Incan War God

Commerce was flat for the first sixty turns or so. And is likely correlated with when I finally got cottages online (and when I wiped out the hated Aztecs). Anyway (and as I recall), pumping out warriors (to kill Montezuma) was the primary objective early game: a gambit which worked wonders, but which (obviously) stunted my early research a bit.

Population growth has a nice exponential curve. But I am not of the opinion my population growth was that dramatic. The game sets certain limits. And I doubt I ever pushed those limits to any meaningful degree.

Spanish Conquest

Originally, this play-through was going to be called Spanish Conquest in lieu of Incan War God. But that did not work out.

Conceptually, I wanted to 'Build a Military and Use It!'

But the problem remains: How?

More disastrously, I added a few limitation to my War Plans:

1. Playing as Spain, I would found a religion, spread it, and defend it.
2. While also preferentially building horse units... or later, any units with multiple movement points.

Unfortunately, founding a religion is a weak start (no matter how much it helps one mid or late game).

And not only do I not know how to research, build, or use cavalry... OK. It's not that difficult. I'm sure I could learn. So, much more important (than mere conceptual understanding), by the time I could mount a cavalry, my offensive options were more limited.

Suffice to say, I am not good enough to play with self-made handicaps... and still achieve the type of (Personal Record) scores I am looking for.

Thus, the Incan War God was born: a decision to start over and concentrate on war. I mean, at first I was going to call it Huayna the Horse God. But like I said, those sort of self-imposed limitations were not working for me

Mid Game
The Spoils of Victory

Capital (and starting city) on left, captured Aztec Capital (and second best city throughout the game) on right.



Late Game
Only Gets Better Over Time

Both cities spent most of the game cranking out wonders.

Quechua Rush

Going forward, I expect some sort of Warrior Rush will become a default strategy for me. I mean, maybe it will not work as well in future games as it did here (and one should keep in mind, I play on Noble Difficulty). But I owe my high score to rushing the Aztecs with a half dozen Quechuas, which was more than enough to defeat the one or two warrior defenders Montezuma could field. And in fact, two warriors may have been (if one got lucky) enough to defeat the two (warrior) defenders I encountered.

I eliminated Monty from the game on Turn 41. And by turn 60, commerce was on the rise.

So, basically, I can see a future of warrior rushes followed by axe rushes and so on, as it is a relatively easy strategy (build a single worker, crank out the warriors, move towards enemy capitol, and capture: a sequence of actions) that has a high pay off.

Monarchy Garrison

In this game, after building The Pyramids, I switched over to Monarchy, which gives +1 happiness per garrison unit. Between the happiness and having a nice early unit (the Quechua comes with a promotion, if I remember correctly), this allowed me to concentrate on military (something I am bad at), while still building my cities.

I had so many Quechuas (and other primitive units) that even though I was flush with cash, I never got around to upgrading them all (as shown in the above image, which highlights a stack of units awaiting transport to distant shores).

In short, The Pyramids remain important to me for the early acquisition of both Monarchy and Representation.

Research Slider

I was proud of myself for having the awareness to adjust my research slider. Basically, if I was going to research a technology in three turns, I might as well bank as much gold in that time, as well. So, I adjusted the slider to the minimum value needed to keep research on track.

Ultimately, this strategy may have slowed my research down a bit, as I did not have as much overflow that way. But it kept me flush with cash without slowing my research down too terribly much (an extra turn per technology, maximum).

The Monk Economy

Ha! Let's see if I can remember the wonders in question?

No. I could not.

So, with the magic of cut and paste:

Paper -> University of Sankore = +2 research from all State Religion Buildings.

Divine Right -> The Spiral Minaret = +2 gold from all State Religion Buildings.

Music -> The Sistine Chapel = +5 culture from all State Religion Buildings.

Thus, one gets significant benefits for each and every State Religion Temple or Monastery built (+2r +2g +5c) above and beyond the normal bonuses.

Now, I did not get an early religion. But by the late-early game (or should that be early-mid game), I was the tech leader, so I got all four of the later (mid-game) religions.

I probably should have only built missionaries for the State Religion (Confucianism). But who knows, it's +1 gold with the shrine for each city with that shrine's religion, so the benefits add up.

Or in other words, two religions and a corporation make an ideal location for Wall Street... as I was in the process of building in Aztec Warriors when the game ended.

Island States at Settlement



Island States Further Along

Astronomy

I opted to get a Great Merchant by researching Economics first in lieu of beelining Astronomy. I mean, I may have been able to get the Great People for a lot of the mid-game techs along with researching Astronomy first. But what's important for me to keep in mind is that I gave up uncontested ownership of the Island States by researching so much else first. And there was a lot of land (ten cities worth, at least) up for grabs. So, I may have traded one city for each Great Person I got (as I only lost three of the settlement sites). Still, a person doesn't want to give an inch. You know how those AI's are.

Barbarian Culture Flip

I was thinking of, maybe, culture flipping a Barbarian City or two. There where several viable candidates this game. But it was simply easier to walk over their Longbows with my Rifles and Infantry. Sucks to be a bunch of backward savages. Anyhow, flipping a few Barbarian City States would have been fun.

Viking War

My first war with the Vikings was rather silly, as they were located on the other side of the globe, did not have Astronomy, and I had no interest in attacking them. Still, (I think it was) Suleiman (who) asked me to join his war. And as I wanted to be his ally in the long term, I didn't see that I had much of a choice than to declare war against the Vikings when he asked me to join his war.

Then, Suleiman was silly (or should that be stupid) enough to settle on one of My Islands (they were ALL My Islands, Mr Silly Man); and from there, future cooperation seemed unlikely. I mean, one of those island cities was undefended and another was only defended by another AI's (as in, not the city owner's) pikeman. So, they were destined to fall.

But in all this, the most important factoid is that Ragnar is a wonderful war ally. Even though backward, he was capturing Suleiman's cities (left and right). And once Ragnar capitulated to me, I gifted him all sorts of War Techs and he became a force to be reckoned with.

In fact, if I remember nothing else from this game, I should remember that some AI's make better War Allies than others. As a vassal, Ragnar was great... and Gandhi is always a pain. So I should preferentially vassal Ragnar... and burn Gandhi to the ground.

Sushi

It's in the play book. I founded Sid's Sushi. But since I won the game within ten turns of founding it. The extra food had no effect on my population or score.

Steam Roller

I do not know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. But by the time I am declaring war in the end game (these days), it tends to be a bit of an avalanche. The final four AI's all capitulated in the same turn. And quite frankly, none of them were up to the challenge of mounting the slightest resistance. The slightest annoyance? Sure. But meaningful resistance? Not a chance.

The Blockade

I built a string of ships and put them on sentry duty in the middle of the ocean, so I could see any invasion a ways off. No invasion came. The AI simply was not that advanced, having trouble enough with Ragnar.

Anyway, I liked building the Blockage (or whatever you want to call it).

And while we are on the subject, it would appear the AI has increased visibility across the ocean: somewhere between 2x movement and movement +2 (my forum research yielded conflicting numbers). But even if the AI's ships only have visibility equal to their movement, that means they do not need to move into my visibility range in order to decide future movement towards my ships is a futile mistake. So, one never knows how many invasions are eliminated simply by being prepared for them in the first place.

Ocean Going Work Boats

Um, work boats can travel across the ocean. I never knew this. It will make sense to build work boats for the colonies in the Home Land from now on.