Nobles' Club 220: Pacal II of the Mayan Empire

[krikav]

Spoiler T205 Finale! :

August survived a few pair of turns longer. With fierce knights that killed alot of cavalery.

I was ill prepared for the attack on Saladin. I had galleys but no plan and little coordination. This was nice though.
Spy can perform it's mission from the boat, going in and revolting. Then DoW and amphibious cavalery gain a foothold.
I must try this out in another game, this way one could grab all weakly defended coastal cities right on T0.

Another fellah that thinks electricity is more important than rifling.

What a glorious continent!

50-60 units lost. Extremly light compared to the slugfests I'm usually involved in.

And second highest score I have ever had too.
Big thanks to Qin who built GLH, TGW and pyramids and gave them to me early on. <3

Also thanks to @AcaMetis for a kick-ass map!

 

[krikav]

@AcaMetis
Regarding your question about the edit:

Spoiler :

I think that it depends. If things turns out differently, if you don't luck out with a HA rush and are much smaller, and Kublai comes marching up thristing for blood in the medieval era with a doomstack, that could have been bad too.
Then it depends alot on what Mansa does, but imagine the situation in my game reversed, with Mansa down there getting under the shield of rifling and just develping. While you are slowed down by Kublais creative borderpushing and aggression early on.

I think it was a good edit and I think it made the game easier but I'm not certain about it!

 

[AcaMetis]

Spoiler :

Yeah, in the end it depends. I'm just glad that I decided to swap in Kublai instead of Sitting Bull or Sally. Sitting Bull would just have been a nuisance with his constant demands and spies, thoroughly useless as a trading partner most likely, not to mention a thoroughly painful slog later when you're up against 15 cities worth of Sitting Bull (upgraded) Longbows. Sally would have forced a level of religious strife, which could have been interesting and/or useful, but considering the whole "15+ cities" aspect it also could have ended poorly. Just imagine if the AP forced all the members to DoW the infidel...

 

[krikav]

@AcaMetis

Spoiler :

I love sitting bull in isolation. He can fool around on his island all he wants.
That, or perhaps if he is in semi-isolation with Ragnar.
Always fun metting those two guys with -12 "You declared war on us", and 6 settled generals in their capitals.

 

[Winth]

No huts, Immortal. Settled in place.

Situation as of T101:

Spoiler :

I ignored the seafood and went Hunting -> AH with Settler on Size 2 while getting BW, then beelined Iron Working after Fishing. It was pretty bad in hindsight because my Worker was idle forever. Reason:

I settled this blocker city because with coast it breaks even on my research at the time and it denies Kublai while going on a mad chopping spree to ensure I can get the gems online ASAP in both Lakamha and later Chichen Itza with lots of Workers and Settlers.

Completed Pyras with a core of 5 cities. I'm an idiot for letting Qin settle Nanjing but if I somehow manage to break out with Elepult (but it might be too late) I will take that for myself.

On Turn 101, I revolted to Representation. I have Construction and swung deals for Alphabet, Calendar, and minor backfilling religious techs. I'm not sure if I can still pull off an elepult attack this late, but with bonus happiness from Representation I will probably try to whip out an army to get Qin and gamble on gems, Financial and cottage growth back home to get me back in the game. I still haven't got any Scientists running.

My mild ADD (which is mostly evident in that I press END TURN too fast instead of thinking before a few micromanagement decisions) combined with a chicken-like cautious nature once I'm in a mess (I've played only a few games on Immortal and I'm not too sure what am I doing) means that I'm probably best off picking up this save after hearing some suggestions and clearing my head.

 

[AcaMetis]

@krikav

Spoiler :

I'd remember that for later , but if I roll the next NC game it's probably not going to be another Fractal map. Than again, that also depends on the leader. No point in being, say, Ragnar or Willem on an Inland Sea map, for instance.

@Winth

Spoiler :

I'd highly recommend restarting and getting advice from t0. Lakamha as your second city is...suboptimal, to say the least. Generally you want AIs to settle cities in the jungle since it slows them down, and especially if you've got Ivory in your capitol and are planning to elepult, since by the time the AIs will have cleared and improved those cities you'll be ready to knock down their doors and take all the delicious jungle stuff from them .

 

[krikav]

@Winth

Spoiler :

SiP is fine, going pyramids is also a nice idea here.
The idea to block of land is cute, but as you probably noticed it didn't turn out that great here.
Too costly a venture for such a important thing as the second city, and that it cost you even more in alot of precious workerturns was worse.
Having to self-tech IW is just icing on a very nasty cake.

What was your scouting situation when you did go for that decision to block of a city there...?
In my game, it took forever for Kublai to venture up and Qin settled all that jungle area himself.
Have you just played a previous game where a blocking city was a good idea, in such a way as you are already in the mindset that it's a good thing to do?

I too encourage you to try again from T0, doing much the same things, but forgoing that idea with a blocker city.
Mutal, Uxmal and Mayapan are in excellent locations, and with those three powercities alone you should be comfortable crusing to construction with or without pyramids.
Ivory gives you the option to safely aquire more cities later on!

 

[Winth]

@krikav @AcaMetis

Spoiler :

Didn't really have a plan at that point without spoilers and Beshbalik was settled close to that place and the rationalization was that I can bounce back as soon as I get tons of Gems, also Stonehenge failgold helped me push research further. That said, I'm not confident as ancient/classical rusher and I guess the idea that Ivory is good for WEs didn't occur to me

I haven't actually played anything in recent memory that warranted a blocker city, I just felt like I'm playing on a difficulty I only attempted a few times, and that's after a break from Civ4 altogether, so I guess I went for a play I considered risky but possibly rewarding (?), especially since I had seen that working the coast this city pays for itself in commerce at least. I might ride it out for a few more turns then drop it if it looks restartable, especially since I play too fast for my own good and 100 turns is a coffee break venture.

Psychologically I'm often the sort of dumbass that does somewhat out of ordinary things to see if they work, based on vague sense rather than proper calculation. The same kind of dumbass that hangs pieces in chess while looking for a "Mikhail Tal move". I'm not a clever man.

 

[sampsa]

@Winth

Spoiler :

For learning purposes, I think it's a great idea to sometimes make those Mikhail Tal moves, so that you learn why they are not good moves. I'm not a believer in firm rules, but I still think it's almost always best to settle strongest sites first. Especially your 2nd city is a major contributor to your early game and settling a break-even blocker is just too big of a sacrifice. To be honest, I don't remember when one of my first 4 cities was settled to a weaker location in order to block. Maybe cities 5 or 6 can serve that purpose, but to me blocking always implies that you are not planning to war, and going to war is often one of the best plans.

Edit: Also, maybe you were overvaluing that gems-tile? It's not worth more than 3 riverside cottages, and you have plenty of tiles for them.

 

[Snowbird]

Spoiler :

Settled on the stone and did worker at size 1. I thought that commerce (from financial phants) was more important since from the screen I wanted like five things at once (in ~15 turns figured masonry is not going to happen).
Tech went Hunting>AH>BW(1turn left). Probably going Fishing>Wheel next, not sure afterwards.
Got AH ~ turn 21, which makes me wonder if going worker at size one made any sense, likely no. I finished mine next to cap cause he had nothing else to do.

I was thinking of settling closer to initial place (1SW of pig), pig being in the first ring justifies animal husbandry thing. That city would auto-connect after fishing. Settler and worker are free to move and in capital.

I could try getting chinese worker, except "Fear my chariot" thing. However... give it is turn 33 and Quin just finished Great Wall, it is far from given he actually has a chariot and if he has chariot might be out of range, so retreat via jungle is possible.

If the city next to worker (I think it is Quin's third one, so unlikely it has produced chariot by itself) has chariot I would probably just delete both warrior and worker. If the tile was not roaded I think it would be pretty much free-roll, but even now risk is likely worth.
Getting second worker, producing holkan or two for peace gives enough head start... after that likely working some financial water to tech HBR (likely skipping all non-military fluff like writing or pottery) and visiting some neighbours (preferably someone with useful wonder - ideally Mids but even stonehenge would do). With Mansa in the game it would likely be possible to flip HBR into Writing/Alpha line. (I can see Mansa research so I could adjust after fishing and Wheel.)

For worker stealing,IMHO, it is high chance of snowball advantage, while low chance of bad outcome (chariot being in 4 tile range from warrior/worker).

 

[krikav]

@Snowbird

Spoiler :

You can check the first screenshots of my post from T37 here:
https://forums.civfanatics.com/thre...-the-mayan-empire.654292/page-2#post-15652979

I did go for worker @ size2, think it worked out very nice.
Although I did go for BW->masonry...

 

[sampsa]

Haven't had time to continue my game, hopefully next week...

On early game

Spoiler :

Krikav, I'm a bit surprised to see how worker+settler@2 seems to be better compared to worker+settler@1. My logic was that growing is moot, since working a mine size1 vs working two unimproved tiles size2 yield the same amount of towards settler. So earlier worker just wins worker turns. I guess the thing is that those worker turns are not so useful.

To compare - I'm settling 2T earlier, but your capital has won 22 and you have another fog buster out, so I had less knowledge of barb activity and felt I need a holkan for safety, when another worker would build up the empire much more efficiently. Connected 2nd city is breaking even in , assuming it's not working a tile with , thus need to compare only +. Working max i'll make 63 empire-wide per turn, so in 2T I'll get 126, which is significantly worse than 22. Don't remember which tiles I worked (maybe the mine to get the holkan out?), but maybe I should work at least one clam to speed up AH.

My ivory is improved T29, a pretty nice tile for a FIN leader, but that's another story and due to different tech paths hard to compare. I'd think masonry is a mistake though after seeing that Qin is in the game.

 

[Snowbird]

to ~turn 78. I think I'll call it enough.

Spoiler :

Grabbing worker was a success, but I had loose chinese archer appearing from south, which caused me chop into holkan and delay second city. The worst it beaten one of fogbusting warriors, so no cheap peace treaty...

Speaking of Chinese threats...


There were 3 or 4 chariots under archer and a settler under the most western chariots. Holkans had a really good day with these (one got healing I promo)... Yet, it took to turn 62 to make peace (teched Horseback and archery by that time).

I was scouting (with chariot) Persian land from Mali territory, when Quin decided he is okay to open borders... Well, Hangzhou had just two archers and could be attacked on turn 1 from Mansa teritory... Spare HA run up the hill and on turn 2 of the war I kill 2 more archers and a chariot to get...


One guy meanwhile had a proper defense...


T78 with GLH, Mids, soon to be captured gems (I think both of them are clear of jungle)... Oh, in about 3-4 turns I am likely to trade for Alpha and then extort Quin for leaving him one jungle city.

Well, I could have played better (not starting worker at size 1 and not gambkling on worker steal - if Quin had metals that would have been very bad). Sometimes it is just better to be lucky

About early stuff

Spoiler :

I'm a bit surprised to see how worker+settler@2 seems to be better compared to worker+settler@1. My logic was that growing is moot, since working a mine size1 vs working two unimproved tiles size2 yield the same amount of towards settler.

But these do not happen at the same time. To get the mine one needs to finish worker climb the hill and mine it. That is ~9 turns later than just growing.

If I tried opening again I would go fishing>BW, grow size two do 5 turn workboat on max hammers and get worker and BW ~ t23

 

[sampsa]

@Snowbird

Spoiler :

I think it's just that all roads lead to Rome. It's an easy map.

 

[krikav]

@sampsa

Spoiler :

Waiting with worker is often seem to lose, since worker is usually worth4-5 hammer per turn.
I figured that growing to pop2 or worker right away, I get to start chopping the same time.

What I lose with pop2 worker, is a mine. And while a mine is a good tile for settler as it yields an extra hammer compared to some unimproved forest, pop2 is equal. Two unimproved tiles is +2 hammers.
And after the settler, the mine is not that useful anymore.

And yes, masonry was almost certainly a mistake, I was already sold on the idea to get TGW but with qin in the game I should have aborted right away, gone for hunting->AH, and perhaps settled pig-city first?

 

[sampsa]

@Snowbird

Spoiler :

But these do not happen at the same time. To get the mine one needs to finish worker climb the hill and mine it. That is ~9 turns later than just growing.

Not sure if I understand what you mean by ~9T later, but indeed it does take 5T to get the mine up, thus worker+settler @1 leads to only 2T faster 2nd city than w+s @2. There are many ways to play the first 25T (mine, Krikav's, your's, your suggestion, Pedro's, his suggestion, earthy's...) and all seem perfectly viable.

 

[Whisker]

@krikav You said: ' Good thing that I had 4700 EP on Kublai, now I have 4700EP on Augustus too! Not sure I can use them for anything though...'

Does this mean that when AI creates a colony they inherit not only all tech of the master, but also all EP a player has accumulated against the master?

Can this be exploited to generate huge ammount of EPs?
Infilrate some great spies to tech leader, gift 2 island cities to them with 5t rested spies in both cities. Wait 1t for them to make a colony and steal all tech you can from the new guy. Throw in a DOW against the master and conquer the island, wiping out the new guy. Sue for peace, gifting those island cities as peace offer and now you can repeat the process when they recreate the colony.

 

[krikav]

@Whisker

Also, @Kaitzilla this question might interest you.

Spoiler :

Yepp, thats how the mechanics works, you all EP you have on some master, you also gain on the newly formed colony.
(Vice versa is true too, the colony also gets the same ammount of EP as the master on you.

The approach you mention sounds plausable but probably difficult to arrange in normal gameplay.
But to share if you find something that works!!

 

[MeowZeDung]

Chiseling off some MAJOR rust by coming back to the game with a NC map. Gave it a whirl on IMM and promptly forgot that settling on the ivory would not, in fact, give my capital a bonus.

To 25 BC:

Spoiler :

Lots of details that I can't remember, but the long story short is that I was boxed in at 4 cities with everyone but Cyrus being part of a Hindu love fest. The saving grace was that all that riverside grassland + FIN, and a good specialist city east of the capitol, had my research cooking. Despite this advantage, the afore-mentioned rust led me to launch the slowest elepult "rush" ever. Frankly I think I screwed up from the very beginning including where I settled and my opening tech path. Oh well.

So I declared on Cyrus with a clear path to take his five cities relatively quickly, but he was able to bribe Khan in against me, which I did not expect at all. I didn't think it was a big deal until 2 turns later after I had taken a Persian city and I saw two mongol swordsman had been patrolling near my southernmost city, garrisoned with a single warrior, before the DOW and were poised to take it as soon as I hit end turn. I just didn't have the patience to deal with all of it even though it is technically salvagable.

 

[Winth]

Up to T159 (replay):

Spoiler :

This time I went something more normal. SIP'd, Hunting -> BW -> Fishing. Ignored early Cows, micro'd a bunch to get to Size 2 and finish a Warrior at the same time. Settled on Stone, got Great Wall to maintain skeleton defense.

At T50, I was a little tiny.
Kept pushing for Elephants, settled Uxmal as 4th for the Fish and an additional whipper. It actually got enough culture to steal plantationed Spices from Qi.

A GSpy from GWall popped and since I got Alphabet from trade (Math -> enough turns into Alpha until it's tradable -> Constructon) I overflowed production into a Spy. I remembered to focus on Mansa, the prospective tech leader, from the start! Thanks for reminding me to do that, guys, I don't usually spy much.

Don't have many screenshots of the war, but the horns blared at around 150 BC.

Didn't take many losses but I did pull a Cease Fire after messing up a little bit and re-declared causing minor diplo loss. No problem though. Rebuilding was easy with 5 workers from Shanghai and cutting down a lot of the jungle.
Meanwhile the Spies took: Compass, Paper, Theology, Engineering, Literature, Music from Mansa. My 2nd specialist, a GSci, bulbed half of Education.
I was sweating over the techs but Mansa went the Economics route so I went Nationalism (but Taj went to Mansa, argh!) and Lib'd Military Tradition.
I'm 3 turns away from Gunpowder, my Chinese war stack is still there.
Shanghai flipped to Mansa.
Kublai is the lord and master of Qin, but they're both horribly behind in technology.
Stack of wonders in Beijing:

I swung Mansa this trade after getting Liberalism to be able to upgrade HAs into Cuirassiers and get tech:

I'm guessing I should kill Mansa before he runs away though because he already has Constitution and has a juicy capital with Pyramids.
My empire:

HE / Moai in Lakamha because for some reason I have this idea that this fairly little city is close to my prospective frontlines and has just enough hammers (15+) to do nothing but poop out Cuirs.
Taking a break now, I do a lot of micro mistakes, not enough roads (i actually ran on just two workers before the conquests) and the Colossus made me lazy and just working FIN+COLOSstline.
Cyrus has Gunpowder already though.
I'm guessing Kublai and Qin are too much of a wall to deal with right now and Kublai is utterly useless.
Met Saladin, he's completely backwards.
Popped a Great Merchant, not sure if I want a mission or a Golden Age, but there's nothing to switch to (Free Speech won't work with most of my cottages still immature, I'm not sure about drafting Musketeers) other than Theocracy or maybe a brief round of Caste+Paci, isn't there?