Von Münchhausen II

Oh, sorry about Warsaw, it is indeed cultural. I think I got fooled by the grey colour. :crazyeye:

Yes, a new policy needs to be chosen in 2 turns. Perhaps Republic does more to accelerate buildings than Piety, an extra hammer is more than a small percentage in our smaller towns.
We do need another worker, but I prefer to keep the money for CS influence.
When a CS asks for assistance, I believe I've always seen they got their worker stolen. It's good to get over there then, but we didn't. Probably Gandhi or Liz got it, and the AI doesn't give back workers.
Sydney will probably build another worker at some stage, but they normally make a few farms first before hooking up a lux.
 
Aaaaarrghhhhh! Just lost a big post!!!!!!!!!

In summery.

SP I would go republic as the +1:c5production: in our two new cities is actually a big deal percentage wise.

I like the idea of getting to Theocracy for the :) from Monumnets and Temples since we're building them anyway.

Si Sat needs a Library and maybe a Water Wheel to support CdP. Also consider building an archer here? Suggest we work the sheep when pop grows.

Muang can finish the Monument and with pop growth and maybe Republic start on a new project. Library?

Capital after Stonewroks finishs the Monument and then starts a Horseman?

I would rather buy a worker than spend on a CS right now. We'll get a spare ivory to trade soon so we can use that money to pay off Sydney or who ever. If we'd settled on the orange dot we'd get 2 ivory to trade... still I like our current spot too ;)
 
1 hammer in Si Sat would is 25% of current output and in Muang its 50%.

Forgot tech.

I'd be ok with going for Iron but I'd be wary of delaying Chivalry. Not really sure what the best option is here as I never beeline Chivalry.
 
Blue also gets 2 ivory, but it will delay horses compared to orange.

I thought buying a worker because I can't see another time to build one soon. I think stone works, horseman/monument (after or before doesn't make much difference). If we can somehow buy a worker and sell a lux to maintain some CS influence it could work out as nice. Our other 2 cities are in no position to build a worker I think yet. we have 20 in Sydney and 73 in Warsaw. Both deteriorate at 1 per turn and 250 buys us 35 I think.

It takes 5 turns to build a worker in Sukhothai but 5 turns for a granary also, maybe less with republic. We need growth in our library city over all I think.

Depends how much money the others have. We will soon have 2 ivories and the gold will be a cheap tile to purchase after the next cultural expansion, if required. We could wait also, I think Si is expanding that way. We can see what the others think.

I won't be around much tomorrow until Friday night so don't wait for my input on any big decisions. I'm sure whatever happens it will be good.
 
Turn 70 - It's been 50 turns since I've seen this game, so I did a little survey of the situation. I decided to write it up in case there were others like me that hadn't been checking the saves between turns.

I checked demographics to confirm some impressions I was getting. We're 3rd in manufactured goods and 3rd in literacy, which is quite good. The bad news is we're dead last in military.

Spoiler :


The tech tree shows we're about 60 turns from Chivalry.

Spoiler :


We have two citizens coming soon and we'll probably be at around 4 citizens in our newest cities in the next 15-20 turns. We'll also have libraries in those two cities around that time. I suspect this means we'll be about 40-50 turns from Chivalry, which puts as at about 100-110 if we rely on our tech alone. This will put us behind a bit and we may see some defensive buildings and crossbows/longbows earlier than we'd like.

I tech towards Currency after Horseback Riding and we can decide at that point how to proceed. The Tradition start slows down the Liberty GP significantly, but we helped ourselves out with the cultural CS. I also finish the monument in the capital and build two libraries immediately. We have very good production in our capital and should be able to build the NC pretty fast. We may be able to get it done without a GP bulb. We'll see.

It seems we have access to some land to the southwest that we haven't scouted? I was under the impression that our scouting stopped because we were locked out by water and AI borders? I found our scout way over by Warsaw, so I started him that way. It took all of my ten turns to get him in a position to do more scouting. Maybe there's a border there that I couldn't see.

Capital has five citizens already, and as I said earlier, production is nice. I only moved one citizen to the stone we were improving. We should improve the stone on the river because of the gold. We need another worker. I'll see what I can do.

Funny, our advisors suggest we build the same thing I was advocating... archers and settlers.

Spoiler :


It's too late for that noise now. We have three warriors and one archer. Our supply limit is 16 units and by the end of my turns we'll have 10. The others should be mounted units. We'll have to live with the composition of our military or delete a unit if we want archers now. Most of the choice city sites are gone or about to disappear, as you will see. There's still that one site on the coast that gives us a river, deer and silk. I still like that site, but it might slow us down to try and settle now. Plus, we didn't discuss continued settling and I got the impression we were going to press on with three cities. That seems like a reasonable approach to me, so I start a library in Si Satchanalai.

It's still 11 turns before our borders expand to the cows in Muang Saluang, so I'll continue the dance with Egypt's settlers. Out of curiosity, I ring him up and see that he only has one other city. I played a few games about a year ago with a mod that lets you take the AI seat, just so I could get some insight into what the AI does. Ramesses always built the NC first, so I'm betting Egypt had those settlers sitting around for that purpose. Oh well. You snooze, you loose.

I also rang up every AI we knew to see if they could be bribed into a war. None of them were interested, at any price.

Turn 61 - New citizen goes to riverside sheep in Muang Saluang. Good spot that gives us 2 free production at the start of the turn. I lock him in, but never get around to improving the tile (went ivory, ivory, horses).

Our warriors are standing around collecting government gold for nothing, so I send one to Hanoi to see if he can snatch us some workers.

Here comes Gandhi to get himself some sugar and marble. Saw it coming. Good play, Gandhi.

Turn 62 - Horseback Riding done. Mathematics and Currency queued.

I pick Republic as our next social policy. It takes a turn off of the monument and stone works we were building in Muang Saluang and the capital and four turns off the library I started in Si Satchanalai. Very handy and under-appreciated little policy.

The new citizen in Si Satchanalai goes right to CdP because it's on gold focus. It grinds growth in that city to a halt (33 turns). I don't move him because I understood that's what everyone wanted. There also isn't any more improved tiles in that city (we've gotta steal a worker) and it brings our GPT to 20, which is pretty impressive this early in the game.

There's a parade of workers and warriors headed to the city Liz planted in our sovereign lands. The number of freebies the AI gets at this level (even more so on deity) always amuses me, yet disgusts me at the same time. I was sooo tempted to take one of those.

Spoiler :


Ivory is done and our "friends" are pretty broke. Gandhi does have about 90 gold and some GPT, so he'll do. I tried Liz but, true to her (rhymes with "itchy" and, apparently, forbidden) programming, she demanded we take 13% off and toss in our last horse. I did enjoy listening to Jupiter during the negotiations though. Gandhi gets 2% off the value of our ivory because he has to pay in installments, and in CiV logic, this means you pay less.

Turn 63 - Nothing worth noting.

Turn 64 - Heeeeere we go....

Spoiler :


No, thank you dear. You two go knock the snot out of each other. We'll just be over here building libraries, and minding our own business.

Seems jackass Gandhi settled Pataliputra this turn and Liz didn't take kindly to another AI stealing our land. Only she can do that.

Spoiler :



Look how far these two jerks went from their empires to planted those cities! There goes Goz's "4 tile" rule. On Immortal and deity they absolutely cover the map with their cities and they'll take your land in a heartbeat if you don't take it first.

Liz builds the great lighthouse. Surprise, surprise.

I'm tempted to build The Oracle in the capital (13 turns) for the GS points and the free policy, but this ain't Prince, so I pass. Monument (1 turn) followed by horseman in the queue.

Ramesses gives up his dreams of settling in our lands. His units and settlers slowly move away.

Turn 65 - Elizabeth declares war on Gandhi. Thank you.

I back us away from the Egyptian road block and take up positions to watch for massing English units.

I have to buy the horse tile because our first horseman will be done in four turns. It's only 60 gold. I really didn't want to do this. We need to save up a bit for the upgrades (100-140 gold each), but this couldn't be avoided. We also have to build horse units if we're going to upgrade horse units. We still made a profit if you consider the horse sales to Gandhi.

Turn 66 - The "let's be friends" trick didn't work real well with us, so Ramesses makes friends with an "unmet player" and will apparently move his settlers onto that unmet player's lands. Good luck with that.

Turn 67 - Hanoi slips up, Siam gets a free worker. Elizabeth will blow a gasket.

Spoiler :


Muang Saluang (can we rename these things?) finishes the monument and starts a library.

Turn 68 - Liz wags her pale Virgin Queen finger at us for the whole Hanoi missing worker misunderstanding. I politely apologize. She goes guarded and promises she'll be "monitoring the situation."

Warsaw is reading my mind. They want us to build The Oracle. I don't think so, but I like the way you think Warzy! Can I call you Warzy?

Turn 69 - Horseman done in the capital and I can't work on another. Our second pasture won't be done for three more turns. Settler, stable, water mill, walls, and archer all seemed like good choices. I reasoned away the settler (discussed earlier), stable (6 turns for one production, although the 15% to mounted would be nice), archer (discussed earlier) and walls (I've only built these on a couple of nightmare deity starts or when I needed the Honor happiness - seems like a waste of production otherwise). So, water mill it is. There's only one turn put into it, so we can change it if necessary.

Liz is wearing down Mumbai and a couple of fortified Indian warriors near Warsaw.

Turn 70 - Nothing. It's all yours Brichals.

PS - I didn't put any gold into our city state friends. As I mentioned earlier, I'm concerned about the gold we'll need to upgrade 6-8 horse units. I don't think we can afford 2 city state friends at this point and we'll surely have to fight for the land we need to fund future city state alliances. I suggest we proceed cautiously with our gold until we can establish some control over the jerks around us.
 

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1 hammer in Si Sat would is 25% of current output and in Muang its 50%.

Forgot tech.

I'd be ok with going for Iron but I'd be wary of delaying Chivalry. Not really sure what the best option is here as I never beeline Chivalry.

You guys already know what I think. I just put the last turns up. Tell me what you think. It seems early game fighting is kind of a routine in every CiV game, and it doesn't seem to be any different here. We didn't really call any victory type at the beginning, but I don't think there's any way we're going to (or would want to) avoid a war soon. The question is, what kind of units would we like to use and how soon would we like to have them?

NC will cost us 185 :c5production: and be available at about the time we start Chivalry. It will take 10 turns to complete, so I think we can get there in under 100 turns, which is fine. We don't want to delay it any longer than that though.
 
It seems we have access to some land to the southwest that we haven't scouted? I was under the impression that our scouting stopped because we were locked out by water and AI borders? I found our scout way over by Warsaw, so I started him that way.
Actually, you yourself had gone way north with that scout, and it has remained there ever since, without too much of a good reason. I pulled it in the direction of Warsaw because there was no other unit in the neighbourhood to check whether they had their whales hooked up.
I'm tempted to build The Oracle in the capital (13 turns) for the GS points and the free policy, but this ain't Prince, so I pass. Monument (1 turn) followed by horseman in the queue.
I would have gone for The Oracle, for the influence. It's possible to miss it, of course, but if we want to grow, we still need a CS for happiness at least. I prefer it to buying a lux from Gandhi or so.
I have to buy the horse tile because our first horseman will be done in four turns. It's only 60 gold. I really didn't want to do this. We need to save up a bit for the upgrades (100-140 gold each), but this couldn't be avoided.
It seems everybody is allergic to build pikes. I would just have thrown a pike in, they are decent enough.

Good work continueing on the chivalry path. For a declaration of war it's best to consult the team, as that should be a team decision.
As far as I know, the first declaration of war is free of a diplo hit, but after that they start to count.
 
Really thorough analysis there, this game is quite gripping.

I have a strong feeling that one of those workers is Aussie born, and an early horse might seriously dent Elizabeths front. I can't say much now as I am not at home but I can look tomorrow and give some ideas. Our declaration on Hanoi is likely to be glossed over but any more and I think we get a bad reputation. We can see. I think we might have to assert ourselves on Immortal as there is a chance for a runaway AI and we don"t want that.
 
Everything that brings us closer to winning has a diplo hit such as building wonders, expanding, taking AI cities, narrowly focusing on a victory condition, allying city states, accumulating a high score, having a luxury or strategic resource the AI wants and yes, declaring war.

I thought I mentioned several times that I often rely on stealing workers and even specifically asked if anyone had a problem with it? I don't know, maybe it was in Gozpel's thread. I could scour the thread for it, but I don't feel like it and I don't feel like arguing about it either. I apologize for stealing the worker.

We could certainly get The Oracle, but we could also build 3 horse units or the NC in the same time. My comment that "this ain't prince" was kind of a joke that you can't really mess around with windows of opportunity like you can on lower levels. I want to take several of Liz's cities and a bunch of Gandhi's while we're at it, not buy luxury resources from Gandhi. I thought everyone else was of the same mind? I would probably approach this game the same way regardless of victory condition. I'd build The Oracle if we were trying for a cultural victory, but even then I'd try to put together a respectable military and take a solid chunk out of my neighbors. It would just be harder.

Which brings me to pikes and warriors. I feel compelled again to point out our support limit is 16 units and we already have 10. Only one of them is a mounted unit. Only one of them is a ranged unit. The logic of loading up on 6 and 10-strength units while you're teching towards Chivalry and a 22-strength unit absolutely escapes me.
 
A stolen worker means little, esp. from a CS, and we need that worker. Lizzy has been grumpy with us since the turn we met her, so she will be just as sooky. Forget about it.

You declared peace the next turn, didn't you NS?

I agree to more troops only 'cause the AI are building some, and we might get advantage of them quarreling while we build up horses. As soon as the Ghandi deal is over, we build more horses, I reckon.

We still have a chance on hard Oracle, starve the city while building and we might get it. Just check the food in the "bottle". Sometimes Ramesses goes for the Pyramids before the Oracle, and if we miss it, we get gold. I didn't have time to check out the save, but I think we can go for horses in smaller cities and for Oracle in Cap! But how much do we NEED Oracle, compared to units?

We need to scout immediately W of Egypt, if we had another civ on this map, they would've sent a scout...so probably fishing boat or gally....if not Optics. But we need to know.

Let England and India rip themselves apart and later we come and say hello with Naruphants.
 
I have no problem with the worker steal, I hope I didn't give that impression. I wouldn't do it on King/Emperor, my normal level, but we need to even the score on immortal I feel. I thought it was actually an elegant solution. In my last game I killed a CS early for a quest (I was trying honour start) and I didn't get a marked diplo hit for it.

I feel like helping Ghandi and trying to pick off Lizzies workers actually. If one is from Sydney we can return it right? I strongly want to denounce her anyway. Surely we can kill a warrior or so for XP also. I'll check the save later and make turns tomorrow.

I have a feeling there is not much west of Egypt. I'd prefer to scout south of Hanoi, but then scarcher can go west.

Strategy wise I also now think beelining chivalry and saving for 4-5 elephants is the path I would support. I think we need to get a timing done on England. Maybe National College also, but we can see how we can fit that in. I think I'd prefer that over oracle.

Do elephnats have a penalty vs cities? If so then I don't think we can take many cities with them. Maybe the gems one could be the first target.

EDIT:
General plan after the save.
Scout will go west afterall, I see coast below Hanoi.

Sukh... water mill > horse
Si........ library > water mill/granary. Just because we could make an extra trading post then. I think this is a specialist gold city. I would go market but we dont have the tech yet.
Muang....... library > stable > all horses. We have 4 stable tiles in this city, if we nick one from Si. That is maybe worth it? It then liberates the cap for other buildings, e.g. NC. Maybe Oracle if you guys want that. I love quests, but then theres a chance we'd miss it and we arent playing a culture game especially.

We can rush out some temples when we get closer to feeling like we need wats.

Next policy I think open piety?

troop movements it looks like we want to keep them around our territory. If you agree I can strike on Lizzies standing army. Don't know if thats a good idea.

I will need to put 250 into Warsaw. Should I put 250 into Sidney also? Ramesses would give us 156 for marble, we have 512 now. This trade would put us on 2 :c5happy:, with a culture expand to gold in 12 turns. We can build additional stone quarries around Sukh to make sure we don't go into :c5unhappy:. We could make this deal, but it favours Egypt. He will give us OB also in that deal, actually maybe we might use that.

I aksed Ghandi what he wants for us to declare on Lizzie, no deal.
 
Just read my earlier post. Came off worse than I wanted it to. I just meant that I thought I'd asked, and if I didn't, then I'm sorry. I think it would help if we agreed to a victory condition, so then we could focus on a strategy to get there and avoid things that made that victory condition more difficult. We're in a good position now for any victory. If we want to go for a cultural victory, I agree we should go for The Oracle. I'd prefer to play aggressive and set us up to own most of the city states because the bonuses are so powerful for Siam. Maybe UN first, with a focus on science and military?

Brichals, I like the idea of denouncing Liz. Egypt may follow. If she takes some of Gandhi's cities though, there's more for us to take without declaring on Gandhi right away.

The NE does get a penalty against cities, but if we get there soon all of the cities will be so weak that it won't be a problem. Then we should get a GG soon after which helps with the city penalty.

I usually finish the liberty tree before I start anything else. We could use the GA, reduced price for future policies, trade route happiness, and the GP is very nice. I try to avoid Piety until I know if I might need Rationalism. I don't think we will, as we got a lot of freebie techs early game that puts us on par with most of the AI. I also like Honor because it really pays off when you start taking a lot of puppets and the reduced cost for upgrades is better the earlier you get it. I don't have any strong objections to Piety though. It's a very good branch.

The NC will really help us get through Chivalry and Education quicker and make all of the lower techs very short.

Maybe just gold for Warsaw? We can catch up with the other ones when we get some pillaging gold and trade routes hooked up?
 
We could take the policy in liberty that starts a GA and push for oracle during that I suppose. If you guys want Oracle I can set us up for that. It will make Warsaw love us long time. I don't know if finishing the water mill first is better, I think theres 3 turns left on it, maybe 4. And Oracle is 13 atm.

So denounce England, put 250 into Warsaw. The rest is straightforward, I'm still open to build ideas but I wrote above what I feel like at the moment.

If we do decide Oracle I will put money in Sydney for the food and let Warsaw drop below allies for a few turns (we won't dropp into :c5unhappy:). If we lose the Oracle we can buy back influence with fail gold.

So the question is do we want the oracle.
 
Hey guys. I'm going to be out of the loop till end of next week. Got an unexpected festival ticket and a trip to Bristol. Sweet.

My brain hurts right now so I can't really add to the discussion!

I'll try later...
 
Our neighbours are fighting, so we can pick the Oracle at will. Only thing is that we have the wonder-whore of all games next to us.

But will he be able to stop us or even threaten us? No.

Go for the Oracle at full speed and save the policy of golden age for later, fill up the rest.
 
The next policy is a dilemma. I have to choose in 3 turns i think.

Tradition we could get the wonder boost from aristocracy - not too keen on that.

We could open patronage or piety, both not bad, but if we are puppeting, keeping rationalism as an option is good. Piety is for wide or culture empires imo (we could still aim for culture win though).

We have a possible slingshot in liberty. Meritocracy gives us nothing now (the trade route one), but representation could speed us up for Oracle with GA. The free policy would then fill up liberty and get a free scientist which we can use to bulb chivalry in 13 turns. Too soon? We will only have 1 horse out by this time. I do like this slingshot though. We would have to hardbuild more elephants. Actually we don't have to bulb chivalry right away, we can build a couple of horses first.
 
I'll stay out of the policy discussion, as I'm a true Honour whore.
Going for the Oracle we can make it or miss it, but I'm not a fan of starving for it. We do this too often in my opinion. 4 of the 5 citizens in Sukhothai came in my set and we saw this in Von Münchhausen I as well; cities mainly had to grow in my sets.
It's not smaller towns that give more research and production, it's bigger towns. For that you'll often have to work a couple of river farms for a while, to gather more citizens to be able to work the productive tiles as well. To only work the productive tiles at the cost of foody tiles is not a good idea. Maybe at the end of a wonder build, but not all along.
I was mentioned pikes earlier as they have been available already for a while and could do a job capturing a town like Hastings. I understand Naresuan's are better, but if pikes come turn 40 and elephants turn 100 then that's not a straight comparison.
Athough it depends when we want to go to war. Most people take a bit longer deciding when to go to war, that's true.
 
We can get some food from Sydney whilst we build the Oracle. We're kind of wonderspamming hence the low growth, but after Oracle we don't need any more wonders for a while. We can take Liz out of the game more or less then concentrate on getting growth. I will go for it with the Golden Age strat slingshot into GS unless anybody says different in the next hour or so. I feel like playing. We could probably have 3 elephants in the middle of the next set.

Just as I have the save open, I can say that we won't starve for Oracle as our optimum production tiles are food neutral. It will halt growth but then I would get friends with Sydney for some growth. Just for info.
 
OK I'm going for it!

Turn 70 end

I buy influence from Sydney. 3 :c5food: in the capital and 0 outside, I hoped for some outside but anyway. Sukhothai goes into Oracle. Keeping one guy on the farm only delays oracle by 1 turn, but this may change in GA. Anyway it has a +5 now and will grow in 7 turns. Maybe I keep it that way.
Oh I denounced Elizabeth - she's a menace in this game. Seems she's building Chichen Itza and has done some damage to Mumbai. Pretty strong, but not for long. I'm also enjoying the theme music, being an exiled Englishman myself.

Turn 71
Not much to report here, except Ramesses tries to pay us back by blocking my scout.

Turn 72
Elizabeth makes peace with Ghandi and sets down Canterbury.
Spoiler :


Horse pasture in Muang comes in. 4 horses, I keep them for now.

Oh the diplomacy!!
Ghandi begs, unfortunately I have to say no. We are saving to upgrade horses. I knew he would ask, oh well.
Spoiler :


Then out of left field.
Spoiler :

I say give us 10 turns and bring it on. Sorry if you disagree but we will have a NE then if all goes well, that can probably solo all of Lizs spammy warriors.

Turn 73
England allies Sydney, this is not good. We absolutely must have more influence than her when we declare. In fact as we could use the food, I'm going to 1 up her right now and put more into Sydney. We are now allies getting 4.5 food in capital and 1.5 in the provinces. They are hooking up incense now. good good.

It's policy time, and its Golden Age time

Warsaw goes friendly.

Muang grows and goes stable instead of library. It's more efficient this way and a library is not useful in a small town so far. We can get library later.

Scout meets Belgrade, militaristic, hostile, wine. Nah.

Turn 74
We lose whales from Warsaw, but we get incense from Sydney now.
Ghandi and Ramesses are happy we denounced England. Ramesses is mobilising for the attack. I hope he can distract them for a few turns before we get NEs.
We are average on food now.
Spoiler :


Turn 75
Si finishes library and goes horseman - 12 turns atm. I switch off CdP for a river tile, growth in 5 turns.

Turn 76
Sydney seeks a new natural wonder.

Turn 77
Elizabeth and Ghandi have gone Medieval on our ass. Not figuratively, or even literally, they just entered the era.
A quite sizable Egyptian army is heading to England borders.

Turn 78
Ramesses declares on Elizabeth.
Sukhothai grows to size 6. New citizen goes on stone for now, but I will put a new farm next improvement and we can work both for a fast growth phase. Optional has a point.

Turn 79
2 unmets go medieval, Muang wants gems, luckily we have them on loan to Ghandi and can get them back in 10 turns. By that time we can trade him something else if we want.
Scout took a bad turn, not much to see, here's Belgrade.
Spoiler :


Turn 80 - 900 BC
ramesses wants money now. I said no again. Both he and Ghandi have like 3 greens and 1 red against us now, so barring hidden modifiers still very friendly.
Spoiler :


Oracle will finish next turn.
We promised to declare on England in about 3 turns. I think she can't really attack us as there are many Egyptian forces there atm.

Heres what the scout saw. We are blocked by Egypt, but I dont think there is much beyond there.
Spoiler :


I think we should finish liberty with oracle and take a GS. Then bulb Chivalry after currency (2 turns away). Maybe we can hardbuild one more horse in Sukhothai before this bulb, and instead research up to optics. Like this (pro drawing skills)?? We will then have 3 horses including the one building in Si. We can hardbuild more elephants in Muang after the stable. Should be fairly productive. So 3 NEs in about 7 turns I estimate.
Spoiler :


Here's our position, Egypt has more forces in the fog I think. About 4-5 war chariots and a couple warriors. We just finish a pasture around Muand now the worker should do the sheep. I did the cow first as it is near the danger zone and I wanted to hook it up in peace times.
Spoiler :


Roster
Grandad (enjoying scrumpies for a while)
Gozpel (up next)
Optional (on deck)
NotSure
Brichals
 

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