SUL4: Training Day for Emperors

[Ziggy]

1750BC preturn
wake up the hoplite...move him toward blue dot
change corinth to temple
saw Thermoylae would starve if left how it was....debated upping the luxuries...or moving to the wheat and thus taking 2 turns to make the warrior...it takes upping the luxuries to 50% to make them happy...but its only for 1 turn...i decide its worth it

between turns...the russian scout sprints across our lands

1725BC (1)
Athens produces settler...starts another...also grows back to size 3...if we ever stop building settler/workers here we will need a temple ASAP
Thermoplyae trains warrior...starts (after some debate over a temple) a worker...i move to work a forest to net 2 sheilds
adjust lux to 1/9/0 writing in 4 at +1gpt
Hoplite walking along St Pete's border notices they have horses on the hill (connected)
settler heads for Blue dot

between turns a russian archer moves next to athens border

1700BC (2)
settler meets up with hoplite
south warrior scouts along babs border
worker moves to connect Therm.
Worker on Sparta's gold starts road

russian archer moves along border

1675BC (3)
ppl move
Babylon has discovered Horseback riding....russia is broke (plus they may still be at war) so doesn't have it yet
Hammi won't trade it anyways (all we can offer is gold) so that ends that quandry
set lux back to 10% cause athens is going to grow next turn...makes no diff to $ or science

between turns...russian archer leaves
1650BC (4)
sparta builds worker...starts temple...it also grows back to size 4 at same time
new worker heads over to connect up Blue dot by road

between turns...Bab warrior appears south of Cornth...i hope hes scouting

1625BC (5) we discover Writing...start on literacy (much debate here...my thoughts are...it gives us librarys...so we get future techs faster anyway...and we are scientific...so we can build librarys faster....downside is its 13 turns when other techs like horseriding are 6....weed?...i hope not)
Delphi founded on blue dot...with the hoplite for MP...it starts immediately on a temple...it also incidently seals up the rusian archer in the NE corner of our continent
Hammi would give us everything he owns for writing (20 gold and horse riding)...i decline as A) we have no horses...and B) we still cant trade it back to russia.they are STILL broke?

the russian archer sneaks across our land...i glare at him but say nothing..he looks embarrassed enough as it is
1600BC (6)
Thermo. produces worker...starts on a temple (feel free to change but seemed like a decent idea)
road to Thermo. finished
new worker starts to road the wheat...old one heads back to bring over irrigation
Athens micromanaged in usual way to produce settler next turn just as it grows back to size 4
establish an e,bassy with russia to keep them happy (30gp)...moscow is size 2...will grow in 8 turns...and has a fully built settler waiting untill it grows oh and defense is 2 spearmen

the bab warrior turns around

1575BC (7)
Athens produces settler...starts...settler
i drop the lux tax to zero..and make a mental note to raise it again in 2 turns when sparta grows..will i remember?...
settler meets up with warrior escort/MP
our southern scouting warrior looks like he has run outa room.solid bab border in front of him

1550BC (8)
movement
Sparta is going to grow next turn..im unsure when the unhappiness kicks in...so i raise the lux tax now rather than risk the revolt
also drop science to 70%..same turns but 2gpt now

1525BC (9)
more movement
Sparta is now size 5..will be size 6 in 10 turns and the temple due in 11....at size 6 with no temple it will revolt...next player watch this!

1500BC (10)
Athens culture border expands
more movement
our settler and warrior are heading for purple dot 1 move away
and some of the slow temples may need whips at some point...im not sure when...i dont usually whip as a rule in this oatch...but one of them is at 25 turns and the other 2 are in the 50s so....i dunno
and watch sparta as i said earlier
Good luck to next player

 

[Sullla]

Too late and too tired to critique now... will cover it tomorrow. And the person up next is... me!

 

[Ziggy]

well good luck to you then Sulla..even "veterans" can never have too much luck

 

[Sullla]

Critique for Ziggy:

1750 - Thermopylae presented an interesting choice here: create an entertainer and go 0 growth for 2 turns or up the luxury rate to 50% for one turn. I was leaning towards the entertainer, but in all honesty it's probably better that you chose to go the luxury route. Neither was really a bad choice though.

1725 - Not so good here. Thermopylae is not a high food region at the moment - at least not until we get some more irrigation up there. With Athens growing every other turn, all workers and settlers should come from it. Not only does this slow down Thermopylae on its temple build, it also decreases its population when it cannot replace it easily. We do indeed need workers, but this was the wrong city to produce one from.

1675 - Good catch on the luxury rate. We certainly wouldn't have wanted Athens to go into disorder. The fact that it cost us no gold was just a nice bonus.

1625 - Literature is never a bad choice for a scientific civ. This was a good choice to research, no weed here. I probably would have researched MapMaking instead to see what was out on those islands, but Literature was a good call. We will get culture in those cities faster by switching them to cheap libraries after discovering the tech. Good call on not trading away Writing, as at the moment Hammurabi cannot pay full price for it. At the present, 5 turns later, he still offers the same thing, which means he is either not researching Writing or has not made much progress on it. I plan to trade Writing when I can get 2 techs from it... and if Russia is getting behind in tech, so much the better for us.

1600 - Good call on the embassy. I always build these as soon as I can afford them. The increased diplomatic options make it worth it, as well as being able to tell your relative military strength on F3. Babylon and Russia are not at war, since we can tell that using our embassy.

1550 - You get one turn after growth to deal with unhappiness, so you could have held off increasing the luxury tax for one turn. However... better to do it early than leave it to the next turn and forget! Always better to be safe than sorry in this case.

1500 - You mention whipping, which I don't think is good in this case, but it doesn't matter because I have the next turn! In any case, this was a pretty solid turn. It might not look like very much happened, but we are in good shape here. Only real issue is our lack of room to expand.

Playing my turn as I post this. And I can always use some luck as well.

 

[Sullla]

(0) 1500BC 4 out of 5 cities are on temples. And I agree with it completely... we need to get those borders expanded early on. The one thing I really want is more workers, because Sparta needs to get shields from those hills and our other cities need irrigation to be brought to them. This is when I wish we were industrious...

(1) 1475BC I move the settler to purple dot. For all the debate, since I'm playing now I get to settle the argument! On purple it goes next turn. Elsewhere, workers are just... working.

(2) 1450BC Between turns, Catherine DEMANDS Writing. Not likely. I hit the "goodbye" option, and fortunately they do not declare war. Whew! We weren't going to give up that tech but we were hardly ready for a fight either. Embassy founded with Babylon, bankrupting us for the most part. They have 3 luxuries and are building the Oracle (37 turns). It looks like they have control of a tiny landbridge to the east down there; there might be some good land out there. New city founded on the purple dot, begins work on temple as well. These temples will get switched over to libraries when we get Literature. Hammurabi still offers full price for Writing, so no deal. Another settler coming next turn (I wish there was more land to settle!)

(3) 1425BC Athens begins a worker after finishing settler. Serious rearrangement of tiles in Athens, Sparta, and Thermopylae to get max benefits. What are the other two guys doing? Neither one has a tech yet. We are researching faster then them even with their 20% tech discount!

(4) 1400BC We learn the Russians are building the Colossus; it's in Moscow. I lower the science slider to go from +2/turn to +4/turn without losing any turns on research. Athens gets rearranged again to more growth after the AI defaults to forest. Sparta will grow again next turn and we'll need to increase the lux tax. So be it.

(5) 1375BC Athens builds worker, starts another. We need them to improve this pretty rough terrain, and where else to put the settlers? Nowhere at the moment. We also have 10 more free support, so we can use that to our advantage. Dang! Catherine has discovered Writing so the cost of it to Hammurabi has gone down. Well, we trade it for what we can: their treasury of 27g. This was the best I could do; Russia had to screw our deal up.

(6) 1350BC Great... our "friend" Hammurabi, who is polite with us, DEMANDS 21g from us. I end up giving it to him, because he has a warrior right outside purple dot (defended by a warrior) and we need to concentrate on Russia, not Babylon. There goes all our gold from Writing though... Hammurabi gets his name added to the "list". We can again lower science without losing time on research, so I do so.

(7) 1325BC Nothing interesting happened here. We do get Litherature next turn though.

(8) 1300BC Worker produced from Athens, one more ordered up and then Athens needs to start growing in preparation for war. Literature discovered, MapMaking research started. Our outlying temples being built just for culture are switched to Libraries. Luxury rate up to 30% temporarily because of growth in Thermopylae.

(9) 1275BC Sparta completes its temple and we go back to 20% luxuries. I want a barracks there, but I set it to a warrior for military police. It needs a BARRACKS as soon as this is completed. Pharsalos founded on red dot. It has good future potential, but is a little weak at the moment.

(10) 1250BC We get the "Forbidden Palace" message. Remember, it's a small map. Corinth will revolt next turn unless we do something, so rather than crank up the luxury rate I make an entertainer. It stops growing, but it will be OK as soon as the road to it completes in 2 turns. We are getting close to finishing our libraries and getting culture expansions.

Comments: We are now finished the settling phase and should begin getting ready for war. Russia is pretty pathetic, a bunch of size 1 and 2 cities in jungle, and their military is average compared to ours even though we've focused not at all on soldiers. Since we don't have much money, and we can't go 0% science until we get contact with the other 3 civs (we'd get killed in the tech race), the warrior -> swordsman upgrade path isn't going to work here. Instead, we need to connect our iron and just begin building swordsmen. Athens already has a barracks and should be allowed to grow after it finishes this current worker. Sparta begins a barracks next turn after it finishes its military police warrior and begins building military as well. We want first of all 1 hoplite in each city, and then a force of swords to attack. I think about 10 vet swords will be good to start the attack. We're still about 20-30 turns away from fighting though. The outlying cities should help contribute by building a barracks if possible, regulars if that's not possible. As long as it's well planned, Russia has not chance. Good luck!

The Game: 1250BC

Sulla
Ihmotep <<< UP NOW
Ridgelake <<< on deck
MingTheMerciles
Ziggy

 

[Sullla]

And our current map:

 

[Ridgelake]

Ziggy and Sulla, you guys made some nice moves there . I am pleasantly surprised that we have been able to lock up the Russians. But they had to deal with a war and are trying to expand in 2 directions.

In looking at the world map, I am laughing at the fact that we have 6 cities while the russians have 4 and the babs have 3 (that we know of. Such is the power of wheated floodplains!!

 

[Sullla]

Originally posted by Ridgelake
In looking at the world map, I am laughing at the fact that we have 6 cities while the russians have 4 and the babs have 3 (that we know of. Such is the power of wheated floodplains!!

If there was more land to settle, the disparity would only become more apparent. We could easily have 9 cities by this point by producing more settlers from Athens and Sparta... and we would have done so if there was more land to settle. Lucky for Russia, there isn't. Unlucky for Russia is the fact that we have to go through them to get land. And we will very likely find some more land for cities when we get out some galleys after we finish researching MapMaking.

 

[Ihmotep]

Got it, will post sometime later today or tommorrow

 

[Ziggy]

1550 - You get one turn after growth to deal with unhappiness, so you could have held off increasing the luxury tax for one turn. However... better to do it early than leave it to the next turn and forget! Always better to be safe than sorry in this case.

Ahh good...i never was sure when that happened...i usually tend not to notice it half the time but in these sucsession games you have the time to check everything so thoroughly...but yeah better sfe than sorry is always good

1500 - You mention whipping, which I don't think is good in this case, but it doesn't matter because I have the next turn!

I didn't think so either...in fact...with the current whipping rules....ie 20 shields instead of 40...i really cant see when it would be good...nothing really costs only 20 sheilds....so by the time you have built up say 20 out of 40 sheilds of something...and are the size 2 it takes to whip,,,you probably can pull off making 2 shields a turn...unless the city is hopelessly corrupt...but by the time i'm usually building citys that far away im in a government where i can BUY things...i dunno just cant see the use now for it

(0) 1500BC 4 out of 5 cities are on temples. And I agree with it completely... we need to get those borders expanded early on. The one thing I really want is more workers,

well...you have one more than you would have had if i hadn't built the one out of Thermopylae

Hammurabi gets his name added to the "list".

Hammy Hamy Hammy.....you have chosen.....poorly

It all looks good mate...the only thing i want to know is where the heck everyone else is?...we must get out and meet other ppl.....I can only hope the other 2 (or 3?..are there 4 or 5 others?) are as screwed as russia...what is she thinking..if i recall correctly the colossus should have been started right when her settler finally built...so shes building it in a size 1 city in jungle

 

[Sullla]

This is a small map, and there are 3 other civs out there. I set the terrain and land formation as "random", but it seems we are on a hot, wet world with continents. One of them is the Aztecs, as they've already finished a wonder. I would guess that their tech will move considerably slower then ours, since 1) We have three civs together trading, for the others to get the same effect they all have to be together as well (somewhat unlikely) 2) We have 3(!) scientific civs on our continent. Yeah... tech's gonna move. 3) Any civ near the "equator" is going to be stuck in jungle just like Russia is. I don't think we need to worry about making contact and finding ourselves horribly behind, in any case.

 

[Sullla]

Ihmotep: You are overdue. Give us some word here in the next 24 hours or you will be skipped. The game needs to keep moving.

 

[Ihmotep]

I have to quit the game due to the restrictions my parents have put on my computer time. I'm sorry

I'll try to keep track of this thread tho

 

[Ihmotep]

I will try to get my last 10 turns in tho...before my parents get home.

be back in 20min

 

[Ihmotep]

*whew* made it....parents are due home in 20min

1 - 1225BCE - Athens Completes worker, starts hoplite, Sparta completes Warrior, starts Barracks

2 - 1200BCE - Tell Russia to get out of the borders, they promise that they will...Corinth completes Library and starts Hoplite. Sparta Expands

3 - 1175BCE - Thermopylae Completes Library, Starts Hoplite

4 - 1150BCE - Nothing

5 - 1125BCE - Athens completes Hoplite and starts Granary

6 - 1100BCE - Corinth Expands. I tell Cathy to leave our territory at ONCE...unfortunately the game moves her in the direction she WANTED to go instead of back to where she started....figures

7 - 1075BCE - Road to Iron completed

8 - 1050 BCE - Sparta completes Barracks, starts Hoplite. Indians complete Oracle in Delhi

9 - 1025BCE - I botch again with civil Disorder in Sparta. Corinth completes Hoplite, Starts first Swordsman. Babs start Pyramids.

10 - 1000BCE - Nada

Well I'm sorry I can't complete the game.....

thanks for including me and good luck in the rest of the game

 

[Sullla]

Ihmotep: We're sorry to lose you. You will always be welcome back in the game if your parent change the restirctions on your computer usage. I am glad that my parents no longer restrict that for me, but then again I am in college, own my own computer, and only live at home during the summer. Your presence will be missed.

As for the game, I will open up the save file and critique it within the next few hours so the next player can play. WE HAVE AN OPENING for any lurkers who want to try their hand at the game.

Sulla
OPEN SPOT
Ridgelake <<< UP NOW
MingTheMerciles <<< on deck
Ziggy

 

[Sullla]

Critique for Ihmotep:

Turn 1: Athens starts a Hoplite. Not a bad choice, but I would have liked to see a sword. Or, alternately, we could have Athens build VET defenders for each city, while another city builds vet swords for our impending attack. The problem here is that it appears the choice was made without any real plan in mind, just a "let's build a hoplite because I can't think of anything else" decision. Always have a direction in mind with your build choices; this early in the game it's most critical to do so. Sparta on Barracks was 100% the right call; good one (though I believe I recommended it).

Turn 2: Why did you ask Russia's unit to leave? It wasn't doing any harm. Repeatedly kicking out their forces only makes them angry and accomplishes nothing, since they will be right back. Just learn to live with the AI units spamming around your territory. And here, in an Emperor game, we can't afford to be trying to bully everyone else around us.

Turn 2&3: Corinth and Thermoplyae start hoplites. Now why would we build a regular hoplite in these cities? If we want military police, we should build a warrior. If we want defense, we should build a VETERAN hoplite out of Sparta or Athens and move it to those cities. I suggest a barracks for these towns so they can build vet swords to attack Russia.

Turn 5: Athens starts a granary?! We discussed this earlier, and decided that Athens did NOT need a granary. If we had wanted one, it would have been built in the first few turns of the game. Right now we want swords, veteran ones coming out of Athens. A granary choice here is some fine . Not a good pick.

Turn 6: See above for comment on asking foreign forces to leave territory.

Turn 8: Sparta starts a Hoplie. OK, is Athens or Sparta going to build Hoplites for defense? You need to decide on this and follow it through. This is more random decision-making. If we build a million defensive units and hunker down here, we will never win the game. We've got to go after Russia while they're weak, and that means getting out some swords!

Turn 9: Sparta in civil disorder? That's a lack of concentration there. We need to avoid that at all costs. Corinth finishes a Hoplite (which was a waste of production) and starts a swordsman? That's all well and good, but a regular sword is not nearly as good as a veteran one. We need a barracks in that town first.

Turn10: Nada? Well, Sparta is STILL rioting, so you obviously didn't fix it. That's bad management there. Ihmotep, you need to work on forming a plan and sticking to it, not making random decisions. Otherwise, you will never be able to move past Regent level in Civ3. I offer this as friendly advice for when/if you get the chance to continue playing the game.

Recommendations: Athens is being managed horribly at the moment. Ihmotep, why oh why did you allow the game to prioritize the forest tiles over the floodplains ones? Athens could be size 6 by this point!! Did you ever consider that's why we're losing money? In any case, Athens needs to be changed to high food so it grows to size 5 very quickly and gets those forest tiles right back again. Make sure Athens has two wheat floodplains, not Sparta; the reverse is true at the moment. And Athens needs to produce swords, Sparta spears for the next few turns. When we have a vet spear (Hoplite) in all cities near the Russia border, Sparta goes over to swords as well. Thermopylae and Corinth go to Barracks, off their production of useless regular units. We have 3 workers mining a mountain, to NO purpose whatsoever . This is while Corinth sits there with 2 bonus grasslands compeletely unworked!!! Come on Ihmotep, what were you thinking? You're utterly wasting our workers' time improving tiles that we are NOT using and not going to use any time soon while worked tiles crying out for improvement go untouched. By adjusting the science slider, we can get +7g/turn and not lose out on any turns for MapMaking!! I get the feeling your heart just wasn't in this one, Ihmotep. 10 turns should take you longer than 20 minutes, unless it's REALLY early in the game. You're always welcome back and I hope you continue to follow this thread, but at the moment you are indeed quite a bit below the level of play needed to win on Emperor.

Good luck to Ridgelake.

Map:

 

[Ziggy]

Sulla....quick Question again on your graphics
i Downloaded that snoopy set you recomended but that only seems to change the terrains...what set are you using for your irrigation and resources...i would love to get my hands on that one...i always have such a hard time spotting them ...especially coal...that just seems to hide so easy

 

[Sullla]

The easy to spot resources mod was made by SkankyBurns a loooong time ago. It's since been buried in the back pages of the Creation and Customization Forum, but it's way too good to go unused by players. I can't imagine playing without it now! Here's a link to the thread:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=15022

I cannot find the location for the irrigation graphics. However, I'm going to zip the files needed for irrigation and post them for you to download anyway.

Sullla's Irrigation

These files all go in the Civilization3/Art/Terrain folder and replace the files that already exist of the same name. No more off topic stuff like this again though, OK?

 

[Ridgelake]

Ihmotep, sorry to see you go. We will miss you.

Here is the description of the Reign of Ridgelake II.

1000BC (0) F1 to check everything. I change a few orders around. Athens from granary (like it doesn’t grow fast enough) to a temple. I also re-allocate workers to 2 wheats, and a fp. It had been working 2 forest spots. Pop growth in 1. I am seriously considering a library here. But with this high of growth, I considered pop control more important than science for this town in the shorter term.

Sparta is in disorder. It had an entertainer lined up. I switch him over to a tax man. Peace will still be kept. It is making a Hoplite. We have a barracks and a temple already. I consider a library here, but we need to get more luxuries lined up. That means taking down Russia. So line up a swordsman. I strongly consider another worker. We have WAY too many unimproved tiles in operation, and a worker will do more for us than a taxman. After the swordsman.

Thermoplyae is working on a temple. It has a library. With war coming, I change to a barrack.

Corinth was working on a hoplite. I change it over to a barracks so that it will make vets. This close to the Russian border, a barrack will be needed. We already have a library here to help with culture.

Delphi is almost done with its library. Good. It will provide more culture pressure on St. Pete.

Purple is growing slowly and building its library slowly. Maybe we should rename this town something like Slowville. Maybe Hicksville, because nothing will ever happen quickly around there.

Pharsalos is coming along. It will help when it gets to use worked tiles…….

Speaking of worked tiles. We have a tremendous number of unimproved tiles in operation! There is a stack of 4 workers mining Iron Mountain. Since this mountain will not be used until we are in Republic, at earliest, I pull the workers off and send them to make other improvements.

Check the slider bar. Map Making is due up in 1. Adjust to 5/3/2 to get it next turn. This will net us 12 gp overall.

Diplo Check. Hammi has Horseback riding and Polytheism to our Literature. He is polite. He also has the same number of cities that we do. We can see 4, so there are 3 others on the landmass to the east of Babylon.

Cathy is annoyed with us. She has 4 cities. Tech wise, she is behind on Lit. Her army is about the same size as ours. Just wait until we build up some…..

975BC (1) We get map making. I consider Math, HorsebackRiding, Philosophy and Code of Laws. Philo and Code will get us closer to Republic. Math allows us catapults and moves us towards Masonry and Currency. My guess is that we can take Horseback from the Russians. I cue up Math. It will also give us a tradeable item to the Babs. I don’t want to give them either MapMaking or Lit right now.

Speaking of the Russians, the units that Ihmotep was barking at was a setter pair. They plopped down about where our would-be fishing village was going. Well, it will take a little longer to take over, but it will save us the settler to send over there, assuming that we don’t raise it. Actually, we probably should raise it for the workers. With the pop growth of Athens/Sparta, we can easily make more settlers.

Thermo grows. It will go into disorder if I don’t do anything. I play with the slider bar, moving it from 1 to 3 luxuries. Three would not calm people down in Thermo. I move the slider to 2/7/1. Entertainers cued up in Thermo and Sparta. Peace shall be maintained. Math due in 8.

I change Thermo’s orders from barracks to a Galley. I want to checkout the near by islands ASAP. Yes, this will slow down our Russian war, but I consider intelligence important enough to do this.

Diplo check to look for workers. None available.

950BC (2) Delphi finishes its Library. I cue up a Galley. I consider a barracks, granary, harbor, and temple. None would be a bad choice. But exploration of the nearby island is calling…..

Diplo check reveals nothing.

925BC (3) Move workers. Diplo check.

900BC (4) Athens grows to 5. Temple and growth due in 3.

Thermo builds a boat. Barrack cued up.

Move workers. Diplo check.

875BC (5) Sparta builds a sword. I cue up a worker, as promised. Again, the worker will due us more good than the entertainer. I send one of Sparta’s warriors to Pharsalos to replace its warrior who will hop on the galley passing by.

Delphi’s borders expand.

Hammi now has code of laws.

850BC (6) Move Sparta’s workers to make its unit next turn and get an additional food.

Diplo check. Move workers.

Corrinth grows. Play with slider again, checking from 1 to 3 luxuries. Come back to 1 with a taxman hired.

The island to the north is only a 3 square spot. Worth populating eventually, but not now.

825BC (7) Adjust slider to 3/6/1 as Math due next turn.

Delphi’s build order switched to temple as the galley showed that the island doesn’t lead anywhere. We can get by with only 1 boat right now.

Move workers, diplo check.

800BC (8) We get Math. I look at construction and currency. Both are very expensive to research. We can research both Philosophy.and code of laws in the same time.

Readjust slider back to 2/7/1.

Move workers and diplo check.

I make a trade with Hammi. Math for Horse Riding, World Map and 30 Gold. I tried to substitute Code of laws the Horse Riding. It would have been rather expensive for us. I take the previous. I want to see his map as much as anything. I know that we cant use the horses immediately. But after St. Pete is claimed…..

775BC (9) Map shows that the Babs have several islands to the East. It also effectively shows that the island off Delphi is indeed small.

Move workers and Diplo check.

750BC (10) I realize that I have made a move. I had moved the warrior out of Corinth to cover the workers. Doing this took away the MP effect. The lost MP caused a citizen to be taken offline to be a taxman. I move the warrior back and reassign the citizen. ::sigh::

Diplo check shows that we are several techs ahead of Russia and their people admire our culture. They are annoyed with us. The Babs have Code of Laws and Polytheism to our Lit. They are polite. OUR people admire THEIR culture.

Note to the next player. The boat has a warrior on it. You might consider taking him off to put into MP duty. The warrior would have been used for scouting the island up north if it was going to be of any size. The boat is headed to the West now that the North has been somewhat scouted.