[SPOILER] Nicolae Karpathia Khan of France

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Nooo ppeeeeaaaccee...

(Wish I could find that clip from Independence Day, that scene owned).

Ioan didn't whip, as his build box hadn't completed over the turn. Instead he reinforced Garofita with a spear and a jag. Great, it confirms he has those things, and that they're already promoted to W2. The chariot has retreated, no sense throwing away troops. Also of interest, Ioan promoted the axe that killed my chariot to W2 as well, decent idea as it lets him cover his vulnerable jags. Still, I don't see those hammers doing anything useful, I have a pair of shock axes covering the forest hills, he's very unlikely to get past them. There is a miniscule risk he can kill Mama next turn, if say his spear kills my shock axe on a hill, and the axe 2-moves into my city guarded by only a warrior. I'm going to 2-pop an axe next turn anyway, as my fish is currently freed up due to my capital 3-pop whipping a settler. After my next round of military builds appears, I'm going to switch to Buddhism to alleviate whip unhappiness (as it's autospread to all 3 of my cities).

Iron working came in, it's a total waste right now as I no longer have military control over the jungle . Going to sailing right now, I'm going to see if I can get a galley into that lake. I expect Ioan to leave nothing but a spear in Garofita, I'll see if I can boat it with an axe (and maybe a spear, just in case he has more, so I can choke the city).

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Of interest this turn:

I've also settled my 4th city, and spotted Ioan moving his settler north, most likely to settle 63 of the ivory.

Ioan is moving a jag northwest of Garofita, I'm not sure why he revealed it to me (it was in view of my chariot). That's okay, I whipped the axe earlier, completed a road, and will be in position to intercept the jag next turn. If he delays for another, then I won't need to bring up another axe to cover the worker so I can improve the pigs.

Sareln just won circumnavigation. That kinda scares me, I don't think he likes me alot, this could bite me badly. However, as long as I control the sea chokepoints, and keep up this expansion, I can probably afford to hedge my bets a little (by keeping archers in the backlines). He also settled a city this turn, it's a powerhouse city with fish and unrevealed iron in the first ring, and bananas, sheep and forest stone in the 2nd ring. I'd really like to culture-snatch those last 2 resources with my own city, but I have no idea how I'm going to be able to afford to spare the settler and worker turns and military. Too many competing priorities.

I've cancelled the boating plan for now, and am going for writing/mathematics/construction so I can at barge through Ioan's forces in the jungle. I daresay I can tech faster than he can. His food and GNP is poor. He still hasn't improved the forest sheep in his 2nd city!

[Nicolae Carpathia]

YES! We have peace! He probably figured he wasn't getting anywhere with his failed rush. I'm going to hold the save for a few hours so I have time to get home and hop on my computer and work out a micro plan. 10 turns of uninterrupted development from my angry neighbour with the 2nd highest power rating and 2nd lowest food? Yes please! I'm continuing the path to catapults, so if he settles any really annoying cities I can just roll them.

Ioan's came out ahead militarily, I traded 2 warriors for a spear, while he got a free axe. But somehow, I can't help but feel I came out ahead...

E: Oh yeah, and Ioan just 3-pop whipped his capital. Something tells me that it's a settler. While he started the settler build before I settled my latest city, he probably feels that he's falling behind. Good! Let's keep it that way! I just hope that city site I wanted doesn't get poached, I may need to stack some whip unhappiness. Then again, if he settles there, it's a weak site with poor production and only a grassland cow.

E2: Oh yeah, it's also T50. Time for a state of the empire with some pwetty pwictures.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

So. It's T52. About those pwetty pictures.

Ioan just settled his 4th city the turn after he whipped. He probably did what he saw me do, build a road on the city site and settle straight away.




This is a Good Thing. It means he's going to have to divert hammers to workers, and will be behind economically. After all, he's been spending all his hammers so far on troops. Not only that, but he didn't settle that poach site, so I can breath alot easier.










Here are my 4 cities. It's EoT, so they've just grown, I'm going to need to reassign tiles when it rolls over. I'm building up units for now as writing only just finished, and I want to dump my hammers into something as I grow.









Demos:


F2 Economy:


F5 Units:


I think I'm doing okay after being "rushed".

And if anyone has finally guessed my naming scheme, do let me know

[spacemanmf]

Queen, obv.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

I've made it my goal to complete the lyrics to the entire song. I no longer care about rolling over longbows with cavalry, what I really want to do is get to the choral bit.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Peace deal is over, Ioan's been massing a force near my cities. Wardeced to take his thread apart piecemeal before it could group up properly. Decided to attack Ioan's W2 Axe with a flanking chariot on 25% odds, won! Traded an axe for a Jag, so now my north is secure as well. Lost an axe on 75% odds against a chariot, it's going to heal to 3.1 and shock. Now I'm deciding, should I cover my vulnerable 8xp chariot with a spear? That leaves my city vulnerable if he decides to advance on my city directly. So no, I'm going to leave my juicy sentry chariot vulnerable as I can afford to trade him down. It would limit his options greatly, and I have interior lines of reinforcement.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Just 3-pop whipped my capital because I was scared of losing a settling race. Only reason I could think of for Ioan taking peace after losing control of the north. He'll be in position in 3 turns, Ioan's power has been increasing alongsides mine, so I hope he hasn't been slowbuilding a settler, but it's definitely overdue.

I was also originally planning on chop-mining my forest gems tile after mathematics came in, trading 5 commerce for 7 hammers, but decided not to because it would have slowed down maths by a turn and delayed other chops.

I should give a proper update, I settled 2 more cities in the last 4 turns, and I'm on track to settle 2 more important blocker cities. Both are fairly aggressive, but they're incredibly useful as they're both on hills and control alot of land.

Let's hope Ioan doesn't win that settling race!

Edit: Looking at the production box of Ioan's 2nd city, it's been going up by ~10hammers/turn. Looking at it's size, I can't help but suspect some of it is food-hammers, which suggests that it's working on a worker or settler. Let's hope it's the former, and that he doesn't suspect enough to whip.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Hrrmm.

I may have overstretched myself. Just a tad.

I just settled 2 more hyperaggressive cities in the faces of Ioan and Sareln, wardecced Sareln to scare him into a slew of whips and inefficient chops (successful!), and crashed my economy. Ioan is allowed to DoW me in 2 turns, and my defences are split between 2 fronts against him. I lack visibility on the majority of his forces. I may choose to "avoid growth" in these cities so that they get razed, I really don't want Ioan capturing them. I'm still ahead, I should just play a bit more conservatively.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

I've been naughty and not updating my thread, sorry, but it felt weird talking into a wall

I'm quite alive, currency has come in, and my economy has recovered (20% is breakeven, I'm making 18-20g at 0% slider).









(I popped silver from a mine, yay!)











I think I'm doing well.

Of international interest, GE built the Colossus (extremely good idea! Look at them coast tiles), Ioan landed Judaism, and Sareln built the GW to fight a culture war (questionable, we'll see how this plays out).

My strategy is to stick to this expansion-vertical growth strategy. I will say that I've been losing focus, my decisions are getting hastier and less efficient, I've been overbuilding libraries and buddhist monasteries, while I'm still 1st in power, I'm also 1st in land and have 3 fronts to defend (4 if I snatch up that barbarian city). I hope my opponents are more scared of me than me of them. Well, now that my economy has recovered, it's time to get more dudes out on the field!