Monarch, French, 6 civs, roaming barbarians, small map size.
There was an Y shape continent with me placed initially at the top right part (East) and England at the bottom part (South).
I was French and my capital, as said before, was in the right branch of the 'Y', making real production possible only for cities in Eastern part of continent.
In the beginning of the game I was able to occupy central strategic part of the continent by two cities, thus securing for industrious French people the western branch of continent also.
I guess English were not happy about that, and when they were able to sail settler to the western part, it was already covered by my cities, so they had nothing to do, but to put their city in the desolate tundra corner.
There were Japanese on the small continent just below English, separated from them just by small strait of water.
Trying to expand on my & English continent, Japanese also found nothing better rather than to put couple of cities in the tundra.
Persians, Babylonians and Zulus lived peacefully on the second big continent. It was long time, before England, Japan and me discovered them.
My cities on the west side of 'Y' were totally corrupted, so I was building Forbidden Palace in one of the two central cities.
When there was a just 20 turns left to complete Forbidden Palace, English started to amass troops along my border.
Of course, being expansionist, they were not happy in their relatively small world (about 8 good cities comparing to my 14).
I had small defence force of pikemen and some Longbowmen. English, to my awe, invaded by MASSIVE force of knights, archers and pikemen.
They cut through my corrupted cities up to the north on the left part of 'Y' like knife through butter. Very soon, my luxuries routes were broken and my cities went into disorder.
Still, their decision to attack the corrupted western part of my civilization was strategically wrong. The easy prey is not always the best.
Instead, they should have directed for the key city at the center point, which was building Forbidden Palace, conquer it, and then move east to Paris, destroying my industrial base.
As they cuptured corrupted French cities on the west side one by one, their mighty IRON FIST of knights and archers was spent to establish military control on these cities, essentially losing initiative of initial attack.
My small reinforcements of warriors and swordsmen arrived to the only remaining forpost city in the center to protect coming Forbidden Palace from ruthless English vandalism.
Still, my strategic situation was critical. With only 7 producing cities on the right part of continent and one struggling city in the center, I definetely had no perspective to win the game. My power was the smallest at that moment comparing to all other civ's.
English knights (composition of Longbowmen attack, Pikemen defence and Horsemen speed!) seemed to be unbeatable.
And then MIRACLE happened!
It should be mentioned, that at the very beginning of evil English attack, I have paid a lot of money to Japanese to join on my side.
But their help was very limited, because they were on the different, though very close to English, continent.
In the really sad mood I contacted Zulus and, suddenly for me, this blessed nation sold me secret of the GUNPOWDER!!!
In times of trouble I even forgot about this Gold Age stuff! And here more luck - I've got the one source of saltpeter available!
Not necessary to mention, all my cities switched to musketeers (3.4.1 against damn English knight's 4.3.2).
Very soon the first of them came to still lasting battleground in the center, were my warriors & swordsmen defended the city with Forbidden Palace coming in just 15 turns.
That poor English archer, who fell to the ground from the FIRST French bullet, he was a cause of inspiration of all French people, that caused the Golden Age and joyful celebrations around the nation!
In another major event, my desperate elite warrior attacked the wounded English pikemen, won battle and gave birth to the great leader - Napoleon!
Very soon, thanks to Golden Age, the really quickly growing number of French musketeers recuptured the second city at the central point, reestablishing connection to the Dyes!
Then, in this recuptured city, Napoleon himself hurried Forbidden Palace from the scratch (the one, previously built in the first central city was quickly switched to Cathedral).
My army of musketeers grew really fast. And here I repeated the same mistake of English army.
Instead of going after their best cities by concentrated army of my musketeers and catapults, I redirected HALF of my army to recupture desperate French cities in the west.
It was wrong decision, but I felt it would be good thing to get rid French people from English oppression ASAP.
So, I got two fronts: recapturing my old cities in the west, and going south after native English cities.
The first front, that is recapturing, went very smooth. My musketeers rooted English pikemen out of my cities, one by one. The population cheered and quickly returned to normal work.
Not surprisingly, English have destroyed all improvements in captured cities :-(
But the south front was really bogged. English knights appeared here and there and slowed my advance to the critical point. Population started to show the signs of war weariness.
Golden Age has ended also :-(.
So, having captured just two English native cities and two Dyes luxuries with them, and having recuptured all mine French cities, I offered the peace, which was willingly accepted.
Now the Japan finally got hold on English continent, using its samurais and successfully cupturing two English cities. The English now are really stressed.
On the other continent, battles also rage between Persians, Babylonians and Zulus.
Meantime, I changed to Democracy and now build urgent city improvements. Whole Godlen Age was spent just on war! :-(
It's coming 1500 AD very soon. If Japan will be successful at pressing English down, I'm going to deliver the final blow, capturing London and another major city.
The English have only 5 cities left, but they're all damn good. Now three of us (France, Zululand & Japan) are close leaders in power contest. To be continued…
