The sun never sets on the British Empire [RFC]

Prelude:
First up, a little background on this. I had planned to play the entire game and take screenshots and then post the story in quick succession, but I'm kind of lost for ideas. I am trying to create the British Empire (or get close to it by founding the more famous colonies) but I've reached a point where I could use advice and as such I'll post this in "episodes". Another reason to post now is that if you guys are waiting for updates I'll get off my backside and play

Another thing I need to know, since my monitor is 1920x1200 (and that is obviously an annoying size for most), I have used spoiler tags to minimize the inconvenience for those of you not on widescreen setups. Any ideas on how I can upload the screenshots with thumbnails instead so you guys can click on them individually?

My version of RFC has a few small changes that I made, mostly concerning the starting situation, and a few changes in the python, most of which only affect the late game (I like the modern era). The changes include city spawns and flips at certain dates, resource spawns, improvement spawns, and slight changes to the starting situation.

Few of these changes are tested before this game, so weird stuff may happen. In fact, this game is my test
I won't tell you what all the changes are exactly either... you'll have to guess or ask. If you ask questions, I won't lie - I'm just curious to see what you guys pick up on

I have saves for a lot of these turns, so I can go back to take pictures as required, too.

and so, without further ado...

Victoria, de facto leader of the English peoples, leads her subjects to some grasslands north of the river Thames. She founds their capital, and tells her people that in 1000 years, this will be more than just the capital of their country. It will be the capital of the world.
As soon as she does so, she is greeted by a smelly guy from south of the sea, who claims to be the king of those parts. He also happens to control the seas between their kingdoms and as such she is forced to pay him for right of way. Damn bastard will pay for this eventually.


A few years after the creation of her kingdom, Victoria is approached by the people of Scotland. They say they're tired of being oppressed by their Scandinavian masters and decide to revolt and join England. The United Kingdom is born, with its two capitals London and Edinburgh.
Ragnar takes this as an insult and declares war on the traitors. Victoria rallies an army from London to defend her new lands.


Victoria sends her navy to explore the seas and find new lands to settle. Along the way the navy find yet another kingdom, and are forced to pay yet again for right of passage. This is a recurring theme which the British don't much care for. Along the way the fleet find there are two ways they can travel. They can follow the coastline or travel East, past the Spanish outpost near "Gibraltar" into new seas. Since the admiral was ordered to find new, unoccupied lands, he continues his travels South, but marks the spot on the map for future reference.


Our people are diligent, always good to know they're efficient Notice we're still in our phony war with the Vikings, who refuse to give up even though none of their armies have been seen in decades. Some believe their civilization has disappeared.

French travelers teach the British about their religion: Christianity. They have a group of followers in London, who intend to spread the faith. The French also tell us of their religious enemy, Islam, which is being spread by Arabs to the East. Worried, Victoria orders more military buildup. A larger navy is required to defend our home and our overseas settlements.

Our admiral makes several discoveries. He founds our first overseas city at the southern tip of Africa, Winburg. He also meets Mansa Musa, leader of the Malinese Empire. Mansa is persuaded to trade plans for a great tower that reaches into the skies for various old technologies of little worth to Europeans. Victoria would like to rally her believers in London with the great monument.
Our admiral also explores beyond the Spanish outpost, and finds skirmishes between barbarians and the Arabs who wish to control the area. The Arabs reveal themselves to be advanced, with a homeland full of riches - however their armies are tied down in conflicts with barbarians, the French and the Spanish. Victoria wishes to join her religious allies, and hopefully overwhelm the non-believers...

... oh the excitement, how can I pause our story here? Frankly, because I must sleep. Tune in tomorrow for the second episode!

Interesting starting setup. Personally, I would take a 3-city initial setup in the UK. Still interested to see if the Ireland gambit works.

micbic said:

Interesting starting setup. Personally, I would take a 3-city initial setup in the UK. Still interested to see if the Ireland gambit works.

Click to expand...

Not sure what you mean by the Ireland gambit, but by 3-city setup in the UK I assume you mean you'd settle Manchester or Newcastle. I prefer to leave just 2 cities in the UK (plus 1 in Ireland) since we cover every resource like that - even if we have vanilla RFC (with Inverness) the only non-worked resource is the oil.


After a not-so gruelling war, Ragnar comes back to Britain in peace and offers Victoria a trade he believes she cannot refuse. He brings valuable seafaring tools and requests only that the English set up a merchant guild in his kingdom. Victoria accepts: if she is to settle more faraway lands or conquer the Arabs from across the sea, she will need these tools.

A vicious power struggle in London leaves us with a free Great Instructor at the London army barracks. He'll be needed to train the troops to attack Arabia - according to recent reports from spies in Arabian lands, Saladin is losing control of his empire and is set to collapse. Victoria joins her European friends and declares war.

The navy enters the Mediterranean and follows it to the heart of the Arabian lands. The troops land in Egypt in 1280AD and lay siege to Alexandria, their most important target. Alexandria is the largest trading center in Arabia, and is home to the fabled Great Library. The English assault was the final straw for Saladin, and a civil war lays waste to his empire. The English decide to take advantage and attack the more valuable cities while they are disconnected. They even take control of Jerusalem, the birthplace of their faith, and with it take control of the Church's vast treasures and resources.

Meanwhile back in Britain, scientists have more money to conduct research than they ever dreamed of and are devising new, faster ways of traveling the seas using the stars to guide the navigators across oceans.

Where will the settlers go with their new knowledge? Who knows?

Let's see how fast can you get a chain of cities from Egypt to South Africa

Interesting to see expansion to Egypt. I see next target being N. America (obvious) and S. Africa (the Dutch will claim it more or less)

Not sure what you mean by the Ireland gambit, but by 3-city setup in the UK I assume you mean you'd settle Manchester or Newcastle. I prefer to leave just 2 cities in the UK (plus 1 in Ireland) since we cover every resource like that

Click to expand...

Yes. In vanilla RFC I usually go w/ Inverness, Newcastle, and London (sometimes I add Bristol). In your version I would doubt I would do it (by Ireland gambit I mean settling initially in Africa)

Sorry for the inactivity, next update on!

The admirals of the glorious Royal Navy reach the New World! We claim it for ourselves and get to work immediately. We want all of this land under the English banner.
The military also find new civilizations in the Far East. The Chinese, who are more advanced and cultured than even the mighty English, are at war with the Japanese, an island people with similar imperial ambitions to us. In order to stop them, and hopefully be closer to China, Victoria immediately pledges to assist in their conflict.



Back in the Old World, Adam Smith, respected Scottish merchant travels to the trading capital of the Empire Alexandria and adds his ideas to the Great Library. He outlines a method of "free trade" which should increase prosperity in an empire such as England's - allowing the colonies to freely trade anything with each other and with the outside, generating much needed money for the military. With the money, England starts founding cities all over the world:



It soon turns out that England is not alone in the New World. Though less wealthy, the other European nations decide to grab the riches whilst they still can and secure their piece of the pie. Fair play.



Greville Wynne is born in Edinburgh. His talents for espionage are world-class and Victoria decides to send him on a mission to China to steal their secrets.




All in all, I'm now pretty stuck. I think I know roughly what I want to do, but I have a number of probems:
- Damn Turkish culture is engulfing Jerusalem even though the city's culture is mainly English

- Bloody Independents in India are rock solid. I don't have the military power to remove them and take over imo
- I could build more of an army but I need the British Isles to make wonders. I have a big Galleon fleet but no troops since all my cities are busy making buildings
- Why is it so hard to maintain a tech lead? Everywhere I look I feel like I'm getting beaten to techs

killerkebab said:

All in all, I'm now pretty stuck. I think I know roughly what I want to do, but I have a number of probems:
- Damn Turkish culture is engulfing Jerusalem even though the city's culture is mainly English
- Bloody Independents in India are rock solid. I don't have the military power to remove them and take over imo
- I could build more of an army but I need the British Isles to make wonders. I have a big Galleon fleet but no troops since all my cities are busy making buildings
- Why is it so hard to maintain a tech lead? Everywhere I look I feel like I'm getting beaten to techs

Click to expand...

The story is very good and I really like what you did in Egypt!

As for the other things:
Turkish culture is really annoying, you basicly have one good option: capture Bagdat and make them collapse (english controlled Irak in real life too), but you need rifles to do that. For troops you can use conquerors, you did get them right?

To maintain a good tech lead you need money, so that you can run at net loss. To get money I sell techs and maps. I never sell my map in the beginning so that later you can even get techs for it.

In this update, Victoria gets, well... greedy

We start in 1700AD, because not much of interest has happened since 1615AD. Admirals Nelson and Drake (Privateering got lonely for him, military work is more appealing ) are ferrying troops and supplies from the New World to India for an imminent British campaign. Using Madras as a base of operations, the First and Second Marine Expeditionary Units crash through the gates of Bombay, and set their sights to Delhi, capital of India:

Word gets through to Admiral Drake from Victoria that Turkey has set its sights on controlling the entire Indus Valley! Turkish troops are rushing to Delhi, which would allow the Ottoman empire to control both sides of the Indus river, and maybe even be in a position to control British trade to India - especially after they've captured Mecca and are nearly in a position to control the Suez Canal!
This cannot come to pass - Drake and Nelson have their orders: take Delhi at all costs before the Ottoman army take control. Britain cannot afford a war with them... yet. Taking heavy losses, the First Unit bursts into Delhi after a night assault:

Now time to attack Patliputra
The Ottoman army give up the chase and return to Iran. Victoria knows the Ottomans have a massive military advantage and orders reconnaissance flights over Iran and Iraq every day to ascertain what they are up to. Thanks to the discovery of Physics by Great Scientist Isaac Newton, Victoria knows that whilst she is outclassed by most European armies, she is the only one to have an air force.

It is time to make ourselves look bigger than we really are! New British colonies are founded all over the globe. Vancouver, Cape Town, Sydney just to name a few


Now Victoria is in trouble. Somewhat historically, money is running out. Britain has the world's finest economy - in fact, the world's first and only free trade economy since the 15th century (everyone else seems to be running a mercantile system and making much less money), but the Empire looks to be getting bigger than it can handle. Stability is down for the first time ever and we cannot afford to give our scientists access to 100% of our budget any more

Britain cannot afford to sell its technological secrets any more, either. Other countries are catching up thanks to the "cheap" deals Britain gives away - in fact, France is currently research Electricity and when they finish, it will be the first time a foreign power has access to a technology that Britain doesn't have since the mid 17th century! Something must be done, and military plans are being drawn up against the two great powers: China and their Asian vassals, and Turkey with their European vassals (which include France)

Now, its just a matter of time until they can be implemented.

Hope you enjoyed this update - and now I can say I haven't played any further than you've seen
Judging by the year I'd say its only a matter of time until America takes NYC away from me - which is fine, since I only used that place to make ships, workers, and settlers. I built Toronto on the River close by instead of on the lake so I could annoy the Americans more. This should be an interesting game to play against America, since a couple of my modifications affect them
I obviously cannot move against Turkey and their massive advanced army - I could try against China but I need more of a fleet - their army seems to be muskets mainly, and I'm starting to equip my guys with rifles. Where would you guys go? Middle East? Far East? Neither for now?

As for tech order, I'm researching Medicine because no one ever does and because I want to found corporations to keep my economy rolling - right now I'm in trouble. I have vast amounts of sea-borne resources so I figure Sid's Sushi will be a good plan - combustion next so I can modernise the fleet and get Creative Constructions (or maybe Mining. Inc. ?)

remember to MM for a Great Merchant, so you can get Sid's Sushi - With France hot on your heels, you don't want no Sushi just because there wasn't a GM! Also, combustions good for something else: connecting (land-based) oil! Also, I think you should invade China and Khmer first, but also build up a massive military in North Africa and India to attack Turkey.

Damnit, damnit, damnit, damnit.
Having destroyed my hard drives and tried to recover the data - and succeeding, partially - I go to look for my civ saves so I can continue this game (I'd reached 1820AD ish and was in a pretty big war with the Vikings) and lo and behold, its gone

I'll have to start this again at some point