Dr kossin #1

Round 2b

To sum it up : this was hard. Were it not for War Chariots, the game would likely be over :S
I did reload an auto-save for a misclick. Anyway, on to the game.

From the last round, I settled the Horse/Fish city and put research on 0% because it wasn't connected yet but would be the next turn.

Research went Fishing>Finish Masonry>Pottery>Writing>Place on Aesthetics

I met Hannibal but forgot to take a screenshot.

Decided to rush Justinian when I saw he went for the other copper almost at the beginning of the round.

I built *War Chariot until I had 11, some from Chops, some from whips and some from the horse city. I also squeezed in the gold/corn city at some point.

I looked at the Culture shape and when for his Capital first.


Justinian has swords! (Which means: a lot of spears and barely any Axemen.... )


This is why:

Gems! Also Ivory and a religion for a high early cap. Sadly it didn't contain anything of interest. I whipped a Library and a warrior with the unhappy people. (Still unhappy at this point)

I pillaged some roads around so his Spears couldn't move so easily and found this...

I had moused over it but that's 2 settlers waiting around. I really despise rushing Justinian.

I tried as best as I could to pillage all his mines but I could never get his Copper out. At least I got both Irons.

Justinian wouldn't talk yet so I hit another city, Thessalonica, which I kept. I attacked over the river since it wasn't overly fortified.


It's not great but it will help generate a Prophet for the Shrine at some point. Still, a settled GG and Pig are always good but the most important reason I kept it is for the Iron. (I don't have Copper/Iron anywhere else)

Now Justinian is willing to talk on the upside. I don't see any easy way of getting rid of him just now though.


I whipped a granary the previous turn and 2 chops came in this turn, yielding in 212 towards the Pyramids.


Here are Justinian's last two cities with metal sources pinpointed. Also note Brennus has a settler under that spear and will likely settle next turn.


Mouseover of the stack outside Constantinople - 2 spears and 2 archers


Techs: Saladin has Alphabet. I can tech Aesthetics in 10~11 turns at 100% research.


Current units... 21 War Chariots built, 10 lost. The last battle also generated a Great General. He's sitting in Thebes.


Killed units: 5 Axe, 4 Archers, 3 Swords and 1 Spear. 10:13 is not really good but I'll take it. I've also captured 3 workers.


The known world.


I think I should take peace and finish him off at catapults or something. Having Ivory also opens up Elephants so maybe teching HBR instead of Aesthetics?

Going forward, I need to chop chop the Pyramids and backfill the land. The clams city I am not convinced of anymore, it could claim the Rice as well if we wait. But that's probably not worth it if I can get my hands on The Pyramids.

Hopefully I did not make too many blunders (cottages!?!?) and maybe things get easier from here

Look for next round tomorrow!

As a starting neighbour Justin is nasty!!! Expands too fast.

Good work on the rush. That Holy city will pay for itself. Gems. ivorty and rice. Jackpot!!! I would finish Justin off before he builds more cities. How many spears does he have?

WC's rock!! You do need to get that shrine up and running asap. UB built anywhere?? All that excess gold will help found construction or HBR. Choose your poison carefully.

Currently, I would chop out the Pyramids, sign a CEASE FIRE (important it's not a treaty) with Justin then get all of your units ready at his borders by Adrianople. Then once you have all the WCs there, attack him, take the city, then broker a peace deal. North of your borders is all jungle/desert anyways, and is not use to you, so it's better if you let Justin keep that and improve it while you tech up the Construction/HBR line and improve your economy.

You'll need more workers, but this game it looks like you're in very good shape. Cottages are a good idea in the cap, Bureau looks good too.

@Gumbolt
I don't have Mysticism yet so no Obelisks built so far. Justinian has about 4 spears at least left I would say. Construction is after Mathematics so I can't get it just yet.

@Kadazzle
4 workers stand next to Thebes to finish The Pyramids presto.
It will depend on where he sends his leftover spears but he has 1 spear, maybe 2 in that city. A Cease Fire is the way to go, I agree. Taking Adrianople will unify the empire so it would be great. Maybe he'll even develop that jungle up north for me.

pilaging metals could have helped surely

Play with yields on, that way even though you can't see iron, you can tell where his iron based on a mine that gives more hammers then it should if there was no resource there.

Loki Strikes said:

Play with yields on, that way even though you can't see iron, you can tell where his iron based on a mine that gives more hammers then it should if there was no resource there.

Click to expand...

Indeed, doing this was a factor in my shadow...although I also got open borders with him and completely scouted him out with a chariot as I built up.

okay, i tried to go from last posted save [tried means i reloaded at some point for some stupid reason].

Had epic fail on trying pillage iron, so this would not win awards for speed and beauty. [also had some problems while trying whip warrior for cash 3.19]

Com,ments from seeing stuff from inside game -
to little chopping [of course i built another worker]
whiping chariots is very meh.
IT is zero point in having 300 gold. I'd rather have tech and work coast to avoid strike.
Not really sure what the hell you were doing after 1240BC. Why you stopped after getting his capitol? As it is now you either call peace or Justinian gets his cap back.

You know you need hunting to get phants hapiness, right?

@Loki Strikes
I do play with yields on. I sent 2 pillagers for every resource but like I said I could not get his bronze resource. This was a major headache, and since his other iron was so deep in his territory.

@TMIT
I should really have gone for Writing earlier, I couldn't scout him and that caused me a lot of trouble -_-

@Soirana
Yes, I'll sign a Cease Fire now and continue after a little while. I'm looking at your save to see where I went wrong. The biggest thing I find is that you did not build the gold city while I did. I now see taking Justinian's cities was more important, so was chopping the Pyramids (I knew those cottages was a bad idea). In the spirit of learning I will continue from my save, but I will also replay from the previous save and try your approach.

kossin said:

Pyramids (I knew those cottages was a bad idea)

Click to expand...

Yes if you chopping mids to make more room for cottages something is wrong.

Soirana said:

Yes if you chopping mids to make more room for cottages something is wrong.

Click to expand...

Indeed

Anyway, just done replaying. The date is 925 BC, Justinian is out of the picture and The Pyramids are in. Settlers are on their way (there are at least 6 excellent spots left) and Aesthetics is almost in. I've also made a quick detour for Hunting to get the extra happy. This is now a very easy position compared to the one I left in the other save. Obviously, I now see that when going for a rush there's no time for small detours anymore that I could get away with on Emperor. Lesson learned.

Forget the Pyramids and get more war chariots. Pillage the metals at all cost then bring down as much military as needed to kill off Justinian. Settle the GG in Thebes. Once Justinian is dead you can try for the pyramids.

If you wait for war elephants and catapults I guantentee Justinian will have longbows.

Round 3

First, I took a Cease Fire to allow myself to regroup.


It also had the positive effect of scattering Justinian's troops as he settled a new city.


As per Mad's suggestion, I settled the Great General in Thebes and set on to build War Chariots to finish Justinian off. My workers were reassigned to chopping for The Pyramids which were completed in 650 BC.


Immediately switched civics. It improved science quite a bit (2 settled Great Generals, used some Scientists as well).


The workers were later on assigned to road towards Brennus' city for Foreign trade routes. I still need to explore westwards to connect to Saladin's and Hannibal's trade networks.
Research path went Hunting>Aesthetics>Trade for Alphabet+Mathematics+Iron Working and Mysticism.



While Mysticism is not the best of ideas for a trade, it opens up Obelisks which open up 2 Prophet slots and The Statue of Zeus.

I resumed the war with Justinian as soon as I had enough new War Chariots and when he started improving his iron again. I gained a few workers and proceeded towards Nicaea which I took in 575 BC.


Finally his back was broken and he had no more access to metals! I pillaged some improvements in Adrianople for gold and to try and get his 2 spears to come out, which they would do but only later. So I sent the War Chariots to his other city, Antioch.


Which I razed since I did not like its location, cost 8gpt and would not be any help in the near future.


Justinian then sent his Spearmen out of Adrianople to tackle my pillagers. This only left 2 archers in Adrianople so I moved everything that I had towards the city.


Justinian is no more in 425 BC. I decided to keep the city as it was akward to settle the Iron in any other way and I did not want Brennus to send a settler in the area (I currently don't have any handy).


Compared to Soirana's, my alternate try and I suppose TMIT's shadow game, this is extremely poor play!

Here is the view of the land: city sites have been decided and look obvious. I'm leaning to settle west of the Clams but doing this will render the rice unusable, which is not so bad in itself since it is not irrigated.


Justinian's former land. The Aqueduct is for a shot at the Hanging Gardens. There are 3 good city sites here and should be settled in the near future I believe.


Tech situation. I mm'd cities so that Currency will finish next turn.


Relations. I took no Diplo hit for 2 DoWs against Justinian, which is great. OTOH, I need Saladin to spread Hinduism to me so that I don't have to worry about Diplo for the next thousand years.


Now, religion-wise, Buddhism is now spread to 4 cities. If I can generate a GProphet, the shrine will surely become handy as I spread it a bit around. I have not yet generated my first great person so I could instead whip the Obelisk and get a quick Prophet out.


Built 27 War Chariots and 2 workers, 8 captured for a total of 10. I need more workers to make up for the lost time.


I've killed just a bit more of Justinian's unit than I lost. It's really not good.


I might not have time to get a round in tomorrow but I might be able to play a second later on today.

Going forward, I need to backfill the land and get settlers. The Statue of Zeus would be nice for Deficit research, which is why I have some Obelisks going up.
By my count, I need 5 settlers and about 6~8 more workers.
This will leave me with 12 cities and almost all of them good ones.

After Currency, I think Code of Laws is inevitable. It will open up the Philosophy bulb and Caste System+Pacifism. Getting Litterature for the NE would be good but without Marble, I don't think it's worth it.

As long as Hinduism spreads relatively soon, I believe this game is just about in the bag, but I've yet to see what's in the fog. Let's hope I didn't speak to soon!

Library --> scientists. A lot of your land can't get irrigated any time soon so just run a bunch of size 4-5 cities until CS. With all this green land, you should be fine. And send out a scouting WC when you get a chance.

great game, your pic of justinian's land is a duplicate of the previous image

RyanZ said:

great game, your pic of justinian's land is a duplicate of the previous image

Click to expand...

Thanks, I had missed that - I have fixed the screenshot.

Nice job Finishing Justinian off, now it's just a matter of fixing the econ and hoping Brennus doesn't decide to bite you in the a$$. Maybe some spears to defend against his future ellies would be in order. Your city marker to the SE of Thessalonica looks like a bad spot- lots of overlap with just one fish. A better site is 5S of Thess.- Clam, Rice, Fish and enough production for infrastructure. Probably a better choice for a GP farm than your little penninsula way out west. Someday a city on that penn. with moai statues may be productive, but that is a long ways from now.

The City marker SE of Thessalonica actually has 2 fish in its BFC:



I like the idea of 5S of Thessalonica, I'll need 1 less settler, get a better city rather than 2 semi-marginal ones but I lose out on a fish and several grassland.

The peninsula city will be able to run 7 scientists at size 10 without a food deficit. Combined with a library and Representation, that's some great early science. Moai will definitively go there or perhaps the Globe Theater if drafting becomes necessary.

Looks good, Mids can bring in quite a lot of early science with specs assigned. When currency is in next turn you'll revert to working tiles i assume to grow the cities to their happy caps. That double fish spot looks tasty indeed.

The city near your capital has 3 fish and iron. Dont forget upkeep cost is higher further from capital. That being said you have a solid science base it seems.

I cant see you losing this game really. You can still do a phant/pult rush on Celts.