NCXXVIII Gandhi

[Foamy7]

Okay, the aforementioned update to AD 1050. Noble/Epic (And spoilered... )

Spoiler :

The rush on Mansa worked too well. Didn't have enough time to go after Bismarck right away; he hooked up copper right away and had Axes defending on hills. Not good. So I left him alone for a while.

Got Oracle; chose Civil Service. Tech rate is really slow. I have not made a single trade and am waaaay ahead on tech.

Monty declared on me before too long, I took out his stack in my land and got a MASH Horse Archer; took peace for gold and map and then immediately declared on Bismarck.

Took him out in a long war that was really over right away, Shaka dogpiled and took two cities. Once I made peace with Bismarck for map, two techs, and gold (couldn't find his last city), Monty declared on Shaka. They are currently at war.

Workers are automated; built a decent army and now am concentrating on infra.

My cities...

My empire...


Tech...

Civics...


So here it is. I am 4 or so turns from liberalism, but there is no need to grab it at this point. So I am thinking of going for military techs until someone else grabs education, and building a much more modern army while updating my infrastructure.

Any comments or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I have not switched from wartime production to peacetime scientists yet, so my bpt are a little low. I am considering switching to buddhism to improve relations with Shaka and Monty while I upgrade my military, but I don't think it will do much good at this point, to be honest.
Those loons will DOW me no matter what.

 

[Single Malt]

relax, it happens

 

[Foamy7]

Yeah, popping BW from a hut in 3900 BC will do that to me...

Seriously though, I could use some advice on the approach I should take from 1050 AD. This is usually the point in my games where I either get bored and lose focus or make a serious misstep and get my butt kicked. (Or both at once.) I feel that the game is mine to lose, but the strategy I should use from this point escapes me.

I have problems with about 1000 AD to 1500 AD in most, if not all, of my games.

 

[Single Malt]

Do what you want. I recommend building a proper army, and going all out war. Your tech advantage seems ridiculous!!!

Spoiler :

Approach Bizzy with care...he has feudalism and longbows, meaning unless you have CR2 trebs, its will be a costly war. Maybe wait till cannons/maces for Biz, and hit Monte or Shaka after rifling, using 0%science to fuel a mass upgrade of CR3 maces to Rifles

 

[Foamy7]

Do what I want...

Spoiler :

I just took Bismarck down to one city. Look at the first screenie, my last 6 cities are named Berlin, Hamburg, Essen, Dortmund, Frankfurt, and Munich! He's got one city I left him with (for 10 turns, of course!) so I could get 2 techs from him. Saves me some work. Tech is meaningless unless you have an army to back it up. Shaka and Monty are my only real rivals; we each have a different religion and they are at war with each other! I think the different religions is what really slowed the tech rate down so much in this game. Bismarck and Monty are both Buddhist and seem to be doing the best of the AI's.

Shaka is currently researching Alphabet!!; Monty, Feudalism. I imagine I will tech to Machinery, Guilds, and Engineering for now to get at least some better units. Trebs, Knights, Macemen, X-Bows. Then either turn off tech for a while and get a huge army together to go for Monty, or tech Gunpowder > Chemistry > Liberalism (Steel). Monty seems to be a bit ahead of Shaka, at any rate. I can always overpromote my units against huge stacks of obsolete units.

 

[I<3PWG]

i realize it's noble's club and i've been loving these games the last few weeks. however having won ( i think ) 5 straight with noble i wanted to give prince a shot. i played a bit of the prince4dummies game with the ottomans and did not do well. gandhi has always been a favorite leader so when i saw this game i could not resist.

Spoiler :

i didn't set out necessarily going for an SE in this game but as things developed and out of economic need i lowered the slider and sort of fell into an SE economy. i found the 4 civilzations on my continent quite early through exploration. i really wish their positions could have been swapped. it would have been great to take out a war monger early but instead i had killed both bismarch and mansa musa by 1 ad.

i'm posting a save just after finishing off the germans when my economy was on the absolute brink. in order to recover i actually deleted all axemen that didn't have 3 promotions except for single axes with 2 promotions in cities.

i was able to bring things back from the brink and then switched to hinduism to court favor with the 2 war mongers remaining on the continent. the plan at that time was to get the economy back in order and settle my remaining land. it was shaky for many turns. i had to beeline currency to keep from going bankrupt.

things did turn around i think in not too long i will have a tech lead. i was able to make some trades with both the aztecs and the zulus to boost my economy and bring in some happiness items.

i've gotten 2 g prophets which i've used to build the hindu and confucianist shrines. the rest of my gp's have been scientists as i kept up my research when the slider was at 0 by running 2 scientists in the majority of my cities.

i used one scientist to build an academy in delhi. i whipped delhi to near the brink in order to get a large enough army to finish off the germans but it's come back well and i'm envisioning it as a science city. for the time being my cities are sort of a mix of specialists as i've switched back to slavery to whip out some units / buildings in the new city of cities i'm settling. i have my economy in good enough order now that i can continue to expand.

not surprisingly shaka and monty have gone after one another which i figure is largely good for me. both have asked me to drop deals with the other but i refused since i had happiness items coming from both and i've been fighting the happiness cap it feels like the entire game.

i'm thinking my next steps should be to better specialize my cities and plan national wonders although i'm very inexperienced at that so any advice on this subject would be welcome.

i also am building the wonder which allows all religious civics at the moment. this will allow me to go to theocracy when war comes. i'm wondering when i should be planning this. surely i can't expect to be left alone by monty forever and he is the closer of the two so likely an easier target.

i'm wondering at what tech level i should make a move. i believe i would be the only civ with maceman at the moment and i don't think monty has longbows yet but he can't be too far away and my recollection of war pre cannons , post longbows is that it's really brutal. i'm also not sure i have the economy to run another war. monty has a good sized empire.

i'm providing two saves, one is just after i finished off the germans ( around 1 ad ). the second is around 1000 ad. i had spent that 1000 years rebuildling my economy and working towards a tech lead.

 

[Single Malt]

i realize it's noble's club and i've been loving these games the last few weeks. however having won ( i think ) 5 straight with noble i wanted to give prince a shot. i played a bit of the prince4dummies game with the ottomans and did not do well. gandhi has always been a favorite leader so when i saw this game i could not resist.

Spoiler :

i didn't set out necessarily going for an SE in this game but as things developed and out of economic need i lowered the slider and sort of fell into an SE economy. i found the 4 civilzations on my continent quite early through exploration. i really wish their positions could have been swapped. it would have been great to take out a war monger early but instead i had killed both bismarch and mansa musa by 1 ad.

i'm posting a save just after finishing off the germans when my economy was on the absolute brink. in order to recover i actually deleted all axemen that didn't have 3 promotions except for single axes with 2 promotions in cities.

i was able to bring things back from the brink and then switched to hinduism to court favor with the 2 war mongers remaining on the continent. the plan at that time was to get the economy back in order and settle my remaining land. it was shaky for many turns. i had to beeline currency to keep from going bankrupt.

things did turn around i think in not too long i will have a tech lead. i was able to make some trades with both the aztecs and the zulus to boost my economy and bring in some happiness items.

i've gotten 2 g prophets which i've used to build the hindu and confucianist shrines. the rest of my gp's have been scientists as i kept up my research when the slider was at 0 by running 2 scientists in the majority of my cities.

i used one scientist to build an academy in delhi. i whipped delhi to near the brink in order to get a large enough army to finish off the germans but it's come back well and i'm envisioning it as a science city. for the time being my cities are sort of a mix of specialists as i've switched back to slavery to whip out some units / buildings in the new city of cities i'm settling. i have my economy in good enough order now that i can continue to expand.

not surprisingly shaka and monty have gone after one another which i figure is largely good for me. both have asked me to drop deals with the other but i refused since i had happiness items coming from both and i've been fighting the happiness cap it feels like the entire game.

i'm thinking my next steps should be to better specialize my cities and plan national wonders although i'm very inexperienced at that so any advice on this subject would be welcome.

i also am building the wonder which allows all religious civics at the moment. this will allow me to go to theocracy when war comes. i'm wondering when i should be planning this. surely i can't expect to be left alone by monty forever and he is the closer of the two so likely an easier target.

i'm wondering at what tech level i should make a move. i believe i would be the only civ with maceman at the moment and i don't think monty has longbows yet but he can't be too far away and my recollection of war pre cannons , post longbows is that it's really brutal. i'm also not sure i have the economy to run another war. monty has a good sized empire.

i'm providing two saves, one is just after i finished off the germans ( around 1 ad ). the second is around 1000 ad. i had spent that 1000 years rebuildling my economy and working towards a tech lead.

I took a look at the 2nd save. I attached a save with a few suggestive signposts. Now, the bad news: I'll tell you what you did/are doing wrong

Spoiler :

You are not working one commerce tile. Two grassland gems, and a grassland dye not being worked. You need more workers asap. Berlin should be building an army. You are a very, very soft target. A specialist economy does not mean no cotttages. I did not see one cottage. Are you bulbing? You should be halfway to education. All your cities are underdeveloped.

To rectify the situation
1) Set both cap and Berlin to high hammer tiles. Cap starts pumping workers, berlin the best units (axes) you can build/whip (use whip in berlin, its food heavy). Mali cap should continue pumping settlers.

2)Build national epic in the most food heavy city you have after researching literature. This is the GP farm. Make sure its not the same city as your unit pump. Delhi(your cap) is a good candidate. Use caste system and run scientists. Great scientists bulb the education path.

3) get your workers to build cottages on grassland tiles, and start working them.

4) the settler you are currently building should block Shaka on the tile I marked on attached save.

5)Hope for the best, ie the other two don't declare.

 

[Single Malt]

I<3PWG, I actually played on a bit. (till 1380AD), I like a challenge save attached, if you want to see whats going on, how the empire looks

Spoiler :

I guessed right. Shaka claimed the barb city. He DoW me shortly after. The war machine is rolling. I bribed monty into the war with 4 techs, including CS, philo, drama, and some other one. This prevented shaka from bringing his stack to bear on me, as he had two fronts. I took the barb city frm Shaka, as is a very good city. The tech pace is terrible in this game. I got nationalism, am now going for lib. take MT, and hit shaka with curries.

 

[L-Plate Ruler]

I'm always a bit slow to get onto these. Here is my game to 1AD. Going pretty well if I might say so.

Spoiler :

Ghandi is my favorite leader and I always tech for an early religion, but given the terrain and likelihood of close neighbours I opted for early expansion.

Settled in place after getting gold from the first goodie hut. Started building a worker. Second goodie hut popped agriculture and third xp, enough for woodsman II.

[Tech path]
BW - The Wheel - Iron Working - Fishing - Sailing - Pottery...

[Events]
350BC - Mansa Musa dead.

[Planning]
My next move was to take out Bizmark, he's currently fighting the Zulus. However, looking at that power chart I really need to lift my game so might hold out a bit while building local cities and getting some more gold flowing. On the other hand I don't need Shaka getting more cities after conquering 'ol Bizmark... to war!!

 

[Amao]

Prince/Normal

Picked Prince because my unfinished 1st try was Prince. That one stopped at 325BC so I pretty much know all the important resources, reachable AIs etc.

The opening, to 225BC.

Spoiler :

This map is rather hard. It is true that the 3 mover is superior in working efficiencies. But there are just way too much jungles to start with. And Bismark was readily to choke you by blocking the narrows. While, if you succeed in expanding there, you may not look good economy wise. I'm not sure if a Axe rush to Mansa is viable on the Normal speed. Otherwise, you have to settle with 6-8 cities and then settle down and do something else.

So, here I am closing to 1AD, peacefully settled 5 cities, then grabbed the 6th from barbs. And running out of space by now. Actually, I don't have 2 cities places for settle, but I decided that I don't really need those production boost to win and don't want to get burdened for the extra maintenance. Minimum military time, needs some luck before I'm done basic researches and devote myself into warring.

The plan next is to get Construction and start a Cat/Axe war against MM. Heavy loss expected with MM's UU. But he's in my back yard. He has to be out.

Monty surprised me by researched Alphabet first. I got it from him and started trading. Shaka was willing to DoW to anybody. However, I didn't have enough chips to buy him into warring with Monty. So I let him roll the dice and decide by himself.

Spoiler :