*SPOILER3* Gotm16-Rome - Radio

[cracker]

This is the Industrial Age spoiler discussion thread for Gotm16-Rome.

Again take a few moments to read this introduction carefully to make certain you DO NOT run afoul of the new spoiler rules.

This is the third spoiler thread to support discussion of Gotm16-Rome. We are experimenting with the addition of this spoiler break to facilitate discussion of Industrial Age Warfare, Technologies, and Wonder progression. If possible, you should have already summarized your game progress and included that information in a short reports in the Early and Mid Game Discussion threads for this game.

Every player must pass ONE of two tests in order to be able to view or participate this spoiler thread. These two tests define a dividing line where knowledge and events prior to the line may be discussed but knowledge that you may have from later in the game may not be included.

For Gotm16-Rome:

• your Roman civilization must have discovered the technology of Radio. OR
• you must have ended your game in a Victory or defeat before the discovery of Radio and submitted your game for analysis.

Essentially this thread is intended to be a discussion of the Industrial ages and nothing beyond that point in time. If the AI civilizations are more advanced than your Roman civilization, those features may be freely discussed but this should not be an invitation to proceed with discussion of the Modern Age Technologies or Strategic Resources.

Special Topics:
We are particularly interested in how you have been dealing with the evolved industrialized vestiges of the Visigoth empire that existed to your North in the form of Germany. What if ancient Rome had dealt with their Visigoth's differently and managed to survive to a time period when the Visigoths developed tanks and artillery?

Also, how did you deal with the civilizations on the second major continent and what did the minimap of that continent look like when you first began to make your physical presence known (if you decided to do so)? Who where the Powerful civs on the second continent and can you assess how these things came to be?

How did you gain access to the continent and how did your trades of resources, luxuries, and technologies influence the progress of your game?

Remember that you may freely discuss the added barbarian features but be sensitive to NOT REVEALING the question or the answer that is related to the special puzzler question for this game. If you think you know the puzzler, then email cracker at gotm@civfanatics.net with the question, plus the answer as well as the year/date in your game when you figured out the puzzler.

Have fun!! That's what this game is all about.

 

[Bolan Longpants]

The industrial age in my game was pretty boring because I played a builder type of game. However in the beginning of the industrial age I was having a quick war against the Americans to grab some more land and cities. They were left with three cities until the end of the game. England was bullied on the other continent by most of the other civs and because of two MPPs I was at war with Elizabeth too. They were no thread to me.

After building Copernicus and Newton I got a tech lead and never gave it away. The Romans were the first to enter the industrial age and managed to build all industrial wonders. I focused on science and did 1 tech/4 turns and made other civs happy with decent trading. I changed my plan to go for a SS victory and decided to try a diplomatic victory. At the end of the industrial age I was bribing all the AI civs for their vote. It's probably just outside the scope of this spoiler thread but I build the UN 1 turn after I built the UN by prebuilding a palace and aqcuired a diplomatic victory.

On the other continent the Indians were by far the smartest and the strongest. They were the one against me during the UN vote and responsible for wiping out the Aztecs.

It was refreshing to play a builder type of game after the massacre in GOTM15.

Edit: here's the map at the end of my game;

 

[Bolka]

I started the industrial age sharing my continent 50/50 with the germans. They had a huge army, and were well into the industrial age already. I built my cities up a lot, since I was late on that side too, built an army, and launched a major attack on the germans, who just got their panzers when I got the tanks.
At the same time on the other continent Russia and France were starting to conquer, wiping the greeks who were once second on the score. Russia and France are leading the tech race. Indians and babylonians still exist, and the english are slowing leaving. There never was a leader on their continent before now, I usually tried to keep them even, so that no super power would emerge there out of my control.
Only in 1700 I started colonizing the barb island. I had to slaughter about 200 units to do so, but that wasn't too difficult. I totaly forgot about the puzzle though.

So I think there still is chance I can win this game, but I must deal with the tech leaders at some point. I am making plans to be ready to take their capitals in case they start a space race.

 

[RufRydyr]

Glad to see this thread. I think it fills the gap nicely that was missing in the last GOTM.

This game has been a struggle for me and it continued in the Industrial Ages. I was very concerned the AI was going to beat me out of this age in the tech war and build UN 1st. Since everyone was furious with me that would not be good. I beat up on them and got techs for lots of gold per turn and then redeclared war.

Moving my capital with Leaders to the middle of newly conquered territory at the beginning of wars worked really well to keep the first city from culture flipping.

Build some arty to go with my cav, but it was slow going battling against riflemen and then infantry.

I've had very low culture. Finally started building libraries to speed up tech research, but it's still been slow.

Just kept slogging it out during this period.

Left some units fortified on hills on the 'center divide' and let the barbs commit suicide against them. Then built some cities to grab luxuries. Wasn't happy to see the line of mountains stretching from N to S that meant I had to send a ship all the way around the world if I wanted to move some units E of the start position over the mountains. Wound up sending my main invasion force W from the old Japanese territory.

Speaking of the Japanese, I waited a little too long to battle them and they got samuri. Also, I forgot several times that they have 2 movement. It's very important to realize which UU each civ has and to time the conquests before they get them (or if they get a strong unit very early to wait until the technology has left them in the dust). The Americans and Germans were a little easier to kill since their UUs come so late.

Late in the Industrial Age I got a Leader and saved it to build the UN. The Babs (I think) got to the Modern Age way before me and I was sweating it out hoping I could get fission 1st. I couldn't believe it when they kept researching everything but fission. I couldn't buy radio for anything and just kept building libraries and praying.

The downside to moving my capital several times was the loss of production and science, because I used the arty so much.

This game has certainly been more of a challenge for me than the last GOTM and it looks like my score will be lower even with the higher multiplier because it's a higher level.

 

[flexo]

I had a firm grasp on the world. I had managed to trick the world into a war with the English and while they where going at it I took the tech lead and didn't look back. Having a crappy reputation in the world cause of what I had done centuries ago to the japs I decided I had to build the UN to prevent a Diplomatic loss. No problem in getting it. One serious misstake was that while I was ahead I had sort of forgot that germany gets it special unit late with the panzer, so they had been surpassing my mighty army with the construction of many panzers.

<snip>

 

[el_kalkylus]

Here is when everything changed for me:



Gonzomonium had just finished the forbidden palace, so things finally started to look good. Along with the forbidden palace, my second great leader appeared in the war against the americans. This leader built an army of 3 veteran cavalries and was just about to head for Washington which had sulfur! This turned out to be the only source of sulfur that the germans had, so I had to take Washington before they built alot of cavalries against me. One army, 25 cavalries and 3 knights would make their way to Washinton and make sure no german unit passed the Roman border.

When the time was right, I declared war and took Washinton quickly. There, my cavalries and army healed and kept attacking every riflemen that passed (hit and run). After that, I could destroy the surrounding german cities quite easily, but I couldn't make an assault further into german territory, so I waited. I never made peace with the germans again in hope for more great leaders. It was a good thing I was in Monarchy all along.

The greeks were controlling the science. I was not far behind, but I had to research all by myself. Noone wanted to trade their techs to me unless I had a new tech myself. Finally, I researched Nationalism. The civs that didn't have this tech gave me alot of gold per turn for it, so I could research at 70-100% for a long time. This helped me get the lead in science which made the so greeks angry that they declared war.

Alot of things happened after this. I got at least 4 great leaders which hurried 2 battleships, a wonder and built another army. I got into wars with all civilizations from time to time. The germans still had great culture, so it was hard to move into their territory (their people were dismissive to our culture). Finally, I could build tanks, and the germans could not, not even infantry. It didn't take much effort to destroy them with tanks.

At this time, I invaded the other continent, I could afford it. I took one of the iroqious coastal city (I don't remember the date) and kept bringing more tanks into this city every turn.

The pollution was bad, but I had great production.

End of Industrial age.

 

[Yndy]

I can barely qualify to read this thread as I have no science from the modern ages. Here’s an update on my barb conquest. Casualties so far: 7 legions, 1 spear, 1 pike, 1 musket, 2 riflemen, 1 cavalry, 1 infantry! [Edit: 1 Tank] I felt the need to send in the armored troops. Two tanks and a cavalry that had nothing to do were sent. Currently they rest on a mountain at 40% strength (at least they are not redlined). I never thought I would see something like that. Probably I will be able to see that Tank die vs. Spearman (actually Impi) thing. [Edit: OK I conquered the Barb Ridge and one tank died from successive Impi and Horses attacks].

The game was pretty lame, I researched Steam power myself but I did not want to build hundreds of workers so the result is even now I don’t have my country railroaded. The AI researched Industrialization pretty fast and I bought it and waited for good trading opportunities while I did my 40 turns to Nationalism. The most amazing thing happened. The AI researched Communism, Espionage, The Corporation, Steel and Refining before Electricity or Medicine. Finally, I built ToE, took the usual Atomic Theory and Electronics, while the AI stopped for Rep parts and then headed for Flight!?! I decided to build the tank science and to attack Germany before Pz.

The World situation was pretty balanced and I tried to keep it that way. Greece, India, Russia, France, Iroquois and Azteca had about the same size with up to 10 cities and are arranged by the tech development. Babylon was small from the beginning and took some beatings which left them with 5 cities. I attacked England at the beginning of the industrial age to kick them out of my continent. England was later attacked by a coalition of countries and managed to keep only 5 cities.

I was pretty bored at that time and decided to wipe them out to secure a stronger presence on the second continent (my presence consisted of a city built by Japan and surrendered during peace negotiations). I sent my 15 cavs by air to the Yokohama and declared war to England. Got London and a neighboring city and was heading towards the final three cities. At that point I discovered tanks and sold them to Greece and India. India sneak-attacked me the next turn depriving me for more than 3000 gold. London was razed with its Great Lighthouse, York was captured, half my cavs were destroyed. I took another English town and made peace with England and took half the world on my side against India. My purpose was not to have the others wipe India but to have them locked in a state of war. Which actually happened. I built tanks and attacked Germany who managed to get Panzers but too late. It was over for them in about 10 turns. I got only ONE LEADER while I conquered them and used him to jump my palace SE of Berlin. After finishing the Germans I sent some tanks to finish the English and get some Aztec towns, which were in my way. I now control most of the ancient England. World peace is near as wars between the AI are almost over. Greece, India and Russia have the Free Rocketry and might have some other sciences after that.

 

[Ribannah]

Originally posted by cracker
We are particularly interested in how you have been dealing with the evolved industrialized vestiges of the Visigoth empire that existed to your North in the form of Germany. What if ancient Rome had dealt with their Visigoth's differently and managed to survive to a time period when the Visigoths developed tanks and artillery?

Hahahaha, Germany did NOTHING in my game so far. They built their cheap Libraries and then set their research rate at 0%, like they always do. They have been second in score since the beginning but have not researched ANYTHING during the entire game, hardly improved any tiles (they were by far the latest to establish a trade connection, I wager America took pity and hooked them up), never showed a military unit. All they are good for is paying some gpt for MY tech (I finally gave up on pampering them).
The others at least came up with Economics and Communism, so I could built Smith's and police stations. But like in the Middle Ages I had to do all the main-path research on my own.
Even Sanitation is still lacking, as is Printing Press still from the MA. I gifted the AI's all my remaining surplus luxuries, but no good. They just sit there waiting for the inevitable.

The inevitable came for Japan in 540 AD when their gpt deal ran out and I finally took their last two cities. The barb-nursed Elites gave me my first Great Leader, who built the Hoover Dam in 590 BC. This was of course right after I got Atomic Theory and Electronics from the ToE.

In 600 AD I decided to gobble up America (they were absolutely useless, not even a gpt deal was ever possible), Cavalry/Infantry versus Spearmen/Warriors and only the occasional Musktetman/Cavalry, a job which was completed in 740 AD. Sadly, despite many dozens of elite victories, no second GL appeared. Now we are amassing our elites at the border with Germany, waiting for their gpt deal to run out. All the other AI's are easily kept polite with the occasional gift.

In 750 AD we discovered Radio, there are 3 techs to go before we enter Modern Times.

Nobody else tried to settle on Barb Ridge in my game. There are still a few Barbarians in the far north that can make my remaining draftees elite. Btw, I'm having trouble to deal with a bug that prevents me from drafting more than one unit/empire a turn. Frequent closing and reopening windows appears to be the only remedy.

 

[PattonTwo]

For PattonTwo's Rome, Steam Engine came at about 1280ad, right in the middle of my final continental war. Japan and America were dead (Germany killed off America long ago), and I was rolling over Germany.

1305ad. Cologne deposes my civ and flips back to Germany. Fine. They can die immediately. I retake it (since I now keep all units outside the German cities.) I also take Frankfurt which is sitting behind my main lines. Germany is down to 7 cities, all size 3 or lower except the current capital Leipzig.
1320ad. I can now build Wall Street. I take the chance that no one else is waiting to rush Sufferage and build it.
1325ad. Leipzig falls. No new GLs.
1330ad. I finally begin the revolution heading towards Democracy. At this point I was collecting just over 800 gpt without any research. My strategy for the balance of the game will be cash only, unless I’m right up on a tech I don’t expect anyone to sell me. Even paying $5000 for a tech, if I can resell it for $200+ gpt it makes sense for me. Why the AI will demand so much from me, but give so little for equivalent techs I can’t understand. But that’s true of luxuries as well as techs…
1345ad. Konigsberg falls. I get my GL out of it!
1355ad. Heidleburg flips back to Germany. Again, not a problem because I now station my troops immediately outside the city.
1360ad. Rome builds Universal Suffrage. Back to my GL factory (otherwise known as Germany). Nuremburg falls and Germany is down to 4 cities.
1365ad. Destroy a German city, forget the name. It was only size 1. 4 Elite victories, and I’m waiting for that next GL. Russia is suddenly furious with me. I’ve been very kind to them. Maybe they are tired of being broke because they are spending 30 gpt with me for 3 luxuries. Who knows.
1375ad. Boston flips back to Germany. The amazing thing is it is a size 4 city WAY behind German lines and it has only ONE Germany citizen in it. The rest are mine…
1380ad. I retake Boston (didn’t have any troops that far from the front lines. This continues to confirm my despite for the culture flipping rules in Civ3. It needs to be eliminated, or at least a simple solution (i.e. 1 unit per population will keep a city from flipping) needs to be available. On a related note, it makes it VERY difficult to catch up in tech. The only way is to make peace, but then you are subjected to the culture flips for the next 20 rounds with no recourse. Two steps would IMHO make the game more fun and playable. 1. Add a simple rule to prevent culture flips if there is at least 1 unit per 6 population in an enemy city. 2. Create a random chance that capturing a city will result in a tech being discovered if possessed by the enemy civ. It doesn’t have to be 1 for 1, but even 1 in 4 would make a difference.
1400ad. Germany has been destroyed. I don’t really want to go fight another civ, but I need more GLs. Oh, I almost forgot. Someone put this wonderful GL factory off my eastern coast loaded with barbarians. I’ll ship my Elite Cavalry over there to get some more GLs!


World Map as of 1400 ad after Germany is destroyed.

1435ad. I steal Electricity from the Greeks! I went in SAFE, though if he caught me and declared war it would be a good excuse. I can research techs at a rate of 6 turns per tech now. I’m going to try that for a while and see how it goes.
1460ad. I am convinced that you can NOT get a GL by being attacked by barbarians. I’ve won about 16 battles with 4 Elites against the barbarian hordes by standing on the mountains. But zero GL.
1485ad. Babylon was destroyed by the Indians.
1545ad. Still no GL from the barbarian ramage. I pulled my units off so as to drop strategically and attack, but zip out of at least 14 Elite attacking victories. And for all my trouble, I even lost an elite Cavalry.
1640ad. Never did get a GL from killing most of the barbarians. There are still some left, so you never know. I’m still building the Wonders ahead of everyone else, but I’m doing it the old fashioned way. Currently I’ve got over $26,000 in cash, an income of 500 gpt and a research rate of 1 per 9 turns. India has stayed on par with me for techs, but mostly because I fed them about 3 almost for free some time ago. They and the Iroquois seems to be in the best shape, and have decent countries (20 cities each) and a reasonable tech rate. No one else has ANY money at all.
1655ad. England is down to ZERO cities! Must have a settler floating around somewhere. Greece is down to 3 cities and will be gone soon. That leaves India on top (other than me) with 27 cities and only 2 techs behind me. Russia with 21 cities is behind by 3 techs, and the Iroquois have 20 cities and are behind by 4 techs. Everyone else has less than $100.
1715ad. I’ve pulled my luxuries from India since I was only getting maybe $20 gpt for 3 different luxuries. I’d rather see them deal with more unhappiness than help them out. I’m still not 100% sure of what victory I’m heading for. If it was conquest, then I should be attacking right now as I just developed Motorized Transport, and India (the closest) is still 4 advances away. However, I’m thinking I’ll go for a Space Ship victory. I’m thinking more of how to end the game quickly. It would take to long to plan and conduct an attack to take everyone else out.

For me, the critical part of the game was taking out Japan. Once that was done, I was twice the size of any other civ and first in production. At that point the game should be just a matter of time. I have never engaged in any significant modern era wars. I could do that here and should have no problem achieving a Domination victory, however I think it would take too long directing all the attacks.

 

[Mongo97]

In the last thread, my attempts at Roman glory were, well...unglorious. My minor wars with the Americans only resulted in me comeing close to catching up with the rest of the world in tech, and just gave Japan a few more cities when my captured cities flipped to them.

Then, somewhere around 1430ish, the bottom fell out. Japan started a massive invasion, which my defenses were ill equipped to handle, and the treasury was still depleted from the barbarian hordes dancing through the city I had founded there, where it seems the Treasurer was vacationing with all of Rome's money. By 1460 or so, Rome was in flames, Nero fiddled, and we watched as Japan evicted us from the home continent, leaving only the few cities that were built in the barbarian lands. We held out as long as possible, but finally were forced to give Japan one of our newfounded cities as tribute to halt the attacks and try to rebuild.

The next 500 plus years were mostly uneventful. Our lands grew, with one loss to the Greeks due to culture (who also culture-flipped the city we had to give to Japan.) The world fought many wars, but the only thing we saw was the Iroquois destroy the Greeks, capture the the two cities that were under their control, and wander off, leaving the New Roman empire be.

We never managed to catch up with technology...we were close to the Industrial age when the war with Japan started, and had only just learned Steam Power when in 2015 a pretty spaceship flew off, which regretfully wasn't ours.

All in all, while I didn't win this go round, I was happy for the game. I had survived my first go at Emperor, learned a good deal from both my own experiences and from reading up on everyone else's, and, most importantly, killed many hours worth of time at work.

Loved the game, can't wait for next month's edition!

 

[jeffelammar]

My Reman empire spent most of the industrial age just trying to stay close. (In my world I decided that Remus won the fight instead of Romulus, so the home city ware Reme instead of Rome)

Not much interesting happened till the very end of the industrial age. For the most part the first continent was split evenly with Germany, myself and America.

The main thing that happened was the colonization of the barbarian isle. I didn't pay much attention to names as they spent themselves on my fortified musketmen. (I sent the foray before I got riflemen) I ended up with about 2/3 of the barbarian isle. Not sure if it was worth it, but it did get me an extra luxury.

Germany led the world in tech through the entire industrial age. Bismark was able to snap up all 3 wonders. I stayed out of conflict till I could get the all powerful Tank. I was actually shocked at just how effective the Panzers were. I hadn't ever had any problems dealing with them before.

With America as a buffer between my lands and most of Germany. (Germany had 4 cities on my northern border left from the conquest of Japan) America was at war with Germany, so I negotiated a military alliance with ROP. As the industrial age ended for me (with Germany already a bit ahead of there) I had taken all German cities south of America and was ready to use my ROP to move large amounts of troops through.

I'll stop there for now. I know I stepped over the scope of this thread, but I don't think it spoils any of the modern age.
The one note, is that with all the war going on, all civs were in Communism, so tech development slowed to a crawl.

 

[Singularity]

Here is my last chapter in GOTM16

I had to edit out most of my original report as it was grossly out of the boundries set for this thread. I was at work and thought that my clever mind could recall the dates for my progression. Most of my original post had stuff that occured a few turns after Radio where researched. Here is a slightly less interesting recap of my industrial era.

I started the steam age with wings under my empire. Around 50-60 workers on my modest empire. Soon my science, score and military where overlapping my competitors who still struggled through roadless mountains and jungles. This was my first attempt at converting my lands quickly with a wave of newbuilt workers after I gained monarchy. I estimate my worker count to be somewhere around 2-2.5 pr city, and that was before I had started to capture my neighbours workers. I was a bit surprised that the other civs didn't speed up their infrastructure work. The AI certainly didn't work on all cylinders in this emperor game.

Like my democrazy run, I blasted down the Electronics tech three. I started out at a slight disadvantage since Greece wouldnt sell Theory of gravity to me for any price. Alexander tried to enter the combustion three. But then his entire continent exploded when a tiny spark lit multiple MPPs. Allmost all work, science and production where halted as they duked it out. The Germans faded away first, Indians and Aztecs soon followed suits. And Hiawatha where toying with the limey englishmen. In the west I decided to go looking for rubber and luxuries in that weird spine of mountainis that ran from pole to pole. I landed with two infantrymen and a settler, and settled on a hill. I had traded worldmaps for the last 100's of turns, but the land was strangely unexplored. One of my ancient ships tried to aproach it in an earlier age, but rumors of strange giant squids proved to be a fatal bit of reality. After three turns and rushing of walls and barrax I praised the lord that my last Infantryman's head didn't sit on a Zulu pike.Nasty Cracker! I found no rubber, but my ironclad had ensured that we would never ever run out of fried calimari again. Sadly the horrors of the Boer war where revisited on this strange continent, where my lone city where encircled in a wall of zulu and horseman corpses.

With no rubber but a weak 20 turn agreement with a wartorn France I had to secure rubber by conquest, and that meant Tokugawa where moving up on the list of endangered civs.



My city placement where pretty optimized for max tiles pr. city. So I where not aiming at a ICS game at this time in the game. And quite frankly I had little entusiasm to start down that road before I Conquered or dominated the lot.

 

[Jurimax]

As mentioned in my previous post (2nd spoiler) I was among the first to get into the industrial age, I prebuilt ToE, and after its completion, I took a giant leap forward tech-wise. The japanese were really getting on my nerves, and after planting a spy, my thoughts became truth... it was the beginning of 'Bello Japanesum' (ie the Japanese War). The once great Japanese Civilization crumbled to the power of my combined forces (Tanks, Cavalry, Artillery, Legionaries) Yes, Legionaries. It was around 1400AD (not 100 % sure) and my Golden Age hadn't arrived yet . My spy told me to use my Legionaries, because in some Jap cities the only defenders were Spearman.

I took out the Japs fairly quickly, (RoP rape).
I'm leading the histograph big-time, Germans are next on my list,
entered modern times way before any of the other civs.

On the other continent, the Indians whacked the Babylonians. There's been a state of almost constant World War, but for now, I'm at peace with everybody.

I'm going to play on now, I think I'm in the right seat for a Space Victory, perhaps Domination, we'll see.

See y'all in the next spoiler thread...

greetings Jurimax

 

[LKendter]

1180 AD - We complete Suffrage; we are in much better shape to deal with a war.

1200 AD - The total junk city of Cincinnati flips to us. However, it does give us another Iron source.

1255 AD - Well after several tries we get Japan to declare war on us. We immediately ally with America and Germany vs. Japan.

1275 AD - I would like to know the answer to just one question - how in the world did Japan get ships with troops on the east side of the barbarian island?

1295 AD - Scratch the Aztecs, the first civ to bite the dust.

1305 AD - We pull off the Standard ToE play, and get Atomic Theory and Electronics.

1340 AD - We finally get our FIRST leader. It is time for an army to be formed. Of course it wins, and heroic epic is in progress.

1375 AD - Germany kills the one stray city, and Japan bites the dust.

1380 AD - Oops, our spy is caught and Germany declares war [dance]
We get foolish Abe to join the fight.

1385 AD - The Iroquois destroy the English.

1425 AD - America declares war. Germany gets a breather with a peace treaty and an alliance with vs America. They backstab me on the alliance in 1435 AD and declare war on us! Babylon joins the party due to an MPP.

1460 AD - The Americans are in the dead pile, up next killing Germany.
1485 AD - I finally get my second leader, and I really don't know what do with him. No wonders, and no need for armies. I simply decide to rush a factory in a decent city to get it on-line 31 turns earlier.
(I) Greece is the next civ to die.


Summary - I am in better shape then at the end of the last spoiler. Greece was my biggest threat with a large tech lead, but then are now dead.

However, I don't hold high hopes for a high finish this GOTM. My domination push was way latter then normal for me. I usually like to nail at least one civ before factories, as cities gained after factories rarely become useful.

 

[Ambiorix]

Just discovered Radio (1784AD) and 5 more techs to go in the industrial age. Things started promissing enough, but around 1450 everything went wrong :
it all started when the city covering my only coal resource flipped to the Japanese. I decided to declare war but was way too weak : I got the coal back, but lost 5 other cities. The other civs didn't want to trade any more, so had to rely on my own reseach. The result is that I'm hopelessly behind now.

On the positive side, I now have a great leader that I hope to use for a wonder one day or a SS-module. I also managed to clean up the barbarian continent, and have 15 cities there. The japanese are currently at war with the germans, so maybe it's time for some revenge (been building up military for the last 300 years).

On the other continent the Aztecs, English, Iroquois and Russians have left the building. Greece is by far the biggest and most advanced, but all other civs are ganging up on Greece. I'm currently 3rd in score, after Greece and Japan.

Great map this is - but I think I mentioned that already.

 

[hbdragon88]

Wow, still only on the first page! By the time I usually get to the spoilers, because of the guidelines, it's usually quite late before I get to the thread!

I mentioned before that it was impossibly hard to buy my way out of of Middle - and to a lesser extent, Ancient. Gold was running high at 1000 gold. I thought that was high. But Industrious rose the bar even higher. It took 1550 to get Steam Power, and Nationalism was out of the question for a while.

I took some time off of tech buying to advance through the tree and went back. Bought Economics, Printing Press, and Democracy. It was a tantilizing 6 turns, but it was well worth the time in anarchy to come out in Democracy and make 279 gpt, with still the 0% science/30% luxuries.

The Germans have been very powerful in this game, dispatching the Aztecs, Japanese, and Americans, and having commanding land and naval power. It would unfortuanely turn on me, though. Germany declared war on my in 1950 and by 1954 Rome was extinct.

On the first turn alone Germany razed fourteen cities. I wasn't even ready for anything. Hell, I only had workers, warriors, spearmen, pikemen, and a single musketman. One defender to a city.

With panzars, calvary, infantry, riflemen, and everything that was before mentioned armies, I gave up pretty fast. I abandoned eight cities, disbanded all my workers and all the defenders in those cities, and sold off improvements. Veii, Brunstrium, Pompeii, and Hispalis out of about twenty-two cities are spared.

As an answer to the topics Cracker suggested:

The Germans, I let those ***** overrun everyone. As mentioned before, they smashed the Americans to bits, later the Japanese and the Aztecs, razing most cities in their wake. They built no settlers, instead colonies for resources/luxs. After the destruction of twelve cities that filled the Japanese void, they quicly rebuilt the colonies that I had dispersed. I guess I should have known that they were after me, when, two turns before, I gave them 82 gold as a tribute demand.

Iroquois, France, and Greece were the powerhouses. Iroquois captured all of England's cities but later fell to the ruthless French and Greeks. Greece took Russia's last city (only city, when I got the map). There was a hell of a lot of warring. Iroquois - England, and later there was the French-Greek - Iroquios war. When I was destroyed India was losing fast to France and Greece.

I never traded much with the second continent. I worked hard on building the relationship with the Germans; all techs, except monarchy (Iroquios), were bought from them. France and I had a long-standing trade of Spices and Dyes, but that was about it.

I have to say that I disliked the fact that the Squids were regulars (3hp) which made it harder to sink them, whereas the regular barbarian galleys, conscripts, were easy.

 

[Ribannah]

Originally posted by hbdragon88
I never traded much with the second continent. I worked hard on building the relationship with the Germans; all techs, except monarchy (Iroquios), were bought from them.

It is not wise to set up your neighbour as a great power. Unless you're ahead anyway, it's much safer to do most trading with distant civs.

 

[Dimy]

In my former post I mentioned Germany was holding me up in the early industrial age by building a lot of riflemen.... and their terrain was full of mountains and hills, my cavalry had a rough time butchering through them.
Germany had no gunpowder and iron, so riflemen were there best units. They were able to block my quick uprise for about 200 years, but around 1500 AD I finally beat them while the Russians took some of their northern tundra cities. I then smashed the left-over of the american empire in about 2 turns. They had only 4 cities left in the western jungle and spearmen were no challenge for my cavalries. I actually got a GL (only my 2nd at that time!) and decided to fortify that leader in Rome, so I could rush the ToE with it later in the game... I was still far behind in tech, and knew I needed the ToE to catch up with the rest of the world. The russians declared war on me, dunno why, but I suppose they felt lucky after getting a few of those former german towns....

I kicked them off my continent easily.. greece and france had respectively 3 and 1 city on my continent in the south western tundra, but for the moment decided to let them be.... I decided to expand my territory and started shipping forces to the barbarian riffs. After clearing the southern part from the impis, I started shipping settlers and workers to establish a foothold on the riffs. From then on I started expanding northwards slowly.

In the meantime I went straight for Scienific Method and rushed the ToE with the leader i had saved. The next turn I finally caught up with the AI, only Greece was still a tech ahead, but the rest of the AI were behind now. There were only 4 rival AI left on the other continent, up untill then I didn't pay much attention to that continent, so dunno who cleared out who and when, but only France, Russia, Greece and Iroquis were left. In land area, Iroquis were the strongest, but techwise Greece was the one to fear most for me.

Around 1600 I started building tanks and shipped 16 tanks and 8 arty's to the other continent, capturing two russian coastal cities on the eastern part of the continent. Sued for peace and started shipping some more tanks and arties. Iroquis sneak attacked me and tried to take one of my cities on barb riffs. I made russia, france and greece to join my cause. I took two of their coastal cities and just defended from then on to wait out the 20 turns before sueing for peace with them. Iroquis were getting a beating especially from Greece and I was worried Greece would become to strong if the Iroquis were to wiped out. When I made peace with the Iroquis I gave them the techs and resources needed to build tanks and they were able to stop the Greek and Russians (France betrayed our alliance and already made peace earlier). Eventually Greek and Russia gave up and made peace.

In the meantime I had started building up my army and discovered flight so could now use airports to ship my troops quickly to the other continent.... It was around 1730AD when I discovered Radio.

To be continued,....

My 1730AD world map:

 

[hbdragon88]

Originally posted by Ribannah

It is not wise to set up your neighbour as a great power. Unless you're ahead anyway, it's much safer to do most trading with distant civs.

Maybe so. But they were already shaping up to be a world power. I originally traded with the Americans before they got destroyed. It was easiest to trade with them because, and it just became rountine after awhile.

Maybe it's the level, but the Germans were very huge in units. I saw panzar, infantry, riflemen, and calvary armies running around. Japanese samurai couldn't hold them - can samurai win against cavlary?

 

[Bolka]

Germans were also a major difficulty for me, as I wiped the japanese, and Germany wiped the americans (after I paid the americans to go to war with them), we shared the continent 50/50.
By the time of the radio, I already had 2 wars against the germans, very bloody ones, and in both cases came out with a draw. They have a lot of military units, and were much ahead in tech, until now, when they inexplicably stopped getting new techs.

I don't think samurais can handle cavalry well, I killed them with my legions...