SG: Queen Teuta

[Hypnotoad]

So I probably should have just had you guys skip my turn this time. I played about 8 turns but now need to call it quits. Next player should take over. These turns are taking longer and longer and I need to get work done, unfortunately...

So I inherited a war on Iberia. I kept four cities, burning a fifth. It seems like we are going for a "keep Europe" strategy, so I stuck with that.

My basic plan is to upgrade Axemen/Swordmen to Infantry/Heavy Infantry ONCE they have city attack 1, 2 and 3. I've upgraded a couple of units already. We are researching tactics right now (having finished steel). Once we get that, we can build heavy infantry (strength 12). With city attack 1-3, these guys will be unstoppable.

I kept on building up the troops to attack Lydia. I didn't start, although we really could at any time.

The agora in southern france reduced maintence costs by about 90/turn. Pretty nice. I completed a bunch of caravan thingies started by Jet. Started a bunch of things as seemed necessary.

Here's a picture of Iberia. Notice that Carthage has a city in the northwest and Lydia has just built one in the northeast. That's not going to last long.

Hmm, trying to get the image to work...

http://download.yousendit.com/83951DAC0D201898

(By the way, to use the yousendit, send an email to yourself and it will give you a url.)

PS: I forgot to upgrade our units to steel weapons! This should definitely happen before our war on the Lydians...

 

[Shqype]

OK, here were go:

T1: Hatshepsut offers a peace treaty for 340 gold
T3: captured Osca
T5: Captured Palancia, researched Heavy Armor and went after Republic
T6: Used GP Mencius to discover Divine Right, got a Great Merchant in Lissus, which I consumed to join the city, razed Ocilis in SW Iberia
T8: Hiram offered 270 gold for commerce, I accepted
T9: Captured Ilerda in the north and destroyed the Iberian civilization!
T10: researched Bridge bulding, giong for road building; I demanded 240 gold from Kroisos and he gave it to me ... damn ... but I declared war on him anyway.
T11: conquered Halikarnassos
T12: conquered Miletos
T13: captured Kolophon + Sardeis
T14: Aristotle was born in Shkodra, I brought him down to Lissus to construct a great academy. Science output in Lissus is now 448!
T15: captured Priene

We got RoadBuilding and can now more efficiently move out troops throughout our vast empire. The Iberians are long gone, and the Lydians are clinging onto life as Illyrian legions sweep across the continent. There are 3 cities south of Phokaia, 2 on the mainland and 1 on an island: they are weakly defended and can be easily taken before turning to the Lydian capital as conquering what would be the last Lydian stronghold. Phokaia is blockaded by the Illyrian fleet, so there is no chance of escape, and their last remaining Settler will not do them any good.

Remember to keep constructing Trade Barges and sending them to Carthage and Kolchis for over 400+ gold a mission. The Egyptians seem to be a likely candidate for the next episode of Illyrian conquest.

http://download.yousendit.com/5853A8BF57B53FE9

 

[SrWilliam]

Please skip my turn, the earliest I can run is Wednesday or Thursday.

Anyone know what % of the map we control?

We may be close to Domination.

SW

 

[Hypnotoad]

I noticed some trade barges and merchant ships were being built in cities with very low production. This meant it took a long time to build them. Since you are limited to 3 total, this reduced our money substantially. I would suggest trying to build them in higher production cities (such as Rome).

 

[Shqype]

You're right HT, but I really wasn't up for the micromanagement... I was more concerned with the fun of capturing Lydia. Whoever massed our military in Hyskos and had those Transport Barges ready, thanks a lot!

 

[Hypnotoad]

Mostly Jet, I think, a little bit me.

 

[Jet]

@Dux_, you're up.

@All, in general please post at least a "got it" within 24 hours (see page 1), thanks. I'll post again asking schlappi to continue if we don't hear from Dux_ in a while.

 

[Dux_]

Sorry, got it, I'll post my turn tonight...

 

[Dux_]

Sorry guys, skip my turn...

 

[Jet]

Sorry, hope I didn't make you feel overly rushed. (and the protocol does give you 48 hours after "got it"...)

But OK - schlappi is up.

 

[Shqype]

Come on Schlappi, let's see what you can do for us

 

[schlappi]

Long live Queen Teuta!

While the wars with the barbaric tribes raged on all fronts, the Illyrian empire experienced a golden age of culture and arts. Libraries and theatres were built in many cities, displaying the magnificence of illyrian culture.

The wild and barely civilized people of Lydia and Egypt, who dared to oppose illyrian rule, were swiftly subdued; their cities taken by the might of our armies.



T1: Changing production in some cities to trade barges and armoured infantry build we must!

T3: Captured the city on Cyprus and the on in central Anatolia

T5: Captured Phokaia at the black sea, researched tactics, started on empire

T6: Finished conquering the Lydian empire, started sea blockade of egyptian cities

T7: Creating Battle groups and positioning them near Egypt

T8: Finished research of Empire, starting Civil Service

T9: Declared war on Egypt, landed near all Egyptian coastal cities, destroyed their fleet

T10: Captured Thebes, Alexandria and Elephantine. Landed near Mannea (south of the iberian peninsula)

T12: Captured Memphis and Mannea.

T14: Used great artist in Mannea.

T15: Captured Egypt's last city, Heliopolis. Great scientist was born, used him to discover greek fire. Dido, worried about our progress towards her estates, cancelled the ivory deal.

I built amphietheatres in almost every city, along with aqueducts and all we needed to keep health and happiness on a good level.
Even though our monetary balance is at around -450 gold per turn, the trade barges and merchant vessels do more than equalize it.

The domination victory should come soon; the last 15 turns increased land posession from around 30 to over 40%.
Next turn we should switch civics to free religion and vice royalty to decrease maintainance and increase happiness.

The productive coastal cities produce quinqueremes, so soon the navalwise powerful civs cannot harm us. Since our main forces are located in former egypt and lydian lands i suggest to go for phoenicia next. However, its also possible to attack carthage soon, since i started gathering troops in Lissus and Neapolis aswell! I did not have enough time to properly deploy our transport barges yet, they are somewhat spread out at the moment, i used them to transport workers to africa...

http://www.koolfiles.com/files/Queen_Teuta_AD-0272.zip

 

[Hypnotoad]

Given that we have to attack a friend now, I say we go for Carthage. That way the west would be completely ours.

Interesting that we still only have 40% of the map. That will go up as borders increase also (which the ampitheaters should help with).

 

[Shqype]

Too bad that we've gotta take Carthage; I don't like turning my back on my friends.

But, if we do take Carthage it would give us the West and once we filled up that empty space with Illyrian culture we could probably win a Domination victory.

But, I think that's too easy. I like the military route, and it keeps the game going longer, so this is my proposal:
Raze all of Carthage and maintain a naval blockade to prevent settlers from founding cities there. This way we won't win a Domination victory and can continue to conquer the rest of world and go for a Conquest victory.

That's my vote, what do you guys think?

 

[SrWilliam]

My vote is end this game ASAP so we can play 1.97.

I have a Warlords install and a TAM (non-Warlords) install. I am itching for 1.97.

If TAM Warlords is still a few weeks away, we can start a 1.97 Succession game at a higher difficulty level.

SW

 

[Hypnotoad]

I too think we should end this game sooner rather than later. We should really be playing 1.97 and at a higher difficulty level. Plus the early game is more fun

Plus I don't like razing cities. Seems so brutal...

 

[Jet]

Wow, that was incredibly fast! Maybe I like building units more than I like using them.

I wrote the following before seeing SrW and HT's last 2 posts -- if the overall vote is for fast finish, that's cool, let's just hear from everyone...

Really I'm sure we could attack either Carthage or Phoenecia and tactically it would be just fine. I can't imagine anyone attacking us.

For the fastest finish diplo should be easy because we still have high pluses with both Carthage and Phoenecia, right? Then we could all install 1.97. But I'm not sure that's my favorite.

For domination I'd suggest Phoenecia, then Babylon. That would be somewhat Alexander-style (well, he marched down the coast to Egypt, but whatever). Then if needed, whichever of our allies is more convenient to backstab. Phoenecia is big and is in the path to Babylon. Domination would certainly be cool and it would be kind of cool to minimize the backstabbing.

I don't feel strongly about it but I do think conquest would be slightly cooler. Shqype's idea sounds good, we could certainly close borders with Phoenecia, but I don't know about Aeetes. We'd either have to give up a lot of commerce, or maintain a foreign legion in Africa (say, in Carthage) to clean up any Aeetes colonies when we finally declare on him.

I probably won't play until Friday night, maybe Saturday. It might be nice to see if we can get a consensus on the end game strategy.
Edit: yeah, right. Two hours of sleep last night I may have gotten, but I'll Civ before sleep any day of the week. Still I would prefer to hear from everyone before my turnset. Or, maybe I'll just tech towards a diplo victory while maneuvering our troops around. And actually (duh, speaking of time limits) Friday afternoon would be the 48-hour time limit for my turnset anyway.

 

[SrWilliam]

I never finish a game when I'm this far ahead, so I have no clue what would be fastest.

If it’s diplomatic, I vote diplomatic.

Plowing through Phoenicia and then Babylon would keep all our options open.

Schlappi captured 8 cities in 15 turns, nice!

SW

 

[Hypnotoad]

Me too. I've never won by Domination, Conquest, or Diplomatic in TAM.

 

[schlappi]

Schlappi captured 8 cities in 15 turns, nice!

SW

Well, its quite easy when you are that far ahead in weapon technology, and the troops were deployed nicely for conquest. Usually i do not build that many transport units, but that helped alot, i obviously need to reconsider my current strategy setup.

I would gladly join another succession game, any chance we could do it on a huge map setting? My favoured map is the huge med. one and on emporer level it is quite a challenge if you choose some "barbarian" civ.