Chevalier Rides Again: A City Lights exploration

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Well, at least destroying the world around you fits your city naming theme.

I kind of embraced it after attacking and eating a neighbor on turn 50. Figured I may as well wear my colors on my sleeve. 

Speaking of destroying the world...



Nidaros' campus, much pillaged during the late war, can't catch a break, as I spot that it's also flooded - and there's no way Norway will be able to research & build sea walls to save it before perma-flooding kicks in in a few turns (the progression of sea level rise is .5 meter rise [warning] -> 1 meter rise (temp flooding) -> 1.5 meters (permaflooding) -> 2 meters (temp flooding) -> 2.5 meters (permaflooding) -> 3 meters (temp flooding) ->3.5 meters (permaflooding)). So you can gradually introduce sea walls in your low-lying areas first, and then moving to higher ones.

Rocketry comes in:



Next target is Satellites, for the Moon Landing project:


Need to finish 1 biplane (finishing next turn, 1 already built) and 2 broadcast centers (1 due in 3 turns at Cerin Amroth, 1 in about 5 turns at Caras Galadhon) for boosts, but I should manage everything within 7 turns.

I do a bit of micromanagement of my cities. I flip a mountain into Osgiliath's city area from the Black Gate, and plop another ski resort on it:


The extra amenity makes #5 for Osgiliath and its yields jump by 10% (from 1.1 to 1.2 overall, basically). Our production here is up to 150, and that's with only a few trade routes. Spaceport is only a 12 turn build for the 1800 production, as expected:




I place my 5 spaceports, but start none of them yet - only Osgiliath needs to finish it as soon as possible (since you can only work on one project at a time prior to launching the exoplanet), so it's not urgent at the other 4 supporting sites. Osgiliath will finish the Research Lab (1 turn) then begin. 

I grab Nobel, 2 turns before Phoenicia would get him - I don't want any surprises next turn!


1200 gold, 2 turns' income. A good grab. The next scientist up inspires Computers, which is of course useless to me. 

Amenities really rounding into form:

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Have taken two turns, just haven't had the time to write an update. No major news except we start the spaceports and a comical amount of the world is flooding. Phoenicia is desperately crash-building Military Engineers (who can rush seawalls) to save his land but Indonesia and Norway are screwed, I think.

Update later.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

252 - 254

Okay, weekend morning, can finally catch up on reporting for this game - it moved relatively quickly, plus somehow my Chiefs are back in the Super Bowl for the 4th time in 5 years (suck it, haters), so my time to report was low compared to time to play.

Anyway, everything is proceeding as I have desired.



Cirith Ungol finishes a second Biplane, which boosts my research towards Advanced Flight and gives me two useful garrison units in case an opponent gets frisky as he sees my spaceports going up.

North of the mainland, the Indonesian outpost of Barus revolts for the third or fourth time (Indonesia has been reconquering it with his massive but obsolete navy time and again):



This time, he doesn't recapture and I snap it up.


Any one of my units one-shots it. 

This objectively is no help to me at all. Barus is a tiny island outpost with no natural resources, just a wheat farm and some fish, and it will contribute nothing save a trickle of science and culture - and will make achieving +3/+5 amenities harder everywhere else, so it's probably a net loss. But it's fun so eh, fuck it. 

Anyway, stadiums are finishing, and I carefully juggle Ski Resorts each turn to max out my +3/+5 cities where possible. By 252 nearly every single city is at least Happy, and I have a few Ecstatic cities popping up as well:



This is the best I've ever done at lategame amenities, not gonna lie. It's also teh first time I've truly paid attention to amenities and done my best to maximize them, which was the whole point of playing this game peacefully late instead of just galloping over Phoenicia and Indonesia as I could have 20 turns ago (see: Barus being one-shot). It's an exercise to truly grasp how all the lategame of Civ VI hangs together, which I've never bothered with since I usually murder everyone around the Industrial Age.

Capitalism comes in on 253 as Barad-Dur finishes the second imperial stock market, enabling this policy setup:


Every trade route is now getting a minimum of +6 food/+6 production (from Democracy + Wisselbanken), +2 science/+1 culture (from Trade Confederation/Market Economy), +4 gold/1 faith (triangular trade) and finally +a lot of gold from Market economy. I MIGHT drop triangular trade soon for Liberalism (+1 amenity in cities with 2 districts, ie basically all of them), which might tip all of Mordor into ecstatic status, but I need a few more stadia & aquaria to finish first.

Barad-Dur begins on the final tier of Government building in the Plaza, the Royal Society:


In addition to the title, it will allow me to trade builders for progress on the space race. I did the math earlier for how much progress each builder grants - I think it's something like 8% per charge? Can't recall, will look it up later. Anyway, we'll finish it and begin queueing builders to go and stand around Osgiliath to rush our projects when possible. I think research is the bigger bottleneck than production, honestly, but we'll see.

Cold War comes in on 254, and now there's just 4 civics between me and the final tier of governments:


Rapid Deployment needs a foreign airstrip. Irritatingly, all of the Misty Mountains are actually the same continent as Barad-Dur, so that won't work. Has to be in Lothlorien somewhere. Caras Galadhon is working on a spaceport, so I designate Cerin Amroth to try for that inspiration. Space Race needs a spaceport, super easy. Social Media needs telecommunications, not happening, and Globalization needs 2 airports. Cirith Ungol will build one, Cerin Amroth the other. Hopefully I can land all of these. 

The Misty Mountain colonies have reached young adulthood and are racing through infrastructure, powered by Moria's factory and power plant:


I'll build the spaceport later since Moria can't contribute any projects for some time. Gundabad is building a sea wall, since it's a 4-turn build and I am still faith constrained. I also find this nifty tab:



It lists the vulnerable tiles in every city, and how big a barrier is needed to protect them! So, for example, you see Moria's just-completed wall is checked off, while Cirith Ungol has 4 vulnerable tiles - the wheat, the Industrial Zone, the Spaceport, and the Encampment. So I know I must prioritize Osgiliath, Cirith Ungol, Cerin Amroth, Durthang, and the Black Gate for seawalls - call it 800 faith, about 10 turns' of generation or so. Seas rise in less than 15 turns, so I might get one or two more of my other 5 needful cities, but most of those will need to be hand-built (could build military engineers like Phoenicia to rush the project, but my two encampment cities are busy with other projects). 

Speaking of, a look at Phoenicia:


He's running campus projects and military engineers almost exclusively, no doubt racing to Computers (he landed Tesla, a major coup) to enable his own seawalls before the seas permanently flood his industrial zone and campus in 10 turns. 

Wheeeeeee! Mordor floods the world! This is surprisingly fun.

[Erasmas]

Huh, Trade Confederation is made obsolete by Martket Economy. Must be a bug.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

When I unlocked Cold War on 254, I had to change governments due to Trade Confederation vanishing, and slotted Rationalism instead. Didn't have a screenshot so didn't mention it.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 256



These turns are of building. I finish amenities and start sea walls, wehre not cost-prohibitive, and try to hit Eurekas. I don't think I'll get the Aerodrome down in Cerin Amroth for the inspiration for Rapid Deployment - I still need to grow to size 15, 2 turns, and then build the damned thing, and frankly I have culture to spare. Especially since the Moon Landing will give me a one-time juice of 5,000 culture, which will really race me towards the next government. So I'm thinking about just ploughing ahead next turn.

7 turns til Spaceport finishes, then Launch Earth satellite is 900 production - either 6 turns or possibly 3, since I've already forgotten if I got a boost to Space Race production or not.  Guess we'll see in 7 turns. Then Moon landing, 10 turns (or 5). So we're in position to move on Mars in as little as 15 turns!

[Erasmas]

Building an airstrip costs one military engineer charge - and it does not have to be within your borders, just on another continent. Surely that is doable?

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Building an airstrip costs one military engineer charge - and it does not have to be within your borders, just on another continent. Surely that is doable?

...my God, of course! Kyoto has a fully developed Encampment and tons of production. It can spit out a military engineer in just two turns, and there's plenty of flatland. Brilliant idea. 

Maybe also build two tanks from there? Hm, might be worth it. Still need to work out if my remaining bottleneck is PRODUCTION (building out the other 4 Spaceports and then running the projects when the time comes) or SCIENCE (researching the projects just quickly enough that Osgiliath can start one as soon as the previous finishes).

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Randoms 257

Kyoto (Caras Galadhon) finishes my second broadcast center (after Takamatsu's), triggering the Satellites eureka and completing the tech:


That enables Mechanized Infantry, the ultimate infantry unit (I still haven't upgraded my 3 Line Infantry, presently on garrison duty in Lothlorien), solar panels (if I needed more power), and the Launch Moon Landing project. Still 6 turns before I can even begin the Satellite project, though. 

Caras Galadhon starts a military engineer to grab the Rapid Deployment inspiration:


See, I never build Encampment buildings, really, and so I never build military engineers - need to change that. I'd like to build railroads for fun, but each tile takes an iron and a coal, and my coal income has been falling since 3 units were coming from Nan Madol, which had its coalfields flooded by climate change. I'm meeting the crisis by converting a coal plant in the Misty Mountains over to oil power, of which I still have an abundance. 

Looking ahead:


Space Race will be inspired in 6 turns, so we'll swap off in time. Social Media will be a hard burn, not diverting from the golden path to Telecommunications. Globalization MIGHT be doable - Cerin Amroth grows to 15 next turn, then needs to build an aerodrome, a Hangar (380 production, probably 6-7 turns by itself) and then an airport (480 production, another 8-9 turns). So optimistically 20 turns, at best. Yeah, no chance we get through all that. Could I *buy* a building? Maybe. 

Either way, that, plus the culture boost from the Moon Landing in approximately 15 turns, should boost us to the final government tiers and their Space Race production boosts (plus superior policy card setups). THat's the most important civic at the moment, so I won't swerve to the upper row until after that. 

Misty Mountains finishing up amenity builds:


Note also the Grand Fleet at anchor in the bay.  It's beautiful. Anyway, Gundabad is working on an aquarium, Moria on the aforementioned oil plant before polishing off the research lab and then working on its own spaceport, and Angband (should be Angmar to keep the theme, but too late) is on a stadium. Utumno is on an aquarium that will cover most of the northern archipelago cities. 

Amenities are largely solved:


Every single city is netting a +10% boost at this point, good for more than 50 science and culture at this point, and 4 (Barad-Dur, Osgiliath, Morgul, and Umbar) are Ecstatic for 20% boosts to all yields. More will follow as we finish our amenities over the next 10 turns. It's been 20 turns since the war with Japan ended, but we've made enormous strides in that short time. Very pleased on this front.

Core:


Everything looking good. Our air force is constantly scouting Phoenicia, supplementing our already perfect intelligence on the interior of his cities. He's my main 'rival' with 250 science and culture, but frankly he's not been a threat for ages. Flooding is under control and we'll have seawalls fully built by the time the next round hits. THen we can save faith for our own religious founding and maybe get a few spare holy sites down? That's the only way I lose this game at this point. Mostly it's just a race to see how quickly I can launch the spaceship.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

I keep getting hit with this error when trying to play the latest save:

unhandled exception code: exception_access_violation error reading address 0x160 call stack ----------------------------------------------------- ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0 ??? ! ??? ???, line 0

We've tried reverting the save, I've tried disabling all mods, swapping between DX11 and 12, verifying my files, re-installing, playing on a different machine entirely, downgrading graphics, restarting everything, etc. Nothing works. :/

Might be dead again. I was going to win in only like 30 turns, too.