Kuro Plays An Adventure 59 Shadow Report Really Late.

[Kuro]

Adventure 59 - Shadow Report (Isabella of Spain)

I didn't jump on this game when it started, so I am mildly spoiled: I know Isabella needs to expand to islands, I know of the fun Christmas Trees and that's about it, though. I got bored and felt like playing a Civ game, so since this game seemed to get few reports, I decided I would do a very late Shadow Report (Since I do have spoiler knowledge!)



Spin on!



Obvious place to settle pretty much. The villagers gave me the dread "map of mostly water", and I go with Agriculture first to hook up the grain: Ignore the Worker here, I changed it to an 8T Work Boat after I moved the Scout. My capital seems really good, so that is nice: Plenty of food surplus for Worker/Settler builds or whips and Silver for some early research. 8T later, my WB comes out along with a Buddhism founding, next turn Agriculture comes in. 10T Worker is started. Research path is set to Mining -> Bronze Working.





First AI met are Asoka and Mansa Musa: Some big peaceniks. Neither have switched to Buddhism, so neither founded it. Sadly, this is a NTT game, so Mansa Musa isn't as good of an ally as I could hope. His borders also block me in an uncomfortable way: Maybe an early bum rush? But Skirmishers are such a pain...

My Scout kills two Wolves in the span of about two turns. I nickname him Wolfslayer. T17, Mansa Musa founds Hinduism and converts to it. Now I get a holy city if I decide to kill him, too. My Worker finishes and I decide to make another Worker: Many chops will be had and I will want to convert the rice at my likely second city to farm quickly. I also spot a Village Christmas Tree: Very nice!



Next leader met is Justinian, who founded Buddhism. I predict religious strife.



Hatty has also been met!



Copper's right here and I'm confident I can whip + chop enough Axes out to kill Mansa even with Skirmishers: The AI isn't exactly the best at warfare. Dunno how much potential room it'd give me, but it's probably worth it for the holy city anyway, and more space. Then I can backfill some cities a little and spread out to islands. The Great Lighthouse? After I snag The Wheel, I head for Pottery (I'll need to throw down cottages to sustain a post-wartime economy and the second city has nice Flood Plains). Sadly, my advance Warrior for the spot dies to a Lion, delaying Settling for 3T: What a pain. Mansa Musa is also kind enough to found Judaism as well, assuring that he will be behind in military techs and I will get 2x the holiness if I win! After Animal Husbandry comes in, I get to Sailing.



The city of Spinzaku is founded: I will go after the Copper before the Rice because the speed of getting axes out is more important. Wolfslayer is now 5/10 EXP! Copper is connected: They will farm the rice before doing any chopping. Sailing comes in: Presumed tech path now is Writing -> Masonry -> Polytheism -> Monotheism so that I will snag Organized Religion around the time I conquer Mansa Musa, allowing me to spread religion for cultural pops, get 25% production bonuses and so on, with Writing there for the Library. It also gives me a shot at the Great Lighthouse. Sadly, India built stonehenge and not Mansa, so I don't get to snag that too. Sadly, Wolfslayer is cornered by a Barbarian Warrior and nommed on. T77, Egypt builds the Oracle: Dunno what she picked but probably MC...nope, she just adopted Hereditary Rule, so Monarchy.



My stack to fight Mansa: 13 Axes and 1 Spear with more reinforcements as built (The second city had no time to build a Barracks, so troops without promos here). With Monotheism in, I switch to Organized Religion, I begin a long path towards Mathematics on my way to Currency. Timbuktu is only defender by two Skirmishers as I approach it, so...

I lose 2 Axes taking Timbuktu, an expected amount, and now own the Hindu holy city! I head straight for Kublei Saleh to get the Jewish holy city, then will sweep back around for Djenne. (Then I realized I messed up: It's Timbuktu which is the Holy City.)



Timuktu.



In addition, the next turn snags me The GReat Lighthouse! Combined with plunder money, I will now run strong deficiet research and begin an age of expansion!



An additional Skirmisher the turn I get next to Kublei Saleh turns this into a bloodier battle than hoped: With a capital that can churn out 2-3T Axes, I start doing that and make peace with Mansa for another round. My economy is fine and I've gained 2 cities: Justinian has 1 more than me and Asoka/Hatshepsut 1 less. I convert to Judaism for shared religion bonuses with everyone but Justinian! Then Hatty founds Confucianism and breaks that up...phooey! I also rename the Malinese cities to Spinbuktu and Kumbi Spinleh. Mansa Musa founds a city right on the walkway to Djenne: What a pain. Amusingly, my renaming means it is named Timbuktu. I'll call it Timbuktwo. Clever!

And now 10T later, time is up for Mansa Musa! Timbuktwo is razed with a single Axe. Amusingly, Mansa decides to whip a Settler the turn my Axes all come to Djenne's door step...okay? It takes some work, but Djenne is also captured! Also remaining units converge on what should be Mansa's last city: Gao. One thing I do wish is that I could pop a Great Prophet: I might have to go to Meditation and run two Priests somewhere to get one.



I also found the city of Spiral Power: My straight up finances are bad, but when Currency comes in I'll be fine, I've got Libraries to help tech and in addition a probable Great Merchant from The Great Lighthouse for LODS OF EMONE.



Gao is a crappy city, but I keep it anyway, eliminating Mansa Musa from the game on T119. My axes go about their new business as Garrison units: I have 7 cities, which vastly outpaces everyone but Justinian, with backfill room to spare.



Aggra's positioning really pisses me off...Currency comes in and so Markets become the hot topic of building. Virtually everywhere starts building one. My capital ends up popping a Great Scientist over a Great Merchant, but I ain't complaining: My cap has mighty fine future commerce prospects, so it gets an Academy. My fortunes begin to look up very quickly: I'm +4 at 20% Science...but even that gets me Code of Laws in like 7T, and I don't even have any Markets finished yet! I'm going to be an economic monster. One problem I do have is being a bit light on Workers: I'll pop a few out of Djenne, one of my few cities not building Markets, to compensate. Next, I whip out Markets in my capital and in Spinzaku/Kumbi Spinleh, rapidly increasing my breakeven rate to 30%! This is enough for a 14T MC, not great...but not bad, I'm tech competitive while having the most land, expansion room, a large army and, most epicly, Asoka builds a Jewish AP for me! So many hammers! I might need to kill Asoka fairly soon, Knight push maybe, though...he's starting to expand into MY territory. I switch to a 4T IW to see if I can get to Knights and also to help Gao out by Jungle chopping. And Asoka pops a Golden Age! Justinian might be the leader, but Asoka is far more dangerous to my gameplan. Plus, Asoka has some juicy wonders...



The explains the Grassland Mine! I figured maybe the AI just chopped down a Christmas Tree. In that case, plan Knights of the Round Table is a-go: Metal Casting -> Monarchy -> Horseback Riding -> Machinery -> Feudalism -> Guilds. Overwhelm Asoka with Knights and then see what I can do to anyone else. Too bad Conquistadors are no longer Knights...



Not seen due to the name tag: A fish resource. This city instantly pays for itself thanks to The Great Lighthouse, so it's actually economic to found it even if it does nothing the rest of the game. Hatty and Justinian are warring, which is a good thing and a bad thing: Good because Justinian will be slowed down, and likely has huge maintainence costs, but bad because his empire is enormus and Hatty is already losing ground. Metal Casting comes in on T150, so I feel like it's appropriate to show how my empire is going:



My capital, Hula Hoop. I probably should have worked more cottages, but I needed production more most of the time and the rest of the time I was using two Scientists specialists to help me through my tougher economic times: As you can see, I've got an Academy here too. It's gonna go Forge, try to see if I can do more colonizing and then likely spit out legions of Knights for me: The Great General means a cool 7 EXP Knight train coming out from a big production center.



Spinzaku has just whipped a Settler, which will head North, and will then go into a Worker or two to help out. It's got some good commerce and I'm thinking maybe I should put Moai here, didn't think of it sooner....but it'd sure help it when I can give it more happiness @ Monarchy (It hasn't had time to build a Jewish Temple, I might whip one: The +2 hammers are nice).



Spinbuktu is working two Priest specialists and will hopefully improve on those Great Prophet odds before the time comes in 12T. A Jewish Shrine would be amazing here thanks to how much Judaism has spread and would give me insane cashola. It's going to finish this Monastary build, +2 hammers!, then go into a Forge, Stable and probably Knights.



Kumbi Spinleh isn't a city that amounts to much commerce, but that's fine because it is a good production center: 16 HPT before Forge and will be much better once Civil Service allows me to chain irrigate, adding a bunch of +1 hammers and +1 food on the rice, which will also let me run both the grassland hill and desert hill. A very focused city. It'll go Forge after the Hindu Temple.



Djenne is the other city that Moai is being considered in: It's an okay city with decent commerce and hammers, but Moai would improve the large amount of water tiles it has to work. I'm more inclined to put Moai here. Aside from that, a fairly standard city that helps me all around. After the Market is, surprise, a Forge.



Spiral Power is primarily a hammer basedcity, plenty of hills and just enough food to almost work it all (I need to Windmill one of the hills for it to do so, may not be worth it). Not a strong enough city to put Moai in, it'll provide enough commerce though to go with it's production. It'll go Forge after this Courthouse.



Gao's tile yields provide basically nothing to my civ, but it gives me important access to Iron, so I'll stuff a good deal of defenders in here. Late game it's a decent cottage cheese city, but that'll come too late to be a big factor. It'll whip the Courthouse, then go into a Jewish Temple and such for the hammers to help it build more stuff.



And finally, The All Spin Zone (It only has no spaces in-game because there's no room for them). It just got founded like 2T ago, so there's not much to say here, but it will be a useful fishing city that can do okay production-wise with Stone and, eventually, Jewish stuff plugged in (Mass Media is not needed for a Domination or Spaceship win, so I can keep the AP on all game if I want).

In terms of Civ-wide plans, I am just truckin' along to my planned Crusader against Asoka. It is likely that Hatshepsut will also be eliminated and leave me + Justy as the only two Civs, so I'll either kill him (Most likely) or outtech him to space. I feel I am in a very strong position.

Asoka builds both the Mausoleum ANd Hagia Sophia...two ripe wonders for the takin'! His military is stronger than mine, but only because I haven't built much since my Mansa war with no need, I'll blow past him when I get Knights...might want to sneak some military in though for insurance and garrison happiness. On T161, I finish The Colossus in my capital basically as an afterthought (It was a 5T build), giving me even more economy! Spinbuktu also gives me Rabbi Akiva and that means...



Wow, 17 GPT, before Market! It also lets me put the Priests out to work better stuff (A grassland mine and a change to an Engineer specialist)

(Also, apparently my island knowledge wasn't good since all I knew was they existed: I didn't realize there was a huge one there!)

Iron pops in Kumbi Spinleh! Heh, now I have some pillage protection...not much interesting happens for a while. I found the city of Spin Filler: A decent, filler-ish coastal city that will pay for itself quickly and add a small bit to my empire. T172: Guilds comes in. Knights go into production EVERYWHERE: They are generally 3-5T builds, in lots of cities so I will amass an army quickly. I will also double switch to Vassalage + Theocracy in 2T, as I get Theocracy in 2T, giving me 11 EXP Knights from my capital and 9 EXP Knights elsewhere. Asoka only has Longbows/Spears, so this should be a romp with my superior production. Now I mostly just need to scout out Asoka's land while building an army. Research path will get Divine Right, The Spiral Minaret will be crazy with all my Jewish buildings, then head up the Liberalism line and either snag Nationalism or see if I can get Military Tradition right off of it, in which case Conquistadors to Cavs will romp Justinian for the win.



The Great Wall has gotta protect the Stone it was built with! Divine Right is in, I interrupt the Liberalism line (I can see Justinian is not researching down it) for three things: Alphabet, to see where I stand tech-wise, and Construction + Engineering, for both Pikes (In case of surprise Justinian Cataphracts) and the quickened roads.



Basically even with everyone: Most of the techs they have are things I can pick up quick and cheap. Asoka complets The Great Library, meaning I can snag it, and Chicken Pizza, which is annoying.



Still pumping Military everywhere, but Asoka is close to Engineering so I'm gonna strike now.



24 Knights ain't bad...for a start. T194 brings a war dec: Agra goes down that same turn and, amusingly, it looks like Hatty is about to die as well. I'm losing a TON of units to my fucking mouse, which has an issue with double clicking sometimes...and this time it triple clicked about three of my Knights away to attacking. Because of that, I lose at Bombay with a ton of Knights...not helped by losing a bunch of 60%~ battles too. Oh well. Time to just build more! A Great Merchant is born in my capital, so I use it for a one man Golden Age to help myself more. On the plus side, I do peel a good deal of defenders from Bombay and Varanasi will be falling shortly: I can outproduce him easy, so despite being a losing exchange from the hammer side the fact I peeled away a good deal of defenses means I am fine. T199 sees Varanasi fall to me, in addition to Hatty finally being eliminated from the game (Justinian had a hard time plowing down her last 2-3 cities!). I also snag a 1T Drama to run some Culture Tax to counter early war weariness and Archery for Longbows to stay behind in cities. (T200 Archery!)

I am losing a LOT of battles at odds I should be winning. Phooey. Still took out his "big" stack with ease. This war also led to some oddities: For example, Calcutta having an attacking Longbow be a key to victory, along with an old City Raider III Axe (The only units left that weren't redline were Pikes, so...). I take Calcutta and Bombay, then sue for a pretty good peace deal: I'll come back in 10T with about 20 more Knights to finish Asoka's mainland off, dunno if I'll bother taking his island cities...but they do have some damn fine stuff! Asoka is even happy enough to open borders with me after the war! (He's "pleased" with me! +8 faith bonus!)

This allows me to see all his defenses while I wait to invade, goody goody! Thinking about it, when I go after Justy, a Rifle/Cannon war might be more worthwhile: It's slower, but the Citadel will give me insanely promoted Cannons (3 + 2 + 2 + Great General is a 2 + 5, So 12-14 EXP Cannons) and I can go Nationhood for supreme drafting, I've got plenty of places to skim off population. In that case...Gunpowder -> Chemistry -> Liberalism and take Steel, go up to Rifling, draft and Cannon Justinian away after Asoka's mainland is dead. I can bring in mounted support later if need be, as well. (Mass Knight upgrade midway through?)



Hula Hoop popped Copper! That's 47 hammers when I make a Military unit: Good for 2-3 turn Cannons to support a Rifle army. Sadly, I don't have a good Globe Theatre spot: It'll probably just be Spinbuktu. If I bother with it, really.

ASOKA, ROUND TWO: 29 Knights with 4~ more straggling behind and more being made and he doesn't have much militarily...let's do this! For the crusade!

Delhi gets taken with acceptable losses, along with most of Asoka's army, and giving me access to a TON of wonders, including the Pyramids: I instantly swap to representation...which is kinda a mistake because I forgot how much I needed the Monarchy happiness during the war. 70% culture slider, save me! Amazingly, Justinian is Pleased with me, and I actually get 100 free Gold from him by asking. Fortunately, I manage to get to Hereditary Rule quickly enough to save me...though even with it I need a huge Culture Tax thanks to our shared faith. Definitely not pushing to Asoka's islands and might even have to leave a mainland city to him.

Full health Medic II Knight dies to a wounded Archer to fail to take a city by a single unit. This is the kind of combat luck I've had today.



Starting to think maybe I shouldn't be striking him militarily. T237, University of Sankore in. I'm going to see how well I tech compared to Justinian for a while: If I can get a good tech lead, I might just Space Race him. I need some rounds of Infrastructure anyway...though from the looks of it, I'm going to have to war him and cannon the hell out of his shit on killing grounds. Though he has a lot of Grenadiers...mix in Rifles, Cannons and Cavs/Curassiers? I get a Great Merchant for a 1300 Gold trade mission. Delhi also pops a Great Prophet...none of my other religions are worth a shrine, so I save it for a Golden Age.

Anyway, after that, I paused for a long time: Both to re-evaluate the game and to take a mid day nap due to tiredness. I'm thinking that I probably should have paused the Indian invasion even when he got Engineering and made a larger force the first time. I might have been too hasty and cost myself a good deal. I'm not sure I can take Justinian in a war: Just a single border city has like 17 Grenadiers, 10 Cataphracts and a bunch of other stuff...though if I have a lot of Cannons I can slaughter them on killing grounds, but it'll be risky. But my tech parity will probably never be better, since he is researching at a clip close to my own. I'll head up to Railroads for emergency Machine Guns too: Those mow down Grenadiers easy. And now Justy got Taj, too...when Rifling comes in, I swap to Nationhood and begin rigorous drafting of max units every turn. I also move my Knights up: He has Catapults and Trebs, so hopefully I can get some Flanking in. A Great Scientist comes in, letting me trip a nicely timed Golden Age to help out my production, though Justinian will have gotten to Railroads...I want to at least kill his huge stacks of units, though.

T262: War is declared. I have 20+ Cannons, 20+ Rifles and go to 0% for a turn to upgrade all my Axes and junk to Rifles. My cannons absolutely shred his stack: It has something like 60 or more units so I can't take it down all in one turn, but I slaughter a good 20 or so to start with and my losses consist almost entirely of cannons...and a good deal retreat. (10 Cannons total survive) Indeed, even over TWO TURNS the stack is too big to kill entirely...but I'm getting something like 90% of almost every battle and still building/drafting units.

Three turns later, the stack is destroyed at minimal cost to me: I lost about 10 Cannons and a handful of Rifles, he lost 17+ Grenadiers, at least 17 Curassiers + Cataphracrs and at least 20 in assorted Siege Weapons and other junk. Now to see if I can advance at all with his biggest stack gone and vs. Machine Guns...my own Machine Guns and army mean I have little to fear in way of counter attack. In addition, I've upgraded a nice amount of CR Axes (And Spears I am now upgrading to CR) into Rifles to help out! I'll head up Music -> Military Tradition as well for Conquistadors. Or am I already to Cavs? I also sit a Guerilla II Rifle next to one of his city and watch him waste a Cat and 2 Cataphracts on it. His Infantry is starting to hit the scene though...



This graph says a lot, I think. Cannons turn the battle of Iconium into a rout: Even some Machine Guns and Infantry can't hold up to them because I've got CRIII Cannons, which get decent odds against Guns and Infantry @ 0% defense, to go with Collat 3, shredding them down to where my Rifles got great odds on them. Now I just need to keep Cannon production up while keeping up steady drafting and I should be able to eat him up or enough that he is no threat to win the game (And with Asoka still on Education...yeeeeeeeah.). The biggest problem I face? he DOES have naval superiority with Transports and junk, so my poor seafood is getting all pillaged. Sadly, it looks like he has teched up to Fighters now, so my offensive actually is pretty much over. Was it worth it? I can't really tell, but I wasn't in a good position if I left him alone with his huge, cheap to upgrade army, so I had to do something. I get peace, essentially blank, and I don't think I can do much militarily past now...so I suppose it is time to hope my superior tech path ability and large production lets me Space first. No real shot at culture and Justinian actually has more pop than me so no Diplo. Spiral Power pops some iron to help me out.



T297: I found Mining Inc in my Holy City, which will also get Wall Street, and already have it giving me 15 HPT. I will spread it as best I can and I am also running Merchants to go with stuff like TGL in my Capital: If I get a Great Merchant, I should have the wonderful Mining Inc + Sid's Sushi combo that can allow me to overtake Justinian with it. (Ignore the Spy specialist: Stupid AI loves assigning them and I just hadn't de-assigned it yet).

T298: Justinian completes the Apollo Program! D: Sadly, I also get a Great Scientist from my capital and not a Great Merchant. Delhi will pop a GP in 5T but it is unlikely to be a Merchant (It doesn't help I have to keep it from assigning Spies and I accidentally let some accumulate...)

T302: My capital pops Gems! I'm popping a lot of stuff today, it feels like.

Delhi also gives me ANOTHER Great Engineer: Save it for a possible Space Elevator rush? IDK. Or a GA. Also, Justinian has a ton of EP, so every turn he's trying something, most annoying.

T307: Justinian declares war on Asoka! Good news for me: I hope he builds much military and not much Space Race. Actually, in retrospect, maybe not so good: He might be able to hit Domination!

T318: Asoka is destroyed. Poor Asoka. Only took 11 turns.

T321: Justinian demands I conver to Buddhism. I actually do, for the moment, which brings my relationship with him up. It may be more valuable to just stay Buddhist for the relationship boost than any benefit Judaism or Free Religion could give me now anywho.

T323: Assembly Line comes in. Factories EVERYWHERE!

T327: Apollo Program complete. Justinian has only completed one part, the S.S. Docking Bay, so I've got a shot.

T329: UN Elections! I think Justinian can vote himself winner, drats...for that matter, he's only 3% of Land Area away from domination!

T332: Next Great Person is a Prophet. Golden Age time! Also, Justinian completes the Space ELevator.

Sadly, Justinian is completing parts fast enough I probably can't catch him.



Kinda late there Great Merchant! And apparently this popped before my other GPP places. I found Sid's Sushi anyway. +11 FPT!

T344: Justinian launches his ship.



And that's the end of that. Post game comments etc in the next post because image limit.

[Kuro]

In terms of starts, I agree that Isabella has the weakest start: Mansa Musa boxes her in a lot, so she has to expand to the islands, take him out or both. Justinian probably has the best start, followed by Hatty: Justy has a lot of land that is free to snag and a decent trait combo to pull it off, plus Cataphracts, while Hatty can also expand pretty well and can push against him with Creative. Asoka has an okay start, but the peaks around his starting area probably make expanding a bitch, Mansa Musa is also okay but he seems a bit short on land and will want to stretch towards Justinian/Hatty to snag land or kill one of Asoka or Isabella.





Impressive to lose 45 Rifles but only build 3!



Seems fairly high for a loss.



My Hall of Fame. I'm usually a Monarch player, there's not more Monarch games here because sometimes it gets boring trying to finish them, so Emperor was a bit tougher than usual.



A final tour of my cities. Ignore the unhappiness: I had to defy a switch to Universal Suffrage and didn't feel like making and shuffling a bunch of units around to fix the unhappiness problem when Justinian had already launched a spaceship like 4T prior. You could build really strong units here.







































Ultimately, I feel I lost for two reasons:

1. I didn't expand onto the islands well enough. I should have taken an even worse mid game econ hit and settled faster, especially since I snagged The Great Lighthouse for this.

2. I went to war with India too quickly, so I was not able to effectively finish them off. This put me in too weak of a position to compete with Justinian without a military strike, which due to his tech advantage failed. I also totally forgot about using Spies, which I could have done easily: It would have been helpful against his Chicken Pizza!

Fun game though! I didn't count how many Christmas Trees I had but I know it was not a lot. Hopefully next Adventure/Epic I will actually play when I can submit an offical report!

[T-hawk]

Wow, I don't think I've ever seen that happen before, a human player strong enough to conquer two AIs but then not winning. You didn't research fast enough. You should have more than 1800 beakers at break-even by late in the game - like twice that, with that much land. I see too many farms and not enough cottages in those endgame cities, Delhi in particular. Also it looks like you didn't use Representation, which is an essential part of late game research once you get a food corporation.

There's also espionage which is the standard way to keep up with an AI who has a stronger economy. Lots of players like to ignore EE because they don't understand the mechanic and the discounts. But that's like ignoring bluffing in poker, you're crippling yourself and you'll get destroyed by those who do know how to use the tools correctly.

Thanks for the report, I always like reading them even if late.

[Kuro]

The biggest problem I had was the fact I was too early to war with India meant I had to fight twice and that really hurt my economy: I think I probably could have had at least 1.5x the research (It especially hurt me doing stuff like properly terraforming Delhi). I wasn't that far behind so I think I probably would have won if I had better done the India war.

I didn't get a Great Merchant for Sid's Sushi until like 10T until the end of the game, so that's why I didn't abuse it more.