A (2nd) modded Civ4 playthrough - PsillyRevolution

[Psillycyber]

For the past 10 years I've been tweaking a personal mod of Civ4 based off RevolutionDCM.  There are too many changes to count and I never kept a formal changelog.  I explain more about the mod here in this thread where I started a first playthrough of the mod on Emperor here:
https://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/show...#pid815313

Well, that first playthrough was quickly becoming a snowballing blowout of the AI, partly because I guess my Civ4 skills weren't as rusty as I assumed, and partly because the AI gets knocked down about a level in difficulty from dealing with the Revolutions mechanics.  So, I'm starting a 2nd playthrough in this thread, this time on Immortal difficulty. 

(By the way, I put that thread in the "Adventures & Epics" subforum, but then I realized that that is more for multiplayer succession games, so I'm putting this 2nd playthrough here instead).  



I chose Jan Sobieski III of Poland to show off a new civ and leader from the RevolutionDCM mod:



From playing ahead a little bit, I can already tell you that this is going to be a CRAZY roller-coaster of a game.  So HERE WE GO!

The starting location:



I'm thinking settle-in-place unless the scout reveals something amazing.  SIP gives the capital irrigated corn and lots of riverside forests and jungles.  Why are riverside jungles and forests important?  Because in this mod, you can build camps in any forest or jungle tile, and we are going to get most of our early commerce from camps on those tiles.  

Tech-wise, I already start with all of the worker techs I'm gonna need, so I'm gonna go straight for Priesthood for the nerfed Bureaucracy civic (+50%h, +50% GOLD, +50% city maintenance) even though I don't expect I'll snag Hinduism on the way there.  



I find some horses and some coast exploring to the NE.  We appear to be on a sort of peninsula, which is great because it will make fogbusting versus barbs a lot easier!  Also, STONE!  



As Warsaw's borders expand, I find two goody huts just to the south of the capital.  



The first goody hut gives 43 gold.  Also, as I expected, we don't even come close to snagging Hinduism.  There must be another starting civ that started with mysticism and beelined straight to Hinduism.  The second goody hut also gives gold.  80 gold total between the two of them.  

Also, there's THIS:  a starting barb city (from having "Barbarian world" checked on the starting options).  



And this city doesn't even have a garrison for some reason (which is weird.  Usually they start with a couple of warriors...).  Alas! I don't think I can take this city anytime soon.  My capital's production is pathetic, and by the time I get 1 or 2 warriors over here, the city will surely have 1 or 2 warriors defending, and I'd have to have delayed my getting a worker out in the meantime.  Plus, this city is too far away to keep in the very early game (due to revolutionary unrest scaling with distance and lack of trade connection with the capital, especially in the early game).  So, snagging it is out of the question.  The only question is, what will happen when this city gives birth to a new civ (which is something that can happen in this mod).  Usually when that happens, the new civ gets a fairly big army and a golden age to start off with.  It can be frightening if you are unlucky enough to be right next to such a civ when that happens.  (Hint: foreshadowing...)

Another goody hut spotted!



This goody hut gives mining!  Not essential at the moment, but it will speed us onto bronze-working whenever that becomes relevant....



My scout ends up right next to a bear, which kills it on the interturn.  I should have known that animals would start to come out and that I ought to start being more careful with my scout.  That'll be 1 more scout I'll need to build for fogbusting eventually.  Oh well...



Someone builds Stonehenge VERY early.  Also, here you can see the power of early riverside camps.  The 2 commerce is nice, and you might ask, why is the tile giving 3 food?  Because the starting labor civic in this mod, communalism, gives extra food from camps and pastures, and also makes units built with food.  Sounds great, right?  But it also comes with +50% city maintenance and -10% commerce and hammers.  It's not a civic that any decent-size civ can stay in forever, and is outclassed by slavery and serfdom at a certain point.  But in the beginning, it really speeds up the early game and gives the player a reason to consider staying in the starting civic for a while.  

Also, I'm building the monument mainly for the +1 happy from charismatic. 



We meet Shaka.  He shows up with a scout, which is fortunate because our capital still doesn't have a defender...



Many uneventful turns.  Priesthood comes in and we immediately revolt to (nerfed) bureaucracy.  



Now with our +50% hammers and having grown to size 7, we can plow those hammers and food surplus into 1-turning some warriors and scouts as fogbusters, which we need to do because the barbs will start showing up soon.  



Pottery comes in.  We might want to build a granary at some point in preparation for going into slavery (although granaries only store 20% food, kind of like in FFH2), but the main point of pottery is just to get to masonry so that we can start building the Oracle.  



I get some javelin peltasts out as fogbusters.  They are resourceless and available with hunting, and in most cases slightly better than 3-str warriors (although warriors get +20% melee combat, so javelin peltasts can be situationally worse, but are usually a slight upgrade).  



I detour from my masonry beeline for The Wheel so that I can expand to a 2nd city and get trade routes connected.  



And here's the 2nd city.  For food, it will have irrigated corn at first, and then ocean fish eventually. 



My fogbusters are getting into position.  There is a convenient mountain chain that serves as a great chokepoint, so as long as I can clear the fog within that boundary, I think we will be in a good position vs. barbs even without copper or iron units.  

We also receive a negative event worsening our relations with Shaka, but I doubt it will be relevant anytime soon because Shaka's borders must be some way off. 



We get enough fogbusters out and, with masonry in, start on The Oracle.  The plan is to oracle Code of Laws for Confucianism and courthouses (actually, Semjiks, the Polish UB that is cheaper to build and gives culture and +1 xp to mounted units).  



OH NO....the moment I've feared...the barb city has spawned a civ.  I don't think the Aztecs will come after us quite yet.  But once they graduate from minor civ to full-fledged civ, we could have problems....



I forget what I was trying to show with this screenshot...maybe just how neat and tidy I had all of my fogbusters set up?



Writing comes in.  I've been skating by without any military techs so far.  I wonder if I will come to regret that...



We get the Oracle and slingshot Code of Laws!  (Also, you'll notice 1 barb warrior did manage to slip past my fogbusting net from the hills to the east.  I've gotta clean him up somehow...)



Bronze-working comes in.  And look!  We have copper in the 2nd ring of our 2nd city!  Just in time to build some spears and axes to guard against our new Aztec neighbors, right?  Right???...



I start frantically building military even before getting the copper hooked up, and put a few units in what I think will be a strong position on the hills across the river.  And it WOULD be a strong position for defense...if I had enough units.  But I don't.  And here come the Aztecs, SWOL from their emergence from being a minor civ.  



I briefly swap to slavery to do some frantic whipping.  (Being spiritual is nice. No anarchy!)



I get archery, just in time for the Aztecs to declare war on me and overrun my pathetic border guards.  To be fair, if those units had been archers, it wouldn't have made a lot of difference. 



They easily take my Confucian holy city.  And LOOK!  It appears they have even more chariots than I first assumed. 



At this point, I was tempted to ragequit and question whether the boost that minor civs get was OP.  But notice that chariots don't do great when attacking cities.  And my capital can 1-turn archers.  Maybe I can hold this.  

I'll be honest, at this point in the game, I did not think that it would be remotely possible to ever win this game.  I thought, best-case scenario, I would be able to punish the Aztecs at some point and retake the Confucian holy city.  That was my goal.  That was my mission.  That was my solemn oath.  So I played on...

But the rest will have to wait until the next installment....

[Psillycyber]

To be honest, I didn't take as many screenshots in the turns right after the Aztec invasion because I considered this game a throwaway at this point, but I played on nonetheless. 

The next screenshot I took shows the Aztec stack sitting at my capital, ready to siege it down with capped rams and storm it against my 9 archers, 3 javelin peltasts, and 2 warriors. 




I also happened to get my first Great Prophet from The Oracle on this turn.  My original plan had been to use this GP to found the Confucian shrine, but of course the evil Aztecs spoiled that plan, and I didn't think I'd be getting the shrine city back under my control any time soon, so I settled the prophet immediately in my capital.  Since bureaucracy civic gives +50% gold, this will allow me to build up a huge gold surplus while also running 100% research (although my research would remain somewhat pitiful as long as I was stuck at only 1 city).  

I looked forlornly at my civ only having 1 city while the Zulus raced ahead to 5.  Like I said, I was sure that I was out of the race for this game, and I was merely determined to "roleplay" the rest of this game and at least get some revenge on the Aztecs.  

As it turned out, I would lose about half of that stack to the Aztec attack on my capital, but the Aztecs would lose more than half, and the rest were mostly redlined.  I remember I did have to heal up and sacrifice a few units to take out a few Aztec units that had not gotten redlined from the attack so that I could finish off the redlined ones.  Thankfully, the indecisive Aztec AI kept shuffling the stack around rather than sitting it in place with a medic I unit to heal.  A few turns later, and the initial Aztec stack was mopped up.  

You might also notice that I have iron right outside of my capital.  As soon as I finished archery, I went for iron working, and I got lucky.  Now that the Aztec stack was mopped up, I could hook up the iron before the next wave of (slow-built) Aztec attackers arrived. 



This Crusade was a huge event.  I was determined to retake the holy city anyways, and this way I could get the shrine auto-built by the event and not regret having settled my first Great Prophet as a super-specialist in my capital.  \

By the way, that Great Prophet super-specialist was now pulling in +8 gpt (rather than +4) because I was running both Bureaucracy and Despotism (-50% culture, but +20% hammers and +50% gold in capital and +1 hammers on farms).  

I research alphabet.  This will be useful for extorting some tech from the Aztecs once I have had some revenge on them.



After building some iron units to supplement my archers, I'm able to whittle down the garrison in Krakow and retake it.  By the way, one thing I like about having a nerfed bureaucracy available early, aside from giving a consolation prize for the priesthood tech line, is that it allows small civs a chance to get back into the game even with a rough or cramped start.  I was able to build almost a dozen iron units in about 15 turns and completely turn the war around against the Aztecs. 



We finally reclaim the holy city and get the shrine auto-built.  Yay! We have 2 cities again!  (Meanwhile the Zulus have had 7 cities for a while...yeah, I had completely given up hope of winning this game at this point.  But I played on...)



I capture 2 badly-needed Aztec workers with a guerilla-2 phalanx...



...and dial-up Montezuma for peace talks.  



Thus ends our (first) war with the Aztecs.  I've reclaimed the holy city, dealt with the initial Aztec wave (they won't be getting any more free units in the future like they do when they graduate from being a minor civ), and now I'm ready to catch up as fast as I can on expansion to the east.  



Here's the full screenshot of what the Despotism civic does, by the way.  



We're also gonna go back to slavery after having spent a lot of time back in communalism to build iron units in the capital as quickly as possible with the food surplus.  But now I'll need to whip out a bunch of infrastructure and try to get my economy and production caught up with the leaders.  I also switched to Organized Religion around this time too to help my cities build infrastructure more quickly.  I started to have some hope around this time that maybe...just maybe...I could catch up with the scoreboard leaders a bit...



Monty has no hard feelings (he shouldn't; after all, he declared war on me), so I get open borders with him to scout him.  I was even wondering if I might be able to be long-term allies with him since Confucianism had spread to his cities and a shared religion would mean a lot to him, but I think our border tension and his aggressive personality just about guarantee that he will try to pick on me again in the near future...



I found my third city (finally!) and have a plan to chop-out a monument to get that stone hooked up ASAP so that I can try to snag the Pyramids still in my capital.  I also end up settling a Great Prophet in this city to speed the border pop (which will otherwise be REALLY slow since I'm running despotism with the -50% culture).  



While I have 10 turns of peace with Monty, I send an expeditionary force down south to take care of a barb city that I saw pop up on the edge of the fog.  I sure don't want to have to deal with yet ANOTHER civ spawning with a sudden doom stack.  I will also get some gold from the city raze and from pillaging the city ruins.  I might even be able to snag that worker too...



Boom! Stone is hooked up, and I can complete the Pyramids in 7 turns in my capital!



We reject some threats from Monty.  Yeah, he's gonna come for us again, but I'm okay with that.  When the time comes, we can turn the tables and use it as an opportunity to take the rest of the Aztec cities.  



I get metal casting.  I bet I can still snag The Colossus.  I don't plan on working water tiles in my capital all that much (and in my mod, the Colossus only boosts commerce in the city's water tiles), but at least it will give me great merchant GPP and a trade route bonus.  Also, forges are important.  (In this mod, +10% hammers, and +10% additional hammers for both copper and iron being hooked up, and I have both, so +30% hammers overall). 



We found a 4th city (in the north) and close in on clinching the Pyramids.



In my mod, the Pyramids starts a golden age.  (By contrast, The Parthenon opens all government civics).  So I get to start a golden age, which will help my cities get forges up and running in no time.  



I'm also keeping an eye on the Aztecs while I go into builder mode.  I still about evenly match the Aztecs in military, and I have a VERY strong defensive position on hills across a river, so I'm not too worried yet by this mini-stack.  



After the forge in my capital, I start on The Colossus:




Meanwhile, the Mayans are getting bogged down fighting an upstart neighbor of their own, the Byzantines.  Look at that stack!  And look at the Zulu with 10 cities already!  I am starting to suspect that the Zulu might be over-expanding and might have financial and revolt troubles soon, which might be my only ticket for catching up to them...

[Psillycyber]

Speaking of the Zulu, I had hoped that the one consolation about the game leader already having 10 cities to my 4 would be that they would be far away and have to go through some other poor civ before they would border me.  I hadn't seen hide nor hair of the Zulu borders up until this point and assumed they were quite far away.  Well, apparently not far enough!  Here they are with their ELEVENTH city, right on my doorstep!  They are also fielding an even-deadlier version of their unique unit, the Impi, in this mod.  



That said, it's not all bad.  This city must be some distance away from the Zulu capital, and the Zulus have to be paying an arm and a leg on city maintenance, even at Immortal difficulty and with their maintenance-reducing barracks, AND notice that it already has 83% Polish culture in it.  That's from Influence-Driven-War, another part of the RevolutionDCM base mod.  When you win battles in an area, you spread your culture, and that particular culture of ours is from when my expeditionary stack just recently took out that barb city.  Of course, the Zulu city will eventually pump out its own culture to overcome that, but in the meantime this city's revolutionary instability is going to be dangerously high for the Zulus.  Don't be surprised if we see a civil war break out in this city in the near future, long before the city will end up paying off for the Zulu.  Maybe I can even snag it from them in the process...

But before we worry about the Zulu threat, we have the Aztec threat to respond to.  I've had a scout watching the two frontline Aztec cities for the last few turns, and now it seems like they've conspicuously moved a stack out of those cities closer to the border.  I expect a war declaration next turn...



...and there it is.  



That said, I'm not too worried about this pathetic Aztec attack stack right now.  I have three strong units on each hill tile across the river that neatly and conveniently separates our territory from the Aztecs, with fortification bonus, and some with guerrilla-2 promos.  As I expected, the Aztecs did not even try to punch through this defensive line.  For the next few turns, their stack milled about, apparently not sure what to do.  It wouldn't even help the Aztecs to try to go around the mountain chain because I had a unit also guarding the only southern pass in my lands as well.  The AI logic was probably dumbfounded. 

Tech-wise, I just got calendar, which will raise my happy-cap by 1 with a spice plantation, and in this mod I can build (non-resource-yielding) plantations on any flat jungle tile.  Keep in mind that, in this mod, I can't chop jungle tiles until machinery, so plantations will be the best improvement I can put on these tiles for a while.  They give +2 commerce and +1 additional hammer with slavery.  That's a lot better than just the +1 commerce from a camp.  



Next, I'm going for currency for more trade routes. 

This was a huge stroke of luck from the RNG:



The spread of Confucianism in that Zulu border city all but guarantees that it will try to revolt in the near future from the predominantly Jewish Zulu Empire.  We can take advantage of that. 

What's more, I just got another great prophet.  (I think my 3rd in this game so far?)  I'm also going to settle this one like the other two.  This time, it is going to be in a brand-new border city 3N of the Zulu border city.  The great prophet will add yet even more cultural pressure on that Zulu border city to all but ensure that I can capture it in the near future with the aid of a revolt there.  My new border city will also get silver in the 2nd ring.  I considered settling 1W to grab both silver, but I'd rather have the extra grassland farms to help this food-less city grow.  



And there's the new city.  Unfortunately, since I'm running Despotism, the GP super-specialist will only be putting out +3 cpt instead of +6.  Still, it will only be about 30 turns before I'm putting culture directly onto the Zulu border city.  And I'll get the silver hooked up in only 4 turns. 

Note that, thanks to all my GP super-specialists and small empire, I've mostly been running 100% science this whole time.  Only now am I starting to run a sizable deficit at 100%, but I'll still be able to coast on this for a while.  

The forge is complete in Krakow, my holy city, and after a barracks finishes, this is going to be my unit pump for this war against the Aztecs. 



Therefore, I settle a Great General in Krakow as well.  I had been keeping this GG on ice in the capital in case I wanted to settle it there or use him for a golden age (possible in this mod), but since Krakow is going to be my main unit pump, the GG deserves to go here.  



Note that I already have 1 GG settled in my capital, so my capital can be a secondary unit pump as well, although it is very tempting to build wonders in my capital instead because it is my great-person-pump.  I will probably build nothing but units for the next 10 turns or so and then switch back to wonders/infrastructure in the capital.  Thanks to my capital's bureaucracy bonus, I can 1-turn swordsmen out of there.  And Krakow, even without the bureau bonus, is not far behind that level of production.  

Scouting around, we find that the Zulu capital is indeed quite a distance away.  



This further reinforces my confidence that the recent Zulu border city is going to revolt soon, and also I notice that the Zulu don't have a lot of land tiles.  They aren't financial, so sea tiles are never going to be stellar for them either.  Their geographical situation may be a saving grace in this game that prevents them from developing a runaway economy.  

We also meet a Khmer scout (not shown), and it appears the Khmer are about on our level currently, although they aren't willing to trade any techs and are (presumably) even further away from us than the Zulus, so the Khmer are not really of concern right now.  

There was one tad issue with founding that 5th city to encroach on the Zulu border city:



It gave the Aztec AI an accessible target to go after.  Now, I do have some fortified guards in the hills guarding the passes, but not as many as are guarding the river border further north.  I suspect the Aztecs might just suck it up and take a few losses to plow through those to get to Gdansk.  I am going to need to rush reinforcements to Gdansk ASAP.  Boy, am I glad that I decided to build that city on a hill!

Meanwhile, it seems the Mayans have the upper hand in their never-ending war with the Byzantines.  



I'd prefer those two to stay locked in a stalemate so that I don't have to worry about any threats on my eastern front, especially because Judaism spread to the Mayans and they are growing peeved with us over religious differences.  

We meet the Mongols to the SW of Zululand.  



They are a small civ, probably an upstart from a barb city, I would wager, and unfortunately don't have anything to trade.  Just as long as they don't get absorbed by the Zulus, I'm happy.  

Here's my capital after I get camps replaced with plantations where possible.  This city is ROCKIN!  



The Mayans are even more peeved with us after we reject their extortion attempt:



As expected, the Aztecs try to plow through my defenders sitting on the forested hill west of Gdansk.  They do take the hill, but at grevious loss to their stack, while I only lose a couple of units.  



Tech-wise, currency is in, and now my plan is, roughly-speaking, to go Construction --> Machinery --> Engineering in order to unlock crossbows and faster road movement.  Machinery also comes with a lot of new tile improvement possibilities, including the option of chopping jungle (and in this mod, jungle gives 30 hammers just like forests).  



HA HA!  The first minor revolt occurs in the Zulu border city!  I'm sure that city's revolutionary instability must be through the roof!  And the city still doesn't even have any tile improvements yet!  The silly Zulu AI over-expanded without even having enough workers to make the new cities pay off productively.  That city is only a liability for the Zulus.  



Maybe at 400 BC, turn 150, it's a good time to have an overview of the world.  Here's the tech situation:



The known world:



(Note that I was thinking of building a settler and expanding to the NE across that mountain range, but I soon changed my mind before the end of turn because I realized that I would be stretched too thin trying to guard that city against the Mayans, and I should just let them clam that land and count on the mountain chain to be a convenient border with them, and instead I should focus on expanding west against the Aztecs and, later on, the Zulus). 

Resources.  The Zulus have ivory, so we can expect to see war elephants from them, which I'm not thrilled out.  (War elephants are str-7, so, slightly nerfed in that way, although they also get a first strike and do a little minor collateral damage).  



The wonders screen.  Somebody whom we haven't scouted yet is building a lot of the wonders.  Thankfully, it's not the Zulu, so that's another reason for why I have to assume that the Zulu economy is not great.  Thank goodness!



The GNP screen.  As I suspected, the Zulu economy is really no bigger than ours despite them having 11 cities.  Our capital is just so strong. 



Production.  Once again, the Zulu do not actually have great land.  A lot of sea tiles instead.  Meanwhile, we have a great capital and a great unit pump in our 2nd city.  



Crop yield doesn't look great.  The Zulu still have long-term potential, although like I said, a lot of the tiles they will be growing onto will be 2/2 sea tiles.  



Power.  I'm glad we aren't at war with the Zulu yet.  They look scary.  But notice our power spike.  That's not even from using the whip.  That's from 1-turning units in our capital and unit pump city while our other cities build infrastructure.  



That same turn, we meet two new civs:  the Egyptians and the French.  We don't have graphs on them, but I can see roughly what techs they have.  Sadly, none they are willing to trade.  The Egyptians are at 5 cities.  The French, at 3.  





The French and Mongolians are...apparently...at war with the upstart, insignificant "Chinese Tribe."  I don't yet have the full picture of what is going on over on that other side of the world, but apparently there is some serious fighting going on because I'm seeing a lot of Great Generals being born...



But for us, our focus is on putting an end to the meddlesome Aztecs once and for all!...

[Psillycyber]

Construction comes in.  I consider trying to build the Hanging Gardens in my capital since the capital is going to have tons of good tiles to work, and it will be constrained more by health resources than happy resources over the long run, and the Hanging Gardens in this version of the mod would help with that.  But it appears that my capital is too northerly in latitude to build it.  



So instead, I start on the Chichen Itza.  Didn't I say that it was going to be difficult to resist building wonders in this capital, even during wartime?  



That said, thanks to my stone and capital production, it's only going to take 6 turns, and it will actually provide a huge bonus to my military production afterwards, so it will pay off even in military terms in the long run.  

But, just as soon as I get ready to start on the Chichen Itza at the start of the turn, a hurricane hits the capital (obviously, the game punishing me for getting greedy for wonders!) and destroys my barracks and forge.  



I am not worried about losing the race to the Chicken Itza, so I rebuild my forge first and then plan to resume the Chichen Itza afterwards.  

A spy is caught around Gdansk (probably Zulu if I had to guess), and the Aztecs show up with reinforcements:



But meanwhile, I have my stack finally ready to go on the offense into their territory, where the Aztec cities are not very well defended now that their main stack is out of position trying to attack Gdansk.  



We actually get an event that could help patch up relations with the Aztecs, but I have absolutely zero interest in that.  I'm not even sure if there was any upside to picking the "no mercy" option, but I did it anyways since relations with the Aztecs are going to be of absolutely zero relevance in about 15 turns.  



Notice also that I left a swordsman near Wroclaw to guard against Pacal in the east...just in case the Mayans get tired bashing their heads against the Byzantine walls and want to go after us instead.  

We easily capture Tlatelolco and raze it since it is an absolutely miserable city with no food resources and no intact infrastructure or specialists. 



The Aztec attack is closing in on Gdansk, but I have just enough defenders in place, and walls will be ready just in time to stymie the Aztec attack while MY offensive stack makes decisive gains in Aztec lands.  



Here's finally a glimpse at my offensive stack.  The Aztec capital's garrison stands no chance.  



The Aztec capital is a VERY nice prize, with a granary, a GG, and a GP.  That's the 4th settled Great Prophet bringing in the Great Profits to my empire.  



Meanwhile in the east, as I expected, the Mayans are claiming that area to the NE of my eastern border.  It would have been futile of me to try to try to plan a city in that spot while I had my hands busy with the Aztecs.  I feel good about the decision to call off the settler build for this spot.  



Machinery is in.  Lots of stuff for my workers to do now!  



At this point, I actually made a detour to literature to try to grab the Great Library rather than go on to Engineering as originally planned.  I don't even think I'll need crossbows in order to finish up the war with the Aztecs.  

Justinian comes begging, and I give him Alphabet since he seems to be the underdog in the east, and he is now quite pleased with me due to that and shared religion.  A reliable ally going forward in case I ever run into troubles with the Mayans. 



Literature in.  Gonna build the Great Library in my capital.  



Afterwards, I continue the hiatus towards Engineering to grab aesthetics and meditation first for Confucian monasteries to spread my religion and consolidate control over my empire.  (Note that Organized Religion in this mod does not allow building missionaries without monasteries).  I'd especially like to make sure that Judaism or some other foreign religion doesn't spread to my most far-flung Aztec conquests because that would seriously increase the revolutionary unrest in those cities. 

I mop-up the trivial garrisons in the last two Aztec cities (not even worth showing onscreen) and I make peace with the Aztecs in exchange for horseback riding.  



I have "require complete kills" on (it's kind of mandatory for Revolutions to make sense because rebel civs will usually spawn just units first, and if they aren't able to immediately take over a city, they would just be deleted without having "require complete kills" enabled).  So, the Aztec attack stack that had been besieging Gdansk will just wander around homelessly in the no-man's land to the SW of my empire...until they decide to restart some mischief against me, or until I am ready to getting around to finish off that stack.  If I can eventually kill off the Aztecs for good, it will be nice because I can get rid of all of the Aztec culture in my conquered cities and have much less revolutionary unrest in those cities.  

We are now second in city count with 8!  Although now, in addition to the southern border, I also have a pseudo-border with the Zulu to the far west where they could try to land some sort of amphibious invasion of that peninsula if the AI is smart enough.  



I keep 4 units in Texcoco just in case while I send the rest back to a more centralized location in my empire, ready to react if the Zulu try to start something...

...Speak of the devil.  THEY ARE COMING.

[Psillycyber]

So, I'm at war with the Zulu, and my next step is...to finish The Great Library with the help of some jungle chops.  



Yeah, I know it seems kinda silly to be at war with the strongest army on the map, and to not be building military in one of my military pump cities.  But to be honest, the Zulu invasion stack is kind of underwhelming.  I already have half a dozen units defending Gdansk, and as long as the Zulu don't have another stack coming up behind that first one, I think I will be okay just building units in my main military city as of now.  

I swing some trades, trading literature now that I am very confident that I'll beat everyone else to the Great Library. 



And then this trade:



And just at the right time, a civil war breaks out in the border Zulu cities as the Arabian rebels rise up against them in several cities!  (Note that, in this mod, Camel archers are unique unit replacements for horse archers).  



The Great Library is in.  The capital 1-turns a Confucian monastery for the research bonus mainly, but I also might build a missionary or two out of here to get missionaries ASAP to the most important frontier cities.  



The next turn, my capital gives birth to a Great Merchant.  I settle him in the capital in order to take advantage of all of the capital's bonuses.  



I also figure it is high time to switch out of bureaucracy back into kinship networks, the starting economy civic.  My capital won't be as strong, but it will greatly improve my overall finances now that I have 11 cities.  



I rationalize giving Suryavarman literature by the fact that I've already traded it around to others.  In hindsight, maybe I should have just told Sury off since the Khmer are looking to be the next strongest competitor after the Zulus.  

I also give in to the Mayans:



At this moment as I'm in a war with the Zulus, the last thing I need is another antagonist.  

While sending my phalanxes to Gdansk to wipe out the invading Zulu stack (which happens to mostly be mounted units), I peel off the other veterans of the Aztec campaign to make a quick strike towards Khangela.  And almost as if I had planned it, the Zulus suffer another outbreak of civil war almost on cue as my mini-stack arrives.  The revolt not only removes the city defenses from Khangela, but also damages the handful of Zulu units in the city.  



I'm going up against warbows (longbows), so I still lose a unit or two, but Khangela is mine!  I choose to keep the city since you couldn't ask for a better chokepoint.  It will have a decent amount of food too once it can get the ocean fish in the 2nd ring.  (And the nice thing is, the Zulu ships won't be able to pillage it since it isn't in their borders anymore). 



Two things are going on in this screenshot:  the barb city Carib spawns the Sumerians, and the Zulus temporarily recapture Khangela.  The Zulu only seized it with a single damaged impi, however, so I was able to take it back immediately even with my weakened swordsmen.  



Regarding the Sumerians, I'm not too concerned about them since they appear to be entirely enclosed by mountains (see that former barb city NW of Khangela), so even though they are technically on our same continent, they can't get to anyone without ships, and neither can anyone get to them right away.  

All of the fighting with the Zulus brings another Great General, my third so far in this game (or my 4th, if you include the settled GG I got from the Aztec capital).  I settle this GG also in my military city since I don't need a GG unit for unlocking Heroic Epic.  In fact, I already have a level 6 unit, a phalanx with Combat 1-5, so I'll also be able to build West Point when the time comes too. 



Soon thereafter, my phalanxes (fresh from mopping up the invading Zulu mounted stack) win the Zulu border city that had been concerning me for some time:



Engineering finally in.  I still need feudalism for castles, but with my stone, I'll be putting up quite a few castles for the extra trade route, in addition to protection against the Zulus. 



Shaka apparently still has more strength than us, and I'm kind of worried that a big 2nd Zulu stack is waiting somewhere in the fog, so the first thing I do is upgrade this Guerrilla-3 archer to a crossbowman.  This, plus all the other units, ought to hold the all-important Khangela chokepoint just fine against Shaka for the foreseeable future.  



After founding my first island city, I take a peek at the new Sumerian city.  Fairly weak units that I could probably take on if only I didn't have the Zulus to worry about at the moment...



I sign peace with the Mongols.  The Mongols?  Oh yeah, Shaka bribed the Mongols into joining the war against us a while back.  I completely forgot to mention it earlier because it ended up being utterly irrelevant.  I saw a total of two Mongol galleys, of which one I was able to sink with a trireme, and after that and a few inconclusive turns the Mongols were willing to bail out.  



We make a nice trade with the Mayans:



A few turns after the Mongols bail, and after a few more inconclusive turns where I feel not quite strong enough to set out aggressively from Khangela against another city while still being able to leave a sufficient defensive force, and where the Zulus probably felt not quite strong enough to even think about cracking Khangela, Shaka is ready to discuss a more-or-less even peace.  



I am fine with this.  Those techs would be nice, but I'm not confident that any stack I send out past Khangela won't get schwacked by Zulu war elephants lurking in the fog, so I'm not confident I could extort those techs out of Shaka with a longer war.  And I don't need any more cities right away.  I need to consolidate what I've gained, and Khangela is a super convenient chokepoint.  Even if I was successful in progressing further and grabbing, say, the city to the SW of Khangela, I would end up having a longer front to defend, and I'd need to split my forces more precariously.  

A funny event happens to the Mayans:  4 barb phalanxes spawn against them from the Philistine event:



I plant Lublin, a 1-tile-island city with 1 fish to work in the 2nd ring, right in the face of Shaka.  Lublin will give me constant vision of the Zulu capital and will be a real thorn in their side, hehehe.  Perhaps also a nice staging ground for a later alpha-strike against the Zulu capital...



Now that I've built some spare crossbows and I have 10 turns of enforced peace with the Zulus, it is time to clean up the 9 or 10 Aztec nomads (mostly axemen & spearmen) wandering in the arid uncolonized region to the north of Khangela.  This will remove one potential wildcard from stabbing me in the back later...



Civil service comes in.  Irrigation for farms is a big deal (I have 5 corn that will benefit from this), and pikemen will be nice if I need to restart the war against the Zulu.  In this screenshot, you can also see my crossbows after having cleaned up the Aztec nomads, although the Aztecs must still have a scout or workboat or spy somewhere because they haven't disappeared from the scoreboard...which means the former Aztec cities will still have Aztec culture in them until I can track down the last Aztec unit.  



Speaking of former Aztec cities, here's one of them.  



Note the revolutionary unrest.  I don't think this is coming from Aztec culture because I have 95% Polish culture here now.  Rather, it is just distance from the capital, and the fact that I have a large empire, and the fact that I'm still running Despotism and Slavery.  Also, after the Great Library, it has been a while since I have finished a wonder.  Finishing wonders is one way you can keep your empire happy.  So, given this (and this isn't the only city feeling restless), I think it is time to use a great prophet I got a few turns ago for my first great person-fueled golden age:



I do this trade with the Zulu.  In hindsight, I'm not sure it was wise to give Zulu cities 2 more health in exchange for 8 gpt, but oh well...



I make a bunch of civic swaps which should improve my unrest (along with the golden age).  With feudalism in, I can swap into chivalry (happiness with military units, plus extra unit experience and great general emergence).  I also swap into vassalage and serfdom.  My production goes down, but my culture output doubles and my research/gold output improves a lot.  



Optics is in.  Off the coast of former Aztec lands is a whale resource I can hook up.  Also, I can build caravels and try to get the circumnavigation bonus.  Caravels will also allow me to spread Confucianism around more easily.  I have already spread Confucian missionaries around to all of the Mayan and Byzantine cities east of my empire, and now the Mayans are sharing my religion and are looking to be game-long allies with me as long as I stay in Confucianism.  That feels good to have one front that I don't have to worry about.  

[Psillycyber]

A nice deal.  I doubt I'll want to build war elephants at this point, but the extra happy will be nice.  



Two things:  our first caravels are out.  And secondly, we got a Great Scholar (Great Scientist).  I'm going to found an academy in the capital.  



Guilds comes in.  It's a big boost to our economy.  We have about a dozen workshops and several towns, with many more towns on the way in the next 40 turns.  For a single turn until our golden age wears off, we have grassland workshops making 2/3/2.  Several cities start on grocers, including our holy city site and capital.   



Paper is in.  Unfortunately, I have some competitors for these wonders that it unlocks.  Shaka went the theology --> paper route, whereas I went the civil service --> paper route.  Also, I want to finish Angkor Wat to supercharge all my settled great prophets, and I hope delaying the University of Sankore a few turns doesn't lose me that wonder.  But I think I have much better production than Shaka, so I'm crossing my fingers that it will work out.  



Speaking of Angkor Wat, this trade is how I open that up.  I feel fine trading with the French since they are no long-term threat.



I trade for some maps and finally get to see where the Egyptians and Khmer are:



The Khmer look like they are going to be the biggest long-term rival after the Zulus:



The Sumerians graduate to a full-fledged civ and get a bunch of free units.  In theory, they could land those units using those galleys, but I have caravels sitting by that could snipe those before they do any trouble if I fear that they are making hostile moves towards me. 



At first I was thinking of trying to take over Uruk, but not only do they have a ton of units to chew through, but they are also set to deprive the Zulus of their only source of iron as soon as the Sumerians win that cultural battle over that iron mine tile that the Zulu Swordsman is camping on.  That will cripple the Zulus in the long term.  

We get this relatively irrelevant event.  Note also that I'm replacing most mines with workshops now that I'm out of slavery and workshops are actually better than mines now.  



I switch back to Despotism temporarily for the production bonus.  My GNP tanks, but I really want to make sure that I win the wonder race for the University of Sankore, and this will shave several turns off of that.  A nice side-effect is also that, along with serfdom, my grassland farms are bringing in 3 food and 2 hammers.  Quite powerful!



We get the ship circumnavigation bonus!  Also note how I'm spreading farms with irrigation to get some of my cities to grow more quickly.  Some nice cottages are starting to mature in my peripheral cities.  



The Khmer are at war with the Egyptians.  This Khmer stack isn't super scary, but I'm still afraid that the Egyptians will eventually buckle due to having pathetic production compared to the Khmer.  And I don't want the Khmer to get any stronger.  The Egyptians have TONS of wonders.  



Unbelievably, the Byzantines are holding their own against the Mayans.  This war doesn't really worry me one way or the other since I've converted both to Confucianism and to becoming close allies with us.  



I give the Byzantines some more help.  I still think they are the underdog, even with their recent capture of a Mayan city.  



Here are my builds in the core.  I'd prefer-to build Leonardo's Workshop (a free engineer, and effectively +5 engineer GPP) in my capital to take advantage of the national epic there, but I fear I will lose out on that wonder altogether if I delay it, so I'm building Leonardo's Workshop in my heroic epic city instead.  It will help the city's production and probably give me a great engineer eventually anyways even here, especially if I always run an engineer specialist there too. 



Here are my production queues.  The cities taking super long to build stuff are my 1-tile island cities.  Still, those cities are more than paying for themselves, although I'm interested at swapping into slavery for 5 turns at some point to whip out some infrastructure in those cities as soon as they have built up some pop.  



Also, I need to think about another military buildup to take out the Zulus sooner rather than later.  I need to constantly struggle against the siren song of just going into a mindless infrastructure-building fugue state.  It is a constant tendency of mine any time I get into a cozy position in a Civ4 game, even though it is not always optimal.  Right now, I have a heroic epic city that can nearly 1-turn city raider 3 maces, so I should probably just focus on that after finishing Leonardo's Workshop and steamroll Shaka.  Although I am so, so tempted to build a bank there first because my heroic epic city also happens to be my Confucian holy city.  I'm gonna have to stew on that...

Here's what my frontier with Shaka looks like (former Zulu lands).  



Former Aztec lands and my annoying 1-tile islands stuck right under Shaka's nose.  I have some drill 4 crossbows and phalanxes guarding the most precarious island just in case Shaka tries a sneak amphibious attack.  That oughta do it.  



The tech situation.  The Zulus are teching annoyingly quickly (they've almost finished printing press).  I won't ever be able to develop a tech lead on them unless I go on the offense again.  And look at the Egyptians, already with gunpowder!  Maybe the bombards unlocked there (a halfway point between trebs and cannons) will help the Egyptians hold off the Khmer...



Our tech tree.  I want to get as many of the free great people as possible (such as the free great merchant from economics) and maybe fire off a 2-GP golden age.  Bombards would be nice for taking on Shaka, though.  Maybe the Egyptians will eventually trade that to me, and I can focus on building up maces and pikes first and then build my bombards at the last minute before going on the offense.  I will also want astronomy soon-ish for observatories and for getting to Scientific Method (which gives the free tech instead of liberalism in this mod).  



GNP.  I outpace the Zulus when I'm in vassalage, but when I go back into despotism the Zulus take the lead again.  And look at the Khmer catching up!



Production.  I outclass the Zulus, although it won't be by as much once I switch back out of despotism.  And look at the Khmer go!  They are the dark horse rising in this game.  



Crop yield.  We're number 1!  



And power.  We have a ways to go to catch up to the Zulus. Look at those dips from our earlier war with them! 



Overall, I'm happy with our position in this game, but I have to watch out about getting complacent.  I need to keep taking risks and putting the foot on the gas against the Zulus or else the Zulus and Khmer with their immortal level bonus will slowly outpace me even still at this point.

[Psillycyber]

The next GP I get is a great scholar.  He can bulb almost the rest of Education for me, so I do it.  I considered founding another academy, but I didn't really have a 2nd super-science city where that would pay back anytime soon.  This way too, I can start building universities earlier, which will make up some of the beakers I'm foregoing by not building another academy. 



My caravel discovers a whole new, uncolonized continent just SE of Pacal's territory.  Sadly for Pacal, he was just 1 tile short of being able to colonize this continent pre-astronomy.  



A pivotal turning point:  Shaka declares war on Gilgamesh!  On the one hand, I kind of get it.  Gilgamesh's capital was getting ready to flip Shaka's only source of iron (where the Zulu swordsman is).  On the other hand, this will probably mean a lot of the Zulu army will be out of position when it comes time for me to declare war on Shaka soon-ish.  But I need Gilgamesh to survive at least another 10 turns or so.  

So, I do this:



On that new continent, I spot a tribal hut guarded by a barbarian javelin peltast.  I'm going to return with two explorers to get that.  



Leonardo's Workshop is complete!  And yeah, I said I wouldn't get complacent and just go into infrastructure-building mode, right?  Yeah, yeah...well, just this one more building in my holy city.  Then I'll switch over to full-time military here, as well as in a few other cities.  This city will produce my siege and heavy-hitters.  Other cities will produce pikemen and other support units that only need 2 promos.  



The Zulu attack did not go well, attacking with too few units (and not pausing to bombard the defense first, for some weird reason...) into Sumerian CG longbows behind walls, hehehe...I think the Zulus here will get cleaned up next turn. 



Or, the Sumerians might have been attacking out of the city.  Not sure.  Either way, the Sumerians are left with a decent stack to withstand the next wave of Zulu troops:



Meanwhile, it looks like the Khmer are on the verge of taking Elephantine, but Egypt has a mini-stack of reinforcements just about to arrive in the nick of time.  Let's see if Egypt holds on (which I hope they do, to keep the Khmer contained...)



Randomly, I get declared on by Genghis Khan.  The Mongols have a decent stack, but it is biting into granite at Khangela.  I might lose a few tile improvements, but nothing that will be too big of a deal.  



It turns out that I'll snag the University of Sankore after all!  Shaka must indeed have other priorities or not have the big production cities like I do to snag these wonders!  My research has been stuck around 250 bpt for a while.  Let's see how finishing this and also swapping back into vassalage (now that the despotism production bonus won't be so vital) improves my tech rate...



My capital starts right away on Oxford University the next turn.  I am less worried about losing the race to this one since nobody else even has education at this point.  



Economics comes in.  I get the free great merchant, which I'll store for a corp or golden age, and the tech itself is a huge boost to my economy.  The biggest boost will be from switching into free market out of kinship networks.  



Doing so will actually lose me a trade route, but all my other trade routes will be buffed by 25% IN ALL THREE CATEGORIES, food, production, and commerce.  You might think this isn't a big deal, but it is.  The game does not take your existing trade route food and production income and add 25%, which would still be zero.  Instead, the game calculates your commerce income from trade routes and sets that as 1.  Running free market will increase that to 1.25.  But importantly, each trade route will now yield 0.25 for food and production.  So if a trade route is yielding 8 commerce, it will yield 2 food and 2 production as well.  My capital here shows the most ridiculous example of what this can do:



Even brand-new cities with only 2 tiny trade routes (as long as they are overseas trade routes to give at least 2 commerce, or 0.5 food and 0.5 production, which mines will always be since I have the two offshore island cities) will end up getting an extra food and production from free market right off the bat.  Here's an example:



This is a city with no trade route bonuses, and yet it's still getting +1 food and production from trade routes (the partial food and production from each trade route are added and rounded down).  This city is producing a settler to found a city in a nearby filler spot to further take advantage of free market in this way.  With free market + food corps, even tundra cities can become viable in the late game due to this food bonus, especially cities on the coasts that can build lighthouses and harbors.  

Shaka is back with another attack on Gilgamesh.  I'm glad I'm not going up against that!  



Shaka is now attacking into fully healed-up CG3 longbows, though, so I don't expect any immediate success on his part.  

Gunpowder comes in.  This unlocks a crucial siege unit, the bombard, that really ought to be in the vanilla game already to bridge the gap between trebs and cannons.  

 

Note that, in my mod, siege do much-reduced collateral damage, which improves their survivability but also means the finishers that you bring along are not trivial anymore, and you still need some heavy-hitters to clean-up after the siege goes to work.  Pre-gunpowder units do a max of 20% damage, bombards do 30%, cannons do 40%, and artillery onwards do 50% max damage.  

I get an interesting event that gives me an opportunity to improve my relations with my Confucian allies on my eastern flank.  The more I can do to lock-in their cooperation for the rest of the game, the more secure I will feel.  So I go for the most extravagant option, even though it causes Sumeria to declare war on me instantly.  Oh well.  It's not like they can do anything to me about it.  



Remember that tribal hut being guarded by a barb javelin peltast?  Well, I finally get two explorers down there to get that, and...



A huge stroke of luck!  I had just started researching astronomy, so this puts me WAAAY ahead of where I expected to be technologically!

Somehow the Egyptians are holding on with the help of their own bombards and are even reinforcing Elephantine!  That's great to see the Khmer get stymied in this war!



The Khmer do get the Apostolic Palace, though.  But I'm not too concerned.  The Buddhist bloc is quite small.  I'm just glad the Zulus didn't get it.  



The Khmer return a couple of turns later with a new stack, but this time it looks like they are bypassing Elephantine and striking towards Alexandria.  I'm not sure what the Egyptians have defending there, but I hope it is enough...



My first filler-city:



I have another one on the way just SW of my capital in some fairly arid lands with only 1 deer resource, which didn't seem super-viable before biology...but now I'm planning on soon researching Scientific Method for the free tech and slingshotting biology for biofarms, so that city will soon be viable too.  

We meet Boudica of the Celts on what appears to be a large continent just south of the Zulus.  It appears the Celts have had contact with the Zulus for some time, just barely, albeit also just barely out of trade route range with them pre-astronomy.  We swing a resource trade now that I have astronomy.



So, the Celts are the mysterious Hindu founder civ that has been missing this entire game.  They are actually slightly stronger militarily even than the Zulus, although not quite caught up in tech.  



Two things in this screenshot: the far-away Vikings NE of the Byzantines have fully emerged as a full-fledged civ (not likely to be relevant to this game, even with tech diffusion on, which will help them catch up somewhat), and more importantly, Shaka just founded the Jewish shrine.  Shaka just became an even juicier target!



Also, note that our research has almost doubled since last time I pointed it out to about 500 bpt when at break-even!  It is about to get even higher once Oxford University finishes in 2 turns!

[Psillycyber]

My buddy Justinian wants to trade Drama for some techs that are already widely-known elsewhere.  So why not?



Chemistry is in.  I'm going to build some frigates in my heroic epic city to guard my island cities and NW peninsula against anything the Zulu might try to spring on them whenever we end up going to war against them in the near future...



Education is starting to become widely-known, so I swing this deal for printing press while I can.  Besides, the French are no threat. 



I make peace with the Mongols.  Their attack cost me a couple of units, but their stack was fairly easily wiped out, and since then the turns have been uneventful with them (after all, all of Zululand stands between us and them, so it was silly of them to attack in the first place). 



Replaceable parts is in.  A huge instant boost to my production everywhere.  



The Khmer and Egyptians conclude a neutral peace after Egypt resists another Khmer attack.  



Oh, and that stack at the bottom of my screen that you see?  It's meant for Shaka. 



I'm staying on the hills, even though it will take me an extra turn, just because the Zulu have some heavy hitters that could hit my stack pretty hard if I'm not careful about stack defense.  



Still, I'm glad I'm not facing the entire Zulu military.  Imagine if the big Zulu stack currently stuck sieging the Sumerians was in that city too!  I'd have to postpone the attack for at least another 10 turns.  

Scouting the Celts, I see some very well-developed cities with some very peculiar names for a Celtic civ...hmmm, there must have been quite the early war down here!  And look at all that seafood next to Washington!  



This little maneuver ended up working out really well.  I had some extra knights coming up as reinforcements, but they couldn't join the main stack without first exposing themselves to Zulu hitters.  So I had some guerrilla-2 warbows accompany them (taking different paths to that tile, of course).  



As it would turn out, the Zulus found that small mini-stack very appetizing and decided to attack-out of their cities to take out that stack, losing a handful of units of their own in the process, trading about 1-for-1.  I was perfectly happy with that result because it made Ondini all the more vulnerable the next turn to my main assault.  



More unbelievable luck with goody huts:  I get music from another goody hut on that uninhabited continent!



I could have probably gotten Shaka to give it to me for peace, but this way perhaps I can bargain for better things...

BUT FIRST!  I suddenly have a new problem to deal with!



The Celts declared war on me and tried to storm Khangela!  (They failed, given that Khangela had a castle and reinforcements for the Zulu war sitting there already).  But the Celts also landed two mini-stacks:





Thank goodness they landed the mini-stacks separately!  I would have had a hard time dealing with them if they had just landed them together, along with the troops that suicidally tried to storm Khangela!  

Still, this isn't going to be a piece of cake.  I have no naval presence in this area, so the Celts can reinforce as much as they wish until I get some frigates built nearby.  (And because of the unfortunate geography of this map, I need to capture the Zulu isthmus cities before I can send my main fleet in the inland sea near my 1-tile island cities down to this ocean.  Until that, I only have two mediocre cities with which I can pump out naval units on this ocean).  

So, first things first, I must wrap up this war with the Zulu...for the time being, of course.  Also, I needed to take out this city so that my nearby troops would not be at a movement disadvantage compared to the Celtic ones using Zulu open borders.  Thankfully, I was already set to storm this Zulu city this very turn.  



That turns out to be enough to get Shaka talking peace.  I can't get nationhood out of it, but oh well.  



I need peace on my western flank while I deal with the Celts.  In 10 turns, if I've gotten the situation with the Celts under control, I'll finish my business with Shaka...

[Psillycyber]

I'm about to finish research of Scientific Method, which in my mod will give the free tech (rather than liberalism).  I think I'm going to use it to slingshot biology for +1 food farms and, as soon as I get nationhood too, the national park, which I will put in my capital (national epic city) and get about 6 or 7 free specialists there out of it with forest preserves.  



Anyways, back to the unexpected war with the Celts...

I was able to clean up the northern mini-stack with no trouble since it didn't have any pikemen defending it.  

The southern stack, though, has pikemen sitting in a forest tile along with knights, so I evacuate the Zulu city that I just took and let the Celts retake it.  Not only do they retake it, they garrison it with most of their stack, which opens them up to a devastating counter-attack. 



Also, as you can see, Napoleon got the Taj Mahal, which I am A-OK with.  I'm just glad it wasn't the Zulu, Celts, or Khmer, who are the nearest runner-ups.  

Here's that devastating counter-attack, to be aided by nearby knights coming in to help clean-up the defenders once the bombards take the enemy units down to 70% health. 



I eliminate that invasion wave, but just a couple of turns later another invasion wave shows up and plants itself annoyingly on that same forest tile along the coast.  (I'm getting that chopped at the first opportunity!)  Keep in mind that it is going to be a while before I have any naval assets in the area, so the Celts can keep ferrying over as many troops as they want.  



I clean up that 2nd invading wave and chop that annoying forest so that future stacks landing on the coast will be even easier to clean up.  (I leave a few woodsman-2 defenders on that other forest tile for the time being.  If they really want to land on a forest tile, they are going to have to pay for it).  



Meanwhile, there is a veritable barb empire on that overseas continent, although it looks like the French have a mind to start a little colonial empire of their own over there.  More power to them!



A THIRD invading Celt wave shows up.  These stacks are starting to be no joke, although by now I have a generous number of bombards and knights nearby, so as long as I get the initiative, I can clean up these stacks with minimal losses, especially when they come with only 1 pikeman like this one.  



I get nationhood and military tradition and notice that Mt. Rushmore and the Brandenburg Gate are still up for grabs, even though the Zulu have had these techs for quite a while already.  Maybe it's their lack of stone and low-production cities holding them back.  I bet I can grab both of these wonders.  Brandenburg Gate gives some extra unit XP and happiness on the continent.  



I'm starting to get my own frigates out and start sniping some of the Celt galleons which surely have units onboard.  Don't know where these ones were going...maybe looking to land near Ondini?  Doesn't matter...I have that city well-defended too.  



After sinking some of these galleons (and probably some units onboard too), the Celts are ready to sign a reasonable peace.  I'm good with this for the moment because I have unfinished business with the Zulu, and my 10 turns of peace with them is just about up.  But I'll be dealing with the Celtic threat later...



I realize after a few turns of having nationhood that I should actually switch out of chivalry to nationalism.  I don't need the military garrison happiness in my cities by this point, and nationalism will come with culture and espionage bonuses as well as the ability to draft in a pinch.  



It's go-time against the Zulu...again.  



Here is my invasion force approach their decently-defended border city.  



The Zulu can break through my frigate screen if they are willing to sacrifice a galleon or two, so I draft a musket each on my 1-tile islands just to dissuade the Zulu from trying any amphibious storming of those cities.  At least my frigates will prevent the Zulu from rescuing most of their expeditionary force that is engaged with the Sumerians...

The Zulu are also screwed in this war over the long term because I am pretty sure they lost out on their only source of iron when I took Ondini in the last war, so those will be the last knights and crossbows that they will be fielding.  I don't even think the Zulu have copper in their remaining territory either.  Their reinforcements are going to have to be horsemen (HAs) and warbowmen (longbows). 

The Zulu wisely retreat their galleons to Ulundi before my invasion stack is ready to strike.  Here is my army about to storm Nobamba after my CR3 bombards have softened them up.  



The Riddle of Steel has been solved.  (As the film Conan the Barbarian taught me, Steel pales in comparison to the power of getting cultist acolytes to jump off cliffs for you.  But Steel is still pretty awesome.  Cannons and drydocks!)



Notice what is going on here.  I can research physics in 6 turns.  (I've been putting it off because it isn't very important to my plans).  But the Khmer are set to research physics in 6 turns.  I might lose out on the free scientist...unless...I start a 2 GP golden age.  That will allow me to lock in this free GP, and essentially this GP will only end up costing me 1 net-GP.  That's a good deal, so I go for it.  



I do end up getting Mt. Rushmore.  Look at my GA-boosted capital as it starts on the National Park!  Yowza!  



We take Ulundi, the Zulu capital.  After defeating some stronger units, the last remaining defenders we clean up are JAVELIN PELTASTS!  Poor Zulu without any metals.  I almost feel bad for them.  Almost.  If they hadn't surprise-attacked me earlier when I was struggling with 5 cities, maybe I would be more sympathetic towards them.  



FYI, the Celts have some scary units (they have grenadiers and military science up on me), but thankfully not enough galleons at the moment to transport them.  I post this screenshot especially because the enforced peace period is running out, and the Celts could theoretically attack me again at any time.  I'm keeping some reinforcements down in that southern area just in case to keep an eye on them.  It's not like the Zulu war needs any reinforcements.  



Here's a peek at the Vietnamese minor civ that emerged on the barb island.  The Spanish are down there too.  I finally lose my last explorer.  



I do indeed get the free physics GP.  If I can just get another Great Artist, Engineer, Priest, or General, I'll have what I need for a 3rd GA at some point.  I can probably bank on having 4 GAs in this game before it is finished.  



Also, THEN THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED!  Notice above that my heroic epic city is almost 1-turning this Polish cuirassier UU.  This Cuirassier UU starts with "charge" which in my mod gives +20% vs. siege, archery, melee, gunpowder, and trench units.  

The next Zulu city falls. 



This one comes with some buildings and a free great artist!



And I forgot to show Ulundi, which has a great general instructor and 2 wonders and an academy, plus some other intact buildings!



Things are going well!  I was almost confident enough with my military to start on West Point in my heroic epic city.  



The leadership promo in my mod gives +10% strength AND double XP gain.  I thought about this, but then I realized that this city is already pumping out 4-promo winged hussars, and I'd rather have 10 or so of those than West Point 12 turns from now.  I'll toss West Point in some other high production city, where it will be more impactful.  (After all XP gain makes more of a difference to units that start with lower XP).

I think I'll want a sizable reserve of winged hussars to deal with the Celts if they try another landing in my southern cities.

[Psillycyber]

The next Zulu city falls.  This one has two settled great artists and a great general???  What was Shaka thinking?



I start shadowing this Celtic galleon fleet even though we are at peace with the Celts for the moment.  I suspect that this is bringing Celtic troops back that just recently participated in the conquest of a Vietnamese city on the barb continent.  Also, this comprises probably the majority of the Celtic unit ferrying capacity.  If I sink then, then my coasts are relatively safe from the Celts for a while.  I shadow the stack for a few more turns to see where it is going and to decide if I want to pull the trigger over this.  



Steam power is in.  Coal is revealed.  I'm expecting the "ka-thunk" sound to show that, surely, I must have coal somewhere inside my vast borders...right?  Nope!  Although there is coal in Sumeria's borders, just outside of my own.  Well, Gilgamesh has got to go!

But you know what else is interesting?  The Celts don't have coal either!



Neither do the Khmer!  (In hindsight, it is extra fortunate that the Khmer couldn't manage to take that Egyptian border city that has coal).  



Sure, I'll bet the Celts will have oil in their territory.  But this will give me a window of opportunity to dominate them while they are still using Age of Sail ships and no railroads.  

The Zulu Jewish holy city falls.  Yeah, look at that shrine!



Okay, after shadowing that Celtic galleon stack for a couple more turns, I decide to pull the trigger and declare on them.  I easily wipe out those galleons with a handful of frigates.  The Celts are fielding SOTL, so I will have to hang back until I get my own coal hooked up to start fielding ironclad ships. 



Speaking of MY coal, I declare on Gilgamesh the very next turn and land an invasion force that will easily outmatch his pikes and warbows.  



Meanwhile, the next Zulu city falls.  I raze this one since it won't have any food to grow.  



I take a dip in secularism to speed the research towards railroad along.  It boosts my research by about 200 bpt, but my production takes a hit from leaving OR, and my diplo bonuses with my Confucian allies take a hit.  As soon as I did it, I regretted it.  I think I will switch back to OR and Confucianism at the first opportunity.  I can't afford to be antagonizing the Mayans and Byzantines on my unprotected eastern flank.  



Here's what my capital looks like after a levee and the national park.  IT IS A BEAST!  It has 9 specialists and 4 super-specialists, with a 15-food surplus that will eventually mean 7 or 8 additional specialists!  I also decided to build West Point here.  



The last Zulu city falls.  Unfortunately, the Zulu must have a spy or workboat or caravel somewhere because they are still on the scoreboard...which sucks, because my cities will still have some Zulu culture in them, which will contribute to revolutionary unrest.  



To deal with that, and to lower my city maintenance costs, I'm relocating the capital to a more central location...the former Aztec capital.   



The Sumerians fall.  Hey look, a free great scientist in the city!



I found my coal city right on top of the coal I was coveting.  This way I don't have to worry about a spy or random event sabotaging a mine.  I will always have coal hooked up now.  Also, a nice 2/2/1 city tile for that city, and it will have some decent food to grow with some (unirrigated) grassland farms and free market trade routes bringing in an extra food.  +5 food surplus.  



I immediately start building some ironclad cruisers in my southern cities facing the Celts...