As I stated in Part I, my expansion to 7 cities (too) early had a significant negative impact on my financial position. At the turn of the century it was evident that I needed to do something about this situation. My first great person (Ananda the Prophet) was born in 125 AD. I used him to build the Hindu shrine, Kashi Vishwanath. This allowed me to increase my science to a whopping 40%. I also flooded the world with Hindu missionaries to spread the faith and further improve the effectiveness of the shrine.
Another method to increase science is to intentionally run a high science rate at a deficit. To do this, one need a big pile of cash and cash can be obtained through trades.
These two trades in 305 AD made it feasible for me to run maximum science for quite a few turns. I also concluded the Colossus in Memphis on the same turn for one extra commerce per water tile.
A cultural picture of the known world in the year 305 AD.
I made another financially geared trade in 365 AD. On the same turn, JC demanded copper as tribute. I gave in to his demands to further build on our relations and he became firmly pleased with me.
In 455 AD, my second great person popped up as a great engineer. This was quite annoying, since I had tried to get a great scientist for an academy by running scientist specialists in Memphis. However, the game itself kept on reassigning my specialists which turned the 100 odds of a GS into a hodgepodge. However, with civil service just around the corner, I put Imhotep to good use by having him invent Machinery. Hmm, can anyone guess what machinery plus civil service yields? You are correct, Mace men.....
After the discovery of civil service in 485 AD and subsequently adopting Bureaucracy, my financial worries were over for the time and I could focus on other things for awhile.
One such activity was the settling of my eighth city, Alexandria. Its location may look like jungles without end however, with all those hills, an iron resource and the food to go with it, this will become a powerhouse. Have no doubts!
The great Tacitus confirmed in 515 AD, that I was perfectly in line with my semi-objective to have as many cities as possible.
In 650 AD, the trumpets of war sounded for the first time. Upon realizing that Mao was the pundit, I must admit that a devilish smile touched my lips. Mao was completely shut out of both Copper and Iron so his army consisted of Archers and Chariots. Meanwhile, my first mace men were under training. I had also researched construction to get some catapults on the battlefield.
Before Mao even came close to one of my cities, I captured Guangzhou without the help of catapults. Mace's against archers are devastating to the defender.
Oops, what is this? Maybe I underestimated the Chinese powers slightly.. The galley did not land outside Guangzhou but continued towards the former barbarian city of Visigoth where my garrison consisted of two War chariots and a catapult under construction. It turned out that that garrison was good enough to deal with the invasion.
One of my mace men continued towards the Chinese capital, Beijing and found it quite well defended. I would need a lot of mace men and some catapults to bring this city to its knees. A good thing though, for me, was that Mao had kept all those nice, cosy forests (with 50% extra defence) right next to the city. I could simply park my units outside the city and let its defenders suicide themselves against my soldiers.
This disturbing message popped up in 800 AD. I had completely failed to notice that Taoism had even been founded. Apparently, JC founded the religion and spread it to his own cities to such an extent that he decided to convert. This killed my efforts of turning him into a life long religious pal and I decided on the whim, to stay pagan until the discovery of liberalism and free religion. I continued to send missionaries to him though, for economic reasons.
Xian became the tenth Egyptian city when my mace men captured the city in 845 AD. AS you can see, Heliopolis had almost finished the Hanging Gardens at the same time. To be honest, I timed the capture of Xian with the completion of THG to enjoy the instant population increase.
The tech situation at the time of the capture of Xian. Elizabeth's domination was really disturbing, she was clearly in the tech lead, with both feudalism and paper in the bag. It was amazing that she could generate so much commerce from her hemmed in location to have this scientific output. The disturbing aspect was of course, that if she was left unharmed, she would soon reach her beloved Redcoats, making it extremely difficult to eliminate her.
In 860 AD, I received the message that Egypt now had more than 2 million inhabitants.
Memphis concluded the Great Library in 980 AD, allowing even more scientific output from that city (and hopefully great scientists for academies). On the same year, the Egyptian forces also captured Harappan in the NW corner of China. After that, I signed peace with Mao.
In 1025 AD, Memphis generated yet another GP. A great scientist? No, One more Great Engineer was popped. I do not understand why the game reassigns my specialists, but it had done it again. This was starting to become really annoying, since I wanted those academies. I had been running Bureaucracy for ages without even an academy in my capital. I put Archimedes to good use though, by having him force the construction of Notre Dame in Elephantine.
One problem I had at the time, was the number of workers. They were simply too few to support the ever expanding Egyptian empire. To deal with this, I traded feudalism from Roosevelt for serfdom and built the Hagia Sophia in Thebes. This had a significant impact.
On the tech front, I was bee lining for Liberalism and after the discovery of Paper and Music, Elizabeth was only up Guilds and Compass.
In 1214, Memphis finally generated my first great scientist!!
He instantly created an academy in Memphis, which at the time had a higher beaker output than Thebes.
I discovered Education in 1316 AD and since JC did not want to trade me Philosophy (he was constructing Angkor Vat) I had to research it myself. I could, finally, start researching Liberalism in 1358 AD.
In 1358 AD, I decided to eliminate Mao once and for all. I had assembled two hefty stacks, one NE of Shanghai and the other NW of Guangzhou.
The inhabitants of the former Chinese city Gao, were so happily surprised by my decision to wage another war against their former leader, that they instantly declared the day a holiday worth celebrations!
Shanghai fell in 1376 AD and Beijing in 1406 AD.
During my siege of Beijing, the above announcement popped up in 1400 AD. Excellent news!! Both JC and Roosevelt had at the time surpassed Elizabeth. A fight between these two behemoths, forcing them to build units instead of research, would only benefit the other civilizations.
The significance of the above picture is not the route of, yet another, Hindi missionary but the message in the two blue boxes.
She beat me to Liberalism with one turn!!!! AARRGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!
After my own research to Liberalism, I switched to Free Speech and Free Religion. I did not pick Nationalism at once, but instead researched Printing Press first.
In 1490 AD, Mao ceased to exist and with him the war weariness that had started to become problematic. Egypt now consisted of 16 cities.
Nationalism was researched in 1520 and one of my great engineers (Heron this time) got the honours of forcing the Taj Mahal in Elephantine, sparking of a Golden Age.
With that ends Part II, please move on to the next page.
