this was a rage-quit that turned into a rage-delete.
playing babylon, deity, pangaea, standard. a really surprising start. near a 3-tile wide land bridge and a coast with 2 gold, 1 marble lux and no ocean tiles to work. about 5 spices in various areas around it for a 2nd city but otherwise not good lux variety as those were really the only 3 for all available areas around me. long story short i settled in place, explored, met japan, alex, korea, and bismarck, (and later egypt and america) and settled a 2nd city in this really solid defensive spot. it was centered between 2 mtn ridges 5 tiles apart on a gold at the start of a river that trailed back to my capital. and it had a SEA of hills in front of it, perfect for bowman defense since everyone could only come in 1 at a time.
it worked for a bit, all the way into turn 120 or so. japan broke an RA 1 turn from its completion and DoWd around turn 95. i wasnt worried because i had such a defensive position and he could only come in from one angle, over those hills. also Alex was at war with me but he could only reach me by sea and i kept a trireme to get his embarked land units.
i had 6 bowmen all with rough terrain promos, some with 2, most with 1. japan sent in maybe 10 units i had no problem with. even his samurai which took all 6 shots and the city shot to kill them. got a few up to 3 promos. i added 2 more bowmen to the back side of the mountain ridge because a CS (alex ally) was trying to sneak guys in that way. i was 1 turn from getting crossbows and japan, singapore, helsinki, and alex all lined up everyone to come at me. i held off unit after unit after unit.
then all of a sudden i had 12 1-dmg shots in a row (over 2 turns) on one samurai who insta-healed and I lost 3 of my bowmen on the turn after that because the other units could finally advance far enough, 1 from the samurai, 2 from other ranged guys. 12!!!!!! this against pikemen, archers, a couple crossbowmen, and eventually 2 rifles, 1 samurai, 1 cannon. i get that they are tougher, but 12 1-dmg shots in a row was just ridiculous. it's not like i was shooting infantry or cavalry with basic archers.
it wasnt my capital, but if i lost that city there was no way i was taking it back with my inferior pikemen (no iron sources for me) and my 3rd city was just an awful producer. it was definitely game over. so screw that game. i deleted it.
(i still have some autosaves should i cool off ...)