Orion's Home School 2: Nobles in Space

[Nickzilla]

I wouldn't say Prae's are that dangerous to be honest. If you build a barracks, you can use axemen which almost match them in strength thanks to the +50% melee they get plus a promotion.

But still, I think an early rush would be good if it could be pulled off. I mean, the earlier he's dead, the earlier you can make his ex cities productive right?

 

[Belisar]

I don't know how the AI is programmed to "think" (apart from them more often than not being idiots), but Rome is almost totally covered with forests, so maybe Augustus has gone for bronzeworking early too. If that is the case, he may settle early on his copper. Would it be an idea to send a scout/warrior down there to "keep an eye on things"? I'd hate for your axes to meet him prepared with more than archers.

Actually there is little difference between archers-in-city and axes-in-city if you attack with axes. Axe-defenders are more of a concern if you attack with swords.

If I had that map, I would settle yellow dot for the copper and start spamming axes there, whilst building one more warrior/settler/worker in the capital. I would then settle red dot and let a worker build a road there, then let all 3 cities spam axes and send all axes to red dot for the launch. Is it this kind of thinking that makes my axerushes "die before they start"? Is the founding of a third city the cause of my "Ups, too late"-problems?

A rush depends on speed. You settle for the copper because you need the ressource, the city itself takes time to mature and be productive.
It is best to build/whip and most important: chop your early army in the capital, the second city will contribute little at most.

 

[Carabodes]

@Belisar
Thank you, I'll chop/whip in capital on my next try and forget about my securityblanket of one more city/one more axe.

 

[MrFelony]

a rule of thumb is to bring about 2axes for each archer, though you can usually get away with 3:2 ratio depending on a few factors. Is there city a holy city and is their city on a hill and are they protective? hills, holy cities, and protective civs make it much harder to rush so you'll definitely need to bring a 2:1 ratio, maybe more if they have all three lol.

 

[Cleverbeans]

@Carabodes

I practiced early rushes by using a couple "practice" scenarios. First, when I do practice round I always ramp up the difficulty. If I'm playing at Noble or Prince I will practice on Monarch or Emperor so that when I switch back down I'm extremely dominant. I think a good rush practice map is Earth 18 with Rome, you've got iron in you first city, lots of enemies nearby and not a lot of room for expansion. The goal of my practice sessions is to find out how far I can go before my economy goes belly up. An outline of my general plan follows

1) Tech "The Wheel" and build a workboat/worker on turn one. I used to tech bronze/iron immediately but my workers never had anything to do.

2) Second tech is BW, Third is IW, get into slavery right away. When you have BW you can start to chop/whip your barracks/settler.

3) Get your second city, start building a barracks immediately. Have your worker connect these cities. I try not to have any military units built until I have iron hooked up and focus on workers/buildings.

4) The moment I have IW I hook up the iron. The moment I have it hooked up I load both cities with Praets in their queues. Once I have four Praets, I rush the first city.

Although Rome rushes are somewhat cliche, they will give you a better feel for the economic restrictions of rush wars, as well as the basic tech plan. Once you feel comfortable doing this with Rome, switch civs and start the same plan with Swords/Axemen.

Another good warring practice is to load up a custom Deity map with a random leader and turn on raging barbarians. Your goal is survival and to build/aquire three cities.

 

[Chewie]

I too would like to see a rush - my main mistakes in early rushes seem to be not having enough troops to make a quick decisive victory, which means by the time I win the war I'm behind the AI in techs. Live and learn though. Would like to see how to work out roughly how many troops to use and how to get them out quick enough.

 

[Roxlimn]

The start is plenty good. Not amazing, but more than sufficient. I absolutely love Floodplains. Floodplains AND easy access to health bonuses? That's darned spiffy. I think Agriculture was absolutely the right choice here, for farming a Floodplain for the early growth boost.

I didn't see the point of delaying the Worker by one turn to wait for AH. The Scout wouldn't have been built faster anyway, and it only gives you a 5 food bonus on a one turn advantage. Since you'll need to complete the Worker anyway, and the food advantage won't materialize in a pop advantage, it's largely pointless.

I would have considered using the extra Worker turn for Farming the Floodplains immediately E of Aksum, then Pasture for the Cows after. Of course, this is Epic, so I don't know about the balance of worth in this situation. Is the early production of a Pastured Cow worth a one turn premium for a Farm-first improvement style? The early food boost would certainly go a long way for me, and it'll help Aksum generate lots of Settlers and Workers fast.

Yellow dot is a strong move for the Copper access and the Sheep for health. Pottery tech is a good move with so many Floodplains tiles in the capital, but the region is awash in fresh water, so a pop-intensive SE is also doable, with a focus early game on production for the axe-rush. In that sense, I would have thought about going for Ironworking straightaway. Ironworking will reveal if the Romans have any accessible Iron for their UU, and if the only source nearby happened to be in the vicinity of Red Dot or White Dot, I could see an expansion into those locales a good move prior to invasion, just to make sure Rome doesn't get any Iron.

 

[Carabodes]

@MrFelony
Thank you, will remember and will do
(When I do go to war, I overproduce units to be on the safe side, then declare and at the same time continue to spawn units. My maps then has a frontline heavyly infested with my troops, and a long line of units all heading for the front from back home, my roads are paved with live soldiers )

@Cleverbeans
Monarch? Emperor? DEITY??? Raging barbs? Sounds scary , but your advice also sounds extremely good.
Thank you, I will try that out - if I survive your tactics, nothing on noble (or below) will ever scare me again, I'm sure.

@Chewie
You and me both. This thread will make warriors out of us, I'm sure, as well as teach us heaps about techpaths.

 

[Orion071]

Lots of questions! Good! Let's go over the main ones first...

I think an axerush on Augustus is a good move but also a very risky one but nevertheless, go for it!! Anyways, considering the dotmap .. I'd move the blue city 1S to encompass the horses and I'd discard the white city and instead build the red city 1NE. Either way, great first game.

There were a few people asking why I'm not including the Horses in my coastal city. Let's see what happens if I move Blue dot down 1S. I gain Horses (a rather dubious 1 3 1 tile in the Tundra), but also get 2 Coastal tiles and 2 relatively worthless Ocean tiles. I give up a riverside Plains hill, 2 Grasslands (1 by a river) and 2 Plains (also 1 by a river). Even with the Maoi Statues, I think I'm giving up too much. Once the city's borders expand to the Horses, I can still use the resource without it being in a BFC. If I didn't have easily available Copper, then 1S would make a lot more sense. I'm looking at the very long-term.

Building the Red dot 1NE is far too greedy. I don't need to grab every resource into one super-city. Even if I did, I don't think it would even be all that great. I'd lose the fresh water bonus for being on a river, and I'd lose the awesome Levee building later on. The riverside Corn tile is plenty enough food for Red dot, and the Pig and 2 Floodplains is enough for White dot. I'd rather have 2 good cities than 1 very good one. White dot will be a better city than I think a lot of you realize.

I disagree about that being a weak start. that's a pretty good one. sure it doesn't have gems or 2 corn or w/e but it has a lot of production and commerce potential. you can cottage the FPs and stil have +5. this means that size 8 population you could run 4 cottage FPs, 1 cow, 2 plains hill mines and 1 Grass mine yielding 15 and a lot of . If you farmed those FPs, you'd have 9 and be able to run 3 of your plains hills and 3 grass hill mines for 25 . or if you'd like, just cottage all of those river tiles and you'd have a bonanza. i also think that the capitals base 2 only pays for itself, so the +7 is misleading.

The capital is weaker (not too bad) early on because it doesn't have that 1 high-food tile to make whip-receovery easier. I won't be able to whip the capital nearly as much as I did last game. The +7 food isn't misleading. At size 1, working the city center and the Cows, I'm at +3. At size 5, working the Cows and 4 Floodplain Cottages, I'm at +7. The city center doesn't pay for itself, it's essentially 2 "free" food and 1 "free" hammer.

I didn't see the point of delaying the Worker by one turn to wait for AH. The Scout wouldn't have been built faster anyway, and it only gives you a 5 food bonus on a one turn advantage. Since you'll need to complete the Worker anyway, and the food advantage won't materialize in a pop advantage, it's largely pointless.

I would have considered using the extra Worker turn for Farming the Floodplains immediately E of Aksum, then Pasture for the Cows after. Of course, this is Epic, so I don't know about the balance of worth in this situation. Is the early production of a Pastured Cow worth a one turn premium for a Farm-first improvement style? The early food boost would certainly go a long way for me, and it'll help Aksum generate lots of Settlers and Workers fast.

Delaying the Worker 1 turn was largely pointless. Don't worry too much about it. Let's look at the Worker. It's pretty simple, really. Farming the Floodplains would take 10 turns and give me a 1 bonus to the tile. Putting a Pasture on the Cows takes 6 turns and gives me a bonus of 1 and 2 to the tile. A much more effecient use of his time. I still will probably Farm one of the Floodplains simply to give me more food for faster whip recovery.

 

[Orion071]

And now the big question: Do I try to Axe-rush Gus? Let's look at a list of Pros and Cons...

Pros

Eliminates a dangerous rival before he gets his deadly UU.
Gives me more room to expand
Acquisition of the Buddhist Holy City

Cons

Holy City doesn't have a Shrine yet
Gus is Creative and Rome is Holy = significant cultural defenses (Rome could also be on a hill)
Gus is in Slavery so he has BW - could be facing Axes as well as Archers
I have to expand backwards so Rome is 12 spaces away from my closest city


What other pros and cons do we have? Given all of this, I'm thinking that I should delay the attack until Construction and Catapults. Rome's defenses will require a minimum of 2:1 Axes:Archers and he could whip 3 more defenders before I even get to the city. I can easily grab 5 cities to start (Red, Blue, White, Yellow and the capital) and destroy Gus with a much more decisive advantage than I have now. Make no mistake, war is inevitable here, but do I really need to attack right now?

 

[Roxlimn]

Orion071:

I vote for choking him out now and attacking later.

 

[dankok8]

Yea, you can attack later but he will have praets then.. maybe just expand towards Louis and wipe him out instead.

 

[Carabodes]

Yellowdot has to wait for a borderpop to be able to hook up copper. If yellowdot is moved 1S or 1SE to hook up copper immediately, the yellow site looses too much out on productive/workable tiles.

The absent shrine in Rome is both a pro (less culture to beat) and a con (we have to spend our own priest if we take Rome now, but will fight a higher culture if Gussie gets a priest).

I really would like to see Reddot up and running before attacking, both to shorten the way to the front as well as preventing Gussie from settling there while we're producing nothing but axes.

Praetorians do not worry me when I'm on the offense (if I can beat them - and I can - I'm sure you'll have no problems beating them), it's when I'm on defense that they're a bit scary.

So: As much as I'd love to see an early axe rush, start REXing and delay the war for the time being.

 

[slaze]

Keep in mind that gus is Imperialistic, so he should get first pick of the land he wants, or at least you should expect him to act like such, especially in the choices of cities #2, #3, ... etc. And I'd expect that his being Industrious might further value the marble right there, so i wouldn't be surprised if his second city went after then marble. And despite the red, white and blue you got planed out, there's a city with pigs, corn and marble available, so ... unless you make the red wite and blue happen yourself, i don't think it's gonna.

Still to be said is that if anything, I think your advantage is production. If you have some commerce around (gold, etc, etc) then teching to Construct might be a good move. I mean, the river definately helps commerce-wise, but it's no gold mine.

Blue's fine 1S. a horse and more plains = more , which is just like the other cities. Gus probably bui;ds it anyway so there's some debate in whether or not to build it or just take it.

but bronze looks like the move, not construction. More defenses mean more Axemen, but that's your advantage. The weight of the other arguement lies in what these choices will do to your economy but, ehh, you got alot of . Your advantage looks to be there.

 

[Roxlimn]

As a Settler pump, Aksum is probably top-notch. Farm two tiles of Floodplains to grow fast, then Mine a couple Hills for production. Any Settlers you produce will be boosted by the production of the hills AND the ridiculous growth power of the Floodplains. Time enough to Cottage later.

Red Dot and White Dot are priority sites and altogether acheivable given the great start position. Cottaging White Dot early will help to sustain the economy while its Pig helps it grow.

I'm actually rather concerned regarding the remarkable lack of happiness resources in this landmass. No Ivory, no Furs, no Sugar, no Wines. Pyramids for Representation or Monarchy for Hereditary Rule would be priority moves for me here. Neither Red nor White Dot provide happiness resources, though, so if the Axe Rush is shelved, I'd actually consider going for Red Dot and settling near the Dyes, before or shortly after settling White Dot and Yellow Dot. I couldn't care less about the Horses, really. Too badly positioned.

 

[Deriem]

Wow, I just finished a game with bad tiles south of me, and I rushed a neighbour for the land. Except I was Rome

It looks like YellowDot is the best choice, since Gus is going to have access to some resources that you could use. Let's just hope that he doesn't have Praets, or you could be looking at trouble!

What do you think of getting RedDot, even if you don't go for a rush? The marble would help with the Oracle, but would it be worth it in the long run? Like, are there other wonders that help in a Space Race victory, and is it worth possibly ticking off Gus just to win the Oracle race?

 

[tboner23]

Marble also helps with the Great Library whose 2 free scientists help with reasearch until scientific method. A hevily cottaged city with the GL and Oxford University can be a monster Science city, even moreso with Pyramids and early Representation.

Orion071... if you want to show us that we don't need to grab the early wonders to win that is great, but maybe give the GL at least a try in this game, don't prioritze it, but grab it if it is available and fits into the overall tech plan.

 

[eewallace]

Well...that start looks a little indimidating. On the plus side, the humble cow is a much underrated resource--a first city that can work cows right away is off to a good start. You have lots of forests to chop, and that snaky river gives you a great bunch of river tiles for commerce (and levee will make a huge difference). City 2 with the bronze also has lots to chop.

Okay, here's what I'm hoping--iron shows up right between you and caesar! That should make it decisive what needs to happen next. (Of course, it would also be very educational if caesar has the only iron and has you in his sights rather than Louis. We could get an "ealy defense 101" lesson.)

 

[Deriem]

Woot! This thread has already made a good impact on my game. Started and finished one today on Warlord. Cultural win in 1810 as Ghandi. Not a single war throughout, and it was on an extremely crowded Pangaea map. And instead of getting a low rating (My previous best was the third worst), I got Charlemagne. Thanks, Orion! All the tips you've given me have paid off.

Next stop, Noble!

 

[madscientist]

Just to pipe in one thing, your playing BTS (since your Zara) so Agustus is Imperialistic and Industrious. Fast expanding and fast wonder building. Creative pressure is not an issue except from the religion.