Yeah, Superjm has steamrolled Xenon and Sareln massively. He's definitely my biggest threat now, making good use of extended peace to get lots of easy land. I have a stronger economy now, but he might outgrow me if he's left alone. I have a NAP with him until t130 and one with waterbat until t127, pondering how to go about them. For now, I need to press my advantage against Azza unless he's interested in negotiating. He seems to be set on warring until the death, he might even reject a free peace offer even though he has little left to fight with.
I can get Liberalism this turn to grab Democracy (2682 beakers), or I can get it next turn to grab Rifling (2299 beakers) after I research Replaceable Parts. A third option would be Chemistry => Steel first and start building cannons, then Replaceable Parts and Rifling. Any macro suggestions?
Nasty surprise when I clicked end turn: Just found out how war weariness works I'm guessing my loss of catapults upped the counter, or was it triggered by the capture of F? Either way, this is a significant hit to my economy as I was near the happy cap in many cities. 15 unhappy faces are revealing themselves around my empire, there were none before ending the turn. The good news is that Superjm has just as much war weariness from his two wars, I'm not the only one suffering. My assortment of luxuries is as complete as it can be on this map (no sugar anywhere), so I don't have any easy ways out. I revolted back to Slavery and Theocracy, so I will try to use the spare population to whip units soon. I also went for Replaceable Parts first, getting ready to crank out rifles. I have 6 catapults total now, that should be enough to take one or two cities. I have a nagging feeling I might be heading for quicksand in Azza's empire, in spite of an excellent start to the campaign...
I decided to cash in on Liberalism, intending to take Rifling next turn. Not much else happening, GA ended at EOT and the next one is a few turns away. Preparing another invasion of Azza's lands, will wait a few turns for a handful of catapults to arrive.
It looks like we have all decided to accept a really slow pace, which doesn't really bother me any as I'm busy with school lately. Still mustering my troops for another push towards Azza, I think I have a good shot at taking one more city before he manages to entrench his entire front. My first 3 drafted rifles are in (C1 + 2 XP from Theo and barracks), and the results are already showing! waterbat has offered a NAP extension to t142, I'm happy to accept. This lets me remove all troops from my eastern front, I currently have about 10 units there (muskets and longbows plus 2 new rifles) which I can move against Azza or Superjm. Superjm is doing pretty good economically, even though I'm in a good position this is far from won. He's getting a lot of easy land from Sareln and Xenon and has well developed cities + very decent tech levels. He'll be able to get to Rifling in a few turns as well, so any kind of offense against him will not be realistic for a long time. If I don't win a decisive victory against Azza, chances are I'll be slowed down so much that Superjm will pass me by.
Azza is still quite far from Rifling, he recently got Divine Right and has just built the Spiral Minaret. This makes me even more eager to invade him, as I'll be able to grab both SM and UoS to complete the monk wonder trio. I'm finally starting to commit to a proper military buildup, I have 6 rifles in production (in addition to rapid drafting) and am researching Chemistry for a push to Steel. I've also started colonizing the SE desert, another 2 good city sites are ready to be claimed.
It's good to hear news about this game. It's not so good to hear that Superjm may be gaining ground against you by beating up less interested opposition, though. Assuming the war against Azza goes well enough to neutralize him and assuming Waterbat doesn't want to pick a fight with your rifles, what weakness do you see in Superjm that you may be able to exploit in the future? Is there any important city placement accessible that you could surprise attack and make a viable invasion from?
Played: Pitboss 18 - Kublai Khan of Germany Somalia | Pitboss 11 - De Gaulle of Byzantium | Pitboss 8 - Churchill of Portugal | PB7 - Mao of Native America | PBEM29 Greens - Mao of Babylon
Perhaps a few galleons drop out of the fog and land a 4 cats + a dozen rifles next to the capital
Any other core city would do ... I don't feel like digging though the thread to find map pictures to pick out a feasible target, but if you post a couple wide shots of the your's and Superjm's land and what you know of the water between I could do some theorizing You might even use those boats to leapfrog past Azza's front ... or vice versa
NOTE: any :warpath: theorizing that I do will completely ignore the economic opportunity cost, and you've already been at war for quite a while. (also, do you have colossus?)
If I didn't have Colossus already I would have been all over Astronomy, 5-move Galleons would be awesome for taking his island completely by surprise. I'm working a large amount of water tiles given that I have mostly coastal cities, so the economic hit would be significant.
I'm slowly moving my units towards Azza's next city, he's sniping at my muskets with knights. This turn he managed to take out 3 muskets while losing 1 knight, bit more painful than the last few turns. I still have a very large army marched up on him, my power rating is a bit more than twice of his. I used another two great generals for XP and upgrades, so I now have 6 drafted rifles and 3 upgraded ones. I feel confident about delivering a massive blow with current military capability + drafted reinforcements, and as soon as I take this city his tile culture behind it will fall away and I will be able to get my troops to the front faster.
This leaves me with an important tech decision: I just researched Chemistry, planning on going for Steel next (to build cannons). However, I can also research Scientific Method and then Communism, letting me grab a great spy and giving me a head start on Kremlin. Not to mention letting me switch into awesome awesome State Property. I only have peace with Superjm for another 8t and he just signed peace with Xenon, so I can't consider that a safe front anymore. On the other hand, the extended NAP with waterbat allows me to move a lot of forces down south so I think I'll be safe long enough to push deep into Azza's territory. Cannons will probably arrive too late to help against Azza, and I don't need them right away against Superjm. So I'm thinking go for Communism first, followed by Steel.
As for Superjm weaknesses, I have easy access to a long line of coastal cities as well as current economic and military dominance. His land gains will benefit him considerably over time, but they won't help him any if war breaks out in the coming 10-15t. I'm tentatively planning for war against him in 20t, building up my economy in the meantime. War weariness threw me for a loop for a while, but I have it mostly under control now while still drafting 3 rifles each turn. Nationhood is simply wonderful, thanks again cheetah for suggesting that I prioritize it.
Exams have me swamped these days, and my motivation for reporting has dropped to a low point. But if you ask nicely I just might put up some screenshots one of these days If I'm able to take Azza's town next turn with my advance stack I'll make sure to put at least one up.
Nothing much to report yet, but I will be invading another big city in two turns and will do a proper report by then. Azza is defending it with a bunch of knights, and I'm moving around 30 units in range. I have a bunch of catapults incoming as well, I may be able to use those for a push on his capital if I take this city without major casualties. Alternately, I can entrench here and take out his desert arm while getting more troops to the front. Sending 12 units down to my Superjm border to encourage him to renew our NAP. Just got a great scientist, combining it with the communist great spy lets me launch another golden age in 5-6t or so. Down to 5 unhappy faces now, and can still draft 3 rifles per turn without much trouble.
Thinking about taking Biology after Communism, then Steel. Biology will give me +26 food right now, can probably push that up to 40 quite fast after putting up some more farms. I also want Democracy for the civics and the Statue of Liberty, keeping a close eye to see if others are competing for it.
I think taking rifling with Liberalism was a good play. I'm quite a bit behind on what's going in this game, so thanks tha with a grain of salt.
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
I would have gotten it soon anyway, but it does give me a few more turns of drafting. So yeah, I'm happy with Rifling too. Azza is defending his front city with a stack of 11 knights, 1 musket, 1 longbowman and 1 crossbow. I have 32 units total, of which half are maces and the rest is a mix of rifles, muskets, praetorians, crossbows and longbows. 9 units are 1 tile away, another 7 units are 2 tiles away. The knight defense seems suicidal, although I did mess up and forget to put Mobility on two units as intended. Even so, rushing into my stack won't be much better for him than letting them sit and defend. I've been too slow in getting pikes to the front, getting lazy myself.
EDIT: Forgot to add, Scientific Method finished at EOT and I discovered Oil. We each have a single resource, it's situated at the start of the close desert arm with the gold. Communism is next, it'll take 3 turns. I'll use the Great Spy to launch my 4th GA, together with an artist and a scientist. Switching to State Property, no other switches planned. I probably want Caste eventually, but what will I do with Kremlin if I switch out of Slavery? I guess I will take Universal Suffrage eventually, maybe plan a switch to Emancipation later in the GA to grow towns faster. Then whenever I launch my 5th GA I can make a final switch:
Universal Suffrage + Nationhood (maybe Free Speech instead, but I doubt it) + Caste System + State Property + Theocracy.
I have a feeling my economy is very unfocused, will upload some screenshots soon in case anyone feels like criticizing it apart.
I'm guessing my loss of catapults upped the counter, or was it triggered by the capture of F? Either way, this is a significant hit to my economy as I was near the happy cap in many cities. 15 unhappy faces are revealing themselves around my empire, there were none before ending the turn. The good news is that Superjm has just as much war weariness from his two wars, I'm not the only one suffering. My assortment of luxuries is as complete as it can be on this map (no sugar anywhere), so I don't have any easy ways out. I revolted back to Slavery and Theocracy, so I will try to use the spare population to whip units soon. I also went for Replaceable Parts first, getting ready to crank out rifles. I have 6 catapults total now, that should be enough to take one or two cities. I have a nagging feeling I might be heading for quicksand in Azza's empire, in spite of an excellent start to the campaign...
It's not so good to hear that Superjm may be gaining ground against you by beating up less interested opposition, though. Assuming the war against Azza goes well enough to neutralize him and assuming Waterbat doesn't want to pick a fight with your rifles, what weakness do you see in Superjm that you may be able to exploit in the future? Is there any important city placement accessible that you could surprise attack and make a viable invasion from?
