Sury demigod shadow

[jnebbe]

T105-132

Spoiler :

I want to keep warring, because I feel like my attacks are always good and I get land but I don't really know how to recover fast besides just mashing next turn, and what the next step is after that first breakout.

Forgot to show Genghis' land. Good amount of green and lots of food (also GLH lol)

Speaking of, he declared on Hatty after like 3 turns of plotting lol. I waited a few turns to let his stack go into her territory, then I declared.
I think only Nap and Qin liked him so only -1 with those two

This trade was available for 5 turns or so, I was hoping he would give more than 50 gold but he never did so I just did this.

My roaming axe lost an 85% battle to snipe a barb city for gold :/

I kinda get what Izuul said about your army being a bunch of "whatevers" to clean up, I only have 3 or 4 elephants at any given time but in the past I would've made way more and not enough catapults

Genghis is completely falling over so I make a go for GLib, I had 10 or 11 cats still and was hardly losing units. If Hatty wasn't distracting I probably wouldn't do this.

GLib+Music in the same turn

I think I declined this because I wanted to trade for machinery or feudalism. I never know what to do for demands+embargos and usually feel like I make the wrong choice...

I believe this turn I went into HR+OR

Just in time
Genghis just has 1 more tundra city to the north

Qin just got CoL this turn; for the longest time Huayna was the only one with it, which is a small problem since courthouses would be great to build right now, and it's needed for philo. Should I tech it myself? I can get it in 2 turns. Already gotten 6 tech trades, but maybe with Hatty at friendly it doesn't really matter.

-140gpt at 100% and +46 at 0%.
Wanted to settle either the marble by capital, coastal for GLH and can work a FP cottage, or the tundra spot which grabs silver+gold, and can share the cow to grow to a decent size.
I have a scientist to bulb philo, and an artist for a golden age, but all my cities are soooo small, none are double digit pop.
What's the win con here? What kind of great people do I want? Seems a little late for cuirs so probably not merchants, and the map is one big blob of hinduism so war will be hard anyway. 10 cities is decent but I feel like I will not be able to keep up as the game goes on and the era bonuses get bigger.

 

[a pen-dragon]

Spoiler :

Good war.

I think I declined this because I wanted to trade for machinery or feudalism. I never know what to do for demands+embargos and usually feel like I make the wrong choice...

IMHO there are two scenarios that have to be considered separately: If they are cautious or lower, they can start plotting if you refuse to give them tribute, else they cannot (unless I am missing some edge-cases?). If they can not start plotting, all you take is a -1, against some leaders -2 diplo hit. If they do not ask too many things this is fine. Depending on how easy a leader is to please, it might not matter. For example, Hatty, with OR as fav civic and up to +6 from religion is easy to get to friendly, as seen in your game.

Anyway I would reject almost all demands if the demanding party can not plot on me.

If they can plot (Cautious or lower), you have to be careful. Can you withstand a war? How much will it slow you down? If you are not building up for a war you will typically want to give in to their demands. If you have to go to war against a specific target and that is not the party demanding tribute, you give in. If you want to attack them anyways, you might want to refuse.

Qin just got CoL this turn; for the longest time Huayna was the only one with it, which is a small problem since courthouses would be great to build and it's needed for philo. Should I tech it myself? I can get it in 2 turns. Already gotten 6 tech trades, but maybe with Hatty at friendly it doesn't really matter.

Courthouses are not that good. The thing is that you typically will want to go for State Property, which caps maintenance at 8 per city on Deity. This makes Courthouses much weaker. Basically you have to ask yourself if a courthouse pays back sufficiently quickly. For an organized Leader they make more sense, but 120 is a lot. This could be 120
immediately, i.e. one turn of research, This then snowballs, etc.

For Hatty on Deity you reach WFYABTA after trading 14 techs. So this is no major cause for concern, even if not being Friendly.

In this game I would say that bulbing Philo is less important as you already got Machinery. You might get Feudalism and, if lucky, Civil service in trades. That said, CS would go nicely with your captial, and CoL is on the way, so I would say, go for it when you have enough gold for CS.

Wanted to settle either the marble by capital, coastal for GLH and can work a FP cottage, or the tundra spot which grabs silver+gold, and can share the cow to grow to a decent size.

Why not both? Silver + Gold is useless itself, but increases your happy cap by 4, making it very valuable. It does not even need to grow itself, just the resources are good enough. Also The marble spot to could help the cottages in your capital. IMHO it should be on the hill 1E of the marble, for more overlap. Additionally, you might want to cottage your capital, instead of putting down farms. It has enough food to cottage every possible tile. With bureau you want to maximize commerce in your capital.

I have a scientist to bulb philo, and an artist for a golden age, but all my cities are soooo small, none are double digit pop.

Why are they so small? Do you not have enough happiness resources? (Btw, you need sailing and calendar for the spices.) Especially your capital should be bigger. IMHO you are short on workers, seeing the lack of improvements around Hari and Ning-hsia. Also Angkor Thom is working an unimproved tile and will probably soon be growing to work what currently is jungle tiles. If you want to add cities these will need quite a few worker turns, amplifying your shortage.

What's the win con here? What kind of great people do I want? Seems a little late for cuirs, and the map is one big blob of hinduism so war will be hard anyway. 10 cities is decent but I feel like I will not be able to keep up as the game goes on and the era bonuses get bigger.

Sure, all that Hinduism does not look good. OTOH it means that you can probably attack Hatty and secure against bakcstabs down the road. You will need to time this with the AP though.

You do not have enough different religions for Culture.

You do need some war. My rule of thumb for space is that you need at least 50% more cities than the biggest AI to be relatively secure. In my experience Saladin is quite a tough opponent for space races as well. Based on a sample size of a few games, he seems to prioritize Compurters more than other AIs and the Internet is huge.

Cuirs seem very much in play. Hatty seems to be the logical target due to land shape and being the least militaristic AI in this bunch. Both Sal and Qin are Protective and thus harder targets. That said, You + Hatty + some backfill gets you to ~25 cities which is sufficient if the others do not expand.

 

[jnebbe]

Spoiler :

Good war.


IMHO there are two scenarios that have to be considered separately: If they are cautious or lower, they can start plotting if you refuse to give them tribute, else they cannot (unless I am missing some edge-cases?). If they can not start plotting, all you take is a -1, against some leaders -2 diplo hit. If they do not ask too many things this is fine. Depending on how easy a leader is to please, it might not matter. For example, Hatty, with OR as fav civic and up to +6 from religion is easy to get to friendly, as seen in your game.

Anyway I would reject almost all demands if the demanding party can not plot on me.

If they can plot (Cautious or lower), you have to be careful. Can you withstand a war? How much will it slow you down? If you are not building up for a war you will typically want to give in to their demands. If you have to go to war against a specific target and that is not the party demanding tribute, you give in. If you want to attack them anyways, you might want to refuse.


Courthouses are not that good. The thing is that you typically will want to go for State Property, which caps maintenance at 8 per city on Deity. This makes Courthouses much weaker. Basically you have to ask yourself if a courthouse pays back sufficiently quickly. For an organized Leader they make more sense, but 120 is a lot. This could be 120
immediately, i.e. one turn of research, This then snowballs, etc.

For Hatty on Deity you reach WFYABTA after trading 14 techs. So this is no major cause for concern, even if not being Friendly.

In this game I would say that bulbing Philo is less important as you already got Machinery. You might get Feudalism and, if lucky, Civil service in trades. That said, CS would go nicely with your captial, and CoL is on the way, so I would say, go for it when you have enough gold for CS.


Why not both? Silver + Gold is useless itself, but increases your happy cap by 4, making it very valuable. It does not even need to grow itself, just the resources are good enough. Also The marble spot to could help the cottages in your capital. IMHO it should be on the hill 1E of the marble, for more overlap. Additionally, you might want to cottage your capital, instead of putting down farms. It has enough food to cottage every possible tile. With bureau you want to maximize commerce in your capital.


Why are they so small? Do you not have enough happiness resources? (Btw, you need sailing and calendar for the spices.) Especially your capital should be bigger. IMHO you are short on workers, seeing the lack of improvements around Hari and Ning-hsia. Also Angkor Thom is working an unimproved tile and will probably soon be growing to work what currently is jungle tiles. If you want to add cities these will need quite a few worker turns, amplifying your shortage.


Sure, all that Hinduism does not look good. OTOH it means that you can probably attack Hatty and secure against bakcstabs down the road. You will need to time this with the AP though.

You do not have enough different religions for Culture.

You do need some war. My rule of thumb for space is that you need at least 50% more cities than the biggest AI to be relatively secure. In my experience Saladin is quite a tough opponent for space races as well. Based on a sample size of a few games, he seems to prioritize Compurters more than other AIs and the Internet is huge.

Cuirs seem very much in play. Hatty seems to be the logical target due to land shape and being the least militaristic AI in this bunch. Both Sal and Qin are Protective and thus harder targets. That said, You + Hatty + some backfill gets you to ~25 cities which is sufficient if the others do not expand.

How does machinery affect philo? I'll need philo for cuirs anyway.

I whipped my core cities for units maybe once, one was working 2 PH mines to slowbuild units, and I believe they had -1 or 2 health bc I traded corn for gpt when I didn't need and forgot to cancel. I think my happy cap was only 8 bc I got HR rather late. I definitely could use another worker or 2.

Is cuirs still possible? I aim for t160-170 to declare with cuirs and I figure nationhood+MT+CS+gunpowder will take way too long since my eco isn't that great right now. I have a couple good production cities with settled generals, I'm more worried that the tech will take too long.
But also if I'm going cuirs, wouldn't it make sense to not settle the marble city? gold/silver might still be worth but I don't even have any forges yet

 

[a pen-dragon]

How does machinery affect philo? I'll need philo for cuirs anyway.

One of the main uses of a Philo bulb is to trade it for other medieval techs. Typically machinery, feudalism and civil service are targets. Since you already have machinery you can not trade Philo for it and thus the value of the bulb decreases.

Keep in mind that you do not get the full value of a bulb from Philo. If you do not do anything time-sensitive (trades!) and are going for Lib it might be better to bulb Education for the full value.

Is cuirs still possible? I aim for t160-170 to declare with cuirs and I figure nationhood+MT+CS+gunpowder will take way too long since my eco isn't that great right now.

Cuirs are possible until Rifles show up. Also Cuirs into Grens is painful. Looking at how the AIs do for tech I think you have a bit more time. Seeing how nobody has paper yet Lib still looks possible.

Your current breakeven rate is 25%, and that will go up quickly as your cities grow (on cottages).

gold/silver might still be worth but I don't even have any forges yet

2 more happy cap is still good.

But also if I'm going cuirs, wouldn't it make sense to not settle the marble city?

Basically the question is if it helps your econ. With 4 trade routes and a couple of cottages it should.

 

[jnebbe]

T132-156

Spoiler :

Genghis is dead, actually not a terrible city bc 4x trade routes, lighthouse+baray
Also, fur+fish could be nice to get later. I don't need either but I could trade them away.

I got my 2nd scientist and was able to double-bulb education, but still needed philo for liberalism, and ofc giving away education means other civs could get lib as well. I waited a few turns until I thought I had enough gold to go straight to lib during my golden age.

Mission success

Scouted all of Hatty's land, her stack is just chilling in her capital. This could be pretty awkward at the beginning because there's such a wide front and I don't know which direction she'll go. I wonder if it's worth investing in some spies to scout for the first few turns? Regardless I'll probably want to start on the right side since it's better land, it's mostly desert to the west off-screen.

I realized I made a pretty big mistake with my great people, the capital generated 2 scientists so far, and then 1 merchant during the GA. That's one of the reasons it was so small after the war, bc it's had 50 turns of -4 food (and ofc it has both not been growing cottages or benefiting from Bureaucracy.) But Hari also built GLib and got a 3rd scientist out which I completely didn't think of. I tried run a bunch of merchants when I realized for the ~10% merchant but no luck. I have 2 great merchants already and will definitely get a 3rd out before the war so maybe it's not that bad. Is it worth to use the scientist+1 merchant for a 2nd GA? I'd probably get all 3 merchants out so 4 in total, and it would let me get out of pacifism and maybe go vassalage without anarchy. Maybe just keep him to bulb chemistry or astro?
OTOH Qin is teching Edu right now but I can trade it for gunpowder which makes the attack a bit faster. -247gpt at 100%, +87 at 0 so MT is still kinda far, some cottages aren't being worked over merchants but it seems pretty rough still, should I stop making as many elephants? No courthouses but I'm chopping 2 out that have spare forests.
Atm I have 20 elephants, 13 on the right and 7 on the left. Don't know if I should keep them all on 1 side and risk Hatty's stack going to the other, or split them up.

 

[a pen-dragon]

I waited a few turns until I thought I had enough gold to go straight to lib during my golden age.

You could probably have put a turn into Philo and then traded it for CoL and Lit. This would have allowed for Nationalism before Lib, Libbing MT for more beakers and starting earlier on the Taj.

This could be pretty awkward at the beginning because there's such a wide front and I don't know which direction she'll go. I wonder if it's worth investing in some spies to scout for the first few turns? Regardless I'll probably want to start on the right side since it's better land, it's mostly desert to the west off-screen.

IMHO you should not think in terms of land value, but where you can hit the army in the best manner. This probably means attacking Heliopolis from the South and trying to hit the army while it is moving. Byblos might be possible as well, but is more difficult to access. OTOH this army is heavy on mounted and siege with few units getting defensive boni, so it could be possible to hit it in a city.

Atm I have 20 elephants, 13 on the right and 7 on the left. Don't know if I should keep them all on 1 side and risk Hatty's stack going to the other, or split them up.

That depends on the attack plan.

No courthouses but I'm chopping 2 out that have spare forests.

Why? those forests would be better used in units.

I have 2 great merchants already and will definitely get a 3rd out before the war so maybe it's not that bad. Is it worth to use the scientist+1 merchant for a 2nd GA? I'd probably get all 3 merchants out so 4 in total, and it would let me get out of pacifism and maybe go vassalage without anarchy. Maybe just keep him to bulb chemistry or astro?

So, first you want Taj. You have marble, so it is not that expensive. If you do an additional GA you should start it before completing the Taj for the extra GA turn. Also I think that it would be better to get Cuirs earlier, even if it means burning more money on research.

With 2 merchants you can expect to get 2200-2600 gold. Try to find the city with ToA, or if that is not good enough a big coastal city that is far from your capital. Your capital should be as big as possible when making the mission.

Also your capital should definitely not be running merchants. It is only the third city in line to get one out, so it would take an eternity. At the same time a bigger capital translates into more gold from trad emissions and, if you are running bureau, into more research.

should I stop making as many elephants?

An elephant into cuir upgrade costs 100 gold. So you can upgrade around 30. Since getting the tech will take a bit of time you should maybe (almost) complete the builds but not get the units out yet. This allows you to not pay maintenance for what basically is a finished unit.

 

[jnebbe]

T156-173

Spoiler :

Bunch of trades, everyone's friendly so no trade limit for now

I started the 2nd GA t156 I think. I guess I did not notice that 2 other civs had gotten nationalism so I did not get taj, only ~250 failgold.
Regardless, got the 2nd merchant out and I'd get the 3rd a few turns into the war.
I begged Theology from Qin and swapped to these civics.

Used my 2 merchants and declared T166. The blue lines indicate where her stack could be. On t166 it could move to anywhere under the lower blue line and the next turn it could move anywhere below the top line, so I moved all my cuirs above the 2nd line on the next turn after that.

Hatty didn't want to fight me so she sent everything west I lost Old Sarai but took 2 Byblos and Helio. I didn't want to throw my stack at hers bc she had so many elephants, and I just wanted to keep cuir numbers high and see what happens.

She moved her stack into the fort on the dye (and luckily for me, left almost all her elephants in Old Sarai. I pillaged the road on the chokepoint Dye, she moved there next turn, and the rest is history.

That's a lot of green!

So here I am on t174, and I don't know what to do. AP vote is next turn, but the AP is in Thebes. I think Hatty won't vassal to anyone during the war since I'm friendly with everyone else and thus can't be bribed on. If I ceasefire now to dodge the vote, there's a high chance she peace-vassals to someone which would be a disaster. She won't cap but I don't want to cap do I? I think I just want the cities to myself. I have 45 or so cuirs but they're all pretty spread out. I know I can wipe her out, but I just need to know how to deal with this next vote. I can probably take Thebes, and hopefully hold it for just next turn, and then get reinforcements there from the north in time to defend from her elephants.

 

[a pen-dragon]

I think (but am not absolutely certain) that Hatty would not peace-vassal at the current time, due to her considerable territory.

To avoid an AP peace resolution, you can do a cease-fire, wait until the resolution is done and declare again. Alternatively you can defy.

Also Nappy is only pleased and can be bribed against civs he is pleased with, so that could be possible later on.

Getting PP from Nappy would probably be good as well. (For Guilds and Lib, or even MT, as it is not that valuable anymore)

 

[jnebbe]

t173-193

Spoiler :

I ended up ceasefiring since Hatty had quite a lot of land as pointed out and didn't look likely to vassal.
She had a stack of elephants which I was (maybe too) afraid of so I moved in slowly with a few pikes and tried to bait her to attack me on a hill. She didn't and gave more time to reinforce the capital.

Thebes was a total b**** to take, I probably lost 15+ cuirs on that city alone, so many muskets and longbows on a hill, but ultimately I had the numbers advantage, and she completely ran out of steam.

Huayna freed himself from Saladin strange considering Saladin grabbed more land from the captured border cities.

Nap started plotting while we had peace from a beg so it wasn't for me, he just wanted to scare me a little by going this way

A few turns later and Egypt is no more. I settled a few cities plus 1 more next turn wherever I could fit so I'll be at 28 total.

834 bpt and -456 gold at 100%, +242gold at 0%, but that will get better once the rest of cities come out of revolt.
Communism is 4.2turns away at 100%
Obviously state property and caste when I can, should I go OR too?
Is space race the play here? Everyone basically loves each other so war will be really messy. I don't think I've ever won a space race at a high difficulty, but I do have 1 memory of getting all my parts destroyed by spies. Do I need espionage or spies to defend? Do I need any buildings besides observatory/labs, forge+factory+leeves?

 

[a pen-dragon]

Obviously state property and caste when I can, should I go OR too?

OR will definitely be good for building factories. If you should stay in it depends on your win plan.

Is space race the play here?

AT this point in time you can basically choose your win condition from domination or space. To go domination, tech up to tanks, build 100-150 of them, add in a few spies or planes and just roll over the AI.

To go space, beeline computers after Communism.

You are currently 8 relevant techs behind (Constitution, Economics, Corporation, Rep parts, steam power, chem, physics and steel). That is a significant amount if the AI will trade techs between themselves. IMHO you should tech to assembly line, and decide whether to go for domination or space when you could start building tanks. There is little difference in the strategy before that point. For a space victory you would build more (science) buildings...

Try to have a golden age ready for civic swaps and building of factories when you research assembly line.

Let me repeat here that I consider Saladin to be amongst the most dangerous AIs to be doing a space race against, as he is a relatively good overall leader and seems to have a high preference for going computers. (I have lost a few (and had a few more close) games against him in that manner.)

Do I need any buildings besides observatory/labs, forge+factory+leeves?

No, except power plants. IMHO the cities that will not be building a spaceship part do not even need a lab.

I don't think I've ever won a space race at a high difficulty, but I do have 1 memory of getting all my parts destroyed by spies. Do I need espionage or spies to defend?

The AI does sabotage parts rather frequently. However, this does depend on your relations. If they are friendly or pleased this hardly happens. To be a bit safer, you could prebuild all parts, but only finish them when you need them to launch the ship, so that optimally they all finish the turn before you launch, minimizing espionage risks.

 

[jnebbe]

t193-231

Spoiler :

Civics change, Rep to get Napoleon to friendly. 0 great people so I had to tank 3 turns of anarchy.

If I put 1 turn into rifling I can get that+steel from Nap.

Nothing's really happening, just covered my land with windmills and workshops.
Nap is plotting, almost surely on Huayna.
Qin and Saladin have had a defensive pact for ages. Can I beg from one and attack the other without triggering the defensive pact? I've never tried mass tanks before, but it sounds quite fun. What is a tank if not a cuirassier on wheels
nvm just tested it and you'll get declared on by the other party regardless.

Space it is?

 

[a pen-dragon]

Could you show what your cities are doing? Only +200 /turn in this situations is worrying.

Edit: This is worrying since you are on 100% gold.

 

[jnebbe]

Could you show what your cities are doing? Only +200 /turn in this situations is worrying.

Edit: This is worrying since you are on 100% gold.

all cities are building research, almost all factories are done

 

[a pen-dragon]

Did you build power plants?

You should be building wealth instead of research, as you should have a better modifier for research than wealth. The increased wealth should be used to increase the research slider. Try it out and compare the tech rates.

Did you keep your towns? Your 0% wealth rate dropped from 400 to 200.

IMHO with lots of mature towns it is better to go free speech and keep the towns until you actually start building ship parts.

What do you usually do for a space race?

Frankly, from what I know, your current position seems tight for space. It should be possible to win, but I would like to have better look at your empire before proceeding. Could you upload a save of the current status?

 

[jnebbe]

Did you build power plants?

You should be building wealth instead of research, as you should have a better modifier for research than wealth. The increased wealth should be used to increase the research slider. Try it out and compare the tech rates.

Did you keep your towns? Your 0% wealth rate dropped from 400 to 200.

IMHO with lots of mature towns it is better to go free speech and keep the towns until you actually start building ship parts.

What do you usually do for a space race?

Frankly, from what I know, your current position seems tight for space. It should be possible to win, but I would like to have better look at your empire before proceeding. Could you upload a save of the current status?

Just tested it, at breakeven gpt build research is 1400bpt. Building wealth gives 1475bpt by running slider at 100% and then assigning cities to build research until gpt is breakeven.
I normally workshop over my cottages no matter what, unless I'm FIN then I might keep to go into universal sufferage. I never go for space race so I just assumed that's what you do. No powerplants yet, are grocer's worth for the health?
Is there a number of tanks I could get where I could conquer Qin+Saladin at the same time? Currently 1191 hammers per turn empire-wide, maybe 1500 after powerplants. Tank is 180, that's 8.3 tanks per turn, round up to 9 bc Hari has the Heroic Epic. I've never gone mass tanks before so no idea how well it would work.

 

[a pen-dragon]

You really need power plants for replacing towns to make sense. The question (before building the spaceship) is what generates more science.

A town is 5 , a workshop 4 . With modifiers of 25% (science) and 100% (production), that is 6.25 or 8 . That 25% science from a library should really be present in all your cities, since you are creative and going for space. Without power this changes to 6.25 for a town and 6 for workshop, meaning that the workshop is less efficient. Note that if you have an observatory and university (city will build a spaceship part and contributed to oxford), that adds +50% science, i.e. a town will be worth 8.75 and thus more than a workshop, even with power. With free speech, a town is worth 7 , or 8.75 with a Library only. Thus, in free speech, you typically want to keep towns as long as possible (IW city is the exception), and else just in a selected few cities.

Another thing that I neglected to mention and you neglected to do, is to build oxford university. This is really the only reason to still keep running bureau, as it will increase any by a factor of 1.5 (bureau commerce modifier) *2.75 (oxford + lib + obs + uni) = 4.125 or 1 town = 20.625 . Even with all these modifiers, it can still be beaten by a sufficiently wide empire. Bureau increases the science output from towns in the capital by 50%, so is responsible for 6.875 per town. Lets assume 15 towns in the capital, resulting in 103 . Even without modifiers, this will be offset by running free speech if you have 52 towns. The production bonus from bureau has been neglected here, but it will typically not be much as the capital is mostly working towns. Additional science modifiers will make FS even better. Also free speech is less expensive (low vs. high upkeep).

I did not consider US here, but if you can run it alongside FS it makes the towns even stronger. The problem is that you need democracy for it, i.e. ~4700 , or about 3000 raw science (20% prereq bonus from constitution + bonus from other civs knowing it). At 1 /town with 100% production modifier this would require 1500 town-turns, or 30 turns with 50 towns just to get your investment back. Thus US is not a sufficient reason to tech democracy. If you can get it on the cheap from a civ that can not trade you anything else that is even remotely useful, this can be worth it.

So, key points:

• build power plants ASAP
• build oxford after finishing wars
• check if free speech is worth it
• do not self tech democracy

About health buildings, you do want those to counter unhealthiness, but not more. Barays and harbours are better than grocers for health though.

Depending on how much time you want to spend on this game, it might be worth it to go back to T193, build oxford, maybe go into FS, build wealth when you have nothing else to do, build observatories in shipbuilding cities and build power plants sooner, and compare to the current state. I think that would be a worthwhile learning experience for recovery/going for space.

I did make a quick test, building coal plants, required health infrastructure and a few observatories, and got to 2100

per turn at T239.

Beating Saladin to the Internet will be really difficult, as he only needs plastics and computers, and your science needs some work. Not having the internet hurts, but in this case I think you would only get 2-3 useful techs (artillery, rocketry, maybe satellites), so it would not be the end of the world. However, this would mean going directly for the expensive projects, namely the apollo program, then for superconductors for labs, fusion to start on engines,genetics, and the rest of the techs that unlock parts.



If you want to go to war, you do not need to conquer them both at the same time. It is sufficient to attack one and defend against the other. As both are protective, you will need more units attacking. OTOH they have not been at war, so will probably have few units. Scout to confirm this!

If you can attack them before they get mechs you would need less units. To gauge how many units you need, estimate how many you need to defeat ones army on the defence and the other ones on the offence. Get spies for revolts to get around cultural defences, at least in the initial few cities. A revolt into wartime civics (police state and theocracy) would probably be worth it, due to the additional modifier on building units and XP. Around 100 tanks would probably be sufficient, a bit more to be safer. Once you got the tech you need (industrialism and combustion), turn on the espionage slider to be able to do a few revolts.

If you are unsure if you have enough, you might want to just try it out, and if it fails, reload, build more and try again, to get a feeling for how many you need.

 

[jnebbe]

You really need power plants for replacing towns to make sense. The question (before building the spaceship) is what generates more science.

A town is 5 , a workshop 4 . With modifiers of 25% (science) and 100% (production), that is 6.25 or 8 . That 25% science from a library should really be present in all your cities, since you are creative and going for space. Without power this changes to 6.25 for a town and 6 for workshop, meaning that the workshop is less efficient. Note that if you have an observatory and university (city will build a spaceship part and contributed to oxford), that adds +50% science, i.e. a town will be worth 8.75 and thus more than a workshop, even with power. With free speech, a town is worth 7 , or 8.75 with a Library only. Thus, in free speech, you typically want to keep towns as long as possible (IW city is the exception), and else just in a selected few cities.

In my mind I was thinking workshops would be better even without power because you're getting those 6 beakers every turn regardless of what slider is at, and in reality you'll also be able to run 100% slider every 3-4 turns. But the 6.25 beakers from the town is only that much while running 100%, and after paying for maintenance. That's why I workshopped everything without really thinking.

 

[Plains-Cow]

In my mind I was thinking workshops would be better even without power because you're getting those 6 beakers every turn regardless of what slider is at, and in reality you'll also be able to run 100% slider every 3-4 turns. But the 6.25 beakers from the town is only that much while running 100%, and after paying for maintenance. That's why I workshopped everything without really thinking.

Did you do any of the math behind this to test? You can add up what you're actually making in terms of beakers regarding your workshop vs. cottage(town) setup under typical play conditions and then again in ideal conditions over 10-20 turns to see how fast you're able to tech and switch into various economies (research mode, war mode, etc) to see what's most versatile vs. what's most efficient. However, considering, the current high-level meta seems to be having your entire empire working towards one goal, it seems like what works best is what you can do at-large. I know it's a pain sometimes, but learning a few core math mechanics behind CIV IV is what took my game to the next level. I'd spend a day or two playing with this in worldbuilder. Mostly because ideal conditions don't always mean practical conditions.

 

[jnebbe]

Well it's t252 and Saladin has modern armors . I tried attacking with 130 tanks to see what would happen, I could capture 1 city but modern armors+gunships just devour tanks, he has sushi and I'm losing a ton of tiles to that, he can just take 3 border cities after I take my turn. Do I just tech to my own modern armors? He's still fairly far from space.

 

[Plains-Cow]

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Well it's t252 and Saladin has modern armors . I tried attacking with 130 tanks to see what would happen, I could capture 1 city but modern armors+gunships just devour tanks, he has sushi and I'm losing a ton of tiles to that, he can just take 3 border cities after I take my turn. Do I just tech to my own modern armors? He's still fairly far from space.

Nukes are always an option.