TSG 233 After Actions

[vadalaz]

In this thread you can post the results of your game. Please state your victory/loss date (preferably in the post title) and describe your path to glory in this post! Players are encouraged to provide feedback on the game.

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- Did you manage to clear the home continent before researching Astronomy?
- Were Siamese uniques useful to you? What about unique units from City-States?
- Did you have a strong navy, or were your conquests mostly done with land units? How many armies did you have?
- How many cities did you have in the end and where did you settle them?
- Which Ideology did you choose?

 

[Rhodro]

Domination victory turn 248.
- Did you manage to clear the home continent before researching Astronomy?
I think I was still busy with the last few cities of Morocco when my caravel started crossing the ocean to the east.

- Were Siamese uniques useful to you? What about unique units from City-States?
I built a few of Siamese UU, but that was to upgrade the scouts that that were garissoned in all my cities for the honor bonus. I upgraded a few of them to cavalry and they kept the barbs away.
I was actually friends/allies with most city states except the militaristic ones, so I did not get UU gifts.

- Did you have a strong navy, or were your conquests mostly done with land units? How many armies did you have?
After the tech to cross ocean I neglected the frigate tech in favour of land military tech. I saw that poland needed a land invasion and I expected my land troops to be able to take the opponents. Around the end I did make a few frigates and privateers but they came a little bit to late to the Indonesian cap.
I had 1 primary army of about 6 archers, 3 blocker units that were conquering my own continent. Later I mustered their ranks with a few siege unit that got promoted to artillery and some more blocker units and a few cavalry. This army went on to cap the celts, songhai, russia. I split like 4 units off that went to indonesia.

My 2nd army went to capture poland. When it came on land it was just 1 artillery and 1 cavalry. Because he didn't protect his border I could cap one of his cities in 2 turns and use it as a landing zone. Then I got a train of artillery and cavalry streaming in for Warsaw.

The most difficult opponents were Russia and Poland. Russia had great wall but not many cities, but she had another city between the mountains next to her capital. So some of my units got shot by 2 cities at once. I think I lost 2 units there. Poland was spamming his UU a lot after I capped one of his cities. Because I started war on his continent with only 2 units it was a bit slow until the rest poured in.

My ancient era units got quite promoted in the end. Logistics, range, march and cover on most archers

- How many cities did you have in the end and where did you settle them?
I only settled 2 cities besides my capital. The rest were opponent capitals.

- Which Ideology did you choose?
Autocracy. I actually had few policies in autocracy, because I was on autopilot: always waiting to bulb workers after worlds fair, but worlds fair was extremely later, it started just before I won. Maybe I could have bulbed writers earlier to get the extra damage policy?

 

[sebtanic]

I conquered Edinburgh (which belonged to the Russians at that time) and won turn 237.

Initial build order - scout, scout, shrine, monument, granary, library, worker
Ruins: 100g, map, pop
Policies: Left Liberty, right Honor, full Honor, rest of Liberty, plus 1 each in Rationalism (out of habit), Exploration (the ocean was huge and my Frigates were slow, so the extra movement really made a difference), and Commerce

Major events timeline:

t46 Desert Folklore
t102 Religion: Tithe, Happiness from Shrines
t112 Oracle
t153 Enhanced: It. Preachers, Extra Production
t170 Astronomy

Conquered Capitals in the following order:

t118 Rome
t139 Istanbul (which had Statue of Zeus and Colossus, both great to have at this early stage)
t157 Stockholm
t188 Marrakech
t206 Gao
t215 Warsaw (w/ 2nd army)
t229 Jakarta (w/ navy and parts of 2nd army)
t236 Moscow (1st army and parts of 2nd join forces)
t237 Edinburgh (w/ navy mainly, plus 1 or 2 cannons)

I was contantly struggling with happiness throughout the game. Gold was an issue in the beginning, but when I completed Honor and opened Commerce it got a lot better.

The toughest opponent was without a doubt Rome. The terrain was tricky with all that Jungle, and he had city spammed to the north (I had an expo on the copper, as described in the Opening Actions thread) so I had to raze 3 Roman cities before I could get to Rome from a convenient angle. I wanted to attack the capital from the SE, where there was no jungle.

Against Rome I was still using Composite Bows, while he had Ballistas and Legions. Once Rome fell I got Machinery and I upgraded to Crossbows. I razed one Ottoman city on the coast north of Istanbul, then took their capital. It was a walk in the park with XBs and catapults.

Istanbul was my only city with ocean access, so I annexed it to be able to build Frigates.

After conquering Istanbul my army went north towards Stockholm, then west to Morocco. Neither of them put up much resistance, but Morocco was far away and had difficult terrain. I had to raze one of their cities to get access to the capital (I didn't want to take the long way around).

Around the time I conquered Marrakech I researched Navigation, but realized I didn't have any Iron for Frigates. So I had to settle another expo between the 3 Iron tiles, NE of Istanbul. The tiles were already mined by the Romans.

My army near Marrakech embarked SW towards Gao, and new units built in the capital and expos went east towards Poland. My Frigates were also sent to the east, to eventually conquer Jakarta and Edinburgh from the sea.

I took Warsaw with Musketmen and Cannons, and Jakarta with Frigates mostly, plus some land units coming over from Poland.

Meanwhile, my first army which by now had some highly promoted XBs and Cannons in its ranks, took Gao. Then it made its way west towards Moscow, razing two Songhai cities and two Russian cities along the way. I allied Anantarivo just by liberating their workers. Having them allied gave me a good angle for my inital attack against Russia.

The Russians had the Great Wall, but I had enough GGs to build some citadels and take their cities easily. As I approached Moscow, units from Poland came to help out from the west and joined with my first army coming from the east, completely swamping Moscow in units. They didn't even put up much of a resistance, and Moscow fell in turn 236. Edinburgh (which was occupied by the Russians) fell one turn later to my navy of Frigates and a Caravel, securing my victory in turn 237.

I used 2 GSs on Fertilizer and Military Science, and was planning to pop Dynamite with Oxford University but I won the game before finishing Oxford.

Spoiler t233 screenshot :

 

[fiddlesticks]

Domination victory turn 204.

Initial build order: scout, scout, shrine, archer, settler

Initial research path: archery, pottery (ruin), calendar, writing, AH, mining, masonry

Ruins: pottery, map, spearman, 60g, map, -> not very helpful

Policies: full tradition, open honour + warrior code and military tradition (122), open patronage, (135)

Diplomacy: steal Swedish settlers (24), (50), capital captures: Stockholm (59), Rome (134), Istanbul (~145?), Marrakech (174), Edinburgh (188), Moscow (192), Gao (196), Jakarta (198), Warsaw (204). Moscow was captured by taking Yaroslavl in an earlier peace deal and buying cannons and musketmen, Jakarta was using frigates and a privateer bought in Istanbul, and Warsaw was through a second army clearing troops and taking a coastal city and buying artillery.

I had really good luck with liberating city-state workers. Sofia (Camel Archers) in particular I was able to get an unescorted worker, then the same worker again, then a camp clear plus worker that Morocco had almost completed all with one scout!

 

[The_Black_Vegetable]

Victory turn 246.
With so many capitals to take, and many of them far away, I felt I needed to sim for a while before building army, so I went tradition and put down 4 cities, including a second coastal near Istanbul, underneath Valetta, which I don't see anyone having planted. When I felt it was more or less time to go, I had already gotten so many units from the three military CS, that I only built a couple of elephants from the cap, and maybe a few trebuchets from the expands. It turned out, though, that the King AI did not have that many units, so I could have gone much earlier.

My cap did get Petra, but I also missed a couple of wonders I would have liked: Oracle, Mausoleum, and ToA. I cleaned up the main continent with crossbows and elephants: Stockholm first into Rome (who had killed Ottomans), into the Great Wall from Morocco (who also had built ToA). I embarked my main army off the west coast, and made a new army of cavalry and artillery which I embarked east. The latter went to Poland, the former to Celts, and in the end the armies met in the middle for Moscow and Gao. I did build a couple of frigates too, but I did not really make much use of them.

Nearing the end of the game, the cities on the main continent had little to contribute to the war effort, because it would take too long to get reinforcement to the front. Also, I forgot to bulb any of my writers

 

[zxcvbob]

Domination victory on turn 472 (domination is my weakest game, especially on large maps) As I posted in the Opening Actions thread, on turn 111 or thereabouts I had settled a couple of cities, captured Stockholm, built Petra, and started on the National College. (building things seemed *so slow*, I think I'm used to playing at quick pace or having lots of high-production tiles) After getting the NC up, I settled one more city and got on with my warmongering. Rome was first (and I liberated a Swedish city), and then the Ottomans. All this took about 100 turns. It took a long time to explore once I got my caravels out even tho' I captured the Great Lighthouse at Istanbul; I should have attacked Poland as soon as I knew where he was. By the time I thought I was ready to attack he had the Freedom tenet "Their Finest Hour" and his cities were 200 strong. It took me about 100 turns to slog through Poland and capture Warsaw and Jakarta. He was building new units almost as fast as I could kill them. After Poland, things moved along much more quickly. Russia was next, and that got me all the rest of the capitals except Marrakech.

Around turn 400 I accidentally won a diplomatic victory on the first vote, but I just kept playing. I was at war with a half dozen Polish-allied CS's and I did not yet have Forbidden Palace nor the world religion. I had the world ideology, I was the head of the UN, and I had most of the CS's. Sweden voted for me; that should have put me close but I don't know how I got over the top.

- Did you manage to clear the home continent before researching Astronomy?
I didn't see an easy approach to Marrakech and it had very high strength for this time of the game so I saved Morocco for last. I figured I needed someone to trade with. When I did declare war on Morocco, it was over in 2 turns. His cities were no stronger than they had been in the early renaissance.

- Were Siamese uniques useful to you? What about unique units from City-States?
Elephants were not very useful. I did build a couple but didn't use them much. What was really useful were the siege towers I got from one of the city-states.

- Did you have a strong navy, or were your conquests mostly done with land units? How many armies did you have?
Battleships were my primary units for attacking the other continents; later I added missile cruisers to my fleet. I also had subs, a few privateers/destroyers, and one carrier with fighters. (those fighters really earned their pay) But many of the capitals were inland so I had to bring along artillery, AA, and lots of infantry.

- How many cities did you have in the end and where did you settle them?
At the end I think I had almost 30 cities, but I only settled about 3 myself. I'll add a screenshot or two at the end.

- Which Ideology did you choose?
Autocracy. It's a fun one that I don't use very often. Order might have been faster because of its science bonus from factories and Iron Curtain, but I don't know how I would have paid for all the unit maintenance, plus it was really nice being able to buy units at a deep discount in newly-conquered cities.

 

[Bemep42]

Domination victory turn 206 (but it should have been 205).

liberty-honor-full liberty-patronage(0,1-right)-commerce(0,1-left)-full patronage. religion - DF, +100 gold/city, pagoda, +1 happy from shrine and 25(50)% faster. 2nd GP from liberty (about turn80). war all game from beginner.

capital captures: Stockholm (42), Rome (111), Istanbul (130), Marrakech (153), Edinburgh (177), Gao (190), Jakarta (202), Moscow (202), Warsaw (206).

After take Edinburgh i upgrade my first army cats and bows (7/11) to bows (11/18) and trebuchets and use tham for take Gao, Timbuchtu and Moscow. for Jakarta i use 4 frigats and 1 pikeman. For Warsaw i plant city about Fuji upgrade bows, siege (from Alma-Ata) and ele from Valetta to trebushets and UU and DoW on 190t. There no cities between Fuji and Warsaw but Poland has 1st power with knights, pikes and musketmens. and he has Great Wall. so i needed time for take it. It took me some time to come up with the idea to buy tiles and use the general as a fortress within a 3rd radius of Warsaw. Maybe i can take it on 202 turn If I had been smarter).
But I did the most stupid thing at the end of turn 205. I attacked Warsaw with all units except 1 UU and 1 Impi. But before I captured Warsaw, I made peace with Catherine. She gave me 3 cities as a result, I got -14 unhappy. This greatly reduced my odds and I was unable to capture Warsaw. I checked, if I had used 1 unit first, then taken 3 cities, then I would have been able to take Warsaw by 205! Stupid greed. Because of the extra turn, I lost more points than I gained from 3 cities. In total, I have 28 cities at the end, if I counted correctly.