Civ 6 SG2 - Duty Free Egypt

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

Difficult turnset. I felt I set out on the right path then kinda got waylayed... Not really feeling like I did it the best it could have been.



I feel I started well. I did a bit of general tidying up. I swapped a lot of cities to a more production over food orientation especially those at the housing cap. IMO working 2 cogs over 3 food is a good idea when it goes through the severe housing penalties that there is. Especially with neighbourhoods just around the corner, the extra food gained is marginal at best.

I also made a few corps. It halves the maitainence of the units involved and cleans things up a bit. Also with the 3 corps I got the mobilization inspiration straight off. I moved everything towards valencia so we could do something there if needed. I also noted our universal denouncement and chuckled, whilst checking around and noone will offer us any nice deals, so I basically ignored diplo. Got a couple of workers over the next few turns too.

I did look up and note the saving envoy idea, but did some math in my head and spent them on jakarta. With the amount of CZs we have, I think this was well placed. This netted us 8 gold per CZ. With just that move and the making corps, we were roughly 70gpt richer. I think overall they were wise moves!

Next turn this rolled up.



I decided to pass noting the high GEng points of Greece thinking that they could nab this and then we would be pretty much sorted for getting most of the others. This bonus is a bit meh I think as well personally. 

Also got a decent ish trade too



Note I swapped off R Parts. I felt the push to electricity and radio more useful straight away, and that we could soonish eureka RP also.

I noticed this too - pillaged mine in madrid. How long has this been there?



All goes a bit tits up turn 184. The AI has a habit of doing these non joint joint declarations. I think the war triggers are perhaps too generic? Annoying. Very annoying. Whilst no cities are under threat, perhaps we should have had a better navy like Norway said to prevent his fecking coastal raids. At least all cities can bombard now.




I sent everything up to China to see what we could do... Note they are all corps so not as paltry as it seems. Harold was pissing around our iceball south pillaging, annoying Nan modal and pillaging around the inner sea



This was supposed to show the combat odds, but basically the ironclad would kill itself in about 3 attacks and would take near 50 to remove the walls. I felt this was a bit pointless then.



At least I got Ruhr!



I pushed on China but didn't really make much impact. Combat AI is still poor. China moved the frigates around rather than engaging the helpless embarked units. Captured a 1 charge worker though! GO US!



Also that scouting warrior managed to pillage a pasture for gold before getting beaten back and killed by 2 more clubmen and a slinger. Bare in mind we could have infantry at this point, and china allows a tile inside it's caps influence to get pillaged by a warrior and only has starter units to fight it back.



Still - naughty us for warmongering!



We get to have Gustav Effiel. I snap up this chap. Annoyingly it seems Norway bought the other chap so Greece still has a decent GEng pool of points. Need to be careful not to loose key GEngs. The faith built up could be nice to get some GPeople.



Greece joins the fray! They still despise us mind. 



The combat odds vs the city are a bit grim... That 60 damamge on the crossbow corps is from one city centre bombard. China still sailing merrily about with the frigates letting me move my forces in unaided, but letting the ironclad melee the ranged ships!



I haven't reported the Norway defences well, but here they are ending turn within range of our static city that has been there forever letting us kill the caravel...


Ending shot. I was thinking of landing the bombard corps and seeing whether it can get the walls down in a timely manner. If not probably just best to flee. Could flee now with little loss too should we wish.



Some points that I didn't state with pics - just the one Norway frigate outside Cobden Cheviliar. Worker slowly picking up the pieces in his wake. There are a few workers there and should be enough. I did the bombard action this turn in case you missed it.

I started Big Ben in the cap because very few other places can build it. It needs CZ with bank adjacency on river. It is on hold whilst a +6 neighbourhood gets built.

I started the colossus in one of the Eastern Seaboard cities. At 400 prod for a TR I felt it wasn't too bad (13turn build)

I eurkaed Steam Power buying a Shipyard.

I placed lot of neighbourhoods. In hindsight I should have used the +50 gold per housing policy. Didn't think of it at the time. I don't really ever do the carpet farming so didn't occur to me. Lost a thousand gold or so... Grr. 

Civics went a bit awry during the war. I upped the catapult and the swordsman in the upgrade policy before swapping back out of it (this would have been the time to place the neighbourhoods in that civic). As we are god for amenities currently I got out of the district boosting civic for TR science boosts (16sci/16culture not bad IMO) As we are not getting builders atm I swapped that for the unit cost reduction.

I left the gold balance high for 2 reasons. One to decide whether we push the war and buy units, and 2 because burning 2 turns of Effiel we can get Big Ben like now (I have already chopped into it and it is 300/1450) and this doubles the treasury. We could hold fire until it would be really worth it. 

Natural history has made some tiles unusable now. Can't do anything with the antiquities...

New load of city state quests.

Overall a bit meh. I think the war should be abandoned personally after that poor showing. We can raze the Great walls for 50 gold a piece currently. 

Great people - I would avoid the next GS, but try for all the others. China will steal a merchant at some point.

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

SAVE

[Ruined Everything]

Nice turn set REM! It looked pretty good (although you're a better player than I am, so perhaps standards misalignment?)

Some thoughts:
- That mine was actually pillaged on my turn set. At one point, Spain had been having difficulty with happiness and spawned a couple sets of conquistadors, which were generally annoying until I got crossbowmen into position. 

- I'm sure a determined push, as always, could break China. Bombard corps are very good against cities (although I think pound for pound having separate bombards gets down the walls faster?) It's still probably the optimal move, but feel meh about warmongering and will be fine either way.

- Jakarta was definitely the right move - I didn't realize that it existed. Jakarta's gold in the mid game is actually reasonably powerful.

- I like the Big Ben -> spending spree idea. 

- Have we started our campus run yet? We've grown well but our science is pretty meh. If we're not going to destroy China, I would start getting science up.

[Sareln]

I also like the doubling of money for Big Ben.

For the wars, if we take a city then give it back in the peace-deal, is that net something which reduces our warmongering penalty? Also, there's a time-decay on it as well iirc, is it possible for us to weather the storm and let the AI cool off, or is it the far future and there is only war?

Other than a few defensive boats in the water, I'd be inclined to just carry on with the space gameplan.

[pindicator]

Edit: Whoops, forgot the order there.

[Sareln]

Got it and have played 3 turns or so, should be able to get the other 7 in tomorrow morning.

[Sareln]

Wasn't able to catch it this morning, so my next play window is in 12 hrs.

Thoughts from the first 3 turns I want to consult on.

The bombard is doing about 40 hp / turn to the walls, so we can bring Longxi down I think. I've bought an exit tile in case we need to evacuate by land though. We have about ~4600 GP, I'm inclined to spend it on workers, and/or entertainment buildings to relieve our amenities crunch, either that or turn it into an ironclad fleet to fend off the Chinese navy, maybe hold about half of it in reserve for GP sniping.

For worker actions, I've just been gravitating towards mines or previously marked farms, tech was a 1 turn detour onto steam-power but then focus on Chemistry. Eureka is a completed research agreement, which I don't think we'll be getting...

[Sareln]

Pictures to edit in later.  First surface the save ASAP

Pre-play thoughts.  Hold gold for big ben, defend, get worker labor out to the cities. Try not to rack up more warmonger.

T190:

Madrid is at -3 purely on WW it seems like.  The Automatic distribution system seems to not account for this, as there are many other cities which are fine?




What I assume was the captured worker is spent on a fishing boats for Barcelona

Move worker around Madrid to chop jungle tile next to neighborhood.  Does the neighborhood's appeal get updated or is it only at time of placement?

I almost buy a caravel out of Cobden-Chevalier b/c I won't want the Norway Caravel to pillage our harbor, but then I notice the harbor isn't done yet and it should die to city fire so I hold off.

Around Longxi, I pull back wounded crossbows which can still snipe out the Chinese chariots and land the bombards.  I assume they can't shoot over the hill, so they'll have to advance onto the farm to get range on the city.  In the meantime the knights give flanking bonuses against the frigate...




T191:

Apparently the city-center + nearly-dead frigate are enough to clear our non-corps knight.

Finishing the neighborhood in Silk Road inspires Conservation, it Continues Big Ben (12 ish turns), use a charge to bring that to 6.  I think it correct to double-charge Eiffel into Big Ben.

Trader finished in Trade Winds, start on another.

Commercial district finished in East India Company, continue the neighborhood there.

Chop a Jungle in Madrid, finishes the neighborhood, I start the entertainment district, b/c this is a ton of unhappy.

T192:

Longxi kills the iron-clad in combination with the frigate fleet.  Ugh, I don't think we can hold this here.

Flight is in, Steam Power gives us ironclads and show coal and is mostly done (1 turn left).  What, how did we have an ironclad then? I'm confused.

After that I think to tech Chemistry for the research lab builds & continuing on towards rocketry?

British Petra-oilum finishes its neighborhood and I opt to have it produce a quick Trader (2 turns).  Holding off on the worker builds until we have the policy up.




Cobden-Chevalier brings that Norwegian Caravel down.




Pop Eiffel to double ~2300 gold into ~4600, about 7 turns worth? I slot in Liberalism for now. Silk Road could one-turn a monument or work on its harbor, I choose the harbor.  Also of note that we can build Potola here, though it would mean giving up one of our 5-6 production hills.




T193:

We lose a crossbow around the city.  I'm trying to bring units away from the water, as getting doubled-up by the city and frigate navy is rough.




We have 3 sources of coal, all already mined and in places we like (Common Market, Silk Road, and a 3rd shared between them)

Consider buy options, probably the strongest may be to buy universities?

Take a look at the GP List.




T194:

China bombards, maybe kills a unit, but offers peace with some gold and citrus for our trouble, which I say yes to (they hit the bombard with two frigate fleets & the city center, killing it ).  Norway does the same (without the bombarding), offering silk and cotton, and some gold.  I also accept.  Absolutely no point fighting here.




I also embassy both of them, since they haven't denounced us (we just got done fighting...)

I do buy a pair of universities for 750GP each.

T195:

Mass Media In, swap policies.  Looks like we lost retainers as an option? Slot in Rationalism for faster teching. Drop Trade Confederation for Free Market, assuming we can convert the gold into culture/science more efficiently than the yield from the trade-route (+20 Sci/Culture per turn vs. +300 GPT which can be cashed into +10 Science per Turn from Universities every 750).    Ideology will come in in 3 turns, so there will be another swap then, probably to builders.




T196:

Regret a little bit not taking the worker policy, as I really want to buy workers, but they don't get the charges right now.  Gold income is 593/turn though!

T198:

Greece offers a whole mess of luxuries on our part (Pearl, Jade, Citrus, Tea) for Marble and 70 +13 GPT.  It looks like they're all doubles for us, so maybe we actually get to be not enemies?

We also land John Spilsbury, which gives us toys.  I finally remember out discussions and buy a pair of muskets to land the Replaceable Parts Eureka.




T199:

We get a great admiral, he is encamped in Madrid's port.  Also the next great Merchant is Adam Smith (+1 Economic Slot in any government.  We may want to spend our payout on him, depends how much you value the earlier slot, as greece is at 234 +4/t and we are at 38 + 23/t with a target of 420.  Ideology is in, I put us towards conservation for forest planting and naturalists/national parks for boosts + amenities if it's an issue. Swap craftsmen for public works, next one should buy builders, have fun .




T200:

Chemistry is in and time for the handoff. I suggest buying workers, making a national park for the boost to radio, and keep teching towards rocketry (it goes through radio).  Oh, also buying research labs where available?  Civics wise, maybe lay down sewers for the boost on democracy then pick it up for Great People patronage?

The Save

[Ruined Everything]

Looks like a strong turnset. More thoughts later, but could Madrid's WW problems be because we conquered it from Spain? We should really finish Philip off. How could the world hate us more than we already do?

[Sareln]

Looks like a strong turnset. More thoughts later, but could Madrid's WW problems be because we conquered it from Spain? We should really finish Philip off. How could the world hate us more than we already do?

Finishing Spain off at this point involves a world-tour, as he's plopped down a bunch of small cities along the Greek Coastline.