Experiment 626's Solo TDG

[Eltrai]

One other thing to look at will be the need for settlers. We should probally raze the Mayans as then we will not have to worry about filps back so easy. So if we can find two towns to set out settlers and a couple to make units we are on our way.


Yeah WAR!

 

[Experiment 626]

The following pics are my Top Ten Most Productive Cities:

Washington, D.C.​

New York City​

Philadelphia​

Boston​

Salem​

Toronto​

Memphis​

Atlantic City​

Pittsburgh​

Houston​

I know that you only asked for 6 Cities, but I like round numbers. In the early game, New York City served as my Settler Factory.



On to your posts:


Originally posted by Eltrai:

I beg to differ Mr. Pres. Go for war, start to build troops all over and launch the invasion. If we do not get them in one fell swoop we can take most of their strength away. Raze the cities, so we do not have to worry as much about them flipping back, make some more settlers to take over the new area.

I will take it under advisement. I will also work you into the next chapter of the mini-story, but I'm not sure if you should be an Admiral, as I have no navy. Perhaps another General. Can't have too many of those around, can you?

Now they say violence never solves anything, but they are wrong. The Mayans are a huge problem and these flips are the result of it. The longer we wait the worse it will be.

We need to push them into the ocean. (on the other side of the cont. of course )

Waiting until next week 626 looking forward to you getting rid of our problem.

I wish that it were possible for me to play 2 Sets of Turns each week, but real-life won't allow it.

One other thing to look at will be the need for settlers. We should probally raze the Mayans as then we will not have to worry about filps back so easy. So if we can find two towns to set out settlers and a couple to make units we are on our way.


Yeah WAR!

See above pics for that information.



Originally posted by Marsden:

I uploaded your 950 save and I'm going to actually take a really good look around and submit a report on Monday, I don't think I can get to it before then.

I'm looking forward to your report, General.

THESE MAYAN MUST GO.

No argument there. I was putting the finishing touches of turning EDM into a Science farm when it flipped.

Were going to get them back and the only sky blue troops will be America!

Amen to that, General!



Originally posted by CommandoBob:

I don't remember Washington's production numbers, but it is possible to get it to produce one attacking unit per turn (not catapults, but real fighting units).

Actually what I am thinking of is about six core cities that could produce units every other turn, with three new units being created each turn. It will take some walking time to get the units to the front, so we may want to delay our attack until those units are one turn or so away from the front line. Then we make an effort (not a rule, but a guideline) to be aware of how many units we lose as we attack. We can build smarter than the AI. The goal would be to be as strong at the end as the start.

See above pics for that information.

This sounds like good advice, even to me. I think I'll even use it in my Arab game, once I get back to it.

Wish I had thought of it earlier.

So do I.



Hopefully, by pooling our knowledge, we can make successful war, and destroy the hated MAYANS. Korea better not get too comfortable, though.

THEY ARE NEXT!​

 

[Tribute]

Maybe, just maybe, you didn't focus on culture enough? I know your military 'advisors' have advocated only troops. However, the gap between your culture and the Mayans cannot be ignored. All the border towns and cities must have at least 1 cultural building and 1 cultural expansion before they can be deemed safe. Additionally, none of your troops are garrisoning in the towns down south where most of the flips have occurred. You've got to be a bit more careful. (I thought you were going to have a defense battalion?)

 

[Eltrai]

Maybe, just maybe, you didn't focus on culture enough? I know your military 'advisors' have advocated only troops. However, the gap between your culture and the Mayans cannot be ignored. All the border towns and cities must have at least 1 cultural building and 1 cultural expansion before they can be deemed safe. Additionally, none of your troops are garrisoning in the towns down south where most of the flips have occurred. You've got to be a bit more careful. (I thought you were going to have a defense battalion?)

That is part of the restrictions that he put on himself in the begining.

 

[Eltrai]

Mr. Pres. You can work me in as you see fit.

I understand about not being able to play two sets of turns a week. I think you are doing well in this game, and it is actually good to see this happen. It will help with your overall ability to get better. Overcoming an obstacle such as this will really help!


Once again, enjoying your game and looking forward to the turns!

 

[Marsden]

I finished the report. It's huge and I don't know if you want the full or abbreviated version, and should I post it here? Let me know please.

Edit: change of plans, I had to leave work early. I'll try to check from home later if you want me to post the pics,there are 26. Also, i'll caption with details. Thanks. Here are the saves, I hate sending things from home I uploaded everything to photobucket.

 

[Experiment 626]

Originally posted by Tribute:

Maybe, just maybe, you didn't focus on culture enough?

Originally posted by Eltrai:

That is part of the restrictions that he put on himself in the begining.

That is the reason exactly. Supposedly, it was to teach me not to build Temples and stuff in the Ancient Age, so as not to incur the crippling maintenance in the early game.

Oh, and Tribute? Welcome to the thread!


Originally posted by Eltrai:

Mr. Pres. You can work me in as you see fit.

Will do. I need to write the next installment yet, so we'll see how soon I can fit you in.


Originally posted by Marsden:

I finished the report. It's huge and I don't know if you want the full or abbreviated version, and should I post it here? Let me know please.

President E626: 'General, you're not trying to withhold information from me, are you?'

Actually, I'd appreciate it if you posted the full version. If it's totally huge, post a Zip file, so that I (we) can download it.

I had to leave work early.

Oh, you lucky bugger! What I wouldn't give to leave work early! *grumbles* Teacher's pet! (I'm too tired to watch 'Life of Brian', and post the whole dialogue of the dungeon scene.)



I won't play the next Set of Turns until next Tuesday, so I (we) can see what General Marsden has come up with. Perhaps we could discuss where I went wrong. When I play the next Set of Turns, I want to know exactly what to do. Hopefully, by then, we can come up with a consensus.


A question just crossed my exhausted brain: How many lurkers are out there? Post a , so I (we) know that you're out there.

 

[Marsden]

President E626: 'General, you're not trying to withhold information from me, are you?'

Actually, I'd appreciate it if you posted the full version. If it's totally huge, post a Zip file, so that I (we) can download it.

Ok, let's get this started. As you might of seen from my above post, I played your game 20 turns. I saved after 10 and again at 20. I only did this to show you rather than try to tell you what I meant, I'm far too lazy to type that much.

Hello, Mr. Pres. fellow officers, and others. I've prepared my report as a slide show so here we go.

This first slide shows a problem that's been touched on recently, the culture gap. As you can see it's pretty large. And I can tell you what is causing a large portion of it, the Mayans have the Temple of Artemis in their capital. This is one of the most powerful culture generators in the game. Every enemy city automatically gets a temple, free, the instant it's founded, making even totally corrupt border towns culture generators.

Slide two shows how cheaply we can bribe the Koreans to our side, wether they will be helpful is questionable, but this will almost guarantee they won't join the other side.

Slide three shows my reorganization of the units already present. These will reclaim Edmonton and continue into Mayan territory to take cultural pressure of our border. Note: There are no knights in this force, they have been withdrawn to the capital and other cities with barracks in theater.

Slide four is a special task force assembled to claim the ONLY source of saltpeter on this continent.

Slide five is 3 turns later, the task force settler stepped over the Mayan border and founded a camp next to saltpeter mountain. 6 of our workers can road the mountain in 1 turn, then start a fortress to retain control of it. The first build in the camp itself will be a temple (cash rushed) to secure culture borders and a wall.

Slide six shows the rest of the task force destroying Cuello and futher releaving pressure on our borders.

Slide 7 shows our knights receiving new weapons, becoming rifle cavalry instead of sword cavalry as soon as the saltpeter road is completed.

Note: I had withheld all knights from the northern force for this purpose.

Slide 8 shows the northern force closing on Yaxchilan. Note that one of the other reasons the knights were withheld was because the rough terrain would nullify their movement advantages.

Slide 9 shows us obtaining a Right of Passage with the Koreans in order to use the roads in their territory to quickly reach Copan and other targets in the Mayan core areas.

Slide 10 shows the northern force, having secured Edmonton, now destroying Yaxhilian(or whatever it was called), again to relieve pressure on our border. Also Edmonton is building a library to further expand its border outward.

Slide 11 shows the cavalry charge as a follow up to slide 9.

To be continued

 

[Marsden]

Excuse me, sir? I noticed your eyes were closed. My appologies, it must be the light in here. Well, onward.

Slide 12 shows right after the destruction of Copan, our enemy is already begging for peace.

Of course no quarter is given.

Slide 13 shows a negotiation obtained by our foreign office to show the desperation of the enemy. Again, these negotiations are only to see how desperate the enemy is.

Slide 14 shows our cavalry continuing on to another victory in the Mayan core.

Slide 15 shows our first reverse of the war, the scum in Buffalo have overcome our garrison, again.

Note: Census takers deployed to the city after the first liberation of Buffalo showed 5 out of 7 citizens identified themselves as Mayan rather than American.

Slide 16 shows the second liberation of the beseiged city.

Slide 17 shows the success of the northern force in taking the enemy capital. After a brief thought about keeping the Temple of Artemis for 5 turns to expand all of our borders, the decison was to raze the city outright to prevent the local population from defeating our garrison.

Slide 18 shows further destruction of the former Mayan core and our forces closing on the new capital.

Slide 19 shows the new city of Santa Fe which has claimed inscence for our people to enjoy at home.

Slide 20 shows the new city of Gem Town has claimed gems in the south, again to the enjoyment of our people.

 

[Marsden]

These last shots are at 20 turns progress.

Here is an overveiw of the northern theater of operations.

And the southern theater of operations. Note the new location of the enemy capital.

These next three slides show future efforts to secure additional resources.

Finally, again a mock negotiation showing what the enemy is willing to give up for peace.

In conclusion, in 20 turns we have decimated the enemy core area, relieved almost all pressure on our borders, and secured 2 new luxuries with 2 more on the way shortly with a new source of iron as well.

Some shortcommings were the loss of the roads to the current iron supply in our territory by 2 Mayan spearmen dressed in American uniforms that snuck into our territory and a the failure to destroy Calakmul when the cavalry assigned to that task failed to beat the spearmen defending the city.

Edit: Added the shot of the spices. Also another shortcomming of the campaign was to contain Korean expansion into the vacuum left by the destruction of the Maya. But this is temporary, of course.

 

[Eltrai]

Very nice!

Here are some recomendations for city production from the top 10 cities;

Washington finish current and start Knight
NY Knight
Phil Knight
Boston Knight
Salem Knight
Toronto Settler then knight
Memphis Knight
Atlantic Settler then Knight
Pitts Knight
Houston Knight

Also, in the more corrupt and unhappy cities finish the knight and then build a settler and a knight if we have the time and are still at war.

This should give us the needed fire power to pull of Gen. Marsden's plan and get us in the position to fight 20 turns, rest, recoup, grow and get prepared to complete the Mayans in another 20 turns and perhaps begin the end of the Korea at the same time. We will then have this whole land mass for our own and we can then begin to look at the rest of the world!

Yeah, we will take it all!

 

[Experiment 626]

That's incredible! I half-tempted to download the 1150 save, and proceed from there, but then, I wouldn't learn anything, would I?

Some things that I noticed that I'd like a little clarification on:

1. You lowered the SCI sclider to 0%. Why?
2. You razed the city with The Temple of Artemis in it. Why? Since the ToA puts a Temple in every city, wouldn't it be a good thing to hang on to? If we're worried about La Resistance, couldn't we put more defenders in there?
3. Did you declare war before our Settler stepped into Mayan Territory to found Saltpeter Camp?
4. I know that you signed an RoP with Korea to reach more Mayan cities, but wouldn't that be counter-productive? Isn't that giving Korea a chance to RoP rape us?
5. How exactly did we lose the road to our Iron? It's right next to a City Center. We would just need to get Huey, Dewey, and Louie to rebuild the road, right? Should we then build a Fortress on the Iron and protect it?

Your Set of 20 turns just goes to show me how much better you are at this game than I am, and how grateful I am for your help.

I realize that this is probably impossible to do, but could you explain to me (step-by-step) how you did these things, and why? If I tried to play the Set of 20 Turns like you did, the RNG would probably kill me.

All in all, Marsden, a most impressive presentation.

 

[Eltrai]

Mr. Pres. you are very close to being there, that is why this flip problem with the Mayans is good for you. You are going to learn a lot from this problem.

General Marsden, please correct me if I am wrong in any of these assumptions:

1- To get cash and have extra we can use on the Lux slider. We will be able to up research after the war, with more cites and a larger pop.

2- If we did not raze the city we would be facing a huge problem if it slipped back to them. We would then have to retake it again, and either then raze it or, continue with the problem that it could flip back again. Yes having a temple everywhere would help us, but do we want to garrison a ton of troops here to try and keep it from flipping? (troops=$, and troops sitting around = wasted money)

3- Don't know but I would have.

4- They could but I doubt if they have much to hurt us with. An alliance with them and a ROP will help us more than them, if they ROP us, we kick them and if not we use them to get through to the real threat of the Mayans. With them on our side, we do not have to worry about fighting two armies and once.

5- Yes, rebuild road.


Mr. Pres. I am looking forward to your next set of turns. Look how far you have come, and you are getting ready to take another huge step.

 

[Tribute]

Ah yes, the restrictions. The only defense I have for saying that unknowingly is that your thread is so long and took a LONG time to read through. Hope you have a nice war! The reason of my rudeness was well, you did lose about 3 towns, right? Unacceptable! Well, according to my standards:

I don't normally build cultural buildings in the AA except in border towns right before/during anarchy, which finish about 60 turns later in the Middle Ages. But then again, I also focus on culture in my main cities INSTEAD of troops. this is a bad strategy for a warmonger, which I am not.

So good luck. And don't get bogged down saying the RNG will cause trouble. All it does is control almost every aspect of the game.

 

[Eltrai]

So good luck. And don't get bogged down saying the RNG will cause trouble. All it does is control almost every aspect of the game.

That is a great line!

 

[Experiment 626]

Originally posted by Tribute

The reason of my rudeness was well, you did lose about 3 towns, right? Unacceptable!

I didn't think that you were being rude, and you're right! It is unacceptable!

And don't get bogged down saying the RNG will cause trouble. All it does is control almost every aspect of the game.

Eltrai is right! That is a great line!


On to other news, like I mentioned earlier, I didn't play a Set of Turns today. I'd like everybody's input on General Marsden's slideshow, and hopefully, the information will sink in to my thick skull before I play next Tuesday.

AND:

I'm composing the next chapter of the Saga as we 'speak'. Hopefully, it will be finished and posted tonight. Fair warning, though, it's not as funny as the previous chapters have been. We're at a serious point in the game hence the sober tone of the chapter. Of course, there is SOME humor in it.

Later, sports fans! If I could just get over the U.S.'s performance in their opening World Cup match versus the Czech Republic yesterday. Man, did the U.S. team ever stink up the joint, or what? They seemed to be trying to out-suck a black hole! I am so depressed!

 

[Marsden]

That's incredible! I half-tempted to download the 1150 save, and proceed from there, but then, I wouldn't learn anything, would I?

Actually, I wanted you down load both of them to look around, but not to go from there, they are only theoretical possiblities. And do not sell yourself short, the only reason I was able to do what I did is your good management of your empire. If you didn't give me anything to work with, I could never have done what I did. And I must add, your lands are beautifully manicured, excellent job, much better than I would do. Actually, if you load the 1150 save and wonder why I have most of the workers roading mountains, its to keep them busy and out of trouble. I get tired of running them.

Some things that I noticed that I'd like a little clarification on:


You lowered the SCI sclider to 0%. Why?

To free up cash for rushing improvements and money is good to have in the treasury. Also, you (wisely) have so many scientists that reducing the slider to zero only added about 3 turns to the length of time to discover education. It also change our tax revenues from 22 to 131 per turn.

You razed the city with The Temple of Artemis in it. Why? Since the ToA puts a Temple in every city, wouldn't it be a good thing to hang on to? If we're worried about La Resistance, couldn't we put more defenders in there?

Eltrai has good points, but most important of all, we already discovered education which cancels the Temple of Artemis ability to make temples making it one big liability.

Did you declare war before our Settler stepped into Mayan Territory to found Saltpeter Camp?

Oh, yes definitely.

I know that you signed an RoP with Korea to reach more Mayan cities, but wouldn't that be counter-productive? Isn't that giving Korea a chance to RoP rape us?

A slight possiblity, but very unlikely as we are going to keep the miltary alliance in effect until after the RoP expires. It's due to expire in 1220, we will not be extending it. If the Koreans don't leave immediately we will demand they do so. If they refuse and declare war on us, our cavarly will make short work of them.

How exactly did we lose the road to our Iron? It's right next to a City Center. We would just need to get Huey, Dewey, and Louie to rebuild the road, right? Should we then build a Fortress on the Iron and protect it?

This was my fault. I saw the 2 spearmen walking through our territory. I was concentrating on the attacks and didnt want to risk any weaker units attacking them when they really couldn't attack, but then they pillaged the iron mine. And as of 1150 they were still loose in our lands. I was going to have one of the regular (one made in a city without a barracks) cavalry pop them when one became available, but I kept needing them on the front. Mostly a lapse of concentration on my part.

Also, if you'll allow me, I'd like to rant here.

[RANT] What the heck is going on here, there is no, absolutely no difference in the color between us and the enemy! Twice I moved one of our troops thinking I will just move through this tile to go somewhere and it was occupied by the enemy I thought was one of ours! I looked in Buffalo at the citizens and they were all the same color! This makes everything twice as hard. Just look at azzaman333's Iroquois story, Maya and America are neighbors and the Maya are yellow and America is light blue. I don't know why the colors were assigned this way but it sucks! Let's just be lucky the other neighbor isn't Sumeria, then we'd really be screwed. [RANT/]

I realize that this is probably impossible to do, but could you explain to me (step-by-step) how you did these things, and why? If I tried to play the Set of 20 Turns like you did, the RNG would probably kill me.

.

That's what I'm trying to do, within reason. I am trying to point things out to you so you see them on your own, not tell you do this and that. You have to make your own decisions, it's better that way and I think more fun. Too much instruction makes confusion and turns it into homework. Have a good time! You're not bad at this at all, you just lack confidence, don't forget what I said before, your empire management made this possible, and that is something RNG can't take away from you.

 

[Marsden]

I'm composing the next chapter of the Saga as we 'speak'. Hopefully, it will be finished and posted tonight. Fair warning, though, it's not as funny as the previous chapters have been. We're at a serious point in the game hence the sober tone of the chapter. Of course, there is SOME humor in it.

Maybe because we've already used all the Blazing Saddles jokes we could except everyone at the next staff meeting sitting around a campfire and eating beans and tooting away!

 

[CommandoBob]

Maybe because we've already used all the Blazing Saddles jokes we could except everyone at the next staff meeting sitting around a campfire and eating beans and tooting away!

Best line from the worst Star Trek movie, #5 The Final Frontier. Kirk, Spock and McCoy around the campfire singing 'Row, row, row, your boat..'

Spock: Captain, life is not a dream.

Just thinking of campfires...

@Marsden: good instruction methodology. Show what can be done and challenge the student to do the same.

 

[Marsden]

...the worst Star Trek movie, #5 The Final Frontier.

I liked that movie. I know, I was the only one.

But at least it wasn't a 90 minute save the whales commercial.

And don't let get me started about the next gen movies.