Sons of Monarchy VI: Julius Caesar

[WelshGandalf]

Guys... if you post a report, please state the difficulty.... makes it really hard to compare otherwise.

Question for everyone..I haven't played the Romans much. How do Praets do against Axes? Base 8 str vs 7.5 with the 50% melee bonus. If (when) I attack a city there also the 20/45% City Raider bonus against 25% fortification bonus plus any culture defence bonus, Head's full of hayfever, can't figure it out?

It's a toughish fight... I usually send in a CR1 in that scenario who has a chance to win, just not a huge one (35%?). Once any shock axes are out of the way, send in the CR2 guys. Of course, if you have siege, it becomes a lot easier...

Becuase Praets were so strong, in this game, I decided to settle my first GG to get CRII praets out straight away and my second GG as a super medic.But afterwards, I got another 4 GG's and I had no idea what to do with them I didn't have two stacks in my game so felt another super medic wouldn't be very useful. So I settled them all in my HE city which I felt was also a waste although if the game went to WP, that would've been a beast city.

I settled them in a few different cities, so lots of cities could give CR2 troops straight away. I also used one to lead some troops, in doing so he upgraded a few CR2 praets to CR3 which was very nice, and now I have a CR3 combat 1 double experience praetorian to lead the troops into battle

To 1100AD ish... emperor, 2nd play after RNG screwage first time.

Spoiler :

The English have 1 city left, after my second war with them. It should be gone in a turn or two. I took Rameses's insane wonderspammed capital (7 of the 11 wonders were there!) then took peace, but he's at war with me again now. I'm at war with Cyrus too as I have been for most of the game (Ram/Viccy keep bribing him in). Wars everywhere! I am being friendly with Saladin and Ragnar, as they are a long way away and I share religion. Economy is somehow bouncing and waddling its way towards liberalism... I bulbed philo and am just finishing paper. Ragnar's small but efficient economy is the main threat to lib.

Only just realised the map type. I thought my land % was kinda low.... hah.

 

[Teoes]

Monarch/Marathon/huts&events off, 940AD Conquest. No screens though, I'm too lazy.

Rough outline:

Spoiler :

Settled the gold/pigs/FP site first to deny Viccy, then the Northern FP/heffalump spot, then the corn/pigs/iron. After that I filled in a city between Rome and the FPs to share the corn/horses and work hills; lastly the pigs/corn/horses site further West.

Tech went Agri->AH->BW->IW->Currency->Construction->click on Steel->win. I only changed up the automatic order to get Feudalism earlier so I could start scooping up vassals.

As soon as IW was in I was building Praets non-stop in the production cities and Rome and building wealth everywhere else; once bare minimum (plus some Libraries) infrastructure was in place.

There were a couple of phoney wars for diplo points (which was mostly terribad as I was in a mostly Hindu and a bit Jewish world, but stubbornly remained in Buddhism after getting the holy city in London - which I never managed to shrine!) but here's the main stuff:

• DoW Viccy 830BC.
• Took 3 best cities, razed 2 or 3, sued for peace and techs in 730BC when she was down to her last city. Re-declared in 620BC, wiped her out in 610BC.
• DoW Ram 230BC; captured and kept his core, netting Mids, GW & SH in Thebes.
• 140BC sue for peace and techs; re-declare 20AD; peace again 100AD.
• Tech Feudalism around 150AD; re-declare on Ram 210AD, cap him 290AD.
• DoW Toku 470AD, cap him 510AD, gift his cities back.
• DoW Saladin 555AD, cap him 590AD, gift his cities back.
• DoW Rag 680AD, cap him 720AD, gift his cities back.
• DoW Cyrus 895AD after a brief GA to boost cannon production, raze everything I find, cap him 935AD.

Cyrus found the new world but no-one settled there and no-one reached Lib.

Yeah, that was great fun. Showed me a few things too. Namely I've been playing public games here for a while and followed many a thread and keep seeing the advice to not be lured by wonders - but they're sooo shiny! This was the first game I didn't build a single one. All I ended up with was Mids/GW/SH on taking Thebes.

Also due to over-expansion and unit spamming my economy was in the toilet; generally no more 10/20% breakeven and during one of the wars I was losing gold at 0%, so that was interesting - staying afloat and out of strike on conquest gold.

Thanks for the map Wolfman.

 

[Choggy]

825BC-1100AD Monarch/Normal

Spoiler :

Halfway there... Vicky dead, Cyrus vassalled in 860AD, Toku vassalled this turn.

This isn’t a world you would want to live in...

Ragnar (isolationist Buddhist) is boxed in by the increasingly large Saladin empire (hindu). They’ve already had one war, Ragnar is WHOORN with him again but I don’t think he’ll have enough troops to DoW him unless he gets desperate. Toku (hindu) was in a long war with the Ram (jewish) who was briefly joined by Cyrus (also jewish) who I had boxed in with Vicky’s captured cities before I sneak-attacked and vassalled him.

Attacked Toku as quickly as I could get my Preats down from Cyrus – he had feudalism and Machinery and was only a few turns from Civ Service and those dreaded Samurai so had no time to get any Cats to him. It was a bloodbath against his PRO-longbows...took two cities including his cap but out of 42 Preats I now only have 16. He offered capitulation on the turn I captured Kyoto, which is just as well as I was in no fit state to defend it, never mind attack anywhere else.

Vicky went on a mad REXing spree from 5-11 cities by the time I finally got enough Praets to DoW her in 100AD. Would have been more but I intercepted two of her settlers. Killing her was a slog...in addition to the Iron in London she also settled on some copper to the North so had to attack her in two places. Finally killed her in 625AD – Cyrus was easy though as he didn’t have access to copper or iron.

No religion yet, no open borders apart from my vassals. Diplo is easy – there isn’t any! Built Mom and am in my first GA on the run to Lib. Tech rate is terrible for everybody. Going to DoW Ramasses as soon as I can, got a load of belated Cats and Elephants on the way and will need to rebuild my Praet army again. Then it’ll be Saladin and finally Ragnar.
It’s total war and I’m loving it! Definitely not for the faint-hearted...

Couple of things I've learnt about the Romans...probably better to play them on Epic than Normal as slow Praet movements are allowing the AI to beef up their defensive techs. And they don't do well against PRO-longbows without some help

 

[Jex]

Gave this a go on Immortal/Normal. Was doing well until just recently.

Spoiler :

Expanded to six cities, built up a force of praetorians, and attacked Cyrus. Stalled at his capital, but took peace in exchange for calender + monotheism. Redeclared 10 turns later, took his capital, bringing him down to 2 cities. Then next turn Victoria, who has almost double my power, declares on me.

Turns out Cyrus peace vassaled to her. Ugh. Victoria just got out of a war with the Vikings, so she probably has a sizable stack somewhere. Worse, she has maces. Unless I can get her to sign peace, I'm probably going to lose this one. Times like this make me really hate the freaking peace vassal mechanic.

 

[Giant Wolfman]

@Jex

Spoiler :

What was your diplo standing with Vicky before she accepted Cyrus's peace vassal? The AI taking peace vassals and subsequently declaring on another civ who they may have been on good terms with is just one of the reasons why vassal states can be such a joke. If she was friendly with Cyrus and furious/angry with you, the PAssal (as TMIT is so inclined to call it) kind of makes sense--she is just defending her ally against an enemy. Other than that though, it's a garbage mechanic that makes you cross your fingers and hope for the best, or resort to things like begging for gold to ensure a peace treaty.

 

[Jex]

@Giant Wolfman:

Spoiler :

Yeah, she was actually at annoyed at the time of attacking. That still doesn't make it less of a garbage mechanic though. Are you winning a war? Taking cities? Congratulations, you're now at war with the most powerful civ, regardless of whether they were planning to attack you. (I think they can't even take a vassal if they have enough on their hands, even if their target is you!) It just reeks of bad design - it actively punishes the player for doing well, and will often happen unless you do stuff like beg a gold for peace treaty. Granted, I probably could have done a faster praet rush, but this is immortal. The AIs research Feudalism pretty fast.

 

[Choggy]

1595AD Monarch/Normal. Conquest Victory. Earliest ever victory, wohoo!

Spoiler :

DoW'd Ramesses in 1300AD, he kindly spent his time building Wonders for me rather than trying to defend his borders. With Toku smashing him from the North and me launching lightning raids from the East, he capitulated as soon as I took his goody-bag capital and a couple of crap cities.

Finally crawled my way to Lib in 1340AD. Ridiculously late for Monarch, by this time I was running lots of specialists so took Nationalism, built the Taj and ran an extended Golden Age that in the end lasted until the end of the game.

In the end, Ragnar did Dow Saladin. It didn't go well for him - Saladin vassalled him quite quickly. The last World War commenced in 1440AD. Me and my vassals against Saladin and his. Had to raze a load of his cities to get Ragnar free from his vassalege. The moment that happened of course, Saladin capitulated. Next turn I attacked Ragnar. Game over in three turns.

Victory screenshot below.

http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/6707/civ4screenshot0050k.jpg

Wow! First time playing as the Romans, I get why people rate Praets, they completely OP early on and later in the game are really cheap. I also freely admit that the turgid tech rate in this game increased their longevity but even so, they are pretty awesome.

Made one big mistake - I thought that Maces obsoleted Praets so didn't tech Machinery until way after Lib, which meant no Engineering, no Trebs and was only able to move units two tiles as a time

@Giant Wolfman. Thanks for a great map. I learned so, so much from this game about managing powerful vassals and I'd forgotten how much fun medieval warfare can be. Cheers!

 

[WelshGandalf]

Finished my Emperor game with a 1560AD conquest victory, scoring 174,646 points.

First game went awful in large part due to RNG, but the second game went a lot better, the big change I made was

Spoiler :

teching to almost-completing construction too; I declared before I had cats but by the time I got to difficult cities, I had catapults ready, made a BIG difference.

Report following on from my previous reports...

Spoiler :

Taking the Egyptian capital, featuring among others the Pyramids, MoM and Parthenon, really kicked my game on (I built the national epic there too). Before long it had produced a great artist, which I used for a 12-turn golden age. Rep/caste/pacifism were used during the GA to generate 2 great scientists and another not long after the GA finished. These were used to part-bulb Education, Printing Press and Chemistry. This, along with a 2nd golden age thanks to 2 more great people, sent me flying through the tech tree and I libbed steel in 1300AD.

I fought two wars for the longest time, with the Egyptians and the Persians. Eventually the Egyptians capitulated (1190AD), but I had to sacrifice a few high-level units to grab the city that I correctly thought would bring on the capitulation. Most of my troops were moving north to fight the Persians, and when they got there they wreaked havoc, it was very nice after the constant irritating attacks the Persians had launched throughout the game (they never managed to take a city but my northern stacks got whittled down again and again). The Persians capitulated in 1350AD.

The Japanese capitulated to Saladin and Ragnar peace-vassaled, so it was the three of them against the three of us. I had 20 or so cities at this point so I was confident of victory. In my 2nd GA I chose civics of police state/vassalage/slavery/despotism/theocracy, ultimate war civics. Loads of cannons came out as well as swarms of praetorians and a random assortment of other troops. I prepared 4 stacks and declared war in 1420AD. 4 Japanese cities were close to my (or my vassals') borders so they fell quickly, and the Japanese civilization was destroyed in 1480AD. Disappointingly the Arabians didn't put up great resistance, with only 1 defensive stack and 1 offensives stack detected, about 15 units each. They all died, the Arabians capitulated after I took about half their cities, then I just threw everything at the Vikings (who ended the game the most technologically advanced!) who gave up after I took 2 cities. The end. I'm glad I moved as fast as I did as the Arabians were only 4 or 5 turns from rifling so things would've been a bit messier, though I did get rifling myself in 1515 AD.

End game military stats...

Spoiler :

I was obsessed with reaching 100 preats

 

[troglodyt]

16something, emperor, diplomatic (by accident). Beelined straight to ironworking to see where the good stuff is. Building order a little bit strange: WB, WB, WB, Worker, Worker, Settler.
Then praets and praets and praets. So OP it isn't even fun anymore. I basically destroyed the first two civilizations without losing one dude. Nearly screwed up everything with overexpansion and the fact that you have to wait ages on emperor for someone to get alpha (nevermind the fact that this human is to stupid to actually get it from the AI). After that chainvassaling.
By always voting for myself I managed AP victory without realizing it. Next turn I would have tackled the last civ anyway.
I think I'll play immortal from now on. If emperor is that forgiving regarding my mistakes and strategy lacking gameplay...

 

[dmd175]

First game with Julius Caeser. Have to say I loved Praets.

Spoiler :

Beelined IW and rolled over Victoria and then Cyrus by turn ~100 and ~120. Ramesses however vassaled Vicki with one city left, and then vassalled Cyrus...

Japan attacked me so took a city from them and razed another. Then Cyrus escaped the protection of Ramesses, so I promptly attacked him and finished him. He had some city sites that became great 21-25+ pop cities.

After that Japan was fighting Ram/Vicki + me and they vassaled to Ramesses. Fast forward a few decades and Ragnar attacks me, everyone gets in on it, and then Ragnar vassaled to Ramesses after I took one city and Egypt took NONE of the Viking cities.

I was pretty steamed about this, so I beelined toward astronomy and planned to conquer the entire new world. Got liberalism in 1290 and took astronomy. I successfully conquered the entire new world.

Spoiler :

With Ramesses' bloc he was teching well and he built 11 wonders in Thebes (but all older than Spiral Minaret/Notre Dame). I didn't have a tech lead and couldn't easily take on all four of them so I headed for industrial revolution and with railroads (made easier to exploit this as a comparative advantage because I had controlled every coal source in the new world), factories, corporations (had Sid Mining Creative Aluminum), and Three Gorges then I was cranking out tanks for a final showdown. The clock was ticking b/c Egypt was far far ahead of me in culture and I didn't want them to win that way. In the meantime I made sure I got every religion into my top three cities and built the cathedrals in each of these, so that I had 1001 culture/turn in one of the cities (with 0% culture slider). The corporations also helped with the culture.

Saladin and I remained friends (same religion) and he helped me get the diplomatic victory on the first vote.

Spoiler :

For a future game, I could have
-used Praets better/more durably for a longer period, but this was limited by a huge Ramesses block and not many opponents
-Saved money on the 300 gpt in colony expenses. I know I could have made these into colonies and kept my gold higher, but actually didn't need to, as I lead in tech from just before liberalism to the very end. I wanted to control all the resources and try to deny everyone else aluminum, coal, oil, etc.