Agreed. Although there is another idea that makes sense - go alpha and trade for IW. Pretty sure you can expand with swords (and axes). Then again, I don't yet know if we have iron in a convenient spot. But yeah even if going construction delays stuff like bureau a bit, it's a safe and sound way to expand.
Elizabeth - Emperor - Fractal
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Fish Man
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You'll have to sack a ridiculous amount of swords if the enemy has metal, since swords vs axes in a city is basically 6str vs 12str. Unless you know for a fact AI has no metal and won't be getting any soon, swords are out. And if you can trade for IW, chances are, AI has metal. Elepaults are the most hammer efficient choice since they don't really have classical era counters (even vs spears ellies can fight w/ parity) and every single catapult weakens entire stacks instead of a single unit even if they die. An argument can be made for HAs since on large maps standard since they're fast and sheer distance is one major factor holding you back on a speed where units obsolete by the time they travel across the map; however, there aren't really horses close here and HBR + archery is an even bigger waste of time. If you're going HAs you can't really give away HBR as tradebait since 1. you don't have alpha at that point and probably neither does anyone else, and 2. you don't want the AI to start building horse archers. However, by the time you have construction, HBR is actually useful tradebait since the opposite is true - you can trade for alpha with it and, say, math, and also you want AIs to build HAs so that your phants can eat them up faster instead of having to deal with annoying spears.
Fish Man
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I always spare autosaves, hope this helps:
T30Spoiler :
T40
Spoiler :
T50Spoiler :
, ability to borrow corn, 4 fps in 1st ring. Not sure how your worker is there btw, as improving northern corn first wins a turn (can reach 2nd corn 1T faster). Optimal chopping pattern is to maximize forest growth, i.e. first chops forests that are surrounded by forests.Ah, that's very helpful. Basically did what you did, except one thing: started building worker on York instead of granary as first build. With PH, 12t worker isn't too shabby, and the sooner we get chops and those sweet riverside cottages running, the better.
I have not played many games on emperor so I don't really know what to expect compared to say immortal. But if an AI has 1-2 archers defending, or even say an axe and an archer... 8 swords or so can plow through many cities. If an AI lacks metal swords offer pretty good bang for the buck I'd assume.
In my experience, HAs beat elepult by a huge margin in swiftness of conquest (as I'm about to demonstrate in the other thread), but as you point out, it is a real detour and possibly doesn't play that big of a role in space games.
Yes, didn't do any math concerning it. Borrowed the corn for a few turns from cap at convenient points (i.e. capital putting
into settler so not growing) so growing to size 2 didn't take long. Probably worker out at roughly at the same time, maybe 1T later, no biggie either way. Growing costs 22
and whipping gives 30 so I try to 1-pop whip instead of slow building even pre-granary when lots of and extra 
is available.
Fish Man
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OK, math is in t67 but I'm still slightly behind.
What did I do wrong this time? Feel like I whipped cap quite enough. Perhaps the 3rd city not being founded on the gold is the culprit...then again I'm sure it's better this way long-term. Nottingham is going to have a bit of trouble growing beyond size 10 in your save (then again one city being short of food is not a real concern when you'll eventually have 40).
Also...Julius has an axe and like 4 archers on a hill city alone. Yeah...swordrush not really gonna work here.
Khmer seems to be going not alpha this time, which is annoying. Oh well, we won't need trades for a while. I think I'll attack Louis and then move on to Julius before he gets praets (since he has copper hopefully he'll prioritize IW less), and finish of Wang, and then swing around.
What did I do wrong this time? Feel like I whipped cap quite enough. Perhaps the 3rd city not being founded on the gold is the culprit...then again I'm sure it's better this way long-term. Nottingham is going to have a bit of trouble growing beyond size 10 in your save (then again one city being short of food is not a real concern when you'll eventually have 40).
Also...Julius has an axe and like 4 archers on a hill city alone. Yeah...swordrush not really gonna work here.
Khmer seems to be going not alpha this time, which is annoying. Oh well, we won't need trades for a while. I think I'll attack Louis and then move on to Julius before he gets praets (since he has copper hopefully he'll prioritize IW less), and finish of Wang, and then swing around.
I think choosing a slower 3rd city is the main culprit (also note how many worker turns it is draining!), but also I think you should have chopped 1-2 more forests in capital. Granary micro seems a bit off in both York (should have definitely whipped 1-2T ago) and Nottingham (I think improving the rice is a mistake as I already said earlier, chopping to get the granary done earlier is better, mainly because dry rice is not that big of an improvement over unimproved fp).
I'm sure 3rd city 1NW of gold instead of on gold is better long-term since it claims grass cow and other workable tiles, and I also agree it's unlikely a concern at all.
I think at some point I'll just give all the cottages to the ph-city and whip gold-city down (workers or units) or starve down a 
.
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Fish Man
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After some further play it seems like sub-t250 space really isn't possible. Phants are too slow, and HAs encounter heavy resistance in the form of impis, praets, and Surry's 60% defense walled hilltop capital.
Unless...
We aim for something really crazy, like a knightrush in the BCs. This sounds even crazier than the longbow rush in that you not only have to get the Oracle, but also get the right great people to bulb the right techs. However, since LIzzy is phi and fin, we just might have what it takes. A great engineer can bulb feudalism and machinery, and despite what common sense may denote, feudalism is actually higher in the bulb order of a GE than masonry and construction (I know...makes no sense...why isn't the engineering, idk, the most engineer-est tech?). If we Oracle MC which we can most definitely do with the abundance of forests in our BFC, we can get a quick forge up (maybe library too if we risk pollution) and rush out 2 GE (because we're phi) to bulbspam. The only really expensive tech we have to research is guilds, which I don't think will be a problem considering you're raking in over 100 bpt by before 750BC. If all goes well, BC knights are well in order. What do you say I give this a shot?
Unless...
We aim for something really crazy, like a knightrush in the BCs. This sounds even crazier than the longbow rush in that you not only have to get the Oracle, but also get the right great people to bulb the right techs. However, since LIzzy is phi and fin, we just might have what it takes. A great engineer can bulb feudalism and machinery, and despite what common sense may denote, feudalism is actually higher in the bulb order of a GE than masonry and construction (I know...makes no sense...why isn't the engineering, idk, the most engineer-est tech?). If we Oracle MC which we can most definitely do with the abundance of forests in our BFC, we can get a quick forge up (maybe library too if we risk pollution) and rush out 2 GE (because we're phi) to bulbspam. The only really expensive tech we have to research is guilds, which I don't think will be a problem considering you're raking in over 100 bpt by before 750BC. If all goes well, BC knights are well in order. What do you say I give this a shot?
Swordnboard
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@sampsa I'm Curious why you chose to stay on 4 cities all the way up to T84. Your method seems to optimize for research, but now that you've reached your tech goal for the time being you seem to be hurting for hammers a little bit (and the rice/cow spot as well as the southern wheat would both be very productive sites). You can certainly make it work using the whip, but it definitely hurts to whip off all of the nice cottages you've developed and it might be better to generate some production from satellite cities that don't have as many juicy cottages to work.
@Undefeatable Uh... IMO Sub T250 space is definitely possible here. Top tier leader, very nice start, emperor difficulty... the advantages go on.
I think elephants should be fine and, hammer for hammer, are probably the most efficient non-UU in the game. Just be sure to not commit too many to any single civilization, and don't be afraid to conquer 2 civs at once since the emperor AI is quite slow to militarize.
As for knights: knights aren't particularly easier to reach than, say, cuirassier, because your 2 GE (which are rather difficult to generate and polluted) could easily be the GS that get you up to Lib->MT. And as compared to attacking with elephants, knights are only a little stronger but run the risk of the AI reaching longbows, castles, pikemen, and just generally militarizing more. Plus the later attack date makes it harder for you to recover quickly and might push back dates for communism and assembly line.
One more tip I can give is not to be too ambitious with landgrabbing. You don't have to go all the way to the domination limit if doing so requires 50 additional units. Conquer when it is an easy way to expand your economy, but when other easy ways become available (GP spam, workshopping, factories/plants, building research, manipulating AI to do research for you), consider those as options as well. Cuirs/Cannons are the absolute last time I would even consider warfare, and even then seems kind of marginal (except on deity where that can be the only option).
Maybe this is some motivation to pick up my playthrough again and try to get through the conquest phase at least.
@Undefeatable Uh... IMO Sub T250 space is definitely possible here. Top tier leader, very nice start, emperor difficulty... the advantages go on.
I think elephants should be fine and, hammer for hammer, are probably the most efficient non-UU in the game. Just be sure to not commit too many to any single civilization, and don't be afraid to conquer 2 civs at once since the emperor AI is quite slow to militarize.
As for knights: knights aren't particularly easier to reach than, say, cuirassier, because your 2 GE (which are rather difficult to generate and polluted) could easily be the GS that get you up to Lib->MT. And as compared to attacking with elephants, knights are only a little stronger but run the risk of the AI reaching longbows, castles, pikemen, and just generally militarizing more. Plus the later attack date makes it harder for you to recover quickly and might push back dates for communism and assembly line.
One more tip I can give is not to be too ambitious with landgrabbing. You don't have to go all the way to the domination limit if doing so requires 50 additional units. Conquer when it is an easy way to expand your economy, but when other easy ways become available (GP spam, workshopping, factories/plants, building research, manipulating AI to do research for you), consider those as options as well. Cuirs/Cannons are the absolute last time I would even consider warfare, and even then seems kind of marginal (except on deity where that can be the only option).
Maybe this is some motivation to pick up my playthrough again and try to get through the conquest phase at least.
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Fish Man
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I prefer not to do cuirs when I don’t have to. As for elepaults...yes they’re strong, but also slow. I’ve seen the sheer girth of the continent and it takes a 1-move unit 50 turns to cross. I don’t know how I’ll manage to conquer everything in time.
If you want to see why I’m skeptical check out the Mansa immortal win I posted a few days ago (shouldn’t be too far back). Took out 4 entire civs with elepaults and later trebs, 300 bpt by 1AD...still only win after t260. There must be some things I’m doing fundamentally wrong, and slowbuilding workers is just one of them.
The reason I chose knights is because knights vs classical units is an even bigger stomp than cuirs vs medieval. Also, guilds and the things leading up to it is less of a detour from communism than MT. Finally I’m willing to sacrifice my morals and replay as many times as necessary to get the 2 GEs.
Swordnboard
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Yes. However, units generally don't move all the way from one side of the continent to another (and if they are doing that, then that would qualify as something fundamentally wrong). They are produced somewhat centrally and radiate outwards, in effect only having to travel half of the width of the continent. Even though your core isn't perfectly central, you can endeavor to shift it by building units in conquered cities as well. Other helpful factors: some of this movement will be across roads, and you do not have to own the entire continent!
I totally agree! (I don't like cuirs much either, they are just a suggestion of why knights might be bad) But firstly, I doubt how long knights vs. classical will last: you may not even have a window to attack with knights before longbows hit the field. And if such a window does exist, then you could have had elephants on the field as much as 30 turns earlier (and thus a 30 turn longer window of phant vs. classical compared to knight vs. classical), which both snowballs your economy faster and also alleviates the issues elephants have with slow movement.
I did take another look at the 1 AD save from your Mansa game. It looks to me like your empire at that point is quite "Tall", in that your core cities are well-grown and cottaged, i.e. lots of their commerce potential is already realized, whereas you don't have that many satellite cities yet, so all of their development will have to happen rapidly in the future. Perhaps if you instead emphasized a "Wide" empire up to that point, with more satellite cities but less population and development in the core, then you could experience a larger growth swing later on because more cities would eventually be like your tall core since you started their development process earlier.
At the same time: I don't play space all that often, and haven't looked at this map in a little while, so my hunch on finish date may be a little off. I guess we'll just have to play some more and find out.
Fish Man
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@Swordnboard
This is a large map, and a pretty sizeable one at that. It’s 50 tiles across roughly HALF of it, so from London to Seoul.
The AI are relatively slow though on this map except for Mr. doublegold Surry. As long as I knock him out early there should be little risk of feuda before about 250AD. Wang in particular has a nasty jungle start.
About the Mansa game: I was expanding as fast as I could, with 4 rapid wars bringing me 0.5% below the dom limit before 1000AD. Guess it still wasn’t enough.
This is a large map, and a pretty sizeable one at that. It’s 50 tiles across roughly HALF of it, so from London to Seoul.
The AI are relatively slow though on this map except for Mr. doublegold Surry. As long as I knock him out early there should be little risk of feuda before about 250AD. Wang in particular has a nasty jungle start.
About the Mansa game: I was expanding as fast as I could, with 4 rapid wars bringing me 0.5% below the dom limit before 1000AD. Guess it still wasn’t enough.
Fish Man
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OK I decided to give up on the knights when Julius daggered me 1000BC. Guess the game's sending a clear message here...
t84 update for me: I have less science but 2 more cities. One is prime whipping material with a rice and cow. Another grabs the silver. Or will eventually, I guess.
Meanwhile nobody has alphabet yet. Yeah...don't think the AI's teching nearly fast enough to threaten feudalism on this map. Or maybe they're intentionally not teching alpha to lull me into a false sense of security
.
t84 update for me: I have less science but 2 more cities. One is prime whipping material with a rice and cow. Another grabs the silver. Or will eventually, I guess.
Meanwhile nobody has alphabet yet. Yeah...don't think the AI's teching nearly fast enough to threaten feudalism on this map. Or maybe they're intentionally not teching alpha to lull me into a false sense of security
.
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Fish Man
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25BC:
Finally people are getting alphabet. Took them long enough.
Half the world somehow doesn't have math yet so I make use of that. Surry is getting completely thrashed and should be gone within the next 5-10 turns no problem. After that I could attack Louis, who's dangerously close to feudalism, or Shaka, who has mids and will probably start plotting on me at one point or another. Because he's Shaka.
Feel like phants are really slow. This map can easily be HoF-worthy if it was marathon.
Finally people are getting alphabet. Took them long enough.
Half the world somehow doesn't have math yet so I make use of that. Surry is getting completely thrashed and should be gone within the next 5-10 turns no problem. After that I could attack Louis, who's dangerously close to feudalism, or Shaka, who has mids and will probably start plotting on me at one point or another. Because he's Shaka.
Feel like phants are really slow. This map can easily be HoF-worthy if it was marathon.
@Swordnboard I have no idea if staying at 4 cities was good. There wasn't really natural 5th+6th spot, and at least they would drain a lot of worker turns. I can't whip much in these cottage cities, but even one extra via trade would mean an extra whip in each. Now I'm just growing into unhappiness and "banking" that way, to whip later. Good news is I don't need many units to take out Louis I think.
@Undefeatable Very hard for me to believe in knights, but it would be cool if it worked. I'm starting to think HAs would be very good even if they distract the tech path a bit with these settings. As you say, there is just so much land to travel that 1-movers feel awkward. edit: ah, like you mentioned, two AIs have annoying UUs against HA...
Probably can't play this week, but that leaves some more time to think about the grand strategy on this map.
via trade would mean an extra whip in each. Now I'm just growing into unhappiness and "banking" that way, to whip later. Good news is I don't need many units to take out Louis I think.@Undefeatable Very hard for me to believe in knights, but it would be cool if it worked. I'm starting to think HAs would be very good even if they distract the tech path a bit with these settings. As you say, there is just so much land to travel that 1-movers feel awkward. edit: ah, like you mentioned, two AIs have annoying UUs against HA...
Probably can't play this week, but that leaves some more time to think about the grand strategy on this map.
