NC - 182 - Tokugawa - Japan

[Takesitez]

Regarding Space victories: the usual plan is to go for the techs that enable the most expensive parts (SS Engines - Fusion) first. The reason is that by that time you often have 20+ cities and enough of them can finish the small parts (from Ecology or Composites) in 5-6 turns, but larger parts like the Engines will take 8-9 turns even in your big production cities, which you have only two or three of.

I also often go for Superconductors rather early as you want research labs in almost all your cities. You want them in commerce cities to speed up techs and in hammer cities to speed up spaceship parts.

Yeah thats basically what I did beyond the last part where I researched Fusion after composites, upon which Shakabrade remarked. I suppose this can shave of quite a few turns, but the disparity between my 2 mega hammer cities and the secondary sites, was such that the secondary sites produced casings at 7/10 turns whilst I could build the engines at 8/9 ish, so in this case less turns (2/3) would've been saved. Thanks for the reexplanation though

 

[Gumbolt]

125bc Edited.

Spoiler :

13 cities and struggling for science a bit. I have science now to help push me along. Mongols and Russians at war. They have taken Moscow.

Spanish are now are gone. Waited for a ceasefire with Spanish for the hill city and for an archer to leave the city. It fell 3-4 turns later. Other Spanish city i auto razed. No resources and no idea why he settled it. Okay maybe sugar in second ring but no use to me. Whole land mass to myself.

Took out 2 barb cities. Lost 3 units to the 2nd one..

Traded HBR for alphabet. Then HBR/writing for IW with Mongols.

Just late built GLH. Still way behind on tech here. 4 turns off currency.

75 ad

Spoiler :

Up to 15 cities now. 16th soon. COL has arrived and I can build some court houses. -15-16 gold a turn in my most distant cities.

 

[pandamancer]

IMM 1800AD cultural victory

 

[hankinsohl]

Diplomation Victory 1912, Emperor No Huts/Events

Spoiler :

A fun game. With just a few cottage tiles but starting on the coast, I decided early on to use TGL to fuel my early economy. I moved west to free up a cottageable tile, and to gain access to more hills and to make space for a possible helper city along the coast to the east in case a food resource tile is available there.

I built my second city and settled it nearby to the west with the rice tile just within the BFC. I researched up to BW in case that would be needed for defense and then researched sailing/masonry for TGL. I build TGL without any issues.

Bernnus was scouted to the west and I plotted a two city wall to cut him off (I didn't really want to take one of these cut off cities as its only decent food tile is the flood plains - moreover that city was very close to Brennus' capital so I assumed that Brennus would quickly settle there.

To my surprise I eventually settled the 2nd cut-off city.

Early on I was able to expand to 10 cities, all coastal, with three of them on tiny islands. I just missed settling an 11th city on Peter's continent.

Research pace wasn't extremely fast - didn't get an academy built until far too late. I researched up to civil service and then the high route through music and nationalism. I missed out on the great artist from music (I guess one of the AI's in the far continent got it).

I was able to bulb my way to get liberalism first and I took military tradition to launch a cataphract war against Russia. Russia fell quickly and I gave Peter back his cities. Next up was Mongolia who, for some reason, was less willing to capitulate. In the end I decided just to wipe the Mongols off the map; moreover I wanted to keep the mids that the Mongols built and wiping them off the map makes unhappiness/revolt easier to cope with.

I was taking care to befriend Brennus - I took his religion and avoided trades with his worst enemy, Isabella. This paid off as I got Brennus to pleased and he built the AP. I built temples and monasteries everywhere for the hammer bonus; and with the cities from Mongolia plus my original 10 I easily controlled every AP vote.

Last target on the starting continent was Isabella - by now I had cavalry and sheer weight of numbers caused her to cap. I returned all her cities once she capitulated.

On the far continent, the 3 AIs were all about size 10 but were somewhat ahead of me in tech except for Lincoln. I therefore went after the Americans, building numerous cannon to augment my cavalry.

It took quite some time to get my troops into position, and it was cannons against artillery, but I had overwhelming numbers; brute force quickly caused the Americans to cap.

The same trick did the job against Germany who was even more advanced than America but didn't have many troops.

Once the UN was built I won a diplomatic victory - but I already had tanks/artillery/cannons/cavalry attacking Elizabeth. She would not have stood long and then Brennus would go in a matter of turns.
--------
This game was boilerplate for the way I like to war:
Bureaucracy-Police State-Slavery-Theocracy and pump out mass numbers of promoted units to stomp the AI.

I was lucky in that each civilization expanded to size 10 (no runaway giants to contend with) and trading on the far continent where they all went confucianism was none-too-vigorous allowing me to keep tech relevant.

 

[Choeimok]

Noble/Normal because I feel rusty and it's Toku on top of that, no huts/events/vassals.

Spoiler :

Settled in place and started WB / Agriculture. The one good thing about Toku's is his ability to get cottages earlier than most, unfortunately this isn't much of a fast cottage start... Also going to need Hunting and BW before going anywhere, so the starting tech situation is already quite awful.


I derped while exploring - wanted to put 1 turn into a warrior to grow before getting my first worker, but ended up building the full warrior. Oops.
Not really sure about the settling situation, Brennus is quite close and I can't settle directly on the river to the west and get the food there.



As a result, second city kind of late. Placement one off the coast and deleting a forest is awkward, but who has time for mysticism?


Planning to use these two as mostly pure cottage spots. I could theoretically axe-rush Brennus, but it seems better to just grab the free land and wait for Construction.


Getting that sweet block spot... which still will take a border pop. Brennus appears to have more land to the west - second city is NW of his capital, no idea where the third one is.
Tokyo actually ended up getting Hinduism from Brennus while I was still struggling to complete that library.



Peter is right across the strait, and his stack which I failed to screenshot here is also kind of scary. Hope he won't plot on me if I settle the Clam/Spice site which I plan to do as it would block the islands to the south. Already getting quite close to the ADs and struggling to get currency. Using Kyoto as a pure Settler/Worker pump probably doesn't really help. I probably should whip, but it won't regrow for this reason so I'll just tech Calender after Currency...
(Peter ended up beating me to the site by 2 turns while my warrior could only shadow his settler party as it was already too late, so I probably should have whipped.


I was camping this site just about forever, and finally it grew to size 2... just be be immediately cut down again. That completes my settling of the home continent. I did get Buddhism from somewhere, so maybe Brennus knows the founder? Or he got both.



Just why do I think he might be plotting on me? He hasn't met Brennus, perhaps that's why there's no WHEOORN?


Despite lots of random religious spread of of seemingly nowhere, I snagged confucianism... and got quite the awkward holy city placemenent. Peter keeps stacking troops on that strait crossing city, but I actually want to build up against Brennus as originally planned.



Oh. Just as I build the great latehouse after the end of my Settler frenzy.
I had rejected some stupid conversion demand because I like not having anarchy and getting border pops from my other religions that came out of seemingly nowhere...




Unlike Peter, he doesn't really have a stack I did panic-whip the Spear (my best defender in Satsuma against his Chariot would have been my own wounded Chariot who already got lucky on defense once), but it should be easy to turn this war around unless Peter suddenly has a lot of Galleys and places his stack inside my capital.




War ended up not going well, though. I had a stack of about 10 units get half-destroyed by lucky Axemen, Chariots and Gallics attacking my better-promoted AGG guys in a forest and had to retreat from Bibracte. It's almost 1000 AD already now


By the time I managed to make a significant push despite hm not having a lot of troops, I have Samurai already. If this wasn't noble, I'd probably be in a disastrous spot here. Brennus made a GG ... Combat 2 Horse Archer.


Just as I wonder if a bit of culture in the shadows SW of Bibracte has a slightly different shade of pinkish brown... I meet Isabella, who has a Celt city. Brennus looks like a goner.
My cities still hate me and I'm quite far from Monarchy, I don't have Mysticism...


Brennus very quickly lost another city in the south to her after that, so now suddenly the Celts were already taking their last stand...

... in a battle of unique units in Gergovia.

Since I didn't expect the war to end so early (Brennus was actually throwing a lot of scattered junk at me for having so few cities, he must have had low defenses in his south so Isabella could easily roll over him), so I'm still pumping units... I think I will attack Spain after this rather than let my units go to waste, the grass south of Bibracte is looking a lot greener than this plains-y north.


Brennus is dead, but I'm in an iffy spot. Most of my 13 cities hate me - I'm not whipping very much because nearly all of them either have too good production to whip (Kyoto, Osaka, soon also Bibracte) or are cottaged (Tokyo, Kagoshima, and, for lack of better options over there at the time, Nara) - that just leaves Etruscan (supposed to be a GP city, irrigation hasn't quite gotten up there yet and my crappy happy cap hurts) and the islands. Izumo on that island is kind of bad, I still haven't managed to build a work boat... Maybe building Moai right away wasn#t that great of an idea.

Peter is still plotting, even after I overtook him in power and have 2.5 times his number of cities. He does have a ton of units, but is probably bankrupt. Only peaceful guy so far has been Genghis.

So not going well, the rust definitely is there as I'm teching badly (true to Toku I haven't traded once... though I did get OB with Peter and, wherever he may be, Genghis) I've been managing both my cities and first offensive in the Celtic war rather poorly... though the latter must have been bad luck, losing veteran Axes to random Gallics on first try or a Formation Spear to 2 Chariots, all while defending at full health in a goddamn Forest The second wave with Elephants and the first few Samurai rolled over him, but in the end I took a millennium to take 3 cities.

Isabella has Feudalism so it won't be a walk in the park, but I'm planning to regroup my stack and go for some action before it obsoletes... If I get to 20 cities with a good medieval war after the very drawn-out classical one, I'll catch up in tech eventually. She also seems to be easily my greatest threat right now, not counting the 3 unmet civs of course.

 

[Mizar]

I definitely like your detailed writeup.
If you have so much land, eventually even Toku's economy gets going with a lot of cottages

 

[Choeimok]

Thanks It's perhaps a bit more detailed than it should have to, but I do enjoy that just for the reflection it offers alone.


Up to 1400-something:

Spoiler :

Very conveniently, Isabella has her stack right here. I will wait to reassemble and heal my army while plundering the cottages outside my new cities' BFCs, but with Trebs, Elephants and Samurai this should be easy... Very inconveniently, it's a hill, so if she camps the city...

So a few turns later I declared while camping in Bibracte in an effort to lure that stack of her off the hill...

That's what I'm talkin' about!



Uh... finally? His WE was actually Isabella recently, so I was hoping he might actually be targetting her, nope. After all this time...
He appears to have two Galleys to ferry over his outdated army while I have two axes tand an almost finished Samurai in Kyoto so I'm still not very concerned and intend to continue to push in the west.


Entered the Renaissance at last - looks like I'm running out of ways to not tech Mysticism. I'm not really interested in Gunpowder yet...


Peter gives me free Alphabet after losing 4 Swordsmen and a Galley. I could have dragged it on a bit more to grab more tech or gold, but that way I can march my garrison to the front as well.


That's three holy cities and zero shrines now. This one also contained a big stack - I lost a lot of cats and trebs (only my first treb had <70% odds...), but not a single dude. Maybe I should be using CR Samurai to soften up these longbows garrisons instead - most of them actually have combat as promotions because circumstances required it at the time.



After the third city, Isabella doesn't really seem to be putting up much of a fight anymore, so the all-importnat question now... where is Madrid? I got a map from Peter showing that Genghis in, in fact, in the east (I wsa contemplating to bribe him to war earlier, but scrapped it because "what if he's behind Isabella instead?". Sevilla was probably settled before Cordoba (Cordoba probably was in the jungle belt originally?), and I would expect Camelthing to be farthest from her capital, so I think Madrid to be north. Then again, that land isn't all that developed up there and little troops have come from that direction. So even if it's north, the south looks juicier...


But there it actually is - that's pretty close to Brennus' start, then... The defenders got demolished, nad I actually get a shrine finally... and turns out she had the Chichen Itza all along, perhaps that's why I had to bombard so long
I also notice that I appear to have forgotten to cut the copper I wanted to. Oh well, better she builds axes and spears than longbows, right?


Holy City #6, shrine #2! Christianity is actually the most popular religion right now, with both Peter (previously confused) and Genghis. Maybe Isabella also has Islam, maybe it's on the other continent, I don't know. Since it sits at 0%, it's probably with Isabella after all.


What are you gonna do now Izzy, strap your dead El Cid onto that Chariot?



So that leaves my empire and the rest of the known world in the following state:
I have 20 cities, still getting problems around size 10, but once the war is over, I should be able to get up to size 15 from WE going away. Economy is in the tank right now, but I'm phasing out of unit spam mode (gotta switch that Treb in Satsuma to something else)

The war has been going well after initial heavy siege losses in Tolosa and Seville, the next 5 cities were a stomp and Isabella is essentially dead now. I think my non-siege losses have been exactly one Samurai, I think one of the 3 guys from the Kyoto defense, to a swordsman on a hill, that's fair enough. Since I don't really fancy taking on Peter just now even though I probably could since he is backwards and I have a big stack, I've pretty much phased out of unit spamming mode to try and salvage the economy, at one point I was down to just 20 gold on 0% science.

And I did find those 0% muslims, also spanish... that city looks like an auto-razer, but I will take some time to get my single Galley over from the Russian border to here, so maybe it will grow. Maybe I'll even let Isabella keep it, have a peace treaty for a bunch of techs and only then take her out to get rid of the cultural . Or maybe I'll just build another Galley in Bibracte Tech situation is poor for 1400 AD, but Genghis and Peter are so far behind, it's not even that big of a deal.
Since the unmet civs probably have no religion, I might even try to convert to Christianity, spread it to the heathens overseas and use my huge land advantage to tech peacefully ahead - I don't think I'll be seeing draft rifles this game - if I want war on the eastern continent, I can just crush these two guys using Trebs, Samurais and Galleys that I don't have yet. I probably could bribe Genghis on him if I declare first, based on his willingness to be bribed onto Isabella.


Since with Brennus, Peter, Isabella and Genghis I have only met 4 civs, there's got to be some more in the fog... but they can't be too far ahead without Optics, so I probably don't have to be too concerned... Unless it slipped my attention, the Liberalism slug race is still open, too.


I'm actually rank 7 in and trade even with Brennus dead - so there's one extra civ on the map even? GNP is quite a concern, but again, once my new cottage cities in the south come online and those courthouses finish... Maybe I'll even move my palace to something like Cordoba, as it looks really juicy and Kyoto is a border city right now.

 

[Choeimok]

1625 AD, I finally have an economy

Spoiler :

Took a few more years to get those Galleys over here and the troops from the west, but done! Holy 7 #7 actually was at size 2 by the time, but this way...


... it's more likely that my 2 shrined religions will spread.


With the WW out of the way (I think this way was maybe better than 10 turns of peace after taking the last continental city for all her techs?) and the rich spanish cities coming out of rebellion, the economy is starting to flourish as planned. Lib is late but in the bag.

Took the boring option here.


I take the anarchy hit to switch into OR, HR and FS, then started to research Theo... which I then give cheaply to my neighbors as I don't really care which one of us exactly builds that thing (if I get fail gold, that's fine by me)... Hagia is standing IADL, but they have no religion as far as I'm aware...


Fail gold it is apparently.


Looks like my old best friend did it - I gave him Theo in which he had no research for a worldmap containing nothing new, and got no +Diplo out of it with the old alcoholic, but those sweet hammers...




Empire at the end of this short turnset. Religion is actually far better spread around the old Japanese core than near Barcelona itself. Genghis and Peter are laughabily behind, both still lacking CoL and Paper. I have been on a major building spree (including a palace move to the center), but kind of forgot about the national wonders. Just researched Democracy as evidenced... now I'm wondering: do I stay in HR (Bibracte would be less huge if I hadn't parked my medieval doomstack in there) or switch to US and Emancipation (Cottage growth would be nice - right now, Tokyo and Kagoshima are still my best developed commerce cities despite the land in the south being much richer) and take the population hit in my new capital?
I also still need to get some basic buildings in some of my lesser developed cities (or fishing villages, like Shimonoseki and Nagasaki), might want to do that first before getting out of slavery. If the next GP decides to be a Spy, I will burn him, not sure about the "good" GP types as an extra academy or some future corps look attractive.

And of course, where to put which wonder:
NE & Globe - Etruscan, that one was clear to me from the start but I forgot about Literature until now by skipping Aesthetics. It's not really a great city since 2 of its 3 food are mediocre and half of it is seafoodless coast, but everything else is prod city, commerce city, or filler fishing village.
HE- probably between Kyoto and Gergovia, both being coastal hammer cities. Osaka has been the source of very many of my units, but having it 1 off coast was the trade off for getting both resources right away, and any further war willl need a fleet...
IW - Bibracte. I btw haven't cut these forests yet as I don't want to get sucky workshops and would rather wait for lumbermills.
WS - Barcelona or maybe Madrid (which has more cottage land, but the "wrong" shrine)
OU - Madrid or Cordoba... Madrid has more tiles used by resources so they won't be cottages, Cordoba is has slightly more cottage land but is 1 off the river and has a mountain. Probably Madrid as it's more well rounded in the end - it's a really good commerce capital, but I just wanted to keep my capital central as FS >>>> Bureau in a 22 city cottage kingdom.
NP - there's not going to be any forest preserves, so any of my bigger cities can get it for just the health boost.

I still haven't met the other civs, so while they did build Hagia, they can't be teching very well... over there, it's probably Shaka, Monty and .... ??? I'm Toku, Brennus is dead, Genghis is here, Stalin can't be in the game, neither can Boudica... maybe Mehmed? Alex? Difficult to say, who possibly could tech that badly?

 

[Choeimok]

1790 AD...

Spoiler :

... I finally meet an overseas civ, Lincoln. Seems to be ahead of Peter but actually behind Khan. (who's not in Industrial yet, so I'm still delaying SciMeth and the free GPs from Physics and Commieism. If someone gets close it, I should still be able to change my path and grab Physics in 3-4 turns.




Economy has been doing well in this quiet building turnset - I've had Assembly Line for a few turns by now, and am heavily industrializing. I almost had forgotten Japan's UB is a Coal Plant, but was pleasantly surprised when dreading some nasty population decline from
I also having Mining, but Barca is still slooowly building that Wall Street... Since I ran out of Gold after my most recent teching spree, I might just rush buy it.

Apart from that, I managed to finish most of my NW plans though. Heroic in Kyoto (kind of a shame that Osaka has 3 settled GGs, I almost forgot about those), Ox in Madrid, NE in Etruscan and Izumo even finished its Moai at some point. I just need to get some more religion over there for temples, cap is still kind of low over there. Only Yokohama still sucks right now, party because it's the last city that still lacks the correct faith. I didn't get a second shrine but spead other religions anyway for temples. (I know FR would solve my problem and give me some Science, but I'm enjoying not going the same route for once, OR is fine).

So the plan: delay Scientific method, build even more buildings and then maybe I'll go for space or maybe I'll Deus Vult Lincoln and whoever is other heathen friends might be.

And yes, I know the Factory is worthless in a city like Nagasaki, but I'm building it anyway out of principle, and it will eventually finish.

 

[Choeimok]

Noble/Normal, Space 1919 AD

Spoiler :

The last ~130 years were just lots of building and corp spreading. My Toku-conomy went through the roof, I did a bit of colonizing on the other continent (lost the best spot there because I forgot to unload my Machine GUn along with my Settler, and a barb ate him), but Sapporo (late Hermitage city) actually got quite close to 5k culture, reaching their city tiles and probably flipping them quite soon.
Menwhile, Peter and Genghis were fighting the Free Religion guys from the other continent, while I just teched lightyears ahead. Maybe I also could have gone culture. Domination would have been an earlier win, but taken more effort. I also could have won via AP, but always fell a few votes short because Peter and Genghis were friendly.

South half of the continent from Barcelona (bit unfortunately placed, but with the AP shrine, that didn't matter) to Kyoto ended up being the economical core of my empire, but even the fishing villages were worth it, I think.

The game went terribly from the late BCs to around 1000 AD with my cities small and hateful while I was in a long war against an weak opponent (Brennus), but the medieval war against Isabella and forgivingness of Noble made it a stomp in the end. The 500 years of Pax Tokugawa in the end were actually a lot more enjoyable than anything before the spanish conquest. Next NC: back to Prince!

 

[pigswill]

Immortal marathon. 1424ad Domination.

Spoiler :

Settled on PH. Teched mining and BW. Built worker, warrior to pop2, settler, worker. Second city went between copper and corn. Capital and city2 built axes, chopped axes in city2. Rushed Brennus c 2100 w 8 axes. Razed three cities. Then picked on Isabella. Used razegold to reaearch sailing and masonry, chopped Glight while fighting Spain. By 1750bc I had the continent to myself and Glight. Kept Madrid for Stonehenge. Rexed slowly. Barbs were a nuisance, especially barb galleys ripping nets and sinking my galleys. Peter started settling the former Celtic lands. Economy improved once I got Col, whipped courthouses and got FP in Spain. Barb galley situation improved once I got MC for triremes. Got Colossus and CS c 1ad. Expanded slowly and fairly peacefully until Peter put Ragnar in charge of his Celtic colonies. Quick sam war to eliminate Ragnar, kept on teching. Finally went to war 1000ad with sam and cannon, annexed Russia and Mongolia then went for Bismark: artillery, MGs and Samurai vs rifle, cav, cannon. Samurai massacred all opponents (after being 'softened up' by artillery). Took half a dozen German cities before Bismark capitulated, just enough to trip domination.

 

[Gumbolt]

Only up to 580.

Spoiler up to 580ad :

Not much has really happened. Just teched CS. I now have 18 cities.Built MM wonder. Got beaten to G library by a distant AI.

Mongols and Russians are still aimlessly killing each other.

Thinking about my first golden age. I have 27.91% of land. Just a case of when I reach domination and if I try for the Samurai UU to take out the Russians and Mongols. Maybe quicker to just go cuirs.

Game feels pretty much won. AP would be easy from here too? Should be able to peace vassel someone else too.

 

[Gumbolt]

Spoiler Up to 1110ad :

Took the golden age at 580ad. Ran a second golden age pretty much after it too.
Teched Paper, Edu (bulbed), poly, lit and music. Got Great artist. Suprising considering I missed the Great library and date.
Traded for med, then tech philosophy, nationhood, Lib (bulbed), GP and took MT from Lib. Traded for construction, feudalism and PH. Monarchy too.

Declared on Peter around 1010ad. Bribed Mongols onto Peter too.

Peter lacked LB and pikes so his 6 cities fell quickly. I lacked units at start of was but cuirs made easy work of most defenders. I currently have 38 cuirs. 30 or so are in Russian's old land. Mongol's have 2 stacks of 6 or so units mostly his UU and some pults. His LB will be a small pain. I have time to wipe out the Mongols while I wait for astronomy.

Currently 8 turns off astronomy. No idea what other continent is doing. Need to chain vassel them quickly once I have astronomy.

Not sure if I can reach a win without the final continent. Might give it a go.

 

[Gumbolt]

Well this is not going so well now.

Spoiler Up to 1200ad. :

Russians and Mongols are now gone. My economy is tanked.

The cause? Colonial expenses from taking on so many Ai cities. Capturing a 1 pop city was a mistake. 34 gold per turn. Yikes!!

So now I face a choice. Create a colony wich would ultimately would mean I have to lower the power of the final Ai much more. Or squeeze out Astronomy. if I had paid attention more I probably would of built TM sooner for the golden age. Losing nearly 57 gold a turn is not funny. I still have wealth. I do have 40-45 cuirs already. Should be ample really.

On plus side I have found the Germans, English and her vassel the Americans. I don't think I will have enough land just vasselling English and Americans. There is a small barb island I can inhabit. Would put me close to 50% of land with no further wars. Meaning I need about 12% from the AI. Of course the barb island would be expensive if colonial costs are weighted in.

Spoiler Up to 1270ad :

Recovered things quite well. Forbidden palace built in Moscow. Whipped court house in captured cities. Ran wealth everywhere. Should get TM next turn for a golden age.

Whipped 8+ galleons too.

 

[Gumbolt]

Okay 1350ad domination. Immortal

Spoiler 1350ad :

After taking on Mongols and the Russians. i teched galleons. Spammed about 15-20 of them by whipping. Used my cuirs army left. Then sailed to Germany. Took down 5-6 of his cities and gifted them back to him after he became a vassel. The barb island I ended up 3 cities on it that took me across domination line.

Might of won this quicker if I got astronomy much quicker. Colonial cities cost me dearly.