STR-03 Viking Traders

[angeleyes]

330 1580 AD moving

329 1583 AD Democracy > Scientific Research, put Osaka on research till time is right to give it away to Mansa, islamic missionary fails to convert (why should that be ....), wait till our golden age is over till we revolt to emancipation.

328 1586 AD Moving units to Tokyo.

Refuse since he will probably our opponent in the UN-election (allthough some korean guy seems to be favorite..).

He's a friend of Huayna so don't listen to him either, and stops talking with us. I send a caravel towards his borders to keep an eye on this guy. Find out his strongest unit is the mace.

Gift Asoka economics, he turns friendly! This encourage me to gift the same tech to Mansa, he stays pleased but with a bigger smile.

327 1589 AD moving units to Tokyo

Obey. Asoka and Mansa both adopt Free Market, Qin adopts Mercantilism.

326 1592 AD Toku razes Niani, i think that was a new founded Malinese-city in the north-east. Go on with pillaging towns and bombarding Tokyo.

325 1595 AD Golden Age ends, revolt to Emancipation. Capture and raze Tokyo (gifting this city to Mansa makes no sense, it should soon have revolted back to Toku). At this point we need five more points for a great general, so go on with the war! Huayna has rifles! Our caravel keeps an eye on him.

324 1598 AD Toku has knights

323 1601 AD Mansa founds a city near the ruins of Tokyo, at a save spot i think.Now gift Osaka to Mansa. He's friendly! I ask and get 160 gold from him.

322 1604 AD moving units to Kyoto, pillaging a town

321 1607 AD bombard Kyoto

320 1610 AD Scientific Method > Physics, on our way to the UN

Final Revenge on Toku in the Battle of Kyoto:
-first treb dies, second (4,7% chance) kills a longbow and gets six xp extra! Gaius Marius is born in Haithabu, .
-one cat dies, another retreats,
-two berserkers with 85% and 90% chance die against knights,
-next five defenders have no chance:

We raze Kyoto and have a little talk with Toku:

319 1613 AD Great Merchant born in Uppsala, send him to China, allthough he could get 1812 gold for RP. Attach Gaius Marius to an old fashioned warrior, give him some promotions and an upgrade. Start building Heroic Epic in Haithabu (our capital already has two national wonders, and Uppsala has an accademy, so is more usefull as science city).

318 1616 AD retreat soldiers to their homecountry

317 1619 AD Our great merchant reveals the unknown inlands of China

316 1622 AD Asoka adopts free religion, he's pleased

315 1625 AD Oxford University finally comes in, start Statue of Liberty (?can be changed offcause, i found it expensive). Toku made peace with Asoka and Mansa. Almost all our troops are back from the war, great merchant has revealed China for us and can put into money next turn (Beying). The world's again nice and peacefull as if nothing has happened, i think Strauss will be satisfied.

peace

 

[Bede]

Nice. Now we have to bootstrap our neighbors into a voting force.

 

[Strauss]

I am satisfied. Good turns.

I won't be able to play until Tuesday though. I'm having meetings about my voyages to Rome and Edinburgh until 10 pm tomorrow.

Roster:
1) Strauss --> skip until Tuesday
2) Pvblivs --> UP!
3) karr1255
4) Bede
5) Asperger

 

[karr1255]

In case I don't get the save in time. I won't be able to play from tuesday to saturday. So just skip me for this time.

 

[Pvblivs]

Will play tomorrow evening or tuesday. Swap me if you wish, karr.

 

[karr1255]

Alright I'll play monday in the afternoon sometime and hopefully be here for the next round. Just in case my report isn't here by 5pm CEST tomorrow just skip me.

 

[karr1255]

pre turn - I MM some cities and switch to universal suffrage since we don't need monarchy really. Then I take a look at the relations: Qin and Shaka love Huayna while we might not even get Asokas vote. On top of that our land isn't very food rich except for 2 or 3 cities.

T1 - Our great merchant is used for a trade mission in Bejing and gives us 2850 gold. We now have 4418.

T3 - Sign open borders with Shaka for some extra income

T5 - Physics in and we get the GS. But I disrupt our beeline for mass media to get biology. I use the GS to bulp chemistry to 1 turn so total time to biology is 10. Adding the GS wouldn't have been worth it since even in our main city he would only give 30 beaker per turn. But he added 2700+ to chemistry and saved 3 turns of 100% research.

T6 - Chemistry in going for Biology and building farms in the last spots

T8 - Asoka starts a golden age

T9 - I trade Asoka our only marble for 4gpt to get better relations. If we need the marble again don't forget to cancel this deal.

T10 - Globe Theater started in Uppsala since there is no better spot for it

T11-15 - zzz


Uneventful turnset. Biology comes in next turn then we can continue to go for mass media. Remember that the bigger the cities get 1pop is worth more and more population in the demographics and for the vote. Right now workers are chopping unworkable forests near Nidaros in favor of farms.

Our treasury is still in good shape. I've been running 100% the whole time and we still have more than 2500 gold.

And I forgot to mention that we have Uranium in case we need to thin Huaynas population a little bit.

 

[Pvblivs]

've got it!

 

[Pvblivs]

1673 (1): Biology is in to power our farms. Next is Replaceable Parts.

1682 (4): Replaceable Parts are in and I'm starting lumbermills Next tech is Steam Power...

1685 (5): Asoka gives us his world map for ours

1691 (7): Nichola Tesla is born in Birka. Well, we wait for the next wonder, don't we?

1694 (8): Shaka, very politely, asks for Military Tradition, offering 340 gold. I feel a little bit ashamed telling him that technology is something about a lot of money and leave.

1700 (10): Trading world maps with Mansa Musa... get a little bit by this

1703 (11): Selecting Steel after Steam power comes in. We have coal

1712 (14): The Statue of Liberty stands now in Nidaros...

1715 (15): I lost some notes here. Never do them in the forum directly. Well ... Quin comes and asks for Economics and offers 120. I tell him to research Economics first in order to understand that his offer is an insult to a trader. Isn't it? I'm starting the Wall Street in Uppsala.

Did you know that Quin and HC are in a Defensive Pact? Interesting... And please, don't forget the Great Engineer waiting for order in Birka.

Finally a little game: Identify and locate the wonders of the following city:
- The Great Library
- The Statue of Liberty
- The Taj Mahal
- The Sistine Chapel
- The Heroic Epic
- The Oxford University

Into the Industrial Age

 

[Pvblivs]

Please note that I'm on holidays until the 15th. You'll be finishing the game until then for sure. Have a lot of fun and don't EVER break the variant

I'm in Cala Ratjada (Mallorca, Baleares) from Wednesday till Thursday and in Heidelberg visiting a friend thereafter. I hope to have a lot of sun at the Mediterranean

It was interesting to test being at least some kind of peaceful with you guys.

 

[angeleyes]

I have suddenly not the slightest idea where this game is going to ?? ??
Trading is nice but you can't win a game as being the greatest trader. How are we gonna win this game, there is no plan according wich we play.

 

[Bede]

I'm with Asperger on this one. We seem to have backed ourselves into a corner. Forty turns of Defensive Pact, or mutual warfare, position Qin and Huyana for a Permanent Alliance which, if I read the charts aright, put them in the driver's seat for the UN victory, or Space.

Something needs to happen here, and I don't know what it is. Bulking up our population with Biology will be of but marginal benefit when the three biggest nations on the map are having a love-in.

Perhaps if we can take Shaka off the map, with the help of the rest of the Buddhist bloc and using his cities to bulk up Toku or Asoka-Mansa, will either break the Huyana-Qin Pact, or give us the leverage for a UN victory.

Or we put the hammer down and see if we can beat two over developed and allied financial nations into Space.

Looking at the save right now and will post further later.

 

[Bede]

That is us, fourth on the power curve with Huyana and Shaka taking big, big jumps, probably from upgrading to grenadiers or rifles.

The demographics are okay, though we rank second in GNP and only third in soldiers.

But what I can deduce from the above is that Toku has to go and then Shaka if we want to win diplomatically. We have a chair at the table, but not enough votes to win the election when Huyana, Qin, Shaka and Toku vote together, as it is likely they will. The best outcome for us is to take Toku off the board - giving his cities to Asoka, and then an eastern island dogpile on Shaka. Again giving his towns to Asoka. That could lead to war with Huyana, or we may need to foment one, but we need to have Mansa and Asoka on our side for that one. Getting the eastern island involved in war with Shaka and then Huyana will neutralize their position at the UN election. And giving cities to Asoka should boost the relationship so that he will not abstain.

That is if we want to win diplomatically and keep our population percentage under 40%. An alternative of course is to nuke the two partners but I think the use of nukes is a really permanent relationship negative with everybody else on the board. Never had the opportunity to test that one.

Going to Space is our other option. And one we can undoubtedly pull it off if we focus research on the tech for the Space Elevator immediately. And build it first before any other parts (you don't need Apollo until you actually start building space ship bits) ANd I would then hold the Engineer for the Elevator.

Does anybody know how to derive latitude from the map? To build the space elevator we need a site within 30 degrees of the equator and I am not sure we have one, as we appear to be closer to the south pole.

We are now at a real parting of the ways; a diplomatic victory is going to take some judicious warfare, space we can probably manage without it. But this decision has implications all through the management of the empire in terms of what kind of GPP we want or need and where we can get them and how we develop the fields. If the choice were diplomatic I would emphasize Engineers and Merchants and hammers, if the choice were Space it would be Scientists and Merchants and commerce.

And Wall Street should go to Birka as it is our most commerce heavy city, and maybe West Point in Uppsala, if we take the warfare route.

 

[angeleyes]

I think it's proven that aiming for Diplomatic Victory and at the same time being obliged to take revenge on the aggressors of your trade partners, isn't a good combination. Also i just read in the papers that a Korean guy (who's main point seems to be to get rid of the moon) most likely will be appointed, so we are too late anyway.
For cultural victory we are to late, so my vote goes to space.

With worldbuilder (and another game) i came to the conclusion that the space-elevator can be build between the blue lines of the picture, which means Haithabu is able to build it. (not 100% sure).

 

[Strauss]

Since a Diplomatic Victory by eliminating all opponents is not in the spirit of this game, I also give my vote to the Space Race.

I'm up now, but I won't be able to play today or tomorrow. So we'll just continue down the roster, with Bede up and Asperger on deck.

 

[angeleyes]

i want to know from my fellow gamers if they think Diplomatic Victory and being obliged to revenge the aggressors of our trade partners, is a possible combination, or that it's something they feel is normally impossible.

 

[Strauss]

i want to know from my fellow gamers if they think Diplomatic Victory and being obliged to revenge the aggressors of our trade partners, is a possible combination, or that it's something they feel is normally impossible.

It is definitely possible. You just need to be very careful whom you choose as your trading partners. If your trading partners give you enough votes for a Diplomatic win, it doesn't matter whether the others civs are cautious with you or furious because of declaring war on them. Our problem was that we traded with everyone, making our position impossible.

 

[angeleyes]

First we hit mansa to an OCC, than trying to please him. that's dubious. The war declaration on Asoka was an accident. But we wanted to please Toku, when we knew sometime he would go to war with one of our trading partners. That was impossible.
Finally, the three guy's from the other continents were already pleased or friendly with eachother when we met them, so that was very difficult too.After all, our only possible friend was Asoka, but exactly he we par accident declare war on.
My conclusion, in this game it was (nearly) impossible. (but i'm not the best civ4-player of course).

 

[Bede]

i want to know from my fellow gamers if they think Diplomatic Victory and being obliged to revenge the aggressors of our trade partners, is a possible combination, or that it's something they feel is normally impossible.

Much depends on how you want to play the game. If you are willing and able to bully the AI into opposing blocs with you in control of the stronger bloc though defensive pacts and the like then a diplomatic victory is always possible. In this instance we missed some opportunities to weaken the other bloc and build stronger relations with our natural voting partners.

Now we have an 800 pound gorilla on our hands and I am not sure that even a Space Victory is feasible with two financial and agressive nations teaming up (I see that Defensive Pact between Huyana and the Chinamen as a precursor to a Permanent Alliance)

Got and playing tonight

 

[Bede]

Not much building or training going on, and no trades to report other than the sale of some civics to Asoka and Mansa (Democracy), then a follow on sale of what ever else we knew to get the tech spread around and get some movement across the pasrt of teh trech tree we will not be pursuing quite yet.

Finished steel, then researched most of Electricity with a lightbulb. The goal is the tech that allows the Space Elevator. Took a slight detour to Medicine as we are going to need a at least couple of hospitals to take the pressure of the factories we are going to build (Running Environmentalism would help too, but that is out for the duration).

Missed the opportunity to swap Civics to Free Religion and Representation. Mu objective here of course being to maximize scientific output.

My citizen strategy has invloved using as many merchants as I can as the added commerce runs through the beaker multiplier buildings that we have, while the raw beakers don't.

I used the Engineer to build Wall Street in Birka.

I also Manufactured Research in all towns except Hadribatha (building the Iron Works) and Timbuktu which needs some health enhancement. That of course will have to change while hospitals and factories are being built.

The international scene is quiet. Toku has joined the Unholy Alliance of Huyana and Qin, so random wars of aggression are not expected, except possibly from Shaka who I think remains outside the coalition, although he is very very friendly with all of them and not so friendly with the southern tier nations (India, Mali and Scandanavia). My concern is that if one of these nations builds the UN, then the game goes to Huyana. And even if we build the UN the game goes to Huyana, as I don't think we have the political mass to prevent it.

So tech hard and tech fast and let's build a Space Elevator.