What would you do in this situation?

[CrazyCanuck87]

I'm looking for some advice on a game that I probably can't lose at this point, but I'd like to know what other people would do in this situation. I started a game as Darius, Monarch difficulty, Hemispheres map, with the idea of using an Immortal rush to grab some land, while relying on Org/Fin to keep the economy afloat. I found myself on a continent with Pacal, Huayna, and Churchill. It's now 550BC and I'm alone with Churchill. My conquests netted me three holy cities and the Great Wall, while I built the Oracle and Stonehenge myself. At the moment, I can break even at 50% science, but that will drop when the formerly Incan cities come out of revolt and I need to pay their maintenance costs.

Now I need to decide whether I should keep going and take out Churchill, to get sole possession of my continent. As I see it, here are the major pros and cons of further conquest:

Pros

• I get a continent all to myself very early, giving me the luxury of settling at my own pace and choosing ideal city locations.
• If I want to conquer Churchill at some point, better do it with Immortals against archers, axemen, and spears than later on when his Chm/Pro Redcoats show up.
• Since there are no other civs (I think!) on the continent, I won't be missing out on the chance for tech trades

Cons

• My economy is already struggling a bit, and taking more cities risks slowing down my research further. At this point, there's only one religion on the other continent, so their tech rates will probably be pretty quick.
• I don't have enough military to attack Churchill right away, and the hammers needed to prepare for another war could be spent getting my new cities online more quickly.
• I probably have enough good land to win space or culture at this point, so more war isn't necessary.

The save is attached. I have a few future cities marked out, although I know that I need to explore more. I have a Great General; what should I do with him? Tech wise, I'm thinking CoL and CS after I finish Literature for the GL. What do you think?

 

[Ultimate_Waffle]

50% research is too low. People usually expand through peace or war until their science sliders reach 60%. Fix up your economy before taking out Churchill. I think it's best to use your Great General to build a military academy in your military city.

 

[Bureaucracy]

How can u tell his research is too low just because he is at 50%?

I've seen people run at 0% and still do fine.

 

[JBossch]

I assume you are running a CE with the financial trait? If so, I agree that reducing research below 50% may hurt you long term. I definitely agree you should plan on taking Churchill out before you discover the other continent but I don't see any rush to do it right now. Taking out 2 AIs with an Immortal rush is huge but your economy will need time to recover. It would seem Churchill has no chance to pose any real threat.

What is diplomacy with Churchill like? Perhaps you could even trade a few techs with him to keep up. Since you plan to kill him anyway I wouldn't worry about giving him too much as long as you don't trade key military techs like feudalism (though I think you should plan on him having longbows by the time you take him on).

My advice (for what its worth) is to hole up until you have macemen and crush him with those. Then, with all the religions you have, I would probably go cultural. That way you can simply turn off teching after say, democracy and rifles and be on your way to a win when you meet the other continent.

P.S. don't waste too much on espionage against him, just what you need to beat him, because the leftover will be wasted once you kill him off.

 

[Ur_Vile_Wedge]

My offhand advice is to declare war, not to conquer, but to pillage and loot. This will do 2 things. One, if he's running a CE (I rarely see the comp do an SE) you can cripple his economy, and looting those cottages should let you bump your tech slider up, at least temporarily. You won't pick up any more maintenance, and his protective trait is more or less meaningless if you're not shooting for his cities.

 

[futurehermit]

War, but only after you have CoL. I rarely expand that fast/far without having CoL so that I can whip courthouses. Once currency/col are in place you can pretty much expand as fast as you are able, especially with org/fin darius. If you built the oracle I would've taken CoL off it and then you wouldn't have to slow down your conquest at all imo.

 

[CrazyCanuck87]

Yeah, in hindsight, I should've taken CoL with the Oracle, especially with an Org leader. I took Monarchy, because I like to run HR early and spam cheap units in my capital. In other games, I've had a size 20 cottage spammed capital running Bureaucracy by 1 AD, and I'm kind of addicted. My other reason for not taking CoL was that I was hoping it would be founded on the other continent, as we already had two of the early three on ours, but Huayna went and founded it anyway. Even if he hadn't, I still agree that CoL would've been the better choice, if only because of the Organised trait.

@JBossch: Diplo with Churchill is fairly neutral so far, though I will easily be able to convert him to a religion of my choice. However, he isn't going to trade unless I get him up to friendly, because we're alone with no contact with other civs, as far as I know. Stealing techs, on the other hand, especially if I pop a GSpy from my newly acquired GW, could be profitable.

 

[Ultimate_Waffle]

How can u tell his research is too low just because he is at 50%?

I've seen people run at 0% and still do fine.

It's a bit too early in the game to run at below 60% research and do fine. I think so anyway. Perhaps later in the game, when his economy is strong, he can run at 0%.

 

[Gooblah]

Checked out your save. First of all, congrats on the Immortal Rush. Worked quite well!

Anyways, here are my comments:
1) Not enough Workers: I think you had one each in the former Incan cities, and a few scattered throughout Persia. Some were building Cottages, others were simply doing nothing. I built 2 more, then finished the cottaging of Persepolis.

2) Improvements are lacking: Direct result of number 1. You had un-mined Iron outside of Persepolis, Stone w/o a Quarry, etc.

3) The Tech Situation: As others have said, your tech situation is a little scary. You have a tech lead over Churchill, yes, but you're lacking key techs like Calendar, Sailing, Alphabet, Code of Laws, etc. I delayed Literature by one turn to grab Fishing, then Literature, then Code of Laws, a Calendar beeline, and Alphabet. You have three coastal cities that can't work their greatest assets, the coast tiles! Plus, Inca has a few seafood resources.

4) The Trade Situation: Ouch. You have no roads between Inca, Maya, and the Persian heartland. The only roads are the ones the AI built. The Incan Workers were immediately paired with Immortals as they built the Trans-Continental Highway, connecting Tiwanaku to Persepolis, and the Mayinca Highway (corny, yes, but I am tired, bored, and a kid ) between Lakhama and Cuzco. This alone increased income.

5) Courthouses: My last point. If you build a Courthouse in every city, you will gain about 20 GPT! Do it!

 

[vicawoo]

Hereditary rule's better for your economy if you lack happy faces.

0% is low if you can't run scientists.

 

[Silence101]

In most cases, I don't think Darius will be able to run an effective SE this early in the game without Pyramids. It would probably be a good idea to cut expansion until post-CoL to take advantage of cheap courthouses, which will also increase espionage. You may be able to supplement your research with specialists to a degree, but I think you're looking getting your primary research from the slider, so try and keep it at least in the 60% - 70% range.

I think Darius is tailored more for a CE based on his traits. You can advantage of that focusing on cottage improvements in commerce cities, as well as building courthouses and building markets in those cities (via CoL and Currency - these techs pave the way for increased expansion through warfare or otherwise.)

 

[CivCorpse]

50% research is too low. People usually expand through peace or war until their science sliders reach 60%. Fix up your economy before taking out Churchill. I think it's best to use your Great General to build a military academy in your military city.

He can't build one until military science. I would settle the GG and start working on your infrastructure. Develop all that land you conquered. Undeveloped land is not power, it is expensive. With all the extra land, you will be out teching Churchill like crazy. Spread all 3 religions to every city and run priests to get the shrines up. All three religions in each city means 3.75gpt with a market in the shrine cities. then 4.5 with guilds. Banks make it an even 6gpt. Get CoL asap and pump out workers.

 

[alex sword]

You are in winning position. 50% is good. 30% is good. Even 0% is good for now if you've 5-6 scientists with libraries. You should look at total amount of beakers generated, not at percentage. 30-40 beakers is enough before 0BC. You are going to rocket after CoL and cottaging.

Do:
1. Beeline CoL and spam courts.
2. Use whipping as much as possible in far-away cities. It reduces their maintenance (size matters).
3. Spam farms and cottages in your core cities.
4. I would attack Churchill after Optics. You need someone to trade techs with.
5. After you've build a couple of academies (= a couple of Great Scientists needed), startrunning priests to have three shrines ASAP.

Once again - you're winning here.

 

[cabert]

Even without CoL (but I would think you have it already) I would go for the kill.
Darius is financial. If you can break even at 0%, you just need to grow and plant cottages all over the place.
After a few turns, you'll be positive again, then very positive, then dominant.

Heck, even if you don't break even at 0%, you probably have enough gold from pillaging/ capturing cities to overcome the hole.
Maybe you need to raze everything except london, though.

 

[Killroyan]

Who cares about the tax slider if you:
a. are Darius who can recover more quickly then anyone else with his trait and courthouses.
b. still can research CoL pretty quickly and recover with the cheap courthouses again
c. can have a whole island to yourself without anyone intervering. As Cabert mentioned you will become strong pretty quickly, then stronger, then unstoppable.

Darius is a walk in the park once you get your land going.

 

[kcmarkwell]

Totally agree with cabert and killroyan. Tech towards Code but put all you got into eliminating england. Should be able to finish him off fairly soon while whipping military / later courthouses to recover. Cottage the world after he is dead and decide at that point which victory you want to go for. If you are winning this easy, my suggestion is to step it up a notch in difficulty. Although Darius is one of the best civs to play even as you get higher up in difficultly.