RLC#1. Suryavarman of Khmer.

[pigswill]

In the end I've gone for a feeble compromise and decided to research currency before going maths>construction>HbR (or maybe aesthetics>drama>music ). I've played a few turns, some vaguely interesting stuff happened but its a bit early for an update.

 

[pigswill]

400bc. The first 100 turns.

Some Vaguely Interesting Stuff:

700bc Another trade:

Do the deal with Chuck. His ivory for our horse and rice.

675. Gil completes Oracle and founds Confucianism.

We build Isavapura (iron, stone but pretty naff otherwise):

650 Gil adopts confucianism having founded it.

600 Shaka adopts Buddhism from his neighbour Chuck.

575. We meet Mao the Hindu, he's not happy that we traded with his worst enemy Chuck the Buddhist and won't open borders. When was the last time anyone saw Mao found Hinduism? Weird game indeed. We also get our first GS.

525. Shaka discovers HbR, 'fear my horse archer' he says (until we get ballista elephants aka blisters).
Brennus completes Temple of Artemis (to join Great Wall in Bibracte)
Academy gets builts in Raja, likely to be our long term capital I reckon (but no rush until we're close to CS).

500. Brennus is too slow. Banteay Kdei (BK) founded:

450. Mao adopts HR. Mao founded a religion and is first to monarchy. That's one for the (little red) book. Everyone else remains despotic.
Our last peaceful city is founded:

400bc. Currency is in at last. Switch everywhere from building research to building wealth. Science slider goes from 30% to 80%. Economic boom. (Before currency 80 bpt -5 gpt. After currency 120bpt -6gpt. On the other hand there's no decent tech trades anywhere.

Good news is that Shaka, Gil and Brennus all have different religions. Its not enough to offset warmonger respect but its enough to stop them becoming friends:

Be it never so humble there's no place like home:

Overall not too bad. Got up to 9 cities and got currency. A reasonable start.

It will probably take another 11 turns for Maths>construction>HbR. Once construction is in I'll start chopping cats, after HbR I'll add massive whipping for rax, cats and blisters (probably won't bother with stables because I'll end up building a lot more cats than blisters).
Should be ready for war just after 1ad. I'll probably leave Brennus alone for now, maybe he'll build us another wonder.

 

[Kwibuss]

I see unhappy cities producing wealth. Isn't that a bit of a waste?
Better whip some of those citizens for something useful and return to producing wealth?

Or is there a reason for this? Keeping pop high for whipping cats for example?

Also a nice religious mess. There won't change into 1 big hugparty, but it will end up in carnage that's for sure. Only Charly and Shaka share a religion, but that usually doesn't hold Shaka back from declaring if he decided Charly is a nice target.

Since you leave Brennus alone (which makes perfect sense since he's no threat at all) I assume you will declare on Gilgamesh?

 

[Mec AntiKythera]

Looks like a solid start to me.

One comment about the fractured religion situation, while it does keep the AI from buddying-up, it also makes it impossible to placate more than one or two AI by adopting their religion. Not a problem in this case as far as I can see, but it isn't always good news in my experience.

So, the plan to war has been made, Brennus has been set aside for later land sharing arrangements and you want to go for a Space Victory. Are you already thinking about how much land you want to conquer before shifting your attention to the stars? I guess I am asking what the goal (or exit strategy) of the war will be, take every city? Merge the empires into one ball of greatness with you at the helm?

Have you thought about where you will want which wonders?

These are long-term questions and more forward thinking than I generally play myself, but since you named the VC already I thought it worth asking.

 

[pigswill]

Wealth production is to get elephants faster, I'm saving misery to be double whipped as soon as blisters are available.

I reckon that crushing Gil then Shaka then Brennus should give me plenty of land. If I manage that I won't need to worry about placating remaining AIs.

Haven't thought too much about wonders so far. Sury's not industrious, only recently acquired stone but still don't have marble. Pyramids is unlikely. Glib is worth considering in the medium term, maybe MoM for golden ages when the empire gets bigger. One of my favourite wonders is Kremlin, boosts cash rush and whipping. Almost certainly Taj Mahal, maybe SoL.

Haven't thought too much about national wonders. Unlike most people I'm not a huge fan of national epic pre-lib because I'm aiming for 100% GS early on, later on when GPs will be mainly used for GAs the flavour doesn't matter so much. HE may be worth considering but it depends on tech path after elepults.

 

[Mec AntiKythera]

I was wondering mostly about National Wonders but it is interesting to hear your thoughts about the others as well. Okay, you don't want NE yet and HE won't come in time to help with the first war anyway so I guess there is little need to worry about wonders at this point. Maybe you will want the HE up before engaging Shaka though.

I am wondering if there is another Civ nestled in between Gil and Shaka, seems like a lot of land there. It would be great to keep Shaka busy with something, that's why I'm interested in finding out what is over there.

Would it be worth giving the stone to Brennus or another of your neighbors to get them to invest in building a wonder nice and close by?

What is on your tech wish-list at this point? Monarchy and Feudalism for HR and vassals? Drama might be nice, you have some good food sources and a GT whip center would be a pleasant facility to have available. Oh wait, are you committed to the Constr+ route for cats and elephants? If you are meant to be highlighting leader traits and uniques (are you?) that would seem logical to me. And smart I would think.

 

[Pengu]

Spoiler :

Well, everything is easy on this map except Shaka who has a huge area to expand into. And even if I am way more advanced than him and had no land border towards him, and I was the leading civ, he had to attack me. Holding him at bay with all his armies is a pain and it happened just before I got rifles. It delayed me quite a bit.
Then as soon as I got cavs I attacking him. Then for some reason every damn civ in the game declares on me....
Gilga was pleased and in the same religion and Shaka had backstabbed me before but of course he declared, as did Stalin, Charles and Mao. Sigh. So I capped Shaka and Gilga and that is more or less the end. No one has edu and I am 1 tech from Assebly line.But it could have been so much quicker and easier if Shaka had delayed his attack 10-15 turns.

 

[pigswill]

I think I'm meant to be highlighting each leaders uniques as well as traits as long as they actually help us win the game. There's no doubt that elepults (or ballistics in Sury's case) are very powerful, particularly pre-feudalism and/or pre-eng.

Brennus has stone already in this particular game. He's also got masonry and maths so maybe he'll build pyramids and/or HG for us, that would be nice.

But anyway the next bunch of turns has been played taking us up to 1ad....

375. Meet everyone's favourite Uncle Jo. Hey Joe, where you going with that gun in your hand?

Do you have a death wish? That's on a par with "so punk, are you feeling lucky?" Despite his dismal social skills Mao and Chuck seem to like him so open borders it shall be.

325 maths>construction.

275. Brennus builds the Temple of Solomon. So Brennus do you have a death wish?

225 construction>HbR.

150 HbR>med
.
125 med>ph.

100 ph>CoL.
Trade alphabet to Brennus for poly+50g.
Trade currency to chuck for monarchy .

Its worth mentioning that once construction was in I started chopping some cats. Once HbR was in . Brennus and Gil meanwhile got into missionary spam (still my favourite AI behaviour script).

25ad. Stalin is first to theology, founds christianity and revolts to theocracy. He also declares on Chuck.

1ad. CoL is in. Cities have been whipped to the bone. Time for some anarchy while waiting for a hereditary ruler to emerge. Oh and Stalin has built the Great Lighthouse.

 

[vranasm]

well at least we will see UU in action ;-)

 

[Kwibuss]

Oh Stalin. Must be 1 of the worst AI's. I've rarely seen him making an impression.

Anyways I don't have much to add just that I'm looking forward to your next update

 

[pigswill]

Having gone to the trouble of whipping out a ballistic army I thought I may as well use it.

25ad. declare on Gil. Capture Ur to keep trade routes with the rest of the world.

75ad. Chuck builds the Pyramids and adopts PS (he's at war with Stalin).

175ad. Calendar>CS.
Yas starts MoM.
Pop a GS who bulbs philosophy and founds Taoism somewhere.
Capture Nibru.

250. I notice that Shaka has enough on his hands .

300. Capture Uruk. Capture Kish. Needed the gold because I was about to go into deficit.

325. On the subject of gold we pop a gold resource from one of our mines .

350. Gil recaptures Ur!

425.Re-recapture Ur and reinforce it a bit.

450 Chuck and Stalin declare peace.

475. CS is in. Start paper.

500. A wonder!

Who needs marble when you've got wood (and a whip)?

With that safely done ( Mao had calendar before me) revolt to Bureaucracy.

520. Capture Eridu. GG becomes MI in Jay. Change my mind and decide I'll need feudalism before the end of the next war.

620. Capture Lagash. Capture Bad-Tibira.

 

[Kwibuss]

I wonder if Shaka will declare on you. I kinda hope so as that would make the game a bit more interesting.

Allthough I like the fact that you play at my skill level and that you think about the people with less Civ skill I think it's better you play Emperor or Immortal.

 

[pigswill]

For a personal challenge (i.e. a reasonable chance of losing through bad play or bad luck) I suspect that would probably be immortal particularly when playing an open forum game where you not only get feedback from other people but you have time to think about what you're doing.

It sounds as if you're finding this too one-sided to be interesting and I can understand that. On the other hand while tactical stuff like micro-management, diplomacy, opening up trade routes and bulbing techs apply to all skill levels the pace of the game varies between levels. At lower difficulties you end up getting a much bigger empire earlier on if you're playing well and the AI are slightly irrelevant. At higher difficulties you have a much smaller empire for much longer and the AI are much more relevant (diplomacy, alliances, tech trading etc). However optimum strategies (as opposed to tactics) are different for a noble game to a monarch game to a deity game. You'll almost certainly win monarch using immortal strategies (turtle up with compact empire, go lib>miltech) but you'll win faster and easier using monarch level strategies. That's what I reckon. Maybe I'm wrong on this one but I'll need some evidence.

 

[Mec AntiKythera]

I don't know about the pigs but the elephants seem to have wings at the moment.

 

[pigswill]

Seems like I miscalculated the level of interest in me playing a monarch level game. Fair enough. I'll probably try stomping Shaka and if succesful call it a day (though I may continue off line just to practice space ship victory).

 

[Shaandore]

I'm interested. I don't think that you should abandon this game. (In my book it's an evil thing to do, not that I didn't do it myself )

This game is educational. And it shows monarch players that the difficulty can be owned. (It was hard for me to believe at first). You could skip some details though to save your energy for upcoming games. Just drop some lines about major decisions and thought processes. Things like "Capture Eridu" are important, but saying "I fought a 20 turn war and captured 5 cities" is better. And explain how you did it, what kind of stack you brought and why.

And keep up the good work! I'm rooting for you to get your best Space date ever.

 

[pigswill]

I guess I'm just easily disheartened. On with the game.

With Gil gone I've got plenty of land and a reasonable number of cities:

Not too shabby for 600ad. The economy is of course really hurting due to city maintenance and research is down to 20%. From one perspective it would be sensible to stop now to consolidate and recover the economy. From another perspective this is the time to take out Shaka, he's got plenty of land and if he's allowed to grow peacefully he'll become a major problem and the only AI I'd have to worry about long term.

Elepults are really quite powerful because you can get them relatively early when they're still likely to be facing archers. The war itself was rather messy and best forgotten.

Hopefully the economy will recover with a major program of courthouse building and forbidden palace somewhere in the land formerly known as Sumeria. If nothing else I've still got cheap libraries and can build wealth and/or research so I shouldn't go broke. Brennus is an also-ran (it did help blocking him off early after all ) and the other AIs are overseas and busy with their own squabbles. As long as I can weaken Shaka before he gets to feudalism/engineering ballistics should be enough.

One other problem is a shortage of workers (15 cities, 12 workers), I only captured 4 from Gil so I'll guess I'll have to build them myself. So much to do, so little time.

So war it shall be .

 

[Revent]

Very nice game so far! However, I think it may be better to build the FP in one of Shaka's cities purely due to it being further away and it will have an effect on more cities. (Even more if you decide to take the war further down)

Are you sure on a space race? I think Conq or Dom is so much easier on this map.

Side note: Very nice to see you using his UU although tis a shame there's not many horses from what I've seen

 

[Benginal]

I love a good elepult war. I think you probably could have done it a little faster, though. Something to strive for. 31 turns from HBR to end of first war is respectable, but you were only trying to capture what looks like 6 cities.

If I were playing I'd probably go ahead and take out Brennus and then bottle up for a nuclear finish! And don't be disheartened about the interest level. 1) A lot of people like the first 100 turns the most and like discussing that the most since lots of stuff is up for debate. Whereas at this point it's pretty clear what has to be done. 2) People are probably still watching/reading, just not talking anymore, see comment (1).

 

[pigswill]

Played up to 1000ad.

Took a few turns to move units to the borders of Zululand and get them healed up. Declared in 720ad.

I decided to bribe Brennus to join me, not that I expect him to achieve much but if he's fighting with me at least he won't be fighting against me.

My armies were better organised and progress has been slightly faster, captured 4 cities up to 1000ad, Shaka's stacks were pretty feeble though blisters did get to strut their staff against HAs and the occasional elephant. More to the point Shaka got feudalism about 900ad or so and I've lost a big chunk of my front line cats to LBs. Shaka also launched a small amphibious attack which was indeed annoying but my cities stayed intact.

Despite being reduced to 6 cities and losing units faster than me Shaka is refusing to capitulate. Do I want him as a vassal or a historical footnote? I'm up to 19 cities now, 21 when I polish off Brennus. In addition to the Temple of Solomon Brennus also just finished HG which would be welcome for the small health boost so he's definitely a target.

Either way I'm going to have to wait a few turns to reinforce and heal. Maybe I'll go for a ceasefire. I really don't want him free on my borders plotting some tiresome revenge.

Other news is that the other island's AIs have been busy fighting inconclusively between themselves so slowing down their research and general development.

As anticipated declaring on Shaka lost me a lot of trade route income, BK (island city) has suddenly become a regular destination for our cities' merchants. As a result of this research has slowed to a crawl. Finished feudalism and started on paper, still 3 turns from completion. I have a GS due to appear in 4 turns. Standard play would be to use him/her to part bulb education but I'm also wondering about another academy. Lib looks pretty secure and if I'm heading to the end of the tech screen then an academy will contribute a lot more than 1500 beakers by the end of the game.

To reduce cash loss I've been busy building courthouses and theForbidden Palace ended up in Eridu iirc. Its not made a huge difference but every little helps.