King of the World #10: Charles de Gaulle

Don't forget settled great merchants in terms of max population he can achieve

Round 6 has been played, but things have been hectic. I'll try to post it Sunday night or Monday afternoon.

In this round, I grumble that managing diplomacy in a field this crowded can be a pain in the arse.

I started out by arranging what I think was the least painful deal for Astronomy from India:



Those two techs are pretty benign, and they're fairly widespread, anyway. And money, well, money is no object in an OCC. This shaved a turn or so off of Scientific Method. Hey, every little bit helps!

In 1250, the belligerent Ethiopians became even more of a pain than they were before:



... Pinch? On the Oromos? That could be bad. That could be very bad.

I made a minor deal for Lincoln's map (Literature, I think), and what I saw didn't surprise me:



The Aztecs are just eating the Native American's breakfast instead of the United States'. Coincidentally, this means that Lincoln has been left alone to rival Montezuma as a military power. We just might see Monty get pushed back without player intervention!

Isabella is one of our few friends on this map. And, of course, Darius is one of our many enemies. I was having difficulty finding a willing partner for a Defensive Pact, so when Spain came a knockin', I complied:



Of course, the self-important Babylonians got in on the action, too, declaring war on us, but I never really saw anything from them.

Persia, on the other hand...



Quick work for my fleet-footed Cuirassiers and Musketeers. This brought the numberless nations of Persia to the bargaining table. I still had to give up a tithe to get them off of my property, but 45 gold seemed like a reasonable price to pay. Again, other than a few unit upgrades, what am I really going to do with all the gold coming from those Artists, Prophets, and Merchants?

Needless to say, once Scientific Method completed, I went traipsing down the path of Physics. It's a fairly high-priority tech for the AIs and, well, I wasn't going to lose that free Great Scientist without a fight. I also nabbed Constitution from our Indian friends:



I'm so glad you didn't get et by a lion like in the Shaka game! And, yeah, I know that Theology is worthless. But I'm getting sick and tired of six or seven AIs shoving it in my face every time I hit "End Turn!" I'm not interested, Charlemagne! I already gave at the bank, Wang Kon! Leave me alone!

A fake war with Arabia earned me a Great General:



And a bit of tribute coin in my own pocket. It felt good to kill something again, and the settled GG is worth a little bit of spare research and culture. And Arabia submitted to the Khmer shortly thereafter, so they can hate me all they want now. Hey, Saladin! Yo momma so big she earn the circumnavigation bonus. Ooooooohhhh!!! And so long as his boss is happy with us, there ain't a thing he can do about it.

So peace once again settled over the French city-state. But not for long. Our noble Roman allies required aid against Zara Yaqob!



Y'remember Zara? With the Pinch Oromo Warriors? Yeah, that Zara. I don't know what I was thinking.

Anyway, we never saw any of those gun-wielding buzzsaws, but apparently they were too much for Augustus' primitive troops:



#$%&! Well, I beat back a terrifying stack of a Musketeer and a Pikeman from Rome, and I was able to buy peace from Ethiopia. But now Caesar is all pissed at me because I'd declared war on his master. Yeah, at your request, you jerk!

The game continued to mock me by spitting out another Great Artist:



... Well, at least it wasn't another Spy.

In 1465, even Greece was forced to kneel before Darius:



And what of Leonidas? Pericles may kneel, but the people of Sparta will FIGHT! Or, well, they would, I guess. We really need Xerxes and Leonidas leaderheads. Just think of the goofy diplomacy quotes that could be mined from that movie.

Even Elizabeth joined the Persian Empire as a sister-civ:



Well, hopefully that'll at least keep those two from declaring war on the world all willy-nilly anymore. You can also see that Gandhi has beaten us to the Statue of Liberty. It would have been nice, but we're a little late to Democracy.

In 1495, I decided to end things with a limp-wristed tribute payment to our erstwhile German allies:



Oh, come on, Otto! We're best buds! Don't do this to me! *huff* Fine. Take it. Jerk.

I settled the Communism Great Spy, and I'm thinking of saving the next Spy or Artist for a Golden Age for some Civics changes. At the very least, a future dip into Universal Suffrage could be valuable. Or maybe I'll just wait for the Cristo Redentor.

Here's a look at Paris, complete with all of its buildings and units:



Yeah, I went with the National Park. It has its drawbacks, but if we're supposed to be creating a utopian city, we can't let our people choke to death in the streets. And I think the extra Specialists (and the ability to use buildings like the Industrial Park without fear) will more than make up for the lack of Coal.

So here's the world:





And the tech situation:



I'm wondering how reasonable a Computers beeline would be for the Internet at this point. Then we could switch everything to production, trade the Scientists' lab coats for frocks and hammers and shoot for the stars from the backs of our enemies. I dunno. I gotta admit, I feel like a green-behind-the-ears newbie all over again in an OCC. If I seem unfocused and chaotic, it's because I am. What should our next goal be? I look forward to your input and discussion.

The save:

Neal said:

Hey, Saladin! Yo momma so big she earn the circumnavigation bonus. Ooooooohhhh!!!

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Nice round, computers beeline sounds like the best plan I guess.

Wow, Sitting Bull usually is able to stem the tide of Aztec jaguar warriors.. guess not this round! Ah well, lol.

And Neal, you do know that the National Park's free Specialists only work when there are Forest Reserves INSIDE that cities' BFC right? I may be just missing them, but I don't see any in thar. Now, the park is still good for the healthiness o'course.. just makin' an observation.

Hmm, very interesting, Ost-Rom's emperors have exiled to Irland this time and who said that Zara has a weak starting spot on this map , but those Oromos will geta cold on Iceland for sure.

Can someone explain to me how you can still be earning gold with the slider at 100%? It seems to me that if 100% of commerce is being turned into science flasks, there shouldn't be any left being left as gold.

Internet FTW.

Can someone explain to me how you can still be earning gold with the slider at 100%? It seems to me that if 100% of commerce is being turned into science flasks, there shouldn't be any left being left as gold.

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Settled Great Prophets/Merchants/Artist.

Maybe Neal can show a pic of the city screen with all the settled Great People.

I'm quite skeptical of using the internet in here. Mainly it is a question of production: remember that you need to build Apollo and all the used SS parts ( I wonder how many of the spare parts you'll really use ) in one city. Making the internet in the same city might be a overkill in terms of production.....

How about beelining Superconductors via refrigeration and then get Rocketry instead? Supermarket would give you 1/2 spec and labs are pretty much needed for a SS win.

^That's true. However, Neal has only got 827 beakers/turn, and around this time where cottages are booming along with incredible bonuses (like Free Speech etc.); other civs are going to have major advantages in researching. Meanwhile, while they many have tons of cities to build multiple things at once, Neal, probably has the most production in one city. Plus, I don't think its been maximized because farms are still there. Those can be replaced with workshops and water mills etc. (whichever is suitable). On top of that, what would he build in the meantime that could prove as advantageous as the Internet even though it costs a lot of hammers?

Well, there are 2 things that Neal really needs to build:
-Laboratory
-Apollo

There are other things that would be good to have:
-Supermarket
-Hydro dam ( remember: Nat park = no coal = no extra hammers from coal plant )

P.S I can see workshopping + SP, but watermills are a , given that most riverside tiles are metals or hills. Mines are far more suited there

Another thing is you can't wimp out with casings. You need to build all 5, as each one you skip gives you a 20% chance of failure which is obviously unacceptable. Multiple thrusters and engines are much less important, as they only increase ship speed.

I think the internet beeline is a good idea, expecially with this many civilizations. It'll help him maximize hammers without worrying about research which is nice. In state property and caste system, each workshop will give 4 hammers without removing any food, which will make them a very nice tile. Or he could just run engineers from the farms...

Plus the route to Computers is pretty helpful. Radio will give him the Redentor, Industrialism gives him very nessecary Aluminum, and Plastics will give him power.

r_rolo1 said:

I'm quite skeptical of using the internet in here. Mainly it is a question of production: remember that you need to build Apollo and all the used SS parts ( I wonder how many of the spare parts you'll really use ) in one city. Making the internet in the same city might be a overkill in terms of production.....

How about beelining Superconductors via refrigeration and then get Rocketry instead? Supermarket would give you 1/2 spec and labs are pretty much needed for a SS win.

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If he doesn't have aluminum, then I agree. If there is aluminum then I would go Superconductors --> Industrialism --> Rocketry --> Composites --> Fiber Optics --> Fusion --> Ecology --> Genetics.

Matthew5117 said:

Neal has only got 827 beakers/turn

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That's plenty. The AI doesn't follow the optimal techpath for space, preferring the flight branch, which Neal has no use for.

I do think that people are not seeing the big picture regarding the SS race in OCC : There is no point in getting the techs faster that you can build the SS parts ( well this applies to all the games, but in OCC it shows more ). 827 beakers per turn ( + some extra pocket change you will get from the +25% of the lab ) is more than enough IMHO compared with the rate you will make the SS parts

@Gwynnja

Neal has two sources of Al ( see post #1 ). I agree with getting Industrialism before Rocketry ( Ind park ), but you forgot to include Fission in the tech path..... the AI is always somewhat stingy with it and trade is not guaranteed.

Some other things:
-UN loss is a danger? Who would be the candidates ?
-I don't see rails in the pics Rails would add 5 raw hammers to your prod in current tile improvement configuration ( +1 if you mine that uranium )
-Corps.... have you considered getting mining corps? Maintenance is not a issue

Mining Inc AND Cereal Mills! Go go go!

r_rolo1 said:

-I don't see rails in the pics Rails would add 5 raw hammers to your prod in current tile improvement configuration ( +1 if you mine that uranium )

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He doesn't have Replaceable Parts, so no Steam Power, so no Railroad. This turn was spent dancing around the goodies from Scientific Method. (Biology, Physics, Electricity, Communism) By the way Neal since you got Communism, are you going to take a shot at the Kremlin? It'll be a useful wonder for cristo-induced US rushbuying. I don't think you mentioned it in your write up.

r_rolo1 said:

-Corps.... have you considered getting mining corps? Maintenance is not a issue

Click to expand...

Any idea how many mining resources he has in his culture? (copper, iron, coal, gold, silver) This is a huge map, and corporations scale, so it will take more resources than usual to get a production boost. He'd be able to trade his spare resources around for excess metals, but I'm not sure how much he'd be able to get overall. It'd have to be nice to be greater than the +3 +6 a settled GE gives you, expecially since you lose state property for workshops.

If he pops a great merchant Cereal Mills might be worthwhile though. the AI doesn't value grains as much as precious metals so he might be able to get a lot from trading, and extra population will be handy for either research or production. Seems somewhat unlikely to pop a merchant though.

At this size map, mining won't give you more than 1 hammer per 2-3 metals. Sushi/cereals will probably be like 1 food for maybe 4 food. I think SP will probably give more food and production, or even stick in FM for the extra trade route. It's probably up to almost 10 coins per route, so that translates to about 30 beakers a turn, which isn't too shabby.

Feyaria said:

Settled Great Prophets/Merchants/Artist.

Maybe Neal can show a pic of the city screen with all the settled Great People.

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So settled great people don't add commerce, just gold? That's a rip! What am I missing?

Fetch said:

So settled great people don't add commerce, just gold? That's a rip! What am I missing?

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...they also give beakers, expecially with representation?

And hammers, food, culture, and espionage.

Aye, Settled GP don't give , but , , , and all = anyways, so instead of getting something that allows you to choose which of these 4 things to get, you just get one of these 4 things instead.

Thinking of vs .. I've been wanting to try a game where my comes primarily from 's, having few/no cottages and no scientists.. but instead, have the GLighthouse, and have a ton of coastal cities, each with at least 3+ 's, then keep my economy afloat through merchant specialists. Think that would work?


Anyways, back on subject, keep it up Neal.. goin' good!