Nobles' Club 196 - Lincoln of America

[mscellaneous]

The Nobles' Club series started out as a way for Noble-level (and below) players to improve their game. Most of the original participants now play at much higher levels, so this has become a way for advanced players to help others learn to play better. You can play your own game at any level and with any mod, but it would be nice to comment on the games of other players and give them advice.

Our next leader is Lincoln of America, whom we last played in NC CLIII. America starts with Fishing and Agriculture.

• Traits : Lincoln is Philosophical and Charismatic
• The UB: the Mall, a Supermarket that gives and . It comes quite late in the game, so some players consider it very weak compared to other UBs. The extra cash might be useful in keeping research at a higher rate in the late game, where it could make a difference in a space victory race.

• The UU: the Navy Seal, a Marine with March promotion (can heal while moving) and 1-2 first strikes (one of few late-game units to have them), making it a very strong late-game military unit. Like the UB, some players consider it weak because they're in too strong a position at that point to need it (or have won the game already).

And the start :

Spoiler map details :

Lakes with high seas.

Spoiler edits :

Added some strategic resources near AI starting locations. Moved some gems

Finally, a cut and paste of our standard doctrine:

There are no hard and fast rules here. Fun and learning are our primary goals, but we do suggest that you update your progress at various points in the game, using the Spoiler feature of the boards. You can post as often as you like; here's one suggestion:

• 4000 BC (starting thoughts, no spoiler required for that discussion)
• 1000 BC or so (how you decided to progress up the early tech/build paths, which AIs you have met, where you're thinking of putting cities, etc)
• 500 AD or so (after establishing some cities and a possible plan of action)
• 1200 AD or so (mid-game, Lib race, wars or peace, or whichever happened or didn't, met other
• continent if applicable, etc)
• 1600 AD (or when you have decided on a course of action and a specific victory condition)
• End of game (Victory!!! or defeat, no shame in losing, especially if you tried a higher level. Learning is what we focus on, not fastest win or biggest empire)

The WB-saves are attached (zipped; they are bigger than standard saves). To play, simply download and unzip it into your BTS/Saves/WorldBuilder folder. Start the game, and load your favorite MOD (if you use one, if not, check out the BUG MOD), select "Play Scenario", and look for "NC_196_Lincoln_Noble" (or Monarch, etc., for higher levels). You can play with your favorite MOD at the Level and Speed of your choice. From Quick-Warlord to Marathon-Deity, all are welcome! We stuck with the name "Nobles Club" because it has a cool ring to it.

Spoiler what's up with specific difficulties :

In each scenario file you can select your level of difficulty, but that doesn't give the AI the right bonus techs by itself. Use the Noble save for all levels at and below Prince. The Monarch save gives all the AI Archery. Emperor adds Hunting; Immortal adds Agriculture; Deity adds The Wheel.

For players on Monarch or above, you should add archery as a tech for the barbarians (if you don't, the AI will capture their cities very early). This cannot be done in the WB save file and must be done in Worldbuilder as follows:

Spoiler how to add techs to the barbarians :

1. Zoom in all the way so you can't see the rest of the map.
2. Use the CTRL-W key (or the menu) to enter the worldbuilder. Avoid looking at the mini-map in the lower right corner.
3. By default you're in "player" mode (look in the box in the upper right; the icon that looks like a person should be selected). You'll get a drop down menu labeled with your leader's name. Barbarians are at the bottom, so cover the rest of the list with your hand if you don't want to see who else is on the map. Select "Barbarians".
4. Select the "Technologies" tab in the box on the left.
5. Find Archery (the arrow head icon; 8th row, 3rd column from the right) and click it.
6. Exit the worldbuilder.
7. Zoom out again after the map fades, and start playing.

Spoiler huts and events :

Note: The standard saves have no huts and have events turned off. If you want tribal villages and random events, choose the saves with "Huts" in their names. If you want huts but no events, select the Huts saves and use Custom Scenario to turn on the option that suppresses events.

 

[Fish Man]

Finally a new one!

Judging by starting screenie: settling on ivory seems like no-brainer.

 

[hankinsohl]

Thanks very much for posting the game mscellaneous!

 

[dutchfire]

Finally a new one!

Judging by starting screenie: settling on ivory seems like no-brainer.

Yes, seems like this loses only 4 forests (one of them grassland riverside though), and an unforested plains tile that's quite likely to hold a resource. The plains hill could then be a nice second city.

 

[Gumbolt]

New NC game. Let the fun begin!

I have started this already. Likely update later once I have got a bit further.

1000bc

Spoiler up to 1000bc :

Settled on ivory after warrior revealed nothing special.

Techs Mining/BW/ TW/PotteryAH/writing/HBR/hunting/archery.

Stole worker from Zara. Stayed at war with him.

Mostly prepared for HA rush with 1-2 chariots. Had a few issues with barbs. Not greatest RNG from combat.

Went NY as second city to grab gold. Corn/second gold and cow with border pop.
3rd city to grab floodplain river. Lucked out as found horse there too.
4th city for sheep and corn.
4 cities by 2120bc.
3 workers.

Paused expansion for HA/chariots.

2x gold resources makes teching HBR much easier.

Lack of border pops so far has not been a big issue.

125bc update.

Spoiler 125bc update :

Declared on Zara. Just about managed to capture his capital in 925bc. It had one spear and I had some good and bad RNG to take it. Spear was a big pain. Took a ceasire for my 4-5 HA to join front line..

Unfortunately I failed to spot Zara had alphabet. He bribed the Germans on me. Germans only had chariots and archers.

Eventually I got maths and traded for alphabet/myst.

German war involved a lot of cities building research. At the worst point I was on -20-30 gold a turn. Kept economy alive by capturing cities and pushing towards currency.

Attack on Germans was slowing me down. So after taking 4 of his cities took peace for monarchy/MC and poly. He had a mini stack approaching me from the south.

Traded for construction too.

Overall 12 cities and an economy pretty much struggling without wealth. Need to trade for gold to get calendar. No way I could do any of this without research or wealth!

AI has COl and Mansa has machinery.
Mansa in war mode. :Likely Germans or China?

Behind techwise where I would like to be now but pults/cats for Toku next.

 

[Imploding]

Alright great game

I did two attempts on deity on this map.. first game just did not seem to give me that "wooah" experience. So I simply started again. Second attempt tho.. got kind of ridiculous.. in a good way

Spoiler 1320 AD W-Conquest :

Played a fast and fun game. Had this song on repeat:

The game!

SiP was pretty obvious! A ridiculous capitol!

Got lucky with a 50/50 vs lion, and got a WoodII guy from a lion. Ended up stealing 3 workers from Bismark.. slowing him down and getting a really fast game for myself. I got such a fast start that the Ai seemed slow. Simultanoiusly the wonders also came slow. low stone/marble on this map?

Then I Eliphoarspulted Zara, got a great 2x gold spot from him with ToA. the end result was a nice vassal and a well promoted army.
Did some diplo tricks and "everyone" was at war.
The engine of war just powered trough Elizabeth -> Mansa -> Bismark & Tokugawa -> Quin.

Other mentions, started a 24 turn goldenage when i got the MoM from Elizabeth. Knigths rock.. got some supertrebuches.

Killed 364 units
Lost 117 units
K/D ratio: 3,11
Produced 196 units
Standing army 79 units.

Guess points on improvement:
REXing - faster, better and more cities. Had fast 4.. but kind of slow.. 5 and 6 cities.. when the capitol got occupired with library / GS.

Better whip/production
Army movements.

Had a blast playing this and a great learning experience. Puts me rigth back in Civ4 mindset!
Thx for posting!

 

[Gumbolt]

Looks like you had a strong game here imploding. Have to see if I can match your date.

Not played on my game yet.

 

[ArchGhost]

Ooh, PHI leader and Ivory? Decisions, decisions! Depends on who is around I suppose.

Looks like potential for a fun one. Haven't played in a couple weeks, lets see how well Immortal goes. My last game was a rather lame Space Race sitting on my own island :s

 

[Gumbolt]

Played on a few more turns.

325ad

Spoiler Update :

I traded HBR for 335 gold to Mansa.
I started to prepare a secondary stack for English. Meanwhile I used existing HA, whipped phants and pults for Toku and Germans. I had to declare on Germans as they built a new city blocking my troops.

I took a golden age and switched to HR and jud for happiness. Used the golden age to tech fuedalism. (3-4 turns.)


Took 3 German cities before they capitulated. Took mono and some gold.
Took 3 Toku cities including his capital. After 1-2 more combats he offered capitulation with COL and gold.

I am approaching London/Hastings with a reasonable sized stack. Hopefully he will cap after Hastings.

2 more wars to plan here. China and Mansa. Mansa has machinery so could present some challenges. He had been in war mode for ages. Once I capped Toku this ended. So Toku was his likely target.

I will likely need to cap all AI here to win. Mansa normally caps quite easily. My power rating is at least 1.9 with all AI here.

Spoiler 425ad :

Took Hastings and London and English have capitulated.

Declared on Mansa who suddenly has engineering and feudalism! Could be very annoying!

Losing 60+ gold a turn. Ouch!

Spoiler 540AD :

War with China was somewhat quicker. Took 3 cities and he capitulated. He only had archers and catapults.

Mansa war is painfully slow. Taken 2 cities but I am low on troops. Trying to build up my power rating so I am at least 2x his. He has 6 cities left. His capital has a castle.

 

[Gumbolt]

All done 720ad. Conquest win 288288 score. Immortal.

Spoiler 720ad :

Killed 168 units lost 76.

Mansa near the end was a real pain and i was left waiting 9-10 turns for more troops. His land was well protected by sea/lake tiles. His 2nd city had 3-4 HA, 3 pike and a LB so needed 5 catapults to weaken and bombard.

If I had done this properly I would of attacked Mansa after Germans to save time and used just HA. I knew Mansa was always going to be fastest techer. Taking peace with Germans was perhaps a mistake.

 

[ArchGhost]

Immortal attempt:

Spoiler Turnset :

Sent Warrior up on the East hill as more desert to the south isn't exactly promising. Settling on the Ivory is like a Plains Hill cap which seems good because I don't like moving towards desert unless I already know whats around it.



Well that worked out rather well. Don't necessarily like all the jungle but the cap itself is pretty strong. I will probably go for quick Pottery > Writing after BW, and since I'm PHI and this is a good spot, do the Academy thing for once. Could probably fit in Myst somewhere with this gold mine.

I want to see what else is on this river then maybe see if anything west can be used as food to work the gold long term as the cap only has one food source.



ooh baby



We meet Zara, and wow, this spot is double gold and 3 FP?. I have to go for that if Zara is close, too good to pass up. Especially as he's CRE.

(forgot to get a screenshot of his borders to the east of gold, apparently. D'oh!)
And he is close....ho boy. Well I have a mission already at least.



Bismarck out west. i don't know what Lakes maps are like but I seem to be in the middle of it, guy on either side and in the jungle belt?



T11 meet Qin, whose heroic scout eats a bear for my warrior then runs off North. What a nice guy

T12 Worker out, gonna go Farm corn, mine gold, then probably go for chop.



T13 brief preliminary city planning, subject to change. man some of those peaks are in juuuust the wrong spots. Argh.

t14 AI founds Buddhism



t16 I find Mansa and Stone...man it sucks that spot has BOTH potential food sources jungled.

T18 Hinduism founded by Mansa.



t21 micro city to get BW one turn earlier since it will still grow.


T22 BW in. Washington size 3.

I think I will grow for a 4>2 whip and revolt after 4, since I need another worker for all these chops to go fast. I don't see a reason to double settler yet and I won't have Pottery in time for the overflow for a Granary. This will let me work the gold when regrowing and with Zara (CRE) here i think it might be a fine time to sneak in Mysticism before I run -gold from another city.

Not sure how sound this reasoning all is, but with chops + the hammers from Ivory + working gold mine I have got a lot of hammer output in a short time here even with slower regrowth working gold, and I'll get some extra tech speed. And I want to get that gold spot from Zara since he's close to it, which a Monument + Library will also help stave back his encroachment. I hope. I don't know. Seems like I'm trying to accomplish a lot of things at once.



t24 I want this warrior to start busting towards the double gold now, not after the settler. and it saves me a turn teching, so that's something in return.




t26 chop into settler, revolt to slavery. More jungle up NW, yuck. Maybe that Gem + sugar could be something later, if Bismarck doesn't muscle in there, he's fairly close to my West.. My PH down south has corn and I have Myst, so will continue to look that way.

T28 myst. On to Wheel > Pottery.

T30 chop comes in so whip the settler at 54/100. Not ideal but I'd rather not waste a worker turn waiting on the city to put in more hammers.

T31 Stonehenge (Germany). great. CRE on one side and henge on the other.



T32 Wheel. man, this spot down South has PHs, Corn, Sheep, and then Copper and Deer. I need to figure exactly how I want to plan it out but Copper anywhere near me has been a sorely lacking thing in my recent games before i took a break. Settler on his way to double gold spot with warrior out front.

t33 Worker 2 out, headed to city 2 site.

t35 a forest delays it by a turn, but New york is founded. It also turns out it has corn, though I doubt I'll keep that if (when) Zara tries to settle it as it's in 2nd ring. Monument started, need dat culture to fight Zara back!



t36 worker starts a FP farm at new york.

t37 pottery. Start Writing, and warrior in Wash completes this turn so start Granary.



T38 With that chop coming in and 8 hammers in the Granary, I can 1 pop whip it next turn with no worries thanks to CHA. Will pick up another warrior, maybe 2, and slowly work towards a Monument for the free happy.

T49 Writing. Chop/Whip Settler number 2 out. Bismarck is coming my way already so I might take the Cow + Gems spot to make sure he doesn't. 58 overflow into worker will 1 turn it with the city hammers. tech set to AH.

T54 Boston founded on Cow + Gems, can share gold and FPs. Could have had it settled a couple turns earlier but waited until I could get a cottage done for it to work. *EDIT* That seems dumb in retrospect, it could have at least started growing earlier. monument as this is right up against Bismarck's border now.

T56 AH. i have horse on the river between my cities, so maybe that corn/sheep/bronze not vital. Set to Aesthetics. Setting up another 4>2 settler whip in Washington.



T72 Aesthetics. No Alpha but I'll be ready. Managed to secure the Copper site with a risky gambit against the flow of barbs by just stuffing a bunch of warriors in it. I NEED that copper as it's just a matter of time before Spears and Axes roll out of that tundra. Short on workers.




T75 state of the empire. copper is soon to be hooked up, I had to chop 2 warriors in that city to hold back an archer though. It can't come fast enough between barbs and Bismarck being a potential problem (who crossed a desert to settle in my face and steal my corn ). Decided to pump settlers to try and finish land blocking then fill in the middle. Need a Library in New York ASAP so maybe I can keep corn + the extra gold. Running Scientists in Cap + new york should be enough to farm around 4 GS being PHI so I can swing this I think. No signs of alpha on Liz or Mansa yet, disappointing. Gifting Cow to Bismarck to start relations, counteract some of that border tension hopefully as he could really try to kill me at any time so beg is important.




T80 Liz comes through for me on Alpha. Pick up Meditation from Qin for Writing, who doesn't have it yet for some reason. Copper is hooked up. Gonna try to block Zara more directly and gift a city to Bismarck to help on that front I hope. Library whip in New York.



t81 make this trade with Mansa. Going for Currency now.



T91 Bismarck begs Aesthetics. Thank God. Peace treaty and now he is pleased. Was sweating cause he wouldn't accept my city in the spot I dropped it (i guess it was too close to Mansa? Decided to reload it, never seen that before). I eventually get another place where he will accept it and find out Tokugawa is behind Biz. Apparently Mansa is staying small at 4 cities, Liz has the tech lead and the world has fallen into two religious blocs, Buddhist (everybody but Mansa + Biz) and Jewish (Mansa and Bismarck soon after this screenshot). Yay.



T92 a shot showing how Zara runs right around my border and takes the Stone + Pigs spot. He took a spot even further NorthWest around the lake just North of Washington too. I think blocking and filling in the center later was a good call here, else he'd be even more in my face (up against the capitol if I let him anywhere near that rice) and those cities can do useful things at low pops like share cottages or work a gold mine.

T102 Currency, finally. Trade Aes + Currency to Zara for Poly +Sailing. He almost had Aes anyway so it gives me Pleased with him. Set to Code of Laws, will track back for Math + Music later. Cities are starting to grow onto cottages and running Scientists in Washington and New York. Washington has helper cities to grow its cottages and my land is mostly consolidated except for the Stone spot Zara ganked, but I didn't care much about it anyway.

T109 GS #1 born, academy in Washington.

T113 Code of laws. Starting Civil Service. Found Confucianism, interestingly.

T115 China builds the Mids. Finally. Wow.

T117 Drama, for some trade-bait. Monarchy to Zara for Literature in case it comes in handy.

T118 GS #2 born, bulbs Philosophy (got math sometime before CoL). Found Taoism. Funnily enough, those missionaries come in handy as scouts when dudes don't wanna trade maps later on.

T121 Revolt to Caste + Pacifism

T122 Revolt to Judaism

T123 Drama + Lit to Bismarck for Calendar. Start starving three cities for GS (not the capitol). I want to get this done and get out of a religion ASAP.

T128 Civil Service. GS #3 born in Boston.

Zara or Liz got Code of Laws and a rash of trading broke out, CoL and Music went everywhere. Might as well get what I can out of Bismarck as he won't trade with me after i leave Judaism I think, and trade CoL away. Compass, Metal Casting, and Music are all up for trade.

Trade Col + Civil Service for Music + Metal casting out of Biz. I *think* he should keep CS to himself a little as he's semi stingy and in opposite religion of every one but Mansa. *EDIT* this backfired because I overlooked he would trade it to his buddy Mansa, who WILL trade it to anybody not his Worst Enemy...*sigh* Put a turn into to compass to see if Zara wants to trade it next turn for Metal Casting.

Begged Sugar from Biz as I need health in Washington. He's probably my first target once I get into Buddhism and start pumping Cuirs, so whatever.



T129 Metal Casting to Zara for compass. Drama + 45g to Liz for HBR. Tech set to Paper. Revolt to Bureaucracy. Here's the tech breakdown at this point. Qin and Toku getting left in the dust tech-wise.

I'm doing pretty good: I've collected up all the GS bulbing pre-reqs so they don't interfere with Lib bulb, I have a monopoly on Philo, and my Academy cottage capitol gives me a respectable tech rate at full slider (something like 300+ beakers?).

Spoiler Turnset :

T130 build a few workers as I'm short (8 for 9 cities) and I need to spread irrigation, mine hills, and chop.

T131 Mansa finally builds the GLH >_>

T134 Liz builds AP in Buddhism, So i have the capitol work a hill and build some Missionaries with its Monastary. Qin wins the elections, despite Liz being founder of Buddhism. Paper is in, GS #3 bulbs most of Education. GS #4 will bulb most of Lib, while the upcoming GS #5 will initiate a golden age for me that will allow swaps into Slavery, Theo (hopefully by that time) and Buddhism, help tech Nationalism, and crank at least one more GS #6 out of New York. Just need Qin and Toku to give me some gold for all this backlog tech...

T138 Education. GS #4 Bulbs Lib. GS #5 starts my first GA, which will help a lot with Nationalism. On the last turn i will swap into Slavery and Theo if I have it. Time to trade away Philosophy. One turn into Machinery to cheapen it...

T139 Philosophy +45g to Mansa for Feudalism. Philosophy + Compass to Bizzy for Construction, Machinery and 70G. 100% slider to preload Liberalism, then going for Nationalism.

T141 GS #6 is born. He may be used for Printing Press as I'm rocking a Bureau cap. Man i love PHI trait. Normally I need to stay small or use NE to get this many GS this easy.



t142 Qin randomly offers me this deal. Uh, yes? Thanks bro.

t143 Biz also has a ton of gold, ~400, that I trade Paper for and a map, finally. It was the Colossus going on turn 141 i guess that made these guys have all this gold. Zara is plotting

t145 Last turn of the GA. Theocracy isn't gonna happen. Swap into Slavery + OR and Buddhism. Beg 1g from Zara and he stops plotting. Punk. Bismarck is still Pleased and I am about 15 turns from Cuirs, so I think I'm okay.

t147 Nationalism. Start whipping Forges + barracks + Stables as I'm not in theo or vassalage.

t148 Lib > Military Tradition. Start Gunpowder.

T152 Gunpowder. Set to Printing Press. Continue whipping infrastructure. Buddhism is in every city so OR is helping as much as it can. University going down in Washington, which won't be whipped. Cuirs are almost ready to begin pumping non-stop.

I realize the map now wraps laterally. Fortunately this makes my attack plan easier. I can't even locate a stack for Bismarck...and I've been looking at all of his cities with two Missionaries and a worker. being that large but that weak, he's definitely first if he's on my border. Then straight on west to Tokugawa, then probably Qin from there. Liz or Zara next, depending on how things look at that point.

T155 Printing Press. One turn in Engineering to get it from Zara next turn

t156 Philosophy + 65g for Engineering from Zara. On to Guilds.

t157 Cuirs are rolling off the line now.

T163 Guilds. Might go for Economics, though Mansa is already at banking and could be teching Edu now. Almost ready to steam roll Bismarck. Toku is plotting on...someone Only the 2nd plot of the entire game.

more to come (image limitations)

 

[ArchGhost]

Spoiler Cuir wars :

T164 It's time for Bismarck's reckoning. DoW and take Frankfurt immediately, the friggin desert eyesore that stole my corn +sheep+ bronze spot so long ago. it has Shwedagon Paya in it, so Theo will happen here is a sec after I gauge his reaction to the DoW.

T165 Bribe Qin into the the war and then he promptly tries to AP out the very next turn. my and Tokugawa's no votes shoot that down even though defy isn't even an option for some reason. Punk AI.

T171 Tokugawa hops in the war on Bismarck on his own.

Predictably, Mansa rushed straight to Education then Economics, then promptly traded both away to Liz, beating me to the GM by a turn and dispersing his monopoly on it right way even though it only took me 7 turns to go through Banking and Econ...way to go man, I'm sure it's gonna keep me from steamrolling you with Cavs later. Punk AI. Well I;m still finishing it for Free Market when the econ crunch hits after a while. Anyway, i don't have to build gold to shave at turn off of it anymore.

T173 Economics. Revolt to Free Market. Teching onward to Replaceable Parts then Rifling.



T179 After a lot of of unnecessary piecemeal resistance, Biz gives up. Apparently he thought because he teched Gunpowder that he was gonna come out okay when I had two stacks running through taking cities In any case, now he can tech Chemistry for me.


Toku managed to snag a city off of him but Bismarck's culture is trapping the stack there...all I have to do is heal a bit and then smash Toku's stack before moving into his land, haha.


i trade economics to Zara for a whopping 1190 gold. Should put a dent in Rifling. Onward!

T180 Replaceable Parts. Rifling is due in 7 turns, i have about enough gold for 6 turns of 100% tech.




t184 Toku, it's your turn baby...




Ouch, that's gotta be painful!

t185 damn Qin, trying to get Toku out with an AP resolution immediately... how does he always get a vote turn right after my DoWs? Ugh. I CAN defy this one though, so no way. It would have passed this time too, without Toku's votes and my cities being whipped into nubs by this point. That's all she wrote for Toku's stack though. Now to just heal a bit and pick off cities until he comes to his senses.

T188 Rifling. Next goal is Communism, so we need Chemistry to go through SciMeth. for now, Slider is off though, and focusing on capping Toku.



oh yeah, he's boned and but good. This is just gonna be mop up but it's still gonna be nasty -- for him.



I think I'll plan to go for Liz next and raze the damn AP. London has a ton of wonders in it:


But none of them are gonna speed the rest of this game up...while razing AP could save me much more on defy penalties in the future, which Qin is sure to repeatedly call on me.

T195 Toku still made me take 4 cities from his stubborn keister. He caps though and I get a whale for free. Japan and whaling....heh.



This is where I'm planning to run across the border to smash Liz and kill the AP. Qin just called an AP vote so I should probably go now, honestly...Zara can't do anything to me at Pleased after the DoW, Mansa isn't a factor, and if Qin caught a bribe I'd start ripping through his back line with the Cuirs over in Toku-land. She's no Churchill but I still don't want her being the first to Rifles.

Heh, nevermind. Both Qin and Zara are still Friendly after DoW. Haha Liz.



T199 Forking London + Newcastle. I *might* be able to kill London in one turn, but those Pikes could get quite stubborn with that 80% defense.

T201 London survives round 1 by 3 units, but is now gone forever. Goodbye AP and Liz's dreams of cultural victories. Qin dogpiles Liz this turn! Wow, he really is just an obstructive turd.

Btw, I know everyone complains about how horrible the automated workers are, and this is far beyond the point I care what they are doing...but man they are smoking something dank...they Cottaged over the Corn in my Bureau cap for whatever reason, then replaced the farm next turn.



T204 Man why are these stupid weak AIs being so stubborn? Liz founds Liverpool where London was and I promptly raze it...she still won't cap after losing 2 cities to razing and another on Qin's border that I snagged from his grubby claws. She's running to Communism (despite being at war, what an idiot) so I'm sure Zara, whom she is freely giving tech back and forth with for nothing and at the same tech level, is probably going Physics right now.



T205 Finally. Even starting earlier in this game than I usually get Cuirs, it's still taking as long because of the stubbornness of these AIs to give up. Ugh.

Will probably just let her finish Communism for me. I give her back Hastings and she'll tech it faster than me. I do buy her into not trading with Zara though.

Now who? Qin is behind in tech but has the most power *EDIT* I thought he had Grenadiers at this point too, but I was wrong. Zara is bigger but weaker than him, and surrounds my border...if I hit Qin now, he's done, and I have a Cuir stack on the other side of his border...then he would completely surround Zara for me. Or if I hit Zara, he might offer less resistance and complete the surround of Qin, but I can't see his tech and he could just quickly go RP + Rifling whereas that's not an issue with Qin right now.


I'm thinking Zara. he just got Biology, and I know he doesn't have Grenadiers at least. Will quickly scout him with a Sentry Cav and see what he's up to while I heal in Hastings.

Oh yeah, definitely Zara. Like with Bismarck, I'm not even seeing an assembled stack anywhere. And he will block Qin for the follow up to the point Qin will basically be unable to get to me without my vassal's borders slowing him.

A couple turns to heal, get my Cuirs stack over to his border through Qin's land, and let Liz tech Communism a little faster.

T207 His stack in tiny and was out razing a barb city...that's why I couldn't see one. Heh. it is right on my south border though in the ice, so I'll have to reroute some fresh Cavs there to nullify if. I'm waiting to get some cavs to block opportunists form his north cities anyway, so I need to wait a couple turns still.



t209 In place to take 2 cities immediately and have reinforcements headed south to engage his stack. Next turn, he gets it.. He also got Communism first as well as biology, punk.

T210 DoW on Zara. He loses Lalibela and Addis Ababa instantly as well as a couple workers. I just checked the wonder screen to see if he had any thing and look how sparse it is since I razed London:



jeez Liz. She populated like half the list with London alone...and now it's all gone. Shame, that.

T211 trade for Communism, revolt into state property. Qin not-very-smartly accepts a bribe into the war on Zara's side in exchange for Communism. Not only will this allow me to wipe his stack inside Liz's territory, but Zara will be wrapped up quickly and I won't have to deal with waiting out a peace treaty to hit Qin.



t212 yup. Took one city more and Zara folds. I trade Biology for Replaceable parts + Military tradition and now Qin is alone in a 4-way war against Cavs + Cuirs and he has neither

T213 Qin takes Hastings...and I pounce on his exposed stack:




Not a single loss, and it doesn't even all fit on the screen. BIIIIIIIIG mistake Qin. Clean up the stragglers and then it's just pushing into his own territory.

T214 Qin loses a border city



T215 Qin loses 2 more border cities, including the stack he was tying to rebuild in Macau. Still won't cap, but then again he's an idiot, to use a Lain-ism Losing 4 cities and 2 stacks isn't enough for him apparently, and he wants more beatings.

t218 still no cap....this crap is getting old. He has a TON of catapults everywhere, interestingly enough. He'd be scary with Steel. But he's about to be dead if he doesn't quit it.



t219 Good boy. Still refused to cap (he was willing to talk ever since I wiped his initial stack in Hastings!) until I killed another small stack of catapults, and took two more cities. Argh. I am KEEPING your cities for that, punk.



The path of destruction


Immediately declare on Mansa so no trading is done with him, and so he'll burn his units up fighting with my vassals until I get there. Maybe he can resist capitulation forever too? That will be fun




t223 Two stack ready to push in for cities. Hey look, I am almost turning a profit



t224 What, that's it? No dragging it out? Fine be that way, Mansa, you clearly aren't part of the cool kids.

Spoiler End Result :

t225 NC 196 Lincoln has won a Conquest Victory!!!











my highest scoring Immortal game yet.

 

[Choeimok]

Spoiler Monarch/50BC :

I should be playing my ALC game, but this looked like a fine diversion...
In that game, I played like 10 or 15 hours, more with writeup, until the early ADs, here...

... my empire management is horrible, but in 45 minutes of playing, I've had a lot of fun, that's more important than winning. Screw actually settling cities or citizen micro, I saw phants and wanted to do something with them, rather than care about all the important stuff. So I've taken out an AI with them (Sight Chariot found his iron at the start of the war; I stole a settler, took 3 cities, razed on directly placed on a gold tile) just barely in the BCs and am still ahead in tech thanks to the pretty good land from just those 3 cities. Plan: Elizabeth stole my rightful Gems tile in Gondar with some city's third ring, and I still have a big army that will be twiddling thumbs... Just got MC, so I won't be playing with one trait for much longer either (too busy building civil+military units to bother with failgold)
The lack of metal and fairly high amount of foliage did cause me quite some problems with barbs, at one point I had to emergency 3 pop whip a phant in Washington who then lost to the barb axe but my Warrior mopped up.

 

[southquote]

Nice writeup, ArchGhost and impressive win.

Spoiler :

Biggest thing I learned from reading through your post is not to be afraid about DOW with low power rating when you have Cuirs versus medieval. You had 0.52 versus Bismark and still rolled him.

 

[southquote]

Emperor - 1858 Domination victory.
A few firsts here:
First win as Lincoln
First time tripping the Conquest condition (however, my last cap also tripped the Domination condition, and that is what the game awarded)
First win with Liz as an AI (randomly, I have almost never rolled her as an AI)
First time playing Lakes

Overall felt comfortable throughout, but did not roll over the map as quickly as I thought I would at the beginning. Here are some highlights:

Spoiler 325 AD :

Settled on the Ivory, Rexed to 7 cities. I probably spaced them out too far and/or could have fit in a few more. Looking at ArchGhost's maps, I could have placed some cities better (e.g., NY should not have been on the FP).
Stayed out of a religion because Bismark who seemed to biggest threat was Jewish, whereas my other neighbors were Buddhist. In fact, I had a high happy cap with Ivory, Gold, Gems, and Charismatic coupled with not a huge amount of food. Later, there was Spice and Dye in my borders. I never even built a monument...did not need to.
Built Parthenon in NY and GLib + NE in Washington, all without marble. Probably a habit I need to break, but it did pump out a lot of GP. I had a huge tech lead at 325.

Spoiler 1310 AD - First Attack :

Finally ready to roll with Cuirs. First victim is Zara. Took Aksum, Debre Berhan, and Addis Ababa and then cap. Maybe I should have tried to take all his cities since the rest of the game those cities kept revolting somewhat annoyingly. Eventually, after I took Nanjing it flipped to Zara. Not that it really had a noticeable impact. Later, I did completely wipe out Liz and London became a beastly city (as opposed to Aksum which spent much of its time in revolt...). Other English cities contributed to later war efforts more than the Ethiopian cities.

Spoiler 1490 AD :

Liz was next. By now I have Cavs and Cannons, whereas she still has medieval defenders. I captured all her cities pretty easily. When she was down to 2 cities, she peace-vassaled to Mansa putting me at war with him. I am not really sure why he would want to do that since I was ahead of him in power, cities, and slightly in tech. London had 8 wonders in it with the Mahabodhi and its +51 Gold being the crown jewel. Eventually, I built Wall Street in London (when I captured London, it came with a bank too).

Spoiler 1555 AD :

Mansa is next. I took a 5 of his Eastern cities (razing one of them), but did not make it Timbuktu before deciding to cap him. He really had terrible land this game.

Spoiler And the rest :

Went after Qin next, but dawdled a bit, building infrastructure. You can see in my last save Philly is building a University (wanted to build Oxford). My science was really starting to slow, and I was losing my tech lead. Plus I wanted to get to Tanks for a fun easy finish. Anyway, that was probably the wrong thing to do, and I should have focused on finishing off my opponents. I had some trouble taking Beijing and did not really turn the tide until I got Assembly Line, built some Infantry, and they made their way across the map to Beijing. It took me until around 1800 to take Beijing.




In the meantime, Bismark and Toku had a war, and Bismark vassaled Toku. Bismark also caught me in tech momentarily (he got infs). In any case, once I took Beijing, I took a few more cities from Qin and capped him. I healed up and moved my troops back to the border with Germany. I got to Industrialism giving me Tanks + Navy Seals. Yes I did build a few and employ them in combat!

Took two cities from Bismark (not even Berlin), and he capitulated. Took two from Toku, and he capitulated. Tripped both conquest and domination threshold. Game over! Final Score = 113525 (4th highest for me).

 

[ArchGhost]

Nice writeup, ArchGhost and impressive win.

Spoiler :

Biggest thing I learned from reading through your post is not to be afraid about DOW with low power rating when you have Cuirs versus medieval. You had 0.52 versus Bismark and still rolled him.

Thanks for the kind words, southquote.

Spoiler :

Looking through yours and the other guys' plays i can say I definitely still have issues with being paranoid over what the AI is doing (something I think elitetroops pointed out) which leads me to doing stuff like teching Mysticism or grabbing spots I can just take by force later. Bleh. Also a bit reliant on GP mechanic, I kind of crutch on GS to do anything. Trying to break that by watching Lain's stuff.

The power comparison can be a little deceitful sometimes. I'm much more powerful than the scoreboard may think because I'm fully pumping units at that point, and those units dominate Bismarck's in 1:1. In a few turns I will crush him though straight productive capability so even if the initial attack fails, the pipeline will pump more than he can. However, the earlier I can cap or at least cripple him while stealing some cities, the better. The AI gets a lot of power from its total unit count and it likes to keep 2-4 defenders per city, so even without a stack it can appear strong.

Which leads to another thing: I scouted Bismarck thoroughly (every city at least once, most twice) because he bordered me and I didn't want any surprises. He had no stack of note, so DoWing with relatively few units was fine as long it was enough to take lightly defended cities quickly and then just sit there for backup. The AI tend to scramble and then just assemble defense in cities under threat, so it's super easy to abuse the mobility of Cuirs to hit a different spot or run a secondary stack elsewhere while you hold his attention

 

[Gumbolt]

Thoughts

Spoiler Thoughts :

I never understand how people reach steam power and rifles. By time i get cuirs on most maps the game is over. Especially if you kill off the fastest teching Ai first. That being said Mansa should be a quick AI to vassal. . I pretty much turned my science slider off after CS and feudalism on this game. Phants/HA and pults is still pretty strong before engineering.

I think I got 2 great people all game. Land is normally key and by time I had rolled over 1-2 AI game was pretty much over. 2-3 gold resources really make life so much easier.

Power ratings are a joke. Not only do the Ai spam 3-4 units a city. They pretty much spam all buildings. Walls, barracks and forges all add to power ratings. So does each 2 pop for a city. So whilst I am busy whipping cities constantly from size 6-3 or 4-2 the Ai is building size 14-16 cities.

Not sure I really faced any Ai stacks over 6-7 units this game. Germany/China never had metal. Zara died early. If I did destroy stacks maybe they were defending cities.

Nor did I really use any fail gold from wonders.

I think the char trait here really helps war wise. Happiness too.

 

[hankinsohl]

Thoughts

Spoiler Thoughts :

I never understand how people reach steam power and rifles. By time i get cuirs on most maps the game is over. Especially if you kill off the fastest teching Ai first. That being said Mansa should be a quick AI to vassal. . I pretty much turned my science slider off after CS and feudalism on this game. Phants/HA and pults is still pretty strong before engineering.

I think I got 2 great people all game. Land is normally key and by time I had rolled over 1-2 AI game was pretty much over. 2-3 gold resources really make life so much easier.

Power ratings are a joke. Not only do the Ai spam 3-4 units a city. They pretty much spam all buildings. Walls, barracks and forges all add to power ratings. So does each 2 pop for a city. So whilst I am busy whipping cities constantly from size 6-3 or 4-2 the Ai is building size 14-16 cities.

Not sure I really faced any Ai stacks over 6-7 units this game. Germany/China never had metal. Zara died early. If I did destroy stacks maybe they were defending cities.

Nor did I really use any fail gold from wonders.

I think the char trait here really helps war wise. Happiness too.

Reply

Spoiler :

Somewhere in these forums is a strategy thread/article detailing a recipe for success in any non-Diety game.

The article advised that you expand to 6 cities or so, then get C/S and Currency, and then beeline Cuiriassers. If you take this approach, your initial attack will occur very late and you'll perforce be in position to research Rifles/Steam Power and other advanced techs.

Recently, I've been inspired by other posters to try something else.

In particular, worker stealing coupled with as-early-as-possible attacks seems much better than the Cuiriasser strategy. Worker stealing/early attacks means that you won't waste time researching techs that you don't need and won't waste hammers building structures that aren't necessary.

 

[Fish Man]

Reply

Spoiler :

Somewhere in these forums is a strategy thread/article detailing a recipe for success in any non-Diety game.

The article advised that you expand to 6 cities or so, then get C/S and Currency, and then beeline Cuiriassers. If you take this approach, your initial attack will occur very late and you'll perforce be in position to research Rifles/Steam Power and other advanced techs.

Recently, I've been inspired by other posters to try something else.

In particular, worker stealing coupled with as-early-as-possible attacks seems much better than the Cuiriasser strategy. Worker stealing/early attacks means that you won't waste time researching techs that you don't need and won't waste hammers building structures that aren't necessary.

This is why you bulb. You would ideally get 3 bulbs from 3 GS and use for philo, edu, and lib (maybe even gunpowder if you get a 4th). That’s 6000 beakers, and enough to get 12 cuirs up by no later than 800ad.

 

[hankinsohl]

This is why you bulb. You would ideally get 3 bulbs from 3 GS and use for philo, edu, and lib (maybe even gunpowder if you get a 4th). That’s 6000 beakers, and enough to get 12 cuirs up by no later than 800ad.

That's the point - by 800ad the game has already been won using worker stealing and early war.