TGOMTG Conquest Class Challenge (C3C)

[Methos]

Ignore the above as I didn't bother signing peace at all. Figured I'd let Bede have all the fun!

Here it goes, hope it's not too long.

Pre-Turn: Whom, Korea’s price dropped to 500 so they must be researching Monarchy.

Trades:

Sumeria: We get Engineering; we give 860 gold
Korea: We get Feudalism; we give Engineering and Monarchy
Greece: We get Monotheism and 2 gold; we give Feudalism
Sumeria: We get 860 gold; we give Feudalism

We gained 592 gold and three first tier techs. I’d say we did pretty good!

Moved 4 cats out of WDC.

IT: Persians are building Sun Tzu’s. Horseman defeats Persian archer near Lagash. Spear in NY defeats a Persian archer who attacks from across the river.

1@360 AD: Washington Temple>Horseman. Boston Horseman>Temple. Fortify two of the cats in NY, send the other two on east. Move one of the workers south of SF to connect a road with Greece. Now that we have the second spice it would be nice to be able to trade it. Sorry but I just didn’t like the flip risk of SF so I rushed the temple for 96 gold. Move elite archer out of NY in preparation of my assault on Akshak (those silks are just too tempting).

IT: Two Persian spears come up from the south.

2@370 AD: Kish Worker>Settler (will probably change). Atlanta Temple>Horseman. San Fran Temple>Trebuchet (possibly change). One cat to Atlanta (fortifies) and the other heads for Lagash. Met the Ottomans, unfortunately they don’t have crap to trade with. I also went ahead and established an embassy with both the Ottomans (103 gold) and the Koreans (58 gold). Chicago is at max pop with one food wasted. I swapped out one tile with Agade and am changing the oasis from watered to mine. This will get Chicago at max food with no growth. One elite archer and five vets are heading for Akshak.

IT: There is a German archer and a Babylonian Bowman in Greece just south of SF. Again, Persians are building Sun Tzu’s.

3:380 AD: Upgrade 5 cats to trebuchets for 150 gold. Continue towards Akshak. Begin chopping forest near Erech and Isin. Move spear from SF to protect workers.

IT: Babylonian’s are building Sun Tzu’s. An elite Bab swordsman has shown up in Greece.

4@390 BC: WDC Horseman>Horseman. NY Horseman>Horseman. Chicago Horseman>Horseman. Horseman from NY kills Persian archer. Send two vet horseman from WDC towards SF. Our Persian invasion force is outside of Akshak.

IT: Bab bowman attacks someone to the east of him. The Bab swordsman moves adjacent to our workers and spear.

5@400 AD: Philly Barracks>Spear. We lose one vet archer and one elite archer but manage to take Akshak. BTW, Akshak was defended by two spears and an archer. Sorry about our elite I wasn’t paying attention and sent him up against a fully healed spear. My bad. Hehe, both Babylon and Persia are willing to negotiate. Workers finish road connecting our trade network with Greece. Move spear back to SF and get the workers out of there. The two vet horses reach SF and fortify. We bombard the two passing Persian spears removing one hp from one of them. They’re on a hill so I’ll wait until next turn to finish them off. Send some workers over to connect Akshak.

IT: A Persian archer heads towards Akshak. Persian spears continue towards Chicago. The Bab swordsman fortifies on the hill SW x2 from SF. The Bab bowman enters our territory.

6@410 AD: Boston Temple>Horseman. WLTKD in WDC. Move the two trebs out and bombard the spears, removing one hp form one of them. Follow this up with one vet archer (who kills a spear), an elite archer versus the 2 hp spear (yep, we lose our elite), and than a vet horse who is promoted to elite when he defeats the spear. Attempt to take out the Persian archer near Akshak and only manage to lose our archer. Move the other archers and captured workers back into Akshak for now.

IT: Bab swordsman kills a Greek archer. Persia sends one reg horse and four reg archers. The Bab bowman left our territory heading east.

7@420 AD: WDC Horseman>Horseman. Atlanta Horseman>Aqueduct. Archer kills Persian horse. Switched one of Erech’s citizens to a taxman as they were about to riot. Lux is already at 30%.

IT: Bab swordsman fails in his attack on the Greek city of Corinth. We lose an archer near Akshak and Persia now has 7 reg archers and a spear nearby. I fear we will not be able to hold the city so I’ll probably burn it to the ground. A Bab galley appears near Erech.

8@430 AD: NY Horseman>Horseman. Philly Spear>Spear. Chicago Horseman>Horseman. Arrakis City Temple>Treb. We can’t hold Akshak with our two archers so I burn it to the ground. Sorry.

IT: Persia and Sumeria have signed a peace treaty. Persia and Greece have signed a peace treaty. Looks like I’m stopping here to ask some questions online. Greeks are building the Great Library. Ottomans are barb hunting.

9@440 AD: Boston Horseman>Horseman. Archer defeats a Persian archer (promoted to elite). Archer defeats another Persian archer.

IT: Persian archer kills our wounded archer. Several Persian archers head north towards Atlanta. Babylonian spear heads north towards WDC. We lose the Great Lighthouse as Kish deposed to Sumeria.

10@450 AD: Washington Horseman>Horseman. Didn’t really do much this turn.

@Bede: The Horse stack near what used to be Akshak still has movement, figured I’d leave them for you. There are also several workers who haven’t moved yet either. They just finished their work and I left them for you rather than start something. I also didn’t sign peace with anyone so kill something, would ya? Also, in the horse stack are several workers who are also fortified. They are slowly building a road south towards the silks.

One last thing, our peace treaty with Sumeria ends next turn and they have an archer next to Isin. Their troops have been steadily heading south to fight the war so I haven’t paid much attention to them. Just noticed that archer.

 

[Bede]

Gotta deal with Sumeria right now. Jump down their throat as soon as the peace treaty breaks and make them go away from the north for good. I will make peace with Persia and Babylon to do it.

@Methos,

here is how namliaM handled the same trade series:

I did the trades for our TGOTM game this way:
Sumeria: Eng for 778
Korea: Feud + 256 for Eng
Back to Sumeria: 778 for Feud (no GPT )

Sumeria and Greece have not yet met??

On with Greece: Mono +2g (again no GPT ) for Feud
Korea: 423 for Monarchy

Net gain: 781g & 3 techs, lose Monarchy 'monopoly'

The difference is the use of cash in the opener with Sumeria than recapturing the cash on the back swing, and picking up the difference by selling Monarchy to Korea for cash. A lesson I learned some time ago is use the cash first, then trade knoweldge for that cash on the backswing. Also, giving two for one is a two-fer in reverse, better to give one and some cash then pick up the other on the way back.

What's bothering me now is that for one reason and another we have been unable to hols our gains in the north. The biggest reason has been the need to fight the Persians so we could not garrison the captured Sumerian towns properly, the other reason has been our abysmal cultural level, and the last reason is not finishing them in the north on the first go-round.

I didn't fight that part of the war so my comments need to be accepted with a grain of salt. I might have approached the tactical problem differently and gone straight for the capitol leaving Isin as a mop up project. By splitting the force and going for both Isin and Umma we failed to capture either. The lesson learned here is always concentrate, unless you are bringing overwhelming force to bear everywhere.

Got it. Will play tomorrow but try to comment further tonight, after finishing three turns in Handy15.

 

[Bede]

@Methos, Don't see the save. Am I missing something?

 

[Methos]

On Trades: I see one of my mistakes was giving them the amount of cash they asked for rather than check to see what the minimum amount was they'd take. Definite mistake. Also with the deal with Korea I failed to check on the minimum there as well.

Lesson learned, haggle with them. Thanks!

Should we consolidate our forces than and finish off Sumeria? Or should we attempt to work more on Persia? After losing Kish to Sumeria I worry about losing more.

 

[Bede]

Still looking for that file.....

 

[Methos]

Whoops, sorry. Here it is.

 

[Bede]

Whoops, sorry. Here it is.

Tanks, got it now.

 

[namliaM]

Biggest 'deal breaker' on the trade was not getting Gold from Korea in that trade (I think) Doing 2 for 1 should hold its own to doing 1 for 1 and Gold for 1, should it not?

My comments based on the turn log, not seen the save....

Sorry but I just didn’t like the flip risk of SF so I rushed the temple for 96 gold

a temple in a flip risk city does not 'really' help fight the flip risk. If you want to prevent flip you have to put (a lot off) units in the town or get your own culture growing (by having temples all over the place)

2@370 AD: Kish Worker>Settler

Kish has 2 sumerians, why not build a slave??? Less foreigners means lower flip risk..?!

San Fran Temple>Trebuchet

Why build another Treb? They are of no/little use in the (current) persian war, I would have gone with Horses....

Chicago is at max pop with one food wasted

Why hold towns at 6 pop? I would think either pop a worker/settler or build Aqua?!

5@400 AD: Philly Barracks>Spear

Defence? Take the war to your opponent, do not make them come to you. I would think Offense (Horse/Archer/Treb, in our current situation i guess Horse)

WLTKD in WDC

Is Lux rate up that high?

7@420 AD: Atlanta Horseman>Aqueduct

Atlanta has a barracks, can we spare the time to build an Aqua? Maybe build a worker/settler instead and keep pumping horses?

A Bab galley appears near Erech.

Do we have some horses near Erech? there may be a unit in that darn galley. Dont think Ur is defended...

8@430 AD: Philly Spear>Spear Arrakis City Temple>Treb

More defence?! More Trebs?! See above. Does Arrakis have a Barraks? If not then ignore that comment.

We can’t hold Akshak with our two archers so I burn it to the ground. Sorry.

Better to burn than to lose I guess, no need for the sorry tho.
Question: Why only 2 archers? We have multiple archers and dozens of horses around. Why are there only 2 archers?

Note: I commented on the things that I would do different, that does not mean I am right or that 'my way' is better. Just wondering, trying to keep learning on the how when and why of your strategy/Build order(s). an keep the learning curve going....

Sumeria ends next turn and they have an archer next to Isin

IIRC Sums were building a wonder in thier OCC, We can take/raze Kish and wait for the wonder to finish?

are several workers who are also fortified.

Must be something them workers can do? Why fortify them?

Persia is willing to give two of it's former Sumerian cities in the deal (the southern ones) and what little gold they have (something like 11 gold). Babylon is willing to do peace only if we give them Monotheism.

On peace with babylon I hate paying gold for peace, I hate giving away techs even more! Surely whe can hold our own against the babylons a bit longer? Maybe even attack a city or 2 using some Trebs (Can they get there?) Spears and archers (like we started on Sumeria)? They will want peace then and give us something in return...
On peace with Persia Hmz, hard to be at war with Persia & Babylon and kill off Sumeria. Guess we can take a peace with Persia for a while if we can take Sidon?! Asspecially if Persia is willing to give them to us, this means NO MORE DARN PERSIAN citizens in the towns (IIRC) and I dont think Sidon is under any cultural presure... Maybe Persia will even give us more (jungle) towns? I know they will not produce much, but atleast they will give unit support & 1gpt & be ours instead of Persia's, who will use the production against us instead of for us. If nothing else they can build their own workers to start clearing the jungles around them....
General I would really really like to see a few settler go into the jungle and claim some nice future spots and/or claim them luxes...

 

[Methos]

Since your commenting on my write-up I’ll point to the obvious things you overlooked.

Question: Why only 2 archers?

One elite archer and five vets are heading for Akshak.

You read it, it states I sent a force of six archers, apparently only two of them were left.

Must be something them workers can do? Why fortify them?

They just finished their work and I left them for you rather than start something.

Again, I specifically stated I fortified them so that Bede could set them on tasks that he preferred. I didn’t see a point in me setting them on a task when it was the end of my turnset.

 

[namliaM]

Sorry did not mean to offend you....

 

[soul_warrior]

hey guys, M & M.
chill. relax. have a or a .
i think we (this is the ROYAL WE speaking) that we never mean to offend ANYONE.
all is written in good faith and a quart of humour (and if you understand 50% of my humour, you get 12 points ).
*an exception to the quart rule

Spoiler :

i use a FIFTH

 

[Methos]

Sorry did not mean to offend you....

Don’t worry about it. I had just gotten off work, was extremely tired and grumpy and wasn’t in the correct state of mind to take it as a learning tool. I apologize for such childishness.

Edit: You know, one of those days its just better not to interact with other people?

chill. relax. have a <snip> or a .

Lol, ohhh how that would be so nice, but it’s been seven to ten years since I’ve done that so all I can do is reminisce. Besides, they test for it at work .

 

[Methos]

5@400 AD: Philly Barracks>Spear

Defence? Take the war to your opponent, do not make them come to you. I would think Offense (Horse/Archer/Treb, in our current situation i guess Horse)

I hesitated over this decision for quite a while, as I also wasn’t so sure about the spear either. I went with the spear due to several reasons. First and foremost was Babylon’s activity in Greece. Babylon was walking through Greek territory with absolutely no resistance. I realized Greece would more than likely fall soon and we wouldn’t have our buffer anymore.

Second was we had no force in that part of our nation and in truth at that time didn’t have the means to shift any forces over there. I did manage to send two horseman over just in case, but that wouldn’t be enough.

In summary, I decided to do a spear to protect that area until we could get back to it. BTW, I put the spear in Arrakis City so it could cover both SF and WDC.

Kish has 2 sumerians, why not build a slave??? Less foreigners means lower flip risk..?!

Didn’t realize that, my mistake. I was hoping to settle some of that free land in the north.

Why build another Treb? They are of no/little use in the (current) persian war, I would have gone with Horses....
<snip>
More defence?! More Trebs?! See above. Does Arrakis have a Barraks? If not then ignore that comment.

Yes, SF doesn’t have a barracks, hence the treb.

Remember that the silks near the former Akshak are not controlled by anyone. There is a lot of jungle territory available if we want it.

 

[Bede]

Well, I made peace with Persia, getting 5g and the two coastal towns. He was not about to give up Sidon. Then I paid off Babylon who proceeded to concentrate on the Greek with his maces and bowmen.

Moved all the forces north except the a covering horseman and archer and the troops in Arrakis and San Francisco. Over the nexe few turns the forces were disposed with the bulk of them at Isin, and the remainder at Sumer and Erech to deal with intruders from Umma, bu able to provide support to the column marching on Kish and from there to Umma.

In the meantime Hammirabi came by demanding more gold and I paid him off. Didn't need either the gold or the aggro. There is way too much gold in the treasury, BTW. Onl;y about about a grand or so to finace any Middle Age knoweldge buys. So I spent some of it rushing culture and settlers.

Spent a lot of time dithering about where to put the Forbidden Palace as determined leader fishing was unsuccessful. I really would like it in Agade I think because of the production potential but I wasn't sure I wanted to wait the 27 turns or so necessary. Anyway that is where it is building now. We will have to raise the luxury tax as the town grows so we don't lose any production to disorder, but that is the way it goes, and fell free to change the location if the team consensus is different as to location.

Miami was built to support the Sumerian war if it had gone badly, it is now set to self destruct so we can site a better town in that area.

When all was in place (500AD) the march on Sumeria began. Troop dispositions were four horsemen and two trebs in Sumer, two spears and two trebs in Erech, and eight horsemen, an archer and two trebs positioned to take Kish on the second turn of war. Kish fell into my hands in 520 with no casualties and the healthy horsemen moved on to the mountains above Umma, Miami was built in 530 and the horsemen at Sumer moved up to support the assault on Umma while the trebs from Sumer and Kish caught up to the invasding horsemen. And by 550 it was all over. One horseman was lost in the battle for Umma. during the advance a couple of wandering Enks appeared in the south, one was killed when he moved into the open grasslands and the other shadowed. There were no other Sumerian counterattacks.

Meanwhile the Babylonians carried the war to the Greeks and Thermopylae fell into their hands.

The Germans built the Great Library, which is really great news for us as we can now buy Babylonian and Persian technology at a discount and the Germans won't be buying from them either, so the Babylonian tech monster won't be getting any more monstrous.

Korea has learend Invention but I see no reason to buy it from him as we can wait for the other guys to learn it and buy really cheaply, or we use it as later trade bait for something more interesting. We really do need Invention as our heaviest offense is going to be longbows unless we can buy some iron from Hammi. Longbows are actually a pretty good value as they are a lot cheaper than knights (40sp vs. 70sp), have a defensive bombard, and the same A value as a knight. They are weaker in defense but a longbow/spear combo is cheaper and stronger than a knight. The opportunities for combined arms are stunning.

With Sumeria out of the way it is time to start developing the north and getting water to the south so the hills and mountains can be worked for productivity.

I sold Dyes to the Germans since they have at least one harbor town. And I gave an RoP to the Greeks. We may want to think about the relationship with the Greeks and using our troops to safeguard their existence. Should they find themselves in extremis we could gift them one or both of the jungle coastal towns gotten from Persia.

And now they are four:


soul - up
namliaM - on deck
Methos - hoed an even harder row
Bede - wrote finis to Gil.

 

[Methos]

Just looked at the save, great job btw.

Ur might want to take the citizen off the cow or else we’ll be wasted food. Move him to the mined grass and we’ll still grow in two without waste. For the next two turns Houston can work that tile, the shields don’t help due to corruption but at least it’ll grows faster (we’ll shave off two turns).

We have two cities at 90% corruption and five total above 70%. Since we’re not researching should we make these money-making farms? Irrigate them and max them out in pop and turn the extra citizens into taxmen?

How much does a courthouse help? Does it just reduce the max corruption down to 85% or does it reduce corruption by x%? I’ve never understood that.

Just about to comment on Miami when I remember it’s setup to self-destruct. I can’t remember does this produce two workers or a settler?

Should we send some defenders to our captured Persian/Sumerian cities?

Argh, just noticed Persia has already taken control of the silks.

 

[Bede]

Anything north of Sumer should be irrigated on the flats and mined (later) on anything with a tilt.

Corruption and waste will change when the FP finishes, but I build CH's almost everywhere. They pay for themselves. The reduction in corruption is in basis points, so if corruption is 85% it drops to 75%, etc, and then the comerce values are recalculated, and net will increase using the new corruption value times the total commerce.

In Miami you will get a single worker when the pop-up appears.

I would not send any defenders to the acquired towns until there are roads down there or they have grown to two. If somebody wants them then can have them until that point, but there is nothing worse than having forces stuck in one of those remote outpost kinda places.

 

[namliaM]

If we indeed are forced to go the Longbow way, shouldnt we start mass-producing some archers? and upgrade them at our leasure later? Archers are only 20 shields (IIRC) so we could produce 2 archers for 1 Longbow.

We will want to take (at least) a bite?! out of persia (and maybe Babylon) in the future. To get them gems and spices?! and offcourse the productive city's just east of WDC. (Will they be productive? Close to Palace, but high rank?!)

Why perserve Greece?

Why the FP in Agade? Why not Ur for instance, with the wonder(s) and the high f/s/c potential. Agade has a lot of hills/plains/Dessert while Ur has more grass and less mountains/hills.
What is the reasoning for placing the FP in Agade?

 

[soul_warrior]

got it.

plan - develop and irigate the north, build bows for the babylonians,
keep the Agade build

keeping Greece alive will keep a Sci civ in the game = more players = cheaper techs

 

[Methos]

Why the FP in Agade? Why not Ur for instance …

I’m confused as well, what is the reasoning? Ur does seem more productive since the majority of the land surrounding Ur is grassland. Agade has a lot of plains that must be irrigated to get to two food, other than a couple tiles to the south.

[Pause while I load up our game…]

Hmm, looking at the save I’m guessing the reasoning is that working the two tiles south of Agade provides 10 food themselves. Subtracting the 4 food necessary for those two citizens gives an excess of 6 food. This is enough to work all four hill tiles and the mountain and that isn't even counting all the other tiles that can feed themselves. Also Agade only also has 25% corruption where Ur has 68%. Am I close?

 

[soul_warrior]

[Pause while I load up our game…]

Hmm, looking at the save I’m guessing the reasoning is that working the two tiles south of Agade provides 10 food themselves. Subtracting the 4 food necessary for those two citizens gives an excess of 6 food. This is enough to work all four hill tiles and the mountain and that isn't even counting all the other tiles that can feed themselves. Also Agade only also has 25% corruption where Ur has 68%. Am I close?

well, having played with the grumpster a few, and trusting your counting skills....
i guess you are...
close, that is.