AU601: Aqualung71's DAR2 (Rome, vs Paddy)

[Aqualung71]

Please do NOT read this thread of you are playing the game and:

1) You are Paddy the Scot

OR

2) You are not Paddy the Scot but are playing as the Greeks

OR

3) You have not yet explored the entire map (including oceans and islands) or discovered Gunpowder


This is the thread of my DAR2 for my AU601 game - against Paddy the Scot - AU Mod, Monarch level.


This is the link to the thread for my DAR1

Go hard Paddy, old friend and foe

[Aqualung71]

640AD

Copernicus' Observatory was completed in Rome in 590AD. We are still building Smith's and Leonardo's and have commenced a Newton's pre-build.

The Roman Emperor Aqualungius has settled on a peaceful course of development in the immediate future, since our expansion has now hit its limit and we are technologically advanced compared to all other nations on earth.

Rome will now endeavour to stretch its tech lead until it is clearly the dominant civ on earth, and then will respectfully request all other civs, including Greece, to pay homage to Roman superiority or risk annihilation.

We are however, considering embarking upon a policy of pillaging the land of any civ that attempts to keep up in research

Paddy is building Knights Templar, which we bypassed....and currently has a stronger army than us. However, this does not particularly concern us, since we have a couple of AC wandering through his territory watching what's going on, and our production capacity is substantially higher than his should we need to get a few Muskets built quickly.

Which reminds me.....we have Saltpeter, luckily

[Aqualung71]

Culture Flip?

The Carthaginian town of Leptis Magna must be pretty ripe for a flip. I did a check of the flip calc, and based on my estimate of comparative culture and assuming there are 2 defending units stationed inside, this town has a 4.5% chance of flipping each turn and 37% chance of flipping in 10 turns!

But nothing so far....I just hope culture flips was set to on

[Aqualung71]

The Wonder Race

Everybody is building Sistine, which means the game is heading towards a wonder cascade, with Leo's being the obvious target. Viroconium is still 13 turns away from snatching Leo's, so I have an anxious wait before I can start to upgrade units cheaply.

Of course, if worst comes to worst, I will have to switch it over to a Palace and wait for Newtons, which should go in either Viroconium, Rome or Pompeii since these are the highest commerce producing cities. Unfortunately, Pompeii is shield poor, though with a concerted effort towards growth would probably have the highest commerce potential - unfortunately the area is a little crowded so growth is an issue near the capital.

Obviously I won't be trading Economics to anyone at least until the other wonders are completed to avoid any cascade into Smiths. I may bypass Magellan's completely and push on towards the juicy Industrial age wonders.

A move into Democracy would be sweet at some stage (making Universal Suffrage virtually mandatory and Police Stations desirable), but difficult to achieve for the forseeable future due to the number of wonders I'll be building and the fact that I'm not going to divert to optional techs and so will have to rely on the AI researching it.

[Aqualung71]

700AD

Golden Age has ended. Paddy reports that the Babylonians are really annoying him with invasion, while he is taking the opportunity to plant some towns in their territory

He also reports that the Egyptians and Persians are going at it near his territory. All this while Rome researches at 4 turn pace and builds Universities and Musketmen to protect her borders

[Aqualung71]

By the way, is anyone still reading this stuff or has AU601 died for most people now?

[alexman]

I'm reading!

It seems backwards that Greece is focusing on military and Rome is doing the building in your game! Perhaps you're both compensating to counter each other's traits.

By the way, the AI tends to increase the garrison until it has enough to prevent culture flips, so Leptis Magna might not have just two defenders.

[Aqualung71]

Hey, welcome back Alex!

Yeh, it does seem a bit strange doesn't it? Well, I guess it shows that I'm a bit of a pacifist builder......bear that in mind when you're preparing your armies in the Iron Civ final (yes, I know that's why you're paying careful attention here... )

Well, Leptis Magna may certainly have more than 2 defenders, but with 17 of their 21 tiles under my control, they would need a hell of a lot of defenders to get the probability down significantly. In fact according to the flip calc, they need 85 units to prevfent a flip

By the way, how many effective cities do you have in your Iron Civer game?

[Aqualung71]

710AD

Brief update:

We've just discovered ToG so I've swapped the wonder builds around somewhat. The raw commerce of Rome (taking into account both commerce for the existing population and growth potential) is substantially higher than both Lutetia and Viroconium, so I have switched Rome's Smiths build over to Newton and given Smith's to Lutetia. Viroconium will keep Leonardo's with only 10 turns to go, since I'm worried about other civ's completing Leo's first.

Now almost all the other civs are building Sistine and Knights Templar....big deal

Closest civ in tech is Persia, who is still trailing Rome by Economics, Chemistry, Physics and ToG. Paddy doesn't yet have Theology or Gunpowder. I daresay my trading strategies have denied him many trade opportunities.

Now researching Magnetism (not Metallurgy, to extend the life of SoZ)

Still, having your 3 most productive cities tied up building wonders seriously restricts your ability to build adequate numbers of defenders....I hope nobody sneak attacks me

[Aqualung71]

....and here's the domestic advisor screen:

[Aqualung71]

Originally posted by alexman
It seems backwards that Greece is focusing on military and Rome is doing the building in your game!

Perhaps this also has something to do with the fact that I organised a world-wide military alliance against Paddy fairly early, so his surorunding AI civs are probably still annoyed or furious with him even though he has managed to make peace....and so they declare periodically, like Babylon evidently has.

This has probably meant he never had much chance to build his cheap Libraries, though he may be doing so now since I'm only 3rd in Literacy. Still, I've got a bunch of Universities being built that will be completed over the next 10 turns or so.

Strange really, since Greece has got a decent number of rivers....though I think the trick to playing Greece in this game was to build plenty of workers to fell the forests and clear the jungles, otherwise growth and production/commerce would have suffered.

[vmxa1]

I am still reading as well.

[Solomwi]

While we're chiming in, it isn't just those two, either.

[cracky]

beh, guh

Still reading here, keep up the posts.

...I don't post much, but I do lurk around and read most threads

[nbarclay]

I'm still checking in every now and then, although not on a daily basis.