All Leaders Challenge Game 19: Sumer/Gilgamesh

MrFelony said:

I agree with everyone that the best option is to block ragnar in. It doesnt look like he'll have any iron or copper, since all his tiles look like forests with the exception of the cow. and being in that coastal spot he probably has lots of seafood resources. I think going to teal and green would be the best path. While the brown city would limit ragnar to one city until he could get some galleys and ship settlers out, it would give him some breathing room so he wouldnt feel like he has to declare war on you possibly. that and the brown city looks terrible lol. also teal=stone, which is always nice

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There are tiles (looks like 2 judging by the photo) south of Nidaros that are still in the fog. For all we know, he could have both metal and horses.

You do not want to tick Ragnar off by blocking him in if you yourself is not very well defended. He's a lunatic.
An example of that:
First time I met Ragnar, we became the very best of friends, sharing everything, trading happily through some 4 - 5 millennia. Then he placed a new city smack into my border, as it happens, that was the border of one of my cities that became legendary a couple of turns later.
His little "newborn" got swamped by my culture and flipped. Happy about that, I moved some more units into my new city and, SMACK, Ragnar turned round and bit me! He came at me with everything he had. And he had not been preparing for war, he drained his other cities of forces just to get back at me.
Ragnar is the only one that has ever attacked me for culterflipping a city! And at friendly???

Personally I would go AH (possibly with hunting first?) for the cow and the possible horses and start by settling westwards (especially the floodplains) and that part of the north that is not totally covered with jungle, i.e. the coastline up against the northern stone (stone is yummy).
If horses are indeed found close by, I would consider going for religion/priesthood/oracle before IW, researching IW while oracle being buildt.
If horses are not found, I would go straight for IW (archery first if hunting researched before AH), meaning we may have to tech MC "the hard way".

And if horses are found, I would contemplate sending them all towards Ragnar, in a constant stream untill the viking is no more.
(So much for kinship, same bloodline and all that.)

Ugh, this happened in my last Gilgamesh game, no bronze but I did get iron later. It wasn't bad at all though because I got the tower sheild random event so all of my vultures (which I had tons of because I did oracle-metal casting slingshot for forges) were 6str+25% verses melee and archers. Wiped out Zara Yaqueb in 3 turns.

My advice is this: Get Mysticism (should be pretty cheap by now) >Poly>Preisthood then oracle for Metal Casting. Focus on peaceful expansion while doing myst>poly>preisthood>Oracle then whip/build forges in all of your decent production cities while researching iron working. 99% of the time if you don't have copper you should have Iron somewhere. Keep a settler ready if you have to make a city for it. You should be able to whip/build a ton of vultures to overwhelm Ragnar, after that REX and head for alphabet to trade with Washington. Metal Casting/Iron working are highly valued techs to the AI so you should be able to make up for time lost.

I like the block Ragnar plan. Creative + Protective = early cities anywhere you want. You don't have the opportunity for an Axe rush. You could do a Chariot rush, but that doesn't leverage the leader. Blocking leverages the leader. The UU is still useful at IW. For example:
* Hunting -> Archery -> AH (Cows) -> Pottery ($ for IW) -> IW.
* Build a second worker, then chop Archer, Settler, Archer, Settler, Archer.
* Grab Cyan then Brown if possible, else Green or S or SW of Green.
* Each new city starts by building a Worker off a 3F+ tile.

Edit: I suppose Writing could substitute for Pottery, since you're Creative.

Jet said:

I like the block Ragnar plan. Creative + Protective = early cities anywhere you want. You don't have the opportunity for an Axe rush. You could do a Chariot rush, but that doesn't leverage the leader. Blocking leverages the leader.

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I like this! It's maybe not as strong as a Vulture-rush, but we don't have copper and this will show off how Gilgamesh is not just a one-tune band. After blocking Ragnar to the south, Sisi ideally will be able to REX to his hearts' content, and maybe show off the strength of Ziggurats in doing well.

Well blocking sounds like fun and all, but if you are lucky you will be able tu plug one of those cities. You sure wont be able to build all two before ragnar first settler...

So here the scenario i can see:

you build stone city. creative is nice but may not be enough to keep all tiles of the FC.

You are building second settler, ragnar settle right in the middle of your "legitimate" territory. You are in trouble if you dont get vulture fast...

Agree with all here that blocking sounds good but might not be doable with the AI settling rate.

You're not going to get both cities, but you don't need to get both cities to block Ragnar. You just need to get the flood plain city site, or thereabouts to keep Ragnar away from the greater largess of the continent. If he beats you to the coast, that is not a problem because you will still have him pinned in.

So settle the stone city first (if Ragnar doesn't beat us to it). That city will be enough to hem Ragnar in on its own. And then as long as you defend that city well, you should be okay against any incursion from Ragnar.

Validator's ideas sound really good. If I'd been playing myself without advice I'd probably not have thought about it, and just put my second city by the flood plains or somewhere to claim horses if I had researched AH. I think that should be a priority by the way since I think this map will spawn lots of barbarians and it would be nice to have access to chariots soon even if we manage to build the GW.

I agree. Going for IW now is a too much high risk. I'm sure that a source of iron had to be nearby, but, if it doesn't, the game will be seriously compromised.
I also don't like at all the idea of a chariot-rush.
I think I'd try to exploit others Gilga's characteristics, pursuing a REX, bee-lining for Priesthood (and then whip quickly Zigurrat)... you can have at least 4 good cities after reconsidering to attack Ragnar: Vultures do their good job until Macemen compares.... according with cats and swordsmen they are still dominant!
I'd go soon for the green city, and go for GW (as mentioned, build up quickly an "espioniage system"), it prevents from barbs as we decided to remain with only warriors for a bit.
If something goes wrong or Ragnar became dangerous, I think you can quickly switch to Archery (preparing for this evenience) and build your protective archers.... I think you have nothing to worry about.

I know that barbarians will be an issue, but it's only 3150 BC. Since Sisiutil will be chopping out some settlers anyway, I don't see the harm in going for Iron Working first. Yes, he delays working the cow tile, but frankly he's going to get more production from chopping and whipping anyway. Going for IW first also means knowing where iron is sooner for city placement purposes.

Even if there is no iron near, Sis will still have time to get archery or AH to deal with barbs and provide a credible defense to the AI.

I would go for AH, green city (it has cows as well) and then IW.

I would not expand towards ragnar as close borders might provoke him early, I would wait to see where Iron is first.

Some suggestions
1) I am a fan of using what you got. You have a creative and protective leader. I say tech hunting/archery after AH (regardless of horses).
2) Drop city #2 onto the SW floodplains/cos area and try to block out Ragnar. Use the creative trait to contain him.
3) Ragnar is very agressive in BTS, I would not be surpirsed if he went after you early, get the protective archers.
4) DO not underestimate Washington. He will get very large cities fast (charismatic/expansive) and the charismatic trait is the most dangerous military trait.
5) Get iron working after AH/HUNT/ARCH but before the myst/med/priest techs needed for the Ziggarets.

Just my 2 cents.

Indiansmoke said:

I would go for AH, green city (it has cows as well) and then IW.

I would not expand towards ragnar as close borders might provoke him early, I would wait to see where Iron is first.

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I agree about animal husbandry, but I disagree with you about expanding towards Ragnar: I think it is the best bet; is there a better leader trait combo than creative/protective to box in a rival?

Not only that, Ragnar also does not have copper, and it will be a long time before he even gets a chance to find iron. I have a hard time believing that we won't have either iron or horses close enough to grab if we need to.

If he does choose to attack us, we can have some protective archers waiting for him.

As for city order, definitely found cyan first, then orange. if we could have some military ready in case he makes a run for orange himself, we could possibly declare war on him and destroy the settler if we feel prepared for war at that point. Otherwise, let him found it for us...

Looking back at the ALC games I noticed there has only been one game with a protective leader, Tokugawa (who is in a rather unique catagory being agressive).

The current game may not be the best to showcase vultures but an excellent time to demonstrate the Protective trait and how to exploit it. Looking at the given map again I really think a good plan is to quickly get 2 settlers down south and choke off Ragnar while teching hunting and archery for the highly promoted archers. You have the trait, exploit them.

Also, if you can nail the southern stone, I would shoot for the Great Wall for a great spy (Ziggs and early spy specialists too). Send him off to Washington. Between choking off Ragnars land and stealing Washington techs you should do very nicely without ever lifting a sword, and you'll have alot of land to settle.

Not actually a spoiler, it's just that this start has some similarities with my current game.


You may not have copper nearby but you are still creative and you can and should block Ragnar off. Creative + Protective and Stone means you will have 20/40% cultural defense very quickly and with Stone/Protective you will be able to build Walls nearly instantly. With those your defenses can be rock solid (don't mind the pun).

I think that weighs in favor of a gambit - aim for Iron Working (which you will definitnely, definitely want to develop into the luscious jungle) and play aggressively. You also want to know where Iron is because Rangar will beeline it when he realizes he doesn't have copper anywhere nearby either. In my experience he is very aggressive, although I do play with Aggressive AI on.
If -and I think it's a big if- you don't have Iron in a reasonable spot for city 3, you will still have your Creative+Protective+Stone archers and walls.

I think AH is the worst option - I really don't like seeing AH resources show up when playing Gilgamesh - they just pull him in an awkward direction. Even without AH your worker will have plenty to keep him occupied for the next few milennia between farming, chopping, and roading. You'll want plenty of workers for cottaging and clearing jungle.

If you had a few more river tiles in the capital I might suggest Pottery to build a cottage and work that while researching IW. Unfortunately that doesn't seem like a great option in this situation.

You still have the tools to deal with this start even if Vultures don't feature quite as early as you'd like.

civ4legs said:

I agree about animal husbandry, but I disagree with you about expanding towards Ragnar: I think it is the best bet; is there a better leader trait combo than creative/protective to box in a rival?

Not only that, Ragnar also does not have copper, and it will be a long time before he even gets a chance to find iron. I have a hard time believing that we won't have either iron or horses close enough to grab if we need to.

If he does choose to attack us, we can have some protective archers waiting for him.

As for city order, definitely found cyan first, then orange. if we could have some military ready in case he makes a run for orange himself, we could possibly declare war on him and destroy the settler if we feel prepared for war at that point. Otherwise, let him found it for us...

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Ok if we are sure Ragnar does not have bronze then expanding towards him is a valid option...but an even better option might be then to get archery asap and invade him with protective archers....maybe not take the capital, but steal workers and pillage until we get iron.

If you end up not blocking off Ragnar and want to leverage some diplomacy, keep in mind that Ragnar & Washington will absolutely hate each other (they give -4 from peaceweight alone). Washington will become Ragnar's worst enemy and you might be able befriend him and keep him occupied with attacking Washington, and stab him in the back later.

Box in Ragnar without a strategic resource at your peril. I think Validator's Green Dot is too good of a city to let Ragnar have, and it partially blocks him but allows Ragnar some expansion space. I would grab the green dot first because it is too valuable to lose the spot, and will give nice production. After that, see where the horsies are and what is to the NW.

I'm going along with the crowd that land stuffing Ragnar is your best option.

I would tech AH then hunt/archery, then IW, then myst/med/priesthood

Things is, ziggurats are 90 hammers. Recently tried gilgamesh for the first time and stressed the ziggurats early. Tough to build them and a granary, and a library, barracks anyone? There's just too much on top of units/workers/settlers. The thing I like most with the ziggurat is you can avoid CoL. While it is a great tech, it's not really needed with the courthouses (zigg) available under priesthood. It really provides the flexibility needed to fill all the early tech gaps to get him going. Plus, with creative, you don't need to found a religion. Something will spread to you and then act accordingly.

I really like the GW/Great Spy/early ziggurats/tech stealing ploy. Oracle for Alphabet is probably out but alphabet should be an early priority. If you follow this path, you'll need a city early dedicated to spies. A dozen is enough early. I seem to lose a lot of them when I try to use them. For instance, should you try to bring down a cities defenses with a spy for one turn, bring two spies, it sucks when the first fails and you have no backup.

I would agree with validator on founding teal to the southwest. great location in the long run.

masonry and archery should be priorities... from there beeline to priesthood and chop the oracle for alphabet.. why??

BUILD THE GREAT WALL... america is going to be a good place to steal techs from while you worry about beating up ragnar. the spy won't take too long and if I'm not mistaken you can run a spy once you get a zigg online. hopefully you build the wall and the oracle in different spots.

protective archers will keep ragnar at bay if you crank out enough of them.

steal iron working from ragnar or washington and you're set methinks.

NaZ