Space-1: War While Waiting

[TedJackson]

SP1-900AD

Pre=flight checks... OK
Babylon is up Astronomy - more enemies soon

Pre-turn
Upgrade 2 Horses for 160gp

Press button
Vet Legion kills attacking Knight & promotes 2/5
Same vet Legion kills attacking Horse
Vet Pike kills attacking MDI

1 - 910AD
Elite Knight kills Archer
Vet Knight kills Archer & promotes
Elite Knight kills Archer
Army/Knight pillages NE Bergen
Send re-inforcements to Jerusalem
Research 50% (Gunpowder at EOT)

IBT
Spanish Spear and Archer arrive near Palmyra
Bab Spear ESE Palmyra
Bab Pike arrives SW Byzantium
Discover Gunpowder - Chemistry (straight to Mil Trad)
Ravenna Knight - Knight
Brundisium Pike - Library
Hispalis Lib - Pike

2 - 920AD
Vet Knight kills Pike (SW Byzantium) & promotes
Vet Knight kills Archer (NW Centralia)
Vet Knight kills Spear (ESE Palmyra)
Hurry walls (Niagara Falls)
Hurry Walls (Jerusalem)
Army/Knight pillages E Bergen
Handyaugusta switches to Temple

IBT
Pike kills attacking Knight (Jerusalem)
MDI arrives N Jerusalem
Spear moves to SE Palmyra
Niagara Walls - Temple
Neapolis Knight - Knight
Viroconium Pike - Knight
Lugdunum Lib - Harbour
Jerusalem Walls - Temple

3 - 930AD
Cat (Jerusalem) bombards vet MDI for 1hp
Vet Knight kills 3/4 MDI
Cats (Palmyra) bombard Spear for 1hp
Vet Knight kills 2/3 Spear
Army/Knight SE, pillage

IBT
Pike forces retreat by attacking Knight
MDI arrive N Jerusalem
Spanish Spear arrives ESE Palmyra
Our GA ends
Pompeii Knight - Knight

4 - 940AD
Elite Knight kills Spear (ESE Palmyra)
Road links to Niagara completed
Vet Knight kills vet MDI (E Jerusalem) & promotes
Oh dear, I spot a Beserker with our pillaging Army
3/4 Knight kills Berserker
Send 4 Cats back toward Brundisium (for onward moves to Jerusalem)
Research 60% (Chemistry 11 turns @ -20gpt, 717gp in the bank)

IBT
Elite Knight (Jerusalem) kills attacking MDI
Vet Pike (Jerusalem) kills attacking MDI
Vet Berserker arrives N Jerusalem
Iroquois Archer arrives NW Brundisium

5 - 950AD
Cat bombards Berserker (Jerusalem) but misses
Elite Knight kills Berserker (N Jerusalem)
Vet Knight kills MDI (N Jerusalem)
Elite MDI kills 1/3 Archer (on plains, unfortified) but is red-lined
Pike moves to cover elite MDI
Workers road river tiles near Brundisium

The Big Picture

Notes
Now that Berserkers are on the board we need to be even more careful and locating & pillaging their Iron is our top priority.
I think all three Temples in our border towns should be rushed but I leave the final decision for the next player.
There are some Cats on their way to Jerusalem - I have left them in Brundisium, N Brundisium & Byzantium
I forgot about the two Pikes (NE & E of Hispalis) so they could move forward to our borders.
Centralia is still stuck at pop 1. There's a mixed stack in the forest to the North and a fortified Pike 1 N of the forest - I found him useful there but move him if you like.
Research is at 60% (Chemistry 10 turns @ -20gpt, 697 in the bank). This isn't good enough and the next players shoudn't neglect Libs & Universities in our core cities. Rome will finish the Pentagon in 3 turns and should probably start on a Uni straight after.

The save is > here <


Ted

 

[Greebley]

I guess that makes me up. I will definitely work on the Iron. I probably won't pillage much other than breaking roads connecting towns, but primarily look for that iron source. Unfortunately, the viking will probably start connecting the other iron up so we may have difficulties keeping the world berserker free.

I can work on libraries and Uni's, markets to whatever extent seems possible.

Madbax, a lot of Europeans are getting Conquests now. Is it delayed in your area? We won't start until after thanksgiving, so I think we could include you at the end of the order if you did want to play. Then your turn would be around the 5th (Though if you feel that another SG would be a too much in terms of time I can understand that too

Well I have time so I think I will see where I can get to. I will try to keep tabs on the "new mail" popup, so I might get your message in time if you want to post an opinion.

Ted, FYI there are some short introductory "tutorial" conquests that might be good if time is short. I finished the first one in about 2 1/2 hours.

 

[Northern Pike]

Good round, Ted.

I'm afraid this whole discussion of Berserkers and iron is wrongly premised. The only resource Berserkers require is aquavit. Our only recourse against them is to attack them before they attack us. Fortunately that's not hard, given the way the AI uses them.

The situation in Niagara Falls is dangerous. Edit: Well, not that dangerous. Greebley, I'd noticed our cultural superiority over the Iroquois, but I'd assumed that this factor and the unfavourable distance-from-capital situation would roughly cancel out. But now I see that the flip formula works more subtly than this.

 

[Greebley]

I disagree on the flip risk. Check out the culture graph. We are currently about 4-5x culture over iroquois. The number of units will bring the flip chance to 0 I think.

Note that niagra has a saltpeter near it which I will connect.

Final question: Knight army or sistine chapel? We could really use the happiness of sistine, but it would mean we need to build cathedrals.

[Edit]Well, I have been pondering the above question and have decided on the army. Cathedrals are just so expensive. Maybe we can get another leader for sistine, or even better, Bach.

 

[Northern Pike]

Is this a strictly theoretical Great Leader we're talking about, or have you already generated one? In any case, I'd build the knight army too. But leave the fourth slot in the army open after we get the Pentagon, so that we can add a cav to it later.

 

[Greebley]

The very first battle after bombardment generated a leader. It is now a knight army. I am playing as we speak.

I am still going after Viking iron to stop the knights, but thanks for the heads up on the Berserkers. It will help to know that they will still be a danger even if I find the iron.

 

[handy900]

Originally posted by Greebley
I disagree on the flip risk. Check out the culture graph. We are currently about 4-5x culture over iroquois. The number of units will bring the flip chance to 0 I think.

Note that niagra has a saltpeter near it which I will connect.

Final question: Knight army or sistine chapel? We could really use the happiness of sistine, but it would mean we need to build cathedrals.

[Edit]Well, I have been pondering the above question and have decided on the army. Cathedrals are just so expensive. Maybe we can get another leader for sistine, or even better, Bach.

I vote Knight ARMY. You can move and pillage on the same turn. We can do tremendous damage to the AI with a knight ARMY. If Handy was not so stupid , he would have built one on his last set of turns and we would be killing the AI production.

 

[mad-bax]

Handy: you played fine. I made exactly the same decision as you in another SG not a week ago. There are pros and cons to every decision.

I'm glad we have Salt. Now we can make cannon and Cavs soon.

I don't think we should neglect expansion into the jungle. It's the most likely source of coal.

I also agree on infrastructure. We must get to steam with the AI.

 

[Greebley]

Preturn: Hmm... I don;t think Ted noticed the Saltpeter outside Niagra? It is hard to spot being almost under the name and only one of two that we can see. I will borrow some of his hill roading beatniks and turn them into desert roading beatniks.

I do like the idea of sending the Spear army off to explore the south, so I am going to do so. It will pillage the Iroquois saltpeter on the the way there.

I also do a small amount of MM to eek out a few more food or shields out of a few towns.

Decide to rush Niagra falls temple. I think we will be able to steal furs from Iroquois by doing this and we would really like to keep the Saltpeter. The other two I will wait on.

I debate the concept of sending a boat out and meeting the other AI's first. We might get some good trades on the first turn by selling communications - assuming the AI has anything to trade. Well I will at least build the boat. Switch Viroconium to a galley.

Move some troops toward centralia (which does not have saltpeter oddly enough).

Decide we have enough elite units to leader fish with and upgrade an elite horse. also upgrade a spear.

IBT: A viking knight attacks and retreats near jerusalem.
a random Babylonian pikeman and spanish spearman show up near niagara falls.
Niagra Falls:Temple->Worker
Lutetia: Knight->Library (needs a market as well).

960 AD:
Some random bombardment including the babylonian pike.
Elite Legionary attacks pike and wins getting us a great leader. Well that is a good start I must say.
Debate the merits of Sistine vs Knight army. A really tough call.

Move (southern) army and knight - Iroquois have connected up the iron in their territory.

Decide to see if I can take centralia. Knights and such vs fortified spear in a size 2 town.
Longbow gets to go first (as the most expendable) and wins revealing an unfortified spear. Looks worth continuing.

Decide to use the leader for the army, simply due to the high cost of Cathedrals. I start filling it trying to use veterans and keep our elite knights.

Attack on Centralia continues
Elite Med Inf loses vs regular unfortified spear
Knight wins and Centralia is destroyed. Switch Pompeii to a settler so I have the choice of replacing the town if I want to.

I moved some units out of Niagra Falls(mostly to use them). It might now have a small flip risk, but won't lose a lot of troops if it does flip. An elite knight is parked right outside in case it does end up flipping.

IBT:
The legionaire that created the leader is attacked by a med inf and loses. It only occurred after my attack that I should have used a knight so I could get back into the city. I was hoping it might win (it had 4 hp vs 3 for the med inf), but it didn't.

Cumae: Library->Catapault
Pompeii: Settler->University
Viroconium: Galley->University

970 AD:
Bombard Allegheny and do 1 hp to a spear.
Attack Allegheny with first army and kill an elite spear. the 2 hp spear is now on top=Battle will continue
Elite knight vs injured spear moves to not attack across the river and wins. City is taken.
Allegheny is building a worker.

IBT: Knight was going to try to pillage Iroquois iron. I was hoping the fact it was on a hill would keep it alive, but it was killed by a babylon knight.

Hisapalis: Pikeman->harbor
Riot in Ravenna. Sorry about that
Bombard a knight outside of allegheny to 1 hp.
An elite knight with 4 hp attacks the 1 hp knight and loses. Arggh!
I use my army to take out the knight. The reason I used the slightly damaged knight in the first place was it was the only one that could attack and retreat. The knight had a berserker next to it. So the army finished it off. I don't think the berserk will attack it it has 12 hp or so.
Veteran knight vs horse wins

More cities are going to riot so I raise the Lux and lower scient. Chem in 10 again
Salt is hooked up and upgrades cost 1920! Will need to be selective in my updates.

IBT:
A few random troops are seen.
Niagra Falls: Worker->Catapult

990 AD:
Gah! I missed the Pentigon by 1 shield. I wish I noticed that last turn.
I upgrade some of the key pikemen on the edges of our empire.

IBT: Not much in the way of enemy troop movement

Rome: Pentagon->University
Neapolis: Knight->Knight
Byzantium: Knight->Market

1000 AD:
Niagra falls borders have expanded. This means the only thing causing flips is the 3 citizens, so hopefully 3 units will hopefully be sufficient.
Pillage the gunpowder in the Iroquois territory.
Movement of catapults and such toward the vikings.

My goal was to make a good front to the south so we can turn to the north. I really didn't see a whole lot of enemy troops. I was thinking if we take out the one Iroquois city of Grand River, we have a solid front to the south and can concentrate on the now isolated Vikings. We are ready for the major offensive against them I believe. I don't expect them to be in the game when I get it next.

Grand river also has another Luxury which we REALLY need.

My concentration at the end was not what it should be. I would give everything a once-over just in case. Especially check that I left 3 or 4 units in Niagra falls to give it a zero percent chance of flipping.

The vikings:

Our southern border with pithy notes:

The save

 

[handy900]

I see I am up . I'll grab it tonight when I get home and play.

 

[handy900]

Pre turn (still 1000 AD) my how the world has changed.

F1 40/10 Chemistry in 8; -1 GPT; 13 in the bank.
F2 1 saltpeter, Ctrl + shift + M reveals no other sources. I’ll try to build a fortress on the one we have. I don’t see any SP in the exposed Viking lands, and they have not yet researched guns. We were due some luck like this after having no iron.
F3 20 cats, I like it. We have a settler to use. We are strong verses our rivals. Excellent!
F4 Iroquois 32 gold; down Invention & Education, they have silks
Spain 1 gold; up astronomy no saltpeter hooked up yet. Dyes & Silks
Scandinavia 11 gold; down gunpowder J; wines
Babylon 152 gold; up astronomy; Wine & Dyes
When we rule this continent we will have gems, furs, wines, silks, dyes. Four is enough, 5 is most excellent.
F6 moderately advanced.
F7 Greeks have Leonardo’s bummer. Sun Tzu is better, and we do have that. 1 of those 2 is good enough.
I feel much better, the spear army I created is still alive & pillaging. J

Greebley, very nice job rushing the temple to steal furs!

Goals:
1. Take Grand River for the extra luxury.
2. Send an additional ARMY (Knight) south to pillage after it heals.
3. capture a Scandinavian city. I’ll probably raze it.
4. Found a city on the hill near Grand River.
5. Pillage all roads around the Iroquois capital to isolate them & break any trade deals with the other AI’s, then pillage to the south & uncover the darkness. Looks to be a lot of jungle. If we can pillage the roads thru the jungle it will take AI units a lot longer to reach us.

Turn 1 1010 AD
Cumae – cat – cat
Galley sinks.
Viroconium has 3 pikes. I “chain” 1 to Palmyra near the front.
Pillage
Handy Augusta under attack. Elite knight loses to regular knight unfortified I fortify on mountains to play defense.
Bomb & kill knight near Jerusalem

Turn 2 1020 AD
Ravenna – knight – knight
Allegheny – worker – worker

Bombard knights near handyaugusta. We have no units to kill them, but they will retreat. I need a knight in that city. I chained a pike to fortify on top of the Iron as that’s what they are after.
Bombard Copenhagen, waiting for more cats next turn before I attack.
Found Caesarea - walls
Capture Grand River - walls. Lose 1 legionary, 3 knights promote. The RNG is not being very nice tonight. This gives us silks, so the slider goes to 50/zero, but I have to hire a scientist in Ravenna. Switch Ravenna to settler due in 4 who should go to the former Viking capital after we raze it.
Pillage Viking horses.
Notice no walls in Allegheny, switch over due in 5.
Drop slider so I can rush walls in Grand River (silks).

Turn 3 1030 AD
Spanish spear lands at Grand River in jungle.
Bombard spear near Grand River, no damage, I’ll wait to attack.
Knights retreat from handyaugusta. Two possible reasons. I fortified a pike on the iron, or most likely, they want those silks back.
Antium – library - cat
Bomb Copenhagen take out 1 citizen & the barracks
Route cats to Grand River, that’s’ where all the Ai knights are headed I think. Rush walls in Grand River. We have 2 pikes, 1 legion & 3 knights in Grand River.
Cats are parked on the mountain fortress between handyaugusta (iron) and Niagara Falls (saltpeter). The cats are 2 tiles from each city, so they can move to & fire from either city on from this location. Same goes for the med infantry on the same hill.
Knight ARMY (healed) leaves Allegheny to begin the move to Grand River. From here they can scout & pillage down the east coast.
Next turn workers arrive @ the saltpeter to build a fortress.
Hurry walls in Allegheny

Turn 4 1040 AD
Babylon builds Sistine! so it’s on our continent. Thank you Babylon for both the Chapel and not wasting those shields on military.
Spear moves to our silks as another spear lands on jungle in Grand River. Cats do not arrive for 1 more turn in Grand River, so I can only bombard with 1 cat & will have to kill the spear before he pillages our silks. Silks are not in the jungle thankfully. Next player needs to build a fortress on top of the silks if you can. Silks & Saltpeter are where the AI is focusing their attack units. I think we’ll need some more cats here near the salt.
Kill spear on the silks.
Bombs take points off the pikes in Copenhagen, so I attack. We take Copenhagen & lose 1 knight in the process. I razed it & got 3 workers in the deal. I think we can capture all cities east of the ruins with little flip risk if you starve them. East Viking cities appear to have no culture and are size 6.
I’m starting to send the cats from Copenhagen back to the south. They are too slow to drag around and miss a lot when firing at cities. They work a lot better firing at exposed units.
We can take these Viking cities fast & effective with Knights I think.
Move cats off mountain to Niagara & bomb Spanish pike. Attack & kill pike. Move workers & a pike on top of saltpeter to build a fortress.
Southern pillaging Knight ARMY arrives in Grand River.

Turn 5 1050 AD
Brundisium - market – duct
Bomb & kill spear on silks near Grand River.
The 3 Babylonian AI knights that left Handyaugusta arrive at Niagara (saltpeter).
I bomb them & kill 2 of them (only had 2 knights to work with).
Moved all but 1 of the cats off the mountain towards the Niagara & the saltpeter. I sent one cat to the Iron. There is an AI spear near handyaugusta. I bombed & missed so try again next turn. He cannot do us any harm where he is.

Closing comments.
We are in good shape. Two armies moving south to pillage will grind down the AI production. Think of all the turns it took them to build that stuff.
1. I think we are building a little too much infrastructure. My AW rule of thumb is to average 2 to 3 cities at each core building infrastructure and the rest military. I did not change any of the builds, but I think when Palmyra, Syracuse, and Veii finish their builds we should build knights there. I’m open to a friendly discussion on this topic.
2. The saltpeter tile has 2 fortified Pikes and a fortress due in 1. We need a gun on that tile. I put slider @ 40% & we still get chemistry in 2. Buy a gun next turn and fortify on the saltpeter tile with at least 1 additional pike.
3. Next turn you can pillage the last road tile & cut the Iroquois capital off from the world. Then move the SPEAR army down the west side of the continent pillaging. Move the KNIGHT army that is S of Grand River down the east side pillaging.
4. The “Viking east coast invasion forces” is healing in Jerusalem.
5. Send the cats near Jerusalem down to the southern front between Niagara & handyaugusta on the mountain tile between the two. Looks like the Ai is primarily going for the saltpeter and silks.
5. Scan Rome’s eastern back door for galleys trying to sneak back there.
6. Ravenna settler can go to either the ruins on our SE coast near Lugdunum, or to the old Viking ruins near Jerusalem. We need another settler. You could switch & get one from Jerusalem in 7 turns.
7. If you get lucky, build another ARMY. Send it south to pillage.
Pass by the Iroquois saltpeter to prevent them from hooking it back up. You could park on the Iroquois salt if you choose to.
8. have fun pillaging!!

Rome 1050 AD save

 

[Greebley]

It sounds like you got a LOT more AI attacks than I was getting. It sounds like what I left on the front line was barely adequate for the job. I should have left more units on the lines, especially catapults. I will remember for next time.

I agree that a lot of towns were working on infrastructure. Unfortunately, universities take a long time to research and we need them more now than later to get to Cavalry. My thought is that slowing military production for a while would simply slow our conquests by a bit. By all means we should go back to military as the universities are built.

It looks like our pillaging is keeping the vikings under size 7. Very nice. Their production seemd way down too. Hopefully we can clear out that whole back area before too long.

I don't think we need to worry much about flips of Iroquois and Viking cities. We totally dominate them in culture - something like 6x their culture. The babylons will be a different story though. I would keep most viking and Iroquois cities and maybe starve to size 2 or 3.

If we meet someone new we REALLY want world maps. I think that should be our top item in terms of trade. I sudder to think of needing to track down small islands in the ocean to kill a civ.

 

[a space oddity]

Good (and fast ) work guys.

NP: you're UP.

 

[handy900]

Originally posted by Greebley
It sounds like you got a LOT more AI attacks than I was getting. It sounds like what I left on the front line was barely adequate for the job. I should have left more units on the lines, especially catapults.

Not at all. The front was very well defended & attacks were stacks of three kinghts at the most. We were never even close to losing a city. We got a raw deal from the RNG twice. I could have used a couple of knights to attack after bombarding, but that's it. We needed those knights elsewhere to attack the vikings. You left me in excellent position. I did send the cats back to the defensive front. They are better at defense than offense, and slow the knights down too much.

I agree that a lot of towns were working on infrastructure. Unfortunately, universities take a long time to research and we need them more now than later to get to Cavalry. My thought is that slowing military production for a while would simply slow our conquests by a bit. By all means we should go back to military as the universities are built.

There is not a clear cut right or wrong here. More infrastructure is a good thing, but it does slows down our capture of the AI. You do not want to go too far in either extreme. Two or three core cities building infrastructure has worked well for me in the past, but that's not to say it's the only or best way. Just something for us to be aware of. Keep a balance in our builds.

It looks like our pillaging is keeping the vikings under size 7. Very nice. Their production seemd way down too. Hopefully we can clear out that whole back area before too long.

This is where Sun Tzu is so awesome. Our knights heal that much faster for the next attack. I just love wonders that put a building in each city.

I don't think we need to worry much about flips of Iroquois and Viking cities. We totally dominate them in culture - something like 6x their culture. The babylons will be a different story though. I would keep most viking and Iroquois cities and maybe starve to size 2 or 3..

I thought about not razing Copenhagen, but decided I'd be really mad if we took it & then had to take it again. It was close to the viking capital. Don't think we need to raze anymore.

If we meet someone new we REALLY want world maps. I think that should be our top item in terms of trade. I sudder to think of needing to track down small islands in the ocean to kill a civ.

I agree, but don't worry about the islands. We can win via domination without ever taking an island if we need to. I usually win AW via domination. We'll see which is easier, conquest or domination when we get maps.

Vikings Upon reflection, I think we may not want to conquer the viking east coast next. Are there any luxuries we can go after first up there? The vikes ability to make war has been severly compromised, so we can likely take & hold any city we choose. We need luxuries more than totally corrupt cities . If we do go after the viking east coast cities, and they are totally corrupt, build workers in them. Rails are not too far off and those workers com in very handy.

Our pillaging is going to ruin the AI's to the south. Wehile we are improving tiles, we are also destroying tiles. The balance of power is going to swing in our direction dramatically on this continent.

 

[a space oddity]

Originally posted by handy900


I agree, but don't worry about the islands. We can win via domination without ever taking an island if we need to. I usually win AW via domination. We'll see which is easier, conquest or domination when we get a map.

Well, like my great example mad-bax, I try to make game interesting in the beginning but also later in the game. One of the reasons I took a continents map is to encounter a strong competition later. So I'll keep the freedom to have our goal be conquest, if domination is too easy to achieve.

By your leave, as always of course.

 

[handy900]

Originally posted by a space oddity


Well, like my great example mad-bax, I try to make game interesting in the beginning but also later in the game. One of the reasons I took a continents map is to encounter a strong competition later. So I'll keep the freedom to have our goal be conquest, if domination is too easy to achieve.

By your leave, as always of course.

Of course! It's your call. You are Caesar!

Continents IMHO, actually make the AW game a little easier. Imagine 8 civs coming at you on a Pangaea! Let's do that one next.

 

[Greebley]

While we can't tell it now with all the pillaging, the vikings had 3 luxuries to trade us when we had just the one. So they have 1 or 2 more (we already took their furs) they have 2 more if they.

In other words if we own the viking lands we should be up to at least 4 luxuries.

If they didn't have the silks we got from the Iroquois, it would put us to 5 luxuries.

I don't know where the luxes are located; just that they had them in the past. It was why I was in favor of going for them first.

 

[TedJackson]

I agree,

Luxuries should be our preferred targets in the Viking lands. IIRC they had 3 luxes: furs, Silks & something else


Ted

 

[mad-bax]

They had furs, silks and wines.
The wines can be had quite quickly as they are around the captal, but the silks are right over on their western Seaboard. We don't need to be too concened about getting new luxes right away. We have time IMO. We have 3 garrison units and temples in most places. I would take the viking wines and then eliminate the iroquois.

 

[Greebley]

So all we are missing are the wines.

I guess I am still in favor of going after them completely. I like the idea of grabbing all that northern land for our own use.

We could even move the palace to a central location up there. It would hurt a bit initially, but give us a very strong base by the time we were looking toward the other continent.