Genghis Khan - Beating Emperor

[Gooblah]

Hey!

I'm trying to get back into the flow of things for this game recently, and I can finally win consistently at Monarch again. I've been pushing it up to Emperor for the past few games and have found myself kind of unprepared for the increased Barbarians and the necessity for better attention-paying while playing. My first attempt at Emperor ended up being alone on a continent as Cyrus with room for a cool 12 cities, but my tech rate crashed and I ended up playing an Espionage Economy off Mansa Musa for a while. Caught up to him, and then was promptly discovered by Montezuma, who had a tech lead on both of us, was a different religion, and promptly marked me as his worst enemy. 30 turns later he swamped me with an amphibious assault. My second was a game as Frederick, but for whatever reason I kind of abandoned that one - it was pretty slow, with barbs up the wazoo because of the Civ spacing.

What better way to improve my game than to post one here?

Anyways, the settings are: Emperor/Epic, played on a Standard Fractal map, with all other settings being normal. Rolled a random leader and got Genghis Khan of Mongolia.

Unique unit is the Keshik, unique building is the Ger. Cavalry aren't my favorites, but I do enjoy the Keshik...but on the flip side, Horseback Riding is kind of a dead-end tech. Regardless, our start suggests prioritizing Animal Husbandry...

Foggazing is something I don't do regularly, nor am particularly talented at, so my feeble attempt will be left in spoilers :

Spoiler :

That aside, there are quite a few options here. I generally don't move my Settler around much, and the Scout isn't in the best position to help, but I was thinking about moving 2N? That would minimize the number of water tiles but still leave Clams, allowing me to deprioritize Fishing a bit.

My initial build path is usually Worker/Warrior/Settler with little variation (unless there's fish/clams/crab and I start with Fishing), probably a problem ...although I'm not quite sure how to improve on that. Tech path suggests Animal Husbandry -> Mining -> Fishing -> Bronze Working? That order's probably not too great though, esp considering I can't see any unforested hills at the moment. Perhaps BW -> Fishing would be better so I can chop out a Work Boat instead of spending 45 hammers or whatnot.

The save's below, if you'd like to follow along/whip me without a second glance

 

[GGracchus]

First move the scout to see the optimal start position. I would usually insert more warriors between the worker and settler to grow your cap and help spawnbust. See where your opponents are before deciding whether or not to use keshiks, you want to play the map, not the leader.

 

[Htadus]

No harm settling in place and poing for AH. Excluding the cow and the south clam, all other food can be shared by and ovelapping city placement. Or can go into settler and worker spam mode.

Depending on tech path, you should let your city grow to 2 as a minimum. Once you have the cow pastured the warriors going to come out fast. Including WB's.

My choice would be to go AH, fishing then to BW since the 2gpt will be an asset to get the research going fast.

Worker first and warrior or two and then WB's.

 

[Gooblah]

First move the scout to see the optimal start position. I would usually insert more warriors between the worker and settler to grow your cap and help spawnbust. See where your opponents are before deciding whether or not to use keshiks, you want to play the map, not the leader.

So....how far do you go with Warriors? Is there a certain pop? I know there aren't hard-and-fast rules, but I'm sure there are...guidelines.

And yeah, I play the map, not the leader, although I feel bad if I pass through an era without building the unique unit ahaha

 

[Ghpstage]

So....how far do you go with Warriors? Is there a certain pop? I know there aren't hard-and-fast rules, but I'm sure there are...guidelines.

And yeah, I play the map, not the leader, although I feel bad if I pass through an era without building the unique unit ahaha

My guideline is grow to work the stronger tiles. Here the Cow and Pigs are clearly in that group, but I would only improve one or two Fishing boats before building a settler.
EDIT - Forgot about IMP, that makes mines stronger than clam for building settlers.

Your fog gazing looks accurate to me, but it'd be more useful if you identified the tile type, not the yield. After all, theres a big difference between a grass hill and plain despite the same yield! Unforested tiles can also indicate resources, and resources are tile specific (no gold on grass, no cows on hills, no corn on plains etc).
Remember, your not just trying to read the unimproved yields, your trying to assess how good the spot is likely to be.

 

[Gooblah]

My guideline is grow to work the stronger tiles. Here the Cow and Pigs are clearly in that group, but I would only improve one or two Fishing boats before building a settler.
EDIT - Forgot about IMP, that makes mines stronger than clam for building settlers.

Your fog gazing looks accurate to me, but it'd be more useful if you identified the tile type, not the yield. After all, theres a big difference between a grass hill and plain despite the same yield!

Yeah, the IMP thing was part of the reason I was leaning towards not settling in place. I'll move the Scout and post a screenshot later.

And good call on the gazin' there ahaha, like i said, quite inexperience in the trick of it.

Edit:

Moved the Scout 1W and then 1N, 1NW was the most logical location. didn't reveal anything particularly game-changing I feel, although that Corn site looks quite nice.

 

[ecuwins]

It didn't start you on fresh water?

 

[Ghpstage]

Yeah, the IMP thing was part of the reason I was leaning towards not settling in place. I'll move the Scout and post a screenshot later.

In this start Imp is more of an argument for considering your improvements (making mining the hills is more important, whipping settlers is stronger etc) than one for moving. In fact moving onto a forested hill and removing access to all that production would quite a mistake.
With the new screenshot up, i'm comfortable with SIP.

 

[Zechnophobe]

SIP for sure.

Since you are Imperial I think that really changes the maths' for early settler production. You can get away with building them earlier, especially if you are chopping. Chopped production is multiplied for settler production! This can allow for INCREDIBLY speedy starts.

Consider your first pasture. Normally you'd want it on those pigs for 5/1, That'd net you a total of 5 + 2(*1.5) = 8 production. But if you build on the cows first you get 3 + 4(*1.5) = 9 production, for building settlers.

This is important for the possible scenario of building Worker-SETTLER-Warrior. Daring, but doable considering the start position.

Then you would tech AH->Mining->Bronze working. Leave the clams for now, grow to size two while you build a pair of warriors, and then chop out a second settler.

Worker builds cows, then Pigs, then pre chops a few spots while you grow to size two and get your warriors out, then finishes off those spots for settlers #2. I don't have the timing perfect in my head, you may end up idling the worker for a small time while you get BW.

Anyhow, after settler two, get another warrior, maybe two depending on how the map is scouting out (lots of empty land = more warriors). Then continue with worker production to keep up on your Improved Tile count.

 

[Gooblah]

It didn't start you on fresh water?

Should it?

In this start Imp is more of an argument for considering your improvements (making mining the hills is more important, whipping settlers is stronger etc) than one for moving. In fact moving onto a forested hill and removing access to all that production would quite a mistake.
With the new screenshot up, i'm comfortable with SIP.

SIP for sure.

Since you are Imperial I think that really changes the maths' for early settler production. You can get away with building them earlier, especially if you are chopping. Chopped production is multiplied for settler production! This can allow for INCREDIBLY speedy starts.

Consider your first pasture. Normally you'd want it on those pigs for 5/1, That'd net you a total of 5 + 2(*1.5) = 8 production. But if you build on the cows first you get 3 + 4(*1.5) = 9 production, for building settlers.

This is important for the possible scenario of building Worker-SETTLER-Warrior. Daring, but doable considering the start position.

Then you would tech AH->Mining->Bronze working. Leave the clams for now, grow to size two while you build a pair of warriors, and then chop out a second settler.

Worker builds cows, then Pigs, then pre chops a few spots while you grow to size two and get your warriors out, then finishes off those spots for settlers #2. I don't have the timing perfect in my head, you may end up idling the worker for a small time while you get BW.

Anyhow, after settler two, get another warrior, maybe two depending on how the map is scouting out (lots of empty land = more warriors). Then continue with worker production to keep up on your Improved Tile count.

Hmmmmm....alright, I gotchu. I forgot that Imperialistic affects chops as well (durr...), so yeah, SIP is the best option.

I'm pretty nervous about going Worker -> Settler though, I always like to grow the city before even starting the Settler.

A few random things, then:

Fogbusting - isn't there a two tile radius around a fortified unit that barbs can't spawn in? I remember reading this somewhere, and it would help minimized the amount of units necessary...

Tech order: Definitely Animal Husbandry -> Mining -> Bronze Working, and then Fishing? Looking ahead, my second city will probably be near that Corn, so Agriculture should also be a priority, and then Pottery to get some commerce going.

 

[Zechnophobe]

I am less sure about after BW. Agriculture may make more sense, hard to look that far forward without seeing the land a bit more. If both of your first two expansions need agriculture for worker work, then yes. Giving the conditions, I'd not worry too much about delaying the work boats a little bit in favor of additional workers anyway. Probably means Agri-Fishing-Pottery.

 

[AbsoluteZero]

I'd settle 1 S 1 W. Reason? Fresh water + decent cottage capitol + plenty of food. Settle the second city 1 E of the pigs.

I'd tech AH -> fishing -> mining -> BW.

 

[Zechnophobe]

Huts are on in this game, which caught me by surprise. I hutted fishing from the first one... which rather changes things.

I didn't notice that it was set to epic speed during the conversation, so... that also threw me a bit off. There isn't any real way to keep an initial worker working, and the worker->settler idea just won't work at epic speed it seems (maybe not any speed). You'd need to start with mining for it to make sense.

Fun little map though, wish it wasn't on Epic, or I'd have actually played it for more than the first little bit.

 

[pigswill]

Shadow 3425bc (spoilers!)

Spoiler :

I used to be able to win at emperor but that was a long time ago, thought I'd give this a go.
Huts took me by surprise. An even bigger surprise is that my scout popped 4 huts and survived the experience. The huts gave me a map , 97g, mining and HbR (having just finished AH). Yum, keshik rush. Do we have horses nearby? You bet:

Spoiler :

So that's the dilemma. Do I go for fishing>sailing to grab the horses? Do I finish BW first? Do I grab some mainland cities first? There's some nice land south of a jungle belt though without any production, north of the jungle belt we've got Spain on a Hill who's already founded Buddhism and I've met Mansa's scout (though not yet discovered Mali).

 

[ben-jammin]

If you could oracle code of laws and chop out the great library in your capital it would be a ridiculous GP farm come hereditary rule. You're looking at what, 20 food from four tiles with a lighthouse?

 

[Gooblah]

Round 1: 4000 BC to 2675 BC

So I ended up settling in place. Set Animal Husbandry as the first tech (20 turns, since I'm getting 9 commerce/turn while working the Cows, and there are no other commerce sources until Fishing), and Worker as the first build (23 turns).

I noted that I probably should have turned off huts...I really like playing with them and events out of personal preference, the game gets a bit livelier IMO, but since this is a forum game I should've skipped them. My worst fears were confirmed when I moved my Scout onto the Hut and...

Heh. Well, one less thing to take care of. That kind of threw off my game plan though.

The scout ventured onwards to pop two more huts for some gold, finding a very nice valley in the process.

Early gold like this helps buoy the tech rate for a bit, so it's always helpful. Buddhism was founded in 3875 BC, the same turn I met its founder...

Lovely! I haven't had a map with Izzy on it for a while, so it'll be a fun experience. Her scout came from the north, suggesting she's around there as well. The next turn I met AI #2, Mansa Musa:

He went on to found Hinduism, and instantly they're at each others' throats. I'm planning on sticking by Mansa though, much stronger techer and therefore a bit handier to have around. I'll need to put him down quickly though, in previous games he secures a tech lead and then his army becomes pretty advanced pretty fast.

After the Worker, I started up a Warrior, which was great because of this...

T.T Poor Scout! I guess it makes up for the nice hut pops though...

Forgot to grab a screenshot of Animal Husbandry, but slotted Mining -> Bronze Working afterwards. The Worker pasture'd the Cows and the Pigs, which Karakorum worked while building a Work Boat -> Settler and growing to pop 4.

Livy had some news for us:

Smh. The initial Warrior went Scouting. The rationale for the Work Boat was to grab the Clams so that I could go ahead and Mine the Pigs... and just realized that they're the same in terms of hammer contributions to the Settler. No biggie though, that extra production will help with other stuff. The Clams also provide much needed commerce (bringing it up to 11 commerce). I played until grabbing Bronze Working, and revolted into Slavery.

The Warrior revealed quite a bit of nice, easily settleable land...easily room for 6 solid cities before we have to broach the jungle.

^ Preliminary dotplot.

Save attached. So where did I go wrong? I guess the Worker should shift to chopping out a forest for hammers. I'm thinking a Warrior or two, and then Settlers...letting the capital become a Settler pump and then exercising the Corn city to pump out Workers for a while.

For techs, Agriculture -> Pottery -> ?

Save below:

 

[Zechnophobe]

I played A fair bit of this last night, but not too much. To Avoid spoilering anything for you, I'll just comment on my city placement:

I put three cities in the bottom area: One SE of Corn, one 3S of Gems, and one on the grasslands at the end of the floodplain river.

I also hutted Fishing, which was really nice, and just like you, totally changed the early game plan (same hut I think!).

 

[Ghpstage]

Its much more important to chop and mine those forested hills than mine the pigs that you have already pastured! Once mined you could feed both of them with the pigs.
Also, at size 4 the capital doesn't need the Warrior sitting around, use him to fogbust the corn site instead.

 

[Gooblah]

I played A fair bit of this last night, but not too much. To Avoid spoilering anything for you, I'll just comment on my city placement:

I put three cities in the bottom area: One SE of Corn, one 3S of Gems, and one on the grasslands at the end of the floodplain river.

I also hutted Fishing, which was really nice, and just like you, totally changed the early game plan (same hut I think!).

I was considering SE of the corn to squeeze in another city, but I really don't like settling one off the coast like that. The corn would let me absorb the hit though, I guess.

IMO 2S of the Gems would be better, since I could slap a farm down on the floodplains and then be able to work Plains Workshops or whatnot, or at least grow faster and have more tiles covered.

Its much more important to chop and mine those forested hills than mine the pigs that you have already pastured! Once mined you could feed both of them with the pigs.
Also, at size 4 the capital doesn't need the Warrior sitting around, use him to fogbust the corn site instead.

Yeah, good call, realized that as I was writing up the post ahaha...I'm going to move the Worker over to the first hill, which I conveniently roaded while waiting for BW to come in.

I have a slight aversion to moving the Warrior since my last Emperor game had my second city burned by a Barbarian Archer blush, but I guess leaving it in the city wouldn't really significantly alter my odds if such a scenario happened again

 

[Zechnophobe]

SE of Corn IS on the coast! I rarely suggest 1-off .