Nobles' Club 380: Darius of Persia

[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 Darius I of Persia, whom we last played in NC 343; we last played the Persians under Cyrus in NC 376. The Persians start with Hunting and Agriculture.

• Traits: Darius I is Financial and Organized. Financial adds +1
  
  to any tile that already produces at least 2
  
  . Organized cuts Civic Upkeep in half, and gives a +100%
  
  bonus to Lighthouses, Courthouses and Factories.
• The UB: The Apothecary, a Grocer with +2 . Not likely to be useful early game, as health is generally not that much of a concern and Grocers are rather expensive buildings to build. But after industrializing you generally find yourself in dire need of extra health and with production to spare, so a building that can get you up to +6 by itself is pretty useful at that point.
• The UU: The Immortal, a Chariot with +50% vs. Archery units which gets defensive bonuses. A very early and cheap 2 unit that can punch through Sitting Bull archers and easily manoeuvre itself into a defensive position when necessary. Why, yes, this is indeed a good unique unit.

And the start:

Spoiler map details :

Shuffle, Tropical climate, Medium sealevel.

Spoiler edits :

The usual strategic resource swap and poorly placed seafood moves.

Spoiler isolated? :

Not isolated.

Spoiler what is shuffle? :

Shuffle is a map script that chooses randomly between Archipelago, Continents, Fractal and Pangaea map scrips.

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 380 Darius I 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]

Don't have time to analyze the start in detail, so I'm just going to guess SIP is "good enough" and roll with that. Any experts with time to analyze the start are free to correct me .

 

[Thrasybulos]

A bit awkward... What's 2N & 2N1E would be crucial information, but the scout is badly placed.
I don't approve of BDSM practices, so I like having natural production available: 1S1E would tempt me more than SIP.
The PH is an option... but that's heading into the jungle and into the unknown, so...
I'd probably send the scout 3S (from the settler) to get a better idea of what's West of the PH and reassess then.

 

[chinemol]

Hate attacking with immortals, but they are good enough for defence against barbs and the jungle is right there. SIP and early AH is a gamble that might pay off if horses are found. Archery is still available, messes up the BW route. Wheel is expensive, but working a spice farm is enough to reach.
Conservative approach demands mining bw opening I guess

 

[soundjata]

We should totally favor settling 2SE for the natural production indeed.

By moving onto the PH, we lose 12 on T0
The worker is built on T13 instead of T15. He can improve the corn immediately instead of wasting a turn moving.
This means that on T15 SOPH earns 6 and 4 (growing for 2 turns) compared to SIP
The corn being improved 3 turns earlier earns 9 more (and 5 too) between T15 and T20.

Overall at T20, SOPH trades 12 for 15 and 9
Lovely ain't it?

I think most here understand this effect will compound after T20 (earlier warriors, earlier city 2 etc...)


Enough looking at economical advantages. How about jungle?

At deity level, (although it depends on the map type), it is statistically correct (c)@sossos to assume expansion will be constrained.
The jungle is normally one of the last areas the AI settles, so having a nearby jungle backyard covered with our culture could help secure a few extra city spots.
Who cares about having no more than 12 clear tiles to be worked in the cap during the early game?

The scout can't help with that decision of course... As per mapmaker evilness evidently

But let's hypothesize there resides an extra wet corn 2N of the settler for example.
Would that make SIP a better starting city? I think not: Ugly, ugly worker movement

 

[chinemol]

Spoiler attempt Nº3 :

First attempt ended with an immortal rush against shaka that didn't work. Second one got me under the yoke of the barb archer.
Took @soundjata 's settling advice on my third attempt and opened up with archery (attempt 2 went really bad), wheel, pottery, mining, BW.
Popped gold, so self teched IW. Going to get calendar and probably catapults after that
Toku is trolling:

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

We should totally favor settling 2SE for the natural production indeed.
...

At deity level

Only at deity difficulty. At immortal or below, I would settle in place for better long-term potential. I want my city on a hill for barbarian defense. I really want to work a farm on the riverside spices tile to unlock bronze working sooner.

Horse archers accompanied by immortals, might be better than pure immortals, for Darius who is financial. Horse archers can weaken any spearman first.

Please correct any flaws in my reasoning.

@chinemol

Spoiler :

Obviously you should go catapults. You have enough space, you just need time (and iron working). Immortals are a strategic mistake.

However, if you insist...

Spoiler :

Deity, turn 79

 

[sampsa]

Only at deity difficulty. At immortal or below, I would settle in place for better long-term potential. I want my city on a hill for barbarian defense. I really want to work a farm on the riverside spices tile to unlock bronze working sooner.

Horse archers accompanied by immortals, might be better than pure immortals, for Darius who is financial. Horse archers can weaken any spearman first.

Please correct any flaws in my reasoning.

I think long-term potential matters less the lower the difficulty level. The benefit on the ph is massive and I'd go for it on any level.

I would definitely not go for HAs if I have access to immortals...

 

[jorissimo]

I would definitely not go for HAs if I have access to immortals...

Wouldn't that depend on factors like the proximity of the target, number of good city sites available at the start, etc.? If a later attacking date makes sense, HAs and Immortals have a lot of synergy as the whip overflow of a HA is often enough to finish an Immortal. And the latter are a cheap way to deal with archers while the former deal with spears and swords.

 

[sampsa]

Maybe under very rare conditions, though it's a bit hard to come up with a scenario where immortals won't cut it but a lot later HAs will? Not sure about synergy either, I can't really see it. I think cat+immortal has more synergy even.

 

[jorissimo]

Maybe under very rare conditions, though it's a bit hard to come up with a scenario where immortals won't cut it but a lot later HAs will? Not sure about synergy either, I can't really see it. I think cat+immortal has more synergy even.

They can fortify, get defensive bonuses, aren't as useless as chariots and you can get a lot more units out fast if you put the overflow into them. You might not always have horses super close by, maybe you only get them with a 3d or 4th city. Sometimes you need that expansion to get the production necessary to sustain an invasion. Immortals by themselves are only good before the AI gets spears, and that's a very short window in which a lot of variables have to be right to allow for an immortal rush. But hey, last time I did a pure immortal rush I was playing on noble so who knows.

 

[a pen-dragon]

You might not always have horses super close by, maybe you only get them with a 3d or 4th city.

If that is the case I would frequently prefer cats over HA, as then HA will come relatively late, and cats have a longer useful window.

Re: synergy. Basically while it is true that HA are stronger against spears/swords and immortals do very well against archers, this does not result in as much synergy as one would think due to how combat works. Always attacking the relatively strongest unit means that the first HA will fight against spears but probably loose and leave a medium health unit that is still strong enough to take on immortals. Also when attacking hill cities archers might even defend over spears, making things worse.

Regarding overflow, what you describe is certainly possible, but IMHO the additional base strength makes HA flat-out better than immortals, except if fighting against an AI without metals (and not the maya). In the end I see little difference between HA with a few chariots and HA with a few immortals. The 4-strength units will clean up after the horse archers.
Yes, working with the overflow from HA is more demanding but well-timed chops and careful whipping make things possible.

With cats all you need is a lot of them and any units to clean up (even archers will do), and if possible one or two units to defend your stack. Again I do not think there is much difference between cats + chariots and cats + immortals.

In conclusion, Immortals really shine against an AI without spears and swords, but once they have these units there is little difference to chariots IMHO.

 

[sampsa]

The point of immortals is to attack early and your first aim is to pillage copper/iron. One or two spears/swords won't kill 10 immortals and since you can chop, you will have numbers.

They can fortify, get defensive bonuses

Good points, but these seem more useful with cats than with HAs?

 

[Izuul]

HAs are awesome but they require a 450ish beaker tech + archery + cost 20 more hammers to build. You're going to be able to attack with Immortals like 40 turns earlier under "normal" circumstances.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

I think long-term potential matters less the lower the difficulty level. The benefit on the ph is massive and I'd go for it on any level.

I would definitely not go for HAs if I have access to immortals...

I think we agree that catapults are usually better than horse archers, if there's enough land to work with.

Do you mean that, if given the choice, you would go immortals instead of catapults?

 

[soundjata]

Deity T33

Spoiler :

The land is great!

Spoiler :

IDK why everyone is talking about I can see none

 

[jorissimo]

I guess I'd have to see an example of a high level immortal rush to be able to visualize it better. I still think it's more situational than a HA rush because you need horses and a neighbor very close by for it to be possible/ pay off.

 

[sampsa]

I think we agree that catapults are usually better than horse archers, if there's enough land to work with.

Not really, no. Depends also a bit what exactly "better" means. Safer, yes.

Do you mean that, if given the choice, you would go immortals instead of catapults?

I mean that if immortals work, they work very very well, simply because you can attack so early.

 

[sampsa]

@soundjata

Spoiler :

Seems very promising. Only worry seems to be Shaka.