Featured Game #2 Spoiler 1: Pre-Astronomy

[Txurce]

rf900, elaborating on what Thal said, you could either wait until you have a military tech lead or at least parity, or create a strong enough unit pump(s) that you can overwhelm the first AI or two. Either way, as log as you have a decent army you are unlikely to be dogpiled after knocking out one civ.

 

[RedRover57]

Initially in my game I was going to go for Egypt first, but then they built both SH (huge border expansion) and the Great Wall, which would have made it much more difficult to attack. With my current strategy of going after Germany first, then continuing roughly clockwise (Germany - India - Persia/Rome - Russia - Egypt - Iroquois - Japan) I will reach Egypt right at about the time I get artillery.

 

[Txurce]

The GW is a real wild card in a game like this one. Russia built it in my game, but stayed small the entire game. I hit them last as part of my overall game plan,and didn't even think about the GW. Hitting Egypt last in your game definitely seems like the way to go.

 

[Gamewizard]

Im at about turn 170 (avoiding Astronomy like the plague). I expanded to 5 cities first, claiming luxuries and extra horses, and then Egypt built a city real close and declared war. His attack was weak, however, and I was able to defend and get peace while I built up my Camel Archer army. Aided by 2 militaristic CS's, my army consisted of roughly 6 Camel Archers, 2 Swordsmen, 2 Levies, 2 Archers, and 1 BFG (thats the city annihilator some may call a catapult). I puppeted 3 of his cities, eventually annexing Thebes to regain some happiness. Japan took one Egypt city east of Thebes.

I then moved onto my other enemy, Persia, who had the largest empire of the AIs and had been busy expanding south toward my territory. I added a couple more Camel Archers and wrecked his empire, taking his capital around turn 170, which is where I left off.

Policies: Complete Honor, opened Piety, 3 policies in Commerce, and 1 back to Piety for some happiness from culture buildings.

Wonders: Pyramids, Great Wall (I'd rather have it than let the AI grab it, +1 free happy), Hanging Gardens (I think?), and beat to the Himegi Castle by a couple turns!

Other notes: Lots of resource trading for gold (special thanks to Caesar for all that gold), lots of RAs.

Didn't build National College for a long time, which was a welcomed change of pace after so use to the vanilla strategy of "must rush the National College".

The AI is pillaging (awesome!), but they aren't building any walls, so taking a city every 2~3 turns is quite easy.


My goal now is to finish before Txurce's turn count. 30ish turns to conquer Rome, Germany, Russia, Iroquois, and Japan...improbable, but possible!

 

[Txurce]

Gamewizard, it sounds like you're about 10 turns ahead of me... and like you peeked at the final spoiler page!

 

[Gamewizard]

Well ya, I did take a look to see what turn you finished, but I had the whole map uncovered so there wasn't anything to spoil or give me an unfair advantage.

 

[Txurce]

Yeah, I think we should revise the Astronomy marker in future Pangaea games.

 

[Thalassicus]

The reason for the Astronomy marker is it's shortly before the late-game resource reveals. Oil's reveal recently moved to Chemistry however, so perhaps simply "renaissance era" is a better threshold for future games.

On this particular map (spoiler!):

Spoiler :

There's those half dozen citystates accessible only across oceans, in addition to numerous Whale resources near islands. I was careful to ensure Astronomy has value even on this Pangaea map.

 

[rf900]

Things have changed for me a lot, around turn 150. I was expanding west leaving Egypt as I was not confident to confront him, but then I annoyed Bismark. He declare war on me when I had only a small army, but I had SO MUCH GOLD and in 2 turns I got chivalry.

I basically bought my army of camel archers supported by some melee troops, love them. Bismark capital fell and I got another city, will leave him alone now. I will try to use the 8 camel archer army against Egypt before they go obsolete, probably some good 20 turns left. Good thing is that catherine is also in war with them so it should be easy.

Afterwards I will consolidate my empire, go ahead in tech probably to artillery and conquer the rest of the world ha ha ha. Can you see any faster strategy? I know that camel archers suddenly become useless but maybe I can still use them to conquer more civs. Gamewizard you seem to be in a similar path with 2 civs down, what are your plans for the following turns?

BTW, great capital location, massive production and with hanging gardens and stonehenge it is growing like crazy.

 

[Thalassicus]

I'd recommend keep conquering, if you have the happiness to support it. Standing armies are very expensive to maintain. I use the "Avoid Growth" button a lot to stay ahead of the happiness limit, and balance out growth across the empire.

 

[Txurce]

I basically bought my army of camel archers supported by some melee troops, love them. Bismark capital fell and I got another city, will leave him alone now. I will try to use the 8 camel archer army against Egypt before they go obsolete, probably some good 20 turns left. Good thing is that catherine is also in war with them so it should be easy.

Afterwards I will consolidate my empire, go ahead in tech probably to artillery and conquer the rest of the world ha ha ha. Can you see any faster strategy? I know that camel archers suddenly become useless but maybe I can still use them to conquer more civs.

I had fewer camel archers than you, and promoted them to blitz. They never became useless in my game. But if they do, upgrade them to cavalry. By then you should have plenty of cannons. The lesson here (forced into a war that turns out easy) is that there's no need to wait for crushing superiority. I started fighting as soon as I reached Chivalry, and my only second thought is that I should have built more units. I tend to build just enough, then focus on buildings, which inevitably makes the game take longer.

I'd recommend keep conquering, if you have the happiness to support it. Standing armies are very expensive to maintain. I use the "Avoid Growth" button a lot to stay ahead of the happiness limit, and balance out growth across the empire.

I always forget about the "avoid growth" button. Do you use it to stay out of the red, or out of the penalty?

 

[Gamewizard]

I too never use the avoid growth button, but I do micro-manage my cities fairly frequently. When conquering I just try to avoid the -10 happiness mark. -9 and up and I just keep on pushing.

In my game my whole army is at Persia's defeated capital. Russia, Rome, Germany, and Japan are all super friendly right now, and I think I have a RA with all of them. Japan has the largest army and for all I know they may be marching on my eastern front. Germany is the tech leader and I've seen up-to-date units marching around in his territory, so I know he won't be a pushover either. Russia would be the easiest to conquer since she has only a few cities, Moscow sharing borders with my new Persian cities. The Iroquois would be next in line, mostly due to proximity. However, to maintain a quick finish I don't really want to march my army northeast and then all the way back west for Rome and Germany. Most likely the next to go will be the one whose RA expires first!

 

[Thalassicus]

Try this as a starting point for conquest: Avoid Growth in cities with ≥10 which are not the capital or military-city. From this starting point you can adjust priorities based on experiences from gameplay.

In domination games my #2 city exclusively trains military Strategic Resource and Siege units from the Heroic Epic. My #1 city, the capital produces Vanguards and other miscellaneous units, mainly as city garrisons.

For more complex strategy, I use avoid growth to plan ahead 50-100 turns in advance of happiness "bottlenecks" like the Medieval era. When we first get Honor and Colosseums in the Classical era we have a gigantic amount of happiness. If we use this immediately and drop to 0, we'll have no wiggle room to deal with unplanned wars of opportunity, and it's a looooonng way to Theaters.

If you keep about 10-20 during wartime you can take advantage of openings for quick military blitzkriegs. These blitzkrieg chances usually come when we've just killed off the opponent's main army. If we have a good happiness buffer, we can steamroll their weakly-defended cities, wipe out the leader before they can regroup, and end up just above the "very angry" state when they sue for peace. If we already have negative happiness we cannot take advantage of the situation without getting the combat penalty. It's the defender's doom by preparing in advance! Positive happiness also gets happy-Golden Ages, which last +50% longer in VEM than vanilla and immensely help the war effort! Even in peacetime it's useful to halt growth in large cities to let smaller ones catch up. Smaller cities grow much faster, and ~10 population is usually required for a city to become self-sustaining in terms of production.

Planning and rationing happiness was key to improving my Domination victories, pushing Hall of Fame high scores from the 6k range up to 11k.

 

[Txurce]

Planning and rationing happiness for blitzkreig wars was the key to improving my Domination victories, pushing my Hall of Fame high scores from the 6,000 range up to 11,000. Even in peacetime it's useful to halt growth in large cities to let smaller ones catch up. Smaller cities grow much faster, and ~10 population is usually required for a city to become self-sustaining in terms of production.

Try this as a starting point for Domination games: avoid growth if a city has 10 or more and is not the military-production city or capital. From this starting point you can adjust priorities based on experiences from gameplay.

Very interesting, although I don't feel I waste happiness, as opposed to saving it. Playing for Conquest I usually build two cities, so presumably you want both of those to grow. So you'd advise me to cap the growth of large captured cities, and let the smaller ones grow. Why is this better - because I can build more happiness buildings, and have them cover a higher portion of the overall population?

With regard to your HoF scores, I assume that you still race to the finish line, since you seem to rarely reach the Modern era. So what pads the score - more cities than the average conqueror?

 

[Thalassicus]

I don't feel I waste happiness, as opposed to saving it.

Was the "don't" a typo? I'm not sure I understand the meaning of this sentence, but I'm really tired today.

One broad goal of VEM is to reward long-term planning and strategizing, with benefits over playing on a purely turn-by-turn basis. Effective planning is one of the major advantages we humans have vs the AIs after all.

In terms of scores, I love totally dominating every last corner of the earth. It's a thrilling challenge to maintain positive happiness when the globe is painted from sea to sea with our borders. This is harder than capitals-only but seems to also give higher scores. I do not sell cities or perform surgical strikes on capitals - I take every city and raze as few as possible. Planning a hundred turns in advance for major blitzkriegs to knock out leaders seems to be the most effective way of accomplishing this.

On the other hand, I generally start conquest immediately and keep it up for the whole game. For domination games I usually follow Strategy A from the Mongolia guide (even with other civs), attacking citystates as soon as a few spearmen and archers are trained. Militaristic and cultural citystates are fantastic to plunder since they give tons of units and help fill out Liberty/Honor.

 

[Txurce]

Was the "don't" a typo? I'm not sure I understand the meaning of this sentence, but I'm really tired today.

I don't sell cities or perform "surgical strikes" on capitals, instead taking every city and razing few. Planning ~100 turns in advance for major blitzkriegs to knock out leaders seems to be the most effective way of accomplishing this.

I meant "don't," in that I don't see how I'd be saving it early on regardless. But if you meant by capping all cities except the unit pumps at 10 - something I don't encounter until later - then yes, I'll try it (and am trying it in my v114 German Immortal Conquest game).

I can see the enjoyment of conquering the planet. What blows my mind about your performances is that you achieve it while racing for every capital, as opposed to milking your way there.

 

[Thalassicus]

On a side note 10 also seems to be a good size to annex puppets. Smaller cities stay puppets, and when they grow to 10 I build a courthouse and halt growth. A city of this size can build a courthouse in a reasonably fast time. The happiness penalty can typically be offset by purchasing happiness buildings (which puppets don't generally prioritize).

 

[Gamewizard]

I played 12 or so more turns, now at turn 185ish. I got super lucky as Japan conquered the Iroquois capital for me, saving me lots of turns no doubt. Also, Catherine built Notre Dame the turn before I decided to declare war on her, so taking Moscow might actually increase my happiness! I've split up my army into 3 groups, 1 taking Moscow, one headed southwest to take a city Darius built next to Germany, and a small group of garrisons on my eastern front in case Japan tries to get tricky now that he has taken care of those Native Americans. No happiness problems at the moment thanks to completing Honor and a tiny venture into the right side of Piety. Gold is coming in at 250+ a turn and rising. I think it might be time to go diety on the AI and spam units till I run a negative income.

Happy to note that I've finally run into a city with walls and have actually lost a couple units. Was beginning to think this would be so easy to the point of not being fun, but that is not the case.

 

[rf900]

Turn 200, Germany, Iroquis and Egypt have fallen. Japan is very weak, I will probably leave him till the end, I am friendly with all the rest. 6k gold +500 per turn, thanks for the advices. Keeping happines with avoid growth helps a lot, and the camel archers are great.

I think I will build a larger army and take the rest as fast I as I can, they are all behind tech. Turns are taking forever BTW.

 

[rf900]

t220, went for all, Rusia and Persia nearly down, Japan probably also. I will then go for Rome and last India, or both at the same time. Victory is sure now, managed to get all money from AI by selling resources. They are no match in military and I am getting 1000 per turn with a golden age.

My guess is that it will end around turn 250... will see. Will probably post in the end game with some general tips, finishing the commerce tree has been very helpful.