Hickman888
Prince
A Chinese UHV game, assuming that you start from 3000 BC, is the lengthiest game to be found in DoC. It encompasses almost 4,000 years of history, and, assuming you're a madman and you play on Marathon speed like me, can last over 900 turns (depending on how long you take to complete the last goal).
Like my Greek walkthrough, I'm writing this little guide because it took me several tries to get it right, and I thought this might help anyone else out who maybe was too intimidated to play through as China.
The first half of a Chinese game is fairly high energy, rushing around making sure that all of your ducks in a row. The second half of a Chinese game is much more calm, going along at cruise control where, while your hands are still on the wheel, the heavy lifting has already been done.
We begin the game with an archer, a militia, and a settler. I settle my capital one tile south from the start, so that it is situated on the river (I'll explain why later), and send my militia down to northern Indochina, and pickup the goody hut that spawns there. I do not build ancestor shrines, because Confucianism will spread to my cities before I research Divination, and thus my temples (and production) will be wasted.
There are several technologies that need researching here in the immediate future: We need Alloys/Bloomery in order to chop all of these forests and train units to fight barbarians, we need Calendar in order to build plantations on the luxury resources to keep our cities happy, Riding so that we can train horsemen to fight barbarians, and Masonry, to build our Great Wall. I've read on some old threads that other people like to immediately tech for Calendar... Not me. In fact, you might be shocked to hear that it was my last priority, of the above technologies.
My early game strategy goes like this:
Now in my games, I frequently made use of a strategy that would fill up my treasury nicely. In vanilla Civ 4, whenever a wonder you are constructing in one of your cities is built elsewhere, it will return you 1 gold for every invested hammer. In DoC, this is nerfed to only provide 1 gold for every two invested hammers. However, wonders that have "Double production with X resource" will give you twice the amount of hammers, allowing you to essentially achieve 1 gold = 1 hammer parity! It is the most efficient method of obtaining gold in Civilization 4.
Therefore, after I quarried my stone and Confucianism spread from my capital to my 2nd largest city, I began constructing the Great Wall. Furthermore, I chopped several of the forests surrounding the city, to provide even more production (which was doubled from the stone).
Meanwhile, I saw that it would take about 30 turns to construct in my capital. Knowing that the first barbarian horsemen horde spawns in turn 400, I canceled production in my 2nd city, and began constructing it in my capital on turn 370. As I'm doing this, my two cities to the north have been constructing monuments, to expand their borders as much as possible, prior to the Wall's completion. (The Wall will only hurt barbarian units and reduce enemy movement within the actual representation of the Wall on the map, even if your borders expand later.) By the time the first horde invades me, I am well set. I've got several horsemen to deal with them, I got a couple of swordsmen in my capital, a treasury that is nice and full, and a big, beautiful, border wall.
Horsemen are perfect defenders of the north, as they can be promoted to deal with light calvary units, and rush from city to city, depending on where the barbarians spawn. Meet the barbarian horse archers in your city, on a hill, or a forest, just not on open ground. That is their advantage.
Barbarian swordsmen from Tibet to the west will periodically spawn as well, starting about turn 383. Swordsmen with the shock promotion are your best bet.
I continue improving the land and begin training an army: 6-8 swordsmen, and 2 catapults will do nicely. Korea spawns in, and settles Pyongyang in turn 444, and you should try to capture it as soon as possible. I choose not to eliminate Korea, because they are a good tech trading partner to have as a vassal. Additionally, if I besiege their capital after taking Pyongyang, they will give me a technology in addition to their capitulation.
I adopt Clergy/Merchant Trade/Citizenship to help me get my infrastructure around my empire up and running, because many of my cities do not have the best production. Settling two more cities in south China expands my total to 8 cities. Spread Confucianism/Taoism to all of your cities, and build the temples in all of your cities. I construct the cathedrals of my state religion in the cities that need the extra happiness the most, and I need to make sure that all 4 cathedrals are done by 650. (I may or may not have miscalculated and constructed my last cathedral a turn too late...but other than my one little usage of Worldbuilder, I consider this a solid game
)
Depending on what the rest of the world looks like at the time, you may or may not have some serious competition for your tech goals. In 4 of my attempted Chinese playthroughs, I was beat out to Compass by the Persians twice, the Byzantines once, and the Vikings once, all around turn 600! You may want to consider having a scout meeting the other civilizations, and seeing where they are technologically. Also, rush Compass. For whatever reason, the AI loves that technology.
Once I began bulbing for technologies, however, I didn't have any problem getting my technologies first. I use my Great Statesman to dual bulb Politics and Law, and the Great Scientist to dual bulb Scholarship and Alchemy. After Compass, I head for Paper.
With the Machinery technology, I can now build the Grand Canal wonder, which provides an extra two commerce on all river tiles of that city. I construct it in the capital, steal the tiles from the neighboring cities, and adopt Regulated Trade, which provides +50% commerce in the capital...
After Paper, beeline Gunpowder (the AI's obsession with this technology makes a bit more sense). And finally, after Gunpowder, pickup Printing, the last technology for the second goal! At this point in the game, we are more or less golden (pun unintended) and just have to focus on getting the final golden ages. I adopt Monasticism/Meritocracy, and then Isolationism later on.
There is, of course, one more obstacle in the way...
Mongolia.
They spawn on turn 713, and come at our great civilization with nearly 20 Keshiks/Mangudais, and 8 bombards. Whenever their army approaches an enemy city, that city descends into unrest, rendering defenses useless. Furthermore, their Keshiks and Bombards inflict collateral damage whenever they attack. Sitting and defending in your city is not the play.
To deal with Mongolia, after I research Gunpowder, I begin training 25-30 firelancers. These bad boys, when twice promoted, not only have a 65% chance of defeating a Keshik on a hill, they also inflict collateral damage! Whenever Genghis Khan invades China, and heads right for Beijing, he is met with a nasty surprise...
His army is almost completely annihilated. He takes Shenyang and Pyongyang for a few turns, but I take them back with ease. I march over and burn his capital to the ground, take a few slaves, and ask for peace.
The boss battle of the barbarians is won. I still have a massive army after the war, so after I disband several firelancers to save gold, I opt to invade the Khmer and vassalize them, because why not. I construct the Porcelain Power, adopt Isolationism, and construct the Forbidden Palace. Other than two brief wars where the Japanese and then the Mughals declared war on me, the next few centuries were uneventful, and consisted primarily of ending my turn and micromanaging my specialists to insure the correct great person would be born. I had one too many Great Merchants birthed in my empire, but other than that, I still managed to be done with my fourth and final golden age in 1687, with over a hundred turns to spare.
General Tips for China:
I wouldn't really choose to change anything about China, their victory is challenging but doable if you know what you're doing, which is how it should be IMO. The only nitpick I have is that Beijing deserves a bit more love. Beijing today is China's second largest city, and Wikipedia described Beijing as the largest city in the world, from roughly 1500AD-1700AD. I wish that resources could be planted there around 1500, to help simulate it's growth of importance, and perhaps to even convince the human player to construct his capital there. (I saw no need to.)
China was fun; I hope some of you try them out as well. Let me know what you guys think, thanks.
Like my Greek walkthrough, I'm writing this little guide because it took me several tries to get it right, and I thought this might help anyone else out who maybe was too intimidated to play through as China.
The first half of a Chinese game is fairly high energy, rushing around making sure that all of your ducks in a row. The second half of a Chinese game is much more calm, going along at cruise control where, while your hands are still on the wheel, the heavy lifting has already been done.
We begin the game with an archer, a militia, and a settler. I settle my capital one tile south from the start, so that it is situated on the river (I'll explain why later), and send my militia down to northern Indochina, and pickup the goody hut that spawns there. I do not build ancestor shrines, because Confucianism will spread to my cities before I research Divination, and thus my temples (and production) will be wasted.
There are several technologies that need researching here in the immediate future: We need Alloys/Bloomery in order to chop all of these forests and train units to fight barbarians, we need Calendar in order to build plantations on the luxury resources to keep our cities happy, Riding so that we can train horsemen to fight barbarians, and Masonry, to build our Great Wall. I've read on some old threads that other people like to immediately tech for Calendar... Not me. In fact, you might be shocked to hear that it was my last priority, of the above technologies.
My early game strategy goes like this:
- Tech Masonry/Ceremony, adopt Slavery/Monarchy.
- Tech Property/Writing, train several workers, settle the second city three tiles to the east, and build a library.Spoiler Ancient China :
- Tech Alloys/Bloomery, harvest the rice beside the capital,build the Dujiangyan wonder in the capital (+1 food on all river tiles), and mine the iron two tiles to the north of the capital. Chop forests and build mines/cottages in your capital. I run a statesman and aim to birth a Great Statesman in the capital. After that, I aim for a Great Scientist. (For bulbing reasons)
- Tech Riding/Construction, and settle the next three cities: One to the northeast of the stone resource, one to the northeast of the horse resource, and one to the north of the pig resource. The two northern cities are settled early so that they have time to expand their borders with a monument, to maximize the effect of the Great Wall.
Now in my games, I frequently made use of a strategy that would fill up my treasury nicely. In vanilla Civ 4, whenever a wonder you are constructing in one of your cities is built elsewhere, it will return you 1 gold for every invested hammer. In DoC, this is nerfed to only provide 1 gold for every two invested hammers. However, wonders that have "Double production with X resource" will give you twice the amount of hammers, allowing you to essentially achieve 1 gold = 1 hammer parity! It is the most efficient method of obtaining gold in Civilization 4.
Therefore, after I quarried my stone and Confucianism spread from my capital to my 2nd largest city, I began constructing the Great Wall. Furthermore, I chopped several of the forests surrounding the city, to provide even more production (which was doubled from the stone).
Spoiler The strategy in action. :
Meanwhile, I saw that it would take about 30 turns to construct in my capital. Knowing that the first barbarian horsemen horde spawns in turn 400, I canceled production in my 2nd city, and began constructing it in my capital on turn 370. As I'm doing this, my two cities to the north have been constructing monuments, to expand their borders as much as possible, prior to the Wall's completion. (The Wall will only hurt barbarian units and reduce enemy movement within the actual representation of the Wall on the map, even if your borders expand later.) By the time the first horde invades me, I am well set. I've got several horsemen to deal with them, I got a couple of swordsmen in my capital, a treasury that is nice and full, and a big, beautiful, border wall.
Spoiler Good situation :
Horsemen are perfect defenders of the north, as they can be promoted to deal with light calvary units, and rush from city to city, depending on where the barbarians spawn. Meet the barbarian horse archers in your city, on a hill, or a forest, just not on open ground. That is their advantage.
Barbarian swordsmen from Tibet to the west will periodically spawn as well, starting about turn 383. Swordsmen with the shock promotion are your best bet.
I continue improving the land and begin training an army: 6-8 swordsmen, and 2 catapults will do nicely. Korea spawns in, and settles Pyongyang in turn 444, and you should try to capture it as soon as possible. I choose not to eliminate Korea, because they are a good tech trading partner to have as a vassal. Additionally, if I besiege their capital after taking Pyongyang, they will give me a technology in addition to their capitulation.
Spoiler Reducing Korea down to one defender persuaded him to give me Seafaring. :
I adopt Clergy/Merchant Trade/Citizenship to help me get my infrastructure around my empire up and running, because many of my cities do not have the best production. Settling two more cities in south China expands my total to 8 cities. Spread Confucianism/Taoism to all of your cities, and build the temples in all of your cities. I construct the cathedrals of my state religion in the cities that need the extra happiness the most, and I need to make sure that all 4 cathedrals are done by 650. (I may or may not have miscalculated and constructed my last cathedral a turn too late...but other than my one little usage of Worldbuilder, I consider this a solid game
)Depending on what the rest of the world looks like at the time, you may or may not have some serious competition for your tech goals. In 4 of my attempted Chinese playthroughs, I was beat out to Compass by the Persians twice, the Byzantines once, and the Vikings once, all around turn 600! You may want to consider having a scout meeting the other civilizations, and seeing where they are technologically. Also, rush Compass. For whatever reason, the AI loves that technology.
Once I began bulbing for technologies, however, I didn't have any problem getting my technologies first. I use my Great Statesman to dual bulb Politics and Law, and the Great Scientist to dual bulb Scholarship and Alchemy. After Compass, I head for Paper.
With the Machinery technology, I can now build the Grand Canal wonder, which provides an extra two commerce on all river tiles of that city. I construct it in the capital, steal the tiles from the neighboring cities, and adopt Regulated Trade, which provides +50% commerce in the capital...
Spoiler Great Capital of Xi'an :
After Paper, beeline Gunpowder (the AI's obsession with this technology makes a bit more sense). And finally, after Gunpowder, pickup Printing, the last technology for the second goal! At this point in the game, we are more or less golden (pun unintended) and just have to focus on getting the final golden ages. I adopt Monasticism/Meritocracy, and then Isolationism later on.
There is, of course, one more obstacle in the way...
Mongolia.
They spawn on turn 713, and come at our great civilization with nearly 20 Keshiks/Mangudais, and 8 bombards. Whenever their army approaches an enemy city, that city descends into unrest, rendering defenses useless. Furthermore, their Keshiks and Bombards inflict collateral damage whenever they attack. Sitting and defending in your city is not the play.
To deal with Mongolia, after I research Gunpowder, I begin training 25-30 firelancers. These bad boys, when twice promoted, not only have a 65% chance of defeating a Keshik on a hill, they also inflict collateral damage! Whenever Genghis Khan invades China, and heads right for Beijing, he is met with a nasty surprise...
Spoiler Have you ever seen Mulan? :
His army is almost completely annihilated. He takes Shenyang and Pyongyang for a few turns, but I take them back with ease. I march over and burn his capital to the ground, take a few slaves, and ask for peace.
Spoiler Go home G.K. :
The boss battle of the barbarians is won. I still have a massive army after the war, so after I disband several firelancers to save gold, I opt to invade the Khmer and vassalize them, because why not. I construct the Porcelain Power, adopt Isolationism, and construct the Forbidden Palace. Other than two brief wars where the Japanese and then the Mughals declared war on me, the next few centuries were uneventful, and consisted primarily of ending my turn and micromanaging my specialists to insure the correct great person would be born. I had one too many Great Merchants birthed in my empire, but other than that, I still managed to be done with my fourth and final golden age in 1687, with over a hundred turns to spare.
Spoiler I just love the Rhye's and Fall guitar solo that plays after you achieve your victory. :
General Tips for China:
- At least one Great Person bulbing is necessary to get ahead in the tech race to Compass, but two might not be necessary. It depends on how the other AI's are doing. Scout them out, and use espionage to spy on their research. I opted to bulb with 2 great people, because I'd rather be safe than sorry.
- Don't be afraid to sell/buy technologies from other civilizations, especially your vassals. Just make sure they are not selling them access to beat you in the tech race.
- Constantly check the foreign advisor screen to see who has extra gold per turn to trade away...China has lots of resources, don't forget to sell some of them for extra gold!
- I made the mistake of beelining for the Vassalage civic in a couple of my games, to help me afford all of my units. Don't do it. You will lose the race for compass, and it will only save you about 10-15 gold per turn.
- Micromanage your population centers, to make sure you are assigning the specialists that you need for your next golden age. One golden age is on the house, provided after you achieve your first two goals, but the other three are on you! You need 2, 3, and then 4 different great people types to start your golden ages.
- A barbarian warrior wave will sometime happen around turn 300. Don't be afraid to take archers out of your cities to defend your improvements, the unhappiness is not a big deal.
- Constantly be checking the financial advisor, and keep an eye on how much gold your units are costing you. If you don't have a plan for some of those units, delete them. They are costing precious gold just to sit around.
- If you extend your golden age while still in the middle of a golden age, it appears it does count for two different golden ages for the purpose of the victory condition. Furthermore, they last 24 turns (marathon speed...), and they do not count until the age has ended.
- Confucianism was founded around turn 320ish, and Taoism around 470ish.
- Barbarian Keshiks with 3 movements (2 inside the Great Wall) begin spawning around turn 630. Cho-Ku-Nu's and Firelancers are your best bet.
I wouldn't really choose to change anything about China, their victory is challenging but doable if you know what you're doing, which is how it should be IMO. The only nitpick I have is that Beijing deserves a bit more love. Beijing today is China's second largest city, and Wikipedia described Beijing as the largest city in the world, from roughly 1500AD-1700AD. I wish that resources could be planted there around 1500, to help simulate it's growth of importance, and perhaps to even convince the human player to construct his capital there. (I saw no need to.)
China was fun; I hope some of you try them out as well. Let me know what you guys think, thanks.
=higher population), Monasticism (increased 
), and Meritocracy (more 
from specialists, among other things), and Regulated Trade (My preference for China).
for 10/15/30 turns, on top of the 
from the Taixue much sooner as well. Maybe Republic could see some use after you research Writing, but before getting Calendar? (Before Calendar, your 
