Role Play Challenge: Tokugawa the Isolationist

Tokugawa the Isolationist: Start

Welcome to my next RPC; Tokugawa the Isolationist. The RPCs are meant to fun and bring a lighter side to these games. In addition I generally try to include some strategy or economy as an education angle which probably do not help veterans (aside from comic relief at my mistakes) but help newbies. Generally all situations and most strategies can be utilized to obtain victoy. In this game we take the old samuri Japanese Era leader Tokugawa and play up his heritage and his unique Civ style, basically an isolationalist. In fact the saved game was donated by Rolo (the master host of those lonely-hearts club games) and is an isolated start. So you will see my approach to playing an isolated start. Once we meet the first AI the RPC angle will start, otherwise play at the beginning is strictly how I normally attack an isolated start. I will also explore as I normally would to determine if we are isolated even though we are told we are by Rolo (unless he's having some fun with us!).


So, Tokugawa probably one of the AIs you hate the most as he is agressive (attacks very well), protective (hard to dislodge), and a royal pain to deal with. That's OK, he doesn't like YOU!!! That's right he basically hates everyone not Japanese. In fact he sill not trade with you, he will ignore you, but he will perhaps make a tech trade for the greatness of the Japanese people. Once he finds out that there are others out there, he desides he cannot stomach the idea of sharing this world with inferiors and decids he wants to visit the stars!

Starting conditions

Marathon Speed
Monarchy difficulty
Fractal map, but Isolated
Tech brokering is turned off, we can only trade what we tech ourselves.
Otherwise all random!

Rules:
1) We play a normal game until we meet another AI.
2) We can NEVER open borders with anyone.
3) We cannot trade resources!
4) We must repel any AI city on our land mass.
5) We may trade techs.
6) We can only winn via a space race.

Guidlines:
1) All civics are in play EXCEPT religious ones unless we found a religion ourselves.
2) We will not initiate any wars unless we need access to a resoruce not on our continent. The we may take what we need.
3) We may defend ourselves as we see fit. There is no rule when to declare peace.

Tokugawa starts with fishing and the wheel, pretty goo. The UU Samuria is one of the best, especially as a defensive/offensive unit. 2 free first strikes, starts with Drill I (which stays upon promotion) but requires iron instead of copper or Iron for Maces. The UB offers +10% production which will help with the Space Parts production. He is agressive and protective, getting free promotions to all melee and archery units, plus gunpowder units get bvenefit from both traits.

Let us begin...

As Toku is rather Shy we have no scrrenshot of him, but here is the start



OK, not too bad.. 2 different seafood plus pigs. OK, do we move or settle in place. I think we go worker first and tech hunting followed by AH and archery, Might as well start leveraging that protective trai early.

PS: I know I start these RPCs one after another, but to be honest they are more entertaining to me now than playing a standard game.

Isn't it better to grow to size 2 on marathon speed? I'd start with a workboat.

Clearly workboat first....

And no ,I ' m not having fun with no one The start is really isolated... but feel free to explore... in fact I urge you to explore.

From my experience with the toku LHC,I strongly suggest that you do a careful economical buildup and forget all those shiny stuff... Japan excels in war and the best way to win with them is to storm the world with drafted rifles. If that fails, try infantry.... and after that launch your ship

P.S No spoiler info was revealed in this post

Doh!!!!!!!! Yes of course a workboat first.

RPC rules, no off-shore wars unless there is a need for a resource (such as oil, coals, aluminum). Of course if we see a galleon of Aztec or Spanish military attacking our cities, Toku can attack and raze as long as he wants!.

And we can definitely send out as many privateers as possible.

workboat workboat most definatly...

I know you are big Archery fan, but do you really need it in this game that early? If you have either copper or horse, you can do it without archers and Hunting+ Archery is 40 turns now. Barbs wont attack you, until you settle your 3rd city(unless you get that nasty Arians event), so you can research it, if you need it.

Do you plan to keep some huts unpopped? I always do, when I am isolated and sometimes they surprise me with techs like Astronomy!

I generally prefer to take the immediate benefits of goody huts. Gold or a warrio help alot more during this time, although I agree teching astronomy can be a game turning event.

Regarding archery, I plan to play the game as I normally would at least until I would prove to be isolated. So since I would normally tech it after hunting and AH I will stick to that unless I can determine I am isolated early.

I want to minimize the benefit of knowing we are isolated.

The irony about Japan starting out with the Wheel is that Tokugawa supposedly banned the use of wheels on roads so that his vassals wouldn't be able to travel easily and thus would be forced to camp near the capital and under his control.

Anyways, a few points:

1. Fill up your continent sooner rather than latter so you won't have to deal with barbarians.

2. I'd go for Wonders ASAP; not being able to trade techs makes GP pretty important.

3. I'd use Mercantilism; again, GP Economy applies.

4. Good luck Mad Scientist . In a few ways, this reminds me of my Espionage game that I've sort of let fall by the wayside, haha (I swear I'll get back to that game as soon as I've done my 1800s moonshot!).

Gonna for for the pyramids? Representation + Mercantilism is a killer combo.

Definitely settle in place and get a work boat out there in order to hook up those fish or clams, depending on whether you want food or research right now.
Judging only by the amount of food you have in your fat cross (that can be seen for now), a SE doesn't sound like a horrible idea unless you somehow lack food across the whole of your continent.

BalbanesBeoulve said:

Gonna for for the pyramids? Representation + Mercantilism is a killer combo.

Click to expand...

I concur, and would like to add that all the forests you have around your capital would be good for chopping the Pyramids.

Hm not to bad a start. Settle in place. I think workboat>workboat then warrior or worker depending on if you've got AH or not.

I think you could try to get MC from the Oracal to help you speed along to Optics to try and grab the +1 movement from circumnavagting.

Early rep might be nice but thats a lot of wonder hammers for the Oracal and the mids. Maybe there'll be some stone or marble hanging about.

one thing about isolated starts is that you usually don't have any civs that really hate you till very late on in the game, makes diplomacy much easier

definitely try to fill your continent before astronomy anyway, which economy type is better to REX with? I'm inclined to go for an SE myself as it is much easier to generate gold when you really need it

on the subject of first builds workboat, workboat then if at size 3 worker if not warrior

Tokugawa the Isolationist: Part I

I stated this RPC right away as I am planning to play the beginning as more of a normal game, thus a walkthrough until we start meeting other AIs (then we can behave like the jerk Toku is).

So there are essentially two paths to go for an isolated start (which we found out pretty early here). Beeline the economy/liberalism techs and let the AIs find us, or beeline optics/astronomy and go find everyone. The latetr approach we used in the Willem game, so perhaps the former would be preferred her. Certainly more in line with Toku's thinking, and my experience both work well

SO where to settle? I see no glaring disadvantage moving or settling in place, so we trust the computer and settle in place. Looks like a good choice as



Jumbos in the BFC meaning easy access to 1 extra happy, important for Toku as I am not planning on founding any religions besides perhaps Confiscism or Taoism if we are lucky.

As suggested I begin by building the workboat

The city view of Kyoto



I will always work the highest hammer tile to produce that first workboat. Getting that food ASAP.

More than ever the first tech was hunting

Techpath: Hunting/AH

Then our warrior got




archery/sailing/mining/BW/Masonry/Agriculture/Pottery

I pushed sailing and masonry up in order to head towards the Great Lighthouse, one of the best ways to combat an isolated start. We will also make a run at the Collosus, but that later for the next segment.



We barely even started archery when we discovered we were isolated



we finished archery anyway as they make great defenders against barbs, are cheap, and we get those free promotion. Also after AH we have 2 sources of horse, one in Kyoto's BFC, the other just north of it. I basically will be ignoring barracks until there is nothing else to build.


Kyoto's build order went

WB/WB/Worker/archer/archer/archer/Settler/chariot/lighthouse/Great Lighthouse.



A closeup of the land



Well we have copper and right near seafood and marble. Definitely city #3 since city # 2 went



Yes very close to get that fast trade route since the culture borders touch and to minimize distance costs. No need to claim all the land at once.


With some chopping we quickly get



Now we need severla coastal cities to leverage this wonder.


Kyoto is pretty well established already



And the view of the land at the save.




So some of my thoughts here

1) A rather small and unspectacular land mass, no wonder Toku wants to head to the stars. Rather poor Ce land, but neither does a SE look atractive. We shall have to see where this goes.

2) 2 more fast cities, the marble/copper city and one claiming those sourthen Jumbos.

3) Techpath: Mysticism/Polytheism/priesthood/writing/CoL. See if we get lucky with founding Confuscism. Then Aesthetics/literature followed by math/currency.

4) Once the marble is locked up we can take a fast agressive attempt at the oracle (for MC and the Colossus). Also I think the parthenon and SoZ (in a different city from Kyoto) is an option and of course the great Library in Kyoto.

5) Next group of cities would be northen coastal (land sticks though) and one internal to fill out the land. Once the economy is pumping we can fillin the remaining land.

All the above is alot for Toku, so I do not expect to be hitting the machinery/compass/optics block too fast but you never know.

If we miss the oracle and get a GM as the first GP I will seriously consider builbing MC and making a run at the colossus that way.

Hint ( not spoiler ): you have land to the west ( just check the graphs ) and it will be acessible pre optics when osaka hits 2nd border pop ( BTW you missed the fish )... and there is land as well south of small island to the south
of the capital ( graphs again ) .I urge you to explore both ASAP.... your main island is not that good

TGL.... a interesting choice for someone that doesn't want to open borders .... ..... Collosus is a entirely diferent business ,especially because you don't want to prioritize Astro

I see the traces of land to the West and South, but I can't figure out what you mean by "graphs".

Exactly what you saw.... Civ blends neighbouring tiles graphs and if they are diferent they tend to "project" small indentations of the neighbouring terrain, allowing you to have a idea of what a fogged tile has by simply looking at the neighbouring tiles "graphs" ...

I confess I would have placed Osaka NW of the ivory. Your placement -- are you just planning on having it turn into a late-game super-cottage city?


Even with Osaka there, I would still probably found a city west of the ivory, especially with GL. Even if nothing else, it can run 2-3 scientists and a few coast tiles all game; I think it will pay for itself very quickly early on, and still pay for its upkeep in the late game.

that really isn't a great start, I hope the other islands have some nicer city sites

What a crappy piece of land that you got there

Try building a workboat or galley or two to explore those foreign landmasses once Osaka's borders pop?

Okasa 2nd border pop will take a while ( this is Marathon ,to add.... )..... I would work on that( p.s No spoiler again... )