[R&F] Early warmongering

[Rancio]

Hello I'm actually trying SV victories on Deity and seems that I'll need more expansion early on.

My questions are:

- Should I rush with archers + warriors if I've one or more close neightbour? IE: Japan at 15 hexes or less north, Poland south 15 hexes and Aztecs east 20 hexes.

- Is it actually better to hold off and wait until swordsmen + battering ram for and early push? What happens if no iron near, just reset?

- How many settlers should I build on the very first 50-100 turns? Taking in consideration enought space for 3-4 cities.

- As Korea is viable to rush Seowon at the beggining to speed up swordsmen?

- If neightbours close. When I should declare war? Or is better to just don't send delegations and let them declare on me?

Actually trying with archer rush but somehow I allways get dark age after conquering 2 or 3 cities of my closest neightbour and all conquested cities swap to them in 10 or so turns.

All that taking in account civs without Classical or Medieval UU.

PS: Sorry about my poor english.

 

[BarbarianHunter]

My questions are:
- If neightbours close. When I should declare war? Or is better to just don't send delegations and let them declare on me?

Send a warrior or scout off toward your nearest neighbor. If there are no units around, they are elsewhere conquering a city state or warring with another deity level AI. Look for a mine, preferably two. Declare and pillage them. A quick 50 science. That can make a huge difference when you're only making 3 science per turn. Perhaps find a wooded hill and fortify. Maybe the AI will send only 1 warrior, and it may impale itself on you while you're fortified. Or perhaps, better yet, it may send 2 or 3 75%+ wounded warriors back from the front. This could get you some war reparations, as the gold per turn the AI pays seems to be based off the number of units it loses in the war.

The rest I think is situational.

 

[MarigoldRan]

With people this close you're going to build archer anyways to stay alive at Diety. May as well also attack with them after fighting off the first rush.

 

[Rancio]

Archers is a must have to defend myself, but how should I expand early on without space, archer rush seams weak, at the time I can push they have a lot of warriors and probly 1 or 2 archers and more comming, and for some reason that I don't understand at all when archer rush allways get dark age.

And more important in the case of early UU civs as neightbour, for example Persia, Macedon (not to hard AI is useless with him), Nubia, Gilgamesh or Rome, how to defend vs them and counter attack invading them, Rome and Gilgamesh for me are the most annoying civs as neightbour, Gilga cause of War-carts, with 3 or 4 archers can defend myself but cannot conquer them, Rome for some reason allways have more science than me and at some point I go with swordsmen and they have knights.

For example:

DeityImDone

• Rancio
• Sep 28, 2018

Rome and Cleo near me, Persia on the other side and Cleo or Rome taking the city-state near me

 

[liv]

It looks like you have not done builders. Developing squares for production and luxuries to sell to AI is very important as is getting the eurekas. If you have not met a cultural state first you may want to buy a monuments for your cities so you can get a bit faster with culture and get to Magnus. I usually sell all my luxuries in the very beginning.
In that scenario there I would have tried to anticipate the attack on Bandar Brunei and be ready to jump in and snatch it up before Rome got hold of it.

I often do a scout to explore so that I can maybe avoid that first dark age if I need to attack early. But scout is a bit contested since it does leave you potentially vulnerable.
With Korea you should be able to chop in a campus to avoid dark age if you need to

In that scenario there you may be too far away for a archer rush.
I find archer rush works if they are close and if they decide to attack a city state and move all their troops in a different direction. My preferred attack would be with horses when that is possible

 

[BarbarianHunter]

Liv has salient points, and there still may be hope? When an AI sieges a city state so close to me it's always an opportunity. Firstly, they almost always surround the CS with warriors, who tend to get themselves to 90% wounded. They will then wait and heal some, then attack again, dropping to the 90% red zone threshold again. Never a better time to pounce on a deity AI. Eliminate a unit, or two. Maybe stop the CS from falling, maybe not. But you will get some reparations. Take the lump sum gold, upgrade to archers, then liberate the CS for 3 envoys .

 

[TheGreatSleepyOne]

On deity level my go to opening is 5 slingers followed by the first victory district.
You stop the inevitable first push. If you found your own religion pick up Defender of Faith (+10 in own territory). Its very nice to have. I did find that faith is a great strategy to accumulate culture (choral music), and culture is a great way to push science (reach key civics faster). For a science victory, you can use the faith to grab extra great scientists and engineers, and ignore using it on religious units.

I'd say go for a Deity Science win with Arabia. Choral Music religions zoom through the civics tree meaning you get to Feudalism (serfdom) faster, you promote your governors faster, higher tier governments, and corps and armies, and faster SPIES.
Your core cities will have decked out HS and campuses, you need 1-3 high production cities to make the spaceship, and you can never have enough gold.

The HS might seem counter intuitive, but you only need shrines and temples (with choral music +6 culture and faith). Don't spend faith upgrading the religion, save it for great people.

 

[Rancio]

Going for faith in a science victory seems a reasonable go but I think is better to just have a few theater squares.

Defender of the faith is a very good belief, but my problem isn't defend my own territory, for some reason I'm allways getting pushed on the very first 50 turns by one or two civs and barbarians (too common for me), last game with Rome scouting barb camp spawned on capital border and India declared on me, turn 40, and on turn 60 Gorgo declared on me slowed the win to T340+- cause of the early war and defend, was able to survive but cannot expand enought early on.

My real problem is with expansion, seems impossible to me expanding early on, with Civs with early UU can take down my close neightbour on turn 100-120 and have 10-15 cities but with civs like Korea it's just impossible for me.

 

[Spudsie74]

Hmmm.....glad to see Im not the only one who likes Choral Music, it's a good way to supplement culture. If I have neighbors, I regard it as a good thing, as the AI is not as good at managing it units as any competent human.

Sorry, posted before I finished babbling. Something about enjoying being the "Neighbor from Hell," although it's easy to get carried away...R&F seems to be more demanding that one multi-task. Seems like every game is very different, and you have to have "situational awareness," or you will get burned....examples being getting a "Dark Age," because I'm too focused on gobbling up neighbors, or too much focus on Religion (production, growth, Gold, ect). R&F makes me keep my options open, and is much more demanding of a flexible outlook (and a careful eye on everything on the map), as compared to vanilla. Makes for a much better game. Now, if thy could only give the AI a few brain cells.....

 

[TheGreatSleepyOne]

Going for faith in a science victory seems a reasonable go but I think is better to just have a few theater squares.

Defender of the faith is a very good belief, but my problem isn't defend my own territory, for some reason I'm allways getting pushed on the very first 50 turns by one or two civs and barbarians (too common for me), last game with Rome scouting barb camp spawned on capital border and India declared on me, turn 40, and on turn 60 Gorgo declared on me slowed the win to T340+- cause of the early war and defend, was able to survive but cannot expand enought early on.

My real problem is with expansion, seems impossible to me expanding early on, with Civs with early UU can take down my close neightbour on turn 100-120 and have 10-15 cities but with civs like Korea it's just impossible for me.

The theatre squares provide less culture for your hammers compared to choral shrines + temples. Although, I don't use the Great Works trade "bug" (feature?). HS allows you to have competitive culture while also generating faith which I'm starting to believe is the most OP yield in the game.

If you are getting pushed in the first 50 turns, you are probably exploring too far and not settling nearby lands fast enough. I usually need my starting warrior to garrison my first expansion. If your early neighbor gobbled up the other one, you have to take em out and now you're the one with 15 cities. gg wp.

 

[liv]

eal problem is with expansion, seems impossible to me expanding early on, with Civs with early UU can take down my close neightbour on turn 100-120 and have 10-15 cities but with civs like Korea it's just impossible for me

I think you can wait till horses or swordmen and rush then if archer rush seems hard. With Korea knight rush could work very well, hurry for stirrups and build some chariots to upgrade have battery rams ready and you should be able to get neighbour cities easily. It does not have to be archer rush.

I build encampment early to try to get one of the early great generals. They are very helpful for early rushes with horses but also works with knights. Having a great general is like having a a special uu

 

[Rancio]

I think you can wait till horses or swordmen and rush then if archer rush seems hard. With Korea knight rush could work very well, hurry for stirrups and build some chariots to upgrade have battery rams ready and you should be able to get neighbour cities easily. It does not have to be archer rush.

I build encampment early to try to get one of the early great generals. They are very helpful for early rushes with horses but also works with knights. Having a great general is like having a a special uu

With this another problem come to the board, economy. How do you manage to maintain 10 or more knights or swordmen+archers/xbowmen? Usually I don't have more than +10/20 GPT early on with districts and buildings maintenance with a real beeline to stirrups hard researching it knights can come online on turn 80 or so, 15 GPT or so, only 8 knights seems really pure to me, ok they are strong as hell but only 8 of them seems slow to take down a civ on turn 80 with walls, battering ram helps but probly 2 turns per city after taking down troops.

Swordmen + Archer/Xbow seems good but on turn 60 or so I don't have enought money to upgrade 6/7 warriors and 6/7 slingers.

 

[Spudsie74]

his is not a cure-all, but I tend to run the "All units cost 1 less gold," military card. Often it is used in conjunction w/ Oligarchy or Merchant Republic. I try to have as any trade routes as possible (hence lots of Harbor & Commercial Districts). Between that, conquest and trade, Gold is usually not a major issue, (although it does require careful budgeting).

 

[liv]

Funding the early classical and medieval war can be an issue. I try to store up some funds for upgrades by selling luxuries and anything I do not need from the beginning. Hold on to upgrading units till the last minute. But war is also very profitable. You can plunder, steal trade routes and demand a lot for peace and then use that windfall for the campaign against your next neighbour.

And if I go to war with melee units or cavalry I do not bother that much with archers and such. Horses will be fast even swordmen can get fast with promotions and knights are very fast so all I bring are battery rams. And if you are fast to get knights as Korea you do not need that many. Knights are so strong. No need to be excessive.

 

[Casualty of war]

No one on this start is close enough to rush, except Bandar Brunei. Almost anything else you conquered would have loyalty problems and flip Free. With that fantastic mountain range defense, this is a dream environment to hide til victory though. Room for 5-7 cities and highly defensible.

However if you did want to carve out a kingdom, you have 3 Animal Handling improvements right in the first ring. This could be a Builder start right into a quick Craftsmanship, Slinger into Archer army while selling off Furs to keep your economy healthy. You could gamble on Iron being readily available and create a swarm of Warriors also. You might be able to just buy your first Settler from all that Fur money then upgrade your troops on the renewal of the trade deal.

If you are having trouble with Dark Ages, try leaving shadowy areas near your cities to encourage Barb Camps to form. They are easy Gold, Era Score and experience for your troops as long as you deal with them when they are just a Scout and a Spearman.

If you have this saved game to share, especially from the start, that would be great.