I had a city (Antium) that directly bordered Mongolias capital. I thought to myself: why should I kill all my units fighting Greece and everybody else for that matter? I can simply support the Mongols as their best allies I can be, and then sneak attack their capital in a single turn to end the game!
I thought I was a genius
, but two things went wrong
. 1st of all, Mongolia were unfocused in their campaigns
. They kept wanting to split their forces to go after this or that city-state
. They showed none of the killer focus going after Greeces cities that Greece had shown against them
. Secondly, Persia and Ghandi wised up somehow. I did absolutely everything in my power to create the greatest coalition in the game. Ghandi had been my super BFF since the beginning of recorded time. Darius was nearly as close. I brought Khan into the coalition later, and altho there were some initial issues especially from Darius. I got them all trading and RAing with each other and I thought we were all good.
However, Darius went nuts. He killed off Suleiman
, got filthy rich
, entered a neverending golden age
, shot up in score, denounced Mongolia
, denounced India
, denounced me
, and went to war with Khan in the span of 15 turns
. I tried my best diplomacy but Darius simply would not listen to reason .
My plan was failing. Everything in my game depended on keeping my coalition strong. I needed a new strategy ASAP. I saw it happening and recognized I would never be able to defend any of my cities if any of my allies attacked. So first I made peace with Greece. Then I systematically sold off every single city I took, and pared down to my original two city empire. I deliberately sold cities to players that were right next to another nations territory. I had research agreements with everybody but Greece and Rome (rome was just an island city at this point). I did what it took to get RAs with both and traded every luxury and strategic resource I could. What was the result of all this? I am proud to say I made every single player go to war with every single other player in the game. India Persia Mongolia Rome and Greece were ALL AT WAR WITH EACH OTHER, and none were at war with me. All of their RAs were broken, and all of mine were on.
So my original plan to help Mongolia dominate, only to backstab them failed. But suddenly I had a shot at a tech victory. My attempts to stay militarily relevant had me well set up for science victory, and even tho my science was a pathetic 292 beakers at turn 362
I still had a shot at building a spaceship first if my RAs held up.
As it turned out things could not have been any closer at the end. My spaceship launched on the same turn as the UN vote. I had to go to war with Alex and break one RA b/c he was buying every CS on the map and starting to kill Mongolia again. I actually had two more RAs than I needed (you cant be too safe) so breaking one with Greece didnt ruin my strategy. I didnt know if I would be allowed to launch my ship before the UN Vote, since they were going to happen on the same turn, so I was warring Alex and I was going to take one of his CS by military force if I had to vote before my spaceship launched. As it turns out I was able to launch without having to vote, so I WON. I WON I WON I WON.