COTM 11: Second Spoiler

[DJMGator13]

My only spoiler - I start this game with less than a week to finish it due to tax season and SGOTM06.

I begin by moving my settler NE and founding on the hill between the game and the cow. My original production consists of 3 warriors (2 for exploring and 1 for MP) and then a granary. By 3000BC I have discovered the elephants but have not met anyone yet. I have already researched Pottery and I’m currently working on Writing heading for what I expect to be a standard Republic slingshot. I meet Carthage around 2750BC and found my second city in 2710BC.

By 1990BC I’m up to 4 cities and have a settler in route. I’ve also managed to trade for Warrior Code and Ceremonial Burial. I’m now running science at 80%. By 1750BC I have still only met Carthage but I can see a Dutch city. I meet Japan in 1700BC, the Mongols in 1550BC and finally contact the Dutch city in 1525BC. The tech pace is amazing me for a Regent level game and I’m actually concerned about the slingshot. I have also not uncovered any horses even though I have cleared a lot of fog. Based on this I decide that the Statue of Zeus is going to be imperative in this game. So I decide to go for Philosophy prior to Code of Law and to select Mathematics. I also start a pre build for the Statue. By 1250BC I have met the Celts and the Vikings. I’m up to 8 cities and 1 turn from Philosophy. The Celts are up Polytheism and I can’t buy it from them, so this cements the selection of Mathematics next turn.

By 1000BC I have met everyone except India, I have 11 cities, 23 pop and I have 14 techs. I’m short Poly, COL, Const & Curr for exiting the Ancient Age. I’m 9 turns away from the SOZ and have a military of 8 warriors, 1 archer, 1 curragh, 1 settler and 10 workers.

Here’s a look at my empire.

In 800BC I complete the Statue of Zeus and quickly build a barracks in Pyongyang before making my first Ancient Cavalry. Since I still have no horses this will be my major offensive unit. I start to build up my army at this point.

In 570BC the Celts declare war on me after I refuse their demand. Because I’m so short of time to play I decide to be a little nasty in this game in an effort to make it a quick one. So in 490BC I buy embassies with the Mongols and the Dutch. I then buy Republic from the Dutch for 2 techs and gpt. Then I sign the Dutch to a MA versus the Celts, hey they started it, for more gpt. I then sign the Mongols to a MA versus the Celts also. I then revolt drawing a 7 turn anarchy period. And as a parting bit of nastiness I declare on the Dutch to get all my gpt back. I enter the Middle Ages at this point.

The rest of the game is a pretty straightforward path of destruction. Having seen the map layout I decide to launch a three-phase attack. The first phase consists of a push up through Carthage and into the main part of the map. The second phase is an assault on the Vikings before they can build Berserkers. When I launched this phase I did not realize they were on an island, but I just moved a few ships over to later transport those units to attack India. The third phase consisted of another naval crossing and attack on the Dutch and later on the Celts.

Phase 1 – Center Strike starts in 450BC with a declaration of war on Carthage and the capture of my first city. My military at this point was 8 warriors, 6 archers, 3 cats, 5 trebuchet and 3 Ancient Cavalry. Their land is full of marshes and jungles so I’m not really interested in wiping them out at this stage. I capture their capital in 290BC and generate my first Great Leader in 250BC. I quickly use it to form a very powerful weapon, a 3-unit Ancient Cavalry army with 3 moves and 3 attacks. I make peace with Carthage in 110BC after capturing 6 cities and leaving them with 3 cities in the marshy mountain area. I’ve hooked up my iron by now and a military of 12 swords, 5 archers, 3 cats, 5 trebuchets, 2 galleys, 3 Ancient Cavs and a 3-unit AC Army. The earlier nasty play has brought the world’s tech pace to a virtual standstill.

The second stage of Center Strike continues with an assault on Japan, I declare on them in 90AD after positioning 6 swords, 3 AC and the AC Army just outside their lands. My cats and trebuchets are stuck at the mountains and are waiting for roads. They were very helpful on the Carthage war but will now sit idle for a long stretch of time. I capture the first Japanese city in 130AD and luckily produce my second Great Leader in 210AD after capturing Tokyo. Again, I use the Leader to form my second 3-unit AC Army. My goal is to progress towards Shimonoseki and gain control of horses. Later in this war I sign the Mongols up in a MA versus Japan to try to reduce the number of Mongol units. At this point I am strong against everyone and I am considering going for conquest, if I have enough time. The Japanese war continues until 430AD when I sue for peace and gain a city in the eastern side of the Celtic lands. Japan’s last 2 cities including Shimonoseki are surrounded by Mongols units, which impacted my decision to make peace with Japan. I quickly gift this city to the Mongols who are still at war with the Celts from my earlier dealings. I have still not acquired any horses.

Around 380AD I notice that the Celts have captured 1 of the 3 remaining Carthage cities in the game, so I detour a few units to go after the last 2 cities and to keep the Celtic troops out of my undefended lands. No real problem here and I position these few troops near the former Carthage city that the Celts took. I have also signed ROPs with both the Mongols and the Celts to allow them to travel thru my lands to wage war on each other.

Phase 2 – Western Strike starts in 70AD with a declaration of war on the Vikings. Using 3 galleys I transport 5 or 6 swords and 2 AC to the island. I quickly capture 2 cities on the island and slowly continue to take it over. I continue to ferry over swords and a few AC. At this point I still do not realize this is an island, but it is looking that way. To my dismay there are no horses here either. The Viking assault continues until 410AD when I eliminate them from the game. By now I have built up a force about a dozen MDIs, which are supplemented by 3 ACs and 1 trebuchet. At the same time I am capturing the last 2 Viking cities, on the smaller island NW of their former island, I start transporting the rest of the Western Strike Force towards India.

India turns into a little tougher challenge for 2 reasons. First I have to transport reinforcements from the mainland to Viking Island and then run them across the island before transporting them to India. Not a quick supply line. The second reason is that due to India’s isolated location I was not able to draw them into any of the world wars. This is a direct result of having been aligned with the Mongols for most of the game. So even though I am Strong to India they still have a nice supply of units in their holdings. I capture two Indian cities in 440 AD and also generate my third Great Leader. Before I can make another AC army I lose 2 of my 3 ACs in this region so I end up making a 3-unit MDI army. By 550AD I have captured 9 Indian cities and my forces are spread out across their lands. They send a small stack of swords to a city I only have 1 defender in so I make peace with them. After a few turns of peace I decide to run the MDI Army up through Mongol (have ROP) lands to help participate in the second stage of Phase 3.

Phase 3 – Northern Strike starts in 420AD with a declaration of war on the Dutch. My assault force consists of 1 AC and 9 MDIs. I capture Groningen on the coast which allows me to load a galley enter the city unload the galley and then return the galley to my loading spot (2 tiles north of the iron) and load in more troops. I capture the Dutch capital in 440AD and have gained 7 cities by 500AD. I then detour 2 galleys and 3 troops to go after all the little islands that the Dutch have settled. I’m still tempted to go for a conquest win at this point so I sue for peace in 510 AD to gain the 1 tile island city of the Dutch. The peace only lasted 1 turn because they demanded I remove my troops and I said no, big surprise there. By now all new troops to the Northern theater are being run up the western side of the former Dutch holdings and are attacking the Dutch cities near the Celtic border.

Center Strike – Part 2 - After resting and healing my 2 AC Armies, I reposition them towards the Celts in anticipation of a two-front assault on the Celts. I am also slowly filling in a chain of cities in former Japanese lands as I head to claim a supply of horses. In 510 AD I finally build a city to claim the horse supply in former Japan. Unfortunately, there is a lot of roadwork that needs to be completed to actually hook them up.

I kick off the Celtic assault in 520AD attacking the former Carthage cities that the Celts captured. I then move them into Celtic land proper and start capturing cities from West to East, slowly working my way to Entremont which houses the TOA. (It’s now Sunday, so I am no longer trying for conquest and decide to go for domination, since I only have a few hours to finish.) The MDI army arrives from the Western Strike force and joins the fun. In 660AD I finally have the horses hooked up. I still have not bothered to learn Chivalry and I am now on Entremont’s doorstep, which falls to me in 670AD.

Northern Strike continued – 550AD sees the capture of the last large Dutch city and the first Celtic action on the second front. The prolong state of war that I arranged for the Celtic, through wars with Mongol and the Dutch, have left them with almost no Gallic Swords and they have never hooked up their supply of horses. By now the Northern and Central strike forces have merged and are being resupplied by a constant flow of MDIs following the Dutch supply line. I get a little greedy and lose my MDI Army in 690AD so I quickly make peace with the Celts in an effort to save my stack of cats and trebuchets. Prior to making peace I actually rush 2 horses to attack a Celtic unit that has slipped thru my lines and is approaching a city. These are the only 2 horses I make in the game and I lose one of them attacking the Celtic troop.

End Game – In 710AD I control 1370 tiles and need only 387 tiles for Domination victory and I’ll get expansions in 90 of my 125 cities. Unfortunately, I’m 62-tiles short of victory after the expansion in 720AD, so I declare on the Celts again and grab a city. I’m 36- tiles short of victory in 730AD, so I capture 3 more Celtic cities and declare on India to capture 2 more cities and secure my victory. I even manage to generate another Great Leader in 730AD.

Game ends in 740AD.

Here’s a look at my progress

Great map Karasu. I see Ronald got me by 2 turns, but he used Cavs

EDIT: I also finish the game without triggering my Golden Age.

 

[hendrikszoon]

Predator Class

The first important decision was the placement of the capital. The advantage of the starting point were the game and the cow, the disadvantages were the absence of fresh water and the position at the end of a peninsula. Only one advantage, but two disadvantages: I decided to walk. Two steps later I found a passable location at the lake.

The next important question was: How I can trigger the Golden Age? I didn't plan to spend to much effort for research. In this case the Hwach'a was not an alternative. So I had to trigger GA by two wonders. The commercial one was clear: The Colossus. But for the scientific one there were two choices: the Mausoleum or the Great Library. I decided to build the Mausoleum because it needed 200 shields less (or allows to build 20 Warriors more) than GL.

While I was developing my civilization, a - at least in my opinion - strange thing happened: My reconnaissance Warrior found a not defended Carthagian town. I never saw this before. In every AI town there was at least one defending unit. The only problem was that this town have had only one inhabitant. So I decided to wait. Maybe the AI would build a Numidian Mercenary. In this case the increment of the population would happen before the defense unit would be available. But a Carthagian Warrior appeared at the same turn when the population increased. Nevertheless after all this waiting I decided to attack. It was a 45:55 chance against me, but I was successful. I also decided to attack because this town was a valuable one: it was build on an ivory resource. So after building a harbor I was able to build the Statue of Zeus. I made peace when - very late - the Carthegian counter attack started.

In the beginning of the game I decided to go for a conquest victory. So I was not amused when I realized the lack of Horses. In the foreign advisor I could see that only the Mongols have Horses. I assumed - later it becomes clear that this was a wrong assumption - that this is the only strategic resource Horses on the map. So the Mongols came at the second place of my attack list. The first place went to the Vikings because I was afraid that they will be successful by building the Pyramids or the Temple of Artemis on their island. This first attack was done by Medieval Infantry and Ancient Cavalry. Because the Vikings were not very strong and I have had around 30 MI - all Veterans and most of them upgraded Warriors - and six Ancient Cavalry it was not a challenge to defeat them.

After the defeat of the Vikings and my troops were on the way to the Mongols I got the message that the Great Wall was completed in Carthago. So I made a little trip to conquer Carthago. The resulting war was a low intensity one. From the Korean side only three MI and one Spearman were involved. It seems that the Carthagians didn't recover from the first fight. It was possible to eliminate them but I wanted not to spend any additional time. It was necessary to get the Horses and to start the build-up of Horsemen as soon as possible.

With the use - or better: the abuse - of Right of Passage I started the Mogolian war. In the first turn some important cities like Karakorum (Pyramids) and Ta-Tu (Dyes) came under Korean control. In this moment the Indians declared war. The Indians were very inactive and I was not interested - also I didn't have enough troops - to fight against four enemies on a high activity level. So for a long time nothing happened at the Indian front. The first strike weakened the Mongols enough so that they were not able for a powerful counter-attack. Their territory was captured step by step. The supply reached the Mogolian front via ship chaining.

Why I say four enimies? Mongols, Indians and Carthagians are only three. In the meantime the Dutch finished Temple of Artemis. This was reason enough to attack them (again with the abuse of RoP). But this attack came too late. The Dutch have upgraded a lot of Spearmen to Swiss Mercenaries. So I made peace (getting one additional city) after conquering Amsterdam (ToA) and two other cities. The next attack would start when Knights would be available.

The time for the second Dutch war came when the Mongols were nearly eliminated. Now all new troops - most of them Knights - were sent to the Dutch front. After elimination of the Mongols the Army Group West was regrouped by splitting them into two parts: One part was marching South to finish the Indian war, the second part was marching East to attack the Japanese. At the same time I made peace with the Carthagians.

With the engagement of the Knights the Swiss Mercenaries were overcome. But most of the also engaged Medieval Infantry were lost. In most of the city attacks the MI formed the first wave and the Knights the second one.

Now it was time to eliminate the Celts. Nevertheless I have abused the RoP with the Mongols I could conclude one with them. While I was placing my troops for the last big attack in this game I found a third Horse ressource - a second one was discovered on the former Mongolian territory - and saw a Celt Worker connecting it. Two turns later the Horses were connected and Gunpowder was researched by the Celts. I was not interested to fight against Knights and Musketmen. So I started the attack immediately although not all off my troops have reached the best attack position. The resulting fight itself was running better than expected. Until Celtian defeat only two Knights and one Musketman appeared.

At 490AD when I had 65% of world area under my control I started to destroy small towns with one or two inhabitants.

The elimination of the Indians and the Japanese happened without any bigger problems: No War Elephants and only one Samurai.

All was going well and it seemed that I would get my conquest victory in 600AD. But then something happened what I am calling the "Cadiz Desaster". Cadiz was located on an island in the West of the Carthagian country. By ship chaining I sent four Veteran Knights (I used only Veteran MI and Knights) to this island defended by two Standard Numidian Mercenaries. But the attack was not very successful: Two Knights were killed und the two survivers had one hit point. Only one of the defending Numidian Mercenaries was also killed and the other one was now a Veteran. So I sent two additional knights to this island with the following result: Four dead Knights and one Elite Numidian Mercenary defending Cadiz. Now I lost my nerves, took all what I could get and brought it to this damned island. The third attack was successful. But I lost five turns. All the other Carthagian towns were not a problem. So I got conquest victory in 650AD.

I made three big - and some minor - mistakes in this game:
1. In the Ancient Age I exchanged technologies with the Dutch. So the Dutch were able to research Feudalism - and in consequence to upgrade Swiss Mercenaries - before I start my attack.
2. My advance was not very well organized. So I have had sometimes a lot of troops at locations where I didn't need them. It is better to make something like a "strategic plan" latest after the map is more or less known.
3. I have had a lack in reconnaissance. Without this lack I would have discovered earlier the Horses at the border between Celts and Dutch. With this knowledge another - better - strategy was possible: Two advancing wings, the West one defeating in this succession Vikings, Indians and Mongols and the North-East one defeating Dutch, Celts and Japaneses.

 

[Paul#42]

Hey Son of Hendrik, I was wrong to expect no spoiler from You.

Great game, good write-up!

Although I'm missing some milestones, years when you reached a new Era, Golden Age, key techs. Just to compare.

Maybe some minimaps (with date) would also help.

I still wonder how you could be so fast even without horses (for a long time).

Ganz großer Sport!

 

[bradleyfeanor]

Indeed, thanks for the summary Hendrikszoon! I don't suppose you happen to have recorded when you captured the Pyramids and ToA also, do you? I am trying to determine if it was better early population management/territory acquisition or an earlier capture of the ToA/Pyramids that led to your higher Jason score, and the dates would be most helpful.

 

[hendrikszoon]

Hi bradleyfeanor,
unfortunately you are right: I am too lazy to document my games (next time I will do it - at least a little bit). Also in the moment I don't have access to my computer, so I can not replay to have a look. But if I remember correctly I got Pyramids and ToA more or less at the same time in early AD (30AD, 50AD or 70AD). I will look for the exact dates when I am back at home on May 20th.

In my opinion Pyramids are not so important like ToA. I got most of the Firaxis points (after reducing the early win bonus) from the territory. The exact values will follow when I am back at home.

And there is another interesting detail: The lost five turns didn't cost me any Jason points. In the last turns my Firaxis score increased by 41 points every turn. So finishing in 600 AD I would have had (inclusive early win bonus) 6114 Firaxis points and 10975 Jason points. So I got 12 additional Jason points thanks my "Cadiz desaster".

 

[bradleyfeanor]

Oh my. I don't think you need to bother loading up your old game. If your 50ad date for capturing the ToA is even close to correct, then it would certainly account for a big score difference. I didn't get the ToA until 420ad.

I paid very, very heavily for allowing the Indians to have peace.

Very impressive game Hendrikszoon! I believe this gives you a "gold medal" / "games played" percentage of 66.6%. Sheesh!!!