Monarch Student XI - Washington

Settled 2S on the ivory, start the worker. Sucks to not have a 3 hammer tile. Meet Willem, and get gold and a map from huts. Teched AH first with the cow. Then mining/BW, which was stupid as my worker sat idle for 5 turns. No copper anywhere in sight, and the only horse is far away in a suck position. Send my settler out to claim it – nothing better to do.



Our landmass seems small – I haven’t fully explored, but I wonder if it’s just me and a creative civ with minimal military resources except the elephant and horse I’ve claimed. Maybe there’ll be iron. I put city 3 down here to block, and it then dawned on me that there’s potentially meaningful land to the west, as I saw fish over there. City 3 here:



And I screwed that up royally. One tile further south and I would have had that clam. DUMB! It’s 1800 BC, I still haven’t hooked up horse, and barbs have to be coming soon – feeling like this game is off to a bad start. And after a bit of exploring from my work boat – it’s confirmed – this is a perfect GLH map. Islands everywhere. I only hope I’m not too late to build it, and start my lighthouse in 1025 BC. By the time I’m done with that, GLH is built, so I’m screwed there. I have managed to block a decent amount of land from Willem, who seems to be boxed in between me and a barb city with no metal. I can't confirm the size of our landmass because every warrior I send up to the northeast gets eaten by the barb city's archers. Three in total.

So my 3 blocking cities are set, boxing him in tight, and I settle a couple islands. There looks to be a few more nice island cities to settle, so at 10 AD, when I cut off, I’ve queued up loads of workers and settlers to try to settle some more land. Tech is a disaster right now, and there appears to be some AI who’s going nuts with tech, as Taoism was discovered in the BCs. Empire and tech situation:





Like I said, tech is a disaster – teching HBR first to try to get some trade bait, and second because Willem is boxed in a bit on the mainland and doesn’t appear to have much land. So hoping I can finish HBR, use it to try to get closer to COL, and really try to right the ship. I think this is my worst emperor game so far - clearly it is in terms of tech. I'm actually at 50 beakers a turn, not 36 as I switched some tiles to scientists, but at 10 AD that's absolutely abysmal. If I replayed this, would be easy – beeline GLH and win. Not sure how I’m going to win from here – my tech rate has been crappy for a long time. Hoping at caste some scientists will help me take off, but caste is a ways off. I have 2 cities working scientists though - should pop 2 in the next 20 turns. Academy and a bulb/settle might help right the ship a bit.

Oh, and I tried for Aesthetics for trade bait...stupid Willem teched it first. He also has the hindu holy city, so he's generally pissed me off this game. I am hoping that taking his hindu holy city at some point might help my cause, especially if he did shrine it. Since he's boxed in tight, I assume worst case once I get construction, I mow him down with elephants. But at this tech rate, I might not hit construction until about 1800. I do have a bunch of cottages laid down, so if I can just limp to COL, I may be able to make it. I'm hoping someone else builds SOZ - I'm building it for gold mainly.

4000BC – Settle in place assuming something will pop up under the warrior. Talk about lack of food though, sheesh. AH for cows and a worker for um doing stuff.

3900BC – Not my first choice of a free tech but it beats a map.


3850BC – First thought is “I hate that guy”, which leads to the thought “Heeeeeey Abbot!”. So maybe he's not that bad.


3600BC – Desert to the east. Jungle to the south. Fish 3 tiles off the coast so there is land of some sort west of Washington. This map is uh… interesting?


32225BC – Its almost all jungle to expand into BUT there are clearly a ton of other landmasses nearby of varying sizes. GLH is starting to look really really nice.


2725BC - I’m really a sucker for SH. I hate waiting for border pops almost as much as I hate building monuments.


2325BC - Finally put down NY


2050BC – Well if nothing else charismatic and a large jungle unlocked HE really early.
Too bad so far it looks like just me and Willem on the continent and marching troops across a jungle… bleh. No early war =(


1975BC – Well BW is done and I found the closest source of copper. Yeah early war is a no go.


1750BC – Boston is up as a quasi blocker city. Yeah that's right, I'm building a wall!


1300BC – A few chops I needed for putting down grassland farms anyway and... GLH cheese on the way!


825BC – Just finished teching alphabet since Willem still has yet to get writing. If nothing else having just the two of us lets me tech intelligently to trade with him. Borders are still closed though so he has to at least walk around to settle next to me. Once I trade IW from him I’ll settle the jungle though there is one little technicality I’d have to solve even after IW.


Thinking of killing my immediate tech variety and going for Metal Casting for the Colossus even without copper. This is looking like some sort of freakish archipelago hybrid map. Hopefully Willem will trade Iron Working soon. He still has 3 turns to go until it is done. My only other thought right now is if I wish to war it will be a modern one involving an Industrialism beeline involving a certain useless UU storming a ton of island cities. God I hate massive water battles =/

3975 BC: Settled 3S, training a workboat and researching hunting
( Hunting's not a popular pick, I know, but here it will speed up my animal husbandry research, let me get camps going on all that ivory, and lead to archery as my first military upgrade)
3775 BC: Researching animal husbandry and a meeting with an archer belonging to Willem van Oranje – apparently coming from the SE
3575 BC: A goodie hut gives me a scout – definitely a nice bonus

3400 BC: Start researching archery – Willem’s archer has already fended off a Barbarian warrior for me. Horses are located a little way east of Washington – excellent news. I appear to be on a largish peninsula, so I’m tempted to try to block it off early and ensure I have plenty of land

3225 BC: Located Willem’s city. This is looking less like a largish peninsula and more like a smallish island. I may have to try to switch to a rush strategy. Time to check Willem’s UU. Ah yes, the East Indiaman. Good for a map like this, but no immediate help to him.

3175 BC: A chariot->horse archer rush? I suppose it could work. Finish archery, start researching the wheel.
2900 BC: Start researching horseback riding
2800 BC: Settler underway in Washington. I’ll put him down just W of the horses. Not the ideal spot but I need those nags fast.
2475 BC: Willem adopts slavery – not good news. Let’s hope he’s short on copper.
1975 BC: HBR done, two barracks built and horses hooked up for both my cities. Time to belatedly get started on the mining research path.
1850 BC: Looks like the espionage points have built up enough to give me a view of Willem’s tech path – and he’s nearly done with Monotheism. Great news, and here’s hoping he sticks to the religious techs.

1800 BC: Start on bronze working
1750 BC: Willem has founded Judaism for me. Very kind of him.
1425 BC: BW done, time for IW. Looks like Willem has bronze next to his 2nd city. Bugger. Oh well, maybe some pillaging is in order.

1325 BC: Hmm, a worker within striking distance inside Willem’s borders. I was planning to build up a little more but this could be too tempting. I’m well ahead on the power graph… I guess it’s go time!


1300 BC: Turns out Willem’s 2nd city isn’t next to the copper – it’s on it. That can be remedied, however. Burn! There’s an axeman and an archer in Amsterdam. Fortunately I prepared a chariot for just such an eventuality.


1125 BC: Amsterdam is mine! But Willem survives somewhere, and that’s not acceptable.
875 BC: IW, finally! Time to get rid of that jungle. Meanwhile, the Hague has been located, and soon it will fall.
865 BC: The Dutch are gone, and the island is mine. The only city I chose to keep was Amsterdam, the others were not worth the cost. As an added bonus, I have a 13 XP horse archer to help me qualify for a Heroic Epic. Hmm, looks like the city on the copper that I eliminated so blithely was the holy city. Oops. Nevermind, I still have Judaism in Amsterdam, and I’ll survive without the extra cash. Time to get this economy going and do some serious expansion.

Turns out Amsterdam had Stonehenge, which will make my life easier – no time wasted building monuments to pop borders. Training pottery.
320 BC: An encounter with Boudica is a somewhat unwelcome surprise – I guess I’m not as isolated as I thought. While I appreciate that tech trading opportunities, I’m behind on expansion and don’t want well-armed settling parties invading my lands.
185 BC: Monty drops by to say hi with a work boat. Fortunately, the obnoxious Aztec is willing to offer me a useful trade, and appreciates the fact that relative beaker totals are much in his favour.

80 BC: Boudica’s borders are in sight just off my east coast. Can’t say I’m too comfortable about that. At least I know she’s lagging well behind Monty in tech, and as she’s Hindu and he’s Buddhist, they won’t be getting along too well either.
40 AD: State of the Union: I’m lagging well behind my neighbours on tech, but my land looks good, and I think I’ll be able to hang on to it. Monty the Mexican worries me though. What tech do I need in order to train Rednecks in Pickups to patrol my southern border?

I notice early all the piddly crap islands and at least have the sense to build a wonder that makes life easier:



I go to 1 AD to get 9 cities:







With elephants and more cities all is set for a catapult war on willem. But, I also have to settle all those crappy little garbage isles. Great.

Dial up WAR:





Brief break since maces kind of own swords/cats:



I get maces of my own and go again.



He has a tech lead. Good job, now lose anyway you crappy dutch with your overrated UB.



I get beat to liberalism. Who cares.



I'm currently pushing rifles (just got rifling) and cannon I will shuttle those to boudica shortly, who might not be able to react right away:



I settled a GG to get CR II cannons from my HE city in rapid succession. 2 Cottage cities, fishing village GP farms, rest is hammers.

I'll just war rifles/cannon until I need infantry, then upgrade to that. Infantry/arty can probably end the game for me.

355 AD: I start work on currency in the hope of improving my economy and just possibly getting a tech I can trade. I’ve launched an exploratory galley as well. It’s time to find out just how extensive this island chain is.
370 AD: Buddhism has shown up in my lands. I’m happy about that, as I’m starting to think buddying up with Monty might be the way to go. I won’t adopt it just yet, however. All the isolated peaks scattered across my land are annoying me now. I’ve had far too many volcanic events in recent games, and it’s making me sick of the sight of mountains.
445 AD: Miss Boudacious is almost done with currency. I’ll switch to metal casting in the hope of getting something tradeable.
580 AD: Augustus Ceasar shows up. Another AI with a huge tech lead over me, but more importantly, another Buddhist. Hmm.
655 AD: Saladin joins the party. He’s the founder of Hinduism – and the Hindus have just built the Apostolic Palace.
685 AD: A foolish mistake on my part. Whilst I’m not looking, Boudica lands next to the site of my intended next city and builds there herself. As I had a settler standing ready nearby, I could have prevented that by being a little more observant. I opt not to move for immediate war, however. I think I’ll be better served in the long run by locking down the rest of my land then acquiring that city. Furthermore, the brewing religious clash overseas means Boudica may have fewer friends later on.

850 AD: Darius shows up. Another Hindu and Monty’s worst enemy. My tech situation is laughably bad – I should have stuck with the currency research and focussed on getting my economy going. Maybe a little begging will get me back in the race? Nope, none of them are above cautious with me currently, and selecting a religion to change that may only dig me in deeper.
910 AD: It’s times like this you need a hero, and here comes the greatest of them all: Prof Einstein, we need your help!

There’s nothing to bulb that the AIs don’t already have, but a settled great scientist and a Golden Age from the great priest I’d been saving could put me on the road to financial security.
990 AD: I finally acquire currency and start work on code of laws. Still horribly far behind, but the land available to me gives me hope I can eventually catch up. Speaking of land, my wandering galleys have revealed part of the vast collection of tiny islands that make up a large part of this map. Although this does indeed suggest the Navy SEALs may prove useful, my main thought is that settling or fighting one’s way through here is likely to be a serious pain in the arse.

1110 AD: Once again, I’ve been unobservant and allowed Boudica to expand on my island. Not a big deal though. She’s still got lots of friends, but I’m almost at code of laws, and I’ll be sufficiently happy with my economy at that point to kick her back into the ocean.

1080 AD: I finally have code of laws. And even better, some of the AIs don’t! Saladin is my first target. He’s Monty’s worst enemy (and at war with him!) unfortunately, but the fact is, I need techs and I can’t be too fussy. Turns out Monty doesn't mind though - not a single negative diplomatic point in fact!

1090 AD: Boudica’s next up, and provides me with a few more useful techs. It would be poor form to declare on her immediately after she’s helped me out like that wouldn’t it? Nah!

1100 AD: 1 turn later, and my lands have been purified. Now let’s just hope she doesn’t hold a grudge about that whole city-razing thing…

Hmm, does Augustus know something I don’t?

I know some people don't like this script. I'm not a fan of B&S either.
But we didn't have a single water-heavy map so far in this series. And it's still better than archipelago garbage.

I've regenerated it a few times to get a "soft" version of B&S. It's basically a continent+pangaea, with the added small islands galore.

Lots of jungle - start thinking willem and i are alone but then meet monty. Put down Boston and Philly to block off willem. Quarry on the stone and built pyramids. This is enough to get a really solid tech rate. Refused a demand from monty and he goes into wheoohrn mode. Figure he's too far away to every send anything, but teching construction for war elephants just in case. Got willem up to pleased with religion. Used prophet to bulb theology. I founded both Christianity and Confucianism. Probably won't spread them at all unless i get another prophet.



Tech



The two holy cities



Here is what the capital looks like

1 Ad to 1900 AD was kinda a blur - didn't take enough screenshots. I won lib around 1150 i think and had a pretty good tech lead.

Waited pretty late to conquer the friendly willem. I think it was in the 1600's. Then it was just tech to space. Thought about going for domination but space is just so much faster (real time, not game time) Had a pretty good lead - waited too long to tech rocketry so got a really late start on apollo program.

I know i originally went for the UN when a look at the crazy map got rid of any thoughts of domination. I got the techs way before anyone else - had everyone at pleased except monty and caesar. I gifted monty the techs since no one liked him. Took him forever to build the thing. If he builds it and i get up to #1 in pop i would win - except Boudica was doing some conquering - she also capitalated an AI or two, so i had no shot to be #1 in pop anymore. I could have built it myself but didn't bother - couldn't win with it anyway. So i keep teching...

I demanded oil from Willem (didn't have my own source) and really wanted to go for navy seals and ships. The map was perfect for amphibious attacks. All the AI's could be defeated just by taking their coastal cities-enough to make them capitulate anyway. I started building an army but thought it would take too long. I was getting close to space at that point. My computer is pretty fast, only start to get a few seconds between turns at the end - but it usually is enough to keep me away from modern war.

Boudica declared on everyone on the turn i won. She was really big, but i could have held her off my island fairly easily.

She had just finished smacking around Darius - who prior to that was my only threat techwise. No one was even close to building the spaceship at the end because of that.



I had mining inc in all my cities - HQ in Amsterdam where Willem had put the Jewish shrine for me. Wall street was in there too. Tried 3 times to get Sid's Sushi - it never got founded this game. Couldn't get a merchant. First attempt was a low 40%, didn't get it. Then it was 58%, still didn't get it. Next time it was 80%, still didn't get him. Oh well. Ended up getting a scientist and an engineer that i used for a late golden age.

I played slow at the start cause i really didn't want to lose another MS game. After 500 AD or so i started playing really fast since i figured it was won already and i didn't have a lot of time to play this weekend. Ended up being around a 4 hour game total. It wasn't too poorly played but i still need to do some things better if i want to start winning more on emperor or even move up again. I always hate wins when i'm way down in power - they just feel cheesy. Even if it's a space win with a huge tech lead. I wish i had of taken my time more, and conquered the map. Monty and AC would have been easy to conquer right after willem. Then Darius would have been really easy after that. Just would of had to keep the other 2 AI's pleased/friendly with me, then pick one and conquer to win the game. I think that would have been more fun. Probably a fun map to late game war on - just needed to have the time to do it. I really enjoy games a lot more when i'm warring - or getting ready to start a war. Taking out Willem was great, but pretty easy and quick - that's all the warring i got this game unfortunately. Next game i'll make sure to have more than just 1 war.

I also could have finally tried to do a culture win, since i had 3 religions. My capital was like 25 or 30k culture at the end. I really wonder if i had of actually built cathedrals, and ran artists (and tried harder for that merchant for sushi) how fast i could have won with culture?? I might replay this and try it out - depending on what saves i have. Culture seems even more boring than space though, but it's something different anyway - i need to try it out sometime.

Settled 2S bagged a little bit of gold and a map from huts. Realised we were on an island with Wil and with lots of little islands around went for the GLh as well as most others after reading the spoilers. Also managed the Mids later. I had a wb out exploring so had mapped out most of the North islands which then went East to meet all the rest of the AI except 1.

Didn't seem any point taking Wil out while we had lots of land to settle so that will come later.

I'm only getting about 60 beakers per turn at the moment but I've nearly finished currency which will help a lot (Monte has just finished the SoZ so I'll get some cash from part building that). He has also just declared on AC so that should kleep them busy for a while. I'm also still in my settling phase but as there are so many islands to settle that could go on for a long time.

Regarding the GLh. It does make a huge difference on this type of map. Game breaking? Probably but I like winning. I'll certainly be building it in the next BOTM as well.

The plan was to get a watery map, but not very different from standard continents.
There are no civs starting on tiny island chains or small continents, so it shouldn't be any different from our traditional map scripts.

But probably the AIs see all the tiny islands and fail as if it was a standard archipelago.

The main issue with a map like this is not so much that the AI fails at the continents part but that they cannot take advantage of island trade commerce like a human can. AI simply is not coded to handle it well.

This is a picture of my Foreign Adviser's Info page at the end of the game. It's much more useful now that it shows trade commerce and really shows the glaring problem with the AI on such maps. Only real spoiler would be finding out the other AI's you haven't met really but just in case.

To understand this picture a bit better GLH has gone by the wayside due to needing to take Corporations so there is no longer any wonder cheese other than the UN Currency regulation and buying/whipping a lot of airports with the Kremlin. The difference is pretty astounding considering this is just trade commerce and does not include my cottage cities on the mainland. Also ignoring all the beakers from caste/representation scientists on massive food surplus one tile islands once all the whipping/buying was over.