I think we need to play a couple more turns untill we can see Kahn's capital. I was vague in my comments earlier. I was hoping to send the boat to the tile by corn and horse hoping to see if the capital is visible, but I did not say it. My error. But the chariot can make the contact in few turns. So we should let boat keep on going west.

This is what I am thinking. If he has iron, copper and horses connected, we got a problem. If metals are not connected, we need to take what we got in about 10 turns and go on a pillaging job to deny him his horses. and then go take his capital with all we got. With out horses and metal. He will only be able to build archers. BTW if he has his wine connected, we need to hurry real hard. Beacuse he is on his way to get LBows. Please comment.

I think we need to play a couple more turns untill we can see Kahn's capital. I was vague in my comments earlier. I was hoping to send the boat to the tile by corn and horse hoping to see if the capital is visible, but I did not say it. My error. But the chariot can make the contact in few turns. So we should let boat keep on going west.

If I understand you correctly you originally wanted the WB to retrace it's course? Why would we have seen anything more this time than the initial time?


This is what I am thinking. If he has iron, copper and horses connected, we got a problem. If metals are not connected, we need to take what we got in about 10 turns and go on a pillaging job to deny him his horses. and then go take his capital with all we got. With out horses and metal. He will only be able to build archers. BTW if he has his wine connected, we need to hurry real hard. Beacuse he is on his way to get LBows. Please comment.

As I recall there was iron by Ning-Hsia which at the time was unconnected.

The subject of attack was discussed earlier. Realistically we are probably not in a position to do this. Khan currently has seven cities to our three and can out produce us. As I see it we need to try and keep on good terms with Khan whilst building up enough military to defend ourselves.

OK, I will do few more turns in 17 hours' time and post an updated view. Any other comments made before then will be taken into consideration.

The settler will be ready in 2 turns so I will probably have to deal with that at the same time. If I send that north with an axeman, we should be able to clear the fog up there and finalise a settlement spot.

OK, I will do few more turns in 17 hours' time and post an updated view. Any other comments made before then will be taken into consideration.


This is starting to be a rather disjointed turnset. I think it would be best to defer any further moves until we have a better idea of what we actually want to do and build in this turnset. I realise this is messing you about, and I apologise for that, but I really think it would be better otherwise we may end up cancelling builds and retracing our steps.

How will I actually know when we actually have a better idea what we want to do?

How will I actually know when we actually have a better idea what we want to do?

Well I've floated some ideas on what we might do and Htadus has posted some ideas. We've still to hear from Thrallia and Jenarie and mark. If you have any ideas as how we can get back on track on the science and military side then post them by all means. Then we need to get a consensus on what is feasible and desirable.

Looking at what I've just written I'm not sure that entirely answers your question. I guess all I can say is follow, and post to, the thread.

I’m not so good on the ‘how’, as I have not played as much on Monarch level as you guys have, but I know what outcome I am looking for in the medium term, and it definitely involves getting rid of the Mongolians.

If I was playing the whole rest of the game completely by myself, I would be:

1) Settling near the iron (probably the yellow spot)
2) Chop-whipping the pyramids
3) Focusing research towards Catapults
4) Catapult-rushing Khan
5) Focus research towards Trebuchets and Beserkers to finish him off.

For me, Khan is the primary objective. I would be worrying about Gandhi’s space race later. Once Khan is out of the way and our economy has recovered to make use of his land, then there would be plenty of time to manipulate factors to help Gandhi into space. Then we could focus on getting him there as early as possible. But we’ve got to get into that position first, and I don’t think we’ll get there if Khan is still on the scene.

My problem is that I am not that good at the intricate micromanagement required to optimise the situation, as I usually play on Prince where life is a bit more forgiving of lazy city management.

The primary questions I would be asking when seeking help on this would be:
- how do I make best use of the Pyramids once I had them?
- What is the best way to maximise the benefits of the Beserker (as I have never played as Ragnar before)?

I’m pretty keen to get on with the game, but I will wait to play any more turns until there is a clearer team view on where we want to take things.

Who would have thought a game like this could be so engrossing?

If I understand you correctly you originally wanted the WB to retrace it's course? Why would we have seen anything more this time than the initial time?

I did not think that the WB was on the tile south of corn. If it was on that tile and we did not see the capital, that is good news indeed. That mean it is Not on a Hill.


As I recall there was iron by Ning-Hsia which at the time was unconnected.

The subject of attack was discussed earlier. Realistically we are probably not in a position to do this. Khan currently has seven cities to our three and can out produce us. As I see it we need to try and keep on good terms with Khan whilst building up enough military to defend ourselves.

Well the thing is, If kahn has no horses and metal, then all he can build is warriors and archers. Spears, Axes, Swords and chariots can make life very misarable to warriors and archers. Once his Initial onslaught is done, ie his KESHICKS are dead. We get to experiance up our units and take one town out at a time.

On a recent game, I had Iron and horses, but did not have them protected with archers. Saladin Dow'ed and took out my horses and iron in couple of turns. The game told me that I could not continue building my chariots or axes. He had most of his cities defenbed by just 1 archer and my archers did not do that well against that and i had to bow out. I think we can do the same. But all this depend on what he has built now.

BTW if we are going the wait until later route to take Kahn out, we need to maximize our city plots, That mean we need to go to markH's coastal blue spot and another along the river. It will take us a long time to have cities working 20 tiles and the land is being wasted in the interim.

So we come back to what we need to do over the next 17 turns.

I think we can agree that we will not be in a position to attack Khan within 17 turns. So this is not something I need to worry about.

I think what needs to happen in the next 17 turns is:
- take the settler north to settle (not sure how we resolve exactly where – maybe there is no wrong place)
- complete reconnaissance of Mongolia
- build some spearmen for defence (and future attack support)
- finish mathematics and research something else (how do we agree on what?)
- micromanage commerce output of 4 cities to keep science running hot
- chop the Pyramids after mathematics (but will probably still not be complete within 17 turns)

For the next turnset, we can re-assess our readiness to attack Khan, based on where we find ourselves in relation to his units and resources at that point.

Having not played a successive game before, I am a little unclear on exactly how much agreement is required before we can move on. In the meantime, I will err on the side of caution and wait to at least hear another round of comments from everyone before proceeding (depending on whether Thrallia gets back online or not).

So we come back to what we need to do over the next 17 turns.

I think we can agree that we will not be in a position to attack Khan within 17 turns. So this is not something I need to worry about.

OK. But if they declare war, Immidiately switch ALL builds to Spears (first)followed by Swords or Axes. After the initial Spear in Cap is done I would switch back to the Mids and I would not hesitate to rush a unit at each city with 1 pop (well that is most likely scenario with just 3 citizens any ways)

I think what needs to happen in the next 17 turns is:
- take the settler north to settle (not sure how we resolve exactly where – maybe there is no wrong place)

I will support any decision as far as bonus food is within the 9 tiles. 5 or more fpt will grow a city much faster than 2 fpt. Growth is power. Since we do not have a religion we will need to build culture via a monument by chopping and wait 15 turns for it to grow. With 5 extra food by this time we will be getting close to or have 3 pop to work all other tiles. With just 2 extra food, we won't even have the second pop. Other thing is of course Iron in the fat cross. Lastly, take a worker with/before the settler and If we are going to settle on a forest see if it is worth chopping it for Nidaros. If it will give 15 or more I would think it is worthy.

- complete reconnaissance of Mongolia
- build some spearmen for defence (and future attack support)
- finish mathematics and research something else (how do we agree on what?)

Agree on first two and I vote for Alpha since we need it to find out if Kahn is willing to share his kowledge and to go for Lit.

- micromanage commerce output of 4 cities to keep science running hot
- chop the Pyramids after mathematics (but will probably still not be complete within 17 turns)

Harbourboy, one of the workers should start prechopping, the forests nearest to the Cap. Just remember to stop the worker before it is done and go to the next forest.

Do not let the cap grow to 7 pop until gem is mined and roaded. Wait until it is one turn from growth and let city manager hold growth. If possible, work more mine too.

For the next turnset, we can re-assess our readiness to attack Khan, based on where we find ourselves in relation to his units and resources at that point.

Having not played a successive game before, I am a little unclear on exactly how much agreement is required before we can move on. In the meantime, I will err on the side of caution and wait to at least hear another round of comments from everyone before proceeding (depending on whether Thrallia gets back online or not).

Once everyone made a choice and we have a majority, we all should live with it and proceed. Since we have 6 active players, in case of a tie(:crazyeye: ) We can PM Hawk. If any time during your turn set you feel like the whole team should have a say, please stop and post the issue.

I think you will get a respond from almost all.

Sorry to post late, but we had some family business the whole Sunday.

One more thing I should have mentioned after my set. There is a barb axe in the North, so be aware of this when moving the settler to the iron spot (which ever we take).

As a compromise I would agree to Htadus' suggested city site between blue and the iron.

We have to build up pur military. It would be very dangerous not to do this. Khan has his horses connected, so if he has horseback riding he will have Keshiks around, so spears will be important to have.

I have not checked how long it would take to research construction, but I feel we will need cats earlier than later. Without them I think we will have quite some trouble to go for him, so maybe construction might be a good choice as next tech. However I have not checked how long it would take. If it is below 20 turns I would seriously consider to go for construction next.

If we want to get the Pyramids I do not think that we can disturb Nidaros in building it. If Khan declares it is another story, but as long as we are at peace we should let it go. I think you can let Nidaros grow into unhappiness. Each pop point we can use for whipping the Pyramids. Or am I mixing something up ?:crazyeye:

El Do should start military after the settler. Spears and chariots first. Uppsala should join El Do in the military build up as soon as possible, so maybe switching to a barracks now might be an option. I do not have in mind how much of the library build is left, though. If it is not much let it finish the lib first.

I think we are getting towards agreement on a general approach for the immediate future. Good point about the gems as a happiness factor. The gems are currently 12 turns away from being mined, so maybe I need to send another worker down there to help. It's going to be a tradeoff between gems and pre-chopping. I vote for gems because there is not as much value in having pre-chopped forests quickly.

I think the library is about 10 turns away.

I pretty much agree with the approaches proposed by Htadus and markh. Not sure if we are expecting to hear from Thrallia given his internet problems.

Only point of contention at the moment is Alphabet vs Construction. Maybe the tie-breaker here is the number of turns they will take, and the position of our foreign affairs at that point in time. Both are very valid for our current position although I would feel safer with Construction.

I will be ready to play in 8 hours time but will wait and see what other comments we have by then before deciding whether or not to proceed.

Just to make it easy for you :) , If construction is achivable by no more than 3 or 4 turns more than Alpha, you have my vote for it. They suck against horse archer, but they do wonders against cities.

Now we are clearly going the monger route. :D

Good night. You will not hear from me until next turn set.

I think going the warmonger route is just pre-empting the position that Khan is likely to put us in anyway before long, especially if we maintained our low power rating.

I have no strong opinions atm - I've been checking the thread about every two hours all day but nothing new to add right now. Don't wait for me to post again before playing but if I do happen to wake up with a sudden flash of brilliance :lol: I'll be back (just don't hold your breath!)

OK, the barbarian axe is still there, sitting right on our proposed city site (75% defensive bonus). How would you like to deal with that in as risk free a manner as possible? Our chariot is 8 turns away from being able to reach there.

Given the possibility of losing a military unit or two at this point, versus delaying the settlement of the next city, I will stop playing until I get a view from some of you on this.

OK, the barbarian axe is still there, sitting right on our proposed city site (75% defensive bonus). How would you like to deal with that in as risk free a manner as possible? Our chariot is 8 turns away from being able to reach there.

A pic would have been helpful. :) However, assuming that you are on the desert hill immediately N of the copper, I would suggesting moving to the forest NW on the coast and fortifying. I doubt the barb is promoted and with luck it will be tempted off the hill and attack you there. Assuming no horrendous RNG it should conveniently suicide against you.

EDIT: I don't think we want to bring the chariot back. We want it to do the scouting. Another alternative is to wait until El Do finishes the spear(?) that it is building and have it join you but that'll take a while. Hopefully the first suggestion will do the job.

Send the chariot before the settler and let the axe attack. It will attack if you move the chariot beside the axe. Just make sure you move the chariot into a forest or hill beside the axe. If our chariot defends successfully bring in the settler and found the city. Good luck !

Sam Yeager's suggestion worked. Our axe defended on a hill against an axe and an archer. Hooray! But there is now a barbarian city on the coast 3 squares north of proposed city site.

149246

Does this affect our decision to settle next to the iron?

Actually, I have run out of time to continue playing today. I will complete my remaining half dozen turns in 23 hours time. In the meantime, here is the current save for anyone with the time or interest to analyse it.

149248

It shouldn't affect it. In fact, placing the city between blue and the iron now is pretty much the only place to put it. We can't devote the military necessary to raze the barb city, so unless we want to wait quite awhile, we should just found it where it is. The axe you've got there should provide plenty of defense for that city, and protect Nidaros from having to deal with any potential barb axes as well.

Sorry for my disappearance this weekend. As far as the Pyramids goes, I think we'll still be in the safe zone when it finishes, the fact that the Great Wall and Stonehenge were both built post-900BC, and that AFAIK the Oracle is still unbuilt, means it is very unlikely that wonders will be an issue to get in this game. I think we will safely get Pyramids and the Great Library.

I'm of the opinion that my looming turnset will be fairly straightforward in nature...I'll finish Construction, start Alpha, and build up our military while chopping the Pyramids. lol

I think your turnset looks like it's gone pretty well, if a barb city N on the coast is the biggest news to take place so far ;)

edit: It also looks, from the minimap, as if Khan has a lot of cities, but none of them except his capital can match either El Dorado or Nidaros in production...which means he shouldn't be as hard to combat as it sounded earlier.

This may be too late but I just looked at the save and what about settling 1 south of the iron. It would put us on a plains hill instead of a grassland hill but mainly would eliminate all the unworkable coast tiles. I don't like the idea of having coast tiles in a city where we can't build a lighthouse. It loses the food but has plenty of irrigated grass so would still do ok and would have room for another city north (or take barb city) in the future.

Otherwise I'd prefer Mark's original blue dot site so at least we can use the coastal tiles.

If this is too late no worries. :)

Thrallia, the Oracle has been built in far off land during the last few turns. And yes, things are looking OK. All of the Mongolian cities we have discovered have all only had archers in them (either 1, 2, or 3). We have seen no other military units other than one trireme.

I think that once we get Construction and have the iron hooked up, that a bunch of catapults and swordsmen should be able to start taking control of things.

Given Khan's rapid expansion, I doubt his economy is up to much so maybe he wouldn't have been much use as a tech trading partner anyway. Somewhere out there in the fog there are some big guns who are probably storming ahead of Khan, if the wonder building and top five cities are anything to go by.

Jenarie, wouldn't settling 1 south of the iron mean losing the food resource? I'll be settling 1 east of the iron unless I get any strong objections in the next 19 hours.

ah, so the Oracle was built in the 500BCs...that's very late for Monarch. We shoudln't have any issues with the Pyramids then, especially if we don't see the great Lighthouse built yet when we start getting close.

my only problem with settling 1E of the iron is that it appears we then only have 1 food resource? On the other hand, the presence of the barb city means if we want to settle in any reasonable amount of time, we'll need to settle 1E. The only alternative is to hold off on settling and sending the first 2-3 troops we build N to deal with the barbs first.

I am favour of settling 1E, just because the settler has already been hanging around waiting for the barbarian threat to be dealt with and I don't think we want to stuff around on this any longer. The main issue with the barbarian city is the threat of constant pillaging attempts on our iron mine. Given that we will be ready to attack barbarian city before we are ready to attack Khan, this should not be an issue for too much longer and will probably be the focus of the next turnset.

I agree with sticking with 1E of the iron and getting that city founded.

I guess the other thing we could discuss is worker priorities over the next few turns once they have finished chopping the Pyramids. Some of our cities will soon be working unimproved tiles, but there is also the iron to be connected up.

Just thinking out loud. Would it be really bad if we were to build on the Iron? Does it not give us 3 shield city center? We would have a powerhouse there since the monument will get done in no time and for the time being we can irrigate a river tile to speed up growth. They can never pilage iron. The loss hammers (3) is returned when we work another plain hill mine with the 2 extra in the city.

Just being mad as usual.:crazyeye:

I like the idea of settling ON the iron much better then settling one east of it.

Htadus, you were the one who first suggested the 1 east of iron. I can't believe we can have so many options of where to build one city!

I like the idea of unpillagable iron (that is just one less thing to worry about), but I will leave it to others to work out the maths of tile usage, but I will be playing my last few turns in 14 hours so you'd better have something concrete by then otherwise I'll be settling wherever I feel like (because clearly nobody has a really strong preference one way or the other).

EDIT: The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of unpillagable iron that also does not require worker time to mine. This is very short-term thinking, I know, but it does meet our immediate needs (and in Civ IV - short term thinking is often the best because the game is shorter than you think and we're in a race here), and given that 1E of iron was also considered to be a compromise solution, settling on iron can surely be no worse. Unless someone comes up with a strong objection, that is what I plan to do. We will then still need to get rid of the barbarian city as soon as possible because once we start improvements around that city we don't want to have muck around contiually defending them against pillaging loin cloth wearing savages.

Htadus, you were the one who first suggested the 1 east of iron. I can't believe we can have so many options of where to build one city!

I like the idea of unpillagable iron (that is just one less thing to worry about), but I will leave it to others to work out the maths of tile usage, but I will be playing my last few turns in 14 hours so you'd better have something concrete by then otherwise I'll be settling wherever I feel like (because clearly nobody has a really strong preference one way or the other).

EDIT: The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of unpillagable iron that also does not require worker time to mine. This is very short-term thinking, I know, but it does meet our immediate needs (and in Civ IV - short term thinking is often the best because the game is shorter than you think and we're in a race here), and given that 1E of iron was also considered to be a compromise solution, settling on iron can surely be no worse. Unless someone comes up with a strong objection, that is what I plan to do. We will then still need to get rid of the barbarian city as soon as possible because once we start improvements around that city we don't want to have muck around contiually defending them against pillaging loin cloth wearing savages.

I am fully at fault. But another reason is that the two additional totally cottageable (3gpt to bigin) (4 total) river tiles are going to be in the fat cross and the indian culture is limiting our westward migration. This will give us a very powerful and high commerce city like ElDO and Cap.

BTW. I would use the Barb city svages to get our first swords and others promoted to CR1 by building that farm and waiting on the tile next to it. They will want to pillage it often and our units can get the promotions. We use swords against non axes, and axes and chariots against the axes. So when we go Keshik hunting we should have very capable units. we get rid or take over that town just before that.

Yes, I am wondering when and where we are going to start building cottages.

Yes, I am wondering when and where we are going to start building cottages.

I think the first thing we need to build here is a farm to get the city to grow fast. The next I would build a cottage on the adjacent river tile. Once the pasture is done, I would change the river farm to a cottage.

But the first thing we need is a chop to build the monument or a library for culture. Library takes 3 times more hammers but has a good long term return. How many hammers do we get now per chop? We may want to do that and rush a grainary. Rax is a luxury compared to growth and culture in this city.

My build order for the new City would be. Culture building of choice, Grainary and Rax. Some may want Rax first or second. But that problem is Thrallia to solve.;)

I would not mind settling on the iron although I do not understand your fears on the barbs. I had barb cities that near to my cities and they did not get anything done as they will not send out a worker to improve tiles if you place a unit at the border. The occasional archer they will send is nothing we should fear about. The city will be razed as soon as we have two swords.
The only objection coming to my mind is that we would waste a 5 or 6 hammer tile. Nevertheless I don't really mind whether we settle on or beside the iron. I would say it is up to you, Harbourboy.;)

I'm hopeless at working out efficient city placement. Maybe I will toss a coin to decide where to settle.

I think we get about 66 hammers for a chopped forest now, because I think we used to get 44 before mathematics.

BTW it appears that Kahn may have a source of copper somewhere since our trade screen did not show it. But with cats who cares.

OK, I am done. Here is the log of my turnset:

IBT: Nothing
685 BC: Open Borders with Khan, Moved Chariot to Uppsala, El Dorado Settler Chop completed – sent worker to mine gems at Uppsala, moved Work Boat west

IBT: Nothing
670 BC: Sent worker to pre chop pyramids, work boat kept moving but found nothing interesting

IBT: Nothing
655 BC: Worker started mining gems, work boat kept moving but found nothing of interest, chariot found Khan cultural border 4 squares south of Uppsala

IBT: Nothing
640 BC: Moved Work Boat west. Found Old Sarai guarded by 2 archers, plus another land mass with an intact goody hut. Moved Chariot south and found New Sara guarded by 1 archer. Moved Nidaros citizen from corn to hill to slow down growth and get more hammers for Pyramids.

IBT: Nothing
625 BC: Settler completed in El Dorado Sala. Started Spearman (10 turns). Moved Settler north with Axeman from Nidaros. Moved Work Boat north and found some stone in Khan’s land. Moved Warrior south, found Chehalis guarded by 2 archers.

IBT: Advisor suggests Library in El Dorado Sala
610 BC: Moved Settler/Archer north. Moved Chariot south, found Karakorum on river hill guarded by three archers with horses connected. Moved Work Boat north, found Khan’s trireme. Sorry – worker finished chopping forests for Nidaros! I forgot to turn it off last turn.

IBT: Nothing
595 BC: Spotted Barbarian Axe sitting on iron to North. Sent our axe ahead without settler, just in case. Hmmm, we need our Chariot back. Chariot and Work Boat found nothing this turn.

IBT: Uppsala grows to size 4.
580 BC: Work Boat completed navigation of Mongolia. Decided to send back south to new land rather than risk destruction at hands of misunderstanding Indians.

IBT: The Oracle has been built in a far away land
565 BC: Moved Work Boat south and Chariot back north. Moved El Dorado Sala warrior to Nidaros and Nidaros warrior (still unpromoted) to Settler in case Barbarian axe comes pillaging. Moved Nidaros citizen back to corn. Nidaros now to grow in 7 turns and Pyramids to come in 21.

IBT: Nothing
550 BC: Barbarian axe and archer in north move toward our axe on a hill. Gem mine completed, started road to link it to empire.

IBT: Our axeman survived attack from Barbarian Axe and Archer. We discovered Mathematics.
535 BC: Started research of construction (17 turns). Alphabet was 14 turns.

IBT: Nothing
520 BC: Uppsala completes library. Started production of barracks (5 turns). Workers sent to chop forests north of Nidaros. Spotted a Barbarian city 3 squares north of proposed city site.

IBT: Nothing
505 BC: Spearman completed in El Dorado Sala (left unpromoted). Started work on another one. Forest chopped by Nidaros. Pyramids now 14 turns away.

IBT: Nothing
490 BC: Warrior found fish in sea but too far from any iron city sites. Founded Iron Sheep on iron hill. Set to build Library (45 turns) Fortified axe in Iron Sheep.

IBT: Nothing
475 BC: Clearing forest gave 44 hammers to Nidaros.

IBT: Nothing
460 BC: Work Boat discovers new civilisation to the west, but don’t seem to be able to make contact. Nidaros grows to size 7.

IBT: Nothing
445 BC: Barracks completed in Uppsala. Started Axeman. Western warrior sights an Indian swordsman.

IBT: Nothing
430 BC: El Dorado Sala grows to size 6. Western warrior sees Bombay, guarded by one archer and one spearman. Worker starts chopping a forest for Iron Sheep.

IBT: James Cook is born in a far away land
415 BC: Clearing forest created 36 hammers for Nidaros. Worker build road to Iron Sheep. Exploring units find nothing interesting.

IBT: Nothing
400 BC: Uppsala grows to size 5 and borders expand. Worker started farm for Iron Sheep. 6 turns to Construction. 2 turns to Pyramids.

Summary of key points to take forward:
1) We explored Mongolia looking for Khan's Weapons of Mass Destruction. We didn't find anything (other than Archers and a Trireme), but we know he has them so, godammit, we are morally bound to bomb him to the Abyss before he uses them.
2) We found the traces of an orange or red civilisation to the west but could not make contact.
3) We are 6 turns away from Construction, running at 80% science for +1 gold
4) Pyramids are 2 turns away. Hope my illtimed chopping does not cause us to miss by 1 turn.
5) We now have 4 cities to Khan's 7. Khan has no copper hooked up, but he does have lots of sheep.
6) There is plenty of work for our 3 workers as our cities have grown to be working some unimproved tiles.
7) The issue of the Barbarian city to the North to be dealt with.
8) We need to decide what to do with our work boat next.
9) We built a barracks and a spearman in that turnset and lost no units. Another spearman and an axeman are on their way.

This game is loads of fun and is at a fascinating stage. The floor is now yours, Thrallia.

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm4/Geezers_SG004_BC0400_01.CivWarlordsSave

thanks. I'll wait until Thursday to play it, but it looks like things are set up nicely.

I assume we are playing 10 turns each now?

I think we have the ability to take on Khan now, although I think we want to just build up our forces, research Alpha, and then see what we can get from him prior to declaring on him.

I'm cautious to actually conquer his cities. They'd lead to a massive amount of maint. costs thanks to the distance and # of cities we would then have. When we do declare on him, I think I'd prefer we just raze his cities and expand into them on our own time...but that will be a different turnset.

Cities
After the Pyramids are finished, I think Nidaros should build a worker or two, so that we can get started on our cottages. While it does that, El Dorado can either build more military or build that library we most likely want(after all, we'll need a library somewhere for when we get Literature so that we can build the Great Library)

Tech
I assume we are confirmed on Alphabet after Construction finishes?

Miscellaneous
I think we should keep exploring with the WB, and try to take out that barb city. Additionally, we need to start cottaging our cities. I think that's about all that could be covered in the next 10 turns.

I agree with Alphabet as next tech.

Looks good. :goodjob:

Do we want to rush the pyramids ? Costs us 2 pop, but we are on the safe side. Would be a shame to be short by one turn.

I agree to alpha and building up our forces. Now that Nidaros comes back into play a lib in El Do might be affordable.

These are my first thoughts. Will have a closer look later.

I would be comfortable with a Pyramid rush given that we haven't whipped anything for ages so our population is not exactly running thin. We should be able to spare a pop point here and there now.

Yes. Whip them citz to get them Mids done on turn zero Please. Let the shields from the chop go for another worker.

Alpha is the way to go and then we need to focus on Optics. I tested out few maps with the game setting. Other continents are far away. We need the contact to speed up techs and to get the extra extra movement from Circumnavigation.

Is it too early to setup another city in the south as a GL farm? Or even the barb City using both food sources.

460 BC: Work Boat discovers new civilisation to the west, but don’t seem to be able to make contact.

This is probably because of the ocean between that civ and us.

Cities
After the Pyramids are finished, I think Nidaros should build a worker or two, so that we can get started on our cottages. While it does that, El Dorado can either build more military or build that library we most likely want(after all, we'll need a library somewhere for when we get Literature so that we can build the Great Library)

It might be worth Nidaros building a couple of military first. We don't really have that much military at present and we want some to take out that barb city. Uppsala already has a library and IronSheep is building one. I think there's a lot to be said for making IronSheep our GP farm city.


Miscellaneous
I think we should keep exploring with the WB, and try to take out that barb city. Additionally, we need to start cottaging our cities. I think that's about all that could be covered in the next 10 turns.

Certainly agree that we should send the WB to investigate Ghandhi's lands.

Do we want to rush the pyramids ? Costs us 2 pop, but we are on the safe side. Would be a shame to be short by one turn.

No major objection to rushing the 'mids although it'll be a shame to lose that production capacity. Should we switch to HR after the 'mids is complete?

Let the shields from the chop go for another worker.

That chop is destined for IronSheep's library.


Alpha is the way to go and then we need to focus on Optics. I tested out few maps with the game setting. Other continents are far away. We need the contact to speed up techs and to get the extra extra movement from Circumnavigation.

Optics is certainly important. It's quite possible that Gyathaar has deliberately put the rest of the AI on another continent or two. CoL is also important, not just for the courthouses but also for the Caste civic.


Is it too early to setup another city in the south as a GL farm? Or even the barb City using both food sources.

As mentioned above I believe that IronSheep would be a good candidate once those barbs have gone.

I agree that is important to have a pathway planned for meeting the other civilisations now that we have written off Khan as a major tech player.

I would also like to carry on the discussion on how we plan to make best use of our Vikingness and leverage our strengths:

Financial – I assume this means cottages, but what exactly do we need to do that is different from what any other civilisation would do? Just about all civs should build a lot of cottages.

Aggressive – again, how do we make the most of our Aggressive bonuses in a way that is different from other civilisations?

Beserker – when playing as Vikings, should we do more amphibious attacks?

Trading Post – do you use this to try and get circumnavigation first and develop a strong navy to cause havoc all over the world? Does the timing of techs allow for a strong navy + beserkers combo?

It might be worth Nidaros building a couple of military first.

No major objection to rushing the 'mids although it'll be a shame to lose that production capacity. Should we switch to HR after the 'mids is complete?

That chop is destined for IronSheep's library.

Optics is certainly important. It's quite possible that Gyathaar has deliberately put the rest of the AI on another continent or two. CoL is also important, not just for the courthouses but also for the Caste civic.

As mentioned above I believe that IronSheep would be a good candidate once those barbs have gone.

I suppose, we give Nidaros a chance to regrow after the rush by building some units.

I have no idea where the chop goes since I have not seen the save. But that is jsut as well.

I hope Gyathaar did not put the rest on a single continent. If so either they are going to be so advanced or some one is heading toward domination.

The IronSheep (is that what it is called :) ) has only one bonus food source but have the potential to be a production-commerce combo city. Would it not better serve at that function. Nidaros can be our production city for either navel or ground units with El Do and IronSheep being commerce (hence Science) cities. Iron city can either work cottages most of the time when not growing and when the need comes switch to high food and shields. The Barb city on the other hand probably can run upto 4 or 5 specialist with all that food. GL farm do not have to do anything else. But some cottages would be nice.

Which one is going to be our Science city? Do we have a Science city yet?

Also, I have been looking at the graphs of the other teams' performance. There seem to be some interesting graphs there that look different to ours. Is anything we can conclude from those graphs at this stage?

BTW Harbourboy, that was a text book (if there is one) execution of a crisis turn set even with the runaway chop. The patience you showed was very appreciated. :clap: Good Job. I just need to go look at it now.:D

Which one is going to be our Science city? Do we have a Science city yet?

At the moment, El Dorado-sala is our primary science city. It is contributing nearly 3 times as much as the Cap. To me a good science city makes alot of money, and has a Library and a monestary untill we can get more research buildings built. The differance between the commerce city and a science city is basically one has science multiplier building and other commerce. I have not made these type of cities. I always build the combination of the two and most of the times had good production capacity.

Financial – I assume this means cottages, but what exactly do we need to do that is different from what any other civilisation would do? Just about all civs should build a lot of cottages.


As a financial civ, we get an additional coin for each tile that has 2 or more coins. Lets look at a city with 10 river tiles with a cottage (built the same time and worked) and 15 turns to become a hamlet. By the time these become hamlets, the city will have made 10x15x3=450 coins for a financial civ while another civ will get 10x15x3=300 coins. This can be a major boon over other civs. This is why we want to build them cottages soon. If the cottages are not located on river tile, then we wont get the bonus untill it become a hamlet.

There is a major financial city site to the south near the old barb city Kahn liberated. We need to establish it the moment we kick him out of that land.

Are we sure we are moving? It has been mentioned several times but wouldn't it be easier to just take out whoever is next to Gandhi and let him expand on his side of the water? I'd hate to plan less then optimal cities because we are going to move and then end up stuck with them the whole game.


Sorry for the delayed response. But the wait helped. As you can see Gandhi's culture is already intruding upon our land and from the score, it look like he is doing well on his own already. Once he get bold, he is going to send units across the divide. This will only leads to war weariness for us mostly but also him. The sooner we can establish ourselves in a place far away from him the better. At the moment, Kahns land will give us what we need for the mid game. But I definately see problems with game progres if we actually start attacking each other. The only way I have seen fake wars cause problems is when we are at war with another civ.

This is the reason for us to get to Astro as soon as possible. This can be done fastest by using Great Leader or using the Liberalism sling.

Yes, whilst Khan is the immediate objective, naval power has got to be on the horizon pretty soon. Looking forward to how Thrallia handles things. I'm sure there will be more crises in that turnset as well. :)

Berserkers are quite nice for amphibious attacks. Wasn't the last WOTM as the Vikings, too ? There I used them several times from ships with very good success. If they will not be outdated when establishing our new home they will contribute nicely. :viking:

I already suggested a lib in El Do as Nidaros comes back into business now. I think we can afford that.

I would let Nidaros grow again after the rush before training any workers. It will lose 2 pop. Some military first would be my choice.

What exactly is our plan to make best use of the Pyramids we have worked so hard to build?

I've just started a separate game as the Vikings, just to get a better feel for what they are all about. Aggressive and Financial is a great combination. I'm currently running Vassalage and Theocracy and with Barracks and Stables, after a few victories, my units have more promotions than I know what to do with. A few extra experience points makes a massive difference when going head to head with with equal units (e.g. Axeman vs Axeman). The extra coins from Financial are a great complement to the cash coming in from taking cities and pillaging.

Main thing I have noticed about Vikings is that, not being Industrious or Organised, they probably shouldn't bother building very many wonders and they should be very judicious about the choosing not to raze enemy cities.

From my experience in WOTM6..without using any spoilers, since it is still open to be submitted by any who want to, is that Berserkers and Trebs are an amazing combination. Catapults are ok...but we really want to use Trebuchets ASAP, which means if we were to plan on warring anyone after Khan, we would want to research engineering fast.

Berserkers are great for attacking off ships, which leads to very fast coastal assaults(I took out 4 AI cities in 6 turns along their coast with the same forces each time), but they are also great on land...for attacking across rivers. Rivers only give a +25% modifier, rather than +50%, but that's still a benefit we'd have when defending and not have to worry about when attacking. Plus, they are still +50% against melee units. That combined with the vassalage/theo/rax experience quickly gives the ability for CR3/Combat 1 troops.

Another thing to consider is what to do with the Great General we will likely get out of our war with Khan. IIRC, we can use him to give bonus experience in a single city, give +50% production in a single city, or give experience to all units in a single tile/free upgrades for one unit.

Generally I've used them for superunits, either super-city raiders or super-healers. In WOTM6 though, I found it to be a great boon in my military city to have +2 exp, +50% prod, and with the Heroic Epic, +150% total.

As for my turnset...I don't expect it will have any surprises. We can place the Great Library anywhere we want if we can get a GE in time, otherwise we'll want to put it in either El Dorado or IronSheep, since they can both have decent production and still have a few forests.

As for civics, I should think Hereditary Rule would be good for growing our cities more if needed, otherwise I'd propose Representation...it'd give us some bonus science, along with +2 happy in all of our cities. I don't know that we want to grow our cities larger than that right now anyway.

I'll leave the HR vs Representation decision to others, as I can never sit down and work out the maths of the benefits of either happier cities that can work more cottages, or more science from specialists. Isn't representation quite good when we still only have a small number of cities? I don't know.

Also, can someone explain exactly what makes the Great Library so essential? Can you quantify the benefit provided in terms of beakers and tech pace?

Which one is going to be our Science city? Do we have a Science city yet?

Also, I have been looking at the graphs of the other teams' performance. There seem to be some interesting graphs there that look different to ours. Is anything we can conclude from those graphs at this stage?

Since I seemed to be fairly accurate about my readings last SGOTM...I can take a guess about what some teams are doing:

CRC: Built a wonder between 925BC and 820BC...probably either Pyramids or the Oracle. Oracle would be an easy build then, but they tend to go extreme, so probably the Pyramids(remember, they didn't move their capital, so had more forests) They are currently building up their troops, either to invade or raze Khan. Either one is a valid move, although I'm tempted to think they will raze him unless they did a CoL slingshot rather than building the Pyramids...they could easily whip/chop courthouses in their viking cities, build up their military, take on Khan, keep all his cities and then whip/chop the FP in Vikingland and move their palace to Karakorum.

VQ: Played the religion card. They are growing larger cities thanks to religion, and are hoping it spreads to Gandhi allowing them free spying into his lands. They too are building up a military to take out Khan. They built something between 2800BC and 2200BC, probably Stonehenge, and something else between 1600BC and 1300BC, probably the Oracle.

Peanut: I believe they are going toward Pyramids as well.

CDZ: Either they are whipping a TON, or they're having real issues with barbs/Khan/Gandhi

Real Ms Beyond: Low population, no wonders, small military...I don't know what they are doing either, they beat us last SGOTM, but it appears they either have some plan I can't begin to guess at, or don't know how to help an AI win.

Moved Nidaros
Us, Trash Team, Smurkz all founded Nidaros 1 turn later...I don't know where they moved it, but everyone else founded on turn 1, which to me means in place. VQ cuild have moved, but I'm not certain they could have founded Hinduism if they had.

Built wonders
Us, CRC, VQ. Ours will be at the beginning of my set, CRC built either Oracle or Pyramids 600 years ago, and VQ has built two wonders, likely Oracle and Stonehenge, from the dates. Peanut will likely built Pyramids before us but after CRC. I can't begin to guess if anyone else will.

That's about all I can gather from the graphs right now...perhaps in two months I'll know how accurate I was :)

Since I seemed to be fairly accurate about my readings last SGOTM...I can take a guess about what some teams are doing:


I'll have to make a note of this post to check how accurate it is when we finish. :) That said, it doesn't sound too far off the mark. We probably need to think a bit more at the start of a SG about trying some of these ploys.

EDIT:

Real Ms Beyond: Low population, no wonders, small military...I don't know what they are doing either, they beat us last SGOTM, but it appears they either have some plan I can't begin to guess at, or don't know how to help an AI win.

I very much doubt the latter.

I'll leave the HR vs Representation decision to others, as I can never sit down and work out the maths of the benefits of either happier cities that can work more cottages, or more science from specialists. Isn't representation quite good when we still only have a small number of cities? I don't know.

Also, can someone explain exactly what makes the Great Library so essential? Can you quantify the benefit provided in terms of beakers and tech pace?

Benefits of HR
+1 Happy per military unit

Allows very large cities as long as you have a lot of defensive units

Benefits of Representation
+3 Beakers per specialist
+2 Happiness in 5 largest cities

That means all our cities currently would get +2 happiness..combined with gems and gold, that gives us...what, size 8 or 9 cities before we'd get unhappiness? I think that's a good size for this point in the game..I'm not sure we could get much higher in our cities with HR for quite a while.

Also, the +3 beakers per specialist, while not valid right now(we have no specialists), we do plan on having a GP farm, preferably running mostly scientists, thus +3 beakers would give 9 beakers per specialist...that's a TON of bonus science, especially since they are subject to modifiers just as commerce is.

Eg. We build a library in Nidaros and then hire 2 scientists. That would normally give 6 beakers each, so 12 beakers...plus the library gives 18 beakers. On the other hand, if we have representation, we get 18 beakers BEFORE the library, giving us 27 beakers total...from just 2 pop. That's more than we'd get from running two citizens on anything, including towns(+7 or +8 gold for us IIRC)

As for the Great Library...I consider it and the Pyramids to be the best two wonders of the early-mid game.

Benefits of Great Library
It gives you 2 GS ppt
It gives you 2 FREE Scientist specialists

That equates to 18 free beakers per turn withour representation, 27 with, plus 8 GS ppt. And that's without pulling any citizens into being specialists...in order to build the GL, you need a library, so you could conceivably have another 2 science specialists and still have a growing city...in such a case, we'd have 54 beakers per turn(under representation, 36 without) and 16 GS ppt, giving us GS's very quickly and often.

The combo of Representation and GL is a very powerful one, especially in the early game.

I very much doubt the latter.

I agree, I just can't think of any strategy they might have other than to have declared on Khan immediately and be spending all their efforts at gaining his cities and giving up their starting cities/location to Gandhi/barbs.

I'll leave the HR vs Representation decision to others, as I can never sit down and work out the maths of the benefits of either happier cities that can work more cottages, or more science from specialists. Isn't representation quite good when we still only have a small number of cities? I don't know.

Also, can someone explain exactly what makes the Great Library so essential? Can you quantify the benefit provided in terms of beakers and tech pace?

The Great Library gives two free scientists, + 2 GP points per turn, which helps research. Combined with Caste which allows unlimited specialists it can greatly help research and the generation of great scientists which can be used to pop techs. I believe that Representation doubles GP points but I may be wrong about that.

EDIT: Crosspost with Thrallia.

Great analysis guys. That has answered a heap of my questions. I overlooked the GP aspect of Great Library + Specialists, which if used to pop techs equals additional "beakers" over and above the ones visibly used for research each turn.

It is fascinating trying to work out what the other teams are doing as the graphs are starting to diverge all over the place.

Yes...if we truly wanted to go all out Specialists for our GP farm, we could go Pacifism/Cast System once we get CoL/Philo.

That'd give us unlimited specialists, and Pacifism doubles GP points.

Thus, with 4 scientists, as above, we'd make 28 GS ppt(4 scientists*6 points + 4 points for GL), with adequate food, we could go to anywhere from 6-10 specs(including the two free ones) giving us up to 64 GS ppt! That would very quickly give us lightbulbs for space race techs.

Interesting ideas that will make for heated debates when the time comes for that decision.

When do you start playing then?

And, based on your analysis of the other teams, who are looking like early threats?

Early threats are, as always, CRC and Peanut. Right now I'd say VQ is a threat, and most likely Gypsy Kings and Murky Waters will be threats. Real Ms Beyond is likely to do well also.

However, I would tend to think that anyone who does not get the Great Library and/or the Pyramids will have trouble maintaining the tech pace of the others.

How do you rate our chances at this point? And when are you playing your turns?

I'll play my turns tomorrow, on Thursday, it'll be my first chance, but I'm not sure we're in a hurry anyway.

I don't think I can rate our chances right now other than to say I think we've done a pretty good job so far...Once some of the other teams are farther along I'll be able to rate us and them.

One thing I do have to add, as an aside, is that I am impressed by the standard of writing in this thread. You all use real words, not gibberish like "omg wot a dum 1 2 do u noob!" It is quite refreshing compared to some other message boards around.

Go 4 1t, Thrallianizzle. u da bom. pwn the mf mongols!

I think my brain just exploded. :eek:

Just checking in 'cause I've been quiet lately. Still reading every day but nothing to add right now. I've been sick and I'm not thinking my best at the moment. I did have an amazing dream about barbarians attacking but that's about the extent of my civ playing atm. I'm better now though - hoping to play G-Minor tomorrow and if I can do it without doing anything completely insane I'll start trying to contribute here. :)

Hope you're feeling better now, Jenarie. And, no, Thrallia, we're not really in a hurry, but we are in suspense as to what is going to happen next.

In my Viking game I'm playing at the moment, I am rolling in cash from cottages and coast tiles. My capital is making enough cash to fund all the maintenance from my new cities. I think we really need to cottage it up in this game too.

It was also be great if we could somehow time the arrival of Beserkers with some sort of intercontinental military campaign.

What do you think our chances are of getting circumnavigation?

Depends on how long it takes to get to Optics, which I agree we should beeline for after we get Literature.

Starting play now...will post a turnset soon after I'm done :)

Turn 0(400BC): Rush Pyramids for 2 pop.
IBT: Nothing
Turn 1(385BC): Pyramids complete, Nidaros starts Spear. El Dorado Spear>Library. Informed Gandhi has techs to trade...that means he knows Alphabet...Now we can see his tech progress. Revolt to Representation. 1 turn now will cost less than 1 turn later
IBT: Nothing
Turn 2(370BC): Revolt over, Nidaros now has happy cap of 10 :) Forest chopped for IronSheep
IBT: Nothing
Turn 3(355BC): Find my first Keshik. Other than that, he's all archers...we cannot allow him to hook up the iron outside of Ning-hsia
IBT: Warrior killed by barb archer, N near barb city. I had him fortified in woods with combat 2...darn RNG
Turn 4(340BC): Nidaros Spear>Spear
IBT: Great Lighthouse BIAFAL
Turn 5(325BC): Gandhi has galleys, he's got one on our Western Shore. Uppsala Axe>Axe. Iron hooked up. Swords will commence once the Spear and Axe in Nidaros/Uppsala are complete
IBT: Archer dies attacking our Axe in IronSheep
Turn 6(310BC): Cottage started in Nidaros. Workers start filtering down from IronSheep to cottage around Nidaros/Uppsala
IBT: Nothing
Turn 7(295BC): Construction>Alpha Nidaros Spear>Rax Library Rushed in El Dorado
IBT: Archer dies attacking our Axe in IronSheep. Confuscianism founded in a far away land
Turn 8(280BC): El Dorado Library>Catapult: grows to size 4
IBT: Gandhi converts to Confuscianism and adopts Org Rel. I think he's building the Great Library himself...I suppose that's kinda a good thing?
Turn 9(265BC): IronSheep grows to size 2
IBT: Nothing
Turn 10(250BC): Nidaros Rax>Sword



Summary: We've got the Pyramids, Representation, and a high happy cap for us to grow our cities up if we desire. Rep actually gives us +3 happy for the top 5 cities :)
Alphabet due in 10 turns, then we can find out if Gandhi knows Literature yet...if he does, it may be worth ignoring it and just heading to Optics.

El Dorado grows next turn, then we'll have quite a powerhouse there. El Do, Nidaros, Uppsala all can build 1 sword/cat/axe in less than 8 turns(El Do is 4 turns, Nidaros is 3 turns, Uppsala is 7/8 turns) and all have Rax. I think we can safely begin transporting our troops down toward Khan and just leave them there until he's about to hook up his iron, or until it looks like he may get Feudalism(watch for him to research Monarchy)

Cottages have been begun near El Dorado, Nidaros, and a jungle on Sugar is being cleared near Uppsala for either a cottage or farm.

Chariot is at Ning-Hsia making sure Khan doesn't connect the only source or metal he has access to.

Our score actually barely went up as well thanks to the 5 whipped pop I had...I felt it was best to get the library finished ASAP, and since El Do regrew the next turn, we barely lost any research time.

Side note: From the graphs, it appears Real Ms. Beyond built the Pyramids around the same time period as we did.

I would propose that in our next turnset, after we've built say 2 Swords in Nidaros, or perhaps after it grows once more, we begin producing more workers...we desperately need to get cottages down, mines down, and perhaps build another city S of El Dorado...either on the river, or near the river, clearing the jungle and setting up a GP farm there.

Looking good, Thrallia! I am excited to see the words "Cottage" and "Catapult" appearing in your turnset. Sounds like our army is building up nicely.

What are the implications for our strategy of Ghandi getting the Great Library? It is quite difficult to keep thinking in terms of his victory instead of ours. I would assume that Gyathaar would have given Ghandi some difficulties to overcome. The game will surely not just work on the basis that he has some killer position where he can cruise to the stars without our help. There must be some other people standing in his way somewhere along the way.

He's probably next to a major warmonger.

As for his lands...thus far it looks very food-rich. Lots of seafood, some sheep, I've seen gold and gems for him. He's already outteching us as we know 2 techs he doesn't(math and construction), while he knows at least 6 we don't(depending on whether he knows any we can't see, which is likely).

As for him getting the Great Library...I'm certainly not opposed to it. I'd prefer we had it so we could keep up with him in tech, but I definitely prefer he build it than anyone else. He's Industrious and with Org Rel, that gives him +75% wonder building right now, if he's building it somewhere he has Confuscianism...if he has access to Marble(? is it marble or stone?) then its even higher.

I'm not entirely sure what kind of land Gandhi will have, but I suspect it will be research strong but production poor...I think he may have given Gandhi good land considering the difficulties faced in the Civ3 version of this SGOTM(refusing to settle off his 1 tile island, refusing to build apollo program, refusing to build spaceship parts)

You ARE a veteran of this stuff. How do you stay interested for so long?

What do we do if Gandhi simply refuses to go into space? I'm sure that wouldn't happen. He always does in my games. He seems to be going along nicely at the moment so there must be Montezuma or someone similar perched on his doorstep to cause him problems.

Good to see our Power Graph starting to trend upwards.

Well the problem we could run into in this game is that he will go for a cultural victory. If that happens, we simply raze that city. All the AI's seem to like to build the ship in this game.

As for the Great Lib, I would rather we build it, and let him take it as most AI start to slow down in the mid game at this level since that is the only way we can assure that he will get the benefits down the road instead of some one else building it. Of coarse we too will benefit from it. I do not have it yet. But will right after this. Will post my game plan in 24 hrs.

What do we do if Gandhi simply refuses to go into space? I'm sure that wouldn't happen. He always does in my games.

Well the problem we could run into in this game is that he will go for a cultural victory. If that happens, we simply raze that city. All the AI's seem to like to build the ship in this game.

AIUI the AI is hard coded to go for space with, I believe, Diplo as a fallback option.

I have never seen the AI go for cultural victory. Does that actually happen?

Looking forward to hearing the big plan, Htadus, and seeing our graphs go through the roof! Unless that is not the plan, of course.......

I have never seen the AI go for cultural victory. Does that actually happen?

I've only heard of it happening in Better AI mod games.

You ARE a veteran of this stuff. How do you stay interested for so long?

What do we do if Gandhi simply refuses to go into space? I'm sure that wouldn't happen. He always does in my games. He seems to be going along nicely at the moment so there must be Montezuma or someone similar perched on his doorstep to cause him problems.

Good to see our Power Graph starting to trend upwards.

*shrug* I bought Civ4 at launch, got Warlords shortly after its launch. I don't get time to play more than a game or two per month, but all of them are W/GOTMs and the SGOTMs, so I've learned quite a lot since I started them. As for all this analytical stuff...that's just something I've always been good at...and having a good amount of factual knowledge about the game just helps me analyze it more accurately.

It's a good thing that Gandhi is teching so fast, but we need to be able to keep up with him or something may go wrong later on and we'll be unable to stop it.

It looks like Khan gets into some serious trouble. :hammer:

Very nice we got the Pyramids. :goodjob:

I will have a look at the save this evening.

@Thrallia - Looks like a nice productive turnset. :goodjob:

I'm not entirely sure why we're chopping jungle atm, especially on land that can easily be pillaged?

Khan's trireme shows he obviously has sailing so our food by Nidaros is likely to go when we attack him. It also means we have to watch out for seaborne invasions so we'll have to be careful about maintaining our garrisons. It looks like Khan has founded another city to the N of Chehalis so it's probably a good idea to send our warrior to see what's there.

The military looks much better although we're still pretty thin on the ground. On the research front Currency, on the way to CoL, would be a good after Alpha. Hopefully we can fill in the gaps in the tree, including Sailing, from Khan.

I'm not entirely sure why we're chopping jungle atm, especially on land that can easily be pillaged?

The military looks much better although we're still pretty thin on the ground. On the research front Currency, on the way to CoL, would be a good after Alpha. Hopefully we can fill in the gaps in the tree, including Sailing, from Khan.

The jungle chop will help even without any improvment. But we should either farm it or cottage it. Farm may be best for the moment for 4 food.

I think we need to chop a forest in Iron city to complete the Lib and build a cottage. I would rush a grainary just before that city grow to 3 and let any overflow go to a Rax. I will continue building units for my turn set. Currency is a good choice for me at the moment but I only got to look at the file for a brief time. I will post if I see any changes needed.

We do need to get a war plan going. I see a horse pillage team and a town capture/raze team starting at the iron city and going CW. I am not a fan of the Mongol Capital site or the city by the marble. They both need to move north. I do like the Iron city site and would not mind keeping it. We should leave them with 2 cities for another extortion round after the first war. The low production coastal town and another would be ideal.

I kinda liked the Mongol capital...it looks like a potential powerhouse with all those floodplains.

As for the jungle, yes, I decided to chop the jungle instead of just building a farm or cottage, partly because I didn't know which we'd want(it is a river tile, thus would give +3 commerce immediately if cottage and +4 food if farm) and because it doesn't take any extra time to chop then build than it does to just build. It also gets rid of the jungle unhealthiness faster...I learned that from Simon last SGOTM.

I agree that chopping jungle then improving is usually slightly better than starting the improvement on the jungle itself.

Well since there are no other comments for the moment, I will play later. I will set science to zero for turn 0 and on next turn with the new pop in ElDo, I should be able to run science at 100% until We learn Alphabet. Since there is no way of assuring Gandhi will build the GLib, we need to try. With Marble within the radius of our next city :), we should be able to build it in the cap rather fast. Any ways, I will stop at that point to see what all others think. Currency still is a good choice and so is CoL. Since we will not have Marble available soon, we might as well go for currency. Then again, we won't be able to build a market for a while due to troop buildup.......ok time to go to bed.:crazyeye: Has any one learned Col yet.....I am out

@Thrallia - The reason I would like to move the Mongol Cap one north is to give it 3 - 4hammer tiles while still retaining a ton of food and commerce, and speed up the construction of all the needed building and units. And leave room for another city to be placed to use the sheep to the south. And we will not get a city with a lot of population saying they want to join the motherland. And no more ands.:D

Confuscianism was founded by Gandhi during my turnset...so I'd assume Gandhi already has CoL ;)

The main reason I would support CoL next is to enable us to keep Khan's cities if desired without destroing our economy completely. We would just whip Courthouses in them ASAP

So Caravels are a bit of a way off then?

So what exactly is the plan for Khan? As we're playing Warlords it seems to me that we have four options:


Eliminate Khan.
Damage Khan enough to vassalise him.
Fight a limited war to take out the two cities to the west and the two cities to the east, which might turn out to be the same as option 2.
Build a big enough military with the option of following option 3 if Khan attacks us and live in relative harmony with Khan for the time being.


The discussions so far seem to indicate option 1. Is that really the best idea? The majority of our cities are going to be tied up building military for quite a while and our science will not be that brilliant. Option 2 seems better although we will still be focusing on war for some time and who knows how long it will take for Khan to capitulate? Option 3 has advantages although since we will probably want to keep Chehalis and Ning-Hsia to stop Khan settling those areas again we will suffer unhappiness. Option 4 still means some focus on military since we can't trust Khan that much and Khan is likely to be more difficult to take out in the future.

I can't say that I'm that keen on option 1 as it distracts us from cracking on with research and discovering the other civs. OTOH all the other options have a downside as well.

I'm raising the subject now so that we can consider how much the current course of action will impact on our subsequent game before we are committed.

Just quick thought - I don't think we can take any vassals this game. WE know the war with Gandhi is "fake" but any vassal we have will also be at war with thim and if they have any power at all could give him a hard time.

Just quick thought - I don't think we can take any vassals this game. WE know the war with Gandhi is "fake" but any vassal we have will also be at war with thim and if they have any power at all could give him a hard time.

Ack! That's a good point. Spot the person who hasn't played too many games on Warlords. :blush:

MInd you I still think we need to consider whether or not the disruption caused by attacking is worth it. After all that leaves us without any trading partners until we can contact the other civs.

Speaking of which I hope Htdatus moved the WB to explore Ghandhi's lands.

The main reason I would support CoL next is to enable us to keep Khan's cities if desired without destroing our economy completely. We would just whip Courthouses in them ASAP

I agree that CoL's good. Not only for the courthouses but for the Caste civic. However unless we can trade for the religious techs then we probably have to go for Currency first anyway. Which raises the quezstion of what we would trade for those religious techs. If Khan doesn't know IW then would we really want him to know about the iron by Ning-Hsia?

However Currency is also good to make the most of the gold.

I think we should play the Khan military thing by ear and see how it goes. I think that we need to be capable of eliminating him if it seems like he'll just be too painful to have hanging around.

Ugh, we are far away from eliminating Khan. We can and should damage him, but I do not think we can take him out of the game. We should raze some cities, but we are far away from finishing him.

It is really hard to see too far into the future until we have met and assessed the state of the other hitherto unknown civilisations. Until then, we need to be satisfied with strengthening our own position, controlling Khan's threat, and developing the ability to go and explore the world.

I personally would prefer we not destroy Khan, but we do want to keep him from becoming a threat. Here's my thoughts on what we can do to him:

1. Eliminate him completely
1a. Keep his cities, this would likely require CoL to remove the distance penalties and enalbe us to build the Forbidden Palace in his lands
1b. Raze all his cities. This will remove him and allow us to avoid distance penalties, leaving his lands open for major barbs and later a vacation from our lands to allow Gandhi some major tech/production increases

2. Vassalize him
2a. Take the minimum number of cities to vassalize him and hope to use him as a trade partner whom we can essentially control the research of. Requires Feudalism and possibly CoL since to vassalize him we'll need to keep his cities so he doesn't suddenly expand enough to throw off our reign.
2b. Take him out to a single city and then vassalize him, essentially removing him from the game, but giving us an AI for Gandhi to focus on rather than us militarily. Requires Feudalism

3. Limited war to keep him a non-threat
3a. This would require removing his iron access and possibly his horse access. Then he'd be stuck with archers until Feudalism. Unfortunately he wouldn't be a trade partner afterward unless he is the one that declared on us. It would though leave open the option of taking him down later with him being militarily inept still

4. Be Peaceful toward him
4a. We'd need to keep a strong standing army and not get complacent in keeping it strong, but we probably need one anyway. It'd give us a trading partner, especially if we got friendly with him, and would leave open the option to migrate down later as long as we kept our army strong.


We do need to eventually move down to the Khan's land, but I'm not convinced we need to preemptively take him out. I do believe he can't be allowed to get dangerous, which may mean early war on him.

*sigh* This could be a major decision where various teams get split on. Peace or no peace with Khan? I would tend to say peace, but we'll need his land anyway, so after a round or two of tech trading it may be best off to just raze him out and leave his land open for our later migration.

I think that's my vote...We attempt to build the Great Library, we continue building up our army, which I think is nearly large enough to declare war on him now, set up a GP farm somewhere(I'm not sure where....I don't think we've found a good spot yet? perhaps in the area that Chehalis is), and start migrating our army south. We've got a number of spears ready already, we can use our first round of swords on the barb city to get them to CR2, then send them south without cats and axes, and I think within 30 or 40 turns we could be ready to wipe Khan out.

Summary: We learned Alph and started Currency. We have more units and some have already move down south. When Nidaros grow in 2 turns, it will be able to build a sword or a cat every 3 turn. Kahn settled another city (Tabriz), we should let it grow and when the time is right take it for keeps. This also made it impossible for us to go the peace route. Gods of War here we come.

My Battle Plan: Considering having three groups out at first when we assult. I placed an axe and a spear on a tile labeled Pillage team. I would add the Chariot and a sword in New Saria to it. We should get them to the Horses in 4 turns and the chariot can pillage it that turn. Then I would send them to the city east of Kara. On the other side of Karakuram, I labeled a tile called Assult/block. That team should move to the Forsted hill to east when we DoW. His forces are going to gather to protect the capital and we can block some of them for a while. Next Our city raid team should start at the marble to attack and raze New Sarai on the second turn with the main assult force of at least 2 cats and 4 swords. Once that is done, they can join the pillaging team to take the city east of Kara. And on to the next city.

0250 BC (Turn 150) Reduce Science to zero for this turn.

0235 BC (Turn 151) Move War south, Chariot to look at the Kands cap. Moved the WB to find a Gandhi's Trireme waiting, pulled WB back. Set science to 100%, Education in 7 turns. Mm Nidaros to grow in 2 and finish Sword in 2. Rush lib in Ironcity.

0220 BC (Turn 152) ElDo completes Cat and start Sword. Moving cat, Spear and an Axe to south. Upps complete Axe and start Sword. Move Axe south. Iron city start Grainary. The Trireme is still waiting outside of Kahns border. Taking the WB back to the red border. Moving worker to improve Iron city.

0205 BC (Turn 153) Nidaros: Sword>Cat. Units move south. Chariot is returning to iron site from Karakorum. Worker move to chop forest for IronCity. Fabeled Samarkahnd, Kahns new city, is defended with 3 archers.

0190 BC (Turn 154) Units Moving South and see 2 of Kahns Archers near by. Just Noticed Stonehenge in Bombay and he just got a GProphet.

0175 BC (Turn 155) Complete jungle chop. Mm Upps to use new tile. Grow fast. Science to 0.

0160 BC (Turn 156) Set Science to 100%. If Kahn Make a demand and we say no, he is in position to kill one of our workers. Worker building cottage for Upps.

0145 BC (Turn 157) Barb galley's are near Kahns iron city; still no mining activity. There are 4 workers near kahns Gem cities.

0130 BC (Turn 158) Kahn is about to place a city near Upps. Our forces are near the target area for future endevors. Mm Nidaros to grow and build a sword in 3. Once this city grow, it can be a 3 turn (20 hpt) sword or cat factory by using the 3 hammer hill or a mine. Had to reduce Science to 60%. (I did some thing wrong with my math)

0115 BC (Turn 159) Learn Alpa and start Currency. We are missing a few Prereq for CoL. We are at half a million pop. Mm Iron SHeep to grow and build grainary in 4 turns. Hope this will still give us the half full grainary. Gandhi has five techs on us and we have math over him. Kahn does not have Alpha. Setting Science to zero.

0100 BC (Turn 160) Iron Sheep radius grow, exposing the Barb city. There are 3 warriors in there and Kahns two archers are heading there. ElDo built the sword, so he is following the archers and I pulled out the warrior from Nidaros to go to Iron Sheep so the Axe can go with the archers to the Barb city and hopefully the sword will catch up in time to take down that city. I have had some luck with this method with just one axe. I wait for the 2 archers to attack and once the city is down to just 1 warrior, my axe attack. Started a chariot in ElDo, we can change it to a Sword.

Session Turn Log from 250 BC to 100 BC:

Turn 153, 205 BC: St. Patrick (Great Prophet) has been born in Bombay (Gandhi)!

Turn 156, 160 BC: The Kong Miao has been built in a far away land!

Turn 158, 130 BC: Clearing a Forest has created 44 ? for Iron Sheep.
Turn 158, 130 BC: You have discovered Alphabet!

Turn 159, 115 BC: The borders of Iron Sheep have expanded!

Thrallia
Htadus- just played
Sam- UP
Jenarie- on deck
Mark
Harbourboy


The Save
http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm4/Geezers_SG004_BC0100_01.CivWarlordsSave

wow he's in a hurry to expand.

Why are you using the old-style foreign advisor? Why not switch to the new and improved advisor you have access to thanks to the HOF mod? :)

If Khan doesn't have Alpha and is willing to trade with us, perhaps we should trade him Alpha for everything he'll give us(sailing is the most important) and then see what else he might have hidden behind that.

Also, binary research doesn't exist in Warlords...they changed it to include decimals when calculating commerce/research/culture so that there isn't any extra beakers lost or gained when going 0%/100%

Also, binary research doesn't exist in Warlords...they changed it to include decimals when calculating commerce/research/culture so that there isn't any extra beakers lost or gained when going 0%/100%

Dooh. Now you tell me. :) :thanx: This should speed my game.

Other Team Updates:
Peanut, CDZ, Trash Team, Murky Waters all built wonders between 1300BC and 1000BC.

Fistful of Dynamite had a huge culture boost before 3000BC, I assume they founded Hinduism

Murky Waters and Peanut began building up their militaries massively at the same time we did.

At the point when Htadus submitted our save, we are more powerful than any of our competitors...that gives us the ability to be fairly certain that no one else has started warring Khan yet, unless they are doing so with a weaker army than we are.

T-minus 20-30 turns until we must war Khan if we want to make it quick and painless.

3. Limited war to keep him a non-threat
3a. This would require removing his iron access and possibly his horse access. Then he'd be stuck with archers until Feudalism. Unfortunately he wouldn't be a trade partner afterward unless he is the one that declared on us. It would though leave open the option of taking him down later with him being militarily inept still



My choice. It will keep indian Navy from being a problem for a while.

T-minus 20-30 turns until we must war Khan if we want to make it quick and painless.

Man.....Did Mark plan this? in 23 turns the cap alone can give us 8 swords or cats. He get to DoW. Lucky Bas.....:D

Well played, Htadus. So much can happen in just 10 turns. Khan is always that expansive in my experience. That is why his economy is always so rubbish and why he never has the tech lead that Gandhi always does, but it is why he will always be a pain until we can get him under control.

Looking forward to seeing what Sam can do now with this position. It's all starting to get very interesting.

Good progress Htadus. :goodjob:

Ok team, I return to my previous question. What's our plan for Khan?

Htadus obviously feels we want war soon. Thrallia seems to be of a similar mind. Does everyone else agree? If so, then what type of war? To the death or limited? If the latter then which cities do we want to capture or raze?

Trade wise should we give Alpha for Khan's techs? Of those on offer ISTM that only sailing is really needed and we can research that in three turns. Is it worth trading?

I'm assuming that we want to keep Yayoi. Am I correct? I won't play before tomorrow evening at the earliest as I would like to receive thoughts on our way forward and just what our targets are. If we're not going to be warring soon then a worker or two and a library in Nidaros would be very nice. Otherwise I shall just go for military.

I feel that we do need to war soon in order to create more spare space for cities and growth to the south. Once started, my vote is to carry on until we reach the point that we need to stop to rebuild economy or armies. So the decision on how to far to take it will depend on how well the initial campaign goes (and how the Random Number Gods treat us).

I'm not yet decided on targets for Khan. He has a lot of land in the jungle which would be a bit painful to deal with until cleared. Ideally we would let him clear some of it for us, but I think it would be good to be able to get rid of the western cities like Samarqand in order to have a more manageable war front with him. Maybe we need to raze Samarqand early-ish so we don't have to defend that flank. Cutting him off from resources is another priority. I'll leave it up to you guys to decide which of his cities are best to keep as we go along.

I'm not sure about tech trading with Khan. What is the downside of trading for something like sailing.

Not sure about Yayoi. How much of a maintenance burden would it be compared to the benefits of another city up there?

Thinking about what Thrallia said about trading Alph for any techs Kahn will trade seem to be a good Idea.

I have been mongering lately and I noticed that when a civ is down to the last couple of cities, they are willing to part with more technologies. But as previously said by Thrallia, they will choose to go extinct over giving any techs if you redeclare on them.

My goals are:
Take away all cities North of Karakurum, including Kar. Leave Kahn with 2 coastal cities to Southwest, unless we want stone. At that point we offer peace to Kahn for all his techs and if he refuses, take out one of the 2 remaining cities. He will most likely give what he know by then. But anywhere down the road if we are slowing our science and the war is not progressing well we need to pow wow.

Most of his cities are protected by 2 archers while others are with 3. If we have the CR group supported by about 4 cats, even the cities with culture will go down after two turns of bombardment.

My recent exploits showed me that if I go after high culture city without cats and without 3 to 1 odds in favor, I can not take the city. Since most cities of his have no culture, just swords can take those cities with 2 to 1 odds. This war should only take as long as getting troups to the attack points.

My initial, war plan was thinking about attacking in about 10 turns, If we are going to attack in 20+ turns, we should also have another team go after the Iron city right when we dow since we will have the forces needed.

I would only keep his iron city and Tabriz and settle a replacement city one tile north of Karakurum and another by samarkahnd and Chehalis. See attached map.

I am in favor of keeping the Barb city and making it our GP farm but it may become an additional city to keep in mind during the war.

Sam: I was bringing back the warrior to ElDo for security back up. Also if you do not change the tiles worked in Iron City, please take a notice when it grow and build the grainary, if we get a half full grainary. Thanks.

I like all those ideas. Let's do it.

Good progress Htadus. :goodjob:

Ok team, I return to my previous question. What's our plan for Khan?

Htadus obviously feels we want war soon. Thrallia seems to be of a similar mind. Does everyone else agree? If so, then what type of war? To the death or limited? If the latter then which cities do we want to capture or raze?
I'd say we limit him to just a few cities, give peace for techs, then eliminate him a little later. If he isn't willing to give techs though, perhaps just eliminate him to prevent him from attacking our backs while we begin defending from Gandhi.

Trade wise should we give Alpha for Khan's techs? Of those on offer ISTM that only sailing is really needed and we can research that in three turns. Is it worth trading?

All the techs are worthwhile, but only sailing is needed right now. However, every turn saved by trading for it is worth even more. He won't be around for very long, trading with him won't impact our trade ability with any other AI(if the AI haven't met us, they don't care about his trades, and Gandhi will not be a trading partner anyway), and trading him alphabet or any other non-military tech won't help him deter the end that is coming :hammer:

In other words...yes, it is most definitely worth it. Plus, by trading just Alpha for anything he'll give us now, we can see what else he knows that we can trade for the next turn.

I'm assuming that we want to keep Yayoi. Am I correct? I won't play before tomorrow evening at the earliest as I would like to receive thoughts on our way forward and just what our targets are. If we're not going to be warring soon then a worker or two and a library in Nidaros would be very nice. Otherwise I shall just go for military.

I suppose we could keep Yayoi, I hadn't even thought about that yet lol. I think we do need to war Khan soon and that it will likely begin during mark's turnset lol simply because he'll be so easy to take down right now. His Keshiks and archers are no match for our already accumulated axes, swords, and spears. I'd say that we could almost declare war on him now since most of his cities have no cultural defenses, but I think we should position our strike forces before declaring.

As for the strategy...I'd personally ignore his northern cities since they have no resources or production and they'd just distract us from his core cities. I'd actually be willing to leave them as his leftovers when we try to extract techs from him. That'd let us concentrate entirely on his core and hit him quick and hard later when we took him out for good.

Man.....Did Mark plan this? in 23 turns the cap alone can give us 8 swords or cats. He get to DoW. Lucky Bas.....:D

Of course. I have to keep the tradition. :lol:

I like the alpha trading thing. It is definitely worth it.

So, go Sam, give me a nice army to play with. :D

Ok, I'll play in an hour or so. Plan is to build military, keep Yayoi should it fall into our hands :mischief: and trade Alpha to Khan for all his techs.

Sounds good. I think the timing will be nice for Mark to start the party with Khan during his turnset. Give Mark an army. That'll test his character......

Summary

Life just got more complicated. :( Ghandhi landed a force by El Dorado-sala. Khan has started building Keshiks. Traded Alpha for Sailing & Archery. Captured Yayoi.

Turn 160 - 100 BC
Traded Alpha for Sailing & Archery. HBR is still so expensive that this was the only trade possible that included Sailing even if I included Mysticism.
Turn 161 - 85 BC
Ghandhi lands a sword and archer by El Do. :eek: Move sword on pigs to El Do. Rush chariot in El Do. Perhaps a bit of a :smoke: move but I've suffered bad RNG in the past in this type of situation. Nidaros Sword -> Chariot. Moved sword to pigs. MM IronSheep to grow before granary finishes. Khan also knows Calendar but won't trade.
IBT:
Ghadhi sword pillages gold mine. :mad: Archer moves to another gold mine.
Turn 162 - 70 BC
El Do Chariot -> Axe. Sword on pigs moves to El Do. Warrior reaches El Do. Kill Ghandhi archer with sword (0.2/6). Khan now knows Calendar & Currency but won't trade either.
IBT:
Ghandi sword kills our sword on the gold mine.
Turn 163 - 55 BC
Nidaros Chariot -> Catapult. Kill Ghandhi sword with a sword (0.3/6). Whip the granary (1 turn left) in IronSheep.
Turn 164 - 40 BC
IronSheep Granary -> Worker. Khan now has a Keshik & 2 archers in New Sarai. Keshik heading owards Tabriz. Kahn's archers killed one warrior in Yayoi and inured another. Kill a warrior with axe.
Turn 165 - 25 BC
Kill last warrior in Yayoi and capture it.
Turn 166 - 10 C
Nada.
Turn 167 - 5 AD
Nidaros catapult -> Sword.
Turn 168 - 20 AD
El Do Axe -> Spear. Both Ghandhi & Khan have a trireme to the N of Yayoi.
Turn 169 - 35 AD
Both Ghandhi & Khan's triremes move south.
Turn 170 - 50 AD
Nidaros Sword -> Sword, Uppsala Sword -> Spear. As Ghandhi's trireme is heading towards Nidaros we may want to rush a trireme in Nidaros to protect our sea resources.



Turn 160 (100 BC)
Tech learned: Sailing
Tech learned: Archery
Nidaros grows: 8
Nidaros finishes: Swordsman

Turn 161 (85 BC)
Nidaros begins: Catapult
Spearman promoted: Combat II
Nidaros begins: Chariot
El Dorado-sala finishes: Chariot
Iron Sheep grows: 2

Turn 162 (70 BC)
El Dorado-sala begins: Axeman
Swordsman promoted: City Raider I
Swordsman defeats (0.24/6): Indian Archer
Chariot promoted: Combat I
Nidaros finishes: Chariot
Uppsala grows: 7
Swordsman loses to: Indian Swordsman (6.00/6)

Turn 163 (55 BC)
Nidaros begins: Catapult
Swordsman promoted: Shock
Swordsman defeats (0.30/6): Indian Swordsman
El Dorado-sala's borders expand
Uppsala finishes: Chariot
Iron Sheep finishes: Granary

Turn 164 (40 BC)
Uppsala begins: Swordsman
Iron Sheep begins: Worker
Axeman promoted: City Raider I
Axeman defeats (3.20/5): Barbarian Warrior

Turn 165 (25 BC)
Axeman defeats (3.20/5): Barbarian Warrior
Captured Yayoi (Barbarian)
Yayoi begins: Granary

Turn 166 (10 BC)
Nidaros finishes: Catapult
El Dorado-sala grows: 6

Turn 167 (5 AD)
Nidaros begins: Swordsman
El Dorado-sala finishes: Axeman

Turn 168 (20 AD)
El Dorado-sala begins: Spearman

Turn 169 (35 AD)
Nidaros grows: 9
Nidaros finishes: Swordsman
Uppsala finishes: Swordsman

Turn 170 (50 AD)
Nidaros begins: Swordsman
Uppsala begins: Spearman


Turn 160, 100 BC: You have discovered Sailing!
Turn 160, 100 BC: You have discovered Archery!
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman (6.60) vs Gandhi's Archer (4.50)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Combat Odds: 86.6%
Turn 162, 70 BC: (Extra Combat: -10%)
Turn 162, 70 BC: (Plot Defense: +25%)
Turn 162, 70 BC: (Hills: +25%)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 16 (84/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Gandhi's Archer is hit for 24 (76/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Gandhi's Archer is hit for 24 (52/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 16 (68/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 16 (52/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Gandhi's Archer is hit for 24 (28/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 16 (36/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 16 (20/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 16 (4/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Gandhi's Archer is hit for 24 (4/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Gandhi's Archer is hit for 24 (0/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman has defeated Gandhi's Archer!
Turn 162, 70 BC: Gandhi's Swordsman (6.00) vs Geezers's Swordsman (0.32)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Combat Odds: 100.0%
Turn 162, 70 BC: (Extra Combat: +10%)
Turn 162, 70 BC: (Plot Defense: +25%)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 23 (0/100HP)
Turn 162, 70 BC: Gandhi's Swordsman has defeated Geezers's Swordsman!
Turn 163, 55 BC: Geezers's Swordsman (6.60) vs Gandhi's Swordsman (6.00)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Combat Odds: 68.1%
Turn 163, 55 BC: (Extra Combat: -10%)
Turn 163, 55 BC: (Plot Defense: +25%)
Turn 163, 55 BC: (Combat: -25%)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Gandhi's Swordsman is hit for 20 (80/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Gandhi's Swordsman is hit for 20 (60/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Gandhi's Swordsman is hit for 20 (40/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 19 (81/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 19 (62/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Gandhi's Swordsman is hit for 20 (20/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 19 (43/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 19 (24/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Geezers's Swordsman is hit for 19 (5/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Gandhi's Swordsman is hit for 20 (0/100HP)
Turn 163, 55 BC: Geezers's Swordsman has defeated Gandhi's Swordsman!
Turn 163, 55 BC: The borders of El Dorado-sala have expanded!
Turn 164, 40 BC: Geezers's Axeman (5.50) vs Barbarian's Warrior (2.10)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Combat Odds: 99.9%
Turn 164, 40 BC: (Extra Combat: -10%)
Turn 164, 40 BC: (Plot Defense: +25%)
Turn 164, 40 BC: (Fortify: +25%)
Turn 164, 40 BC: (City Defense: +25%)
Turn 164, 40 BC: (City Attack: -20%)
Turn 164, 40 BC: (Combat: -50%)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Geezers's Axeman is hit for 12 (88/100HP)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 31 (69/100HP)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 31 (38/100HP)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Geezers's Axeman is hit for 12 (76/100HP)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Geezers's Axeman is hit for 12 (64/100HP)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 31 (7/100HP)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 31 (0/100HP)
Turn 164, 40 BC: Geezers's Axeman has defeated Barbarian's Warrior!
Turn 165, 25 BC: Geezers's Axeman (3.52) vs Barbarian's Warrior (0.48)
Turn 165, 25 BC: Combat Odds: 100.0%
Turn 165, 25 BC: (Extra Combat: -10%)
Turn 165, 25 BC: (Extra Combat: +10%)
Turn 165, 25 BC: (Plot Defense: +25%)
Turn 165, 25 BC: (Fortify: +25%)
Turn 165, 25 BC: (City Defense: +25%)
Turn 165, 25 BC: (City Attack: -20%)
Turn 165, 25 BC: (Combat: -50%)
Turn 165, 25 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 34 (0/100HP)
Turn 165, 25 BC: Geezers's Axeman has defeated Barbarian's Warrior!
Turn 165, 25 BC: You have captured Yayoi!!!
Turn 167, 5 AD: The enemy has been spotted near El Dorado-sala!
Turn 168, 20 AD: The enemy has been spotted near El Dorado-sala!
Turn 168, 20 AD: Nidaros will grow to size 9 on the next turn
Turn 168, 20 AD: Nidaros will become unhealthy on the next turn
Turn 169, 35 AD: The enemy has been spotted near El Dorado-sala!
Turn 169, 35 AD: The enemy has been spotted near Yayoi!
Turn 169, 35 AD: Nidaros has grown to size 9
Turn 169, 35 AD: Nidaros has become unhealthy
Turn 169, 35 AD: Antoine Laurent Lavoisier (Great Scientist) has been born in a far away land!
Turn 169, 35 AD: A Forest has grown near Iron Sheep!
Turn 170, 50 AD: The enemy has been spotted near El Dorado-sala!
Turn 170, 50 AD: The enemy has been spotted near Iron Sheep!


EDIT: Forgot to mention I saw an archer on Khan's horses earlier. Also there is at least one more Keshik about.

Oh dear. Things are never simple. How would you sum up our current position then?

Oh dear. Things are never simple. How would you sum up our current position then?

Khan building Keshiks means the planned attack will not be quite so easy as hoped. The Keshiks mean we are more at risk of pillaging especially in El Do and Uppsala. Ghandhi's attack means we'll have to leave enough forces to defend against him, certainly in El Do but maybe also in Yayoi and IronSheep, as well as against Khan. This will impact on the amount of military we need and hence how soon we move against Khan

Is the plan still to declare on Khan? I'm not big on war but I have no good reasons in this case so have just been quiet until I could think of something worthwhile to say which never happened. :)

Am I up or Mark did you want to go next? Not sure if you were swapping us since people were talking about Sam building you an army but maybe plan was for me to defend vs Gandhi while continuing to build your Khan army and you do the attack? I really prefer not to declare in my turn which is good cause I don't think we are ready anyway. :)

Will look over everything more carefully later just wanted to check on Khan so I have the overal plan in mind when looking at the save.

I did not expect harmless little peace loving Gandhi to attack us so soon, but then again, I have never played him under permanent war conditions before.

Oh dear. Looks like the Real Ms Beyond encounter some sort of military difficulties as well. Look at the big dip in their power graph.

It is not bad as I thought it was going to be. Good save at ElDo Sam :goodjob: , it could have been worst :eek: . Is that a new galley there or typical AI galley still waiting?

Well seeing another Keshick is not that bad. Our Spears are 8 vs 6 against them and if promoted with shock it is 8 vs 7.5 in our favor. They do not get any defense bonus'. so a spear can attack them on a forested/jungle hill and still get the same odds.

Cities
Upsala need to be mm to either grow in 4 and finish spear in 5 or grow in 6 and finish spear in 4. It is not using its best tiles.

We should mm Cap as a 20 hpt city and still grow. If anything we should build a UB there, but for the moment I am ok if they pillage the seafood. We only loose 2 food. I would wait on the trireme. But I take silly risks.

Yayoui should be mm to grow in 9 turns and the grainary rushed with 2 pop when it grows and let the next build benefit from it. However, if we let it grow as is and rush it in 11 turns, the next build will get alot more hammers. Either way is good.

Workers:
North need a pasture and cottage for Iron-Sheep and a farm and a mine for Yayoui
Cap and Upps need another mine each. Maybe chop the 3 hammer hill and build a settler with it.

War:

We should let Jenarie build more units and defend as need for the next ten turns. Set up Mark to DoW.
We are going to need to place a spear and another unit just south of the mntn by Upps for defense.
A few turns before we dow, we should raze roads outside of Kahns cultural borders to limit horse access just for 4 cities just in case they want to rush keshicks. Especially Old Sarai.
Attack with at least 2 teams. One on New Sarai and another on the cap or Turfan. If we can build a road, send a team to those Gem cities. We already have enough for 2 teams. My biggest concern is if he build cats. So we should use more than one tile when attacking cap or Turfan since it will take a few turns to drop the culture defense.
We need to remember to promote one of the units with medic 1 of needed.

Captured Cities:
We should Raze New Sarai, Chechils and Samarkahnd and place a new city to work the gems immidiately.
Perhaps we can keep the capital and cities to east of the capital. They have enough income as it is to be a too much of a burden. But Karakurum have very little production capacity.
We all know this but lets not forget and pillage villages.:p Happened to me recently trying to pillage a road.:cry:

Good set, Sam :goodjob:

@Jenarie : you are up.

Sooner or later Gandhi would have landed. Maybe we should try to get 1 or 2 triremes there to sink the galleys before they can drop units.

Have to check the save tonight.

Is that a new galley there or typical AI galley still waiting?

That's the galley that brought Ghandhi's force. It's just been sitting there ever since. Ghandhi still has that wretched trireme sitting further south and of course there's the trireme on the eastern side that's bound to pillage our resources by Nidaros. We'll need to do something about Ghandhi's navy. :hammer:

Good job taking out Gandhi's offensive, Sam! :)

His navy is frustrating...it keeps us from continuing our explorations and is distracting us from the more immediate goal.

Khan should be dealt with before we deal with Gandhi's navy. We only have 1 sea resource and as Htadus says, we can live without it for awhile. It is more important to gather our forces for a strike on Khan before he can go from building Keshiks, which we can fairly easy deal with, to Longbows or metal-based troops.

For now, I think we should concentrate on building Swords, Cats, and protective Spears.

on a side note: my internet at home is down again :( stupid ISP...I'm not sure how long it will be, if it isn't up again on its own in another day or two I'll call in a technician. Luckily I have the school internet during the week, but if it doesn't get fixed fast I'll be MIA this weekend again.

It all adds to the excitement. Hope Jenarie is looking forward to more thrills and spills!

Looking at the save right now. It is unusual for me to not have archers in my cities - makes it harder to determine which troops are homeguard and which are for the offensive. Just a thought... since we traded for archery and have it now what if we make archers and used all our current troops for Khan? Archers are much cheaper to make then what we have guarding the cities and in production.

Still looking in detail and re-reading over thread but curious what people think ab