Minitourney III - Spoilers

[Harovan]

This is the spoiler thread for the Minitourney III

Do neither read nor post spoilers, if you civ has not yet entered the industrial age

So, you entered this thread rightful? Great! Let us know how you did, feel free to post a minimap, and tell us about your glorious empire. Now, the thematical part of the tourney begins.

Be creative! Set up a great scenario for an intercontinental invasion! And then... DO IT!

Let the jar heads go, in their footsteps the tanks and infantries. Let us know about your victories, and how many of your elite units earned the Medal Of Honor (i.e. made you a GL ).

Lurkers: If you want to participate in this game, don't read the spoilers now and get the game here.

[alexman]

I normally wouldn't read the spoiler thread yet because I don't know all the map, but since I reached the Industrial age and there are no other spoilers, here it is:

Ancient Age: 4000 B.C - 310 B.C
Zero research. Built 4 warriors for exploration. Got lots of goody huts, including Ceremonial Burial and a settler . Found the other civs - much lower than us on the powergraph (Double worker speed, along with the free settler, and the early warrior pump will do that for you on Monarch). Decided to extort tech, gold, and workers from them instead of trading. Set research to 100% to make use of all our cash. Building everything. Got Colossus and Pyramids. Switched to Republic. Reached Middle ages without a single war.

Middle Ages: 310 B.C - 830 A.D.
Japan and Egypt expand and start catching up on powergraph. Egypt even demands Monotheism! We refuse and they declare war. By 460 A.D. our Riders reduce them to one city. In the process, we get a Great Leader and the FP in Memphis. Japan's turn comes in 560 A.D. with Cavalry. In 660 A.D. another Great Leader becomes an Army because we already manually have built Sistine, Copernicus, Adam Smith. We missed Sun Tzu and Leo's though. Japan escapes in a galley, and eventually settles on an island to the North. We enter the Industrial Age with our elite units poised to take Egypt's only city.

Now what? I guess we need to explore. A barbarian galley already sunk our one and only Galleon. We definitely need to kill Japan before they tell on our attrocities.

I'm surprised this game turned into a build-first kill-second affair. I thought I would kill a neighbor or two before building, but they were too far and I initially didn't have horses. The builder in me can't stand using workers to make attack roads instead of improving terrain. So I missed out on a very early leader, but at least I inherited already improved terrain and cities.

Stay tuned...

[jshelr]

Amazing alexman - here's the opposite start

Sir Ralph's game presented a nearly optimal starting position for Mao.

„« Plenty of room and good turf for the early expansion
„« Spotting horses out east pulled the expansion by the nose in a direction that proved to be very helpful
„« Iron was within reach
„« The location allowed Japan to be sealed off from coastal locations that could then be developed at leisure
„« Most importantly, China was at the end of the land mass, leaving Japan caught in the middle between China and Egypt

OTOH the $%&&*#@ goody huts had nothing but barbs in them.

Expanded out to the usual modest number of cities relatively closely packed. Concentrated on hooking up resources and cities, building barracks. Was well on the way to a professionally trained sword army while Japan and Egypt over extended their land grab.

When a stack of 11 swords, 2 archers, and a vet spear were ready in a city close to Japan's iron Tokyo source on the east side of my civ, and when all other cities were reasonably well defended, declared war on Japan and made an alliance simultaneously with Cleo. Japan was doomed.

Proceeded to take Tokyo and left the stack there. This allowed capture of two small coastal cities later that were separated from the rest of Japan by the initial thrust and gave me a good base to deflect the counterattack. Meantime, built another stack of ten swords to enter Japan from the west.

The goal was to get my share of Japan's turf without major losses because the real war was going to be with the larger Cleo empire. After taking one city from Japan's west, the capital loomed ahead. That was a bit of a struggle but it fell after about three turns. All this was done slowly, allowing Japan and Egypt plenty of time to lose units to each other, and the 20-turn alliance soon came up for renewal. I dropped it and sued for peace -- getting several techs and maps, etc.

Tech was closing in on the needed chivalry and I had gone to building only horses after the second sword stack was completed. If Cleo stayed calm for a few more turns, I would be golden. She didn't. Almost without pause after Japan was destroyed, she moved on to China.

I stayed on the defensive and weathered the chariot rush for some 10 turns until Chivalry. Then, having been hoarding gold, I upgraded horses to riders. Never played China before. Riders are the best.

On the appearance of riders, Cleo inquired as to whether I might want to negotiate peace. Not a chance. The home front was turned into a rider factory and they relentlessly destroyed huge swaths of Egyptian cities. There was not enough time or horsepower to garrison cities. So, just razed them as I went. Used leaders to build Bachs and armies. Got heroic epic through Pentagon complex up and running

The result was a very large empty area, swarming with captured workers and respawned barbarians. Complete chaos for awhile. The question was when to stop. On spotting two foreign civs from the other continent gaining a beachhead, I thought it was time to stop and turn builder. Maybe that will prove to be a bit too soon, because I left ivory in Cleo's hands.

Meeting with the foreign civs went very well. Traded the acquired wine and spices lux for tons of tech. However, there is no lux for sale anywhere. This is going to be a problem that has to be solved.

Made a bush league mistake at this point. Already on printing press, I changed government from Dep to Rep after peace with Egypt. Advisor says 7 turns to complete. I'm Shocked. Shocked. I always play a religious civ and simply forgot the normal anarchy. So, I fumed through the anarchy knowing that I should have waited until democracy was available to switch.

Still, by trading freely and skipping nationalism, I may have a shot at ToE by staying in republic. We will see.

The bottom line is that the early wars, while very time consuming, left me in a great position to fulfill the themes in Sir Ralph's game. I will have to build some good productive seacoast cities and turn out some battleships / transports. Meantime, the home front has to be turned into a tank factory. In this form of game, it probably does not pay to try for a tech lead. The situation is sort of like the US before WWII. China is protected from danger by the ocean and can proceed to minimize defense for awhile, concentrating on building the woefully neglected economy. (I can't remember ever building railroads and temples at the same time before. The 60-turn temple is also a shock for the normally religious player.)

[Alkis]

The good thing is that I can follow your stories. Unfortunately something really bad happened in my game. I entered the industrial age first, got steam power and I was building railroads. Then the game crushed.

This usually happens when I hit F3 to see my military. Because of that, I always have autosave on. But on Sir Ralph's settings it was off and I didn't notice it. So when the game crushed the only save I had was from yesterday! Some 30 turns ago (****).

So I gave up. In any case I had a winning game. In my game I expanded towards Japan. I built a temple in my border town and the nearest japaneese town flipped to me. then I attacked Japan with swordsmen and despite losing a lot of them to defending archers (f*ck you Firaxis) I managed to reduce Japan to 3-4 towns.

By the time the second war started they had 7 plus another one on the island. Eventually that one town was the only one left to them. The purpose of the second war was to get a GA and it was done with Riders mainly. I belined for Navication and made contact with the other civs on the other continent.

There was a free spot near the silks, so I built a town there. In the end it was Egypt and me sharing the starting continent and my plan was to wait a little more before I attack them. I had Bach's and Newton's only but I was sure I could build ToE, US and HD, in other words all the wonders of the Industrial age.

My infrastructure was great, in several cities I had built all the improvements, my army was ok and my technology number 1. Then the stupid game crushed.

P.S. I didn't get a great leader, oh well, bad luck.

[Velociryx]

The Running Start

The game was kicked into overdrive on something like turn 6-7 when the FIRST goody hut I popped contained a settler, sitting EXACTLY where I woulda built my next town. Wow....that, and three techs from huts saw me absolutly dominating my starting continent. In fact, I took the exact opposite approach with research....kept mine pegged at 80-100% for the entire game, and was pulling down techs faster than my AI rivals.

Because my rivals could only help me by trading their starting techs (after that, I was researching so much faster than they were that I found them to be utterly useless), I decided that I'd trot the ol' Archer rush out and see how it did.

Hit Japan like an unholy hurricane is somethinggodawful BC (that free settler REALLY sped things up!), took two cities intact (reducing them to one), and made nice with them. Lost all of one archer in taking the two cities. Replaced the archer (and by this time, had my second strike force already en route to Egypt), so my initial force turned north to join the party.

Took two cities intact from Egypt and captured a third in peace negotiations (reducing Egypt to three cities). Was sitting on something like a 4 tech lead with them in the ancient era....the early strikes just decimated them both (oh...got Egypt to blow their golden age too...left a wounded archer in the field, in range of a War Chariot....kiss da GA goodbye, Cleo....).

Japan gets uppity with their two cities (I've got more than a dozen by this time), and actually launches an attack against their former capitol. Two Japanese warriors bite the dust to a veteran spear chucker, and my strike forces turn south once more (no significant damage in taking the Egyptian cities...I think I lost two archers).

Attacked Japan again, killed them outright, burning two cities and capturing one. They respawned on the far eastern tip of the continent, and I called them up, curious to see what a respawned civ started with.

Got their worker and 100g in reparations, and settled back into full expansion mode.

Faced THREE massive barb uprisings, and finally got to the point where they were inflicting enough damage and slowing me down by killing workers and settlers that I posted guards on high ground so I could have perpetual LOS over the whole freakin' map. That finally undid the barb problems, which were getting on my last nerve!

With Japan relegated to a smallish sliver of the continent, I built horsemen to augment my aging, and now somewhat tattered two strike forces, and began edging toward Egypt again.

Soon as I broke through to the middle ages (350bc or thereabouts....not sure on the date....at this point, it was something like 2 in the morning), I beelined for Chivalry, and started upgrading horsies to riders (80g a pop...didn't think it'd let me do that, but I wasn't complaining).

Egypt went extinct shortly thereafter, netting me another four cities (two more burned).

Then the Riders made the (suprisingly short) trip to the other side of the continent, and it was good night to Japan before 0 A.D.

With the continent secured, I raced up the tech tree as quickly as I could while still maintaining profitibility, and every time I checked the science screen, I was listed as "technologically advanced," which told me that my native research efforts were at least as great as the other folks' combined research....good news indeed!

So...I dropped into wampum big settler build mode and ALMOST got the whole continent filled up before the English found me. We did some horse trading, and I diminished my 3-4 tech lead by two, in order to snag world maps, a few techs I had missed (Monarchy), and find out who had what.

Nobody had even built a freakin' harbor on that side of the pond tho, so I couldn't start trading....

But....we hung tough, and lived with the fact that England got two little toe holds on my continent, while Germany snagged one. That's okay tho....I've built every wonder I've been interested in since Newton's University (without GL's....of which, I only got one, during the last fight with Egypt, and he went to rush the FP). Got ToE with ease and really opened up the tech lead, Universal Sufferage just because, Hoover's is just turns from completion, and everybody else has just started working on it.....I'm researching my second modern era tech, and just sold the Euros Atomic Theory to be nice...LOL

Building Mech Infantry at home for the moment, two techs out from Modern Armor, then I'll attack....

-=Vel=-

[Alkis]

"Next time don't throw the dice, just say what you want and play it"

This is an expression we use in my language when someone is rediculously lucky in backgammon.

[Velociryx]

I'll be the first to admit, it was a very lucky start...with Japan sooooo close, AND the free settler to jumpstart things, I just exploded out of the gate and never looked back.

First time I've ever been able to out-research the AI on Monarch in the ancient era....or maybe I was just so preconditioned not to try that I never really bothered with it....don't know...but I have been kicking their collective a$$es in research the whole game!

My attack plan is....well....I'll not outline it here, cos I want it to be a surprise.....but I'll likely target England for extinction, since they're the next biggest (about half my size on the chart). After that...dunno....well, I do, but it's that whole surprise thing....

-=Vel=-

[Harovan]

Ok, just entered the industrial age.

I did not find an early settler, but had no problem to beat the AIs in expansion though. I attacked Japan around 1500BC with archers, but since the barbarians killed 3 warriors scouting to the north, I didn't find Egypt for long. I made my own research from the ancient age on, because the AIs were very slow. Japan was gone in the 3rd war, in the early ADs. No leader, despite a lot of elite victories, $#*&%! My GA was triggered by the Great Wall (what else), since the civs on the big continent beat me to the Great Library and there was no other wonder left. After getting Chivalry, I attacked Egypt. I fought 2 wars with riders so far with them and reduced them to 11 cities. The 1st Egyptian war gave me finally a leader. I made a mistake and built the Sistine with the leader instead a FP. I thought I get a new leader soon, almost all my riders were elites, but alas, bad luck so far. Although my culture is bigger than the Egyptian, I suffered some flipping back of taken cities. Thebes flipped twice back, the second time even starved down to size 1. The next time I will raze it.

Around 500AD my 2nd suicidal galley found the big continent and made contact. The AIs there were slightly ahead, but a few good trades and the delayed switch to Republic made me catch up soon.

That's the situation now. I'm stockpiling cavalries now and hope I can finish Egypt after the current peace treaty expired. I will be alone at the continent then. Hopefully I can make a leader this time.

[nbarclay]

Contrast Vel's initial luck with mine: for me, that first hut produced barbarians who, instead of just taking some gold, killed a pop unit and destroyed the work I'd started on my first settler. (I might should have waited to pop it, but if the hut offered a free settler or unit, getting it ASAP would have been useful.) I definitely wish there were an option (if not a default) to preset the huts so the same people get the same things if they pop the same ones! I also got pushed into pop rushing an archer unit in another town fairly early in the game when barbarians showed up at an inopportune time, but that’s probably about par for the course given the strategy I used. Still, little bumps like that aside, I was able to expand like crazy (irrigating the game tile and building a granary to set up Beijing as a size 4/5 settler pump able to do settlers in four turns or workers in two).

In contrast to the early fighters, I only built two archers and one warrior through the whole ancient age, relying on the sheer size of my nation to deter AI aggression. I learned from Aeson’s posts that the AI generally respects the latent power of a large nation even when the nation’s armed forces are laughable, and there are times when I play the advantage that knowledge gives me to the hilt. (Not that it’s a sure thing. In mini-tourney 1, I was thrown back on my heels temporarily when America attacked unexpectedly.)

I also went all out on research (aside from needing some gold to combat unhappiness), and eventually outpaced my neighbors so much I could trade tech to Egypt for wines, ivory, and whatever gold they could spare and still stay ahead. And because I beelined for literature and made libraries a high priority (usually ahead of temples - scientific civs don’t have a monopoly on that trick), I actually got a cultural advantage on both my religious neighbors.

I switched to Republic exceptionally early, completing the transition in 550 BC, and entered the medieval period exactly two centuries later. I then headed for Chivalry and started building riders in my more fully developed cities. I stayed out of the ancient wonder race until late, when I managed to pick up the Great Lighthouse. (I figured keeping the overseas AIs from meeting up with my rivals might come in handy, and I just might be better at finding them than they would be at finding me.) England was the big winner in the wonder race overseas, getting the Pyramids, the Colossus, the Hanging Gardens, and, more recently, Sun Tsu’s. Japan got the Oracle and Egypt the Great Library, not that the latter ever did Egypt an iota of good other than the culture it produced.

As I was building my riders, the clock started ticking because Japan had gotten the prerequisite techs for Chivalry. If they could build even a single samurai unit, and it could win a battle, I would have to fight whatever was left of the war against an enemy in its golden age. That’s not an idea I’m entirely fond of. But with how narrow the border was, I figured ten riders would be sufficient for my first strike, and after that, my golden age would let me churn out reinforcements at a much faster rate. (The rest of my army still consisted of those two archers and a warrior; I briefly had a horseman unit from a goodie hut, but it got caught in a barbarian uprising in the far southeast and made the barbarians pay dearly before being overwhelmed.) The annexation of Japan started in 320 AD.

In 350 AD, my luck started redeeming itself from the earlier goodie hut fiasco. In probably my very first battle using an elite unit, a great leader emerged. The next turn, I formed an army, won a battle, and switched Beijing over to the Heroic Epic (which it could build in four more turns!). I’d initially planned to use the leader for a Forbidden Palace, but then I figured that the odds of not getting another one with a militaristic civ with most of Japan and all of Egypt before me were essentially zero. As it turned out, I didn’t even have to wait for the Heroic Epic for a second leader to show up, and he did build the FP. The war ended in 440 AD when Japan’s only two surviving cities were on the southeastern peninsula, on the far side of Egyptian territory. In the process, I got my third great leader and the Sistine Chapel.

With the continent-spanning border between China and Egypt, I wanted to build up my forces for a while before taking on Cleopatra’s forces. As best I knew, Egypt had not yet had its golden age, so all I had to do was run into one lucky war chariot unit and Egypt’s golden age would begin just as mine was winding down. That might have a little potential to get ugly. In the meantime, I got Music Theory and Economics to make sure any leaders I got from the Egyptian war would have something useful to do.

War with Egypt started in 580 AD and, for the most part, my riders cut through Egypt’s forces like a hot knife through butter. Some were killed by spearmen, but the dreaded lucky war chariot never materialized. I got two great leaders on the very first turn of the war (building Bach’s and Smith’s), but then no more for the entire rest of the war! By the way, Sistene, Bach’s, and Smith’s were all built in the towns I was in the process of capturing when I got my leaders. The towns were big enough to survive recapture if they flipped, and that technique frees up the leader slot for another one quite quickly.

Toward the end of the Egyptian war, the peace treaty with Japan ended and I decided to take them out. Unfortunately, the first spearman must have been named Clark Kent, and my magnificent three-rider army was in serious danger of being destroyed before it finally found some Kryptonite. That conflict took a bit longer than expected since I only had one rider down south outside the army, but the final outcome was never really in doubt.

During the Egyptian war, in 590 AD, my galleys made contact with the other continent. After trading for Astronomy (which I hadn’t gotten around to researching yet, since the Great Lighthouse made my galleys almost as good at exploring as caravels), I found myself three mandatory techs and three optional ones ahead of my nearest rival. That felt GOOD.

My war with Egypt and Japan took a bit longer than it might have otherwise because both civs had cities on North Island. But I finished off Egypt in 730 and made peace with Japan (which survived only due to a settler in a galley).

That same year, I discovered Navigation, opening up trade with the other continent. I was only able to find two luxuries on the open market, but trading some tech for them gave me the happiness margin I needed to switch to Democracy (which I had researched during the war). The democratic rebels succeeded in taking over the government in 780 AD.

As the year 860 approached, Japan had the audacity to refer to China’s elite riders dong guard duty along the border on North Island as swine. Such an insult was not to be tolerated, peace treaty or no peace treaty! Japan quickly went from having one city left to having none left.

Now it’s 900 AD and I’ve just entered the industrial era. I may or may not get Leonardo’s Workshop; it depends on whether Beijing’s superior production capacity can make up for the time lost in anarchy becoming a democracy. Chinan, home of my Forbidden Palace, is scheduled to complete Newton’s University just before Beijing finishes Leonardo’s (and quite possibly before the foreigners even have the tech to start it). And the great Chinese explorer Magellan finished his voyage just before the discovery of Magnetism rendered our Lighthouse obsolete.

And with my local wars over, I’m ready to start on the long, slow, plodding road of a perfectionist not content just to hurry through the industrial era to get to the real meat of the game. But when I get my modern armor, watch out. My dream is of blitzing Germany with modern armor - after taking out America and France along the way - before they have panzers to counterattack with. Is that kind of tech lead realistic? I don’t know, especially considering that I’ll be trading tech for luxuries along the way. But the fact that I can get Steam Power in four turns with a small gold surplus is a good sign. So is the fact that I’m currently five mandatory and two optional techs ahead (with Democracy being one of the two optional), albeit not counting whatever progress they’ve made toward whatever they’re researching at the moment.

Nathan

[nbarclay]

I just rechecked the income allocation slider, and my surplus researching Steam Power in four turns isn't as small as I originally thought - 211 gold at the moment. The slider needed to be at 80% when I set it in the process of telling my science advisor what to research between turns, but I guess my income improved just enough by the time my turn started to nudge me into 70% territory. That gives me surplus income to rush improvements to get more surplus income to, well, you get the idea.

Nathan

[Velociryx]

Sounds like you had a good run, despite the initial bad luck with huts!

My game continues along at a blistering pace....now into the early 1600's, I have concluded my first transcontinental war in....five turns.

While building in preparation for the war, I cranked out an even mix of Mechanized Infantry (upgrading my old Infantry and Riflemen along the way...still a few stragglers out there, but hey...it's coming along!), and Tanks, with a mind to mass upgrade them as soon as I got Synthetic Fibers....what I didn't remember was that Aluminum only shows up after you've researched Rocketry, so that was one additional tech I needed to get in the modern era.

Not that it was a big deal....England, the dominant power of the Euro block had decided it was high time to do some butt kicking, and declared against the then #2 Euro power, Germany, who wrangled deals with everybody else on yonder continent (France, Russia, and America) to help out against the burgeoning might of the English. Everybody but America dropped into Communism, and their research essentially froze in place, locking them in the Industrial Age (they didn't advance a single tech in something like thirty turns, whereupon I sold them Flight to help finance my upgrade plans).

My entire "navy" if you can call it that, consisted of a single transport, laden with 8 Modern Armor.

England had two cities on my continent, and so three MA's were dispatched near each of them to deal the opening blow (the English had kindly razed Germany's single city on my continent, and had two workers and a lone infantry out trolling through my territory, so another MA was dispatched to shadow that group for the opening shot of the war).

Turn 1: England's two cities on my continent are captured with minimal fuss. The Infantry trolling in my territory is squashed beneath the tracks of my mammoth MA, and the two workers captured.

Transport unloads it's deadly payload on the southern periphery of England's empire and ends their movement.

The English counter attack, sending three infantry to their death, and dealing out a whopping two HP's of damage to my attack forces. They also sink my entire navy. Ah well....the damage had already been done, and the package of doom had been delivered.

Turn 2: The Trans-continental attack force takes (insert name of cute lil' English town here), and moves in. We immediately set production to an Airport and wait for resistance to be quelled.

The English counter attack, but my German allies are swarming around my new acquisition, so the brunt of the counter falls on the shoulders of their blue-clad infantry. Only a single English Cav actually attacks my new city, and he meets the expected bad end.

Turn 3: Resistance ends, and an airport is rushed to completion. No expense is spared. We don't even flinch at the cost, cos there are some thirty MA's just waiting for their Airlift orders, and it's a heckuva lot cheaper than building a sufficient number of transports to get them there in a timely fashion.

The MA's hole up for the turn. All quiet.

Turn 4: Massive Air Lift campaing sees an additional dozen MA's whisked off to the Euro Continent. The initial 8 go off and capture themselves two more cities, including London, with the Sistine Chapel inside. No English counter attacks against Chinese forces this turn, but they do make peace with both France and The Rus. As a side note, we caught sight of an English great leader guarded by two infantry, attempting to sneak back to some English city for an undoubtedly nefarious purpose, and ended the lot of them most gloriously with a single MA).

Turn 5: Four additional cities captured (1 MA lost to a stubborn infantry in a metropolis...the only loss we suffered). We call up the English and strip them of their last two remaining cities, in exchange for peace. England is now OCC-ing it.

More MA's flood onto the continent, in preparation for phase two...next target, the anemic Rus, who stand between me and France/USA. I anticipate a 1- turn war....two at most, and then we'll roll on through.

The war with England simply didn't last long enough for any of the cities to have much chance to flip, and now that they're OCC-ing, and their capitol is not bordering on any of my new acquisitions, I have little to worry about, but all are currently building libraries (will rush those in a few turns), to help push the borders back out and prevent too much in the way of sleezy AI expansion.

Looks like a checkmate.

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

Some additional saves along the way, so you can track the progress, if you're curious.....

[Velociryx]

And one more, as we entered the Modern Age....

[vulture]

Ancient era

Started off pumping out settlers as fast as possible, and warriors in the interim. Started off with research set to 10%, which in retrospect may have been a mistake since the AI researched so slowly in this game. 40 turns for alphabet, 40 for writing, and I was still the first to both of them. Anyway, with the beautiful start position, I managed to out-expand Japan and Egypt, which was pleasantly surprising. Got two warriors from the first two huts, so at before I even built my second city I had 5 guys out exploring. I met Egypt long before Japan did! Met Japan around 3300 BC and finally discovered where the nearest horses were. Japan got a city there not too long after. I got the source of iron between my and Japan though. By this time I had a nice supply of archers, and upon connecting up the iron I upgraded most my non-expolring warriors to swordsmen and decided to take the Japanese wine city. Took that one and razed the city by the horses withouth losing a single unit, and only lost one archer taking Kyoto. Meanwhile, managed to find another 5 huts and get entirely barbarians from them. Neither AI civ seemed to be doing any exploring. Took 3 Japanese cities in pretty short order, and got all their remaining ones aside from the new capital for peace. Change to republic.

At this point I decided not to try and expand too much more. The avavilable space was for about 2 cities deep all along the south coast, and the cities would all be useless. So I just filled up my area of the continent and nestled up against the Egyptian expansion, and let them take the far end of the continent for me. During the war I had researched literature, and started building the Great Library, which I got. 20 turns after making peace with the Japanese I go at them again, and wipe them out. They respawn in the far north, and I take everything they have for peace in 190 BC. I'm building the great wall, but don't really want it. Nothing from the great library so far.

Middle ages

We enter the middle ages in 110 BC, and I'm pretty sure I've done most of the research alone... Start research with Feudalism, and change great wall build to Sun Tzu when I could complete the wall in 4 more turns. 3 turns later someone else finishes it. Doing palace prebuild for Sistine. Decide to research theology and chivalry, and then let the Great Library carry my tech for a while. When I'm one turn from building Sun Tzu, I sell all my barracks off (ooh, 2 gold each). Get Sun Tzu's in 540 AD. In 650 AD I lose out on Leonardo's by ONE TURN!!!
I have got precisely nothing from the great library, so I crank my research back up, wondering if everyone else is really that far behind. Then the French complete Copernicus. What the %$#@! Was the GL obsolete before I even built it or something? But no, next turn I get gunpowder, education, banking and astronomy from the library as it goes obsolete in a blaze of glory.

Egypt is bigger than me now, but that's fine. They've been building cities, I've been building infrastructure and military. And now Egypt has a nice pile of units I can kill to try and generate leaders. And once I have riders, I go on the offensive. In a short and nasty war I capture 7 cities in the north-west of the Egyptian empire, and trash a load of war chariots. I lose one city on the island to the north. peace in 870 AD gains me 3 cities (two on the island, one in the far north of the continent). Miss out on Sistine narrowly, get Bach's. I kept the war going a few more turns that I needed just to raze Thebes, sitting next to all that ivory. With that out of the way, my border expansion from a captured town gave me access to some ivory at last, so I now have 3 luxuries. Egypt, with the lighthouse, has made contact with the other continent, so the usual horse trading goes on. England and France look to be slightly the larger powers over there.

Japan has meanwhile bult 4 new cities - so it has two in the north I can't get too and three scattered around in the south. So I immediately go to war with them. This is the oscillating war phase, in a desperate attempt to get a great leader. I beat up the three Japanese cities I can reach, but they get America and France to declare war on me before I can make peace. I get Russia to fight France for me, trying to start some serious wars over there to weaken the other civs. Manage to make peace with Japan. Have to wait a while before I can honorably attack Egypt again, but they make it easy for me by being bribed by the Americans into going to war with me. Knowing how things work, I immediately contact the Americans and make peace :-). During this war I capture 6 Egyptian towns in the north, and all their remaining towns are south and east of their original capitol. Finally get my first GL in 1010 AD, who goes to make a forbidden palace. Very near the old Egyptian capitol, which is pretty much ideal. Get Adam Smiths in 1060AD, and end the war in 1120 AD.

Oh look, now I'm right next to the two Japanese cities. They don't last long. I get Magellan's (and later, Newton's). Upgrade everything to cavalry. Make peace with France when my alliance with Russia runs out (Russia didn't do very well out of this). Hit the industral era, and off we go again against Egypt. This is the last war, and I take the remaining 8 cities, gaining control of the whole continent. A few of the cities had riflemen, but they're not much of an obstacle to a large number of cavalry. Since Egypt has been without iron for a long time, there have been plenty of longbow men to wipe out in these wars, which is great leader fodder. But it's not until 1350 AD, with my last attack of the war, that I get my second leader, who is now an army.

My plan of letting the Egyptians produce lots of cannon fodder for me suffered from bad luck. I had something like 80 elite victories, and got 2 leaders, somewhat below the average expected of 5. My army has no-one to fight, so I can't build the heroic epic yet. I'm pretty close to the TOE and replacable parts, and I might just invade America with cavalry before they get to infantry. I'm running away with the tech lead now, but the damned AIs on the other continent just don't want to fight each other, which is a shame. Had fun using stacks of workers to good effect railroading to captured cities in one turn to rush in the defensive riflemen, and also to allow the cavalry blitz to continue. Don't you just love 3-move attackers.

And now, off to the industrial age invasion....

[vulture]

Incidentally, I've not seen this curious feature mentioned anywhere here, so I'll put it out now in case anyone hasn't noticed it, because I've used it a few times in this game.

If you want to trade excess luxuries or resources, often the civ you want to trade with has no gold per turn excess. Put the resource or a tech on the table and ask what the civ will offer you for it. It's not unusal for it to free up some funds to make a gold per turn offer, and you will now find that they suddenly do have gpt to make any trades you want to with. I.e. you can get them to reset the science slider during your turn by asking them to make an offer. Doens't always work (sometimes they offer something naff or jusr refuse), but it does fairly often.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Sounds like you had a good run, despite the initial bad luck with huts!

Definitely. I'm up to 1070 now and easily clicking along at four turns per tech, so I'm researching my fifth industrial tech while the leaders on the other continent don't even have Theory of Gravity or Magnetism yet! (They switched to democracies, except for Russia, whch I'm sure cost them some time.) Someone there did just research Free Artistry, which I had skipped over, but I was able to trade some spare iron to Germany for that plus forty gold per turn. (The fact that no one in the game, myself included, has Military Tradition yet probably has something to do with the fact that iron is still valuable.) So much for England's plans to steal the works of the great Chinese writer Shakespeare, given how quickly a city with a factory and railroads can work . Oh, and I did win the race for Leonardo's earlier.

The micromanagement is getting a LOT better now that my industrious workers have replaceable parts to help them work faster. That's one of my favorite things about Industrious: half as many workers to move around for any given job.

I'm also starting to think in terms of hitting America earlier with tanks, mech inf, or a combination thereof. America is smaller and lagging a couple techs behind compared with the leaders on the other continent, and they have two luxuries that they're foolish enough to sell to others instead of to me. I'm a bit annoyed at not having enough luxuries to keep all my subjects loving me, and annoying a superpower that's centuries ahead in technology is NOT a good idea .

Nathan

[nbarclay]

The Great Library only gives you techs that two other civs THAT YOU HAVE CONTACT WITH know. What happened is that as long as you only had contact with Japan and Egypt and were ahead of them in tech, the library was worthless. Then (I'm assuming) you made contact with other civs and got everything they both knew at the time you made contact. Interestingly, as in your case, the Library can provide techs beyond Education if you get them at the same time you get Education.

Nathan

[vulture]

Originally posted by nbarclay
The Great Library only gives you techs that two other civs THAT YOU HAVE CONTACT WITH know. What happened is that as long as you only had contact with Japan and Egypt and were ahead of them in tech, the library was worthless. Then (I'm assuming) you made contact with other civs and got everything they both knew at the time you made contact. Interestingly, as in your case, the Library can provide techs beyond Education if you get them at the same time you get Education.

Nathan

Ah, makes sense. I had wondered if it was something to do with contact. Chalk that up to a mistake by me then.

[jshelr]

Puttering along with a nice tech lead into the modern era, the evil Chinese leadership conceived of a plan to stall a little longer in order to discover the star wars defense while attempting to set a new record for number of MA and MI units. I wonder how the AI will react to the nightmare combination of nukes followed by massive invasion of the US and European civs by China. I will need to take a quick shower after this one.

[Velociryx]

Okay....it seems unanimous...the AI just didn't do much in the way of researching this game....why not?

Was it the particular combination of civs? Can't be attributed to starting postions...I've SEEN London, Moscow, Berlin, and Washington...I know those guys had good terrain at the start....then what?

What are the barbs set to? Felt like raging, the number of times I got WHACKED by them....if so, could that have some bearing on the AI's emphasis on research (more barbs = a greater need for military focus = less emphasis placed on research?)

Don't know...but if we can unlock the WHY behind the AI's research paralysis in this game, then we can find a way for the human player to reliably out-tech the AI on Monarch, and possibly beyond....

-=Vel=-

[jshelr]

Just throwing out ideas to be ruled out on Vel's question:

1. It's perfectly normal to out research the AI on Monarch after (about) the arrival of factories. In this game, China was probably the top GDP for all players after that point or sooner.

2. Speculating: Is it possible that the civs on the large continent all researched the same track and did not trade well? Maybe the mix of civs is important and, say, taking out England to get a "noneuropean civ" and adding in the Iriquois might lead to a very different result.

3. Do we know what wars were happening on the "other" continent in the industrial age? In my game, Bismark was eliminating Russia and, I think, had fought England.

4. On the home continent in my game it was constant fighting until the time we met the civs on the large continent. They were ahead on tech, but gave it away for lux and amazingly soon were behind. I got ToE with no problem even though I was several techs down when Bismark had Nationalism. I think all those mountains produced a poor economy.

5. Anyway, the better question is who we have to pay to get the results from goody huts that Vel gets. After a tech start like that, keeping up is, perhaps, not so hard to do.

[Velociryx]

Ahhh...what I failed to mention was the 2 barbarians I got from the huts, the three barb uprisings that pretty well demolished my treasury on two occassions, and the *numerous* settlers and workers killed by random barbs before I got the continent staked out firmly, but yes....the free techs and that settler on turn 6-7 was just about as fantabulous as you can get, and made dealing with the bad stuff a little easier to swallow...

Good observations, but I've noted that even for folks who DIDN'T attack right away, they still outclassed Egypt and Japan in research in the Ancient Age....that's odd to me...first time I've encountered that on Monarch....usually I struggle up til I get factories, as you say, but in this instance, I had the tech lead from the start (thanks to huts), and kept it (thanks to keeping my research pegged at 80-100%).

Could be as you say, poor tech tree runs and research coordination, but again, that's odd for the Euros, who are almost uncanny in their ability to do that very well (at least that's been my experience in all my previous games with them). This time around tho, they sucked.

Curiouser and curiouser....I think I may start up a few new Monarch games with different barb activity levels and note the difference (if any) that makes, and then combine civs in different ways to see what difference....

-=Vel=-

[nbarclay]

I routinely out-tech the AIs on Monarch well before the industrial age, and usually by the end of the ancient age. Some of the keys are:

- Good expansion, with plenty of tile improvements to make the cities wealthy and productive.
- Don't trust the governers to put city laborers the right place.
- Research the peaceful techs and trade for the military ones. More specificially, my current trend is to beeline for Literature and then for Republic (although lately, I've tended to grab Pottery first to set up a city or two to produce lots of settlers).
- Focus on buildings, not wars (assuming your starting position lets you). Once you get your economy built up and a good tech lead, wars are easy. In the meantime, every three archers or two swordsmen you build is a library you won't have. And saving up gold to upgrade warriors to swordsmen or chariots to horsemen is death to science! (Courthouses are also valuable in cities any significant distance from the capital.)
- Don't be afraid to ratchet up the entertainment slider a bit so the core cities can get big enough to build improvements reasonably quickly.
- Switch to Republic ASAP.
- Don't waste gold buying maps; at least not unless you really need the information. Instead, do stuff like trading your tech for someone else's, and then trade your tech to another AI for its map. (World map for territory map deals can also come in handy to reduce how much you don't know, and thus reduce the cost of a world map later.) The goal is to keep as much gold in your hands as possible so you can afford to run a deficit in order to research faster.

That's what I can think of off the top of my head, anyhow. This game, science went exceptionally well for me. I'm enclosing my save from 550 BC (if I have the year recorded correctly) right after I switched to Republic, in case anyone might find it instructive.

Nathan

[Harovan]

Originally posted by Velociryx
What are the barbs set to? Felt like raging, the number of times I got WHACKED by them....if so, could that have some bearing on the AI's emphasis on research (more barbs = a greater need for military focus = less emphasis placed on research?)

Barbs are at restless. I got several scouting warriors killed, as huts didn't give me anything useful (the best was a map, once), but only barbs. But I had not a single uprising.

Argh, guys... I can't play today and how it seems, for at least a week . My job cuts in my time for civing. But I'll keep a Poly window open and will read your spoilers. Maybe I can spare a few hours at weekend, but I doubt so far.

[Chemical Ollie]

I think I am far behind most of you guys, as I didn't go industrial until 1180. I'm only third on the map, behind Egypt and Germany. I think the main reasons are some strategic mistakes and bad luck in the early expansion. I went for the spices to the west, while the great land mass and strategic recources was to the east. I ended up with no horses or iron for a long time. More about that later. Perhaps I was also delayed by my wonder building in the capital. Despite my delay compared to you, this is one of my top 3 games when it comes to walking through the eras quickly.

Why are they called goodie huts? The only good things I got from them in this game was a constript warrior and 25 gold. And some training for my military which eventually turned out lethal for most of my scouting units

The barbs also killed my first worker and delayed my first settler. Despite this, I have beaten my own record in wonder-building, thanks to the great capital location. I moved one step north east before settling, to get a gold mine in my capital. Then I set up a few temporary cities within the capital borders. These were used as unit, settler and worker pumps. They were very useful until industrial times when they were abandoned because my regular cities needed more space. By then, they were quite useless anyway, at size 6 and only barracks. I used the temp cities for all settlers and made my capitol into a wonder factory. It has so far produced Pyramids, Great Library, Leo and Bach's. A coastal city has produced Colossus, Lighthouse and Magellan. Another city is currently just 3 turns from Suffrage. All this without a single leader! I can normally build one or two of the ancient wonders, but not this many. Unfortunately, I was beaten by just few turns to get Hanging Gardens, Sixtine, Sun Tzu, Smith's and Newton. The lack of those happiness wonders will be painful in later wars.

I saw the closest iron located just inside Japan's border and set up a city adjacent to be a culture vulture. My plan worked, but then the iron source ran out just a few hundred years later. I just managed to build five or six swordsmen. Then I had to buy my Iron from Japan until late middle ages. A horse hill was liberated to the east when Egypt razed a Japanese city. I rushed for it and got there just before Egypt. Then I placed another city on the flood plains where I built my FP, right on Cleo's border. I pumped out 20+ horsies but stayed in peace until medieval times.

In 400 AD, even before I got Lighthouse, I was able to cross the ocean on the first bold attempt! You can't have bad luck all times can you? Some tech trading gave me republic, which I entered about 500 AD (quite normal time for me). Around 800 AD, I sold contact to everyone for gold and tech, as the Europeans had researched navigation and would find my neighburs any turn. My golden age was triggered by Leo, even before I got chivalry! That was my first wonder GA ever.

I had an early medieval war with Japan and grabbed/razed a few cities. They started it, but I was just about to go for them anyway. To bad most of my horsies were lost in the war and I had to rebuild my military without iron. They made peace for some tech. The razing got me dozens of slaves and I already had plenty of own workers, so all my land was well improved. I had to buy iron expensively from the Japs, who were furious at me for some unknown reason. When my GA ended, I blitzed them again and grabbed saltpeter, wine and iron. I was just able to get 5-6 riders before the Iron deal was cancelled but had plenty of longbows. When I had razed their closest towns but before I had my iron mine up and running, they sent cavalery on me! Even if I had grabbed their only saltpeter, I found it appropriate to make peace for magnetism and military tradition. The goals of that war were accomplished anyway, and war disorder was not far away. Unfortunately no leaders turned up in the Japanese wars.

It is now 1350 something and I'm tech-rushing for Infantry and Hoover. Egypt has a large lead but I keep up in tech with them by selling them coal (which I probably have to regret later, but at least they are building railroads for my military). Germany is second. They have destroyed one neighbor and hold more than half of the European continent. Japan has 6 or 7 cities left on the south-east corner. My 20+ stack of cavallery is waiting on their border until the Suffrage is finished in just a few turns.

I have this plan for the rest of the game: I will blitz the Japs and reduce them to one useless city, then make peace to avoid total ruin of my reputation. Then I will take on Cleo. That will be tough one, but I hope to get help from Germany. The Egyptian wars will come in three waves with peace in between. The first wave is probably fought with cavallery and I will go for their ivory as main target. The second wave will be fought with tanks, and the final assult will be made with modern armor. Then I will try to stay in peace and milk the game until I get to future tech. By then, I expect that only Germany and China are left on the map, with one fully settled continent each. There will be an all-out WWIII with nukes, modern armor, stealth bombers and radar artillery. I have never even seen modern units like Aegis cruisers or smart weapons, and it will be fun to test and see what they are good for. They must be in the game for some reason, huh?

War plans seldom go as expected but time will tell. AI MPP:s could put you in unwanted trouble.

[Velociryx]

Played to 1695....England is extinct, France, America, and Russia may as well be....made a Mutual Protection Pact with Germany, and they were actually somewhat helpful, chasing down odd units trying to slip behind me and muck up my newly conquered territory. I'm rushing Libraries and Temples when possible to bump out my borders and solidify my holdings, which amount to the northern half of the continent so far (where Russia, England, and America used to have the bulk of their holdings). Gonna rest my troops for a couple turns, then hammer Germany and work my way down the peninsula where the last few remaining cities are. Might also wrangle peace with the Americans and strip them of their two cities over where Russia is (making peace with them for a couple turns so I can rush in an Airport on the island)....then....break the treaties and finish everybody off. Ran into some undesirable "features" of the advanced Civ3 combat engine when a freakin regular Longbowman on open terrain beat an Elite MA, and had a couple of other similar upsets (yep...including the ol' spearman vs. tank loss...OUCH), but at this point, I'm cranking out MA's in 2-3 turns at my war cities, and infrastructure development is proceeding apace at all my fringe cities back home....those offshore mining platforms are actually quite handy! Takes too long to get to them, but that's okay...gives me something to build while the army is off a conquering....

-=Vel=-

[Nakar Gabab]

Got Robotics yet, Vel?

Manufacturing Plant + Nuke Plant = 1 turn MA.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Nakar Gabab
Got Robotics yet, Vel?

Manufacturing Plant + Nuke Plant = 1 turn MA.

Yeah, but how many turns do you have to delay conquering the world to get your 1-turn MA?

The real world may be starting to intrude on my civving somewhat. The Supreme Court just came down with its voucher ruling (I'm a strong voucher supporter), so I may start debating vouchers on the misc.education newsgroup again as I've done at times in the past. I don't expect it to grind my civving to a halt, but it will very likely slow me down.

Nathan

[vulture]

And now, the rest end of my game...

Industrial era

As previously advertised, I took control of my continent in 1350 AD. Then I started building up forces for my invasion - mostly I needed transport boats and more defenders to stock captured cities. The invasion, which happened in 1485, eventually took 8 galleons with 8 elite cavalry, 4 veteran cavalry, 8 veteran infantry, 8 artillery and a 3 (vet) cavalry army. I picked out America as my beach head of choice for several reasons. One, it was the shortest crossing. Two, two of the coastal cities had luxuries (gems and spices) that I was currently having to pay for. Three, Washington had the Sistine Chapel. The fourth city in that little corner of America had the Colossus, which would look nice in my garden but wouldn't actually be any use (unless wonders count in some way towards a domination victory). As a bonus, America had just signed an MPP with Russia. The geography of the continet was such that America owned the western end, France owned the next chunk of land, and then Russia, Germany and England all bordered France, although England was the only large country (France was second). The reason that the MPP was a bonus is that Russia would declare war on me, and I could then bribe France to go to war with Russia (and America, via the MPP). France and America would both be fighting two front wars, and hopefully France and Russia would wipe out each others offensive stacks before I finished with America, so I would only have the city defenders to deal with.

The first war lasted about 5 turns, and went exactly to plan. I took the 4 cities I most wanted, gaining 2 luxuries, Sistine and the Colossus almost no American counterattack. The last American city I took was sporting some shiny new infantry, so I decided to make peace until tanks (only a few turns away). Meanwhile, Russia also MPPed with Germany, to give France more to think about. With those countries softening themselves up for me, I was happy, since I figured that taking all of them might just be enough for domination, and I'd never have to touch England. I didn't want England involved in these wars because it was so much larger that it would win easily and just become more of a problem for me later.

Built the Hoover Dam in 1530 AD.Tanks appeared on the scene, and I built 40 or so of them in short order, and then broke the peace treay with America, reputation no longer being an issue as I was only trading with England and didn't really need that anymore. Took out America, aside from a few towns scattered down the southern peninsula (which France eventually got).
Then went through France, taking about 4 cities per turn. Since Russia was down to one city, I nabbed that one too. Rushed lots of temples to consolidate borders and claim more land area. Captured the Univsersal Suffrage and another luxury in the process of invading France. Then I had a brief pause since modern armour was only 2 techs away. Got them and took all 4 German towns in 1 go. Only me, England and one French town left now. I have to say that the strategy of getting France, Russia and Germany to destroy each others infantry stacks (which is all that happens in infantry wars usually) worked an absolute gem. I saw only about 5 units from them all combined that weren't defending cities. Easy pickings.

Somewhere in the middle of this I got two more leaders - one for SETI and one for Manhattan, and of course had mech inf. Also had the heroic epic -> pentagon setup built. Only managed to produce two armies before the game ended, and none of it really had any effect. Didn't build a single airport or aircraft.

Still didn't have a domination victory, so I healed all my mech inf and went on the offensive against England. Came across an object lesson in the value of good intelligence (and the value of good railroads and MA). England had briefly joined the war against America when America had one town left, and had captured that town. The town was now entirely surrounded by me and cut off from the rest of England. Their entire offensive force was in and around the city radius - every square had between 2 and 4 units on it, mostly infantry. This was a bit of a surprise, and slowed me down somewhat since half my MA force got diverted to clearing out all the infantry sitting on hills. Eventually got everthing sorted out, tok 6 English cities in 3 turns and won via domination in 1730 AD. Engalnd, way ahead of the other (now extinct) civs for the end of the game, still didn't have steel or electronics (or they might have just got electronics). I never faced tanks or aircraft. As Vel said, the AI research never took off in this game, and on the replay, the 5 civs never really fought before we made contact - only one city changed hands before I started bribing them into fighting each other in the middle ages.

Unlike Vel, I never had a problem with Barbarians. I saw one uprising, which my elite warrior and single spearman took care of without the benefit of city walls. Didn't lose a single unit to barbarians, and they were never a factor. I was amazed at how slowly Egypt and Japan expanded given how much room was available on our continent. The AI played this game like a muppet, which is pretty unusual in my experience. Still didn't need to use any of the later modern era tecs for anything - I barely needed to industrialise, since most of my industrial cities were only producing wealth during my wars.

[vulture]

I notice that some people chose not to attack Japan early on. This puzzles me somewhat, so I'm curious as to the reasoning. Was it a conscious decision to wait for later, or just a lack of decision to go to war?

For me it was pretty clear cut. Japan had horses and wines (that I wanted) in its territory. It hadn't yet connected the horses up to the net. So it had no good units. This game *has* to be won militarily, so I'll have to fight Japan at some point. It'll be worse if they get iron, and far worse if they're still an issue when Samurai appear on the scene. Plus the possibility of an early great leader, and the chance to add some developed cities to my empire. For me, absolutely everything screamed 'kill Japan now', and waiting appeared worse in every respect.

So, were other games sufficiently different that early that a different strategy appeared good, or were there other more important factors that I decided to gloss over? (Like building up infrastructure)