Here are the five practice games this month. Feedback is appreciated. I'm trying to figure out an appropriate number of maps. Last month I did ten. Should I do five more this month, or is five sufficient?

I know I used all ten last month.
Five is probably adequate this month? Ten would always be nice.
Either way thanks a bunch doyen. :goodjob:

Thanks very much, Doyen!
Unfortunately, there are a few differences in the actual starting position: The eastern hill is desert not plain, and I'm almost sure there are at least 3 desert tiles south and west, while most of the territory north and east looks more like plain than grassland to me. Also, the forest south of the mountain seems to be a plain hill...and I doubt there will be much livestock around in the actual savegame.

All those details aren't very important, but I prefer my testgames to simulate the worst case scenario.

I used all ten last month, but I agree with Ljdjr that 5 is enough for this game. The more difficult the game, the more I practice.

Anyway thanks for the time invested in making the starts.:D

Doh!! Thanks for pointing that out, Karmina. Somehow I managed to end up thinking that both hills were plains hills. Sorry about that. I didn't know what was in the SE dark corner, but I guessed that the two southmost tiles from east to west were desert, and the two eastmost tiles were floodplains. It was just my best guess though. I'm a bit busy this month, but if I get a chance I'll redo these maps and make a few more.

If anyone else catches any mistakes, please point them out.

Thanks for preparing and posting these, Doyen. I played all ten last month, some several times, and plan to play all of them this month as well.

thanks, doyen! hope i can find some time to practise a little bit before i start

thanks, this should give me a better practice strat than the one I had yesterday randomly lol, I started out in what I assume were the ozarks...massive grasslands and forests all around me with a number of hills as well.

I just want to say I appreciate you doing this.

thanks doyen, I find them to be very helpful in exploring what is possible and what is not at these gotm settings.

Thanks for creating these.
This will be my first go at GOTM, so some practice beforehand will be a nice help!

Thx Doyen!

My testing results: You can archive a military victory before 0 AD easily if you has chopper or iron. But the main question of course is how to max your score. I'm very interested which strtegy will get the highscore.

Best regards, emork.

I highly doubt we'll get bronze or iron anywhere near our starting position...but if we do, I'm gonna be trying to conquer the world as fast as possible...perhaps I'll finally break my builders mentality! :D

Thx, five to five done :)
Have you edited the huts?
Only in one game I had two settlers, in the other only gold (a LOT of it) and techs.

Cossacks seem to be useless (too overpowered on this level), better simple knights.

Emork how can you reach domination in 0 AD without forest like in this starting position? Even if you move your settler eight squares to the west is near impossible to do it, u find your opponents there ?!?

hi guys.

what is your best score ?????

Turkish Guy:
My score was around 71 000. I did fast games without caring about maximizing points. But i don't think I could have reached significant more points without changing to a milking game style.

Tauro:
In most of the games I found a settler. All my workers I got from the AI. I produced one settler at maximum, all other production was going into maceman.

Regards, emork.

I know I used all ten last month.
Five is probably adequate this month? Ten would always be nice.
Either way thanks a bunch doyen. :goodjob:


Exactly the same for me. Thanks doyen! :)

Turkish Guy:
My score was around 71 000. I did fast games without caring about maximizing points. But i don't think I could have reached significant more points without changing to a milking game style.


i think you should milk the game.or fast finish with short milking.;)

I'm glad these seem to be useful to people. Next month I'll do ten again. I appreciate all the feedback. I'm especially glad when people talk about the strategies they use during the practice games. It helps me with my own game.

Thx Emork :)

Turkish what's your best here?

Turkish what's your best here?


actually i didnt play the maps.but i think 200K+ is doable.of course with milking.and biology.;)

Indeed, but my worst trouble is to arrive at biology EARLY :(
You can set well your map (40% of land and only one enemy city left) on 500 AD, but biology cames on 1000 :|

And the score is often about 100.000 / 120.000
So what?

Indeed, but my worst trouble is to arrive at biology EARLY :(
You can set well your map (40% of land and only one enemy city left) on 500 AD, but biology cames on 1000 :|

And the score is often about 100.000 / 120.000
So what?


i think you are making a mistake.100K -120K?.

do you build all your cities on grassland or plains?.
do you know when or how to use the Hanging Garden.
do you know how to balance your economy.
do you know how to use cottages?
and your tech tree??

as i said if you use my warlord game as an example you can make more points.kust change some points for barbs.rest is the same.
and if you get biology too early you dont expand fast enough.means you used too high tech rate.never get it over %30-40.

and i played the game (GotM5) 680 BC my score is 70K:confused:.. 100K is too low for the end.isnt it?

don't disclose any GOTM5 facts outside the spoiler-threads when the game is still running, please.

Redbad I'm talking about the practice game ;)
Anyway I know that concerns also gotm, and I've already wrote about it in the dedicated thread splitting my report on 500 AD as usual. If somebody feels disappointed I can continue in PM....

This spoiler is about my strategy on this kind of map...



do you build all your cities on grassland or plains?.
Yes if possible. I always avoid rocky zones. My cities have quite all pop 20, but I don't use a default pattern to build them, even if I don't overlap.

do you know when or how to use the Hanging Garden.
sure, at the end or before biology, when all my cities can support it with extra tiles already worked

do you know how to balance your economy.
What do you mean? :)

do you know how to use cottages?
I think.... :D
But maybe my mistake is here: I hate to make farms on theme.....

and your tech tree??
food --> slingshot to CS and early religion---> masonry for Pyramids ---> literature for GL ---> Guilds (1st golden age) ---> Nationalism ( 2nd GA) ---> military tradition for fast conquest (about 500 AD) --> liberalism, economy, biology, communism, phisic (usually 3rd GA), corporations (1000-1100 AD) and game over.
On large maps I build UN and win by "bulgarian" :D elections in 1000 AD (on marathon)

Redbad I'm talking about the practice game ;)
Anyway I know that concerns also gotm, and I've already wrote about it in the dedicated thread splitting my report on 500 AD as usual. If somebody feels disappointed I can continue in PM....

This spoiler is about my strategy on this kind of map...



do you build all your cities on grassland or plains?.
Yes if possible. I always avoid rocky zones. My cities have quite all pop 20, but I don't use a default pattern to build them, even if I don't overlap.

do you know when or how to use the Hanging Garden.
sure, at the end or before biology, when all my cities can support it with extra tiles already worked

do you know how to balance your economy.
What do you mean? :)

do you know how to use cottages?
I think.... :D
But maybe my mistake is here: I hate to make farms on theme.....

and your tech tree??
food --> slingshot to CS and early religion---> masonry for Pyramids ---> literature for GL ---> Guilds (1st golden age) ---> Nationalism ( 2nd GA) ---> military tradition for fast conquest (about 500 AD) --> liberalism, economy, biology, communism, phisic (usually 3rd GA), corporations (1000-1100 AD) and game over.
On large maps I build UN and win by "bulgarian" :D elections in 1000 AD (on marathon)



i think it is your tech tree.if you change it it will help a lot

Redbad I'm talking about the practice game ;)

I'm sorry Tauro, I wasn't very clear. I didn't mean you, but I was referring to the last sentence of post23. It states an actually achieved result in GOTM5.

Just wanted to say thanks to doyen for posting these the past couple of months. Last months was VERY helpful and even with the low difficulty this month it was nice to get a feel for the map.:thumbsup:

Ok, no problem at all :)

P.S.
Best polite forum seen, very appreciated.
Thx to the admins and all the users