Emperor Cookbook V: Saladin

[KingMorgan]

Lansky, Manus took the city before i knew it even exsisted, the Northern one i got beat to the capture by a few turns. If you'd read my report you'd know about the unhapiness The borders of manus now capital expanded killing my trade routes and thus my trades with the AI, a new road is being built and you can remake the deals to cure the unphappines. Or you could whip in some units and take the manus cities, i'll leave the choice to you. Prophet is up to you as well, you could build the shrine or settle in flooplains city or cap, very disapointed to have a GP rather than a GS.

 

[ChromiumL]

Yay--finally got some votes in!

With that, let me make my own votes:

1st - Lansky - I am not too great at figuring out the balance of war (how to keep tech rate high when capturing cities), so, for me, this save would be a great learning opportunity. Not to mention that stack is absolutely delicious!

2nd - Leventis - Nice all around save. Good expansion, I like the fact that you are building hero epic/moai statues early. Good military too...

3rd - King Morgan - I like the save, but the way Mansa is surrounding you is not cool. This save would require a quick build of military and taking out those cities (hopefully before someone else does!).

So that brings the final tally to:

10 votes - Lansky
7 votes - KingMorgan
7 votes - Chromium
6 votes - Leventis

That makes Lansky the winner! We will be continuing from his save! The next round will run through 1100 AD, and we will start voting somewhere around Monday.

 

[RJM]

Spoiler :

Because of the impressive stack in Bulawayo, I decided to continue the war against Shaka until he was no longer a threat. I thought it would be easier to make him a vassal, so I switched to Feudalism. (This was a mistake; Shaka did not capitulate until a long time after I discovered it.) My research path after that was Aesthetics and Literature (for the GL). I then went for Paper and Education. I picked up various other techs on trades. The combined effect of the war and the cities I captured was to crash my economy which now needs to be rebuilt. I made a couple of small mistakes towards the end - I forgot that I could build missionaries without a monastery so I wasted some hammers. I then sent my first missionary to the wrong city.

RJM

 

[Gumbolt]

Still offline here till wednesday so I am an unlikely to take part in this round.
I have now played on my own starting save to finish. I got an AP win around 1325ad. The religious start on my initial save made this somewhat easier.

Spoiler :

As i eventually grabbed 3-4 religions on my save these spread conveniently and I was the only player to use my religion. I used a GP for xtianity and chopped the AP. This helped with lots of wars as all the Ai adopted different religions. Gilga did start off with my religion but switched to xtianity. Shaka went conf.

I did lose one city to Shaka early on around 1000bcish but I took this back with numbers and eventually used my religion/AP to force a holy war against him with gila and the mongols joining. I eventually took a few of his cities. i had very few issues with barbs from my save position.

As for spreading AP religion i built some ships and sent my missionaries hunting. Probably could of done this much earlier if I researched oiptics. I had no trouble spreading the religion.

I got the Ap win on the first vote. I did have to give Gilga enough free techs to make his dilpomacy +11 with me. His yes vote and me being the onlu candidate gave me the win.

I dont really want to give anything else away till you have reached this stage.

I will upload a save once I am online and once you are past 1100ad.

 

[Lansky]

Round 3

Spoiler :

Okay basically one giant war against Shaka and a really long phony war with Mansa. Plan was to just eliminate Shaka, but got lazy and had him capitulate with one city left. Yeah pretty useless, but he’s still managing to tech Aesthetics for me. In 1070 Medina popped a GE that is sitting in waiting for a potential next turn set. No real good wonders coming up though unless Divine Right is grabbed and perhaps Versailles rushed. I'd lean WS or Oxford myself.

Diplomacy – We’re untouchable for the time being. Gilgamesh is friendly. Genghis made Mansa capitulate and is friendly. I have an OCC Shaka. Genghis will attack Gilgamesh, but we don’t have enough to bribe him to start a war currently. Could start up another war or fully recover the economy.

Techs – Gilga has a slight lead still largely due to trading from him at a loss. I have not been racing to Lib, but at this point I’d still see it as winnable depending on the other continent. Genghis is behind but captured the Jewish shrine which is HUGE. I’d really like to get this from him personally.

!5 cities. Gilgamesh settled a really annoying one in the middle as the war was winding down but I’d expect it to flip culturally at some point. Biggest problem is a lack of stolen workers and subsequently working FAR too many unimproved tiles. Still have tons of jungle to chop and cottages to build. Medina got the MS. Otherwise Wonders have been built and lost, mostly by design, for some gold. Currently in the beginning of a tech cycle - using merchants to push up the slider. A few more turns until next civic swap (around when guilds would finish) is possible at which point slavery to finish up some courthouses and other key buildings is planned. Remaining stack is in kwaDukuza as my first instinct was to build up and attack Genghis, however this would be tricky diplomatically. Would need to gift Gilgamesh a tech, which we don’t have atm, in order to be safe from a drop to pleased and subsequently backstab.

 

[ChromiumL]

My round:

Spoiler :

My goal for this round was to either destroy or vassalize Shaka, then do everything in my power to improve the economy.

War: I ended up taking several more of Shaka's cities: flood plain/pig city to the east, the newly settled fish/wine city to the northeast, Fish/iron/sugar city to the southwest, Shaka's capital (clam/rice/gold/spices), and dye/cow city to the southeast. I also took the barb city to the north after the war was over. After I teched vassalage I accepted Shaka's capitulation for some gold and the rest of civil service. I was in a war with Mansa for a while, but only for the added relations. I can potentially bribe Genghis into war with Gilgamesh for Philosophy, Civil Service and Paper.

Tech: First I went for Feudalism so that I could make Shaka my vassal, then I got the rest of Civil Service from him. Next was Aesthetics and Literature (for GL and HE), after that I went for philosophy (founded taoism), Paper, and used a Great Scientist to halfway finish Education, which I just finished up completely. I'm not sure what is best to tech next, but its sitting on Liberalism. There are a few techs that I am missing that the AI has (engineering, compass, theology), but its not really worth it to trade for these things IMHO.

Cities: I focused on building 'tons' of courthouses. I whiped a few in some places with extra pop to spare. I just finished up the Forbidden Palace in one of the Southeastern Shaka cities. Also build Great Library in capital, Parthenon and Heroic Epic in Baghdad (also settled Great General in Baghdad). I am currently building a lot of Madrassas, even in production cities--so that I can try to get Universities and Oxford up ASAP.

Right now at 40% tech rate, I am getting 193 bpt with +7 gold.

Lets wait another day to see if anyone else has a save to submit...

 

[KingMorgan]

I have a save, here it is

Spoiler :

View attachment Emperor Cookbook KingMorgan AD-1100.CivBeyondSwordSave

 

[Gumbolt]

I will join next game. I have kind of given myself an unfair advantage map wise if i continue. I will post save from the end of my game next week.

 

[ChromiumL]

Alright, its votin' time!

Here are the submitted saves (not many this time!):

RJM

Lansky

Chromium

KingMorgan

Lets vote till Thursday or Friday...

 

[RJM]

It's rather fun to know that each of us will get at least 3 votes!

Here are mine:

#1 Chromium - good tech rate and liberalism within grasp
#2 Lansky - also good tech rate, but I don't like the tech path
#3 King Morgan - lower tech rate and Shaka still active

RJM

 

[Lansky]

Pretty amazing round of voting here

#1 Chromium - Strong position and set up for standard Lib push. Could perhaps delay one or two techs and try to claim something along the lines of MT or Democracy.
#2 RJM - Similar to Chromium only a bit slower tech rate.
#3 King Morgan - I just don't want to deal with Shaka again. I hate that AI script. Freaking wack job.

Regardless this game feels won baring an unforeseen tech/military giant on the other continent.

 

[Gumbolt]

I could vote if it would help get things moving here. Not sure I really have voting rights though.

 

[RJM]

I could vote if it would help get things moving here. Not sure I really have voting rights though.

I'm not sure that would help. I think we should wait for Chromium and King Morgan. We can then decide what to do next.

RJM

 

[KingMorgan]

Hi Guys, sorry for the delay - it's been a crazy week and a crazy Easter holidays thus far.

1. Lansky - not my tech path, but i'm interested to build castles and a warlike approach, for this reason top spot.
2. Chromium for the blanced approach - i was aiming to do something like this but failed i'd vote this top but that would not be a learning approach.
3. RJM - Good save, behind on the tech - only problem. WORKERS Shaka has 6 workers and 2 cities. You have 4 workers and 12 cities. (Lansky has 6 workers)

RJM has more improvements than Lansky - tut, tut.

Excuse my ranting but i never realsied the importance of working well improved cottages, building workers ealrier and more of them, working early cottaged tiles made such a differece to my game - a very simple thing but for me, so effective at increasing my game.

We should rigg the next game map for "cottage heaven" and play a Fin/Exp leader

 

[RJM]

RJM - problem. WORKERS. Shaka has 6 workers and 2 cities. You have 4 workers and 12 cities. (Lansky has 6 workers)

Well, maybe 4 workers for 12 cities may be a touch light even by my standards. But, I have difficulty establishing to my own satisfaction the benefit of the oft quoted rule of thumb - 1.5 workers per city. I've tried replaying the first 100 turns of this game many times. I really can't see any noticable improvement in having 3 workers. This may be my play style, for example not chopping as much as I should or perhaps my research order, or even low population cites due to whipping. I'd be interested to know what you use all those workers for.

BTW

RJM has more improvements than Lansky - tut, tut.

Is the "tut, tut" aimed at me or Lansky? What's the problem?

RJM

 

[Gumbolt]

3 workers does seem a bit low!!! If I start a war i like to try and steal a worker or 2 on first turn of a war.

I had a game recently where i took a barb city and took 4 workers in the city. So 3 isnt a disaster. Its just finding a rich source of workers to harvest.

 

[KingMorgan]

Is the "tut, tut" aimed at me or Lansky? What's the problem?

RJM

Lansky, he has more workers yet less improvements. Sorry i'm not having a go just trying to help, as i said having more workers earlier helped my alot in my game.

 

[ChromiumL]

Sorry I haven't done this sooner--its been a busy week for me too!

Here are my votes:

1st - Lansky - Good tech (though I am a tad mystified by the tech path... I guess banks will eventually be nice...But I would prefer Oxford and Liberalism). Once again in this save Gilgamesh is becoming a monster. BUT, theres a good tech rate, and control of a lot of cities.

2nd - RJM - Gilgamesh in this save is even scarier than in the previous save. With Mansa as his vassal the two of them will tech themselves into a huge lead. The economy is also in the gutter--but its nothing a few courthouses won't clear up.

3rd - KingMorgan - Tech rate is better than RJM, but Shaka is going to be a huge nightmare to get rid of...

That leaves the vote total at:

8 - Chromium
8 - Lansky
5 - RJM
3 - KingMorgan

If I would have posted earlier, I would have said its fine for Gumbolt to vote (hes probably played the round, and hes a regular player). So, right now I either have to make an arbitrary decision (and probably pick my own save, since Lansky won the last round), or I let Gumbolt make the tie-breaking vote.

I don't really like making an arbitrary decision since it involves my own save--so I will let Gumbolt do the honors. He logs on regularly enough that I don't think we should have to wait too long . After he makes a vote, you can start playing right away from either my or Lansky's save (whichever he gives more points).

The next round goes through 1500AD, and as usual, we will give people a little more than half a week to play.

 

[Lansky]

Regarding the questioning of my save.

Tech - It's a gamble. If I can keep Gilgamesh at friendly (may be tough) then the idea is a push on Mansa/Khan with Knights/Pikes/Trebs (I forsee most of his army consisting of elepahnts/LB's by then) in order to grab the Jewish holy city and a large chunk of land. I see this as a small window to back stab a major power block before they can catch up in tech. This does of course hurt my own tech pace, however with enough land I normally just don't care if I lose liberalism. With the Jewish holy city (that shrine has to be a monster by now) and that much land a back stab on Gilgamesh with Calvary/Cannons or even Infantry should work. Not at home, but I also believe Khan has the 'mids for an early PS military build up, but I am not positive on this one. The castles should also give a large enough espionage lead to keep him in HR for as long as we desire if it is prioritized.

Workers - The warlike tendencies also means that most of the workers I have over RJM were very recently captured from Shaka. When given the choice I tend to prefer to steal workers/cities as opposed to using my time to produce them. Not always efficient, but its my style. I am relying a lot on cycling between merchants for my teching and whipping for my production. I need to work on my vertical/horizontal growth while I am at war. It's a weakness I readily admit. In this regard I feel Chromiun put me to shame this round.

 

[Gumbolt]

Ackkk I leave for a few hours and next i have to make a decision. Oh the heavy burden. I will only judge on what I can see as i have played this game to a win already.

So we have Lansky with a slightly slower tech rate. Shaka as a vassel. Heading towards banking. I do like The GE ready for a nationalism MM grab? Downside here is that the Ap is built and thats a risk. Gilga again is a pain. Although the empire is large enough to take him or another Ai on.

Chrom has a better tech rate and is heading towards liberalism quickly. No other Ai has paper yet on this continent. So there could be a chance for a steel grab? Shaka is a vassel and mansa is khans vassel. No Ap built here.

I do think you would find chroms save the easiest to win due to the tech position. Yet Lansky has put forward a brave plan of how he will hard graft a win. This I would like to see. It will be a different sort of challenge to the usual lib race win and Ai stomping game. Theres a possible Ap win if you can vassel Khan/ Mansa.

So I personally will give.

2 votes to lansky.
1 votes to chrom.

I have not voted on the others as it was a tie breaker vote anyway.