S-04 HC's worst nightmare

[pindicator]

I played 14 turns to get us back to an even number. But it was busy enough to fill 20 turns.

We started by making the concessus changes: increase commerce and slider to 40%, start St. Pete's on military, stop farming the tundra. I'm still looking to the west at picking up the city site with the gold, marble, ivory, and sheep, but it looks kind of food poor. Maybe a coastal site right beside the oasis would work better?

I keep shifting the proposed city location around, mainly because all the land tiles suck -- aside from the oasis plains hill and the gold grassland. This location seems the best one spot to pick up all those resources while also working a good amount of water tiles (which are better than the nearby land tiles). There's already a barb city in the area, most likely at the quesiton-mark due to the lone tile we can see.

I would put this city at a high priority so we don't lose the site to Egypt. Our south has also been filled up: to the west is the only peaceful expansion we have left!

Izzy and Monty are such chums. Great minds think alike, or something like that. (I'd roll my eyes here if I wasn't already at the image limit.)

So I chummed along the first couple turns. I was building axes for the impending war with Monty (since he loves those Jaguars). I had the farm worker re-connect the road between Cuzco and the north (later he would chop the forest north of the Fish), and Novgorod was building a settler to claim the tile with. The proverbial poop hit the stereotypical spinning blade on my 5th turn:

I had seen the barb axe coming and tried to lure it away with one of our Quechas while I moved in axes. But I wasn't able to buy enough time and Uzbek was re-captured. The axe to the south didn't waste in time in taking it back:

I was very tempted not to take the city back: our GNP shot up when we lost the city! But long-term it was more valuable to get the city up and running, so we took it back.

At the same time, we were taking on Monty's invasion. He came at us with an initial force of 5 Jaguars and an archer. 4 Jaguars and an archer went north; a lone pillaging jaguar went south. Somehow I forgot to take pictures of all this, but the initial phase of the war had us attacking with Swords because that was all we had to attack with: still, a shock sword was ~80% to win, so of course it lost against the pillager. And the sword who came to mop up lost as well. Now Monty had all those Jags and we only had 2 archers and a Quecha in Cuzco. Not so good. I double-whipped an axe, using the spillover for 2 axes in 2 turns. The first axe killed the archer, mightily injured. The second axe killed a Jaguar...

then the next turn promoted to heal and killed another jaguar...
then the next turn promoted to heal and killed another jaguar...
then the next turn promoted to heal and killed another jaguar.

I wish I had taken screenshots of that! He's Combat III, Shock right now.
Here's the current situation against Monty's forces. His initial troops have been eradicated and he is sending in one or two at a time.

Our lone Axe is in danger from Monty's Horse Archer. I thought about promoting him to Formation, I thought about leaving him unpromoted, and I'm thinking now it might not be a bad idea to move the Combat/Shock/Medic axe out to cover him. Someone will have to do the math and see what is the best odds on defense, but maybe we should just leave it how it is and if the HA wins we'll mop up and kill it off. We're also short of Spears, so I'm making a couple of those throughout the empire.

It wasn't all warfare and blood and guts. I was very peaceful and loving and tried to get along with everyone. I even met a new friend:

Doesn't he look friendly?

I met him the same turn that Compass came in (20AD) and noticed that he was teching towards Alphabet at the same time. It seemed obvious to start making trades, so I did so immediately. My first trade was to get Math so we could open up all the other techs we so sorely needed. I traded with Lizzy because she was the tech leader and therefore seemed less likely to trade Alphabet to anybody else:

That was followed on the next turn by these following trades over the next few turns:

Looks like I cropped out the 230 gold that Louis gave us as well. Somewhere in here I know I traded Code of Laws to somebody for Calendar as well. So in total we traded Alphabet and Compass for:

• Mathematics
• Monarchy
• Currency
• Code of Laws
• Polytheism
• Monotheism
• Calendar
• 550 gold

I probably shouldn't have taken the cheaper religious techs because of WFYABTFA, but I was drugged on the rush of getting as good a deal as possible.

I set our research to Drama because a part of my brain told me that was a tech the AI didn't research on its own so could be used for future tech trades. If it's a bad idea, nix it. Maybe we'd want to go for Civil Service now that we have some cash to burn?

Unfortunately, Izzy decided she wanted some of her cash back. The turn after I took her gold she made this demand:

Of course I didn't want to be fighting a war in the north AND in the south at the same time, so I caved in and gave her most of her money back. But then 2 turns later!

Obviously I was the fool. Last time I give her any money. Since I annihilated Monty's southern forces so easily, I didn't bother to shift units made in the north down south. We may actually get to take some of her cities because of it: Izzy doesn't appear to have any metals. She also doesn't appear to have any horses. The only unit she's moved in our territory is an archer next to the iron of St. Petersburg. I have an axe in the area.

In Novgorod we have 2 Quechas that can be upgraded to axes: they are both Cover promoted, one is also CR1. If we want to take an Izzy city we can, but it would come at the expense of deficit research (to upgrade the Quechas). I really like where Izzy put Salamanca; Novgorod is food poor to begin with and won't be able to work all of its tiles anyway. Salamanca also picks up the grassland furs, a lake tile, and a floodplains tile.

I have a bit of a beef with Novgorod's tile improvements. I understand we needed commerce immediately and that was why we cottaged its only floodplains, but the city needs food to work all of its tiles: that flood plains is going to need to be irrigated when our economy is in better shape. Fantasy Realm maps can be very food poor; we can't get away with just cottage spamming here.

The settler is due out of Novgorod in 3 turns: where does the city go? 2W of the Whales is the safe spot -- but how about the red dot I outlined above?

Finally: I didn't revolt us to Hereditary Rule. With us being at war I didn't want to lose a turn to anarchy. Plus, with Calendar luxuries now online we may not need to.

 

[sooooo]

Well that was certainly exciting! Thanks for the detailed report Pindicator . Blid is up now. Can't look at the save right now, but the trading looks excellent. Good choice going for compass Mike.

 

[mike p]

Yeah, I love it when a plan comes together. Though Compass wasn't my suggestion, I just ran with it. And I can't believe I didn't get around to quoting Hannibal Smith in the Lambs SG!

 

[blid]

Good job there, pindicator. Now do I have to face two immortal AIs together ?
I nearly wrote a "got it" before realizing there's no save

 

[pindicator]

I don't know if you'll have to worry too much about Monty, blid. His initial attack has been taken down; he's just sending units in 1s and 2s now. Izzy may be a problem: I don't see any metal units, but there are a LOT of hills in the north and if she comes at us with a bunch of archers we're going to need units defending our tile improvements: either that or attack at poor odds to prevent pillaging. I think it may even be possible to take a city or two from Izzy, should our economy be able to handle it. All the cities to our north are fringe cities on her empire, and so they are lightly defended. You'll be able to give us a good picture after your turnset, but I don't fear us losing any cities to her.

One thing I would do is make sure every border city has a spear. HBR is getting passed around the AIs.

What technology do we go for next? Civil Service seems like the usual choice at this part of the game for Beaurocracy. Maybe we could get "creative" with our tech choice and try to pick up the free great artist from Music. Get it? Creative? He he he

 

[blid]

Thanks for the details pindicator. I finally see that the save was in your teaser spot. This is official got it.

Going for music means we can't trade drama. I am sure one of those AIs can research twice faster as we would. Looking at the demographics, I see we are 5th in GNP ranking and dead last in all the other areas. Personally, I prefer to go civil service and trade for metal casting and machinery.

Concerning settling, IMO we should go to that red spot designed by pindicator first. I don't think it can work all its resources, but at least we will hook them for trading opportunities. Hopefully, Louis won't steal the fishing village from us

I would see if I can't start an AI-AI war. Right now, they are all peeking on us. I would try to turn us above Isabella in power graph. Why is Kublai saying "you declared war on our friend" ? is this immortal distortion ?

EDIT : the flood plains in Salamanca is icy and can't improved. Do you really want to keep that city. It would start with -13 maintenance like Novgorod

 

[mike p]

blid, I agree for the most part, but the flood plains can be farmed, even if it is on ice. Look across the river to St. Pete's - we have a farmed ice flood plain. It's still a pretty crappy city site though.

 

[pindicator]

Nah, I didn't really think Music was a good idea. Even if we could do it, the artist won't get us much and the tech itself isn't needed for anything.

Salamanca is a town I would eventually like to grab. It's low on the list, though. It does pick up another luxury for us and the grassland furs is no slouch of a tile.

 

[blid]

IHT : I emptied StPet moving the axe and archer to the barb archer.

He would probably go to the iron to pillage and I want the archer to finish him if the axe fails. Better one turn with an angry face than leaving the barb pillage and take promotions.
I also set Moscow to emphasize everything to accelerate growth, I would whip the courthouse there once city gets past its happiness cap

I upgrade the queshua in Cuzco to spear to deal with Monty HA next turn.

Turn 1 : Louis comes asking for 100 gold. I refuse. He is till cautious, but we took -2 hit. I check and he has enough on his hands too. I am taking spain reaction as example, he is probably already decided so

Monty HA attacks our axe and looses. The crossing river penalty helped us. I sent the queshua made spear to the north to deal with an eventual french attack. Louis has horses

The barb archer goes to the iron mine like expected.

Turn 2 :
I give our axe near StPet cover and kill the archer with 80% odds. Sent the archer back to play military police.
Louis has construction. If he attacks, it would be dirty
Hatty would go against Isabella for COL and monotheism. I keep this as a B plan for the moment. I want to trade for metal casting with her and it is still red
I send an axe to check terrain for the upcoming settler

I also drop the research slider to keep 110 gold for urgent queshua upgrading

Turn 3 :
Novgorod finished the settler and starts a sword. We need to attack cities if we want te get reasonable peace treaties
StPet : spear->sword

Monty sends another HA. I have an axe guarding our cottage.
Isabella sends an archer towards Uzbek. I send a queshua from NovGorod to deal with him


Turn 4 :
Monty HA suicides against our axe on the cottage. He was again attacking cross river because a forest is blocking the direct path.

Capital finishes a spear and starts a market. It is getting +18 commerce so the bonus would be nice

Turn 5 :
I change my mind about the marker and switch to a sword. Need to go on the offensive
Isabella showed with an axe and an archer in the north. She does have metals

Drama is in. I go for civil service. No interesting trades yet

Turn 6 :
I kill another HA from Monty
I doublewhip the courthouse in Moscow

Turn 7 :

Monty shows with 3 jaguars and horse archer near Cuzco.
Louis offers 30 gold for drama, so he would get it next turn. I refuse and check for opportunities. Still nothing to trade around. Hope Louis won't get anything from drama too

Turn 8 :
Kublai has enough on his hand too. Arghhh. Would it be us ? We don't even see his borders. Sure he has a better target, right ? How would we fare against 4 immortal AIs ?

I position troops to deal with Monty stack

A barb archer shows near Uzbek, garrisoned by an axe. If he moves to the farm, I will attack with the axe. Since I am paranoid, I queue a queshua in case RNG hates me

Turn 9 :
Our settler is finally in place to find Tiwanaku. It was close, Hatty was sending her settler too, unescorted !!!

The city starts on a granary

The barb archer just attacked at Uzbek and died.

Euh, about Monty. He is really serious about this war. I underestimated his remaining power, with me sending the spear north to deal with a theoretical french threat.

There's a total of 4 jaguars and 4 horse archers here. I queue new spear in the capital

Turn 10 :
Novgorod and Moscow finishes swords and start axes. Spain is starting to send axes north
Monty killed my spear with an HA. He lost an HA and a jaguar to axes and the remaining attack forces advanced to the capital

I whipped the spear in Cuzco and sent our axes back inside city. A horse archer would probably pillage our farm IBT.
Monty is finally willing to talk and I am surprised to see he is paying a good price for peace

I like that city Texcoco



There is 2 archers, 1 HA and a jaguar there. A sword is going to Cuzco from the north and another sword is due in the capital in 2 turns. Once we deal with the forces inside our land, we can try to go for Texcoco. I like this city, it has many resources and the food to work them. It is close to capital so no big expenses

OTOH, if Louis declares, we may as well take that peace treaty and send all our forces in the north

At the moment, I can see three axes from spain along with an archer and a spear. They are converging on Novgorod. We have a sword, axe and 2 queshuas there and enough money to upgrade one of them. We also have an axe and a sword who should get there in a couple turns.

I was torn during my turnset between making a big stack to start attacking and having small stacks on each side to be safe and deal with pillagers. I went for the second option. The two fronts being on opposite sides didn't help.

There's still no interesting tech trades, so I didn't bribe Hatty to the war with spain. Don't forget that option, especially if things turn grim with spanish war.

If you think we have enough forces already, you can switch Novgorod to a courthouse. I started one in StPet on my 10th turn when I realized it has resumed its buddhist temple. We really need to reduce that killing maintenance. I also hired a scientist in the capital, feel free to fire him if you think it's a bad idea. He would help with civil service though (still 45 turns to go )

EDIT : attached save.

 

[pindicator]

Great job on picking up that city before Hatty! We should make one more settler to pick up the site 2W of the whales: that will be a good commerce town as well.

I would like to take Texcoco, too, but it has walls and is on a hill. We will need cats before we take that town, and we don't have a one. In fact, we probably don't even have Construction yet, do we? I would take the Monty peace deal. In 10 turns we still won't be in a position to take one of his cities, and if he is dumb enough to pay us for peace then we should let him. Or is we really want to build up a force for that, then we need to bribe Hatty into war to tie up Spanish troops so we can focus on Monty. In fact, it may be worthwhile to buy in Hatty just to get some bad blood going amongst the AIs.

 

[Cosmichail]

Wow that's a lot of horsies man. As usual Blid you put up a good fight. Louis and Kublai are with their hands full. That doesn't sound good and Blid you've called that before and were right.

 

[sooooo]

Right, I've got it and will play today.

sooooo - UP
Cosmichail - On Deck
mike p
Qwack
pindicator
blid

 

[sooooo]

OK, for being at war with two of the most aggressive neighbours in the game at immortal level, we are doing surprisingly well. 2 AIs (Louis and Kublai) will also declare on someone soon, let's hope it's not us. However, I make peace with monty for the deal that he offered to blid. We could have held off his current forces, but would have gotten our nice improvements pillaged. As pindicator said, we can't take Texcoco without cats. I hire 2 scientists in Cuzco.

T1: Bribe Hatty into the Spanish war for Drama+Mono. Most people have these techs anyway. She throws in 40 gold too. Upgrade axe at Novgorod to shock.



Hopefully she will trade MC before she gets CoL.

T2: Our newly promoted axe kills an attacking Spanish axe. There are 2 spanish axes, 2 spears and an archer in our borders. I upgrade a quechua to an axe for 110 gold so we have a full strength axe in Novgorod.

T3: Our new axe kills another attacking Spanish axe. A mine gets pillaged here by a spanish spear.

T4: Kublai wants help with his English war. What English war? Ah, I see, he declares on Vicky later in the turn. This is good for us, hopefully it will slow Vicky down. I kill an axe threatening to pillage our cottage at Novgorod with our shock axe. No more spanish axes in the area, just spears to mop up. Hatty now has CoL so we can't get MC, which she still won't trade. Is she building colossus?

T5: Kill spanish spear and archer. Whip courthouse at St. Pete. Spot some french troops near St. Pete (2 HS and an archer), fear the worst and move a spear towards the city.



T6: Sure enough, Louis declares war. Who decided it would be a good idea to play immortal against these aggressive AIs? Kill spanish spear.



T7: Louis starts a golden age, fantastic.

T8: A french HA attacks St. Pete, incredibly killing our C2 spear at 9% odds.

T10: Both french HAs attack again, this time the same spear kills both of them without a scratch. That's better. The archer runs home. Kill spanish axe. Take Salamanca, losing one sword:



Revolt to HR.

T11-13: Not a lot, no sign of more french or spanish troops. Izzy will sign peace and give up 60 gold, but I figure it's best to keep the war going because she will be suffering from WW and we get mutual struggle bonus with Hatty. Drama is widely known so I sell it to Vicky for Literature + 190 gold for more deficit research.



We should prob build the HE in Novgorod once its courthouse is finished.

T14: Monty demands 190 gold. Think about it for a long while and turn him down. We need that gold for deficit research towards CS to trade for construction, and are going to fight him soon anyway.

T15: 2 french HAs and 1 cat appear near St. Pete. There are 2 spanish axes near Novgorod, but we have some highly promoted axes there to deal with them. CS is due in 4/5 turns, and a scientist is due in 11 turns.



Some people have feudalism. Not monty though. Vicky is most advanced, being the only one to have philosophy. We can prob trade CS around for construction, metal casting etc. I think we whip some cats and take monty on. His lands are close to our capital. We may need to reinforce St. Pete more against the french. Salamanca and Tiwanaku need culture, hopefully a religion will spread soon. I started a buddhist monastery in Cuzco, but maybe that wasn't wise.

Cosmichail: Are you able to play, or will your graphics problems hinder you? It must be pretty annoying playing with black tiles. I don't want to skip you if you can play because you've been a great servant to the team, but equally I don't want a team member to make mistakes because he's playing blind. Let us know.

 

[Cosmichail]

Sooooo,

I updated my graphics drivers but still no change in the black tiles. I was hoping that would fix it. It seems to happen with tilted axis and occassionally I get a black area near the bottom in regular games but it's just in the mini display only and not during game play. I am looking into getting a better graphics card to play with the goodies too.

I don't like to make errors in judgement because of difficulty in ascertaining the terrain but don't like to skip so I will give it a go and just watch the terrain carefully by bringing the mouse to it and ascertaining the terrain type that way. A two front war is always interesting too and I do say we are doing well for immortal.

So this is "I got it" and will play later today.

 

[Cosmichail]

Ok I started to play and tried different things to alleviate the blackened tiles. Nothing really worked other than panning in tight on an area which is too close for gameplay. I am finding it very disorienting and feel that I best let this go until I get a new graphics card. Might head up to Future Shop/Staples and see if they have any good deals on a 256mb card. For now I will have to skip/lurk until I rectify the problem.

Thanks Sooooo for the enjoyable play as usual and am honored being a loyal servant to the team.

EDIT: Sooooo, I do have Warlords now thanks to Veritass's gift. It runs good and boy I would love a game with a "Viking Blitz". Do those Berserkers Rock man they gobble everything up especially those Generals who gain experience. Had a Viking with 30% combat CRIII General Wings - gains 50% experience with every battle and amphibious. I kept saving him for 100% odds (didn't want to loose that sucker) and by the end of the game he had two lines of promotions.

 

[sooooo]

Cosmichail: Sorry to hear about your computer issues. If they get sorted out, the spot will still be open to jump back into this game.

So that makes mike p up and Qwack on deck.

 

[pindicator]

Good turns, sooo! I prefer to have the war in the north rather than around our beautiful capital. Hatty will keep our western flank secure if we can get her to friendly, so good call on keeping the Spanish war going.

Speaking of our beautiful capital, since we have a bunch of unused units there, perhaps we could send one scouting out southwest? Izzy has a town down there, and it wouldn't have much for corruption is it is any good (although it doesn't look like much). Plus it'd be nice to know the land.

Novgorod is already capped out on population at size 6. We are going to want to farm over that floodplain cottage now, and Machinery would be nice for some windmills -- well, as soon as the Spaniards leave us be. I agree with HE going here; this town will have nothing better to do for us than pump out military all game.

Whip Tiwanaku's granary. It's only growing at +1 right now. I would go for a theatre next to get some cheap culture there, and follow that with a lighthouse so we can work those ocean tiles.

We have unprotected workers doing tile improvements nearby enemy lands. With horse archers out there, that is asking for them to be taken. The north does look pretty weak on troops. I would set Cuzco on troop production; nothing wrong with the monestary build but it seems a negligable return for the hammers right now.

Any chance we can squeeze a settler out somewhere to settle 2W of the whales? Novgorod is already capped in population. Madrid is capped at happiness. Maybe Cuzco?

We can sell Monty Lit for 120 gold. He's the only one without it, and we could use the cash.

One thing I love about SGs is that they let you take a clean, hard look at a game every 10-15 turns. Not something that is easy to do in a normal game! So I'm not trying to berate play, I'm just trying to help us improve our position. (In other words, it's constructive criticism and I welcome the same on my turnsets!)

Edit: I just noticed this tidbit!

Monty has no Iron! What would be the best time to leverage that to our advantage best? I would say Knights, because pikes require only iron, but we have no horses! Maybe we'll find some before we get to guilds?

Also, I suggest we sell our only rice to Hatty for 5gpt. The AI usually has more problems with happiness than health, and we have another rice we can hook up at Uzbek.

 

[sooooo]

Some good points Pindicator. Only thing I would disagree with is whipping the granary in Tiwanaku. I was working the forest-hill instead of the coast to hand-built it and I think it only has 6 or so turns left, so I would keep it going. I'd whip a lighthouse though.

Agree with scouting and getting one more settler out for the whales+fish site.

Monty has no metals but does have horses, while Izzy has at least copper but no horses. I haven't seen any french troops which require metals, but he does have horses.

The north does look slightly weak on troops, but Izzy is just sending lone axemen around - which don't fare well against our combat 3, shock axemen. But we could do with reinforcing the french border.

EDIT: We are in HR now so our happy caps can be shifted around.

 

[mike p]

OK. I should be able to play this today. Sorry for the late Got It. I was playing the SGoTM and my own GoTM yesterday, and didn't realize I was up here too.

 

[mike p]

I'm having so issues with the PC as well, as you can see! (Double posts and such)