Songhai - very powerful

[Randall Turner]

I'm only a lurker there. I never beat the game higher than prince so far.

To show that for our grandmasters also other "easy" civs exist:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=416112

Good strategies. I wonder what the effect of playing huge/epic would be on them, though. Encampments spawn at a set rate, independent of selected game speed. Tech research is of course hugely negatively impacted.

To be fair, the "CS tech/research agreement" strategy I'm using is sort of a mid-early game strategy, I'm usually in the middle of the pack tech-wise before getting Philosophy. But again, it's a strategy to just enjoy the game - you'll be advancing in all areas, tech, policy, production and military very evenly, giving you the opportunity to play stress-free far into the game. Without concentrating on any one victory condition.

Playing not to lose, and to have the opportunity to win anytime after renaissance, more or less.

The fun thing is, you get all the toys. Lots of policies, lots of wonders, big tech lead mid-game, fun.

Note that at some point, usually around the time Songhai hits industrial, civs like Greece can strip the City-State allies from you too. (The difficulty bumps will eventually overwhelm even a near-optimal barbarian farming set-up.) But they can't compete early, and by then you're just soo strong...

 

[Michl2602]

Note that at some point, usually around the time Songhai hits industrial, civs like Greece can strip the City-State allies from you too. (The difficulty bumps will eventually overwhelm even a near-optimal barbarian farming set-up.) But they can't compete early, and by then you're just soo strong...

Especially the Greece also have very good early units to rush. If they are really weaker than Songhai only a multiplayer game between strong players of compareable strength could show.
But if they don't rush you with their early cavallery units + siege, I think you're right, they'll eventually fall back.

 

[Randall Turner]

My experience with those aggressive early-strong guys is that the AI will add up all your barbarian-thumpers and city-state allies and go, "neh, let's attack someone else."

That thread you posted about early tech win, the guy mentions that he assumes you're competent enough at diplomacy to avoid a war and concentrate on tech. Only diplomatic challenge with Songhai early is staying patient enough to not kill your research partners.

I think the problem with a multiplayer game would perhaps not be so much getting conquered, as having to deal with someone who does beeline to one of the other early-win scenarios on another continent, where you can't get at them. Or otherwise blocks you from accessing barbarian spawns. Not sure, it's pretty hard to manage a multiplayer epic/huge game. <shrug> Just can't coordinate enough time off work.

 

[Martin Alvito]

To show that for our grandmasters also other "easy" civs exist:

I can claim grandmastery along with DaveV? No? *sigh*

Songhai is very good, and has probably claimed the flexibility crown from China in the most recent patch. Using the Legalism trick with Songhai for free Mud Pyramid Mosques is quite powerful for a builder approach, as the returns are equivalent to having an Industrial or later era Cultural ally very early in the game without maintenance cost. Songhai is also a top tier warmonger (along with Mongolia and Babylon) due to the Chivalry slingshot.

To accomplish focused objectives, better civs exist. That's the same knock that China had in the initial release; other civs could exploit a given type of start more effectively, but no (non-DLC) civ did a better job given a completely random start than China.

I'd argue that Babylon is the "best" civ for SP given almost any purpose you have in mind, but Songhai is a very strong civ in SP that will perform well irrespective of your intentions. Songhai is a beast in multiplayer.

My experience with those aggressive early-strong guys is that the AI will add up all your barbarian-thumpers and city-state allies and go, "neh, let's attack someone else."

This depends on the difficulty level. On Deity, the AI starts with four Warriors and two Scouts and only increases its military from there. You're going to be hopelessly outnumbered for a very long time unless you work at it (and indefinitely if you don't). The result is that it's extremely difficult to deter Deity-level attacks at the times when they normally occur, which is following the turn 40 and turn 70 AI recalculations. The most efficient way to deter those attacks is not to build a military, but to spend your cash to convince prospective threats to initiate a severe conflict with someone else. That's an odd sort of deterrence that Schelling didn't anticipate given his bilateral framework, but clearly it must exist (just not necessarily as "deterrence" as he defines it).

 

[Keejus]

At 225 gold a pop

Uhhh... what difficulty is this? My encampments only give 25 gold; 75 for the Songhai. This is Standards speed, granted

 

[Randall Turner]

I play exclusively Immortal/Epic/Huge, I've been a bit leary of going to Deity, but that might be necessary if I bundle a few of your strategy tips with Songhai.

Thing is with these guys, getting a strong early army pays. It's an economic boost and doesn't necessarily even involve production. We're talking pre-horseman here, very early - my experience on Immortal is that there's no reasonable early military threat. That very well could change on Deity, though.

re: 40/70 turn AI recalc - Martin, I'm having a bit of a problem with your "turns" though. They sound like "normal" time scale turns, right? I think things change dramatically with an Epic timescale game. (Again, it's that barbarian encampments spawn at a set rate, independent of time scale, while everything else slows down.)

btw, I'm in the modern era and crashing every turn, about all I can do until I restart is talk about stuff. That's the main grump I have about Civ V - my machine isn't a dog at all but I'm going to have to upgrade to play w/o every turn saves.

edit: Martin, what's the "Chivalry slingshot"? I should search more, I guess...

 

[Michl2602]

Uhhh... what difficulty is this? My encampments only give 25 gold; 75 for the Songhai. This is Standards speed, granted

I also never saw 225. Even on settler you only get 150 as Songhai. Should be a typo.

 

[Michl2602]

I can claim grandmastery along with DaveV? No? *sigh*

It was just a try to thank you for your excellent articles, which make my day every time, when they come up. Thank you!

 

[Martin Alvito]

It was just a try to thank you for your excellent articles, which make my day every time, when they come up. Thank you!

I appreciate the thought. All I'm saying is that I'm not there yet!

 

[Randall Turner]

I also never saw 225. Even on settler you only get 150 as Songhai. Should be a typo.

Oh, crap, I just realized I've been saying "Epic".

I play on the longest, biggest possible setting. "Huge" world. "Marathon" time scale.

And then, yeah, encampments == 75, 225 for Songhai.

 

[Martin Alvito]

re: 40/70 turn AI recalc - Martin, I'm having a bit of a problem with your "turns" though. They sound like "normal" time scale turns, right?

Correct. The game skews sharply in your favor as you move towards longer and longer timeframes. The AI is bad at tactics, and its tactical shortcomings cease to be properly counterbalanced by its ability to quickly deploy reinforcements at higher difficulty levels in Epic/Marathon.

I can't say whether Quick or Normal is harder, as I don't play enough Quick games, but it's pretty clear that time frames longer than Normal stack the deck in your favor.

edit: Martin, what's the "Chivalry slingshot"? I should search more, I guess...

If you "lock" all alternative technologies by researching them to 1/3 completion or greater, you can force Research Agreements to give you the technologies you want. The classic method is to force three Research Agreements to give you Currency, Civil Service and Chivalry by researching Trapping, Horseback Riding, Philosophy and Mathematics and blocking alternative techs. (These will be Theology, Sailing, Masonry/Construction and Bronze/Iron).

All of that can be set up by turn 70 or so in a normal speed game, so if you sign three Research Agreements around turn 40 you should be able to upgrade any Horses you have to Mandekalu, Keshiks or Naresuan's Elephants and lay down the law starting around turn 70. This can yield an insta-win on a Pangaea at levels below Deity. DaveMcW was the first player I know of to exploit this to the fullest, using the ability to upgrade units in rival civs' territory if you have Open Borders to turn a horde of Chariot Archers into Mandekalu and produce a lightning-fast, simultaneously backstabbing Domination win before turn 100 on normal speed in a standard (8-player) Pangaea.

 

[Randall Turner]

Oh, okay, I do that as a matter of course. (Locking "undesireable" techs.) I remember the patch moved that to 33%. I just have no huge desire to get to Chivalry, I'm not playing to conquer.

Vis a vis timescale balance - what you've described will affect all player-controlled civs more-or-less equally, I'd submit that the Songhai are grossly more sensitive to it (due to, again, constant spawn rate and increased encampment pillage.)

You know what, though? Long games are simply more fun. You get emotionally attached to your country, your units get personalities, you build up grudges against certain civs, and you get to use a tech for a while before it goes obsolete. To my way of thinking there's just no reason to play a shorter game than Marathon.

 

[RedRover57]

@Randall

I'm curious, what troops do you rush barb camps with to start? Two warriors, warrior/scout, warrior/archer? Or do you rush to horsemen first?

In my past games with civs that have strong early troops, like Hoplites, Jaguars or Immortals, I have used them to clear barb camps, but with Songhai I have been trying the "Chivalry rush" strategy that Martin posted about instead. I haven't tried rushing barb camps with warrior or spearman units with Askia but it sounds like I should give that a try (and also try larger than standard maps). I also haven't really tried Honor since the patch as the Tradition and Liberty trees are both so strong now, but it sounds like Askia may be the exception.

 

[Michl2602]

Especially when you go NC-first and Philosophy before Legalism, you kind of run out of SPs you want to take. You don't want legalism and also no free settler/worker for quite a long time. So you just have to take it in that opening at some place, if you don't have turned on "Save Policies" in Advanced Options. But I'm almost sure that saving the policies until Patronage would be actually stronger than taking Honor. But as I want to produce a game for the HOF, that's nogo.

 

[Randall Turner]

@Randall

I'm curious, what troops do you rush barb camps with to start? Two warriors, warrior/scout, warrior/archer? Or do you rush to horsemen first?

In my past games with civs that have strong early troops, like Hoplites, Jaguars or Immortals, I have used them to clear barb camps, but with Songhai I have been trying the "Chivalry rush" strategy that Martin posted about instead. I haven't tried rushing barb camps with warrior or spearman units with Askia but it sounds like I should give that a try (and also try larger than standard maps). I also haven't really tried Honor since the patch as the Tradition and Liberty trees are both so strong now, but it sounds like Askia may be the exception.

Warrior/scout, but if I'm lucky I'll get a goody-hutted scout->archer and he'll go solo. Archers when you get them. Soon as I get the wheel, mix in chariots, they're the best. But basically, anything, and I take chances on getting killed, too. (Except with that first warrior - with him, only attack from hill/forest tiles until the first Honor social policy, 'cause they counter-attack now .)

It sounds, though, like you were deferring barb-clearing until quite late. Make it your #1 priority. Don't worry about anything else. As soon as you destroy the first one, use the 225+your reserve to buy a scout. (You should have another scout in production as your first action.) You'll get something from the goody-huts - if it's military tech, buy that unit. If it's social points, go Honor. If it's money, blah. sucks.

The only other early-action I take is generally allying with the first maritime CS I bump into.

By the time you get to chivalry, you should be hunting encampments across your entire continent, and already racked up 20,000 gold from them. (yes, Virginia, 80 or so encampments - clear them out quick, get your troops back quick so they'll respawn, rinse and repeat.) Clearing one a turn is doing well. Multiple a turn is do-able. One every other turn will get you the 20K gold by Chiv in a Marathon game, more or less.

 

[Michl2602]

Oooops, that's industrial usage, what you suggest here. Will have to try this out another time, as I'm already at chivalry, but except 3 CS-allies (2 militaristic, 1 maritim) and a semisolid GPT I haven't much to show.

Did I mention that militaristic allies fit in very nicely?

 

[Randall Turner]

Oooops, that's industrial usage, what you suggest here. Will have to try this out another time, as I'm already at chivalry, but except 3 CS-allies (2 militaristic, 1 maritim) and a semisolid GPT I haven't much to show.

Did I mention that militaristic allies fit in very nicely?

I should have mentioned that. (The synergy of getting military city-state allies.)

Basically, what with clearing every encampment that pops up and having a bunch of disposable income early, you'll end up with a lot of city-state allies very early. Half the time you get city-state allies by "accident", ie, "help clear an encampment for us".

As it turns out, I ended up not even building military units except in the early stages of the game. I even tailored one city with the usual stuff (barracks, etc.) to build units, but I was getting so many from military city-states that I only ended up building one (1) single unit once past the early turns. (Plus you have to turn off unit spawning fairly early or you'll "accidentally" end up with a massive army, which may be what you want, but I didn't want as many units as I'd have ended up with.)

Aside - I built one single rifleman just because I'd gone to the trouble of constructing a barracks and an armory in one city. I realized later I should have saved the barracks/armory/rifleman production for something else. Like another wonder or something. <shrug>

Aside-aside - Though you'll want to purchase a few military units early, in general it's not a good idea to spend gold on units or buildings. Save it for what it's meant for - city-states, research agreements and unit upgrades. However, because you can reasonably depend on getting a lot of city-state allies, it sort encourages you to take a few of the patronage social policies. And of course once you have the "scholasticism" policy, those military CS allies will also be giving you a lot of research points.

This is actually a bit harder post-patch, because they buffed the "tradition" etc. policies so much it's tempting to take a few of those instead. Depends on play style. <shrug> But you'll have a number of "culture" cs allies with a compact empire, so that along with the mud pyramids means you'll be getting a lot of policies.

 

[JoeBas]

(Plus you have to turn off unit spawning fairly early or you'll "accidentally" end up with a massive army, which may be what you want, but I didn't want as many units as I'd have ended up with.)

I don't understand why people do this.

If nothing else, gift the newly spawned units you don't want to a friendly CS. It will make them super powerful and make them actually effective allies if an AI DOES declare on you, even if you're playing a peaceful game.

Personally, I like to gift my excess units to a CS Ally on the other continent in a continents game. Many's the time an AI on another continent declared on me out of AI Rage, only to find the 4 or 5 infantry-equipped CS Ally of mine over there go on a conquering spree of his empire for him...

 

[Randall Turner]

That's reasonable, but I was also at a stage where the other civs were doing the tug-of-war thing with city-state alliances. They'd flip-flop, and I'm not sure I like the idea of having to fight my own high-tech units.

To be fair, I only kept it (spawning) off for a few dozen turns. Finally got fed-up with Greece being a pogue, bought as many of their allies as I could afford and declared war.

but overall, yeah, you're probably right.

By the way, I've noticed that you get units a bit more often now, post-patch. Might be random chance making it look that way, but seems like I was getting more. <shrug>

Edit: why is it every time I sit down to post in this forum, my cat attacks my feet? Furry bastard.

 

[JoeBas]

That's reasonable, but I was also at a stage where the other civs were doing the tug-of-war thing with city-state alliances. They'd flip-flop, and I'm not sure I like the idea of having to fight my own high-tech units.

If that's the case, then make sure you ONLY gift them to CS allies well away from your home lands... no matter how strong and uppity you make them, CS units won't stray halfway across the board to come after you.