Immortal Earth18 challenge: single city isolated start

Fun game so far. I went AG/Mining/Masonry/Wheel/Pottery/Writing to begin, while building a worker. Plan was to get food, stone and marble online and wonderspam. Going for a wonder/settled specialist economy.

Improved corn/rice/gold/stone/marble, while building workboats until I could start Mids.
Oh yuck – random events are on. Oh well - this event was the first of 4 in about 30 turns:



Sure, why not – didn’t even lose the pop, so worked out. Two bad events (bandits and forest clearing) caused some unhappiness, then this:



Ok, fine, guess they’re working out so far. First wonder is important for my plan:



First GP is a scientist in 1350 – academy. Next wonder:



Another scientist popped same turn and was settled. The all important wonder for this strategy:



Followed by National Epic, of course. I went for a bit of an odd tech path after lit, going music and construction next. Not worried about currency or even COL right away, but I wanted the extra great person and I wanted the odeon as well for the happy cap. Meanwhile, great people are flying out left and right for my super city.

Finished Sistine while teching Metal casting for my forge. Started CS, but realized I wanted philo (for pacifism), so switched to that to make sure I got it...and my Philo religion was:



Buddhism. Immediate switch to pacifism. Finished CS four turns later (so I didn't get the prompt to switch to bureau due to recent anarchy), and then idiot me forgot to switch to bureau for about 25 turns - cost me a bunch of beakers and hammers. Built colossus since it was only 6 turns and was there. Continued wonderspamming with Sankore:



And Angkor Wat. Headed up to education.
Safe to say I’m not very powerful:



One warrior doesn’t get you too high on the power graph.

I cut off after education, so I can decide whether to tech all the prereqs to astro to try for lib-astro, or go another route. Tech rate seems pretty good – I have plenty of settled specialists, and production is set up to be able to quickly amass an army to gain foothold in Europe. Thinking about cannon/rifle approach, but still unsure as to the plan at this point.

Of course, I had forgotten to tech IW until 300 AD, when it dawned on me I should make sure I had iron. I did, of course, which makes cannon/rifle a viable approach to gain a foothold. My other big dumb mistake is not teching sailing yet – that lighthouse probably would have been useful with the 4 sea tiles I’m working, and moai could have been helpful too. Guess it’s not that big a deal since I’m at my happy and health cap. No indications I’m behind in tech at this point – I’ve had no issues in getting the wonders I’ve gone after – haven’t failed any of them. Will be interesting once I make first contact to see where I’m at. My city:



Seems like I'm in ok shape, although I clearly was sloppy - haven't played a lot of civ in awhile with work, so more dumb mismanagement mistakes than I'm used to, but I could hit lib in 15 turns or so if I chose to. Will likely get the prereqs for astro (only about a 15 turn diversion) and then use astro to start meeting other civs.

The evidence is clear!

I settle in place, and pretty much beeline the 'mids then research out to priesthood and pick up the oracle as a bonus. Wonderspam and GP fly out--I take astro from lib in 500.
At 1000 AD Spain is mine, circumnav is in, I'm about 6 techs ahead of next place--researching steel. Seems like it'll be a walkover.

Well this sure has been fun, racing towards lib with the plan of picking up Astronomy. Heres what i've acheived so far,



These are all the wonders we snagged so far,



and our tech path so far ...



And here's the relative tech position ...

When I quarried the stone and mined the gold, they didn't connect to the capital until I built roads. This doesn't match my expectation; is there something wrong with this particular collection of rivers? Note the lack of stone in the resources listing (upper right corner of city screen) and the fact that building a wall shows stone isn't accessible.

I've met 12 of 17 rivals: all of the Americas, Africa, Europe; India; Persia (and soon Arabia). Not the rest of Asia (Russia, Mongolia, China, Japan). I have Astronomy and am building an army of CR II macemen to invade Mexico (and possible save Roosevelt's ass, but he may succumb to the Jaguar hordes before I get there).

The warrior explored the island (hah!) then fortified in Atlantis; I should have built one more to be safe from the Bandits event, but that was trivial. Tech path:

• mysticism > mining > masonry. I suppose mining first, for the gold, might have made sense, but with building workboats I wasn't going to have a worker that soon, and I wouldn't be working gold until the city grew a bunch.
• bronze working; no copper! but slavery was especially attractive with all that food to regrow with.
• wheel > pottery > writing; start running two scientists to get a GS (and academy).
• meditation > priesthood > CoL > Math as prerequisites for Civil Service from the Oracle.
• sailing > agriculture (and farm the food) > animal husbandry. No horses.
• aesthetics. At the next GS I realized I should have done Alphabet earlier so I could bulb Philosophy, which would apparently discourage the AI from getting a vital Liberalism prerequisite. I corrected my error, and immediately switched to Pacificsm for the extra GPP.
• Literature, opening the National Epic for even more GPP.
• Iron Working. Yay, iron! Decent Middle Ages troops will be possible, so I can invade somebody pre-gunpowder.
• Metal Casting > Compass > Machinery > Optics, and start exploring.
• Paper > Education (partly bulbed). I held off on Liberalism for a bit, since I guessed I'd be far ahead on the race.
• War civics techs: monotheism > theology for theocracy, with monarchy and archery from Hatty making it easier to get feudalism for vassalage.
• Construction from Asoka, which diverted me to Engineering for a castle and the extra post-Astronomy trade route.
• Drama, then a turn at Music before I got it from a Tahitian hut. I used a saved GA to partly bulb Divine Right, to take Islam. One more temple and monastery for Atlantis seemed worthwhile.
• Horseback Riding from Frederick; this will help me get a decent medic faster with the stable.
• Partly bulb Printing Press, then bulb Astronomy with 2 GS; there isn't a lot of overflow, and I figure at this point I can save Liberalism for a later tech like Steel. I'll get it to 1 turn away, then watch for my opponents to get the prerequisites before finishing it.

I now expect Gunpowder > Chemistry, then take Steel from Liberalism.

Builds:

• Basic infrastructure phase: workboat x 3; worker (quarry the stone first, once a worker was available, then mine the gold); workboat 4 until pottery, then granary, finish the workboat, and a 2nd worker. In retrospect this may have been unnecessary, but I expect to eventually send one or two overseas. As it turned out, having a 2nd worker helped restore a destroyed quarry faster.
• Wonderspam phase:
  • Oracle to 1 turn away, then pause for Code of Laws and Math to get Civil Service. At Noble this seemed like a reasonable risk.
  • Next Pyramids and switch to Representation.
  • A lighthouse after Sailing (in prep for running lots of science specialists supported by even more food) then aqueduct and Hanging Gardens.
  • Moai Statues. In retrospect this was a mistake; I intended to build the National Epic here and forgot this wasn't a real one-city challenge with its higher limit on national wonders. I should have saved the slot for eventual Heroic Epic or maybe Oxford.
  • During a lull, the Temple of Artemis -- the only time I'm likely to build it, given various comments against it I've read.
  • The Mausoleum. After I conquer enough cities to make a Golden Age worthwhile, I'll burn a spare GP (an extraneous Prophet or Artist, likely), and might beat everyone to the Taj, so this might give me the equivalent of one extra Golden Age.
  • The University of Sankore.
  • The Apostolic Palace. This was for denial to the AI; I shudder at a Holy War started by one of the religious blocks.
• Mixed in at various points and in an order I didn't record: barracks, walls, castle, harbour, stable, forge, library, theatre, courthouse, university, market. 3 temples and monasteries (Confucian, Taoist, and Islamic).
• Exploratory phase: 3 caravels, 2 with explorers (aiming for contact and circumnavigation, 1 to shuffle missionaries). 2 Islamic missionaries sent to the Americas; there were no religions there previously.
• I'm now starting an army.

War planning: I expect to build a bunch of CR II maces, which I expect eventually to upgrade to CR II rifles since CR isn't available to gunpowder units. Not sure what else I need to invade Mexico, and not sure how many to build. A few catapults? I hope cannons aren't too far in the future, but I might need some city bombardment before then. I suppose longbows for defence -- but if gunpowder shows up soon, I won't need them and can use Muskets instead.

One advantage of a small invasion fairly soon is getting a 4th level unit to qualify for the Heroic Epic, but that can only be built after I conquer a decent production city.

Most of the events were nasty, except the minor:

I don't regret playing with Random Events on, though; I generally enjoy it.