Monarch Students game - climbing from Prince

[Ai Shizuka]

Can anyone else give a rundown on their political strategy given these AI's and their locations?

Spoiler :

Beside the early rush on JC, my main goal was to avoid massive dogpiling. Pretty straightforward in my situation. SB is the only one not declaring at pleased (he has 90% peace probability at cautious), so the main priority was keeping him there: lopsided trades (our trade relations blabla), religion, giving him tribute.

With SB pleased, I had to worry about the small mongolian front only (Isabella attacking from there, too),

In an hypotetical scenario with different religions, I would have adopted SB's one. KK is a jerk anyway and Isabella fails at warmongering (nothing new here).

Been very careful about WHEOOHRN status in this game (and BUG mod helps a lot, with the little fist icon), so I wasn't caught with the pants down by Isabella's DoW.

About more games like this, I think it's doable. Quite a few people are playing this one, so we can even make a new serie, targeted specifically at Monarch players.

 

[MkLh]

From BC's to 1460 AD:

Spoiler :

Cat/Axe-war with 4 cities against Bull started 85 AD. I should attack Caesar, cause he had built Pyramids, but I thought I could take both, and Bull is a nightmare if he gets Feudalism, so I started with him..

View attachment 197805

Bull was hard with his Walls and CG2&Drill archers, I was warring bad and it was not before 730 I managed to finish him.

View attachment 197806

It was too late then for another cat war against Caesar. Economic & tech. situation was quite bad too: -22 deficit at 0% research, no CoL or Currency or any tech to trade. I hade made some major mistakes: perhaps the biggest one was to tech towards Priesthood->CoL, and not Currency (building wealth would have fixed that deficit easily).

Luckily I had Alpabeth so I could build Research, but the progression was slow for a looong time. Finally I recovered and won the Lib race (late but anyway, burning one Scientists for Edu). Willem van Oranje came out and helped backfilling. At 1460 game is surely winnable: I soon have rifles and can take at least one opponent with rifles & trebs if not all the continent. Don't know if I ever finish this though, winning takes still so much effort, thanks to poor early game.

View attachment 197810
View attachment 197807
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[Bleys]

Spoiler :

@ Bleys - Can you explain in a little more detail about your diplo manipulation of Izzy? How did this work? To what end? and what do you mean about KK being your "bullet stopper"? Were his cities between you and Iz?

Spoiler :

Izzy is one of the easiest leaders to get in good with. All you need to do is adopt her religion, and within 30 turns or so, you will get a whopping +6 Same Religion diplo. I would have waited to join her religion, or if she missed them all, tried to spead one to her. Once you have religion with her, you can leverage the SPI trait for her favorite Civic as well.

I also gave in to her "asking" for a tech, and gifted her a resource, all to try to keep her as high as possible.

As TMIT noted, SB is the only leader on our landmass who wont DoW at Pleased, so sharing religion and giving him a resource or tech will keep him off your back.

As for KK being my bullet stopper, I am planning to gift him military techs as I get them, so he can build tech-parity units. If I find I want to take out SB he will help a ton with his units. Overseas wars using vassals is a bit trickier, but you can tell them to attack a specific spot, and be ready to take your moves off his.

I think the key to the first half of this game was diplomacy. Knowing your opponents is critical to moving up in levels. It was clear very early that there would be competition for land, so you must be able to make strong diplomatic assessments in order to succeed.

 

[futurehermit]

From BC's to 1460 AD:

It's important to pick your opponents well. One of the best pieces of advice I picked up on these forums is to "attack soft targets early and warmongerers late". The reasoning here is that the soft targets early are the techies who may out-tech you and then be hard to invade because of their superior units. However, they don't focus on military early and thus are vulnerable to attack. In contrast, the warmongerers will be hard to invade early because of their unit-spamming. However, they will fall behind in tech and thus be easy to steamroll later once you have a tech lead (killing stack after stack of outdated units).

Sitting Bull is one of the worst leaders to attack pre-renaissance imo, unless you can really get an early rush on him. In contrast, he has a real tendency to fall badly behind in tech renaissance onward, so he is much easier to attack in later eras.

 

[Gumbolt]

I am playing this game for fun. A break from my Emperor and other monarch game.

I will do an update for 10ad with lots of screen shots. The game is going rather well so far.

I am going to try a risky strategy of avoiding BW and mining for now and teching for horses. I will Probably avoid all the wonders too.

See what happens.

 

[Ai Shizuka]

Part IV, 1600-1808:

Spoiler :

War preparation and war vs Isabella in this round.

Techs: steel - nationalism - mil tradition - rep parts (from SB) - economy - constitution - astro (Willie) - democracy - mil science - biology - medicine - electricity - radio, plus some more trades.


1635 - Great Eng burned to rush Ironworks in Rome. The plan was to use him for Oxford, but military build-up is a priority now. Rome starts spamming 1 cannon/turn.

1690 - Willem asks to adopt Free Religion. Enough bonuses with Sitting Bull to keep him pleased and I don't care anymore about the bonus with Isabella. Willem may be crucial in the future for a UN win, so I accept. Isabella drops to annoyed.

1712 - Knights and trebs from the mongolian war upgraded to cuirassiers and cannons.

1716 - Ready to DoW and quickly recapture Turfan:

But I notice a large spanish stack in Zaragoza, wich can be captured in the first turn, attacking from SB's land.

1720 - Event. I pick the happy option:

NOW ready to declare:

Zaragoza captured, and in the onslaught my power ratio with her increases from 1.1 to 1.4:

1726 - Cordoba:

1728 - Another GG settled in Rome. 3 now.

1732 - Free golden age:

1736 - A small squad is harassing Turfan. They managed to keep Turfan's ministack at bay for the entire war, wich could have easily captured Magyar, still defended by swordsmen (lower left corner):

A GA is born in Karakorum and promptly burned to prolong the golden age.
Another big spanish stack at Salamanca:

1738 - Switch to cottage-mode: Universal Suffrage (+2 hammers from towns in the golden age), Free Speech and Emancipation.

1740 - Salamanca captured. Isabella is willing to give Turfan back for peace, but I want Versailles and the buddhist shrine:

1744 - Karakorum completes Oxford Uni.

1750 - Toledo captured. Now Isa is willing to capitulate AND give Turfan back.

1760 - Barcelona captures, with Versailles:

1762 - Trade with Willem:

1766 - Great Scientist in Karakorum. Put to sleep for now. Isabella is finally able to deploy some conquistadores.

1768 - Justinian declares war on Willem. Willem has rifles, Justi doesn't even know what gunpowder is.

1772 - Double golden age ends. Madrid captured. Wonders and buddhist shrine:

1774 - Mini-stack finally manages to capture Turfan:

1776 - Justi captures a dutch city.

1780 - Seville captured and tech trade with Willem:

1784 - Zaragoza revolts and join the Natives. Justi captures another dutch city. I guess he's spamming cataphracts on Willem's face, whos power is pitiful. But he should be able to defend himself with rifles and grenadiers.

1798 - Willem wants help vs Justi the caveman. Easy bonus, so I accept. Not that I'm going to do anything. It's quite a big distance to swim for horses and cannons.

1798 - Valencia captured, 5 free workers inside.

1800 - +1 event with SB:

1806 - I fail to build the Statue of Liberty and get 1162 gold. SB beat me to it.

1808 - Murcia captured and everyone's favorite zealot is no more:

Tech situation. Sitting Bull is quite the surprise here. He's falling behind, but still keeping contact with a couple techs. How can Justinian be so utterly backward, I don't understand. He claimed all the jungle area on his continent and has over 15 cities:

Glance. Justi is not amused by that DoW:

Continent. 2 cities lost to Native culture:

Other continent, 2 dutch cities captured by Justinian:

War statistics:

And victory conditions:

Now, what to do. I'm beelining Mass Media to build the United Nations. But I don't think Willem's votes are enough. Sitting Bull would be the second candidate, so it's pointless to push him at Friendly. I can, if necessary, gift him Medicine and adopt Environmentalism when asked, for the extra bonus.

Justi is pathetic but, as said above, I don't have a single boat yet. So I think a quick vassalization war vs Sitting Bull is the only option. Probably beelining Artillery after mass media to get a solid advantage.

At some point Willem could vassalize, but I'm not sure about oversea vassalization mechanics. SB's and Willem's land may be enough for a dom victory. If not, diplo win with SB forced to vote for me.
I need to locate his main stack first.

 

[Rameau's Nephew]

OK, Checkpoint at 700BC:

Spoiler :

Settled in place. The river was tempting, but it would've cost me the plains hill. The hut popped for about 50 gold (as did 3 other huts I found in initial exploration). Initial research was AH, because War Chariots kick ass, and because the capital had Pigs.

My warrior went north, then circled the capital in a clockwise direction. Immediately to the north, I met Caesar, and could see that his capital was quite close. Met an archer from the Bull to the east. Buddhism and Hinduism were FIADL in turns 12 and 25, respectively.

Once AH came in, and I saw the Horses to the NW, I knew that a War Chariot rush of Caesar was my clear best option. Eliminating Rome before the Prats start marching would be a huge, huge advantage. Thus, the early build order in Thebes was Worker, Warrior, Settler (normally, I go for a 2nd Worker first, but I didn't yet have BW to deal with all the forests around Thebes, so he would've gone to waste), Worker, Barracks (chopped and whipped), and then a long series of War Chariots (chopping and whipping where I though appropriate).

Memphis, which was built on the hill between the Horses and the Rice, started on a warrior, but switched to a WC when I got a random event building a free pasture/road on the horses 2 turns after the city was founded. That WC was the scout I sent to circle Roman territory as my forces built up in Thebes.

Anyhow, once I had 7 Barrack-built War Chariots, I sent them north. Fortunately, Jules didn't seem to have any metal at all yet. Rome fell in 2000BC with only a couple losses:

Cumae, the Roman city to the south, auto-razed. Antium was a tougher nut to crack, being on a hill. It eventually took out most of my remaining Chariots, but it did fall. The Roman Empire is no more!

I decided to keep Antium. The location isn't fabulous, but it would stop the Bull from grabbing the land. I also settled a replacement city (Heliopolis) on Cumae's old location. Lots of rivered grassland, with some spices-- it should make a nice cottaged-up Bureaucracy capital while Thebes focuses on wonders and troops.

Then, my economy tanked. I had burned through my hut winnings and my war plunder, so the slider went to 10% as I got the new cities up and running, assigned a few priest specialists (thanks to the UB), and worked some cottages.

As I was switching off war production mode, I noticed that the other wonders were coming in pretty slowly (Henge at 1700BC, Wall at 1675), so I got the Oracle built in 1550BC, and went for the 'Mids shortly thereafter. At the cost of most of Thebes' remaining forests, I finished it in 775BC. (I took MC from the Oracle.) Switching to Representation and allocating a few priest specialists has mostly taken care of my economic woes. I even staked out a new city east of Antium, on the coast to gather 3 seafoods. Should be a lovely GPP factory.

Still no religion. I met Izzy quite late in the round (I didn't explore through the jungle to the south until the war with Rome was over). She is predictably Buddhist, but hasn't converted anyone else yet. Hopefully she'll spend the next few centuries pouring all her hammers into missionaries.

Tech order: AH, Mining, BW, Mysticism, Pottery, Meditation, Priesthood, Hunting, Archery, Masonry, Writing (really late for me), Fishing, Maths (current project).

The South:

The North:

Now that the economy is doing OK, I'm going to focus on rebuilding my military, and maybe trying to grab another city to the SE.

 

[Gumbolt]

Spoiler :

Fun fun fun.

They walk right past me. Heres where my warrior follow.

Yep those 4 archers were lethal so early.

Then they came back but my 2 warriors held them off.

Onto Rome now.

Thats my second AI capital by 1525bc. Hurrah.

Rome is gone.

Short but valuable attack on SB. Took 2 out of his 3 cities. I then saw a spear and ran.

Overall. I was lucky getting the barb event. I remembered a previous Celt game. So i followed the uprising and took the city when it fell.

I did accidentally lose the Mongal capital to barbs but I retook it 2-3 turns later with chariots around 900bc.

Overall my science is in trouble. Just getting Alphabet required a lot of city razing. I wouldnt advice getting HB and Alphabet before basic techs like mining/ BW.

In terms of AI threats Sitting bull is weak and the Spanish have a stack of 10 or so units heading their way. hehe. Although I am nearly at strike on my economy. Not good!! Will play this more tomorrow.

 

[Ai Shizuka]

Final Part, 1808 - 1913:

Spoiler :

What, 1913? Yes. Should have been a quick vassalization war vs Sitting Bull and it took more time to make him capitulate than to completely wipe out Isabella. Possibly the most boring session I've ever played.

Tech path: Radio - Mass Media - artillery - railroad - assembly line (Willem) - fascism - industrialism - combustion - plastics - flight - rocketry - satellites - advanced flight - fission - computers

1812 - Great Merchant builds Sid Sushi in Madrid. Seems pointless now, but it saved the day at the end.

1818 - Broadway completed in Rome.

1822 - Stack upgraded to Cavalry and rifles:

1836 - More wonders in Rome:

1840 - Artillery done. Science to 0% to upgrade the cannons and front cities defenders to rifles.

1842 - Peace between Willem and Justinian and so do I. Trade with Willem:

1847 - Ready to DoW on Sitting Bull. He has infantry somehow, science slider still at 0% to upgrade front cities to infantry.

1848 - UN completed in Rome:

Nacogdoches razed, I'm hoping for a quick war here:

SB has an outdated but very big stack at Shangian:

1849 - I'm the UN secretary. Willem votes for me, Justi for SB.
GS settled in Karakorum. I don't have much use for scientists now.

1850 - Shangian captured by SB. The defenders managed to kill quite a bunch of units, but there are too many. A small Native stack is destroyed by Salamanca's defenders.

1852 - 27 units killed at Shangian, and he still has some:

1853 - Shangian recaptured. SB built a military academy there? Thanks, I guess. His power ratio got a huge hit and he's talking about peace.

1954 - Back to 70% research. Willem completes the Eiffel Tower, wich I ignored.

1856 - Nanih Waiya captured:

1857 - Single Currency resolution succeeds.

1860 - 20 units killed in the capture of Chaco Canyon:

SB offers Toledo for peace, but not capitulation. A couple more cities, I guess.

1864 - Justinian declares war on Willem again.

1865 - Open Market resolution succeeds. 20ish units killed capturing Chaokia, wich has the Statue of Liberty. SB still doesn't want to cap, and I'm starting to get annoyed:

1866 - Willem founds Mining Inc.

1870 - More stuff in Rome:

21 Native units killed in the capture of Poverty Point and the idiot still doesn't capitulate. He keeps offering Toledo.

1872 - A GE rush the Pentagon in Rome.

1873 - And completed:

No nukes resolution succeeds. I'm running out of useful things to vote. At this point I was hoping to vote for a diplo win with SB's votes.

1874 - Willem capitulates to Justian. Ouch, there go our votes. Bad mistake here, I should have bribed Justi off that war.

1877 - Mound City captured and guess what? He doesn't capitulate. I'm not counting native deaths anymore.

1879 - Willem proposes this non-sense out of the blue. Yeah, very fair deal indeed. Not accepted, of course:

1880 - Turfan completes the Cristo Redentor? It was there just as a placeholder to get some cash. Completed in some 40 turns:

1880 - Same year, Anhaica is captured. 18 units lost on the native side. Outburst of profanities when he keeps offering Toledo and not his capitulation.

1886 - Some 15ish units killed in the capture of Moundville. Toledo again. I'm starting to regret the no-nukes proposition.
Seriously, is this normal? He lost 7 cities, well over 100 units, my power is 3x and he still doesn't cap. Total bullcrap.

Another GScientist is settled in Karakorum.

1890 - Snaketown captured. The idiot is down to 5 cities now. Getting VERY boring.

1894 - I just want to end this game and forgot to leave some defenders in Snaketown. SB recaptures it.

1885 - Mesa Verde captured and he's down to 5 cities again. Power is 3.5x and still no capitulation. I'm starting to think about some bug.

1898 - Snaketown recaptured and finally:

1905 - Spy event:

And diplo victory elections. My mood at this point is not that hard to imagine:

Domination limit is very close, so I go settle 2 junk cities on the southern ice to claim 5 extra tiles and hope for the best:

1908 - The two ice cities aren't enough. Pushing the culture slider to win some tiles from SB.

1913 - And, at last, barely get a diplo victory. Here is where Sushi won the day, pushing up the population:

Graphs:

Demographics:

Statistics:

Score:

Techs:

Glance:

Continent:

And second continent. I still can't figure how Willem managed to get beaten up so badly by Justinian:

Obviously, I'm happy about this game, being my first try at Monarch and all.
Chariot rush on Rome was the key, and it allowed a much easier diplo game, with the possibility to pick my opponents at my own leisure.
I think I've used Ram's spiritual trait well, switching a lot in and out from slavery and the military civics. Not so many wonders, but I never build a lot of them.

Main difference I've noticed from Prince is the amount of units built by the AIs. I don't know if SB's over-stubbornness is related to the diff level, but I've never seen anything like that. I was really expecting him to capitulate after the first 3-4 cities.

One huge mistake in this game was not bribing Justi to make peace with Willem, with him becoming his vassal. His 50 votes was more than enough for an earlier diplo win.

Anyway, very happy. Now off to the new LHC game.

 

[Single Malt]

Diplomatic Victory 1920something. My first on monarch.

Spoiler :

I said earlier that I thought it was in the bag... It was the hardest fought victory I could muster. Diplomatic victory 6 or 7 turns before WvO was going to get a cultural victory. All wars fought on tech parity or inferiority, arty and masses of tanks FTW!!! After vassalising SB the diplo victory became possible, thankfully, as my little dash and raze army would only have reached WvO on the turn of victory. I got lucky.

How do you keep up with tech and production? I had more land and pop than everybody else, yet still couldn't keep up with either. Well, I had better production, at the end, coz I spent quite some time in police state(first time using the civic) which allowed most decent production cities to get a tank every 2-3 turns, same for arty. Still both Izzy and WvO outteched me big time, even though they were half my size.

 

[Gumbolt]

Spoiler :

Up to 325ad. Spanish capital fell and I made peace. Too many spearmen roaming.

I rushed for priesthood and chopped the oracle and took currrency. Chopped the mids near Rome. Well i had lots of spare forest for once.

Just DOW on Sitting bull again. (I am his and ISabella worst enemy.) His capital with the GLH fell. I did lose 4-5 units in doing so. This could be a tough ask as his archers are CG3 in some cities.

All in all no original AI capital remains on this continent. Lets hope the other island isnt doing too well.

Biggest issue at mo is 0% science rate and distance from capital for cities. Although madrid has a holy shrine.

 

[JTMacc99]

To 1030 AD:

It's important to pick your opponents well. One of the best pieces of advice I picked up on these forums is to "attack soft targets early and warmongerers late".

Spoiler :

Unless, of course, a warmongerer starts trouble with you because you boxed him in and he has a particularly powerful UU.

As has been the case in my game. JC declared war back in the early ADs and the proceded to suicide a pretty healthy stack into a city with walls and lots of axe defenders. After that, I bribed Izzy into war with him, and the JC hatefest went into full effect. He's the only non-buddhist, which is not helping him at all.

After I took one of his cities (all of them are on hills except Rome, which is not helping), I declared peace for a little while just to finish up machinery and start work on engineering. I'm completely sacraficing stuff like CoL to do this, but I will be in a great position of power if I can claim the remaining four Roman cities. Sitting Bull managed to capture one Roman city over on the coast, which was a really good thing for him, sadly. KK and Izzy continue to send stacks up to Roman territory, but they don't really have an answer for the Praets.

I also went into the period of peace in order to build the SP in my capital, and then quickly changed into Theocracy. That's going to be a great deal of help in the long run, as the Spiritual trait works well with wonders that let you change to any civic you want.

KK has already researched Fuedalism, which is annoying. I would really like to finish up this war with Rome before Sitting Bull gets longbows. I could probably capture some nice territory from him with Trebs if I get there when he's still using archers.

 

[Gumbolt]

Spoiler :

Its a tough game really for me. The start wasnt wise avoiding BW for so long.

Okay SB is down to a size 1 city surrounded by jungle. The Spanish now have 5-6 cities and axes/spears and swords defending. My biggest issue is keeping the economy out of stike. Had to whip courthouses everywhere. meanwhile I am being attacked by barb galley and axes on my far off cities (karakorum and Madrid)

My science has been somewhat hammered. I have been using whatever trade tiles I have to avoid strike.

Least i dont have to worry about lots of hosile neighbours. The question is what is happening on the other continent??

 

[vicawoo]

Replayed it as Ramses the wonder spammer, got every wonder except great lighthouse and notre dame (lost by a couple of turns) at the point of liberalism. All the artist wonders are relegated to my second city, which is probably why i lost notre dame. Nobody has declared on me. Spamming wonders with ramses isn't much of a spoiler, so I'm justifying my laziness in omitting the tags. It's not really much of a game, just get a tech lead and kill people with advanced units.

 

[Rameau's Nephew]

700BC - 580AD:

Spoiler :

Not really much to report. No wars (although Kublai is making some aggressive noises), just peaceful expansion, building, and research. I built the Gardens and the Great Library in Thebes.

The real story so far is the relative tech pace on the other continent. Someone over there is smoking us in the liberalism race. Confucianism was FIADL in 600BC, and Taoism followed in 70AD (!), and then Christianity in 400AD. By comparison, I kept waiting for one of the others to discover Alphabet so I could trade for it. Eventually, I couldn't wait anymore and researched it myself in 175AD.

Here's the current culture map:

Spoiler :

 

[Gumbolt]

Might concede this game. I tried a different strategy which killed my early economy.

Spoiler :

I am up to 1300ad. I think the Ai elsewhere has Music as a GA has been born. I am guessing they are teching way ahead of me. I am way behind on my usual teching rate. I have lost out on christianty and conf. I dont even have asthetics or metal casting or feudalism yet. The choice of techs at start didnt help here.

Okay I wiped out the Romans early using war chariots. Those UU rock.
Mongols were taken care of by barbs and I nabbed their capital. (bad move in terms of upkeep)
Sitting Bull after 1-2 wars was taken down using mainly mounted units. Well it took me ages to hook up copper (I never teched BW - traded). This made protecting the chariots a minor issue.
With the Spanish left still on 5 cities without Madrid and eventually 3-4 techs behind me it made tech trading hard. Well it was a long trek down to reach them with jungle and forest. This was mostly done without catapults.

The problem with this is that it left everyone my worst enemy and no real economy to work from. I did struggle for culture at start to pop the borders of cities. Must tech mystism next time.

A few pointers when you know you are ignoring your economy.

1. When Ai capital cities out number the amount you have actually built. 4-2 in this case at one point. Downside of this is each of them have a 7-8 gold upkeep due to distance from capital.
2. You have 0% science but are actually producing no science relying on money from razed cities. Well I could of hooked up gold/silver i guess. Specialists really do help!!
3. You have 3-4 captured cities spread on several sides of the map but not connected to your capital. Even with 12 workers!! Hehe

All in all it was a lot of fun taking down 3-4 Ai before longbowmen. Might play on just to kill off the Spanish but they have longbowmen now and lots of room to expand.

If i did this again I would skip HA so early and tech other things first. Romans as a first attack was a good move. Their capital is a production power house and could chop 1-2 wonders. Mongol/ NA capital would make a great GP farm too.

For an early war economy it really does help having a holy city with the shrine. I just never got that early enough. Although I did get philosophy first.

What would civ 4 be about if you didnt play about once in a while.

 

[vicawoo]

Might concede this game. I tried a different strategy which killed my early economy.

Spoiler :

I am up to 1300ad. I think the Ai elsewhere has Music as a GA has been born. I am guessing they are teching way ahead of me. I am way behind on my usual teching rate. I have lost out on christianty and conf. I dont even have asthetics or metal casting or feudalism yet. The choice of techs at start didnt help here.

Okay I wiped out the Romans early using war chariots. Those UU rock.
Mongols were taken care of by barbs and I nabbed their capital. (bad move in terms of upkeep)
Sitting Bull after 1-2 wars was taken down using mainly mounted units. Well it took me ages to hook up copper (I never teched BW - traded). This made protecting the chariots a minor issue.
With the Spanish left still on 5 cities without Madrid and eventually 3-4 techs behind me it made tech trading hard. Well it was a long trek down to reach them with jungle and forest. This was mostly done without catapults.

The problem with this is that it left everyone my worst enemy and no real economy to work from. I did struggle for culture at start to pop the borders of cities. Must tech mystism next time.

A few pointers when you know you are ignoring your economy.

1. When Ai capital cities out number the amount you have actually built. 4-2 in this case at one point. Downside of this is each of them have a 7-8 gold upkeep due to distance from capital.
2. You have 0% science but are actually producing no science relying on money from razed cities. Well I could of hooked up gold/silver i guess. Specialists really do help!!
3. You have 3-4 captured cities spread on several sides of the map but not connected to your capital. Even with 12 workers!! Hehe

All in all it was a lot of fun taking down 3-4 Ai before longbowmen. Might play on just to kill off the Spanish but they have longbowmen now and lots of room to expand.

If i did this again I would skip HA so early and tech other things first. Romans as a first attack was a good move. Their capital is a production power house and could chop 1-2 wonders. Mongol/ NA capital would make a great GP farm too.

For an early war economy it really does help having a holy city with the shrine. I just never got that early enough. Although I did get philosophy first.

What would civ 4 be about if you didnt play about once in a while.

Spoiler :

Seems like skipping bronze working would slow down your rush. I actually went worker worker settler (2nd worker finished about when bronze working finished) and went for a very fast first city.

After taking Rome (second Roman city autorazed), I scouted everyone else being too far away to take without going negative. So I got a library in my capital and started on a great scientist and worked 2 cottages. 2nd city worked two grassland cottages after growing (building war chariots while growing). There's a decent economic base. My next priority was to contain the AI, after all, it's easier to settle land than take it from sitting bull's longbows. I kept settlers unsettled at the seafood city north of sitting bull, one for the cow/copper/dye city.

While undergoing this first recovery, I opened borders with Kublai, scouted his two cities with minimal forces, and had two workers build a road across the jungle to him, minimizing unit upkeep costs.

Next step of recovery, get as many cottages up as possible. My 2nd city (rice/horse) took over great scientist recruiting duties, and I looked to acquire happiness. Was too late on oracle, and monarchy would take forever. So I settled the fur and the gems after I had roads prepped and the gem jungle chopped.
Temporarily decreases my economy, but I compensated by
1) having beelined alphabet earlier
2) extorting techs (particularly math) from kublai
3) having an early great scientist from much earlier for an academy at my capital
4) razing 3 barbarian cities for enough gold to push me to monarchy.
If this were higher level, I could have gone aesthetics and traded it for alphabet and iron working and monarchy, and I would have pushed for currency instead, but monarch nobody had monarchy early.

Checking the tech screen, sitting bull did not have monarchy for a long time, so I was able to delay building horse archers until after I had great library and civil service and a strong economy. Sitting bull and isabella are not dangerous neighbors, especially since caesar and kublai were attacked before they got the +1 relations, so I skimped heavily on units in favor of economy, and when isabella asked me to convert, I had diplomacy locked up. I purposefully kept kublai and sitting bull alive to prevent the duel no tech trading situation.

Heroic epic rome and bureacracy capital easily produced enough horse archers to bring down sitting bull.

 

[Gumbolt]

Spoiler :

Seems like skipping bronze working would slow down your rush. I actually went worker worker settler (2nd worker finished about when bronze working finished) and went for a very fast first city.

After taking Rome (second Roman city autorazed), I scouted everyone else being too far away to take without going negative. So I got a library in my capital and started on a great scientist and worked 2 cottages. 2nd city worked two grassland cottages after growing (building war chariots while growing). There's a decent economic base. My next priority was to contain the AI, after all, it's easier to settle land than take it from sitting bull's longbows. I kept settlers unsettled at the seafood city north of sitting bull, one for the cow/copper/dye city.

While undergoing this first recovery, I opened borders with Kublai, scouted his two cities with minimal forces, and had two workers build a road across the jungle to him, minimizing unit upkeep costs.

Next step of recovery, get as many cottages up as possible. My 2nd city (rice/horse) took over great scientist recruiting duties, and I looked to acquire happiness. Was too late on oracle, and monarchy would take forever. So I settled the fur and the gems after I had roads prepped and the gem jungle chopped.
Temporarily decreases my economy, but I compensated by
1) having beelined alphabet earlier
2) extorting techs (particularly math) from kublai
3) having an early great scientist from much earlier for an academy at my capital
4) razing 3 barbarian cities for enough gold to push me to monarchy.
If this were higher level, I could have gone aesthetics and traded it for alphabet and iron working and monarchy, and I would have pushed for currency instead, but monarch nobody had monarchy early.

Checking the tech screen, sitting bull did not have monarchy for a long time, so I was able to delay building horse archers until after I had great library and civil service and a strong economy. Sitting bull and isabella are not dangerous neighbors, especially since caesar and kublai were attacked before they got the +1 relations, so I skimped heavily on units in favor of economy, and when isabella asked me to convert, I had diplomacy locked up. I purposefully kept kublai and sitting bull alive to prevent the duel no tech trading situation.

Heroic epic rome and bureacracy capital easily produced enough horse archers to bring down sitting bull.

Spoiler :

Yes i went worker/worker settler at start too!! I think. I just wanted to see how important BW was. By 1925 i had a second city., the mongal capital and a size 6 capital knocking out chriots in 4 turns. The mistake was HA so early.

A few key dates.

2675bc. mongals destroyed.
1375bc Romans destroyed. Tad late.
900bc - mining teched. hehe
625bc bronze working traded. Ooops
155bc masonry. Still got pyramids though.
900ad Native Americans destroyed. Not a longbowmen in sight!! (final city)

I dont think i have ever teched BW or masonry so late. Quite amusing. If this was a continent I would of conquered it.

Will play the map again properly.

 

[assass1n]

TO 1700 AD

Spoiler :

Monarch is much tougher then Prince
Izzy capitulated KK in a war in which I joined in
I DoWed Izzy with Rifles/Trebs
take out two cities from KK
Izzy is suiciding stacks of 10+ Cavalry on my city which has 10 CG III Rifles

And I won Lib and also got this from JC

I feel this might end up in a loss as the AI has 3+ techs on me

 

[Gumbolt]

Playing it a bit more seriously this time round.

Spoiler :

This time I went AH/mining/BW. Working the resources round Thebes first. I grew thebes to size 3/4 once i had the food resources in place.

Took out Rome once i had 2-3 cities set up. By 2000bc i had 4 cities including Rome. The Romans were left with 1 city. Unfortunately he built 5 archers so war was not a great option for a size 1 city on a hill.

I built Stone henge in capital. (Gives me the UB)
Great Wall in Rome and later the mids too.

Meanwhile i sent my chariot stack to KK who was defending capital with 2 archers. i had previously scouted area with a warrior. Took his capital and destroyed his 2 other cities. KK is gone. His capital is looking good but barb galleys will be an issue.

Built the oracle and took COL. Conf was mine. I used 2 priests in rome and soon had a holy Shrine to add to the city.

Meanwhile I built the GLH in karakorum.

Had a brief war with SB and razed 2 of his cities but took peace when a archer popped up by an unguarded city.

Currently doing 60ish science beakers a turn but not crabked up scientists yet with representation. Looking 100% better than last time in terms of science. I was 0 beakers a turn on last game come 250bc.

Overall got about 9 cities now. Room for more.