Carthage Challenge

wenz

Scout
Joined
Jul 11, 2004
Messages
101
The variant:

is a sea-based game to show the power of trade routes and the combination of Great Lighthouse + Temple of Artemis.

Normally playing on Lakes/Highland/pangea maps with many wars, I wanted to play a little builder game with some cute islands and tasty fish. Since having the Warlords Exp. I also wanted to try out the imho very powerful unique building of Carthage, the Cothon which replaces the harbor!

This Game is inspired by aelfs Emperor Challenges. His 3. Master Challenge is about Trade Routes, Great Lighthouse and Temple of Artemis.
The thread can be found here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=187982
Link to the Pre-game discussion: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=187662 (post #11)

The game is also inspired by the sucsession game "Independence Day" by pigswill, which can be found here http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=184835

His idea is playing on a terra map and moving the whole empire on the other continent after researching astronomy. This fits perfectly with the historic Phoenicians, who colonized the whole Mediterranean and lost their homelands. Thereafter, the western part of their empire became a new civilization, Cathage! Lets see how this will come into play ...
 
Pre-game:

For playing a sea based game I wanted a long coastline with some bigger and some smaller islands. Most of them should be within reach of each other before astronomy for some little oerseas wars and earlier trade routes.
So continents (with big landmasses separated by huge oceans) is out.
Islands/custom continents is too predictable for my taste, I like the randomness of the game.
Ice Age is very dry and I dont like fractal, so these two are also out.
Playing with the map generator I found some nice settings: Archipelago, Snaky Continents for some random islands, low sea levels to make the islands bigger and bringing them closer together. To counter the low sea levels with much land overall and per civ, I took a small map but added an extra AI. And tropical, of course, I hate ice.


Settings:

settings.jpg


Leader/ Traits:

leader.jpg
 
Starting Position:

startpos.jpg


The Save: http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/48982/AutoSave_Initial_BC-4000.CivWarlordsSave

The Game Plan:

Playing as Carthage: They have a powerful unique building for sea based games, the cothon: replaces harbor and adds an extra trade route to the city at the cost of some hammers more. So the capital and most if not all of the cities should be on the coast and build it.
Unique unit: Improved horse archers??!! No, thanks. Riding is expensive, dont want to invest beakers in a dead end tech. For great profit with trade routes I also need many friends (open borders), so no early wars this game!

Getting an early religion? I dont think this is necessary. As a charismatic leader I dont need the happiness. Getting a shrine is nice, but with the wonders I want to build chances are high for getting a great merchant, and that fits even better with the theme of the game.
Also founding a religion often restricts foreign affairs, and I want friends for big money.
Third, in my opinion, it is an overall very strong move to found an religion very early and I do that in most of my games so why not play this variant without?

So the plan is as follows: Building up a solid economy, getting a second city online asap and go straight for Great Lighthouse and Temple of Artemis, preferably one in each city just for the flavor.
Afterwards building some oversea colonies and see what happens...
 
ToA provides a free priest, so at a GPP gross total of +2 merchant +3 prophet per turn you are actually more likely to get a prophet. Since you probably won't use that guy for a shrine or lightbulbing a religious tech, you could try for a modified CS slingshot using the ToA. Just an idea.
 
@ robo kai: you are right, with the ToA I get a free priest, but the priest and the wonder are both one source of GPP, so the chances would be 50:50.
Sure I could make use of the GPriest, but having a GMerchant for making one biiiiiiiig Trade would also fit very nicely. :)
 
Research:

tech1.JPG


There are just a few techs I will need in the beginning.

There are neither corn or cows near the starting pos, and I already have Mining and Fishing, so the only worker techs I need are Pottery for cottages on the floodplains and Masonry for a quary on the marble. And I need The Wheel for roads (Trade Routes!!), but its a prerequisite for Pottery anyway.

And I need the techs for the wonders I want to build. Polytheism for the Temple of Artemis and therefore Mysticism, but this can wait a little bit, because my capital has other things to build before starting the wonder and I dont want to found Hinduism. Masonry is needed for the Great Lighthouse and its an economic tech, too, so its very high on the priority list.

I need a lighthouse build before starting the greater one, so Sailing is also important. Because the AI is often slow with building wonders that need a city improvement constructed, my second city will try getting the GLighthouse. Therefore I want Sailing discovered before the city is founded, so it could start building a lighthouse asap and it would be connected to the capital by sea from the first turn. Last but not not least, Sailing means Trade Routes!!

@sulla: I restarted the map a few times because I dont like tundra directly near the capital. Imho its more fun to start in the center of the map, there is space (or an enemy) in any direction. This is the first start with jungle in the surrounding, and I got really lucky with the marble.
 
Correct me if i´m wrong, but I dont think there is a better tile for founding the capital than the place the settler already stands, so Carthage is founded on the spot.

capfound.JPG
 
Getting the Workboat

If You start near a sea-ressource then getting it up&running asap is often a very strong opening move, I think.

So this is why I started the workboat in the first place, but this is only possible if You have Fishing as a starting tech.

Growing at full speed for 7 turns and then two turns of MicroManaging...

workboat.JPG



...means getting the workboat by arround 3500BC. So I´m 12 turns into the game and work the first improved tile with my capital size 2.

Time for a worker, methinks. Lets have the city governor reign the town a few turns. :coffee:


3520BC.JPG
 
justa little bit exploring the west...

explore.JPG



the next research goals:

myst.JPG



and the Carthage at that time:

3320BC.JPG
 
Defending the empire

Now I just realized, this is emperor and my army consists of one single warrior.
In not so many turns, barbs will appear and I have to protect, whats mine.

Therefore, the next round I tried to improve my military...

...through building...

warrior.JPG

(You can notice the first cottage up&running :gold: )


...and research.

defense.JPG
 
Founding the second city

I didnt explore more, because I´ve found a perfect place for city #2 already.

cityspot.JPG



and Carthage builds the settler:

settler.JPG
 
That's a really good 2 city sites. Looks like you can have one more on the flood plains area near the gold...
 
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