Nobles Club XLIV: Darius I of Persia

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cas

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Welcome to Nobles Club 44: Darius I of Persia. Fourth time hosting...NC41 Lincoln was a little rough for some people on a watery map, so I decided to go with Darius on a Great Plains map this time. I only made a couple of minor tweaks and chose 3 of the 7 AI rivals, so it is relatively unaltered. Yes, I added one AI to make it a little more crowded since the map has a lot of land. Used 'flat' setting...meaning all map borders (north/south/east/west) are not passable. For those unfamiliar with Great Plains...a general description:
Spoiler :
Mountains in the west with lots of hills and resources like deer, sheep, uranium, silver, gems, oil, dye, gold, incense, aluminum, coal. Plains cover a large (mid) section of the map where you will find resources including wheat, cow, stone, horse, copper, iron, oil, wine, and maybe a couple others. The plains start changing to grass/hills towards the east and grass-forests/jungle cover roughly the eastern 25% of the map with corn, pig, marble, deer, fur, sugar. There is always a small ocean in the SE corner with some seafood resources.


Darius I is Financial and Organized. Starting techs are Agriculture and Hunting. Financial gives +1 :commerce: on plots with +2 :commerce: and Organized gives -50% Civic Upkeep with double production speed of lighthouse, factory, courthouse. Very strong combination for larger empires.


His UB is the Apothecary, which replaces the Grocer and gives a bonus +2 :health:. In spoiler tags to save space.
Spoiler :


His UU is the very popular Immortal, which replaces the Chariot but also receives +50% versus Archery units. The Immortal description doesn't say 'no defensive bonuses' like the chariot, so I'm not sure whether it receives defensive bonuses or not...just noticed that. Either way, exceptionally strong early UU. In spoiler tags to save space:
Spoiler :


The start position:
Spoiler :



Finally, a cut and paste of our standard doctrine:

There are no hard and fast rules here: fun and learning are our primary goals, but we do request that you update your progress at various points in the game, using the Spoiler feature of the boards.

Tentative posting updates are suggested at:

4000 BC (starting thoughts, no spoiler required for that discussion)
1000 BC or so (how you decided to progress up the early tech/build paths, which AIs you have met, where you're thinking of putting cities, etc)
500 AD or so (after establishing some cities and a possible plan of action)
1200 AD or so (mid-game, Lib race, wars or peace, or whichever happened or didnt, met other continent if applicable, etc)
1600 AD (or when you have decided on a course of action and a specific victory condition)
End of game (Victory!!! or defeat, no shame in losing, especially if you tried a higher level. Learning is what we focus on, not fastest win or biggest empire)

Remember, these are only guidelines. What we really want are your thoughts as the game goes on, so if your strats don't fall into line with those dates, feel free to adjust your reports accordingly.

We also welcome players to ask for specific game advice, as we have a number or stronger players who lurk and help out with solid tips, and of course, we help each other. Replies to specific questions should also be in spoilers, with a simple "@" in front of the person the answer is directed towards.

Special Thanks go to Bleys and TMIT, who really made this series a great one, r_rolo1, mapmaker extraordinaire, for his maps for most of the series, and all of you for playing.

The WB-saves are attached (zipped; they are bigger than standard saves). To play, simply download and unzip it into your BTS/Saves/WorldBuilder folder. Start the game, and load your favorite MOD (if you use one, if not, check out the BUFFY MOD), select "Play Scenario", and look for "NC44 Darius Noble" (or Monarch, if you want the AI to start with its usual Archery bonus tech, or Immortal for AI receiving Immortal start techs). This allows you to play with your favorite MOD at the Level and Speed of your choice. From Quick-Warlord to Marathon-Deity, all are welcome! We stuck with the name "Nobles Club" because it has a cool ring to it. Huts and Events are turned off by default...you can turn back on events if you want...not sure about the huts once the wb file is generated without them.

Let me know if there are any problems with the saves.

View attachment NC44 Darius wb files.zip

Good luck!
cas
 
I don't think I've ever played a great plains map, looks fun :)

I'll probably send the scout 2S1W to see what's around that river if anything and settle accordingly.

I do get bored of fractal, looking forward to playing this one.
 
I've lurked a bit on the forums, decided to try a Noble's Club game. I'm fairly new to Civ4, but I've got a basic idea of what I'm doing... Or at least I think. I'm not 100% sure what is kosher for posts so I'll keep my thoughts in spoiler form only unless noted otherwise.

4000 BC
Spoiler :
Moved my scout up north to do some minor exploring before settling my city. Found the extra cow so I settled NW1 from the starting location. Based on the start I'm going to take animal husbandry off the bat and put those cows to work.

 
975 BC
Spoiler :
I thought I made a great play picking up the extra cow in my capital... After a bit of exploration I have to ask myself how many cows are on this map? There isn't a shortage of food for this one... Anyways, I settled my second city grabbing some additional cows and some wheat as well as my third city to grab some copper. I debated about Immortal rushing the Mayans but I figured by the time I got my troops there in good supply, they'd have some Holkan's to just ruin my fun. They're part of my religion so the main military focus will be on Kublai Khan, west of the capital.



25 AD
Spoiler :
I waited an extra turn for the screenshot so I could finish conquering the Mayans. It turns out not too long after the 975 screenshot and recording update that they convert religion to Buddhism, and start to get uppity with me. Yeah... Anyways, I used Immortals with Flanking I and II with Axeman with City Raiding I and II. While the war was a bit longer then I projected, they went down pretty easy. Made out with a killing in early wonders. Turns out the Mayans had been busy producing some wonders... Stole Stonehenge and the Temple of Artemis from Mutal and the Greatwall from Lakamha. Looking back, I should of put it up to a higher difficulty. Next time I'll be wiser.

 
....
....
....
Garbage...

Spoiler :


First of all, this map type sucks. One leader gets starts like ours with minimal food, and others get super gold + copper + horses. Then, I lose 5+ immortals at 50% odds IN A FREAKING ROW when rushing Kublai. RNG= Random Nonsense Generator. I will not retry cause I really don't enjoy this map type. It's all plains garbage. Give me a fractal map any day of the week.

 
^ cas, Immortals do get defensive bonuses, which is one of the things that make them really good.
 
BigTime said:
....
....
....
Garbage...

Spoiler :


First of all, this map type sucks. One leader gets starts like ours with minimal food, and others get super gold + copper + horses. Then, I lose 5+ immortals at 50% odds IN A FREAKING ROW when rushing Kublai. RNG= Random Nonsense Generator. I will not retry cause I really don't enjoy this map type. It's all plains garbage. Give me a fractal map any day of the week.

Click to expand...

Spoiler :
Ok I'm in agreement now, lack of food makes Financial pretty much useless here, and I lost 5 immortals to 75% odds in KKs capital. A food source being a desert hills sheep is pretty ridiculous, tech rate must be terrible on this map type :(
 
Great plains is playable on most difficulties. I haven't even looked at the map yet, but I see a severe flaw in the map without needing to do that:

The map is great plains, and yet only 1 extra AI was added to compensate what is likely ~20-40% more land than a standard map with water. What this does is give more room. When the playing field is relatively level, the AI suffers too and it's all ok. However, when one tries a map like this on immortal, you see multiple AIs put up 20+ cities and have no trouble footing the bills to do it. If one AI wins a war, it's about 40 cities. Yes, if you hurry, you might get 12-15, but then you run out of money...and that's IF you're lucky, since obviously the land might be poor enough quality to stop you before that.

The only approaches I can think of that come close to being competitive on high levels is bulb (hopefully you can find 1 good spot) out to communism + bio and rampage then or do 6 city culture (it's not hard to get 6 cities when everyone can get like 25). If the AIs are nice, the latter will win as the AI has no idea how to adapt and it will win more slowly. If you get spanked by early war it will be very hard to come back.

But yes, generally giving the AI 2x land for what amounts to free is a garbage setup, but I'll see what I can do with it.
 
Map Observation:

First guess: we are in the north west of the map with hills and moutains to the left and a hugh plain to the right and down. There will be tons of cows and little trees in this area (unless you expand into the mountains). Other guys are pretty far apart (even with +1 AI) and if you want do Immortal rush, looking for a neighbor to the SE, most likely. Rushing 2 AIs will be hard due to the distance and you'll have a lot of Barb problem.
 
Did you add Archery to Barbs for the Monarch save? It didn't seem to be added?
 
Noble/Marathon

Spoiler :
I normally play on quick but I've been hearing that warmongering is a lot easier with Marathon. I wanted to get maximum use out of the Immortals. It was easy, stupidly so. :/



Guess I need to move up to Prince if I play Marathon.
 
nona_mouse said:
Noble/Marathon

Spoiler :
I normally play on quick but I've been hearing that warmongering is a lot easier with Marathon. I wanted to get maximum use out of the Immortals. It was easy, stupidly so. :/

Guess I need to move up to Prince if I play Marathon.
Click to expand...

Wow, that is easy. Can you give us a score check please?
 
@TMIT
TheMeInTeam said:
Great plains is playable on most difficulties. I haven't even looked at the map yet, but I see a severe flaw in the map without needing to do that:
...However, when one tries a map like this on immortal, you see multiple AIs put up 20+ cities and have no trouble footing the bills to do it. If one AI wins a war, it's about 40 cities.
Click to expand...

Wow. Such overstatement without even making your attempt. You must be in politics. :lol:

Spoiler :
I ran through deity/quick up to the point most of the land was settled except some SW mountain area. I did not build additional cities...just the GWall and some mech inf to stave off attacks. The average city count of the AI was 8. With my border expansion in the capital, maybe that could be considered = to 4 cities land area for me. With the AI expanding into the remaining SW territory...overly generous average would be 9/AI. That's about 70 total cities on the map. Period.

With war, that could easily lead to 1-2 AI with 15-20 cities. But multiple 20ish and 40+ cities ? Really ? Maybe ONE AI civ will run away with it and have 30ish cities after war...OR maybe two AI will have 20ish.

You make it sound like every AI will have 15-20 cities and some will have more like 40. Complete overstatement. But post your end-map and show me I'm wrong.


On a separate note @ BigTime
Spoiler :
can't help the bad RNG rolls with 50%+ odds. I will be the first to say is sucks. However, your point about the AI city with gold/horses/copper is taken as I obviously added the horses. But it was not the AI capital, must have been his second city. On emporer- diff it would not have been settled so quickly. And your gripe about financial is valid to a point, but you also have organized which allows for more cities with less upkeep, although they will probably be lower population in general with all the plains.


cas
 
lymond said:
Did you add Archery to Barbs for the Monarch save? It didn't seem to be added?
Click to expand...

I don't think there is a way to add archery to barbs with a wb file. It has to be added after you start because the barbs are not in the wb file where you can add it ? That is my understanding.

So the answer is no, because I'm not sure how to do that in the wb file.

cas
 
Cool. I'd make a note of it in your intro. It seems you could add it and then save the WB file again, but I've never setup a game for the forum before.
 
cas said:
Welcome to Nobles Club 44: Darius I of Persia. Fourth time hosting...NC41 Lincoln was a little rough for some people on a watery map, so I decided to go with Darius on a Great Plains map this time. I only made a couple of minor tweaks and chose 3 of the 7 AI rivals
Click to expand...
Just noticed this... I've ran the game 'till 1AD and I confess that when meeting the AIs I went from "oh noes !" to "oh noes !" :lol: But I made friends with the baddest, so I guess it's alright for now !
What 3 did you choose, if you don't mind telling ?


So... I've played this on Emperor, normal speed.

4000 B.C.
I'm not used to low-food starts but my starting plan was to settle many cities (Organized !) but small ones working a few farms and a few cottages (Financial !).
Bronze Working would not be a priority, once is not usual. Here is the reasonning : with low food, I'd rather not whip. On the other hand, Pottery is a priority to grow cities faster. On a sidenote, finding horses is a military alternative to BW.
From the starting point screenshot : I'd like to have the gems in my capital city, if possible food wise. Thus, I started pausing the settler for a turn and moving the scout up to the gems to see what's on the other side of those mountains (food ?).
Techs would go either Mining first, or AH.

Spoiler :
Up to 1000 B.C.
- So... Seeing the floodplains, I settled 1W and went for Mining then AH.
- Persepolis built a worker that would farm the F. Plains (then mine the gems and build a pasture for the riverside cows).
- Techs then went The Wheel, Pottery.
- 2800B.C., Persepolis reaches size 3 and switches from warrior production to settler.
- Techs --> Writing and start Alphabet.
- By 2240 B.C., my Pasargades would be founded in Food Heaven. Wanna know how ? I found it funky...
Spoiler :

- I then needed a worker and some more warriors (time to grow Pers to 4). Well, I had the 3rd city a bit late, by 1880 B.C., on the "Cottages" spot. No whip and only 1 chop makes a difference..
- 1600 B.C. Oh ! Of course, I've met the neighbours ! So we're stuck East-West between to Creative leaders (uck !), one of them being Protective and the other a treacherous warmonger with a dreadful UU ! To the South, Pacal and Justinian know how to REX, and Pacal has an Immortal-proof, resourceless UU, great ! Fortunately, both of them founded a religion and Justin started spamming the world with missionaries. No, I won't try to rush them !
This would make 40+% of the world pop being Hindu and Pacal the hated guy. Good for me ! So... from now on, I'll try to be friend with the Khan and with Shaka.
1600 B.C. ? Bad surprise and good surprise : Kubilay discovers Alphabet 3 turns before me, but he is willing to trade it for Pottery (yay !). He and Shaka are bribable into war (another yay !).
- Now I'll skip some events. I made some trades (Meditation, IW, Masonry), beelined for Monarchy and ordered 2 settlers. Gilgamesh is the major techer : he'll have Monarchy 6 turns before I do.
--> By 1000 B.C., I've got those 5 cities, space starts to be lacking and I lurk towards Pacal lands. I hate that they're in the middle of the map, though. I guess it's better to fight Holkans than Keshiks or Gilgs' troops.
--> 900 B.C. Monarchy : Revolt to Slavery and Hereditary Rule. Adopt Hinduism.
--> 500 B.C. 1st to Currency, starts a Feudalism beeline, aiming for Guilds.
Just then happens a fun thing : Pacal declares war on me but doesn't send many troops in my territory. The Khan of Keshiks is bribed into the war with Currency (he'll actually take a city, then lose it). Shaka refuses the bribe but soon engages his armies as well.
This allows me to safely found 2 new cities, capture 1 from Pacal and... and now it is 1A.D. I've with Feudalism in my hands, horse archers, and my first longbowmen are coming online, eager to fight swordsmen. I'm aiming for Mutal.
6th in land, 2nd in pop, 4th in army.

Here are the city locations.
Spoiler :
Here there are the first 3 cities, one that grabs iron, a small cottage plantation to its east to fill the space, and up north, I think I will farm it for production.


2 more cities in the south. West, it grabs 2 gold, 2 silver. I don't think it will be able to hold the 2 floodplains from Kubilay, though. East is Pacal's city and my would-be-a-stack-to-take-Mutal. The Khan and Shaka made peace with Pacal so he'll quickly be able to reinforce this 60% protected city, although he has less troops than me. Dunno how I should go about it. Suffer losses, I guess !


I'm not sure of my plans from there. Taking on Kubilay probably is the most secure thing to do. Or I could just wait that he declares war on me. He and Gilgamesh have some nice resources and probably better land than me so... a bit of warring with military tech superiority should do fine.
Guilds some 40 turns away (I can hurry this with scientist, of course). If I get my 9 cities, I'll need time for infrastructure, so the timing may be ok. Construction should be tradable by then...

Thoughts ?
 
@ BornInCantaloup

Spoiler :
Khan, Shaka, and Hannibal. I liked the random (other) 4 AI for various reasons and did not switch any start positions. I chose Hannibal because he always seems to give me problems, and becomes a mid-late powerhouse.


cas
 
Monarch / Normal 4000BC -> 25 AD

Spoiler :
Settled 1E for gems in BFC, after initial scouting around thinking despite being financial there's going to be a whole lot of farms and mines. Horses grabbed by 2nd city, will want to rush a neighbour to get a little more space, Kublai seems to have some nice land to expand into in terms of resources + flood plains to enable working them, so I build 10 Immortals. Sadly due to more close odds wins than losses I arrive at Karakorum with 4 Immortals and he has a spear + archer >.> Not fancying those odds I take peace for Masonry and build more Immortals, took two cities and raised one in the initial attack, the second time round I raise two and keep one. There's a barb city on my borders I plan to take and keep, then I can expand south from the old Mongol land and tech up a bit for some more conquest.

 
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