A Guide to Rapid Expansion (REX)

[Gooblah]

The land to the south looked way too arid (plains all the way). The screenshot shows exactly what you'd see in the game. If you're looking for food, the green to the east looked much more tempting than the brown to the south. Plus, you would have settled right on top of the copper.

...Spoilers in spoilers, please. ray:

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Well, we do know that there is a hidden resource somewhere in the BFC no matter what, due to how the script works. Anyway...

I finished it.

1400's domination

Spoiler :

Not much to say. Just look at the pictures. I got to currency, built wealth to construction/hbr, then switched all cities to barracks, then elephants/cats.

Note that most cities had only monument, granary, barracks. Some had lighthouses, too, others I skipped the monument b/c didn't nee the border expansion.

The only (brief) snag is that pacal bribed sully to war vs me and I lost a city to that. Fortunately if you don't invest much in infrastructure there's not much that gets destroyed...just the barracks and possibly granary . So I captured it back and trampled the continent with a bout a bajillion cats and elephants.

Complete eradication couldn't have happened to a better guy.

I was gunning for astro (and as you can see, I'd have gotten it soon) and building galleys to upgrade to galleons to transport my sizeable forces over to hammy in one go. He was also still medieval so even with just cat/phant/lonbgow it would have been an easy war just due to sheer #'s I had.

But I unexpectedly tripped domination before that, so that's that.

 

[J-man]

I'm surprised how little infrastructure you build and still don't strike. You have any specialized Science, specialist and commerce cities?

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I'm surprised how little infrastructure you build and still don't strike. You have any specialized Science, specialist and commerce cities?

In the 500's ad mark or so I bothered to actually make an academy in the capitol and actually built a library there (along with 1 other city that was running scientists). I stopped trying after the 25 AD point because it was won by then.

There were LOTS of commerce cities. You can see those. The 1st city other than my cap ran a few scientists, a couple more to the west a bit in that city, the rest were just building/whipping military all game.

Cottages + trade routes > strike. I didn't even have courthouses in half of my cities, right up to the end.

 

[crazyunits]

My thoughts exactly. You don't need to "REX" to win at Immortal and certainly not any lower (and at Deity it's impossible). Rex is a lower levels strategy, but there are other ways to beat those levels.

i find it very very difficult to win any sort of victory if i don't have 10+ cities around 10AD, (prince difficulty) what's ur secret?

 

[Gooblah]

Round 1: Setting Progress into Motion (4000 BC - 2560 BC)

So, this round began like any early-game round: pretty boring. Moved the Warrior 1SE:

More grasslands and less ocean to the east, so I moved 1E. The Copper we haven't seen yet () is still in the BFC I imagine. Settle on the hill and dial up a Work Boat.

I work the Silk to get 2 production, 1 food, and 1 commerce. When going Work Boat first, it's advised to head for the highest production tile possible in order to spit that WB out quickly, then dial up a Worker and proceed as normal, using the extra food and commerce to get it out faster as well. Our Warrior, meanwhile, heads scouting, popping a hut for 30 gold. He gets into a scrap with a Panther...then a Lion (a seocnd lion missed him). Fortified on a Jungle Hill, nothing too serious happens, and he gets Woodsman I to boot.

After recovering from the shock of the Lion, we meet one very beautiful redhead pimp...

Ahh, yes. Every Civfanboi's dream. Remember the second lion I told you about (if not, improve your reading comprehension)? It was beat down by her Scout. Anywho, in 3600 BC, the Work Boat comes out and begins fishing the clams (heheh), and a Worker is requested.

Heading south, we meet this dude:

Nice pose there, Pacal. He's founded Judaism, met Elizabeth, etc, etc. In the grand year 3475 BC, our Empire takes many steps forward with the discovery of Bronze Working, and the subsequent switch to Slavery:

Agriculture is chosen next to unlock Animal Husbandry. This was a slightly tougher decision. I was considering The Wheel -> Pottery -> Agriculture, but decided that hooking up resources should come first, and if worst came to worst, I'd work extra Coast tiles. Anywho, you prophet posters (CLEARLY you have read Attacko's latest article!) predicted this, and it came true:

Not that I mind or anything. Agriculture comes in in 3175 BC; Animal Husbandry is coming up next:

A turn later, we find Mayan borders. It appears thus far that we're on a giant peninsula, and the land to the east is an island. I think blocking sites should be our top priority (assuming we get down there fast enough!). The Worker comes out. He immediately moves to chop the forested Silk 1N of Carthage, to free up that tile for later cottaging. A settler is dialed up:

Sure enough, Animal Husbandry:

The Wheel is set for our next research path. We won't complete it in this set though. Meanwhile, the Worker hooks up the Copper, then sets on pasturing the Cows. Carthage switches to working the Copper to get the Settler out faster. We meet a local pothead:

Though it appears 3.19 has reduced that a bit. Good for him. While Ottoman archers look on, our barely clothed group of club-clutching men defeat vicious Panthers, earning their Woodsman II promotion.

in 2750 BC, we get a nice event. I take the third option...and laugh.

Fatalities and anger! But wait! I'm charismatic and the anger and population loss only applies to one city, which happens to be one-pop anyways!

Ahem. The last leader we meet this set is another Mesoamerican:

And he's already someone's worst enemy! Damn! He founded Taoism (kinda weird, considering his temperament...). And this is where we left off:

Settler's out! Worker is pre-chopping the forest while waiting for the Wheel. I have some dotmaps drawn up:

And the global perspective:

That's about it. Thoughts?

The save:

 

[Freedom]

How do you REX when you're next to an opponent like Monty or Shaka? If (more like when) they declare you're way overstretched and it's basically game over.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

How do you REX when you're next to an opponent like Monty or Shaka? If (more like when) they declare you're way overstretched and it's basically game over.

Nah. Settle the city closest to them on a hill, stuff it with 4-6 archers and just about any pre-deity BC's DoW gets owned. I guess you MIGHT need 2-3 extra archers if they went really heavy on military, but you can always whip them.

If you can mix in some axes even better.

The hill is a big deal though. It completely turns the odds...even AGG swords fail.

 

[Gooblah]

How do you REX when you're next to an opponent like Monty or Shaka? If (more like when) they declare you're way overstretched and it's basically game over.

Meh..TMIT beat me to it.

When I'm next to Monty or Shaka, I'll usually avoid earlier expansion and favor expansion closer to the 1AD, after eliminating the threat. I'm still expanding...just by war, not by settlement.

 

[Draco Spirit]

I never thought of building cities so close to each other....

*makes a mental note to try it out*

 

[Crusher1]

With the new patch and changes to gold overflow you need to carefully balance expanding with tech rate. Hence, a lot of my views on expansion have changed. Their is no point in REXing to 1,000,000 cities if your tech rate and future military advantage is severely hampered.

Simply saying, I'd rather have 8-10 cities by 1000 AD and be able to mass upgrade 30-40 units to Rifles than have 12-15 cities by 1AD but be 150-300 years later at getting rifles.

 

[futurehermit]

Not a very good map for rexing imo. I really dislike coastal starts when I want to be REXing. I also feel like Hannibal favours a more militaristic approach to expansion.

When I REX hard I like to have a leader with a mix of fin/org/exp/imp/cre, with an inland start. Give me Joao with an inland/forested start and room to expand and I'll show you a hardcore REX

REXing is my fav approach to the game. But it is not always the best strategy.

With this map and Hannibal's UB, I would think that a tangent toward the GLH would be a nice move on this map.

Still, well played thusfar and a timely guide indeed.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Not a very good map for rexing imo. I really dislike coastal starts when I want to be REXing. I also feel like Hannibal favours a more militaristic approach to expansion.

When I REX hard I like to have a leader with a mix of fin/org/exp/imp/cre, with an inland start. Give me Joao with an inland/forested start and room to expand and I'll show you a hardcore REX

REXing is my fav approach to the game. But it is not always the best strategy.

With this map and Hannibal's UB, I would think that a tangent toward the GLH would be a nice move on this map.

Still, well played thusfar and a timely guide indeed.

GLH is nice, but he also only has so much time to settle his land before the neighbors take it. Is GLH worth 1 city? 2? 4? That said, it does look attractive due to the landmass to the west and AIs that have been met, along with likelihood of coastal sites.

 

[Wlauzon]

why anyone so anal about REX ? who need more 7 city on Standard to win ?

Some of us like to win overwhelmingly and crush our enemies before us.

 

[mi6agent]

The more cities you have, the more overall commerce and military production. If you can get those cities faster, you can get a faster edge over the AI. I can win with 7 cities, but I can do alot better with 12, 20, 30+.

you can have 20 city , but I beat you to Liberism at 400-500 AD with 7 cities . You can have 20 city but you cant have 30 rilfes at 1000 AD because you fcuk up your economy . In the end you may produce more Infantry/Arty than me , but what the point when I vassalize all with my Rifles SOD

 

[mi6agent]

REX to get all 7 before 1AD.

lolz 7 city is not call REX sir . REX is 12+

 

[Crusher1]

Once again, the new patch has removed gold overflow from whip/chopping - which was arguably the strongest REXing strategy available. So, myself and Duckweed argued about it's usefulness. Duck was fond of blocking and filling in later.

Ironically, since the new patch, that is my preferred strategy. I played the game using a simple 5 city expansion and once my empire was very stable I added 3 more cities by around 1 AD. Now, before the new patch I used the same basic tech path and game strategy that I'm about to show here, but when overflow was enabled I could always get 3-5 more cities while maintaining the same tech rate.

Anyways, here is my game - so so so sad no more overflow =D


5 city expansion till 900 BC and added 3 more cities by 70 AD

1350 Domination

Spoiler :

1st picture is of my initial tech path - a bit late since I forget to take a screeny. The initial land was crap, food poor, in a tiny tiny little corner, and there was jungle everywhere.

Anyways, no way I was settling in place. I settled on the silk to get +2C +1c from trait and planned to use that city as a worker/settler pump and find a new home later. I got TW, not writing - that was normal teching and about $250 from huts.

I went to war with Pascal and ended up stealing 2 workers from him thanks to a WII warrior. I prevented Pascal from expanding and he never got BW - made clear by not attacking me and by asking for a trade, me offering BW and him Archery after I eventually made peace with him.

I very aggressively settled near other AIs and blocked off a nice chunk of land while securing both marble/stone. Carthage would make some warrior to fog bust and build/chop a Library out before I started making my 1st settler. Utica would be my new capital and thanks to the free workers I already had all the jungle removed from the 3 gems.

I traded for Poly and Masonry and finished Literature very early, around 800 BC, after I already self researched IW, Alpha, and Aesth. I had completed TGL and NE before 200 BC and finished the HE well before 1AD. I also researched calendar before I even started Currency, lol. But heh, I wanted to get a head start on those Bananas and The Mausoleum.

The rest of my strategy revolved around timing GAs with techs/switching civics/GPPs and GM generation/and mass upgrades. I used the GA from music to start my 1st GA then switched civics to produce the needed GS for bulbing paper and education. I then started Nationalism so I could get the Taj early, and quickly finished universities and Oxford.

With the Taj GA I was the first to reach Economics and got a free GM and went back to caste/pacifism and produced 2 GM from my GPF which ended up netting me over 6000K in gold. I ended up with 46 units around 1000 AD, 30 of which I upgraded to Rifles, 5 were trebs, and the rest swords, which would be upgraded from conquested gold.

Anyways, I just wanted to show that with the new patch I think people need to rethink their overall strategy. REX till your broke has been severely gimped with the loss of whip/chop gold overflow.

Having said that, a simple 8 city empire at 1000 AD can be quite powerful when utilized properly. Another trick I like to do on small or pangea maps is switch every single city to mass farms, except the strong Oxford Capial - then switch to Nationhood and draft draft draft, plus whip whip whip while you keep pushing the culture slider up to combat Unhappy faces. Assuming you have theaters and colloseums, you should be able to safely tech to steel before you find yourself at 100% slider and 35+ unhappy faces, lol.

BTW, my city placement was on purpose, lol. I planned each city to have so much food and production, etc - and they are serving there purpose just fine!

However, if you give me an obscene Leader with an obscene UU, on an obscene game speed, I'd definitely prefer to warmonger non stop into 20+ cities by 1000 AD. It just depends, lol!

Basic City set up was:

1 HE city
1 GPF city
1 Wonder city
1 Oxford Capital
4 cities with at least 6 cottages, some of which can whip or build Universities.

 

[Crusher1]

Sorry =/, Double post!

 

[Crusher1]

No clue peoples, sorry! I was trying to edit my original original post and anytime I try to edit it another post pops up!

Yikes, tripple post! Gotta love Site Lag!

 

[futurehermit]

Very impressive Crusher, well done.