.....aaaaaaaaaaaaaand America is dead. I don't know who
for sure killed them, but I have a hunch it'll be a man with lots of feathers in his hat. Also, religions have been spreading like wildfire, but everyone is Hindu. After my neighbors convert to Hinduism, so do I for better relations. All the major powers are Hindu, and the minor powers flip-flop between faiths randomly except for Hatty who sticks with Christianity (which she founded). I was able to settle successfully into Southern China and all the way through Thailand and Indonesia. Japan already has claims on Australia, but that's OK because I have started to spread around religions in cities that are getting culture pressed. I plan on attacking at rifling, and China's Qin is always reluctant to be a civ that techs military as a priority. I have an orphaned crab inside my cultural borders, but I don't care since I'm pressing harder into the mainland with my cities. Despite being originally full of jungle, I knew that with fast workers (quickly becoming my favorite UU), the land would be amazing once developed. I'm using science from religious buildings and organized religion civic to get the most out of my whips to race to rifling. The tech trading is pretty slow between everyone, but I try to speed things up when I can. Basically feels like I'm speed-civing my way through this Monarch campaign lol
Here's a shot of my core territory. Hinduism has been slow to spread, but it's not bad considering I have so many happiness resources. Been slapping missionaries into border cities to make sure I can build cultural buildings; it seems like China is pushing culture. Persia is no threat at all. I plan to sweep counter-clockwise to take out as many civs and get as much land as possible to just snowball my way to domination. It feels good to get back into posting games here, and this has been a fun way to stretch my legs thus far. Eagle-eyed minimap spotters will see that I've also settled a city in the middle of South Africa for the memes.
Someone get the cooks to start frying up some khichdi! We have some draftees to feed! The Globe Theater is placed in my capital because I am clinically insane when playing Monarch (and I want a nice stage to show off my plains cows), and I whip-draft constantly. I also make trebs because I haven't gone to steel and railroads yet, but I plan to zip to there next. They also upgrade fairly cheaply into cannons. I rally two armies at the border of China. Also, the world is more and more Hindu over time. It's a great opportunity to soon beg for gold from "pleased" AIs so that my flanks are secure as I crush the Chinese. I also have built a lot of windmills, which are perhaps my #2 favorite tile improvement not only because they offer food in hilly areas, but they're also pretty fun to watch spin around, which is
way more important than any strategic value a tile improvement could have.
The War of Cow Liberation begins! The southernmost army, the Army of Govinda, surges to Nanjing to free the holdout moo'ers to the north while the northernmost army, the Army of Shiva, beelines for Shanghai and the Chinese capitol city. Tianjin will be picked off by a third force that forms later after it's confirmed that the Indian forces will steamroll northward. In prep for railroads, I am routing my fast workers together and forming them in pairs before putting them in a line through my core territory so they can start building rails as soon as possible. The Army of Govina gets hit with a much larger force than anticipated, but holds out against the archaic Chinese hordes.
The southernmost Chinese cities fall to the waves of Indian riflemen. Sun Tzu DEFECTS to India after discovering the flame for bovine liberation in his heart and hearing the percussion instruments of the Indian armies as they chant their battle hymns. He's put to use making a Super Medic III recon unit for faster healing. I am also rallying troops for a few turns to take Tianjin, whip-drafting them into existence with little happiness penalties via careful timing and plenty of resources.
The Chinese capitol, Beijing, falls within 5 turns of starting the war. The current plan is to take as much as possible without going far into nowhere land. I want to swing back and hit Mongolia, then Persia before they get anywhere near rifling themselves, and I don't have rails to quickly move them back to the Middle East from East Asia. Also, Alexander is behaving rather strangely, and is vassaling-unvassaling a lot to random civs.
Mansa Musa is also one to frequently vassal and un-vassal himself, seemingly always looking for a new master. Also, the English are brainiacs in this game, apparently. We'll see if that pays off for them in the long run.
