Originally posted by Offa
I was intrigued by some of the games by the top players and tried to look up their reports in the forum only to find ... nothing.
Clearly you don't have to post, but you guys who are better than me, how I am supposed to learn if you don't tell me how you did it?
Ancient summary
Middle Ages summary
All the information you need to play a high scoring game is within these forums.
Looking back on it the key things in this game were:
Fast growth start (look at some of Qitai's posts or Cracker's starting guide)
Aggressive trading (I think Moonsinger started an excellent thread on this)
Targetted research (SirPleb's GOTM19)
RCP (see DavidesJ's thread in strategy articles) and resource disconnecting to upgrade (not sure where this came up 1st) also help
It looks like not bothering with a Forbidden Palace may also have ended up helping my game and that building warriors to upgrade to swordsmen wasn't as bad as I thought at the time.
The only thing I haven't seen get much exposure are tips for fast unit tactics. Things I did were:
Attack with numbers, but don't waste forces by using more than is needed. In the initial phases I'm happy with about a 80-90% chance of taking a town if it is not on a critical path and even less if it is. By a critical path, I mean an enemy town that is slowing up my progress towards further targets. If a town is slowing me up and is down to its last defender I am quite happy to sacrifice wounded units in attempting to take it.
Obviously at the start of a rampage you want to attack more cautiously, and the more success you have the more you can throw caution to the wind as each of your units becomes less valuable.
Combine this with a tactic I refer to as "forking" (careful how you say it
). If you can position attacking units so that they threaten 2 or more enemy towns at once then you can adjust the number of forces you throw at each town as the turn progresses. If you divide 6 ansars against 2 towns each with 2 pike defenders then you end up with two risky 3 on 2 attacks. If on the other hand, you have all 6 available to attack both towns, you are almost certain of success against the 1st, and then can decide whether to attempt the 2nd town that turn. With multiple smallish stacks of ansar each with a number of possible targets, you can improve your attacking odds significantly by picking the attack order and adjusting your targets if the results go particularly badly or particularly well, taking maximum advantage of whatever the RNG throws up. You also have fewer "wasted" attackers. A fully healed ansar that spends a turn in the front line without attacking is not pulling its weight.
Many forks exist where taking one town will opens up a path to further towns. Make sure your forces are positioned to take advantage of this.
Unit healing:
If a unit has a single point of damage you can rest it anywhere for a turn
If a unit has 2 points of damage then resting outside or moving to a town and then resting, both have the same 2 turn cost.
If a unit has 3 points of damage then resting outside or moving to a town without a barracks have the same 3 turn cost
Don't forget to take advantage of a wounded units remaining movement. Often you can save a turn by waiting till the end of all combat before moving wounded units and then moving them as far forward as you can. They are not going to heal that turn anyway, so the extra movement is effectively free.
Other things to do are:
If you are not that bothered about leaders (and you shouldn't be towards the end), always send in elites 1st. They have both a greater chance of winning, and better retreat odds if they fail.
Keep fast units on roads where possible, even within enemy territory when that territory will soon be yours.
Keep workers near the front to build roads where needed; build roads towards distant targets before you attack if none exit.
. If you aim for the fastest finish via other victory conditions then typically you will have to sacrifice Jason points to do so, as you are unlikely to reach the domination limit as fast as domination/conquest players will 
.
)
And, if I counted correctly, my 870AD Domination Victory puts me in a 3 way tie for 22nd fastest victory. What a bunch of warmongers! 
