Nobles' Club 189 - Mao Zedong

[Pedro78]

@Izuul

Spoiler :

Alpha is one of the rare techs that these AIs will always trade. And they probably won't trade stuff like IW/Sailing for a while. So it might be better to go to Currency through Maths (although Maths is pretty useless here aswell). With less land I would even skip maths/currency and go straight for Optics (maybe get Monarchy first). I would say no to Civil Service because it ruins the Astro bulb, even though it has many benefits on a map like this.

On IMM maybe you can go for CoL for Confu? (I suppose none of these guys have founded one ) Plus it would help the GP generation for the Astro GS. Not sure how early Confu goes on IMM though. A sure thing is that if you're going for it it has to be through Polytheism, assuming that you plan to bulb Astro, which is probably the most "advanced" move here

CKNs? With this much land and such slow techers on your continent cuirs look like a much stronger/safer option to me - especially on IMM, they won't even have Engi by the time you get MT.

 

[Izuul]

@Pedro78

Spoiler :

Yeah, but on this map i don't think the AI will have Alpha anytime soon enough to be useful. I might be waiting until close to 1 AD.

 

[Pedro78]

@Izuul

Spoiler :

Yup but you don't need "early" Alpha in this case. Will probably have to self-tech IW but it's still more useful than Alpha imo

 

[hankinsohl]

@Pedro78

Spoiler :

Thanks for the comments - I'm just an Emperor-level player and could use a few tips.

With regard to skipping TGL though - generally, on these sorts of maps skipping TGL is a no brainer. But in this map, 9 out of 10 of my cities can be comfortably located on the coast and most of them would have to be on the coast to leverage the coastal food. Additionally, there's a small island also with fish (and as it turns out bronze), so that's another trade route. Under these conditions, building TGL would seem to me well worth while.

@Gasp

Spoiler :

I had another look at my save - I was monitoring Darius as he had built the Apollo Program and I thought that he was nearest to victory. But as it turns out, England was just 7 turns away from its third legendary city! Attacking England in time to stop her cultural win would have been doable - I had 30+ tanks next to her ready to go (my intended victim was Darius but England was right next door) - but she was slightly ahead of me in tech and moreover had a defensive pact with Mansa - tackling both of those AI's would have been a tall ask.

Another question - if I take a nation's city and it later recaptures that city, what happens to culture? Is it reset to zero, reduced or back to the same value it had prior to capture? I may have had to raise London were I to war with England if recapture restores most/all of a city's culture.

 

[Izuul]

Played up to 1100 AD. My micro has been pretty much crap in this game. It's not really rust either, i just find i don't have the patience for planning anymore like i used to.

Spoiler :

The AI offered very little in terms of trades (both resources and techs) in this game so the pace was quite slow. I was also a bit unlucky i think to not meet Stalin until 450 BC after finally getting OB with Toku. I'm surprised he didn't get a WB out to explore before Toku sealed off both coasts. I ultimately decided to delay CS in favor of the Optics path, however i did tech Alpha and Currency first before heading down the MC line.

After picking up Machinery and connecting my iron (had to wait a few turns on a capitol border pop) i whipped and chopped a little group of galleys and CKNs and captured Kyoto which housed the GLH, a fantastic wonder for this map. That's definitely a move that only works on immortal as a deity AI would never leave their capitol with such paltry defenses. I also met Lizzy around the same time, shortly followed by Darius and Mansa over there. Lots of techers on that other continent which often sets up for a more difficult game.

Spoiler :

I only got 1 GS to bulb Astro after using the 1st one on an academy. That may have been sub-optimal, but I'm OK with it. There was no religion on our continent to leverage Philo and i never even bothered with CoL after Confucianism was founded pretty early on the other continent. With those available i likely would've eaten the anarchy turns to go into Caste and Pacifism for a few quick great people, but here i just plodded along without. I'll use my great people for golden ages later once things get rolling.

After getting Astro and making a bunch of resource trades, i went straight for Lib and got there nice and late at 1090AD, but still safely ahead of the immortal AI. I took MT of course. With 12 cities and a tech lead it's going to be a Cuir spanking from here on out, just with the added joy of galleon chains. I have enough BPT to head on for Cavs and such too.

Spoiler :

 

[sampsa]

Izuul, those images don't seem to work. What I do these days is just attach images directly (click "upload a file") and they work just fine.

 

[Izuul]

Interesting. I can see them so i didn't realize anything was wrong. I'll try that.

Work now?

 

[sampsa]

Yep, working now.

 

[unas876]

Continued after travelling for a week, 425 AD, IMM

Spoiler :

Omw to Optics, will upgrade two Triremes and then send the GM to the other continent where I'll hopefully find the ToA. Maybe I'll bring him there and wait for Astronomy even.

Tokugawa snatched the Horse spot, which actually is pretty annoying since I not only lose the Horse, but also any chance of irrigating the Gem spot to the east. Doubt I can steal the tile necessary with just a Library.

Settler and Worker otw to this little spot I found. Not really sure whether its worth grabbing or not, but I suppose it might after a while since I have GLH.

Been running Caste for a while now, made a double switch with CS. See no reason to get back into Slavery right now, especially since I might want another GS. On the other hand, it looks like I'm self-teching Astro. Won't get the GS in time. Poor planning I suppose.

Nothing much here, SB won't talk since I stopped trading with him upon Stalins request when the two were at war. Toku doesn't like him either, so no big deal I guess.

What did you expect? I didn't think Stalin would be that bad, but for some reason he hasn't expanded to his full ability.

I tried to stop Toku from trading with Stalin, which would have isolated everyone from each other, but that didn't last too long.


So, straight to Optics and Astronomy and we'll see from there. I don't know how the other continent looks like, but if its anything close to the tech situation of the guys on my continent I don't see any trouble.

 

[Pedro78]

@unas876 looks like you've got things mostly under control -

Spoiler my 2 cents ^^ :

• Looks like you founded Confu. Why didn't you convert?
• Why haven't you settled the eastern Sheep spot yet? It should have been settled a long time ago, especially with the GLH
• Nothing wrong with settling the far away little island indeed
• IMO, teching CS was a mistake as it ruins the Astro bulb. If you're going out of your way to reach Optics then early Astro is extremely valuable, and it's very expensive to self-tech (actually it does cost exactly as much as Rifling/SciMeth as you can't get any prereq bonuses on it). Having the GLH is yet another reason to priorize early Astro in this case.
• A shame you didn't get the horses, this Japanese city is really crappy lol. Cuirs look like the quickest/most elegant way to get your continent so I would consider DoWing Toku at some point to get the horses, especially on IMM. Looking at the tech pace, you might as well wait for drafted rifles (without cannons ), but that's a long way...

 

[unas876]

@Pedro78

Spoiler :

Well, what would be the reason really to convert into Confu when you don't have the tech to adopt any religious civics? You think there is a point in going for Mono if you can't trade for it? That, plus all the missionaries necessary etc made me just neglect religion entirely. Right now obviously the ship has sailed, as I'm close to meeting the rest of the dudes who surely all have state religions and would hate me.

The Sheep spot I neglected as well until now, but that was definitely a mistake. I've been running a lot of scientists everywhere while slow building some stuff, definitely could have gotten out the last two settlers instead that I need for my main continent. I just thought a plains Sheep, plains Iron and two forests wouldn't be that urgent.

And *******, I totally forgot that CS screws the Astro bulb... oh well, I'm not PHI, dont have Pacifism or a GA in sight and already got two great people. It probably wouldn't have come to a bulb anyways, let's be real. But thats a good point where I can improve my game in the future.

Also a good idea to lead a quick attack against Toku, maybe with a few CKN to steal those horses back. I definitely don't lose much from stingy old Toku, as long as I can keep my traderoutes. Gotta check that out, maybe it'll be better to do that after Astro TRs are online.

 

[Pedro78]

@unas876

Spoiler :

what would be the reason really to convert into Confu

Well my mind was set on deity where you can actually get techs from Toku, the idea behind converting being getting him to friendly (and avoiding DoW). In your case it probably won't do much good, indeed...

running a lot of scientists everywhere while slow building some stuff

Don't switch to Caste and run scientists before your basic infrastructure is ready. It's often better to be done with expansion before you switch to Caste aswell.

 

[Pedro78]

@Izuul I read your writeup and somehow it jumped off my mind when I replied to the thread

Spoiler :

It's crazy how many things you can get away with on IMM. Building a couple of CKNs to grab the GLH is sweet lol

You're talking about Cuirs/Cavs + Galleon chains, so you're assuming that you'll catch the other continent pre-rifling? Or simply attack the other continent before taking control of yours? I'm a bit confused, not sure what the tech pace looks like on IMM (lib went 200AD in my deity test game )

 

[unas876]

You tricksed us with this map @Pedro78
Imm, post Astro:

Spoiler :

This crowd of weaklings on our continent and then three of the best techers in the game together on the other?
Still looks kinda easy on Imm:

I plan on keeping my stuff to myself for now, maybe get Feudalism from Mansa in a while to capitulate some guys on my continent. Wonder if it would be worth grabbing Mono and going for OR. I have by now spread my religion to my capital and like two other cities. I'm thinking its not worth the hassle and the Anarchy + maybe I'd be worst enemy of Mansa until he has Optics.

Btw: considering I got GLH: on a scale of 1-10, how dumb was that settle?


Anyways, I'm quickly self-teching Engineering here. Have already built a few Maces and am now starting on a few CKN. Toku is weak (like two Archers per city weak) and I'm thinking I can easily capitulate the whole continent with Engineering. Massive failgold inbound from Chicken Pizza (have ~499 hammers into it in Beijing + a fair few in Xian already) + Moai Statues when I finally get to chop them out somewhere. Also my Great Merchant is currently exploring the other continent and will do a trade mission in England at the ToA. So realistically, I don't think my advantage could be any bigger at the moment

 

[Pedro78]

@unas876 Well that's a fun setup isn't it?
On a more serious note, the map is not that different from others unless you're playing on deity. And most deity players around here are looking for some kind of a challenge anyways. So I thought it would fit most people's taste.

Spoiler about your game :

I'm shocked how slow the IMM AIs are. Only Mansa has feuda by 800 AD wtf?

Anyways looks like an easy win from here... You should probably try Deity some time.

Oh and

Spoiler :

Btw: considering I got GLH: on a scale of 1-10, how dumb was that settle?

Would be 10/10 even without GLH lol

 

[Izuul]

@Izuul I read your writeup and somehow it jumped off my mind when I replied to the thread

Spoiler :

It's crazy how many things you can get away with on IMM. Building a couple of CKNs to grab the GLH is sweet lol

You're talking about Cuirs/Cavs + Galleon chains, so you're assuming that you'll catch the other continent pre-rifling? Or simply attack the other continent before taking control of yours? I'm a bit confused, not sure what the tech pace looks like on IMM (lib went 200AD in my deity test game )

Spoiler :

I'll figure that part out when i get over there. I just finished off my continent a little before 1400 AD. Darius didn't trade a great deal with Mansa and Izzy so he doesn't have Rifles or anything dangerous like that. The other two both do, but they don't build many units. Right now my plan is to wipe out Darius really quickly, use his cities to start upgrading my units to Cavs, and then I'll either just brute force my way past the Rifles with sheer numbers of Cavs, or I'll pick up Physics and use some airships. I don't anticipate it being a big problem.

 

[unas876]

Okay, forget that... 1110AD

Spoiler :

I vassaled Tokugawa and took two cities from SB. I libbed Steel. But I don't believe this tech screen:


Like, I get it, this is just Immortal, but I coulda libbed Assembly Line easily here, against three strong techers. So I check my settings screen, maybe I picked the wrong save?



I picked the right save, but it says the game is on Noble.
So do you have to manually change difficulty level even if you pick the right save? I thought I pick the Imm save and everything will be on Imm automatically, because thats how I remember it from old NC games, but I guess I'm wrong? My bad....

 

[Pedro78]

@unas876 The IMM save only gives the AI the IMM starting techs. You have to select immortal difficulty from the scenario menu to actually play it on IMM. That's a Noble game you're playing here, only difference is the AIs all started with Ag, Hunting and Archery. No wonder it was so easy

 

[elmurcis]

I picked the right save, but it says the game is on Noble.

Feel so sorry about this mistake... Could be so great if that would be true about tech lead

 

[antimony]

New to this series, I'm trying this game at Prince.

T61 situation...

Spoiler :

Tech order: AH, Wheel, Pottery, BW, Writing (next: Iron Working to reveal iron and possibly alter settling priorities)
Build order in capital: Worker, Warrior, Granary, Settler, Worker, Settler, Library

My plan was to grow the capital to the happy cap. of 5 then start expanding. After reading the other early starts, I realize I could have gone BW first and whipped more. (Right now I only used whip for a Granary in 2nd city.) Due to the large food output in Beijing, building a settler takes less than 10 turns, so is it a good strategy to 2-pop whip every other settler when passing happy cap?

I decided to put 2nd city on the river south of corn and pigs for the trade routes and to cut off possible AI expansion. As you can see I forgot to reveal the whole coast which was one of a few micro mistakes made. When the library is done my capital should produce settlers (and workers) for the gold city spot (sharing pig with Shanghai) and the copper city spot. I'm thinking gold is better for economy and happiness, but perhaps if the AI were closer, copper should have been a settling priority?

Overall, I was surprised with the amount of space to expand (and I haven't seen an AI city yet, just one of Stalin's scout).

Spoiler Dot map :