GOTM-02: Pre Game Discussion

This game MUST be played in patch version 1.52.

In addition, if any further patches are released before the end of january, you will have to complete your game in v152 and submit before patching.

Game settings:
Civilization: England (Leader: Elizabeth; Traits: Philosophical & Financial)
Rivals: 6 (Random)
Difficulty: Prince
Map: Lakes
Mapsize: Standard
Climate: Tropical
Waterlevel: Low
Starting Era: Ancient
Speed: Epic
Victory Conditions: all enabled

The starting screenshot is here:
http://gotm.civfanatics.net/civ4games/images/gotm02large.jpg

Leader Traits

First up, Elizabeth is Financial and Philosophical.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/images/avatars/civ4/civ4elizabeth4ss.jpg

Financial:
+1 commerce on plots with at least 2 commerce.
Double production speed of Bank.


I quite like the financial trait -it provides quite a bit of extra cash, especially in water tiles - coastal cities can generate a lot of commerce. Building cottages becomes even more valuable - build them on a river and you've effectively got an instant hamlet - and it can still grow.

The bank comes late(ish) in the game, but it still provides a bonus - 50% extra gold in the city.


Philosophical:
+100 great-person birth-rate.
Double production speed of University.

I consider Philosophical to be another very strong trait - this trait can give you a few extra great-people throught a game, and careful use of them can give you a great advantage - especially if you secure a few wonders to generate great people points.

The other benefit is the double production speed of universities - good in itself; but it also means that you can build Oxford University much faster!



Unique Unit

You unique unit is the Redcoat; a replacement for the Rifleman. It costs the same as an ordinary rifleman (137 hammers in the epic game), but it has a strenght of 16 compared with the 14 strength of the standard rifleman. In addition, it gains +25% vs gunpowder units (in addition to the riflemen's +25% vs mounted units). In effect - this acts as an instant 'pinch' promotion - which provides a slight nullification against the main counter to rifleman, the grenadier.

<reserved>

Gee, how disappointing. There's no way I'm going to invest many, many hours in another game at Noble level. I like to participate in the GOTM, but it's just not very interesting to play when I know I'm going to be way ahead throughout the whole game. :(

Edit: The level was announced incorrectly and it is going to be Prince after all, as I originally expected. I withdraw my complaint. :)

Let's see, I think I'll settle right where I'm at. Looks like tundra and ice up north, plains to the east, and nothing eye catching to the S or W. So it looks like we'll have wheat and sheep to start with. Pretty typical start, I would say.
England starts with fishing and mining... not many forests to chop right off the bat, so I'll probably hold off on bronze working and start with agriculture then animal husbandry to take advantage of what we got, then probably bronze working.
No early religion, unless I pop a hut and get mysticism, then I may consider it.

Not too bad, kind of hoping for a prince level, but its only the 2nd GOTM. I'm digging epic speed though.

Fishing and Sailing are other priorities.

The Warrior will go up the hill, to check if we're missing something by settling on the starting tile. But the starting position looks good, it would be hard to beat.

I like epic speed, by the way.

Starting techs are fishing and mining.

There's a lot of food in the starting location. Plains/wheat, Grass/sheep, and 3 lake tiles that will become (with a lighthouse) 3f/3g tiles. It does seem to be a bit short on hammers, though. Just the one plains/hill, a plains forest, and 1h each from the other plains or grass/forest tiles.

Pretty nice starting location. Ecpecially with financial leader trait.

I think once the plains/hill is mined there'll be a reasonable number of shields, but the capital doesn't look as though it'll be that great for building wonders, unless there's also iron or copper in the radius that we can't see yet. I'll probably end up going for conquest or domination anyway.

And I really like the Epic speed:)

What is the main difference between Normal and Epic speeds?

Cool. Can't wait.

With that starting posi, and it being only Noble, I'll definately be sacrificing a couple turns to explore south (river may hold even more promise) and south-east options (you can see more grassland se too) for the starting city.

The ice to the north means it's likely you aren't gonna be able to expand that way, and the desert makes the west a risk that could turn out unusable.

To keep the palace more centered, minimising maintainence, this starting spot seems like a good place to hedge your bets and reserve it for your second city. One square up (just below sheep) may even prove the better spot for that city if there is a sea resource in that blacked out sea square.

3 days and counting!

What is the main difference between Normal and Epic speeds?Units have more turns to move. There are also some little changes, too.

The starting position looks pretty food heavy-shield poor. Moving south is an interesting idea for the gamblers - I don't think I'll do it, food is good.

This lakes map is almost all land, and sized 52x32 instead of 84x52.
http://www.civfanatics.com/images/civ4/sirian_maps/sample-lakes.jpg

Lighthouses are very powerful in this position. All freshwater lakes get boosted to 3 food.

Great! another game to break our heads over. And epic... but why not marathon ;-) *edit* not Noble but Prince will offer a nice challenge*

Lots of food, low shields though. Clearing all forests will hurt in production a lot. It will support many specialists, ie GP factory, but limited wonders. Judging from the yield map, we are next to the coast and lakes, so lighthouse should be possible making lakes worth 3 food. That means we are looking at +9 food (+2 city, +3 sheep, +2 wheat, and +3 for each laketile) before building the first grassland farm. You'll need agriculture, animal husbandry and sailing to unlock them though. Finding health bonuses early will be most useful. Of course we have sheep and wheat. Until Londen can really expand we can use the rabbit-like breeding of population with the Slavery civic for extra production .

The tropical climate will show more of this pattern of high food and low production. Founding a few production cities where possible will help. Locations of city 2 onwards could be problematic. Ice to the north and desert to the south.

Also important to note Lakes map have no world wrap, so civs in the east and west have one side they dont need to defend as much. Judging from the screenshot we are in North and knowing GOTM we are probably in the middle (orange dot) surrounded by three opponents (Red, Cyan and Yellow). And if they expand fast enough we could be bordering 5 civs (purple and green as well) sounds like early warfare.

I will settle on the spot and start with warrior and then with worker. With all that gold available research of mysticism will be first and then the goal is hinduism and then agriculture. In approximately same time the worker will be ready.

Gee, how disappointing. There's no way I'm going to invest many, many hours in another game at Noble level. I like to participate in the GOTM, but it's just not very interesting to play when I know I'm going to be way ahead throughout the whole game. :(

I feel the same. And a lakes map too... :(

-- Roland

Psh, these are like my second least favorite traits (after Spiritual and Expansive). I'm going to have to be much more agressive than last GOTM (no turtling and expecting to get ahead), but we're not Organized, so I don't think I can get a domination victory.

Lakes and Tropical. Once 'cleared up': Food heaven, production hell. Plopping early cities down in hilly landscape (if there is any) is going to be very important if you want to get any wonders. If there isn't anything hilly nearby I'll probably won't cut down much forrest (and as such won't go for Bronze right away).

The type of map seems to be made for early Conquest/Domination type of games, a lot of people are not going to use those Redcoats...

This looks like a very nice start for the English, unless I'm forgetting something. The financial bonus on the lake tiles make an early religion gamble possible (not many other civs will have as much early commerce, so even if England loses the race to Hinduism, the race to Judaism looks good). And with good food and lots of commerce, London looks likely to become the science and great people centre of the world.

You know, I will kill myself laughing if that black spot has fish. No-one has talked about the starting skills yet (I assume the 3rd post is reserved for that), but England's are Fishing and Mining. If there is a sea resource in that spot then moving up one sqaure and building a workboat IS the best start and there will be hundreds of people crying over their keyoards :P

Any gamblers daring enough to move up one tile and settle on their first turn?
(sacrificing two river tiles for ice and tundra with forest, but on bright side gaining a hill)

I'm thinking that researching hunting and pumping out a few scouts first thing is the way to go. Make a beeline for writing via animal husbandry + pottery, then sailing and agriculture, and go science-heavy the whole way. If I can find marble , then shift to mysticism + polytheism and build Parthenon to boost G'Leaders production +150%.

In theory. If it all doesn't go sideways.

Hmm, don't like the lack of hills. Maybe it's just me, but I like my capital to produce lots of hammers.

I could move north to get an extra plains hill, but without wasting turns there isn't a way to find out what will be at the top of the city radius beforehand.

You know, I will kill myself laughing if that black spot has fish.

Any gamblers daring enough to move up one tile and settle on their first turn?
(sacrificing two river tiles for ice and tundra with forest, but on bright side gaining a hill)

Yes, I will be going one space north. I think it's a decent gamble.

EDIT - Actually, I take that back. Having a village on the river to the south would be great, and that upper left dark tile looks like it might be tundra.

North would be a silly move, IMO. You'd pick up a snow tile + tundra forest + a couple extra coastal squares + 1 plains hill. Meanwhile you're losing plains/grasslands/river tiles. Another reason is the settler placement right where he is is perfect for optimizing tile useage without grabbing the desert tiles to the SW.

Elizabeth is one of my favorite leaders. All the extra commerce and some early scientist leaders for academies makes for a very fast tech pace. I bet we see a 1500AD launch this month. I'll be going for a military victory, myself, because I'm bad at those and I want to be humiliated by my betters. Also because I'm bored of fast tech games with no AI competition. I can use this as an opportunity to improve my warmongering.

I will not go for an early religion. On a map where you meet all the civs early I tend not to, because you'll get some spread to you early enough. Meanwhile, since I'm going for a military victory I can capture a holy city for the income bonus. I will be going to war very early this game. I probably won't build many settlers of my own. One thing I have to be careful of, though, is emphasizing my cities too much for production. Commerce will be necessary as well. I will probably leave London as a science city and maybe one other city that's able to work a lot of cottages.

edited thanks to Smirk

A move south might be a good gamble, ie to the south of that lake. Unless that salt water has a resource its not all that useful to me, when considering any river tile instantly and in the future outcompetes coastal for commerce.
Although I've never played a lakes map yet. And I see already my assumption that all water would be fresh is flawed so I'll have to give one a try before the gotm to see if the lighthouse combination is very useful. That is, can you get salt with fresh lakes enough to make this a useful general strategy and thus then building Colossus can have a big impact?

Although I'm always bored with the space race so am not even looking at that as a goal. So I will most likely settle at the spot or at least with fresh and salt for my capital. I'll send that warrior southwest but if he doesn't see anything then no further thought is needed.

Beyond that I may try for some early religion, and going for hunting for some scouts and village rewards is tempting as well.


Shillen: Catherine is Russia Cre/Fin. This is Elizabeth, she's the more restrained redhead. ;)

Gee, how disappointing. There's no way I'm going to invest many, many hours in another game at Noble level. I like to participate in the GOTM, but it's just not very interesting to play when I know I'm going to be way ahead throughout the whole game. :(
Oh darn. :blush: Its actually prince.

Oh darn. :blush: Its actually prince.

That's good news. :goodjob:

No mods, right?

Is there an easy way to tell Civ4 to ignore all mods? Yeah, yeah, it's easy enough to just remove/rename the files, but maybe there is something that will allow you to leave them in place...

Is the save specific to the latest patch level?

Gee, how disappointing. There's no way I'm going to invest many, many hours in another game at Noble level. I like to participate in the GOTM, but it's just not very interesting to play when I know I'm going to be way ahead throughout the whole game. :(

LOL I was just gunna say...Noble?! This game is still new, right? How about giving the Warlords a chance? ;)

I actually think it would be interesting to run 3 GOTMs, 1 per 9 days (ie, one starts on the 1st, one starts on the 10th, one starts on the 19th..or 20th for nice round numbers). Each GOTM would have 1 month to complete from the start date. Each GOTM would guarantee a semi-standard difficulty level:

1) Settler to Warlord (starting, say, the 1st of every month)
2) Noble to Monarch (starting, say, the 10th of every month)
3) The top 3--Emperor, Immortal, Deity (starting, say, the 20th of every month)

(Forgive me if I botched the names of the difficulty levels...I just got my copy yesterday, and am having fun with a Settler game to get used to all of the new features.)

This would fit several peoples' tastes for GOTMs, and allow some steady progress.

If that is too much, then perhaps 2 GOTMs with the split being Settler-Noble and Monarch-Deity would work...

I love the GOTM concept, but I usually know I will get whooped...I could win about 3/4 of the time on Regent on Civ3, but lost all but one game on Monarch...I know that Noble would kick my royal trash on Civ4 right now! I think the split (if there is >1 GOTM) should be difficulty level-based, and somewhat standard...

I don't mean to overwork our GOTM staff...but if it isn't too much to ask, can it be considered?

Sam

Wow, this spot looks great for either commerce or GP. You could either run cottages along with all the extra food, or run more food for GP. One way would want Writing and on to Code of Laws quickly; the other would want Pottery. I think settling in spot is the best bet; I don't see the warrior revealing anything to change my mind. Financial + Lighthouse = 3f3c freshwater tiles... so much food and with Philo trait I think we'll see a lot of GP this game.

Its actually prince.

Yay! :D

-- Roland

Oh darn. :blush: Its actually prince.

I certainly hope this will be the first Prince game I end up winning... :crazyeye:

I think I will move into the forest 1E then settle there, it will take until the expasion of london until I have animal hus or farming and a worker anyways so all goodie squares will be in play. I will build a lighthouse asap to get the food bonus on the water. Plan on either a Spaceship or Diplo victory

It still seems like a very easy start, but I'm a whole lot happier at Prince than Noble. Thanks.

One question I'm not sure about---if you settle in place, will the capital get a free river connection to resources along the river? I.e., does the freshwater lake function as an extension of the river?

It still seems like a very easy start, but I'm a whole lot happier at Prince than Noble. Thanks.

One question I'm not sure about---if you settle in place, will the capital get a free river connection to resources along the river? I.e., does the freshwater lake function as an extension of the river?

Almost all starts in civ4 look good. Don't worry, I'm sure we'll have a monarch and an emperor game in the next couple months.

The lake will extend the river. You may need sailing to connect it, though.

I think I am going to try for a Culture victory. I have attempted it on Noble but not on Prince. I plan on settling in place and grabbing 3 city sites quickly. I am still undecided on heading for a religion or going for bronze working first. My priority is going to be getting some defense from Barbarians quickly then to drama and music.

I think I will move into the forest 1E then settle there, it will take until the expasion of london until I have animal hus or farming and a worker anyways so all goodie squares will be in play. I will build a lighthouse asap to get the food bonus on the water. Plan on either a Spaceship or Diplo victory

East seems like good shot at getting another resource in the city radius. Problem is you are giving up three forests (2 west and one where you build the city), river plains and one grassland. And you dont know what you'll get. Especially forests could hurt your early production a lot.

Then again it wouldnt be GOTM if there wasnt something that we are just missing by settling on the spot....

Forests just outside your radius can be chopped for full shields. So moving east is not a problem, unless you are one of those tree-hugger types that leaves them uncut.

The optimal "explorers gambit" would be:
1. Settler SE, N
1. Warrior NE
2. Warrior NE
2. Settler can build in place, move-and-build, or walk north if the warrior sees fish.

But the start is so good, that I can't justify wasting a turn in hopes of making it just a little bit better.

I'll settle in place, as I see no reason to move. Never played a lakes map so need to try one out. The only prince level SP game I've played was on inland sea and techs went pretty quick. I'm guessing this will be similar.

I'll stay away from going for the religions, and just pick one up from someone. Probably work on worker techs first that'll benefit my immediate surroundings. Than head for writing.

Not sure about victory condition yet.

A quick question...

Which patch are we to use for IVotm 2?

I don't want to download and install the new one if we are to use the old one.

Thanks!

A quick question...

Which patch are we to use for IVotm 2?

I don't want to download and install the new one if we are to use the old one.

Thanks!
People must play in v1.52. Any playing in the original release or v109 will have their submissions rejected (although they probably won't load anyway).

deleted (ainwood's too fast!)

Forests just outside your radius can be chopped for full shields. So moving east is not a problem, unless you are one of those tree-hugger types that leaves them uncut.

The optimal "explorers gambit" would be:
1. Settler SE, N
1. Warrior NE
2. Warrior NE
2. Settler can build in place, move-and-build, or walk north if the warrior sees fish.

But the start is so good, that I can't justify wasting a turn in hopes of making it just a little bit better.

I prefer to clean-cut as much as possible to get a boost early on that helps the entire game. However in this case it is our only source of some extra shields for quite a while. Could be useful to keep some forest for production in this case.

Btw, DaveMcW, how is your 4OTM1 going? Will it be the fastest victory?

Thanks for the quick answer and the link guys!

Never played a l;ake map, but isn't city not ablt to build lighthouse and stuff when only connected to lake?

To the northeast of the settler is sea coast tile.

To the northeast of the settler is sea coast tile.

Lake maps, by definition, have no sea coast. As a result, no lighthouses and no harbors.

Lake maps, by definition, have no sea coast. As a result, no lighthouses and no harbors.

I don't think this is true. The water to the northeast has only 1 food on it; it must be coast and not lake.

People must play in v1.52. Any playing in the original release or v109 will have their submissions rejected (although they probably won't load anyway).

I suggest you edit the opening post in this thread, to restate that 1.52 is required.

Of course, I assume it will be stated in the download announcement, too.

Almost all starts in civ4 look good.

That's not my experience. Perhaps it's because the game systematically gives worse starts at higher difficulty levels, but most of the random starts I get at Emperor look a lot worse than this one.

That's not my experience. Perhaps it's because the game systematically gives worse starts at higher difficulty levels, but most of the random starts I get at Emperor look a lot worse than this one.

It's definitely true that you get worse starting locations on higher difficulties, but they're not much worse than this start. Just to check I started a bunch of games on emperor with the same map settings and I got a few better locations than this GOTM start while the rest were not quite as good but not bad at all. This start for gotm actually has a pretty big misfortune of starting near both tundra and desert. That's rare on a tropical lakes map.

It's definitely true that you get worse starting locations on higher difficulties, but they're not much worse than this start. Just to check I started a bunch of games on emperor with the same map settings and I got a few better locations than this GOTM start while the rest were not quite as good but not bad at all. This start for gotm actually has a pretty big misfortune of starting near both tundra and desert. That's rare on a tropical lakes map.

The big plus for this start is that you have the lakes and you're also on the coast, so you can build lighthouse and get 3f from the lakes. That's a lot better than having lakes but no coast so that you can only ever get 2f from them.

(I believe we'll be able to build lighthouse. If that's not true, as Jason Fliegel claims, then this isn't a good start at all.)

Settling in place seems good to me, because my hunch is that the only useful tile to the north is the tundra forest. Moving north would encompass more non-useful tiles; moving south would leave more useful tiles unoccupied between my starting city and the icecap. And I think it's a fool's errand to try to find a better location laterally, since I'd be shocked if we were close to either the western or eastern edge of the map.

Also, this position is good for my modified tree-hugger strategy. I chop forests just outside my city radius as soon as possible--and I can see two such here. Then, if I am lucky, the multiple adjoining forests I preserve inside the city radius will spread back outside, and I can do more chopping, all without sacrificing the long-term shields, which will be especially precious for London in this game.

Last month was my first-ever GOTM and I enjoyed it a great dea. It left me chomping at the bit for this one, especially now that I know to install a logging mod beforehand so that I can write up a nice report to share. Any chance that you'd release it a few days early, for the benefit of those of us who've got extra free time to spend between Christmas and New Year's?

-- Kevin

P.S. Clarification on how those tiles that appear to be coastal will behave on this Lakes map would be much appreciated.

I don't think this is true. The water to the northeast has only 1 food on it; it must be coast and not lake.
You're right. That's weird. Every lake map I've played on (and granted, it's only been 2 or 3) has had no seas. I wonder if the GOTM staff modded this map -- or maybe my lake map games haven't been representative (or maybe this one isn't representative).

Anyway, sorry for spreading misinformation!

Lake maps are mostly fresh water, but the larger "lakes" become 1f "sea" tiles. And larger is very much a relative term!

If Harkonnen comes out with a patch compatible with v1.52, can completed games be submitted when played with that patch? ...Assuming it happens within the next week or so, and doesn't affect any changes in rules, only game performance.

The lake will extend the river. You may need sailing to connect it, though.

You don't need Sailing, it acts as a river as far as connecting is concerned. The finer point I don't know is whether a salt water lake acts the same as fresh water and rivers or as coast which does need Sailing. I'd assume the latter as it makes more sense programatically.

I'm glad to see it. Prince, fine. English, anytime.

With a start like this, I rather think the Pyramids + religion could come quite in handy. Holy City off a GP, gold like nutz, exploit chopping to get 1st settler in hammer heaven... culture victory?

As I never played CIV4 Epic Game, what is the legendary culture needed for your 3 cities in order to win by culture ?

thanks in advance

109129

Was rebuilding the map in the world builder to see what Londen would be like, when I realised there are three plains hills to the south of Londen. Good spot for the second city, to make up for lack of production in Londen.

The red arrows indicate the directions the AI could be coming from, assuming we are in the north middle. In my test game there was 4 AI near me: 11 tiles east, 14 west and about 20 SE and SW!! We'll probably have to expand to the SE and maybe W, as N and SW are poor terrain.There also seems to be coast to the N of the plains hill.

*edit* one more thing, those 4 forests provide 2 health... giving 6 base health. +2 from sheep and wheat. We just need happiness to compensate.

If Harkonnen comes out with a patch compatible with v1.52

The Patch 1.52 solved many of the memory issues (maybe even with Harkonnen's help) so Harkonnen's patch is kind of obsolet now.

So Blue Marble is out of question and also nice clock mods? Should be nice if there is a way to use only those mods which do not change any game mechanism or do not give any illegal information and still be able to submit the GOTM.

What ?
We can not use BlueMarble terrain Mod with C-IV GOTM02 ?

If "No cheating" is checked, custom assets aren't used by default.

Never played Epic before, I hope I will be able to finish in due time. Never played a lake map before, I suppose it’s a single continent. With low waters and Epic speed, I will try a conquest victory.

Desert S, Ice N, seems like we are in the N hemisphere. No shields, I don’t like this starting zone. But sea coast + lakes is perfect for a lighthouse.

Even if I cottage all around London won’t be a great science city, there will be better spots for that. Six specialist can be supported (more if merchant superspecialist are added to the city), so London will be my GP city. I will try to build the GLib here. Probably my specialists will be merchants, taking care of the maintenance of the empire at 100% tech.
I hope that the 2nd city will be my main production center.

Slavery will be used intensively. Mounted units too. No need for founding a religion in a single-continent game.

Bureaucracy doesn’t seem like a good idea with London. I will build a Palace in other city or maybe I should use Vassalage, I guess I can afford it being financial.

As I never played CIV4 Epic Game, what is the legendary culture needed for your 3 cities in order to win by culture ?

thanks in advance


75,000

So Blue Marble is out of question and also nice clock mods?

I don’t know about the Blue Marble terrain but the clock mods and the autolog mod worked fine in my GOTM1 game.

If "No cheating" is checked, custom assets aren't used by default.

I didn't know that. So the mods wouldn't work. How sure are you about that statement? I think I'll start up a game with that checked and see.

If "No cheating" is checked, custom assets aren't used by default.

I didn't know that. So the mods wouldn't work. How sure are you about that statement? I think I'll start up a game with that checked and see.

Just tried it, and you are correct. When 'No Cheating' is checked neither my autolog nor my clock mod worked. It even states under the description of 'No Cheating' that the game assets couldn't be modified (or something similar to that).

The question is whether the GOTM Staff will check it. They've already stated autolog could be used. Plus they have already set up their own type of security.

Any hope of an early release for those who have a spare day between christmas and New Year? Most of the 'working people', like me, have a tough time finding time to play, which is one of the main reasons I haven't participated in GOTM much. Would be nice if I could finally send in a game and see how I do compared to the rest :)

hola.
can anyone tell me where to find a list of differences between normal and epic ?

I'm not looking for a specific hammer comparison on every unit, but maybe a general % increase in hammers for the builds / beakers for the science discoveries. Someone already mentioned 75K for each legendary city instead of 50K in the culture win. Give me a rough idea of the movement increases of units, etc...

I've only played one Civ4 game and that was GOTM1 (normal). Strategy might change a bit with epic and also the changes in 1.52 patch.

This is probably listed somewhere and I'm just not finding it.

Thanks!
cas

It's too bad that we can't load UI-only mods with "no cheating" enabled, but you can understand why the game can't tell a cheating mod from a harmless one. But we trust GOTM submitters to be honest in so many other ways; maybe we should trust them to not use cheating mods too, and unlock the games? Then again I can imagine folks may modify their rulesets by accident. Maybe a whitelist of approved mods that we trust players to follow would do it? Hmm.

I suppose we could make a "GOTM mod" with all the popular mods included. And a control panel to turn off the stuff we don't want to use.

But I really dislike requiring mods to be installed, as it breaks forward compatibility. Is there some way you can include a whitelist inside the save file?

uh, prince, lakemap, epic - all things i've never tried before :eek: i will try my best

and a gotm-mod would be great :woohoo:

Just tried it, and you are correct. When 'No Cheating' is checked neither my autolog nor my clock mod worked. It even states under the description of 'No Cheating' that the game assets couldn't be modified (or something similar to that).

The question is whether the GOTM Staff will check it. They've already stated autolog could be used. Plus they have already set up their own type of security.
From Mods forum Autolog thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=3501609#post3501609):
The mod doesn't intentionally change the score, but it changed cvutil.py which includes the "getScoreComponent" function. That function changed in 1.09, but the version of that function in the mod is the 1.00 version.I think they will have to re-evaluate the mods. I wouldn't assume we are going to be able to use them. :(

Why would they need to check "no cheating," why not just lock the game save with a password? Doesn't it do the same thing, but you can still use mods? (I could be wrong about this)

Why would they need to check "no cheating," why not just lock the game save with a password? Doesn't it do the same thing, but you can still use mods? (I could be wrong about this)
"No cheating" and the admin password effectively do the same thing - prevent use of custom assets, and make sure that your base (normal) assets match those in the original game.

The reason the clock and autologger could be used in the first GOTM was presumably a bug that allowed custom assets to be used. This is no longer the case, as new (HOF staff member ;)) Deniz mentioned.

DaveMcW mentioned that we need an approved GOTM (and possibly HOF) mod - the HOF have a mod approval thread, but I haven't checked it lately to see how they're implementing it. We will probably try to do something similar at some point - it may be that we end-up generating multiple start saves for the various mods.

My concern with this approach is that not all GOTM players are computer-savvy. There is the risk in supplying multiple saves that people download the 'wrong' one, and we end up with a tech support problem on our hands. Maybe AlanH can whip-up a custom mod download screen - most players download the normal starting save - others go to a specific (different) download page to get the save as-per the mod they want to run? (I wouldn't want to suppy starting saves for more than (say) two mods though).

Still up for discussion - maybe in another thread though.

The reason the clock and autologger could be used in the first GOTM was presumably a bug that allowed custom assets to be used. This is no longer the case, as new (HOF staff member ;)) Deniz mentioned.So that's why some mods worked, and some didn't in GOTM1...cool.

Still up for discussion - maybe in another thread though.Definitely a great idea.

Can the mod be set to have access to these folders:

CustomAssets/art
CustomAssets/res
CustomAssets/sound

in addition to approved python mods?

It's too bad that we can't load UI-only mods with "no cheating" enabled, but you can understand why the game can't tell a cheating mod from a harmless one. But we trust GOTM submitters to be honest in so many other ways; maybe we should trust them to not use cheating mods too, and unlock the games? Then again I can imagine folks may modify their rulesets by accident. Maybe a whitelist of approved mods that we trust players to follow would do it? Hmm.

It's very easy for players to forget which mods they have installed. Counting on hundreds of people to actively check a list of approved mods isn't very realistic. You need a system that passively enforces itself.

I'd like to know what mods people want to use and why they feel that it's necessary for them to use them for GOTM. Personally, I have no problem playing the game vanilla. I'd like to hear compelling arguments for why people can or will not play gotm without using mods. I thought the no cheating checkbox was a great idea so people who liked mods could keep all their mods installed for personal use, but still play the GOTM without using them.

The only mod I would like to use for GOTM is Eotinb's Autolog mod (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=141164). It uses the event manager that is already built into the game in such a way that the player can manually enter player comments. Before I realized a QSC submission wasn't being done in GOTM1 I used it to keep track of my QSC moves. It makes things a lot easier when you don't even have to Alt-Tab out of the game.

It also keeps track of when growth was, techs being learned/started, and build ques.

It makes things a lot easier when you don't even have to Alt-Tab out of the game.
Especially if alt-tab causes the game to crash ...
At the moment I have to use pen & paper to make notes.

By mere happenstance I'm playing a game right now where I needed a lake at the end of a river to connect two cities. I did not have sailing and the connection was not there. I switched my research to sailing and the turn I learned it the connection was made. So sailing is definitely required to connect via lakes.

What about other options for the game?

Raging/Barbs/No barbs, etc.

I would prefer Vicky over Lizzy, but yeah, I need to be schooled in the ins and outs of customizing Great People builds.

However, this is an interesting start. Making the capital as the GP city will be a totally new challenge for me.

What about other options for the game?

Raging/Barbs/No barbs, etc.
All standard (its not a custom game setup).

Looks like a good spot for a GP-farm. At this point my biggest wish is for a good production spot somewhere nearby, followed by marble or stone. A good city order would be:

1 - specialist farm. If marble is present maybe even chop for the great library, though that would mean sacrificing some early settlers.

2 - high-production city to take up the slack for the hammer-poor start. Build either pyraminds or parthenon to take advantage of the specialists. A pyramids + forge + engineer combo could possibly be used to spawn a great engineer to rush the great library in the main GP-farm. Or maybe just chop for pyramids in city 1.

3 and up - cottage cities to take advantage of the financial trait. If I can get the great library that would mean multiple academies to further boost science production.

Of course everything depends on the strengths and weaknesses of nearby city spots. For tech I'd probably go for agriculture->husbandry->writing to get a library in the specialist farm and open the doors to techs like currency, CoL, or literature, with important side-tracks like BW or hunting/archery thrown in as needed.

Reigions anyone? I guess a polytheism beeline for a leg up on the parthenon wouldn't be entirely a waste but I suspect most of us'll be going for confucianism if anything.

That looks like an interesting game. I am currently playing my first Prince level game and it is not too hard to beat, I think. I also played a financial leader and conquered my 2 closest rivals pretty early.

At that point, I had 12 cities and realized that even if I put research to 0%, I would have a small deficit! :eek: Fortunately, I had over 300g at that point and could run research at 40% for a dozen turns. I already had lots of cottages and worked coast tiles to profit from the +1 commerce, but that was not enough. I had to build courthouses almost everywhere and go for calendar to have enough happiness to allow my cities to grow bigger than size 6 or 7 to support my expenses.

I don't know how the epic speed or the lake map will affect the game, but I bet I will run into the same kind of problem. I have never pop rushed anything in Civ4 yet, so lots of new things for me to experience! This is going to be fun!

As for the start, I think setting on the spot seems a good idea. Building a worker first seemed to help a lot in GOTM1, so I will do it again. BTW, I got 7 huts in GOTM1 which gave me 2 maps and 5 times gold, so hunting does not seem like a good idea. I will go for agriculture and/or animal husbandry to profit from the wheat and sheep as fast as possible. Considering the low hammer of London, I will probably keep the 2 forests in the plains, but will probably cut those on grassland for the first few settlers.

Without meditation as starting tech, we would have to go for Monotheism to get an early religion, so we are better to conquer one! :mischief:

Playing a test game with same settings and the Screenshot modeled in Editor, so London will be the same. Here is what I found:

1. Other civs are close! - if we are top north similar to what the screenshot suggests we could be facing upto 4 neighbouring opponents soon. I built one city east, and several south before I ran into enemy borders.

2. Upkeep rises fast - with 4 quick cities science was already down to50%.

3. enough hills on tropical - I did notice quite a few hills on this tropical settings. No problem there it seems.

4. London Health - London runs into health problems soon. Health is 6 (2 at prince, 2 for forests, 2 fresh water). Health gets better once you connect wheat and sheep with agriculture, wheel and animal husbandry. If you leave less than 2 forests health becomes limiting. I also noticed two forest growing in the London area early on. Could be freak luck.

5. London Happiness - Hapiness caps at 5 (4 at prince and 1 for palace), but extra pop can be used with slavery. The key for the early game here is a religion and a temple. But until then London can spend its time building workers and settlers.

6. Lakes are great for financial - giving 2 food and 3 commerce instantly. Most cities will have access to lakes so any time you need science boost, you can switch around to lake tiles and really boost science.

English with Philisophical and Financial is a big advantage for a cultural/science boost.
but as we not start with Mysticism, founding a religion in the beginning seems hardest.
So I do not know if I will focus
- on military units in the beginning in order to conquest the first 1 or 2 neighboord and after focus on commerce
- or directly on commerce

it will depend on the game:
- civ near my starting location
- number of civ in the continent

Elizabeth is my favorite Leader. I like it to farm Great People. With a philosophical Leader you can get the first Great Scientist very early. I expect to get the first one at 1425BC. Using him to build an Academy in London will boost science. Also the financial trait of Elizabeth will accelerate science.

With the starting position I am not so happy. It is the perfect place for the second city to become a Settler and Worker Factory. For the capital it is a little bit too "Hammerless" - especially after chopping all the Forest around. Also I will go the scientific way, not the religious one. So if there are no Gold, Gems or Silver close to the starting position, the maximum Population of London will be for a long time five Citizens. My hope is that one of the three Plain Hills in the South (because one of them is a Forest Hill, only for two of them there is a real chance) is a Gold Hill. In this case also the place of the second science center would be clear.

Nevertheless I will settle in place founding a Great People factory.

hendrikszoon you can have your first scientif very early and you have to build the library first in your capital ?

hendrikszoon you can have your first scientif very early and you have to build the library first in your capital ?

My research path will be Agriculture - Animal Husbandry - Writing. After discovering Writing I will build a Library immediately. Because of the "foodrich" environment it will be possible to maintain two Scientist.

hendrikszoon Quote:
Originally Posted by LeSphinx
hendrikszoon you can have your first scientif very early and you have to build the library first in your capital ?


My research path will be Agriculture - Animal Husbandry - Writing. After discovering Writing I will build a Library immediately. Because of the "foodrich" environment it will be possible to maintain two Scientist.



So you do not go in the beginning for military purpose!

Just tried rush for writing, while building a worker and working a lake tile. worker took 25 turns just like agri and anim.husb.

After writing I did bronze working and using chop and slavery got the library around 1700 BC, great scientist in 1300BC. Afterwards I had enough research power to get judaism...

I can just see it now. First writeup and 90% of the people beelined to writing and built 1300BC academies in London. I have to admit it's a very appealing strategy. So much for the bronze working first, chop chop chop dominant strategy.

Is there any expectation to make, concerning chances of loading problems, like we had in the first gotm?

I can just see it now. First writeup and 90% of the people beelined to writing and built 1300BC academies in London. I have to admit it's a very appealing strategy. So much for the bronze working first, chop chop chop dominant strategy.
That's the beautiful thing about Civ IV--there is no one dominant opening strategy. You've got to pay attention to your starting position and other circumstances.

What we may discover through these GOTMs is the answer to a more difficult question: is there one dominant opening strategy for each single given set of circumstances? Or is the game sufficiently subtle and deep that even this is not true?

Can't wait to get this one underway!

-- Kevin

Is there any expectation to make, concerning chances of loading problems, like we had in the first gotm?
Could you please generate a save file using the "no cheating" option and e-mail it to me @ gotm@civfanatics.net? I'll check whether I can load it - and that should answer a lot of questions!

Lake maps, by definition, have no sea coast. As a result, no lighthouses and no harbors.

This is the second inaccuracy I've seen posted about lakes maps. I just played one (As Elizabeth, fortuitous prep there, eh?) and there is world wrap AND lighthouse/harbors. Heck, Napoleon even built a galley, on a one-tile water spot, locked in by the polar ice cap. :lol:

This will be my first prince, though... so I'll probably get roasted, assuming my comp doesn't bog down with the standard map.

think i will be a little different and move the settler southish to build on a plains hill next to the river. explore just the immediate area with the warrior and research hunting first to pop out a scout...maybe 2 scouts. next research will depend on what I find to the south...probably masonary or bronze working. 2nd city will eventually be a chop rush settler located in or near the initial tile for a GP factory

i do lose two turns moving the settler and possibly run into bad terrain. the desert looks to be more west to me. might get 1-3 tiles of floodplain along the river. but i like the extra defense building on a hill and moving the palace south a little. hopefully my scout will uncover a couple of extra villages...maybe even pop a tech or two.

cas

In my test game barbarians were very active and I can't defend myself just with warriors, so at least archers should be ready about 1000AD. Research path should be agriculture, animal husbandry and then to archery. If copper will be close around then pikemens should be enough.

I can just see it now. First writeup and 90% of the people beelined to writing and built 1300BC academies in London. I have to admit it's a very appealing strategy. So much for the bronze working first, chop chop chop dominant strategy.

LOL. I doubt that. You can probably get Bronze Working first and chop the library. Without loosing alot of turns (and getting other, probably better advantages).

You can build not only a lighthouse but Colosus too so all fresh water tiles give +3C +3F, salt water give +3C +2F add in the +1C for financial and there is a potential for a lot of income from water alone. I tried a simulation and the other civs were making contact almost right away with me. Archery is a must at least due to the barbarian hords. I think I will settle in place now and turn London into a GP factory, ie farm/irrigate like crazy. Look for a hilly local for my factory city and try to set up a money factory along a river or two.

Also, in my simulation the fresh water lake provides a link with cities along the river with out sailing.

Why would we have two different results? Here are the screenshots from my game.

Before sailing:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/shillen_notraderoute.JPG

After sailing:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/shillen_traderoute.JPG

Why would we have two different results? Here are the screenshots from my game.

It wouldn't surprise me too much if a size-1 lake works differently than a larger lake. Or, if a river flowing out of a lake creates a connection to tiles adjacent to that one lake space that the river touches, but to connect through other spaces of the same lake, you need Sailing.

For me it's the first game on Prince, Epic and Lake too. At least I played Liz before and liked her traits. With a little prep and attention vic should be possible, though.

My simulation revealed what could be read in previous post too: There are lots of Barbarians and money is tight.

But at least we can wrap around the world. Can't wait until it's our turn!

/Blue

Yeah I tried a test game with my strategy of not building many settlers and going to conquer another AI early. Well, it didn't work out. I built 3 cities, one next to an iron source, then started to build nothing but swordsmen. Only I couldn't even take my swordsmen anywhere because I was getting attacked by barbarians like crazy. In a span of 20 turns I must have killed 6 or 7 barbarian axemen, 4 or 5 archers, and a few warriors. Even on emperor I don't usually get it that badly. I think it's mainly due to all the tundra on one border and the desert on the other border (which I also had in my test game). It will be important to settle a bunch of cities and send units out to break up fog.

edit: Some more research on connecting via lakes. In this game I'm on a lakes map and a coastal lake connects my cities without sailing:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/shillen_lakes_connection.JPG

My best guess is that lakes will connect without sailing on lakes maps, but not other maps. My other screenshots were from a pangaea map.

On the lakes:

On thing from all the screen shots, maybe there is no connection on the lakes but the edge of the cultural borders to the river, allow for the city to city connection?

I don't know and can't test it right now :(

ISTR (but maybe my memory is tricking me) in GOTM1 I had two cities trading along a sea cost before sailing because their cultural borders touched, and a third coastal city not connected where its border was isolated. So it's possible that sailing allows trade connection along coast outside your borders but you always have it inside.

Can't wait for this gotm2! :goodjob:
What are your plans about religion? Will you go for an early one (hinduism budism or judaism) or planning to 'start incarnations' :) later?
Imo early religion is not a very good idea, cause you have to hook up those resources and research bronze for chopping.
I myself plan to build The Oracle for that free tech right after I researched writing so that I could choose Code of Laws and gain Confucianism :p Stonhenge would be nice too if only the second city had many hammers I think I would have some chance to pull it off.
I think I'll aim for either 1) culture, diplo victory or 2) domination
Also my first game on Prince :eek: Imo everyone will have a hella good time playing this one ;) Cheers!

We'll have to see who else is there. Building the Oracle may not be easy if there is no site with more hammers neaby.

I seem to have issues with keeping my population happy. London seems to grow very rapidly and I had cranked out a couple of Great Scientist before by the time I was entering the AD side of time.

I also declared an early war on Asoka and got a couple of fast workers before he sued for peace. The workers seem to keep their fast work ability.

:mischief: :spear:

Given that my test games seem to indicate barbarian problems. I will research hunting then get archery for protection, bronze working for slavery and chop, wheel, pottery for cottages then start racing up the tech tree towards a spaceship launch. London will be my Great Scientist factory, will attempt to settle my second city along the river as a money factory, third city will focus on production.

I hope to expand to 4-5 cities by Anno Domini.

I hope to build The Colossus, The Great Lighthouse, The Great Library, The Hanging Gardens, The Kremlin, The Statue of Liberty, The Taj Mahal, The Three Gorges Dam, The Space Elevator

I seem to have issues with keeping my population happy. London seems to grow very rapidly and I had cranked out a couple of Great Scientist before by the time I was entering the AD side of time.

I also declared an early war on Asoka and got a couple of fast workers before he sued for peace. The workers seem to keep their fast work ability.

:mischief: :spear:


As far as I have been able to tell - when you capture a worker you actually "destroy" it and a new one for your side is created in its place. This is why when you capture one, you always have full movement on it even if it had been "doing" something that turn.

However, if you were gifted the fast worker they should retain their 3 speed movement.

I've edited many ini files for my game, such as nukes, the power of SDI, things of that nature in the C folder where cIV is located. Does that mean I can't play this game? How do I get back the original files?

If you edited the original files, the only way to get them back is reinstall the game. You can't play GOTM with modified files.

A safer way to edit XML files is to put a copy of the file in \My Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\CustomAssets\XML.

Or for mods, C:\Program Files\Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Mods\MyMod\XML.

I ain't even been able to do better than a time vicory on Noble yet. So, I'll most likely lose this GOTM rather quickly.

I'm going to move from the starting location, if only to get a look around, as DaveMcW suggested. The desert tile SW, SW of the starting location is very interesting. It appears to be a fresh water desert tile. This would be a nice city location if any of the desert tiles around it are actually flood plains. So one advantage of moving from the starting location is to make that desert tile a potential city site.

I may try and place my cities closer then normal, maybe only 3 tiles apart and then use shared cottages to grow them up to towns around my science cities. This allows me to have maximum specialists and production in my science cities and still grow cottages into towns.

I'll start by moving the Settler SE one tile. Then I'll move the warrior, either NW or SW. Then I decide what to do with my Settlers second move. If I see gold in the hills to the south, I might settle in place. Otherwise I would expect to move N into the first forest tile. If fishes show up in the tile north of the plains hill, I won't see it before I settle so that will have to used by a later city.

StanNP :cool:

I thought about moving too, but if you build a lighthouse and Collosis you can get 3F and 4C from the 3 freshwater tiles. The sea will give you 2F and 4C each. toss in the 3 food bonus for farmed wheat and London will grow very large provide decent income and be a GP factory.

I'm really looking forward to getting into the new gotm last month was my first try at a gotm and i won a space race victory (I didn't post it as plenty people had won space race quicker than i did) the prince challenge will be good and i will post this time. Good luck all and a happy healthy new year.

Gee, how disappointing. There's no way I'm going to invest many, many hours in another game at Noble level. I like to participate in the GOTM, but it's just not very interesting to play when I know I'm going to be way ahead throughout the whole game. :(

Go play RB Extreme challenge then. GOTM is meant to cover most of CIV4 playerbase...

Regarding the mod, IMHO, play with no mod enabled. That way, we saves a lot of time for GOTM staff and there will be no mistakes on the players part since they literally just need to install and patch the game.

Happy New Year, ainwood!

I see it's now eight o'clock in the morning, January 1st, in HELEИGRAD.

So anytime you care to release the save file would be just fine... :D

Chomping at the bit up on the right-side-up part of the world,

-- Kevin

I am eager to actualy play my first Civ4 GOTM and actualy finishing it. But the thing that I am not comfortable with is the difficulty level since its set on prince :-s.

I see it's now eight o'clock in the morning, January 1st, in HELEИGRAD.
-- Kevin

And its a beautiful day too. No rugby games today so the roads are safe...

0:10 here, can I play GotM 2 any time soon? ;)

(Fireworks only interest me when its due to a we love the king event. :P)

0:10 here, can I play GotM 2 any time soon? ;)

(Fireworks only interest me when its due to a we love the king event. :P)

LOL, doode you must be freakin addicted to Civ4 as myself too :)
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! ;)

In the last days i tried various games at prince. Everyone at lakes and epic and so on.... And nearly every time i was crushed by barbs... :cry:

This were my first atempts on prince, but anyway it is very disappointing :rolleyes:

I really hope to have more luck when playing my first gotm.

btw: happy new year, and please excuse my spelling - too much scotch :crazyeye:

0:10 here, can I play GotM 2 any time soon? ;)

(Fireworks only interest me when its due to a we love the king event. :P)

I was wondering the same thing as it is already past 10 am here. Of course, the debate is to actually start the GOTM or continue the test game I started already or try a couple more to see how things change. Found barbarians to be crazy, but managable after holding on early. I was surprised how quickly I was able to pull ahead in tech with just a few cities. I was pumping out cavalry before a single enemy had the ability to build Pikeman.

I am definitely going to play a couple test games with my preferred victory condition before I touch GOTM2.

Civ4 games are fast enough that it's more efficient to play out a test game than try to calculate the winning strategy.

I am definitely going to play a couple test games with my preferred victory condition before I touch GOTM2.

Civ4 games are fast enough that it's more efficient to play out a test game than try to calculate the winning strategy.

I have to agree, though I never did that in Civ 3 since they took so much longer to play. For the first IV GOTM I mapped out a strategy, played a few test maps (usually not all the way through) where I tried to recreate the starting the conditions in the editor and modified the strategy all before I opened the actual game, which caused me to further change the strategy due to actual conditions.

So far for this one I've only gone to Military Tradition, but mainly did 3-4 opening starts to see how different Epic speed is going to be, and it is really different than normal. First thing I noticed was building were 50% more expensive, but units were only 25% more expensive, which makes warmongering easier if you get ahead in tech, which seems easy. Have to figure out if it is worth it to go to Rifling for a slower, but much easier sweep across the lands (since nothing early on has a bonus vs gunpowerder, but some will be double vs the mounted Cavalry).

I have to agree, though I never did that in Civ 3 since they took so much longer to play.

People keep saying that Civ4 games are faster, but I don't really see the difference. Civ4 games have fewer cities than Civ3 games, but a similar number of "productive cities". In Civ3 I would often have lots of highly corrupted cities doing nothing but building workers, which never got very big and didn't take much micromanagement at all. Large cities in Civ4 take slightly less micromanagement than in Civ3, because you don't lose production carryover, but it's not a huge difference (although it's certainly a welcome change from 1.09 to 1.52). Combat is about the same, perhaps a bit slower (it takes longer to grind through in the Middle Ages in Civ4 than in Civ3 because Cavalry only move 2, and because cities have larger cultural radii, and you can't encroach on them so easily with your own cities). Workers take a bit more time to manage in Civ4 than Civ3, because you have more choices, because you can't just mindlessly assume that building roads everywhere (and then railroads) is the best thing at a certain point, and because I feel the need to find something for my workers to do (like chopping all of the remaining forests at the right times) at a point in the game when in Civ3 I'd be joining my excess workers back into cities.

I don't deny you could play a quicker game just as an experiment, and not pay as close attention to all of the details, but then, I think you could do that in Civ3 too.

I'm just not seeing how the game is faster.

Also, personally, playing the same game twice just in order to get a better score doesn't appeal to me. I have no problem with someone else doing it, though. I'd rather play two different games in the same time, and if I don't score as well, that's ok.

P.S. The option to play with a growth notifier would, by itself, significantly speed Civ4 games, because I find that much of my time is spent clicking through cities, most of which don't need anything new. But it's pretty important to visit and evaluate each city on the turn that it grows. (Actually, I'd also like to have a "pre-growth notifier", that would list cities that are will grow on the next turn.) This isn't currently available for GOTM, as I understand it, but it's true that one could play test games with more tools so that they would go faster.

P.S. The option to play with a growth notifier would, by itself, significantly speed Civ4 games, because I find that much of my time is spent clicking through cities, most of which don't need anything new. But it's pretty important to visit and evaluate each city on the turn that it grows. (Actually, I'd also like to have a "pre-growth notifier", that would list cities that are will grow on the next turn.) This isn't currently available for GOTM, as I understand it, but it's true that one could play test games with more tools so that they would go faster.I used a growth notifier by eotinb for Gotm1. I really dislike playing without it which is what I have to do for RBCiv games and for Gotm (now). :(

I used a growth notifier by eotinb for Gotm1. I really dislike playing without it which is what I have to do for RBCiv games and for Gotm (now). :(
I believe that the HOF staff are working on a 'mega mod' - which will incorporate all the useful mods. We'll allow that for the GOTM as well. Next month maybe?

YAY! i just got back from party couple of hours ago and i find a new GOTM!! I am so happy! I enjoy playing civ4 GOTM's way more that civ3 :banana:

happy New Year everyone this looks awesome. Been looking forward to GOTM2 for awile now. I have never played above Noble yet so this should be interesting.

Happy new year folks, hmm this looks fun, not sure if I'll get chance to finish it though (any idea how long it'll take to finish an epic length game?) anyway I think I'll settle in place after sending the warrior southwest. I really like the new cultural victory settings (although I do miss the single city version of CIII) and I'm still getting my head around how to set up effective great people factories. With any luck we'll have a nice island or at least a good bottle neck to keep those nasty civs away from my precious cities. In an ideal world we'll have three spots for good 50K cities and a few others I can concentrate on food with. Looks like fun! Thanks.

Call me crazy... but I'm in! :) Wanna give a Civ4 GOTM a chance. I've won diplo on Settler and Time on Chieftain (just missed spaceship by a few turns--originally shooting for diplo again but couldn't get the votes)...never played any other levels--and never fought any wars. Never played on epic or lake either. Should be interesting!

My goal is to just stay alive long enough to see another person be victorious, with an added bonus if I am close to them. We'll see how it goes! I also wouldn't be too upset if another civ attacked me--give me a reason to go to war! I won't declare war on someone myself without a lot of help...given the above!

Sam

Ooh, ooh, the save is out and I just downloaded. Can't wait to play! Had to get a quick post in before I fire it up.

Hey, is there a list of mod/tools anywhere that people use to help record events and such during their games for a write-up? Taking notes by hand seems like a lot of work to me. I suppose I could do a search on the forums, but as you can probably surmise from my comments thus far, I'm too lazy, and not sure what to look for anyway. Thanks for any leads/thoughts, and good luck in CIV IV GOTM 2!!!

The kind of mods I would like to play with are UI or audiovisual mods. Things like an autologger, better advisor interfaces, fixed clock display, different music selections. I like having fun when I play, and playing through the modern era with the dissonant music it normal has, or without the Blue Marble terrain, just isn't as fun :)

UI and sound/display mods don't affect the gameplay, after all, so the ruleset would still be identical to the standard version.

You can run this program on any savegame to extract the events.

Simple tool for dumping your event log to file (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=141769)

wow. lakes map on prince? at epic? talk about being overrun by barbarians.

You can run this program on any savegame to extract the events.

Simple tool for dumping your event log to file (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=141769)


Thanks DaveMcW! This is what I was looking for.

looks like fun, too bad i cant play standard maps on my comp. Any chance there will be tiny maps in future GOTMs? btw im new here and this seems to be a very active and good natured forum, keep it up

I ain't even been able to do better than a time vicory on Noble yet. So, I'll most likely lose this GOTM rather quickly.

If you enjoy the game, that's what counts. I won my last few games on Noble; it's time to move up a level.

A good goal: Avoid getting slaughtered by the barbarians!

[pissed]

FYI: the barbarians are the least of your problems, I've found.......



:spank:

I played 4 test games and have found the barbarians to be a real problem, I have never played epic before. Normally I skip archery and trade for it later but I am finding forming more than 2 towns early on with only warriors is just not working out.

Could go for bronze working early but I was thinking of getting agriculture,animal husbandry and sailing as starting techs. I find barbarians by this time are a big problem.

Anybody got any tips for early defence on this type of map ?

Anybody got any tips for early defence on this type of map ?It's possible to have archers well before the barbs get dangerous units.

Does anyone know how far exactly into the game the Barbarian units upgrade (like, go from Warriors to Axemen etc.)? Is it triggered by our own research (like entering the Classical Age or sth) or do they just follow their own timeline in growing in strength?

I saw barbarians having horse archers in the time I get to knights. Looks like they progress too, but slowly or maybe as average of others.

This is going to be fun, never played cIV on prince level yet :) Maybe going to have a testgame with the same conditions as this GOTM to get a feeling for it

How do we actually start the GOTM? Is it different in [civ4]? Should we "load game" and simply open the save-file or use a scenario option, or?

How do we actually start the GOTM? Is it different in [civ4]? Should we "load game" and simply open the save-file or use a scenario option, or?

Though some simply open the save-file, others have reported problems with that.

For myself, I just "load game."

Req

I'd like to know what mods people want to use and why they feel that it's necessary for them to use them for GOTM. Personally, I have no problem playing the game vanilla. I'd like to hear compelling arguments for why people can or will not play gotm without using mods. I thought the no cheating checkbox was a great idea so people who liked mods could keep all their mods installed for personal use, but still play the GOTM without using them.

Well, if the original programmers had included some pretty basic functionality in the game, I would agree with you.

As is, I know that trying to deal with specialists is going to be a nightmare without my mod.

And it was REALLY nice to not have to wait for 15 seconds to figure out what turn you're on.

Plus, I'd really like to be able to take a glance and see how other civs feel about other opponents without having to hover over every damn leader head.

And in the future, pop-ups related to cities about to grow, cities which just grew, enemy units landing near your cities, etc. would be very nice to have.

And for QSC, it will take MUCH longer without eotinb's log changes mod.

Req

Though some simply open the save-file, others have reported problems with that.

For myself, I just "load game."

Req
Thanks. I used "load game" indeed and that works fine. I seem to recall from [c3c] that there was some kind of welcome message introducing the game as a scenario, but maybe I'm mistaken. It's been a while since I played GOTM.

Well, if the original programmers had included some pretty basic functionality in the game, I would agree with you.

As is, I know that trying to deal with specialists is going to be a nightmare without my mod.

And it was REALLY nice to not have to wait for 15 seconds to figure out what turn you're on.

Plus, I'd really like to be able to take a glance and see how other civs feel about other opponents without having to hover over every damn leader head.

And in the future, pop-ups related to cities about to grow, cities which just grew, enemy units landing near your cities, etc. would be very nice to have.

And for QSC, it will take MUCH longer without eotinb's log changes mod.

Req

All good reasons. :)

This is a VERY interesting GOTM. Havent had so mutch fun in a long while. Suppose we will get lots of crying afther the first 2 cities is settled.

No spoilers please.

-- Roland

3x lakes + lighthouse + financial + start sailing makes for something of a powerhouse tech start. I'd settle on the spot and pump every worker and settler from the capital after getting a library/academy out while teching up to happiness stuff and pumping military from the second city. Probably ignore religion until someone spreads it to me so I can cap their holy city. Stabalize at math and catapult one, maybe two rivals into the ground.

That's the plan, anyway. See you on the other side.

Hi, it appears you can walk around the world. Or at least it seems that way. You can at least scroll around the world. Before I get too far can anyone confirm that the lakes world is "flat"?

I never played a Lake map, but according to Sirian's map script guide:
=====
Lakes
=====

Regional Map: No world wrap
Land-Heavy Map: 52 plots wide, 32 plots tall, at "Standard" map size
Sea Level: "Sea Level" setting will slightly increase or decrease the lake sizes
this is a regional map and there is no world wrap.

in the test game i was messing around with last night the map wrapped normally.

There seems to be a bit of a graphical bug with the map... if you scroll across an unrevealed area at the edge of your screen, it will be briefly revealed to you. Scroll back or across, and it goes black again. Lakes is the only map I've seen this phenomenon on.

Not sure of the significance, other than it gives you some foreknowledge of what's there, and possibly could be exploited to not waste moves.

I know for a fact it wrapped around since I normally the first to go around the globe. I get the useless +1 ship movenment bonus. (I lose a game on prince as too many AI gain up on me)
Lake map normally have lot of barbs. I find they will continue to come from north and south poles on lake maps. Barbs usually start coming around 2000bc in civ4 so that how much time to prepare for them.

If I find myself surrounded by other civs then I don't worry about barbs as much then it more about land grabbing. As I found on tropical maps you have to race getting settlers out to get good city placements.
Don't want to get stuck having cities in the jungles since I found it take a lot longer for these cities to be profitable.
So this will be an interesting GOTM. I have to wait to reveal the land around me to detemine exactly what to research. I may have to chopped those trees to beat the AI civ to grab those good city placements. With England I'm going aim for an early religion while I search the land..

There seems to be a bit of a graphical bug with the map... if you scroll across an unrevealed area at the edge of your screen, it will be briefly revealed to you. Scroll back or across, and it goes black again. Lakes is the only map I've seen this phenomenon on.

Not sure of the significance, other than it gives you some foreknowledge of what's there, and possibly could be exploited to not waste moves.

Hmm I don't have that graphical bug. But I do have a similar bug at the edge of the map (right side of minimap where it wraps around to the other side of the globe) where a small seam of terrain is revealed. It's always there like that, moving my screen doesn't affect anything.

edited for no spoily :P

My graphical errors are few, but very wierd. I get leader head errors on most of the leaders. The usual is one or both of a leader's eyebrows will be fuzzy white, so it looks like they have funky mascara. The other more disturbing one, is that Montezuma and Tokugawa, when a diplomatic conversation starts, their eyes and lips are steched out or non-existant, showing me their eyeballs and teeth. It is gross and very disturbing so I dont look at them when conversation starts sometimes!!! :vomit:

Please no posting in the pre-game thread once you have opened the save file. Some of us are still on holidays and have not had a chance to start playing yet!

StanNP :cool:

Sorry!! :goodjob: :goodjob: :goodjob:

I never played a Lake map, but according to Sirian's map script guide:

this is a regional map and there is no world wrap.

I doubt this is a spoiler so: I just walked a warrior around the map. No 'circumnavigation' message. Mini map is messed up though.

In general though: pretty easy map just a matter of deciding on a vic condition and putting in the hours to get there.

-drjones

The map should wrap round normally.

Please no posting in the pre-game thread once you have opened the save file.

I think it would be a good idea to add this to the first post, in bold, along with the other admonitions there. There's a lot of GOTM tradition that new participants won't know.

Is prince much harder than Noble?!

I'm often barely able to pull off a time victory at noble... never won conquest, won domination only on Warlord.... plus never played a Lake map, never tried Prince level and neither tried England... so I guess I'm in for a real BIG challenge....

Well... I'm ending up my current game (1900ad spain Huge Terra map,12 opponents, epic speed) that I'm currently "winning", tried a shot at cultural but Spain got WAY to many diplomatic minus (almost every Civs on map Backstabbed me once and some several time dispite having "good" relation with almost everyone and having most of AI civs under MY religion : I'm rich but I've got a lot of enemy) I think I'll win anyway.... Im almost alone colonizing the NEW continent!!!

But GOTM2 scare me... I barely won GOTM1... I'm not complaining though... just realizing that I have to step up my game...

Can you still win while Automated your worker?!?!

I'm not really comfortable with doing it myself :sad: and way too lazy too!!!

anyway!!! I'm going to practice a least once with similar setting first, it might be a good idea:mischief:

Can you still win while Automated your worker?!?!

Probably, but I bet that winning at Prince with 100% automated workers is at least as hard as winning at Emperor while actually controlling all aspects of the game yourself.

Is prince much harder than Noble?!

Prince is only a slight increase of the difficulty level. The step to monarch is much steeper.

Can you still win while Automated your worker?!?!

I think you can. It always depends how much you're automating. Example: I tend to automate the building of the trade network. That is, in the late game when it comes to railsroads I take some workers and let them build all the railsroads automated, as it is a very boring thing. I only fill in the gaps.

Else I would say: Improve your gameplay. Think about your alternatives, about the "why" before you decide and you should win. As in every game :crazyeye:

Can someone please link me to a Prince strategy thread! PLEASE OH PLEASE!:blush:

Can you still win while Automated your worker?!?!


The AI automated workers don't know your goals and priorities. The governors are better in that regard since you can influence their choices.

i am not able to play the game, i followed the suggestions made but it will still not load, any other suggestions anyone may have?

If the save file will not load for you, please visit this thread Here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=151269)..........

Is prince much harder than Noble?!

I'm often barely able to pull off a time victory at noble... never won conquest, won domination only on Warlord.... plus never played a Lake map, never tried Prince level and neither tried England... so I guess I'm in for a real BIG challenge....

Well... I'm ending up my current game (1900ad spain Huge Terra map,12 opponents, epic speed) that I'm currently "winning", tried a shot at cultural but Spain got WAY to many diplomatic minus (almost every Civs on map Backstabbed me once and some several time dispite having "good" relation with almost everyone and having most of AI civs under MY religion : I'm rich but I've got a lot of enemy) I think I'll win anyway.... Im almost alone colonizing the NEW continent!!!

But GOTM2 scare me... I barely won GOTM1... I'm not complaining though... just realizing that I have to step up my game...

Can you still win while Automated your worker?!?!

I'm not really comfortable with doing it myself :sad: and way too lazy too!!!

anyway!!! I'm going to practice a least once with similar setting first, it might be a good idea:mischief:

I've learned more about the game controlling my workers than anything else. Like where to put cottage, if you need to irrigate some tiles, leave at least one fresh water tile without a cottage so you can string farms together and get them in the back of your land. This is especially true with Liz. traits, because at least 1 city you will want to be a GP factory (lots of farms), but you will also want lots of cottages on the rivers since they are an instant 3 commerce for a good portion of your cities.

Hmm I don't have that graphical bug. But I do have a similar bug at the edge of the map (right side of minimap where it wraps around to the other side of the globe) where a small seam of terrain is revealed. It's always there like that, moving my screen doesn't affect anything.
Yes, I get the same.

I also get the strange map revealed portion, and this also happens on multiplayer. Though not game breaking, because you can't see anything ON the tile, its a little annoying!

Forgive me, I am new to Civilization and to this community, but I feel there is too much information being given in this "pre-game" thread. I would think people would have the common sense that once you start the game, you should not post here at all. You are no longer part of the 'pre-game" mini-community and it's just too easy to let things slip.

Maybe with the patch Lake maps wrap, but in the original release they definitely didn't as I played several.

ALL PLAYERS PLEASE READ THIS

There is a very simple GOTM rule that applies globally.

From the time you open the start save until the time the game closes you MUST NOT post about the map, or any aspect of the game ANYWHERE except in the official spoiler threads. That includes the Pre-Game thread or the Saves Available thread.

This is not because we are power-crazed or 'anally-retentive' to quote a previous critic. It's because the majority of players want to play the game on a level playing field. They cannot do that if they inadvertently discover advance information about the game from players who have already started.

Simple? Easy to understand? Please comply :D

I think going 2S would be a good idea....to me it looks like there are 2-3 hill hiding under the shadows at the bottom of the screenshot. You would still be able to make use of the wheat, since by the time you make a worker and get roads and farms researched, your capital would definately have expanded to include the wheat.

Getting that farm up is probably priority #1. Then, I'd probably get wood chopping researched, and work on a settler if the capital is at least at 2-3 population. Hopefully by this time ill have explored enough to locate some nearby stone, and settle beside it if at all possible. The reason I emphasize this is that I want to get pyramids in the capital ASAP. There is a twofold strategy behind this move:
1. getting some GP points coming in ASAP is important to make full use of the philosophical trait, and
2. getting pyramids allows you to instantly convert to universal suffrage, which i foresee as being very important, as it will be a great place to spend the excess money created by the financial traits and the many cottages you are likely to create.

In the second city near a stone site, i'd go for a barracks and research and pump out 4-6 archers for the 2, hopefully soon 3 cities you have.
after pyramids and perhaps another stone-based wonder (oracle?) which should get done quickly with stone and woodchopping, another settler to get either copper or iron if you dont already have it nearby. This should be a pretty good start.

I think I will settle where I am at. 2nd city will be south along the river. 3rd city east along the southern sea shore.

I think I will start with sailing and then bronzeworking. If no copper nearby then I will head for archery to get some defenses up. If copper is available then I will head up through agriculture, animal husbandry to writing.

Will build a warrior first and then a lighthouse when it is available to make use of the 3 lakes tiles and the financial bonus.

I'll found Dublin where I am to act as my research and commercial city. I'll then send my warrior south to found Cork as my industrial city. Sailing / Lighthouse will be my first technological priority.

Building cottages becomes even more valuable - build them on a river and you've effectively got an instant hamlet - and it can still grow.

so hamlets/villages/towns get an instant coin bonus if built by a river? i didn't know that. ::sigh:: i still have a lot to learn in this game

All tiles bordering rivers give +1 commerce unless there's a forest on that tile. The cottage is immediately +1 commerce as soon as it's built. Then the financial trait adds +1 commerce to any tile producing at least 2 commerce. So if you build a cottage on a non-river tile it's only going to generate 1 commerce to start. But if you build a cottage on a river tile it will produce 3 commerce immediately.

Well, I never played on prince before, Noble is winnable for me though still challenging so I'm probably in trouble here. I like the financial trait on elizabeth but I'm not particularily fond of great people since I dont use many specialists and I dont build alot of wonders >< guess I'll have to adjust. Lake maps are perfect for because I really dont like boats.

Hmmm, I'm thinkin settle on the start spot and create a population factory. Lots of good food on that spot especially if a lighthouse is available. 2 heath resources and some forests (I'll probably only chop down 1-2 tiles) will be great for supporting a large population. A commerce and a production city will be priority once the warrior scouts around a bit, probably the production town first.

Agriculture (put the worker to work!)-> sailing(lighthouse) -> archery(defense/settler escort) -> ironworking(gotta find it, gotta chop trees) -> pottery(granary will be nice to help recover from all those dead slaves:) -> contruction(colloseum) -> liberalism/gunpowder (duh?)-> rifling (mass redcoats woot!) -> spaceship

I'll just have to cross my fingers and hope I either find some stone and build pyramids or trade a friendly AI for monarchy before my population gets fiesty.

GL HF

North would be a silly move, IMO. You'd pick up a snow tile + tundra forest + a couple extra coastal squares + 1 plains hill. Meanwhile you're losing plains/grasslands/river tiles. Another reason is the settler placement right where he is is perfect for optimizing tile useage without grabbing the desert tiles to the SW.

Well, I'm seriousely thinking of settling 1 N. :) Of course you're right that plains/grasslands/river is better than snow/tundra/coast, but my idea is to keep the option to place my second city on the desert tile. In this case I havn't lost anything, since the second city would use all the important tiles the first city loses. I want to keep the option of placing city #2 on the desert tile because this allows it to use the wheat. This may prove crucial if there are no food bonuses or floodplains down south.

The only real downside I see of moving 1 N to settle is that the capital probably ends up in a slightly less central position. This is much less important than in Civ3, however.

-- Roland

Roland, I think the better move is to plant in spot. Let your capital use all the good tiles that we can see. The second city can use a bundle of good tiles that we later scout for. Now, if it becomes obvious that we are going to be crammed (very doubtful for a lakes map) I would lean more towards your line of thinking.

Let your capital use all the good tiles that we can see.

Settling 1 N "wastes" only three good tiles compared to settling on the spot: The plains by the river, the grassland by the river and the grassland to the SW. All these three tiles will be used by the second city, so you havn't lost anything. London will have enough good tiles to use anyway.

The second city can use a bundle of good tiles that we later scout for.

What if there are no such tiles? I have a feeling we're in pretty bad surroundings. West looks like desert. East nothing but plains. North tundra and coast... This makes me want to keep the option of cramming in two good cities in the area we can see.

Now, if it becomes obvious that we are going to be crammed (very doubtful for a lakes map) I would lean more towards your line of thinking.

If you settle on the spot you no longer have the option to use my line of thinking, because it will no longer be possible for you to place your second city in a position to use both the wheat (for food if there are no food bonuses down south) AND the plains-hills (for the much-needed hammers).

-- Roland

Deleted a quote from a deleted post - AlanH

Can you PLEASE follow the simple rule: NO NOT post ANYTHING in this thread after you have opened the original save! :nono:

Sorry if this makes me "anal". :wavey:

-- Roland

I'm going to settle on the spot, and I will chop, chop, chop. I don't care if there's no production left, I'll chop it all. :)

Here's why. With all that food and being philisophical, I figure I'll try something I've never tried before. I'm going to build a bunch of prophet wonders (stonehenge, oracle, chitzen itza, angkor wat), then add all the great prophets to my city for hammers and gold. With angkor wat, my priest specialists will give me even more hammers and more prophets.

To start, I'll build a second warrior to help scout, while researching agriculture and archery, mostly working one of the lake tiles, but I'll micromanage with the forests so that my warrior pops out as I reach size 2. At size two I'm going for a worker, who will farm the wheat first, then mine the hills. I'm skipping the sheep at first, in favor of using those lake tiles to speed my early research.

Then it's Mysticism, Bronze Working. Chop Stonehenge, build archers while researching priesthood. I'll probably have to lay off the lake tiles while I build a few archers for sentry duty, because here's what may suck...

Against my better judgement, I"m building the Oracle before settlers. I'll need the confucian holy city in my capital, so when my first prophet comes out, I can build my shrine, giving me access to four priest specialists (with temple). I'm gambling here that my borders will have expanded enough to be able to help chop 2-3 settlers immediately after, and my archers that I built will be able to keep the barbarians at bay.

I suppose that if anyone has finished this game and wants to communicate about it while it's fresh in their mind, they could PM someone who has submitted the game; there are over 20 submissions already. (I haven't uploaded the game; doing practice games). Please correct me if this is not permitted.

I've almost finished a practice game on the same settings as GOTM-2.

I saw the same graphics glitch mentioned earlier. In my game it looks like a bright "seam" at the edge of the map (the edge of the absolute, "centered" map - think of it as the International Date Line). The bright seam illuminates a little bit of one column of tiles but all it revealed was jungle.

Barbarians weren't a problem at the beginning because it was lions and wolves for thousands of years, and animals never enter your cultural boundaries. So it's possible to delay developing archers until a little later. I had Montezuma and the Incas as neighbours, and their early UUs were pretty terrifying but they never rushed my settlers or workers (does the AI ever do that?)

In the later years, there are tons of barbarian warriorss / archers / axemen. I think it's because Lakes maps have so much more land, and therefore lots of black space which remains unexplored and thus fertile barbarian territory. Another factor is that the entire world is continuous land, so barbarians aren't stuck on islands - they can travel halfway around the world to attack you if they have to. I had some warriors perform guard duty at the north pole to keep it out of the fog of war and prevent barbarians from being generated, but I'm not sure how successful that was.

Maintaining a contiguous territory is really hard with so many cultures jostling for land. In the end I produced a sort of blob shape, and ended up expanded by conquest and settlers into a U-shape that encircled Montezuma. Even though we had good trade relations and shared the same religion and had Open Borders, he declared on