MLDR003 - NOW in the big D

[ChrTh]

Question time, me boyos:

We've captured Delhi. It has Sistine Chapel and Great Wall. Do I keep it, or replace with Combat Settler? It has 8 resisters, and India has a whole lotta culture at its borders, despite Roman gains in the West.

What do you think?

 

[ChrTh]

The turnlog so far:
Turn 0 -- 850 AD

With Sipahi and the GA coming up, I decide to go defensive, and will not actively pursue any activities that could cause the loss of valuable knight units.

I'll also save up gold for upgrading.

IT: Cav attacks Pike, gets redlined and retreats

Antalya Knight > Knight

TUrn 1 -- 860 AD
I send an Elite Knight to finish off the Cav. No GL
Settler takes up position in Wine Tasting

The galleon didn't land anything, and instead continued east. I'm sending the knights in the general direction.

IT: Cav attacks Musket, dies

Akkad Temple > Cat
Izmit Pike > Pike
Adana Knight > Knight

Carthaginians are building Newton's -- TOG has been discovered. Carthago has a Monopoly

Turn 2 -- 870 AD
Not much, just some maneuvering

IT:
Ship keeps moving, still not landing

Istanbul Knight > Knight
Bursa Bank > Knight
Konya Pike > Bank

Turn 3 -- 880 AD
More moving. Aztecs have ToG.

IT:
Rome and India fight, I think Rome gets the better of it (although losing a Musket). The ship has turned South.

Edrine Knight > Knight

Turn 4 -- 890 AD
Carthage wants a Kings Ransom for ToG, I politely decline.

IT:
Cav dies attacking Musket
Uskudar Knight > Bank

Turn 5 -- 900 AD
Troops outside Wine Tasting are moved sw to form a new position o' strength

IT:
The Romans are making more strides in the West, and I just saw a GL for them!

Istanbul Knight > Knight
Iznik Bank > Knight

Turn 6 -- 910 AD
Saltpetre deal expires, I switch all Knights to Sipahi
I upgrade several knights to Sipahi
I rush Barracks in Wine Tasting for 32 gold
Since the Romans have it well-guarded due to their assault on Kolhapur, I move the guarding forces towards Wine Tasting.

IT:
Romans take Kolhapur
Wine Tasting Barracks > Cannon
Izmit Pike > Cannon
Mugla Library > Barracks

Turn 7 -- 920 AD
Troops mass outside Delhi

IT:
Cav attacks Sipahi--GOLDEN AGE TIME, BOYZ!!!!! 143gpt to ... 315!

Bursa Sipahi > Sipahi
Palace expansion! I add a wing.

Turn 8 -- 930 AD
I trade Silks and 38gpt to Carthage for ToG

We're in the Industrial Age ... we get Medicine ... huh, we're the only Scientific Civ? I order up Steam Power at 0% (don't gain much by spending all of our cash)

I trade Physics to Arabia for Printing Press.

I don't feel the need to trade for Democracy yet.

Assault on Delhi...we lose 1 sipahi in the assault, but kill 3 muskets and a spear. We capture it and get Sistine Chapel and Great Wall... do we keep it?

Here's how the world currently looks; I hope to get Bombay my turn and then prepare two assaults, one for Bangalore and one for Karachi.

 

[meldor]

Sistines is good. Is the Great Wall good across the entire empire or is it limited to only the current landmass. This would be a good capture for this type of game as the replacement cities get free wall for defense. I don't hardly ever build it as there are more important wonders at the time. If you think we can keep enough units in the city without slowing down our advance. Is there enough trash units to move in until we can rush a library and get the population down to 1?

The other option is to not put any units but one trash unit and let it flip if it will. Then simply have some units on standby to take it back, rinse and repeat until it is down to size and/or the Indians no longer exist.

 

[ChrTh]

Great Wall expired with Metallurgy. Sistine Chapel doubles the effects of cathedrals, but considering we're not bloody likely to go to Republic or Democracy any time soon, our happiness isn't as much of an issue--plus I don't think we have any cathedrals.

Personally, I'd rather save the containment effort to Bombay, but that's just my opinion.

 

[ChrTh]

Turn 8 930AD - Continued

I like my logic above, so the resistance in Delhi ends as I abandon it. Bingo!, er, I mean Bingol, is built in its place.

IT:
Antalya Sipahi > Bank

Theveste completes Shakes, cascade time?

Turn 9 -- 940 AD
I hurry Barracks in Bingo!

Assault on Bombay: Kill 2 Muskets and 2 spears without loss. I keep it and start to starve it.

Hrm, I have some troops left over ... I go raze Madras (Rome had the full-on assault on it, now it's gone )

IT:
I lose the Sipahi that razed Madras (no one else could reach him in time). Our MDI fights off a Cav, though.

Turn 10 -- 950 AD
Bingo! RAX > Cannon
Istanbul Sipahi > Sipahi
Edrine Sipahi > Sipahi
Nippur Harbor > Worker
Adana Sipahi > Bank

I send our Elite Knight to kill off the Cav who dared to attack our MDI .. and get a GL!

I change Wine Tasting to Smith's and Rush it

Assault on Bangalore .. we take it without loss (killing one musket and two spear)

Assault on Karachi .. beat 3 muskets, lose 1 sipahi. Since it's pretty close to Dacca, I raze it...DOH! Saltpetre is still in Indian borders as a result. I bring a unit down to pillage it, but no moves left.

I get revenge on the cav that killed our Madras-razing sipahi

Carthage has Steam Power AND Nationalism?!?! We can trade for Steam Power, but I leave that to Belisar.


Well, I lost 3 sipahi, and more or less wiped out India:

There's still a city to the far north, for whatever reason the Romans have been leaving it alone. There are 2 Sipahi in Kafa (just upgraded this turn), and a galleon right next to it. Expedition, anyone?

BTW, SIPAHI KICK ASS. We might want to get started in on the Romans now before they get Rifles, especially since Carthage now has Nationalism...

Here's the save:
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/MLDR3_950AD.SAV

 

[Coffee]

Reads like a fun set of turns.

 

[ChrTh]

Originally posted by Coffee
Reads like a fun set of turns.

Oh, it was glorious...I was tempted to keep playing, but didn't want to deny Belisar some enjoyment. I just hope I didn't leave any Sipahi vulnerable to counterattacks during the interturn...

 

[Northern Pike]

Fine work, ChrTh. Smith will help a lot.

The war against Rome will be unusual and interesting, with three separate narrow fronts.

 

[Belisar]

Glad you left some Indians for me

As I said before, Sistine is not very important for us in this game.
Smith on the other side is very nice, now ToE is the top-priority.
Bad thing we didn't get Nat. or Steam, I think we just can not have it all.
The fact that we are the only scientific civ somewhat compensates for that.
The huge income increase will help us, we have to upgrade a lot of troops and need to stay equal in tech with leader Hanni.

And now I'll have to drive a few Sipahis. :devil2:

 

[Belisar]

Originally posted by ChrTh

Well, I lost 3 sipahi, and more or less wiped out India

That's the way we will win this game

'Got it'

 

[Northern Pike]

Just a thought for the future: we should found a city five tiles straight NW of Istanbul, and one five tiles straight NW of Antalya, as soon as the progress of the Roman war permits. These first-ring cities might help us a fair amount before the game ends, but only if they're founded promptly.

 

[meldor]

It's a good thing you fallowed my advise...

Good work pounding the Indians into the dirt. Now we get the payback for having to build all those early barracks at full price. A nicely timed GA and a UU that should last us even after Infantry show up.

Medicne isn't as bad as you think. It is one of the requireds for SciMeth so we have one foot in the door, only two more to go. If we get ToE we should be able to win this with no problems.

I think that maybe after Rome, we should start looking at hitting Hannie, as they are the tech leader. Thoughts?

The hit list:
1) Babylon - gone
2) India - On the ropes!
3) Rome - In the sights.
4) Iroquois, Carthage, Aztecs (Fielders choice)
7) Arabia

NorthernPike
CtrTh
Belisar (up)
Coffee (on deck)
Arizona_Steve
Meldor

 

[ChrTh]

Sorry meldor ... if I had realized how quickly I'd be able to alleviate the cultural pressure by thwacking the nearby cities, I would've kept it.

Oh, I know we need medicine...it's just that I was thinking that having Nationalism during our GA would be keen as we'd have extra cash for upgrades to Rifles (and we'd build them faster), and I was running out of tasks for the workers so if we'd gotten Steam I could've had them work on the railroad.

Of course, both Steam and Nationalism is available now from Carthage, although the latter is probably prohibitively expensive. I'm going to guess that India got one and traded with Carthage, as none of the other Civs have either.

 

[Coffee]

Yea the tech leader for sure, should start a ToE prebuild also.

 

[ChrTh]

The Sinop(sp?) prebuild is still going...I think it has 50 turns left, but that's in GA, I think it was in the low 80s...so it'll probably be about 55-60 turns left after the GA

 

[Coffee]

The Sinop(sp?) prebuild is still going

Ok, thanxs

 

[meldor]

Should we be researching sanitation?

[EDIT] BTW, I was only teasing about not following my advice. It doesn't really matter, it is likely we won't build too many cathedrals anyway. Only in those cites that get hospitals and can go high enough in pop.

 

[Northern Pike]

Sanitation or Nationalism, certainly.

 

[Belisar]

RL was buisy so I will get to the game tonight, sorry for one day delay.

A few things which are open to discussion:

Steam is available now (we still have a monopol) so I'm taking no risk and
will secure it. Thereafter, we will be short on workers, so my question is probably not important short-term: Do we consider worker-merges for growth as exploit?
I do it all the time in solo-games and our northern FP-region cities are way below size 12. Speeding up growth would require irrigation and we have not the labour nor can we accept the loss of production.

Next: I fully agree that we research sanitation at min, a necessary but optional tech. Nationalism isn't affordable yet (this tech is way overprized), but it should be too expensive for Rome also.

Leading to my next point: Do we sell the Romans Med. (@last) for gpt ?
If we have to declare in ~ 4, 5 turns we won't get every coin but they would get it from the other AIs anyway, so we could take the extra money. Not sure if that's within our variant.

Prebuild: With the current prebuild we have 600 shields in ~30 and 800 shields in ~45-50 turns, depending on MM. (GA is considered)
Timing is not easy, it may be ideal for Hoover. In ST2, the AI researched all the way to Combustion before getting SciMe, but I had other games as well.


And last: I was left without any settlers

 

[ChrTh]

@Belisar: Sorry, I only had one to start, and I was so busy building military that I didn't make any for you

Do we really want our cities to go above size 12? If we can get enough Luxuries, we might be able to maintain a Republic during AW ... but not if they get larger than 12. To be honest, if this were a solo game, I'd just keep popping workers/settlers off the large cities to keep them around 11 and not bother with hospitals.