Latest you have gone to war?

[Killroyan]

Ok, this is a question about a normal game. What is the latest you have gone to war and how did it play out? Why am I asking this because last night I started up a game on monarch. Was building up a nice empire. Researched animal husbandry, but didn't get any horses near my two cities. The closest horse was about 20 tiles away close to Huayna my neighbour. Then researched bronze working but again no luck with the resources. No copper in all the territory I explored (about 50% of a very big island). Then got sidetracked and forgot to research iron work (wanted CoL and alphabet first). When I finally researched iron working I got iron 10 tiles away from closest city but iron at last available. So then I got to build up an army and started a war with Isabella around 600-700 AD which is incredible late if you ask me for your first war.

So far this monarch game hasn't turned out bad after I almost whiped out Isabella (2 holy cities yum yum). I am second in score behind Huayna (who is about 2 techs ahead of me) and I am very close to getting cosacks (military tradition on the way so only gunpowder left). Then I will take over the rest of the island although Huayna will be hard but he is friendly. So I guess this can work out ok. Or am I too late with everything (sorry no screenies, I am at work )

Also 1 side question. I took over Madrid and saw it had a holy building in it. I checked the culture slider and I only got 2 culture per turn from creative and not the 4 culture of the hindu shrine. Anybody knows why that is? The city was not in revolt anymore.

 

[carl corey]

You mean the latest "first" war, right? I'll have to check the date for my Gandhi/Warlords game. Since I had elephants in my capital's fat cross I waited for Construction before going to war. Of course, two gold mines also in the fat cross really sped up the research. Really, really lucky this time. Anyway, my war was War Elephants & cats vs Archers & a few Axemen. You can imagine how it worked out. By the way, it's a Prince level game.

 

[cabert]

Well, my latest "first war" was with navy seals and went quite well
that's the result from Rex with org/financial on archipelago...

But you asked for a "normal" game. I assume you meant continents/pangea and not aiming at a cultural victory?

The latest i did is a knight attack in the 1000 and some AD.
not so great longbowmen resist knights much too well
cavalry was still a good deal away, so not really an option.
With cavs, you can storm through an enemy. Condition is he doesn't have elephants!

edit : for your game, it should go well, you obviously need catapults against capitals, but apart from this, just do it

 

[Killroyan]

Yeah continents game, normal speed. So 700 AD is still not too late? This is my first monarch game I am actually doing nice but I will have to kick Huayna's behind very soon otherwise he will get too strong but that damn Roosevelt has taken down my army a lot (I hate the 30 horse archers he sent my way covered by crossbowmen and catapults). Roosevelt will get the shaft when I get my cossacks (first game with Cathy so this should be nice). Right now I am at 1550 for my second war but I think I need about 100 more years to get the cossacks rolling.

 

[carl corey]

Well, not seeing your empire in screenshots it's difficult to assess this. About my Gandhi game: I was going for the Great Wall - Pyramids gambit so I built the 3rd city really late and it was partly eaten by the cultural borders of a chinese city. I went to war because I was waaay ahead in techs but pretty much boxed in.

Maybe in your case - no close resources - you could have also beelined for Construction and attack with cats? I've never done this in a normal game (the Gandhi one feels like a cheat ) so I don't know how feasible it is.

 

[cabert]

Well, not seeing your empire in screenshots it's difficult to assess this. About my Gandhi game: I was going for the Great Wall - Pyramids gambit so I built the 3rd city really late and it was partly eaten by the cultural borders of a chinese city. I went to war because I was waaay ahead in techs but pretty much boxed in.

Maybe in your case - no close resources - you could have also beelined for Construction and attack with cats? I've never done this in a normal game (the Gandhi one feels like a cheat ) so I don't know how feasible it is.

you need defenders for your cats, since they don't benefit from terrain bonus and are weak against mounted units
I did send cat+archer stacks, it's quite effective if you can stay on hills (preferably forested ones ). Of course, best bet is cat +elephant stacks. Elephant kill HA without injuries, most of the time = 1/2 elephant are enough to defend your stack vs the 30 HA (well, maybe not, but 4 will be enough, i bet, if you also have an archer vs the occasionnal spear or pike)

 

[Killroyan]

Should have beelined for construction, argh. I did have elephants from the start and used them in large amounts against Roosevelts horse archers. Was so peeved about not having the other resources that I forgot this route

 

[MrCynical]

I've completed one or two games without ever going to war, so I guess that would count as the latest.

 

[Meanness]

I'll start warmongering fairly quickly, usually as soon as I get a base of 2-3 cities and I can churn out axemen. If there's no bronze, I research iron working ASAP, as you did.

If you are waiting until 700AD to start fighting, most times you'll have fallen significantly behind in the tech race, but it's still possible on Monarch to stay even through city specialization, wonder management, and tech trading. What you need to do now is bribe someone else to go to war with Huyana. Some of his resources will be pillaged, and his workers will stay indoors, and this will hopefully give you a chance to catch up.

 

[cfacosta]

Um the latest I goto war is 1000 BC.

Edit: Unless continents randomly puts me by myself...

 

[carl corey]

Yeah, I didn't count the times when I was aiming for no-war, or when I was alone on the continent. Killroyan seemed to be more interested in times when you delayed a war you really wanted to fight. Axemen, Chariots, Swordsmen are my usual first-war attackers, but sometimes I don't get the resources, others I keep teching in one direction because of a specific goal, etc. Most of the time I research Bronze Working very early anyway, but sometimes no copper leads me to change my strategy and go to war later, especially if I have food-heavy or commerce-heavy cities, or if I have enough room for an early expansion, or if I'm aiming for a certain wonder, etc.

 

[gdgrimm]

I recently won a Domination victory with my first war occurring with Gunpowder (I was Ottoman).

It was a large (?) map with 9 civs. I founded Hinduism and converted almost my entire continent (I and 3 other civs). One then decided to go Judaic, which made them my first target when Janisseries became available. Took them out with Janisseries alone (well, a few cats for cultural bombardment).

Next, I hit a 2 civ continent with Cav and Jan's.

Then started on the 3 civ continent with Tanks. Only needed to wipe out half of that group before Domination was won.

Back to the original question.... Gunpowder is that latest I've went to war and won militarily. With Warlords, I could certainly see waiting until Eng. (Trebs) and Theology (Longbowman) as an effective launch into military win.

The biggest question is do you have enough space to expand peacefully? As long as you can expand without conquest, you really aren't losing much military ground. In the game I mention above, I was still building settlers, founding cities, or taking Barb cities, right up to when I discovered Gunpowder. There wasn't a military expansion need until then.

 

[Killroyan]

@Meanness I forgot to research iron working asap, that is why the warmongering started so late (big oops). Huayna is now in the tech lead because of this and it will be hard to take him down. Should have bribed him to go to war with Roosevelt but the price was civil service and another good tech so i declined. I wish I had done it because I lost over 30 units against Roosevelt. It would have been better if those two lost their units on each other since they are 1 and 3 in score.

@GDGrimm I did a lot of settling. I have roughly 10-12 cities going now and they are all good ones. So that is ok. Research at 50% or so which is also not bad. But I do need more land to get ahead of Huayna or I am toast.

It will prove to be an interesting game. Good thing I learned a thing or two from the forum here.

 

[bitplayer]

Ive started warring really late a few times. Think the latest was around 1200 ad or so but that was just because I shored off a big chunk of land and got into a builder mode.

Hate when I do that but I do it.

 

[Killroyan]

I know the feeling bitplayer. I still step in that trap from time to time.

 

[automator]

My last game I somehow held off on being involved in a war until 1600AD. Noble, Large Fractal, Epic Speed, AGGRESSIVE AI. The AI was busting each other up like nobody's business, but I was left out of it.

As riflemen came into play, China decided it wanted a land grab and pounced at my border cities. They were luckily a few techs behind me, because I had the smallest armed forces in the game and were attacking with elephants and knights -- I was able to hold them off with Pikemen and Longbows until I had enough money to upgrade/produce rifles. I was able to defend as I built an attack force and took two of his border cities, penning him into his penninsula and separating him from the rest of the continent.

He hated me for the rest of the game. Every 20 turns or so I'd be in another war with him, stepping up in military techs each time. By the modern era, we were having one hell of a tank battle, busting the hell out of each other's navies and trading towns left and right.

 

[HectorSpector]

I maybe need to change my play style, as I'm a bit of a builder. Only been playing for a few weeks, but as yet, I've NEVER gone into a war before 1000AD. On noble I've never found myself not to be in front scorewise, and always have a good defensive military. Even on prince now I'm never behind the AI, and still war late on, often finding that I'm using cavalry against inferior units.

 

[automator]

As long as you like the way the game plays out as a builder, keep doing it.

My favorite war times just happen to be with axe/sword/(later)cats, calvary/cannon/muskets and finally modern war. Modern war is fantastic for the speed -- bomb, strike, finish off, raze, move on to the next city.

Seriously, an early war is a lot of fun.

 

[cabert]

and an early war requires less units = not as tedious as a modern age war

 

[raymondieee]

I had a game where my first war was Marines and nukes. It was out of bordom though as there was just nothing else to do waiting for my last couple space ship parts. It set off a world war 4 vs. 4 with 3 nuetral countries due to defensive pacts and vassal states. I also used mainly subs to defend my own mainland. I have since started turning off space ship as it seems to just become a crutch, or last choice win, since there was no way by then to get the others.