Played 10 turns.
Inherited turn. Turn 201, 1410AD
Have a look around, switch a cottage to a hamlet in Bombay.
Slip a Granary in to the front of the queue in Rheims as it will grow slowly otherwise, will chop it out.
Change Memphis from wealth to Confucian temple.
Change Lagash from Buddhist Monastery to Confucian Monastery, we should be taking advantage of the Apostolic Palace benefits.
Notice out of a group of 4 workers 1 just finished a cottage the rest still have movement points but when they’re grouped like this it will get wasted. If I’m grouping workers I usually do it in pairs.
Wake up a couple groups of workers who are doing nothing? I don’t understand this as there’s still a lot of tiles to be improved, I can appreciate if we’re waiting for governor orders before improving tiles but roads should be built at the very least to improve the movement paths of our troops to the frontline.
Notice outside Heliopolis there has been farms built on no river tiles in preference to river tiles, River tiles should always be the first to be improved because of the +

.
Our troops have been accumulating outside our borders, this is not so good as you incur troop supply costs, by moving them back into our borders we save 9 GPT. Let’s hope they we’re moved there last turn

. Then I move our stack out of Lagash to get ready for war and now we’re losing an additional 24 gpt

Change research to Engineering as I want the +1 movement bonus as our empire is getting larger and I’d also like Pikes and Trebs. Liberalism is not in danger as we have a monopoly on Philosophy and no one has education yet. Will take 4 turns.
Sorry if I was being too harsh or picky but SG’s are all about learning, I hope I get some constructive criticism too .
Ok decision time. We still have a peace treaty with Gil for a few turns, he’s currently at war with Catherine. Looking at the Powergraph Gil has taken quite a hit in Power and Cathy has had a few losses as her graph has plateaued, ours is on the way up.
So assuming Catherine has her stack inside Gil’s borders I’m going to go against the group consensus and attack Catherine. Thanks to the 2 nice stacks I’ve inherited . I couldn’t resist it when I saw only an LB and Axeman in Yaroslavl. So the troops get their marching orders and move towards Russia.
IBT
Peace treaty with Gil expires.
Food stores of Kish are emptied and we’re asked for aid from Memphis. I decline.
Turn 202, 1420AD
Orleans Market => Confucian missionary.
IBT
We get this
Very strange. She’s already at war with Gilgamesh and decides to have a go at us too? That’s the second time in BtS I’ve had an AI declare on me when they’re already at war, the first was Monty go figure. Must have been the denied request earlier, the strange thing is we’re equal in power too. Well on the Brightside it saves me from anger from the group and I was already going to declare on her anyway.
Islam founded by Cyrus in Cuman, I wonder if he’ll head to Nationalism next?
Turn 203, 1430AD
Heliopolis Angkor Wat => Elephant
Catherine moved 2 Horse Archers outside Rheims, I promote a cat to combat 1 and attack, it withdraws, attack with spear against softened up HA and losses at 78%.
Attack with Pawelo and sword to finish them off.
Catherine must have captured Kish as borders have moved. So I move 1 stack towards the captured city to pounce on injured units and take advantage of CR bonus against elephants for which we have no good counter at the moment.
The other stack goes towards St Petes.
Our caravel spots uninhabited shores.
IBT
Thebes gets killed by a War Elephant, have no idea what kind of unit that was

assume it was a mace.
Turn 204, 1440AD
VoK Cat => spear (2 turns) will turn into Pike
IBT
Lost worker to speedy Russian HA
Turn 205, 1450AD
Engineering in => Education research down to 30%
Helio Elephant => Treb
Orleans Conf. miss. => Barracks
Set up Espionage points to Catherine only.
IBT
Nothing
Turn 206, 1460AD
VoK Pike => Pike
Helio Treb => Treb
Paris Elephant => Elephant ( forgot to mention earlier that I built a stable in Paris so it should stay on Elephants if building units)
Apparently Cyrus completed Notre Dame in the IBT.
Whip Lighthouse in Agra
Spy notices Gil is laying siege to Yekaterinburg. Both sides are damaged.
Troops have arrived at Kish which is full of damaged Russian units about 8 cats, a spear, chariot and elephant or 2. Start the battle.
Send in VoK Swordsman(Maceman)

defeats Elephant
Mace beats HA flawlessly
Send in cats to earn some GG points, XP and soften up the rest.
3 maces attack 2 cats and a spear and win.
There’s a CG Longbow 1 tile outside Kish which I want to attack but it will leave a Mace exposed to a troublesome War elephant outside Kish leave it for now.
Bombard St Pete’s to 30%.
IBT
LB reinforces Kish
Turn 207, 1470AD
Didn’t write anything down. :hmmm: just attacked Kish again for no losses, bombarded St Petes to 10% and defeat a couple of HA’s outside Orleans with the 3rd stack I’ve been assembling for Yaroslavl.
IBT
Catherine has a couple of LB’s on the way to reinforce Kish but they’ll be too late.
Turn 208, 1480AD
VoK Pike => Treb
Helio Treb => Mace
Paris Ele => Ele
Orleans Barracks => Xbow
Bombay Conf. Temple => Conf. Monastery
Confucian missionary fails in Wen Amon, the Buddhist holy city

Caravel spots grey borders, must be German I’m thinking Bismark coz of the wonders.
Attack Kish win without losses and capture. Gain 20 gold and the Hanging Gardens. Comes with a forge and granary, start it on a library to be whipped when revolt finishes.
Move 3rd stack to Yaroslavl.
Battle for St Pete’s.
Bombard defenses to 0
Send in 2 suicide cats at <9%, both die.
Wen Amon attacks and wins against LB
Mace defeats LB.
Mace defeats LB.
Get a Great General (George Patton)
Mace defeats Axe.
Mace defeats spear.
Capture St Pete’s for 138 gold, has a granary aqueduct and market, start forge.
George Patton settles in Heliopolis.
Lagash whip barracks
Agra whip granary.
IBT
Nothing.
Turn 209, 1490AD
Heliopolis Mace => Mace
Wen Amon Market => forge
Paris Ele => Ele
Yaroslavl gets bombarded to 14%
Elephantine borders expand to marble the turn after 3 workers finished their road

start quarry.
Meet Frederick.
Doesn’t have contact with anybody, Has Fuedalism on us, we have Philosophy and Paper on him. Sell him paper for 70 gold to get him pleased with us and we’re pretty safe in the Liberalism race IMO. Immediately realized I should have just gifted him 40 gold for the +4 fair trade bonus. Goes to pleased and is now willing to sell world map for 60 gold, do so. I don’t see any caravel exploration from his map. He has pretty crappy land but a good score, 1505 against ours at 1991. He’s Jewish. Now he’s pleased I ask for 8 gpt but he refuses

.
Map of his lands. Open at your own risk.
IBT
Capture a spy near Wen Amon.
Turn 210, 1500AD
Gil wants open borders, I agree.
Thebes conf. temple => catapult
VoK Treb => Treb
Memphis Treb => Mace
Heliopolis => Mace => Mace
Paris Ele => Ele
Elephantine Lighthouse => Conf. temple
Lagash Pike => Forge
AP vote comes in, only option is to stop the war against us. Pass.
Move spy into Moscow, defended by an LB and 2 Axemen. Easy pickings. Camp him there for a city revolt mission later.
Battle for Yaroslavl
Bomb to 0
Send in catapult first as it’s cheaper than a treb and will hopefully give the treb better odds next, which fails as it dies without scratching the top defender.
Send in treb, retreats.
Catapult attacks and retreats.
CR1 sword attacks, wins
Send in Pawelo on mop up, wins captures Yaroslavl.
Booty = 134 gold. No buildings. Starts granary.
Pawelo scoots over to St Pete’s to help heal main stack.
Whip Conf. Monastery in Boimbay.
IBT
Russian HA attacks St Pete’s and defeats Mace.
Turn 211, 1510AD
Education done. Divine right selected for now, up for discussion.
Start forge in Agra, should whip it in a few turns when at size 4.
Pawelo finishes off formerly victorious HA at 36/37 XP, but should have use Wen Amon forgot he had morale and leadership.
Check out what Catherine will offer for peace, Drama and 200 gold. We should be able to finish her easily.
Handing over now.
Researchwise I don’t think we have anything to worry about with Liberalism just yet, we’re up Education and Philosophy on everyone, we could research it to within 1 turn but I think we should head towards something more immediately useful.
Thoughts are:
Divine right=>Nationalism =>Gunpowder=>Military Tradition. DR will give us discount on Nationalism research, we can build Spiral Minaret (hopefully Cyrus will build Versailles for us) then Taj Mahal and will eventually get us curassiers.
Or we could head towards Guilds for knights + a discount on gunpowder then to Economics for the Free GM
Or towards Chemistry for Grens.
Not really any tech trades out there.
Cyrus has silver on offer but we’re ok for happiness right now.
I’ve left our 3 stacks active so the next leader can decide if they want to move in on a Russian city this turn.
Once Pheonician is captured Catherine will be lacking a city with Confucianism, Cyrus and Frederick both have 1 city each so we could start a holy war

but that would be overkill I think.
A spy is sitting in Moscow for a city revolt mission if desired, all EPs are going towards Catherine at this stage.
I’ve put a few signs in to irrigate the rice outside Rheims but if you can irrigate through the diagonal on hills then the bottom sign should be moved 2E.
About half my turns we’re spent in no State Religion

and Theocracy, I assumed we’d be in Confucianism and it wasn’t until I saw Frederick had no negatives for heathen religion that I realized we weren’t. My bad.