Welcome to your C_IV SGOTM 1 Team Thread. Please use it for all internal team communication, turn logs and discussions. Subscribe to it to receive notifications, and do not visit the other team threads for this game until you have finished. Please also subscribe to the Maintenance Thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=170295) for this game, where teams and staff may post non-spoiler information of general interest. I hope you enjoy the game.

This game will be played in Civ4, patched to v1.61.

This first SGOTM will not feature any advanced variant.. the winner simply will be the team that wins the game at the earliest game date with either domination or a diplomatic victory. All victory conditions are still enabled though, with exception of Space Race, so you have to avoid getting another type of victory (and of course prevent the AIs from winning).

Individual start files for all teams will be available on the SGOTM Progress and Results Page (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm_submission_list.php) at midnight, server local time, at the start of May 12.

Here's the start position.

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/civ4games/images/SGOTM01_start.jpg

Map Parameters
Playable Civ - Hapshepsut of Egypt
World size - Standard
Difficulty - Monarch
Landform - Mystery
Game Speed - Epic

Permanent Alliances are turned on (can form permanent alliances after either communism or fascism is researched)
Space race is disabled.
Egypt is locked into war with Huayna Capac of the Incas.
Egypt is locked into peace with an unknown civilization.

The map is hand built, and therefore may not have a standard configuration.

Please visit the following links to ensure that you are adequately prepared:
Civ4 SGOTM reference thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=168439)

Notes:

A. ONLY Civilization4 v1.61 is supported for this SGOTM. All teams will compete for a single award - the Gold Laurels.

B. All teams must play the sponsored variant - victory will be awarded for the fastest victory by either domination or diplomacy.

C. All saved game files uploaded to the server are parsed through software that extracts and archives data about your save, including reload count for each turn set.

Good luck to your team, and remember rule #1: Enjoy your game :D

moving settler one square south to grab cows might be good idea...
we cannot afford to chop those forests.

Moving one square south might be a good idea as stated, but we might be missing out on any resources in the north.

Moving on the plains hill could also be a viable strategy. The extra sheild in the beginning could really help out.

I dont think moving on hill is good idea because improved it can give us 4 shields, cows as well, i think getting cow in capital would be bonus.also by moving to hill we loose one on the right

Yes, but there is a hill that you gain in the west (you can see the land rising) plus the possibility of other hills. Sticking with the spot where the settler is now will make a very food and commerce rich village with not a lot of production. Moving to the south for the cow would help but moving on the hill could balance it out a lot with less flood plains but possibly more hills. We might even be able to fit in another city on the desert tile on the coast. It's a gamble though that could or could not pay off.

following acid01's strategy, I would settle 1 tile south to get the cows and irrigate the flood plains. If we have the happy support, we can whip our UU and then take out the nearby enemies rather than concentrating on research.
It worked surprisingly well and a fast domination is possible. Thus, I sgueest to make the first city a growth city with whipping initially. Later, we can emphasize shields.

settling one the hill takes away couple of FL on the right as well as hills, and settling city there without much overlapping is a mistake. I would also go for mining first, BW (slavery), then AH.

Okay, settling one tile south sounds like a good idea. It will be interesting to see what other teams do and how that will affect the games overall.

I think what we should agree for the early stages on a few issues:

settling location: so far 1 tile S seems to be the way

research: mining , BW then AH?

build order: worker first or wait for growth while building a warrior?


as for long term, I think we have an issue here with permanent peace. We can not let that Civ get too big else we can never win by domination. Or can we ally others against them? With my experience in Civ4 diplomacy, to get someone declare war against a Civ you are at peace is very tough, get them to wipe that Civ out sounds impossible to me. Any other comments on that?

worker first.

bribing is possible as long as we have enough techs. It also depends who are those other civs...monty would be interesting set of circumstances.
I have a feeling Cyrus will be our friend, or some other creative dinosaur...
imo, we should try to expand as much as possible, even if it means lowering our research for a while.

Research Path sounds good. Worker first, with the flood plains we will grow like a weed so delaying growth first to improve land won't be a problem.

We should probably kill off Huayna ASAP then expand like crazy.

We could bribe the AI's to kill the one we are at peace with then take everybody else out after the civ we are pp (permanent peaced) with is dead or reduced significantly.

Or we could kill all the civs our pp civ does not like and get a great relationship with the pp civ. As soon as fascism comes in we sign a permanent alliance with them winning a domination victory with our combined land.

The biggest problem I see here is the landform. If this is continents then maybe the pp's expansion won't be a problem.

we still have a few more players to give comments here..will pm them I think.

I can start this off, what amount of turns are we going to play? first round 30 then everyone 20 turns? But for this competition, a good and healthy discussion is really what is needed.

its my way or the highway!!!!! :lol: :lol:

Since you want to start off, i think 30 would be good, I'll follow with 20, as well as everyone else first round. After that 10 is better i think. 20 might be too long especially when warring.

I'd move the warrior first on the desert hill to see if there is
a water resource.I prefer to build the first city on a plains hill,
but we will lose 2 hills.So I agree on the suggested spot.

Wow, talk about a good start location! :wow:
Settling one south seems like the best plan to me, too.
Then beeline for chariots and take the Incas out. Apparantly we have already met them, so getting rid of them should be a priority.

I am here. Don't yet have time to comment, but thought I would check in.

Till, you want to beeline to AH? This we need for the war chariot (since we need horses for that). I actually rather have BW and slavery first. We will be having super high growth in our capital due to the flood plains and cow. Thus, whipping could be a great tool for early attacks (assuming we have copper).

The starting move 1S seems good to me, though I agree on moving the worker first.

I don't think I would go for BW as our second tech however if we don't plan to chop the forests. In fact I would only get BW if we do plan to chop the forests right away. Otherwise BW can wait until after the more useful AH.

We need to worry about WW with the Incans. I think we want to take them out quickly. Whether this means taking them out early or late, I am not sure, but we should have a larger force when we do go for them and plan to pursue them until they are dead.

[Edit: Whipping might be good enough reason, but I think AH will be much quicker than BW. Do we want Pottery fast? I like starting cottages early when I can. I think that pretty important.

Till, you want to beeline to AH? This we need for the war chariot (since we need horses for that). I actually rather have BW and slavery first. We will be having super high growth in our capital due to the flood plains and cow. Thus, whipping could be a great tool for early attacks (assuming we have copper).
If we beeline for AH and then research BW, we'll probably have to stall growth in the capital and waste whipping opportunities. I usually don't whip units, but in this case it might be called for.
So you are probably right in that going for BW first is worth it.

guys, I have a problem to open the save file. Until that is solved, why doen't someone else start this. Suggest for the first rotation, whoever posts a got it, plays then.

guys, I have a problem to open the save file. Until that is solved, why doen't someone else start this. Suggest for the first rotation, whoever posts a got it, plays then.
I assume you have not edited the files in Assets dir in any way? Like used civscale?
Also having backups of files or extra files inside Assets dir could cause problems.

If you do uninstall, check to see if there is still an Assets dir there before you reinstall.. if it is there.. delete it first.. the uninstaller wont remove any extra files you have put in that dir, but they may still cause problems

No problems here.
I can take it.Team decides.
I'd suggest 20 turns first round.
And maybe an update after 10 turns for more discussion.

ok u take it first 40 moves. after you first round 20 moves (ill go 2nd). starting 2nd round - 10 moves each. Settle on spot, and mining->BW->AH, as we agreed on that. gl!

Ok,I'll start right now and will stop if important info
is needed.

4000 BC
Move warrior on the desert hill,fish revealed.
Thebes founded.Another cow resource revealed.
Start to research Mining.

http://img63.imageshack.us/img63/1848/pic2335py.jpg

3970 BC (1)
Another water resource revealed,clam.

3880 BC (4)
Borders of Thebes expand and reveals stone.

3760 BC (8)
More fish revealed in the NW.

3730 BC (9)
More cows.

3700 BC (10)
Tundra.So we must be somewhere north.

3670 BC (11)
Mining is in,start to research Bronze Working.

3580 BC (14)
Our warrior kills a wolf.

3550 BC (15)
I've seen enough.We can only expand SW.

http://img503.imageshack.us/img503/6697/pic2375dm.jpg

3370 BC (21)
Second warrior is ready.Start a worker.

IBT 3250 BC
Hinduism has been founded in a distant land.

IBT 3220 BC
Warrior survives a lion attack.

3130 BC (29)
Bronze Working is in,start on Pottery.
Thebes has 5 hills,so I prefer to cottage the floodplains.
Bad news.No copper.
Revolt to Slavery.

3040 BC (32)
Our warrior meets a Russian scout and also reveals copper in the west.

http://img117.imageshack.us/img117/8762/pic2385ub.jpg

IBT 3010 BC
Buddhism has been founded in a distant land.

2950 BC (35)
We don't have much room to expand.I already see Russian borders.

2830 BC (39)
Worker is ready.

2800 BC (40)
Well,this is ugly.We should claim that copper as soon as possible +
Cathy blocks our only way to expand.
There's only one (calendar) happy resource.
We need the numbers,so maybe we should settle with more
overlapping as normal.

http://img503.imageshack.us/img503/4195/pic2395yz.jpg

A total screenshot of the scouted area.

http://img106.imageshack.us/img106/6122/pic2401yj.jpg

You need to upload the save btw.. not just attach it here

I'm thinking maybe chop a settler out ASAP and get a city on the desert tile 1west of the copper. This would block off Cathy's expansion towards us and grab us copper.

I don't really like the starting position here. We miss stone and rice. Moving the settler on the plains hill would have been better imo. Then we would have also been able to fit a city on the desert tile two north of the clams. It's much easier to see this is hind-sight though.

I don't really like the starting position here.
You're not the only one.When I saw the fish I had my doubts,
but when I also saw the clam I simply :vomit:.
I could have replayed. :mischief:

I made a dotmap.Feel free to comment.
The right pink spot is unsure,because of invisibility
of the tiles to the east of the mountains.

http://Serv1.imagehigh.com/files/ih000001/19354_pic_242dotmap.jpg

I think the boat shortcut is important. I would place a city on the desert near the copper. It can potentially make a large difference on when one could invade across water. Depends on the map of course.

hillplacement would've been better. The point however is that before we settler, usign only info we have, settleing one S was way better. Thats thepoint, use info u have now to its best so i dont feel bad at all.
i'll play this a little bit later,or GOT IT.

chop a settler settle on the desert tile near copper (yes, it has to be the canal placement)

Then go for AH and start a rush to take out Russia. If we manage to get Moscow early, that will be huge

by the way, I would make a much different dot map, I will post it soon

Tatran, you must submit the save to the SGOTM page (I'll do it for you for now, but next time please do so)

ok ,here is my take, which is very similar to Tatran, I simply included the borders for better understanding

I tried to creat cities with little overlap and making use of the resources.

- Red dot is next to close the choke, get the canal and copper.
- Orange dot makes sure we grab as many flood plains as possible
- the 2 dark red rings are options, I don't really know which is better


http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/ratpack1000.jpg

You need to upload the save btw.. not just attach it here

Tatran, you must submit the save to the SGOTM page
First SGOTM,so I'm not surprised everything is not going smooth.

To the ThERat :thanx: .
Btw,your dotmap isn't very different from mine (both purple dots).
The canal function is a good reason to settle on desert tile,didn't think
of that.

im sorry where exaclty do we need to upload each save besides post it here?

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm.php

It's in my sig, on every page on the main gotm web site, and linked from the first post in this thread.

thx

and no i think its not too short

by the way, that SGOTM page gives useful information about the progress of other teams. You can judge where your team stands so I recommend you guys to bookmark it and have a look every now and then.

0th turn - Tatran, please explain to me why is our only worker building road to nothingness, we researched BW almost 10 turns ago, we have NO SETTLER STARTED, but our 3rd warrior is getting build??? I think we made it clear that we need to get our key resources as quickly as possible.

http://img302.imageshack.us/img302/5163/civ4screenshot00476dg.jpg


1, 2 (start chop for settler) , start AH
3,4,5,6,7,8 (start another chop)
9,10,11,12,13, 14 (start yet another chop for settler->barracks, we need some catching up quickly).
15(AH done), and I quit here so we decide for next I know id go straight for IW but that’s me. Horses just north of capital.
I strongly suggest we grab them and get chariots instead of axmen now. Mega quick rush please. theRat , you’ r up.

http://img302.imageshack.us/img302/2139/civ4screenshot00481pu.jpg

Removed attached file. Please use the one that was uploaded to the SGOTM server:
http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_BC2350_01.Civ4SavedGame

Please don't duplicate the save as an attachment here. It wastes space, and *could* get you out of sync with the saves on the server.

The next player should ALWAYS get the save from the SGOTM server. If you want to post a link to the save here, then copy and paste the link you get back when you upload your save to the SGOTM submission page.

sounds good to me

agree on grabbing the horses and use the war chariot to go after Catherine

do you guys know whether we get border expansions or do we need an obelisk for that? if we need a border expansion, we should shift the dark green spot 1 tiel east and the purple spot 1 tile northeast for the fish

what do you mean border expansions? We are creative aren't we?? byt he time we expand to horses we need to build road from capital to it...

the modified dot map
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/ratpack1000a.jpg

suggest to go for settler -> worker and then connect horses and cows
capital goes for rax and then chariots

oh, I just found out that Egypt is creative (forgot) and we get border expansions, so forget my modified dot map then

0th turn - Tatran, please explain to me why is our only worker building road to nothingness, we researched BW almost 10 turns ago, we have NO SETTLER STARTED, but our 3rd warrior is getting build??? I think we made it clear that we need to get our key resources as quickly as possible.

2830 BC (39)
Worker is ready.

@acidsatyr
You're overreacting.Relax man,it's too hot for it.
First we want the save the forests and now we're cutting them down.
We know where the horses are and the settler isn't even ready yet.
Also why didn't you rush it with a population rush?
We can't scout more area,so a third warrior isn't necessary.

lol, i'm not mad at all, I'm just wondering why you did what youdid
We will pop rush baracs and chariots

Alright, horses next to our capital is great. One thing we may be um... forgetting though is the permanent peaced nation. Is it Cathy? Even if it is I would still suggest blocking the choke so she can't expand that way and not signing open borders with her until we fill up our land.

If she isn't the pp nation we should be able to take her out quite quickly with war chariots, as long as she doesn't out expand us to the copper spot.

Who's up next?

knupp, you can take the next 15 turns, I am going bed now

Played 15 turns.

Founded Memphis.

http://img318.imageshack.us/img318/7388/civ4screenshot00298ud.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

I talked to cathy and said your head would look better on the end of a pole to see if it would let me declare and it did (though I said no when it asked me if I was sure) so we don't have to worry about her being our pp civ. Memphis's borders will expand in 2 or 3 more turns. It is building a worker to hook up that copper ASAP and build a road to the rest of our empire.

I don't think we need to be going after iron working right now. It is an expensive tech and we don't need it for anything that I know of. I left it there though which I wish I shouldn't have done.

I think we need to get two more cities up quickly. The pink dot so we can connect Memphis to the rest of our empire and the dark greenish dot to grab the horses. Then we can over run Cathy with our war chariots.

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_BC1900_01.Civ4SavedGame

great job closing the gap. Now we can connect the horses, get maybe some swords and go after Cathy once we have the required military might.

We also could go for cats to get some important support (construction). I guesswe will not bother about religions for now. WE can always take whatever Cathy did for us.

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp

not played yet
TheRat
Greebley
Till

am playing now 20 turns...result coming soon

changed research to fishing for a small detour so the southern town can grow faster and grab that resource
decided to start the cottage business in our capital
founded Heliopolis and went for a work boat there as well for faster growth
barely beat a barb warrior at Heliopolis

Memphis whipped the work boat the moment it grew to pop2
worker will be done in 5
Thebes is on rax to grow to pop 5 and can then go for worker and settlers while we get horses up

worker is on the way north to hook up cows and horses
Heliopolis should whip the boat as well once it growns to pop2

IW is done in 3


now we have to decide which tech to go after next?

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/ratpack1300.jpg


Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp
TheRat - just played

either of you is up
Greebley
Till

:bump: Till or Greebley, can any of you take this game and play? I suggest skipping archery for now and go after construction for cats.

:bump: Till or Greebley, can any of you take this game and play? I suggest skipping archery for now and go after construction for cats.
Got it. Also got the Rat15.

Weekend was a bit busy. I can get it after Till.

Inherited turn:
Everything peachy.

3
We learn Iron Working.
Set research to writing.
We have iron out of our borders:
http://img369.imageshack.us/img369/2610/civilization420060515222246122.jpg

5
Begin to connect copper. Memphis starts working on barracks.

6
Whip barracks in Thebens. Start worker.

7
Whip workboat in Heliopolis.

8
Start warrior in Heliopolis for fog busting duties.
Realized i goofed up and develop the wrong cow. Sorry!

12
Judaism spreads to our lands. Oh joy.


14
We learn how to write. I go for Mathematics next in an effort to get to 'pults as soon as possible.
An alternative would be to research the religios techs, now that we have judaism. But that would take away too many resources for little benefit from the upcomming war for my taste.


15
Whip granary in Thebes. Copper is online in Memphis. It might be worth to change research to Sailing, in order to get it online asap.
Warrior completes in Heliopolis. Start Settler to grab iron.
Once again, sorry for the cow mess up.
---------->The Save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_BC0910_01.Civ4SavedGame)<----------

Got it.

I think we should settle that green spot to give us iron, and rice and speed up the connection, then get the horses hooked.

With a mix of axes, swords, chariots and cats we should be able to really harm and take on Russia.

I played and went mostly for Settlers. I feel we should settle ASAP given the position.

I just signed an open borders deal with Russia. I think we can grab the spots first.

I think we should also build a town on the indicated spot. It grabs 2 sea resources and can generate a good bit of commerce.

I fought a single battle. We won vs a Barbarian.

I also built an Axe. It was going to investigate Russian lands.

Here is the Log:
Turn 113, 805 BC: The Pyramids has been built in a far away land!

Turn 115, 775 BC: The Parthenon has been built in a far away land!

Turn 120, 700 BC: Moses has been born in a far away land!
Turn 120, 700 BC: The Oracle has been built in a far away land!

Turn 121, 685 BC: The Kashi Vishwanath has been built in a far away land!
Turn 121, 685 BC: Barbarian's Warrior (2.00) vs Rat Pack's Warrior (3.00)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Combat Odds: 9.9%
Turn 121, 685 BC: (Plot Defense: +50%)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 24 (76/100HP)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 24 (52/100HP)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 24 (28/100HP)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 24 (4/100HP)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Rat Pack's Warrior is hit for 16 (84/100HP)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Rat Pack's Warrior is hit for 16 (68/100HP)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Barbarian's Warrior is hit for 24 (0/100HP)
Turn 121, 685 BC: Rat Pack's Warrior has defeated Barbarian's Warrior!

Turn 125, 625 BC: Elephantine has been founded.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/RatPack1_BC625.jpg

The 625 BC Save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_BC0625_01.Civ4SavedGame)

since we signed open borders, let's settle our land and then go after Cathy. I would go for orange and purple spots, red can be added later since it is within our own influence already.

Use the axe to find out about her cities and how to take them out.

I would be nice to get the circumnavigation as well and get more contacts as it looks as if we are alone with her on this continent.
so sailing after maths/construction might be a good idea.

Roster
Tatran - up
acidsatyr
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley

Pre-turn
No one has mentioned we have silver in the north.
Problem : do we want to waste a city to grab it ?
Also Cathy has spears.

610 BC (1)
Warrior reveals another fish resource.

http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/1026/pic253re5jv.jpg

IBT 580 BC
Confucianism has been founded in a far away land.

565 BC (4)
Mathematics is in,start to research Masonry.

490 BC (9)
Masonry is in,start to research Construction.

475 BC (10)
Found Alexandria (above the cows tile).

We are alone with the Russians and they have no more room to expand!

http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/3622/pic255re4fc.jpg

ok got it,
i didnt look at the save, are we ready to attack cathy in my turn?
other suggestions? i'll play later today

are we ready to attack cathy in my turn?

With one axe and a handful of warriors ? :lol:
We need catapults,St. Petersburg has 40% culture and is
built on a hill.

we have 2 more cities to build in the near future and then go all out after Catherine. She has 1 more lux for us (gems). Unfortunately, 3/5 cities are built on hills and we do need some cats support.
On the other hand, we do need to go overseas sooner rather than later, so research should head for caravels in the long term.

acid, feel free to whip some stuff so we get some military up.

ok heres the thing, judging from Russian cities she has only thing like archer/archer or spearmen/archer, and capital has axe/arc/arc. So I really don’t see the point of construction right now, as it will only take few more swords so soften all of that. We also meet Ghandy who is advanced judging from the score, and we cant declare war. I suggest we switch from construction to alphabet, since we are only few moves into construction /26! Left. That’s a lot for 3 cats. What do you think?

ok heres the thing, judging from Russian cities she has only thing like archer/archer or spearmen/archer, and capital has axe/arc/arc. So I really don’t see the point of construction right now, as it will only take few more swords so soften all of that. We also meet Ghandy who is advanced judging from the score, and we cant declare war. I suggest we switch from construction to alphabet, since we are only few moves into construction /26! Left. That’s a lot for 3 cats. What do you think?
I'm not sure about that idea. Our military buildup is still in its early stages and it will be a while until we have enough units to be able to safely skirmish with Cath. Waiting 26 turns+ catapult construction turns is daunting, but we can use the time to built up an army of axe and swordsmen.
Going in without catapults might result in higher casulties, more war weariness and thus slower progress.
I'd play this conservatively, but that's just my 2 cent. I trust your judgement in this matter.

so our permanent peace is with Asoka. Hmm, this would mean we have to get a premanent alliance with him to get domination?

Anyway, short term is to take on Russia, if we can muster an attack without cats, that would be good. Alphabet is always good for obvious reasons, so acid, you judge and make a decision.

ok capital building settler, done in 4 so I won't touch that.
Heliopolis barracks in 7.
Elephantine on granary, after that barracks. Memphis can’t grow and should not be whipped.
Boring set of turns follows.
1 - We meet Ghandy (we cant declare on him), I open borers with him, Heliopolis gets Hindu and I convert so it grows to 5.
I leave construction here since I didn’t want to touch previous player’s decision. Going for alphabet before constr. would’ve been better, but we will need it one way or another. So screw it I leave it as it is. If this was my game only i would've done it however.
2 - nothin
3 - Memphis sword -> axe
4 - Thebes settler -> axe, i don’t want to whip anything there as it has nicely grown cottages.
5 - I don’t want to settle anything now as it will ony cost us even more
6 - However i start building road towards silver so we could do that quickly later.
7 - xzzzzzzzz
8 zzz
9 zzz
10 I didn’t touch units in this move.
Basically we’r building units no whipping we’ll have enough of them once we have cats.

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp - up
TheRat
Till
Greebley


Ok, let's hope with some cats we can fight Cathy properly. I strongly recommend to go for alphabet once we have completed construction. Maybe we can spread that religion now so we can have more happies in our capital as well.

5 - I don’t want to settle anything now as it will ony cost us even more

I disagree with this. If you place it in the flood plains area west of heliopolis, it will cost a bit of money in the short run, but quickly start generating funds. When the city count is under around 8, I think it always profitable to get your cities up and running quickly so you can make a profit.

In addition we are falling behind with workers. I would build some more.

if you want to settle it, then it is more logical to grab silver and let all cities grow by 1.

For the silver we can wait until we at least have the road.

I would have settled the flood plain city first and started another settler for the silver when the road completes.

My personal preference is to found 3 more cities before Russian war - silver city, city on the coast near the capitol to use both sea resources, and city in the floodplains. Once we have that we start gearing up for war. That way Russia is improving their land for us while we get ours up and running.

I don't know how many turns we are to be playing but I just played to an even number so I'm not sure how many turns I played.

Founded the city up north by the silver. It doesn't harm our economy to the point where we should wait and the extra happiness will more than pay for itself even though this isn't a great city spot.

I continued building up military. We have a settler and a worker being built plus a settler can be built next turn to finish up expansion in our lands.

And the save:
http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_BC0250_01.Civ4SavedGame

got it, what are we researching at the moment? Did we get to construction already and head for alphabet? We need that to trade with India and maybe extort a tech before finishing off Russia. I found that a powerfull tool during the recent warmonger games.

I think we have 2 cities to settle, the flood plain city and the sea resource city. Hope we can take on Russia after that.

My personal preference is to found 3 more cities before Russian war - silver city, city on the coast near the capitol to use both sea resources, and city in the floodplains. Once we have that we start gearing up for war. That way Russia is improving their land for us while we get ours up and running.
but why? Why do you want to pay 15 more gpt for 3 undeveloped cities at this point we'll run into problems when we capture those russian cities. Nobody can plant cities on our continent yet what the rush?

We are still researching construction.

taking over Russia's cities will dent our economy short term, but we should go for alphabet and then CoL to builds courts and then head for astronomy so we can expand overseas.

indeed we are bleeding already, so no more cities for a while
Catherine is around with a settler pair, if nothing, I will snatch that for sure

on turn 5 Catherine landed the units, declared and started the war
razed that new city (lost 1 axe in the process) and moved next to St. Peter

on turn 9 we got the great news that we have a new source of gold next to Elephantine :cool:
attacked St. Peter
defeat 4 units without a single loss
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/ratpack115.jpg

city has a shrine :dance:

defeat an archer next to St.Peter

on turn 10 WW already starts to hit after losing our 2nd axe, ridiculous
defeat spear and archer there
construction is in, alphabet next but takes 34 turn currently

maybe we should switch religion so that we can spread our faith for more cash and we can then see what units Russia has
maybe we need to settle for peace in bewteen to get some cities and then wait 10 more turns
Thebes gets a settler in 2 to fill that flood plain spot, (maybe we better don't settle, since we take on Russia first)

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/ratpack100.jpg

I'm aware that i'm up, but won't be playing before tomorrow.

I would like you all to discuss a little more here in this forum and chip in your ideas. If anyone looks at the graphs provided, we ain't do too badly. Currently there are 2 other teams playing around the same date as us.
We are 1st in terms of power (score we are 2nd). This means our military is surely top, our score started to increase.
I think if we can take out Russia soon, we will have a nice advantage.
Thus, military is top priority.

And switching religion costs us no anachry and will reveal all the cities with that religion (by the way there are 7 cities with that reilgion according to the shrine income, but I can't see 7 Russian cities that are jewish). There must be another city having that religion giving us more contacts maybe?

This would be a nice way to find some other Civs, we got to know India due to the spread of their religion.

and , not to rub this in again, but to keep in mind for the next time maybe,
you don't need cats to take cities, so i'm sure we'd have lead if we just skiped construction.

seeing how I took the first Russian city like this, I have to agree with you, acid...

I plan to play on Sunday.
Switching to Judaism seems sound to me, now that we have the shrine.
Currently we have 1 Bhuddist city and 3 Jewish. Looks like a no brainer to me.

After switching, we'll be better albe to judge the situation in Russia. I'd love to grab Moskow before settling for a (temporary) peace. The settler can slack off until after the war.

Alphabet is 34 turns away. I would like to have galleys for exploration soon.
Maybe we should try to extort sailing out of cath for peace, after we grabbed Moscow?

your plan sounds good to me

yeah, make sure you get sailing after grabing Moscow

Inherited turn:
All right!
Convert to Judaism. Meet Cyrus! He's got 6 cities, one of which is Jewish and his capital. Looks like got a bit shafted by the RNG.
Moscow is defended by one axe and 3 archers.

1
Cath crashes a chariots against St. Petersburg. Sucks to attack a city on a hill, eh? :D

2
Settler finishes in Thebens.

3
St. Pete comes online.
Cyrus demands a cow.
Ghandi has Alphabet!
He is up (at least) Sailing, Alphabet, Hunting and Mysticism.
We are up construction and Sailing.
I check with Cath and she would be willing to part with Sailing and Mysticism for peace.
Since Ghandi and Cath know each other, i don't feel comfortable about making deals.
Ghandi would be in a 2fer position, but on the other hand trading now would save us 30+ turns of research.
I toss a coin and decide to go for the deals:
Alphabet + Mysticism for Construction
Everybody has Polytheism and Bhuddism but nobody can trade it. They show up under "can't rade" in the foreign relations window and aren't even visible in the trade window.
What's up with that?

For once, i take issue with a cottage as well. The one in Alexandria prevents us from irrigating Elephantine. (Unless we want to sacrifice two grassland tiles from our capital)


4
Suddenly trade with Polytheism and Bhuddism is available. No tempting deal on the table, though.

5
First units arrive near Moscow. 8 attackers, 4 defenders. Odds are daunting.

6
Our odds at attacking Moscow range from 0,6% to 6,3%. I fear a 2 to 1 ratio isn't enough to take the city.

7
A spearman joins the defenders of Moscow.

8
Spearman leaves moscow. We have our first catapult! :)

9
Another Chariot chrashes into St. Pete. Swordman demands a raise for having to clean up the mess again.

10
Cath manned a galley with an settler/archer combo! It's probably wise to send one sword to monitor the east coast.
And for the love of all that is holy, don't pillage the horsies! As long as Cath keeps pumping worthless chariots and not archers, we are golden.
Sailing is due in 3 turns.
---------->The Save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_AD0050_01.Civ4SavedGame)<----------

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley - up

we didn't actually attack Moscow? I think we should try if we have a chance of winning and then go for peace to extort a tech and then replenish the tropps and repeat that exercise.

good tech deals. by the way Till, teching was nerfed, that's why you can trade techs that are beyond the traded techs only on the next turn. another of those nerfing techniques to make the game more 'balanced'.

I didn't attack, as most of our units faced 0.6% odds of winning, with two "leet" axemen having 6.3% chance to succeed and two swordsmen having about 5%.

That was too much of a gamble for me to take. Didn't want to be the guy, who got our army killed.

Didn't want to be the guy, who got our army killed.:lol: let it be Greebley then

by the way, we can get 3 techs from Cyrus for alphabet, please get that...

I would wait for the cat, suicide it and attack mosocw, we should be able to take it and go for peace straight away and get a tech.
I would head for literature, maybe we can bag the GL

Ok, I got it.

I have to agree with Till, at those odds even with 3x the troops as the enemy you can end up losing all those troops for nothing if your luck runs sour. It has happened to me and is very frustrating as the troops remaining are stronger than ever due to promotions.

You really want Cats in that situation.

Ok, I played 15 turns.

Preturn: Woke up the settler and sent it off to be settled. When a town can become profitable quickly you want to build it as soon as possible. These towns have water food resources so the grow quite quick. The earlier a town is built the sooner it becomes profitable and the better off you are in the long run. The only question is whether the start up cost will slow tech and hurt us that way - the towns will be online fast enough that maybe one or two techs is a turn behind before we catch back up again and go ahead. Each town pulls in 4 commerce so will probably only cost 2 per turn for less than 20 turns and will be profitable forever after. I am pretty much positive that you will using a settler is a win if you have less than 8-10 cities. The real cost is building the settler instead of something else.

I am going to build the other town too. Start a settler.

Kill a random Chariot.

Note that it will be a while before we can get the defense down. We have only 1 cat less than 6 turns away.

65 AD: Giza is founded. The plan is to rush a workboat ASAP to get us to +5 food so we can grow quickly.

80 AD: Trade with Persia for Meditation, Sailing, and Hunting for Alphabet. Persia is now pleased with us as well.
I am going for Monarchy next.
Kill another Chariot.

95 AD: Defeat another chariot.

110 AD: Lose our War Chariot vs a Chariot. Kill said chariot.

125 AD: A Swordsman accidentally impales himself on an Ax in Moscow. Normally, I would just replay the turn for a misclick, but I don't since this is GOTM.

140 AD: Defeat yet another Chariot.

170 AD: FInally ready to go for Moscow. Even with no city defense the units in the city are tougher than us.
Lose a Catapult and two swords (against odds for the swords) and Kill 3 Archers, Ax, and a Chariot. Madrid is Captured[b]

185 AD Kill yet another Chariot. Note the Russia no longer has Horses..

200 AD Discover Priesthood and start Monarchy.
Kill an Ax.
Lining up for an attack on the Yaroslavl

215 AD: Kill 2 Archers.

230 AD: Found Byblos.

245 AD: Attack Yarozlavl with a sword with odds on our side. We lose and I decide to wait for more units to try again.

260 AD: Kill an Archer in Yaroslavl with a well promoted Ax.

275 AD: Attack on Yaroslavl. Again one Cat retreats and one loses. We then kill 3 Spear and one Chariot.[b]Yarslavl is captured

Notes:

Note that I raised science from 30% to 60% when I captured Moscow.

Giza grows in 5 turns and can build a work boat for Byblos. Rushing it will mean breaking even for these 2 towns much quicker. Giza already is at +5 food and Byblos will be at +10 food in 12 or so turns.

We captured 1/2 of Russia on my turn. Two more cities to go.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BTW, the following idea occurred to me. If we are really friendly to the civ that likes us, we may be able to get a permanant alliance. If this permanant alliance works the same way as an alliance at the start of the game, then we can get a domination win when our combined area is over 64% and we don't have to do it ourselves alone. Not sure if permanant alliance are soon enough to make this a decent strategy, and I don't know if we can get a permanant alliance with our friend, but it something to consider. One thing that makes Dom victories hard is the fact that you need to support a lot of towns. If two civs share that burden, it could potentially mean a faster finish. Not sure if it faster than pure war mongering though.

The save for 275 AD (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_AD0275_01.Civ4SavedGame)

Here is a picture:

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/RatPack1_AD275.jpg

good work, could we get any tech from Russia for peace? If they do, we should go for peace, wait 10 turns and then take the rest of the land.
We need to sail overseas, so astro seems a must tech.


We should also try and beeline for the tech required to form permanent alliances. not sure whether one can form 2 of them.


Roster
Tatran - up
acidsatyr
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley

had a look at the save, we can get 3 techs from Cathy including monarchy, we should do this and get back at her 10 turns later

we should then go maybe for lit to get the GL? I can see that we can reach Cyrus via galleys though that would be a little tedious.

Ok, I played 15 turns.
10 turns?15 turns?
I prefer something between 10-15,so I can finish what I started
during a session.10 turns isn't enough in Civ4 SGs,you need a
decent preparation + slow movement.

Normally, I would just replay the turn for a misclick, but I don't since this is GOTM.
You're a real saint,but I'm not a spoon collector.We aren't doing that great
in score.

If we are really friendly to the civ that likes us, we may be able to get a permanant alliance.
Gandhi and Cyrus are already very friendly with each other.Wait a minute,
what if they have a permanent alliance can we still attack Cyrus (and
in this way Gandhi)?
If we want a friend it has to be Gandhi,but then Cyrus has to be removed.

Also I didn't know Civ4 was a X-rated game. :lol:

http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/6135/pic261xrated9rh.jpg

we can get 3 techs from Cathy including monarchy, we should do this and get back at her 10 turns later
I disagree,Cyrus won't trade Calendar for Construction and we have
already invested in Monarchy,all those beakers will be lost.
Peace with Cathy : Calendar + Polytheism.

Got it.

305 AD (2)
War chariot destroys Russian catapult near Moscow.

320 AD (3)
Rush a temple in Moscow.

350 AD (5)
Whip a granary in Pi-Ramesses,a workboat in Giza + a lighthouse in Yaroslavl'.

IBT 350 AD
Russian catapult destroyed by a sword near Novgorod.

365 AD (6)
War chariot destroys a catapult near Moscow.

395 AD (8)
Monarchy is in,start to research CoL.
Revolt to the Hereditary Rule.
Rush a workboat in Byblos.
Lose a suicide catapult + 2 swords to the defenders of Novgorod.
Axes kills 3 archers,war chariot kills wounded spear.We capture 2 workers.

http://img61.imageshack.us/img61/9356/pic265re8yf.jpg

Trade gems for dyes with Gandhi.
Trade cows for silk with Cyrus.

We're still at war with Catherine and we have no happiness problems.
I don't know if this is allowed,but we can get Calendar + Polytheism + Archery
for peace,but she has also Monotheism + Literature.

Off topic.
I couldn't get rid of Greebley's creative works above Giza and Byblos.
Please tell me how to create and delete this.

as stated before, make peace with cathy and get those techs. We can trade even more with her as she is as good as dead and no threat.
after CoL we need to head for astro as the goal will be to fight overseas and I don't see galleys suitable for that.

Try and get back inot the trading game by starting with 3 techs from Russia...

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr - up
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley

I still disagree to go for those crappy techs.
Maybe if we trade/research Polytheism we can get
a better deal,Monotheism and/or Literature.

I don't think calendar is crappy, but even if that's the case, we have to get back into the tech game. Look how far we are behind...we need to catch up. We might even miss the GL, which would be a pity.

by the way, we might want to run a priest once we have a temple so that we can build the shrine

The disillusion : Gandhi has also Literature,50% wonder bonus + Monarchy
level bonus and maybe early starting turns.
The only reason to build the Great Library is to get some cash,because
I really don't think we have a chance to finish it before Gandhi.

Btw,the Temple of Solomon is already in St. Petersburg.

ok got it 10

[Off topic.
I couldn't get rid of Greebley's creative works above Giza and Byblos.
Please tell me how to create and delete this.

Actually, they predated me and I would have gotten rid of them, but I've forgotten how.

Out of curiosity has anyone made a list of all the keyboard shortcuts in this game? Such a list would be very useful. There are a lot of odd/useful things you can do via a shortcut. Just recently I was wondering how to redirect units just built automatically to a given city and also couldn't remember.

I would like to know about setting flags for new units as well.

I know how to get rid of those markers, though. Zoom all the way out and select delete and then remove those markers.

Since you did all the fun part, I was stuck with uneventful set of turns.

-obviously, get peace and those techs from Cathy. She's still please with us.
-trade rice for pigs to Gandhi.
-Start cottage, start Gem mine.
-Thebes is building temple yet is 12/7 and has no library. Switch to library and micro so its done in 17. St. Pet. is building granary, yet it doesn't have any food nor lighthouse. We have 5 cities without jud. Transporting our maces with galleys is tedious but very doable. We should attack Cyrus soon, astro is so far away.
- Elephantine granary-> galley, it has no science only some production. Hire two scientists in Alexandria to get Col faster.
-Ask Catharine for Mono, she agrees, switch to Organized.
Rest of turns zzzzz
i didn’t move units in my last turn.
Cyrus demands Construction. No

I suggest- we plan to attack Cyrus even with Galleys.
Also, leave that scientist we should use for Philosophy.
We are ready to attack Cathy again I think.
Use that Galley to scout Cyrus.
I don't agree with some decisions we did but it's all in the spirit of SG.
I see Team One is leading but not by much, when we finish off cathy, and if we start war with Cyrus we should be there.


http://img385.imageshack.us/img385/7138/civ4screenshot00205yt.jpg

niec turns, I especially agree with your MM. I looked at the save but was sure you would swap that temple as well. We need a monastery to spread our faith though.
Nice going to get mono from Cathy. before we redeclare on her, I would trade with her or demand techs, she is not going to survive much longer anyway.

our research rate looks atrocious at 30%, guess we need courts badly.

I also agree to prepare to attack Cyrus with galley since they are that close.

Once we have CoL, are we heading for CS or machinery first? Guess maces will help a ton to take on Cyrus.


Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp - up
TheRat
Till
Greebley

i woudl go for CS first since it boost our reasearch by much and has greatest trading potential. Though i'm not sure if Ghnadi will trade anything for now.
We should get few galleys to transport Maces and catapults over to Ghandi's theritory, and then declare. Cyrus is toasted.

I agree on attacking Cyrus, but do we really want to wait for maces? Civil Serivce is ~40 turns away at the current rate and Cyrus doesn't seem to have stronger defenses than Cathy had.
I think there is a decent chance to take at least one or two cities before macemen become necessary.

Edit: A Hindu missionary is being built in Heliopolis, yet our state religion is Judaism. An accident or a master plan i do not grasp? ;)

As long as we dont criple ourselves economicaly, we could attack. That's why i suggested waiting for CS.

Edit: A Hindu missionary is being built in Heliopolis, yet our state religion is Judaism. An accident or a master plan i do not grasp? ;)
No accident,Gandhi is Hindu,so my vote goes to a religion switch.
We can always start a war with Cyrus and instead of capturing cities
we can simply raze them and let Gandhi fill up the empty spaces.

I know how to get rid of those markers, though. Zoom all the way out and select delete and then remove those markers.
I don't know what you mean,but ALT + S will insert and delete text on a tile.

we need to get good relations with gandhi so he ultimately agrees on a permanent alliance. Would capturing and then gifting cities to him help us in that respect?

I was playing a recent game where I got the option to give back cities to the previous owner. I did so, though and didn't see any bonus. I think giving cities would just go under the easy-to-maximize trade bonus.

It occurs to me that one of the hardest things with Ghandi is that we can't get the military coalition bonus by having him attack. For that reason If anyone attacks Ghandi we should instantly declare war on the person, that being the only way to get the military bonus.

Other than that, I think we agree to anything he asks for and switch religion to match his - I can't think of any other way to get a good bonus - Oh, I guess matching his favorite civics??

knupp seems to be pretty busy these days, will slot in my turns tonight and if he posts, he can take it as a swap...

so, got it

played 16 turns to even things out
got CoL and went for compass since nobody had that
traded CoL with Russia for lit
Novgorod had 3 revolts and Russia should be taken asap
unfortunately Gandhi got compass in between
went for CS after compass, though Gnadhi has that too. I feel we need to get caravels to find other and get back to the trading game
economy should get better now with more courts. I was pretty conservative on whipping, I think we whip too much, it hurts our economy

took Tarsus after declaring on Cyrus, gifted it to Gandhi
repeated the same with Susa, losing 2 units

we have +11/-2 relation with Gandhi now
Cyrus has currency, maybe we can extort it from him

on the last turn, Cyrus would make peace now
he would give us 210gold and 3gpt, but not currency
maybe we can press on to 1 more city, pillage along the way and then go for peace once our units are burned anyway

we need to keep on improving our economy

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp - up ??
TheRat - swap with knupp
Till
Greebley

Took a look at the thERat's save.
We can bribe Gandhi to declare war on Catherine.
Maybe we should go for a phony war against her to
get those needed Military Alliance points/turns for a
Permanent Alliance.

I've been busy.

Sorry for the delay. I've got it.

I couldn't get to this game today and I'll be busy for most of tomorrow. Please skip me this round. Sorry.

I got it then. Will play later today.

Well I tried for a permanant alliance in a recent game and couldn't do it. The option wouldn't even appear. I had the two techs I thought I needed (communism and Fascism) but no good. I also read someone's post on getting them and we would have to have 40 turns of a defensive pact which means 40 turns of not declaring war. Finally, we and our ally cannot be the most powerful or it doesn't work.

I am now inclined to suggest we don't bother with trying it. Straight forward Domination is going to be faster.

The defensive pact is not an option,because we're at war
with someone.I disagree with Greebley's suggestion.
We have the opportunity now with a phony war with Catherine.
It won't hurt us if we try.

The defensive pact is not an option,because we're at war
with someone.I disagree with Greebley's suggestion.
We have the opportunity now with a phony war with Catherine.
It won't hurt us if we try.I do not understand exactly. Does our permanent war make a defensive alliance impossible?
In that case, we need to take out Huayna and then get an alliance. In addition we would have to make sure there is someone stronger than us or Gandhi./
If all that is true, I think this game is a little too complicted for an SG...But we can always try

If Greebley is correct, then i wouldn't even attempt to get a permanent alliance in a SP game. Can Ghandi flip our cities /can we flip his? If yes, maybe it is wise to switch to a containment strategy.

Gambling on the permanent alliance could make domination impossible, if Ghandi refuses to play along.

i agree with grebley, we should destroy persians and incas, and se it from there, i woudnt rely on allliance.

Inherited turn:
There's a Persian axe outside Susa waiting to tear up our 18 EXP chariot. I move it out along with an injured axeman.

1
Axe is chasing us. Unfortunately the empty city was not enough to tempt Cyrus into declaring war on Ghandi.

3
Whip courthouse in Moscow.
An Incan caravel shows up next to one of our fishnets.
A great scientist spaws. Use him to research Philosophy, as Ghandi doesn't seem to have it yet.

5
Take Basra, losing one unit. Burn it down.
Dial up cyrus. The cheap bastard still doesn't want to part with Currency. Alright, we can't take another city, but there's still pillaging left to be done.
Whip Courthouse in Yaroslavl.
Dial up Ghandi. Let's see what we can get for Philosophy.
Um Drama and 10 gold?! Come again?!
The best offer i can get is Philosophy +150 gold for Feudalism. OK.

6
Start pillagin Persia. Anything to fuel our research.
Damn! Cyrus managed to land two swordsmen on our lands. The galley must have come from Tarsus. Thanks again for being our buddy, Ghandi! :mad:
I can't get sufficient defender to the threatened town, so i dial up Cyrus for peace.
We get 210 gold and 3gpt, but no tech. :(

Nothing interesting happened during the remaining turns. Units are gathering near moscow for the final strike against Russia.
Most cities have courthouses now, but our economy still needs recovering. With only one trade partner, tech deals are sour.
We might consider gifting Cyrus spare resources, just to get him to trade with us again. Not that he has anything worthwhile besides currency.

(Also: Interesting that nobody has posted in the spoiler thread yet. Seems like we are not the only ones with a lack of contacts.)
---------->The Save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_AD0935_01.Civ4SavedGame)<----------

Interesting that nobody has posted in the spoiler thread yet. Seems like we are not the only ones with a lack of contacts.)We are pretty fast compared with other teams and honestly this map seems very slow and draggy. The game setup also makes thing difficult. I honestly do not understand how Huayna and Gandhi can be so advanced. What are they doing? Persia/Russia and us are those backward people. This isn't emperor or such difficutly.

We need to get to caravels to get overseas asap.

Anyway, good turns Till

I tried to go for a permanent alliance without a defensive pact,thus
only a military alliance in a current sologame.The facts :
You need indeed to be at least 40 turns at war to get the PA option.
After a 40 turns MA with Alex (+16),I did get the option,but he doesn't like
me enough.I didn't count the turns with Qin (+12),but the PA is possible.
See the pictures,the same phony war with Gandhi,.Also no WW.

http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/7273/civ4screenshot00040zd.jpg

http://img70.imageshack.us/img70/497/civ4screenshot00051cp.jpg

So,I still believe in this idea.

Hi guys just a lurker here and enjoy watching everybody's strategy. PA can be tricky but when I played a game I was approached to sign up for it and took it which resulted in winning a diplomatic victory. Here were the conditions: I was at war and we were mutually fighting the same enemy for some time. We were on a friendly status and trading quite a bit. He requested a tech and I let him have it as I have found it can really pay off.
Oh yea I was in second place and he was in third. I hope this give you some ideas and good luck......

Just another thing I forget to mention. I did have to sweeten up a third party to get them to vote for me for diplomatic victory. That PA is sweet by the way as you share everything and can double the tech speed. Just research what your partner isn't. That was the first time I got a PA and have to say made the game really enjoyable. Constant warmongering is fun but can have it drawbacks.....

Is it Ghandi we have permant peace with? If so, it will be very hard to do a phony war because you can't get him to attack anyone and we can't bribe someone to attack him. That is why I think we would need a defensive pact. Ghandi would stop the war before 40 turns.

One can get high bonuses with a Religious Civ. In my test game I had +8 for religion (and +5 for tech demands) I think I was over 20. The real problem was that 40 turns for the defensive pact - well I could take out all civs but my friend faster.

If it is not Ghandi, then a fake war may be good. Another rule I read is that neither us or them can be the most powerful which may mean disbanding troops.

[edit: I forgot one other major concern. Gyathaar, put us at peace with the civ (something not easy to do). If we are locked in peace, then can we get an Alliance? We may not be able to if that is a different "state" than "always peace". We could try it and find we can't do it at the end of the 40 turns.

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley - up

Ok, here is what I suggest. We try for permanent alliance victory make sure Gandhi get's big in the long run.
We ourselves make sure we are not better than #3.
We need to have a long war (preferably phony). It would help if we can make sure that Huayna and Gandhi do not like each other and we can get Gandhi to declare war on him.
If we can't get Gandhi to declare, we need to get rid of Huayna first, then go for a defensive pact.

This should be started around 30-40 turns before we can get facism. Then of course, we should make sure, we can grab as much land as possible to go beyond 66%. Thus, we might want to prepare a huge invasion force once we have that alliance.


As for shorter term, it might be good to trade with Cyrus as he is as backwards as us. Gift him some techs and other stuff to make him friendly and we might get back to trading.
And we need caravels urgently to explore the world and know everyone around.

Hi guys had a look at your game and looks good. Here some things you might want to consider. If you get PA with Ghandi eventually and he is at the top he will control UN and thereby will achieve a diplomatic victory himself. If you are in third spot it won't give you control of UN. Another point is that if another party signs DP with Ghandi and you need to take out that other party what happens when you declare. It is more likely you can achieve PA with a party less powerful than you and you are let's say in second spot. I noticed that Cyrus is friendly with Ghandi which complicates a future relationship with Cyrus since you have so many negatives with him. So it is likely as I have found (in other games) he will sign DP with Ghandi when he can. Good luck you haven't found everybody yet so there is room for diplomatic options. Just some things to consider.

AFAIK, you can never get Ghandi to declare war on anyone.

Can anyone verify or deny this?

"you can never get Ghandi to declare war on anyone."

yes you can if the price is right

Have to correct what I said earlier about PA. I just discovered that no matter what, you are one and if in control of UN counts for both. So I am sorry about that. You just need a friendly third party to get a diplomatic victory. I have also learned that it's 40 turns of DP or similiarly mutual war to get PA. I think it's better to be in second place to get PA with Ghandi. If you are at the top you might get the "too powerful" statement. Good luck and hope you don't mind commenting.

yes you can if the price is right
That will be our problem.

Just look at Till's save and we have now a double option,
we can bribe Gandhi into war with Catherine and Capac.
Also the 40 turns MA doesn't mean non-stop and with the
same enemy.
One war for Gandhi is enough,if he signs peace with one
enemy than bribe him to attack the other enemy.
40 turns are over before you know it.
I prefer we work on this idea to have more options later
ín the game.I don't like to fight against time,because
someone is running away in tech while we are fighting.

Off topic situation
Same solo game.Won diplomatic,but played some more turns to see
if Bismarck wanted immediately a PA after the 40 turns MA.
Btw,I owned the U.N. and Alex still didn't like me enough for a PA.
(He voted for me,but did lose the game. :shake: )

http://img110.imageshack.us/img110/6292/civ4screenshot00010me.jpg

Score graph

http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/7227/civ4screenshot00038jl.jpg

Power graph

http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/341/civ4screenshot00052gj.jpg

http://img110.imageshack.us/img110/6582/civ4screenshot00077cw.jpg

I can't make any conclusions based on the positions at the score +
power graph.

That PA is sweet by the way as you share everything and can double the tech speed. Just research what your partner isn't.
I don't think this is completely true.
To me the tech costs are doubled.

Tatran what I meant was this:

Let's say it takes 10 turns for umm satellites. If you both research it then it is 5 turns for each civ. I am not convinced it doubles the tech costs as when I entered into a PA the turn count did not increase to reflect that. I could be wrong.

you are right, no cost increase

Kan wel wezen,maybe you guys can explain the following :

Before the permanent alliance

http://Serv3.imagehigh.com/imgs/03/9792_Civ4ScreenShot0004.JPG

After the permanent alliance

http://Serv3.imagehigh.com/imgs/03/26652_Civ4ScreenShot0005.JPG

Wouldn't be fair,would it?

Tatran,
Good point, Ben jij Hollands???
I noticed you started your sentence in dutch.

Greebley, just to make sure you know you are up :bump:

@Cosmichail
"Oranje boven"

On topic.
Those permanent alliances are a real game saver.
You still can win if you're ages behind in tech.Allmost a cheat.

Greebley, just to make sure you know you are up :bump:

Whoops, I got it then. Sorry about that. I thought I had checked.

Tatran,
Do you need 40 turns total or 40 continuous turns? I am guessing the latter.

Going to go ahead and play...

I played 10 turns.

Preturn:
I don't think I have been this far behind in tech in a Monarch game. But then I like concentrating on commerce.

Looking it over, one thing I think we need to do is grow our towns. I MM for food in many of them. We aren't even using some of our food bonuses. I also hope to work more cottages and such to improve tech.

Early: Line up for the Russian War.

Mid: Advance into Russia.

Late: Take the Last Russian town.

An Incan Caravel goes to our Clam resource and camps it.

We got Civil Service and Currency. I then went for Metal Casting to go for Caravels. I don't like losing sea control on a map with this much water.

Units have been moving back over toward Persia again now that Russia is no more.

I just started the Irrigation shown in the following picture.

Our position seems very weak to me for this point in the game. I am hoping I am wrong. If we can take out Cyrus, I think it will improve things.

I put the Capitol on Hanging Gardens, but it hasn't started yet. Feel free to switch.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/RatPack1_AD1100.jpg

The 1100 AD Save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_AD1100_01.Civ4SavedGame)

Pre-turn
Set Moscow on the Forbidden Palace.
Also those forests have to be chopped or it will take
ages for St. Petersburg to grow.
Cancel the Hanging Gardens in Thebes.This city needs a marketplace.
Same thing in St. Petersburg.

1136 AD (6)
Capac changes to mercantilism.

1142 AD (7)
A Jewish missionary fails. :mad:

Quiet turns.Worked mostly on our economy.
We have a large stack at Cyrus' borders.He's cautious and
doesn't have longbows yet.

http://img144.imageshack.us/img144/20/pic270re4sr.jpg

i need a skip

Alright I'm up then.

Sorry I haven't been as active as I should be. Been pretty busy lately. Your discussion really is enlightening. I'm not sure which strategy is best. I guess things will just play out.

I hope we can find someone who is till stronger than us else this condition that both can't be #1 and #2 would be a problem.

The stack we have has a lot of old and soon obsolete units, so I'd say use it to get some cities for Gandhi and pillage some cottages.

Meh. Really sorry guys. I'm going to need a skip. Two times in a row, bleh. :(

Feel free to yell at me. If we lose the contest you can blame that on me.

Promise after this weekend I should be able to finish this game up skip-free.

Does this SGOTM have a close dead-line?
If not,I won't mind if we continue next week,following the roster
without the skips.

there is no deadline and we aren't the last team anyway, I agree to wait for acid to come back and follow the roster from there

Tatran,
Do you need 40 turns total or 40 continuous turns?
You only have to ''collect" 40 turns.


I don't know whether this has been brought up or should be discussed, but what are the exact conditions for permanent alliances in this game. Or are they disabled due to permanent war?

Not sure if I should answer this, since you could figure this out yourself with some test games or reading articles/SDK... but ok.. being at war does not prevent permanent alliances..
@ThERat
You probably meant defensive pacts,so Gyathaar's comment is totally
useless.We still don't know if it's possible to sign a defensive pact and
being at war with someone from the start.I don't think we can until
we have 100% peace -> means the Incas have to be eliminated.

I am pretty sure you can't be at war and sign a defensive pact. I couldn't in a previous game and I don't think starting at war would make a difference. We would have to wipe out the Incans before any defensive pact. I am more inclined to try the Allies in war method.

I would rather not give a whole lot of land and cities to Ghandi until we are sure we can get an alliance. If we can't for whatever reason, we have made it much harder to win.

You cannot sign a defensive pak if you are at war at someone.

Also, if you declare war when you have a defensive pak with someone the deal will be canceled and the other Civ is NOT required to declare war on the person you declared war on. The same goes if the AI declares war on someone while you have a defensive pak with them, the deal will be cancelled and you don't go to war with the third party.

There a variant possible to sign to a peace treaty with Huayna Capac
if we sign a permanent alliance with Gandhi and he is at peace with the Incas.
Or Gandhi will declare war on the Incas after signing the PA.
I don't know exact what will happen.
See this thread.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=4122280#post4122280

I'm really sorry guys, i need to be put on autoskip for now, i hope to get my hands on a copy of civ4 next week since my laptop died on me.

Alright, I'm up then. What exactly is our plan here. Take Cyrus's cities and then gift them to Ghandi?

Just did a test what will happen if 2 civs sign a PA and one is at war
,in our case the Incas,and the other is not.
War overrules peace.
The test also gave info on the defensive pact like in our case.
The option isn't available.
So sharing a military struggle is the only way to get a permanent alliance
as long as the Incas are in the game.

Cyrus has to be eliminated in the second war.
Instead -1 we get -2 with Gandhi for every war
we have started.

Ok, I think if we want to win this competition, we simply need to gamble. If we go for another Cyrus war (we should prepare more troops for that adventure), wipe him out and donate cities to Gandhi. We simply need to play this game hoping we can get a permanent alliance.

Either getting him to declare on our foes for 40 turns or having a defensive pact. However, for option 2 we need to eliminate Huayna, might not be that easy though.
So, I hope we can get Gandhi to fight alongside us against our foes. Whatever that takes.

I am very leary about giving Ghandi cities right away. If he becomes most powerful, then there is no way we can make him less so. Gifting him cities and he becomes strongest then we could make it impossible to get an alliance and could find the game unwinnable if he grew enough.

Lets keep at least the better cities for now. Once we have the alliance we can gift him to our hearts content.

Tatran,
Do we need both Communism and Fascism for a permanant alliance or just one of the two?

We need either on of them.
I don't like the idea of gifting cities to Gandhi at all.
I think we should try to wipe out Cyrus and keep all his cities if we can for higher score.
Also, I think in one of my older games I was able to sign PA some civ even though I never fought war with that civ but we did share defensive pact for a long ass time. Honestly I don't see this PA thing happening that easy here, but I’d be glad if proved wrong

I don't like to give Gandhi all those cities either.
In my solo games he's always one of the tech leaders
and wonder builder.
Maybe we should wait until our economy can handle another
expansion.
If we let Cyrus live there is another variant possible.
Gandhi and Cyrus signing a defensive pact.
I don't know what will happen in this case,but maybe
we can get rid of Gandhi too.

My turns were eventless economy improving ones. Discovered Marchinery, Optics and started on Guilds. Forbidden Palace finished down south.

Once this round of infrastructure finishes up we should be able to go all military and take out Cyrus. I don't think the stack outside his borders now will be able to do much more than take a city or two. Knights will help in that area.

I also don't like the idea of gifting cities to Ghandi. He is already ahead of us tech-wise and making him stronger makes no sense. As long as we have +4 for friendly deals we aren't getting anything out of gifting him cities. If we aren't able to get the PA then we will need those cities to achieve a domination victory ourself.

And the Save:

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr - autoskip
knupp
TheRat - up
Till
Greebley

Agree on building up a stronger force to take on Cyrus. Did we send out some caravels that we know what we are facing in th world? More contacts are essential for trading as well since Gandhi is so far ahead.

whip caravel in Byblos and Alexandria, we need contacts if nothing else
also get open borders with Cyrus, might as well check their land to attack

what I had hoped happens and Huayna loses his caravel against ours

explore and get HG for us in the capital for much needed health

get guilds which gandhi has, go for paper for the liberalism slingshot
get theology from Cyrus, he is still good for something

discover an interesting Island city of Huyana, home of 2 religions, we should take that instead of Cyrus
while near Huayna, meet Theordore and get engineering from him

on my last turn get a new source of iron near Byblos, not that we mind that

situation:
paper is done in 2 turns, maybe we can trade to Gandhi for astro, we need that to invade Huayna
we are #2 in score with Gandhi #1, how to get permanent alliance

I would try for the liberalism slingshot now, while building some troops to get that city and a starting point

for an invasion, we should also bring our troops back from Cyrus, we can always invade him later
if we go for that, trade with Cyrus, he has 5gpt for us


http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads11/ratpack1280.jpg

by the way knupp, you never uploaded your save to the correct site, I did that for you, next time please do not post your save here but at the SGOTM page, thanks ;)

Our enemy is very close.That's good.
Btw,how many AIs are in the game.
I know Saladin is in the game,Roosevelt has some
Arabian cities and isn't running any religion.
Maybe Huayna is alone and that holy island looks
worthless to me.
Let Cyrus live for now and get Astronomy.

(I'm curious what will happen if Cyrus and Gandhi sign
a defensive pact and we attack Cyrus.I can't test this
with the custom settings.)

Sorry about that Rat. Completely forgot. Thanks. :)

maybe we could use Saladin for some war with Gandhi, as we said we need 40turns of common war. Since Saladin lost some cities to Roosevelt (if I understand Tatran's post correctly), he should be weak.

We can start fighting Huyana close to our Island, we should build a nice force with maces/knights/pikes/cats and also bring our old stack over.

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr - autoskip
knupp
TheRat
Till - up
Greebley
ok, one team finished already and we have roughly 60turns to domination. So, if we still want to win here, we got to play absolutely optimal and start invading Huyana NOW even with galleys

So,Team One finished in 1610 AD.
Well,if we have only about 60 turns
I doubt we will finish before this date. :(
Looking at the demographics/land area :
Gandhi 20%,we 18%,Roosevelt ?,Huayna Capac (average),Cyrus and Saladin.
The Incan territory + Gandhi's territory isn't enough and we still need those
40 turns MA and a required tech for a permanent alliance.

Got it. My turns will probably consist of war preperations against Huyana. But even if we pick up the pace, i am doubtful about winning within 60 turns.

I agree with theRat, we need to start trowing rocks on HC if we can
and damn it sux not being able to play now

I'm sorry, it looks like i won't have time to play today. Feel free to skip me, otherwise i'll play as soon as possible, which might not be before saturday. :(

I looked at the graphs and we have exact 69 turns to beat Team One.
Another horror was the power graph.

I suggest Till plays this weekend.We aren't in a hurry.
(Greebley is also up in some other SGs.)

Ya, I don't mind waiting. I was busy tonight and have another game for tomorrow. I wouldn't be able to get to it any earlier.

Thanks for your patience, folks! :)

Inherited Turn:
Sugar to Cyrus for 5gpt.
Try to move a Galley into Incan territory, but it wouldn't do. Unless there is some black magic i don't know about, we will have to wait until Astronomy.

2
Caravel discovers Incan city. Man, those Ican names are worse than the Aztec ones! Incan caravel heads for our coast.
Paper comes along. Gandhi doesn't want to give us Astronomy, however. All we can get is Drama+ WM+ 30 gold.
That's a balant rip off! No way i'm going to take that deal. We badly need Astronomy, but it is a 4k tech opposed to paper being 1k.
I reckon it's wiser to gamble on the Liberalism slingshot...

3
Move our caravel next to the Incan one.
Our first unit arrives back home from the Persian expedition.
With Nationalism and Astronomy Gandhi is leaving us far behind in the tech race.

4
Incan caravel backs off.
Started the Heroic Epic in Thebes.

5
We get a great scientist!
Education comes in 6 turns and if i understand Dave's technology chart correctly, the scientis will most likely research printing press for us afterwards.


7
We meet Saladin!
He is extremly backwards and annoyed with us for trading with his worst enemy.

9
Give Cyrus Literature for 100 gold + world map. That should shorten the race to Liberalism by a turn or two.

I tried to balance building units and infrastructure. Even with moderate whipping, there are growing health issues. Education is due next turn. I'm curious which tech the great scientist will offer then.

---------->The Save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_AD1370_02.Civ4SavedGame)<----------

This game is becoming more and more a disaster.
Huayna has already Education !!!
Also,we can bribe Gandhi only into a war with Huayna.
If we steam roll the Incas the military struggle option
is gone unless Gandhi gets annoyed with Saladin.

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley - up

well, let's just try and finish this without looking at the other teams. Obviously we haven't played this the way to win...

I got it. I was busy with civ3 last night and unfortunately didn't finish. So I will be playing this tonight or tomorrow.

So do we want to bribe Ghandi into a war with Hyuna right now then?

Yesterdays game took far too long into the night (which I spelled knight the first time), but I am now free to play this game. Hopefully, that will be tonight.

(which I spelled knight the first time)
I'm 100% sure it isn't the first time someone spells knight for night.
Must be in one of LK Civ3 series,maybe it was you.

Back to the game.Take your time.I haven't played Civ4 for more
than a week now.Too busy and it's too warm.Maybe I'm losing
interest.
To keep our dreams alive,try and bribe Gandhi into a war so we
can collect some military struggle points/turns.

Probably was me. I've done it before...

I am going to start playing and see how we can do.

Well I played to 1406 when we lost the race to Liberalism (5 turns away).

I am handing off now so we can discuss if we to switch techs. I am inclined to switch to Astronomy.

We are really lagging in tech this game. We also have nothing to trade to get Ghandi to declare on anyone and he won't do it for free.

Here is a picture with the techs we can choose. Good ones include Astronomy, Gunpowder, PP, Drama.

We are doing very badly in keeping up in tech and I have no insight into why. In Rat16 we can keep up with Immortal AI but we are behind by many many techs to Ghandhi at Monarch? I would be interested in anyones theories on this.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a251/Greebley/RatPack1_AD1406.jpg

I think I forgot to wake up a Caravel. Check on them.
The 1406 AD Save (http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/civ4sgotm1/Rat_Pack_SG001_AD1406_01.Civ4SavedGame)

ell, we must have done something wrong here, I am also puzzled why we are that far behind Gandhi. In hindsight, we should have nurtured Cyrus for a trading game since we can't fight Gandhi anyway.

Well, for now I suggest to go for astro so we can send unit to Huayna

Astronomy is the only viable option, from my perspective. We can't do anything before we get galleons.
In hindsight, the whole war with Cyrus wasn't such a great idea, but it can hardly be the only reason why Ghandi is running away on us.

Greebley didn't mention Gandhi was the one who beat us to Liberalism. :eek:
I think we went wrong with the Russians.Maybe a combo attack against
Cyrus and give Catherine those Persian cities to handle Gandhi later was
maybe a better option.

Also,it's not a fact yet,we lost the competition,but I don't want to lose
this game.Gandhi runs away and we can't do a thing about it.Roosevelt
is our only hope in trading.Roosevelt is busy researching Education,so
another tech trading opportunity is gone.I suggest finishing Liberalism and
start trading with Roosevelt,we need banks anyway.

Got it.

No, i'll tell you where we went wrong: Going TOO LATE after cathy, i.e waiting for catapuls, settling too many of our cities which lowered our gpt thus research, etc..
also i just noticed, did we actually gift our cities to ghandy??

Pre-turn
Well,this is a team game,I'll switch our research
towards Astronomy.We can always switch back to finish Liberalism
or in between,we don't lose any research points in Civ4 by switching.

1472 AD (11)
Now this is something I was afraid of.

http://img352.imageshack.us/img352/4812/pic285re4oh.jpg

Both favor the UniSuf civic.
If these two sign a permanent alliance...
Positive point Roosevelt switched to a Theocracy.

1484 AD (13)
Roosevelt is now also Friendly with us.
Nice friends,Gandhi and Roosevelt,they don't share any tech and
won't help in war-time.I kept trying every turn.Nothing works.Sigh.

1490 AD (14)
Astronomy is in.
Roosevelt hasn't got it,so there is a trade opportunity.

Important !!!
I could finally test what would happen if Gandhi signs a defense pact
with some other AI.Conclusion : we can get rid off the great Mahatma.

Did i get that right? We can declare on Ghandi now?
Well, that's excellent! In that case we might want to consider laying waste on him instead of Hyana.

No, i'll tell you where we went wrong: Going TOO LATE after cathy, i.e waiting for catapuls, settling too many of our cities which lowered our gpt thus research, etc..
also i just noticed, did we actually gift our cities to ghandy??

This isn't why we are behind Ghandi in tech. Its quite possibly may be why we don't finish fastest - that is another matter entirely, but other games I have played show that building early towns helps tech in the long run not hurt it unless you go over a certain number of towns, which I don't think we did here. I am more inclined to think that we settled too late rather than too early. We did have that weird haitius where we didn't use settlers we had. I may be that we built the towns and fought the war at the same time. Settling earlier or later might have both been better. It does take a bit of time to get towns to a production level where they are ahead.

Rapid settlement of 8 towns very early works well for tech if the cities have commerce. This is probably the most powerful in terms of the tech race.

What happens if we declare war on America?

Maybe I wasn't clear enough.
I tested the defensive pact between Gandhi and Roosevelt
by declaring war on America and this initiated a war with
the Indians.

this sounds like an explout but so be it. This means we can now turn against the #1 in this game, I would like this. We won't win this game anwway, might as well have a blast at it.

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr - up
knupp
TheRat
Till
Greebley

ok got it will play today-tommorow

:( I sincerely apologize guys I really don't have time to play now, unless you don't mind waiting couple of more days please skip me.

@acid
I noticed you're up in several SGs.
Some other teams are still in BC. :eek:
We can wait,but I'm not the teamleader.

I'd say we can wait here too, SGOTM's usually progress very slow and I guess especially this SGOTM has seen many new players that udnerestomate the committment needed for SG's.
That said, acid, if you can't take it soon, ask for a skip, thanks

Maybe I wasn't clear enough.
I tested the defensive pact between Gandhi and Roosevelt
by declaring war on America and this initiated a war with
the Indians.

PLEASE NOTE:

If you have played ahead to try this then you are committed to it. You cannot try things out and then back up to a previous save and choose whether to do them or not.

@AlanH
First,no one knows how permanent alliances exactly work
and I couldn't test it in a custom sologame.
I had an idea,but I think the option ""permanent war or peace"
in the set up is bugged.I never had a permanent war result.
I also don't want to use an option if I don't know the result.

Second,I've also the feeling the permanent alliances are bugged.
I encountered some PA problems before I joined this SGOTM.
See the thread I started.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=173008

Btw Alan,you aren't that naive to think everyone plays 100%
clean on the net.Do you?
Look at our team,we have several members who won at Immortal
and still we are doing bad in almost every category.

Yes, I am naive enough to try to ensure a level playing field for all players in the competitions I help to organise. If you don't want to play by those rules, please don't insult my efforts by joining in the competitions and breaking them. Just play solo games according to your own rules.

If you had a question with respect to the way the permanent war and peace were set up then you should have asked.

ok, so if either knupp or acid can play this, we will follow AlanH's point and declare war on America as 'tested' by Tatran. We do honor the rules of this game. So, please from now do not play forward any longer.

Roster
Tatran
acidsatyr -
knupp - up
TheRat
Till
Greebley

I guess I always felt it was ok to test with older saves but not the current one (being careful not to learn new info in playing old save - learning the strength of a potential enemy is bad - trying to duplicate someone elses result for example would be ok - though it best to wait enough turns that any info can't possibly spoil). Since the def pact is new that means we tested with the recent one and so I agree with Alan. We should declare war immediately. Besides Alan is the