This is why deity players own anything below. Amazing game have to check your save. I tend to rush and win in the beginning but stall on economy recovery. How did you deal with that? Did you get your economy back up by stalling war? Or just raze most of the cities to keep up with maintenance?
This is why deity players own anything below. Amazing game have to check your save. I tend to rush and win in the beginning but stall on economy recovery. How did you deal with that? Did you get your economy back up by stalling war? Or just raze most of the cities to keep up with maintenance?
Opened the last save and took a closer look at the game. There is no need to go into war mode since there is plenty of good land is available and economy is sustainable at 50%. However, I noticed that 2 AI can tech Feudalism. So I decided to change my war plans and DoW on 2 AI at the same time; HRE (with a small army) and Hanny (with a larger Army since he is closer to learning Feudalism)
Techs: After learning Machinery, the plan is to head to optics and go find the missing AIs. But before that there is the music GA to collect. Then toward Liberalism and liberate Astronomy or I might delay Liberalism to get Steel. It has been a while since using a Mace + cannon army.
NOTE: I intend to chop the forest around cities to build majority of the units required for the upcoming war(s). There is no plan to use the whip to build an army since it is way too overpowered against AI up to Monarch/Emperor level. But that is just a personal preference only. So the war will be declared sometime around 500AD and will see how it go. Also I will force a 10 turn peace deal with Germans and Ottomans by asking for a small tribute prior to declaring war against Hannibal. Then adopt another religion to force HRE to stop being Pleased with me so I can DoW him without feeling like a back stabber. I know I am silly.
Building the Army
4 cities will help in the war effort while others will grow and build other things. The copper city will complete the forge and start on the Mids and the Dye city will just work on growing. The gem city will build the Moai Statue. Most workers will go on chopping duty once Machinery is learned. One or 2 workers will focus on building roads to the Dye city and then to Hannies cities. His Capital is the main target and plan to bring the attacking Army from Copper city. Once we learn or steal Construction all cities will build a cat. (Here is something odd about my Civ4 play; I usually do not mind whipping cats and trebuchets at any level. ).
All good plans and Murphy
Spoiler:
First thing I noticed is that I cannot try to steal a tech from HRE without a spy or 2. So switched captal to build one.
When he is complete he went to HREs iron city. Before that, we learned machinery.
Finally, HRE learns Construction but is not willing to trade it yet. No problem, we have a spy waiting to steal it from HRE. But oh no. Disaster. The spy was captured and eliminated. Grrrr. Good plan but bad RNG. Just roll with it. The second spy is ready ..and he failed and were captured . Oh well Murphys law wins again.
Plan B.
Ok no big deal. We have a choice of learning Construction or wait for trade. We will wait for a trade opportunity to learn Construction since we still need a few more Maces.
In the mean time, we learn
Spoiler:
and start on
And finally Construction is open for trade. So we do some trades.
Forcing peace.
Spoiler:
Now that we are about to start a war, I want o minimize getting dog piled. So I will force a 10 turn peace treaty by begging some gold from the 2 AIs that I intend to not attack first.
Single Stack
Spoiler:
Typically I like to have 2-3 teams attack simultaneously. But 2 things messed up this plan. First the delay in building cats and the second was Hanny founding a city along the path I intended to take toward his capital. My priority is capital and do not want to get bogged in a none essential battle. So it will be a single stack. I see that he has a small stack of his own.
Not a big deal. He also have elephants btw and I am not going to bother with spears though I did build one. Here goes
We move in and his stack move toward our Dye city. Then I moved my stack next to his city and in between turns his stack die attacking my stack. But it was not a major issue since I had a large stack and had plenty of units (by my standard). We capture the city without using the 2 cats but lost a Mace.
In the mean time
Yay..Mids is done, Mids is done. And I forget Representation since the game does not prompt the civic options. Grrrrrrrr.
Second Front
Spoiler:
It is time to go after HRE. I am embarrassed to say I forgot to change my religion so he would not be pleased with me. Oh well, I back stabbed. Cowered.
And moved 2 groups of units into HR Empire. In the mean time in Carthage, I used a collateral promoted cat to lead the attack. Here is the damage. Then used another with collateral promotion
and then captured the city with no other losses.
Then got this trade from Biz
And then again used 2 collateral damage cats and a CR1 cat to attack HREs capital.
The city falls to the small stack there. The war continued for another turn or so before it was time to call it a day,
Notable occurrences, planned buildings and Miscellaneous observations
We completed our first national Wonder; the Moai Statue. I should also consider building the FPalace in Carthage and find a good HE city. Most captured cities will be building the Sacrificial Alters and Forges likely in reverse order.
The two fronts are going well and I will continue the war until the entire continent is under Aztec Rule. I just realized that I should skip learning Education and directly learn Astronomy. Also I am building the Glib in the wrong City. Need to make a few changes and I forgot the MoM and launch the GA with music GA.
You can get some pretty crazy lib techs if you secure a good lead, and then never let go.
Spoiler:
This was also on Prince. Look at the date at the top right, and at the bottom right you can see that I could have easily held off for a lot longer, too.
At the end of last set, the Aztec empire was at war with Holy Roman Empire and Carthage. This set continued the wars and ..well we started more wars and ended some. Also I switched the espionage points from HRE to Germany. This way I will know when he is teching Feudelism.
Ending Wars and Starting others.
Spoiler:
There were only one city left of Hannibals empire and that would fall and eliminate Carthage from the game.
Then it was time to upset Sulei. So we closed our borders and he immediately became annoyed with us. Well then.....you are next grumpy.
Earlier, while we were moving forces to start the war with Ottoman Empire, our caravels found a remote HRE city on a nearby island. So instead of splitting up forces to capture that city, Aztecs sued for peace and get the remote city and Drama. HRE is down to 2 Tundra cities.
What Next?
Spoiler:
Before declaring on Biz, lets see the current situation. It seem that Germany will soon know Feudalism. Unfortunately I do not have an image of what Germany is currently researching. Biz was learning Feudalism and had 7 turns left when the war was declare. So it seem this is a good time to start taking his cities.
Techs
Foreign Advisor
One Last tech trade with Biz
Then we DoW. Oh yeah, this time I had changed the religion before declaring. I know it is cheesy but
This is a typical city attack stack for me. The second stack going after Frankfurt was less than half of this and actually could not capture the city the first turn of attack since I killed the reinforcement coming to aid the city and ended up losing a few units. But eventually the city was ours. BTW, at Emperor level, this could have been a disaster.
German city defenders receive collateral damage after being attacked by a single collateral promoted cat
Here is their status ofter being attacked by the second cat which was CR1 promoted. Note that the culture was quite high, but it does not matter with suicide cats. In this instance, I lost both cats and no Maces. Also had I more cats and used them after the 2nd cat attack instead of using the maces, then I could have lost more cats. It would have been a waste.
The German Cities fall like dominos from here on.
Meanwhile in a more peaceful settings
Spoiler:
Look who we found and he is backwards
We are starting another wonder .which may be obsolete soon. BTW, the capital is about to be done with the Glib.
Then we meet this guys. Same tech situation.
Also we sue for peace to get Theo when Sulie was down to 1 city.
We get a GP and we use him to found a shrine. The choice of shrine was based on which of the 2 major religion cities had more food. More food there are, the better chance to run some extra merchants. Assuming this game last until we have both Banking and Corporation, then this city can build the Wall Street and run several merchants. Each commerce source will get multiplied by 3 if a bank, Market and a Grocer is build in this city. I will assign 2 cities to spread Buddhism.
And once Biz was down to 2 cities, we sue for peace just to get Engineering.
And so ended the Phase 3 of my game plan. Next is economic recovery.
The status of the Empire.
Spoiler:
Economic Recovery Plan
Spoiler:
The easiest way to recover from the economic downturn is to switch to slavery and whip a bunch of CHs and Markets. But I had planned to run a MoM enhanced GA with the Music GA. However, I lost the MoM to Rags. So next set, I will launch that GA and try to get a few GS to bulb Education and PP and then finish Astronomy. During the GA, I will try to get The Taj Mahal build to get the second GA a.s.a.p. Once the both GAs are done, then any needed whipping will be done. Also in between the 2 anticipated GAs The forces will plan and rid our continent of the remaining AI. The technology path will be toward Steel after Astronomy. I will build the FP soon too. That will save about 40-50 gpt.
Side Note: Had this been a hard Emperor Game or Immortal and I am heading for a War type Victory, my tech path would have taken the game toward MT. That is the most efficient way to capture AI cities in harder levels or situations. It is not really needed in this game.
I would have generated about 2 (or 3) more GSs to part bulb Education (or fully with 2nd GS) and part bulb Liberalism before trading/teching Machinery. The tech path would have been to Nationalism after that and get MT as the free tech from Lib.
The Economic Recovery from over expansion or via war can be done in many ways.
Runing a Golden Age to increase commerce,
Building Courthouses to reduce maintanance,
Building Markets to run merchants and boost the commerce gains by 25%,
Building the Forbidden Palace in a distant city and
Building wealth.
Also could plan ahead and use failed gold. it is a bit tricky but with the correct resources, it is better than building wealth with a forge.
I started the process with a Golden Age and built markets and Sacrificial Alters where there were Forges. Else built a forge before the other buildings. Then eventually completed the FP. Several cities that were already grown helped by building wealth. Again most of these buildings could have been hurried with the whip but I selected not to out of habbit. The truth is this game would have been much more advanced had I use the whip.
This is what the process looked like.
Spoiler:
Music GA launching a GA
During this time I hire a bunch of scientists in the capital and a newer city that has been running 2 scientists for about 12 turns. The first GS was born in the Capital and will be used for Education later. He would supply 2271 bulbs right now but i will let that value increase with the population growth in the entire empire.
Starting a very late Hanging Garden
Carthage completes the Forbidden Palace and save over 70 gpt. Not bad and better than I expected.
Finally learn Astronomy.
Finally bulbing Education, notice that the GS will provide slightly higher number of bulbs.
Also notice that the first GA is over and the Taj has 3 more turns to complete. So lets take this break to get mischievious.
2 Turn Wars.
Spoiler:
I have been waiting for the 10 turns of peace to expire to finish off HRE and Sulei. Since there is 3 turns for the Taj to complete and start the second GA, I will use this break to finish them off. All i need is 2 turns to capture the 3 cities.
Next turn they were dead and we are ready for the second GA.
We can draft Maces
Spoiler:
This is my favorite early draft unit. Combine them with cats and these rax and theology enhanced Maces are awsome. I did not need them in this game but have had the need in the past.
I was living the good builders life in this game and here is Notra Dame about to save the day.
Spoiler:
Taj GA
Spoiler:
A few trades, failed spy and last intra-continant war.
Spoiler:
I have been delaying the 2nd German war untill my spy were able to steal Feud. But the espionage luck has not been kind to Aztecs.
So we will trade for it
And finish the Germans and Razed the last city for poor placement.
Wow, you have a ton of farms. Yup but some of them will become workshops once the city gow to it sustainable size. Typically about 16-20 depending on workable tiles
As for the game, I did a late night stint to continue the game and almost regretted it. Oh well, it is a bad idea to drop off cannons on one tile and the knights and maces in another tile.
I will try to get the game done tonight and post the final phase of the game: Winning. Just for the fun of it, I decided to do a Vanilla style conquest. At 20% science rate learning Rifling was a 4 turn distraction from hrading to Democracy to use the 2 GE's sitting around to build the SoL. So I made that detour and had just promoted several CR3 Maces to CR3 Rifles. Conquest should be very fast from this point, with or without, cannons.
Only in post BC cities usually. I am a cottage guy but this map was not very cottage friendly. So I chose the next easy path which is the production based hammer economy.
The best way to go about the hammer economy is to run farms primary and also get math as early as possible and then whip the needed infrastructure. For me it is Granary, Forge, CH and then Lib and Markets. Whipping these is the best way with food tiles/farms.
For most cities this map was not very favorable with regards to the use of whip either. Since Casts System gave me an extra hammer with workshops, i just took the lazy route and did not abuse the spiritual trait of Monti.
But getting back to your question, yes work farms and whip the infrstructure and once the cities grow to the size you want, then convert tiles to workshops is the fastest way to get to a production monster Empire. Oh yeah...you need to turn on food emphisis for those cities in the city screen. Othewise the city governer will start hiring specialists for you. Angry faces are great if you are whipping.
Hmm, so the governor can actually be useful for something besides pissing me off? Who would have thunk it!
Have read about farming first and then workshopping later when the cities are larger, but never tried it myself (tend to cottage a lot). Had a read in the War Academy yesterday about the Hybrid Economy, and unless I read it wrong something similar was stated there - except first grow with farms and then cottage later when you can't run Caste any more due to Emancipation (at least in some cities). Err, WTH? Those cottages will do next to nothing for quite a long while. But doing it to prospective production sites sound a lot more reasonable. Or of course to just farm a lot to run specialists, which was the first stage of that Hybrid economy article.
Hmm, so the governor can actually be useful for something besides pissing me off? Who would have thunk it!
Have read about farming first and then workshopping later when the cities are larger, but never tried it myself (tend to cottage a lot). Had a read in the War Academy yesterday about the Hybrid Economy, and unless I read it wrong something similar was stated there - except first grow with farms and then cottage later when you can't run Caste any more due to Emancipation (at least in some cities). Err, WTH? Those cottages will do next to nothing for quite a long while. But doing it to prospective production sites sound a lot more reasonable. Or of course to just farm a lot to run specialists, which was the first stage of that Hybrid economy article.
Yes, it is much faster, but still takes a lot of turns. Just checked the article again and it was mentioned for WS and Oxford cities, so not as big a deal as it could have been. But for cities like that, I would imagine it's better to cottage earlier than to rely just on specialists. No expert though, just guessing here
Yes, it is much faster, but still takes a lot of turns. Just checked the article again and it was mentioned for WS and Oxford cities, so not as big a deal as it could have been. But for cities like that, I would imagine it's better to cottage earlier than to rely just on specialists. No expert though, just guessing here
W.R.T. Oxford, ususally it is the players capital with an academy and these cottages are started early and get to develop to towns in the early mid game.
I have mixed feeling about the Wall Street though. The wall streets effectiveness is directly related to the science slider. If it is at 100% then a Wallstreet city working cottages is not very productive w.r.t. commerce output since 3 x 0 commerce from cottages is just zero. However, if the slider is at 0%, then while the cottage based Oxford city is not doing anything worthy, the Wallstreet City is extreamly productive.
So normally for me, the science slider will get to at least about 80% and often to 100%with supporting cities building wealth. So my prefered WallStreet City can run 7 merchants with available food as well as any priests under Emancipation and as many merchants under the Casts System. Now all these commerce is getting 3x multiplier. Regardless of what the slider is doing. Also having a shrine in the wallstreet city is just a boon. Last night I accidently triggerd the domination in 16th century in this game by mistakingly keeping a city in the other continent and I did not get to finish the Wall Street. I think I will replay the last save and finish the WallStreet and show what I mean by this.
I have not forgotton this game. I am trying to finsh the current WOTM game with the limited time I have and will play the rest of this game afterward. Very likely tomorrow.
Yeah, those are taken care of. Perhaps Buffy has issues with the multiplayer version of Bug and Bull, as those mods create folders in civ4 bts installation directory...?
In any case I don't want to jack your thread with tech problems. This looks like a fun match and I wanted to see how things panned out
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). 
. Oh well Murphys law wins again.
