BGZ01 - Builder's Game - Warlord

[Mike Lemmer]

I've played it. The report will be up tomorrow afternoon.

We should concentrate on our robust economy before our power base, else we're going to spread ourselves into bankruptcy. I've got the details in the report, but basically we're losing 5 gold a turn & we only have 85 gold left. I figure each new city we build/capture will now cost us 5 gold a turn.

 

[Panth]

Everything okay over there? Been almost 24 hrs since that last post . . .

 

[Mike Lemmer]

Yep. My activities just took a bit longer than expected.

My countrymen, we are expanding too fast! Our cities are undefended and unimproved while corruption leeches away at our income. Note these barbarian archers from the NW:

that successfully pillaged a mine & almost razed Arretium while the only Praetorians in a 15-tile radius were slaughtered by barbarian axemen.

Or look at our finances, which are still draining 5 gold from the coffers at 80% science:

We must reverse these trends before our treasury is drained and our units start disbanding!

My first step was revolting to Heriditary Rule. For 2 gold a turn, each military unit stationed at a city increases Happiness by 1. Not only do we protect our cities, but we squeeze 2-3 more population out of it as well! This is only a temporary measure, though. I begin building temples for a more permanent solution.

I began cranking out more workers, although I get the feeling each new worker we make costs 1 gold a turn. We need cottages badly, even if it means taking gahtering off the mines. My plans for a massive workforce are cut short by increasing barbarian activity all throughout the North. I revamp production: "A praetorian for every city!"

In other news:

-The winery is finally hooked up. Happiness throughout the Roman Empire increased by 1. Drunken chariot accident on the rise.
-Genghis Kahn demands that we cancel our deals with the vile Persians. We refuse. Should we fear the mighty Mongols?

I doubt it.

Advice:
Right now, the easiest way to save money is to change our civic policies & build courthouses.

Reverting from Organized Religion to Paganism would reduce our expenses by 4.

The following cities have maintainance costs of 4+ & should be slated for courthouse production ASAP:
Arretium, Arpinum, Circe.

We might need to whip a few people to get it done, though.

 

[BotlGnomz]

I'll keep that in mind.
Got it.

 

[KabeDerlin]

Yes, I've been afraid our expansion may have been to rushed.

We definately need to be able to protect our cities. Wiping out the northern tribes will be too time consuming for the moment. I agree with mike. Let them come to us, and we'll just fight them off when they come. A Praet for every city...

 

[tmarcl]

[
We must reverse these trends before our treasury is drained and our units start disbanding!

So far, my experience on Noble has been that the only thing that happens when you get to 0 gold is that your science slider is automatically reduced. Don't know if this holds true on higher settings, though.

Marc

 

[Panth]

So far, my experience on Noble has been that the only thing that happens when you get to 0 gold is that your science slider is automatically reduced. Don't know if this holds true on higher settings, though.

Marc

Hehe, I just finished up a game a few minutes ago. Lost a space race by 1 turn $%#*(%&^!!! But I digress. I made an early takeover of the Americans and doubled my empire bringing on the dark ages. For a very long time, I was so broke I was losing 3 or 4 units a turn. I finally got it turned around but it took awhile and essentially crippled me for the rest of the game.

So yes, units will disband on noble. And it can happen quickly. Within a matter of 20-39 turns I went from running 90% research breaking even to 0% research and losing units.

 

[Mike Lemmer]

Yeah, commerce is definitely a problem. I'd say it's either people concentrating on food/hammers instead of coins or trying to expand too fast. In both Succession Games I'm in, bleeding treasuries is a fact of life.

 

[Panth]

We're not that bad off right now, I don't think. We can even keep expanding at a slow rate as long as we really focus on economy in our existing cities. For now, maybe the cities we do build should be on our north coast for that coastal cash.

 

[BotlGnomz]

600 (0): Flip through. Reassign tiles to pull in extra commerce. Switch Pisae to Barracks; I don't want regular Praetorians. Send Cyrus Poly for Meditation; out of the ones willing to sell us it, he is the one I feel we should foster the best relationship with. Asoka dislikes us alread and Genghis is a wimp.
620 (1): Rome Barracks -> Jewish Missionary, Cumae Worker-> Library. Barb fighting!
640 (2): Ravenna Library -> Jewish Temple, Arretium Granary -> Courthouse, Neapolis loves the Monarch, Arpium gets Christianity.
660 (3): Liguria Courthouse -> Library
680 (4): Rome Missionary -> Monastery. Missionary heads to Arpium.
700 (5): Barb Axe attacks the Axe I deployed from Arpium to intercept. We win, but it's damaged. Fortifies.
720 (6): Our axe gets pwnt by an archer, of all things. Arpium Courthouse -> Barracks. We have a balanced budget.
740 (7): Divine Right comes in and Islam is founded in Cumae. We begin Music. Send missionary to Rome. Ravenna's borders expand. Barb archer threatens our workers, I move archer from Arpium to defend, but shift workers away just in case.
760 (8): The archer attacks and we crush him. Rome Monastery -> Explorer. Cumae Library -> Rax. aaaaaaaaand...
NEAPOLIS FINISHES THE PYRAMIDS!
We begin an Aqueduct so we can follow up with the Hanging Gardens. Pisae Praetorian -> Library. Ownz0r barbs.
780 (9): Arpinum gets Judaism, Rome gets Islam, both from Missionaries. We are now a Representative government with a caste system.
800 (10): WE ARE RUNNING IN THE BLACK!
(and/or the nineties)

Explorer due next turn. Send him out to go find the barb cities and direct our Stack of Praetorite Vong Doom (two P-dawgs and two Warriors) to CRUSH THEM LIKE BUGS! THEY SHALL BE AS DUST BEFORE US!

 

[Panth]

Sounds like a good set there.

Got it.

 

[BotlGnomz]

Oh, and I forgot to mention. Now that we're running a positive number, there was a Settler hanging out in one of our cities. I vote we send him up to the flood plains, to my original Teal Dot. It'll be a badass city, and gets us a strong presence on the northern coast.

 

[Panth]

Preturn 800 AD

Religion: 6 have been founded, 5 by us. Taoism still open.
Info: We're #1 in most categories, 2nd in approval & life expectancy, 4th in trade (no routes, I'm guessing.)
-We have 3 of the Top 5 cities right now.
- We have 49% of the world population! 22% of land area
- Everybody seems to be getting along except Ghengis & Cyrus with closed borders.

+ Start Settler N of Arpinium, East of Neapolis to help seal off the Northlands. We've got enough jungle to deal with already right now.

T1 820
+ Machiavelli proclaims the Glorius Roman Empire the largest in the Land! #2 Cyrus, #3 Ghengis, #4 Asoka.
- mm Antium for Sistene in 3 instead of 4.

T2 840
Rome explorer -> Great Library. It's a builder's game, right? Super science is handy and Sistene in 2 next door.
-Oh, and a barb archer fruitlessly attacked Neapolis. There is, however, a barb sword coming in towards Arpinium now.

Those flippin' Indians somehow snuck by Nancy and put up a city right where I had planned on going in a few turns.

T3 860
Neapolis -> aquadeuct -> Hanging Gardens . . .sure, why not. Free people!
***Satricum is founded*** We're @ -$2 now @ 80% but that ain't bad.

T4 880

Ghengis wants compass for calendar. I consider for a bit but we have all kinds of stuff that needs plantations. Stonehenge was going to get obsoletified at some point anyway. We're still a good 5 techs up him anyway.

***Sisten chapel Complete in Antium!!!***

Our explorer was brutally attacked by a barbarian warrior who subsequently died rather gruesomely. Explorer is now hills 2 & woods 2 and man can he cover ground!

T5 900

Music -> Philosophy (might as well try for 6 of the 7)
***Homer the Great artist was born in Rome. 14/turn is a lot of culture, but I'm not sure so I'll leave him so we can discuss.
Bombing that Indian city might be a possibility as well.

Praetorian protects Arpinum pasture from pillaging. barb sword now fertilizer.

T6 920
movin' around . . .

T7 940

Couple libraries finished -> jewish monasteries
Couple workers finished -> libraries

T8 960

Not much of interest. Explorer is finding nothing up there in the way of cities. Galley made it all the way to the north pole and found nothing interesting - no secret passages or islands. Not even much seafood.

Oh, we have gems hooked up now. By the by, plantations are going on silk, nanners, and spices as well. And I'm quarrying that stone down there - not sure why that wasn't done. It had a road. . .

T9 980

Arretium settler ->harbor

T10 1000

Well, our galley killed a barb galley up north. Not a whole lot of interest really. I swear, I have the explorer, the mini-stack, and a lone praetorian canvassing the northlands and not a city in sight.

****Important stuff:
- Hanging Gardens in 7 (will drop with quarry in 2 and forest chop)
- Great Library in 9
- We have a lot of other wonders we could build but I held off. Notre Dame is always good, and Sprial Minaret could make good use of our widespread Judaism.
- Homer is still hanging out in Rome awaiting group decision or something. Red tape . . .
- Settler west of Antium. I think we ought to fill in over there a bit, but that can be changed.
- Philosophy/Taoism in 2.
*** We're losing $4/turn @ 80% with $40. With libraries & monasteries going up we could back off the slider a notch after philo until we're built up a bit. With Hanging Gardens & 3 luxes about to go online we can afford to get a lot bigger shortly and will catch back up. With the exception of maybe a couple more jungle cities in the land grab, most everything else will be coastal or clear land and will be profitable more quickly than the jungle ones. We also have both Forbidden Palace and Versailles available to build should we desire, both of which would help immensely. Personally, I think Neapolis should get Versailles after the Gardens. It's far enough away from Rome to be helpful, and productive enough to be able to do it. Forbidden Palace may work nicely in Our Future Northlands.

+ Notes:
- We so far have built all of the wonders of the world except the Great Lighthouse.
- We now officially have over 50% of the world's population. We're almost to 5 mil already. Cyrus has 600k.

 

[KabeDerlin]

Forgot the save again :-/

 

[BotlGnomz]

Personally, I'd build and then culture bomb big yellow @.
Then we can expand north at our leisure.

 

[KabeDerlin]

When I loaded the game, I realized this is the wrong save! hehe. I'm not leaving til tomorrow morning so as long as you can get me the save by tonight it'll be fine.

 

[BotlGnomz]

I wouldn't have edited, Kabe. Now there is nothing to call attention to this until I post this post.
Yo, Panth, FIX THE SAVE! Let's get our Rome on!

 

[Panth]

Erm, yeah. Sorry again.

It looked right . . .

 

[KabeDerlin]

I wouldn't have edited, Kabe. Now there is nothing to call attention to this until I post this post.
Yo, Panth, FIX THE SAVE! Let's get our Rome on!

Er... Yeah sorry. Didn't even think about that. I was wondering what in God's name was taking him so long... heh

Playing now....

 

[KabeDerlin]

I skimmed my turns

Turn 1 - 1010 AD
---Nothing much. I'm going to concentrate on building more workers. We have too much land and not enough of it's improved

Turn 2 - 1020 AD
---Philosophy done-->Currency (3)
---Didn't go with Pacifism because we have to much Mil.
---Taoism founded in Satricum
---Ardea founded

Turn 5 - 1050 AD
---Currency-->Metal Casting(3)
---Dropped research to 70%
---Neapolis creates Hanging Gardens-->Market

Turn 6 - 1060
---Barbs terrorizing South of Setia

Turn 7 - 1070
---Rome completes Great Library-->Notre Dame

Turn 8 - 1080
---Metal Casting-->Civil Service(5)

Turn 9 - 1090
---Cyrus wants to trade Construction and 200 Gold for Compass. We could use the money so I accept.
---Thespis (Great Artist) born in Antium. Keeping him for later to culture bomb close border.

Turn 10 - 1100
---Done

Suggestions: Cut back on Mil, we went from having none to almost too much for a builders game. Still need more workers. We got that huge jungle to chop down.

Going out of town for Thanksgiving. I should probably still post and sutff but I wont be able to play.