The emperors strike back

[K.Murx]

So this is the continuation of the little ``Regicide'' game here
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=433585

There I tried to find a setup that would be difficult for me (archipelago, arid, high seas),
with difficult opponents (Cathy, Darius, Joao, Zara), but which turned out to be even more difficult for the AIs. obsolete finished this game in 1655 AD, it took me some more turns to 1715 AD

Still, 11 turns slower than obsolete is hopefully good enough for emperor. So, let's move up and give those AI's a chance for revenge.


The settings (suggested by vranasm) are:
Small size,
Pangea,
low sea level,
no huts, no events,
standard barbs,
emperor difficulty.

The opponents are again:

Cathy
Darius
Joao
Zara

And my leader is the well-loved Charlemagne of the holy roman empire.

The not too crappy start:

Spoiler :

Especially as there is seafood to the west.

I explored a bit and met the natives:

Spoiler :

Until my scout had an unfortunate accident which involved a large, hairy cat.

The land looks.... well... not that good:

Spoiler :

Marked in blue is Darius' capital.

Plan: Darius has to go. There is just no decent land for me.
But... How?
I do have horses, which could mean chariots or HA. What is the deciding factor between the two?
I *think* axes are out of the question, unless there is copper right at the capital or one of my city sites.

If HA, the plan would be to settle the floodplains spot (do I actually have a chance for that at all?), and then maybe a third city W of the horses, which can borrow tiles from the capital. The marble tempts me for the oracle, but that is 1.5 HA/2 Axes/2.5 chariots missing from the rush (not to mention the beakers).


Tech path was agriculture -> AH. Mining just started, probably should be switched to the wheel if I want that floodplains spot.

What about barbs? Do I need archery after the wheel or can I get away with chariots?

 

[vranasm]

this really looks bad enough, good luck with the game...
I even wonder...did you really worldbuilder it or something?

city 2 I would probably place 1W of marble (3FP's should feed that spot)

forget incense nonsense.

I know obs likes to be small at the beginning (if there are some marble thingys), but I don't really think this start warrants slow expansion to 5 cities and not heading towards HA's and looking for greener pastures and moving palace.

 

[K.Murx]

this really looks bad enough, good luck with the game...
I even wonder...did you really worldbuilder it or something?

No. First start I rolled - guess my computer hates me after that monarch game and rigged the RNG.

city 2 I would probably place 1W of marble (3FP's should feed that spot)

Hm, right. Thank you!
Hopefully, any barbs will head that way, too...

5 cities

Such dreams! I can't find space for three...

 

[Keilah]

1w of the horses, steal some tiles from the capital, pasture up the horses and it'll contribute well to the HA rush. bad longterm city but meh, whatever.

 

[Sian]

yeah ... in this case 1w of the horses is a useable city ... this is a game where i'd build enough cities for National Wonders (5 on small?) and then turtle to Cannons and go nuts

 

[vranasm]

And why not HA rush? 300 BC and Persia dead, the only problem being that

Spoiler :

Zara spammed a bit spears so i can't probably continue and have to recover

Spoiler :

Btw the early game with HRE is really really really painful without anything useful for the things that are important, so I had HBR a little bit later :-(

 

[K.Murx]

Perhaps they meant "turtle after rush?" At least that is what I interpreted...

So I settled the hills W of the marble, and 1W of the horses, stealing the clams from the capital.
Wanted to go HA, but after 5 of 24 turns researching HBR decided that this would simply take too long. Scouting had revealed that Darius had no metal, and strangely, he was falling behind in score.... -> chariots.

Attack force:

Spoiler :

The Persian defense force was pathetic (Darius whipped an Immortal next turn??)

Spoiler :

Double checked the settings - yep, that's emperor...

Spoiler :

And the predictable result:

Spoiler :

My thoughts:
There are in total 9 chariots left. 4 in persepolis, 1 W, 1 SE, two fresh builds in my cities and one that will be finished in two turns. That should be enough to take (and raze) the city W of persepolis, and the grassland city E of persepolis. The gold should be enough to get me to writing. Pasargarde is on a hill and also the new capital -> forget it. At least with chariots.

Will move the palace probably to the city on marble hill.



The problem is Cathy. She's a runaway in score, and in GNP (graph) as well. Has stonehenge also, which means she's a culture monster. I guess she has some great city location with a couple gold/silver.However, creative+henge means I can forget about attacking her with chariots, and she is the AI furthest away, so there is probably nothing I can do about her currently. Will scout her, though.


Now, I have stone and marble. This means I could turtle now, wonderspam a bit and try for cannon/rifles. But Cathy...

What are your thoughts?

 

[vranasm]

chariot rush wasn't wise decision imo... the distance maint will kill you and you're really far away from currency.

In my shadow i attacked when I was deep in Alpha.

Ok as to what to do next... you certainly have to secure the pigs city and the barb city with elephants.

as for other cities of Persia... the hill city would bleed you out, the Persians have city west from you, which is crap city, but could be razed just because you can .

Too bad you can't extort techs if you decide on peace with persia.

i think you will have tough time with recovery in this situation.

Btw I think I kind of beelined writing after AH (most certainly before BW) and run scientist early with settling the first one.

 

[vranasm]

1635 conquest victory

Spoiler :

I still somehow wonder why such late date... From the 300 BC I tried to take 2 most important cities from Zara, which I succeeded at (and got GLH)

And then repeatadly was at war with Zara up to 800 AD with the aim to take the rest... which I took only 2 more and he had 3 left.

At that point I realized this goes nowhere and i need seriously upgrade... so went for cuirs, but since I got to cuirs around 1300 AD, I did easy decision to go for Cavs...

then I start the war against Cathy+Zara... when Cathy was ~7 turns from Rifling herself (could i had more bad luck even???!)

so of course I had to fight a lot of rifles... but nothing good production can't beat. I capped her after 4 cities.
Then Joao who fell after 3 cities.

some final screens of progress and finish

Spoiler :

 

[K.Murx]

Hm, don't have time for a full update right now...

chariot rush wasn't wise decision imo... the distance maint will kill you and you're really far away from currency.

War spoils kept me going to writing (after which I did hit 0% slider for some turns and had to delete two chariots), libraries and the 'mids solved the rest. Got currency (self tech via math), IW and some other stuff from trade, and could get alpha for currency but do not want to give that away. Researching aesthetics for that now.

Too bad you can't extort techs if you decide on peace with persia.

For some reason, Darius is more than happy that I took the tiresome task of empire management out of his hands and is happily trading techs (he has alpha already).

Maybe he will hand me construction eventually. That would be ironic...

 

[K.Murx]

Finally, a somewhat free weekend! So, back to Civ.

This is where I left the game:

25 BC
5 cities, with one settler en route and building a stack to capture a barb city.
Two strong nations (Cathy, Joao), two middling (Zara, me) and one... city state (Darius).

The diplo situation:

Spoiler :

Joao loves his Buddhist buddy Cathy to bits (who does not reciprocate the feeling, she's just in it for the sex), and Darius. Me? Well, I declared war on his little friend, so he is somewhat... consternated. I gave in to a demand (marble) of him.

Cathy seems somewhat frustrated at the performance of her mates, and views everyone with disdain.

Zara tries hard to look happy to see me. In his situation, I would want as many friends as I can, too. He's Hindu, and borders the Buddhist eastern block Cathy and Joao.

Darius? Ah, who cares...

Tech situation:

Spoiler :

Somewhat decent, although Cathy is an unknown factor. Aesthetics will be done soon, which I will trade for Alpha and other stuff.

The world:

Spoiler :

Buddhist block Cathy/Joao in the east, me to the west, Zara sandwiched in the middle.

The wastelands (my initial starting location):

Spoiler :

The Persian imperial remnant, and my new lands:

Spoiler :

Building a couple swordsmen in Aachen to take that barb city (some scouting chariots are returning, too). Will also settle the Rice/Dye spot.

Questions

1. What victory condition is reasonable to pursue (no culture)?
2. What should be my city specialization? My current ideas are:
   • Unit pump - Aachen (has a settled GG already)
   • Secondary unit pump/wonderspammer - Persepolis
   • Cottage Central - rice/dye city
   • Workshop/Watermill - barb city
   • GPP-Farm - err, yeah. Where to put that?
3. How can I make sure that Buddhism spreads to me? I would very much prefer to be on the good side of Joao/Cathy. At least, for the time being...
4. Should I trade currency?

Things I alredy know:
-need more workers (currently have 5 only)
-need more cities
-need more happiness resources (ivory from the barbs will be helpful)
-need more/better units (time to replace those warriors).