1.27
Link to Ancient Age spoiler
Contact with the Last Continent
Late in Ancient Times, in 875BC, my first suicide galley followed the suggestive sea lane south of Greece, survived one turn at sea, and met France, England, and Scandinavia. They were rather backward. I traded for their maps and a bit of gold.
It became clear at this point that the Great Lighthouse was something I would want. There wasn't a hope I could build it. I didn't have any strong coastal towns, didn't have any prebuilds on the go, and didn't have the military power to get a Leader anytime soon. So it seemed a good idea to immediately throw the remote continent into war. None of the Civs there would trigger a Golden Age due to fighting. Slowing them down would improve the chances for my other four rivals to build the Lighthouse. Scandinavia seemed strongest so I declared on her and allied France and England against her.
Ongoing Wars
After our brief wars in Ancient Times Carthage and Zululand remained peaceful.
At the beginning of the Middle Ages I decided to foment war between Greece and Arabia. I declared on Arabia and allied Greece against her.
When my alliances expired I gave Scandinavia and Arabia peace. France also gave Scandinavia peace but the other two wars I'd started continued without my help until the end of the game.
Research
My free tech on entering the Middle Ages was Feudalism. I gifted Greece to the Middle Ages and got a nice bit of luck - her free tech was Engineering.
I researched as quickly as I could learning Invention in 7 turns, Gunpowder in 7, Chemistry in 6, Metallurgy in 6, and Military Tradition in 5 at 70BC.
And that was it for research, I didn't do any more in this game. Nor did I sell much to the other Civs. They never did catch up - by the end of the game my most advanced rival had learned Invention.
During my research phase England built the Great Lighthouse, dashing my hopes for an easy way to reach the far continent. I formed a new plan to deal with that problem.
Conquest
While researching I built barracks and horsemen. I also finished my Forbidden Palace, increasing the empire's productivity a bit. And finished a few miscellaneous builds - a couple of harbors, aqueducts, and marketplaces.
When I learned Military Tradition in 70BC I had 27 horsemen. My treasury was empty and my net income with research off was 263gpt.
In 50BC I upgraded two horsemen. In 30BC I declared on Carthage and my two Sipahi invaded. They triggered my Golden Age which boosted income nicely - I'd now be able to upgrade at least 3 horsemen per turn. And it would of course help production of new Sipahi.
Map at 50BC before beginning conquest:
By 90AD I was up to 25 Sipahi. I'd lost just one so far. My map looked like this:
I had just a few Sipahi still in Carthage to finish her next turn. I'd split my other forces. I declared on Zulu and part of my force began the assault on them this turn. The rest of my forces assembled with some rushed galleys on the west coast, ready to invade Arabia when my peace deal with her expired next turn in 110AD.
In 110AD I finished off Carthage and was at war with Zululand and Arabia. They were both so underdeveloped that it slowed me down. Arabia had a number of population one towns which I razed. Both Arabia and Zululand had incomplete road systems.
In 230AD I had nearly finished Arabia. I declared on Greece and my forces on that continent continued westward.
In 260AD I began my plan to cross to the far continent. By this date I'd taken much of the Zulu lands and had rushed many galleys on their east coast. The first four of these galleys had reached a jumpoff point across the water from London. They sailed empty to the halfway point across the water:
Two of those galleys sank and two remained in 270AD. I declared on England. Two additional galleys carried four Sipahi from the coast to the midway point. There the Sipahi transferred to the surviving galleys and continued the rest of the way across to land beside London on the same turn. In 280AD they captured London and the Great Lighthouse. Two Sipahi turned out to be all that was necessary to take London! England weakness was presumably due to her ongoing war with Scandinavia.
That solved the remote continent problem. My galleys could safely travel from Greece to France and from Zululand to England.
My greatest worry through all this was that there might be a one tile island somewhere and one of my rivals might settle it. I traded maps with each rival every turn until I declared war on them. So at this point I knew that Zululand and Greece had each settled an island and that no one else had. I dispatched galleys to both of those islands and they were no problem. They turned out to be the only islands I had to deal with.
As my troops advanced I also kept galleys moving along enemy coastlines to make sure I handled any settlers in boats. These were a concern because I was razing size one towns and leaving some sections of land vacant for a while. I did try to fill the biggest vacancies with new settlers to keep my score maximized but this wasn't a top priority.
In 310AD I finished off Zululand. All forces from that region, plus my ongoing production from the home region were sailing to England as soon as they could.
In 330AD I declared on both France and the Vikings. Just before invading them my map looked like this:
In 340AD I finished off Greece's last town on her northwest island. My troops were already sailing from Greece's south shore to France. At this date I had 52 Sipahi. Many of them would not be able to reach the remaining warfronts in time.
In 350AD my Sipahi advancing on the last English town were amused to see some Vikings, still at war with England after all this time, take that city and thereby eliminate England.
The last bit went very quickly. In 360AD I eliminated France and in 370AD I eliminated Scandinavia. If Scandinavia had had a decent road system I'd have finished a turn sooner. My fault I guess - they'd been at war for a long time and I'm sure that didn't help their construction efforts
So, a conquest victory in 380AD:
Miscellaneous
I never shifted out of Republic after learning it. At most points in the game I was paying support for 10 to 15 units. For a long time I was adding cities at about the same rate as units. I didn't notice any war weariness - the conquest of each rival was swift. My cities remained small so luxuries and an occasional specialist were sufficient to handle happiness without needing the luxury slider after Ancient Times.
Leaders and wonders played a very small role in my game. The Great Lighthouse was an exception but I could even have done without that, taking perhaps three turns longer. (Would have built, rushed, and lost a lot more galleys.)
I had good leader luck, getting four of them. But by the time I got even the first there was little for them to do. The first rushed Sun Tzu's on the home continent which was a bit useful. The second rushed Leonardo's just for the heck of it though I had nothing left to upgrade. The third rushed a harbor to connect luxuries from the far continent. I got the fourth on the last turn and he did nothing.
I captured Hanging Gardens from Zululand which helped score a little. Eventually I captured the other wonders but none mattered much. France had the Pyramids in my game.
There turned out to be a lot of similarities between this game and GOTM19! GOTM19 was Ottomans on a small continents map at Emperor level. In it we shared the homeland with two other Civs, there was a second inhabited landmass in easy reach, and there was a third inhabited landmass which required Astronomy or the Great Lighthouse to be reached safely. I'd really hoped to beat my GOTM19 conquest date in this game. And although I did it wasn't by much, just one turn. Oh well. In other ways this was a very different game and hard to compare. The largest differences in how it played out for me were 1) In GOTM19 I gained enough land at the start to do a Palace jump. That gained a fair bit, especially since I didn't know about the Palace rank bug. 2) A local Civ built the Great Lighthouse for me that time. 3) A local Civ also built Pyramids for me in GOTM19. 4) I got a leader early enough in GOTM19 to rush Leonardo's while it still helped.
Anyway, I like to think I played better this time...
![[civ3mac]](/images/smilies/macciv3.gif "Mac Civ3 Icon [civ3mac]")
Predatory Reloading Monkey Class 1.27f (militaristic and scientific)
. I still have 775 left. I need it for upgrades soon for war with Carthage
We did however, capture the remaining Zulu cities on the mainland, and head for the Arabs at this time.
We positioned as best we could, as we still needed some garrison in resisting cities of the Arabs. In 830AD we decided to get rid of our enemies' offensive troops (MIs and longbows are quite capable of killing def 3 Sipahi). We declared on the Vikings and signed a MA and RoP with the French. The English only had five cities anyway! In 850AD the Greeks were left with an island holding.
