Decided to try this Adventure. Didn't have much time to play. Don't have much time to report. But, since it's fun to compare starts, here goes!

Founded Paris in place. A *great* spot! We decide we're going to kick butt early, so set the research plan for "BronzeWorking via Mining".

Sent the warrior off to the west to look for victim...err...neighbors.



We quickly meet Mansa, who offers us his head. We decide we'll take it from him later. Blast our luck! Our nearest neighbor has Skirmishers for his UU. Better look the other direction. At least the inland-lake map means we know roughly where to look. That and the fact that we can see the edge of the world up north.



Some kindly tribal types show us where we can find other tribal types. The southerners end up giving us gold, though we have to detour a bit around some lions to get there.



And with BronzeWorking...we have Copper in Paris' fat cross. Ohhh this is going to be a ROMP!

After beating up a few lions, we meets some more of our city-builders...err...neighbors:



Saladin offers us his head...and...



Kublai offers us his hand. Good. No ancient era UUs for either of them. Looks like we'll be conquesting off to the east at first.



Ahh. Our workers have provided us with a Copper mine for our nefarious purposes. Now, they can start cottaging our floodplains to pay for our soon-to-expand empire.



Ohh Alex, you sly dog. Maybe we can work together to...expand our respective empires? Ehh? Mmm? Ehh? Mmmm? Let's talk after I secure Mecca.



Oooh, another warmonger with Caesar! Oh it will be a bloodfest, what with all the wheeling and dealing.

(It's just sad that in 2320BC, I'm already planning to use, abuse and backstab these fine leaders.)



Not just a few warmongers, but a choice! This is a well designed Adventure! Hi Izzy! (Okay...we also met Bismarck and Hatty.)



Oh. That's where I put Orleans. Another good spot. All these floodplains and food resources are fantastic.



Now this is pretty cool. I think Saladin just pulled off a Farseer slingshot! He just built the Oracle (for us, heehee) and must have chosen MetalCasting. Why, I'd demand it from him if we weren't just 2 turns away from discovering it the old-fashioned way. We must demand something from him just before we start our axe-assault! Kindly, he gives us IronWorking.



I think these fine workers would love to join the French Empire! A declaration of war and they decide we are certainly worth working for!

Medina is protected by two warriors and an archer. Here's our initial assault force:



Medina is soon ours. Actually, so is Mecca. But this was a surprise!



That archer should have disappeared with the fall of Mecca, but I guess it means there's another Arabian city somewhere. I thought for sure that Saladin would only have 2 cities at this point. I went back and checked when I blackmailed him for IronWorking. I guess I wasn't even connected to his trade network and so couldn't tell how many cities he had. Oops. Rats, I thought this archer would just disappear. I guess we'll have to use him for more experience.



Ahhh. There's Damascus. With a 2-archer defense, this won't take long.



Well, it didn't take long, but it was a bit painful. Those two wounded archers are easy promotions for the remaining axemen, but also represent two axemen of ours who were sacrificed to the cause. Oh well. One enemy civilization down.



Not long after that, in 500BC to be exact, we finish our research in Code of Laws and--somewhat to our surprise--found Conficianism. In a good place, too: Orleans! We should be able to pump a goodly number of missionaries from this production city. I was a bit slow on the draw, and only caught part of the pillar of fire that inspired the Orleansians.



We'd actually picked out a nice production site down by the pigs, but Alex put a city too near the location. We'll have to kick him around for that. This is a great site too, though.



Note to the fine readers of this alternate French history: At this point, the record of this civilization is lost. The above image, taken when they apparently discovered Construction, is our last surviving visual indication of their progress.

Many theories have been offered as to why they only destroyed one civilization in this Adventure and then failed to continue to thrive. A minority of scholars actually think it was a decent start for the French.

Most scholars agree, however, that the French were overwhelmed by the simple size of the world and the fact that no one on the planet could find it in themselves to torch the cities of other nations to the ground. Perhaps if they'd researched Civil Service earlier, their Bureaucracy could have prevented the Imperial Implosion, but that is speculative.

Fragmentary documents have come to light which indicate that the French intended to quickly crush half the planet's surface and compel its citizens to work toward the great French Technocracy.

After achieving a dominating tech lead, the plan, it seems, was to generate a huge cash surplus, enough to support a vast military blitz force with no further income. Then, apparently, this evil dynasty planned to whip its own citizens to size 1 and 2 cities, and attempt to take over the remaining civilizations of the world as fast as possible. Culminating in a last-turn conquest victory with the best troops rolling through all the remaining cities of the world simultaneously.

But, they didn't do that; they only dreamed of doing that. They finished the Adventure, Compromise's first, with but a single point.

Domination date - 1906

Score - 9 points.

Catherine of Russia and Bismarck remain standing but on the ropes.

Details to follow.

End game notes:

The end game turned into a nuclear winter for Russia and Germany. They were just too big to take down with tanks and I didn't think I could reach all of their towns before the borders of the first taken towns popped to hit the domination limit.


I developed the tactic of wasting the cities with nuclear weapons, destroying the defenders with gunships, then moving troops in for a simultaneous kill when all was in readiness.

An alternative would have been to start the conquest from the inside out by capturing interior cities first.

However time was not on my side, and a couple of towns on the edges of the map popped their borders out to claim the last turf needed for domination. I didn't pay any attention to their culture growth.

The Details

Other than a few barbarian battles and the capture of a barbarian city it was a quiet 4000 years in the Realm of the Sun King. Scouts were busy exploring the world (know your enemies) and the people of France studied hard on the knowledge that would bring them prosperity and happiness in the coming wars, for war was surely coming.

Research path was Mining, Bronze Working, Hunting for the scouts, Pottery, Writing, Mysticism, Masonry and Paris starts the Pyramids, Polytheism, Priesthood, and Code of Laws.


Confucianism founds in Lyons and immediately spreads to Paris. Lyon begins working on a temple to get a priest for the Prophet. Spreading the teachings of Confucius is an important part of the plan: religious allies and the money from the collection plates in cities all over the world are vital.

Religion was an important adjunct to the military and every expeditionary force carried a missionary either with it or not far behind. And missionaries were constantly active elsewhere, at home and abroad. As many as could be were on the ground at all times.

Paris built the Pyramids in 725BC(T86), the French adopt Representation and Organized Religion and get started on learning how to fight a real war with swordsmen and catapults and elephants.

The Hanging Gardens goes up in Paris in 75BC(T112) for a nice boost to the population and the first Engineer completes Chichen Itza in 200AD (T123). Paris is going to need the priest points to overcome the Engineers so it starts a temple to go with Chichen. I need that shrine up and working as the missionary efforts are beginning to pay off and my first religious ally is now in the fold (Bismarck).

By 100AD the economy is where I want it and it is time to start the warfare. I have already picked my first three targets (Alexander, Isabella and Kublai Khan on the east side of the Inland Sea) as my scouts have revealed that their lands will add to the manufacturing capacity of the French while Saladin's to the east is mostly green (I want him to turn those meadows into towns for me then I will consider relieving him of the cash flow), and Mansa and Bismarck will be my guardians against Caesar on my back. Cyrus and Hatsheput will be the punching bags on the other side of the water. Catherine between England and Egypt will do as she pleases, as always.





The French are a little weak on the power curve but that is about to change as iron is due to be connected soon and we begin producing swords and catapults and elephants.



Five cities were founded by the French and one captured from the barbarians by 225AD. The seventh and last built was founded as late as 1080AD as a coastal filler to prevent poaching by the neighbors.

The Core Three



The West



The Barbarian South




And in 225AD the wars begin with an attack on Corinth.



There is immediate success at Corinth and Sparta then a little back and forth as Sparta is retaken by the Greek.

In 700AD the Kong Miao goes up in Lyons thanks to Zoroaster out of Paris.

Athens falls in 800AD followed closely by Thermopalaye and Delphi in 960AD.

Meanwhile Bismarck is pounding on Hatsheput on the other side of the Inland Sea.

In 980AD The Great Library goes up in Paris.

The Greek is down to one city, but to get there the French armies have to cross the lands of that other psychotic Isabella so she gets a war declaration too in 1060.

War with Isabella proceeds apace and what I thought was the last Greek city falls in 1130AD and I discover that Alex has captured a barbarian town in the far northeast of Saladin. So peace is signed with Alexander.

I begin the process of turning Athens into a second troop depot. Orleans has been handling the major part of that effort up to this point.

By 1390 the Spanish Queen rests with her ancestors.

And the time has come for Kublai Khan



And the realm at 1440







The Grand Armee



Logistics are atarting to get tougher with the war in the SE and the producitve capacity in the north. The worker force is doing what it can to turn Spain and Greece into productive areas. The Kong Miao is proving its worth as the shrine income is carrying the cost of the military.

Kublai Khan is simply unprepared for the French war machine. By 1555 (18 turns later) he too rests quietly in the dustbin of history. And in a sideblow Alexander will soon be no more.

I could show you the statistics but the only thing that has really changed is the size of the army. It is now twice the size of anybody else's and is looking for its next victim. Still supporting the cavalry with catapults but Steel is next on the research path.



Items of note include the missionary count and the number of seige engines. Those two things are a constant in the military planning as missionaries are essential to keeping the troops moving, and the seige engines reduce the losses of higher price troops.

In 1570 things start to get interesting as without any prompting on the part of the French Mansa declares on Caesar, Bismarck goes to war with Hatsheput (again) and Catherine of Russia declares on England. The French join with Catherine in the English war as the English border butts right up against the old Spanish lands and there is Big Bag of French Ticklers on the border (lots of cannons and cavalry)

By 1615 England is no more and Mansa has asked for help against Caesar. The French grenadiers and cannon and cavalry are only too happy to oblige. Bismarck smells the blood in the arena so slips in the back door to help.

In 1650 it is time to separate Saladin from all the cash his towns are generating so the French Cannon-Grenadiers-Cavalry (CGC) gallop into Arabia and quickly take Mecca, Medina and Kufah and Najran. While in the west Rome is crumbling under the combined French/German/Malinese forces. The French contribution is to hammer the defenses down to nothing, kill a few defenders and let Bismarck and Mansa race each other to the spoils.

Meanwhile in the south Catherine has declared on Cyrus and begun the dismantling of the Persian Empire. She suffers a few setbacks, however, so French troops began the long march from the east and the west into Cyrus's land to give the lady a helping hand.

The Arabs are off the world stage by 1735 but it is just too much of a trek to get into Persia so the French leave that war for the Russians and turn on the Malinese with the help of the Germans. Mansa ends his career in 1795 and most of his lands are in German hands. I kept the cities closest to the French western border but let Germany have the rest.

Bismarck is feeling really frisky after his Roman holiday and tour of the Sahel, so with hardly any urging at all he goes off in another direction - towards Thebes with murderous intent. But like most of his efforts it gets stalled by Egyptian Resistance so his French friends step in to help and finish the Egyptians for him in 1836. He is the primary beneficiary of this war as the French are now wrestling with the problem of achieving Conquest before Domination while preserving enemy cities....

Cyrus is next on the Franco-German-Russian hitlist and it is at that point the scientists present a solution to the problem of Conquest before Domination - Nuclear Weapons and Helicopter Gunships supported by Tanks and Infantry. Bomb them into the Stone Age, destroy the city defenders with the fast moving gunships, then capture them all in one strike with infantry and tanks.

War against Germany starts in 1872 with a Russian sneak attack even as Catherine is cleaning up Persia with French troops doing most of the heavy lifting. Cathy asks for our help against Germany in 1888 and artillery and infantry begin reclaiming the Roman and Malinese lands.

Rocketry is learned in 1868, Combustion in 1886, The Manhattan Project goes up in 1888, and the first ICBM launches in 1900 against a German city in a test of the nuke strike/gunship tactics. All goes as planned!

In 1902 another German city is reduced to smoking rubble and the defenders massacred by gunship rockets but 1904 is the banner year as four more cities are ripened for plucking.





And it is in 1906 that a cultural expansion in Rome and another in Santiago on the very south edge of the map ends the Quest for Conquest. I was a lttle surprised at the Roman border expansions as the town was first captured by the French in 1665, given to the Germans in an effort to trim the landholdings some years later and only just recaptured from the Germans in 1902. The combination of the Creative trait, a State Religion and cultural memory must have contributed.

The real enemy in this game was not the opponents but the logistics of moving troops to wherever the active battles were occuring. It just flat did not occur to me to use the Inland Sea to transport troops, though I did keep a couple of caravels busy moving missionaries around.

The tactic that kept the French war machine in high gear was the high level of missionary activity. Having the Kong Miao and a dedication to producing as many missionaries as possible and having them follow the troops made the support cost of the very large military bearable. I now think of Monasteries as an important adjunct to barracks.

As a first time poster I think it is appropriate to say Hi to everybody and introduce myself as a CIV4 player, before the actual Adventure 8 report.

"Hi everybody!"

I've been playing CIV4 for some time now and in the beginning it was kind of hard to play at higher levels than settler or chieftain. After all it was a time since I was playing the original release of Civilization. I almost dropped the game because of the complexity, but then I found this great thread with a SG by Sirian and Sulla, called "Cuban Isolationists" and I was hooked. So already now I want to thank these two and others that besides of playing well, also takes the time to write excellent reports that are great fun reading.

Although my playing and reporting is of much lower quality, I thought I would try to repay people on this forum by posting a game report to at least one of the events taking place. And Adventure 8 seemed to be a suitable to do so. I apologize for not having any screenshots, but I'm also not familiar of hosting any homepages, so this has to do.

Have fun!

This is the first RB adventure I post, and I think it was a good game.
I was Louis of France on Noble with conquest and domination enabled, and 1 point was awarded for each civ conquered. (11?)
Obviously, I would be heading for the grand prize and a conquest victory, but checking the settings and seeing that the NO CITY RAZING
option was enabled, I knew it would be difficult to get conquest before triggering domination.


I decide to settle one south of the starting spot. Paris is a nice city with some floodplains and hills.
It also has got corn and stone for food and wonders.
I go for mining first and BW second, and send the warrior out to grab huts.
Production in Paris is set on a worker.
I pop two huts (gold) with the warrior and go for the third right outside borders of Paris to the southeast.
In 3680 was an eventful turn for me. Mansa Musa shows up to the west, meaning he is close. Those skirmishers sure are hard to deal with. When warring with Mansa, you usually have to wait untill you've got cats or maces, in order to deal with his skirmishers. That sucks, cause I want to do some early warring to get an upper hand technologically and productionwise.
In the same turn, I pop a tribal village and it gives a free tech... Guess what it was? Bronze Working! Wohoo! I had only spent two turns or something researching it, so this was indeed a nice break. Copper is found right ouside the capital.



I'm supposed to be warmongering right? This could sure mean a very early axe-rush.
Maybe I can even take Mansas Capital before he gets those Skirmishers out? On Anything higher than Noble, I would think it impossible, but in this situation....
Mansa would need a couple of turns researching archery and building his first skirmisher.
If I do this right I might capture a second capital real quick.

For research next, I figure that the I don't need any worker techs very soon, so I decide to try for a religion.
Mysticism is next.
3440 BC: Meet Saladin, and Buddhism is Fidal. That's probably Isabella at work.

3360 BC: Worker is done, and Mysticism comes in. I go Polytheism and try for Hindu. Worker immediately go mine the copper.

When the copper mine is done, the worker starts roading it, and the city starts working it, getting a warrior done at the same time as the copper is connected.

3160 BC: Copper is online, and I use 80 of the 160 gold I have gotten from huts to upgrade the finished warrior to an Axeman. I don't think I've had an Axeman in 3160 BC before.



I then send it straight west to find Timbuktu.
2920 BC: Poly comes in and I am the first to dicover it and found Hinduism.



This start has been perfect, everything seems to go my way.
I hope to find Timbuktu soon, and see it without skirmishers defending.

It's 2800 BC and I decide to go to war against the Mali civilization with my lone Axeman.



And to my great pleasure I look upon the city of Timbuktu with only two WARRIORS for defence. Mansa, you are

2680 BC: The Axe outside Timbuktu takes out the first Mali warrior with 3,7 strenght remaining and the first promotion due next turn.



2640 BC: The great city of Timbuktu is captured with a worker inside! What a start! I happily count One down ten to go.



2560 BC: Masonry comes in, and I start pottery. I want cottages on those flood plains and get the commerce going.

2240 BC: I settle Orleans on a very nice spot.



1920 BC: This is my empire at this point.




Stonhenge completed in Paris a couple of turns ago,
and I plan to build a city somewhere between Timbuktu and Paris. There's still some fog between the cities, and I hope to find some horse there.
My Spread out civ will be vulnerable to barbarians, so some chariots would do nice as border patrol.

1520 BC: Everything is going quite well. The second settler is soon done and will make my fourth city. Then I will build the Pyramids.
I guess I will try to go for the CS slingshot as well with the Oracle, but it might be to late for that. This is noble though, so I'll give it a go.

Without problems The Oracle was done in 950 BC and the Pyramids finished 4 turns later.
Time to build up an army and start taking out some more civs.



500 BC: Rheims has just been founded, and another city will be placed here where the axe is standing on the next screenie.



Both will focus on production throughout the game and for now build maces, which will be possible in 8 turns when machinery comes in.
I might not even need catapults against Saladins archers, so they will be ready when I go the other way and take out Caesar.





After a long two front war, I took Rome in 640. Saladin only has one city left, and The maces are going west to finish Caesar completely.

With the no razing cities rule, I wonder how to best kill of as many enemy civs before triggering domination.
I guess building up a huge army of tanks and taking as many civs out in a single massive strike with transports from the central lake will be best.
I'll need to take out all the remaining enemy cities within something like 4 turns of eachother, before they come out of revolt and the borders expand.



1000 AD After a long war with Rome and Arabia, and a long boring buildup, I have a nice chunk of the map. About 25 % of the landmass is inside my borders.



My plan now is:
Go for Cavalry as fast as possible, build a great bunch. Then go pillage maniac on all of the AIs. That will slow them down bad, and pay my research.
Then when I get to tanks, the AIs will be quite backwards and it will be possible to take out a lot of cities in a short amount of time,
allowing me to kill all the AIs before the domination triggers.

I get Liberalism in 1160 AD and choose millitary tradition as a free tech.
Go for gunpowder and then lots of cavalry

I kick of a golden age with Taj Mahal and start pumping out Cavalry.
Soon I'll roll over Bismarcks lands.

Here's the horsies in Germany. I can make up for a -100 gpt with the gold from the pillaging. And Bismarck will have a hard time getting his economy going again after this.


Notice that I am also in war with alex. Superior tech and production makes it possible to circle around the lake on both sides and burn the enemy lands but not their cities.

I did this to one by one of the AIs to keep them from cathing up in tech and power.
At about the same time as I reached the bottom civs, England, Spain and Russia, I was starting to get some trouble from the defending troops. Fortunately, that was at about the time I got tanks and artillery!

I used transports to get tanks stationed across all the AI lands to get ready for the final strike.

Before:

After:






I'm happy with getting the conquest victory here. In the end it wasn't hard to do it, but figuring out how was the trick.

11 points

(the P is silent)

Well, I wasn’t going to play this game at all since I’d been on a France kick lately, (see my “Teers 02 game at CFC ~ kind of neat experience based on the “man in the iron mask”) and am Beret’ed out. However, after my thrashing in Adv7, my eventual thrashing in Epic3 due to my lack of military and Louis’ underhanded attacks ~ I needed revenge. So, a little warmongering for me was in order.

Here's a quick exec summary from work:

6 civs were eliminated = 6 points.

Early techs: mining>BW>pottery>myst>poly>Priest>AH
Builds: worker first>warrior>warrior(?)>settler

1280bc: oracle
700bc: Pyramids (didn't revolt until about 1000 years later)
125bc: Saladin done.
1370 ad: Mansa finally done.
1635 ad: Alex dead.
1735 ad: JC dead (courtesy of Hatty and my 7 gifted cavs)
~ 1850 ad: Isabella dead.
1884 ad: Bismarck dead
1900: declare on Mongolia
1904: Dom victory.

more complete report and screenies to come later today.

Results for my Adventure 8 can be found here:

http://home.earthlink.net/~tvandyke96/adv8/adv8.htm

Enjoy the read!

http://www.regoarrarr.com/civ/replay.php...=11&page=1

Domination win in 1840, 6 civs eliminated. Ended up with my personal top score ever.

Hi,

I had intended to present my first ever RB report for this adventure.
Yes, i played it
Yes, i had loads of fun
Yes, the french legion of doom came out victorious (domination)

However, i am on a business trip this week and cant upload my report until the end of the week

I hope it is ok if i delay my report.

Bulwark

Recently I found myself in some Monarch games where teaming up with an AI via Permanent Alliance seemed the only way to actually win the game. I'd like to hear your opinion about it - do you consider this a "real" win (besides from variants like Adventure 7 were it was intended to be so) ?

Imhotep

Here is a link to the Epic's page. Please refresh the page, if you haven't already, to see the updated variant rules.