PW-01: Holy word

[Zargon]

We are in representation from the pyramids, right? I'll burn the artist on DR, and settle the prophet for the 2 hammers, 5 coins, and 3 beakers. Oh and bureaucracy (holy crap I spelled it right first try - I usually have a hard time getting close enough for the spell checker to give it to me) will make that 2 hammers 3.

Looks like you cleared lots of wonders off the list. If there are any wonders that are in danger of falling elsewhere, I'll build them, otherwise I think I'll put off wonders that I can in favor of some military and lots of expanding. And courthouses.

 

[r_rolo1]

I think that we should prioritize AP ( 9 turns in capitol ) , Sankore and the Minaret ( when getting DR ). My reasoning about the artist and the prophet is the same as yours ( burn the artist ( not a nice visual ) and settling the prophet in capitol ). But else, courthouses and missionaries all the way ... and settling the sushi area almost at any cost.....

 

[TriviAl]

R_Rolo1

That's a lot for 15 turns!

And nicely done with the Shak Attack!

 

[pholkhero]

man, i HATE that guy!! nice job keeping the peace in our empire and sending him home w/his tail btwn his legs

 

[Zargon]

turn 0: None of the AIs are remotely close to DR, so I'm going to switch the tech to..... something else.

Trade for calender from Alex. We have so many monopoly techs it's not funny, but I can get it for monarchy and monotheism. Literature is one of those monopolies, but I trade it away since the wonders in that line are already gone, and because everything else we had to trade was a monopoly tech too.

Settle the prophet

I decide on metal casting as the next tech.

turn 3: settler in the capitol finishes

Alex is coming to claim more of seaworld.

Spoiler :

turn 4: MC in, and back to Alex for construction.

Spoiler :

Since Gilgamesh only needs Theology to be able to research DR, I decide to do DR next just in case he has 2 prophets sitting around ready to pounce on DR.

And the artist is burnt.

Spoiler :

Also, Gilgamesh makes a funny

Spoiler :

turn 5: Shaka stopped his retreat. This could be a problem for settling seaworld. Also, Sistine Chapel is in.

Spoiler :

turn 7: I pay off Shaka in the hopes he will get his guys out of there. And he does.

Spoiler :

turn 8: Alex isn't settling for a spot close to his end. It's a race to the middle. Alex is going to learn all about Sistine powered artists when he settles that guy.

Spoiler :

turn 9: damn, Shaka completed the colossus, I wanted to build it at the copper city. We pick up a great scientist. I could have burnt him on education, but I feel approximately zero pressure in the liberalism race (nobody can research paper, nobody has philosophy), so academy it is. Beaker output jumps 28 with the slider at 50%.

turn 10: Islam falls.....

Spoiler :

to us.

Perfect positioning alex!

Spoiler :

Market is built in the capitol and lets me jack the research bar 10% with no loss of coin surplus.

turn 11: sell some worthless techs.

Spoiler :

turn 12: unlucky Judaism spread

Spoiler :

turn 15: AP is in, and I vote for us

Spoiler :

Another unlucky religion spread.

Spoiler :

And the capitol says hello. I started tilting it towards more of a commerce city in preparation for other cities to take over the role of GP farming.

Spoiler :

to do list:
1) road to the forward seaworld city. It will take a long time but it will be worth it.
2) ferry the missionary forward on the galley. Get there in half the time
3) need buddism in the wine city for pacifism bonus
4) The copper city already made one work boat, and is building another. Pump out 6ish work boats (they are 1 turn each) and send them up to the eastern cities of seaworld. Those cities need to get up and running asap to overpower Alex's city. Whip up a theatre, and buddist buildings when possible, then crush his hopes & dreams with Sistine powered artists. Remember to laugh manically when his city flips.

recommendations:
1) engineering > guilds > banking. Better road travel, castles for the culture war, Notre Dame, then money multipliers for the capitol.
2) Use the wine city for settler and worker production, rather than more whipping, for the moment.
3) Get buddism into the copper coastal city, build a monastery, and spam missionaries from there. Now that the AP is in, we really want buddism in all our cities.
4) The far east seaworld city might do well to get buddism sooner rather than later. If you drop buddism in there, then whip the theatre, the monastery, and naturally build the temple, that will be 13 culture before artists. Then it could start producing missionaries much much closer to where we need them on the eastern continent.

 

[Zargon]

Oops, looks like I didn't take a screen of the new city on seaworld. I wedged it between Alex's new city in the middle of seaworld and his city on the eastern end of it. The next city can go down 3 tiles west of Alex's seaworld city, and the settler is already built and heading there.

 

[pawelo]

@Zargon
I was about to reply that we could stuck a city between Pharsalos and Rhodes when I read your last comment - great minds think alike

Anyway, wonder-ful turns guys. Great stopping Shaka r_rolo1 - given the short notice. Here, Imhotep powered isthmus gave us a nice advantage of slowing madman's HA.

I love all these wonders, I think we will win the culture power on the morder with Mao.

I agree with Zargon's research path - we need the +1 road movement and Notre Dame, added to the HG, is a nice combo that will help the seaworld in fulfilling their potential.

As from now, I would reserve 1 missionary spot for our border cities and 2 spots for the eastern continent. I think we will experience some flips later on (was it a nice devilish laugh ?)

Btw, how are our three missionaries in the east ?
If not yet assigned, I suggest Uruk, Athens (or Sparta if Athens is already Buddhist) and Rome.

I propose we continue by 15 turns, if it's not too long for you. Of course it might be a little bit tedious to manage, but I think it's a nice length.

ROSTED:

pawelo
r_rolo1
Zargon - just played and put in place a ish plan
TriviAl - UP to get some more wonders, settle the sushis and spread the true faith
Pholkhero - on deck for the cultural war on two fronts
stuge

 

[TriviAl]

Curses - the forums ate nice post.

Nice work there Zargon - one lovely hydra assembled!

One of the lords commandments down!

The advice sounds good - will endevour to follow!

Banks and guilds seem to make a lot of sense with this much shrine flying around. Extra move engineers would just be too good to pass up.

We should possibly consider researching Liberalism to 1 turn of completion, holding off till an AI gets close and then grabbing whatevers current?

Any thoughts on our eventual target victory condition?

 

[pawelo]

We should possibly consider researching Liberalism to 1 turn of completion, holding off till an AI gets close and then grabbing whatevers current?

Any thoughts on our eventual target victory condition?

In the spirit of the game, we should go for religious

Still, it's irrealistic given the commandements - impossible to do during the AP opportunity frame.

I would go cultural or space.
For cultural we already have Thebes and Memphis pre-selected for legendaries, I would add Elephantine (wine GP farm).
Problem with cultural is that it's difficult to 'contain', should one of our variant conditions be pending (for exemple - some far away cities (like in the middle of the mountain range ) still not buddhist ).
Space is very much doable and more easy to control, we still have to keep an eye on cultural ambitions and tech edge of our neighbors, setting up a war should one of them get too close to a win.
Diplomatic should do too, hopefully everyone will be buddhist soon and this will become a world love parade making this win doable.

 

[TriviAl]

In the spirit of the game, we should go for religious

Still, it's irrealistic given the commandements - impossible to do during the AP opportunity frame.

I would go cultural or space.
For cultural we already have Thebes and Memphis pre-selected for legendaries, I would add Elephantine (wine GP farm).
Problem with cultural is that it's difficult to 'contain', should one of our variant conditions be pending (for exemple - some far away cities (like in the middle of the mountain range ) still not buddhist ).
Space is very much doable and more easy to control, we still have to keep an eye on cultural ambitions and tech edge of our neighbors, setting up a war should one of them get too close to a win.
Diplomatic should do too, hopefully everyone will be buddhist soon and this will become a world love parade making this win doable.

Hehe - the only problem with Diplo is the AIs will probably love one another more than us? Unless we engaged in some weaseling to make the top AI land owner hated...

Think spreading the true faith around should be (hopefully) quite fast - noticed the AI seems to really like spamming the AP religion around to ensure it doesn't lose votes...

The difficulty might be getting 7 religions into all our cities! That's gonna be tricky.

 

[pawelo]

The difficulty might be getting 7 religions into all our cities! That's gonna be tricky.

Well, I don't think so - already done that with an offline Ethiopia game
The thing is you have to make sure you have at least one Monastery of each religion before Sci Meth, otherwise

Edit: OK, you can still go OR. Dumb remark above...

After, it's only dedicating each monastery city to the task of delivering enough Missionaries.

I don't think we will go above 15-20 cities in this game (maybe I'm wrong), so it's doable.

 

[pholkhero]

it's possible that Elephantine will be a *much* slower culture producer w/o all the wonders we'll get @ the other 2. though, if we temple up in 9 of our cities, we'll have 7 cathedrals in the Big 3 for a whopping 250% THAT would be something. still, pawelo's right; we won't be able to stop the culture train once it gets rolling.

i think space is the easiest thing to do, esp. since now we can actually control the launch.

and so, let's see:

1 – Thou will found every single religion in the known world.

2 – Thou will build every single holy shrine for all thy beliefs.

3 – Thou will spread thy initial religion to every known city in the world by any mean.

4 – Thou will achieve to spread every belief into every city thy tribe possesses before the end of thy reign.

5 – Thou will seek to convert every neighboring tribe to thy beliefs.

6 – Thou will remain peaceful to thy neighbors, unless they declare war on thou.

7 – Thou will not keep more than a third of thy neighbor’s conquered cities.

8 – Thou will assist a brother in belief tribe with any peaceful knowledge he shall request.

9 – Thou will never give up thy own freedom to become a vassal to a neighbor.

10 – Thou shall win peacefully.”

one down, 9 to go

 

[Zargon]

Right now, there is one missionary heading eastwards (he can jump on the galley to get there faster), one missionary heading to the wine city, and one missionary unbuilt. I'd redirect the missionary heading to the wine city to the copper coastal city, then spam missionaries from there after it does it's 6 or so workboats.

I also agree with space. Getting all 7 religions in all our cities is going to be a matter of luck & perseverance, so I'd rather not have a time limit.

Also, on teching, after guilds, optics. There's probably an island somewhere with god knows what on it. I'd like to find it before the AIs do.

 

[TriviAl]

Firstly, will start with some apologies for the slightly delayed report. I have also only played 10 turns.

This a little disjointed and lacking in enough photos. It took a while, partly because my computer kept crashing - it's normally very well behaved - maybe it got upset at all the religion?

You'll see the main reason if you read on.

Spoiler :

Preturn:

I open the save. It all looks wrong. Everything is so backward...

Then I realise that's the 1200BC save. Idiot!


Following this, I load the correct save.


This looks a lot better! I look at things for a while, but Zargon has left me a nice clean game. Thank you!


Press enter.

IBT - we are the 3rd most wealthy. We lose the AP election to Alexander.

Spoiler :

Not a great start, but oh well.

Turn 1:
Shuffle some units as advised, a few builds complete and more are started.

IBT - Greece asks for a deal cancel with Rome. I refuse. Then it really kicks off:

Spoiler :

Crap!

Turn 2:
Mao blows up our theatre in Giza.

And moves a mini SoD next to Alexandria:

Spoiler :

3 catapults and 4 chariots.

In a normal game I'd laugh at this. However, we have a single axe in the city and that is the most impressive bit of our army locally.

I try to bribe Stalin into this, but he's not interested - at least his hands aren't full.

Some trading is required - Gilgamesh gets music and literature for feudalism and his 10 gold. Alex gets music for his 90gold and horseback riding.

I upgrade the axe in alexandria to a mace. To hurt the stack more when it attacks. Alexandria also cold whips a longbow for 3 population - we're probably going to lose it - if we do, then we don't give 3 pop to Mao - if we keep it, then we might hold it next turn.

All core cities switch to some military. I revolt to Theocracy. GPP can wait until we have some cities left.

IBT - hold breath and press enter. Lol - Mao has decided to shell Alexandria rather than attack it. Idiot.

Greece asks for a DoW on Rome - isn't there a 'hands full' flag I can put up?


Turn 3
This round, I whip some builds in the outlying cities not under direct threat. Caeser gets literature for the bargain bucket price of 40g. Enough to upgrade the whipped archer in Pi-Rameses to a longbow.

It seems that one of the earlier crashes negated my swap to theocracy. I do it again. Meh.

The chariot in Pi-Ramses kills a maurauding chariot.

Alex gets feudalism to give us enough gold to defecit research to engineering next turn.

Alexandria: The new maceman and whipped longbow fortify. This feels safer. Slightly. More troops moving up.

IBT: Mao Bombs some more. Stalin demands drama - he gets it - 10 turns of enforced peace rocks!

Turn 4
Engineering in - set for guilds. Drop research rate to 50%. Hieraconpolis is founded on the city #1 spot.

Kill a few mauraders.

IBT: Maos stack is put off the attack on Alexandria and crosses the river - pillaging a road.

Turn 5
In a fit of tiredness at repeated replays, I leave 2 wounded maces uncovered after attacking - thought I had space to get them covered by the end of the turn.

IBT: The 2 maces die.

Turn 6
A great general and a great engineer are born. The great engineer is used to rush The Spiral Minarette - we could use some more cash and that ones a doozy. A great general is born and I decide to bank him for calmer times. Troops are coming out at 5xp, and we don't have a stack to suit a medic - or a spare unit to make one.

A mace and a horse archer do some damage to Maos stack - ruining his catapults - they survive and are covered.

The missionary arrives in our culture push fishing town.

Turn 7
Skirmish with Mao. A second stack turns up outside Giza - mostly chariots - which probably wasn't that bright of Mao! The Spiral Minarette and Mausoleum both arrive this turn.

Turn 8
Move troops up to support both fronts. Mao has reinforced at Alexandria - but it's nothing to worry about.

Drop research to 20% to upgrade a warrior to a pike in Giza.

Turn 9
Move more troops up. Upgrade that pike!

IBT: Mao suicides a bunch of troops at Giza - we gain some promotions here! The AP throws up a vote to stop the war against Mao - my every inclination is to pound his slimy face into the floor - but it's a peaceful game! So I vote yes. Dammit!

Turn 10
Shore up defenses and shuffle troops...

At this point I'm knackered and have to get up for work tomorrow! So decide to submit the save.

Overall - used theocracy + slavery + 2 non whipped high production cities to produce us something we can pretend is an army! Been holding the line as his troops cross. So far no cities lost!

Been trading for gold and playing with the slider to get cash for urgent upgrades - but think most are done.

Got us a couple of wonders and a net gain of 1 worker as well.

In following Zargons plans, I have pushed a fair few workboats up towards the Isthmus and kept up business as usual there. I left the Shaka Stack there in place as a block - just in case one of the neighbours gets feisty - and it'd take forever to pull back. The road is being built up there by 2 workers.


Here's the situation at the front:

Spoiler :

The badly drawn MS paint pentagram is to represent Mao - enemy of the faith! Booo!


The lines indicate the routes Mao has attaked so far. Pi Ramses is disconnected from the trade network and has 2 defenders. He only probed here - a full scale attack would be bad.

The circled item is his stack on our lands. Attacking them accross the river is too long odds. However, we have enough troops in reach to paste them if they cross - although they may be heading for Giza...

The AP might make peace in the next turn, but that's for the next player to find out.

We have an unused great general - I suggest a Stable/Barrack produced Chariot Medic - get enough XP for the Heroic Epic?

Don't forget we are in Theocracy, just in case the war ends.

Edit: A long term thought - we need to make some cities with very pure GPP pools - we need to pop 6 prophets before the game can end...

The Save

 

[Zargon]

Wow. I figured Mao was gonna get antsy, but I didn't expect it so fast. Can't believe we didn't lose any cities, I left basically zero military laying around on the continent.

We don't really need pure GPP pools because we are going to crank out craploads of great persons - we've got at least 5 cities that can run 8+ specialists. Sure, run as many priests as possible first, but I don't think we will have any trouble putting out 20 more great persons by the end of the game.

 

[r_rolo1]

I think that somebody should say to the AI that we are trying to be peaceful here . But with our nice neighbours I'm almost sure that we'll have to face all of them in battle sooner or latter.

To say the truth, I was expecting it... Mao is ReXing and finds himself cramped by us... we are weak, he declares ( as simple as that ... better AI ,where are you? ). I must congratulate TriviAL for coping this without losing a city , but this is only telling us that we are negleting military.... We need more troops, and more cities ,and more power..... Then we can be peaceful. As we are now, we are a SoD magnet....

 

[pholkhero]

wow ~ now I have to live up to all these great turnsets

nice job in holding the line Zargon ~ you would hope our brothers in faith voted with us to end the war against the infidel shouldn't they want to stop the war against US?

but this is only telling us that we are neglecting military....

hmmm . . . didn't one of us, after his first turnset, start yacking his face off about building more military? hmmm . . . i don't remember . . .

i've got it, but won't play until tomorrow hopefully ~ it's halloween and i'll have to take the kids out after packing my house, and preparing for a teaching exam, so I *may* not have time. if i can't get to it then, though, i'll be able to go thursday.

 

[Zargon]

Well, I played my turns in between the two wars, and didn't build a single military unit, (and in fact sent almost all our military off the main continent), so I'll guess that comment was misdirected, lol.

I held off building military to avoid upkeep due to pacifism, but perhaps we cannot afford such a luxury anymore.

 

[pholkhero]

er, it was ~ nice job, TriviAl!

 

[pawelo]

I must agree with r_rolo, we need more cities and military before being peaceful again

Anyway, great job TriviAl - you were the right person in the right place for this 'dark ages'.

Btw, remember, quoting The Decalogue:

7 – Thou will not keep more than a third of thy neighbor’s conquered cities.

We should conquer at least three in counter-attack (if we want to counter-attack), to keep one juicy stuff.

On the one side I hope the resolution passes, and we have time to build up our border with Mao, on the other hand wouldn't it be nice to pacify his three cities, keeping one and screwing him to peace afterwards ? Remember, we have Knights coming in one or two turns + engineering road bonus...

Pholk, no problem to play on thursday. I hope your kids won't each too much candies