A delimma of world domination. What would YOU do?

[Feinder]

The situation :

You are Germany (militaristic and scientific).
You have have 10 well-developed cities on a medium map.
You are a Repulic.
You have just entered the Middle Ages.

You have dominated the northern penensula of a continent (all of your cities are well spaced, your borders have no gaps, and your coastlines are secure (no place for enemys to land without war).

To the south you share a wide border (about 4 cities) with Russia (expansionist and militaristic). They have always been a polite neighbor, occasionally trading tech. From all indications, they are behind you in tech, but the actual strength of their military is relatively unknow.

To the southwest, there is a narrow spit of land (2 spaces wide, and maybe 6 long), that separates you from the Egyptian Empire (religeous and industrious, special unit currently available : War Chariot 2.1.2). You control the narrow spit of land (that has a convenient mountain range and some hills) with several spearmen. Relations with the Egyptians have been "tense", no actual fighting, but considerable saber-rattling by Cleopatra.

You have a single galley that is been mapping the coastline.

Life would be grand except for one thing : No where in your large empire is there any Iron! Soon you will (potentially) be beset by swordsmen and knights, and whatever other units that require iron.

First problem, you don't even know where there is any iron (yes, you have iron working, or whatever the prerequisite tech to find it is).

Do you :
Explore with a worker who will possibly be killed?
Open your borders (or otherwise trade) for free passage into Russia or Egypt? I am a terrible xenophobe!

Even if you do find a deposit that no one has claimed, you'd have a LONG way build a road back to your empire.

Do you :

Trade for it? Being dependent on imports sucks...
Take the military option? If so whom do you attack?

Russia - The (appearently) weaker of the two, but you'll be attacking on a wider front. Good natual resources if you want to get greedy. Their military is probably larger than yours tho (altho your own can be built up relatively quickly). But again, having a freindly (and probably inferior) neighbor isn't a bad thing.

Egypt - You're attacking a narrow front (a good thing). But he's also defending on a narrow front. You should be able to defend your own territory well enough, because you can always fall back to the mountains which you control. But he will be able to reinforce faster (and you will be lengthening your supply lines), as you press farther into his country. Presuming that you win the war, you will have obtained Iron, and hurt a civ that would likely give you competion later. But it also screams "protracted", that you may end up pouring units a long way into enemy territory for a lengthy war, and may have to spend considerable resources just to secure your captured territory. And then, you might not "win" anyways, and just end up draining your own resources and ultimately just p_ss-off the Egyptians.

Also, the senate of the Republic may force you to end your war, before you even attain any iron at all. That's mostly an annoyance, and not something you really have to plan for, since there's little you can do about it.

Also, consider that whomever you attack, WILL have iron, and will thus (likely) have the tech to produce knights and pikemen (vs. your horsemen). Perhaps your "victim" doesn't have knights and pikemen yet, that would work well for you, but you don't know. But the longer you delay, the stronger or closer to having knights and pikemen your victim becomes; so a decision must be made soon...

(Yes, this is my current game situation)

What would you do?

 

[docceh]

Kill Egypt. Dead.

-docceh

 

[Ripley]

Get hold of as many territory/world maps as you can and then hit ctrl-shift-m.

 

[Greadius]

Whichever side has the closer supply of iron. Prepare a large defensive force, and enough units to surprise sack the place with iron. Then grab it and dig in until the computer gets tired of fighting.

Personally, I'd trade for it or do without. You won't be an aggressive civilization until Cavalry, but I got the impression you were happy with the territory you had.

 

[FullofHoles]

Wipe out Russia. Attack suddenly with huge force.

You have two choices for attack force: A. 100% horsemen B. 80% archers, 20% spearmen

In my last few games, I have done very well with horsemen-only hordes.

After wiping out Russia, I would reinforce the spit between you and Egypt with as much defensive force as you can spare. Build fortresses if you have sufficient workforce nearby.

Here is the key to my advice: The AI is pathetic at amphibious invasions. If you can limit any potential aggressors to overseas assaults, you can survive
without iron. It is hell to be without iron, but a good road-network will allow you to live until the Industrial Age when iron becomes considerably less significant. The only real need of iron once the Industrial Age starts is to build factories and railroads, both of which are crucial, but both of which can be built in one "20-year trade deal" span.

 

[FM_Freyland]

Originally posted by Ripley
Get hold of as many territory/world maps as you can and then hit ctrl-shift-m.

Sorry... gotta ask: "Ctrl-shift-m" does what?


Jonathan

 

[WarKiwi]

Easy, trade with Egypt for iron (if you can - build a road ASAP) because they will be less inclined to attack a trade partner, and then build like crazy for the 20 turns.

As Germany you have no specialist unit until the industrial age so you should concentrate on technology, trade, defence and reputation until you are in a position to kill them.


Oh yeah - ctrl-shift-M shows the map without units... that makes looking for resources easy.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Great to see someone who doesn`t quit when he has no iron!


my advice:
trade for iron (warning - my strategic advise will make you the black sheep of the world but if you aim for anything but diplo vic you`ll end up hated by everyone anyway.....)

-----if they can trade you iron they can build swordsmen ------

build as many swordsmen as you can quickly

build one settler, 6 you can poulation-rush in despotism

build enough Galley to transport settlers and lots of swordsmen (+ perhaps Knights if possible) and some Horsemen

find iron close to the coast somewhere (use map trading)

secure your bordeers

invade from the sea (make sure you don`t get into a war before - loosing your settlers when their Galley sinks would kill this strategy!!!!!)

plant a city on the iron or on a hill next to it. use several settlers in despotism so you can rush build Walls, Barracks, Temple right away IN THIS ORDER!!!!!! Fortify your swordsmen and spearmen in the city. You your Horsemen to kill wounded opponents, grab catapults and so on but make sure you don`t loose them. Better let a Horseman get away then risk loosing your own!

avoid offensive action!!!

After trying to kill your city they`ll soon give up.....

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

should you decide to take my advice please mail me how it worked out.!!!


Oh, if the city on the iron can be a coastal one, make it so. then 2 harbours suffice to get the iron back to your main areaand you don`t need peace with the civ in between....

 

[Feinder]

And this is what happened folks...

I was able to buy territory maps of both the Russians and Egyptians. The Egyptians had iron just behind on of their cities (within their borders). I didn't see anything close enough to bother Russia with.

I shifted some horsemen to attack down the land-spit to attack Egypt. We skirmished for a bit, but frankly it wasn't conclusive. I beat them back initially, and was attacking the city. The Egyptians counterattacked en masse, and I had to retreat back to the safety of the mountains on the land spit.

While all this was going on, some iron appeard about 8 past the Russian borders. Not WITHIN the Russian borders, but I had to get past their borders to get to it. I traded for passage, then made a colony on the iron.

.
.
.

I actually played way too late last night. It's now passed into the industrial age (woo-hoo, panzers coming!). The iron in Russia has dried up, but some appeared in my own coutry, and I was able to use it. I've signed a mutual protection pact with Russia. Egypt still remains my biggest competitor. My plan is try to get Mutual protection pacts with Egypts lesser neighbors, and then build an army of Panzers and knock the crap out of Egypt. My panzers should be able to do the job, and any help from my minor allies will be appreciated.

-F-

 

[Moulton]

I would have built a city not a colony. Russia typically would have built cities around it and absorbed it.

Invasions are fun. I joined with France to start a war with Russia. It was a high cultural thing. Both their cultures wre far above mine, and the only way I could achieve parity was to demolish some of theirs...

Turns out I did not have to do anything.. France initiated war. But Russia attemped to invade me. First they sent waves of Frigates and Ironsides. Probably all they had, since no more appeared for a long time after these sank. Then they sent two galleons with ironside escorts. Unfortunately, one of them sank. Teh other landed their invasion force. A Cossack. Yes, one.

I took longer to invade, but after taking the first two cities they sued for peace. war weariness was starting to be a real pain, so I extracted what I could and signed. (That kicks every city into WLTK, of course ) -- BTW congress no longer declares peace for you.

I was surprised at the minimal resistance. The cities had riflemen, and were tough, but only one lone defender came to their support. Bombardments failed about 90% or thetime.... with artillary, destroyers and battleships.--so Cavalry to rush.
But, I also noticed, during this part of the campaign, france lost about 10 cities on a far coast... but they got them back during my invasion. I think Russia is ripe for plucking

Egypt: I do not fear Egypt. I rolled over her cities on my continent in one turn, and sank every support ship she sent.

Iron is most important (IMHO) for rails. You could win with out them, I suppose. But they provide two vital things. Industrial gain is monumental. instant transportation. When Russia bombarded my coasts, I was able to send enough artillary to any point she attacked, to move and bombard her ships to one point in one turn. If I had a ship close enough, their ship was easy pickings after that, and if not, they limped back to port to repair. That is also why they never really invaded--they did not risk the galleons on the coast with only one hit point.

 

[hamster]

i would have attacked russia. attacking on a wide front is actually a good thing. it gets the AI is split up its forces, weakening their defense.

on the other hand, if I had to attack egypt, i would've first sent 4 galleys of 4 horsemen and 4 spearmen to the farthest point of egpyt away from your planned point of attack. they would act as the diversionary force, just plundering improvements, capturing workers, taking targets of opportunity, etc. while the AI moves its forces down to get rid of them, rush in with your main attack force. by the time the AI returns with its war chariots, you would've taken a few cities and established a strong foothold in his land.

this of course is classified as a sneak attack and may give you a bad rep