AAW - Almost Always War

[bihary]

We are Kublai Khan, the aggressive but cunning leader of the Mongol Hordes. We will wage war, almost always, but retain the flexibility for devilish diplomatic plots.

Difficulty: Prince
Game speed: Normal
Civilization: Kublai Khan, Mongol
Map: Balanced, small, low sea level
Opponents: All the five other aggressive leaders (except our brother, Genghis)
Victory conditions: All allowed, but we are going for a military win (Domination or Conquest)
Special settings: Aggressive civs, Raging barbs

Variant rules: Before 2000 BC, no obligations. After 2000 BC, we have to be in war with at least two other civs all the time. We can only make peace after 2000 BC with any civ if we are in war with at least two other civs.

I am looking for 4 more players, preferably with prince-monarch experience and with AW experience. EDIT: We have had a great start with a great team, things look great. Players of any level may want to consider joining our game.
24 hours for got it, another 48 hours to submit report.
I will start with 40 turns, next player plays 20 turns, then 10-15 turns per round.

roster:
bihary
katank
Shadzy19
open
open

Our start position:

 

[Sirian]

Kublai Khan was Genghis Khan's grandson. He ruled China and a rather large empire, and staged a massive invasion of Japan that was sunk at sea by a most unfortunate (for him) Typhoon, in Japanese lore, the "Divine Wind". One can appreciate why the Japanese became entrenched in their beliefs after that. Talk about divine intervention!

Anyway, this sounds like a good compromise variant, short of Always War but with some of its flavor. Good luck rounding up a roster.


- Sirian

 

[bihary]

Thanx for the history background Sirian. No divine storm is going to save the Japanese on this balanced pangea map though

I also hope some people will be interested in this variant. I hope you start your AW game soon, I sure will lurk that.

Best,
Bihary

 

[katank]

Sounds good, sign me up. This could be a lot harder than our other SG though. The map is a lot more open and we have a higher level to deal with. At least we can declare peace every now and then.

 

[jameson]

I've been thinking of starting an SG like this ( except I was thinking along the lines of 'must war, that is, actually fight, with at least one civ on an 18-civ highlands map. And I'd start as soon as the second military unit was built).

Looks like I'm at the limit of what I can manage already though, so I'll be lurking along for this one .

 

[bihary]

Hi katank,

Welcome aboard, I added you to the roster. Actually I have already started playing, have seen *our* horses. As soon as I see *our* copper I post and we can start discussion.

Jameson - good lurking. I only just started overstretching myself with SG's, but I appreciate your existing load I think.

 

[bihary]

Well I started this game, let us see if people will get interested.
Our starting position is shown in the first post of this thread.
We have 50 peaceful turns, after that, history will be written with blood and (hopefully) iron. I play 40 turns.

4000BC (0)
Let us scout that village. Got 34 golds. Nothing interesting to the north, I move south-east with settler and found our capital. We are lucky, we have wheat within the city's radius on top of the pig and the cow. Work the plain forest to get another scout out ASAP(5). Start Animal Husbandry (11).

3880BC (3)
Karakorum's borders expand. There is a hut close to our southern border.

3800BC (5)
Karakorum finishes scout, starts barracks. I switch to a floodplain, we will grow in 6 turns, then I will switch to worker. We find Napoleon up north, quite close.

3760BC (6)
An Aztec scout appears from the south-west. Our scout just beats him to the hut and we get... Animal Husbandry (it was due in 5 turns, still a nice boon!). Started researching Mining. We spot horses down there!

3720BC (7)
Well, there are 2 horses down there!!! And the Aztec capital is very close.

3560BC (11)
Japanese warrior appears from north-west. Our capital hits size 2. Changed for worker(12), working the floodplains.

3520BC (12)
Mining - Bronzeworking(12)

3480BC (13)
Buddhism founded.

3320BC (17)
Our scouts are scouting, occasionally scared or attacked by wild animals. But they push on. No huts for us though, the other civs are quite close and quite active. Northern scout is attacked by lion. Survives, but heavily damaged. A bear is approaching, attracted by the smell of blood. Our scout frantically runs to a forested hill, will heal in 9 turns. Ouch.

3160BC (21)
Southern scout defeats wolf and promotes to woodsman I. It needs to heal for 1 turn.

3080BC (23)
Worker built. Resuming barracks.

3040BC (24)
Bronze working - Archery(5). Closest copper is 5 squares west.

3000BC (25)
Border expands again, one of the horses are next to our border, but we will need a city down there to claim it.

2920BC (27)
Napoleon adopts slavery.

2880BC (28)
Northern scout finds the Inca capital to the west.

2840BC (29)
Archery - Iron Working (19)

2800BC (30)
Alexander comes acalling with a scout from the north-west. The location of his homeland is not known yet. Hinduism founded in Tenochtitlan. Pasture on pig complete, now working pig and forested plain hill, as we need to finish that barracks now soon.

2760BC (31)
Montezuma is Hindu now. Inca are Buddhist. Karakorum grows to size 3. Working forested plains.

2720BC (32)
Barracks complete, start archer.

2680BC (33)
Southern scout defeats wolf, then ends up next to bear. He is on a forested hill... But the predator executes him next turn.

2600BC (35)
Tokugawa adopts slavery.

2560BC (36)
Archer - archer
MM to synchronize archer with city growth. Next should
be a settler, right after growth.

2440BC (39)
Cow pastured.

2400BC (40)
Archer - settler. Second archer moves south-west to explore a bit more and update fog of war. We want to put our second city somewhere there to get copper, but I anticipate a race with the Aztecs and the Japanese. This is balanced map though, so we have good chances to get iron somewhere close too.

That is it for now, we have 10 more turns of peace till 2000BC

Katank, play 10 turns, make a report, and then we have to discuss who will be the two unfortunate civs we will declare on. You dont have to hurry though... Let us see if the roster fills up at all. At the moment we dont have a large military, but after the settler we can crank out some I guess

Iron working due in 8, settler due in 8. The health of our capital is not very high, be careful with the chops. We absolutely do not need farming around capital (except of course the wheat). I would mine those plain hills, preferably the one next to the river. Also, a strategic road towards the copper should be high priority...

An overall picture with our enemies' location, and some ideas for future cities:

 

[katank]

Hey buddy. The save game would help.

 

[bihary]

The savefile

 

[katank]

Got it. Probably play it tomorrow.

 

[Shadzy19]

I would like a spot if you would have me , ive played maybe a dozen AW games at prince/monarch , havent played with raging barbs but i take it we will have enough military anyway

Il look at the game tonight when i get home .

 

[bihary]

I would like a spot if you would have me , ive played maybe a dozen AW games at prince/monarch , havent played with raging barbs but i take it we will have enough military anyway

Il look at the game tonight when i get home .

Hi Shadzy and welcome, you are on the roster.
Raging barbs, I believe, makes this venture actually easier, as we are better to handle barbs than the AI civs.
I havent seen a single barb yet up to 2400BC, and we are pretty much shielded by our neighbours... We will see.

shadzy - If you find my no-military gamble too risky, feel free to slip in another archer before the settler. As we are on the edge of a razor now, a chop or two to speed things up may be a good idea too.

For some reason I have the feeling the Aztecs should be on our list. Would be nice to scout them out, grab their worker and pillage-park them. If they steal our horses, their fate is sealed.

 

[katank]

Methinks settling the spot with pigs, rice, copper, and gold would rock. Going for that now.

I'd say axe rush the Aztecs. I would laugh as he sends hordes of jags at my axemen. Free exp.

 

[bihary]

My overall thinking on the diplomatic and military aspect of this variant.

We have 5 opponents, and 2 of them will be our enemy. The 2 can change in time. I see some nice trade-off considerations working here:
If we concentrate on 2 enemies and beat them to death, the others may run away. If we hit all of them in an oscillating manner, we can impede the growth of most of them, but we soon will be out of friends. No trading, no capacity to encite AI-AI wars can hurt us bad.
I would like to think our ideal strategy should be a balanced one, and I suggest we adopt such balanced strategy, for fun if not for efficiency. I would try to group our opponents in the following categories:

Blood enemy(s) - We declare, and want to finish them fast. By taking their land and money, we grow strong.
Oscillating enemies - We declare on them regularly, but make peace with them if things get too tough, or if we can gain substantially from the treaty.
Friends - We should try to cultivate honest friendship with some civs, to have trading partners, and potential allies.

It is very early to decide and our decisions will be driven by history, but at this point I would pick the powers as follows:

Blood enemy - Aztec. They are close, probably will try to steal our horses, and by conquering them, we get a nice, compact empire on the south-east.

Oscillating enemies - Greece and Japan. You cannot trust Toku and Alex anyway.

Friends - French and Inca. Their leaders are relatively nice. WE ALREADY HAVE TRADE ROUTES with both of them via rivers!!!
And the Inca is centrally located - could be very useful as an ally.

In 2000BC, from what we know now, I would declare on Montezuma and Alex. Hopefully by the time the Greek reach us, our army will be set.

What do you guys think?

 

[bihary]

Methinks settling the spot with pigs, rice, copper, and gold would rock. Going for that now.

I'd say axe rush the Aztecs. I would laugh as he sends hordes of jags at my axemen. Free exp.

It seems we are thinking along the same lines. The spot you mention is indeed fabulous, although may be a bit overreach. If the Japanese settle over there, try to get at least next to the copper. We can culture-muscle anyone.

 

[katank]

Aztecs settled south of that spot. Aztecs must die. I can still settle there.

Scratch the axe rush. I discovered iron within the cultural borders.

BTW, tokugawa converted to Hinduism (Aztec's religion). I think smacking those two is a good idea.

 

[katank]

I think I'm gonna kill the Aztecs and Japs. Aztecs since they are stealing our horses and japs since they wouldn't like us killing their religious brethren.

Going forward with that now. Hope no objections from you guys.

 

[katank]

Turn 0: Not much. Decided on next city location.

Turn 1: Scout moves onto forest hill next to bear. Archer moves towards copper and future city location. Worker finishes roading cows.

TUrn 2: Scout beats bear (0.4/1) Promote combat I and heal. Hoping to get him home alive to be a medic eventually. Probably a pipe dream. Worker chops.

Turn 4: Aztecs settled Teo below our planned location. Gah!

TUrn 6: Scout kills Lion

Turn 7: Found Iron in city radius.

Turn 9: Founded copper city. Revolt to slavery.

Turn 10: Declare on Toku and Monty!

Turn 11: Killed a Jap warrior without a scratch.

Initiating park and pillage mode. Until Iron comes on line, it's crank archers out and park out the Aztec capital.

Turn 16: Archer park at Teno in Place.

Turn 20: Archer park at Teo in place. Sword moving in toward Teo.

Both their cities are on hills. ***** to take out. Adds extra 1.5 to all their archers.

Researching Horseback riding as I anticipate getting horses online around that time to enable our UU. vetoable of course.

 

[bihary]

Nice turns katank.

It seems we are doing well. Could you post some screenies?

Shadzy, you are up. Let us play about 10 turns from now on, trying to hand the game over at points of relatively low tension.

So how exactly war declarations / peace treaties work in civ4? From my experience, after declaration, it is 10 turns of war before the AI talks. After peace treaty, you cannot declare for 10 turns.

I think parking the Aztec cities is fine, as long as we can keep it up. With 3-4 swords we can take a city even on hills.

A second worker could be good at some point, but maybe we will just take workers from the Aztecs.

 

[katank]

We should park out the Japs too. Kill Teo first and then move on Teno. Gives some of surviving our swords the great CR 2 promo to knock down the 40% cultural defense city on a hill.

We should then be able to wreck havoc with our keshiks.