Pong 8: Scythia

Greetings and welcome to Pong8!

For this round, I was dealt Scythia, France, or Russia in the draft. I picked Scythia because I've been reading a lot of Central Asian history, and I thought it would be fun to command the hordes. I have also had difficulty getting my civ going in the last few rounds of Ping Ping Civ, and I wanted a militaristic civ that would make my teeth a little sharper, so Scythia it is!

Turn 1 - Starting location

After a mulligan, this is what my start looked like. I was a little concerned about the lack of production, but lots of food and horses meant that I would be able to grow and expand fairly quickly. I kept the start, hoping that I'd be able to find a better production zone. Starting with double-wheat, I bee-lined granary as quickly as possible. 

14- Discover Macedon

I met Alexander of Macedon (Darren) pretty quickly. With a crucial choke-point between us, I realized that war would actually be pretty difficult for either of us to wage against the other. One of us would just occupy the isthmus and stop it if anything grew too threatening. As a result, I was pretty open to peace, and when he offered to keep a peaceful border between us, I was more than happy to work with him. Over the course of the game, this relationship continually blossomed, and the Macedonians were loyal and good allies of Scythia the entire game. 

29- Georgia met and second city

I struggled a lot trying to decide where to put my second city. Production was a serious issue in the capital, but I also had expanding neighbors on both sides. Where to establish myself and what to prioritize? Tough choices. I ended up settling the fish-filled inlet shown above because of the woods and incense. I pushed the city further west than normal (6 v. 4 tiles) to take up more space and create a softer border with Georgia.

In subsequent sessions, I regretted this decision. At the time, I thought it made sense strategically because it would allow me to control Georgia's expansion, but when he didn't push hard against me, I ended up wasting valuable space in my western region. Complicated game!

76- End of session 2

My expansion and settlement has mostly filled out the heartland of Scythia. I'd raised an early horde and started driving south. I initially planned to attack Arabia as quickly as possible, hoping to prevent him from fortifying the choke-point between us, but before the horde could reach them, he attacked Granada. He mostly withdrew when my riders arrived, and I think he became the state's sovereign, so I simply turned on the city to take it for myself. It took longer than anticipated without siege equipment, but I conquered it early the next session.

96- Georgia (Zar) declares war on Greece

Here we are in session 3 when Zar attacked Greece. I could barely see the far west, but it was becoming clear by this point that the real center of our world was in that direction. Gorgo (AI) had surged to an incredible lead in culture, keeping both Georgian and Nubian (Joe) eyes on them. With both of them grappling for position against Greece, neither of them bothered too much with each other, and as a result I didn't see any big opportunities to catch up. 

Throughout this period, I was focusing on ways to use my horde to some kind of advantage. I didn't want to attack Macedon or Georgia, by eastern and western neighbors, because both of them had been loyal and true friends, and their military and scientific parity meant that victory was far from guaranteed. Arabia, to my south, continued to have great land and a relatively weak military, but the damned chokepoint at Homs continued to loom large.

99- Attack on Arabia

The horde tries, and largely fails, to make any progress against the fortress of Homs. I tried a number of creative maneuvers and feints but didn't get anywhere. Arabia (Tel) pulled Greece into war with me but it never mattered. I didn't see a single Greek military unit near Scythia the entire game.

126- The second invasion of Arabia

The first Arabian war ended in a ceasefire. The death of so many of my units in a surprise war led to a lot of war weariness, and neither of us were getting anywhere so we settled for peace. This gave me time to recover and build an even larger horde, which was in position by the end of session 4 (above). At the time, I thought it was obvious that I was moving around Arabia, but I've since learned that I alarmed most of the world with this movement. Both Joe (Nubia) and Pete (India) mentioned being pretty freaked out by this movement.

In any case, the Arabs attacked me immediately at the opening of the next session. They saw an opportunity to cut down some of the horses before they were fully in position so he took it. The surprise attack ended up being much better for my war weariness, and it had the added benefit of pulling my economic ally Georgia into the conflict. 

147- End of War

The end of session 5 saw the end of the age of horse, the end of the Second Arabian War, and the end of Scythian hopes at greatness. My attack generated a lot of plunder and circumstantial wealth, but it had cost me nearly everything, and the war weariness was crippling me. I traded for every luxury in the world, often at high prices, and it was still barely keeping us productive. Running out of options, I decided to withdraw and put everything I had into fixing the science gap between me and the leaders. By this point I'd given up that anyone was going to wage a major war that I could take advantage of, and as I fell further and further behind, science seemed my only, last hope. 

168- End session 6

Focusing on science and domestic issues helped, but the world was passing me by. I began to explore the far west extensively as Nubia conquered the last of Greece. It was then that I realized how inevitable a Nubian victory was. Joe (Nubia) had managed to convince Arabia and India to let him conquer the world, and now not even Georgia would be able to do much to him. War was inevitable, but I couldn't see how anything could stop Nubia now, especially after they claimed all the former Greek great works. 

175- End session 7

I'm in next to last place as Nubian fortunes explode upwards. I sat out the next three sessions as Nubia went on to an absolute and complete victory via Culture. 

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Reflecting on the game, I made a few minor mistakes that added to big losses. Probably the biggest mistake was my sub-optimal city placement, which led to large gaps in my heartland. This made it slower and harder to develop, which made me lag in other ways over time. I did much better this round developing my land, but the cities didn't maximize the use of the space.

I built a strong military but failed to use it effectively. Most of this was due to the map - several chokepoints really hurt my land-based military. It made for a really interesting and fun game, but it was still a disadvantage. In hindsight, I probably should have attacked Georgia at some point, but our economic alliance was so profitable that I really didn't want to close that option forever. Humans tend to be pretty prickly about that sort of thing, and frankly I was just thrilled to manage an actual friendship with the eternal warmonger, Zar, for once. 

In my opinion, Joe just outplayed everybody. I have no idea why his neighbors allowed him to gain as much territory as he took, but I suspect that they didn't even notice until it was far too late. It was the single greatest achievement of the game. He managed to occupy the Japanese (AI) capital very early and then more and other good lands, one after another, while everyone else sat in their starting positions. Early war trumps most other strategies in Civ, and while a coalition of civs working against him might have had a chance at stopping him, there was no chance with Arabia and India taking his side. It was a good game, but it also played out pretty much exactly as you'd expect if one could see everything through sessions 3 and 4. 

Scythia is a LOT of fun. I was almost constantly flush with gold and had elite horse riders and knights running around until far after they would normally have been useful. I plundered a ton of caravans and tiles, and generally had a great time being a steppe-based menace. Pong 8 was one of the best ones yet, and I can't wait for the next one with Gathering Storm.