The Hall of Players

[WastinTime]

Elephants can't get city raider I II III

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[Dhoomstriker]

I'll either lib Democracy or Biology, depending on whether I go for Cottage-spam or for Sushi. Education (with Oxford! ) is just too good as a tech in a spacerace to deny it to onesself.

Hmmmm. You do have a strong point about Oxford. I wonder how an Astronomy beeline would compare, though, if you were in a position to spam overseas Settlers, given that you'd get pretty good Trade Routes with the New World Cities (both ways).

Getting New World Cities early on could also mean grabbing new Resources and not having to settle Cities such as Fur City for a long time. Astronomy is usually my choice way of getting Scientific Method, so it's no a wasted tech, but I agree that it's usually used for an overseas conquest.

But, if you want to push the idea of Peaceful REX to the max, then Astronomy would be the way to go on a Terra map.

About Masonry: I found it in a hut. Settling on top btw. wouldn't have helped, and AIs don't tend to build the Mids if they don't have Stone, they build them relatively fast if having Stone though, especially Lincoln. Don't know why, but I observed that multiple times.

True, settling on top of the Stone without knowing Masonry wouldn't have given you Stone, but settling on top of Stone or Marble will allow you to use it (or gift it) as soon as you have knowledge of Masonry, saving you the Worker turns.

As for AIs choosing build items, I believe that the cut-off amount of turns on Normal Speed is 17 turns... 17 turns or less and they'll consider it to be a valid build item. So, with enough bonuses (Resource bonuses, Industrious, a Forge, Org Rel, etc) and/or with enough raw production, an AI can choose to build a Wonder in a given City. I'm pretty sure that I got this info from MancoCapac's personal thread.


Do you need to tech Mysticism if you're going to Chop/Whip Libraries or settle adjacent to Food with earlier Cities? Better might be to ensure that you have a Trade Network connection with the AIs to get Taoism or possibly Christianity... it looks like you might have one to Lincoln once Sailing comes in, but it might be better to complete a Road connection to his Cities in the short term, giving you Foreign Trade Routes and the possibility of receiving a Religion (Religion only auto-spreads via Trade Network access).


I'm still not understanding why Sheep + Fish isn't being moved 1E. You lose 3 Ocean squares, 1 Coast square, and 1 Grassland square but enable the Deer for use by this City and allow for it to be improved for Fur City before Fur City gets settled.

If you were desperate for Happiness, you could even settle on top of the Fur, as Tundra Fur isn't great to work and then the Clam would be in that City's big fat cross, allowing you to settle Crab City 1NW of where you placed it to share the Wheat. If you really care about the Hills, triple-share the Wheat with a City to the NE of where you've placed Crab at a later time.

Hmmm... now that you've revealed Iron by the Crab, I suppose that your Crab City is all right as is, but without Iron there, I would have preferred sharing the Wheat for that City.


I think that Gold City is rather weak. Could you move it 1NW onto the GH so that you can borrow the capital's Pig to grow to at least Size 2 quickly, allowing you to slowly grow the City while working the Gold Resource and borrowing the Pig from time to time after having completed a Granary there? At Size 2, it could act as a short-term Worker-creation City. Later, it would be a great Cottage-grower for the capital.

I'd consider settling it as soon as you have all of your blocker Cities in place.


With Copper being to your west, you could create a decent Cottage-helper City 2N of the Copper, sharing the Rice. I wouldn't build it yet, as the Rice isn't in your Cultural Borders yet, but you'll want it soon enough to be able to get 30 Culture into the City before Lincoln's Culture makes it to that square. Once a City has hit 30 Culture, it will output the City's Culture per turn plus 20 Culture every turn on its City Centre square, meaning that once your City his 30 Culture, it'll take considerable investment for Lincoln to flip it.


The timing of when your Cultural Borders will expand over the Rice to the north will determine when you can settle Cow + Rice + Banana City... try to have the Rice Farmed by the time that the City gets settled.

So, toward that goal, maybe next you can settle 1W of Gold (3E of your capital), which steals the Pig to grow to Size 2 and then spams Workers before getting its Granary, allowing your Workers to go elsewhere. Low Maintenance costs do play a factor at this stage of the game, and it won't take too long to get a Road up for a Trade Route. Plus, you really need a lot of Workers for Chops, Roads, and Improvements.


Forget Democracy and go for Astronomy, even if you take Astronomy via Liberalism while going for Education earlier than Astronomy. Being on Terra totally changes things... The Statue of Liberty is not nearly as great in your hands when you'll have half of your empire or more on another continent, and delaying access to Cities that would otherwise help your empire to become productive sooner sucks. I'm not sure how you plan to deal with Colonial Maintenance, but I suppose that the Forbidden Palace helps a lot when built on a Colony landmass.


Personally, I take Combat Promos with Maces and I hardly miss the City Raider Promos. Combat II is very similar to City Raider II in many cases and while City Raider III is a nice Promo, it's rare for my units to get that high until I've earned some Great Generals, at which point you're probably already far enough in the tech tree to be able to build Maces even when you'd started off going for War Elephants.

Thus, in my opinion, Combat II on a War Elephant is about as good as the Combat II Promo that I would have put on my Maceman.

Maces are nice on defence, but that's more important in multiplayer. Crossbowmen counter Maces and AIs like to build those buggers... with War Elephants, you laugh at the Crossbowmen.

 

[Seraiel]

I'm beginning to fear this game...

Mansa built the GLH and the Colossus . This are his GNP and his tech-level:





He got a Great Prophet and even bulbed Philosophy. I have no idea, how I'm supposed to catch up, but will do my best.

Lincoln built the Mids as planned and even founded the right Shrine, so the one with the 40% religion and not the one with the 4% one ^^ :



I'm currently building Christian Missionaries in the capital and even think I'll need to chop them once I have Maths. Running anything but Christianity would be extremely stupid, Mansa and Lizzy are friendly because of it, Lizzy is willing to trade Theology, which could be a great shortcut to Paper. Unfortunately, she's also friendly to Mansa, so they will also trade everything. I don't want to build Monuments when Missionaries pay back when building a Forge already... This slows my borderpops though... I need to hire 2 Scientists at size 7, no matter what, without an Academy, this game is probably over:



I built a completely superflous Granary in city 2. Lincoln had the fastest borderpop ever and directly captured the Sheep, no chance to get them back. City therefore has no , it needs to build Workers / WBs anyhow though. I don't know if this is, because I'm rusty, or if others would have acted the same way.



Marathon really is its own category in CIV. I stupidly built a Road towards the northern city, because I played so much Normal speed, that I didn't think of pre-road-hopping with the Worker to the Rice. This costed a lot of :



You see, that I captured the Iron and have 5 cities btw., this astonishes me. Claiming the Iron was necessary, because Lincoln claimed the Copper near my capital, and he was already waiting with a Chariot at Sheep-Fish. He also claimed the Marble near Mansa instead of settling Rice Sugar, that's good though, because then, he can build the MoM for me too . Need to trade him Calendar somehow... To bad that I cannot trade it from Mansa because I have not even Maths .

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Currency gets you Monarchy and Monarchy + Currency gets you Theology or Metal Casting, although it puts Lizzy on the nasty path to Longbowmen... not that you care since she doesn't seem to have any Wonders and it might be best never attacking her.

Lightbulbing Compass could also be decent trade bait if combined with another tech or with partial tech research.


I suspect that Lincoln may want to declare war on you if you're not nice to him... definitely keep an extra copy of a Resource around that he wants so that he can demand it from you in Tribute. I.e. Get an extra Gold Resource and don't trade one to him then wait for the eventual Demand. If he asks you to switch to Taoism, suck it up and do it.


It's unfortunate that Mansa got blocked from settling closer to you, which makes it harder for you to gift him a tech-stealing City.

 

[Seraiel]

Hmmmm. You do have a strong point about Oxford. I wonder how an Astronomy beeline would compare, though, if you were in a position to spam overseas Settlers, given that you'd get pretty good Trade Routes with the New World Cities (both ways).

Getting New World Cities early on could also mean grabbing new Resources and not having to settle Cities such as Fur City for a long time. Astronomy is usually my choice way of getting Scientific Method, so it's no a wasted tech, but I agree that it's usually used for an overseas conquest.

But, if you want to push the idea of Peaceful REX to the max, then Astronomy would be the way to go on a Terra map.

This is actually an interesting approach. It sounds unbelievable, but I really have not played even one game, in which I went or needed to go the Astro bulb path. Interesting, that you favour it so heavily, in S&T they all play nothing than Pangaea so everybody only knows Lib.

Do you need to tech Mysticism if you're going to Chop/Whip Libraries or settle adjacent to Food with earlier Cities? Better might be to ensure that you have a Trade Network connection with the AIs to get Taoism or possibly Christianity... it looks like you might have one to Lincoln once Sailing comes in, but it might be better to complete a Road connection to his Cities in the short term, giving you Foreign Trade Routes and the possibility of receiving a Religion (Religion only auto-spreads via Trade Network access).

I got to know, I think also from Tachy, that Religion has two codes for spreading, one for spreading via roads, one for spreading via rivers or sea, so building a road-connection might actually double the chance for the spread of the religion. In the current game though I noticed, that Marathon is simply different. All cities have at least one religion. There are just so many turns for the religion to spread, and with Lincoln being so close and having a Shrine, all of my cities are simply getting Taoism and I can't use it because of Christianity .

I'm still not understanding why Sheep + Fish isn't being moved 1E. You lose 3 Ocean squares, 1 Coast square, and 1 Grassland square but enable the Deer for use by this City and allow for it to be improved for Fur City before Fur City gets settled.

The Deer is not forrested, it's a 3 1 tile. That's compareable to a normal Grassland Farm. With settling 1E, I claim an additional Grassland and have an additional Grassland Hill to work. This simply matters more to me, because the city has a lot of and some will help in reducing the number of whips. I also like that the Fur-city has more tiles then, though that's probably non-important, as both cities together will have enough tiles for very long.

I think that Gold City is rather weak. Could you move it 1NW onto the GH so that you can borrow the capital's Pig to grow to at least Size 2 quickly, allowing you to slowly grow the City while working the Gold Resource and borrowing the Pig from time to time after having completed a Granary there? At Size 2, it could act as a short-term Worker-creation City. Later, it would be a great Cottage-grower for the capital.

I'd consider settling it as soon as you have all of your blocker Cities in place.

Gold-city is weak, but moving it 1NE would lose tons of tiles and completely cripple the city. I thought about a chance to make it able to work more Cottages, but the desert spot is unbeatable. It has Freshwater, it creates another workable tile, it has the FP in the 1st ring and it has an amazing amount of Grassland tiles, most riverside. Don't forget, that this is a Spacerace and not a Conquest game, my cities need to grow big, using the land properly is very important, I cannot waste that many Grasslands and I'll also not borrow the Pigs from the capital, because that city needs to produce at least 1 GS and already is low on then. Even if it weren't, letting the capital grow large is much more important than claiming that Desert Gold fast.

With Copper being to your west, you could create a decent Cottage-helper City 2N of the Copper, sharing the Rice. I wouldn't build it yet, as the Rice isn't in your Cultural Borders yet, but you'll want it soon enough to be able to get 30 Culture into the City before Lincoln's Culture makes it to that square. Once a City has hit 30 Culture, it will output the City's Culture per turn plus 20 Culture every turn on its City Centre square, meaning that once your City his 30 Culture, it'll take considerable investment for Lincoln to flip it.

Thx DS, that info is extremely interesting, I didn't even know that there was any info about tile- or culture-distribution. I know it's completely different in Vanilla though, there, all tiles get the full , making a strong city easily claim tiles in the inner ring of other cities that even have a Library etc.

About the Copper: I don't care about the Copper, I'll have Iron. Also, founding the Copper-helper-city imho isn't worth the resources for a Settler, when so many other spots need to be claimed. Grassland copper is combareable to dry-Rice in terms of value, believe it or not. It's a good tile, but without having own food, the value of the city is very low.

Forget Democracy and go for Astronomy, even if you take Astronomy via Liberalism while going for Education earlier than Astronomy. Being on Terra totally changes things... The Statue of Liberty is not nearly as great in your hands when you'll have half of your empire or more on another continent, and delaying access to Cities that would otherwise help your empire to become productive sooner sucks. I'm not sure how you plan to deal with Colonial Maintenance, but I suppose that the Forbidden Palace helps a lot when built on a Colony landmass.

You overestimate the value of the new world and underestimate the speed at which one reaches Astronomy normally in a Spacerace and also the SoL. The SoL is a mighty wonder, should I get those cities + Lincolns cities, actually I even want to conquer Lizzy if possible to claim the whole continent, except for Mansa. If I go for Corporations I still need to go via Chemistry aswell and that isn't available via Astronomy, there's no way around Liberalism in Spaceraces, believe me, Astro bulb is for Conquest. If possible, I'll reach Biology 'til 1AD, though I don't think I'm gonna be that good not playing Persia or Incans.

Personally, I take Combat Promos with Maces and I hardly miss the City Raider Promos. Combat II is very similar to City Raider II in many cases and while City Raider III is a nice Promo, it's rare for my units to get that high until I've earned some Great Generals, at which point you're probably already far enough in the tech tree to be able to build Maces even when you'd started off going for War Elephants.

Thus, in my opinion, Combat II on a War Elephant is about as good as the Combat II Promo that I would have put on my Maceman.

Maces are nice on defence, but that's more important in multiplayer. Crossbowmen counter Maces and AIs like to build those buggers... with War Elephants, you laugh at the Crossbowmen.

@ WT: CR totally doesn't matter, Elephants beat everything they need to beat. Also, Elephants can get 5XP from the start while Maces only can get 3XP, so Elephants can start with Shock while Maces start with CR1 at most. Shock or Combat II is easily compareable to CR1 and CR2 is not that much stronger, that it would justify spending so much more resources as Maces actually cost.

 

[Seraiel]

I believe, this game is only warm-up for Marathon, Mansa simply researches techs in 7-8T while I need 20, and that with 2 , Currency and 5 cities. I'll still gonna play it a little further, but in general I wanted to really thank you for all of your opinions, advice and suggestions. I'd have i. e. thought, that there'd be an absolute resistance against peaceful REXing, but it seems, that you all view it much more positive than yyeah and me. This forum really lived. Don't let it die again, I'm sure that everybody had the chance to learn from this discussion, and I won't end it hereby, if you want to discuss more, i. e. about Mansa and how it's even possible that he has such a tech-speed, because he had that speed already before GLH and Colossus, or whatever you like. Ask for advice for your games, no matter if you play them further on your own, the discussion is interesting for everybody, post situations and let the others comment on them, S&T is not the only forum where that can be done. In the HoF-forum, we can give each other advice for HoF-style-games that it was really great, when we all played GM-137, and discussions must not necessarily be based on big events, they start by one person asking and you see that there's a willingness to give the best from everybody, if he's / she's only made aware.

Still gonna play a little further. Should the unlikely event happen, that I'm able to catch up, the game might really profit from a fast researching Mansa, I think he's just going to research and trade all techs and fly away ^^ .

 

[Pangaea]

@Pangaea
There is a little-known trick behind your current dilemma:
1. Declare war on the AI
2. Assuming that you're totally dominating that AI, stack a bunch of armies next to his Cities and reduce the number of defenders in his Cities but do not capture any of his Cities
3. When the AI is willing to talk, and assuming that you aren't going to lose a lot of battles (i.e. assuming that you won't make the AI unwilling to talk by losing a lot of battles--although, I'm not sure if this "willing to talk" status can change mid-turn or not), capture enough of the AI's Cities to bring that AI down to 3 or less Cities
4. As part of the Peace Treaty, give the AI back all of its Cities plus any of your Cities on the map (except for your Palace) that you want to give away to that AI
5. Laugh hysterically when the AI says "It is agreed."

Interesting you should say this, because that's the option I was looking at as a way out, but didn't want to use (due to issues in cities I wanted to keep). Thankfully I found another way: colonies

An AI can "stop talking" during a turn btw. There have been cases where they attack my stack in the open (let's say on a hill) and lose heavily. They want to talk. But I want to take more of their cities, and wipe their stack. I lose units doing that. He no longer wants to talk.

 

[Seraiel]

I confirm this. Sometimes, you can even get a vassalage deal, when the AI was not willing to capitulate at the beginning of the turn. This is, what causes the situation that we hate, an AI not capitulating to us but capitulating towards someone else on the next turn. Therefore i. e. , it needs to be checked at the end of every turn, if an AI is willing to capitulate.

 

[Seraiel]

Sometimes the AI...

Lincoln founded a city without food, because he accidentally saw my Settler. He was 1T before claiming the central Gold spot which would have closed the gap.



Mansa with GLH vs. me (with an Academy ) .

 

[Seraiel]

Sometimes AIs just... . (Lincoln can choose between 8 techs and takes Feudalism. )

 

[Seraiel]

This is ridiculous. I can't stop playing the game, because too many things go into my favour, Lincoln MoM i. e. . An Education-bulb is the only real chance to help me against the teching speed of the other AIs. The problem is simply Mansa, he techs like crazy. 17T for Nationalism, and I need 20 for CS. I can't trade with him anymore, because he has all techs that I could research!!! As him and Lizzy are friendly, everything gets traded easily between them, and when Mansa and Lizzy both know a tech, chances are good, that they're also willing to trade it openly, so with Lincoln. Look:



I feel, like I'm somewhat slow, but can't really prove it, because I could compete with Lincoln and Lizzy by trade. I'm just wondering, that I got 10 cities by REX and I can still not Ele- / Macepult, normally I settle 3 cities for Elepult, on Marathon, I should have Elepult even earlier, because Marathon is faster, how is it possible, that I got 10 cities, could compete with Lizzy and Lincoln, but Mansa has three times the GNP of me. Not enough, that he already had great research before the GLH and the Colossus and is FIN and trades everything. He has 11 cities, because there are islands near him too. Islands are super-rare on Terra, it's absolutely needed to settle them oneself if possible, this game is so unusual to me though. I'm used to Mansa researching fast, but not Oracle, GLH, Colossus, Great Merchant, Islands, Double Gems and TGL... I'm still hoping that I can catch up somehow and maybe even get Liberalism anything. Getting a GS in 23T, that's probably even before I reach Education, because I have so little money, as I can't sell techs. I needed to whip Warriors from the HGs-population to be able to research Civil Service. That tip was really great btw. Wastin .

[EDIT]

Yes, ofc., game destroyed, Lincoln and Lizzy got CS so I can't trade it to them for the Elepult techs. I won't give this up yet though, curious what will happen next, probably Lincoln will double bulb Education, Lib Economics after trading Guilds and Banking from Mansa, and if I play further, Mansa will found Mining and Sushi .

[EDIT2]

Posted the wrong screenshot. Mansa already has Engineering aswell.

 

[Seraiel]

I wanted to post a screenshot, but Photobucket has destroyed its site once again .

Mansa is researching Paper in 2T . I'm doing 200 BPT at 800 BC and he has a GNP of 650+ . Yes, 200 BPT on at 800 BC on Marathon is probably not much for some, but don't forget, that I'm playing a leader that gets strong in endgame and through bulbs, and is not Darius or Huayna. 200 BPT on a tiny map are also more than 200 BPT on a large map. The infrastructure of my cities is also developed very well, I almost got Forges in all important cities + Libraries in the planned University cities, and before having Paper, that's imo really good, as they're even size 4-7 (capital is almost size 10, suffered a little because it needed to build the HGs which required a 2-pop Forge and Aequeduct whip) . Still not giving up .

 

[Pangaea]

Figured I'd pick up the mantle (spoon?) from Seraiel/Cereal and ask for some advice about a game I'm playing too. It's with BUFFY, but not sure I'll submit it. Depends how it goes, and dates on Immortal/Standard/Normal are pretty darn tough.

Went with Pericles on Pangaea (what else? ) and the rest is random. I was a little fed up of just facing the usual squishies. Regenerated until I found a decent start. Didn't bother to wait for gold, but double food is fine too. Noticed wet wheat north with the scout, so took a chance on settling 2N, which rewarded me with 12 riverside grassland

Still double food, and 5 1 1 (wet wheat) beats 5 (dry corn). I started with Agri, and then beelined for Alpha, not even stopping for Mining first. Settled four cities (including capital). Isabella showed up first, so I assumed Oracle was dead from the start, but it kept not getting built, so after Alpha I decided to go for it. Think I ended up able to trade for Myst and Priesthood, but teching Meditation myself. 1000BC passed with the Oracle still in play, so I chopped pre-Math, and quickly teched Masonry myself, and finished the Oracle in the same turn, picking Construction, with Elepulting in mind.

Chopped pretty hard, but was still a tad late on attacking. Isabella spread Hinduism around and built the Shrine, ironically painting a mighty fine cross between her breasts in the process. I attacked her in 375BC, with 8 catas and 6 elephants, continuing to chop and whip out more (barracks+stable in capital).

It's nigh on 1AD now, and I've just taken down Madrid, with a 22 shrine
Hilled and walled cities are not nice, but I suppose it was still fortunate I managed to take out her only source of metal when we took the first city (settled on iron). That said, CG2 and Guerr2 archers are not weak, so I had to bomb away most of the walls first. 4-5 catas died when we assaulted (still 16% culture defence), but (for once!!) all other attackers won, and we killed 11 guys behind her barely standing walls.

Spoiler :

The idea is to keep attacking her and take all her stuff. Currently I have a decent enough army to do that, though catas are dying beneath her stupid hills.

Due to the shape of the continent, basically a horseshoe on its side, conquest or domination would be awkward - not least due to protective leaders in Charlie and Sitting Bull. Napoleon is on the march too, and have actually taken Persepolis from Darius, which surprised me. I had half a mind to try out the "Lib Democracy" idea for space, due to all those cottage spots, but I'm teching a bit slowly, still far from Civil Service, and I'm now heading up for the Music GA instead, and will maybe try to grab the GLib too, since we just captured Marble. I don't know... Democracy-Emancipation just feels wrong...

Darius and Charlie have CoL, Calendar and MC on me, but otherwise it's okay. Only 112 at full speed though, which isn't all that much. Buro is such a game changer, it's kind of sickening when you don't have it.

Spoiler :

Charlie and Darius have encroached from the north, and Charlie has an axe sitting on the copper so a settler will surely arrive there shortly. It's mostly jungle, though, so I'm not too keen on going through there asap.

Spoiler :

The north looks pretty good, and eventually I want that central jungled luxury belt.

Spoiler :

The capital is size 9 and will hit 10 at 1AD. Started developing cottages really early in this game, so we actually have a Town already, with 2-3 villages more well on the way.

Spoiler :

Suppose it's a bit questionable to build the Hindu Temple, but I put some hammers into it yonks ago, and didn't want them to start deteriorating. The Odeon is pretty good actually, hadn't realised that before. Cheap too for CRE Pericles.

Hopefully some of you got to the end with the sanity intact I'm wondering how to proceed from here, like how to deal with the Charlie/Darius situation up north, whether to join in on Nappy's war, and the tech situation. Really miss CS, but I don't like teching CoL when several have it either, so I figured a decent alternative was to head for Music. Will want the NE and HE anyway. Economy is tanked, as per usual



(Photobucket blows chunks again today, so I'm trying out Imgur -- apparently had an old account there.)

 

[yyeah]

@ Pangaea

112 BPT is kind of low but you can bulb... bulb ... bulb everything
Going Lit -> Music is a good decision IMO.
Late CS would be acceptable for me with early war, but i would focus to not delay Edu.
Lit + Phi trait will be v handy with this goal.
Cheep Universities and fast Oxford should recompense(?) lost beakers beocuse late CS if you know what i meen.
And yea keep rolling, until they dont have Engi you are fine. Engi is stop on Deity dont know on IMM, thing is that cats cant cut through Castels one can deal with Pikes and everything else but not with Castels.
I would say try to grab as much as you can until 700 maybe 900 AD ?

 

[Dhoomstriker]

I count 11 base Hammers in your capital and I see 13 final Hammers... it could be worth it to Cottage (or even Farm) the P Riv that is SW + W of your capital, to get you that 12th base Hammer, at least for as long as you are building Temples and other Buildings instead of War Elephants and Cats.

Yes, the Odeon is a fantastic Unique Building, as it is one of those rare Buildings that can be captured and instantly start producing Culture for you, even though you didn't build the Building (unlike captured World Wonders, which won't produce Culture if you didn't build them yourself).

See if you can secure a Stone Resource either via trade or warfare.

If you're going to help Napoleon out in his war, do so very soon... Darius will have Longbowmen in a short bit. Try to get Charlemagne up to Pleased first. Gift him increments of lump sums of Gold for additional Fair and Forthright Trading. If necessary, consider switching out of Hinduism (into Buddhism or into No State Religion if you don't have Buddhism) temporarily, if you'll be running a Great Artist Golden Age soon. Once he is Pleased, beg 10 Gold just before declaring war on Darius, to keep Charle from going after you via a war bribe.

Darius has a nice Stone + Fish City in the north with no Cultural defences. If it becomes too expensive to hold, you can gift the City to Charle who will then have 2 sources of Stone and will trade you one, even if he is only Cautious toward you after your war declaration on Darius (StrategicBonus = ANNOYED for Charle; I'm not sure if that's a greater than or greater than + equal to relationship--I believe that it's a greater than relationship, but confirmation would be nice, yet Cautious will work in either case).

On the way, you can capture Ghulaman from Darius and you can make a buddy out of Napoleon. Doing so beats earning "-1 You refused to join the war on our side" from both sides.


So, in my opinion, the next big steps are getting 1 or 2 Great Scientists for Education (probably only 1 is practical, seeing as how you already have an Academy) and securing a source of Stone. If Isabella has Stone, then you can simply choose to focus your war efforts solely on her, although it's hard to pass up the opportunity to go after Darius. Just watch for Napoleon getting to about twice the size of Darius and bribe Napoleon out of the war at that point, to avoid turning Napoleon into a super power. Also, watch out for the possibility of Darius Peace Vassalling to Charle if Darius becomes Friendly toward Charle (Vassal = PLEASED for Darius) and if no one is at war with Darius at that time.

Essentially, the big thing to watch out for in the north is PREVENTING Darius from joining sides with either of his neighbours. Keeping him from becoming a Vassal through good diplomacy should be one of your primary goals for dealing with the northern AIs in the medium term.

 

[Pangaea]

@ Pangaea

112 BPT is kind of low but you can bulb... bulb ... bulb everything
Going Lit -> Music is a good decision IMO.
Late CS would be acceptable for me with early war, but i would focus to not delay Edu.
Lit + Phi trait will be v handy with this goal.
Cheep Universities and fast Oxford should recompense(?) lost beakers beocuse late CS if you know what i meen.
And yea keep rolling, until they dont have Engi you are fine. Engi is stop on Deity dont know on IMM, thing is that cats cant cut through Castels one can deal with Pikes and everything else but not with Castels.
I would say try to grab as much as you can until 700 maybe 900 AD ?

Thanks, and those are good points. Once Music is done, and I really hope I've got CoL then, it should be full steam ahead towards Edu. Quick unis will help get up Oxford faster, although I need stone from somewhere. Haven't fully uncovered the southeast 'arm' of the map yet, but I can't see any there, so the closest known stone is in the very north and northwest parts of the map. Unlikely to get those in time

Engineering, or rather castles, is indeed horrible to get past. Catas don't work, and trebs aren't much better. At that point I would really need cuirs or cannons.

I count 11 base Hammers in your capital and I see 13 final Hammers... it could be worth it to Cottage (or even Farm) the P Riv that is SW + W of your capital, to get you that 12th base Hammer, at least for as long as you are building Temples and other Buildings instead of War Elephants and Cats.

That's a very good point. I sometimes remember to look out for stuff like this, but not this time. Another hammer would come in handy when erecting buildings.

Yes, the Odeon is a fantastic Unique Building, as it is one of those rare Buildings that can be captured and instantly start producing Culture for you, even though you didn't build the Building (unlike captured World Wonders, which won't produce Culture if you didn't build them yourself).

See if you can secure a Stone Resource either via trade or warfare.

Hadn't considered that Odeons can remain after capture, but that's a fine point too. Not likely to happen yet (not a damn thing survived in Madrid, not even a granary), but at some point the AIs will build everything in sight. I actually wish wonders would retain their culture output, but understand why they don't. Thankfully they retain GPP output at least. Losing that too would really suck.

If you're going to help Napoleon out in his war, do so very soon... Darius will have Longbowmen in a short bit. Try to get Charlemagne up to Pleased first. Gift him increments of lump sums of Gold for additional Fair and Forthright Trading. If necessary, consider switching out of Hinduism (into Buddhism or into No State Religion if you don't have Buddhism) temporarily, if you'll be running a Great Artist Golden Age soon. Once he is Pleased, beg 10 Gold just before declaring war on Darius, to keep Charle from going after you via a war bribe.

Darius has a nice Stone + Fish City in the north with no Cultural defences. If it becomes too expensive to hold, you can gift the City to Charle who will then have 2 sources of Stone and will trade you one, even if he is only Cautious toward you after your war declaration on Darius (StrategicBonus = ANNOYED for Charle; I'm not sure if that's a greater than or greater than + equal to relationship--I believe that it's a greater than relationship, but confirmation would be nice, yet Cautious will work in either case).

On the way, you can capture Ghulaman from Darius and you can make a buddy out of Napoleon. Doing so beats earning "-1 You refused to join the war on our side" from both sides.

As you noticed, Darius are going for Longbows already, so if I were to go after him, it better be asap. That's not really my plan though, and don't think I'll change that, as it's better to wipe out Isabella first I think. Ghulaman should be a good city once Darius chops down all that jungle though, even if it doesn't have any food. If the marble north of Ghulaman had been stone, it would have been easier to go after Darius sooner.

So, in my opinion, the next big steps are getting 1 or 2 Great Scientists for Education (probably only 1 is practical, seeing as how you already have an Academy) and securing a source of Stone. If Isabella has Stone, then you can simply choose to focus your war efforts solely on her, although it's hard to pass up the opportunity to go after Darius. Just watch for Napoleon getting to about twice the size of Darius and bribe Napoleon out of the war at that point, to avoid turning Napoleon into a super power. Also, watch out for the possibility of Darius Peace Vassalling to Charle if Darius becomes Friendly toward Charle (Vassal = PLEASED for Darius) and if no one is at war with Darius at that time.

Essentially, the big thing to watch out for in the north is PREVENTING Darius from joining sides with either of his neighbours. Keeping him from becoming a Vassal through good diplomacy should be one of your primary goals for dealing with the northern AIs in the medium term.

Depending on how slow I am to Paper, it may be possible to get another GS for a double Edu bulb -- but to be honest I prefer to just single-bulb it, and use another GS for another tech. Though that is perhaps because I rarely have two GSs in time Might be possible here since I'm PHI. Unless stone turns up somewhere in the SE, getting my hands on it will be tough, and probably practically impossible by Education and Oxford

I was surprised and a little worried that Napoleon captured Persepolis so soon. Usually the AIs can hang onto their cities in AI v AI wars pretty well without catas involved, at least now so close to 1AD. Hopefully Napoleon doesn't waltz over Darius, because then he'll become a beast. Have to keep an eye on that.

As far as I can see, Darius peace vassals at Friendly btw, not Pleased. Same with Charlie. But because they're in the same religion, they're at +5 and +7 with each other, so Friendly status isn't out of reach.

My thinking is that a key decision after a hopefully continued successful war against Izzy, is whether to swing back north and attack either Charlie or Darius, or whether to continued eastwards in the SE arm of the continent. Sitting Bull is next in line there, which isn't ideal, and Charlie too is protective. With that in mind, Darius would be better, but he's also likely to have longbows. Further in the SE, Joao is next in line, and he has built the Lighthouse of Great OP-ness (though it's less OP on a map like this). Napoleon self-built the Mids, pretty early, so if he were to get 12-15 cities, he'd become rather dangerous.

This is what the southeast looks like:

Spoiler :

What could speak for continuing the war in the south, even though it's Sitting Bull, is that Darius and Charlie could potentially become decent trade partners, as both are teching well. If this game goes all the way to space, that might come in handy. Their land is pretty good though, so there is that....

 

[Kaitzilla]

I wanted to post a screenshot, but Photobucket has destroyed its site once again

(Photobucket blows chunks again today, so I'm trying out Imgur -- apparently had an old account there.)

Ya, I don't know what is wrong with Photobucket this week.
It is making it really hard to post images on Civ Fanatics, and I have a paid account too.

Elephants can't get city raider I II III

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

They can't fit down the streets. :O

I also can't figure out how Hannibal got them across the Alps in real life.
Did he sail them 1000's of miles on a raft to Spain, then whip them to get them up into the mountains?
Craziness.


Link to video.

Apparently they liquored them up before battle, then poked them in their ankles until enraged, then let them loose on the enemy.

 

[Pangaea]

Well bugger, just when I thought things were going fairly well, bloody Izzy gets Feudalism out of the blue

Almost all her cities have been on hills too, so if these archers magically turn into longbows next turn, I'm boned.

Spoiler :

Hoped this place would be lightly defended, but 3 catas and 4 attackers (2 injured) will prove difficult, and if at least one archer turns into a longbow, I can forget about it. If one of the Axes decides to assault the damaged HA (he killed an archer), he's gone. Thankfully the city isn't on a hill, though, amazingly enough.

Madrid on a hill. Sevilla on a hill, and of course bloody Toledo is on a hill too!
Yet more potential longbows inside, though at least I have a good sized army there, once it heals up.

Darius is in mighty big trouble up north.

Spoiler :

Even if he manages to promotion-heal those "defenders" and has the wherewithal to whip a proper defender, he's likely to lose that city - though smart upgrades, if available, may help between turns. But the same applies to Nappy's four remaining attackers. There was a GG SW of Susa, but what Darius does with him, if anything, is anyone's guess. Looks like Feudalism comes too late for poor Darius.

Didn't think he would be in this much trouble there too, and without thinking I gave Nappy Currency for 120 because he was the only one without it. Would have helped if I need to buy him off Darius. I can still do it, but it costs Aesthetics, Calendar and 75 gold.

Sadly there is no stone in the south nor middle part of the map.

Really unsure what to do, especially with the Darius-Napoleon situation, so what would you guys do here?


(edit) She's definitely hurtin'.

Spoiler :

Normally I want to kill off the first AI I fight, particularly with the remaining cities spread out like this, but maybe it wouldn't be the worst idea in the world either, and then move on to Darius.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

When an AI upgrades an Archer to a Longbowman, that Longbowman no longer has its Fortification bonus. So, when that Longbowman isn't in a Hills City, it's not THAT much stronger than an Archer with full Fortification bonus. Thus, there is still a window to attack Isabella, especially as she may not upgrade all of her Archers at once. Just gather your forces at a City that matters and focus on grabbing it before ending the war.

I'd bribe Napoleon or Darius to stop that war. Either that or whip out some Horse Archers, let the war rage on, and send 5+ Horse Archers up there as soon as you can, to try to snipe a City or two that keeps changing hands, then take peace again after grabbing one or two of the nice Cities that are being exchanged.

Probably continue eastward with your WEs + Cats if you negotiate a Cease Fire between Napoleon and Darius. If you get involved in that war, obviously follow up against your chosen war target (which may be Napoleon) with your main army.

 

[Pangaea]

When an AI upgrades an Archer to a Longbowman, that Longbowman no longer has its Fortification bonus. So, when that Longbowman isn't in a Hills City, it's not THAT much stronger than an Archer with full Fortification bonus. Thus, there is still a window to attack Isabella, especially as she may not upgrade all of her Archers at once. Just gather your forces at a City that matters and focus on grabbing it before ending the war.

I'd bribe Napoleon or Darius to stop that war. Either that or whip out some Horse Archers, let the war rage on, and send 5+ Horse Archers up there as soon as you can, to try to snipe a City or two that keeps changing hands, then take peace again after grabbing one or two of the nice Cities that are being exchanged.

Probably continue eastward with your WEs + Cats if you negotiate a Cease Fire between Napoleon and Darius. If you get involved in that war, obviously follow up against your chosen war target (which may be Napoleon) with your main army.

Thank you for the advice Dhoomstriker.

Think this is good advice, and after sleeping on the notion of taking a chance on Darius-Nappy war continuing, it's too risky and it's better to bribe Nappy off him. Most civs already have Calendar, and although I don't like giving up semi-monopoly on Aesthetics so soon, especially to an AI with marble, it's better than the alternative of Nappy most probably taking 10-size Susa in between turns, and thereby breaking Darius' back. After a 10-turn peace, Darius will have longbows, so even if Nappy comes right back in for the kill, he should find it much harder.

Thanks for reminding me about the vanishing fortification bonus when upgrading units. That might help a little bit. Best to forget about that hilled city (Toledo), and instead try to grab Barcelona (SW of the banana). That's her new capital, so hopefully big, and non-hill. A GG just spawned there too, and with some luck she'll settle him there, considering the city isn't under siege atm.

If I'm really lucky, and don't suffer too many losses, maybe it will be possible to grab Barcelona and Salamanca, and then sue for peace in return for Feudalism, or at least Theology.