Au402 Dar4: 10ad-1000ad

vmxa1 · June 28, 2003, 01:15

Well it seems to be working for now, but I am going to pack it in for the day.
I am not making up for my early blunders so far and they may be unrecoverable with my holdings.
I managed to get to Republic around the 4xxAD mark.
Is this one of the surprise you mentioned Dom, I had 1 turn to switch as England?
I finally stopped the galley runs as I had lost all the ones going east from the top and the bottom of the map.
I have two sitting on a small island north of Arabia nd east of Japan. I think I will leave them until Astronomy, by then the island will be covered and I will let them sink or swim towards the east.
I am about to send a tag team of two more directly south to see if another civ is there or an island to land on. I wil send a settler in each wih a spear and hope for the best. I have nothing else useful to build in the capitol, but I needed a break from the sinkings.
Not sure how many I am willing to send, but the contacts I have made gave up their maps and they had the land covered. I am not able to touch them now as I can not use my iron on the one island. I can make horses on the mainland as no sea tiles are between us.
I have pikes and med inf, but only on the island with the iron.
Russia declared war on me when I refuse to give them a contact, but they can probably do no better at getting to me, than I can at them. They have Mono and I am working on it as well. They have Monarchy, but I skipped it. They are the lead in the ones I know about, but I suspect they are not the true top dog.
I know some of the wonders went elsewhere. I was too lasy to look at the list of built and under construction, what the diff anyway.
I am not sure why all but one where ahead of me the last time I looked at the score. Many are far behind in tech, probably culture. I should start to move up as I have lib/temp and even some Coll in place.
I only know of one civ off their mainland and it is arbia and they are in last place.
I know Russia has had wars and so has Arbia (not with each other).
Someone build SunTzu before I even got to the age with that wonder, I hope they are not that strong.
No wonders and none in sight.
Most turns seem to be getting about 25 seconds, but once in awhile I see one go to about 90 seconds.
Not exactly exciting. I am begining to dread the really late turns. How long will they take?
Remember this is 3.06 Gig with a gig of memory.

Dominae · June 28, 2003, 01:25

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
Is this one of the surprise you mentioned Dom, I had 1 turn to switch as England?

Nope, no mods to the rules from my end. I just tinkered with the map.

Keep at it, vmxa1...I hope the slowdowns are not too bad on your machine (because that would basically mean that everyone else's will be horrible!).

Dominae

vmxa1 · June 28, 2003, 01:56

I left out trades or rather the lack of them.
I confess that I am not fond of trading and do as little as I can get away with even though I know it is another lever that can be used.
I have some contacts that I could use, I have my maps, but I have not trade either contacts or maps. I have accepted some maps, but not given one.
I have tech (as many as 5 one one case), but most have nothing to offer and no money (sounds familar). Only one other than Russia has a tech and it is Monarchy. I offered two techs and they wanted map and 810 gold, not likely. Russia wanted about the same, but not tech (now we are at war).
I even offer a contact to them, but that was not of much interest to them. Not sure why, I doubt they will be going off the island soon, maybe.
As to strategy, I don't have any at this point. I was thinking that I could make some good money out of my contacts and maps at some point, but I am not sure about that now. Maybe a key RoP to get at another Civ, if I get the troops to do anything. If I can muster up one decent island to add to my holdings I should be able to get ahead after a time with the extra cities. The only canidate that I can see is south, so that is why I am going for it. I
Just a though, but what the heck is the number needed for an FP in this map? I am piling up cash to upgrade if I get the chance. I am making a few horses in the hope that I can eventually get saltpeter. Given the research levels, I am probably going to have to make a skip on knights and any thing else I can think of doing.
I am also having trouble with the unhappy citizens of England, but it is just a small thing as so many tiles are none shield yielding it is just as easy to make entertainers. I can spare the food and gold, not the shields.
I finally got the mainland competely roaded, what a job without industrious workers. I could have make more workers, but there was no need to rush into it as the tiles are often of little value.

Catt · June 28, 2003, 18:22

Part 3 (see previous threads)

When we last left Elizabeth's empire, England had just become a Republic in circa 50 AD. Exploring English galleys had found safe passage to (i) German-Franco lands, (ii) Arab-Egyptian lands, (iii) America, and (iv) Rome. It seemed clear that Rome shared its landmass, but Elizabeth had been unwilling to pay for contacts that would come soon enough.

Much of the early ADs consisted of city improvements and galley exploration. Elizabeth considered an assualt on Arabia or Egypt, but decided to press ahead with empire development for the time being. Had either civilization controlled additional luxuries, controlled an important wonder, or controlled productive land, English forces would have invaded. Alas, with such bleak lands under their control, the Queen decided to focus on exploration and economic matters, and save the invasion for a time when the relative advantage between English and enemy forces was greater still -- with English exploration the Queen expected to race forward while the Arabs and Egyptians, denied contacts around the world and living in desert, withered away. The Arab-Egyptian lands would really be most valuable as staging grounds for an invasion of Germany and France to the north. An assualt on America, which controlled many spices, would have been approved immediately - unfortunately, there was no safe passage to America and many forces would be lost at sea. Peaceful exploration it was, then.

Very soon numerous additional civlizations were discovered near Rome -- the Zulu, the Iroquois, the Mongols, the Ottomans, the Persians, the Celts, the Spanish, the Vikings. Later, English galleys would find isolated Babylon, Carthage, India, and even Japan. (Who am I forgetting?)

Several brave English galleys perished during dangerous runs into the oceans, but eventually such runs paid off - English saliors discovered an unihabited island to the north-east of the home isle. It was isolated by ocean and so not subject to settlement without great risk, but the Queen hoped that English knowledge of the island, combined with keeping close to a tech lead, would enable English colonization of the lands before others.

The backwardness of Arabia and Egypt allowed England to settle a small island just off the Arab coast -- this small island will be the staging grounds for any future English invasion.

The great island to London's southeast contained both a source of iron and a source of wines. It's been colonized in full, though the iron remained unconnected. English cities continued to build improvements; fully-improved cities began building England's army - in the absence of connected iron, spears and horseman are coming in numbers. At some point, veteran warriors may be produced. England still has some 12 - 15 warriors - almost all regulars - from her expansion stage, and may choose to upgrade these regulars to swords rather than disband them in favor of veteran swords.

Strategic resources that might deplete will not deplete if they are not connected to a city / trade network. Since I have no use for iron now, but will certainly have use for it later, I have not connected my sole supply of iron. It would be a real shame to connect it and have it deplete before I'm really ready to use it. When I have a sufficient force of horsies, warriors, and spears I'll connect it and upgrade. I did mine it for the extra shields - but no roads.

With the discovery of so many new civilizations, Elizabeth discovered that England was slightly behind the tech leaders, but not terribly behind. The Persians and the Ottomans (followed closely by the Iroquois) were the leaders. All three civilizations were constructing Sun Tzu's Art of War upon introduction to the Queen, but none had begun Sistine Chapel or Leo's Workshop.

Several civs had discovered Monarchy, but none other than England had discovered the Republic. Elizabeth leveraged her knowledge of Republic to trade to tech parity (or nearly so). Shortly after a trading round that brought England into the Middle Ages (and allowed her to acquire Feudalism), Persia and Ottomans secured Monotheism. Elizabeth allowed her treasury to grow as she turned off research completely. Too few libraries made research seem so expensive -- but as time passed, Elizabeth cam to understand that buying techs was going to be very expensive as well. Monotheism couldn't be fetched for 1700 gold, even after three civs knew the technology. After building a treasury of approximately 2000 gold, Elizabeth turned on research so as to run only a small surplus or a small deficit, and began research on Engineering. More than a dozen turns had passed, and no new technologies seemed to have been researched (SUn Tzu's was built by the Perisnas and no cascade to Sistine followed - I knew no one had Theology).

The Queen's scientists researched Engineering in about 14 turns. England was the first with the knowledge. A pre-build was started for Leo's Workshop -- the completion of Leo's might induce Elizabeth to upgrade regular warriors but without Leo's, she'd probably build new veteran warriors for upgrade to swords. Soon each of Persia, Ottomoans, and Iroquois began work on Sistine Chapel. Monotheism was still fetching 2000+ gold. In a failure of attention, Elizabeth allowed someone else to discover Engineering before she was willing to trade. Rats! Sometime in the 600's AD England discovered Invention. England was the first to do so. A few turns later, a series of trades brought England Monotheism (for cash), Theology and Chivalry (for Invention), most of England's cash back (for Invention), and tech superiority over all but the Ottomans. The Ottomans had discovered Education, and it was too expensive to trade for or buy.

Below is a screenshot showing the Egyptian empire at 680 AD - the stage of the game I am at. It includes a large minimap (showing some vapor trails of suicide galleys) and a shot of the far eastern English outpost just north of Arabia.

Catt

Catt · June 28, 2003, 18:25

And here's a shot of my empire's "status" at 680 AD. Included is the trade I made to Persia for a tech lead (actually one tech behind Ottomans).

Catt

Catt · June 28, 2003, 18:32

I think this game is going to come in much smaller chunks now -- it may truly be a summer epic (as in the entire summer). I'm playing on a 1.6 Gz laptop with 256 Mb Ram, and I timed my last turn from 670 AD to 680 AD. From end of turn through end of next turn - exlcuding all time spent moving forces, selecting build items, conducting diplomacy, etc. -- in other words, all the time spent with the info box saying "Please Wait" -- 3 minutes 55 seconds passed! Just shy of 4 minutes, and there is no known AI war, no new settlements popping up that I can see, and very few AI ships exploring (no one has astronomy yet).

Four minutes is a long time, especially when broken into about 2 and a half minutes between end of turn and then 1 and a half minutes between science / city build selection and unit movement -- it's broken up into smaller chunks, but still represents a large investment of time. I want to at the very least discover the few remaining civs I haven't found, and then I'll slow down quite a bit.

Catt

vmxa1 · June 28, 2003, 22:14

Man I do not know how you managed to get all the way across the map, that is some feat in my book.
I did not post a mini map here as the 1000 marker as I did not want to spoil anything for those that did not make any galley runs.
I got China, Japan, Arabia, Cleo,Aztecs,Russia,Korea and some other civ before I got sick of losing gallies.
I also could not find anything to do with the contacts, so I figured to forget it.

vmxa1 · June 28, 2003, 22:21

The other thing you mentioned that I wondered about was any attempt to attack one of these civs.
I mean how are going to get units there in any numbers?
I lost at least 3 out of every 4 and most of them were empty. I would hate to do even worse with loaded ones. I did lose about 4 loaded ones trying to settle off of Japan and South of the homeland. I figured I had no choice on that one. Invasion would face fully settled islands and be very hard don't you think?
As I said before I play almost no maps with losts of island and therefore have no real experience at this aspect. Is there something I need to know?
The other point is no real good units can be made on the mainland as you have no Iron. Ok horses, but no Swords or Med Inf. What was your plan?

Dominae · June 28, 2003, 22:26

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
Ok horses, but no Swords or Med Inf. What was your plan?

Both Horses and Iron require a Harbor on one of the adjacent islands.

Dominae

vmxa1 · June 28, 2003, 22:28

I dam I forgot the world was round and I could go west and hit the far side sooner. I guess that will learn me to not use more water. Now I can run off looking for more contacts. Like a dummy I was trying to go east all the way across.

Catt · June 29, 2003, 01:26

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
Man I do not know how you managed to get all the way across the map, that is some feat in my book.
I did not post a mini map here as the 1000 marker as I did not want to spoil anything for those that did not make any galley runs.

The Great Lighthouse helps immensely - it would be an entirely different game without the GL -- I suspect you're playing that different game. With the GL there are safe sea passages to almost all the civs I've found -- I think the only civ that I've already discovered that needed a suicide galley run is Japan (in the upper left-hand corner of my map). The rest are all accessible via sea routes. I know there are 5 or 6 additional undiscovered civs but I suspect they are all backwards. And I suspect there are several islands / landmasses near my home island that I haven't found because I've not been running suicide galleys -- I had enough exploration to do via safe sea routes. I did get a jump start by suiciding my way to America (northwest of the home island - appears in the mid-right of the minimap) which opened up Rome and about 5 or 6 others, but I would have discovered those civs 5 or 10 turns later via the sea passage through Arabia / Egypt to France / Germany. Without the GL, I would have lost a lot more galleys trying to find folks.

Quote:

I got China, Japan, Arabia, Cleo,Aztecs,Russia,Korea and some other civ before I got sick of losing gallies.
I also could not find anything to do with the contacts, so I figured to forget it.

The contacts haven't actually helped all that much. Had I been technologically backwards, they would have helped a lot. But since I was pretty close to the leaders, the contacts basically offered a great deal of comfort in picking tech research choices and the comfort zone necessary to pursue wonders if desired (so far Leo's is the only target - I would have liked Sistine on this map, but didn't have a chance at it). I do expect a bonanza from contatcs sometime soon, as I will trade contacts when astronomy hits the scene. I've stumbled a bit with tech research versus cash hoarding. The tech costs, both research and cash trade value, are so out of whack compared to my normal experience on standard maps that I've run science at 0 for a dozen turns before deciding to turn it back on because of the exceptionally slow tech pace and the absurdly high tech trade cost.

Quote:

The other thing you mentioned that I wondered about was any attempt to attack one of these civs.
I mean how are going to get units there in any numbers?
I lost at least 3 out of every 4 and most of them were empty. I would hate to do even worse with loaded ones. I did lose about 4 loaded ones trying to settle off of Japan and South of the homeland. I figured I had no choice on that one. Invasion would face fully settled islands and be very hard don't you think?

Again, the GL makes all the difference. Getting units there in numbers just requires logistics planing, provided you can get units there safely. The GL allows you to do this. For instance, I have settled a small island just off of Arabia. It is a galley run from Arabia (with the GL).

Quote:

The other point is no real good units can be made on the mainland as you have no Iron. Ok horses, but no Swords or Med Inf. What was your plan?

Not to beat a dead horse, but once again it is the GL at work. Without the GL, you won't have iron on the mainland until astronomy. But that can be an advantage - I've left my iron unconnected, but without the GL, my homeland would operate without iron anyway. If I decide to attack Arabia and Egypt, I'll do so by massing horsies, spears, and warriors from the mainland on the eastern island (where there is iron), upgrading them to knights, pikes, and swords, and then moving them into position on my small island off of Arabia. There's not a real good reason to go after Arabia yet (except for basic land and a staging grounds to the world's heartland) and since they're backward and will remain so for some time, I'll bide my time building expensive cathedrals and then universities, and attack with knights against spears and some pikes or even cavalry against the same when I'm in a better position to move against the heartland. I'm hoping for Leo's to help me -- building expensive improvements now, enabling a constant stream of cheap units later while maintaining economic superiority / parity with the world leaders, and further enabling cheap upgrades to a first class fighting force when needed. There's no fear of invasion now, so I can choose to focus on infrastructure or units -- in many cases I would go for units but in this case I'm trying to put infrastructure in place and count on a later unit swarm to carry the day.

In my game, the looming strategic choice will be to go after navigation, economics, or cavalry. Navigation offers luxury trades, allowing me to lower my luxury slider (constantly at 20% or 30%), but also chepens the tech and starts the rush to settle unsettled islands; also, contacts go out the window completely with Navigation. Economics allows Smith's (a boon on this map, I think) and the trade value of the tech. Cavalry offers an easy steamroll over Arabia and Egypt (provided we have saltpeter) but probably comes too late to allow an effective rush against France and Germany.

BTW, per Dominae's suggestion in the scenario intro, I turned off cultural victory. I am woefully behind in culture, even compared to the "backwards" civs, because I didn't build a temple or library until after I had met my first civs (didn't have the techs until then given my beeline towards Republic). I expect that any invasion will be frustrating slow with lots of resistors and lots of culture flips.

I notice in aonther thread that you're seeing 90 second turns with a 3+ Gz machine -- I'm consistently seeing 4 minutes per turn on my 1.6 Gz machine and there is no war nor any new settlements with corresponding trade route calculations. This could turn into a serious grind soon (it's already painful to do something else for minutes at a time only to make a few unit moves and set a few building orders before tapping "next turn.")

Catt

vmxa1 · June 29, 2003, 04:25

BTW you get Iron on the mainland with Astronomy as only sea tiles are between you and the other island.
I did not notice the mention off turning off culture, so I am stuck with what ever the settings are. I think al the selections were on, but I did nto really look at, just click by that screen.
Anyway I have misplayed this from the start, but I am trying to plough through to see the whole impact of this map. I am not concern with the out come and that is why I did not restart. can you image trying to play this over, ugh.
It will surely cure any thoughts of huge maps for me for a long time.
I may want to start using more water to get the hang of it.
I tried to get the lighthouse, but shield production was too low. I got no settlers and had to use my capitol too much.

jshelr · June 29, 2003, 07:06

America the builders move toward the industrial era.

150 AD finishes the harbor in North Island – year of the horse. 13 turns to Great Library.

Nine turns later Russia suddenly builds the GL and our goose is cooked. Just as well. The game remains interesting.

America turns completely builder, abandoning suicide galleys and keeping the military down to an absolute minimum. Full speed ahead on tech. I think we are ahead on tech and we will try to build a lead heading into the industrial era when cross ocean landings are possible. Arab/Egyptian large island looks ripe for plunder.

jshelr · June 29, 2003, 07:33

Jealous of Catt's exploratory success. That extra space moved each turn changed the whole game!!

Question: how many cities for the FP??

There is only a moderate amount of steam rising from the computer. I play a turn and go away for a few minutes. Very calming.

Catt · June 29, 2003, 13:14

Quote:

Originally posted by jshelr
Jealous of Catt's exploratory success. That extra space moved each turn changed the whole game!!

The safe sea travel is what did it -- that and ponying up 35 - 65 gold per civ to buy territory maps each time I met them. The extra movement point is nice, but the safe sea travel is especialy helpful on this map. I must have invested 2,500 to 3,000 gold in map purchases and embassy establishments.

Catt

Catt · June 29, 2003, 14:12

Not a whole lot more to report. The turn after I last posted (680 AD) Babylon demanded contact with the Mongols and then declared war when they were rebuffed. The war declaration helped, if anything. I didn;t try to quantify any "reverse war weariness" happiness effects, but I probably gained a content / happy citizen in most cities.

Elizabeth decided to go after Economics for Smith's, and trade down for Astronomy towards Navigation. With 2 turns to go on banking, the Queen learned that the Ottomans (together with England, the most technologically advanced) had discovered Gunpowder. Elizabeth had thought that the other civilizations would prioritize Astronomy, but their failure to do added a little breathing room to the Queen's plans.

In 870 AD the Mongols demanded contact with the Babylonians -- these two civs really want to get to know each other! Temujin declared war when he was rebuffed. The Queen reduced here luxury slider one notch.

Sometime around 900 AD, Elizabeth learned that the Persians had begun onstruction of Copernicus' Observatory and the Ottomans had begun work on JS Bach's Cathedral. With the discovery of Astronomy, particularly by Persia with a lot of nearby sea routes and more than a few galleys roaming, Elizabeth decided it was time to introduce the world to itself. Elizabeth was up late and a bit tired, and rather than spend many hours determining the best possible succession of trades, she "winged it" a bit. She traded all her contacts to Persia plus 900+ gold for Astronomy, Banking for Gunpowder and Music Theory to the Ottomans, and Banking to Persia for the return of all English gold and a sizeable per-turn payment. She then traded a melange of contacts around the world for every available bit of gold and refreshed maps. Elizabeth refused to trade the English maps at all. She negotiated a peace with Babylon as part of her trades, but remained in a technical state of war with the Mongols. At the conclusion of the trades, England enjoyed tech superiority (England had just discovered, or was about to discover, Economics), an unmatched view of the world map, and 1500 gold in the treasury.

A pre-build was converted to Smith's -- still 20-something turns to completion. A second pre-build (cathedral) was converted to a Palace for a later switch to Magellans. Elizabeth wasn't happy with the prospect that the Ottomans would control both Sistine and JS Bachs, but barring a great leader, it sure looked like Bach's would be Ottoman - the Queen didn't covet the wonder, but would have preferred another civ to acquire Bach's. The Queen knew her pre-build for Magellan's would almost certainly be inadequate in the event of a wonder cascade -- she hoped that England would complete Smith's, and two other civs would complete Bach's and Copernicus' before Magellan's was available to others, bt it looked dicey.

Germany vaulted into the tech race by virtue of its Great Library -- Germany had been stuck at the Monotheism / Engineering point but leaped all the way up to the Banking / Gunpowder / Music Theory point when contacts were traded. Had the Queen been able to change past decisions, she would have gifted Theology and Education to Germany before contacts became available. Oh well, live and learn. Without universities, Germany would probably fall back soon enough.

Elizabeth wanted to get to Navigation as quickly as possible. Ocean travel would open up trade -- just a few luxuries would eliminate the need for any luxury spending and improve English scientific advancement by 30% or so. Navigation would also allow cross-ocean invasions. Though somewhat unprepared with a very weak military, many English cities would be free to concentrate on military units soon, and the Queen contemplated one or more invasions of backwards neighbors for luxuries and more fertile land. The Americans in particular were backwards, controlled numerous spices, and industrious American workers had helpfully cleared most of their jungle home. Just a few turns' trip from the homeland, America started to look as if it had a large bull's eye painted across its lands.

English caravels loaded with three settlers, three muskets, and three workers will soon be in position off the coast of the small northern island for a sprint northeast to colonize the small, centrally-located island English sailors had discovered years ago. Additional caravels waited at the hoe islands southern tip, expecting to find one or more landmasses to the south. The Queen guessed that additional civilizations existed east of Egypt / Arabia, and potentially north of the northern island. Horseman and knights (England workers connected their iron mine upon discovery of astronomy) will soon gather in the northen island in preparation for an invasion northwest to America.

The screenshot below shows the English empire at 1000 AD (pasted in disparate locations) and an enlarged minimap showing the known world. Navigation is 8 turns away; Smith's is 23 turns away. Turns are taking 4 - 5 minutes (ughh!).

Catt

nbarclay · June 29, 2003, 23:39

Quote:

Originally posted by Catt

The safe sea travel is what did it -- that and ponying up 35 - 65 gold per civ to buy territory maps each time I met them. The extra movement point is nice, but the safe sea travel is especialy helpful on this map. I must have invested 2,500 to 3,000 gold in map purchases and embassy establishments.

Catt

My SOP is to trade a tech (preferably a relatively cheap one) for a world map plus whatever else I can get for it. Individually, the deals cost me a little in relative terms. But collectively, I end up getting gold from a civ in every group I meet instead of giving gold, and with as many civs as there are in this game, that adds up.

nbarclay · June 30, 2003, 00:12

The reason I had a save from 230 AD is that that's when I entered the medieval era. I'd recently made contact with Germany and France (which were more advanced than Egypt and Arabia), and with their assistance, plus popping Polytheism from the hut on the eastern island, I found myself the most advanced among the civs I knew.

By the way, I discovered a point of game mechanics that I hadn't known. It would appear that if you only have one ancient non-governmental tech left to research, it is actually possible to get that tech from a hut even though you are already researching it.

My galleys continued to search (always following safety regulations to the letter) and, in 460 AD, established contact with the largest group of the world's civs. A decade later, history's third great turning point (after the Ottomans' completion of the Pyramids and Carthage's construction of the Great Lighthouse) occurred. The Ottomans and Persia had both already discovered Engineering, but then Carthage discovered Theology and...

nbarclay · June 30, 2003, 00:46

Until that turning point, Carthage had been forced to run a significant (54 gpt as of 460 AD) deficit in order to run science plus luxury spending at 100%. After that point, Carthage was able to run a surplus. As long as Carthage could keep foreign gold rolling in, it could continue to research at its maximum feasible rate (currently 80% science, 20% luxury) forever.

The Ottomans were a definite economic threat. Even in 460 AD, they were huge and prosperous, and that was only a shadow of what they would become later. But they were also in Monarchy, not Republic, so at least for the time being, the financial advantage was mine. I was fully intent on using it while I had the chance, and I could only hope that the Ottomans would stay in Monarchy. Worse, the Ottomans still had their golden age in front of them. I still had mine ahead too, but with my not planning any invasions until Military Tradition, Numidian Mercenaries were starting to feel like a poor substitute for Sipahi.

As the millennium drew on, Carthage continued to stretch out its tech lead (and expand its cash stockpile as well). The Ottomans had snagged Sun Tsu's before Carthage was even in the medieval era (very possibly with a combination of a wonder cascade and Feudalism as a free tech), but Carthage had come back to get Sistine and Leo's and was on track to get Copernicus's and Smith's just ten years into the next millennium. No one else even had the prerequisite technologies to start them! Also, the recent discovery of Navigation enabled luxury trading for the first time, and the process of discovering the few civilizations the Great Lighthouse had not yet brought into safe reach was almost complete.

But amidst all that happiness, an ominous danger loomed. The Ottomans had finished swallowing their Mongol neighbors three centuries before, and were vastly larger than Carthage. As long as they remained in Monarchy, Carthage could hope to maintain its scientific advantage. But the danger that they might switch to Republic and end Carthage's technological advantage lurked like a vulture in people's minds, ready to swallow up Carthage's dreams of supremacy like so much dead meat.

Dominae · July 2, 2003, 16:28

Posted at alva's request (because he really does not any spoiler info):

---

- 50 AD Got contact with Arabia

- 100 AD got contact with the Egyptians.

- 170 AD - Ottomans build GL ( 3 turns before it would be finished

, so a 370 shield marketplace it is then. Well I was able to buy construction and build the great wall instead.
The smarter move would have been to take the marketplace or any other improvement though, but héy, who cares.
The first time I build it anyway

)

- 300 AD Mogols get wiped out. 22 to go

- 350 AD contact with Germans. ( = contact with around 15 civ)

- 410 AD finally went into anarchy ( 6 turns)

Seeing the abundance of luxuries Dom has given the world, the better thing to do would probably have been to choose monarchy, should be more fun this way )

- 560 AD started prebuilding sistine chapel.

- 870 AD I finish Sistine.......oh wait, there is a messenger at the door, one moment, I'll be right back.
* goes to open door and listens what news the messenger brings *
What!!! W H A T !!!
* comes back storming to the throne room, shouting and cavorting wildly *
I Don't Believe It....

Yep, you've guessed it, they ARE done.

Just to show how PO and mixed-up I was: (I edited this part in later) I only realised while I was doing some very extensive and elaborate micro-management, what the rather obvious flaw in line of thought was. [strike]
Great!, Good thing I've been rushing all those expensive cathedrals everywhere. 8 BLOODY shields, I can't even hold it for something else.Next wonder tech is at least 11 turns away.

Unless I go full steam for Music theory, not sure if it's worth it though. I Think I'll sleep on it.

[/strike]

ah well, all in the game.
Loosing:
the GrLIGHT (10 turns)
GrLibrary ( 3 turns)
Sistine ( 1 turn)
(I am getting closer though, aren't I

)

Theseus · July 2, 2003, 21:07

That all gets a very large and empathetic:

AAARRGGHH!!!!

Theseus · July 2, 2003, 21:34

And for me, the suicide galleys continue. Now I can see the outlines to the NW... F******ck.

Theology in 590AD, with a Colosseum pre-build in T-heim (risky, I know).

Still no mil units in the homeland. Iron Island is developing nicely, with low corruption and good terrain.

BTW, to an earlier point between Nathan and me, I have mined quite a few of the desert tiles...

Markets rule.

Theseus · July 2, 2003, 21:50

540AD: WHOA!! I meet Carthage... and I'm in the tech lead by Phil, CoL, Lit, HBR, Poly, and Curr.

"What do the generous Viking people suggest?"

MWAHAHAHAHA!!!!

"Your leetle girls... I want to buy them... how much? How much you want?"

Ohhhhh, not what I expected. Hmmm.

Theseus · July 2, 2003, 22:11

Did I mention that I'm playing as Scandinavia?

:smirk:

Oh, and look, all cities but Carthage are coastal...

nbarclay · July 3, 2003, 00:28

Please keep in mind that the human-playable civs end up in random locations among the slots available for them. So talking about Carthage, America, England, Greece, Spain, and the Vikings as AIs tells readers who you're talking about, but not where you're talking about. For example, my English are where Catt's Americans are, among other differences.

Catt · July 3, 2003, 01:15

Quote:

Originally posted by nbarclay

My SOP is to trade a tech (preferably a relatively cheap one) for a world map plus whatever else I can get for it. Individually, the deals cost me a little in relative terms. But collectively, I end up getting gold from a civ in every group I meet instead of giving gold, and with as many civs as there are in this game, that adds up.

Mine too. But in this game I was quite a bit discombobulated by the tech pace / cost, and didn't want to trade techs for maps until I had my arms around the tech progression. I also had so much gold (until I needed / wanted to buy techs

) that I was a pretty free spender early on. I spent a lot of gold buying maps and building embassies (for RoPs) even though my possession of the G.Lighthouse meant that no invasion of England was possible -- so no need to be polite with RoPs -- and the maps would become cheaper with further turns of exploration.

Catt

nbarclay · July 3, 2003, 02:05

Do RoPs really matter in galley explorations? I normally just promise to leave and do so as quickly as I can get my galleys across to the other end of the civ. (And it's not like I'm being any less polite than AIs typically are in that regard; at least I'm planning to get out of their territory in some kind of reasonable timeframe.)

vmxa1 · July 3, 2003, 03:24

Yes. I had been using the same tactic and it was working. When I got to China I did the same thing and moved and then next turn they bounced me out. This put me where I would have had to do a bunch more ocean tiles, so I made the only RoP of the game and it is still in place.

Arrian · July 3, 2003, 09:36

Nathan,

If the AI has to ask you to leave their territory, I believe there is an attitude hit each time. So repeated tressassing will result in annoyed or furious AIs. On the other side of the coin, a RoP will boost their attitude.

I have taken to getting RoPs with newly-met overseas AI civs (typically via suicide galley) when I know for a fact that only I will gain from it. It doesn't cost me anything usually, improves the subject AI's attitude toward me, and allows me unemcumbered exploration of their coastline.

-Arrian

vmxa1 · July 3, 2003, 12:35

That is exactly why I made the RoP. I need to aviod going out into sea/ocean tiles and China was very backward. This meant they would not be in position to attack for a few millenia. If they did even then it would be hapless, so the RoP was a no brainer.
The rest of the civs asked me to leave once and I said sure and kept on going, never to me asked again.
Normally as long as you are moving, they interpret that as compliance.