Nobles' Club XCI: Alexander of Greece

[dalamb]

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 Alexander of Greece, whom we last played in NC XIII; we last played the Greeks under Pericles in NC LXXIII. The Greeks start with Hunting and Fishing.

• Traits: Alexander is Aggressive and Philosophical, a combination good for mixing some warmongering with some cultural and economic development. AGG gives Combat I to melee and gunpowder units, which benefits the UU; PHI gives faster Great People, which means more golden ages, tech bulbing, or bonuses from settling.
• The UB: The Odeon, a Colosseum with +3, +2 instead of +1, and +1 from Hit Singles. Colosseums arrive with Construction, which for warmingers means Catapults, but a diversion to build them in some cities might help with war weariness and allow additional growth for additional production (or specialists, especially valuable with PHI).
  
  
• The UU: The Phalanx, an Axeman lacking the usual vulnerability to chariots (+100% defence vs the chariot's +100% attack). Should we hope for a naive chariot rush from a nearby AI?
  

And the start:

This is a small but land-heavy map. Even if you don't like to read map spoilers, you might want to read this one.

Spoiler map details :

Boreal, small, random opponents, one extra AI to make land-per-civ about equal to our average maps. Boreal has lots of tundra, trees, and deer, plus a smattering of other resources and terrain type. Because most food is deer, there's less total than we're used to; it looks neither good nor horrid to me. There are a few fairly small multi-tile lakes. As usual I make sure the resource for our UU is reasonably nearby.

Spoiler edits :

Swapped us with an AI to swap the resource our UU needed for the one his needed (the gems were just a side effect, of course ). Rerouted the river to irrigate our wheat -- we need all the help we can get given Boreal's relative paucity of normal food. Moved the scout to make the wheat and 2nd gem visible.

Finally, a cut and paste of our standard doctrine:

There are no hard and fast rules here: fun and learning are our primary goals, but we do suggest that you update your progress at various points in the game, using the Spoiler feature of the boards. You can post as often as you like; here's one suggestion:

• 4000 BC (starting thoughts, no spoiler required for that discussion)
• 1000 BC or so (how you decided to progress up the early tech/build paths, which AIs you have met, where you're thinking of putting cities, etc)
• 500 AD or so (after establishing some cities and a possible plan of action)
• 1200 AD or so (mid-game, Lib race, wars or peace, or whichever happened or didn't, met other
• continent if applicable, etc)
• 1600 AD (or when you have decided on a course of action and a specific victory condition)
• End of game (Victory!!! or defeat, no shame in losing, especially if you tried a higher level. Learning is what we focus on, not fastest win or biggest empire)

This is just a guideline. If you're trying to improve your game, then posting more frequent updates, in as much detail as you can manage, is the best way to get suggestions from other players. If you come to what seems like a major decision and you want some advice, post an update, regardless of what game-year it is.

We also welcome players to ask for specific game advice, as we have a number or stronger players who lurk and help out with solid tips, and of course, we help each other. Replies to specific questions should also be in spoilers, with a simple "@" in front of the person the answer is directed towards.

Special Thanks go to Bleys and TMIT, who really made this series a great one, r_rolo1, mapmaker extraordinaire, for his maps in the early days of the series, and all of you for playing.

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 number Leader 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 Noble. The Monarch save gives all the AI Archery. Emperor adds Hunting; Immortal adds Agriculture; Deity adds The Wheel.

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.

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.

 

[dalamb]

Reserved.

 

[Archon_Wing]

I would so prefer Pericles for this, but eh, looks like Agriculture to get the wheat and bronze working so we can get the gems. It may not be so hot to go chopping like mad on map like this.

 

[Zx Zero Zx]

...... Why the hell did you pick the worst map script ever?

 

[Horgh666]

...... Why the hell did you pick the worst map script ever?

Spoiler :

Oh come now, change is good! I applaud the idea and will try to find time to play this game. After all, they can't all be Fractal and Pangaea. I myself played a Prince-level game with Brennus on Boreal (the game is somewhere in this forum) and found it an interesting experience.

And I remember hearing some top player folks claiming they could claim the world with an ice-bound start! Boreal map script isn't THAT bad, but it does require you to step outside your comfort zone and do things differently.

No, you won't be elephant rushing anyone anytime soon. And no, you won't have tons of super duper cities by 100AD. But after watching and following my share of top level games, you tend to see patterns. I'm interested on seeing top players tackle this.

Oh and dalamb...

Spoiler :

It isn't how much land, but how good said land is that counts on Boreal. In my Brennus game, myself and Mansa Musa had enough GOOD land (for this map script) to get a bunch of useful cities up, but the Incans and Aztecs were far less fortunate, having perfectly fine starts but lousy land otherwise.

 

[Archon_Wing]

...... Why the hell did you pick the worst map script ever?

Trolling is fun! This map is perfect for it. It's just variety since a lot of the maps lately have been similar.

Though I may just dial this down a level since Alexander is kinda meh :S , lol.

 

[NetGear]

i don't even like fractal.... strictly Pangaea.

but I guess this fits well with the learning spirit of noble's club and I'm gonna give it a try.

 

[Zx Zero Zx]

Spoiler :

Oh come now, change is good! I applaud the idea and will try to find time to play this game. After all, they can't all be Fractal and Pangaea. I myself played a Prince-level game with Brennus on Boreal (the game is somewhere in this forum) and found it an interesting experience.

And I remember hearing some top player folks claiming they could claim the world with an ice-bound start! Boreal map script isn't THAT bad, but it does require you to step outside your comfort zone and do things differently.

No, you won't be elephant rushing anyone anytime soon. And no, you won't have tons of super duper cities by 100AD. But after watching and following my share of top level games, you tend to see patterns. I'm interested on seeing top players tackle this.

It actually just makes the game not fun. :| Slows down the map speed a ton due to no food and no commerce. It's not that I can't win with this start, on Deity I feel it is actually impossible. On IMM it would be hard. Anything lower than Emp this map is a cake walk with just Archers and if you have Copper Axes.

 

[Archon_Wing]

GP pollution FTL so...
1505 AD Diplo
(Monarch/Normal/No huts or events) Probably gonna retry this map.

Spoiler :

Decided to spam wonders and settle them great people as I figured I can't beat Julius to the spots to the west, and I have a delicious marble site nearby that nobody will nab. Agri---> BW---> Myst---> Mason---> Wheel---> Jump to priesthood/writing, nabbing SH/GW/Oracle. I truly regret building the Great Wall, since it gave me 2 Great spies which I really should have used to steal some techs but whatever. With copper in BFC, that was just overkill. Maybe I should have just built the oracle

Oracled Aesthetics and built the related wonders. I made the mistake of building the Parthenon because of those stupid Artist points, and the National Epic artist points... gah. I settled 2 artists in the outer cities to eat away at opposing culture.

Tech pace was of course, poor


I kept everyone away from me by bribing/dogpiling poor freddy. A Great Engineer comes out so I build the AP with him. Eventually he caps to Julius, but not before I spread some Judaism over. Julius immediately plans war, most likely to go after me, but before he can, he gets screwed because everyone hates his vassals. Well isn't that a change?

Well, Gil and Ragnar were willing to take war bribes against Rome, so he wasn't gonna be able to attack!

It's late and automating workers (cottage tundra wut) and not putting effort in focusing EP/stealing techs made this a lot harder than it should have been, and so I just felt like ending it with diplo.

But hey! Julius was resident and called for diplo victory, so don't blame me.

 

[dalamb]

Negative reactions to "unusual" map scripts is the reason we have only one of them per mini-cycle of 5-6 games now. It'll probably be a year or so between occurrences of each particular unusual one. Nevertheless I think it's important to broaden Nobles' horizons occasionally.

I think I'd better make a point of playing this one out myself, just to have the High Moral Ground.

 

[The Oz-Man]

I figured I'd play just a couple rounds of this last night to get the feel for the game, but One More Turn Syndrome kicked in. Luckily, it wasn't too long a game.

Conquest, 1750 AD, Monarch/Normal Speed/No huts or events:

Spoiler :

This game was rough going early on due to neighbors REXing towards me and very difficult fogbusting. I was considering a Phalanx rush, but I didn't like anybody as an early target except Hannibal (who was too far away), so I decided to spend the early game turtling up, building wonders, and setting the table for a Cuirassier rush after Lib. REXed to about nine cities but was cut off in going for a tenth by Giggles, Hannibal, and Rags all building toward me.

I was shooting for Civil Service from the Oracle, but I missed one of the prerequisites and settled for Philosophy in 800 BC. I should've run Pacifism at that point, but I hadn't adopted a religion yet since Caesar was Hindu, Hannibal was Buddhist, Giggles was Jewish, and Ragnar was changing religions basically every turn. Also got the Parthenon, Great Library, and Sistine Chapel for beefy specialists and tons of Alex's GPs.

Giggles did a laughable DoW in about 500 AD that consisted of a couple of HAs and Chariots getting picked apart by whipped spears. I bought him off with Lit since I'd already gotten everything I needed from it, and I started to pull far, far ahead in tech.

Lib'd MT at around 1000 AD and did my usual Taj Mahal + Specialists double GA to pump out Cuirs. DoW'd Giggles shortly thereafter. He had a really sucky stack parked on a hillside border city, so I set my army there and spent a few turns knocking him down the power ratings. The AP was Jewish, which was in none of my cities; luckily, the first resolution (to stop the war) came after I captured the city, so no holy war for you, Giggles! Defying the resolution had no real consequence, and Giggles got wrapped up nicely and vassalized. Hannibal was next and met the same fate, and Freddy got it right around the time Cavalry came online. Economy was in the toilet at this point thanks to my stupidly keeping Hannibal and Giggles' cities. I set most of my cities to build Wealth to keep things afloat, and trading for Constitution for Rep kept the research rate reasonable (if a little bit slow).

The fun thing about the last two wars with Ragnar and Caesar was that, thanks to my building wealth instead of new units, I was the second most powerful empire on the map. The most powerful? My vassal, Freddy, whom I'd traded MT and Rifling for some backfill. The result was that I was getting ridiculous levels of military support from my vassal. I didn't really need it though; Ragnar and Caesar had been warring all game long, Ragnar's army had been wiped out trying to capture and hold Rome a dozen times, and Caesar had spent so much time building units instead of infrastructure that he was ridiculously backward.

So, in 1750, Caesar capped and I got my Conquest win.



I know people are going to hate this map due to weird food allocation, a lack of good commerce sites, and few solutions to get smily faces beyond running HR forever. However, I'm a simple man of simple tastes, and not having to hack one single jungle for this entire game? Outstanding.

Thanks for posting, dalamb!

 

[obsolete]

Damnit, another map with bugged tiles. Why did you feel you had to tamper with it?

 

[goldys_lackey]

I loaded the Monarch file but evidently I never changed the difficulty to Monarch, so it was a Noble Conquest victory.

Spoiler :

Tech IW early to stop Julius getting Praets. Basically just stalled him for a few turns until I could kill him with HAs



Next, Ragnar, then Carthage, Germany, and finally Gilgamesh



It may just have been the Noble difficulty, but I had a lot of fun with Alex. I didn't even need to build barracks and stables til I DoW'ed on Carthage. Then it was mostly knights and at the very end, currasiers against Gilgamesh. I chopped everything, as you can see. At Noble, if you keep warring, you can just chain-chop until victory.

Edit: To be clear, I enjoyed this map. Food was not a problem, with all the deer. Gems kept my econ afloat, and quick switch into Caste allowed running of GMs, so commerce was never really a problem either. I cottaged the one site up where the grass was green too, for backup. I'd have to agree with Oz-man - chopping lumber instead of jungle was definitely more fun.

 

[dalamb]

Damnit, another map with bugged tiles. Why did you feel you had to tamper with it?

It's what I do, and what I've always done. You can always create your own series or, if the fans want a different map-maker, someone else can take over.

 

[Manco Capac]

Seriously, I don't know what occured through my head, but I couldn't resist to try this no commerce and no food map on deity. Just for fun and on a suicidal tendency. How far I can get until the situation becomes desesperate.

Spoiler :

That start isn't considering all the boreal maps I've seen. Wanna try a capital with one deer?
But of course, if I can get better, I will try and on a whacky type of map like this, moving capital is a tactical move; we have no ensurance to get enough food bonuses.

BTW, very frustrating to know copper was in the BFC when I added Archery, Hunting, Agriculture and Wheel to the barbs. Shame I couldn't run the game on Buffy mod where I could've zoomed to close I wouldn't see anything!



I decided to move my scout SE thanks to fog gazing a hole in the forest. On boreal, often a resource.
Another wheat is great. Furthermore, I suspected something 2E, thus preserved the tile within the BFC.
Ended up to be a great capital. And the number of hills was preserved. Being on a hill with some rivers reassured me a lot against barbs or a backstab.

When exploring, I was very careful at some point to keep the scout for fogbusting. On those types of forests, early, the animals are mostly wolves, but sometimes, some bears were spawning.

I directed all my research towards Hannibal. With Freddy, he was likely to be the best techer.



I uncover Julius very close to my capital. Everyone was cautious to him and there was a worker. I snatched it. On boreal, everyone is slowed down, especially on the production aspect. There was no insurance of a strategic resource for him.

It was very fun messing with Julius.



My tech path was Agriculture => Mining => BW => Mysticism => Meditation => Priesthood => Wheel => Pottery => Writing (Partial)...

I did a very bold move with the Oracle. But if I wanted a efficient war while being on par technologically, I wished to possessed a good trade bait: Metal Casting. And the gems are helping the cause of building the forge in productive cities.



Bad move, I admit. Strategicless, probably. Especially with Sumeria. They often build wonders and Gilg has founded a religion. But when I saw the SH done, I was a bit relieved because he was busy on another wonder.

Unfortunately, on war side, I made the terrible mistake! Iron was present within Julius' capital BFC. Just between his two earliest cities. Such a shame I decided to move the warrior E instead of north; that way I would've spared myself all the preats. I had to enter in always war mode. I was waiting waves of stacks towards my hilly capital. One reason why I attacked Julius. Hill axemen can survive well waves of preats.

After killing three stacks, at one moment, my three valorous phalanxes made it to the iron; on boreal, this is too easy to go through the lands with all the forests.



At that moment, I started to train super enslaver (woodsman II phalanxes) and the worker farming started. I stole much more than I imagined. Around 25 workers...perhaps more.



Capture, capture and capture. I never get tired to do so.

Finally, when all the stacks where killed, there were no preats except one in the capital. I started the march.




When Julius has two cities left. He accepted peace for Aesthetics and a city!
He was reduced to a single city without hope for anything. Don't even mind he peacevassal to someone later.

Meanwhile, I was gathering another army to go after Gilgamesh now. He has the TGL, a beautiful shrine, etc. I had to make it fast. Longbow time is approaching. I suffer so many economical problems. I have gone strike twice. I had to switch civics sometimes.

The third city capture, I finally had Hannibal helping me out. I captured that city without any loss! I got luck for the first defender.



Ragnar made peace with Freddy. Few turns later, he went after me. Lo!



The last city had longbows and I couldn't march further inside Gilgamesh lands. I made peace for Currency (partial) and 70 gold. Finally I was saved economically.

I forgot to say I used my first GProphet for Theology. My second GPeople was a Great Engineer. I rushed the AP under Judaism to benefit full power and the hammers (just for myself). I have the Parthenon and Hagia Sophia waiting to be built elsewere because I chopped mad the gift city from Julius. Fail gold will be useful to get another tech to get in return Construction. I am so near to get the Hinduist shrine spreaded at 33 %.

Ragnar is the main threat now. I want to ask advices somehow. I am somewhat stuck.
The map is completely horrid; on a normal map, it would've been easy to improve the lands, but here...errr. All the workers can do is chop, chop and chop. Not a good idea when the forests are the main source of health (many bonuses are inexistant on boreal) and what remains is a non-improvable land.

Any tips?

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Damnit, another map with bugged tiles. Why did you feel you had to tamper with it?

In another game I might complain, but sometimes the starts + positions variances in this game are so bad I'd call the default game "bugged" on occasion. Remember, 2 corn + marble + gems = dry rice and 1 flood plain.

For a game series intended for lower level players, I don't see a true issue with the host giving impossible (but minor) advantages in comparison. Also note that this map script on its own does generate some otherwise impossible tile/resource combinations on its own, such as the tundra wheat.

This is not a map script for people who like cottages.

 

[Habitus]

Seriously, I don't know what occured through my head, but I couldn't resist to try this no commerce and no food map on deity. Just for fun and on a suicidal tendency. How far I can get until the situation becomes desesperate.

Spoiler :

That start isn't considering all the boreal maps I've seen. Wanna try a capital with one deer?
But of course, if I can get better, I will try and on a whacky type of map like this, moving capital is a tactical move; we have no ensurance to get enough food bonuses.

BTW, very frustrating to know copper was in the BFC when I added Archery, Hunting, Agriculture and Wheel to the barbs. Shame I couldn't run the game on Buffy mod where I could've zoomed to close I wouldn't see anything!



I decided to move my scout SE thanks to fog gazing a hole in the forest. On boreal, often a resource.
Another wheat is great. Furthermore, I suspected something 2E, thus preserved the tile within the BFC.
Ended up to be a great capital. And the number of hills was preserved. Being on a hill with some rivers reassured me a lot against barbs or a backstab.

When exploring, I was very careful at some point to keep the scout for fogbusting. On those types of forests, early, the animals are mostly wolves, but sometimes, some bears were spawning.

I directed all my research towards Hannibal. With Freddy, he was likely to be the best techer.



I uncover Julius very close to my capital. Everyone was cautious to him and there was a worker. I snatched it. On boreal, everyone is slowed down, especially on the production aspect. There was no insurance of a strategic resource for him.

It was very fun messing with Julius.



My tech path was Agriculture => Mining => BW => Mysticism => Meditation => Priesthood => Wheel => Pottery => Writing (Partial)...

I did a very bold move with the Oracle. But if I wanted a efficient war while being on par technologically, I wished to possessed a good trade bait: Metal Casting. And the gems are helping the cause of building the forge in productive cities.



Bad move, I admit. Strategicless, probably. Especially with Sumeria. They often build wonders and Gilg has founded a religion. But when I saw the SH done, I was a bit relieved because he was busy on another wonder.

Unfortunately, on war side, I made the terrible mistake! Iron was present within Julius' capital BFC. Just between his two earliest cities. Such a shame I decided to move the warrior E instead of north; that way I would've spared myself all the preats. I had to enter in always war mode. I was waiting waves of stacks towards my hilly capital. One reason why I attacked Julius. Hill axemen can survive well waves of preats.

After killing three stacks, at one moment, my three valorous phalanxes made it to the iron; on boreal, this is too easy to go through the lands with all the forests.



At that moment, I started to train super enslaver (woodsman II phalanxes) and the worker farming started. I stole much more than I imagined. Around 25 workers...perhaps more.



Capture, capture and capture. I never get tired to do so.

Finally, when all the stacks where killed, there were no preats except one in the capital. I started the march.




When Julius has two cities left. He accepted peace for Aesthetics and a city!
He was reduced to a single city without hope for anything. Don't even mind he peacevassal to someone later.

Meanwhile, I was gathering another army to go after Gilgamesh now. He has the TGL, a beautiful shrine, etc. I had to make it fast. Longbow time is approaching. I suffer so many economical problems. I have gone strike twice. I had to switch civics sometimes.

The third city capture, I finally had Hannibal helping me out. I captured that city without any loss! I got luck for the first defender.



Ragnar made peace with Freddy. Few turns later, he went after me. Lo!



The last city had longbows and I couldn't march further inside Gilgamesh lands. I made peace for Currency (partial) and 70 gold. Finally I was saved economically.

I forgot to say I used my first GProphet for Theology. My second GPeople was a Great Engineer. I rushed the AP under Judaism to benefit full power and the hammers (just for myself). I have the Parthenon and Hagia Sophia waiting to be built elsewere because I chopped mad the gift city from Julius. Fail gold will be useful to get another tech to get in return Construction. I am so near to get the Hinduist shrine spreaded at 33 %.

Ragnar is the main threat now. I want to ask advices somehow. I am somewhat stuck.
The map is completely horrid; on a normal map, it would've been easy to improve the lands, but here...errr. All the workers can do is chop, chop and chop. Not a good idea when the forests are the main source of health (many bonuses are inexistant on boreal) and what remains is a non-improvable land.

Any tips?

I'm playing it as a Deity Culture Game at the moment

 

[Archon_Wing]

In another game I might complain, but sometimes the starts + positions variances in this game are so bad I'd call the default game "bugged" on occasion. Remember, 2 corn + marble + gems = dry rice and 1 flood plain.

For a game series intended for lower level players, I don't see a true issue with the host giving impossible (but minor) advantages in comparison. Also note that this map script on its own does generate some otherwise impossible tile/resource combinations on its own, such as the tundra wheat.

This is not a map script for people who like cottages.

Given stuff like the cow glitch, I think I don't need to tamper with the map to screw it up. The map generator does that for me!

 

[MilesBeyond]

Going to give it a shot. First NC game!

I'm playing Normal Noble (heh). I usually play Monarch but as I almost always peacemonger and I've never tried Boreal before I figured I should maybe keep things a bit simple for now.

Spoiler :

4000 BC:
At first I cringed at all the tundra, but the start actually seems pretty good. Greeks have got rubbish starting techs, so I'll have to sacrifice more turns than I'd like getting my tiles up and running, but that's the way it goes. Agriculture first, then Mining.

The big question at this point for me is: To chop or not to chop? I haven't got much experience with tundra (usually avoid it altogether) but without any forests on them those tiles are looking woefully unproductive...

 

[Manco Capac]

I'm playing it as a Deity Culture Game at the moment

That's even more suicidal to me. Good luck.

Spoiler :

Even with marble around, culture was the last victory I thought.