Manifest Destiny, that's what it's all about. The real United States used the term to talk about how America deserved to stretch from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific east to west. Now, we're talking about North to Sorth. That means taking out Saladin and filling in the south. I'm going to try to do both! HAHA! Hopefully we have the troops to do it.
Inherited turn wow, Saladin has quite the army. Almost double-digit horse archers, which isn't so bad. Nine catapults can be nearly fatal, however. I have to be a bit careful. So I don't declare on the inherited turn. I did change a few cities over to settlers and whipped a few things, too. I want to be ready ASAP.
My plan is to lure Saladin's forces into our land, where I can flank away the catapults with our fast-movers. To that end, I grab the knights from the western attack group (which will be actually attacking, I think/hope) and move them over towards Timbuktu, which will be the counterattack/defense group. I just really REALLY don't want those catapults to attack our forces, because the collateral damage will destroy an entire stack, even if we have grenadiers around.
Still, I only delay a little. In 1555, I make the call...
Our only offensive actions are to sink a workboat and to snag a worker that Saladin had left unprotected. I'm moving quickly because Damascus is still in revolt and we can snag it with less pain if we move quickly. If Saladin moves his monster stack west, well, I have a plan for that, too.
Saladin doesn't do quite what I'd hoped, moving his forces east instead of south towards Timbuktu. That's OK, I've prepared a reasonable welcoming committee for wherever he shows up, and he's not going to like it much. Meanwhile, we can march on Damascus.
Couple settlers move south, too, and forges/courthouses are being worked on. More knights in the east.
Bad news, though. Frederick beat us to Taj Mahal. I did everything I could to speed ours up, emphasizing hammers and such. I went from 9 turns expected to 6, but it wasn't fast enough. I couldn't even whip it. Bummer to miss out on the Golden Age from TM.
We should get a fair bit of cash, though, which I plan to use to make some troops into grenadiers.
You can see Sally's stack there, too. Note the catapult(9) at the bottom. Boys, when you see numbers in parantheses like that, it means their stack more than fills up a page.
After we completed Military Science, I went into Literature. Heroic Epic will be really nice to be able to build. It'll increase our military production a fair bit. After that, I'm not sure.
We also got a great scientist. He probably should build an academy for us somewhere. Atlanta? I'm going to look around and see where our best science-producing city will be long-term. It appears to be Philadelphia, with lots of cottages growing, coastal for trade routes, gems tiles. That should be our Newton's city, too, once we get universities built. I send the scientist there.
Working on the southern part of our Manifest Destiny. I put up a bunch of signs for more city sites. We still have 8 or so unfounded.
First real combat. Saladin let a horse archer/chariot pair get ahead of the rest of his army. Bad move. A pike takes out the horse archer. I leave the chariot, though, as I'd have to expose a pike to a nasty counterattack if I took out the chariot. And the chariot can't really hurt us on its own.
Major attack time. Lose two trebs to do a bunch of collateral damage.
All four knights kill horse archers, doing flanking damage to the catapults and killing a few of them. Then the granadier wins. Maces turn, as I want to cut them way down to size. First one kills a horse archer, next two kill the longbows. Then it's back to attacking horse archers and down under 80%. Hmmmm.....
Flanking damage in action... You also get to see my meager attacking stack. We're greatly outnumbered. Do we have a chance?
I take a break and found Houston and Los Angeles in the south. They'll be good cities in a half-dozen turns. Costs us a bit right now.
And near Damascus, the revolution ends, but somehow it immediately has 60% defense. $#(*)&@. I guess that means I'll need to bombard it down, because I have no spy in the area.
Back at the big stack, I really wish for another couple knights, but I sac another treb to do more collateral damage and send in a mace to kill the final longbow. Pike kills highly wounded swordsman.
Pike kills catapult. Mace kills horse archer. Pike kills catapult. Mace kills horse archer. Mace kills horse archer. VERY LUCKY!
Win 2 and lose one on the interturn. Didn't see where all of Saladin's catapults went. I don't like the way Civ4 doesn't display enemy actions very well, regardless of how I set up the options. Turns out they didn't go anywhere!
Next turn, send in the knights! Errr....send in the one healthy knight! Knight kills horse archer (and 2 catapults by flanking). Two maces take care of the other horse archers. Now it's just catapults left. Knights should do OK there, I think. Knight kills 4 catapults. Knight then kills a chariot and the last catapult. Saladin now has very very little strength left. Once this stack heals, we'll be ready to take Djenne.
A note on promotions. We should have more city raider macemen!! One of the big values of melee units is that they get city raider promotions. Then when we upgrade to grens/rifles, they'll keep those city raider promotions and be really REALLY nice units. I'll be working on getting us a number of city raider 3 units on my turns, if at all possible. We should have also medic at least one medic with each stack. Medics made and helping heal.
Start the bombarding of Damascus. It'll take 3 turns, but Damascus is an important part of our Many-fisted Destiny. We need to from north coast to south coast. And it's progressing. It'll all be blue eventually.
Of course, our spy in Djenne, who'd been hanging out happily for a LONG time, is caught that interturn, so I have to bombard it down too. Slow going against Saladin. I should've probably built a couple more spies. Oh well. We'll be OK.
Damascus:It's bombed down but we only have 3 trebs in place. And it's on a hill, so it's gonna have to wait a couple turns until reinforcements arrive.
Djenne, however, is flat land. And we have a large army in place. First treb dies, but the second survives. Then it's time to send in the real troops. Mace wins at 50ish percent. Mace wins at 84%. Knight wins at 98%. Knight wins at 96%. Knight wins at 96%. Pike (that I had at CR2) loses at 95%. Maces wins at 99%. Knight wins at 99%. Pike wins at 99% and
And then I have to heal. Only one city, but Saladin's major force is smashed. Bunch more trebs on the way and another grenadier being built in the area. I like Kumbi Saleh for Forbidden Palace. I don't know why I built a library there. Sorry. Bit inattentive.
Still working in the south....
Saladin shouldn't pose too much threat too long, if we stack our forces together and go after him. I hope arkenstone is up to the task. Damascus is going to be a tough nut to crack. Might need to wait for the grenadier to help with busting the gate. I'm pretty certain the 4 trebs won't be enough. A couple knights from the eastern army should probably also head cross country to join the west forces.
I failed in my mission to expand our borders from sea to sea. I did found a number of cities and they will get our borders fully expanded to the south in a few turns. But going north was harder. I smashed Saladin's main army, though, so we should be able to move more quickly soon. The eastern army is now nice and large.
BTW, longbows being built are to help defend new cities (either conquests or from settlers). Trebs/mace/grens are to help take cities. We don't need any more pikes.
Don't worry about Saladin's metal. He doesn't have the ability to build anything better than swordsmen, techwise, so it's not worth sending a spy to eliminate a metal source.
I left signs all over the map for what I had in mind for various units. We must complete our Manifest Destiny!!!!