GOTM 46 second spoiler - Entering the industrial age

GOTM 46 Second Spoiler

To qualify for this spoiler, you must have the full world-map, all contacts and be able to research an industrial-age tech.

How did you time your golden age? Did you manage to secure your home continent? What about the other continent(s)? Who were the most powerful civs, and how did you work to compete and beat them?

PTW Open. Goal - Domination.
AA spoiler

I entered MA in a decent 270BC, getting Mono from Persians and starting a 2nd war against Spain (allying Egypt as didn't want a 2nd stab in the back from them).

But after that my pace slowed to a crawl, because I was always at war, I guess, and other nations weren't any help at all.

I researched Feudalism hoping to get it before Egypt, upgrade to MDI and wipe them out. I don't remember why but I didn't get Feudalism until about 400AD, and Egypt beat me to it by a few turns.

Main events, in short:

Spain destroyed in 170AD (but Egypt took 2 of their cities as well). While attacking Madrid in 70BC got my 1st GL but there's nothing to do with him - no FP location yet, and no good Wonder.

400AD - learn Feudalism and realize that Egypt has Feudalism too. Egypt also has GLH in Elephantine which I want much, but they have no contacts with the outside world yet.
Use GL to build Sun Tsu - that proved very useful.

420AD - prepare dow Egypt with MDI. I prepare a ROP rape, hoping to destroy them until they get to know anybody. I drop some forces on Egypt's only Iron, hoping they didn't upgrade to many Pikemen yet.

430AD-970AD: Incredibly hard Egyptian war. learned Chivalry in about 520AD and joined MDI with Knights but resistance was fierce - 5-6 pikemen in every city, and every city is bigger than 6.

I got another GL and used it to build FP in Thebes in 970AD, after Egypt was banished from the continent, but they built a pretty big 2nd core on the southern islands.

But as I now own GLH in Elephantine, their peace won't last for long. I also realize that Egypt has contacts with outside world now, so my rep is shot. But I don't care.

1020AD - Reach Southern islands and dow Egypt. They have only Spearmen there so it's a walk in a park.
Around this time: Persia dows us and I ally Iroquese against it.
Halelluia! I can reach Persia via South islands with galleys & GLH. So that's how Egypt met them.

1070AD - Egypt gone (refusing to talk up till their demise, and they had some useful knowledge like Invention). They obliged us by tightly colonizing the islands and growing all towns past size 1, so we have a big jump in pop/territory.

1200AD - Our galleys with Knights reach Persia and take 3 cities. A GL is born on the other continent - how convenient. Make Knight's Army.

After that it was a matter of building knights and galleys (in 2 cores with free barracks) and getting everyone overseas. We reduced Persia to 2 cities and then our ally Iroquese stabbed us in the back, so we almost destroyed them as well, we even saw some muskets while doing so.

But the end was fast.
1345AD - domination after 10 hours of play.
Jason: 8545
Fir: 4825.

The whole world never got past Astronomy and Gunpowder - amazing, considering it was on Emperor.

Minimap of our win:

The Middle Ages on both continents were similar. I was fighting a series of wars, in Monarchy, to exterminate the Egyptians and Spanish. Meanwhile the Persians were doing the same to the Iroquois and Zulu. We both finished our respective jobs at about the same time. The Persians, meanwhile, had built the Great Lighthouse, and had colonised the large incense island. Incidentally - there were only 6 luxuries on this map! No gems or silks, that I could see, anywhere.

The most interesting point about the Middle Ages was the usefulness of the Great Library to me. I'd rushed it with an MGL, and expected to get the usual string of techs up to about Gunpowder and Education. Spain, though, went for Chemistry right after Gunpowder... then Metallurgy... then Military Tradition! Persia on the other hand were more traditional, and I ended up getting both MT and Chivalry from the GL on the same turn - clear Spain and Persia had swapped!

Once I was rid of Egypt and Spain - all of their cities were on hills, and a source of Saltpeter "defected" to them, so it took a loooong time even with Cavalry, I switched to Republic, and started flat-out research. I still didn't reach the Industrial Age until the 14th century.

Medieval Age, 280AD-1060AD

I decided to wait until I wanted to launch my GA, that's a luxury of having an early UU. However, EsatP, Capt Buttkick, and probably others got much better results than me using the early Jaguar rush.

340AD Egypt declares war on me. They suicide so many units at Tlaxcala that my military becomes average vs. them instead of weak. I even got a MGL.


430AD I accept peace from Egypt and get Feudalism from them.
520AD Chivalry discovered.
590AD war with Egypt again. Rop rape for 3 cities.
600AD GA starts with Jaguar warrior killing a horseman.
710AD Egypt eliminated.

My plan was for domination to take over the weakest civ on the other continent. The Iroquois were defeated by Persia long ago, and Persia was very powerful. I used Rop rape vs. the Zulus to secure one city to upgrade my knights to cavalry then killed them fast. Immediately afterword, Persia started prancing through my land with their Immortal army and other units. I just needed a few more tiles for domination, so I took 2 cities from them and that was it. domination in 1060AD.

1.29 Open

First post is here. Ancient Age 4000BC - 30BC

The last Spanish city on the continent conquered, I decided to invest in infrastructure before making war on Egypt. I assumed the other AIs to be "distant" and thus I wanted to strengthen my research power. I started the Middle Ages by not researching any MA tech, but literature first.

Despite owning the (formerly Spanish) Great Lighthouse, I lost about 4-5 suicide galleys in my attempt to explore the world. Finally contact was established in 110AD. Persia had (its free tech) monotheism, everybody else was still in the Ancient Age.

In 380AD I felt ready to attack Egypt; my army consisted of 15 Persian mercenaries, 10 catapults, some pikes and horsemen. Thebes fell 400AD. A Great Leader was created and it built me Sun Tzu's. Afterwards I slowly but steadily took one after the other of the Egyptian cities, until finally in 540AD Egypt was assimilated.

I switched back to all infrastructure and researched up to navigation in order to connect the overseas luxuries and get decent naval support for my invasion.

The Spanish settlement on the southwestern island was conquered in 750AD, war on the Iroquois started same turn with a massive knight D-day against their spears. The biggest "problem" was roading thru the jungle with the captured slaves. By 840AD I had learned military tradition and started upgrading my knights to cavalry. Production was now on all cavalry (plus some caravels). I stopped researching and used all money to rush units. In the end I had 58 cavalries and 14 caravels. The AIs never even learned gunpowder.
- Iroquois were gone 880AD
- Zulus were gone 990AD
- last Persian city conquered 1030AD
- last Persian settler killed 1040AD
- conquest announced 1050AD

Firaxis 6363, Jason 10172

My first gotm-war-game and I quite liked it. And it was much faster than histographic gotm45.

You guys are pretty amazing. I was going for a military victory, but I guess I just bumbled my way through the game and ended up with a Histographic victory.

Here is my map in 70AD. I still hadn't found the other continent. I had only made 2 suicide galleys and neither found the Persians, Iroquois or Zulus. I still hadn't started mounting an attack against either the Spanish or Egyptians. The Spanish had already found the southwest islands, but I didn't know that either. And I still haven't reached the Middle Ages at this point.



Now it is 1260 AD. It took me that long to finish off the Egyptians. It is obvious that I do not know how to wage an effective war campaign. Things kept going back and forth with sometimes Egypt taking a city and sometimes me taking a city. Spain for most of the time was also attacking me from the east so I was waging a 2 war front. I had not time to build marketplaces, libraries, or research. Everything was pretty much war all the time.

The Spanish have made good headway on the southwest island. Of course, Persia is not a superpower yet, so if I could have made it to their island now, maybe I would have been able to do something, but at this point I still had not discovered them



In 1605 AD, I finally managed to finish off the Spanish and secure the southwest islands, but it is too late for an easy victory because Persia has Military Tradition and I don't at this stage. You can also see that Persia is becoming huge(I had met them at this point), and I still didn't have a good way to get over there. I had hoped that Zulu would hold their own so that neither would become too strong, but it didn't happen.

I started building lots of Galleys in the hopes of transferring a bunch of cannons, Musketmen, a settler and Cavalry to the northern edge of Persia's continent in the hopes of making that an attack point.



In 1820 AD, I got my first settler to the other continent along with about 30 units. Persia already had Riflemen and I did not. They easily wiped me off their continent.



In 1983AD, things were starting to look good. I had just finished cleaning up the northern tip of the continent, but then they launched a massive counterattack with a bunch of infantry and I ran out of offensive power and punch and had to make peace with them. They had a bunch of IronClad and kept destroying my Galleys. I tried to destroy their ironclad, but no matter how many I had they seemed to have more, and I wasted a bunch of time building ironclads instead of Cavalry and Infantry. I also had a bunch of artillery, but it's hard to drag artillery around behind you when you are in another country's culture.



Stupidly, I let them get behind me again and had to redestroy the northern tip of the continent so my final turn looked like this. I managed to destroy the last city to the southwest had a ton of units lined up for the last city, but I needed one more turn Guess it goes to show what happens when you waste a turn in the middle of the game.




This was my first GOTM so I had fun with it, but I saw lots of room for improvement and seeing how others played is definitely a learning experience. I'll have to go back to the War Academy and see if I can pick up some hints for next months game.

I think my final Jason score was only 3000 or something like that.

First spoiler:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=3017377&postcount=13

What was very decisive for a good win was capturing the Great Lighthouse!
After I had wiped off Egypt and then Spain in the early Middle Ages, I could settle the SW island undisturbed.
And on the other continent there were 3 Persian towns on the eastern part which never build any culture, so I could fit 2 cities in between. Luckily the 3 civs were almost equally strong.
I shipped with galley chaining a bunch of Knights over there and then took those 3 perisan towns when the Zulu attacked me. But that was no problem since they were also at war with Persia.
I then attacked Iros and allied with Persia against them.
After I had taken their last city, I got a 1030 AD domination victory.
I never even had build the FP which wuld have given me another boost.
And I think Gunpowder was the last tech I had gotten.
Jason score slightly over 10k which is the first time I had beaten that frontier!
And if I didn't have that disease early on which pushed down my capital to size 1 just before I had build my first Settler it would even have been higher...
But I don't complain since luck has compensated throughout that game!
Then I attacked the Iroquis

Please note that I have yet to beat an Emperor-level game.

70 BC: Decent start, choked off the Egyptians, decided to therefore take on Spain first.



300 AD: Only 2 Spanish cities captured, but meanwhile Zulu and Iroquois are combining to rout Persia right off the continent... and onto the SW island.



810 AD: I get a new lease on life by capturing the Great Library, Oracle and Colossus in 500 AD and defeating Spain shortly thereafter, but the Iroquois are looking quite strong, and also have a presence on the SW island next to pathetic Persia. Time to take on Egypt...



1260 AD: Egypt gets Musketmen just in time to slow my advance, and I fail to take Thebes by the slimmest of margins. While trying to regroup, Pi-Ramsees overthrows me and I choose to peace after recapturing it. By this point, all nations are 5-6 techs ahead.



1794 AD: Successive wars seem to gain me 2 cities at a time, as further cities are repeatedly overthrown. Memphis's capture gives me Smith's Trading, but Elephantine (along with Giza on the tiny island) hold out with mass quantities of infantry, on a hill, against my cavalry and cannon. Iroquois begins work on ToE, and Persia and Zulu are long since dead. I finally defeat the Egyptians somewhere in the 1840's, gaining Sistine.



2050 AD Too little, too late. I'm forced to beeline for tanks, then modern armor. My best efforts to catch up in tech are not enough, so spaceship is seemingly out of the question. I'm greeted by MI, MA and radio towers when I finally land 105 MA (including 2 armies) on the Iroquois mainland. I manage to capture and hold a city at the end, just to say I did it.



Time played: 22h 51m
Firaxis: 2000
Jason: 3310

First game we've seen that the Iroqs do well. They were eliminated be4 I started my push on the other continent as well.

Btw, Genghis: that sig of yours cracked me up like

Moderator Action: Folks, this is the second spoiler, not the final one.

Please try to keep your descriptions to the Middle Ages.

open, 20K

overall the goal is to get great leaders to rush wonders. they didn't fail me and almost always come when i could build some wonders. so except for the colossus, all the other wonders were rushed for my game... however the initial slow tech pace and failure to get a decent number of ancient wonders doomed my game.

690AD, got another GL, rushed forbidden city in thebes
+155
740AD, Egypt left the game... revolted again to republic making 177gpt
740 learned chivalry from great library
republic

790AD, declare war on Persia to slow down techpace
920AD, persia, though having the great light house, is not send enough army for me to kill ... establish embassy with Iraquois and found that they're at war. so i declare war on zulu.
3950 BC Palace
1625 BC Colossus
230 BC Great Library
210 BC Heroic Epic
540 AD Art of War
1050 AD Sistine Chapel
1265 AD Shakespeare's Theatre (Classic)
1285 AD Bach's Cathedral
1315 AD Copericus' Observatory
1420 AD Newton's University

1.27

Monty the Diplomat – Part 2 Link to Ancient Age Spoiler

The end of the Ancient Age and early Middle Ages revealed something I had never seen before in a game of civ. Egypt had triggered their GA earlier when they declared war on the Spanish, and they had obviously overbuilt units. I sat and watched a significant number of Egyptian units commit suicide on their long march back to their homeland. I presume they were losing buildings as well, as they had zero cash for a good 10-15 turns after their GA ended.

I needed to prune back the Egyptians to give me ample room for my core cities, but I decided to wait a while – their crippled economy was doing as much damage as my military could inflict in the short term.

Warfare
I had reduced Spain to one offshore town (on the big southern island) shortly before the end of the AA. They had plenty of food down there, so they had 2 towns before I sent some military units to deal with Isabella. I waited for my peace treaty with Spain to expire (still maintaining a clean reputation just in case Egypt lived to meet others) and declared war again in 290 AD. I captured both Spanish cities along with a couple of settlers and eliminated the Spanish in 330 AD.

Meanwhile, Egypt completed the Great Library in Thebes in 270 AD – perfect! Unfortunately, they completed the Great Wall in 390 AD in a city on the far west coast. Ultimately the GW didn’t really matter that much, as most of their towns were above size 6 anyway. I waited for Feudalism research to complete and produced several Medieval Infantry before attacking Egypt. Egypt was still managing decent research, as they learned Monarchy in 290 AD and Monotheism in 440 AD. I decided to attack before they got pikes.

I declared war on Egypt honorably in 480 AD. I recaptured Tlaxcala (“my” iron town) the next turn, and the Egyptians completed the Hanging Gardens for me in Elephantine the same turn. I took my time with the Egyptian campaign, as I was still fishing for that elusive first great leader. Egypt learned Feudalism in 540 AD, so I faced quite a few pikes. Another first for me in a civ game – I actually sent a few horses and pikes on a pillaging mission to their west coast to disconnect their horses and iron. That helped matters quite a bit.

Actually, this war dragged on forever as I was sending units on pillaging missions and whacking archers with MIs. Culture flips were a problem, so I burned a couple of non-essential Egyptian cities to the ground. I finally generated my first great leader on my 38th elite victory in 800 AD, and captured Thebes and the Great Library on the same turn.

The leader was sent to former Spain to rush my Forbidden Palace in Tlacopan. Meanwhile, Persia declared war on me in 830 AD when I refused them contact with Egypt. Nobody but me was even close to being able to cross the ocean safely, so this was a completely phony war. The war happiness from the Persian declaration did help mitigate the mounting war weariness I was suffering from the Egyptian campaign.

I finally had the last Egyptian city within range in 880 AD, and they had learned Education. I gave Egypt a phony peace for Education, then re-declared and eliminated Cleo the same turn. The civs on the other continent never met Egypt, so my reputation was clean.

The cold war with Persia ended in 920 AD – they gave Chivalry and I gave Education as part of the deal.

Tech:
My notes in 70 AD read something along the lines of “research is a pipe dream right now – shut off science.” I had to spend some time building up my core. I finally turned science back on in 260 AD, learned Feudalism in 380 AD, and shut off science again to upgrade swords to MIs.

A suicide galley finally managed to make contact with the other continent in 520 AD. I met Persia first, and was astounded that they didn’t know Literature yet. Traded Lit to Persia for TM, some gold and contact with the Iroquois. The Iroquois had been beaten back to one city by the Persians and were completely backward. I traded them 2 AA techs for their WM and contact with the Zulu. I then traded Lit to the Zulu for their WM and all 61 of their gold. The Persians and Zulu knew all 3 first-tier Middle Age techs, but I held off on further trades until I captured the Great Library from Egypt. I also held on to my WM, as it would have good trade value later on.

I realized at this point that there were only 6 luxuries on the map, which wasn’t good news for the builders. It turned out this only cost me score. After learning Magnetism and trading for additional luxuries, I could keep my size-12 cities happy at zero lux tax simply by building a temple and market (and capturing the Hanging Gardens didn’t hurt).

At the end of the 800 AD turn, the newly-captured Great Library taught me Monarchy, Monotheism, Engineering and Invention. I learned Theology from the library in 850 AD.

I learned Education from Egypt through the phony peace deal in 880 AD, then finally cranked up science again.

Things went more smoothly from that point:
Learned Astronomy in 920 AD
Learned Chemistry in 980 AD – Sold it to Zulu for 24 GPT in 1000 AD and gave it to Persia. I wanted to encourage them to study Metallurgy for me.
Learned Physics in 1040 AD – Traded it to Persia in 1080 AD for Banking and some gold, and sold it to Zulu for 17 GPT.
Learned Theory of Gravity in 1090 AD – I also completed Copernicus’ Observatory in Tenochtitlan that turn and started building Newton’s University there.
Learned Magnetism in 1140 AD - Traded 4 luxuries each to Persia and Zulu for one luxury from each.
Purchased the last turn of Metallurgy from Shaka when he learned it in 1180 AD and entered the Industrial Age.

Yep – this is a fairly lousy date to enter the IA in an Emperor game. I’m looking forward to seeing how much earlier Redbad managed to enter the IA.

I guess a pic would be nice, so I’m attaching one from 1150 AD. The careful observer will note that I have 7 towns at RCP4 around Tenochtitlan along with 3 decent towns around my FP in Tlacopan (including Madrid with the Colossus). I’ve irrigated most of Egypt to turn it into a settler (and later worker) farm. I haven’t bothered to chop the game forests around Tenochtitlan yet, as the shields were more important to my wonder builds.



Damn, my spoilers are turning into epic accounts. Let me know if these are getting too tedious to peruse.

Open, diplo

Entered the MA in 70AD with having defeated Bella and Cleo. Bella left me the Glight so I could settle the southern large and small island without competition. In fact nothing exiting happened in MA as it was all about research.

Just before the MA in 30AD I met Xerxes. Xerxes is down on literature and up on Feudalism. There is no trading possible for Feudalism and he’s not even prepared to introduce Shaka to me for Literature, so I have to settle for maps and some loose change. (Am I the only one who can’t find a way for getting along with the X-man?) At least with the map I know were to sail to meet Shaka. I’m in luck as Shaka is taking a walk through the former Iroquois lands and we meet in 90AD. Shaka misses Literature and has no extras. So again maps and change for Lit.

Research is on Engineering as perhaps Xerxes might have been studying Mono for some time. Engineering comes but still no trades possible. I have to research Mono as well before the X-man is willing to trade. Research first towards Education (for uni’s) and Banking, but not Astronomy as I don’t want Xerxes to have seaworthy boats. Gifting/selling the techs as I research them. I’m able to trade for Invention, but that’s the last techbuy (for a mandatory tech that is) I make. From then on the tech selling is slowed down, because I don’t want anyone rushing into Military Traditon. I want to have uni’s in my cores before having to worry about military.

Right after defeating the Egyptians I disbanded the barracks as they cost 1 gold upkeep and there was no need for any military for some time. However in the early MA I did start a palace-prebuild for Sun Tzu. Not only would it provide for free barracks but also ignite a GA.
And that’s what happened at 610AD.

Shigella said:

Yep – this is a fairly lousy date to enter the IA in an Emperor game. I’m looking forward to seeing how much earlier Redbad managed to enter the IA

Click to expand...

The GA ended in 800AD and so did the MA.

And a pic at 570AD (the latest I had during the MA).

Damn, my spoilers are turning into epic accounts. Let me know if these are getting too tedious to peruse.

Click to expand...

Actually, I love reading all these accounts. I've been playing CIVIII on and off for about 7 years now and thought I was pretty good. After finding this site, I realized how awful my playing strategies really were. All the descriptions of how people did things are very helpful as I always see new tricks or strategies that I can use in my games.

@Shumble I quite agree, not only in broad strategy but in the infinite detail of this wonderful game.

Redbad said:

The GA ended in 800AD and so did the MA.

Click to expand...

Ouch! 38 turns is a bit larger deficit than I anticipated. Congrats on a well-conceived and executed AA and MA (especially the timing on the GA).

I might make up some time during the Industrial Age, but you should be able to cruise to an excellent win date.

@shumble and Gailainne - Thanks for the encouragement. Sadly, there seems to be an inverse relationship between the length and detail of my spoilers and the game results.

Ancient Age link

DBear's GotM46 Med--Open:

This Land Is My Land
Madrid finally falls in 460. Next turn we trade Egypt currency for lit and rename Madrid to Montezuma's Revenge. In 550 we kick Spain off the continent at last, taking Seville, renamed Figaro. Next turn we build Taco Bell s of Madrid on the coast. We make peace in 580, getting Republic + 14 and Zaragoza, renamed Incense City. We now have a presence on the third continent.

Suicide Jockeys
We learn feud in 610. Thebes gets the GL in 700. Dixie is built in 710. Egypt refuses to trade spice for wine. In 730 we start a suicide run off the third continent. The ship sinks, but we know where Persia is. Taking the Lighthouse really helps. Switch to republic in 780. Moonshot is built, named because it is near Ciudad de la Luna. In 850 the run is successful and we contact Persia. We trade them mono, contact w/Egypt (against my better judgment, but they insisted), WM for Engineer, contact w/Zulu, 7+TM. Persia is HUGE and they've been kicking Zulu butt. We contact Shaka and he's doing the 1CC on an offshore island. They are way backward and won't last much longer.

Guns and Butter
Military costs are hurting us. We sail by Tyre in 890, and see a musket! In 910 we learn chiv and trade it to Persia for invent + 21. Trade Egypt chiv + wine + 15 for Theo. Stupid Cleo woulda got it anyway from the GL, at least I got something for it. In 1020 we bring the galley back home from its exploration of Persia. Two turns later we learn guns and are happy to find saltpeter outside Texaco Station.

And STAY Dead!
We build Tula on the third continent in 1080, while bringing in military. We decide to wipe out the Spanish once for all. We finish them in 1170--taking Ciudad de la Luna, renamed City of Lunatics; Valencia, renamed Violence; Murcia, renamed No Mercy; Pamplona, renamed Running with Bulls; and lastly Aldea de Ribannah on an offshore island, renamed Cortez Died Here.

Who Do They Think They Are?
In 1190 Persia tries to extort from us and declares. They can't even get to us! Egypt gets Copernicus AND Sistine this turn--they are going nuts with wonders, so how can they afford military and tech? We learn banking in 1220. In 1250 I build Octavarium, and sometime in the 13th century we learn chem and metal.

A Splendid Little War
Egypt has three towns on our turf--two in the jungle w of Capital, and the aforementioned Santiago. We decide to correct this in 1290, justifying it on the grounds that Egypt still won't deal spice. Santiago and Byblos fall next turn. They are renamed Ironville and Bible Belt, respectively. Border Guard comes under tremendous attack and they start taking losses in 1310, which brings out the peaceniks. A redlined knight takes Giza after tough fighting, Giza renamed D'yer Mak'r. We got what we wanted, so we make peace, getting astro for 19 + 6/turn. Xerxes still won't give us a fair peace.

Trying to Keep Up
We learn MT in 1330. Next turn we make peace with Persia, giving them 2 + 1gpt. Whatever. In 1360, Egypt declares war on Persia and next turn we learn physics. We trade Persia dye and wine for ivory + 50 + 3/turn, more than getting back our tribute. Cleo will not give up spice. We learn magnets in 1390 and finally incense from the third continent reaches the capital. This helps the research. Xerxes wants a cut in 1410, give him some to shut him up. At this time we also learn grav, finally entering the IA. We renegotiate the peace treaty w/Egypt so I don't pay 6gpt anymore.

Commentary
The tech pace is way slow due to having few opponents. Getting a diplo win is unlikely, and I'd like to see if anyone can pull it off on this map. My only hope appears to be the starship, if I can catch up in tech.

Vanilla 1.29f - Open class.
Goal: Domination, but things can change
Medieval spoiler (150AD - 1180AD).

-----------------------

Homeland cleanup

Middle Ages begin in 150AD, with the Spanish reduced to a distant offshore town in the incense island. Since we own the Great Lighthouse now, the spaniards cannot escape, nor they can be reached by anyone else than us. There's still a RoP with Egypt, why not using it for a fine rape? Troops are placed, a combat fort is built and 2 cities are immediately destroyed.

Egypt has 2x our culture and a respectable military force, but the advance is steady. A few big cities are destroyed (unconvenient to keep), and some of the space is resettled. Meanwhile, 3 galleys filled with brutes are sent to the offshore city-state of Valencia. A peace is signed with Egypt, they hand over all their treasure, then war is redeclared immediately. The last egyptian cities are captured. Egypt and Spain are eliminated in the same year: 400 AD.


Scientific age

It's time to think on how to take over the rest of the world. Large chunks of the former Egyptian territory are still unclaimed. The incense island is totally empty, and there's another small island to colonize. Domination seems too unconvenient this time, and so the goal becomes a conquest victory. Long ago, the Persians have conquered the whole Iroquois nation. They also own a pair of former Zulu cities and are quite powerful. They also own the Great Wall, on the most distant city. The Zulu are in a bad shape, although they managed to survive as long as Persia.

A revolution is held and Monty becomes President in 420AD. Emphasis is set on research. Filler cities are built to get a better unit support. A good part of the army is dismissed. All archers, all catapults and a good half of the spearmen are disbanded. Shields are collected to speed up marketplaces. A few libraries are built in the money factory cities. In Tenochtitlan a university is built later.

Research goes up steady. Feudalism is completed in 450AD, then Monotheism is bought from the Zulu for money and gpt. Theology is mastered in 520AD, and is traded for Engineering. Education is due in 600AD, Astronomy in 710AD and Navigation in 830AD. Next turn Education is sold to the Zulu for Chivalry and Invention. At this point, research is stopped completely. Gunpowder will be bought later, but it would have been better not being able to buy it.


Persian war

In the late scientific age, the army has been quickly rebuilt. Mercs and pukemen and catapults. Horsemen are trained, with the intention to upgrade them later. Once known Astronomy, galleys are upgraded into caravels. More ships are built to set up a shipchain. A marauder team is sent to Antioch, the Great Wall city. That damned town must be destroyed before doing anything else, or we'll face walls in every persian settlement.

The rest of the units are sent all together for a devastating 1st strike. When Navigation is mastered the 4th luxury is finally hooked. A good happiness bonus. The attack will take place on the eastern peninsula. Those cities were not very important, and weak defenses had to be expected. I was tempted to attack directly at the core, but this way is better. We'll hook up the 2 remaining luxuries much quicker, and this will help much against war weariness.

Before attacking, Persia does me a big favor. They ask wines, i send them packing and they declare. Some fine war happiness won't hurt. Troops are disembarked in 840AD. An alliance is signed with the Zulu. Antioch, the GW city, is immediately destroyed, then a city is founded in ICS between 2 persian settlements. The position is perfect for a shipchain with 2 intermediate nodes. The city rushes a temple immediately, then gains over those stinking cities, that are conquered a few turns later.

The advancement is quick. One after one, the persian cities falls over the might of the Aztec Republic and are assimilated or burned from the ground. In 990AD all the 6 luxuries are hooked up and almost a half of Persia has been already taken over. Persia is de facto cut in a half. Too bad the Zulu are being badly beaten.


Dastardly Montezuma

A phony peace is signed with Persia. A RoP is signed with both, then a rape against 2 major core cities is prepared. The combined strike is executed in 1040AD, and 2 size 12 cities next to the capital are burned from the ground. The teams rejoin outside Persepolis and the persian capital is captured in 1070AD. Pyramids (useless) and Sistine (very useful) are owned.

Persepolis is starved quickly, and didn't flip. Shortly after another core city is destroyed. Only 3 cities, the new capital and 2 new settlements are around. The northern part of Persia is corrupted and unconnected. The team remains south to heal and keep Persepolis safe. New units are sent north. Another phony peace is signed. Persia hand over 2 small cities. War is redeclared the next turn, the 2 empty cities are immediately abandoned. Two ex Zulu cities are captured from Persia.

The final advancement meets some resistance from Persia. 2 filler cities are destroyed, thanks to some bad RNG rolls, but those unfortunate occurrences didn't hurt a bit on the long run. To the south, the 2 new cities are destroyed. In 1150AD, only 2 cities remains to Persia, while Zululand is in OCC from ages. Troops are outside Arbela, but they'll wait 1 turn for the other marauder army to strike at the same time and kick Persia out with a double hit.

A curious end

In 1170AD, the last 2 persian cities are captured and Persia is no more. There are a few spare knights that can reach the Zulu OCC in the same turn, but will they be enough? An investigation is done: the city, size 8 and on a hill, is defended by only 2 impis! Shaka is building Leo's Workshop from bloody ages, and has only 2 impi defending his capital. Stupid AS. 4 knights are sent and the city is captured with the last unit. Zulu are out in the very same turn as Persia, as it happened with Egypt and Spain.

The Conquest victory is recorded in 1180AD. Firaxis: 5760. Jason: 9766. Quite an enjoyable game.

EDIT: Despite countless elite wins, i got only 1 leader in the whole game!!! (used to rush FP in Santiago). A pair more would have been better. Two knight armies would have been useful against persian muskets.

What is a ship chain?

A ship chain is when you position ships so that they can convoy units in one turn. It costs no movement to go from one ship to another, so if the units didn't move onto the ship to begin with, it is possible to transport from one continent to another. This is viewed as somewhat exploitive, but allowed in XotM.