TH4 - The Age of Sail - OPEN SG

Greeks have Theology on us, English is unknown, since they will not speak with us.
To bad Dover was defended so well. WOuld have been nice to get that.

We have two caravels with spears/Swords in the ocean. Seems like our rep is shot also,
as in spite of 240 gpt income, we cannot get anything from Greeks for Theology.

IBT; Wounded 2/4 archer attacks and kills our warrior in Glanum, leaving us with a redlined swordsman.

760AD: ENtremont is at 16 spt. I will let it build horsemen, as the 50 shield swordsman will be evil. We could always
upgrade the horsies in a couple of turns to Knights. Camulodonum is our best city at 22 spt. This is also evil. I will let it build one turn, then rush a horse and switch to swordsman.

Entremont at size 12 is running a huge food surplus due to fish and whale. WIll see if I can get a worker or two out of it to mine the plains.
Brighton is defended by a pike. PIke dents first swordsman without getting hit, but second swordsman slices him, only to discover a second line of defenders. Spears this time though.
Birmingham is captured after liquidating its two spear defenders. ( Considering distances to capitols, decided to keep it.)
Build a city on the iron island where there was just our settler and a barb. Was thinking of rushing a warrior. To late I realize I cannot rush a warrior, since we have iron :)
Will wait a turn and rush. Discover we do not need any lux taxes right now. Next player better keep track of when our Golden age is done.

IBT: Greeks are building SIsitines.

770AD. The spear defending Brighton manages to retreat our second sword while yellowlining. I will not attack him with our spear, instead will have to heal our swordsmen.
I up lux tax again, since we need to get a few cities back into WLTKD.

IBT: No counterattack. Some English ships are prowling about, up to no good.

780AD. English will talk to us. They are ready to accept peace now, but they wont pay for it. They are also the world tech leader with bot Theology and Feudalism.
I would like to span them some more, and see what they can deliver. We have had three swordsmen in Birmingham for two turns now, but the lone resister is good at hiding himself.

IBT: Finally resistance in Birmingham ends. WIll rush a couple of warriors to keep the english in check, and use the swords to crack Brighton.

790AD Kill of the pesky archer/spear pair of that has been menacing us. Do a lot of exploring. Really want to uncover the world map. Tech pace seems like it is at a stand still.

IBT: English lands an archer on our mainland. The barbarian to our far east, near our newest city, manages to kill his stalking spear, while said spear was on a hill. :(
We will get pillaged. It is a small city, and a long way from our core, so I gather it will not hurt much, but I would rush some things anyway.

800AD: That was a nasty bowman. It retreats our first horseman, and then kills our second. OUr sword is down two before managing to kill it. With opposition this hard, it is no wonder it is promoted.

IBT: Got disorder in an outlying city that grew to size 2. Barbarian sacks us for 28 gold.

810AD: Brighton second run. STill only a spear on top, so we attack with our two healed swords. First is killed, while redlining spear. Second regular sword then wins.
Dover is defended by an elite spear, I will wait for reinforcements. Do not think two swords is enough. Greece has fed the warchests of the enlish by buying into Feudalism.
We still have 8 turns to go on the minimun research. Hmm, there must have been a turn or two without scientist. Sorry about slipping up.

IBT: English move their ships around in weird directions. I saw a city completign a library, and realize it might be time to start building up our capabilities for self research.

820AD: MOvement, exploration, no combat.

IBT: Japan wants us out of their waters.

830AD: Pop a deserted hut. Our three swordsmen makes the process short with the Elite and regular spear defending Dover. Think it is time to go to the negotiations table.
Lizzy still doesn't want to give us theology. This is bad, as we are running out of targets, and need to regroup our forces.
It is getting late, and I will leave the game here to next player. We are getting to a strong military. WIll be even stronger once we get Feudalism.
Have started LIbraries in a few cities. Probably should switch to military production if we want to dent the really large cities.

Save: http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads4/TH4-830AD.zip
 
(0) 830 – Let’s survey the situation. We’re in our golden age. That’s good. We’re running 20% luxuries when running 0% doesn’t hurt anything. That’s not good, but is quickly repaired. Glevum is running a tax collector when it doesn’t need one and Deva is running one too many clowns. Not good, but fixed. We lost our ability to make gpt/lux trades for hard goods (e.g., tech). :saiyan: I looked at the turn reports and, if my math is correct, we declared war on the English while we still had an ongoing lux deal with them. :nono: Ugh. We’re really going to need to build up our self-research capabilities or generate a lot of gold to make tech purchases. This goes in the not good category. Unfortunately, it cannot be remedied. I wake the caravel and two swords in Camo and send them toward Reading. Taking that city will take some gpt off the cost of Theology from England in a peace deal and will get us a few more steps closer to victory. MM some cities more efficiently. Finally, I scroll through the cities. Birmingham swaps to temple, Alesia to sword, Richborough to granary, Agedincum to duct, Eboracum to market, Ratae to harbor, Cataract to temple, Lindum to courthouse, Nemausus to market, Verulamium to library, Novio to temple, Curovernum to temple, ditto Brighton, Argos to duct, Segusio to temple, Mongun to courthouse, and Deva rushes worker. Almost all of those changes were made to facilitate our drive towards a domination victory. We are almost to the domination population limit and building temples in a lot of our outlying cities will bring us close to the land limit. Killing off rival cities here and there will speed us along further, but it appears to be easier to achieve domination than conquest.

(1) 840 – Gergovia: sword->settler. Deva: worker->temple.

(2) 850 – Entremont: sword->settler.

(3) 860 – Camu: sword->sword. Gergovia: settler->sword.

(4) 870 – Entremont: settler->sword. Alesia: sword->sword. Richborough: granary->sword. Augusto: library->sword. Nemausus: market->duct. Curo: temple->duct. Axima’s sword has to retreat against an English archer that landed on our shores.

(5) 880 – Our Axima sword defends against the archer’s attack. Veru: library->rax.

(6) 890 – Our GA has ended. Feudalism comes through and we begin Invention research @2nd @ 50% (six turns). Camulo: MI->pult. Our attack on Reading goes smashingly, as we win two straight battles and begin building a temple in our new city.

(7) 900 – Lugdunum: library->settler. Richborough: sword->temple. Veru: rax->MI. Gergovia: MI->MI. Reading’s resistance ended. It’s set to starve now. Burdigala: worker->temple.

(8) 910 – Entremont: MI->MI. Camulo: pult->MI. Tolosa rushes its settler. Glevum swaps to settler. Lapurdum is founded and begins a temple. The English have Gunpowder, because I can see some muskets in their mainland cities.

(9) 920 – Augusto: MI->MI. Tolosa: settler->settler. Glevum: settler->harbor. It costs us a sword, but Richmond falls and begins a temple. New Entremont is founded on a cozy little one-tile island and begins a temple. We make peace with England and get Theology+6gp for 14gpt. Thankfully, we can use gpt payments as part of a peace deal.

(10) 930 – Rich: temple->MI.

England has Education, Invention (for one more turn), and Gunpowder up on us. Our peace with the Greeks ends next turn. Pharsolos is ours for the taking and Delphi should be easy once we get another boatful of MI ready to sail over there. The workers that appear to be idle are, in most cases, waiting one more turn for Invention so they can irrigate without water access. There is a settler waiting to board the boat by Clevum. We should settle the uninhabited islands north of Spain with that settler and the one in the boat near New Entremont. There’s another settler in a boat northwest of Azteca. If we upgrade the swords in Tolosa and Reading and/or bring in a few MIs, we should be able to take Calix and Tlax from the Aztecs. Taking Knossos and settling the two islands north of Knossos should be high priorities, too. I left a lot of cash in the bank, which could be used to rush temples or military. It looks like the tech buying isn’t as much of a concern because we’re not likely to be facing too many muskets from anyone but England for quite awhile. In fact, we should be able to win the game without having to attack the English mainland. Finally, it looks like we’ve uncovered the important parts of the map, so maybe T-hawk can jump in and enjoy the game he created. :)
 
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads4/TH4-930AD.zip

th4930ad.JPG
 
Reagan,

Quote: "I looked at the turn reports and, if my math is correct, we declared war on the English while we still had an ongoing lux deal with them. Ugh. We’re really going to need to build up our self-research capabilities or generate a lot of gold to make tech purchases. "

Whoops, you are right. That was my fault. I pulled up the 650 AD save and noticed that while one of our deals with England expired in 2 turns, we had another one that didn't expire for 5 turns. I attacked 2 turns too early. Sorry about that everyone.

JMB
 
That stuff happens, JMB. I think we've lost per-turn trade rights in at least 70% (no exaggeration) of the SGs I've been in. It's easy to lose the "flow" of the game when you only participate in 20-25% of it as a member of a multi-player team. Fortunately, it looks like it shouldn't slow us down in this game.
 
Regrettable, but yeah, a reputation hit shouldn't hurt us much now.

I'd recommend going for a domination victory, since there are one-square islands out there and if anyone else gets a city on one we'll be stuck until marines. Domination shouldn't be too far away; it probably won't quite be reachable purely peacefully, but we can probably research up to cavalry pretty quickly if we wanted to. :hammer:

I don't got it right now, but if nobody claims it in the next day or two I'll go ahead and play a turn.
 
I got it.
 
Preturn: I liked most of Reagan's suggestions, in particular the attack against Alex.
I could not find the settler near New Entremont and the mil.advisor tells us we have only the
two near Clevum and NW of the Aztecs.

940: I dedide not to buy gunpowder @1 as we can get it in 5 and don't need it that much.
Richb. could now be set up as a settler factory (+7 food). It could produce military for 3 turns
(e.g. pikeman) and then the settler for the other three turns.
War preperations against Alexander.

950: Declare war on Greece, troops from Dover move towards Pharsalos
Two Caravels land MDIs near Phars.
New Alesia is founded NW of the Aztek homeland.

960: Take Phars. without losses, one MDI promotes to Elite
One worker captured, 3 hoplites dead, 1 hoplite and 1 archer still in the jungle
Defeat a hoplite/archer pair with gallics south of Calixtlahuaca
The Azteks land a settler/jag pair near Noviomagus, I tell Monti to leave
which he does.
I adjust science to 50% and we still get gunpowder in 3 while making
barely no deficit.


IT: The greek Archer dies to our veteran spear fortified in the jungle and our spear is now elite
The hoplite moves to the open ground, stupid AI

970: Our MDI takes the hoplite and the Pharsalos area is now clear.
I build a few more Caravels, this is the age of sail, we have numerous troops
to transport.

IT: The English build Leo

980: I collect troops for the assault on Alex's homeland.
I decide to hit them where it really hurts, Athen.
A caravel detaches two settlers and a gallic on the islands north of spain, they are ours next turn


990. We get gunpowder and I go for chemistry. We have plenty of salpeter, I think 3.
It has been ages since I self-researched in the Middle-ages, but the AI
is just too weak and we want cavalry sometimes.
Until now, our core was busy producing about 15 MDIs.
I order some muskets now. However, we should not produce a lot of them.
7 Caravels with MDIs, 2 Catapults a few horses an elite gallic and a settler
head for Greece, whereas reinforcements (MDIs and a second settler) are on their way.
We settle New Lugdnum north of Spain.

1000:The first wave lands near Athen. Alex moves additional troops into the city.
Too bad we are just too many...
We settle New Comulodunum on the second Island north of Spain.

1010:The great attack on Athen: First the Cats, as usually they miss. Hopefully they
will provide some defense fire IT. Then the Gallic (I would have liked more of them but
there was no time to collect them and bring them along), then 3 horses.
One hoplite dead, two injured, not bad.
Now the MDIs. We lose two of them, 8! additional hoplites and 3 archers are killed.
We take Athen and race it. Five workers are cought and sent back per ship,

IT: The greek counter-attack is a lonly LB that kills one MDI despite the Cats...
A greek hoplite/warrior pair lands near Pharsalos
and an Aztek settler/spear lands north of Lapurdum.

1020:Athen is replaced by New Athen, a rax is rushed.
Most of the MDIs are garrisoned. 3 additional Caravels with MDIs and a settler arrive.

IT: The warrior commits suicide against a spear, the hoplite is still in the jungle
near Pharsalos, but he can not even pillage something.

1030:A stack MDIs lands near Thermopylae, it should fall next turn.
A Caravel with MDIs is sent to Pharsalos.
We 'take care of' the hoplite (I love gallics), so they are not even needed.

Strategic summary: I avoided the additional war against the Azteks, but they are probably next on
our list. The troops in New Athen are ready next turn and Greece should be finished off easily.
There is a Caravel with Gallics (two elite, one vet) near Dover, they just didn't made it for
the first attack on Greece. The MDIs in and north of Pharsalos need new targets too.
If Greece falls quickly, all these troops can be used against the Aztecs.
There is a settler near New Athen and I would use him to replace Sparta.
The smaller cities shoul be no problem.
I couldn't do anything against the Aztek settler north of Lapurum, there are two gallics
there, just strike together with the main attack.
The captured greek workers are currently near Dover in two ships.
I would suggest libraries in Nemausus and even in Ratae Coritanorum.
Our core-cities are set to Muskets, we will need at least a few, I don't trust the
AI (especially when I look at LOTR6...).
There are two idle worker in Verulamium, I didn't have the boat-space to carry them over
to the Pharsalos area, which may be the only place worth developing.
The next beachheads should be covered by a few Muskets, we could upgrade a few spairs too
(Our best defender was an elite spair)

Good luck to the next leader.
 
Good turn, Belisar. You are right about the lack of a settler near New Entremont. I added that comment after looking at the picture and seeing the little white lines next to the boat. Unfortunately, one of the white lines was missing -- the settler that founded New Entremont. :)

As for building defensive units, unless we are going to use a few to escort offensive units that land on foreign shores, I prefer that we build mobile defense-through-offense units (e.g., horses, then knights and cavs) for our cities. Remember, with the Vikings not in the game the AI will be unable to attack our cities on the first turn unless and until they learn how to train marines. We're not going to let the game get that far. That gives us first shot at any foreign dogs that land on our shores. If we hit them hard with offensive units, we won't have any need for defenders outside of our own landing parties. Just something to think about . . . .
 
@JMB: Sorry, I made a double post as I typed 'got it' and recycled it for the save.
@Reagan: Agreed with building only a few defenders, I was only worried about the English. If they land stacks with Muskets it will be tricky to strike first until cavalry.
And of course, we definitely need them to cover our own landings, as you stated.
 
Belisar, np, I was just wondering as I didn't see it and thought that you might have forgotten to upload it (as I am apt to do...).

Reagan: Thanks for the pointer.

JMB
 
Welcome to the team, Arathorn! Hopefully you'll have nothing but smooth sailing on your turn. :)
 
Ah, well, it all came together tonight. Hard to get into the flow, though. I can see why this is somewhat struggling as an open game. Great concept, but it took me about 8 turns to get into the movement flow and I'm sure my ideas will be different than the next player's....

Anyway, it's hardly worth a turn-by-turn blow of the game.

Early: Surveyed. Surveyed. Looked around. Tried to get a feel for the game. MM'd cities to my heart's content. Looked around some more. We're at war with Greece. Aztecs are natural next target. Temples rushed in a number of locations to get more land/sea/coast under our control. Domination or conquest?

Oh, and then I started playing. Greece unloaded a few troops by Pharsalos/Dover, which made things exciting there. Ended up killing an archer with a spear. Not exactly the way it was planned. Thermopylae fell, too, right away, and we got some palace expansions. Corinth and Sparta (the latter razed) didn't take much effort, either. So I started moving in earnest towards the Aztecs.

Middle: Capture Delphi and Knossus to eliminate the Geeks. Xochicalco was razed easily. Tlaxcala captured, but I *greatly* underestimated the number of troops the Aztecs had on their home island. Landing party hit by a dozen archers the first turn and another 10 the next, killing tons of troops. I'd killed another half-dozen archers on the offense, too. No cities captured/razed yet. It's kinda ugly up there. A demon spear in Calixtlahuaca, apparently spurred on by the difficulty in spelling the name of his city, retreated two vet gallics and killed a longbow.

End: Calixt...finally captured. Tenochtitlan assaulted and 8 spears killed. More still showing. Should fall in a turn or two, I would expect. Raze it as it's been whipped mercilessly. I don't really have a settler in position, but one can be rushed in old Greece and sent up there ASAP.

Aztecs are nearly gassed and should start suffering soon. Troops on hand might be enough, if they're used very carefully. A city with barracks for healing is a must.

I put sci on min after Chemistry came in. Min on Metallurgy. I see no need to hurry anything. And the cash was helpful for rushing things.

Japan is the next target, fairly obviously. I'm starting to try to move troops in that general direction. England could work, too, but I think the Japs make more sense.

Next leader's key to power is found at http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads4/TH4-1130ad.zip

Arathorn
 
Got it. I'll play and post tonight, barring something unexpected happening (like Cameron Diaz asking me out, an armored car crashing in front of my house and spraying money all over the street, etc.). If someone wants to play/post before 9 pm Eastern tonight, be my guest. I'll pick it up from there.

BTW, we are at the pop limit for domination and don't need too much more land area.
 
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