cz4: RaR ()==[];,;,;,;,;,;> The Hitlist

[Knappagh1]

@ Greebley, questions will be the order of the day on my turns, although, with all the extra tech available, it would be nice to have a definate path decided before my turns to save some unneccessary questions.

@ cizzlewalk, The Incas are fine by me. Emperor on the other hand is a bit daunting but should be a good challange.

Just one question about the barbs in RaR. The Swordmen and Riders have being leaving the game very difficult at the start. Has anyone else experienced this?

 

[Greebley]

Yeah, the barbarians are extremely nasty. This was true in DyP too.

If they are threatening a newer city, then sometimes the best strategy is to step out of the town and let them pillage (just keep your gold reserves low) rather than losing the town defender. They can do very little to a size 1 or 2 town with no improvements.

Only thing you can really do is fill in the lands. If you have a spot not seen by your cities then send a unit to guard against barbs appearing.

Playing with no or sedentary barbs is definitely an option.


Since the techs are new to all of us, I agree we should probably discuss them to have a general plan in mind. For example, getting to Dynasticism is a priority as your towns don't grow before then. Sometimes though, you want to pick a tech the AI doesn't have for trading however.

Additionally, we have the variant that we need to follow the optional techs.

We might want to clarify this. Must we always choose an optional tech if it is available? Or is it only that we have to research all techs of the previous era before the next? Can we choose domestication as our first tech if we can also research an optional one?

Note that the AI doesn't research optional techs as often, so I think our strategy should be to go for techs that the AI is less likely to choose and trade for the non-optional techs. This is only good after we know two or more civilizations though as we will be at war with the first.

If we don't get another player soon we may just want to start with 5 players.

 

[Greebley]

So no takers yet. I think 5 should be enough to play. Someone might also join an active game with a start position.

Do we want to start?

 

[Macdandee]

Hi all,

I'd love to have an opportunity to get into this sg. I generally play emperor level and have been sticking to RaR for the last month or so. I have never been in a sg, but have followed quite a few.

So, if you can put up with a quasi-newbie, sign me up!

 

[Gogf]

I would like to be as far back in the order as possible. Thank you.

 

[Greebley]

Hi Macdandee,
Welcome It is always good to have new players in the SG. I certainly would like to have you join.

We have our six. Yay!

Emporer and Inca sound best to me too. I just hope we don't meet our first civ too early. I would build more (american champions?) at the beginning due to the variant, and perhaps wait a bit before agressive exploration?

What do people think. Shall we be stay at homes to get stronger before first contact? Or should we explore agressively in the hopes to meet more than 2 civs?

Actually with Argipelligo, we may be by ourselves and it is a non-issue. Also meeting another civ on an other island before the one on ours would be a sneaky way to avoid the early attack.

 

[AntiTwelve]

@Macdandee Welcome to the SG world... good to see your an emporer player as well, you will go far on civfanatics

And so it has begun... I hope everyone has the patch taken care of as we will start our game TOMORROW! I'll begin with 20-30 turns depending on how much time I have, but will post a screen shot when complete.

Thank God for newcomers !

"Unless you're a regular forum player with a new name "

 

[Knappagh1]

@ Macdandee.... :slaute: Welcome aboard comrade.

@ cizzlewalk, How do we decide the Hitlist? I know we declare on the first civ we meet but after that? Do we take them out in the order we meet them or do we pick at random as we go along?

Cant wait for this to start.....

cizzlewalk... let the games begin!!!!

 

[AntiTwelve]

@Knappagh1 The hitlist is explained in post #1 and we will declare, NO MATTER WHAT, on the next civ after the first one is dead.

Example from a fake diplomacy list (D selection button):

Korea (at war, our first met civ)
Rome (Perhaps they lay across a contient and our UBER powerful)
Greece (these guys are our good friends, we love em!)

Korea is finally destroyed.

Rome (We now go Total War on them as SOON AS KOREA LOSES its last city, meaning we will NEVER be at peace in this game... until we win. Or are out of civs for the moment (That would actually be really cool, IMHO )
Greece (They are still our good buddies )

Rome dead.

Greece (As soon as Rome loses that last city, KER-PLAH!!!! We declare on Greece!)

So we just go from top to bottom on diplo list, so yes, keeping our rep will be a challenge in itself (let's see how far we can get, shall we?)

 

[AntiTwelve]

Game Settings
*Domination, Conquest and Space Race victories enabled

*Cultural Conversions are on

*Those b@$7@rd Scientific Leaders are also on... we will never get one.

Pre-Flight
Our start is pretty nasty, nothing but plains as far as the eye can see, BUT WE HAVE ONE COW! ( ) Move our tribe one space NE, to create Capital of Cuzco as a port city, it begins a scout.

We begin with the techs:

Masonry: Allows for the creation of monuments and Working Housings, both are marvelous early builds IMO

Warfare: Allows for the creation of archers and Eagle Warriors (A good unit to have early on) and elephants are displayed

Since we MUST start with a dead end tech, and there is only one choice, I begin a max research (50% until next government) on Boat Building.

3800 B.C. Turn 4
*Cuzco Scout--Tribal Guardsman
Worker finishes roading cow and now begins another road (we can't get mining for awhile, and can't get irrigation for a LONG while)

3650 B.C. Turn 7
A Goody Hut gives us the 1st tier tech of Alphabet, we create the great Frat of Tappa Kegga Pi in honor of this glorious event. No special units/buildings/extras come with this tech.

3550 B.C. Turn 9
We learn Boat Building, begin Sailing at max rate
Another GH is popped for a HUGE map of our surroundings, nice lands actually.

3500 B.C. Turn 10
Cuzco's borders expand and... we begin to starve. Put lux up to 20% for 1 turn.

3450 B.C. Turn 11
*Cuzco Tribal Guardsmen--Hardy Clan (say good-bye to helpful goody huts ) (I know this might not have been wise, but I had no idea if we had enemies to our north/direct south yet, sorry)
Lux is back down to a blissful 0%.

3350 B.C. Turn 13
A GH gives us barbs, so I get myself out of there!

3100 B.C. Turn 18
Another GH gives us some maps, more of our north revealed.

2950 B.C. Turn 21
Learn the art of Sailing, begin our advancement of Naval Warfare (35 turns of research with size 2 city!!!)
We are the 4th richest civ according to the history books. (37 gp making 2 gpt)

2700 B.C. Turn 26
*Cuzco Hardy Clan-- Eagle Warrior
Send our HC to our covered south, 89.5% sure it's a small peninsula. Good, we have elephants to our direct north!

2630 B.C. Turn 28
Our HC JUST MISSES a fish resource... DAMMIT! (moving it so that it could reach it would cause SERIOUS overlapage w/ Cuzco in the future)

2590 B.C. Turn 29
*Cuzco Eagle Warrior-- Hardy Clan
Eagle Warrior heads toward the newly founded City of Machu Picchu as a MP. The city begins a harbor, obviously vetoable.

Well Greebley doesn't need any tips here, it's a really nice set up. Mainly because I think we OWN THIS WHOLE ISLAND!! I have not uncovered all of the south, but these looks aren't all that deceiving right now. Time will only tell. Remeber, as soon as we're done with that top row of techs, we must focus on getting the QUICKEST possible dead ends (so fermentation and stuff first). Also, if you can, go ahead and take 20 turns Greebley, after that it will be a nice and steady 10 turns a piece.
Bring us some good news.

 

[Greebley]

Ok, I got it.

So if we have no optional techs to research, can we choose any required tech we want? Or are you saying we are limited in choices to ones that lead to dead end techs?

 

[AntiTwelve]

The goal is to reach the dead end "optional techs (not needed for the next age)" as soon as possible. Whenever we start a new research path, we should stick with it until all of its dead end techs are no longer an issue. Now I'll let the team choose any research path after the first row of ship techs are complete, but we should definetly go for the closest ones to keep the spirit of game strong.

 

[Doc Tsiolkovski]

lurker's comment:

we will NEVER be at peace in this game... until we win.

Welcome to the world of maximum WW. Be sure to have the actual Government stats at hand. Absolute Monarchy is clearly the top chioce, but what do you pick before?

Domination, Conquest and Space Race victories enabled

No Diplo? Boo! Cowards!

Something important: You, Greebley and Knappagh1 will have the NoAIPatrol=0 setting from "my" SGs. Make sure you agree what you use here, and everyone uses the same settings.

Nice island you have, looks like the game is in the bag (unless you meet someone like the Sioux in the S.) Who are your opponents, btw?
Luckily Elephant Training is optional, so you can research it soon enough . Those Jumbo Roading Crews rock.

 

[Greebley]

Preturn: I don't think the harbor does us much good. The coast is 2 food which doesn't increase due to the "despot penalty" but remains 2. It also doesn't give us Vet units (If I am wrong pls tell me - This mod is fairly new to me). I will go for a galley first to contact more than one civ if I can.

Early: Find a spot with an elephant and apple to the south. Might be decent for our next town.
Everyone knows galleys can't enter ocean?

Mid: Cizzlewalk explored pretty much all the "good bits" other than the apple and elephants. Most of the lower terrain is Tundra.
Our scout is killed by a barbarian

Late: Settle Quito. Note that I choose the location that gives us the most shields near the Apple and Elephants. This is so it can pump out non-hardy clans. The location has 6 BG and a forest (8 shields max).

We are going to have some of shield poor towns since grassland cannot be mined. I suggest we go for more spread out cities. Remember also we can grow to size 15 before we need a sewage system which allows us to go past that size.

Do not cut down forests willy-nilly. They can't be replanted right for a while and may be our only shield source.

Notes:
After the Archer completes, I would build a Hardy settler to go with the archer out into the wilds if you are feeling adventurous. Always move the defender first so you don't move the settler next to a Barbarian and just settle right away if the settler is in danger (and send our other unit out with the settler in the other town too).

If you want to play it more safe then build a tribal guardsman first and then the settler.

I didn't have time to make a dot map, but if anyone wants to make a stab at it go ahead. I would look at how many hills/forests are near a spot to figure out shields. Note that we can only use one forest until we get irrigation, but we can plan ahead. I would go for a more spread out build as we will be more shield poor. It will also allow us to cover the lands and suppress Barbarians faster. (If any newer player wants to give it a shot then go for it. Its a good way to learn to see how others would place their towns differently and why).

Quito was going for the monument first for a border expansion and then the non-hardy clans.

 

[AntiTwelve]

Most excellent turns Greebley. I agree w/ the change of harbor, I COMPLETELY forgot about chiefdom (our despotism) rules for a moment, I did remember naval ports means vet ships.

Greebley brought up something I neglected to mention... DON'T YOU DARE CHOP DOWN FORESTS! These can save our lives, especially later on. In case you are almost entirely brand new to DyP/RaR, forests can be mined and later they give MASSIVE shields when mixed with rails. Only chop em when there is no other source for grassland or need shields THAT bad (both of which don't show up on this island )!

And, omfg, we control our own island... trust me when I say I didn't even tweak this at all, for we still have 11 enemies, so I'm guessing 3 to 4 other continents to meet. I think this provides a wonderful experience for our 3 RaR new guys to enjoy a beginning sprawl of infrastructure managing and learn the tweaks behind this epic mod. Plus, once we declare war on an enemy, it will be more relaxed then we had predicted (I'm still glad we chose the MIL trait, hope you are Greebly )

@DocT

Welcome to the world of maximum WW. Be sure to have the actual Government stats at hand. Absolute Monarchy is clearly the top chioce, but what do you pick before?

Hm, by what you mean is that do we choose the first one? Or what I would choose? Either way, Absolute Monarchy is hands down our top priority for a government. I think our gov switch progress might look like this...

Chiefdom -- Despotism -- Monarchy (ich weiss nicht) -- Absolute Monarchy

Only if that's the appropriate course we take, natch.

No Diplo? Boo! Cowards!

Something important: You, Greebley and Knappagh1 will have the NoAIPatrol=0 setting from "my" SGs. Make sure you agree what you use here, and everyone uses the same settings.

Nice island you have, looks like the game is in the bag (unless you meet someone like the Sioux in the S.) Who are your opponents, btw?
Luckily Elephant Training is optional, so you can research it soon enough . Those Jumbo Roading Crews rock.

Shut up Doc, I don't need diplomacy to screw things up here , it'll be a challenge enough to keep our rep (that is going to be A LOT OF FUN... I'm serious!)

Yes, I asked beforehand that everyone d/l the patch w/ RaR and have the exact same settings... all players make sure you follow the download instructions ENTIRELY and make sure RaR is running properly. In fact, I ask that everyone d/l my save (as not to see into our future via Greebley's save) and make sure everything is working smoothly on the game screen, diplo screen and advisor panels. Much thanks.

And yes, thoes elephants are going to be our Shock Troops in wars to come... but don't necessarily say this game is in the bag. Need I remind you of CMM2, except our island is way bigger and at higher difficulty. I mean sure, it will be a more lax game since we have so much going for us, but you never know what civs will drop in or who we have to declare on first (as opposed to cmm2 where you would win by diplo... sound familiar?).

My 2 pfennig.

 

[AntiTwelve]

MacDaddy Macdandee, you are up sir.

Another point I think Doc brought up in another thread is that at one point we can out produce settlers faster then they can. How you ask, by not researching Dynasticism. I think it's a quasi-exploit to be able to stay behind that tech long enough to mass produce settlers, but no matter, it still is there for a reason. With that in mind, I want Dynasticism to be the VERY LAST tech we can research before following the rest of the tech tree to those wonderous dead end technologies! Hope that makes sense to all, good luck to Macdandee on your first turns in the forums ever!

and thanks Doc for the info, duh .

 

[Greebley]

Dynasticism is impossible to avoid. We can go for some dead end techs but at least 1/2 the tree requires it.

I also don't think that avoiding Dynasticism is good in our case. We have all grasslands which is 2 food in Chiefdom. that means very limited size. With grassland we can grow to any size once we become a monarchy. We don't need irrigation to do so. This makes Dynasticism a big win for us - mostly because we can bring in a lot more gold.

We will probably fill much of the space before we get there anyway as our towns will all be small.

[Edit: Cutting out Diplomatic Victory is fine. It is too easy to manipulate anyway. The AI wasn't going to win by it, and I don't like going for it either.

 

[Macdandee]

Got it!

As I understand the tech "twister"... now that we can no longer continue on the top naval line without other techs, we should shoot for the closest tech we don't need to advance to the next age. That gives two lines, domestication (in 9) to wheel, or ritualism (in 6) to slavery. So, I guess in the spirit of the twister, I'll have to go for ritualism.

Question 2- Are we allowed to do the first turn tech trading like in an Always War game, or must we immediately declare when we meet our first opponent?

Gonna wait to finish my turn till I get the feedback on these, don't want to goof on my first sg turn!

 

[AntiTwelve]

@Macdandee to answer question 1 (2 in your case), yes we are allowed to trade on turn one. On chosing the next techs, try and focus on dead enders that will give us resources (especially luxuries!) or better buildings.

@Greebley Ahah, normally I would say go ahead and get dynsaticism, but you forget we're AGR. We have been producing HCs at a much faster rate than normal, plus nothing can beat that sweet, sweet feeling of only losing one pop to two and you have a granary as a back up. I understand Dynasticism is unavoidable, it's a major tech (if not the single most important one) in AA. That's why REL trait civs do so well, they switch in one turn and BAM, start getting all their shields and food w/ no hassle. But, it is in the hands of the next player. However, we CAN NOT get this tech anyways, not until EVERY SINGLE dead end tech has been researched/traded w/o using Dynsaticism to open up new technology paths. Once that happens, I think we can decide as a group where to head next, seeing as how there are so many limited options, it's OK for the next player to go ahead and choose any tech tree to follow, just make sure its a close dead end tech to research (i.g. Fermentation only requires 1 other tech (I think)). Hope that clears up that mess, sorry if there was a misunderstanding on what I said, just had to make sure we all remember we need to go for the QUICKEST dead end techs to try and keep up w/ the variant.

 

[Doc Tsiolkovski]

Cizz:

Greebley Ahah, normally I would say go ahead and get dynsaticism, but you forget we're AGR.

You're MIL/IND.
Though your reasoning why it sometimes is better to NOT research Dyna is correct, AGR Civs are the only ones who will always benefit from Dyna - Cultivators and Settlers cost the same.
And my note on 'outexpanding' solely related to AGR Civs.
However, if you're stuck with Plains, Jungles, and a few high shield/ high food tiles, Dyna should be delayed. BG, Monarchy is superior.

Govs:
I would advice Demo nevertheless; if your Gov collapses, there's always Republic or Fundamentalism.

NoAIPatrol:
True, you'll find this in the readme.txt for 1.01. However, better point out again everyone needs to apply it in the .ini, since this is not stored in the save.

About CMM2: I simply cannot expand more on this game to avoid spoilers (why the heck are they so slow? ), from mid-industrial I was clearly #2 in relevant power. At that time, I could have taken out any AI Civ (most of them where about equal in size). I only was too lazy and waited for Transports, when suddenly one AI literally exploded and overran all but one on the landmass. In a SG, with Diplo not really an option, it would have been defintely no problem to win by any other condition as well.
Face it, you cannot loose on Emperor...unless you play an odd variant .

Greebley:

Cutting out Diplomatic Victory is fine... The AI wasn't going to win by it

With the League of Nations, I wouldn't be too sure about the later...since you will be busy with optional techs at that time
No Diplo victory for you, sure.