[Spoilers] rho21 follows the works of Homer... D'OH!

[rho21]

Turn 72

Score tracking
Aztec finished another tech (13 now).
Kongo finished a civic (8 now, like me). No sign of conscription as yet, but perhaps any gold income won't show up until next turn.

Eastern Theatre
Cleared the barbarian camp. Hoping for more barbarians to spawn, the money is really handy.

Western Theatre
Kongo has a sizable force - at least 3 archers and an Ngao Mbeba - moving westwards towards Brussels. No idea if they plan to engage the Aztecs or take the city state. They'll need rather more than that to take the city: it has walls and a bunch of units.

Housekeeping
Civics swap time. I decide against buying the campus tile at Hippocrates (while Land Surveyors is still in operation). I just don't think I can afford another 72.

I need Conscription and Colonization and may as well have Charismatic Leader, which leaves me two wildcard slots to fill. I'm choosing between:

• Manoeuvre: I really want to get some chariots out before long, with the medium-term plan of upgrading them to knights and perhaps going on the warpath. Unlike horsemen, chariots cost nothing to maintain with Conscription.
  
• Agoge: more swords wouldn't be the worst of ideas, all told.
  
• Ilkum: I need builder labour badly.
  
• Urban Planning: still awesome.
  

I decide to stick with economy for now: Ilkum and Urban Planning it is. There's another swap in 4 turns, when I'll definitely bring in a military policy (ready for a chop at Xenocrates). Shouldn't be too long after that (maybe 5 or 6 more turns) until Defensive Tactics is done and Limes is available for super-powered +100% chops.

I've decided that Xenocrates will chop its walls into the encampment, once Limes are available. Accordingly there's no need to send the builder over from next to Hippocrates: I'll just build one in Xenocrates now. That builder can head back to Pythagoras and do something useful there.
I'm also producing a builder in Hippocrates now as it's just finished the ram.
I improved the jade at Hippocrates this turn which means all my cities are happy again.

More micro at Euclid gets the settler very close to completion after this turn, ideal for a chop next turn.

Forgot to take a screenshot this turn, but there's not all that much to see.

[Garath]

Chariots -> Knights is clever - I didn't know that one. But you've been talking about money as pretty pressured lately - are you going to be able to able to afford those upgrades? Will you need to try to find some time to build a couple of Commercial Districts and traders in order to do so?

Something occurred to me - I can't remember whether you've scouted enough of the eastern side to be sure whether there's ocean somewhere or whether the landmass connects all the way around as a strip. (I think I've explained that badly - does it make sense?). Basically, I want to know whether there's a potential for Aztecs attacking from either side in the mid- or longer-term future, or whether defenses can definitely be more concentrated in the west.

[rho21]

Money for upgrades is a big problem, yeah.
I'm heading for crossbows right now, knights are probably about 20 turns away. The policy for half-cost upgrades is perhaps 8 turns after that. Hopefully the Aztecs will let me wait that long to do upgrades.

They had a scary amount of income last time I was able to see it. I assume this is from working resource tiles with a big gold income. I must get cities out to claim my nearby truffles as soon as possible, they will really boost the economy. That would be another reason to chase after a religion, too.

I'm expecting to get a couple of commercial districts finished (plus an acropolis and an encampment) pretty soon. I may have to send trade routes to Geneva or Hong Kong just for the income, much as they are lovely for growing new cities at this stage.

The east is safe (except from barbarians), no land bridge there. Well, not north of Hong Kong anyway, and I'm pretty sure not at all given that this is based on a pangaea map. Defences can definitely be concentrated in the west. I'm intending to set up a strong line at the river north and south of Xenocrates (though there are a few sites on the far side of it that look promising if I can defend them). Then hopefully the 11 cities I can fill out to will be enough to hold my own economically.

I'm planning to send the hoplites west now, keeping just an archer and a warrior in the east to guard settlers and deal with barbarians. I should request open borders with Kongo so I can do a bit of scouting on the way.

[rho21]

Played turn 73 over lunch at work. Will report later.
The big foreign news is that another unmet city state has fallen.
Back at home, chop overflow from Euclid's settler means the first commercial hub is expected in 4 turns.

[rho21]

Turn 73

Score tracking
The Aztecs conquered a city state - Preslav according to rumour. They made 15 empire score this turn, so I imagine they founded a new city as well. The also finished a tenth civic. Still in the early classical era, so they now have all civics to that level.
Kongo finished a chariot, I think.

Western Theatre
I moved the great general forward for a little scouting, as he's invincible. I revealed a pair of eagle warriors and a pair of archers, guarding mountain passes into Aztec territory. If Kongo is coming to attack this, they're going to have problems. There are also quite a few units from Brussels milling about.

Here's what the general saw:

Housekeeping
Apollonius finished its granary repair and started a builder.
The forest chop at Euclid yielded 56 (and ), for an overflow of about 82 into the commercial hub. This should be done in 4 turns, as should the city's regrowth to size 4. The settler will be founding C8.

Research was set to Astrology as it's quick and I want to open up Stonehenge as an option. I'm considering chopping it out at Hippocrates.

I offered an exchange of Open Borders to Kongo, with 10 thrown in. Not that I can really afford it, but they are bleeding cash (-6/turn at last count) and have none in the bank so will see their units disbanded if they don't have another plan. If their strength drops, the Aztecs will attack and the game will be over. I'm wondering if Japper is completely checked out of this game. I'm certainly not sending any more good money after bad from now on though.

Planning

Here's a shot of the river to be fortified in strategic view. Once C5, C4, walls and encampments are in place, it will be a formidable line of defence. The white squiggly line drawn on the map shows the extent of coverage of the planned static defences.

Unfortunately, like the Maginot line, it will have the glaring weakness of an attack through the wooded hilly country on its flank. To fix this, I'll need a fairly weak city 1W of the isolated mountain SE of Xenocrates. Such a city would have a stone and quite a few forests to chop, and could put out walls and an encampment quickly. Kongo holds the flank of this city, so given enough defenders of an adequate tech level, this whole border should be defensible.

The other disadvantage is that I'd really like another couple of cities west of the river, near the north coast. They're going to be tough to defend. I'd rather not just cede this territory to the Aztecs though.

[rho21]

Played a turn late last night, not much happened.

Turn 74

Score tracking
Aztec gained a tech (now 14, like me; their most advanced is late classical though) and a pop.

Western Theatre
Nothing much moving except city state units wandering into the Aztec ambush.

Housekeeping
Kongo accepted open borders. My hoplites will head west through Kongo.
They also signed peace with the Aztecs and declared war on Brussels. Hopefully they can take the city state and set up a good defence there.

I earned my first envoy. I could use it to take sovereignty of Hong Kong, but there's not much point right now. Instead I'll save it until I can use it on Geneva for extra science.

---

And this morning a new turn was waiting. It was another quiet turn.

Turn 75

Score tracking
The Aztecs finished a new unit, from the looks of things. Probably a sword, horse or catapult.
Kongo finished a tech and gained a pop. Their military power is falling though, probably due to their continuing negative income. Not sending them any more gold.

Eastern Theatre
The hoplites are getting held up on their march west by loads of units from Hong Kong.

Western Theatre
Still not much going on. I set a trap for an archer in case they decide it's a good idea to kick my general.

Housekeeping
Astrology is done. There's most of a turn overflow, which I drop into Mathematics as it would take Engineering past the halfway mark.
Pythagoras puts a turn of production into the library while it waits for the chop into the settler which will overflow into a 1-turn acropolis.

[Garath]

Yikes. For all that your river provides a useful defensive feature, the Aztecs' mountain-hills line is *much* stronger. Puts paid to anything *resembling* even thinking of attacking that for a long while to come.

I think the territory west of the river isn't too bad defensively once the rest of it is in place, just because sending troops past Xenocrates like that would definitely overstretch supply lines and leave a vulnerable flank, IF the water above Near Wild Heaven is salt - part of the east coast. If the Aztecs have access around that (though I guess they can just boat over anyway, but it's not quite the same) then I agree that territory is very exposed and will be hard to defend.

It's really awkward at this point not having a good idea of how much more land the Aztecs have over there. If this line we can see now has more than half the continent on it, that's very different from the Aztecs effectively having more than half the continent to themselves.

Is Geneva now the only remaining city state? A lot have died already!

[rho21]

It isn't salt, it's a lake. There's a 3-tile wide choke point to the north of the lake that might be defensible, but it'd need a lot of force to establish myself there as there aren't many trees.

At a guess, the river line to Xenocrates then south through Brussels is pretty close to half the land area, really tough to be sure though.

Good question about the city states. We started with 8. The Aztecs have conquered three, on turns 28, 43 and 73. I invited the fortunate people of both Valletta and Yerevan to join the Greek empire on turn 67. Still standing are Brussels (the border city between Aztec and Kongo, at war with both), Hong Kong (on the east coast south of Apollonius) and Geneva (nicely hidden away in my back lines, though exposed to naval attack).

[Garath]

It's a shame Brussels is too far away for you to have any real influence on the fight - there's a *big* difference between Kongo getting it and Aztec getting it.

[rho21]

Turn 76

Score tracking
Kongo finished a civic and a tech. Still no sign of positive income, units appear to still be being disbanded. I guess this may just be how this game ends, there doesn't seem to be much point playing on if Kongo is just going to collapse. I guess I could ask them to transfer all their cities to me so we could carry on, but I'm not sure suboptimal would be OK with that, it's rather cheesy.

Western Theatre
Nothing moving on the western front.

Housekeeping
Swapped Pythagoras back to the settler and chopped... but apparently if you chop a settler while the food box is nearly full the city doesn't regrow until the interturn. As a result it's size 3 and I can't place the acropolis. D'oh. Instead the overflow will finish the library and the acropolis can be placed next turn.

Games & Recreation done, Defensive Tactics is set as the next civic research, due in 6 turns.
The new government drops Colonization for Manoeuvre. I can easily afford to hold off making settlers for a bit.

Hippocrates has finished its builder and starts a chariot. I'm going to look at chopping a couple of forests into Stonehenge here, via a chariot and walls. Maybe that will work out.

C8 is ready to plant next turn.

Nothing much to screenshot.