SGOTM 01 - Rat Pack

[ThERat]

I would like you all to discuss a little more here in this forum and chip in your ideas. If anyone looks at the graphs provided, we ain't do too badly. Currently there are 2 other teams playing around the same date as us.
We are 1st in terms of power (score we are 2nd). This means our military is surely top, our score started to increase.
I think if we can take out Russia soon, we will have a nice advantage.
Thus, military is top priority.

And switching religion costs us no anachry and will reveal all the cities with that religion (by the way there are 7 cities with that reilgion according to the shrine income, but I can't see 7 Russian cities that are jewish). There must be another city having that religion giving us more contacts maybe?

This would be a nice way to find some other Civs, we got to know India due to the spread of their religion.

 

[acidsatyr]

and , not to rub this in again, but to keep in mind for the next time maybe,
you don't need cats to take cities, so i'm sure we'd have lead if we just skiped construction.

 

[ThERat]

seeing how I took the first Russian city like this, I have to agree with you, acid...

 

[Till]

I plan to play on Sunday.
Switching to Judaism seems sound to me, now that we have the shrine.
Currently we have 1 Bhuddist city and 3 Jewish. Looks like a no brainer to me.

After switching, we'll be better albe to judge the situation in Russia. I'd love to grab Moskow before settling for a (temporary) peace. The settler can slack off until after the war.

Alphabet is 34 turns away. I would like to have galleys for exploration soon.
Maybe we should try to extort sailing out of cath for peace, after we grabbed Moscow?

 

[ThERat]

your plan sounds good to me

 

[acidsatyr]

yeah, make sure you get sailing after grabing Moscow

 

[Till]

Inherited turn:
All right!
Convert to Judaism. Meet Cyrus! He's got 6 cities, one of which is Jewish and his capital. Looks like got a bit shafted by the RNG.
Moscow is defended by one axe and 3 archers.

1
Cath crashes a chariots against St. Petersburg. Sucks to attack a city on a hill, eh?

2
Settler finishes in Thebens.

3
St. Pete comes online.
Cyrus demands a cow.
Ghandi has Alphabet!
He is up (at least) Sailing, Alphabet, Hunting and Mysticism.
We are up construction and Sailing.
I check with Cath and she would be willing to part with Sailing and Mysticism for peace.
Since Ghandi and Cath know each other, i don't feel comfortable about making deals.
Ghandi would be in a 2fer position, but on the other hand trading now would save us 30+ turns of research.
I toss a coin and decide to go for the deals:
Alphabet + Mysticism for Construction
Everybody has Polytheism and Bhuddism but nobody can trade it. They show up under "can't rade" in the foreign relations window and aren't even visible in the trade window.
What's up with that?

For once, i take issue with a cottage as well. The one in Alexandria prevents us from irrigating Elephantine. (Unless we want to sacrifice two grassland tiles from our capital)


4
Suddenly trade with Polytheism and Bhuddism is available. No tempting deal on the table, though.

5
First units arrive near Moscow. 8 attackers, 4 defenders. Odds are daunting.

6
Our odds at attacking Moscow range from 0,6% to 6,3%. I fear a 2 to 1 ratio isn't enough to take the city.

7
A spearman joins the defenders of Moscow.

8
Spearman leaves moscow. We have our first catapult!

9
Another Chariot chrashes into St. Pete. Swordman demands a raise for having to clean up the mess again.

10
Cath manned a galley with an settler/archer combo! It's probably wise to send one sword to monitor the east coast.
And for the love of all that is holy, don't pillage the horsies! As long as Cath keeps pumping worthless chariots and not archers, we are golden.
Sailing is due in 3 turns.

---------->The Save<----------​

 

[ThERat]

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley - up

we didn't actually attack Moscow? I think we should try if we have a chance of winning and then go for peace to extort a tech and then replenish the tropps and repeat that exercise.

good tech deals. by the way Till, teching was nerfed, that's why you can trade techs that are beyond the traded techs only on the next turn. another of those nerfing techniques to make the game more 'balanced'.

 

[Till]

I didn't attack, as most of our units faced 0.6% odds of winning, with two "leet" axemen having 6.3% chance to succeed and two swordsmen having about 5%.

That was too much of a gamble for me to take. Didn't want to be the guy, who got our army killed.

 

[ThERat]

Didn't want to be the guy, who got our army killed.

let it be Greebley then

 

[ThERat]

by the way, we can get 3 techs from Cyrus for alphabet, please get that...

I would wait for the cat, suicide it and attack mosocw, we should be able to take it and go for peace straight away and get a tech.
I would head for literature, maybe we can bag the GL

 

[Greebley]

Ok, I got it.

I have to agree with Till, at those odds even with 3x the troops as the enemy you can end up losing all those troops for nothing if your luck runs sour. It has happened to me and is very frustrating as the troops remaining are stronger than ever due to promotions.

You really want Cats in that situation.

 

[Greebley]

Ok, I played 15 turns.

Preturn: Woke up the settler and sent it off to be settled. When a town can become profitable quickly you want to build it as soon as possible. These towns have water food resources so the grow quite quick. The earlier a town is built the sooner it becomes profitable and the better off you are in the long run. The only question is whether the start up cost will slow tech and hurt us that way - the towns will be online fast enough that maybe one or two techs is a turn behind before we catch back up again and go ahead. Each town pulls in 4 commerce so will probably only cost 2 per turn for less than 20 turns and will be profitable forever after. I am pretty much positive that you will using a settler is a win if you have less than 8-10 cities. The real cost is building the settler instead of something else.

I am going to build the other town too. Start a settler.

Kill a random Chariot.

Note that it will be a while before we can get the defense down. We have only 1 cat less than 6 turns away.

65 AD: Giza is founded. The plan is to rush a workboat ASAP to get us to +5 food so we can grow quickly.

80 AD: Trade with Persia for Meditation, Sailing, and Hunting for Alphabet. Persia is now pleased with us as well.
I am going for Monarchy next.
Kill another Chariot.

95 AD: Defeat another chariot.

110 AD: Lose our War Chariot vs a Chariot. Kill said chariot.

125 AD: A Swordsman accidentally impales himself on an Ax in Moscow. Normally, I would just replay the turn for a misclick, but I don't since this is GOTM.

140 AD: Defeat yet another Chariot.

170 AD: FInally ready to go for Moscow. Even with no city defense the units in the city are tougher than us.
Lose a Catapult and two swords (against odds for the swords) and Kill 3 Archers, Ax, and a Chariot. Madrid is Captured

185 AD Kill yet another Chariot. Note the Russia no longer has Horses..

200 AD Discover Priesthood and start Monarchy.
Kill an Ax.
Lining up for an attack on the Yaroslavl

215 AD: Kill 2 Archers.

230 AD: Found Byblos.

245 AD: Attack Yarozlavl with a sword with odds on our side. We lose and I decide to wait for more units to try again.

260 AD: Kill an Archer in Yaroslavl with a well promoted Ax.

275 AD: Attack on Yaroslavl. Again one Cat retreats and one loses. We then kill 3 Spear and one Chariot.Yarslavl is captured

Notes:

Note that I raised science from 30% to 60% when I captured Moscow.

Giza grows in 5 turns and can build a work boat for Byblos. Rushing it will mean breaking even for these 2 towns much quicker. Giza already is at +5 food and Byblos will be at +10 food in 12 or so turns.

We captured 1/2 of Russia on my turn. Two more cities to go.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BTW, the following idea occurred to me. If we are really friendly to the civ that likes us, we may be able to get a permanant alliance. If this permanant alliance works the same way as an alliance at the start of the game, then we can get a domination win when our combined area is over 64% and we don't have to do it ourselves alone. Not sure if permanant alliance are soon enough to make this a decent strategy, and I don't know if we can get a permanant alliance with our friend, but it something to consider. One thing that makes Dom victories hard is the fact that you need to support a lot of towns. If two civs share that burden, it could potentially mean a faster finish. Not sure if it faster than pure war mongering though.

The save for 275 AD

 

[Greebley]

Here is a picture:

 

[ThERat]

good work, could we get any tech from Russia for peace? If they do, we should go for peace, wait 10 turns and then take the rest of the land.
We need to sail overseas, so astro seems a must tech.


We should also try and beeline for the tech required to form permanent alliances. not sure whether one can form 2 of them.


Roster
Tatran - up
acidsatyr
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley

 

[ThERat]

had a look at the save, we can get 3 techs from Cathy including monarchy, we should do this and get back at her 10 turns later

we should then go maybe for lit to get the GL? I can see that we can reach Cyrus via galleys though that would be a little tedious.

 

[Tatran]

Ok, I played 15 turns.

10 turns?15 turns?
I prefer something between 10-15,so I can finish what I started
during a session.10 turns isn't enough in Civ4 SGs,you need a
decent preparation + slow movement.

Normally, I would just replay the turn for a misclick, but I don't since this is GOTM.

You're a real saint,but I'm not a spoon collector.We aren't doing that great
in score.

If we are really friendly to the civ that likes us, we may be able to get a permanant alliance.

Gandhi and Cyrus are already very friendly with each other.Wait a minute,
what if they have a permanent alliance can we still attack Cyrus (and
in this way Gandhi)?
If we want a friend it has to be Gandhi,but then Cyrus has to be removed.

Also I didn't know Civ4 was a X-rated game.

we can get 3 techs from Cathy including monarchy, we should do this and get back at her 10 turns later

I disagree,Cyrus won't trade Calendar for Construction and we have
already invested in Monarchy,all those beakers will be lost.
Peace with Cathy : Calendar + Polytheism.

Got it.

 

[Tatran]

305 AD (2)
War chariot destroys Russian catapult near Moscow.

320 AD (3)
Rush a temple in Moscow.

350 AD (5)
Whip a granary in Pi-Ramesses,a workboat in Giza + a lighthouse in Yaroslavl'.

IBT 350 AD
Russian catapult destroyed by a sword near Novgorod.

365 AD (6)
War chariot destroys a catapult near Moscow.

395 AD (8)
Monarchy is in,start to research CoL.
Revolt to the Hereditary Rule.
Rush a workboat in Byblos.
Lose a suicide catapult + 2 swords to the defenders of Novgorod.
Axes kills 3 archers,war chariot kills wounded spear.We capture 2 workers.

Trade gems for dyes with Gandhi.
Trade cows for silk with Cyrus.

We're still at war with Catherine and we have no happiness problems.
I don't know if this is allowed,but we can get Calendar + Polytheism + Archery
for peace,but she has also Monotheism + Literature.

Off topic.
I couldn't get rid of Greebley's creative works above Giza and Byblos.
Please tell me how to create and delete this.

 

[ThERat]

as stated before, make peace with cathy and get those techs. We can trade even more with her as she is as good as dead and no threat.
after CoL we need to head for astro as the goal will be to fight overseas and I don't see galleys suitable for that.

Try and get back inot the trading game by starting with 3 techs from Russia...

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr - up
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley

 

[Tatran]

I still disagree to go for those crappy techs.
Maybe if we trade/research Polytheism we can get
a better deal,Monotheism and/or Literature.