[BTS] Writeup for 610 AD Space

[Anysense]

I want to go through the details of this game, and probably the best way to do it is to make a writeup. Besides, Romans aren't widely used in space games, so readers may benefit from having a closer look at this game.

Settings: Deity, Marathon, Small, Terra.
Temperate climate seems optimal for the quality of land and amount of forests. Low sea level goes without saying. Aggressive AI and no barbs are also almost mandatory.
Leader: Julius the Stargazer of Rome.

Starting location is good although not great. Wet corn and double gold are kind of standard and it is good to have have stone at hand, but there are going to be health issues. Swaping a couple of floodplains for forests would have been an improvement.

Settling 1N gives 6 floodplains and 6 forests. In this case 2+2+3-2=5 before any forests are chopped. And 1NW is at least 7 floodplains and 6 forests (4 or 5 ). Not much, but Rome is definitely not going to grow further than size 3 for a while, so it is not really a problem. Starting settler on size 3 has its merits: you start working golds sooner.

Spoiler :

Settled NW because I want to settle on stone at some point (saves a tonne of workerturns) and there are 8 floodplains And I receive 84 gold from the hut.

Opening with a warrior as usual. Starting warrior moves NE, looking for inland civs.

Found Elizabeth and another hut on turn 2. She beat me it but I had her worker. I think it was quite safe. London was on flat land and working corn. If I remember correctly, Deity AI starts with 10 hammers in archer and it costs 30 on marathon.

By the way, nice first ring food, Liz, you do look like a perfect first victim. Wheat is wet because of oasis 2W of York, making it great production-wise, and I don't care for the hill much.

Met De Gaulle on t4. Good. Perhaps, I will have my second worker from him.

Spoiler :

Elizabeth was a bit stubborn and accepted cease fire only 8 turn later, by which time I met all other AI's. Apparently, I'm somewhere in the middle. Border pop in Rome revealed quite reasonably good land. That rice will help with my health problems once I have the Wheel.

First worker mines one of the golds for 9 turns and begins farming corn once Agriculture is done (t22 thanks to oasis and meeting AIs very early). The warrior wanders westwards and takes second worker from Roosevelt. It seems to be perfect spot for repeated worker stealing.

Spoiler :

What do we have by turn 22: decent capital, good surroundings, two fairly early workers with potential to get more, good AI's cities nearby and 84. So far so good.

 

[Anysense]

Stole third worker from De Gaulle on t34. He built a farm and was still unguarded, meaning that he did not have an archer attached to him. There was a chance for a roaming archer to just be there by accident, but I took the risk. At worst I'd have to delete the worker and the warrior. Another warrior attempted to have a glimpse of Paris, but security was pretty tight. At least this big-nosed fellow is very quick to make peace.

Spoiler :

T37 Buddhism was founded in Orleans. First warrior moves back into position to take another worker from Roosevelt whilst the other travels eastwards for scouting and possible worker stealing from Peter or Huyana Capac. De Gaulle is improving his second ring wheat after a border pop. Unfortunately I can get there only through American territory. And so I do a few turns later!

T50 Finished Bronze Working. Next tech is IW. The only copper in vicinity is in Orleans second ring. De Gaulle does not have BW yet. And so after stealing American worker my glorious warrior marches through forests and grabs a French one, who was still improving the wheat.

Revealed gold and more forests in Paris. It is not visible that Washington also has first ring green hill sheep. This is 3 AIs close by with very good cities of which only one is on a hill. It does sound good, doesn't it? I really should not take any further risks.

Spoiler :

T56 Got another worker from HC. It seemed perfectly safe. Found coastal fish that can be settled with two forests in the first ring, but it is kind of in the middle of nowhere and I can't spare workertuns for roading. Besides, it does not have any good tiles except fish. On the whole, not a very good city until Sailing.

Spoiler :

T58 Second city founded and is growing on barracks. I need one for some promoted units against hill in York or 40% culture in Orleans and Rome is in no fit state do it quickly. Only 1 of city maintenance (for number of cities). Its marvelous to play on Small. Maintenance on Tiny made me ill.

Six workers are chopping and farming. Third city is settled on t69. Rome already has 1.

Spoiler :

T78 Iron Working. Third settler is ready, but do we have iron?

Spoiler :

Why, yes

 

[Anysense]

T80 Peter has completed Stonehenge. Surely it had to be built on the other end of the world

T81 De Gaulle adopts Slavery. He will have a bunch of axemen by the time I'm ready to attack Roosevelt and Liz have iron but not IW.

T86 The Wheel. Mansa is on the way to Alpha and going fast!

Chopped a boat in Neapolis and began roading. Another settler is in order. I'd like to get third gold, probably, on size 2. Or just stagnate at size 1?

Pottery next is quite automatic since AH is no use here.

Spoiler :

T94 Pottery.
Nice bloke Roosevelt. He certainly should read Seraiel's guide on city placement. Well, I'll just settle on the stone then. I'm going to need it soon enough.

Spoiler :

T101. Fifth city is founded and borrows corn from Rome. It is healthy now and can survive on a FP farm, Ravenna, on the other hand can benefit hugely from a six food tile. Antium has just 2-pop whipped barracks and will finish a praetorian with overflow, then whip a warrior at 28/30 and with a chop finish another praetorian.

Spoiler :

T104 Mansa finished Alpha. I put some beakers into Writing beforehand and yet he would not give me Writing for Bronze or even Writing+Mysticism for Bronze+Pottery. I ended up trading BW and Pottery for writing. Better than risk him getting BW from someone else. Then he decided to tech IW He would not give AH+Mysticism for it either. Why I chose AH I don't know. Getting closer to the Oracle was much more important. Elizabeth opened borders and only one road was required to get foreign trade routes. Very Convinient. She will open borders and even trade techs at annoyed as long as you are not her worst enemy. Such a lovely girl

T116 Finaly, I'm ready to attack. First west (France) then north to America, east to England and finaly Russia and Inca in the far east. I think this is the best way to take over most of the map without unnecessary movements. I will deal with Darius (penesula in the south) and Mansa (west of De Gaulle) later.

T117 Excellent timing for second border pop in Paris, it earns De Gaulle first prize for being a prick
But its not too bad - only one axe and two archers. I take Paris, get rid of roaming units, loosing a pratorian against archer at 95%, and pillage the copper. I addition to gold and vast forests Paris has first ring cow and wet rice.

Spoiler :

T124 I take Orleans. Apparently, De Gaulle was in deep shock and forgot about these workers. Well, thanks for three free workers!

Spoiler :

Mansa teched Masonry and is about to finish Sailing. Math is due in 2 turns. So far it looks good even though I fumbled first war, partly due to bad luck. The reward is worth the price I reckon.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Low sea level goes without saying.

Great thread, looking forward to it (I have an ambition to do a million point game!) but I wish you would discuss this choice!! On B&S / Sushi High Sea level is the choice to create many tiny islands but looks like you have a different approach here.

 

[Seraiel]

EDIT

You gambled when settling .

Try to learn Ivory and Stone are good tiles.

 

[Anysense]

EDIT

You gambled when settling .

Why?

Try to learn Ivory and Stone are good tiles.

I know, but I would not have the population to use them for a very long time. Therefore I'd rather settle upon them for extra as well as to save workerturns. Seems logical enough.

 

[Anysense]

Great thread, looking forward to it (I have an ambition to do a million point game!) but I wish you would discuss this choice!! On B&S / Sushi High Sea level is the choice to create many tiny islands but looks like you have a different approach here.

Big and Small has the advantage of extremely powerful Sushi (up to 60) and tiny islands allowing more cities. B&S also tends to have more food than Terra.

On the other hand, Terra offers 1.4-1.5 times more forests and 10-20 stronger Mining. There is also a lot more land for AI to settle, and capturing developed cities is by far more efficient than settling islands.

 

[Anysense]

T128 Mathematics. Just in time to chop granary in Paris at half-full bin.
Mansa has spare silver

I put one turn into Mysticism and he will give it to me along with Sailing and Masonry for Math. I doubt that getting Alpha was worth it. Only Mansa and Darius would trade with me. Mansa is researching Meditation and I'm teching Polytheism, hoping to trade it for Priesthood.

T137 NY and Washington have become valuable addition to my empire. Philadelphia was autorazed, not a big loss. Only 9 cities by t137 is veeery sloooow; I had 13 at this time in the previous game.

Got a spare warrior to scout Persia. Not bad. I wish Darius would hurry up with gems.

Spoiler :

T138 Poytheism
Halt research and wait for Mansa to tech PH, which does on turn 140 and he already has his reasons and Math for better chops . I need 3 turns to research PH and Orleans can build the Oracle in one turn with 4 BFC chops, one 3rd ring chop and some overflow. Should be okay?

T143 Priesthood
Fifth chop is delayed by 1 turn and what do you think? Next turn the Oracle was built by... Huayna! I recieve 409 as a consolation prize. I really need to remember to prioritize the Oracle - free Currency is too big a boost in such games to just miss it like that. Turn 144 is not even early, it is rather late actually.

Next target is Elizabeth. By t148 I took Nottingham, York and London. All in all 5 food resources, iron, horses and 6 forests in their first rings. Not a bad haul The rest of her cities aren't that good though.

Spoiler :

Not the worst marble.

On turn 153 Darius trades Alpha for Math and Poly. HC has Monarchy but won't trade. The rest can only offer Meditation and Hunting. Mansa is researching Monarchy! I'd better get it before changing one civic costs 4 turns of anarchy.

T155 Finished the Pyramids.
Perhaps, this is too early and I managed to prepare very little amount of failgold but the evil Inca has BFC stone and I could not let him build Mids in a city with prophet or spy contamination.

T157 I'm done with Liz and have enough gold to tech Currency at 100%.
And now I'm 6 cities behind the benchmark

Huayna's land is better but Peter has Stonehenge which I need rather badly. Besides, HC built too many wonders and it can make life difficult for me if 100% GE is not my first great person.

Darius is building something big in Persepolis. Must be GLH. I hope HC will build it, I'm not ready to attack Darius.

Spoiler :

 

[Anysense]

T163 Mansa finished Monarchy and started on Currency.
T164 GLH is built by Darius. DoW on Peter.
Peter had several axemen, so I had to consolidate my units and heal up a bit. It will take a while to capture GLH, not that it is urgent with only 4 coastal cities. This is another advantage of B&S - GLH is incredibly powerful there with numerous coastal cities and islands that one can have there very early.

T167 Currency
Some 30 turns later than it could have been should I put proper emphasis on the Oracle. I trade small techs for gold and Currency+160 for Monarchy. Mansa will tech CoL next.

No granary in Moscow. Captured very few granaries so far. Perhaps, I should bring more expansive AIs next time? Made peace for 80. I could try to extort Archery but what use is it?

Finished the Hanging Gardens on turn 172. That ought to be enough to secure GE as first great person.

Spoiler :

St. Petersburg is first city that has only second ring food. All cottages are to be pillaged, can't think of a better use for them. See that 2-move praetorian snatching two workers. They are very good at that, because AI will assume that they have only 1, and when you take a city and can use roads they can move very fast.

Looking for a better spot for an island city I found another hut and the villagers gave me... Archery!

Spoiler :

T183 Mansa Finished CoL.
Next tech is CS. Trying to make up for his ugly Currency behavior?
Cuzco is size 9 after capture and it even has granary. Not that lucky with other cities, but Cuzco alone is a huge asset. Pillaged copper and took cease fire - not quite ready to take on axemen on a hill with 40% culture.

T191 DoW on Darius.
Ten praetorians with great general should do it. Mansa is very slow with CS. A bit unfotunate that he should land in tundra. Rome is size 7 and growing, finally. Settled a few cities but still very behind the benchmark (30). In the 320 AD Culture game I actually had 31 by t189.

Next turn Peter declared war on me

I expected some loses in Susa (hill and 20%) but I won a 50% fight then 5 fights at odds between 66% and 78% in a row. There could not be a better time for RNG to be generous.

T198 Calendar, GLH.
Mansa wants Calendar and 360 for CoL. I half-tech Aestetics and extort it from Darius. Now Mansa will give me CoL and 270 for Calendar+Aesthetics Next tech is MC. Cuzco has too many wonders and Paris needs forge to hire an engineer.

Spoiler :

 

[Seraiel]

Why?

I know, but I would not have the population to use them for a very long time. Therefore I'd rather settle upon them for extra as well as to save workerturns. Seems logical enough.

I just looked, and didn' t read Marathon. The faster the Speed, the more important Hammer-tiles become, so while on Marathon, this settling was a choice, on normal Speed the Ivory and Stone would have to be in the BFC. I' m only helping you advance further, but maybe @Dhoomstriker better should.

 

[Anysense]

T208 Metal Casting. Huayna, Peter, Elizabeth and Roosevelt are eliminated.
It took 31 turns to research Calendar and only 8 for MC. In fact, I did Calendar in 7 turns and spent 24 turns trying to muster gold to do it. On t191, when I began teching Calendar I had 23/188/-220 cities//. On t203 - 29/321/-261. The Great Lighthouse is... great.

Settled 3rd island city on t209, which added 16 per turn. And ~100 ovefrlow from that settler will become ~200. By t210 Rome is size 10, working its golds and FP cottages; I have 33 cities and 404 per turn, which is more or less what I was aiming at. Where was Kaitzilla in his 600AD game on this turn? Persepolis at size 10 with HE and Bureaucracy but no cottages; 27 cities and 362. But he was 4 techs up and had 5661. He also missed the Oracle but on turn 174. I don't know how late it is for Huge. On the whole, I'm not trailing too far behind.

By t216 I wiped out De Gaulle, took 3 cities from Darius and made peace for Monotheism. Settled forth island city; 40 in total now. Thats +7 cities in 6 turns - the rate of expansion worthy of Rome.

T219 Literature
T226 Mausoleum of Maussollos and 3727
T227 Construction
Not that I need catapults but it would not hurt to have a chance for Sports League and free golden age. Pity this map is so small; catapults are great units for 2-pop whips with 90 overflow but there is nothing left to conquer. Mansa finished CS but won't trade it. Nevermind, he will trade anything soon enough, I only need Feudalism, which is a prerequisite for Guilds and Banking, anyway. Worse is that his next tech is MC.

A bit of statistics. Apparently, I have built too many praets. Still not enough units even for police duties.

Spoiler :

T229 Nichola Tesla has been born in Paris
T232 Music
I'm not sure when to start GA yet, but it should be soon. I trade MC for 120 with Mansa and he will tech Machinery next.
T239 Feudalism
T240 Mansa capitulated
I take a break to do some calculations and they show that Mining is to be expected in ~70 turns. That is on t310, or 66 turns sooner than I did on Tiny. Yet all benchmarks seem quite achievable and are not very different from 320AD Culture game. I start golden age and adopt Breaucracy, OR and Buddhism. Mansa is too slow. I will task him with Paper, Compass and Optics and do Machinery myself.

Spoiler T241 overview :

Numbers on signposts are in Parthenon.

T244 Machinery
Failgold preparations are in full swing. Chopping away around Circei. I'll need to switch to Hinduism for extra from 6 chops there and in other Hindu cities too. Darius is reduced to one city and I can steal all his gold in one go.

Spoiler :

T251 Guilds
T254 Banking
I adopt Mercantilizm and Representation and bpt jumps from 980 to 1163.
T257 Philosophy
Shah Jahan (Great Merchant) has been born in Cuzco. I was afraid it would be a prophet but GM is fine. Next GP has 0 chance of becoming great merchant and these two will be able to start another GA.
T264 Nationalism, Parthenon
Meeting the benchmarks so far. London can do Taj, it is strong with its double corn, iron and hills and still has many forests. Received nearly 11000 in failgold

 

[Anysense]

First GA is over and so is the building phase. I switched to caste and pacifism on the previous turn and will let my cities grow until second GA, for which I need an arbitrary GP from Moscow (NE). Mansa finished Paper and will research Compass and Optics. This is partly because I must avoid Compass - Optics and Astronomy have higher priority than Biology and I want to bulb the latter. It has an obvious downside of leaving very little time to explore the other continent but I'll manage it.

Expansion is over too, I will stay at 50 cities until Medicine. Except may be a few cities to pick up Mining resources.

Not much to do with cities as nearly all of them are building wealth now. I only have to manage workers and make a GP plan. And spread Buddhism to future GP farms, of course.

T267 Engineering
T270 Gunpowder
T275 Chemistry
Research rate is gradually increasing and is just over 1500 now.
T279 Printing Press
On turn 280 I finalize my GP plan and start second GA.
T283 Replacebale Parts
T289 Steam Power
T293 Education
Could not part bulb Education because Scientific Method has higher priority. I need to remember it and avoid getting PP or Chemistry to soon next time.
T298 Steel
Random event have been rather disappointing in this game, but at last I have a really good one!

Spoiler :

T301 Lib->Railroad
T304 Economics
T307 Constitution
T309 Corporation
I have all mainland resources and Mining inc. starts at 39. I considered using coldwhips for faster spreading but settled on using chops overflow prepared beforehand at the rate of 2-5 spreads per turn. Mining does not do much without multipliers and on this smallish map spreading is mostly done before AL even at this rate. BTW, some of my cities don't even have courthouses.

Spoiler :

T310 Scientific Method (bulb)
T315 Compass (Mansa)
T316 Biology (double bulb), Optics (Mansa), HBR (Darius)
T320 Assembly Line
I adopt Slavery, OR and Free Market - corporate expenses are too high to stay in Mercantilizm. There is no way around it, factories are too expensive even with Organized; few cities can build them quickly and it is essential to get factories and power ASAP to make Mining really work. How people can play space games without Organized is a mystery to me - it takes eternity to build factories at their default cost!
T328 Last turn of GA.
I switch back to Caste and Pacifism. I'm far from being ready for strike, so I will have to stay in Free Market until Christo.
Mansa did Theo and Drama for me - time to pop some huts! I found: a scout, a map, another map, 159, another scout, gold, more gold, gold again and finally
T334 Astronomy!
T336 Rifling (Mansa)
T337 Medicine
Alas, Sushi is pathetic, only 15. It will become ~20 later, but it is still pathetic. At least there is no problem spreading Sushi, there a lot of cities that can one-turn executives now. Unless... Unless half of the spreads simply fail. This is bizzare, I've never had such bad luck before.

It is time to fill the gaps. Soon I will have ~70 cities on the main continent. No new courthouses will be built. No point in them since I'be in strike in ~10 turns.

Spoiler :

Collecting Mining and Sushi resources. It is thanks to Mansa that I know about these islands. It did not occur to me to scout this area.

GP production, corp spreading, collecting resources and preparations to enter strike were rather a mess. I'll need to reflect on how I went wrong and what had to be done differently.

 

[Anysense]

Let's look at key dates:
T309 Corporation, Mining inc.
T320 Assembly Line
T334 Astronomy
T337 Medicine
T352 Strike

Ther is not much that I can do about AL and Astronomy but t337 Medicine is preposterous, and t352 strike is even worse.

On turn 325 my total commerce was 1113 and expenses 1814. That is going strike would already have been fairly profitable, not to mention that I could have stayed in Mercantilizm for extra 300. That is 1000 difference! Besides, I could afford spreading to cities without courthouses and those spreads would pay back in 6 turns. But then all military would have been disbanded long before Astro and the only way to spread Mining to the other continent would be a chain of galleons with settlers. I suppose I could live with that, and it is hardly the most important thing, anyway.

Making gold for spreads during strike is easy enough. Rome and London (IW) together could produce over 200 by simply building executives. Several cities could produce 50-80 each with workers and those workers were urgent! Something that I did not realize until at least t341 when my expenses hit 2361 (with Free Market!) and it became clear that strike is long overdue. But there was to much work that had to be done and too few workers; I haven't even finished mining and roading desert hills! I have to do that, because my workers would vanish before Industrialization and I can't gamble with aluminium.

That's a nasty trap I walked into and kept going until a break on t352, building mostly infrastructure and too few workers. By t344 expenses were over 3000, by t350 over 4500. Such a horrible waste

Edit: I ought to have read this before I even got Mining https://forums.civfanatics.com/thre...-10-year-veteran.574724/page-37#post-14842244
But of course, I had to learn it the hard way.

 

[Anysense]

By t350 Sushi is 19 and Mining is 48, 68 cities. There are still 6 Mining resources that I will have soon. I can hardly do any research due to insane corporate expenses. Building wealth almost everywhere.

T352 Strike, Finally
Now I can tech at 4000-5000 while building a lot of infra, mainly factories, coal plants, forges and libraries. Feel the difference. Settling on another copper adds ~140 and 50 more after Mining spread.

Spoiler :

T354 Physics
T357 Electricity at ~7000bpt
T360 Industrialism at ~9000bpt
See how quickly bpt grows when you don't have to waste tonnes of hammers to pay maintenance? Following stupid habit of going strike only after Sushi cost me some 10 turns in this game, may be, even 15.

Still growing, filling gaps, spreading and collecting resources. The latter is delayed because I'm about 0.3% below domination limit and have to wait for gifty cities to pop their borders and reduce my territory. Three GSs are waiting for greater population, 9333 is good, but later they will be worth more than 10000. Oh, and I have 5 aluminium resources connected, including one under a city.

Did 29 spreads while in strike. Mostly paid for by overflow gold from executives and workers. Also traded and stole a bit from Mansa and Darius.

Spoiler :

T363 Radio
T365 Artillery
T369 Combustion
T372 Plastics
Time for some bulbing. Its less than 20 turns to Ecology and a few cities are still building libraries and forges...

Spoiler :

T373 Computers
T375 Superconductors
T376 Fiber Optics
Bribe Mansa into Buddhism because he is about to build the Apostolic Palace and I want the hammers.
T378 Fission
T381 Fusion
Rome and Paris were obvious candidates for Engines. I expected t390 Ecology, so here we go

Spoiler :

I simply built worker->industrial park-> lab in Paris.

Docking Bay and 4 Casings were easy, I did there the same thing as in Paris. London (IW+4forests) built a Thruster with overflow into Stasis, again easy. Cuzco (4 forests) fell 1turn short to do Thruster->Life Support. My research rate was rather higher than I anticipated and Cuzco had little time for preparation after wasting several turns on Broadway (which I finished only after the launch). The right thing was to build the 5th Thruster somewhere else, Cuzco could have done LS in one turn with overflow from lab (~350).

Fifth Casing was more of a problem. I simply did not have a city strong enough to do it with less than ~450 overflow. The only way to it was to have something prewhipped for extra 89 and 375 overflow from a lab. The prewhipped building must at least 200 base hammers worth (or extra are lost) and is to be released after lab overflow is put into Casing. However, one turn of slavery could upset plans for other parts. For example, it was very close in Rome. Anyway, 605 or 610 AD what's the difference?

T383 Satellites
T385 Composites
T388 Genetics
T389 Ecology
Expected to do these four in 9 turns, not 8. I don't think that t390 launch was possible here. Overflow preparations would hurt research and it was a very close call already.
T392 Last Casing and Life Support are finished. Launch!

Spoiler :

That's it. Now I only need to make sure that I don't win Domination. Landing is turn 322 or 610 AD. Correcting some of the worst mistakes I made due to hastiness, sloppiness and lack of judgement may result in 15-20 turns imrovement. May be, even more. And with a better map (only 6 forests and on size 3 is ridiculous) I'm sure it is possible to get well under 500 AD.

 

[Anysense]

Looking to improve early game I experimented with gems + large amounts of forests with interesting results. Their advantage is that you can grow on them getting a lot of very early commerce. The only real shortcoming is lack of floodplains. Here I had 3 gems and wet rice. Since I tech AH only after IW the grassland cow does not really count as food. The result is: t49 BW, t73 IW (the fastest I ever had), t107 DoW with 6 praets. Could have been better if I stayed at 4 cities and Liz had not stolen my wheat with unusually early monument.

Spoiler :

 

[Kaitzilla]

Crush those English dogs!

 

[Anysense]

This is my feeler for Standard size Space, just to get acquainted with its possibilities and problems, set some benchmarks and finally do proper planning.

It seems pointless to oracle Currency now that Mansa is teching it. The question is what is the best way to get Pottery? It is still worth about 340 with all bonuses.

Spoiler :

I see three possibilities:
1. Put some beakers into it and trade with Liz.
2. Whip Novgorod then give it Roosevelt. DoW him, take Novgorod and try to extort Pottery.
3. Settle a city to get land target with Mansa and demand Pottery.

 

[Seraiel]

I'd tech Pottery in your Situation because Pottery imho. always pays off and then continue with CoL because of the High trade value. Maybe even Aesthetics, because of the even higher trade value. Your AIs are all Buddhist, you seriously need to build up your empire. CoL has the advantage, that if you're first, it's very advanced and gives you a holy city, Aesthetics is really the last chance to get onto the tech-train.

 

[Anysense]

Yep, Pottery is a very useful tech, quite apart from being a prerequisite for MC. I could do with a few cottages and granaries. I use those built by AI but I really need more.

CoL could have been an interesting choice, but what use is holy city? I'd like to have Buddhist holy city, especially with a shrine built by AI. There is still a chance; De Gaulle has the Stonehenge and the holy city.

Next turn Bismarck completed the Great Wall and solved my problems - I simply teched Math with failgold and traded everything I needed. Then oracled Metal Casting. I wish I did Currency, though, and killed Mansa for teching at turtle speed. Its really unfortunate that he, being the only AI who is any use at all, is so close while utterly useless Joao, Liz and De Gaulle are so far away. May be, Liz will surprise me and bring CoL at some point

Even more unfortunate is that damn worldwide Buddha lovefest. I have -13 with Mansa for declaring wars on his friends. That git is pleased even with De Gaulle! I need him at cautios to avoid worst enemy and attacking anyone means another hit to diplo. I think up to -16 is managable and then I'll just cap him.

On t157 I'm at 25 cities, bleeding heavily. It is unsustainable by whipping warriors and qonquest gold anymore and Mids are still at least 20 turns away; perhaps, its better to suffer a few turns of strike than waste population whipping warriors. I'm about to settle first island city and Mansa needs 3 turns to finish Currency. Hurry up, man, I can't wait for ever! Once I have extra 2 in 26 cities and ability to trade/build gold everything will become much easier. And I'd better finish GLH before De Gaulle did it - its bad enough that he's built Stonehenge on the other end of the world.

 

[Anysense]

I definitely overexpanded. By 1720 BC I had 33 cities, that is 3 more than WastinTime had in 90 AD game. Half of my cities are whipped to the ground, though, making meager 330 per turn.