This round was fairly epic and (I hope) fairly profitable.
It all started with me playing it safe. I took Chemistry with Liberalism and immediately began research on Steel. Apparently I could have gotten Steel as my free tech, but that would have felt a little cheap and, besides, doing it this way allowed me to also adopt Free Religion without any time wasted in Anarchy.
As Europe erupted in flames (what else is new?), our citizens found something very cool in Karakorum:
It's a little late for it to be a gamechanger, but I'll take a free commerce boost like that any day.
Of course, some people just can't stand to see their neighbors prosper. I ended up embroiled in fake wars with both Rome and Spain early in this round. Neither one really came to anything (I think I got a pittance of gold from Isabella, and the war with Caesar was ended by papal decree), but they were, um, fun while they lasted. Meanwhile, I was building my forces up for a real war with our buddy Asoka.
Part of this buildup involved training fun with the unaffiliated natives:
I also razed another Barbarian city just as Asoka settled his ridiculous stack (two Pikemen, two Knights, two War Elephants, two Trebuchets and a Catapult against a pair of Longbows) into position. That stack would turn into something of a headache once India went from friendly rival to hated enemy.
I made some tech trades in the buildup, nabbing Nationalism and some gold from Catherine for Astronomy and Guilds, and more gold from Alexander for Guilds. Those Trebuchets (which were being pumped out by Chengdu and Beijing) weren't going to upgrade themselves!
Finally, in 1290, it was time to blow the horn:
A lot of people suggested a two-pronged approach. I did that. Sort of. I sent my main, huge force trundling westward through Burma and Bangladesh.
Meanwhile, I sent some quick-strike forces at India's island holdings:
That city was defended only by a single Flanking II War Elephant. So I knocked down its walls with Frigate power, and sent in a Combat Jumbo of my own. Worked like a charm.
Of course, everyone's favorite Hellenistic opportunist had to get in on the action:
... Maybe selling him Guilds for chump change was a bad idea.
Anyway. How was the main force doing? Quite well, thank you:
That's why I love mid- to late-game wars. The cities come with all this great infrastructure built right in! Oh, and Cannon? Thanks to everyone who suggested this beeline. They tore through Asoka's medieval defenses like butter!
Of course, this is not to say that my Settlers were idle:
Yeah, maybe Banjarmasin (not Bangalore) should be 1NE or something so that it doesn't conflict with Bali so much. But I don't think the added tiles (Coast, mostly, with maybe one Grassland) would be worth sending out a whole new Settler for.
On the same island as Bali, Madras also fell:
And was renamed Jakarta. No sweet free buildings in this one, unfortunately.
Farther south, in Australia, the war was more of a tense standoff:
Neither one of us had the troops to commit to the eradication of the other's colonies. I had one Garrison unit per city, and I think Asoka had a War Elephant to spare. So I just hid behind my walls and glowered, and apparently the Indians were content to do the same. Oh, I'd wanted to name the southeastern city Surfer's Paradise instead of Brisbane (the two are close enough geographically), but it wouldn't fit as a city name. So, fiddlesticks.
I made a semi-split of my forces on the mainland, sending my reinforcements on a quick detour to raze one of Asoka's less useful cities:
Thankfully, the place didn't boil over with guerillas. I
hate that event.
Around this time, I figured it was about time to head to Rifling. As it turns out, Replacable Parts needs Banking in addition to Printing Press, so I nabbed it and 250 gold from Catherine in exchange for the sinister secret of Liberalism. All right. Tech path discussion over. Back to the war!
India's Barb-crushing forces (remember those?) ended up doing some damage on the desert roads between Karakorum and Beijing. All of the local cities, from Turfan to Pyongyang, pumped out Cannon and Longbows to deal with the threat. It was touch and go for a while, but the force was finally eliminated outside the old Chinese capitol.
Bombay (where Asoka had moved his capital for some reason) fell fairly quickly:
And was made the new Calcutta. Academy! Score!
Around this time, despite my switchover to mostly running Merchants in Pyongyang, out popped a second Great Scientist. So much for my Golden Age. So I switched to ALL Merchants, and sent Tycho Brahe off to found the Academy of Hanoi.
And we weren't the only empire expanding by the sword at this point, either. The inevitable American-Aztec war was raging in the New World and, just as inevitably, Roosevelt was losing. City after city was reported as being conquered. By the end of the round, of course, the United States were bound by the chains of vassalage. So that didn't change with the map fixes
So Asoka was broken, already willing to Capitulate for peace. But my army was romping, and I had no desire to let him keep a foothold on the mainland. It was time to kick back and have fun, right? Unfortunately, I wasn't expecting this:
Because I am an idiot. Maybe selling Guilds to Alexander was a bad idea... Anyway, Calcutta was well-staffed, but it was (appropriately enough) my Hospital city, full of wounded units trying to get healthy enough to go back to the front. The city held, and the stack was finally destroyed, but the losses were tremendous. Thankfully, once the stack was destroyed, Greece was willing to pay handsomely to end the war.
Farther south, the healthy troops were doing well, at least:
Asoka's forces were in a full rout at this point, at least down here.
Up north, meanwhile, I bashed my head against the Himalayan fortress city:
"Oh, sure," I said, "A couple of Cannons and a few mop-up troops and the city will be mine." Sadly, Cannons don't do so well going uphill, and Asoka was drafting units faster than I could knock them down. It became a classic stalemate.
Thankfully, the once and future capitol of the Indian empire was much more accomodating:
And that would explain why Asoka moved his palace. Versailles, everybody! All right! And Notre Dame is another nice little bonus. It's gonna get some heavy Persian cultural pressure, but what are you gonna do? Cyrus is probably next on the chopping block, anyway. Even though he did beg for Gunpowder, and I gave it to him... I need to start being more stingy with my military techs.
Oh, yeah. Asoka had one more city on the tip of the subcontinent:
So with that, Asoka's last city on Eurasia proper was nestled in the forbidding mountains of Nepal.
The time for half-measures was over. It was time to send in the big guns:
Have I mentioned that I hate the inevitable hard-to-conquer Himalayas city? That seems to crop up every other game!
Anyway, having been ousted from his homeland, Asoka is willing to give up quite a bit for peace:
Hyderabad is the Australian city pressed right up against Cairns. So, questions and state of the world to follow.
Catherine is LOADED. But I don't know that I want to trade either of the techs I have on her. Maybe I could nab Economics from Liz for Liberalism and/or Printing Press.
