Roman Empire

[PaganPaulwhisky]

On monarch, anyone can found hinduism. The AI's always go for Buddhism first, and myst then polythesim is a lot cheaper then buddhism then polytheism.

I just got beat to hinduism by one turn (Gandhi) after popping mysticism from a hut on the first turn. This was with Mao on Prince level, so it is definitely far from a sure thing on monarch without mysticism!

[chequita guevara]

I'm getting my ass kicked with this strategy

[chequita guevara]

Hey, it's finally working for me.

[chequita guevara]

BronzeWorking - Meditation - Wheel - Iron Working then shoot for Alphabet to trade for everything I've left behind.

1st build is a settler and I try to settle my first city on a dry hill. Then while I'm working on Iron working, start on my next settler, so it should be ready just after I figure out where the iron is. Then start pumping praetorians and go beat up on someone.

[Yosho]

In my current game, I did a slightly different stratagy as rome, but again I expanded to 12 cities before even finishing alphabet. Even though my research dropped to zero at one point before my economy rebounded, I managed to finish alphabet and literacy, build the great library, and recover; in big part by having several cities actually build research for a short period, something I almost never do. Very much worth it in the long run.

[Upstart1]

I'm very new to this game, and find this discussion fascinating. Just a newbie question.

What does it mean when you say "chop a worker" or "prechop for settlers" or "chop out pyramids", etc.

And what does it mean to "idle stonehenge or the pyramids if stone is nearby"

I guess I need to know what "chop" and "idle" mean.


Thanks.

[Yosho]

when people say something like "chop out a settler", they mean to chop down trees in order to get more hammers right away to build a settler faster.

[Jaybe]

I'm thankful I am not the only one who isn't familiar with smak's "idle" term. I would guess he means to work on building {whatever} when there isn't something else of priority to do.

It is SO nice you can do that in Civ4 -- interrupt building one thing to work on another, without loss (if you don't make it TOO long an interruption).

[Addled Platypus]

now with the same concept, tweak it and make it work for Genghis and his horsies

usually promote -1 terrain and go for at least 1 medic

[chequita guevara]

I finally did win a time victory using this. I'm trying to win a domination victory now.

[One_more_turn]

As Romans, I would consider researching Iron Workings and exploring the map as the highest priority. Once you get Iron Working, find Iron and start pumping out Praets. Go after AI's capitals or their best cities. AI's cities are usually protected by 2 Archers at this time, and if you can pump out 5 Praets before 1000BC, you can knock out at least 2 AIs from contentions before 0 AD. AI capitals should be much much better than your lousy new cities.

[One_more_turn]

The new Protective trait gives great boost to Archer's defense. Praetorians may not have it that easy anymore.

It appears to me that this new trait exactly serves the purpose to counter early Axemen/Swordsmen rushes.

[PaganPaulwhisky]

now with the same concept, tweak it and make it work for Genghis and his horsies

Yes, this strategy also works great for Genghis. Genghis is probably the best early warmonger IMO. In fact my highest score ever was with Genghis, using a very early Keshik rush (since I had no metal) and then converting to melee units later. Keshiks are really useful for a very long time. They are great for pillaging and diverting enemy units while your melee and seige units go in for the kill. I like to keep some around even after cavalry.

Aggresive and Expansive work really well together (and I think expansive is becoming one of my favorite traits now). If you focus on granaries early then Genghis is an early game monster (and for this reason is one of my favorite leaders to play). You have to be careful not to conquer too many cities early (seriously, its hard to stop with this guy) or recovery will be a tedious process.

I haven't seen much discussion about Genghis on these forums. Granted his traits don't work very well in the late game, but then you should not let the game go that far since he should be used exclusively for warmongering. His usefulness probably diminishes on levels higher than monarch, but overall I think he is underrated.

[chequita guevara]

Teh woot! I finally won a domination victory using this strategy!