Heroic Comeback, Xuenay vs. Kassiopeia

Xuenay · January 18, 2006, 22:44

So we were playing a Quick No Barbarians match with Kassiopeia, Duel sized Balanced map. He was playing as the French (Louis XIV) and I was playing as Mongolia (Kublai Khan). I was hoping for a quick rush win, taking advantage of my Creative attribute to quickly expand city borders and provide protection as I'd seize horses and crush him with my Keshiks.

From the onset, competition was fierce. Within the first couple of turns, my scouts initiated war by entering his borders to explore. Soon his warriors would find my undefended city, rushing towards it in an attempt of early capture, only to find warriors constructed to defend it at the last possible moment. The next couple of hundred years passed by with minor skirmishes as both sides developed bows and deployed their new, shiny archers. In a move of daring psychological warfare, Kassiopeia placed a couple of his archers on easily defended squares just inside my territory. The move probably served its purpose, as it found me intimated for a while and momentarily limited my expansion as I churned out archers of my own to defend my capital.

But what about my Keshik rush, what about my early attack? As I researched Animal Husbandry, my scouts located horses some distance away from my capital. I'd have to found a new city to take advantage of them, so I produced a Settler and a couple of Archer escorts for him. Then I sent them out, only to discover that while Kassiopeia's Archers had limited my expansion towards the copper deposits, he had seized some of his own and was now sending Axemen and Spearmen to stop me from getting the horses. Never being one to be intimidated, I chose to found my city on top of a nearby hill, one square further away from the horses than would've been strictly necessary. It would keep the Archers and the city alive for the while being, while I'd consolidate my forces to drive out the pesky French and get those horses.

The time that passed after that was relatively uneventful. The horse city I established was actually my third, as I'd founded my second city on a peninsula behind my capital. It didn't produce many hammers, but it was protected by my capital and would hopefully go unnoticed by my foe. I took a risk and eased my military production a little, building the Oracle to do the CS Slingshot. Having firmly established myself as a Bureaucracy, I researched Construction in order to build some Catapults I could use to finally beat those annoying Frenchmen.

The decision to momentarily stop building my forces turned out to be a mistake, however. While I had been without horses, Kassiopeia had secured some of his own. Now I was seeing an invasion wave of Horse Archers, Axemen and Spearmen assaulting my horse city just as it was building the Catapults. My Archers set up a brave struggle, but it was for vain as the city was first captured and then razed by the French. Of course, this only strenghtened the resolve of the brave Mongolians, who swore to fight their foes to the bitter end.

Fortune was on my side, however, as Kassiopeia apparently hadn't researched Catapults himself yet. As the marauding attackers marauded my capital, they found themselves the target of some very big rocks hurled in their general direction. Collateral damage did its part in weakening the attackers, enough for the Archers in my capital to hold their own and drive back the resulting attack. However, Kassiopeia now very clearly had the initiative, possessing both horses and copper and with me having neither.

In the many years that followed, my capital was under a constant siege. I realized that I could not beat my foe on his own terms, so I would have to come up with ways to neutralize his resource advantage. The only way to do this was to invest heavily in technological development. Fortunately, my opponent did not seem to be very keen in developing his technology, instead preferring to produce huge hordes of units. I was also lucky in that he did not notice my second city, still sitting quietly in that little peninsula (despite the fact that there was a road from my capital leading to it!). That gave me some valuable commerce I was able to take benefit of.

Time passed. He built more units to attack me, I built more units to defend myself, as well as city improvements to help my research. Building the Great Library was a bit of a gamble for me, as it bound up my production for a bunch of turns at a time when my opponent had developed Catapults of his own. It paid off, however, helping me develop Feudalism and Longbowmen to help defend my city. By the time I had managed to build the first couple of those Kassiopeia chose to mount his second assault against my city. It was a long and desperate battle, but in the end my Longbowmen helped me survive, even though they all only had a couple of points of health left at the end.

After I had fought off the second attack, I dabbled in a couple of extra technologies, grabbing the free Great Artist from Music and getting myself Education so I could speed up my research. Then I resumed my Gunpowder beeline. The Great People I got from techs and wonders really helped me maintain my production and pay the increasing support costs of my military. By this time I was running a Hereditary Rule/Bureaucracy/Slavery/Theocracy combo in civics, and from the way I kept founding religions in my city I figured my opponent wasn't investing much in research.

Then the second major assault came, with me being greeted with a sight both uncomfortable and supremly amusing at the same time - those uptight, snobby French riding to battle on the back of huge War Elephants! My foes had also learned something from their failures, as their forces were scattered around the nearest tiles, making it impossible for me to hit a very large portion of them with my Catapults. I was lucky to have some small lakes near so they couldn't entirely starve my city. Not so luckily, my lookouts could find no end to the amount of hostile Catapults laying siege on my city.

As the French maneuvered their beasts in position, Lady Luck again betrayed me, as they finally spotted that second city of mine. While most of the troops in my capital had already been upgraded to Longbowmen by this time, the production-poor commerce city was protected only by four or so Archers. It was quickly taken and razed, with the French then turning their filthy, greedy eyes towards my capital.

Battle was then joined once more, with my first Musketmen being one turn from completion (talk about bad timing). Fortunately my capital contained a Forge, Barracks, and a Heroic Epic, giving me plenty of well-trained warriors to bravely die protecting their motherland. There was much bloodshed and battle, but by the end of the turn my defenses still held, though many bold soldiers had perished.

The next turn began with my newly-trained Musketmen joining the field of battle, possibly saving me from a certain death. Boldened by their success, I gave the order to sacrifice as many slaves as was necessary to get a new shipment of muskets ready for the next turn. I also saw Kassiopeia swear at me, saying something along the lines of "oh to hell with you" as he saw my Musketmen. We had entered the 19th century, with me having been under siege for over 1500 years.

Finally, however, the tide of war was turning. Aided by the shiny new muskets, my forces (barely) crushed this latest and last attempt of taking my capital. I then continued churning out new Musketmen, giving them promotions to aid them against mounted foes. It soon became apparent that the Horse Archers and War Elephants laying siege on my capital were no match for this new, scary technology. One by one they were destroyed or driven out from my lands.

But I could not rest on my laurels, for I was still definitely behind in score. While I told my scientists to research Liberalism for the free technology and then head straight for Rifling, my Musketmen moved farther out and were given a mission of escorting a newly-built Settler. As my single Worker was busy rebuilding pillaged improvements, my Settler and his Musketmen escorts were ordered to rebuild the razed city and finally get me those horses - I'd need them once I'd get the technology to build some Cavalry units. And I knew I had to hurry up on my efforts, for somehow my foe had caught up on me and was now fielding his uniquely French Musketeers. During this time I also built the Pyramids, instituting a draconian Police State to help me in my war.

Having developed Rifling, I sent some Musketmen and some Riflemen towards enemy territory. They marched onwards, defeating all who stood in their way. I secured the horses and developed Military Tradition. I was a bit baffled when I realized I still couldn't build Cavalry, but then I realized I should probably research Horseback Riding also (oops!). By this time my Riflemen were laying siege on the first enemy city they could find. Unfortunately, by this time my opponent had somehow gotten his hands on Chemistry, so that city was defended by Grenadiers. Fortunately, they were a precious few in number.

My forces having massed around that city, I built more Cavalry, thinking about a feint where I'd concentrate the bulk of my visible forces around this one city while I massed fast-moving Cavalry on a secret rally point, using them to strike at the lightly defended Paris. In the end, however, it turned out that this wasn't necessary - my Riflemen were so successful in bringing down the defenders of that city that I only needed to bring out that Cavalry and deliver the final blow. I didn't even need to bombard the city (and I wouldn't have had any Catapults to do it with, anyway) - it was giving its now-dead defenders a steady 60% defensive bonus even as my forces entered and burned it to the ground, slaughtering all inhabitants without mercy. Now I actually had a chance of winning - there were only 25 or so turns left, and I finally jumped from the second place to the first in the rankings. Seeing how more modern siege weaponry might be necessary, I began concentrating my research efforts on developing Steel.

Cannons did, however, not become necessary. Seeing their defeat, the French took all their units from all their cities to a one last suicide attack against my forces. After that my forces marched into the two remaining cities, sacking them and finally avenging all those dead Mongols who'd been slain so long ago. It was the year 2035 or something like that, and at last the Mongols stood victorious and triumphant. All of that degenerate "French" race had been slaughtered, their civilization once and for all wiped out from the surface of Earth.

(And then to wait for Kassiopeia's version - I'm sure he'll delight in explaining to you all how in the hell he could lose to me when he had three cities and I had one, and he was besieging my city for something like that 1500 years. Of course, none of his lousy excuses will be recorded in the Mongolian history books - history is written by the winners, and the Mongol schoolchildren of coming generations will all be taught how the French were so degenerate and useless it was a wonder they managed to even breed among themselves.)

Kassiopeia · January 18, 2006, 22:58

Originally posted by Xuenay
So we were playing a Quick No Barbarians match with Kassiopeia, Duel sized Balanced map. He was playing as the French (Louis XIV) and I was playing as Mongolia (Kublai Khan). I was hoping for a quick rush win, taking advantage of my Creative attribute to quickly expand city borders and provide protection as I'd seize horses and crush him with my Keshiks.

Me too, except I picked a random Civ and hence didn't have Keshiks. Or Aggressive for that matter.

Soon his warriors would find my undefended city, rushing towards it in an attempt of early capture, only to find warriors constructed to defend it at the last possible moment.

And I had to divert production from food to hammers to get another warrior built in time. A very close call.

The next couple of hundred years passed by with minor skirmishes as both sides developed bows and deployed their new, shiny archers. In a move of daring psychological warfare, Kassiopeia placed a couple of his archers on easily defended squares just inside my territory.

Actually, I saw you had an iron resource in there, and I wanted to keep an eye on you in case you researched IW and wanted to develop it. Turns out, you researched IW when I was already doomed.

The move probably served its purpose, as it found me intimated for a while and momentarily limited my expansion as I churned out archers of my own to defend my capital.

Yeah, churn them out you did!

I chose to found my city on top of a nearby hill, one square further away from the horses than would've been strictly necessary. It would keep the Archers and the city alive for the while being, while I'd consolidate my forces to drive out the pesky French and get those horses.

Tee hee, that was a good play.

The time that passed after that was relatively uneventful. The horse city I established was actually my third, as I'd founded my second city on a peninsula behind my capital. It didn't produce many hammers, but it was protected by my capital and would hopefully go unnoticed by my foe.

Yeah. Geh.

I took a risk and eased my military production a little, building the Oracle to do the CS Slingshot. Having firmly established myself as a Bureaucracy, I researched Construction in order to build some Catapults I could use to finally beat those annoying Frenchmen.

Meanwhile, I was churning out hordes of Horse Archers and Axemen. I had found an iron resource behind my own cities, but I figured it'd fall inside my borders soon enough (turns out I built exactly one Swordsman in the entire game), and based on previous experience I was confident in my Horse Archers. (Had I played the Mongols and gotten Keshiks instead... who knows.)

Fortune was on my side, however, as Kassiopeia apparently hadn't researched Catapults himself yet.

I was working on Metal Casting! I had three cities to secure copper and horsies and a dozen units inside enemy borders, there wasn't enough commerce to go around.

they found themselves the target of some very big rocks hurled in their general direction. Collateral damage did its part in weakening the attackers, enough for the Archers in my capital to hold their own and drive back the resulting attack. However, Kassiopeia now very clearly had the initiative, possessing both horses and copper and with me having neither.

Indeed - and this moment is where I think I lost the game. Instead of building up my infrastructure and instead of researching new technology, instead of isolating you, I tried to overwhelm you with numbers. Turns out this wasn't a good call, and once I went down that road, I had to keep trying before you outteched me. As you did. Not discovering your peninsular city was the other crucial mistake.

(And then to wait for Kassiopeia's version - I'm sure he'll delight in explaining to you all how in the hell he could lose to me when he had three cities and I had one, and he was besieging my city for something like that 1500 years.

As I just did.

Like I said, the reasons I think I failed are:

- Less than stellar Civ choice for an early rush (no Agg trait, for one thing)

- Poor strategic choices tech-wise (not going for Forges or Wonders, even though I was Ind - I got stuck in "rush mode" even though the early rush clearly failed)

- Starting my rush too late and allowing you to consolidate your capitol; and after this mistake had been done, I tried to desperately rectify it by throwing away massive amounts of hammers while producing next to no commerce, or wonders, or libraries; the end result of which was that I had to try to keep Musketmen at bay with Elephants and Riflemen and Cavalry at bay with Grenadiers and Musketeers.

All the possible edge I might have had from having two extra cities (one of which was more a burden than an asset, save for the copper it provided) vaporised at the gates of Karakorum. The mistake of throwing away units compounded its effect over time, as your defenders kept getting more and more experience. The more I banged my head against the wall, the sturdier it became.

It was a nice game though, the 1500 year siege was quite epic. I lost over thirty catapults during it.

What I should have done was accept your Cease Fire proposal after the first offensive failed, and consolidate my position in points lead. That would have eased off the pressure on military production enough to beat you in tech and in the endgame.