Classic GOTM 34: Second Spoiler (Entering Industrial Age)

SirPleb said:
I used a new trick to help lock in the new Palace location - I moved 22 Knights, the bulk of my invasion force, to the target city. The Palace jumped nicely in 210AD.
Interesting! Do you know how many units mean one population point or something else more exact?
 
Drazek said:
Do you know how many units mean one population point or something else more exact?
Yes: every 3 military units present in a city increase its attractiveness for the Palace as much as 1 citizen.
 
SirPleb said:
Yes: every 3 military units present in a city increase its attractiveness for the Palace as much as 1 citizen.

This is the most valuable information that I read in months. :thanx:, SirPleb.
 
Yes, this is valuable new information! Thanks SirPleb! :goodjob:

I've been wondering how to jump a palace to the middle of a region of size 12 cities without starving down the cities in other parts of the map.
 
This will be my first submission! For my standards, I did well with a domination victory in 1625 (mid industrial age). I had quicker domination victories but those were on higher difficulty so the tech pace was quicker; from the MA on I had to research everything myself (only 4 turns/tech though).

The main factors that held me back:
- Focussed on expansion for too long a time. I founded cities in the north part of the continent, separated from my core, which served no real purpose and were actually a pain to defend when going to war. I didn't want to loose cities because this increases WW.

- Lenghty first war with Carthage (eliminated them), WW was problematic because I switched to republic when the war had been going on for a long time and I didn't have enough luxuries to keep the WW down. I didn't realize the 'republic' population would remember it's hardship from back in the despotic times.

- Only 3 luxuries on the continent and the other continent not keeping up with the tech pace, so trading was out for a long time.

Game: GOTM 34
Date submitted: 2004-08-29
Reference number: 4784
Your name: Crakie
Your email:
Software Version: PtW 1.27f for Windows
Entry class: open
Game status: Domination Victory for Zululand
Game date: 1625 AD
Firaxis score: 2898
Jason score: 6698
Time played: 13:26:57

I'm curious, those who had a quicker conquest or domination victory than me, can you tell me:
a) when did you start your first war
b) how many cities and workers did you have at this point (approximately)
c) which opponent did you pick and why
d) what kind of hostile units did you encounter... were they easy to combat or did it require catapults
and e) how extensively did you use artillery (catapults, cannons), because in my experience knights vs pikemen is not pretty. Im assuming you encountered pikemen or even musketmen and didn't even need cavalry.
???
 
@Crakie

a) as soon as I met the first civ. with my first warrior.
b) 1 or 2, my 2nd city came from a hut about this time.
c) Persia, my warriors found them first.
d) I only built warrior untill iron then swordsmen, knights, and cav. (no defence)
e) did not build any the whole game. Only a few pikemen late in the game. No one else got gunpower.

Note: I was not the fastest win, but I did win in 980AD.
 
Crakie, just to chime in with another extreme:

a) in 410 AD, one turn after discovering Military Tradition and upgrading 23 horses to cavallery

b) about 20 cities, less workers because improvement of the core was mostly finished

c) Egypt, was just most convenient and the nicest land for a bit score increase

d) no noticeable opposition, nobody had anything better than pikes

e) no artillery and BTW also no swords,no MI, no knights

result : conquest in 720AD, not fast if you look at Drazek, but also not really slow
 
Crakie said:
... because in my experience knights vs pikemen is not pretty...
Knights (4/3/2) vs. Pikemen (1/3/1) or Cavalry (6/3/2) vs. Riflemen (4/6/1) Similar situations. Both can be ugly, but if you have sufficient numbers you can capture the city. The biggest advantage is the ability to retreat. You will lose some but some will only be red-lined. You just have to be patient and pause for healing when you don't have enough for a good stack. As a bonus, the veterns red-line the defenders, which allows you to try for a ML with Elites. But you got to have enough units to begin with.

I generally don't mess with artillery until well Artillery. :) (i.e. Replacable Parts) Now, I find Cavalary vs. Infantry to be expensive, if not a waste of time without artillery. But generally I wait for tanks once my opponents get Infantry. I like artillery for bombarding enemy shipping. Used in concert with bombers you can devistate a group of ships. :D
 
In my wars to date, I've been trying to build more Cats/Cannons. They certainly help, they even helped in the Carthage war to knock down the Mercs 1 or 2 hps. I didn't have a huge problem with Swrods vs Mercs, but as soon as I could build horses, I did. The ability to retreat, then to follow up with Swords/MedInf vs. red-lined defenders, makes Mercs (and the Pikes I knew I'd meet in Egypt and Persia) a lot less fearsome.

Just remember to check terrain before attacking a city... I forgot to check Memphis, which was built on a hill, and lost two and red-lined another Cav against a single Pike!

Neil. :cool:
 
Crakie said:
I'm curious, those who had a quicker conquest or domination victory than me, can you tell me:
a) when did you start your first war
b) how many cities and workers did you have at this point (approximately)
c) which opponent did you pick and why
d) what kind of hostile units did you encounter... were they easy to combat or did it require catapults
and e) how extensively did you use artillery (catapults, cannons), because in my experience knights vs pikemen is not pretty. Im assuming you encountered pikemen or even musketmen and didn't even need cavalry.
???

I had a domination victory at 1400ad
a. I do not remember when I started a war, but well before 1000bc.
b. I think I had 5 or 6 cities.
c. I started it against Carthage because they had horses near by.
d. They had their UU and such an early war was a mistake. I attacked a city with 5 warriors, all of them were killed, I even gave Carthage technology for piece.
Ooops.
 
Originally Posted by SirPleb
Yes: every 3 military units present in a city increase its attractiveness for the Palace as much as 1 citizen.

Sorry for the question but I do not undestand ! Do you mean it 's reduce corruption in the city ?

LeSphinx
 
Thanks guys... I am impressed at how quickly people cleared their continent, after that it was a formality to clean up the other continent. I wonder what it is that held me back for an extra thousand of years... My guess is to focus less on infrastructure in the beginning and start pumping out units earlier, and to make better use of the retreat ability of the horse-based units. I wonder if there's room for improvement in my approach to an attack, the exact movement of units.
 
I'm also interested in the research path people took... given the map, I'd have thought a beeline across the top to Navigation, and trading for the bottom path, might've worked better.

Neil. :cool:
 
eldar said:
I'm also interested in the research path people took... given the map, I'd have thought a beeline across the top to Navigation, and trading for the bottom path, might've worked better.

Neil. :cool:
On regent level you cannot expect much at all from the AI in MA, if you want to go fast. You have to research nearly all you need yourself.
In my case I traded for the free Feudalism of Persia and in all the time it took for getting the whole lower path to MT (@ 4-8 turns per tech), the AI did not get more than Monotheism and Chivalry (and I had gifted all my neighbors into MA to speed up their research).
But if you look at Drazeks post, the best was to not research the lower path at all, but beeline to navigation and finish with horses and knights.
 
I have just posted my save:

Game date: 1120 AD
Firaxis score: 4472
Jason score: 9890
Time played: 21:26:05

It was a very beneficial game for me. If it wasn't GOTM I would probably postpone my invasion to the other continent until I had galeons. This time, I felt a little hury so I tried MI/Knights invasion transported by galleys/caravels. Despite having lighthouse, my transports were unable to cross the sea safely (6 ocean squares IIRC).
Unfortuantely I was not aware of the game feature that adding empty ships to a stacks prevent transported forces losses, which I discovered in this spoiler thread after having the game won. Learning the hard way, I probably lost more units in the ocean than in combat during the invasion. So this was my big mistake made and lesson learned.
 
horragoth said:
Unfortuantely I was not aware of the game feature that adding empty ships to a stacks prevent transported forces losses, which I discovered in this spoiler thread after having the game won.
Adding empty ships to stacks doesn't help.
You have to perform ship chaining.
That is loading your troops from one ship into another in mid ocean.
I think this is much too tedious and rather invest a few turns in researching navigation.
You don't need to go all the way to magnetism for safe ocean travel.
 
LeSphinx said:
Originally Posted by SirPleb
Yes: every 3 military units present in a city increase its attractiveness for the Palace as much as 1 citizen.

Sorry for the question but I do not undestand ! Do you mean it 's reduce corruption in the city ?

LeSphinx
They help with "jumping the Palace". It is a trick for moving your Palace to a different city by abandoning the city which has your Palace, and controlling which city the program will then choose for your new Palace. Click here for DaveMcW's "Free Palace Jump" thread which explains the details.
 
This is the second GOTM I played and I think I did well although I made some important mistakes.:blush:

I entered the MA in 230AD with half of Carthage conquered, all Persia but a single city and having broken through Egypt defenses. I recently built FP in a Persian city just N of Persepolis, maximizing the number of cities that would profit from it. It was a good choice, but not the best considering that the terrain was not worked very much in that region.

Around 300AD I captured Thebes & The Great Lighthouse. I though that was the key to get to the other continent, but it proves that I could not get to the other continent without making suicide galley which I decided not to try as I did not want an invasion force safely in the same manner and at regent level I would probably not be able to trade any tech.

Then I made a big mistake. I do not play on regent level anymore except in GOTM, so I was not used to that situation (master of my continent before the end of MA) and I research toward magnetism instead of navigation. :shakehead I conquered the rest of the continent slowly, concentrating on research instead of building military. The other civ on my continent were very weak so I did not need reinforcement. Around 600AD, I was alone on my continent.

I finally got magnetism, upgraded my galleys to galleons and found the other continent very fast. There I made another mistake. Somehow, I expected the other continent to be closer W than E and my invasion force was on the wrong side. :gripe: But I was going to get MT soon anyway and cav move fast so I did not loose many turns because of it.

A few turns before 1000AD, I landed on the southern tip of Arabia. Cav vs Pikemen & spearmen meant fast conquest and I had domination victory in 1200AD after conquering Arabia & all but one Indian city. :banana:

A Jason score of 9368, which I consider very good for a second GOTM. :yeah: Still, I think I could have won before 1000AD if I researched navigation instead of magetism. A lack of experience I guess.

@rrau: I am surprise you did not do any better as you looked like a very good player in our Mon&Emp SG.

@crakie:
a) My first war was just after I hooked up iron. I had researched writing at a slow pace to get enough money to upgrade about 12 vet warriors to swordmen. They were surprisingly very efficient against Numidian Spearman. I do not usually stack that much warriors, but it took a long time before I could trade for iron working as I was researching toward republic.
b) I had around 8 cities at that point.
c) Carthage was the target to get the horses that they got just a few turns before me (even if they were so close to it!). Don't ask me why they did not consider the cows near the horses as the best spot to settle!
d) The best unit I faced on my continent was Numidian Spearmen. Other civ got spearmen only. I faced pikemen & spearmen on the other continent.
e) I almost never use catapults. You have to build a large enough force so you do not care if you loose a few. I am used to play C3C at emperor level. The AI sometimes has more than 10 units to defend its capital. Imagine the number of catapults you would need to wound every defending units! I also prefer having fast units and do not like to wait for catapults to get to the front.

In MY experience, knights are good vs pikemen. You will loose a few from time to time, some will retreat. As long as your invasion force count about 2 knights for each pikemen defending a city & they all attack at the same time, your invasion should succeed. You may need more to attack a city on a hill. Of course, gettting the cities on hills as a payment for peace is better but not always possible. I hope that helps.

BTW, my skills improved a lot after I read a few articles in the war academy a few months ago.
 
Thanks SirPleb for the Jumping Palace info.
So I undestand, you found the capital, tben start to play.... then you create the forbiden palace, then... you stack a lot of armies in the city "elected" and you abandon the capitol ?
What about the people, the culture of the capital ?

LeSphinx
 
Back
Top Bottom