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The Race for Space I had
discovered Computers in 1876, and Flight
in 1896, and had a monopoly on both, but Caesar and Vicky had access to
Rocketry through Artillery. There
weren’t very many trading options left, and I didn’t want to boost any of my
rivals, so I researched Rocketry
myself in 1910AD, followed by Refrigeration
in 1920. I was eventually able to
trade for Plastics from Saladin (I didn’t think he was as far along as he
turned out to be), and discovered Robotics
in 1929. Now I could see how close
this race would be. Caesar
actually completed Apollo first, in 1931, followed by both me and Saladin in
1933. Time to take stock of the
situation. Caesar was behind in
tech, lacking Plastics, Refrigeration, Computers, and also lacking Aluminum.
Saladin also lacked Refrig and Robotics, but had Satellites (which I
didn’t). But they also both
outproduce me, especially Rome. This
could get interesting.
I
completed my first part, an SS Casing, in 1939, the same turn as Saladin
completed one. The next few turns
didn’t look so good, though: Turn 350, 1940AD: You have declared war on Mansa Musa! RBCiv-Adventure-2 has completed SS Casing! Julius Caesar has completed SS Casing! Alexander has completed Apollo Program! Saladin has completed SS Casing! Turn 351, 1941AD: Julius Caesar has completed SS Casing! Julius Caesar has completed SS Casing! Julius Caesar has completed SS Casing! Saladin has completed SS Casing! Saladin has completed SS Casing! Saladin has completed SS Casing! Turn 352, 1942AD: Julius Caesar has completed SS Casing! (I’ll get to the war with Mansa in a
moment).
I have 2 parts done, and Sal and Ceasar are both done with their casings!
I better hope my tech lead can keep me ahead of their production!
And now Alex is in the race too! As for
Mansa, China asked me to join in, and since he only had one remaining city
(which had a source of Uranium), I went along.
It was quick and painless, a good chance to use my gunships and some
tanks against machine guns and riflemen, although Vicky’s culture quickly
swooped in and took the Uranium.
Back to
the space race. First, I was
confused/frustrated/etc by my inability to build the Space Elevator.
The only thing I could see that prevented me was the requirement of being
below the 30th latitude, but Texcoco was near the center of the map
and couldn’t build it either. I
don’t know if there is something about Highland maps that calculates latitude
differently? Anyway, so I instead
tried a different approach. I had
Khoisan build the Internet, so at least I wouldn’t need to trade any techs to
my rivals. Saladin
was moving ahead, completing all three thrusters between 1948-50, Caesar built
his between 53-57, and Alex got his from 58-62. Meanwhile I was working on the other pars, completing Cockpit
in 1958 and Stasis in 1960. I did get
some good news in 1951, when for some reason, Alex declared on Saladin.
This triggered a defense pact, so Caesar declared on Alex.
Good! That might slow their
research. By 1956
the diplomatic race was tilting the other way, as Mao was elected Secretary
General, but (I hoped) I still had enough votes on my side to block a victory.
More tense turns would follow. I
did complete Fusion that turn, and also get a great engineer.
I was hoping to use him for the Elevator (until I realized I couldn’t
build it). And unfortunately, the
engineer wouldn’t help rush any parts. Now,
I had a great artist that I had hoped to use to push out the borders at Bulgar,
so I decided to hold them, and at the rate Tenoch was pumping GPPs, wait for a
Scientist. It didn’t take long,
as I got the Scientist in 1965 and triggered a second Golden Age to speed up my remaining parts.
The Internet was completed in
1961 at Khoisan, which netted me Facism, Communism, Artillery, and more relevantly, Satellites
and Composites! Mao-228,
Alex 200 for 428 (678/1094 required) Me-180
Vicky-164,
Caesar-218, and Saladin-107 all abstained. After
dodging that diplomatic bullet (I guess I shouldn’t have been worried after
all), I was able to launch in 1971!
Here’s
a view of my Space Ship progress:
(Is this a known bug, or one of my video problems? I never saw any change in this view.) Here’s the status screen right before completing the last
Thruster, the missing techs were holding back my rivals..
So my final result was a score of 10,530, earning me a Nelson Mandela ranking. I had finally reached the Number one ranking in Population and GNP, although I was still 3rd in Manufacturing and 4th in Crop Yield. Here's the score graph for the last hundred turns, you can see how it was a slow but steady slope from bottom to top of the curve:
This was a good challenge, a somewhat frustrating start (made worse by my lack of focus and learning curve). I was hesitant to expand too fast, as I had over-expanded in one of my early solo games, so I was slow to claim some of the fertile lands that I needed to really grow. I also didn't settle my fishing villages until much later than I should, they were great commerce generators and would have paid for themselves much quicker if I'd settled earlier. A fairly quiet mid-game, but the attack from Vicky and then the Space Race added some real excitement toward the end. Converting to Christianity was key, as it kept Saladin firmly in my corner, which I think averted war when we had our cultural struggles later on. Also a good chance to learn the new Space Race tech progression, definitely several good paths to reach there. Seeing that the AI had Rocketry without Flight was an eye-opener, but shows the flexibility of the tree.
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Thanks to our hosts/sponsors, I hope to be able to participate in a few of these
Adventures, as they fit into my limited gaming schedule better than the epics
(this one took 23 hours, BTW, I am definitely a slow player).