Welcome to your C_IV SGOTM 1 Team Thread. Please use it for all internal team communication, turn logs and discussions. Subscribe to it to receive notifications, and do not visit the other team threads for this game until you have finished. Please also subscribe to the Maintenance Thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=170295) for this game, where teams and staff may post non-spoiler information of general interest. I hope you enjoy the game.

This game will be played in Civ4, patched to v1.61.

This first SGOTM will not feature any advanced variant.. the winner simply will be the team that wins the game at the earliest game date with either domination or a diplomatic victory. All victory conditions are still enabled though, with exception of Space Race, so you have to avoid getting another type of victory (and of course prevent the AIs from winning).

Individual start files for all teams will be available on the SGOTM Progress and Results Page (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm_submission_list.php) at midnight, server local time, at the start of May 12.

Here's the start position.

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/civ4games/images/SGOTM01_start.jpg

Map Parameters
Playable Civ - Hapshepsut of Egypt
World size - Standard
Difficulty - Monarch
Landform - Mystery
Game Speed - Epic

Permanent Alliances are turned on (can form permanent alliances after either communism or fascism is researched)
Space race is disabled.
Egypt is locked into war with Huayna Capac of the Incas.
Egypt is locked into peace with an unknown civilization.

The map is hand built, and therefore may not have a standard configuration.

Please visit the following links to ensure that you are adequately prepared:
Civ4 SGOTM reference thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=168439)

Notes:

A. ONLY Civilization4 v1.61 is supported for this SGOTM. All teams will compete for a single award - the Gold Laurels.

B. All teams must play the sponsored variant - victory will be awarded for the fastest victory by either domination or diplomacy.

C. All saved game files uploaded to the server are parsed through software that extracts and archives data about your save, including reload count for each turn set.

Good luck to your team, and remember rule #1: Enjoy your game :D

Greetings fellow Chokonuts!!

Being a complete and utter virgin at succession games, any tips at all would be appreciated. Also, I'm based in Australia so don't know if the time differences make any difference.

Anyho, I'm sure we'll rock and hopefully don't come last!!!!

Hello Chokonuts,

I'm also totally new to succession games, but I'm looking very much forward to trying it, I'm living in Denmark, and I think the time difference will enable us to play around the clock.

Well, cheers to an excellent game.

McArine

We have quite an international group. I am from Indiana, USA.

One suggestion for our starting order is for the first round whoever picks up the game goes and then will keep that order for subsequent rounds. I will be out of town Friday and Saturday, so I will surely not be first.

Are their any preferences for reporting. In the succession games I have played we post all city builds, civic changes, religious events, and research. I also list significant events that occur in the year, like "1560: Tokyo captured".

It would be nice to post some screen prints, since it makes for a more enjoyable read and we can use them as a basis for discussing plans.

Checking in as well.

I too am from the "good-old-USA" (Kansas).

I, too, have not had any experience playing SG's however I have read over a lot of them. It is one of my favorite things about CivFanatics; reading about how others played, the decisions they made, (how I would have done it better ;) ). I don't have CIV on my computer at work :p so that is how I get my CIV fix during the day.

I would propose that we (the team) talk about major goals before the individual players plays the turns. eg: Where to found the capital, when to go to war (if at all), long-term goals (who to befriend, tech choices, etc.)
What do you guys(?) think?

Here's my two cents worth.

We probably need to decide from the go, are we dominatrixes or diplomats? Egypt is not ideally suited to a fight (weak UU) but creative trait always helps with domination and you can always pull of a earlier victory via domination. Also, you can't go too defensive as gool ole Huayana Capac is going to have to be dealt with one way or another. Domination on Monarch I imagine will be a killer financially. For what its worth I think domination.

From what can be seen, one spot SE of settler seems to be the spot for the Capital. Will hook up cows and all those lovely floodplains for cottage spamming (we'll need that cash) or GP farms. Would be nice to see what is in the blacked out areas north and west of settler to know for sure but would use at least one turn to find out.

Early techs, Pottery, Animal Husbandry, Mining and Bronze Working (in whatever order) for domination. If we're going diplomatic, an early religion (probably Judaism) for missionary spamming is always handy, so Pottery, Animal Husbandry, Mysticism, Polytheism, Masonry and Monotheism.

Probably all rubbish and doomed to failure but there you go!!!

Thoughts?

How about SW to go to the plains hill for the extra early production. We still get access to the flood plains and the cow. It also leaves room for a coastal city using the flood plains. If we decide to move the setler, going on top of the hill will also give us a view that may influence the decision. i like early Pottery and Animal Husbandry. Cottages are great on flood plains and we need horses for our War Chariots, if early war looks promising. As for long term strategy, I think we can stay flexible for a while.

Although my first impulse was to move the settler 1 space SE to get the cows and ensure some decent production with 4 hills in our city radius, I think ngraner has a good idea in settling on the plains hill. 2 cities instead of 1 to maximize all that flood plain territory is smart. I have this bad habit of founding "supercities" that are badly spaced so I end up with fewer cities because I try to nab all the resources into one city instead of dividing them into 2 or 3.

Never played a succession game, but like KabukiJo, I read lots of them online at work (real estate market is a little slow these days :cry: )

Hi teammates :)

This is also my first try at a succession game. I've been practicing with Egypt and Monarch, as I am not in my comfort zone with either of those settings.

My vote is always for domination over diplomacy, in my opinion, uu doesn't really matter, we can pull of a domination victory using the standard units everyone can get.

I think the capitol should be founded on the two hammer hill sw of where the settler is standing, the extra defense will be important, and an extra hammer is always nice for early production.

I agree that war will be expensive, and suggest we settle about 5 cities with loads of cottage spamming, and take the rest from our closest neighbors.

I also think we should aim for a cs slingshot, early macemen will be essential.

I amalso in the US, Ohio eastern standard time, although time is very relative to me, I'm aslikely to be up at 3 am as I am at 4 pm....I work at home, and play civ - all the time.

I'm looking forward to this a great deal.

Since I have only played very limited on Monarch level, I played three test games to see what it was like. I only played until about 2000 BC in each game. I ran a Fractal map (we have no idea what is out there), Monarch, standard size, with one of the opponents Huayna. I regenerated the map until I started all three attempts on several floodplains (like we have in the opening screenshot).

Here is what I found out:

1. I went straight for Hinduism each time and got it. (I got it in 3160 BC, 3190 BC, and 3250 BC.) I don't know if that is a fluke with random opponents or what. Who knows what Gyathaar (sp?) made for us map/opponent-wise :confused: . This might be a way to go if we are going diplomatic (or just want a religion). However, we will be sacrificing worker techs, Bronze Working, Animal Husb., etc. to get a religion and will most likely slow or start. Is it worth it?

2. Barbarians show up a lot sooner than I am used to on Prince. In another game I beelined to BW. By the time I found where copper was barbarian warriors were running around. By the time I was able to chop a settler and send him on his way, barb archers were wondering about. We will have to keep an eye on that.

3. Unhealthyness hits you rather quick. My starts had anywhere from 2-5 floodplains around them and the "green-faces" were taking food quicklike.


I would advise splitting up that great expanse of cottage land err... I mean floodplains... into 2 if not 3 city sites. I like the idea of settling SW onto that plains hill for the extra hammers in the early game. If we settled our second (or whatever) city on the desert hill E of the warrior we could make a great GP city. We would have fresh water (to combat unhealthyness), coast access, food galore with six uncontested floodplains and three shared fp's (that is, if we settle on the plains hill).

I would favor a diplomatic victory at this level of play. If we cozy up to the right civ's and head towards MM for the UN, I think we can pull it off. Maybe wait on a religion until we find out who founds which and which spread to us. We can then make religious friends that might help us with Huayna if he becomes a problem.

Geez, that was a lot. Hopefully you guys caught it all.

Tech wise, I would suggest the following pattern:

Mysticism
Polytheism
Pottery
Animal Husbandry
Priesthood <build oracle as soon as first settler is on it's way>
mining
bronze working
writing
math
COL <from oracle>

After that, following the lowest number theory
Civil Service
Metal Casting
*<iron working if needed>
Machinery
Monarchy
Fuedalism
Guilds
Gunpowder
Chemistry

* They describe this map as mystery. I'm not sure what that means, but I have found on fractile maps, copper is few and far between, but iron seems to be abundant, so we may have to study iron working to get metal, or we may discover lots of jungle under our black...

anyway, those are my thoughts on the tech tree, but I am very open to suggestion...and always willing to learn better ways.

We also need to work out the order of play and how many turns we are each taking as by my time difference reckoning we can start in about a day!

Once this is established we can argue about ... I mean agree upon our opening gambit.

I assume that once someone has had their turn and posted an update, we give it a day or so to discuss the upcoming moves before the next person starts??

Sorry everybody:

I will not be able to play this round. I have been called out of town on business until May 18th. I will be happy to play in the next game.

Sorry about the hassle and good luck!

hey all, sorry for taking so long to check in but im here.

I think we should settle the plains hill because all of the flood plains which everyone else has already pointed out.

I assume that once someone has had their turn and posted an update, we give it a day or so to discuss the upcoming moves before the next person starts??

I would agree with this.

Is everyone going to be able to check this thread at least once a day?

I will be able to. When are we going to decide the who goes first?

For who goes first. I had suggested we go with whoever picks up the save first and continue this way until everyone has played a turn. Then we can keep that order. Ok?

I do like the plan of discussing major decisions before they are made, such as where to put new cities, civics, techs. I am ok with letting ordinary decisions be made by the up player, such as build orders, worker actions. Of course we can bring these topics up for discussion also, I just would not be annoyed if the next player went ahead on minor issues without guidance.

I have a friend of mine (Terminator3k) who would like to replace kanderso. He is a Prince level player, who I have played succession games with.

I have it. Lets rock and roll.

I also have fired up a test game and have played it through (my first game on Monarch and a win). A couple of thoughts (mainly just echoing what KabukiJo said).

1. Barbarians and animals are killers early. I lost two scouts and two warriors to animals and there was a barbarian warrior about by the time I had my first settler out. I think we will need archer convoys for the settlers as it would suck majorly to lose a settler.

2. I thought originally that domination would be the way to go in this game but I just couldn't sustain my empire financially to expand quickly enough early (which is the key to domination). Once I realised this I switched tactics to Diplomatic and had a win about 1650AD. So I now think Diplomatic is the way to go.

3. I was unable to found any early religion (although could have founded Taoism and Islam but was already in bed with 4 other civs with Judaism - which allowed the victory). We may be able to get Hinduism or Judaism early but would be at the expense of archery, pottery and bronze working, which I think are going to be more helpful early.

4. I was only able to build one of the early wonders (Great Library as I was first to Literature) due to backwards techs. I don't think we should plan any strategy that depends upon building a wonder (that's not the same as not trying to build any as the extra cash is always handy)

Tech wise then I think something along these lines...

Hunting
Pottery (in time for first worker, switch with hunting if not in time)
Archery (to allow an escort for first settler)
Mining
Bronze Working

and a build queue along these lines

worker
worker/warrior
archer
settler

A little slower than usual perhaps but better safe than sorry!!

4000BC Settler moves SW; Warrior discovers fish for our likely second city site.

3970BC Thebes founded, begins Warrior. We have access to Stone, Cow and Rice. Potter research began.

Warrior kills barbarian wolf.

3670BC Warrior completed, Worker began.

3580BC Pottery finished, Mining began.

3520BC Catherine of the Russians met from the SW.

3400BC Warrior kills barbarian lion.

126426

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Chokonuts_SG001_BC3400_01.Civ4SavedGame

With the discovery of stone we may want to consider going for the Pyramids. The great engineer points would be nice as well as Representation combined with our flood plain cottages. This would be a good idea on Prince. I don't know for Monarch.

Another thought, though this may not be terribly exiting. We ha a nice isolated sub-contingent with good food. We could found up to 9 cities and go for a cultural victory. If we want to go this route, we better find religion asap.

I am going out of town until either Saturday night or Sunday and will be out of contact until then.

Have we decided what the play order is going to be?

[QUOTE=ngraner42]

Another thought, though this may not be terribly exiting. We ha a nice isolated sub-contingent with good food. We could found up to 9 cities and go for a cultural victory. If we want to go this route, we better find religion asap.
QUOTE]

I was under the impression that the parameters of this game were to win by either diplomacy or domination, while preventing the other win types from being accomplished by the AI's.

I think we need to pick a play order so everybody is clear when it is their turn.

I think the idea was for the first go around that whoever is able to grabs the save, posts their strategy for discussion on the board, gets some feedback and has their go. We'll then stick to the same order for subsequent turns.

I'll be able to play my turn tomorrow night if no-one else has grabbed the gauntlet.

grab it from where exactly, I noticed a save and screen shot was posted to this thread, but I seem to recall mention of some special place for uploading the saves???

grab it from where exactly, I noticed a save and screen shot was posted to this thread, but I seem to recall mention of some special place for uploading the saves???
Take a look at:

(a) the first post in your thread ... yes, this thread

(b) the first post in the SGOTM 01 Maintenance thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=170295)

(c) the post (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=4035305&postcount=27) in the Maintenance thread where I announced that the saves were available.

(d) my signature, which contains links to C-IV SGOTM 1 Submissions (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm.php) and C-IV SGOTM Progress and Results (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm_submission_list.php)

(e) if you really don't want to read my scrawls, go to the GOTM web site ( http://gotm.civfanatics.net), where you'll find two links on the right hand side:

Submit C-IV SGOTM (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm.php)
C-IV SGOTM Results (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm_submission_list.php)

Guys, I really try to provide you with all the information you need :cry: Please tell me where I *should* post the links you need to play this game?

Well I feel sufficiently scolded ;)

OK. I've got the save file to have a go! I'm planning to research hunting/archery/animal husbandry in some order and work towards our first settler.

Any divurgent thoughts?

I'll post up a walkthrough tonight (my time).

3400BC - We start
3310BC - Warrior killed by Lion
3280BC - Mining discovered, Hunting began
3190BC - Worker completed, Warrior started.
3070BC - Other warrior killed by same bloody lion.
3040BC - Hunting discovered, Archery began.
3010BC - Hiduism discovered in a distant land
3010BC - Buddhism discovered in a distant land (Huayana Capac)
2950BC - First cottage built
2920BC - Thebes grows to population 3
2890BC - Warrior completed, settler started.
2800BC - Archery discovered, Animal Husbandry began.

So there you go. Whoever is going next watch out for lions!!!!!!

Only exposed a couple more squares, so won't upload a map.

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Chokonuts_SG001_BC2800_01.Civ4SavedGame

Just to show how unlucky I was with that lion here's the paste from the game log for each encounter:

Turn 22, 3340 BC: Barbarian's Lion (2.00) vs Chokonuts's Warrior (2.40)
Turn 22, 3340 BC: Combat Odds: 27.0%

Turn 30, 3100 BC: Barbarian's Lion (1.72) vs Chokonuts's Warrior (2.40)
Turn 30, 3100 BC: Combat Odds: 12.0%

Oh well, c'est la vie!

ok, well, since I happened to be sitting here bored before work, I went ahead and grabbed the save...maybe I can survive a lion.

ok, nevermind, someone else better go. I downloaded the file, but my game doesn't see it, even after I fixed the extension.

Civ4 is case senitive, I believe, so if you re-type the extension you must ensure that it is .Civ4SavedGame with exactly that capitalisation.

[QUOTE=ngraner42]

Another thought, though this may not be terribly exiting. We ha a nice isolated sub-contingent with good food. We could found up to 9 cities and go for a cultural victory. If we want to go this route, we better find religion asap.
QUOTE]

I was under the impression that the parameters of this game were to win by either diplomacy or domination, while preventing the other win types from being accomplished by the AI's.

You are right.

A pointer for whoever is lion taming next. I've got our worker farming the rice at the moment. They should finish in a couple of turns, at which point we'll need to use this tile (I don't know if the game switches automatically but I always open up the city view and manually place my working tiles) to speed up the settler.

Also, as a group, where are we going to go research wise from here. I think after Animal Husbandry (which we're on now), Bronze Working and Masonry are the definate (IMHO anyway) next two to hit but then we hit a choice. Do we go for a religion (already having to research Masonry opens up Judaism with Mysticism and Polytheism) or do we head for Sailing for the second city likely being on the coast or do we beeline straight for Alphabet/Currency and pick everything else up afterwards?

And where shall we place the second city? For mine, directly east of the fish and west of the cows is a prime spot but we could head southeast to block of the landbridge that obviously seperates us from the Ruskies!

I like the idea of going for the choke point to the SE. Here is a suggested dot map, with the orange cities coming next. The site to the north might be best for city 3, with 3 special resources.


http://img360.imageshack.us/img360/4701/chokonuts2800bc8ni.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

I'm a bit uncomfortable with sending our first settler so far away(choke point), and would vote for fish/cow site as second city, because of the two cows.

Additionally I think that a city on the desert hill to the NE would be a good point for early cottage spamming.

Research wise I think: Bronze Working, Masonry, Sailing, Alphabet/Currency, Religion. Early sailing because we will get many coastal cities, and then pick up one of the later religions like Confucianism.

Btw. where is that lion located? and have you found any friendly villages?

The lion is around where the cows are on the choke point. Possibly another reason for not putting the first settler there. The second settler might make more sense here as we should have an archer or two for protection.

I didn't find any huts, don't know about ngraner42

Just a few quick thoughts while I am at work.

Victory: If we are going for diplomatic then we will be wanting a lot of cities (more population for more votes). We might want to ride the edge of economic collapse (30-50% research) in maintenance costs so we can grab as much land as we can defend. We will want to research techs that give us markets, libraries, etc to make those cities viable. We will also want to meet as many civs as we can so we can trade with them.
If we are going for domination then we need to establish 4-5 cities and start our first war (Russia? maybe. I haven't been able to check out the saves yet.) We will also need to research towards some good units.
I would still advocate going for diplomatic even though we didn't grab an early religion.

City placement: I like ngraner's dotmap. However, I would suggest placing the eastern orange dot one tile to the north to put it on fresh water. That city will need the health as it has tons of floodplains around it. This would also open up a better city site to the south (one tile north of the mountain).

Lobbying for the choke point. If we grab that location we pretty much lock up our end of the continent, with the option of keeping closed borders until we have our main cities established. The other thing is if we don't go there Peter may, pretty much requiring early war with Peter to expand.

We should try to get a unit exploring to the south to see what we are up against.

I agree with KabukiJo's dot map adjustment.

Lobbying for the choke point. If we grab that location we pretty much lock up our end of the continent, with the option of keeping closed borders until we have our main cities established. The other thing is if we don't go there Peter may, pretty much requiring early war with Peter to expand.

We should try to get a unit exploring to the south to see what we are up against.

I have mixed feelings about the chokepoint. On Prince level I would go for it knowing that I could defend the travel there against barbs and against Peter if I did settle it. On Monarch... I don't know.

I agree with ngraner about exploring more. If Peter is far away I would go for settling the chokepoint. However, if he is near and has nowhere to expand then that is just asking for war. Lets get a unit down there exploring before we commit to sending a settler down there. I wouldn't mind plunking down a city by the capital first (probably the northern orange dot as it has two cows and a fish if I remember correctly) as that city could provide us with some military to deal with any barbs that are sure to start arriving soon.

Also, I find it VERY helpful to settle my first or second city next to copper. We are going to need metal's of some kind to deal with barb axemen (and Peter too, if he gets restless).

Agree that copper should play a role in either our first or second settler. Also agree we need to explore more.

As for going for the Diplomacy win. It is not entirely necessary to have huge numbers of cities unless you are going to kick some heads along the way. Another tactic is to science rush to Mass Media, have a GE and build the UN, while making sure that we are nice to everyone else other than Huayana. You need to know who you'll be running against (ie who has the highest pop) and smooch up to everyone else (pick a suitable religion, +4 for trading science techs for military techs, resources etc). You can do this with 5-6 cities running at 80%-100% science. I don't think we can afford to be behind on technology as Huayana is coming and if he has out teched us, we're in trouble.

KabukiJo, do you want to go ahead and take the save.

KabukiJo, do you want to go ahead and take the save.

I will try to take it this evening when I get home from work. (Crappy evening shift.)

Got it. Will try to play tonight.

I played 10 turns. Will post later when I can write it up and upload pics.

Well, I played ten turns.

Inherited turn: We are building a settler with only one warrior in our kingdom. I decide to build another warrior and let Thebes grow to size 3 before kicking out a settler. I send the warrior SW towards the choke point. I also change research towards bronze working to see if we have any copper.

The turns went pretty uneventfully.

Between turns 6 and 7 an orange border pops up south of my warrior. St. Petersburg was founded on one of the hills in the isthmus :mad: Arrggghhh!!

The warrior survived an attack from the lion (thank goodness animals don't get promotions) and moved north to bust some fog.

The worker finished the rice farm and is currently building a road back to the capital. He can't work on the cows as we don't have AH yet. I propose him building some mines in the next turns.

I put one turn of production into an archer to allow Thebes to grow to 3. It is now working on a settler. The settler will still have 8 turns left after we discover BW.

Here are a couple of screeny dotmaps. I propose we settle the red ones first to get as much land as we can towards Catherine.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Dotmap_%231.JPG

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Dotmap_%232.JPG

#1, 2, and 3 cities could be production, commerce, or a hybrid of the two
#'s 4 and 5 will make excellent commerce cities
and #6 will make a pretty good production city (farm the FP's to allow city to work the 4 foodless hills for mucho hammers)

What do you think?

BTW. I have a sneaking suspicion that Huayna is to our East past that range of mountains.

The Russians are a lot closer than I thought they would be. That is my reason for wanting to settle the two red sites before the more lucrative sites.

Edit: Dangit, can anyone see the pics? I can't get the upload to work. (These are the first pics I have ever uploaded.)
Edit2: Got them up.

Nope. Can't see the pictures. Never uploaded any before so can't help you!

I would have the worker building cottages rather than mines at this stage. Max Thebes with commerce and second city with production.

I would have the worker building cottages rather than mines at this stage. Max Thebes with commerce and second city with production.

Yeah, that is an option too. I was worried about hitting our happy limit though. Since we are getting Slavery soon I suppose we could :whipped: some population :D

I will try to figure out the picture problem tonight before I go to bed.

What time is it over there Ozbenno?

With Catherines sudden approach, I agree with KabukiJos city placing strategy for the two first cities. I also agree with the placing of the rest.

What I suggest is to start with production in Thebes, so we can speed up our build of settlers. Then I would suggest building the eastern cities as 3 and 4, and use these for commerce, until we have built what we need from Thebes.
City 5 would be the one to the north, and 6 would be the one to the south.

The reason for this is that of the possible cities, Thebes has the biggest potential for production. (This could change with dicovery of bronze)

I would also suggest to speed up the settler production by cutting one or two of the grassland/forests.

About what long term strategi to use: I will suggest an early war against Catherine, to gain more land, and avoid that she makes friends with other of our opponents. For this we need bronze.
If we do not have any bronze I think we should go for Diplomatic, with the 7 cities plotted above.
If we get bronze, I think we should wait with deciding between Domination and Diplomatic, until Catherine is gone.

That's my current thoughts, I'd better get back to work :-)

If we do get bronze, I agree with McArine. Bye bye Ruskies.

Its currently 8pm Tuesday over here!!! Its something like 15-18 hours ahead of the States (depending on the coast) but I could be wrong.

If we don't have any copper should we research IW to see if we have any iron? Catherine is a headcase and if she comes at us with axemen and swordsmen its gonna hurt. We would have to put production into a lot of archers instead of a few defensive axemen and infrastructure.

I do like it that we can block her off at a decent chokepoint though.

Some other ideas. We might want to get a galley out sometime soon to see who else is out there (and maybe aquire a religion).
We have some really good land and I hope we can make a competitive game out if it.

So far the order has been:

ngraner42
Ozbenno
KabukiJo (Just played)

That leaves McArine, merandaBlue, mrwhite89, UNCpenguin, and Terminator3K left to pick it up.

Allright, I'll take the save and play some turns.

Here's the events up to the year 2200 BC:

2530 BC: Starting
2500 BC: Worker finished road, we now have rice in Thebes.
2470 BC: Catherine is the secondmost powerful, we are seventh and last, Huayana Capac is fourth. Brought to you by Gibbon. Worker moved began cottage.
2440 BC: Barbarians spotted to the NE.
2410 BC: -
2380 BC: -
2350 BC: -
2320 BC: Bronze Working discovered, Animal Husbandry begun. Changed to slavery. D*, no bronze for us, but Catherine has in St. Petersburg.
2290 BC: -
2260 BC: Worker finished cottage.
2230 BC: Worker begun another cottage.
2200 BC: 4 turns to settler, 6 turns to AH, 7 turns to next cottage. The barbarian stayed away from the city!?

The save is Here. (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Chokonuts_SG001_BC2200_01.Civ4SavedGame)

http://img528.imageshack.us/img528/7493/civ4screenshot0000a0rg.th.jpg (http://img528.imageshack.us/my.php?image=civ4screenshot0000a0rg.jpg)

i can get it later today, but if someone else can get to it quicker go for it.

What does everyone think of settling down there and taking it by cultural force. We could settle to get the clams and the bronze.

I think it is a good idea, because we need more than 7 cities.

I feel this is heading for Domination...

so before anything crazy happens...The only known copper is by st petes. should we settle 1 north of it to steal it or rather go with the dotmap and hope for iron?

Its kinda risky to settle that close to anyone, much less Catherine. If we settle one tile north of the Copper then we need to be ready for an early war with her as she is a known psycho-bunny.

If we do go to an early war we need to make sure that we don't kill our economy. (Settle 4 cities and attack?)

Edit: If this were my own game (on Prince) I would stick with the dotmap and go for Iron. Or, I would see if I had horses and take out St. Pete with a big stack of War Chariots (don't underestimate their power in numbers). That way we could control the copper BEHIND our city and control the isthmus better.

0 2200
look around - MM Thebes for more research w/o affecting the time on the settler.
1 2170
hauyna now has slavery

4 2080
settler finished -> archer


6 2020
animal husbandry in -> IW, we need metals!!! May have to move the settling of a northern city up the list of priorities because of the horses to the north
Memphis ->Granary, founded at site 1 have to cut science to 90 now at +2gpt with 0 in the bank.
7 1990
start pasturizing the cows near thebes.

9 1930
judaism founded somewhere

I wasnt sure if we wanted to go for iron next, because we could go for masonry to mine the stone or fishing so memphis can work the water tiles. Right now Thebes is working mainly production with a +2 surplus but it is going to take a while to get to iron working.


http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Chokonuts_SG001_BC1900_01.Civ4SavedGame

That a real issue, not having the bronze. UNCPenguin, I think you did the right thing, heading for Iron Working as we need to know where we stand for our military. An early axeman rush would have seen off Catherine. I've never really used war chariots but they may be all right in a stack. Even if we grab St Petersburg and just hold on, rather than head for wherever Moscow is.

Which also brings up another issue. We can't explore (except with maybe a work boat) unless we research Writing for Open Borders with Catherine. I also suspect that Huayana is hiding behind those mountains (remember its a man made map).

Good turn Penguin.

I thought you made good decisions.

ngraner42
Ozbenno
KabukiJo
McArine
UNCpenguin (just played) (skip from the 22nd to the 29th)

merandaBlue, mrwhite89, and Terminator3K. "first come first served," ehhh?

With a unit up north and one near the sugar we could pretty much eliminate barbarian activity. Especially with a northern city there would be little fog of war left.

Getting that rich northern city and the horses online seems like the next priority (along with getting a few more archers).

Early war with Catherine seems a must, so that we can expand. Iron would help, but a stack of war chariots will work.

Without being in a position to load up the save at the moment to see how many turns until Iron Working and how many turns until we could spit out another settler, if these could be roughly the same time we could see whether we have iron.

If we do, we have the settler to grab the iron start pumping out a few swordsmen and archers and off we go.

If we don't have iron (or if its already in the borders of the existing city), we can settle near the horses (again no idea where this is, hopefully within the areas we were already planning on), to have a mix of war chariots (for raiding/picking of isolated units) and swordsmen.

By the time we have an army ready we should (hopefully) be pretty entrenched in our little corner of the world (unfortunately so will Catherine).

This is one of the most enjoyable (frustrating?!?!) things about civilization as you play on the harder levels, always three more things on your to do list than you are ever able to do. It tests your juggling ability.

Just had a look at the save, settler could be done in <19, IW in <24 with MM of science, and horses are E-NE from dotmap(within city limits).

I agree with Ozbenno, manage to coordinate settler and IW to match, and place the settler on iron or secondary on the horses, and then use whatever we have, to take out Catherine.

I will be available to pick up the game on Friday night.

Here is a small pic of what we have.

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

Whether we have Iron or not, I think we should settle by the sugar next. We can prevent Cathy from getting more land and seal her off from that area. Then, if we have Iron somewhere we could settle there next and start a war.

I have a suspicion that the iron (if we have any) will be up in the tundra in a useless city area. If that's the case I would suggest settling the cow, horse, fish city (#2 in the above shot) next (after #1 is settled, so 4 total cities), build a bunch (10 or so) war chariots and taking out Catherine before she gets too many axemen.
On that note, maybe we should put together a preemptive strike force to prevent her from hooking up her copper. (I have noticed that if you station troops near unhooked resources, the AI will not send out escorted workers to hook them up.) So, unless she has more copper or Iron somewhere we should be safe until we can hook up some WC's and trash St. Pete.

Edit: Maybe change the Granary in Memphis for a Barracks. With cows to provide food, Memphis can work two plains hills for a lot of hammers.

Remember that this is a hand created map meaning there may not me any metal at all. We may have to use our UU to fight for metals, which would be costly but very doable. I guess we will see in 24 turns or so. We need to pump out another worker soon too, I was going to but thought we needed more defense first. I will be away from the 22-29th so if I come up again just skip me but I will be back 2 mondays from now.

If we are going to war anyway, wouldn't it be better to go for the better location (site #2) first.

If we are going to war anyway, wouldn't it be better to go for the better location (site #2) first.

True. However, then we would have a bigger front to deal with if Catherine settles by the sugar.

That might be a better idea that ngraner has. What does the team think? Should we settle #2 (above) and another city (maybe to the NE or E) so we can cottage some FP's and get some money for the war machine?

I would say it depends on iron. If we get iron in one of the citys we have planned that one should be first.

If we do not get iron, I would vote for site #2 as next city.

After that, I would take the sugar site (because of defensive value), and thirdly a cottage site. So we would depend on Thebes providing the money until then.

I agree with McArine on placement on city. We're not going to knock over Catherine without swordsman or war chariots, we need these asap.

We also probably need another worker (as UNCpenguin said). Maybe after Memphis has grown to size 2, switch to worker. Then back to granary until it grows to size 3 and switch again for settler??

Hi everyone. I am getting caught up via reading the threads and talking with NGraner (I work with him here in Indy). I am grabbing the game now and promise not to do anything rash.

1900 BC - Terminator3k takes Game - Moved Thebes Warrior out to hills just NE of horses to remove significant northern fog of war.

1870 BC - Archer build in Thebes. Another archer underway.

1840 BC - Cow pature for Thebes completed. Moving worker for Mephis cow pasture.

1780 BC - Warrior moving to north ran into Barbarian. Moving to hill to NE for defense.

1750 BC - Despite hill defense Barbarian warrior kills our warrior. Nothing like a bad die roll.

1720 BC - Worker arrives at Mephis cows and begins pasture. New archer produced in Thebes with another archer underway.

1690 BC - Mephis hits size 2, Settler underway.

1600 BC - Archer moved onto hill next to horse. Barbarian warrior still hurt at 1.4 of 2.0 health.

Next archer built in Thebes. I will leave it to the next person to move him where he needs. Next production for Thebes is currently scheduled for another archer. However, this can be changed to something else as needed.

1570 BC - Mrwhite89 takes game. Injured barbarian warrior kamikazees vs. archer in North.

1540 BC - Worker completes pasture, begins road. Begin moving one archer from Thebes over to Memphis for protection (should have done this on the 1st turn :mad: )

1510 BC - Archer in North healed. Begin scouting further North.

1480 BC - Scouting archer discovers silver in far North :D

1450 BC - Archer finished in Thebes. Begin worker. Active worker continues road to link Memphis and Thebes & also get a road on the hill with stone.

1420 BC - Archer reaches Memphis & fortifies. Scouting archer completes exploration of North; unfortunately no fish/crabs/clams in ocean tiles next to silver.

1390 BC - Begin moving scout archer back to hill tile north of horses. Will keep him there to prevent barbarian city to form in that area.

1360 BC - 1330 BC - Worker contnues building road.

1300 BC - Entered Classical period. Discover Iron Working :D . Begin on Masonry so we can get that quarry up and running. Iron discovered in South between Thebes and Memphis :banana: :banana: :banana: !!! Guess we know where to build city #3!!!

I'm curious if we should chop-rush the settler in Memphis or just be patient. Just don't want Catherine dropping a city and getting that iron from under our noses. Hope you guys were okay with my moves.

I took 2 screenshots of my last turn, but I don't know how to upload them to the message board. If someone would tell me how, I'll post them as soon as I get home from work.

I think we should sacrifice a forest to get a settler faster.

About pictures, if you choose the button "go advanced", you will get different options for attaching files and adding images, below the edit box.
I uploaded my image to ImageShack, and they supplies sourcecode to be pasted into the message you are creating. You should use one of the "Thumbnail for forums" codes.

Now lets get that warfactory going and crush Catherine:hammer:

Merandablue is up.

Lets take St Petersburg out.

Here are the screenshots from the end of my turn:

http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/3163/civ4screenshot00020rj.th.jpg (http://img525.imageshack.us/my.php?image=civ4screenshot00020rj.jpg)

http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/1733/civ4screenshot00036kz.th.jpg (http://img525.imageshack.us/my.php?image=civ4screenshot00036kz.jpg)

Things are looking good.

Another one or two cities then attack?

I would agree with McArine about chopping a forest for the settler out of Memphis. Question is, can the worker get to a forest tile and chop it quick enough for it to be worth it?

I am concerned about Catherine having the Copper hooked up. It may be her only source of Copper, and we can easily take it out. Of course we will need to be prepared for a counter attack.

I'm about 2 turns behind on my reading, as this is my weekend to work, but I'll grab the save when I get home tonight, and catch up on where we are...I'll try to play my turn tomorrow.

meranda Blue

What do you know, I fund an hour to kill.....

here is the summery of my turns, I didn't take any screen shots, cause the view hasn't really changed.

1300 BC picked up save had a good look around. I see space for 3 or 4 more productive cities, but agree that city #3 needs to be for ireon and St. Pete's needs to go!

1270 BC Click Click

1240 BC Worker finished road to stone, moved to grassland for cottage, as chopping for settler would not help do to time.

2nd worker completed, sent him w/archer to road to the site for city 3 and over the iron. Began making barracks for upgraded troops.

1210 BC Click

1180 BC click

1150 BC click

1120 BC unhappy people in Thebes, whipped barracks, costing 2 population, built archer

1090 BC Masonry completed, study fishing so as to be able to work water squares for gold if need be, besides, it was the lowest number.

1060 BC Oracle built elsewhere, settler completed and sent on way, cottage done, moved worker back to stone.

Seperated archer from worker and moved archer to site for city 3. Put pyramid in front of granery in Memphis.

1030 BC worker 1 building quarry, worker 2 road on iron, archer 4 done given city defense upgrade and sent to Memphis, as most likely attack site from Cathy. Building archer in Thebes.

1000 BC settler arrived under archer, city on next turn.

The assault on StPetersburg begins. Russia will be denied Copper. Soon Swordsman will take the city.

1000BC Move archers toward StPetersburg.

985BC Warrior moves on to Copper and declares WAR! on Catherine. Heliopolis founded and begins work on Archer. Memphis switched to Archer.

970BC Fishing finishes, Writing began. Copper pillaged. Archers move onto Copper.

955BC Move Archers and Warrior onto Cow.

940BC Warrior pillages Cow. Archers fortify.

925BC Heliopolis conected to capital.

910BC Worker begins road to Copper from Memphis.

895BC Archer completed in Thebes, promoted to Drill 1, Setler began.

880BC Archer pillages mine. Quarry completed, worker goes to finish road to Thebes.

865BC Pyramids completed in foreign lands, we get 18gp. Heliopolis expands.

850BC Iron mine began. Archer created in Memphis, Archer began.

Ozbenno (up)
KabukiJo (on deck)
McArine
UNCPenguin
Terminator3k
MrWhite
MerandaBlue
ngraner42

I'm grabbing the save now. Will play tonight but may not be able to post results for a couple of days.

Seems like things are going swimmingly, long may it continue.

850BC - Have a quick look around. All seems to be in order here. As you were...
835BC - Discover Writing, move onto Mathematics
820BC - ...
805BC - Heliopolis creates Archer, onto Granary
790BC - Iron mine built, Heliopolis switches production to Swordsman, Thebes switches production to Swordsman (figure we need this more than another settler)
775BC - Archer camped outside St Petersburg killed by Catherine's archer (her odds 30%). Ozbenno has flashbacks to lions and moves stack back to hills.
760BC - ...
745BC - In a curious move, Catherine moves two archers to the copper square (one at 3 health with Combat II and the injured one (2.3) with Combat I):confused: . Seeing an opportunity we sacrifice the warrior to injure the first archer and then attack. Used the Drill I archer to kill her Combat II archer (odd 57.6%) and then one other to kill the Combat I archer (odds 85.5%). So we lose one warrior and one archer for Catherine's loses of two archers. More importantly, she now only has two archers in St Petersburg. In others stories making news in 745BC, Memphis finishes archer and starts on Swordsman.
730BC - Both victorious archers gain a promotion. I went for Drill II and Combat I. Move all archers back to the hills, hoping Catherine tries that one again.
715BC - ...
700BC - Let the massacre of St Petersburg begin. Thebes produces Swordsman, back onto Settler.

All yours KabukiJo.

A couple of points on the current state of the game in terms of where do we go from here.

1) We have one swordsman built, another ready in 3 turns and 4 archers sitting outside St Petersburg. Catherine has 2 archers (one with Garrison II). Should be fairly easy, probably losing 1 archer and 1 swordsman. So..... Do we just hang on to St Petersburg and sue for peace, picking up the copper or do we go all out for attack on Mother Russia? Personally I think lets keep going.

2) We're currently researching Mathematics, as we have no religion so not worth going for Mysticism, we have no one to trade with so not worth going for Alphabet. The only other one I thought about was Sailing, because sooner or later we need to look beyong those mountains (although we could build a workboat and do this). Mathematics will lead us into Currency and Construction, both of which we will need and we get value for trees if we chop.

3) Thebes is currently unhappy at population 6 (was happy at 5). Do we pop rush the settler once it costs us one population to do so? Memphis is unhappy at size 4 so I've sent an archer back to garrison, so should be right.

I agree with Ozbenno, lets take out Russia.

I think we should go for Sailing first, because we will need it (if we go for domination). Then Currency and Code of Laws. Construction could be sooner if we find elephants south of St. Petersburg. Going for Optics could be necessary if the island is isolated?(if it is an island).

Preturn:
- We should whip or stagnate before any cities become unhappy. I whip Thebes settler. Make sure to not whip only one citizen if #:mad: = #:) as that means the city will be angry for the next 15 turns. Whip two citizens for the 60+ hammers if you can.
- I know the cottage on the grass was close to where the road was being built but we won't use it for a long time as we have river plots to use for cottages. This was a waste of worker turns (my opinion, no harshness meant :rolleyes: )
- We are running 90% research. From my experience this means we are not building/capturing enough cities. (Another reason for whipping the settler in Thebes.) In the short term it hurts us in research but long term gains from productive/commerce cities outweighs the initial loss.
- I am curious as to why Heliopolis was founded there. While it gains more hills and gets a two hammer city plot (compared to the original dotmap), it shares three tiles with St. Pete (which will soon be ours :D ) and loses out on 4 flatland tiles by Thebes.

Hit enter:
Turn 1:
- Moved two archers onto copper plot to deny Russia some shields. (if she builds walls there...)
- Heliopolis worker finishes cottage and starts a road towards St. Pete. (for troop movement and reinforcement)
- Settler starts trek northwards towards Cows and fish site.
- Stagnate Memphis (archer quelled rebellion) as it is at its happiness limit.
- Slow Thebes growth (move plot to stone hill for hammers) because of whip unhappyness
- Move archers back to hill as another archer reinforces St. Pete (3 total, 2 with CGI)

IBT: Archer moves out of St. Pete (out of vision anyway)

Turn 2:
- Move two archers back to Copper plot
- Elephantine founded. Starts on Workboat for fish. Ele will make a GREAT whipping site as it has three food sources. Ele will be a powerhouse down the road.
- Move Archer onto hill closer to Ele as it would suck to have a barb axeman appear out of the fog close to Ele.
- Research set to 80%

Turn 3:
- Send an conscript archer to Helio for some protection.
- Helio Sword -> Sword
- Thebes Sword -> Sword

Turn 4:
- Move troops towards front
- Worker starts pasture at Ele

Turn 5:
- More troop movement

Turn 6:
- Memphis Sword -> Sword

IBT:
- Moses born in distant land

Turn 7:
- Still more troop movement

Turn 8: nothing

Turn 9:
- Thebes Sword -> Sword
- Worker completes road to front and starts mine at Memphis

Turn 10:
- Three archers back in St. Pete
- Ele's border pops
- Finish pasture at Ele, start another

Post turn comments:
- Thebes will revolt in 4 turns but will be fine one turn later (whip will wear off). I suggest letting sword finish then starting settler for clam site down south. Whip could be deployed, your choice.
- Granary could be whipped in Memphis (it is stagnate now due to happyness limit). With a granary and cows it will grow back quickly. Make sure to whip for 2 pop if you do whip.
- We need another worker. Maybe start one in Helio?...although, Helio needs to grow.
- Once Helio completes its sword we will have six swords (3 with 4 exp. points) and 3 archers to attack St. Pete. I didn't attack as I have had bad experience attacking against archers on hills. They will be especially hard as St. Pete has 40% cultural defense. (A City Raider I sword has an 18% chance against one of her entrenched archers.) With three archers in St. Pete, she might attack with one of them. Maybe use an archer as bait to lure her out. I would rather lose an archer on the flat and only have to face two archers in the city.)
- I suggest going for Construction next as we will need catapults if we are going to continue this war. Maybe take St. Pete, sue for peace, build up cats and swords and whack her other cities.

All above comments are not meant to criticize in any way. They are just thoughts gained from my Civ4 experience. Maybe I will learn new things if other ideas are tried.

Lets kick some Russian tail.

Preturn:
- We should whip or stagnate before any cities become unhappy. I whip Thebes settler. Make sure to not whip only one citizen if #:mad: = #:) as that means the city will be angry for the next 15 turns. Whip two citizens for the 60+ hammers if you can.
- I know the cottage on the grass was close to where the road was being built but we won't use it for a long time as we have river plots to use for cottages. This was a waste of worker turns (my opinion, no harshness meant :rolleyes: )
- We are running 90% research. From my experience this means we are not building/capturing enough cities. (Another reason for whipping the settler in Thebes.) In the short term it hurts us in research but long term gains from productive/commerce cities outweighs the initial loss.
- I am curious as to why Heliopolis was founded there. While it gains more hills and gets a two hammer city plot (compared to the original dotmap), it shares three tiles with St. Pete (which will soon be ours :D ) and loses out on 4 flatland tiles by Thebes.

Hit enter:
Turn 1:
- Moved two archers onto copper plot to deny Russia some shields. (if she builds walls there...)
- Heliopolis worker finishes cottage and starts a road towards St. Pete. (for troop movement and reinforcement)
- Settler starts trek northwards towards Cows and fish site.
- Stagnate Memphis (archer quelled rebellion) as it is at its happiness limit.
- Slow Thebes growth (move plot to stone hill for hammers) because of whip unhappyness
- Move archers back to hill as another archer reinforces St. Pete (3 total, 2 with CGI)

IBT: Archer moves out of St. Pete (out of vision anyway)

Turn 2:
- Move two archers back to Copper plot
- Elephantine founded. Starts on Workboat for fish. Ele will make a GREAT whipping site as it has three food sources. Ele will be a powerhouse down the road.
- Move Archer onto hill closer to Ele as it would suck to have a barb axeman appear out of the fog close to Ele.
- Research set to 80%

Turn 3:
- Send an conscript archer to Helio for some protection.
- Helio Sword -> Sword
- Thebes Sword -> Sword

Turn 4:
- Move troops towards front
- Worker starts pasture at Ele

Turn 5:
- More troop movement

Turn 6:
- Memphis Sword -> Sword

IBT:
- Moses born in distant land

Turn 7:
- Still more troop movement

Turn 8: nothing

Turn 9:
- Thebes Sword -> Sword
- Worker completes road to front and starts mine at Memphis

Turn 10:
- Three archers back in St. Pete
- Ele's border pops
- Finish pasture at Ele, start another

Post turn comments:
- Thebes will revolt in 4 turns but will be fine one turn later (whip will wear off). I suggest letting sword finish then starting settler for clam site down south. Whip could be deployed, your choice.
- Granary could be whipped in Memphis (it is stagnate now due to happyness limit). With a granary and cows it will grow back quickly. Make sure to whip for 2 pop if you do whip.
- We need another worker. Maybe start one in Helio?...although, Helio needs to grow.
- Once Helio completes its sword we will have six swords (3 with 4 exp. points) and 3 archers to attack St. Pete. I didn't attack as I have had bad experience attacking against archers on hills. They will be especially hard as St. Pete has 40% cultural defense. (A City Raider I sword has an 18% chance against one of her entrenched archers.) With three archers in St. Pete, she might attack with one of them. Maybe use an archer as bait to lure her out. I would rather lose an archer on the flat and only have to face two archers in the city.)
- I suggest going for Construction next as we will need catapults if we are going to continue this war. Maybe take St. Pete, sue for peace, build up cats and swords and whack her other cities.

All above comments are not meant to criticize in any way. They are just thoughts gained from my Civ4 experience. Maybe I will learn new things if other ideas are tried.

Lets kick some Russian tail.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/Dotmap_3.JPG

KabukiJo's analysis sounds good. The only thing I can add is the northern archer could be moved over to clear out some more of the fog.

Since construction will take a while, I think we have to bite the bullet and take StPete the hard way (w/o catapults). The city should give a return on that investment fairly quickly with all those gems and the copper.

Turn 0: 550 BC: Looking around, Whipped Memphis granary, and moved Northern archer into fog.

IBT: Catherine moved archer up beside our archer stack, now 2 Archer and 1 Axeman in St.P.

Turn 1: Started Axeman in Memphis, Moved archer and swordsman to hill to avoid Catherine grapping it.

IBT: Catherine attacks our archer with axeman and wins, moves archer to stack on axeman. Now 2 archer and 1 spearman in St.P.

Turn 2: Heli finishes Swordsman, began another one. Killed Catherines Archer and axeman, we now has one archer north of St.P.

IBT: Catherines Spearman attacks archer and wins. St.P. has 2 Archer, and injured Spearman.

Turn 3: We know Mathematics, Construction began. Memphis finishes Axeman, started a Swordsman. Promoted a swordsman to Combat I. Moved attack force next to St.P.

IBT: Christianity is founded in a distant land.

Turn 4: Attack on St.P. begun. We lost 2 Swordsmen, and gained 84G from capture and a worker. An archer and an axeman just south of St.P. Promoted swordsman in St.P. to Combat 1, and moved Archer to St.P. and Fortified. Catherine has acces to horses although not connected.

IBT: Catherines Archer and Axeman attacked St.P. Our arched saved the day, and defeated both.

Turn 5: Thebes finishes Swordsman, Settler started. Road started sw of Mem, Mine finished, moved worker to connect Ele. Promotions: Archer to CG 1, SwM to Combat 2, SwM to CA 1. Moved Axeman and Swordsman south of St.P. to explore and pillage.

Turn 6: Worker finished pasture moved to horses, began pasture.

IBT: Catherine offers Peace Treaty, she has 4 cities: Accepted, to get time to build Catapults.

Turn 7: Ele finishes Work Boat, started granary. Rebellion in St.P. stopped, started Granary. Units fortified next to border.

Turn 8: Moved worker towards gems. And created fishing boats.

Turn 9: Heli finished Swordsman, started barracks. Started mining Gems.

Turn 10: 400 BC: Fortified a Swordsman, Thebes can be whipped in this turn to finish settler.

Postturn: Next player should decide if settler should be whipped in Thebes, I think it should.
Result from first war: lost 2 archer and 2 swordsman, destroyed 4 archer, 2 axeman and 1 spearman and got St.Petersburg. I think that was quite good. Peace Treaty lasts for another 6 turns.
Memphis is whip-mad for another 4-5 turns. Memphis and Elephantine grows in population next turn.
What we can see, Catherine has two gems inside her border, with one connected. She has one horse unconnected and 3 still useless sugar. I think Moscow is south of the south easternmost mine.

Thoughts: With access to gems within 11 turns, I think we might want to consider placing the new city at one of the desert spots to start cottages, and then put the second city at the clam spot.
I also think that the next settler should be started ASAP whereever it will be possible to whip or forest-cut rush it.

Aarg, to wait for catapults or not to wait for catapults? I say build so we have 10 swordsmen take whatever we got, and go take out Moscow. And use the catapults for the next cities.

As a sidenote, I would like that more of us are active on the forum, reads all posts, makes comments and suggestions. And most importantly follows the directions that has been agreed upon on the forum.
I would like to win this, and I think the best way to do that, is if everybody voices their opinions, and argues why they think that a certain move is right or wrong.

KabukiJo's analysis sounds good. The only thing I can add is the northern archer could be moved over to clear out some more of the fog.

Since construction will take a while, I think we have to bite the bullet and take StPete the hard way (w/o catapults). The city should give a return on that investment fairly quickly with all those gems and the copper.

Yes, we should be able to take St. Petersburg with swords and archers. I was thinking we needed cat's to take out Moscow's defense and soften defenders.

I moved the northern archer closer to Ele because I didn't want a barb to appear to his Southeast and he wouldn't be able to retreat in time to protect Ele.

As a sidenote, I would like that more of us are active on the forum, reads all posts, makes comments and suggestions. And most importantly follows the directions that has been agreed upon on the forum.
I would like to win this, and I think the best way to do that, is if everybody voices their opinions, and argues why they think that a certain move is right or wrong.

I see lots of things suggested, and some discussed, but it's nearly impossible forme to tell what's been agreed upon or not, is it possible to have some kind of viote or something here so it's a little easier to tell what has or hasn't been agreed upon?

I would like to see more discussion as well.

Maybe have the person who just played the turn post some thoughts, intents, suggestions on where the game is headed, research, war, etc. The team can then comment on what they think/would do. Or have the next player pick up the save and post some comments, questions, etc.

Maybe wait twelve hours (?) for teammates to comment before the next person plays the turns.

is it possible to have some kind of viote or something here so it's a little easier to tell what has or hasn't been agreed upon?
We could just make our own voting system, where the starter can post some suggestions, people can join those with a new post, and/or add new suggestions:

City placing vote, in which order should we place the next three cities(locations according to dot-map by KabukiJo in post 50 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=4051330&postcount=50)):
Southern Desert, Clam, Northern Desert: McArine
Clam, Southern Desert, Northern Desert:

Then you should paste the vote text, the result, add your own vote, and/or add additions to the vote. You could even fix deadlines, and allow multiple votes. And to try it out we could just try the vote I've just made. And an (extreme)example for a vote post:

City placing vote, in which order should we place the next three cities(locations according to dot-map by KabukiJo in post 50 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=4051330&postcount=50)):
Southern Desert, Clam, Northern Desert: McArine, MyKindOfVoter
Clam, Southern Desert, Northern Desert: OtherOpinionVoter
2 south of silver, Northen Desert (moved 2 north), north of St.Petersburg: CrazyVoter
I know this could result in many posts, but AFAIK there are no limit to the number of posts.

Maybe have the person who just played the turn post some thoughts, intents, suggestions on where the game is headed, research, war, etc. The team can then comment on what they think/would do. Or have the next player pick up the save and post some comments, questions, etc.
Great Idea :goodjob:

Maybe wait twelve hours (?) for teammates to comment before the next person plays the turns.
I will suggest waiting 24 hours, because we are spread around the globe, and since we would like all to take part in dicussions/votes we will need time to reply to the reply of a reply :crazyeye:

I will suggest waiting 24 hours, because we are spread around the globe, and since we would like all to take part in dicussions/votes we will need time to reply to the reply of a reply :crazyeye:

24 hours sounds good to me.

City Placement ThoughtsThoughts: With access to gems within 11 turns, I think we might want to consider placing the new city at one of the desert spots to start cottages, and then put the second city at the clam spot.
I also think that the next settler should be started ASAP whereever it will be possible to whip or forest-cut rush it.
KabukiJo: Either way would work I suppose. I just thought with a workboat on the clam the city could grow and start making us money faster than the other sites. Unless happiness is hurting us really bad I would say holding off on the silver city as Russia's cities (once we "aquire" them:D ) are going to start killing our economy with maintenance.

On another note, I am wondering why we quit the war so quickly with Catherine. I believe there is another city to the SW of St. Pete that shouldn't have too much cultural defense. (And there is always pillaging which would net us money ((and maybe experience if done right)) and hurt Catherine.) BTW, we might want to consider razing cities that aren't optimally placed or aren't that great of a site (maintenance costs again). Vote?

I agree with McArine's idea of getting two settlers out, with both cottaging flood plains they can pay for themselves fairly quickly. Either Memphis or Thebes itself can do the second settler as they are pushing happiness limits.

It seems like we have a great balance between commerce sites in the east and production sites in the west. This will let us build high commerce cities to support the former Russian cities captured with armaments created in the high production cities. Thebes being in the center can perform either role as needed, by switching which tiles we are working.

Chop rushing a Barracks at Memphis may be a good idea, since the forest is not needed for health and we can get better units. I would either chop rush the Barracks in Heliopolis or switch to unit production.

The stopping of the war was a little quick. Our power graph is about equal to Peter's. As a general rule I assume that if I have an equal power graph, I have more than enough to beat the AI. By the way, what happened to our archer that was on a pillaging raid.

I normally lean toward quiet building up, but on Monarch the AI has strong advantages in research and building. We are also well situated to take the Russians out (close contact, defensible homeland, apparently key resource advantage). These factors lead me to conclude on aggressive warfare.

Another worker helping get the gems online would be good.

Stopping the war with Russia was done in a weak moment by our former monarch King McArine the second, because he wanted a quiet time to rearm for the next push against Russia, which could be in another 6-7 turns.

I agree with KabukiJo, that the AI doesn't pick the optimal spots for cities, so we might need to raze some of them.

I think that ngraner42s idea of chop rushing barracks in both Heliopolis and Memphis is a great idea. I would then put Heli on unit building, create a settler in Mem, whip it when possible, and then switch to unit building.

I think ngraner42s analysis of our commerce/production site is spot on.

Stopping the war with Russia was done in a weak moment by our former monarch King McArine the second, because he wanted a quiet time to rearm for the next push against Russia, which could be in another 6-7 turns.

I agree with KabukiJo, that the AI doesn't pick the optimal spots for cities, so we might need to raze some of them.

I think that ngraner42s idea of chop rushing barracks in both Heliopolis and Memphis is a great idea. I would then put Heli on unit building, create a settler in Mem, whip it when possible, and then switch to unit building.

I think ngraner42s analysis of our commerce/production site is spot on.

Sounds good.

I am going to be gone tonight (25th) through Monday (29th).

The only things I would add to the above analysis is that we need to get Sailing researched pretty quick as we can explore the world some more. If there is land to the east of the mountains, it might be better to war/settle here instead. Also, we should spit out a few axemen as well as swordsmen. We don't know if Catherine has other sorces of copper and I've seen Axemen (+50% melee) wipe out an army of swordsmen.

I think clam site is slightly better than other site but not by very much.

whose turn is it? I know an order was posted, but darned if I can find it now in all these posts...

UNCPenguin is up
Terminator3k on deck

One more thing to throw into the mix is Wonders. We could go for Hanging Gardens (Pop and health boost is handy at this level) as we have stone. We'd have to tie up one city to build aqueduct and Gardens but as we plan to have more cities by that time will be a big scientific, economic and production boom, plus we'd start getting Great Engineer points. Worth a shot or not?

I also think a vote (as has been mentioned before by others) is a must for important decisions. Worker placements, build queues and exploration can be handled by whoever is taking a turn. Starting and ending wars, research, city placements and wonders should be as a result of group consensus. You can also consult a group half way through your turn. I'd rather take longer to run my 10 turns to make sure everyone was happy with what I was doing than finish the turn and realise I'd gone against what everyone else wanted to do. Remember, part of the reason to take part in this type of game is seeing how others play. I've already picked up some really useful tips seeing how you all play.

As I see it, moving into UNCPenguin's turn we need to agree on:

1) one (or maybe two) city placements, as per post#100 by McArine (hopefully I've read your intentions correctly KabukiJo and ngraner42, need thoughts from others)
Southern Desert, Clam, Northern Desert: McArine, ngraner42
Clam, Southern Desert, Northern Desert: KabukiJo, Ozbenno

2) research after construction
Sailing: Ozbenno
Alphabet:
Mysticism:
Horseback Riding:
Metal Casing:
Currency:

3) Go for Hanging Gardens?
yes: Ozbenno
no:

4) Recommence war with Catherine after peace Treaty expires?
yes:
no:


Order is:

UNCPenguin (up)
Terminator3k
MrWhite
MerandaBlue
ngraner42
Ozbenno
KabukiJo
McArine

Its been 5 days since last turn. In future should we put a 3 or so day limit, whereby if the current player hasn't played their turn, they swap places with the on deck member?? Obviously, we don't want to p*ss anyone off by bumping their turn but also we want to get things moving along at a reasonable pace.

OK. Sorry for all of that, I can really rabbit on sometimes but hopefully it means we can get more discussion and contribution from the whole group, so we can all enjoy the ride even more.

1) one (or maybe two) city placements, as per post#100 by McArine (hopefully I've read your intentions correctly KabukiJo and ngraner42, need thoughts from others)
Southern Desert, Clam, Northern Desert: McArine, ngraner42
Clam, Southern Desert, Northern Desert: KabukiJo, Ozbenno

2) research after construction
Sailing: Ozbenno, McArine
Alphabet:
Mysticism:
Horseback Riding:
Metal Casing:
Currency:

3) Go for Hanging Gardens?
yes: Ozbenno, McArine
no:

4) Recommence war with Catherine after peace Treaty expires?
yes: McArine
no:

[QUOTE=Ozbenno]
As I see it, moving into UNCPenguin's turn we need to agree on:

1) one (or maybe two) city placements, as per post#100 by McArine (hopefully I've read your intentions correctly KabukiJo and ngraner42, need thoughts from others)
Southern Desert, Clam, Northern Desert: McArine, ngraner42
Clam, Southern Desert, Northern Desert: KabukiJo, Ozbenno
Nothern Desert, clam, southern desert:merandaBlue

2) research after construction
Sailing: Ozbenno
Alphabet:
Mysticism:
Horseback Riding:
Metal Casing:
Currency:

Mysticism, horsebackriding, alphabet, lit then go for GL: merandaBlue

3) Go for Hanging Gardens?
yes: Ozbenno, merandaBlue (but only after we have taken second city away from Catherine)
no:

4) Recommence war with Catherine after peace Treaty expires?
yes:merandaBlue
no:


Order is:

UNCPenguin (up)
Terminator3k
MrWhite
MerandaBlue
ngraner42
Ozbenno
KabukiJo
McArine

Its been 5 days since last turn. In future should we put a 3 or so day limit, whereby if the current player hasn't played their turn, they swap places with the on deck member?? Obviously, we don't want to p*ss anyone off by bumping their turn but also we want to get things moving along at a reasonable pace.

[QUOTE]

3 day limit?
yes: merandaBlue
No:

I guess most of us are on vacation for Memorial Day weekend? It's been a while since someone posted a turn.

Though I agree that it is important for us to analyze the situation as a group and get input on key decisions, I am not in favor of the voting approach. We already have an issue with playing a little slowly, since there are only a couple of other teams behind us. I personally want to learn from the other players on the team, but when it is my turn I do not want to do something that is against my personal judgment.

I tried to contact UNCPenguin a couple days ago, with no response. I would recommend we let Terminator3k go if he gets to the game first and then rotate UNCPenguin back in.

I agree with merandaBlue's 3day rule. If you do not get it in 3 days the next person up can take the game.

A suggestion for rotating back in: If the skipped person contacts us before two more people have played they can take the game, otherwise they wait until their next turn.

The idea of the voting is to clarify where people think we should be heading and to collect and collate these thoughts together for easy reference and also encourage everyone to have an input. I didn't view it as being either compulsory (to take part) or binding (to obey). If you choose a different path to the consensus that's fine, but in your report try to explain why!

We had already said we would wait 24 hours after each turn for discussion. This still holds, so don't see this slowing up the game.

Would it allay your misgivings, ngraner, if we put a blurb with the vote, to explain our choices?

I also noticed that UNCpenguin said in an earlier post that he was away until the 29th (I missed this completely at the time - oh well) but I think the 3 day rule is now in effect. Hopefully, we'll back in the swing in the next day.

Hey y'all I'm back and can play tomorrow ill catch up on everything I missed tonight

I am good with Ozzie's clarification of the voting. Here are my votes.

I think you have my city vote correct, but I have attached a screen shot so we can be clear on the discussion. My vote order in this screen print is site 2 then 1 and then 3. I shifted site 3 over one from an earlier picture, but could see moving it one right. I think it is a relatively marginal site and can wait.

I would love to get the Hanging Gardens for the engineer points to grab the Great Library, but we have little need for Aqueducts and are facing happiness issues already. If we have the war with Catherine under control, lets go for it.

We must expand and get those happiness resources to the south. We are gearing up for war, lets do it.

I am good with Sailing next. We are going to need Calendar and should push for Optics. We need to meet other civs and leverage our research with trading. Possible order: Sailing, Calendar, Alphabet.

128307

Looking at your city placement map ngraner, I would move city 3 one spot north (or east depending what over yonder mountains). Moving north, you would add one square of ocean and a forested hill and only lose an unusable mountain.

1) one (or maybe two) city placements, as per post#100 by McArine (hopefully I've read your intentions correctly KabukiJo and ngraner42, need thoughts from others)
Southern Desert, Clam, Northern Desert: McArine, ngraner42
Clam, Southern Desert, Northern Desert: KabukiJo, Ozbenno
Nothern Desert, clam, southern desert:merandaBlue

I agree with moving #3 from ngraner's dot map one north. It will give it a little more early production while it grows by using the trips floodplain.

2) research after construction
Sailing: Ozbenno, UNCPenguin
Alphabet:
Mysticism:
Horseback Riding:
Metal Casing:
Currency:

Mysticism, horsebackriding, alphabet, lit then go for GL: merandaBlue

3) Go for Hanging Gardens?
yes: Ozbenno, merandaBlue (but only after we have taken second city away from Catherine)
no:

4) Recommence war with Catherine after peace Treaty expires?
yes:merandaBlue,
no:


I will have results posted by dinner time est.

0 400bc
well seeing that construction is a ways off - 19 turns I switch Thebes to a worker we only have 3! I also agree with chop rushing rax in ele and heli.

ibt - memphis expands.

1 385bc
duh for got to swith granary in elephantine to a rax last turn so did so now. Also its pasture was finished

2 370bc
memphis finishes sword ->sword
road complete to ele...roading horses other worker will begin chop next turn

3 355bc

4 340bc
st petes expands
move some of the tiles around in ele to increase prod and cut growth because it is undefended and getting close to unhappiness

5 335bc

6 310bc
avoid growth is on in ele once it is garrisoned it will be able to grow again

7 295
worker done in thebes work resumed on the settler due in 6. chop finishes rax due in 1 in ele, i couldnt get a free worker in time to get to heli for it rax its due in 4

8 280
well peace treaty ends..I did not build up any more troops other than 1 sword. I know that some wanted to declare war asap, but with 1 new rax online and another almost done I decide to wait for the second barracks to finish so that it can focus on immediate troops production.
mine started on copper by st petes

9 265
parth bifal

10 250







The barracks in heli is due in 1 turn, troops are being produced in memphis and ele as of now. settler due in 3 @ thebes. The copper, cows, and gems are all under worker care right now.
Russia is 3 turns away from hooking up its horses, and we are capable of building war chariots now. Construction is due in 9 which helps ele send troops to the front with the +1 roads movement and who can forget catapults. We will have 3, maybe 4 cities producing units once current builds are finished. We should easily have numbers when we invade.
Another thing is that catherine converted to hinduism so she probably has contact with others. Sailing seems like a very good next choice to research.

Order now is:

Terminator3k (up)
MrWhite
MerandaBlue
ngraner42
Ozbenno
KabukiJo
McArine
UNCPenguin

I'm at work so can't load the save to see but... How many troops do we have available NOW for declaring on Russia? If we have plenty (and enough to garisson St Petes and guard gems), we could go on a scouting/pillage run to see where her other cities are, as these will be the first to fall (again, raze them if they aren't in productive areas)

iirc i believe we now have 8 swords and 1 axe on the border or atleast on the way to it

If 2 were left behind for protection of St Petes, 6 swords and an axe (and an archer if there's one spare anywhere) should make a decent SOD to head SW towards Catherine's secondary cities, pillaging her resources, hopefully taking one or two before the cats come online for the seige of Moscow. It also might bring us into contact with another civ, which would be nice.

If 2 were left behind for protection of St Petes, 6 swords and an axe (and an archer if there's one spare anywhere) should make a decent SOD to head SW towards Catherine's secondary cities, pillaging her resources, hopefully taking one or two before the cats come online for the seige of Moscow. It also might bring us into contact with another civ, which would be nice.

That would be my first inclination. Lets take it to Cathy before she can get any more powerful. If we can, take her worker in the first strike, then look to make sure she doesn't have any other metals hooked up.

We really need to make contact with other civs.

Also, not meaning to be harsh, but we really need to get this game going. If it is has been 24 hours since the save was posted and the "on deck" player hasn't picked it up, then the next player should. A skipped player can be easily plugged back into the rotation since we have so many players.

I haven't looked at the save but I would probably agree with either placement of city #3. Where it is on ngraner's map gets the fresh water health bonus.

As for the voting system, I think it will slow the game down alot to hear from each player as to their votes. I would propose that if you want to have a say in how the game decisions go, then check in often. I really like it when all the players put in their opinion's on what should be done.

If you choose a different path to the consensus that's fine, but in your report try to explain why!

well said Ozbenno

There you go Terminator, your brief is to live up to your moniker and bring death and destruction to all things Russian (well as much as you can manage in 10 turns anyway).

Good point about the worker Kabuki, we're short of these as well.

250 BC - Awordsman on copper moved to front line, changed tile work in Heli to cottage tile

235 BC - Moved remaining swordsman forward, war declared on Catherine, worker captured across border, all St Pete and forward units move into Russian territory, Heli Barracks -> Axeman (Have enough swordsmen), St Pete switched Granery to archer.

220 BC - SOD moves forward - still no contact, lone swordsman finds Rostov with only 2 archers and 1 spearman. Looks tasty. Copper online in St Pete.

205 BC - Thebes settler -> War Charriot, Cows online for St Pete., moved archer in SOD SE and there was Moscow (surprise, surprise, surprise). Rest of SOD marches on Rostov after seeing a well dug in Moscow (4 archers and 1 spearman on hill).

190 BC - Ele Swordsman -> War Chariot, emergence of Russian Galley out of fog causes slavery rush build of axeman in Heli, rougue spearman killed, sacked Russian mine for 7 gp, Rostov falls with No Losses :king: .

175 BC - Fortified positions in enemy territory, sacked gem mine for 15 gp, founded Alexandria on ocean front hilltop east of Thebes, workers finish cottage next to Mephis, lone Russian axeman appears out of Moscow, Galley lands 2 Russian archers west of Heli (hope our upgraded axeman holds!).

160 BC - Heli holds by defeating both archers! :cool: Thebes war chariot -> war chariot. Our swordsman falls to axeman on mine south of St Pete but our archer in St Pete avenges swordsman's death. Our archer falls to axeman north of Moscow but our swordsman in hills avenges archer's death. Moscow has 4 archers and 1 spearman.

145 BC - Memphs farm completed, located Russian town of Yekaterinburg,

130 BC - Construction research completed, sailing underway, lone spearman jumped in the bushes by our swordsman - the spearman had a bad day.

115 BC - Pillaged 8 gp from mine, continue position moves on Moscow.

100 BC - Cut road to Moscow from other Russian cities, Thebes war chariot -> library, Mephis war chariot -> catapult. Healing of units and advance of new units continued toward future Moscow assault.

Final thoughts:

- Our army is good but the cost is high. My suggestion is to continue the advance on Moscow by bringing down the two axemen, war chariot and swordsman from the north of Moscow. Also need to move the swordsman on the hill SW of Moscow into attack position. Troops on hill north of Moscow will be healed by then.

- Ask for peace right after Moscow falls. The Russians are ready to talk peace at this point.

- We have 4 workers finishing a road to Alexandria. Once completed they can be redeployed to help improve Rastov (and hopefully Moscow soon).

Good work terminator!

Catherine might have another source of copper. We should convince her very strongly otherwise.

I think we should take out other Russian cities before Moscow (which we can take after catapults are streaming to the front) as they may be easier to take. We will suffer financially for this but can take a breather after.

NO PEACE FOR VILE RUSKIES!!!!

OK, here's an idea (partly expressed before) that may be a good strategy for the next little while. Start building the Hanging Gardens in Thebes (currently just started a library). Change to aqueduct, then HG (maybe a bit of chopping to speed things up - but no whipping). At the same time, after we research Sailing, go for currency then COL. If we can time the two to come on line roughly together, use the additional population provided by HG to get out the old whip and build courthouses in every city we can. Will help the finances hugely. I think our empire is big enough now to have one (albeit) major city doing something other than military. If we leave this any later we probably will get beaten to HG. What do you all think?

BTW, whoever's up next, once sailing kicks in we need galleys fast!!

I will play my turn after work today (about 9 hours from now).

Sometime today, I will post my strategy to get some feedback from you guys.

Terminator - can you post a screenshot?

I need to run, but here are a couple quick comments.

Reducing our financial burden is critical and I am not sure we can support too many more cities. We may want to raze some of Catherine's cities, possibly even Moscow since it is badly placed, though thats a lot of population to throw away. Cottage building is a priority and possibly working sea tiles. Check out our break even financial situation.

128514

Elephantine has the stop growth button checked. We need to uncheck this button. It can grow twice more with out problem (with a defender).

128515

We should not finish new non-catapult military units and leave them in queue with one turn remaining. This way they can be finished in a pinch, but cost us nothing.

128516

Here is a shot of our glorious empire.

128517

so once we finish up catherine economic techs seem to be the way to go.

at the time I put avoid growth on it was prior to the gems being hooked up, so lets get that off asap.

Sorry I missed the avoid growth button in Elephantine. I should have caught it in the game and just missed it.

As requested, attached are a couple of screenshots.

The first shows our troops advancing on Moscow and the #/type of city defenders.

128552

The second is a high level view of the entire empire.

128553

One caution I didn't blatantly mention (and should have) was that the Russians have at least 1 galley so we need to watch our back country just in case one shows up bearing a couple of axemen (assuming Catherine still has access to copper or has axemen leftover from when they had copper).

Commenting on Ozbenno's last post: I am always a fan of the Hanging Gardens and I like the strategy of using the pop increase from the wonder combined with slavery and COL to get courthouses in our cities.

By the way, looking at the scores through 100 BC, it appears that we have the largest military of all teams. We should definitely continue to use our military might, question is whether to:

1. Take Moscow, sue for peace, reorganize and then take out remaining cites; or

2. Start taking the remaining cities until cats are online and then assault Moscow.

I like to think of myself as a lover not a fighter (hence the peace offer after a Moscow takeover), but it wouldn't take much to sway me to continuous Russian extermination if we don't think it will cripple our economy.

Finally, I also like the idea of making a few Galleys.

Comments? Thoughts?

I will preface my turn log by stating that I made a lot of mistakes here & stubbornly continued to lay siege to Moscow when I probably should have asked for peace.

85BC: Reduced tech research to 20% as we were at zero $$. Moved all forces present outside of Moscow, including 2 axemen and war chariot in the North and Swordsman in the southwest into 2 stacks: one to the North and one to the West. Workers completed road to Alexandria. Had 2 stay in Alex and prepped to move the others towards Rostov. Changed construction in Thebes from Library to aqueduct in the hopes that we could construct the hanging gardens eventually. No use have the stone resource if you're not going to use it.

70BC: Start attack on Moscow. I figured to soften the archers and spearman with the axemen and war chariots and then go in for the kill with the swordsmen. Final tally: I lost 5 swordsmen, 3 axemen and a war chariot. Catherine lost the spearman and 2 archers[pissed] :gripe: :badcomp:
Now just for the record, I lost two battles wher I had a 69.9% advantage and an 88.5% advantage :cry: . I couldn't $#*%ing believe it.... The 2 remaining archers in Moscow were at like 1.2 and 0.3 strength, but I had nobody left to attack them. In other news, I moved one worker from Alex towards Rostov to irrigate the rice. Moved tech back to 40% (more $$ available due to losing almost entire army); sailing in 7 turns.

55BC: Heliopolis: archer trained, start war chariot. Promote surviving war chariot outside Moscow to combat 2 and surviving swordman to city raider 2. Moving another swordman towards Moscow and heal all survivors. Unhappiness pops up in Memphis from war weariness. Place war chariot in front of catapult and whip for loss of 2 population. Moved archer in Hele south towards Moscow.

40BC: Rostov expands its border then suffers a russian revolt during the same turn :confused: Moved war chariot from Memphis south towards Moscow. Russia sends an archer from Yekaterinburg North towards Moscow. I block it with a combination of the healing war chariot and healing swordsman. Started work boat in Alexandria ahead of archer.

25BC: Worker completes cottage in Alex. Starts another one. War werariness appears in Thebes. Start cat in front of aqueduct and will whip it as soon as I can lose only 1 population. Start shuffling archer guarding silve in far north down to Ele. When he gets there, will move him to Memphis to fortify, freeing up war chariot currently in Memphis.

10BC: Archer moves to jungle hill north of Rostov. Attack roaming archer with swordsman at another 69.9% success and of course the archer wins :suicide: . My God, can at least have one thing go my way? Is this what the higher difficulties are about? Getting screwed by the computer on the percentages? Unbelievable. I finish off the archer with a war chariot, almost predicting another defeat even though 99.9% probability:cringe: of success. Whip workboat in Alex. To sum up, I have 2 swords and 2 war chariots in Moscow with 2 cats and 2 war chariots just about ready to go.

5BC: Memphis: Cat ready, start axeman. Alex: workboat ready, continue archer. St. Pete: granary ready, start axeman. Worker reaches Helio, starts clearing jungle. Cat moves towards Moscow. Whip cat in Thebes losing 1 pop.

20AD: Sailing discovered. Start researching calendar. Hele builds war chariot, starts granary. Ele builds granary, starts lighthouse. Moving 2 cats and 2 war chariots down to Moscow. Swordsman kills another roaming archer.
Russian axeman seen moving towards Moscow - they must still have copper. Another revolt in Rostov. 2 workers improving St. Pete until it's safe to go further south. Whip axeman in St. Pete.

35 AD: Start cat in St. Pete. Move axeman towards Moscow. war chariot clears some fog south east of moscow and finds cows and pillages them.

50AD: Rostov expands again (revolt over) 2 archers leave Moscow towards pillaged cows. war chariot kills one of them.

And that's it. I really apologize for some lousy decision-making. I should have been more patient in attacking Moscow, or at least had asked for peace after the failed attack. I stubbornly continued the fight hoping to get enough forces down there soon enough for a second attack and then asking for peace once we had captured the capital. Our army should be ready in a few more moves and this time with cats, but it's up to you guys if you think we should just ask for peace now and build up our forces.

Having been a previous victim of the RNG Gods in this game before (I'm still having lion nightmares), don't feel so bad. Probably needed to wait for cats though.

If we feel we're going to go for peace with Russia, lets try and get something for it. It would be nice to ba able to have alphabet or currency researched to get techs or cash out of her. If we can't at least spend a couple of turn pillaging!

I would switch research to currency BTW. I'll DL the save and check it out.

Meranda you're up!
calling ngraner, please step into the on deck circle.

I agree with Ozbenno, we need to switch research to currency and then Code Of Laws after currency.

Having committed us to the siege of Moscow, I think it is important to intercept any reinforcements Catherine might send. Also, I think Moscow should be razed, it is poorly located, sharing a lot of land with Rostow. I would keep Yekaterinburg when we capture it, and build a new city on the spot east of Moscow.

Just had a look at the save. We're in deep doodo!!!

MMing Heliopolis, St Petes, and Roztov can help a little bit but not too much. I would say take Moscow out with cats and current units, sue for peace, get all soldiers in cultural borders and MM all cities to max gold (could even do this straight away). Switch research to Currency (still will be ages away). Change Elephantine production to work boat and Heliopolis to galley. Get a settler up to grab silver (for happy and gold), chop forests round Thebes like crazy (esp hill) for HG (might be our only hope going now, we HAVE to get it).

I think after Moscow, builder mode might be switched on for a while. If we get out of this we're all legends!!!!!

I still think we need to take out Moscow asap. If not, we will lose Rostov, which has already rioted twice. We take out Moscow with the cats which are almost in position, raze it and eventually get a settler down there to found a city 1 space to the east to get the cows and sugar resources. Then we make peace and get our economy in line. I agree and should have chosen currency over calendar. We'll get through this!!!

I don't think we raze Moscow as Cathy will just re-settle it quicker than we can. It isn't in the greatest location but is (with Rostov) in a great choke point.

Once we conquer Moscow, we'll have forces in the area, including some war chariots. We just keep them in the general area around the razed site until we can get a settler in that area. That should prevent Catherine from re-settling the area. Moscow is in a really lousy spot. Having a city 1 square to the east will get us a cow and 3 sugars and also make it a coastal city. Our culture should still create a choke point in that part of the map. We should whip a settler in Alexandria asap and get it down there.

Just had a look at the save. We're in deep doodo!!!

MMing Heliopolis, St Petes, and Roztov can help a little bit but not too much. I would say take Moscow out with cats and current units, sue for peace, get all soldiers in cultural borders and MM all cities to max gold (could even do this straight away). Switch research to Currency (still will be ages away). Change Elephantine production to work boat and Heliopolis to galley. Get a settler up to grab silver (for happy and gold), chop forests round Thebes like crazy (esp hill) for HG (might be our only hope going now, we HAVE to get it).

I think after Moscow, builder mode might be switched on for a while. If we get out of this we're all legends!!!!!

I wholeheartedly agree with Ozbenno here. Except that we might want to raze Moscow, NOT declare peace, and use the old Moscow area as an "intercepting zone" for the units Cathy sends at us. All this provided that we can accept the war weariness. Getting $$$ should be our first goal as we need a jump in research.

I like the HG idea.

p.s. Why did we attack Moscow before we had catapults? We really should have waited for the cats to soften their defenses and damage them collatoraly.

The main problem I see with razing Moscow, is that we need to get all our troops in our cultural zone to save money (~5 gold a turn if I recall correctly from the save, probably 10% jump in research). If we raze it, we either have to keep leaking the cash to patrol the area to stop Cathy resettling or get the troops back into St Petes or Rostov and cede the spot to her.

Either way, the cash from Moscow should help us out in the short term.

We'll need to get some troops to Heliopolis to jump on the galley, heading over yonder mountains! If we whip a settler I'd prefer it to be for the silver up north (can use both the cash and happiness).

Hi, nothing more to add, just wanted to tell you that I'm out of town until tuesday.

Well I'd say that three days have passed!

Meranda and Ngraner, whichever of you can grab the save first should go!