Rat20 - Middle Age AWM - Byzantines

Greebley said:
Ya, the settlers are a good plan. We should have sufficient units to hold off the enemy and possibly expand to the north.

We will have the tar roaded in a turn I think, the Quarry in 2, and I connected our 4th Lux up.
Click to expand...

I beg to differ.

The Danube and that hill range S of it is the best defensive position we can gain. Europe is crowded with Civs, and most of them have better units than we have. They'll soon send hordes of Swords as first wave; if we push too far here, we'll get deep into troubles.

Especially since other theatres are a lot more fearsome.

Strategic outline:
We have to take care of four different frontlines.

1. Balkans
Once we've pushed back the Bulgars a bit more, we can hold our ground here with enough Cats and a moderate number of units. Any city here won't be very corrupt, and will provide cheaper units easily. Pushing too far here means a Phyrric vitory, IMHO.

2. Mediterranean
Vikings and the like - can be handled with like 10 Dromons.

3. Abbassids
If we allow them to develop their lands and connect their resources (especially iron), we can loose the game here. This is near always the strongst AI Civ in this Conquest, for good reasons. Never underestimate the numbers and quality of units they can send; Ansars are move 3, and can wreck havoc in our soft underbelly.

4. Black Sea
The wildcard. Two other very strong Civs in the late game, Rus and at foremost Turks (Sipahi = 6.3.3).
While we will not face any seaborne raids here, this is indeed the theatre I'm worried about the most!
However, there is a way to handle them efficiently: There is only one source of Horses in that entire area, close to the NE shore of the Black Sea. And no Horses = no Sipahi.

So, I'd suggest the following longterm strategy:

Lets play defensively on the Balkan and med theatre. Push aggressively against Abbassids. Send an early army to the Turks; even if it does nothing but fortify on the Horses, it may win us the game.

If the situation in the West is somewhat under control, the very 1st Army should pillage Abbassids, and the next one molest the Turks.

Something else: Tar has the annoying habbit to deplet...we must at least have a shot on securing the other source, if necessary: This one is @ real life Trabzon, 2 cities spots East of our current Black Sea holdings.

Good job on capturing Pliska, btw.
 
@ Doc T

sounds like a very reasonable plan, I guessed the north will be too tough to take. Abassids should be eliminated, their assassins could be very annoying too.

@pat4
try to play 24/48, thus provide a nice report instead of rushing too much. I will play your save since I am free today. Maybe you can edit you above post to insert the missing report. (also just as a hint for SG's, try to name the save 'Rat20_year', this way it isn't that generic ;) )
2 armies sounds great, I think we should go after Abassids and Turks as pointed out by Doc T
 
save

Pre-Turn
research: set for Western Churches, but even at 30% we only get the min run, thus reduce to a single scientists and 34 to go
armies: both in the north, will try and shift them south and east
cities: we could still use many settlers to fill the gaps

so, my goals are laid out here
pat4, you orders some workers to chop forests, you are aware that forests rock in this scenario, so I stop that

change our frontline cities in the north to walls
Ancyra gos for tapestry, in case we don't get it we can change to the wonder that gives 2 free techs and the 4 unit armies
Larissa is maxed out on growth, change to settler

many of our workers are in the north, where the enemy activities are, I will get them back to th core where we have to improve a lot of land

IT defeat a horse in the north, but lose a mace in the south that was exposed
Abassids land a unit in our core when our dromons are sitting in the south
they should prevent exactly that

1.1011AD
defeat the intruder archer, move workers a little south. The settler goes on a long march south
armies will shift in the correct directions
attack Gyor and take out a spear

IT no attacks this time

2.1014AD
take out 2nd spear and we take Gyor...this should be our frontline
army takes out 2 spears in Belgorod

our spears are fortified on mountains in the south and the other units can hide underneath and attack take out an archer that way

IT Franks are met and they start the Holy Roman empire, I wonder how we are going to get that

3.1017AD
The research in that direction on min run won't get us far, change to COL in 10+
declare war on France
need to keep one army north for strategic defense

in the south, need to be aggressive, defeat 2 archers and retreat a horse
defeat 2 more units in Belgorod, it still stands


4.1020AD
2 more units down in Belgorod and it still stands :gripe:
defeat 2 units near Ruse and we gain 2 slaves
make it 4 as we defeat the French settler pair :)

defeat an archer and lose a horse at places

5.1023AD
you know the story, defeat 2 archers and Belgorod is still standing...how many more units do we defeat there
defeat 2 units in the south

IT go 1:1 on defense

6.1026AD
2 more units go down and Arpad shows up, send 2nd army there to help out
defeat 3 assorted units
gain 2 more slaves from a settler pair in the north

IT almost lose a spear to archer in Caesarea

7.1029AD
finally raze that city after defeating 2 more units, Magyars now 1 king down
rat201029.jpg


found Chalcedon in the south

IT lose a spar to a horse in the south
get more units and the cost is dragging us down

8.1832AD
one army now searching for the eastern horses
defeat 2 units on the south, but it is a bit dicey there
gain 2 more slaves to the growing pool of slaves

IT the area around Sredets gets crowded, good thing we finish the walls there

9.1035AD
we say hello to yet another enemy, the Celts brought in a settler pair
this is exactly what we need badly in the south
rat201032.jpg



fill army with 2 maces
defeat 2 more units there, but lose a reg sword
defeat 3 Magyars and the army moves east

IT defeat a sword at Sredets, but the area really get crowded
we should shift a sword army there to help defend

10.1038AD
this is tight, defeat 4 units in the north and shift units around
gain 2 slaves from Celts
move army towards Sredets

meet Polish in the east and declare war

CoL is due in 3 turns, we should dicuss which tech we would like next
I started the tapetry but it will take another 40+ turns, but I would say it's well worth it

with the mace army, we should be able to make some progress in the south
the eastern army is a little aimless but Doc T will know where to pillage

a settler has almost reached its destination, other will be ready soon


situation around Sredets
rat201038.jpg



The Roster
TheRat - just played
Doc T - up
empiremaker
pindicator
Greebley
pat4
 
I would think we would want to take Map Making. This will put us in the next age, and will give us harbors. We then may want Arab Learning, but I think that getting Assassins will take too much time. We may also want to research Lost Roman Secrets for aquaducts. We may also want Heavy cavalry for a better mounted unit. Intelligence Agency and spies may be invaluable.
 
Doc T, can you play this or do you need a skip?
 
Sorry, been away from the my comp for 2 days. I could play, but I may not be able to finish before tomorrow evening (=~22:00 CET) - if someone fells like picking up the game within the next couple of hours, fell free to do so.

'Phracts are useful for Armies. And effective against the Spear/Sword (later Mace) SoDs we'll see from the Europeans.

They are for sure not as great as the other Knight replacements. But at least - we have Horses and Iron to build them at all :) .

Research: MM is useless for us. No Harbors or the like, only enables map trading (which is huge for regular games, but pointless for AW). CoL OTOH is extremely useful; nevertheless, don't think it would be the best move to try that with the @1st-research costs.
Arab Learning will give us Libraries. And while we research that, some Civs should have shown up that know CoL already.

Those Horses - better disembark from a Dromon, not sure if the Army can get there on the land route without clearing the path first from Spears etc.
But, if we haven't contacted the Turks yet: Better be prepared at Sinope!
 
Please let's discuss a bit more about our research path; comments like the MM one indicate a not too deep familiarity with the tech situation in this Conquest.

IMHO, there are only 4 things we really need, not necessarily in that order:

A1) One production booster
A2) One way to grow above 6
A3) One unit to detect invisible units
A4) One better defender

Then, there are a couple of things we want, but those aren't as crucial:

B1) Happiness
B2) Commerce
B3) Fast mover
B4) Harbors

There are several approaches to most of this goals. But to get there efficiently, IMHO Libraries are an absolute must-have. That's why I suggest Arab Learning.
After that, some options would be:

Norse Traditions - Seafaring - Smithing (advantage: the later two are really cheap techs)
Jihad - Assassination (advantage: Assassins are 5.1.1, and the best attacker we'll get)
Lost Roman Secrets - Heavy Cav (advantage: Aquaducts mainly)
Religious Prosecution asap, with no detour on flavor techs (will solve several problems: Inquistors are 4.1.1 ATAR, detect invisible, and very cheap; Theology will give us cheap Cathedrals, and RelPro also gives us the FP equivalent!). If we choose this path, we may want skip the Viking tree entirely, and focus on 3rd era techs like Milling, Polearms for Pikes and Middle Classes for Markets instead. Disadvantage: Tech costs.
The Western tree: Manors + Monasteries for cash + beakers, Crusaders as cost-efficient multi-purpose unit.

My plan would be:
Arab Learning - LRS - reassess the situation: How much headaches do the Assassins cause? - depending on that: Smithing (if no real troubles) or RelPros (moderate) or Assassination (if they wreck havoc).

One more point: If we focus on cheap units like Maces/Crusaders, Spears, Cats and Inquisitors this also means that production boosters may be a waste of shields. But, if we focus on Cataphracts and Assassins, we will need them.
 
good thoughts, that's what I was waiting for.

I can agree with libraries and aqueducts, then assess the situation.
Catapharacts are at least 3 defense, that's the best we can get IIRC.

It's ok to wait for your turnset, take your time, DocT.

I read your SG from last time and now saw that source of horses in Turkish land. We also need to cut the Abassid iron to prevent their UU. I hope we can actually raze some of their cities. Do you know where their 3rd king unit is? I only know Damascus and Jerusalem.
 
Going for Libs first seems great to me.

It is hard for me to judge the different options. I would think that Berserkers would be nice along with Blacksmiths for more shields. How big can Berserker armies be and still fit on a boat? Amphibious Army attacks are pretty strong if there is the boats to support it. OTOH getting over size 6 seems pretty vital to me.

I think the problem with concentrating on cheap units alone will be unit costs. I would tend to think that isn't the way to go as we get less science with high unit cost.

Do Berserkers have attack 6 like the regular game? If so that seems one of the highest unless there is better later on. I like high attacks for taking out units as there is less chance of loss. We do need a speed two decent attack unit as well though.

I will try to look at the civopedia so I at least understand the units and their costs/strengths.
 
our best attack is 4, but then we have cats as support.
and we have armies at least. I guess we can only win this by getting 30000 victory points. each spear gives 15 pts I think. razing cities gives much more points
 
lurker's comment: This is probably a noobish/foolish question, but this is a real map, right? If so, is it only Europe/Middle East? :)
 
lurker's comment: You can also win by Domination or Conquest, but it's sooooo much easier to go kill Bulgaria, the Magyars, Germany, and Burgundy, take the Shroud of Turin and the Piece of the True Cross to Jerusalem, and win becuase the relics guve you 20,000 total and you should already have more than 10,000. :cool:
 
Winning by Dom or Conquest is almost impossible. While those VCs are enabled - you cannot get there without reaching the VP limit, unless it' Chieftain or you go on King-hunting rampage with a Viking Civ.

I'm not sure if we can capture Jerusalem/ the victory location before the limit, but I am sure we cannot capture a Relic @home and Jerusalem. Maybe one of them comes along - but we never came anywhere close in the other game. So yes, we'll have to slaughter gazzillions of Riff-Raff. At least, Assassins are worthwhile.

Our best available attacker is the Longbow @6.1.1, 40sp, comes with Invention...if we ever reach that.
But, it doesn't matter much; the AI won't get Pikes for a long time, and thus the only Def3 unit will be the occasional Knight. And Maces are surely able to handle Spears.
 
The Save

Inherited: Change almost nothing.

IBT: Couple of Germans show up, Spear retreats Abbassid Horse without taking a scratch, no attacks on any city.
Ruse Rax -> Temple, Nicea Settler-> Worker

Turn 1: 1041AD
Kill 2 Bulgar Spears, Burg Sword, 2 Burg Archers. Bomb various stuff.
Found Smyrna. Healing turn, mostly.
IBT: Const Horse->Horse

Turn 2: 1044AD
Kill some stuff, Cats fail horrible, Balkan Army barely kills Bulg Sword, retreat NE Army.
IBT: CoL->Arab Learning (currently in 29, but we cannot afford that research rate much longer)

Turn 3: 1047AD
Our entire Cats hit exactly twice; not much action.
IBT: Ugly pRNG. Loose MDI to Abbas’ Horse, Sword to German Archer; Germans approach in numbers. Magyars plop down a town right in front of our NE Army.
Couple of units finish.

Turn 4: 1050AD
Army kills 2 Spears and autorazes to new Magyar Vesprezem. Cats fair as usual (horribly…), and not even the Dromons hit.
IBT: No attacks, just some minor pillaging.

Turn 5: 1053AD
Road from Varna to Sredets finishes. This turn, Cats hit a couple of times; decimate one German Sword stack, Army is badly hurt.

Turn 6: 1056AD
More of the same. Balkans is somewhat under control, the Abbassid front – better don’t ask…

Turn 7: 1059AD
Pretty little action. Found another filler city.

Turn 8: 1062AD
No advances, anywhere.

Turn 9: 1065AD
Ugly…Burgs and German switch focus from well-defended Sredets to ill-defended Ochrida/Gyor…barely can clear them out for now, but have to expose a MDI. Meet Castille and declare.
Found Dyrrachium.
IBT: Exposed MDI survives

Turn 10: 1068AD
Meet and declare on Cordova (which may not be bad, since research time on AL drops a bit)
Kill stuff. I’ve left some units unmoved; the Dromon could be used to shuffle at least a Horse to Sinope, and I admittedly was a bit clueless what to do with our MDI Army. There’s a 3rd MDI in place, and IMHO it’s better to fill it; but we’re lacking units in that area.
Didn’t dare to start towards the Turks, we couldn’t afford to move the Army away.

No luck on leaders, grr…and not exactly the most inspired turns I’ve played in my “career”. Not that I think I made obvious blunders, I just didn’t seem to get anywhere.

Rat20_1068.jpg
 
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