King of the World #9: Genghis Khan

Played the next round. I'll try to post it sometime tomorrow.

This round began simply enough, with the foundation of Sydney in southeastern Australia:



I don't know that all of these cities "Down Under" will get to the point of being seriously profitable before the endgame, but I've always kind of given the continent up as a "crappy AI city ecological preserve," so it's been fun actually developing it for once.

With Communism researched, I traded it off to the lovely Catherine:



What's Russia without at least the possibility of State Property, hmm? I also made the switch myself, plunging my empire into three long turns of darkness.

Which is not to say that my armies were idle:



I took the warnings against accepting Cyrus' vassalage lightly to heart. I was going to need to carve Persia up a little bit more first. Jinjan, though, was in a crappy spot, so I burned it to the ground.

Meanwhile, in the west, apparently Hatshepsut scored some major military victory, or simply pulled ahead in a war of attrition, since Julius Caesar capitulated to her and joined her war against Greece! Suddenly, Alexander is looking at a war on two fronts! I don't know that his dominant position on the board is going to last much longer...

The war on the Persepolis front was quiet for a few turns (except for the occasional raid from an Airship. Then, in 1605, Saladin sent what seemed to be one last ditch stack to try to oust me:



Well, it's green Cavalry and Trebuchets. And I've got veteran Cavalry and Cannon that have finally gotten a few turns' worth of healing in. It was something of a rout. I lost a Cannon or two, but, well, being lost is their job.

This was enough to end the Arab threat and allow me to focus my attention on Persia:



Saladin's stack has been crushed, so he should be weak now, yes. But Cyrus is even weaker, and, again, I think that our army can rebuild a lot faster than his can at this point. And it's gonna take some time to get troops into position to strike Arabia proper, anyway.

On the other side of the world, Sydney experienced some hard times:



Why didn't anyone warn me that Australia is a volcanic wasteland?

But I soldiered on, founding another city there:



You can also see that I've come out of Anarchy. The difference between State Property and Free Market isn't huge (I think that the free Trade Routes on all those island cities were making a lot of cash), but it was significant enough to make it worth the Revolution, especially since a Golden Age was 30+ turns off.

I continued to stomp Persian Siberia:



You can resettle that when you're my mindless battle thrall, Cyrus. Maybe.

I also built the Statue of Liberty:



Or, I guess in this case, it's the Statue of Not Getting Pulled in Half by Horses. That's the best you can hope for in Genghis' world.

I continued to chip away at Cyrus' holdings:







And I was named the second most powerful leader in the game, behind only Montezuma! Apparently my program of building more Cannon and Cavalry worked!

So, in 1660, I'm at a crossroads. We have Assembly Line and, with it, the ability to create Infantry. We once again have a significant military advantage over Saladin, so I think it's time to start funneling troops down there to redeclare. At the very least, I have to save Kuwait from being choked out.

At the same time, though, Cyrus is one the ropes. We could knock him out:



Aryan, at the very least, looks like a juicy prize.

But is it worth it? Persia is willing to capitulate:



And Tarsus isn't a terrible city to get for free:



I mean, it's not good, but it's not terrible.

Here's a big-picture look at the empire:



and the rest of the world:



The Power Graph (or what we know of it):



Diplomacy:



And Science:



So I guess the question is, do I accept Cyrus' surrender? He's easy pickings, but he's also kind of a waste of time, and I need to get as many guns to the Arabian border as I can as quickly as I can. I'm going with Railroads to hasten continental transport. I trust that's the right decision? I look forward to the discussion.

The save:

I think you should accept Cyrus as a vassal, but leave him the city of Tarsus. It's not really that good.

Also, no espionage on Saladin? What if he gets artillery the second turn into the war? He's had physics for a while and AIs like that tech. Airship-bombarded infantry will get shredded by artillery. You better bring a big stack.

I would take Aryan. It's already a size 18 city and with grasslands to boot. Take Aryan, then accept the capitulation and go on to Saladin. With a larger military force, by the way (I'd go with 30 cavs, 15 cannons to be safe).

I'd vassalize Cyrus after Aryan.

I'd also beeline Radio for UN and diplo victory. In the meantime, go and knock some aztec heads. I guess diplo is faster than domination. Otherwise, there's no need to tech to radio.

BTW, you might consider d/l'ing the BUG mod... It would be nice for us to get more info from your screens and I doubt you'll be sad if you get more info and help managing huge empires...

Take Aryan, count the riverside tiles, with leeve and some serious worker action (state property workshops/watermills) this is a serious troop-spam site.

And build more units. This reminds me of civics, In your last GA you picked the wrong ones for this game, some serious drafting would have been in order, you are Ghengis, not Mansa.

Take the offer. Tarsus will keep at least Persian revolts away from more useful cities.
After that, prove the world wrong and demonstrate how the Mongols are much more powerful than the Aztecs

I'm in the "take the last city" camp. Take Aryan and then vassal Cyrus. I would take Tarsus if it is still offered and then gift it back to him to help build a bit more good will. I might even give Aryan back too (or by itself if not offered Tarsus) for the same reason. Helpful if Cyrus has a city like Aryan to keep itself in the loop tech and production-wise. Plus, it will be surrounded by Persian culture and may have revolts.

Perhaps Cyrus might tech something off the beaten path for you and then trade.

Cathy is pleased and without rifling I see, but I'd still be very wary of her and her backstabbing tendencies - especially if you head to the New World to fight a slogging war. How does she feel about Cyrus? - taking him as vassal might affect her thoughts of you if those two haven't been getting along...

The Great Khan has no use for Vassals, He rules with an iron fist. Those who oppose the Great Timijun, sign their own death warrant.

Eliminate the Persian scum, remember what they did to your Ambassador??? Eliminate them completely, while fighting the Arabian dog's. Camel Archers may rule the deserts, but on the Steppes of the world, the Golden horde, Rules where its hooves strike the ground.

To sum up YOUR FREAKEN GENGHIS KHAN The great khan

Thing is we've already done chain vassal conquest and conquer-entire-eurasifrica victories. What else is there?

Maybe you could just raze everything outside of eastern Asia to the ground.

Yeah, raze everything to the ground!

You've won. Do whatever the hell you want

IPEX-731BA5DD06 said:

The Great Khan has no use for Vassals, He rules with an iron fist. Those who oppose the Great Timijun, sign their own death warrant.

Eliminate the Persian scum, remember what they did to your Ambassador??? Eliminate them completely, while fighting the Arabian dog's. Camel Archers may rule the deserts, but on the Steppes of the world, the Golden horde, Rules where its hooves strike the ground.

To sum up YOUR FREAKEN GENGHIS KHAN The great khan

Click to expand...

I agree. C'mon, I've been calling for a true (no vassals) conquest since I started following this series. Let's do it!!
As I have said previously, if you don't get them all, no big deal, you'll still probably win a time victory.

You realize how much of its a hassle to conquest everyone? It gets excruciatingly boring and along with that, you know you already won, so its more of a responsibility.

Edit: Neal, maybe in your future games you could play around with the options more? I don't mind if you disagree, I just wondered if you could.

CONQUEST! RAZE THEM! RAZE THEM ALLL!!!!! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA!

Yeah, just take out Cyrus; keep the cities, but slowly move down, eventually hitting Kuwait. From there, invade Arabia - Greece - Egypt - Mali in that order. Just switch into total war mode. Every city should either build Wealth, military buildings, espionage buildings, or units. That's it.

I agree with the maniac above me.



'LET EM BURN!

Immortal or Deity plz. in next game. This one has been over since Genghis conquered India.

ConsoleCowboy said:

Immortal or Deity plz. in next game. This one has been over since Genghis conquered India.

Click to expand...

..Or China.

set the world on fire

I'm fine with any win, as long as I see mongols smashing aztecs