The Emperor Masters' Challenge 3 (on Warlords)

aelf said:

If our neighbour was Monty I would never dream of befriending him. But I think there was one game where he voted for me. He was on the other continent and buddies with Alex, whose empire blocked any prospect of Aztec expansion. And I was running Police State

Click to expand...

Sounds like an idea for one of those challenge games. Highest net diplomatic relations with Montezuma by 1200AD.

The inland (site A?) spot is good, with the pigs. A coastal city with the copper wouldn't grow very quickly if at all due to the lack of food resources, I would plant that one next to the river. I'm also wondering about where a good Great Lighthouse producing city spot would be. What about immediately south of the capital with the deers and pigs? There's two hills and plains along with some food resources for growth. There doesn't seem to be any other close coastal spots with any sort of good food/production capabilities.

Round 2: 2640BC - 1560BC

Deja vu? The previous attempt's 2nd round was from 2400BC to 1560 BC. This time, however, it won't end like the last.

I went ahead and researched The Wheel. We needed Mysticism to chop a monument at marble city and AH to pasture the pigs, but there was time. Our settler had to get to the site, the pigs could not be worked without border expansion and our first build in marble city would be a worker, since Washington would be too busy with the Great Wall (gotta get that GE asap). This way, at least the worker at our capital could build roads when he had chopped enough.

First, Washington would need a garrison to grow to size 4, so we built a warrior while letting the city grow:



And built him at full speed when it hit the happiness cap:



Meanwhile, our settler/warrior pair met a barb archer just as we were about to settle marble city:



Rats. Now we had to play hide-and-seek with that stupid barb and waste several turns. And as you can see in that screen, Saladin had planted a city nearby to snatch the marble. I fear he may win for now. Hope we can wrest it back before we start on the Great Library.

Washington started on the Wall as soon as a new warrior was ready:



Most of it would be done by chopping trees. A great stone wall made from logs

Anyway, we researched Mysticism after The Wheel for the necessary monument in marble city, which the new worker could chop for immediately when he's built.

At last, we managed to shake off that barb and settle the city itself:



Our warrior over there survived an attack by another barb archer while standing in a forest. Whew!

Washington grew to its max size again:



You might be thinking of stagnating the city and focusing on hammers for the Great Wall now. However, I decided to grow the city till it was at the point of becoming size 5 before stagnating it. When the time is right, I would revolt to Slavery, manage the tiles such that it would grow to size 5 on the following turn and have enough hammers to whip 2 pop for the Great Wall immediately. That would shave off a few turns of construction time. The earlier we get the GE, the better.

Then Saladin came and offered a deal out of the blue:



Sure, pal. Better found that religion of yours soon, though. Given that he had researched Writing (not usually a priority for the AI) at this date, he's probably racing to grab CoL for Confucianism.

After Mysticism was discovered, we went on to research AH so that we can pasture the pigs at marble city. And who knows, it might actually reveal horses in our capital.

The next interesting thing was the Venerable Bede telling us that we weren't quite the poorest country in the world:



Saladin was the richest, so I'm betting that he will found his religion after all. Brennus, on the other hand, was no richer than us, so he's probably not going to be a competition for Saladin. He already had two religions, though. I hope different civs on the other continent will found at least two more.

[to be continued in the next post...]

[continued from previous post]

The time came to prepare for the Great Whip:



Washington would be able to grow on the next turn and put in just enough hammers to whip the rest of the Wall for 2 pop. For a unit or an improvement, we could whip 2 pop for 60 hammers. For a wonder, however, I figured we could only get approximately 45 hammers (not a math expert at all ). If my calculation was wrong, Washington would have to spend 1 turn in unhappiness.

I made the approriate civic change:



And it turned out that I was right:



Great! Here we go...



I must say that the Great Wall movie is quite entertaining. Maybe it's the model snaking off the table

Anyway, we discovered AH soon. Guess where horses were revealed:



Great! This start is definitely not as bad as the previous one. The downside is we might not have iron nearby.

And New York completed its worker:



The monument would be chopped for without delay.

This is where I stopped. Another set of decisions need to be made.

What should we research next? At first, I thought of Pottery so that we can start cottaging the capital. But I realised that we should probably get Sailing to start on the Great Lighthouse asap. In fact, Washington could possibly build it, since it still has 12 forests nearby to chop and more further away.

Washington is building a settler right now for the copper city. I'm thinking of settling it NW of the copper to grab both sugar resources. It would have poor growth early on, but the point of the city is to grab the copper and benefit from extra trade routes. When we've built plantations on the sugar later on, the situation would improve.

The map of the known world:





There's still room to expand to the north. We can settle maybe 2 more cities after our next before there's no more land.

I'm quite certain Saladin will found Confucianism soon, and it will probably spread to us quite quickly. In that case, we will get a united front vs. Brennus, which I think is the ideal situation. After Brennus is done, we would probably turn on Saladin and conquer the continent. What do you think?

things noted from your map of the local world. brennus has a city with horses.. that needs to be taken away from him before he researches horseback riding. no numedian calvary for him!!!!

definately settle NW of the copper to take those other resources AND leave it on the coast AND hopefully leave room for a river city to the east of that (didnt do the dot mapping but someone really should.) and hell take more territory always a good thing.

research sailing before pottery, yeah you need the cottages but the lighthouse is more important for the particular strat.

need to mobilze a small stack of ass whooping to take that city away from brennus. hopefully hes not an ally of saladin though so you can avoid the diplo penalty. shared religion could accomplish that. would like to see brennus seriously hurt next round.

NaZ

edit: while I suck at actually doing the dotmapping, this should convey my suggestion for city placement. the inland city barely gets access to the river health bonus but still a good move. the city south of the capitol will end up just being trade route and resource access but why not.. prevents someone else from landing a stupid city there. hopefully someone with better skills can map this out further with suggestions for you

NaZ

NaZdReG said:

things noted from your map of the local world. brennus has a city with horses.. that needs to be taken away from him before he researches horseback riding. no numedian calvary for him!!!!

Click to expand...

You're mistaken. Brennus' UU is Gallic Warrior. Hannibal gets Numidian Cavs.

NaZdReG said:

need to mobilze a small stack of ass whooping to take that city away from brennus. hopefully hes not an ally of saladin though so you can avoid the diplo penalty. shared religion could accomplish that. would like to see brennus seriously hurt next round.

Click to expand...

Maybe the next round is too soon. We need to hook up copper and build the Great Lighthouse and barrackses before we can start amassing axes. I do want to get a war started asap, though.

maybe after copper u could settle a stone city. im thinking of 2E of stone and u would have stone, wine, river, and 2 flood plains

Good work getting the GW done! Masterful use of the whip.

Copper city is your top priority, methinks. I'd even advocate using a chop or two to rush that settler. I don't have Warlords and I don't know Brennus' personality, but I think you're going to want Axes and eventually a few spears to defend your nascent empire, especially since your strategy requires you to be left alone to get a couple more wonders completed.

Assuming you can get the copper hooked up ASAP and better defensive units built, then yes, go for Sailing and the GL since that's a priority for your strategy. The longer you put it off, the greater the liklihood that the AI will beat you to it. I would then leverage the tech by building a galley for more exploring. If Washington will be busy with the GL, make copper city coastal so you can build it there. In fact, given your strategy, aren't you going to want as many coastal cities as possible?

(A minor non-strategic suggestion: turn on the option to display additional info in the city bar. This way it's easier for your devoted fans to know, just from the posted map views, how many turns until each current build completes and until each city grows.)

Brennus aggressively attacks weak neighbours. Get some defense, at least a few chariots.

WA looks good for the GL now that we have horses for shields. If you build a lighthouse w/out chopping it that leaves all the trees for the GL, which might be good since WA's production won't be fantastic even w/ horses, but it'll be sufficient. (GL is 400 shields, right?)

Off the top of my head, the 12 forests will get you around 240 hammers. With WA getting around 6 or so hammers a turn from it's tiles, by the time the one worker chops everything (36 turns) WA would have also produced from working its tiles 216 shields, which gives us the GL in just under 36 turns if we don't chop a lighthouse as well.

Factoring in the need to chop another settler for the copper, add another 16 turns for the GL if we build it in WA. That would give us the GL right around the time we get our GE, so we'd be building the GL and ToA right at the same time. If they're both in WA, that gives us around 6 or so GP points per turn in WA from its three wonders, giving us our next GP in 33 turns!

whoops my bad on the UU POV. good pointing that out aelf thanks. hopefully my dotmap is helpful to you. though I realized that I squashed the southern city's map but you get the drift.

agree with sisuitil. found the copper city coastal, it lets that inner city I pointed out still be settled. grabs you the copper and another coastal city and lets you make a galley there for exploration.

beeline to getting the lighthouse sooner rather than later anyway. all those particular wonders should end up at a different city than the capitol though. the engineers in the long run would be seriously beneficial.

mind you if you can just straight build the lighthouse it might be worth it to spend the engineer on the pyramids just for the civics choices and further GE points.

NaZ

I'm a bit paranoid about military myself. I think what I would do next is get the worker in Washington to pasture the horses for longer term benefit to production while building the rest of the settler. Washington would build a worker next, in between chops for the lighthouse and Great Lighthouse. The worker would go to copper city and get the copper online asap. Copper city's first assignment (after the possible monument): build barracks and mass produce axes.

NaZdReG said:

beeline to getting the lighthouse sooner rather than later anyway. all those particular wonders should end up at a different city than the capitol though. the engineers in the long run would be seriously beneficial.

mind you if you can just straight build the lighthouse it might be worth it to spend the engineer on the pyramids just for the civics choices and further GE points.

Click to expand...

Don't forget we need the ToA in the capital for the biggest benefit (capital gets inherent +25% to trade route income, which will help with the number rounding). The GE is meant for that, since we would certainly not be able to get it if we don't use him to build it.

Sisiutil said:

(A minor non-strategic suggestion: turn on the option to display additional info in the city bar. This way it's easier for your devoted fans to know, just from the posted map views, how many turns until each current build completes and until each city grows.)

Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll do that.

illram said:

(GL is 400 shields, right?)

Off the top of my head, the 12 forests will get you around 240 hammers. With WA getting around 6 or so hammers a turn from it's tiles, by the time the one worker chops everything (36 turns) WA would have also produced from working its tiles 216 shields, which gives us the GL in just under 36 turns if we don't chop a lighthouse as well.

Click to expand...

12 Forest = 360H (20H from Forest +10H From Industrious Trait +50% Production on Wonders) If you chop everything then all you need is to get 40H from tiles Which Won't be Difficult becuase chances are you'll get the 40H before you even finish Chopping the forest (probly from the horses tile).

Aelf,

I don't think you need the TOA in the capitol to actually get its benefit there. maybe it would be a good idea to run a test in the world builder and see what happens. if it can still get the benefit then DEFINATELY put it in a different city. in the long run engineers are too damn useful.. free wonders every age or so are not to be scoffed at. could mean free pyramids, great library, etc.

NaZ

NaZdReG said:

Aelf,

I don't think you need the TOA in the capitol to actually get its benefit there. maybe it would be a good idea to run a test in the world builder and see what happens. if it can still get the benefit then DEFINATELY put it in a different city. in the long run engineers are too damn useful.. free wonders every age or so are not to be scoffed at. could mean free pyramids, great library, etc.

NaZ

Click to expand...

The 100% trade route bonus from the ToA only applies to the city it's built in, which makes a coastal capital the best location there is. The synergy with the Great Lighthouse can be huge early on providing you've got people to trade with and those two definitely don't need to be in the same city, so I'd advise building the copper city coastal and aiming for the GL there, with the ToA going in the capital... unless you want to double up on the merchant points in one location (the free priest from the ToA always provides a bit of contamination, but with Brennus having religion I'm sure you'll find a use for one).

kniteowl said:

12 Forest = 360H (20H from Forest +10H From Industrious Trait +50% Production on Wonders) If you chop everything then all you need is to get 40H from tiles Which Won't be Difficult becuase chances are you'll get the 40H before you even finish Chopping the forest (probly from the horses tile).

Click to expand...

Forgot about those modifiers, even better. As it stands I think WA is the best site for the GL at this point since time is an issue.

in the long run engineers are too damn useful.. free wonders every age or so are not to be scoffed at. could mean free pyramids, great library, etc.

Click to expand...

GE's also are good for lightbulbing military techs, in many games I use the first one for pyramids and then the second one for machinery (or whichever one gives you macemen) although after about 2 or 3 it takes a while for those +2 points to add up. (The second one would take 100 turns alone!) I don't think we'd be able to get the Great library if we use the first one on the ToA.

illram,

exactly. I know that would be a deviation from the strat, and maybe a good suggestion for the NEXT emperor's challenge with a philo leader (abuse GP strat maybe) build the great wall, use the GE on the pyramids, double up the GE points, build a forge, add an engineer for like 10 GE points per turn and use that to pop the library and other wonders for free while focusing on military conquest though use of police state. and/or research through representation (would be great with the library afterall)

but while the TOA in the capitol would have slightly higher benefit, the contamination of the total GPP pool would be more harmful than the benefit of the 25% boost to trade income. if you could land the TOA, lighthouse, and colossus in the copper city it would produce merchants while the capitol produced engineers.. a good combination enabling trade missions with saladin to keep research at 100% while beating the tar out of your other neighbor.

there's my input on the matter as it will effect the next round, but the choice is ultimately yours aelf

NaZ

NaZdReG said:

... maybe a good suggestion for the NEXT emperor's challenge with a philo leader (abuse GP strat maybe) build the great wall, use the GE on the pyramids, double up the GE points, build a forge, add an engineer for like 10 GE points per turn and use that to pop the library and other wonders for free while focusing on military conquest though use of police state. and/or research through representation (would be great with the library afterall)

Click to expand...

This can be disgustingly powerful with a PHI leader. I'm playing a game now on Monarch/Epic/Frederick where I beelined Masonry, built the Wall in 1750 BC, and had three (!) GEs before 0AD - 835BC, 505BC, and 135BC, with the fourth in the mid-300s AD and about 2/3 of another GP (600/900 and 55GPP/turn) at 500AD or so. To be fair, I've built Pyramids and HG with Engineers, and I also got the Oracle the old-fashioned way and took Metal Casting for the forge, so I've got a boatload of GE points in Berlin. It cost some growth at the beginning, but I've started on the rampage already, and I'm owning Korea in spite of his Protective trait.

Hmm... I don't think the GE points from the Wall would be able to compete with the mixed points from ToA, no matter where it's built, so that's a moot point.

The location of the Great Lighthouse is not dependent on our choice, I'm afraid. The copper city would take time to get up to size, so we're probably better off chopping for it in Washington asap. Maybe this will be the first game I've ever played where I'm getting a GM or two so early. Personally, I'm not very picky about GPs in this game. I'll take what comes. They don't play a big part in our mission anyway.

We stand a good chance of getting the Great Library, actually. We are Industrious and we can get marble. That would make the Library extremely cheap. By then, Washington might not have enough forests to chop for it, though, so its might have to be built somewhere else. It's not very efficient in terms of concentrating GPP in one city, but if it gives us a few scientists in the game (Great Wall + ToA + free priest + Great Lighthouse = 9 GPP; Great Library + 2 free scientists = 8 GPP), I'm not complaining.

I am wondering if all the wonderbuilding (ok, we are industrious) matches the early war against Brennus. Where do you intend to build your army of axes,spears and chariots? If you pursue your wonder/trade strat. the war might come too early. Even if we assume Saladin will get a religion and it spreads to you, I doubt Saladin will join your war freely. Maybe if you are well on your way. But don't forget although he might like you, he still can backstab YOU if he see a window of opportunity. If we want to bribe him into the war, we need alphabet or at least currency. That means no early war.