Arabia to the stars (Goal:IMM fastest space colony)

Decisions:

Ok, I've decided even though I want to get techs from Peter, I see his second city is still with one archer! Also, I calculated the amount of invested hammers via espionage...it's 40 !!!! That means either a monument or something more costly than an archer. Thus I'll whip an axe in my second city and chop another one and run over his second city. :yum:

2 unpromoted axes against a non-protective archer in a flat city without culture in it already has great chances to win! Also, I'll bring a warrior or two to maximize my chances.
The gains of invading him surpasses so much over tech trading with him. Also, we have Willem and Darius, two great techers, so no need for that poor Peter.

His capital seems to build either a settler or a worker. Thus no reinforcement!

Stupid Willem's scout attracted that barb next to my copper source. A barb next to an improvement will always go for it. I had to whip an axe to get rid of that archer.


Completion of spawnbusting.



A passageway!




Writing in. I OB with Willem and start exploration in the west. Information is master.

I can finally start a madrassa.








More exploration. Willem doesn't have metal but horses.

Corn reestablished for good.



After all, maybe, I should have tried to Oracle something!






Perfect MM.


A barb? Does it mean Willem have much more free land?




Oh Peter, you shouldn't have!




What a second adjacent worker! Oh my friggin' gawd! That means a successive worker steal because when I kill a friendly AI unit, a trick I called "Hide in sheep's clothes" that make the AI completely blind to my axe for a turn. SO, I'll get a worker next turn for sure!



But I can't bring my other axe, otherwise the trick doesn't work. It only works for the attacking unit.



I start another settler instead of immediately whip the madrassa. Meanwhile, I'll bank gold for when I get my madrassa up. Also, going for a settler is more optimal than whipping the madrassa now as I work good tiles longer and the angry face doesn't eat.




Oops. I forgot that one. Get away russian archer scout.

No need to whip again, my axe will arrive just in time for defense.


Just as I said. This is nothing new to me. Aww, I wanted that freebee settler.

Gotcha b-tch!

Given the "sheep's clothes" trick is universal and not just workers, see that capital hasn't whipped anything!


And I finish my third round with a hanging cliffhanger: will I attack and gamble big or not? Such is the question!?



BTW, that undermining Peter's archer is as courageous as his master. Spit on him. Coward!



I let the save to everyone. Feeling lucky! Test it out!
I don't know the result, but I'll definitely take my chance next round. Unless someone dissuades me. If I knew, I would have taken my CR axe!

Comments? Strategies now?
But don't tell me the result of that 8% kamikaze! I want to see the surprise next turnset.

So much thinking goes into your game and posting Tachy, and all I can think of when seeing your avatar is how many kittens I want to kill!

An 8.8% chance to take Peter's capital AND get a free worker?

Nice work.

I wouldn't attack Moscow at less than 10% odds. I might try at 50% but not 10%. You'd just be giving Peter war success and a free promotion.

At 10%, for Peter it's 90%, thus 1 XP. He has City Garrison now at prolly 3/5 thanks to the rax. Thus, he'll gain 4/5, not enough for another promo.
I got 2 workers individually, which nets to 10 war success and that evasive scoutish archer is gonna be killed for another 4 war success. With my present power ratio and war success, he has to bend hard to see me giving mercy!

Let's do a vote:

Attack or not.
I'll comply to the result unless someone has the ultimate justification of my madness.

I vote no, but you knew that already. You'd be throwing away 35...

BTW, have you considered going after Willem soonish since he has no metal? I'd consider leaving Peter at two cities and shifting attention toward him. You can finish Peter off any time you like...

Hmmm grow some balls and attack!!!! There is so much of an up side of attacking that the 99% chance of losing doesn't really hurt.

You guys aren't gamblers. The odds look bad on paper, but the risk is worth it. His capital and a worker for 35 hammers? Wait a few turns for him to bulk up and you'll be looking at 4 archers or worse in the capital. You'll need 8 axes and wasted time.

Accuscore says to go for it.

It really kills me how you make settler and madrassa during axe rush. Couple more axes and road from Mecca to Medina to ship them quick.

^
What do you mean? I'm trying to do a balance between rushing and science.

At 8.8%, statistically, you're spending close to 400 to get the city. Doesn't seem like a good deal to me, you can get it significantly more efficiently later. Peter isn't going anywhere.

Nice payout so far.

Gamble

Good thing about 8.8% is that Archer won't get a promotion when he kills your Axe.

I'd like you to attack just for fun of it, but if you succeed it will kill strategy in your thread and replace it with luck. So, I am slightly against it.

You could continue playing controlled game and load this save just to see what would be?

Now that the game is pretty advanced and there's no remaining jokers, I can settle a basic outlining of what I intent to do so to win a space colony the fastest possible.

Right now, on the tech side, I went:

Agriculture ==> Pottery ==> Mining ==> BW ==> AH ==> Writing ==> Alphabet

Even though I didn't follow ABCF 's suggestions in city placements, alphabet beelining is fine so to fill missing techs and the prize is IW for those gems. If I'm lucky, I may get Math!

After Alphabet, I will beeline techs for the path of war. Although Construction+phants are great, they are better in the end of the BC era and the early AD once, I dunno, Willem will get longbows. I don't doubt his teching capacity. Before that siege war, which will stand as the third generation of war, I will beeline HA's.

I don't know yet if I should wait HA's against Peter's capital (albeit, it's perhaps preferable to axe rush him and I'll be able to set up a great site for HA's pumping...see those untouched forests...ah the power of choking), but I intent to hurt Willem and get most of his cities. His present capital is a nice second mass cottage city. I won't axe rush him because it's inefficient. The first encounter is a hilly city with 40% culture, which is despicably costly. At least, with HA's, I have 20% of retreat, which may save some hammers.

Thus my planning goes like this:

Alphabet ==> (trade Hunting, Archery, other stuff) ==> HBR ==> (Math) ==> Construction.

I will likely crush Peter with axes and then shift to HA's to get more cities from Willem. And free extortion techs. I don't think Darius I really likes him because he has a high peaceweight while Willem a low one. I hope those AI's shakabrade mentioned are present early so to avoid a semi-isolation situation, which is definitely not good to keep a good and fast tech rate.

I will settle gems city by the time I get IW (otherwise useless city) and will settle most probably cow city next to grow more cottages around the capital. You see, overlaying cities. City helpers...
Sadly, cow will have to be off of coast to be a city helper, but that may be more profitable, is it? I know, I may strike out good oversea trade routes for later doing sol...

About the Oracle, given we're at ~1400 BC and I still doesn't have PH, I don't think the shot is worth. I don't even know who is the buddist. If that was somebody like Hannibal, that wouldn't be a problem, but it can be anyone, including some religious wonder lover. BUT, after the trades with Willem, if I happen to get up to PH or Poly (which I somehow doubt unless Darius went that route), I might try even it's a lucky 800 BC shot. But I won't spend my precious beakers on something now extremely risky at this point. And I also think, the progresses now are pretty good (4 workers+1 free city) to relinquish the oracle opportunity cost.

There's another city spot, the clams, but I won't claim it. I'll let Willem settle it for me and upgrade his city in the process. I won't burden myself with a short-term useless city when I've got a lot to do with the war machine.

Regarding wonders in general, I don't think any fit the situtation. I don't have marble, stone and even gold (shwadagon paya fail gold). The situation is grim on that aspect and I hope the war with Willem will provide me some hidden marble, so I can build the TGL. I wish for the Mids, but that's a total refusal to spend 500 just for Rep and that GEngineer.

I hope WIllem will build the ToA for me.

As for the late strategy: I need currency at some point, so I suppose the spoils of war will fund currency. Afterwards, the usual Music route or CS towards Lib. What will I Lib? Depends how generous the war was. If extremely, I can perhaps Lib something big like Biology, Communism (temp) or even Medecine!
Will see, will see.

Now, I also need to explore that water passage NW; perhaps it leads to Darius I or more AI's. More AI's translate to a better leverage of my Alphabet beeline.


Any suggestions on top of that? You see, I'm supposed to get tips, not making a show off. Please~~~some help. I want some tiiiiiips.

EDIT: I forgot about the GScientist: my second city...after pumping few axemen, will spawn that missing and critical to science GScientist. The capital will be too busy with cottages growth.

Kaitzilla said:

Don't forget, you can use the espionage screen to figure out if St. Petersburg is building a 2nd archer. Once it completes, your warrior can suddenly die from it.

Click to expand...

I did not know that, thats really helpful.

First, I play on immortal and loose more then I win (or quit when I not finish before the 1900s), so I am lurking with more questions then contribution here, but its a great thread to learn, especially for the late game, since I normally opt for a pangea cavalry finish in the early to late 1600s. Never seen much corps or factories, only in captured cities

I am very curious how this attempt will work out. Early rushes in my games are too much of a gamble, I guess since they are not that early. Still, I would have liked to see a non war start here, but its obviously so much better, you get two workers and one city out of the deal. Isnt it risky to attack with only two unpromoted axes? With bad luck you could loose these two.

About settling spots: I usually look more for the long term perspective of a city, which is suboptimal, as I can see here. I would have settled the corn city to grab both phants after a monument and diamond town to have the banana and fresh water (coast, levees etc), but most (successful) players seem to advocate the fast gain, since a monument and a border pop would take too long, am I right? Tachy, your third city settled one south would have a PH, is that something that can be neglected? I thought of hills as a resource too...

its a great threat to learn

Click to expand...

No, learning is good.

Still, I would have liked to see a non war start here

Click to expand...

Me too. I ended up again rolling over someone. I wanted to learn and again I got stuck with the vicious circle of wars.
In fact, I got 4 workers plus a free city. For the prize of 2 axemen initially. And I didn't lose any yet!
That's a net gain of 460 hammers+imponderable gains for an investment of 70 hammers.

Isnt it risky to attack with only two unpromoted axes? With bad luck you could loose these two.

Click to expand...

Well, the first had 33%, which means at that point, great deal in at least hurting the unit.
Also, I had a warrior on top of it if it went wrong. I think I had 95% to get the city.

but most (successful) players seem to advocate the fast gain, since a monument and a border pop would take too long, am I right?

Click to expand...

Yes, early gains outweigh later ones because of the phenomenon called snowballing.
A prime example of trying to play optimal by comprising everything in a city is an AI settling with all his/her resources outside the culture reach. That means monuments and waiting period while working bad tiles. I even saw AI's doing so without Mysticism for a long moment; that was so ridiculous that once a deity Joao II, I almost crushed him with chariots because he misplaced all his cities and by 1500 BC, still no mysticism. Also, he ReX too fast, thus 1.5 archers per city.
Furthermore, why creative civs are more succesful than the typical one: not only for fast libraries, but thanks to free border pop that palliates the AI stupidity in settling their cities.

Green hills are a good non-bonus tile. The hammers for food consumption ration is most excellent. While PH needs to give up two food for 4 hammers, with the GH you give up 1 food for 3 hammers. So, less affected growth and better food-->hammers conversion.

That city one south meant no BFC copper in the short term. See the difference it made! Axemen are miracle doers. Or great anti-barbs. I was lucky I ended up with only one barb fight.