danaphanous
religious fanatic
- Joined
- Sep 6, 2013
- Messages
- 1,501
As most games seem to end with someone becoming a runaway in tech (usually you) I was wondering if anyone has any inspiring stories of taking on the tech leader and ending their reign through war. It's difficult because they are usually a gen ahead in war technology and gets harder the closer it is to the end of the game. There is nothing like the feeling of flattening someone with superior tech though. It just makes you feel so good about yourself!
One of my stories:
I played a hotseat game vs. myself trying for a religious-enhanced science victory for indonesia on a continent by himself. I was playing Zulu at the same time on a large 5-civ continent and warmongering away for a domination victory. There was a total of 8 civs including us and the rest were immortal AI.
I did extremely well with both of them.
As Zulu:
Zulu wiped out Austria early and was denounced by the other 3 civs on his continent. Luckily he hadn't yet met Indonesia and Iroquois so he stopped for a breath and emphasized happiness and tech infrastructure when all luxury trades abruptly ended. The standard AI punishment for warmongering which can be surprisingly effective at shutting you down. As soon as I met the others I locked down loads of luxury deals and as soon as I finished National College and got Impi began the war again. This time I did not stop rolling until I had wiped out Greece, Sweden, Siam, and crossed the channel to deal a death-blow to india the closest island civ. This left Indonesia (myself) and Iroquois going strong overseas. They cut off all trades and I again had to turtle for a little while while I secured my tech, stabilized, built factories/etc, and got positive in happiness after grabbing forbidden palace and opening Autocracy.
I opened an ideology a few turns before anyone else as indonesia had gone straight for public schools and bulbed toward research stations. He was doing amazingly actually and Seeing in the espionage screen just how far he (myself) was getting and that he was about the get infantry and ironclads which would grind a sea invasion to a painful process I decided to take him now before the lead widened. I turned spies onto him and managed to steal 2-3 techs while I was in transit. Counter-spies seemed to do nothing as the zulu had grabbed the double-stealing tenet. So it was an epic clash of playing styles and I used it as a testing ground for experiments and alternate play-styles as I could compare my own progress directly in the same game.
I figured he was expecting an assault from the east and had scouting ships between us as the spacing was only 15 ocean squares between my empire and his there. So Instead I sailed 75 squares around the world from the West and landed the whole party on the back-side since I knew he would not suspect me to take such a long wasteful route. I completely bypassed Iroquois as they were only half the distance this direction and ignored them as they were slightly behind me in tech and not a runaway like indonesia. This was a huge risk as it gave him time to outdate my invasion force, but I sailed it as soon as I finished upgrading my victorious army on India's island and launched. I arrived supported by a fleet of privateers and frigates that I spammed and raced to catch up with the fleet in all my harbor cities over the long 25-turn wait. It was a stressful time as I saw in the science screen he was getting GW infantry, then ironclad technology, then starting on aircraft. I also was harassed by barbarian privateers along the way as apparently the island civs had failed to deal with simple problems out in the boonies. They got close to my fleet a few times but I managed to get some support in and stole several new privateers for the invasion. This proved pivotal later as I'll explain.
As Indonesia: It was hard not the cheat for Indonesia as I liked them too and give him the heads-up about the surprise invasion corridor, but I played it as I would. I first built a few boats for colonies close to zulu, then starting rushing ironclads for home defense and stationing them near the closest points to the zulu empire. I did not guard the flank near the iroquois as I figured zulu would not sail past him without either a) invading or b) being seen. Meanwhile he finished universities everywhere while rapidly grabbing superior military tech as he guessed he was probably going to be invaded soon. Primary on his list was flight which he managed to get about 5 turns after D-Day.
As zulu again: INdonesia already had 3 ironclads and a couple frigates ready to sink such an assault and actually had a decently well-balanced land defense force stationed on hills and ready to crush a landing party but the sneak-attack caught him off guard and I landed the whole army in a safe spot before he got around. It was like reverse-D-Day if Germany had thrown everything against America and sailed an invasion force around the world and across the Pacific. I pitted my Ikanda-enhanced 6-upgrade rifleman swarms with city attack bonuses in waves against his war infantry, meanwhile pillaging like the plague to keep up on health, and found myself on even footing even being a tech gen behind due to their massive cover and flanking bonuses. Then I tag-teamed his ironclads with like 3 frigates apiece and finishing with the privateers stole 50% of his ironclads as he put them out even before I had the tech for them. I bought out and friended a nearby CS as a beachhead for wounded boats and there were dozens during that invasion due to the ironclad defense. Even 1 ironclad every 2 turns couldn't save him though bc of the shear numbers and I kept adding them to my fleet. After seeing this happen 7 times or so he stopped making them and gave up on defeating my inferior fleet now that I had stolen his ironclads. The land force was trickier though as it's hard to hold out against cavalry and infantry with outdated troops no matter how upgraded they are. I crushed as many big cities to nerf his production and thus defense response but eventually flagged after being able to take 3 of them. 2 core and 1 peripheral.
As indonesia:
It was freaking scary being indonesia. He landed and the next turn had pillaged everything within reach. His riflemen had all previously been highly decorated impi and retained 3 of the Ikanda promotions including +1 motion giving him 2 movement even in the jungle where he landed. I on the other hand couldn't move through my own jungle so he secured the beachhead there easily. I moved my prepared GW infantry that I had on hand to match the riflemen but when I hovered over them I saw a huge 8-term list of positive green modifiers he had 2 due to military wonders, 2 generals, and multiple flanking and cover bonuses. After adding them all up his riflemen were basically like GW infantry if they had a flanking partner and they always did. He rushed and crushed a 25-pop city in a mere 3 turns and mostly with melee due to his city attack bonuses on them all. This was my highest production city unfortunately as my capitol was science-oriented and slightly less. Good choice for him. I then resorted to some hit and run with my cavalry and managed to slowly pick off riflemen. I killed more than half of his highly decorated riflemen over time and started to have hope. But could never recover the beach-head as he had 4-5 cannons back behind his troops and tons offshore boat support to bombard me. I pretty much had to stick the the core and guard it. Hitting occasionally with cavalry. My ironclads which I thought would be my savior were all stolen. Once I lost 2 side by side in the same turn and watched them join his side. I eventually gave up...he owned the waters. My colonies fell next in a spiral and he pillaged all the nearby luxuries plunging me into unhappiness and killing my gold even though he stopped invading by land for about 20 turns. I got aircraft technology to my joy but found I could not lock down oil and my CS partners weren't gonna develop their's anytime soon. I was screwed though I made him pay for some of it.
As Zulu:
Same with his great war infantry. They were way better 1on1 but my riflemen had huge flanking bonuses and way more eperience and so I mowed through them anyway. Then as he turtled to protect his core cities and cranked out gw infantry and cavalry, I started to lose ground troops and my momentum flagged due to not having number superiority so I cut my losses and fortified my borders halfway through his territory and right at the doorstep of his impressive capital. I rotated wounded in and out but kept him out of my beachhead. Anytime I got near the capital the huge guns and cannon were killing my ground troops (his age ahead city-bombard bonus was rough) so I played it cool and switched strategies. My fleet sailed around erasing all his off-continent luxury cities and plunging him into unhappiness. and I went on a pillaging rampage erasing every resource/luxury I could get my hands on. He raced infantry (double my riflemen's attack) and also aircraft to fend me off. It might've been over if he could've fielded some bombers, but the damage had been done and his tech lead was lost. Unfortunately, aircraft science doesn't help you if you don't have oil or the workers to improve it. And my huge offshore fleets made sure that never happened. After bulbing artillery it was over as his capitol could't touch my 6 city-enhanced artillary with centuries of city-taking experience.
So that's my story. I flattened a massive tech leader who led in every category of warfare and had a pretty decent army. And that person was me so he fought very well at war. Mainly because of the pillaging actually. I ended a lot of his gpt deals which made it difficult for him to rush/upgrade really taught me a lot about guerrilla and economic aspects of warfare. I tried to play it real blind and fair even though I controlled both.
I barely stopped to heal my boats before launching a naval invasion of the iroquois capital. Unfortunately for him on the coast and close. It fell in two turns and that was the game. Over before a single bomber was built or oil source used.
Another:
On my Deity game I also flattened the tech-leader Korea despite the fact that he had his Hwa'tcha's by switching paths in the renaissance. He kept staying 3-4 techs ahead and slowly widening. I was second. He went top going for public schools and universities and I, realizing this, went south and beelined cannons and musketmen/cavalry/lancers/riflemen/gatling guns instead of fighting him peacefully. Killed the fool and then recovered the tech lead after a short bloody war where AI dogpiled me--even my ally from the war! It slowed my SV by about 20-30 turns but was worth it. I was proud of that choice and that I was able to end a prominent Deity AI and tech leader at that! He was good enough he actually managed to catch up to me and field riflemen by the time I was on his capital's doorstep but it was over for him by that point. Just slowed the war marginally and fed some good experience.
One of my stories:
I played a hotseat game vs. myself trying for a religious-enhanced science victory for indonesia on a continent by himself. I was playing Zulu at the same time on a large 5-civ continent and warmongering away for a domination victory. There was a total of 8 civs including us and the rest were immortal AI.
Spoiler :
I did extremely well with both of them.
As Zulu:
Zulu wiped out Austria early and was denounced by the other 3 civs on his continent. Luckily he hadn't yet met Indonesia and Iroquois so he stopped for a breath and emphasized happiness and tech infrastructure when all luxury trades abruptly ended. The standard AI punishment for warmongering which can be surprisingly effective at shutting you down. As soon as I met the others I locked down loads of luxury deals and as soon as I finished National College and got Impi began the war again. This time I did not stop rolling until I had wiped out Greece, Sweden, Siam, and crossed the channel to deal a death-blow to india the closest island civ. This left Indonesia (myself) and Iroquois going strong overseas. They cut off all trades and I again had to turtle for a little while while I secured my tech, stabilized, built factories/etc, and got positive in happiness after grabbing forbidden palace and opening Autocracy.
I opened an ideology a few turns before anyone else as indonesia had gone straight for public schools and bulbed toward research stations. He was doing amazingly actually and Seeing in the espionage screen just how far he (myself) was getting and that he was about the get infantry and ironclads which would grind a sea invasion to a painful process I decided to take him now before the lead widened. I turned spies onto him and managed to steal 2-3 techs while I was in transit. Counter-spies seemed to do nothing as the zulu had grabbed the double-stealing tenet. So it was an epic clash of playing styles and I used it as a testing ground for experiments and alternate play-styles as I could compare my own progress directly in the same game.
I figured he was expecting an assault from the east and had scouting ships between us as the spacing was only 15 ocean squares between my empire and his there. So Instead I sailed 75 squares around the world from the West and landed the whole party on the back-side since I knew he would not suspect me to take such a long wasteful route. I completely bypassed Iroquois as they were only half the distance this direction and ignored them as they were slightly behind me in tech and not a runaway like indonesia. This was a huge risk as it gave him time to outdate my invasion force, but I sailed it as soon as I finished upgrading my victorious army on India's island and launched. I arrived supported by a fleet of privateers and frigates that I spammed and raced to catch up with the fleet in all my harbor cities over the long 25-turn wait. It was a stressful time as I saw in the science screen he was getting GW infantry, then ironclad technology, then starting on aircraft. I also was harassed by barbarian privateers along the way as apparently the island civs had failed to deal with simple problems out in the boonies. They got close to my fleet a few times but I managed to get some support in and stole several new privateers for the invasion. This proved pivotal later as I'll explain.
As Indonesia: It was hard not the cheat for Indonesia as I liked them too and give him the heads-up about the surprise invasion corridor, but I played it as I would. I first built a few boats for colonies close to zulu, then starting rushing ironclads for home defense and stationing them near the closest points to the zulu empire. I did not guard the flank near the iroquois as I figured zulu would not sail past him without either a) invading or b) being seen. Meanwhile he finished universities everywhere while rapidly grabbing superior military tech as he guessed he was probably going to be invaded soon. Primary on his list was flight which he managed to get about 5 turns after D-Day.
As zulu again: INdonesia already had 3 ironclads and a couple frigates ready to sink such an assault and actually had a decently well-balanced land defense force stationed on hills and ready to crush a landing party but the sneak-attack caught him off guard and I landed the whole army in a safe spot before he got around. It was like reverse-D-Day if Germany had thrown everything against America and sailed an invasion force around the world and across the Pacific. I pitted my Ikanda-enhanced 6-upgrade rifleman swarms with city attack bonuses in waves against his war infantry, meanwhile pillaging like the plague to keep up on health, and found myself on even footing even being a tech gen behind due to their massive cover and flanking bonuses. Then I tag-teamed his ironclads with like 3 frigates apiece and finishing with the privateers stole 50% of his ironclads as he put them out even before I had the tech for them. I bought out and friended a nearby CS as a beachhead for wounded boats and there were dozens during that invasion due to the ironclad defense. Even 1 ironclad every 2 turns couldn't save him though bc of the shear numbers and I kept adding them to my fleet. After seeing this happen 7 times or so he stopped making them and gave up on defeating my inferior fleet now that I had stolen his ironclads. The land force was trickier though as it's hard to hold out against cavalry and infantry with outdated troops no matter how upgraded they are. I crushed as many big cities to nerf his production and thus defense response but eventually flagged after being able to take 3 of them. 2 core and 1 peripheral.
As indonesia:
It was freaking scary being indonesia. He landed and the next turn had pillaged everything within reach. His riflemen had all previously been highly decorated impi and retained 3 of the Ikanda promotions including +1 motion giving him 2 movement even in the jungle where he landed. I on the other hand couldn't move through my own jungle so he secured the beachhead there easily. I moved my prepared GW infantry that I had on hand to match the riflemen but when I hovered over them I saw a huge 8-term list of positive green modifiers he had 2 due to military wonders, 2 generals, and multiple flanking and cover bonuses. After adding them all up his riflemen were basically like GW infantry if they had a flanking partner and they always did. He rushed and crushed a 25-pop city in a mere 3 turns and mostly with melee due to his city attack bonuses on them all. This was my highest production city unfortunately as my capitol was science-oriented and slightly less. Good choice for him. I then resorted to some hit and run with my cavalry and managed to slowly pick off riflemen. I killed more than half of his highly decorated riflemen over time and started to have hope. But could never recover the beach-head as he had 4-5 cannons back behind his troops and tons offshore boat support to bombard me. I pretty much had to stick the the core and guard it. Hitting occasionally with cavalry. My ironclads which I thought would be my savior were all stolen. Once I lost 2 side by side in the same turn and watched them join his side. I eventually gave up...he owned the waters. My colonies fell next in a spiral and he pillaged all the nearby luxuries plunging me into unhappiness and killing my gold even though he stopped invading by land for about 20 turns. I got aircraft technology to my joy but found I could not lock down oil and my CS partners weren't gonna develop their's anytime soon. I was screwed though I made him pay for some of it.
As Zulu:
Same with his great war infantry. They were way better 1on1 but my riflemen had huge flanking bonuses and way more eperience and so I mowed through them anyway. Then as he turtled to protect his core cities and cranked out gw infantry and cavalry, I started to lose ground troops and my momentum flagged due to not having number superiority so I cut my losses and fortified my borders halfway through his territory and right at the doorstep of his impressive capital. I rotated wounded in and out but kept him out of my beachhead. Anytime I got near the capital the huge guns and cannon were killing my ground troops (his age ahead city-bombard bonus was rough) so I played it cool and switched strategies. My fleet sailed around erasing all his off-continent luxury cities and plunging him into unhappiness. and I went on a pillaging rampage erasing every resource/luxury I could get my hands on. He raced infantry (double my riflemen's attack) and also aircraft to fend me off. It might've been over if he could've fielded some bombers, but the damage had been done and his tech lead was lost. Unfortunately, aircraft science doesn't help you if you don't have oil or the workers to improve it. And my huge offshore fleets made sure that never happened. After bulbing artillery it was over as his capitol could't touch my 6 city-enhanced artillary with centuries of city-taking experience.
So that's my story. I flattened a massive tech leader who led in every category of warfare and had a pretty decent army. And that person was me so he fought very well at war. Mainly because of the pillaging actually. I ended a lot of his gpt deals which made it difficult for him to rush/upgrade really taught me a lot about guerrilla and economic aspects of warfare. I tried to play it real blind and fair even though I controlled both.
I barely stopped to heal my boats before launching a naval invasion of the iroquois capital. Unfortunately for him on the coast and close. It fell in two turns and that was the game. Over before a single bomber was built or oil source used.
Another:
On my Deity game I also flattened the tech-leader Korea despite the fact that he had his Hwa'tcha's by switching paths in the renaissance. He kept staying 3-4 techs ahead and slowly widening. I was second. He went top going for public schools and universities and I, realizing this, went south and beelined cannons and musketmen/cavalry/lancers/riflemen/gatling guns instead of fighting him peacefully. Killed the fool and then recovered the tech lead after a short bloody war where AI dogpiled me--even my ally from the war! It slowed my SV by about 20-30 turns but was worth it. I was proud of that choice and that I was able to end a prominent Deity AI and tech leader at that! He was good enough he actually managed to catch up to me and field riflemen by the time I was on his capital's doorstep but it was over for him by that point. Just slowed the war marginally and fed some good experience.