AU 301 DAR 4 - Industrial Era to The End

[Vaugula]

Post your AU 301 DARs part 4 here

(Sorry Zargon, I have been sitting on my DAR for a couple of weeks now)

[Vaugula]

1867 AD – 1970 AD

I was starting to get complacent with my position and failed to upgrade my defenders from Oromo Warriors to Riflemen once I discovered Rifling, this proved to be a costly mistake because Bismark declared war on me and marched a massive stack of CR2 cannons towards Abbis Abada. Actually in hindsight, I think the lack of a response units (in particular loads of siege, but some cavalry for flank attacks would have been handy too) was the thing that killed me. I bribed Periclese into the war with Democracy so that took a bit of the heat off me but I was sure Bismark would take at least one city. I tried to get Shaka to join in but he had enough on his hands so I was really worried about being on the receiving end of a dogpile.

The German stack took down my defences in one turn and then rolled the defending units the next turn.

I don’t think it would have made any difference what I actually had in the city and so I learnt a valuable lesson that it is crucial to engage the enemy in the field because you can’t actually defend against a decent sized stack. This was a real revelation to me because I didn’t play with Blake’s AI before BtS and was used to really insipid AI stacks that you could hold a city against.

In building news, I finish the SoL. This was sped along quite nicely by Periclese’s copper. This having allies caper is really good I set everything else to building units, Riflemen until I discover Steel and then I mix in some Cannons. I am determined to not make the same mistake of letting them get a stack next to a city unopposed because the next most logical target will be Lalibela which will sink my chances of winning via a cultural victory, or at least make it significantly harder.

Shaka ends up declaring on Toku and Monty which is a great relief. With those guys tied up in their own war I can concentrate on fighting the Germans. The Germans make a strategic blunder and send troops to the west, presumably aimed at the Greeks, but have to trudge across a nice empty plain. I caught this stack in the open:

I destroyed it over 2 turns without losses. I keep my eye on their big stack of cannons, mainly assisted by passive spying, to try to work out where they were going to strike next. They kept moving them out of Abbis Abada but would then move them back once AA went into revolt. I think this could be considered a bit of a bug because they would have been better off moving up some sort of garrison to suppress the revolt and move their cannons onto my next city. It probably would have been worth it to not actually suppress the revolt at all, it wasn’t like I had the units to take it back at that point. Anyway, after destroying another stack heading for Greece, they commit their cannons and an attack force to try to knock over Lalibela. Having learnt my lesson I engage them in the field.

Destroyed with the loss of 2 Riflemen.

With the bulk of the German forces destroyed I take the initiative and march on Abbis Abada. I have enough siege support that I will easily take the city in one turn but I use a Spy to put it into revolt to put it beyond doubt. After 30 years of German occupation, Abbis Abada is liberated. The war really took its toll on the Germans, I think the power graph tells you a lot (also: I wasn’t really prepared for war before):


I now have a choice as to end the war or make the Germans pay. I choose the later and invade with a big stack of cavalry, my mission is to tear up as much infrastructure as possible, capture stray workers and destroy any units that venture out of the cities. I end up capturing 8 workers! This is a bit crazy, while I like that they don’t run away and hide in cities, I would have thought that if there was a cavalry 2 plots away that they would run away rather than continue working on their improvements. The looting continues for 8 turns before Toku and Monty declare on me. I hastily wrap up the war and bring everything down to the Japanese border.

The Japanese send in a few of stacks that I manage to destroy cheaply. I then get peace with Toku and Monty. I am not sure what they hoped to achieve in their war, maybe Bismark bribed them in? If so, it had the desired effect.

Periclese is pressing the Vikings pretty hard and asks me to join in the war which puts me back at war with the Vikings and the Germans. I manage to destroy a small German stack before the war ends with the Germans becomes a Vassal of the Greeks. This frees the Vikings, which is odd in this situation because the Vikings were the ones getting hammered by the Greeks. But anyway, I take the opportunity of peace to enter a Defensive Pact with the Greeks.

The Vassal dance continues with Ragnar becomes a peacetime Vassal of Shaka. This worries me because I now that the Greeks are determined to destroy the Vikings, predictably they go to war putting Periclese and Shaka, my 2 long time allies, at war with each other. Sorry Shaka, but I have hitched my wagon to the Periclese train. Bismark manages to get free from Periclese a little way into the war. Predictably Periclese asks me to join the war so being a good ally I join in. I probably could have sat it out because I am not that far from victory at that point, but you never know something strange could happen and an ally might be handy in that case (like everyone else declaring on me because I am close to winning).

In 1959 a Great Merchant is born so I use him to activate my first Golden Age. In 1961 I turn off research and have 100% allocated to culture. I can afford this by having all my cities, except for my troop production city and my 3 culture cities building Wealth. Periclese finishes the Apollo program in 1963 but with victory 7 turns away he can’t possibly win by Space Race. My Golden Age finishes in 1967 at which point Aksum and Gondar go Legendary. In 1970 Lalibela joins them and I win. My in game score was 2787, normalised to 10264 which ranks me Emperor Constantine.

Not the fastest Cultural Victory ever but I found it quite satisfying because I didn’t go into the game wanting to do one, I just thought that it was going to be the easiest way to win from the mid game onwards (1060 AD was the turn that I had the idea). The other great hope for victory was through the AP but I couldn’t get Monty to open his borders to allow me to sneak a missionary in (I was his worst enemy – hey buddy you started it!).

I managed to generate 10 Great Artists in the time between 1060 and 1970. I did this with a city purely dedicated to punching out Great Artists, it had the National Epic (of course) and was running 10 artists at one point (post Biology). This was out of 13 great people all up.

My empire:

[ZargonX]

(Sorry Zargon, I have been sitting on my DAR for a couple of weeks now)

No problem; I've been away on business, so the students have the run of the place

[joncnunn]

Jon's Dar Noble - Normal - Solver's Unoffical Patch til 1864 / 314 1864 -1888 / Buric's Unoffical patch post 1888
The Industrial Era: 1750 AD - 1898 AD

1750 AD Start Physics. 4th round of bombardment reduces Ondidnit down to 7% vs Gunpowder units. Lose a damaged rifle

during this round of combat. City is almost out of defenders but I'm out of units that haven't already attacked this

turn. A couple of my reinforcing Rifles arrive.
Sell Iron to Greece for Copper + 10 GPT

1755 AD Germans capture a border town from the Vikings and the Vikings capitualte. Finish bombarding Ondinit down to

no defenses. Lose one Treb in softening up their reinforcements. Capture and raize the town. This marginaly moves

the border east & removes them as a voting member of the AP. Zulus still refuse to surrender. Sell Dye to Germans

for Sugar. This appears to greatly help the happiness problems from WW and also elimates the unhealthiness in our

city constructing the West Point.

1760 AD WW increases sending the cities that just became happy back into unhappiness. Complete the Mori Statues in

our southwestern most city. The Zulus capitualate (+ all their gold + max per turn income + WM). This eliminates the

happiness issues entirely. Open the borders with Zulu. Trade a spare Incense for their only Silver. Revamp all

cities queues. All remaining UUs upgraded to Rifles. All remianing War Elephants upgraded to Calvary

1765 AD Aztecs become vassel of Japan

1775 AD We have a very close election and have the choice of +1 gold or +3 culture in every courthouse. We go with

the culture option.

1780 AD Receive the Great scientist from Phyics. We'll decide what to do with him after the next Great Person is

born but locate him over the southwestern most city. In the mean time, start researching Communism for the option of

that civic + the free Great Spy

1795 AD Sell Ivory to Germany for Silk

1800 AD Complete Hermitage in Gondor, the idea here is it's a border city,

1802 AD Great Phophet naturally born. Get a Free Great Spy from first to Communism. We decide to build the Academy

in our southwestern most city. We then trigure a Golden Age from the Phophet + Spy. Then we switch to State

Property. Science Rate bumped up to 90%

1806 AD Wall Street Completes in our Religious Shrine City. Greece now gives me 11 GPT + Copper for Iron

1808 AD Complete National Epic in Derbe because it was currently producing the most GP points and I wanted to keep

my options for IW open between the capital and the holy shrine. This was before I remembered the new National Park

Wonder (and Derbe already being the FP). Complete the Globe in our Southwesternmost city with all that ocean

producing hammers from Mao Statues.

1810 AD Start Steam Power, mostly to discover the coal. But it also appears that we need to switch some improvements

around with the increase in food production from Farms.

1812 AD All remaining Maces upgraded to Rifles

1816 AD Start Steel for the Iron Works. Complete West Point in our Heroic Epic city

1818 AD GA ends. Review cities in light of GA ending

1820 AD Finish the Statue of Liberty in the capital. Review cities in light of that completion.

1822 AD Start Medicine for the Hospitals. Great phophet born in National Epic city, settling him in the holy shrine

city which is also the future Iron Works city. Stop growth of the Iron Works city. All Trebs upgraded to Cannons.

1824 AD Looks like I started Iron Works one turn too soon (and in the wrong place) in light of the new Levy

improvement.

1826 AD Aztecs renouce the protection of the Japanese

1832 AD Start railroad. Add Hospitals to most cities queues.

1838 AD Complete National Park in Adwa

1840 AD Start assembly line for the factories. All crossbows upgraded to Machine Guns. Aztecs become vassal of Japan

1842 AD Complete the Kremlin. Japanese declare war! Aztecs declare war! Japanese declare war on Zulus! Aztecs

declare war on Zulus! Revamp all city queues in light of this war. Awaken military units. My, that is one big stack,

but it seems to have choosen the point on the border that's the furthest tiles from any of my cities so it looks

like the perfect kill zone. It's also quite a bit out of date (mixture of Knights & Crusanders; muskets, pikes, and

samaris; and Trebs. Many of the muskets have the wrong promotions to be on the offense [city defender]). A couple of

units into this, a Great General is born in our southwestern most border. We'll continue with the attacks to trim

down that stack fist and decide what to do with him later. By comparision all my horse units are Calvary's, my

gunpowder units are Rifles, my siege units are a mixture of Cannons & Machine Guns, and while I still have Longbows,

none of them are on the front line. Neither Germany nor Greece seems interested in joining the fight against the

evil Japs. Have the frigate pillage the Jap Clams.

Between turn: Japs wipe out the smaller of my two stacks adjoining his stack. Japs adopt Vassalage.

1844 AD Decide to use the Great General in the city building Iron Works near a lone Jap Knight on Horses simply to

get a free upgrade of the defender from a 0 XP Longbow to a 20 XP Rifle. Calvary from border with Greece arrives

into the area killing that Knight. Find a Longbow to move in to replace that defender. Kill the 3 units he left

behind in last turn stack movement south. Rifle reinforcements from SE town arrive including stack of cannons.

Bombard his stack to weaken it. Follow thru with Calvary and Rifle attacks. End result is what's left of his stack

is very much unimpressive with all that serious damage. Drop the Stone for Wheat deal I was getting with Zulus since

I'm not building anything that benifits from Stone now. Have the frigate pillage an Aztec Clam.

BT: Japs send a couple more stray units in south east. Zulu reinforcements start arriving in that area. Meanwhile

Jap AI stack appears to be commiting suicide in the west, it's forces stayed in place instead of retrating across

the border to heal.

1846 AD Wipe out the 2 Japs in the east. During the attacks upon the heavily damaged Jap stack, a Great General is

born in the capital. We send him to report as a second instructor to West Point / Heroic Epic. Finish wiping out

that stack. Trim stack of two Japs inside their territory in that area down to one. Wipe out lone Aztec on Windmill

in my territory. Trim stack of two Japs on the ice oil in my territory down to one. (I'm out of healthy enough units

too attack in that area for this turn.) Have the frigate pillage another Aztec Clam.

1848 AD Frigate pillages another Aztec Clam. Kill lone Jap knight on willmill near Mass. Kill lone Jap knight on Ice

Oil. My territory has now been cleared of Jap units. Trim a Jap stack just outside my borders.

BT: Aztecs kill Frigate with newly constructed Ship of the Line. Japs kill damaged Calvary on ice hill. Small stack

of Japs invade from west. A sucide Jap catapult also invades.

1850 AD Iron Works completes. Order air strikes against Jap city of Shim. Town is so slightly defended and only has

20% culture, and adjoins my boundaries so major combat against it begins immedately. Capture and raize the town, the

worse result I got was a retreat. This leaves the coastal Jap town west of it very much cut off from the rest of the

Jap empire. Kill the 2 Samari in the invading stack. Kill Jap catapult. Kill Jap Knight.

BT: Remains of Jap stack retreat back across border. Jap Sam kills wouded Rifle on Iced Oil. Aztecs send a few more

troops into my territory.

1852 AD: Notice that factories seem to produce a lot more unhealthiness in BTS. With completion of Assembly Line,

Infs displace Calvary as my favorite unit to build. (We would have stoped building Calvary earlier if it weren't for

the war). Decide to research Facism for the free Great General. Two dry docks complete on our western city. We place

2 Frigates in both their queues because Iron Clads can't enter ocean. Kill Sam on Iced Oil. Airstrikes against the

next Jap town east. Upgrade the new Rifles with a Warlord to Infs. Upgrade the Rifles near the Aztec Granaders to

Infs.

1854 AD: Great Phophet born in West Point / Heoric Epic; we'll settle him in our Wall Street / Iron Works City next

turn. Capture and Raize Yokohama. (One retreat; no loses) Downsize Aztec stack on hill with Infs.

BT: Japs kill Calvary that raized Yokohoma

1856 AD: We send the free Great General to West Point / Heoric Epic and put him to sleep to save him for the

Military Academy. We decide to resarech Artilery to allow upgrading the Cannons to them.

1858 AD: Bombard isolated southwest Jap city down to zero%. Kill Japs near Azma. (Aztecs still have a couple of

units in that area) Aztecs pillage one of my sea resources.

1860 AD: Kill all Aztec units in my terriory. Capture and raize that southwest Jap city. (No loses nor retreats)

This brings an additional Iron into my territory. I now ask the Japs what is the price for peace since I've met

minimum objectives and WW even with Jails was up to 4 extra unhappiness in my core cities, and the Japs volunteer to

turn over Najaski, all their gold (200), their WM, and 2 GPT. I accept and consider it ok to actually keep this city

since the Japs voluntered to hand it over. Redeploy units in light of the new much shorter Japanese border. Revisit

all queues in light of war ending.

1862 AD: Great Artist born. We decide to store him in our Wall Street / Iron Works City waiting for Mass Media at

least for now. We'll probably change our mind if we get a Great Enginner before then.

1864 AD: Hum, that's strange, discovery of Artilery lets us build Anti-Tank Missles while no one can build tanks

yet. Start reseraching Combustion. Reconnect the Clams.

Patch 314 installed. Review screens & specalists. Corporation costs now seem much more reasonable. In addition, the

governor's specalist choices make a whole lot more sense.

1866 AD Decide that a much better use of the Great Artist would be to expand the borders of Nag immedately (instead

of holding onto for Civilized Jewer. The primary reason being that Mining Inc uses the same resources and also while

yielding at least 10 hammers per town. Cancel the Incense for Silver deal and the Iron for Copper + 11 GPT deal.

Trade Incense to Zulus for Stone. Change civics to Enviormenalism. We will need the extra health at least

tempoarily.

1868 AD A cache was discovered in the Budist Monstary, we decide to go with the culture from that Monastary option,

but will fail to see any; maybe that expired already?

1872 AD Start researching Electricity

1876 AD Complete Mt Rushmore in Yeha

BT: Germans cancel all trade deals. Germans close borders. Germans declare war! Vikings declare war! Germans &

Vikings declare war on Zulu! Germans downgrade Town to nothing in their major strike force.

1878 AD Remobilize military. Revise all queues. German smaller stack near Liber of 3 Calvary and 1 Cruisander

killed. This still leaves German stack of 15 Calvary, 15 Rifles, and other minor units near Gondor

BT: Germans split some units off their stack to go pillaging in multiple tiles.

1880 AD While dispatching smaller stack, Great General born in Gondor; assign him to a left over Rifle with 14 XP,

promote him and use the upgrade to Inf. Artlerry & Cannon arrive in Gondor, heavilly bombarb the German so called

stack of doom, losing 2 cannons. Follow up with a major attack on that stack, results are it is downsized to 5

Calvary, 3 Rifles, 1 Mace, 4 Trebs with no loses on my side.

BT: Trebs bombard defenses of Gondor down to 16%. Zulu forces arrive near Cologne.

1882 AD: Finish wipe out of German so-called stack of doom. Kill German Rifle + Cal on rice near Gondor. Kill 2

German Cal near Liberalon. Because of how weak Cologne's defenses are (2 damaged Calvary inside, 2 damged rifles adj

east, 1 Pike! under construction), send 4 Infs to the tile just south of it on hills.

BT: Looks like Zulus and Germans skirmed near Cologne. Germans sent more units into Cologne but they are all heavily

damaged. Looks like the Germans have cut the rice.

1884 AD: Great Scientist born, decide to store him for a probable Standard Ethanol corporation in the future.

Attacks against Cologne reduce it to a single Calvary defender (0.8 out of 15) & 3 Aztec units just east, depending

upon the realtive turn order between the Germans and Aztecs, Cologne may be in BIG trouble. Kill German Calv on my

side of the culture line near Cologne. Kill 2 Viking units & 2 German units near Gondor.

BT: Aztecs capture Cologne, apprently with an extrmely wounded War Elphant; I'm highly surpized they didn't either

raize it or liberate it to me.

1886 AD: Hatch a devious plan, we are going to keep our 4 Rifles just south of there in place which should result in

the Germans retaking it, this should allow us to take the city and raize it ourselves. Clear our culture of enemy

units. Essen looks weakly defended enough to try to attack (just 3 Rifles, two damaged from air strikes), so we

start doing so. Early in this, a Great General is born, assign him to a Rifle with 15XP, give promotions and upgrade

it to Inf. Essen captured and raized to the ground. Redepoly most of the Machine Guns back to the eastern border

since they are no longer needed here.

BT: Germans kill Calvary that raized Essen. As expected, Germans retake Cologne.

1888 AD: Lose 1 Inf capturing and raizing Cologne. Ask Germans "What is the price of peace?" They respond:

Capitulation + City of Hathiu + WM + 300 gold + 9 gpt. Deal! Peace treaties signed. Vikings have broken free of the

Germans. Open borders with Germans. Trade a spare fur to Germans for Whales. Send forces into Hathiu to secure it,

and decide to send aprox 1/2 forces from the German border to the Japanese border. This will allow us to immedately

respond to a war declaration by either Japan or the Vikings.

Install Buric's unoffical patch.

1890 AD: Complete the Pentagon in our Iron Works city. Vikings become a vassal of the Greeks.

1892 AD: Start refridgeration for Super Markets. Trade a spare Incense to Zulus for Ivory with it now being obsolete

1898 AD: Enter the Modern Era.

[joncnunn]

Jon's Dar Noble - Normal - Buric's Unoffical Patch
The Modern Era: 1898 AD - ????

1898 AD: Start Plastics, we're thinking we want both Three Georges Dam and to found Standard Ethanol. Add Super

Markets to most city queues, in some cases by itself and in others paired with an Industrial Park, depending upon

healthiness.

1901 AD: The Rice the Germans had disconnected is now reconnected. Complete Broadway

1904 AD: Great Enginner born in the capital. Found Mining Inc in Iron Works / Wall Street. Reduce Science to 80% to

free up money for corporate expansion

1905 AD: Whale for Fur deal auto-canceled. Start Ecology for Recyling Centers. Found Standard Ethanol in Iron Works

/ Wall Street. Expand Mining Inc into City building Three Georges Dam. Confirm that Mining Inc is cash-negative (but

the +12 raw hammers should make it up) while Standard Ethanol is cash positive. We'll focus more on expanding

Standard Ethanol for now. We're also going to actively spread Confucism a bit. Trade Hit Musical to Zulus for their

Fur. Trade Hit Musical to Germans for thir Whale.

1906 AD Expand Standard Ethanol into the capital. That's strange, our capitulated vassal says they don't like us

enough to trade Military Science

1908 AD Spread Confucism to Stuggart, which the Germans founded one tile NW of old Cologne. Hook up the oil off the

course of Gondor Spread Standard Ethanol to the other two Academy cities, Gondor, and the city SW of Wall Street /

Iron Works.

1909 AD Spread Confucism to Hamburg. Spread Standard Ethanol to two more cities. Spread Mining Inc to the capital.

1910 AD Start reseraching Radio. Add Recyling Centers to most cities queues. Great Enginner born, use him to help

hurry along Three Georges Dam. Spread Mining Inc into another city. Spread Standard Ethanol into another city.

1911 AD Spread Standard Ethanol to another city

1912 AD A German spy is caught at the highest levels of govt, we release him back to the Germans. Trade Astronomy to

Germany for Military Science. Construct a Military Academy in our Heroic Epic / West Point city.

1913 AD Spread Mining Inc to Haithu & our Heroic Epic / West Point / Military Academy city.

1914 AD Spread Mining Inc into 2 cities & Standard Ethanol into 2 cities

1915 AD Spread Mining Inc into 3 cities & Standard Ethanol into 1 city

1916 AD Start reseraching Mass Media. Spread Mining Inc into 2 cities & Standard Ethanol into 1 city.

Upgrade Buric's unoffical patch to Version 107.

1917 AD Spread Standard Ethanol into Haithu. It now present in every city within our empire.

1918 AD Spread Mining Inc into 1 city. Spread Confucism into 1 German City

1919 AD Start Super Conductors Spread Mining Inc into 1 city; it is now present in every city within our empire.

1921 AD Complete Effel Tower in Iron Works City

1922 AD Complete Rock N Roll in Capital

1923 AD Complete Christo Redemer in our third best hammer city. Switch civics to Free Market; wow, that caused

income to spike up! Increase Science rate to 90% and I'm still making a bit more per turn post switch than before.
This did however cause six cities to become unhealthy; mostly -1s, but there is also a -6 one (Heroic Epic). Spread

Confucism to 1 German & 1 Zulu city. Decide to build a spy in three of my cities, perhaps that might help bringing a

sugar into my culture boundary.

1924 AD Start Genetics to help with the healthiness issues. Add Laboratorys to most cities queues. Spread Confucism

to the Zulu capital. Trade Fascism to Greeks for Divine Right + all their gold

1926 AD Complete the UN. Vote for myself. Monson season in the capital, we lose a Confucian Temple & a Marketplace.

1927 AD I'm elected the leader of the UN. (My vasals back me), the other candidate was Greece, their vassal backed

them. Japan & the Aztecs abstained.

1928 AD Spread Confucism to a Zulu city. Upgrade all remaining Rifles to Infs.

1929 AD We have entered the Future Era. Start researching Flight. Join the Great Enginner to our Iron Works City.

Spread Confucism to last German city without it and a Zulu city.

1930 AD Complete Hollywood in the capital

1931 AD Spread Confucism to a Zulu city

1932 AD Try for a Diplomatic Victory. Spread Confucism to a Zulu City

1933 AD Start Rocketry. Add Airports to most city queues. Upgrade all Zeps to fighters. Upgrade all remaining

Frigates to Destroyers. We're 24 votes short Add Confucism to another Zulu city

1934 AD Decide we have sufficent military units now for the rest of the game, so am now starting to build Wealth in

Iron Works / Wall Street. Lose a Battleship in the Bermuda Triangle. Bump up science to 100%, Last Zulu city now has

Confucism

1935 AD Athens has acheived Legandary Culture

1937 AD Family found some lost writtings. Choose to disperse them for +780 beakers towards satelight. Alternative is

-780 gold for +1 science at the libary (game will be over before breakeven)

1938 AD Start Computers as prereq to Robotics. Propose Open Markets

1939 AD Open Markets motion succeeds

1941 AD Start Robotics for Space Elevator

1942 AD Complete the Apollo Program in Iron Works / Wall Street. Great Prophet Born there & settle him in place.

1944 AD In Light of Japan reaching Fission, call a vote to ban nuclear weapons.

1945 AD It unamiously passes. Start researching Fiber Optics as twofer allowing both space ship part & leading to

Fusion. Notice that Iron Works is unforunately too far south to build the Space Evalator; looks like by one tile.

1947 AD Great Enginner born in our National Epic City.

1948 AD Star Composites for another space ship part. Have the Enginner hurry along the Space Evaltor

1950 AD Complete Space Elevator in the capital. Complete Internet in 3rd best hammer city. Called a vote to make the

Ethopian Currency the world one. Revising most city queues to place space ship components in them.

1951 AD The Motion to make everyone else adopt the Ethopian currency succeeds. Start Advance Flight. Add more space

ship parts to city queues

1954 AD Start researching Laser. SS Cockpit completes

1955 AD Complete all five SS Thrusters

1956 AD Complete SS Docking Bay & SS Status Chamber, and SS Life Support

1957 AD Complete first 2 SS Casings. Start Fission

1958 AD Complete 3rd SS Casing.

1959 AD Start Fusion. Complete 4th SS Casing. Great Engineer born in Adwa, have him join Iron Works

1960 AD Complete 5th and final SS Casing

1962 AD Start Stealth. Propose Global Civic of Universal Suffrage. Have the Free Great Eng join Iron Works. Change

Sliders to 50% Culture - 50% Science. Add SS Engines to queues.

1963 AD Universal Suffrage passes

1966 AD Finish the Tech tree. Culture now at 100%

1968 AD First SS Engines Complete. We discover an advanced refinement for Motor Oil. Choose the increased unit

support option. Propose Global Civic of Free Speech

1969 AD Fails because the Vikings vote "NEVER". This seems to have caused massive unhappiness problems in their

lands.

1970 AD Second & Final SS Engine Complete. Lauch the Space Ship. It's expected to land in 1980.

1974 AD Propose Free Religion. Great Eng born in Mass. Hurry along Future Tech 1

1975 AD Free Religion fails because Aztecs vote "NEVER". Start Future Tech 2 which should never complete. All

fighters upgraded to Jet Fighters

1980 AD Propose Emmancipation. Space ship has reached Alpha Centauri. Win a spaceship victory.
Time spent 43 hours 5 minutes.


On the top 5 city list, Athens is #1, but our cities are occupling the #2 thru #5 slots
I'm ranked as good as Augustus at 16K, this is my new highest ranking in Civ IV.
It then crashes
Restarting Civ IV; checking Hall of Fame: Ok looks like that got saved ok.
Size certinately seems to matter in terms of the final score.

[ZargonX]

Excellent work, jon!

[Swiss Pauli]

Emperor Normal v3.13

We left off with the dawning of the industrial age with the world at peace. It couldn't last, of course:






I declined to join the war on Ragnar's request: the diplo hit won't change his from Friendly. I get a very handy event:




I use the Great Spy I got earlier to spark a GA that lets me complete Biology and be first to Physics. I use the GA for a no anarchy swap to Free Speech, Free Market and Caste System to allow max artists and culture push now that I have Biology farms to boost my pop.

Having forgotten to dave at the end of a session, I had to use an autosave to restart . Founded my final city:






I beelined towards Radio and got a GP which I decided to save for a GA (with the GS from Physics) as the Taoist shrine wouldn't help so much. Peace broke out between the warring factions at the end of the C18th, so it wasn't a huge surprise when this happened:




I bribed Bismarck and Ragnar into the war, and saw off Shaka and Monty's initial skirmishing stacks. The Zulu SoD was a different matter:



That's possibly the biggest stack I've ever seen in my own games. Shaka came over the plains hill, so I retreated my troops into Lalibela. I didn't switch to slavery, but I did upgrade some cats to cannon (and had been training 1 turn cannon in my HE city. (The GA I sparked was a bit of a cockup: it burnt an artist instead of the scientist! Ooops.)

The first round of my attack on Shaka consisted of barrage cannon smashing into the stack then trying to pick off some units with strongest troops. Thereafter, weaker troops were used with mixed results and it was with some trepidation that I ended my turn...

...only for Shaka to bombard with his trebs. Phew! Although I had only 2 cannon in a fit state to attack, I had some reinforcements and was able to pick off a lot of units for very low casualties: lots of Knight attacks gave lethal flanking damage. Shaka still had a good sized stack, and could probably bomb down my defenses and attack the city itself...

...but my borders popped in the interturn, so Shaka's bombardment only took him back to square one. I had been wating for this:





Emboldened, I mopped up the rest of Shaka's stack (successfully using an axe and a spear to kill wounded units).





Beware of Greeks bearing votes! I was able to make peace with Shak soon thereafter: with his SoD gone, Bismarck and Raggy were putting the hurt on him. I made him adopt Hinduism as part of the treaty. Monty had escaped his vassaldom during the war, but I got the Great Mediator event for peace.

I'd still been running culture all this time, so the rest of the game was 'hit enter' - aside from a switch to Pacifism once I'd completed Eiffel and Cristo - until my Artist farm was culture bombed to legendary in 1916.




So I managed to survive my useless dotmapping and poor early cities, as well as a silly move of the initial settler (grass hills beat wines) and still win by some margin (Pericles 3rd city only had 11k culture and no AI had Apollo). I did contemplate quitting when it looked like Shaka would steamroll Bismarck, but Shaka threat was neutered when he took Monty as a vassal and got sucked into a long war with Japan. From my part, I did well to ally with the Hindus (Bismarck, Ragnar and Pericles) as I felt they would tech better than the Buddhists (Shaka and Monty).

See you for the next course.

[Theseus]

Monarch, Normal, Solver and 3.03 patches [finally finished with Firaxis 3.13]

[Note: I had to take a big pause from playing, due to crashing the end-game using 3.03, and even when I got 3.13 installed I had problems, so I bought a new computer JUST FOR AU!!! I lost all but my first DAR in the process due to terminal stupidity, so this last AAR will have to suffice.]
________

Well, the big news is that I technically failed the course!!!

“Ummm, a barbarian ate my BTS disk… Uhhh, no, I got mugged by Shaka…. Errr, ahhh, I got abducted by Alpha Centaurians…”



Nah, just let my warmongering instincts get away from me! And, though I exuberantly broke the rules, it didn’t really matter in achieving a win.

I’ve tried to go back and review the game from 1 AD on, which is a pain. Rather than try to reconstruct my DARs, here’s what I remember and can piece together:

• My initial REX worked out fine, with only Bismarck’s Essen intruding into my natural CP spread. I left two Settlers in reserve for building my south coast cities, and opened the borders (i.e., I wanted to put off building them as long as possible due to bad terrain and the suspicion of late-appearing strategic resources influencing CP, so I just left the Settlers/Archer pairs in place in case an AI civ were to try to cross my territory to settle there… which they never did).
• I somehow succeeded in gaining a significant tech lead, which I used to foster bad relations between the AI civs. I also loaded up on Horse Archers, which I don’t usually use much, to maintain a good defensive score, and, heck, let’s face it, got LUCKY and avoided any serious early wars. I saw many SODs criss-crossing my territory, though, and started planning on some serious warfare once I got up to and past Oromos.
• I ended up following Dominae’s tips on specialist economies and GA’s almost to the letter, including scoring the Oracle, Parthenon, and Mausoleum (amongst many other Wonders). Kicked BOO-TAY!!! Seven, yes, count’em, SEVEN GAs! I know I could have used my GPs for some other good stuff, most importantly settling and more Academies, but I gots no complaints! BTW, I don’t think this would have worked on anything higher than Monarch, in that I would have been facing way too much of a military threat to focus on Wonders, much GP points.
• I forget exactly when, but sometime in the mid-game I saw two huge problems developing: 1) Shaka was on his was to domination, having vassalized both Greece and Germany, and 2) I couldn’t see my way to a clear win. To make things worse, on the way back from Greece that mofo Shaka turned his attention to us peaceful Ethiopians, and lassoed Ragnar into the action against me as well. Luckily, I had seriously buffed my defenses with Oromos (gotta love all those first strikes!), and I was able to hold them off.
• This is ALSO when the game started crashing on me…
• When I came back to the game on new computer (with a 24” widescreen no less!), I decided to lay on a serious smack-down... on everybody! DOMINATION THROUGH 100% VASSALAGE!!! OOH-RAH!!

So that what I proceeded to do… finishing with ( ) only 31 turns remaining on the clock. Some hiccups along the way, including more SODs from Shaka and Toku, but with a good tech lead I was able to hold them off with Infantry and Arty, and got to Industrialism waaaaay before anyone else, mwahahaha. In the process, I couldn’t help myself, sorry, but:

1) I didn’t follow Blake’s dictum of no units entering a foreign city… I needed to raze in general, but most importantly to break Pericles and Bismarck free from Shaka’s evil clutches, and,
2) As I trimmed away around me, man, I couldn’t HELP filling in two holes… so technically I razed/rebuilt twice, although I set a limitation on myself that the rebuild had to be at least 3 tiles from the AI location (thus, technically, not really a “rebuild”); clearly a contravention of the game rule as to “what you build in the early game is all you get”. The cities didn’t really make a difference, but I was enjoying myself, so there.

Somewhat of a slog at the end, no doubt, but fun overall.

-T

ps: Special thanks to Dominae... this was the first time I really ran a SE / GA economy, which was a blast.

[Modo44]

Originally posted by Theseus
[Note: I had to take a big pause from playing, due to crashing the end-game using 3.03, and even when I got 3.13 installed I had problems, so I bought a new computer JUST FOR AU!!!

Now there's a superb excuse, if I ever saw one. (I kind of did the same not long ago. )

Great read as always, Theseus.

Originally posted by Theseus
I decided to lay on a serious smack-down... on everybody!

Priceless.

[Carch]

This is a little bit off topic, but I just started looking at Apolyton U scenarios...

I noticed in some of the screenshots that the text fonts look different, particularly in Blake's and Theseus' screenshots. I just got a new system with Vista, and when I got Civ installed, my fonts looked that way too, harder to read.

Is this a Vista thing? Is there a way to get those nice crisp fonts back? The way it looks on Vista is a lot harder to read.