- maybe it would have kept them alive. Hard to say. We had green, red, and yellow stacked against us there.] I suspect that we just didn't have the cash for it.

Oh, research was set to Map Making on a single scientist, and I left it at that. Should we push harder to get some galleys to counter AI landings? Or abandon research altogether to max production and cash at home, pinning our hopes on the GLib?

That's my take. Any other thoughts, team and lurkers?

I don't mean to stall this game boys, but the decisions to take with 3 armies at hand are beyond my experience and expertise, so I'd like to hear a bit more - or I'll just play it all blindfolded, which is a sub-par choice IMO.

The monkey would like to hear from glorious leader Own, certainly. Any lurkers care to chime in? This one's a challange, to say the least.

If vmxa hasn't taken a look at the save, maybe I'll PM him to see what he thinks.

My plan is always to whack what I can and leave other stuff alone. By playing defensive you kill more than if you go on the war-path yourself. Well, most of the time, that is.

We need that choke up there and we needed it yesterday. One army up there can heave havoc, another save our butts in between and the third could go pillaging. It would be easier with a fast army, like horses, but we can't afford to sit around.

Rome are the power on our continent, they need to be pillaged and severely damaged on their homelands.

Can't think of anything else. It feels shot, too many units lost lately (by chancing) and the AI build new stuff too quickly.

Problem is, I don't know if we can pump out enough spears at home to hold out against the waves of AI and free up our armies to do what they need to do -- go burn Roman cities and pillage their lands. The stacks of pikes and medinf are comming about 10 high these days. That's a lot of spears for us to produce. :(

Ouch, that is an ugly situation. AWD on pangea, is a load. It looks like you will have to abandon a few towns and draw back to a tighter area.

You really cannot take and hold towns at this point in the game. It is all about kill ratio. You will not have a high enough one, if you have to spread out.

Swazi has to be abandon and Hamadan will to, once it comes under threat. Sardi and Seidon will probably have to as well. You just cannot defend all that land.

It would be one thing if you did not have to worry about landings behind you, but you do. Not losing troops and cats is so important, you just cannot put them at risk. You will not be able to replace them fast enough.

The only place that could benefit from an FP is Seidon and I am not sure that can be saved. The AI will attack cities with armies in them, if it things it can defeat it. It will do it anyway on it former towns or one that are planted on it former land. That stack of LB' probably will take chance and attack a town with the army in it.

It is only in the open that they are safe. A smaller core would let you use the bait and switch to run units around while the armies picked off some.

I just do not know if any of the civs have spend their main wad of troops and will be in trickle mode soon.

Since you won't be able to make an army soon and you could not fill it if you did and probably have little to use the leader on till you get markets, I probably would rush HE.

If that MW defeats the spear, well lets hope that does not happen.

I sent out the 2 man army to finish off the MW. BTW name those armies so you can track them. I use names like Imm-1, then Horse-4 or what ever the number is at the time. Then I always know how many armies I have and when I look at them from the F3, I can tell what they are. Plus tlaking about them in a post is easier.

I send out an immortal from Seidon to finish off the archer. I put the group of worker on the swap to road it. I abandon Swazi and move the unit towards Seidon.

Switch Arrow Valley to worker and rush it, then switch to archer and rush it. They can finsih of a weakened unit and have bombardment if attacked. You could make it a spear or even a Imm.

Move worker to the other side of Arrow to road. Move an Imm to Bactra. Want to be able to get the MW, if it retreats.

Send lead to cap.

I wonder if going into Monarchy so soon was a benefit. Despot allow me to use pop rushing.

Sorry I had to rush out the door. I meant to mention that great care should be given to making settlers. I seem to recall a mention of one and any for those towns that are likely to fall, could be the difference in some of the loses.

The settler could have been a spear or an archer and turn the tide in one or two places. It is just very hard to expand in AWD, especially without horses to pick of damaged units or cover a threat.

You have to turtle a bit and let them spend there excess units, befoe trying annex more land.

Thanks, vmxa! :hatsoff:

The settlers were important because we needed to get up to 12 cities for our 3rd army. I wish we could be expanding (I long for those Aztec horses we need so desparately) but that's not going to happen yet.

I'm starting to wonder too about the switch to Monarchy. Pop rushing could have saved us in a couple of places. It's not like our economy is doing so well that we could afford to cash-rush. On the other hand, we're so pressed now that we might not ever have the luxury of switching later.

Oh, and it's embarassing to admit this, but I can't figure out how to change the name of a unit. :blush:

If you go to preference you can enable advanced buttons or some such thing. I think then you will have two buttons on top of the rest. The right most is the rename.

Yes getting to 12 sounded nice, but was not going to be viable at that time. I think a few more units at an earlier point may have saved some of the other that were recently lost.

So now you may have had 4 or 6 more units and those cats. That would be huge, in that you could defend better and gotten in some kills.

Every choice is harsh at this level and this variant in AA. Hope you get a few breaks. If only one of the civs would take after someone els for a time.

The hotkey for renaming is shift-n or ctrl-n, can't remember but either will work.

Taker your time vmxa, I'll be reasdy to take it whenever.

I think vmxa was just taking a look at our current situation and seeing what could be done, rather than actually taking a set. Now, if we could talk him into a guest spot on the team, I certainly wouldn't object. :mischief: But the hot potato might still be yours, Beorn. (Or was Own going to take a shot at it? :hmm: )

Yeah there was something fishy about him taking the save, but I couldn't point what it was. Yeah, he's not on the official roster. I'll have to read more carefully :p

Sorry for the confusion. SM send me a PM to look at it and that is why I posted some ideas for consideration. I was an unoffical member as Own had my name in the start list.

I begged off as I go nuts waiting for turns and responses. I do like to read what is going on from time to time.

I guess it all started when a previous SG of Own's looked like it was going to sleep and I offered to fill in to finish it. I just hate to see all the effort that everyone put in be lost and it looked like a few turn sets would do it.

IMO the point is to have fun playing, the whole point of it, so although I don't play to lose, wether we win or lose or finish the game at all matters little to me: the good times playing are what I remember.

I've got a newly formed, significant load of things on the shelf, so I'll play either when I get more feedback or when I get significantly ahead in the work, whichever comes first.

Or if we can convince Own to take a turnset of his own SG. :lol:

Regardless, thanks for the look-see, vmxa. Your input is always appreciated. :thumbsup:

Let the guy play if he has the answer. :lol:

Or I'll play, since I understand some of his ideas. But then, I'm pretty busy.

So if vmxa feels like he wants to be involved, let him play. :)

AFAIK, the roster should be:

Roster:
Smart - backed out after 5 turns.
SM - got two leaders, lost an army and cats
BEF - up if he wants it
Goz - busy but ready to whack somebody (on deck)
Own - Went to grandma (skipped), not heard from recently

vmxa - not on the roster, but offered welcome advice

vmxa would be more than welcome to sign on here (in this monkey's opinion), but I suspect that the pace of SGs are too frustrating for him, so he'll stay a lurker.

I've been busy and honestly uninterested in civ recently. I'm going to have to drop out of my own, it's becoming a chore.

I've been busy and honestly uninterested in civ recently.
I wonder if he's gotten himself a girlfriend and a life. :hmm:

Alright Own, we all have such passes. I'll play this in a moment, while trying to keep the comments in mind.

Roster:
Smart -
SM -
BEF - playing
Goz -

First thing upon entering, I form the army, abandon Swazi, clear all but a pike from our land. The red stack is full of LB's, much easier to attack than to defend against. I rush a barrack in Sardis for the curative properties of stacked up soldier housings and troop commanders' yells and foul breath.

On the first IBT, I see a catapult dragged in along with the green stack:

http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/55/own9158ho.th.jpg (http://img221.imageshack.us/my.php?image=own9158ho.jpg)

On the second IBT, I lose Hilltop to badluck, Sidon to a stack of LB's I haven't been able to attack (pike+2 maces cover was too thick for our troops with a 1/4 catapult hit rate). Sardis holds.

3rd IBT gives Copernicus' to the Iroquois. Let's recall we're doing min on MM. I resign. If anyone wants to grab, here's SM's save (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Own9_380_AD1.SAV). Mine is a straightforward loss.

This may be a dead game. :cry:

If Own has moved on, then unless Goz would like a crack at it, we may have to run up the white flag. It's too bad. We had a good opening spot and good luck with iron in our core, but AW small continents with three :eek: militaristic civs as neighbors may have been too much.

We could try fighting this out to the bitter end, but losing Hilltop (where the Persians held off so many waves of attackers) as well as Sidon takes the wind out of my sails. I don't know that I'd want to see it go down to the last spearman. But that's just my opinion.

My further thought is that AWD on small continents might be winnable with an agricultrual civ or (and I'm tending towards this one myself) as the Romans. Starting with Warrior Code is good, but not the most important thing. Having an early uu that defends as well as it attacks could have made the difference. The immortals just don't cut it as a defender, and we ended up just never getting the traction on offense to make them really effective. But again, that's just this monkey's opinion.

I think easier opponents and a better UU (immortals are awesome, but given the circumstances, I would have taken a legion any day) would have made this a win. We had a good team and a good planning, but you can't get them all. AWD continents against 3 mils is, indeed, overkilling it.

Edit: yeah, what you said about rom, didn't notice :blush:

unless Goz would like a crack at it

I looked at it and got similar results as Beorn. We're too thin and the opponents are just too strong. It's a lost game.

As SM pointed out, 3 Mil civs on the same landmass is at least one too many. I also think the land we had wasn't the best, too many mountains and even marshes that slowed down our expansion. The location was a pity as well.

It was quite interesting though and a always a challenge. :)

Definitely a great game. :salute: Not the result we wanted, but we put up a great fight and had fun doing it.

I'd also suggest that we should probably also have left the barbs switched off. Not that we can't handle them, but they help the AI too much. (Ya think that Shaka researched Literature as his second or third tech?? :rolleyes: )

I'd like to take another try at AWD small continents. With the lessons we learned in this game, I'd suggest trying the Romans, but I'm open to other ideas. If there's interest, I'll roll up some starts and start a thread this weekend.

I'm immediately unable to go for another game, but in a week or two I might be able to give you guys everything this idiot has, again. I probably will start a game of my own sooner than later anyways. But there's exams coming and the books call me back, it's like the ring that wants its master or something.

I think we gave it all a very honest effort. TBH I think that despite the greatness of immortal armies, despite how eager we ALL were to get one, and despite the fact we all agreed on the wise move of disbanding the spear army to form one, it would have done us more good pillaging Rome to the last roaded tile. Pillage is what kept the Aztecs and Zulus manageable, and what would be the key to pulling this off. But hindsight is always 20/20 and if I had had to whine about anything I would have done it 2-3 pages ago ;)

And the barbs ... they're necessary at some point for the economy to roll, you just need those 25 golds after a while.

Great game :thumbsup:

despite the fact we all agreed on the wise move of disbanding the spear army to form one, it would have done us more good pillaging Rome

If I didn't take the punt of that, we wouldn't have lived as long as we did.

But I certainly see the point and containing Rome to LB and junk, we might have had a different game. But unfortunately we were swamped already and couldn't even get one of our new armies out to do some damage.

This is a lesson for a new game, if we get an early army, it should go stright at the strongest enemies heart.

And seriously, if we want to win anything like this we need better lands. What we got this time was barely satisfying, then the perimeter killed us.

So flat lands for next setting and please! - no barbs. They help the AI with huts and muck up our plans with barbs.

I'm going to propose an AWD or at least a defiant game on small continents. Civ of choice seems to be Rome, though that's up for negotiation. The militaristic trait helps for cheap rax and even more promotions (though if things run the way they did last time, we'll have more leaders than we can actually use to make armies). Commercial is also nice when you're struggling for every gold piece, plus we can make curraughs fast to get every civ on the map in on the party. I agree with no barbs -- I think we killed maybe 2 huts this last game and 50g isn't worth the big research boost for the AI.

I think that in hindsight I might have wanted to hold on to the pillaging spear army, even if that kept us from getting the second immortal army. Part of the reason we couldn't get any traction to get our forces out to pillage and burn was that the AI had too many high quality troops. That kept us on the defensive at home, and so it was only a matter of time, even with as high a kill ratio as we were usually getting. Of course, Goz may well be right, and we would have been overwhelmed a lot sooner without that second army at home. Dunno.

Personally, I think that what may have hurt us even more was the lack of horses. Nothing you can do about that. At least we had iron. I think I would have hit End Game immediately if we had learned IW and not found any in our borders.

So, if there's interest, I'll start a thread and we (whoever "we" is at this point) can roll some starts.

I know! We had like 18 enemies going for our middle, most of them MI's. I remember the turnset very well, thank you, and it was the only way of survival.

I'm not here to lose games, I killed a bunch and survived. The fore-seeing of other players or rather the lack of it, created our loss. You can lose stuff IBT, that's unlucky, but throwing stuff around is unskilled. And losing half of our Pults, come on?

Defense is a fine line and so is offense, we can't throw stuff away and we have to use every single unit to it's potential. We didn't.

For a new civ, I just hate Romans. What about Iro? I love horses and especially strong horses.

I agree about losing the pults -- that was a huge blunder on my part. Had we been able to build a road that could have gotten them down south, they could have been saved. As it was, their only way out was across a river and they would have been stuck out in the open.

Oh yeah, and don't forget that I lost some workers too, trying to build that very road that would have saved the pults. :blush:

Iro a pretty darn good, but I'm still tempted by the defense/offense capacities of the legion. French are tempting for their starting tech combo, allowing for an immediate beeline to Math for pults ... and if you happen to have ivory nearby ... :mischief:

EDIT: BTW, if it wasn't clear from the above, I totally take responsibility for being the weakest link in this game. The monkey is still learning.

Wouldnt "No Barbs" help you guys? Because the AI will get techs out of Goody Huts.