ALC Game 17: Russia/Peter

[Yushal]

I'd settle the three fish tile and put the spice city on the coast, forgetting about the copper. Take Ragnar's capitol with swords or horse units. Horses hopefully, which you can keep to make Cossacks.

It'll take a bit longer, but its do-able, and all you really need is his capital. Once that's done, provided you guys are isolated, make friends and go for caste system and then caravels. Try to get the Great Lighthouse somewhere.

Looks to me as though you are going to want to do alot of light-bulbing and you'll want that fish-farm for that.

Cottage the capital, research AH, then decide whether you need IW right away or can use horses. Dont make any final decisions on city placement without discovering where your horses lie as capturing that copper any way you place one infringes on best placement, IMO, and its unnecessary. Also, get any mines up ASAP and pray for gold....

Priorities: AH, IW/HBR, Sailing, Writing, Meditation (once holy city is taken), Optics.


Shot at 2007-07-08

But hey, Im not a very good player, lol...

 

[OldDays]

Me thinks Validators map provides the best spots for settling next. Spreading the fish between two cites and instead nabbing the wheat with one of them will pay of more at this stage of the game imo because the happy cap is quite low this early ... so you cannot really leverage the huge growth rate of three fish resources. Bulid only few cities for raising an appropriate army an expand by force into better land. You want Ragnars Gem-City ASAP, don't you?

I hate to say this because I am a builder at heart, but I found it vital to go full warmonger mode in the early game when you are hemmed in and lack decent land. I got my best score and earliest win in a monarch game where I did not build a single wonder... well, I captured enough of them

 

[EEE_BOY]

yes, three fish city has very low production and the wheat city cant grow before CS, the same problem with the cow-spice city. so validator's map is better

 

[slaze]

With furs your cities will only be able to reach pop 5 and as tempting as the triple fish city is, it needs to be at pop 11 to reach its potential. Then it can handle as much as 6 specialists, or it can produce up to 10 . No doubt it would be a decent city, and especially with a philosophical leader.

But split the fish into two cities and and you can have two early game production centers which coincidentally, is exactly what you need to build the units to fight Ragnar. At pop 5 bronze can produce 13 and wheat can make 14 . And after the war, they can both run scientists instead of the mines with wheat allowing more specialists if needed.

The problem however, is maintenance. Getting the bronze city hooked up by road would take one worker 40 turns and then it would take a monument and a border pop to get to the furs. Although, you will need the road for troop movement and one could argue that techwise, you'll only need The Wheel, Mysticism, AH, and Fishing to fight the viking.

If you were worried about your reseach, then you research Archery, road and settle the deer first while the east is fogbusted and send archers to defend the west (riskier). If not, I think you still fogbust, but settle bronze first and go from there (less risky). I'm a little torn between either one.

Also chopping this tile and you'll need 5 fogbusters instead of 6 and it looks like you'll be putting a city there in about 1330 AD or so

 

[EEE_BOY]

I would settle the green city in validator's map and followed by the blue city to secure the route. after u produce some axemans ,stop fogbusting in hope the barbs could settle the red city for u to take.

 

[TRJS]

I would settle the green city in validator's map and followed by the blue city to secure the route. after u produce some axemans ,stop fogbusting in hope the barbs could settle the red city for u to take.

I like this tactic. Making good use of our barbarian friends. The other advantage is free exp for our Axes on the way to Ragnar. Always good for the troops to get a taste of battle before the real thing starts.

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

I agree with the sentiment of Validators map, road and settle Blue first, road THROUGH the fur's to the Green spot, and mine the copper, now you have a road for axes to traverse, and MAJOR metal linked up, border pops, road to cows..(pre roaded) so only needs pasture, Furs get camps for happy chappies. 3rd city is Red canal city. roaded of course and continue roads to Ragnars borders or further if open borders.

Must up your axes, and hang your shields in Ragnars halls.

Ragnars Capital, NOW YOUR CAPITAL. Hopefully will have a Hindu shrine by now, working gem mine, a Science/Beauracy capital monster. So move palace there..MOVE IT, DO IT MOVE IT.

Ragnar's sure to have equal lands in fog to what you have in east, so its a central capital for a snakey Island, or a northern capital for a Snakey Continent.

Moscow is Science Centre/Great Library, Ragnar is Wall Street, Capital I still belive should be Ragnars, Rename it MOCBA..

Specialist Economy DEMANDS SCIENTIST SPECIALISTS in MOSCOW, wall Street/Merchants in MOCBA, and raping, pillaging, burning, storming the beaches........errrr Maybe keep Ragnar alive till you find trading partners...trade as you do.........heh.... if 2 others...Kill Ragnar

*Praise* Long time lurker, reader, avid follower of these threads. Full points for your dedication and devotion, learned a lot, Mainly to trade more, don't allway's agree with your decisions, but we all play different stratergies..Trying to keep pace with your level...but bit reluctant to move up from Prince untill after BTS, using Vanillia inproved AI...but stuck on 1.61 version till BTS...

Also I LOVE marathon games...I like/need time to decide/plan..anything else just goes too quick, yes EPIC is too quick for me...

 

[Porphyrius]

Go west where the grass is green, southwest where the gems are shiny...


OK, lets get to some more serious thoughts.

First, about the differrence in production favoring splitting the fishes:
Yes, we do get 13 + 14 that way but only when the 2 cities grow fully to size 5. Say, that saves a couple turns (like 12 to 14) from finishing the axes needed. But, growing will take a while as both of them need a cultural pop before working any food resource. And the proposed fish-copper city will grow slowly after size 2 as it a has a single fish to grow on. At the same time the wheat city will put quite a strain on the workers that have enough on their hands as has been posted.

Moscow can make 12 but copper may be hooked late there.

The 3 fish city comes at 9 but can grow faster making fish boats as it grows and need only size 4 for those hammers.A city SW of the copper will work it as soon as its hooked and makes 6 at size 1, and when it grows slowly to size 2, 10 . Smaller production yes but ASAP and keeping it at size 2 will likely save a in maintenance.

So things even out quite a bit, leaving the medium term development to judge efficiency. And then its a non issue the wheat city can barely support size 8-9 considering it has to work plain mines and specialists to be of use. The copper-fish one is much worse. And their production capacity in mid term matters little as the land is reeking with hills.


Second, financial stagnation is a matter that needs to be considered more. We dont need maintenance for the 3 early city alone, we need to cover Ragnars capital and maybe a couple more of his cities witch may be far from Moscow. And a fur can be worked along with max production as stated only in the 3 fish city(both afterwards in any case though).


I share Slaze's concern on barb however, and dilema. Maybe the answer lies in chariots though, if horses can be easily hooked. (Nice chop suggestion by the way ) .

 

[Porphyrius]

Also I LOVE marathon games...I like/need time to decide/plan..anything else just goes too quick, yes EPIC is too quick for me...

Me too, i mean i love getting extra chances to correct sily mistakes i make out of rush moods here and there.
Makes checking for new trade options a bit tiring though, maybe i should civ4 alerts as well...

Reading suggestions about using chariots made me consider a mixed rush force of axes and charriots. If horses turn up they ll be around Moscow likely so the time later cities grow cuold be used to make cheap chariot for barb protection initialy and softening fodder on city attacks later on.
Chariots with flankI or ComI have similar chances of survival as axes in all cases but 0% culture res cities:

In most typical cases:

• 20% cult city: Axe 29% - ComChar 17%(+8with)% - FlChar 8+ (18with)%
• 0% cult/hills city: Axe 21% - ComChar 7(+10%with)% - FlChar 3(+20with)%
• 0% cult city : Axe 61% - ComChar 22(+8with)% - FlChar 18(+16wit)%
  

Now chars will do less damage on average but they are faster to make and fast enough to receive reinforcments in. I think its worth considering given the mounted UU and poor/late access to copper from Moscow.


Also, we are getting libraries and writing anyhow, so how about replacing monuments with them for poping. They cost more but pop twice as fast and will use chopping mostly as all early far east cities will exaust their food far before health problems, even the 3 fish city.

 

[Sisiutil]

Round 2: 3190 BC to 1300 BC

Well, it wasn't easy distilling all that advice down into a few playable turns.

To start off, let me just say that I know my micromanagement sucks, it always has, and it always will. So don't look for me to improve in leaps and bounds in that regard. Nevertheless, some of your criticisms had an effect, so I changed a tile working in Moscow to accelerate the build of the Worker by a turn.

A few turns later, I finished researching my next tech.

Unfortunately, the Worker was done before the tech, so rather than farming a flood plain right away I decided to mine a hill. I could have waited a turn or two, but I don't like having a Worker standing around doing nothing, even if what I have him do is sub-optimal. I build a mine on the SE hill since it will also contribute 1 commerce from being beside a river.

With Agriculture done, I started researching the Wheel, and after that, Animal Husbandry.

With the Worker doing his thing, I devoted myself for the next few turns to building my fog-busting Warriors.

They're certainly cheaper than the Great Wall and not dependent on stone. As a downside, however, they started to cost me maintenance and they won't give me a Great Engineer later on down the road. But after experiencing how badly a bunch of barbs can set you back in the Mehmed game, I was quite open to trying this alternative.

Once Moscow grew to 3, I decided to sacrifice a citizen or two in order to speed up the Warrior factory and keep my nascent empire safe:

All this whipping and delaying my first Settler meant I came in pretty close to last when civ size was evaluated.

Well, I hope to make up for that later.

The Wheel was finished, and after it...

So, do I have horses nearby? Yes, and coincidentally, near where my Worker was biding his time waiting to improve the cows by building a future military route to the Vikings:

So I just had to wait for Moscow's next border pop and I'd have horses. Nifty.

With my Warriors in place--5 to fog-bust and 1 to guard Moscow--I began work on another Worker. Trying to follow everyone's advice, I whipped him to completion, though I keep missing the 2-pop window on that. Like I said, I suck at micromanagement.

I finished a Settler after this (no whipping, I didn't have the population for it) and finally settled my second city, right by the copper as per Validator's dotmap.

So I will shortly have copper and I already have the horses hooked up. No barbs around thanks to the increasingly-expensive fog-busters. However, my teching slowed down, and I pursued Writing after AH in order to open Ragnar's borders for my Scout. So I need Mysticism next to expand St. Pete's borders. Someone else managed to complete Stonehenge.

My first build in St. Pete was a barracks, then, to allow the city to grow. I moved one of the fog-busting Warriors into town as the city's initial defender.

I decided to keep playing, since I think we're all curious as to whether there are other civs on my land mass. So I finished my next tech...

...then I signed an OB agreement with the Viking and sent my Scout south. Sure enough, he soon encountered another neighbour:

Speak of the devil. The land around Mehmed's territory so far looks like jungle, so he's positioned on the equator, more or less. That makes me think (and hope) that the land mass is even larger and that there's another civ or more beyond him. Once again, fractal has given me an interesting map (though certainly not an easy one).

I haven't explored much of the south, but here's what I have so far:

As several of you surmised, Ragnar has several gems, marble too, and of course he built the sugar city. I hope it's not too late at this point to axe-rush him--producing all those Warriors slowed me down some. I have one more Settler nearly complete in Moscow. Once the third city is built (the scented canal to the SW?), I think it's barracks and Axes. I only see Archers, and not many, so far in Ragnar's cities, but that could soon change. Since his capital is a holy city, it will likely have a 60% cultural defense by the time I get there. That will take several Axes to overcome. Should I wait for Construction and Catapults?

Anyway, here's a look at Russian territory:

As I said, I'm researching Mysticism now, and that will likely be followed by Fishing in anticipation of St. Pete's border pop. What techs should I pursue after that? I skipped Pottery, as several of you suggested, to get Writing first, and that seems to assume that I will, indeed, be running a SE.

Anyway, the saved game file is below, and I look forward to your comments.

 

[Validator]

I have one more Settler nearly complete in Moscow. Once the third city is built (the scented canal to the SW?), I think it's barracks and Axes. I only see Archers, and not many, so far in Ragnar's cities, but that could soon change. Since his capital is a holy city, it will likely have a 60% cultural defense by the time I get there. That will take several Axes to overcome. Should I wait for Construction and Catapults?
first, and that seems to assume that I will, indeed, be running a SE.

I would build the blue dot city on my dotmap as your third city. It will give you another good early production city to help build the axes you'll need to take out Ragnar.

I wouldn't wait for Construction. Your tech rate will be poor and by the time you get there the Viking may well have LBs. Just build lots of axes.

 

[Tyrael]

Long-time lurker coming out of hiding to say thanks for doing the ALC and helping all us noobs learn a thing or two , and (hopefully) give some reasonable advice. So here ya go:

First off, I think you should replace your southern warrior with your first axe. This gives you a chance to grab a settler if one tries to sneak up later on if you're about to declare war anyway. But let him settle if you're not ready to march on his lands soon- you don't want him being left alone and going into war production mode- you'll have a hard enough time as it is.

Also, why don't you run binomial research? I know the extra micromanagement's a bit of a pain, but all you gotta do is click + or - a few times every couple turns. It shaves a few turns off of research and doesn't really cost anything. It's not an exploit, unless you consider stopping the game from rounding down your fractions of and every turn in each city (it adds up) exploitive. There's an article about it in the War Acadamy if you want more specifics.

PS- I play vanilla, does binomail research help in Warlords? If so, ignore above paragraph .

 

[InFlux5]

I'd like to see an Axe rush before cats, mostly for selfish reasons. I have been struggling lately to find the right number of Axes to go to war against a 60% capital with, pre-cats. I fear waiting too long and tend to rush it, so I'd like to see how others might handle it.

P.S. Tyrael I'd hardly call you a noob. Some good advice in there. I need to place Axes where I think the computer will settle more often. Also, very good advice about not starting a war too early if you hope to take a capital.

 

[Tyrael]

Well, I was playing on Warlord before S and Aelf showed me the way . Now I'm winning Monarch about 40%! And thanks, but I'm just glad I got to the easy stuff before everyone else .

 

[Moxxa]

I think you should research pottery next even if you want run a SE so you can start cottage spaming in your capital. It's nice to have some mature cottages up when you switch to beauracracy. Pottery also gives you access to the cheap granaries from expansive.

 

[jerVL/kg]

I agree with Validator -- found blue city next, and start spamming axemen. About 12 should do it, but build extra to be safe. Ragnar doesn't have horses or copper, but he does have marble. This means he's probably building a wonder. (One of the Poly wonders, most likely.) Good...let him waste the hammers. This is the perfect time to strike, do not wait for catapults.

You're at 40% science already, with only 2 cities?? How did that happen? (Or is that normal on Monarch?)

Also I would go for Pottery after Myst/Fishies. Not for cottages, for the granaries. You are expansive...

 

[Killroyan]

I can only say I have never seen a more tasty enemy then Ragnar right now. Just look at the resources. His capital is SWEET!!!! This is wall street heaven. 3 gems, enough food and all tiles that need to be cottaged. Yes even though this is supposed to be a SE economy I don't think that 1 huge commerce city is going to hurt and this one can even run 3 GP while growing. This city just screams for Oxford/wall street.

And I agree with JerVL he is propably building a wonder. Did he scout your country yet? I would settle the clam/incense sity and use it as a beachhead to invade Ragnar. Get those axes going now since he is still very weak. Also Mehmed is very close so he will propably want to expand upwards. On the other hand if he does it you can take it from him at the cost of an axeman or 2

 

[CivSetä]

Looks like Ragnar lacks copper. Invading Nidaros seems quite easy, 60% defence Axes could have been more challenging. I agree 12 axes is definitely enough, no extras needed in this case (if Sisiutil goes directly to the capital).

 

[Yushal]

Heheh, well, here is some more silly advice from me

Let him build a wonder or two before you take the capital. Bide your time building horsemen. Ragnar, if allowed 30 turns or so, will completely cottage his capital and give you the Great Lighthouse. Hopefully someone else buys the Oracle, etc, but you might gift him the tech for the one that give extra GPP (Hanging Gardens?) and get lucky.

IMHO, a worthy gambit. You will certainly succeed in taking the city no matter how long you might put it off, so all you lose is one happy point for awhile and some cash, traded off with many worker turns and cottage growth turns he is going to perform for you.

And since he's hemmed in, you will take all his continental cities. Therefore you need the money their cottages will be bringing in.

 

[OldDays]

...hmmm? Will 12 axes be enough to overcome the Better AI? I just had my first try with this mod and AIs truly are smarter when it comes to warfare.