Nobles' Club 239: Montezuma of the Aztecs

[Willem V]

Welcome! 1210 AD sounds like a fast win, how many turns does that translates into?

I want to jump in NC's games as well but it's hard during the week to sit down and put a few hours into Civ4
At least the weekend is coming

Thank you migalhone! Been lurking for years and years though, so it feels like I have already been here for ages

1210 AD is turn 181 if I calculated that correctly (do not have access to my save currently). It is my earliest finish, reason why I wanted to boast about it here on the forum. Of course, it isn’t deity so there is still a lot of room for improvement.

My two cents on the Sacrificial altar: if you lack happiness resources, the reduced whip timer can make a difference. Typically though, by the time you are going to go in a whipping frenzy, you generally have several ways to gain happiness available already, so it’s advantage is usually mitigated a bit.

In this game, with a relatively early cuir rush (and no real economy to speak of outside the capital) some whipped sacrificial altars in new city conquests helped me limp to communism, although by the time it came in the game was almost won. It did stop me from going bankrupt though.

All in all, I am a fan of the SA and Monty in general.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

The best part about playing the Aztecs is... you don't face the Aztecs. Weak leader, weak starting techs, plus

Spoiler :

Nasty barbarians, lots of forests. Wait, tons of forests and tons of food, must be great right? Not when you have weak starting techs. So, pottery and bronze working before BC1000, that's the goal...

Deity, no huts no events, normal speed, BC4000 to BC1440

Spoiler :

Tech path: agriculture, mining, bronze working, masonry, The Wheel, almost finished pottery, next item will be writing.

Also: if pottery is so important, why detour to masonry? "production trap". I need the unwanted production to go somewhere. Whatever I build, workers cities settlers warriors, my maintenance increases. Yet before alphabet I cannot produce research. If I expand before pottery, my research will tank to zero quickly.

I chose bronze working and then there is no copper. The "normal" response once you see no copper will be archery or animal husbandry but I don't have the commerce! Plus Chariots perform badly with so much forests.

I just have to learn to fight with warriors.

I parked warriors next to barbarian cities. Once the AI attacks and fails to take it, I can take it for pillage gold. With this gold, I can research pottery. With cottages, I can research writing. With writing, I can build libraries...

This is going to be a stressful game.

 

[sampsa]

Doesn't the 5 turn anger essentially mean you can whip twice as often in a high food city though? It also lets you whip cities that are closer or at the happy cap more? I am curious to know your reasoning.

Basically, yes. However, often happiness isn't the limiting factor with whips, it's more that you don't have anything good to whip. Most buildings are bad, so we are left with units. Yes, at the stage of the first attack (cuirs?) it's nice to be able to whip non-stop without getting into -problems, but those problems are not a big issue in my experience because there are ways to gain more happiness (trades, conquering new resources, -slider). The smaller penalty on whipping is certainly nice, but won't change much in my experience. Maybe with a very small empire (like 5-6 cities before breakout) SA might make an impact.

edit: it's also possible that I just never ran into a position where I could really see the difference. We tend to rely (too) heavily on past experiences.

 

[Willem V]

The best part about playing the Aztecs is... you don't face the Aztecs. Weak leader, weak starting techs, plus

Spoiler :

Nasty barbarians, lots of forests. Wait, tons of forests and tons of food, must be great right? Not when you have weak starting techs. So, pottery and bronze working before BC1000, that's the goal...

Deity, no huts no events, normal speed, BC4000 to BC1440

Spoiler :

Tech path: agriculture, mining, bronze working, masonry, The Wheel, almost finished pottery, next item will be writing.

Also: if pottery is so important, why detour to masonry? "production trap". I need the unwanted production to go somewhere. Whatever I build, workers cities settlers warriors, my maintenance increases. Yet before alphabet I cannot produce research. If I expand before pottery, my research will tank to zero quickly.

I chose bronze working and then there is no copper. The "normal" response once you see no copper will be archery or animal husbandry but I don't have the commerce! Plus Chariots perform badly with so much forests.

I just have to learn to fight with warriors.

I parked warriors next to barbarian cities. Once the AI attacks and fails to take it, I can take it for pillage gold. With this gold, I can research pottery. With cottages, I can research writing. With writing, I can build libraries...
View attachment 558581
This is going to be a stressful game.

Spoiler :

did you consider going pottery before bronze working? Don’t know if that is proper play (especially on deity) but I did, figuring I had enough food/production and commerce would be the one lacking. Mind you, I also settled 2S from starting position. Reason why I also researched AH early (with cows plus pigs in fat cross of capital).

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Spoiler :

did you consider going pottery before bronze working? Don’t know if that is proper play (especially on deity) but I did, figuring I had enough food/production and commerce would be the one lacking. Mind you, I also settled 2S from starting position. Reason why I also researched AH early (with cows plus pigs in fat cross of capital).

I win all standard immortal-level games but only a fraction of deity ones**. I am not qualified to provide advice. I am seeking advice.

Spoiler :

As I understand, depends on map and desired victory condition. Pottery before bronze working is less common but happens. In my case I had no choice. The starting position is all covered in forests. If settle-in-place, bronze working is needed to clear the forests before I can build the cottages. If I can start over I would also move 2S but no takeback-sies.

Everything costs "slightly" more on deity and the numerical difference is small. However the interaction effects are massive. On immortal, you settle a few new cities just as a key economic tech is completed. On deity, you just fall short, your research grinds to a halt, and the centimetres on the green bar becomes kilometres. That's why I had to forgo animal husbandry and other posters here talked about mining the pigs. Mostly a choice between agriculture and animal husbandry for food. Can't have both. Similarly, unit cost and city maintenance costs are very slightly more expensive. The "very slightly" turns your research slider from 30% to 20% which is actually a 33% drop. Or slightly more barbarians. You get the idea.

On the other hand, refusing to research archery is not recommended. The "proper" play would be mining, bronze working, archery.

**(and never with Incas - - I can never make them work.)

Speaking of starting techs: I have also begun to wonder if, even for Nobles Club practice games, leaders that start with hunting should be played with goody huts on. Removing huts reduces variance but systematically weakens all leaders that start with hunting. What does everyone think?

 

[AcaMetis]

Speaking of starting techs: I have also begun to wonder if, even for Nobles Club practice games, leaders that start with hunting should be played with goody huts on. Removing huts reduces variance but systematically weakens all leaders that start with hunting. What does everyone think?

I wouldn't recommend it. Huts benefit the AIs moreso than the player on higher (Emperor+) difficulties, since they'll start with Hunting/(more) Scouts themselves and gobble up more huts than the player can, and huts are so incredibly swingy that I wouldn't call them a balanced gameplay mechanic in any circumstance. Hunting is a weak starting tech, especially in situations where you don't need to/can't afford to go Archery, but huts are just not a balanced enough mechanic to improve that situation without making it far worse at the same time.

 

[dankok8]

Immortal/Normal/NHNE which I forgot to mention in the last spoiler.

Played to turn 50 (2000 BC).

Spoiler :

Nice land with plenty of food around and neighbours seem far as I haven't encountered anyone's borders while exploring a bit more than 10 tiles from the capital. But hey I'm not complaining!

After Pottery, the plan is Masonry, hook up Stone (will finish roads while it's researched) then chop the Mids in Tenochtitlan. It's got lots of forest. Teotihuacan whipped a Monument and Workboat to help develop. The forest 1E of it grew a few turns ago! Lucky! It's going to chop a Worker once it grows to size 2. I really can't have enough of those. Where to send the next Settler? Maybe 1E of Gems which grabs Cows in the first ring as well. Fogbusters are aligning quickly as we speak because I think barbs could pose a lot of trouble here.

Here is my empire if you can even call it that yet.

Spoiler Question #1 :

Was I wrong to delay AH for this long? The Pigs seemed like a good tile to Mine and I farmed the Cows. Monty's starting techs really suck!

​

Spoiler Question #2 :

For the most efficient roading, I think I have to road the grassland hill 1 SE of Tlateloco, the Stone tile itself, and the tile where Bull's Scout is standing. Teotihuacan's borders will pop in 3 turns so the entire west river will be in my cultural borders. Is that correct?

 

[dankok8]

Basically, yes. However, often happiness isn't the limiting factor with whips, it's more that you don't have anything good to whip. Most buildings are bad, so we are left with units. Yes, at the stage of the first attack (cuirs?) it's nice to be able to whip non-stop without getting into -problems, but those problems are not a big issue in my experience because there are ways to gain more happiness (trades, conquering new resources, -slider). The smaller penalty on whipping is certainly nice, but won't change much in my experience. Maybe with a very small empire (like 5-6 cities before breakout) SA might make an impact.

edit: it's also possible that I just never ran into a position where I could really see the difference. We tend to rely (too) heavily on past experiences.

Well units is what I was thinking about. I think the lower cooldown should allow Monty to whip lots of units in the classical era too like Catapults very quickly. And like you said with 5-6 cities i.e. small empire... like in my Izzy game with a 6-city empire if I had Altars in every city my economy wouldn't have crashed so badly after whipping my cities which probably would have led to an earlier victory.

 

[Imploding]

Deity NH

Writeup

Spoiler T0- T50 :

Moved settler 2N, and got rewarded with a river Cow. That means we have 3 - 7 yield tiles in cap! Also see 3 good spots that can share food with cap in the early game.
Almost thinking about double worker here..
But.. barbs will be a issue.. so im improving the river corn first.. to get some production (and still work the commerce)
BTW! The early comments about commerce crappy startingtech.. working 3 commerce (from rivertiles) while producing settlers/workers etc.. is actually a 30-40 %increase from a "normal" game.. In
I also think Agg-> AH is a really good opening (duh) considering the start. If i had mining.. I would have gone for BW and 2nd worker! With no mining i will just slow build warriors and fogbust while "slowly" improving my land.
Think a faster 2nd city is more important than 2 worker.

Next big decision.. Go for Archery after AH?
With Agg.. and "ok" hammers.. i can probably defend with warriors.. I also see a couple AI archers in my land..
I also saw a Napoleon scout take out a archer which is rater amazing.. wonder what kind of odds the AI gets.

Ill skip Archery!
Fishing->Mining->BW->TW-> Masonry->pottary (I Think..) Lets be greedy!

Some barb issues @ turn 40.. had to sacrifice my scout to buy time and I got a "lucky" roll with 30 % odds with hillforestwarrior vs a barb archers. Overall I think I'm fine. As long as i Don't get anything pillaged..
Turn 50.. minor barb issues.. got one tile pillaged.. barb cities is popping up everywhere. I have my 3rd city ready.. just want to get out another worker before i start to share tiles.
1... maybe 2 settlers then we will start to plan our next move..

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Basically, yes. However, often happiness isn't the limiting factor with whips, it's more that you don't have anything good to whip. Most buildings are bad, so we are left with units. Yes, at the stage of the first attack (cuirs?) it's nice to be able to whip non-stop without getting into -problems, but those problems are not a big issue in my experience because there are ways to gain more happiness (trades, conquering new resources, -slider). The smaller penalty on whipping is certainly nice, but won't change much in my experience. Maybe with a very small empire (like 5-6 cities before breakout) SA might make an impact.

edit: it's also possible that I just never ran into a position where I could really see the difference. We tend to rely (too) heavily on past experiences.

But that's exactly the kind of situation we always fall into!

Spoiler :

I looked at my past games, including the archived ones from over a decade ago. I realised I never played the Aztecs before and

I am not sure if this stack can take out anyone but, only the sacrificial altar can generate this kind of stack with a tiny little kingdom. The sweet spot is around 5-7 population, whip units every five (5) turns nonstop for a thousand years. Once I capture new cities, I whip out the sacrificial altar, whip the units, and keep pressing the offense.

 

[Imploding]

Deity NH

Spoiler Turn 51-77 :

OK.. Suleiman is getting closer.. and "stole" my spot.. HAd the settler ready.. so if he dident settle the turn he did i could have claimed the corn.. It would have killed my economy tho.. So he is maybe better as a target for my elipult?
1 more city.. minds probably only for failgold) then elipult

@turn 77.. I have met everyone.. got 5 good cities.. pyramids just got built. Getting something like 100-150 gold next turn.. and I have a "thinker" about my next move.. probably some warfare.. probably vs Suleiman. I also have a couple of bar cities my army can practise against untill I'm ready for War

Spoiler Update :

WW1 broke out.. I backstabed Sitting Bull.. grabed a couple cities.. then backstabed Sulei (he was always my real target. He also was in a joint war Vs Williem with sury.. so was afraid he could run away.).. grabbed a couple cities.
Ended up in a stalemate.. I just had a bit to few units.. and was a bit slow.. ended up giving me a game that was not to fun to fun to continue..

Might have a 2nd attempt here.. and go full Elipult! with map knowledge!

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

To the other people playing this map:

Spoiler :

I really really should have moved my capital like you all did. Life would have been so so much easier.

Deity, no huts, no events, normal speed, BC-1440 to AD-0800

Not much going on during the Classical Era. Aesthetics, accidental first to philosophy, tech brokering, stagnation until the fifth century when

Spoiler :

Everyone was busy fighting. I was not going to be attacked by anyone in the next few centuries.

The Native Americans declared war on the French some turns ago but neglected feudalism. Not a typo: the French were not the aggressors.

I took the opportunity to steal a few cities. The Native Americans even took a city from the French and then declared peace. That also signaled my war was over.

I am so behind I can’t even see what they can research. The last piece of information I have is that the Ottomans finished military tradition a few turns ago and, theoretically, can start producing cuirassiers. Thank goodness Suleiman does not plot at pleased or I am Dead Meat. Elephants do not match up well against cuirassiers.

What do I do now?

 

[Snowbird]

My 2 eurocents on Monty's unique building....

It does sound good in theory... but in practice...
Post lib wars, I am not interested in it cause roll and get to communism is better. I'd rather put hammers in units than happiness buildings (even if they are passable).
Something like swords and catapults on epic speed... that sounds promising... except no way I will have CoL so SA happens after war at which point it is cute that I can 3 pop whip, but that is it.

Overall I think it is interesting UB, but a bit oddly placed in tech tree for it's effect.

 

[dankok8]

Played to turn 88 (675 BC). Not doing too badly I think but annoyed as hell.

Spoiler :

Completed Pyramids on turn 75 which is a bit late but passable I guess. 5 cities and planning for minimum 6 preferably 9. Plan is to win a cultural victory which I haven't achieved since I was a Monarch player. With Spiritual and cheap temples plus lots of religions on the continent it seems very doable. I converted to Judaism because it's the most popular faith right now and the only one that's spread to me. Just finished Aesthetics and going for Drama and Music next followed by a beeline to Liberalism. The reason I'm annoyed is barbs were so damn unreasonable. The surrounding land is too big to fogbust effectively (would need 6+ Warriors which will cost maintenance) and the bloody barb units mostly Archers would completely ignore my fogbusters and beeline straight for my land. They refused to attack units standing next to them on defensive terrain once in my cultural borders too and just went to improvements and pillaged them. Because I was whipping my cities and they weren't working so many tiles it didn't do so so much damage but still it stalled my development because I had to repair the damage. Research is solid and with a compact empire and running Rep I should be ok. About to start popping some GS and they should be coming quickly. Probably gonna save the Music GA for a culture bomb.

My main worry are of course getting declared on by someone. Spiritual does give me some diplomatic flexibility to switch to whatever people like. Willem is willing to trade AH, Sailing, and Archery for Aesthetics. A few of my cities are building Walls and I'll build a few Archers once my maintenance limit is raised so I can stop what is a probable attack. About to gift a city to Sitting Bull who is the pariah of the world so I can get him to Pleased because he's near me and a notorious unit spammer. Ragnar is plotting and wouldn't trade any techs with me so I could be his target. A few Archers behind a Wall should stop him especially since his units need to march far to get over to me.

Anyways here is my empire:

EDIT: After reading some other games here that went to turn 50...

Spoiler :

I feel a bit better about struggling with barbs. Should have teched Archery early!

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

@dankok8 Some questions (comments?)

Spoiler :

Not sure if I missed something but I would switch to Judaism. Suleiman owns the holy city so that makes "+4" and he does not plot at pleased. Sitting Bull only has "-1" modifier for different religion. He also always demands tribute, which you give, and that easily pushes him to "pleased" also; if not then give him a lopsided trade. Sitting Bull does not plot at "pleased" either. So both neighbours will not attack you. Thus, no need to build walls.

Instead, I would build a workboat to explore.

Deity, no huts no events normal speed, AD0800 to AD1140

Spoiler :

Defeat. My classical-era units got wiped out by highly-promoted renaissance-era armies. The French were also nibbling on me with combat III musketeers.

The bad starting techs were too much to overcome. The Sacrificial Alter is absolutely amazing but it wasn't enough.

 

[dankok8]

@sylvanllewelyn

Spoiler :

I did switch to Judaism.

Bull gave me -2 for religion maybe because he owns the holy city for Hinduism. I'm a little worried not just about neighbours but some psycho like Ragnar sending a stack hallway across the map which I've seen him do before. I know I can whip in case of emergency but I need some insurance. Walls are very quick to build with Stone anyways. Besides I don't have Currency or Alpha yet so I don't want to build more units which cost maintenance right now.

Ragnar is actually plotting for several turns now but I doubt he sends more than 3-4 units which a few Archers behind a Wall can stop easily. But subsequent invasions from just about anyone can be scary and I don't think I can get everyone to Pleased.

 

[migalhone]

Finally got to put my hands on this one! So i went ahead, picked Noble dificulty no huts no events, settled in place and played until turn 100.

Spoiler :

A inland sea map, that's a first one. Are Barbs more abundant in this map than a Pangea, or is it just me?

Man this map pushes me towards REX...which i did tried. I have the habit of sending a settler to a location already guarded by a unit, and didn't do that.

Lost 1 worker and 2 cities to barbs, managed to regain one (the SW fish) but the other one got razed (the one near gems). Will re-settle it though.

Researched Code of Laws at turn 70-80 but instead of using Great Artists for border pops, i've instead built monuments. DUH

Also whipped 1-pop buildings and units, which isn't great, but Jaguars are a nice defense against barbs, and the Sacrificial Altar may come in handy considering the amount of stuff i will have to whip later on, and the map is provoking me to settle more cities so an extra help with maintenance cost may be nice.

I'm also trying to get the Mids, the flexibility of using any Great Person and still get Science via Representation seems awesome. Even if i don't get it the amount of gold i get will be nice to run 100% Science slider.

Napoleon is going to be a douche all game, isn't he? Also Suleiman?

Anyone in the mood of picking the save and pointing out where i can improve?

Thanks in advance!

 

[AcaMetis]

@migalhone

Spoiler :

A inland sea map, that's a first one. Are Barbs more abundant in this map than a Pangea, or is it just me?

They are, yes. Inland Sea barbs are definitely something you need to be prepared for, especially on higher difficulties. See Lain's Darius game if you want an example of how utterly insane they can be on Deity.

 

[migalhone]

@migalhone

Spoiler :

They are, yes. Inland Sea barbs are definitely something you need to be prepared for, especially on higher difficulties. See Lain's Darius game if you want an example of how utterly insane they can be on Deity.

Spoiler :

Hum, thought so. That explains the lost worker and cities.
Traded for Archery and self-teched Iron Working, to reveal Iron + getting Jaguars + mine jungle gems.
So all under control now, i hope. I'll hold on Deity for a while i think

 

[AcaMetis]

Spoiler :

If you want a nice example of how insane barbs get on Deity Inland Sea, Lain shows off(/suffers) a good example during his Darius (Cyrus?) game. It's pure insanity .