ALC Game #4: Egypt/Hatshepsut

[Eggolas]

I took a look at the current save also and played out a few turns. All is not bleak by any means and there's plenty of time to win this easily. However, it might have been a lot easier if Thebes had been founded next to the river and the second city at the copper/rice/bananas.

You're just going to have to adjust by changing Thebes' production to something you can use . . . research when you get to the third level techs.

Connecting the Gems is the first goal. A road on the ivory is the second. Gold mine third ... all at Vandal. This will permit the growth you need to increase GNP and production overall. I used four workers.

The river is a massive road and easier to maintain against barbarians than the actual roads you built. However you really need to fogbust the northern areas so that you can cottage the river north of Thebes in safety. Also, you need to move out the busters a little from current positions as the axemen will keep coming for quite awhile.

I began ratcheting down the research rate to around 40%-50% (finishing Fishing in two turns). Connecting the gems and ivory to the river permitted some whipping of buildings and the work boats. Researched Mysticism and Meditation at 4 turns each I believe. Then switched to Research in Thebes to research Priesthood for the Monasteries in about 5 or 6 turns. At this point, I was able to raise research to a very respectable level, using coastal tiles and anything with coins at all. I suspect that you could research higher level techs by switching some production to research as well for now.

Basically, I just went 10 turns from your current save. No spoilers involved, just wanted to see if the decision to rebuild economy at this juncture worked as easily as it would appear. I think the answer is yes.

Keep using the river as your major artery and road and connect all resources to it.

Vicky is Icky .... well, if you understand that turn of the phrase, then you watch too much Nickolodeon.

She won't budge . . . but you need to connect to her trade network at some point. Now, I would definitely camp one ivory and possibly cottage the other. Not a resource I would trade when war elephants will decimate your mounted troops.

You may want to irrigate the bananas at first so that you can use the gold mine also.

Off hand, I'd say that the military operation was a success, but for a number of reasons, the last adversary survived and will probably require a new campaign with cats and war elephants later. I'm not a fan of CoL at this stage. Courthouses are a major investment in time, hammers or population when you're not organized and you only have 5 cities. Madrid is the issue and if you can raise the population and cottage stuff, it should be fine for awhile.

Finally, look carefully at your coastal city options and the marble. Your economy will pick up rather quickly from here and you're going to need a couple more cities.

 

[Hans Lemurson]

Madrid and Barcelona are the cities that need courthouses the most, and conincidentally, the ones best suited to building them. Madrid will be a production-powerhouse (6 hills + Iron + 3forests +Wheat and Cows. put ironworks here), and Barcelona is your national whipping-boy. Madrid would also be a good location for your Forbidden Palace.

 

[Gnarfflinger]

I think that my next start I will have one city (judged by greatest need) producing workers as long as I need more. This will let me cottage spam around my established cities while I carry our my first few wars. This will let me slow the rate of scientific decline.

Also, perhaps always have one city building an improvement leavingt he rest to keep the pressure up. Conquered cities build what they need to get rolling then joint the military craze...

 

[Sisiutil]

Round 6: to 1 AD

Not too much to report; I followed the general consensus and devoted myself to getting my economy back on its feet.

Speaking of which, a touch of irony to start off:

Well, I guess things can't be too bad if I'm the wealthiest civ around!

I sent a WC over to English territory to sniff around:

This revealed some valuable information:

• Vicky has one source of copper.
• She has built some Spearmen and Axemen--notice how most of the former are in the cities closest to mine? Smart girl.
• In typical AI fashion, however, most of her city defenders are Archers.
• London has a 60% defense bonus and is on a hill, but it not heavily fortified.
• She is sending a settler into the desert north of her territory--probably to snag the iron.

Mind you, some of these things won't last. But with those Spearmen, I'll need a mix of forces to crack open her cities.

Techwise, I finished researching Fishing and started the bee-line to Code of Laws:

As you can see, the science slider gradually climbed back up as the cottages grew and the gold and gems at Vandal became available. I'm 11 turns from Code of Laws now. Surprisingly, none of the four later religions have been founded, so I may actually have a shot at founding Confucianism. I have a little over 100 gold in the bank, and I'm tempted to jack up the slider into a deficit to see if I can achieve this.

Speaking of religion, I'm building my first monasteries, one in Barcelona and one in Heliopolis, so I can start spreading both faiths.

Along with the ivory, the gold and gems also allowed me to let the cities begin to grow. In fact, I'm letting them all grow now, and I'm using the whip to contain problems. The luxury resources I now have means I'm facing unhealthiness more than unhappiness, but the whip works for that, too.

I'm micromanaging the cities like crazy, trying to allocate all citizens to as many commerce tiles as possible while still culling enough hammers from the production tiles. I've started to team some of my Workers in pairs; they were focused on Vandal for awhile, but now I'm sending them back out to the other cities, which have grown and can work more cottage tiles.

The two fish tiles are now being worked, and I've built a couple of Guerrilla-promoted Archers to be fog-busters. A couple of WCs are roaming around the fog, looking for barb cities, but haven't found any, probably because they're fog-busting and preventing them from forming. I've pulled most of my units back within my borders, though, to save on maintenance costs. Barb activity is down considerably; though not completely gone, it's now manageable, and nearly all of my WCs are at Level 4 now, thanks to them.

I also built a settler and am about to build Gold City, on the hill tile one west of the two gold hills just southest of Memphis. I have a CGI Archer, a WC, and a Worker all on hand to get that city profitable ASAP.

Here's the map:

Now, after all this time, is Vicky friendlier? Well, she's pleased with me, but she's not coughing up any techs:

I don't have a trade route with her--my workers have been busy elsewhere--but I'm thinking my Worker at Madrid should connect a road to Canterbury.

I expect several turns in the next round will be more of the same, except now that I have my lucrative luxury resources available, the Workers will focus more on cottage spam. I would also like to start thinking about a science city--Vandal, perhaps?--because Literature is a short jump from Alphabet, and I could get started on the Great Library. Then research Masonry and get the Marble city up and running.

Or should I follow a different tech path? Mathematics and Construction to get Cats and take out Vicky? She's expanding and will only get stronger.

 

[Nares]

It looks likes she's coming up on Fuedalism, and later Civil Service. I think it's highly unlikely that you can get a well-balanced force down to her in time to avoid at least the former, which alone is enough to largely outdate whatever you send. She's going to be tough to conquer for a good while yet.

My only advice is to get it done before the brings out some Redcoats. That should give you some idea of what kind of a timeline you're working on.

Granted, if you could get a few Axemen down there to take out the those Spearmen with minimal War Chariot losses (I figure they'll only come out of their cities to attack WCs), you could use your remaining WCs to pillage her countryside (and hopefully throw her back far enough to put you on more even terms).

However, it's a good distance between your main production cities and her borders. Getting the Axemen there in time is really the difficulty, and its not one that throwing more War Chariots can really solve.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Vicky is in the bucket - that land she is playing with really sucks. I don't see any urgency in taking her out, versus making sure that you get your land (which is: all of the green stuff and everything north of it). Seriously - her techs will unlock when the other civs will make contact, and she gets more out of those ocean coastal tiles than you do anyway. Stay friendly, and let her do half your research for you.

Hey Tex, are you alergic to granaries? You have rice and wheat, so granaries are +2 health as well, not to mention doubling the effective yield of your whips.

Personally, I'd be hoping to put the Great Library where the National Epic goes (presumably that's Barcelona?).

I'd be looking toard Math Calendar - aqueducts will help with health, as will the Hanging Gardens (which may score you a GE to burn on Great Libby). Alternative possibility is Metal Casting (remember, forges make your whips more effective, and give +2 happy, as well as letting you run engineers for GP points).

It looks like you are about to take care of goldsville (good). The other site I'd have my eye on is (I), with all the dies. Being creative, I'd get really Grumpy if Vic got there first. The dyes feed themselves, and are worth 4C each when you get them Planted. Not that bananas give a health when connected - another point in favor of Calendar.

 

[pigswill]

Might be worth building a couple of settlers to found a couple more jungle cities to seal your borders before Vicky gets there. Bythe time they're built and in place you'll have finished CoL ready to whip courthouses to control expenses.
Control vicky's expansion by closed borders and carry on restoring economy to build a tech lead.
No GP points?

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Surprisingly, none of the four later religions have been founded

If you think you might land another religion, you might want to take steps to try to double up the shrines.

Temples are cheap, so you might want to think about running some prophets, possibly aiming toward Philosophy.

 

[Sisiutil]

Well, I'm tempted to build a bunch of cities at this point, but the maintenance costs would kill me. I'll have to expand slowly, towards Vicky at first. The tricky part is that if I take too long, she'll beat me to these sites. It would be so much easier if I could just kill her...

I'm thinking after the gold city, the dye city (I) makes sense, as VoU says; then (L), which is "Nuovo Seville", to guarantee a path (and no dangerous fog) to/from Barcelona and Madrid. Then (B), the second horse city, to start sealing off my northern territory from Vicky. At some point I also have to build (E), marble city, to help with the Great Library.

That's a good point about leaving Vicky alive until another civ makes contact, since it will unlock her techs. It certainly gives me a lot of time to expand and build.

But I'm damn tempted to pillage her back to the stone age and throw a couple of axes/swords at some of her weaker cities. I don't know if you noticed, but I could sneak some WCs around through the tundra until they're just outside of London, then pounce on her copper mine.

So what is everyone's thoughts on this: should I make nice with Vicky, or pillage her into stagnation?

And what about Confucianism? Is it worth running a deficit for a few turns to try to found it? I'm really after the courthouses and FP, after all, but founding another religion would be a nice bonus.

 

[Hans Lemurson]

Ouch, Vicky really got cranking on those spears. When I played your 975BC save, I was able to intercept the Settler that made Canterbury, and cut off her copper before she built even a second spear. By 150 BC London was England's last city, and was heavily besieged by my forces. It was also heavily defended, but fortunately not with Spears.

The main difference between my plays and yours seems to be that I was significantly more militaristic than you, and earlier. Maybe I just have more practise in outmaneuvering AI armies to their doom. I was impressed that you were able to conquer Rome so early, even I can't pull off a BC continent unification.

Anyways, it looks like your wars with Victoria will be..."Interesting".

Advice on how to fight the enemy when they have spears for defenders: Never place your chariots in a position where a Spearman could kill one and then return to the city. If the Spear can't retreat, the AI won't attack. This is one of the resons the AI roads-up their entire territory.
1. Don't Leave you Chariots in stacks when adjacent to the enemy city. When you kill a unit in a stack, you do not enter the square invictory because it is still occupied. This means that a spearman in a city can pick-off your chariots 1 by 1 while never leaving its defensive bonuses.
2. Don't leave lone chariots on a road when next to a city. This is another opportunity for "hit and run" attacks on your forces. If you must go onto a road, make sure you have a movement point left to pillage it.
3. These only apply if next to the enemy city. If you are 2 squares away you can be stacked or single at your own discretion. Stacked if you want to remain safe, single if you want to draw your enemy out into the open.
4. If you really want to draw them out of their cities, sit on top of some resources, they are much more likely to attack you then.

Using these tactics, your War-Chariots should be able to run pretty freely throughout Vicky's countryside and disconnect her resources.

As for where to settle next, I would actually recommend looking at site A, for its gems. You only need 8 worker-turns to get that thing spitting out a profit from the gems, plus its a coastal city with food resources available, and so would be able to work some coastal tiles as it grows.

I will also designate a few more City-locations:
Location "Q": NW of Thebes, between the Wine, Rice and Sugar, on a grassland-river tile. This city will basicly be abother cottage-site, with food resources, comerce resources and floodplains.
Location "R": North of Q, it is 2 squares east of the fish. This city will be a fishing village and nothing else, 'cause that's all it's got.
Location "S": On the northern-peninsula, on an ice-tile shall be your department of Fish and Game. It's another fishing-village, but has a fair number of 1F tiles which could potentially be cottaged and fed by the food-resources.

 

[pigswill]

If you want to pillage Vicky then stack an axe with a chariot; chariot will defend against archers (and pillage), axe will defend chariot against spears.

I'd say again that sealing off continent should be your priority regardless of wether you pillage Vicky, so I,B,L. Once you've got courthouses your maintenance should decrease rapido (and you need 8 cities for FP). If you seal off your territory you will outgrow and out-tech Vicky (which means I suppose that you may be better off not pillaging her and expanding in peace.)

 

[vormuir]

Agh, you could have totally crippled her. Now it's going to be more of a wrestling match.

Well... I agree that sealing off the continent is priority #1. Vicky will spread like fungus if you don't block her.

Once that's done, carefully consider your war options. Your experienced WCs will still be good raiding units even after Feudalism -- though, yes, you'll have to stack some of them with axes. (The ones that are within a couple of squares of a city with spears.)

Keep scouting her anyway, whatever you do. It's not unknown for Vicky to suddenly send a SOD lurching over your border, and Vandal would be a particularly juicy target.


Waldo

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Cripple and go for a Construction Kill, take a nice group of WC ans hit that Copper+Iron Settler Simultaneously, declaring War immediately before (the Copper is close to her borders... keep the low experience WCs in the 'Forward position' until the Spears have hit you, and you've counter attacked them... or just pull some axes with the high experience ones.

But you Do need to Cripple her, probably much more effective than trying to out expand... expansion needs settler.. which you don't have, Crippling requires units.. which you Do have. (you might need a few more Axemen)

Also you can't seal off the Continent with the Settlers.. she has Galleys

So I'd say CoL->Construction->Calendar (while Crippling Vicky and building up to kill her.. a few Axemen, then Settler Expansion and Cats/Elephants)

Once you have some Cats and Elephants then go down and Finish her off... one less thing to worry about... then its just the other three civs on the Jewish continent, so expand as rapidly as possibly on yours. (Literature, Currency are good techs)

.. after smashing Vicky is the best time to decide your path, if you got Confucianism, then there is a good chance of a 5 religion continent and Cultural Win.. so things like Drama, Philosophy, Theology

If you go for Space race, then Philosophy, Civil Service, Education, Liberalism, Gunpowder [so you can bypass Guilds/Feudalism in the short term] and Democracy

Domination... Race for Optics to get the scouting... and circumnavigation... to determine if you want to do a Middle age [Cat/Mace/Long/Knight] or Renaissance [Cav/Gren/Cat->Cannon] invasion

 

[Lance of Llanwy]

Yeah, beat her down. From my experience, she gets a pretty sizable modifier for sharing a religion(+6), so as long as you remain Hindu, you'll be abke to trade once some one else comes along, though I think you should screw that and just pound her into the dust before then, because then it's only a short while until the Galleons come, full of Settlers eager to build marginal fishing villages for the sole purpose of being annoying.
I'd say get the Gold and Marble cities ASAP so you can get the GL somewhere. The marble will also let you put the Heroic Epic somewhere in no time, but I'm not one to recommend where. I'll leave that to wiser players. At this point, I'm tempted to say mix in swords. They ARE better city raiders, and better at dealing with archers. You should always have at least a couple, if only to crack the tough nuts that tend to give axemen tough times. Sometimes, they're just stronger enough to hit one of those thresholds in the odds and make a huge difference. Obviously, you should always have at least some axemen, but I do believe mixing them(however you prefer) is better, especially since the AI is obsessed with archers...

 

[uncarved block]

OK, I'll throw in some comments from the amateur corner.

Whether to go after Vicky or not depends on which theory you want to follow. Civ-specific thinking says that the big advantage the human player has over the AI is in war, in using your intelligence to overcome the building and research advantages of the difficulty bonus. Can you pillage the English out of the game? A look at the GNP ranking might be interesting.

General strategic theory, OTOH, really stresses the notion of "initiative", and looking at all those Spearmen already hanging around, there's a good chance you've lost it. (vormuir certainly thinks so, eh?) My personal experience is that war can really set you back if it's too involved (losing a game as Bismarck right now because of it, as a matter of fact), and given the distances, "complicated" would seem a given. Of course, how much this theory applies to the game is an open question . . .

One observation that you might have already made-- that Galley in Hastings. Do you think she's already explored the coast and come back? If so, you aren't going to have any company until Optics; given the AI fondness for the religious techs, you might be looking at well over a hundred turns (I think; I play on Epic, and can't be positive on the timing) before anyone shows up and "unlocks" Vicky's techs. You've played on Prince and I haven't. Where do you think everyone else will be at that point? A pedantic reminder, and I'm sorry if this has already figured into your planning-- but as Samuel Johnson noted, "men need more often to be reminded than instructed", so thought I'd throw that out. (The fact nobody else has founded one of the later religions is a promising sign, especially since it's likely they're working on getting a religion of their own.)

Keep up the good work. The tips here are beginning to help my own games, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

before anyone shows up and "unlocks" Vicky's techs. You've played on Prince and I haven't. Where do you think everyone else will be at that point? A pedantic reminder, and I'm sorry if this has already figured into your planning.

Thats a good reminder, we all forgot about that... Vick Won't give up any techs because she is the only one with them as far as she knows. So there is NO reason to make nice to her.


Marble city won't be good for Wonders/NWonders yet because there are no Wonders/N Wonders Available with Current techs

with CoL:
ChickenItza* possibly good for the GP points, but see below for a probable better investment

Masonry:
Pyramids* This might be Worth Getting after CoL and Founding Nova Roma.. with Stone it will at the least be a nice chunk of gold.

Literature (withe the Marble Wonders) Might be worthwhile before Construction, but Risky, you don't want Longbows before you get Elephants. (Pillaging will help that)... I'd say more immediately After Construction.

 

[badgerpendous]

uncarved,

You are definitely not the only one! In my most recent game (Saladin/Prince) I found myself pretty far behind, techwise, by the time I had finished my early warring. I had a large continent pretty much to myself, but I was only just then coming up to speed on production. All of the remaining Civs had the same 4 or 5 tech lead on me, and I couldn't find any trading partners. Remembering a discussion in the previous ALC, I immediately researched Steel and managed to trade myself back into the running. I eventually won, thanks to what I learned reading these threads.

a.badger

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Masonry:
Pyramids* This might be Worth Getting after CoL and Founding Nova Roma.. with Stone it will at the least be a nice chunk of gold.

The Mids were BIDAL 15 turns back.

 

[Eggolas]

England's territory is poor and Victoria isn't making the most of her financial trait as she's not spamming cottages at all. In fact, she's just getting to the gold mine north of London apparently. It's 1AD and she doesn't have the gold mine going? Sheesh!

You have two major choices: either snipe the settler under your Combat 2 chariot and begin a campaign to keep her in check, or leave her alone, expand towards her and eventually you're going to overwhelm her with any military tech advantage you choose: maces, cats, knights, etc. Her longbows won't stand up to your culture stripping cats, combined arms force.

The copper mine, gold mine and farm at London are pretty open for pillaging. So too are the resources south of Nottingham and between York and London. She'll have a lot of troops in London, so plan your pillaging accordingly if that's your desire.

However, my preference would be to expand towards her, taking the prime spots and getting my economy on a great footing by settling some cities close to Thebes and Vandal. She doesn't have anything you need to win this game and if you have a shot at Confuciansim (Thebes to research lowers it to 9 turns), then the other continent isn't a major threat yet either. At least, not yet. Even if you lose out on the new religion, there will be others and until there are a lot of cities . . . not a priority.

I would look at the distance issues for maintenance and settle the following cities:

1. 4-3 SW of Heliopolis on the coast getting the gems, bananas and rice.

2. 5-1 North of Thebes on the hill to capture the resources. Chop the river line and farm or cottage as necessary

3. 1W of Rome ... cottage those elephants after clearing terrain. Or turn them into 2/2/1 tiles with camps ... the extra hammers are not special.

4. 5 tiles east of Vandal when you have calendar. Get those dyes. West of Vandal also there is a nice spot. Together, they form a nice front.

5. 5-1 NNW of Barcelona.

I suppose you'll have to take the gold city as well since eventually someone will settle it.

I really don't believe Victoria is going to be a major threat in this game and you won't let her survive until Redcoats. Hem her in, build your economy and power up your research. Don't worry about trading with her or extorting techs. Get a caravel across the ocean, circumnavigate the world because it's fun, get ready to spam your religions to the other continent.

I would also make two scientist specialists (you have two cities as choices here) to get the GP scientist. Make it, use it.

You can try for domination, but with continents it's sometimes dicey (although I have not tried on Prince level). To me, it looks like an easy space race win, especially with the number of nice production cities you will have as you clear away England. Or you can play nice with the other civs and head for diplomatic after taking out England.

 

[Sisiutil]

I am definitely leaning towards taking the initiative with Vicky. Krikkitone makes a good point: I think trying to out-expand her at this point is riskier and less likely of success than warring. As I've moved up the levels, I've gotten looser about following the "60% rule", but I'm very, VERY cautious about building too many more cities when I'm below 60% to break even on the slider. The double-gold city makes sense because it will be able to pay for itself quickly, and perhaps, as Han suggests, site A--though I think I should focus once again on military builds.

I would have to start building an Axe or two as WC stack defenders--I have a CR I Axe in Madrid at the moment, but I'll also need to build some additional city defenders (probably Axes again) since my WCs are functioning in that regard as well. Fortunately they can be moved into action quickly.

Victoria has a Settler and a defender sitting on the same tile as my WC just SE of Vandal. I prefer to attack a settling stack before the city is founded--no gold, but you get a free worker (which I could really use right now) and the defender has no fortification bonus. Taking those units out would start things off.

The battle plan would then be to move a small stack of WCs across the southern tundra to take out Vicky's copper near London, then move around her territory, following Hans' guidelines, pillaging as much as possible--including roads to reduce her ability to attack out of her cities.

Meanwhile, I'll build some Swords and research towards Construction and Catapults. I should be able to take a couple of her weaker cities before Cats, and then use the latter to attack London.

Explain to me the advantage of War Elephants in this sitch, someone. They are 8 strength, but can't get CR promotions. They have a 50% bonus versus mounted units, and I haven't seen a single one for Vicky--IIRC, she doesn't have horses or ivory. Is it for pillaging that you're thinking?