RB3 - Daring Deity with Ottomans

OK, figured it out. Looks like luddite does indeed have the deluxe edition; I'm attaching a new savefile with Gyathaar's conversion fix to this post. Worked perfectly after applying that. Someone at Firaxis has inherited a giant amount of bad karma from this whole situation, not allowing compatibility between normal and special edition savefiles. (Can these people even play Multiplayer games together? Sloppy, very sloppy.) :smoke:

Yes, that's indeed Siam down there in the far south. I checked with their leader, and in fact we are already selling Ram-whatever our Open Borders for 50 gold! Nice work there. No one else seems to have Writing tech yet, but keep an eye on that diplo screen to fleece them for their gold too.

For our own tech, it seems like we want Pottery/Calendar soonish so that we can start selling our wines around for megabucks. We'll also want Trapping somewhere in there for our deer and to get started on some trading posts, and that should be plenty for the immediate future. (Probably Writing, Construction, and Iron Working in some combination after that.)

Here's the major question: how do we want to spend our 500 gold? We can either ally with a city state, or we can save the money to immediately rush-buy a horseman once our own supply is hooked up. (Building 2 horsies and rushing the third.) Personally, I'd dump our gold into allying with Helsinki, the maritime state right next to us. And I'd do it immediately, for the following reasons:

- We could really use the food. Both Istanbul and My Little Pony are production heavy, food poor. Get the food coming in, and we can work those hills and add trading posts, getting the snowball rolling.
- We'll get incense from Helsinki for more happiness, once they hook up the resource.
- We'll also get horses from Helsinki. In fact, if we want to be bold, we could even sell our 4 horses for cash and then build horsemen off of Helsinki's horses. That would be risky, of course, but we *COULD* do it.
- Money is easy to come by in this game. By the time we're ready to go to war, we should be flush with cash and can probably buy a third horseman due to wine sales.

I say we put the money to good use immediately, and start pulling in the benefits. Of course we'll need to dump in another 250g to maintain allied status in 15 turns, but we should be able to manage that with Open Borders and resource sales. What do you guys think?

Let's plan on going to war with Japan sometime around Turn 60-70. As long as we have 2-3 horsemen, we should be able to kill the initial wave of warriors without too much trouble.

EDIT: Also looked again at the map, and noticed that Japan is building the Pyramids in Kyoto. Perfect. Let's hope he completes it, and then we can take it away from him for some sweet fast workers. :hammer:
 

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Wow that's annoying. Sorry about the mixup there. I do have the deluxe edition but I haven't actually tried any of the special content there yet.

I forgot to mention selling open borders to Siam. Took a screenshot of that but I forgot to put it up. Usually I don't like to sell open borders to people, because I hate having their scouts blocking my workers, but I did it since it's early on and Siam is so far away.

I think we should save the gold for a 3rd horseman. For one thing, we're already at the happiness limit and we can't hook up the wine until we research calender. Any food we get from Helsinki will be mostly lost to unhappiness until they give us incense. And you don't want to underestimate Nobunaga... his Bushido UA does make him a little more resilient to rushes, because your units take more damage than you might expect.

:lol: pyramids plus liberty workers would be great. I've never had that combination at the beginning, before.
 
Good question. What do you think about the following option: Keep the 500 in the bank account until we know we can deal with Oda with the horses we have. If we then see that we need another one, we can buy it and bring it over within two turns. If we see we don't need it, we dump it on Helsinki for food. Seeing we don't have the luxury of reload cheating, I would go for "better safe than sorry" because, if we can't beat Nobunaga, we'll be toast.

Totally annoying about the incompatibility but also totally not your fault luddite ;)
 
Well, the counter-argument to that would be that every turn we sit on 500 gold in the bank, it's a turn we're not using that gold for explosive growth upwards with maritime food. Obviously there's no right or wrong answer. But I like putting my money to work for me. :D
 
Well, the counter-argument to that would be that every turn we sit on 500 gold in the bank, it's a turn we're not using that gold for explosive growth upwards with maritime food. Obviously there's no right or wrong answer. But I like putting my money to work for me. :D

Yes but don't under-estimate the value of flexibility. If Paradox games (well actually the Magna Mundi mod) have taught me one thing, it is that keeping some money in your bank account in case of emergency is often a very good idea. This goes for real life as well - you never know when you need a set of new teeth :lol:

I think in this case, we can afford some more turns of waiting when it buys a huge amount of security. I'm pretty sure two horsemen are too risky if we don't have a potential backup. I played a deity game some time ago where two horsemen simply wouldn't cut it so I had to sell another luxury, putting me dangerously close to -10 happiness, and that wasn't even against Oda.
 
Lurking

Can't say I agree with the placement of 'My little pony'. Two tiles north east would have got the horse just as quickly and given a little more breathing room for the two cities.
 
Very interesting game. I'll be following this closely as a lurker. :)
 
Lurking

Can't say I agree with the placement of 'My little pony'. Two tiles north east would have got the horse just as quickly and given a little more breathing room for the two cities.


On the plus side, the two cities provide covering fire to any enemy attacking from the east (ie, Japan).
 
Got it.

Maritime food would allow both cities to grow in 8 turns, getting 2 unhappiness simultaneously, after which we switch to non-food tiles. This higher pop configuration should net us an additional 4h/3g/2s per turn or thereabouts. So it's definitely useful, the question is really how much the horseman (or horsemen) buying will help.

Our capital right now can make a horse in 9 turns or so, and MLP will need about 14. Guess what? 15 turns after HBR finishes is turn 61, the turn we get our gold resource back! This makes me think we should buy Helsinki, make two horsemen, and then sell our gold and buy a third horseman just about in time for fighting. Sound good?
 
Lurking

Can't say I agree with the placement of 'My little pony'. Two tiles north east would have got the horse just as quickly and given a little more breathing room for the two cities.

To what end? We'll place a city there, too, ere you know it.

Got it.

Maritime food would allow both cities to grow in 8 turns, getting 2 unhappiness simultaneously, after which we switch to non-food tiles. This higher pop configuration should net us an additional 4h/3g/2s per turn or thereabouts. So it's definitely useful, the question is really how much the horseman (or horsemen) buying will help.

Our capital right now can make a horse in 9 turns or so, and MLP will need about 14. Guess what? 15 turns after HBR finishes is turn 61, the turn we get our gold resource back! This makes me think we should buy Helsinki, make two horsemen, and then sell our gold and buy a third horseman just about in time for fighting. Sound good?

Sounds good to me, we'll probably not be able to dish out enough settlers before turn 90 for this to have a negative impact.
 
I would rather save all our gold and rushbuy horsemen personally to hit Japan as soon as possible, if it was any other civ but Japan I'd buy the CS alliance. Every turn counts when dealing with Japan because each Spear they produce is guaranteed to do serious damage with their civ ability (can't clean up low HP units cheaply) and we have a limited supply of healing promotions. So we don't want them building Spears or settling cities (which would buy time for them to build more spears.)

If we pay for the CS alliance now and commit to paying another 250 in 15 turns, that's 750 we didn't spend on rushing horses, which means building 2 horses the slow way, and thus delaying our attack by about 10 turns.
 
I would rather save all our gold and rushbuy horsemen personally to hit Japan as soon as possible, if it was any other civ but Japan I'd buy the CS alliance. Every turn counts when dealing with Japan because each Spear they produce is guaranteed to do serious damage with their civ ability (can't clean up low HP units cheaply) and we have a limited supply of healing promotions. So we don't want them building Spears or settling cities (which would buy time for them to build more spears.)

If we pay for the CS alliance now and commit to paying another 250 in 15 turns, that's 750 we didn't spend on rushing horses, which means building 2 horses the slow way, and thus delaying our attack by about 10 turns.

What do you think is a good alternate plan?

Edit: I'm planning to play late tonight. At this point I'm going with the Helsinki buy which has an actual plan and more support, though I'd love to hear a fuller argument and plan for an earlier attack, to compare.
 
What is the policy on lurker comments in this thread?

I noticed someone earlier saying you placed MLP too close to Istanbul, but one problem with the original red dot city was that it didn't fit the 2 up/1 side lattice work for ICS'ing. You might as well never build a city that doesn't fit the tightest possible dot-mapping.
 
Got it.

Maritime food would allow both cities to grow in 8 turns, getting 2 unhappiness simultaneously, after which we switch to non-food tiles. This higher pop configuration should net us an additional 4h/3g/2s per turn or thereabouts. So it's definitely useful, the question is really how much the horseman (or horsemen) buying will help.

Our capital right now can make a horse in 9 turns or so, and MLP will need about 14. Guess what? 15 turns after HBR finishes is turn 61, the turn we get our gold resource back! This makes me think we should buy Helsinki, make two horsemen, and then sell our gold and buy a third horseman just about in time for fighting. Sound good?


At this point I think I'm cautiously in favor of allying with helsinki now and growing them both once. I don't think we need to renew the alliance though- being friends should be enough for now. It costs 410 gold to buy a horseman, right? So we'll need all of the 300 gold we can get later to buy it. I don't think we can afford another 250 early on, even if we sell our horses.

Bear in mind that if we grow our cities again the horses will finish a little faster. So if we do that, we'll have to decide between waiting a few extra turns or breaking the agreement (and risking some wrath from other AIs).
 
I noticed someone earlier saying you placed MLP too close to Istanbul, but one problem with the original red dot city was that it didn't fit the 2 up/1 side lattice work for ICS'ing. You might as well never build a city that doesn't fit the tightest possible dot-mapping.
Actually there is some use in having 1 or 2 large cities with high production just to produce wonders or units. But I think these 2 cities will still have enough room for that, and you can always steal tiles from adjacent cities if you need to. I wasn't really trying to pack them in as tight as possible, I don't think it matters much if you lose 1 or 2 possible cities because your cities are slightly less tightly packed. I just thought that was a good location. And you only need 2 road segments to connect it, which is very nice.
 
T40:
Pact of cooperation with Siam.
Pact of secrecy vs Japan, again with Siam.
500g to ally with Helsinki. Doing so gives us contact with Napoleon, via a nearby scout of his. I also promise to protect Helsinki.
Helsinki supplies us with 4 horses. I sell our own horses to Montezuma for 180g. (He is the AI in the best position to attack Helsinki and deprive us of our current horses. So if it comes to blows, we’ll get our own horses back.)

T41:
Montezuma enters the classical era.
I’m sending our scout to wander around Japan’s borders. We need the military intelligence more than map knowledge right now.

T42:
Napoleon offers an OB swap. Instead I sell ours for $50.
Our road finishes. It is currently break-even: 2 segments, 2 pop in MLP.

T43:
Someone builds the Great Library. Siam is Classical. Brussels wants someone to kill Monaco.
We meet Ramesses’ scout. He has writing so I sell OB for $50.
Helsinki has hooked up their incense! We are now at +5 happy.
I start a river hill mine and send the other worker to chop a forest for MLP.
Our empire looks pretty similar so far:


T44:
Genoa (the other Maritime CS, in the south) needs barb help.
I clear out the barb encampment, which had been vacated.

T45:
Egypt wants a pact of secrecy vs Greece, I decline politely.
Egypt declares on Genoa! Apparently Egypt is in the south.
The barb spear, at 1HP, returns to his hometown tile only to find it gone! Lol. Our warrior attacks and kills him. Now we can also use the warrior to keep an eye on Japan’s forces.
We complete two Monuments. Sadly HBR is a turn away. For lack of a good option, I put a turn into a Warrior in MLP and a Scout in Istanbul.

T46:
We get Horseback Riding! Switch both cities to Horsemen.
Japan enters the Medieval Era!
Somewhere out there, some city-state called Seoul is conquered.

T47:
Siam declares war on Egypt!
Both our cities grow, and the chop is in. ETAs on our horsemen settle to 6 turns in MLP and 7 in Istanbul.



T48:
Genoa and Siam are now allies.In summary, it seems that Egypt wanted to kill Genoa, Siam decided to save it, and now we have run into one or more snags in our goal of allying a second maritime city state.

T49:
Pottery in.
We finally have a good view on the Japanese military:



Weak units, but a lot of them.

T50:
The Japanese military seems to be on the move!



Most likely they are going for us, except they are heading a bit farther north than makes sense. I consider our options. If I buy a horse now, and then borrow against all 9 of our GPT in 5 turns, I will barely have the 250 necessary to keep our Helsinki alliance, just in time. (Which, due to the horse resources, is very important!) This is cutting it very close, so I’d rather not. Once we are at war with Japan, we have $300 instantly anyway (I checked, and there are 4 AIs without gold of their own), and this plan doesn’t take advantage of that money at all. So for now I hold off on the rushbuy.

T51:
Rome asks us to declare war on Egypt.
Me: No.
Caesar: Perhaps another time then.
(Me: Well I’m free next Thursday...)
Japan completes the Pyramids.

T52:
Japan declares war! I explain that he will pay for this “in time”. Actually he will pay in cities and units.
Our warrior is dead meat. Luckily I have the presence of mind to take a screenshot just as he dies. Japan has 6 warriors and 2 archers visible.



Our scout is bombarded, which gives him a promotion. I take the extra sight. I love having such a scout around in war.
Helsinki wants us to get Gems.
MLP demands Sugar.
Our capital produced a horseman (and started another), two turns accelerated by a chop. Another is due from MLP next turn. I purchase a third (in MLP, as the river actually makes our capital an inconvenient troop spawning point).
Siam would not help us in war.
I resell gold for $300.
We have access to a new policy. I am assuming we will take the worker speed one, but as this has no immediate effect I hold off on taking it.

T53:
Siam and Egypt make peace. Siam gets a research agreement with Japan. (Not sure whether to be mad at Siam, who’s supposedly our ally, or thankful that Japan lost $200.)
The rushed horse, and the horse than MLP built, are now available. MLP starts a warrior build. (I think having a single warrior can be very useful, and we lost ours.)
This is the first turn of real engagement. I take out two warrior and suffer 1 damage on the horse that was supposed to take 2, and 2 on the horse that was supposed to take 1. Then I run the horses out of effective counterattack range.



T53:
Japanese units mill around in a sort of retreat-like maneuver. I kill a warrior and an archer.
I give Helsinki our $250 renewal fee a turn early to be safe. I can't afford to forget for a turn, and lose all our horses because they are at half strength.

T54:
Montezuma scares the crap out of me by insulting us. I thought it was a war declaration at first, but even so this is not a good sign. He is now hostile. Given that he is right next to Helsinki and also close to us, this is very bad.

T55:
Wow, Japan is actually retreating! This is the first time ever I have seen the combat AI do something intelligent. What’s going on? :lol:

As we are at war, this has taken quite a while, and the part of the game is critical, I decide it’s probably best to stop at this point, after 15 turns, for discussion.

The current position:


Some notes for the next player:
- A chop came into our capital this turn. This is why the hammers per turn don't mesh with the expected horseman arrival date.
- Our scout still has a movement point left. Obviously, he needs to get out of harm's way. I only left him half-unmoved for temporary vision.
- We have an unused social policy. You should probably just choose the work rate policy right away.
 
What do you think is a good alternate plan?

Edit: I'm planning to play late tonight. At this point I'm going with the Helsinki buy which has an actual plan and more support, though I'd love to hear a fuller argument and plan for an earlier attack, to compare.

Don't bribe Helsinki, build the first horse in 8 turns with some of the stored food in Istanbul, when it finishes (turn 54?) declare on Japan getting our gold resource back, sell it to someone else and buy 2 horses immediately. Follow with settler, drop the 3rd city on the NE wine, sell wine, bribe city-state (More horses if we need them)

- oh we cross-posted, nevermind. I suppose the way it worked out with Japan declaring war on us turned out faster than expected with both my plan and your originally posted one (neither of which accounted for the chopping.)
 
The rough terrain around Tokyo is quite a nuisance, if all Japanese units stay there I'd be quite tempted to swing around to Osaka (size 9 already??) to make them move
 
- oh we cross-posted, nevermind. I suppose the way it worked out with Japan declaring war on us turned out faster than expected with both my plan and your originally posted one (neither of which accounted for the chopping.)

Yes. After seeing the results, I think the Helsinki plan worked flawlessly, getting within a turn or so of the fastest possible time to three horsemen, due to the extra hammers gained from maritime growth, and being much more efficient long-term. And surprisingly for me, we didn't even have to borrow any money!

There's just one problem, and that is Montezuma's hostility, and his proximity to Helsinki. It may yet turn out that our long-term investment in Helsinki was too bold.
 
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