[BTS] Deity Shadow Game: Julius Caesar

[georgjorge]

I think both your tech path and location for the second city are solid (if you plan to not get too close to Alex).

You also need a mid-term plan for dealing with Alex, because even if you don't settle too close, eventually he WILL expand and sooner or later attack you (unless you get very lucky with religion spread from somewhere else, but that's not so likely).

What I'm not sure about is your fogbusting. You haven't secured or even scouted the area north of the capital - there might a strong city location for you up there (sharing the wet Corn). And the two Warriors south of the capitol are contributing very little, you could keep the "beach" in the south barb-free with just one 4S of the capitol (barbs don't spawn in a 5x5 area around your units, including Workers) and send the other up north or west.

In my game so far, barbs have been pretty tough - I managed them, but it cost me some hammers for Warriors.

 

[Simple Machine]

Played on to T61:

Spoiler :

Teched Pottery --> AH --> Writing (just finished). Going to chop a library in Rome, and southernmost city is getting a workboat for exploration. I'm not sure my city placement is optimal, but I wanted that northernmost one to have access to 4 food sources so it can run lots of specialists later...there's just a mind-boggling amount of food here honestly. In any case, another city can fit on the plains hill 2N 1W of gold to use that corn and work the gold mine.

Longer term, what's the best way to handle this semi-iso with Alex? With so much food it'd be easy to whip up a large army very quickly, but I don't have horses and don't know if I have iron. I think perhaps it's better to avoid provoking him for now and quietly tech to optics and astronomy to meet everyone else?

@georgjorge I ended up having no barb trouble at all, but perhaps I just got lucky. Probably would have been better to be more proactive about fogbusting the north.

 

[Fippy]

IW is needed for Optics too, no harm in looking for Praets next?
If you want peace with Alex, a crappy gift city (cheaper with IMP) would be good..secures pleased.
If not, Cats + Praets should be good. Axes could be used if no Iron until you can find one.
Maybe i would look into whipping (or slow building with good production) the libraries rather than chopping, more forests for war.

 

[Anysense]

Why not 6->3 whip library in Rome and Atium? More than enough food for that. A bit of scouting prior to making long-term decisions would not hurt.

 

[Simple Machine]

Update T71:

Spoiler :

Settled Ravenna to get the westernmost Corn, and then teched IW to discover the Iron there. Have libraries in Rome and Antium, and will 3pop whip one in Cumae too.

After exploring a bit, this is what the rest of the continent looks like:

It looked like there was coast just to the west of Sparta. Alexander is getting slowed down right now settling the jungle region, but it looks like he will get a lot of good land there.

Also, from the Espionage screen, it looks like Alex is in contact with another AI - I'll try to meet them ASAP:

He's only putting 2 of his points on me.

Having iron and so much food, I'm tempted to beeline construction and then rush Alex with Praetorians + catapults. From the power rating, it looks like he's still in expansion mode and far away from generating any kind of stack. That would also make good use of all the forests I have.

Is this kind of early war advisable on Deity? After construction I could tech up to Monarchy and Feudalism to capitulate him, but I'm not sure how bad the economic recovery will be without currency or courthouses and stuff.

 

[georgjorge]

My two cents on early war on Deity: In many situations, I would prefer out-teching Alex (who is a slow techer with a fair amount of units) and then attacking him. However, in semi-isolation (even if there's another AI out there, trade routes would go through him) and with him likely to attack you at some point, it may be more beneficial to attack sooner than later, i.e. Praets and Catapults.

Re: economic recovery - if you're worried about getting to Currency and Code of Laws, definitely go there right after Construction. You don't want to vassal him anyway if you can take all his land instead. Plus, the main threat for a Catapult attack are Longbows, and I think if he has Longbows he will be able to vassal to you anyway.

 

[Simple Machine]

OK, in that case I'm going for catapults and teching Math --> Masonry --> Construction. I won't bother with Myst and instead will just whip/chop a library to get the Iron. It looks like that will put an attack date somewhere between T100-120. After construction I could directly tech Currency --> CoL, or if I find someone with Alphabet I hopefully can trade for one of those

 

[Fippy]

With this quality land, i would not worry too much about the economy
Taking cities can give you capture gold, and plundering tiles can also add some.

Currency only good for building wealth without trading partners, i would be more interested in Alpha for demanding techs after beating on him (10t peace).
Can be done while healing & re-grouping.
So if he has no Alpha after you reached your war techs, i would def tech that first..also would discount currency, so not that expensive if you want both.

 

[krikav]

I can't seem to get BAT to work. >_<
Anyone care to load the starting save and make a worldbuilder save?
Haven't played the Romans in ages and it would be fun to tag along.

Me looking at the starting save would go for PH+dual corn, and likely grab the gold with a early second city.

 

[Simple Machine]

@ krikav let me know if this works for you, I think I did it right

 

[krikav]

@Simple Machine Thank you!
It's kind of hard to not do it right. From starting saves it's just as simple as to start the game and make a worldbuilder save. That doesn't work with games in progress though, as alot of data (like culture on plots for example) isn't saved in a worldbuilder save.
Problems also arise if one wants to change settiings such as difficulty or speed, but if it's just to migrate a starting safe from one mod to another this is the way to go.

I have started the save from buffy5 and added barb techs, in case someone else is BAT-handicaped like me and wants to play along too.

 

[krikav]

I have been too sloppy with scouting in my game so I don't want to open any spoilers yet, but I played up until T56 now (when I reached writing).

Spoiler T56 :

I didn't see the coast when settling, but I was reasoning that with all the floodplains and with two wet corn, it wouldn't have been any big deal to ruin some seafood.
Isn't it weird that I'm glad that there isn't any fish out there? I mean, it's objectively better if there was seafood out there, even if I could not work it, it would still be available for health and resource trades.
This land is insanely good, gold to pay for early sins, loads of chops, juicy rivers and abundant chops.

Something went wrong with the BAT->Buffy conversion anyway, Alex has the wrong flag. Oh well...
He also goes for an early religion, and EP indicate that we are in semi-iso.

Tried to calculate, thought I had enough overflow to 1-turn the worker, but something with IMP-hammers made me miss the mark. This prompts me to throw the overflow into barracks instead.

I reason that I will soon lose the second corn in the capital, and I want to grow. The chop which comes soon will finish the worker in one turn anyway.

As so.

Cumae has potential to be a hell of a GPF city. I placed it there to enable the posibility to mature a cottage, and get abit cheaper maintenence, but I think it might have been better 1NW, as that would have gotten the dry corn in the first ring too.
Delayed the settler for the south, so sync overflow into library. Two chops should finish it next turn.
Now I'll start exploring abit west with axes and probably get two workboats out asap.

But the name of the game now is to lay down cottages and tech.
Perhaps crushing Alex with prets+catas is a good idea, but it might be sensible to settle some turtleshell city westwards on a hill and just wait for his inevitable DoW and defend while doing a iso-play and astro bulbing is best? If I meet the others and start trading, Alex is sure to fall behind in tech and he will just continue to develop the continent...?
Sailing for org lighthouses and traderoutes with alex next might be sensible, or possibly myst to get the fish for a south-western city by that river?
Or perhaps just self teching IW is the way to go?

 

[krikav]

Spoiler :

Techpath was:
Agri->BW->TW->Pot->AH->Writing

Buildorder
Worker first, then Settler, Worker, Settler, Worker, Settler.
All settlers 2-pop whipped in capital.
Antium has a worker half-build to, which it has been putting hammers into every time Rome has taken the corn to grow.

 

[Simple Machine]

@ krikav

Spoiler :

Interesting play to settle the plains hill - I wonder how your game will turn out differently with that! Also curious to see where you decide to go from here. To rush or not to rush, that is the question...whether 'tis nobler in the mind...well, I don't actually remember how the rest of it goes

I've played up to T113:

Spoiler :

Ultimately decided to hit Alex with cats and praets - when you see what the bottom half of his continent looks like, I think you'd agree

All that land was completely uncontested, so many rich jungle resources!

From my last save I teched Math --> Masonry --> Construction (700 BC), DoW 450 BC with 8 cats + 8 praets + 2 axes - here is my path of destruction:

Corinth fell first at 400 BC, lost 1 catapult, 1 praetorian. Alex soon came with a "stack" - it was like a few phalanxes, swords and chariots, less than 10 units total though. They suicide at Corinth 325 BC. After that, the Roman army charged west like a hot knife through butter. Around 250 BC I had slogged my way to currency and traded it for Alpha (maybe not the best, but oh well). Athens fell in 175 BC (lost 2 catapults, 1 praetorian @ 95% odds). Thebes to the north fell in 100 BC, and then to the far west Knossos dropped at 50 BC, turn 113.

Totally caught Alex with his pants down - he a bunch of defenders in Athens but they all died in the city. Both Thebes and Knossos had just 3-4 units each.

Using the pointy-stick gold, I teched Mysticism --> Meditation --> Priesthood. I started CoL and am 2 turns away @ 100% research, but think I might go for sailing first. I want to take a few more cities from Alex, then squeeze Monarchy, Calendar and maybe even Metal Casting out of him before finishing him off.

Also have gotten a GS, he's sitting in Rome waiting to bulb philosophy.

The homeland has been struggling with happiness, but the cottages are holding the economy together:

(I stupidly allowed a barb galley to spawn and he smashed my crabs )

 

[Simple Machine]

Forgot to mention above

Spoiler :

My workboat met Victoria, Mehmed and Kublai. There are still 2 others out there, and so far only Mehmed has built like 3 wonders...I'm worried about a super strong wondermonger out there somewhere

 

[krikav]

@Simple Machine

Spoiler :

I don't think that my settlement is superior, given the layout of the land settling 1S of the gold would probably have been better than what I did.
I like your capitals position too.

I think that your position looks very good now at T113.
I'm not completely convinced that there was much need to rush though. There is nothing wrong with letting the AI develop the land abit.
With all that land, he would surely be in expansion mode for quite some time and likely crashed his economy, and with abit later date, there would be more cities growing and more land developing and you would have fruits to pick for a longer time.
But then again... he could pick up speed with all those calendar resources and reach feud in notime too.

 

[Simple Machine]

Update T121:

Spoiler :

After healing for a couple turns, I moved in to take Sparta and Argos. At the same time, Alex sent another small stack of HA + War Elephants (I think Alex may have been getting Ivory from Kublai Khan, or he may have them in the jungle). Lost a couple praets to that, but still took Sparta in 75 AD, then Argos in 150 AD. Took peace for Metal Casting, Monarchy and Calendar

Here are the new acquisitions:

And home base is much happier now with the Calendar resources:

Just switched into Hereditary rule. Alex was teching Machinery but he hasn't gotten a new source of iron yet, so for now I don't have to worry about crossbows.

Taking stock, I still have a decent army left:

Will need to build some more catapults before attacking again.

And my workboat has explored some of the nearby continent:

There's still 2 other AIs out there that between them have 11 wonders (!)

At this point I think I can tech feudalism and vassal Alex after DoWing again.

 

[sampsa]

@Simple Machine

Spoiler :

Well done so far. Some criticism though on city management: Your capital area has many weak tiles improved (plains mines). Whipping beats working those tiles by a significant amount. I don't understand why Cumae is size 2 with so many improved tiles around (corn is not even worked?) nor why does Naepolis even exist. Capital is very small for this date (with so much food around) and is not even growing. I get the feeling you are way undervaluing food. I understand that you were previously starving for happiness, but still I think there must be a better way to handle it.

edit: Ah, cities are not growing since you are in anarchy...

 

[krikav]

@Simple Machine

I played along for abit. Trying to show a alternative play where one delays construction abit longer and instead develops the empire abit more first.

Spoiler T113 :

Viccy can get whatever price she wants, the monarchy happines is very important.

Alex has been fist mode for some time, I have been building pretorians and have kept them spread out to increase happines.
Now he comes knocking at the door.
He jumps back and forth abit before he leaves his stack on the flatland.

First general lifts 10 units up from 3-4xp to 5-6xp, gaining alot of promotions. Especially good for the catapults.

Things where looking rather dire right before currency.

At T113:
I lost at LEAST 4 catapults because I'm an idiot and let them move to the front unescorted, and they got sniped by horse archers.

Not at all sure if this is better or worse. Tech is much further ahead, but I'm not as far along taking Alex cities.
Alex is willing to give some city and a bunch of tech for peace, but he will not give Argos, so I think I'm forced to roll on, even though I lack catapults.
Peace after Argos is ok.

I also have a similar experience as you have with the wonders.
I think this makes it all the more important to bulb philo, as to deny any culture crazy AI yet another religion.

 

[krikav]

@Simple Machine
Feedback on your T121 situation:

I don't think it makes any sense to vassal Alex. That would likely cause problems with diplomacy with the other AIs, and he won't do you much good. Especially since he is landlocked relative to the other AIs, he can't really work like a meat-shield either.
Also, the motherland anger and culture pressure will be a problem for a long long time.
Makes much more sense to just kill him off.

I second what @sampsa says about neopolis, but with a caveat...
Cumae had waaay too much food to handle prior to calendar/CoL, and a city to unload the pig is perfecly OK.
I would have prefered the city you marked with "s" though, as that city would have made more forest available earlier.
Now they are just standing there doing you no good.
That 'S' city is also superb in that it can help your capital grow, by holding the gold.
Your pig city now, I would cottage the flatland by the copper, and the grassland hill and let it be pigcitys goal in life to mature those two cottages for the capital.

In your position, I think I would go for CS sooner rather than later.
What did you do with your GSci? Have you gotten a second GPerson?

Difficult to see how your economy is going as you are in anarchy, but I don't think it would be wrong to make a academy in capital as you have all by won against Alex, you could afford to just get org courthouses up and recover and build a few stray catapults and go at him again with that later on and see how far that gets you.
But bulbing Philo is certainly fine too, I mentioned earlier that I would be abit worried about those wonderbuilders.

I would have jumped into Hindu the second I got a city with religion given how the religious distribution is in your game, I think it was a mistake if you decided to delay it prior.
With Mehmed having the holy city, and Kublai with burocracy as favourite civic, it won't be much trouble getting those two gentlemen to friendly. And if I know them right, they will reduce viccy to insignificance.

Once Alex is taken care of, and diplo under wraps and economy humming along, I would prioritize finding out what the other AIs are up to, it might be sensible to go for them next and leave the Hindu team as trading partners.