Babylon and On - Spoilers and Strategy

[Velociryx]

Here's the thread to discuss the trials and tribulations of getting our small island nation from where it is now to glory....

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

Spoiler....sorta
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I've not played the game beyond 1570 yet, and am not sure when I'll be able to, but I've already got a plan in my head for how I wanna proceed, and will outline that here.

First, gotta plant some spies, so espionage acquisition will be priority numero uno....spice trades, here we come!

Second, gotta start building a military...will hold off on doing that till I get tanks, and then build like a demon. Until then, I'll be happy to continue to improve my infrastructure, and flesh out that rail network.

Third, *IF* war breaks out between several parties, I'll assess the situation, and throw in my lot with the biggest side, making sure I get my piece of the action.

Fourth, that island to the northeast of us WILL BE mine! No particular reason...'cept that it'd look much better red than multi-colored! Not sure how just yet, cos there are cities from several different nations on it, but sooner or later....

Fifth, I'll let the game decide. Soon as I have an army and a Navy, I'll start refusing demands from people who wanna take my spice without paying for it. If somebody tries to bully me, we'll hit back.

Sixth, if that doesn't work, then I'll resort to global terrorism, and use a ROP-Blitz to take China out in a single turn. That should get their attention.

-=Vel=-

[Aeson]

I decided to try my hand on this map, it's an interesting game for sure. Trading really is the key here, so I kept a log of all the trades up to the time I received Integrated Defense and finally caught up. It took until 1802AD. I'd guess the AI had gotten there 5-10 turns before I did. There was no war at all during this time, just a lot of building up.

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1570AD

F: Refining
B: Incense 17gpt 14g

R: Sanitation, Steel, 4gpt, 22g
B: Oil

A: Combustion, Dyes
B: Incense, 31 gpt

C: Mass Production, Furs
B: Incense, 35gpt 6g

1585AD

I: Flight
B: Incense, 33gpt 6g

1650AD

A: Atomic Theory, 71gpt 512g
B: Oil

F: Ivory
B: 240g

1670AD

F: Electronics
B: Incense 247g

A: Motor Transportation, Dyes
B: Incense 546g

C: Radio, Furs
B: Incense, 49gpt 17g

1675AD

I: Ecology
B: 91gpt

R: Fission, Espionage, 8gpt, ROP
B: Ecology, Iron

1690AD

I: Synthetic Fibers
B: Incense, 95gpt

J: Computers
B: Synthetic Fibers, 11gpt

R: Amphibious Warfare, Communism, 55g
B: Synthetic Fibers

1762AD

F: Stealth
B: Incense, 37gpt 1295g

J: Miniturization
B: Stealth, 8gpt

I: Nuclear Power, 338g
B: Oil

R: Recycling, Space Flight, 8gpt 55g
B: Stealth, Miniturization

C: Genetics, Furs
B: Incense, 124gpt

J: The Laser
B: Incense, Genetics, 53g

A: Dyes
B: 300g

G: Satellites
B: Stealth, 18 gpt

1764AD

I: Robotics
B: Incense, 128gpt

J: Superconductor
B: Robotics, 10gpt

G: Wines, 20gpt 107g, ROP
B: Robotics

1778AD

R: Advanced Flight, Horses, 21g, ROP
B: Genetics

G: 5gpt 47g
B: Advanced Flight

F: nothing
B: Coal (my only one on accident )

1788AD

F: Ivory, Smart Weapons, 15gpt 360g
B: Oil

G: 9gpt 80g
B: Smart Weapons

J: Spices, 20g
B: Smart Weapons

1802AD

I: Integrated Defense, 310g
B: Oil

A: Dyes, Saltpeter, 18g
B: Oil

R: 11gpt 20g
B: Nuclear Power

C: Furs
B: Incense, 90g

F: 480g, ROP
B: Incense

G: 7gpt 38g
B: Incense

[Aeson]

I haven't done much else besides trading and building up military/improvements. I decided to go with a (un)conventional military, lots of aircraft carriers, battleships... I've even built some nuclear subs, stealth bombers , jet fighters, an aegis cruiser, and tactical nukes. It's my very first time building any of these units. I almost built a stealth fighter, but that would just be insane.

Shortly after I caught up in tech, the whole world went to war. The main targets were the Americans and Japanese, but only the Japanese really took any losses. I sent a couple transports of MA's, MI's, and settlers up to scavenge some land, claiming a large portion of former Japanese territory. I claimed a few luxuries; 2 silks, 1 wine. Also claimed a lot of resources; 2 aluminum, 1 rubber, 2 uranium, 2 iron, 1 coal, 1 horse. All without a fight.

I'm just in the process of setting up my battle groups, no real plan on how I'm going to use them yet though. 3 of the AI are dependant on me for oil, or without it as I only have 2 spare. So 1 of them will be my first target. After the initial breakthrough they should fold quickly, not being able to build any MA's or MI's.

I think I'll try for a cultural victory, without taking everyone else out (leaving the AI with the most culture at least). Probably will need close to 200k by 2050AD, not sure if I can do it. It's 1844AD, and I'm not quite to 30k yet.

[FrustratedPoet]

That is very impressive Aeson.

I feel I should tell you, however, that the only victory conditions enabled are Conquest and Domination.
(See the bottom of Vel's first post in the original thread).

No cultural victory for you I'm afraid. Sorry.

[Aeson]

Oops... I read that Diplomatic and Spaceship were turned off in another post, didn't notice Cultural was too. That's ok, Cultural victories tend to be a bit boring.

[FrustratedPoet]

Originally posted by Aeson
That's ok, Cultural victories tend to be a bit boring.

Hehehe ... I know what you mean, my most recent game (my top score too, a little over 2,000 on Regent, not quite 65,000, eh? ) ended 2 turns before I was due to finish my Spaceship.
Suddenly I got that boring ... "oops, you've won by accident .. erm ... well done!" pop-up telling me that I had won a Cultural victory.

[DeepO]

Well, this is an interesting game for sure. I started the game, and was doing relatively well, but as I screwed up my first attempt of war I'll have to go back, and replay. But, no problem, it was the goal of this game to learn, and play in a situation that doesn't normally occur, and I can savely say this is the first time such a situation occurs in one of my games.

The key, I think, to this game is combined arms. This is exactly where I failed. I thought that MAs would be enough, well, think again.

Two things defined my play so far: trade (as Aeson pointed out), and 2 40-turn tech researches. As the continent had enough space for 2 additional cities (one below Babylon, as a money machine, the other next to the iron with 5 free tiles), I had put the iron city to a scientist as fast as I added a worker to it to get to size 2. This allowed me to research first radio, and then syn. fibers without paying for it.

The home continent was of course RRed asap, I built a few extra workers, and changed quite a few build orders to granaries. In those cities where I would lose shields, granaries were the first thing to build after the current build finished. Further, all cities received coal plants (the first time I actually have built those, normally I always get Hoover), and recycling centers once available. As the continent had no fresh water, nuclear plants were not possible, however I did build one of them in the southwestern city. I think it was a bug, as none of the other cities could build one.

Around 1800, I managed to create a beachhead on the largest continent, as the whole world was bashing the Russians (and razing their territory). I rushed an airport and a temple, and to my surprise the next city flipped to me a few years later! Not that it mattered, I could reach it with a MA in one turn, but still, it saved me the trouble of fighting for it.

In 1834 I thought I was ready to launch an attack on the Germans. I just researched syn. fibers my self ( and upgraded a few tanks), bought integrated defense, was one turn from completing Star Wars, but had no stealth yet. I had a moderate navy (4 BS, one nuke sub with tactical nuke loaded, one transport, one carrier with 2 bombers, 2 fighters). My goal was Berlin, as it contained 4 wonders (including Universal Suffrage) and controlled 6 wines. I had about 45 MAs, and a few MI standing by. More refinforcements were rolling in.

So I MPPed with both the Americans and the Indians (both at their own request), as they bordered the Germans. I slipped in a spy in the hopes of a war declaration, but it infiltrated Berlin without a sweat (why do spies always succeed when you want to trigger war?) So I renegotiated peace, let the negotiations fail, and was hoping to bash the 35 German MIs and 12 panzers in a few turns.

Boy, was I wrong.

Berlin is built on a hill (which I failed to notice the first turn), and even under constant barrage from my BS, it didn't lose pop fast enough to lose the metropolis defense bonus. I finally got it when they starved to pop 11, but those 10 MIs and a few riflemen costed me my whole attack force. I lost over 50 MAs there, and when I took it I had nothing left to continue the fight. Meanwhile, the Indians were happy to relieve the Germans from their spice city (which was a secondary target for me), I didn't get a leader, and the Russians were attacking me from the other side. As the whole world was chasing the Russians and Germans by now, I feared I was going to lose the domination to either the Indians, French or the Chinese. So, a replay was in order, this time a bit better thought out.

When I go back, these are the things I will pay more attention too:

• Combined arms: this is one of the few times you really need either lots of bombers, lots of BSes, or lots of radar artilleries. MAs alone are much too costly, you never are able to reinforce your troops at the rate you're loosing them
• more MAs: 45 MAs is a joke when you're fighting 35 MIs. Especially when one city is protected with 10 MIs, it takes way too long to gain anything. This war was dragging from the start. You need those extra MAs as you can be sure you lose them in a 2:1 ratio, sometimes even worse. Next time I'll need at least 150 MAs or I won't start a war.
• look out for defensive bonusses! When your MAs are fighting infantry, maybe a few MIs, you just roll over them. Not so when the majority of defensive troops is MI, it changes the game a lot
• multiple invasion points: as I had a beach head, I figured a traditional invasion on a choke point was not needed. Now I realize it would have helped tremendously if I had blocked off Berlin from the East of the German territory. The attack was too slow, a blitzkrieg tactic was not possible. So you have to counter reinforcements.
• mobilization: I did mobilize, but only in the year I started my attack. Next time, a few turns earlier would have helped a lot. Okay, no rushed temples in the new territories, but you have to out-produce the AI, which is hard when you only have 13 cities (of which 3 were still producing libraries)
• GA: I did built one bowman to trigger the GA, but was too late in using it. After you take Germany's aluminium and oil (which I was trading to them), longbowmen appear. Ideal for a bowman to win from, and I had planned this, but forgot all about him until I figured I needed a replay.
• trade: looking at Aeson's list, I was still a little late acquiring all techs. I think the difference was that most of the times I took the cheapest tech, without being able to trade it to anyone, as everybody allready had it. Paying more for a tech which still had some trade opportunities would be better. But still, apart from Stealth I was only some 10 turns behind Aeson, which I consider good enough. After all, I'm no Civ-god
  Another reason might be that the AI research was a bit slowed, in my games the AI started to fight a lot amongst each other when I was entering the modern age. I was only a few turns behind for SDI, and a few AIs didn't had it yet.
  What did surprise me was that Aeson did not research anything on his own, which was possible for at least radio and syn fibers. So it is possible to improve some more...

I hope I will be able to replay this evening, it is a very nice game. Thanks Vel for the challenge, I loved it!

DeepO

[Aeson]

MA's against purely MI's in large cities is very hard without an initial army or two. No previous army means no heroic epic for more leaders to turn into armies, no building armies yourself with the military academy, and no pentagon for bigger armies. MA armies are the key to breaking through a Modern AI's MI defenses without high casualty rates.

My combined arms forces were pretty ineffective themselves. I could take several cities, but only at very high loss rates. My Stealth Bombers didn't do much good, Radar Artillery is going to be the key I think, at least until I can get a couple of leaders. My whole plans were really messed up when one of my 3 oils moved to India, which was the one AI that hadn't had oil and I wasn't trading it to them. I realize now why I never built most of those units, as they are less than useful. A pure MA, Radar Artillery (with a few MI guards per stack), Transports, and Battleships force is probably what is called for.

I think most trading schemes would end up about the same date, even though they will take paths slightly different from each other. The biggest trade IMO is to get refining on the first turn, and trade away your oil sources, that really gets the ball rolling. In my game I did try the 1 researcher 40 turn ploy too, but always ended up having to trade for the techs well before the 40 turns were up. I think I was at 22 turns or something like that when the AI got Synthetic Fibers on my game. This is probably because the AI's weren't warring at all, so overall tech rate was a bit faster. If I had gone for recycling (instead of Synthetic Fibers) myself I think I had enough time to research it. This type of trading situation is something I've never had to try before (even OCC spaceship tries are usually much closer to the lead in tech), definitely room for improvement still!

A lot of good points in your post DeepO. I'm thinking about playing this again from the start myself. Germany would definitely be a better first target than India. I'm too used to the MA slaughters (led by MA armies) that happen if you get them about the same time the AI gets Computers, and thus hasn't done much to modernized their forces.

[DeepO]

Aeson, I agree completely regarding the MAs versus MIs. I was thinking radars as well, but there is one downside to this: for several turns I was not producing much useful in my cities, except BSs. As this is an archipelago map, they can reach nearly all cities, and can be built at a time that no radars are available yet. I fear that when they get available, I'll like MAs or tanks (to be upgraded) more... however, radars have a better chance of actually hitting a MI. I'll give it some thought before I build masses of them

About the tech: you might be right that refining would be a better first choice. I beelined my trades so I could start on radio right away, buying electronics from the start (first couple of turns had a scientist from another city, until I built the iron size 2 one). But, this left me no option to buy refining, it was too costly. I think (but am not sure anymore) that I bought sanitation instead. And, I had to wait a couple of turns before radio completed to get to the modern age, turns that might be used better as well. Perhaps it is possible to first buy refining, and using oil buying electronics in the same turn, that would still make radio a nice one-researcher tech.

What syn. fibers is concerned: my AIs were as fast as yours to get it, I think I was lacking some 20 turns too. But I didn't care, I was not going to war that early, so I was building tanks, and saving some cash to upgrade them. In the mean time I could still buy the rest of the tech tree. And, the more tanks I could build, the faster my attack was going to be: with so few cities, building a tank and upgrading seems to be a lot better than building an MA, as it will take longer.

BTW, my last few trades, like yours, were just gold, not gpt trades. And in 1834 I could cancel all resources and incense trades if I would have wanted that (some of the incense was being traded for other luxuries). I wanted to keep my options open.

It always is nice to see the difference in evolving games, I too lost an oil early on (I don't know to whom, I didn't pay attention), and lost my uranium as well. The first time it just shifted a few tiles, but a few turns later it was gone completely. I didn't use it for much, as I had already built 2 tacticals (just in case, not planning on using them)

In attach the minimap of 1850, the year in which I decided this was not going the right way. You can see that the Japanese are destroyed and some of the Russian cities, which became German first, are now French. The Germans are about finished (I did take one further city that turn, and they lost another to the Indians before I could get to it), and Babylon is relatively speaking still the smallest civ around

DeepO

[Velociryx]

Glad you guys are enjoying it!

I played to 1979 so far...yowza...I'm not sure if I can win via domination before the clock runs out!

Unlike you guys, who seem to have had a long stretch of peace, the whole world went ape$hit shortly after I took the game up again!

I started cranking out the tanks, and while I was doing that, loaded two settlers and two of my infantry onto a Galleon (I know I was the only wooden ship on the water!).

My settler transport paid off....Japan and The Rus had formed an ill-fated coalition against Germany, India, France, and the USA, and were both getting ground into dust. Germany graciously asked me if I wanted to give my army some combat experience by joining in the party, and before I even had my first tanks online, I readily agreed (got ROP and Alliance). So basically, I bottom fed.

Founded two new cities on the German/Indian mainland, had the distinction of removing Japan entire from the game (captured one city on the island to the far north of German/Indian holdings (America was an island hopping HOUND tho...got all the rest), and one on the German mainland (which flipped to Germany about three turns later, taking my two tanks with it). Did some island hopping of my own and reduced The Rus to one stinking, miserable city in the far southern polar regions, and Babylon was officially on the map.

No sooner had that war pretty well wrapped up when a new coalition formed...America and India vs. France and Germany....the battle of the titans with poor little Babylon swept along for the ride. My entire attack force consisded of some thirty MA's, 4 BB's and 4 trannies. One airport rushed on the German mainland and the fleet near home....MA's about evenly split between the German continent and home.

So....taking a lesson from my native south, we did what Robert E. Lee would do when hopelessly outnumbered.....we kept our force divided and attempted to outflank our opponent, striking toward Deli with one group, and smashing onto the island that France and India were battling over (the one to the north and east of Babylon proper).

That's when the nukes started flying.

I didn't outright SEE any nukes, mind you...but as my army approached Deli, I saw that it had been reduced from size 23 to size 4, and had OCEANS of pollution around it. No dice, then....we re routed our German contingent to the southern portion of India...it looked as though the Germans were well on their way to reducing northern india to rubble anyway.

America booted me off of the island north of my German mainland holdings with ease, and, using their burgeoning naval might, kept me from even trying to get it back. I watched in horror as a lone Aegis cruiser of theirs munched FOUR attacking German battleships (which amounted to my entire attack fleet!). Considering that America had nine of those puppies...I kept my lil' navy closer to home, and prayed that none of those big bad wolves decided to come hunting.

The US also landed forces in India near Deli in a splended moment of AI strategy, in an effort to relieve their allies.

They and the Germans got into a TITANIC MA/MI battle, which was great for me...while they were slugging it out, I plodded along and kept capturing Indian cities and/or raze and replant my own settlers (brazenly walking them on German railways right through the thickest parts of the fighting).

When the dust settled, Babylon had truly become a world power, with significant holdings on the German mainland (eight cities, counting the two I founded at the start of the last war), and a smattering of cities on various islands.

There was one point that left me a little concerned, when my French and German allies stopped talking with me, and suddenly got annoyed. They promptly made peace with the US, leaving me to fight the beast alone.

America easily captured one of my german cities, and it took everything I had to get it back. Afterwards, I begged for peace (parting with 230g for the pleasure) and the American giants grudgingly accepted.

Time to consolidate.

Nope...strike that...no time to consolidate. France declared war on China, who had been peacefully sailing along in the sea of war.

Well....not in my backyard! So...here we go again....to war.

America jumped in with both feet and they and the French had some really quite classy naval battles. France built the HELL out of some subs! Fortunately for me, aside from bombing all my terraforming efforts to nothing, the Americans left me alone, and I sailed my entire navy (which had grown to 5bb, 5 trannies) 'round my homeland and landed thirty MA's and 10 settlers on China's doorstep.

China's culture wasn't great, but was bigger than mine, so I figured I'd slash and burn most of it, and keep the minnows, and that's what we did.

Three cities captured on the first turn, we basically ran through China like they weren't even there. Oh sure, we were losing lots of MA's, but with a rushed in airport, we could get reinforcements there very quickly indeed, and thus, we stole France's attempt at becoming a globe spanning empire. They snagged three of China's cities, but we got the rest, and truly carried the bulk of the fight.

China had a couple cities in the far south, near where we had relegated the Russians to living, and I had loaded transports to head that direction....and then I thought about....balance.

So far, I had been reacting to events, rather than creating them.

That was no way to win the game, especially with time running short.

What was needed was something decisive.

The USA had to go.

*GULP*

So....I brazenly asked for German assistance against the powerful Americans, and got it! They started slugging it out with the mighty American navy, and my small fleet inched its way northward.

Blessedly, aside from assorted bombing raids which tattered us, and one pesky destroyer that sneaked in a kill of one of my damaged bb's, we arrived safe in our northern Germany holdings (where an airport had been rushed, and 40 ma's stood ready).

Loaded up thirty nine ma's and a settler, attacked the american mainland and burned...I forget which city to the ground. Withstood a half decent (about ten mi's) counter attack, got a leader!!!! Built a city the following turn, made an army, and braced for the real counter attack.

47 mi's and 18 ma's struck my force on the following turn. I don't know if I'd have survived or no if I hadn't made an army there. Not sure. But that was a very tense turn indeed, watching a seemingly endless stream of American hardware plow into us.

Airport rushed, reinforcements pouring through just as quick as we could....and considering America's cultural dominance, I dared not risk keeping many US cities, so most were burned, and German immigrants brought over to resettle. We lost....oh God, I shudder to think how many MA's we lost taking the American mainland, but in the end, we got all their cities save one (Germany snagged it), reducing America to the islands north and west of its former home, with Babylon large and in charge of the American and Chinese heartland, with scattered holdings elsewhere.

Now the question....1970. Not much time left.

Germany or France? Germany would be both easier and harder, but I dunno.....

-=Vel=-

[alexman]

I have played only up to 1770, but can someone take a look at this save and tell me why I am suddenly at war with Japan next turn? Am I missing something or is it a bug?

[DeepO]

Vel, any idea on how many MAs you burnt? If you are doing it without any radars, it has to be huge...

Don't blame me for having a relatively long peaceful buildup time, I had to give in to demands a few times, but as I tried to rotate whom I traded techs from, everybody was happy, and both Americans and Indians were graceful. I was considering joining the modern wars to try to catch some crums falling off the big boys' table, but I thought I was much too weak. I know that I should be more bold, but even now, while waiting for Star Wars and MAs, I was not performing good.

The difference of course is that I had an ambitous goal: Berlin seemed to be perfect for a palace, and even if Aeson is right in the power of armies, still my first leader would go into a palace. I wanted to enter the world with a bang, instead of waiting for the crums and building it up from there. And I still plan to do so, if the AIs will leave me alone in my replay, Berlin is my target again. But you can be sure I bring massive force this time around, up until the point that I don't care anymore if I lose 50 MAs on it.

Another reason why I wanted to remain peaceful is my fear of nukes. I really don't like them, but love the tension (kind of like irl). Waiting to complete Star wars seemed to be a good, all be it tense, solution. If anyone tries to nuke me after that, they are going to regret it.

One question though, I guess that your BB means the same as my BS, but how do you get to that abbreviation? I always thought BB meant Brigitte Bardot. It sure makes reading your post interesting, if you mentally replace madame Bardot each time you encounter BB

DeepO

[DeepO]

alexman, I want to, but my ISP has other plans... Internet has been an on/off thing all day. Tomorrow I'm going to ask my ISP what they are doing to their servers. It took me half an hour to post last post, so I hope this gets through

DeepO

[Aeson]

I just checked the 1570 save and you can do quite nicely trading for Refining, Atomic Theory, and Electronics.

France: Refining for Incense, 17gpt 14g
Russia: Atomic Theory, 1gpt 17g for Oil
China: Electronics, Furs (renegotiate) for Incense, 41gpt 4g

Also it's best to get one more luxury, and trade away the 3rd spare Incense.

India: 327g for Incense
France: Ivory for 12gpt 12g

This allows all the workers to be working, except for the one scientist researching Radio. I also disbanded all but 2 of the riflemen to rush the Coal Plants and Factories in the bigger cities. Ended the turn with 516g and 113gpt, which will get over 1000g nicely by the time the Wall Street is finished.

Alexman -

That is very weird, I can't see any reason why you go to war with Japan. I tried renegotiating the peace treaty and nothing seems to work. My advice is to load up some settlers and send them to claim some of that Japanese land that is opening up. It looks like they are losing ground, and having their cities razed. Should be an easy way to claim some resources, one Uranium is already there for the taking.