aelf
Ashen One
It is easier than playing peacefully and letting the AI make use of its economic advantage, right?
ALC Game 13: Mali/Mansa Musa
- Thread starter Sisiutil
- Start date
It is easier than playing peacefully and letting the AI make use of its economic advantage, right?
not for me, really(I'm a rather competent warmonger, but except for war academies, this is not culture linked, and chasing a cultural win by weapons is quite hard
)The AI also has production and upgrade bonuses, right?
If you can outwar it, you certainly can outresearch it too :better trades, better diplo are the keys, but who am I trying to explain those things to ?
Fetch
When in doubt, reboot.
Someone may have said this already, but you may want to attempt a resource trade with Ragnar for a +1.
How exactly is a Cultural victory out of the window at this point with that many religions? Just spread them around pump out the religions around pump out temples rushbuild the curches and win. The i sugest gettin nationalism from liberalism then researching constitution and then democracy before turning off research.
it's not out really, but it's not going to be fast.
He is really low on cottages, and even with cottages built, they need to mature.
Your tech path is indeed a good way to grow those cottages a faster (and to keep up in techs a bit longer).
KMadCandy
giggling permanoob
poor ragnar is really suffering. maybe give him civil service so that once you do know astronomy he might have more gpt you can get from him in a resource trade *evil giggle*.
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
Regarding the cottages--Cabert, I have quite a few, though I agree, I could use more. All that jungle is slowing me down. I'm not sure which "best cottage" city you were referring to only having 5 cottages. The capital is the best cottage city as far as I can tell and it has around 7 or 8, IIRC.
I'm thinking I should switch civics to Serfdom to speed up the workers once Karakorum produces its next GS and switches to building some infrastructure. A change to Organized Religion, also for infrastructure (banks, universities, stables, markets, grocers, monasteries, etc.) would also be a good idea, I think. I can switch back to Pacifism once Karakorum is ready to go back to GP production again (say after the National Epic is built, which could take some time--that town is low on hammers!).
I'm thinking I should switch civics to Serfdom to speed up the workers once Karakorum produces its next GS and switches to building some infrastructure. A change to Organized Religion, also for infrastructure (banks, universities, stables, markets, grocers, monasteries, etc.) would also be a good idea, I think. I can switch back to Pacifism once Karakorum is ready to go back to GP production again (say after the National Epic is built, which could take some time--that town is low on hammers!).
patagonia
Emperor
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2006
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With marble connected, whipping the NE in Karakorum is the best way to go. It'll grow the pop back quickly enough.
the capital is rarely a problem in cultural games, so I didn't check it out. I may have missed a few though, it's no big deal.
The real question is "Do you want to go cultural or not?"
The answer isn't obvious from the save. And if you're going for space, then astronomy is as good as can be.
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
Cultural? Nah. I'm leaning towards Space and have been since the beginning of the game, I think.
I prefer to plan on Cultural from the start. Build Stonehenge and maybe the Oracle as well; use one of the Great Prophets to lightbulb Theology, then build the Sistine Chapel, and go from there. Didn't do that this game--not even close.
1. Beeline to Industrialism to discover and then claim aluminum.
2. Beeline to Robotics and then build The Space Elevator.
3. Win the Space Race.
I'm sure someone will say why this strategy is too simple minded, but it seems like getting The Space Elevator gives a definite advantage over any other space racers. As long as you have two or three strong production cities and two or three decent production cities, the spaceship parts will just keep appearing as you leverage that Financial trait to tech your way to victory.
In my games I always seem to try and build to multiple victory conditions. Since you already have a clear direction, it sort of makes some decisions easier. You can still keep building culture around your borders in order to flip a few more tiles. Most likely this ALC game is almost locked at this point. All bets are off if you don't control aluminum.
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
I haven't tried winning a space race sans aluminum, but I've done it without being the tech leader and without the Three Gorges Dam, the Space Elevator, or a late golden age. (See the Hannibal game). So I don't think a lack of aluminum is insurmountable.
The suggested bee-lines avoid Representation and Democracy, which I'm inclined to think would help us tremendously with research (the Representation civic for its specialist research bonus, Emancipation for accelerated cottage growth, and much later, Universal Suffrage for its per-town hammer boost).
Oh well.
I recently moved up a skill level from Warlord to Noble, in large part from studying the ALC threads and other strategy discussions.
Perhaps you could explain a little bit about when it is appropriate to beeline to a certain tech while trading for desired "missed" techs versus when it is appropriate to mix it up a little while putting long term goals on the back burner in order to meet short and medium term goals.
I recently moved up a skill level from Warlord to Noble, in large part from studying the ALC threads and other strategy discussions.
Perhaps you could explain a little bit about when it is appropriate to beeline to a certain tech while trading for desired "missed" techs versus when it is appropriate to mix it up a little while putting long term goals on the back burner in order to meet short and medium term goals.
pigswill
fly (one day)
Don't know if Sisiutil has started playing this set. If not I'd say go for astronomy. If going for space then first stage is teching strongly, production comes later. Astronomy gives oceanic trade routes which is free commerce boost, observatories are also useful but don't have the same immediate impact.
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
I think the answer lies in whether there is a substantial and immediate benefit that can be derived from a tech, or whether its benefits can be delayed or even bypassed completely.
A tech will, basically, green-light one or more game elements: a wonder, a civic, a unit, a building, a diplomatic option. To justify a bee-line, you have to be in a position to take advantage of the tech's benefits right away (such as by switching to the newly-enabled civic as soon as it's available, starting construction of a wonder, building the enabled units or buildings, etc.). And those benefits have to be significant. There's little sense in bee-lining and switching to Representation, for example, if you're running few or no specialists.
The other advantage in bee-lining a tech is to have it available for trade. This, however, I seldom do, simply because many techs worth a bee-line offer you a significant advantage that you don't to share with others for quite some time, if at all. Civil Service is a good example of this; I almost never trade that tech except with a backwards civ long after everybody else has it. And of course, trading a wonder-enabling tech before you've completed the wonder yourself is just nuts. Still, you will likely want to, even need to, trade techs along your bee-line for those you missed. But there are some techs you can likely do without completely. I often ignore Divine Right, for example, and it's been very interesting in aelf's current game to see him leave aside Archery, the first time I've ever seen that done.
The other consideration is whatever disadvantage(s) not having the other techs you're bypassing will leave you facing. As I mentioned, in this game, bypassing Representation and Democracy could actually be detrimental to my research and production in the long run. The later, expensive SS techs will likely be faster to research if I have additional flasks from some specialists as well as fast-growing cottages.
That being said, I can see myself in this game researching Representation soon for its civic. I'm running several specialists, especially now that my cities are growing large and many of the best tiles are being worked. Democracy, however, could probably wait for a trade. I frankly think Huyana will beat me to it, and he's Industrious and has copper and will likely beat me to the Statue of Liberty. I also plan on switching between Slavery, Serfdom, and Caste System for awhile before I'm really ready to run Emancipation. So I'll likely trade for Democracy later on, after the SoL is built and the AIs are more willing to give up the tech.
OK.
Thank you Sisiutil for the tech tree explanation.
Thanks also for building the University of Sankore in Timbuktu. These little details make the ALC games more special.
I'm also glad that Isabella is still alive, because normally we would try to kill her as fast as possible since she is insane. The Spain music is some of my favorite music in the game, so I generally feel bad when I kill her, which is almost immediately upon meeting her. Part of the ALC series is to demonstrate different approaches and strategies.
- - - - - - - -
This could be a good time for all the excellent "advisors" to jump in and make recommendations for the next twenty or thirty turns. Instead of just one or two techs . . . perhaps a few people could list approaches for about the next five or six techs in order.
If and when it is time to attack Mehmed, perhaps a very strong alliance with Spain would be possible? If you match all her civics and especially match her state religion and gift her some free resources then she would most likely bend over backwards to be helpful. How's that for an image? I think my wife dislikes Isabella, but I'm not sure why.
Thank you Sisiutil for the tech tree explanation.
Thanks also for building the University of Sankore in Timbuktu. These little details make the ALC games more special.
I'm also glad that Isabella is still alive, because normally we would try to kill her as fast as possible since she is insane. The Spain music is some of my favorite music in the game, so I generally feel bad when I kill her, which is almost immediately upon meeting her. Part of the ALC series is to demonstrate different approaches and strategies.
- - - - - - - -
This could be a good time for all the excellent "advisors" to jump in and make recommendations for the next twenty or thirty turns. Instead of just one or two techs . . . perhaps a few people could list approaches for about the next five or six techs in order.
If and when it is time to attack Mehmed, perhaps a very strong alliance with Spain would be possible? If you match all her civics and especially match her state religion and gift her some free resources then she would most likely bend over backwards to be helpful. How's that for an image? I think my wife dislikes Isabella, but I'm not sure why.
KMadCandy
giggling permanoob
just one note ... for matching civics, only one thing matters. each civ has a "favorite civic". if you're using that civic while they're running it, then you get the shared civic bonus. if they're not using it, you don't get one even if you match them on all 4 of the others.
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
And Isabella's favourite civic is Police State--unavailable until late (unless I capture the Pyramids, which Mehmed built), and not a civic I run often or for long.
Seems to me that Theocracy would be a better favourite civic for Isabella, don't you think?
KMadCandy
giggling permanoob
her favorite civic is police state in vanilla. she changed her mind in warlords, and in fact does prefer theocracy in warlords. i can't code to save my life but i was bored and i know how to ctrl+f on .xml for the few things i don't have cheatsheets on *giggle*.
If you follow the tech path I described earlier [Nationalism (free)-> Gunpowder-> MT-> Constitution-> Democracy] I don't see how Huayna will beat you to Democracy. Once you have Nationalism you're 2 techs ahead of him on the path to Democracy (assuming you don't trade PP to him, and you shouldn't). So even with the detours to the military techs you should win the race by a fair margin, and if Huayna gets side-tracked with some other techs you may even complete SoL before he gets Democracy.
If you don't plan on researching Democracy what techs do you plan on pursuing? Chemistry gives you grenadiers, but I don't think that they'll do a better job at defended than cavalry. RP gives you the ability to build lumbermills, but your workers are kind of busy as it is. It also boosts windmills and watermills, but you don't have many of them. You could follow up both Chemistry and RP with Steam which would reveal Coal and get you faster workers, but I'm not sure that those benefits will be greater than those you'd acquire via the Democracy route.
Astronomy is another option, but I find that this is the time of the game when the AIs acquire Banking and immediately switch to Mercantilism, so you don't get the trade route boost you expect. The ability to build Observatories is nice, but at the moment there are a number of other buildings needed, so Astronomy can wait until after Democracy.
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