Nobles Club III - Kulai Khan

[schwartz]

Past Rounds:
Round 1 - (4000 BC - 875 BC)
Round 2 - (875 BC - 125 BC):

Spoiler :

Round 2:

The next few turns are spent whipping/chopping keshiks (pottery came in during this time). I have 7 ready to go by 650 BC, I feel that should be enough with reinforcements streaming in, so I declare in 625 BC and immediately raze Freddy's city that was right by my borders. That's what you get for settling it right there, my friend.



in 600, victoria declares on me. Possible bribe by Freddy.



In 450, Berlin is mine. Flanking II keshiks soften up, combat keshiks and my medic finish. one city left! I also was able to snipe a worker early on with a warrior.



400 BC:
Freddy is no more. He has learned not to settle really annoying little crap cities smack in the middle of my borders.
Got the first GG and attached him to an already medic II keshik and give him medic III and flanking (misclick, meant to give him the +1 movement promo). He is now level 6 and unlocks West Point (and, obviously, HE)



We got the hurricane event in turfan.. it lost its Ger

300 BC we sign OB with ragnar and wang kon, chariot heads over to check his capital, it's not well defended, we should take it with ease.



I see an opportunity to snipe a worker in 275 BC and I take it.





Vicky saves me 4 turns by giving me IW for peace. Total casualties:
Me: None
Her: 1 warrior
Iron popped near turfan



next turn we see seoul still has 2 archers (60% cultural bonus), we have 9 veteran keshiks.
The flanking keshiks ride in first, we lose 2, 2 withdraw and the final 2 win.
Needless to say, Seoul is ours. I kept it.

250 BC:
We raze pyongsang, no screen.

150 BC:
Wang's last city is size 1 so I take a gamble on him not getting another defender and heal another turn, he has 3 defenders (warrior/archer/axe)



125 BC:
No new defenders, wang is no more
Total casualties for the war:
Wang = dead
Me: 3 Keshiks, 1 chariot.

I stopped here, next round will focus on getting the economy back on track before taking out victoria.

Overview, beginning with the new aquisitions: Berlin and Seoul (Hindu holy city + ToA!)





And Beshbalik, you can see that I've begun cottaging to recover my economy.



finally, the globe:



Power




I may continue tomorrow, if not, saturday night.

 

[schwartz]

@Groo:

Spoiler :

Keep going! You'll get back on track!

@Kaytie:

Spoiler :

Sounds like a strong game you have going. My plan is to settle the gem city as soon as I get courthouses up (I'm bleeding cash at 40% tech and a cool 17 bpt in 125 BC,) but Victoria will probably beat me to it, being imperialistic and all... On the positive side, I have taken out both Wang Kon and Freddy.

@Krick:

Spoiler :

Bleys gave you some great advice, I hope you get that economy back on line, because once you've taken out both Wang Kon and Frederick, you should have a bunch of land to work with.

 

[Rub'Rum]

What is it with my luck, coming here at 8:36pm to see untagged spoilers again! hehe. I bet you'll already have fixed it right after that!

 

[schwartz]

Sorry about that, I'll wrap those answers in spoilers asap
Hope that didn't mess anything up for you.

 

[Geoffroy]

Schwartz:

Spoiler :

Don't forget to connect that elephant resource for the extra happiness!

Krick:

Spoiler :

Do you have, CoL or Currency? These should be priority once your empire starts to grow! Get courthouses everywhere, use all the commerce tile you can an/or run merchants. You can also set production to wealth once you have currency.
What also helps is pillaging around cities you didn't keep if any. Deleting the scouts maybe, I don't like deleting warriors as you can upgrade them later, but if your economy is reaaaallly bad, it's better to lose a warrior than a Keshik....

 

[Jaaboo]

Check Point 2, 25 AD

Spoiler :

We rejoin Kublai after the destruction of the Korean empire. P'yongyang has been burned to the ground, the twin Holy City of Seoul lies in Mongol hands, but all is not well. Kublai must quickly secure the horses he desires, and other challenges such as Victoria's great wall lay in wait to be surmounted.

So let's get to it!

I feel that my beaker count is low, so I start a library in Turfan and Seoul, though Turfan may need help culturally against Germany. But, there's a solution for that too. I also start chopping a Settler in Beshbalik asap to claim the horses. The oracle is finished (woo) and I take HBR. Let's get those Keshiks online fast!

Oh good christ. Vikky has settled near our horses. Damn, I knew I wasn't fast enough. I decide to convert to Hindu, relations with the two lowest civs! But I may need a helping hand if the war against England goes south.

Iron is found in Turfan! Well, that will help.

Unfortunately, Freddy still ain't pleased with me, so I can't get to it yet But in a few turns, our mutual faith opens his heart and his borders and a worker is immediately dispatched.

I settle the less-than-ideal city of Ning-hia simply to claim those horses. It shouldn't be too bad once I develop it though. I got the gems (ideally, I was going to settle 1S, but hey, that's the way things go, yes?

In 470, we finally bring our UU's online!

And the world has been set into religious cliques. Great.

We take advantage of Toku's largess for a trade for Alphabet. Freddie gives us Sailing for Writing.

I decide to backstab Freddie. I want Berlin and he's weak. Hamburg is sacked within minutes of when I deliver the bad news to Fred. Munich falls a few turns later to my Keshiks. Soon after, my hit and run attacks overwhelm Berlin, and Fredrick is no longer.

Robert E. Lee, Kubali's right hand man in the Germanic Wars, retires to Karakorum amidst incredible celebration. His school of combat will teach generations of young warriors to come.

Surprisingly, with all my bills, I manage to squeak out Code of Laws before anyone else. The next round will surely be used to build courthouses and solidify my power (unless of course I can catch Vikky off guard? Confucianism spawns in Ning-hia, and if Kublai already has plans to use this religion as a weapon to sow discord amongst his enemies.

I use the Missionary as a scout and send him to London. Vikky's wonderful capital is defended only archers. Oh, my.

I'm new with the espionage system, but I decide to try something out by sending points towards my farthest rivals. I am concerned about the two of them being all buddy buddy over there, as Justinian already has his hate on for me. Hopefully Tokagawu will serve as a distraction for him.

I make a trade with Vikky for Monarchy, and give her HBR, and that's where I end this round. Vikky may start to pull away in tech from me, but military wise, she's weak. My Keshiks can strike at London in two turns and York in the same turn as a DOW. York has an axeman defending, which isn't really all that significant, so a Keshik rush should take the city and secure my horsies for good. London will probably whip out a few defenders, but I will send my axes there early so that a full stack of axes and keshiks will cross the river Themes together. Hopefully taking her capital will shake loose a few techs from her.

The problem with taking on Vikky is Justinian, who already has his hate on for me. Most likely, I forsee him DOW'ing on me if I attack Vikky. Militarily though, I don't think he's any better off than she is, and Mr. Loyal-to-a-Fault Toku can probably join in again the Byzantiums. War is fun.

Checkpoint Links:
Check Point 1, 2000 BC
Check Point 1.5, 1750 BC
Check Point 2, 25 AD
Check Point 3, 665 AD

A few thoughts about how this game is going;

Spoiler :

This map is lending itself to war really well. Maybe war is a bit easier for me, but I think this is a good warring map. Freddy, Vikky and Wang were/are all close to us and Fred and Wang went down incredibly easy. Economy wise, I am nowhere NEAR where I am normally in Warlord games, but now that I have two rivals in the bucket and a third in my sights, who cares? There will definately need to be a time to rebuild my empire and consolidate, but I think it comes after London is mine and Vikky has been shattered. I haven't explored much at all, sadly, but oh well. I can live with it. Let the world build and I'll come take it has been my motto so far. And London, with its gold and GLH, mmm yums.

Okay, getting serious here, I may be setting myself up to over expansion. I've razed every minor city I've come across and only kept the resource-rich capitals of Berlin and Seoul. I've founded three cities of my own outside of Karakorum, and there is quite a bit of open land within my territory. Do I move to settle it? I think not, I think I keep my military high, and take London and raze York. Once Vikky has either been defeated or packed into a corner, then I can backfill and cottage the crap out of everything.

How does that sound?

@Groo

Spoiler :

It's tough, I find that being a warmonger sometimes forces you to walk a thin line unless you're like MadScientist and just raze the . .. .. .. . out of everything. That might be fun too, but it's hard to support a large army. Sometimes you have to let the dice fly high. With Wang, for example, your game might be different, I found taking Seoul first gave me a shot of hope that I didn't think I had. One thing about warring is that you can find yourself wanting just one more unit.

Anyway, get some Keshiks together and go a-plundering. The great thing about Keshiks is that they are an incredible plunderer, dart in, plunder, dart out. Once you get a decent horde, unleash them and smile.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I've finished my game, and put the updates on the reserved space on page 2. Enjoy it all, it's a good map for the khan!

 

[KaytieKat]

Hi

Okies I got my second checkpoint done at 1100 Ad here --> http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=6652581&postcount=40

Kaytie

 

[Groogaroo]

Okay I've played through this game till 600 AD, so I'm making up my own check points now!

I had an awful time of things during my first war attempts, things are better now but Its still going to be a struggle!

The short version, just a couple of my most excellently stupid decisions up to 600 AD

Spoiler :

1 - Never attempt to build the pyramids in the middle of a war

2 - Never fight a 1500 year war against two AI's if you don't have to

3 - Never wait 4600 years before building a granary in your capital

And here's the normal report,

Checkpoint? 3.5? 600 AD

Spoiler :

This following report details several bad calls and basically throws my game in to turmoil for about 2500 years!

I started off by switching to slavery to chop whip some axes to go to war with wang! I wanted to raze his horse city and then replace it with my own, then go for his capital as more axes joined the fight. His horse city only has a warrior so I just send to axes to take care of him.



This all seemed to go to plan, but I realised I couldn't take his capital, should have waited for more troops before starting the war. I sued for peace planned to get keshiks on line before starting up the war again. Sorry this is the point where everything went crazy and I started forgetting to take screenies!

I made a fatal error before going to war, I decided to build the pyramids (I really have to get out of that habit). On my next attempt at wang's capital I had a nice stack of axes and keshiks against five archers. Unfortunatley even though I had overwhelming numbers my whole army got wiped out bar the last axe which took the city. Had some really bad luck with 80% odds to win on a lot of my attacks.

The worst part was Wang bribed Freddie to DOW on me so... I had no Army, about a single archer in each of my cities and I was at war with two people.

I 1500 year war followed, why didn't I just sue for peace? I have no idea! I was pretty lucky not to lose any cities, eventually I managed to get on top of things, and with enough troops I finally managed to finish of wang and freddie soon followed as I had pretty much pillaged his land to smithereens.



So both freddie and wang are dead. few! but I could of handled that so much better!

Economically, I'm at 0% of the slider, and running a deficit of -16 Gpt but I'm still getting 86 beakers

power is really equal at the moment



All of my cities lack infastructure, 600 AD and capital still doesn't have a granary!



and tech, 600 AD and still havn't researched some of the earliest techs!



It's time to build infastructure get my economy up and running and rebuild my army for the next attck. I really need to pic up fuedalism so I can vassel rather than wipe out the other civs.

Cheers

Groo

 

[TheMeInTeam]

@ Groogaroo:

Spoiler :

Yes, war/peace balance is important in all wars, even the early ones . My game played pretty differently early on since wang got killed by a barbarian uprising, but similarly I was fighting vicky and freddy DoW'd on me...so I quickly sued for peace with Vicky and trounced stupid freddy. I will note that I went STRAIGHT for the horses (first city I settled after capitol), so there was no need to take one to get to horsies!

You should get stables and promote at least some of your keshiks with withdrawal (=50% with flanking 2!!!)...it's very powerful!

Pyramids are bad in the middle of a war, but honestly I considered chopping them out (decided to go for oracle instead), in order to take police state (and abuse the other government civics later, such as rushbuying in the early times!). No stone though, and with the start we had I thought it would slow me down too much.

Final note: the capitol often delays infrastructure in my games, as it serves as an early settler/worker pump, then often military. If you aren't whipping (and with a hammer heavy food weak capitol like that, I'd not do so there!), you don't really need a granary early anyway. Especially in a heavy warmonger game, every single building you make should have a very clear and important benefit, because it's hammers not going into troops.

 

[Groogaroo]

@Meinteam

Spoiler :

Thanks for the advice, reading your report its good to see I'm not the only one who running huge defecits at 0% science! I think you can tell I'm not very good at warring, atleast not to this extreme!

 

[TheMeInTeam]

@Meinteam

Spoiler :

Thanks for the advice, reading your report its good to see I'm not the only one who running huge defecits at 0% science! I think you can tell I'm not very good at warring, atleast not to this extreme!

Spoiler :

The important thing is keeping out of strikes, and staying at at least tech parity. Whether staying at tech parity involves you teching decently, or dragging the entire world down, well that doesn't matter much . Merchants and building wealth are money (literally)! Warring takes planning just like peaceful building/economic expansion, the planning is just different. You can keep cities if you can pay for them. Who you hit, and how quickly you capture them, makes a big difference, because if you run through an AI in a matter of a few turns, then you have heaps of gold for deficit research (or just deficit troop maintenance). If you chain this long enough, some of the earlier captured cities start coming out of the red and actually ADD to your wealth a bit. It's almost like normal expansion is good, over expansion is bad, but SUPER OVER EXPANSION done lighting fast is good again? Well, maybe it's not good but it does everyone else in the world a lot of damage too. I still don't recommend doing what I did. I need more discipline razing cities and picking my targets...

 

[r_rolo1]

Good to see that some people already trasformed the world in pasture for the Golden horde horses

There is a ( IMHO ) good reference for Keshik warfare in the SG area.... search for Fox 06 ( there are 2 ...pick the earliest one ). Crazy variant: units with less than 2 movement couldn't leave the territory besides settler escorting.... They won the world by conquest using only keshiks, chariots and ( IIRC ) a GG catapult with mobility .

Speed is the essence......

 

[Rub'Rum]

Prince, Epic.
Round 1. Up to 1900BC

Spoiler :

Since most people have already far past this point, I'll just post two screenshots..

I popped archery from a hut! Wowzers, this almost never happens to me.



My empire in 1900BC

 

[grandad1982]

Well its raining outside at the moment so I decided to stay in and play instead of going for a walk. Still I took the hurses for a charge round....

@SimonL
I checked the spoiler was working before I posted this time!

Checkpoint 3: 25AD

Spoiler :

The Golden Horde - whilst lacking gold - went on its first group outing in this section. They decided that it would be very nice to visit Korea to see the famous Hindu holy city of Seoul. Not that there home nation had nothing to other of course....

So tech path: Archery> HBR> Writing> Myst> Fishing (trade)> IW (trade)> Med (trade)> Poly (trade)> Sailing (trade)> Priest> CoL (Oracle)> Alpha (trade)> Monarchy (trade)> Aes> Currency (started)

Are you counting? Thats 7 trades!

Picture time. I chop out the Great Wall.


I found city for horses. After reading some other peoples reports I decided this was a better location despite the overlap (my original plan was 1W of the horses).


Like Schwartz(?) I got the herb event and didn't lose any pop!


While my nieghbors look on I destroy the puny Uzbeks.


I meet the final AI.


Some trades and a gift to Toku (I want to try to be his friend as people say hes pretty loyal (also check my glace screen at the end)).






As ever I decladre before I'm 100% ready - got to stop doing that! I would have liked a couple more Keshicks. Still the less protective archers the better!


A trade for a tech I really want - spies. Soon my prettys, soon.


Nuff said. Well appart for flanking2 is pretty handy.


A trade with posh spice. Actually Queen Vic is marginally more attractive.



Burn a GG on a Mash unit, and open a future westpoint.


Taken and razed.


Settle a city and see an English settler pod. Should hav settled on the river(?).


Ok then my empire - hardly as migh as the real Kahns, but its a start.


Glance (justin and Ragna love Toku hence my getting in with the boys).


Tech. Hopefully Vic will trade my currency after I put a few turns in it.


Demo. ot to bad, but I'd like to up my GDP, so will get some more cottages online I guess.


Cities. Seoul will b an espionage city - I settled a Great Spy there, will farm it up and run a load of spys eventually. The capital is screaming Iron Works!


I also got the Oracla pretty late - no screen - and took CoL for courthouses. I founded Conf. Only took 7/8 turns to build!

My plans for the future are take Wangs last city. revmp the economy, get some spys, then attack Fred. Sadley hes a buddist like everyone except Wang, so it'll damage my diplomatic relations. Ho Hum.

And the save

 

[Rub'Rum]

Round 1 here
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=6654743&postcount=54

Round 2, up to about 25BC, Prince, Epic

Spoiler :

Decided to rush Frederick, since he wasn't protective or anything...



Yay.



I made a mistake here. I kept Hamburg. My original thought was that it'd hook me up iron right away... But I didn't need it that quickly. I was going to raze it and refound it one north of where it is now... Whatever.

Empire at the end



Now I've got a sitting army waiting for catapults to go to Wang Kon... I'm considering attacking before that, but it's a scary though. It's just... the army's just sitting there...

Also, I have a question here. Tokugawa, Ragnar and Justinian are all Buddhists. Since they appeared to be far away, I chose their religion. But now I'm wondering if picking such a widespread religion is a good idea for warmongering! ... I don't want the AP to continually annoy me (what tech allows to build it?), but I don't want to be dogpiled either.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

@ SimonL

Spoiler :

AP is opened up by Theology. Look at who you're talking about, they're not going to tech like mad (though justinian is a real threat to build the AP). You have budhist cities regardless now, so you'd best stay in that religion because the AP can hose you even if you aren't. In fact, I'd spread it heavily and try to get more votes! You plan to warmonger, and there are non-budha options out there. Smack everyone around, spread budhism to all of your cities, and guess what? YOU control the AP.

Once you're voted in (because in theory those warmonger people are going to like you since you're their religion and whatnot), quickly declare on someone and splatter them. At that point, you would probably have enough votes to control the AP by yourself!

I hate that thing. The other alternative, although more difficult and highly unpopular, is to find where it was built, take that city very quickly after the DoW, and razz it. Alternative 1 seems better to me in your situation.

 

[grandad1982]

@ SimonL

Spoiler :

Nice war. You picked up some ok land there.

About the religion and the AP and religion. Going with the majior religion is good IMO. Life is easier if some people like you. Also hopefully when the AP is built you will have control from all those cities you have captured in war. If you get Theology first and then build the AP in Kara - lots of hammers ... - you'll have control. You could even quikly switch religion before it comes on line so you deffinatly control it and then use religion as a wepon by spreading it to the AIs.

edit. What TheMeInTeam said about razing the AP. I'd only do that in very extreme conditions, like you can't hold he city and the AP is hittnig you with angry peps. If you raze it, its gone, and its a pretty usaefull tool to control eg " Propose vote: Stop war? Err let me see? No! bog off!" See what I'm saying?

 

[Rub'Rum]

@Grandad and theMeinTeam

Spoiler :

Theology uh? ... I have been mainly teching military shtuff now. I don't think I even have meditation or the other tech up above or below it yet (never remember the names of these... Uh... Those that open up buddhism and hinduism...). So, hmm... If I see Christianity is founded somewhere, I'll know what to expect!... I guess I can only try to see how things develop.

 

[grandad1982]

@ SimonL

Spoiler :

What your millitary tech advantage? Could you not trade and switch your way to get Theology first? HBR and Aes are pretty good trading tools the AI don't tend to got for. Just try to get Alpha as an early trade to give yourself options with whom to trade.

Also just edited my last post to add what I think of razing the AP. Can be good but could be great!