NC CLXXIV - Justinian I of the Byzantine Empire

[cseanny]

1st game in over a year so Emperor til around 500 BC

Spoiler :

Planned to settle on Jumbos but then I saw PH Marble which is where I settled. Teched Hunting > AH > Writing > Med > Masonry >Priesthood (Oracled Alpha) > HBR > Currency.

Made Chariots and went straight to Monty stealing 2 workers and taking his only city(only 2 Archers). He went worker > worker > Settler (pretty sure) and founded Hinduism. Backfilled Mining, BW, Pottery, IW, Archery, Mono, and Sailing.

Settled one more city north (wheat/gold) and then whipped/chopped HAs from 2 cities (capital had barracks/stable) and attacked Willem with around 9 HA and 3 Chariots, killing him off in 500BCish. I kept 3 of his cities and razed 1 (killed 2 archers and 1 settler in open too).

So right now I'm sitting at 6 cities and I'm thinking about just turning off my slider and keep chopping/whipping HAs ftw. I forgot how strong HAs are on Immortal and below. It's been a while though so I'm sure I can find a way to mess up my economy if I don't kill everyone else off.

 

[sampsa]

T134 (475AD)

Spoiler :

Attack Willem 225 AD, war goes well and I capture 4 cities with minimal losses. Used my by destroying walls in Amsterdam for faster bombardment.

Capture Parthenon (nice!), ToA, chr shrine (only +7). Capitulated him, which was probably a mistake due to diplo. Not going to gift cities back.

Tech is at halt, need to failgold and build wealth, maybe even build 6 courthouses+FP. I just double bulbed edu, but I'm going to skip Oxford, just too costly as I don't need any tech power beyond steel. Also need to spread hindu and switch Willem to it to get our team up to friendly with the techers. I definitely should have bulbed philo earlier as now I can't get it via trade... Sucks to run a golden age without pacifism. Still with this amount of good cities I don't think there is much trouble ahead, even if I can't lib steel. Nationalism+Taj should be good enough.

 

[sampsa]

T160 (1000AD)

Spoiler :

A rather uneventful turn set, focused on economical build up. Lots of failgolding and wealth building. Decided that libbing steel is too risky (HC was teching fast) so just self teched philo, bulb liberalism, take nationalism 680AD. Got Taj 840AD. The GA is just about to end, but I'll promptly start another. Got Willem to hindu so I got some trades from again friendly HC and Pacal, who also formed an alliance at some point (HC peace vassaled). Found the pathetic Kublai, but somehow lost circumnavigation. HC is the only AI who has techs that I don't (constitution+economics).

I'm still in pacifism+merc, but started to crank out troops. Plan is to upgrade and declare very soon after steel.

HE capital. Decided to take advantage of HE -points (+some scientist -points from the BCs) and cranked out a random (type doesn't matter much, going to fire golden ages), that's why the -bar is empty.

Putting ToA+FP -points into use, too.

Corn-fish-horse makes a decent moai.

Need to protect Amsterdam against revolts. I don't understand the "city nationality" mechanics at all - was it moot to build -buildings here?

NE-city is pretty good, it can feed 9 specialists (+1 from merc, and 2 sci from GLib).

 

[ConfusedCounsel]

Started this one last weekend, but I

Spoiler :

Overextended by taking on and wiping on Monte early on, irreparably ruining my economy.

Will give it another try, probably around this weekend.

 

[elitetroops]

Nice!

Spoiler thoughts on map :

For once I managed to find a map that isn't super easy to roll over, but still manageable. With a nice start that allows lots of different strategies.

 

[Pangaea]

Started this playing quickly, maybe too quickly. Just 28 turns so far.

Spoiler :

Saw the marble when moving the settler SE, so went onto it for a better view. Then went back and settled on ivory. Kinda "meh", but at least it grabs the floodplains. And there is room for a pretty decent horse, corn, fish city. Not sure whether to found city 2 there though, or go in a north-westerly-ish direction. If I want to quickly smack Monty in the face, grabbing the horse makes sense. If I want to REX peacefully a little bit, probably not.

Took a chance and assaulted a lion at 65% odds, and thankfully won, so have a Woodie1 warrior.

Need more exploring, but the land to the east looks utter gunk. North ain't great either. Desert and tundra around the capital. Oh joy.

Starting techs is horribly awkward here. Hunting-AH is fine enough, then build some roads, but everything you need feels so far away. Would perhaps have been better to build a warrior first, actually, since you'll be building roads for about 7 turns anyway. Then more wasted turns after improving the cow, while you ponder what is the least bad path of Agri-Pottery or (Mining)-Masonry. And then there is the fish for the southern city. Argh.

 

[Rusten]

Started this playing quickly, maybe too quickly. Just 28 turns so far.

Spoiler :

Starting techs is horribly awkward here. Hunting-AH is fine enough, then build some roads, but everything you need feels so far away. Would perhaps have been better to build a warrior first, actually, since you'll be building roads for about 7 turns anyway. Then more wasted turns after improving the cow, while you ponder what is the least bad path of Agri-Pottery or (Mining)-Masonry. And then there is the fish for the southern city. Argh.

Spoiler :

Worker-settler!
Mine marble - road towards city 3S. Utilises IMP and gets by without early techs.
Give marble to city 2 on settling and make monument-settler. It will have 8* production towards settler on size 1.
*typo -- 6+50% = 9.

 

[elitetroops]

@Pangaea:

Spoiler :

I never tested Hunting-AH, but I'm pretty sure AG-AH is the better option. Farmed FP is just as strong in food as the cow and you get it online earlier, before AH is in.

No mining needed for masonry btw.

 

[Pangaea]

@Pangaea:

Spoiler :

I never tested Hunting-AH, but I'm pretty sure AG-AH is the better option. Farmed FP is just as strong in food as the cow and you get it online earlier, before AH is in.

No mining needed for masonry btw.

Spoiler :

No need for Mining, but we need it anyway so may as well get the +20%. Could be a mistake though, timing and all. I played too quickly. Agri would be better than Hunting. Not sure what I was thinking. Probably nothing

Interesting idea Rusten, though building a settler at size 1 is pretty unusual I'd say

 

[Rusten]

^

Spoiler :

It's not that unheard of to make size 1 settler with IMP. Besides, Justinian has terrible starting techs and this BFC doesn't have a power tile until AH which is way off. I'd be very surprised if worker-settler (or something similar) is not the best start.

 

[sampsa]

T185 (1250AD)

Spoiler :

Attack 1060AD. Now how do you like them cannons, Pacal?

11 turns later I had crawled into his core cities. After one more city he threw in the towel.

Sent an excessively strong fleet to take care of Kublai. But first those 3(!) great merchants made missions worth +5k .

Everyone was bending quickly, but can you blame them? Masses of cannons vs longbows is rather unfair. Upgraded all my old phants to cuirassiers, as I had plenty of and no need to research.

Final fork in Huyana's lands. Both cities have a spy to incite revolt, and a two-mover cannon in the stack to soften up just in case.

Successful spy mission and mop up, didn't even need to capture the northern one.

Victory! Spent at least 20 hours playing this, was fun but I'm glad it's over.

 

[sampsa]

@Rusten

Spoiler :

I like the idea of going worker-settler @size1, but Justinian starts with myst+wheel so why mine the marble? Maybe go masonry-agri-AH etc.

 

[Rusten]

@Rusten

Spoiler :

I like the idea of going worker-settler @size1, but Justinian starts with myst+wheel so why mine the marble? Maybe go masonry-agri-AH etc.

Spoiler :

True, that might be even better. Quarry the stone first (only gives 4H as opposed to a 5H mined marble, but with 2H city center it makes no difference).
You want hunting before AH IMO as it gives +1 happy and discount to AH. Knowing that there's horse there might change it but there's no way of knowing that beforehand.

You're further off BW and will have 5H instead of 6 in 2nd city which matters, but having stone early can pay off for fail gold -- especially with a start like this.

I wouldn't go masonry just to quarry the marble though. It's a pretty bad improvement/tile. Masonry is only an option because of the stone being there as well.

The details of this are not *that* interesting though, I just wanted to point it out as most games ignored it so far. Sometimes an unorthodox opening is best and one should always think before doing the same old thing.

 

[Pangaea]

The details of this are not *that* interesting though, I just wanted to point it out as most games ignored it so far. Sometimes an unorthodox opening is best and one should always think before doing the same old thing.

Definitely. I didn't think (enough), and simply did the default play of worker first then some warriors. Might replay those first 28 turns actually, though I'd have some slight map knowledge benefit.

Spoiler :

Not sure what I would change, but starting with Hunting would be one of them. The early happiness isn't needed, and Agri is at least more useful, particularly if going worker first, which is probably still better than the pondering about warrior first.

This map shows how tricky things can be if you have woeful starting techs.

Very nice to have both stone and marble secured early, though, it got to be said. The immediate land may suck, but this gives us good reason to (ab)use fail gold, and of course secure some key wonders.

 

[ConfusedCounsel]

Second try, immortal difficulty.

Spoiler :

Settled on jumbos.
Tech order was masonry, agriculture, AH, pottery, meditation, priesthood, mining, BW, {oracle MC}, writing.
Stole a worker from our neighborhood Aztec psychopath and did the worker->Settler-> warrior -> chariot spiel.

Kept Monte in check with a force of roaming chariots, capturing two more workers at some point and doing a whole of pillaging and preventing him from settling too much. Only made peace when he was effectively boxed in and restricted to three cities and no longer a thread.

Economy wise I build the oracle, expended to 7ish cities, failgolded quite and bit and decided to go for the Cataphract gambit. No one was willing to trade me feudalism however (booo!), due to a meh political situation so had to self tech that. Still, got guilds around 400 ad and wartime it was.

Whiped out Monte without any casualties, he didn't have feudalism yet. Willem was the score leader, but my Cataphracts crashed through his defenses as well. I capitulated him as soon as possible, leaving him his capital as it didn't contain much of note.
While I repositioned my stacks to attack the Maya's, I squeeked in a quick golden age to generate some GP to win lib. Pacificism while in warmode is kinda expensive, but i figured it worth it. Got the GS to bulb education and the GM to help me finance liberalism. Thankfully Mansa has apparently gone for economics rather then liberalism. Libed astronomy as the most expensive thing I could get.
The Mayans have engineering, but I still manage to get his castle cities with roughly 1-1 casualty rates. He should capitulate at some point in the near future.
Currently, it is 1090 ad.

Next question is, who next? Not sure if Cataphracts are enough to take on Mansa, he is quite far advanced. Could try to go for steel and take him on with that, but that might take a while.
Alternatively, I could build a bunch of galleons and go take Kublai. He has created a vassal (I think?), Qin, entirely in character , so has only a few cities himself and he is enormously behind in tech, does not even have MC yet.

Options, options.

 

[sampsa]

@ConfusedCounsel

Spoiler :

Not that easy to give advice without seeing the game. Probably you can just keep capitulating civs, although with such a high casualty rate they might not be willing. You mention Mansa, who was not in my game. I guess you mean the inca-dude.

For me, Willem was a useful vassal as he could tech astro. Maybe you can use your vassals to get you closer to steel? With such a huge empire building wealth gets you somewhere fast, too. If steel is under 20 turns away I guess just switch to full research mode, upgrade some trebs to cannons and win.

 

[ConfusedCounsel]

@ConfusedCounsel

Spoiler :

Not that easy to give advice without seeing the game. Probably you can just keep capitulating civs, although with such a high casualty rate they might not be willing. You mention Mansa, who was not in my game. I guess you mean the inca-dude.

For me, Willem was a useful vassal as he could tech astro. Maybe you can use your vassals to get you closer to steel? With such a huge empire building wealth gets you somewhere fast, too. If steel is under 20 turns away I guess just switch to full research mode, upgrade some trebs to cannons and win.

Thanks for giving your thoughts!
Yeah, should probably figure out how to upload screenshots at some point.

Spoiler :

Uh, yeah, that other dude with two names that always techs like a maniac .

Your advice seems sounds, Huana Capac is really the only one worthy advisary left, as the French are small and the roleplayers are stuck on their islands lightyears behind. Squash him and the map is mine.

 

[Metaslab]

IMM, NHNE, Normal speed, to 1AD:

Spoiler :

Bit messy really. But winnable, I think.
Settled on jumbos. With IMP, extra hammer in the city tile and a 3H tile in the BFC, I made the unusual move of going Settler first. Only took a couple more turns than a worker would have done. Then worker in both cities.

Tech path was Agri-AH-Masonry-Mining-BW-Pot-Writing.
Then Aesth for trade; got Alpha (with 1T sunk into it) and a few other bits of backfilling:

Spoiler :

Built GW in Cap, Mids in 1st city. Plan was that the GSpy from GW would go and infiltrate the tech leader, after which the cap would be running Rep scientists. Thessalonica would slowly chug its way to a GE who would build a useful wonder at some unspecified point in the future. But I got a bit impatient and hired a scientist in the cap once the library was built. The odds were still heavily in favour of a GSpy, but a GS popped out instead. So the cap has an academy.

Probably should have Oracled Alpha instead. Ah well.

Have been peacefully expanding through the BCs, currently on 8 cities. Cap has the GLib, with NE due on the next turn.

Nappy DoWed me a few turns ago, presumably because of this:

Spoiler :

And Monty has just decided to try his luck. He sent a small stack at Angora, and here's how that first skirmish went:

Spoiler :

Being IMP, and having the GW, these few battles in my territory were enough to create a GG. So I now have a supermedic chariot, which means the HE is available.

So quite a few decisions to be made in the next few turns. Fun but slightly nerve-racking decisions. On the warfare front, I've just switched to Police State, and am planning some mass-whipping of HAs (+WEs if I can trade for Constr) for a counterattack on Monty. He's pretty backward - nowhere near LBs - so this should be enough to take him out. Might be able to move on to Willem from there, he and Monty been warring so he should be softened up a little. And where to put the HE? Maybe Cap, but both Epics in the same city doesn't feel right. Perhaps the southern Horse-Corn-Fish city, with Moai.

But I seriously need to get back in the tech race. This ain't pretty, Huayna is way ahead:

Spoiler :

And here's my slider at max/min and break-even:

Spoiler :

There'll be a decent chunk of failgold when the NE completes next turn, and more on the way when those lazy AI can be bothered to build the Parthenon and Shwedagy Pedagy. A GP due next turn too, most likely a GS. He'll want to bulb Compass, as I need CoL or Drama to open a Philo bulb. I dunno, Compass could be useful for trade, but maybe better wait and get Philo. Drama could be good for trade as nobody has it yet. If it's a Spy I'll go tech-stealing.

So I'm thinking smack Monty about, maybe continue to Willem, somehow get to Lib and rampage eastwards. I'm a little way up the MT path already so will probably go for that. Not sure if Cataphracts will play a part, Guilds feels like a detour.

The empire:

Spoiler :

 

[Metaslab]

To 700AD

Spoiler :

Things are looking a bit more solid now. Started a new session and realised that I hadn't saved the 1AD state shown in the above post, so started again from 25BC. Made one change: stayed in Rep rather than switching to Police State.

War with Monty was a bit of a slog. He sent a procession of small stacks at all of our border cities, so it was a while before I could begin the counterattack. All that warring within my borders has produced 4 GGs though. 3 are settled in Antioch, where I built the HE. Haven't built the Moai there, it's doing fine without it. Might spam it for failgold now that I have more coastal cities.

At around 300AD Nappy sent a few units over. After killing them he took a peace treaty for a small cash donation:

Spoiler :

Finances improved fairly quickly after 1AD, still some work to do on that though. Used the failgold from the NE to tech Drama at 100%, then traded that + HBR to WvO for Currency. Income at 0% science pretty much doubled immediately. The GP who arrived in 1AD was a Spy. I used him to infiltrate Pacal. Stole CS and Feud from him. A GS came about 10 turns later, bulbed Philo. Wasn't first there though - Taosim FIDL 1t before that. Nobody I've met had it, so it must have been the mystery isolated civ.

Shweddy Paya was built in 300AD, failgold from that allowed me to power through MC and Paper. Around this time Huayna went WHEOOHRN, and I was his worst enemy. Switched to his state religion of Hinduism, and he quickly became pleased. Begged 10g off him once that happened. I only have Hindu in the cap. As it has GLib and NE I went Caste/Paci to pump out a couple GPs, and also allow whip-anger to subside a bit. Running merchants but with the two GLib scientists the odds aren't certain. Had one GM at just over 50% odds, who is currently on the way to Mutal, where the ToA is. Next one is most likely to be a GM, by no means guaranteed though.

Monty had SH and the Buddhist shrine (+12g) in his cap, and SoZ in Teotihuacan. He capped after I'd taken a fourth city, Texcoco. Got a nice settlement deal:

Spoiler :

Promptly gave that one back. Have just stolen Calendar from Pacal, and he has Engineering due in 2t. A spy is sitting in his nearest city waiting to steal that.

Current tech situation:

Spoiler :

Much better than before. I'm well ahead in the Lib race compared to the civs on the mainland - Edu is done (part-bulbed) and I've started on Lib itself, everyone else wants Paper still. But the unmet civ is a bit of a wild card. Isolated usually means backward, so hoping I have time to take something game-changing from it. HC is a worry. He'll have MilSci soon, which means I'll be facing Grens.

Thinking I should probably go for him first, but that means going through Pacal's territory. Seems a waste to cap Pacal while I still have quite a few EPs to spend on tech-stealing. Maybe they go on revolts instead for an easy victory. MT seems very doable here - Monty can research Music for me in 13t, so it'll be ready by the time I have Nat. But Cuirs against Grens doesn't sound good. Maybe try for Steel instead. HC has Chem and Gunpowder too. He's definitely the biggest threat.
The empire in 700AD:

Spoiler :

Once the current crop of HAs are in I'll be building a lot of wealth, probably a few courthouses too.

 

[sampsa]

@Metaslab

Spoiler :

I think libbing MT and taking on Willem is a sound idea. With the help of two vassals you should be able to keep up in tech. Steals too, of course, getting that great spy was excellent for you.

Game doesn't look bad, so I don't want to be overly critical, but just a few pointers:

- I don't think you should finish those horse archers, they just cost you maintenance. Keep them in queue, sure will decay a bit but they will transform into towards cuirassiers when you have the tech.

- Your capital is very small for 700 AD and it is not growing. I understand that this is due to having NE and running specialists, but the city lacks a large surplus making it awkward. When possible, should be produced outside of capital, as bureaucracy is a powerful civic but doesn't give a boost to specialists. Many of your other cities are small too (over-whipping?).