ALC Game 20: Vikings/Ragnar
- Thread starter Sisiutil
- Start date
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
Round 9: 1495 AD to 1722 AD (52 turns) - Part 1
Sorry for the delay in playing and posting this round, everyone. Real life does intervene every now and then.
I started the round with a civics change:
That resulted in a big savings--my income went up to just over +100 GPT and I was able to raise the science slider to notches from 40% to 60% as a result. Of course, it didn't stay there through the whole round...
Meanwhile, you'll recall that I had earned a Great Spy from researching Communism first. He went to Carthaginian territory on an infiltration mission:
That put a tech theft within reach:
Meanwhile, of course, I kept researching my own techs, focusing on military ones in anticipation of going to war with Hannibal:
This was a key tech for the war in my eyes because while I had Cannon and Grenadiers for offense, I needed good defensive units, and Rifling provided them. I upgraded several Musketmen, Longbowmen, and one or two Pikemen and other units to Riflemen once I had this tech squared away.
I also founded another city.
Not exactly a powerhouse city, but it gave me my second crab resource for trading. It also claims some additional land--which is at a premium on this map--towards the anticipated domination win.
So with Rifling researched and my units ready to pounce, it was time to declare war.
I decided to attack Kerkouane first. It would provide a buffer for my formerly-German acquisitions, and it would also relieve all of that cultural pressure on Hamburg that KMad surmised was caused by a Great Artist. This would give me a source of Pigs for additional health in my cities, too.
Kerkouane was not strongly defended:
Once the Ships of the Line cleared away the cultural defense, I first attacked with my Cannon:
That's not the first one that attacked--I lost a couple. Once the Cannon were done, I let my Berserker go at it so he could earn XPs towards his next City Raider promotion.
Then I let the Amphibious Grenadiers finish things off.
The city didn't have a lot going for it, but I kept it.
Meanwhile, back home, my next Great Person was, of all things, a Great Prophet.
I was tempted to use him for a Golden Age, but I'd like to use the GE to rush the Ironworks. Also, Hannibal did not build any shrines, so I decided to save him for that purpose.
One of my spies in Oea finally achieved a 50% discount, so I stole a tech from Hannibal.
It made sense to focus on military techs. Though I was researching Biology, but that was, first off, because I'm running a lot of specialists, and second, because I could see it would make good, harmless trading fodder.
Speaking of Oea, it was my next target.
I decided to capture all of Hannibal's coastal cities on his main land mass, proceeding around in a clockwise direction. My ships and amphibious units would allow me to do this quickly and effectively while I built up sufficient forces to capture Hannibal's sole land-locked city, Hippo.
And, of course, a few tech trades were in order, as the opportunities presented themselves.
Mehmed, by the way, ended up building the Kremlin. I didn't even bother going after it. I heeded your advice and decided to forgo wonders in favour of military units (mostly).
To be continued...
Sorry for the delay in playing and posting this round, everyone. Real life does intervene every now and then.
I started the round with a civics change:
That resulted in a big savings--my income went up to just over +100 GPT and I was able to raise the science slider to notches from 40% to 60% as a result. Of course, it didn't stay there through the whole round...
Meanwhile, you'll recall that I had earned a Great Spy from researching Communism first. He went to Carthaginian territory on an infiltration mission:
That put a tech theft within reach:
Meanwhile, of course, I kept researching my own techs, focusing on military ones in anticipation of going to war with Hannibal:
This was a key tech for the war in my eyes because while I had Cannon and Grenadiers for offense, I needed good defensive units, and Rifling provided them. I upgraded several Musketmen, Longbowmen, and one or two Pikemen and other units to Riflemen once I had this tech squared away.
I also founded another city.
Not exactly a powerhouse city, but it gave me my second crab resource for trading. It also claims some additional land--which is at a premium on this map--towards the anticipated domination win.
So with Rifling researched and my units ready to pounce, it was time to declare war.
I decided to attack Kerkouane first. It would provide a buffer for my formerly-German acquisitions, and it would also relieve all of that cultural pressure on Hamburg that KMad surmised was caused by a Great Artist. This would give me a source of Pigs for additional health in my cities, too.
Kerkouane was not strongly defended:
Once the Ships of the Line cleared away the cultural defense, I first attacked with my Cannon:
That's not the first one that attacked--I lost a couple. Once the Cannon were done, I let my Berserker go at it so he could earn XPs towards his next City Raider promotion.
Then I let the Amphibious Grenadiers finish things off.
The city didn't have a lot going for it, but I kept it.
Meanwhile, back home, my next Great Person was, of all things, a Great Prophet.
I was tempted to use him for a Golden Age, but I'd like to use the GE to rush the Ironworks. Also, Hannibal did not build any shrines, so I decided to save him for that purpose.
One of my spies in Oea finally achieved a 50% discount, so I stole a tech from Hannibal.
It made sense to focus on military techs. Though I was researching Biology, but that was, first off, because I'm running a lot of specialists, and second, because I could see it would make good, harmless trading fodder.
Speaking of Oea, it was my next target.
I decided to capture all of Hannibal's coastal cities on his main land mass, proceeding around in a clockwise direction. My ships and amphibious units would allow me to do this quickly and effectively while I built up sufficient forces to capture Hannibal's sole land-locked city, Hippo.
And, of course, a few tech trades were in order, as the opportunities presented themselves.
Mehmed, by the way, ended up building the Kremlin. I didn't even bother going after it. I heeded your advice and decided to forgo wonders in favour of military units (mostly).
To be continued...
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
Round 9: 1495 AD to 1722 AD (52 turns) - Part 2
I finished researching my next tech, which allowed me to run more specialists and/or grow several of my cities larger.
This would also help towards the domination win, since population is part of that victory equation. And as I said in the previous post and as you'll see in this one, Biology was, indeed, useful for tech trading.
After that, I researched...
I've been burned in a few recent offline games because the AI is now very reluctant to trade this tech, I suppose because it enables the founding of corporations. And as a result, I've delayed Assembly Line and lost out on both the Pentagon and Fascism's free Great General. So, no delays this time. Strangely, though Corporation added 1 trade route per city, but income dropped considerably on that turn. Strange...
I kept on capturing coastal Carthaginian cities:
Hammurabi continued to be a useful tech trading partner. Here's the first instance of Biology coming in handy:
War weariness was mounting and several other civs were converting to Emancipation, and so I knew I wouldn't be far behind.
My next tech had something of a military bent, and a potential hammer boost for some of my cities:
Another turn, another Carthaginian city falls...
And once again I was able to get some mileage out of Biology:
Eventually, I captured Hannibal's capital:
It was quite a prize, with no less than 3 world wonders:
As you can see, I kept every Carthaginian city, even though some of them are in some dubious locations--building right on top of wheat? Nuts. But winning by domination is going to be challenging on this map, so I need all the population and territory I can get.
Mehmed came by with a demand, and to keep him happy, I caved:
So the Yanks may be my next target, after Carthage is destroyed, as per Cato the Elder.
I finally had to change civics. Between the war weariness and everybody and his dog running Emancipation, unhappiness was becoming unmanageable.
And as I planned, I finally had enough units for a land-based invasion, and captured the last two Carthaginian cities on the continent:
I kept Carmona--it will work that oil tile and has sugar to feed itself. Spain, however, claimed two of the sugar tiles--that's Isabella's capital right there--so I will likely have to attack Spain after Carthage is done.
My next tech was completed near the very end of the round:
Normally I'd found Mining Inc. with that Great Engineer I still have, but not this time. I'm running State Property and will probably keep it that way to deal with all the distributed maintenance costs. Once the railroads are built on the hammer-rich tiles it will provide a very welcome hammer boost. Plus I can now build Machine Guns, a very strong defensive unit. I usually like to build Grenadiers, give them City Garrison II (a promotion MGs can't be assigned directly), then upgrade them to MGs. I'd better get on with it, though--once I finish researching Assembly Line (which I've chosen as my next tech), I won't be able to build Grens anymore.
So Hannibal has lost everything but four island-based cities. Is he ready to capitulate? NO!
Stubborn li'l cuss, ain't he? I think this means that Cato the Censor prevails: Carthage must be destroyed. I'm sick of the unhappiness in his former cities anyway. I certainly have the ships and amphibious units to take out his remaining island-base cities, and I have Ships of the Line sitting outside each one keeping their defenses at 0%. After that, I think it should be Spain, then America. But what do you think?
The game save is below. A state of the world post will follow.
I finished researching my next tech, which allowed me to run more specialists and/or grow several of my cities larger.
This would also help towards the domination win, since population is part of that victory equation. And as I said in the previous post and as you'll see in this one, Biology was, indeed, useful for tech trading.
After that, I researched...
I've been burned in a few recent offline games because the AI is now very reluctant to trade this tech, I suppose because it enables the founding of corporations. And as a result, I've delayed Assembly Line and lost out on both the Pentagon and Fascism's free Great General. So, no delays this time. Strangely, though Corporation added 1 trade route per city, but income dropped considerably on that turn. Strange...
I kept on capturing coastal Carthaginian cities:
Hammurabi continued to be a useful tech trading partner. Here's the first instance of Biology coming in handy:
War weariness was mounting and several other civs were converting to Emancipation, and so I knew I wouldn't be far behind.
My next tech had something of a military bent, and a potential hammer boost for some of my cities:
Another turn, another Carthaginian city falls...
And once again I was able to get some mileage out of Biology:
Eventually, I captured Hannibal's capital:
It was quite a prize, with no less than 3 world wonders:
As you can see, I kept every Carthaginian city, even though some of them are in some dubious locations--building right on top of wheat? Nuts. But winning by domination is going to be challenging on this map, so I need all the population and territory I can get.
Mehmed came by with a demand, and to keep him happy, I caved:
So the Yanks may be my next target, after Carthage is destroyed, as per Cato the Elder.
I finally had to change civics. Between the war weariness and everybody and his dog running Emancipation, unhappiness was becoming unmanageable.
And as I planned, I finally had enough units for a land-based invasion, and captured the last two Carthaginian cities on the continent:
I kept Carmona--it will work that oil tile and has sugar to feed itself. Spain, however, claimed two of the sugar tiles--that's Isabella's capital right there--so I will likely have to attack Spain after Carthage is done.
My next tech was completed near the very end of the round:
Normally I'd found Mining Inc. with that Great Engineer I still have, but not this time. I'm running State Property and will probably keep it that way to deal with all the distributed maintenance costs. Once the railroads are built on the hammer-rich tiles it will provide a very welcome hammer boost. Plus I can now build Machine Guns, a very strong defensive unit. I usually like to build Grenadiers, give them City Garrison II (a promotion MGs can't be assigned directly), then upgrade them to MGs. I'd better get on with it, though--once I finish researching Assembly Line (which I've chosen as my next tech), I won't be able to build Grens anymore.
So Hannibal has lost everything but four island-based cities. Is he ready to capitulate? NO!
Stubborn li'l cuss, ain't he? I think this means that Cato the Censor prevails: Carthage must be destroyed. I'm sick of the unhappiness in his former cities anyway. I certainly have the ships and amphibious units to take out his remaining island-base cities, and I have Ships of the Line sitting outside each one keeping their defenses at 0%. After that, I think it should be Spain, then America. But what do you think?
The game save is below. A state of the world post will follow.
dragomaster
Warlord
man it's here. long time no see sisi
Corporation obsoletes the Great Lighthouse, so you actually had a net loss of 1 trade route in almost all of your cities when you researched that tech.
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
The State of the World, 1722 AD
Let's look at the Domestic Advisor to begin things:
As you can see, a lot of the builds are dealing with happiness issues. I'll be glad when Hippo's borders expand and I get access to sugar.
Civics:
Foreign Advisor, Relations:
Foreign Advisor, Glance:
Active trade deals:
The former Carthaginian territory is very resource-rich, so this has changed considerably. The Vikings are not nearly as dependent on foreign resources as they used to be. Once Hippo comes out of revolt, I'll have dye and can cancel that horse deal with Hammy.
Resources:
Trade route income and civics:
It's always nice when everyone starts to leave Mercantilism behind.
Techs:
State Property makes Divine Right even more unattractive--Versailles is unnecessary, ditto for the Forbidden Palace.
Military Advisor:
It's tough to have enough ships on this map! Many of my seafood tiles are still undefended. I've had to keep churning out land units for the war.
Religion:
The focus on military builds also kept me from spreading religions around for happiness to take advantage of Free Religion. D'OH! I didn't really have a Galleon free to ship Missionaries around, either. But I probably could have benefited from them if I'd made the effort.
Victory conditions:
A long way to go for domination. But considering that I started isolated, I think that's not too bad.
Power:
Yep, I'm the biggest, meanest kid on the block.
It's been very interesting to see how the AI has approached this map. Hannibal's power base seemed to be largely based around sea power--he had hordes of Caravels, and not nearly as many land units as I'm used to seeing the AI have. Also, the AI seems to be de-prioritizing many of its favourite techs from the more land-based games, such as Replaceable Parts, Military Tradition, and so on.
Demographics:
It's a little embarrassing when you're a Financial leader, you're dominating the game, but you're third in GNP. Oh well, I'm #1 in almost everything else!
Top 5 Cities/Wonders:
And, finally, Espionage:
One more thing: I just earned my next GP, a Great Scientist. I'm thinking of saving him and hoping for a different GP next. I captured the Mausoleum, remember, so I can have an extended Golden Age. Thoughts?
And what does everyone think of finishing off Carthage, then Spain, then America?
Let's look at the Domestic Advisor to begin things:
As you can see, a lot of the builds are dealing with happiness issues. I'll be glad when Hippo's borders expand and I get access to sugar.
Civics:
Foreign Advisor, Relations:
Foreign Advisor, Glance:
Active trade deals:
The former Carthaginian territory is very resource-rich, so this has changed considerably. The Vikings are not nearly as dependent on foreign resources as they used to be. Once Hippo comes out of revolt, I'll have dye and can cancel that horse deal with Hammy.
Resources:
Trade route income and civics:
It's always nice when everyone starts to leave Mercantilism behind.
Techs:
State Property makes Divine Right even more unattractive--Versailles is unnecessary, ditto for the Forbidden Palace.
Military Advisor:
It's tough to have enough ships on this map! Many of my seafood tiles are still undefended. I've had to keep churning out land units for the war.
Religion:
The focus on military builds also kept me from spreading religions around for happiness to take advantage of Free Religion. D'OH! I didn't really have a Galleon free to ship Missionaries around, either. But I probably could have benefited from them if I'd made the effort.
Victory conditions:
A long way to go for domination. But considering that I started isolated, I think that's not too bad.
Power:
Yep, I'm the biggest, meanest kid on the block.
It's been very interesting to see how the AI has approached this map. Hannibal's power base seemed to be largely based around sea power--he had hordes of Caravels, and not nearly as many land units as I'm used to seeing the AI have. Also, the AI seems to be de-prioritizing many of its favourite techs from the more land-based games, such as Replaceable Parts, Military Tradition, and so on.
Demographics:
It's a little embarrassing when you're a Financial leader, you're dominating the game, but you're third in GNP. Oh well, I'm #1 in almost everything else!
Top 5 Cities/Wonders:
And, finally, Espionage:
One more thing: I just earned my next GP, a Great Scientist. I'm thinking of saving him and hoping for a different GP next. I captured the Mausoleum, remember, so I can have an extended Golden Age. Thoughts?
And what does everyone think of finishing off Carthage, then Spain, then America?
fizbankovi
Warlord
- Joined
- Oct 19, 2004
- Messages
- 278
Great round. Game is practicly won now. Still its gonna be a lot of work to micomanage all those units...
ranion
Chieftain
its really just a matter of time now, you seemed to practically steamroll Hannibal, and you are probably in a good position to do the same to whoever the heck else you feel like, when you feel like it. so get to it, start gobbling up land and stepping on whoever happens to be on it at the time until the game is won and the vikings rule this water based world.
Gooblah
Heh...
- Joined
- Jun 5, 2007
- Messages
- 4,282
I can think of a quick list of objectives:
1) Mop up Hannibal and Isabella. Isabella still has Catapults; Hannibal has 4 cities and won't be going anywhere soon. Also, is Izzy still Hannibal's vassal? Do colonial vassals have the ability to cancel?
2) If every one of those green tiles is one of Mehmed's cities...Ouch. He'll give you a run for your money.
3) Build some Galleons, and send three missionaries of all religions present in the Empire throughout it. Culture will help (mildly) for a Domination Victory. You can ignore the slider, though; using it is slightly pointless.
4) After the war is over, switch into Free Speech and Emancipation. It'll cut costs and unhappiness. Get Hadrumetum some food! It's at -14, and will likely starve several citizens until it comes out of anarchy, and even then...
5) Go for Sid's Sushi. Not just for the food and culture, but for the fact that any other Civ that gets it will have a HUGE supply of fish, crabs, and clams...
6) Conquer Roosevelt. He's weak, Cautious, and in position to conquer Suryavarman II.
1) Mop up Hannibal and Isabella. Isabella still has Catapults; Hannibal has 4 cities and won't be going anywhere soon. Also, is Izzy still Hannibal's vassal? Do colonial vassals have the ability to cancel?
2) If every one of those green tiles is one of Mehmed's cities...Ouch. He'll give you a run for your money.
3) Build some Galleons, and send three missionaries of all religions present in the Empire throughout it. Culture will help (mildly) for a Domination Victory. You can ignore the slider, though; using it is slightly pointless.
4) After the war is over, switch into Free Speech and Emancipation. It'll cut costs and unhappiness. Get Hadrumetum some food! It's at -14, and will likely starve several citizens until it comes out of anarchy, and even then...
5) Go for Sid's Sushi. Not just for the food and culture, but for the fact that any other Civ that gets it will have a HUGE supply of fish, crabs, and clams...
6) Conquer Roosevelt. He's weak, Cautious, and in position to conquer Suryavarman II.
popejubal
Emperor
You're in Emancipation now and you will be for most (if not all) of the entire rest of the game.
Why not nab the Kremlin to make all of your rush builds (theaters and military units especially) that much cheaper? I'd say take the Ottoman empire and build a shrine in whatever the biggest religion is without a shrine. I'm pretty sure you'll have the Buddhist, Confucian and the Islamic holy cities after Mehmed, right?
Mehmed will give you the Sistine Chapel in addition to the Kremlin and that will make border pops very much easier. If a city has too much population for that first ring, any Citizen or Marchant specialists that take up the overflow will give a couple of culture points each. That makes the cultural pressure and the wait for that first pop a lot easier to handle.
You certainly don't have to go after him immediately, but I'd say that he's worth considering for those two wonders alone even if he didn't have good cities and good land. He'll be a tough nut to crack since he's just a couple of turns away from Railroads, but a little bit of Artillery makes just about any city defense go *pop*.
Why not nab the Kremlin to make all of your rush builds (theaters and military units especially) that much cheaper? I'd say take the Ottoman empire and build a shrine in whatever the biggest religion is without a shrine. I'm pretty sure you'll have the Buddhist, Confucian and the Islamic holy cities after Mehmed, right?
Mehmed will give you the Sistine Chapel in addition to the Kremlin and that will make border pops very much easier. If a city has too much population for that first ring, any Citizen or Marchant specialists that take up the overflow will give a couple of culture points each. That makes the cultural pressure and the wait for that first pop a lot easier to handle.
You certainly don't have to go after him immediately, but I'd say that he's worth considering for those two wonders alone even if he didn't have good cities and good land. He'll be a tough nut to crack since he's just a couple of turns away from Railroads, but a little bit of Artillery makes just about any city defense go *pop*.
From civilopedia: "So long as relations remain good between the parent civilization and the colony, the colony will remain as a vassal for them."
So colonies only break off if their attitude to the parent civilization sours.
It's not emancipation that allows $rushing, it's universal suffrage, and sis has loads of specialists (strange idea for a financial leader by the way). o he's benefitting more from representation.
Is it worth going for a late conversation into total commerce economy? I don't think so, because it's so late and because you'll be running culutre slider soon enough to not really benefit from commerce.
No need to worry about your next target now, you're stille at war with 2 of them.
edit : you have a great prophet and a great scientist. Just what you need for a golden age now. Is a shrine worth the effort? not enough to compete with a large empire worth of golden age. I'd wait until most cities come out of revolt though.
It's not so strange for an archipelago map where the possible cottage sites are limited, and there's seafood nearly everywhere.
Bobbalouie
Chieftain
- Joined
- Jan 7, 2006
- Messages
- 80
I'm too lazy to go check the beginning of the game, but didn't you make the Great Lighthouse? So long ago I can't remember clearly. Anyway, if you did, that would've been obsoleted by Corporation, so you lost a trade route in all of your many coastal cities. If you didn'nt have the GLH, then the loss of income is a mystery to me.
absimiliard
Warlord
Censeo ceterum, carthaginem delendam esse.
After Carthage is gone I don't care. Eat America, make some colonies, win the game. Whatever makes you happy.
-abs
After Carthage is gone I don't care. Eat America, make some colonies, win the game. Whatever makes you happy.
-abs
Gooblah
Heh...
- Joined
- Jun 5, 2007
- Messages
- 4,282
Hmm.
Sisutil, you built the Great Lighthouse, which gives +2 trade routes per city. Then, you researched Corporation, which gives an extra trade route to be sure, but obsoletes the Great Lighthouse, reducing the number of trade routes in each city by one, thus reducing your commerce and income.
Also, Cabert, even though Ragnar is Financial, Sisutil's playing on an Archipelago map. Thus, seafood is prevalent, and with a Lighthouse, a great source of food (Fish provide 6 food, Crabs/Clams produce 5). Fish can support 2 additional specialists; Crabs/Clams can support 1, with 1 extra food, and with 2 Crabs/Clams, 3 Specialists.
Sisutil, you built the Great Lighthouse, which gives +2 trade routes per city. Then, you researched Corporation, which gives an extra trade route to be sure, but obsoletes the Great Lighthouse, reducing the number of trade routes in each city by one, thus reducing your commerce and income.
Also, Cabert, even though Ragnar is Financial, Sisutil's playing on an Archipelago map. Thus, seafood is prevalent, and with a Lighthouse, a great source of food (Fish provide 6 food, Crabs/Clams produce 5). Fish can support 2 additional specialists; Crabs/Clams can support 1, with 1 extra food, and with 2 Crabs/Clams, 3 Specialists.
Nice going! I enjoy reading these posts, they are very educational. In my last game I played as the vikings, and I found it surprising how quickly I forgot about the amphibious penalty and always just attacked straight out of the boats, without even checking if I was using "old" amphibious upgraded units or "new" non-amphibious ones.
By the way, how do you get the "glance" screen in the diplomatic adviser?
By the way, how do you get the "glance" screen in the diplomatic adviser?
Shoot the Moon
Playing World in Conflict
- Joined
- Dec 24, 2005
- Messages
- 708
It was in the original BtS release, but one of the later patches turned it off. However, Buhric's patch turns it back on (Sis is playing with Bhuric's).
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