Conquest of the New World – France Strategy (Deity)

France’s colonial history in North America is dominated by the struggle with the English and the Dutch and their wars with several Native American allies (Hugons, Algonquians) against the Native American allies of the other Europeans (mainly Iroquois). Even back then proxy wars were a common thing. In reality the success was great, but not overwhelming: Tout le Monde Francophone? The answer is no.

One aspect of the British dominance in North America most certainly was population: In 1745 more than 1 Million British colonists lived in the 13 colonies, but only ~50.000 French colonists inhabited the much larger area of New France. The Seven Year’s War (1756 to 1763) spanned across all continents and involved almost all major powers at the time. France was superior in territory in North America. France’s allies, Austria, Spain and Russia amongst others were by far superior to Britain and Prussia. Yet the latter two prevailed in the Seven Year’s War, which ended in France ceding almost all of it’s North American colonies to England and Spain. This marked the end of France’s colonial history in North America and shifted the balance on the European Theater.

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The following Steam Achievement Guide is basically the same as Conquest of The New World – Tea and Crumpets for Everyone Steam Achievement Guide, which describes how to succeed with England. Thus the headlines are similar but I kept this post more brief on the content. If you need more details on something, please check out the English strategy first. I optimized on the build order (below) and had a slightly bigger army to start with. 🙂

Tout le Monde Francophone?

Unlocked 29 Apr 2017 @ 12:32am

Win the New World Scenario as France.

German and French names of this Steam Achievement:
DE: Tout le Monde Frankophon?
FR: Un monde francophone

Part 1: Dominate Europe

Chapter 1: Initial Build Order and Research

The AI in this scenario is dominant as always. So as usually we need to defeat the main AI players as early as possible.

Now in Conquest of the New World, European Nations can not declare war on each other until the discovery of Piracy. This means in order to make tout le Monde Francophone, you need two things:

1. Direct your Research straight to Piracy
2. Meanwhile build a military strong enough to capture those European capitals

The initial build order shows exactly that focus on Production improvements and right after only units:

La Rochelle	Charlesbourg Royale (48)
1. Ironworks (5)	—
2. Forge (8)	—
3. Cargo Ship 1 (11)	—
4. Navigation School (16)	—
5. Cargo Ship 2 (18)	—
6. Seaport (24)	—
7. Cargo Ship 3 (26)	—
8. Cargo Ship 4 (28)	—
9. Galleas 1 (29)	—
10. Galleas 2 (31)	—
11. University of Oxford (turn 34, Researching “Warships”)	—
12. Galleas 3 + Upgrade to Frigates	—
13. – 15. 3x Frigates	—
2x Trebuchets	—
2x Conquistadores	—
Researched Piracy turn 50 buy Privateer for 650G build #2 in turn 52 build #3 in turn 54 buy Privateer #4 for 650G	Only here production in a 2nd city starts

This build order pretty much guarantees to by turn 54 have an army of:

• 6 Frigates
• 4 Privateers
• 2 Trebuchets
• 2 Conquistadors

Having a Golden Age in turn 53 already helps the further build up of our military. Also a first colony definitely helps scoring some VP and having a foothold in the new world ourselves. So you have to pump out one settler early, preferably buying it early. Here’s where I established Charlesbourg Royale:

Research

1. Navigation (10)
2. Trapping (15)
3. Calendar (18)
4. Printing Press (24)
5. Education (29, starting University of Oxford ASAP)
6. Imperialism (34)
7. Piracy (50)
8. Treasure Fleet
9. Economics (67)
10. Banking
11. Religious Orders (87)
12. Gunpowder

The French Unique Ability – Native Allies

City-State Influence Influence degrades at half and recovers at twice the normal rate.
This quite nice unique ability basically guarantees that once you’re allied with a City-State, this alliance is almost permanent throughout the game.

Social Policies

Here’s an overview of the social policies I used whilst playing France, trying to make tout le monde francophone:

1. Maritime Infrastructure (Level 1) — Immediately boost your production!
2. Merchant Confederacy (Level 1) — Get more Gold from trade routes.
3. Total War (Level 2) — Boost production of Military units! This is when the arms race starts.
4. City Sack (Level 1) — Just in time before the first war 🙂
5. Merchant Navy (Level 2)
6. CONQUEST OF THE NEW WORLD (Turn 112, Level 3)
   This comes much later compared to my England game — mainly because in that game, the City-States I was allied with were mainly cultural. This was a tremendous boost I didn’t get in this game.

Here a quick overall of the all the social policies available in the Conquest of the New World Scenario:

Chapter 2: Conquest

With the army listed above it was as planned super easy to already make tout le Europe Francophone by conquest. Right in turn 54 I declared war on England. I picked the England first, because with their unique ability, making their navy even more powerful they had to be taken out as quickly as possible. They already were on a good way building their navy so it took 3 turns until Plymouth got captured! It granted me 3 treasures (so 3x 25VP and 300G). In the peace deal in turn 61 I demanded their 2nd colony, Jamestown, which I razed for another treasure.

In turn 63 I headed for the Netherlands. This took quite a bit longer, since the English Channel protects them from big fleets. After healing all units and bringing them in position, I declared war in turn 63. Amsterdam fell in 2 turns and in turn 69 we had peace. They had quite some power in North America, so convincing them to make peace took more time.

Geography dictates the next target: Portugal. It took 3 turns after Amsterdam fell (65) to bring the fleet in position to strike, so in turn 68 I declared war and Lisbon fell in turn 70, generating 3 treasures again. We made peace in turn 74.

Bringing the (now even bigger) fleet in position at Seville and having the ground troops attack from land, Spain was the last nut to crack. The AI really notices my warmongering and arms quite a lot. Declaring war in turn 75, my fleet captured Seville in turn 77 (they were really mad – we only made peace in turn 99).

Playing France, Europe was liberated 6 turns earlier than playing England even though their ships have an additional +2 movement points. The point of all this — again — is to make the other European nations lose their home base. Without intercontinental trade routes their Gold per turn income is heavily cut.

Part 2: Conquest of the New World

Chapter 3: South America and the Native Americans

Since the Americas geography was quite unfortunate for me, I wanted to keep my fleet busy. During the European wars the Iroquois have already sided with one of them and in turn 93 we made peace (for 70 GPT for me). I attacked the Shoshone right one turn later (turn 94, full 17 turns after Europe’s francophone liberation) and captured

• Moson Kahni turn 102 for 3 treasures but it got liberated and
• I recaptured it turn 105 for another 3 treasures

Chapter 4: Defeating the European’s Colonies

Since the Europeans are still much more powerful than the Native Americans, the first goal still is to get rid of them or at least severely diminish them. The following is the chronology of conquest in the Americas. Unfortunately unlike in my England Deity game I wasn’t able to completely destroy any of the European Nations:

• 

  087 Nombre de Dios (Isabella) captured

• 089 Lake Simcoe (Hiawatha) captured
• 092 Canandaigua (Hiawatha) captured
• 093 Genesse River (Hiawatha) captured
• 095 Timbisha (Pocatello) captured
• 099 Santo Domingo (Isabella) captured
• 101 Duckwater (Pocatello) captured
• 102 Moson Kahni (Pocatello) captured
• 105 Moson Kahni (Pocatello) captured
• 109 Tukudeka (Pocatello) captured
• 114 Hukandeka (Pocatello) captured
• 116 Yomba (Pocatello) captured

• 

  119 Pohowki (Pocatello) captured

• 120 Agaidika (Pocatello) captured
• 121 Porto Seguro (Catherine) captured
• 124 Agaidika (Pocatello) captured
• 125 Curacao set ablaze after peace treaty
• 126 Recife set ablaze after peace treaty
• 126 Washakie (Pocatello) captured
• 128 New Amsterdam (William) captured
• 129 Te-Moak (Pocatello) captured
• 130 Texcoco (William) captured
• 132 Beverwijck (William) captured
• 136 Porto Seguro (Catherine) captured

• 

  136 Tula (Montezuma) captured

• 137 Atzcapotzalco (Montezuma) captured
• 138 Tenochtitlan (Montezuma) captured
• 141 Moson Kahni (Pocatello) captured
• 141 Roanoke Island (Elizabeth) captured
• 146 Goshute (Pocatello) captured
  Shoshone defeated
• 147 St. George (Elizabeth) captured
• 149 Jamestown (Elizabeth) captured

Tout le Monde Francophone (Deity) – Conclusion

The next playthrough for Conquest of the New World and still a positive bottom line: 15h54min play time that were unexpectedly exciting. Mainly because things didn’t go as smoothly as with England before and I was worried if I would have enough time to score VP. It worked and it’s been fun and challenging. It would have been much nicer to compete in an equal race for the Americas, but as human player it’s impossible to outproduce the AI and settle faster or even just stay on eye level.

Anyways: A successful game with 6774 VP in the end and several treasures on the way. This attempt validated the approach from playing England and thus should also work for other European nations.