Chronicle Of A Civilization, Second Try

[Ben E Lou]

GAME SETTINGS
MAP: Titled Axis
SIZE: Huge
CLIMATE: Temperate
SEA LEVEL: Random
ERA: Ancient
SPEED: Epic
LANDMASS SIZE: Random

All "Options" remain disabled as in default.
All "Victories" remain enabled as in default (including Space Race).

I am playing at Noble level, with 5 AI civs. All 6 civs are random. I'm using less civs this time, because the last map was surprisingly crowded.

[Blade6119]

GO GET EM TIGER!

[Ben E Lou]

CRADLE OF CIVILIZATION

The game begins, and I am Tokugawa of the Japanese Empire. My starting techs are Fishing and The Wheel, and my characteristics are Aggressive and Organized, giving the following bonuses:


Free Combat I Promotion for Melee and Gunpowder Units
Double Production Speeds of Barracks and Drydock
-50% Civic Upkeep
Double Production Speed of Lighthouse, Courthouse
I like having the "organized" trait. Hopefully I'll have enough space to make it useful. If not, I reckon that "aggressive" trait will help. ;)

I start with a settler and a warrior. My settler sits on a flood plain, between two rivers that are 3-4 tiles apart (maybe the same river that circles around). Before building the city, I also can see three forest tiles, one hill, one hill/forest/plain, one plains tile, a one-tile lake, corn, and three flood plains tiles. All eight of the closest-in tiles have fresh water. No reason to move away from there, so Kyoto is founded right there, and set to build a warrior. The founding of the city reveals even more useful tiles, and not a single problematic one in the "fat cross."

http://www.younglifenorthlake.com/fofc/2screen1.jpg

[Ben E Lou]

EARLY RESEARCH AND EXPLORATION
With corn right there next to me and lots of arable land, I decide to research agriculture for starters. I'd like to know if I'm anwhere near the ocean, too. Zooming in reveals that the river near me is flowing to the west and south, so I head in that direction with my warrior, following the river.

I micromanaged Kyoto to maximize hammers, so I got the warrior out in 11 turns, which gives me time to get a second one out before switching to a settler. The first built warrior heads off to explore the northeast branch of the river.

I finish Agriculture, and Hunting makes a lot of sense next, to get to archers. The second created warrior is produced on the same turn that I discover Hunting. I research Archery. Because I'm only 7 turns from getting the city to size 3, and because the sea is nowhere in sight to the west, I decide that I must once again be on a big land mass. This time, however, there's not as much forest and jungle, but much more plains and grassland. I build a Scout to go find some goodie hunts and take advantage of extra movement. The new warrior fortifies in Kyoto.

I finally make it out to the sea on the west in 3040 B.C.

http://www.younglifenorthlake.com/fofc/2screen2.jpg

[Ben E Lou]

EXPANSION, EXPORATION, <s>FIRST CONTACT</s>
The warrior to the west explores southward through the jungle and down the coastline. The one to the northeast explores that branch of the river. The one to the northeast encounters a goodie hunt that gives barbarian warriors, and is killed in 2920BC, but the one off to the west reveals a vast jungle and coastline.

The scout is completed in 2720, and Kyoto is size 3. Time to crank out a settler. It is scheduled for completion in 25 turns. I send the scout off to the southeast to explore that river branch. Archery is completed in 2680BC, and I begin the mining-bronze working research line.

Mining gets discovered via goodie hut off to the southeast. The southeast, by the way, looks very, very nice. Lots of flood plains on both sides of the river, and not TOO much desert.

Buddhism gets founded in a distant land in 2520BC. Meanwhile, the source of the river branch to the southeast is discovered in some hills, and another river is running on the other side of those hills, so my scout explores that one next. It gets a couple of bits of gold, and also kills a lion attacking from across the river. Later (2240BC) it finds a goodie hut well off to the southeast that gives us a warrior. I send the warrior back toward home, destined to reveal more of the area of the map due south of Kyoto.

The scout eventually follows the second river all the way to the east coast of our starting continent, some 15-20 tiles from Kyoto. It then turns northward, set to reveal more coastline.

Most Powerful Civs is released in 1975BC, and we're #4. Everyone else still unknown. I begin to wonder if I'm alone, save for Barbarians, on this continent.

I get bronze working in 1950BC, and begin the direct move toward Mysticism-Polytheism-Monotheism. I want to found a religion. Hinduism is founded in 1875BC, so I now hope that I can get to Monotheism and Judaism.

The settler in Kyoto is completed in 1825BC. I switch to Archer, for better Barbarian protection. The settler heads for the fertile lands to the west along the river to build the next city. I still haven't encountered another nation yet, and I've found water on three of the four sides, so I'm now strongly thinking that I'm alone on this fairly sizeable continent. I see lions and barbarians, so I wait with my settler until the warrior can make it back to defend the new city.

http://www.younglifenorthlake.com/fofc/2screen3.JPG

http://www.younglifenorthlake.com/fofc/2creen3.JPG

[Ben E Lou]

GROWIN', FIGHTIN' BARBARIANS AND FIRST CONTACT!
Barbarians, both animals and warrios, continue to be seen near Kyoto, so I have to wait for the return of the two warriors before I send my settler out, delaying that growth. Bummer. Finally, in 1475, my archer finishes in Kyoto, and my warrior links up with my settler to found Osaka off to the east. Kyoto, now at size 4, works on another settler. The archer heads a little north to reveal the land up a few tiles from Kyoto. Osaka works on a barracks.

FINALLY, my scout, now nearly due north of Kyoto following the coastline, encounters Napoleon, and a French city. Hmmmm...another aggressive leader is closest to me, although he appears to be 20-something tiles away, and I still have a great deal of land to the south, east and west. All appearances at this point are that France is on the very far northern end of the continent, and no one else is here.

http://www.younglifenorthdekalb.com/fofc/2screen4.jpg

[Ben E Lou]

Aw man. I accidentally deleted this post that I was working on, and of course I can't remember everything that was in it. Here's where I am right now:




It is now 520BC. I didn't get Judaism, so I decided to pull back, finish the early economic stuff (pottery/husbandry/sailing), then go for priesthood and writing (temples and open borders). After those are finished, military stuff will be the primary order of the day. As of now, I'm working on Priesthood, and then need Writing.
The scout has now circled all the way around my starting island/continent. It is a nice-sized piece of land that contains only Japan and France. My plan is to build 4-5 cities in "ideal" locations (including one on the coast), and then just push northward to cut off French expansion. I hope to have a bigger economy than him, then crush him militarily and have the island/continent all to myself.
I've now got three cities. Tokyo was built off to the southwest of Kyoto.
Currently, Kyoto has built a barracks and is in a worker-archer-settler queue, Osaka also has a rax and is working on a settler, and Tokyo is building its first thing: a barracks.
http://www.younglifenorthdekalb.com/fofc/2screen5.jpg
http://www.younglifenorthlake.com/fofc/2creen5.jpg

[Ben E Lou]

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

I just got FOUR straight crashes to desktop when trying to build a farm on the corn to the south of Kyoto. I'm going to try rebooting and reloading the game. If that doesn't work, I'm waiting for a patch before I play again. I didn't mention it, but I got several during the last game, too. :mad:

All of my CTD's have happened upon a worker action.

[Ben E Lou]

OK. I rebooted and it worked fine. Moving forward...

[gi]

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

I just got FOUR straight crashes to desktop when trying to build a farm on the corn to the south of Kyoto. I'm going to try rebooting and reloading the game. If that doesn't work, I'm waiting for a patch before I play again. I didn't mention it, but I got several during the last game, too. :mad:

All of my CTD's have happened upon a worker action.
I've gotten a number of CTD's as well. Graphic glitches too when wonder movies play. Good luck in having a stable game!

[Ben E Lou]

WORKING THE LAND, LOOKING TO THE COAST, FENDING OFF BARBARIAN HORDES

My first worker is completed in 460BC. His first task is to build a farm on the corn to the immediate south of Kyoto to bring our health back up to speed.

The river heading off to the west empties into the sea in what looks like a good place for my first coastal city.




Tokyo finishes a barracks in 320BC, but is still size 1 so I go ahead and work on an archer while it is growing. Kyoto finishes another archer in 280BC, and begins work on another settler. Kyoto is now size 6.




Writing, the last of the techs I felt like I needed to go ahead and secure before focusing heavily on military stuff, is finished in 220BC, and I begin work on Iron Working.




Ugh. Here they come. A barbarian kills one of my archers, and no less than FIVE can be seen ready to menace my three cities. That's the biggest problem with not having many rivals out there. There's really no reason to build settlers right at the moment, because there's no place for them to go right now. I switch all three cities to archers, and adopt slavery just in case I need to rush-build one to save a city.




All five of the barbarians mentioned above attack units fortified in cities, to no avail, giving us some experience points. One was an axeman, which lost to a warrior in Kyoto. I'd imagine that I'm fortunate that it attacked from across the river to the northwest, rather than crossing and then attacking. An archer does destroy my farm south of Kyoto, though. We continue to face attack after attack from Barbarians that don't work. After all three cities finish an archer each (and Kyoto finishes two), I go back to building settlers in Osaka and Kyoto.




With the discovery of iron working, we enter the classical era in 180AD. We then move to discover horseback riding and the horse archer. There's a source of iron within Kyoto's borders, which is quite nice. Swordsmen should be coming soon. :)




Most Advance Civs is completed in 220AD, and we're #3. France is #6. We will crush him. :D




In 220AD, we also finish our settler in Osaka. It heads with an archer off to the west coast to found a city at the mouth of the river. Osaka builds another archer. By the time the archer is finished, Osaka should be at size four, and ready to churn out a worker, too. Meanwhile, my worker, guarded by an archer, builds a mine on the iron in Osaka.




In 380AD, Edo is built on the west coast at the mouth of the river, giving us four cities in very nice locations. We work on a lighthouse there. Time for the push northward!




http://www.younglifenorthdekalb.com/fofc/2screen6.jpg

[Ben E Lou]

PUSHING NORTHWARD

Kyoto finishes its settler, then switches to granary. Gotta get that health up and help it grow some more. There's a great site along the river to the northeast of Kyoto, and that's where it heads, with an archer for defense. Osaka finishes an archer a few turns later and is up to size 4. I switch to settler there. The archer heading northeast gets defeated by an archer. Bad luck there, but the settler escapes southward back to Kyoto, so that's good. I fight off a few more barbarians, then send the settler back to the northeast, this time in a stack with two archers. I then finish horseback riding and strike out toward Monarchy, with my sights set on Feudalism.

AD540 brings two good things: the completion of the granary in Kyoto (and thus the beginning of our first swordsman), and the founding of Satsuma, with two archers for defense, to the northeast of Kyoto along the river. A barracks, of course, is begun there. Napoleon offers open borders, and I accept. I could use the trade boost for now, plus it will allow me to scout his territory. Unfortunately, a barbarian slips through and destroys my iron mine, forcing me to switch production. I decide to put up city walls there.

During the time awaiting the walls to finish, several more barbarians are thwarted. Once the walls are finished, I decide to go archer/settler one more time. Osaka finishes a settler a turn later (AD670) and goes archer-archer-worker-archer-settler. (It has good production, and only the settler is set to take more than 10 turns.) I decide to take a bit of a risk and send the archer and the settler northward, leaving only a warrior in Osaka for now. Six turns later, and my gamble has paid off. No attacks on Osaka, which is now only two turns from finishing another archer, and the archer/settler have made their way northward to my next city site. Kagoshima is formed there. Because it is in a site conducive to early growth, I eschew the barracks for now, and go straight to archer/settler combo.


With six cities now complete, I'll scale back on the details a bit and present things with more broad strokes.


http://www.younglifenorthdekalb.com/fofc/2screen7.jpg

[Ben E Lou]

SCOUTING OUT THE ENEMY, SETTING SAIL

We complete Monarchy in AD760, and immediately switch to hereditary rule and go with the mathematics/construction research chain to get war elephants and catapults. As per the title of this section, I build a Scout in Tokyo to check out what France is up to. Edo finishes its lighthouse and works on a galley to explore the seas. Most Cultured Civs finishes in AD810, and I'm dead last. Napoleon is next-to-last, so I'm not terribly worried. His culture won't overwhelm me, and once I wipe him off the map, there will be time for ramping up culture before the potential invasion of another continent.

Striking out northward reveals that the French and Japanese borders are now only three tiles apart heading northeastward from those of Kagoshima, and French borders are also only 6 tiles north of Satsuma's borders. I'd like to squeeze in one more row of cities to the north, then build up for an attack.

We discover mathematics in AD 930. I'd love to get the health boost from Hanging Gardens, but Kyoto is my only city with the hammers (11) to go for a wonder, and I really could use those hammers toward building an army, so I decide not to go for H.G.

I now begin to crank out swordsmen from Kyoto, swordsmen with City Raider bonuses. They get +4, so I try to get one attack on a barbarian to get them to +5 and another City Raider bonus before sending them northward toward the French border.

http://www.younglifenorthdekalb.com/fofc/2screen8.jpg

[Buccaneer]

That's a nice chunk of terrain you have settled on.

Why did you go for Bronze Working at the time you did (I see no immediate units from that)? Couldn't you have gotten on the Religion track a little earlier?

[Ben E Lou]

That's a nice chunk of terrain you have settled on.

Why did you go for Bronze Working at the time you did (I see no immediate units from that)? Couldn't you have gotten on the Religion track a little earlier?At the time, I was thinking that I'd need axemen to fend off the Barbarians. I'd never played with an Aggressive Civ, though, so I didn't realize how effective fortified archers with a city defense boost could be. Plus, I forgot that I needed copper to build axemen, and I don't have any. So, if I had it to do over again, I'd have gone down the Religion track before Bronze Working.

[Ben E Lou]

CLOSING IN

A settler/archer combo makes first border contact with France as we build Nara 5 tiles due north of Satsuma, and on the border with Rheims. We immediately begin working on a library (culture) there. In that same turn, we find Paris, just as I had figured, on the very northern coast of the continent.





The galley is finished in Edo in 1020. My main purpose in building it is to find out if there are any other plots of land close enough to be explored and conquered now, before Astronomy allows the crossing of oceans. It sets sail southward from Edo.





In 1085, I finish construction, and immediately begin building catapults in several cities that are size 3 or bigger. Nagoya is built in 1135, , finishing off the extra row of cities up near France, but also bumping up my maintenance to -9 per turn. I have 139 gold, so I'll keep it there for now so that science can remain at 90%. I'll need to start working on economic techs, and on getting courthouses. I didn't mention a few of the lesser techs I gained in the past few turns, but now (1135), I'm working on Currency (23 turns).





Heh, shortly before I was ready to roll, Napoleon declared war in 1175AD. His first attack, on Kagoshima, fails miserably. I send the stack that I have ready, three swordsmen and one catapult, into the territory near Rheims.





Ugh. Attacking AI cities ain't easy. I may be out of my league for now at Noble. I lost my entire offensive army near Rheims, including 2 more swordsmen and 2 catapults that I built and sent up there into the fray. :( I have a feeling that I'm going to be soon overrun by Napoleonic forces.

[Ben E Lou]

http://www.younglifenorthdekalb.com/fofc/2screen9.jpg.

[Ben E Lou]

Update: I got my ever-lovin' BUTT kicked in the war with France, and therefore made peace. At the time, he was still #5 in culture (with me #6), so I figured the only chance I had was to ramp up culture. Chronicling that would be pretty boring, I think. Right now I'm just doign everything I can to build it up and keep from war with France. Currently, it is 1678, and my score is 591, and his is 1000. I've circled around the island now, too, and I now know that I'm going to need astronomy before I can get to any other land.

[Buccaneer]

What were the odds on the attacks near Rheims? The Swordsmen and Catapults were going up against what?

[Eilim]

Ugh. Attacking AI cities ain't easy. I may be out of my league for now at Noble. I lost my entire offensive army near Rheims, including 2 more swordsmen and 2 catapults that I built and sent up there into the fray. :( I have a feeling that I'm going to be soon overrun by Napoleonic forces.

Did you use the "Bombard" feature of the catapults before attcking the city? While it slows down the combat, I almost never start truly attacking until I have the city defenses down to zero. I then usually sacrifice oen or two catapults (depending on how many I have) to get some collateral damage going if the odds for my main "attacking" units still aren't to my liking.

Side benefit is you'll occasionally have the AI harass you while your bombarding, giving you a chance to promote a few units and get some upgrades to help in the assault.

I also try and get ivory by hook or crook if I see an early war coming. War elephants can be truly devestating early on. I just wiped the Mongols off my continent quite handily using a combined forces of catapults, war elephants, and swordmen. Catapults for city defenses, Swordmens to deal with any "anti-mounted" units and the elephants to just run over everything else. :)

[Buccaneer]

I never attack a city without at least 2 catapults - and they attack first. With Vassalage, I get my new Catapults instantly to Barrage II. If there are walled cities, then I would promote to Barrage and Bombard.

When using the "odds" button (Alt-MouseOver), the Catapults do show odds like 5.0 to 13.9 so they will lose but they will inflict 10-30% damage on all units in the city. That's nice before my Riflemen and Knights go in.

By the way, when do I get a gunpowder equivalent of Catapults? It seems funny to fight with Riflemen and still throwing dung from catapults.

[Ben E Lou]

Did you use the "Bombard" feature of the catapults before attcking the city? While it slows down the combat, I almost never start truly attacking until I have the city defenses down to zero. I then usually sacrifice oen or two catapults (depending on how many I have) to get some collateral damage going if the odds for my main "attacking" units still aren't to my liking.Yes, I bombarded, but no, I didn't get the defenses all the way down to 0.

Update on the game: the French keep accepting my bribes for peace, then declaring war again later on. Between them and the Barbarians, I'm down to four cities, and this has ceased to be any fun, so I'm resigning. I've learned a great deal about Civ4 by posting these two threads. I'm going to drop down one difficulty level and start a new game (with no dynasty thread) and try to prepare myself to play on Noble.

EDIT: One things is for sure: most of the old strategies, even from Civ 3 Complete, are now null and void. While the basic mechanics of empire-building are pretty much the same (with the nice new bells and whistles like pastures, windmills, health, religion, and Great People), it is very much a new game, strategy-wise. For that, I give the team a big thumbs-up. :)

[Katon]

By the way, when do I get a gunpowder equivalent of Catapults? It seems funny to fight with Riflemen and still throwing dung from catapults.

You get cannons with Steel.

[Ben E Lou]

Heh. I dropped down one level, used same settings, with a new game start. I got the Russians with a scout, and got an extra settler from a goodie hut on the third turn of th e game. THat's a great head-start, I would think.

[Eilim]

Yes, I bombarded, but no, I didn't get the defenses all the way down to 0.

Update on the game: the French keep accepting my bribes for peace, then declaring war again later on. Between them and the Barbarians, I'm down to four cities, and this has ceased to be any fun, so I'm resigning. I've learned a great deal about Civ4 by posting these two threads. I'm going to drop down one difficulty level and start a new game (with no dynasty thread) and try to prepare myself to play on Noble.

EDIT: One things is for sure: most of the old strategies, even from Civ 3 Complete, are now null and void. While the basic mechanics of empire-building are pretty much the same (with the nice new bells and whistles like pastures, windmills, health, religion, and Great People), it is very much a new game, strategy-wise. For that, I give the team a big thumbs-up. :)


One thing I think I've noticed is you've tended to have trouble with barbarians. The amount of barbarians are in direct relation to map size. With you playing with a lesser amount of civs on the larger maps your going to have *alot* more barbarians and barbarian cities around then you'd normally have.

While I fully understand wanting to get the epic feel with such settings, as I do the same myself alot of the times. You really have to have a gameplan prepared for alot of barbarian incursions while growing your nation. Maybe a beeline to archery along with creation of multiple defensive units early on. Maybe some scouts and warriors placed at strategic hill areas to give you good line of sight and early warning of barbarian approach.