CV Turn 142 --- **INVALID**
- How many cities did you settle or capture? 18 in this order: Settled 3, conquered Yerevan, settled another to the north, captured 3 more cities from Monty, 3 from Gilgamesh, conquered Preslav, took 2 from America, and finished up with 4 more from the Dutch.
- What did you prioritize for research and policies? I prioritized cartography as I thought I’d need it for an invasion/discovery mission, but there was a continent to continent shallow water connection to the west.
- Did you send anyone to the dustbin of history? Aztecs.
- Did you bother with Religion? No.
- How did you pump your culture? Theatre Squares.
- Did you instigate any major wars? Looking through the prism of Macedon’s UU, the Hetairoi, there was nothing I would term major, but we did instigate 4 wars.
- Were City-States helpful? Suz Vilnius, then Kumasi, then Nan Madol all got me to Cultural Heritage quicker, which got me the Heritage Tourism policy card (+100% tourism from great works and artifacts).
- How did the new features help you? n/a
- Any surprises you ran into? Feisty barbs for prince.
- How did you deal with it? Reboot.
- Did you enjoy the game? Other than the silly mistake circa turn 50 (which kind of made me angry), I did. My culture game seems to be improving. Who knew Macedon was a CV juggernaut as well? I would never have guessed for a sub T150 CV finish.
After winning my de facto 1st culture victory on 6otM 39, I planned to utilize the advice of the more efficient players to improve my game. I decided to play several prince level Macedonia hypothetical CV scenarios of my own to hone my skills before the game in hopes of perhaps turning in a mildly competitive finish time. This plan came to a screeching halt around turn 50 as my 3rd settler wandered into a barb slinger and was captured. It was simply lackadaisical play, as I had a slinger sitting in an adjacent city center DOING NOTHING that could have escorted the settler. My lack of respect for the prince level barbs seems to have cost me! I ended the competitive aspect of the game by initiating reboot from a previous save and carried on...This time I actually had the otherwise idle slinger escort the settler (which proved a stunning success).
Once I got matters straightened out, my focus switched to how I was going to work through the vexing conundrum of how to attain the era score necessary to earn a Classical golden age. As the turn counter counted down to 7, the great general I sent off to explore (Hannibal Barca) happened upon an undefended barb camp, and wallah, 21 of 24! Next step was to chop up a Basilikoi Paides in Pella and I’d have it.
The productive capacity and rainforest chop out of Pella turned out to be considerably more optimal than I had imagined it would be. With the outlying mines, suzerianship of Kabul, and the maneuver (+50% cav) card, it’s kicking out a Hetairoi every 3 turns and indirectly generating 8.33 science per turn from the Basilikoi Paides as well. The 8.33 science per turn doesn’t sound like much, but it is a WHOOPING 79.3% of my base 10.5 science per turn!!! Next stop Yerevan.
Yerevan was the proverbial cake walk, and when I saw Monty’s settlement to the North was already being “red fisted” by the loyalty mechanics of my new city (Yerevan), I immediately moved my Hetairoi north. It looks as though he has built the Temple of Artemis to the west in Tenochtitlan for me as well!
Since it’s a cultural victory, I thought it’d be best to leave 1 Aztec city, and besides I don’t really want it anyway, as it looks generally non-productive. It was here I learned that there is a serious disconnect between the Monty’s “on the ground” intelligence and his new “working capital” in Atzcapotzalco. It would seem he feels his recent string of defeats are but temporary setbacks, and refused what I consider a rather gregarious peace offer for all his gold as well as 30 turns of income.
Things may have started kind of slow, but they seem to be picking up STEAM (pun intended) due in no small part to the Hetairoi corps I created by retiring El Cid on top of a 4 promotion unit (Kabul). Next stop Amsterdam!
I decided it would be counterproductive to start any more wars as if would negatively impact tourism. And besides what cities the extra continental AI’s (Tamar, Kongo, and Cyrus) did have, didn’t have much in the way of culture generation. The game ended on turn 141 then rolled over to 142. Here are a few screenshots.
Question: I wonder if I could have gotten out onto the high seas sooner and discovered the land bridge, then rushed printing instead of cartography if it would have gone faster? Things really didn't start moving until Cultural Heritage, so I'm guessing not so much so.