I favor playing it out too. This is a big challenge, and I think there will be a lot to learn watching you play such a tough challenge. I think you should stick to the REX plan and not sidetrack onto the Hanging Gardens. The pop jump will be only a mild benefit and you're going to be happy-limited so the health + is no big deal. Plus, you can easily be the largest civ and long-term that will be a big help.

For now, I'd Rex the clam-cow city, two cities using the other river, and a city for the Iron. Pump Axes from Edrine to bust that Barb city and found a replacement at the mouth of the river and another using the cow and two fish. Then go for city expansion and courthouses. Any more cities will be too much of a research drag.

You've been getting complacent and its about time you had a tougher game. It is potentially winnable, at least one person has posted a victory (space 1899) in the spoiler thread.

You've been getting complacent and its about time you had a tougher game. It is potentially winnable, at least one person has posted a victory (space 1899) in the spoiler thread.

I hesitated to unspoil it too...

Anyway, I'm pretty sure you can still get liberalism first. Just stop to research anything else : go for CS!

+ you're going to need hordes of workers (and some settlers).
I agree with the fact that more cities = more research in your situation. Don't forget to spread confucianism.

look at it this way :
each city will give you at least 1 commerce (central tile) and 1 gold for you shrine + another commerce for trade route. That's 3 + any commerce tile or scientist you can assign. + cheap courthouses.
IMHO you should build up your empire asap.

hit the barb city before it builds walls (even if you have to temporarily pull military police). Otherwise you might have to get construction or leave it there for a long time, both unsatisfying propositions.

If you can't win the liberalism race, go for drama and music.
Or get Music with liberalism if you win it.
Either way, build up theaters, caste system artists, and start cult. bombing your 3 best cities.

Just my suggestion :mischief:

-WhistlingBear

AIs neglect paper and education, so you still have a good change for a liberalism. I recommend a switch to a caste system, but whip lighthouses, granaries, hammams and libraries before change. You can run four scientists in your capital and 2-3 in Bursa. Maybe 3-4 more in fishing village if you decide to found it. SE is your way to go until you reach liberalism.

I think that you can get at least two GS in time. First one in capital is a bit tricky, as Oracle has spoiled your GP pool. But in Bursa (or fishing village) you surely get GS. Lightbulb philo first, then self-research paper and wish for another scientist to lightbulb education. Timing is important, let Bursa finish GS. (I'm in the office so I can't check current GP points in capital.)

Edirne and Ankara could run merchants when needed with Caste system also, so you don't need currency either. In general those two cities should keep building more settlers and workes to expand. Have scientists where you can, cottagespam everything else so cities can pay their maintenance.

Research CS next. You want bureucracy soon, and maybe you want to build some cottages in capital to boost commerce then. You should also consider building Sankore, you have stone, math and lots of forests around capital. Is it worth it though? I don't know about that. You probably want to switch FR as soon as you reach liberalism to maintain good relations, but at least it would give you some GP points. And it keeps it away from AIs who have enough bonuses already.

Damn. What happened to the SE? You had Writing a little after 1000BC and you were still slow-building a library in the capital at 355BC. Why didn't you whip it much earlier? You didn't mention running scientists. They would've helped you a lot with research. You probably are doing so by now, but you really should have done that since long ago.

If you didn't want to go with an SE (which I think is necessary for Liberalism), you should have gotten started on a CE, but apparently that didn't happen either :eek:

I'm sorry, but at this point the game is looking like it will be a boring catch-up session. But to mitigate my harsh comments a little, you can probably still pull it off. You should still try for Liberalism (do not take Astronomy, that's scuicide, and don't research Monarchy on the way - you have Hammams to help you out). If you don't get it, still beeline to Democracy. Make sure you cottage spam. You should be able to catch up and surpass the AI in the late game.

You may be isolated and hideously backward, but you've been given some juicy land right on the equator.

Cultural's going to be a long hard slog unless you can pick up a couple more religions, but other victories (UN/Space) are still on the cards. Neither would make for the most exciting game since there's not much reason to expand overseas with either option, but they're both eminently winnable and would illustrate how to clamber up the tech ladder from an isolated start nicely.

Finish sailing (for lighthouses), tech to currency (once you get some more commerce going markets will help your economy more than courthouses will), build LOTS of workers and get the rest of the island settled. Go farm and HR-military police happy to grow your cities large (this also helps with rapid infrastructure whipping), as you beeline democracy. As the cities grow, cottage everywhere, use emancipation for rapid growth and a combination of deep beelining and trading to catch up with the AIs.

PS - I notice your riverside cottages are spreading in the capital. Don't forget to leave one tile farmed so that you can chain irrigation to the rice once CS is in.

cultural is virtually impossible without a great number of religions. UN also seems a bit farfetched without the GL to speed uo things though ofc that only means you cant do it as early... It is still possible to catch up as you have a nice amount of land to settle.

Sisiutil- you need to man-up here. As. Dr. Elmore Jiggle once said, there are few map problems axemen can't solve. This may be one. I would say the corollary is "...Axemen or caravels". You've got yourself in a jam. No happiness resources and no trading partner. Isn't the idea of the ALC to play to the leader's strength? You're expansive and your UU isn't around the corner. EXPAND to fill up your island, leaving the barb city for XP. Once you do that, you can hop on some galleys and expand some more until your UU's window has passed. This will give you a toehold on the other continent(s) securing your victory. Although, it's OK to lose once in a while too.

Sisiutil,
Any luck with confucianism spreading on its own ? You need the culture and the happiness to expand throughtfully your continent. Don´t leave any gaps for the Ai to set foot on, you still have time though.
As for a particular religion civic, I am not sure. You usually run OR at this time, but you would lose valuable time researching Monotheism and the benefits of running OR is less than average since you already have cheap granaries and courthouses.

There are a lot of prophets of doom around here :p , but I must agree that things aren't looking easy....
In my point of view the more acheivable victory types are space ( cottage spam, Emancipation, maybe Internet ( if needed ) and maybe Space elevator too ) and Caste system powered late Cultural victory ( the one that you described in your strategy article ( needs beeline to Philosophy and taoism is already founded :( ; also asks for Sistine chapel.... tricky) ) , and I would stick to aelf's plan: ReX, cottage, Emancipation, .... , Space.

About city sites, maybe the cow/iron spot in the north could be next, or the cow/clam in the west, or maybe near the horses in the east ( less fogbusting )

Ankara needs a lighthouse....

About the barb city ... The city placement of barbs takes in account all the resourses, so I'm betting that an oil/uranium in the desert or a coal/aluminium in the hills are waiting to be discovered. But it overlaps with the double fish city.... raze or not to raze.... well, it's your call :lol: .

I think the key to winning isolated starts is NOT to think of them as boring. In fact, it's all the more important to go on automated mode. To Aelf: I think Sisiutil went on autopilot mode, that's why he didn't rush-build the library. Don't go autopilot. Work out every meticulous detail. It'll be a shame to let this game go - the hammams are truly spectacular for this.

I still believe a liberalism-astronomy is possible, should you try hard enough. If not, but you still want to go for liberalism anyway, consider divine right. The hapiness bonus from Islam might help (trade theology from the AI once you meet them with caravels).

I really don't see how this game is lost. It's not. Monarch has launch dates of 18xx at the earliest, giving your cottages plenty of time to tech up and conquer.

It's bad, but not horrible. You have plenty of room to settle a respectable number of decent cities. I'd minimize army, go settler-worker heavy and spam cottages. Screw liberalism, go for optics instead. Cultural victory would be fun to watch, I'm really bad at those myself.

Damn. What happened to the SE? You had Writing a little after 1000BC and you were still slow-building a library in the capital at 355BC. Why didn't you whip it much earlier? You didn't mention running scientists. They would've helped you a lot with research. You probably are doing so by now, but you really should have done that since long ago.

If you didn't want to go with an SE (which I think is necessary for Liberalism), you should have gotten started on a CE, but apparently that didn't happen either :eek:

Tch, you took the words out of my mouth. The downfall came with this comment.

I also began employing the whip as my cities grew in order to hurry the infrastructure along:

You should have been whipping settlers and let buildings/units slowly build. The objective here is to REX as fast as possible, tanking research for awhile instead of slowly expanding and tanking research forever. I would suggest Sis, that you drop the research slider to 0% and settle everything you can. Then, build/whip a Worker and Courthouse in every city. Once those are completed, say goodbye to Slavery and jump to Caste System. Count on your merchants/scientists to keep you alive.

Can you replay that last set of turns perhaps?

I still believe a liberalism-astronomy is possible, should you try hard enough. If not, but you still want to go for liberalism anyway, consider divine right. The hapiness bonus from Islam might help (trade theology from the AI once you meet them with caravels).

I really don't see how this game is lost. It's not. Monarch has launch dates of 18xx at the earliest, giving your cottages plenty of time to tech up and conquer.

It's strange that you recommend cottaging up and going for Liberalism-Astronomy at the same time. Why not grab Nationalism and make a beeline to Democracy?

You should have been whipping settlers and let buildings/units slowly build.

The libraries, though, could not wait.

true about libraries, how can you expect to avoid prophets if you don't run scientists?
A change to caste system would have made it possible to slow build, though.

cultural is virtually impossible without a great number of religions.
I respectfully disagree. I won a cultural victory as Qin on Prince once, from an isolated start, with only one religion.
Damn. What happened to the SE?
The SE struck me as a non-starter due to the lack of neighbours to (a) beat up for gold and/or (b) trade lightbulbed techs with.
Sisiutil- you need to man-up here.
Right. I'm off to consume mass quantities of dead animal flesh and fermented hops-based beverages whilst watching popular sporting events clad only in my underwear. I'm leaving the toilet seat down, though, just so I can tell the divorce court judge I did something right.
Sisiutil,
Any luck with confucianism spreading on its own ?
As I recall, it spread to my 2 newest cities on its own, even before the shrine was built. I suspect I'll have to build very few missionaries.

The SE struck me as a non-starter due to the lack of neighbours to (a) beat up for gold and/or (b) trade lightbulbed techs with.

On this account you are mistaken, comrade. An SE doesn't need neighbours. Like I said, you only need to trade to backfill techs. And that can happen after you've won the Liberalism race. And you don't have to be going to war for plunder either. Specialist beakers and lightbulbing are all you need for a healthy SE.

On this account you are mistaken, comrade. An SE doesn't need neighbours. Like I said, you only need to trade to backfill techs. And that can happen after you've won the Liberalism race. And you don't have to be going to war for plunder either. Specialist beakers and lightbulbing are all you need for a healthy SE.

Thus betraying my limited experience with the SE. Maybe I should play a few more off-line games with it.

I think aelf has it right, and after reading his late-game comeback as Montezuma on Immortal I'm inclined to think you can do the same, following a similar plan. He had very few tech trading partners throughout the game, had to worry more about being invaded, and had worse traits than Mehmed for a space race win. This is very doable.
----------------
I agree with what Melior has suggested too - Bureacracy in the capital will be really helpful, and since Mehmed is Organized the high upkeep shouldn't hurt too much.
It's on the road to Liberalism, which still seems to be one of the major goals people are pushing for.

How long would it take you to research CS and what other immediate tech needs do you have?

You have a lot of young cities and a few more planned on the way - somewhere is going to have to step up and carry the research burden. I don't know how feasible it is to research Monarchy along the path to Liberalism, but if you don't you can stagnate your growth with workers, which you will need plenty of. Getting +50% production in the capital and +25%(on hammers) for Expansive means you should be able to crank them out fairly quickly.

When I think about it Mehmed has great traits and a terrific UB for this kind of situation. If the Janissaries don't feature prominently, oh well - they're another tool in an already strong toolbox.

The libraries, though, could not wait.

When I REX, I generally get all of my settlers done before worrying about infrastructure. It's a more efficient use of whips and it's more efficient for the economy. Since most of the cities will be settled at the same time, when you're ready to switch out of Slavery after whipping a worker/courthouse in your last city without them, the rest should have a Library/Market and some with a Hammam. This makes a huge impact on economy, yes, but it drastically reduces the number of turns to recover.

Thus betraying my limited experience with the SE.

Same here, as my current game shows. I only know it in theory :p

Ok, I guess I just did it recently in an offline game.

When I REX, I generally get all of my settlers done before worrying about infrastructure. It's a more efficient use of whips and it's more efficient for the economy. Since most of the cities will be settled at the same time, when you're ready to switch out of Slavery after whipping a worker/courthouse in your last city without them, the rest should have a Library/Market and some with a Hammam. This makes a huge impact on economy, yes, but it drastically reduces the number of turns to recover.

Why not run scientists and REX at the same time? Remember, the true spirit of an SE is getting benefits now rather than later, which important in winning the Liberalism race. You can't take your time to get to it.

Here's my dotmap, reasoning below.

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/3860/mehmeddotmap2rq8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Red dot should be the next city you settle. It is close, which means few maintenance fees, has cows in the first ring to work right away.

Orange Dot is the best I could do for the fishing village in the NW. Too bad you can't settle 1S where that peak is.
White X grabs the Iron and the Cow, and has the fresh water from the lake + a river to the east, so it can farm a few of those grassland tiles. On second thought, the fishing village will get the Iron in it's 3rd ring so White X should be 1E of where I put it so it can work more of those river tiles and drop a few deserts and peaks.
If you don't like White X, Black X overlaps a lot with the capital, but grabs cow and can poach rice from the capital when needed. It could potentially work cottages for the capital to take over later.

Yellow ? - I can't tell if it's on a hill or a peak. If it's a peak the city could be moved 1E , which would pick up 1 useless coast tile but that wouldn't be a big deal. It would lose 1 or 2 river tiles in its SW corner though.

Blue Dot looks like an obvious spot, you already have a warrior parked there like he's waiting for the party to come to him.
Pink is just a good commerce spot, plenty of grassland under the jungle with a few hills and a few river tiles. It fits nicely with the other spots as well.
You'll need a lot of workers for when you want to tackle pink and blue.

The NE island is kinda crappy and low on the priority list. The Yellow X's are the best I could do, they grab the most workable tiles they can. The grey > won't be workable, but at least you can chop the forest there.

I don't know what to do about that iron NE of the capital. There's not a lot of food and quite a few hills and plains. 1S of the Iron wouldn't be terrible, you'll want to fill it eventually or it will be a beachead when the other civs come knocking.

Hope you find it useful.

Instead of light yellow, I'd build a city 1 NE/ 1 NW of the Iron/cows. You'd have a nice coastal city with decent production to build the ships you'll need very badly. Plant a 2nd city east-ish of the peak to grab the wheat. You could then maybe squeeze a small city north of pink and west of your capital. Cottage its few tiles all to pieces and it will be close to the happiness cap.

Disclaimer: All this is back-of-the-envelope figuring.

Much thanks to Scaphism and Fetch for the city site suggestions! I count 11 cities on the big island and 2 on the smaller one. 13 has always been a lucky number for me (go figure!), and that's a pretty good-sized empire.

I'll get to it in the next round, following Whitefire's suggestion to REX and then recover, while researching towards Civil Service and churning out Settlers and workers. The barb city can wait for awhile.

Why not run scientists and REX at the same time? Remember, the true spirit of an SE is getting benefits now rather than later, which important in winning the Liberalism race. You can't take your time to get to it.

Yes it's valid, but as Sis found out, isolated tsarts mean fog busting is a priority. The fewer Barbs wasting your worker turns by pillaging or delaying you by forcing unit construction (that may likely be disbanded later) the better. So it's a question of direct benefits from running scientists or indirect benefits from fewer Barb hassles.

I thought a fair bit about a Cow/Iron city but it's really food poor and far from any fresh water making it difficult to irrigate. I don't think we need another coastal city either there are already plenty and there's no plan in place to take advantage of being in the coast. Maybe if the GLighthouse or Colossus came factored it it might have some merit, but I have a feeling those hammers will be spent on infrastructure instead.

Re: Tech path. I know it was said earlier but you are really low on happiness resources, but the good news is that can kind of help you streamline your research.
Calendar is not any kind of priority, nor is construction since you don't have to go to war. Normally those would be eating up beakers at this point in the game, but they don't have to for you.
Sailing is probably a good pickup for the cheap harbors and lighthouses, and after that you can be off to the liberalism races.
If you had Silver or Gems I would say Metal Casting and Forges would be warranted, but with only 1 additional happiness coming from them I'm just not sure it should be a priority. Hopefully the RNG gods are kind and gems or silver appear in one of your mines - you could use a small blessing like that with the dearth of happiness on your island.

From the map above it looks like you can fit 11 cities onto your island with 2 more on the nub the the NE. Is 11 enough to do what you need? Would the Statue of Liberty be a good goal as well?

*Edit* I meant to address the cities to the NW - I think those should wait as well. The barbs require a large force to take down, a force that is currently fogbusting to keep other barbs away. It will take a fair number or resources to settle the area up there anyways - a few workers and settlers and military to clear/garrison the area, and its far away from the area you've just expanded into. Sisiutil already said it, but I agree with waiting to move up there until you start having some extra time and hammers to devote to getting tha area up and running.

Maybe that could be the Janissary campaign? ;)

Much thanks to Scaphism and Fetch for the city site suggestions! I count 11 cities on the big island and 2 on the smaller one. 13 has always been a lucky number for me (go figure!), and that's a pretty good-sized empire.

I'll get to it in the next round, following Whitefire's suggestion to REX and then recover, while researching towards Civil Service and churning out Settlers and workers. The barb city can wait for awhile.

We have a game plan!!! Woot (http://www.woot.com/).

I have a propensity for not sticking out the tougher games, so I patiently await the next installment. ;)

/SitOnEdgeOfSeat

This is a tough and lonely platform from which to launch, but I think it is clearly your best victory strategy.

I suggest you add scientists in your capital and cottage spam there. Elsewhere build settlers and workers to REX fast. Chop everywhere as needed to get courthouses and more settlers and workers.

Liberalism will be very difficulty given this start, but you might as well try since you need all the same techs for space. Ignore military techs, ignore monarch, ignore astronomy. The AI's will come calling soon enough.

Internet is the wonder that you must get to close the remaining tech gap as we enter the space age.

With this large an island and # of cities, you have a chance for a space victory.

Last night I won a monarch game with a large island start, but I was lucky enough to find the AI's by trireme and so tech and resource trading was easy. I REX'ed my island, kept a small military, built a few wonders, and launched in 1838. The only speedbump was the absence of aluminum of my island. I had to fight one short war to capture it from an AI on a small nearby island.

You have a large enough island, but no contact with the AI's and few happiness resources. Just pray you have aluminum.

The AI's are not usually adept at coordinating space ship part construction - lets hope that proves true here. Diplomacy can also help if they can't resist the need to attack each other.

A starting point might be to grow your existing cities (no whipping, maybe the occasional chop for CH) so that a couple can divert to GS production while the others churn out settlers/workers.

You have a large enough island, but no contact with the AI's and few happiness resources. Just pray you have aluminum.

The AI's are not usually adept at coordinating space ship part construction - lets hope that proves true here. Diplomacy can also help if they can't resist the need to attack each other.

Because of the truth of the 2nd statement, I can question the 1st. I've won space race wins without aluminum, a golden age, the Three Gorges Dam, or the Space Elevator.

I think domination and conquest are out of the question, frankly, but space, cultural, or diplomatic are all on the table. But ReX comes first. My aim is to have all my cities established by the end of the next round. That might mean a little military build-up too, to get rid of that barb city.

Here's my dotmap, reasoning below.

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/3860/mehmeddotmap2rq8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)



I don't like yellow ?. It takes an area that could easily hold 2 good cities, or 3 good/decent cities, and breaks it up. Here are my alternates for that area:

http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/7758/mehmeddotmap2rq8revise1nk0.jpg

1, once the jungle was cleared, would be a cottage powerhouse, though it would grow slowly. 2 would have 8 coast tiles, thanks to the other island, and could grow quickly with the wheat, working those coastal tiles (net 0 food w/ lighthouse) for 2 :commerce: until cottages could be layed out. 3 would be optional, with a lot of overlap/ocean, but some forests and iron to at least have halfway decent production.

Or, alternative 2:
http://img48.imageshack.us/img48/8430/mehmeddotmap2rq8revise2wm0.jpg

Here, 1 would be more of a hybrid, with the iron mine and lots of cottageable jungle. 2 now has more land to work with and less ocean, but still has the wheat and some coast to hold its own until workers can cottage up. On this one, there are only 2 tiles of overlap, and one is a peak.

Re: Tech path. I know it was said earlier but you are really low on happiness resources, but the good news is that can kind of help you streamline your research.
Calendar is not any kind of priority, nor is construction since you don't have to go to war. Normally those would be eating up beakers at this point in the game, but they don't have to for you.
Sailing is probably a good pickup for the cheap harbors and lighthouses, and after that you can be off to the liberalism races.
If you had Silver or Gems I would say Metal Casting and Forges would be warranted, but with only 1 additional happiness coming from them I'm just not sure it should be a priority. Hopefully the RNG gods are kind and gems or silver appear in one of your mines - you could use a small blessing like that with the dearth of happiness on your island.
On the subject of tech, the dearth of happiness actually makes construction slightly more attractive. Colosseum's are +1 :) which isn't to be sniffed at in this sort of situation, and the +1 forges will give wouldn't hurt either.

However, if you think you'll get to CS during the REX phase with the opportunity to research those techs quickly once you're in Bureaucracy, then go for it.

On a hammer-miser tack, is it worth having one city unconnected to the trade network as a warrior pump for cheap garrisons/MPs?

On the subject of tech, the dearth of happiness actually makes construction slightly more attractive. Colosseum's are +1 :) which isn't to be sniffed at in this sort of situation, and the +1 forges will give wouldn't hurt either.

However, if you think you'll get to CS during the REX phase with the opportunity to research those techs quickly once you're in Bureaucracy, then go for it.

On a hammer-miser tack, is it worth having one city unconnected to the trade network as a warrior pump for cheap garrisons/MPs?
That's what I was thinking--take a page from aelf's recent games and bypass certain techs entirely, then backfill them later or not at all.

As for the Warriors, that's why I've hung on to all those extra ones I built for defense who are now fog-busting.

Oh no, he's taking my advice.

Just to reiterate (and make sure you're doing this right) as many cities as possible should be founded on the same turn. Since we're not worried about maturing cottages, delaying the founding of cities for 15+ turns won't cause a major problem, unless Barbs start settling. For this REX, I would suggest 5 cities. Going by the below dotmap, these 5 would cover the pinky city in the NW, the eastern red city, the SE pink and blue, and one city in the NE to fog bust, of your choosing. Then, start on a courthouse until you have a pop of 2, start on a worker, whip the worker, finish/whip the courthouse then jump to Caste System.

http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/7758/mehmeddotmap2rq8revise1nk0.jpg

Your existing cities *must* have a Library and Hammam before this point. I would almost say that Hammers are more important than commerce right now. Anyway, I would normally suggest you staying in Slavery longer, but now that you have Hammams, it's a waste to whip your large populations away on markets, grocers, etc. when they could be producing you GSs and beakers. Anyway, once you fog bust, you can go back to slow expansion. Although, make sure you claim all of the land shortly after you make first contact. Some AIs are quick to grab Astronomy after Optics and I'd hate to see a foreign city settled.

The make or break here will be how you manage your workers. Until you get Civil Service, you're better off improving the tiles around the pink and blue cities. Clearing jungle, or even constructing roads, in the other cities is a waste. Just improve one tile in order to help along the Courthouse, then move away.

And if this all fails, at least Sis won't be to blame ;D.

EDIT

I fgailed to address the issue of the Barb city in the NW. I would personally raze and rebuild it. It's in a horrible location, and shifting it 1 or 2 tiles SE will make for a much better city. I haven't loaded the save to see what units it contains, or the type, but I would raze it withing the expansion parameters I go by.

Every city should have an Axeman. If you're going to settle 5 cities (possibly 6), you need 5 units. We have 2 fogbusters that can turn into defenders, so we will require 3 more axemen. These 3 axemen should be enough to raze that Barb city, unless they go crazy with the Archers. Again, I don't know your existing military, but it may behoove you to whip 1 Axeman and build another before starting on Settlers. That way you can raze the city for gold and lessen the threat of the settler you send to the NW.

I don't understand how people are still suggesting that Liberalism is possible. If my math is right 1100AD (the early end of the AI's Liberalism window) is only 46 turns away. 100 turns after the restart would take it to 1424AD, around the end of the time when you can expect the AIs to get Liberalism. CS is currently showing as taking 75 turns to research. This can be speeded up somewhat by city development and reassigning citizens. However any sort of expansion in the next round will prevent any significant speedup. And REXing will kill the research rate for a while. Even if Sisiutil could somehow get CS done in time he would need to generate 4 GSs to completely lightbulb Phil, Paper and Edu. Given the current low population and food supply I don't see how that's possible. And even if the GSs could somehow be produced in time that would still leave Liberalism to research which isn't going to be quick.

I wonder if any of the people advocating trying for Liberalism would want to indicate how many turns they think it will take.

My advice for Sisiutil at this point would be:

Ignore the Liberalism path for now and focus on more immediately useful techs. Currency then finish Sailing then Monarchy. These three can be finished in about the same time as CS and will provide more immediate benefits.

The reason you are so low in GNP is because you are so low in population. This means more cities with higher population, so REX and stop whipping. Infrastructure isn't as important as gaining population at this point, and all of the cities will have decent production available to build any needed buildings.

I would reconfigure Istanbul to work all the food tiles and cottages but no mines so it can grow quickly to size 8. At that point switch to building a settler and work all the food and mine tiles (no cottages). That will allow settlers to be produced in 8 turns, so in around 40 turns you can settle 4 more cities. I've included a dotmap as to where I think cities should go in the NE part of the continent. I would settle the red, then yellow, then green then orange. The yellow city could be moved 1E to get the cows, but I think the site I've indicated provides a little higher productivity in the long term. The blue dot city will make a good ironworks city with around 50 base hammers, but I don't think it needs to be settled any time soon since you don't need iron or production at this point. The purple dots in the NW and on the island can wait until later, although you could be seeing AI galleons within the next 100 turns.

While Istanbul is building the settlers Edirne and Ankara should be building missionaries, workers and any additional military needed. You might want to think about building chariots instead of axes at this point since they're cheaper.

BTW your current military is incorrectly deployed. You have axes defending your cities while warriors are on barb sentry duty. The roles should be reversed. You want to use the strong units to keep the barbs away from your cities and their precious tile improvements.

I don't understand how people are still suggesting that Liberalism is possible.

/me sighs. For the fourth time, it's not just about winning the Liberalism race. The techs that Liberalism opens up are vital for any economy, so not going that path is stupid.

Milk the barb city for a level 4 unit.

Just realized after Validator's post that the light blue BFC in Scaphism's dotmap is misplaced. Given that, I'd either switch to Val's dotmap or use my second variation on Scaphism's, but with red city 1 moved 1 W to use more land.

75 turns for CS???
that's clearly leading nowhere...

Aren't you working your commerce tiles?
Don't you have scientists???

/me sighs. For the fourth time, it's not just about winning the Liberalism race. The techs that Liberalism opens up are vital for any economy, so not going that path is stupid.

You're right. Communism and Communism are absolutely vital for any economy.

Just realized after Validator's post that the light blue BFC in Scaphism's dotmap is misplaced. Given that, I'd either switch to Val's dotmap or use my second variation on Scaphism's, but with red city 1 moved 1 W to use more land.

Ack. Apologies all, I had Istanbul (the capital!) in the wrong spot. I blame it on all those sugar tiles obscuring the location. ;)

And I will definitely concede that the light yellow ? on my map is the area I'm most unsure of. If extra cities could be squeezed in (and useful) then go for it, I'm just not sure how to fit it in there myself.

I would recommend that Sisiutil makes use of Organised trait to run as many cities as possible on the island, half price courthouses and cheap civics reduce city maintenance costs significantly. There are going to be health/happy caps for a while yet. Twenty size 10 cities work as many tiles as ten size 20 cities . Every tile that can be worked mid-game will help Sisiutil overcome the isolation and catch up.

Its also worth considering heading for astronomy instead of liberalism to open up overseas trade routes asap.

Round 4: 420 AD to 1280 AD

A long round because, when you're isolated, it takes a while for anything to happen.

I started off by running a couple of scientists in Istanbul to help research and to hopefully generate a Great Scientist, though I was well aware I had GP competition from the Oracle.

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_01.jpg

I decide to follow Validator's recommendations regarding techs, pursuing Currency and then Monarchy. Civil Service was just going to take too darn long. My builds were a mix: granaries, courthouses, libraries, hammams, workers, settlers, Axemen.

Meanwhile, I started expanding, beginning with this city:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_02.jpg


Why that one first? I wanted access to the iron. That barb city was a threat and a nuisance and I wanted to take care of it ASAP. Some Swordsmen would fit the bill in that regard; I built a couple of barracks to give them City Raider I promotions. Plus this city was a step towards fog-busting the rest of the island.

Several turns later, I finally finished researching Currency:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_03.jpg

That seemed to help the economy a little bit, though of course I only have domestic trade routes at the moment.

I generated my next Great Person, unfortunately not the Great Scientist I was hoping for, but a Great Prophet. He would have lightbulbed Polytheism, which was hardly worth bothering about at this point. So I settled him in the holy city instead. The 5 gold would help the economy, and the 2 hammers were welcome in a city that's short on them.

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_04.jpg

And then everybody and his dog started showing up just to rub in how backward I am.

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_05.jpg

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_06.jpg

There were more to come, but first, I finished researching Monarchy...

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_07.jpg

... and switched to Hereditary Rule right away.

I also managed to raze that barb city, at the cost of a couple of Axemen:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_08.jpg

Yes, and I even got a Worker out of it in the bargain. I was tempted to keep it, but it's not exactly in an ideal spot. Not one of all your helpful dotmaps had a city in that location.

More civs continued to show up. Seems like everybody else discovered Optics at around the same time. Worse still, I can't help thinking they're all tech-trading amongst each other.

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_09.jpg

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_10.jpg

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_12.jpg

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_11.jpg

Evidently the best was saved for last. :love:

So there I am, isolated and in dead last place, without a tech to trade even to lowly Huyana, who is Catherine's vassal and God only knows what else. I'm torn between feeling sorry for the guy and suffering pangs of jealously.

Catherine was the first to discover Liberalism, while Cyrus was the first to circumnavigate the globe. Cyrus was also, evidently, the first to discover Astronomy (I'm not sure what Catherine chose as her Liberalism tech). A fact from which I could immediately benefit:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADa_13.jpg

Fortunately, I was now in a position to rapidly settle the rest of my island, so I don't anticipate the AI settling on my little landmass anytime soon. Invasion, however, is another matter, as I'm dead last in power. But I'll get into that in the next post, which deals with the state of the world.

The State of the World, 1280 AD

Let's start off with a look at the map:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_01.jpg


So I now have 11 cities, which is more than enough to pursue a cultural win.

To help in that potential regard, I deliberately avoided spreading Confucianism to my new cities using missionaries. I had better things to spend hammers on and the shrine in Edirne ensured that some of those cities converted on their own. But if you look closely, you might notice that Bursa managed to pick up Buddhism!

That could be helpful in several regards. Obviously, if I go for a cultural victory, the more religions, the better (they've all been founded now, by the way). In addition, Cyrus, Frederick, and Ragnar are Buddhists, so I could potentially join their diplomatic block by converting.

I'm hoping some of my other new cities will pick up another religion or two on their own. Judaism would be nice, since that would give me the choice between the Buddhist or the Jewish diplomatic blocks. Hinduism would be nice for culture, but I'm sure everybody else already hates Monty and I have no desire to join his club. However, if and when Monty gets Astronomy, that will likely spell trouble for me.

On another note, I haven't settled that northeast island yet. Should I bother at this point? I don't have any Settlers ready to go (though I am building a Galley), and I wouldn't be surprised if Cyrus beat me there.

The domestic advisor:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_02.jpg

A mix of builds, but all of them civilian. I figure I'm safe from military incursion for some time, and besides, what would I throw at them if I was invaded? Nevertheless, a conversion to Buddhism to gain some allies is sounding more attractive the more I think about it.

Civics:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_03.jpg

It would be nice to have and run one of the religions civics, but that clearly isn't an option yet. This is going to be one of those games where I bypass a lot of techs, I think. I'm not even thinking about wonders anymore. I'll be lucky just to survive, let alone win.

However, I think it's time I switched to Caste System, agreed?

Diplomacy:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_04.jpg

Yeah, I suppose it would be helpful to see how everybody feels about everybody else, though you can gather some of that. Cathy and Huayna are tolerating Monty (they have Open Borders agreements with him), while the Buddhist block is clearly not happy with him (no OB). And Monty is the one who likes me the least. As I said, if and when he gets Galleons, I'm going to have to watch out.

Technologies... brace yourself!

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_05.jpg

Mind you, I could potentially do without a lot of those techs, like Hunting and Archery, for example. I don't even need Alphabet in a big hurry since (a) everyone else has it and (b) I have no techs to trade anyway.

I don't see any way to rectify this situation in a hurry. I'm thinking I should finish Civil Service, then research Calendar so I can get my sugar plantations going for some more trade, hopefully, once everyone else starts getting Astronomy. After that, I'm thinking Machinery and Engineering in order to defend myself just in case someone gets any funny ideas.

Active trade deals:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_06.jpg

Religion:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_07.jpg

So I have 3 cities which could, potentially, still acquire another religion. I suppose that's an argument in favour of settling more cities, but I really think I need to focus on building up the ones I have. I mean, my research is down to 10%! Granted I expanded pretty quickly in the last few turns, but any more cities, especially further away on that rock, for example, and I might start losing the units I need to boost happiness in my cities.

Victory conditions:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_08.jpg

The one bit of good news there is the land area I have, and keep in mind several of my newest cities have not experienced their first border pop. That, I think, bodes well: I have a lot more land--and very good land at that--than several of the other civs. I just have to stay alive long enough to benefit from it.

The power graph:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_09.jpg

Not so good. Even vassalized Huayna looks like he could kick my butt. If, of course, he had Galleons. But Catherine can't be far away from getting those. There's a problem: if I convert to Buddhism, it'll tick her off, and who's to say my Buddhist buddies would come to may aid? Nevertheless, some allies are better than none.

Demographics:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_10.jpg

As I said, the good news there is that I've got land, lots of land: I'm #2 in land area. And I'm number 1 in my approval rating. Well, all that indicates is that, as usual, I'm probably not whipping enough. I guess the other bit of good news here is that they're nowhere to go but up!

And we finally have some information about who built all those wonders:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1280ADb_11.jpg

Cathy's been a busy girl. And here I was thinking it was an Industrious leader, but clearly the only leader with that trait--Huayna--has been falling down in that regard (and several others, evidently, since he's now a mere vassal). Though he did manage to build Chichen Itza; well, big whoop, Mr. Industrious, you built the worst wonder in the game! I'm dead last but at least I managed the Oracle! Russia must have sources of both stone and marble, I'm thinking.

Anyway, that's where things stand. On the positive side, I think I can get the cottage economy going to restore my economy and research. I don't think the tech lead is as insurmountable as it looks so long as I pick my techs carefully.

In that regard, I have a choice: I can either plod along and pick up techs I need that the AI civs already have, or I can gamble on more expensive and advanced techs in hopes of trading them. Frankly, at this point, I'm so far behind that the former approach makes more sense. By the time I nab a tech, everyone else is likely to have it. The only exception might be lightbulbing, but we'll see. I truly believe that a late-game Internet bee-line will be required for a space race win.

The key, I think, is going to be avoiding an invasion, or dealing with one if and when it does occur. Diplomacy is going to be very important. So a conversion to Buddhism might be the key first move in the next round.

Its certainly a Challenge.

At least you'll get a discount on known techs now. Once cities start growing your GNP is likely to increase (it could even double to 2 :lol: ).

It might be worth stockpiling any GPs you get (and work on getting some more) so that you might have a chance of some decent lightbulbs later.

I think you're better off with NSR; its safer to have no friends than to have just one enemy. Tech-trading is certainly something for the future (probably 17th century).

Good Luck ;) .

Don't listen to the pessimists.

I think you're better off with NSR; its safer to have no friends than to have just one enemy.

I'm not so sure about this assertion. One problem, of course, is that no state religion would instantly take the happiness cap down by 1. It also renders any religious civics I manage to get useless, aside from Free Religion (but of course I don't have any religious civics now and I'm not targeting any). But I'll wait to see what everyone else thinks of this idea.

Well, what to say? The REXing is (almost)done, now just cut the jungle and cottage it. The small island is crap; let Cyrus take it if he wants to.
About religion, maybe go budhist would help with the Buda guys and it wouldn't hurt the diplo with the others more than staying confucian. So, why not?
With luck, you'll get a GS in 19 turns. I think that you should lightbulb it ( It would give you one less step to go...).
About defence ( against Monty , most surely ) ,Gunpowder is too far away... and you can't rely only in catakazies. So Machinery and Engineering it is...
About victory Types, you seem to be thinking in cultural. I must concur that the space prospecs are starting to be dim, but if you want to go cultural with two religions, you must go to Caste System ASAP ( Music GA and Sistine are gone, so you'll probably need Mercantilism and SoL ) and let cities grow ( one of your cities will need long chain irrigation for farming).

Even if Cyrus, Fred, or Huayna founded Christianity, it is at 1%; 0 spread. There will not be a change in the religious blocks. Monty is a punching bag.

Do you think everyone has theology already? Maybe since they all have philosophy. They are all running organized religion.

If not, you can trade theology around... build a temple(s) in the oracle city and run a priest(s). Even if you never run a priest in that city again, the temples are happiness. Run some scientists too since philosophy wouldn't be bad (though everyone has it for sure). Convert to Buddhism now for the trade benefits needed when the great priest is born and to give them time to hate Monty/Jews. Research Mono, lightbulb theo. Trade it for CS, fued, Alpha, philosophy. Convert to no religion and trade with the Jewish block (no Monty trade should be necessary). Convert to Confucianism. Change civic to organized if you want buildings, theocracy for a few turns if you are worried that the Jews or Buddhists will hate you more than Monty. Even if they all have theology, you might still want access to organized because your are building buildings everywhere and theocracy since you need to build troops before astronomy can be militarily leveraged by the AI (10-30 turns?). Or you can go pacifism and spam artists, but I think it is too early for that.

Side comment: Without Monarchy, Priests would have lightbulbed Theology and then CS. That would have been better than unused happiness now with temples needed for cultural victory.

Edit: Since the Chapel is built, they probably all have theology. What are you going to trade?

You might get theology or CS, lightbulb paper, and find them offering education. Engineering? Are pikes that much better than crossbows, longbows, or maces? Catakazie vs stacks, spearakazie vs pillaging knights.

Pray for war. Since you have nothing to trade, you might try gifting anything you can to the most powerful buddhist, declaring on Monty, and then begging Buddhists to join the war. It's an almost suicidal attempt at causing a dogpile, but if anyone is going to xp_farm off inept AI naval invasions it might as well be you and if the dogpile happens, you are 1/2 way to igniting world war - If Monty goes Jew (he would have to lose hindi founding city), he could get help. You may not get peace from him, but you will not suffer casualities outside cultural borders.

Since you are not winning the liberalism race, you are not likey to have a tech up on the AIs again. Do you really want to just pray for the world war you need to ensure cultural freedom or Internet use, or are you going to do something about it? If you wait much longer and Monty picks you anyway, the invasion will be SoD instead of a furious trickle. If the Jews hit you because your power is so weak, Monty will be a one man dogpile. You need farms because you will never be able to defend your seafood (how close are you to astronomy/chemistry/combustion?).

I don't think research can end at ironclads. It will need to end at liberalism. No US or printing for cottages. Plod to liberal and spam artists after mono and perhaps theo. Ragnar is probably itching to fight with those berserkers about to finish researching +1move galleons.

Then again, Monty and Russia have border difficulties... a civic change by one of them could ignite them.

Was fun, next game. Tried peaceful ploding. Russia declared with grens before I got construction (1430).

At least we have a monopoly on cows!

I'd leave the little island unsettled. You can't afford the maintenence and in addition cities there need to be well-defended or they'll attract assaults.

I'm really not happy with your city placement since you're not making good use of riverine grasslands. There's quite a few that no city can use, but they're one of the strongest benefits to your position. It looks like you founded your expansion cities like early cities (where the goal is to grab resources) and not late cites (where the goal is a large sweep for optimizing cottages or mines long-term) Malatya (sp?) in particular is grossly inferior to a city on the rivermouth but is still close enough to really cramp a city there. You only have one city using the other river and you really should have two. This is particularly bad if you want to shoot for for a cultural victory; I only see two good candidates for legendary cities, Istanbul and Diyarbakar. Too late for now, I guess.

I think you need more workers. The cottage spam should already be apparent by now but I'm not seeing it. That's the point of all these cities; use it.

Allies are useless against invasions. You'll get invaded if somebody sees you as a juicy target, which means you need a decent military. Your allies' attacks on your enemy's homeland, even if effective (unlikely :rolleyes: ) it won't do anything to stop the units on ships toward you. So you'll be on your own anyway. All your coastal cities should have good *defensive* units and walls. That'll cut down on the bullseye you have painted on you. NSR is the way to go eventually but I suspect you can't afford it until Liberalism because of your happy caps. I would push Guilds and Gunpowder soon because you're going to need the Jans after all as defensive units. You need Gunpowder before Monty gets Astronomy.

Well, the All Leader Challenge is living up to its name in this one. :lol:

Opening the save to find Monty tops in power is always disturbing.

First, on the domestic front, good work settling the rest of the continent. Now, how to pay for it? I'm gonna raise the possibility of doing something I wouldn't normally consider: building Wealth in Ankara & Konya, at least for the time being. I would say to concede the island to the NE. I honestly don't think that island will make much difference as far as whether you'll win. If you're invaded, it'll be hard to defend & you might end up building up a city for the AI to take away from you. Also, I don't think Konya should be building a Hammam. It's way below both caps ATM.

If you switch those two cities to Wealth, science can be bumped up to 50% without running a deficit, which cuts CS from 13 turns to 7 turns, which similar dividends for further research. Once other cities get infrastructure online & cottages mature, those two cities can build their own infrastructure. Or if worse comes to worst, rotate cities building Wealth. Drastic times call for drastic measures.

I'm trying to figure out what the Woodsman II Warrior is doing in the middle of settled land. Might as well move him to garrison somewhere & delete some lower level Warrior to save on upkeep. Or is he to the be the garrison for the island city?

Your cities are all at least 3 below the happiness cap. One of the reasons for getting CS earlier is to irrigate the cities that need it to grow. Then again, if you had gone CS first, you probably wouldn't have Currency yet & can't build Wealth to pay the bills. But then again, going CS first would have allowed you to whip some infrastructure probably. So I'm not sure which approach leaves you coming out ahead. Anyway, now that CS will be coming in, farm as much as needed to get to happiness cap & whip away.

You've got stone, so you might want to build Walls in your coastal cities. They boost Power rating & that could have a deterrent effect on a would-be invader. Walls can buy you time to bring up reinforcements to a city that's had an enemy stack landed next to it. Sometimes, the AI breaks up a stack after a couple of failed attacks & starts pillaging the countryside, so you can pick them off one by one. If your cities were more established, the 50% defense bonus isn't so important, but 50% is nothing to sneeze at in cities with minimal culture.

One more thing on the domestic front, some of your cities are in places where they'll need 2 border pops to cover up all the land that can be settled by an AI. You should probably decide how you want to deal with that & design your gameplan with that in mind. You could switch over to Caste System & run artists to get the required pops & preclude the AI from settling in some nook on your continent that'll result in border clashes. If it's Cyrus or Fred, that's not so bad, but Monty & Ragnar get extra ticked over close borders.

I would seriously consider dedicating a city to keep pumping out military. If you wait until you tech to Machinery & Engineering to start building up your army, it might be too late to offer any resistance to an invasion, which is probably not a matter of if so much as when.

Joining the Buddhist bloc could pay off, as once those guys get to Pleased, you can start begging stuff from three AIs. In fact, switching over to Buddhism would probably get you to Pleased with all three pretty quickly. Ragnar is the most volatile of the three Buddhists, but his favorite civic is HR, so hopefully, that will get him not to attack you.

As far as foreign policy, I think you'd be wise to give in to any demands from Monty or Cathy, until you've had time to build up a credible military. Assuming you switch to Buddhism, I'd tell your co-religionists to beat it if they demand anything, as a -1 penalty from them can be compensated for by the shared religion bonus, over time. Pray that in combination with giving tribute, the favorite civics bonus will get you to Pleased with Cathy too, over time. Then again, I have been attacked by her even at Pleased.

Techwise, I would recommend Feudalism to give you a decent all-around defensive unit. Build Longbows & Catapults. The Longbows should be able to hold down the fort at a city under attack, long enough to bring reinforcements, provided you have three Longbows & Walls. And the Cats will soften up enemy stacks for your offensive-challenged Longbows to take out. Teching to Machinery & Engineering will take too much time. After Feudalism, Paper, Education, Gunpowder. Then, go for Democracy to get Emancipation-powered cottage growth.

Bear in mind too that if you ask an AI to gift you a tech, they can somehow sense how far along you are in researching it. So if you beg them again after some more research on it, they might agree. Being diligent in checking these things could save you valuable time, as you're playing some serious catchup.

Victory conditions, I think is still too early to tell what to gun for. Cultural is certainly possible. Space probably less so, but not out of the question. Diplomacy may also be possible too, depending on how events unfold. I wouldn't be surprised if you find yourself #1 in population towards the end of the game, as you've got some good land. Mix in some happy/health resources from your Buddhist buddies & you might find yourself on the UN ballot without ever asking to be on it.

I've got to continue to throw my support behind a culture victory here, but I think the order of the day is cottage spam and development. You have to start making this great grassy island work for you. Keep along the 'cottage' tech path.

As far a diplomacy goes I think switching to Buddhism is a no-brainer. You are in HR so you can make up the happy, and you are not running any religous civics. As someone else said, moving to Buddhism is not going to be any worse than staying confusion, and it could potentialy be much better. You might even be able to get the AI's to gift you a tech or two.

Cottage cottage cottage = Culture Victory, I still have faith.

Edit: Also, remember that being in the bottom half of the score card gives you immunity from WFYABTA. Probably won't matter, but something to keep in the back of your head

As far as foreign policy, I think you'd be wise to give in to any demands from Monty or Cathy, until you've had time to build up a credible military. Assuming you switch to Buddhism, I'd tell your co-religionists to beat it if they demand anything, as a -1 penalty from them can be compensated for by the shared religion bonus, over time. Pray that in combination with giving tribute, the favorite civics bonus will get you to Pleased with Cathy too, over time. Then again, I have been attacked by her even at Pleased.

i can't stand cathy, she is one of my most hatest leaders. izzy is a fanatic and i think most people hate her more, but at least she has a reason. cathy just gets in these moods. she is the one AI i don't even try to get along with, since it does me no good to even bother. you can bribe her to go to war against somebody she is officially Friendly with. so what is the point of even getting to Friendly? but i know S likes her.

Edit: Also, remember that being in the bottom half of the score card gives you immunity from WFYABTA. Probably won't matter, but something to keep in the back of your head

very good point, i doubt S is used to that situation. it matters sometimes! i use it to my advantage in every deity OCC game i try :lol:. it only gives you immunity with the people that are in the bottom half with you, so the chances that you'll get the very best techs aren't that hot, but it doesn't hurt. keep an eye on who's in the bottom half, they'll act a lot more like mansa than you're used to if you're down there too, it's kinda cool.

Read that (excellent) strategy thread carefully. You're only immune to WFYABTA if both of you are in the bottom half of the scoreboard.

But definitely, Sisiutil is doing better than I expected. And he's right in that religions should be used to boast hapiness, not improve relations. You're not trying to survive as long as you can, you're trying to win. It's like trying to win in a poker game rather than trying to survive until you're second place. Go for the win.

And I also have an unusual request: do you mind listing exactly what techs you have at the moment? Like, all of them? Tech choice is critical at this point.

I doubt it's a grim as it appears, if the the demographics hold any truth. Too bad about the Janissaries, but...c'est le vie, eh? Spam the cottages....and I'd actually advocate some thought of domination. How often do we see you fighting serious wars with more modern units? When was the last time you employed carriers and marines and tanks and the like in a serious war against a near-equal opponent? I don't think I ever have, but in my experience, warring with all those shiny toys is actually quite enjoyable, especially with air superiority. Just a crazy thought....

I would research techs that would get you better military options and the best civics options available.

Ideally, you'll want to stick with HR until you can get down the Constitution/Democracy path and then decide whether Representation or Universal Suffrage is the way to go. If you want to run more Scientists, then make the switch to Caste System. Free Religion is the only religious civic you need concern yourself with, unless you think you can pull a Cultural victory off. As always, it's either Mercantilism or Free Market for the economic civic, depending on the situation. And Bureaucracy is what you want as well.

Diplomacy-wise, I don't think it matters what you do with religions, because Monty will start preparing to invade once he's got Astronomy. So you should see if you can push Ragnar into war with Monty. Ragnar will likely never switch to Free Religion since he founded Buddhism, but the other two in the Buddhist block might, so Ragnar is the one you should try to make your friend. The Jewish block could be broken up if Frederick gets Liberalism.

The game is salvageable but its going to take some time.The first stage is actually surviving long enough to begin to catch up. At the moment its likely than any AI will get to astronomy and miltrad before you get to feudalism and build up longbows or machinery for crossbows, especially if you're going for civil service and calendar to improve economy. At least you have a lot of cows to trade.
If any AI lands on your island with half a dozen cavalry then your game is in serious jeapordy. You have nothing to bribe any AI into war on your behalf; even a GM trade mission will need optics which is many turns away. That's why I said no friends is better than one enemy. Keep a low profile and hope for the best.

On the diplomatic side, you should convert to Buddhism first. Running HR would placate Catherine and her vassal (though the latter's opinion doesn't count) while Buddhism will make you chummy with that bloc. Can't do much about Monty, though, so be on guard.

It seems everyone's bent on Cultural Victory but what about Diplomatic? You should be able to get all buddhists to vote for you. Prioritising biology and gifting it to your newfound buddies would bring in sufficient votes I think.
Perhaps go beat up Monty a bit and grab some of his land as well. No one will mind anyway and you can get a nice mutual struggle bonus out of it too. I'd consider a fake war with Monty for that purpose alone in fact; all you need is a good naval defense to keep him at bay.
I'm not entirely convinced of cultural regardless. You only have two religions and it's rather late to start on such a victory. I suspect an AI may launch well before you get there to be honest.

For the immediate tech issue: cottage up everything (why so few cottages by the way?) and you should catch up nicely. In the mean time you could try begging techs from the other civs. Most of the techs have virtually no value to the AIs since everyone except you have them already, so even with a mere Cautious attitude you may net a few.
I would go settle that smallish island myself and even squeeze in another city to the north of your capital. But again, that's mainly assuming cultural victory is far from in the bag; extra cities would only be useful for space or diplomatic. Still, it'd make a total of about 15 cities which is a very sizeable empire on a standard map.

Finally a small nitpick: why did you put that city to the NW of your capital in its current spot? Sure, you grab the iron but you have a source of iron already and you'd be able to hook the resource after second border pop anyway. If, however, you had put the city 1e you would have traded no less than 5 desert/mountain tiles for workable ones!

It seems everyone's bent on Cultural Victory but what about Diplomatic? You should be able to get all buddhists to vote for you.

At this point I think diplomatic is much more viable than cultural. I thought cultural had promise when Christianity, Taoism, and Islam were still on the table, but Sisiutil said all religions have been founded now, so at this point for a cultural win, we'd be either working with just two religions or crossing our fingers and hoping one or two more spread to us. Normally if you want to win by culture with only a few religions, you do it with wonders, but Catherine has seen to it that we won't be doing that. With Montezuma willing to attack anyone whose power isn't twice his own, the slow buildup to victory could be extremely risky.

It's fairly easy to see what needs to be done for a diplomatic win. I'm not saying it will be an easy win -- just that the route to victory is obvious. Clearly Catherine will be your opponent. She leads on score by a substantial margin, she has the land and population lead, plus she has a vassal. There's no way she gives up that lead. Therefore, you need to be friends with all of the Buddhists. If you can afford the happiness ding from losing state religion in most of your cities, I'd strongly consider the conversion to Buddhism. And then spread it fast.

Perhaps go beat up Monty a bit and grab some of his land as well. No one will mind anyway and you can get a nice mutual struggle bonus out of it too. I'd consider a fake war with Monty for that purpose alone in fact; all you need is a good naval defense to keep him at bay.

Mutual war is always a great diplomatic tool, especially when you have a universal enemy like Montezuma; however, at this point we have nothing (and I mean nothing) that we can use as bribes, so the only way it turns into anything besides Montezuma kicking our ass is by luck. This is something that we should remember for later after we (hopefully) catch up a little on technology.

Once you start making some friends, don't forget to go begging for free stuff. You're so far behind that you should be able to get a free outdated technology out of most of the AI's if they like you enough.

If you can get your relations to pleased with some of the civs then you can ask for some of the old cheap techs. I have done this before when I feel behind on an island start and I was able to get about 5 or so of the basic techs that I had skipped past.

This game definitely has the potential for a replay of this gem in aelf's first Immortal challenge. Speaking of which, This image from that game is another good reminder of the power of democracy:

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j76/aelflune/Immortal%20Challenge/Immortal180.jpg

[aelf was the Aztecs, and the sudden vertical ascent of his GNP marks where he converted to emancipation.]

Given the internet, your skill at trading, the amount of fairly good land you have settled (just not developed), and the potential to make nice with the Buddhists, I'd say even a space race isn't impossible. :crazyeye:

Whatever victory you go for, the biggest asset will be that the AI doesn't focus on a win, like a human can. So while they're eventually going to launch, they'll also divert to pick up techs like flight, mass media, composites, etc., giving you some extra time to cross one finish line or another (hopefully).

you need to focus on growth and economy. Right now you are working almost no cotteages whatsoever. There are some cities you can whip in granaries in. Get the cities to grow as fast as possible and start working those cottages. You have way too many cities focusing on production. This just wont hold if your not gonna go for any sort of military victory. Keep whatever tricks you need to not get invaded then focus on growing all your cities on those cottages. You probably need more workers too.

As other have mentioned just beeling to democracy asap. Thats quite expencive so you need to get more cottages out there and worked asap. You realy shouldnt bother with production in most of your cities as he whip should take care of that problem. Dont let your cities work any title with under 2 food unless you cant avoid it(plains cottages are still better than plains farms...), hopefully most should have a surplus of 3, 4 or more and grow quite rappidly. Both philosophy(bulbed hopefully) and nationalism and constitution should be easy enough to trade away for sevral techs to let you catch up somewhat(hopefully you can get paper and printing press for them at least).

1 or max 2 production cities should be more than enough to cover all your needs in that area...

another good reminder of the power of democracy.

I might add that the exhilaration can be quite addictive ;)

Wow, I'm glad you didn't listen to me and move up a level. Although I think you have a nice chance of pulling out a victory, if you lose, do you replay with Mehmed? I would like to see that, as then there could be a legitimate janissary rush.
Assuming you aren't isolated again...

you need to focus on growth and economy. Right now you are working almost no cotteages whatsoever. There are some cities you can whip in granaries in. Get the cities to grow as fast as possible and start working those cottages. You have way too many cities focusing on production. This just wont hold if your not gonna go for any sort of military victory. Keep whatever tricks you need to not get invaded then focus on growing all your cities on those cottages. You probably need more workers too.

As other have mentioned just beeling to democracy asap. Thats quite expencive so you need to get more cottages out there and worked asap. You realy shouldnt bother with production in most of your cities as he whip should take care of that problem. Dont let your cities work any title with under 2 food unless you cant avoid it(plains cottages are still better than plains farms...), hopefully most should have a surplus of 3, 4 or more and grow quite rappidly. Both philosophy(bulbed hopefully) and nationalism and constitution should be easy enough to trade away for sevral techs to let you catch up somewhat(hopefully you can get paper and printing press for them at least).

1 or max 2 production cities should be more than enough to cover all your needs in that area...

I fully agree. Growth and commerce should be the name of the game right now.

Cottages are being built but some cities aren't working as many as they could be, Istanbul is a good example.

Also, you have a couple of cities that can whip Granaries at the moment :whipped:

Why is Konya building a Hammam? It doesn't need it yet.

With Civil Service right around the corner, I would cottage the heck out of Istanbul. It should be able to contribute a lot of your science in the near future.

I would assign a city or two for military production, use Izmir as a GP farm and focus the rest of your empire on commerce. Hopefully you can start catching up and/or beelining to techs the AI values highly for trade. If you're going for space, Democracy is definitely a priority as others have pointed out, although a bit in the long term. You have neither happiness issues, nor are you running any religious civic so I would convert to Buddhism and hope to be able to beg some techs.

hmm.

everybody reccomend cottage, but it is already late and your cities are way too small. In my opinion you need at least +5 food in *each* city (+6 if no granary). +5 is really a magic number that can halve the number of turns required to get a decent size.

Whatever win you choose to pursue, you need your cities to be at least 12-15.
that means farms. Besides +5, there is no real gain, so you can still cottage other tiles. It is too late for a full SE, but the HE road is better, as you get both size and the financial benefit of towns.

and you want to grow now, not when biology kicks in.

btw, first to liberalism was acheivable with a full SE, i missed it for 3 turns and did some very weedy moves, starting from your 580BC save.

It looks bad, but hope remains. Maybe a Defensive Pact with a strong leader could discourage Monty and his flying circus from attacking you. Are you sure you can pull out a culture victory though? I would recommend a beeline to Fiber Optics for Internet if that isn't unreasonable. The AI could launch a space ship before you even finish the Internet, unless you're confident you can tech fast enough.

BTW, I moved up to Prince last week, and your guides are part of what gave me the confidence to finally move up.:goodjob:

I have read a lot of post regarding just these ALC, and they have always given me some insight on how people play, and whats good and whats not.
Recently I am involved in a game with an isolated start just like the one in this game, although I am much better off since I am playing Bismark, and as an indostriuous leader managed to pick up the pyramids, colossus, and the great library, and all those wonders made me the tech leader in the game for now. Although my landmass is much less, and could only fit 5 cities on the island, so I am wondering if to go for astronomy, which would destroy my colossus, but give me galleons for invading others.

But I have a question, since the game is similar to this one, would 5 cities be enough for a cultural win???

The game is certainly winnable if you aren't invaded. You might want to whip courthouses and granaries (both cheap) in all your cities before switching to caste system.

A potential solution to tech deficit may be to study GP preferences and prereq techs etc. and go for a deep beeline (burning 3-4 GP very quickly to get an advanced monopoly tech then trade it for loads of others). In the long term cottage economy is the way to go however.

It might also be worth building some small cities on the island. You will need every tile you can get and you can't guarantee acquiring overseas possessions quickly or easily.

@menssana: if you are financial, do not obsolete colosus

NE Island: Forget it, the AIs are on their way and you can't afford more cities or spending your hammers and food on settlers right now.

Caste System: At the very least whip granaries in all cities before switching. Granaries enable growth, which you need in order to run specialists.

Don't forget Expansive's +25% Hammers towards Worker production. There may not be many cottages now but Sisiutil just founded 7 cities last round. This dip is inevitable.

If/When you get Feudalism, you could think about switching to Serfdom for your army of workers to speed up how quickly they improve tiles. I don't think Feudalism is a priority right now, but it's something to keep in your back pocket. Unfortunately you're not spiritual. :)

Converting to Hinduism does seem like a no brainer, you're below the happiness cap in every city (as little as 3 under and as much as 7! in some cities). Right now, GROW GROW GROW, get citizens working tiles!

Whoever said Hammams aren't necessary? They're a no-brainer in every city (although after granary and courthouse). If it weren't for Hammams this game would be truly, utterly unsalvagable. And as far as space race is concerned, having Monty around is better than "Mansa Musa on the other continent". Everyone trading with the Mansa while you're isolated kinda means you're truly screwed too.

I repeat, I'd rather have Monty over MM any day.

Whoever said Hammams aren't necessary? They're a no-brainer in every city (although after granary and courthouse). If it weren't for Hammams this game would be truly, utterly unsalvagable. And as far as space race is concerned, having Monty around is better than "Mansa Musa on the other continent". Everyone trading with the Mansa while you're isolated kinda means you're truly screwed too.

I repeat, I'd rather have Monty over MM any day.

Hammams aren't necessary if your cities aren't anywhere near the happy or health caps. In that case it's clearly better to build something else first.

Hammams aren't necessary if your cities aren't anywhere near the happy or health caps. In that case it's clearly better to build something else first.
like a granary or a library

like a granary or a library

Okey-dokey, I'll check the builds and adjust them accordingly. I'm mainly going to alternate between infrastructure and Workers. Serfdom is attractive, but a diversion to that tech is not. I might just compensate by leveraging the Expansive trait for more Workers.

I'll get the citizens working more cottages, but up until now, I've been focused on growth.

As for military, you will need to beef up one way or another. Your best units are currently Swordsmen (as soon as iron is hooked up). It's not great, but it will have to do for now. One of your cities should probably keep pumping out whatever it can.

For now your best hope is diplomacy. If you really expect a fight there are two choices to make: Gunpowder or Engineering. With Gunpowder you obviously get Janissaries. With Engineering you'd get Increased Road Movement, Catapaults, and Pikes. You have a large island and will probably have a smallish and spread out military. The extra road movement is what's most important to cover your territory effectively.

It seems likely that someone is going to declare on you - you are just a juicy target at the moment. So the questions are: How long do you think you have til someone does declare, and What is the best unit you could reasonably expect to field at that time?

For Gunpowder you'd probably go through CS->Paper->Education, a route you already plan to go to get to the cottage techs for your economic recovery.
Construction should be cheap-ish by now, but Engineering requires Metal Casting and Machinery.

How many beakers(and turns) it will take to get to either of those goals is fairly important at this point. I can't look at the save right now, hopefully someone else can.

I might just compensate by leveraging the Expansive trait for more Workers.

I'll get the citizens working more cottages, but up until now, I've been focused on growth.Stay focused on growth until you hit the happy cap, then stagnate working cottages. Unless you go purely cultural (which is an option, although space is the way I'd go in this situation), emancipation is what's going to salvage this so early cottage growing isn't an absolute priority - the ability to grow lots of cottages quickly (ie by having large cities and lots of workers to cottage over farms) is more important.

Essentially a deep beeline to democracy is key here. If that doesn't yield any trades, it'll give you the commerce necessary to make a subsequent beeline to something that will. The only military you really need at this stage of the game are catapults, which can pulverize any landing stack well enough...I'd grab Calendar for those sugar plantations and then get cracking on the long slog to the emancipation civic. If you can generate a GS or two to help along the way, so much the better.

Buddying up to the Buddhists is an option, but I'd be reluctant to pursue that at this early stage. It's going to be a long time before you have anything to bribe them with should Monty decide to attack you, and an equally long time before any of them become reasonable trading partners. Cyrus is unlikely to invade as he's generally one of the more agreeable AIs, but don't be surprised if a Persian galleon or two bearing settler parties shows up. Unfortunately even a single unclaimed tile will be enough for the AI to leap in at this stage of the game.

A bit late now, but what was the point of expanding so rapidly when no one else was competing for land? It seems like this was one situation where you could expand exactly at your own pace and maximize your science, with a continent to yourself...

A bit late now, but what was the point of expanding so rapidly when no one else was competing for land? It seems like this was one situation where you could expand exactly at your own pace and maximize your science, with a continent to yourself...

I actually disagree, I think he made the right choice, as the AI should start showing up pretty soon with settler parties. Should be fun seeing him try to dig his way out of this one, looking forward to it.

Now this situation is looking more like one of my games. That's not good news. I often don't manage to salvage them.

One minor point, if possible: try to build up some tribute money. That might buy you a little grace if things get dicey, but not more than a few hundred. Otherwise, I would probably go for liberalism and democracy for the economy and research bonuses, then start the long space race. This will be a challenge, especially diplomatically.

I actually disagree, I think he made the right choice, as the AI should start showing up pretty soon with settler parties. Should be fun seeing him try to dig his way out of this one, looking forward to it.

I agree. I've tried it both ways and REXing your own continent works better almost every time. You're screwed tech-wise no matter what; the majority of your catching-up will be done post-astro when someone finds you.

In this game: if we can keep the AIs at bay long enough to beeline for democracy and get even one tech over someone like Monty, that may be enough to bribe Monty (or whoever) into attacking someone else, if he doesn't do it himself. AI v AI wars drastically slow down the AI tech competition both in direct costs and indirectly because the land between two warring AIs tends to get pillaged to high hell, thus slowing down whoever wins the war almost as badly as whoever lost the war.

I actually disagree, I think he made the right choice, as the AI should start showing up pretty soon with settler parties.

yeah, that's my theory too. if there is an AI left in the game, then they are going to have a settler on a boat, even if it's 2049 and all spots are taken. that's just the way they are. so i'd definitely have staked my claim now on the coast.

One minor point, if possible: try to build up some tribute money. That might buy you a little grace if things get dicey, but not more than a few hundred.

hmmz. i've always figured (but just from intuition, couldn't check code if i wanted to) that i shouldn't have too much money sitting around, because they'll ask for it; if i don't have it laying around, they can't ask for it, and i get to invest in science. sounds like you're saying that if you have money, and they ask for tribute and you give in, then they might not go to war with you yet? but if you don't have it, then they can't ask so the war is earlier by default. is that really how it works?

hmmz. i've always figured (but just from intuition, couldn't check code if i wanted to) that i shouldn't have too much money sitting around, because they'll ask for it; if i don't have it laying around, they can't ask for it, and i get to invest in science. sounds like you're saying that if you have money, and they ask for tribute and you give in, then they might not go to war with you yet? but if you don't have it, then they can't ask so the war is earlier by default. is that really how it works?

Only thing I can think of, is if you have the money, they'll ask for it to give you a chance, if you have nothing to give them, they'll just attack you giving you no chance to appease them, so I think what he's saying is if you have some money laying around that would give you the means to appease an AI, and maybe even get them to like you. Whether I agree or not... I'm not sure...

having money is good, for the reason cds0528 mentionned
having lots of money isn't, because AIs ask for a portion of you gold.
If your pockets are full, a portion of your gold is a huge amount.
If your pockets are almost empty, it's a coin :lol:.
I like to have 300 or so gold in the bank for this reason.

Someone sent me a PM wondering if this is possible and I honestly don't know.

Can you vassalize yourself to an AI civ? Thereby gaining their protection? Having to surrender a resource or two might be worth it.

having money is good, for the reason cds0528 mentionned
having lots of money isn't, because AIs ask for a portion of you gold.
If your pockets are full, a portion of your gold is a huge amount.
If your pockets are almost empty, it's a coin :lol:.
I like to have 300 or so gold in the bank for this reason.

Much better said. You want enough to make it cost you around 100 for a +1 diplo modifier, but not much more than that. 300 is also useful for that one emergency promotion should we be forced to go to plan B at some point. It may not matter, but it may buy some time, and money can always be used eventually.

Someone sent me a PM wondering if this is possible and I honestly don't know.

Can you vassalize yourself to an AI civ? Thereby gaining their protection? Having to surrender a resource or two might be worth it.

This option is turned off.

This option is turned off.

Ah, so there's a custom game setting that allows the human player to vassalize him/herself to the AI?

I don't think so. "Turned off" should mean "completely unavailable". I think they said it could lead to all sorts of exploits, that's why they didn't include it.

Ah, so there's a custom game setting that allows the human player to vassalize him/herself to the AI?

Turned off meaning, in the code, it was disabled. It could be turned back on, but the consequences are unknown (as far as I know). And, as carl_corey said, it can be exploited in many ways.

it actually IS possible to do so as this very slow-moving game demonstrates (http://www.deviantminds.us/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=84). The Master demands resources from you as well as gifting you resources (and taking them away as well) and tech

Sisiutil,

Oh, how did you ever get into such a sorry shape :confused:

I think it all stems back to only 2 cities in about 600BC. What the heck?

Maybe the whipping of the ewarly wonder held back your Capital also.

Anyway, It's probably not right to dwell on that right now. Good luck getting out of this jam. That's why I usually play on Pangea ;)

BTW: Any thought to having some of your cities just build 'Research' to hasten along your techs somewhat? Or is that a bad idea?

Cheers.

Sisiutil,

Oh, how did you ever get into such a sorry shape :confused:

I think it all stems back to only 2 cities in about 600BC. What the heck?

Maybe the whipping of the ewarly wonder held back your Capital also.

Anyway, It's probably not right to dwell on that right now. Good luck getting out of this jam. That's why I usually play on Pangea ;)

BTW: Any thought to having some of your cities just build 'Research' to hasten along your techs somewhat? Or is that a bad idea?

Cheers.
I lay it all at the feet of the barbs, frankly. If you don't get one of the 3 early strategic resources in the capital's fat cross on an isolated start, you're going to have a very hard time. I had to build and whip Warrior after Warrior because it was either that or lay down and die.

I suppose the sensible thing would have been to forgo any wonders (which I'm doing now) and focus on expansion and growth, but hindsight is always 20/20.

Only thing I can think of, is if you have the money, they'll ask for it to give you a chance, if you have nothing to give them, they'll just attack you giving you no chance to appease them, so I think what he's saying is if you have some money laying around that would give you the means to appease an AI, and maybe even get them to like you. Whether I agree or not... I'm not sure...
I still deny extortionate tribute because of my experiences in CivIII. In CivIII, the AI would demand tribute - and then sneak attack 2 turns later anyway if I gave in. I've never tested it, but the Civ IV AI seems even more eager to attack when it thinks it has a military advantage, so I figure it will still do the same thing.

At present I give in to demands only with the aim of making AI which aren't going to attack me anyway become or stay friendly. Tribute sometimes permits open borders, and then it's often worthwhile.

Round 5: 1280 AD to 1358 AD

I didn't play very many turns during this round because I'm in a precarious position and I want everyone to alert me to any necessary course corrections ASAP. That being said, things are starting to look up a little bit.

I started off by postponing the build of a hammam in Konya as all of you were urging:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD01.jpg

Easy for you lot to suggest! With all those Workers out toiling away in the jungle all day, the place is starting to reek. But the city is still growing, so I suppose their wives are just pinching their noses shut and tolerating it as best they can.

Now that they have a new whipping boy, the other civs came by to push me around a little. Guess who was first in line:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD02.jpg

Not that giving in made him any friendlier, but I suppose I'd rather have a demerit with the much more reasonable Frederick than this nut. Not, I suppose, that it will make much difference in the end, but it may buy me time, which I very much need.

And Montezuma wasn't the only one who felt like showing poor ol' Sisiutil who's boss:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD03.jpg

Oh, rub it in, why don't you, babe? :p

Fortunately, not everybody else was so nasty. Freddy turned out to be very forgiving:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD04.jpg


I don't really need the health bonus, but he had no other resources to offer and this way I start accumulating a diplomatic bonus for resource supply to offset the trade cancellation Monty forced me into.

And look who was feeling generous!

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD05.jpg

You'd never peg Vikings as being a bunch of softies, would you? What a guy. This enables forges, of course, and since I have a source of gold, it means I have another means to boost the happiness cap (not to mention production).

Shortly after this, I finished researching my next tech:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD06.jpg

Of course I immediately changed civics to take advantage of it:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD07.jpg

Unfortunately, everyone already has CS, so I wasn't able to trade it to anyone. I started researching Construction with an eye towards building several Catapults for defense as some of you suggested. I agree that I should bee-line to Democracy soon, but I think Cats for defense, then Calendar to give me sugar for trading are necessary pits stops before pursuing that path.

Speaking of trade, I had some luck on that front as the other civs gradually obtained Astronomy:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD08.jpg

In fact, by the end of this round, I had several trades in place which allowed me to raise the research slider:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD11.jpg

Here's a look at foreign relations, which seemed to be the focus of this round:

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD10.jpg

And finally, a look at the map:


http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i193/sisiutil/ALC15/ALC15_1358AD09.jpg

I shifted tiles worked as the cities grew to the cottages, which I was laying down with the help of a couple more Workers that I built. I would have built more but some of the cities haven't popped their borders yet. With so many civs having Astronomy, I'm beginning to think that I should waste much more time in that regard waiting for other religions to spread to me. Next round I think I should just spread a religion and get all my land claimed to keep out the other civs.

Speaking of religion: I spread Buddhism to Istanbul and Edirne, but I haven't converted, nor have I given up Confucianism. Any recommendations there? Even without converting, I've managed to get almost everybody up to "Pleased", so is it really necessary?

The saved game is below.

How big is everyone's tech lead on you now? I think you should rush up to that little island to get the copper, if only for denial/trade purposes. I think it's pretty amazing that you have everyone up to pleased, even though you have a state religon that no one else has!

The Vikings gifting you a tech? Whew... This is a challenge.:D

I would have built more but some of the cities haven't popped their borders yet. With so many civs having Astronomy, I'm beginning to think that I should waste much more time in that regard waiting for other religions to spread to me. Next round I think I should just spread a religion and get all my land claimed to keep out the other civs.

is there a "not" missing in there somewhere? you shouldn't waste much more time?

Speaking of religion: I spread Buddhism to Istanbul and Edirne, but I haven't converted, nor have I given up Confucianism. Any recommendations there? Even without converting, I've managed to get almost everybody up to "Pleased", so is it really necessary?

well, the only benefit to staying confused is if it's already spread to your cities, to save you hammers in making missionaries. the line of sight you get from it being your state religion isn't gaining you anything since you're the only with it in any cities, and you get the shrine money whether it's your state religion or not. you can still spread it to get more shrine money, to your own cities and to AI cities, even if you're no longer a "true believer" of course.

there could be real benefits to converting to buddhism. if you're the only confused one, nobody's on your side. if you're buddhist, then the non-buddhists think you're a heathen, but they already think that so that's not a negative of the conversion plan. the buddhists tho, they'll change from think you're a heathen to thinking you're one of the righteous. that's a good thing. only down sides are making the missionaries to spread it around, and i suppose giving ragnar line of sight into your cities although i never worry about that ;).

i don't know if it's absolutely necessary but it's something i would definitely do. using religion in diplomacy and politics is part of my style, and something i concentrate on. having wicked fun in a current game, i sent jewish missionaries to genghis when he surprisingly opened borders after a present. i sent hindu ones (my own religion) to saladin and frederick muhahaha. genghis is gonna die soon :mischief:. i'm much better at that sort of manipulation than i am at the "make a ton of chariots and kill somebody off before i learn construction" angle *giggle*.

As I said before, it's not a question of if, so much as when...

http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q29/anoxia_mutant/Civ4ScreenShot0002.jpg

http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q29/anoxia_mutant/Civ4ScreenShot0000.jpg

http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q29/anoxia_mutant/Civ4ScreenShot0001.jpg

:eek: The two highest power civs both have enough on their hands. Looks like you're gonna have a chance to see those Catapults in action.

That isn't necessarily true; check to see who Monty and Cathy hate most. As long as you aren't their Worst Enemy, you will probably not be first on their hit list. If there are any barb cities still in play, they might even be targeting those instead of you. However, if you are someone's worst enemy, and they have full hands, and no barbs are around, then peace won't last much longer... Normally what I'd do is bribe someone to attack someone I know is about to attack me. That's the only way to avoid war. But right now, there isn't anything we can offer in terms of tech, and I doubt we have enough gold to bribe. So uh, yes, build more cats. :)

Heheh, I just love how "We have enough on our hands" is code for "We're planning to attack you." I still say a DP is the best way to cheat death, but it looks like Sisiutil may not have that much time. Just how far away is Military Tradition?

Cathrine and Monty share borders (see diplomatic advisor). There is some hope.
Pay tribute in any way possible or good luck with those cats.

Axident, this is not true. In my last game I was up to +7 to Genghis but was lacking a bit in military power but was leading the score. Even if there were other characters with +4/+5 I got still invaded like no tomorrow.

Anybody who says that the AI is not able to land a decent SoD has never seen Genghis move an invasion force of 25+ units with boats. I was like "What the.........!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Lost 2 main cities (defended by 6 units) in the first 2 rounds.

I would have expected some more coastal cities Sisi, but I guess you choose the cottage appraoch with as many workable tiles as possible. Good luck in the next round.

As I said before, it's not a question of if, so much as when...

:agree:

Monty is only Annoyed with you and Frederick, and I doubt Frederick is anywhere near the top of his hit list.

By this time period, I presume everybody has Knights. It's somewhat of a gamble, but loading up on cheap Spearmen might not be a bad idea, either.

If you can wrest a World Map from somebody, that might at least help us to know which direction he's coming from, too.

http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u128/OTAKUjbski/ALC15Notgood.jpg

How big is everyone's tech lead on you now? I think you should rush up to that little island to get the copper, if only for denial/trade purposes. I think it's pretty amazing that you have everyone up to pleased, even though you have a state religon that no one else has!

http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u128/OTAKUjbski/ALC15BassAckwards.jpg

In no particular order:

State Religion

I vote either NSR or Buddhism. We have no religious civic running, so except for the +1 :), it may very likely be doing more harm than good -- especially where Monty is concerned. Losing that -4 might buy as a few more turns of preparation.

Land is Power and Power is Land

Even though the island is a bit far from Istanbul, I think it's worth it. Our traits will get us a 50% off Lighthouse, Granary and Courthouse -- all the things we NEED this city to have ASAP.

Given the 4 Forests in the SW of the Island, that would be the place to stake a claim, if there ever was one. If you found a city 1S of the Desert tile, you'll have 3 Forests in your inner ring for a total of 132 chop hammers. Courthouse + Granary = 135 hammers ... Lighthouse = 45, which +29 of can come from the forest outside the inner ring (+44 if we bring along a Missionary to pop the borders).

This city will increase our total maintenance by 12 :gold:, I think. Rushing our 3 primary builds, working the Coast and adding in +2 :commerce: from trade routes means we shave off 11 of that (albeit 2.5 of it is in beakers). Leaving 1 total commerce lost for the city, which should be recouped in 17 turns when it 2 pops -- at which point we might work the mine or a Cottage.

Who knows, maybe this city'll become a distraction to the AI if/when they invade.?.

Istanbul = :science: City

http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u128/OTAKUjbski/ALC15NoGNP.jpg

Even though Istanbul is the top :hammers: city right now, we are way down on GNP, so I think we should focus Istanbul on :science:.

As soon as the Axeman is finished, lock in 2 Scientists, 1 Merchant and set the governor to :food: & :commerce:. This will allow you to increase the Science slider by 1% (thus speeding up Construction a turn) and also speed up the GP by 2 turns sooner (granted, this might 'pollute' the pool, but even a GM would be better than a GPr right now, though we all pray dearly for an Academy-building GS.)

Making this switch in Istanbul will also result in +7 food, which is highly respectable and will get us to working all the cottages that much sooner.

Edirne = Dry County

Edirne's Rice isn't Irrigated. This could be rectified in one turn with all the Workers running around.

Speaking of Edirne, I might also run a Merchant there -- at least until the Rice Farm is irrigated and the Lighthouse is finished.

Bursa = :hammers: time

Since Bursa is #2 on the production list, I'd recommend moving all military production there (especially if Istanbul is switched to Science).

To facilitate this, chop 2 of the forest tiles for +88 hammers towards the Forge.

Given the fear of invasion, we need this city up and running ASAP.

Crutch city

I just recently learned the power of the crutch and have never gone back.

I'm talking about a city whose purpose in life is to work cottages for other cities until they can stand on their own feet.

Build a crutch on the hill between Istanbul and Konya. There are 7 forests surrounding this site, resulting in 308 chop hammers. Courthouse 90 + Granary 45 + Library 135 = 270 w/ 38 overflow.

Similar to the island expansion, you can time the chops to all hit the city on turn 1 as it's built -- in which case it will almost immediately pay for itself after cottage / trade routes are factored in.

The crutch will be able to work 2 tiles from each city and will later have a number of its own grasslands and hills to draw from.

Alternately, I would also have the crutch take over Istanbul's Rice for the 1st 7 turns it needs to grow to pop 2 -- thus enabling it to work both of Istanbul's east river cottages. This will still leave Istanbul with +4 :food:.

I believe making the Istanbul changes and adding the crutch will increase science by 6 and gold by 8, if my numbers are correct. Total cost goes up to 93, though, so running a Merchant in Edirne and Istanbul along with the crutch is almost a must at first.

The crutch is nearly impossible to do in conjunction with island expansion, imo ... it hurts a lot ... if the crutch is built first and the expansion is built after the crutch 2 pops and Edirne & Istanbul run Merchants, :D THEN you'll more-or-less break even building both of these cities quickly.

Tiiimmmmmbbbeeerrr!

There are Forests all over the island ... is there a particular reason why we aren't chop-rushing anything?

Given that we're post-Mathematics, every Forest is a Granary or Lighthouse ... every 2 Forests is a Courthouse ... every 3 a Library. If not anything else, that's a ton of units waiting to be unleashed, too.

My 2c

I think that pretty much covers my immediate suggestions. My biggest fea