I'm going to write what is, for me, an exceptionally detailed report. Read: boring. Sorry, but this is our first war and I wanted to impart some of what I've learned
about the right way to wage war in CivIV. Please note, this is far from the perfect way to wage war in CivIV. You'll see that I highlight one major miscalculation I
made and I'm certain others can poke holes all throughout. Please do. I'd rather the boys learned from my mistakes than their own.
'Nuf said. We're 108 miles from Chicago. We've got a full tank of gas and half a pack of Bazooka Joe. Mansa's got 9 visible units and I've got an itchy trigger
finger.
Hit it.
Well, not quite, as previously stated, I examined our empire.
(Inherited) Turn 200 1400AD
I was fine with most things here, though the Forbidden Palace needs to go up north. (It wouldn't let me build in Timbuktu. Don't know why.) We had no hammers invested
in it, so I gleefully switched it to a trebuchet.
I also wasn't too keen on the University of Sankore in Washington. I let it ride, though, as A) the extra beakers
will help and B) we already had a not
insignificant number of hammers invested.
Here's the tech scene, for anyone interested.
Only thing else I did on my inherited turn was whip. I whipped a treb in Atlanta, an Xbow in Philly, a mace in Not Chicago, a forge in Hun, and a workboat in Khoisan.
Turn 201 1410
Unfortunately, I still can't let slip the hounds. I've got to deal with all the junk that came in this turn. (My fault for whipping everything in sight.)
Atlanta treb -> mace
Not Chicago mace -> Pike
Philly Xbow -> treb
Hun forge -> ???
Research gives us Drama and I choose Education, due in 10.
We earned another great merchant (Hanno) in Washington, who I park over in Seattle, building a caravel on our west coast.
And finally, before I can kill anybody, Machiavelli reminds us that we've built enough pretty stuff to be respectful and that we can get back to building things that
go splortch.
So...finally? Finally.
Mansa left a wandering knight on a floodplain. I had a pike nearby. Pikemen (being a more advanced form of spearmen) get double strength against mounted units. Dead
knight.
The battle of Walata:
Arkenstone had left me four troops outside of Walata: a treb, a knight, a pike, and an axe. Mansa has a longbow, a catapult, and a swordsman. City defense was 0. I
figure I had enough to take it. I was wrong.
I first sent the treb in on a suicide mission against the longbow. The intent wasn't to win this fight, but to weaken the longbow and (hopefully) the other troops
through collateral damage. This worked and I sent in the knight, who took out the longbow.
Unfortunately, here's where I had miscalculated. I was hoping to use the axe against the sword and the pike against the cat. Nope. Attacking with the axe put the cat
on top, so my shock-promoted axe only had a 50% chance. Selecting the pike put the sword on top at something around 30%. Not good.
For now, the battle of Walata is on hold.
Nearing the end of my turn the only thing left for me to do is move troops into position and keep exploring with my caravel (who has a great merchant loaded up).
Move one more to the east and...
Groovy. I traded open borders straight up and bought his map for 110 gold. I didn't want to give my map to anyone. I knew Sitting Bull had no contact with our
continent and assumed the rest of east continent didn't either. I had a caravel just about ready in Seattle and knew that I was the front-runner for circumnavigation.
Hit enter.
Turn 202 1420
Boston jewish monastery -> mace
The battle of Walata (part deux):
Fortunately, Mansa couldn't put another unit in the city between turns, so I ought to be fine this turn. My knight from last turn's longbow victory was eligible for
an upgrade so I gave him shock to take out the sword. This gave him 89.7% odds and we had no surprises there.
So now I had a choice versus the cat. Axe at 50% or pike at 67%. I made the decision to use the axe, figuring that I could see another 2 Malinese knights on the prowl
and I wanted to keep the pike alive.
Axe goes in...and dies...without hurting the cat 1/10th of an HP. Curses and mean-spirited sentiment spewed forth. Well, at least I have the pike.
Crosses fingers...
I started it on a theatre and shook hands with our new great general in Boston (who is still there--what to do with him?).
I then did a once over of our empire and decided to whip the caravel in Seattle. I wanted that circum bonus.
Turn 203 1430
New York courthouse -> treb
Bactrian treb -> knight
Seattle carvel -> treb
Mansa left a swordsman out in the open and I clobbered him with a knight @ 89%. Free XP and one less defender to worry about.
Rest of the turn was movement. I'm getting ready for the assault on Gao. Last turn I had decided, based on Sitting Bull's map that German (probably Berlin) was a good
target for the trade mission, so I unloaded my merchant and sprinted over to a hill overlooking some white tiles.
Fred and I did an open borders swap and left cautious of one another. I still hadn't decided on Berlin for the trade mission, though. For one, Hamburg (I think) held
promise. But I wanted to check out that dark green area. Istanbul was a holy city.
Still, nothing to do about that yet. Hit enter.
Turn 204 1440
Mansa gave me a bit of my own medicine IBT when a spear of his took out a horse archer I'd over extended. Cost of doing business, really. That horse archer had just
pillaged Mansa's only source of iron.
No more swordsmen or pikemen for you, buddy.
Still though, can't let something like that go uncontested. His spear died halfheartedly thanks to my knight. Unfortunately, though, the IBT victory gave Mansa a new
general in Gao.
The battle of Gao:
Someone had put a sign on Gao that declared it to be our primary target. Okay, says I. If you say so. First things first.
"The shield is down, commence attack on the Death Star's main reactor."
Now, I could have done that with siege weaponry. But then I would have had to wait five turns and Sally would have gobbled up all the good stuff. And besides, I
wouldn't have been able to do this...
city raider (CR) treb attacks city garrison (CG) longbow @ 50% odds to withdraw. He withdraws.
A note: all other siege is already promoted to accuracy 1 and barrage 1. This is less than ideal compared to CR. Barrage is somewhat useful when attacking big stacks,
but CR usually gives better all around value.
treb vs CG longbow @ 53.5% withdraws
mace wins v cat
mace wins v bow
mace wins v bow
xbow wins v spear
Taking the city sank a galley and killed the general Mansa never had a chance to use. I started it up on a theatre.
Continuing my trek to sell our great merchant at the highest price, I took him to Hamburg (I think), Germany's second largest city, and one that overlooks the Ottoman empire.
Of course he's annoyed with us. Won't give us open borders. Hamburg offers us 1500 for our merchant, so I send him back to Berlin.
I also met Pacal this turn with the caravel that had dropped off our merchant. Forgot to get a screenshot, but I did trade him open borders straight up.
Hit enter
Turn 205 1450
IBT a treb I had been sending up met demise at a Mali sword who'd wandered down into "our" land.
Boston mace -> treb
Then this pops up.
We're the resident of the AP??? Needless to say, I declined to put forward an ammendment.
I took out that uppity sword from the IBT using an axe I had handy in Atlanta and that's when I notice that Timbuktu is starving. Guess it came out of revolt. It's losing food badly, so I whipped the monument it was building. There was a penalty for having no hammers in it, but it brought the city out of starvation.
I'm finally able to settle down with my merchant this turn and he promptly sets up shop in Berlin, netting us 1700 gold and letting me crank the science slider for a while.
Turn 206 1460
New York treb -> jewish monastery
Hun worker -> lighthouse. (that's why I didn't write down the hun build, the worker had been queued)
Timbuktu monument-> jewish monastery
Turn 207 1470
These are quiet years as I'm moving the bulk of our army over to Kumbi Saleh. We're in a race, though, as Sally's got about 23 horse archers and two cats moving in. We'll arrive in position on the same turn, but I think it doesn't matter anyway as Sally's likely to spend 16 turns taking the defense down with two cats.
Turn 208 1480
Washington completes the university of sankore...
...and begins a knight.
Boston treb -> pike
New York jewish monastery -> pike
Bactrian knight -> pike
Timbuktu jewish monastery -> pike
Walata comes out of resistance and whips a theatre
I built a lot of pikes here. All in response to Sally's enormous horse archer stacks that will, knowing my luck, all turn into camel archers the turn before I attack.
Turn 209 1490
Boston pike -> pike
Seattle treb -> harbor
Walata theatre -> harbor
The battle of Kumbi Saleh:
Just like with Gao, I used a spy to take out any defense. Sally had taken it down to 27% so I might not have needed to. Either way, you can see in the screenshot, that I had turned our espionage slider up to 60% for a turn to get the espionage points to do it.
Kumbi Saleh is harder than Gao. It's on a hill and its longbows are better promoted. On top is a hills defense (guerilla?) 2 longbow. Let's rain death with trebs.
CR1 treb v longbow dies at 11.4% odds
Barrage treb v longbow dies at 12.5%
barage treb dies v longbow at 44.1% odds without hurting the bow!!!!
barage + accuracy cat loses to longbow at 5.9%
barage + accuracy cat loses to longbow. Another without hurting the bastard!!!
All out of siege. Bummer.
CR mace v longbow loses at 66.5%
combat + cover mace wins v longbow at 83.4%
combat 2 mace wins v longbow at 84.6
cr mace v longbow # 95.1 wins
combat 2 pike beats a knight at 99.5
combat 3 knight beats the last bow @ 99.9+
We take the city, but lose the screenshot. Kumbi Saleh has the apostolic palace.
That was it for my killing. Mansa has one more city, but it'll be tough to get it before Sally's legion of horses.
Looking up from the war for a moment, I notice that we'll have education next turn. No one has liberalism. ...hmmm....
Turn 210 15000
Education comes in and I select liberalism, due in three (at 100% science, which we can afford). Unfortunately, we can't do any of the really cool slingshots. Nationalism is probably our best choice. I could use a Taj golden age.
Washington knight -> university
The only thing worth noting is that I had loaded great merchant 2 onto west-side caravel back in turn 203 or so. I zig-zagged west all set and he has just revealed the last longitude. Next one to hit enter will receive the circumnavigation bonus.
)
.
and go for the deficit 
especially if you want the Liberalism slingshot. 
