Epic 8 - Benno's Chinese Lessons

[Benno]

OK, I'm Mao. Philosophical and Organised. I like Philosophical as a trait, can use GPs as an effective tech catch up tool when needed, Organised I'm not so sure of how to use. Half price courthouses are good. Finally the UU. I like the Chokonu! One of the more versatile UUs.

Starting strategy might be to head towards Metal Casing and get an engineer employed to burn a GE for Machinery (unlocking UU). We'll see.

OK lets load this baby up! I've got a thing about settling on floodplains but can't easily see a better spot even after moving the two warriors, so settle in place it is.

Start off with building a warrior and researching bronze working (to assess feasability of early axe rush).

I see the stone, if only I was Qin (floodplains and stone - yum).



We meet our first contestant in 3640BC. Hatty come on down. We also meet our second in the same year. Nutter alert.



Warrior completes and I'll put 6 turns into a barracks to grow to 3 before switching to a worker.

Bronze Working comes in and no copper to be seen anywhere. Hunting is now up (and then archery). Was hoping for copper nearby to avoid this path.

Fun Time Sally appears and in the same turn (weird huh) another nutcase.



Now archery is in I can go back to plan B, which is Animal Husbandry, The Wheel, Pottery, Writing and Alphabet.

Worker is in and as I start farming a floodplain (I'll cottage once I know pottery).

Roosevelt shows up but no accompanying nutcase, I'm dissapointed. Mansu and Elizabeth show up as well. 5 friendlies and 2 shall we say unpredictable opponents.

Shanghai is founded 1780BC, east of Beijing. My next city is going to grab that Bronze.



Once Writing is in, its straight for Alphabet to see what I can pick up. open Borders with all, of course (well except for Toko of course).

After Hatty takes my prefered city location as decided before I decide on here as my 3rd city, Guangzhou, west of Beijing.



The big moment is here Alphabet. Depending on what I can get for this depends on how my game will be going. Here goes...

Lizzy, Writing for Mysticism and Fishing.
Mansu, Writing for Masonry.
Hatty, Fishing/Pottery for Meditation

And that's it for now. Was hoping for more (JC and Lizzy won't give up Iron Working).

Finally research Iron Working myself and guess what, yep no iron. This game is really going downhill. I needed to grab that bronze earlier.

Found Nanjing in a really bad spot just to get some metals! You don't want to be in a culture war with a creative civ fighting for your only metal. Methinks this city is building only cultural builds.



At 1AD, I am down Monotheism to two AI and Code Of Law to Mansu but still have a monopoly on Alphabet and am about to build Great Library. I lose this to Mansu by 2 turns as the Chinese cities are somewhat poor in production.

In 155AD the bells of war ring out for Tokogawa . I take Kagoshima same turn but raze it as he built it in the wrong spot.



Tokyo falls soon after and I keep this one.



As well as Osaka. I raze Satsuma near JC's lands as I would lose this in a cultural war. When I take the capital Kyoto, I decide enough is enough and give him peace and his island city.

No sooner do I settle my city near the ruins of Kagoshima than Hatty settles a city in the south east of Beijing :mad: . I was going there next!!!

It then becomes a tech war. I hold onto a monopoly on Machinery, Civil Service and Paper. The AI research Theology and Music. I stop the trades until I hit Liberalism in 1262AD (I take Nationalism). Next round of trades mean that Divine Right is the only tech I don't have and I still have a monopoly on Liberalism and Nationalism.

Tokogawa drops a culture bomb in his island home of Edo, stealing Kyoto's food resource. Not happy Jan!



Time to take out the trash. We rid the world of the Japanese!

Time for some emancipation unhapiness for the poor AI. I manage to time researching Economics (for free GM) with a 66% chance of a GM in Kyoto, which works and gives me Constitution (by burning both). Normally I wouldn't burn two 2 GMs on a tech but hopefully it gives me a tactical advantage down the line. Research Democracy and switch to emancipation straight away in 1532AD. No AI has constitution yet. Hopefully I can create some major unhappiness in their cities.

1550AD is a big year in Chinese history as we build our first Wonder of the Game - Taj Mahal.

Our tech lead is still immense, so Space Race seems the easiest victory from here. One problem, got no copper!! Hatty has some. Therefore, lets get some from her. I could try for a trade but I prefer a more violent and permanent method so I declare on her. Plan is to take Heliopolis and raze Alexandria and Elephantine.



This should cripple her research as well as she is closest to me in the space race. Saladin is already at war with her and JC joins soon after.

Part A works well.



As does Part B and C and we declare peace for 700 gold and world map. Thebes (Hatty's city above Heliopolis) is the Buddhist Holy City and is applying some cultural pressure to Heliopolis. In retrospect I should have taken Alexandria and razed Heliopolis . In any respect I have my copper to build those space parts

I'm getting a bit worried about my production capacity for the spaceship. A capital with 26 production running bureaucracy being your best production centre ain't good.



So midships we change tack, domination it is, next target Saladin (he doesn't have rifles or cannons and I have many). I trade JC democracy to get peace with Hatty as he will take all her cities (and I want them eventually).

I take Baghdad and Mecca (Hindu Holy City).



We then raze Narjan (too close to Medina) and then take Medina (Jewish Holy City) and Saladin is dead. Thanks for the two holy cities though Sally, my economy is in much better shape.



Back to taking out Hatty. She has CG rifles and I'm a few turns of infantry but have cannons! We take Thebes (Buddhist Holy City) and that's that for Hatty.



1746AD brings Statue of Liberty, my second wonder.

Bring on Lizzy. She has redcoats, so I will have to wait for infantry here (due in 4).

I think about turning off research at this point (for upgrades and rush buys) but decide to research railroads (to get units to the front quicker) and artillery for more smashy smashy.

Lizzy only has 3 mainland cities. I take them and she is left with an ocean square but no cities!





Next item on the menu is Mansu. He is probably not far from infantry, so I'm upgrading all cannons to artillery (CR3 artillery is very nice). Actually he still has riflemen, so my artillery eats him alive. Another holy city, excellent.



He is beaten down fairly easily and then comes the crunch. I don't have enough land for domination without taking on JC. He has infantry but I have Tanks .



Ok its not quite a spear vs tank but I found this axe lying around, a relic from the Japan wars, noticed it had 9 xp, found a battle it could win, so I could give it a CR promotion before upgrading to an infantry .



JC donates enough land for this.



And a summary in pictures:









FINAL THOUGHTS:

Wasn't a great starting location, no metals and not much production, in terms of commerce and research was a great location. Will be intersted in how the other Chinese participants went.

Only built two wonders and no CS slingshot, worker steal or Pyramids/GL/Representation. Sadly, this wasn't by choice .

I never used a chokonu in anger all game, only built 2!

Best laid plans of mice and men, my initial plan (forge, GE for machinery) went out the window, my second plan (Space) went a similar direction. Third times a charm.

As usual, a great game, long may they continue.