Nobles' Club 377: Gandhi of India

[AcaMetis]

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 Gandhi of India, whom we last played in NC 340; we last played the Indians under Asoka in NC 325. The Indians start with Mysticism and Mining.

• Traits: Gandhi is Philosophical and Spiritual. Philosophical gives all cities +100% generation and a +100% bonus to Universities. Spiritual allows you to swap state religion/civics without suffering Anarchy, and gives a +100% bonus to all Temples.
• The UB: The Mausoleum, a Jail with +2. Combine it with Gandhi's ability to quickly (and cheaply) swap into Police State to keep your cities functional during a long, dawn-out war, or build them during a Space Race to offset Emancipation unhappiness while boosting your generation.
• The UU: The Fast Worker, a Worker with 3. A very powerful UU in the right hands, these guys can chop forests and improve distant tiles faster than regular workers could ever hope to manage.

And the start:

Spoiler map details :

Fractal, Rocky climate, Medium sealevel.

Spoiler edits :

A few strategic resource swaps, some seafood that was placed in horrible locations was moved, and two AI starting positions were swapped.

Spoiler isolated? :

Semi-iso.

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 377 Gandhi 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.

Spoiler what is demigod :

The difference between Immortal and Deity difficulty is akin to the difference between Noble and Immortal. Players eventually reached a point where Immortal was too easy, but Deity was still out of reach, and so neither difficulty provided a fun experience. "Demigod" is an otherwise standard Deity game where the AIs are only given their Immortal level starting units, in an attempt to bridge the gap.

Spoiler 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.

If you're playing at higher level than Monarch, consider also giving them Hunting at Emperor, Agriculture at Immortal, and The Wheel at Deity.

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.

 

[AcaMetis]

The Cow tile does not report Fresh Water, so the water tile to the east of it must be coast. That means SIP could potentially ruin seafood, but settling on the wine 1W (for the 2 city tile) reduces that risk (can settle a city 2E from SIP). There's still a minor risk of ruining seafood as far as I can tell, but I'm not sure how to check that without delaying settling by a turn, which doesn't seem worth it to save at best a potential second city spot.

That's my read on the situation, what do the experts think?

 

[Izuul]

I'm just trying to decide which moves give me the best chance of finding a food tile. I guess warrior SW first to check over there. There could also be food on the 2 tiles to the east but only the settler can check that and it would mean sacrificing a turn.

Any food on the 2 tiles to the north would be retained if we settle 1W so we don't really need to worry about that.

 

[notslin]

Some thoughts:

• From the shapes of trees, we're maybe halfway up north from the equator.
• We don't have hunting or agriculture. Agriculture -> AH is ~25 turns normally (without working any commerce), ~22-23 turns with an extra commerce. (Hunting is ~2-3 turns faster than Agriculture.)

Where to move warrior:

• 1W doesn't seem like a bad settle. SIP often reveals extra resources in the BFC, so, just in case there's food NNE of the settler, I would be tempted to move warrior 1NE. If moving the warrior 1NE reveals food, that could be a reason to SIP.
• Moving the warrior 1SW might reveal a resource on a hill 2W3S of the settler, but we have no way to know if that's a hill anyway. Other than that, I don't think it reveals much that lets us decide between 1W, 1SW, or SIP. (Edit: Also reveals 3W2S of the settler.)

Tentative conclusion:

• Move warrior 1NE, settle 1W (unless there's food NNE of the settler), then possibly grow to size 2 so you can time completion of fast worker with completion of AH. This might let you go for Agriculture instead of Hunting (which is a bit more useful for the worker) and have an early warrior for fogbusting. (I tend not to like Hunting -> Archery much, but that just might be my bias.)

 

[pmarc]

Turn 58, deity (2nd try)

Spoiler :

Hunting-AH, followed by BW, made the barbarian wave much easier to deal with. Just finished Pottery so cottaging can start in Delhi (which was not working great tiles after having to give up its pigs to Bombay) and the newly founded Paliputra. There is still space for two good commerce cities in the NW. We should have some intel on Pacal's research after Writing to get an idea of what to do next.

 

[soundjata]

Run away from the cows i think in this case...

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Stupid question. Suppose settle on wine. Is it really that bad to farm the riverside wine while waiting for animal husbandry?

 

[Izuul]

I was thinking in my head that 1N of cows was water. I like the NE warrior move alot more than I was initially thinking. If there's no food there I'm not sure how much I like blindly moving west onto the wines. Id be tempted to burn the 1T and move the settler 1E to check for food over there.

Burning a turn isnt great, but playing this with just 1 plains cow is the scenario I would try to avoid at all costs.

 

[AcaMetis]

Stupid question. Suppose settle on wine. Is it really that bad to farm the riverside wine while waiting for animal husbandry?

You'd basically be trading 1 for 11 (compared to building a grassland riverside farm), which I don't think is a great deal if you've already got a 2 capitol and the only visible food resource is a Plains Cow. Long term (relatively, pre-Monarchy) you'd probably want to cottage the wine tile and farm one or more grass tiles for extra food, so putting an early farm on the wine tile seems like a waste.

That said, I don't know if worker first -> farm wine tile -> work wine tile would speed up that research by one turn compared to size 2 first or worker first into grassland farm tile. If it does it might be worth doing? You would lose at least one turn going Agriculture instead of Hunting into Animal Husbandry, but if you gain at least one turn back it might be worth it depending on various factors? (I.E. if there's Copper in the BFC the value of Archery sinks through the floor, and that in turn makes Hunting less appealing, whereas if there's no Agriculture resources anywhere nearby the value of that tech diminishes)

 

[chinemol]

don't know where to move the warrior, but unless something is found next to cows, the settler can move on hills to explore (riverside or south ph i'd guess). not gonna try deity, so wasting turns beats plains cow. also in my mind philo requires good food to be useful

 

[unknown_civ]

First post.. been reading a while and attempting to improve, get some consistent wins at warlord.


Started in place. Fast worker took forever. Warrior ran around exploring.
2nd city east to the coast. 3rd city between mountains.
Lost and regained 3rd city from barbarians. -- The warrior was south to help on another barbarian, when a spear welding barbarian swooped in. Somehow my single warrior was able to take the city back.

Tech has been slow.

I built up some military (swordsmen, horse archers wont be useful for the special unit the neighbor has) to wipe southern neighbor off my island, but when asked he proudly gave me a tech. So I left him alone.
Now he is acquiring techs left and right (GL or ?) , as he wants me to trade my optics badly.

I think next few games Ill create a T50 to T100 save to get some reviews on what I should be doing better.

Only have a 1010AD save (turn before I DIDN'T go to war with southern neighbor), and a save much later (1455, still no liberalism or astronomy anywhere yet).. while I am focused on getting liberalism.

I do not think any FOOD on this island, I did see 3 fish. I didnt pay much attention to other islands other than to make contact and see if any good trades. They have no trade routes yet, odd.

 

[a pen-dragon]

Welcome to the forum!

If you have not read it yet, I recommend you take a look at this thread.

Next, a formality: please use the SPOILER BBCode instead of the ISPOILER one to increase readability.

I think next few games Ill create a T50 to T100 save to get some reviews on what I should be doing better.

That would be helpful, as any text will have difficulties conveying the entirety of your situation. Screenshots of some key moments are also helpful.

Just post the 1010AD save you have, even that allows to infer major parts of the early game.

Spoiler Game specific feedback :

They have no trade routes yet, odd.

I assume you do not have astronomy yet, as it is required to have trade routes that cross ocean (except if all ocean tiles to create a connection are in your culture).

Regarding food, this is not the most generous start, but there are a few fishes and pigs, as well as a floodplains, so it is not that bad. Still, farming a few river grasslands and floodplains will be extremely helpful.

 

[unknown_civ]

Thanks ... I found the Spoiler button, and re-read the link posted.
I feel to far into this 1 and might abandon.. but might be useful to try to shimmy through.

Spoiler warlord :

My neighbor is advancing tech wise quickly. I did take a quick look on attacking him, but Ill need upgrades, or catapults.
I probably should of took him many turns back.

using Buffy 3.19.005.

 

[aitkensam]

Unusual happenings at 650 BC on Immortal...

Spoiler :

Not sure I remember seeing the AI use the human tactic of gifting a crappy city to boost relations... Anyone else seen this? In this case I didn't accept...

Game has been pretty fun so far. Playing quite carefree given it's immortal. Oracled Monarchy (not sure I've done that many times...) in 1880 BC and planning to go build GLib for some fun before heading towards Astro. Just starting to grow Bombay after it worked Horse and Gold for a bunch of turns. Other two cities are pretty nice. A bunch more to be settled later now that all the land is blocked off.

 

[AcaMetis]

Spoiler :

Not sure I remember seeing the AI use the human tactic of gifting a crappy city to boost relations... Anyone else seen this? In this case I didn't accept...

AIs can indeed gift cities, I have seen it before, but it's a very rare occurrence. I think for it to happen the city needs to be culturally crushed, and maybe closer to your capitol than the AI's capitol? The one other example I can recall was another NC map and that city gifting happened in the post-Optics or even post-Astronomy era, so it's not necessarily restricted to the player having fewer than X cities and I don't think an AI being in financial trouble is a requirement either (a factor, maybe, but not a requirement).

 

[sampsa]

@unknown_civ also consider taking screenshots by pressing the key and they will be saved to the screenshot folder. People are generally too lazy to open saves but can comment based on some well chosen screenshots.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Question to those that viewed the games of @pmarc and @aitkensam

Spoiler :

Why is there no religion on their continent? These two leaders usually take all the religions.

I just don't feel comfortable in semi-isolation without shared religion.

 

[pmarc]

@sylvanllewelyn

Spoiler :

That would have been very useful indeed. Pacal with shared religion and civic (at monarchy) and your diplomacy is set for the game.

Pacal's AI has a Culture/Growth focus, which has a good chance of opening with a religion, but maybe depending on the resources around his capital he'll start with useful worker techs rather than Meditation or Polytheism.

 

[soundjata]

@sylvanllewelyn

Spoiler :

i'm shocked too!
In my game it's a happy budda lovefest on the continent
RNG has ways to spin the jam around though.

 

[a pen-dragon]

@unknown_civ

Spoiler :

Looking at your save you have an awfully low amount of workers. Typically you want 1...2*city number, depending on what you have to do. You have 4 for 8 cities. Also watermills are weak, all these rivers should be cottaged and the cottages worked to grow them to provide lots of commerce. Watermills are terrible at this stage of the game.

Typically it is also better to grow a city to the happy cap before running specialists. Also the capital should grow for later adopting bureaucracy instead of stagnating on a wonder.

Agra and Pataliputra would also really profit from a few farms.

Next, city placement. Agra ruins a fish, this is not good , especially for such a bad city. Try to scout the coast before settling such a spot. Founding this city 2 tiles south would have freed up the fish and strengthened your city at the same time, as it could share the pigs with the capital. Granted, there is little food for the capital , but once it has grow to its happiness cap it could work grassland cottages and give the pig away.

Continuing, Madras is a really poor spot that has basically no way of growing and should only be settled later, if at all. Meanwhile you could have claimed the fish near Delhi, and basically any city with food is worth building.

Regarding your planned war, that would have failed (I think pacal already had longbows back when you decided against it.). You have extremely weak (swords vs. maces is just bad.) units that are spilt up and without siege.

Now to your tech choices. You have a significant lead in spent research (except vs. pacal, who is slightly ahead), but what have you got to show for it? Divine right is nearly always useless, theology is not much better. That is nearly enough beakers to get you education or astronomy. You also skipped some very strong techs that allow building an advantage. Civil service allows bureaucracy, which can be extremely strong if you play for it (grow your capital and start cottaging it early), also allowing maces which are much better than swords for attacking. Music gives you a free great person if you discover it first, and even an artist allows you to get a golden age.

There are two ways to use a tech advantage: win a space race victory (long term) and use your advantage to conquer someone. Everything else (wonders, first to lib) does matter only insofar as it helps building an advantage. Leveraging an advantage requires a plan and you seem to be missing one. It could be as simple as researching rifling quickly and running over pacal, but have a plan in mind.

Military tradition and gunpowder for cuirassiers (and attacking with only them) or steel for cannons and attacking with cannons + anything are the other two medium term options. You could also go for an attack with medieval units short term, but you would be fighting without a tech advantage.

Furthermore you should be using more advanced civics. Gandhi is spiritual, so there is not even the downside of anarchy. The pyramids are a great wonder, but it does nothing if you do not adopt better civics. For example representation would give you a huge benefit due to the caste specialists you are running. Also a religion civic would be really helpful. Org rel, theocracy and pacifism are each great for certain things. They are definitely amongst the more impactful civics.

Lastly, all your cities except Delhi are missing the single most important building (some even say the only important building): the granary.

Conclusively I think this game is far from lost, but you do need a plan on how to progress. Btw, most these idle units should be deleted, as you are paying for them.