COTM 22 Second Spoiler

To qualify for this spoiler, you must have reached the industrial age, or completed (and submitted) your game.

Getting a start in this game should have been the hard part - once you got a foothold, it should quickly have become more like a standard monarch game. As such, the middle ages are where you may have been able to stamp your authority on the game.

How did the middle ages go for you?

AA summary: peaceful expansion, although held back by a war with Windoze. Eight cities claimed 2 iron, horses and 2 luxes. Tech parity.

I made some poor research choices in the MA, trusting too much on the AI to research things for me. Specifically, I gambled on the Invention -> Gunpowder path hoping to trade for mono and chivalry (feud for free, eng by trade). I thought that:
a) this would keep me at tech parity
b) this would get me the army of knights most easily, as my cities could produce a horseman every 3 to 5 turns, whereas knights took much longer.

Well... I think I was wrong. It would have been better to self-research to chivalry, attacking with a couple of upgraded knights and triggering a GA to produce more of them. As it turned out, I was fighting the Virologists' muskets with knights, which greatly offset the speed of knights by the additional healing periods required.

I did take most of the Virologist cities (one or two going to my ally the Dell), self-researched to military tradition and took out the Dell as well. The world by then only contained the operating systems, and quite appropiately my Mac army was the weakest :D

Open - goal diplomatic
Entered MA in 1275BC.
850 BC revolted to republic (3 turn anarchy).
310 BC we get a second phony war with programmers (we still are at war with Linux).
290BC we start the first real war, we need some space so take on Virologists
In all wars Windoze is our ally. We have very few troops so they have to defend our land :D , while our few knights take a city every now and then.
90AD we make peace with Virologists. They have 2 cities left.
280AD we start war with Dell.
320AD start GA by a Hoplite taking on an archer.
360AD we make peace with programmers in preparation of IA trading. I had taken Cobol, but couldn't muster enough troops for Assembly (with pyramids) before IA.
390AD the last Dell city is destroyed by Windoze. That's also the year we enter IA. Big picture trading went very well again, buying steam and medicine.
We now have 35 cities, but are still only third in score. Programmers and Windoze aren't much help with research, though they are pretty big.

Well, I decided to bail this game in the late BC. A trifecta of bad breaks made certified this one as either a loss or a real big time eater. I managed to settle 6 cities before all of the space was gone. My original goal went from 20K to survival as Colossus was completed by Russia in turn 28 and I missed the Great Library by 1 turn in a 4 Great Wonder cascade (ToA, SoZ, HG & GL). About 10 turns later I lost city 5 to a flip. Within the next 5 turns I lost 2 more (including Iron & Silks) to flips. With only a very expensive colisseum, a library & a temple, 20K was hopeless. At 800 BC I had 3 cities, Russia had 18, Windoze 14, America 12, Dells & Linux with 11 each. I was even in tech, but without Iron or horses, using cats & archers to take back Iron seemed futile.

For a Monarch level game, this sure played like a Diety level. I guess it was meant to show just how big a mountain Apple has to climb.

C3C Open. Diplo.

800BC - Enter MA, draw Engineering, same as Programmers. Germany has Mono. Sell Republic to Linux for 60g+11gpt. Germany wants all our money +Eng for Mono. We'll wait, as need money to upgrade to Swords. Revolt. Draw 2 turns of Anarchy!
750BC - we are a Republic.

370BC-230BC - War with Viruses. We take 5 of their cities with 10 swords, some of them got upgraded to MDI as we learned Feudalism. We get 2 more cities in a peace deal + Monotheism, plus we aquire Silks, Dyes and Furs with captured cities.

170BC - Get Invention from Linux for Monotheism. Start GunPowder.
50AD - 1 turn till GunPowder and Windoze learns it 1st! Buy it for Furs and 3gpt, then sell to Linux for Chivalry+14g, to Programmers for Theology+2g and to Dells for Education+30g.
Build Embassy with Virologists and see that their capital is guarded by 4 Spearmen. They don't have Iron anymore, so let's try and finish them!
Dow Viruses.
290AD - GL in war with Viruses! Build Knight Army.
300AD - Learn Chemistry as Mono, sell to Dells for Astronomy, Music, 50g and 5gpt.
340AD - Viruses destroyed.

At this point we deside to go Diplo route and spare Dells as they are an excellent research partner.

Circa 400AD - Learn Metallurgy, trade it for Banking from Dells and lots of gpt from all around. Then dash to ToG with Newton prebuild going in our capital. As we are going for Diplo our Capital can have a science boost.

Circa 500AD - We have ToG, switch prebuild to Newton (due in 12) and see that Dells have Mil.Trad. Deside to research Magnetism in 4 turns and trade to them as don't want to trade ToG to risk Newton. Meantime we start to connect one of our Saltpeters and start some Knights, but our capital is building Newton and Miniton, our best city, has just finished FP, so not many Knights are around yet.

One turn later: Windoze sneak-attacks!!! :mad: With lots of ACs, Knights and even some Cavs! And we almost don't have any military: Knight Army, 2 Knights, 2 Horses, 3-4 Hoplites and some MDIs still in the North, 3-4 turns from Windoze border.
We defend the 1st turn, and our Hoplite starts GA.
Very nice, isn't it?

I sign up everybody against Windoze, and I see a welcome sight: Conquistadors approaching from the North en masse.

But in 2 more turns we are overrun: Knight Army is dead attacking one Musket(!), 4 of our major cities are taken, and worst of all: Windoze have razed our capital! With 8 turns till Newton, and stuff. :mad: :cry:
Palace jumps to our FP city, of course. We have only 3 decently developed cities for our GA. :( I almost gave up the game at this point.

But GA helps recently aquired Virus cities to be pretty productive, MDIs from the North reach the Southern front, Conquistadors wreck havoc among Satan troops, and Windoze advance is stalled.

Circa 550AD - we research Magnetism in planned 4 turns still, enter IA and draw Nationalism.

Gift Programmers and they get Medicine which they gladly trade to us. We trade Magnetism to Dells for Mil.Trad and sell Nationalism to them for lots of gold. And then - we draft Rifles! And upgrade 1 Hoplite still standing. Only that saved our FP/Palace city and a few others. And connect SaltPeter and upgrade a few Knights to Cavs, and hurry some more.

So we are looking forward to a so-so Diplo date, but we want to see it through. And pay back the Windoze!

I lost...

I was cramped in 3 towns which is far too little so I had to start a war to expand somehow. I started one with Satan and took one town enforcing Feudalism. I also gained one Army. Yippie!!! Not bad I would think.

Then the Programmers became mad at me and they had 1/2 of the western world, but with many swordsmen, hill usage and hoplites I was able to kill quite a few of them until they left me alone. I should have pressed on taking them into war weariness.

Then for no reason the Virologists backstab me (they were pleased a few turns ago but then my iron deal canceled and no renewal) and decide to drag in Linux. I could have taken the Virologists, but Linux was way too powerful with all their Berzerkers. I tried to ally the Programmers and Satan but they came too late and Linux was at the door of my last town. I had to shell out 20 gold/turn too which could have worked if they had shown up immediately and not let my towns die.

I had set all science to nothing and bought techs by trading iron. That got me 2 medieval techs without problems, sometimes even more and I could sell them to other civs for cash or other techs to keep up the pace. I wasn't really that far behind, just one or two.
I think I learnt tech trading quite well but the problem is that I was too cramped and I would have done better in an open starting position which will happen next time :).

Predator.

I settled near the game as soon as it was possible. I only managed to build one more city before being completely boxed in by the AI. Guess they started with even more free towns and units as in the open class. That left me with no other option except archer rush. I took the iron city from virologists and connected it quickly with a colony built by a slave, upgraded warriors using money i got from tech trading (quite a lot, AI were rich) and proceeded with sword rush. Somewhere around 1000BC i captured most virologist land and made peace. I had about the same number of towns at QSC that i would have from a settler factory start, but the population was much lower. I whipped granaries in both cow towns and built lots of workers to make up for this. Research was straight to philosophy, no chance of free Republic with such strong AI. I took currency for free and shut down research to allow extreme lux rate to keep growth of american towns while at war with america (i didn't starve them down cause that would have slowed me down too much at that point), untill i could trade for everything to get into MA in 1175BC, then started researching Republic which i got in 850BC IIRC. After the american war i concentrated on fast growth and libraries to get MT asap. I got it in the early ADs. Research was stopped at Theology/MT to use ToA to get to dom limit quickly. The war with cavalry went smoothly, and i fought mostly spearmen. Domination limit was reached in 390AD after which i traded for Education and Astronomy and researched everything else in 4 turns to get into IA in 550AD and got both steam and medicine. I have 120 towns and 300 workers at this date and i am going to go all the way to 2050AD, but this is damn boring, i think i'll just automate everything and start hitting spacebar at some point.

The Ancient Age, by Greek Imperial Historian PaperBeetle
Details from the ancient age are hazy, as the Greeks wrote nothing down until 1000bc (although they had been practising their Alphabet since 4000bc). What we know of their history is gleaned from the writings of other cultures, now long dead. In particular it is in the works of the early German and American writers that the Greeks are first mentioned; how they sailed ashore from the Inland Sea, in a mighty ship of such cunning design that none could copy its like for many thousands of years. And yet no sooner had they disembarked from this miraculous artefact, than they proved themselves to be the most perverse, quarrelsome and ignorant band of thugs the world had ever seen.

Traditional Russian epics pick up the tale, relating how in 1870bc Catherine the Great attempted to civilize these lime-green-clad barbarians, by relieving them of the corrupting influence of the Greek imperial treasury. However, even this selfless act of kindness was thrown back in her face, and so Catherine knew that only military might could pacify Alex and his savage people. The Russian armies began their long march eastward, persuading the people that they met on their way to join their mission to bring civilization to the Greeks. So it was that Russia, Scandinavia, America and Germany all came to turn their armies on the four wretched little towns of Greece.

Only Spain stood aloof from this crusade, for the Spanish considered themselves to be people of such culture and refinement that the vulgarities of war were beneath them. Spanish poets and playwrights of the classical age were so prolific that a Great Library was built in Dellopolis to house their works, and although the Greeks burned the Library to the ground in 1405ad, some classic texts were saved, from which we get the most complete picture of Catherine's War. A more detailed account is available here, but the remarkable thing about this campaign was that the Greeks were able to hold out, and they did it by once again deploying curious technology.

The great American strategist, Sun Tzu, records the tactics of the ancient Greeks in his masterwork The Art of War - a copy of which, dating from 70ad, still survives in the museum of Melissa. To prevent their enemies from crossing the OSX Mountains, the Greeks armed their men with short pikes made of bronze, known as "hopls" (from which we derive the modern Greek term for an urban militiaman, "hoplite"), and as the troops of the civilized nations prefered ranged combat, the Greeks developed short iron swords, to take the fight into close quarters. The sword was a surprisingly difficult weapon to use, but the Greeks persevered, and one by one Catherine's allies agreed to withdraw their armies. But peace was not without a price. To the Germans and Vikings, Greece ceded settlements so that Greek people could be taught a more civilized way of life, and to appease Lincoln, the Greeks had to agree to adopt the American system of Writing ;).

Thus, in 1000bc Alex ordered the commencement of the Istoria, the official Imperial written account of Greek history. I have quoted at length from these texts elsewhere, so I need only summarise here. Although the Americans and Germans had hoped that peace might bring civilization to the Greeks, they were to be disappointed. Alex maliciously prolonged the war with Catherine until 530bc, and almost as soon as the Russians had been allowed to withdraw, the Americans found themselves under attack. This was the first time that Greece had taken its armies on the offensive, and although the war was only brief, the returning troops brought back much new knowledge with them.

Perhaps this second wave of cultural exchange awoke something in the Greek people, for many began to declare their towns independent of Greece, and joined the more enlightened German and American nations. These betrayals only enraged Alex, and short campaigns were conducted against both nations. All the while, new towns were being squeezed into every available space in Greek land; in 1040ad, the famous Russian traveller Magellan would write that the towns of Greece were as tightly packed as the rats on the street of a Greek town!

Although these latest campaigns were successful on a small scale, Alex was worried that his reputation for savagery might be slipping, as his armies looked ever quainter compared to those of his neighbours. He resolved to instigate a program of study that would bring Greece into a new era, where maybe the Greeks could learn to use elaborate weapons like flails and longbows. In 330ad, peace with America brought such a haul of technology that this new era was proclaimed: Greece was finally medieval!

The Medieval Age - excerpts from the Istoria, compiled by Greek Imperial Historian PaperBeetle
The first event of the medieval era is, unsurprisingly, a flip. Germany takes its incense town back. Okay, then, let me just get my troops back from America, eh Otto? Then Bella demands furs from me. I'm feeling cavalier again after my last couple of successful campaigns, so I let her dow instead. Mind you, she has conquistadors, so the hoplites in my northern towns need to brace themselves.
In 410ad my full steam research of Feudalism comes to fruition, and I can upgrade my swords to maces. I am ready for war with Otto. He is on my land too, so I give him a boot, and get a dow.

First job for this war is to take G5. A quick history of G5: I built it, I gave it to Ragnar for peace, it flipped to Abe, I captured it from Abe, it flipped to Abe, Otto captured it, now I captured it from Otto :crazyeyes:. This war isn't exactly fast, as I am mainly using foot soldiers, but it is steady, and I slowly pick off German towns. They have Ancient Cavalry, who are pretty good at recapturing towns, but I don't mind. After all, I'm still a despot, so it's not like I have to worry about war weariness. Meanwhile in the north, by 470ad Bella is prepared to give me a fair bit of cash peace, so I oblige. As she's on the other side of a civ who is furious with me, she can wait her turn.

This time, I have decided to take the war through for my belated first kill, so I grind onwards until Germany is down to one town. The date is 870ad, but even so, they would have put up a better fight if Russia hadn't been (weakly) attacking their western front for much of that time. I give Otto peace for Guns and Education, clear out of his territory, then dow, and charge back in to wipe out Germany in 910ad. No time for rest though - these AI have got it in for me. Abe dows in 950ad and razes one of my towns. America is the first civ into the industrial era, and is fielding cavalry. I can't remember the last time I fought with maces into cavs, but it’s pretty daunting. I now have more sympathy for how the AI must feel most of the time :lol:.

So for some light relief, I boot Cath for a dow in 1000ad. Despite Russia's large size, she seems to be having resource issues, and is defending with pikes. Anyway, the war in the north is going okay, as Abe doesn't have enough towns to produce cavalry in great numbers. As the American war quietens down, I reflect on why I am in the 11th century and haven't yet reached Mil Trad, and can find no answer. So I ramp up research on Chemistry, getting it in 1090ad. I give Abe peace for Metallurgy (after taking Sun Tzu from him), and set off to do Mil Trad in 5 turns, while building a stock of horsemen to upgrade.

By 1180ad my new force of cavalries is ready to roll into America, but now the AI have Nationalism :sad:. I dow anyway, and set about trying to take the last string of American towns. Even with cavalry, it is still slow going, as these towns all have vast cultural territories, but they are finally gone in 1285ad. I managed to get Banking out them at the last minute, and am now researching Physics. Over in the west I have made faster progress against Russia despite not concentrating my troops on that front. Despite being scientific, Cath didn't seem to find Nationalism until very late in the day, so by the time Abe is dead, she is down to a half-dozen towns. She gets rifles just in time to slow my push into the Russian core, but by 1350ad I am at the gates of Assembly.

My medieval research also finishes in 1350ad, so I take Steam from Cath, get Nationalism as my free tech, and then finish her off, taking the Pyramids in the process. Oh yeah, and I'm still in despotism :lol:. It really isn't much cop for building cavalry! :lol:

Predator, going for the Longest Spoiler. Is that a VC?

Don't think so, but we been having props for best spoiler writers, and your writings are awesome. Keep up doing it, but maybe you won't get a medal :(. But your writings have been awesome so I'll give you a GOTM honorary spoiler writer award now! (I'm sure everyone will agree with this one!) It has been so great stuff.

I wasn't sure that I'd have enough time to finish this one, RL has kept me busy. Anyway I played a very unfocused game. Like most I settled by the game and was quickly boxed in. Manage to squeeze in about 5 or 6 cities before being boxed in and went to war with the most powerful Windoze which took way too long. Windoze and Programmers fell using knights but the Vir had muskets so I turned research back on and went for cavs to finish off the game at a rather late 1120AD for a Dom game.

I would like to know how many settlers the other civs had at the start? The opening portion of the game played more like a deity level game.

Open
I was going for a rather unfocused :rolleyes: diplo win.
Mistake was to elimante Windoofs and keep just Linux and Dell around. Everything was timed nicely, in 1300 I was building UN and holding the vote, I had declared on Dell the turn before and allied Linux against him.

But my lack of experience with diplo wins hurt me big time: Linus Torvalds voted for himself :hmm:, and Dell abstained. I decided to go for a second vote.

Now I turned around by 360 degree :crazyeye:
I declared on Linux and allied Dell and suddenly everybody was annoyed :ack: (what a surprise). Waiting for the next vote I accidently crossed domination limit - to make things perfect :suicide:

At least the Jason score was quite decent:
Game date: 1325 AD
Firaxis score: 4421
Jason score: 8156

domination in 360AD, but wasn't able to submit

domination in 360AD, but wasn't able to submit

Nice game! It is good to see new players getting good at the game (civ3) now that many great players only play civ4. It is a pity that you couldn't submit the game, you could get jason ~11K and maybe a silver medal (if Drazek went diplo or space). I could win by domination in 400AD and that would have given me jason slightly above 11K, but i had already invested a lot into growth by that time.

BTW, it seems that the jason scoring system greatly underestimates population growth rate in a milked game - my score was rising much faster then the jason curve predicts and so my jason score was increasing rapidly during the beginning of a milked game. It reached maximum (well above 12K!) at about 1600AD and then began dropping. In 2050AD i had 11.5K. (I am posting it here because the game ended and there is no final spoiler thread). IIRC Dynamic also experienced this in his cow game. This also explains why recent 100K games scored so high. Maybe it is too late now to fix this flaw though.

I went for space in 1140CE. I really suck at science play. Jason was only 10k.

1140 is a great date imho.

I second that. A five-digit Jason score on a scientific VC is definitely a strong result.

Any final spoiler from you, Klarius?

Just curious (although my attempt for diplo did not even get close to yours :blush: )

Well, not much happened in IA. Just research (AIs never even got nationalism), slowly taking over programmers (2 knight armies and some more knights were enough).
At some time I also took the last Virologist city.
Around the 700s made peace with linux and gifted them a city I could block, to save them from our everlasting friends windoze. I never did anything bad to them in the several thousand years of war, so a small gift made them immediately polite.
Researched to modern in 860, gifted programmers and windoze.
Windoze got fission, so just took out programmers (tanks managed to take out spear :D , but I had a knight army in reserve just in case), switched over prebuild, declared on windoze, allied linux (probably not necessary).
Vote 2-1.