Level up: Emperor & Immortal with 4 games

[Gasp]

Hello CFC !

I would like to post here some game I play to learn with you winning on Emperor.

Since I'm not confident with my choices in many aspects of the game and I know I'm missing a lot of important strategic facts I hope to find some support. I also hope this will force me to post regular updates.

I've never played on Emperor before. I'm not winning 100 % of my games on Monarch neither but I don't really have much fun because I feel that if I did well in the 100 first turns the game is pretty much won.
Hence my desire to play on Emperor difficulty.

Let's start (results can be found by clicking the next game's link and check posts above):
#1 - Huayna Capac (IND-FIN): Emperor / No huts/No events, Random map, Normal speed and Standard size (Stops turn 165);
#2 - Frederick of Germany (PHI-ORG): Emperor / NHNE, Normal speed, Standard size map (Conquest turn 139 - 580 AD);
#3 - Saladin (SPI-PRO): Immortal / Inland-sea / Normal speed / NHNE (Domination turn 219 - 1545 AD);
#4 - Peter (PHI-EXP): Immortal / Continents / Normal speed / NHNE (playing - turn 182).

 

[Gasp]

#1 - Huayna Capac (IND-FIN): No huts/No events, Random map, Normal speed and Standard size;
Initial save attached

Spoiler the start until T25 :

I think SIP is a good option, I moved my Q NW to see nothing interesting.

Cuzco will start on a worker and my Q scouts further West. Research Mining
On T3 I meet Charlemagne and I can see his culture, his capitol is 7W1S of mine.
T6 we meet Pericles coming from the south
T8 Mining is done, switching to BW
T12 Worker is out, start on Q
T17 I see Pericles territory not too far south
T20 we meet Louis XIV. Quechua 1 is ready to scout
T24 BW finished, my worker chop a forest into a Settler. Research set on The Wheel

Finally what we know of the map

 

[elmurcis]

Just my 5 cents.
Looks good to SiP, 3 corn farms (2 wet) also is nice to have I guess "regular" opening - worker-warrior(s)-Settler (size 3 I guess, anything else looks forest in BFC... so Mining-BW for that massive production, chop is good enough here, no need for whip with that many forests. Specially if chop like chess-table so can regrow again grassland forests with atleast 2 forests next to tile 1st - plains forests also can regrow but with smaller chance).
Pig to south is with 1 commerce so its riverside (can farm without need for AH.. so can go to Writing from Pottery), looks like its FPlains 1S from Pig there? So I guess 1W or SW from Pig. Another good spot could be on PH 3S1E (can use dry-Corn almost forever). Anything else is still in fog.. and Copper would make changes too (best thing about Huayna - you can build Q, Axe and Spear same time - magic that nobody else has)
Better advice coming from masters

 

[elitetroops]

At t25:

Spoiler :

I spot some mistakes already.. You have improved one wet and one dry corn, instead of both wet corns, this is a costly mistake. You shouldn't be chopping here either until all corn is improved. Now you are working wet corn, dry corn and some 3 yield tile, which with the chop gives a settler in 7 turns. If you were working double wet corn+dry corn, you get your settler in the same amount of time without a chop. Maybe the settler would be delayed one turn as it takes some time to improve the last corn, but that's no big deal as you also save a forest and have a much stronger capital set up with three strong tiles improved.

 

[Gasp]

Thank you both !
@elmurcis
I was editing when you answered but I did pretty much what you had in mind. HC is a good leader to start with, it was random so I'm lucky I guess.
As for a 2nd city I also think about grabbing these Pigs and foodplains since there's no copper (maybe NE if my Q survive this bear ! )
Also I was wondering if it's worth to mine that grassland hill to have more hammers but I guess it's not (right now).

@elitetroops
these are good comments ! I completely occulted the fact that my Corn south is dry... And also that I would work an unimproved tile on size 3...

Now what should I do ? Improve 3rd Corn then chop or finish chop (done next turn) then improve the Corn ?
EDIT : I improve corn which gives me time to bring a Q south to fogbust and allows faster growth in Cuzco
Then I guess Cuzco will grow to size 4 while building a Q (there's one with 5/15 in queue) and I'll need to chop a 2nd worker for my next city.

2nd city will probably go 1SW of Pigs which will block Charles from coming South of me (north is jungle!). And 3rd city isn't clear yet but I like the spot on the PH south (it will be a good production city).

 

[Pedro78]

People are already giving good advice, so I'll just play a quick shadow. The Inca with a triple corn start shouldn't be too hard

Spoiler turn 25 :

• SIP but I don't really like the 3 first ring food as it's hard to share with helper cities
• This start screams for Mining-BW - whip settler 4-2 opener. It times perfectly.

Worker first, grow to size 4 on Qs and start on a settler. Quechuas sent exploring, one fogbusts my second city spot (3W of Cuzco as it grabs the river corn and allows to share one corn). Need to hurry to get it before Charly though. I don't see border tensions with him as a big issue (on Emperor) as Charly doesn't plot at pleased so I'll just have to either adopt his religion (he founded Buddhism) or gift him Alpha a little later and will be completely safe. With a Terrace Charly's culture won't be an issue either. Third city will be the Pigs+floodplains spot, will grab it very fast aswell.

Worker improves both wet corns and then chops to get the settler ASAP (will be 2pop whipped on T32). Then the worker will probably improve the third corn (second city will grab one corn) and chop a second settler at size 2. I want to secure these 2 awesome spots, the rest can wait. Going for Pottery next (will help a lot with expansion), then probably AH. On emperor and playing with the Incas, barbs are a non-issue.



No fancy Q rushes for me here, even though it's the best option with the Inca (even on deity), but it won't teach you to beat more "standard" games.

 

[Gasp]

It is nice see a lot of participants here already !

@Pedro78
This is certainly a good start and I'm happy to begin with it on Emperor.
I like your second city spot and I was really thinking about getting it too because I feel Charly is going to get it and I don't want to let him expand here. I didn't play further yet so I could probably go for it.
Settling here allows me to finish my chop thus not waisting my worker turn (in case I'd improve corn as previously said) and pop a settler faster.
I think I'll play until turn 75 or so and write my report here

 

[Pedro78]

I think T75 is too long a turnset. People will have trouble analyzing everything that went right/wrong in those 50 turns, it's suboptimal for learning. I'd suggest play until T50 and wait for advice

 

[Gasp]

Good thing I received a notification of your message then I stopped T64

2nd session T25 to T64

Spoiler To T64 :

T29 setter is out and T30 Tiwanaku is funded 3W of Cuzco.
Tiwanaku build a Q until I can build a Terrace there.
T33 The Wheel is done and I switch to Pottery
T41 Machu Pichu is funded SW of the Pigs I switch to slavery (not really necessary though)
T44 Pottery is discovered and I switch to AH
T59 Ollantaytambo is funded on the PH south of Cuzco.
T64 AH is researched I'll go for writing

Here is the map.

We can see Louis territory East of Charly, they are very close and worst enemy (most of the time).
Well I'm not sure going for AH before Writing was the best as my economy isn't too good, i could use foreign trade route right now... but nothing alarming.

AH revealed Horses near Machu Pichu which is a good strategic ressource since I don't have copper. Maybe there's room for a coastal city between Wheat and Horses.. not sure it's worth grabbing the Wheat though as it'll be an expensive city.

I placed a few city dots for the future. None of them is definitive but I'd like to block Pericles with this purple city of the river. It could be 1SE of that but I doubt it'll be free by then. Do you think I should get this spot ?

As you can see there are nice gems north in the jungle, I hope I'll get them before Charly once I can have IW.

I put my EP on Charly. Not sure it's the best, shall I rather aim Pericles (probable 1st target unless Louis DoW on Charly) whom isn't spying on me ?

I attach my saves T25 and T64, tell me if you'd like more pictures.

 

[sampsa]

I think this was a fantastic time to stop, because managing your cities at this stage can be a bit tricky at first, but doing things well will be rewarding. What makes this map even more tricky is the abundance of food and no instant way to get happiness. You are doing a great job at sharing the food, that is very important under these circumstances.

Capital

Spoiler :

Not sure what you were planning, but I think you clearly need to whip a settler here. Post-granary slow-building is very inefficient, so you should always be looking to whip settlers/workers. I'd settle the white dot and forget the banana, this way you can share more riverside cottages (sharing the corn doesn't hurt either). Working riverside cottages is what you should imo aim to do here in general.

Tiwanaku

Spoiler :

Same deal, need to whip, worker.

Machu Picchu

Spoiler :

You messed up here since there is +30 invested in a terrace so can't 2-pop whip. My solution would be to whip a worker and complete the terrace asap with a chop.

Ollantaytambo and general overview

Spoiler :

Farming that tile was a poor choice (you have plenty of ), you should be cottaging or chopping. Maybe you did it to spread irrigation, but that happens only at civil service which is still ~50 turns away. You could have also just roaded 1N of Ollantay instead of 2N and 1NW.

Cottages are your main source of in the near (and probably distant) future. You have had pottery for quite some time and only one cottage. The tiles marked with red X are the ones I'd be cottaging first. Capital cottages are more valuable than others because of bureaucracy and floodplain cottages are just better tiles. Also cottages that you can share should be given preference.

Managing happiness will be the biggest challenge in the following turns. Growing to size 6 (=unhappiness) and whipping a settler is one solution, but you shouldn't be spamming cities that lack and/or connection. If you find -resources somewhere I'd be tempted to settle the 6th city there. I wouldn't worry at all about blocking the AIs at this level.

 

[Gasp]

Thanks sampsa for this review!

I was not too sure if I should cottage my capitol now or wait a bit more.
Barracks in Cuzco is a mistake. I queued it just to have my screen free to take a picture to post here and accidentally pressed entry which ended turn 63...
I agree with your advices. I believe I need one settler fast and a few more workers to cottage everywhere. As you pointed you I lost worker turns with roading badly and maybe not very good worker management. But well I still feel I'm doing better now than a few days ago.

I was starting to worry about my economy and lack of cottages is mainly the reason why I'll be slow in research soon. Let's hope i can remedy this soon enough.

Happiness ressources I can use in a near future are located north. I think I'll settle 4N1E of Cuzco, riverside. This city will have Gems in 1st ring and 2 other Gems to trade later. But this is a jungle place so I need IW ASAP. In these circumstances shall I research it after Writing or go for Alpha first (which could take some time)? I'm pretty confident I could beg for it to Charly or steal it with a Spy.

Not blocking Pericles here seems fine because I think we will both be Buddhist and Louis is going to be our common target which will make him at least Pleased with me.

 

[sampsa]

Yeh game is looking good despite some small mistakes. In general, I'd never recommend self-teching IW when you have AIs to trade with, though with this amount of even that is not out of the question I guess. It's just one of those techs that you can always get via trade, because AIs prioritize it. Another one is monarchy, and that would be a massively useful tech for your empire right now. HR is the favorite civic of Louis, so he might be teching towards it. This would be a reason for you to go towards alpha asap.

The gems are just +1 and you need like +5 to work all those juicy financial riverside cottages.

 

[Lexicus]

I see the game has already moved on but I'd have moved 1E to settle on the river. Gives you more river tiles. Is the hammer from the Plains Hill and settling 1 turn earlier enough to offset that?

 

[sampsa]

I'd say losing a turn moving away from a plains hill and not catching more food when doing so is nearly always a mistake. 3 turns faster worker and +1 in the early game is huge.

 

[Lexicus]

I'll take your word for it. I also have an irrational desire to have levees in all my cities so I place a premium on riverside cities, but that's a habit I'm trying to kick, as I know full well the early benefits (e.g. settling one tile away from a river to get food in the inner ring of a non-capital city) vastly outweigh anything coming as late as levees.

 

[sampsa]

I remember building a levee three years ago. It didn't make me win or lose the game.

 

[lymond]

I remember building a levee three years ago. It didn't make me win or lose the game.

wait..this game has levees?!

 

[Lexicus]

I just love the hammers man the hammmmmmmers

 

[Gasp]

The gems are just +1 and you need like +5 to work all those juicy financial riverside cottages.

Writing is coming in. I'm sure these AI will trade some + ressources and religion also +1 (unless I decide to attack Charly which I could probably do very well with Qs ).
Alpha is definitely coming next and will most likely allow me to build science +1 buildings if necessary.

 

[sampsa]

Getting -resources via trade say 1000BC might happen or it might not. Depends on the map. Religion is +1 yes, but you need to adopt it which likely cuts down your trading possibilities. Hereditary rule is IMO the only good solution. -buildings like temple or colosseum are very weak for their price.