Nobles' Club 280: Brennus of the Celts

[Mr_Trotsky]

Spoiler :

I played the golden age from the Taj last night. I decided not to wait on it just in case Mansa had nationalism - he had to have philosophy given I'd not met the founder of Taoism - and because I need to start whipping and drafting soon. In retrospect I should have waited a few turns because I’d switched civics four turns ago so couldn’t go into caste until turn two of the golden age. It also turned out that meeting Mansa was two turns away and I could have gotten guilds and then banking from him for some oldish tech, allowing me to go into mercantilism in the golden age too. By the time I had these I’d already switched civics. Consequently just the one GM and an agonising miss on the second. Still I got a fourth from economics which is surely enough. They’re sitting in or travelling to Aix-la-Chapelle waiting for Bibracte to grow now it’s got a grocer. Might be able to get a bit more than the 1700 each currently on offer.

Replaceable parts next turn. Then I think I’ll go gunpowder and chemistry so I can build privateers. This is partly because of the comedy of hovering one tile from the coast and sinking galleys and triremes - most AIs don’t even have optics - and partly to hurry along my first great general for a super medic. Let’s be honest it’s mainly the former. Then it’s time for vassalage and theocracy to whip 7/8exp trebs for upgrade while I tech steel and then rifling. I’ll flip to nationhood then for some drafting. I’ll probably whip some other « bodies » first as I won’t need too many rifles for Pacal. Just enough to protect the stack(s) from knights.

I’ve found a mediocre globe spot. It’s only got a grassland cow and several grassland farms but I got drama too late to build it somewhere with more food but fewer hammers.

I got control of the AP. Gave Charlie a junk city to get him to friendly and bribed Pacal into bureau with my map and 30g, which dropped Charlie to pleased with him. Then, because there weren’t any possible resolutions, it just went straight to another election. Nice.

The only downside was that I’d forgotten that an oasis can irrigate a whole continent and my junk city blocks my route for chain irrigation out east. I guess I’ll be able to resolve that in time.

Also got fail gold from notre dame, which Pacal kindly built me, and I’m considering giving him stone so he can build the spiral minaret. Not sure he’ll live long enough to finish it though.

 

[Ianrudy]

Knocking off the rust in my Civ4 game lately so checking in for the wonderful NC save.. first 50 turns on Monarch no huts.

Spoiler :

Moved Scout SE to see if worth moving.. nothing special so SIP. Definitely can see some issues with research and if my calculations where accurate worker would be wasting turns going for AH initially and not really needed until later (farm cow, mine pigs).

So instead went Agri->Fishing->Mining->BW->Wheel->Pottery->Writing and made a beeline for the gold site.

Really tempted to go for the GLH on this map.. but city 2 location that seems to work out based on the land is land locked so meh.

 

[Mr_Trotsky]

1715 AD domination - super fun game. Thanks for a great map.

Spoiler :

After the golden age, I whipped about twenty 7/8 xp trebs and a rag tag bag of muskets, crossbows, maces. Then went nationhood and started drafting. Once I had about four rifles down on Pacal's border along with the above, I upgraded the trebs to cannons using two of my four GMs. The spike in power caused by the upgrade and another round of drafting caused him to offer a peace vassal. I'm sure the optimal play was to take it and attack Charlie ten or so turns earlier but my army was there, he'd built the Buddhist shrine, Notre Dame and the Spiral Minaret. The Spiral Minaret would allow me to complete the holy trinity of SM, Sankore and AP for my temples and monasteries. I'm also quite an inflexible individual and I'd been planning this for about four thousand years. I politely declined and rolled over him in about ten turns. He was still pleased with me as I took his last city.

Meanwhile I'd been using the cash from the third GM to tech towards railway. I tend to do this quite a lot on rifle/cannon conquests for a number of reasons. First, I find that troop movement tends to be the thing that slows down one mover attacks more than lack of troops. I was pretty confident that I didn't need to whip/draft my empire into the ground to get an army capable of taking the map. To the extent I was reinforcing, I needed to be able to get them to the front. Secondly, I find the AI tends to like constitution and scientific method so I figured I could trade for those down the line. Trading for steam power and railways on immortal never seems to happen.

Despite this logic, I hadn't finished railway by the time I'd finished with Pacal. Consequently, marching my army up to Charlie took about as long as the war with Pacal. He got cuirassiers in the meantime which was mildly annoying because they can flank cannons even if they die hard against rifles. I declared on Charlie and on turn two of the war killed all but one of the units in Augsburg in the hope he'd reinforce and then I'd wipe his army out with all the CR3 cannons I had from the war with Pacal. Instead he attacked me, which had much the same result albeit the flanking damage possibly resulted in a turn of healing that could have been avoided. He got grenadiers shortly after but this made basically no difference. Especially because once I had railways I was able to whip two or three machine guns for stack defence.

I wiped him out too. Again, I'm sure the optimal play would have been to cap him but I find endless city revolts annoying and also wanted to reduce the number of naval invasions I'd need to do to get to the domination limit. The same turn he was wiped out I attacked Saladin. Again he'd just managed to get grenadiers and this didn't do much for him either. I left him with one city and took military tradition along with his capitulation. He had scientific method, communism and constitution which I could take later.

During the thirty or so turns of slow grinding war, I'd teched combustion and was on the cusp of winning the physics race and using that GS to bulb biology. I'd spent the war with Saladin near enough one turning transports from my heroic epic city with +3 movement from circumnavigation, drydocks, charismatic and settled GGs. They'd been stacking in Pacal's former territory and now it was time for my army to use those railways to go catch the boat. I triggered a golden age with the last GM and a GS because, if not now, when? I got to artillery and some other techs I didn't need. It was all pretty ragged by the end. Most of my cities were just building wealth and there was little thought as to civics. Just moving units around the map by this stage.

All aboard for Mali. Mansa had also just managed to get grenadiers. They were even less use for him. Every city was on the coast so he lasted about eight turns. He'd been willing to cap after a couple of cities but, as I was already in the vicinity, I thought I'd finish the job. Then it was off to Korea. WK was willing to cap after one city and that was that.

Nobody had rifling, and my vassals only had steel because I gave it to them on the last turn, and I was two turns from tanks. It would be fair to say that I enjoyed that. I think Brennus has my favourite trait combo. Shame about the Celtic starting techs

 

[krikav]

@Mr_Trotsky

Spoiler :

I really enjoy your writeups.

"I'm also quite an inflexible individual and I'd been planning this for about four thousand years. I politely declined and rolled over him in about ten turns. He was still pleased with me as I took his last city." lol!
"No, no I'll rather just exterminate you, thank you very much! Oh, how unfortunate, well, we part as friends anyway I supose? Yes, ofcourse!



". It was all pretty ragged by the end. Most of my cities were just building wealth and there was little thought as to civics. Just moving units around the map by this stage." <- High recognition factor on that. Happends alot toward the end.

 

[Mr_Trotsky]

@krikav

Spoiler :

Much obliged. I’ll try to play more of these games and post write ups. It might be a little while because I’ve finally escaped on holiday and, after eighteen months hunched over a laptop, I think it’s best to expose my pasty skin to the sun and try to unwind my developing hunchback. A shame because settling on plains hill riverside stone is almost better than a holiday

Regarding Pacal, I’d like to think he won’t let a misunderstanding like this ruin a promising friendship.

 

[dorhin]

Deity, NH/NE

Up to Turn 147

Spoiler :

I am at a point in the game where I am not sure on how to progress best, so I would be glad about any suggestions

Short summary of the game as far as I can remember:

Settled in place, tech path was Agri->AH->Mining->Fishing->Wheel->BW->Pottery->Sailing->Masonry->Writing->Math->Construction->HBR
I decided to go to for the great lighthouse relatively late, but I was lucky and built it in 875 BC. After that, I expanded to 7 cities and went for an elepult attack on Pacal, whom I wiped out 475AD.
After that, I sneaked a city from Charlemagne who was at war with Saladin at that time and made peace after that.
The idea was to go for optics after that, Mansa Musa made contact with me briefly before I reached it. Luckily, he traded me his map and I got the circumnavigation bonus

I have now made contact with all the AIs, not everyone knows each other and there is a lot of hate among them Saladin and Charlemagne hate each other and might attack each other again in the near future, also Wang and Inca are at war.
I am not the worst enemy of anybody, but three guys are annoyed (mainly due to religion and a stupid trade with the Inca that I did). Charlemagne can't declare at the moment because I tributed him compass:

My tech pace is rather bad at the moment, I am paying a lot of money for my cities. Mansa is of course the tech leader, the other AIs are approximately as advanced as I am.

My cities are nicely developed in my opinion, most of them have granaries, forges, barracks and a hindu temple ( I conquered the AP from Pacal). However, my pop is really low due to heavy whipping.
State of the empire:

And my capital:

Mansa built a lot of wonders, but I am quite happy to have the GLH, hindu shrine and AP:

I bulbed philo and optics so far. Bulbing philo was a mistake but I realized too late that philo is a higher priority than optics, so I had to use both Great Scientists to be able to bulb Optics. The next one will be used for Astro most likely (or would a Golden Age be better to generate more great people)?

Overall I am quite happy with the current situation, having 14 cities and not being too far behind in tech. However, I am not sure about the future plan:

Possible options would going for Astro, which would be a great boost for science and would allow me to attack maybe Mansa who is running away in tech, or trying to reach steel as fast as possible and (try to) take out the rest of my continent.
Another option would be to perhaps try for a diplo win, but I think people hate me too much for that to be possible.

 

[krikav]

@dorhin

Spoiler :

In your situation, I think I would prioritize growing cities. Haven't checked the saves but it looks like you have whipped alot, do you have a large army still or was most lost during the attacks on Pacal/Charly?

I wouldn't really worry about Mansa running away in tech, but I would keep a watchful eye on him going for culture.
Continuing to push against Charly looks like the most obvious path forward I think, but astro would be really nice to get too.
I think that tring to reach steel as fast as possible probably involves going through astro. The overseas traderoutes would be nice for you with GLH.


Depending on how large the current army is, perhaps just trying to get engineering from Capac and getting trebs/pikes out could be enough to continue to chip away at Charly?

 

[dorhin]

@krikav: thank you for feedback, I finally got around to finishing it

1730 AD Domination victory

Spoiler :

I teched engineering and pushed for Charlemagne, capitulating him in 1050 AD

As I had quite a few units left, I also tried to take out saladin but was only able to take 2 cities.

At that point I took peace and teched to cannons, at some point I traded steel for Military Science and was able to capitulate Saladin 1505 AD

I then continued straight for Mansa who had a lot of wonders but no real military units. He was even willing to capitulate before I took a city, but I decided to take his capital anyway because of the juicy wonders he had in it (mainly Kremlin)

The Inca were no real threat, besides being stubborn, not willing to capitulate fast and thus drawing the game out until when they finally gave up, Wang had Infantry and I was still playing with cannons/grenadiers However, I had enough numbers to take 2 of his cities which brought me almost to the domination limit, so I just built culture in all cities until it was enough

Final statistics:

I lost quite a few units, especially towards the end of the game. Fighting protective infantry in hill cities is kind of frustrating if you only have cannons