Classic 33: Spoiler 2 (Industrial age)

This is the second spoiler for Classic 33: Greece

Qualification for this spoiler is reaching the industrial age.

For those of you who recovered successfully from the ravages of the barbarians, coped with the fast tech rate and beaten off the indians and chinese; how did you move through the middle ages?

Please don't post any maps showing industrial-age or later resources.

edit: My mistake - I put that the qualification a finished game was a qualification for this spoiler - sorry about that

Beaten off the Indians and the Chinese? What? My Middle Ages celebrated no such glorious advances. I had considered a Chivalry war, I really had. India was ready and willing to trade cheap horses to me, and I had iron. Saltpeter had turned up in Chinese territory, but I could take that city in the first turn of the war if I chose to.

Thing is, I'm at heart a builder. That, and this tech pace is faster than even the Deity games I've played. My Great Library bonus didn't last long, and I was feeling the pressure of acquiring more and more tech to not fall behind. That, and I sold a few early MA techs for about 100gpt in indiviidual trades, and that'll whet your appetite for more research even without the outrageously cheap universities.

But I can't call the Middle Ages a success. I kept my cities fully upgraded (excepting a Colleseum here and there), but at this tech pace that left no turns for the building of military units. Sporadic but inconsequential wars in the west didn't hamper research much, but many civs were too poor for effective brokering. My military for most of the Middle Ages consisted of a good number of hoplites, a few token Med. Infantry, and a few token knights. Luckily, demands were few and far between, as I had good relations with just about everyone. Plus India and China were involved in two furious wars spanning most of the Middle ages. In the, er, classic matchup of War Elephants and Riders, China was destined to win. But both civs were having fun with their Golden Ages, and for most the Age China only just managed to gain the advantage in the underdeveloped southern area.

Near the end of the middle ages, people were passing me in tech. China and the Arabs were passing me in culture (finally). I had an anemic military, not enough cities to even build a forbidden palace, and a wild look in my eye. I had considered holding out for an industrial age war, where I could utilize one of my favorite Civ3 rules: 'With enough artillery, anything is possible.' Thing is, at this pace I wouldn't be able to gather enough artillery, let alone the infantry to accompany it.

I had to utilize Cavalry, and it had to be decisive before Replaceable Parts, if not Nationalism. Luckly, even without Wall Street (not enough banking cities...) my finances were in good shape. I decided to do something I'd never done before, purposely disconnect a resource to bulid a crappier unit. Unfortunately, I only had 8 horsemen before I forgot what I was doing and demanded Iron to sweeten a trade for a tech where I could only get a moderate gpt.

Screw it. The Arabs zoomed into the Industrial Age, and a few years later I had Military Tradition. It hurt, but I didn't trade it. The Chinese needed to pay. They had just taken a northen border city that India needed, and India didn't have the draft yet. If they ran over India before I made my move, I was doomed.

I had only mustered 16 cavalry when I attacked, but China only had the occasional musketmen backed by pikemen defense. Then again, India's northern border (the important one) had lost a city and I could feel it crumbling. I had clogged the few roads leading south, felt prepared, but only took two cities on the first turn. No Saltpeter, but the Ottomans were providing it for me.

I took two more cities, solidifying my gains. Hoplites on mountains were still good enough to start my Golden Age, and three more Chinese cities had fallen when the Industrial Age started. Sounds good, sure, but my initial military buildup was already depleted, China was still three times my size, workers are still hiding in my cities, and the Republic had stopped celebrating the war.

The story continues next spoiler...

I managed to continue to keep up in the middle ages, despite the fact that techs were traded pretty quickly among the AI, often meaning only one or two civs didn't have all known techs. So many of my cities got banks before universities. I think I stuck to 40 turn researching until I went for Electricity, Medicine, and the Scientific Method.

Towards the end of the middle ages, the arabs demanded some gold. As far away as they were, I refused, and for the first time, I went to war. Of course, I saw only one ansar warrior, or whatever their UU is called, and it was killed by one of my three knights. Throughout the game, I had a fairly weak military, even when I had the resources from trades to build modern units. Since they managed to send over a unit, I figured they weren't busy enough with their ongoing war with the Romans, who were finally going down the path to defeat (although the excellent starting position for Rome kept them alive far longer than I had expected). So I brought Egypt and Spain into the fight. The Arab response was to get Korea to declare war on me. This was handy, since I had actually been considering a war on Korea to get the source of horses southwest of our starting position. With a number of catapult, a few hoplites, my knights, and the few med. infantry I had managed to build, I took three Korean cities that had been in the way for too long. With no other cities in the area to take, I made peace with Korea for their gold and world map.

About the same time Korea declared, China decided it needed some extra space, and declared war on India. Razing half and capturing half, I saw an opportunity to slip some settlers in and grab some extra spices, another source of horses, and in general some good territory. As my first two settlers were about to go on their way, the Arabs, who I had for the most part forgotten about, brought China into the war against me. I very nearly gave up, since they had cavalry and I had hoplites and a couple knights (forgot to mention, I got a great leader from one knight, who rushed Smith's, the only wonder available). I quickly lost those knights, however, as they were taking advantage of an RoP with India to observe the Chinese-Indian conflict. But I guess I was blessed this game, as the RNG was friendly to me yet again (two-turn revolution was the first). I think China lost more cavalry then I did hoplites, and a few times a lone veteran hoplite in a city managed to hold off a veteran cavalry. The first of those victories trigged my golden age, which aided me in waging war. I guess China was much more occupied with fighting India, since all that I lost was two of the Korean cities, one Greek city, and a few workers. In return, I managed to take two Chinese cities that were to Greece's south and auto-razed another. I might have also been able to get one of the Korean cities back, but I was worried that with India down to its last, I would be seeing more units come from China. So I got peace, as well as a Chinese town right were I had been planning to settle (the settlers never made it out of their home cities, since I didn't want to lose one, and the territory I was going for was claimed), and a once Indian town that would have claimed my lone source of coal if its borders expanded.

Using my golden age, I did build a lot of universities and started doing my own research, taking the tech lead for the rest of the game. I also decided to go for Diplo or Space, since my military was no match, and probably Diplomatic since I have no patience to build all of those spaceship parts. I was also second in territory and population after my war, and was quickly surpassing the rest in score (except China).

PTW 1.27f open

1000bc Trade my way into the MA. Get Engineering as our free tech (ottomans are in MA but no free tech - Ainwood must have been playing with tribe characteristics again )

Sold Korea techs cheap - they got the same free tech as we did

975 ibt Arabia cautiously demands a tech - no as they are across the world - they dow on us. Barbs are approaching our towns we have 473 in our treasury. Will try to buy some alliances against Arabia with it before the barbs come.

950bc buy alliances against Arabia with Egypt, Rome, Spain, and France, open Delphi to be a barb sink

ibt delphi sacked uncountable times

900bc barbs appear near corinth - open to be a sink (recently settled, not far on first build)

450bc ibt we finally learn the republic & revolt with 4 turn revolution

370bc the Greek Republic is born

330bc trade for feudalism (now down monarchy only)

50 ad and spain is massing troops next to my cities - I think they will dow next turn

70 ad Spain bypassed my cities [dance]

190 ad buy partially researched invention and trade for Monotheism (we're down monarchy, theology, chivalry and gunpowder)

260 ad Jaipur decides to join the Greek Empire

310 many trades this turn - down monarchy, education (only known by 3) and I think astronomy (china's building Copernicus) Roads to other empires have been built so will get a second dye online to trade for techs.

450ad get 2nd dye hooked up and trade it plus gpt for education

500ad Ganges decides to become Greek

520ad China dow on Indians

540ad completed FP (by hand)

650ad completed more trades now I'm down Physics (known by 2) and up several others (I think I started this trade round by buying chemistry with 8 turns left on 1 scientist research and netted Music theory, democracy, Free Artistry, Metallurgy, Astronomy, navigation, banking, Astronomy and horses - I wish I had kept track of whom I traded what with as I think it was one of my best trade rounds ever). Unfortunately since I'm paying out 85gpt for these techs, I can't revolt to democracy for 20 turns without ruining Greece's good name... and we did no trades with India - I'm eyeing her saltpeter and second horse city and might join in the war in a bit

670ad -- After trading those techs around, the world went crazy - Arabia dow Ottomans, Rome dow China

710ad France lands a single warrior next to a worker (they are receiving furs and 14gpt for a tech but I think we are about to get declared on anyway. Moved hoplite to cover worker and to trigger our GA if attacked)

ibt Arabs want alliance against china - no thanks, but they will give us some gems for metallurgy . French warrior moved into our territory, next to a city but avoided the hoplite

720ad hoplite and worker moved into city.

ibt warrior avoided the hoplite and seems to be strolling around our countryside.

740ad India's cities changed into Industrial age and India and China made peace (before I was ready to get into the war )

ibt French finally dow on us , but attacked a warrior and not a hoplite - no GA, but do have reverse WW

750ad Buy MA with Egypt against France, and MA with Ottomans against France

840 ad India has moved 2 cavs into our territory - I guess Ghandi wants back those cities that flipped . We trade our way into IA, hoping for Nationalism as our free tech as hoplites and knights vs cavs isn't going to be fun

Open PTW

Ancient Age
If I put this up early, it should give everyone else confidence that their game is in better shape.

The trio of early MA mistakes

I entered the MA in 925BC, but without the important resources of horses or iron, and without a representative government. Construction had been my final tech that I was holding out on procuring - it was available at 1000BC. I delayed the easy purchase because I would have preferred to be in a better form of government, and I did not want to precipitate the barbarian uprising, because at this time I had become very aware of the undeveloped territory to the south. Clearly the change of ages would cause significant barbarian trouble. However, my delay to 925BC before entering the MA did not gain me any government tech opportunity, and it cost me a better trading opportunity. So it was my first big mistake of the age.

I moved to the MA when I received the message that there was a massive barbarian uprising, and hence decided that there was no point waiting any further, and so purchased construction, and received engineering as my free tech. I traded the Koreans into the MA very generously, and they received Monotheism. In spite of my generosity, there was absolutely no trade I could do to get this tech.

I then committed my second mistake of the time. I was in a phony war with the Ottomans. I wasted engineering to get out of this war (further devaluing the tech). The tech was far too valuable to waste on this even if they had received a bonus tech, which of course they did not.

And then I realised that I needed a decent government quickly so I put research to republic. It was going to take 40 turns even at max. I decide to build libraries across the land to speed this up. Marketplaces would have been more useful, even though these were cheap libraries, and the culture helped. I built libraries in about 5 of my key cities, but this made no difference to the due date on republic. At least marketplaces would have given me more economy to try and trade for the tech.

These three mistakes are the beginning of a tech slide that makes progress very difficult for the rest of the age and beyond. I am unable to buy republic at any time and finish research finally (40 turns later) in 190BC. Fortunately, I was left alone through this time. Five turns of anarchy see me into a republic in 90BC.

The Southern Expansion

In the 800 years of middle ages so far we have added 3 cities (now 10) and 3 workers (now 4). We are very short on workers - usually I have a bunch more due to war at this stage. On the positives, we have found sources of horses and iron. The Koreans have already claimed the horses, but we are able to claim the iron and ivory, and do so.


The Chinese War

Our military is very weak, but now with iron available we have a chance to make a semi reasonable force and attack a weaker neighbour. So we sart building warriors with the intent to hook up our iron and upgrade to medieval infantry. We never get the chance. In 340AD, the Chinese declare war and attack. They raze our east coast, coastal town, but kick off our GA. In spite of this, the Chinese start turning up with riders, and take Sparta, a 1st ring city.

The Chinese bring in Egypt into the war against us. Egypt is not much of a threat. They have one city on the southern coast, but the rest is buried on the far side of the continent. For peace China wants Corinth, our furs city to the east. I don't think I have ever had to give a city for peace before, so I stubbornly refuse. A few turns later they have conquered Corinth, and now want another first ring city for peace. At this point in the game, I am almost ready to concede, and let the Chinese overrun my positions, but finally I decide, well lets see how long we can survive. I take the peace deal in 470AD (net loss 4 cities).

I am still at war with Egypt. though, so I finally connect up the iron, upgrade a bunch of warriors to MI and attack Abydos on my southern coast. We take the city and peace for 58gp and 2gpt.


Unrealised Military Ambition

We find at this time that the Koreans (who got to our horse resource first) are only average versus us, and the horse city is exposed, and hard to reinforce. We therefore think that a Korean war will net us horses, and so start preparing for this with a further buildup of MI, and catapults.

In 620AD we are boosted with the hand built forbidden palace.

Before we are ready, we find that the Koreans have gunpowder, and a source of saltpeter, meaning that our small force of MI backed by an even smaller force of the weak catapults will be up against muskets - not good. Similar considerations rule out India at this time, and China is simply a run away behemouth at this point.

The Culture War

We decide on a very different strategy while we try to catch up in tech. We decide to try and use cultural pressure to grab the horse resource, and to flip Indian cities that are projecting into our 'zone'. Our cheap libraries are very useful in this regard. A tight build of new cities commences, as we try to maximise the potential from our lands. We succeed in taking the horses fairly quickly.

Our culture versus India looks fairly similar, however, the strategy doesn't appear to work well, especially in 1000AD when Miletos flips to the Indians!


Tech Catch Up

Since I was already facing muskets and falling rapidly behind in tech, I decided to rush straight toward cavalry as fast as possible, and then war. We ran into another problem when we found we had no saltpeter, and could not trade for saltpeter. So finally, we decided to concentrate on improving the economy and buying tech as fast as possible to catch up. We were able to agree to several MAs against distant foes for tech at this time as well. These wars remained phony from our point of view, fortunately. First we warred against Rome for monotheism (finally, about 1700 years after this tech first became available!), then Arabia for Chemistry.

Buying tech from last is actually quite cheap, so we focussed on building a bunch of marketplaces and banks to buy the rest of the age. Unfortunately, there were no opportunities for two-fers, so every trade was a one for one. Also, I noted that it seemed that I got the best prices from the weakest civs? This was quite handy, because I really did not want to give China more money.

In 1030AD we enter the Industrial Ages, getting Medicine as our free tech. We are still well behind, and can only pick up a few optional MA techs with this (including chivalry, so we can at least build knights, now). We enter the IA with 23 densely packed cities:

Future plans? Space or Diplomacy seem the only likely options at this time, assuming we can hold out the Chinese threat!

My second GOTM and first attempt at describing a game...

This was quite an unusual game in that after 3900BC pretty much everything went according to plan. I could almost say that it was dull. I think this was due to the following:

1.) Even the nearest civs were very far from our starting location and nobody started to the South from us, so grabbing those horses and iron to the South, even though they were relatively far, was quite easy.

2.) The choke point where the Romans started effectively sealed off half of the Civs from us. So even though I was in war with most of them for a long time, they didn't bother me apart from the occasional lone spearman or knight that they dropped off from a boat.

3.) The other civs waged war on each other a lot.

4.) As a result of the less than spectacular starting position, I made a rather conservative plan. For example, I haven't even tried to build any Ancient or Middle Age wonders.

Anyway, rough timeline (after the fact, from memory, so a bit vague):

4000BC

Settler moves NE, mainly because I convinced myself (based on what I read in the speculation thread) that the tile under the fog to the NE-NE is a hill. I figured in worst case I will settle on that and have an easy to defend location with two bonus grasslands within reach. Accordingly, I was highly disappointed to see that the tile to the NE-NE was in fact a mountain. Nonetheless I moved the worker West, as I had planned, to get optimum view of the surroundings. For the record, had I not read the speculation thread, I would probably have moved the settler to the North and eventually settle on the tile N-N from the starting position. The capital position I ended up with wasn't too bad either, it was next to a river, fortunately it still had two bonus grassland in the radius, and there were wines nearby. Not the best but workable.

3950BC

Settler moves N, worker moves back to the starting position.

3900BC

Settler builds Athens, worker starts road (and later mine) on the starting location.

3850BC-1000BC

Athens built 3-4 scouting warriors, some hoplites for protection and happiness, a granary, and then settler+hoplite combos at a steady but rather slow pace. We researched Writing at minimum speed and made a killing in trading it to the other civs. I might have researched Literature the same way but its trading value wasn't noteworthy any more (so as a matter of fact I might have bought Literature from someone). The next thing we researched ourselves was Industrialization, everything inbetween was bought or "learned" from others as a courtesy of the Great Library.

I started to scout towards West on the North edge of the jungle. The second warrior went towards South-East to the shore and then up North, and the third to the South across the jungle (I think there was a fourth one as well, perhaps replacing the third that died an early death).

I met the Indians and the Chinese quickly, and then the Romans later on. Traded for contacts to the others. All the scouting warriors were killed by barbarians, but not before we made contact with every other civ and discovered the horses and iron to the South. So in a sense losing the warriors was a blessing because they accomplished what they were meant for and I didn't have to bring them back and "feed" them. It also made me realize that barbarians were quite active in this game so I started to guard my workers with hoplites diligently. I lost only one worker when a conscript barbarian horseman killed my veteran fortified hoplite. I remember this because this was about the only outrageous thing the RNG did to me during this game.

The first wave of settlers built a single ring of cities around Athens, plus an extra city to get the furs near the Eastern shore. A major barbarian uprising sacked this fur-city like 20 times over shortly after it was built, but I cleverly spent all the money beforehand on building embassies and population was at 1, so the barbarians destroyed only about 5 shields and stole around 10 gold.

Shortly after we met, the Romans demanded tribute (some technology I think). We had a deal going where we were paying large amounts of gold per turn for contact and/or tech and I didn't think they would break it, but they did and declared war. This saved us a bunch of gold, but strangely enough it also screwed up our reputation. Nobody was willing to make gold-per-turn-for-tech deals with us afterwards. I was quite pissed about this at first but ultimately it didn't matter.

We engaged our Indian and Chinese friends to provide a protective cushion between us and the Romans (read: military alliance), and they did such a good job that we never saw a Roman unit during this period. The Romans also dragged in someone from the Western half of the continent but those units never made it to our half, see again choke point.

Shortly after the discovery of Map Making, the Chinese also demanded tribute (territory map and cash), which we handed over without hesitation.

1000BC-10AD

The project of bringing the southern iron and horses within our borders was started and successfully finished during this period. You can see the project underway in the 570BC screenshot I attached. I built a city to span the distance across the jungle, another one next to the horses, and a third one next to the iron. These cities were quite far apart from each other and from the core but I figured it was worth anything to get horses and iron. Plus at that point I wasn't sure yet how far away the other civs were so I was kind of in a hurry. The plan was to connect the horses first, start building horsemen, then connect the iron and mass-upgrade to knights and teach the Chinese a lesson.

The Indians built the Great Library in Delhi in 730BC. This further clarified our plans: grab the Great Library before we buy Education to take full advantage of the fact that the owner of the GL can learn advances past Education.

10AD-750AD

The time has finally come to punish the insolent Chinese. We didn't have enough money to upgrade all the horsemen, so the offensive was launched with a 2:1 mix of knights and horsemen. The Chinese went down with surprising ease, one might even say that I overengineered this attack a bit. A Great Leader was generated right on cue, just before I was about to occupy Beijing (see second screen shot, from 580AD), so a Forbidden Palace was built in the former Chinese capital, by the books. You can see that Mycane (next to our iron ore) is building a Colosseum. That was supposed to become a Forbidden Palace until the Great Leader appeared and the opportunity of building the FP at a better location presented itself.

As a matter of fact, we were at war with the Romans, the Indians, the Egyptians, and one or two others as well during this period, so the war went on on three fronts (to the North with the Chinese, to the West with Romans/Indians, and on the Eastern shore with the others who landed units there) for more than half a millennium. This might sound scary, but thanks to the Golden Age that we used to produce almost exclusively knights, in reality this was all a piece of cake. The long war also produced several more Great Leaders which were rather inconsequential since there were no wonders to build (more exactly I didn't have the techs). I think I used all of them to make armies, which then also didn't make much of a difference.

At the culmination of the war, we marched into Delhi (which, just like most other Indian cities, was now owned by the Chinese). At this point the game was, in essence, won. Via the Great Library, we learned almost all mandatory Middle Age advances, plus a few optional ones, most notably Democracy (but not Military Tradition, unfortunately).

This also reminds me of government issues. Greece was a despotism for the longest time. A switch to monarchy was made shortly before the Great War to be able to make the most out of the inevitable Golden Age that started when the Chinese hordes committed suicide on the impenetrable wall of hoplites (those guys really rock, hehe ). I was debating with myself for long whether to choose monarchy or republic. Eventually I decided in favor of monarchy due to the 2gpt unit maintenance that I believe is now standard for republics in GOTM. Still not sure if this was a good call. We stayed a monarchy until the successful introduction of Universal Suffrage, at which point we moved on to democracy. I am sure this was a good call.

At the time I finished the first war against the Chinese, I think I would have had the choice to continue the war on the Koreans, Romans, Chinese, and maybe Egypt, using knights, then cavalry and eventually a cavalry/infantry/artillery combo, but I decided to knock it off and go for a research lead and tanks. The former might have yielded an earlier victory in terms of in-game time, but the latter was definitely the more time efficient in real life. This way, the late Middle Ages and much of the industrial era was an almost-zero-maintenance effort with setting up build queues and sometimes moving workers around.

Moderator Action: Went a bit further than the middle-ages

I've copied your original to the staff forum, and to save you re-writing it, I'll post it back when the final spoiler opens.

I entered Middle Ages in 900BC trying to develop the Southland into a second core and at war with India, Korea and Egypt. And with tons of barbs around from the Uprising.

Development. I had 4 settlers in the jungle heading south at 1000BC. Wasn't able to found "Palace" by the cows until 630Bc, 14 turns later. These settlers, and others as I was building them almost to the exclusion of everything else, had to dodge barbs constantly. I had to retreat the settlers more times than I could advance them.

I hand built the FP in Thermopylae right next to China in 190BC and next turn added a worker to "Palace" to get it to pop 7. I had run Athens down to pop 1 at that point and abandoned it, jumping the palace to the southern core, and so had "two" cores operating. The northern core was more like 1/2 a core since it was next to China.

Military. At the start of MA in 875BC I had 11 Warriors and 1 Archer.
500BC. 10 Warriors, 1 Archer and 1 Hoplite.
10AD. 8 Warriors, 1 Archer and 5 Hoplites.

Very light for being at war with 4 civs and the barbs, but India was the only civ close and they sent units in ones and twos which I could pick off with warriors.

The barbs were allowed to pillage new towns as they were settled. I counted 39 pillages by barb horseman. Botched the money angle and lost about 600g to this pillaging.

In 750BC I used my free tech Monotheism to get Republic and buy Peace with Korea and India. A few turns later, Egypt and Rome (Allied against me at one point) each gave a town for peace after never showing up to do battle.

I finally got the last barb camp in the south in 150BC although they had been only a minor irritation since about 500BC.

In 170AD I declared on Korea, who was in my 2nd ring in the south, in order to clear them out and to try to trigger a GA with a Hoplite. A number of turns later I hit a redlined Knight with a veteran Hoplite and won, triggerring the Golden Age in 300AD.

330AD. 1 Warrior, 1 Archer, 5 Knights, 6 Hoplites, 7 MedInf
490AD. Up to 11 Knights

Research. I did minimum (10% or 1 scientist) or no research for a long time in MA. Basically until the 2nd core was set up in 170BC. Then turned on research and did Education in about 12 turns. Then Astronomy in 5 and Chemistry in 4.


The Golden Age showed up about then and the remaining 4 required techs were researched in 4-turns each. We entered IA in 470AD. The AI had contributed 6 of the required techs to complete MA.

The Greek Republic at 490AD just into IA. We're now starting on clearing the jungle.

590 BC: India and China both got to MA 1 turn before me. Got Both Govs. for gpt sold to every one for all they had. trade feud. for mono.

I still was keeping science at 0% buying most from India and China. They were getting them fast.

Lib. and markets in all citys I was first in culture.

Gov switch to Rep. 3 turns.

Was still at war with Rome and Arabras (they both said pay or, I picked or), but I never fired a shot. Paid the world to go to war with me.

Spain was in bad shape. Arabras killed them off. And Rome was killing Korea.

I mad peace after the 20 turns of allied was ended with peace for peace only.

I bought Democ. from India. Sold to everone who could buy it. The next turn India suprise attacked. (ending 102 gpt I was paying them) I swith production to war unit. Had Rome and China allied with me. China also got right of passage.
India got no cities on their first wave. But tey did triger my GA.

Go, Go, China Go!!!!!!!!!!!!! They rushed in and stopped India. The only real short turm dammage from India was on turn three of the war when they destroied my horse culture flip city in the south. But the next turn I took the horse city from china and 3 more cities.

Also at this point I turned my science to 90% I was even or ahead with everone, so started for my tech lead w/GA 17 turns to go.

China only took 3 Indian citys one of them was the Indian Capitial I took the rest. 2 Indian cities culture fliped from China back to India But I had troops there and got both including the orginal cap. At this point Rome had done little to help I think because they were still at war with Korea and had Korea down to 3 cities. Spain was gone. Egypt allied with India against China.

With 8 turns still to go before I could end the 2 allied, India had 1 main land city and a one tile island off the coast. India will give me the little island. I deside to wait for 8 more turns so I don't get the rep hit just in case I cannot hold a tech lead and have to start buying them again.

No Luck, Rome finilly does something in the war they take the last Indian main land city. The Indian Capitial is now that little size 1 island.

As soon as I can I get peace from India lotsa gp/gpt.

I'm now get a tech every 4 turns. I sell to china and anyone who will pay gpt. With the gpt I'm at science 90%, lux 10%, and still 4 to 5 turns for each tech even after my GA ended. I'm also about +100 gold per turn left over!

China's cities start to culture filp to me I think I got 3.

Rome is the only one who I did not sell any techs to. At this point Rome looks weak so I attack. I get Arabras and the Otto to help, they wanted less than 10gpt ea.
Rome and all their cities fell in less then 10 turns.

Shortly after the Rome war China attacked with out warning!!! They did little damage.
I got the whole world to go to war (I didn't need the help this time, but if everyone is at war with China then China cannot buy any techs). I took about 1/2+ of their cities. and made peace on turn 21 of the war. I was in the IA by then w/Railroad to every city.

I was the first to the IA, I got nat. was at war with China (I won), way ahead in gold
and no dought I could win any way I want.

Open - PTW 1.27f

Well, I certainly cannot win any way I want, at least not without a late finish.

After what seemed like a steady improvement in my CIV skills since I started playing GOTM with #29, I thought I'd do much better than this. The barbs (and some risky decisions) really set back my early devcelopment, and I now have virtually no resources. I was able to steal horses from India in the south by plopping a city right next to their border and `culture-flipping' the horse tile, thanks to cheap libraries. And I have secured the iron in the far south. But I am buying saltpeter from the Ottomans, which I was only able to do recently once I had a tech that seemed worthwhile to him. And I failed to secure any land that ended up providing coal, so my plans for a rapid industrialization at the beginning of the IA has been put on hold. China also just decided to sneak attack me with riders and cavalry, and I'm still defending with hoplites. I'm hoping that a military alliance with India against China is going to save me. We'll see.

My best move so far has been to buy Physics, then Magnetism and Theory of Gravity just as the last two became available and affordable, but before everyone had them (so I could make some money back), and before anybody had discovered an IA tech yet, so that I could reap some benefits from my free one (Steam Power). After selling it around, I am now researching at 100% but still raking in 100+ gpt. (Well, I was until China attacked me last turn, thereby weaseling out of the gpt they were paying me.)

My biggest mistake was, I think, waiting too long to finish setting up the second core -- I was midway through the Middle Ages before I jumped my palace. Once I was behind in expansion, I should have settled for my ten cities, with two cores, and built a bunch of units to steal the other civs' cities. Instead, I kept building and trying to claim the bad lands in the jungles with the hopes that they would one day become fertile. But that's just taking way too long. Probably I have become too reliant upon fast units like knights and cavalry when I go on the offensive, and I didn't have enough of these so I didn't want to attack. I need to become comfortable with longbowmen and catapults.

Right now, I'm thinking that my only good option is a diplomatic victory. I've started a prebuild for Theory of Evolution, which I hope to get to propell me faster toward the end of the era. With such a frantic tech pace, this may be my best way to get some good techs first and remain in the trading game. Then I'll do a careful calculation to estimate when to begin a prebuild for the UN.

That is, as long as China doesn't marginalize me first.

Should FP 1275BC




90 AD waiting for chivalry...



End of India an China 410AD waiting MT...




DOMINATION 680AD 11h 51m 8777 Fraxis 10,xxx Jason

My mistake - I put that the qualification a finished game was a qualification for this spoiler - sorry about that

PTW 1.27f Open

I entered the Middle Ages in 975 BC. As soon as I entered it I made a mistake. I had the good fortune of getting Engineering as my free tech. I had been researching republic for the last 10 or so and should have made the decision to abandon that research and switch to invention as other civs had gotten CoL and philosophy before me, as it was I wasted 20 turns continueing to research republic at minimum. Given that my intention was to upgrade horsemen to cavalry this was silly. As a result I didn't get to MT till 400 AD. Once I got MT I didn't compound my error by going with too few cavs. If I had gotten to MT 20 turns sooner 20-30 cavs would have been enough to deal with the chinese. But at 400 AD the chinese looked way too tough and I decided to wait until I could upgrade 50 horses. I finally declared on the chinese in 520 AD with my 50 cavs - the war didn't last long but I lost twenty cavs. By the time I finished with Chinas homeland I had another 50 upgraded cavs ready to join the remaining thirty and I attacked India and Korea and reached Rome in 840 AD. Rome at this time was a Chinese outpost, the Romans themselves had earlier been annihilated as consequence of an alliance organised by the cunning Greeks.
By this point in the game I was aware that I had already blown a shot at a decent time with the invention mistake. I perhaps should have done as toyo did and went for chivalry ( and china ) while waiting for MT to roll round. But I never seem to do that well with knights. I was calculating that i would need to go for space and milk after I had defeated the remaining civs to get a good score. To compound my irritation I got a series of inexplicable crashes to desk top all on the same turn, after several hours faffing and crys for help I managed to get rolling again. But I was hacked off and just wanted to get the thing over with - I took the last Ottoman city in 1050 AD giving me a conquest victory in 1060 AD. Firaxis score 7005. Jason 88??. At the end my in game score was increasing at 60 points per turn but not even the thought of AlanH trouncing me again could persuade me to continue.
Ordinarily I would expect to get a dom or conquest victory on a standard Emperor pangea before 1000 AD unless I did something really stupid. I didn't do anything really stupid, the invention mistake perhaps wouldn't have been that significant on another map. But on this map everything was a struggle from the start position, the surrounding civs with their early MA UUs, the lack of iron and horses nearby, the barbs looting me stupid, the brutal tech pace ( considering there was only one other scientific civ - I can see why ainwood changed the Ottomans trait from scientific). I used every dirty trick in the book to keep myself in it - RCP, infinite map trading, resource disconnect, phoney wars and I was still totally up against it until about 500AD.
This was probably the hardest emperor game I've played. The inital 100 or so turns were also the most interesting in a GOTM that I can remember.

The End of the World


The Military

Civ3 1.29f Open

...I learned monotheism as my free technology. I started minimum research on theology, intending to get it first. In 730 BC, I founded Pharsalos south of the jungle near the cattle. Soon afterwards, many barbarian horses converged on Pharsalos. I thought I might fight them off, but several horses couldn't hurt my hoplite and promoted him to elite, then one horseman killed him without getting hurt (I think) and barbs carry away hundreds of gold. More horsemen converged on Pharsalos, so I gave 54 gold to five people (those I knew I didn't intend to attack), and the barbs only stole 3 gold.

In 630, I sold monotheism to Rome for the republic, monarchy, their world map, and some gold. I noticed a one tile island which Rome had settled. That should annoy those going for conquest (although they can get it for peace). I decide that I will not attack Rome. I revolt. In 570, I founded Knossos near spices. In 550, I became a republic. In 510, I sold monotheism to China for two luxuries. In 190, I bought engineering from Rome for a lot of gold. I bought theology from India from India for engineering and some gold. I sold theology to China for feudalism and some gold. I started minimum research on printing press. In 130, I founded Argos near iron and ivory. In 90 AD, I bought chivalry from India for my world map and some gold. I bought education from Korea for chivalry, my world map, and some gold. I sold chivalry and invention to France for invention, their world map, and some gold.

In 170, Corinth deposed to China with several military units stationed there. I lost my source of horses, so I could only build longbowmen, hoplites, catapults, and warriors. In 270, I bought banking from Rome for some gold. I bought gunpowder from Korea for banking and some gold. Unfortunately, there was no saltpeter available. In 370, I bought astronomy from Spain for gunpowder, my world map, and some gold. In 430, I learned printing press. In 520, after refusing my only demand so far, from pathetic Egypt, I bought chemistry from France and physics from the Arabs. I started minimum research on metallurgy. In 580, I bought theory of gravity from India for some gold. I bought magnetism from France for theory of gravity and some gold. I sold theory of gravity and magnetism to Ottomans for metallurgy, horses, incense, their world map, economics, and music theory. When I entered the industrial age.... (to be continued)

As you can see, the barbarian uprising hurt. I decided that if possible, I would conquer just China. However, China is the most powerful nation in the world, and I have few resources (although I have horses and will soon connect iron). I still continued to build horsemen in preparation of the upgrade to knights. I had also built longbowmen, catapults, and warriors to upgrade to persian mercenaries. I may have to just keep going peacefully and buy technologies (I don't have the capabilities to out-research the AI) until fission. My firaxis score will be low, causing my jason score to be low.

1.27, going for space.

I spent most of the Middle Ages trying to catch up with my own tech rate I couldn't increase my research capacity as quickly as I wanted. So almost all my efforts went toward doing what I could for research - expanding and growing population, improving the land, and building city improvements.

After entering the Middle Ages in 1075BC I emptied my treasury and a couple of towns to ride out the barbarian uprisings. That worked well. By 900BC I'd absorbed the uprisings with little damage and could start building up my treasury again.

I continued researching Republic at the forty turn rate and learned it in 550BC. I immediately revolted via the "big picture", got a 6 turn revolution, revolted again when asked and got a 3 turn revolution (two turns remaining.) I gave Republic to my rivals to boost their research. In 510BC I became a Republic and was able to start cash rushing some much needed buildings, especially libraries.

After becoming a Republic I ran at zero research for a while since it was a good bet that some of them were researching every available path. And so it was - over the next eight turns my rivals learned Engineering, Chivalry, and in 350BC Theology. I paid 28gpt for Theology and started research again, working on Education. It was a good bet my rivals were researching Invention.

In 330BC I completed building a Forbidden Palace in the north. I added four workers to bring Corinth in the south (beside the cattle) to size 10, then abandoned Athens. And in 310BC my capital jumped as planned. I then had two productive regions, one with Knossos as its core in the north and one with Corinth as its core in the south. By this time I also had the two regions connected by a road through the jungle, so four luxuries were available throughout the empire:



My research rate was still too slow. It would take seven more turns to learn Education. I decided it was time for a Golden Age to temporarily boost the research pace and to hurry the construction of universities. I didn't have much of a military (had 7 archers, 1 horseman, and 1 warrior) so I chose Korea as a target for a brief skirmish which could be terminated without much bloodshed. I declared war in 290BC and tried to destroy a Korean settler+spearman pair and the one Korean town in my territory. My first attacks were a disaster, the Koreans defeated a number of my units. I cash rushed more and finally in 210BC had a Hoplite win, triggering my GA.

That finally got things moving at a better pace. I learned Education in 190BC (8 turns) and gave it to most of my rivals - after they learned Invention I wanted some of them to pick Astronomy to research.

Korea agreed to peace in 170BC and that was the end of our little war.

I learned Banking in 90BC (5 turns) and was able to trade for Invention. I then switched to the bottom path, learning Gunpowder in 6 turns, Chemistry in 4, Metallurgy in 4, Physics in 5, Theory Of Gravity in 5, and Magnetism in 5. Along the way I traded for Astronomy, Music Theory, Printing Press, and Navigation.

It was 370AD when I learned Magnetism and entered the Industrial Age. By this time I'd built Copernicus' and Newton's - I prebuilt for those as high priority wonders since I wanted all the research help I could get.

There was some ongoing warfare among my rivals during the Middle Ages which resulted in Spain's destruction in 250AD. I didn't join in, just kept trading and gifting tech with everyone to keep them happy with me.

In 370AD my map looked like this:



I had seven luxuries, three of them via trade. Most of my cities now had universities as well as libraries. I'd recently begun to have spare production capacity and finally started building barracks and Knights. I had just 3 Knights by the end of the Middle Ages but production was ramping up quickly. Greece will finally become a military force as well as a scientific one in the Industrial Age!

SirPleb why did you revolt 2x in a row? I've never seen this, why is it done?

Psychonaut777 said:

SirPleb why did you revolt 2x in a row? I've never seen this, why is it done?

Click to expand...

Its a 'sort-of' bug / exploit.

If you research a tech (rather than buy it), you are given the option of revolting to the new govt. If you choose that, you will be taken the the screen to check the next tech. If you choose 'show me he big picture', you have access to your advisors and can go to the domestic advisor screen. You will see how many turns you are likely to be inanarchy for, and if its too long, you can hit the 'revolution' button again. It will give you a new number of anarchy turns.

1.29 open

900 bc
After entering the MA, I still didn't have a government, iron or horses and I had a great number of barbs in the south to deal with. The barbs turned out to be a lot of fun. My roaming warriors paid the ultimate price but succeeded in leading the barb horses to two Chinese settler pairs. I was laughing the whole time. The remaining barbs were lured in by Argos, on the southern edge of the jungle near the cattle, hurting me very little.

My world at 1000 bc:


775 bc
I finally got Monarchy and underwent a 6-turn anarchy. Due to the lack of resources, I realized that my drive for domination would be seriously hampered. This really threw me out of my typical game. That and the extremely fast tech pace in the AA (I slowed it down in the MA) are two of the reasons this game was so much fun.

In an effort to slow down the tech pace, and the Arabs, the strongest civ in the western hemisphere, I declared war on them and signed MAs with Rome, Egypt and Spain. China was still involved in a very slow war with the Indians, so all the major players were being kept rather busy.

At this point I decided to improve terrain, expand and build libraries and markets in my core. I did this almost at the expense of military. Just building enough to discourage any potential aggressors.

110 bc
Other than declaring on the Romans and signing a MA with Egypt, things had been pretty uneventful. Being careful not to break any deals with the ai, I was now at peace with everyone. That would soon change. The iron was finally hooked up and the luxuries were plentiful. I had ivory, wines and furs, trading China for dyes and would soon hook up the spices in the south.

My focus had shifted to military and I was ready to go on the offensive. Having shut off research and counting on the fact that the ai was probably researching everything, my first rival forced to kneel before me would be Ghandi, the current owner of the Great Library.

My world and puny army at 110 bc:


16 warriors
9 swords
8 hoplites

230 ad
By this point I had triggered my GA, conquered most of India including the Great Library and maybe even more importantly taken control of the horses in the south. Capturing the Great Library enabled me to pocket some gold and gave me engineering, feudalism, chivalry, invention, theology and education. I turned up the research and was managing gunpowder in 8.

460 ad
I spent the next couple hundred years beefing up my army and getting the southern area productive. I was having to hand-build the FP by the cattle. Needless to say it was pretty slow going and I probably should have tried a palace jump instead. By 460 ad it was completed along with Leonardo's in the north. By this time China had become a monster so I decided to declare on Rome and MA/ROP with China. The sheer number of troops they would soon move through my territory was daunting indeed.

My world and slightly larger army at 460 ad:


5 warriors
7 swords
3 muskets
15 knights
14 hoplite

810 ad
I started a very quick conquest of Korea to obtain saltpeter and the silks. I had been trading with China for saltpeter up until this point and had been upgrading knights since learning military tradition. The most strategic city on the map, Rome, soon became an integral part of my game. I was able to block the Chinese access to the choke for several turns letting their troops back up. I then gave them access and let them have at it. They took Rome and began moving large number of troops through to the other side. My plan was to declare on China next, take Rome and effectively seal off the bulk of their army in the west.

1080 ad
I was still a little hesitant to attack China, so I continued to build my army and wait to declare until all deals had expired. I had unhooked my resources to build horses for upgrade when the Chinese decided it was a good idea to stab their good neighbor to the south in the back. Luckily I had been positioning troops for an invasion of my own and I had enough workers on the resources to hook them up again. It's almost as if the ai knew what I was planning. I loss no cities on the first turn and their initial invasion only consisted of a few muskets and cavalry. I in turn claimed the spices and a few other cities including Rome. Signing MAs with almost everyone in the west more than took care of the bulk of the Chinese military.

My world and army at 1080 ad:


5 warriors
5 swords
9 horses
18 muskets
23 knights
35 cavalries

1200 ad
I had been researching hard toward steam power in an effort to get rails to the front and I entered the IA. Things were really starting to snowball for me militarily and I was rolling over China pretty fast. As weak as the ai now was in the west, my domination came shortly into the IA, but that will have to wait for the next spoiler.

My world at 1200 ad:

1.27f - open

Ancient Age

In 970AD, I was 2 turns from researching ToG when the RNG gods decided how they would punish me for falling behind on tech. (The rest of the world was already in the industrial age.) I had recently traded for horses from China, who now was offering me a MPP. I accepted and they immediately attacked.


I desparately brought everyone into the war against China. Including a fatal MPP agreement to get Spain. (The had a small stack near China's two west coast cities that I thought could help distract China.)

So there I was, Republic, Golden Age, massive WW from loss of cities despite 4 lux resources. No horses or saltpeter. I still had a few Knights a-building, 9 MI, 5 Muskets (an earlier trade), 2 LB, and a bunch of Hoplites. Against Cavalry and railroads.

I felt like I was holding my own until I could make peace (I had lost 6-7 of my 19 cities at that point). I even figured out, eventually, that I had to get back to monarchy and got a 4 turn anarchy.

I got peace and then Spain, who had no more troops on-hand, somehow pulled me back in via MPP. With the renewal of war, China, with Infantry by this time, rapidly reduced me to 5 cities by 1110AD.

At one point, I had secured horses in a trade wiht the Ottomans, but the RNG gods didn't like that, so Ottoman DoW on me the following turn.

I got steam power (free tech) and traded for medince, but I could not trade for nationalism to save my life (literally ).



So here I sit, I haven't touched the game since last weekend. I might be able to get peace before get I destroyed but it is a race between that and the end of the MPP. I am not sure I can make myself play it out.

----------------------------------------
On a side note: For S&Gs, I went back to 970AD and started a war with Rome and got China in on my side. All I can say is that things would have turned out much better if I had directed China's aggression rather than letting it find me. I also tried replaying the beginning using some of the things I learned from Sir Pleb's AA post. I was able to increase my growth but I could never seem to get horses or saltpeter, even though I knew where it was.

Demiurge said:

810 ad
I started a very quick conquest of Korea to obtain saltpeter and the silks. I had been trading with China for saltpeter up until this point and had been upgrading knights since learning military tradition. The most strategic city on the map, Rome, soon became an integral part of my game. I was able to block the Chinese access to the choke for several turns letting their troops back up. I then gave them access and let them have at it. They took Rome and began moving large number of troops through to the other side. My plan was to declare on China next, take Rome and effectively seal off the bulk of their army in the west.

Click to expand...

Very nice! One of the best moves I've read in the GOTM in a long time

That choke at Rome is one of the most sadistic/inspired features I've seen to date.

As for my MA... entered it in 450BC, and got Engineering as my tech. Good news indeed - nobody else had it so I traded it around and very briefly had a tech lead. I was still at war with China and France and Spain and Korea, but mostly China, who were taking away my core cities.

At some point (don't have my spreadsheet accessible from work...) I lost Athens, and signed peace with China for Corinth, finally abandoning my original core north of the mountains and getting a new palace in Delphi, with its two cows and abundant grassland. Great spot to start again.

After some shennanigans with a French longbowman (eventually whacked by an Elite Hoplite coming down from a mountain!) and the town of Rouens with its 'Super Spear' defender (2 reg+2 vet Archers took 1HP off it, meanwhile it gets promoted twice), I get peace with pretty much everyone, build a bunch of workers, and start about improving the terrain.

I didn't bother with military - just token Hoplite defenders - and concentrated on Libraries and other culture to prevent flips (Mycenae flipped to China; I ended up with 6 cities, all quite productive). Trading Ivory, and also using my single Spices and Iron when necessary (never realised 'til recently that I could trade using my only available Resource/Lux - but Spices for Silks+gpt is better than just Spices!).

Started off revolting to Monarchy (2-turn Anarchy) whilst small, then Republic (2 turns again!) when I got large enough cities.

I realised I was catching up with Rome, who were getting swallowed by China, who were rampaging across the map, taking out India in the MA. I kept wondering when I'd get whacked, but it never came.

Finally entered the IA in 1360 or thereabouts, a whole age behind most of the rest (apart from Rome, who I'd just overhauled, and Arabia still a few techs ahead but marooned on a 1-tile island). I did have 6 nice cities, and the jungle was rapdily disappearing.

My plan was to wait for China to kill me, or to launch, or to win a UN vote (not likely, given they'd been at war with pretty much everyone at one point or another), whilst retaining some semblance of dignity.

Neil.