ALC Game 17, Take 2: Russia/Peter (BtS)

[DragonHawk]

Rome begins with Fishing. Sailing is available from the get-go. He has already invested in a sizable fishing fleet, and it seems likely the AI would want to build Galleys to defend it.

I don't think it's a stretch to research Sailing for immedate benefits of the lighthouses, defense of Russia's fisheries, pillaging of Julius' fisheries, possible military transport, and (later) hut-popping on the adjacent islands.

I was thinking along the line of Galley is probably lower in Caesar's build order -> he should want to expand first. But better safe than sorry, so count me in the research sailing first crowd. My tech order now is Sailing>AH>writing

 

[Validator]

I think one big question needs to be answered to decide how to move forward. Do you want to try for Pyramids? Without the advantage of stone or the Industrious trait it will require a significant amount of chopping. But look what's to the S of Moscow. A veritable sea of forests. Hmmm...

A city founded 1N2W of the eastern gold would have 9 forests within its fat cross and a few more just outside if needed. That city site would also be very cottage-spammable, so a good possibility for a bureaucratic capital. It seems to me that going after Pyramids at this site is a low risk/high return endeavor. If you get beaten to it you'll get a nice consolation prize for your treasury. You needed to clear the trees anyway for cottages. And of course if you end up winning the race it will provide a big boost to the SE.

Of course if you do give it a try you won't be able to afford to use Moscow for much of a military buildup. But you'll only need a couple of units to contain the Roman so Moscow can focus on supporting the Pyramid play.

Here's what I would do:
Switch Moscow's build to a granary. After a turn whip to finish it. The overflow plus another turn or two should get the barracks done at the same time the iron gets hooked up. Moscow can build a sword which can be sent to camp out on the forested hill NE of Rome. With the warrior denying the worker any opportunities in the south Caesar will be boxed in.

Moscow can then build an axe (to head S to stake out the Novgorod site) followed by a settler which can be whipped. Novgorod's build order is simple: granary whipped, monument whipped, Pyramids. After the settler Moscow can build another axe or 2 to defend against barbs and then a few lumberjacks (i.e workers). The workers can farm a couple of floodplains, chop the forests adjacent to Novgorod and mine the three plains hills after the border expands, the finish the chopping. At pop 5 Novgorod can work two farmed FPs and the three mined plains hills for 13 /turn.

It should be possible to get Pyramids done before the end of the BCs. I don't know what the odds are that a BtS AI will get it done before then, but we do know one AI that won't be building it.

While Moscow and Novgorod are focusing on Pyramids St. Pete can take its time building up a force of swords to put an end to the not so mighty Roman empire.

Once Rome is history it's time for expansion and exploration. St. Pete can build some galleys to try to make contact with another AI. It might be helpful to build a scout for each exploring galley just in case you encounter some larger islands (or goody huts ).

Tech order would probably be Sailing->AH->Writing->Masonry->Math.

After that things are a little less certain, but I'd probably go something like:
Aesthetics->Drama=> use culture to raise happiness and start growing cities
Poly->Priest->CoL=> so you'll be able to do something with that large population
Lit=> you know why

MC is definitely a possibility for forges and extra plus Colossus. Also Construction for coliseums.

 

[phurph]

Rome begins with Fishing. Sailing is available from the get-go. He has already invested in a sizable fishing fleet, and it seems likely the AI would want to build Galleys to defend it.

I don't think it's a stretch to research Sailing for immedate benefits of the lighthouses, defense of Russia's fisheries, pillaging of Julius' fisheries, possible military transport, and (later) hut-popping on the adjacent islands.

It appears Julius doesn't haved sailing. He went the pottery route (we can see cottages in rome). Also, in the second slide of the last post you can see a Roman work boat exploring the coast. No lighthouse in Rome either. And hardly any units. If he has sailing he isn't using it.

JC has been building work boats though. There are two options:

1)Go for sailing and throw a galley in the queue and that will take car of all his fish tiles (less defenders whipped during war). You should be able to get this done before he gets sailing (due to pillaging gold!). Also, this may encourage JC to build a Galley instead of Archers. Plus you can use that Galley for later exploration and defense.

2) Go straight for AH or Writing and just take Rome with some axes/swrds. JC will probably go whip crazy. This appraoch leaves all those Roman water tiles developed for you.

After the war, Pyramids for representation would be ideal, if possible (sorry can't help ya here!).

In regards to your happiness problem, I second Popejubal's idea of Theater/Colliseum based happiness (20% culture slider for 6 ) instead of HeredRule.

Here's the hammer cost
5 axes = 175
5 archers=125
Theatre+Collsm=170

Yeah, you'll need to sacrifice 20% science for culture. That's fine. Units cost money anyway and you won't really need them for a while. Higher pop (which you can feed) should more than make up for sacrificed science slider

Sisituil, Thanks for the series and the frequent updates!

 

[Janus0]

Re: happiness

You should make it a point, after the war is over of course, to fully explore the icey island to the north. There is a decent chance you can find either silver or furs there, and if you can find a decent seafood or seafood / deer city to claim it with it might even pay for itself.

 

[LlamaCat]

funny how your road goes right around the gold... I'm not a very good player but I would be interested to know why it wasn't roaded in the first place.

also, this worker nabbing business should have stopped with the new AI. is there a reason they could not code the AI to be more protective of its workers when they are on the borders?
And how are you able to view Caesar's technology so early in this game - just from the palace's spy points? I have yet to get that amount of espionage points so soon.

I mostly bring questions and not answers to these threads, but I do enjoy lurking! I will vote to attack and destroy Caesar.

 

[Sisiutil]

1st a critisism, why no road through the gold mine on the way to St Pete's...might take a few extra turns to make but instant gold online

In a previous ALC I was advised to focus on getting the roads built as quickly as possible, which means sticking to flat open terrain. That's now become a habit. Roading the gold isn't a huge priority just yet anyway. Roading the iron to both cities, and providing the military with a quick route to its first victim, was.

How long is that road going to take? Sailing might get the iron conected to your capital quicker, and it's also pillage-proof

The road is done, thanks to the captured worker, so Sailing is not a priority for that reason, though it may help with the REX that will follow the fall of Rome.

And I agree it'd be great to block off the food resources, which is why I'd stick with researching Sailing next so we can build a Galley.

I would go writing before sailing to get those libraries online fast.

I was thinking along the line of Galley is probably lower in Caesar's build order -> he should want to expand first. But better safe than sorry, so count me in the research sailing first crowd. My tech order now is Sailing>AH>writing

I'm leaning towards the latter tech route as well. Normally I'd prioritize writing for a Philosophical leader to get libraries and scientists running, but I'm not going to be building libraries just yet, and I don't need open borders with anyone, so that means writing can wait awhile, at least until after Rome has been conquered. At the moment, the gold mine is keeping research going quickly enough for my needs.

Galleys from Sailing would indeed allow me to restrict Caesar's ability to whip Archers, so as someone above said, it's looking more and more like a key military tech.

Another question: should I get granaries built before military units to help whipping? I think if I can get 1 Axe or Sword out first to keep Caesar from settling anywhere, and a Galley to suppress his own whipping ability, I'll have some time to get granaries built.

 

[Validator]

And how are you able to view Caesar's technology so early in this game - just from the palace's spy points? I have yet to get that amount of espionage points so soon.

That's a really good observation. Since Caesar obviously has a palace too does the disparity in EPs mean that Caesar has made contact with another AI by sending a fishing boat to explore that landmass to his W?

If so that would mean this isn't going to be an isolated situation after Caesar is dead.

 

[Sisiutil]

funny how your road goes right around the gold... I'm not a very good player but I would be interested to know why it wasn't roaded in the first place.

also, this worker nabbing business should have stopped with the new AI. is there a reason they could not code the AI to be more protective of its workers when they are on the borders?
And how are you able to view Caesar's technology so early in this game - just from the palace's spy points? I have yet to get that amount of espionage points so soon.

I mostly bring questions and not answers to these threads, but I do enjoy lurking! I will vote to attack and destroy Caesar.

The question on the road was answered in the above post. I probably should have roaded right through it, but I sometimes get over-excited about things like hooking up my cities and key strategic resources ASAP and forget to do the math.

As to the espionage, keep in mind that Rome is the only Civ I've contacted. In my other off-line BtS game I was on a virtual pangaea (2 continents separated by coast tiles). It took centuries and much fiddling with the espionage weights to see what anyone was researching. This time, with only one civ, it's happened pretty quickly.

A related question: when you see the espionage icon next to a rival's name on the lower right-hand score list, what does that mean?

 

[facistal]

I do not think anyone has mentioned this yet, but it is pretty important so I'll chime in.

If you can see what JC is researching that means you are accumulating espionage points on him faster than he is on you which means, he knows somebody else. (since you are both generating the same amount of points) Therefore you cannot be totally isolated. I would imagine that there is another civ on a landmass west of JC.

On other topics: Go for writing next - I guess you can get AH to make it cheaper first, but getting some scientists online will be essential.

On Happiness: Go for Drama instead of Monarchy. For one thing you want the GL so you will get to drama along you natural tech path. Second, you wont need a standing army for centuries after Rome falls, so why build excessive garrisons. Part of the true power of the SE is the culture slider. Use it.

 

[Validator]

A related question: when you see the espionage icon next to a rival's name on the lower right-hand score list, what does that mean?

It means that you have more EPs against them than they have against you.

 

[Pomp]

I'm all for the Sailing -> AH -> Writing tech path. You can cut off Caesar's food supply and easy whipping while being prepared to explore beyond your island continent.

Also, here's another factor to consider. In my current BtS game (Monarch, Epic, Aggressive AI), playing as Hammurabi, I got a similar start, isolated with Charlemagne. I denied him metal, choked off his expansion, and built a sword army to finish him, only to discover that the AI had apparently decided to cut its losses on my continent, build a settler, and send it overseas. I saw the galley sail away as I moved up to attack his capitol, and had to tech belatedly to Sailing to chase it, which extended the time it took me to finish him considerably.

The espionage icon, btw, means that you've accumulated more EP on Caesar than he's accumulated on you.

 

[icantdrawanime]

I'm all for the Sailing -> AH -> Writing tech path. You can cut off Caesar's food supply and easy whipping while being prepared to explore beyond your island continent.

Also, here's another factor to consider. In my current BtS game (Monarch, Epic, Aggressive AI), playing as Hammurabi, I got a similar start, isolated with Charlemagne. I denied him metal, choked off his expansion, and built a sword army to finish him, only to discover that the AI had apparently decided to cut its losses on my continent, build a settler, and send it overseas. I saw the galley sail away as I moved up to attack his capitol, and had to tech belatedly to Sailing to chase it, which extended the time it took me to finish him considerably.

The espionage icon, btw, means that you've accumulated more EP on Caesar than he's accumulated on you.

I've seen Napoleon do that as well... He ended up with a sizable empire even after I took all his mainland cities... I'm glad the AI puts more priority on settling overseas now.

But I wouldn't worry about chasing down his galleys, just kick him off your mainland and expand. You might have to boot him a few more times but that shouldn't be too big of a problem if you're running HR with a decent sized military force

 

[nwadams]

i'm gonna go with the screw sailing/galley to start whipping army for now camp, worst that can happen if we go after him is that he can either A: spam archers or B: built a boat and run away...neither are a huge deal...we can deal with the archers and if he runs away...well so be it, we'll deal with him in 200 years.

But if we go for sailing and a galley, what happens if he manages to get the copper hooked up? things could get ugly in a hurry.

 

[slaze]

Another question: should I get granaries built before military units to help whipping? I think if I can get 1 Axe or Sword out first to keep Caesar from settling anywhere, and a Galley to suppress his own whipping ability, I'll have some time to get granaries built.

Yeah, whip them right away, as expansive it will only be 1 pop. Even with all the food in Moscow allowing you to grow back, it'll just mean you'll be able to work more mines while "putting the brakes" on food in between whips. For St. Pete I'd whip from 3 -> 2, as the iron is such a strong tile.

After Rome, The biggest problem is going to be the happiness issue. Some people are suggesting the Drama thing (a very good idea i might add), and some Monarchy. Ultimately, I think we'll need both; there's just no way we can get our pop up into the teens, unless we can turn our 4 golds and 4 sugars into 8 happiness resources. The drama idea (which was calculated wrong is only 4 at 20% ) puts Moscow at pop 11 (with gold and sugar) which is a start but then I don't like the idea of diverting 20% of :beakers: for happiness all the way down the home strech. And keep in ming that it's cheaper to get to monarchy than drama

As usual, we'll have to combine strategies into tech priorities (for example, do we want the Great Library?, Do we expect to be running Pacifism? Shwedagon Paya? etc.)

After Caesar, I'd think about putting down the two gold cities, Civseta's #2 & 3. Gold mines, at this point in the game, work wonders for the sake of economy. After that, the window on the Great Library will be closing so you may have to get marble. The best marble spot is the one with all 4 sugars. Even if it wrecks all the dotmaps; it'll be good for a maximizing resources-minimizing cities kinda thing.

But given all your food, I don't think you can ignore HR & Caste System for Rome and Moscow. It's not necessarily something to scramble to, but it definately shouldn't be avoided. One thing from my experience with HR is that it's really hard for cities to be self suffincient (i.e. build their own units along w/ everything else); you'd have to demote other cities to do that for you (civseta's #2 hint, hint, your future Ironworks city).

There's alot going on, but i'd think that after the sailing>(AH)>writing ... well it's really hard to say. Do you head towards the GL (and drama & philo -religion would help), back to monarchy and then up through CoL through Currency? Maybe. Metal Casting & the Colossus Is another good idea.

Another thing, with sailing coming soon, is that you could maybe get the Great Lighthouse. I'd think St Pete would be perfect place for it, to not spoil you scientist pools.

It's a hard call, but i'd lean towards the above: Taoism, monarchy, CoL, and then CS to Liberalism. GLighthouse in Pete

Another thing, don't be afraid to stockpile great people. An Academy in a Bureaucratic, cottaged capitol is a very strong move, but kepp in mind that you could also be bulbing (possibly paper) , education, liberalism, chemistry, scientific method, printing press, physics, biology, electricity

And i see caesars trying to chop a tree. No Caesar, no

 

[slaze]

i'm gonna go with the screw sailing/galley to start whipping army for now camp, worst that can happen if we go after him is that he can either A: spam archers or B: built a boat and run away...neither are a huge deal...we can deal with the archers and if he runs away...well so be it, we'll deal with him in 200 years.

But if we go for sailing and a galley, what happens if he manages to get the copper hooked up? things could get ugly in a hurry.

I agree with this. I don't think we have to build a galley, especially not to pillage resources that will soon be ours. And a workboat can explore just as well

 

[martin031]

also, this worker nabbing business should have stopped with the new AI. is there a reason they could not code the AI to be more protective of its workers when they are on the borders?

It actually has improved. I have noticed in a few of my games, that the AI wil accompany their workers with at least one unit on our border cities. This has only happened though when we have some close borders demerits first. It also tipped me off that they might soon mount an attack (which they did).

I think that it needs to be tweaked for the ancient era though. But I did get burned doing this in one game where I stole the worker and did not realize they had an archer near my capital that waltzed in before my warrior was done. Game over, lesson learned.

 

[ratrangerm]

Question: What would be the turns it would take to research AH, then Writing, as opposed to the turns it would take to go straight to Writing? That would answer the question as to which path to go.

I'm thinking you probably should have risked going after one of those cottages when Caesar had just the one Archer. Unless the AI will always attack with its sole unti defending the city if it believes it can win (although it would have been a risk if the Warrior was kept across the river, which could be done with that cottage that is now a hamlet).

I'd get your units out first, and work in the granaries when you can. St. Pete will probably need its granary first as it has just the one fish resource. Moscow has enough food that it can grow back after whipping without a granary at this time. So I'd let Moscow build/whip units after the barracks is finished, while St. Pete should have a granary.

And watch Caesar just in case he decides to send an Archer out into your own territory. He may risk pillaging, or even trying to take a city.

 

[Scaphism]

On granaries: I'm not sure. You have so much excess food you'll grow back very quickly with or without a granary. The benefit would come if you can work mines on those turns it would spend growing without a granary. The limit is obviously happiness and not your ability to regrow quickly. That means you probably want ~3 mines available to produce while slowing growth. Grow back to your happy cap very quickly working food tiles for 1-4 turns, spend the rest working mines and probably a single food resource.

If you can whip a granary for 2 pop and put the overflow into a barracks (or even an unpromoted sword) I'd guess it's worthwhile, but that's based on estimations and not calculations.

 

[slobberinbear]

Jules' espionage deficiency + the mysterious non-settling of another visible city = Jules has met other civs and likely settled another city not on your continent.

All the more reason for Sailing. Hunt his salad dressing hiney across the seas, baby!

 

[martin031]

Jules' espionage deficiency + the mysterious non-settling of another visible city = Jules has met other civs and likely settled another city not on your continent.

All the more reason for Sailing. Hunt his salad dressing hiney across the seas, baby!

I do not know if I get the resoning behind this. Why not clean out the continent first, then see if he has made cities elsewhere. Is it just to mitigate the "long to be with our homeland" unhapiness? Seems like alot of effort for little gain, when those hammers can be divested elsewhere if that is in fact the case. But I highly doubt he has a city already on another landmass already.