The Reign in Spain: Inquisition, Exploration, and Enlightenment

[Cam_H]

I will be away from my CIV pc for at least 2 days so I will need either a skip or swap, ok? Things are looking better I'd say.

No problem, is it OK if you swap with TCMIV? Or did you need more time than this?

• Norvin_Green <<< On Deck (swap with TCMIV for this round)
• TCMIV <<< Up (swap with Norvin_Green for this round)
• nocho
• IPEX-731BA5DD06
• happyturtle
• Sengir
• Cam_H

Also, I've left the last turn incomplete, so there are a few units with movement points available to them.

[Edit] IPEX - Thanks for the link to the Spanish Netherlands, and all that history on Ned Flanders! "Ohoho... Todd, taxes pay for everything! Policemen, trees, sunshine, and let's not forget the folks who just don't feel like working, God bless 'em!" Thanks again - an interesting read. [/Edit]

 

[Sengir]

I agree with most of what has been said (tech trading, tech compass).

Only thing I don't see much use in (yet) is windmills, they are not beneficial until electricity (or environmentalism) (IMHO)

About Charlie: probably best to try and wipe him out, I don't think he'll be much use after the war.

 

[Brian Shanahan]

The only problem I can see with a formation of the Spanish Netherlands, is that I can see no Burgundian royal line to marry into.

 

[Sengir]

Well, the Burgundian royal line is descendant from Charlemagne.... you'd have to go back to before the official start of the dynasty though.

 

[TCMIV]

Took a look at the save, just a few questions before I start.

Trade engineering to Joao for Civil service? I'd say we put a turn or 2 in to it to balance the trade first, but we don't want him getting it from someone else first.

Trade theology for compass to Willem, and other AI for gold + other useful techs? Theology has no reason not to be traded around imo, we should get what we can from it before Joao does.

Not sure why Cordoba is building a lighthouse, it has no seafood and non-fin coast is pretty terrible.

We should think about which city to start getting trebs out from, my vote goes for Madrid as it has the most hammers and can quickly build a citadel and start on CRIII trebs while the others build crossbows. Also not sure why the eastern cities are being cottaged at all, far too many plains to be worth it imo, they'd make better production cities and we could even just chop out units from them atm.

With Bureaucracy, we could leave the current capital as is for now and use the +50% hammers rather than moving it to Barcelona to benefit from the +50% commerce more, but I'll leave that up for discussion before I play. If not, Barcelona has some trees so we could get a palace there relatively quickly and bump our tech rate quite a bit.


Assuming we trade for compass/civil service, should we go optics next, or paper and chase the lib -> demo line?

Also, I'm probably going to chop/whip our military cities a bit if we're planning a war asap, if Charly gets longbows we'll be slowed down quite a bit, and that's looking very possible right now. Best to get a good force together before he can get a base of longbows in each city (his garrisons right now would be cut to pieces by even a small force of trebs + crossbows).

 

[Cam_H]

Not sure why Cordoba is building a lighthouse, it has no seafood and non-fin coast is pretty terrible.

I admit that even though it was my decision to re-build the Lighthouse after the hurricane event, I was thinking the same thing. Nonetheless, without a Lighthouse Cordoba's population will quickly stagnate, so working more coast thanks to the food generated by the Lighthouse yields a bit of extra commerce. A Lighthouse is half the cost of a Courthouse, and if the Lighthouse allows us to work 'say' three coastals in time, then it probably is just as good a choice. The other thing is that we continue to not pursue Maoi Statues, and this city was a candidate. Furthermore, coastal tiles with a Lighthouse are food neutral and appropriate tiles to take citizens from if we opt to use the whip. Still, if you want to spend three remaining turns on the Lighthouse build on a Citadel or something, I won't lose too much sleep.

Also not sure why the eastern cities are being cottaged at all, far too many plains to be worth it imo, they'd make better production cities and we could even just chop out units from them atm.

It is that they have so many Plains that there's some uncertainty how to handle these tiles, as there's some sort of a case for Farms, Cottages, and/or Watermills. I don't mind the Grassland being cottaged up to now, as it was otherwise unimproved and only had a food-reducing Workshop as an option. The Cottages on the Plains are more suspect, and I could go along with replacing them with Farms which at least don't detract from population growth and make whipping more practical. When we get Civil Service, the two Grasslands can be Farmed by chain irrigation.

With Bureaucracy, we could leave the current capital as is for now and use the +50% hammers rather than moving it to Barcelona to benefit from the +50% commerce more, but I'll leave that up for discussion before I play. If not, Barcelona has some trees so we could get a palace there relatively quickly and bump our tech rate quite a bit.

My inclination is not to hurry the Palace in Barcelona until Madrid has made its not inconsiderable contribution to getting our invasion force together. To me, this is the priority, and a +50% in Madrid I feel works better than an expensive Palace move and +50% in Barcelona right now, although once our army's together, a Barcelona capital does have great appeal.

Also, I'm probably going to chop/whip our military cities a bit if we're planning a war asap, if Charly gets longbows we'll be slowed down quite a bit, and that's looking very possible right now.

Just on whipping, most of our production cities are food-poor and will take a while to regrow, so I'm wary that we whip with some measure, although certainly the last round of units pre-war can be whipped out. Probably stating the obvious.

 

[TCMIV]

All fair points, I'll finish the lighthouse since it's just 3 turns anyway, and we can whip off those tiles without hurting the city. Also I'll probably chain irrigate Cordoba and work up it's pop anyway since it will eventually be a pretty good ship production city.

As for whipping, I was definitely not planning on using it heavily, mostly on cities that have hit their health/happy cap most likely. I'll probably start chain irrigating the plains ridden eastern cities as they'll make decent production cities and don't really have the food for cottages.

Main objective: grow cities, improve all worked tiles, build invasion force. Are we OK with the trades that have been proposed? We don't have any monopolies, so we should get some mileage out of eng/theo while we can.

 

[Cam_H]

Yep - I'm supportive of the proposed trades.

 

[nocho]

Plan sounds good to me. No hurry with the palace in Barcelona, though long term it will be better there.

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Build the Citadels in the various cities, mainly Cordoba and Madrid. Pump out those Trebuchets (10xp), and conquer Charlemagne.

Once we've done that, what about looking at Willem, we could take him out quickly.

 

[TCMIV]

Played 12 turns, I think someone's getting a reminder in 3 turns so just ignore it

Opening turn (223)-
Switch research to civil service to get a better trading rate from Joao, I hate giving up 165 gold, rather give up 60 by putting a turn in to it.
Traded theo to Willem for Compass + gold, and to Louis for HBR + Gold.




Turn 1 (224)-
Joao offers Civil service and 60 gold for engineering, there's the 60 gold we just spent on 1 turn of researching it!
Moved some crossbows towards Toledo which seems like a good jumping off point for troops.
Started getting more farms up with chain irrigation.
Switched to bureau.
A spy was auto assigned in Barcelona, removed it for a plains cottage.
Switched the wheat from Barcelona to Madrid, Barcelona is nearing max pop as it is while Madrid can work lots more hills with some food.
Swapped research to optics at 90% slider



Turn 2 (225)-
Event in Madrid gives our walls there +1 gpt, chose this over paying 35 gold to spread Christianity to 2 cities because I didn't think we even had 2 cities without it,
which we didn't.
Barcelona: Aqueduct -> Barracks
Seville: Crossbowman -> Pikeman
Saladin completes the Mausoleum
Charlamagne completes Chichen Itza, more for us to bombard :\




Turn 3 (226)-
Cordoba: Lighthouse -> Crossbowman
Salamanca: Spy -> Crossbowman
Madrid: Crossbowman -> Citadel

Turn 4 (227)-
Nothing notable

Turn 5 (228)-
Joao has optics

Turn 6 (229)-
Cordoba: Crossbowman -> Crossbowman
Madrid: Citadel -> Trebuchet
Charly wants compass, nah.



Turn 7 (230)-
Optics in, start on paper
Switch to a caravel in Cordoba
Upgrade our current trireme to get some exploring going
Seville: Pikeman -> Pikeman
A pretty big tech gap is showing up between the AI, with Willem/Joao ahead of the pack considerably,
we have no one to trade Feudalism for since all the other AI who we have some techs on aren't trading it.
Switched all EP to Charly for now.

Turn 8 (231)-
Barcelona: Barracks -> Crossbowman
Madrid: Trebuchet -> Trebuchet
Renegotiate our copper deal with Louis, Copper for 10gpt and clam



Turn 9 (232)-
Cordoba: Caravel -> Crossbowman

Turn 10 (233)-
Cordoba: Crossbowman -> Crossbowman
Uzbek: Courthouse -> Crossbowman

Turn 11 (234)-
Louis starts an overseas colony, Lincoln of America (not in the new world, just south of him) good news for us as we open borders and trade Engineering for Feudalism, much better trader than his master apparently.
Fair trade gets him to pleased as well.
Madrid: Trebuchet -> Trebuchet





Turn 12 (235)-
Cordoba: Crossbowman -> Crossbowman
Lincoln converts to Christianity
Willem got the great library

Decided to stop here, Charly has Feudalism, which means protective longbows and 125% defense in most cities due to Chichen Itza, he looks like a terrible target now but if we go at him it had better be hard. He only has 7 cities, so if we really gear up for war and take him out, we'll be set with some good land and a good chance to peacefully vassal Joao. I set tech to education at 0%, but I'd be tempted to run a little espionage slider right now, getting some city revolts on Charly would help the war go a lot faster.

Caravels are just getting out, only one with a spy atm. Need some workers to our eastern cities, they're looking ugly and slightly culture pressed.


Tech and Civic info:




Paper first gives us a chance to make some gold selling maps, I suggest we get someone else's map and then sell it to everyone, specifically someone who has seen Saladin/Liz's land as that would give us a pretty good sized map.

 

[Cam_H]

Thanks for the report.

Wouldn't mind the saved game posted (?).

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Whine Whine Wine (slurrrrpp)..I want the saved game Like a broken record

Good set you've done, and it was 225 you made on 1 turn of research, 165 we'd have paid out, and the 65 we actually received.

What might be best , we bribe Charlie into war with Elizabeth, for say Compass, then we hit him from behind, while his stack of Doom is fighting the English.

Espionage, spies and taking down Culture would definitely be an aid to war. Did you remember to put on Explorers or Spies onto the ships, no save so No I'd say

Cam, chill out Bro (or is that Sis), Put on some of that white base on your face that you need..

 

[TCMIV]

There's a spy on one ship, no explorer as I kinda spaced it, but neither are really out to sea yet. One was escorting a WB to our northern fish and took some time to get out.

Forgot the save completely but it's attached to this post

Also, we could fill in some maces in to our stack, but imo they're just too expensive and trebs will pulverize everything anyway, so cheaper crossbows make the best mop up units. I already made a couple pikes for anti HAs, we may want 1-2 more (though maybe not, Charly doesn't seem to be a unit spammer here and he's barely got any power on us, probably just the typical 4 unit garrisons).

Still no wars is pretty unusual by 900AD

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Some notes and idea's;

Cordoba, should get out a Citadel in 4 turns, and start spamming Trebuchets as well.

Seville, could produce a Stable in 4 turns, with a run at Guilds for knights. We have Horses, and pikes to take out the War Elephants. Mainly for the longbows in cities. Worth 1 Crossbowman.

Move Capital to Barcelona now, and reap the benefit of Bureaucracy. Allowing Madrid to produce 4 Trebuchets in 10 turns, due to fractional overflow from completion.

Salamanca, should farm that cottage on its grassland, and cottage the riverside plains.

Forbidden palace in Santiago (22 Turns), for future expansion into Willem and Elizabeth's lands. Build walls and Citadel next after forge, with growth, that's 20 / Turn will take 6 turns to do, and can produce Trebuchets and Catapults in 4/6 turns with a barracks as well.

Uzbek, cottage that farm on the Flood plains for a 1 loss.

Toledo, Farm that Grassland or 2 that has a Cottage below the farm, lake, for quicker growth, and working more mines.

To revolt Charlies cities will cost Min 747 . rising to over 900 in some cities, I doubt we'd be able to get 1 or 2 cities. Maybe a set of Accuracy Catapults to take it down in 1 turn, 4 are needed I think.

We'll have to fogbust for the fishin nets on the Northern fish, as, its only 2 tiles into our Culture, and not the Fog-busted tiles, which won't deter Barb Galley's. Both to the West and East.

Really, A Granary (whipping) + Forge ( )should be the 1st 2 builds in virtually every city.

Road from Marble to Charlies borders and link up with his Road network. If we attack from Joao's Territory, we could take Ausburg on the 2nd turn of the war, 1 turn move to walls, 2nd turn bombard with Accuracy Catapults, massacre with 10 Pt's Trebuchets (city raider 3) and clean up with City Garrison Crossbows, who hold the city.

Of course, in an ideal world, we can bribe Charles into war with Elizabeth with Optics or Compass. Louis is Friendly with Charlie, and Willem is Pleased, so doubt he'll be giving over tech's.

Seems strange that there have been no wars as yet, only us declaring upon Saladin.

 

[Norvin_Green]

Returning for duty. Can take the swap with TCMIV if ok with everyone. i can post a PPP later today and play tomorrow sometime.

 

[TCMIV]

I don't agree with forges right now, we're planning a war and units are pretty much the only priority in my opinion. Forges will not pay for themselves for a while, and they cost a lot of hammers that could otherwise be trebuchets/crossbowmen. After Charly is dead we can think about forges

Knights are also expensive, and require us to tech guilds which isn't really needed right now. Personally I'd think lib -> astro is pretty good on terra, to start settling the new world early, but I never play this map type so I'll yield to someone elses personal knowledge.

Trebuchets are our main attack unit, we really just need some mop up units for after the collateral is done, which is why crossbows are nice (with some anti mounted stack defense). They tear apart melee units so our stack of trebs is safe with just some pikes mixed in.

We definitely need to convert another hammer city to treb spamming, the capital spits them out pretty quick but we've got crossbows coming from a lot of cities. I'd wait until the war is won to move the palace or build the forbidden palace (shouldn't this be in the new world anyway?) 240 hammers for a palace is nearly 3 crossbows, what if those 3 were the ones that won us the war

 

[Cam_H]

Lots of good thoughts. Just some to chime in;

Seville: Christian Missionary > Walls > Citadel ?

Toledo: I'd like to see the chop going into a Market. Agree with IPEX that we should use those Forested Grasslands. I'd lean towards more Cottaging, but can live with Farms for the Mines. Also, a pedantic one; the Marble Quarry yields better than a Grassland Mine.

Cordoba: As painful as it is to take a citizen off a Mine, I'd work that last Farm and get the population up faster. Grow by 1 and go back to working the Mine. As discussed, we can whip the coastals in time. It is still not Christian and therefore not getting the Theocracy benefit, so getting a Missionary over there (maybe as proposed; ex-Seville) might have to be included in our deliberations.

Uzbek might benefit from a Christian Temple. It's not much Culture, I know, but it's still competing with Maastricht.

Agree with IPEX also that the Salamanca Grassland Cottage can be replaced with a Farm.

Is Vandal blocking access to our Fish? Not normally a problem except Barcelona's at its health cap. Is our Crossbow going to take the city (88.8%), and if so do we keep or raze it? Personally I'd raze it.

We can't complete the Forbidden Palace for now as it contributes Great Spy points.

Liberalism > Astronomy is fine by me. I'd also consider Printing Press as a prerequisite for Democracy. I appreciate that Nationalism is marginally more expensive than Printing Press, but I think that the boost to Barcelona, Uzbek and Toledo will compensate. We can't build either Hermitage or the Taj Mahal until we get to Democracy anyway.

I'm also a little mindful that Charlemagne has a couple of units floating around to the north of us, and when we declare we just don't get caught off guard.

I can live without Knights, however I think a few Accuracy promoted Catapults is a fine idea.

A 'slow build' Palace in Barcelona's OK by me. I'm not sure why we're building / built Barracks in our commerce cities, and would probably look at Spies or Settlers or something, but it's no biggie.

Let's not forget we need to undertake the Siglo de Oro between 1490AD and 1660AD, and I'd imagine that this will be undertaken with a Great Prophet out of Madrid.​

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Lol, I liked the previous picture Cam....sorry if I've stirred you too much...

I agree on barracks in commerce cities??? don't need them, market is better or spies/settlers.

Bigger cities=bigger Army, so more farms on grasslands, can't be all cottages.

Vandal I'd be inclined to keep, its one less settler, and claims a resource.

None of my dot mapping has been compromised, if anyone thinks of better sites, feel free to add/change.

4 Accuracy Catapults would be enough to remove any culture, or is it 5 we need??? best just to go with 5, if 1 too many, its a suicide Barrage trooper.

A lot of the rest was more long term idea's. Moving the capital (spy points) and forbidden palace (more spy points).

After the Charles war, we really need to decide on the 3 Legendary city sites, and cottage/build accordingly.

On the spices and Silk, we can get more in trade deals then we can with Cottages or towns. I don't understand you reluctance to trade resources. Tech's you'll give away, but resources...COME ON!!!!

Joao, has every one available to declare war, but won't be bribed into it. Would also take up and embargo against Charles, and Louis.

Louis will declare war, but wants nearly all our techs to do so..I don't think so. Other wise, no one will war, worst enemy or not.

Trades are there to be picked up, Trade them off, sell some resources, Barcelona should fall 2 or 3 into the red, and whip a forge for 4 pop with 1 turn of building, 3 are unhappy who all work marginal cottages

 

[Norvin_Green]

Sorry for the delay. Yesterday's chores took far longer than anticipated. Here goes-

Madrid – grows in 3 , hire priest (speeds up GP for a GA), alternate maces & trebs

Barcelona – walls, citadel (culture) & missionaries or palace

Seville – maces, xbows, pikes

Cordoba –citadel, keep current xbow, LB send axe to Toledo

Toledo – finish spy>wall>citadel>spies (also road and chop SW area for maneuverability in defense)

Uzbek- market>harbor

Santiago – forge>walls>citadel

Salamanca – xbow>Christian monastery

I like teching PP per Cam_H’s suggestion.

I’d also like to propose attacking Charlemagne from the south. If we take these two cities first it should go a long way to crippling his ability to produce strong units.

Roads between Toledo, Uzbek and Cordoba would be needed for defense in case he doesn’t attack Toledo as we suspect.

Spoiler :

I'd also gather up our promoted axes from various cities and send them to Toledo (after replacing them with a proper unit of course) to be upgraded to maces when we are ready to launch our attack.