King of the World #3: Tokugawa

I would say first thing you want to do is settle the pacific. It's pretty hard to get a good foothold. It's much easier to build up some forces and attack Asoka.

And you should have a tech advantage over Asoka soon.

Settle Indonesia and Australia while teching to astro. Then prepare the attack to the American civs, starting by Monty

All right. A quick round just to finish what we started and reach a new decision point.

It turns out the defenses of New Sarai weren't quite as imposing as I'd thought:



Siege? We don't need no stinkin' siege! No losses, but the forces were beaten around enough to warrant holing them up to heal for a few turns.

Mr. Musa, as always, was quite happy to help us with our research needs:



It's hard to figure out the sides, here, since everyone's Buddhist. In fact, most wars here seem to be based on opportunity rather than real enmity. As a result, my tech trades are based more on getting the best deal than making specific people happy.

The Russians were significantly less generous than the Mali, but no less helpful:



Catherine isn't really a factor in either the Liberalism race nor the Circumnavigation race, so I threw her a bone. And Guilds unlocks way too many economic technologies to be ignored for long.

I sent a lone Samurai to lay waste to Otrar:



He had sufficient odds that knocking defenders down one at a time, and keeping healed through the magic of promotions seemed viable. Sadly, he was not up to the task, and is now apologizing to his ancestors for his failure. His replacement (again, a single Samurai) fared better, and, y'know what? I kept Otrar. Call me crazy, but it'll anchor our northern borders, and has some potential once the National Park is available.

Mongol cities continued to fall one by one, despite the depletion of our Catapults:



Gotta love battles against obsolete opposition.

We also made a trade with Frederick:



Yeah, he is a threat in both races, but I think our head start is safe at this point.

The remainder of our offensive army set up for the long Battle of Turfan...





... And burned it to the ground. Khan had too many units hanging around in preparation for a counterattack.

Another turn, another stronghold:



This one, however, was not to fall. All the cards were on the table, and the game was up. The battle would be long and hard, and would likely require reinforcements on my part. The end result, though, would be Genghis Khan's utter eradication and he knew it.

He waved the white flag.



As I'd said, this brought Temujin back to Cautious with me, and I'm sure that with a tech gift or two (which he needs anyway to be useful) and maybe a few of his weaker cities back, he should be pretty darned useful.

Which cities are his weaker cities? Well, here's the empire:



I'm thinking Old Sarai and Sanchu (and maybe even Otrar) to determine a definite border and let him deal with the Siberian savages. In the corner there you can see our Caravel scooting off to see how Roosevelt and Monty are getting along. Not pictured (and learned once we bought a map) is the fact that France built the Great Wall. Yeah, to help with all of the Barbarian problems suffered in central Europe. *sigh*

Here's the Power Graph:



I'm frankly surprised we're still as high as we are. Most of our cities are guarded by a token unit, and our offensive army was whittled down pretty severely. We do have a lot of Barracks and Promotions floating around there, though, so maybe that's it. Bottom line, though, we're going to need to do some serious work rebuilding the army if we plan another war.

The Diplomacy screen:



Yeah. A minor brushfire war half a world away, but we're everyone's buddy. Well, except for poor Alexander. On this map, though, as we've learned in the previous two games, Greece is a backwater, anyway. This wasn't how it was supposed to happen.

The Production graph:



Yeeah. That's... quite a lead we've got there.

And the requested tech parity screen:



As you can see, we're pretty much the premier technological power at this point. Liberalism will soon be ours, giving us an even greater lead. And our production is second to none.

I hate to sound cocky, but I think the game is pretty much won at this point. I mean, we can still screw it up with a bad war or two, or even get backdoored by an A.I.'s Diplomatic or Cultural win. But at this point I think it's just a matter of picking a victory condition and grabbing it.

Space Race is trite, but always an option.

Domination and Conquest are really hard to do on this map (see: Frederick), but certainly possible. And at the very least, if we're well on our way, we'll win a comfortable Time victory.

Cultural is possible, but a little dull.

Which leads us to the condition I'm seriously considering: A real Apostolic Palace win. I'm pretty sure we already have the population to be a candidate. We could grab Astronomy with Liberalism and convert the Americas by the katana, thus spreading Buddhism to the last few corners of the map and setting us up to win as the Buddha intended.

Thoughts?

An AP vote would be nice, but rather anti-climax.

I'd rather see a domination win (or more feasibly, a conquest win since you can vassalize everyone for a win).

Thanks for the techs screen!
Seems like you're only down Music on some people, and up quite a lot of techs on others. I'd do Education -> Liberalism -> Printing Press (free from Liberalism) -> Replaceable Parts -> Rifling

I see a Persian city in Indonesia, time to start settling the pacific! There's still plenty of time till the next big unit, riflemen, are available.

Keep old sarai.... it has some nice riverside grassland....

If you want to go to Autralia , you need to get moving: if cyrus is alrady in Sumatra, it will nnot take long. And those calendar resources of Indonesia would help

A conquest win would be interesting, since further wars would generate more negative modifiers like "you declared war on our friend." Would be interested to see how you'd handle it.

Well, no matter what we're doing, we're clearly in a rebuilding/buildup phase. This seems as good a time as any to post the save. In the interest of micromanagement, I would appreciate any advice from someone willing to cycle through the cities and pick apart my work. I tend to paint in broader strokes during wartime.

In this round, we laid the groundwork for our incursion into the Americas.

First off, we gave Genghis Khan a little background on how we beat him:



This brought him back to Pleased. I also planned on liberating some cities, but that would come later.

We traded Guilds to Mansa Musa for Music, a handful of gold, and his world map, which was rather distressing:



The Indians had beaten us to most of the best spots in the South Pacific!

In real life, Wang Anshi was a Chinese economist, statesman, chancellor, and poet who brought sweeping government reforms to the Imperial government in the 1070's (thanks Wikipedia!). In the game, he showed up in 1160 as a Great Merchant in Japan, bringing forth a Golden Age. Close enough, I guess. This Golden Age was crucial in getting to Liberalism quickly and getting some much-needed infrastructure built across the empire.

The anti-Mongol Samurai had one last task in northern Asia:



I captured "Phoenician" and liberated it, along with Sanchu, to Genghis Khan. He's not a great vassal, he doesn't contribute much or do any tricks, and sometimes he pees on the good carpets, but he's our vassal, and he keeps our northern borders safe.

In 1180, we finally made our breakthrough:



This was a really, really tough decision. I stared at the monitor for a good five minutes before finally settling on Economics for our free tech. Yes, Astronomy is "worth" more, but the extra trade route from Free Market (which we switched to immediately- Thanks, Wang!) and the ability to shift said routes into high gear with Custom Houses was too tempting to resist.

Meanwhile, the settling of what remained of the Pacific islands wasn't going so well:



As you can see, we're limited to a pretty marginal stretch of a pretty marginal island, there, and we nearly got beaten to that by the Arabs (who are more of a factor in this game than I've ever seen on this map). In addition, our colonization fleet was wiped out by those Barbarian Galleys I've been hearing so much about. I guess they do exist.

It wasn't all bad news, though:



That'll be quite useful for the taking of the Americas.

Around the same time, Zoroaster was born in Kyoto (a somewhat unlucky break, being a Prophet instead of something useful). He's currently hanging out, waiting for a buddy to start a second Golden Age with.

Speaking of good news...



We won the election pretty handily, giving us all kinds of cool powers, including the ability to not have the pope on our back should we decide to start a war or to grab that Religious victory should we choose to after... converting the Americas.

Roosevelt came by, offering me a deal I couldn't refuse:



Monty can do absolutely nothing to us without our permission, and we can get some free diplomatic merits with America while we build up.

Unfortunately, I didn't realize just how useless those diplomatic merits would be...



Ah, well. That's one less AI I'll have to worry about.

So, in 1370, we have what I think is a pretty decent expeditionary force built up:



This could either put a serious dent in the Aztec empire, or possibly even claim some of those Pacific cities of Asoka's. India's actually dropped to Cautious, due to their antipathy towards our incontinent little vassal, so maybe war with them is an option, after all.

Here's a peek at the two hemispheres:





Our Domestic Glance:



The Tech situation:



As you can see, we're not quite the runaway leaders I thought we'd be, but we're certainly on the cutting edge. And the American civilizations are certainly not.

The Diplomatic situation:



Tokugawa shoud not be this well-liked.

And the power graph:



So... We have our (small) fleet. I really like the idea of our forces holding off the ridiculously massive stacks of Aztec savages, gaining a foothold, and upgrading to Riflemen as soon as the tech is ours. Then again, the fleet would also be useful in "reclaiming" some of those islands to our south.

Thoughts?

I think your Mongol war lasted to loog (to be fair, part of the problem is that you play on normal instead of epic on this huge map).
Still India is the prime target, then Persia, not the far away Aztec who builds a zillion of outdated troops and is no long-term competitor.
If it is possible from the diplo point of view, India next.

Hey.. has the Aztec city of Teotihuacan been captured by Mali?!? Look at that view of the world pic.. I would go against the previous poster and attack the Americas starting with Monty.. attacking Asoka or Cyrus now means the half the world will declare on you. Someone like Liz could really get ahead in tech as a result. Convert the Americas and win by AP if you can. If not, Space Race.

Heh. No, that's just the overlap from Texcoco's bar.

I'd say a war against primitive American savages would be more fun than a massive war with India... even if it may not be the very best strategic move. There is lots of good land in North America though, expecially Mexico, think it'd be worth keeping even with colonial expenses?

Also Roosevelt's situation is hilarious. I played as him once and with Montezuma nearby I know very well how it could happen, if I didn't have the emergency whip I would have probably suffered the same fate.

India's mainland empire is surprisingly small... if you do attack his island empire, be sure to take advantage of him getting distracted to land a powerful blow on his base.

Monty has weird land -- not as fertile and cottage-able as FDR's, but his capital is a production powerhouse, and he has a nice assortment of resources if not much growth potential. Take Tenochtitlan first if you go that way.

I have to agree with others about India. Why not wipe out Asoka's pacific empire with your attack fleet, then vassalize him as a shield against Cyrus?

i say go against india. It'll remove a major competitor and hopefully help you defend attacks from cyrus if they do come( better be safe than srry, remember fredericks game?) Plus Monty has homefield advantage. You have to ferry troops across a ocean while his cities pump out massive amounts of jaguars ect ect. If you do take a city youll be overwhelmed.

If you wait, India will likely attack you, getting the world against him. Let him do your dirty work, sick the mongols on him, and concentrate on Monty.

Inspired by your game Neal, I took another crack at the earth map recently. One of the things I noticed is that india and china have some of the best land in the game, if you appropriate both to yourself, you'll have won the game, and can pursue your desired victory condition at your leisure. Monty is a sideshow, whether you take on his jaguars with samurais or macemen with rifles, he will be annialated easily, so wait until you have your backyard consolidated in asia then embark on an american war ...

I would argue you should attack mainland india first. Its a short front and you will have qaulitative advantage from your mongol campaign veterans. Augment them with some more seige and cannon fodder and the indian campaign should be short. Take peace then go after the pacific island and you will be in terrific position. Although Cyrus usually does well in this map he has a couple things going against him now. First is that he doesn't control mesopotamia as he usually does, which is usually his best land. So he has all that god aweful desert in central asia. Second he borders russia and arabia which have higher power ratings than him. In Russia's case this is likely to continue. Given Cathy's personality bribing her into war with the persians might be a good idea, to keep those two occupied while you annialate india.

Just a few ramblings.

Hmm... Yeah, I'm starting to come around to the idea of war against Asoka. Oh, the main reason he dropped to Cautious with us? He turned his back on the Buddhist family by adopting Free Religion. And, especially with us being the Pope now, we cannot allow such an insult to the family. Handing over his juicy lands would be just penance for his transgression to the Buddha.

I am still going to send some missionaries off to the New World to spread the true faith. But the bloodthirsty Samurai will not be accompanying them. So, should we send the Victory Fleet off to India's island colonies, or maybe use them to launch a surprise strike against the tip of the subcontinent?

I would say they should go after the south of the subcontinent while your main stack goes through what would be burma on the map. With two threat axes, hopefully Asoka will be confused and just camp in cities the way the AI often does. If he doesn't he will at least be forced to split his stack making it easier to take out piece-meal.

Once you take out mainland india, take peace re-organize your army and fleet then make a quick swing through the pacific to eliminate Asoka.

I'd go for India and capitulate them probably. This is a wall that will be useful to you while you go after the americas - which should still be handily backward.

This is a cool series for sure. Maybe I'll do a Sal one on Monarch/Epic after my APG game and immortal Alex. IMO Sal and MM have it pretty rough on this map at first. Although you can make a case for most european civs too they have access to super capitols and you can usually rush the AI to death and have all of europe - kind of brokenly (what the? "brokenly" isn't triggering spell check issues?) easy after that.

America would be hard until after Monty is dead, then mindnumbingly slow but easy.