Adventure 34 - Dawn's Great Person

[Dawn]

After being away from Civ for a year (due to a Guild Wars addiction) I figured it was time to return. Adventure 34 had just opened and promised to be interesting. Though Monarch is definitely above my level of play I decided to try it, with the help of the Bug-mode. So I'm not sure if that disqualifies me from actual scoring, but I wasn't too worried about being in the running for the top spot.

So, never having played Charlemagne and with my issues of keeping up with the AI tech-pace at this difficulty level, I chose the Great Scientist.

With the starting spot showing 4 sources of food I simply settle in place and start on Fishing to get the workboats cracking.

Around 3925BC Elizabeth runs into me so she must be close. My early exploring days end when the scout is eaten. My techs have gone from Fishing -> Agriculture -> mining -> BW. Needed BW to clear some trees and mine the local hill.

From BW -> wheel -> pottery -> writing -> AH. AH and my second city gave me a nice present - horses!


I wasn't able to spread east as Lizzy had dropped her city in the nice flood plains. But it would work out for me in the end.

In 1375BC I ran into Isabella. We didn't hit it off too well as Elizabeth and I were happily Taoist and Izzy was the founder of Christianity. After obtaining IW in 825BC from Lizzy I find no iron in my immediate area. I was to later snatch it just before Izzy with a new city.

In 535AD, Izzy has finally had enough of my Taoist self and declares war. I am unable to find anyone to assist so I plan for the worst. In past games of this difficulty level I have relied on catapults for defense of the cities - they are cheap and can devastate the enemy stacks outside the city. So I fall back to a basic strategy of turtle up and build cats.




She would end up sending 4 waves of troops at Nuremberg - once taking out my iron - before Lizzie had enough and joined the war. As Izzy moved her troops up the gates of the city, I would simply hammer them with the cats, she would suicide some troops, and then I would attack out of the city. Mansa (to the east of Lizzie) joined the fight but I wasn't able to see anything of that warring. By 980AD I had the Heroic Epic up in the capital was churning out 2 cats every 3 turns.

In 1040AD, Izzie stops making her attacks on Nuremberg, allowing me to start building a small attack force. She and Lizzie are battling over Valencia. Civil Service has just come in so I'm cranking military out of the capital - cats and swords.

In 1160AD Holy Roman forces moving south from Tartar make the attack and take Pamplena!


Izzy starts fielding maces in 1210AD, but thankfully the brunt of those is felt by Lizzie as they continue to trade Valencia. In 1265AD the AP votes to fight against Izzy and Augustus (good trading buddy to my west) and Louis join the fight. Never saw anything from Louis and only saw a few units from Augustus.

As I prepared to launch another offensive move against Izzy, everyone else makes peace with her. She crushes my forces with ease and sends the few units left into Valencia which is held by my good neighbor Lizzie. In 1370AD I check with Izzy to see what peace would cost me - Pamplona and Aesthitics. Tell her nope and she can have Pamplona when she pries from my troops' cold dead hands. She does exactly that in 1380AD.

At the same time I get my first special unit - landsknecht. Pretty nice! I am able to snipe at Izzy's troops now by hiding in land held by Lizzie. The AI doesn't really know how to handle that and it stalls her attacks. She then accepts my pleas for peace and I give in to her demand for paper in return. That war lasted from 520AD to 1420AD and was truly a world war (I would later find Peter was out there and didn't participate).

Continued......

[Dawn]

So with the war at an end, I am falling way behind in tech. Lizzie to my east is growing massive and is now unreachable. Augustus to my west is losing ground to my culture there, so I keep up the pressure on that side. My trading is bringing in 35G per turn and that helps sustain my tech pace at around 70-80% now.

In 1485AD the AP declares war on Peter, whom I just met only recently. He was annoyed at me anyway, but it is only a false war. With so many continents and islands I didn't really see that much movement in the borders during this time. I did notice that the AI was setting up colonies. Washington and Justinian came to power in this manner.

In 1690AD Izzy comes demanding Rep Parts. As I had just gotten Rifling and not yet upgraded I cave to her demand. I also start toward Democracy as emancipation anger is showing up (Lizzie has been there for a long time).

As 1750AD is being celebrated, Izzy declares on me again! This time she's bringing grenadiers and I have rifles. After a few tries at Tarter, she pulls back long enough for me to build a fort (my first ever!) and stock it full. This sends her back up by Valencia and English held territory - and gives me a nice killing corridor between the mountain and Lizzie Land.


I am able to strike her forces with cats out of Lizzie's territory and then finish them off by striking out of the fort to the west. She continues these attacks until 1812AD when an arbitrator settles the war for us. In the meantime my cultural battle with Augustus had snagged the only oil to my west - so I kept up the culture building on that side.

In 1822AD I sign a defensive pact with Lizzie, who is running away with the game. In 1830AD I get this strange message about Vienna wanting to join the motherland?? I settled the freaking city!


In 1848AD Lizzie completes Apollo, but I start to notice her culture creeping in on my eastern border. Checking her cities, looks like she's headed for a culture win. Also, in world news, the American president is facing impeachment. Huh? Haven't seen that before.

In 1904AD I get a glaring message that Lizzie has canceled our defensive pact and I about wet myself. Turns out she declared on Izzy, causing our pact to end. After cleaning up my chair, I start to send scouts in to watch the war. Parachutes are falling, tanks are rolling, and Izzy is dying. Keep in mind that I am scouting with knights and rifles while Lizzie is bombing from B-52s and blitzing Izzy. Nice to have been on her good side since the beginning of time! Izzy would end up becoming her, um, vassal, and I quickly put our defensive pact back in place.

In 1942AD, Lizzy takes the cultural victory.


Continued.......

[Dawn]

A few demographic screenshots:






Holy Roman Empire at the end:



As I look back on it, at least I survived to the end. That was really my goal from the outset. Having the Great Scientist create the academy at the beginning was paramount to my ability to keep up. The war with Izzy really slowed down my exploration and building. Two wars with her (520AD - 1420AD and 1750AD - 1812AD) was not in the plan.

I had a blast and am looking forward to getting back into some more Civ during the upcoming holiday.

[TheArchduke]

Wow, what a peculiar game. I would have never dreamed of not settling into the east on the flood plains and the gold and leave that to Izzy.

But it seems you did fine.

[Ares]

I appreciate your endurance in this Adventure. It's disillusioning to see how a financial AI romps away if left all alone.
I am playing civ4 and Guild Wars for over a year in parallel :wink2:

[Dawn]

@ Archduke - I didn't choose to not settle to the east. Elizabeth beat me to that spot. My settler was en route when she build her city. In this difficulty level I seem to be a step or three behind the AI. I knew I wouldn't be in the running for a win (the game or even RB) but I did want to survive until the end.

@ Ares - Yeah, Elizabeth got the jump on Mansa who usually runs away with it. He was actually a vassal to her for awhile which really let her open up a lead. My GW playing was actually all-consuming. Finally worked a warrior through all campaigns and started up a Derv and Monk to do the same thing.

[Ruff_Hi]

The main difference I find between Monarch and the lower levels is that you need to push your expansion earlier. My first city went directly at Liz so she expanded North and North East in my game.