GOTM 44 Second spoiler - entering the industrial age

GOTM 44 Second Spoiler

To qualify for this spoiler, you must have the full world map, all contacts and have reached the industrial age.

Given the nature of the isolated start, the middle-ages are where this game will likely come alive for most players.

How developed were the AI? Were they able to stay in-touch with you? How did you go about expanding off you home island? What were your invasion plans?

Predator
It took until 30AD for my ancient age to end because I researched Republic in 40 turns. But I didn't use Republic to trade my way to MA. My respect for the AI was too small for that. No, I traded ivory and 27gpt to France for Currency. By this time I had reduced Greece to 1 town with about a dozen swordsmen. Yes, I took the opportunity to steal iron from Greece, as mentioned in the AA spoiler.

I got Feudalism as my free tech and traded Montheism from Greece. Korea got Feudalism. I had to pay my last gpt to Greece to get Monotheism.

First turn of MA I broke both gpt treaties by declaring war. France caved in quickly to my swordsmen. I managed to stock up a dozen chariots/horsemen before getting Chivalry. Then I just kept rolling over the AI at my leisure. But I never researched Engineering and missed it because of the many rivers.

In the end I got another decent domination victory in 6** AD. Again 4th-15th spot in the rankings I should expect.

A funny thing was finally meeting the Iroquois. They were still in despotism but saw it reasonable to value our World Map at 228 gold. I have never seen so many towns defended by just 1 unit, and I only lost one single unit to an attacking AI. It was a reg Korean warrior who had something of an upset victory against a bowman on a hill.

It was a good thing I had barracks to build vet warriors to start with, because my stats against the Greeks were incredibly good. But I built the barracks a bit too early, since I really didn't know what to build before harbours were available. A larger stack of workers could have been an option.

I spent far too long dealing with Greece.

India and France were mostly easily dealt with - except for the one French city that flipped back to them (the one with all the Dyes, and my main connecting town along the north of the continent). I did meet a single Musketeer.

America were a little tougher to winkle out, Korea just had terrible, terrible land to hack through, but once I got to Spain's wide open spaces, my Knights finished the job easily.

If the Iroquois hadn't built the Great Lighthouse, I would never have met them.

Domination in 12 or 13 something.

I could've finished the game much earlier than my domination victory at 1570, but I had a hell of a time against a weird bug. I had finished taken over all the French cities, and yet somehow the AI still think France existed. I had to hell of a time keeping the French people happy and even had a city switch back to France even tho there are no France left!!!

Oddly enough, I declared on everyone on my continent, but the Indian was the one to declared on me.

Anyway, here's my map at the beginning of the Industrial Age.

I could've finished the game much earlier than my domination victory at 1570, but I had a hell of a time against a weird bug. I had finished taken over all the French cities, and yet somehow the AI still think France existed. I had to hell of a time keeping the French people happy and even had a city switch back to France even tho there are no France left!!!

Click to expand...

berserks01, it sounds like France had boat people somewhere out there.

I expect most participants will opt for early Middle Age domination/conquest victories, so I'm probably going to be one of the few who even reach the Industral Age, let alone the Modern.

I didn't take careful notes while I played, so this writeup was mostly reconstructed from analyzing my old saves with CivAssist.

Here's my Ancient Age post. As the Ancient Age ends in my game, I was bringing to an end a Pyrrhic victory over Greece at the dawn of the Middle Ages. I missed out on all the ancient Wonders except the Colossus, but the Athenians had left me the Great Library when Babylonian bowmen and swordsmen came marching in.

The world was so densely settled by this time that I never saw any barbarians past the Ancient Age, not even the random marauding galleys that prowl the coasts around cities.

New York, a city that was very poorly placed by the Americans and flipped to the Greeks, was razed in 470 AD, leaving the Greeks one tundra-bound retreat in Pharsalos. Uruk was refounded on the ruins of New York in 540 AD. In 570 AD Pharsalos is taken. Exit Greece, stage left. Alexander's head is put on display on the end of a newfangled defensive weapon the soldiers called a "pike".

Babylon has won her first war and gained the living space she has so desperately longed for, but the war has left the nation stunted. Our Golden Age was squandered in despotism, and all the AIs went to Republics early. Babylon couldn't follow suit until Greece was destroyed as the war weariness would have been crippling without infrastructure. But while we've been building swordsmen and spearmen to smash against Greek hoplites, the AIs have been building cities, culture, farms, roads, and wonders. Babylon's new lands are large in area, but lacking in all of those things. The Middle Ages are a battle for commerce, culture, and production. We have a lot of work to do to catch up.

After the war ends, Babylon undergoes a revolt and emerges a Republic. It's shaky going at first without military support for happiness, but some of the unhappy citizens were rounded up into worker bands and sent to till the fields for a thousand years, and when cathedrals and marketplaces go up soon after, the unrest subsides.

I squeezed in a few more cities as the culture boundaries of France and India started to clash with mine. Eridu is founded in 670 AD on the far tip of the north peninsula. Samarra is founded in 830 in a culture gap near Pharsalos; Lagash is founded in 870 north-northeast of Athens and west of Cornith to plug another culture gap. By 930 AD the entire continent had been carved up by the six civilizations on it.

The Forbidden Palace had been commissioned in Athens in 610 AD, just after the Greek War, but was not completed until 870 AD, thanks to not getting a leader because my units died too fast to get many elite victories. The mainland empire immediately surges in productivity when it is at last complete.

In 1070, Babylon builds Sun Tzu's in the capital to keep anyone else from getting it. , I know.

Washington finishes Leonardo's in 1150, setting off a instant wonder cascade. France gets Copernicus's Observatory in Paris and Babylon unveils the Sistine Chapel in Sparta. I'm about 3/5 of the way of the way through the MA tech tree at this point, having just finished Chemistry and aiming for Military Tradition.

Caravels sent out to explore the seas finally find the lost-lost Iroquois around the year 1170, on an isolated island continent far to the northwest of our homeland. The Iroquois had built the Oracle so I knew they were out there. They were a backward people, as expected after over 5000 years of isolation. But they control all the wine and gems in the world. Literally.

There are several tiles with wines on the Iroquois homeland, and a single source of gems on a mountain on their lands. They would generously trade their wines (at first) but would not part with these gems for any price. With the fact that there are no silks anywhere in the whole wide world, this means no other civilization could secure more than six luxuries for their people.

Maybe it was a blunder to let slip any contacts with the Iroquois to the outside world. Should have kept him isolated to keep him stupid as long as possible, but another AI would have found him eventually, and then they'd have the contact to barter with. Contact was passed around in short order, and soon Hiawatha was wheeling and dealing with the whole world. I surmise he put his wine monopoly to good use and traded it for techs, as he soon started catching up in the tech race surprisingly fast.

Knowledge of the world beyond the main continent spread fast as a result. France put a fishing village on a half-hill-half-mountain island with iron north of Eridu, and further north of that lay the last bit of unclaimed dirt on the planet, a half-frozen little island far removed from everyone else. Any city put up there would be corrupt to the point of uselessness, so Babylon didn't bother to stake a claim. But the AI is wont to settle every last square inch of land, even if it means sending a settler halfway around the world to put a fishing village in a inhospitable wasteland at the ends of the earth, and so the AIs would all set out to colonize this final frontier as soon as they could reach it.

In 1355 France completes Magellan's Voyage and starts their Golden Age.

In 1380 the city of Babylon builds Newton's. This was the first wonder we'd completed before the AIs even got to start on it, as we're finally pulling ahead a bit in tech.

I reach the Industrial Age in 1395 AD, getting Nationalism as my free tech. France, India, and America all got there at practically the same time I did. Spain is 3 techs from the IA, Korea and the Iroquois have over half the Middle Age tech tree unfinished.

Minimap at the end of the Middle Ages. It's not quite entirely uncovered, but there's no more land left to reveal at this point.


The Middle Age passed fairly uneventfully, but the Industrial Age will be plenty explosive enough. I'd built up over a dozen cavalry, ten spare riflemen (in addition to the 40 or so on city garrisons), and ten cannons, and I'm planning to invade France next. I had just gained a very narrow tech lead at this point, after trailing France for much of the game. The big three AIs are only one or two techs behind; Korea and the Iroquois are still backward. I need to move fast before the other civs get riflemen, or it's going to take artillery to crack AI cities open.

Read the epic conclusion!

forget when i entered MA. Korea has such a bad land and i really take pity on them.

the war against India went so well. the first two cities i conquered were both defended by a single spearman.. i didn't lose a single unit in defeating them. Delphi is the third city that was captured and it has 2 spearmen!

420AD, entered the golden age. was making 10gpt, and now making 41gpt with 23 cities and forbidden city already finished. the next largest nation is france, my good allies in the past two wars and saddly the target of my next war once i got knights.
monotheism due in 1 turn. after adjusting the science slide, making 118 gpt with 30% science.

500AD, finally a Greek city revolt to me. i've intentionally planted two cities next to it

540AD, declare war on France, allied india, spain and korea against it. to my surprise, Korea even gave me its world map to go to war against france. giving spain republic.

560AD, conquered Paris, losing 1 knight after killing about 5 spearmen. starting to pump out settler from Babylon so that i can palace jump to Paris... though this means that I would lose the Collossus.
French cities fell in front of my knights just too readily. twice my army composed of 20knights turned out to be overkill after i found out that the cities were guarded by 1 or 2 spearmen...

730AD, finally saw the map with Iraquois. but spain is charging a lot for the contact. at war against Korea, India and America. all of them had less than 4 cities left (they never had more than 6 anyway.)

790AD, get contact with Iraquois. they're very backward. their land is definitely better than our starting land.

820AD, Korea no more
870AD, get the 1st leader

890 AD, conquered the entire continent. waiting for the culture to grow.

Meant to post this here:

Middle ages for me mostly consisted of trading to keep up in tech, a short Indian war to grab Iron, and the beginning of some settler cramming to keep Greece from getting Domination. I built the Hanging Gardens(see note 1) and Sistine's and this may just be enough:



Since I'm going for low score, the rest of my game will be attempting to keep the other Civs from winning.

Note on Hanging Gardens: After everyone on the continent had Republic, they all started going after Middle Age techs, apparently. Iroquois were the only ones to actually research Monarchy, which didn't even get traded around until much later.

Map on turn before reaching Industrial Age:

1.29 Open - AA spoiler is here.

Babylon enters the Middle Ages 30BC completing The Great Wall. Next a cathedral is hurried, and then aqueduct and colosseum(210AD) are build.



The Greeks are very strong and start Sun Tzu's 30AD while Babylon works on its infrastructure. 330AD GLib gives us monarchy and since Sun Tzu's is the only current Wonder build, we start Hanging Gardens and finish it 570AD. A well-timed chop starts a market which is hurried same turn.

Theology and chivalry come 640AD and since Sun Tzu's is under construction in small town, we feel safe to start Sistine - and we finish it 1000AD - the turn after Washington completes Sun Tzu's. In the cascade the AIs build Leo's, Copernicus', and Magellan's. We work on Bach's, but since the race is tight (especially Washington) we research towards economics to have Smith's available.

In 1305 the AIs are working on Shakespeare's and we decide to make some trades:
- America gives democracy for economics, 10gpt, 500g
- France gives free artistry, 2g, tm for 27gpt
- sell FA to America for 380g, wm
Babylon switches to Shakespeare's wasting 110 shields, and builds the 8cpt Wonder sacrificing our 6cpt Bach's build. And rightfully so, because 2 turns later Sparta completes Bach's and Washington cascades to Smith's completing it 1365AD and voiding all other builds.

But already in 1380AD/1390AD France/Greece start Newton's and the race is on again. We are still backward and have to wait till 1305 for our gpt deals to expire before we start a fast and furious trading frenzy (Greece and France are already Industrial Times):
- Spain gives chemistry for 662g, wm
- India gives 34g, wm for education
- America gives physics for 39gpt, 110g
- Spain gives 684g, furs, wm for physics
- France gives magnetism for 14gpt, 691g
- America gives TOG for magnetism, 2g
switch Babylon to Newton's due in 22, maybe 21
- Spain gives metallurgy, wm for magnetism
we enter Industrial Times and learn nationalism - both Greece and France have it
- Iroquois give horses, wines, navigation, wm for chemistry
- America gives 149g, 30gpt, wm for nationalism

As the included map shows, Greece has gobbled up India; Ghandi is confined to a 1-tile-island. Surprisingly, France is the leading cultural nation contrasting this to the Greek power-civ.



There were a number of minor extortions and Babylon always complied - even to pathetic Koreans; no need to risk a war with our army of 2 warriors and a musket. The projected 20k date is in the 19th century and I seriously doubt that Babylon can build any further Wonders - except hopefully Newton's.

Link to my AA spoiler

I enter the Middle Ages in 320AD having successfully kept the tech pace slow and I am building a new core around Delphi. By 370AD I’m up to 6 horses and 14 fully healed bowmen. America and Korea are in the Middle Ages with me so it’s time to start the fighting again. I’ve been positioning troops to go after Greece and India, can’t let India get to Chivalry.

There is no earthshaking strategy for the rest of the game. It’s a simple matter of kill everything I see. I fanned out with 2 forces and cleaned up the east and west sides then turned my attention north. The western force took out the Greeks and finished off the French. While I was working on India with the eastern force I was sneak attacked by Spain who captured the former French dye city. I quickly signed America and Korea into MA against Spain, so now everyone on the mainland was at war. The much smaller eastern force took out India and then both groups met in the former America section. I then targerted Korea and Spain.

I learned Chivalry in 560AD and turned off science and upgraded all my horses to knights. In 580AD I generate my 2nd great leader and use it to rush Sun Tzu. In 700AD I generate my 3rd leader and use it to rush the Forbidden Palace in Seville.

I was able to capture the Great Lighthouse from India. As the war on the mainland was winding down I sent a galley full of knights across to find the Iroquois. I had a rough idea of where they were because I had a semi-successful suicide galley earlier in the game. This galley did not make contact but survived 1 turn on an ocean tile to find another patch of sea tiles. Once I had the Lighthouse I sent my first galley across that opening and found the Iroquois. They were still in the Ancient Age, although they had built the Great Wall. So after capturing a beachhead city I went straight for their capital and the Wall. I generate 2 more great leaders and form 2 knight armies.

I win by conquest in 850AD in just under 8 hours.



After seeing some of the other maps I feel lucky that the AI’s stayed on the mainland. I actively traded world maps throughout the game and even demanded them in a few of the false peace deals. I acquire 2 small islands, that were settled, through peace deals. I think my early warfare and some early MA's helped to keep everyone on the mainland. By freeing up space as I battled Greece and France it gave the other AIs places to settle on the mainland.

Hmm, not sure I should be posting in here as I didn't get to the Industrial Age I had 4 turns left on TOG before winning in 1335AD.

To try it, I never researched Chivalry but instead destroyed the French, Greek, Indian, Americans, Korans and Spanish using MI instead. The initial reason for this is knights cost a lot more than MI to build for the same attack, so I built built MI exclusively in the early stages of my conquest of the mainland and the AI's were so week that I didn't need to build anything else.

Bizzarley the Iriquios found me, not the other way round, just as I was building ships to find them, but they did get the Lighthouse which allowed them to explore and expand further than I would have expected.

I could have won alot quicker, but at this level it was just a bit of fun and I was never under any kind of threat.

PTW Open, going for 20K.

AA spoiler

After pretty smooth Ancient Age I let the game slip (playing till 6am often does it) and did some stupid things in MA, wasting a lot of time wiping out AIs and missing on important Wonders.

Enter MA in 210AD, get Feudalism, trade for Monotheism an finish Cathedral the same turn from a harbour prebuild.

Next build: Aquaduct, and then Colosseum which completes only in 390AD - I don't remember why it took so long and why I didn't have cash to rush it sooner. Probably AI were broke (they often were during this game) and I was busy upgrading warriors to MDIs.
Babylon is maxed at 19 shields at 10 pop (could have made it 12 pop just for commerce but didn't occur to me).

510AD - settle Ellipi close to Ivory, Nineveh completes Harbour.
650AD - Sparta flips to us!
750AD - Akkad founded stealing Furs from France.
830AD - Build Sistine. Iroquese contacts us.

840AD - Sparta flipped back! that does it, I'm declaring on Greece. I finally upgraded about 10MDIs and 6 longbowmen, so it's time.
850AD - got Sparta back
860AD - took Knossos with Ivory.
900Ad - took Corynth which also has Ivory.
910AD - get Education (gee, who would think GLib would keep going that long). See that my Wonder prebuild overruns University just by 1 turn, so build University.
930AD - trade Education around, get Insense from India but Hoplite pillages Furs.
970AD - Research PP, trade to France for GunPowder.
1060AD - Took Delphi with Horses. Have Iron, GP, Horses and 2 Lux - nice.
1140AD - took Athens.
1200AD - Greece is off the continent, banished to 1-tile island south of us. We got a GL when conquering their last city! Rushed FP in Athens to hurry infrastructure. In hindsight - bad move. Should have rushed some wonder, Bach for example (Bach would come to haunt me later). Athens could have build FP in maybe 25-30 turns with a courthouse.
1275AD - Built Copernicus.

1340AD - deside to dow India. Her cities form such a nice 5RCP-ring around Athens. Also see some elephants running around which is unnerving.

1380AD - Built Shakespear. Start Newton. Check reveals the closest Civ will complete Newton in 40-something turns against mine 22.

1440AD - Build/upgrade some Cavalry. America is in IA, but no techs yet, and no Mil. Trad.

Wonder cascade by France building Bach (here it comes!) caused America to flip Newton to Washington where it's due in 6 turns against mine 11! Need to take Washington ASAP.

Make peace with with India for 1-tile island city (which I'll save for Korea), they have 2 cities left and are harmless now.

Buy Magnetism from Abby for 40gpt meaning to dow this turn. Enter IA.
Get Medicine.
Gift Greece and Korea, both get Nat. That's really bad: it's useless for me but they can trade it to Abby now. And they are not trading it to me.
Gift them Economics and M.T. as well to take away Abby's trading chips.

Terrible RNG luck attacking New York. 4 Cavs die taking out 2 Reg.Pikes, another 3 redline the 3rd Pike and still don't take the city.

IA started pretty bad, and more bad luck will follow in the next spoiler.

MA Culture:
Colosseum: 390AD
Sistine: 830AD
University: 910AD
Copernicus: 1270AD
Shakespear: 1380AD.

In 1440AD Babylon has 8168 culture at 70cpt. Estimated 20K date is in 20th century.

Attached: minimap at entering IA, Babylon.

Middle Ages


The Bungled Greek War (50-550AD)
After a slow but mostly typical ancient age, I quickly declared war on Greece. Since I got feudalism as my free tech I had the advantage of building MDI against their hoplites. In 130 AD I started my golden age and took the Greek city of Sparta. While this was a despotic golden age, I figured that I needed more production now more than ever, since I still had only 10 fairly small cities. My goal was to take Athens and jump my palace there to gain a better core and suppress culture flips. Sadly, the war dragged on much longer than planned, partly because of those @&%#! hoplites, and partly because of stupid tactical mistakes on my part. If Greece had simply invested in a bunch of horsemen, they could have held me off indefinitely. In 490 AD I finally took Athens and built the palace there with a GL. The war extended to 550 as I snatched a couple more vulnerable towns and then made peace in exchange for monotheism (I think) and a small 1-tile island city that would be hell to capture by force. Having made peace, I revolted to republic at last.

Rebuilding (550-1020AD)
The period after the Greek war was a time of recession. Jumping the palace meant that I got heavy corruption in my old core, and I did not yet have enough good cities near Athens to be productive. Add this to the Republic recession and you get an idea of what I was dealing with. During this time I fought a short war against France, snatching three border cities for myself and getting more room around my new core. I then proceeded to roll over the tiny Indian nation, gaining a few cities of doubtful value (due to corruption), then finally took the two remaining Greek cities to complete my domination of the core area. I also succeeded in revitalizing my economy by founding more core cities and building the FP near Athens. The final defeat of the Greeks roughly coincided with the discovery of military tradition…

Dominance, but not Domination (1020AD-?)
With MT in hand and enough productive capacity to field a large army of cavalry, I was in a position to start a domination win. However, after my dismal performance in the first war with Greece, I had been set back too far to turn in anything but a mediocre late domination game. So instead I remembered the consensus about warlord games being bad for spaceship wins and decided to challenge this consensus. Looking around at my neighbors, I decided that America and the Iroquois were rich and advanced enough to be reasonable trading partners. France, on the other hand was not, so they were targeted for elimination, mostly for scoring purposes and to grab the pyramids. My cavalry quickly took Paris (and the Pyramids and Sun Tzu). It quickly flipped and I took it again but succeeded in triggering the French golden age, which propped France up for a little longer. In 1220, the final French core city was razed, leaving an amusing little settlement on the other side of Spanish territory which I let them keep, as it was too far away to trigger flips. Once the war was over, I revolted to democracy and disbanded all my units except ~10-15 cavalry to act as a deterrent just in case America decided to pursue a policy of regime change in Babylon. I don’t remember exactly when the IA began, but it was fairly soon after the end of the war.

Wonders
There are few middle age wonders that could actually realistically help me win the game sooner. The four early MA wonders are only really useful for war-heavy games . Even the so-called ‘peaceful’ wonders (Bach and Michelangelo) don’t help much since luxuries and markets are all you need during peacetime to keep your cities out of disorder. The French war provided Babylon with the Pyramids, which were somewhat useful in squeezing extra population into my core sooner, but they came too late to get the full benefit. I did manage to get Copernicus in Sparta, with plans to get Newton and SETI there too eventually. I also built the Sistine Chapel with a leader purely for milking purposes. While markets are enough to keep cities out of disorder, a size 12 city with a market and a half-priced, double-effect cathedral could easily have all happy citizens, which is a clear plus to scoring.

Retrospection
In retrospect, I should have leader-rushed the FP in Athens and prayed that it wouldn’t flip. Even razing and replacing would have been a better idea than what happened. As it was, I hampered my early growth and denied myself the possibility of two true cores. It may have even been a better idea to go for France and flip my palace to Paris, thus gaining the pyramids when they were still useful and not having to face hoplites. My other mistake was forgetting about the religious trait. A period of monarchy would have done wonders for the Greek war. As it was, I never got Monarchy until late, and suffered through a bad republic recession. On the other hand, my performance after 550 was a pretty good balance of conquest and economy. At the dawn of the industrial age, I was receiving enough gpt from American and the Iroquois to go 90% science and ~6-8 turn techs.

Warlord Spaceships?
So are spaceships on Warlord a good idea? Well obviously not, since you can win any warlord game with cavalry at the latest and the IA-MA will be pretty uneventful milking. But looking purely in terms of score and finish date, warlord doesn’t seem as awful as some people would suggest. With the tech costs low, there’s no reason you can’t self-research at a blistering pace once your economy is up and running. The main drawback is really during the ancient-middle ages while the AI struggles to expand and build something resembling an economy. Once the economy is in place, though, slow AI research ceases to matter, as the AIs become a source of free gpt from tech sales. As long as you get to 4-turn research, the AI doesn’t need to research anything.

Class: Open. Goal: Domination. Spoiler 2: 340AD-1080AD

I eliminated everyone from the major continent in 910AD and I started to panic.
Because I thought that there might be a trick that this continent is less than 66% of all land. I did not have contact with Iroquois and I did not know what the map is.

I started to research on maximum and started to send suicidal galleys. Fortunately Iroquois came in
960AD, gave me their map and I estimated that we have enough land. After that I stopped research and rushed temples and settlers.

Achieved domination in 1080AD. If I knew the map earlier I would be able to save a few turns.

MA started with 6 cities, 4 on starting island, fairly developed and attempting to become world commerce centre. 2 cities on mainland concentrating on military output, along with Babylon which is working all the best land available to it. 1 Ivory. No resources. I was too slow to the mainland thanks to building harbours then galleys, instead of just galleys.

Already have contact with all 7 AI: Took Galley to far side of continent, which looked most likely place to attempt suicide, by the time it gets there I have GLight in Babylon. Move 2 tiles, see sea on other side. Next turn I have contact with Iroqouis. Didn't even risk the Galley thanks to GL! Have contact monopoly for a good 1000 years IIRC, although I get precious little from it.

With no resources, war, especially against the Greek Hoplites, looks like being painful so I decide to prepare well. About 400AD I send a stack of a dozen Catapults, 8 Bows and a couple of longbows to Sparta, which is still a town and falls in 1 turn for the cost of a single Longbow, now I have Iron and start upgrading the warriors on my island and shipping them over, replacing with Pikes. By now I have researched Gunpowder - on a beeline for Mil Trad - and can see Saltpeter between Sparta and Athens, so Athens must be next. The Greeks respond with a couple of MDI, which I redline and kill with bowmen to start GA (republic). Time to upgrade Bows to Longbows...

My stack moves over to Athens and bombards it for several turns (it's size 12 with 4 Hoplites!) new Cats are arriving every 2 turns, but I eventually decide to sacrifice some longbows to get things moving and attack, losing only 3 out of about a dozen.

The Greeks give monotheism for peace. Stack heads off to Knossos where there are horses, declare war, Knossos and neighbouring Pharsalos put up little resistance, the Greeks are now left with Mycenae (on Tundra) and Thermopylae/Corinth. I decide to take Mycenae with some spare MDI as it is small and badly defended. Then it is time to go after someone else:

Hmm the French have one City sitting next to Spices, Another next to Furs. Amiens is surrounded by Dyes, Paris looks like an ideal FP location.

Spices and Furs are mine in short order, I have now upgraded about 25 Cats to Cannon, Paris falls fairly easily and gains me 4 Wonders, they have been busy, date is roughly 6-800AD. Decide to stop for a breather. Garrison Stack in Paris and start worker shrinkdown.

Oh ****. Paris flips, costing me over 40 units.*sigh* I only had control for about 4 turns, what were the odds I ask myself? As with many other peoples' games the French have been something of a Culture powerhouse, but they are still impressed with me.

The MA is drawing to a close by the time I have a new stack. I test my new Cannon/Cavalry combo out on the remaining Greek Cities. Then shift my attention back to the French. Unfortunately Cavalry are becoming obsolete by the introduction of Riflemen and I decide to make Peace and wait for a new technological edge...

Damn that Culture Flip

The Medival Age started quite uneventfully in 110 AD. I built up my 9 cities and made some 9 Knights, upgraded them to Cavalry in 920 AD and started rolling up my new continent. I entered IA in 1265 AD. By then I had thrown everyone except Spain from the pangea, and they won´t have to wait very long, too. My mighty army had raised to 16 Cavalries at this point. They were just riding through the lands and cities of my enemies like a hot knife through butter.

Seeing that India has the 1-tile island city, it´s impossible to win by conquest, and I guess I´m pretty late for domination. So I guess I´ll go for 100k. Never did that before, but the plan is: eliminate Spain, ICS the lands and rush culture. I only hope Spain will provide me with a MGL, as I haven´t built FP yet, nor moved my palace.
I enjoyed a decent tech-lead over the time, but as I´m going 100k, that does not really help a lot.

brennan said:

Damn that Culture Flip

Click to expand...

the amount of cultural flips suprised me in this game. Just watch my minimap after 800AD.

Am I the only one getting very rapidly fed up by the CivAssist II created animations in the posts? IMHO 2-3 well-chosen maps are at least as good or better than these constantly changing nuisances.

Let me conclude by giving one of my favorite quotes:

But, why, oh why is it that when people are short of ideas,
they animate them? Blinking text, blinking banner ads, blinking
logos come at you from all corners of the screen. It really
makes you appreciate the lack of animation in newspapers.

Joe Gillespie

What an odd complaint. Animated maps contain far more information than a simple screenshot in less space. Think of them as a number of pictures stacked on top of one another and shown in order. They add another dimension to a display, change wrt time.

BTW I forgot to mention my biggest complaint: End of MA 9 cities captured, how many leaders? None. I think I had 3 Elite Cavalry, that was the sum total of promotions I had at this point, grr.

Twonky you are not far short of Domination and late to start looking for cultural. I got that island as peace terms from India before I finished squishing them...

Damn that flip again...

90bc-550AD

In 30BC I triggered GA with a bowman. After that steady flow of Knights steamrolled over AI. I hadn't own iron source but I traded iron from Greeks. I haven't used ROP rape against more than 1-2 opponents. In this gotm I signed ROP with every nation in 250AD except with the Iroquois. Actually I never met the Iroquois. At last I fully understand how powerful ROP rape is.

310AD:


Just like solen I feared that "pangaea" is less than 66%. But in the end culture expanded in coastal tiles that triggered domination victory in 550AD.

550AD:

brennan said:

What an odd complaint. Animated maps contain far more information than a simple screenshot in less space. Think of them as a number of pictures stacked on top of one another and shown in order. They add another dimension to a display, change wrt time.

Click to expand...

I think it's not a matter of them being informative or not. In my experience it's when reading posts and there is a animation on the screen, I'm constantly distracted by the animation. So I understand tao's concern and wouldn't be happy when many posts were getting animations.