1205 AD on GEM

Quick update: I've settled in North America! The East Coast belongs to me! Andd it seems Portugal is begining it's new empire when Brazil is located. They have their one city, but it's growing fast. I think they might try and reconqure their home, and give Spain a kick in the shins. Anyway, I went to war with Venice, capturing the city of Venice. However, I was forced to return it to them, seeing as the Papal State was going to go to war with me over it, and I didn't need that right now.

I'm also starting to wonder if I made the wrong choice by backing the Welfs. They're becoming voerly aggressive, and are at war with Bohemia. They also have a lot of units lined up on my border. Perhaps I should begin a quick rebuilding of my armed forces?
 
Quick update: I've settled in North America! The East Coast belongs to me! Andd it seems Portugal is begining it's new empire when Brazil is located. They have their one city, but it's growing fast. I think they might try and reconqure their home, and give Spain a kick in the shins. Anyway, I went to war with Venice, capturing the city of Venice. However, I was forced to return it to them, seeing as the Papal State was going to go to war with me over it, and I didn't need that right now.

I'm also starting to wonder if I made the wrong choice by backing the Welfs. They're becoming voerly aggressive, and are at war with Bohemia. They also have a lot of units lined up on my border. Perhaps I should begin a quick rebuilding of my armed forces?

Never declare war on Venice in this game, it seems. They are pleased/friendly with literally everyone!

And I keep Welfs friendly with me without big effort. Keeping him friendly is very good because he actually helps you in wars.
 
Never declare war on Venice in this game, it seems. They are pleased/friendly with literally everyone!

And I keep Welfs friendly with me without big effort. Keeping him friendly is very good because he actually helps you in wars.

The only problem is, the Welfs and I have a troubled history. Witha -5 in relations already, plus when I trade with a civ they hate, my relations suffer more. I wonder if I should just invade, and get them to vassalize. Perhaps that would be a good way to handle this situation.
 
Never declare war on Venice in this game, it seems. They are pleased/friendly with literally everyone!

And I keep Welfs friendly with me without big effort. Keeping him friendly is very good because he actually helps you in wars.

You might be right regarding Venice.
I think it is due to the Willem LH.

Venice doesnt start with great relationship with his neighbors, but over time the LH (a "good" one) improves them quite rapidly.

Anyway, I'm currently trying to see if I finally manage to implement the crusade event.
Then perhaps get a better Lh for Ottokar of Bohemia (I dont love that Christian IV LH with the drakkar ship behind... when Bohemia is landlocked).
I'm also giving the Great Lighthouse to Lisbon, to improve the Portuguese starting set up.

If you guys have any other input just let me know.
 
You might be right regarding Venice.
I think it is due to the Willem LH.

Venice doesnt start with great relationship with his neighbors, but over time the LH (a "good" one) improves them quite rapidly.

Anyway, I'm currently trying to see if I finally manage to implement the crusade event.
Then perhaps get a better Lh for Ottokar of Bohemia (I dont love that Christian IV LH with the drakkar ship behind... when Bohemia is landlocked).
I'm also giving the Great Lighthouse to Lisbon, to improve the Portuguese starting set up.

If you guys have any other input just let me know.

I'd love if you are able to implement it! ;)

Ah, and please don't get me wrong, I didn't say you should change Venice or anything. I think it is actually good like that, after all the civ starts only with one city as far as I could see, no?
 
No, Venice has some other cities, islands mainly. I feel I also need to agree, I happen to like the fact that Venice is an all around friendly civ.

Another update: The Native Americans are quite tough. They're not technologly advanced, but they appear in huge numbers. They've founded atleast 10 citites, and seem to be ready for a war with me. I don't think I'll be able to win that one before I finish researching gunpowder so I can have my UU.
 
No, Venice has some other cities, islands mainly. I feel I also need to agree, I happen to like the fact that Venice is an all around friendly civ.

Another update: The Native Americans are quite tough. They're not technologly advanced, but they appear in huge numbers. They've founded atleast 10 citites, and seem to be ready for a war with me. I don't think I'll be able to win that one before I finish researching gunpowder so I can have my UU.

Yeah, Venice starts with 3 cities (Venice, plus two isles, Corfu & Crete) and I dont plan to modify it.

re: Native-Americans, damn! what year they managed to get 10 cities?
tech-wise they start a bit behind Aztects & Maya and have just one settler.
Perhaps it is the good terrains that allowed them to grow so fast.

I can strengthen the barbarians in north america.
 
It's around 1550-1575. I think their capital city became sort of a settle factory, and they're using the other cities to produce units. Strengthing barabarians would be good.

I've been thinking about starting a new game, but I don't know what civ to play as. Maybe an Asian or Amrican civ? Any suggestions?
 
It's around 1550-1575. I think their capital city became sort of a settle factory, and they're using the other cities to produce units. Strengthing barabarians would be good.

I've been thinking about starting a new game, but I don't know what civ to play as. Maybe an Asian or Amrican civ? Any suggestions?

I would try an orthodox one, like Bulgaria, Serbia or the Byzantines.
The balkans is where all the actions take place at game start: crusades.
However the set up isnt overly easy.
 
Taking your advice, I started a game as the Byzantines. So far, I've retaken Constantinople, Athens, and Thessalonica. I also declared war on Serbia, so we'll see how that goes.

Oh yes, I've secured France as an ally. After sending 3 Othodox Missionaries to France, I was able to pursuade her to convert. So, the top two civs on the chart are allys. Excellent.
 
I uploaded version 3.2 :)

The most significant changes:

- Fixed missing music for Raymond VI & Frederick II LH.

- Switched around a few Diplomacy Music Intro to better differentiate civs (Joan of Ark gets "la marseillaise" as much need national anthem).
England gets Elizabeth LH music.

- Exacerbated conflicts: Mongols start at war also with Jin Dynasty and with the Kwarezmian Empire and are more likely to repeat historical achievements rather than passively wait.

- Strengthened English invading army in France.

- Redistributed World Wonders.
Rhodes (Byzantines) gets the Colossus.
Venice the Great Lighthouse.
Lisbon the Academy.
These three civs (Venice, Byzantines and Portugal) dont have much room to grow and badly needed a cultural boost.

- Removed Tallin and added Turku in southern Finland, to create more room to grow for Turku and Riga.

- Moved Novgorod one square closer to the sea to give the Kiev Rus one coastal city in the baltic (Kiev Rus influence in the baltic was the main reason for the Swedish-Novgorodian wars of early 13th century).
Changed Smolensk to Moscow.

- Cyprus is now a barbarian city, likely to flip to the Byzantines.
County of Toulouse now has just 2 starting cities, but Toulouse has been improved with an aqueduct and two extra units and a galley.

- Cagliari has been changed to Olbia and moved one square north in sardinia. The city is now more likely to fall under the influence of Rome rather than to flip to the Almohades (as it happened before with Cagliari, that was too close to Tunis).

- Strategically placed new barbarians units to simulate the Cuman nomadic hordes in modern Ukraine & feuding norwegian warbands in Scandinavia.

- France: removed Reims and added Calais to provide France with a 2nd coastal city out of the starting five.

- Several other minor modifications regarding buildings, cultural borders and diplomatic modifiers.


FYI, I'm still fighting with the python code trigger to activate the Crusade event :crazyeye:
 
Downloading now. A good thing you did this to, I was getting beat up from all sides as the Byzantines.

I made a pretty good start, as I said, retaking Constantinople, Athens, and Thessalonica. I also conqured Bulgaria, and conquered a Serb city. However, that's when things began to go downhill. I neglected to look at my commerce, and with running research at 100%, I had about -109 per turn. So, within about 10 turns, I had 0 gold, and my arm began to deteriorate .

Then, Serbia called in Hugary, who had been converted to Othodoxy, to aid her in the war against me. Figuring I wouldn't stand a chance, with just one unit defending each city, I recalled them all to Constantinople. While they were comming at em from the north, the Turks came at me from the East, beating me back to Constantinople. So, basicly I'm now a one city empire, trying not to lose said city.

But in Iberia, Isabella failed to beat back the Muslims, and Yusuf II conquered all of Iberia, and then moved on to Toulouse. I think they were in Northern Italy the last time I played. Either way, the update gives me an excuse to try again. Good luck with the python.


Lean
 
I hear you.
If you play at high level the Byzantines are in a tough spot (we how it ended in history).

The key seems to be building very good relationship with your orthodox neighbors, all of them, so that they help you against the Seljuks, that is the civ that really holds you expanding area.
Even christian civs like Hungary and the Hohenstaufen can help attacking the Seljuks.
Kwarezmia is less an issue than what it was before, as the Mongols hit them pretty hard in Asia.
Saladin, of course, is always the major enemy.
I recommend also channeling the Christian civs against Saladin and Suleyman, to avoid they rally and attack you or other weaker orthodox civs.
Kiev Rus can be a great ally in the north, as well as Serbia and Bulgaria - if you manage to get good diplomatic relationship (FYI, I usually play at Prince or Monarch).

As the byzantines it is important to take Constantinople (holy city of orthodoxy), Athens (has the parthenon wonder) but leave Thessalonica to Bulgaria as it is very close to Sofia.
You need to keep the culture high, to defend your borders.
In this new version the byzantines have troops in Cappadocia, close to Trebizond, and also, Cyprus, considering Rhodes has the Colossus, can flip to them.

Have fun!
 
On the first post of this discussion thread I just added a difficulty coefficient score, close to every civ.
It takes into account a bit of everything (military strength, cultural level, room to grow, diplomatic relationships etc).

1 being the easiest level (Mongols, France etc).

4 being the toughest (Native Americans, Toulouse).

It is pretty much self explanatory and can give a good indication of what are the odds against you.
 
On the first post of this discussion thread I just added a difficulty coefficient score, close to every civ.
It takes into account a bit of everything (military strength, cultural level, room to grow, diplomatic relationships etc).

1 being the easiest level (Mongols, France etc).

4 being the toughest (Native Americans, Toulouse).

It is pretty much self explanatory and can give a good indication of what are the odds against you.

Thanks, that is helpful when starting a new game. And thank you for the patch.
 
I agree with Arlborn, that would be good when starting a new game.

I, once again, started a game as the Byzantines. This time, I'm a lot more sucessful. I paid much better attention to my commerce, which resulted in no loss of units, which allowed me to fight both the Bulgarians and the Seljuks. I've conqured the Bulgarians, and reduced the Seljuks to two cities. I've converted Hungary, and they're my newest ally.
 
I'm currently playing at Emperor. And I've eliminated the Seljuks, Bulgarins, vassialized the Serbians, and took Jerusalem back for Othordoxy. All in all, a very sucessful game so far, but not without it's draw backs. Once again, in Iberia, the Christian kingdoms are having a tough time of it. Isabella only has one city, while Sancho is fighting for his capital. It seems I might have a Muslim Iberia on my hands.
 
Interesting.

The pattern I'm noticing is that until Prince level, Castile-Leon and Portugal manage to repel the Almohades and complete the Reconquista (in my games it happens nearly often).

Monarch or higher it gets tougher for them, perhaps because the AI is smarter and uses galleys to move troops to Valencia and Granada.
 
In a game at Monarch (where I play the Papal State and dont interfere with other civs but just mind my business), in 1416 AD the Reconquista is nearly complete.
Yusuf is left with just Valencia in Iberia.
If Castile-Leon attacks the city, they can take it, even though I suspect the AI will wait until it has more units.
Perhaps completing the Reconquista closer to 1492 AD, like in history.


I tried to start a game as Castile-Leon at Monarch too.
By 1225 AD, within 5 rounds, I took both cities from Yusuf and completed the Reconquista.
Portugal helped me too sending a few troops.

What is crucial is to attack Yusuf early.
It is beneficial to also send the Spanish large fleet (they start with a Galleon and two caravels, plus a few triremes and galleys) into the mediterranean to block reinforcements coming from Africa.

Clearly enough the AI is ******ed and doesnt implement any strategy :D
 
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