Looking out for hints in my AW-variant game

[goodsmell]

Hello everyone .

I recently started solo game AW, Large, Pangea, Monarch and play as Ottomans .
I finished an AW game before that one with Persia on Standart, and won quite easly,
I wasn't a sandwich, I had only one front in the beggining and things were working out just fine .
On this AW game , I face difficulties, AI's forces heading over my borders from 3 ways ( Weast, East, South ), They're stacks aren't that large, but there are enough enemy civs to make pressure on front-cities .

I post 2 screenies which shows my 2 hot fronts . east front city has Horses which the AI always try to pillage, and western city has Iron which they succeeded once to disconnect it, now it's Fortressed and defeneded by pike&spear .

About tech pace, I'm in a good pace since I managed to build GLib .
About military, I had really bad luck earlier, horses died to archers and archers to archers .

Anyway I hope some PROS will check things around ( I post the save ), and first tell me if my chances are still positive here . I'm not sure what's my plan now, first I thought spreading South west, invading America, or South East ( Inca/Portugal ) .
but I can't make stable fronts, I always move units from front to front, because one of the fronts sometimes loosen and the other is really rough .

Problem is Sumeria and Inca already sending in MACES . which is pain in the ass now .

Ottomans 390AD , Monarchy . 37gpt zero research, 98 in bank ( spent for upgrades )

 

[vmxa]

As you have seen location location location in AW. I do not make horses in AW, till I am in quite a few turns and then only a few. I only use then to finish off redlined units and get back inside.

The 1 defense is just a killer, better to use archers as they are cheaper to replace. In addition you do not upgrade horses in AW, you cannot afford it and the cheap units make great MP's in the rear.

You may upgrade a few knights, but not that many, too expensive.

 

[vmxa]

Horse armies, are very very risky. The AI is not unwilling to attack a 12hp defense 1 army. I would much prefer swords as they would not be attacked at this stage, unless damage 5HP, maybe 6. It looks like you had little choice at the time.

I would give up my 33 beakers into Invention and switch to Chiv. Knights are the king in AW, it is very hard to expand with even sword armies, unless you have a lot of them and they are 4x. Even then pikes can be a problem.

Do not entertain thoughs of Leo's, forget upgrades. Cash is for research and a few rushes. Later rushing settlers is important.

You have 25 enemy units now and little to fight them with, if they elect to go around defenders. Inca knows Chiv, I hope they are not on your landmass or at least far away.

You have choosen to not stay with the CxxC and that could be fatal in this spot. I presume you only recently aquired Iron and that is why no swords? Still 12 horses, could be 18 archers and have made things a bit easier. At least you could attack more and force them to kill more to progress.

I know you stuck the one town out to get Iron, if you CxxC from the capitol and then stuck another town on the Iron, you gain some. First no need to road the iron, presuming the town was not captured and the road already there.

Second those pikes could be defending something other that the iron.

Not having been in the flow, I have no idea if you have faced the main waves or not. If not, then it is precarious. I would form that third army now. Move it to the right and move the MDI to met it.

Add it and move to the town south of the cap. Add in the pike and kill the unit there. Rush the MDI in that town and next turn add it to the army and see how many units I could remove.

 

[vmxa]

BTW why did you explore all that land? 9 nations is really a handful so early, even at AWM. I only wander out enough to see where to place my next town or two.

When I click on the leader and went to the cap I saw you could switch the joker to sci/tax. Why the obelisk?

 

[goodsmell]

My overall situtation might seem like a mess, because I was like giving up and kinda hopeless about this game .
I explored to have an overview where I would settle my empire, and it appears to be a mistake now
About military, yeah I managed to connect Iron lately, I found the iron city after razing Washington.
I prefered horses over archies simply because they retreat and 2Movement, it seemed to be crucial to have them roaming in my empire because AI's units never stop coming .

about main waves, I haven't face any fat stacks from west, but Portugal and Inca sent some stacks that I managed to kill with my army and some horses . the MACES Inca sending are kinda painful, and I'm pretty much sure that I will soon face their knights as they seem to be kinda close to my borders .

as for Chiv tech, Inca has it, they're going to trade it with somebody else, or other civ researches Chiv, and I will get it too since I've GLib, so I keep zero research .

and what you meant about the Iron, no need to road the Iron ? what army would I produce ? archers&horses again ? facing MDI's archers and horses all over ? is a pain I think .
or you meant something else ?

Looking forward for your reply . I paused my game, I'll play when I'll be sure about my strategy .

 

[goodsmell]

as I suspected , Inca must be very close to me, I played few more and they've sent some Knights .
The most problematic civilizations are Sumeria & Inca . Sumeria sending stacks of MDIs and some AC, it makes the west front kinda wild, I abandoned the City I captured from Sumeria, since I could'nt defend anymore .
the Southeast, I reconnected horses because I have Chivalry ( Sumeria has it too, and they've resources for Knights too ), Portugal isn't an issue for now, they only send in Archers. Arabs and Russia sending swords .

It seems so hopeless, vxma help me out Making peace signing some MAs for techs seems like the only way to go, but it won't be AW any more, so . . . I'm waiting for some suggestions :] Anyone ?

 

[vmxa]

What I remember it was a very tough situation. If Inca and their knights are close, will be a really hard one. Do you have the 4000BC save or autosave? You could start over and not go exploring all that from from home right away.

The relative close nations will find you soon enough. Dealing with 3 civs is hard enough at say 6 towns, 9 civs at even 10-12 and mostly horses is brutal.

I would go out maybe 6 tile in any one direction and hope to not find anyone at that time. If they are 10-12 tiles away, you will see them quite soon enough. If you have 2 closer than 7 tiles, that will be a pain, since you already know they are not alone.

Put my towns down with strict AW placement, only moving around for rivers, but still not going farther. You can always drop a town down closer and then one at CxxxC. Later abandon the close one, once that area is safe.

Don't take advantage of the knowledge of horses and Iron, till you have the knowledge in the restart.

 

[vmxa]

I am not a huge fan of civs that do not have an AA offensive unit for AW. Ottoman do have good starting techs. Masonry and BW. You have walls right off and can start research on IW. Big plus for AW.

Maybe research IW, WC (may need archer, before you have Swords, well we know that, but even if we did not know that), Alpha to get to Math for cats. Then probably head straight for Monarchy.

I am presuming you do not trade and must DOW on contact. If you allow trade, then that changes research.

My concerns are attackers (archer/swords), walls and then Monarchy. Move Horses up, if I find I do not have Iron for some time. I still would not make many horses, but a few to let me kill and retreat to town.

 

[goodsmell]

Thanks for straight answers vxma ! I waited for those answers . .
I'll probably give up this one even though I liked my starting location .

I didn't place all cities according to CxxC, but do you really think my city placement is fatal here ?
You're right about the civ choose, Persia seemed to be lot easier, had Iron in my first ring, lot of immortals early . I like industries civs in AW . . .

One of the most important things I'll try to stick to in my next game is the exploring . I really over-explored in this game, but in time it felt like I'm just exploring in order to have a bigger view of where I'm going to settle my cities .

 

[vmxa]

The placement is only an issue, because you found 9 civs to fight already.

 

[vmxa]

Two civs I tend to skip are Summeria and Celts. Celts as I see no value in Rel, especially in AW.
Sumeria as the UU is too early, unless you are in something like AWDG.

Strongest for me is Rome as Legions are great on off and def. Mil and Com are good traits and WC and Alpha have value.

Persia I like Ind, but not Sci so much. They start with two great techs for AW and the UU is perfectly timed.

Iroq not bad as MW makes horse much better, but still poor for an army. Alpha and Pottery are not too great.

Maya is har to say with Mason and Pottery, but Ind good and Ag, not bad ( I prefer not to have it in AW. Its UU can be super as you have an dual attacker and defender, but is cost more. Big draw back is super early GA.

 

[goodsmell]

Celts religious, but their UU is really nice .
Maya is an option, they're ind, but 30shields might be a pain in the beggining right ?
I like iroq UU, maybe I'll play Iroq next time . even though I wanted to start with WC/BW starting tech.

 

[vmxa]

A couple weeks back I played AWM where I could not build the GLB as Germany an idea that came from Overseer's game. Germany doe not have an early UU, but they start with archers and spears.

This lets you research any path that makes sense to your game. It turned out the GLB was not an issue. I actually captured it, but waited till I would have Ed on the next turn to stay close to the variant.

The idea was to see, if not having it and not doing any zero research was important at that level. Getting and having Ed meant no zero research and I only got PP, so no free techs as I would not have researched PP anyway.