RB23 - Alex the Decentral....

[Qwack]

Bad news guys... we got Great library. Oh wait

First turn, go to our good friend bismarck and beg for 2 gold per turn, he gives it to us. Send phaylanx that was guarding horse to the about to be founded city in south. He attacks at 74.2% odds in 230 AD and wins.



He pillages a huge 2 gold... but every bit matters, right? . Send a scouting party to check defense at london. Ugh, so many units, I would have preferred a 2 to 1 ratio, but this is a desperate situation, so I ccouldnt wait for more units. It wasnt looking like good odds, it was 10 units to 7 and +60% cultural defense.



Our army reaches london's gates by 320 AD, I was hoping she would play like every other AI and move some units out at about this point making it easier for us to capture, but she didnt... After a 2 turn battle, london is ours



I try to extract construction or currency out of victoria at this point, but she didnt give in. I wait 1 turn, hoping she would be offering more, but nada. So I pull off this deal in 350 AD:



In 365 AD, start GL in athens with a huge army of 5 workers nearby to chop it out. Now ill be completely honest here, every message that came up got me scared, that it was going to be "Great library has been built in far away land", but that message didnt come up, and on my last turn, or 500 AD, GL is finished in Athens.



And the same turn, we find a gold source near sparta... are you kidding me?



Wow. This was seriously the 15 luckiest turns I have played in civ4 so far. First with the amazing win at london, then great library not being built, then the gold pop.

Yeah, and now how to move forward. Construction is due in 4, elizabeth has longbows, so we will need cat's now to take anything. GL in capital has significantly improved our research situation. Our first great scientist should be used on a philosophy lightbulb IMO, for trade material and catching up.

[edit] Also in terms of corinth, I think we should use that as a production city, so building cottages there is pointless. I have started Heroic epic in it which is due in 7 turns. In terms of athens, im not sure what to build there so ill let TheRat decide. National Epic probably wont be as useful right now as more army to take some more cities, so I was leaning towards army. I also think we should switch to Judiasm soon for happiness, everyone on our island is jewish so it will atleast hopefully insure nobody attacks us while we take care of victoria later on.

save:

 

[Qwack]

Rooster:

Qwack
TheRat - up for 15
Darreljs - on deck
Greyfox
Ozbenno

 

[GreyFox]

Absolutely Fabulous.

We won't be able to get construction in 4, since we would soon be forced to drop our science rate to perhaps 40%, or even 30%. So I suspect its a post-war lay low build up period in the hope of improving our economy, and then a massive cats rush to finish off Vicky. We still want that Shrine city.

--

 

[ThERat]

what a brilliant job netting us GL, London and another source of gold

will play right now, trying to get us cats to fight again. Remember the only way we can win this without civics is and more

 

[darrelljs]

Hoo boy, this game is a lot more exciting than the last one! I think Qwack just proved it is best to be lucky and good . I totally agree about popping Philosophy with the first Great Scientist, although note that we will need to have Sailing researched. We can trade it to the AIs for good value and it doesn't really buy them anything. I believe the priorities should be Currency and Code of Laws to get our economy in better shape.

Darrell

 

[ThERat]

save

Pre-Turn
realise that the known world is all jewish...that will be great for us once we have the shrine
construction will be more likely done in 6
ask pleased Caesar for 100gold but he denies that, too bad

hire 2 scientists in Athens as it will grow into unhappiness soon

1. 515AD
going to connect iron, swords and maces will be better to attack in the future

2. 530AD
we have a GS, but we need drama before we can lightbulb philo
ask Bismarck for 100gold and he gives that to us

3. 545AD
Bismarck cancels the free 2gpt deal, well, we can't have it all

4. 560AD
construction is in, drama next
Sparta and Athens start both cats

give Khan cows for 6gpt
nobody will part with any proper tech, but if we have cash, we can get drama fast
get monotheism, sailing and 300gold from caesar

now 100% science will give us drama in 5 (and philo)

5. 575AD
all of them have calendar, that would be great to have really

6. 590AD
zzz

7. 605AD
Corinth finishes HE, starts cats as well. We connect the iron finally

8. 635AD
drama is in, CoL takes only 7 turns with 100% science

lightbulb philo


Canterbury has 3 unhappy faces now due to join motherland whining.
We need to take on England soon again

9. 650AD
big trading round now
get calendar and currency from Khan
get metal from Bismarck for construction and drama

Vikky has machinery, but nobody else
sell her drama for 200gold to fuel our research on CoL (in 4 turns), which only she has currently

10. 665AD
Khan comes to trade spices and silks, I agree for now
London's borders expand as well

fire 2 scientists for faster growth in Athens since happy limit is up
start a forge there

on turn 13 we get another GS, that could lighbuld compass now or build an academy, team can decide
on turn 14 get CoL, go for CS now

Khan/Bismarck have machinery as well
we could give Khan CoL for monarchy and 140gold to fuel our research
we are currently even at 50%, but due to surplus cashcan afford more

London will get a forge helped by chops to connect spices
I think I would build an academy now in London since it has the GL

as for military, we must continue with swords and cats to attack Lizzy soon, she is running away with techs and even has CS

 

[GreyFox]

Great build up ... so the Rat is not a warmonger but actually a all-rounder ...

I vote for academy ... coupled with TGL it will speed up our research a bit.

How did Liz (I keep using Liz and Vic interchangeably ... ) manage to continue teching like that with her capital decapitalized?

--

 

[darrelljs]

I take a little time to explore our new empire, which is radically different than the one I inherited last time. I note in passing we are (barely) first in land area. However, we are only 4th/5th/6th/7th in food/gold/soldiers/production. Still, things are looking up. I see that London already has an Academy (and The Oracle), so I am assuming ThERat meant the Acadmey for Athens (which has the GL), especially since the GS is sitting there. I go ahead and build it, and switch the Corn and a plains forrest to two river cottages since we are at the happiness cap. Civil Service drops from 9 to 8. Sparta is under the happy cap so I switch the desert Copper mine to the flood plains river, which speeds growth from 15 to 4 after which I'll switch it back. A couple of other cities are under the cap as well, but there is no way to radically speed them up without giving up a lot of hammers, which we need now

I think about it for some time and finally decide to pull the CoL for Monarchy/140 gold trade with Kublai. That's going to carry us for four turns of deficit research. The last thing I do might be a bit controversial, but I adopt Judaism (ducks rocks). It gives us an extra happy in most of our cities (two of which are unhappy) and will really help diplomatic relations, especially if we can get Kublai Kahn to adopt it. The turn of anarchy sucks, but I took it on my turnset. Oh, one other thing, England has built the Temple of Solomon

The incense comes online and now we only have one unhappy person (in Cantebury).

800 A.D. - I spot a Maceman in Coventry



830 A.D. - KK converts to Judaism, we run out of money for deficit research (CS due in 4 at 50%). JC has Machinery but won't do a straight up for Philosophy. Neither will Bismarck. However KK gives us 100 gold for being Jewish p ), I think about it a bit and decide killing Victoria to get the Temple of Solomon is time critical, so I go ahead and let J.C. rip me (Philo+Drama for Machinery + 70 gold). He's at +6 relations. Deficit research nails CS in two turns.

860 A.D. - Civil Service comes in and Victoria declares war!



Kudos to the AI, we were coming after her anyway and she declares before we are ready. On the plus side we won't accumulate any more "you declared war on our friend" penalites. I drop research to 0% as I believe we'll need to upgrade to some maces soon. Bismarck takes advantage of the situation:



I give in to him, everyone else has it and he is pretty backwards. Here is what she has coming at us:



The bottom two HAs are solo pillagers. The top "stack" is a Crossbowman, Catapult and HA. I'm going to stop now, with 6 turns left for some consultation. Kublai Kahn will declare on Victoria (and throw in 30 gold) for Civil Service. Caesar will do it (and throw in Horseback Riding and 10 gold) for Civil Service. Bismarck is not willing to at all. We have in London a Swordsman, 4 Catapults, 3 Phalanx, 5 Axeman. We have 90% or better odds with the two Phalanx against the three Horse Archers, but that will leave them exposed in the open.

In a normal game I'd just whip up some Maceman and take her out. However, we can't whip. We can upgrade an old unit to a Maceman or Crossbowman every other turn. That means that if Vicky really comes at us (her power graph is a decent chunk above ours, and she has Feudalism which we lack) we could be in a bind. KK is in the lead but JC is pretty backwards, so I would like to make the deal with him (the shared war might even get him to Friendly). It is a bit of a worry as he might end up taking the Temple Of Solomon. However, it is probably the safest move. I'll wait until we have consensus before continuing.

Darrell

 

[GreyFox]

I would bring in JC. Where is the ToS? Is it anywhere near JC-Vic border?

although we can't whip, we could do something akin to whipping (a lot less effective though) is to starve population off by working on all avialble hammers.

--

 

[darrelljs]

The ToS is NOT in the one city I can see on JC's border. The exact location is currently unknown to us.

Darrell

 

[Ozbenno]

Wow , I'm away for half a day and what happens???

I was a bit skeptical on how we were going here but you guys have pulled us out of the fire. Although Qwack, we've already got gold, you should have found silver

I would hold off calling in a war ally unless we really need it. Don't want anyone else cutting our sandwich do we? That Jewish Holy City would be really nice.

I'd get the troops in London, upgrade what we can, and let her come at us until we're ready to attack. Some crossbows should hold off the maces. I'd get rid of the HAs if we can but I assume we're going to get pillaged pretty bad in London.

 

[ThERat]

birng in JC, AI fighting each other is always good for us...even though we need to give up CS

 

[darrelljs]

Okay, so continuing where I left off. I do end up bringing JC into the battle. He pays the price fairly early:



I re-arrange cities for max hammers although I still keep commerce a priority as we have plenty of troops to upgrade. Two cities are running a 1 food deficit, but are nowhere near starving off a citizen. My math was off before, we get one upgrade every three turns. I decide to kill all the enemy around London. Two suicide cats soften up the main stack, then I take out the Horse Archer, Catapult and Crossbowman with no losses. I also kill the two Horse Archers with Phalynx although next turn one falls to a Pikeman. I draw first blood:



The city brings in zero resources and is size one, so I raze it. The cash will help upgrade a Maceman this turn . I kill time for a few turns just moving troops around (pulling in some Archers from the back line, watch out for that barbarian city). First off, I am completely ignoring Coventry. It is fairly well defended and not the Jewish holy city. Let Caesar throw some troops at it. There are two staging grounds. The minor one is at Nottingham:



It is a large city, but not particularly useful to us. The forces assembled are enough to take it probably, at the least to prevent it from becoming a thorn in our side until more arrives. The larger force is heading due west searching for the Jewish holy city:



The stack is not as beefy as I would like, but it should serve. More troops are on the way, if you want to wait for them or wait to upgrade another axe to a Maceman. My begging for money has gotten me nowhere, but I haven't tried for about five turns. I've seen several Horse Archers, so keep cranking out our UU. Other than that I've seen mostly Maceman, Longbowman, and Pikeman (thankfully). Good hunting .

Darrell

 

[Qwack]

AI declares on us while we were preparing to declare on it? Amazing .

Nice turns darrel. Looks like that stack darrel put together is probably enough to take care of nottingham, with our smaller army down there. Btw, I think we should build a irrigation chain to corinth now since we have CS, its size 5 but its happiness limit is 9, so we should try to grow it with farms allowing us to work more mines. We should go after that jewish holy city this war, looks like Elizabeth's main attack stack is already gone from the power graph, jewish holy city will be huge for spying and gold.. everyone on our island is jewish Although I agree with you that nootingham might not be a huge use for us immdietely, it will severly hurt elizabeth's research. She is working alot of 3 commerce coast tilles. Interestingly though, she is working 1 ocean tile which is worth 2f1c when she could be working a coast tile worth 2f3c. Hooray for AI, ive seen this happen with plains forests and grassland mines also. AI works a 1f2p plains forest when it could be working a 1f3p grassland mine...

 

[GreyFox]

Executive Summary

Frustrating turnset ... I hope I had the luck of Qwack, but alas that is not to be. Hope being good is enough.


Inherited turns

Looks good. Made a few adjustments here and then, but nothing major.

Made a trade with Bismarck to improve relationship ... he is friendly with Vicky, and I am a bit worried Vicky would convince him to attack us.



Also traded lux with KK.




Battle of Hastings

After some movements, we finally found our prized city:



And in 1055AD, the atatck comence:



I half expected Vicky to reinforce Hastings, but she did not. Fine.

While attacking, Catapult loses to: English Longbowman (6.00/6) at 0.3 percent.
Catapult promoted: City Raider I
While attacking, Catapult loses to: English Longbowman (5.22/6) at 0.4 percent.
While attacking, Maceman defeats (2.56/8): English Longbowman at 84.8 percent.
Catapult promoted: City Raider I
While attacking, Maceman defeats (6.64/8): English Longbowman at 86.8 percent.
While attacking, Axeman loses to: English Longbowman (0.78/6) at 80.3 percent.
While attacking, Axeman defeats (5.00/5): English Pikeman at 99.2 percent.
While attacking, Catapult defeats (5.00/5): English Longbowman at 100.0 percent.
Judaism has spread: Hastings
Captured Hastings (Victoria)

At the cost of one cat (the other retreated) and one axe lost at 80% we own the Holy City:


Battle of Nottingham

Did Qwack says the southern force is enough? Not when you have my luck ...

While defending, Maceman loses to: English Catapult (2.40/5) at 96.8 percent.

Jeez! THAT IS NOT SUPPOSE TO HAPPEN!!!

This stroke of bad luck renders our southern force not capable of taking Nottingham, since without a mace, it will take a lot of suicides to kill the longbow.

No choice, I have to pull some maces to the south. Finally, in 1100AD, we attacked:

While attacking, Catapult loses to: English Longbowman (2.10/6) at 0.4 percent.
While attacking, Maceman defeats (4.96/8): English Longbowman at 67.0 percent.
Maceman promoted: City Raider I
While attacking, Maceman defeats (2.56/8): English Longbowman at 99.5 percent.
Swordsman promoted: City Raider I
While attacking, Swordsman defeats (1.68/6): English Pikeman at 85.1 percent.
Judaism has spread: Nottingham (English Empire)
Judaism has spread: Nottingham
Captured Nottingham (Victoria)



After giving it some serious thought, I agree with darell to raze it. It was a painful decision, but really, Nottingham has nothing to bring forth to our empire at the moment.

Razed Nottingham

Vicky had also brough a cat and crossbow to Hastings. I upgraded our sword and axe to maces when I see that. The cat has been easily repelled, but the crossbow is a headache, especially when it is Shock promoted. We lost one mace.

Here is the situation, suggest taking out York and then we can consider peace. York can be kept, since the cottages alone should be able to pay for the maintenance.



I checked Bismarck throughout my turnset, and he is unwilling to part with Feudalism. Always demanding gold + philosophy. Towards the end, he placed us with the WFYABTA limit

Our empire is in dire need for courthouses. Once those are built, one may consider shifting palace to a central location, like London. Without bureaucracy, it makes not much differenc ewhere the capitol is, so the incentive for capital is only the distance upkeep.

We also had a great scientist, I don't know what to do with him. We could merge him, construct one more Academy, or learn Paper.

>>> The Save (1100AD) <<<

 

[Qwack]

Good turns even with the bad luck, great job getting the holy city. +20 gold . I dont know if we should have razed nottingham, even if it increases our city maintenance, it would have reduced our unit cost. Im not sure of the mechanics on that but it was 12 pop, so it probably reduces unit cost a decent bit. Definately keep york though with the developed cottages and wine.

btw, check out that 5 horse archers/1 maceman army victoria is sending towards cumae on galleys, that probably would have been attacking us if we didnt bring in JC into the war. I agree with greyfox we should seek peace after York. Our army is really good now so once we rebuild our economy we can take on pretty much everyone except kublai, we still need to get that barb city and a fur/silver city to improve our happiness in the south. With shrine and the cities now, I think we are in good position to keep up researchwise.

Im not sure what to do with scientist, maybe save him for education on the way to Liberalism, but ofcourse we will might get another GS by that point also..?

 

[Ozbenno]

Well the situation is much brighter than last I picked up this save . Maybe I should skip .

I upgrade the chariot in Hastings to a HA to deal with the crossbow hanging around.

Just as planned first IBT crossbow attacks and is destroyed by HA.

I leave the GS alone.

Vicky comes back at Hastings 2nd IBT with a HA, crossbow and catapult (emptied from York ). We lose another mace. I dispose of the crossbow with the HA next turn.

Barb archer kills sentry on forrested hill.

I finally have some forces assembled at York.



Didn't need this. Knew I should have skipped .



Take part in the battle of York before retiring for advise. Sacrificial cat does a nice job but dies. Don't lose any other troops though.



And with that Vicky is ready for peace. This is her offer. I'm sure we can get better.



Kublai will declare on Bismark but we've currently got nothing to bribe him with. Two options I can see. If we can get Engineering from Vicky for peace he doesn't have it. We could also bulb Paper from GS in Athens and use that.

Have seen one lone longbow from bismark so far. He has settled a city down south that we should raze. We are essentially equal with him in power.

I'd take out the barb city as well soon as it has resources we can use.

Have played 6 turns only, will gather thoughts and wisdom before playing out the rest (are we on 10 or 15?).

Question is do we try and get Kublai involved or just play a defensive role until we can get peace or do we go all medievil on him to teach him a lesson? Do we leave Vicky alone for the moment?

 

[Qwack]

If she gives engineering, take that and get kublai involved IMO. If she doesnt bulb paper and get him involved. This will insure that none of the AI's on our island run away, Kublai is getting too strong right now, war should slow him down a bit. But wow, I seriously wasnt expecting bismarck to declare after he gave us so much help...

I would say peace with vicky, get kublai involved against bismarck, and play defensive/rebuild economy. Lets see what others say, maybe we can even backstap kublai this way after his primary offensive army is used up on bismarck, but im getting ahead here .

 

[ThERat]

I agree with Qwack's plan, getting AI's to fight is worth a GS (and we get paper on the way as well)

 

[darrelljs]

Good turnsets fellows, no one said the game would be easy and you did a great job prosecuting the war against Victoria. My very strong suspiscion is that she bribed Bismarck to enter the war. I would say if there are no more juicy plumbs we get her to make peace for Feudalism AND try to get her to cancel deals with Bismarck . I think he might have a hard time finding us without open borders from Vickie or Julius. Alternatively if there are more good cities in range we can take one or more two and try to get Engineering, as it will have more trade value.

After peace, we really should get a Market in Hasting, and eventually a Grocer and a Bank! Each Jewish Missionary would then be worth 2 gold per turn, as well as spying. I am guessing Isabella is on the other continent hoarding the other religions, which is great for us. We also need Courthouses, just like Qwack said, to get our costs under control. Some of those cities are getting darn expensive. I would actually leave the Palace in Athens and build the FP out west. I think it has the exact same reduction effect on nearby cities, and we'll need Athens to reduce the maintenance of Kublai Kahn's cities, eventually

So in short, I recommend one or two more cities at most before peace, then a couple of builder turnsets to get some of the happiness resources settled and Courthouses in place. Research path generaly along the Guilds/Banking and Chemistry/Steel path. We don't have to wait for those techs for the next war of course, but that should be the general direction given our strategy!

Edit: Read Qwack and ThERat's reply better, and agree with their course on the war diplomacy.

Darrell