Interesting game this month, as my goal was fastest conquest - but the
no city razing option completely blocks the standard BC-era axe-rush, due to the massive maintenance costs from captured cities.
I decided to try an experimental strategy to see if a BC (or ancient era) rush was still possible, by vacating AI cities after capture, and allowing the barbs to recapture at the first opportunity, thus eliminating maintenance costs and allowing the conquest to continue.
Opening game went fairly smoothly:
- settled on the rice
- 2nd city next to copper
- 3rd city on the bananas (to work cottaged river tiles for commerce)
- stole workers from all 3 southern AI and left fortified forest-hill warriors to slow down their expansion
- starting building roads north across the desert with the plan to take out the most distant AI first.
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On reaching the north, met Toka first and as he was current score leader, I took out the first few of his cities while passing, and left them for the barbs (who were happy to oblige). 625 BC. So far so good...
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I knew now that Stalin was my most distant neighbour and continued west leaving 1 axe to protect the barb cities (from the AI) and prevent Toka hooking up his horses and metals.
Stalin was easily eliminated in 5AD and by 185AD all but one of his cities have been recaptured and are safely in barb hands.
My stack now includes upwards of 15 (captured) fast workers which allows rapid chopping of reinforcements in captured cities, and roadbuilding at the frontline. Using the fast workers ability to move into jungle / hills / forest and complete a road the same turn, my axe stack is moving 2 tiles per turn allowing for rapid conquest (working like a free mobility promo for all my axes). I am also careful to build roads around all my captured cities so that after they fall to barbs, new cities at the frontline remain connected to my capital's copper (for chopping axe reinforcements while my cities await the barbs).
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However, my finances are starting to get unstuck. After reaching 800+
from captured cities, I had decided to tech mathematics (~400
) for the chopping bonus, and eventually leading to construction for cats. Big mistake, as the pickings are slimmer from Mehmed (less advanced than Stalin, perhaps due to my initial worker steal and early war) and worse, the supply of barbs to recapture AI cities is beginning to dry up...
By 395AD, Mehmed has also been eliminated but no barbs are spawning to take his cities (despite all Russian lands now in barb hands) and the situation is looking increasingly dire... -61 gpt with 90
in the treasury.
I begin disbanding units and attacking at lower and lower odds, and am just able to keep things going until 500 AD, capturing one of Brennus' cities for gold (then allowing him to reacapture) before completely abandonning the SW front. Meanwhile, I take a primitive English city on a river for cottaging, and several more Japanese cities, including Toka's capital (which the barbs capture while still in revolt) . But it is all too little, too late...
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At 500AD, my units are on strike, and with so many undefended cities still unclaimed by the barbs, I will be running a deficit even after
all units are disbanded, preventing me from building any new units either...
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In hindsight, I think this strategy could still be effective, but with some significant tweaks:
- not researching mathematics or writing (save the cash for the war effort); maybe ironworking if required / possible at the end; (but on Prince level, even the toughest cities can be taken without cats)
- improving, rather than pillaging, AI cities that are subsequently captured by the barbs, to stimulate barb unit production
- an extra cottage city at the start
- possibly relocating the palace early on to a more central location.
Thanks to the staff for the map - this has been a very different and interesting game!! Doesn't look like a successful outcome for me though this time...
