*sigh*. Wang Kon is addicted to tech.

[Leeksoup]

Is it just me, or is Wang Kon an even worse tech-whore than Mansa Musa? Seriously. In my latest game I decided to go a-warmongering. I killed my nearest three neighbors and reached him. I gave him a pass, because he had longbows and I lacked catapults as of yet. I kill another neighbor, now he has Macemen to my crossbows. Decent, yes, but when I declare war he storms me with Knights. I reloaded. So, after my reload, I killed *another* civ (this was a 15 civ game) and came back for him. He now had Muskets to my maces. Keep in mind that at this point I have 30 cities and he has 6. I'm running at 70% tech, thanks to my Great Merchants, which means I crank out a tech every 3-4 turns at Normal speed.
Wang kept ahead of me all game. I had muskets? He had grenadiers. I had rifles? He had SAM infantry. I had Infantry? He got tanks. I finally managed to kill the bastard once I got Modern Armor, but damn! That guy can tech!

How do I stop him from doing this?

 

[Uncle E]

I guess he's your first target and you gotta cripple him early (real early) ... sometimes a well fortified hill/forest unit in his territory will hole him up for a very long time.

 

[oyzar]

all the financial leaders are insane sometimes. When i meet elisabeth the first time it is allways dishartening to see she have alphabet + your missng basic techs + math etc.

 

[scooter]

What difficulty level was this on?

 

[axident]

Is it just me, or is Wang Kon an even worse tech-whore than Mansa Musa? Seriously. In my latest game I decided to go a-warmongering. I killed my nearest three neighbors and reached him. I gave him a pass, because he had longbows and I lacked catapults as of yet. I kill another neighbor, now he has Macemen to my crossbows. Decent, yes, but when I declare war he storms me with Knights. I reloaded. So, after my reload, I killed *another* civ (this was a 15 civ game) and came back for him. He now had Muskets to my maces. Keep in mind that at this point I have 30 cities and he has 6. I'm running at 70% tech, thanks to my Great Merchants, which means I crank out a tech every 3-4 turns at Normal speed.
Wang kept ahead of me all game. I had muskets? He had grenadiers. I had rifles? He had SAM infantry. I had Infantry? He got tanks. I finally managed to kill the bastard once I got Modern Armor, but damn! That guy can tech!

How do I stop him from doing this?

My preferred method is to get a slight tech lead on a bully civ and the bribe that civ to rough up my tech rival. I love how Mansa will continue to be Pleased with me and trade with me even after I send Monty to his doorstep.

P.S. In my last game, Monty and Mansa traded cities in their first war, then Saladin dogpiled onto Mansa, who made peace with Monty. After Sally captured a city, Mansa peaced out with him. So I bribed the map's biggest army (Zulu) to attack both Sally and Mansa at the same time. Monty chimed in by dogpiling onto Mansa. When the dust settled, I had a big tech lead, which meant another bribe, this time to Shaka to attack Monty, since they were by that time my two biggest rivals in land and army. Mansa waits a while and then DoW on Monty--but on the same turn that Shaka and Monty come to peace! What terrible timing by Mansa. Monty quickly takes Mali's eastern border and Sally dogpiles onto Mali (yet again), and this time Mali is reduce to one city when the dust clears. Despite Mali's, uh, struggles, Mansa was still the runner-up to the race to Democracy, which I used to hurt my opponents indirectly via Emancipation. That guy is still a bigger tech threat than Wang Kon, imho.

 

[Napalm102]

With Mansa you can also press an attack against him despite his tech advantage. He will not have that big of an army, usually two/three defenders per city. Even if they are Muskets vs your Macemen, your trebuchets at this stage should cause enough damage for you to take/raze the city, I suggest razing cause that way you don't have to face his siege weapon counter attack, then grab a nice city and immediatelly sue for peace. Or you could just pillage him to hell, those towns take oh so long to grow back.

 

[Bhruic]

If his units out tech you like that, don't focus on trying to take his cities, just lay waste to his land. Raze every cottage that you can see. He's not going to be able to maintain a tech lead if he hasn't got any income.

Bh

 

[DigitalBoy]

If I see a chronic tech whore on my continent and I don't expect to be involved with a war elsewhere, I'll train a half-dozen or so horse archers and pillage their countryside. Aside from destroying their GNP, you also get a nice lump sum as compensation for your effort. Spearmen can be a hassle, but with shock promotion, the casualities may not be that horrid, especially if you're quick about getting the horse archers over there.

 

[Galileo44]

Maces vs Muskets = win for the maces. Just seige and suicide some cats. Problem solved.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

MM you can cripple by charging at his core cities and then pillaging him to death. Wang Kon, he's protective, a little more difficult. Plus, one time he pulled off a 440AD liberalism on me. That wasn't pretty.