Role Play Challenge: Brennus, A Simple Man

[madscientist]

Brennus, A Simple Man: PArt IV continued

We tried to pry nationalism off of MM by teching a few rounds but he must have gotten off another trade.

Then the AP vote for Popemanship arises.

DAMM, DAMMM, DAMM. So Dammm close. Stupid Charlemagne abstaining with his 12 votes which would have put us over the edge.

We did get a very nice random event

OK, with vassalage new muskets come out with combat II and pinch. Considering we are charismatic, a force of then can get some pretty high promotions in later wars!!!! But right now Brennus is a pretty popular guy, and let's see if that is a path to victory.

We did find a use for DR

I should also mention we are building courthouses now. Maintenace costs are increasing, and now is the time for them.

We also took a chance with diplomacy of Charlemagne by adopting these civics, mostly for costs

Still produce of advanced units though!

Another great event, a free academy in the capital!!!

These insane old people are really helping our science. Brennus is immensely entertained, taking those ranting in stride.

Another AP diplo vote

OK< HC is out of HR although back into it by the save. Somehow if we can get SB into FR we can get the AP to work for us via a diplomatic win.

We popped a GS

And opted for a Golden Age. We then got all our cities to build infrastructure.

Now a problem with the AP, HC spun off a colony which I am unsure yet if he has a Hindu city

GW is easy to get along with and I see no problems getting one American Hindu city!

The GA finished and we teched constituion. Time for some decisions here.

A lokk at AI info

First, notice that we are getting 99 commerce in foreign trade routes.

And we are doing well in diplomacy, HC is back in HR

OK, what to do with civics????

Do we adopt representation sacrificing HC to pleased? If so do we adopt Mercantilism for the free specialist while getting +3 free beakers at the cost of about 100 commerce??/ These numbers are too complicated for our fine leader.

Here is a view of London

A likely GM soon. Trade Mission, settle, or save for founding a corp???

And our continent

OK, do we continue to fill up more land with cities???? My guess is yes and look for a diplomatic victory here.

One final note. Mansa Musa is approximately even with us in power numbers. Just pointing that out

 

[KrikkitTwo]

One point, (said before) if we are doing diplomacy give us the Glance Screen.

In any case, it depends on how the "favorite civic" works

If you are in HR for 100 turns, and HC has just changed into it is it the same as if you had just changed into it?

If so I would just switch into HR whenerver HC does, and Rep otherwise... stay in FreeMarket (happiness with MM if he takes it+trade points) and Vassalage and HR
(Free Market and HR are good for your economy... large with trade) (Vassalage... well it keeps Charly happy.[or you can go for the equally useless Free Speech to keep Washington happy)
and use spies and requests to keep them in it (especially just before a vote)

I'd probably say go for Biology/Medicine instead of Democracy and get the extra pop (and save the GM for a Food corp (which means no communism))

Possibly use some spies to force civic changes (on charlemagne/washington to change religions... that would be a large benefit... makes them happier with you AND increases their vote)

you can also spread Hinduism more to your friends (like MM) to boost their vote.

/ramble
So in conclusion

Economics for Free Market (more trade)
Corporation for Food Corp
Biology/Medicine for more population (and food corp)
Communism/Democracy for spy points

Go with the Popular civics
HR+Vassalage/Free Speech+FM

Try and Get George and Charles to be Hindu
Try and get HC and MM to stay in their favorite Civics

make your Good friends more Hindu (Especially MM)

Fill out cities


PS Sitting Bull Has the AP.. whether he goes FR or not he will be a candidate. (although it will cut his votes)
See if you can make sure he has techs that are NOT the favorite civics of other leaders (constitution/liberalism.. medicine means you need to give him biology which may not be a good idea)



OPTION 2 = Whomping

If you go with that... switch to Representation (still no Merc, you don't need free specialists, excess food remember) don't get a food corp you will want to upgrade. stick with Vassalage and produce a bunch of Muskets (drafting makes people unhappy, and isn't simple, and doesn't get full experience)

Then target Rifling and Steel, and send waves of Musket(pike)/Trebs->Rifle/Trebs->Rifle/Cannons on Charly (who seems to be behind you in techs and didn't vote for you and won't trade with you...he seems like the type who wants a tussle anyways... MM on the other hand may not want a tussle... even if he is asking for it)

Whomp Charly until he admits you are better (capitulates) and THEN make him vote for you (and get him properly Hindu)

*Replacable parts is a good trade tech, something you can get the leaders don't have

 

[xxamonxx]

@Krikkitone,
I don't know attacking Charly is a good idea. It seems that either he is a vassal on monty of vise versa. Either way I don't think that a war with the two of them is a good idea. Even if we win the war and vassal charly, we would piss off Monty whos votes we would lose.

@Madscientist
Definitely try to convert washington to Hindu.

 

[madscientist]

Scrrenshot of the diplomatic Glance scree. Finally downloaded the correct Bhuris patch.

 

[semirami]

Research Liberalism immediately. Send a hindu missionary to GW immediately. Gift Liberalism to SB. Win the game!

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Either George or Charles will take work, as will MM (to keep)

George can definitely be converted to Hindu (or at least Free Religion) to get him more votes And to like you more. ... maybe just give him money??

definitely try and get MM into Free Market (along with you) and spam Missionaries to him.

But if you can get Sitting Bull to go Free Religion that does cut his votes enough to give you the win I think


Otherwise I think all this complex diplomacy may be too complicated.... the AP vote takes long, and people can switch, it might be time for a good fun romp... get a nice simple empire... No Capitulation, Representation, Communism, Biology, Rifle, Steel (Railroad), etc.

 

[semirami]

SB will adopt FR, as soon as he has Liberalism. That is 100% sure. Not sure, when he will research it. Washington is not important. You only need to spread Hinduism to him. Just be careful and accept any demand from Mansa, Monty, or HC. The game is won.

 

[BalbanesBeoulve]

Remember that the rules say no corporations.

 

[madscientist]

After screwing up diplomacy and techs bigtime and getting DoWed and pummelled by Charles, I reloaded. Did the game corrected and

Well, recap coming in a bit.

 

[madscientist]

Remember that the rules say no corporations.

Good point although it does not matter as we did not get that far.

 

[madscientist]

Brennus, A Simple Man: Part V

OK, OK. Calm down everyone. Yes we reloaded the last save. We butchered the diplomacy, foolishly thinking Sitting Bull would vote for us once he adopted FR and forgetting he built the AP. Also I forgot to address Charles favorit civic ending in a DoW. Bah, we reloaded from the last save.

No screenshots except diplomacy as that is the angle we played. TEch was way out the door, as HC was getting a free GG from Fascism while we were still teching Scientific Method. One chance for victory for the big guy, He needs Pontification!

So we adjust civics

HR to make HC happy
Vassalage to make Charles tolerant of us, the extra +2 XP helps too.

The first AP vote

And the results

NUTS! Well I really did not expect Charles to like us that much. We proceeded to spam Hindu missionaries to MM as suggested.

Next vote for the AP chair

That is not good, all those hindu missionaries and he votes for SB now.

Our tech path went democracy (we did adopt emancipation)/SM/economics/staretd Biology

Why SM before economics? Because Brennus is none too bright!

Also SB converted to Buddhism lockign up Charles voting for him. It did alientate MONTY quite a bit though

After waiting for a long time, and adopting Free MArket the vote comes up again

We quickly check the Glance screen

And the actually vote results.

AP Diplomatic Victory!!!! Great Victory for a beloved leader, and makes up for the missed AP victory during the CHarlemagne game.

The Power graph numbers

Demographics

And the Polaroid

This was a very interesting game. We jumped on that AP once we had the chance, as playing a farms/mines game being essentially isolated was a tech death sentence. Frankly I did not expect to win the game once I saw the start but played it out anyway.

Recap to follow.

 

[madscientist]

Recap of this games RPC

Rules

Wow, playing farms/mines is not all that hard although we definitely fell behind in tech bigtime. This is more attributed to the isolated start after that unfortunate discussing with Liz Didn't miss the wonders although I have no problems with them. I think not being able to found a corp may have been an eventual problem as I would have boxed us into a corner late game. State Property would have been nerfed due to no workshops or watermills, and no corps. Probably in fairness to the RPC, we should have allowed Brennus to workshp/watermill once he teched communism. While I am certain I did not play teh "FE" game as well as the pros would have (that's essentially what we played), we certainly stayed competitve.

Why we won this RPC

Oh, besides the reload!!

1) Diplomacy! Yes, you can play with only farms and mines and yet if you have proper diplomacy victory can be acheived.
2) Seeing that the AP was a viable option once we got Hinduism.
3) Chariot rush against Liz certainly helped. TEching was tough, can you imagine how tough it would have been without all that nice English lands?
4) The GS bulbing of Astronomy was big. Trading it away got us tech parity for a while, long enough to build some decent muskets to defend our lands.
5) So if we did not abuse teh AP, how would we have tried victory??? My guess is a very outdated Assault on Mali first and a slow plodding war which likely would have failed (ever realize that I am the eternal pessimist on my chances to win these games?)

One other point not covered in teh final segment, Charles spun Hammarabi off as a colony, so had to quick sent a missionary to him.

Thanks to all for following and the advice!!!!

Next game is a three city cultural challenge for who I consider the strongest leader in the game, Hyuna Capac! I'll post the start as soon as I decide on a good title.

 

[r_rolo1]

You should try this variant in Pangea someday..... This game ,in spite of the win, did not showed the true power of this aproach, that is the superior prod power

Good win, and a nice show of diplo... everyday I become more convinced that the thing that separates the good players of the really good players is the handling of the Diplo.

 

[BornSlippy]

Excellent thread, very educational and entertaining. Thanks a lot, mr. Scientist sir!

 

[madscientist]

You should try this variant in Pangea someday..... This game ,in spite of the win, did not showed the true power of this aproach, that is the superior prod power

Good win, and a nice show of diplo... everyday I become more convinced that the thing that separates the good players of the really good players is the handling of the Diplo.

I agree, the game did not properly demonstrate the Farm/mine game as I envisioned although it went decently given the start. RPCs with Pangea maps seam to always strugle (MAo 1 was a loss, Charles 1 was a loss, Shaka 1 was a loss) but this strat is made for Pangea. Sometimes it happens, remember Willem was supposed to show a CE game, but that was abandoned fast and delayed until Persians in Space.

I think an Agressive leader is needed to deal with Pangea. The Simpleminded leader has been played out, but we can come up with a different "Story" for a Pangea Farm/mine game. Kublai comes to mind as we can forget religion and get fast libraries early libraries. Of course Kublai cannot let his grandfather out perform him, so perhaps another Conquest Khan game using a Farm/mine approach. Burn Baby Burn!!!!

You are right, alot can be done with good diplomacy.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

You should try this variant in Pangea someday..... This game ,in spite of the win, did not showed the true power of this aproach, that is the superior prod power

Good win, and a nice show of diplo... everyday I become more convinced that the thing that separates the good players of the really good players is the handling of the Diplo.

Yeah, when Getting it back it might be interesting to see what an earlier DoW might have done (when you had gained a decent Tech Edge on someone).

but on Pangea, or even Hemispheres/Big +Small, etc. it might work.

 

[BalbanesBeoulve]

I'm giving up on my shadow game. Played to about 1500. Teched to rifles and was ready to take out Elizabeth, i even took out her northern most city. But i stupidly forgot one thing. Redcoats. She was teching to rifles as i took her first city and after that, forget about it. I actually wouldn't have minded letting her stay on the island, if it wasn't for her massive culture. She went wonder spam crazy, plus a holy city right in the middle, meant that the cities by her were getting culturally crushed. If her culture had stayed to her BFC and hadn't started extending into the 3rd and 4th ring i would have stayed peaceful.

Techwise wasn't doing too bad. Only Mansa and Liz were ahead of me. The tech rate really started going up drastically after representation.

 

[grandad1982]

Well done. You seem to be pretty good a getting diplo victories.

Its pretty scary how much lower your GNP is than the average!