OK, well, this got crazy REALLY fast! As I said, I split the stack in Lisbon and went for Jaoa's 2 easternmost cities. No sooner to I DoW, then I hear that noise in the background and this hits my screen:
Well, it was inevitable. I quickly swap into Slavery and Vassalage and whip out some troops, mostly HAs and Pikes, although Toku seems melee-heavy, and doesnt have Samurai yet. HA-Pike teams are nice for pillaging stuff though.
Anyway, its not so bad, I do settle the Spy in Thebes, though. I take the 2 cities from Jaoa as I shore up the defenses in our Western cities. We got pillaged to crap out here, so another bout of Serfdom may be in order, but for now, I have them mostly chopping out units.
I got worried when we got Education, and went straight for Lib. Another AI had Edu, and I was worried we would lose it. Took Nationhood, so we could get working on that 45 turn Golden Age, although an SPI leader makes GAs less effective. Still tons of prod + commerce bonuses though, so its very worth it.
Anyway, here we are. I played 1 turn over, sorry. I also chopped out the AW in Thebes to give us 2 hammer Priests, one of the nicest combos with Egypt. Makes em better than Engineer specialists because theres an extra gold.
I think I have enough defenses in the West to hold out Toku while we finish off Jaoa. 2 cities to kill. Needed some healing though. Heres a screen of the situation:
I must mention a gameplay thing here. I havent played a lot of sets this game, so its gotten a lot later than I thought, but I think I know why are are "holding our own" instead of "totally dominating". We should have settled this tundra area in the southern part of that screenshot, those arent bad cities at all.
Oh well, live and learn. I dont think we are in any trouble at all. Toku cant mount any threat, and as soon as we have enough units over there, we should clean his 2 stacks out.
Heres the situation in the North. Jaoa is down to 2 cities, I have some units healing up and slowing bombarding one of them, while the other stack comes in as well. Next set should be the end of Jaoa, both his last cities are keepers.
I did manage Lib though, and in retrospect, I may have panicked too much. Again, though, no worries there. I got rid of Edu for a couple techs (forgot to take screenies though), and once I got Lib, I made these trades:
Both these bozo's still have a pile of cash, too, heres the current tech situation:
The final "actual" turn of my set I got this for us, as I said. An underrated Wonder, solid for Egypt and Arabia though, all those yummy priest slots.
So thats about it. I did a second civic change after I picked up Theo, so I went back to Bureaucracy and Theocracy, but we should be done making units once this round of War is over, so next guy should look at a civic change when its available (2 turns I think). Thinking Rep, Bur, Caste, Merc, Paci, popping into Slavery now and then. Get as many specialists hired as we can.
Other Points of note:
- Some HAs and Maces have moved into the West and we may be ready for offense. We need a couple more siege units, then lets try to have battles with Toku's piles of outdated crap (both those stacks you see are mostly Swords, Axes and Chariots) on our soil for the GW bonus.
- If we are going to go with an SE, we need to go with it. I did hire a bunch of Scientists, which slowed growth in many cities, so adjustments are needed there now that the Lib race is over. I am teching Gunpowder, maybe Steel or MT before Rifling? Biology is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for more pure SEs, though, so lets keep that consideration.
Good game though, we have a solid position. I think a quick war with Asoka to put him in his place is a plan for the medium future (and scarf some of those Tundra cities along rivers he's already improved for us, heh). Moving some of those troops from Jaoa's front in that direction shortly anyway, although Toku's northern flank is open from the east when we finish off Jaoa, so we have some options up there.
.
. I need to learn to be more comfortable playing from behind.
Its not that I don't have time to play a set but more a case that I havn't played any civ at all since my laptop died briefly. I really don't wanna screw up the game by playing a rubbish set.
