Immortal University 88 - Catherine

[Omincron]

Oof..

Spoiler :

I'm new to Immortal and it's a nice challenge. Been playing for years but never got good, just played for fun.

Anyway... I'm learning and this one wiped me 3 times before I got the expanding without a decent economy underway (keeping cities small small small and working only commerce sometimes).

I won the Great Library by the skin of my teeth at 350 AD, tried to do a bulb into engineering kinda messed that up but got trebs at 475AD

I built trebs and got everything ready for war until 740 AD when I tool a huge stack of x-bow, horse, and trebs to eat Darius's babies.

I had just researched Guilds and had infrastructure to push kinghts into the field fast and teh army I had would last a good long while.

Despite the slow and slightly bungled start, I was beating Darius like a bad monkey when Gilgamesh got a hard on for taking my eastern most city. (probably bribed), he was pleased and we were both hindi so the move was rather dickish to say the least.

So here I admit to being pissed, saving and coming back latter...

The first time I came back to it, I made with Darius and moved my army to defend... I was very successful in defense even when others (fu Sury and Charl.. you'll get yours) decided to dog pile on the attach but his stacks would not stop and eventually I was facing advanced units. I gave up when I saw a cannon.

Convinced that I was doing good before that I thought about it and decided that playing into Darius's plan to go to peace with him was where I really lost. I reloaded and made a much less successful effort to defend my eastern city and beat more on Darius.

I know that's cheating but hey, it's a game and I'm learning.

I beat Darius back to his capitol 1090AD before getting peaceful with him while wheeling my army north just fast enough to take the city back and earn peace with Gilgamesh thanks to a lucky AP vote (repayment for voting for Brennus).

Anyway... So I have a big army now, my cities are pumping re-enforcement units like mad, and I'm at peace with everyone but surry and charl...

In 1300 I hit Darius again (with Brennus giving him a solid ramming from behind) and he rolls in 4 turns.

I was still at war with the Romans.... No one really liked them at the time and Brennus was already at war with them too.

They seemed weak but i was shocked to see my army roll into them with monster truck force. It got way worse when in 1360 I got steel and cannons started arriving.

I took their three western cities including the capital. Played take it back after leaving it undefended a few times (letting Brennus settle more cities did not seem wise so no razing).

By 1580, Charl was so weak others went after him to try to get cities. He wisely joined my pho-USSR which saw him restored and teched up (well, best I could which at this point was cannons) and rolled into America in 1615.

Two cities on the way to Washington, a bit of back and fourth, and a quick hit (by now I had enough cannons to drop the walls and shred everyone down to 1% with spare cannons healing in the stack) on Washington saw him saying Zdravstvuite, tovarishch!

Let me be clear here, it's 1700 and I still have a few regular archers in stack, mostly though it's about 30-40 cannons, maybe 8 knights, 8 muskets, and then x-bows. My economy is crap. I haven't build anything much past a bank or two so I could afford my army and my research was at zero for ages.

So like any logical man with a big army, I declare war on Surry... That punk had it coming.

So what if I'm fighting cavalry, rifelmen, and artilary? Don't tell me the odds!

Thankfully Willem was at war with him too (everyone was itching to liberate everyone in this game). In 1755, everyone was at war with Willem after a vote (me included).

I take a city anyway...

Then another.. I raze this one as my army is feeling mean after 1000 years of war.

Brennus is finally fed up with hating all my vassals and goes to war hitting Darius hard... well hard as you can hit someone that has Infantry already. Did I mention my vassals had a HUGE tech advantage on me... Yea well they were pretty much out of my class from the get go but that did not stop me.

With my supply route cut, i built up a new army to defend Darius while i finally teched Rifling (binary research really does work even if I completely f'd it up).

I retreated back to the 1st of Surry's cities re-took it, traded and begged some extra techs to get gold and a supply route to my new city. Upgraded everyone to Cossaks and Rifles.

America was pounding surry with force and when I showed up next to his capitol with a stack that said don't EVER tell me the odds for me, he rolled and joined the cause.

Fighting on 2 fronts now against people vastly stronger than me I took 2 of Willem's cities before capping the capitol which I believe had every single military unit he had in it. Glad most of my knights (yes, I still had some knights) had blitz....

1844 He was like o damn my dike! and ran off to put his finger in something better than the barrel of my cannons. I was worried that it might be possible for him to win (he had 2 legendary cities and was close to #3) even as a vassal but decided not to care as I was shocked I got this far anyway. I returned his cities, returned my army through Gilgamesh's land.

Some of the same units left that place over 1200 years ago so there was much baby making to be done as I needed more people to whip (yep... slavery all the way through).

When the americans really joined against Brennus he started caving fast.

They had an army from hell at one point and it was like:
Me: I think we should attack x
Them: ok
5 turns...

America has taken X

Nice.

1866...
Cletic Empire vassaled
Gilgamesh is building the space shuttle
I just discovered steam power

As I'm moving my ~ 200 unit strong horde into position to make a final stab at Gilgamesh (he's had it coming for a LOOOOONG time now and I will not let him escape by flying to another planet), an election for the UN comes up....

Well, due to my overwhelming popularity with the working class and habit of eating babies for 1500 years, I win in a landslide.

I beg economics (yea, it's that bad) in 1866 and a vote comes up... I decide to vote myself as world leader rather than throw my cannons against modern armor...

Not that they would have lost or anything... apparently I never lose.

Stack of Doom (heroes of the motherland... whatever you want to call them, these guys were champs).

I can not believe that worked.

 

[King Pluto]

1806 Diplomation

Spoiler :

I settled 1W like a lot of other people. Teched Ag/AH to find horses and settled three quick cities to the east to get the good land. First was on the desert hill to get the oasis/Cow and a few FPs, then north for Cow/Horses, and then on the Stone for GOld/Cow/FPs. I also grabbed the Ivory/oasis/Iron in the south early and backfilled the Corn/Sheep/Horse right behind it. I had two filler cities to make 8.

I forget the exact tech order, but I went Aesthetics/Lit/Music and grabbed GLib/Parthenon/MoM/Sistine. Gilgamesh got Confucism and spread it to me, I converted late though to avoid strife. Darius and Brennus were Jewish, and Buddhism/Hinduism were spread among the others. AP was Jewish, so I built all the Jewish buildings but went Confucist as my state religion to make friends with Gilgamesh, who had good land but was way behind in tech. Grabbed MT from Lib, built the Taj and went straight Cuirs/Cossacks. Attack order was Darius/Brennus/Charlie/Lincoln.

At that point, I ran into a Willem/Sury master/vassal pair that was teching faster than I was. My options were to slug it out with them or take out Gilgamesh (didn't have Rifles yet!) and press enter until the UN.

I went for the UN. Got there in 1806. Great land as usual on inland sea, I always forget how much I like Cathy for her traits and Cossacks.

Thanks for the game!

 

[Izuul]

Immortal 1610AD Conquest

This turned out to be a really fun game, so I'm going to give a more detailed account of the action than i normally do.

Spoiler :

Lots of land available here, but little to no commerce. Coupled with a great hammer capitol and the Imperialistic trait, it would be pretty easy to carelessly REX yourself into early economic stagnation on this map.

I settled 1W and researched Ag first followed by AH after discovering sheep and cows in the immediate area. AH revealed Horses to the west and my 2nd city was settled 1E of those horses to grab them along with the sheep and corn. I decided to address the economic situation with my 3rd city and settled way down to the SE b/t the cows, stone, and gold. I think connecting this city required roading 7 tiles, but i believe it was worth it since the stone allowed me to chop out the mids in the capitol around 1100 AD and switch into Rep + Slavery. At this stage of the game i wasn't sure if i should make use of the ivory and go Construction, or just use the mids to play a Lib game. That decision was essentially made for me a bit later...

While i was building the mids, my 4th city was also settled far away, 1S of the sugars near Darius. This looked like the strongest commerce spot available on the map and perhaps a place to move the capitol to down the road. I also wanted to settle one more city to the west and use these two to block off Darius. However, i found out when i settled city #4 that i had just barely beaten Darius there by 1-2 turns, and he marched that settler right on north and settled all the way up 1S of MY iron (that hadn't been revealed to me yet). He followed that up with another city a bit SW of that by the ivory just a handful of turns later, and i decided right then that he deserved to be trampled under the feet of elephants for the effrontery.

With my plans of blocking Darius ruined, i just settled out some remaining spots with the cows + ivory location to the east, and one more filler-type city about 4 tiles S of the capitol. I let my cities grow to where they could run rep scientists, and that plus the gold mine boosted my research up to a respectable level and i was able to finish Aesthetics, trade for Alpha, IW, and various other techs, and then go for HBR > Math > Construction. In hindsight, i wish i had gone Math > Construction > HBR so that i could start building Cats earlier, but i put off Math in hopes of being able to trade for it. That never happened. It seems that only on Deity are the AI willing to part with Math early enough to make trading for it really viable.

I received my first great scientist around 450 BC and really waffled on what to do with him. I had 3 options - bulb Math (which i had just begun researching that turn), save him for a better bulb later, or burn him on an Academy in the 4th city that could later become my Bureau capitol. Math was only going to take 4 turns, so that seemed like a big waste. I think i should've saved him, but i opted for the Academy instead. While i was teching this stuff i accidentally built the Parthenon in my capitol. I was shooting for the FG but ended up with the wonder, but that wasn't a bad thing since i was running rep scientists.

After some really intense chopping, i had both the Great Library in my 2nd city and a satisfactory number of elephants and cats, so i declared war on Darius in 200AD and moved in on his annoyingly-placed iron city. Work had also begun on the National Epic.

I actually had no metal at all so i really wanted to get rid of that city and claim the iron ASAP to build a couple of stack-protecting axes. His two northern cities fell easily and from there my northern invading army merged with some more cats and elephants that had been protecting my future capitol city in the south. Together they would march on his core cities.

While this was taking place, many other things were going on. In 325 AD i bribed Brennus in on Darius.

At the same time i also realized that Willem already had Philo and Paper.

He was way out in front of everyone in terms of tech, but only had 6 cities. I decided he needed something to do, so i bribed someone on him. Just who that was escapes me right now. It seemed to do the trick b/c his tech pace slowed significantly after that and he also went down the Machinery > Engineering line which may have been due to the war. This opened up Lib for me which i decided to pursue while fighting the war with Darius. You can't always get away with that, but i could here since a) it wasn't Deity, b) i was fighting a wimp in Darius, and c) i had the mids, some strong tiles to work, and lots of forests, so i was able to get plenty of both research and production.

Things were also touch-and-go with Gilgamesh for awhile as he moved a big army near our border, but never went red fist. I decided to adopt his religion and also kept a settler sitting in an open area to the north ready to found a city for gifting. That was never needed as he eventually ended up at war with Charlie after apparently being bribed in by Willem.

Meanwhile, my merged army moved on taking Persepolis followed by Pasargadae which, coupled with Brennus taking another Persian city, was enough to cause Darius to throw in the towel in 780 AD. Here's the remains of my victorious army sitting in Pasargadea. You can also see the new Palace being built. Better late than never i guess. It didn't help me win Lib, but it did help a lot to keep research going as i conquered the world. The plan was to move to capitol immediately after completing the Taj so that Moscow could benefit from the Bureau hammers to complete it faster. That didn't really work out though...

During that time i also researched Nationalism, triggered a GA with my artist, double-bulbed Edu, bulbed Lib and took MT in 880AD, generated 1 great merchant, and started on Gunpowder while building more elephants.

In 860AD i lost the Taj Mahal to Charlie by two turns. That was actually a bit shocking, but i ended up with 570 fg to upgrade more troops so it wasn't too bad.

A few turns later somebody built the Sistine Chapel and i received around 575 more fg which was fantastic. The fg plus 1100g from my great merchant gave me 3000g which allowed me to upgrade 20 or so elephants to cuirs.

Money!

Those guys moved in on Brennus and were faced with a menacing stack.

That war was extremely quick and i captured two decent shrine cities in the process that were able to contribute 40gpt each once they were outfitted with a market, grocer, and bank. Not too shabby.

I then moved on to Charlie who, once again, surprised me with a really big stack.

There were 35 units in that stack despite him being at war with 2 AIs for awhile. I always manage to underestimate Charlie, perhaps because he's such a terrible leader to play as a human. At any rate, i was able to take out that stack with the Cuirs i had over there and, after waiting for some reinforcements, beat him down until he capitulated. I also got Rifling before the end of the war and started upgrading Cuirs to Cossacks.

Lincoln was up next, except i had 4 turns of peace remaining with him for some reason. I had to bypass him temporarily and take out Sury. With a full army of Cossacks at my disposal, he fell really quickly. I then turned around and took Lincoln out. I sandwiched him with my veteran army coming from the N and my new recruits hitting him from the W. He fell in 3-4 turns which only left Gilgamesh and a six-city Willem that had peace vassaled to him.

Forced to fight them both at once, i had to wait a few turns to amass enough of an army in my home territory to defend against a possible Sumerian invasion while my main army was stuck on the other front. Once that was done, i moved in on Willem and took all 6 of his cities because he was too stubborn to break free. With only Gilgamesh left, and having him surrounded by two armies, it seemed like the end of the game would be a cake walk, however i hit one little snag when he picked up Rifling a few turns before i could invade. I suspect one of my vassals helped him get there despite my efforts to keep them from trading with him. The end result was him mass upgrading to a bunch of cavalry and protective rifles. That caused me to take quite a few losses, but he couldn't hold out against two large stacks of Cossacks hitting him from both sides, and he eventually gave up in 1605AD giving me the Conquest Victory a turn later.

 

[Grashopa]

Nice game Izuul, I love the medieval war then GM / FG upgrade path.

 

[ABigCivFan]

960AD Immortal first attemp.

Spoiler :

8 cities, with good infrastructure. 4 GPs waiting, 1 GM going on a mission, 1 GS can bulb PP or wait for another Academy, 1GA+1GP will start 3rd GAge . Have MOM, tech leader. Will do a strong Cuir invasion.

 

[Nothingontv]

Immortal-normal Diplomatic victory 1906

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

I seldom play this far because i usually find it more fun to start another game then continue an existing one.

I joined Sury in a short little war against Willem even though my forces weren't really up to it. I figured i could take one of his border cities and just let him fight against Sury.
Sury capped him after a short while.

I was behind in tech after my previous 3 wars but with all the land i had i teched fast. I was the first to get industrialism and decided to just go with tanks. Willem was very close to a cultural victory so i had no choice but to declare war on him (and Sury).

One turn after i declared war Charlemagne did the same with Lincoln so i didn't have to worry about one of them being bribed against me.

After i took all but one of Willems remaining cities he broke free of Sury. I decided to just finish him instead of taking him as a vassal.

Unfortunately it was now Sury who was close to a cultural victory so i decided to just keep going and try to destroy at least one of his cultural cities before maybe capping him.

I took two of his cities, razed a third one and finally barely managed to destroy one of his cultural cities. Now he needed 34 turns for a cultural victory so i made peace to be able to build up my forces and give it another go after 10 turns.

In those 10 turns there was a UN vote and i chose UN victory which i won.

It was a fun game but i need to get a lot better at modern warfare because that didn't go so well.

 

[shulgi]

1420AD

Spoiler :

I probably could have done some things better. I don't micro my cities very well, GP production was a lackluster, if it wasn't for wanting to get captured cities online I probably would have switched out of slavery since I am not whipping much but it's not much of a map for workshops pre-chemistry.

I am getting out-teched by everyone including my vassal Darius who has three cities and few cottages and also by Brennus who is fairly behind as well.

Been fairly screwed by peace vassals. Willem passalled to Charlemagne early after he was attacked by Sury and fairly recently Lincoln passalled to Charlemagne after he was attacked by Sury. Willem has AP and Lincoln was tech leader so they are not weak.

I have found Darius to be a useless vassal again. Difficult to trade with (I could have had some trades early) and not useful in wars. I wanted a lot of tech from him but even after reducing him to one city with one longbow, I could only get one technology from him. I immediately threatened him for another one which worked. How often can I threaten him? Here's what he has at present

Spoiler :

Charlemagne + Willem had been at war with Brennus and I figured Brennus would be weak. He was, it only took two cities, one of which I gave back. I actually gave back two which allowed him to revolt and cast off being a vassal. Screw that, reloaded and only gave him one.

Spoiler :

Moved to attack Charlemagne immediately after because him and his two vassals were fighting Sury. Sury took peace very soon after. Well Charlemagne got rifles... I don't even have gunpowder yet. Desperate trebuchets let me take two cities and he gave me money for peace. It would be great if that would encourage at least one vassal of his to break away.

Spoiler :

This is what part of my civ looks like. edit - I see Petersburg working two forests. arg. Don't think market was a good build there either

Spoiler :

I have remained in HR/vassalage/theocracy much of the game. Recently switched to mercantilism, have pyramids. I don't have Oxford yet. Bureaucracy didn't help economically even though have multipliers in capital. Large military (not really that large) and two wars somewhat set me back and made vassalage better even for economy. That and being cut out of AI trading. Considering an economy based on stealing techs from Darius. Sheesh.

edit - checked techs again: the Charlemagne peace vassal block has a good lead, followed by Darius, then a ways back Brennus, me then Sury are all semi close.

Religion has hardly had any role in war and diplomacy. I don't own a religion which makes Gilgamesh a good target (he has Confucian and Daoist shrines). Still, I am not sure I had the chance to fight him and now I need to worry about Charlemagne more.

If anyone wants to take a look this is k-mod emperor.

 

[Gumbolt]

Giving this a shot.

Spoiler :

Made a classic mistake at start by only building 5 cities.

Willem was a tech monster. He had 5-6 techs on me quite early as he got COL and the oracle early on.

AG/AH/Writing/TW/ masonry/BW were my early techs. I grabbed the gold/stone site as second city. Unfortunately I was slow expanding as my cities were running hammers over food.

Got to aesth first and I traded around for a lot of techs before heading to music for GArt.

Eventually built mids, parth, TGLib, NE, MOM and TM using a GE. Ran 2 golden ages and was ready for cuirs around 600ad. At this point Gilga declared on me the turn I started whipping cuirs. 12-14 units wiped out.

The war was slow and painful due to my lack of cities. I took 2 ceasefires to heal troops. With three cities left he became Celts vassel forcing me to take out all his cities. Celts have closed borders with Persians so it was rather pointless.

Dutch are next on my list. He is on the way to physics but for some reason lacks guilds. He may have MT but seems to lack GP. The rest are much slower than him. Hoping for some UU action later on.

Cheesed out 1500ad. 163350 score

Spoiler :

Bit of a long slog. Captured all of the Dutch cities. Took Sury down to 3 cities. Eventually made him my vassel.

AP vote came in. Turn after I switched to Ap religion and bribed Lincoln to do the same. Ap win 1500ad. Had to switch into Hindu and gift Celts techs to get open borders and to get him infected with Conf religion.

Persians had rifles by 1500ad. HRE had Grenadiers and quite a large army. I was quite close to rifles but lacked steel. Behind on techs but a large empire covering 30% of map. Quite happy given the poor start I made expanding.