Mic4 - AWM

[Justus II]

Lose two shields and this turns production in Athens switching to Hoplite. We do not have HBR and the settler will be done 4 turns before growth. Change Thermo to settler for Iron.

Strart HPR at max due in 6 turns.

Doh!

Sorry about that! I had made some notes about getting the horses hooked up and building some fast units, it never dawned on me we didn't have the tech yet!

As for the leader, my recommendation would be a pillaging army. 2 Hoplites, with a sword as the top attacker, could pillage any AI resources or luxuries with near-immunity. The sword gives it a limited attack ability, good for picking off settler pairs , but it's primary use would be to disrupt and cripple the AI's production core. Most AW games I've read seem to involve at least one or two pillaging armies to ensure we face a steady stream of spears and longbows, vs. Knights and Muskets, come the middle ages.

 

[grs]

What to do with our leader? An empty army?

I'd rush the forbidden palace in Pharsalos. It will expand its borders and tremendously help it being low on shields. An early fp is always a good idea in c3c.

What to take as the free tech? Map Making is the most expensive available now. We can self research Literature in 7-8 turns.

Map making seems obvious to me.

 

[microbe]

I'd vote for a horse army. I don't quite like Pharsalos as an FP. By the way, why it's working on the gold mountain? Give it high food and whip the rax. But do we really need a rax there? This town should keep building settlers. We can push our front further.

Map Making sounds good, and galleys will find the other continent easier. Math is another good choice.

Roster:
microbe - on deck
gozpel
grs
Justus II
6thGenTexan
Nick014 - up

 

[6thGenTexan]

I build the rax in Pharsalos thinking we need to be able to quickly heal units on our front lines. Granted, we have one enemy half our size with a good 5 squares of no-man's-land in between, it was not really necessary in this game at this time.

Lack of exploring and our start position in the corner has given us the opportunity to establish a defined front and prepare a place for our Library. The down side is the lack of tech options. Smoke knows Mysticism. If we had some more contacts, Polytheism might have been available at an initial meeting. Wishful thinking I know, but Monarchy as the Philosphy freebie would have been nice.

If we had any one attacking us, Math would be the bettoer tech option, but I'm still voting for Map Making.

 

[Nick014]

got it. Will play either tonight or tomorrow depending on how busy my evening is.

 

[Nick014]

PT: Looks good. I decide to rope in map making as our free tech next turn, and to use the leader as a horse army. This will no only allow us a great deal of mobile defense, but also let us build the heroic epic. We should be getting enough leaders in this game that using one for an army this early won't hurt too badly. I create the empty army in Thermopylae so we could get a nother leader if we have an elite win between now and when we can fill it. Change corinth to a worker; our land is very underdeveloped and we have most other cities building military, we can spare this low-shield one to churn out a worker or 2.

Hit enter
1: Get philo-map. Set research to 80% literature in 10 turns.
Move our warrior 1 north and contact the iroquois. They have mysticism and mathematics on us, and we have map making and philosophy on them. Suprisingly, we can get both their techs for only philosophy and 23 gold. We have map making to trade but they have no money. Negotiations break down at this point and conclude with both parties declaring war

IT: Archer defeats a jav thrower and beats it, promoting to elite.
Warrior defeats our sullen iroquois contact

2: Athens:Horse-Hoplite
Load the horse into our empty army

3:
Delphi:Worker-Worker. This city is a dead end

4:
Corinth:Worker-Galley

5:
Athens:Hoplite-Horse

Kill 2 jav throwers with out pair of elite archers, one redlines, but the other is undamaged.

6:Nothing

7:Thermopylae:Horse-catapult

I'm not sure who mined all the food bonuses around thermopylae?? We should be using those to grow faster, thermo has plenty of hills in the are to make it productive

IT: Sumerians build the pyramids

8:
Athens:Horse-Catapult. I just wanted to finish off our horse army before switching to cats

9: switch prebuild to palace in sparta. Lit is due in 2, so there shouldn't be much of a problem here.

Our curragh spots red borders.

IT: lose a warrior to a jav thrower Maya is now in their golden age if they weren't already.

10: Argos:Baracks-Hoplite

Attack the redlined jav with an elite archer, and it barely wins with 1hp left
I move the horse army over to cover it from a counter attack by an iroquois warrior.



The summary of my turns: horse army created, literature due in one turn, started our first catapults. Met the iroquois, who are to the northwest of the maya. Galley in corinth ready in 4 turns to take settlers to our little island if we want, or can be swapped with a military build. The next player has an opportunity to meet the red player with our curragh near the iroquois, I'll leave that up to him.Our left border is fairly exposed, but the mayan forces have been focusing in the north mostly. Plus the horse army should be able to react to a threat quickly.

Greece and some potential future city sites (note, I did not expand much this turn because we were overextended as it was). I would prioritize the island first.


Mic4-705BC

 

[microbe]

preturn: I switch Thermopylae to hoplite. Since we'll have GL soon, I think some warriors to upgrade to swords would be good. Howver GL is still about more than 20 turns away..

MM around to shorten certain builds.

What is the stack of worker mining beside Mycenae? Why not connect the iron?

IBT Maya wants peace. Iro starts and completes MoM.

(1)730BC: Horse army kills 2 spears and captures Tikal. We get back our worker and a slave.

We spot the red border but I think it's better not to contact them. So curragh retrieves.

I switch Pharsalos to settler from rax.

Start min on Currency.

(2)710BC: IBT JT kills our archer - does it trigger their GA?

(3)690BC: horse army kills the JT.

(4)670BC: Kill another JT.

(5)650BC: Sparta grows to size 6 and GL is due in 14 turns.

(6)630BC: Kill an archer and a warrior.

Army kills spear in mayan capital and a reg JT shows up.

Found Herakleia which starts worker.

(7)610BC: a Byzantine warrior shows up. I dial her up and she has only 21g, down Philosophy and Lit. So I declare away. I didn't bother to establish embassy as we roughly know where she is.

Maya reinforced a spear into capital. Horse army retreats to heal. Capital drops to size 6 so it might have whipped something.

(8)590BC: movement.

(9)570BC: Byz warrior approaches Tikal. I don't want it to lose to our hoplite to trigger our GA so elite archer kills it.

Army kills reg spear in Chich and there is another one.

(10)550BC: army kills spear and 2 JT, there is one reg spear still showing (and after JT?). Army drops to 5hp but hopefully won't be attacked.

Note: army should retreat to the oasis tile to heal.

I'm building some warriors to upgrade once iron is connected.

GL in 9 turns.

We now know where the other continent is. Keep sending galleys until we meet them.

Avoid hoplite being attacked if you can.

Workers south to Argos need to irrigate toward the horses.

Roster:
microbe
gozpel - up
grs - on deck
Justus II
6thGenTexan
Nick014

 

[microbe]

 

[6thGenTexan]

Good job taking the fight to the Mayans. Are we trying to hold the GA until Monarchy?

 

[microbe]

gozpel/grs, are you able to take it?

 

[grs]

Well, gozpel is up I guess. If he asks for a skip I can take it, but won't play before the weekend. Maybe send him a PM, he is always active in a timeframe about 8 to 12 hours from now. I did read him during the last days so he might just have overlooked he is up.

 

[microbe]

Gozpel is up in both GG1 and this one, so I guess he just doesn't have time.

 

[gozpel]

No I am able to play. The daughter came home from China yesterday, so it was a little bit busy.

Will play right away.

 

[gozpel]

Pre-turn - MM Argos to get horse a turn earlier, that's all.

Two JT's are close to Herakleia, I'm not sure if I can hold off the GA here.

530bc - Our westbound curragh sinks.

Army is at 5 hp, so I pull back my troops for now.

Galley to the east spots bluish borders.

Start roading the iron.

510bc - JT attacks horse, which retreats nicely.
Iro archer dies against second horse, which promotes to elite.

JT moves away from Herakleia. No GA yet

Knossos warrior -> warrior.
Argos horse -> warrior.

Galley sinks.

Elite horse kills JT.
Another horse kills Mayan spear near Pharsalos.

490bc - Athens horse -> horse.
Thermo horse -> warrior.
Delphi worker -> galley.

470bc - Argos warrior -> warrior.

Horse kills Iro archer.
Move troops in to Mayan territory again, army is healed.

Keep a couple of horses near Argos to watch that skulking JT.

450bc - Thermo warrior -> warrior.
Pharsalos settler -> settler.

Army goes down to 5 hp again, but kill 2 spears in Chichen.
Elite horse kill another spear.
Another spear shows up.

They have whipped like crazy in this town, it's down to 2 pop, was 6 before.

430bc - Iron is connected

Knossos warrior -> worker.
Argos warrior -> sword.

We lose an archer at Chichen, elite archer takes the city plus 2 workers. I decide to keep it, not for the Oracle, but it will be a nice point for assembling an army for our northern neighbours. At least Sparta benefits of the happiness.

Kill Byz warrior.
Kill Iro archer by Argos and get rid of the JT as well.

Maya is down to 4 cities of what I can see.

Upgrade 10 warriors to swords for 600g.

410bc - Athens horse -> settler.
Thermo warrior -> sword.
Corinth galley -> galley.

Kill 2 Iro archers.

Move some swords north.

390bc - Byz completes the Lighthouse in Constantinople.

370bc - We build the Great Library in Sparta -> settler.
Knossos worker -> galley.

Ephesus founded -> worker.

Army attacks Copan, kills 2 spears and autoraze the city.

350bc - Athens gets a taxman for a turn.

 

[microbe]

We are doing very well. Maybe next game we should try pangea.

The top priority is to reach the other continent.

Maybe we should consider doing some research.

Roster:
microbe
gozpel
grs - up
Justus II - on deck
6thGenTexan
Nick014

 

[Justus II]

Looking at the map, I'd really like to see us mop up the remaining Mayan/Iroquois cities to the west. Looks like we could then consolidate with just one front line, and some zone defense for coastal invasions. Leaves us plenty of area to backfill cities, while fortifying along our current front lines in the north. (And we don't have to mess with all the marsh )

Edit: As for research, our priority ought to be getting Monarchy. The GL will give us all the required techs, but if at least 2 AI decide not to go for Monarchy right away, that could hurt us. Especially since we've been holding off our GA, I'd say (now that it seems we've done most of our upgrades) it would be worth researching Monarchy ourselves.

 

[microbe]

I originally started min on Currency as it's usually low priority for the AI, and only one tech away. Monarchy is two techs away and AI usually is fast at it. But I'm fine either way.

 

[grs]

Got it. Will play Friday night, about 36 from now, but may delay finishing till Saturday morning. I will look at the save and see about research. If we already invested in currency, I'd like to keep it.

@gozpel: I love those line about the upgraded warriors

 

[grs]

PreTurn: Change Pharsalos to worker - settler will either take ages or whipping. Research to 90% - currency in 8 at +/-0gpt.

IBT: We get CoL and construction from TGL. Maya have polytheism.

330BC: --

IBT: --

310BC: Centralia autorazed. Thessalonica founded. Disperse barb camp for 25 gold. Kill 2 Iroquis archers.

IBT: Sword defends vs. javalin thrower and is an elite now.

290BC: We kill 2 spears and one javelin in Palenque and take it. Horse army kills Theo's setteler pair. Kill a spear and a javelin in the open losing a sword.

IBT: Iroquis ask for peace.

270BC: --

IBT: --

250BC: Elite horse victory give us hector, who hurries The Forbidden Palace in Palenque. Spices colony online. Horse army takes another Iroquis spear/settler pair. Lose a sword removing an archer and a spear from a mountain.

IBT: The Forbidden Palace completes.

230BC: Lose a sword, kill an archer. Horse army kills yet another Iroquis spear/settler pair. Whip a settler in Pharsalos. Research adjusted.

IBT: Theo shows her first sword. Currency in - research off. Hope the Maya will trade polytheism some time.

210BC: Remove an archer from a mountain and 2 others from hills. Lose a horse killing a spear.

IBT: Foolish placed horse defends vs Theo's sword, but dies to an archer afterwards. Another horse defends a mountain. Theo does not attack our galley with her dromon - seems some valuables are in there.

190BC: Tonowanda autorazed, but our horse army is down to 1 hp now. We have crossed the first mountain ridge to the north. Sink Theo's dromon. Kill a sword and an archer.

IBT: A horse gets enslaved by a javelin. A sword defends vs an archer.

170BC: Lose another horse to the same javelin. A galley spot Sumerias borders again, but no contact. Rhodes founded.

IBT: Sword defends vs archer again and is now elite.

150BC: Lose a sword to an archer, redlining it. Lose 2 swords to a spear/settler pair, before killing it with a horse. Our galley contacts Sumeria, but is still in danger of sinking. Gilgamesh knows Poly - fine, but misses writing, currency and construction. He has 12 cities, 1 source of gems connected, no other resources and owns 5 gold. No trade is made.

As I am not sure how we agreed on embassies and it does not become obvious from the thread, so I did not establish one, but also did not declare war on Sumeria. So we have to decide on embassies and declare before pressing space!

Chichen Itza is in danger in two turns. You could either move in a second archer our the hoplite, but that would risk a GA. I left you with both options - I'd not use the hoplite.

Argos can be mm to sword in one after the next turn. There are 2 settlers under the banana sword near Palenque.

 

[microbe]

We can establish embassies, but don't have to. We have to declare war.

Roster:
microbe
gozpel
grs
Justus II - up
6thGenTexan - on deck
Nick014