[BTS] BOTM 229: Ragnar, Deity - First Spoiler - 1AD

[DynamicSpirit]

BOTM 229: Ragnar, Deity - First Spoiler - 1AD



Use this thread to tell us what happened in your game, up to 1AD. Where did you settle in the end? Did having the workboat influence your decision? How is your game going?

Reading Requirements
If you are participating in BOTM 229, then you MUST NOT read this thread unless EITHER

• You have reached at least 1 AD in your game, OR
• You have submitted your entry

Posting Restrictions

• Do not disclose ANY events or information gained post 1 AD.
• Do not reveal your final result if that happened after 1 AD.
• Do not discuss the location of resources that may not show up before 1 AD (Iron is OK, coal and oil are not)
• Do not post any savegame file from the game. Discussions and screenshots are fine but not actual games

 

[MirrorGuard]

Contender save.
Settled on PH next to banana. Built another 3 cities(I tried to build a fifth but the empty space was taken by Shaka, so I deleted that settler). I talked to Shaka every turn. To my surprise, he has no access to metal for a long time. I thought about a swordman rush on him, but changed my mind as I saw his stone quarry: he might built the Pyramids for me. He did so. I dow'ed with 11 axes 3 spears 11 catapults in T90. Till BC100 I took 8 cities from Shaka with Mids GW and Hanging Garden. Shaka was quite weak in this game. Each city was defended by no more than 5 units. While I was busy with my warfare, a great general was born in a faraway civ. The good news is the other continent is busy; the bad news is that despite having 12 cities, I am far behind in terms of land area(Babylon/Persia has 8, Justinian has 9). Seems there is a monster across the ocean.

 

[Frederiksberg]

Given the workboat I knew from the outset that I wanted to settle on the coast to get fishing nets super early. I considered settling 2N of the scout to get the gold, but prioritized production over commerce and settled on the plains hill where the scout started. First techs: mining-BW. On deity level I'm always worried about connecting horses or copper before barbs invade and when I discovered the copper inside the borders of Nidaros, I immediately went for THW. Speaking of barbs I also met Shaka which is often bad news on deity level because he's likely to attack early. For a long time I have wanted to play a hyper-aggressive game to see how it plays out and now seemed to be a good time, pre-empting Shaka's attack. So I built barracks in Nidaros and in Uppsala (founded on the plains hill next to the gold). From then on, it was basically a race to get a stack of 15 units built ASAP and build a road to the Zulu's. At T64 a small pillaging crew crossed the border at the horses declaring war and next turn followed the rest of the army: 12 axes and 3 spears in total. Ulundi was on a hill with walls defended by a sword, two impi's and four archers and it cost six axes to capture the city and with it TGW and the Mids. With no prior knowledge of the Zulu lands, I moved the stack north from Ulundi and this was probably a mistake because after taking two northern cities, I came back and found Bulawayo very well defended. I ceased fire to prevent Shaka from spamming units non-stop and eventually Bulawayo was captured along with a second southern city that was later lost to cultural pressure from the Babylonians. I agreed to peace with Shaka in return for Alphabet, and as soon as the peace deal expired, took the remaining two Zulu cities. Waging ancient war takes a toll on the economy, but the Mids allowed me to switch to representation and I got a GE from Ulundi I immediately used to bulb MC to get a monopoly tech for trade so at 1 AD I'm still "in the mix" regarding tech-trading.

Stats @ 1AD:
Cities: 10
Pop: 46

I'm 4-6 techs behind the other three known civs, but have a trading option of Calendar for Currency and enough spy points on Hammurabi to steal a tech. The game looks challenging but far from hopeless. There is a barb city up north-east of Ulundi I plan to take and room for a couple of more cities up there. I doubt that I will start any war with berserkers since everybody on the continent are hindu and the AP was built by Justinian in the hindu faith making any war likely to be stopped by a resolution. The way forward could be to wait for cuirassiers and then raze the AP city in the beginning of the war. Not sure if this will work but there is certainly a chance.

 

[Frederiksberg]

Shaka was quite weak in this game. Each city was defended by no more than 5 units.

That's surprising. When I attacked Ulundi T67 it was defended by seven units including several metal units. And when I came back to Bulawayo it was defended by nine units, most of them metal units. That's why I had to cease fire and wait for reinforcements. Maybe the lack of metal messed up Shaka in your game?

 

[Powerfaker]

I too thought hooking up the fish would get me the faster start. I chose the ''2N'' spot. To me that spot seemed equally strong in production as ''PH'' , so preferred the better commerce. Well, then the PH-spot turns out to have copper.......
I knew there would be idle worker turns but went worker first anyhow. Getting the mine and pasture fast is more important. Turned out I had to wait 1T for AH and 5T for Bronze.

Plenty of AI units circle around, no barb issues at all.
City2 went wheat/fish, city3 1S of corn. Then Shaka's settler shows up to steal my pig. The capital borders pop right that turn and he turns around, pffew, narrow escape.
Settler4 guards a spot in the jungle without settling. Only a few turns when Darius' settler shows up. I have to let him approach the dye and settle in his face last moment to give him a longer detour to the gems, so settler 5 can get there right before him and also settle in his face. Pffft, welcome to the deity settling race. City6 1N of pig no problem. City7 just fillimg a last leftover, PH-coast further south..

I use my goldfast tech pace to get Sailing/Masonry after the usual stuff and build GLH. Also prioritize Metal Casting and build Colossus.
Everybody is Hindu and gradually gets pleased. Apostolic gets built in the Buddhist world though. I gift Shaka a city on the last non-cultured tile between him and Justinian, so by 1AD we are at friendly, which I'm quite happy with cause he just started plotting. Shaka is a 15 city monster while all others are 7-9 cities.
I'm pretty much done with building infra and have turned in plotting mode myself too you could say. Most attractive options are the weak Darius (who has horses in a border city) or the nearby Hindu shrine city owned by Hammurabi. Just need to tech 10-12 turns through Machinery + Engineering.for trebs and berserkers.

So, a peaceful economic approach, much different from the above. All early classic era stuff is in up to and included Civil Service. I only traded Aest to all 4 around for Math/Alpha/IronW/Monarchy.
I also built Moai in the fish/wheat city, Didn't produce any GP yet.

The empire (note: as usual did much scouting, which will show in the minimap):

Spoiler :

7cities, 46pop, doing 300 beakers at 100%,

 

[MirrorGuard]

Maybe the lack of metal messed up Shaka in your game?

I often use horse archer rush on my neighbours. When I raze their metal mines, they spam so many archers that I have to keep switching target city. I have never seen such weak defense after T90. I guess what happened in my game can be interpreted as: wonders slow down Shaka's expansion->when I dow he was still expanding so his defense force was diluted.

 

[Tonny]

Hiya,

This is the first time I have ever reached 1AD playing Deity.

Spoiler summary :

I went for 1S of corn to settle, keeping the wb to scout N and later use for the 2nd city I settled on the ph east of banana. 3rd went 1NW of piggy. I was almost ready to settle my 4th city 1SE of copper, but Hammu beat me to it by only 1 turn!!! He settled 1SE of my intended spot. I then settled number 4 1W of cow and number 5 3E of my 2nd city, leaving me at 5 cities by 1440BC. At 1AD I'm still at 5 cities. There was no more room left .
The use of failgold was completely and utterly useless in my game. All of the early wonders were already built before I ever had the chance to even research the necessary tech.

Spoiler wonders :

There were several times that I almost crapped my pants. First, when I met Shaka, then when I saw him plotting, and finally when I saw his stack moving to my borders.
I was fortunate that he was after Darius on whom he declared at 775BC. This war is still going on and Shaka asked me to join and I did... Still at war.
But the war did not slow me down to develop my empire. I only have a few axes and a spear at the borders with Darius on whom he can suicide his troops.
With so few cities and a tough crowd I knew that an early rush was not an option. I went aesthetics and metal casting first to be used as trading chips, but it only gave me alphabet, iw and calendar as a return. On the other hand, the early forges with gems and gold, it was nice to go this way. With only 5 cities and 37 pop I'm at 225bpt.
Currently aiming for engineering, which is due in 5 turns. Darius will be my first target.
Treasury is fine with 395g and -8gpt at 100% research. I can go a long way now for the key techs to conquer the world.
This scenario has been fun and scary for now... Hope I can survive...

 

[MarleysGh0st]

I played the Adventurer save. Despite saying in the pregame discussion that I'd move to the coast, I was persuaded by the other discussion to move 2N, next to the gold, instead. Big mistake, as it turns out. Then when I saw that left me one square short of the ocean, I decided stick with that decision, instead of taking another turn to move east to the coast. Another long term mistake.

Anyway, I only managed to settle four cities before being boxed in by the AI. By 1 AD, I've built the Colossus and all has remained peaceful. Shaka was plotting; I presumed that was against Hammy, his worst enemy. Then Hammy asked me to cancel my deals with Shaka. I agreed to that, and Shaka stopped plotting. So...he must have been planning to march through my territory to attack his second worst enemy, Darius?

I've got a tech lead against Shaka, so he'll be my target.

I'm still in awe at how much everyone else manages to accomplish in the BC, while playing Deity, to boot!

 

[crofter]

Playing contender save.

Settled 2E of gold, not sure in the end that was better than the coast, but never mind. I could see I was getting boxed in pretty quickly, with Hammy / Shaka to the south east and Darius coming through the jungle, so decided to go for a construction rush with 4 cities. Thought Darius might be easiest target, then as I was getting ready, Justinian started to plot. Looked like it would be on Shaka (border tensions), but then instead of attacking, his stack started heading through Shaka's territory towards me....

I decided to attack Darius anyway (figured I would have enough time to get a city) & bribed Shaka in so at least he would be busy. After taking Darius' first city, I turned my stack around & took out Justinian's stack (which handily moved on flatland). I signed a brief ceasefire with Darius around this time, but then went back in against him (Justinian signed peace once he decided to ask). By 1AD I got another city and Darius still has no longbows, so optimistic of taking some more territory from him (next city has the Mausoleum).

Not sure how this will be long term, tech is a bit behind (no CS yet) and the Justinian distraction feels like it wasted a lot of turns, but its been a fun game so far.

 

[NickTrofimuk]

Settled on plains hill next to banana. I saw that Ragnar starts with fishing so wanted to take advantage of the free workboat as soon as possible.

Went workboat first for that two-fish-magic, then worker, as I researched mining/BW. Worker still had to wait a few turns but luckily copper was there so I mined that instead of chopping. Researched the wheel next to hook it up. (perhaps should have gone wheel first to avoid wasted worker turns)

I wanted to settle the plains hill next to the gold, but a barb city already popped up 1N of that! So instead of making a settler I went for about 5-6 axemen (it was defended by 4 archers) and took that city (lost two axemen). Then settled Upsala SE of the corn, and Haithabu between the cows and gems. Aside from that and a couple workers I mostly just made axemen (and a couple spears) in all my cities. I was happy that barbs weren't a big issue (usually I die to them when I try to play diety).

I saw Ngoma wasn't that heavily defended (one axe and one chariot), and went for an attack with 6-7 axes and a couple spears. Took it easily, marched towards Ulundi but was shockingly confronted with a stack of 12 or so units waiting for me. Thankfully they attacked me across the river into the forest I was in, so I managed to kill quite a few that way. As I went to retreat I found Bulawayo and, with a couple reinforcements, took that and made peace as soon as Shaka would let me.

I tried for Ulundi again later, but there were again too many units for me, so I moved towards his city SE to try my luck there. He attacked my stack again but also moved almost all his Ulundi-defnding units to that city. Since I pillaged a road earlier I was able to move my stack back towards Ulundi in a way that he couldn't get back to defend. I took it on the next turn, and after suffering some attacks, he eventually agreed to make peace (I had to give him aesthetics - I researched it for trade bait but it didn't get me far).

Below is where I am at 1AD. I have 7 cities, around 33 pop. Quite behind in tech. Shaka didn't build any wonders in Ulundi for me to take, unfortunately. However, he just built the pyramids somewhere (I'm guessing in a city I can't see yet somewhere to the NE).

Not sure where to go from here. I've survived until 1AD which is farther than I usually make it in a deity game. I'm debating between (a) researching construction, making cats and going after Shaka again to capture the pyramids, (b) doing the same but going after Hammurabi (he has quite a few wonders to Shaka's only one, though I worry he may be stronger), (c) researching construction, metal casting and machinery to attack with cats and crossbows, or (d) going all the way to engineering for trebs before attacking either Shaka/Hammurabi. My tech rate is fairly slow, so construction is reasonable and I am planning to do that and attack, the others will delay things quite a bit.

Any advice from regular diety players? I'm also debating going for drama and using it to trade, since nobody has it yet. I'd like all Hammurabi's wonders but I am currently on okay terms with him (and will be even better if I switch to hinduism) and already worst enemies with Shaka, so I think it may be better to keep going for Shaka first rather than making an additional enemy and potentially facing multiple fights at the same time.

 

[WastinTime]

I see some nice progress here. If you want to know how bad things could have gone, I have quite the story to tell. I've killed close to 100 units already. Here we go...

Settled Fish-gold. Then PigCorn-SharedGold. I didn't know where copper was, but I coulda guessed correctly. I had to get a 3rd city down there quick.

I was busy with the GLH and Darius settled the gems-West while Shaka settled an Iron/silk city. Fine. Darius can chop that jungle and I'll wipe out Shaka.
T77 DoW Shaka. The next turn, he gets Alphabet which, means he bribes Justin into the war too

Attempt to solve the problem: Justin has a couple wandering units. Kill those and try to get peace.
I lose at 70+% and Justin won't talk for a long, long time.

I hope he didn't really want this war and was not mobilized, so I continue with Shaka conquest after the 10 turn peace expires.

T95 Justin completes the AP already.
T97 Justin's stack of 17 units arrives (6 cats, 8 chariots, metal units) Two tiles away from my southern cities with 0% defense. My Defenders?:

1 warrior in each city

My army is deep in Shaka's land and cannot get back for 3-4 turns. Game over? or can I save this?

Pay for peace? No, Justin will finally talk, but he's too far for me to gift a city, and he says 'peace is impossible'.

Hot tip: There is one stall tactic that I've used a few times before. I happen to have a worker whose orders were auto-cancelled when the stack stepped up next to it. So, I move the worker around the stack hoping the AI will not just wisely grab the worker with a chariot, but instead chose to move the entire stack 1 tile south, as a group.

Whole stack moves as predicted! So now, 1 turn later, the stack is 3 turns away. I just bought 2 turns extra time to return my army and whip new units. I didn't even want to blow all my hard earned cash and cripple my game by upgrading warriors, so just went with newly whipped spears, swords, axes, and many cats.

the frustrating thing is. Even after wiping out his stack, his power is so high, he won't agree to peace.
And now I have no units near Shaka. Even he won't accept Peace!!!! I've captured 3 of his cities with only minor losses
So, I reluctantly gift him back the size 1, no food, marble/gold city for peace until I can deal with Justin.

I kill another giant stack of Justin units and he still wants some gold for peace. I don't pay him, but I start moving the army to Shaka since I know I can get peace if I need to. Finally, Justin ends the war with an AP vote for peace.

I re-take the gifted city, and I'm about to take the capital. Then, in a couple turns disaster strikes again!!

Continued post 1AD thread....

 

[MarleysGh0st]

I can't even imagine, WastinTime!

And are you playing the Deity save?

 

[WastinTime]

And are you playing the Deity save?

Yeah Deity. I don't recall seeing so many units so early... or such unwillingness to make peace.

 

[MirrorGuard]

The last time I saw such bloody war was this.

 

[WastinTime]

The last time I saw such bloody war was this.

That's about the same kills as mine at 1 AD, I quickly hit the 100 kill mark soon after.