Ultimate Power: a more pragmatic approach

[Mountain Sage]

‘American Adventure’. PTW, Monarch, standard map, 8 civs, all else is random, Barbs ‘meek’.

[Mountain Sage]

4000BC: the beginning. The spot looks nice: water, hills, gold, wine, forest, let’s give it a chance.

[Mountain Sage]

2350BC: interesting: 3 more luxuries, wheat, gold and a big jungle north. Therefore, go south, east and west, young men! (and women, and cattle, and goats and…).

[Mountain Sage]

850BC:
The good news: the Babylonian’s expansion is checked for now. Now, if they were to do something stupid…
The bad news: it’s so crowded down there! How do you plan to get a viable empire with only half a dozen cities?

[Mountain Sage]

370BC: did the Babylonians really believe that they could smuggle two settlers’ caravans by our watchful guards? Ah well, I was short of workers anyway…

[Mountain Sage]

90BC: the end of the American’s peaceful expansion. The ruin was a Babylonian outpost.

[Mountain Sage]

190AD: Persia threatened the mighty Americans. Unfortunately for them, their land was the best around… and so the first American-Persian war started.

[Mountain Sage]

630AD: end of the first American-Persian war. We even got a GL for the trouble. Let’s celebrate and make people happy!

[Mountain Sage]

920AD: Second American-Persian war: the Persians were too stubborn to surrender, even in front of overwhelming odds. Now they are… history.
We got two new GL: the FP is in Antioch now (perfect!) and we completed Leo’s (you never know…). Our expansion is over. We have attained our critical size.

[Mountain Sage]

1285AD: Of course, I wanted to say that our expansion was over, provided nobody else would do something stupid again. Well, the Aztec did. Lincoln is still wondering why Montezuma is not happy with us….

[Mountain Sage]

1295AD: The lazy American-Aztec war: we did not plan this war, therefore we did not really want to fight it. Who cares about the Aztec’s land anyway? Mostly jungle, no new luxuries. So we let the others fight it for us. The only drawback is the amount of military units on our roads.
Oh, we still plan to get some Aztec cities. We don’t want pour neighbours to get too powerful, after all. We definitively plan to conquer Atzcapotzalco (and its spices), if only to change its name!

[Mountain Sage]

1365AD: Montezuma was really stubborn, so instead of keeping his eastern cities he lost them. Oh, another GL for a cavalry army. We’re ahead in techs, build all the MA wonders. So far, we got 5 more cities, but we really don’t know what to do with them…

[Mountain Sage]

So, this is the end of part 1.
My comments? The Americans are fun to play. I could not conceive not to play a non-industrious civ (my English is really going downhill).
As for the expansionist trait, I couldn’t really use it. This standard map was too crowded from the beginning (I just got 1 goodie-hut, Barbs of course), but on a huge map…
Looks like a PUP game after all.
More next Wednesday, if I still have a computer….

[cumi]

Nice starting point, actually. 3 types of luxuries guarantied...

[Arrian]

MS,

One question, regarding your 2350 & 850 BC screenshots:

Why is all that grassland irrigated? Surely you're still a Despot at that time, so the irrigation is totally wasted. The only thing I could think of is that you wanted to get irrigation over to Erin and Philadelphia, but you could have done that via Atlanta without slowing Roxane's production (while aiding Atlanta's growth).

Regarding the one hut you popped: it could not have been barbarians, since expansionist civs never pop barbarian warriors. Are you sure it wasn't "empty?"

Anyway, it looks like a very solid game. Good Palace/FP placement, some GLs... well done indeed.

-Arrian