How should I go forward in my first Monarch game?

[star15389]

I'm Boudica on Custom Continents, my continent is largest and contains me, De Gaulle, Hammurabi, Charlie and Pericles on a large island off the coast. Stalin and Mao are on another continent and Lincoln and Peter inhabit the other. It's 1902, and I recently capitulated Ham and Charlie who are none too pleased with me; De Gaulle capitulated a few centuries ago. I'm three or four (can't really tell) techs behind the tech leaders Lincoln and Pericles, who are starting to build spaceship parts. I've got about 30% land, but I'm only third in power. Pericles and Linc hate me for using, um, stern methods to capitulate Charlie and Ham. Lincoln already has the Internet and has built a few spaceship parts so I don't have time to overtake him and win space. Lincoln is too far away to reinforce much as I don't have time for many Destroyers or Battleships but he has no uranium and can't trade for it as Pericles only has one and all the rest belong to me.

The problem is, if I nuke and capitulate him to stop that spaceship Pericles will almost certainly declare on me (it'll get him down to Furious and I'm sure Lincoln has plenty of gold for bribes) and he's first in power. My mighty fleet of a Battleship and two Caravels (EDIT: I lost the Caravels, so it's just one Battleship. And only two cities have Drydocks! ) can't really stand up to his massive navy and air force, and it will take a while to build enough Transports to get to Lincoln and ICBMs to nuke him into submission. Peter and Stalin are both big and Stalin is very backward, I'm almost sure he doesn't have Anti-Tanks. If I got both of them and Mao as vassals it would probably be enough for domination or at least diplo. Not sure I can do all that before Lincoln launches his spaceship, though.

But my experience with modern warfare is limited as I would usually tech way ahead in Prince; it wasn't even a fight. So I want to ask some experienced players: what should I do?

 

[FlyinJohnnyL]

Focus all your EP against Lincoln and keep sabotaging his parts. Build an airport so you can airdrop the spies (not sure if you can do this I just thought of it on the fly).

I guess you could also nuke and take his capital after he launches so it will fail. Then you'd buy enough time for dom or diplo.

 

[star15389]

Lincoln is only the leader in the Space Race. Mao completed the Apollo Program and Pericles has built a few Thrusters, and I can't sabotage them all.

 

[Joshua368]

Eh, I can't load the save because you use BUG as a separate mod. Maybe screenshots of the situation/tech screen/diplomacy and so on would work better.

A lot of it depends on how confident you are in a quick war, I would say taking out any threat on your home continent is important before launching overseas. Conquest of your continent though should have probably occured somewhat earlier.

Look carefully at the uranium locations, as well as checking to see if the civ has fission/rocketry. If either of your targets (pericles, lincoln) doesn't have uranium, you may be able to nuke them back into the stone age. Also use espionage to destroy any uranium mines before the war. Nukes can be very effective if you launch them in pairs and you can pretty much destroy every major city on the first turn of the war. At any rate, this sounds like a victory you'll have to fight for.


(Alternatively, look at the capital location of all potential space race winners... if its easily accessed such as coastal, wait for them to launch their ship and then fire two or three nukes. Then it will only take a meager force to capture and raze the city, destroying their ship. You could probably launch your own ship before they get a chance at their second.)

 

[star15389]

Most of them (not Stalin or Charlie; Charlie has rocketry but he's my vassal so I don't care) have both. The mainland of my continent is all my vassals. Pericles is on a very nearby island. Doesn't matter where he is; he has nukes, which are all I'm worried about.

Incidentally, my BUG isn't working. I get this error and it just goes to the regular game.

Spoiler :

The relevant graphs:

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I'm behind but Boudica's traits are great for warring and...

Spoiler :

I at least produce as much as he does. I can't see very many civs info, but here's the demographics screen:

Spoiler :

Which confirms I can trash Lincoln no problem (he must be below me, and AIs are stupid.) He is in fact trading uranium with Charlie, but I can make them cancel deals. Mao and Pericles both have one source each, but an AI wouldn't trade a resource it only had one of, would it?

Incidentally...I played one more turn, Peter captured Philadelphia from Lincoln! So I'm confident I can take him out. Charlie will have Laser soon so I can build SDI for the war with Pericles, though it might not be necessary as AIs are rather stingy with nukes. I'm positive I have a lot more than he does.

 

[star15389]

Oh, and both Lincoln and Pericles have coastal capitals. I haven't seen Mao's but it has the Colossus so it's probably on the ocean. I can really just raze their capitals? That'll destroy their ship? I had no idea, thanks!

 

[Joshua368]

Oh, and both Lincoln and Pericles have coastal capitals. I haven't seen Mao's but it has the Colossus so it's probably on the ocean. I can really just raze their capitals? That'll destroy their ship? I had no idea, thanks!

You should have probably traded enough maps by this point in the game to know the entire world.

Anyway yes capturing the capital will destroy the ship, but only after its been launched and on the way to Alpha Centurai. If you take it while the ship is still in production, it won't get destroyed and the capital will just move.

On normal speed a full ship takes only 10 turns to reach its goal, so make sure your army is in position beforehand!

 

[star15389]

I played through. Lincoln and Pericles both launched. Linc was a total pushover; I nuked Washington three times (he hadn't built SDI despite finishing the tech tree several turns ago), razed it and he made peace within five turns. Pericles was a different story...I surprise attacked Athens which took eleven mad Tactical Nukes and ICBMs before one finally hit. It was razed by the world's bravest Gallic Warrior.

Spoiler :

Pericles was not as amused as I was. He launched about fifty Guided Missiles and...TWO nukes at me.* The natural response to his restraint, of course, was a nuclear holocaust , the results of which are shown here:

Spoiler :

and here:

Spoiler :

He dropped three stacks of doom; one successfully captured a city before being destroyed; one came very close to doing it; and the other attacked my best-defended city amphibiously. I ended with -30 diplo for "You nuked us!" from Pericles and -20 "You nuked our friend!" from Lincoln, Mao, Charlemagne, and Hammurabi. In addition to Linc and Pericles, Peter finished the tech tree before me but never launched, which was very fortunate as his capital was on a lake. Presumably the brilliant AI decided to build the SS Engine in a tundra city without any hammers, though the war I bribed him into might have had something to do with it.

We reached Alpha Centauri in 1985. Personally, I feel sorry it has to meet us.

Spoiler :

Augustus Caesar queen, though personally I feel I did rather poorly.

Spoiler :

*Made all the more amusing by the fact that my production city building the SS Engine was on the other side of the continent, which he didn't even try to touch.

 

[Skallagrimson]

I need to start studying up on playing nukes. I usually conquer conventional-style in the modern age. Good ole grunts, slogging it out.