Never ever give up: 2. Deity level challenge

[Snaaty]

Just finished this game... ...must learn to be more patient...


The game ended 1822 AD via Space Race. That makes 14 turns later then with our first try, what means that we have been in fact able to slow the AI´s down via our "ONE WAR" strategy:

We have been able to keep out of wars throughout the whole game (exept the ONE WAR) and most AI´s were pleased with us the whole game. On the other side, we have inflicted wars throughout the whole game among the AI´s (but we´ve also been more lucky with the AI´s this time).


Who wins? You will find out (since I will continue this thread up to the (bitter?) end).

...

Nice christmas to all of you

..

See you

Snaaty

 

[Zombie69]

2. Use slavery more early and more aggressive

Whipping infrastructure helps a lot in speeding up your town-building. On the other side, whipping to early (without enough happiness buildings and resources) can severely cripple your town size for a long time. I the last try, we started whipping only after 500 AD, when most of the happiness buildings were researched. This time, we will start to whip ASAP when currency (market place) is in and we will use it throughout the entire first half of the game (until we are forced to use emancipation). We will try to whip only when we can balance out the unhappiness caused by whipping with happiness buildings whipped so we can still grow our cities. Our cities should remain between size 5 and 9 and will be set to “max growth only” throughout the whole process.

You should start whipping as soon as you've got bronze working and then never stop, and you should make bronze working and pottery (for granaries) two early priorities in order to start slaving as early as possible. That's what i do in nearly all my games and i never regret it. Waiting for currency is way too late.

 

[Snaaty]

@ Zombie69:

When you don’t go to an early war (and therefore don’t need much early troops) there isn’t much you can whip before currency is in. Obelisks and libraries normally can be chopped (or partly chopped, then the rest can be produced). Therefore I only build granaries after currency is in. Since I never go for a religion (even when I’m first on Philosophy and found Taoism I stick to the religion of my strongest neighbour(s) to maintain good relations) and since I never build temples (I simply don’t think they are useful enough) there’s nothing left to whip before currency …

…

After I read through the write-ups I produced before Christmas (up to 900 AD) and with the knowledge of how this game will go on, I came across a proper name of this strategy:

“PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING “

I also picked this name, because I have read a lot of posts and threads lately saying CIV 4 favours warmongers and you can’t win a game playing (mainly) peaceful on higher levels. I think this isn’t completely right. Playing (mainly) peaceful is a strategy that works, even on deity; but now back to topic…

PEACEFUL because we will be in peace with all other AI´s for about 95 % of the time (=95 % of the turns played) when looking at the entire game (because of our “only one war strategy”).
For this strategy to be effective, peace is very important. Since we won’t spread to far a lot depends (maybe all) of good trade relations (mainly health and happy resources and a tech-trade here and there).


OUTPOPULATING because in the last 3rd of the game we will have about 30 % of the landmass within our territory (more or less average when doing only one war) but within our cities will live almost 50 % of the overall world population. In my opinion this is the only thing that really counts (and what may enable us to win this game in the end even on deity).


For PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING, forget about cottages (never build them), forget about specialists (only use them in one city for GP production), forget about Warmongering (=expanding too much and/or too early). The only thing that matters for this strategy are Population Points (PP). And the only way of getting them early enough is via no cottages (you need to irrigate every single tile where irrigation is possible to grow enough), no specialists (you need to work every tile possible to grow enough), no warmongering (you must be able to trade for the resources your cities need to grow enough). Grow the cities you have. GROW… The basic philosophy of this stragtegy is, that the one with the most PP will win the game.
So I repeat it again: Irrigate everywhere possible; mine everywhere possible; when cities aren’t productive enough, build a workshop and/or a mill here and there. Only when every tile within city radius is worked, then turn to specialists. By doing so, ALL of your cities will turn into huge science, commerce and production monsters quite soon. By using the switches in the city menu, you even can change that for every city whenever you want.


To give you an example of what I mean, I have attached the following screenshot. It shows you how the last blocking city we have build (Chengdu, was built about 750 BC, see the write-up to follow) will look in 1450 AD. All infrastructure possible is build, all resources available (happy and health) on the map are traded in and when set to go for science, this city alone will bring more then 100 beakers (our best science city brings home 231 beakers/turn in 1450 AD, when set on science only, our best production city 60 hammers/turn in 1450 AD, when set on production only).

View attachment 144945

…

Now back to the original write-ups:

…

With marble in our territory and a productive gold city (Shanghai), we decide to go for the Great Library. Having decided this, we also know now, that we will do the medieval war, because the early one cant be done while going for the Great Library.

Good thing is that Isa has in fact joined the Buddhist club. When we have researched Codes of Law and lightbulbed Pacifism, we also will join in to increase the effect of our Scientists creating Great Scientists.

We now see Isa’s territory directly to our north. But our settler was already waiting and before she could claim the bananas and crabs, we settled Chengdu.

View attachment 144946


Much the same has happened at our south border. We also had to settle there (at a very crappy position…), because Sal was approaching with a settler. Since Sal still lingers with his settler, we didn’t open border to him…

View attachment 144947


There is iron close to our south border, but Sal was first. So we have to face it. No iron for us in this game so far (another reason for not going to the early war…)

We have managed to delay the founding of our 5th and 6th city quite long, so we are still running research at 90 % what is very good. We have space for 2 more cities in our back-lands, but we will delay to build them until we have finished the first courthouses and currency is traded.

We were fist to get to alphabet and traded it for:

Mathematics
Iron working & fishing
Polytheism
Sailing

Later we traded Literacy for meditation and some gold

I know about the tech trade limits, but still I always tend to play after the simple principle:

Take what you get as early as possible. So I tend to accept all trades possible as early as possible. Later you can still bribe some AI’s to trade with you by becoming pleased or friendly with them


Bad luck is that Taoism has already been founded, and I fear that it was Isa. (She already has Cods of Law). Once the computer has researched Codes of Law and is first in doing so, he normally also lightbulbs Philosophy. Now we can only hope that somebody on the other continent(s) was faster then her, because when she switches to Taoism, we will be enclosed by three neighbours with tree different religions (and we will still have to stick to Ash because of the GPp)

Since we haven’t encountered additional AI’s we now can also expect to be on a relatively small continent with only 3 neighbours. This is OK, more neighbours would be better for tech trades, but 3 are still enough.

Our first GS will be in soon, but we had to assign two scientists in Peking for producing the first one. All other will be produced in Shanghai, but right now Shanghai has to focus on the Great Library.


See you

Snaaty


save in next post

 

[mice]

Using 'peaceful overpopulating' does this affect your choice of civics? I mean because civic cost is based on population.

 

[acidsatyr]

When you don’t go to an early war (and therefore don’t need much early troops) there isn’t much you can whip before currency is in. Obelisks and libraries normally can be chopped (or partly chopped, then the rest can be produced). Therefore I only build granaries after currency is in. Since I never go for a religion (even when I’m first on Philosophy and found Taoism I stick to the religion of my strongest neighbour(s) to maintain good relations) and since I never build temples (I simply don’t think they are useful enough) there’s nothing left to whip before currency …

BULL. Whipp is the name of ealry game, dont pay double price for choppin before Maths in.
Chop for obelisk?? No let it grow to size 2 and whip. No whip b4 currency? LOL

After I read through the write-ups I produced before Christmas (up to 900 AD) and with the knowledge of how this game will go on, I came across a proper name of this strategy:

“PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING “

I also picked this name, because I have read a lot of posts and threads lately saying CIV 4 favours warmongers and you can’t win a game playing (mainly) peaceful on higher levels. I think this isn’t completely right. Playing (mainly) peaceful is a strategy that works, even on deity; but now back to topic…

PEACEFUL because we will be in peace with all other AI´s for about 95 % of the time (=95 % of the turns played) when looking at the entire game (because of our “only one war strategy&#8221.
For this strategy to be effective, peace is very important. Since we won’t spread to far a lot depends (maybe all) of good trade relations (mainly health and happy resources and a tech-trade here and there).


OUTPOPULATING because in the last 3rd of the game we will have about 30 % of the landmass within our territory (more or less average when doing only one war) but within our cities will live almost 50 % of the overall world population. In my opinion this is the only thing that really counts (and what may enable us to win this game in the end even on deity).

BULL. You WAR 95% of the time, not the other way around.
Yeah, spread the X-mass joy to Gadhieski AIs. Try that with Toku, Monty, Shaka, Alex.
The onyl thing that lets you win on Deity is WAR. Unless ofcourse you start with Ais you started with.

For PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING, forget about cottages (never build them), forget about specialists (only use them in one city for GP production), forget about Warmongering (=expanding too much and/or too early). The only thing that matters for this strategy are Population Points (PP). And the only way of getting them early enough is via no cottages (you need to irrigate every single tile where irrigation is possible to grow enough), no specialists (you need to work every tile possible to grow enough), no warmongering (you must be able to trade for the resources your cities need to grow enough). Grow the cities you have. GROW… The basic philosophy of this stragtegy is, that the one with the most PP will win the game.
So I repeat it again: Irrigate everywhere possible; mine everywhere possible; when cities aren’t productive enough, build a workshop and/or a mill here and there. Only when every tile within city radius is worked, then turn to specialists. By doing so, ALL of your cities will turn into huge science, commerce and production monsters quite soon. By using the switches in the city menu, you even can change that for every city whenever you want.

Wow. No cottages, no specialists, NO WARMONGERING. Anyone reading this?? I guess thats how you win on Deity. UNLESS you start with 2,3 gold mines, so you dont have to do crap early

To give you an example of what I mean, I have attached the following screenshot. It shows you how the last blocking city we have build (Chengdu, was built about 750 BC, see the write-up to follow) will look in 1450 AD. All infrastructure possible is build, all resources available (happy and health) on the map are traded in and when set to go for science, this city alone will bring more then 100 beakers (our best science city brings home 231 beakers/turn in 1450 AD, when set on science only, our best production city 60 hammers/turn in 1450 AD, when set on production only).

So your showing trade based economy in that city. Trade routes -> +8, +8, +8, +6, or whatever. This is not what you usually get in 9)% of the games. More likely scenario is that youll be warring with other civs thus having most of trade routes internal. Then wat your city does? So that strategy works ONLY in few instances, and is by no means a standard way of handling economy. Sudden borders closes and your economy dies

With marble in our territory and a productive gold city (Shanghai), we decide to go for the Great Library. Having decided this, we also know now, that we will do the medieval war, because the early one cant be done while going for the Great Library.

Wrong. You can go early war / build GL.

We have managed to delay the founding of our 5th and 6th city quite long, so we are still running research at 90 % what is very good. We have space for 2 more cities in our back-lands, but we will delay to build them until we have finished the first courthouses and currency is traded.

Those two gold mines are sure handy dandy


dont get mad, just pointing obvious.

 

[Snaaty]

@ acidsatyr:

I think there will always be different approaches to this game via different players.

...

I never whip to early (before I can build market places) because I want my cities to grow to a decent size, because of the income (money, money, money)...

...

Ah, and by the way, Monty, Isa & Alex ARE in this game (some will come in later). They even have all different religions. Still we are peacfull with them all (or most) of the time. Trick is to trade techs (and gift a tech here and there) and force them to accept your civics for that tech (like Isa "Free Religion", Monthy and Alex "Free Market " etc.) Additionally, they are quite easily "convinced" to attack someone else (to keep them busy. In this game, after we met Monty and Alex, we bribed them to war for about 90 % of the remaining game...). Concerning civics; they will switch back, but for the next tech you just force them again to switch. Another thing. Look closer. We have Isa next to us. She is a religious nut. She will always try to kill you over not sharing her religion. We never shared her religion through the whole game and still she loves us... (may it by luck... ... or something different?)

...

Most of the money we work with in this game is generated via trade. Trade techs for money, trade resources for money per turn etc. (and yes, two goldmines are handy, but since they are the only happy-resources we have until very late, I think this is GOOD but not "THE GAME WINNER")...

...

I always try to play peacfull, so for me, the trade routes shown in the screen you mentioned are normal (in fact, I just wanted to show how fast you can grow a city, the trade routes I didn´t realise as something special until you mention it now...)


One thing to ad:

I tend to be peaceful, but after the one war I usually do, I maintain quite a big army for defence (helps in staying peaceful). And even if you are attacked, it helps also surviving the 10 to 15 turns untill you can bribe again for peace...

...

Again, if you think your/other strategies work better (what may very well be true), try out this game, save 4000 BC is attached in first (or second) post.


"dont get mad, just pointing obvious". No problem, I´m happy for any feedback and others reading this can even see better how different the various approaches of this game are...



@ mice:

I usually stick to despotism until representation comes in. Then representation until end of game (research will boom because you will have lots of specialists towards mid and endgame).

Next is barbarism until nationhood (to draft for defence) comes in. Free speach I normally skip because I have no towns...

My labor civic is slavery (to whip out city improvements fast enough) until I´m forced to go emancipation

For economics I stay Decentralization until Free Market comes in


When I look at this myself, yes, I tend to go for the cheap ones...


See you

Snaaty

 

[Snaaty]

Before we go on, I think we have to have another closer look at some strategies behind PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING to get some better understanding (because some objections brought up against it are right, but can be countered in game via the right strategy). If you want to stick to it, you have to start it very early in the game and have to stick to it throughout the whole game.

So the simple reason why I prefer chopping over whipping the Obelisk in all of our blocking cities (here I take it the same way then with tech-trades: take what you can get as early as possible; therefore, chop ASAP when you need it, don’t waste time waiting for math) is because we will have the Obelisk about 3 turns after the city is founded, when you have a worker ready.

This is a clear advantage (as always, in my opinion), because it allows to
- expand territory earlier
- therefore helps blocking of the AI
- brings more resources in your (early) working area

So another pillar we build PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING onto is workers. Lots of workers. Early workers. In general, I build 2 workers before founding the second city, two more before founding the 3 city and then for every new city I found I build one more worker. This may sound too much, but if you intend to max out growth you must be able to work every tile BEFORE it will be used (after having 10 cities, its OK to stop building a worker for every new city&#8230



From midgame on, the remaining civs in this game are Spain (Isa), Greece (Alex) and the Aztecs (Monty). So how to deal with them ALL at once when sticking to PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING (without switching to one of their religions)?

Here, you have to rely on your diplo skill to compete. When meeting one of them for the first time, they normally tend to be angry towards you, wont trade nor open borders. But when you gift them a tech for free on the very first meeting, you get a constant +4 on relations. After that, they will immediately switch to cautious (or even pleased), trade with you and open borders etc.
Open borders ASAP, do one or two resource trades, gift them another resource for free, and some turns later (maybe 5 to 10) they will most likely switch to “pleased”. Now you can (and should immediately) do two things:
- bribe them to change their civics
- bribe them to go to war
If you have a decent military yourself and keep doing this throughout the whole game, you don’t have to worry too much for them…

I think the hardest part for any warmonger in PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING may be this: If anybody ever asks anything from you (no matter how far away or small he may be) give it to him. You may need him later…



In fact, the civs that are most dangerous for PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING are those that tend to tech away peacefully (like Roosevelt, Ghandi etc.), because they always are the strongest rivals in the Space Race. Therefore those should be the prime targets (if possible) when going to your ONE WAR in PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING …


But now back to the original write-ups…

…

We made it for the Great Library. Then we decided to delay excess GS production and to build the National Epic first. Now we only have to wait till Shanghai reaches its happy cap, then we will assign two more scientists (and still will be able to work one of the gold again in 10 – 15 turns form now). But for now, most important thing to do is to GROW Shanghai to max. size, so no gold is worked :

View attachment 145018


There is an additional GS hanging around in Shanghai (here the special trait of the Chinese kicks in) with whom I still haven’t decided what to do. He can either speed the research of Education (the second GS lightbulbed Paper) or build an Academy in Shanghai…

Bad news first:

It was in fact Isa who founded Taoism. Shortly before finishing this turnset, she switches to it, her mood towards us goes down to angry and she closes borders. We will have to do something about this ASAP in our next turnset (build some more troops, gift her some techs and resources etc)…


The rest of this turnset proceeded as planned; we settled the blank spots in our back-lands and have now 8 cities in 250 BC:

View attachment 145019


Our cities are set to produce granaries next and we will start to whip quite excessive soon (we have already started to whip).

Tech trades:

Codes of Law, Philosophy and Paper allowed the following trades:

Currency
Construction
Calendar
Monarchy

After Codes of Law, we had set our research directly to Civil Service (although it is a slightly longer route to Paper then Theology, but Sal already had Theology and we will need Civil Service for producing (or better drafting) Macemen for defence against Isa ASAP (no iron&#8230


Trade possibilities 250 BC:

View attachment 145020

We are doing quite well in science. Ash and Isa have no paper, Sal has no Civil Service. Since nobody wants to trade anything with us right now, we decide to delay trading at the moment.


See you

Snaaty

 

[zooropa86]

4 workers before 3rd city is rediculous, especially if u claim u want to out populate in the beginning. i think it's much more efficient to whip than to chop pre math. it just makes sence.

 

[Immaculate]

I never play Diety (or immortal for that matter), but i am gonna give this a try.

 

[Snaaty]

@ zooropa86:

Maybe you are right.

But what also is important is the timeline. With chopping, you have an Obelisk out much earlier…

Concerning the workers: Here I have to admit that I even have experimented with building 5 workers before the founding of the 3rd city in some other games. This I had to quit because of upkeep (workers cost upkeep as well…) and therefore I stick to 3 or (what I think is better) 4 of them…

By looking at the actual game, I think we nevertheless hadn’t enough workers, because Shanghai (see screenshot) has some tiles in use that still aren’t worked (but because of the upkeep costs, we had to live with that)

For PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING, it’s not important to have big cities early. What is important is to have fast growing cities early (we will whip a lot soon). The big cities will come around only after 1000 AD because we will run out of whipping stuff (nothing left to whip).


@ Immaculate

Sounds great. Best is to try out emperor then for a first run, if it works for you and you like it, then advance in level. If you like, you can wait for 2 or 3 turnsets more before you start, because there we will go for war in this game and warfare and the teching up to there, is very important (also when doing only one war)

 

[Snaaty]

One more thing that could be important when going for PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING:

I always try not to specialize my cities. Each city should be able to produce hammers, science and commerce. When we look especially at this game that means that all our northern cities will need watermills and workshops to be productive enough since they don’t have enough hills around.

Basically, I try to have every city produce 20 hammers before factories come in. When the city is finally fully grown and has enough infrastructures whipped to support happy and health you don’t need to whip anymore. The rest of the infrastructure can be produced without whipping at almost the same speed. This is quite important (again in my opinion) because once we are forced to use emancipation we have to stop whipping…

Back to the write-ups

…

In 250 AD, two turns more till we have Liberalism. We will very likely make it. In general, the game processes quite strange. Isa became somehow the top dog and still lives and trades peacefully with most her neighbours. She is cautious with Sal (5 positive, 4 negative modifiers) and Ash (1 positive, 4 negative modifiers, and recently closed borders), who both have a different religion then she has. Normally, at that point of the game, Isa is stomped to the ground by a large coalition of foes because she behaves in general like a lunatic with suicidal tendencies (like declaring war to all her neighbours within 1 turn)…

Well we can live with that. After giving her some tech we could spare, she isn’t angry any more with us but cautions. With 5 negative and 5 positive modifiers and the fact that she will open border again with us, we are quite safe now. When we open borders with her, do some resource trades ASAP and give her education for free once we have liberalism in we will get very likely altogether 3 more positive modifier (1 for open borders, 1 for sharing techs, 1 more for good trade), and will finally be able to bring her to pleased (8 positive to 5 negative is enough for that) soon after. So far, good thing is that she hasn’t asked to switch to her religion (what we would have been forded to do, no matter what we want), pay her more tribute (we would gladly pay) or cancel deals with Ash or Sal…

I think that she will go after Ash, because with 1 positive and 4 negative modifiers, AND closed borders, her mood will soon drop to angry…

We built (uhm, … I mean … ahem, …whipped) quite a good city infrastructure so far, so we are researching with 100 % and are loosing only 15 gold per turn. We still have 450 gold out of some tech trades, so we can go on like that for quite a while.


Tech trades:

We only managed to trade education and Civil Service for metal casting and feudalism with Sal and to sell Paper for some gold to Ash. To Isa, we were happy to gift Paper for free…


Trade possibilities 250 AD

View attachment 145038


Out of our deal with Ash, we received a map of our continent with the money. We seem to be all quite equal in size on our little continent. Only our cities are still way too small to really compete. But here I’m quite confident that this will change soon…

Continent map 250 AD

View attachment 145039


Besides that, not much has happened.


See you

Snaaty


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[Snaaty]

For all of you that really want to try out PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING you should know that this is a long term strategy (maybe the longest term strategy possible). In general, the game can be divided in three more or less equal (concerning turns played) parts:


In the first third of the game you will be very busy trying to block of the AI’s via your own settlements and producing enough workers to work all your land (remember that we have to do all the work for ourselves because we won’t capture any cities and/or workers). Here, our research mainly relies on lightbulbing and trading some “key-technologies” to keep up tech-wise. In this part of the game, we will even tech up a little slower then the ones with the cottage or the specialist economy (not much, but a little).


In the second part of the game, we will whip out our city infrastructure. Our cities will grow fast, but due to extreme whipping, they will remain relatively small. Also, we will not have enough health and happy resources to support bigger cities (they will only come in after we have astronomy and can trade them with the other continent(s) since the random map generator spreads them usually quite good&#8230. Additionally, we have to go to war in this part of the game, what requires some more whipping (and drafting) what slows our growth some more even after we stop whipping city infrastructure. Thanks to a very good city infrastructure, we will now be at least able to keep up with the specialist and cottage economies (we wont close the gap, but we stop falling behind).


But the last third of the game belongs to us. With some cities built and one war, we will have about 15 – 20 cities at that stage. Now imagine this (if we stick to 15 cities):

- 15 cities with all (or most) infrastructure build
- 5 – 6 specialists in average at work in each city (under representation)
- Every workable tile under work
- Every city producing in average 20 hammers/turn
- Every city generating in average 30 – 40 trade points/turn
- Additionally, your research rate still running at 80 % because of huge income (resulting of excellent city infrastructure)

The computer will never be able to keep up with you. Not even on deity with all his advantages. Only thing you have to do is to stay in peace with most of the remaining AI´s (because of the trade). Another thing with this strategy is, that it also works for isolated starting positions (archipelago maps for example), when you slightly adapt your research route in the beginning (leave alphabet for later because nobody is there to trade, go directly code of law, math, currency&#8230.

But once again, back to the…

…

We managed to get first to liberalism and took as free tech nationalism. Then we had set research to gunpowder, since none of the AI’s had that at that point. Right now, we are missing 10 turns till military tradition comes in, and then the real fun begins…

Meanwhile Isa races of in score by building every wonder possible (no idea how she manages that) and culture-pressures Ash completely down. I have never seen anybody culture-pressuring India down before (it’s normally India that’s going for culture), so this is quite a remarkable screenshot. Good thing is, that China still competes at the Spanish border with culture (he, he, thanks to early Obelisk’s and Libraries & extreme-whipping thereafter)

Spanish culture pressure on India in 700 AD

View attachment 145075


But even better is the next screenshot which shows Ash, who seems to be bored since he can’t build any wonders. To spend his free time, he seems to have decided to invade and massacre Sal with the huge!!! Indian army (good that we have been friendly with him&#8230:

Indian invasion on Arabia in 700 AD

View attachment 145076


Meanwhile Montezuma (Monty) sailed over to our continent and immediately is angry with us (who would have expected that)…

But after giving him some older tech as present, he opens his borders and agrees to tech trade with us. When we update our Indian maps, we see why there aren’t any wonders build on the other continent.

The foreign continent 700 AD:

View attachment 145077


We identify the nations there by their cities and colours:

Monty the mad
Alexander (Alex) the greedy and
Huyna Capac (Huy) the dead

Monty has no time to build any wonders because most of his time he is busy building troops. Alex may build a wonder here and there, but with Huy as neighbour, he will very likely try to get his wonders (and cities). Huy would love to build wonders, but I think he is busy enough with surviving. Still I thing that Huy will never make it to modern times alive (sorry Huy, but we need you as prey&#8230

It is one quite big continent they are all living upon, which would be ideal to cooperate and speed away in tech, but with Monty and Alex, no way. This is quite good for us, since they are all a little back in tech compared to our continent.

Only thing that would be real bad is when Huy would get killed by Monty or Alex and one of them turns into the overdog and kills of the other. But I’m quite optimistic that Monty and Alex will gang upon Huy and share the prey (we will make sure to take care about that&#8230.


Now back to our own military and strategy:

Since we haven’t enough cities to do a war only with cavalry (can’t produce/whip them out fast enough), we finish the Globe theatre in Peking and started to draft citizen as backup (musketeers) ASAP. Since Peking grows in one turn form size 5 to 6 we will draft a musketeer every turn from now on until we have 10 of them. They will form the defensive back of our army. Guan… and Nan… (I seem to be unable to write or even remember those city names) have finished producing city infrastructure and are producing horse archers right now (can’t produce elephants because we have no ivory; can’t produce knights because we have no iron) which will be upgraded to cavalry, once Military Tradition hits home. All our troops (not many so far, but growing fast) will be parked near the Spanish border to show some presence (you never know&#8230

Our small and humble army in 700 AD:

View attachment 145078


Ah, concerning Isa. Remember the trades and stuff we carefully planed to do during the last turnset to increase our relation with her? I’ve completely forgotten about that after the shock of meeting Monthy…

Good thing is that Isa in fact declared war on Ash and is busy right now. Still, her mood towards us is back down to angry, because we now have an additional negative modifier for trading with her worst enemy…

This time, we mustn’t forget about beefing up our relations with her (same way as describe in last thread).


Once again back to our own military and strategy:


We will have about 1200 gold lleft when we reach Military Tradition in 10 turns. To upgrade one horse archers we need 240 gold, so we plan to build 8 of them which makes about 2000 gold for upgrade costs. The gold we are missing right now, we will try to get via selling some older techs to the other continent. For that we plan to send out a caravel of our own to go on a contact mission.

Then we will whip 7 cavalry more, so that we will have a strike force of 15 altogether, build additional 6 catapults and then we will go for India.

Going for Arabia seems quite senseless; since there isn’t much left of them (India is surprisingly successful with their little quest against them) and going for Isa seems too risky (she loves to mass troops on her own). Additionally, Ash is a builder and therefore dangerous in late game. Since ash is already involved in a war, we are quite confident, that our plans will work out…

Since some of our cities are already starting to grow (nothing left to whip), we are producing our army quite fast and Ash is working on Sal, we climbed up already in the score ladder to the 4th place, with 2 civs still missing in the score list (Alex and Huy).


Tech trades:

When meeting Monty, we gifted him Drama. After that, we opened borders and traded with him:

Machinery, optics, guilds and some money for education, paper and banking.

Ash and Sal will trade with us now (economy and theology), but I decided to delay all trades until our little relation problem with Isa is solved. Right now we cannot afford any more negative modifiers with her…

…

This is the last of the original write-ups I have. Think that I will do maybe 2 more to describe our war and post a final save, then everybody is invited to finish this game on his own (for example starting after the war, via my save). I will provide a little guidline for endgame (how to tech best, how to stay at peace), but in general, a win via domination (beeline for modern armor ASAP) or a win via space race (go immediately for computers) should be quite easy when picking the save after the war...

Since I was very indecisive towards the end and spent much free time building most (maybe even all) modern wonders, a huge army etc. I didn’t make it over 100.000 points but finished 95. something. It wont be a close win, we will be way superior in tech, production etc., so with a little bit more disciplined play in the end, it could be possible to make it over 100.000 points…

…



See you

Snaaty

 

[acidsatyr]

You are playing heavy FE, showing once again that it is superior strategy.
Thats a plus.

What isn't plus is that PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING works only in 1% or games on deity. Look at your power graph. If by any chance you ended up with more aggressive civs around you, you'd had your ass handed to you 6 times already. Sahaladin, Isabela and Ghandi are all nonagressive civs.
Now, instead of trying to finish that strategy hoping that along the way noone attacks you, why not adopt more agressive stregy that will make your position stronger. You have farms, USE THEM! PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING is not strategy its a gamble. Why gamble with PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING when in reality it never works?

 

[Snaaty]

... why not adopt more agressive stregy that will make your position stronger. You have farms, USE THEM! PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING is not strategy its a gamble. Why gamble with PEACEFUL OUTPOPULATING when in reality it never works?

because it works

 

[ABigCivFan]

If all the AIs are also doing "peaceful outpopulating", then it is probably ok, you should be able to out-build them.

But in reality even Isa will attack if you are very weak on the power curve. Also, the other guys can land on you. People get thumped everytime when they just getting into the build groovs, and they won't last 10 turns when a powerful AI attacks. Especially on high levels.

Gear up for your "one-war" ASAP. If you just build units for defensive purpose, they are waste of gold, but if you build offensive units for war, they can conquer new land, boost power score, and defend better than the pure defensive units when situiation arise. Get some trebs ready before Mil Trad.

 

[Snaaty]

yes, we are going for our war soon (very soon)

Don´t worry the other AI´s... trick is that you must go heavy politics... bribe to war, bribe to accept your civics etc.

In this game for example, Isa, Alex and Monty will be in a war forever (till Monty dies but then Alex and Isa keep on fighting...)

Even agressive AI´s wont come for you when they are pleased AND already involved in another war

 

[ABigCivFan]

Sorry, i see that you already won the game, congrats.

 

[acidsatyr]

Even agressive AI´s wont come for you when they are pleased AND already involved in another war

I have to correct you here, this is not true. I had games where AIs (all aggressive i admit) attacked me EVEN when fighting another war, for example Monty couple of times, Alex. If AI sees he can handle both wars, he will declare.

 

[Dirk1302]

^^ Please note, though i have learned a lot from your own strategies that FE structures are better than CE structures it seems to me that your own games rely heavily on constant agression. I agree that even for space races an SE economy is (probably) better then the inflexible cottage strategy. I found though in my own space race games that you can't only rely on the specialists. Lot of income comes from trade routes and growing bigger on static coast tiles with some 15 good cities (as Snaaty does here) you just can't ignore the income from this tiles when going peaceful even when not financial. It's not only the extra commerce but also the increase trade route value.

So your policy of capturing cities and make some science in every city and then continuing the war is very different from the building strategy that Snaaty uses where you have to grow your cities big to get really something out of it.

As for agressive civs, they should be taken out early or left into the tech dust if they border you. I don't think Snaaty has run too great a risk in this game so far.

 

[acidsatyr]

Well, none of the civs you can really leave in dust on deity unfortunately. I agree your strategy will depend somewhat on who your neighbors are. But I am also saying that his strategy is not something that can work most of the time. Having a low power on deity no matter who your civs are is gambling. So having almost purely builder’s intentions in any deity game is an illusion. You must make sure you lower chances of any possible unwanted war.
That said I congratulate on him on his game, any win on deity counts. But now I ask him to try his "peaceful out populating" with aggressive civs on his tail and only one war. How do you know AI won’t declare on you? I even had Gandhi declare war on me, every time my power was in toilet !
Alos his trade route trick works because he is not warring, with closed borders you need to adapt.