Another Emperor mid-game attempt

[noontide]

guys, I'm here to solicit advice again. I've been playing on Emperor. For this game attached, I was able to war on Celtics and India. Didn't wiped out India cause there was a apostolic vote to stop the war against India, if I defy the resolution all my cities became angry with me for being a villain. Same thing happened to the Indian city at bottom right corner, I took it then there was anther vote to return it to its rightful owners.

I was able to rush Liberalism but still now Germany and Persia are overtaking me in science and culture. I have a huge standing army, but since every one believes in the same religion if I declare war on anyone all others declare war on me the very next turn and it's too much for me to fight on two fronts. With Germany running away, what can I do? Thanks.

 

[AcaMetis]

One tip to deal with AP nonsense: If you call for a cease-fire there won't be a 10 turn peace treaty, and if there isn't a war there can't be a vote to stop the war. It will reset your war success and re-DoWing will incur a new set of diplo penalties, but it's an option if you must keep a war going and cannot defy it.

Also, razing the AP city to the ground whenever there's no chance of you taking control of it? Good idea. The last thing you want is to fight tooth and nail to conquer a city only to have it be flipped back because the rest of the world says so.

 

[noontide]

One tip to deal with AP nonsense: If you call for a cease-fire there won't be a 10 turn peace treaty, and if there isn't a war there can't be a vote to stop the war. It will reset your war success and re-DoWing will incur a new set of diplo penalties, but it's an option if you must keep a war going and cannot defy it.

Also, razing the AP city to the ground whenever there's no chance of you taking control of it? Good idea. The last thing you want is to fight tooth and nail to conquer a city only to have it be flipped back because the rest of the world says so.

Well that's what I did, on the turn the vote for peace popped up, I suited for peace and got some obsolete techs out of it. But can't do nothing about flipping the city. Compounded the problem is India has such a culture boost, after flipping the city pushed the culture border to the brink of the other cities I took.

The bigger worry though is the run-away civ towards the end game.

 

[noontide]

Is it true if a Civ is pleased with you, they can’t DoW on you? I mean I’m on good term with everyone until I popped Liberalism and decided to adopt free religion. If I keep the same religion with everyone else can I wage the war on one of them?

 

[elitetroops]

Well that's what I did, on the turn the vote for peace popped up, I suited for peace and got some obsolete techs out of it.

That's not a cease fire, that's a full peace deal. If you want to continue the war, you should put nothing on the table on either side, just ask for the cease fire that is there by default, then you can declare again next turn if you so wish.

Is it true if a Civ is pleased with you, they can’t DoW on you? I mean I’m on good term with everyone until I popped Liberalism and decided to adopt free religion. If I keep the same religion with everyone else can I wage the war on one of them?

Many leaders can declare on you if they are pleased. But in this case the question is not if they can declare on their own, but if they can be bribed. You can find this info for all leaders in this thread.

If the civs you are worried about are pleased with you, you can beg for some gold from them right before you declare on their friend. The amount you can beg for depends on how long you've known them and the last time you begged for something. At your stage of the game, something like 30-50 gold should be perfectly safe, probably a lot more. When they comply, it will create a 10 turn peace treaty that they cannot break. When 10 turns are up, they are much less likely to join the war, because the likelihood of your target to bribe them is largest at the very beginning of the war.

 

[noontide]

That's not a cease fire, that's a full peace deal. If you want to continue the war, you should put nothing on the table on either side, just ask for the cease fire that is there by default, then you can declare again next turn if you so wish.

Many leaders can declare on you if they are pleased. But in this case the question is not if they can declare on their own, but if they can be bribed. You can find this info for all leaders in this thread.

If the civs you are worried about are pleased with you, you can beg for some gold from them right before you declare on their friend. The amount you can beg for depends on how long you've known them and the last time you begged for something. At your stage of the game, something like 30-50 gold should be perfectly safe, probably a lot more. When they comply, it will create a 10 turn peace treaty that they cannot break. When 10 turns are up, they are much less likely to join the war, because the likelihood of your target to bribe them is largest at the very beginning of the war.

Hmm... interesting. I did Not know that. Many thanks. By begging for gold you mean demand gold per turn without offering anything in return?

 

[elitetroops]

Yes, nothing in return. It must be a one sided deal.

The same 10 turn peace treaty happens if they demand (or ask nicely) that you give them something. If you comply, neither of you can declare war in the next 10 turns.

 

[AcaMetis]

You could beg/demand everything from gold to GPT to a resource to a tech, but a small lump sum of gold is usually the safest option if you don't understand the math behind it. Do note that if you demand something you'll get a diplo penalty for making an arrogant demand, but begging for something won't. Whether you'll beg or demand depends on your relative military strength, possibly other factors, but beyond those factors you can't choose whether to beg or demand.

And that does go both ways, but IIRC you won't get a 10 turn peace deal if you comply with joining a war, switching a civic or converting to a different religion. Tech, gold and resource demands do give a 10 turns peace deal.

 

[elitetroops]

Whether you'll beg or demand depends on your relative military strength, possibly other factors, but beyond those factors you can't choose whether to beg or demand.

Actually whether you beg or demand depends only on their relation to you. If pleased or friendly it's begging, if below pleased it's a demand.

When you beg, the success depends only on how much you beg and whether they can remember the last time you begged. If you demand, your relative power rating also comes into play. How much relative power you need for a successful demand depends on the leader, but iirc it's mostly enough if you are slightly below their power rating.

The other difference between begging and demanding is that a demand will always result in a negative diplo modifier. A beg has no effect on diplomatic relations.

 

[noontide]

On a related (or maybe not so related) topic, is there a rule of thumb in terms of tech trading? In my game I’m already behind in techs, but I beelined to Education before everyone else. Two turns before I got Liberalism Persia came ask for a trade foe Education and was willing to pay a king’s ransom. Should I trade it to him, or should I guard it jealousy? I mean I know not to trade key military techs but what about less crucial ones?

And I remember reading on the forum that once you trade a tech to one Civ you should trade it to all in the same turn, even if for one gold? Cause the AI will turn around and sell it to everyone if you don’t.

Thanks.

 

[AcaMetis]

Depends on the situation. If Persia is someone's suzerain (or master or whatever the term is) and their vassal has Education, pretty good odds they'll get it anyway so getting a king's ransom for it isn't bad. If Persia is hated by everyone, probably not worth the flood of Traded with Worst Enemy diplo penalties. I don't think there's really a rule of thumb beyond "read the situation and try to judge whether the gain exceeds the risk and opportunity cost".

As for trading techs to everyone, who you also sell a tech to when you pull the cat out of the bag depends, but "trade it to everyone even if only for one gold" is not a strategy I'd recommend. At least pay attention to stuff like Worst Enemies, so you don't end up raking in diplo penalties for a handful of coin.

 

[Fish Man]

Please post t0 save so we can walk you through some early game stuff

 

[noontide]

Please post t0 save so we can walk you through some early game stuff

Here it is, thanks.

 

[sampsa]

Looking at your save:

• you are not whipping, even when only very weak tiles available
• you are building way, way too many buildings
• your early game is still very weak, as you are not aiming to do things quickly but rather trying to build an "optimal empire" for late game

My T50

Spoiler :

You should definitely settle capital 1W to get the plains hill city center bonus. Agri-BW-AH-wheel-pottery-(writing). Got two settlers out asap, settled southern first T32 as it has a great unimproved tile available (financial oasis), T42 cow+copper. Getting 4th(!) worker next turn, figured I could use them as have plenty of forest to chop (cap border pop claims 7 more inside our culture). Settling 4th to claim wet corn in the east, then teching towards a constuction attack. Got a woodsmanII-warrior by killing wolves, but didn't steal a worker, which would have obviously sped up the start a lot more.

 

[noontide]

Looking at your save:

• you are not whipping, even when only very weak tiles available
• you are building way, way too many buildings
• your early game is still very weak, as you are not aiming to do things quickly but rather trying to build an "optimal empire" for late game

My T50

Spoiler :

You should definitely settle capital 1W to get the plains hill city center bonus. Agri-BW-AH-wheel-pottery-(writing). Got two settlers out asap, settled southern first T32 as it has a great unimproved tile available (financial oasis), T42 cow+copper. Getting 4th(!) worker next turn, figured I could use them as have plenty of forest to chop (cap border pop claims 7 more inside our culture). Settling 4th to claim wet corn in the east, then teching towards a constuction attack. Got a woodsmanII-warrior by killing wolves, but didn't steal a worker, which would have obviously sped up the start a lot more.


View attachment 508648

The thing is, I don’t know what to whip into. I already field an army large enough to take out two neighbors, if I shouldn’t construct buildings either, what should I build? More army units to war on multiple fronts?

 

[sampsa]

The thing is, I don’t know what to whip into. I already field an army large enough to take out two neighbors, if I shouldn’t construct buildings either, what should I build? More army units to war on multiple fronts?

Yes, build wealth/research, whip units. If your army had been large enough, all villains would be dead by 1000 AD. Check my T92 save to get a clearer idea on how to set up an empire, although it's pretty much the same as in your Freddy game.

T92

Spoiler :

Things went as planned, chose to ignore fishing (despite nice lake tiles) to be able to bulb machinery/engineering and cottaged all green tiles. Pericles has been WHEOOHRN for +40 turns, even I could be the target. Saw that Cathy has ivory for trade so gifted her all spare -resources to get her to pleased. She went into missionary spam, which was a huge stroke of luck for me (being first to writing for OB can be very profitable) . First +1 via religion and then +1 from ivory, not to mention that I'll be able to build phants soon. Just declared on hated Brennus, don't have that many units yet (main army is 3 hwa + 5 axe), but on emperor the war should be easy.

 

[Gumbolt]

Sampsa save is pretty strong. You don't need a huge empire here as Koreans are fast teching with a great UU. I think with a leader like this you should be teching way ahead of the Ai. 500bc or so on Sampsa save and no one has alphabet. Skipping Aestheics and music was probably a mistake if you wanted a free artist for a golden age.

 

[sampsa]

T115

Spoiler :

23 turns since the start of the first war, Brennus is long gone and Asoka has two cities left. Wars need to be swift and efficient! Catapult wars are very strong if you can start them early enough. I'm losing at 0% research, but someone should get alpha+currency soon . Also Cathy's shrine will help. No monarchy yet via trade even, so pace is extremely slow. Plan is to self tech machinery and bulb engineering to speed up the conquest.

 

[noontide]

T115

Spoiler :

23 turns since the start of the first war, Brennus is long gone and Asoka has two cities left. Wars need to be swift and efficient! Catapult wars are very strong if you can start them early enough. I'm losing at 0% research, but someone should get alpha+currency soon . Also Cathy's shrine will help. No monarchy yet via trade even, so pace is extremely slow. Plan is to self tech machinery and bulb engineering to speed up the conquest.

View attachment 508695

Thanks for taking the time Sampsa, I just looked at my old saves, I only started my catapult rush on turn 113, I think what slows me down is mostly having four cities (on my first few playthrough I had 5) instead of three, and I worried about negative cash flow and unhappiness so didn't whip my cities to the ground. So, speed is everything on higher difficulties?

 

[sampsa]

Yes, faster attack leads to faster capture of enemy cities, make them productive faster and so on. I think many people overly worry about "killing their economy". You don't need to stack a lot of whip anger pre-attack and remember to 2-pop whip, as 1-pop whips have the same happiness penalty. At monarchy happiness becomes so easy to obtain that you can more or less whip when you want (build warriors!).

That being said, catapult rushes are not the only way to play. You could also get 6-8 cities and win liberalism with the help of some bulbs, take military tradition and take over the world with cuirassiers. Lain's videos have many examples...