ALC Game #22 Take 2: Arabs/Saladin

CivCorpse said:

Zara backstabbing is not much of an issue. Washington is a moron techwise so lacks the bribing ability. Besides, if Zara backstabs us we get the GG points from the wall we wanted. And it requires fewer troops to withstand the stab. Aren't you glad we're protective. It also give us a chance to take a couple of his crappy little cities that are applying cultural pressure. They then get the pressure and free up tiles for the culturally pressed cities. Though if he backstabs us and we take those worthless cities our cost will go up with the american cities we take as well. If we have to, we can buy peace with zara with one of his own cities. Then gift the rest back. He DoW on us so no diplo hit there. And we get positive diplo points from returning his cities. That might help if push comes to shove with Surry.

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Provided that we first strengthen up with Crossbows and Elephants, I support this strategy.

Artichoker said:

Provided that we first strengthen up with Crossbows and Elephants, I support this strategy.

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We are a backwards people without the knowledge of machinery. Jumbos everywhere. Though i believe machinery is on the list. So build jumbos til machinery then some crossbows. Trade for monarchy to get fuedalism in the list. Switch to vassalage and Police state. Unleash the big grey tusked dogs with long nose of war.

CivCorpse said:

Start a war....

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A nuclear war! At the gay bar, gay bar, gay bar!



Or what was it we were discussing again...?

Jet said:

a defensive war against Roosevelt

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Let me articulate a more complete plan with this concept. Of course you'd have to adapt it to game events.

1. Steal MC, bulb Machinery, research CS then Engineering.
2. Settle a filler city or two.
3. When your American border cities have adequate defense (Castle, Crossbows, Elephants, Pikes, old units), declare on Roosevelt. The goals are:
   • weaken him with lost hammers and war weariness, which means you'll be refusing peace
   • get no WW of your own, which means you won't leave your borders
   • farm great generals: settle #1 in Etruscan, settle #2 in Gaul, Medic III #3
   • tech in pseudo-peace to Rifling. Skip Liberalism unless you can farm a ton of scientists - and maybe you can in Gaul, but otherwise Gaul can be productive building the Globe and producing units with floodplain workshops.
4. Do Scaphism's Spy economy, adding Forges. Every city gets Forge+Courthouse+Castle+Spy. Mecca works cottages with Bureau. Other cities get farms and workshops and besides the Spy, work mines/workshops or Engineers/Scientists to taste. If a city runs more than one specialist, add a Madrassa. Skip buildings outside Mecca. You will need significant production to hold your cities and fight off pillagers, but without war weariness and losing units on offense, you can still tech pretty fast. Put all EPs on Zara and steal techs, which of course will require you to produce Spy units.
5. Do patagonia's Gaul/Globe + Etruscan/Heroic plan. So research or steal Literature and Drama, maybe after Engineering.
6. As you approach Rifling, make sure the Globe will be ready, and fill in extra Theatres and Colosseums for war weariness.
7. Do a standard Rifle + Treb rush on Roosevelt, followed by Zara. Hopefully a Treb stack with Accuracy and CR 2 from your settled generals will be ready to go. You can start with a mass draft, and Gaul can auto-draft Level 2 units with a settled general.

You could substitute Zara as the first war target, and Surya as the tech stealing target. I was just thinking that Roosevelt is weak. But maybe Roosevelt is too weak, and Zara has better stuff.

The only problem with trying to drain Roosevelt at this point is if Sury or Zara decides to wipe him out. I'm in favor of a more aggressive approach towards Roosevelt so long as we're sure Zara won't give us trouble.

Let Zara come. we're not skeered of him. Sheesh let's bang the war drums boys and girls. Washington is bewtween a rock and a hard place. Right now we have a minor edge in military strength, but his lands are more fertile and now that he has all that Dye plantationed he is going to get a tech lead on us. We need to get control of Philadelphia and possibly Seattle in order to deprive him of iron. If not through war then focus some EP's at him and let's use espionage to keep him out of iron. He has but it is from Seattle which falls on the first couple turns though. But if we deprive him of iron he can not build pikes, x-bows or knights. Though i think surry will DoW before then. I say we do the dirty deed with jumbos, cats and Longbows. Tech HBR (3turns)Trade for Monarchy and start on fuedalism while building a few cats and some jumbos. We don't need an SoD. We are after 2 lightly defended border cities. Seattle could be taken with about 4 jumbos and no cats. Philadelphia is on a hill, so whack the defenses. Suicide every cat we have then plow in. At that point if we have smashed him up nicely we may consider pounding him some more. Gather all those HA and chariots up and let's do some pilliaging. The commerce from Seattle's dye will really help boost our research
But the longer we wait. The more likely surry decides to invade. And if he does he will ask for any tech we get that he does not have. Everytime we say know we are inviting trouble.

Oh and courthouses. City costs are at 37 per turn and will go up as the cities grow. If we shave 18 off with courthouses we can afford to switch into Police State. We're only running 3 specialist right now so the switch to police state. A colosseum with the market will keep the happy cap @ 14 in mecca.
And one last thing (for now). Keep an eye out for them sneaking a settler into the heart of arabia and settling that big chunk

Well, CivCopse, you saw the save, so I defer to your assessment. Now that I think about it, I would agree that Zara shouldn't really be a concern due to the defensive power of Protective. InvisStalker has had experience literally fighting the entire map with Protective and winning because of it, although the concern here is that we may be delaying the entire continent's tech level with war unless the wars are quick or we don't target the continent tech leader.

If Washington doesn't have an SoD, then it's useless to use defensive war on him since he's got no hammers to lose that way. Given Zara's position, it might not be profitable there, either. Sury's really the best target for a defensive war right now, unfortunately, he's also the one pulling the continent forwards in terms of tech so it might not be a good idea to alienate him as a trading partner or to slow him before contact with other continents is reached.

Bandobras Took said:

I have to ask, LordChambers: If you object on principle to the entire point of the ALC series, why do you bother posting in the thread?

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I don't object on principle. I object to people misleading newbies by pretending "leveraging protective" is anything but a sub-optimal decision. If the ALC series were just an academic excursion into playing blind with pre-planned leverage for the leader's traits and unqiues then that would be appropriate. But it's not. It's a pratical guide which more often than not educates new players on the strategical considerations that go into decision-making. Players can read all about how to execute a myriad of plans in this forum; these different strategies and gambits are well documented on this forum. Where the shortage lies is teaching players how to know when to employ one strategy over another, and that's why a game series such as this is so valuable.

But, for some contributors here, the only considerations they wish to inform new players on are ones which emphasize Saladin's advantages over other leaders. Which is make believe because he has just about none. And it's okay to say that. ALC won't vaporize by admitting not all leaders are created equal, and that the best way to play Saladin may be to drop the act and play the map.

First that [protective] is not one of the strongest traits so it isn't worth changing your tech path/game plan (when you get one) to accomodate it. Secondly, it is definately a passive trait, especially once you get muskets and beyond. Just play the game as you would normally and forget about it. It's there when you need it until you buld an army for war. Then just build 3/4 the defending units you would otherwise build.

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Bullseye. I think this is the first time anyone in the thread has spoken such truth. I would also extend this sense to Camel Archers, Madrasas, and Walls. And if you want to get philisophic, to all uniques and traits insofar as they blind a player from making optimal strategic decisions.

If you really believe all the leaders are equally good and that one just needs to know how to properly leverage the traits and uniques, then by all means, continue on your search for the holy grail. When you find the one-in-a-thousand chance that sitting back into some defensive war with walls and archers, or organizing your game around uber-promoted camel archers, you should make a post about it. But don't pass off that kind of thinking as actually optimal in a forum where people go for help to win their games.

If you want to debate the relative merits of the Protective trait, I think other threads are more appropriate for that. This isn't a thread for principles and such. It's a thread about playing a particular game in a particular map.

CivCorpse said:

...but his lands are more fertile and now that he has all that Dye plantationed he is going to get a tech lead on us.
...
The commerce from Seattle's dye will really help boost our research
But the longer we wait. The more likely surry decides to invade.

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This is the key. Dye is an immediate source of extra commerce that is almost equivalent to a full-grown town, without requiring all the turns of cottage growth to get there normally.

Now that Calendar is widely available, we need to look at prospects for developing or stealing Calendar resources to gain an immediate boost to commerce.

As for military, I guess the most important thing is the end result. Elephants are obvious because of their low tech requirement, but they are an easy counter to whatever mounted troops Zara can produce while being good offensive units at the same time.

I think this is a rather unusual game in the ALC series because one continent has 6 of the 7 possible religions, and Saladin's game focuses so much on having religions available to him.
Spiritual gets its power from Civic changes and and half priced temples, but there's been little to no opportunity to flex the power of spiritual.

Without a religion available, and no plan to bulb Divine Right/Islam, I think you have to throw out the rulebook with Saladin. That's just how this particular map has played out - I think a game where Saladin can run multiple priest or scientist specialists easily and with few hammers invested plays to his strengths, but it's simply not there right now so we need to explore other options.

The advantages we do have are:
Pyramids + Great Wall
Pretty good land/cities with room for a few more
Civic Flexibility - Bureacracy/Vassalage/Nationhood (in the near future) and Caste System/Serfdom (near future)

The other clear issues are:
-Zara is a cultural threat but not a military threat, particularly if you sabotage his iron.
-Roosevelt is lunchmeat for someone
-Suryavaraman is the biggest threat on your island
-There are a lot of religions in the rest of the world, so hopefully there's been a lot of strife (have you seen a lot of messages about great generals being born?)

The most important question to me is how you choose to deal with Zara. If you can fight his cultural push (I don't know if you can), then let him do whatever he likes for now - you can take out his iron and he will not be a big threat. Camel Archers are not amazing but they ignore the only bonus his UU gets which means they are effectively normal musketmen. If he does want to fight you, you're still protective, you have more land, better land and you have the Great Wall. Let him come, that's essentially free Great General points for you.

If you can't combat his cultural push, then you have to address Zara soon.

I am still in favor of Washington first. Surry is creative as well, so any American land he takes will bump against our american land. But we need a chunk of America to stay remotely even with Sury, Once Washington Vassalizes to Sury, we then turn our sights on Zara. We have the advantage over sury that we share a border with Zara and can execute a war swiftly.
Even without camel archers. Phants can get the Pinch promotion if we are facing Oromos without Guilds. Though since we are tackling Washington first we can tech guilds while we recover.

Looking further at the map of your continent:
You have an opportunity to monopolize most of the happiness resources.
Happiness sources available:
Gold, Gems, Dye, Spices, Elephants, Silk, Wine (only 1)

You have all of the sources of gold and you could fairly easily control all of the dye, gems, and spices if you took out Roosevelt. That would leave Zara with 1 source of elephants and Suryavaraman with 2 silk and 1 wine.

I say you should go ahead and hog all of the good resources that you can. I don't know if it will be possible to cripple the AI with lack of happiness, but you should be able to lower their ceiling quite a bit. And if you really want to flex your spying power you could foment unhappiness in their key cities.

The short of it is that you're not in a position to take over your continent - yet. But you do have a number of advantages to work with.
Your specialists bringing in more research for you than your rivals.
You have the Great Wall + Protective to defend you.
You have a good shot at monopolizing the important happiness resources for the forseeable future.
You have a settled great spy giving you great intel on all of your neighbors.

I'd say this looks like a good time to pursue a specialist economy and start thinking about longterm war to take over the continent. You should be able to grow your cities much larger than any of your rivals, and assuming you can steal Metal Casting and Feudalism in the near-ish future, you could switch between Serfdom (to quickly build farms and workshops) and Caste System (to run specialists and work the improved workshops). Let your enemies come after you into your territory - you can easily switch to slavery to whip some troops, then back to Serfdom to rebuild any farms and workshops they might pillage, then right back into Caste System to get back to work.

Medina looks like an amazing Ironworks spot in the long term, with lots of riverside tiles, copper, and a few hills and plenty of food to feed workshops. It also has pretty good commerce from the gems and spices. Maybe you should consider settling the Great Engineer there, and building a wonder to fight of the cultural pressure from Lalibela?

At this point I would simply be trying to gobble up as much land as possible. With representation and a settled great spy you can run a pretty nice specialist economy. With more land than your neighbors you might even be able to lead in tech shortly. The great spy almost ensures that you'll be able to stay even in tech, at worst.

You can't fight Suryavaraman directly yet, but you know he is the true threat among your neighbors. The best way to hurt him may be beating him to the punch to take out Roosevelt and deny him important resources.

With Metal Casting + Drama you should get forges and theaters which will give you a much higher happy cap than your neighbors can achieve, once you monopolize the gold, gems, and dye. (+6 happy above what they can get).

I'm sorry I don't have any specific step-by-step advice on what to try next. I'd say Metal Casting should be a fairly important priority tech, though it needn't be #1 - you could try stealing it. Between Courthouses, Forges, and Military (and a few stables), you have a lot of hammers committed for the near future.
I'd look at dedicating 1 of your cities to mundane tasks like producing workers and settlers. I'd start farming wherever you can so you can whip and regrow ASAP, and eventually draft. The rest of your cities can focus on military or economic needs, whichever you determine is the most important at the time.

Don't get discouraged by the game - the advantages you secured early (choice land, pyramids, great wall) are going to start paying dividends soon. You're not the biggest kid on the block (continent) yet, but you could be soon.

What were some of the guiding principles of the earliest ALCs? Expand in the direction of your rivals and try to take out the biggest threat as early as possible? If you follow that path, it poitns prety clearly towards taking Roosevelt's land before Suryavaraman does. Just make sure that you can fight back against Zara's culture. A Madrassa + Farms + Artist Specialists from Caste System might be enough. If not, maybe you should build Chichen Itza in Medina?

CivCorpse said:

Phants can get the Pinch promotion if we are facing Oromos without Guilds.

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I thought Pinch was only available with Gunpowder in BtS?

Bandobras Took said:

I thought Pinch was only available with Gunpowder in BtS?

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LOL, well if you want to get technical. But, you're right, it is only available with gunpowder.

Is work being rough nowadays?

According to his last post, he's got the "I don't like Protective" blues. Maybe he's in therapy.

I officially declare this thread dead.

Next!



Anyway, I'm just kidding, but geez...from April 15th to June 2nd?