Nobles' Club LXXXVIII: Suryavarman II of the Khmer

Till 860AD: see post #25

I was going to cap Lincoln, but since everyone was angry with him, I hesitated. Caesar took the opportunity to capture his last city and ended him for good.

1. So I continued my march, capped Byzantine and England before Rifling as planned.
2. I did Lib->Nationalism->Taj Mahal, and with two more golden ages, got another army of Cavalry, Cannon, and Riflemen.
3. Charlie and Caesar attacked Babylonians and capped him before I could take part in the war...I took too much time arranging my troops.
4. Time to attack Caesar: I was worried that Charlie might backstab, so kept some of my troops in my border. Anyways, he did not and Caesar was also capped after I took 5 of his cities.
5. Six turns later, I attacked charlie...it was a world war but lasted about 6-8 turns cuz I won.







Probably the map was very easy because I got my highest score ever. I paid a lot of attention to GPs this time, and got a lot of early scientist which I settled...that really got my research back on track.

Charlie founded Buddhism in my game so I expect to get it soon

After reading a little bit more haven't checked others checkpoint 1 will do after this part I decidied to continue pursuing my current startegy which was researching Iron Working which I got in 1520 BC.



And as you can see Charlie does have Iron in it's capital of Aachen (therefore I decidied for peaceful expansion at least for now)



There were three other iron sources near my territory though one that Hari misses for a bit one near the floodplains where I decide to try and put a new city back there.



There is another source to the east but as I later find out it's close to England's borders so I am not sure if I can get there.



Next turn I look at the southwest and see that Charlemagne found a city near the copper for the city I wanted there making me do some adjustments (I was already producing the settler in Hari)



In 1400 BC I found England's borders near that iron which I did already told you (thaht means I need to rush spicesheep fast or England will beat me to that site.



In that turn I also dotmap two more city locations one to the southwest of Hari 1 W of the gems on that river (That town will get me 3 gems and will be the future site for the Great Library) and also a town right at the mark for potential site that grabs me a cow and a corn resource as well as the lake there(suboptimal commerce site)





The next turn Yasoda completes the Pyramids!



They will defenatly be a boost to my empire as I can now adopt all of the government civics (haven't adopted yet because I need some more civics possible when I let get Caste System and COL I might go for Representation and Caste) It also allows me to potentially get a Great Engineer which I will use to build the Great Library at the three Gem site.

Afterwards Yaso starts on workers which I desperatly need right now!



Around 1280 BC i get another bad event this time getting me a - 1 relation with Holy Rome. It doesn't really scare me since as you can see if you look at the score I am stronger than Holy Rome in Power.



In 1160 BC I get Writing which is very nice as it allows me to get OB as well as build Librarys which will be useful to boost my research as well as pop borders.



Also in that turn I found Nagara Jaysri (from now on just Nagara) to get those three gems. First building a Granary though since that city doesn't have any food source (If I had put the cow I would have lost one the gems.)



During this period despite my attempts at good fogbusting I still have to face some barb incursions into my land which nonethless are severely dealt with not just with my warriors but also with Chariots wich Hari was producing nonstop (Only differet queue during that time was a Library I sneaked to take advantage of the gold)



I keep on laughing at poor Charlie afterwards when he built Nuremberg in 950 BC (He must be really desperate to get those dyes, that city most lickely will end up flipping to me)



Several turns then passed with nothing happening when sundenly Lizzy came asking for OB which I gave it to her (No need to make her angry) I also did the same to JC since we already had a trade connection going.



Just 3 turns before I get Alphabet Lincoln beats me to it. I decide to keep going for it though since I am sure I could get something from trading to the other civs. I did make a trade with Lincoln sending him Masonry for Mystcism (I want to see if I can get Meditation just like archon said from Charlie in order to bulb Philo with the Scientist, but at the end of this turn he isn't willing to give it to me)



In 700 BC two important events ocurred. I got a Great Engineer from my capital which I decide to bring to Nagara (going for Great Library there that city has huge potential as a commerce capital or should I build it in my capital?). Also Buddhism spreads to my empire, I don't convert yet though since there isn't any more Buddhist civ right now besides Charlie himself.



In 675 BC I finnaly arrive at Alpha and decide to sopt here to hear more advice from the experienced players here.



Here are some potential trades:



Justinian is willing to give me fishing and Archery for Iron Working (While it is not necessary right now I will eventually of course need fishing for some cities I will be founding in the future.) Justinian is the only AI not with IW so trading this tech wouldn't hurt me plus he is far away it seems(I haven't found his lands yet) so I am thinking of doing this trade.

BTW Charlie is willing to give me those same two techs but for Writing which I won't probably do.

Here is my cities:



The capital is mostly right now a Worker/settler farm while also working some scientists in order to get an Academy.



Hari this city has been pumping chariots like crazy. It is gonna switch to some Swords soon as I got Iron on my borders right now with an Archer or two between.



This town is a true steal (wasn't my original planned but it serves it's purpose as very good commerce site)

Finnaly here is a shot of my empire

I chopped/whipped three settlers as quickly as possible, settling them in the southwest, southeast, and along the floodplains (in that order).

(the western city was much later; it won't be much help in the first war, directly, but helps block Lincoln, who might be my second target after Charly).

I continued along my originally-planned research path. After Priesthood I immediately started building the oracle and took Metal Casting, and tech'd Writing and Aesthetics (the latter for trade bait), then Math, Construction, and Horseback Riding for the war effort. Next was Currency for better trading, and now I'm working on Code of Laws.

A rough timeline:

• 1325 BC: Horse Whisperer Quest
  
  This is probably not worth doing, since few cities really need stables. One choice is +1, which might help a few places slightly; another is 6 horse archers, which would be nearly useless. The third is all mounted units getting Sentry, which is mildly useful.
• 1075 BC: I finished Aesthetics and immediately made several trades:
  • The key trade: Alphabet
    
  • Archery and Fishing:
    
  • Sailing:
    
• 950 BC: Judaism spread to my capital, but I decided not to convert yet, to avoid the negative reaction from other civs. I may switch when Hammy demands it.
• 625 BC: Lincoln is willing to trade Iron Working, which will soon make Angor Thom a good city.
  
• 425 BC: Elite Swordsmen Quest:
  
  This seems worth doing. The rewards are either all swordsmen getting CR I or all melee units getting Drill I; if I hold off on the barracks promotion I'd get 8 CR II or Drill II swords. It would make an earlier attack on Charlie possible, I suppose, but seems to be likely to derail the Role-Playing aspect of attacking with Ballista Elephants. I could also view them as an investment on some eventual CR II or Drill II riflemen.

The current situation in 395 BC:

• The rest of the world:
  
  I've got a scout exploring the last of Justinian's territory.
• Charts. I'm only a little ahead of Hammy in power, but if I figure he's becoming a thread I can switch to Judaism for a diplomatic benefit. I'm well ahead of Charly, my first target, and my production is so far ahead of everybody that I should have no trouble dominating the game whichever way I choose after my initial conquests.
  
• The tech situation:
  
• Wonders:
  
  I was thinking of conquering America after HRE, since they're the 2nd closest target, and Stonehenge makes that slightly more attractive.

For the next phase I plan to conquer Charly. I'll want to be ready to take out his iron quickly (NW of Aarchen), to stop him from producing spearmen (and axemen and swords, of course, but it's the spearmen who can seriously hurt my elephants) so I plan to build my own road and send in a few pillaging Horse Archers. I'll also need to figure out the composition of my Stack of Doom. Certainly lots of catapults! A couple of spears and axemen for protection, and eventually lots of Ballista Elephants; not sure about the swordsment yet, though.

Looks pretty good; I like how the cities were placed. You can fit a 6th city (not urgent because you wish to war)1 NE of that iron by the lake and gold. It can share food and generate decent production by working the iron. The pig/horse/coastal city is nice, though you may settle at your leisure.

Elephant/Catapult with a few axes to kill spears is fine. You really don't need anything else, although if you wish, you may have a few cheap archers tag along to garrison conquered cities. I wouldn't bother with swords/spears at all, since your catapults are the ones doing most of the city attacking. Everything else is really just a cleanup force.

You also could use an extra worker or two; a lot of land needs to be improved or chopped.

This one was a bit rougher than other games on the forum right now when it came to actual warfare, even though techwise it was even faster than that Willem game. The reason is that JC went up to 19% land untouched...and my first target with draft rifles was protective.

I did pick up great wall + mids. I settled a great spy and used that to steal a bunch of tech (including metal casting + feudalism so I didn't have to trade for those) off hammurabi who grabbed a barb city near me. I had 7 cities before my first rifle war...along with basic globe city + theo for better quality troops.

Anyway libbed nationalism around 600 AD, built taj, had rifles in full production ~1000 AD. Charlemagne inflicted some casualties but the draft out-paced. Hammurabi and Elizabeth capped quickly and I let them keep their cities (I kept charlie's). It was at this point I had a hard choice...JC declared on lincoln and it would have been a pain if I capped him, so I declared before I had all of my forces there. JC had cannons but did not have rifles or grenadiers (oddly lincoln had grenadiers). I had JUST used charlemagnes research into steel to trade for it myself...I was able to wear down on his 40+ unit stack w/o losing a city or very much in the way of units actually, and then my forces shifted over and I brought down a 3 way stack split on him. JC is very annoying though in that IIRC he is the AI that is least willing to capitulate in the game. He resisted a very long time in the war despite me rolling him. This resulted in me completely wiping his core and opting for domination over conquest, which I got by merely taking washington before capping lincoln. I didn't need justinian for the win although for fun after winning I declared on him and had him capped by 1615 AD too .



Draft rifles continue to own these games silly .

I WOULD do the Horse Whisperer Quest, extra food is useful. Stable+Baray in all your cities means 2 extra food, which means one free specialist.

Also, you have to build Stables anyways in your cities for your warfare, no matter if you do Elepult, Cuirs, Cavs, etc.

The main theme this thread was a military buildup to take out Charlie; as usual I overbuilt but at least that let me sustain the combat pace since the part of my troops that never engaged one city could move on to the next without waiting for the injured. Now my economy is in the tank but I'm rebulding.

Timeline:

• 170 BC: Monarchy from Hammy. With the 'mids I don't need it for HR, but it's a step toward Feudalism so I can get the AIs to capitulate; I haven't decided yet whether to go Conquest or Space, but I definitely don't want Domination.
  
• 110 BC: I finished the Elite Swords quest. What with having delayed the barracks promotion until then I got CR I from the quest and CR II from the promotion, sitting at 3 XP -- thus enabling CR III at 5 XP after two wins. It was hard to resist! I immediately bulbed Theology from the Great Prophet I got at 215 BC; I delayed so I wouldn't fail the quest.
  
• 20 BC: Master Blacksmith quest. Since I expect to build forges in most cities anyway, I decide to pursue this one, too.
  
• 415 BC - 900 AD: Conquered Charlie. I never had to pause the advance; maybe with so many troops I could have split into two armies and done it faster. As soon as I could I created a Medic III horse archer for a super-healer. I'm 18 away from a second Great General to settle in my Heroic Epic city.
• 715 AD: I was 1 away from finishing the Apostolic Palace, so used the Music great artist to start a golden age, switch to Christianity (which nobody else had), finished the AP next turn, and switched back to Judaism (the majority religion) four turns later. I don't intend to try for an AP victory; I just wanted the +4 from Monastery and Temple in most cities. I also trade with Liz for Calendar:
  
• 920 AD: Traded with Liz to get Feudalism and Hammy to get Machinery:
  
  
  Then next turn Hammy peace-vassals.
• 1000 AD: I trade with Lincoln to get Compass. It may be a bad trade, since I gave him Theology which might let him build better defenders against my eventual assault.
  
• 1060 AD: One away from Education, but if I enter the Renaissance I lose the Horse Whisperer and Master Blacksmith quests; I decided to go for the former on mtr12's advice and it's one turn away; the last forge is 6 turns after that.
• 1070 AD: bulb Engineering with a Great Engineer.

My economy has tanked, as expected, but I am building courthouses in the conquered cities and running merchants in a couple to stay positive on GPT.

Territory map is in the next spoiler.

• Charts. Rome has the most territory after me, and the strongest army, but I expect to be able to beat him when I want to; he'd be the next after America.
  
• Demographics. I'm first in most things I care about, with a nice gap to the "rival best".
  
• Tech situation (and who is researching what, though that's from the following (partial) turn):
  
• Wonders. Washington's wonders (especially the Mausoleum) make him my next military target, followed by enough American cities for him to capitulate.
  
• Foreign relations:
  

1. Are there any guidelines as to where to best place a Forbidden City? I need one somewhere in Charly's territory; Aachen and Prague look like the best possibilities. Prague is closer to the south and east cities; Aachen has more production and can get it done sooner. I think I'll only be conquering Washington rather than any more western cities, but maybe even that one city out west means Aachen is best (see attached save file if necessary).
   
   The red line is the approximate boundary between me and America.
2. Unfortnately, Rome just declared on America, presumably aiming to take out Philadelphia (the south-easternmost city). I had really wanted to delay taking on America until my economy recovered, but I also really want Washington and its wonders. I started thinking I need to invade ASAP -- Washington is pretty close to Philadelphia. But America has Longbows, and Rome lacks Construction and thus catapults, so I suppose Rome's attack is doomed and I can still afford to wait a bit. I need to fortify my border cities slightly (a few of my own longbows should be enough) and promote some of my swordsmen to macemen.
   
   So, invade in a few turns, or ignore Rome and continue recovering my economy?
3. Several cities still have a lot of trees, most of which I expect to chop for infrastructure. However, given so many forests I figured it would be nice to figure out which one would get the National Park if the game lasts that long. Is there a guide on what an NP city needs in the way of non-forest resources and infrastructure?

I've attached a save in case someone wants to take a look.

Something similar happened to me. Charlie attacked Babylon, and I delayed joining the war. In the meanwhile Charlie managed to capture 2 cities and Babylon capped to them. In your case, if you delay attacking America, and in the meanwhile Rome manages to capture 1-2 cities, America may capitulate to Rome, and make your life even more difficult.

Imo its a tough decision to take: you are not ready for war, but combined forces of Rome and America will also be annoying later, esp. because both are your neighbors.

Not sure if it's the best idea, but Aachen is fine to put the forbidden palace in.

For now, since they'll soon all be fielding lots of pikes that will prove bad for your elephants, I would say go economics for free GM. and then lib Military Tradition. Nobody looks like they are remotely close to lib, so you can take this detour, and go for lib if it proves too close.

Build wealth in your cities asap and bring the slider up a bit higher. Also you have many forests to chop down and build irrigated farms from them.

In the end, the best goal would be to get curs upgraded from your elephants and beat up on Elizabeth because she is usually weak. Rome and them can wait, but they're really no threat for the most part as they are very backwards.

Its great to see that my civ skills arent as bad as I first thought
So I decided to settle in place, given the central surround of resources and sure enough i recieved another corn in my bfc.


Charmelagne was the first guy i met, then lincklon and JC. Hammy elizabeth and justinian followed. I tech to Agriculture-Ah, and find horse in my Bfc, guess what?!?!?! Thats right i decided on a chariot rush. And my first victim is lincklon.7

Empire at 100 ad


Thankfully linckons only had one city on a hill, however his capital did require a bit of a fight to get. It takes 11 chariots before it falls. I tech to mathematics, currency, construction and out to Education. I decided to hit Charmelagne next for stealing my land . The UU and catapults/Axes are the chosen units vs his longbows and maces. However he dosen't prove to be too much of a threat as JC seams to have been ticked off by him aswell.

Perfect opportunity for me IMO. So i gather up a force of 20 units and then declare on Charlie. I get the mutual alligence bonus and keep JC at pleases. However im going to admit to reloading the game twice, as for no reason, after JC made peace with charlie he dowed on me, despite our military ventures and diplo rating. Can someone explain this? I did have the 10 turn peace treaty, luckily on the reload, i bribed JC to dow on CHarlie again getting us to friendly.


His troops are very helpfull, softening up charlie's protective longbowmen and allowing me to snipe the cities Heh heh. I might be rusty but i can still do this XD.

However despite being the first to get toaism from a philo bulb, Elizabeth is the first to research liberalism.

I finish off Charlie and get some nice tech from him, he has a single island city that i couldnt be bothered to capture, so i vassle him.
Question now is what do i do to win? right now Domination and Diplo seem like the most realistic victories

however there might be a chance for space race if i can take out elizabeth, and i have to be carefull about elizabeth, she seems to be ahead in tech. JC is a bit of a powerhouse atm as-well. He has a ton of cities and could very well run away with this game.Right now though the plan is to recover from that war and try to catchup in tech.

Founded 4 cities and moved my capital to the flood plains to the south. Built the pyramids and was planning on going elepult, but I had the opportunity so decided to just bulb machinery and engineering at 25 AD. The rest of the game was pretty simple from there. Charlie first, then hammurabi and elizabeth. It was already over but taking down JC with cavalry was going to be tedious since he had grenadiers and had lincoln as a vassal so I just tech'd to tanks. Won domination shortly after starting the war with lincoln when one of hammi's 2 cities culture flipped.