Epic 6 - DaveV

[DaveV]

Summary:
Domination in 1490.
First city conquered: Bombay in 685 BC.
Forbidden Palace in Kyoto, 1232.
28 cities in 1490, I would have captured two more in the next two turns.
First civ eliminated: India in AD 35.
No Panzers.
Going in, I figured the big challenge in this one would be to keep war weariness and maintenance under control. I resolved to chop trees early and often, and pumped out two barracks and two commerce/great person cities. I captured Bombay when my reconnaissance in force found it defended by a single archer.

After that, I rolled up the Indians and Japanese. The game was really over when I captured the Kyoto, which not only provided elephants, but the Pyramids. The AIs made a pretty good effort at recapturing the city, in 230:

And again in 515:

And again in 785:

And yet again in 875:

They did manage to do some damage in the Arabian peninsula, when they sneaked in a stack (the galleys must have come through the coastal waters of Saladin's offshore island, or maybe I just missed them):

Then Roosevelt wanted to join the fun, but I held Mecca and was never again seriously threatened.

The final casualities show how I was using knights and macemen against archers and axemen:

War weariness was never a real problem, thanks in large part to Republic (thanks for the Pyramids, Tokugawa!) and cheap Forges combined with lots of shiny stuff.

The end:

Final comments:
I resolved early not to build ships in this game, and I think it paid off handsomely. Naval warfare is just too random for me, and I would have had to pour a lot of shields into shipping to keep up with the AIs. The AIs used their ships very poorly, just parking them by Delhi and the Arabian peninsula. They did manage a few annoying naval invasions (and one which razed Najr), but I think the shields would have been better spent on land units.
I didn't get many wonders out of my Industrious trait, only building the forbidden palace and the oracle for a very late CS slingshot in 905. I saved a bundle on cheap forges and cheap granaries, though.
I expected more difficulty from support costs than from the AI in this game, and I did have some tough times around AD1000 - I remember being -27 gold at 0% research. My big mistake there was researching Feudalism before Code of Laws, thinking I could save more on troop support than from courthouses. Again, the Pyramids saved my bacon, letting me continue researching while most of my cities were pumping cash as hard as they could.
This was the first game of Civ4 I've actually played through to the victory, and it was a lot of fun. I'm looking forward to seeing how the heavyweights handled this one.

[Rik Meleet]

When you took Kyoto did you get a time of tranquility around your other cities (except for coastal cities) like I had when I captured a city on the exact same spot ?

[DaveV]

Very much so. There were only a couple land attacks that weren't aimed at Kyoto, and those may have been trying to attack Kyoto from the southeast; I intercepted them before I was sure of their goal.