temurleng
Another Dumb Message
(I'm beginning to go through alot of my saved games, and this was another very interesting one...)
This was a game played on a map based on the Pacific. I played it back when the only two governments I was comfortable in were Despotism and Fundamentalism. In the game, I ran into a few problems. First off, I started in the deserts of Southwest United States. (the pink city in map 1 is my capital) Problem two: I stayed in despotism until somewhere between 1901 and 1974. And yet, I didn't fall horribly behind in technologies: I was the second civ to get gunpowder (oh, and this was prince, the highest I've been able to been able to compete and win at).
The rest of the world was kinda wierd, too. The Germans were hyper-aggressive: They had declared war on the Indians (purple), Arabs (green), Spanish (yellow), Romans (white) and English (orange). The last three had formed an alliance with one another against the Germans. Neither side had an advantage: the Germans take Lugdunum, but then the Spanish capture it; the Spanish capture Cologne; the Germans capture Dover; the Germans destroy Cologne; the Spanish build another city there, and the Germans destroy that too. Along the way, the Germans capture Bombay and build cities right in the middle of the Indians, splitting them in half (map 2). It was kinda interesting watching the game battle itself.
The other hyper-active civ was the Arabs. Based out of Australia, they were trying to force themselves onto the mainland. They founded Cordoba (the green city in south China), Algiers in Cambodia, and Medina in Malaysia. The English weren't too happy about them, so they were repeatedly at war with the Arabs- and lost Liverpool (in Vietnam, map 2) during one of their skirmishes. The English repeatedly offered me an alliance to make war against the Arabs, but I simply didn't want it.
1901 is the last saved game I have where everything was pretty well-balanced. Then, all hell started to break loose. It started when the two weakest civs, the Indians and Persians (me, teal), declared war on one another. I quickly overwhelmed the Indians' southern province and the Germans' cities in the north effectively shielded me from any counterattacks.
Next, for whatever reason, the anti-Germany alliance fell apart. The English and Romans declared war on one another and the Spanish and Romans canceled their alliance. The Germans capitalized, pushing back the Spanish and Romans and beginning direct attacks on their cities, rather than fighting invading Spanish and Roman armies.
I got concerned with the Rome-England War when the English lost a city and were on the brink of losing another. Might the Arabs swoop in and use their superior technology (no one else had stealth bombers!) to capture all of England? That would give them a solid base to conquer me, one of England's neighbors.
I never found out. I launched a preemptive attack, bribing Algiers and Liverpool with my huge fundamentalist treasury in 1974. I sold all the city improvements and induced starvation in both cities. By the time the Arabs recaptured them, Liverpool had gone from a size 13 to a size 4. Algiers was eventually destroyed, taking Shake's Theater with it. I also took advantage of the war to capture the two cities the Arabs had built in my territory: Palmyra and Aden. I also fortified a few units along the narrow land-bridge from the core continent and Medina, effectively bottling up the Arabs' growing army. The only way to unleash it on the English was to destroy my units, but they were wary of engaging me in another war so soon. My gloriously dirty war with the Arabs pretty much set back their war preparations against the English nearly 100 years.
But things were really unraveling elsewhere. The English, with their southern flank fairly secure, went after the Romans with gusto. They captured Byzantium and Rome, while the Germans took Hispalis and destroyed Pisae. The Spanish, sensing a hopeless situation, cancelled their reborn alliance with the Romans and, within a year, declared war and captured Neapolis and Antium. The Romans died in 2064 (map 3).
But during the final death throws of the Romans, two problems for the English suddenly appeared: first, pushing the Romans out of the way gave the Germans a clear shot at them. The Germans poured south, taking Reading and Brighton (the pink cities in map 3) and destroying Rome (along with the Great Library, Magellan's and Eiffell Tower in it). The second problem was that the Arabs had recovered from my war with them (they began sending their newly-formed armies to Cordoba, bypassing my Medina bottleneck). As the English helped finish off the Romans, their one-time eternal allies, the Arabs were attacking from the other end, capturing Oxford, Newcastle, Dover, Norwich, Coventry, Warwick and Nottingham (all the cities in red in map 3).
As I watched the English get ripped apart, I again grew concerned that the Arabs would turn on me afterwards. The two nearest English cities to me were York and London (the maroon cities in map 3). They had been built on the Ganges River. Whoever owned them would have a powerful defensive wall. Rather than let that fall into Arab hands, I launched a sneak attack and took them. The English were destroyed in 2072. Additionally, I'd stationed a sizable navy and airforce off the Indians' coast and, when the transports of Mechs and Howies arrived, attacked with everything I had. I took their cities easily, destroying them in 2079. In fifteen years, three modern-era civs were destroyed.
Meanwhile, another massive war had sprung up in northeast Asia: the elimination of the English allowed the Germans and Arabs, the two most powerful civs, to go at each other, with the Spanish caught in between. The Spanish would capture a German city, then the Arabs would blow out its defenses, then the Germans would re-claim it. The Arabs would try to build cities in the empty areas, and either the Germans or Spanish would destroy them. The Germans would capture a Spanish city, then the Arabs would take it, then the Spanish would destroy it. The Germans would build a city, the Spanish would bomb it into oblivion, then the Arabs would pick off the bombers. The Manchuria/Mongolia/Siberia area became a dead zone, so many cities were destroyed. It was a vicious, beautiful war.
Then, in 2087, I did something I'm not certain was the wisest thing: I allied with the Germans, even though they hated me. During the negotiations, the Germans asked me to declare war on the Arabs, which I did. Within 2 years, the Germans made peace with the Arabs, so I had to face the Arab juggernaut alone. Of course the Germans were "Enthusiastic": their two main rivals were gonna knock each other's brains out and give them a chance to finish off the Spanish in peace.
Surprisingly, the war didn't go terribly horrible, even though Napoleonic-era artillery pieces were still a significant part of my military. The Arabs made peace with the Spanish to focus all their attention on me, but that wasn't enough. Over the next 24 years, I destroyed Nottingham and Dover, while capturing Newcastle, Coventry and Liverpool (again!). In the meantime, the Germans had finished off the Spanish and had begun building cities in the (former) dead zone.
The year is now 2129 (map 5). The Arabs are getting restless, massing a huge navy in the Bay of Bengal and mobilizing an army along the southern China/northern Vietnam area. Their opinion of me has slipped from "Neutral" to "Uncooperative". I feel another war getting warmed, but this time, I'm gonna boot em off the continent! And, if I can stall the next war long enough, I'm sending a navy and army around to land in Tasmania, New Zealand and southern Australia. If I can build up those areas enough, I'll be able to open a second front, perhaps capture their capital and maybe even split their empire!
It's games like this one that make me say: "I love modern war!"
This was a game played on a map based on the Pacific. I played it back when the only two governments I was comfortable in were Despotism and Fundamentalism. In the game, I ran into a few problems. First off, I started in the deserts of Southwest United States. (the pink city in map 1 is my capital) Problem two: I stayed in despotism until somewhere between 1901 and 1974. And yet, I didn't fall horribly behind in technologies: I was the second civ to get gunpowder (oh, and this was prince, the highest I've been able to been able to compete and win at).
The rest of the world was kinda wierd, too. The Germans were hyper-aggressive: They had declared war on the Indians (purple), Arabs (green), Spanish (yellow), Romans (white) and English (orange). The last three had formed an alliance with one another against the Germans. Neither side had an advantage: the Germans take Lugdunum, but then the Spanish capture it; the Spanish capture Cologne; the Germans capture Dover; the Germans destroy Cologne; the Spanish build another city there, and the Germans destroy that too. Along the way, the Germans capture Bombay and build cities right in the middle of the Indians, splitting them in half (map 2). It was kinda interesting watching the game battle itself.
The other hyper-active civ was the Arabs. Based out of Australia, they were trying to force themselves onto the mainland. They founded Cordoba (the green city in south China), Algiers in Cambodia, and Medina in Malaysia. The English weren't too happy about them, so they were repeatedly at war with the Arabs- and lost Liverpool (in Vietnam, map 2) during one of their skirmishes. The English repeatedly offered me an alliance to make war against the Arabs, but I simply didn't want it.
1901 is the last saved game I have where everything was pretty well-balanced. Then, all hell started to break loose. It started when the two weakest civs, the Indians and Persians (me, teal), declared war on one another. I quickly overwhelmed the Indians' southern province and the Germans' cities in the north effectively shielded me from any counterattacks.
Next, for whatever reason, the anti-Germany alliance fell apart. The English and Romans declared war on one another and the Spanish and Romans canceled their alliance. The Germans capitalized, pushing back the Spanish and Romans and beginning direct attacks on their cities, rather than fighting invading Spanish and Roman armies.
I got concerned with the Rome-England War when the English lost a city and were on the brink of losing another. Might the Arabs swoop in and use their superior technology (no one else had stealth bombers!) to capture all of England? That would give them a solid base to conquer me, one of England's neighbors.
I never found out. I launched a preemptive attack, bribing Algiers and Liverpool with my huge fundamentalist treasury in 1974. I sold all the city improvements and induced starvation in both cities. By the time the Arabs recaptured them, Liverpool had gone from a size 13 to a size 4. Algiers was eventually destroyed, taking Shake's Theater with it. I also took advantage of the war to capture the two cities the Arabs had built in my territory: Palmyra and Aden. I also fortified a few units along the narrow land-bridge from the core continent and Medina, effectively bottling up the Arabs' growing army. The only way to unleash it on the English was to destroy my units, but they were wary of engaging me in another war so soon. My gloriously dirty war with the Arabs pretty much set back their war preparations against the English nearly 100 years.
But things were really unraveling elsewhere. The English, with their southern flank fairly secure, went after the Romans with gusto. They captured Byzantium and Rome, while the Germans took Hispalis and destroyed Pisae. The Spanish, sensing a hopeless situation, cancelled their reborn alliance with the Romans and, within a year, declared war and captured Neapolis and Antium. The Romans died in 2064 (map 3).
But during the final death throws of the Romans, two problems for the English suddenly appeared: first, pushing the Romans out of the way gave the Germans a clear shot at them. The Germans poured south, taking Reading and Brighton (the pink cities in map 3) and destroying Rome (along with the Great Library, Magellan's and Eiffell Tower in it). The second problem was that the Arabs had recovered from my war with them (they began sending their newly-formed armies to Cordoba, bypassing my Medina bottleneck). As the English helped finish off the Romans, their one-time eternal allies, the Arabs were attacking from the other end, capturing Oxford, Newcastle, Dover, Norwich, Coventry, Warwick and Nottingham (all the cities in red in map 3).
As I watched the English get ripped apart, I again grew concerned that the Arabs would turn on me afterwards. The two nearest English cities to me were York and London (the maroon cities in map 3). They had been built on the Ganges River. Whoever owned them would have a powerful defensive wall. Rather than let that fall into Arab hands, I launched a sneak attack and took them. The English were destroyed in 2072. Additionally, I'd stationed a sizable navy and airforce off the Indians' coast and, when the transports of Mechs and Howies arrived, attacked with everything I had. I took their cities easily, destroying them in 2079. In fifteen years, three modern-era civs were destroyed.
Meanwhile, another massive war had sprung up in northeast Asia: the elimination of the English allowed the Germans and Arabs, the two most powerful civs, to go at each other, with the Spanish caught in between. The Spanish would capture a German city, then the Arabs would blow out its defenses, then the Germans would re-claim it. The Arabs would try to build cities in the empty areas, and either the Germans or Spanish would destroy them. The Germans would capture a Spanish city, then the Arabs would take it, then the Spanish would destroy it. The Germans would build a city, the Spanish would bomb it into oblivion, then the Arabs would pick off the bombers. The Manchuria/Mongolia/Siberia area became a dead zone, so many cities were destroyed. It was a vicious, beautiful war.
Then, in 2087, I did something I'm not certain was the wisest thing: I allied with the Germans, even though they hated me. During the negotiations, the Germans asked me to declare war on the Arabs, which I did. Within 2 years, the Germans made peace with the Arabs, so I had to face the Arab juggernaut alone. Of course the Germans were "Enthusiastic": their two main rivals were gonna knock each other's brains out and give them a chance to finish off the Spanish in peace.
Surprisingly, the war didn't go terribly horrible, even though Napoleonic-era artillery pieces were still a significant part of my military. The Arabs made peace with the Spanish to focus all their attention on me, but that wasn't enough. Over the next 24 years, I destroyed Nottingham and Dover, while capturing Newcastle, Coventry and Liverpool (again!). In the meantime, the Germans had finished off the Spanish and had begun building cities in the (former) dead zone.
The year is now 2129 (map 5). The Arabs are getting restless, massing a huge navy in the Bay of Bengal and mobilizing an army along the southern China/northern Vietnam area. Their opinion of me has slipped from "Neutral" to "Uncooperative". I feel another war getting warmed, but this time, I'm gonna boot em off the continent! And, if I can stall the next war long enough, I'm sending a navy and army around to land in Tasmania, New Zealand and southern Australia. If I can build up those areas enough, I'll be able to open a second front, perhaps capture their capital and maybe even split their empire!
It's games like this one that make me say: "I love modern war!"
