Well, luckily for all involved, I got the save last night and didn't read any of Ozy's spoilers. He definitely played more than one turn there, though, I think. Germany did NOT have contact information after just one more turn.
I don't mind folks playing from the saves, but please NO comments about anything from such experiments.
So here we go:
Inherited turn: I marvel at the veto that took place in regard to growing our cities. Charis says "to stay on max shields while they still can" -- which is a solid theory -- but, um, they are so NOT close to being unable to run max shields that I lower luxuries from 20% to 10% AND DO NOT NEED A SINGLE ENTERTAINER.
Almost every city in the north is thus reshuffled back to max food. I can at least get 10 turns of that in before the next veto.
I also vetoed the wealth, and used all those cities to make replacements for the MASS of units I just disbanded to speed progress in a couple of key cities, most notably San Charisso and its cathedral, but also a couple others up there, with aqueducts.
Click next turn, and Greece completes Magellan. This makes me sure that contact WILL come on my turn.
1160AD: No contact yet.
1170AD-1220AD: Still no contact. Most of our lagging cities have been grown now, all at 5 or 6. I melded workers into San Charisso, Elippi and Akkad.
1230AD: I spot "Communications" option on German diplomatic screen. 1550 gold to Germany for contact with Aztecs, Greece, China. Embassies established. 330 gold to Greece for contact with five more civs. 18 gold to Rome for contact with Russia. All embassies established. WE ARE NOW BROKE. Well, nearly. 3000 gold goes in a hurry, I tell ya.
RoP's established with Rome, Russia, Iro, Japan (all the small fry). Some (very) minor cash recouped.
1240AD: We receive the following eighteen techs from the Library:
Monarchy
Feudalism
Engineering
Theology
Chivalry
Invention
Printing Press
Education
Gunpowder
Music Theory
Astronomy
Chemistry
Banking
Navigation
Democracy
Economics
Metallurgy
Free Artistry
Cuba now FULLY up to date on all known technology.
Greece, Aztecs, China also all up to date, and building Smith's, China starts Shakespeare on this turn.
We broker to Egypt, bringing them up to date for gpt and RoP.
I upgrade our horsies to knights, and many spears to pike.
We broker to Zululand, bringing them nearly up to date for Saltpeter, Spices, RoP, and mucho moolah. Cuban people don't know what the heck to do with "luxury goods" -- they have never seen such things before.
We broker to Germany, Rome, Iro, and Russia, as much as they can afford at "fair" prices (10-15% below market value). Japan is broke and gets nothing.
Can't re-upgrade the pikes this turn, but I do upgrade most of our cata's to cannon, and a couple spears to musket.
Despite now being able to research on state of the art tech (at FIRST-Civ prices
Yikes!) I leave science at zero to get as much cash as possible to continue modernizing our military. Our worker force is mobilized and told to "plant a tree". National Arbor Day commemorated. "Juanie-Pineseed" becomes folklore.
1250AD: Everybody and her sister starts Smith/Shakespeare, from techs we brokered. Many more upgrades, many many. I do another one or two last minute broker jobs, and we have six (6!) gold left in the treasury, with mucho modernization yet to be implemented. Most of our troops have been picked up and sent to various barracks locations, but leaving at least one defender in every city.
Charis gets to do a bit of shuffle and dance on his turn. [dance]
I also wonder when he's going to notice that a close parenthesis must be separated from his smileys by a space.
I swap every coastal town NOT already past 40 shields of progress over to building coastal forts. Feeble they may be, but they beat zippo, and these are as close to a "navy" as we are ever going to see. These forts require saltpeter, which is ungodly EXPENSIVE to buy (we have none in our frigid land, ooh big surprise there
) so I figure we have to build the forts while we can. Same for troop upgrades: I've already upgraded all our cata's to cannon. I upgraded as many to musket as our budget could stand. Still have us set to run max taxes, which at bringing in 342 gpt from brokering, plus our natural ability, is yielding I think close to 600 gpt total income. This windfall ain't gonna last forever, so spare the research (we can buy in at lower prices, no sense busting the research curve, at least not yet). We need to modernize, for deterrent value.
As of this point, "we have an average military", or better, compared to all except China and Greece. Rome (a weakling, and probably mostly isolated) is our closest neighbor, as close as Germany or nearly. Zulus are moderately far away but I think they have colonies near us. Everybody else is farther away.
I did not give out our maps to anybody.
I set all our interior cities on banks. Why banks? Because it seems to me that we're better off, for the time being, continuing to make cash and then to buy in (after at least the top four or five all have a tech) at lower cost. Or... we can do some of our own research, but at a slower pace, letting the costs drop before we make the final breakthrough. Last thing we can afford is to rush at first civ prices, then watch our research time drop to nil (meaning we already overspent) as the AI's get there a couple turns ahead of us. Also, we NEED Wall Street, preferably asap.
There are three wonders left: Smith and Shakespeare, now available, and Newton, which they are all at least two techs away from acquiring. I know for a fact, they started Shakespeare only recently (same turn we made contact) BUT... they may have been pushing Smith for some time now. Greece had just started it when I established embassy (I got a look at Athens) and we could beat them to it, but I just have a bad feeling about China and Aztecs. Aztecs MIGHT be at the tail end of a golden age (they ARE, unless they triggered it earlier with Jags or "got lucky" and triggered with just the Colossus). But having built a religious wonder (Colossus) and now a militaristic one recently (Leo), they could have had a golden age running, have built who knows how many shields, and still have six more turns of Golden production left. China's golden age came at the Hanging Garden, if not sooner, but they are the largest civ and MAY have had this tech for a while. It could have been gotten before Democracy, Free Artistry, and Metallurgy... they could be 15 turns into it.
I think our best bet is try for Billy's Theater, END the cascade, then prebuild for Newton and try to snag it too. If we can get Newton, WE might get a golden age. But the cascade must end before ToG is researched -- OR before we finish Shakespeare, which seems unlikely (just 11 turns to go).
So what I'd like to try is to go for Shakespeare's, and for banks, and then start building Newton in Havana (prebuilding, perhaps, if we can) and have Wall Street to fall back on if that fails. Smith looks like a longshot at best.
Judging by the histograph, I'd guess that China conquered England. Or else it had to have been Egypt. Nobody else is large enough. We are still hanging in at middle range on stats, and we are now tied for first in tech (with four, almost five, other civs) though that isn't going to last for long.
I've gotten our relations up to Polite with just about everybody, and took GREAT pains to offer 80% of our deals at non-miserly prices, to keep them diplomatically favorable. I would not be against sucking up a bit (if they demand our map, I'd say it's OK to give it away if you wish). I think our very best bet is to buckle down, ride others on the tech wave until AT LEAST Scientific Method if not longer, and try to make sure we get the UN by having a placeholder ready and beelining for the tech when we get the chance. At least, that would be the plan.
- Sirian
which took most of the eve.
Anything size 6 and looking
(Fortunately in this case there's no course-altering info or quandries presented)
