TSG103 Opening Actions

Settled in place, with an initial idea to turtle until XBows, the start looks great, Pangea+ is usually big and in Immortal I may get an early wonder. First 3 ruins, 2 maps and barbarians located. 4th and 5th ruins, 1 pop, 1 culture, yeeess!

But then who is our neighbor? Shaka! Hate that guy. I am on expert on him, on the receiving end, I have never played him. Ok, no turtling, it is a race to see if he gets to Civil Service and Impis before I can take his cap. Build 4 archers, beeline construction, granary and shrine will have to wait. I calculate that I will get ToA on t40, which should be OK in Immortal, so start building that with my liberty worker chopping both woods and mining the salts.

I redirect my 2 scouts and warrior to the tiles surrounding Ulundi, wait for an opportunity and steal a worker from Shaka. Miraculously my warrior survives the steal, and starts making its way back to Mecca with the worker. I make peace with Shaka, who offers me 1 gold, I take 33 cash instead. My plan is to DoW him as soon as I am ready.

Meanwhile, somebody builds ToA on the turn I was finishing it, and its an unmet civ. I cannot believe it. Could have built my shrine and my granary, and a couple extra archers. Well, will have to live with(out) it. My liberty settler comes online and I start walking it towards a faith wonder that is close to Ulundi. I plant it next to the mountain and river, this has the potential to be a great expo, although it is is far from my cap, I need to plant another city in the middle somewhere, but that will have to wait as I am almost ready for war.

I upgrade my 4 archers to CBs and they start making their way towards Ulundi with a couple (all) of workers. I start building Pyramids, to replenish the workers and prepare for war. My plan is to position the CBs well and do an initial volley to get things going, but half way there, another worker steal opportunity presents itself, and my warrior goes for it, so have to improvise the attack and do it the slow way. So worker bait a couple of archers, pillage repair, and carefully manage the health of the CBs with strategic retreats. Ulundi finally falls on t74. I do a good peace deal with Shaka, which I may live to regret, but my economy is not doing great. At t80, my CBs are healthy, I have built a couple more CBs to protect against potential barbarians, and I am building another settler.

I am not sure what I am going to do next. I need a plan, and I don't have one yet. Taking another cap with CBs is out of the question for me, but I cannot linger long as Casimir is wonder whoring and starting to run away. I am friends with Netherlands and India, but I am certain Montezuma will come for me very soon now, although we have fought against a common enemy and traded. There are 2 civ I have not met yet, and need to build a boat or 2, as I need to start meeting CSs, the sooner the better.

Let's see what happens.

I moved over to the desert to get Petra and I forgot to actually worry about building Petra lol! I missed it and went to war with the Zulu pretty quick wiping them out with Poland. After that I went to war with Poland and traded blows for some time. I got Monty into the mix and as I was about to start pressing into Poland I got the back stab from Monty and had to deal with about 20-30 troops. They slowed me down but I took it personal making peace with Poland and going up to destroy Monty instead which I did and sold most of the cities to Siam with the intent on taking them back in the late game.

I scouted the NW hill, but settled in place.
T5: Hello Shaka! Ugh, I shoulda expected that.
T11: Hola Montezuma! Ugh, I shoulda figured that too
Found Uluru, Netherlands, and Poland shortly thereafter.

Got decent luck on the ruins. T2 +pop, T4 free archery tech, T9 20 cult, scout upgrade at T23
Settled Medina on T33 at the confluence west of Mecca
Opened a mix of Honor and Liberty

With the early archery, I decided to try an archer spam rush on Shaka to preemptively avoid the carpet. DoWed Ulundi on T50 with 4 arch, 2 warr, char arch, GG and another char arch on the way.

Funny aside at this point, which I shared in another thread:
I resisted the urge to DoW early just to steal a worker. The worker hides in the grey just before I DoW. Fine, I move in for the siege. The worker pops up right next to my chariot archer 2 turns later. I take it as spoils of war. The siege wears on, but I'm not making much headway. A couple turns later, out pops a settler from the city and it moves THROUGH my sieging troops. I take it. A couple turns later, out pops a SECOND settler and again it moves THROUGH my troops toward my land. I take it. Thanks Shaka!

OK, back to the game coverage. The siege lasts 15 turns, but I'm unable to take Ulundi. City strength of 20 plus the tough terrain around the city really made the archers less effective than I wanted. Full retreat with 2 CA, 1 A, 1W, GG. Only having 2 horseys really was kinda a kick in the pants here!

Heal up, upgrade to longbows, build T88 Statue of Zeus.
Come back with 2 CA, 3 CBows, 2 spear, 1 warr, GG
Better luck. I take Ulundi on T95, though 1 Impi crushes a couple troops, then retakes the city. I rush a couple reinforcements to replace what the Impi crushed. I manage to take the city back for good on T105 with last rushed melee with a just built Impi lost in the city. If he got loose, I probably would have had to retreat again.

Played a few more turns, in the process of taking out the second Zulu city, then decide what's next. I guess probably pause, get NC up, get Civil Service, then rush to chivalry. I guess I need to find a few more horseys also.

I guess the preemptive strike was a success. The battles were costly, but I (just barely) avoided Death by Impi, which was the primary goal. Getting the free workers and preventing him forward settling probably made it worthwhile.