[Spoilers] AW with highly promoted LB!! (Liz of North America)

[AutomatedTeller]

If you don't want to spoiled for PBEM 34 (players/dedlurkers) STAY AWAY!!

This is a thread for Elizabeth of North America, who's anthem is:

My country, 'tis of thee,
Long live our noble Queen,
Of thee I sing;
Send her victorious,
Land of the pilgrims' pride,
Long to reign over us:
Let freedom ring!
















All other lurkers, welcome

[AutomatedTeller]

I should probably explain my choice of Liz, since basically everyone says that fin is nerfed.

I didn't really agree with the analysis. I actually think that Fin is strongest trait out there, by a fair margin, given the restrictions (3 cities, raging barbs)

If Civ is a snowball game, with that set up, you cannot snowball expansion - you only have 3 cities. You can't snowball units too much - you run out of money.

All you can really do is snowball tech.

Financial is the ONLY trait that allows you to gain a tech advantage. Charismatic allows you some, with the extra happy, but that gets overcome with HR.

I went back and forth on philo, spiritual, industrious or creative as my 2nd trait, as I thought those were the next strongest - culture will be important in grabbing land, plus cheap libs, and spiritual allows for many changes in civics, of course. I went philo, because GP are the other way to get a large tech lead. Industrious is quite strong, made stronger with the reinstatement of nat wonders.

That said, I don't know that this game gets to the renaissance. if it does, it will slow down immensely - teching with 3 cities will be slow.

My plan is to deal with barbs, get my cities into good spaces and tech while fighting off the others. To that end, I picked Native America, which is about as good a defensive civ as there is.

Other choices were Babylon, Egypt and Rome. But with 3 charismastic opponents, praets seemed not so great - shock axes own them, and with this many barbs, there will be shock axes. I thought about Inca - Quechas will do great as early barb defense,but they run out quickly.

I'm not sure NA was the right pick - my other choice was egypt, which would have worked well with my philosophical pick (the UB). And the UU is great, though you can't attack anyone on it, not on quick, not unless they screw up.

Well, we'll see.

I wanted to post my thoughts on the traits and why I picked liz. I may end up completely pillaged and losing horribly, because without cottages, I pretty much end up with 1 trait.

[AutomatedTeller]

oh - that was the first post title. Could I get a mod to change my thread title to the first post title? Once we get going, at least?

[AutomatedTeller]

We have started! don't have the save yet - guess I'l lget it tomorrow.

My opponents:

TT: Washington (Exp/Cha) / - Maya (Holkan [Spear] / Ball Court [Colosseum])
Zero: Brennus (Spi/Cha) / - China (Cho-Ko-Nu [X-Bow] / Pavillion [Theatre])
Serdoa: Lincoln (Cha/Phi) / - Mongolia (Keshik [HA] / Ger [Stable])

I know nothing about their ability or play style, so I guess I'll find out.

First thing - all of them are charismatic, so that's going to be a pain. Since I'm not, either that's going to be a big advantage for me or a big disadvantage.

Washington of the Maya - Expansive is somewhat nerfed, because we don't expand very far, but extra health should be good, and he'll be able to grow pretty well (with ball court and monuments, his happy cap will be 4 higher than mine. I expect TT will ingore monarchy/HR, which I expect to be important for me. Holkan is nice for barb defense, nothing special besides that. He's not an early game threat to me, in any case.
Brennus of China - Spiritual is a trait I thought hard about taking. I'm not sure just how good it will be, since I don't know how many civics changes we will have. No early UU is a weakness here. I think the pavilion will be useful in getting those late border pops faster, but the real benefit of chine, to me, is the traits, which are good. Zero will be able to get axes fast.

Serdoa - Lincoln of Mongolia. Philosophical is a good research tech, though frankly, I think financial is stronger. In any case, It's clearly a tech I think is strong.

Mongola is probably the scariest civ out there - Keshik's can strike from anywhere and with a charismatic leader, they are just 2 xp from 3 promotions!!


I would expect an axe-rush from someone... but I don't see how any axe rush can work in this game.

I'm kind of wondering if I screwed up in my choice of civ - maybe I should have taken a civ with a later UU/UB, one that I could have used offensively. Maybe I should have gone with a guilds UU - I had thought about Arabia - the UB fit into a philo strat, too (2 extra priest slots)

Well, the UB and UU should keep my lands safe for a long time - Keshik's could hurt, but they die on spears pretty well, and a fortified archer on a city on a high with walls and Guerilla 2 defends at 9.75, so they'll need cats, anyway.

[AutomatedTeller]

Since this is going to be a coastal start, I will assume I get 1 or 2 coastal clams/crab.

Questions for lurker:

If I get non-coastal fish and coastal clams - do I net the clams or fish first? Clams gets me a 20% jump in research over the fish (1+8+1=10 vs 1+8+3 = 12), fish gives me 1 extra food.

if I get 2 coastal, is workboat/workboat/worker/worker right? or workboat/worker/workboat/worker? I think if I do workboat/worker, and research mining/BW, I'll have BW before the worker is done and can chop/slave the 2nd workboat.

What do you guys think?

[Commodore]

The coastal start got outvoted, actually. This is your start, or a shifted mirror of it:



Workboat first is still valid, good on you for having fishing!

[AutomatedTeller]

Thanks, Commodore

Well, that's 9 or 10 tiles that get the commerce boost right off the top, so that's pretty awesome (depending on if I farm or cottage the plains tile)

Strong start for a fin empire. BW is less great with it, because there are really only 5 choppables (probably want to keep the forest on the fur), but it's hard to justify moving off the PH. I'm not sure what I'd have to see to to move.

I have the save and will play it tonight.

Currently, plan is workboat->worker. Might be warrior/warrior after that, might be dog.
Probably a 2nd worker after that, then I'll hopefully have an idea of my land, so then it's a settler.

Tech plan:

Mining/BW, then either hunting->wheel->AH or wheel->hunting->AH. Or maybe hunting->AH->wheel, to see where the horses are.

I wonder if people will be tempted by the gold. I'm hoping that's a good spot for my 2nd city, but moving the cap to get it a poor move. it would hurt if I couldn't get it in a city, but we only have 3 cities and if there isn't good food down there, it's hard to use it.

Looks like an interesting map

[AutomatedTeller]

I took a look at the save - we are on a lake, but can build workboats - I assume that we can't build lighthouses or collosus in the cap?

The lake makes the crab very powerful - 5-0-3. The fur will be 1-2-4 and the cow 4-2-1 (on the river). the wheat will be 4-1-0, the lake 2-0-3.

One interesting idea would be to move off the plains hill and onto the wine, giving me even more commerce to start, but less hammers. I don't think that's the smart move, but I'm not sure. It means losing 2 commerce from the wine at some point, plus losing the wheat.

I might have to sim it, but I'm thinking hunting->AH->wheel is good, allowing me to improve the cow, then the fur and then hook up the fur.

one oddity - it looks like Serdoa didn't settle. not sure why that is.

[AutomatedTeller]

As I continue to think, I am now thinking that Stonehenge should be a target.

it's cheaper to build 3 monuments than it is to build stonehenge, but stonehenge has 3 advantages:

1) More culture in my cap
2) GP points
3) Get the monument faster in the new cities. This is huge - I'll expand my borders 10-15 turns before opponents who have to build one.

Course, everyone is charismatic.

Since I'll be researching faster than anyone, maybe the right order is mysticism->mining->BW. I think I'll go mining->mysticism, to hopefully get a bonus on research by people who go BW, though.

That wheat is irrigated, so it's a 5-1-0 tile, which is nearly as strong as the cow.

Moving off the plains - I'll actually get the workboat faster that way (move off and work the plains hills, which is 4 hammers, as opposed to staying and working a 1 hammer tile until borders pop.

I think that's dangerous, though. A) I think it will set me up as a target B) it means I'm not on a hill C) it means I miss the wheat.

I'm gonna SIP unless something really good shows up when I move units out of the cap.

[AutomatedTeller]

I guess I can't attach files? Guess I have to open a dropbox account...


trying now:


I sent explorers out in all directions, saw the marble. I thought about moving towards it, but the land looked crappy and I remember "there will be marble and stone, but it will require sacrifice" and didn't want to move off this awesome site.

Settled in place, need to come up with a naming standard. Will do that by next turn.

Set research to mining/BW for now. I'll think more about mysticism.

I did create a sandbox to test out moving to the wine - got the WB faster, go the worker slower. Said screw it - the commerce is nice, not that good.

Some things:

Rocky, low sea level.

Serdoa has not settled. I assume going towards the gold or the marble - can't figure why he wouldn't settle in place otherwise.

There are 375 land tiles, which implies 93 per civ, 31 per city. I'm getting 18 in my cap. Finding the right spots will be important...

What effect does aggressive AI have? Does it make raging barbarians rage more? Or is it no effect without AI in the game?