Monarch Student XXI - Montezuma

Settled gold/fish city to the NE early to block Zara, but Hannibal stole the sheep city to the W.
5 cities and room for 3-4 more.





Hannibal settled Thaenae, but in the following turn:



GLib:



Capital still recovering from 3-pop whip to finish the Great Library. I'll build the Nat Epic here:



Diplo is tricky. Zara is jewish and Hannibal is Hindu. Hannibal seems pretty weak in this game, so I think I'll join the jewish block.



And techs:

4000 BC - Scout got 45 gold from hut
4000 BC - Settler moved to plain hill, got scout from hut
3960 BC - Tenochtitlan founded, starting on worker and agriculture
3840 BC - Scout found a map in a hut
3800 BC - Contact with Zara Yaqob
3720 BC - Scout found 49 gold in a hut
3600 BC - Discovered Agriculture, started the wheel
3520 BC - Scout defeted a lion, 28 HP left, 1 xp gained
3480 BC - Lost scout to another lion (maybe healing was better)
3480 BC - Contact with Hannibal
3480 BC - Worker done, growing to size 2 building a warrior
3440 BC - Scout found 45 gold in a hut
3400 BC - Scout defeated a lion, 15 HP left, 1 xp gained
3240 BC - Discovered the Wheel, started mining
3240 BC - Tenochtitlan grown to size 2
3200 BC - Warrior done, need advice for next city

Screenshot:

Why the wheel before mining BW? BW is a key tech, that should not be ignored, and is needed early.

After thinking about it a bit i move 1S looking for greener land. I almost went 1SE, really glad i didn't since those 2 tundra would have been in the BFC and i would have had to move back. Started off going AG-mining-BW

Detoured to masonry i think after wheel but before pottery-AH. I blame this on the AI not starting with it's usual 2 scouts. I didn't meet Zara or Hannibal until turn 20 at the earliest. My initial scout died before seeing Hannibal, and my warriors didn't reveal that they actually were both pretty close until i was almost done with masonry. So i build TGW, which might have kept me from getting another city site. It wasn't that bad though - would have had to fight a few barbs, and the GP points never hurt.



This was at really low odds - popped scientist rather than spy. I think i only ran 2 scientists there for 3-4 turns so it was lucky. I decide to settle him instead of the academy - not sure which would actually have been better.



Raze this barb city as i am hurting for cash. I adopt Buddhism since Zara is near and Hannibal is NSR right now. I'll switch if hannibal takes something different.



Get Aesthetics and do some trading. Hannibal converts to Buddhism - the Hindu block won't like me, but with my two immediate neighbors Buddhist i should be much safer from getting declared on. Close borders might keep Hannibal from getting pleased soon though. No one has a worst enemy yet that i know of.





5 turns to COL but i might switch it. Vicky doesn't have currency yet so maybe i could go med-priesthood and trade for monarchy. 2nd GP due in 4 turns so i could bulb philosophy in 7 turns probably if i went COL-med. I have a settler hanging out in the desert since i will probably put a city there for the iron/incense even though it has no food. I also haven't settled the marble. It's getting late but i could do poly-lit and take a shot at TGL. So basically i need med/poly/lit/COL and need to figure out what order i want. Probably will put off on an academy since the phil. bulb will help much more i think. Of course i might end up with a spy in which case i could infiltrate zara or AC. De Gaulle didn't play diplo very well - he's in the Hindu block but somehow managed to get 3 worst enemies. Better him than me. He's also behind in tech, and getting ready to attack someone. Probably won't last too long.

See no reason to stay in place it all looks like forest and there is a river to the south for a net loss of probably nothing and a game of a levee and more river tiles. Annnnnnnnd….



Unless something pops in that NW plains tile I don’t think I could possibly regret doing that. Grow to happy cap after training a worker followed by warriors and send a settler towards the isthmus to the NE. 1S is better long term by quite a bit but this city is more just to work the gold early and stop Zara from coming in so I don’t really care if it’s an awful city later on.



Snag the sheep/river city to the west and discover both horses and copper in the capital’s BFC AND I’m Monty AND this is Monarch level maintenance costs of cities and units. 3 city axe rush?!



Yes. Yes it is.



How am I building nothing but units and yet deficit researching? Well lets see what happens when you chop/whip barracks before math!

Chop/Whip 1

Chop/Whip 2

Chop/Whip 3


I didn't get full returns even and I think I’m hooked. 1 point of pop and some unhappiness is definitely worth that much gold. Every city is an above average yield gold hut. As for the war, aggressive means axes and spears can get cover (+archer damage) with just a barracks and Hannibal had nothing but archers and only 2 hilled cities. The war went quite well. Here’s his capital going down a couple turns into it. A few more turns and reinforcements and I own all I think 5 of his cities. A few cities are very marginal but whatever. They can build wealth and/or work cottages and his capital is my short term GP farm now that the motherland unhappiness is gone.



Hammurabi was my worst enemy and was roughly equal in power. Nothing I want to deal with right now potentially, and at the time I was building religion diplo with Augustus (always like him happy), so lets cheer this sourpuss up!



As far as building wealth currency is in so lets see how bad this looks.



Not too bad. Still have not opened borders with Zara as while the land to the north sucks pretty badly I’d still rather settle it over letting him annoy me. It seems only Victoria and Hammurabi are to my west so I could get a subcontinent to myself later if I can keep him out. After trading around currency and finishing CoL I stop for now. Well after acquiring some help for when I push west against those silly English knigits.




I did get the religion as well. Thinking recover economy by getting down the UB, maybe settle some of the desert, and then cats/elephants into Victoria perhaps. Need to scout her land to see if it's worth it. Oh also HE and NE need to go down asap regardless so probably backtrack to Aes/Lit either before or after CS. Thinking before right now.

Hi after a lil bit of slowdown last cpl of weeks cuz of finals, recovery from finals, graduation (yay!!! ). graduation parties, recovery from graduation parties (kinda enforced due to two week grounding although I think a curfew on grad night is TOTALLY unrealistic not to mention unfair but I digress...) I havent played as much but now I have a lil time Im giving this a try.

I scooted settler down to river then settled cap. Early build order was scout, worker worker barracks warrior warior settler, warrior, settler. Early tech order was ag, mining, bw, wheel, iw, ah.

Extra scout was kinda of a waste cuz I didnt get all that many goody huts but they did scouted out land pretty good before they got eaten. I met Hanni, Vicky, Zara, and Hammy. I saw Hanni is nearby. ANd since he is ALWAYS a pain for me as soon as I got some units going:



Took his cap and a cpl other cities and razed the rest just cuz I couldnt afford em. By the time Hanni got booted out of game my economy is a wreck but I have ALL these units and I AM playing monty and Zara seem to be getting a lil big for his britches so:



He is next.

As you can see from the screenies I am at zero beakers and still havent even finished AH

My empire:



Demos:



As you can see it a MESS already. hammers are sucky and economy is in SERIOUS need of a bailout.

Tech sitch:



Doesnt look like Im gonna be trading my way out of the hole anytime soon. I guess plan right now is just keep pumping units and razing cities and building cottages and HOPEFULLY work my economy out of whole by time I clear Zara and maybe vicki off the land mass. Not sure where hammy is but I think he might be somewhere behind zara.

SO it just TRYING to some how keep one step ahead of a strike and somehow recover. NOOO idea how to do that but maybe it will work out. Wish me luck

Beat on Vicky, and buy peace for techs, while razing her cities.