Deity ABC's - Achieving Better Consistency

Welp, that was quick. Genghis went red fist the turn after i reloaded and declared on me 10 turns later. I gifted him a city, but this didnt stop the declaration. Anything I could have done?

 

Awww

Imo you can do something, galleys.
It's not pretty, but 7-8 should be able to sink his first round of loaded galleys.

Washi with it's 3 mines could (almost) get 2 galleys for each whip, NY might have to add one too..
bad for their happy situation, but better than losing the game
Allowing his units to land with only archers in tech reach would be pointless imo, but with a mix of blocking his naval ways and attacking when you have around 2:1 galley numbers you could make his superior land units unimportant.

 

Hi Fippy,

Yes, he took the barb city and then red fist straight away, such a shame.

I was gifting him resources ASAP but he never got Hindu, Justin spread it to me really late. T73 open borders seems crazy late on Deity to me.

I did try the galley whips twice, got 6 of them out each time before DoW, first battle lost 6/6, second battle lost 5/6 and Genghis got a few Keshiks onto the island, didnt even have time to hook up Iron....

I think the start was pretty strong and I had a nice position otherwise, so I might try one more time tomorrow - both times I added in a third worker so should be able to get 7 or 8 galleys

 

Tough luck. Looking at the save, he might have been plotting for a while, by the way. He only made contact with Justi on that turn. Spy points indicate he hasn't met anyone else. So you are the only one he could have been plotting on -> no red fist.

So how many troops did he land with when he attacked?

 

Hi Lain,

Your explanation makes sense. He only had 6 troops worth, and maybe 2 more in a 4th boat each time.

I've uploaded another save with 7 galleys in blocking position, we can 2 pop whip another in Washington next turn if we want.

Round 5 - 600BC

T80: Genghis takes the barb city. I found Atlanta as planned, start mining the gold.
Red fist – spend 10 turns whipping galleys in Wash and NY.
Got Aest with the last of my gold, and some turns into Alpha. Sury won't trade due to religion, waiting on Justin to finish Alpha now.

Round 6 Plan

Sink Genghis' navy, take peace. Build last 2 filler cities once I learn AH and IW. Tech MC and Compass to keep up in techs while developing cottages. Run GS in NY and Boston.

 

Round 6 - 375BC

T91: Genghis declares. I have 3 stacks blocking landing access, I attack his stack, losing 2 boats for 3. I lost another boat on the interturn but sink his 4th boat. His barb city only has spears and 1 keshik in it – I think I sank most of his army Wash is building Settlers now.
T95: Sink another Galley of Genghis after making sure he put troops in it.
Culture war vs Justin – I will keep my inner ring tiles, but will lose the outer ring. Building Libraries and Monuments to get the critical 100 culture first.
Have settled a 7th city to use Washington's corn.

Research – I need something to trade, am currently saving gold. I think the best option is Metal Casting, otherwise I can go Compass for trade bait.

T97: Met Pacal on the island east of Justin. Gift him 10g and open borders – cant trade any techs or resources though

Barb galley sails past Genghis' 2 new boats to attack me, thankfully it loses.
I use my boats to mop up the next 2 boats without loss. I have put my navy in a blocking position, so as Genghis tried to move around the blockade, I can assume there were units inside??? I'm not sure, because Genghis still has 7 units in the barb city! But I cannot risk a landing at all, so I had to sink them. I still have 5 galleys left, Genghis will hopefully talk on T101?

T100: Sury will now trade! Genghis still wont talk, but haven't seen any more boats yet.

I decide to stop here.

I have 7 cities, with a Settler for the next city almost done. Only two workers, but I will build some more the next set.

Round 7 Plan

War – Genghis won't talk yet. I have 5 Galleys and cannot see any more boats. I think the 10th turn is next turn?

Builds – Finish Libraries in eastern cities. I still don't have a library in the capital. Want to add one there.
Add in 2 or 3 workers. I might whip workers at size 2 from Seattle as I already have a Granary there, and let Washington focus on the Library.
9th city can wait until I get IW or AH

Trading - Sury will trade IW or AH+Poly or Med for Aest. If I get IW, I settle the 8th city up near the Gold. If I get AH, I settle the filler city by the Pigs.

Pacal already has Metal Casting and Drama! Justin is going for Civil Service, so I can finish MC and trade it to him and Sury.

I think the best plan is trade for AH+Med (Philo bulb for more trades?) and self tech Priesthood -> MC. Trade MC for Math+IW+Monarchy+CoL? (if I can get it). Or maybe skip Priesthood and pick up Currency instead?

Will have a GS shortly. Academy is not really good here – maybe save for Philo bulb? Could even bulb Optics and look for the last 2 AI??

 

Yes, it's possible that bulbing is your only out.
You need to do that, grow, grow, grow and keep up with your exploration.
Situation is grim, to say the least. Being out-teched until it's not possible to come back is very conceivable, here.

Genghis is under control, he isn't the problem.
The problem is how delayed your expansion has been. This is turn 100 and you have 2 workers, 1 library, no Iron Working, no Animal Husbandry. Cities came up too late, are too small, tiles underdeveloped.
It doesn't help that the Alpha trade has been a fail ; something you likely couldn't expect.
I would blame mostly the decision to build the GLH ~~ ironic since you managed to secure it very fast. The wonder is good but the opportunity cost is unreasonable, especially when you rush it in the capital, having only a 2nd city to work with.
It's a different thing to complete the GLH with a 4 cities Empire and to complete it off 2 cities. Here, you lacked the peripheral cities to carry on with exp.
Which is more, the GLH requires that you research useless techs (Myst, Mas) and that puts another sort of delay on your development : later Pottery, Writing.
It's especially painful, here, with an EXP leader that has cheap Grans.

I'm quite sure a standard opener, focusing on settlers, workers and chopped granaries, would have put you in a much better position.
You'd have had an early Writing as well, plenty of Libraries, gpp, academy, more hammers for exploration, more population, etc.

 

To illustrate and not act like a negative jerk, here's a shadow, played to Alphabet, 800 BC...
... and better map knowledge than you had, of course (not claiming I'd have played this way blind). They always talk about the value of exploration on Fractal ; if you open the spoilers/saves, it shows :

Spoiler :

Early play-yie play-yie :

Spoiler :

2000 BC checkpoint :

Spoiler :

Follow-up :

Spoiler :

Stats :

Spoiler :

 

I still like GLH here, but it's nice to get different views & opinions..shows how much depth this game has, esp on deity

 

Free trade routes vs cottage development + earlier Writing & Aesthetics...
I don't know. Just getting earlier into a trading position means so much. And then there's city growth.
Better cottages can be worth just as much as the free trade routes. GLH beelines always end up with 1200-1000 BC Writing and that's no good.

To me, the GLH is best built in 1120 BC with a well-established core. Or in isolation with offshore cities.
It's more powerful, it takes longer to pay off but it's like the Oracle : sometimes gunning for it isn't the best option, because expansion has more value.

@ Berks : just thought about it :
Revolting out of religion to speed up the Alpha trade was likely the better option.

 

I think you are mixing points around a bit here thou..
cottages are certainly not a reason why you would get into trading earlier than with GLH, cos they have not been better than sea tiles at this point.

 

Hi BiC,

No need to feel bad about posting criticism - best way for me to learn

Glad you decided to post a shadow to save me the trouble, if I failed my defence the third time, I was going to try a no GLH approach.

I decided to take a look at your saves and compare a few key areas between them and my closest save:

1600BC - GLH
Cities: 2, 1 Settler
Workers: 2
Pop: 6
Commerce: 19
Expenses: 6
Granaries: 0
Cottages: 0

1520BC - No GLH
Cities: 3, 1 Settler
Workers: 3
Pop: 11
Commerce: 29
Expenses: 10
Granaries: 2
Cottages: 3

Way behind here, does the wonder help me catch up??

900BC - GLH (I played 4 turns on my save, ignoring the red fist, 800BC numbers in brackets)

Cities: 4, 1 Settler (6)
Workers: 2
Pop: 12 (17)
Commerce: 51 (69)
Expenses: 20 (29)
Net: 31 (40)
Granaries: 3
Libraries: 0
Cottages: 3

800BC - No GLH

Cities: 6
Workers: 4
Pop: 22
Commerce: 58
Expenses: 31
Net: 27
Granaries: 5
Libraries: 4
Cottages: 8

We can see that your save has way more infrastructure and development, but not as much commerce. I also note you have met more AI, and have more opportunities for trading Aest + Alpha.

@ Fippy - I think BiC meant that not getting Myst + Masonry = faster Writing = faster Aest + Alpha = more trading opportunities?

I think BiC would catch up in commerce as his cottages will mature earlier, and I will have to waste pop and hammers on Granaries and Libraries.....

As I had to waste 10 turns whipping Galleys, I think we can't really compare further down the road, unless Genghis also declares on you. In your save, Genghis has not declared, but has only met you though.....

Be interested in some thoughts on the above.

As for the next round, I am busy the next two days, might have time for a round on Thursday night.

 

Hi Berks, interesting comparison

Yes, Alphabet timing is the bulk of my argument.
My cottages maturing would give me good tiles to work but, since you would cottage too, my tech pace wouldn't run away from yours.
Fippy's right that I stretched it too much, saying, for example : "Better cottages can be worth just as much as the free trade routes."
It's more like : "You can work more tiles faster, hence get there faster."


However, this all happens within a limited timeline. The GLH needs time to pay off.
Skipping the GLH brings you more commerce early and lets you use hammers to go horizontal (cities) : this can put you in a better position by t80 (re : Alpha trade) BUT
The GLH increases by quite a lot your maximum potential research (+6 commerce per city when all cities offshore) : which means the GLH eventually catches up.
I think your numbers show that it wouldn't take too long for the GLH approach to catch up in science.
Probably well before 1 AD.


^ This is : all other things equal. Just considering the Empire's commerce output // science generated.
- Alpha trade can skew things : trading can multiply several times your research ;
- Max potential research (i.e. research at happy cap, developped tiles & infrastructure) can be raised with warring. (Land is power.)
- If one's not using excess hammers for warring when reaching this cap, focusing on gpp is a valid alternative. Although, warning : it typically hurts your game more than not to strain hammer production and go full gpp production too early. Early plateau / cap / max potential research ; too low.

^ Those last two points are hard to quantify and assess with precision. Warring is always uncertain. Relation from gpp to science / Empire's development is also a pain in the neck.
However, it's a certain thing that getting to the point where your potential research has been maxed gives the opportunity to delve into warring / gpp territories. Earlier being earlier.

(e.g. : 800 BC I'm starting on a Barracks and have excess production already.
Not sure what the tech of choice would be but I wouldn't wait on Cannons to try and invade Justinian.
Also, that barb city is mine.)




ps : not really an addition to your comparison but, nevertheless, an interesting factor to look at when assessing a game state :
Happy cap margin / room for growth :
We're CHA, have gold ; I had access to 2 early happy resource deals = +4 happy cap :

Spoiler :

24 unused happy faces spread over 5 cities. Those give you an idea of your "incentive to grow", value of food, something like that. The more margin you have on happy cap, the better your incentive to grow.
With city growth, the margin on your happy cap translates either in :
- more commerce (worked tiles) ;
- more production (whippage).

 

Just to finish what I started. Brennus game.

Spoiler :

Pitiful attempt at domination though. A lot to learn I still have.

A lot of good stuff has been already said regarding the Washington game. Don't have much to add there right now.

Is there an overview somewhere regarding when different AI will vote for your victory? I think some do so at "Pleased" already. Kind of important information.

 

Good job Lain!

BiC - random thought here - your empire has a 'lower peak' research wise, so maybe in your situation, we should aim for a medieval war, hitting earlier before our research begins to stagnate. With GLH, I have a 'higher peak' research wise, so maybe a later war makes more sense? Gives us more time to develop infrastructure and population. Does this idea make sense, or am I going crazy?

Round 7 -50AD

T100: Make the AH + Poly trade with Sury. I have horses in range. Turn on research, MC in 6.
T101: Pacal demands gold, I refuse. Manage to trade him Fish for Sugar.
T104: My scouting workboat dies to a barb galley right near Sury's borders, LOL. I beg 40 gold from Justin.
T105: MC in. Trade it to Justin for Currency + 55G, as Sury doesn't have Currency yet. Trade MC to Sury for Math + Mono.
GS pops, keeping him idle.
Neither Justin or Sury have Drama or Calendar yet. I decide to research Calendar next, to use as trade bait and open up a possible Optics bulb.
Pacal is super advanced, already has Machinery + Drama + Calendar. GK is somewhat backwards, but still has several techs on me.
Up to 4 workers now, going to get at least 2 more.
Trade Clam to Pacal for Dye, cool that he will trade resources even at Annoyed.
T106: Trade Currency to Sury for Monarchy. Revolt to OR and HR. OR cost an extra 4 GPT, but almost all cities are on infrastructure builds. Need IW really badly now though, lots of jungle to cottage.
T107: Sury got Calendar. Decide to switch to Drama – will take 4 turns. Going to use a Philo bulb.
T108: Justin built AP I vote for him.
Genghis will talk, wants Mono + Aest for peace. I decide to wait, I don't think he can get trade routes with anyone else while we are at war. I'm trying to kill a fishing boat of his to get some more warscore too.
T109: Justin is researching Philo!
T111: Drama in. Took peace with Genghis the turn before, I decide to OB with him, I have 2 cities with domestic trade routes.
T112: Med in, bulb Philo. Sury already has it as well now though. Trade Drama to Genghis for IW + PH. Want Compass next, cheap Harbours + trading. Need 8 turns though.
T113: Sell Drama to Sury for 140G – I can make it to Compass in 4 now.
T117: Compass in. Stop here.

Round 8 Plan

I can get CoL + Calendar + 55g for Compass. Probably sell Alpha to GK for 90g as well.

Have 7 workers and 8 cities. 9th Settler on the way to Iron site. Started cottaging as much as possible.
144 commerce – 94 from trade routes. 74 expenses, more once I settle last city.
Lots of infrastructure to build, Forges + Hindu buildings. Think the priority is Hindu buildings first, then Forges. Whip away everything but cottages.
Have enough happy now, probably should hook up Pigs to get another healthy.

Tech – I am contemplating a hard beeline to Gunpowder, trade for Engineering, then double bulb Chemistry + self tech Steel? With hindu hammers and lots of food, should have no trouble whipping out a good army to take over my island?

Genghis will be behind, but he should have a lot of production. Not sure he is a better target.

Maybe I could go straight for Engineering instead. Trebs + Pikes would hold up very well vs Knights, plus with Cha and either Vassalage or Theo, I could get CRII Trebs out the gate.

Third plan seems to be Lib – I think I am way too far behind for this race though.

Some input would be great, this is the part of the game where I start to lose control.

 

It might be a boring suggestion, but I would just rush Justi with Cuirs. It's a bit late already though, 50 AD.. should still be doable. War with Genghis Khan obviously slowed you down a bit.

Not sure about some tech choices. MC, Drama, Compass... hmm. Would definitely trade for CoL (+Calendar if you can) now and beeline Civil Service. But most importantly, switch into Caste + Pacifism and pump out Great Scientists. Otherwise Lib is definitely gone.

Give the 2nd Fish to New York and grow it to size 10+. Get a Great Something out of Washington. Should take 5-6 turns with Caste+Pacifism. Start a Golden Age with that. Switch into Bureaucracy. Starve Great Scientists from Washington + New York. Possibly one Great Merchant from Washington. Depending on GPP situation, switch back into Slavery at the end of the golden age. Or stay a bit longer, one turn of Anarchy later won't kill you.

You want to attack in ~30 turns. AP buildings can be chopped if you want, but they are really not that important. I often don't even build them if I go for Cuirs. I want to hit ~600 AD, so with opportunity costs etc not worth it. Taj Mahal is also not worth it when going for Cuirs. Put those hammers into 6-7 Elephants instead. Slightly off topic, but I see it so often.

Only Granaries, Barracks and Forges are needed. I often whip the Forges veery late, after the golden age, 10-15 turns before attacking maybe. Slow-building them in Caste System.

I would advise most of that, even if you choose to go for cannons. It's really awkward to actually get to a position where you can bulb Chemistry. Feudalism, Machinery, Guilds, Engineering... people won't trade that for a loong time. So it's probably still better to go Paper->Education->Gunpowder, backfill and maybe lib chemistry instead. Only difference: if going cannons, there is time for some more infrastructure, so nothing wrong with AP buildings. But keep in mind that you might defy a AP resolution when you attack and will just lose the hammers anyway.

Whipping everything into the ground to get AP buildings, Forges, Barracks, Stables... is not really advised imho. Your whole empire benefits from a golden age, let the cities reach their potential. More workers could have been good, especially being EXP. There is a lot of jungle to be chopped. 20 cottages by 1 AD would be good on a map like this. So much green land.

Definitely Caste+Pacifism immediately, though. Let New York grow with the 2nd Fish before the golden age. It was whipped quite heavily .

Generally you are in a reasonable position though and with some careful play it can be converted into a successful attack, I am sure

 

Hi Lain,

I don't like Cuirs here, I think Pacal beats us to Lib most times (he has Philo + CS on us already).

Your advice on civics and buildings is excellent though. I thought AP hammers would be a given, but I agree I will end up defying a resolution at some point.

Nonetheless, I tried the Cuirs route using your suggestions above, ended up getting MT at 800AD. Built a stack of 30 cuirs, but didn't attack until almost 1100AD. Justin ruined several trades I had lined up, meaning I got both Nat and Gunpowder later than I expected, and Pacal got edu right after I did and went straight for Lib....... so I was behind.
And naturally, Justin had his own Cuirs + airships, I got a city and wiped most of his offensive stack, but he then used AP to go for peace.

If you can get 600 AD cuirs from my 50 AD save, I would be happy to see a save......

I actually think my last round kinda sucked, I got screwed on the Philo bulb last round, Pacal and Sury didn't have Philo when I bulbed it, then the next turn, bam, they both had it! So I wasted a lot of beakers getting Drama, Med and Philo. And I couldn't get enough techs in trade.

Decided to repeat the 375BC - 50AD save, with the goal of setting up for Steel.

Major changes - got 9 workers instead of 6, and bulbed Machinery instead of Philo. Didn't build any hindu buildings - AP went to Buddhism this time anyway. Justin beelined Engineering instead of Nationalism. I met the other AI's earlier so was able to trade MC much earlier. Got earlier IW, CoL, Monarchy and Currency due to a huge trade with Genghis. Already in Caste + HR. Will have cottages up earlier.
Getting a GM, not a GS - Will go to the ToA city and use him to get enough Gold for Steel. Going to get 2 GS in secondary cities for Chemistry.

I like this save better, I am stocking gold, will power towards Gunpowder once I get Feudalism.

Next round will aim to get Forges + Harbours (expansive + GLH) in all cities and then head towards Guilds -> Gunpowder as soon as I can trade for Feudalism. Still have a monopoly on Compass, plus have other techs other leaders dont.

 

Hi Berks, I accepted your "challenge" and will play a bit from your (former) 50 AD save. I believe that you were in a pretty good position (which would be even stronger if not for that Genghis declaration).

Only played to 200 AD so far, but I did so very carefully and can already see a lot of potential. Things I did:

- Traded Compass for Code of Laws with Justi
- Alpha with Genghis for 90 gold
- Did NOT trade Compass for Calendar with Sury. Because on second thought, Calendar is not helping us in any way. I also saw that he has Civil Service up for trade. So I saved Compass and started on my way towards Civil Service. I managed to trade for the last part of it.

Spoiler :

- Sent many warriors that were not needed in small cities towards New York and Washington (potential +1 happy each from HR)
- Deleted 2-3 Galleys in foreign lands. 2-3 gold/turn saved from each.
- Put Seattle and Atlanta on worker-building-duty. Using EXP bonus from the mines, they can churn out workers quite quickly, even without Slavery, since...
- I switched into Caste+Pacifism immediately
- Start running merchants instead of forests/coast everywhere
- Re-negotiate some ressource deals as I go. Only Washington and New York really need those happy resources you are importing. By shuffling around warriors over there, I cancel the happy imports and pick up 12/11 gold from Pacal/Justi instead
- Beg for 50 gold from Justi when he got some gold
- Give Fish + Clam to New York and let it grow as much as possible. Washington is already at its happy cap
- Start preparing for Civil Service and irrigation spread by chopping the relevant jungle tiles
- Didn't make any other tech trades. Nothing I really need right now.
- Traded Metal Casting for 300 gold (!) from Genghis at some point

I made sure to save the game on each turn. So you can follow the progress I made pretty closely. 200 AD I started my golden age and switched into Bureaucracy. Empire is churning out 300 beakers now with barely any gold loss (thanks to resource trades, mainly). Building wealth or stuff like that is not needed.

Notice that Justi has Nationalism and is Friendly. He won't trade it yet since he is going for the Taj, but meanwhile I plan to get Paper+Education+Music. Trade for Nationalism with him, Lib MT and kick his butt.

600 AD might be a stretch, but I bet some nasty Cuirs attack can be pulled off here.

 

Well, this is the best I could do. This is my army at 760 AD. Too tired to play it out right now, but it should be pretty favorable.

Spoiler :

Play it out a bit if you want. I took more saves aswell, in case you want to know something. Big things were:

- Education for Nationalism trade with Justi. Got burned on Music trade and had to self-tech it
- Lib MT 450 AD
- 2 GS during golden age helped with that ... bulbed Education 1x and Lib 1x
- Switch into Vassalage on the last turn of golden age...
- Kept running merchants with Caste+Pacifism in Washington... 4 more turns for a Great Merchant which I really wanted
- Revolt into Slavery+Theo after that... sent Great Merchant over to Pacal
- Slow-tech to Gunpowder (delayed) while whipping out 20 Horse Archers
- Skipped Barracks in most cities... usually I don't do that, but here I got a bit worried about Justi's tech pace (built the Taj Mahal and went crazy with the teching..). Vassalage+Theo also means 4 XP and that secures 2 promotions, being CHA...
- I refrained from declaring earlier, because now there will be 19 turns without AP peace vote. Happy times.

- Cataphracts will be slightly annoying...
- Declare on Justi right now and bribe Genghis on him aswell
- Take over the landmass and go to space or something

But as you can see, that's what's possible from your position at 50 AD.

PS: Leave the workers where they are when declaring. Trying to bait his stack into open field.

 

All the gameplay & effort you show time after time, Lain..it's amazing
While not playing much myself anymore (wish you were around when i did lol), i just wanted to praise your contribution.