CHRONICLES

RBCiv Epic Nineteen

My third flip was another Chinese acquisition, but... instead of the expected Hangchow defection to France, it was Xinjian, reaching further back into their core. Go figure.

In 340AD, I ended up trading for a partially researched Education and starting on Printing Press, due in four turns. Sold education @miser to China. China has 4 AI's at war with them. My economy was heavy on libraries, light on markets, but I didn't want the research progress to move too quickly, as I wanted as many wonders as I could get for the culture.

In 360AD, Hangchow finally fell. To Rome. Not the worst case, as Aztecs did all the work, then Rome got the final blow and possession of the city, and with their nonculture, I figured the city would be more likely than ever now just to flip on over to me.

My SunTzu had successfully broken the cascade, as the Great Library was built by China shortly after, with nothing for the AI's to cascade to. I was working on both Sistine and Leo's now, with one due right after the other. This is the first Emperor builder-style game for me where I got all three of the first middle ages wonders, that I can remember. Ever. This after getting none of the seven ancient wonders.

And yes, now that I have FP and Sistine in Orleans, perhaps I should build a temple there! LOL!

Also note that China was being carved up. They came due for extinction shortly:

And yes, I greedily poached the small region in the hole of the Chinese doughnut, at Brest, where rushbuys would leave it the dominant cultural center, with a mere one tile of overlap with another city (Beijing). Of course, the Aztecs didn't like that sort of culture pressure, but Monty would be completely foolish to attack the wee little Lamb with Many Friends and Deep Pockets, so of course he won't do it.

My fourth "territorial acquisition":

Note that I still have not attacked any AI cities, only their units coming after my people. I'd be happy to go the whole game like that. I had thought that by limiting my alliances to the Zulus, that China wouldn't get smashed to a bloody pulp by all the Lamb's "protectors" looking to curry Her Favors. That didn't work out, as the Zulus then signed up the rest anyway. Blah. Who was going to be next? And was I doomed to run out of neighbors at this rate? Sheesh. Gobbling them up a chunk at a time, like at Veii, that's what I wanted, not them consuming one another. Oui?

Unfortunately, out of Sistine and Leo, the cascade from THOSE survived one turn too long, giving Cop's to Germany before the cascade died. I would get the rest from there, starting with Bach.

You can see that Smith's is due shortly, and that I have a sickeningly large empire for never having fired a shot in anger at the cities of my rivals. If there is any inherent weakness to the scenario concept, it is that being in the middle is not automatically the handicap. If you don't end up having to defend yourself on multiple fronts, you are actually in the best position of all, as your reach for the land grab extends in all directions, as does your corruption reduction, and as in this case, if any of those parties go to war early, you can grab big chunks of what ought to have been their shares. Also, when the AI's do go to war, they are more likely to be warring across longer distances, which they don't do as effectively as when attacking a neighbor.

My fifth flip was both a Roman and Chinese victim. And can you believe, now all three cities on the coast north of Hangchow have flipped in succession, but that one is still holding out. You can't write this stuff as fiction, folks. Nobody would believe it.

Now can somebody please explain to me the utter emergencies taking place that require patrols around Canton instead of leaving those units IN the city for flip suppression? This is the first time in a while I've seen the AI botch flip suppression. Or... hmm. Maybe not. Maybe the odds were so poor for them, they deemed it not worthwhile? Rome did have virtually zero culture. It was "always war" kind of sad, you know? Vs my headed-for-100k culture. ... Who knows.

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