08/15 - The Adventures of Gunner Yossarian, Assyria Deity conquest of Europe*

[Maxym]

* North Africa and Middle East thrown in for good measure. 22 civs, huge map with historical start locations (TSL).

Or maybe we could call it Exercise in extreme patience, ten minute turn times and all that fun stuff.

I had an idea to play an Assyria Domination game on this map while doing the Deity Challenge 31 with Portugal.

I figured giving my hero the only Assyrian name I know, would be very fitting and save me trouble of looking up real Assyrian names which i am told are long and hard to remember. The moniker Gunner is somewhat misleading as he is only a Siege Tower Operator class II, but I am told it will become more appropriate in later ages. 08/15 of course refers to model years when certain siege tower improvements were implemented (going by years of reign of king Ashurbanipal, So 661BCE / 654BCE by our count, this being a not very catchy name, I decided to stick with original and provide this lengthy explanation).

I have not played Assyria yet, and thought their UA would lend itself well to a huge conquest campaign as all those extra cities will weigh heavily on science progress. Siege towers looked like a fun UU to try some early warring, so I fired a map and proceeded to make a mess out if it..

Spoiler :

Or maybe the historical narrative reasserted itself and my fledgeling Assyrian empire was conquered from the west (Suleiman) and east (Babylon) culminating in the fall and sacking of Nineveh. I knew the starting location (in today's Syria) was tough one with difficult neighbors: Persia to the north, Babylon to the east, Turks to NW and Arabs in the South. Compounding the problem were the four CS (Tyre, Sidon, Byblos and Jerusalem) cutting off access to the Mediterranean. My initial plan was to leave Babylon as a trade partner and push north through Persians and Ottomans to secure the mountain passes of Caucasus and access to Black Sea and Med.

But it was not to be, I settled Nineveh on the Euphrates instead of the Tigris to grab Solomon's Mines for extra production for my early conquests and to cut off further access south to Persian and Ottoman empires. I fully expected Darius to react quickly, instead he wanted a DoF and a common war against Sully. That seemed like too good of an opportunity to pass up given how rare both early war and DoFs are. Our combined forces have been killing Turkish SMs NW of the S. Mines, as I continued to build up my army.

This is the location of Nineveh and Assyrian-Turkish-Persian border triangle (in both games, SS from 2nd game):

Spoiler :

In meantime both Babylon and Arabs asked for DoF and I agreed concentrating on my western borders whee the ware stalemated and Darius eventually left me to fight alone. Nabby used the opportunity to declare and took my 3rd city between Assur and Babylon on the sugar floodplains. I counterattacked, took the city back and then one of his south of Babylon, but had too sue for white peace as Sully beelined his Janissaries and was overhwelming my defenses. CBs are no match for UU muskets and eventually Nineveh fell and i abandoned the game. i think i could have taken it back, but with all my neighbours so strong, and my two expos ruined i had little chance to conquer the world. Best I could hope for was a cheesy diplo or SV, and i wanted a full on Domination.

Assyrian Empire Redux

I restarted right away and slowly the idea of doing this more as a story than a deity challenge took shape. I know I can't write as funny as CountAccountant so I am not going to try and emulate his style, but I hope I can at least be amusing occasionally.

Going with benefits of hindsight and map knowledge I decided to settle Assur in the same spot and Nineveh as well. But this time I knew Babylon was not going to be a friend and a trade partner so I immediately enslaved one of his workers. Enslaved might not be the right word, since as far as I know Babylonians are really Assyrians by other name and the worker enjoyed the right to build roads, dig mines and cultivate farmland for greater glory of Assyrian kings in perpetuity. Besides I am sure he was glad not to have to build roads, dig mines and cultivate farmland for greater glory of Babylonian Necromancer King in perpetuity.

That Nebby is a Necromancer is obvious from the look of his throne room and with a name like Nebuchadnezzar he could not be anything else. I have decided to pillage some of his sugar plantations for good measure and withdraw with my entire army (one spear) and liberated worker as his numerous warriors were coming to the rescue.

This has provided a needed early boost to my economy and with two scouts headed in opposite directions (N and S) I was quickly meeting new empires and city states in the Middle east, Asia minor and later Russia and Europe. I took left side of liberty to grab a free settler and then settled third city to south of Assur. I knew the ongoing war with Nebby will make a sugar location on Tigris and Euphrates indefensible and was hoping he will settle there so I can get a city and a free tech.

History being history, was repeating itself again, and I accepted Darius's offer of friendship and war against Sully, as well a Arabian DoF. I continued harassing Nebby while whittling down Sully's forces as I teched to XB knowing that having to meet his UU with CB was silly and after a while both me and Darius made peace with the Turks.

I was free to move against Nebby burning down one of his cities while he completed GW. That was a bit unexpected but given the fact he was living next to a warlike tribe like Assyrians I can't blame him. I felt that Darius and his rapidly growing army needed something to do, and for two luxes and some gold got him involved in this war as well.

His units provided a bit of distraction during the siege of Babylonian city I burned, but I was hoping they will be involved in securing Akkad and then Babylon. Instead his army seemed so scary to Nebby gave him Akkad in a pace deal and concentrated on my forces. By this time his cap was up to strength 39 and I was still few turns away from XB, so I let him resettle Dur Karigalzu so I could burn it again and get another free tech.

While fighting Babylonian war I was distracted by Byblos joining the evil necromancers and attacking Nimrud, my 3rd city and getting it all the way down to zero health while my reinforcements are pouring back. I very rarely take over CSs but since I did not have to DoW, and the peace with Sully precluded a quick access to the Med, I figured having one less CS to be bribed by my future enemies into attacking me and a deep water port outweigh the disadvantages. I took the city without losses and went back after Nebby.

It did not last too long, as I have let my DoF with Arabs lapse and for some reason he thought I was an easier target than Egypt. Big mistake Harun, what were you thinking , I am not an AI. He did pick the right time, just after getting a bunch of Camel Archers and came at Nimrud heavy.

Spoiler :

I had to spend 1100 gold to get both walls and castle or risk losing the city. I knew that would be close to another game over so I poured everyone back to the new front while giving Nebby a white peace. Within nine turns we have cut their army down and were on the offensive to take the E&T sugar city from the Arabs and another free tech ( all four techs, CS gave me one as well, were the lowest beakers techs available at each moment, coincidence?)

Spoiler :

During the siege of Kufah, our brave Gunner Yossarian lost his triple promoted siege tower. I had a chance to heal upgrade but had no other damaged units to draw fire and had to sacrifice his Tower. With arabian CAs around i really did not want to risk losing any of my XBs well on the way to logistics. As a reward for his brave service Yossarian was put in charge of newly upgraded trebuchet crew and his nickname came a bit close to reality. In the confusion of battle my royal orders must have been misinterpreted and I found myself in possession of four trebuchets but no siege towers and without ability to produce more. I am sure that's not what I ordered but I did forgive those responsible and did not behead anyone, just assigned them as rock carriers to the new trebuchet unit. Let them know their s magnanimity.

 

[Js_9001]

Good story, just want more screenshots

 

[Maxym]

Good story, just want more screenshots

OK coming right up, added few more to OP and will add one or more here.

Update to t137

After taking Kufah, I kept the pressure on Harun as you have to with deity AI, even few turns of slack gets them time to replenish their armies. I decided to go for Najran, by passing Baghdad as it had high defense and easier resupply route and just enveloped it three tiles back and killed every unit poking it's head past the city bombard radius while my army moved in position to take Najran.
Yossarian gives his take on siege warfare in next section of this post. I found myself on turn 136 with a choice of SP, being able to either finish liberty, open rationalism or commerce or honor. Initially I went with liberty open and two left till free settler then patro open and consulates, before going back to liberty. With so many CS on the map consulates are very strong.

I had five turns left till Printing Press finished and gambled for liberty GE and got punished for it next turn when Harun built LToPisa. oh well I needed it only for another GE for Big Ben, which is the real prize as the way I hope to go forward with it is to get Autocracy unit cost reduction and couple it with BB and commerce purchase price discount for some very cheap millitary which will then be put to take more cities for razing and sale to fund the war. All the while keeping good diplomatic relations with immediate neighbors for ITR gold.

Spoiler :

General Discussion or Gunner Yossarian's musings on Strategy and Tactics

During the Siege of Kufah when Yossarian's siege tower was destroyed he did not have the highest opinion of his 's grasp of tactics. What a waste he thought and he did not like the idea of people shooting at him, especially people behind high walls or on camels who disappeared before anyone could shoot back at them. Not that he had that option while in command of siege tower, but at least someone else could have shot back. But once he was in command of brand new trebuchet and 's orders were for his royal pikemen to move forward to draw enemy fire, he saw the 's wisdom. Especially since the guys carrying the long sticks were not really his friends as they came from far away city states and on top of that he heard they upgrade to something called lancers, whatever those may be.

( warfare in medieval times is a bit more complicated then the common arty and cavalry rush. Your units are very vulnerable to city bombardment and siege weapons have limited range. I don't use catapults at all, since I tend to attack high defense cities with older weapons and end up conducting protracted sieges. Cats usually can't take a city bombard and a garrison volley. Trebs on the other hand can, and the only time you will lose one during a well planned siege is when city pops additional range unit and they have to absorb three shots. And that's what happened to me.

Spoiler :

I move in a wounded pike with appropriate promo so rough ground promoted to hill/forest tile and shock ones to open ground and let them take a hit. Nearly full strength pike can survive city bombard up to 40 def and a CA shot if supported by GG. Discipline promo helps a lot if you open honor and take right side of it to get cheaper upgrades. Knights work well too but it will hurt if you lose one while losing a pike is no big deal. You can see both slightly wounded pike and a knight set up to take city bombard and CA shots as well as a loss of a treb the previous turn when a CA just to the left of the city spawned insidde and delivered the killing third shot.

Once your decoys are in place and I try to have two in case one gets killed, you can move in all your range and siege on the same turn and start pounding the city. Remembering that any unit coming out of it or coming into reinforce has to be killed as it will change the equation, AI is trying to eliminate your units and by having additional units around it can then kill full strength units in one turn and will shift it's attention from wounded decoys to full strength XB and siege. And that's what you need to avoid at all cost. So if a unusually large number of reinforcements showed up and all your range and siege supported by mounted can't eliminate them all (do the math, hover cursor over targets without attacking to see approximate damage dealt and add it up) then it's time to withdraw and shoot. Since most units will be one tile away from city, you can step back one and shoot with XB or shoot and step back with logistics XB. Once reinforcements are cleared move back into city range and keep working it over. You can see why people tend to wait for arty as it is a lot of tactical micro and busy work. But it can get you a few civs out of the way before then and that's worth it. In case of Assyria even more so as it hastens the arrival of your arties with every free tech on that path.

 

[Js_9001]

Wow this is some pretty in-depth strategy! I guess that's what it takes to beat Deity.

 

[CountAccountant]

Excellent narrative so far, and I appreciated the shout out . Since you asked for feedback, here are my thoughts:

Things I Particularly Enjoyed:

• Your sprinkling of humor is perfect. You are careful not to go overboard, but you never go too long without a wry witticism, either. The thread remains engaging throughout.
• Your combined narrative/how-to guide format is very effective. The thread is far more interesting than a pure, dry strategic discussion, and it still manages to provide the reader with a lot of useful information.
• Gunner Yossarian ties otherwise disparate elements of the thread together in a meaningful way.
• Your level of expertise with Civ 5 comes across clearly in the thread. You describe specific tactics that other players can emulate (for example, taking cities early with wounded pikemen diversions, etc.). But what was even more useful, at least in my opinion, were the situations where you described your thought process while analyzing a difficult situation (for example, why you attacked the city-state ally of Babylon).

Optional Suggestions:
Note: There is nothing in the thread that actually needs to be improved. However, I wanted to offer you a few suggestions anyway because that is what I appreciate most when I receive feedback.

• Deity-level play is, by definition, much more complex than Prince or King-level play. Anything you can do to organize or illustrate your thoughts will make your writing more accessible to more people. If this is a direction you want explore, some possibilities might include using subheadings in addition to your headings, plentiful screenshots (as mentioned by Js_9001), occasionally summarizing the empire’s status (How many cities do we have? Who are our friends and enemies again?), etc.
• You have already established several good story elements, such as Babylon’s penchant for necromancy. If you would like enhance the narrative’s depth further, consider adding an extra adjective every so often that references your previous story elements. For example, a “flesh-devouring” spearman, an “unholy” city-state ally, etc.

Overall Impressions
Outstanding beginning, both as it stands on its own and how it sets up the thread as a whole. Engaging to read and very informative at the same time. The wry humor complements the analytical overall tone nicely. May not be accessible to novice players, but they are also probably not your target audience. Good characterization. I am looking forward to this thread a great deal and I expect to learn a lot as it progresses.

 

[Maxym]

Thanks for the feedback CA, if I may call you that. I am in the midst of writing another Yossarian narrative and update, and slowly moving the game along. I like your suggestions, and must sadly report that I find myself in unholy alliance with the necromancer King of Babylon, how this came about, I'll let Yossarian explain shortly. I might have more time to write as war are breaking out often now and turn times get longer and longer....

 

[Maxym]

The Man with a Plan

In the 400th or 800th year of the siege of Baghdad, Yossarian could not remember which, they all seemed the same to him with countless Arabian counterattacks and Assyrian troops slaughtering them all, he realized that it was a good thing to be fighting for the guy with a Plan. Especially when the King's Plan revolved around not getting people like Yossarian shot at. He felt sorry, well almost sorry for the guys on camels, horse guys with long lances and the foot soldiers with those new rifles who came every year to try to relieve the siege only to be shot by Yossarian's buddies in other cannon batteries, or his friends in Crossbow regiments who somehow managed to shoot twice each year, and fifty percent further than his cannon. Or if that was not enough, trampled underneath the hooves of two regiments of King's Own Knights. (in case this is not clear, it is my entire army in this screenshot, save for one treb I moved to NE to upgrade when Chemistry unlocks)
All the while King's engineers encircled the Arab lands with a ring road to speed up the movement of Assyrian troops while destroying enemy roads bringing in the countless reinforcements.

Spoiler :

(After this screen, Arabs poured in three more waves of reinforcements of two rifles, 2 lancers and three CAs each, until I managed to cut the road south of citrus and upgrade to trebs and move in for the kill)

Once the preparations were finished he was finally given orders to move in with his battery to bring down the city and castle walls, thinking "Great, now those bastards will get their chance to shoot at me". But to his surprise the King has ordered recruitment of number of scout regiments who liked nothing else but to get within the city range and get shot at. Or that's what he liked to tell himself at night. In few more years the great city fell and the King's musket regiment poured in to secure it. Within their ranks were soldiers of Assyrian special forces, whose task was to secure enemy technology and capture their scientists. He was amazed how well that worked over the years. Every single city Assyrians have captured yielded a new technology: Sidon (optics), Dur-Kurigalzu twice (Drama, metal casting), Kufah (Chivalry), Najran (education ), Basra (banking), Baghdad (Navigation), and Damascus (Mettalurgy). Or maybe that was nothig to be proud of as it showed how backwards Assyrian science was, he thought for a second. Nah, it was brilliant and all part of the Plan, besides it would be Un-Assyrian to think otherwise, and Yossarian was nothing if not Assyrian.

Meanwhile the messengers from the capital have told of construction of a amazing centre of higher learning where the brightest Assyrian minds discovered the secrets of Industrialisation. But the secret itself was not enough for the king whose ambition has driven him to spend his entire treasury on some shady Chinese construction companies who completed three factories seemingly overnight.

The newly created proletariat wasted no time in demanding a new form of government and a Pan-Assyrian Confederacy (PAC) replaced the old empire. The king debated what form the new polity should take, but not for long, as the masses needed a new religion and neither the communist Order nor pseudo-democratic Freedom were deemed appropriate for the great Assyrian nation. After all our goal is the complete domination of Europe* and there is no need to coat it in euphemisms like liberation or dictatorship of the proletariat. We are here to conquer and where possible to steal tech, sell those cities to the highest bidder and move on, Yossarian laughed as he said that and looked forward to many more conquests to come, as long as they don't involve people shooting at him.(Oxford to Industrialization, and three factory rush to Autocracy as the world's first ideology).

ANd here is the aftermath of the First A-A War (Assyrian-Arab)

Spoiler :

I got Anjar and Khurasan in a peace deal with Harun and promptly sold them both. I got about 50 gpt from Sully and 77 gpt from Hrun for his own city. I returned it to him in nearly mint condition, just minus a university which was destroyed when Assyrian Special Forces (ASF) ransacked it looking for their scientists and tech. ( No free tech from gifted cities, so I just sold his uni as it doesn't affect sale price). Before signing I placed a citadel towards his cap (lower right) as we are not done yet, he will be a threat if left alone, and I can save some gpt now and have no shortage of GGs.

Since he started the war he was friendly and signed Open Borders (OB) allowing me to move my forces in the direction of Thebes (lower left). I decided not to wait for arty as it is still 13 turns away even with saved GS. I will stay on Arab side of Nile delta and churn Egypt's units to make a bit of headway for arty assault on his cap and arty/ frigate on both coastal cities.Also it will give me fleet something to do and start its expansion.


I will add some more in depth analysis on how I am going to leverage this mad rush to Autocracy at some point tomorrow.

 

[Js_9001]

That road-building and destroying strategy for attacking is great, wish I'd thought about that.
Also, can you go more in-depth about how you demolished the Arabian units and captured their cities? Like the strategy.

 

[Maxym]

There wasnt that much strategy involved, a bit of early planning and unit preservation. You can easily fight rifles with XBs if you get your XB to log and range. When he brings a wave, I concentrate fire and kill both rifles and at least one lancer. He had rough ground and medic promos on rifles so XB cut them up like butter in the open. My XBs were almost all open ground specialists. You know the optimal promo path for archer line, three in either rough or open then log, then range. Once you have three to four log XB, you can start getting range first as they will bunch up and having a guy shooting from three tiles is great. Your log XB will get then range very fast.

And then the hard part, don't lose any of them. You could see my conquests are slow, but I have not lost one this game yet. Keep them out of harm's way and they will take down cities up to 60 def, from range. It's slow but it works. I guess I got sidetracked, the reason I concentrate on rifles is that they pack the biggest punch. He deploys them in a ring around the city with CAs and lancers with one of those in 2nd ring. If a rifle survives it can heal up, and move one hex and attack your XB, then the lancers or CAs will finish it. If they have one lancer they don't try as the AI can't see that if all remaining CAs moved to shoot they would kill an XB. It must do the calculation with units in place. AI is notoriously bad with range, siege units, another reason to kill melee. It knows how to use those, just charge and die.

If AI brings in enough units you can't clear the field two spaces away from your XB, pull out and deploy your melee in front. He will attack those and then you kill the survivors. You can try clearing one side, pull out on other. This is where roads help, and his lack of roads makes AI ineffective.

 

[redwings1340]

Wait, I thought you could only take one tech per city, isn't that part of the Assyrian UA?

 

[CountAccountant]

Best update yet. This is a good length for an update (before the to-be-added strategic analysis section, obviously), and a good ratio of screenshots-to-text. Your additional investment in narrative elements shows and really pays off. Well done.

I'm looking forward to hearing more about the Autocracy strategy when you post it.

 

[Pliped]

Good story, really appreciate the explanation for strategy as well

 

[Maxym]

Wait, I thought you could only take one tech per city, isn't that part of the Assyrian UA?

Yes, you are correct my good sir, and as I am discovering, sometimes not even once per city. If you get it as gift, then sell it to someone else, then conquer in regular manner, and send in Assyrian Special Forces (ASF), they will come up empty-handed

But if you conquer a city, raze it, and let AI resettle, the name will stay the same, but it is considered a new city and will yield free tech if available. In this case a resourceful ASF commander attached to a regiment of Royal Swordsmen, wisely allowed a Babylonian settler to pass through the lines unmolested as he spotted some suspicious characters who looked like necro-scientists and carts piled high with lab equipment. And he was duly promoted, sitting now as analyst in a palace wing housing the Scientific Procurement Division of the ASF.


PS. I have added some explanation and details to last update, but a full fledged Autocracy strategy is still in the works.

PPS. Thank you for all the encouragements, comments and suggestions. Keep them coming.

 

[redwings1340]

Ah, that's smart. Well, smart on your part. Sometimes the AI can be a little weird though "oh, hey, we're about to die, lets plant a city right in the middle of enemy lines. They will never see it coming!"

 

[Maxym]

The Story Continues...


With the conclusion of the first A-A War, Yossarian was looking forward to going back home from an eternity, it seemed, spent at the front lines. But as soon as the ink dried on the paper on which Arab capitulation was signed, the Supreme Leader of Pan-Assyrian Confederacy (SL-PAC) has ordered his troops to move through Arab lands towards the Nile Delta. At least no one was shooting at him yet, he thought, and rumors had it Assyrian scientists were close to a major breakthrough in the field of artillery. At last, he thought, my nickname will make some sense. He waited for that a long time, not to mention the fact that once in command of an artillery battery, no one will be able to shoot at him. Range, glorious range Or so he thought, but at night he had terrible nightmares about ghost bombers, coming from afar to rain fiery death. He kept waking in cold sweat and telling himself these things were a figment of his imagination and not real machines. (how wrong he was, with Carthage in atomic era and number of nations in modern, ghost bombers were reaping their bloody harvest all over the battlefields of Europe*)

In meantime he walked through the desert behind the horse team pulling his cannon, and thought that maybe the Plan was not such a hot idea after all. He was shaken from his reverie when message came that War on Egypt has been declared. WTH he thought, we are nowhere near Nile yet... Turns out the filthy commie pharaoh Ramses accused the SL of PAC of trying to sneak in an army for a surprise attack on Egypt. And SL might be a warmonger and a ruthless commander not reluctant to order his troops to shoot at civilians, but he is not a Liar, or at least not yet...
( I had only two units near Egypt borders but must have had more in his LoS and Rammy called me on it, and the diplo hit on breaking that promise is so severe you don't want to do it until last stage of the game where you are all in and everyone hates you anyway, so I declared when he asked. On a side note, shooting civilians gets you two free XP per shot so if there is no combat units you need to kill, go ahead and do it with your core veteran units. I don't bother with other ones, they are expendable anyway )


As soon as the hostilities commenced Egyptian units poured across the Nile only to be cut to pieces. Assyrians were finally outclassing their opponents. After few tries they waited out of range while Assyrian Crossbowmen slowly reduced Memphis defences. Another battle raged at sea where Pan-Assyrian Navy (PAN) demolished their Egyptian counterpart and expanded their ranks. While the fighting went on, treacherous Harun, sold his own people of Khurasan to the Effete Greeks to secure a peace deal. Assyrian units found themselves split in two groups and pushed from the front. The previously mentioned ASF analyst exclaimed: " That bastard how can he sell his own people, so soon after we sold them to him? But this is a perfect Crisortunitity if I ever saw one. The Greeks cant do anything while the citizens riot in the streets and Yossarian will like taking a city that won't shoot back at him. We should liberate those poor souls, and sell them to him again. But not right away, not until we ship all those brand new howitzers our Great Scientist, whose name escapes me now, discovered (GS bulb, and upgrade cannons to arty without having to shuttle them back to Assyria) Now this deserves a promotion, SL thought:
-Welcome Section Chief Redwings1340 to my war council. And reassigned his former superior to one of the inquisitive scout units.
(your last post gave me an idea to use settlers to plant cities to disrupt enemy lines and provide cover, i thought it was related and deserved credit. I will let you know when I use it.)

In the next screen you can see how far PAC has rocketed up the military standings as well as my army assembled to take Thebes. I have been around 14-16th position for most of mid game.

Spoiler :

After the new guns arrived at the front, the war was short lived, Thebes fell in three years, bringing PAC it's first treasure trove of art and manuscripts. Some of them on finer points of strategy and tactics and Royal Libraries in PAC heartland put those to good use as new regiments of artillery and squadrons of privateers were formed. The two cities Ramses offered for peace, brought almost 5000 gold from Carthage and 38 gpt from Ramses. The troops turned back, and Yossarian thought, here we go again, I know what's coming. In seven years reparation payments from Harun will end and we will have to fight him again. This time with Great War Infantry, and lots of it....

But before that could happen the Ottomen would have to be dealt with....
While I was fighting Arabs and moving to Egypt, Sully must have pissed someone off and picked up 5 or 6 denouncements in one turn. I jumped on the bandwagon and soon he got another 10 or so, making him an ideal target. I was going to open a second front against him anyway as he is turning hostile and has Himeji which I covet. I need to wait few more turns before Arab reparation payments stop so i can put that issue to rest forever. Also I see Sully running around a bunch of Archeologists. The Age of Archeology is together with the Age of Piracy my favorite time in the game. I love getting things for free, especially ships but units that can't be bought even more so. Not sure if everyone is aware how accurate the popular culture portrayal of Archeology is ( yes I am talking about Indy). It is scary how well researched and true to life these movies are. These fearless scholars will wonder all over the world often in combat zones. And with life imitating art, they will get captured by ASF who continue to regard archeology as a science. One major discrepancy between the movies is that despite what propaganda departments of pseudo democracies would like you to believe, those captive archeologists do not refuse to work for Nazi or Commie regimes. Or at least I have not met one yet. ASF can be very persuasive

Thay have assembled a huge invasion fleet off my coast, and Elizabeth informed me that one of her agents Double Oh something... has uncovered detailed plans of Invasion of Assur (That means the army is on the move and I am a target. I purposefully delayed buying any more arty and especially rifle units as those push you up the pointy stick table, and only got some privateers as i did not want PAN to be overwhelmed and my lands invaded. But it must have been enough, and the war decision failed the last sanity check AI performs before Dowing, and fleet redirected and he attacked hapless Rammy. While the navy waited and nothing happened Ottomen attacked Egypt and found their fleet in betw een my fleet healing up from conquest of Egypt and Home defense naval task force. Coupled with their low diplo standing, the fact they had at least two techs i did not, and lots of Indy wannabees, and provided a nice base to deal with Harun who was still paying, it sealed the deal) The not treacherous enough Ottomen will have to be dealt with right NOW.

Spoiler :

 

[Js_9001]

Looking good so far, but it seems like there might be some problems. I'm not an expert by any means, but here's some advice from what I've seen:
You should probably hold off on more war for now. If you aren't already given warmonger penalties, another war would probably do that. That could lead to the atomic and modern era people attacking you, making you screwed. You should wait at least until you get planes before attacking, and hopefully enough to win against modern/atomic era people with your superior strategy.

 

[Maxym]

Very valid points, but this map being huge plays a bit differently.
There are a LOT of cities here, the way warmonger penalty is calculated makes taking cities virtually cost free diplomatically. Also I need cities both to power my war machine (gold) and advance tech. Also i have not mentioned it yet, but having sold so many conquests i am constantly bumping against military unit limits. I keep disbanding workers to the detriment of my war effort. Most wars I have started were cooperative or against pariah nations to minimize diplomatic repercussions. I will continue to scheme like this and also take other actions to improve my diplomatic standing. (WC relocations, proposals, denouncements, gifts etc).

Also the time is finite, i kept all VCs, as disabling space victory would make this game impossible to lose and the very real possibility of an AI launching is what drives this game forward. As you point out I should not find myself fighting a foe with air superiority. It is as close to a suicide as you can commit in Civ. I won't have to fight the really advanced nations yet, and when I do I will try to launch a multi pronged attacks designed to capture cities on first turn of war, to even out the tech disparity. I am working on flight, and will have air force on t 218.

 

[redwings1340]

Hmm, I was criticizing the idea of planting cities in the middle of enemy lines, but it may actually be pretty useful. Oh, oh wait! what if... 1 turn before you DoW a civ, create a settler and put a city near their borders and sell it to them. Then, you can get one additional technology really easily if they decide not to raise the city!

 

[Maxym]

Hmm, I was criticizing the idea of planting cities in the middle of enemy lines, but it may actually be pretty useful. Oh, oh wait! what if... 1 turn before you DoW a civ, create a settler and put a city near their borders and sell it to them. Then, you can get one additional technology really easily if they decide not to raise the city!

Yes planting cities by AI in between my troops is dumb, but that was my point too, what if i did it to them. Not for tech, for since the city will be gifted, it wont yield any tech, or so i think. But imagine having to fight a war far from home, and them having a good defensive line, planting a city before Dow would disrupt it, provide cover and place to hide, heal, upgrade. It is a fairly standard strategy in intercontinental invasions, but i was thinking of using it in tactial situations.

 

[redwings1340]

Yeah, that could work pretty well. It probably works even better once you get airports, as if you can buy one you could transfer your troops to the front line immediately. Still, it gives you additional unhappiness and increases tech and culture costs in return for a benefit you may or may not need, so this seems like an only when necessary strategy to me.

If they are going for a defensive line, and you plant a city right next to them, that might get them to go attack your city and waste their troops that way instead of keeping their defensive setup. Then you could destroy their troops from a far better position. If necessary, this could definitely be a strong tactic, but it has long term consequences considering your city probably won't be in the best spot.