Immortal University 108 - Napoleon

[Gumbolt]

Side challenge for anyone in the taking. Quickest date to gunpowder. Anything before 1ad could be worth mentioning. I suspect this date could be smashed really. I suspect pre 1ad is more than possible with the right strategy.

 

[GenerallyGreat]

Fun map for one of my first games back from a 2 year break. Lots of ways to go here but I'm not that good and was drinking so I went for a pretty standard approach.

 

[pepe26]

Very easy map for newer IMM players!

Spoiler :

You got almost anything (except for metal), so most options are available. Libbed rifling around 800AD. Crushed my opponents with cavs...

Did Monti act really erratic in your games as well? He spent centuries plotting but wouldn't ever attack anyone. Then, he dicided to dagger me just before my army was ready. Shaka was kinda peaceful in my game as well.

 

[GenerallyGreat]

Very easy map for newer IMM players!

Spoiler :

You got almost anything (except for metal), so most options are available. Libbed rifling around 800AD. Crushed my opponents with cavs...

Did Monti act really erratic in your games as well? He spent centuries plotting but wouldn't ever attack anyone. Then, he dicided to dagger me just before my army was ready. Shaka was kinda peaceful in my game as well.

Spoiler :

Shaka got me randomly at around 300AD, I had to do a trade for Feud and whip the out of my cities. Set me back a couple hundred years but I ended the game the same way with Cavalry.

 

[pomthom]

@rfcfanatic: you're welcome! Good play

@Gumbolt, pepe26:

@cseanny: HA imbalance aside,

----------------

Obviously I haven't been evil enough on this map

Anyone will try it on Deity?

 

[Gumbolt]

Stupid AI strike 1.

Spoiler :

T1 Declare on fellow AI. Then vote for peace in AP the same turn.

T2 Peace among brothers.

I mean why bother attacking???

 

[caoimhin]

(Immortal-normal speed)

Settle in place. Looks good enough that I don't want to waste a turn moving east.

Spoiler :

Stone in the fat cross! And then marble two squares south! This could be a wonder spamming game. Then we have horse and ivory as well. I think this could turn out a very easy game.

Research was AH > Myst > Mas. I got SH for the synergy with charismatic and the great wall because I haven't built that in a long time. Then I quickly built two cities west and north of the capital because Montezuma was expanding fast. I had a go at the Pyramids because with Representation this might be a good specialist economy (SE) game. I there went Mining > BW > Writing, skipping pottery for now.

I got the pyrimids 1240 BC. Now I'll head for Aesthetics and Literature for the Parthenon and the GLib, both great with SE. Now I just have to let this go to my head and have to deal with a surprise attack as reward. I also got my first great spy, which I settled. I should be able to do a good bit of tech stealing this game.

1 AD I'm at CS. It's going pretty well, even with only five cities. I've settled a scientist and started a golden age. I'll most likely get Liberalism. Maybe I'll just take gunpowder with it and attack someone with Musceteers!

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

 

[pepe26]

meh, i thought i could do better:

domination, 1660AD, 180k points

Spoiler :

you can set up one of the best cottage capitals ive seen in a long time. this would have been an easy peace space race, had i decided to go down that path...

 

[Pangaea]

Immortal/Standard til 1AD

Spoiler :

Settled on wine and teched towards Masonry and onto Priesthood. Stole a worker from Pacal while building first TGW, followed by SH, and then pumping out 2 settlers, and then finished Oracle in 1560 (Alpha).

Next I grabbed The Mids (switched to Slavery/PS) while picking up HBR and finishing math in 900s. Had 4 workers already prechopped everything and used 3 cities to whip/chop 18 HAs very quick. I went on a two prong attack declaring war on Monty, immediately followed by Pacal. I split my HAs up 9/9.

Next I headed up to Currency > CoL while I traded my way to Aesthetics (and grabbed HG during the process) and then grabbed Lit (TGL), followed by Music and MC will finish soon. Anyways, a basic HA stomp. I read Thars post above........and he mentioned Monty was weak early on. That was definitely the case in my game too. his 2 closest cities had 2 and 3 units while his Capital had 3. By the time I got to his last 2 cities he had 4 units, and then 2. I only lost 2 or 3 HAs during that whole war.

I've pretty much tried to do exactly this. 2080BC so far.

Spoiler :

Was scouting with a warrior east of Pacal, then sent him back towards the corn. Just as I was ready to snatch the worker there, another popped up on the next turn! So I double-stole

Spoiler :

But what I don't get is why Pacal doesn't want to settle for peace. I've not lost a single unit, have stolen two workers and smashed one of his corn, he is willing to talk, but not settle for peace. What gives? It's been quite some time time - declared in 2480 and it's now 2080 - and I'm getting worried a stack of Holkans will show up on my 1-city doorstep.

Otherwise things have gone well. Grabbed TGW in 2400 and Stonehenge just a smidgeon later in 2240. Will get out a settler just as Priesthood comes in, but am thinking about building another one first, to copy cseanny's play. Am glad to see that my dotmapping is spot for spot similar to his though, so I must be doing something right on my own too

However, why won't Pacal settle for peace? The war weariness has worn off now, but he has -1 the war is going badly for us and is willing to talk. When I settle the next city I bet he wants it...

Edit: Sure enough. I settle Orleans two turns later, and the punk wants it

 

[cseanny]

@ Pangaea

Spoiler :

I also stole 2 workers but his Archer attacked me across the River. You definitely don't want him getting Hulkens out or it will take forever to get peace......you want him spamming out Missionaries instead of units. I'd suggest whipping/chopping a barracks in 2nd city and or getting out a few Chariots in the meantime. This will severely slow down your rush but it might be necessary.

Or restart again and steal a worker from Monty instead?

 

[Pangaea]

@Cseanny

Spoiler :

I've only played a little bit further, but it thankfully worked itself out in the end. He did get out a Holkan, which meant I had to run away with the woodie warrior (tbh, I did try to park him on the forested hill north of his capital(?) which was across a river, but it was no use, so I reloaded a few turns prior). Pacal was the first to Alpha, and I managed to sue for peace by giving him priesthood. Phew!

So this happens due to him getting Holkans then, and that his power rating bumps up? Usually this isn't a problem at all, as long as you don't lose troops, so I was surprised he was willing to talk but not peace out.

Built the Oracle too btw, and was reasonably good with Pacal at that time, but on the same turn it was built, I got bumped back to worst enemy, so then he didn't want to trade me Alpha. So I had to Oracle Alpha instead, like you did, although my idea was to take CoL instead, and then get Alpha hopefully the same turn. Figured I could just shrine Confu if the first GP would be a GProphet. When I finished the set, I was trying to work out how to best trade it around.

I know I basically just tried to shadow your game here, but I have learnt from it Seems like it can be quite useful to stay at one city for a while, at least if the southern border is secure like in this case, and there isn't so much land to compete for. I've never tried a Settled specialists economy though, so if things pan out that way, it will be very interesting to see how such games are. I'm so used to wanting a GS or GM, so having it very random throughout will be unusual for me.

 

[pepe26]

How did Montezuma act in your games? Was he as strange in his plotting and declaring manner as in my game?

 

[Tempesta13]

How did Montezuma act in your games? Was he as strange in his plotting and declaring manner as in my game?

Spoiler :

In my game he was plotting since ~500 BC I think. I assumed it was on Justinian (his worst enemy). I declared on him around 200 AD so I never found out what his plans were exactly. Could go back and look at the map in Worldbuilder to see what he's doing. Seemed to me that maybe he had lots of Jungle/Forests and that was messing him up. Maybe couldn't get the units produced that he wanted.

 

[pepe26]

Spoiler :

In my game he was plotting since ~500 BC I think. I assumed it was on Justinian (his worst enemy). I declared on him around 200 AD so I never found out what his plans were exactly. Could go back and look at the map in Worldbuilder to see what he's doing. Seemed to me that maybe he had lots of Jungle/Forests and that was messing him up. Maybe couldn't get the units produced that he wanted.

Spoiler :

weird... in my game he was plotting so i got him to pleased and begged, fist didnt go away, so he must have been plotting on someone else. never declared however and his worst enemy kept changing around. then he declared on me just when i had begun building elephants

 

[Gumbolt]

Still playing on here.

Spoiler :

Been a bit of a struggle with muskets.

First Ai to fall was Pascal. Left him 1 city.

Next declared on Justin and bribed Shaka and his vassel Monty in. Left Justin with 2 cities.

In middle of war with Sal. (Again I bribed Shaka in. I have 30-40 muskets and 15 or so trebs. His stack took out 1 of Monty's cities. Then showed up just as I approached his capital which has 9-10 LB sat in it. WTH. I have ambushed most of his stack but he is left with 5-6 trebs.

Biggest issue now is Hannibal has rifles and I am several turns off cannons. Sal should cap soon enough. Then I will need to take out most of Shaka/ monty. Monty has a 10-15 unit stack. Shaka 20-30 unit stack. Both have nothing more than gunpowder so far. Cannons should win the day here but I need capture gold to reach steel.

Up to 1200-1300ad. In any case I am happy with the fun strategy I went for.

 

[Pangaea]

@cseanny, 675BC.

Spoiler :

Finally fired up your 1AD savegame to see your attack dates and such, which are certainly a great deal different than I would be able to. How did you manage to get HBR so quickly, and were you able to trade for Math? You got out Pyramids much earlier too, did you chop a lot? I see that Monty and Pacal had 9 cities between them that you captured, while they already have 11 in my game by 700BC. This is roughly when you declared on them, and I only have 1 HA by now. Should be able to chop-whip out a good lot over the next turns, but I'm not ready to attack for a while yet. Hopefully this doesn't mean a pile of Holkans, or worse yet, Feudalism.

It looks like you settled the horse city 2nd while I went for Marble 2nd, and I settled a city to grab the northern floodplains much sooner than I noticed you did (same spot, though), so maybe this dragged down my research a bit, but my hope is it will be able to churn out a few un-barracksed HAs, as I've farmed two FPs.

Perhaps I should have gone for HBR first instead of Math. At least I'd be able to start building them sooner then.

Incredibly good game there cseanny. I'm indeed impressed, as I usually am by whatever you post.

 

[pepe26]

That's exactly why musket rushes generally suck... their time window of effectiveness is to small. Even 2MP don't help much

Gesendet von meinem Nexus 5 mit Tapatalk

 

[Gumbolt]

That's exactly why musket rushes generally suck... their time window of effectiveness is to small. Even 2MP don't help much

Gesendet von meinem Nexus 5 mit Tapatalk

Well they have worked pretty well on 3 Ai so far. The Ai had no real answer to them. Even castles don't hold them back too much. Most stack units like mace/pikes/xbows and even knights can struggle vs them. The odds are not hugely bad. 3-4 pikes and 10-20 trebs and the Ai will struggle.

Of course Cuirs would be better than Muskets but I wanted a fun strategy.

 

[Tempesta13]

Still playing on here.

Spoiler :

Been a bit of a struggle with muskets.

First Ai to fall was Pascal. Left him 1 city.

Next declared on Justin and bribed Shaka and his vassel Monty in. Left Justin with 2 cities.

In middle of war with Sal. (Again I bribed Shaka in. I have 30-40 muskets and 15 or so trebs. His stack took out 1 of Monty's cities. Then showed up just as I approached his capital which has 9-10 LB sat in it. WTH. I have ambushed most of his stack but he is left with 5-6 trebs.

Biggest issue now is Hannibal has rifles and I am several turns off cannons. Sal should cap soon enough. Then I will need to take out most of Shaka/ monty. Monty has a 10-15 unit stack. Shaka 20-30 unit stack. Both have nothing more than gunpowder so far. Cannons should win the day here but I need capture gold to reach steel.

Up to 1200-1300ad. In any case I am happy with the fun strategy I went for.

Spoiler :

9-10 LB's??!?!?! His capital was on a hill too right?

 

[cseanny]

@ Pangaea

Spoiler :

I founded Orleans, followed by Lyons. This played an important role because I used FG from The Oracle and The Mids to power research. And a definite Yes, you should have prioritized HBR first. This lets you get a stable and some nice pre-math chops to get things going.

Did I chop some on the Mids? Absolutely. I wanted to get it finished before HBR was scheduled to finish (1160 BC). Now the FG and immediately building max research in all cities helped me power through HBR so quickly. And, some thoughts on the forest/math/chop question; before you even account for random forest regenerating there are 13 Forest within 3 rungs of the Capital. Ideally it would be nice to save all forest until Math but imo that's not very practical.

Why not? It comes to now is better than later. I'm pretty sure I chopped 7 or 8 Forest pre-Math into The Mids, Stable (1turn), and some HAs. If you wait for Math you get more bang for your buck but you also lose out on a "timing window". Hum.......let me see if I can break it down in the next paragraph.

Every pre-Math forest chop (first 2 rings), in conjunction with a heavy Capital running PS allows us to build 1 HA every turn. Actually, with working 27 with a 2F deficit + PS and chops of +20 3 turns in a row allows your 4th turn to grab a 1turn HA w/out chopping. This means things look like > pre-math chops at 1120, 1080, 1040 gives us 3 HAs by 1040BC with overflow allowing a 1turn HA to produce at 1000 BC. So with the right tiles and chops we have 4 HAs in as many turns. Orleans and Lyons have both whipped 1 HA so far (with some nice overflow) thus bringing to the total HA count to 6 at 1000 BC. The Capital now has zero forest left in the 1st 2 rings.

However, there are still 6 3rd ring forest left. Capital builds a normal 2t HA and its now 950BC with 7 HAs. Now with Math all those 3 rung forest allow the Capital to once again produce 1 HA every turn. So add it up 6 more times. 925, 900, 875, 850, 825, 800, and voila, 13 HAs at 800 BC. Now keep in mind Orleans and Lyons would already have whipped 1 more time each, thus bringing our new adjusted total to 15 HAs at 800 BC. Throw in any forest that regrew in your game and you get 1 additional HA per forest.

I'll finish on.......every little detail quickly add up to huge commerce and production potential. It might not seem like it but the snowball effect potential is rather alarming. That's probably why I value CRE much higher than most. But yea, hang in there and don't get discouraged heh!! I know it might seems like your game is miles and miles behind right now but with a little more practice those seemingly unimportant little details and micro will start paying off HUGE dividends.

Feel free to ask more when the time comes!!..

Edit: Out of Curiosity I went back and replayed the start from scratch and got pretty different results both times. I didn't steal my 1st (no clue why 1st would change?)and 2nd worker till quite a few turns later than in my original game. This made me get the Mids 2 turns later, HBR, 3 turns later, and Math 4 turns later than my original post..... not to mention drastically slowing down my initial HA rush. I didn't get 10 HAs till almost 600 AD. Nevertheless, I still stand by paying attention to every little detail and turn because it does make a big difference in the long run.