ALC Game #6: France/Louis

The question for Coppertown is whether you can give it the sheep resource and still have what you want for Paris.

We'll always have Paris.

A Japan first strategy sounds fine, although as you've indicated, it really depends upon the composition of their cities and empire. Strategically, taking the northern half of the continent might be better militarily than running down the east coast. Of course, if someone has nice happiness resources . . .

Domination ... yeah, that's the ticket! Beat them senseless.

Praise First!--Excellent city locations. I would have panicked and taken the copper right away. Good calm decisions. The wonders are good, and you economy is ok, although low on gold--but who needs gold now? I think you whip hand is gonna be tired after this game though!

Now the not so good news. You are currently ranked 4 in soldiers (2 in area, 4 in pop). Your "number" 54,000; Best 74,000; worst 46,000. If you don't get some units soon, you might have the old suprise visit played on you.

Other bad news--good building sites are gonna be hard to come by. There is a lot of jungle out there. SW is a great iron/cow/something else site; but frankly I will be surprised if it is not taken when you get there.

Weird News--Toku has an open border agreement with HC. Why?
Is this just an early agreement that Toku will void, or the start of a long nasty friendship?

While all is certainly not lost, I don't think it is the bed of roses you imagine either. I sure would like to see a credible military force real soon.

Recommendations on research. COL, then not a beeline, but consider catapults (Const) real soon.

Dr Elmer Jiggle said:

I think you often worry more than you need to about the AI settling in stupid places.

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Thanks for the reassurance, if I may call it that. I own a Sheltie, and they worry about EVERYTHING, and I sometimes thing I pick up that habit from him. Good thing he doesn't hump people's legs...

Yes, I need more workers. Which is why I'm building one in Paris. Thanks for the reminder regarding how the growth will work, Betafor. Maybe I'll just wait and whip the forge. Then again, with the forge & gold, and the Ivory on-line, whipping pop to prevent unhappiness may not be necessary just yet. I probably should build a few more Workers, but if I go to war soon, I can grab some for free. And once the basic resources are hooked up, I need cottages.

Paul666 said:

While all is certainly not lost, I don't think it is the bed of roses you imagine either. I sure would like to see a credible military force real soon.

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Believe me, Paul666, I want to see a good military soon too, and I never imagine a bed of roses in a Civ game--check me, above, wringing my hands over the AI settling in crappy spots in my back yard.

The delay in building a military has been because of the awkward placement of the copper and researching IW. This is why I made a diversion to Archery, otherwise I'd still have only Warriors protecting my cities, and that's a little too appetizing to the AI.

The military delay is nearly over. The Worker that Paris is building will hook up the iron ASAP while my cities build forges followed by barracks. Then everything changes...

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Something else crossed my mind regarding my intention to build the Great Library: where do I put it? In other words, what are my best commerce/science city candidates? Paris is devoted to production and I don't want to pollute its Great Prophet points.

Perhaps Orleans? I'm thinking of postponing its forge taking a run at the Parthenon there. If I cottage the place up, it could be a decent commerce city. It also has some hills for production. The Parthenon would contribute GP points towards a Great Artist, but the odds would be much more in favour of Great Scientists thanks to the GL itself and its two free scientists.

Lyon? Also a good commerce site once cottages get going, but not great for production. Marble and Industrious will help, but I don't want to lose the GL because I built it in a low-production city. Besides, we're already talking about Lyon being the GP farm, and the GL would make it produce Great Scientists almost exclusively until Scientific Method. Not that that's a bad thing...

Rheims? Certainly it's a very flexible site with four different resources. Cottage it up and it should be a good commerce site.

None of them are ideal, though, and it's due to the lack of rivers. Cottages on grassland next to rivers are more lucrative and I usually prefer them for a science city. VoU observed that I don't have my Ironworks city yet; true, but that's less of a problem this early than not having a good science city. The good news is there are plenty of excellent spots west and southwest near those two long rivers. The bad news is I'm not likely to get there first.

This raises the urgency of doing some conquering. Kyoto may make a better candidate for the Great Library, but if I don't grab it soon, I may not have enough time to build it there.

I may have to be content with a good science city in the early game and try to get a super-science city going, without the GL, once I have some better terrain.

Sisiutil said:

Thanks for the reassurance, if I may call it that.

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Yes, it was meant that way.

I own a Sheltie, and they worry about EVERYTHING, and I sometimes thing I pick up that habit from him.

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Been there, done that. We had one and then two Shelties after the first died when I was a kid.

Sisiutil said:

Lyon? Also a good commerce site once cottages get going, but not great for production. Marble and Industrious will help, but I don't want to lose the GL because I built it in a low-production city. Besides, we're already talking about Lyon being the GP farm, and the GL would make it produce Great Scientists almost exclusively until Scientific Method. Not that that's a bad thing...

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Of course, if you get the Globe into Lyons, then it is bursting at the seams with production you just alternate between whipping out units and applying the overflow to the wonder.

Note that when the Globe comes with the same tech that gives access to the culture slider - so if you are willing to turn down your research briefly, you can basically ignore the accumulation of oppression and whip every other turn (applying the overflow to the globe). One the globe comes in, restore the slider to normal levels, then whip the library and the Nat Epic there, and Bob's your uncle.

Sisiutil said:

Perhaps Orleans? I'm thinking of postponing its forge taking a run at the Parthenon there. If I cottage the place up, it could be a decent commerce city. It also has some hills for production. The Parthenon would contribute GP points towards a Great Artist, but the odds would be much more in favour of Great Scientists thanks to the GL itself and its two free scientists.

Lyon? Also a good commerce site once cottages get going, but not great for production. Marble and Industrious will help, but I don't want to lose the GL because I built it in a low-production city. Besides, we're already talking about Lyon being the GP farm, and the GL would make it produce Great Scientists almost exclusively until Scientific Method. Not that that's a bad thing...

Rheims? Certainly it's a very flexible site with four different resources. Cottage it up and it should be a good commerce site.

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The thing to remember is what the GLib is for. It is there for the GP points (8 Science points, hard to get, not for the flasks...6 flasks is easy to get)

It is therefore, best to put it with National Epic and a GP-Farm-to-be... now if that GP farm is a Scientist Farm, then Oxford should go there. Otherwise, outside of a Cultural Win, Scientists are generally the best GPs (except possibly Engineers.. but those are Hard to get)

Now the question of where to put the GL depends on where you want Oxford to be, do you want to use Oxford as a Flask Booster or as a Scientist Allower?

The point of not loosing it is indeed valid, but if you have Marble, then with Industrious you can whip a Wonder for 37 hammers per pop unit (that means at 6 population, you can whip finish it off with 112 hammers to go)... you could also manipulate the whip to allow potentially better results.

pop 4.. put an Axe/Spear in the box... whip for 2 pop
you get 25 overflow that gets the benefits of Marble and Industrious for a total of 62 hammers... you only need to do that 6 times with NO other production being used (if you have a granary then Lyons can probably go from 2 to 4 pop in 4-8 turns) and plus this produces an Axeman/Spearman that can nullify the happiness penalty if you get Monarchy. (or at least be used in other ways)

[which is why I'd go for Monarchy rather than Drama to control the Happiness during the 'Whip to GL'... similar Cost, and all Monarchy requires is the one turn rather than building Theaters, etc.... although the Slider would be inconvenient.... but Monarchy Might be something you can trade for]

I have to agree that after Writing, Monarchy. It's a better overall happiness tool, especially when taking over new cities.

Tokugawa - move the worker from the jungle to Paris and hook up that iron pronto. I'd guess six or seven swordsmen with CR1 will do the job on Kyoto, with enough left over to take out his other cities. Chop out the forests near the horses to build swords and axes in CowFin readying the war on Huayna. The only problem I see is that you're woefully under capitalized and may have to move slider down to 20% until you can rebuild. Or . . . take the easy way out and chop out the Parthenon after connecting the marble and hope you don't get it. Those hammers into gold will go a long ways to finance this little police action.

Huayna ... not quite sure what he's up to. I'd be careful. He's stronger than Tokugawa methinks. With the Japanese cities in your fold and hopefully some new resources, you could probably build to cats to complement CR2 and CR3 swords.

We're such warmongers.

Some thoughts on your first target.

First let's think about the other land mass. It has at least one semi-religious type there. I would guess Hattie and her chariots. The other leader?? I don't know....Peter, Bismark,Mao or one of the Khans. I would guess Mao, but I don't think it matters right now, just trying to picture down the road.

Your land, Cyrus and HC are placed very close together, maybe there is not as much land East as we would think. Which leads us to believe that West is where the other land will be. Therefore, I would think about Toku or Isabella first. Isabella is further away, and although she is a pain, it takes her a while to build an economy, she doesn't start with builder techs, and takes religion first. So even though I am scared of Conquistedors, I think I am more concerned about Samurai. Preliminary thought then, go after Japan.

The only real fly in the ointment is determing the state of realtions with HC, Monitor that and be prepared to shift. Can Isabella or Cyrus be talked into fighting HC while you go west? Because of the shape of your land, your force in the south (build that force!) can be shifted east or west quickly. But once you get deep into a war, you will leave your back exposed. If you cannot get another war going, make sure you have a quick campaign, even if you have to take "just" 2 or 3 cities instead of completely destroying your rival.

Huh, and here I thought I was done learning about whippage after the Vicky game.

So correct me if I'm wrong, but to get the Globe into Lyons and them build the Great Library, I'd be researching Alphabet and then Drama followed by Literature. Lyons builds the Globe, Workers put farms on most of its tiles, build a Granary there, and then start whipping as Krikkitone described.

Eggolas makes a good point about Huayna. Getting boxed in can make a civ more aggressive and dangerous. I haven't checked the power ratings and should do that first thing once I get back to the game.

And yes, workers and cottages. Not Financial. It's the economy, stupid. Like I said above, Paris is building another worker, and once the iron and ivory are hooked up, cottages become the priority. Even the copper can wait awhile.

One slight advantage I have when it comes to taking cities is that I am the only Creative civ on the continent. That and Stonehenge will help reclaim tiles around conquered cities. Another argument in favour of going after Huayna first is that the longer I leave it, the more cultural pressure Persia will be able to exert down there.

EDIT: Paul666 posted practically at the same time I did. Good advice there, and parallel with much of my own thinking. Though I think at least one of the mystery civs is one that starts with Mysticism. I'd have to check the game log to see when Buddhism was founded to be more sure. I wouldn't be surprised to find the same civ founded both it and Judaism.

I am leaning towards attacking Japan first as well, but I don't want to leave my flank/rear exposed to Huayna or even Cyrus, for that matter. As I said, I wouldn't mind a brief foray against Huayna to take the rice city south of Lyon, so provided I have some good defenders in the city (at least an Axe and a Spear to supplement the two Archers), I won't panic if he declares war.

I have a question for clarification regarding health bonuses. I seem to recall that as soon as you get a health resource like fish or wheat for the first time, ALL your cities get a health boost REGARDLESS of whether they have a harbour or a granary. So don't the buildings simply increase the existing health bonus, and are not necessary to get the base bonus? And don't happiness boosting buildings that rely on resources (forges, markets) work the same way?

All cities connected to trade network get basic health bonus from a resource, granaries and harbours give additional health bonus (i.e. 2 health instead of 1).

Sisiutil said:

One slight advantage I have when it comes to taking cities is that I am the only Creative civ on the continent.

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Cyrus is Creative.

Eggolas said:

I have to agree that after Writing, Monarchy. It's a better overall happiness tool, especially when taking over new cities.

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Monarchy? Meh, it's not all that great. There's currently no Wine to connect, and you need to keep troops stationed in the city to maintain the Happiness boost, which is a waste of troops. I don't think it will be necessary for a substantial amount of time.

Paul666 said:

So even though I am scared of Conquistedors, I think I am more concerned about Samurai. Preliminary thought then, go after Japan.

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Yes, I agree with the offensive against Japan. There's no real need to be scared of any UU when it's in the hands of the AI, as the AI has no real ability to use any unit to full effect. And Izzy, as much as she's a little fireball, is no military leader. Tokugawa is far more of a loose cannon, even if it is easy enough to keep him more interested in attacking someone else if you'll feed him the occassional free tech, which is easy enough as he's extremely backwards.

Kyoto is west of Orleans. Taking that would effectively cripple Tokugawa. The only problem is that it will have 60% cultural defenses by the time you assault it, and, given that it's your first target, you'll almost assuredly need either tons of Swordsmen or at least some Catapaults.

Catapaults means Construction, which delays Literacy, which puts the Great Library at risk. Is the GL worthwhile? I think so, as you'll want an Academy for Rheims once it starts working all those Cottages.

Sisiutil said:

Domination has started rattling around in my brain too, because just by taking over this continent I'll likely have the landmass required. And considering the neighbours...

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High speed Domination, pre-Industrial era style. I would very much like to see a pursual of a true Diplomatic victory, and pick up on the various tricks others know of to manipulate AI relations, but this map is entirely unsuited to that. There's really no question that your continent should have enough land to achieve Domination, so you might as well make it interesting and see how fast you can complete the task.

Nares said:

I would very much like to see a pursual of a true Diplomatic victory, and pick up on the various tricks others know of to manipulate AI relations, but this map is entirely unsuited to that.

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As one of the main advocates of the diplomatic victory in some of the previous games, I have to say I pretty much agree. I might quibble over the word "entirely," but otherwise I think you're right.

I really prefer to eliminate only one AI if I'm going to consider it a diplomatic victory, and in this situation I think you have little choice but to rid yourself of both Tokugawa and Huayana. With only 4 AI's left after that, and one needs to be your rival. Since one of those AI's is the always troublesome Isabella, you might be in a tough spot.

This game really seems to be begging for domination. Either you get it super early by taking over your continent, or maybe you need to take 2 extra cities on the other continent to finish it off. Reminds me a bit of the Egypt game.

Nares said:

Cyrus is Creative.

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D'oh! I should always check the Info Center before I make a claim like that.

Well, see, that complicates going after Huayna even more, since Persian culture would likely strangle most of the Incan cities I'd take. I'd have to raze those cities or gift them to Cyrus--either way, he'd be the one benefitting the most from me warring on Huayna.

So as I said before, what I'd really like to do is fortify Lyon, and if (ha! if?) Huayna declares war, take the city to Lyon's south, cripple him, rely on Cyrus to keep him contained, and finish him off much, much later. After Cyrus, specifically--again, I'm thinking of that counter-clockwise sweep through the continent.

If Huayna is still around and bothersome after I have Gunpowder but am still busy conquering someone else, he'd be a prime candidate for the Musketeer pillaging tactic we discussed in the pre-game thread.

So...interested in seeing how fast I can pull off a domination win, eh? A few thoughts on that...

• If there's one thing I learned from that Hatty game, it's to cottage spam when you're not financial, so that will be a dual priority along with a military build-up.
• The Machinery slingshot puts me in a good position to acquire the medieval military techs a little earlier.
• Deprioritizing diplomacy also deprioritizes finding the other continent, so working towards Optics will wait. I'll probably get those techs through trades and/or extortion.
• If I go after the fastest possible dom win, that's going to de-prioritize wonders--so I'll either give the Parthenon a complete miss, or as Eggolas suggested earlier, start it in Orleans after the forge; but with no mines or chops, I'd hope to reap the gold from its failure. I'll bet Izzy is going to build it, so I could always take it from her.

[too much info ... even for a spoiler. Sorry.]

Sisiutil said:

[*]If I go after the fastest possible dom win, that's going to de-prioritize wonders--so I'll either give the Parthenon a complete miss, or as Eggolas suggested earlier, start it in Orleans after the forge; but with no mines or chops, I'd hope to reap the gold from its failure. I'll bet Izzy is going to build it, so I could always take it from her.

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Well, you can certainly get in some Mines and some chops in Orleans. There's five Hills, two Plains and two Grasslands and the Plains Gold, that it can work, verus only three Grassland tiles for Cottages. While you may want to work Cottages primarily, you'll want at least some of those Hills mined so as to facilitate building science/gold multipliers.

As an aside, Izzy founded Judaism, which leaves Buddhism on the other continent.

Round 3: to 1 AD

Not the most eventful round--no wars just yet, but several interesting developments.

First off, as soon as I finished researching Writing, Isabella came a-callin':



Since my Scout was running out of unclaimed territory to explore, I readily agreed. I then went to see the other leaders to get similar agreements. Predictably, everyone agreed except Tokugawa.

I then had to choose my research path, and it was a big decision, because whatever I chose would have far-reaching consequences. I decided to research Masonry so that the Great Prophet, due in only a few turns, could discover Code of Laws for me. Yes, I was tempted to research CoL on my own and use the GP for Civil Service, but I realized that this game called for an even more balanced research approach than had been recommended to me over a Musketeer beeline. Once I had Meditation, you see, I could go after Alphabet for tech trading, knowing I had Code of Laws from the GP.

Meanwhile, my Archer was completed in Paris, and that freed up a Warrior to do some exporing. Turns out I was right, there's not much to the north of me:



I have crabs! (It's strange to be writing that and happy about it...)

Yes, I can build a little fishing village up there later. It won't be much, but it will claim the crabs for me. It looks like the best spot for it will be on the snow tile immediately north of the forested tundra. (And yes, as a Canadian I feel obliged to point out that there's no such thing as treed tundra!)

And as predicted, Toku is getting cranky:



Maybe he just needs his nappies, or his diaper changed. Dunno, don't care. Having him ticked at me fits right into my plans, after all.

A few turns later, my Great Prophet appeared, and I popped him for Code of Laws, which meant...



Once again, I did not adopt my newly-founded religion. It just messes up diplomatic relations, and would have here, especially since Cyrus converted to Hinduism.

My Scout kept exploring the lands of all my Open Borders partners. Turns out I was right about Huayna's territory. He has all of three cities pressed against the southeast coast of our continent.



This is why he's at the bottom of the scoreboard and likely to remain there. Once Nares reminded my of Cyrus' Creative trait, I remembered how he uses that very well. Cyrus is definitely one of the best AI land-grabbers.

Since Huayna is likely relegated to also-ran status because of his lack of territory (don't worry, I'm beefing up Lyon's defenses just to be safe), he was my first choice for a tech-trading partner once I completed Alphabet:



May as well get the most out of Code of Laws.

I actually have a decent tech lead, so I had to wait a few turns before anyone else was able to offer anything close to an equitable trade:



Now that I have Masonry and Monotheism, my next Great Prophet should be poppable for Theology.

And that Great Prophet will appear a little faster than normal, thanks to this:



I know I intended to not complete it for the gold, but Nares' post and my own builder's mentality urged me on. Once I started it, I wanted it. So Orleans may, eventually, give me a Great Artist. Perhaps I should build Heroic Epic there too, since it's turning into a decent production city, with cottages for balance.

Here's where I am on the tech tree, with all techs prior to those shown obtained:



I have an Archer, Axeman, and Spearman in all my cities (save Paris, which can be lightly defended for now), and I have 5 CRI Swordsmen. I plan to build another Spear and a Combat I Axe as stack protectors, and perhaps one or two more swords, then it's Catapults and War Elephants, baby.

After Construction is complete, I should probably research Monarchy. Happiness is starting to become an issue in Paris and will be in Lyons soon as well, though so far, I've used the whip to manage it, and very effectively, I think, thanks to the coaching I got in that regard in the Vicky game. After Monarchy, I'm thinking of grabbing Literature for its wonders, and Drama so I can put the Globe in Lyons and whip the joint like crazy.

I could get Monarchy from Cyrus...



...but I'd really rather not. While I'm trying to stay on friendly terms with him, he's also my biggest rival at the moment. I've already helped him with one tech trade and I'm very reluctant to trade away any more advantages to him.

Here's a look at the map:



And the power ratings:



Now if you glance at the scorecard and check out the religious situation, you'll notice that it's gotten interesting, which means, complicated. Confucianism has spread to Huayna, Toku is Jewish, and Izzy and Cyrus are Hindu and getting all lovey-dovey. Ick.

It's tempting to convert to Confucianism, but all that will do is make the weakest civ on the continent happy with me while ticking off everybody else. Not the smartest diplomatic move, in my opinion. Now I would like to keep Cyrus happy with me, and if I can keep Izzy content and out of my way, so much the better. Huayna is weak and I can handle him.

So what I'm thinking of doing is getting my workers to build a road to Persia lickety-split, then cross my fingers and hope for Hinduism to spread to either Orleans or Rheims before Confucianism does. Then I can convert, build monasteries, and spread it around.

Meanwhile, I'm almost ready to launch my war against Tokugawa. I unfortunately lack much intelligence regarding his forces. I've seen a Japanese Axeman, but I don't know how his cities are defended. Should I plow ahead with my stack of 6 Swords, 1 Axe, and 1 Spear, or should I wait for Catapults? I don't like waiting, I'll tell you that much.

Anyway, here's the save, and I look forward to hearing from you!

What about connecting to Izzy in the process of your war with toku? That would let miss Religious freak spread her faith to your people--until you adopt Theocracy to lay the smack down on her...

Using your last save, I researched Monarchy and launched an attack with six swords against Tokugawa, while building more in Lyons through chopping the forest by the horses. By 50AD, Japan was just about toast. Loss: 2 Swordsmen. Captured: 2 cities including Kyoto. Cats were not necessary.

IThis may come out wrong, but in some ways, I believe that you're too deliberate if you want to achieve faster victories (e.g., space races in 1800s or less). The AI simply fights poorly and massing for a local advantage is the hallmark of warfare.

However, if your intention is simply to win while having fun building wonders, then just disregard the comment and have fun.

Eggolas said:

Using your last save, I researched Monarchy and launched an attack with six swords against Tokugawa, while building more in Lyons through chopping the forest by the horses. By 50AD, Japan was just about toast. Loss: 2 Swordsmen. Captured: 2 cities including Kyoto. Cats were not necessary.

IThis may come out wrong, but in some ways, I believe that you're too deliberate if you want to achieve faster victories (e.g., space races in 1800s or less). The AI simply fights poorly and massing for a local advantage is the hallmark of warfare.

However, if your intention is simply to win while having fun building wonders, then just disregard the comment and have fun.

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Well, I'm honestly not that much of a warmonger. I war so I can build; Hans and I are alike in that respect, at least. I'm also a little more risk-averse than many other players. Thus, I built forges, then barracks, THEN my units, and I even paused a few times to build granaries to better support whipping.

Of course, posting the game like this may also make me play a little (or a lot) more deliberately. If I mass 6 swords quickly, send them off in one direction, then get blindsided by the AI from the other so that I lose all my cities, well, that's no big deal offline, but it would be a disappointing ALC, I should think.

Connecting a road to Izzy as well as Cyrus would be a good idea, Gnarff, thanks. I've noticed that Isabella is one of the AIs who likes to build missionaries and send them off to distant lands. Not surprising, of course.

Tog is likely to be a good target because most of his unexplored territory is likely to be in northern temperate zone. I'd likely hold on for cats and build a proper stack of doom; whip courthouses as you go; consolidate north while beelining gunpowder; keep izzy and cyrus happy meanwhile; once you've got gunpowder switch off research for a while and take out south in one long campaign.