RB Civ 5 SG 4 - Ryder Cup American Team

[NobleHelium]

Well, it's probably better to run the scientists somewhere else, like in Boo. They've only been there for like five extra turns, and remember that Kim is running scientists for the next GS. Those scientists could be 8 base hammers in Holmes which is in a much better location. Washington has cannons, but it doesn't seem like anyone else is close to artillery in tech.

[T-hawk]

Hmm, activity in the European team thread. Probably they're celebrating because we've just gone past their win date or soon will. (Not that we're competing on speed, but speed is an important part of how impressive a game was played.)

I did fire scientists at Holmes and hire them at Boo, more on that later. And I decided it was time to annex Cink/Beijing. We have the happy to spare for the moment (+10). It's currently building a useless Arsenal (third defense building). And we have 3 turns of Golden Age left which can build the courthouse pretty quickly.

Here is our problem on the tactical front versus America:



Visibility. Those artillery could be shellacking Philadelphia and Atlanta from the safety of home territory outside fireback range... if they could only SEE the targets. Tagazha builds a SCOUT to do this. (Great production at this city by the way, 27 hammers builds it in a single turn. Still making use of that +15% production from the Honor policy.)



Better. The scout later died, but I also built one Lancer with Sentry to do that job expertly. Don't get him killed! He's not for fighting, just for sentry visibility.

On a related topic, I'm a big fan of combat roads and workers. Laying roads in a combat zone gives you so many more options with siege units. Look at this case:



I'd love to use that one cannon to blow up that Lancer (while the artillery shoot Atlanta), but it can't see past the forest. But thanks to the combat road I built on the hill west of Taghaza, that cannon can swap with the artillery and both can get a shot this turn.

Anyway, our main problem with conquering is NOT ENOUGH ARTILLERY. We only have four, at least three of which were upgrades. We should be building a lot more and that's what I ordered up in most cities. In Boo I started the National College, we have enough research left to do that it will help.

Stuff that happened:

- Liberated Venice, and sent a worker to repair its wines.

- Spawned a Great General, where I made the executive decision to pop yet another Golden Age since we have two on the combat lines already.

- Took the Honor experience policy.

- Conquered and puppeted Atlanta. It came with Stonehenge.

- Conquered and puppeted Philadelphia. We didn't really need it, but I had artillery idle while waiting for roads towards Atlanta to get built. It has gold so I kept it rather than razing.

- Conquered and razed the coastal Mongolian city between Venice and the capital.

- Started a project to shift the road from Holmes more directly west rather than requiring all the units to walk through Dublin/Mahan.

- Did not lose a single combat unit, just the one scout.

- Reached the top of the scoreboard!

Technology: Kim is approaching a Great Scientist. I think bulbing Rep Parts is the obvious use. I slowed the GPP to just one scientist, so that we won't pay extra maintenance on the GS before using him. We are 1-11-17 turns away from Acoustics-Scientific Theory-Steam Power.

Boo is working scientists too, although it's 48 turns until the city will reach 500 GPP. A Public School could speed this up. I'm not sure what to bulb though. Both Flight and Combustion need oil for their units, which means more researching to Archaeology-Biology. Maybe just Railroad.

Big overview:

Save at 1600 AD, turn 230.

What to attack next is up to the next leader. I'm not sure if the one artillery and three rifles will be enough to capture the Mongolian capital; I think it will but might cost a rifleman or two. Versus America, I think it's easiest to just keep conquering both Seattle and Boston on the way to Washington. Artillery are just broken in how they can fire on a city without the city being able to fire back.

Of course, we'll want to gouge George and Genghis for peace as soon as we take their capitals.

[NobleHelium]

Nice.

We can still opt to raze Philadelphia later because Taghaza can easily claim the gold once it's gone. We're fine on happiness right now though so no reason to raze it. And uh is it just me or has Philly claimed tiles up to fifth ring northwest of Timbuktu? If we have some gold lying around I'd buy that sheep and banana outside of Tondibi for Furyk and Gao before the Songhai can reclaim it. We also might want to buy a harbor at Furyk for three hammers from the fishes.

And where is our iron coming from anyway?

[T-hawk]

Yes, Philly has claimed tiles to fifth ring over there. That was another reason I kept it, to keep the territory for mobility purposes. All the American cities have claimed a ton of tiles. Must have taken the Tradition opener and Legalism early, and also the cities are pretty close to each other so the borders flowed together early then expanded outwards. Oh, Philly also has Machu Picchu (+25% trade route gold) so we should keep it indeed.

We have a 2 iron source at the Mongolian city we just captured. But we also had iron on my previous turnset and I couldn't figure out why then either. Just looked again. Turns out that Taghaza is built on top of a 6 iron source! The resource icon doesn't show underneath a city.

We do have gold, 620 now and making +80 in Golden Age. Can't buy the sheep unless we annex Gao. The banana costs 140 which the tile probably wouldn't recoup by the end of the game. Same goes for a harbor at Furyk, 580 gold plus 3 maintenance for just 3 hammers is too long a payback to be worthwhile.

I think we should save money for rifle - infantry upgrades. We won't have much income post Golden Age, as usual.

After we capture Karakorum, we should make sure to get Beshbalik too, conquer it if he won't cede it in the peace treaty. Need to walk through there to rejoin the armies, plus it has ivory.

[Gaspar]

Nicely done as usual, T-hawk.

I'll play tomorrow night.

[NobleHelium]

Beshbalik looks like it'll become the new capital if we take the capital first, so we'll likely need to conquer both. I'm not so sure our gold income will be that poor outside of GA, it's improved a lot during the GA turns compared to our first GA segment. And yeah, we should keep most cities with a wonder in it unless it's really bad. I guess something like Stonehenge isn't worth keeping (on its own merits) because the city raises costs by more than the wonder produces.

[Gaspar]

Got this decent offer for peace from Georgie on the IT, but declined since we're soon in a position to take cities from him.



T231: Shuffling...

T232: See above...

T233: Yawn.

T234: More of same.

T235: More of same.

T236: GA over still in decent shape. Able to take Karakorum without the loss of any units:



National College done in Boo. Start a Frigate, a little coastal bombardment could help in the future Arabian and Indian campaigns.

Same turn, Seattle falls. Arty really are just awesome.



Decide to burn it since it really doesn't add anything useful.

T237: Temujin offers peace for everything he can. Unfortunately, I need Beshbalik to complete my set, so no can do KAHNNNNNNNNNN!



Right afterward Mahatma offers me this retarded peace deal, considering we have no units anywhere remotely near them. Sure buddy, so long and thanks for all the Sugar.



Gandhi completes Sistine as well. You wonder-whoring fool.

T238: Naturally, Gandhi denounces us again right after this. New Frigate discovers Krakatoa, which was right off our coast the whole time.

Setting up for attack on Beshbalik.

T239: Bah, lost another Rifle in the American theatre. I've been picking off Arabian troops who are completely ignoring us as they try to attack Askia. Pretty funny, actually. I know I was told otherwise, but I took Boston with the Lancer. Only unit able to capture in the area. Boston doesn't really have anything interesting that we don't have but since we're okay on happy at the moment I decide to puppet. Next player can feel free to raze if they prefer.



T240: Bah, lost a Rifle in Mongolia. Definitely too aggressive here, sorry guys. I take Beshbalik, puppeting. I then dial up Genghis and get Jenne and Open Borders for peace, since he's now in the red and 0 gold, but this way he can't snipe our units on the interturn. I set Jenne on fire, this makes us temporarily -12 happy. Anyway, this is Sareln's turn, I just wanted to finish off Genghis.

Here's a big overview:



If I didn't say it earlier, this was a brilliant set-up T-hawk.

Scientific Theory is in, so probably want to slip a Public School in Boo at least. We have 3 Coal already hooked at Mahan and a 3 coal source by Taghaza in addition to a 7 coal source by Atlanta. Obviously those need to be worked on. I don't have a lot to say, this is the part of the game where my computer which plays the graphically vastly prettier and more modern Diablo 3 without the slightest hiccup starts choking on Civ5 and I have to play in Strategic View the whole time which greatly decreases my enjoyment. Absolutely my number one gripe about this game. Anyway, here's the...

SAVE

[Sareln]

At least it's only -12 this time instead of -30...

[T-hawk]

Two lost riflemen, but it's still progress. Riflemen can be expendable when needed to preserve the more expensive artillery. And 9 artillery in the field now is much better than four.

We can make peace with India's city-states: Geneva, Florence, Bucharest, Monaco. No reason not to.

Boston came with a colosseum so it doesn't hurt much in happy to keep. But then again we really would like to get off the -10 angry production penalty. Up to the next leader.

T240: Anyway, this is Sareln's turn, I just wanted to finish off Genghis.

Eh, the handover turn can go either way for who plays it. Most commonly back in Civ 4 SGs, it felt more natural for the first player to do it, so the inheritor can tweak stuff if desired but he doesn't have to. Exceptions are common though if there's something big about to happen where the next player should take control, like my handover to you for war on the Songhai last rotation.

We'll capture Washington in a couple turns. What next? I think the fastest route to the finish is to send our current army to Germany then India, while we build a secondary force to simultaneously knock off Mecca. One thing that Pink Dot Mickelson did was prevent Arabia from expanding north, so that now Mecca remains exposed on the edge of Arabian territory saving us time now.

2000 gold in the bank, which is more than we'll need for infantry upgrades. Can I suggest annexing Hunter Mahan and/or Gao and buying the courthouses? They have decent production and could probably put out an artillery each by the end of the game. As an experiment, I tried with the current save. Happy dropped from -12 to -17 on annexing Gao, but then jumped back up to -9 on buying the courthouse. Seems pretty worthwhile. The 600g purchase recovers us over 100 hammers empire-wide this turn alone by avoiding the production penalty.

Also, Hunter Mahan has its Great Merchant bar almost full! Annex that now or else we delay the second scientist!

[Gaspar]

Yeah, I was thinking about annexing a city with the gold in the bank but was mostly focused on the wars I was butchering.

And yeah, sorry Sareln - it does seem to keep playing out that T-hawk plays the setup, I do the killing, you clean up the mess.