Breaking the Monarch Barrier

[Artisan]

I played a few turns, not much developed. I have a third worker, with a fourth coming, and another settler on the way as well. I decided to chop the monument in Wonsan, would've taken ages otherwise. What sort of improvements should I be building up there? Post-machinery I would be building workshops, watermills, and mines, because that site looks like it could easily crank out 100+ /turn after bonuses, and definitely with a Heroic Epic later. Just not sure if it's worth farming/cottaging before then. Also, how worried should I be about getting roads down all over the place, for ease of mobility?

 

[lymond]

I played a few turns...

Really helps if you post some screenshots, or at least a save, preferably both.

I'd be cottaging the crap outta Wonsan. Basically that is what you do with FPs early, and with FIN you will just roll in commerce. Things like workshops, watermills and HE are far from you thoughts at present. (Much later I might consider watermill/workshops on FPs like in captured cities) Wonsan will be a major research hub, and potentially an alternate Bureau cap if you don't build GLH.

Bit of advice on Monument to help speed that up when you want one fast. If you are chopping, work a hammer tile for a bit (2F1H or 2H1F) to speed up hammers in the monument so when you chop it is 1t from that point. In case of Wonsan, it gets 2H per turn from settling on PH, so the need to work hammers depends on how fast you get your worker over to chop, but a worker should always be ready to help immediately with that new city. (So basically, depending on the city and what it has to work, adjust hammers to speed up Monument to the chop, but only in cases where one really needs a Monument)

So at 2HPT, Wonsan will have 8H in 4 turns and with a ready chop the Monument is done. Or work that 2F1H forest for a turn or two if the chop is faster. That's 3HPT so 3 turns to 9 hammers into Monument + 20H from chop + 2 base hammers finishes Monument.

Granted, many times you will settle such that you don't even need a monument, but sometimes you want that guy as fast as possible, like seafood in second ring or in this case, that wheat tile sitting out there. Although with 3FPs to cottage its not really super urgent, but if you are gonna build a monument there get it out as fast as possible.

Roading beyond what is absolutely necessary to connect a resource or a city, is a major newb mistake. Do not do that. Workers are focused on far more important things. (And be aware when resources or cities are already connected via water...like Pyongyang is to Seoul...via coastal culture. (with that said, later on in the game when worker turns are less needed you might start roading things, or in some cases you may road to speed up conquest path)

 

[krikav]

Slow-building the monument in Wonsan should only take 6 turns if Wonsan was working the cow.
I would want a monument in Wonsan to get the Wheat and to get the forests, then I'll chop pyramids in Wonsan.

With Financial, you should more or less cover your entire empire in a carpet of cottages, and especially the riverside.
And not cottaging floodplains in a third city with a financial leader is bad.

Regarding roads, they can be really beneficial, but you need to plan ahead and be very economical with where you place roads.
Roading in a zig-zag pattern diagonally is for example a no-brainer. It also takes abit of practice to figure out how hills/rivers complicate things.
But in general, roading is a luxery your workers should not be able to afford doing. If you are roading excessivly, your empire is all but guaranteed to be suffering from lack of workers attention to some other detail.

 

[Artisan]

I replayed the last set of turns with the slow-build monument from the cows, although I don't see how finishing the Mids will be possible. Wonsan has access to four forests, given how many base hammers it has, they should be done around turn 90-95. I'm not convinced that's fast enough. Here's a screenshot of what the situation looks like currently:

Spoiler :

 

[krikav]

I chopped up there after math, and pyramids where done T83 iirc.
I think I chopped abit outside of culture too.
But perhaps I had some forest spawn up there?
City center and cow and wheat for 10 turns is 120 base hammers, and you only need 250.


It's no big deal to fail with those stone wonders either, you get a load of cash, it's quite common to do that intentionally.

 

[SittinDown]

Don't forget to get your warriors out of your cities instead of looking for forested hills away from your borders to fog bust.

 

[sampsa]

Oh are you going to settle 4th 1NE of crab btw? You should've chopped the forest before settling. Settles 1T faster and gains that are otherwise lost. Also, looks like you don't have the boat ready.

 

[krikav]

Gazing at the screenshot now, I can't see a road 1N of Seoul on the PH? Did that dissapear during some replay or is it simply not visible?
That means that the settlers for both second and third city got to their location one turn slower.

 

[Fish Man]

t98 update, 425BC

Spoiler :

Pyramids built a while ago, GLH just done, economy looking peachy, Washington/Alex are having a little tussle. I think it's time for the science and seafood master of civfanatics center to make a return .

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

I settled my first city on the PH close to the wheat t39, but I actually went worker first...which seems to be faster, ironically. Tech order was fishing -> agriculture -> AH -> pottery -> BW -> writing; size 2 settler working your 2 power tiles was the way to go here. More details tomorrow, probably, when I'm less tired.

 

[Artisan]

Don't forget to get your warriors out of your cities instead of looking for forested hills away from your borders to fog bust.

The Warriors in my capitol and second city are there to keep the happy cap up so I can work all the improved tiles. The Warrior in my third city was retreating from a barb Spearman and now I'm not sure I want to move him back out, because randomly losing 15 hammers is something I'd like to avoid if possible.

Gazing at the screenshot now, I can't see a road 1N of Seoul on the PH? Did that dissapear during some replay or is it simply not visible?
That means that the settlers for both second and third city got to their location one turn slower.

I never had a road there in my playthrough, must've been something you did in yours. I'm not sure when I would've built it, from what I can remember my Workers were always busy with something. Although I went to a second settler before a second worker, opposite of what everyone else did it seems, so that's probably why. I have fewer worker turns on the board.

@Fish Man The two cities that are distanced from your capitol, did you settle those? I normally would hesitate to have anything so far from my capitol because of maintenance issues. Did you settle that far away to skip the jungle, or are those just former barb cities?

 

[Artisan]

Oh are you going to settle 4th 1NE of crab btw? You should've chopped the forest before settling. Settles 1T faster and gains that are otherwise lost. Also, looks like you don't have the boat ready.

I built the boat immediately after the Settler, didn't even think to do it ahead of time. Also that's a good note about the forest. Again, I didn't even think about it as it's outside the BFC of anything I have on the map.

 

[krikav]

@Artisan Oh, no problem!
But do you see how a road on that hill, would speed up the settlers transit?
It wasn't obvious to me, when I started playing this game, how units moved and how roads/rivers/hills etc effected how long they could reach.

 

[Artisan]

What I think I know about roads: moving onto a road uses 1/2 MP (pre-Engineering, post-Engineering I think it's 1/3) unless you're crossing a river before researching Construction. The 1/2 movement cost doesn't change even if the road is on a forested hill. So the settlers would've been able to move one extra tile and settle one turn earlier.

 

[sampsa]

Again, I didn't even think about it as it's outside the BFC of anything I have on the map.

Yep, I think many players miss these chances. I hate settling on a forest, it's just down the drain.

It would actually work pretty nicely to finish the chop around the time when settler is ready, you have 8 base anyway in capital so it's maybe a 2T boat, not a huge delay. Still, I'd always try to find a way to have the boat ready upon settling.

 

[Artisan]

Sorry about the delay, had some stuff I had to do over the weekend. I just finished off Alpha, what should I be looking for in a trade? Anything here worth grabbing?

Spoiler :

Mao looks like he's offering the best deal so far, with Hunting and Sailing for Writing and Mysticism. He's also the lowest on the ladder at this point, and it leaves me with something to give Washington in case Iron Working opens up.

 

[krikav]

Sounds good, but I wouldn't accept hunting in a trade, far to cheap to self-tech, and it's not really relevant for you at the moment.
It just add unneccesery techs to the "We Find You Are Becomming Too Advanced"-limit (WFYABTA).

But grab sailing from Mao.

 

[Fish Man]

Sorry about the delay, had some stuff I had to do over the weekend. I just finished off Alpha, what should I be looking for in a trade? Anything here worth grabbing?

Spoiler :

View attachment 584070

Mao looks like he's offering the best deal so far, with Hunting and Sailing for Writing and Mysticism. He's also the lowest on the ladder at this point, and it leaves me with something to give Washington in case Iron Working opens up.

You don't have to replay if you don't want to, but I feel like you should have gone math first. At this difficulty, the AIs won't have anything good to trade for a LONG time. As you can see, they don't even have writing yet, only IW is up on the table in the near future, and stuff like monarchy comes 50 turns down the line, if that. Math gives you good chops which will help immensely with mids.

The tech path I would go on, and the one I did in my playthrough, is math -> alpha -> currency -> (medi, priesthood) CoL -> civil service. You really can't trust the AIs to get things fast on this difficulty, so only count on trading for things you won't need in a long time. Meanwhile, this path gives the highest immediate benefit, with every tech being crucial in some way. Alpha lets you build research and get IW, as mentioned. Currency will boost your economy and let you build wealth. CoL gives you a religion (if you wanna switch into it), and even if you don't adopt it, some free culture as well as the option for courthouses (though, to be fair, I rarely build those). And finally, the all-important civil service allows you to switch to buro for a supercapital (especially with financial), while enabling irrigation to grow your cities (at this point in the game, crucial for whips).

Also @krikav - I know it's good to build good habits for deity, but at this point I wouldn't worry about WFYABTA. The monarch AIs essentially don't have a limit, and anyhow you're going to be easily wiping your continent by the classical/medieval eras on this difficulty.

 

[Fish Man]

The first 100 turns of my own game in more detail. Also, in here I explain why I settled the jungle early.

Spoiler :

I start worker first, and then mine a PH before pasturing the cow. This lets me work a high-hammer tile to time the WB perfectly with size 2. I start on a settler immediately after...slow building here is rough but we have 2 decent food/hammer tiles so we get the guy out in 10 turns. It could be worse.

Spoiler :

I don't bother farming any FP because at this point in the game, 7 worker turns for 1 extra food is just a bad tradeoff, and also we get cottages very soon, for those juicy 3f3h tiles.

First settler goes on the plains hill close to the wheat, and I start immediately on a monument to get the eventual border pop. From what I've seen, on a map like this, t39 is actually a pretty good time for city 2, so I'd say worker-first worked out pretty well.

Spoiler :

Third settler is slow-built too; working an extra FP fin cottage. 9 turns, again a bit slow, but at this point whips would take too long to regrow and also my three tiles are very good ones. I settle on the stone for a few reasons - it saves 8 workerturns on building a stupid quarry + road, acts as a PH city center, and the cow would eventually be grabbed by the second city's borders anyways.

Spoiler :

Whip a fourth settler at last. At this point the single worker is pretty busy with cottages, which I'm prioritizing here for several reasons. One...I want to save my forests for math, and there isn't really anything else good to improve. Also, we're fin so riverside cottages are really strong. But the final rationale is that I want a head-start on research as much as possible. Because I'm aiming for a space race win, every bit of commerce matters, and I have deadlines to meet, whereas in other situations you can usually ignore research past a certain point and focus all your energies on mass murdering...especially on monarch, where that doesn't take much.

Spoiler :

I found my fourth city near the crab, making sure to chop the forest first.

Spoiler :

Some more workers are needed, so I build/whip them. For a while I was sitting at 4 cities/2 workers. This is important - if you use workerturns wisely, you will not have to build as many workers, letting you expand faster! I think I built 3 or even 4 cities before even getting another worker, because I knew without forests to chop and roads being unnecessary, the only thing to do for a bit was cottage.

Now I want to explain my rationale for settling the jungle cities. The first is that they were actually really decent spots. In particular, the cow/rice had 2 food resources, a lake, and several unjungled riverside tiles...at this stage in the game, it's a strong city spot, even if it's a bit far! The second is that I wanted happiness and commerce. The riverside cottages, yes, but also the gems/cow city...I knew IW was coming because I could trade for it after alpha, so an extra resource and about 8 commerce on top of that means a LOT at this stage in the game. Finally, I wanted to block off the AIs and deny them those spots...not really necessary on this difficulty because I have plenty of space (and because AI stacks are laughable on monarch), but it makes my space win faster because they don't get as big so I have to spend less time knocking them out.

Spoiler :

Mids + currency + GLH boosts my economy into high gear.

Spoiler :

 

[Fish Man]

The next 40 or so turns, and a demonstration of why 250AD horse archer rush is totally something you can and should casually pull off on this difficulty.

Spoiler :

I settle another decent spot and meanwhile head straight for civil service. It will provide an insane commerce boost with how our capital is shaping up now.

Spoiler :

Post-buro we are making over 200 BPT. And that's when I decide to execute the next step of my plan.

I noticed the AIs were teching abysmally slow, having not even reached monarchy. This is pretty standard for monarch difficulty, btw...expect even strong civs to reach longbows only by 500AD at the earliest, if not later.

So I decided to execute an abysmally late HA rush...after entering the medieval era . Normally this type of stuff wouldn't fly AT ALL on higher difficulties...because of the aforementioned longbows, but also because they may go for machinery/engineering which completely destroys HAs even more, and anyhow at this point begin to have ridiculous stack sizes. But with the tech leader in permanent war mode and researching like a snail, and the other two civs on the continent either unable to expand or getting demolished outright, I felt like now was a good time to make my move

Spoiler :

After CS/HBR, I go paper to get a map trade and see actually what the heck is going on. Then I tech metal casting -> machinery -> printing press, to get even more out of my now FP villages/towns. Along the way I snag a pretty good deal (Mao was almost done with CoL, apparently, and if headed towards civil service, gives me all the time in the world to attack).

Spoiler :

Here we see the power of buro...by alternating 2-pop whips and finishing another HA with overflow, we get 2 horse archers every 3 turns for a dozen turns on end, and that's just in the capital. Meanwhile, by working all the good tiles, we are still researching like a beast. And I'm whipping HAs from 2 other cities as well, with barracks/stables.

Spoiler :

t126 and 275AD attack...waaaay too late by deity standards, but here our enemy doesn't even have monarchy. And 8 HAs as an intial strike force may seem wimpy, but on monarch this is usually more than sufficient. Especially with him STILL going at Alex.

Spoiler :

Yeah he's basically screwed (one of those defenders was a catapult, btw...very poor build choice if I do say so myself).

Spoiler :

There was a a pathetic "counterattack" by his "main stack", which I avoided by emptying DC and then hitting it with fully-healed HAs again.

Spoiler :

I enter the Renaissance via printing press soon, fairly late. From here I take three more cities, completely cripple him, and then he offers me something I can't refuse:

Spoiler :

OK, so...despite Alex, an agg AI and notorious unit-spammer, having not one but TWO sources of metal, Washington took him down to his last city and captured his capital! And the city where he began his attack was on a hill, probably stacked with half a dozen phalanxes and archers. Just how the heck DID you manage to get this far, my dude?

Athens also has marble...which is just what I need for things like MoM and Taj. And a little extra happy resource too. Well, this is a deal I'll gladly take. But, as Lain said, I'll be back .

Spoiler :

If it's not clear already, I recommend for you to clear out your continent ASAP. You can do this with horse archers, or even elepults (remember, you have ivory), which are far slower but also safer and basically unstoppable on this level, even if they get their longbows and crossbows. I personally went civil service first for the commerce boost because, as you'll see later, conquering 20 cities in less than 50 turns trashes your economy hard. But if you don't care about a fast space finish, that doesn't matter, because you have to try REALLY hard to go broke on monarch, and at any rate once you have 20+ cities on monarch it's basically gg; the AIs won't get enough bonuses to keep up. At worst it delays your astro/steel/whatever by a bit.

 

[Fish Man]

Another 15 or so turns of mass murder - we're not done with HAs yet!

Spoiler :

So first of all I feel like I owe an explanation as to my teching choices. I'm going for music now because at this point in the game, if I neglect it, some other AI runs the risk of getting it first. On monarch, as you can see, you can get away with delaying this by a lot, but here I dare not delay it any longer - we NEED the great artist for our science victory master plan. Also, music allows me to build culture for border pops, which is far more sensible than the stupid 30h monuments that are gonna obsolete soon anyways. Finally, literature gives me national epic, which I'm planning to put somewhere soon.

In DC I chop a granary, and then it's straight to the Mausoleum after a border pop. I was kinda nervous building it this late, but I need it as well for my golden age chaining later on (again, this is irrelevant if not going for space).

Spoiler :

After Washington is dealt with, I move on to Mao. From preliminary scouting, his cities are not on hills mostly and thinly defended.

Yeah...that was kinda an understatement. Two cities fall in quick succession, and from then on, he collapses pretty quick.

Spoiler :

I wipe him out; there's no point in keeping him around.

Spoiler :

Our next crucial tech has arrived! Optics will let us finally meet our neighbors, for better or for worse...and we are going for astro right after. Our economy is really struggling now because we're taking some 20 cities in 50 turns, but with buro, GLH, fin cottages, and building wealth, we hold the line.

Spoiler :

I give Washington some techs to buddy him up to trade for monarchy, and then immediately declare once more. Time to put you out of your misery, old George...

Spoiler :

And I declare for a final time against poor Alex. He falls in a single turn (seriously...how did it come to this???).

Spoiler :

Now the continent is finally at peace. You're probably aware at this point there's not really a way I can lose the game now (well, except for one, but we'll get to that later). For now, it's time to recover and rebuild with the 30-some workers that the deceased civs on this continent have generously donated.

So our tech situation is pretty dicey, as of t150. We're not broke but quite close to it, only one tech into the Renaissance, and astro seems many miles away.

Spoiler :

But...

Spoiler :

Yes, that's right. It may seem unbelievable now, given that we have more than three eras work of progressively more expensive tech to research, and an entire spaceship to build, in less than 100 turns. And we're not going to get any help either, since you've seen how slow AIs are to research on monarch. But - something like this is very much possible, and owing to years of perfecting the technique of state property space colony wins, I'm going to show you how exactly to do it, in never-seen-before detail.

To be continued...

PS - I'm aware that in addition to giving you advice, I've sort of hijacked this thread for my own playthrough. If you all find this entertaining or informative, then I'll continue to post, but if you want me to move it to another thread, by all means ask, and I'll be happy to do so.

Also, yes, in the last few images, I do work the fish when I end the turn. It's just that in the screenshot, the city governor was being dumb.