The Immortal Challenge 2: For the Fatherland

I have no patience for this waiting :( ....can somebody go abduct Aelf and chain him in front of the computer please? ;)







(na, take your time,i love these challenges of yours, keep up the good work :D )
 
Round 3: 675BC - 325AD

Alright, so we have two groups with different opinions: One, the overwhelming majority, favours going for Literature and the Great Library before Construction to better leverage Philosophical's strength. There's also the advantage of letting the Spanish build a shrine for us in Madrid before we invade. The second, a small minority, favours Construction first and going to war earlier in order for us to better compete in the land game and avoid having to face longbowmen in Spain. The GL can probably still be built, but a little later.

By the number of votes alone, it is easy to go with the former. However, I agreed quite strongly with the latter. So, forced by my own instincts on one hand and the popular voice on the other, I had to consider both sides of the argument carefully.

I began by identifying what was really important to us. The GL is one, but it's not in dispute as far as I could see, just when it would be built. Land is another, for acquiring land as early as possible means we can develop that land earlier, strengthening our empire (and hence the maxim "Land is power"). How about a shrine? Is that important? At this stage, where it would only give us several gpt per turn at most, not really. And there are ways to get it later on. It's a point to consider, but it's probably not something so vital that we should base our decision on it outright. So, now, having narrowed down our basic concerns, would it be more advantageous to us if we build the GL earlier or if we capture some cities earlier?

An earlier GL means earlier free scientists, which means earlier Great Scientists for lightbulbing and earlier free bpt (beakers per turn) to help with research. Considering the Philosophical trait, it is indeed a good way to leverage it. And we can even toss in a free shrine as a sweetener. Earlier conquests, on the other hand, means an earlier consolidation of empire, which leads to greater productivity and greater research capabilities. Also, we might not have to face longbows, which would cost us hammers in dead troops, lengthen our campaign and cause more war weariness (from the longer duration and more troops dead). So, in terms of giving us more raw research power, both are beneficial. Earlier GL would give us more research earlier, especially due to the effect of lightbulbing, but would not increase our productivity as early. It's hard to decide which is better. War weariness, however, is a tangible factor against the early GL path. And so we have to come back to the question of the shrine: Does it add weight to the early GL option? Ironically, however, the free shrine has tied up in itself the potential for greater war weariness. At 25 years per turn, 50 turns after 975BC would make it 275AD. There's a very high chance that Isabella would have longbowmen if we wait till then, even if she did not take Monarchy from the Oracle. Furthermore, striking at Madrid first is important to our war plans (it would really knock the Spanish economy out and cause the empire to crumble easily). That would leave our army isolated, and therefore it must be able to undertake the siege of Toledo largely unreinforced, something it would not be able to do if it exhausts itself assaulting a longbow-defended Madrid.

Thus, I concluded that going for Construction first is the better option, if only slightly. And while we were researching it, we began building/chopping/whipping axes and swords to prepare for war.

The round proper began with the most logical tech trade (in more ways than one, if you get my drift):



And then I noticed that HC did not have Maths. How convenient!



What happened next was not so good, though. Somebody has voiced out his concern about this earlier, and it did happen:



Toledo stole our gold mine! The unhappy population that suddenly appeared in Berlin could be whipped away for something useful, but the damage to our research efforts were annoying.

Fortunately, Munich had built a library one turn earlier. A few turns later, the borders of Munich expanded:



Yup. Stole it right back, and we're back in business.

Several turns after that, Huayna completed the ToA (what a surprise), and Brennus became willing to trade away Polytheism:



Since we got Sailing out of the deal as well, it was not bad. We could then research Literature right away next.

The Spanish, meanwhile, seemed to be flexing their annoyance-factor muscle:



Little does the AI know what it has in store :trouble:

Soon after that, we got our first GS:



It went to Berlin to build an Academy, which, satisfyingly enough, shaved one turn off Literature immediately.

Then, as if she was not annoying enough, Isabella came with a demand:



No wonder Sisiutil couldn't get along with her ;) I sent her off disappointed. She became Cautious, but that hardly mattered when she's going to be our target, did it?

Anyway, since we would be lightbulbing Philosophy, I decided to make another deal with Washington:



Meditation is required for Philosophy (well, duh!). And this was actually a rare opportunity. How often can you trade small AI-beloved techs like Polytheism for something useful?

After Literature, we went for CoL. It seemed natural, given the Organised trait and the fact that we were about to go to war and conquer some territory. Besides, CoL leads to Civil Service, which leads to Paper, which leads to Education, which leads to Liberalism. CoL also leads to Philosophy, which we would lightbulb and is required for Liberalism. Do you see where I'm going?

Anyway, once we got Construction, we had begun building catapults almost exclusively. We churned out 6 catapults as quickly as possible (with chopping and whipping) and then marched into Spanish lands. Since we wanted to hit Madrid first, I figured we could make use of open borders to walk our forces some distance into Spanish territory before declaring war, such that our forces would be bumped out to neutral territory northwest of Madrid, which would put them as close to the city as possible at the beginning of the war:



Our forces moved another tile and then we declared war. The trick worked. And note that Isabella still did not have longbows at this point.

While our army laid siege to Madrid, the citizens of our capital engaged in a more civilized pursuit:



So we did get the GL. That removed one potential disadvantage about going Construction first. Now it remained to be seen if we could capture at least Madrid before Isabella got longbows.

Well, since we were already outside Madrid and would probably capture it soon, which would put a lot of hurt in the Spanish, I decided that it was safe to trade away Construction:



We did not have monopoly on it anymore anyway, Brennus and Washington having got it. We switched to HR immediately to preempt the effects of war weariness, especially since we were fighting our brothers and sisters in the faith.

And, finally, our assault on Madrid was successful:



We didn't lose many troops in the process either. No doubt the fact that Isabella still had no longbows contributed greatly.

So, our first objective had been achieved. Props to us. But would we enjoy similar success taking Toledo and linking up our territories? Find out when I post the second half of the update later.

[to be continued in the next post...]
 
you took a great risk, trading for meditation and polytheism!
Brennus could have gone for literature and beaten you to the GLibrary.
And now you're nearing dangerously WFYABTA for a handful of beakers :eek:
 
you took a great risk, trading for meditation and polytheism!Brennus could have gone for literature and beaten you to the GLibrary.

Why? Marble and prechopping is hard to beat.

cabert said:
And now you're nearing dangerously WFYABTA for a handful of beakers :eek:

Why so paranoid about WFYABTA? Yes, it's there, but all these techs add up to more than 10 turns of research. If trading for them puts us closer to our short-term goals, I don't see why not. We're not playing hard catch up like the last time. There is a time to trade.

Will post the second part in a while.
 
I see you took Madrid in 125 AD. I wonder how many turns that is away from the 50 odd Izzy needed for a GProphet from the Oracle?

A good job as ever :) I'll comment more fully when the whole round is posted and I see the save.
 
And now you're nearing dangerously WFYABTA for a handful of beakers :eek:

I think it depends of Aelf's goals for the game. There are two more post-optics trading partners to be revealed and both Washington and H.C. are pleased with Aelf.

Brennus will probably stop trading after the next set of trades. Adding Isabella's cities will put Aelf in the top half of the score for the Currency, Calendar, Code of Laws trades. Aelf can probably get one more trade in before increasing his score enough for WFYABTA to be a problem. Brennus has a 5 trade limit IIRC so the next trade would be the last even without the Polytheism and Meditation trades unless Brennus converts. Aelf might be able to get Currency from Brennus at the start of the next trading round and then trade with Washington and H.C.

If Aelf is planning to take over most of the continent, bribing Washington to attack Brennus after Izzy is a good step. It would cement relations to guarantee trading with Washington and eliiminate a troublemaker. One ally on the continent and 2 new civs would totally negate the WFYABTA problem by 1000AD.
 
[...continued]

Madrid was captured in 125AD, only 6 turns from the predicted date of the appearance of a Spanish prophet (the prophecy about a prophet. Go figure ;)). But we invaded in 25BC, and I doubt the AI would be inclined to move its prophet and build a shrine while an army is marching towards its holy city, so we would have had to wait 12 turns, at the beginning of which Isabella already had Monarchy (she was running HR). We could not be sure that she would not have gotten longbows within that time. In fact, even now, she could very well get them while we marched towards Toledo, which would make the siege a lot more costly for us. I could only hope that capturing Madrid had so disrupted her economy that she could not get Feudalism in time even if she beelined for it. Our army needed to rest for a few turns and we had to send a few more catapults as reinforcements. Fortunately, these do not actually have to join up with the army. They only needed to be adjacent to Toledo to help, and thankfully there is a hill and a forested hill leading to the city from Munich so we only needed to cover them with one spearman and one axeman.

One turn after the fall of Madrid, our next GS appeared from the GL:



About just in time to lightbulb Philosophy after CoL was discovered.

We did so. Guess which city was picked to be the holy city of Taoism:



:eek: I guess Madrid was considered a fringe city of ours. Now, a double holy city, that is a remarkable treat. A perfect Wall Street city. I really regret that we could not have captured it with the Buddhist shrine already there. Now, two GPs in the future might be called for, eh?

Then it was Washington who came with a demand next:



Trouble brewing, huh? Unfortunately, we would have to remain neutral for now. Anyway, the Americans would be our next natural target after Spain, so having good relations with them isn't too important.

In any case, our refusal did not make Washington reluctant to trade:



This was a good deal, wasn't it, WFYABTA or no? How does anyone refuse a trade like this? We gave a rather harmless tech for OR and quite a bit of gold to keep our research at 100% for about 7 turns longer. Heck, WFYABTA was not going to stop me from doing this :p

On the same turn, we traded CoL (Washington had it too) and Literature to Huayna:



Calendar is one of those valuable techs that the AI loves and values, and which you never get round to researching on your own as long as you're doing point-stick research, so I was glad to be able to trade for it.

Anyway, as you can see, and as I have mentioned earlier, we went for CS after CoL as the first step to a beeline for Liberalism.

Meanwhile, our siege of Toledo went on smoothly. Isabella hadn't gotten Feudalism so the city fell quite easily:



And we got a GG for the valour of our troops so far:



Having met our second war objective, this is where the round ended. The tech situation now:



We could probably trade Philosophy for Currency and Feudalism, but I'm sure some of you would not agree to it. While I don't think we should harbour dreams of getting the Angkor Wat (too pricey without stone or Industrious), there's Liberalism to consider (Washington has CS already). Personally, I don't think we would be beaten to the latter anyway, since we could easily lightbulb our way there. But I would like to listen to your opinion before deciding.

The power graph:



Despite our relatively large army, we still seem to be low on this. What does the Immortal AI do to maintain such ratings?

The GNP graph:



At rock bottom, it seems, but a partial SE doesn't need to care so much about that.

And the map of the known world:



Now we have to decide on where to move our army next. Do we go for Barcelona or Santiago and Salamanca or Salamanca alone? Knowing you guys, you might even suggest going for all the three southern cities including Cordoba ;) Please elaborate a little on the war plans you have in mind (like whether we need a lot more troops and in which sequence we should attack). Keep in mind WW and upkeep costs.

We also need to decide on how to use our GG. We can't build the usual Medic III chariot until Toledo goes out of revolt and the horses are ours. If we are going to build a lot more troops, settling him might be a good option. But, then again, if we are going for a longer campaign, waiting for a chariot to make a Medic III unit might be worth it.

One more thing, I have rather unthinkingly started on the NE in Berlin a few turns earlier. An NE there would leverage the benefits of the GL but would not be advisable if we're hoping to get both shrines up in Madrid. What do you think?
 

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For the power graph thats just cause the AI have insane city sizes compared to yours so they actually have sucky military just huge cities. Nice war too bad about the shrine. Why didnt you trade with brenus before wfyabta struck like advised higher up? Now you get 1 less trading partner.
 
I want to preface my suggestions by mentioning that I play on Noble, and am still mostly a newbie to the game - or at least, a newbie when it comes to more sophisticated strategies. I'm also not much of a warmonger (yet) - I've only done cultural and space race victories so far.

So...take my suggestions with a heaping pile of salt, I guess.

Anyway, I'd like to vote Barcelona as the next target for military conquest. The iron up there appears to be Spain's only source of metal. There is a copper node east of Cordoba and north of Chicago that her culture might expand to (or Chicago at only 5% American might flip?) but it may be too late for her by then. And unless one of the dark squares around Seville has horses, those longbows you worried about earlier will be the best she can produce until Gunpowder - and I suspect she won't have an empire left to be a threat by then.

The other thing I'd like to contribute is a trade suggestion. You have some new resources coming your way soon: Toledo will add wheat (and surplus gold), Madrid will add sheep and silk. And if you do take Barcelona next you'll acquire both deer and fish; Salamanca as another likely target due to proximity to your capital, nets you pigs. All that in mind, happiness is and will remain the greater limitation on your growth in the foreseeable future, so I would suggest trading either the sheep (when you get it) or your clams (right now) to Brennus for the spices he's offering. You've already got gold-for-dye with him, and aren't concerned with Washington's opinion of you. The +1 :) is worth more than the +1 :health:.
 
I find the appearance of Izzy's GP in Barcelona in 225 AD somewhat frustrating, especially as Taoism appeared in Madrid of all places. A shrine there would allow you to run 3 priests to get another shrine. It really makes me wonder if holding off the attack on Izzy until say 250 AD would have had that highly desireable outcome. I don't suppose you have a savegame just before you declared war on Izzy do you? You could replay it yourself or post for me and any others to enjoy. It would be a fascinating what - if to replay for a few turns. Obviously you have already made the decision and we are commited, I just find alternative histories interesting.

Back to reality. Given the double holy city in Madrid how could we get at least one shrine fired up in a reasonable timeframe? Angkor Wat is a great way to run 3 priests and gives a basic 2 GPPs itself but you have no stone so it would be an expensive 500 hammers. I guess those hammers would be recovered over time from the bonus to priests if you run many of them but you have to pay now for that long term benefit and 500 hammers is a lot of catapults and other troops. Alternatively Madrid could build 2 temples and run 2 priests over a long time. Or if you capture Barcelona quickly it has the Oracle so that would be a basic 2 GPPs to add to a couple of priests run from 2 temples.

Berlin needs happiness desperately, what a pity it hasn't gotten Buddhism yet and another pity you can't spare any troops for a HR bonus. Maybe build both monastries in Madrid, rather than the library currently selected, and spam religions to a few selected cities where temples and monastries have several uses. Berlin could use the happiness and the research bonusses from monastries plus it is another place you can spam missionaries from later in the game when you're running Pacifism (which needs Buddhism anyway) ;)

Finally for now, I spotted one nice little trading trick you might use short term. Ragnar needs iron and has spice and 6 gpt. You only have one iron but you are not using it right now. Why not trade iron to Ragnar for spice and 6 gpt, only for 10 turns of course :lol: but that gives you 60 gold and 1 happiness in all your cities just when you need it. I tried it and he will agree :)
 
I think you should try to press the fight quickly to maximize the Archer advantage, moving in a bombardment stack ASAP while the other units heal.

Cordoba and Santiago would give you two more happy resources and punch a hole to the south. Then if you have time you could do Salamanca.

A benefit of trading for Feudalism is the possibility of vassalizing Isabella before she goes to someone else. She would make a good vassal because she has good relations with you and your neighbors and because she's occupying marginal land. I'd take Cordoba and Santiago, then vassalize her ASAP, taking Salamanca and Seville if needed. Also, with Feudalism you could switch to Vassalage (good in the short term) and OR (good for missionaries now and buildings after the war).

A Medic III would take a while. You could give Medic II to a Combat II Spearman now and use him on the Chariot in Valencia to get the XP for Medic III, but that would still take a few turns. Since I think you're in a hurry, I'd put an instructor in Munich, which is a good city for Heroic Epic, then in Munich build one Medic I Spearman followed by CRII Cats. Alternatively if you got Feudalism and Vassalage right away, it would also be fine to build a Medic I Spearman right away and use the GG to promote him to Medic III. Either way, don't wait for the Chariot.

With the possible exception of Berlin, I'd keep all cities on military until you get peace, because it's hard to tell how long this war will last, especially if you try to vassalize. If it drags on, you can research Drama and use the slider.

For great people, I think National Epic in Berlin is OK. I didn't get your point about that. If you wanted it in Madrid for Merchants or Priests, I wouldn't wait for that. With or without NE in Berlin, I'd try to give Berlin 2 scientists and 2 priests and run 2 priests in one other city. Strategically, though, the Taoist shrine should be very low priority. It would probably need missionaries, and if you're trying to dominate your continent, that probably won't be worth it. Maybe late in the game.

Santiago kind of sucks. You could resettle it 1W, or you could add a city 3W to fill in the good tiles to its west, which would avoid the diplomatic penalty if you want to vassalize Isabella.
Send your Spearman in Hamburg up to kill the Chariot in Valencia.
Swap in Combat units to defend Madrid.
 
Any thoughts on victory condition?
Is cultural an option?

Edit: Now looked at the save. Looks like most of religions are overseas which makes cultural debatable. Wonder who's been founding them. Mansa? Gandhi?
Economy is in poor shape; ok in short term but actually +2gold at 0% research suggests that economy may need sorting before expanding too wildly so take Salamanca for iron and then go for peace. Its ok while you've got plunder to subsidise the economy but that won't last for ever.

Problem with philosophy is that it can be too good to trade early on, if you were going to trade it you'd be looking for feudalism, CS and a couple more decent techs. Could do with currency soon, maybe trade it for construction. Maybe.
 
I'm quite Suprised you haven't switch Civics to Pacifism once your discovered Philosophy, You know SE + Philosophical + Pacifism = GP Spaming, no offense becuase it appears liek a newbie mistake LOL or were you waiting to get a couple temples up to assign a couple of Priest for Prophets before Switch to Pacifism???

Edit: Well I can understand that you may not want the extra support cost that comes with the Pacifism Civic, but the Benefits of the Civic Should outweigh the cost, besides I believe your Treasury of 600 gold can handle it, if your running a large deficit you can always run zero on your research silder, you are running a SE afterall.

I still Recommend going for Angkor Wat, but that's just me I build AW in 90% of my games LOL. I build AW more often then GL, but probably because I always Beeline ot Philosophy.

All that in mind, happiness is and will remain the greater limitation on your growth in the foreseeable future, so I would suggest trading either the sheep (when you get it) or your clams (right now) to Brennus for the spices he's offering. You've already got gold-for-dye with him, and aren't concerned with Washington's opinion of you. The +1 :) is worth more than the +1 :health:.

Correct in a CE economy, Incorrect in a SE. Health is just as equally important as Happiness, because if you reach over the Health Cap, you lose food which could be used to assign that extra Specialist, What Aelf really needs to do is to balance out his Happy & Health Caps, Although I'm reluctant to trade Happy Resources to the AI which will further increase their Pop and ultimately their research.

Any thoughts on victory condition?
Is cultural an option?

Edit: Now looked at the save. Looks like most of religions are overseas which makes cultural debatable. Wonder who's been founding them. Mansa? Gandhi?
Well I think it's too late for Culutral, Building the Sistine Chapel, usually helps, I think Aelf is better off going for Domination, Organized helps that out.

Economy is in poor shape; ok in short term but actually +2gold at 0% research suggests that economy may need sorting before expanding too wildly so take Salamanca for iron and then go for peace. Its ok while you've got plunder to subsidise the economy but that won't last for ever.
This is a SE, 0% on the Research Silder is normal, Beside's Aelf can stay up in research by Trading and GL's GS Light-bulbing techs, whipping those cheap courthouses should help too
 
Correct in a CE economy, Incorrect in a SE. Health is just as equally important as Happiness, because if you reach over the Health Cap, you lose food which could be used to assign that extra Specialist, What Aelf really needs to do is to balance out his Happy & Health Caps, Although I'm relucdant to trade Happy Resources to the AI which will further increase their Pop and ultimately their research.

Not trying to say that health isn't important to what aelf is doing - rather, that he has enough health to support a somewhat larger population, but currently cannot for lack of happiness. The balance between health and happy caps that you say he needs to do, is also what I'm saying he should do. There are quite a few sources of additional health available via conquest, but less so happiness (unless he takes Cordoba next). So, considering the likely gains from the ongoing war...he should probably trade away a spare health for a happiness he can use to add a population point.

Alternately, he could keep the health and spread those religions, and build temples...but that's a decent-sized hammer commitment that maybe shouldn't happen until he's ready for peace with Spain. The trade with Brennus now would give Berlin the happiness to keep the coming population point.
 
Picking up a Great Prophet will be tricky. Building 2 temples and running 2 Priests is an option. Angkor Wat is good. If you pick up Music along the way to Liberalism, then build a cathedral or 2, and you should be in great shape for Prophet points.
 
Not trying to say that health isn't important to what aelf is doing - rather, that he has enough health to support a somewhat larger population, but currently cannot for lack of happiness. The balance between health and happy caps that you say he needs to do, is also what I'm saying he should do. There are quite a few sources of additional health available via conquest, but less so happiness (unless he takes Cordoba next). So, considering the likely gains from the ongoing war...he should probably trade away a spare health for a happiness he can use to add a population point.

Alternately, he could keep the health and spread those religions, and build temples...but that's a decent-sized hammer commitment that maybe shouldn't happen until he's ready for peace with Spain. The trade with Brennus now would give Berlin the happiness to keep the coming population point.

LOL... oops I didn't realize he had a surplus of health resources, (I haven't checked the save game), trading away surplus health resources for happiness resources would be a good option, but in the medium term he's probably better off, researching drama and running a high Culutre Silder, he is afterall running a SE, or build a lot of cheap military units to guard his cities under Monarchy for the increased happiness. Personally I'd try to minimize happy or health resource trading with the AI as much as possible to keep them at a disadvantage, especially at high levels when they already get a boost to research and other things, although I've never play Immortal level.
 
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