Revenge of the Nerds
Time to review the troops. I think I'll declare next turn.
What can I do about trade? Not much. Because Ethiopia likes us so much, I ask if he'll donate his 13 gpt to us. He agrees. Joao isn't so generous.
Our whip economy has taken its toll. Lots of unhappiness. Well, hope the war goes well!
Turn 321, 1505 AD
WAR!
And War Weariness. >_<
-End Turn-
Turn 322, 1510 AD
We get Liberalism. I choose Astronomy, considering the map. I can't recall if there was discussion on this. Kinda got lost in the, uh, other stuff.
I pick Gunpowder next. I also sell Sitting Bull Literature + Code of Laws for Drama, some gold, and his map.
I lose some troops attacking an exposed Camel Archer. It was to cover the attack on Damascus, though, but it may have been uncessary. Trebs take care of the defenses.
Turn 323, 1515 AD
I have some bad luck (read: I made some stupid moves) and lose a Pikeman and Praetorian against a Combat III Camel Archer (hate those). After a tough battle, I take Kufah, though.
Turn 325, 1525 AD
Pop a Great Engineer. Switch to Nationalism (10 turns). Hatty has it already, but I wonder if we can sneak the Taj out from under her.
I check to see who will contribute to our coffers. In the end, I can only strong-arm 60 gold from Boudica and 70 from SB. That should about cover our costs for now.
In what may be a controversial move, I sold our two extra sources of Iron to SB and Sury (our worst enemy) for 8 gpt each. Cancel when able, but this should let us stick at 100% through Nationalism.
Also playing hide-and-seek with Saladin's Caravels. Gonna get some Galleons out!
Turn 329, 1545 AD
Galleons in the water. Hopefully this will help turn the tide against the Arabian navy, and let us move troops freely again. Qin demands Education, I refuse. Then I sell Edu to Zara for the rest of Nationalism, Music, and his map.
I do NOT revolt to any new civics just yet.
Now, hopefully you don't mind that I spend our Engineer on the Taj.
After gunpowder, we can go 0% sci for a bit and upgrade all of our Galleys.
Turn 330, 1550 AD
Our Golden Age begins.
Unfortunately, our combat Galleon took a lot of damage in its first fight and was eventually sunk. We did manage to sink 3 Arabian Caravels, but we had to retreat from the last one due to the poor state of our remaining ships.
I'm gonna pass it off here. We need to spam a few Galleons so that we can control the sea lanes. Then we can move some of our personel around to where they need to be. Building more troops would be nice, too. We should use the whip sparingly.
As for targets, I'd like to burn Khurasan because it should be an easy hit and it's junk. Maybe we could go south and capture Basra because it has Sugar (which we lack). I'd leave Yamama alone because it's under pressure from Zara.
I don't know if we have the power to take Medina right now, but we can probably snap up peripheral Arabian properties in the meantime.