AU 503 DAR 1: Up to 2150 BC

[alexman]

This is the first spoiler thread for AU 503: Pillage and Plunder.

Describe how you managed your upstart civilization the first 40 turns of the game. How did you deal with the lack of fresh water? Have you had success harassing the AI with your Chasqi Scouts? What lessons have you learned so far? What are your plans for the next 40 turns?

[nbarclay]

This game almost rivals Son of So Very Cold in how sadistic the starting position is, and the immediate environs of the starting positionl are actually worse if I recall correctly. (For those who weren't around then, Son of SVC was an AU game under the original Civ 3 in which we started on an island that was relatively small and had limited production potential. It was deliberately designed to force players to overcome a bad starting position.)

I started this game by moving my worker onto the hill and my scout 9-8. I then decided to move my settler 8, thinking I'd probably do best settling in what I hoped would be grasslands to the north. But my settler move showed me a whale, so I decided to settle on the forest instead of looking for a more distant place that might (or might not) be better. That left me with the fish as my only 2-food tile until my capital expanded, which was lousy for production but at least it was useful for gold. More importantly, it gave me the sugar hill, the wheat, and the whale as tiles with both food and production once the capital expanded.

Initially, I thought I'd probably go with a Chasqui and a settler as my first two builds, but I changed my mind when I couldn't find any particularly attractive sites for an early second city. (The main problem was that I would have needed a second worker, which I didn't have, to get much advantage out of it.) I ended up going granary-settler instead, deliberately delaying my growth to size 3 slightly to time it for right after the granary was completed instead of two turns before. In the meantime, by the time my worker finished mining and roading the hill (definitely not a quick operation), my scout had finished exploring to the east and backtracked to discover fresh water, so my worker started roading toward it. I founded my second city in 2310 BC and will be ready to found my third next turn. (My third city's positioning is designed to open up three additional desert tiles for eventual use by the second; otherwise, I'd only have one desert tile the city can work. Unfortunately, I won't have a tile irrigated for the third city until three turns after the city is founded.)

In regard to technology, I started off researching Alphabet at maximum. Then when I met the Scandanavians, I traded Masonry for the rest of the needed Alphabet research plus gold. At that point, I started researching Writing at full speed. Later, I was able ot trade Masonry plus just a little gold to the Mongols for Bronze Working and Warrior Code. Unfortunately, the Mongols and Hittites have beaten me to Writing, which puts me in a tough position.

The irrigation situation in this game is interesting, having to found a city on a hill tile in order to irrigate through the city in order to get water to the starting area. For someone who isn't aware of that quirk of C3C's rules, that could be a problem.

Note that the builds indicated on the map below are tentative. I'll likely change the capital to a barracks before I start cranking out units (in between settlers and workers), and there's a good chance I'll change Tiwanaku to go either granary or worker-granary as well, but I haven't made a final decision yet.

[nbarclay]

With how bad the starting area is in this game, it seems like players are forced to choose between REXing and pillaging, with little real potential to do both at once. This is a vastly harder game to use pillaging effectively in than the "Testing the Jaguar Warrior" game (where Aeson put on his magnificent show) was, and I'll be interested to see whether anyone can use pillaging effectively without having an AI that isn't a victim of early pillaging pull way ahead. (Even with my pure focus on REXing thus far, I'm behind all three of the nearby AIs at least for the moment.) One thing's for sure: I'm glad I didn't try this game on demigod!

Nathan

[Aeson]

I tried my first run at this game on Sid, mistakingly thinking that Alexman included it as a 'possible' option to play.

I moved the Worker onto the Hill, saw nothing. Moved the Scout 88, saw the Whale, and moved the Settler 7 to go build a city on the Forest. I also went with a Granary right off. Worker started mining the Sugar Hill for when borders would expand.

It wasn't very long before I figured it was a lost cause on Sid. The AI start locations are too much better than the player's, too distant to harrass early enough, no good enough city site for a shot at the GL without an SGL, and the Vikings... No way to guard that peninsula against Beserkers, so you are going to be at their mercy the entire game.

Will try the same approach on Deity.

[jim_steer]

AU503 - Emperor

Started off pretty much the same as Nathan, prioritising irrigating up to my capital. After promising the soul of my first born to the dark one I was rewarded with a settler from the one and only hut I popped. I built a city on the hill next to the lake and used its meager production to build 10 turn workers. Judging by the starting terrain I am going to need a lot of workers to stand any chance of keeping in touch with the AI.

I soon met the Mongols who seem to have popped at least one city/settler and already had quite a large tech lead over me, looks like this is going to be a tough game
Contact was soon gained with both the Hittites and the Scandinavians, I was lucky enough to get contact with the Scandinavians before anyone else and was able to use this to tech trade my way to parity with both them and the Hittites.

Managed to do another uber tech trade this turn gaining IW, WC, Wheel and Writing. The Mongols also have Mysticism and HBR, they are shaping up to be a real KAI.

[alexman]

Originally posted by nbarclay
With how bad the starting area is in this game, it seems like players are forced to choose between REXing and pillaging, with little real potential to do both at once.

A choice? Of all things, it's kind of strange to hear a complaint about having to make a choice. I feel that the AU will not teach you as much as it could if you impose artificial restrictions like "use your Chasquis for pillaging". Instead, I tried to pick a map that makes Chasqui harassment a viable alternative to outright REXing.

This map was chosen because your neighbors' starts are better than yours, so you will have lots of trouble if you try to follow the usual strategy of out-REXing your opponents until you are ready to overwhelm them with your superior economy. In my test game (Emperor, where I thought most would play), I built three Chasquis off the bat and sent them south. They found the Mongols, captured both of their workers, and pillaged their improvements. Then I focused on building Settlers and Workers, while the Mongols were chasing my three Chasquis around their territory. It was great.

Anyway, I realize that some people like to follow one strategy in all of their games and expect it to work, but I also know that there are players who like to experience a different type of game now and then.

By the way, this map was mostly a product of the random map generator. I actually had to improve the human starting area to give players a chance!

[jim_steer]

Originally posted by alexman
I actually had to improve the human starting area to give players a chance!

Here was me thinking starts didn't get much worse! Guess I have become weak in always selecting a resonable start.

Hmm I think I will try a quick replay with a lot more emphasis on pillaging, though I am extremely sceptical pillaging will pay off in the long run though.

[Conqueror]

Originally posted by alexman
In my test game (Emperor, where I thought most would play), I built three Chasquis off the bat and sent them south. They found the Mongols, captured both of their workers, and pillaged their improvements. Then I focused on building Settlers and Workers, while the Mongols were chasing my three Chasquis around their territory. It was great.

I did roughly just that ; played on Emperor level w AU mod, starting scout explored NE, contacted Vike warrior there over water, built 2 Chasquis who headed south with the regular scout.

Captured 2 mongol workers, pillaged 2 tiles of their improvement, attacked and destroyed mongol city of Kazan, triggering my GA at 2630 BC, got 45 gold and Ta-Tu in negotiations. This pretty much slowed the Mongols start.

After this, i used the city of Ta-Tu as a research facility (scientist) helping my 100 % research, building more Chasqui there and rushing spear/archer/Chasqui whenever Ta-Tu hit size 2. These units (espesially the Chasquis) proved to be very useful later... but more about that on proper thread

I decided not to even try to get Philosophy first and started to research towards Monarchy at 100% speed. CB -> Mystic -> Poly. Did not benefit much so far, because Hittities had Mysticism one turn before me.

Set up a city north SW of the fish there, which is just about to complete its temple build, and after that start prebuild on GL/SoZ.

Did plan to build my 3rd city near the lake to draw irrigation from there, just needed to set up the prebuild city first. Settler for 3rd city is completing in 1 turn.

Originally posted by alexman
By the way, this map was mostly a product of the random map generator. I actually had to improve the human starting area to give players a chance!

Great map I love rough starts and scarce resources.

I'll attach image after i have booted my PC (sometime in this week ). Printscreen key never works when i have certain P2P program on-line.

[Conqueror]

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by alexman

A choice? Of all things, it's kind of strange to hear a complaint about having to make a choice. I feel that the AU will not teach you as much as it could if you impose artificial restrictions like "use your Chasquis for pillaging". Instead, I tried to pick a map that makes Chasqui harassment a viable alternative to outright REXing.

I'm going to respond to this in the DAR 2 thread, since there's less risk of creating a spoiler effect there.

[jshelr]

We have a bad feeling about crossing the desert only to find mountainous jungles. So, in order to get on record and force ourselves into continuing, here is our "start." Just remember Alexman, we know where you live.

[jshelr]

So, we're on our way south to pillage and plunder when we pop this useless city right by the Mongols. LoL. Maybe when we start pillaging the Mongols will get distracted by this juicy target of opportunity.

It was possible to trade Masonry for all available techs as soon as two neighboring civs were met.

[jshelr]

The first liberation of the oppressed Mongol working class occurred shortly thereafter. These CS units are terrific and fun. (There are two slaves in that "stack," he he....)

A few turns later, with water from the start location, the desert is beginning to bloom. All the Mongol improvements were pillaged and no workers were in sight to capture. Time to settle down into ambush mode unless I can get the Mongols to give up a tech for peace. If they will, we will continue on with the Hittites.

[nbarclay]

Conqueror, what was the battle for Kazan like? I'm curious about what the odds were.

[jshelr]

Good question. Never even occurred to me to try to attack a city.

[Conqueror]

Originally posted by nbarclay
Conqueror, what was the battle for Kazan like? I'm curious about what the odds were.

Odds were not very good, attacked reg warrior (city was on plains) with reg Chasqui, but i tought actually about quiting the game at that point, had played the turns without thinking too much.
If i had lost that battle, i would propably not continued (atleast not right away). Did not actually even expect to win.

[jshelr]

Still, it's a good bet because you are risking a few shields for the chance to take out a city. I was so intent on pillaging that I passed up a nice long-shot bet with a big win, if high odds.

[Aeson]

I restarted on Deity. Tried to keep to my start as much as possible.

I didn't stall growth with the Granary, but seriously considered it. Was able to shave off a turn on the Granary build because of it, so basically was trading 7 shields for 2 food. Eventually that 2 food would pay back the 7 shields (1 turn at +5, 2 non-wasted shields), but I really needed the upfront advantage.

My Scout headed N, exploring out the end of the peninsula. Made contact with the Vikings, trading Pottery + Masonry to them for Alphabet + 10g. Had been researching Alphabet at a 50 turn pace, and switched to Writing. Then my Scout backtracked and headed S.

I found my only hut so far in the S Jungles, got a Warrior. The Warrior headed E and was killed by Barbarians a few turns later.

Made contact with the Mongols and Hittites a turn apart. The Hittites must have been lucky with huts as they had 2 techs the Mongols and Vikings didn't. I traded Masonry+3gpt+87g to them for The Wheel. The Mongols had 3 Workers in their capitol (sometimes high barbs are good ), so I traded The Wheel + Masonry + 2gpt + 1g for all 3 Workers. Then I traded The Wheel to the Vikings for Bronze Working and Warrior Code. This left me with just enough gpt to keep paying for a 50 turn Writing and still be making money.

After the Granary I built an Archer, as it was obvious I would need to be killing Barbs. I sent the Archer up to find any barb camps near the Dyes as I planned to build the second city in that direction. Started building a Settler. The Archer killed 2 Barbs in a camp it found, getting promoted to Veteran in the process. That allowed my Settler to head N and build my second city. The Archer healed up, and went out looking for the next Barb camp. Found a Warrior and Horseman in a camp on the Desert peninsula, killing the Warrior and getting set to take out the camp.

My Scout has made it down through the Hittite lands. I built my first Chasqui, but I don't think there will be much chance to do any major pillaging. The Mongols have already started Zues, which would have meant the Ivory would have been a good target for pillaging if I could have gotten a Chasqui down there soon enough. I don't know where their Ivory is yet anyways, so I don't think it would be possible on Deity.

Everyone has Writing, Mathmatics, Horseback Riding, Ceremonial Burial, and Mysticism on me already. I still have 18 turns left on Writing. Doesn't look like there will be any shot for Philosophy, probably not the GL either. The tech rate is actually going faster than it did on my Sid run to this point. Must have been a few techs from huts.

[jshelr]

Good Luck Kemosabe. (sp)

[Madine]

The start on this map was.... challenging I'm glad I stayed at monarch.

I have 2 cities so far. I am slightly behind the AI in tech. I am planning to continue to expand my cities.

If I'm lucky, I'll get SOZ.

[ducki]

Alright, this start was so engaging, I forgot to take notes and accidentally played through to 1990BC. Sue me.

I'm playing on Monarch simply because my free time is greatly reduced by a toddler and I don't want to work hard enough to be "good" at Emperor just now, so Monarch it is.

Anyway, I lied in the teaser thread. I did scout first, worker to the hill and scout to the plains-wheat, and yet I still settled on-the-spot. My reasoning, flawed as it may be, was that I wanted the "instant" 10 shields from a chop very early worse than I wanted the (limited by Despotism) extras that the whale offered. Additionally, not needing to road the Ivory added to the attractiveness of the spot. Finally, unlike the move to the forest, this spot allows me to ferry boats back-and-forth from east-sea to west-sea, not that I built any.

I started with a Chasqui, as I assume most would.
My scout moved to the northernmost mountain to ensure I had a "good" spot for city #2 and spied fish and dyes. A couple more moves and I knew the northern area was a peninsula and headed back south.
By the time improvements were complete on the hill, I knew of a lovely lake in the mountains that cried out to me. knowing I wanted a resort there, I queued up another Chasqui and then a settler, bidding my worker build a road to the mountains.

Machu Picchu was founded on the hillside and Tiwanaku on the hill NE of the plains-wheat, taking over worker-settler duties. First a worker, then a granary, with the worker chopping the forest and a Viking slave(bought, alas!) connects it to the capitol and begins mining the wheat. Cuzco completed the Tiwanaku settler almost the same turn that Math was discovered and began building the Statue of Zeus immediately, though it's 98 turns away. Still, I think it will be handy considering the distance to the nearest horses. Connecting Iron is high on my list, though not quite tops.

I made a couple of tech trades at monopoly prices to play the middle-man and also sold Math for a hefty fee even though the Mongols reached it on the same turn I did, though nothing of particular note.

I have 3 Chasquis and 2 warriors that I built, 2 warriors from huts, and somewhere I picked up Warrior Code from a hut, I think.
I've explored what I believe to be nearly all of the home landmass; in fact, I've explored to a fault when I should have been harassing the Mongols - which I intend to do as soon as I can get 2 warriors and 2 Chasquis along with the starting scout into position.


On the side, I really like the Chasqui. Maintaining fast-mover ability on hills and mountains is huge on an old map like this and I'm sure it'll be even more important as I prepare to harry the Mongols. All I can say is "Thank gods it's not the Zulu!"

Thanks for a very challenging start alexman, I can't wait to play more, so off I go!

[ZargonX]

Phew... started out on Emperor, found the infinite joys of the start location Never been much of a pillager, but sent my CSs down to harass the Hittites. Unfortunately, the Mongols joined in the war, and I'm far too numerically outnumbered to accomplish much more than a 1-tile hit and run here and there. Plus, I see the stacks heading for my homelands ever so slowly. I could probably hold them off, but the game is clearly a lost cause from this early point. Going to try again in Monarch. I guess alexman was right about the level...

[LzPrst]

Ok, started off. Monarch level...
Moved the settler 7 to the forest in order to get whale and grain once cultural expansion kicks in making "cuzco" a potentially big city...

explored a little found the vikings (saw a warrior on a mountain across some water... luck) and a hittite warrior being chased by a mongol warrior... 3 contacts in 5 turns, not bad.

traded away masonry and pottery i think... for ceremonial burial and warrior code. got alphabet from the hittites for a similar price and the wheel from a small hut somewhere in the deep jungles of "mountain road" as I've dubbed them. got mysticism from mongols in return for some tech or the other.

War with the mongols in 2470bc. pillaged their cows

founded my second city at 9-9-8-8 forcing cuzco to share the grain. cuzco's got sugar, whale and fish allowing fair food supply and with the elephant mined a little production if it ever reaches size 4.

the mongols are attacking my poor scout with an archer but he ran off

the mongols have sent off an army of 2 warriors and an archer. I suspect I'm their target. I'll be seeing those guys in some 20-30 turns maybe

thats all so far.

[LzPrst]

hmm, since everyone else is playing on emperor, I'm thinking about cranking it up a notch... but now I know where things are...
I'll do it anyway and give a more detailed report of my play.

Moved 7 to the forest as last time founded Cuzco. Building a CS from the get-go. researching bronzew at 100%
sent my explorer south into the desert. I almost consider this cheating since I would have sent it north into the good lands if I didnt already know what was there, but hey, its emperor level

roaded the elephant with my worker and moved south to the sugar hill getting ready to mine it for some production when Cuzco expands.

got maps in the hut met the mongols and got a crappy deal gave them masonry and cash for warrior code. built my Chasqui and sent him south, then a warrior for MP and then a settler.
2850 bc met the vikings, got the alphabet and some cash for 2 techs.
2750 met the hittites with my chasqui and decided to try to kill off a warrior in order to get a settler. didnt work and now i'm in for it...
invented CB and decided to go for writing, might take a while...
with my new settler I founded city nr 2 9-9-8-8 from the capital.
and my newest chasqui headed for the hittites was killed... by barbs... easy cash my a$$.

and thats that. a considerably worse game than the monarch version.

should I do another restart :hmm: everything sux on both saves and I cant remember what I've done now either... made lots of mistakes as well. havent planned ahead at all. too much on impulse...

hmmm, how do I take a screenshot?

[LzPrst]

this is just A-noying... the worst being that a chasqui cant win a battle. it seems that every time I've been attacked they've died. and every time i use them to counterattack a 1 red bar archer or warrior or whatever the full health chasqui dies. ridiculous...

and they dont retreat either!!!

after playing a while I've come to the following conclusion, bugger.
I successfully pillaged the hittites to death, but by then the mongols were KAI and when I tried to mess with them a group of "invincible" archers started marching on me. I'm having a lot of difficulty on this game...

[Aqualung71]

Well I've been tinkering around with this game and have played it several times in different ways to see what works for me and what doesn't. I've actually progressed 2 games up to the 1000BC point, so I'll report on both to get some idea of the difference from my point of view. Both are at Emperor level.

1. Traditional REX

I started the way most people seem to have – moved my worker to the sugar, scout north to find the wheat and settler west to access the whale and maximize short term growth opportunities. Upon settlement, I worked the fish tile in order to maximize early research, and started with a slow Granary build, researching Alphabet. The worker roaded the sugar, and the completion of that coincided with the first border expansion.

By 2150BC I had built a granary in my capital and established a second town on the northern hills. I had only 1 CS by then. I also found the Viking Warrior as he popped a hut across the sea, which opened some trade opportunities. I had arrived at Writing first and was able to trade it around so that I was only trailing the Hittites by HBR, parity with the Mongols and 3 ahead of the Vikings.

2. Let’s Go a-Pillaging

I went back and restarted in order to more closely follow the game theme. I built 4 CS to start with and sent them south one after another. After circling the wagons for a while, I finally jumped on a couple of Mongol workers and pillaged their Ivory, then continued on with 2 or 3 more juicy tiles. Then bgan the slow process of bringing the workers back to civilization while trying to avoid the Mongol warriors scattered around the jungles. I didn’t feel confident enough to attack any Mongol towns with my regular CS’, but if I had done so successfully it would probably have made a much greater difference.

By 2150BC I had made peace with the Mongols for a tech swap and was researching Mathematics to go for SoZ. If successful, I plan to embark on a second round of pillaging using AC. My GA was triggered by a Mongol Warrior, which was pretty hard to avoid. Tech parity with the Hittites, the Mongols had HBR and wouldn’t swap it for my IW, and I was 3 ahead of the Vikings. I had built a granary in the capital and was 3 turns away from my first settler, so way behind in REXing. My CS were approaching the Hittite lands to see what mischief they could cause there!

Thoughts:

On this map, the pillaging option is severely restricted IMHO. You must either build 3 or 4 Chasqui’s right off the bat and send them a-pillaging, or drop the idea completely. Our start location is so far from the Mongols/Hittites that by the time you get there they have established themselves reasonably well. Also, by my count, the closest Mongol city was 18 tiles from the freshwater lake and 22 tiles from the sugar near our capital. So pillaging to capture a few half-speed workers is rather a long term investment (though it does slow the AI down considerably), since it takes close to 1,000 years to get them back to your territory where they can actually contribute to the economy! And roading the hills and mountains as they went didn’t seem very smart, unless I was planning ahead for the year 1500AD or so.

I also learnt that you have to be selective when pillaging, and finding opportunities where you could pillage a road and still be safe from counter-attack was very rare indeed….so much so that avoiding a despotic GA is well nigh impossible using the pillaging strategy.
Anyway, the small amount of pillaging I was able to do did seem to dent the Mongols somewhat.

Scouts are pretty useless beasts when there are lots of barbs around – you have to be ultra careful where you send them, and must avoid everything except grassland and plains or risk walking into an unexpected surprise.

Here’s the REX screenie:

[Aqualung71]

And here's the a-Pillaging screenie:

[jshelr]

How come no one is migrating the initial settler even though Alexman broadly hinted in the setup that there was water -- just not "immediately" available?

[Aqualung71]

Because we're not as insightful or intuitive as you, jshelr

Seriously though, your bravery in doing so was impressive! An intriguing trade-off. I'm very interested to know whether you feel the significant delay in founding your capital (what, 7 turns?) was worth the better terrain and more central position.

[LzPrst]

I just realized that I've been playing the stock version! while most of you have been playing the AU mod v. I'm gonna have to start over, AGAIN!!! this course is torture.