Guilds beeline for Justinian

[bovinespy]

Hello all. I've been trying (and failing and trying and failing again) to get a solid game going with Justinian. My only reason to even bother is because I want to try out those powerful Cataphracts. With that in mind:

1. Early religion?

Justinian starts with Mysticism and is Spiritual, so it seems like a no-brainer. The thing is, though, that his other starting tech is the Wheel ( ), so if you go for Meditation/Polytheism, and then Mining->Bronze Working, it's going to be a long time before you're able to work any bonus food plots in your capital's BFC. Basically, I don't want to really go for an early religion (much rather have Agriculture/Fishing/Hunting), but I feel that if I don't, I've done something "wrong". What do you think?

2. Merchant-heavy SE?

My other major dilemma is how best to beeline to Guilds. I'm not sure of the whole tech path, but I believe that Great Merchants can light-bulb some of the techs on the way to (and including) Guilds. Of course, before you can run Merchant specialists, you need Code of Laws (for Caste System). So far in my attempts, it seems to take me way to long to get CoL unless I chop the Oracle. But in that case, I could also light-bulb Metal Casting, which (IIRC) is also on the way to Guilds, and would get me forges early, which would let me run Engineer specialists, which would also (IIRC) let me light-bulb some stuff on the way to Guilds. I have very little experience with light-bulb/beeline strategies, so this is where I get confused. How would you guys do the beeline?

3. Mass upgrades?

Finally, related to #2, is the likelihood of having an "extra" Great Merchant hanging around after running Merchant specialists for a while. Do you think that it would be worthwhile to build loads of Horse Archers, just waiting with a pile of gold in the bank for the moment Guilds is discovered? If it's not worth running Merchant specialists for the beeline itself, might it still be a good idea to make sure and generate at least one Great Merchant to try the mass upgrade strategy?

Thanks in advance for helpful tips/suggestions/etc.

 

[Qwack]

Probably Oracle to Feudalism slingshot first. Oracle is easier for justinian since he is spiritual and starts with mysticism. Research normally/lightbulb up to machinery, you only need 2 techs for this, Metal casting and machinery(merchants work but you need caste system to run merchants at this point). Then you can research/lightbulb guilds. If you play it well you can probably get guilds around 200-300 AD. Ill be running a test game using this strat as it seems viable. Thanks for the idea.

 

[futurehermit]

I find that I beeline guilds and get it around 300AD but the AI doesn't have hbriding/archery to trade so then I have to spend a few more turns researching those techs. By the time I'm actually able to get a pile of knights/cataphracts on the field I feel I could've teched to even more powerful units.

Don't get me wrong, knights vs. pre-pike units is great, but the disparity is not as great as with other units and I prefer to attack early then build up through medieval/renaissance and then attack out again with cav or tanks.

 

[SickCycle]

How do you keep your great merchant from teching currency instead of machinery?

I'm not sure on what GM's can bulb from your post it seemed like you were saying a GM can bulb machinery? I had alphabet and mathematics researched, if it can, is it that I don't research either of those techs before bulbing machinery?

 

[Qwack]

I took a look at the GP tech preferences, and the guilds path in general is not that well setup for a beeline. Only tech you can lightbulb is Metal casting en route to guilds (CS, Math, Alphabet have higher weights then machinery and guilds unfortunately).

Most likely the best route is probably Oracle to Feudalism slingshot. Research CoL normally, caste system and try to generate 4 great merchants (Its possible in around 85 turns with 1 city running 3 merchants and 2 other cities running 2).

Research Alphabet/Math/Civil Service while you are generating the great merchants. First one will lightbulb currency, second will bulb metal casting, third machinery and the 4th one will lightbulb Guilds.

this can be achieved around turn 225 on Epic, which is not as early as I initially thought. But cataphracts dont have any counter usually until around turn 300+ on emperor level, immortal maybe 280+. So you have a nice 50-80 turns to make good use of them.

 

[SickCycle]

So for the merchants you'd want three cities hooked up with a food surplus at the same time CoL is researched and then on the same turn you'd run 3 merchants prob in your capital and then in the other two cities you'd run 2 each for 85 turns and it should give you 4 merchants?

I was reading your game where you are only allowed to steal techs by the way, I was fascinated.. I think it was you.. I'm pretty sure it was you

 

[kniteowl]

I took a look at the GP tech preferences, and the guilds path in general is not that well setup for a beeline. Only tech you can lightbulb is Metal casting en route to guilds (CS, Math, Alphabet have higher weights then machinery and guilds unfortunately).

Actually Guilds has a higher weighting then Maths but maths has a higher weighting then Machinery.

The Key here is to delay/ignore maths, therefore the GM can't bulb CS and Paper which have higher weighting then Guilds.

How to get Machinery? Oracle Slingshot to Metal Casting and assign and engineer, wait 34 turns (on normal speed) and bulb the GE for Machinery.

Then Assign merchants either from Caste System (COLS) or Markets (Currency).

Note the GM will Bulb, Currency, COLS, MC and Monarchy before Guilds (assuming you ignore Mathematics).

Which is all good because Guilds require Feudalism which requires Monarchy.

Guilds also requires Machinery which requires MC.

And since you need Merchants to bulb Guilds, COLS and Currency are also required. They also help ypou cut maintenance for when you conquer with your UU so you don't have to worry about your economy.

So there are no real techs that side track you. The only exception is Horseback Riding and Iron-working. Iron is required to build Knights and HBR is pretty obvious.

The down side is since you ignore/delay maths you can't tech to Construction for Siege weapons but that's ok, since combat 1 and 2 Cataphracts from Barracks and Stables with still own pretty much everything on the field before Pikes and even then you can promote your Cataphracts with Shock.

If you're lucky enough you can do a Machinery Slingshot with the Oracle and assign the Engineer to bulb Guilds, yes a GE has a relatively high weighting for Guilds, as long as you ignore/delay maths or it'll bulb Construction and Engineering techs.

And you'll end up having Cataphracts in the BCs !!!

Great Merchant Tech Weightings (Bolded Keys techs):

Currency
Banking
Economics
Corporation
Metal Casting
Code of Laws
Mining
Constitution
The Wheel
Alphabet (BTS)
Pottery
Sailing
Paper
Railroad
Industrialism
Monarchy
Civil Service
Guilds

Great Engineer Tech Weightings (Bolded Key Techs):

Machinery
Assembly Line
Industrialism
Combustion
Metal Casting
Mining
Iron Working
Engineering
Replaceable Parts
Steam Power
Steel
Robotics
Railroad
Feudalism
Fascism
The Wheel
Plastics
Masonry
Construction
Guilds

 

[Qwack]

AHh, didnt even notice the Paper Weighting for great merchants. that basically screws up the path I outlined above .

so yeah, Kniteowls path is better. Although machinery slingshot is almost impossible on emperor/immortal, the MC slingshot + engineer for machinery sounds better. Self-research CoL, Alphabet and monarchy, bulb currency, then self research feudalism, and bulb guilds.

 

[SickCycle]

Ok so I tried to do what you guys said and this is what I came up with, take a look.

It's set to Monarch/Aggressive AI.
Speed is Epic.

It's 305 B.C. I just popped a Great Engineer and I'm 55 turns from Feudalism? I only have three cities up, there is Iron right next to my capital and a horse up in the tundra I'm just going to plop a city down on it next to the coast.

I do alright? I'm gonna replay it after I finish and see if I can't shave some turns off of it, as well as develop more of a infrastructure/military and maybe a couple more cities, was my first try. Ignore the terrain, I hate micro-managing and I was just kinda skimming through the game.

I actually have to grab horseback riding still now that I think about it, I'm hoping someone will have it to trade by the time I get feudalism done but I doubt it.

I did the Machinery Slingshot as well.

Tell me I did alright.. pweeeeeeease!

 

[kniteowl]

I dunno how many turns is 55 turns comparing epic to normal speed and I'm generally a normal speed player.

The key here is to get Cataphracts before I AI gets Pikes, Generally getting them before the AI gets Machinery is a good sign, even better if you get them before the AI gets Metal Casting.

The only thing that has a decent chance against a Cataphracts is a Hilled CG3 Longbow.

Combat 2 Cataphracts vs defending Hilled CG3 Longbow

(12*1.2) = 14.4 str vs (6*2.75) = 16.5 str

Combat 2 Cataphracts vs defending non hilled CG3 Longbow

(12*1.2) = 14.4 str vs (6*2.25) = 13.5 str

You'll rarely ever face a hilled CG3 Longbow and even if you do just promote them with Flanking 1 & 2 to negate their First strikes and increase survival rate while damaging them.

The key here if you build a stack of fast moving Cataphracts and own everyone before they reach their counter and even if they do, remember to pillage their Iron so they can't build Pikes.

 

[oyzar]

why bother with bulbing guilds directly? It wont save you that much time compared to oracle for feud(writing before monarchy so you can start running scientists in 2 cities asap) then scientists for metalcasting and machinery.

 

[kniteowl]

Doesn't that require you to ignore fishing though? if you plan to use those GS to bulb MC and Machinery?

Or else the GS will end up bulbing all the way to Astronomy?

 

[futurehermit]

I've gone for the guilds beeline many times and it is extremely difficult. As you've seen, bulbing is not easy at all and machinery/feudalism/guilds don't come cheap.

If you have some gold/silver/gems and you are able to take something like MC (feudalism would be amazing) off the oracle then it might be more feasible.

 

[RockTheCazbah87]

I've got a game on atm using Justinian with the XXL World mod (quality mod, search it on here somewhere) and bee-lining Guilds is so hard. I Oracled MC, and went for all the Guilds techs, I ended up getting it around turn 210 or so. It's not a particularly great strategy IMO, but Cataphracts are probably worth it.

 

[Ankh]

Iv'e tried Justinian several times as well, but I can't get him to work. His UU is great and his UB is clearly above average only his traits are lacking although spi whould be great for the theo/vass switch for unit exerience.

I think early guilds followed by a mass upgrade from horse archers powered by a great merchant is the way to go and should be able to grab you the land needed for the win.

Seems Justinian looks better then he actually are, I can't get him to work and the annoying thing is that I really don't know why

 

[SickCycle]

So if you did a Oracle> Feudalism does that mean you'd be reserching machinery the hard way? You could use another Engineer for machinery but that would set you back for your second one to bulb guilds wouldn't it?

Granted I didnt really build a civilization and just beelined to guilds via knightowls description but I think 1AD for Cataphracts is pretty decent lol.. It wouldn't be hard to throw out some extra buildings, cities, and lay down some extra cottages to speed it up. I was mostly just testing out the plan and I actually was getting raped by barbs and random events plopping stacks outside my capital guarded by warriors lol

Also, no one had Machinery/Feudalism, one person had Metal Casting but it was because I traded him it not thinking about keeping it out of there hands as knightowl was saying.

Regardless, I think Justinian has a lot of potential and I'm gonna keep trying to figure something out by picking all your brains

I actually just remembered I forgot to use the Merchants to bulb a bunch of stuff and researched it myself ... this is so complicated.

 

[Kev]

I recently finished a game whereby I was able beeline Guilds and make it somewhat worthwhile. I started as our favorite Incan because I hoped that the Financial trait would help tech faster and give me a better Oracle slingshot and the Industrious trait for hopefully putting together some wonders and help with great people. The game was Monarch, Big&Small, Standard everything.

Part of it worked - I was able to slingshot Feudalism from the Oracle, but my wonder production other than the Oracle was shot. I started with Polytheism and got Hindu right off and planned to get the Temple of Artemis up quickly to see about great merchants (wanted to add the lighthouse and Colossus to the mix). I even got Mansonry from a hut, so I thought I was in a pretty good spot.

My major issue was that I had a terrible time tech trading. Churchill and Stalin were on my own continent, and Churchill founded Buddhism and converted Stalin. Degaulle was off my east coast, but he founded Judaism and went that way. The other three civs were very difficult to locate and I did not get to them until very late (Genghis, Sitting Bull, and Washington). Washington and Sitting Bull shared a continent and were Confucian buddies while Genghis did nothing.

I dropped my state religion, but still practically no one would trade with me.

So, had to tech to MC, Machinery, and HBR by myself while trading for a few others like iron working. I studied Guilds by myself as well, and started producing knights around 800 AD. Of course, who was my only target but Protective/Charismatic Churchill. Ug. Things went well in the beginning, but eased up when he started fielding protective longbows with lots of promotions.

Still ended up taking all English and Russian cities eventually - and knights were a huge part of that. About half-way through English land I had to start involving siege, and once pikes were about my macemen were more involved. One nice aspect of this was my knights were tremendous pillagers. Went after iron like crazy to prevent the pikes and basically was able to cause plenty of disruption while my slow-moving stack went from city to city.

Because I did not want to invade another continent I then just sat back and teched to a space race win in 1930-something - which was close thanks to Sitting Bull teching so quickly on his safe little continent with his tech partner Washington (strange how civs end up in the game, no?).

I could have done better by getting more great people and with some useful tech trading. I had great, expensive techs I was willing to part with if anyone would just have thrown me a bone. Also got beat to way too many wonders and that's my own fault. The ONLY gp's that I produced were Prophets - beside the engineer I got from Fusion.

I wonder if Elizabeth might not work (Financial/Philo) where you get the Financial tech boost early to do the Feudalism slingshot and then trade for COL somewhere and run Caste for some specific great people to bulb. Seems sacrilege to delay redcoats when playing England, though. Would love to work this out to get Cataphracts, but Imp/Spirtual doesn't give you a great deal to work with...

 

[Florian]

I started a Justinian game last night. I went for Animal Husbandry first instead of going for one of the early religions because otherwise my start location would have sucked for food (coastal start with no sea food, 2 sheep, only 2 irrigable grasslands, both with forest in them). Since then I've managed to found Judaism and Confucianism, though (silver in the capital's BFC is helping with that). I'm not exactly beelining for guilds, so I might not be any help in that department, but I'll let you know if I run across any useful insights as the game progresses. I want Justinian to work too, though I'm not thrilled with his trait combo.

 

[patagonia]

I played a game as Justinian recently where I took a slightly different approach to beelining guilds.

I used the Oracle to grab CoL and Confucianism, but more importantly, caste system. Then hired 3 merchants in a food-rich second city and used the gold they were generating to finance expansion to 6 cities while maintaining a respectable research rate. Once the AI had HBR to trade, I started spamming horse archers from 2-3 good production cities, then swapped to vassalage once I'd picked up feudalism and mass-produced CG2 or guerilla 2 longbows ready to defend my new cities while I was researching guilds.

Just as guilds was coming in, I used the 2 great merchants my specialists had produced for trade missions enabling me to mass-upgrade a stack of 20-odd cataphracts the turn guilds was discovered and declare war the turn after.

Because this was slightly slower than a hard-core beeline (about 500-600AD on normal speed), the monarch AIs I was up against had feudalism, but longbows are no match for large numbers of cataphracts. I was able to continue producing them at least as quickly as I suffered losses and eradicate or capitulate the other 3 civs on the continent (Brennus, Kublai and Pacal). I guess the point is, are you better off trying to get the guilds tech as quickly as possible, or getting a cataphract SoD or two as quickly as possible?

The main thing I'd do differently in future is to pick up drama and get hippodromes built before declaring. The wars were short thanks to the speed of the cataphracts and my not bothering to build any siege, but that also meant hideous WW built up very quickly and I had to swap into slavery and whip core cities pretty savagely to keep things in check.

I found Justinian's trait combo to actually come in handy. Imperialistic got me a lot of great generals during the game, getting me a medic 3 and a couple of cities capable of pumping 17XP units by the end of it. Spiritual's also become more useful since slavery got slightly nerfed in BtS (higher upkeep and slave revolts). It allowed me to spend most of the time in caste system with the odd jump to slavery or war civics (vassalage/theocracy) without wasting time in anarchy.

 

[carl corey]

In my opinion Justinian isn't only about the Cataphracts. Granted they are good units and if they come early enough you'll be able to do some real damage. But there are other things that shine for the Byzantines:

- the Hippodrome, their UB, is perfect for running a SE. Use the culture slider for lots of happiness (you want multiples of 20% for full hippo & colosseum effect), and run lots of specialists everywhere; that may or may not mean Oracle for Code of Laws slingshot to run Caste System. You probably have more important things to do early on unless you have marble around. Two scientists per city is ok early on. The rest of the citizens should work production and cover the culture slider through commerce. Then you can run more specialists when you come around to CoL, switching to some Merchants to pay for culture.

- Imperialistic will let you get an early Great General, use it to unlock the Heroic Epic since you'll go for Aesthetics anyway (for Drama), so you might as well grab Literature too. National Epic isn't such a priority, especially if there's no marble, since you'll want GPs from all big cities.

- if you can't lightbulb, just build Academies with your scientists if you have more than one good research city, or build one Academy and settle the rest there. Great Merchants can fuel more research through trade missions even if they don't lightbulb the tech directly.

- when you finally reach Guilds, you should be ok using the Cataphracts as either main or secondary city capturing cities. Unfortunately Military Academies will be pushed back most probably after the next patch, so for your big wars you'll get Great Generals as either Military Instructors (not very needed for Cataphracts, you have stables already for two promotions), super units or mass promotions.

By the way, Cataphracts doesn't mean you don't want Military Tradition. You'll still want West Point for future wars, since Imperialistic + Spiritual pretty much spell war to the end.

---

And now I'm gonna say that my Justinian game ended up in a cultural victory. I vassalized all three AIs on my continent before Guilds (Gandhi and Izzy are easy meat when they share your religion, they vassalize really fast) and took advantage of the fact that I had a lot of religions on the continent. Also, a city I built early near Delhi kept building cultural buildings to avoid being sucked up by Delhi, and no one grabbed Music so I did and settled the GA in shrine city Delhi. All of that made the decision easier. I guess that's another way to play him.

By the way I went for early religion in that game too, since I had a gold tile I could work (2 hammers 2 commerce). Otherwise I found out that on Monarch I'm beaten about 9 times out of 10 for an early religion, so it's not even worth trying.