[NFP] Shadow game - help me beat Emperor

[Noble Zarkon]

Yeah should have looked at the picture before making such a blanket statement!

Thanks

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Just started to play and a big decision to make, trade route has completed - where to send it to next? BA has a quest but might die soon, sending it to Valencia to create a road for my troops to walk on seems apt.

Spoiler Trade route choices :

 

[MrRadar]

Just started to play and a big decision to make, trade route has completed - where to send it to next? BA has a quest but might die soon, sending it to Valencia to create a road for my troops to walk on seems apt.

First of all, your warrior and slinger should stop loitering immediately
They're even not fogbusting, send them up north at once, between Valencia and BA - sniff around, scout out, see, what Philip is doing, try to get in his way and at the same time, do find a Dutch city where this trader could go. I'd move it to Akhetaten and hold it there until Dutch destination is discovered. Trade route to Wilhelmina will save your diplomacy on this continent.

After she turns friendly, DOF her and trade with her. When DoF is signed, your traders may go wherever, as long as you renew the DoF upon expiry on the same turn.
With Wilhelmina DoFed, you'll have your hands free to do with Philip as you please, she won't object.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I was thinking it's a pity I can't see any of the Dutch cities, totally forgot I can wait!!

 

[Noble Zarkon]

t69
Netherlands founds a religion (2/4)
Move my troops towards Spain.
Settler and Campus complete, start on UU x 2

t70
Autocracy is in

t72
Phillip doesn't like my troops hanging about but I'm not in a position to declare war obviously, the grievances will be be swamped when I do declare war anyway!
Sais founded at the nearest of the two spaces I had indicated, it's not a great city but the one near Crater Lake was now showing strong loyalty penalty.

t73
Phillip doesn't like me settling so close, agree not to do it again for 30DF (won't be completing any Settlers in the near future), sell 23 of it to Wilhelmina for 120g
I have 453 g, tentatively I could buy the horses tile at Sais (there's a builder on the way who could improve it) and either a horseman or a UU. I have 3xUU and a horseman in production right now.

Stopped for advice - is that the best use of my gold??

Spoiler Sais :

Spoiler Gold options :

 

[Archon_Wing]

Turn 134

Spoiler :

Using Defender of the Faith, I bait the Dutch crossbows with my great general led horsemen and swordsmen and destroy them. Now that I have my own Crossbows, I take the Dutch lands (they don't seem to like walls this game-- why? Guess they focused all their troops on the offense. I leave the Dutch with 1 city so I can still get tourism from them and also Wilhelmina's cities are going to be great spots for National Parks thanks to the Natural Wonder. However, after all this crap I don't actually have a port city to the ocean to check out the other side of the world so that should be fixed.

Remember a trick is to ask for Open Borders immediately after you make peace, so it won't matter if they denounce you after.

Meanwhile Madrid has finished chopping out the Forbidden City and I faith buy a settler to settle this coastal spot, in the hopes of building Kilwa as that thing can go very randomly now.

Turn 151

Spoiler :

Kilwa was fortunately chopped out (not sure why I took so long here) Chopped out a galley on this side

I haven't researched Cartography yet (still), and buy a chariot to explore any future lands.

Meanwhile on the east side, I settle a coastal city and have it churn out my very first naval units.

 

[MrRadar]

@Noble Zarkon: well, perhaps buying that horse tile is reasonable, although you already have income of +4 horses, but at least it will help Sais grow to 2 a bit faster. It will be tricky to connect iron, so probably it is better to focus on horses and postpone swords until later. Now, that Wilhelmina lost negative diplo modifier, Hattusa is no longer so scary.
BA looks like to hold for a while. If those Spanish warriors are decimated, you can make a move earlier, but preferably after a DoF with Wilhelmina.
There's idle warrior on your campus, bring him north. Don't forget to bring those slingers back to upgrade. Prepare a reserve for that too.
As for what to buy else, if we're relying on UU and horsemen, consider buying a watermill in Ra-Kedet and go for Construction now rather than Iron Working, then lumbermill all those forests, it will help with production a bit.

Edit: Philip will sell you open borders for 14 g. You can buy them and snoop around with that scout around Madrid and further a little more.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Pyramids are in, trade route to Arnhem established and DOF with Wilhelmina accepted .

Phillip is being hassled by barbarians and not getting very far with BA (although he has now brought Hattusa into the conflict which could be problematic when I declare, need to think if I should take them out as soon as I declare on Phillip).

I can change governments now if I want (also have drama and Poetry down to 1 turn so can deploy that whenever I want as well) but with horseman and ranged UUs does Oligarchy gain me anything??

22 turns from a GG (from the wildcard), thinking I'll keep my eye on the faith price for the next wee while.

Spoiler Lay of the land :

 

[MrRadar]

@Noble Zarkon: Oligarchy will still mean faster promotions.
Philips meddling in Hatusa complicates things in that he's now getting 2 iron a turn. That makes things kinda urgent. I believe you should go in in 6 turns, when Swenett completes UU. Leave those 2 UU and the horse with an archer to take Hattusa out asap (liberate Fez to balance out karma, and have some boost to science buildings), the rest onto Valencia. When you declare, ask Wilhelmina to join in, just try no to let her take Spanish cities, especially Madrid. I think, that means you're going to eliminate Spain. Don't stop building units just yet. As for government, probably change just before the fireworks.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

t80
Spain founds religion (4/4)

t81,82
I'm worried about Wilhemina taking Madrid as it's so close to the Hague so I have some troops making it awkward for her to approach.

t83
Phillip makes peace with BA

t84
Take your positions!

t85
Wilhemina marching troops towards Madrid!
Declare war, Wilhemina joins for 1g - clearly that was her plan as well!

t86
Met Muscat

t87
Unmet city state defeated

t88
Capture Madrid and Valencia
Hatusa is giving me more bother but should fall next turn

Paused as loyalty situation is quite bad, could move Magnus to Madrid and slot in the loyalty/garrison card next time using the two warriors?? Will go away once Phillip is dead but I worry about Wilhemina sniping them if they flip free before then.

Spoiler Spanish lands :

 

[MrRadar]

Paused as loyalty situation is quite bad, could move Magnus to Madrid and slot in the loyalty/garrison card next time using the two warriors?? Will go away once Phillip is dead but I worry about Wilhemina sniping them if they flip free before then.

Spoiler Spanish lands :

View attachment 569920

Nice start

yes, move Magnus to Madrid and use Limitanei, also repair the monument in Madrid first, then other population/production buildings, I doubt it will complete that UU fast enough now, but monument maybe. Buy a monument in Valencia as soon as enough cash. Sell honey to Wilhelmina for whatever gpt+lump sum she has.
That Duch GA is problematic, but if you blitz Barcelona and Cordoba fast enough, within 4-5 turns, loyalty in Madrid and Valencia should improve. Then liberate Fez and Toledo should be the last.
You can let the Dutch bring their siege and ranged, just don't let their melee come too close

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Thanks, haven't put any production into anything those are just placeholders so that's fine.

You can let the Dutch bring their siege and ranged, just don't let their melee come too close

Indeed

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Played a few more turns .... RIP Phillip

Not sure I played it absolutely optimal and I probably overbuilt troops (spending 30g a turn on them!) but things were going really well and I felt in the zone so carried on. I was also worried about cities revolting, Valencia got down to 2 turns but I had troops ready to take it back if needed.

Now Spain is gone and I need to make my next dedication so a good time to stop.

Not sure what to do with my army, do I try to take out Wilhemina or disband half of them and go for peaceful culture like I planned. I'm leaning towards the latter but happy to hear what folks think.

Something weird is going on with Fez not showing properly in the City States list??

Spoiler Spanish lands :

Spoiler My core :

 

[Noble Zarkon]

At this moment, you're probably not ready for war at all, unless you want to commit to a few horsemen soon.

At this moment no, but with some dedication, in about 25-30 turns, probably yes. But the commitment must be serious: after PP comes, the capital puts settler on hold and switches to units, in other cities, after Pyramids and campus, just units as well.
That's already almost t100 which means OP may be facing X-bows before too long.

I think I did ok

 

[MrRadar]

I think I did ok

Now you're the Master!

Congrats, this game is as good as won, the thread has served its purpose!

I'd still go with Free Inquiry.
For the army, you can keep it, Conscription card will help with the maintenance, scout with them, fight remaining barbs, send to scout oversees when after Cartography. Continue collecting information, it is the ultimate power, after all. Later, you'll have what to merge into corps and armies for inspirations. Besides, when you discover other AI or if you discontinue cooperation with Wilhelmina, somebody might question your possession of Hattusa in the Congress.

As for further path, choose your own way: simcity to culture or conquer everyone. I'm no counsel as to how it can be done in the fastest and most efficient way.
You still have spots to settle, many districts and many wonders to build, and great people to recruit.

And yes, there's something wrong with Fez, I'm afraid it might be some of your mods, UI or other. Although it does not show up for me as well, idk. You should have at least one envoy there, but neither your capital, nor the Library in Hattusa is getting the bonus. Strange.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Congrats, this game is as good as won, the thread has served its purpose!

Thanks yes, I guess I have the steamroller going lol.

You still have spots to settle, many districts and many wonders to build, and great people to recruit.

Yes, this is the way I like to play so will probably go for that. War is very stressful!!

And yes, there's something wrong with Fez

A few people have noticed this bug, doesn't seem to be Mod related - advice is I need to kill them again lol

 

[Buktu]

I would play peaceful from this point. You have all the land you will ever need now. You are already up to 11 cities but only build 4 settlers on your own so settlers should still be super cheap.
So if you want to push for a CV grab that land and spam some theater squares now. The earlier you get those GP points the earlier you will get great works. And the earlier you get great works the earlier they will genereat tourism for you. You took out a civ so there should be some artifacts from all those fights you can extract later on. Keep an eye out for Mary Leaky. You will need some scientist points for her later on.
Also a little more science would be nice to get to flight and computers faster and keep up in tech just in case. Exploration to find every other civ is important too. Again it looks like you need science for this to cross oceans. The earlier you find everyone and get open borders the earlier the tourism bonus will work. Its just 25% 12 now but it adds up over the turns.
This leads to the next point, you want trade routes with everybody for the tourism bonus. So you will need harbours and commercial hubs as well. The gold you get from this is quite usefull to buy archeologists and great works from the AI. You can also buy buildings since some of your cities don't have the best production.
Alot of districts to build means you need food. Alot of food means you want some builder charges to build some farm triangles. You will have feudalism in a few turns so you can get those 6 charge builders soon! If you want to you can also start mass chopping districts with those once you are a merchant republic.

In general you want to build
- Eifeltower to boost your appeal (national parks, seaside resorts since you have lots of coast)
- Cristo Redentor (again boost seaside resorts)
later on. So you can already plan ahead to get the boosts on the way.

Try to save up as much faith as possible so you can buy lots of rockbands and naturalists later on.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Turn 175

Spoiler :

And so we meet the other side of the world. To our luck, Gilgamesh is in, so free Alliance. Also we're already having a good portion of culture victory done as nobody has solid culture other than China

In these cases, I usually try to find a presence on the other continent to make trade routes and Rock Band sending a bit easier; there's some open space to the north west of China and reasonably close enough-- we want to target him as he has the most domestic tourists.

At this point I beeline flight so that the Sphinx also give tourism as well, since Flight makes all culture generating improvements give tourism. Thanks to Mounemtality, I can plaster the place with them.

Also cities are making theater squares and holy sites. (Tourism was a bit delayed because of all that early war). As we also want wall tourism from Conservation (coming up soon), it's often a good idea to put in the limes card and start building walls wherever you can.

The capital finally has Mausoleum. Meh, but still good to have.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Congrats, this game is as good as won, the thread has served its purpose!

I guess you're right

Thank you so much to everyone who gave their time and knowledge, very pleased. It was a stroll once Spain was gone, I let Wilhelmina live because the layout of her cities made them awkward targets - ironically she was my toughest opponent (although Qin wasn't far behind). A few Rock Bands helped me get over the line, although she censored them just before the end!!

 

[Archon_Wing]

How the heck did we suddenly skip like 180 turns? I guess one more turn happened. But I guess I'll post the rest of my stuff then.

Turn 204

Spoiler :

With Conservation and Fliight researched, tourism begins to Skyrocket. This is followed up by computers for more tourism and time to beeline Cold War. Remember to stay in Theocracy to avoid the different government penalty (do not get t3 unless they do!) Meanwhile the rock band training grounds on their continent begins.

More Sphinx Spam

Parks

Turn 219 (end)

Spoiler :

I probably shouldn't have bothered spreading my religion to more of my cities as I could have used them for Rock Bands, but Phillip was trying to convert it back and I didn't want that.

So apparently, you can build Seaside Resorts at Crater Lake.

Final state of the capital

Madrid's also a fine city that finished Big Ben. And also Huey; I forgot when that happened.