MM8: Philosophical Fredrick

[jameson]

Berlin, München and Hamburg should probably be our culture cities; they're the most built up and have two religions in them so we can get those buildings out of the way earlier. They should be all culture, all the time with military and settlers coming from the other cities.

I'll definitely go for a floodplains city with the next settler, what I'd like input in is an idea I have for placing it off the river, which should redeem an FP tile for extra food at the expense of trade

 

[Shillen]

I think up by the rice/horses has more room/better tiles for a city than over by the flood plains. Sure flood plains are nice but those are about the only tiles the city will have to itself. If not up by the horses my second choice would be using a galley and settling south of Kassite. But up to you guys.

 

[jameson]

Inherited turn: no changes

75 AD (1) Munich finishes settler, Imhotep hurries the Parthenon ! The settler goes towards the Eastern floodplans, an archer near Kassite is deputed to serve as a garrison in that spot. Literature comes in, research set to drama. I don't much fancy our chances of getting to Music first, and theatres will be highly useful (particularly those of the globe variety).

I agree with Shillen that the Northwestern horse/ rice spot is better, but it seems to me we're more at a risk of losing the FP city to the French. I'll get one more settler done to grab the horses too.

Hamburg is my choice for the Great Library, Berlin will build what should be our final settler for now after its temple completes.

100 AD (2) Munich completes Parthenon, I have it build an archer which will get rice/horse city protected. Worker from Kassite roads towards FP spot.

125 AD (3) Munich archer - Buddhist monastery. Taoism spreads to our lands !

Warriors explore, workers work.


150 AD (4) Dortmund is founded, we're now at -14 gold at 70% science. It's an investment we're making here, yeah, that's the ticket .
Here's Dortmund:

As you can see, it will grab 5 floodplains spot and a set of bananas for a food bonanza.

We won't get much out of Theology by just holding on to it, so I get Calendar from it from Cyrus and Construction from Hatshepsut. Louis won't trade with us, and we have a few spare swords around. Could be a plan to beat his techs (monarchy and horseback riding) out of him by force ? Swords get sent to Dortmund.

175 AD (5) Not much

200 AD (6) Frankfurt work boat -> lighthouse.

225 AD (7) Judaism spreads to Dortmund. @ great people get born in faraway lands. Munich finishes granary, starts the national epic. Science now to 60% to stop the haemorrhaging (sp?) of money.

Work boat at Frankfurt finds it cannot actually do anything yet until optics .

Exploring warriors get disbanded because we're losing cash to unit support now too.

250 AD (8) Science now to 50%. Berlin completes settler, starts axeman.

275 AD (9) Sell a spare ivory to Cyrus for 2gpt to stop us from having to lower science yet again. I'm also sorely tempted to sell literature around for the 350-odd gold that's on the table since we cannot use it as leverage in tech trades anymore and we could raise science again. Better wait until drama appears though (and we don't want to wipe out our already slim chances of building the great library).

300 AD (10) Drama comes in, sell it and literature to Cyrus for Currency and 80 gold.

Currency is worth 8gpt for us. Drama and 80 gold to Hatty for Monarchy.

There's about 550- 600 total gold on the table from three different civs for literature; we could probably turn around and pick up horseback riding with that, though it's not a crucial tech for us at this point yet. Alternatively, we could use it to fund deficit research towards music, which is now due in 12 at 60% science (though at this point, no beakers have as yet been invested). I haven't done the trades yet, so it's still up for discussion.

Diplomatically, Cyrus and Hatshepsut like us, the others not so much. Louis should go ( we need a few units more to grab some cities from us, also he's informed us he's built a horse archer which could be painful).

Proposed new city spot (settler on its way 1 tile south of Hamburg, but it's not on goto) :

And the save.

Mark is out of town so Shillen is up next.
BTW, we don't have a state religion yet; our three major cities are all Buddhist so could benefit from the added production, though they won't generate the culture from other religions anymore then. Given that religion by itself doesn't actually produce all that much culture for us yet that's probably a small price to pay for wonder competitiveness.

 

[Shillen]

Don't we want the national epic in our high food/great person city? I think that's about the only wonder I wouldn't build in our 3 main cities. Munich is also low on food and it will be very hard to hire specialists there.

 

[Rince]

As a sidenote: I think we are now able to make a plantation on the bananas near Kassite.

 

[jameson]

The reason I started building it in Munich is it's the only city we have which is already pumping out the GP points on account of the wonders we built there so we benefit that much sooner. It will take a great deal of time for the FP city to pump out as many points as Munich does.

Feel free to veto though, naturally .

 

[Shillen]

I got it. I will play either tonight or tomorrow night.

 

[Shillen]

pre-turn: Our land is seriously underdeveloped. We only have 4 workers and soon to be 10 cities.

Why are we building axemen? Are we going to war?

I divert the swordsmen going to Dortmund and send him to Essen which is undefended. I send the settler towards the suggested city location with the archer fortified there.

I don't want to sell literature as I'm really afraid we'll be beat to the great library. 18 more turns is a long time to wait for it. Passing up 600 gold on the table when we only have 1g and are running 60% science is hard to do, though. We're already way behind in techs, we don't want to fall farther behind. I'll do it. Even if we get beat to the great library it will give us a bunch of cash to compensate us which would help us catch up in tech anyway. Ok we now have 631g. Horseback riding would cost us 610g and it's not a very useful tech until we have knights or cavalry anyway. Set science to 100%, music in 6 turns at -35gpt.

Another thing to note is that we need to get religion spread around, build temples, theatres, etc. We can't spend all our time trying to get all the wonders. Religion is going to net more culture than wonders will anyway.

Little early to build a lighthouse in Essen. If we chop down a couple jungles it wouldn't need to work any coast tiles for a while. I'm going to let it hit size 3 (in 1 turn) then build a worker. It can finish the lighthouse later. I also switch Cologne to a worker. We have no pressing need for a barracks (I know it was started it ages ago when it was first build hehe). It can be finished later. The city needs terrain development badly. I switch Kassite to a granary instead of library. The sooner we get that city grown up the sooner we can hire specialists.

(1) 325AD - Berlin axeman->granary. 4 turns to build granary and 4 turns to growth. It will build a worker or two once it's done with the granary. Axeman gets a combat promotion and fortifies.

(2) 350AD - Hmm French borders expanded into first ring of the soon to be new city site. Caesar learned Feudalism.

(3) 375AD - Interesting. I just noticed that our camp on the elephant didn't remove the jungle. So we still need to chop that tile.

IBT: China demands Drama from us. I give in to him.

(4) 400AD - Stuttgart is founded. The french border is still first ring. Set to build temple. Hatty learned Compass and is willing to trade Code of Laws.

(5) 425AD - Berlin granary->worker. Frankfurt lighthouse->worker.

(6) 450AD - We learn music. Set to Paper in 7 turns. Homer is born in Berlin (for discovering Music first). Hmm do we merge him or save him and culture bomb later? It's quite possible by merging him now he'd generate 4000 culture before the end of the game, esp once we get +50% culture generation buildings. He also generates 3 gold and 3 beakers per turn which is pretty damn nice. I think it's worth merging him this early in the game. I will merge him in Hamburg because I think that will be the slowest culture city of the three. Trade Music to Hatty for Metal Casting and 275g. Music and 40g to Cyrus for Code of Laws and HBR. I know it sucks to give up our new tech right away and it probably prevents us from getting Notre Dame but I really think we needed the cash and to get some of the techs we're missing.

(7) 475AD - Just checking out the AI relations. Louis XIV is not very well liked we should avoid trading with him if possible. Hatty and Mao don't like each other either.

IBT: Hatty wants us to cancel our deals with Mao. We're giving him iron for fish. I remember rejecting Mao's offer of that before. Now it's biting us in the ass because I'd rather piss off Mao than Hatty so I accept the deal cancellage.

(8) 500AD - Cologne finishes worker starts on forge. Blah cancelling the deals also cancels open borders, which gets our work boat stuck in a little strip of Persian territory surrounded by Chinese territory. That's lame. We may want to go to war with China at some point. The two cities bordering us are defended by a spearman + archer in one city and just an archer in the other city. They'd be pretty ripe for the picking and the rest of Mao's cities aren't that close to us. But probably not worth it right now as we can't afford to start building more military. Hell we might even flip those two cities once Hamburg gets going on culture.

(9) 520AD - Berlin worker->theatre. Thespis (Great Artist) is born in Munich. Going to merge him in Hamburg also.

(10) 540AD - Frankfurt worker->granary. Hatty is willing to trade Feudalism now, of course we have nothing to give her. We can get sugar out of Cyrus and gems out of Hatty. I trade rice to Cyrus for sugar. We don't need the happiness at the moment but we had extra rice and it will improve relations.

end turn - Overall I think we're in really good shape. First in score. Our cities are slow getting them developed since we expanded so much and haven't improved the land enough but we'll kick into full gear very soon. Buddhist temples are needed once the great library and national epic are complete. Then one of the cities can build the buddhist cathedral. We also need monasteries in our judaism and taoism cities to spread those around. Those two cities are undeveloped, unfortunately. Maybe switching to organized religion/buddhism wouldn't be a bad idea?

 

[nerovats]

Got it, play later today.

 

[nerovats]

580AD
discover paper->education
Berlin Theatre->Notre Dame
600AD
Stutgart theatre->worker
620AD
Get compas, WM and 10 gold for paper from Hatshepsut
680AD
Hamburg Great Lib->theatre
Munich National Epic->theatre
Frankfurt granary->worker
720AD
Hamburg theatre->Chichen Itza
Munich theatre->Buddist Monastary
Frankfurt worker->theatre

View attachment 103617

 

[nerovats]

grahamiam - UP
Rince - on deck
jameson - in the hole

 

[grahamiam]

sorry, thanks for the roster

 

[grahamiam]

Preflight check: Ok, Hamburg, Berlin, and Munich are the big 3. Turn the Scientist in Berlin to a priest, hoping we can get a Great Prophet instead of a Great Scientist, not sure how it'll work out but we could use the extra 4000 culture.
Currently 4T from Education, going for Liberalism? If so, we need Philosophy also. Mao is the only one who has Philosophy, but when I call him up, he tells me to leave him alone. Apparently, we hurt his feelings by canceling all trades with him.
Turn down research to 90% so we don't lose so much money, Edu still in 4T.
We are really light in regards to military, and I see 3 French horse archers + a cat on our border. Hope he doesn't declare.

IBT: France (Louis) declares war on us. Seems like rejecting military defenses that were being built was not as wise as we thought
Essen Lighthouse -> Library
Stutgard worker -> archer

T1: 760AD Louis is invading with horseman near Dortmund (3 horses, 1 cat), so I switch Berlin to a spear. Leave Dortmund on Lib as it's very shield poor and can't build a spear in less than 12 turns.
Look around and it seems that Berlin and Hamburg have barracks, but no other towns have it, crap. Leave Hamburg on Chichen Itzen, but switch Munich from Monastary to spear, and MM for shields.
Move sword out of Essen towards Berlin. No roads down here yet so the going is slow.

IBT: Dortman gets bombarded by the cat, losing 17%

T2: 780AD manuvering.

IBT: @Dortman: Sword defends against horse archer (5.3/6), but defenses of city are removed by cat. However, only 2 horses left now.
Horse Archer pillages iron mine near Berlin

Frankfort: Theater -> axe

T3: 800AD @ Berlin: Axe dies vs horse archer, but severly damages it (1.2/6). Use a warrior to destroy it (2/2)
@ Dortman: Sword kills horse archer (4.8/6); Sword kills horse archer (4.8/6); 5.6 sword destroys cat (1.3/6)
Whip the Archer in Stuttgart, as there's a horse archer in range. Not sure if this is soon enough.
French will land an archer and cat near Kassite next turn. I think they'll capture the worker on the lux, but not sure.

IBT: Luckily, the horse archer near Stuttgart goes N.
Education -> Liberlism, via Philosophy
Stuttgart archer -> spear
Munich spear -> Axe
Berlin spear -> Elephant

T4: 820AD Moving units SE to take care of the landing.
Sell Egypt WM for 10g
We could get her to go to war with Louis for Education, or we could get Fuedalism, but I don't like either deal.

IBT: kassites defenses down 17% by cat attack. also, nearby farm is pillaged.
Lose an archer near Stuttgart

IBT: Egypt asks for Education, but I refuse, she becomes cautious. Should have traded it last turn
Frankfurt Axe -> barracks

T5: 840AD moving

T6: 860AD Near Frakfurt: Axeman dies to horsearcher (0.2/6); Archer kills it off (3/3)
Near Kassite: 5.4 Sword kills archer (5.4/6)
Near Dortmund: Sword kills spear (3.1/6)

IBT: Dortmund Lib -> spear

T7: 880AD I whip the spear in Dortmund as there's 5 horse archers, a cat, and a spear coming at the town next turn.
Also, looks like Mao might land 2 horse archers next turn

IBT: Kill 2 horse archers at Dortmund, China (Mao) Declares war.
Berlin War Elephant -> Spear
Dortmund spear -> spear

T8: 900AD Near Berlin: WE kills HA (6.9/8)
Near Kassite: Sword kills HA (2.9/6)
Crap, looks like I really screwed our rep up. Now Egypt won't join vs France or China for anything Sell Education to Egypt for Machinery, WM, 10g. She's now pleased, but we don't have anything good enough to bribe her to war. Maybe in 4T when Philosophy is done?

IBT: Lose a spearman and sword @ Dortmund, but kill 2 horse archers. Chinese horse archers pillage instead of trying to take the town.


T9: 920AD Spearman kills Chinese Horsearcher near Frankfurt (1.3/4)

IBT: Lots of action @ Kassite and Dortmund
@ Kassite: Archer dies against cat
@ Dortmund: everything is dinged but only lose 1 spear

Kassite Lib -> market
Dortmund spear -> spear
Stuttgart spear -> spear
Munich spear -> spear
Heron (Great Engineer) born in Munich

T10: 940AD @ Kassate: Archer kills cat.
@ Munich: Spear kills Horse Archer (1.8/4)
@ Dortmund: Not sure what to do. Everyone is hurt on both sides, but I believe that France holds the upperhand due to the cats. However, if I attack, we will lose at least 1 defender, which is not good. Hmm, promote a sword due to XP's, and his health jumps from 2.6 to 4.6. I happened to give him Formation, and now the odds of killing are pretty good. So, attack with 4.3 sword and kill horse archer (3.4/6); 3.6 Sword kills other damaged horse archer (2.6/6). Ok, now all that's left is a cat and spear, but we're too beatup to take them both down. Well, maybe not as I look and look at the numbers, decide to take a chance and attack (2.9 vs 2.3). We win, 1.3/4. All that's left is a 1.0 cat. Warrior kills it. Whew!

Leave our Great Engineer Heron in Munich, unmoved. Right now, the wonders available for rushing are:
Hanging Gardens
Chichen Itza (due in 4t in Hamburg)
Notre Dame (due in 17t in Berlin, but that town is making units atm)
Sistine Chaple

We really need to get some of the other towns (other than the big 3) making units. Hopefully, we can get those towns up to speed and not forget about military in the future.

edit: We can sign peace with France for a good chunk of gold (170g). We should do it and move everything we can to the West as Mao has a ton of LB's poised to strike us from the West. We can also upgrade a couple of Archers to crossbows if desired.

 

[jameson]

Phew, great job at defending against that surprise attack and keeping the empire intact too . The CIV AI seems much more aggressive at attacking you when you're weak militarily, and particularly when you encroach upon their borders. So, um , sorry .

 

[Rince]

Omg, what a game to inherit. Hope i can hold up as bravely as you did, grahamian.

Will play it tonight, CET. Advice and ideas welcome.

Rince

 

[grahamiam]

we need to decide on the wonder we want to rush, and in which city. sorry, no access to the save but I believe it should be rushed in Munich or Berlin, letting Hamburg finish Chichen Itzen

Roster
mark1031 (out till Nov 16th)
Shillen
Nerovats
grahamiam
Rince -> UP and posted a got it already
jameson -> on deck

 

[Shillen]

Good work on the defense. I'm at work so I can't check the save either.

Definitely rush Sistine. +2 culture for each specialist in all cities and double production with marble which we don't have.

I'm not sure why we were building chichen itza anyway. We really shouldn't be trying to get every wonder possible. I'd rather be spreading religion around for temples/monasteries/cathedrals.

We should probably sue for peace with France as soon as they're willing. I find when the AI declares war on you, beating them off and then going on the offensive just takes way too long and the war weariness sets in, not to mention the AI is prepared for you as they've probably been making mostly units for a while now. Just give them a tech for peace or whatever the price is. We can pay them back later in the game maybe.

 

[grahamiam]

they will pay us 170g for peace. I agree with this, as we are also at war with China from the West and we can't hold 2 fronts with our current military.

 

[Shillen]

Well that's what I get for not reading carefully (hey I'm supposed to be working ). I somehow missed entirely that China declared on us also and that you had already suggested suing for peace with France. I'm surprised he's willing to pay us for peace, though, as the AI usually isn't willing to pay you unless you threaten their cities, even if you have a better kill ratio.

I'd have to look at the save to see the situation with China. I know on my turn they had almost no defense in their two nearer cities, but I'm guessing that's not the case anymore. It might be a good idea to sue for peace with both. China might even give us a better peace deal if we get France out of it first.

 

[grahamiam]

china won't talk.

China's cities to our west have a stack of LB's, some cats (1 or 2) and a horse chariot. They also have a horse archer running around, pillaging improvements. Not much, but all we have is an archer, an axeman, and a couple of spears. by signing peace, we can move more units to the West, maybe even sacking the Chinese cities on our continent or, probably better, drawing Egypt or Greece into the war.