ericball
Warlord
My initial settler appeared in Antarctica on what appeared to be the southern tip of a peninsula. Not the best place for expansion, but less likely to be crowded from all sided by the other civs.
My exploring warrior met a Mongol warrior early on - not a good sign. On Emperor I find the AI explorers and expands much faster than on King. So my second warrior becomes defense as I tech for Bronze and CoL. I do luck out and get a galley and the location of Ankor Wat which gives me the Great Wall.
The big advantage of the Great Wall is you don't need to spend as much time building defense. But even with the Great Wall and not waiting for CoL, I only get two cities started on the land north of my capital before the Romans and Mongols start their expansion. Fortunately, my peninsula extends farther than I thought and I find places for two more cities. I also place two cities on a nearby island. Expansion over, I research Democracy and start preparing for the fall of the Great Wall.
That's the problem with the Great Wall - its protection can end rather suddenly and catch you off guard. If that happens, you're in real trouble. So I carefully watch the firsts on the tech tree and how many techs each civ has. I build barracks and pikemen armies in the northern cities in preparation. But I was in for a nasty surprise.
What I hadn't counted on was the Great Wall behaving like a wall from a culture perspective. Both of my northern cities were close to the Mongol capital. I thought I had built them far enough away that they could resist being flipped. And it looked okay. But when the Great Wall expired a huge Mongol banner appeared in one of the cities. I built a temple, but didn't have the funds to rush a wall. So a few turns later it flipped.
But that was the only city I lost. The Mongols sent waves of armies at my remaining northern city but my pikeman army held their ground, even against catapult armies attacking from a hill. I eventually built a cannon army, which significantly improved the odds.
But the Mongols weren't my main concern - the Aztecs were. They were my rivals in tech (we swapped the lead back and forth, even after I discovered Atlantis), they had a major lead in culture and had eliminated the Romans (and taken or flipped Mongol and English cities). So once I had Mass Prodution, I flipped my cities to Gold and went for an Economic Victory.
Late in the game I flipped a Mongol city which was difficult to defend as it had a road back to the Mongol capital. So I built a road back to my northern city so I could import a modern infantry army along with my elite pikemen (with general). They (with some help from a lightning cannon army) held off the Mongol attacks long enough to build a second modern infantry army.
I would have flipped the city I lost as well, but it had a wall. But when the Aztecs conquered the city, they knocked down the wall - causing it to flip! Again, defending that city was difficult, especially since it had to hold off attacks by the Artillery equipped Aztecs. Fortunately, the Aztecs turned their attention to the Mongols.
I started building the World Bank as soon as it was available. I did build a spy ring and some spies and sent them off on a battleship fleet with a modern infantry army to steal some Great People from the Aztecs, but that was just for fun as there was little chance the Aztecs would be able to build the UN in time.
Not the overwhelming victory I have been achieving on King, but a victory none the less.
My exploring warrior met a Mongol warrior early on - not a good sign. On Emperor I find the AI explorers and expands much faster than on King. So my second warrior becomes defense as I tech for Bronze and CoL. I do luck out and get a galley and the location of Ankor Wat which gives me the Great Wall.
The big advantage of the Great Wall is you don't need to spend as much time building defense. But even with the Great Wall and not waiting for CoL, I only get two cities started on the land north of my capital before the Romans and Mongols start their expansion. Fortunately, my peninsula extends farther than I thought and I find places for two more cities. I also place two cities on a nearby island. Expansion over, I research Democracy and start preparing for the fall of the Great Wall.
That's the problem with the Great Wall - its protection can end rather suddenly and catch you off guard. If that happens, you're in real trouble. So I carefully watch the firsts on the tech tree and how many techs each civ has. I build barracks and pikemen armies in the northern cities in preparation. But I was in for a nasty surprise.
What I hadn't counted on was the Great Wall behaving like a wall from a culture perspective. Both of my northern cities were close to the Mongol capital. I thought I had built them far enough away that they could resist being flipped. And it looked okay. But when the Great Wall expired a huge Mongol banner appeared in one of the cities. I built a temple, but didn't have the funds to rush a wall. So a few turns later it flipped.
But that was the only city I lost. The Mongols sent waves of armies at my remaining northern city but my pikeman army held their ground, even against catapult armies attacking from a hill. I eventually built a cannon army, which significantly improved the odds.
But the Mongols weren't my main concern - the Aztecs were. They were my rivals in tech (we swapped the lead back and forth, even after I discovered Atlantis), they had a major lead in culture and had eliminated the Romans (and taken or flipped Mongol and English cities). So once I had Mass Prodution, I flipped my cities to Gold and went for an Economic Victory.
Late in the game I flipped a Mongol city which was difficult to defend as it had a road back to the Mongol capital. So I built a road back to my northern city so I could import a modern infantry army along with my elite pikemen (with general). They (with some help from a lightning cannon army) held off the Mongol attacks long enough to build a second modern infantry army.
I would have flipped the city I lost as well, but it had a wall. But when the Aztecs conquered the city, they knocked down the wall - causing it to flip! Again, defending that city was difficult, especially since it had to hold off attacks by the Artillery equipped Aztecs. Fortunately, the Aztecs turned their attention to the Mongols.
I started building the World Bank as soon as it was available. I did build a spy ring and some spies and sent them off on a battleship fleet with a modern infantry army to steal some Great People from the Aztecs, but that was just for fun as there was little chance the Aztecs would be able to build the UN in time.
Not the overwhelming victory I have been achieving on King, but a victory none the less.
