Diplomatic finagling, military success and possible tech lag
^ My escapades into Spain/Churchill. This guy fought off every other power in the world it seemed.
^ Seized Cordoba early on, not knowing this would be my main base of operations and only real city gained from this war.
^ Spent every third moment in this game spreading Christianity to myself to gain the Organised Religion/State Religion happiness boost as well as Apostolic influence and Confucianism to increase the money made in this holy city of Kish, above.
^ Genghis of the Ottomans would take and hold this town of WK; he still has it after the war but it has been severely reduced.
^ Brief look at espionage screen. Big baddies assigned a value of 3, lesser baddies 2 and my own vassals a 1.
^ Churchill marched a large force up to this town and would try and reduce the defences. Meanwhile I was invading him from the east and other powers were liable to attack from the west. Madness.
^ Despite my declaring war on him like three times when asked by others, he still offered me Open Borders out of nowhere.
^ Churchill just won't concede 'Capitulation' so the war must go on.
^ Slowly built up in Cordoba and then swung straight for Madrid, which remained lightly guarded.
^ Military Tradition researched, thus allowing me to turn all these Knights into Cuirassiers, slightly more powerful but more important they ignore certain defences.
^ Re-declared war on Wang Kon of the Incans to appease this guy. Not that it was needed but I was excited by his progress into Incan lands.
^ I had made peace with Churchill after taking Madrid temporarily so I could swing east into Wang Kon. He seemed very inactive and defensive and of course why not - his army went into Spain and took my Madrid enclave, lost around five guys while my main force advanced on his capital.
^ So while he took Madrid, a rump of a rump, I took his capital and would soon take that one on the east coast too.
^ He will concede! Capitulation is in white.
^ AND he'll give me back Madrid. Status quo ante bellum? OK that and he is now my vassal.
^ One of my fave parts of Civ is playing god-king a lá Louis XV only more competent (I hope). I am the shopkeeper, and I give back Wang Kon some of his cities, feck actually administering them.
^ I fly down to Gandhi of Japan and start sticking it to him, one of the last Eastern holdouts. We only really suffered casualties via defensive units.
^ Leonidas seizes Kyoto, a massive city at 18 after being captured. The Statue of Zeus is also there, swinging it's war weariness penalty off me and toward Gandhi himself.
^ Beginning to press westwards. He won't give in.
^ Perhaps this'll learn him?
^ Nope. And he still has a load of cities?
^ Took another city and would get some help from Wang Kon's Incans.
^ Ah this is why! He has a sizeable island network. Besides Kyoto and a few others, most of the cities I'm capturing are junk.
^ Viking making headway into Churchill? Must get back up there soon...
^ The Incans take a city as do I. Only that last city there on the left then I'll have to consider building a fleet...
^ Never mind, he's conceding! Had to march right up to the last city first. I give him back all his crappy cities and give two to Wang Kon to mess with them both.
^ The fun maps. Note the checkered effect, indicating the city has been captured before and other civ influence is there. Elizabeth, the pink-orange on the left is being gobbled up by Genghis and Mao et al there (green). Churchill, the pink orange on right, also suffering that. My glorious blue-purple in north-east top right is largely unfazed except on southern borders.
^ My 'trade network' map.
^ Hindu influence. Almost exclusively east coast, also Hammurabi purple on top.
^ Christianity. Almost everywhere bar the south-east.
^ My Confucianism. Notably less well-spread but thorough in the north-east. Netting me a good bit of gold anyway...
^ Impressive spread of Judaism. Founded by Alexander the Great of the Arabs in Mecca (!) he was killed early on for his personality, very aggressive always demanding tributes etc. Still managed to spread throughout the centre.
^ A brief look at the beleaguered Elizabeth of the Celts. She founded Christianity and it spread everywhere first.
^ Re-invaded the Spanish. Churchill had little to resist my mounted gun-toting cavalry.
^ Never mind, he brought up a bit to attack me in the south.
^ Another Celt city falls to the west. Not long now..
^ Got Rifling, upgraded all my guys to Cavalry and Riflemen. Used Nationhood and the Draft to bring in 5 new Riflemen per turn.
^ A Mao Zedong city in Ethiopia falls to Charlemagne's Vikings? Interesting...
^ Wise choice, Churchill. The East is mine!
^ My empi-yay with some handy lines drawn to separate the Willem Van Orange/Persian lands from mine. He's next (light blue, centre). Wouldn't mind attacking dark blue Louis in the south there either.
^ The culture/ethnicity map again. The East.
^ The chaotic, Christian, scientifically advanced west. They don't have Rifling however...
^ Gave Churchill back most of his lands. I'm going to need him in shape to help me fight the Great Western War.
