So, I've been reading about this Hall of Fame Mod and all, and decided to give it a shot. Lately I've been playing CivIII, and most of my CivIV experience has been playing the Earth map and ending the game around 1800 when my computer drags to a halt, so it's safe to say I'm not nearly as good at CivIV as CivIII (not that I'm that great there, either). In fact, Noble is the highest level I've beat CivIV at (not counting a Monarch Quechua rush I once did). So hopefully I'll learn a lot and up my skills by at least one level. I'll also get to try a lot of new things in CivIV - I know I haven't played every civ or every map.

So, tonight I uninstalled CivIV and deleted all the old mods I never play to get a fresh start and the wonder movies working again, re-installed Civ, v.1.61, and added the HoF Mod, and started out on the long, slow road towards accomplishment.

And I've played my first game in the HoF Mod. Tonight I decided to take it easy and play a nice, short, Settler-level Inca Duel Map. Don't worry, I won't be playing all Inca Duel games :lol:! Just thought this would be a nice way to start out. And...

I messed up the Quechua rush :blush: . I attacked Washington (random opponent, America) without sufficient forces, and lost my first charge. I rebuild and finally win, but in the end I finish several centuries later on Settler level than I had when I tried this strategy on Monarch level. Looks like I've fallen quite a ways since I picked up CivIII again :).

Or it could just be that Settler difficulty is actually more difficult than Monarch. Hey, I've never tried anything below Noble before, so I don't really know...

The reason Quechua are so good is because they have 100% strength against archery units. In settler difficulty the other civs don't start with archer but rather they start with warrior, wheras in your Monarch game the other civ would have started with archers.

^That makes sense. I did notice America had a Warrior when I first got there, which of course delayed me. Learning something already.

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Game Two
Civilization: Arabia
Difficulty: Noble (see, back up to something on par for me)
Speed: Normal
Map: Continents
Opponents: 7, all random
Sea Level: Normal
Temperate Climate
Aggressive AI
Permanent Alliances

And thus my second game with the HoF mod began. This one of course will pose a much greater challenge than the last one, especially considering my last two completed CivIV games before Game One here were in February and last July.

Starting with Mysticism, I decide to grab Hinduism quickly. That goes well, and I see I'm also well positioned to grab Judaism, so I help myself to another religion. Getting on a role, I direct my research towards Code of Laws and Confucianism. That's right, this quickly became a Religion-monger game. When I completed the Oracle in Medina 875 BC, I took Theocracy for Christianity. After a short break for Agriculture and Animal Husbandry, I got right back on the road to Philosophy for Taoism. And I ended up getting Islam in 1000 AD as well. Only disadvantage? Well, Buddhism exceeded 2/3 of the world's people as followers at one time.

Obviously I focused on getting lots of Great Prophets and spreading lots of different religions. India, my only neighbor on the home continent, became Confucian, so I also did to maintain friendly relations. Good relations were necessary, as my army was Warriors, Archers, and Chariots - obviously a strategy that wouldn't work in multiplayer, but even with Aggressive AI an AI that has +8 relations for "Brothers of the Faith" is surprisingly unwilling to invade.

But what was my real goal? Culture. I've never recieved a Culture Victory in CivIV. It's just imposing - 3 cities with 50,000 culture? 100,000 culture in the entire empire would win in CivIII. But I had a good start with the Oracle in Medina and soon The Parthenon in Mecca. I was getting Great Prophets at an amazing rate with The Parthenon and Philosophical, so Religious Wonders came quickly. I kept on building every wonder I could with my Marble, unfortunately lacking stone. Damascus became my third culture city. I finally researched Music in 1535, probably later than I should have, and expanded my religion-spreading efforts to have temples of as many religions as possible in each city, and then build lots of Synagogues, Cathedrals, Academies, etc. in my three culture cities for +50%. I adopted Free Speech as soon as I discovered it, and built the Hermitage in Medina, at the time the slowest-culture of the 3 cities, for an additional bonus.

Oh, and by denying India rights of passage I was able to colonize more than 20% of the land and be ahead in Domination even with Horse Archers being my most fearsome weapon until the 1800s AD.

That all changed in 1824 AD, when Spain landed 5 Conquistadores and a Catapult by my city of Baghdad, 3 tiles east of Medina. I had one Warrior defending the city. Oops. Good news: They didn't land near Damascus. Better news: I had lots of Chariots and Horse Archers that could reach Medina in time. Best news: I had just finished researching Military Tradition and could upgrade my horse units to Cavalry in time. Talk about perfect timing. Baghdad was hopeless, but Medina never came under attack. I changed several cities' production to Cavalry in case Spain invaded again, and after the war had enough troops to invade India and raze a city (only to come running back to Damascus and using Slavery to get a few extra defenders after India dropped 5 Grens and a Catapult outside the gates by sea).

As of 1872, where I am now, Medina is guaranteed to reach 54k by the end of game, Damascus is guaranteed 46k, and Mecca is guaranteed 45k. Both Damascus and Mecca have Christian Cathedrals due to finish in one turn. Research is on Feudalism. :eek: Yeah, Feudalism. I kind of ignored military, remember? And I build Temples and Monasteries instead of Libraries, Universities, and Markets.

Edit: Played until 1954. Looks like I might be in danger of a Space Race; I'm now guaranteed a win by 2050 but not too much earlier. Meanwhile, India wants revenge and invaded me. They have Tanks, Infantry, and Artillery, as well as modern warships; I still have Cavalry. Looks like I did ignore science a bit too much. At least my Cavalry are still managing to killing the invaders at a 3-to-1 ratio.

Edit: The game continues!

India takes my city of Bahlk, on the site of Madras, in 1955.

In 1957 Spain invaded me and landed Artillery and Gunships near my old city of Baghdad. The Gunships couldn't capture cities, so I hunted them down only as I could, and focused on eliminating the artillery. Again the losses favored Arabia.

In 1959 I launch an offensive against India and retake Bahlk. They come back and retake it in their turn, but in 1960 I take it for good. 6 Cavalry were lost, but India lost more troops, and more expensive troops at that.

The major threat thereafter was a Space Race victory by another civ. I hurried another Cathedral in Medina, set my major cities to culture, and switched from Slavery to Merchantilism so I could get more Great Artists. Mecca achieved Legendary in 2001. That same year India invaded, landing 4 Artillery, a Tank, and a SAM by Damascus. I had Artillery by then, and they never attacked. I used a Great Artist, Vermeer, to create a Great Work in Damascus in 2004, and Damascus achieved Legendary. At the beginning of 2005, Medina achieved Legendary, and for the first time I had achieved a Cultural Victory in CivIV.

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Any egregious errors? Let me guess: Being a little too ignorant of the military.

Any different culture-win strategy? I've been pleased that I've done this well on my first real try on it, but I'd guess Music should have come a little earlier. Maybe forget Islam since I already had 5 religions and go the Music path instead of Divine Right?

Did you use the culture slider at all after getting drama? IMO that is the key to cultural victory.

With all those religions and great prophets you should have built holy shrines for your most dominant religions and have no need for any commerce going to taxes. If I have and doing well on the Tech front I'll gradually increase my culture slider, eventually it gets to 100%. Free Speech after obtaining liberalism is a must with the 100% culture bonus.

Culture Slider - No, or maybe just a little bit. My military's primitive weapons was worrying me, especially after the 1820's, so I directed money to research. Most of the rest I spent upgrading obsolete units and buying off enemies (only after they'd fought me, not giving in to tribute). I didn't really feel comfortable fighting with only Cavalry against Tanks and Gunships, even defensively.

I did build Holy Shrines; that helped a lot in commerce. I never got very many banks built though (didn't get banking for a long time due to focusing on more religions), and never got my religions onto the other continent. I can't even imagine how much money I would've had if I'd gotten 2 religions per city in the other continent's cities. I did have 3 or 4 religions per city in my lands. By the end of the game Buddhism (the other continent's religion) had 70% of the world's people as converts :(.

Free Speech I did adopt right away. With the combination of Free Speech and a few Cathedrals, I was getting a 250% bonus at least in all my major cities, higher later on.

Nice signature by the way. It does a nice job of summing up the thoughts of some of my Cavalry.

Free Speech I did adopt right away. With the combination of Free Speech and a few Cathedrals, I was getting a 250% bonus at least in all my major cities, higher later on.

All your major cities? Cultural victory only needs 3 to be at legendary, so you can still specialize some of your other cities to do the military production. I guess that's a habit that carried over from Civ3.

Once the bonus is up to 250% it can also help to maximize your artist specialists and switching your production to culture. Suddenly a city with 20hammer production is producing an extra 70 culture a turn...beats building that additional temple late in the game for less than 5 per turn.

Nice signature by the way. It does a nice job of summing up the thoughts of some of my Cavalry.

If promotions had quotes, it would be a good one for flanking :lol:

What was the makeup of the improvements in your Legendary cities. The easiest way to a cultural victory is to cottage spam and then crank the culture slider. Each town is 6-8 cpt BEFORE bonuses. Obviously, diplomacy is important to keep the AI from invading. Also, how many Great Prophets did you get? Hopefully no more than two. Those would have been much more effective as GA.