How to REX well?

@ Timo33

Spoiler :
I definitely need to train to handle barbs better

Just in case you don't know barbs can't spawn in 2tiles in every direction from your unit so the key is to space out your fog busters in such a position that you cover huge spaces with very few units. Remember, we had some neighbors around too so their cities culture/boundaries fog bust 2 tiles as well.

I was looking at the dates you gave me at the same time, and saw that i was taking more and more delay compared to you. What i mean is, i got Alpha slightly after you, then got Currency slightly before you, so the 2 delays made a snowball effect etc...

I checked my games event logs and I researched Alpha in 1480 BC, Currency in 875 BC, and Liberalism was actually in 500 BC. Hope that helps in comparison a bit more?

So yeah.. I dont exactly know where this problem came from. I maybe should have grown the city earlier and avoided the whip.

I didn't whip that city because I knew it needed to grow. I chopped one of the forested plain hills I was gonna need to mine and then worked mines to finish it. So I had a few mines, plus the one I was sharing from the neighboring city then everything else was farms.

Did i make the good move by teching it myself?

Perfect choice. I had the same problem.

So, after TGL built, i launched my GA. BIIIG misplay on my part, i switched to Caste + Bureaucracy + Pacifism, but forgot to chose a religion....... Another reason of my lack of GS.
Anyway, then my next problem came: i saw i wouldnt have another GS in time to bulb Lib, so i kept my GS for Lib, instead of bulbing Education. So i had Education in 6 turns at 100% research and all cities building research. For that i needed to trade techs for gold to almost all AIs, which might make them faster.
Did i make a mistake on that? Like, trading CoL for 30gold, is that a waste or was it ok if that makes Education come faster?

I had to sit on my golden age a few turns too. I almost did the same thing as you ;)........and I was all proud of myself for making the calculations of having music/NE/and my GS finish at the same time. I waited a few more turns, until I research CoL, then I started my GA which didn't really hurt cause I grew my TGL/NE city enough to run 7 scientist. You made a good choice for selling techs. Monarchs AI's are just backwards slow (compared to Immortal+) so you just suck it up and get some gold when you can. Besides, you're going to shoot way ahead of them soon anyways.

Then, i got Education. I was like great, I have Lib!! Time to bulb !!!
... But nope :/ the GS was chosing Compass for bulb.
I dont really know the bulb mecanics, so tell me if im wrong: but to avoid this, i needed to NOT have Iron Working and Sailing ?
So, i teched Compass so as to get Lib from the bulb... Once more some turns lost.

So yeah, how did you do in your game? Did you also teched it, or you bulbed it, or an AI traded it to you... ?

You need to have MC and Compass and NOT have researched Machinery in order to bulb Liberalism. I'm pretty sure I mentioned self researching those two in my other post (220-250 AD segment) ;)

Another thing, about civic swap: when do you prefer switching to slavery? In my game i think i switched right after my first settler was built, not before because i wanted to get the settler as fast as possible; but it still delays the build of the other settlers, so i dont know when the right time to switch is.
Same for Monarchy (hereditary rule), i got it pretty early thanks to Ramses, and wanted to grow my capital so as to start working cottages and make it become a nice Bureaucratic capital. So i think i switched to HR right when i got Monarchy, probably around 500BC. Was it a good thing, or should i have just waited for the GA to switch, and during this time just stay at happy cap?

I didn't change into slavery until I started getting ready to whip granaries.......so for quite some time. As far as HR went, I switched to that civic during my GA because calendar, silver, gems, wine, and ivory were giving me enough happiness til that point.
 
@cseanny

Spoiler :

Once again thank you very much for your answer =)

I dont think i have any other questions.

Anyway, i did just too many Rex games this lasts weeks: 2 or 3 with Cathy, then one with Pericles, one with HC if i remember correctly, then your Cathy game.. xD
I still want to try bhavv's idea of Sury of Sumerian, and in general i wanna train on Rexing just because i like this way of playing.

However, i realized that playing too much this way actually made me get use to playing that way; what i mean is that in the Pericles game i wasn't planning to Rex at all and actually i had to rush at the begining; i rushed, killed the guy, and then without even planning to rex, i rexed to 12 cities.
Also i did 2 games with Saladin and lost the first one, because i tried to Rex while sandwitched between Toku and Shaka xD (the second one was the same map, i got domination by being aggressive the whole game). So yeah i think i'm going to come back to more general ways of playing, so as to not get use to Rexing every single games xD

So i think now im gonna stop monopolizing the topic. Thanks again cseanny for all the help you gave me :)
 
Oh, I believe you. I just don't know how to

Spoiler :
Mylene is an amazing player (far far FAR better than me) so definitely check out her post. But from my perspective, when focusing on a small empire (Immortal +) I follow a pretty specific routine. Early tech normally follows food>BW>AH(before or after BW)>wheel>pot>writing>asthetics>2turns into Alpha then trade asthetics for it. Next I directly shoot up to Lit>Drama>Music(GA and GA)>then get some more trade going as I'm heading towards CS then using GSs to bulb toward Liberalsim.

This tech path allows you to typically trade for Iw, Myst, Med, Poly, Masonry, and Monarchy (might have to put 2 turns into it) very early in the game. Math, Mc, and CoL and Currency are usually not very far behind and easy to trade for because you have techs the AI doesn't prioritize.

So basically you focus on a small empire with vertical growth. I always try for 2 cottage cities, one of which will be a powerful Bureaucracy Capital with early growth (14+ pop by 1ad), 1 production powerhouse, then 3 others. With those 3 other cities I focus on farms first, production second, and always aim to get TGL/NE/GT somewhere. W/out marble the NE will have to do, unless IND.

I also emphasize getting an early academy which means I'll need to start a library in my 2nd city and be running 2 scientist no later than 1800 BC. You'll need to keep your power up so you don't get attacked so you'll need to whip some barracks at some point too (usually after granaries is fine). As soon as I get the GA from music, bulbed Philo, and have CoL I start a GA, switch into the safest religion in my TGL/NE city (or worst case use Taoism Missionary if there is no religion there), run Pacifism, and switch into caste. If I dont have CS yet It's not a biggy.......cause you'll be close!!, so just switch into it before your GA ends.

You simply use 2 good cottage cities (by this point each city should be 14+ or close to it) and run some mass scientist (TGL/NE city) so you can bulb techs you need. You're production city should be making non stop units (or enough to keep you from being attacked) while your other cities focus on building wealth and growth.

Once I hit Liberalism my preference it to take Nationalism and begin making the Taj. If I have marble my production city would/will try to make the Maousoleum too (assuming I'm not in fear of being attacked). On my way to the Taj I'll use farms/slavery/whip to get forges and CH (if maintenance is high) and at some point get theaters and colosseums for my future draft/whipping needs (happiness!).

I personally skip on markets and will only throw a bank in a city that has huge production (4-5 turns). Other than that, I typically have nothing more than a granary, barracks, forge, theater, and colosseum (only Capital and TGL/NE will have a library) till after my draft war. Use another GS during a GA (caste, Pac, Religion) and bulb part of PP to help speed up the overall process.

During the Taj GA I like to try and accumulate 1200+ gold which I will use to upgrade 10 macemen then focus on pure research from there.

SO, to reiterate......... 6 total cities consisting of 2 good cottage cities which helps fuel research in conjunction with bulbing), 1 production city, and 3 (one of which would have been your TGL/NE) cities focused on farms/production which will eventually be your drafting/whip epicenter. You should definitely be getting Rifles before 1000AD, or at the worst case a few turns after at which point you start drafting/whipping.

From those 3 cities, in 10 turns, it should look something like 10X3 Rifles (draft) + 4-6 more from the whip for a grand total of 35ish Rifles. Take those 35 Rifles and the 10 Rifles you just upgraded and you have 45 Rifles around 1150-1200 AD time frame. During the time you were drafting/whipping you're Capital and Production city should have been making trebs to suicide for collateral damage or a combination of a few number of trebs and spies/city revolt. Spies are probably the best choice depending on what units the AI is defending with.

So you end up getting 45 Rifles + the units your Capital/Production powerhouse made, so 50 Units plus. This should easily allow you to completely kill one AI and grab 6-7 cities and maybe even attack another AI, taking a few cities, then catipulate them.

At this point you would need to raise culture for happiness while those cities were growing back, and only in those 3 cities, I would start spamming cottages. Now for the new cities you took over. I'd build culture for border pops, then farms while whipping theaters/colosseums and then begin drafting/whipping from those cities. In 10 more turns you get a huge amount of units. Rinse and repeat. Courthouse can be nice in conquered cities, but to be honest, during that phase in the game I don't typically get them until after my Rifles draft/whip phase. Besides, on Immortal plus AIs typically already have CH, and if they don't making a Forbidden palace somewhere can work till I finish draft/whipping in those cities.
 
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