AGA: Saladin on 1.01

OzzyKP

Emperor
Joined
Dec 16, 2000
Messages
1,827
Location
Washington, DC USA
My first game with the congresses and other new features. It was an excellent game.

I started out with Japan, but got bored with them in time to switch to Saladin. Ur, Tyre, Jerusalem, and a Suez Canal city all flipped to me right away (and that city south of Mecca). Ur had Stonehenge (built by the Barbs I found out later). I sent my camel archers into Egypt right away. They were already getting hammered by Barbarians. The barbs ended up toppling the Egyptians, and then I had to fight them off for the spoils.

I did eventually subdue the barbs and took their egyptian cities. The egyptians built the Pyramids (!!) Then after a while I took Carthage and a few other North Africa barb cities. It was slow going though, since Egypt was still getting buried in barbs I had to fight off.

I managed to convert Persia to Islam, and after a while I converted the Mali too. China fell to barbs and the Mongols moved in to fill the space. The Greeks declared war on me, so I eliminated them getting turkey & greece and several more wonders.

I built the spiral mineret which helped me out a lot. It has a very nice synergy with the Arab's UP. I was guaranteed 2 gold for each city I conquered. Not enough to offset my significant upkeep costs, but it defintely helped. Together with the shrines for Christianity, Judaism, and Islam I was able to keep my head above water. Still behind in tech compared to all the top dogs, but I was never too far behind.

I worked on converting India to Islam, but they got invaded by Russia - the biggest civ - and while they did convert, they also got wiped out by Russia and her European partners. For a long time I was feeding India tech to try and keep them alive, but it was no use. They did revolt much later in the game and take back all of India.

Around this time the Congresses started. I sat out the first one thinking it would spare me from losing a city, but nope, doesn't work that way, darn. The stupid Mali, my supposed allies, kept taking my north african cities. I never got anything of note. I didn't want to poach my allies (if only they had given me the same consideration....) so whatever cities I picked up in Congress I handed over to Persia or Mali.

The Americans never took off. They got wiped out by the Aztec, but remeerged and collapsed several more times. The English first, and then the French had a strong hold on Canada. Australia was all English, South America was split between France, Spain and the Inca. South Africa had many civ's settlers on it, but no one settled. Much later the English settled it.

The Mongols declared on Persia, and since the Mongols were one of my main competitors in score I joined Persia against them. Persia as far as I could tell didn't do anything, but I fought a long defensive war against the Mongols in Caucasus. They had a tech edge, but my infantry was able to hold the line against their tanks and marines. Persia survived without losing any cities.

The Egyptians revolted several times and I was able to put them down no problem.

It was getting late in the game and it looked like no one would be able to get a space ship win (good thing, since I was behind in tech). So I started looking to the score. England, Mongolia, Russia and I were in the top 4 - sometimes France was up there.

Germany and France went to war, and I was on good terms with Germany so they asked me to join in - which I did. Unfortunately by this time the stupid UN voted on free religion, so I couldn't use my UP while I was out conquering new territory. :( I took Marsellies I was going to hand it back over to Germany, but then I saw that I could try for a score win if I had more territory and wonders, so I decided to do what I could to get the score win in 2050 which was only a few turns away. Then the Romans joined France and declared on me. So I took Rome.

I took Paris and the two remaining French cities in France flipped to me. I also took the remaining Roman city in south Italy and Rome's madagascar city. I had a very narrow lead over England in points at this point. But they had more tech and my score kept going down as my conquered cities' population kept dying.

Then 6 turns from the end a Congress was called. It wasn't pretty. I lost Rome to the fricken Mali (again! stupid Mali!), and a french city to the french. I don't think the English lost anything, and I didn't gain anything. Ugh. Big hit in score. I had already decided to take over English South Africa, so my troops were heading south for that. Remaining troops in France took back that French city.

I invaded South Africa, they definitely had a tech lead (mech inf & modern armor vs. infantry & tanks) but I had a good number of troops. Then with 3 turns to go the fricken Greeks rebelled! Ah! I lost Sparta and Athens and was back down to 3rd in points. Grr, I quick retook them. I pressed on into South Africa, it was tough going, but just barely I was able to take several of their cities and get myself like a 5-10 point lead over England. Still wary, I invaded my old friend the Mali and took back Rome on the last turn for some cushion just in case.

Whew! So I won on score in 2050. I don't think I've ever played a game through to 2050 before, but with this mod it was an excellent game.

AWESOME mod, it just keeps getting better and better. :goodjob: :goodjob: :goodjob:


Some bugs I noticed:

The end game replay doesn't mention cities that change hands in congress. That would be nice to see added.

When a city flips from congress or a revolt, the garrison units sometimes end up being teleported to a water square. Russian troops were stuck in the caspian all game. This happened when the Greeks revolted too, my troops were in the Mediteranian.

Finally, when a civ re-emerges in a revolt, the land around their cities isn't inside their cultural borders. For example, when Egypt revolted against me, my culture was pushed out, but their culture didn't fill that space until the following turn. So on that first turn I was able to railroad my troops right up to the city and take them back the same turn. If their culture took up space, then it would slow me down.
 
Possibly.

Another thing worth mentioning, when I took a capitol and other area cities flip to me, if there are national wonders in those cities I get those too. That should probably be fixed. I think it only works with national wonders I haven't yet built, but it'd be better to be able to build them on my own instead of getting the AI's poorly placed nat'l wonders.
 
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