ALC Game #22 Take 2: Arabs/Saladin

[whakamole]

And did you notice how [Zara's] GNP has spiked since finishing the Great Lighthouse?

Another good argument for shutting down that open borders agreement with Zara - deny him that Arabian trade income!

 

[schwartz]

Good to know I'm not the only one who gets frustrated and opens up the WB sometimes. IMO you need to whip Madrassas on the border with Zara immediately.

 

[JujuLautre]

The Stele's culture won't double. Only hard build improvements double their culture after 1000 years.

I can't check it now, but I'm quite sure this isn't true. I mean, I'm sure that I saw monuments with doubled cultural output from stonehenge.

Back on topic, I'm really not sure you need that iron city quickly. You need iron for swords, but you can do without for the time being. You need iron for crossbows, granted, but don't forget that you don't need iron for maces (you have copper) and you don't need iron for your knights ! (UU pawa) So beside crossbows, the next iron-unit is cannons, if I'm correct, and one could suppose that at that time, you have some inside your cultural borders.

 

[OTAKUjbski]

The Stele's culture won't double. Only hard build improvements double their culture after 1000 years.

I can't check it now, but I'm quite sure this isn't true. I mean, I'm sure that I saw monuments with doubled cultural output from stonehenge.

Honkoid is correct.

Free Monuments from Stonehenge do not increase their , nor do they persist after Stonehenge is made obsolete, destroyed or lost.

It's most probable the Monument you observed with the doubling culture was one built prior to the introduction of Stonehenge.

 

[slobberinbear]

You didn't miss out in this case, but Pyramids is too important to take that sort of gamble IMO. I suppose if your plan all along was to go back and reload if you got beaten then that might explain it, although it does start to show how your strategy is being skewed in favor of risky behavior with the knowledge that you can avoid the bad outcome by reloading.

I agreed with the points in the rest of your post (re: Zara, building Madrassas, etc.), but I think this is a tad harsh. He's come clean about it and, after all, the ALC is an exhibition game of sorts. If he loses or gets a poor score, that's not really the point of the series. So while while it would have been nice to know that he's taken a Civ mulligan or two, I don't think you can make the leap that he's taking undue risks knowing he can reload, or imply that he actually does reload all the time.

To me, it's a bit of a smear on the integrity of a guy who's shown nothing but class and integrity in every post, and advanced the game for literally thousands of newbies. Give the man a break.

 

[vicawoo]

This is getting unfocused.

You know most of the special resources, borders are close to being resolved, now what?

What's your gameplan? What's your next big tech (construction/metal casting/code of laws)? Are you attacking with catapults/great spy or waiting for medieval tech or liberalism? Are you going to be the tech leader or steal techs? What special resources do the enemy have? What techs do they have? What's the diplomacy situation?

I mean, I like early religion or I like wonder X isn't a very comprehensive strategy.

 

[Nares]

Are you going to be the tech leader or steal techs?

Backdoor Liberalism.

Great Prophet for Theology. Great Scientist for Philosophy (or Education).

 

[3rn0]

WHOAA?! Is this ALC or the movie "Butterfly effect"? My head hurts.
Maybe I should focus to my work now...

 

[kazapp]

Most seriously, I'm afraid you've let the Zara monster out of the bag. You had a chance when the copper tile flipped to go in and choke him to deny him any strategic resources.

My sentiment exactly, and it didn't have to be a offensive war - just enough to wipe away any Ethiopian cities near "your" copper, and showing off your Protective trait. The fact Zara would become completely disrupted (neither getting a strong army or a strong tech position) would be a neat bonus, making the job of mopping up once you get Catapults much easier.

 

[kazapp]

IMO you need to whip Madrassas on the border with Zara immediately.

IMO you need to forget about the cultural race, and beat Zara where you can win. On the battlefield.

Just declare war (and pillage his metal), and then he's a goner.

As it is now, I wouldn't be surprised if the Zara AI has decided he's boxed in, which means he's building an army to backstab you with.

Either that, or you keep open borders, avoid war, and get a few poison pills all over your territory. Cities whose culture will steal your tiles, that is.

 

[kazapp]

10 characters

 

[Artichoker]

Looks like you should expand towards Roosevelt, while slowly building your military.
Choose one of Roosevelt's cities as a future target for conquest...probably go for the one with the best resources, that is within reach. I'd say ~700 AD is a target date for attacking Roosevelt.

Zara looks too cramped and edged against the ocean to be any serious threat.

 

[NaZdReG]

everyone seems to be forgetting a silent weapon at your disposal.

get some spies up and running.. have 2-3 by the time you get your great spy (yeah you could end up with an engineer but thems the breaks)

plant one in each of his cities and the moment you get that infiltrate for the espionage points use forment unhappyness and cutoff all of his working citizens.

this will grind production to a halt and kill a good chunk of his population off. won't help you culturally but you can severly cripple him before the upcoming war even w/o infiltrating the spy there. just direct all your eps towards him for now and you should have enough to forment unhappy a couple of times

NaZ

 

[LuCiver]

Did you notice that the rice NW of Lalibela is now unclaimed in the replay of this round? Since the replay went a few extra turns, that means either he didn't build a settler (ha ha) or he sent it somewhere else. My guess is that without the barb city on the south coast, Zara has sent his settler south and will be claiming that corn-crab city before you get a chance.

 

[Sisiutil]

@Sis
City placement, barbgate and wonderspam aside (you were fine on Pyramids, btw), why are you chopping a non-riverside grassland forest near Mecca, when there are two riverside grassland forests available to be chopped? EDIT: This was in the "alternate reality" save.

I'm just curious, because while keeping forests in your BFC until the modern era may not always be necessary or advisable, if there were some sort of checklist for which forests not to chop, I'd think a non-riverside grassland would be right beside a non-riverside plains tile as the second most useless forest to chop.

Looking at the "real" save, I'm even more confused. The non-riverside grassland forest you were chopping in the "alternate" save is gone (makes sense), but one of the two riverside grassland forests are gone. Obviously, a worker made the trip down to the river to chop it. Why not chop both, and leave the one on the tile you're not going to improve for centuries alone?

Your worker is currently building a mine on the non-riverside grassland hill. That's another forest that will be chopped. Why not chop this one for the Pyramids, and leave the non-riverside grassland forest untouched?

With regards to what forests I chop, my thinking is usually thus:

• Grassland river tiles must be cleared for cottages or farms.
• Forest tiles adjacent to the capital itself must be cleared so barbs/enemy units can't camp in a tile with a defensive bonus right next to the city.
• Forest on hills will usually be cleared to make way for a mine.
• Forest on plains not adjacent to the city (i.e. in the BFC's outer ring) can be kept for the health and for lumbermills later in the game. Or, if they're riverside, clear them later for watermills or, if needed, farms.

Usually I plan to leave 2 forests around a city for +1 health and lumbermills; once I pick them out, I might not be particular about the order in which I chop the others. And, of course, I'm not always consistent or paying complete attention. I might be focused on getting my injured Woodsman II Warrior away from a healthy barb Archer (in this past round, one of the little buggers chased my guy around the forest where Baghdad now stands for 10 turns, I swear), and I might not give the chopping Worker the attention he deserves... "Yeah, just chop that forest, whatever... scamper, little Warrior! Danger, Will Robinson, Danger!"

So most of you are confirming what I suspected for the next round, though it has been helpful hearing several of you pushing for the Madrassas in the border cities. I wanted to get some feedback on that--obviously I'm lacking in terms of Workers and military, but it looks like Mecca will have to pick up the slack in that regard until Medina and Damascus have their Madrassas. So speaking of chopping, I expect Mecca will shortly be denuded of forests in an effort to make it churn out the military, Workers, and at least one Settler for that SE corn/crabs site to further block Zara.

And yes, I'll be crossing my fingers and hoping no one declares war on me.

 

[Daedal]

Zara is going to be a pain. Instead of blocking him with a settler, couldn't we just build a stack of axes and block him by taking his southern city? With 2 cities I don't think he'd be much of a threat anymore and then you can deal with the sagging economy.

 

[Artichoker]

Looks like you should expand towards Roosevelt, while slowly building your military.
Choose one of Roosevelt's cities as a future target for conquest...probably go for the one with the best resources, that is within reach. I'd say ~700 AD is a target date for attacking Roosevelt.

Zara looks too cramped and edged against the ocean to be any serious threat.

I take that back...the first time I looked, I didn't notice the Copper tile is actually in the other guy's territory.

And the blue cities to the north appeared to all belong to Roosevelt, at first glance.

 

[DanF5771]

Zara has an OCC-worthy capital that can't be reached quickly.
With the Great Lighthouse and most likely the Moai Statues soon (he has stone) this will be a monster when he adopts HR. - ouch!

Since we are moving in an exploit/WB-twilight-zone with this ALC - Sis, have you heard of the "get a 10-turn peace treaty + 1 gold" - trick? That one worked very fine for me lately

Just check for WHEOOHs and suspicious SoDs and arrogantly demand 1 gold in time.

 

[Sisiutil]

Zara has an OCC-worthy capital that can't be reached quickly.
With the Great Lighthouse and most likely the Moai Statues soon (he has stone) this will be a monster when he adopts HR. - ouch!

Since we are moving in an exploit/WB-twilight-zone with this ALC - Sis, have you heard of the "get a 10-turn peace treaty + 1 gold" - trick? That one worked very fine for me lately

Just check for WHEOOHs and suspicious SoDs and arrogantly demand 1 gold in time.

Hey now, I replayed that round to get us out of that "exploit/WB-twilight zone"!

However, under the circumstances, I may employ that tactic you describe. I'd rather not have this Saladin game end up the same as the first one. I just need to stay alive for a few turns until I at least have a few Protective Archers guarding my cities--maybe those cheap walls as well.

 

[DanF5771]

I may employ that tactic you describe.

Credits for that tactic (that's where it's at!) go to Unsinnschmierer danieldaniel.

I just need to stay alive for a few turns until I at least have a few Protective Archers guarding my cities.

Word around the campfire is those Protective Archers come close to the Wunderwaffe-abilities of the tank-killa-spearmen of Civ I.

Anyway best of luck for avoiding an ALC#22Take3!