Nobles' Club XC: Catherine of Russia

dalamb

dalamb

Deity
Joined
May 9, 2006
Messages
3,161
Location
Kingston, Ontario
The Nobles' Club series started out as a way for Noble-level (and below) players to improve their game. Most of the original participants now play at much higher levels, so this has become a way for advanced players to help others learn to play better. You can play your own game at any level and with any mod, but it would be nice to comment on the games of other players and give them advice.

Our next leader is Catherine of Russia, whom we last played in NC XI; we last played the Russians under Stalin in NC XCIV. The Russians start with Hunting and Mining.
Catherine.jpg
  • Traits: Catherine is Creative and Imperialistic. CRE gives +2:culture:, which means cities expand without needing a cultural building; it also gives faster colosseums, libraries and theatres. IMP means 50% faster productions of settlers, and doubles the rate of Great Generals.
  • The UB: The Research Institute, a Laboratory that gives 2 free scientists, which boost late-game :science: if you're going for a space race (or high-tech late game war).
    ResearchInstitute.jpg

  • The UU: The Cossack, a Cavalry unit that gets +50% versus mounted units. Cavalry are a powerful UU in their time period already, as Horse Archers are in theirs.
    Cossack.jpg
And the start:
start.jpg

Spoiler map details :
Hemispheres, default parameters.
Spoiler edits :
Placed the deer so we'd have a hunting resource. Ensured horses were somewhere reasonably nearby.
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 suggest that you update your progress at various points in the game, using the Spoiler feature of the boards. You can post as often as you like; here's one suggestion:
  • 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 didn't, 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)
This is just a guideline. If you're trying to improve your game, then posting more frequent updates, in as much detail as you can manage, is the best way to get suggestions from other players. If you come to what seems like a major decision and you want some advice, post an update, regardless of what game-year it is.

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 in the early days of the series, and all of you for playing.
Click to expand...
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 BUG MOD), select "Play Scenario", and look for "NC 99 Catherine Noble" (or Monarch, etc., for higher levels). You can 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.
Spoiler what's up with specific difficulties :
In each scenario file you can select your level of difficulty, but that doesn't give the AI the right bonus techs by itself. Use the Noble save for all levels at and below Noble. The Monarch save gives all the AI Archery. Emperor adds Hunting; Immortal adds Agriculture; Deity adds The Wheel.

For players on Monarch or above, you should add archery as a tech for the barbarians (if you don't, the AI will capture their cities very early). This cannot be done in the WB save file and must be done in Worldbuilder as follows:
Spoiler how to add techs to the barbarians :

  1. Zoom in all the way so you can't see the rest of the map.
  2. Use the CTRL-W key (or the menu) to enter the worldbuilder. Avoid looking at the mini-map in the lower right corner.
  3. By default you're in "player" mode (look in the box in the upper right; the icon that looks like a person should be selected). You'll get a drop down menu labeled with your leader's name. Barbarians are at the bottom, so cover the rest of the list with your hand if you don't want to see who else is on the map. Select "Barbarians".
  4. Select the "Technologies" tab in the box on the left.
  5. Find Archery (the arrow head icon; 8th row, 3rd column from the right) and click it.
  6. Exit the worldbuilder.
  7. Zoom out again after the map fades, and start playing.
Spoiler huts and events :
Note: The standard saves have no huts and have events turned off. If you want tribal villages and random events, choose the saves with "Huts" in their names. If you want huts but no events, select the Huts saves and use Custom Scenario to turn on the option that suppresses events.
 

Attachments

Will do this, but
Spoiler :
im just letting ya know that there is only one emperor save and it has huts :hide:
 
The Russian people had followed the Blue Circle for thousands of years, but finally realized "WTH? We're never going to catch that thing. Let's just stop here." And so they did, and Moscow was founded.
 
happyturtle said:
The Russian people had followed the Blue Circle for thousands of years, but finally realized "WTH? We're never going to catch that thing. Let's just stop here." And so they did, and Moscow was founded.
Click to expand...
:lol: Very clever...I like it. :)
 
Not giving away anything about the map, but... Historically blue circles aren't particularly trustworthy. Sometimes OK, sometimes not at all sensible. You just have to look at the map yourself.

There appears not to be an emperor no-huts save. I'll fix this after I've had a chance to check all the WB saves to make sure I didn't make a mistake with labeling any saves incorrectly.

Edit: A proper fix isn't going to happen tonight because I have visitors. If you need the "emperor, no-huts" save, you could consider taking the Monarch and adding Hunting to each of the AI with the worldbuilder. Zoom in as far as possible first to avoid learning too much about the map. Uh, I suppose that means trying not to catch the minimap out of the corner of your eye. ;)
 
happyturtle said:
The Russian people had followed ...
Click to expand...

:D :D :D :D

Blue circles can be hilarious, anyone see the post where the guy starts with 5 gold and the AI whispers:

"screw the gold, how about that whale to the east? I promise there will be fish"

there is never fish.
 
dalamb said:
If you need the "emperor, no-huts" save, you could consider taking the Monarch and adding Hunting to each of the AI with the worldbuilder. Zoom in as far as possible first to avoid learning too much about the map. Uh, I suppose that means trying not to catch the minimap out of the corner of your eye. ;)
Click to expand...
That's too much work and can be spoilerish.

Just a general FYI for anyone interested:

WB saves are simply text files.

  1. Open WB file in Notepad
  2. Fifth line down should read Calendar=CALENDAR_DEFAULT
  3. Now look at the next two lines below that, if you see something like Option=GAMEOPTION_NO_GOODY_HUTS
    Option=GAMEOPTION_NO_EVENTS    ,
    then huts and events are OFF.
  4. Add or remove those lines as preferred. http://i46.tinypic.com/zojbx2.jpg
 
happyturtle said:
The Russian people had followed the Blue Circle for thousands of years, but finally realized "WTH? We're never going to catch that thing. Let's just stop here." And so they did, and Moscow was founded.
Click to expand...

Awesome. :D

I probably won't have a chance to play this given my vacation starting on Monday (lots to do tomorrow, and I want to turn in early tonight). Looks like a strong production capital, though irrigating the corn might be a pain. Can we use a tundra tile for irrigation?

I'm thinking look for a strong commerce site nearby and use this for a unit/wonder pump, maybe watermilling it up for State Property craziness.
 
dalamb said:
Not giving away anything about the map, but... Historically blue circles aren't particularly trustworthy. Sometimes OK, sometimes not at all sensible. You just have to look at the map yourself.
Click to expand...

I like the worker suggestions. You'll be standing on a riverside green tile that you just finished chopping, ready to farm or cottage, and the blue circle will tell you to go and improve that other riverside green tile 3 moves away.
 
Have not yet begun with this map, but my first thought is to SIP and build a settler.

Settler over worker here imo because: 1) IMP; 2) PH-based capital for bonuse hammer; and 3) river for natural traderoute.

I will be glad if there is any resource towards northwest. If not, the second city could share the deer and work some cottages for the capital to prepare for the Bureaucracy takeoff.
 
...okay, hang going to bed early, this map was a blast.

Monarch, Normal Speed, No Huts/Events, 1802 Diplomatic Victory:

Spoiler :
Cathysaurus REX of course likes this production-heavy capital, so the early game is all about expanding southward. Cut off Pericles from my part of the continent with two central cities, then built everything else to backfill. Thanks to actually competently fogbusting this time, I didn't see a single barb unit (outside of a couple of Galleys) all game!

The REX got me about nine cities, including the Sugar/Corn site near Pericles's borders and the four hills/fish site right next door (workshopped over to become a crazy good HE/West Point city). Economy went in the crapper, but thanks to sheer production madness in Moscow I was able to build the Pyramids before the map's two Industrious leaders could pull it off despite not having stone. Our "continent" (I HATED that strait between the two) broke down into the Buddhist bloc with me and Pacal, with Willem and Pericles as the Jews. Beelined MT, then Lib'd Astronomy because Pacal was on his way there. Built Taj around this time, then ran three pretty close Golden Ages through GPs for a total of 48 turns of Golden Age all game (thanks, Mausoleum!).

Since nobody was really catching up to me, I just ran Cuirs all over Pericles, Willem, and Pacal, teching Communism before Rifling and building the Kremlin in Moscow because hells yes, historical accuracy. Spent some cash upgrading the Cuir horde to Cossacks and shipped them off to Egypt.

Big mistake: I took peace with Ramesses and assumed he had capitulated. He hadn't. I got about half of his cities, but when I got a notice that he had peacevassaled to Augustus (who was my buddy) I kind of freaked out.

But of course, it didn't matter. Moscow was ridiculous, Novgorod was ridiculous (I settled six Great Generals there), and I had Universal Suffrage to buy the UN. And my opponent? Oh yes.

CathysaurusREX_1.png


For a military-type game as a non-Industrious leader, I sure did spam a lot of wonders.

CathysaurusREX_2.png


Fun map! Thanks, dalamb.
 
Monarch, normal speed, no event no huts.
Played up to T85 (BC750).
Need some advice on tech path choice.
Detail in spoiler.

Spoiler :

As I decided previously, I SIP and went for settler opening. That turned to be beneficial imo because my scout found a sheep, a silver and another corn to the northwest along the river. At turn 17 St.Petersburg was founded 1N2W of the deer. Meanwhile the scout roamed around and encountered a scout from Pericles. He went south to find Greek border a dozen tiles away south of Moscow.

The immediate objective is to found two more cities to the south to block off Pericles. I've found some good city sites, just not sure whether I can outpace Pericles, or in other words, how far I can reach to the south.

The plan for the coming dozen turns is to:
1) grow both cities to size 3 to work all the resource tiles;
2) train several warriors during the growth to secure the path to south;
3) produce two settlers to head south.

The nobrainer early tech path has been: Agriculture-AH-BW, in order to:
1) enable our worker to develop our resources and to chop trees;
2) find horse and bronze.

I plan to switch to Slavery while the two settlers are on the road (one almost arrive, the other has just set out).

Beyond that, it might be wheel-pottery, for more commerce and more efficient whip. We have plenty of food in Moscow, and it's a pity not to abuse the IMP 2-pop whip settler. Granary is really needed and hooked silver gives 1 happiness.

And then it will be the writing, for half-price libraries. One in Moscow for the palace, one in St.Petersburg for the silver, some more in food-rich cities to open scientists slots.

*********

During the next 40 turns I follow the previous plan both in science and in production. I've perhaps made a little mistake to improve the PH sheep earlier than the corn in St.Petersburg. Otherwise everything goes all right. Two cities were founded to block off completely Pericles, Novgorod at a corn-marble-sugar site in BC 1840 (Turn 54) and Rostov at a pig-silk-greenhill site in BC 1680 (Turn 58). I avoided fish sites because I don't have fishing yet.

After writing (Turn 51 BC 1960) I turn off research to wait for the first two libraries. Meanwhile I also think about the following tech path. I finally decided to oracle Curency. I want to make a wave of expansion later to take advantage of the IMP trait and the two blocking cities. I count a total of 10 cities in the dotmap. The additional traderoute provided by Curency will be very benificial at this stage of the game (could make roughly +20% of the commerce), not to mention the hammer-to-gold conversion option. As for the Oracle, with marble that's a 75-hammer-to-600-beaker trade-off, with no other immediate need of hammer (land blocked, Pericles being quite peaceful neighbour, complete fogburst done). Although it's a little risky, but it worth the gamble.

*********

At turn 85 (BC750) several things have taken place:
i) my cash drops to zero;
ii) I finish to research math;
iii) Moscow finishes to build Oracle, to bulb Curency.

I used some tricks, as 2-pop whip overflow into wonder, and a waiting settler to save some maintenance. I should also thank someone in a faraway land for building the ToA, which gave me a tiny but important amount of failgold. So I'm very glad to succeed the Oracle gamble (T85 is quite late for monarch...).

Now at the F9 screen I'm in the middle for food, production and commerce, at the last for power, but already in first place for land and population, even I've just done 2-pop whip in two cities. Quite satisfying.

Next I will expand hard to abuse the IMP + Curency combo. Research will be set to 0% to wait for the first GS (11 tunrs) to build the academy in Moscow. I know with 8 hills Moscow could be a powerhouse for production, but I'm personally a fan of Bureaucracy commerce capital. And if you look carefully, Moscow has 12 riverside tiles, and only 1 non cottagable non resource tile (a PH). At size 13 it will work 9 riverside cottages and 1 silk, with still +7 food plus thanks to the 3 food resource. And the PH forest will help to add up to a total 11 base hammer, which is enough to build basic buildings - courthouse, temples, monasteries, aqueduct, and later univesity. Even if we won't be able to import new health resource, with what we have at hand we will be stagnant at size 16(deer borrowed out), with 1 silk and 13 cottages being worked. That's about 100 commerce under Bureaucracy and nearly 200 beakers with academy. Not to laugh at, umh?


While I wait for the GS, the research will be set on Fishing. I think even at 0% research, the beakers from the scientists will be enough for it. Afterwards we will have to make another tech path choice:

Sailing - Calender for galley + 2 happiness + ability to build Mausoleum;
CoL - Civil Service for Bureaucracy, Courthouse and possible Confuciusm (to note that our only neighbour Pericles has no religion now);
Monarchy for HR (important for capital but we can wait until we whip enough);
Aesthetics - Literature for the Great Library and National Epic (we have marble);
IW to discover iron (to adjust the dotmap);
Horseback Riding or Construction to prepare for war against Pericles (perhaps not optimal here because we have enough land to expand peacefully).

Also I should think about Pyramid. We don't have stone, and it seems to be several IND leaders on the map (the SH, the GW, the ToA, the Great Lighthouse all went quite early). With massive chop we could probably get it, but even with the 2 calendar resource, the Representation doesn't provide enough happiness for my super capital plan. I don't know whether it worthes the effort...



 
Loss 1932
Spoiler :

I attempted this map three times, on emperor normal, twice and empeor/epic once.

In my first attempt i blocked off perciles with the two city positions by the mountains, the corn/marble site and the fish/spices. But i didnt realise until i scouted him that he had enough land to get about 12-15 cities, by the time i was trying to master a force of drafted rifles/cannons he had tanks/infantry. And had a ton of techs

Second attempt i try to do the same thing with a crossbow push, but once again as i attack perclies he gets rifles, no good.

Third attempt i decide to chariot rush perclies, even though i get a ton of cities and im able to gain control of my cointent, there is a bunch of peace vassle crap in this map.
Pacal who was one of the reasons why i lost NC Shaka, once again, sat back on his ass buiding three cities and then peace vassled to welliam, who was number 1 in land and pop. Welliam had just about every tech in the game. I did manage to catch up when i got the the modern era however he was on his was to a culture victory.

On the other cointent, augustus ended up in a christian lovefest with rammy and monty, monty vassled to caesar, and rammy later peacevassled.

I decided to improve my econ and tech to nukes, so i can rush buy a bunch of ICBM's and take out Welliam/Pacal, however i notice that welliam is less than 15turns from culture, and has gone WHEOORN mode on me, im pleased with him so i buy a few turns of peace from a gold deal, then he declares.

I nuke amsterdam, the hague, and utrecht four times each, i take out his uranium/oil and i nuke pacal's capital, however its not enough, i dont have the sufficent tech for a direct offensive into his mainland, i dont have the techs for destroyers/subs, for my nuke paratrooper combo. I delay his victory by another 20turns, and im forced to take peace. but then augustus who is pissed at me for nuking his so called friend decides to dow on me with his cointent of vassles, and starts taking cities.

Even though i nuked william's three culture cities four times each he still gets the win.

The problem with this map, is that its not enough to block off percelies, because he will run away with the game if you do. It is also not enough to rush him because you will be too far behind, as what happened to me.

I thought about teching to archery and choking percelies, allowing me to get more cities, i also thought about a catapult/sword rush. But im not sure to be honest if either of these would work.

And next time i see pacal in a game, im turning off vassle states, im so sick of him, every recent game ive played that he was in, he built less than 10cities, and peacevassled, im so sick of this.Of course there was one time when he was friendly to me, after breaking away from william but nope he wouldnt vassle to me.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

AcaMetis
Nobles' Club 380: Darius of Persia
Replies
19
Views
816
pmarc
P
AcaMetis
Nobles' Club 379: Gilgamesh of Sumeria
Replies
19
Views
909
soundjata
soundjata
AcaMetis
Nobles' Club 377: Gandhi of India
2 3 4
Replies
67
Views
5K
Tecumseh1
Tecumseh1
AcaMetis
Nobles' Club 376: Cyrus of Persia
Replies
12
Views
2K
soundjata
soundjata
AcaMetis
Nobles' Club 378: Shaka of the Zulu
Replies
14
Views
989
pmarc
P
Back
Top Bottom