AU 601: sabrewolf's DAR

[sabrewolf]

1150bc
just spotted dyes in the jungle. i think i'll grab that as my 3rd luxury resource. with 2 ivory (i want to also claim the 2nd one), 3 spices and at least 1 dye, i should permanently be able to get other luxes by trades. and with my curragh 2/3 around the continent, i can trade by boat too. just not, if i'm at war with the celts (ship trade route cut by culture border)

carthage has sent out an archer. my archer isn't (yet) in place, but a fortified spearman on the mountain should do the job too.

3 of the carthagian cities are size 1 or 2 (the 4th city not visible), so i'm not expecting a settler just now.

[sabrewolf]

i've just noticed, i havn't yet posted a large area map or the minimap. i'll do so soon.

my floodplain city is building a settler, despite having useless production. once it hits size 4 (in 3 turns), i'll rush it, just before i get philosophy to get another settler on his way.

i just hope my anarchy isn't too long. what are the expected lengths at AU monarch level?

[sabrewolf]

1125bc

persia has literature, egypt has map making, so i exchanged persian literature+25g for polytheism. persia under no circumstances wanted to take maths, so i guess they are short before researching it themselves.
then i sold germany maths+lit for MM+107g. if it continues like this, there will be 3 powercivs in this game: rome, germany and persia. the persian UU can harm greece, while i should be able to cope with germany

some more micromanaging, otherwise shooting getting philosophy in exactly 3 (2 settlers, 1 legionary complete a turn before)


i had a look at the AI's city spacing and noticed then spreading out really a lot, mostly OCP-like. bad for now, because they'll claim more territory like this, but better for later on, because that means less cities (AI doesn't make any kind of camps or temporary cities)

[sabrewolf]

1075bc

has it already been 20 turns?

both egypt and germans wanted renewals of the alliance contracts. egypt actually PAYED me 6g to stay in the alliance, while germany needed 7gpt+10g. at least they'll lose lots of gpt if they should cancel the contract
persia wanted 3gpt+3g. sadly, they still havn't connected the iron. i wonder if they even have iron? i'd be happy lending it to them... immortals need to swarm over greece soon

oh well... 1 turn to philosophy, 1 turn to monarchy. cumae (that's the name of the city next to the wheat-floodplains) just had a settler rushed. shields went from 11 to 30, pop from 4 to 3 (and next turn to 1). antium just produced the first legionary (GA as soon as monarchy is out) and rome sent out the last settler for the moment. with the 2 settlers already on the way, i've got 4 cities being founded in the next ~15 turns

with 255g and owing other civs 10gpt, i should be able to sustain some turns of anarchy. but i still don't hope for anything too long

[sabrewolf]

1050bc will be the 2nd mankind will remember: the end of the despotic regime of rome. in 100 years - so long our theorists expect the nation will need to adjust to a new type of governement - monarchy will be way of the roman life for the next millennia.

some whacky futurist sais that monarchy will some day replaced by a government he calls "communism". of course, he was burnt alive for heresy!

[sabrewolf]

the world at 1050bc

here's the part of the world we know.

as you can see, i know most of the germanic, celtic and carthagian space. one warrior is getting to know the egyptian and the babylonian territory while the curragh is soon around the greek area... which btw is imho a lot better land than the roman. more grassland, tons of bananas, hills instead of mountains and a capital not on the peak of a peninsula, but nicely centered.

speaking of lands: as we're not allowed to conquer AI cities, nothing forbids us from settling their area. i might send a settler all the way up to the german incense and i'll definatly grab a carthagian gem (i even can place a city south of utica without being too near to them)

however, my current settlers are going to grab other things first. at least 1 city must be a productive one, the rest is working for the future.

[sabrewolf]

1025bc

2 (undefended) carthagian archers. oh well... my vet archer fires at the first one, loses 2 HP but gets promoted to elite vet spearman defending him fortifies and hope to take out the other archer. 2 other spearmen together go to the backside of carthage to pillage there... i hope i don't get attacked behind, because there's no place to recover

meanwhile, north of the marshes: a lone settler founds a new city. why there you ask? well, to my experience, ever since c3c, marshes tend to have a lot of oil and rubber sources. as there doesn't seem to be any tundra except a tiny bit in the north, oil is probably there or in the desert oposite carthagian mountains

3 more turns till monarchy

[sabrewolf]

1000bc

CoL spreading
got it+32g from hammurabi for literature

[sabrewolf]

950bc

monarchy now finally

shocked to see that andydog just got philosophy. i didn't expect him to get it this fast! but still... i was 4 turns earlier

my elite archer attacked another carthagian archer and barely escaped... 1 HP left, that'll mean 4 turns of recovery meanwhile, another archer has appeared. hey hannibal, how about chasing the NMs after me?? that's one thing the next version of the AUmod must implement: NMs must get the "offensive" flag!

i'm up to 9 cities now with 1 settler on his way. running out of defensive units though, so i'll have 3 cities make some spearmen.

research is currency at a comfortable pace, but i might even slow that down to get some money for build-rushes...

[sabrewolf]

925bc

damn... andydog made a good move: he made peace with everybody!!! and not only that... he also went from 7 techs down to 2 techs down

well, i can't buy everybody into war again, so i'll wait for a moment.
for now, i'll sign RoP treaties that he can't buy the AI into war against me.

[sabrewolf]

time for some more images

more images to come... and i'd looooove some comments on my gameplay

ok, first an image of the carthagian lands, nicely pillaged, and so on. i've havn't seen any of the 3 visible cities at size 2 for quite some while and all that i've seen have been archers. so i really presume they are rushing their archers as soon as they can. that's of course good, because i don't need to settlerbop a numedian mercenary

in this image, you can also see the red spot where i'm one day planning to plant a village. but i'll need enough money, to imediately rush a temple and/or library. after that - when peace with carthage starts (when i've taken enough of their lebensraum and the military focus goes to celts/germanics), i'll build a road to the gems

[sabrewolf]

the core

next image is the the "core" of my empire. as you can see, lots of space for camps in between (S,S and N,N and W,W of rome for example)

the year is 875bc.

[sabrewolf]

measles?

next screenie (also 875bc) shows the approximate location i want my cities to be. ignore the city production numbers, for i did the screenshot in the beginning of my turn before setting them.

13 dots plus a few in the fow and maybe some further north. together with my 9 cities, that would sum up to about cities 25 eventually, not including possible land-theft cities when AI fight each other and raze a city. but anyhow... next priority cities are the ones up north to set a border against celtic and germanic settlement.

note: these are approximate places... i've quickly dotted them while looking at the screenshot... most likely half of the cities will be at different spots...

[sabrewolf]

rome before....

being in monarchy, lets me use the gold mountain for additional commerce... but it gets better, because in 850 my legionary triggered my golden age

[sabrewolf]

... and during the golden age!

now can the GA be any better? i'm just out of despotism, my cities are big enough to profit of the GA, and with this production boost, i'll definatly get any wonder i want to build (still havn't decided between SoZ (in 12 turns) and GL (in ~20))

here's rome in 850bc after the GA-trigger.

note: the workers are just going to complete the mining of the hills and production will grow to 15 per turn (17 at size 6). that gives me a 4 turn settler-legionary pump

meanwhile cumae (the worker pump) might switch to some settlers during the GA because production will make this doable (with 2 food-only tiles and 2 production-only ones it's not good without GA)