Somebody founds Christianity. I'm guessing one of Team Green... wherever they are!
I start work on The Hanging Gardens. Because I ALWAYS run into problems with sickness in my cities! And if I can keep healthiness up enough, I won't have to switch to Environmentalism later on in the game!
Let's talk about The Colosseum! Basically, this building is... sorta different from the rest, as it's directly related to the amount of gold you assign to culture (which I can't assign yet, not until I research Drama). Yes, assigning culture is one way of increasing happiness normally, but this really gives it a boost!
Aand I get another Great Prophet - only this time, I actually have a Holy City!
Oh, and it's
Tipu Sultan, not
Tippu Sultan, the ruler of Mysore. Although he would've been pretty awesome to have!
I build the Dai Mao as Mond builds the Colossus and Cerulean City goes up a notch! A good year for all, I think!
Two barracks, a stable (gives free XP to mounted units) and an archer? Y'know, for the sole inhabitant of the entire continent, he sure is protective!
The Hanging Gardens are mine! And from the looks of it, I managed to take it right from under Mond's nose... AGAIN!
Things are looking up for me now!
Lets see...
Large army on coastal city + a settler + building a boat...
OH WOW, HE'S ACTUALLY GOING TO SPREAD TO THE OTHER CONTINENT!
.....even though Triemes are military boats, not unit-carrying boats. Hm, well, it's a start.
HAH! The Greek are not interested in talking! Man, what a change from real history!
Really though, it's because a human team's ally will NEVER talk with another human or human-ally! All the trading and war business is left to the player(s).
However, they can still tech trade with other AI teams.
Still, it's quite hilarious to try talk to them!
I'll never get tired of this!
INFO GRAPHS!
daisies, Mond's had quite a lead so far in the game! But at least I've managed to catch up with Greece now!
...which makes it sorta odd that he's slipping in military power. Unfortunately, I never had power to begin with, or I'd try taking him on!
Aaaand MORE sickness! Fortunately, being once again a coastal city, I can just build a harbour to fix that!
IT'S TEAM GREEN! Man, I was wondering when they'd be showing up! And woo, they're worse off than me!
And Yaqob seems to like making threats of imminent warfare to me. OH HO HO, THOSE SILLY ETHIOPIANS!
....I'll kill them all!
HAH! the only reason I discovered them is because they actually managed to build enough so that their empire is visible from the Dutch island!
...wait, FUCK!
Also, we have Saladin. Yeah, when you meet one Empire of a team, you automatically get contact with the other Empire too.
SPY SAPPIN' MAH CULTURE!
Yeah, those bastard Maridians are trying to get my city over to their side! It's sorta an even-even split who'll win the other city over at this point.
FFFFFFFFFUCK GOLDEN AGES!
And oh hey, I found Arabia!
....oh god, Team Green are on the same continent as each other too! This is going to be a real pain in the booty for me to win!
Well FINALLY, he's started colonizing that bloody city! Geez, I was wondering how long he'd take about it!
I think now's a good time to check in on the victory condition scoreboard!
The only really noticeable thing there is that Mond and Co. have an entire 42% of the world's population! That's not good!
Òkay, that's REALLY not good!
Also, it looks like they've nearly taken all of the top half of the continent. Bang goes my chances of expanding to there, and my ship tech isn't good enough to be able to reach out to the third continent!
At this point, my best hope is that there's a fourth continent in that unexplored spot down there! I think I still have a tech lead over Mond, so there's a good chance that I'll get the necessary boats first!
OH HELL! Mond just built the Great Library I was building! ONE TURN AWAY!
No... just THREE PRODUCTION HAMMERS AWAY!
God! DAMNIT!
Anyway, I take the last bit of land left on the continent, a small patch of plains above a desert, to find Saffron City! Sure, the expenses are gonna be massive (the further away a city is from the capital, the more cheddar it costs to maintain it), but it's still better than nothing!
Aaaaaand it instantly gets ransacked by barbarians!
Now that was just REALLY bad luck! Especially since there was only about two squares that it could've spawned in for that to happen!
I create The Apostolic Palace, which is a MASSIVE benefit to me! Basically, this is like an early-game United Nations - in that it allows Empires to vote on different stuff (ranging from holy wars to peace treaties to outright Diplomatic Victory), but ONLY if they have a city with my religion, and ONLY with the amount of votes proportionate to the number of cities they have with my religion in them!
...except that Mond is the only one to have Taoism! You can't actually start making voting choices in The Apostolic Palace until THREE teams are able to vote on stuff!
So much for a turning point for me! Ugh!
Also, I take up spying! ....except I don't have a real use for him, so I just use him to sabotage a building. IN YER FACES, AMERICAN SCUM!
LAND AHOY! I was able to build a Caravel and explore the open seas! And find dry land!
At least, I hope there's land. This looks like just a small island to me...
Woop, a new religion (well, to the Dutch)! Even though it really doesn't matter much to me, it does mean that the Ethiopians, who've been mooching off their ally's religion, just lost his chance to get one of his own!
Aaaand another Great Phrophet, Tsong...kha..pa? How the heck do you pronounce that?!
Ah well, he's a Buddhist anyway! Sure, in this game, it really doesn't matter WHAT religion a great prophet is, but I don't actually have anything to do with him other than to make him contribute to The Printing Press!
Wooooo, Hagia Sophia! This World Wonder makes ALL your workers work 50% faster - FOR FREE! Yeah, this is a BRILLIANT one to get.... if you WEREN'T TRAPPED IN A SMALL PENINSULA BY THOSE EFFING AMERICANS!
Also, woo, Lavender Town! Like Saffron City, it's really not going to get much of an environment benefit where it is, but at least it's safe from barbarians!
Even if there is one, y'know, RIGHT THERE! Good thing it can't touch me while I'm inland!
Also woo, I finally make actual physical contact with my ally!
Yes, we went 5,240 years without ever actually seeing each other. No, it's best not to question how on earth we managed to be able to trade tech like that. Just roll with it.
At least it has it so that you can't trade resources with each other!
Y'know, they've built up quite a lot since we last saw them! That's actually pretty impressive!
...but not as much as Greece! Geez, they're like rabbits!
Y'know, I'm beginning to worry about Nijmegen. Not because it's awkwardly placed (although it's usually a very bad idea to build on a peninsula - unlike a simple coast, a peninsula has too many water tiles, which don't give a benefit to production), but because it's infringing on Ethiopian borders now. Even if you hardly ever talk to them, you really want to stay on the good side with other empires as best you can...
