The Sun Never Sets on the British Empire

[J in Vegas]

The sun never sets on the British Empire
Welcome Civ 4 C2C players. After lurking on these boards I felt inspired to finally join after many years of looking on the board. C2C has inspired me to finally enjoy and post about what Civ 4/5 could have been and should have been. Civ 5 was such a letdown and I have been very happy to play the add-on mods that have followed the Civ 4 Vanilla version. ROM and AND were great add-ons and you can see their work in C2C. So after downloading the Mod in April 2014 and playing it for several months, I felt inspired to post a play along/ commentary/ constructive criticism. It will be on GEM map, and I know that the modders are suspending that map for Ver.35 but once you play GEM you can’t go back……ever.
About me… I live in Las Vegas, USA. I bartend. I play C2C at least 4 times a week. It’s the best mod for Civ 4 ever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. I was playing a game recently and felt the need to post some stuff about it. After looking into the Multiplayer post section, I saw a void of above V30 games posted, so I thought it would be a good time to post info about the mod, and allow the awesome modders some real game feedback about their baby. A little heads up; my grammar sucks, my spelling sucks. I have no HTML skills. I am not a Modder. I have no know idea how to post pics???? I am O.K. at world Builder. When I am telling the British Empire story it will be in italics… all other commentary will be in normal typing. But I can make a mean cocktail…. Without further ado…….. “The sun never sets on the British Empire”

 

[J in Vegas]

About this play……
I want to play this game with my own goals. This game will follow more of the Rhye’s and Fall type of strategy. For each country, you have your own goal. So what defines the British Empire? Global conquest? Tea for the Queen? The Royal Navy and Air force? Scotland Yard? Big Ben? An Empire that the sun never sets on? I will try to follow what historically happened in the U.K. and complete my goals. You might ask, why not start from the beginning? Well, watching someone hunt down a cheetah or wolf gets boring quickly. The first 2%~3% on Snail speed, especially playing on an island is boring. Everybody knows what the earth looks like. Hunting Horses and bears is fun, but not to watch, or so much for the Modders. I should have started this at 3%, but I didn’t until 4%, but I will get everyone up to speed on what happened between 3% to 4%. So this is the Majestic British Empire at 4% (~6700 BC).

 

[J in Vegas]

O ye come close my servants….
After many cold spells the Great people of the British Empire have come together to proclaim their self-rule, to expand beyond the island and expand the monarchy beyond the island to the far reaches of the globe, to have an Empire were the sun never sets. What is my goal in this game? Very easy.

{In my ideal world, the company 2k games or the modders would have an ability to have the game have ice ages, so you would have to be nomadic for the first part of the game ( 50000 BC starts) Everybody would leave Africa, in stages, timed by reoccurring ice ages. I know that the tile squares can by changed by global warming and such, can they be controlled by Modder controlled HTML or DLL code changes? I would program all players to not have the ABILITY TO SETTLE until you reach the Sedentary lifestyle.}

A) To kill the Zulu’s and hang Shaka by 1900AD. ( Why Shaka?… Follow the post and see why)

B) To have a settlement (1 City) in the following British commonwealth by 1775 AD.
1)Canada
2)U.S.A.
3)Australia
4)India ( with a TEA resource for the Queen)
5)South Africa
6)New Zealand
7)Caribbean

Bonus Areas
8)Fort At Gibraltar
9)Fort/Canal At The Suez Canal
10)Hong Kong
11)Burma
12)Falkland Islands
13)Bermuda
14)Singapore
15)British North Borneo
16)Cyprus
17)British Guiana
18)British Somaliland
19)Papua New Guinea
20)Iraq or Jordan


C) To build at least 80% of the following wonders
Big Ben
Edinburgh’s Castle
Globe Theatre
Global Stock Exchange
Isaac Newton College
King Richard’s Crusade
London Eye
World News Network (BBC)
Scotland Yard {Built in London 6685B.C.}
Stonehenge {Built by The Zulu's 14525B.C.}

Bonus National wonders (7 of 8 Needed)

• Oxford University
• East Indian Company
• Adam’s Smith’s trading company
• Theory of evolution
• First cloned Mammal
• Eden Project
• IMF
• Cure for cancer

D) And to found the Church of England (Christianity) in London.

E) To build all 20 Generals listed by www.nam.ac.uk/exhibitions/online-exhibitions/britains-greatest-general and have them at 100xp each by 1900A.D.

So back to the game... here is a chart shot from 6200BC.
J in Vegas

 

[Thunderbrd]

Cool thread! I'll be watching.

We Vegas C2C'rs should get together for coffee (or drinks ) somewhere one of these days. We'll have to rope Foxy into it too.

And go figure... I live in Vegas and spend most of my day CALLING the UK lately. hmm... wonder if I'm falling into the twilight zone here. lol!

EDIT:

{In my ideal world, the company 2k games or the modders would have an ability to have the game have ice ages, so you would have to be nomadic for the first part of the game ( 50000 BC starts) Everybody would leave Africa, in stages, timed by reoccurring ice ages. I know that the tile squares can by changed by global warming and such, can they be controlled by Modder controlled HTML or DLL code changes? I would program all players to not have the ABILITY TO SETTLE until you reach the Sedentary lifestyle.}

Been angling to achieve this for a while. This is the Nomadic Start project you may have seen mentioned previously. Just a few more steps before we get to it is all (we hope.)

 

[J in Vegas]

The King spoke, “Follow my words citizens, as I will lead you to victory”.
Thank you Thunderbird for the response. It’s always humbling when one of the modders gives you a shout out. So before anybody asks about the setting, here they are.

Emperor/ GEM / Snail / Ver. 34 SVN 7077
Raging Barbarians, Aggressive A.I., Permanent Alliances, NO VASSAL STATE, Barbarian World, No BarbarianCivs, START AS MINOR, Multiple Production + Research, Usable mountains, surround and destroy, advanced Diplomacy, UNLIMITED WONDERS, Barbarian generals, assimilation, Ruthless AI, great commanders, advanced economy, Realistic culture spread + Corporations, Religion Decay, united nations, advanced Espionage, expanded castles, artic and city parks, meteorology, civic building, early building, historical wonders, modern corporations advanced nukes, divine prophets, infinite XP, developing leaders, start without positive traits, scale city limits, C2c combat Mod- Fight or Flight, C2C Combat Mod- SIZE MATTERS.

Bug Menu key items….
Viewport 55x55, Terrain Damage, No Multiple religion spread, Dynamic X.P., and Stack limit size (20)
Notes: I always play No Vassals State. The reason behind my decision to disable this feature is that it handicaps the top players. (AI). I feel that the AI gives in too easy to becoming a vassal state and it makes the Civs that get to Vassalage first too powerful.

I always play start as minor. That is the only way to play. You have to fight before writing. A lot of fighting.

I never play unlimited wonders, but this time I did. It actually helped in the balancing of the game. Shaka and the Zulu’s were not as crazy powerful this game because of it. I will explain more about this later in the following posts.

Size matters is just awesome. I will talk more about this later.

Terrain Damage is another game balance equalizer.

No Multiple religion spread… I spend a lot of time building my religions in my cities, and this feature erases them. I know that it follows a more true to life way of religion spread and city control, but I like having my religion stay where I put them.

I read the post about having both ruthless AI and aggressive AI in the same game. I will not enable both in the future.

Another pic of the startup….. You can always tell what’s going on in a game by looking at the Wonder roll call.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Nice! Please keep this up! I love these Let's Play games.

Make sure you get the main British cultures like English, Welsh, Scottish. Maybe even pick up Irish and Celtic. Plus getting American, Canadian, South African, Australian, during the colonial Era would be cool too.

C2C Culture Chart

 

[J in Vegas]

Post about game balancing and GEM Map/ England stats
So here goes this post. Just a warning, it will be long. Why do I dislike the Zulu’s for? Did they steal the King’s son? Do the British need to tame the savage Zulu’s? Most of this stems from some game imbalances in the GEM map. The Zulu’s are given the best starting area in the whole map, with no other strong players around them and the Savanna terrain which is awesomely powerful. Malinese, Carthage, and Egypt are too far away in the beginning to challenge, and the Congo tribe is always an underperformer. What is needed is someone in Ethiopia who is strong to balance them out. I would either add someone there or move the Congo tribe to Ethiopia. Next game I play I will do that. I have 5 games going, and in each one Shaka is running away with the game…. At times like double the score. I did notice on this game do to the fact that I enabled unlimited wonders, Shaka has spent more on wonders and less on expansion and death in Africa. This has kept him closer to the other players. Plus in my Egypt game, Shaka and I have had fierce fight for over 22,000 years. That’s why I don’t like him. He’s going down.

Next on my GEM dislike is the lack of Spain or Portugal. I read the post about how Spain and Arabia were always underperformers, but who is going to battle the royal navy for ocean supremacy when there is no Spanish Armada? It also allows the Celts to expand way too fast, and puts too much pressure on the Romans, who have under achieved in every game so far except the one I played them. I have five games going, (YU), (Romans), (Inca), (Egypt), (And the glorious English). Unfortunately, the Inca game has a bug that crashes both saves the next turn. I’m working on that one. And the Yu game was my first C2C game, and I had no idea what I was doing, and I’m doing poorly in that game. I will use the Egyptian game from time to time so show A.I. battle strategy since every turn has crazy battles in the desert.

Next beef is with the cultures. There is two camps here. One says that the culture should be able to be built anywhere in the continent as long as the pre-req’s are there. The other camp is that the culture should be only available in certain areas, meaning that if you want the culture in the GEM you have to settle in that area. I got both the Hun and the Minoan culture so far. The Minoan isn’t that bad since England is an island, and so was Crete. But I would add a Latitude requirement of south of 45` Degrees to place the culture somewhere in the Mediterranean. And with the Hun, I would take away the grasslands option, and only allow plains to narrow possible locations down in Europe, preferably in Eastern Europe. That would remove both England and the Celts from getting the Hun culture. Also the Scottish culture needs Seals and Sea lions and there are none in Scotland. I would change that requirement to a Marsh square (to represent a Peat Bog), and change a square in western Scotland around the Islay area to a marsh square. No Peat Bogs equals no scotch! I will have to enter world builder, which I loath doing and usually never do in a live game (only pregame), to add the sea lions and such to make the Scottish culture buildable. I am going to do that when I get the English culture at Monarchy. I will also try to get all the rest of the British cultures and British Commonwealth cultures.

Great people breakdown. This was the first game that I got a Great Spy. It is kind of fitting playing England that espionage is going to be big with this game. I first got a spy, which I used in the city. I am ahead a ton of espionage points, and I will be stealing technology like a madman later in the game. I know on other members posts they were talking about fixing the Scotland Yard GS build, which is crazy at the time I built it. It reminds me of the History channel show “Ancient Aliens”, the show with the crazy hair guy. They came down to England to build Scotland Yard, a modern steel and concrete building in 6685B.C. My first general was a great hunter line one, which I took the +6 Hunter for London. I also got 1 great merchant, and later two more spies. I placed one more spy in London, then waited a bit to build Scotland Yard with the last. The -37 a turn maintenance for Scotland Yard is brutal this early in the game and will make me play a bit different. If it wasn’t a game goal, I probably would have not had built it. I have received two more generals, one is a General, and the last one I just recently used as a warlord…… but I can’t reveal on what or why yet…..

On the Wonder roll call, it started out pretty even. It was alright until about 9000 B.C. until the unknown players and Shaka started to run away with the game and wonders. Some beef with wonders/cultures. The Neanderthals culture is way too strong. A 4 strength melee unit that early is so unbalanced. It should be lower, like a 3.5, or have a -25% handicap against humans, or a -50% handicap against cities. In my Roman game I got that culture early and destroyed all of Europe easily. I would also make that culture only buildable in Europe or Asia, since that was I believe the only area that Homo Neanderthals was located at.

Religion was a easy one to pick. Druidism was captured by taking Vienne, and I ended up spreading it across the rest of my cities. It saved me a Great Prophet and the health benefits are great until I get the Church of England later.

The rest of the pics gets the readers up to speed on the English empire up to date. I know that some of these issues have been fixed since SVN 7077. I spent an hour reading through the SVN post log, trying to see if the stuff I was posting about here was already fixed. Now comes the fun part, the game play. I will probably have another game balance post, but not for a bit. It’s time to jump into the game which I am almost 1500 years farther into, so I have plenty of material to post about.

 

[Hydromancerx]

On the Wonder roll call, it started out pretty even. It was alright until about 9000 B.C. until the unknown players and Shaka started to run away with the game and wonders. Some beef with wonders/cultures. The Neanderthals culture is way too strong. A 4 strength melee unit that early is so unbalanced. It should be lower, like a 3.5, or have a -25% handicap against humans, or a -50% handicap against cities. In my Roman game I got that culture early and destroyed all of Europe easily. I would also make that culture only buildable in Europe or Asia, since that was I believe the only area that Homo Neanderthals was located at.

Neanderthals cannot upgrade into better units. So it evens out. You have to use them fast or they will obsolete.

 

[J in Vegas]

Neolithic Period 7000B.C. To 5800B.C
The next two post will be about the period above for England. The previous posts was the Pre-Neolithic Period, 50000B.C to 7000B.C. This age of England includes the entering of the Ancient Era, the rise and fall of the Celtic Empire, and the continuing rise of British power.

First off, there was not enough room for both a strong England and strong Celtic (France). The Celts were rapidly expanding along the western European border, and were going to encroach on England’s sea area in the English Channel, so my crack team of horses with my general was dispatched to deal with them. This leads to my next 2 beefs. Both have been brought up in other posts by other members. First, Generals should be capped on how much experience they get from animals, as they become too powerful by hunting animals in the 50000B.C. to 8000 B.C. time frame. Next, Horseman are too strong of a unit at the stage of the game that you get them. Archers come later and there isn’t any good defense units against horseman until archers come. And they are only good in cities. You have to wait to spearman come with copper units to be able to field a unit that can take the horseman on in the open countryside. And the A.I. doesn’t prioritize defense building when they expand early on. They should build Earth Walls, Fire Abitis?, and all defense building first. That’s a coding error. Especially on “Start as Minors”. With the horseman, I precede to capture Vienne, and destroy another city along northern France. The sly Germans smell the blood in the water and destroy a city around the Netherlands area. I liked that aggressive A.I. move there. I can’t take the capital city of the Celts, no do I want to. I just want to weaken them.

At this point, I do some exploration of the rest of Western Europe. Earlier in the game I had used rafts to explore a bit. I feel that rafts should not be able to explore so much that early in the game. Maybe they can only explore along coasts only, with a high probability of sinking in open waters? So far I have uncovered the Greek, Roman, and Carthage capital cities. I combine the 3 horseman into one monster unit, with the general and continue my destruction in Western Europe. I destroy the Celt city in modern day Venice, which is a great choke point city. The general is close to 100xp by now. After Mining, I switch to Metals and Caste which gets the treasury finally going. Bibracte is strong enough where I can’t take it. The Celts start to field Bear riders, as I have denied them access to horses. The bear rider is another unit that is too powerful. It should be a 6 like the horseman. I finally get around to destroying the last Celt city in modern day Lisbon. At that point, the rise and fall of the Celts is complete.

As I explore, I take a peek inside other rival nation cities. Do to my high points, I can see what everyone is up to. The Romans are again looking like crap. I free a double choke point set up by the Celts in Naples, and the A.I. has a chance to kill my General by sacrificing two units but doesn’t see it. Those sorts of moves are probably hard to code, but easy for a human player to see. I hope that the Romans, now free of the Celtic strangle hold, will develop. I would like to see 4 equally strong countries in Europe, with the Germans, Celts, Greeks, and the Viking all being about the same. I need trading partners later in the game.

 

[J in Vegas]

Neolithic Period 7000B.C. To 5800B.C“

True glory consists in doing what deserves to be written, in writing what deserves to be read.”
Pliny the Elder

Part #2
This post will close out the Neolithic Period of England. Let’s get right into it. First you have England further strengthening the core cities on the island and focusing on increased wealth, reducing crime and unhealthiness, and limited exploration. At this point all the cities are doing great on happiness and health. That will change later for sure. I’m in a solid second for all major categories behind Shaka, and I am finally making a little bit of money. I build the Strategic Grain Reserve at 6153B.C. and a crappy graphic pops up. Definitely needs a more ancient feel that a grain silo from Nebraska! I spot the Great Beast, the KRAKEN, in the North Sea fighting Moby Dick! All of the Kraken’s will be dealt with later.

Some views so far. I think the A.I. needs to focus more on the naval aspect of the game as I am the only player with galleys or war galleys and I’m killing the outriggers. I also noticed that I can combine 3 outriggers together in Size matters mode, but not war galleys or galleys. I don’t know if that was done for game balance or if that was an error. I do some exploration in middle Europe and find that the Germans has been busy bees. That city of Essen will be destroyed soon enough. At least they are fielding archers in the cities.

I also have noticed that the A.I. fields groups of three for their XP hunting for generals. I kind of do the same thing. As the game goes on now its archer/hunter/general combo’s. It’s good to see the A.I. at least trying to get their generals up to speed on XP. The A.I. also picks lesser/meager culture/research/wealth way too much instead of actually building stuff. Empires get bigger by building cities and building. The A.I. puts too much emphasis on converting production into other stuff (research/culture/wealth), instead of building things (workers, settlers, or building that produce the above stuff).

Why did I build Amsterdam, or keep Vienne? Vienne was kept to reflect the history of Brittany, and English influence there. I expect to lose this city eventually, if things go according to real life history. And I built Amsterdam to absorb the play of the Netherlands, who have a similar history of monarchy, seafaring, and overseas colonization. That will be my only absorption of another “player/country” per say.

My traits in this game. All classic British traits. Seafaring, Philosophical, and to a lesser extent, Agricultural. I picked as my negative trait Isolationist. I am on an island, but I do trade a lot. I don&#8217;t know, all the picks for negative traits were terrible&#8230; it was a hard choice. About the play level- even though I am playing at emperor level, do to my self-imposed handicaps, it&#8217;s like I&#8217;m playing 1 level higher&#8230; at times almost at deity. I can&#8217;t settle any cities where there wasn&#8217;t any British history or areas that are not in my goal list. I have to only found Christianity, even though I have the opportunity to found other religions. I am forced to engage the strongest player the whole game. I have to found colony cities all around the world, which is going to be crazy hard with maintenance and instability. My goal wonders are all in the Middle Ages /Renaissance, so I have to rush to found those wonders instead of focusing on more important stuff. I have to field a huge navy, the largest at all times throughout history until modern times. And lastly, I have to keep Monarchy for most of the game and cannot choose Republic which is the best government to have in both the game and in real life. I know I will steadily fall behind in score and everything else until the Renaissance period, where hopefully I can blast off and colonize everything at one time. I will be setting up the Iberian Peninsula as the Royal hunting area; since there is no Spain&#8230;&#8230;&#8230;. ;<(

So this ends the Neolithic Period 7000B.C. To 5800B.C. Next up is the Age of Exploration, starting off with the science of &#8230;&#8230; what for it&#8230;&#8230;what for it&#8230;. Exploration!

Age of Exploration 5800B.C. to 3500B.C. &#8230;&#8230;.to be continued.

J in Vegas

 

[Thunderbrd]

I also noticed that I can combine 3 outriggers together in Size matters mode, but not war galleys or galleys. I don&#8217;t know if that was done for game balance or if that was an error.

You must be playing on v34 stock. First portion of v35 was a massive rewrite of SM that enabled a number of unit types to merge/split that weren't previously capable - among other numerous adjustments to the mechanism. An update to v35 once it's out will be helpful there.

 

[J in Vegas]

Age of Exploration I 5800B.C to 3500B.C.
Part 1
&#8220;The wisest men follow their own direction&#8221; &#8211;Euripides

The king had gathered his minister&#8217;s. &#8220;I must expand this great empire, to take this great country to the ends of the earth. There must be a union jack flag flying high everywhere a civilized man looks. Set sail, my must noble sailors, set sail.&#8221; About this series of posts. It is a 6 part series. A lot of exploration, some decent battles early on, and some more development for the English culture and economy. I will be posting at the end of each series (AGE) a breakdown of all named units, generals, important battles, etc. I will also try to add more flavor to the posting if I can.

On a technical note, I replaced my video card, which was a GeForce 450??? to a GeForce 640-2GB3 card. The extra GB of memory should help. The old card was not keeping up. The old card did have an extra power supply 6-pin, which the new card did not. They are both ASUS cards. At that point I turned off viewports, and have been running without them since. Only after I got to about 6200k saves do the game drops and MAF start showing up. That&#8217;s about when they did in the other games. I might have to turn back on the view ports now (approx. 2100B.C.). I thought I should get to typing here soon as I am getting close to finishing out the Iron Age. I have about 50 more turns to go. The Iron age is been a great play, the best of the ages so far.

Some technology goals. Everyone has their own ways of going on the tech tree. I was looking to follow important British tech&#8217;s first. So here is my beelines&#8230;.
1) Writing (5257B.C.)
2) Ship Building (Approx.. 4000B.C.)
3) Monarchy (3801B.C.)
4) Iron Working (3549B.C.)
5) Christianity (1841B.C.)

They all make pretty good sense. Writing for the ability of peace with everyone except Shaka. Also there are some powerful UU available with the cultures I have assembled so far. Ship building for the royal navy. After my first encounter with Shaka, I realize that I need to get to ship building faster, as I was grabbing some cheap techs beforehand. Monarchy is the government of choice this game. Iron working unlocks more powerful naval and land units. The last one, Theology, is a very costly tech to get. The A.I. players are definitely getting a lot of other techs while I march towards that goal. I finally get my money in order in the Iron Age and can pay for techs. This Age is characterized by my inability to keep the science slider at 100% unless I have at least 1 city building wealth. A lot of the time the slider is at 85~90%. I guess that is good programming, keeping the early civilizations in check until they get better techs and civics.

First off, I start building the Sky Grand Festival, as the Naval one was built by Shaka. I use Liverpool as my secondary builder city next to London. It is putting out some good production now. I am pumping out some serious naval units and archers right now. My mini SOD of horses passes Essen, which in an earlier post I said I destroyed. I got confused. I pass by this city as it is defended by archers and I don&#8217;t like the 54% odds. Next stop in my European summer conquest tour is Greece. Argos is in the crosshairs. Building stuff they shouldn&#8217;t be, instead of walls. Notice the lesser culture being built by berlin??? Argos goes down in 5705 B.C. I take the city and (CRTL-A) everything in the city for cash, then burn the city down. The next turn the Greeks destroy Essen. Another sneak attack by the A.I. The Greeks should have kept their forces in their cities to protect against a stack like mine showing up, but oh well. Knossos is next. You would think the A.I. after losing a city would be building defensive units or building as a SOD is closing in on you. No&#8230;. clay pit seems like a reasonable thing to build. Knossos is destroyed in 5621 B.C. This marks the start of the Greek decline period. The Germans come back from these battles, but the Greeks do not. I capture my first two slaves, a military and civilian one. Pretty cool feature. The Greeks finally show up with some units to defend or attack. But by that time I&#8217;m already out towards Turkey and the damage has already been done.

Lastly, pics 6 and 8 show the naval double choke points at Demark and Gibraltar. Don&#8217;t mind my bad spelling on the maps. And I decided against building a city at Gibraltar, I&#8217;m just going to build a fort there. The goal is complete control of the Mediterranean Sea and the North/Baltic Sea. On a crazy note, if you look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choke_point the exact choke point I&#8217;m doing is used as the textbook example. &#8220;The Strait of Gibraltar is an important naval choke point, as just a few ships could block the entry to the whole Mediterranean Sea.&#8221; I am also building a 5 war galley mini armada to bring the naval surprise to Shaka. I have to bring the pain!

 

[J in Vegas]

Age of Exploration I 5800B.C to 3500B.C.
Part 2

&#8220;And them that take the sword shall perish by the sword&#8221; &#8211; The Bible, Matthew

So let&#8217;s get right into this post. This is going to be a quick post of sorts&#8230; I researched famous British generals and ships and I&#8217;m going to start naming key units that have shown outstanding performance and bravery in the theater of war, and all warlord lead units. The first unit is the pinnacle of British warships, the HMS Victory lead by no one other than Lord Nelson. I will be naming the General I have already to General John Moore. The above quote is from Metal Casting, which I get in this post. I see the Viking have flaming archers, pretty cool. Must be some sort of promotional upgrade. I continue to assemble my 5 war galley mini armada for Shaka. I will be parking the HMS Victory in the Baltic Sea to help with the naval blockade of Germany. I find the Cyprus location at last, with a juicy copper resource next to it. I will be making a beeline to settle that area as soon as possible as I will also have the ability to build the Roman culture there. General John Moore&#8217;s army reaches Asia Minor, regrouping before pushing into "Terra Incognito" (Africa) to face off against the Mighty Zulu&#8217;s. The first battle between the England and the Zulu&#8217;s occurs in the year 5397B.C. as the Royal navy is victorious over the wicked Zulu navy. I am also sending in some units into Northern Africa to try to subdue the wild savages there. Queen Dido sends some forces to try to rough me up!

The last set of comments will discuss the known world. Pic#4 shows the forces around Europe. The naval blockade around the Baltic Sea lead by Lord Nelson and the flagship HMS Victory. The Mediterranean Fleet with the Blockade at Gibraltar, and the rest of the fleet heading to toward Cyprus. Galleys surrounding England, and Archers in all cities. I also have the horseman and hunters in the Iberian Peninsula, a.k.a. the Royal hunting grounds.

Pic #6 & 7 show the city count around me.
&#8226; &#8220;Malians&#8221; -3 cities all along the western coast of Africa
&#8226; &#8220;Egyptians&#8221; -1 city
&#8226; &#8220;Carthaginians&#8221; -2 cities
&#8226; &#8220;Greeks&#8221; -2 cities
&#8226; &#8220;Germans&#8221; -4 cities
&#8226; &#8220;Huns&#8221; -2 cities
&#8226; &#8220;Viking&#8221; -2 cities
&#8226; &#8220;Celts&#8221; -1 City
&#8226; &#8220;Romans&#8221; -1 City
&#8226; &#8220;English&#8221; &#8211; 8 Cities

Until Next week.
J in Vegas

 

[J in Vegas]

Age of Exploration I 5800B.C to 3500B.C.
Part 3

Everything is worth what its purchaser will pay for it&#8221; &#8211; Publilius Syrus

Part 3&#8230;. Much to discuss on this awesome Thursday. Let&#8217;s begin.
First a little side note about myself. I just had my first daughter, so my time has been very busy. I have taken a pause on playing the British game to catch up on the other 3 games I am playing. I was also getting way too far ahead in the British game and it was getting harder to remember what each saved shot was for. I am also getting off of graveyard shift at work after a very tedious 10 months, and am starting my day shift tomorrow. I will have to take you up Thunderbird for coffee on a Sunday, as my new days off are Sunday/Monday. So let&#8217;s get into posting #14&#8230;..

First off is a shot of the demographics. As the game goes on I will fall farther behind in most areas, but most acutely in Manufacturing. Notice the 0 in soldiers. I don&#8217;t know if that is an error or if when you play a higher level they don&#8217;t tell you the military ratio to make it harder. In the other games I&#8217;m playing it does show up, at 2 decimal places. I have it set right in the BUG Screen. It only adds more challenge as I only know the strength of the enemies as what I can see on the active screen. Shot 2 has the quote &#8220;you are the worst enemy of Shaka&#8221;. Damn right! As soon as I get writing, &#8220;it&#8217;s on&#8221; as the hero&#8217;s you get at the writing tech are awesome. Shot 4 has Shaka wanting peace&#8230;or maybe I wanted to test Shaka for peace. And then I&#8217;m like it&#8217;s not going to happen. Look at the nice lead in tech&#8217;s that Shaka has. At 250/181, I&#8217;m not horribly behind Shaka, but he definitely has the advantage. Shot 6 and 7 go together. I start building 2 heroes, Theseus and Daedalus. Theseus has a date with the battlefield and Daedalus is going to be used for the commercial achievement. Britain needs gold! I am guessing that the programming only allows you to use 1 hero per x number of turns per achievement as I would have used all the hero&#8217;s for achievements. The heroes are a nice addition to Civ4. Shot 8 goes out to Hydromancerx as you see a Neanderthal warrior who at 5187B.C. is more powerful than either the 5 Obsidian swordsman or the 8 Arsonist because of the promotions. This unit have been around for a long time. Hence my original request of a 3. I&#8217;m glad to see someone finally taking the time to build the shipwright and field a war galley. If anyone was going to it would be Shaka. And rounding out the top ten photos is a surprise shot of Empire of Scythian 15 deep SOD creeping in the Fertile Crescent. Included in the SOD is a hero to boot.

Couple of side notes. As I start playing my hopelessly behind Yu game I realized what I didn&#8217;t know on my first play on C2C and what to pass on to first time players who are reading these posts. The storyteller&#8217;s line of building is very useful early on and worth the hammers. Also you must build both watchmen and healers in all cities to combat both crime and disease. It&#8217;s almost a 1:1 on building each unit early on, until healers become much more important later on (almost 1:3).

I&#8217;m also adding the challenge of building all 20 the Greatest British generals as named by www.nam.ac.uk/exhibitions/online-exhibitions/britains-greatest-general . And having each one at 100xp by 1900A.D. And not losing any generals, ever. Very ambitious. Can it be done????I will be adding this to my Uber-Mastery Victory page (post #3)

Also added is the additional challenge of building some national wonders that relate to the British Empire.

&#8226; Oxford University
&#8226; East Indian Company
&#8226; Adam&#8217;s Smith&#8217;s trading company
&#8226; Theory of evolution
&#8226; First cloned Mammal
&#8226; Eden Project
&#8226; IMF
&#8226; Cure for cancer

AS if the challenge wasn&#8217;t enough with the 10 world wonders I must get 7 of the 8 National wonders too.

Until next week fellow C2C peeps,
J in Vegas

 

[Thunderbrd]

I will have to take you up Thunderbird for coffee on a Sunday, as my new days off are Sunday/Monday.

That'd work for me if it's not really late as I do work the next morning

We'll have to share contact #s via pms here.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Shot 8 goes out to Hydromancerx as you see a Neanderthal warrior who at 5187B.C. is more powerful than either the 5 Obsidian swordsman or the 8 Arsonist because of the promotions. This unit have been around for a long time. Hence my original request of a 3.

I still stand by my comment that they should be strong since they cannot upgrade like all other units can.

On a side note since you are going to be playing the British Empire will you be having colonies split off eventually? Or are you following an alt-timeline where the British keep all their lands?