Predator, goal is military conquest.
Firstly, worker N, to see if that tile NEx2 was by chance a floodplain (nope). Then, i settled NWx2, hoping to build a good ring of cities even without a four-turner. The initial build sequence ended up being warrior -> warrior -> settler -> warrior -> worker -> granary. Not the best possible, but with barbs roaming around from the very beginning i didn't want to risk leaving stuff undefended.
At first, i decided not to build a granary by now - that's why i started researching Alphabet instead of the more usual Pottery - but then i saw that there was, indeed, some room to expand and with a granary and constant micromanagement Berlin could be made into a decent six-turner.
The barbs were scary but a single fortified warrior, twice on hill and once in a forest, was able to survive 3 attacks (although it did remain regular). After that the barbs ceased to be an immediate threat and i could proceed as usual. Later on, i managed to destroy 3 barb camps before the AS took care of the remaining, but once again no promotions came out of the fights.
First contact was made in 3050bc, when i spotted a Zulu scout oversea. An Aztec jaguar was met on the northers istmus in 2430bc. The remaining enemies were met by trading techs later on.
Cities were built at RCP 4 from the capital. With Berlin tossing out settler as fast as possible, I could carve out a decent productive ring and also seize control of the luxuries in range before the AS could get to them.
Research was somewhat a pain. With Alphabet i was able to trade Pottery with Zulu and nothing else. I got first on Writing, but it wasn't enough to get all the techs and contacts: i could only met France and Rome and obtain Masonry and Bronze Working. Later on, someone sold contact with us to Russia and i could arrange a second round of trade, in which i met the remaining Celts and obtained Iron Working, Wheel and Mysticism. Map Making was another first, and with that i could obtain the whole maps, Horse Riding and Philosophy. Alas, Code of Laws was still unknown, so i had to go for it by myself, only to be beaten half-way by the Russians. Not a big deal, since i could buy the remaining part of it and go full-steam on Republic.
Unfortunately, all the AS were quite short on cash, so i couldn't collect a decent amount of money with trade, and that became quite a problem later on.
I met the 1000bc mark with 9 towns, one of which settled in the Aztec landmass, that would later serve as a beachead where i could both amass units to attack the Aztec core and at the same time send quick reinforcements with galleys.
The plan was to wait until Republic before attacking the Aztecs, in order to avoid the nasty poprushing of units under despotism. Meanwhile, i would stockpile units on the beachead city. In theory it would have been fast, but unfortunately the AS contined to be broke, so at a certain point i had to slow down research to avoid going broke myself. Moreover, with almost no money coming out from the AS, it soon turned out that even a limited mass-upgrade of warriors into swordsmen would have been unsustainable. So i connected iron, started to build swords directly, and kept the vet warriors ready hoping to upgrade them later.
When the stack was ready, Republic was still many turns away, so i decided to gather a 2nd stack on a mountain still free of Aztec influence, that would have attacked a different city. Republic was finally achieved in 800bc. The immediate revolt gave me a nasty 7 turns of anarchy, that were later reduced to 4 with the reroll. In the interturn, i sold Republic around, getting all the techs to enter the middle ages, but once again almost no money was collected, and that meant leaving the vet warriors stacked in the coastal city, ready to be sent oversea but unable to achieve the necessary upgrade.
Russia got Monotheism with the scientific bonus, and i got Engineering. Having missed Feudalism was disappointing, as it was the successive invasion that, thanks also to a scarcity of swordsmen, bore a larger amount of casualties than expected, preventing me to execute the blitzkrieg i had in mind... i suppose i had to pay back in some way the initial luck i've had with barbarians. But this is matter for the next spoiler.
Here's a log of my progress:
Tech log:
4000bc: Warrior Code (prerequisite)
2850bc: Alphabet (research); Pottery (trade, Zulu);
2430bc: Ceremonial Burial (trade, Aztecs);
2030bc: Writing (research); Masonry (trade, Zulu); Bronze Working (trade, Rome);
1830bc: Mysticism (trade, Russia); Iron Working, Wheel (trade, Celts);
1525bc: Map Making (research); Horse Riding, Philosophy (trade, France);
1450bc: Code of Laws (trade, Russia); Literature (trade, Celts);
_800bc: Republic (research); Mathematics, Polytheism (trade, Celts); Construction (trade, Aztecs); Currency (trade, France); Engineering (scientific bonus);
Cities until 1000bc:
3900bc: Berlin;
3150bc: Leipzig;
2150bc: Hamburg;
1830bc: Konigsberg;
1650bc: Frankfurt;
1475bc: Munich;
1325bc: Heideburg;
1175bc: Nurenberg;
1050bc: Valhalla;
Contacts:
3050bc: Zulu;
2430bc: Aztecs;
2030bc: France, Rome;
1830bc: Russia, Celts;
Wars and kills:
none yet
The attached pic is a screenshot of my territory the turn before the beginning of the middle ages.
, then rcp 4 and 6. in 1000bc i had 23 pop, 2 lux connected, 4 rax and 2 gran. two core towns were running as combo factories. research was slow, and i did not imagine to need a whole lot of techs to win this, so i put research towards Monarchy.
