ALC Game 21: Zulus/Shaka

[pieman11]

The original pieman must be the one who lives closest to Wigan, UK.

Lies! Hes the imposter! Shoot him!

 

[Sisiutil]

Lies! Hes the imposter! Shoot him!

Why do I get the feeling I'm watching an old Get Smart episode?

 

[Airefuego]

In the longer term, I'm thinking that it would be very desirable to get Russia and France to fight one another - whether or not it means we are part of the war too.

At the very least, we need to ensure that when our next big fight happens, one of them is on our side, not that they are allied together against us.

I wonder how our diplomacy can work towards this goal. Assuming that their direct relations haven't changed much since round 6, Charles and Peter are pretty happy with each other, shared religion etc... but are there any sneaky tricks we can pull with the AP? Is one of them enough of a backstabber to take a bribe to attack the other one while we stay at peace?

Failing that, if we start by attacking one of them, what can we do to ensure we can drag the other one in on our side? I'd love to see Peter and Charles take themselves out of tech contention by indulging in a long pillaging war down their long common border.

 

[Pieman]

Lies! Hes the imposter! Shoot him!

Quiet, you silly little clone! You know nothing of the mannerisms and Pieisms of the REAL pieman!

 

[Pieman]

(I apologise if I appear to be stealing the thread. Just continue with your strategic musings while I dispatch my clone).

 

[Scarredroman]

De Gaulle will backstab anybody if the price is right.

 

[Churchill's Hat]

Pieman registered before Pieman-11, so, therefore, Pieman-11 is the real clone.

 

[Andvare]

Pieman registered before Pieman-11, so, therefore, Pieman-11 is the real clone.

Or Pieman is a time travelling clone!

 

[Stuck in Pi]

Can we get back to the game?

 

[pigswill]

Ask Sisiutil .

 

[Sisiutil]

Round 8: 1610 AD to 1704 AD (20 turns)

I started off by making that tech trade that we agreed upon:

With that in place, I also anticipated making several civics changes. But I'd already lost a few turns to anarchy in a previous round, and Hammurabi was gaining a tech lead, so I was reluctant to lose many turns again. The only solution was to have a Golden Age. But I'd already used a Great Person for a GA earlier, so now I needed two GPs.

So I set about obtaining them as quickly as possible.

Saxon would generate a Great Scientist a few turns after Thracian (I hoped) generated a Great Artist. Running the artists would help with some of Russia's cultural pressure, too.

I decided to go after Wang Kon next, though it was going to take several turns for my stack to get over to Korean territory:

Well, that gave me several more turns to build a few more units, including a second, smaller stack that could capture Huamanga, the former Incan city (IIRC) that's isolated in my territory south of Cuzco. That would help ensure that some lone unit of Wang's wasn't wandering around in my back yard, pillaging tiles and causing trouble.

I founded another city in former American territory:

I know many of you recommended razing most of the American cities I captured, and they were pretty crappy, and I did; you can see two piles of rubbles above as proof. But the consequence of this is that Washington is extremely unhappy with me. I have a whopping -10 diplomacy demerit with him for razing cities, and that's going to take a while to overcome. I've buttered him up as much as I can with some advantageous trade and resource techs, and avoided demanding gold from him, but there's a long row to hoe there.

This means that for some time to come, George is not going to be willing to trade technologies. I won't make the same mistake with Wang Kon, and it's something I'll remember for future games. I would have been better off simply bypassing the cities I didn't want rather than attacking them.

Many of you said Wang Kon was looking to be dominated, and you're correct:

I was rather torn, but I didn't want to take the chance that he'd break away on his own at some point, so I turned him down.

I earned the Great Artist I'd been hoping for in Thracian:

I tucked him away until the next Great Person appears. If I hadn't been lucky enough to strike gems in one of my mines, I would have been tempted to settle him to try to steal Russia's.

Speaking of Russia, as I researched Rifling, I kept checking with Peter to see what the price of Rifling was--specifically, whether I could get it from him in exchange for Liberalism. At first, Peter wanted a huge amount of gold as well, which I didn't want to part with so I could afford unit upgrades. Eventually, however, the price lowered enough so it was attractive.

De Gaulle then declared war on Korea! Well, I certainly didn't want Wang to capitulate to the Frenchman, so I obviously needed to join in the fun. With significant weapons superiority in place, I declared war:

I moved my stacks into Korean territory, and on the next turn I took two cities:

Along with the good news, there came some bad. I lost the next AP election:

Darn! Bad timing. If the election had only happened a few turns later, Wang Kon's votes would have been swung my way. Though that still wouldn't have been enough to give me the win, so I'm going to have to focus on spreading Islam to my captured cities if I want to be sleeping in the holy palace again.

As I was saying, Wang was ready to come around to my way of thinking:

That didn't take long--which isn't really surprising, given the fact that he was already willing to capitulate to me voluntarily. After this and a tech trade in his favour, he was back up to "Friendly" status. So Wang Kon, at least, will be a vassal I can count on for outsourced research, especially since I left him with so much of his original territory. Resentful George is going to take longer, and may not ever come around. The war was so short, I didn't gain a permanent "shared military struggle" bonus with him. Next time.

My next Great Person appeared, and I began my second Golden Age of the game:

Sigh. Yes, it seemed a bit of a waste of a Great Scientist. He would have lightbulbed Scientific Method at this point, IIRC--I outsourced that research to Korea. I have to remember to be careful about trading techs to Wang Kon for the simple reason that I want to always ensure that I have something to trade to him for whatever tech I have him research.

I checked the foreign relations Info board to determine which economic civic to adopt:

Not a lot of foreign trade route income, in spite of the majority running Free Market. That settled it: Mercantilism, here I come. Along with Representation as well, to take full advantage of the specialist economy I'm running.

I stuck with OR for now because I decided to build up a little infrastructure, which I've been neglecting. I managed to build Jails in almost all my cities, which has helped espionage tremendously--notice I can now see what everyone's researching. (A bit of micromanagement of the Espionage allocation helped, too.) I also want to generate several Islamic missionaries to spread the faith to all my cities; hopefully I can get the AP back. On the last turn of the Golden Age, I plan on changing to Theocracy to generate promoted units, a civic I'll stick with for quite some time. I'm sticking with Bureaucracy rather than Nationhood for the diplomatic benefits with Peter.

So that's it for another relatively short round. A state-of-the-world post will follow.

 

[Sisiutil]

The State of the World, 1704 AD

Domestic Advisor - city builds:

Mostly civilian, non-military stuff. As I said, I've been neglecting infrastructure to an extent, so a Golden Age while running Organized Religion is a good chance to make up for that. Once these builds are out of the way, however, it's on to more typical Shaka/Zulu military builds--especially once I have Steel for Cannon!

Foreign advisor, Relations and Glance:

Heh. Washington dislikes me even more than De Gaulle does. De Gaulle and Peter are also still quite tight with one another.

Active trade deals:

Techs:

I'm not sure how Hammurabi does it. Every game I play against him, he's a tech monster. He doesn't have the advantages of a Mansa Musa, Huayna Capac, or Gandhi, so it must be something in the programming of his "personality". But you'll be happy to know, I should think, that I've stopped trading with him. Why help him out?

Notice I've not traded Chemistry, and as a result, the comforting thing from a military standpoint is that all of my remaining rivals are two relatively expensive techs away from having Cannon. And none of them are researching it, either. I foresee having a significant military advantage in that regard for some time in the next round. Once De Gaulle has Rifling, he'll be able to send both Riflemen and Cavalry at me, so I'll want to have Rifles and defensive Cannon on hand to counter them. (Defensive Cannon have Combat I/Bombard promotions to weaken enemy stacks so my other defenders can easily dispatch them.)

Military Advisor:

I have no navy whatsoever. I really don't see the need for it on this map.

Religion Advisor:

Here's part of the reason I lost that election: I have 5 cities without Islam. Mind you, two of them are brand new captured cities, but this will be a focus early in the next round. Between that and prying some cities away from my next target, I hope to have the votes to swing the AP back my way. I'm just hoping it doesn't cause me too much grief before then.

Victory Conditions:

So I'm definitely in the lead, but have a ways to go before I achieve domination.

Power:

De Gaulle will have Rifling soon, so that will boost his rating, but I'm still quite close--and Cannon are on the way! That should give me the advantage I need.

Demographics:

Once again, the key rating for me is Mfg. Goods--production, where I'm #1. I've found I can rely on that to see me through even if another civ is more powerful. It's civ imitating life: this is why America's entry into WWII was so significant, even when they were fighting on two fronts--no one else could match their manufacturing power.

Espionage, with a focus on the board leader, Peter:

As time goes on I find myself tweaking the EPs in mid-game once I have courthouses and jails to make the adjustments worthwhile and meaningful. A little micromangement allows me to eventually have visibility into everyone's research. It's a balancing act, allocating points to the one civ whose research I can't see while ensuring I don't lose that insight on anyone else. And, of course, if I'm anticipating a war or other action, trying to accumulate even more points to support espionage missions.

Now let's look at the map. To my mind, De Gaulle is the obvious next target, so I've focused on his territory.

The big advantage I have here is that I have a very small border with France. Only one of my cities is within obvious reach of his, so I've focused on garrisoning Thracian, as well as moving my stack there. In contrast, there are three French cities within relatively easy striking distance of that former barb city. Poor Wang Kon is going to be very vulnerable, but that's what vassals are for, sometimes.

Looking at the map now, I think that though the focus on defense at Thracian is a good idea, perhaps my stack is in the wrong place. It should move into Korean territory, to Pusan (sp?). From there, I can sweep west-to-east, taking Cheju, Uzbek, and Avignon in short order before doing a quarter-turn to attack Chartres. That's good land, too, and I would no longer be dependent on Peter for Dye.

I should think that if I then take Orleans as well, De Gaulle would be thinking of capitulating--especially since I'd then be a hop-skip-and jump from Paris. Does anyone one know what it takes to get him to buckle? (On a related note, I'd probably give Orleans back to De Gaulle if I took it; it's too close to Paris, it would be going into revolt constantly.)

I know we discussed the possibility of souring French-Russian relations, but that seems somewhat unlikely. Even though De Gaulle has lost the shared religion bonus since he went to Free Religion, he and Peter are still cozy.

The best I can hope for, I think, is that Peter will simply refuse to get involved on either side, red-lining a DOW on either myself or France on grounds of "betraying our friends". That's never stopped me, of course (witness me back-stabbing poor Wang Kon in this game, and countless other victims in earlier ALCs), but the AI is another matter. How likely is it that if I war against France, that Peter will stay on the sidelines?

 

[LightSpectra]

How feasible would it be to raze the city with the Apostolic Palace?

 

[Sisiutil]

How feasible would it be to raze the city with the Apostolic Palace?

IIRC, Hammurabi built it, so I'd have to DOW on his master, Peter . On top of that, marching to it overland would probably take too long and result in too many casualties (shades of Xenophon...), so I'd have to build a navy of Galleys (since I don't have Astronomy for Galleons) using only one coastal city that has rather crappy production.

So, not very feasible, in my estimation.

 

[r_rolo1]

^^And lose the AP hammers? Not worth it IMHO....

You should beef Wang a little..... Gift him some obsolete units and maybe even a brand new rifles. I also think that your mainn stack should be launched from Korean lands: the bad side of having short borders with a foe is that reduces a lot your options and Thracian, even considering his defensive value ( but I seriously doubt that french would focus on there... they will strike Korea fast and bad IMHO ) is not a good launching point for a invasion.

Basing your main stack in Pyonyang would allow you to attack the French heartland faster and closing the war faster....

 

[Gooblah]

Just wondering, but how in hell did Wang Kon place a city literally in the middle of Peter's territory? Was it Liberated to him? Or was it just there and Peter had to deal with it?

Anyways, good round. I think that you should start moving towards Tanks and Infantry to wipe out Peter, which is required for a Domination...

 

[mystyfly]

^I tink it might've been arb city Wang captured.
Nice sis, 1 civ dead, 2 civs vassalized, 2 civs @ friendly and 1 next target. Looking foreward to seeing you beating de gaulle up. You'll only get -1 with Peter and get some 'mutual military struggle' with Wang and more important with Wash. You know that you can tell your vassals what to research and which cities to attack, right? Might just as well make use of it.

 

[nbcman]

@ Sisiutil:
What about bribing Hammurabi into attacking DeGaulle? Hammurabi is at 0 to DeGaulle but a whopping +18 with Peter. If you can get Hammy in maybe Hammy can get his good friend Peter to join in the attack on DeGaulle also. But it doesn't look like you have much to trade Hammurabi for other than Chemistry now and Steel in 5 turns.

 

[Say_my_name]

@ Sisiutil:
What about bribing Hammurabi into attacking DeGaulle? Hammurabi is at 0 to DeGaulle but a whopping +18 with Peter. If you can get Hammy in maybe Hammy can get his good friend Peter to join in the attack on DeGaulle also. But it doesn't look like you have much to trade Hammurabi for other than Chemistry now and Steel in 5 turns.

Hammurabi is Peter's vassal. He can't declare war on anyone, unless Peter forces him to.

 

[nbcman]

@ Say my name
Ooops-that will teach me not to look at all of the screenshots.

Then it is doubtful that Chem & Steel will be enough to get Peter to DoW DeGaulle.

Is there a chance to get DeGaulle to DoW Peter if you trade DeGaulle Chem, Steel & Constitution? Then join in the dogpile on DeGaulle?