RBC6A1: On Vase And Jar, On Screen And Fan [COMPLETE]

[picklepikkl]

Watch this space for further developments.

[picklepikkl]

Some preliminary thoughts:

We are rocking a funny hat and a tunic with the Triforce embroidered on it. Ganondorf won't know what hit him. Our leader special is a combat bonus for fighting on coastline (eh) and a construction time bonus for building three kinds of districts: faith, culture, and land military. Our civ special is slightly confusingly worded: I understand that this means our districts are better at their adjacency bonuses, but I'm not sure if that means that the "friendly" districts give +1 yield per instead of +.5 per, or if this is a one-time bonus for adjacency that then doesn't affect further district packing. I assume and hope it's the former, but this game doesn't do a good job of clear communication, so I am prepared for it to be the latter. Regardless, this reference image is going to be super important to keep in mind:




If I want to leverage my comparative advantage, then, it's obvious that the game is pushing me in two similar-but-not-identical directions: stacking up cheap culture/faith production to go for one of those two victories, and generally speaking rely on tightly-packed districts rather than basic tile yields. This seems roughly analogous to the specialist economy in Civ 4, where I'm biased towards high-food tiles that will let me drop citizens into districts when I produce the appropriate slots. The complicating factor is that every decision I make about city and district placement has ripple effects down the line for proper packing: districts have their own adjacency bonuses from other tiles, and poorly planning what will go where has the potential to really screw up my yields. This is definitely a challenging civ to try to play well as a raw newbie, but hey, that's all part of the Potluck fun!

[The Black Sword]

That image is great, really should be in the pedia ...

[picklepikkl]

Found it on Reddit, TBS; the /r/civ sub is a great place to lurk for info .

I've been busy all weekend, with little computer access other than my incredible potato of a laptop (seriously, the thing chugs when I try to run Civ FOUR on it, I'm pretty sure just installing Six will make it catch fire and die), so I've been spending my free time watching videos and theorycrafting. I decided that I want to go for a Space victory, since that'll give me a chance to see more of the game and get a little bit of familiarity with the Tourism/Archaeology/Religion subsystems before actually trying for one of the nonstandard victory types. There's also two achievements that look doable -- The Meiji Restoration (for having a district completely surrounded by other districts on all six hexes as Japan) and Man on the Moon (win a Space victory having activated the Great Scientists Newton and Darwin and owning a captured Egyptian city) -- so I think I'll try for those as well.

Openingwise, I will probably try just REXing with military coverage (because if there's one common thread in everything I've seen, it's that barbs are here to wreck your shit) and see where that gets me, then stack a bunch of Campus adjacencies with my National Ability.

Mechanics question: If I build a second district of a given type in a city, how does that work vis a vis district buildings?

EDIT: belay that mechanics question, I discovered you can't actually build two districts of the same type in a city. I was thinking of them as tile improvements, but they're more like buildings that happen to be on the map.

[picklepikkl]

Looking at the start, I see tea and jade (which makes me wonder if Japan has some sort of start bias for “eastern” resources, especially given the Japan start I saw some of from FilthyRobot) and a TON of grasslands. I’m pleased about the grasslands, since I do hope to make use of specialists. Lots of food-neutral and food-positive tiles seems ideal for that sort of gameplay.

I go ahead and found on the starting tile, since it’s recommended and has a 2/2 tile immediately workable.




Fog-gazing implies ocean to my southwest, so I’m going to send initial Warrior northeastish (amended to eastish after an early reveal showed coastal horses to my north; am I at the west end of my continent?)

On turn 5, we meet Kabul to our east.




Triggering the Eureka for Archery is something I want to do anyway, since ranged units seem very good at defanging barbarians in the early game. And +2 hpt in Kyoto when producing units is very nice indeed! What a great city-state to pop early . That finishes our Scout with a hefty bit of overflow, which is going straight into a Slinger, following which we’ll have enough tech to make a Builder worthwhile (I want to use my first Builder on Stone and Cows, so I need two techs for that by the time it comes out).

Unfortunately, my desire to get some scouting done with my Scout is curtailed by the appearance of a barbarian. Since I don’t want to get Epic Four’d, I will try to kill it before it can get back to base, or at least establish forward defense with my incoming Slinger.




I don’t have experience with 1UPT (I always get T-Hawk’s tactics quizzes in his Civ 5 reports wrong), but hopefully this positioning blocks the scout from its camp for long enough. My memories of SMAC Zones of Control are coming back

T12 we pop our first goody hut with our Warrior, currently north of Kabul, and… it Eurekas Archery. Which we were undoubtedly going to Eureka anyway. Sigh. But then we meet Nan Madol, our second city-state friend!




I, uh, have no idea how to recruit a Great General in this game . Is it from the military district, or is it battles like Civ 4?

Our first civic comes in, and I go with the seemingly-standard Discipline/Urban Planning. Also, our scout’s westward exploration runs him into Jakarta:




Kyoto finishes its Builder, and I decide to go for a second Slinger before my first Settler. Our first one managed to corner and kill its target, with no sign of the camp, so hopefully there aren’t dozens of horses thundering in on my capital. It’s headed back now, to play zone defense against any more scouts and then upgrade to an Archer in friendly territory. While that’s going on, I discover a Natural Wonder near Nan Madol, and it’s a beaut:




Apparently there is an achievement for using Charles Darwin the Great Scientist near there. Let’s try to get that .

Meanwhile, a barb camp spawned very close to my capital, but I was able to box the spearman with my Slingers and get promotions for each of them. Time to spend the plunder gold on turning them into Archers! (I was low on money because I bought my way up to Jade; I wanted the Eureka boost for the Wheel, since Watermills seem good.) Unfortunately, as I return them to my lands, a barb scout pulls in from the northeast; looks like I’ll be making friends, whether I want to or not.

We pop our second goody hut, and I have no idea what this means:




I… guess we’re getting a Pantheon? Woo? Anyway, following my Settler, I start on a Trader. I want to try the “rebase to new city and send TR to capital” trick. Our warrior kills a barb spearman near Nan Madol and pops its camp, running straight into an Egyptian and triggering quest completion! I use the capture gold to send Cleo a delegation, and she reciprocates on the next turn.




Looks like she’ll be in competition for the rich band of tropics between us. With tons of jungle and peaks, the campus adjacency bonuses there are going to be sick. I’m starting to think that the area south of the jungle belt might be my industrial area while northern cities bring in the Nobel prizes. We also meet Hong Kong, a city-state Egypt already first-to’d, but Industrial -- that has good bonuses, I might want to bring them into the fold if I can.

We hit 25 Faith, and I decide to found God of the Sea. We started inland, and a lot of the obvious first-ring city sites are coastal with seafood. The extra base production seems like it’ll be handy.




Also, we found Tokyo and rebase our Trader into it.




After taking this screenshot, I bought the insane Spices tile and set Tokyo to working it. I also decided to get a third Archer before the watermill in Kyoto.




Trade routes are weird.

Once Sailing comes in, I do some thinking, and decide that the Pyramids would be really nice, so I’m going to try to chop it out in Kyoto’s northeastern desert. After Masonry, though, I really need to swing around for Pottery -> Irrigation so that Amenities don’t become a problem.




Thanks, Miss Cleo Looking at the World Rankings screen, our Military rating is very near Egypt’s, so that must be the reason she’s playing nice.

State Workforce and Masonry come in at the same time, like I obviously planned and in no way was a happy surprise, so I go into Corvee. After that, it’s just a bunch of quiet turns until I decide to pause at T50.




Wide overview. Following the Pyramids, we’re going to start expanding again. Kabul has got to go at some point; its tiles are just too good. I’m thinking about trying to get a Petra city near it, but the fresh water setup is awkward as hell. Probably I’ll just build a ton of normal cities instead. Also, don't worry, I'll delay Tokyo's builder if necessary to let the Pyramids finish first . Chops are great!

[picklepikkl]

T52 is a big one. We finish Political Philosophy, bringing us into the Classical era and refreshing our city-state quests… one of which we immediately complete (chopping in Civ 6 is like bulbing in Civ 4; it can cause the production queue to finish during the turn instead of during the interturn):




Being Jakarta’s suzerain is mostly useless to us for now, but who knows, it could come in handy down the line. We switch into Classical Republic despite the bonuses not being useful immediately, because I want that Legacy bonus for down the line.

That said, though, Mysticism comes in and I decide to start on a Great Prophet. We seem to be pretty isolated from other civs, so it seems eminently plausible that we can defend a homegrown religion without a lot of investment, and some of the beliefs you can get seem pretty good. I’d like to dip my toe into the new system, even if it’s not optimal.

T57, we somehow run across both an unpopped hut and an uncontacted City-State:




Mmm, scientific city-state. That’s my jam. And of course Japan should govern Korea…

Popping the hut gives us a free Trader, which is awkward because our first trade route just finished and we have that trader back again, with a limit of 1 route. Oh well. We’re starting Currency, so when we get Commercial Hubs, we can set up more.

My Settler wave has started coming out, so after much ado, here’s the dotmap:




All these pins are going immediately, because of map clutter, but I have the screenshot for reference. As you can see, Kabul is a real disruption to the best cities on our dotmap. It has to go, and the sooner the better. To that end, after this screenshot, I changed Kyoto’s build to a Heavy Chariot and sent my Archers Kabulwards; I’m pretty sure we can take them. In the meantime, sending the Settler to the northeastern location, where our science shall go boom.

Tokyo finishes its own Settler, thanks to a jungle chop (preclearing the campus site), and I send that to the future Ruhr Valley site, where it will idle until Kabul burns in hopefully-not-that-long. I take advantage of a civic coming in to swap policies and buy tiles cheaply; Tokyo is in need of production.

Egypt finally reaches the Classical era, and declares war on its own neighboring city-state. They have no self-founded second city yet. Meanwhile, we get a Eureka for Iron Working from a hut, which is nice because 1) the only Iron near me is way the hell in the frozen wastes 2) it completes a quest for a scientific city-state, Seoul, making us its suzerain (nice unique bonus to get early, random Eureka each time I enter an age). Why are there still tribal villages around this late? No AI has been eliminated, where the hell are they all?

I declare war on Kabul on t65. Their military consists of three warriors and two galleys. I think my three archers and heavy chariot have got this.

T66, I found Fukuoka in the northeast. I plan to use my gold to buy tiles while I have that civic, so it’ll be a while before I have a Builder for the area, but I rebase a trader to help it get off the ground.

T68, after clearing out all the warriors, I move my archers to the coast to give them extra strength, raze Kabul, and found Shizuoka:







I swap my civic research to Military Tradition, since it will only take three turns and then I can do a free policy swap. Meanwhile, I finally get started on Apprenticeship for the Industrial Zones. Kyoto is going to do some serious district-building - Holy Site now to found a religion, then Commercial District to get an extra trade route and money, then the others from the dotmap.

Egypt builds Stonehenge and founds Eastern Orthodoxy, which I guess makes sense; I don’t think the Coptic faith is a default in game, and the Coptics are basically Eastern Orthodox with a few minor theological differences. I’m a little annoyed that now it’ll be a while longer until I have my own Prophet, since the Stonehenge free one raises the cost for others like a normal Great Person, but I have the sources ticking away in the background, so I’ll be fine. Meanwhile, since my heavy chariot is overkill, I disband it for a cool 120g.

...which of course gets Cleo pissed at me for having a weak army. Whatever, chica, you’re still at war with Mohenjo-Daro, whereas my own city-state war lasted four turns. I can live with your denunciation. They finally conquer it, but not until T75.

Apprenticeship starts the Medieval Era, and Seoul gives me the Eureka for Education. Nice, that’s actually very useful for unlocking the University in my Campuses.

We have a slate of quiet turns while we build up our infrastructure in our current set of cities, getting ready for the next round of expansion. A barb camp pops up near the desert in our east, so we farm some XP and gold from that. An unmet player gets the Oracle. We establish suzerainty over Hong Kong, less for its unique bonus (boost to district projects) and more for the 3 envoy bonus: +2hpt in Industrial Districts when building infrastructure. Since our first Industrial District is about to finish, this is welcome.

T93 brings some interesting news:




One of our erstwhile rivals has been killed, and Cleo is gunning for another city-state to put on her mantle. If she conquers Nan Madol, I’m in a bit of a dilemma; I want to put a city in the northeast of that area to work the Galapagos tiles, but I also want to own an Egyptian city for that one achievement. I guess I could just try to pursue total victory against her? Should look at what military techs I might need; a force of Samurai/Siege Towers/Crossbowmen seems like it’d be sufficient to the task.

Over in the west, we also met Kandy, a city-state who knows 1 other civilization: one who is unknown to us. Exciting!

Our Great Prophet points finally tick over, and with the help of Songtsan Gampo:




Yazidism is a faith that I thought suited well our desire to leap into the stars, and happily there was a peacock symbol available. I’m not sure what beliefs are good, but Work Ethic seems useful due to the whole “production is hugely important in Civ 6” thing, and Scripture seems like it will help convert my cities passively.




We arrive at turn 100, where I am stopping for now. Next turn I will policy swap into +50% Settler production and push out a round of them to fill out our south and east. I think I will target Theocracy as our tier 2 government; I've got half-price Holy Sites as Tokimune, I can grab some Apostles soon to add the belief where Campus buildings can be bought with Faith, and patronizing Great People also seems like a good use for Faith. Once Kyoto hits size 10, I will get a half-price culture district up, because god damn are my bpt and cpt unequal. Egypt is still in the Classical era, whereas I am not far from the Renaissance -- I wonder how quickly my stupid science rate can get me to Military Science for Cavalry and just run over Cleo? I guess if I find the time I could do it with Knights, but as a counterargument, I am having too much fun just lolbuildering it up.




speaking of which.

[picklepikkl]

T102 we get an envoy. I’d been saving them up, and now drop all three into Hong Kong for the 6-envoy Industrial city-state bonus. This will help Kyoto with its infrastructure projects -- gotta get those district buildings up!




After Shizuoka finishes its Workshop, I have a few turns before I’m ready to clear some nearby river flatland and build it a Commercial district, so I decide to try this “project” thing. Apparently the IZ project will get me gold and Great Engineer points when it finishes, and Hong Kong’s suzerain bonus helps put more production towards it. We’ll see how much it turns out to be; my gpt is dropping as I add buildings to my districts, and the cash infusion will be nice.

...it seems like it gave us around 20g and 30gpp. That’s not that impressive. Whatever.

We get our first “real” Great Person, Hildegard of Bingen:




This reminded me that I had totally forgotten to purchase the Apostles I meant to get when we finished the building in Kyoto. However, when I go to the Religion screen to check what's still available:




Dammit, someone else got Jesuit Education. Never mind, then, I’ll just save the Faith for Patronage and maybe a Missionary if I want it. Guess that second religious building was a waste.

Over in the west, we meet the Cultural city-state Kumasi. An unmet player has established suzerainty, so we must be close by someone. Speaking of which, Egypt has established suzerainty over Jerusalem. At least they aren’t fighting us for city-states we want.

We found Sendai:




And I see Cleo’s missionaries approaching, so I tell her to back off:




Let’s see how that goes.

Our Great Engineer Isidore of Miletus pops, which Eurekas The Enlightement for us, a civic will really want down the line. He’s a Wonder-production-rushing one; going to save him for Oxford, which will be going up in a relatively production-poor city.

Feudalism comes in, and wait what:




I… didn’t know that was a thing. Also, apparently some policies become obsolete? My +30% builder policy is gone, which sucks because I wanted to stack that with Serfdom. Oh well; we swap into Serfdom anyway for a quick round of Builders.

We finally meet someone new, Qin Shi Huang, and send him a delegation:




And also found Okayama:




And Takamatsu:




Cleo did spread Orthdoxy into Tokyo, despite my “could you not,” so I decide that relying on my religious-pressure passive conversion is a bad idea, hence the wave of missionaries visible there.

Speaking of religion, we meet Kongo, who isn’t going to like us because hell no am I sending my missionaries way the hell over there:




(My faith this turn was 666.6. Golly.)

On the interturn, we met Victoria, who is even further out west than the others and whose scouting warrior was near Kongo. That leaves two more civs to find (since someone was eliminated earlier)!

We managed to beat everyone to a second Great Scientist in a row, Omar Khayyam. He Eurekas for us Mercenaries, Mass Production, and Square Rigging. Mercenaries gets us a quest envoy with Seoul, which is very nice; the other two are just naval techs I probably won’t use much, but hey, a tech is a tech. Also, while looking at the tech tree, I realize that it can be used to figure out where other people are. Kongo is Medieval, whereas Egypt, England, and China are all still in the CLASSICAL era . Well, I guess we’re winning this game.

...he says, right before China and England joint DOW him. Well… they’re way the f on the other side of the map, so I guess I’m not worried? Will build some fortifications in my coastal cities, though, and maybe some Samurai. To that end, I use my next policy swap to pick up Veterancy for my wildcard slot.

Egypt keeps missionizing me, so I decide to try out the counter-religious mechanics; I recruit an Apostle (the 2nd-tier religious building wasn't worthless after all!), launch an Inquisition, and recruit an Inquisitor. It successfully purges the Orthodox; that was pretty easy.

We fill out our dotmap with the founding of Yokohama (screenshot slightly late because I missed when I meant to take it):




And also gained the Great Merchant Piero de’ Bardi, who gave us 200g and an envoy. Thanks, bud! From delegate gossip, we hear about America and Arabia, which means that the one who died earlier must have been Rome. Omnia mutantur, I guess.

Speaking of things changing, Qin Shi Huang offers to surrender. OK, buddy.




(Playing with the house rule that AI deals are take-or-leave, due to the negotiations bug)

I was going to pass on the Great Engineer James of St. George, but literally nobody else has any Great Engineer progress, so it would be forever and a day before we got a new one. I decide to put his effect (free Ancient + Medieval Walls in two cities) in Tokyo and Fukuoka, as the nearest to Egypt.

And then, all of a sudden:




...wut.




double wut. Well, I guess at least we’re guaranteed to make his Agenda happy.

We then meet Arabia I know not how:




(can’t find his unit anywhere!)

He’s not going to be my friend, due to religious differences. No big deal.

On T147, 720 AD, we enter the Industrial Era. Kongo and China are Medieval; everyone else is Classical. Whatever; it’s Oxford University time. It’s going to take a long damn time, but I’m two techs away from Industrialization, which will unlock Electronics Factories (+4 hpt for all cities within 6 tiles) and Ruhr Valley (OP bullshit).

Trajan wants to buy my spare Tea for 21g and Open Borders. I appreciate it, but no thanks.

T149 is a big Great Person turn. I recruit Hannibal Barca and Irene of Athens, and pass on Artemisia because I don’t have any real need for a Great Admiral and also genuinely feel kind of bad about how badly I am stomping the AI. I’m saving Hannibal for when I actually get ready for war, but Irene is going to get my capital the Ivory northwest of Tokyo. Why a Byzantine empress is a Great Merchant of all things escapes me.

Anyway, here’s the overview at T150:




I changed my mind about Theocracy; losing out on the extra beliefs meant we just weren’t going to get the value I wanted. Merchant Republic it will be, then. I think I’m going to give Shizuoka a Campus on its Forest next to the Mountain once I hit size 10; it’ll have double adjacency bonus, plus the Mountain. Just haven’t felt the need for much more science. Am honestly worried I will end the game before I can get the cool achievements I’m shooting for; we’re making progress towards Newton, but I don’t know when Darwin will show up (gotta raze Nan Madol and found my own Galapagos-working city by then!). I guess I can spam the Campus project for the GPP.

Let’s see how stupid my position is at T200.

[picklepikkl]

China comes to me wanting to buy my surplus tea and silver. The price is kind of low (15g + 9gpt + OB), but I’ll take it. Dolla dolla billz, y’all. And true to form, Trajan comes to me to congratulate me on my expansion. Thanks, bro.

...never mind, fuck you Trajan, you jacked Hong Kong’s suzerainty from me. That city-state is mine. I send my saved envoys straight away to take it back; I like Projects. In further foreign affairs, China finally makes it to the Middle Ages.




What time is it? IT’S FACTORY TIME. Let’s see how bananas my civ gets with overlapping +4 production bonuses. In unrelated news, we gain the Great Engineer Bi Sheng, who can give a city an extra district slot above its population. I use this in Kyoto, which really wants a Campus.




What time is it? IT’S NEW GOVERNMENT TIME. We hit this civic on exactly the turn we got a tick of our legacy bonus from Classical Republic, because I’m That Good. We are now rolling in hilarious amounts of cash. We pass on Marco Polo the Great Merchant, because China is close and I’d like to grab someone else. China jumps straight into the Renaissance Age somehow -- congratulations, little buddy! We also finally gain a Great Admiral, Leif Erikson, who is going to sit in a harbor district somewhere and do nothing.

Also, somewhere along the line, Egypt converted Tokyo again. Well, fine; we’re going to use that as a casus belli for Holy War later, then see how good you feel about that decision.

Shizuoka finishes its Electronics Factory and begins Ruhr Valley. Even with its 54 hpt, that’s due to take 27 turns. Our third and fourth Electronics Factories come in at Okayama and Takamatsu, boosting the industry of the southern portion of our empire by a lot and Inspiring Class Struggle. Unfortunately, that’s a hell of a long way away, and our cpt lags behind our bpt by about one to two. Not sure if we’ll have time to People’s Republic it up before Mars!

We got Isaac Newton a while back, and take advantage of his ability to instantly give Kyoto’s new Campus a Library and University. Kyoto is now going to churn out some new Traders; we have enough trade route slots to give all of our cities an internal one and also send some foreign ones!

Here’s a curious thing:




My map has updated to show New Orleans on the map, an American city… but I don’t have contact. Whatever, I’m sending my warrior (original from 4000 BC! Still around!) to go meet up with Teddy.

The first of my new traders begins a route to Nan-Madol, which, as I mentioned, I intend to murder. Roads are handy for the purpose of murder.




I jigger tiles around in Tokyo to delay Oxford by one turn; I want to discover as many techs as possible before it finishes and I get new free ones. Discovering the thing I’m 1t away from would be awful.

Trajan wants me to joint war with him against the Kongo. Not bloody likely, friend. We recruit Filippo Brunelleschi, a Great Engineer who will help us knock out Ruhr Valley that much faster. It is now going to come in the same turn as Oxford. The next turn, we get the Great Merchant Jakob Fugger, who gives us two envoys. We use our total of four envoys to Suzerain Kumasi and get Nan Madol to 3; could really use the extra culture.




In other news, England still won’t make peace. Sources speculate that her Hidden Agenda is “unreasonable lunatic.”

I finally, finally meet Teddy Roosevelt and complete the set of AI contacts. Turns out Washington is way the hell over here:




And now, finally: T177, a date that shall live in famy.







We Eureka Steel and Flight, and learn Economics (our normal research tech), Military Science (yes! Cavs!) and Steam Power (sweet! Coal!). We’re going straight to Electricity to unlock the culture part of our Electronics Factories, as well as the Power Plants for even more production. It turns out we have Coal in our territory, with a mine already atop it, which caused the Steel Eureka. Nice. Next stop: build a couple of Industrial Era units and go wreck people.

Humanism comes in, and it’s time to do something new:




Cavalry time.

Also, Rome wants to be friends. What the hell, I accept. In other trade news, Kongo offers to give me Diamonds and 81g for my surplus tea and silver. Hell yeah! More amenities! Which is highly relevant, because my suzerainties are getting poached left and right (Jakarta and Kumasi), losing me those luxuries.

As we’re gearing up for war, I’m happy to get the Great General El Cid, who will let me form a Corps out of 2 units. One Cavalry Corps + one regular Cav should be enough to get the job done.

...ok, it appears I misunderstood how this works. El Cid just automatically makes the Cavalry into a Corps, no second unit required. I also use Hannibal to give one of the Cavs a promotion, so now I have an unpromoted Cav, a promotable Cav, and a Corps. Not bad. On the Great Person front, I pop the Scientist Emilie du Chatelet, who Eurekas my remaining Industrial techs (only two left un-boosted, and she nominally boosts three, so I sort of missed out, but I don’t care), and the Admiral Sun Yi-Sin, who I use to give me a free Ironclad I can use for scouting.

FINALLY England is ready to surrender:




God, this AI is stupid.

On T186, 1250 AD, I enter the Modern era. Seoul Eurekas Radio for us, which is nice. On the next turn, China declares Formal War on me for who knows what reason, I don’t care. I declare war on Nan Madol and move my units in. We capture it on the same turn after all three units attack, and I burn it to the ground.




All of its improvements immediately vanish, which I was not expecting. Oh well! I spend some of my ludicrous purse on a Settler from Fukuoka. This gets me denounced on the interturn by Saladin, but the degree I don’t care about what the AIs think of me cannot be measured by mortal instruments. A new civic comes in, and I grab Serfdom again (need builders for my new city) and Retainers (since my military units might as well do something useful).

The Great Engineer Mimar Sinan comes in, and I use his effect for +1 housing and amenity within Kyoto.

Otsu is founded:




And we get the Great Merchant Raja Todar Mal, who makes all of my internal trade routes much more lucrative (+24 gpt from activating him!).

Up in the northeast, my Cavalry Corps cleared a barb camp my scouting Ironclad spotted, and then pops a goody hut:




Thank you, mysterious tribal village that knows the secrets of internal combustion!

There are an awful lot of Great Scientists in the Renaissance, and we are running the table on them. Galileo Galilei gives +250 science for each mountain around him when you activate him. We have a four-mountain spot (Fukuoka’s Campus), which is nearly a full Modern-Age tech!

America and Kongo go to war, a Chinese scout attacks into the Cav I have covering my Worker for some stupid goddamn reason, and I activate Galileo, bringing in Ballistics, Steel, and most of Replaceable Parts.

On T200, we recruit our first Great Writer, Geoffrey Chaucer, as well as another Admiral, Santa Cruz, and Engineer, Leonardo da Vinci. Chaucer starts putting Works into Oxford University, Leo makes our Workshops produce culture (and was supposed to Eureka something in the Modern Age for me, but I didn’t get a popup), and Santa Cruz heads to the harbor at Sendai to make our Ironclad into an Armada, because why not.




Overview. If it’s not clear, I’m kind of bored and I’m trying to end the game. Hopefully I can do it before T250.

[picklepikkl]

I’m cleaning up old civics to get the envoys you get from discovering them (UI problem: the bonus effects from a tech show up only on mouseover and aren’t indicated by any sort of icon!). Somehow, Kongo has made it to the Industrial Era, which I find very impressive; Arabia and China are in the Renaissance, and everyone else is Medieval (by technologies, anyway; China and Kongo are Renaissance in civics, Egypt and Rome Medieval, I myself only Industrial, and everyone else Classical).

Also, Trajan poached Hong Kong from me. Not cool, bro.

China surrenders, again:




We recruit the Great Scientist James Young, who is completely useless; he Eurekas two random technologies from Industrial or Modern eras, but we already have Eurekad all of them! Whatever. He does reveal Oil for us, though; we have some a little offshore of Takamatsu. The next Great Scientist is even worse, though, giving us even more Eurekas for eras from which we have all the techs! We’re about to enter Atomic, for Christ’s sake, give me someone useful!

Speaking of which, we enter the Atomic Era with the discovery of Rocketry. It’s Spaceport time, and good Lord are these things expensive. Going to have to rejigger my trade routes to get max hammers in my two Space cities.

We finish the Forbidden City in Takamatsu, which I had forgotten I was even building.

Egypt declares war on us. OK, I guess that’s fine. I have Cavalry Corps and I have no idea what you have. We even get Gustavus Adolphus, a pretty good Great General with his own totally baller Sabaton song:



He’s going to turn into a free Bombard for us, because why not. The following turn, we get Ada Lovelace, whose abilities are actually useful -- she Eurekas Computers and lets Shizuoka build an extra District, which I’m going to need to get both a Spaceport and an Entertainment Complex (to solve its Amenity problems). Dimitri Mendeleev comes in a little later and is completely useless, but my boy CHARLES DARWIN is finally next!! Probably going to Patronage him as soon as I can afford it, because why not.

John Jacob Jingleheimer-Smith Astor is a Great Merchant who gives us a bunch of gold and Envoys, which is always nice. This gives me enough to immediately Patronage Darwin. Egypt wants to surrender, but I don’t let her because I will want one of her cities before I win the game. James Watt shows up, but is mostly useless because I already have all the Factories I want.




Achievement get.

I delayed Class Struggle by 1t to get the next tick of the Merchant Republic legacy bonus. Behold, the People’s Republic of Japan:




Also on T228, we finish our first Spaceport and begin straightaway on the construction of an Earth Satellite.

Win-More Roundup: T230 Admiral Horatio Nelson, bonus immediately activated. T231 Engineer Gustave Eiffel, sent to Shizuoka to help rush Big Ben after Shizuoka finishes its Spaceport. T233 John Spilsbury, who gives us the unique Amenity Toys. T236, Big Ben built at Shizuoka, our treasury is now nearly 8k gold. We use this ridiculous war chest on T237 to Patronage out Robert Goddard, whom we then activate for the +20% production towards Space Race projects bonus.

On T238, 1635 AD, we launch a satellite into orbit. Here’s what the world looks like:













Weirdest-looking Pangaea I ever did see. Also, I discover that Hong Kong’s bonus applies to Space Race projects -- Trajan, so help me God, if you steal it from me one more time, I will nuke your pathetic little civ to dust.

Win-More Roundup, part 2: I recruited a Battleship with gold to deal with a barbarian Caravel, and am now amusing myself by conducting shore bombardment of Egypt. On T245, we recruit the Engineer Nikola Tesla, whom I use to make Shizuoka’s Industrial Zone radius larger and stronger.

Then, on T247, in 1680 AD, we send a mission to the Moon. This gives us about 3k culture in one go, which is enormous and clears out nearly two lategame civics at once. Time to finally get the Space Race policy while I research towards the Mars-mission techs.

More running up the score: T248 we recruit Alan Turing, a Great Scientist who actually does nothing for us because we blew past his period. We start building the Bolshoi Theater in Kyoto. T250, we conquer Egypt’s capital Ra-Kedet after I upgrade our Cavs into Helicopters to go wreck her, and sign peace immediately:




Then on the next turn Kongo decides that this is a reasonable request:






Final bit of Winning More: Great Merchant Sarah Breedlove on T252, a Tribal Village pop on T253 giving us an Inspiration towards Scorched Earth, on T257 Bolshoi Ballet comes in and gives us Conservation and Social Media, as well as the Great General Rani Lakshmibai and Scientist Alfred Nobel, Patronage the Scientist Albert Einstein on T260, Engineer Alvar Aalto on T261, Patronage the actually relevant Engineer Sergei Korolev on T263, some asshole Spy sabotages my Industrial Zone in Kyoto but does not actually change the ETA of my last part, and then, finally…




Space Victory on T269, 1790 AD. Let’s see what our score is…




OH FOR FUCK’S SAKE

[Ruined Everything]

Thanks for the report!

It looked like you were pretty much outplaying me economically the entire game (my hugely inflated economy at the end of my game came from owning the entire world - you had the better economic stats when our games were comparable.) Part of that, I guess, was because my spam small cities idea didn't work.

I've been trying to piece together your economy from the screenshots and not quite managing it. Did you have any particular list of priorities when you built your districts? Was Yokohama worth founding (it looked shitty but I think you were getting decent production out of it)? Any particular reason you stopped settling where you did as opposed to claiming the mostly empty north?

Thanks again for an educational read.