How to advance fast?

[Raliuven]

I failed at that. The 4 lux I had were not enough even with a marketplace so I needed 10%-20% lux. Started with 20% and then built some temples, cathedrals and courts in the size 12 semi-core cities (This lux rate wasn't enough in half-corrupt cities), then lowered to 10% but then started massive invasion wars and needed 20% again. I never managed to eliminate lux on republic unless I approach domination already.
In the best case I had 30% tax and 10% lux.
In worst case had 50% tax and 20% lux.
The AI coudn't pay gpt for my tech so I was forced to leave tax at 30% for maintenance and unit support. Of course with tax of 30% banks were good for some hard-core cities and for all metros (Added smith to the equation).

Regarding rates my rule for republic is lux no more then 20% and science no less then then 30%, for monarchy lux no more then 10% and science no less then 60%.

If you were the tech leader from the middle AA, how did you fail to capture . . . well whatever wonder you wanted? At this point you can pick and chose which you want/need for your VC and leaving the rest for the AI to waste their time building. Give the AI tech trades that lead them away from the wonders you are working on and let them build the rest.

If you don't have the ability to move the slider to 100% science or can't do it without going -gp, then that is the issue. I would suggest looking at where to cut maintenance and unit support (which was what everyone else is saying so I won't duplicate it here). The basic answer to your question - why can't you research faster - it is because you are spending 50+% on other things. If you are only researching at 30-50% through the entire game, then you will not excel at science.

Another thought - if you are dominating the research race by the mid-AA, up your difficulty level. The jump from regent to monarchy won't make a huge difference, but the AI should stay competative until the early MA. That will trim some time from your development.

One hint to the issue might be this:

then lowered to 10% but then started massive invasion wars and needed 20% again.

Offenseive wars are not usually healthy to a high research rate. Massive invasions need troops. Troops mean unit support. Wars=war weariness. Production is diverted to military units. The AIs involved in wars often slow down or lose the edge in research. There's less trading Etc.

 

[GamezRule]

@GamezRules - Couple of things about your save interest me. Firstly, destroying cities rather than capturing them? Also, how did you manage to capture so many wonders? Lots of prebuilds/chops etc?

You never have spelled my name right.

I built nearly every wonder in the game with a little SGL luck, how does 5 sound, and being able to finish a wonder before the AI ever got the tech. All in one city, except for Sun Tzu's and Leonardo's. I usually didn't have time to prebuild, but I did get a couple in. Forest chops don't go towards wonders, and I couldn't use them until engineering anyway, since I couldn't afford to lose production in my 20k city.

 

[shl7070]

The desired victory was conquest/domination so thats the reason for the unit support for SOD and war weariness from Aztec counterattacks. Before that I thought of going space but saw that tech may be too slow or the game will be too slow.

The philosophy slingshot was used for map-making and failed attempt at great lighthouse, in addition during the slingshot I was at war with the Babylonians and was't ready to switch goverments.

The games with lower science setting were archipelagoes with resource problems (so required more units, more bombard and defending vulnurable overseas cities built to hook up required resources) In this game the rate was 10% lux, 60% research and 30% tax.

p.s.
Dom achieved in 1782AD with nice spear and tank situation which I posted in interesting screendshoots

 

[Raliuven]

If domination/conquest is your goal, then maybe the real quesiton is why you are trying to excelerate the tech pace anyway? Neither of these goals require excelerated research. You are wasting shields building libraries and banks when you could be making units. If you look over at the GOTM, in GOTM109, some of the players didn't even get out of the AA before conquest/dominiation - some even won in the BC.

I'm not trying to tell you how to play your game, I just wonder if your problem is that your VC is not conductive to a fast research. A fast research pace might even be a bad idea - offensive units have an advantage until the arrival of infantry.

 

[MysteryX]

When it comes to research and development, you are behind the 8-ball in the ancient era anyway, particularly if you play on higher difficultly levels. All the AI's bonuses that come with higher difficultly levels have the greatest amount of comparative advantage against you at the very beginning of the game. You can only compete over time through good early expansion and making wise choices with your resources.

I don't worry too much about getting the tech lead in the ancient era, because it's stacked against me. I just want to stay close enough to be in the tech trading/purchasing process, and be powerful enough that I'm not too easy for my AI opponents to topple. Eventually, the AI tribes are going to go to war with each other and slow down. At the same time, I know when my Golden Age might be coming to speed me up.

I don't do war-mongering and I often shoot for the soft victory conditions, so I'm playing for a later game win anyway. However, I did just complete a game where I was shooting for a Cultural victory, but I got so far ahead in tech that Domination became easy. 4 of the 8 starting tribes had been eliminated; 1 of the remaining was hopelessly far behind while the 2 others couldn't help themselves from being in constant war with each other. The tech race was just about even until I got Scientific Theory, used that to get Electronics, immediately netting me Hoover Dam (which had a prebuild waiting), and Democracy just piled on my riches (with the Religious trait, 1 turn of Anarchy is worth the sacrifice for Democracy). While my production skyrocketed, the next 2 powerful tribes kept grinding each other out. Domination became easy.

But even if that's your Domination scenario (dominating late in the game with advanced units), you still don't need to be tops in research from the beginning. Just bide your time and have a plan to take the lead.

The overall pace of tech in the game isn't important. What is important is that you are ahead at the right time (if your strategy depends on a tech lead). Even if you only get to Industrial by 2000, that's a great game if all your opponents are still stuck in Medieval.

 

[shl7070]

If domination/conquest is your goal, then maybe the real quesiton is why you are trying to excelerate the tech pace anyway? Neither of these goals require excelerated research. You are wasting shields building libraries and banks when you could be making units. If you look over at the GOTM, in GOTM109, some of the players didn't even get out of the AA before conquest/dominiation - some even won in the BC.

I'm not trying to tell you how to play your game, I just wonder if your problem is that your VC is not conductive to a fast research. A fast research pace might even be a bad idea - offensive units have an advantage until the arrival of infantry.

The enemy continent was beyond reach. I coudn't invade it with suicide galleys. I needed navigation/magnetism to reach them and it's better to have qualty military when invading.

The military makeup was based on my information on the trade screen so I saw I had good tech lead and emphasized cavalry. If I was behind or equal I would emphasize bombardment.
I didn't really required the panzers. They were just a bonus.
In early stage they had pikemen and I used crusaders and cavalry to take them.
When they got muskets and rifles I added arty for grinding them.
When I got panzers they were used to quicken the domination but I would win without them. It would just take 10 more turns or something like that.

 

[dominatr]

My way of advancing fast is to make a ton of money, like in my game now i have 50,000 gold, so you can buy techs from the AI. Make sure you have a lot of cities, build Libraries, Universities, and Research Labs in each, and with all of the money you can max the slider and still be gaining gold.

 

[vmxa]

shl7070 I took a look at this concept of faster research in your game. I personally do not care about faster anything. I just like to kill them. I started to make some feedback on what was going on in the 230BC save, but quickly saw it was going to take some time, especially as I had not been playing much of late.

I got this start on feedback:

First thing I see is the hill next to Berlin has a mine. Not sure when this was done, but it is a waste of worker task as it is not in any towns radius. Next I see two hills in Berlin that are being worked and one has no road and the other has Iron and no mine.

Two workers are working on plains that are not being worked. Berlin is on wealth at 230BC? You have a citizen on a plains that has neither a road nor water/mine. You have +3 food at size 12, so mine one of those plains to gain extra shields.

If you are not going to make workers/settler in Berlin sell the granary. Lots of land not filled and only one settler in queue. I see at least two lux and no efforts to get them.

At this point I thought I would recreate the map to see, if map settings would have a determental effect on fast research and getting to modern age. Mainly as you were talking about some time frames for eras and techs.

I suspected that the games you were using for reference were better than average starts and either large continents or pan maps. Not sure, just wondered.

So I took the world seed and cranked up C3C and take a little run.

 

[vmxa]

It seems that there is no real reason to not make pretty fair research pace with your start. Here are three screens 30AD, 650AD and 940AD. I got to the IA working on Elect at that point.

I doubt the game would see modern age as at this level you can just conquer them. They will have pitiful units and organization. The main delay is traveling over poor terrain that has few roads, forested tundra, mounts and hills and jungles.

 

[vmxa]

Here is a log, if you wantto see some of the progressions.

Spoiler Turns to 10AD :

4000BC:
Found in place and see the gov has put the citizen on a cow across the river. I move it to the cow on my side of the river. Why, so I do not have to cross the river twice. Start a warrior. Select Alpha at 20%. If I was playing for myself I would research IW to get swords.

As we are interested in getting to modern times quickly and at Regent, we need lots of research. This can be done with several methods. We can build lib/uni and run Republic. Dem would be nice, but we have to research optional techs and revolt a second time.

We can get lots of farms, but those are later and we are on continents, so it may not have the land to use for a long time.

3950BC:
We start a road on the cow. Why, we want research, so we need gold to convert to beakers.

3350BC:
hut gives 25 gold. We have a road on two cows with the third getting a road. Irrigated one cow.

3000BC:
Met Hammi.

2630BC:
found Leipzig.

2550BC:
pop CB.

2470BC:
pop Pottery.

2030BC:
found Hamburg. Working on Writing. Making a Granary in Berlin.

1750BC:
pop Myst from hut.
Both exploring warriors have made vets. Regent barbs are soft.

1700BC:
bust another barb camp, the third one so far. Curragh is nearing the northern end of the continent/island.

1600BC:
exposed the island, at least I will call it that. Could call it a smallish continent. A couple of fogged tiles here and there to search with the troops. Looks like I have only Hammi to deal with. He has not even sent out an explorer as far as I can tell. Drop research to 20%.

1575BC:
Trade Hammi two for one out of kindness. I hold off on any more trades for now. Start on Philo.

1375BC:
I take Lit for my free tech for Philo. Trade Write for Pottery, so kind indeed. Trade Lit and some gold for IW. I know what you are thinking, no not the Eastwood quote. Why give them Lit? Well what is the down side? They probably could not beat me to GLB, if I went for it.

If they do, I will take it eventually, so no harm. In the mean time I am helping them get their research going better than it has been and I get a tech that I would have had to research. I have circumnavigated the land. Busted another camp.

1275BC:
I forgot to mention that I am research Math for SoZ. Hooking up iron. Have MoM going as a pre. Will found town next turn. Been working on the Colossus for some time. Worker in each town.

1050BC:
start on CoL.
The reason I put Konigsberg there was to start to form a block and of course use the river.

1000BC:
boat sunk in the high seas. Bust a camp on the way to the block site.

900BC:
Frankfurt completes the block of Hammi. He now has to enter my borders or use a boat to get to the land in the rear.

875BC:
MoM completes and I start on SoZ. I did not switch as both wonders could trigger a GA for Bismark. So I may as well get the three happy in Berlin. No reports of anyone working on SoZ. Odds are we have all the Ivory anyway.

825BC:
Working on Map Making to get some harbor options in at least Leipzig and of course to get a galley or two out looking for a new home. I do not recall the map that well, but it seems that I can go east or west and have a shot at land. NW is also a likely path, but is less than the other two directions. Can't go south and north is not real great either.

690BC:
Found Munich. This give us all the cows. It starts a wall as trouble will start here most likely.

650BC:
start on Republic, but this will not be so fast.

570BC:
Well here we go, Hammi sends a spear combo into our borders. I kill it. He has 5 towns all size 1, except the cap size 2.

510BC:
Looks good as SoZ comes in and we are in a GA. Colossum will finish on the IBT.

410BC:
autorazed Niev. Got 6 gold and a slave. AC comes out.

370BC:
Hammi wants peace, nope. He cannot help me research and I see no use for him.

330BC:
start on Construction.

310BC:
kill another settler combo and AC goes elite.

230BC:
take out 3 spears and capture Babylon.

170AD:
start on Currency.

130BC:
autorazed Ashur.

90BC:
GLB done.

50BC:
capture Akkad. Found Hannover. We have 12 towns now.

30BC:
Revolt and get 5 turns. Going to have to starve a couple of towns. HBR was 3 turns out, but will be side tracked.

10BC:
captured Elipli and a slave. I lost a galley and an AC on the IBT.

10AD:
autorazed Eridu losing a sword and got 12 gold and a slave. Bremen was founded last turn and was pillaged by a barb on the IBT.

 

[vmxa]

Spoiler Turn 30AD to 940AD :

30AD:
autorazed Urnk for about 40 gold and Hammi is gone.

70AD:
Revolt over and we are a republic. HBR will come in on the IBT. Disband some units. Need workers now and settlers.

170AD:
Poly comes in on the IBT and we will flip to a new era. Galley is not heading in the proper direction it seems, so I change course. I had switched FP to Bremen as Elipi is not going to grow. Berlin is working on the Great Wall as a pre for Sun Tsu.

Someones borders popped and we now have the wines in our border so I get the place expansion popup.

190AD:
More palace expansion, won't list that again. I got Fuedalism for my free tech and start on Mono in 8 turns. No spears to upgrade and no reason to upgrade swords. Boat finds an island that looks to be empty. I have fog sentries out to prevent uprisings near towns. Two AC's are going to remove a camp next turn. Settler headed for that area to try to get the dyes.

230AD:
Bust 2 camps. The tiny island lead to another land mass and I met Hannibal. He is down CoL and Currency, but has Monarchy. He wants too much for a tech I do no need. Let him stew as I have the GLB to give it to me, if I find someone else that knows it.

270AD:
Finally get another town down on a jungle tile on the east of Heidelburg..

280AD:
Two more towns down and I see Green borders. Mono in on the IBT.

290AD:
Start on Theo and see AZ, but no contact yet.

300AD:
Found New Berlin. Met Montie. Down the same techs as Hannibal, but does not know Monarchy. See a barb camp on the eastern end of our land. Sword will deal with that.

330AD:
Clear the camp, but 5 barbs attacked an AC all dying. That should end barbs on the land as no fog is left. Found New Leipzig on coastal hill.

Disband a sword to speed settler in Babylon.

360AD:
Start on Ed. No surprise the GLB is worthless on this level. Found another town, this in the tundra.

380AD:
Met Arabia and they are down the same three techs. Carthage has learned CoL recdently. I got Monarchy from the GLB.

I have a number of wonders going, nothing else to do right now.

400AD:
Met Alex and they are the most backward so far. Found New Konigsberg. Put pop as science for now as it is all hills.

So meet all players and they are about what you would expect at this level. I have been disbanding new AC units to speed builds as they cannot be upgraded and will not be worth anything by the time we go to war.

410AD:
Alex finished ToA. Someone cascaded to GW and it is done.
Found New Frankfurt.

420AD:
Start Astro. Start on universities.

440AD:
Sun Tzu done. Dyes online, drop lux slider.

450AD:
New Munich fills out the north now. HG done someplace. Switch pre to uni.

460AD:
Found another tundra town by elipi.

480AD:
Two more tundra towns.

490AD:
Start on Eng in 4 turns. Switch Sistine to Cope in Berlin.

530AD:
Start on Invention in 4. Found New Hannover on the coast past Berlin.

540AD:
Drop lux to zero with the gems online.

560AD:
Found New Bremen in tundra.

570AD:
start on Gun in 4 at 80%. Circumnavigated the other continent. Looks like Carthage and Arabia have entered the middle age, but know no MA techs. I was hoping to get Chiv from them at some point.

610AD:
Cope done, start Leo in Berlin. Finally disbanded the last archer. Boat sunk on the way home. Bank in 4.

620AD:
Still chopping all the trees and clearing jungle a little at a time. Want to get the 10 shields while they are of some use and to prepare for rails.

650AD:
Start on Chem in 4 at 80%.

Looking at the 1020AD save posted I see Banking in 2. 12 workers and 73 units costing 52gpt. Carthage has towns on your land and land is still open on the landmass. A town is down on the tiny island for I have no idea why. What do
you want to get from that town?

Why not either invade someone or just use the land on your continent to propel you to a win? Looks like no trees chopped and no jungle cleared, maybe a few tiles.

In 650AD I have only a small area to fill in the tundra and have plenty of time as no one is coming until they get Nav/Mag. There are a couple of places I could drop a town down in the borders now, but may not bother.

Teching Chem with Banking done. Much of the forest are removed now and some jungle. 30 towns now, but only 25 workers. It is a bit short, but with a smallish landmass we can get by and can pop out more, if needed.

We are near our allowed unit count. That will go up with the new towns and some towns going to cities. We have 7 wonders and 2 going up. A palace pre going for another. The next thing is to prepare for our invasion.

I would select Hannibal as he is close, has silks and he seems to be the leader over there. Probably start the gearing up for war in 20 turns as we get to the next age. Use galleons and maybe have infantry by the time we shove off.

One of the things that you see is the difference in Berlin early. I started minning the hills and moving pop off the low shield tiles as soon as food was no longer an issue. Even mined a plains that had been irrigated. Berlin was probably making 43 spt during the GA. You can get things build that way. It makes 31spt now.

A worker will soon be connecting the salt, but no hurry as we have no reason to make troops right now. No one is coming for some time and we are not leaving for 50 turns or more.

680AD:
Montie demands Kit and I laugh, so DOW comes my way.

690AD:
start Physics in 4. No one has even learned Lit.

700AD:
Found New Stuttgart.

720AD:
New Bonn.

730AD:
start Mag in 4.

770AD:
start on Metal in 4. Bad timing as an AC just came out, so it will be the last one.

780AD:
New Salzberg.

810AD:
start ToG in 4 at 70%. Start a bank as a pre for Newtons in Berlin.

830AD:
New Dort...
I forget if Montie got Alex to declare on me this turn or last.

850AD:
crap I got Nat for my free tech. Start on MT in 4, want those cavs. I had just finished my first musket, so I upgrade it. Time to start a small fleet.

860AD:
New branden...

890AD:
start Steam in 5. Found Berlin2. All tundra in borders now. Cavs and Frigates builds started to go with cannon and rifles.

940AD:
start on Electricity in 5. Workers are not well placed for rail work, my bad. The last tile of jungle is being cut now. I have two tiles with trees (non tundra) that I did not want to chop, but will when rail gang gets to them.

I think Leipzig2 was build last turn. Three more spots in the tundra to make a town. Going to RP after Electricity to get faster workers and Infantry. I think 2 frigates is enough for escorts at this level on this map.

Nearly forgot that Newtons finished in Berlin. Only the palace and Sistines are going. I had hope to use one for an HE.

Two coal tiles connected and one not. Turns out the only mine in Leipzig has coal.

None of the others have Lit, Mono, Eng, sad for sure. So nearly a full age back, Alex is still in the AA.

 

[vmxa]

My way of advancing fast is to make a ton of money, like in my game now i have 50,000 gold, so you can buy techs from the AI. Make sure you have a lot of cities, build Libraries, Universities, and Research Labs in each, and with all of the money you can max the slider and still be gaining gold.

Hard to buy techs from them below Demi, they just have too much trouble learning them.

 

[Aabraxan]

OK. On to shl7070's question about fast research. vmxa has already taken a shot at it, but I can't resist.

I'm going to start with the 1020 AD save, just to see what's going on.

1020 AD:

19 cities
16 workers (12 natives/4 slaves)
4 luxes
2590 gold
+43 gpt
308 beakers per turn
72 maintenance
52 unit costs
Republic

There's a whole lotta black on the map. Earlier exploring would have put you in a better position for tech trading.

I scroll through cities, trimming things down that don't contribute to a domination or conquest victory. That means that temples are gone, unless a border pop is within a turn or two.

I also swap production to military. If a city is good enough to warrant a rax, it's good enough to build a knight. If I were going to keep these cities on wealth, I'd sell the rax.

Don't build trebs in towns with raxes (unless you have Sun's). It's a waste of a good rax. You've got defenders in almost every city, if not every one, and that'd not necessary at Regent.

By the way, that sleeping SOD at Munich is more than ample to have cleared your continent.

OK. After a big ol' temple sale, and thinning of units, I've got gold up to 2875, with banking due in 1 at -40 gpt. I had to bump lux spending up to 20%, but maintenance is down to 54 gpt and unit costs down to 28. Beakers are up to 362. I haven't hit enter yet, simply "tuned" the empire.

Science is directly tied to commerce, so a fast research game: (1) increases commerce; and (2) trims expenses. I would also suggest that if you had run a leaner empire from the beginning, you would have put many more beakers towards research by this point.

 

[Raliuven]

Qustion since I can't open the save - what wonders do we have?

 

[Aabraxan]

Knights Templar, Statue of Zeus, Sistine (under construction), Sun's, Mausoleum of Mausollos (sp?), Cope's. That's all I can see in CA2.

There's another good article on the 4 rules of Wonder Addiction that might prove handy.

 

[vmxa]

Aabraxan I only posted to about 940AD. I think I was in the IA, not sure. I know I had RP started by 990AD. I wanted to see if you could do 4 or 5 turn techs from that start location at Regent. You can.

The saddest thing is no army, so no HE or MA or Pentagon well into the IA.

 

[shl7070]

I see I could make it faster and ger IA circa 1000AD instead of 1340AD
Still regent is too easy now (and monarch as well, I beat pangeas quickly at monarch) may be it's time for emperor.

This is the final situation on the German map
It's actually 1780AD not 1842 as written

 

[Abaddon]

Are we turning this game into a mini race? I might have a go playing.

Can someone explain the tundra towns to me.. i've not yet learnt about specialist towns.. those outside my core i tend to have on worker production

 

[Aabraxan]

Can someone explain the tundra towns to me.. i've not yet learnt about specialist towns.. those outside my core i tend to have on worker production

There's an article in the War Academy by Bede entitled "The Role of the Specialist Citizen." I haven't downloaded vmxa's saves, but I looked at his screenshots. He packed the tundra with towns, and (I suspect) flipped the first citizen to a specialist. Those towns will never grow, but they don't have any improvements, either. They'll just sit there, producing beakers and gold, and supporting 1 unit each, until the end of time. The thing about specialists is that their output is unaffected by multipliers (like libraries or banks), but it's unaffected by corruption either.

 

[vmxa]

Yes I think I had 16 towns in the tundra. 13 were left at size 1 with a beakerhead only. 2 were allowed to go to size 6 as they had either some grass or several deer.

They were used to rush out settlers for the tundra. Now they are mostly beakerheads.
One was grown to size 10.

I ended at 1350AD with Computers known and Rocketry being researched as the goal was to get to the modern age in the 1300's.

Spoiler Turn 990AD to 1350AD :

990AD:
start RP in 5.

1040AD:
start Medicine in 4. Rails to all 4 points now. Sunk the barb galley that has been around forever. Using some policemen to get a few more shields in the boat towns and some short rushing.

Not sure, if I mentioned upgrading cannons and rifles. I had about 4 rifles and 3 cannon.

1080AD:
start Sci Meth in 4.

1120AD:
start Ind in 4. Whoops change to AT and switch palace to ToE. Drop research to zero. Will have a 69 shield overflow, not bad.

1130AD:
Hoovers start in Berlin. We have AT and Electronics doing Ind in 4.

1170AD:
Still they do not have Lit or Mono or Eng. Start Corp in 4. Forgot to mention Hamburg 2was built in 1130.

1210AD:
start Steel in 4.

1250AD:
start Refine in 4.
Whoops forgot Kron2 went up. That is all for the tundra. In fact no more for the mainland.

1260AD:
All tiles have a road, except 4 next to the volcano. All flat tiles have a rail. Most hills do as well. All boats done for the invasion.

11 galleons, 3 frigates.
4 ac elites
5 arties
16 infantry
15 cavs
settler
worker

We are 84 units for 79 allowed. Off we go.

1270AD:
start on Combust in 4. Sailing to the target I see chunk of land in the fog. Will need to check on that later. I also see Hannibal has dropped onto the tiny island. Looks like Montie has been eating Hannibals lunch, so they are no longer the owners of the land. That works out as I do not have to start a war with Carthage now.

I should have mentioned that I did not leave a single troop on the mainland. I have one city making a cav. No artie left either.

1290AD:
start Flight in 4.

1295AD:
dropped invaders on the Az soil.
Hoovers in and start a factory in Berlin.

1300AD:
razed an Az town. Found Frankfurt2 and use a galleon to rush a wall. I doubt that is needed, but just SOP. Send fleet home. It took only 2 AC to take the town down. Arties all missed, but one.

IBT:
2 horses die attacking.

1305AD:
3 AA units at the door. Arties redline them. Galleon disband on rax and we rush the rest. 3 elite AC kill the units.

1310AD:
2 galleon disbanded and rush harbor. Start Mass in 4 at 80%.
captured Utica with 2 cavs and rush a wall. Silks in Utica.

1315AD:
kill 3 Az spears next to Utica. Build 3 airfields in mainland to fly over some workers next turn. Airfield by Frank2.

1320AD:
kill a spear and an archer. Use galleon to start short rush of temple and gold to finish in Utica.

1325AD:
elite AC kill 3 horses. Bomber going up just for grins.

1330AD:
Start on Motor in 4 at 80%. Start first rails in new world.

1335AD:
upgrade galleons to transports.
all 4 elite AC win, but still no leader. I have not gone out as I would have to decalre on Hannibal or get RoP. When borders pop I can use cavs to get across with no DOW.

1340AD:
cavs go 7-1 before finally getting an elite. 4 cavs win and 1 elite created. 2 elite AC and 2 cavs win. So Montie finaly got a few units on scene 16 to be exact. Many were MDI.

1345AD:
AC makes a leader and we form the 1st and stuff 3 cavs in it.

Borders pop. We kill 4 more units and attack Leptis Magna with 1st. Silks are online now. I had to make a road of course.

1350AD:
Got Computers for free tech and started on Rocketry. Start MA and HE. Switch cav build to panzer. Whats my traits again? I mean Military, but not a lot of promotions. Scientific, but zero SGL's, though I was first to scores of techs.

Upgraded a few infantry to Mechs. The goal was to get to modern age inthe 1300's and that is done. Game is over anyway. They still do not have Lit, they still do not have Theo and one does not have Eng.