ALC Game 14: Mongolia/Kublai Khan

[oyzar]

Why are you running 60% research? You plan on upgrading anything anytime soon?cause if not, it is much better to run 100% for the lightbub effect and also the fact that with some decent plunders / income from trades you might not get to 0.

 

[Preston85]

Why run bureaucracy if your going to farm the cottages for more scientist specialists ?

I've never played the slower speeds so unsure if 13 turns for engineering is good, bad or average. I would guess they don't include scientists in the GNP numbers so even though someone (probably MM) has twice the GNP you do its not quite as bad as it looks.

Good thing about him cottage spamming is they're nice for pillaging haha

 

[50_dollar_bag]

I'm also curious as to why you razed Rome, I can't see what the BFC encompassed, but usually capitals are the best sites on the map.

I'm casting a vote for early domination/conquest. I can't give to much in the way of strategy for it, but I'm eager to learn how.

 

[curtadams]

Well, he's already building the National Epic in his Great Library city, so Scientist GPPs get doubled there and with no extra scientists he has a 25% chance of an Artist. Sure, he could put the NE in Bibracte instead.

The capital is a poor place for the NE, because there's not too much food, and because there's a very strong alternate benefit to extra food working the hills with a Bureaucracy bonus OR working the already-developed cottages. Bribracte is better. Ning-hua is probably best long-term although I'm not sure the game will go on long enough. Mixing the NE with Bureaucracy violates specialization, since one boosts worked tiles and the other specialists.

Artists can actually have their uses in a war of conquest.

 

[Sisiutil]

Why did you send the Merchant all the way to London when Kumbeh Saleh (2 turns away) would have yielded the same +1350 gold?

As I said in the update, I was hoping that by the time he got to London, something would have changed to make him generate more gold, but it didn't work out that way.

Why are you running 60% research? You plan on upgrading anything anytime soon?cause if not, it is much better to run 100% for the lightbub effect and also the fact that with some decent plunders / income from trades you might not get to 0.

Just trying to stretch out the $$$ until my new GM makes his way to a decent city for a trade mission. If I run at 100% research, I'll be out of cash and down to 20%-30% research for several turns.

I'm also curious as to why you razed Rome, I can't see what the BFC encompassed, but usually capitals are the best sites on the map.

Rome wasn't such a great capital this time. All it had to offer was one or two clam tiles, and some bananas, I think, and I already have those. As far as I was concerned, the drag on the economy I'd face wasn't worth it. I'd prefer to generate a Settler later when I can afford a city over there.

The capital is a poor place for the NE, because there's not too much food, and because there's a very strong alternate benefit to extra food working the hills with a Bureaucracy bonus OR working the already-developed cottages. Bribracte is better. Ning-hua is probably best long-term although I'm not sure the game will go on long enough. Mixing the NE with Bureaucracy violates specialization, since one boosts worked tiles and the other specialists.

Artists can actually have their uses in a war of conquest.

Sounds like I should, then, cancel the NE in Karakorum and maybe put it in Bibracte. OK. I was thinking the former Celtic capital might make a better GP farm anyway.

 

[Killroyan]

I for one would not have razed Rome. It still has 3 resources that you could trade for GPT. And with the collossus it would even produce a good amount of coins. Then again your economy is staggering a bit, but just a bit. Oh well, you will expand when the time is ripe, I am sure of that. Good show so far

 

[UncleJJ]

Rome wasn't such a great capital this time. All it had to offer was one or two clam tiles, and some bananas, I think, and I already have those. As far as I was concerned, the drag on the economy I'd face wasn't worth it. I'd prefer to generate a Settler later when I can afford a city over there.

At size 4 Rome would have paid for itself in the same way Antium is now as its combined beakers and gold are greater than maintenance. Also Mansa will buy your fish now for 6 gold and that would surely have offset any extra costs.

With a granary and lighthouse (both of which might have been captured) Rome will have fish 6F3C and clams 5F3C and Bananas 5F + Coastal tile 2F3C = 20 food - 8 for 4 pop = +12 food / turn when it takes 42 to grow 1 pop. At this city size 1 food is worth approximately 2 hammers with Slavery so it would not take long to whip in key economic buildings. Rome would rapidly outshine Antium and make a very positive contribution to your economy as well as incidently grabbing more territory and adding to your power curve and score.

I'd say Rome was a good city to keep with all that food and resources and an immediate commercial payback. Anyway, what is done is done, so let's press on to total domination

 

[oyzar]

.
Just trying to stretch out the $$$ until my new GM makes his way to a decent city for a trade mission. If I run at 100% research, I'll be out of cash and down to 20%-30% research for several turns.

This still doesnt account for the lightbulb effect(that you get a tech you can trade to the AI for 2 of theirs techs before they discover it so your gaining more beakers than you would otherwise). How much - would you have with 100%? Also why didnt the GL go in Birtcante? I know running a various different great people is bad but all the GP you get are good for something so its not that bad and you would generate GP quite fast especially with NE.

 

[PublicEnemy]

Being a slacker, I've only just started catching up on the ALC games. I've been reading through some of the old ones, very entertaining!

This game though seems (to me anyway) quite straightforward. I haven't checked exactly what techs you have at the moment, but I would have thought that Guilds - Gunpowder - Chemistry would be the way to go after Engineering.

Turn off research once you have Chemistry, pump out CRII Maces and upgrade to Grenadiers.

An old strat, but still an effective one.

 

[Kietharr]

Conquest is looking most appealing at the moment. With your current economic situation you can't afford to expand much more. Burn all of mansa's cities and improvements to the ground, then churchil and bismark. Let them throw out crappy colony cities into mansa's former territory, it just further strains their armies. By the time you're finishing up your conquest(which should be lightning fast compared to normal war, you aren't keeping ANYTHING) the mystery AI should be sending caravels. You have a choice at that point, either settle the rest of the continent for a domination win or send a naval invasion against unknown civ to kill him off. The latter may be faster as that civ is very likely backwards from being alone for over 5000 years.

 

[scy12]

The way i see it the sooner you destroy Mansa the sooner you will win.

 

[cabert]

The way i see it the sooner you destroy Mansa the sooner you will win.

not my opinion at all
MM will help the economy because :
- he trades fairly
- he gives away techs for peace.
edit :
Given the geography, I'd go the following way :
- trade for feudalism with freddy. MC + CoL should be enough. Heck, maybe MC alone is enough.
- start going for MM. I believe razing the 2 worthless cities in the west (size 1 and 3) and capturing Gao should be enough to capitulate him. This shouldn't be too costly : A handful of macemen and 2 handful of catapults should do the trick. If you don't have the handful of macemen, 10/15 older units will do.
- after MM is your vassal, make him research gunpowder, while you try for liberalism
- follow through vs churchill. You power and MM's power will add up. Remember that techs count towards power, meaning that MM will in fact make churchill easier to capitulate
- go for bismarck. Churchill + MM will make him feel very small, should be easy.
- find the last civ, declare war as soon as you find him. capitulate him with a galley and 2 musketmen

 

[KMadCandy]

Sounds like I should, then, cancel the NE in Karakorum and maybe put it in Bibracte. OK. I was thinking the former Celtic capital might make a better GP farm anyway.

i'd have done same as you on GM to london. only downside was 4 extra turns (big deal) and so-slight-we-could-ignore-it risk of JC killing him on the way (not a big risk), and you didn't need the money right then IIRC. rome i'd have done what you did too; i'm coming off re-reading the hatty game where you razed it even closer to your own capital, even having your sole stone resource (this from the man addicted to the wonder resources!!!!) to resettle it one square over. you can always resettle it Nova Roma in this game, or recapture it if someone else travels all that way to do that before you do. big deal, you certainly didn't need it now.

consider me in the karakorum for NE camp for the reasons i stated above.

not my opinion at all. MM will help the economy because :
- he trades fairly
- he gives away techs for peace.
- after MM is your vassal, make him research gunpowder, while you try for liberalism
- follow through vs churchill. You power and MM's power will add up. Remember that techs count towards power, meaning that MM will in fact make churchill easier to capitulate

i'm totally with cabert here. particularly for the "direct him to gunpowder while you beeline to liberalism" reason; i've done that myself. mansa is quite easy to get back into good graces with, so that he'll trade with you again as a vassal, even after "you declared war on us!" mods.

the only issues i've had with this plan was captured cities wanting to revolt back to him, and getting the tiles that overlap into my control to use them myself. and that was only the first time, since i didn't expect it and didn't pre-plan for it.
-you're creative, that will help automatically
-knowing about this will help.
-stationing troops in the cities closest to him (to lower the chances of flips until your culture there is higher than 50%) will help
-in general keep this issue in mind when picking cities that'll be yours and cities you'll let him keep
-you do want to let him keep a few decent enough cities, with tiles on his side of the "this land is your land" side, so that he can tech (and build units to help with wars if you expect him to be helpful there, i've never tried that myself) at a decent level to get use out of him.

but man oh man that's a beautiful thing when it works. having him getting an important tech that you do want someday, while you beeline to lib, is a so nice. dunno what you'll use lib for, but i once to beelined lib to military tradition. i then found out i had the tech to train cavalry, but i couldn't actually make them, since i didn't know gunpowder, oopsies!

 

[bardolph]

- after MM is your vassal, make him research gunpowder, while you try for liberalism

How do you make a vassal research a particular technology?

- find the last civ, declare war as soon as you find him. capitulate him with a galley and 2 musketmen

Funny!

the only issues i've had with this plan was captured cities wanting to revolt back to him, and getting the tiles that overlap into my control to use them myself. and that was only the first time, since i didn't expect it and didn't pre-plan for it.

In standard settings, conquered cities never flip back to their owners. Yes, they will go into resistance (and can do so fairly regularly if you are culturally behind), but they won't flip. The good news is, maintenance costs disappear while they are in resistance, so you won't lose money from it! The bad news is, you won't gain any either.

 

[Sisiutil]

How do you make a vassal research a particular technology?

Under the "Let's discuss something else" option in the diplomacy screen, there's a "We'd like you to research..." option (or words to that effect). This is the same spot where you find the "Why don't you attack..." option with a war ally, although I've found that to be far less successful than giving a vassal research orders.

So it sounds like some of you are starting to emphasize a conquest win through vassalization. Sounds intriguing. Let's first see how easy it is (or not) to vassalize Mansa.

And I promise that once I feel better about the economy, I will resettle Rome.

 

[KMadCandy]

In standard settings, conquered cities never flip back to their owners. Yes, they will go into resistance (and can do so fairly regularly if you are culturally behind), but they won't flip.

cool thanks ! i always use that standard setting come to think of it, since i have to for HoF games so i'm just used to it. so i don't have to worry about putting the extra troops there, yay!

 

[UncleJJ]

Under the "Let's discuss something else" option in the diplomacy screen, there's a "We'd like you to research..." option (or words to that effect). This is the same spot where you find the "Why don't you attack..." option with a war ally, although I've found that to be far less successful than giving a vassal research orders.

So it sounds like some of you are starting to emphasize a conquest win through vassalization. Sounds intriguing. Let's first see how easy it is (or not) to vassalize Mansa.

And I promise that once I feel better about the economy, I will resettle Rome.

I don't think conquest is a good victory option, at least until we know where the missing civs are. If you restrict Vassalising to one or two of the 3 civs left on our continent you might be able to get a domination win without needing much of the other continent if any at all. We seem to have a lop sided land distribution with us on a big continent and the others on a smaller one. Domination is the way to a quick victory.

 

[scy12]

Here(domination) is where creative may speed things up .

 

[Welnic]

I don't think conquest is a good victory option, at least until we know where the missing civs are. If you restrict Vassalising to one or two of the 3 civs left on our continent you might be able to get a domination win without needing much of the other continent if any at all. We seem to have a lop sided land distribution with us on a big continent and the others on a smaller one. Domination is the way to a quick victory.

There is only one other civ, we have met a total of 6 including the Mongols. Someone is on their own little island feeling safe because they built the Chichen Itza.

 

[Lance of Llanwy]

Under the "Let's discuss something else" option in the diplomacy screen, there's a "We'd like you to research..." option (or words to that effect). This is the same spot where you find the "Why don't you attack..." option with a war ally, although I've found that to be far less successful than giving a vassal research orders.

So it sounds like some of you are starting to emphasize a conquest win through vassalization. Sounds intriguing. Let's first see how easy it is (or not) to vassalize Mansa.

And I promise that once I feel better about the economy, I will resettle Rome.

He shouldn't be too hard to break. I had him as a vassal once(he actually asked to be my vassal! granted, it was with Revolutions mod and he had split away from the Zulu because I took their capital, but it was awesome.) He's a great vassal, as one would imagine. I'd try and kill as many of his soldiers as possible, but try and keep the pillaging to a minimum so he can get right to making beakers for you...