PIE's Ancient Mediterranean on Deity

[Manco Capac]

yeah, i knew that, but it seems some animals have double movement in forests so you can still get sniped. Or I'm just not seeing something.

I'm a night owl so I'll be up for a bit, but messing around. You can just play on, but be careful. Honestly, I expect to see a lot of our units die. There is like an animal on every tile literally.

Oh.. I did spot a hut I think 2S1SW of the party. I almost got to it but...you know...bears

Yes, that is true. Unfortunately true. Hyenas, panthers and wolves are those three blessed with hidden woodsanimal promo...whatever it is. Only one that sucks is the wolf for possessing 50% with forest, meaning no defense from forests. At least a hunter with woods2 and 50% for being a spear-bearer will help greatly in our favor. Other animals are evitable...mostly...with luck. Yes, I have once looked into a WB game and the spawning rate is like helling. Almost 6 animals out of a 3x3 square.

PIE wanted land iso, he did it. It is sad that work boats vanish if they try to explore, meaning that even sea is unexplorable!

Oh yes, I'll be careful. Especially the very possibility to get a sentry w2 hunter is tasty.

The hut is definitely a target. We need money.

 

[Manco Capac]

At least once you get double moves you can walk around those Aurochs, but really they are just nonsense.

If only it was a double resource tile ( I wonder if there is a hidden resource 1N of the hilly sheeps...animals cannot move onto hidden resource tiles...I have tried this long ago..by playing as an animal). I'm sure PIE did not know this and did not change this mechanics.

In SGOTM15, it became common knowledge in our team about animals restriction. I vaguely suspected this before and suddenly DanF confirmed this.

What makes me fear is that Auroch decides to move into that thin passage and trap our warriors. What I'll do is obviously our our strongest on the forest and the barb one on the hill. That would lead the animal to charge the weakest and allow me to escape with woodsman ability. Kind of fun tactics that doesn't arrive often in regular BTS. Anyways, before settlers arrive, sadly, we have plenty of hammers to make expendable warriors.

 

[Manco Capac]

Nice. We got 8 dense forests (an exact +2 ) and 3 normal forests (1.5 ). One more and we get max from features, that is +4. And the growth goes up to 7 pop with adequate happiness.

Given the dearth of neighbours, when we'll get access to settler, we should make lots of overlapping to create a strong commerce basis. We need to keep up in tech against those super handicapped AI's.

 

[Manco Capac]

I see. Research is a good idea because I realize the unit cost makes us no profit while 0% science. Stagnation!!! Ah if only we got slaves. Each slave can value 10 to 40 !

 

[Manco Capac]

Stupid Ur_anuses!!!

Spoiler :

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Gotta like to know extensively the AI...that animal lacks courage to attack the weaker first!!!

Spoiler :

 

[Manco Capac]

Funny. That hut wasn't there initially!

 

[lymond]

So it looks like little area is not so safe. It may be good to settle an early city over there somewhere. Horse, sheep and stuff. I thought I made a horse sign..

 

[Manco Capac]

We can't settle until internal colonization, which is soooo far.

 

[lymond]

I forget, so our cities can't produce those emigrants until then?

You know, you should post a note in Pie's thread about this game as well.

 

[Manco Capac]

Third turnset - Tachywaxon bad luck persists...but!​

We could escaped the terrific auroch by sacrifing the barb warrior. It went badly for the ultimate squad, but we at least one AI contact. It is just sad that AI seems inclosed within mountains and is one of the worst. I know him, a good techer!!! He even got the Palace built like 30 turns before we can even start it!!!
That lastmanstanding woods2 warrior should remain there until, I dunno, workers arrive. If not, prepare the way for the next squad. We shall attack him. Why? He is useless. He won't get tech trading for a long moment.

Spoiler :

 

[Manco Capac]

I forget, so our cities can't produce those emigrants until then?

You know, you should post a note in Pie's thread about this game as well.

Exhausted?

 

[Manco Capac]

One thing pretty bad is the sheer lack of hills. That means few ores.

 

[lymond]

Nice stuff. I'll have a closer look tomorrow. At least we met someone. Lydian slaves! yes!

 

[Manco Capac]

Just a reminder that we got AggAI, which means if we threaten their cities but not them, then our peace deal is 3 times stronger, that is a chance to make peace. Anyways, it's not we're afraid with 200% defense warriors and the distance.

 

[lymond]

Okay..so I played some more this morning before work. I stopped a bit short of 30t as I just navigated 2 Lydians slaves back home this turn. I wanted your input on what best to do with them. Looks like we are missing the "palace/temple staff" options as I think another tech opens that up. Maybe Slavery.

Our healing warrior was greeted by 2 Lydian workers on the border. He bid them a good day and then proceeded to indoctrinate them into a lifetime of glorious Celtic slave labor (that Lydian warrior had like .03 health so no retaliation):

Spoiler :

I made peace with Creosus some turns later while navigating back home after finishing healing right there next to his border on the original spot where I picked up. Little worried about animals popping up but none did.

In fact, as maze-y as it was traversing home, it actually went smoothly with Woody always peaking out first. Actually very few animals were present for some reason. A deer and a bear but I avoided the bear easily. Always ending on regular forest in case of sniping.

Priesthood arrived quickly but I waited for the pop growth (we killed a bear for a little extra food as well) and then switched to:

edit: I just realized I didn't have the cursor positioned, but I think you know we are now in High Priests. Little boys beware. +1 happy and faster unit production.

Spoiler :

This was a rather nice event. I forget what the middle one does and often it is usually best, but extra food is always nice:

Spoiler :

And yeah, I did create another camp. maybe that really was not a good idea, but I figured I'd get some more money somehow. Money ran out and after 2 Hunters and 3 warriors the maintenance was really bad. We dropped low into Tax danger, but each turn I raise the slider back up to a safe point and it seems to prevent revolts.

I let some bear kill 2 warriors and that helped out some. then a hunter killed the bear

Here's our city now:

Spoiler :

And Creosus still open borders:

Spoiler :

With that being the case we can send our little party down to him and have some fun or scout further east.

The party is on its way. No issue but there is a bear 2 tiles West somewhere I saw on the last move.

Too bad all our men aren't at least Woody 2 but there is just so much death and destruction in the wilds. Woody can keep them safe for now by scouting. I want to start naming our guys, but they will just die anyway. Maybe when we get buffer units. Hunters can become spears and then they are quite strong.

 

[Manco Capac]

I am impressed! You managed to get those two back to home without a scratch. Nice, this is a huge advantage for us. Kudos.

I lean towards rushing the Palace at once, but I also think we should settled one as a field slave (2 and GEngineer points and the very possibility to get a free slave 5% a turn). The downside of a settled slave is -1 happy, but the Palace is +1 happy. We could settle as another form of settled slave, but each one involves -1, which makes +2 overpowered and the other options underpowered...still because classic slavery civic is terribly weakened compared from what we are used on BTS, finally food is not as strong as it was.

Each turn of slaves standing is a risk that it becomes an insurgent. I don't think it is going to be dangerous for the city (5 vs our >6 warrior), but it would be sad to lose one early. Sadly, killed insurgent doesn't give back the slave, only killed from an offensive.

So basically 1 slave for rushing the Palace and 1 for settling. I wished to settle right now, but that would lead to a revolt because of unhappiness (Palace will take a lil while before being completed).

 

[lymond]

Rushing sounds good. I did not thing settling caused unhappiness.

 

[lymond]

Oh yeah, I was real lucky on the way home. I stalled a couple turns in the middle there just waiting for a bear to go in some direction away, but otherwise clear sailing. The part I was really worried about was waiting for the Warrior to finish healing back at Lydia. Healing takes forever.

Curious if you know this: With medic dudes like our Druid. They always start with medic I. The pedia shows availability of like 5 more medic promos. How in the world do they ever get those promos?

Interesting that civs have many unique units of various standard types but often they don't have unique or special bonuses.

 

[Manco Capac]

Rushing sounds good. I did not thing settling caused unhappiness.

It is not the settled slave that causes the unhappiness, it's the slave center automatically built (like a building) that causes it. And also the the generation of slaves at 5% odd each. Good grief, in the past, that was worse, something like -2 unhappiness. Of course, PIE did this to lower a bit the strength of slavery, but it is nothing compared to the benefits brought.

If the sole field slave dies, the slave trade center will go away with the slave. It is how it works.

I have reflected upon the case about settling as a field slave. It is indeed the strongest case, but also a killer in food. There is almost no food negative tiles and we are inexorably growing towards unhappiness. That is frightening. But also, an early GEngineer is extremely strong early. Hammers are the strongest to me without whipping. Other kinds of GPeople are a GScientist (hard to get too since we are forbidden to build a lib, school, but at least we got the A. Observatory when we have enough provinces) from a mine slave and a GMerchant from the last type of settled slave. I don't say those are weak, far from it! Capital natural early modifiers (50% on all three types of modifiers!) will only work on hammers you see! But the good aspect of other types of slaves is their capacity to refrain the growth a bit. Still, I think I'll for the classical GEngineer because nothing beats it. I tend to forget the other side of GEngineers, but not only 8 (so abusively strong!) but also 2 ! Meaning with the modifiers that making research will almost give the same output as a GScientist, but a GEngineer is far more flexible. Like for easy wonder building (stone, whare are you!?).

 

[Manco Capac]

BTW, I glad I have you for this succ. game. You are quite a strong player and compared to the usual casual player from PIE's thread, you understand the gibberish I say! Until now, all your decisions made are strong, almost perfect. Only flaw is to restrain a bit the improvement construction. We got too much food now. But I hope we'll get lucky and get a 1/10000 chance for another deer or a needed early fur. Yes, in PAE most improvements give a RNG to pop resources, meaning a so-so city can become strong out of luck. Better is to get rare resources like a grain one. Rye, Millet and Oats are the rarest to come by. When I see a greenish yellowish wheat bonus, I know I have hit a rare resource (Oats) just like the reddish wheat (Rye).

Don't be afraid to let out ideas! This game offers different strategies than the original and I haven't seen everything yet.