Climb the Ladder V: Stalin - Emperor (again!)

[dankok8]

Round 2: 2720-900BC

Tech Order: Wheel (remainder), Agriculture, Mysticism (to pop borders), Pottery (for cottages and granaries), Writing (not done)

As the round started, I decided to use the time until Stone is hooked up to build the Barracks in Moscow. We will need it...



Technologically, I opted for Agri to farm the flood plain. I really still think that delaying it until this far was optimal. Copper was far away and we may well have been beaten to it if we hadn't prioritized Bronze Working.



Luckily, we did get the Copper. St. Pete started on a Worker. What's also great is that I see no other Copper/Horses nearby meaning that Shaka may have no units better than Archers!!



Surely enough, once the Stone was connected, the GW was going to be completed quickly.





The capital started on the Worker after this. We badly needed another worker to help us build a road to St. Petersburg and chop Axemen. St. Pete started on a Barracks after its Worker was done. When the Barracks was done, St. Pete joined Moscow to:





Yep, Axemen were built quickly helped by chops and further improvements to the land. In the meantime, one Worker (of the 3) was building a road towards our soon to be enemy.

Ulundi, which is capital city that we are targeting, is 1S of that lake. I knew that another border pop happened so that plains hill is now the nook on the border. My Axemen would move in from the western Incense to minimize # of turns to reach the capital and give Shaka as little warning signs as possible.





Once we felt we had enough Axemen, Moscow started on:



Why not? It's extremely useful if we get and if we don't, we get lots of gold to deficit research. It's not wasting my capital's production for a long time anyways.

I look at the power graph and...:





It's on pardna!!!

When my 10 brave Axemen lead by the "Steel Man" himself, they see:



Swordsman to the NE!! Shaka has Iron.





"Dear Dictator, they have Iron", says a soldier.
Stalin: "Not in the city they don't. CHARGEEE!!!!"

In a mayhem of battle, Russia loses 2 axemen while the Zulu lose all 4 defenders. Ulundi is ours.



However, another one of Shaka's cities is too heavily fortified.



Let's see what Shaka says...



Stalin: "Lies? I told you I would attack you if I had Copper. I did and I did..."

Our Territory:





Demo:



Cities:







My Thoughts:
1) Maybe I can grab that fishing village north of Ulundi. Taking one city is pretty crappy in my eyes. Not hurting him badly means he will settle much of our land!!
2) I really don't know how to settle. Block Justinian to the north or Shaka in the south. I will need your thoughts. I will def spam settlers after the mids are done.
3) I'll try to adopt Buddhism when it comes in to make friends with Justinian and increase the happy cap.

 

[Grashopa]

1640 BC - AH-Ag start with pasture on cows mine on the stone first.

Spoiler :

And I settled on the plains hill 1 SE. Theres 9 food here and 1 SE picks up a lot more hills. Goal right from the start is oracle-monarchy. There are 30+ hammers here with the capital at size 10. On top of that we find another fp cottage site we can grow out.

At 3160 we are about to finish mining the stone and that will give us I think 11 hammers into the settler or almost a 9 turn settler. Mysticism is next for stonehenge sans stone.. I have to go straight for oracle at this point to make sure I get it and I don't want another settler out just yet.
2nd city is going to grab sheep and flood plains. 3rd city will be the fish and flood plains. These two cities will cottage up so we'll need to grab pottery after the oracle techs.



2nd city is in with trade routes ( the extra 2 commerce is very important at this point ) Wheel-pottery is next and I'll have 2 workers to cottage up city 2 and 3. Capital is building a settler after finishing stonehenge for the free monuments and Great Prophets == more hammers and gold since we'll have to attack Shaka.

Shaka settled into a crap city site. He probably doesn't have room behind him. At this point I have already decided to Horse Archer Shaka. This will allow me to fill out my land a bit before attacking and gives me a good shot at Byz as well if necessary. Remember I have 30 hammers in the capital + HE means I don't even care if he gets longbows.

So 4th city will be 1 NW of the marble to grab the horses. It will have enough hammers to help build HAs. Don't have a northern screen, but I plan on picking up 2 more cities after this - seafood and pigs/hills. Its emperor and its Shaka so theres no threat of longbows from him, so I can take my time.



Oracle and pottery shortly. St Pete will put out a 3rd worker at size 2. I'll need 2 workers to farm then mine the capital for when I get BW next and switch to slavery/HR.



Screen of the capital post oracle. Looks like I'll squeeze out a settler and another worker? Or maybe 2 settlers before BW comes in and I grow out the capital to size 10. Byz is already in the jungle to the NE so he may threaten pigs/corn site up there.

I'll get HBR quickly from here as city 2 and 3 are cottaged up.. 1 ADish attack? Late, but Shaka won't be a problem and we'll see where Byz is at. Or if I whip down my cities I can get off earlier. We'll see. I'll want to be able to grab alphabet for HBR before attacking Shaka.

 

[Grashopa]

I don't think you are at any threat of losing the mids on emperor are you? Get settlers/workers out there. I'd have settled a commerce city before attacking, you'd have ~10 more commerce at this point?

Ignore his crappy 3 archer city - it won't even be able to get settlers out. Get the iron city. You will need the pyramids for beakers, but you also can't stop to run scientists when you need to block Byz. You don't have to worry about tech rate at this point. Getting writing for scientists is all that matters for now. Once you have 10 cities running 2 scientists each under rep you will catch up on all the other techs.

St pete doesn't need a monument - build workers/settlers. Hit the flood plain fish city next with a couple workers. Farm up the first fp then cottage the rest. That will get you the gold you need to settle a bunch more cities.

 

[dankok8]

I don't think you are at any threat of losing the mids on emperor are you? Get settlers/workers out there. I'd have settled a commerce city before attacking, you'd have ~10 more commerce at this point?

I think I can get the 'mids no problem. Industrious + Stone + I can chop a little to speed it up. I donno about settling more cities before the rush though. The rush was already pretty late and Shaka has a lot of metal units already and researched Iron Working a while ago.

Ignore his crappy 3 archer city - it won't even be able to get settlers out. Get the iron city. You will need the pyramids for beakers, but you also can't stop to run scientists when you need to block Byz. You don't have to worry about tech rate at this point. Getting writing for scientists is all that matters for now. Once you have 10 cities running 2 scientists each under rep you will catch up on all the other techs.

St pete doesn't need a monument - build workers/settlers. Hit the flood plain fish city next with a couple workers. Farm up the first fp then cottage the rest. That will get you the gold you need to settle a bunch more cities.

I don't have Iron Working myself so I have no clue where the Iron is... maybe I'll look for a mine on flatland to give me a hint. It could also be one of the hills next to Ulundi that will be mine once the city comes out of revolt.

I do plan to run an SE at least initially if I get the 'mids so I agree with the rest. Anyways, I plan to play and post the next round later tonight. It's a very interesting game to say the least.

 

[iggymnrr]

The mids are not a problem but you don't need them. With the GW you need alpha before the economy crash so you can steal from Justinian back to an economy.

 

[CreeDakota]

I dont see a mine in the southern city, I bet you stole it along with the Capital. Make a play for the northern city, get peace, pump out a city and then redeclare later. If you need to make another axe from Moscow and delay Mids to get that city now. I agree you have not crippled Shaka enough to make the next war easy.

The next city you should go for is Pig / corn to your East.

If you adopt Theo and get Just to Friendly will he trade with you in isolation?

 

[vicawoo]

A calculation based REX start of dankok's emperor stalin game. And remember, if calculations are too hard for you, google will perform calculations if you type it in the search box.

Spoiler :

Queue in worker warrior.


our best tile is the 6 yield cow, second is a 5 yield mined/quarried stone.
Calculation 1: grow to size 2 or start on a settler? Our rubric is checking the ratio of investment/extra yield. So a settler is usually at worst 100/4=25, a settler working a 6 yield tile 100/7=14 1/7.
Growing to size 2: with a 3 food source it will take 7 and 1/3 turn. If we went animal husbandry first, we would lose 3 turns x (3 food 1 hammer) and 4 1/3 turns of (3 food 4 hammers).
3 x 4 + 12/3 x 7 = 42 1/3.
(42+1/3)/3=14 1/9 < 100/6. Our next highest yield city is the pig city, as far as we can see.

We need 1-2 warriors to safely expand, so our real game experience makes use of those "wasted" 19 1/3 hammers.


Calculation 2: grow to size 3 or start a settler? Adding up turn by turn yield gets to be a pain, so we'll make life easier by assuming we work fully improved tiles, and we use my old equation:
2*(10+n)*(f+h)/f'.
n is the city size, and it takes 2*(10+n) to grow from size n to n+1
f and h are the food and hammers of the tiles for the best possible worker/settler production.
f' is the food production for the best growing production, although in real life we may settle for a more hammer balanced f' for an extra fogbuster.

It's a lot easier than it sounds. f' is 5 if we work a farmed flood plains and cow. f+h is 10 from a cow and mined stone.
2*12*10/5=48. Our next best tile is a mediocre 4 yield farmed flood plain or mined hill, which improves our total yield by 2 (due to eating 2 food)
48/2=24> 100/7, so our growing to size 3 is now much less hammer efficient than a second city.
What makes this is easy is how easily we can calculate (f+h)/f'; it's not the yields that determine efficiency while growing, it's the food to hammer ratios! This is specifically where food is more useful than hammers in growing, note if all our yield were pure food, (f+h)/f' would be near 100%, and growing would be twice as efficient!


Our settler is out 17 turns after our worker and our empire yield has jumped from 4 to 10 and soon to be 17. Our second warrior has been in queue for 10 turns after we switched to a settler, but now I'm going to finish him since we need more scouting, we don't want to lose hammers. At least we won't have to pay extra maintenance for a new city.

Which brings us to our next point: new cities cost maintenance, so how do we factor that in?
Well in a previous thread I calculated empire wide maintenance increase for the n+1st city (although I ignored a small total empire population component). The figure is 0.9+3/5*n+distance/3.5, although we scale it down 9/10 for emperor difficulty. Our second city is 6.5 tiles away, so it will cost
0.9x(0.9+3/5+6.5/3.5)=3 maintenance, so our empire should be at -3. The city produces 1, so we're down 2 commerce.
Lo and behold:


But comparing commerce to food/hammers is apples and oranges. Well, it depends on the tiles we switch to commerce. For instance, if we had riverside cottage, we could switch a non-riverside mine to a riverside cottage to exchange 2 yield for 2 commerce, in which case 1 hammer is worth 1 commerce. If we were financial, we could exchange a non-riverside mines for a riverside cottages, so 1 hammer is worth 1.5 commerce. A non-riverside mine for a non-riverside cottage is 1 hammer for half a commerce, hence they're terrible tiles to work during REX phases.
In our case, we flood plain tiles in our capital and to our south. A non-riverside mine for a flood plain cottage is 1 yield for 2 commerce, an astounding yield. When you see flood plains, commerce is cheap to exchange for, so give yourself a greenlight to expand.

So in our case, our new city can be compensated for by exchanging 1 yield for a flood plain cottage when the time comes, so even maintenance adjusted our second city is 6 yield. Normally we would build a second worker at the capital soon after our second settler, but note that we already have 3 improved tiles in the capital and the food/hammer ratio makes expansion highly inefficient, and our second city only has two special tiles and no hills/riverside tiles without a border pop. So we start on our 3rd settler and look for a good place to settle it.



Here it is. Now let's calculate how much gold we'll lose by expanding to it:
Calculation 4:
0.9+0.6 x 2 + 9/6.5=4.67
0.9*4.67=4.2
So we should go down another 4 to -7 per turn. Unfortunately we are only netting 8 from the palace, 1 to 2 from the flood plains, and 3 from each city square so we will be teching uncomfortably more slowly than one city per turn. If we get the wheel and connect two cities we'll get two more commerce, so we'll be about even, so it's worth delaying the settler to get the wheel. In retrospect, getting masonry was iffy since I could be teching pottery instead. If it were higher difficulty, we might be able to get some wonder failure gold from the great wall.

This may seem complicated, but after a few repetitions the game forces you into simplifying assumptions: you need a commerce source around when you settle your 3rd city. You need fogbusters and barb defense, even if you have to chop them.

 

[iggymnrr]

I believe AIs will trade at friendly. I don't think Justinian declares at pleased. So same religion, OB and a bit of tech trading may be enough to get him to friendly. With the GW you can risk pleased from him and retain the option of theo if necessary. He is dead in the long run.

 

[Grashopa]

Turn on yields - in AI territory it shows the yield they are getting from the tile. He could have settled on it as well in which case its an extra hammer in the city.

 

[dankok8]

Round 3: 900-200BC

Not a very long round but I've come to a major crisis point.

Tech Order: Writing, Mathematics

As the round started, I sent my axemen to Shaka's other remaining city.



2 archers only and a grassland flatland mine. That's the Iron right there!! My axemen move in and...



I kept the city for the Iron but it is really a marginal city. I talk to Shaka and he realizes the might of Stalin.



Next,



2 of our cities build Scouts to aid in exploration.





At this point..



I start Mathematics. Took much less than that (18 turns) and it leads to important technologies like Construction for pults and Currency/CoL to fix our economy. Still a poor choice. I think Fishing should have been chosen here to allow Ulundi and Nobamba to work seafood tiles that also produce 2 commerce each.

I also switch civics...



Rep will help us run an SE and Slavery can help whip infrastructure.

Our first GP is born...



I decided to settle him instead of infiltrating Justinian. First of all, I plan to get Justinian to Friendly so I should be able to trade anyways + I didn't want the GSpy to get killed on the way there as I had no fast unit to escort it. Finally, under Rep, a settled GSpy is 6 beaker/turn which is pretty good to boost our research.

After a settler is whipped in Moscow, we start on a Library there.



And in other cities...







We also settle our future GP farm. Nice city spot with Corn/Pig/Stone in the east has been claimed by barbs and jungle in the north by Justinian.



After settling this city, I realize I'm breaking even at 0% science. GULP!! Luckily, libraries are finished in Moscow, St. Pete, and Ulundi and I start running 2 scientists in each city, giving us a decent beaker production rate.

I decide to stop here and ask for advice:

Russia and Zululand:





Justinian: (has 7 cities to our 5)



Cities: (production low because we are running specialists instead of working mines)



Power: (worrisome as Justinian is strong while REXing as well)



My Thoughts:
1) Economy is in tatters. Although I can research ok, I just simply can't support Shaka's cities or that barb city even if I can conquer them. I'm thinking I still have to build some cottages around the capital...
2) Shaka has effectively split our empire in two by settling inbetween. I'm thinking to gather all the axemen I have right now and go for his capital which only has 1 archer and 1 axeman in it right now.
3) Buddhism still hasn't spread to us. I think Justinian might decide to attack us in which case we're probably done for.

Current Plan:
- research Fishing (working seafood will allow Ulundi and Nobamba to grow more and also give more commerce - will take like 2 turns to finish) followed by Iron Working (swords will help against Shaka and we know we have Iron connected) followed by Currency (I can whip/chop some gold to keep us alive). Not sure about the order here?
- destroy/capture as many cities as possible from that bastard Shaka!

 

[iggymnrr]

If you have OB with Justinian and he's not spamming missionaries, there's reason to be concerned.

 

[CreeDakota]

I agree with keeping the pressure on Shaka. Even if you cant afford to keep the city you can keep him weak and get some pillage chase and maybe another worker.

I doubt Just and Shaka have good relations but if you will get negative diplo points for a declaration that should be considered.

I agree you should tech Fish and then maybe onto sailing. I think your chance to get buddism will increase if you have trade routes with Justian. If you cant spare the beakers for sailing road up to his territory.

Is just WHEOOHRN?

 

[dankok8]

Round 4: 200BC-860AD

Tech Order: Fishing-Iron Working-Currency-Code of Laws-Civil Service

Right about when fishing was finished 3 turns into the round, Buddhism spread:



I proceed with what we agreed upon:



Yea, he's gonna get it!!



And...



BOOM!! Now that Shaka has no more metal units, I switch production to Swordsmen instead...



Justinian finally becomes pleased. We should be safe...



Meanwhile, Ulundi is seriously suffering from unhappiness - lack of protection (troops off to war), foreign culture, and enslavement of the citizenry has put them over the edge.



Meanwhile, KwaDukuza is besieged..



..and captured.



Our first GG is settled in St. Pete:



At this point, Shaka's last city is surrounded, several defenders killed..



...and all hell breaks loose!!



Justinian must have decided to kill us while still cautious. Declaring war on his friend Shaka certainly didn't help and we had a -2 "you declared on our friend" with Justinian.

His stack is several turns from my capital and I have to get my army there to protect. Moscow's huge borders did give us an early warning. Shaka, lets make peace!!



Justinian's first wave is routed. Moscow build a few Spearmen to deal with Chariots that Justinian was sending.





At this point, CoL is done, my cities are low in pop and full of whipping unhappiness. I switch to Caste System to be able to run more Specialists.



Justinian's second wave was destroyed with no losses.





Justinian was ready to sit at the table and discuss a peace treaty.



That was good enough as his 3rd wave was actually larger than the first two and my citizens didn't wanna fight those of the same faith. Don't worry though my fanatic friend, I'll be back.

My troops were immediately sent to that Barb city to the NE to get there before Justinian.



In a major coup, I won the foot race and captured a productive city:



I also founded Rostov on the west coast:



I pulled several trades with my friend (for now?):









My troops were tired of sitting around and Stalin felt like he still had some unfinished business to take care of.







And the Zulu are done just as Civil Service is completed and I switch to Bureaucracy and Organized Religion (Buddhism is spread pretty well thanks to missionaries from our buddy Justinian).

State of the World post to follow.

 

[dankok8]

State of the World - 860AD

Russia:



Byzantine Empire:



Resources:



Domestic:



Finances:



Civics:



Tech:



Major Cities:

Moscow - future production powerhouse


St. Petersburg - military production city


Ulundi - commerce city, might turn into a GP farm


Novgorod - phenomenal commerce city


Power:



Demo:



Thoughts/Questions
1) Economy still not in great shape but I'm running specialists instead of working cottages so it could get much better especially as Courthouses are coming online too. I also feel like running specialists lower production by not letting me work mines, particularly in Moscow. When do I switch from SE to CE?!? If I didn't have Pyramids, I probably would have by now, but 6 beakers per specialist feels stronger than a cottage before Free Speech. I'm currently in a growth phase where cities are not working many specialists so the research rate is misleadingly low.
2) I'm gonna settle one more city north of Moscow and two down south in the ice to claim resources. I'm thinking 1N of Silver and another city 2S of Marble to grab Fish and Horses.
3) I feel like I should win the Liberalism race. Liberalism will also help me enable Free Religion which I think I'll have to run to avoid being hated by the other continent. I plan to kill Justinian sooner or later (Rifling maybe?).
4) Alternatively, I could go Aesthetics and Literature and build the Great Library? It seems like nobody has built any of the the Aesthetics wonders so I have a chance to get it especially with Marble.

 

[Grashopa]

Use the BUG mod

Farm all the flood plains in the capital - its more hammers and scientists.

If you can farm ulundi's? flood plains thats a huge amount of scientists, with an academy there it would be better than the cottages. This assumes you can breakeven without the commerce.

You don't want a CE, you want to make sure you maximize your SE. That means more farms, and make a plan and decide on a bulb path now.

You going for domination? How about using your UU the cossacks instead of rifles

Did you forget about your EP? As Iggy repeatedly reminded me you should have been able to steal techs? Whats your plan ?

 

[Grashopa]

Here is my capital at 1250 AD. Farm the flood plains! No spoiler, just a pic.

And attached my last save in case you want to take a look.

Spoiler :

 

[Grashopa]

Oh yeah pop a save in there so I can take a look.

 

[dankok8]

Round 5: 860-1380AD

Tech Order: Aesthetics-Literature-Philosophy-Paper-Education-Liberalism-Nationalism (free)-Constitution-Gunpowder

Major theme in this round was city optimization. First Ulundi starting building the Moai statues. It's our only coastal city with serious production potential so it's a good choice.



Unfortunately, just as Literature was completed, some bozo on another continent completed the Great Library.

I did pop a GS and used him..





Yea, I bulbed Philosophy to ensure that I get to Liberalism first. I only needed Paper and Education now and as cities grew, more Scientists were assigned to keep the beaker production high.



I pulled an ok trade with Justinian. Maybe shouldn't have since CoL probably helped him a lot. Monarchy does enable Feudalism though.



To raise the happy cap and in anticipation of being first to paper and building the UofS, I started building temples in a few cities.



and founded some cities..



St. Petersburg would build the following wonder to cut maintenance costs from southern cities:



Justinian is a good friend:



Ulundi builds another national wonder...



Yea, its gonna be a GP farm. Should I destroy those 2 western cottages for farms?
Anyways, it pops another GS which is used to build an academy in Novgorod.



St. Pete built the Heroic Epic..



We also finished UofS right after.



...and went for the home run:



Yet another GS came out of Ulundi and started a Golden Age:



Liberalism was won!! We took Nationalism as a free tech and went after Constitution.





Moscow began on Taj Mahal: (You can see that all cottages except one have been farmed over)



A caravel from a land far beyond visited us in 1310AD.



Brennus. He only has 8 cities and hates me for trading with his worst enemy Justinian. *sigh*

To make matters worse, somebody beats for the Taj Mahal by 2 measly turns...



We did get 500 gold for the effort though while only investing 5 turns building it. It also doesn't surprise as the AI prioritizes Nationalism.

Now that Justinian knows Brennus, I decided to:





I also founded another city down there in the tundra to claim Silver:



..and got an event giving me another source:



Moscow pops a GSpy and I use him to infiltrate Justinian.



In 1360AD, another Caravel from a land beyond reaches us but it's not Celtic!!



Saladin! Until he starts hating me due to different religion, I decide to get even more for Education:



As Gunpowder is finished 2 turns later, the round ends. State of the World post to follow. Saves will be included.

 

[huerfanista]

@Dankok8:

Nice job so far. BTW:

I didn't want the GSpy to get killed on the way there as I had no fast unit to escort it.

GSpys are invulnerable and invisible to enyone else. I often use them as superspies when a pop one in the late game - I let them roam the battlefield in advance of my units looking for enemy stacks/counterattacks.

 

[dankok8]

State of the World - 1380AD

Empire:



Domestic:



Tech:



Civics:



Military:



Power:



Demo:



Moscow:



St. Pete:



Ulundi:



Nobamba:



Novgorod:



Bulawayo:



Thoughts:
1) We're doing well but we are not ahead of the pack. I think I need more land and Justinian is probably the best place to get it. I'm thinking of going Free Religion to suck up to the other AI's and avoid being declared on.
2) When do I switch to CE? Once Printing Press comes in, I should switch some cities (i.e. Novgorod) to full fledged CE? I also want your thoughts on specialization. Moscow will get Ironworks, Novgorod Wall Street, and Ulundi Oxford maybe? Do I also need to plow over those few cottages near Ulundi?