Adv 33 by Timmy

[timmy827]

I'm a little burned out from finishing this game late, so I will summarize and fill in Tuesday/Wednesday.

Judaism went to Cathy and became the dominant religion of my continent. The AI's seemed a bit preoccupied with wonders, allowing me to peacefully claim 8 good cities (before the western island). Shaka declared on me when he had xbows, longbows, pikes, and trebs while I had nothing past IW in military tech, however my size allowed me to crank a LOT of axes and swords to retake my city, pillage his metals before he could get maces, and take Ulundi at horrid cost; then pinned him down until cats/maces could take his last city on the mainland.

Cathy and Mansa were both Friendly from shared Jewishness (also the tech leaders), leaving me safe to build up and freely take any tech trade without fear of WFYBATA. Continual annoyance at Malinese cultural intrusions led me to build up a big cannon/rifle/cav force, with lots of drafting and upgrading, to take all of his mainland cities. Before the war started Cathy became a voluntary vassal. After the war I was at tech parity and had enough land to be a lock for space; but I was able to get out with a backdoor domination on the 3rd try in 1775AD (only votes from my vassals Cathy and Mansa).

[timmy827]

Found on the spot. Akkad founded turn 40 to the SE, D-K shortly afterwards. 4th city, claiming corn, gems, and 5x dyes founded on turn 60. Unfortunately Mansa puts a city in between, guaranteeing close borders penalties for all time (at least it's not Shaka doing that!)

AI's are expanding slowly, building wonders instead. Shaka in particular is sad, still OCCing at 1000BC! A warrior wandering in his lands spots a settler, waiting for escort I guess? I am using this to expand way more than I planned.

After writing I turn off research in anticipation of crashing the economy. The gold stockpiling gives an unusual opportunity, converting Shaka for 35. A lovefest is exactly what I want. Shaka won't attack once Pleased and I'm hoping that comes soon. He has enough on his hands, assume he's going after Mansa instead of me. Well, I was dead wrong about that.
Expand to the 8 cities I want, and get to Calendar in 175BC, helped considerably by a round of gold begging. Most of my locations:

Shaka DOW's in 50BC. I foolishy paid him to convert back to Hinduism a few turns before; could have used that for upgrading a few warriors.

As you can see my first city is toast, I pull back the army and hope the whipped axe will get lucky and kill one attacker. This shows the current unit mix too; really the big concern for a defensive war is the xbows. But if gets to CS and macemen I'm really in trouble. I want to retake my city and pillage his metals before that happens.

This stack advances further and I am able to wipe it out at good losses (3 units). My stack gets bigger and bigger, and soon I realize that I can take Ulundi w/o cats and set research to Currency. I actually don't pillage his metals at my first chance - axes and swords are a lot less scary than longbows - but in 300AD I notice he has CS and so I disconnect both.

The battle of Ulundi is totally gruesome, take these before and after shots:


I, um, forgot about the 60% cultural defense, and my GG had to take the kill (then move back out). Shaka exhibited paralysis for a turn, allowing me to fortify the city, then threw a bunch of units at me; for a few turns it was desperate hanging on there but I did. I turned off the unit pumping too early; fortunately Shaka left one city with only an axe, and I could take it easily with chariots. But the last city was a huge pain, in 680AD I venture forth, lose 4 or 5 units, and retreat in shame without killing either longbow; eventually cats/maces got it for me. However, rest of the news was all sunshine. Cathy and Mansa both got to Friendly during the war; neither vassalized Shaka. I was able to adopt Representation as Ulundi had the pyramids, and research was picking up (however, I had already cottaged a lot of cities and didn't really do much with specialists). I founded 3 more decent commerce cities on the western island.

I spotted an opportunity while researching CS - no one had paper yet. Some did when I got there but was still able to make my first swaps, getting MC, Aesthetics.

I was peeved though with Education - I birthed my first GS right after paper and got education soon by bulbing, only to find that I could only trade with Roosy. However, since Shaka wouldn't capitulate, I was able to pick up considerable tech in the treaty (lost the screenshot so don't remember what). Research set to PP, which no one has yet. I thought a monopoly would unditch me but was totally wrong. I got some good trades from it but Mansa and Cathy were still way ahead. Gunpowder turned out to be another good monopoly; traded it for parts of Nationalism, Liberalism, Constitution. I was catching up, and totally safe since neither Mansa or Cathy would attack me. However, I was getting really peeved at cultural encroachment on my cities and resolved to take them both out. I wanted the full suite of Enlightment military techs (minus Military Science). My 2nd great person kicked off a golden age for civics, switch to Nationhood + Theocracy, drafting 6 rounds of muskets, then to US, Emancipation, and FS. I was spamming old units for a mass upgrade and went way overboard as to what was needed and what I could get the cash to upgrade quickly, but it had a big side benefit:

After pondering I agreed; her land isn't that great, this got some culture pressure off Akkad immediately, I was considering buying her in against Mansa anyways/worried about them signing a DP, and decided that for the endgame it would be cool to have a Friendly vassal that can pull considerable tech weight. Was able to swap democracy for some more techs, then Rifling to Cathy for Steel (pulling her off of Physics research also set Mansa down that path for free GS and further away from military techs). I paid Cathy to stop trading with him but she still managed to give him the militarily relevant techs. However, he didn't get gold enough to upgrade any rifles, cannons, or cavs to save his first three cities, and so it didn't really matter; I rolled over him easily. Even a good ways into the war, I remember not bombarding the defenses of a city because the only unit in eligible for defensive boni was a sword I also think he got more rifles from one raze-and-refound partisan event than his own construction.

Anyways, captiulated him when all mainland cities were taken. Actually screwed up relations with Cathy, delaying my tech aquistion from her; eventually I fixed once I had CR by adopting HR, paying Mansa to do so, then switching back myself. Darius started doing pretty well techwise but once I had the Malinese cities assimilated I zoomed ahead for good. I was fooled by the vassals not being able to own any tiles in your fat crosses and had Russian revolts in two of the best Malinese cities; but shifting my huge army around prevented the flips. At this point I had the most/best land and tech parity and was a lock for victory; I tend to think that space wins take less real-world-time to mop up than cross ocean dominations, so went for that with diplo as a shortcut option.

It wasn't until I built the UN that I realized FDR and Darius were Friendly, had been thinking I could get one of their votes to clinch the game. Fortunately my vassals and I were close, and we crept over the threshold on the 3rd try. Cathy was still doing good work, after the war ended I used control of her research to get RR, Artillery, Rocketry, and probably would have gotten Fission + 1 more if I needed to build the spaceship.