Conquering Caesar

My first attempt on Emperor level had ended pretty quickly - a half-hearted attack with Swordsmen against Musketmen provoked the ire of my neighbours who did me in pretty quick. A few more games at King level has restored my confidence, and hopefully refined my strategy. My experience has continued to show that the AI is weak in times of warfare which is all well and good while you're not technologically behind. So the plan is to push for early war, possibly in the classical era with Horsemen or Swordsmen or an early unique unit if my civ has one.



I draw Rome as my random civilization which dovetails well with my plan. Their Legion unit is a small upgrade over the early Swordsman. After moving to settle Rome a bit away from the unproductive mountains, I have quite a few nearby resources. In particular I want to get the early techs to improve the sheep and deer, Animal Husbandry and Trapping. As a bonus, I can check out if there are any horses nearby before heading down the tech tree to Iron Working.

I get lucky with my scouting Warrior exploring ruins the turn after settling giving me an early boost to my population. That scouting Warrior also finds my neighbour, Askia of Songhai is worryingly close. Fortunately there are horses between Rome and Goa, and my plan is to rush him with Horsemen quickly.

As I start researching towards Horseback Riding, I implement the Liberty social policy for quicker Settlers. I want to get 2 or 3 quick cities to produce a few Horsemen quickly when the tech comes in. By 2280 BC, I've settled two more cities, Antium and Cumae, by sources of horses.



Askia settles Tombouctu right between us - a prime target when I've built my army. He's been threatening me the whole time, laughing at my pitiful army and otherwise being annoying. By 1120 BC, I have an alliance with the city state of Genoa, started on the Honor social policy tree and have trained 4 Horsemen, 1 Chariot Archer and a few Warriors - enough for me to feel confident of my chances, and so I declare war on Askia.



Meanwhile I've discovered a few sources of iron, with the safest on the coast to the east, so I start up a Settler for there while the war begins.

A quick strike by my Horsemen capture Tombouctu. Unfortunately, Askia has more units in the area and the city is recaptured in his turn, costing me a Horseman. But the rest of my units close in and the city trades hands again. The city is to be razed; all the enemy units have been killed; the army rides on to Gao.

In 925 BC, just 6 turns after starting the war, I capture Gao, eliminating Askia. That war went extremely well; though it was helped by the fact that Askia spent a lot of production on the Great Library, now a fine addition to the Roman empire.



My happiness has dropped to critcially low levels: -10 which means I can't even settle my iron city. I research Calendar so I can improve the luxury resource tiles. When that's done, I settle Neapolis on the coast by the iron.

I've met Elizabeth, Catherine and Genghis Khan, and I know English lands are to the south, so my horsemen head down there to see if I can continue my conquering ways.

The ongoing plan now is to continue my conquering ways, growing my empire as much as possible while trying to manage my happiness which, of course, goes down with every conquered city. The plan is to only keep cities that have resources or happiness infrastructure and back-fill the gaps as happiness allows.

So as soon as my mounted army arrives on the English border, I declare war on Elizabeth in 675 BC.



Three Horsemen are enough to immediately capture Hastings. Then as my army moves on to Nottingham, Catherine also declares war on Elizabeth. She's also attacking Nottingham, and helps me out by eventually bringing it down into the red allowing me to capture it the following turn.

In the process I see Catherine's forces are fairly insignificant and the Russian cities must be close by, so if I can win this war with Elizabeth quickly, I'll be targeting Catherine next.

There's no resistance as my forces take York except for Elizabeth begging for peace. As the Horsemen advance on London, I finally hook up my iron in Neapolis and start on building Roman Legions.

I capture Elizabeth's final city, London, in 425 BC (10 turns of war); and as I prepare for the attack against Catherine, I begin researching towards Chivalry so that I can eventually upgrade my elite Horsemen.

I've also spent gold to form an alliance with Copenhagen for its fur luxury and iron resource; and have started constructing a lot of buildings in my cities, particularly the happiness buildings, Circuses and Colosseums.

I've found the Russian civilization is to the south-east of the old English civilization. With my happiness finally back to positive levels, in 300 BC I declare war on Catherine and my Horsemen ride in to immediately capture the Russian city of Rostov.



My horsemen then try to advance on to Novgorod just east of Rostov but across a mountain range. Only a single difficult pass traverses the range, and some careful manoeuvering is required to limit casualties to a single Horsemen. But the hit and run capabilities of the Horsemen eventually whittle away all of Catherine's Spearmen, and so Novgorod falls.

Both the Genoa and Copenhagen alliances run out at the same time and I only have the gold to renew the alliance with Copenhagen. Fortunately though, the size of my empire (which is all connected by roads into my trade network) means I'm bringing in a sizable sum each turn and it's not long before I can rebuy my alliance with Genoa.

I've obtained just 1 social policy in the Honor tree, and as the costs for social policies escalate with each city captured, I look at an alternative and so start Rome building the Oracle for its free social policy.

Meanwhile the Horsemen capture the northernmost Russian city of Yekaterinburg. I lose a Horseman while scouting out the rest of the Russian civilization, but the rest of the Horsemen take Moscow, the Russian capital, with no more resistance.

The 2 Legions I've built with my initial iron finally reach the front, giving my army a boost it didn't really need. The army consists of 3 Horsemen, 2 Legions and a Chariot Archer, and they advance on St Petersburg, clearing out a solitary defending Spearman.

It's not all good as even as I capture and raze St Petersburg, the Oracle is built in a faraway land, beating me to it by 3 turns. I'm also down to -12 happiness and desperately looking around for extra sources of happiness, hooking up and trading for luxuries as soon as I'm able.

Yaroslavl' is finally captured in 175 AD, eliminating Catherine after a 19 turn war.



Peace again, and since I don't even know where Harun al-Rashid or the recently met Washington of America and Genghis Khan of the Mongols are located, I use up one of the Great Generals that was produced during the war to trigger an 8 turn Golden Age. It's primary benefit is to push along the production of those happiness buildings and develop my new under-developed conquests.

With all the infrastructure already completed in Rome, I start building the Chichen Itza there (+50% Golden Age length), though I'm uncertain how many Golden Ages I can reasonably expect considering my happiness problems. Still, it's the best of the wonders still available.

Just as my Golden Age ends, I get the next social policy in the Honor tree, Military Caste, which reduces unhappiness in garrisoned cities. To help the happiness situation, my army disperses amongst the conquered cities.

And then an exploring Horseman finds the Arabian city of Damascus. Spotting that it has a low city strength, and with Chivalry having just been researched, I feel confident that I can quickly conquer Arabia. However I need to reassemble and rebuild my army, upgrade Horsemen to Knights and move them past the isthmus occupied by Monaco who is already unhappy with me.



But another vulnerable civilization; how can I resist? A Roman isn't cut out for the life of a farmer - there will be war again soon.

With Chivalry researched, I want Knights to continue my conquests. I'm in a bit of a construction phase as I build necessary happiness buildings as well as Barracks in my designated military cities like Cumae and Antium.

I soon have enough money to buy an alliance with Monaco and as units are being built they're shifted across that isthmus to the east. I meet Gandhi of India who inexplicably complains that my units are near his border while I don't even know where his border is?! Never mind; if his border is nearby, then his time will come shortly.

In 820 AD, happiness has reached a high of +18, Rome finishes the Chichen Itza (for 50% longer Golden Ages, should I ever get one), and I adopt the Professional Army social policy (-50% cost for upgrading military). I now start upgrading my old horsemen to Knights at a cheap 75g each.

I see Arabia now has Longswordsmen, a dangerous melee unit. I need to attack soon with overwhelming force. My army is slowly assembling east of Monaco. Harun Al-Rashid is concerned about my army on his western border. I bluff, claiming I'm peaceful, as I don't really care about my reputation anymore.

In 1000 AD, Genghis Khan declares war on Washington, while I declare war on Harun al-Rashid. The city states of Rio de Janeiro and Tyre are on Harun's side though I have little concern for them.



2 Knights and a Legion are enough to take the first city, Kufah, to be razed. As my forces heal up and reinforcements arrive, Arabian forces rush to defend Mecca. There are more defenders than I expected and I have to employ some tactical withdrawals, keeping out of Mecca's bombardment range to ensure I have decent odds against Harun's units. With the Discipline social policy bonus (+15% while adjacent to another of your units), Great General bonus (+25% within 2 tiles) and flanking bonus when I can, I whittle away at Harun's army. I have a few cases where a Knight barely survives, but by the time Harun's forces are exhausted, I haven't lost a single unit.

Meanwhile Washington loses his capital to Genghis Khan, and my happiness triggers a Golden Age (for 15 turns). It's time to start capturing cities and driving down that happiness again.

After 10 turns of battle out in the open, my army advances on Mecca itself. It consists of 6 Knights, 3 Legions and a Great General, with even more reinforcements on their way. Just 3 Knights and a Legion are needed to capture it.

The army then splits up to take the remaining Arabian cities. To the south, Damascus has cotton and spices for me - it's captured by 2 Knights. To the north, Medina has Stonehenge - and it's also captured by 2 Knights. Then, to the east, the cities of Najran and Basra are also quickly taken with 3 units each. Finally my army descends on Harun's final city of Baghdad which is captured in 1170 AD after 17 turns of war.



During the war, I've earned a Great Scientist and wasted it on Steel, thinking I could get Military Science with him. No matter; Knights seem sufficiently powerful for now. Also, Rome has built the Forbidden Palace (-50% unhappiness from number of cities), but after the Arabian conquest, I'm still left at negative happiness.

I've also spent money to get an alliance with Sidon south of Arabian lands. Although I've spied Indian lands to the east, I want to check out if there are any civilizations past Sidon.

In 1210 AD, with an army that includes 11 Knights massing on India's doorstep, I declare war on Gandhi.



Gandhi has a few units defending Delhi, his capital. As my Knights surround the city, his co-ordinated fire takes down one of my Knights. But his units easily fall and Delhi is immediately captured.

My happiness has dropped to -12. I plan to get all future Golden Ages through wonders and great people anyway, but at -10 happiness you take combat penalties. So I spend money rush buying Theatres and otherwise building more Theatres where I can, as well as the Notre Dame in London (for +5 happiness).

Some of the amry heads north to Vijayanagara and capture it two turns later, while the rest advance on Mumbai. During the attack on Mumbai, a Great General is born, to be used for a Golden Age when needed. I capture Mumba in 1270 AD, eliminating Gandhi after just 6 turns of war.



After a bit of resting up and scouting, I find Washington to the south of Indian lands, beyond the city states of Helsinki and Tyre. Not really what I need as Washington's already lost his capital; but an easy conquest I can't refuse and it might lead to the last civ, the Mongols. I spend money for an alliance with Helsinki to make moving my army there a bit easier (I still don't have Optics to enable my units to travel on water).

As my army begins to mass near Atlanta, I see Genghis Khan is still at war with Washington, and is busy attacking Atlanta. Even as Washington stoically defends against Genghis's assault he asks for assurance about the units on his border. I let him have the bad news as a I declare war on him in 1340 AD. I proceed to steal Atlanta from under Genghis Khan's nose, which eliminates Washington.

I can now see Genghis's American conquests to the south of Atlanta. I've also spotted a Mongolian city across a channel south of Sidon. While my eastern army trickles down to Atlanta and Boston, new units are diverted to Sidon. I finally research Optics so those units can cross the channel and put pressure on the Mongolian west. I've also researched Military Tradition and start upgrading my experienced Knights at 115g each.



My Golden Age from happiness ends, and I start a new 22 turn Golden Age with the Taj Mahal built in Moscow. With 6 Cavalry at the front and more incoming, I declare war on Genghis in 1370 AD.

He appears to have quite a few units, but they're mostly backward Archers, Horsemen and his unique unit, the Keshik. I quickly learn that Genghis has built the Great Wall (how ironic!) which limits the great manoeuverability of my Cavalry (movement inside his borders is slowed). So while I'm able to pick off his units with ease, my own units are left very vulnerable. Fortunately, they weather the counter-attack with just a few bruises.

After 3 turns of clearing out his defenders, my Cavalry stike at Boston and raze it. The army rides on south to Washington. Again my most forward Cavalry, despite being really vulnerable, survive the counter-attack from Genghis's forces. After a few more turns, I don't see any more Mongolian units and I safely capture Washington.

I capture, Turfan, the city across the channel from Sidon, but I have too few forces there to really exert any pressure. My eastern army splits up, hunting for the Mongolian capital. They capture New York and Tabriz in short order.

I see Genghis rallying the last of his forces at Beshbalik - he finally has a Musketman amongst his defenders. But with the size and power of my army, it just tramples them underfoot to capture Beshbalik.

They then spot Genghis's capital, Karakorum, and even my wounded Cavalry ride on to assault it. The most forward units, a Trebuchet and 2 Cavalry are enough to capture it in 1480 AD (turn 208), giving me a Domination victory; my first win on Emperor level and also, by far, my fastest victory of any kind on a standard-sized map.

This is the first time I've gone for almost continual warfare from the moment I got my first horses, and it's a strategy that the AI seems to be weak against as they just don't have enough defenders and are generally weak at waging war. Once you have a few cities conquered, your strength just snowballs, as your growing Empire gives you the finances and research to continue to wage an increasingly lopsided war.

If you've enjoyed this tale, go ahead and check my other tales on my blog:

• The Golden King
• Great Thebes