SGOTM3 Rome - Team Peanut

[Peglegasus]

Finally, what is our contact status? Have we opened up any negotiations with America and Germany? After every log the person completing the turns needs to post the contact status, listing the order we've contacted civs and the year by which we need to declare war against that civ.

Ah how could I leave that out? Germany and America both made contact trying to sell ceremonial burial on my first turn. Made contact in 1475BC

Russia contact in 2270bc, at WAR
Greece contact in 2270bc, at WAR
France contact in 2270bc, at war by 1075bc
Babylon contact in 2230bc, at war by 610bc
England contact in 2190bc, at war by 210bc
Germany contact in 1475bc, at war by 190ad
America contact in 1475bc, at war by 420ad

 

[Peglegasus]

You're right, Keith and I apologize. The pre-build may turn out to be a huge blunder. I don't think we should give up on it though.

I did use your spearman for exactly the purpose you intended, and he was great at it too.

Now the archers... I never intended to switch our army over to archers. It seemed like an "as needed" situation. I know that we need warriors to upgrade to Legions and that will be our primary unit. But in my situation in that turnset I was trying to match some of the greek firepower I knew would be coming. I think I only built 3. We didn't have iron hooked up yet and workers were vulnerable out there while trying to build the road. I never intended to take archers against Hoplites. Only to have some firepower until the iron came on line, and to save the vet warriors for upgrade.

Next time I'm thinking of doing something even slightly different I'll stop and post. I'll establish a build list before I begin as well.

 

[civ_steve]

Keith: I agree with your comments; I think we've been over that and now it's time, as a team, to discuss the next steps.

Antium: I still think we need to pre-build here. It's likely that the AI will cascade through all the available wonders, leaving them no pre-build for GreatLibrary, so we should still pre-build here. And I like the idea of adding some Workers to Antium to assist it's production during the GA period; perhaps after some more have been built by Veii or Rome. Definitely want to connect the Spice near Cumae soon.

bigchief: in this post I lay out most of my thoughts. Most important is to prevent the interior Hoplite from occupying any of the red dots; we can't kick him off if he takes any of them and he would really hurt us if he pillaged any of them.

In this other post I identify where I believe the next few cities should go. I think that red circles 5 and 6 are still the best places to put the 2 settlers that are being built.

So, Iron is going to be connected next turn. Before you press enter to start the next turn, I'd move the units around as I describe in the first linked post above to prevent the Hoplites from linking up, and the interior Hoplite from occupying an improved tile of ours. Next turn I'd upgrade a Vet Warrior in Veii, the Vet Warrior in Antium, and 5 in or near Rome. I think our near term objective is to keep the Hoplites off our improved tiles, keep the various Greek forces from linking up, and to destroy first the 1 Archer and 3 Warriors (currently in the Mountains SE of Rome). That Archer is the only offensive unit Alex has in our cultural radius right now; get rid of it (do not let it link up with one of the Hoplites), and all he'll have is strength 1 Attack vs our strength 3 defense. The 5 Legions upgraded in Rome have the duty to destroy the Greek Archers and Warriors, and anything else that comes from Alex's direction, first. Keep an eye on Antium; it's actually closer to the Archer/Warriors than Rome is right now.

After our GA kicks off, be sure to micromanage Veii for best effect. Not sure what that sequence is right now, but it should be able to grow in 2 turns consistently. BG's on the River will get the extra Commerce and Shield that our GA will give us; they need no improvement right now, so plan on Mining plain River-adjacent Grassland, and Roading non-river BG's for maximum effect. Veii should probably pump out Workers, and an occasional Settler, to help improve us for/during our GA.

We learn Math in 7; you should have one chance to trade with France. We definitely want Writing first to see what else is around, CerBurial and Mysticism if available, and HorsebackRiding (we have no Chariots, but this may be one of the few opportunities to get it), and whatever else is available - Literature, Map-Making, etc. Also, get whatever Gold is available, especially from France; we need the money for upgrades, and we don't want Joan to have any.

Next Tech to Research: either Currency at Minimum, or Literature at some amount. Problem is we need to get all our upgrades done first, so it might be awhile before we can start serious research on Literature. But if we get it sooner than later, we can use any GLeader to build it right away. Otherwise, we have to save the GL; definitely recommend we save any GLeader we get for Great Library; at that point we should research as fast as possible to get it. So, I guess I'm most interested in Literature, maybe start at Minimum and increase Research% later.

I think we will have to reduce Greece considerably before we can take on France; after France comes Babylon, so we don't want to fight a rear action at the same time we are moving Northwards in force. Maybe take Alex down to 1 city; or maybe take him out entirely. We'll want to conect both luxuries he's got. We might want a few Catapults to help us put some hits on those Hoplites before our Legions attack. In general, with all the attacking we are going to be doing, especially with Legions, we want a decent amount of catapults to do some damage to the AI Defenses, and to defend our Legions against Archer/Swords attack as we approach.

Do we want to pillage the Iron space after we've completed most/all of our upgrades? (I'd recommend to do so.) If so, we can start on a few extra Legions while the Iron is connected, then switch to Chariots/Horsemen/Catapults afterwards, with some more Warriors being built for eventual upgrade. Catapults are a good thing to build in cities without a Barracks; they don't need to be Vets.

Those are my general thoughts. Remember, we can't capture any cities with foreigners in it, nor can we capture Workers. (But I believe we can capture any catapults we happen to take.)

 

[bigchief]

Do we want to continue to build the settler in Rome? I think not.

What I am thinking is:

Change Rome to warrior/legion, and have Rome continue to pump out military units and maybe an occasional worker to get the population down for happiness reasons, if it becomes necessary.

Change Cumae to worker. Have new worker connect spices first, then improve tiles around Cumae and Veii. Then Cumae can alternate between legions and workers for a bit.

Veii continues with settler, and then continues to pump out settlers.

Change Antium to pre-build.

One of the 3 workers from the iron hill will continue to improve around Rome and the other two will improve around Antium.

In the round of trades for math (assuming that we get it first), I definitely want to get HBR. A few horses can cover our entire area and help protect the workers and do clean up on injured units, so the legions can do the real fighting.

I don't like disconnecting the iron. If we had stacks of extra workers, so that we could connect and disconnect fast, it might be different, but we have so few workers, and can't really afford it now. And, there are 2 more sources of iron nearby. We should have at least one of them soon.

I would like to set up a city at the pink circle in Steve's pic as soon as possible. This gets us the second source of iron puts us towards France.

 

[civ_steve]

bigchief: I think that will work. We are not making much money right now, so we do have a need to get Settlers out there; however, I believe we will get to trade Math and there's enough Gold out there to make up the difference if we delay our 6th city by switching Rome to Warriors/Legions. We definitely need more Workers; almost as much as we need to get rid of the Greeks that are infesting our lands!!

We can disconnect the iron later if we need to, or if it makes sense.

I think France has settled on that city site; might be their first loss! Maybe we should plan to build out that way and take it as the first action of our upcoming war; prevents Joan from having a base to operate out of, and we can finish off Greece after taking her outpost.

What are your thoughts on research after Math?

 

[bigchief]

As far as the research after Math, at this point, I would say Lit., but I think what I will do is stop after the trades and come back here and post what the status is. What we research next will depend heavily on what we get in the trades, what everyone else has at that point, the outlook on the Great Library, and probably many more considerations. We can discuss it at that point, then I can finish my turns.

 

[civ_steve]

I agree; I think I've convinced myself that Lit is next. I just don't trust the AI to research it for us in a timely fashion, and if a GLeader pops up, we want to use him for GLib sooner than later.

You wont get Math until your 7th turn; unless you get enough Gold in trades to upgrade all the Warriors to Legions, we'll probably still need money for that so you can probably start out at Minimum for 3 turns to finish your set. But if all upgrades are accomplished and our Military is capable enough to hold its own for the time being, start at Maximum while maintaining an even Treasury. That would be my suggestion.

 

[Peanut]

Generals :

I believe that we are still on track, or at least heading generally in the right direction. I support researching Lit as fast as possible - we may get a GL to build the GL. We probably won't get tech parity through trades as we may soon face some alliances against us once the AIs get their embassies with eachother. So the GL will be a big bonus. Hopefully once we reach Education we will be big enough with two productive cores to fund whatever research we still need to end the game.

Legions should be all we need for some time to come given their offensive and defensive strengths. We don't need archers, although horses may be good for some hit and run fighting or pillaging and in preparation for knights.

The trick with the hoplites is simply to occupy our strategic tiles. They only have an attack of one and are rarely used for attacking.

Workers and Settlers are still essential even with a war going on. Each city gives us some extra cash and production, and ups our free unit limit.

I'm not sure about pillaging the iron - we may be better off building legions rather than periodically mass upgrading warriors. My gut feel is that the cash will be more useful in the longer term if we do need to buy techs or improvements and for our upgrades for next offensive unit (knights). Has anyone done the sums on which is the more efficient option ?

I believe that our strategy should be to generate legions, throw them against the greek core, and pillage greek communications and resources to reduce their production. Then raze their cities. We also need military roads to get our troops into action quicker. The greeks need to be crushed or at least crippled before the next war - a two front war is not fun. The Russians can wait a while. Don't forget that the greeks will have their GA while we have ours unless we can guarantee that we defeat every hoplite we meet in combat.

Hopefully we will spawn a leader soon enough that we can build the GL, otherwise I suggest an army so we can get the Epic built. If we get a leader drought then an FP may be better first if we have enough cities to justify a second core - but now this is getting rather speculative and a little optimistic.

I agree with Keith - we need to clarify our strategy as a team. However once we have done that it is up to each player to make their best judgements in play during their own turn. It's in watching eachother's turns and in constructively critiquing eachother (and ourselves) that we pick up new ideas and approaches. Or at least an amateur like me does.

 

[Keith Larson]

Here's my input:

First Priority: Protect our workers and improved tiles. This means having enough blocking units in the short term and Legionaries long-term. Consequently, I am for building at least on more warrior in Rome before it builds a settler. An additional reason is that we would be hard pressed to protect tiles, take the mountains to the east, exterminate the invading hoplite, AND protect two settlers with the number of units we have currently.

Next Tech: Lit for sure, unless we get it through trade. Get Antium back to pre-build ASP, but watch the F7 status carefully. With so many nations on our continent the AI has a much greater chance to research Lit early. I have not tested this, but the AI seems to pick what it researches based in part on what other know nations are researching. Thus we can’t count on getting the GL first any longer. In fact, I think the AI has a very good chance to get a GL pre-build.

War Priority: I am all for knocking Greece out early. This we give us an ocean on our back door rather than a hostile nation.

Gold, Iron and Cities: Because of the number of nations on our continent the speed of AI advancement will be very fast. Let us pray that Math will give us trading opportunities. I really don’t think we can afford to play the minimum research game with Lit. It may give us our last trading opportunity (if the AI has no pre-builds). Because we can’t hoard gold for upgrades we are going to have to build Legionaries and that means iron. With the abundance of Iron in our area I am not as worried about losing it as I normally would be. In addition, because we need gold for researching Lit ASP we need cities to support our troops. I suggest using Veii as a settler factor and spit out workers and settlers from Rome and Cumae only to keep the population from getting out of hand. I think sending some worker to join Antium is a very good idea as long as these two conditions are met: 1) The new citizen will have a shield producing tile 2) we can afford to keep the new citizen happy. Past 4 we will have to use the slider.

 

[bigchief]

Turn 0 - 1250 - Changed Rome to Warrior. Changed Antium to Palace. Changed Cumae to worker. Moved warriors to block hoplites.

Turn 1 - 1225 - NW Hoplite moves away. Hoplite next to Veii moves S to Hill. Greek warriors move towards Antium. Shuffled warriors around to cover improved tiles. Upgraded 8 vet warriors to legions.

Turn 2 - 1200 - Russians want to talk - No thanks. NW Hoplite comes back our way. Hoplite in our territory moves SE towards Antium. Greek warriors continue to move towards Antium. More shuffling around of units to protect improved tiles. We are dancing now, but there should be some dead Greeks next turn.

Turn 3 - 1175 - Hammurabi demands 11 gold (all we have). I give it to him. We need to be able to trade with him until we declare on him. Greek warrior attacks Antium. Legion kills warrior and we are in Golden Age. Kill another Greek Warrior. Up lux slider to 10% to get everybody back to work. 16 gold + 13 gpt. Can't get math in less turns. Liz now has Math, but has not traded it.

Turn 4 - 1150 - Greek warrior attacks Antium & is killed. Legion in Antium steps out to kill archer and is promoted to Elite. Legion is defeated trying to kill hoplite NW of Veii. I am tired of dancing around with these guys. I need to get rid of the hoplites soon. Greek archer is headed our way.

Turn 5 - 1125 - 2 Greek archers are in mountains SE of Rome. Legion kills hoplite in our territory. Veii produces settler. Upgrade another vet warrior to legion. 2 legions move towards mountains. Abe and Hammurabi are the only ones without math.

Turn 6 - 1100 - 2 Greek archers in mountains move to flat ground and are killed. NW hoplite is being chased away. Settler and Legion move into place.

Turn 7 - 1075 - England completes Pyramids. Germans complet Oracle. Neapolis is founded - starts on barracks. NW hoplite is killed at the cost of 1 legion. No more Greeks in the area. We learned math. Traded math + 8 gold to Abe for writing. Traded math + 7 gold to Hammurabi for CB & HBR. Traded Abe HBR for Myst. These trading rules may be harder than the war part. I think I could have gotten Philo in the trading, or at least some gold if I had been able to haggle. Hammurabi is up Philo on us. Bismark and Liz are up Philo, CoL, and MM (that's all I can see, anyway). We are even with Abe. Declared war on France. She is up Philo, CoL and MM.

Turn 8 - 1050 - Liz demands TM and 6 gold. I give it to her. Greeks move a hoplite and archer next to Neapolis. Units move towards Marseilles. Rome builds Legion.

Turn 9 - 1025 - Greek archer kills a warrior on mountain next to Neapolis. Our units are near Marseilles. 2 hoplites and an archer in mountains near Neapolis.

Turn 10 - 1000 - Our legions kill a hoplite and an archer. One hoplite left near Neapolis. Veii produces settler. Settler and escorting legion move N to head towards Marseilles. We have 2 units next to Marseilles. An elite legion can be there next turn, so I waited to attack to give him a chance.

Nobody has Lit yet. 3 are building the colossus. Let's hope someone finishes it before anyone learns Lit. Our military advisor says we are strong vs everybody we know. Veii needs to take back 1 or both game tiles next turn.

Here is the save:

The Save

 

[bigchief]

Here is a screen shot:

 

[Keith Larson]

Civ-steve protect our iron at all costs! I sure hope there is a unit in Rome that can move. If not abandon Neopolis. The iron is worth much more to us than one city. Guys let's not let blood lust loose this game for us. Killing a hoplite and archer was not worth the loss of iron. We can always kill units.

 

[civ_steve]

Well, well. We are quite engaged now, aren't we? Just loaded the save file to take a look; I've got it!

Not to worry, Keith; there are 3 units in Neapolis that haven't moved; I will move one of the Legions onto the Iron and fortify it. That Hoplite isn't moving there! (BTW, I wouldn't care to lose the town even if it meant losing the Iron; we can rehook it later and that town is generating 4 Shields and 4 Commerce a turn, and supporting 4 of our Military Units!)

Here are snapshots of our F3 and F1 screens:

We are up to 9 Legions, roughly half between Veii and Marseilles, and the remainder near Rome/Neopolis. Rome and Cumae will finish 2 more Legions in the next two turns; we have 5 Warriors, one is way North and effectively out of play. Of the other 4, 1 is Vet. So in 2 turns we can be up to 12 Legions.

Immediately, I'd suggest that we level Marseilles (turn after next), and leave 2 or 3 Legions to counter any French/Russian moves from the North. The remaining 9-10 Legions can regroup and head into Greek lands, taking out Thermopylae and on to Athens. My concern is that we will lose lots of Legions to the Hoplites. We can help out by getting a handful of Catapults to take a hitpoint or two off the Hoplites as we attack. (And provide defensive fire vs any attacking Greek units.)

To that end I propose changing Neopolis' build from Barracks to Catapult; we already have 3 Barracks (1 is in Veii, which probably isn't building any Military anytime soon, but Rome and Cumae can keep us at or above our Military support limit.) Then keep it building Catapults.

On the F1 screen, I show us moving down to a minimum research on Literature. Here's my reasoning: Antium has 50 Shields stored and is gaining 7 spt, which means another 50 turns before GLib can be built by hand. Even at size 6, and assuming no waste, Antium would need another 30+ turns to complete GLib. There is no hurry, but we could very much use the money for Upgrades to Legion. Doing Minimum on Literature boosts us to +20 gpt, or 1 Legion upgrade every 2 turns. This will get better as we build more cities. If we get a GLeader, I would switch this around and maximize the research to Literature, but without the Military, there isn't likely to be a GLeader.

I also HIGHLY recommend that we pillage the Iron. Rome is a 12 spt city right now (I plan to build a worker soon; 12 spt or 10 spt is the same when building 10, 20 or 30 shield cost items, and we need more Workers!) Rome can spit out Vet Warriors for 10 turns (10 more Warriors); saving 20 gpt means we can upgrade 5 of them immediately upon reconnection. Keeping it connected means 3 more Legions built in the same time. I'd rather have 5 than 3, with 5 more still to upgrade!

I also recommend that we finish building our our distance 3 cities before we branch out towards France. We are in our GA and we need more productive tiles with less corruption, more so than setting the Stage to go North. There are 3 or 4 distance 3 sites to occupy yet.

I plan to play sometime tomorrow, or early Sunday. Let me know what you think. BTW, several of the civs know Poly already, too.

 

[Peanut]

CS : In short, sounds reasonable, especially our distance 3 cities. We have to get our core city ring complete to get that production maximised. Looks like the iron pillage sums work out ok so do it. Go teach those upstart foreigners a good lesson.

 

[Keith Larson]

Thank God we have units in Neopolis! As I thought about the situation more, even with Neoplois having one unit in it we have enough units in the area to retake the iron tile, but probably not without much Rome blood.

Civ-Steve, thanks for doing the math on the iron disconnect. I say go for it! I am in total agreement with switching Neopolis to catapults. We already have one unnecessary barrack sucking up gold in Antium, why add to this list? Bombardment is the single greatest advantage we have over the AI. The catapults we build now will pay off throughout the game. I agree with your city placement. Let’s get our first ring completed.

The only downside to the min Lit research is that it may be our last opportunity for trades. But I could go either way. The min research may be wiser. Speaking of trades, it may be too late to get anything good because we gave our maps away under treat, but see what we can get for maps. As long as we continue improving tiles we should be able to get at least 1 gold every other turn. The AI already can see everything, so hiding our maps gains us nothing.

As we enter into the military phase in earnest let’s remember the basic rules of war. Remember, the Romans where able to take over the known world because they exercised military disciple. Our opponents are even more inept than the barbarian hordes the Romans faced. As a crusty old wargamer from the golden age of wargaming (the 1970’s) let me share two simple rules with you. Wargaming 101

Rule 1: Know your opponent. In this cause we are facing Gomer Pile, not Alexander the Great no matter what the F4 screen says. The AI is predictable and single minded. It will throw away its army piece-meal time and time again. Therefore, risk is unnecessary. For example: You would think that the AI would flood a threaten city with defenders, but no the AI does not think, it is programmed to defend cities with 2 to 3 units and send the rest out pillaging and attacking. Therefore, don’t attack a city with just enough forces to win. Wait a turn, wait two. Until you have what you need to guarantee victory. Time and time again I have watched in amazement as the AI sends out defensive units on pillaging missions as I was amassing my attack force.

Rule 2: Make only 2-1 or better attacks. The idea here is that you will have bad luck (Warriors do kill Legionaries), but you always have follow up forces attack the wounded enemy unit. In this way we insure we never have a unit die in vain. For example: We have a stack of 4 Legionaries with in attack range of 4 spearmen in four separate tiles. We attack the first spearmen in the most important tile because we have a 4 to 1 advantage. The first attack wins! We move to the second and win. We can still risk the third attack because we have a follow up Legionary. But if we win the third attack don’t make the forth attack. Why, because there is always NEXT turn, when we can again attack with the odds in our favor. The only time we need to make 1-1 attacks is when we are placed at great risk by that unit, which because of Rule 1 this is almost never.

This approach may seem unnecessarily slow and methodical, but in a long war like ours it will actually speed the game up, because over time we will grow stronger and literally eat the AI armies up. The body counts will be so much in our favor that it will not matter how many opponents we have our how large their production advantage is we become an overwhelming tide that sweeps everything away in its path.

I am sure you all know this, but it is so fun killing units that it is easy to forget at times. I know I have to remind myself of these two rules every game I play.

 

[bigchief]

The spices will be online in 2 turns. That means we can lower the lux slider back down to 0, or we can support a size 6 city with 2 units garrisoned there.

The greeks have a road that leads straight to the mountain that is next to Neapolis. They will be constantly coming in from that direction. If we are going to pillage the iron, I would wait until we have another road connected to Neapolis. We need to be able to get there quickly, and we need to start to push forwards into the Greek territory.

I do agree that we need to finish our first ring core, but I still think we should settle on, or near, the site where Marseilles is, first. England is pushing out our way, and even if we can keep Joan from resettling there, Liz may do it soon. That site will be a good settler or worker pump with the game tile and the flood plains.

As for dropping the research rate, I think we should keep it up. Our golden age will be over in 13 turns. We won't be able to up it later on. Our militaristic trait will have our units upgrading to elite often, and I think we can get a leader fairly soon. The cascade from the Colossus is what worries me.
Liz was building it before I started my turns. Germany switched to it when Liz built the pyramids. They are building it in Berlin. I'm pretty sure they already had shield lead on us at that time, and I would imagine Berlin is a much better city than Antium, even with the golden age.

I still would like to build a couple of horsemen. With war on 2 sides of our territory, they will be very useful.

Keith: I generally agree that we need to have the odds in our favor when we attack, and I try to make sure that I have the better of the situation, but that needs to be tempered some by the need to move forward. I used to wait until I had massive forces and greatly superior odds before I attacked anywhere. Many times it ended up that I waited too long. I am still trying to get over this. This is why I have scored so poorly in the GOTMs. I understand all of the fundamentals of the game, but have lacked the courage and the aggression to attack with even odds or inferior odds. If you read the spoilers and logs by the better players (like SirPleb), they just keep moving forward. Each turn we wait in this game means that the enemies have one more turn to regroup, or build more units, and that we are one turn closer to being at war with another civ.

 

[Keith Larson]

Civ-steve,
Why is East sight 7 not one more tile east? Your orginal sight is not next to a river and it is only 2 tiles from Rome, breaking the 3 tile first ring.

 

[civ_steve]

Actually, the East site 7 IS distance 3 away from Rome! The distance is calculated as follows: going only NW, NE, SW or SE from Rome, count # of spaces; this site is 2 NE then 2 SE from Rome; add Largest # and 1/2 of Smallest number, so 2 + (2/2) = 3; this site is distance 3 from Rome. (And you drop any .5's that occur, so 3 and 3.5 are equivalent.)

This is very good commentary and advice. My time to play is limited this weekend, so I've finished my set of turns. Here's the turn log:

Turn 0, 1000 BC
Send Legion from Neopolis to protect Iron supply from Hoplite.
Set Tax rate to 80%
Change Neopolis build from Barracks to Catapult

(IBT Hoplite goes South to Mountain)

Turn 1, 975 BC
Rome finishes Legion, beg Worker
Upgrade Vet Warrior in Cumae to Legion
Clumsy Legion, ended up destroying the road to the Ore!!
Advance on Marseilles
Legion Settler head East to River/Hills city site
Adjust Veii for fast Growth (alternate using both game, or only one and letting Antium use the Game for a turn); Rome for better Growth (Iron to River BG, gives +2 food and growth every 5 turns instead of every 10)

(IBT: Greece moves Horseman into Mtns near Neopolis; several Legions in area start salivating 'hmm, Horsemeat ... Haven't had that in a while ...')

(Also, at long last, 2 Russian Archers show up near Cumae; 2 Vet Legions await them)

Turn 2, 950 BC
Cumae fin Legion, beg Catapult
Rome fin Work, beg Worker (grows back to size 5 this turn)
Spice Connected! Luxuries to 0
Move Cumae Legions to counter Russians
Vet Legion kills Greek Horse, with no damage; we own these mountains except for that Hoplite
Marseilles Assault: Elite Legion defeats Spear, 4/5 left; Vet Legion loses leaving 2/4 Spear; Vet Archer kills Spear, 2/4 left; they have an extra Warrior in there!
Legion/Settler head East to Hills
Roman Worker out to Road BG, connect Neopolis

(IBT: Greek Hoplite heads North, the Mountains are ours!)
(Russian Archers move adjacent to Cumae, to bad for them!)

Turn 3, 925 BC
Rome builds Worker, begins on Catapult
Neopolis builds Catapult, begins Catapult
Legions make Kindling out of Russian Archers, we get a promotion to Elite!
Elite 4/5 Legion kills Warrior at Marseilles, 3/5 Left; It is destroyed and we get 3 Gold; Archer fortifies; Legion in Veii sent up to protect this direction
Pompei founded 2NE/2NW of Rome (not quite site 6, but it leaves space for an additional distance 3 city SE of site6), starts on Catapult

(IBT French Horseman advances on Archer; French Warrior heads S near Pompei (what is he thinking? ))
(Greek Hoplite goes South, back into Mtns; I have a Catapult now Mr Hoplite!)

Turn 4, 900 BC
Darn, Catapult misses (bet he's scared now!)
Near Marseilles Ruins, retreat Archer to new Legion; retreat 3/5 Elite Legion too

(IBT French Horseman advances on Legion/Archer stack 'hmm ... more HorseMeat')
(Greek Hoplite goes further South, adj to Neopolis)

Turn 5, 875 BC
Rome builds Catapult, beg Warrior
Move Units to Block Hoplite from going West
3/5 Elite Legion does in French Warrior
Vet Legion does in French Horseman, 2/4 left

(IBT French Warrior Advances ... really, he does)
(Greek Horseman comes into Mountains; Hoplite heads back North)

Turn 6, 850 BC
Rome fin Warrior, beg Warrior
Veii fin Settler, beg Settler
Drat, Vet Legion loses 2 HP attacking Greek Horse, and it retreats! Move 2nd Legion to defend
Bombard Hoplite in Mtn with 2 Catapults; he is now a 2/3; surround him leaving just a path to an open Grassland
Fortify French Defense Units

(IBT French Warrior Advances)
(2/3 Greek Hoplite takes bait and goes into Grassland!; Horseman retreats; Hoplite near Thermopylae

Turn 7, 825 BC
Rome builds Warrior, beg Work
Cumae builds Catapult, beg Warr
Catapults Reduce Greek Hoplite to 1/3; Elite Legion finishes him
Fortify Legions in Mountains
Elite 4/5 Legion kills French Warrior

(IBT English Settler/Warrior show up near French zone; Elizabeth wants the Iron too)
(NW Warrior is sneaking through Babylon Territory; Sees another Russian Archer (1) heading our Way )

(English start on Great Wall, so they have Construction)

Turn 8, 800 BC
Rome fin Work, beg Warr
Fortify in Mountains
Pisae founded 3SW/1NW of Rome; beg on Catapult

(IBT nothing Much; Greek Hoplite is moving along base of Mountains; our Legions taunt him from the Heights)
(English form Liverpool on the desert side of the Iron, ha!)

Turn 9, 775 BC
Rome fin Warr, beg Warr
Neopolis fin Catapult, beg Catapult
Move Catapults to Iron Hill (4 there now)

Turn 10, 750 BC
Rome fin Warr, beg Warr
Cumae fin Warr, beg Warr
Pompeii fin Cat, beg Cat
Start Rolling Cats and Legions towards Greece

End Turn Log

Here's a screenshot of our area:

We have a stack of 4 Legions and 4 Catapults just East of the Iron space; and there are another 4 Legions in the Mountains ready to join them as they roll towards Thermopylae.

Rome has popped out 3 Workers during this time; at size 4 it Generates 10 shields, so I built a Worker every time it was about to grow to size5. We should be able to do this one more time during the GA (after 2 more Warriors)

Those 3 Workers, in addition to improving tiles around our empire, are now back on the Iron space, and can hook it up in 2 turns.

Veii is about to finish a Settler; I'd HIGHLY recommend building the site 7 city 2NE/2SE of Rome; this will start our road network moving towards Greece. After connecting the Iron, the 3 Workers, with appropriate guards, can start roading to the East past this city and connect to the Greek road network. That way we can eventually move Settlers and reinforcements through, and claim the Greek Luxuries for ourselves.

We have 4 Vet Warriors in Rome; 2 more can be built over the next 2 turns, then Iron should be reconnected. There is over 240 gold in the Treasury; enough to upgrade all 6 Warriors on that turn. 2 more Vet Warriors will be in Cumae for future upgrade. I've reset the Research Rate to maximum as we most of the money for upgrades already and we'd like to get Lit to take advantage of any GLeader. Lit in 7; our GA expires soon, so it might take just longer than that to research.

After we learn Lit (which none of the AI have yet), we have to decide what to do. It is a valuable trading tool, but not trading it protects the GLib for us. The pre-build is still at least 20 turns from gathering 400 shields (Palace is currently worth 300, so we need 100 past the Palace amount). I think the AI has 2 civs working on Colossus; 1 will finish, the other probably tumble over to GreatLighthous; England is working on the Great Wall. Maybe GreatLib is still safe for us, but it'd sure be nice to get a GreatLeader! If we get one, I'd say we should finish Colossus in Antium, and use GL to build GLib there or elsewhere.

Roster Status:
bigchief
civ_steve -- Just Played
Keith Larson <--- UP!!!
Peanut
Peglegasus

and civ contact and War status:

Russia contact in 2270bc, at WAR
Greece contact in 2270bc, at WAR
France contact in 2270bc, at WAR
Babylon contact in 2230bc, at war by 610bc
England contact in 2190bc, at war by 210bc
Germany contact in 1475bc, at war by 190ad
America contact in 1475bc, at war by 420ad

Keith: you will be declaring War on Babylon during your set of turns.

Here is 750 BC Save File

 

[Keith Larson]

Just notice Civ-steve posted his moves. I wrote the following before. Looking at Civ-steve post I think my points are confirmed. We gained nothing for the death of one Legionaire and now England has founded a city next to the iron.

Looking at the saved file I have some more comments on city placement. The second city sight Civ-steve identified with a 7 should not be placed on that tile. We want the two worker to improve that tile for our wonder building city, once they complete their work next to the river. BTW there was no need for he workers to build the road by the river during a GA. Without the Legion protecting the settler the attack on Marseille is iffy. The French probably have their original warrior and two spearmen fortified on the hill now called Marseille. That means every unit of ours must win its battle which is unlikely. This is a perfect example of what I was talking about earlier. What we gain from razing Marseille is very little unless we plan to move the legionnaire and his settler up there to claim the hill. If our intention is to found that city elsewhere do we want to risk losing all three units? I am all for moving forward as Bigchief said, but what do we gain from razing Marseille if we don’t plan to found a city there? The AI will not make the garrison any stronger. Because it already has 3 units garrisoned there it will build archers or spearmen (most likely archers) and send them towards our territory. The three units we are risking in this attack can easily handle anything Marseille produces (which will not be much because of they are a high corruption city for the French). Besides, killing archers is a great way to generate GL’s. Then when we are ready to found a city on that hill, we attack it with overwhelming odd and guess what? There will be two spearmen and warrior (maybe a freshly produced archer) defending! The AI is so stupid.

 

[Keith Larson]

Turn 0: 750 BC
Good job Steve.

Turn 1: 730 BC
French warrior moves into view SE of Liverpool, good, more GL bate! Hoplite moves next to iron and grapes and horsemen into the woods SE of our infant SOD. Rome completes warrior and starts another. Veii complete settler and starts another. F4 shows that no one has Lit yet. Cat in Rome and one in the SOD red line the Hoplite. Two other cats redline the horseman. The elite Legionaires in the SOD take care of them and the balance of the stack move into vacated woods. Workers start road on iron. Units near French warrior move to channel him into the open. Warrior in the far N will shadow the Russian archer for a while. The intel he provide is too valuable to risk him to the Russian.

IBT: The stupid French warrior took the bait and will die this turn. Two more French warrior appear to the N, looks like they are moving to attack the worker near Pompeii. Mycenae send out hoplite on a pillaging mission. We will be waiting for him!

Turn 2: 710 BC
Rome builds warrior, start worker.
Cumae builds warrior, starts warrior.
French Warrior killed, Romans now next to Thermopylae.
Still no one has Lit.

IBT: GA has ended! Hoplite moves into hills N of Rome.

Turn 3: 690 BC
Rome builds worker and starts Legionary. Bombardment of Thermopylae with one cat fails. Next turn I will attack in force. Iron is on line again and I upgrade all five warriors in Rome. The two French warrior in the north change direction and head south. The our elite Legionary on the ruins attacks and dies to a stone throwing barbarian! I judge the risk of the attack worth it. But this is again an illustration of what I have been saying. With no follow up units near by his death was in vain. Ravenna founded two tiles due east of Rome. Starts Cat. Workers move to bonus wheat. We are at +2 gold and Lit in 5 turns. No AI has Lit. Next turn another warrior will upgrade in Rome.

IBT: Hoplite move to tile NW of Ravenna. Germans complete Colossus in Berlin. English, Americans and Germans start GLH. A French horseman kills our northern warrior.

Turn 4: 670 BC
Neapolis builds cat and starts another.
Pisae builds cat and starts another.
The cat in Rome and Neapolis move to Ravenna and Hoplite takes one hit. The four cats next to Thermopylae all fail. Looks like we will do this the hard way! At the cost of one Legionary we kill two Hoplites and destroy Thermopylae taking 0 gold, but one worker whom we kill. Wounded hoplite near Ravenna is killed. Archer kills wounded French warrior that killed our elite. The archer is promoted to elite. So I don’t feel to bad about last turn's attack.

I have a wedding to go to this afternoon so I will not be about to play again until tomorrow afternoon. I am posting the 670 BC save for your viewing pleasure and look to your advice. There are a number of units that can still move this turn, but we need to decide on our next target. Mycenae or the Greek heartland? If we go for Athens we can’t take the cats with us. Based on your input I will finish tomorrow.