HUI Game #1 - Pacal II

A big thank you to - dankok8, UWHabs, learner gamer, michmbk & dr s

BTW - I was worse off economically a few turns ago and actually kind of recovering now, but all this advice is going to come in very handy, here's what i have summarised,

(A)Tech path -
1) CoL - Get those courthouses and on the path to economic recovery asap.
2) Construction - Extra happiness from the UB is very important + Cats & Elephants to take care of Nappy.
3) calendar - To hook up all those happiness resources, we'll trade sailing from our mate Shaka

(B) I plan to switch the capital to Moscow due to the nice mix of Commerce & Production

(C) GG settle in Novgorod

(D) Use GS to build academy in Moscow.

(E) City Specialisation
1) Mutal - GP farm
2) Moscow - New Capital
3) Novgorod - Military pump
4) Horse city - Production
5) Rostov + St Petersburg - commerce

(F) Switch espionage points to shaka.

Some useful info on Micro as well + Thanks for catching the stupid move on the cows, i was thinking it was in my BFC

Well, once i get partly done with this plan at least i'll be off looking to kick some french rear end ... Seriously i'm quite certain Nappy will DoW before our recovery is really complete, and i usually like to be the DoW'er rather than the DoWee , so this is only going to be the 2nd time ever that i will be fighting a defensive war, with the GW to boot we should be popping some GG's pretty quickly.

 

After a little reflection, there are a few more small points worth noting:

Shafi, don’t forget that if you want the jumbos from construction then you’ll need HBR too - in the absence of HBR, construction will only give you access to catapults. (I’m sure you know this but it’s something I’ve overlooked on more than one occasion to my downfall! )

Re: settling the silver / wheat city. To me, the maths suggests that this city should be settled sooner rather than later (maybe when on the verge of getting currency), even if only to work the silver (and stagnate at one pop whilst building a monument) initially. (If I’m wrong on this BTW, can someone please advise me where my mistake is so that I can learn. Thanks. ) As I understand it, this mine will provide 5 commerce (C) on completion, there’ll be another say 1C from the trade route (maybe 2C post sailing), 1C from the city’s central BFC square (for 7C or 8C once the silver is mined, worked and connected), and an extra 1C or 2C with the additional trade route following currency. Assuming its maintenance doesn’t exceed 7C, (and St Petersburg for comparison has a maintenance of 4.71C and is more developed), this city is therefore capable of paying for itself as soon as the silver mine is working and connected (=move two workers to the city’s mine ASAP.) Once currency is teched, and the financial pressure eases, you can then look to work the wheat instead of the silver so the city grows to work both tiles. In the interim, accessing the silver raises your happy cap by one immediately, which means a few more cottages can be worked throughout your empire.

Talking of cottaging, perhaps it’s also worthwhile taking two workers from (i) the three workers I mentioned (see previous post) around Rostov and / or (ii) Moscow’s worker in production to have them build two cottages around Moscow so they can be worked instead of the mines. (I just realised that I mentioned in the previous post that it was best to cottage Moscow without any mention of assigning workers to the task, apologies!) If doing this, perhaps send the other two workers with the worker you have standing on a mine NE of Novgorod to (i) your new double ivory city or (ii) the wheat / silver city site.

If you’re trading alphabet for sailing and archery, my guess is that Shaka’s only going to love you even more...is it therefore worthwhile exploiting this to see what it will also take to get Shaka to stop trading with Nappy? Admittedly, Nappy will hate you even more but causing a little friction between Shaka and Nappy may not be a bad thing for you.

Look forward to the next update!

PS UWHabs: I’m certainly no expert either (far from it in fact!)...as my user name suggests, I’m learning all the time. With that in mind, you may be right in that there may indeed be value in Shafi cottaging two of Novgorod’s floodplains (as mentioned previously, there are in fact two that don’t need to be farmed to work Novgorod’s hills pre-biology) as an emergency measure, (think of it as Shafi’s version of quantitative easing to help end the credit crunch ), if getting cash is really that big an issue. As the financial pressures end, mines could be worked again instead and the cottages eventually watermilled in line with the city’s status as a military pump. The only caveat if going this route is Nappy and how much military Shafi wants Novgorod to produce ahead of the inevitable next war.

 

Cottages!!

(copyright DaveMcW, 2008)

...which is a shorter way of saying what learner gamer said. Seriously, I'm really enjoying watching this game, Shafi. Thanks for posting

 

You should turn you EP towards shaka and nappy the turn you decided to rush cathy. All EPs you put on cathy went wasted after you killed her.

 

True - this was more oversight than anything else.

BTW - i have completed the next round which is basically an economic recovery, no war this time , but hey it's me Shafi, so towards the end of the round i have started to prepare for an invasion again ....

Will post the write up tomorrow.

 

I believe (someone can correct me if I'm wrong) that settling an additional city increases your maintenance for all your cities, so you have to factor that in as well.

Also, while you acquire the maintenance immediately, it will be some turns before you can work the silver, so you have to be able to carry the city at a loss for several turns. Finally, since you're settling it primarily for the happiness from the silver, you should build a road to the silver before you settle the city.

With that said, settling the silver city seems to me to be a higher priority than the rice/ivory city. I don't think you can afford that one right now. Anyway, why not let the AI chop all that jungle?

 

Number of cities -maintenance will rise in all cities with every new one founded. I don't remember the formula though.
Both Ivory and Silver are happies, and happies increase capabilities of ALL cities. Even considering the maintenance, both are perfectly viable and should be settled ASAP. Bringing happiness resources online will be obvious first task for both cities, to allow your existing cities grow.

 

We trade Alphabet for Sailing + Archery with Shaka.

Spoiler :

Some extensive micro management of all of our cities to squeeze the maximum commerce out of all of our cities. We settle the GG in ivory city which will obviously function as our military pump once we get through our ‘Credit Crunch”.

Spoiler :

Shaka beat us to the Rice & Ivory site by one lousy turn …. Not the greatest of luck …. So we turn the settler around and send him to the northern silver site.

Spoiler :

Great Scientist born in Mutal and we send him to Moscow which is to be our future Bureaucracy capital.

Spoiler :

Meanwhile we have a chariot scout out Nappy’s land, have a look at what appears to be his SoD …

Spoiler :

That prompted us to have a quick look at the power ratings,

Spoiler :

Not bad, we should be able to handle him, funny thing is how low Shaka is in the power ratings, can anyone explain that? Never seen that happen I must say …
We use the GS for an academy in Moscow. Finally complete research of currency aided by almost all of our cities building research and now start on CoL. Our top four commerce cities Mutal / Moscow / St Peterburg / Rostov Switch from building research to Markets, meanwhile the production cities (Horse city & ivory city) switch to production of wealth. We take the southern barb city for some much needed gold, that should help us towards CoL.

Spoiler :

We settle silver city for the extra happy.

Spoiler :

We trade with our neighbours for some happy resources. Cow for Dyes with Shaka and Corn for wine with Nappy, in the meanwhile Nappy’s relations with us seem to have improved significantly.

Spoiler :

Some more micro-ing in all of our cities that had hit a happy cap to get them to start growing again. We complete CoL and begin researching Construction as calendar is less of a priority since we have some of the calendar resources from trading.
We complete construction and begin researching calendar. We begin spamming courthouses throughout the empire.
We complete researching calendar and begin researching HBR. We trade Currency, CoL & Calendar for HBR, Metal casting & 60 gold with Nappy.

Spoiler :

We research Meditation, Priesthood & then Monarchy, after which we switch civics to Hereditary Rule.

Spoiler :

We now begin research Civil Service with the intention of switching to Bureaucracy once we are done. We take the 2nd barb city for some more gold, to keep our somewhat fragile economy going.

Spoiler :

We complete Civil Service and begin researching paper. We also trade CS with Nappy for Machinery.

Spoiler :

I am much more comfortable with the condition of my economy and begin to build an army for invasion, I am basically focusing on Phants + Cats for the invading force, some of Shaka’s border cities seem lightly defended + his power rating has started to sharply increase whilst his relations with me have dropped, so in my opinion as soon as my forces are ready Shaka has to die …

This is what the current power graph looks like,

Spoiler :

The plan is that, we’ll send a smaller army, to take out Shaka’s cities to the south (the rice & ivory site) which are lightly defended and send the major offensive force towards his capital, this way we only need to defend the western front between the mountains, which should be easy to hold with a fort.

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Well, that’s where we will end this round, and the next round is definitely going to be the “Invasion of Zulu lands” unless you guys have some totally different thoughts on the matter.
As you may have noticed I have greatly reduced the level of description on the micro’s now for two reasons, as the game progresses it can get monotonous + tedious also obviously the micro management is much much more important in the early game, hope that’s ok with everyone, however after looking at my save if you do have feedback on the micro aspect of the game please do let me know, I am as always looking to learn.
Save game attached.

 

• It would've been better to head into binairy research while you were waiting for your GS.
• Novgorod needs some cottages on those FPs.
• I'm not sure why there's cottages on grassland near Mutal when there's a FP being unworked.

 

Seems like a good round. Some quick thoughts.

Shaka did you a favor by grabbing that site. Just look at his workers improving it for you!

You have marble, I think you should tech literature for the National and Heroic Epics, not to mention the great library.

Do you have a buddhist city? It might be worth switching to get Napoleon pleased with you in order to dogpile Shaka. Might as well grind down both their stacks at the same time.

 

I must say, i've never done binary research, most of all i'm just afraid i might forget to turn the slider back on . Just so that i know, what would have been the beneifit in this case?
I need the food to support, the production tiles in Novgorod, do i really need to be cottaging it up?
Missed the FP in Mutal earlier on, theres a worker improving it right now.

True about Shaka - Pity we have to thank him by killing him
Yup, i think that would be good for our next tech. might be a bit late for the GL dont you think? Besides letting everyone else build wonders for us is fun . Shaka's got a few too ....
Not too sure about the budhist city, i'm gonna have to check the save, if not having "no state religion" may also help our relations with nappy wont it?

 

Run 0% before the Academy, run 100% when the Academy is built. The gold you would have saved is then multiplied by the Academy's science bonus, which can be quite significant, especially early game.

 

Looking to play the next round tonight (thats in about 14 hours from now) and post the write up tomorrow. Been engrossed in the NC-JC game and the Atlantis map , those two are really fun .

So my plan is to try to get as chummy as possible with Nappy and build up my army of Phants + cats and hit Shaka hard, i will be taking some of my left over swords along as well.

Any other advice?

 

This is really nice.. Please do keep it up..

 

Welcome to the Forum !!!

Thank you!!!

 

Thanks! I've been in the forums for about a month now and it has really helped me with the game. Hope i could learn from you guys and hopefully develop so i could give out advice in the future as well..

Cheers!

 

This may well be too late but, just in case, very well played Shafi, a textbook economic recovery (although I hope the real world credit crunch doesn’t last for 200 years. ) A couple of (concise) points:

Shaka’s power recently looks to have started climbing faster than yours, so it maybe worthwhile (i) judiciously using the whip or / and then (ii) getting a few more cities to pump military so you can hit him sooner rather than later. Although whipping the coastal tiles in Rostov and Chichen Itza will cost you some commerce, 6GPT can be recouped by selling fish to Nappy.

Depending on how quickly you do go to war, is it worthwhile building a spy or two destined for Ulundi (and therefore re-assigning your espionage to Shaka), which a zoom-in tells me contains the SoZ, ToA and, if I'm not mistaken, walls. The window may have already passed for this but I thought I’d throw it out there.

Re: the tech path, for me, it’s either (i) paper and onto liberalism or (ii) if you’re going to war, how about engineering for the trebs? I agree it’s too late for the GL but literature will certainly access the epics to maximise your marble....and, looking at Nappy’s power rating, my guess is that you’ll want the HE eventually if you’re subsequently going to take him out.

Post war and into recovery, how about a forge and temple in Mutal to help try and generate a GE or GP - the latter may prove particularly useful when you get hold of the city of uMgungundlovu.

Work the corn and banana in Moscow to encourage faster regrowth now that you have the capacity to work many more cottages there.

Look forward to seeing how you go!

 

Dont worry i havent started on the next round yet In fact i dont think i will be playing the next round today after all cos i just got a call from some old friends to join them for a and maybe some other alcoholic beverages

Sorry folks ... but i'll definitely take this up tomorrow ....

BTW - all i did was put all of your advice in to practice, but i guess it goes to prove that you should'nt be too shy of pushing your economy to the limit ...

Thanks for your input as always.

 

Have a great night!

Took another quick look at your save and came up with three further points:

(a) From what I can see, you don’t yet have a level four military unit. Given that (i) the GL is likely now a no–go and (ii) the real value of literature is in the HE at this point given your neighbours’ power ratings and the need to produce troops for war, I’d therefore delay the literature tech path until the war with Shaka is over (which will hopefully generate you a 17XP unit or another GG, which you can use to create a 20XP MASH unit). Although Mutal will benefit from the NE, my guess is that you want it to be producing troops right now.

(b) For future reference (and as an aid to anyone who’s reading this thread looking, as Shafi’s title implies, to learn ), Uxmal is the type of city that would benefit hugely from whipping a monument, growing back to pop 2 and whipping the granary when the food bin is half full (or chopping just one forest - since Pacal is expansive - to build the granary). (Note: you could even whip the granary here first, regrow, and then whip the monument.) If whipping, Uxmal would regrow (from pop 1 after the whip, back to pop 2), working just the wheat and then start life again as a pop 2 city, but with the food bin half full for evermore. This would (i) accelerate all future builds (eg. a courthouse, library etc) and (ii) maximise the number of turns the city spends working the city’s two best tiles - wheat and silver.

(c) Is there any reason why Uxmal’s not garrisoned? If not, it’s probably going to be best to let Uxmal build its own archer, leaving other cities to build military for the war. Assuming you go this path, Uxmal’s build path is therefore (i) continue courthouse until pop 2 (ii) work the wheat and silver to finish the courthouse (iii) start granary and whip when the food bin is about half full & regrow working just wheat (iv) archer (v) library.

Look forward to reading of your conquest of Shaka.

 

You should see this:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8479169&postcount=137

You want to whip the granary earlier in the cycle if possible.