Post a (tough) Deity map for me to play

[Pedro78]

Awesome write-up, @Kaitzilla

I got a couple of remarks/questions :

Spoiler :

• Going for Pottery this early, did you ever work the lake tile?
• The AI can't plot war with just chariots (needs 2 units strictly better than the Archer), so you were safe until GK got metal or HBR
• IIRC, barbs only start entering borders when the average number of player cities is superior to three, so basically when every AI in the world has 3 cities and some start settling their 4th one (because you won't have 3 cities at this point anyway)

• Boom, stole the Wheat.
  This caused -3 Border Tensions diplo the following turn 65 when the Land Target kicked in.

  I only see -1 border tensions, is there some hidden diplo modifier tied with the LandTarget status?

Looking at your diplo situation, seeing that you secured copper and that GK's cities are flatland, your game should be winnable
Not sure if it's worth it to wait for Construction, it's probably better to go all-out with Axes right now. A shame that GK got walls so early. Grinding him down without siege will take some time, but going for Construction would take ages and you'd have to fight a defensive war in the meantime anyway. After you're done with him, recovery will be easy as you're financial. (Assuming that you can keep JC off your butt).

Anyways, I'll be watching, good luck!

Btw @Lain good job on the Sury map, what you had to go through in the early game would've made me rage-quit a dozen times

 

[krikav]

@Lain Nice shoutout about GT!
It's a incredibly wonderful national wonder. I made some use of it myself in the NC Ramesses game.

 

[krikav]

For the very interested:
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/optimising-the-globe-theatre-draft-city.301733/
https://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/strategy/military/drafting-for-fun-and-profit/

 

[AcaMetis]

Very interesting game so far @Kaitzilla .

 

[Kaitzilla]

@Kaitzilla

hey very nice to see you give the Willem Map a try. I personally thought it was a very tricky map.
Also a very interesting write up. Pretty enjoyable to read. Curious to see your approach.

Spoiler :

Interesting to see that you managed to secure copper. Maybe that will help you later. But the city is also quite far away from the rest of your empire and will be a bit exposed.I did not manage to grab any metal and also got boxed in a bit more, since i did not settle the gems. Did settle the cows in the north though. Later got an early IW and settled and cottaged the river to the west with the banana.

Would probably have been a good idea to settle uhtrecht in your location, but i wanted to make 2 cities out of the available land in the southwest, and got beaten to the gems by Genghis Khan. Bascially i did not want to settle this place just for another cow, and had to wait till IW to finally make it a bit more useful when it could improve the gems.

Not only you have to play vs 2 of the most dangerous civs, but your starting land is so poor, all you have is the cow. Going AH just for the cow is also quite an investment. Lots of calender resources, but these will not be very helpful until later in the game. Then the very close jungle ring that will make it difficult to secure good early cities.

Also did gift a city to Genghis Khan which slowed me down. Went for Astronomy, played the early game very peaceful and decided to make a very late attack with canons and maceman and Muscetmans. But it failed, the A.I. which i attacked got rifling 1 Turn after my attack. Then even hilldefense 2 promotion on my muscets could not save my stack. Maybe a bit unlucky, but pretty sure i could have attacked some turns sooner with better and cleaner play.

Comments spoilered below.

Spoiler :

Ya, the Copper city is all by itself in a dangerous spot strategically.
It could have turtled up nicely against Archers and Chariots, but Genghis of course had to get Iron, so it will likely die hard later in a real war.

I too am doing a gift city in about 2 turns on T71 in the jungle to my west.
Not sure if it will give the full +4 trade relations this far into the game (It shrinks to +3, later +2, and much later +1 as the relative value of a city gift shrinks), but I'm hopeful Genghis can improve all that jungle for me.

Crowded Deity is extremely hard with warmongers, and usually becomes impossible if you get a pre-2000BC war declaration.
The usual tactic of avoiding settling cities where you become a Land Target with a nutjob doesn't apply when the map is so crowded early and the player civ is cultural.

Awesome write-up, @Kaitzilla

I got a couple of remarks/questions :

Spoiler :

• Going for Pottery this early, did you ever work the lake tile?
• The AI can't plot war with just chariots (needs 2 units strictly better than the Archer), so you were safe until GK got metal or HBR
• IIRC, barbs only start entering borders when the average number of player cities is superior to three, so basically when every AI in the world has 3 cities and some start settling their 4th one (because you won't have 3 cities at this point anyway)
• 
  I only see -1 border tensions, is there some hidden diplo modifier tied with the LandTarget status?

Looking at your diplo situation, seeing that you secured copper and that GK's cities are flatland, your game should be winnable
Not sure if it's worth it to wait for Construction, it's probably better to go all-out with Axes right now. A shame that GK got walls so early. Grinding him down without siege will take some time, but going for Construction would take ages and you'd have to fight a defensive war in the meantime anyway. After you're done with him, recovery will be easy as you're financial. (Assuming that you can keep JC off your butt).

Anyways, I'll be watching, good luck!

Btw @Lain good job on the Sury map, what you had to go through in the early game would've made me rage-quit a dozen times

Comments spoilered below.

Spoiler :

Yes, I did work the lake tile a few times.
Will work it a bunch more to squeeze out Alphabet, and then even more once I get Lighthouse.

I was safe when GK had Chariots?
Wow, I didn't know that, thanks Pedro78.
I'll test that later in a test game if I get some time, thanks

Yes, the player having only 1 city means a few AI need 4 cities to get the world average over 3.
Lemming barbs that rush the player cities at that point are very stressful and deadly in large enough numbers.

Yes, LandTarget status instantly fulfills 40% of the full "Our Close Borders Spark Tensions" diplo penalty. (which ranges from -1 for nice civs up to -4 for angry civs)
I guess it takes 1 turn for my diplo to go from -1 to -3 because the human border pop happens after the AI and right before the player turn starts?
Anyway, I'm playing with fire by becoming a LandStatus target on Turn 65 all for some Copper.

Spoiler :

Turn 65


Turn 64

I'd love to blitz Genghis with Axes, but all his 3 main cities that produce his army in the south all have Walls thanks to settling on Stone.
I just don't have the production to do anything but steal 1 city somewhere, and the Genghis counter-attack would make me lose more than I gain.
The strategic situation changes when I get Construction of course.

Very interesting game so far @Kaitzilla .

Thanks!

Spoiler :

I keep waiting for the hammer to fall with Deity Genghis being so close.
Rome went for his other neighbor and I keep getting lucky with Genghis rolling 2% chance for war each turn once he got Iron hooked up and a Sword produced.
Perhaps the chance is higher than 2% each turn to plot war when the option "Aggressive AI" is enabled which is the setting I always play on?
Will keep trying.

 

[AcaMetis]

@Kaitzilla

Spoiler :

I couldn't quote you any numbers or explain exactly how Aggressive AI changes AI behaviour. But in terms of "an Aggressive AI GK is more likely to DoW me after I settle a Creative city literally right in the middle of him", I have to assume so.

 

[Kaitzilla]

@Kaitzilla

Spoiler :

I couldn't quote you any numbers or explain exactly how Aggressive AI changes AI behaviour. But in terms of "an Aggressive AI GK is more likely to DoW me after I settle a Creative city literally right in the middle of him", I have to assume so.

Hehe, no doubt.

Spoiler :

I'm #1 on his hit list in the first pass through a Total War check with a huge value due to border tiles and a close capital.
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/sgotm-07-smurkz.271903/page-20#post-6806299

Need to get Ghenghis to Pleased to have a chance for peace (90% nowarprob) and get Ghenghis Annoyed with someone else, or better yet bribe him to attack Justinian once I have Alphabet.
Hopefully he doesn't start plotting war before Alpha because then I can't bribe him anymore.

 

[Olafeson]

Ah okay got my library to +4 culture already 800 A.D. So it is not as late as i thought actually.

 

[unas876]

@Kaitzilla

Spoiler :

I've asked this on the forums before, but if Justinian isn't the best AI, who is? Where is the official HoF players ranking for AI?

 

[krikav]

@Kaitzilla

Spoiler :

I've asked this on the forums before, but if Justinian isn't the best AI, who is? Where is the official HoF players ranking for AI?

Very difficult to judge, but there have been alot of AI vs AI tournaments.
http://www.sullla.com/civ4survivorindex.html for example.

It depends alot on the type of settings. But in general AIs do well if they get alot of land (Some AIs do have personalities that make them waste even good land though, Toku is a infamous example).
The Imperialistic trait are therefor very good in AI hands.

But IMHO, the "best" AIs are the one which I enjoy seeing in my games, and that the ones with strong personalities such as monty, isabella, shaka...
If by "best" we talk about the ones who pose largest challenges for me to win, Justaintin are high up.

 

[Kaitzilla]

@Kaitzilla

Spoiler :

I've asked this on the forums before, but if Justinian isn't the best AI, who is? Where is the official HoF players ranking for AI?

There is debate about this of course, but amateur and exhaustive AI vs. AI testing indicates that Justinian of Byzantium and Zara Yacob of Ethiopia are the two AI most likely to win the game if left to their own devices.
Sulla's delightful AI tournament.
http://www.sullla.com/Civ4/survivor14.html

A truly exhaustive and amazing effort was conducted Keler by in the past.
https://forums.civfanatics.com/thre...eaders-tournement.551932/page-6#post-14354991

b) OVERALL Result
Sum of points obtained by each leader in each tournament.Basically this information is the same as the overall result given in tournament 60 with added average information.

Overall Ranking Leaders Overall Points
1 Justinian I 1221,95
2 Zara Yaqob 1116,41
3 Gilgamesh 997,27
4 Catherina 987,37
5 Suleiman 961,88
6 Willem van Oranje 931,06
7 Pericles 914,92
8 Pacal II 914,51
9 Saladin 856,98
10 Mansa Musa 850,48
11 Huayna Capac 825,76
12 Qin Shi Huang 823,06
13 Joao II 809,17
14 Hannibal 798,17
15 Cyrus 798,06
16 Kublai Khan 754,44
17 Asoka 745,52
18 Ramesses II 707,50
19 Peter 706,66
20 Julius Caesar 702,48
21 Suryavarman II 700,49
22 Churchill 670,81
23 Charlemagne 629,41
24 Gandhi 625,94
"" AVERAGE 618,90
25 Augustus Caesar 601,88
26 Louis XIV 577,37
27 Hatshepsut 563,07
28 Bismarck 559,13
29 Boudica 546,86
30 Victoria 534,58
31 Wang Kon 523,26
32 Isabella 510,27
33 Mao Zedong 508,08
34 Hammurabi 500,58
35 Brennus 462,09
36 Darius I 456,04
37 Washington 449,15
38 De Gaulle 447,91
39 Elizabeth 440,72
40 Roosevelt 430,72
41 Ragnar 409,84
42 Mehmed II 409,24
43 Lincoln 402,01
44 Frederick 361,17
45 Genghis Khan 360,36
46 Sitting Bull 335,87
47 Stalin 319,55
48 Alexander 313,45
49 Napoleon 301,86
50 Shaka 279,63
51 Tokugawa 269,45
52 Montezuma 258,41

Here,overall ranking average may not reflect well with their points average. Therefore I adjusted and put traits in overall result.

The AI vs. AI idea was also explored here.
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/ai-tournament-season-3.518303/

A mod here.
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/modcomp-aiautoplay.174812/

 

[ArchGhost]

An interesting point that Sullla brought in one of the later tourneys (where there were seeds for the previous winners) is that the better AIs can crush a field of inferiors much more easily than a weaker AI in a field of inferiors. Similarly, a match full of the less-stellar performers can be remarkably even (and will usually favor aggression) for a long time, while a match full of powerful AIs settles out earlier (with 1-2 leaders and no chance for anybody else for the rest of the game). The better AIs not only are able to contend with each other better as would be expected, but also win harder. It's one of the things that set an "okay" good AI like Caesar or Cyrus, and an "exceptional" good AI like Justin apart.

There is always the random playout of the game to consider too. In one of them I think Gandhi ended up becoming a juggernaut warmonger that rolled the field because somebody attacked him with too little, steered him into war techs with his good tech rate, and he ended up dominating with superior tier military. He's barely around average according to the ranking but events in-game prompted a huge upset where he was expected to die first or second.

 

[Kaitzilla]

Write up Part 3

Continued from Part 2

*SPOILER ALERT for the Willem Map that AcaMetis provided*

Spoiler :

Turn 84 - 775BC

Spoiler :

Finally decided on tech trades.
Mainly it involved calculating the tech values and seeing what the human player needs the most.
Sailing is great but isn't vital for me.
I'm not ready for expensive Lighthouses for extra food and already have trade routes.
Best is to study the AI's 'Can Research' column to figure out every tech the AI has.
Note here that Justinian is in the lead with Metal Casting, Monarchy, and all the minor religious techs.
Julius has Meditation and Priesthood.
Genghis has no religious techs.

Spoiler :

Traded Writing and Pottery to Genghis for Masonry because that is the best I could get and I don't want Julius to finish Alpha in 1 turn and trade Writing to Genghis.
Strike while the iron is hot I say.
Also gifted Julius Alphabet since he was 1 turn away from finishing it.
Both civs quickly go to "We Fear You Are Becoming Too Advanced" after seeing me receive 7 techs from trades on Deity, but I plan on being Friendly with Rome and attacking Genghis so only the short term matters here.

Turn 85 - 750BC

Spoiler :

Sweet, Genghis will take Alphabet in trade.
He will Not DOW Justinian for Alpha.
Traded Alpha for Iron Working + Hunting.

Spoiler :

NO IRON
I am forsaken, dead last in power rating with no swords.

Spoiler :

Mmm, I'm getting a bad feeling with Genghis again now that my Alphabet gamble failed to get him into war.
Genghis has Horse Archers now! His unique unit that ignores terrain the Keshik
He is still rolling every turn to bite my head off, but I'm lucky so far.
I should get to +3 total relation on T86 due to Open Borders going to +1 which might get me to Pleased, but then my new 5th city on T87 will put Border Tensions back to -4 and reset me back down to +2 total diplo. (Cautious)
Will be stuck at Cautious with Genghis until well past Turn 100 if I keep Copper city.

I can beg a tiny tech now since I'm a LandTarget tripling my beg amount.
Say most of Mysticism, or less than half of Priesthood.
Actually, that only works at Pleased.
What Power Ratio do I have to be to not have a Demand automatically rejected?
Is it half as strong as the AI? 0.5?

The tech plan seems easy enough.
Get a Great Scientist while teching Mysticism->Polytheism
Trade Poly to Genghis for Sailing.
Trade Poly to Julius for Priesthood.
Tech Code of Laws.
Trade Code of Laws for Math so I don't bulb Math.
Bulb Philosophy.
Get Construction.

Both Rome and Mongols tech military a lot, so that means they should both go for Math and Construction.

How do I survive 25 turns against Mongols?
Hold onto Mysticism and hope Genghis demands it from me for +1 diplo and 10 turns of peace?
Whip unlimited amounts of Axes, Spears, and turtle up behind Walls?

My next Settler will probably go for a (Liberate) up near Rome so I can get +5 diplo with Julius as I attempt to get him Friendly.
I'm thinking on top of the horse so I can whip a few Chariots before the gift.

Code of Laws -> Philo bulb not only lets me trade my way to Elepault, it also gives me a religious capital so I can start occasionally stealing techs due to having good modifiers.

=================

T86 - 725BC

Spoiler :

Genghis adopted Bhuddism due to a lucky spread. Everyone is now Buddhist except me.
Cities that have 1 unhappy citizen are good at making Settlers and Workers.
Unhappy citizens consume no when making settlers and workers, so production stays high
Should really be 4 hammers per turn, but it is 6.

T88 - 675BC

Spoiler :

Founded my 5th city in the northern jungle, a hot mess.
With 3 elephants, I should control the whole continent's supply except for the one near Genghis' capital.
Will eat up a LOT of worker turns to improve.

T91 - 600BC

Spoiler :

Finally completed Gems, my 1st happy resource.

T93 - 550BC

Spoiler :

Max reseach for my empire.
If Genghis is going to be nice to me, might as well rush for a game changer tech.
Running 2 Scientists in my capital should get Great Scientist on T110.
Every city built since I have Alphabet.

I was wrong about Justinian founding Judaism.
Our continent only has Buddhism.

T94 - 525BC

Spoiler :

Got Polytheism.
Traded it to Rome for Priesthood.
Putting a turn into Sailing for the trade next turn.
Gifted Genghis Mysticism for the trade next turn.

T95 - 500BC

Spoiler :

Gift City to Rome can't settle on Horses.
Moved towards the city ruins to the west.
If I settle there, I can squeeze in 1 more city 3S of there later.

Traded Polytheism to Genghis for Sailing.
Time to chop some Lighthouses.

Thoughts

Spoiler :

Genghis still not plotting anything.
Justinian is strangely incapable of teching Alphabet.
Should I trade Alpha to him for 10 turns of Peace?
Wait, what if he then uses his new tech trading ability and bribes Genghis to DOW me for Metal Casting + a bunch of other stuff?
Genghis is not interested in attacking Rome when I ask, only Justinian. (and presumably me)
....
Wait!
What if Justinian techs Alphabet himself?
The first I might know about it is Genghis DOW'ing me!!

Bah, there's nothing I can do about it right now.
Been living with the Genghis threat for 45 turns now anyway.

T97 - 450BC

Spoiler :

Someone built Hanging Gardens.
Gifted a city to Julius of Rome for +1 Liberation bonus and +3 Fair Trade.
Up to +10 relations now!

Hooked up Elephants too with all 3 empire workers.
Now I've got 2 sources of happiness.
Elephants aren't too bad when they are riverside with Financial trait.

T98 - 425BC

Spoiler :

Great Scientist in capital still on track for T110.
Traded Elephant to Julius for Cow.
"Appreciate the years of resources" bonus now building up twice as fast with 2 resources in trade.

T101 - 350BC

Spoiler :

Justinian is the 2nd most Advanced Civ in the world.
I'm almost last.
Everyone has Mathematics and are willing to trade it.
A popular tech for AI to get after Alphabet.

T102 - 325BC

Spoiler :

Genghis the wimp finally teched something, Currency.
Priesthood sold for 55 gold!
Elephant City is coming along nicely.

T104 - 275BC

Spoiler :

An extra Settler was produced to turn off the Justinian war without sacrificing a large tech.
When it gets razed to the ground because it is Size 1, that will be another -2 diplo penalty that Justinian will feel towards the offender.

T105 - 250BC

Spoiler :

Code of Laws is mine!
Traded it to Genghis to DOW Justinian.
Everyone on my continent is now at war with distant Justinian, and I am now SAFE
Oddly enough, I can't direct him to attack a specific city unless I've actually seen it with a unit or map trade.

Spoiler :

Traded Code of Laws to Julius for Math.
I'm now dangerously close to "We Fear You Are Becoming Too Advanced" with both Julius and Genghis.
1 or 2 more techs will put me over the limit and they will both stop trading with me.

So I'll need to self tech Meditation while waiting until T110 to bulb Philosophy.
Then I will trade it to Genghis for a whole bunch of techs all at once.

Julius is at +10 relations and will soon be Friendly with me and trading me monopoly techs.

Time to tech Meditation, bulb Philosophy, push for Construction, trade for Horseback Riding, and unleash the Elephants and Catapults on Genghis's Pyramid city while his army is up north.
Time to attack, before Longbows appear!

Spoiler :

Continued in Part 4

 

[Kaitzilla]

Write up Part 4

Continued from Part 3

*SPOILER ALERT for the Willem Map that AcaMetis provided*

Spoiler :

T106 - 225BC
Someone far away built Mausoleum of M.
Fast teching to get Calendar so quickly.
Maybe there is a 2nd large continent with all the rest of the AI on it?

Thoughts

Spoiler :

So I want to backstab Genghis as hard as possible once he sends a large army north to pound on Justinian.
It won't happen for around 20 turns, so I hope it is a long war and that Genghis just doesn't sit at home, build up a big army, and sign a Cease Fire in 10 turns.
I've seen that happen a time or two.

Right now Genghis has 8 cities (5 in improved jungle) with 35 population and only 1 city on a hill.
Worse, Genghis has Pyramids and Police State for +25% military production!

I have 5 cities with 16 population and 1 forest to chop.

As the attacker I will have an advantage of pooling 1 very large army and attacking in 2 or 3 places where Genghis is the weakest.
My best move right now is to scout all his cities, make notes of what troops he has, and then follow Genghis' army up north and keep an eye on it with a Warrior.

A fast war to gobble up Workers and of couple of cities will let me sign a Cease Fire or Peace Treaty and heal up and digest my gains.
I don't think it is a good idea to try and eat all of Deity Genghis with 1 war.

Also, flipping Genghis into Caste is a bit expensive, but it might pay off if he can't whip for 5 turns.

T107 - 200BC

Spoiler :

Plot Culture.
Knowing how in works lets you plan ahead because you know if you will control a tile in the future or not.

A built a fast Library in my bronze city (The Hague) not only to reach 100 culture fast and get 40% defenses, but also to harass the surround 3 cities.
Since I reached 100 culture before two of Genghis' cities reached 10 culture, I was able to start planting +25 plot culture per turn on Geghis' inner city ring.
Then when he reached 10 culture, he started putting +22 plot culture per turn on his inner ring.
In conclusion, I can attack 2 of Genghis' cities on T0 of the coming war! (3 if I count the gift city west of my capital)
I will forever maintain that 55%/44% edge and maintain control of those inner ring tiles because I got 2 borders pops before Genghis got 1 border pop.
Genghis would have to reach 100 culture to push me away from his inner rings like that Pyramid city to the south did.
The power of Willem with cheap Libraries.

T108 - 175BC

Spoiler :

Renegotiated my trade deals with Rome.
Traded Elephants for Sugar. (That's 3 happy resources now)

Ugh, Genghis has 80 gold I can beg.
3 more turns until Open Borders reaches +2 and I hopefully get to Pleased.
I don't have enough power rating compared to Genghis to make a Demand.

The Mongol army is streaming north! Woohoo
May they charge forth and die.

More Thoughts

Spoiler :

Now that my Settler is in position, I must ponder what to do with it.
If I give it to Justinian for a peace treaty, I can trade Code of Laws for Monarchy. (Anything given for a peace treaty does not trigger -4 diplomacy "You have traded with our Worst Enemies!")
Metal Casting is a monopoly tech and won't be up for trade.
Or, I could (Liberate) the city to Rome.
This time it would give an additional +2 diplo because I already Liberated one city earlier for +1.5 diplo and it rounded down.
That might be the best option, let me count tiles.
........
..
...................
It is 10 tiles from Rome's capital. (diagonal tiles count as 1.5 tiles)
It is 13 tiles from my capital.
It is 17 tiles from Mongol's capital (rounded down from 17.5)
It is ???? tiles from Justinian of the Byzantines capital.
Mmm, my last city gift liberated to Rome just fine, so this one probably will too.

I'm leaning on gifting the city to Rome again.
That +2 diplo will be a huge help, and getting to Friendly now rather than T116 due to resource trading or T118 due to open borders means I can turn off Rome's war with Justinian.
Friendly Rome won't plot war with me during peaceful times.
In addition, the long shared Buddhism means Justinian will be at +0 (Cautious) with Rome, and Rome will be at -1 (Cautious) with Justinian.
The following turn, the Worst Enemy tag will vanish and I can safely trade with Justinian for his Monarchy.

Since the city gift will go to Rome instead of Justinian, I need to trade Justinian Code of Laws for a peace treaty.
So Philosophy for Monarchy later.
But wait, don't I have -5 relations with Justinian after the war?
With Rome being +0 because their war ended, that means I'm at 'Annoyed' and am Justinian's 'Worst Enemy' right?
Nope, Justinian will be at war with the Mongols, who will take the Worst Enemy tag and let me trade with Justinian.

No reason to give Rome a free city right now.
Will wait 2 turns.

T109 - 150BC

Spoiler :

Great Spy born in the Mongol's capital!
The AP has been built and united all the world's Hindu's on a different continent.
I don't have to worry about it at all.
The AP religion has to spread to every civ in the whole world before Diplomatic Victory is enabled.

Whipped a 4th Worker for my empire since Calendar resources coming soon.

Justinian and Genghis both now have Construction.

T110 - 125BC

Spoiler :

Meditation is mine.
Great Scientist was born in my capital!
Bulbed Philosophy.
Taoism founded in my bronze city The Hague. (aww, was hoping for Elephant city)
Will send the missionary to the gift city west of my capital for future border popping and spy activities.
The 5 Genghis cities that don't have Buddhism should now start getting Tao spreads.

Spoiler :

Founded Gift City #2 and (Liberated) it to Rome for +2 more diplo.
Rome now has a guaranteed source of Elephants for themselves on my border.

Spoiler :

Made a Peace Treaty with Justinian for Code of Laws.
The long war is over and my shared war diplo bonus went back down to +3 with Rome because we no longer share an active war.
Amusingly, all 3 AI got Construction and not one of them was willing to trade it to me.
But now I'm +12 Friendly with Rome and he will trade me Construction.

Spoiler :

T111 - 100BC

Spoiler :

Trading day with Philosophy.
First up is Julius, who is putting quite the price on a Cease Fire with Justinian.
I'm about 300 beakers short of getting Peace + Construction + Calendar.

Spoiler :

If I make any trade at all this turn with Justinian, I'll get diplo penalties with Rome for trading with his worst enemy.
If I make a trade with Rome first, then Genghis will say I'm "becoming too advanced"
The Tech Situation:

Spoiler :

Gave it a ton of thought, and trade Philosophy to Genghis for Horseback Riding, 100 gold, Archer, and Monotheism.
Traded Philosophy to Julius for Construction + Cease Fire with Justinian.
I have to hope Rome does not trade Philosophy to Justinian for Monarchy.
Will trade with Justinian next turn when the "worst enemy" wears off.

Spoiler :

And look at that.
Now that Rome isn't busy, he is willing to DOW Genghis or Justinian for the right price.
Hopefully he doesn't start plotting war against Justinian again the very next turn.
I've seen it happen before.
Buying a stop to a war between 2 AI is a CEASE FIRE, not a 10 Turn Peace Treaty.

Spoiler :

T112 - 75BC

Spoiler :

Haha, I don't believe it.
I am Justinian's worst enemy with -5 relations.
Not Genghis, who is at war with Justinian.
They share a religion, so Genghis is -3 with Justinian.

I guess I'll just wait some turns for "This war spoils our relationship" to build towards -8, but I'm not sure how long that will take.

T113 - 50BC

Spoiler :

Genghis and Julius now have Monarchy too.
Will put 90% slider on Genghis to take a peek at his tech, but it is probably Feudalism since his flavor is Military (High).

Spoiler :

T114 - 25BC

Spoiler :

Damn, 13 turns until Genghis has Feudalism!
Not the end of the world since he only has 1 hilltop city, but what a pain.

He has large amounts of units on the west coast slowly moving north.
I hope they actually head up there or my war plans are shot.
Lots of jungle cities I could attack hmm.

Spoiler :

Continued in Part 5

 

[Kaitzilla]

Write up Part 5

Continued from part 4

*SPOILER ALERT for the Willem Map that AcaMetis provided*

Spoiler :

T116 - 25AD

Spoiler :

Ok, deep breath, here we go.
Genghis finally sent up a group of 6 units. May they all die gloriously.

T118 - 75AD

Spoiler :

Genghis sent up another group of 5, with the trailing single Catapult in Gift City 2.

Spoiler :

Jeez, Feudalism sped up 2 turns. Now it is due on T125.
I need to start my war on T123 to take advantage of the lack of Longbows.
The current situation:

Spoiler :

Turfan, the Pyramids city is too well defended with the wall for me to take and hold.
If I revolted to Representation or Police State and Genghis recaptured the city, I would automatically flip back to Barbarism.

To make this war count, I have to be sneaky and make sure the gain is worth the cost.
Genghis is a vicious AI spamming military units with the Pyramids helping.
I don't have enough resources or time to switch religions and try to make some spy tricks like flipping him to Caste work.
I need a fast war.

So how do I make sure the war goes fast?
Genghis has an iRefuseToTalkWarThreshold = 10 which means if I DOW Genghis, he won't talk to me for 10 turns. (Or Genghis won't talk to me for 20 turns if Genghis DOW's me)
The longest time in the game.

However, if I can gain a lot of war success, then he will talk to me much faster.
Winning a battle is 4 war success, capturing a Worker is worth 1, and capturing a city is 10.
All I need to do is gift him 2 of my 5 cities the turn of the war, and then capture them back with Chariots.
This will remove the massive amounts of whip anger I've built up in the cities.
It will also destroy any culture buildings like Libraries and reset my food to 0.
That is totally worth it since I have cheap libraries.

Recapturing 2 cities and then gobbling up 3 more should get Genghis to the peace table in 2 turns.
Then I can gift him 1 of the 3 cities I took back to him for a 10 turn peace treaty.
I plan on capturing Rotterdam and Ning-Hsia on Turn 0 of the war.
Then Old Sarai on Turn 1 of the war.
Peace for Ning-Hsia on Turn 2 of the war before his vast war machine can butcher me.

Spoiler :

The follow on consequences of this fight will be that Mongol units stop streaming north since our borders will be closed, and I get -1 relations with Rome since Julius is Pleased with Genghis.
It should be manageable.
I can always DOW Justinian again and instantly sign Open Borders with Mongols again due to shared war if I need another Genghis army to travel north.
I am +14 with Rome now and can always switch to Buddhism in the future to get more relations and keep Friendly.

If I let too many units north and Genghis gets 40 war success against Justinian and vassals him, I will kick myself.

Rome should trade me Horse for Bronze+Elephants for 1 turn.

When the 2nd war starts far in the future, Ning-Hsai and Thracian will be cut off from Genghis' empire since my empire surrounds them on both coasts, so those 2 cities will produce just Longbows.

T122 - 175AD

Spoiler :

Rome got Currency 1 turn before I did.
Drats. Was wasting 58 gold to see if Genghis was teching Feudalism on Turn 113 a good idea?
Maybe!

Rome only borders 7 of my land tiles, so I'm 1 away from being a LandTarget for him and getting triple sized begs.
Will hold off begging anything from Rome for now.
Got Horses and Silk from Rome for Bronze and Elephants. This will be a 1 turn deal.

Spoiler :

Good news though, Genghis finally built up enough "this war spoils our relationship" to become the worst enemy of Justinian finally, so I traded Philosophy for Monarchy.
It gave me +1 fair trade boost with Justinian and no "trading with worst enemy" penalty with Genghis.
I'm now -4 total diplo with Justinian.

Spoiler :

My 2 gift cities are producing their own Chariots in a single turn to retake themselves to start the war next turn

Spoiler :

T123 - 200AD
War with Genghis!!!

Spoiler :

Here we go.
Both my gift cities had major whip anger problems.
The Chariots were ready to proceed.

Gifted Nijmegen and Utrecth to Genghis.
Got a -4 "You traded with our Worst Enemy" diplo penalty with Justinian, but I don't care.
Closed borders with Genghis to teleport my units into place. (Do you guys really care about teleport mechanics?)

Spoiler :

Checked to make sure all 4 armies were in place.
Power Graph indicated that Genghis lost a whole bunch of units up north against Justinian.
Justinian's power didn't drop at all, so it must have been a complete victory for him.
Now I don't have to worry about Justinian vassaling to Mongolia.
If it became a concern, I could try to buy a Cease Fire between them to reset war success back to 0.

Spoiler :

Declared War upon Genghis Khan
Instantly got -1 diplo with Rome for declaring war on his friend. (Julius was Pleased with Genghis)

Nijmegen and Utrecth instantly recaptured for 20 war success and cleared whip anger.
Food reset to 0 and Libraries destroyed.
The motherland anger in Nijmegen is because it is Size 4 and my plot culture on the city tile got reset to 0 when I gifted it away to Genghis and became 2 plot culture again when I recaptured it. (Genghis has 2 plot culture there too now).
Since the city has over 100+ city culture, it will generate +43 plot culture per turn and the motherland anger will vanish next turn as my city's nationality % zooms back up to 99% Dutch/ 1% Mongolian.

Spoiler :

Rotterdam captured for 130 !
No buildings sadly.
Lost 2 Catapults taking it.
Ning-Hsia captured for 119 !
Granary and Lighthouse survived, which annoys me because that city is going back to Mongols for Peace Treaty in a few turns.
Lost 1 Catapult and 1 Axe.
Murdered a wandering Keshik and Chariot because they threatened my Axes in Rotterdam.
I don't care if the Catapults attack, they can't kill.
Moved Main army up to the forest next to sweet, succulent Old Sarai.
Hopefully it can be captured next turn.

Spoiler :

Continued in Part 6

 

[Kaitzilla]

Write up Part 6

Continued from part 5

*SPOILER ALERT for the Willem Map that AcaMetis provided*

Spoiler :

T123 - 200AD Continued

Spoiler :

Now I nervously wait for Genghis' counterattack.
He has a few Elephants and Keshiks down south that will likely head north.
He also has a Keshik, Elephant, and Archer that vanished north into Rome's land 2 turns ago that could turn around and come back to attack me.
Keshiks are really annoying since they ignore terrain movement cost and can go through jungles and forests without roads.
Only a jungle/forest hilltop can stop them cold.

I must not allow my bronze city or my elephant city to be captured.
I need both of them to maintain my war machine.
Signing a Peace Treaty in 2 or 3 turns for Ning-Hsia is my best bet, because I can't trade units with Genghis in a long drawn out war.
His production is just too high.

Spoiler :

Traded Currency to Justinian for 70
Not like I can trade techs with him any longer.

Spoiler :

T124 - 225AD

Spoiler :

Genghis now has Feudalism in the trade window.
A Keshik died in between turns attacking my forest spear.

A combat I + Shock Sword.
A combat I + Shock Axe.
Together they guard Old Sarai behind solid walls with +50% defenses.
How much damage can they do to 2 Catapults and a huge stack of 7 Axemen?
..
.........
Oh God, 2 Catapults and 3 Axes died!
I should have brought the War elephant, but I wanted to easily capture Ning-Hsai and then rush back to defend my bronze city.
Old Sarai captured for 117!
No buildings again, because civ 4 hates me and they all got destroyed. (Or maybe these jungles cities never had buildings? I didn't zoom in to check before conquering them)
I need to look up how much culture I need in a city to preserve all buildings 100% of the time.

Killed a roving Elephant too.
All that damage that Justinian and I did, and Genghis' power rating only moderately dipped.
What a monster!

Spoiler :

T125 - 250AD

Spoiler :

My Copper was Pillaged
1 Keshik died attacking my elephant city's War Elephant.
Lost 1 injured Spear to Keshik.

Genghis is not willing to talk even though I have around 86 war success and it has been 2 turns since the war started.
I guess him having war success too makes a difference in the calculation on how long before he will talk to me.

I started teching Calendar.
Rome my only trading partner already has it, but I don't have enough money to do Metal Casting.
Aesthetics would require me to have 200 beakers put into Calender as well to trade for it.
Since I have 13 Calendar resources, it is best for me to just self tech it and fix my economy.
Not worth gambling on Aesthetics since I have no back up plan for getting more gold if Rome techs it first.

I could try Spies and a city gift to Justinian and try to steal Metal Casting and Theology, but that isn't a great idea until the Genghis war is over for sure.

Spoiler :

T126 - 275AD

Spoiler :

Killed an Archer and 2 Keshiks.
Still no peace.
Great General born in my capital!
Will send him to the front to make a super medic.

Genghis is now ready to pillage my gems.

T127 - 300AD

Spoiler :

Lost 2 Axes and 1 Spear with some bad luck.
Killed 1 Longbow.
Still no peace.

Traded Elephant to Rome for Sugar, Silk, and 1gpt.

Super Medic Chariot is now on the front line.

Hmm, Rome now touches 8 of my land tiles.
I wonder how much I can beg from Julius?

The formula is Begging_Ceiling = [((Turns_Known + 50) * 2 * ((Our_Power + 100)/(Their_Power + 100)) * 3 if Land Target]

I met Julius on turn 16 and it is now turn 127.
I've known him for 111 turns.
I have no idea what his power rating is, but the demo screen says that the most powerful AI in the world has 543,000 Soldiers and I have 234,000 Soldiers.
Safest to just assume it is Rome.
So the Begging_Ceiling is equal to (111+50)*2*((234+100)/(543+100))*3 = (161)*2*(334/643)*3 = 501

Gold_Ceiling, the amount of I can beg, is half of the Begging_Ceiling if the AI isn't in Financial Trouble.
So the amount of I can be will be one less than 501/2 = 250.
So I can beg up to 249 gold.
Best to call it 245 to be safe.

Or, I could beg 4/3 of 245 and try for 326
I've got 264/591 in Calendar, just need 327 to complete it.
Better put 1 more turn of research into it just to be safe.
Once a beg fails (or succeeds), I have to hope that the 5% chance the AI forgets the beg occurs in good time so I can beg again later.

T128 - 325AD

Spoiler :

Still no peace after 5 turns of war.
My fast war really backfired!

As near as I can tell, Genghis sent 4 Catapults north to attack Justinian instead of defend Old Sarai or harass my elephant city.
Weird AI.

Lost 2 Spears.
Killed 2 War Elephants and 1 Keshik.

I never had a beg with Rome before.
When doing the calculation, I don't have to subtract off the amount from a previous beg.

Begging for 232 from Julius was successful!
Calendar is mine.
Thanks for the free stuff!

Spoiler :

A shame Rome is twice as strong as me.
If I was twice as strong as Rome, I could have begged for 800!

T129 - 350AD

Spoiler :

Quiet turn.
Genghis just isn't streaming evil units north to attack me for some reason.

Spoiler :

T130 - 375AD

Spoiler :

Killed 1 Catapult.
If Genghis isn't going to attack me or talk peace, then I'm gonna go for a 4th city of his.
If he wants peace he can have Calendar because I don't want to give back Ning-Hsai now.

T131 - 400AD

Spoiler :

Lost 1 Elephant, but it drew a Spear out of the walled city and crippled it, so net positive.
Genghis will finally talk peace after 8 turns!
Massive war success doesn't get the AI to the talking table if they get a bunch of war success too it seems.
I expected 2 turns and it took 8
But now, I want the war to last 1 more turn so I can capture a 4th city.

Traded Dye to Rome for 7 per turn.
Genghis got a 2nd Great Spy.

T132 - 425AD

Spoiler :

Genghis got a Great General. Must have beat up on Justinian some more.

This turn was a slaughter!
2.5% odds Catapult WON
Only lost 1 Catapult the whole turn.

New Sarai captured for 113
It has a Granary!
Killed Sword, Axe, Spear, Keshik, and 2 War Elephants this turn.
Combat odds finally went my way.

Signed a Peace Treaty with Genghis for 40

Spoiler :

Peace will let me hook up copper again and improve my border tiles without worrying about Keshiks blazing in to grab one of my 4 Workers.
I now have 9 cities compared to Genghis' 4 cities. (He has 28 population currently)

Will rebuild my Catapults for the big push to take Pyramids in 10 turns.

Will also try to get Metal Casting from Justinian by teching Aesthetics and hoping he doesn't get Calendar first.
Need to look into stealing a tech or two from Justinian later.
With only 3 cities, he should accept any of my cities as a gift city.

Spoiler :

I've now got -2 Border Tensions with Rome which lowers me to +11 total relations (Friendly)
Even a single point drop will put me back at Pleased and I can't afford a war with Rome.
Revolted to Buddhism!
Thankfully I just conquered a Buddhist city.

Spoiler :

Ok, I think I got the game won now.
Will post highlights of the rest of the game later instead of a blow-by-blow.
I'm starting to clutter up Lain's thread.

Continued in Part 7

 

[Olafeson]

@Kaitzilla

Spoiler :

Very nice write up. I think with your level of game knowledge you can beat this map. Nxt lvl civ 4 magic here with your neat trick of gifting and retaking cities to reset whip anger and create war success. I did learn a lot, but how for example you know that JC can not choose you as a land target to attack if you only have 7 shared border tiles? Where can you find this kind of information?

I learned some new thingsThanks for that. Always nice to learn some more complex mechanics of Civ4 from expierenced players. Now i am looking forward to the outcome of your war. If you should be succesful, i think your position will be pretty decent.

 

[Kaitzilla]

@Kaitzilla

Spoiler :

Very nice write up. I think with your level of game knowledge you can beat this map. Nxt lvl civ 4 magic here with your neat trick of gifting and retaking cities to reset whip anger and create war success. I did learn a lot, but how for example you know that JC can not choose you as a land target to attack if you only have 7 shared border tiles? Where can you find this kind of information?

I learned some new thingsThanks for that. Always nice to learn some more complex mechanics of Civ4 from expierenced players. Now i am looking forward to the outcome of your war. If you should be succesful, i think your position will be pretty decent.

Here you go, Land Target guide
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/land-target-and-manipulating-the-ai.561148/

Don't take the begging guide farther down too seriously.
It was never completed.

 

[AcaMetis]

Spoiler :

Absolutely fantastic job, I did not think that it was possible to yoink Genghis' Copper and Ivory like that and pull off an elepult rush.

And one thing I noticed that you seemingly didn't, comparing Turn 129 to previous turns: Genghis Khan captured the Buddhist holy city. That means he's got 5 cities: Karakorum, Beshbalik, Turfan, Thracian, and Justy's former holy city, which given it's Buddhism how founding religions works is almost certainly his second city, Thessalonica.

 

[Kaitzilla]

Spoiler :

Absolutely fantastic job, I did not think that it was possible to yoink Genghis' Copper and Ivory like that and pull off an elepult rush.

And one thing I noticed that you seemingly didn't, comparing Turn 129 to previous turns: Genghis Khan captured the Buddhist holy city. That means he's got 5 cities: Karakorum, Beshbalik, Turfan, Thracian, and Justy's former holy city, which given it's Buddhism how founding religions works is almost certainly his second city, Thessalonica.

Comments below

Spoiler :

Whoa, good catch AcaMetis!
Yes, in my last screenshot getting peace with Genghis I see Thessalonica right there.

Spoiler :

Genghis must be close to getting the 40 war success needed to vassalize Justinian right now, but his land %, population, and power rating have all taken very large hits.
He might not qualify to be Justinian's master any longer, but I'm too lazy to run the math to check.
Whether Genghis vassals Byzantium or not, I'm gonna conquer them both!
Then my friend Rome when he least expects it and I've gotten the tech I need.



Rome in my game is very careful to garrison his border cities so they don't flip to my culture pressure.
(Hint: AI is dumb. Gift City #2 can't actually flip back to me since I gifted it away, it just continually revolts unless heavily garrisoned)
(The city also can't flip back to me from culture pressure if I settled it and Rome militarily conquered it unless I turned on "City flipping after conquest" in options menu when making the game)

This is one of those nice situations where the human player can kill most of a Deity AI's army on the 1st turn of a war with mass Catapults/Trebs + 25 killing units (Swords, Elephants, Axes, etc.)

Spoiler :

Most of the innovations in Civ 4 in the last 5 or 6 years involve the countless way to abuse city gifting. (+diplo from multiple Liberates, clear city anger, clear the 80 gpp the Oracle accumulated so the 1st Great Person isn't a Great Prophet, suck AI units into a trap city, espionage gift city full of spies ready to steal every tech, infinite Liberation exploit, getting LandTarget status quickly for fast peace vassals, forcing AI's to found a colony over and over to generate infinite , goading the AI who birthed a great prophet to found a shrine in the gifted holy city, having a 3rd party wimp civ hold the cities a strong invader would otherwise take from the human, etc. etc.)


From DerangedDuck's guide on city revolt mechanics:

Anyway, let's move on to the topic of revolts. A revolt in a city can occur if the owner of the city and the person who would own the underlying square if there were no city are different. In other words, a city might revolt if a neighboring city belonging to a different civilization has it within its cultural radius and that civilization's plot culture under the city is greater than the city's owner and that of all other civilizations with a city in range. You don't have to have a majority, you just have to have more of your nationality than the other guy. If a revolt can occur, there is a flat 10% chance each turn of making a revolt check.
During a revolt check, a random number between 0 and the city's revolt power is compared with the garrison strength. If the number is greater than the garrison strength, the city revolts. Barbarian cities always fail this check, so will always revolt. If a city revolts there are several effects. All units in the city lose half their current hit points, the city's cultural radius becomes 0 and it produces nothing for a certain number of turns. Also, there is a possibility that the city may change sides (called a flip). A barbarian city will always flip, period. A non barbarian city won't flip if this is the first revolt (there is always one warning revolt). It also won't flip if the option "no city flipping" is on (this by default is off). It won't flip back to someone who has previously owned it, regardless of reason for ownership change, unless the game option "city flipping after conquest" is enabled (this is by default off). If a city flips, all units belonging to enemies of the new owner are destroyed. If the units aren't at war with the new owner, they simply get expelled unless the new owner has open borders with the units' owner.
So, how is revolt power calculated? The base revolt power starts at 1 and then two factors are added. The first is 2x the city's highest ever population. The second is the number of directly adjacent squares that the revolting people's civilization controls times the current game era. Current game era is considered to be the average era of the remaining players, rounded down, with ancient being considered '1', medieval '2', and so on. So, in the final era (6), if the side the city wants to revolt for controls all 8 squares around the city, this could be as high as 48.
The base revolt power is then multiplied by several factors. The first is the ratio of the two sides' plot culture for the city square. The formula for this multiplier is 1 + ((revoltCulture - cityOwnerCulture) / (revoltCulture)). This would be a number between 1 and 2, being near 2 if the revolt's plot culture is much higher than the owner, and being near 1 if the two are almost equal. If the revolt's plot culture is twice that of the city owner (i.e., 67% revolting nationality, 33% owner nationality), the value would be about 1.5. Sorry for the ugly math, but I can't find a way to explain it more simply at the moment.
Fortunatly, the other multipliers are a bit simpler. If the revolting civilization's state religion is present, the value is doubled. If the city owner's state religion is present, the value is halved. If both are present, these two multipliers cancel each other out. If somebody doesn't have a state religion, they don't get a multiplier.
The city's garrison strength is also simple. Start at 1 and add the cultural garrison strength of all units in the city, regardless of ownership. Double this if the owner and revolting civilization are at war. The only catch is that cultural garrison strength can't be found in game, so here is a list of unit values:
warrior, quecha: 3
archer, skirmisher, axe, spear, phalanx, chariot, immortal, catapult: 4
swordsman, jaguar, praetorian, horsearcher, keshik, war elephant: 5
mace, samurai, pike, longbow, crossbow, chokonu, knight, camelarcher, conquistador: 6
musketman, musketeer, grenadier, cannon: 7
rifle, redcoat, calvalry, cossack: 8
machine gun: 9
infantry, SAM infantry, gunship, artillery: 10
marine, SEAL, tank, panzer: 12
mech infantry, modern armor: 16
Note that ships, planes, workers, great people, and other non-military or non-land units don't help keep a city under control.

Such good info.

The "first revolt is always free" is a source of great comfort to players because the city can't flip until the 2nd revolt.
Barb cities flip on the very 1st revolt.

There has been debate over the years if gifting the city away and reconquering it immediately resets the "free revolt", but no one has ever tested it.
I like how a state religion halves the revolt power for the defender, or doubles it for the attacker, or cancels if both are present.