Nobles' Club 281: Sitting Bull of the Native Americans

[krikav]

@Ianrudy Ah, a long time lurker returning to the best game ever, very nice! So glad you have taken to the forums this time around too. We need all the lurkers on the board!

I don't know if there is anyone who has actually said that AH first is best here, there was as far as I saw it only some post-game discussion.

 

[sampsa]

so let's please leave the personal attacks out of it

Asking if you realize what you are doing is not meant as a personal attack.

Why are you ignoring the research cost in these per turn hammer calculations?

I am not ignoring research cost. is and is. I was pointing out the amount of missed , it's obviously a tradeoff and not a one-sided deal.

Would you not agree with the following priority?

1. Starting techs for food within BFC - we start with a tech that can improve 2.5/3
2. Barb defense - roll the dice for horses or go with the absolute certainty of Dog Soliders?
3. BW for Slavery/chop <- best early production period and even more valuable because of our start (3 food resources plus tons of trees.. and no I'm not saying clear cut before Math but you need all the accelerants you can get at higher difficulties because it's the difference between getting that good city spot and missing out on it)
4. Pottery for Granary
5. Writing for Library

I agree with 1. Number 2 is useless on monarch, relevant on deity. Even on deity depends on the land shape, sometimes warriors are enough. Agree with 3 and 4, BW and pottery are the most important early techs. Granary may or may not be good, depends on -situation, but cottages are nearly always very good. Library again situational, something else might be clearly better. Completely disagree on Stonehenge, close to useless even if it's a free UB in every city, especially on non-deity.

@sampsa I love how you have to argue AGAINST early BW and chopping.

Indeed. Here I think it's far from clear anyway due to cc. Depends a lot on the available 2nd city spot and so on. I do know what way I'd scout though.

 

[CarpoolKaraoke]

Spoiler Diety NH/NE T109: :

I had the same thought as @krikav for grabbing the gold from Genghis, but alas Beshbalik was founded towards me. I asked earlier about the land-based war declaration because I was thinking about squeezing in city #3 to claim that gold anyways.

Tech Path: Mining->BW->The Wheel->Pottery->Masonry-> Animal Husbandry. I thought about getting Masonry earlier for the Great Wall, but I prefer Pyramids + Settlers with a Philosophical leader surrounded by Imperialistic leaders. I felt squeezed even trying to get to 5 cities in the middle. When Genghis hooked the copper, I thought there was a possibility that I would have to fight, so I went HBR after writing. Instead, this dude sends a stack to go barbarian hunting:

Well if he's going barbarian hunting, I'm going to play the UNO reverse card on horseback against Genghis. He flipped from Hinduism to Buddhism anyways, which means a war will likely be inevitable in the future anyways.

James Watt is born in Poverty Point (hmm), which gives me Metal Casting (and Alphabet + Math + Gold), while I can trade HBR for Iron Working and such.

With Alphabet + Math online, I start Currency. Meanwhile, my HA stack grows. 12 turns later, most of Mongolia, including Karakorum falls. Funnily enough, he converts back to Hinduism. Genghis' barbarian party returns, but slams into cheap triple promo archers.

Overall tech situation is pretty good, and I still have plenty of HA left to clean up and find where the workers are hiding. I'll get a scientist in 15 turns, which will give me Philosophy while I use Aesthetics + Literature wonders for fail-gold, and go to Civil Service.

 

[Izuul]

I mean.. I still think one of the biggest reasons to tech AH here is how good HAs are on deity. I don't believe its wrong to start thinking about how you can win a game as early as T5 when you have to lock in your first tech, and HAs are very high on the list of ways to win on deity.

If my game wasn't deity I would likely be thinking differently, but you have to consider that its common for deity AI to get a 3rd city before the player gets their 2nd, and if you wait until turn 40 or 50 for AH when the AI has 4-5 cities, there's a decent chance you can just miss out on horses because you couldn't see them and let the AI settle them.

I'm not advocating teching AH with absolutely no other reason to do so, but I do think just having a 6 yield grass cow is enough justification to seriously consider it. I'm willing to pay a little price for valuable information.

 

[CarpoolKaraoke]

I mean.. I still think one of the biggest reasons to tech AH here is how good HAs are on deity. I don't believe its wrong to start thinking about how you can win a game as early as T5 when you have to lock in your first tech, and HAs are very high on the list of ways to win on deity.

If my game wasn't deity I would likely be thinking differently, but you have to consider that its common for deity AI to get a 3rd city before the player gets their 2nd, and if you wait until turn 40 or 50 for AH when the AI has 4-5 cities, there's a decent chance you can just miss out on horses because you couldn't see them and let the AI settle them.

I'm not advocating teching AH with absolutely no other reason to do so, but I do think just having a 6 yield grass cow is enough justification to seriously consider it. I'm willing to pay a little price for valuable information.

Spoiler :

Well with the early 1st worker and tech costs, I still wasted 1 worker turn (used it for positioning) before arriving at Bronze Working. With AH first and additional maintenance costs the only way I see to not be stuck without worker turns is to go The Wheel, Mining (for gold in 2nd city), and then consider opportunity costs for BW/Masonry or Pottery. I feel like this creates a crossroad between getting a nice stone-based wonder vs granaries/cottages.

 

[krikav]

Spoiler T50 :

I hope I'm not just fooling myself.
I have managed to smash his roads a few times too, and he should crash his economy completely by spamming chariots. He snuck a city toward the west behind those peaks, but other than that it looks like he is kind of trapped.
Now I just have to pray that the other guys keep their cool.
Economy is completely garbage now, and will be worse next turn when I settle city4. But the gold mines should allow me to catch up.
Need a pair of workers, but then I think I need to make a try for pyramids.

 

[lymond]

@Ianrudy Glad to see you come out of hiding. You definitely make some good points. These fellas are very strong players, so you should pick up some nice pointers here.

 

[konata_LS]

Was busy with real life and just got time to check the new posts here. Less than a day and already 3 pages! It seems this NC is very popular .

PRO is a crappy trait, but PHI is definitely strong. Plus, I really like SB's starting techs, as his two starting techs are food tech. A faster growth never hurts during the early game.

But... oh, 3 food resources, a river, 3 riverside stone for a PHI leader . I become a little scared and wonder if such a generous capital should be surrounded by neighbours like Shaka, Alex and Monty .

Spoiler From T0 to T98 :

Settings as below, no huts:


Settle on stone. AH-TW-Mining-BW. But I don't think it's the best tech path, since my early game is usually terrible . So please do not trust me with early game matters.

Chopped HAs rush Vicky, because no one liked her.


Another reason to attack Vicky was she settled her city only 5 tiles from my capital.


T98, Vicky disappeared. This is a good city - possibly a future GP farm, but the current economic situation didn't allow me to keep it: 0%, -4 per turn. I might resettle that spot later.


The economy was very close to strike . 0%, only +4 .


As I said above, my early game was terrible. On T98 my capital remained primitive: no Granary, no Library, no cottage, rice unimproved. Workers were still chopping a library . Without two gold mines nearby, my economy would certainly be on strike.


Once again, "how to avoid the strike" would become the main issue in the next turns.

 

[konata_LS]

I think BW gains some strength here the lower the level. Less maintenance so expanding faster is better. Techs cost less, so AH/pottery is not delayed as much. My intuition is to go for AH on deity, because of high natural .

Spoiler :

Agree with you on AH. I play on Monarch but still go AH first in this map.

About BW... Judging from the starting place, pottery would be one of the priority. But after a dozen of turns, you may think BW gains some strength on Deity, because you'll soon find yourself surrounded by 3 IMP neighbours (Deity IMP leaders expand very fast), so land grabbing becomes more important. OTOH, there are 2 gold mines nearby, if you manage to grab gold mine spots before Genghis or Vicky, that would make pottery less urgent.

 

[Whisker]

Deity, 1 AD, some advice needed.

Spoiler Chariot War :

Very inconsistent play from me, I kept changing my plans all the time.

Settled on stone, like everyone else. Met Brennus on t4 immediately followed by Gengis. I moved warrior in counter clockwise fashion and before first worker is out I have also met Augustus, Saladin and Vicky. Suleiman made contact around BC 2000, but I had no idea where he was located at that time.

Early tech path was wheel, hunting, AH, followed by pottery. I was thinking on doing early writing and alphabet and then trade everything else, but seeing that I somehow managed to settle two cities with gold, mining became priority and after that BW did not feel such a big detour anymore.

I was quickly boxed in by Saladin from West, Gengis from North and Vicky from South. West was impenetrable jungle, but I somehow managed to settle four cities including the Eastern gold that I snatched in front of Gengis. He had settler on the gold and would have settled next turn.

As soon as I met Gengis I started to think on ways to either appease him or destroy him. I gave him all my health resources as soon as we had trade connection and by t60 I had +2 ‘We appreciate years you have provided us resources’ bonus. But this is Gengis we’re talking about and of course he settled on my face time and again. Soon cultural pressure soured our relationship annoyed and I started to get really worried about his hordes of chariots circling around my cities.

As luck would have it, the copper spot I settled as my fourth and last city was his only source of metal, and so he was only having tons of chariots and some archers. I decided to abandon my plans for alphabet in favour of horse back riding. I had not even started on HBR, when opportunity presented itself. For about thousand years Gengis had had a stack of archers and lots of chariots in Turfan, then in BC 950 he suddenly moved all but one archer away. He had some chariots stationed around my copper city but otherwise no forces were visible. I quickly whipped a second spear on the copper city and declared with four chariots of my own.

I lost three of my four chariots but Turfan was mine. Using capture money, I upgraded warrior at copper city to another spear and used the other two for sniping some of his chariots. I kept threatening both of his northern cities Beshbalik and capital Karakorum with small stacks of spears and chariots. Then on BC 750 I combined the stacks and took Karakorum and Pyramids for myself. Couple of turns later Beshbalik fell also dividing Gengis’ empire in two. This was good place to sue for cease fire and to reorganize.

Getting this many cities before currency put my economy to severe strain and I was bleeding money even on 0 % science. I tried to trade HBR for alphabet with Saladin, but he was reaching HBR himself and even pouring my conquest gold to put couple of turns to alphabet did not help. Actually, what he would give me, shrink by the turn. Luckily, Vicky also reached alpha couple of turn later letting me in the tech trading game.

Even with tech trading I was still bleeding money and coffer would dry out fast. I needed pillage and conquest money and soon. So, in BC 575 I redeclared taking Nign-hsia earning me third city within reach of gold. BC 475 Sully was suddenly willing to trade me mathematics and monotheism in exchange for HBR, monarchy and sailing. I eagerly accepted as this allowed my great scientist to discover compass which in turn allowed me to trade for many more techs, even if it took some turns to materialize.

BC 450 New Sarai was captured. I South my scouting horse archer discovered one more city of Gengis Vandal a former barbarian city judging by the name. It was guarded by two archers but located on flatland. Using territory of English as cover, they did not have OB, my HA sniped another of the two defenders. Two turn later rest of my stack reached the city taking it. There was some nice cottaged land, but unfortunately the city was located very far away and sandwiched between Roman and English territories. I gifted the city to Augustus for +4 trade bonus and hopes of creating border tension between my rivals.

BC 200 I was able to trade compass and some other tech for currency, bringing by economy to +4 gold on 0 % research. Of course I could now also sell resources and tech for extra income which came very handy.

Brennus had become quite annoyed with me for repeatedly declaring on his fried and I was getting little worried about his stack stationed close to my border city. To buy time I gifted him some tech to get him back to neutral. This was very good move as just couple of turns later on BC 125 Sully declared on me. He had been plotting for at least thousand years, but I was not worried as I had him pleased and he was located no way near me.

Sully had marched all the way across Saladin’s land to attack. I panicked and quickly gave all my tech to Brennus to bribe him as my ally. This might not have been necessary as Sully’s stack composition was not exactly ideal for attacking Native Americans. Then again Brennus is such a mercenary that if I had not bribed him Sully might have.

Really Sully, you bring melee units only against Native Americans?

It’s now 1 AD. With Sully’s two initial stacks dealt with, Military wise I feel quite safe. I feel my situation is quite decent. I’m pleased with Saladin, Augustus and Victoria and my greatest threat Brennus is my war ally against Suleiman. I don’t know how long Augustus will stay pleased with me, so that is bit worrying, but he declared on Brennus so will be busy for some time.

Gengis will be removed from game as soon as I can move the troops back North to crush his last city.

I will most likely make peace with Sully as soon as he agrees as he is too far away to attack effectively. After peace I could see if war goes bad for Brennus and maybe backstab him? This would also gain me some points with Augustus for shared war.

My coffers are no longer bleeding and representative scientist are actually providing me with some research, but economically I’m still far from stable. I have one GS ready so once I have CoL and meditation, I could perhaps go for philosophy if it’s not too widely discovered by then.

Otherwise, I have no idea what to do now.

Any advice for long term goals and tech path to take would be greatly appreciated.

Relations

Tech situation.

Mistakes made (beside messy no plan game overall):

Capturing Pyramids on 750 BC, but only changing to representation 425 BC.

Feeding my chariot with visibility to barbarian sword (did not notice road).

Feeding warrior stationed on Sally’s land to Sully.

 

[civac]

This may be a consequence of the war. But you are working a bunch of unimproved tiles. Bare river tiles and forests those should be river hamlets.

 

[CarpoolKaraoke]

Spoiler Cont'd Diety T138: :

War, war everywhere. Apparently my conquest of Mongolia was enough to trigger plotting by Victoria (at pleased!), so I begged for Priesthood and bought myself 10 turns to finish off key cities from Genghis. I used the first general to make a super medic chariot and the second general to make most HA triple or quadra promoted. I grab Aesthetics, Literature, and Music for the great artist, finish off COL.

It doesn't look like Victoria really wants to fight either (why do you do this?). I hit the incoming streams with my superior Horse Archers, and wait for a peace condition.

She's willing to settle for 75 gold, which I grudgingly take because she has had Machinery for awhile and likely will have Engineering soon. Tech-wise, my plan to trade bulbed Philosophy for Civil Service fails, because at 250 AD, only Saladin has it, while half the AI don't have COL. Brennus declares war on Saladin yet again, Augustus isn't plotting, so I feel like I'm in the clear to bulb to liberalism.

Nope. Suleiman must've taken Victoria's war as a signal to start plotting, so he sends his army from far far away to ruin my day. I make an emergency trade for Feudalism, get 3 triple promo longbows inside, and watch him slam. The city holds with the help of remaining HA, but this is is really cutting in my tech. My 3rd general goes into the Heroic Epic city. With how much I've slaved, I can only afford to get 2 scientists for Education and 1 Merchant for upgrading HA during the golden age, while probably having need to self-tech Liberalism and Nationalism in addition to Civil Service. At least Suleiman is willing to pay up a little for my troubles.

I'm leaning towards Cuirassiers/Cavalry over Cannons, given the amount of stables I have. Overall world science rate is slow, and the body counts are high.

In hindsight, starting the war against Genghis was probably still worth it, but maybe I should've bee-lined to Civil Service instead of going Aesthetics --> Literature --> Music. I never did find a city with enough food and production to make either the National Epic or the Parthenon in time.

 

[CarpoolKaraoke]

@Whisker

Spoiler :

Capturing the Pyramids was nice, so was the Compass bulb.

I can't load your save (I don't have the mod), but from the screenshots it looks like your Saladin already has Civil Service, which spells trouble, while no one has Feudalism, which is nice. Getting him to capitulate if you still have an army would be quite the coup. Watch out for Victoria plotting though.

Since you didn't go the Aesthetics route, maybe going for Steel would be the better bet?

 

[CarpoolKaraoke]

Spoiler Cont'd Diety T177 :

Around the time I start Liberalism, Saladin techs Nationalism and starts the Taj Mahal. I self-tech Gunpowder and take Military Tradition with the free tech after he finishes the Taj.

Unfortunately, I forgot I didn't have iron. So I agree to an exorbitant trade with Augustus to cash upgrade HA and fill in a round of whips.

I smash the fur camp to cancel the deal afterwards. This results in ~20 Cuirassiers, which is not great, but all I can afford. The options of unpopular leaders for conquering to get iron are either Caesar or Brennus, but Brennus barely holds the iron over Genghis, who has become Victoria's vassal. To help divert Caesar's army, I bribe Victoria with Military Tradition + Liberalism, which is ugly because she is teching to rifling. Suleiman immediately declares war on Victoria in response.

It's a Hindu vs Buddhist war. However, we have the apostolic palace (Saladin), which after a few turns, drags everyone else into the war. Brennus declares war on Suleiman for good measure.

With Caesar trying to defend everything south, my small super-medic backed stack treks it way to Rome and runs it over. I will acquire iron in two turns, which will make everything much smoother.

Victoria is tired of losing her old units to Caesar (despite producing Cavalry and Redcoats now!) and settles for peace to focus on Suleiman. AI logic here seems quite poor, since Suleiman is on the other side of the war and is already at war with Victoria, Brennus, Genghis, and Caesar. Victoria asks for help in the war against Suleiman, and I agree in a bid to get relations up to Friendly. A summary of current diplomatic relations:

Aside from runaway techer Victoria, no one else has gunpowder or military tradition at the end of the 12th century. This one is probably a win.

 

[soundjata]

Commenting @CarpoolKaraoke game:

Spoiler :

Genghis' barbarian party returns, but slams into cheap triple promo archers.

Keshiks are cool but:
1. They'll move 1 tile/turn anyways because they are stuck with melee units inside the stack (?)
2. Unlike regular horse archers, Keshiks are not immune to first strikes

@krikav

Spoiler :

Impressive developpement after 50 turns
Could you maybe make a quick summary of the whips and chops you have performed so far ?
After so many years I still can't understand how REX works

 

[krikav]

@soundjata

Spoiler :

Haven't checked, but I'm almost certain that I didn't even revolt to slavery yet, so the summary of whips is easy enough.

Looking at my screenshots I think I can see the following...

The starting worker farmed corn and cow, then chopped out a settler. Then he chopped out a second worker.
One of the workers went up and farmed the rice for second city while the other worker chopped out a buddy.

The two workers around capital then chopped out TGW.
Then they farmed the rice and mined the riverside grassland hill, grew to pop4 on pyramds and then a settler for city#3 followed right away by another worker.

After the worker in second city was done with rice he chopped out a settler.
I think I revolted either just before these two settlers where out, to whip them to completion, or perhaps I revolted once they both where out and where in transit.

I didn't have to build any warriors/dogs due to TGW, was so lovely to spot a barb spear outside of culture and just causally leave the city empty.

 

[Whisker]

Deity, T139, 580 AD, some more advice needed.

Spoiler Daggers, exposed backs and politics. :

Continuing form 1 AD position. Taking city micromanagement back from governors increased my commerce by ten or so gold. Really why do those guys select to work unimproved grassland or forests when there are cottaged tiles available? I can understand the forest as it provides some hammers, but unimproved grassland over improved one, why?

As I received no contrary advise I continued by my own intuition. I Bulbed philosophy 100 AD, made peace with Suleiman for some gold 125 AD and finished off Gengis 225 AD. I then started to concentrate troops on Celtic border waiting good opportunity to stab my former war ally in his back. Brennus obliged 325 AD, by positioning two workers right in front of me. In addition his neared city only had one spear and one archer for defense at this point, so declaring was easy decision. My catapults were still not in position, but I had enough HAs and some leftover chariots that taking the city was easy enough even when he whipped one sword there. I lost two chariots, one HA and one lucky HA retreated. Taking Tolosa removed some heavy cultural pressure from Turfan and Old Sarai allowing those two cities to actually do something useful.

I waited couple of turns for my troops to heal and for catapults to catch up with rest of my troops. Moving HAs with 1 movers and using the spare movement point to pillage cottages to feed my coffers. Gergovia fell after one turn on bombardment on 500 AD, but I lost a few catapults and one level 4 HA in unlucky fights.

So far I had seen no sight of my war allies Romans and Ottomans, but now both appeared with several stacks, heading right for the main price, old capital of Celts, Bibcracte. Apparently Brennus had decided to move his seat of power to a big island located North-West from his starting lands. I have never before seen AI move their capital peacefully before. I got worried that the city would fall before I would have chance to take it myself.

I send all my 2 movers including my two generals, a super medic spearman and badly wounded melee hunter mace, to follow my ally's stack hoping to have opportunity to snipe the city before they take it. There was one tense turn as Augustus had a stack of three catapults and some war elephants and praetorians bombarding the city and Suleiman had a stack of swords and crossbowmen waiting their turn. Either Brennus got lucky with his combat rolls or he managed to ship some more defender to the city before attack, but next turn Bibcracte still stood. It seems Augustus spend his turn bombarding and not attacking. Suleiman then suicided his troops on Celtic city walls. The city had exact same units defending as last turn, two of them wounded. I happily took my turn, defeating the Celts without single casualty.

Its now 580 AD and Brennus is willing to capitulate. This presents me with dilemma, as everyone hates the bastard. If I take him as my slave my diplomacy will suffer turning my relative secure peace to declaration waiting to happen. On the other hand I don't want my rivals capitulating him either.

So should I take Brennus or risk Augustus or Suleiman taking him?
Taking Brennus, if I turn to Judaism and persuade Brennus to turn too, I could form strong religious block with Vicky and Suleiman to oppose Romans and Arabians. Question is can I do this quick enough before Augustus turns on me?

Allowing Romans to capitulate him, could sour relations between Vicky and Augustus, so maybe there's opportunity there also?

Then there's the option to bribe Sully and Augie to leave poor Brennus alone by giving them some tech. I don't really like that option either, but it would preserve him as scapegoat for everyone to hate, leaving me in relative peace.

So what to do with Brennus, and who should be my next target?

 

[konata_LS]

From T99 to the end.

Spoiler :

Settings as below, no huts:


To prevent the strike, build research to reach Currency. Sent workers to cottage riverside tiles. Got some failgold from Mids. Open border with Suleiman and Saladin. After Currency, foreign TR combined with cottages and selling resources gradually improved the economic situation.

Impossible to refuse such a nice deal from Suleiman:


In terms of diplomacy, Saladin found Hindu and converted Suleiman and GK. Brennus found Buddhism. AC was initially Hindu but he founded Confu and converted to Confu later. I converted to Hinduism so that shared religion + giving tribute could keep GK at Pleased. Brennus and Saladin were WE of each other. AC and GK were also WE of each other.
As a result, the diplomacy screen was like this for a long time:


GK declared twice on AC, captured a city from AC but AC took it back several turns later, maybe because AC had Ivory to defend against GK's keshiks. Brennus and Saladin were busy killing each other for many years. In 1410AD, Brennus capitulated to Saladin:


Took MT with Lib. Generated a GMerchant and upgraded Elephants and HAs to Cuirs. Attack with Cuirs. On T203, GK capitulated, mainly because GK just made peace with AC and his main stack was already lost in AC's land. Besides, GK was the most backward AI and still remained in Medieval era:


AC capitulated on T210, also because he was largely weakened by the previous wars with GK.


Saladin and Brennus capitulated on T220:



And it was Suleiman's turn:


Next turn, Conquest:


Built 50+ Cuirs. Thanks to the Ivory from Suleiman, I could pre-build some War Elephants and upgrade them to Cuirs later.


This is the first time I played on Monarch with a non-FIN leader. To my surprise, SB was much better than I expected. Maybe because PHI is strong enough to compensate the crappy trait PRO? or two gold mines nearby and 3- city centre helped a lot during the early game? or because of SB's starting techs ensuring a faster early growth?... Interesting.

Thanks for this riverside PH stone map

 

[konata_LS]

@Whisker

Spoiler :

Your situation in 580AD looks not bad, in my opinion. But I play on Monarch, and some strategies which work well on lower difficulties might become ineffective or even suicidal on Deity - for example, on Noble we often can eliminate a neighbour with just warriors, but on Deity, non-Incan warrior rush is usually suicidal. So I'm not "qualified" enough to give you any useful advice.

Some Deity players would be able to help you, I think. Please note that if they decide to play this NC themselves, they won't check your game until their games reach at a further progress than yours. For example, a Deity player will open your spoiler of 580AD only when his/her game also reaches 580AD. And all people have to deal with their real life (work, family, friends, community events...). So you might have to wait some time before getting advice.

The video below might give you some inspiration. It's also Sitting Bull, Pangaea, on Deity. The map in the video is much worse than this NC, because there is no stone, no gold mines, and sandwiched between Toku and Monty. You may find some hints about the diplomacy in the video:

Good luck for your game.

 

[AcaMetis]

Spoiler :

This is the first time I played on Monarch with a non-FIN leader. To my surprise, SB was much better than I expected. Maybe because PHI is strong enough to compensate the crappy trait PRO? or two gold mines nearby and 3- city centre helped a lot during the early game? or because of SB's starting techs ensuring a faster early growth?... Interesting.

I'd attribute this largely to the map being great. The PH stone capital and nearby gold helps immensely in the early game, and that's when those advantages matter the most.

Sitting Bull by himself is not a good leader, insofar that he can't tech out-tech Willem or out-culture Gandhi and the like, but he is a consistent leader that no barbarian or cranky neighbour is going to dislodge (barring inordinate amounts of effort). Willem is a great techer if he manages to keep hold of his rich cottages and coasts. Gandhi is a cultural monster if he manages to keep hold of his holy sites and whatever surrounding lands he managed to claim. With Sitting Bull it's not a matter of if he keeps hold of his claims, his Dog Soldiers and PRO Totem Pole archers will repel anything short of Armageddon itself. It's a matter of whether those claims will be enough to catapult him to victory mostly on their own merits, because beyond that Sitting Bull doesn't have much else. When those claims involve a PH Stone capital and Gold Mines? Yeah, that'll do.