SA 1 - Pericles - Staline - Saladin - Hannibal

STALIN of RUSSIA, starting techs are hunting and mining



STALIN is industrious/aggressive
industrious : Wonder production increased by 50%. Double production speed of Forge.
aggressive : Free Combat I promotion of melee and gunpowder unites. Double production speed of Baracks and Drydock.

its UB is RESEARCH_INSTITUTE a Laboratory that gives 2 free scientists, which boost late-game if you're going for a
space race (or high-tech late game war).


its UU is COSSACK a Cavalry unit that gets +50% versus mounted units. The Cavalry are a powerful UU in their time period alre
ady, as Horse Archers are in theirs.

SALADIN of ARABIA, starting techs are mysticism and the wheel



SALADIN is protective/spiritual
protective : Archery and gunpowder units receive Drill I and City Garrison I automatically. Double production speed of Walls
and Castle.
spiritual : No anarchy from civics or religion changes. Double production speed of Temples.

its UB is MADRASSA a Library that gets double and can run two Priest specialists. Extra culture is always a good th
ing (especially on an early building that doubles its culture after 1000 years), and the Madrassa can also help fuel a prophet-based
economy if you feel like doing something different.


its UU is CAMEL_ARCHER a Knight with no resource requirement and an innate 15% withdrawal chance. It's generally regarded as
one of the weaker UU's since Guilds is often a backfill tech for many players, but if you don't have Horses or Iron, it can be used
to secure those resources for a later Cuirassier or Cannon rush.

PERICLES of GREECE, starting techs are fishing and hunting



PERICLES is philosophical/creative
philosophical : Great People birth rate increased by 100%. Double production speed of University.
creative : +2 per city. Double production speed of Library, Theatre and Coliseum.

its UB is ODEON a Colosseum that gives +2 instead of +1, 2 free artists slots, and +3 - a nice boost if you're going for
a cultural win.


its UU is PHALANX An Axeman with +100% defence against chariots, the usual bane of axemen.

HANNIBAL of CARTHAGE, starting techs are fishing and mining



HANNIBAL is financial/charismatic
financial : +1 on plots with 2
charismatic : +1 :happiness: per city. -25% XP needed for unit promotions. +1 :happiness: from Monument and Broadcast Tower.

its UB is COTHON a Harbour that costs an extra 25% (100 versus 80 on Normal speed) but gives +1 trade routes. Great
for a Trade Route Economy (TRE), especially with the Great Lighthouse and perhaps the Colossus (although as it's obsolete with Astr
onomy it's window may be very small depending on the map).


its UU is NUMIDIAN_CAVALRY a Horse Archer with +50% versus melee units, unfortunately its base strength is 5 instead of 6.

Standard map
Pangea
No edits.

Zoom in all the way so you can't see the rest of the map.
Use the CTRL-W key (or the menu) to enter the worldbuilder. Avoid looking at the mini-map in the lower right corner.
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".
Select the "Technologies" tab in the box on the left.
Find Archery (the arrow head icon; 8th row, 3rd column from the right) and click it.
Exit the worldbuilder.
Zoom out again after the map fades, and start playing.

- Moving my scout to the hill north it revealed cows and I settled one east for a food rich capital.
- research started agriculture, then animal husbandry to get some food hooked up.
- while researching these, scout moved in a westerly circle identifying a peninsula. I popped mining from a hut on the peninsula (huts on). Scout was then sent back to the northeast where I found Ceasar on turn 16 up north. Also met Survey-man. Finished husbandry on turn 23 which shows:

- horses to the north near Ceasar, and though I'm still exploring I want those horses.
- scout is now moving east, curving towards the south. Turn 33 I met Pacal and had a map of the east including Survy's land. I identified my next two city spots with the horses in the north a priority.

- you can see my settler about to finish on T34, he was sent to the horse city along with warrior1 as an escort. Worker started a road that direction.
- after settler I built another worker in the CAP then a warrior, followed by a settler for the city marked as bureau for it's future commerce potential.
- after AH I started Writing but switched towards archery with the thought of choking Sury. This was a mistake as Sury had already soaked up the best land easterly by the time an archer got there. So I scrapped the choke plan, not really any land to kick him out of at this point. Worker steal is a possibility if a stack of workers shows up but not a priority.
- snapshot at turn 51:

- Planning on using the capital as a worker/settler pump until I have slavery then using it as the whipping post. It will probably end up as the NE.
- Damascus will get cottaged for commerce/research. I will possibly move the capital there unless a better site is found.
- Medina will pump military for now.
- I'm headed towards alphabet hoping to get there in time to trade writing. Sending the warrior2 to the northwest for more exporation. Need more workers, lots of improvements to be made and I currently only have two workers. Capital is improved to employ 5 citizens though, and roads are built to connect. I've identified a few filler cities between me and Sury, might be able to snag those other horses but there's no food source there so I don't see it as a priority.

No reason not to SIP. Went BW first to do a WB->worker whip opening. All those forests and decent early commerce thanks to the financial trait begs for a Numidian rush. Early tech path was:

BW->agriculture->wheel->AH->pottery->writing->HBR (900BC)->hunting->archery

Of the three horses that were revealed only the most distant one near Augustus is worth settling, which means building a settler at size 2. Having to settle a city with horses and literally nothing else instead of that excellent location (plains hill between horses and cows, excellent early production) would be a very poor start.

Shaka declares on Augustus in 1250BC, making the HA rush even stronger. Praetorians would normally stop an HA rush in it's tracks, but now the ones he manages to produce will be tied up (in fact I end up having to kill only a single wounded Praet). He also turns out to have only one source of Iron that can be pillaged on turn 2 of the war, and no bronze. There is really no hurry.

In 650BC I trade HBR to Lizzy for Alpha, having put a couple turns into it. I also get IW, myst/poly/priesthood, and sailing, which are also brokered for gold once Currency is completed (50AD, it also nets me Monarchy).

Because the capital has too much food it actually starts running 2 scientists as soon as the library is built, while still getting it's barracks and stables built. This allows me to bulb Maths in 525BC. A third city was settled 1N3E of the capital, it gets good production, claims more forest, and occasionally whips when it approaches size 5.

With many forests pre-chopped I declare war on Rome in 450BC with enough Numidians to take the first two cities and pillage his iron from the north. I won't bore you with too many details, pretty standard stuff. 5 cities total are taken, all strong enough to keep. I left Rome, the most heavily garrisoned city, to the end. Augustus built Stonehenge there, very thoughtful of him considering we're charismatic I kill him off completely by taking Rome in 25AD, and this is when the interesting part actually begins.

With regular HAs this would probably be where I stop. But Sury has been building wonders left and right. I nor anybody else traded HBR to him, so he has construction but still can't build his ballista elephants. He'll waste a good many hammers building catapults that never attack. He still doesn't have Feudalism. And here I am with 20 highly promoted Numidians that'll cut through his metal units and 5 captured cities all with forests to chop. His gems city can be captured on the second turn of the war, his capital on the third. He has no more than 5 units in any of his cities. He even builds the Apostolic Palace a turn before I'm ready, in a religion he's been nice enough to spread to most of my cities no less. This all adds up to me declaring on him in 225 AD. I split my stack he's caught with his pants down:



In the two turns it takes to get within striking distance of his capital he is only able to re-inforce with chariots and a single spearman:



Check out the sweet odds:



Better than 50% survival. His capital is very, very nice:



And from there on I barely even need to stop to heal, taking 3 of his last 4 cities in a handful of turns (one of which is razed). Which is important because the next AP vote is obviously to stop the war and I don't want to defy the resolution. So in 450 I leave Sury with his worst city and make peace:



Unfortunately only 1 AI has Feudalism at this point so I can't trade for it and capitulate him. Nobody will trade me Masonry, either, so I can't make Sury give me construction for peace. But that doesn't really matter. Again because our capital has way too much food I was running 2 scientists there for pretty much the entire war, allowing me to bulb Philosophy as a monopoly tech in 400AD. So with relatively little tech trading (CoL had to be self-teched ) and 1000 years of war the tech situation is still pretty nice:



Stats screen sorted by units/buildings/improvements built:



The Numidians made for very low losses even against a very late second target who had metal the entire time (kills were: 44 archers, 8 axes, 7 swordsmen, 6 spearmen, 5 chariots, 4 catapults, 1 praetorian). Against Rome a good 10+ archers were killed wandering away from his cities.

Not considering the good rush...

It's odd to have mines your most common improvement
You're probably missing on production by working all those mines instead of food positive tiles and then converting food to hammers.

Some of your Roman cities have 0 whip anger, can grow 2 happy pop points and work several mines.
If you ask the governor what it'd work, it'd work more food and this would probably be right.
A riverside cottage compares nicely with a plains hills mine. Working some of those instead of the dreaded plains hills mines would allow you to :
a) work more tiles ;
b) use food to hammers conversion ;
c) get some extra commerce to fight the growing maintenance.

(So it's not only that mines lose you.)

Farms are even more productive but can't help nearly as much to pay for an army.

Mines are best worked at happy cap, when you don't want to whip the city, or when a city has a food surplus so high you can't handle it.



ps : not sure when you got your hands on Monarchy... maybe you should have considered revolting into HR It seems you focused a tad too much on training Numidian Cavs for your own good...

SIP, no point in moving.
build order was worker, warrior, warrior, settler, warrior, settler, then pumped out Phalanx.
Expanded quckly to 3 cities, and pumped phalanx out of the capital, wiping a couple of them when I was reach max pop.
Since Augustus was kind enough to build me SH, I went after him as soon as I got 4 phalanx ready, He just built a third city the turn I DoWed him. He went MIA a couple of turns later.
I kept Rome, and razed the rest.
In the meantime, Sury finished the Great Wall, which make him my next target. That was here my first mistake. I should have shoot straight to his capital, which was defended only by 2 archers, instead I razed his second city, and left there two units to heal.
I lost some turns healing and bringing more units, by that time, he has 5 archers. I lost 4 phalanx getting his capital.

With Sury gone, I'm now focusing in recovering my economy, and building Oracle in Rome.
While warring, I built/wiped libraries, and set 2 scientist in most of them.

I stopped in 1250BC, researching currency atm. I will go after the great lib after that.
I reserved my first GS for later, since I was almost finished with Mathematics when I got him.

Religion wise, Pacal found buddhism, Hammy got hinduism, and both of them hate each other now. Shaka converted to buddhism, and Eli is still neutral, but worst enemy of Shaka.
I plan to keep Shaka and Pacal at pleased at least, and see where this is going.

The game is mostly over already.
I'm expanding toward north and east, while keeping a 50%-60% research rate.
I built the Parthenon, the great lib and the pyramids, bulbed education on my way to Lib, got a GP instead of a GS, so, well, bulbed Civil Service with him. Since I'm way ahead in tech, I didn't start researching lib yet, I switched to music, for the GA.
I will lib Steel I think.
I'm building some units, for discouraging AIs to DoW. I'm involved in a war with Elizabeth since centuries, as per Shaka's demand, but I never saw a unit. Eli has to go though Hammurabi territory first, then Shaka's.
Hammy DoWed me out of nowhere for a while, I met dozens of turn later a single damaged swordman, and he asked for peace.

Pacal researched Alphabet incredibly late (around 400-300 BC), so, very few tech trade atm.

The game is already over, I'm researching too fast while building units.
I intend to build one or 2 stacks of macemen/pikemen while waiting for Canons, then steamroll everyone.

I "libed" Steel in 840AD, updated most of my catapults to canons, most of my CR1-2 swordmen to macemen.
a dozens of turns earlier, Shaka took peace with Eli, to DoW Hammurabi. He finally asked to me to join the fray, and I was happy to do help him. As I approach his first city, Hammy capture one of Shaka's. So, well, I wipe most of Hammy's defense unit, and left his city with a single unit in very bad shape. Shaka took the city on the next turn, while I was recapturing Shaka's city, to keep it.
The AIs are so backward in techs that I'm not sure that it's worth the trouble to go up to riflemen or cuir, I will finish them with macemen and canons.