What a difference 30 years makes! My first GL elevator

[splunge the 2nd]

I've been having a nailbiter of a game. After winning by conquest, domination and diplomacy, I decided to play for a cultural victory playing the Babylonians. I pick Monarch, in my comfort range and a continents start. The game goes well at first till I find I'm on a continent with a very powerful Carthage. My research and expansion go poorly and I'm way late for a Republic slingshot, have nothing Carthage is remotely interested in. My curraghs and galleys inevitably sink and so my GL is sitting useless as I have met only 1 AI civ . I have a few surprisingly successful limited wars to expand and gain a few techs as part of peace treaties that I rapidly break, The warring gets tougher, however, as Carthage gets MI's and finally musketmen to my swords and spears.

Wait-Carthage City has the Lighthouse! Maybe if I conquer it I can finally get over to meet some other folks. Well, facing huge losses, I manage to take it losing swords to Numidean Mercs left and right and mounting deeper and deeper war weariness. Again my boats sink! To make matters worse, Carthage flips and I lose my occupying force, leave a damaged sword sitting alone in enemy territory. This is where we find my first save from 850.

Miracle of miracles (it's Hanukah after all) the lone sword beats the musket and I retake Carthage. I send out slaves to act as decoys to avoid the counter attack and hold Carthage. 30 game years later one lone galley ( far East of mapped territory in my second attached save) manages to slip to sea spaces and sees borders. The next turn, the techs come fast and furious and I'm well into the Middle Ages, I trade my contact with the Carthagians for big bucks, contacts and am well on my way to Bach's which will shoot me to GA and hopefully towards Democracy, Free Artistry and Shakepeare's.

I don't know if I can win it and Carthage may never make peace again but it was a wonderful nail biter and a lot of fun!

Question- I came near the shores of the Arabs but met at once all three civs on the continent without trafing for contact or coming near them. Why's that?
Any thoughts of switching to Democracy once I learn it and am past the anticipated GA?
Also, any wiser folks wish to comment or critique based on my saves, please do! I realize I'm relying on entertainers a lot. I've learned tons here on the forums!

 

[Optional]

Question- I came near the shores of the Arabs but met at once all three civs on the continent without trafing for contact or coming near them. Why's that?

How can you tell the Arabs didn't sell their contact with you? I think they did.
If you're meeting the first civ on the other continent, and Printing Press has already done the rounds, you don't need to buy contacts with the other civs, because it'll be done for you.
I haven't looked at the save at all, but be aware that, when you sold your contact with Carthage, everybody came to learn you hadn't kept to your deals, so you busted your rep at that moment - maybe you couldn't prevent the contact anyway, I don't know.
Look at the size of your saves; that's why you should always try to upload manual saves instead of auto saves!

 

[splunge the 2nd]

Thanks optional! How fast does the AI sell contacts? It seemed I just blinked and knew the whole continent!

Good point on the rep. I wouldn't have expected to wipe out the Carthagians any time soon, so it was a matter of time till the rest of the world met them, money was tight and I had nothing else to trade. I can't trade my surplus wines anytime soon as I'm a ways off from navigation/magnetism so I hope I haven't hurt myself too badly with no GPT deals.

 

[ecuwins]

Thanks optional! How fast does the AI sell contacts? It seemed I just blinked and knew the whole continent!

If you make a trade IBT then the AI can trade with other AI instantly.

 

[splunge the 2nd]

Thnaks
Optional, I changed out the Auto save for manual.
Why are manual saves so much "lighter"?

 

[Optional]

I can't trade my surplus wines anytime soon as I'm a ways off from navigation/magnetism so I hope I haven't hurt myself too badly with no GPT deals.

Wine or gold, the AI won't except any of that from you in a 20 turn deal. Unless they are at war with the Carthaginians, because they're blind to anything you've done to their enemies.
But it's not the end of the world.
And I've got no clue why auto-saves are so ridiculously heavy; it looks like that auto-save was 10 times as big!

 

[DWetzel]

Wine or gold, the AI won't except any of that from you in a 20 turn deal. Unless they are at war with the Carthaginians, because they're blind to anything you've done to their enemies.
But it's not the end of the world.
And I've got no clue why auto-saves are so ridiculously heavy; it looks like that auto-save was 10 times as big!

Well, they won't give anything that isn't a 20-turn deal on their end (like lump sums of gold, or a technology) for your resource or gold per turn. They'll still happily give you gold per turn for that resource, because if you break the deal, they get their gpt back.