PtW, Open.
Going for diplomacy.
Link to
AA post.
Link to
MA post.
Entered the IA in 430, after barely keeping my nose above water in the 4-turn research swamp. My prospects for the IA were grim though, lacking a second productive core I was quickly closing in on the bpt limit. I desperately needed a GL to rush a palace for me. I had already decided my new capitol would be Rome.
Early research
On entering the IA I drew Steam Engine as my free tech, great! Gifting up Osman, he drew Nationalism. Less great. In total throughout the game, Osman helped me with Construction and Monotheism. Not overly impressive for a scientific civ, but he was after all quite heavily besieged by the Celts.
I got Medicine in 4 turns, but both Industrialization and Electricity would take 5. I chose the more expensive Electricity, hoping to be able to get Industrialization in 4 after Scientific Method. It worked, and then The Corporation and even Replacable Parts. Still it only worked because I was running my treasury at a deficit, and by cramming out scientists whereever I could support them.
The Quest for a Leader
It was painfully clear that the only thing that would let me keep up a high research pace was a second productive core. And the only way to get that would be through a leader. And the only way to get
that would be through war.
The Japanese and the Celts were out of the way, and my army was parked in the former Celt lands. The next target geographically would be England, but they had Feudalism and the Great Wall. Rome was rebuilding on the SE island. Spain was large and powerful. Iroquois didn't have Feudalism which qualified them as my next target.
To get to the Iroquois I shipped my immortals up the east coast and into the bay, then let them use the English road network through a RoP.
The war was very close to becoming a complete disaster. I split my forces in one larger host and one smaller, in order to take two towns quickly. The smaller force of three (one elite) faced two regular spears. The outcome was one killed spear and two lost immortals. The third withdrew to heal, and was killed by a cursed mounted warrior.
The main host was also harassed by mounted warriors but managed to make it to the gates of Salamanca. There I lost them one after the other, until the very last elite immortal killed the last defender - and got me a leader! I quickly sued for peace, with only three immortals left out of the twelve that set out, and Darius hurried out to the sea where a galleon met up. Using a partial ship chain he was at sea for only three turns, a time i spent a) completing a railroad from Nagoya in the far NE corner of former Japan all the way to Rome, and b) rushing libraries, aqueducts, harbors and even a university in and around Rome.
Darius triumphantly stepped off his ship in Nagoya in 670 AD and travelled to Rome under much rejoicing. There he oversaw the construction of the new palace that would mark the beginning of the new era.
With the new palace in Rome I was immediately making over 1100bpt and steadily increasing, which was enough to guarantee 4-turn research on all but the most expensive IA techs.
Theory of Evolution
This wonder is clearly a key when going for a UN win. There are basically two ways to use it - either to get two expensive IA techs for free, or to use it at the end of the IA to get the last tech there (presumably Radio as it's the most expensive) and then a free MA tech, i.e. Fission.
The latter is the play-it-safe route, guaranteeing Fission and the UN as soon as MA is reached, but requiring an extra IA tech to be researched. The former is a gamble, you can skip one more IA tech and hope for Fission as someone's free tech.
After some calculations it was clear that
if I could keep up 4-turn research on everything once I had built the new palace, I could go the safe route and have a guaranteed UN build in 1000 AD. If instead I gambled on getting Fission for free, I could possible have it in 960 AD, but if I didn't get it I would have to spend 5-6 turns researching it for a UN win in 1010-1020 AD. With two scientific civs in the game, the chances that one of us would get Fission were ~44%, not overly good.
I agonized on and off on this issue for quite some time, safe or gamble, but the chance to have a pre-1000 AD win won out. I set up Persepolis to time Theory of Evolution to give me Atomic Theory and Electronics. It turned out to be a good choice, free techs non-withstanding, since if I hadn't done so I would have been forced to research AT in 5 turns, which evened out the difference between the two approaches.
Greed, War and Panic
At this time there were still 5 AI civs alive, two of which I had warred with. The other three liked me alright, but since it would be one of them I'd go up against (Elizabeth or Isabella) I needed to do something in order to get the vote my way.
Rome was an easy target, having only spears to put up against my guerilla troops. I attacked them in 860 AD, in 880 AD they were down to two towns, and in 900 AD they were gone. I lost one guerilla in the entire campaign.
Had that been the end of things I would have gotten the majority through the votes from Isabella/Elizabeth and Osman. War and greed, coupled with some really bad decisions, would see to it that things wouldn't be quite so easy.
First of all I saw that that the Iroquois were almost as weak as the Romans, and I wanted to increase my score a bit. I rushed a barracks in Salamanca and upgraded the immortals there to guerillas, and I shipped over more guerillas from the Roman campaign. I also started cash-rushing tanks in Salamanca every other turn. The Iroquois would fall easily.
Then near-disaster struck, though I didn't see it at the time. I had an MPP with the Ottomans, and Elizabeth attacked him, and suddenly I was at war with England. They were the largest civ at the time, so I figured it wouldn't matter, Isabella and Osman would still vote for me, I would kill the Iroquois and everything would be fine. So I signed an alliance with the Ottomans against Elizabeth, and brought in the Spanish in an alliance too, in the darkness bind them.
I RoP-raped the Iroquois with my tanks and my guerillas, and the MA and (hopefully) Fission were fast approaching. But I had miscalculated, and I was held up a turn here, and suddenly the Iroquois would still be alive at the dawn of the new era. No big deal, what was a lot worse though was that the Spanish conquistadors were having their way with the English defenders, and suddenly I would be going up against Isabella in the election! I didn't realize that though, I'll blame it was late evening...
The MA came, and brought me Rocketry. Osman got the same. In hindsight that was my small piece of luck, an election at 960 AD would have been inconclusive. I delayed my palace prebuild (I had better margins than StanNP
) and started research on Fission, ETA 1010 AD (i.e. 5 turns). I finished off the Iroquois, then I sat back and evaluated the situation. Gee, the English looked like they'd had a rough time, and then revelation hit me like a none to gentle sledge hammer.
At this point I panicked. I started moving all my troops from the Iroquois lands towards what was left of England, thinking my only chance was to take her out too before the election, then the vote would be 2-1 in my favor. But time was too short, and there was no way I could delay my pre-build any longer.
I quit playing for the night, not really knowing what to do next. I couldn't do like StanNP and go for space instead, I'd neglected most of my major cities to the ppoint where they were all building Wealth once they reached their maximum science potential. I had only two factories, no way I could get back in the race. I though about going for an "easy" domination, but gee, all that science racing for nothing? I thought skipping the first election and aim for the second, taking out Elizabeth first, but hey, delay my UN win for 20 turns?
All's well that ends well
I didn't sleep very well, and in the kind of epiphany that can only come at 3 am I saw the way out. The deal was not to get Elizabeth out of the way, rather the way to win was to get her to vote for me!
I had two concerns though; First of all I didn't want to break my MA with Osman and anger him so much that he voted for Isabella instead. Second I wasn't sure if I could really make Elizabeth like me again, after all I was at war with her.
I started with a DoW on Spain. Then I signed in Osman, making sure his vote would end up in the right place. After that I made peace with Elizabeth. Luckily I hadn't yet captured any of her towns yet, in the last minute she'd drafted a rifleman in London delaying my tank outside. This meant that she was immediately polite towards me when peace was made, but just to be sure I signed an alliance with her to vs Isabella. Then I went back to placate Osman, but lo and behold, he was still gracious to me despite the broken alliance. Must have been since we still held a common enemy.
In a final bout of generosity I showered gifts over Elizabeth and Osman, techs, luxuries and resources en masse. In 1010 AD I got Fission, switched the pre-build on the interturn, and got a 3-1 victory over Isabella!
Phew.
Almost as an aside I got my first 10k+ score, which was kind of surprising considering I was never even close to the domination limit. I hope I get an award for this one, I don't know if I have the stomach to do it all over again...
![[ptw]](/images/smilies/ptw.gif "PTW Icon [ptw]")
Open - My game ended in the Second Spoiler
(usualy he cleans them out enforcing us to use ship chains)
I didn't get a leader until very late in the game (see my spoiler) and didn't, at the time, consider it worth investing the shields. None of my coastal cities were very productive anyway.
But I hope my next write-up will not be quite that exiting... 
The again I shouldn't feel too safe, maybe UN in 1010 AD and no award will be even more ugly... 
