I picked the Dutch for this game because I wanted to play with the Dikes, the Dutch UB that gives all water tiles +1 hammer. Unlike the Levee it replaces, a dike can be built in a city that isn't directly on a river which gives additional flexibility in city placement. Dutch coast tiles with Dikes and Financial give 2f1h3c which is a very respectable output, so if the Dutch have access to enough coast they are able to stay competitive in the later game with less land than normal. With military expansion being difficult in BTS Deity this late-game ability deserves some serious consideration.

Willem (the only choice for Dutch leader) has the nice trait combo of Creative/Financial which makes him one of the best leaders at early peaceful expansion without going broke.

Settings: normal speed, deity, fractal, 7 civs

The starting capital location is nice and settling it popped a hut for 38 gold:

http://img485.imageshack.us/img485/4962/d1wm8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

I'd like to invite players (all skill levels welcome) to take the initial save, play it out till about 1500 BC and compare approaches to the opening, as I think we can all learn a lot this way.

Hey Uber,

Looking forward to this. If I have time, I will grab the save and play along as the Dutch are one of my fav leaders.

coincidently, i played a game where i called myself the flying dutchman a couple of games ago.

on a more useful note, creative and financial is a very fun combination. i remember the fun i had with a vanilla Catherine and cossacks. those were the days... When i play as the dutch, i end up going to space, financial is very well suited for this and there UB adds production to coastal and riverside cities, giving some decent spaceship production. mix the dike with the moai statues and you have an impressive production city even if it is just a 1x1 island.

the start is good, coastal benefits from both the UB and financial traits. the river will give added commerce and it is food rich, making a nice hybrid city running a combination of scientists and cottages. with all that forest and 3 plains hills, it should be decent production as well.

i would love to play but i am still a long way off deity compatible, immortal is beyond my current BTS abilities. but good luck!

I'll give it a shot. I haven't actually won on Deity yet, but I've come closer since BtS than I ever did on Warlords....

Nice start position. Tons of food, and that seafood will all be 3 commerce. Mining-BW seems like the obvious choice, with a series of workboats. Then get chopping and REX for land. Creative/Financial is a very strong combination, imho.

peace,
lilnev

Wilem is my favorite leader so I'll be giving this a shot even though it's a step up from my normal difficulty, expect a fantastic defeat from my update.

I'll give a shot too. I achieved with Willy my first Immortal BtS win and Dikes are great. Cre/Fin is also great. Definitely try this one - looks like some open game to me ;)

Quick report 1 AD

Screen shots disappeared :(
Barbs were out of hand at the start for me, I had 3 barb archers wandering about my capitol at 3500BC, slowed me down a lot!

Went Mining/BW, no copper, grabbed animal handling hoping for horses and found some a bit to far SE of the capitol, with barbs doing a number on me I had to settle it quickly with a bit more overlap then I like.

Found all the action was to our south and the northern lands aren't all that great, rushed down with a settler for the horses to trade and some happiness resourses, beat Napoleon by 1 turn to the spot being forced to settle 1 north of where I should have. Founded the other 2 coastal cities at the top of our world and then met all the AI's, I'm mighty backwards and don't have a religion as they seem unwilling to spread anything to me. Just before I stopped at 1AD the entire world broke out in war, I had 5 different leaders ask me to start a war with them, ended up picking the Confucian block of Gig and Ramses as Napoleon has to my first target.

Just starting to pump out military now, the real war will start in 100 years or so, going to be a very tough win for me.

I gave it a shot. Immortal is challenging for me, but I really have little idea how to compete on deity.

I played up to 1440 BC. Here's how it went: I have two cities claiming land in the south, two workers, three fishing improvements, and a few warriors. I have horses hooked up and a barracks in that city. I had some barbarian problems at my capital, and they pillaged the pig ranch and the mine. I have bronze working, animal husbandry, pottery, and half of alphabet, but that will take a while to finish.

I tried to copy the strategy of expanding far and fast to claim land, but it seems like all I got from that were two weak cities and a poor tech rate. I'm blocking the peninsula now, and there are two barbarian cities to capture in the south, so if I can avoid war, maybe things could work out.

Great, 18 downloads already - we ought to get some good discussion here.

How this will work is anyone can pick up a save at any point and play some turns, and compare the results with other players. So it doesn't really matter if you don't normally play at such a high difficulty level. By playing a session and comparing with what other players did you will probably get insights that you can apply to your normal game.

After giving it a couple of days I'll post my next report and save, and people are free to either use mine or continue from their own save.

Good luck!

add me to the pool but I'm no deity. We have IMHO a very strong leader tho.

A difficulty could be no military UU...

I had an small go at the map. Currently at 1680 with one city which has founded 3 religions and got great wall and oracle. Going to start outward expansion now.

Just a little analysis, had no time to play it out


The start looks good, with all those seafood it's nice to have fishing already.
I see one problem: the tech that would give you the most at this moment is BW (chop/whip would be a superb source of production with all those forests and the excess food, you also get mining in the process which you need anyway)
Additional you would get to axes, and there is exactly the problem, if there is no copper, you are stuck, with deity barbs around this would be a do or die strategy (IW on immortal/deity is usually too late)
On the other side you haven't hunting, so archery takes time also and will absorb a lot of beakers, while you cann't chop, cann't whip.
Going AH for horses first is another gamble. You don't need it in the first place since the seafood is far superior compared to the pigs early on because of the additional commerce and because it won't be pillaged AND horses seem to be less likely in BTS (at least for me)
So the save variant could very well be too slow in terms of expansion and the risk-variant beelining to BW or even IW if necessary would relay on some luck, but from my experience early deity is a bit of gamble anyway.

Completely played with no better idea what to do with stone and what to do with these forests. It's too late to build Pyramids. The second city was close to be razed by barbs. No wonders. Now I'am working on horseback riding to raze barb city. Happiness is a problem. I screwed it.

@ uberfish:

I only have warlords on the laptop I have with me, but I might give this game a shot once I return, but it will be another week or so...

Because I don't feel like to play BtS currently I thought to give this a try. This is my first Deity game ever in BtS. I've tried it couple times in Warlrods.


Tech-path. Mining -> BW -> Iron-> Wheel -> Pottery -> Writing.

Build-order in Capital. Awesome Capital maybe a reason why I started to play this in first place.
3x Warrior fogbusting.
2x Workboat.
1x Warrior. fogbusting.
1x Worker
2x Settler. Chopped.
2x Worker. Chopped.
1x Granary. Whipped 1 pop.
Started Lib for scientist.

Utrecth. Plently of seafood, 2 scientist, whipping, trade routes. No doubt it's going to work.
2x Workboat.

The Hague. Just to make sure I get all those happiness resources.
Started Barracks to pump out some axemens.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/88126/Uberfish_1320.JPG

I think my game is pretty good example what good fogbusting can do. I met only one barb and a few animals. I'm pretty happy that barb-phase is done and only with warriors but the other side of the coin is coming as I'm very low on powergraph AI may attack. Especially Shaka.



I'm trying to post a screenshot of my empire but I dont know last time it didn't work out. I know we spoke about 1440 BC. But I wanted to find my third city.

Drat...I just saw this. What's the deadline?

Darrell

No deadline. I'll probably update Wednesday or so but feel free to pick up and play anytime.

OK--played to 1640

Build WB-war work-war-war?-work-set. Some barb trouble but OK. Tech AH-min-BW-WH-POT-WRIT. As of 1640 I have just completed lib in capital, Utrecht by the horse/clams. However boxed in by barbs to the S and to the north barbs have corn/cow city 1N of where it should be. Not sure how to proceed from here. Maybe build chariots to take barb city to S.

I never won a deity game.

Will give it a try.

Best regards,

First of all, ill just start out by saying that i normaly play Emp. so im not use to deity AI´s starting bonus etc.

I´ve played until 1460 BC and would like some comments on my starting game.
I´ll post my game in spoilers, so people that do not want to know the surroundings should not open the spoilers, due to screenshots.


The tactic I´m going for is a fast great spy for stealing some Techs from the AI due to the fact that they will properly tech faster then I, thus this means building the great wall even dutch isen´t Industrius. After this is completed the Alphabet will be a priority for spys and tech trading if possible to backfill all the starting techs ill be missing.... So here goes my first deity game


First build is a workboat, then a worker. The research is mining/BW to chop and mines those hills. Masonry will be next ..

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/worker0000.JPG

Choped 2. workboat @ 3000 BC

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/3000bc%20city0000.JPG

The explorations of the map showed that we have some secure land to the north so expanding south first will be the best choice i think.
Some exploration to the south

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/barb%20city%20nice%20location0000.JPG

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/Civ4ScreenShot0002.JPG
Native Americans... well not to bad, though the have a huge army so they will likely take the nice barb city :(
The Great Wall finished ! As you can see i have 3 mined hills and 2 workboats giving me 5 very nice titles to work at maximum happycap... I have not used the whip, though i normally use it alot in the beginning/early/mid game.
http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/great%20wall0000.JPG
And just to have a look at my tech tree --> going for Alphabet early hoping to backfill techs and/or steal them with the use of a settled great spy.

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/techs0000.JPG

Bah! while i was building my first settler to move south the freaking barbs created a city around the spot i had in mind :crazyeye:

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/barb%202.%20city0000.JPG

2. city placement! I´m going for 3 S and 1 E of my capital to claime the 2 craps for food and gold/science

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/city%20settlement0000.JPG

Chopping the hill-forest to get the workboat out fast. This will not be a problem due to the +2 culture we have :D

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/chop%20workboat0000.JPG

The barb city next to the native americans was captured by them around 1800 BC.
The 2. workboat is on the way in my 2. city now. The timing of the first workboat matched exatly the turn at which my boarders poped. :D

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/2.%20workboat%20on%20the%20way0000.JPG

The barb city next to be got razed so I´m going to try and settle there...

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/frence%20destroy%20barb%20city%20...%20ill%20rush% 20the%20site0000.JPG

So my settler has arrived at the spot ready to settle. I´ve played until 1440BC, so a few turns more than 1500BC though this was an important thing to see if i would make it to the site in time. :) Right now i´m thinking; maybe i would try to settle even further south to capture land and rush another settler to settle above. Maybe 3. city next to the gems and the 4. city on top of the LUX above the river, 1 W of the suggested...

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/3.cityplacement0000.JPG

And just a quick look at my empire ....

http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/research-alphabet0000.JPG
http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/1.City15000000.JPG
http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s042637/Ny%20mappe/2.city15000000.JPG

So how did i do on my first turns of Deity game ?

It should be said that i normally go for something a bit inspired by obsolete, though with greater expansion of my empire and cottages in some of my later cities. Í must admit that i have not experimented on the lightbulbing for beeling certain tech, so i usually settle GP or start a cheap golden age(mid/late)...:goodjob:

Thus in this Deity game i didn´t think i could pull it off and went with another starting strat. Great spy for cheap techs :lol: (I hope) :p

I've never actually played on Deity before, I normally play on Emperor, or Immortal if I want to be given a good beating, so I'm not going to win this game, but I played up to 1600 BC anyway.


I started with a boat, then went Worker, Boat, Warrior. Research went AH -> Mining -> BW -> Wheel -> Pottery -> Writing. I've started researching Alphabet, but it still has 18 turns left (only just started the Library in Amsterdam). I was surprised by the barbs, I wasn't expecting them to attack so early, and had to let them pillage the pigs. I built Utrecht 1S of the horses. I've just got a 2nd Settler out and I'm unsure about where to put my 3rd city. I'm tempted to found on the Horses to the South to claim the Sugar, Gems and Spices and seal off the peninsula, but I don't like founding on resources, and until I get IW I can't do much there, except build a farm or two and a mine.

I had assumed the only unforested tile in the capital's radius would be a hidden resource, but I don't have IW yet, so I guess it must be Iron if there is one there. Also my starting Warror got eaten by a bear early on, so I haven't had much chance to explore a lot yet.

A very good starting spot, but here are some of my thoughts on this issue...

#1 You want people to play and share ideas, etc...

Well I don't think thats' going to work much. We are starting with a financial leader, as we all know, most people simply resort to the same old cottage spamming since their newbie settler days. There will be no out-of-the-box thinking here, nothing new to share. Just the same old, same old 'if it works, then don't fix it' routine. *yawn

#2 You consider this Deity level...

Well, truth be told, this game isn't anything above monarch level technically. We have not 2, not 3, but FOUR food resources in the fat cross alone! Not to mention 3 hills for mining. Not to mention fresh water from a river too! Ohh and being dutch right by a river for the UB bonus, how very convinient! Convenient even more we have the starting tech already to get the boats going out by turn #1 and happen to be right on a coast.

To say nothing of the least about the great resources and spots just outside the starting location either... You can see what I am getting at here. While I am sure some will win on this, the fact remains it is more of a monarch game, not a deity.

I fear those players will consider themselves deity calibre, then find out they keep getting raped with no chance on an average map.

Now don't get me wrong, who DOESN'T like guaranteed wins when trying a new level for the first time. Some good may come of it, some players can at least be forced to get their feet wet, and it may give them encouragement when winning it.

In any case, if I get some time, I MAY also join in, though I'm not so sure how that could work out so well. If I'm looking at how other people are playing, that affects how I play even if I try not to let it affect me. Obviously any shadowed game is giving the shadower a tremendous advantage in that he sees what is coming, terrain wise and AI. So all in all, what you'd see from me may not be 100% the strategy I'd have used if I went in blind. And those are not very good games to learn from.

#2 You consider this Deity level...

Well, truth be told, this game isn't anything above monarch level technically. We have not 2, not 3, but FOUR food resources in the fat cross alone! Not to mention 3 hills for mining. Not to mention fresh water from a river too! Ohh and being dutch right by a river for the UB bonus, how very convinient! Convenient even more we have the starting tech already to get the boats going out by turn #1 and happen to be right on a coast.

To say nothing of the least about the great resources and spots just outside the starting location either... You can see what I am getting at here. While I am sure some will win on this, the fact remains it is more of a monarch game, not a deity.

I fear those players will consider themselves deity calibre, then find out they keep getting raped with no chance on an average map.

Now don't get me wrong, who DOESN'T like guaranteed wins when trying a new level for the first time. Some good may come of it, some players can at least be forced to get their feet wet, and it may give them encouragement when winning it.

In any case, if I get some time, I MAY also join in, though I'm not so sure how that could work out so well. If I'm looking at how other people are playing, that affects how I play even if I try not to let it affect me. Obviously any shadowed game is giving the shadower a tremendous advantage in that he sees what is coming, terrain wise and AI. So all in all, what you'd see from me may not be 100% the strategy I'd have used if I went in blind. And those are not very good games to learn from.

1) If you liberally regenerate like I, and lots of other players do, this IS an average start. Sue us, we aren't willing to play with crappy capitals.

2) Even that's not a guarantee for a romp of a game. We know this is a START that's great for the dutch, but that doesn't say anything about what the rest of the map is like. You can't call a whole map good just based on the few squares next to the settler. The capital is important, but it's not everything.

Never mind.

I just edited my post and added an screenshot if anyone is interested.

#1 You want people to play and share ideas, etc...

Well I don't think thats' going to work much. We are starting with a financial leader, as we all know, most people simply resort to the same old cottage spamming since their newbie settler days. There will be no out-of-the-box thinking here, nothing new to share. Just the same old, same old 'if it works, then don't fix it' routine. *yawn


After playing some SGs and discussing with other people I have found out that it's the opposite way. IF you share ideas, compare with other players... your "box of tricks" will become larger and your Civ know-how will improve.



#2 You consider this Deity level...

Well, truth be told, this game isn't anything above monarch level technically.

While the starting location looks indeed promising (and a reasonable start is needed for deity level anyway) the game will be far from a walk in the park.
Deity tech-pace and early AI expansion will take care of that ;)

Now don't get me wrong, who DOESN'T like guaranteed wins when trying a new level for the first time.
Guaranteed win on deity by looking at the start. Very impressive analysis. Maybe you could enlighten us mortals with your wisdom?

I gave this a try and played to 1460BC. I normally play Monarch/Emperor. The barbarians were a pain, but I managed to fight them off and expand to three cities.


Research: AH-Mining-BW (no copper :( ), Wheel, Pottery, Writing, Aesthetics (trade bait)
Foreign relations: Met Napoleon, Sitting Bull, Ramses. OB with everyone
Build order: WB, worker, warrior (until size 2), settler, continue warrior, worker, chariot, settler, library. The second city built chariot, barracks, chariot

Plan: cottage more, settle another town to the SW.

http://i229.photobucket.com/albums/ee259/gsejapan/immortal01.jpg

No starting location is going to change the difficulty more than maybe 1 level (and this isn't one of those, that would require some gold or gems or something like this: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=242532). If people win on deity, then they can consider themselves of the caliber to have won on deity.

first time on deity (used to immortal) so barbs breaking culture borders at 2500 BC was something i didn't expect. they captured my capital by 2400, so i had to start over, so if that disqualifies me, so be it, i did scout with my warrior in the same way the 2nd time not to give me an advantage.
wow, those barbarians r a pain.

I don't know how to insert JPGs inside spoiler, so i hope i'm not ruining it for anyone



played till 1440 BC. managed to expand to 3 towns, and secured alphabet this turn, so the next turn i'm on top of the tech chart.

now i plan to use the iron source i found to build/whip swordsman fast and capture napoleon - closest to me and the easiest target cause he's the only one adopting judaism and that won't give me those -1 modifiers to the rest of the world. as u noticed, i specifically disculded him in my tech trades.

improvements wise is pretty clear - financial and not philosophical, so CE.

on the tech tree i'm a bit unsure. on immortal i can consistently get the great libary, and the chance to lose the liberalism path cause of that is very low. that needs some testing if the case remains on deity cause liberalism can't be lost. on the other hand, i would need those catapults if i want to finish the french, but i think they can wait.

one important note i realized on deity level - don't improve ur land with workers until u get chariots/axeman to counter barbs effectively - u can't protect those improvements against barbs cause ur warriors r locked inside the cities.

my tech path was mining->bronze working->AH (when i realized no copper)->writing->alphabet. had it not been deity i would probably get pottery before alphabet (CE), but i just could'nt protect those improvements - so on deity, gaining pottery first is a waste.

If you go to Advance Edit there is Insert image.

Btw, I played already up to 250 BC as that one psycho is around but I'm going to wait for the rest before posting.

To say nothing of the least about the great resources and spots just outside the starting location either... You can see what I am getting at here. While I am sure some will win on this, the fact remains it is more of a monarch game, not a deity.

I find this comment hilarious given your insane starting spots in some (most?) of your "Emperor" games :lol:.

Here is my game. Very weak in military, Immeadiate goal in the next 200 years is build more units so i don't get attacked upon.

relevant update on my game




the french were pretty weak and I managed to conquer paris and lyons with 8 swordsman and 2 chariots by the year 475 BC. the french only have one more city, which they'll lose in 10 turns after peace agreement ends. The usual scouting using open borders found only 1 source of iron and no copper, so it was destroyed at the first turn of DOW.
Early conquest is possible in deity prior to catapults, just calculate that the ai produces one archer per turn when he sees u coming.

razing money helps fuel literature teching. the ai somehow chose to tech aesthetics (i think it was Ramesses) so he reached it before i did. it's a rare occurent and i don't know if that's because of deity. i'm still committed to the literature/great libary path, but i'm still unsure whether it's a good idea on deity rather than to go for HR.

all in all, i feel the same as i would in any immortal game except the barbarians early on, and the ai teching a bit faster. I think it's due to 2 reasons - 1)In this specific fractal map, the continent we're on isn't large enough to allow the computer to use its early deity advantages to expand fast. 2) the capital's location made it a lot easier, not because we have 4 food resources (1 iron too), but, specifically that we have at least 1 coastal resource. i don't believe it's possible to protect improvements early on against land barbs.
on the other hand, the fact that happiness resources are really hard to come by near our capital really hurts the starting position.

Well, truth be told, this game isn't anything above monarch level technically. We have not 2, not 3, but FOUR food resources in the fat cross alone!

That's odd. I had the opposite reaction when I saw that food...what a waste, you really only need a couple.

Darrell

Map is awesome no one can't blame it. That's for sure but still compare this to Monarch sounds little bit odd. I haven't never seen so much grass/rivers in my Immortal games but there's still at least two big threat from AI side to take care as a matter of fact I could bet my money on yellow.

Too much food is never too much in my opinion. That Capital is going to rock when it grows 20+ and all that way up there. You can run so many GP with that food and not to mention if you switch to Caste System. btw, there's one excellent example in Sisitul's online game. I think it was his first BtS game ever.

map is above average but it hardly makes it not deity. map has lots of problems as well - deserts and jungles surrond the capital, no close happy resources, possible early landlock by napoleon, NO COPPER !!!!! need i say more?, so what if it has 4 food resources - they affect nothing till 1AD since there's no happines to support them...

let obsolete play it instead of judging it without even playing a single turn...
I do agree with him that a non-financial leader would have made for more diverse tactics, but at least for my limited skills it's challenging enough as it is.

I totally agree as he said this is nothing more than Monarch that was little too much to be honest I hope he can play like he speaks.

How long are we going to play. Everybody is going to play to the bitter end? It's fine by me though but if Uberfish what to take over that's ok but I wouldn't mind to see at least everyones playing up to 1 AD or so.

If you picked up the game a little late and still want to play along, feel free. This isn't a competition and you can use my saves, your saves or anyone else's. Just don't read on if you don't want to be spoiled.


Analysis:

Seafood with a financial leader is definitely a good start, since 5/0/3 coast fish are uber. The reason the start is good is not that I repeatedly regenerated the start position, but simply that it's the first start with this leader that I managed to get out of the BCs with a playable position and therefore statistically likely to be above average :lol:

The best way to start when you have fishing + a coast resource is to just build a boat as quickly as possible, switching to the plains hill when available. This gets the total food+hammer output of the city up faster than building a worker would, and a couple of posters made the good point that the fishing boats are immune to barbarians in the early game. I decided to research Animal Husbandry first because of the pigs in the fat cross; all that food would make the capital an excellent settler/worker factory in the early game.

Initial builds: fishboat, fishboat, warrior, worker, settler
Research order: AH, mining, bronze, wheel, iron, hunting, pottery

Scouting north reveals that we started blocking off a small peninsula, with three prospective city sites:

http://img74.imageshack.us/img74/3244/abqx8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

The red circle is the most productive of these, so obviously I settle it first.

http://img408.imageshack.us/img408/7475/aaon3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

... or not. Yeah, my second city (Utrecht) went right into the middle of the jungle. I went a bit out on a limb here, because the gems and ivory were the only two early happiness resources in sight and I wanted to claim them as soon as possible before the deity AI with its early bonuses could, and get that Creative culture working the area to defend my claim.

In order to make this defensible the third city had to go in the gap between Amsterdam and Utrecht. I notice a few players settled 1NW of my Hague spot to get 4 calendar resources in the city fat cross, but I wanted to fit two cities into that area to make use of all the grassland and coasts.

There are a couple of downsides to this strategy. I'm giving up entirely on an early rush because these cities have low initial production until I can clear the jungle, and my capital is going to be stuck doing all my early worker/settler production because I didn't get a nice high food site like the cow/corn to the north up early.

Barbarians have pillaged my pigs, but warriors with 40% culture defend the capital fine against archers.

I think expanding south agressively was the only viable move on the long run because the north is somewhat poor with the exception of your red dot.
You will need enough production to back it up so your blue dot with 3 (4 if it shares one from the capital) hills would be my priority while the cap can provide the settlers/workers with all it's excess food.

i have a few questions, and they by no means mean competition nor offense, just a good debate (that's the whole point :) )

1)founding utrecht where u did was a bold move, but in retrospective, would u have done the same?
gaining two happy resources means +2 pop in every city, so that's potentially +6 for 3 cities. However, Uttrecht means pop 1 till quite late in the game (it has -3 health now), compared to the pop 4 limit of happines it usually would have had, so that's -3. Hague's position right now will cause -1 health already at pop 4, and since it has no special food tiles, it can't go over 4 till u irrigate extensively/clear jungles. so that's +2 pop for capital, -3 for Uttrecht and +0 for Hague.
I think Hague could have been built on the 2nd spot u intended - near the spices - it has no health problems, resources and landgrabbing wise its the same as Hague's current position. since no health problems, u'll get +2 pop for hague cause of happinnes, and that's +2-3+2=+1 advantage to settling uttrecht.

how much time will it take to connect those happy resources? let's say till 1000 BC? HR usually gets discovered before 1AD, so that's around 25 turns of +1 pop.

btw, if all ur cities have religion as well, that's -4 to uttrecht, so that's +2-4+2=+0 advantage to settling uttrecht.


2) why did u go for IW before alphabet? u didn't plan on rushing, and IW is highly favoured by the ai's tech, so it will hurt a lot on the possibility to catch the ai on tech. if it was to get clear jungles for the gems and ivory i think the alphabet line is better cause u'll get IW at roughly the same time.

3) do u have a win u're currently aiming for

Here's my update as a matter of fact I'm so eager about the game maybe I've a shot to my first Deity victory althought a long way to go but the map is just nice so I'm going to finish this any time soon. I keep posting it here as I started.



Thoughts before I begin.
1) I need to get more units. I can foresee Shaka's hand knocking my door and saying "Where's your units, dude??"
2) More settlers, I don't want to give any more land to Napoleon. As it looks like to be my first target.
3) I want that gem online asap it's a huge boost to commerce and help me get Alphatech and Currency.
That's pretty much about it. Lets begin!

Tech-path.
Alphatech -> Currency -> Code of Laws.

Events.
1160 BC. Build 7 Libs.
1000 BC. Shaka declares a war on Ramesses II. Shaka, fighting, are you kidding me.
950 BC. Ramesses II ask help with Shaka. I decline, maybe I bad move mutual struggle is nice and Ramesses II looks like a long time friend, but I didn't know if Shaka's wrath never ends and he send a bunch of Trimeres to destroy my fishing boats.
650 BC. Trading with Gilgamesh. Alpatech for AH, Sailing and Mysticism. All very good techs.
650 BC. Trading with Napoleon. Hunting. Freebie. He's going to die anyway.
450 BC. Shaka and Ramesses II makes a peace.
400 BC. Food spoiled in Capital. Wanna bet there will be more.
400 BC. First GS. Bulb Mathematics. Basically just take me closer to Cats.

Capital.
3x Axeman. Chopped/Whipped.
Library. Whipped.
Barrack. Chopped.
Units.
Lighthouse. Whipped.
Units.
Market.

The Hague.
Granary. Whipped
Barrack. Chopped.
Units.

Utretch.
Workboat.
1x Settler Chopped.
1x Worker. Chopped.
1x Settler. Chopped.
1x Worker. Whipped.
Granary. Whipped.
Lighthouse. Whipped.
Barrack.

Rotterdam.
Granary. Whipped.
Library.

Nijmegen.
Granary.

First of all, I'm glad we've a shot to victory. Shaka isn't our neighbour. Thank god for that. When Napoleon beat me to to those borders cities, what was only a matter of couple turn my settler was on the way, damn it eats man, that is one more city to capture. I decide it's war. Reaper man is coming. I don't know if my cities could make it to rifles although they're not so bad and there's two more happiness to get but this's Deity, on Emperor or so I could rape Napoleon with Rifles, anyway, so, war it's and I'm going to make my move with Macemens as I feel like I need some back up for my axes. I think we're too late for an axe-rush anyway even cats are just around a corner, but I'm not a good axe-rusher. I'm also considering if I could farm s GM after bulbing Philo to get some cash and upgrade my units before I go to war, but I haven't had much success with it on Immortal+ because it's damn long way to Liberalism. I wouldn't mind to bulb Paper, Education or Lib. Well, that's pretty much about it. I'm aware of that stone, I think it's badly located to take a advantage of it, you may find yourself boxed by AI if you take that route, but I wouldn't mind to build Notre Dama with it later, and I've to check if Hanging Gardens is built. I forgot to check it as it's one of my favorite wonders.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/88126/uusin_uberfish_.JPG

Next update.


Tech-path.
Code of Laws -> Meditation -> Priesthood -> Civil Service -> Constuction -> Paper -> Education.

Events.
25 AD. Trading with Ramesses II. Code of Laws for Meditation + 400 gold. Sweet.
25 AD. Trading with Gilmagesh. Code of Laws + 290 gold for Metal Casting. Thank you.
25 AD. Trading with Genghis Khan. Code of Laws + 45 gold for Calendar.
25 AD. Trading with Sitting Bull. 175 gold for Poly. Why not.
50 AD. Genghis Khan ask help with Gilmagesh. I decline.
75 AD. Shaka declares a war on me. 4 Sword, 2 Axe, 4 Imp, 4 Archer against mine 4 Sword, 3 Axe, 2 Spears.
75 AD. Trading with Genghis Khan. Alphatech for Masonry. Maybe I can whip a wall before Shaka's wrath.
125 AD. No losses in battle. Nice! Must be because of wall. Shaka retreat. Go and don't never come back, psycho.
225 AD. Napoleon adopts vassalage. Doesn't look so good. Lets hope he's aiming at Sitting Bull and why not maybe it wasn't so bad I didn't switch to Hinduism.
250 AD. Second GS. Nice, I ran 2 GM and 2 GS in Capital my chances to get GS was 80% after this GM or GS it's fine by me but I keep my fingers crossed for GS. BUlb Philo.
250 AD. Scouting reveals that Napoleon's SoD consist of 4 swords, 2 elephants, 4 longbow, 3 axe and 2 spear.
300 AD. Gilmagesh makes a peace with Genghis Khan. I didn't even know war was going on.
350 AD. Calendar for Shaka to make a peace.
400 AD. Bureauracy in.
400 AD. Trading with Napoleon. Philo for Machinery.
540 AD. Trading with Genghis Khan. Philo for Monarchy, Mono + gold.
540 AD. HR in.
660 AD. Genghis Khan delcares a war on Gilmagesh.
660 AD. Trading with Ramessess II. Philo for 460 gold. I needed gold to upgrade my units that's about half of what I need. So, why not.
700 AD. Shaka declares a war on Ramesses II. Back to you, Ramesses II.
740 AD. Napoleon declares a war on Sitting Bull. Yeah! My army is almost ready, about 12 Macemens, 3 Crossbow, 2 Cats, 2 spears. I'm going to make units for a few turn more I think I need at least a few Cats more.
800 AD. War ends between Napoleon and Sitting Bull. According to powergraph at least some of his units are gone.
800 AD. Shaka ask help with Ramesses II. You belong to hospital, psycho.
880 AD. Next Great Person is GM. I was running 1 engineer, 2 GM and 2 GS. Maybe it was better to run Caste System but you live with the decisions you make. Damn, I totally forgot National Epic. This what you get when you don't play regularly. No use for GM yet.

Rotterdam.
Library. Whipped.
Courthouse. Whipped.
Forge. Whipped.
Courthouse. Whipped.
Colosseum.
Aqueduct.

Nijmegen.
Granary. Whipped.
Courthouse. Whipped.
Barrack. Whipped.
Units.
Settler.

Amsterdam.
Market. Chopped.
Spy.
Forge. Whipped.
Units.
Workboat.
Units.
Aqueduct.

Utretch.
Galley.
Courthouse. Whipped.
Forge.
Units.
5x Catapults. Whipped.

The Hague.
Units.
Wall. Whipped.
Scout.
Units.
Courthouse. Chopped.
Units.

I ended here as I've to take care one thing. My army is almost ready. 12 Macemens, 4 crossbows, 2 spears and 5 Cats + 1 Maceman and 2 Cats on the way. Could be better but I dind't want to whip too much as a matter of fact I whipped heavily only in Utretch. I'm going to hit Marseilles first then Paris. Rheims I leave for reinforcements while proceeding to south with my main stack.

I think I've more time tomorrow to finish this.


http://forums.civfanatics.com/uploads/88126/Civ4ScreenShot0002.JPG

Uberfish:
Very bold move on settling! I think you are well positioned.

I had major trouble with barbs--when you have a coastal start like this you are slow to get warriors out a bust the fog. I notice you initially built warriors even slower than I did but seemed to have less trouble.

I also had trouble keeping it busted--this might be a pretty basic question but how do you defend the fogbusters? Archer vs. fort war on hill is around even so I retreat and don't take that. I only stand and fight if I'm fort on forest hill vs archers. On immortal there is more time to get prepared. The culture cross is much earlier as well so often at immortal you can solve the whole thing with a resource hook up just in time which here is too late.

In my game I had an early barb city blocking to the S, and I got pushed out of the red site and they founded near there. Did I just get unlucky or how should I deal with that--seems like you're pretty screwed on deity if the barbs claim near (but not on) your sites?

I've played into the AD years, but don't have time to post now. I too had my chosen blocking site occluded by a barb city. So I settled the Horses instead, with the intent of eventually pushing them off. Barb cities can sometimes be a blessing, actually, as they hold the spot for a while and keep the AIs out.

To deal with barbs, I mostly let them kill themselves on my cities. Keep an extra warrior, as the fights are favorable but not unlosable. Once my Horse city hit 10 culture and my capital 100, I only needed two warriors to completely fogbust the north, plus one for the neck of the peninsula.

peace,
lilnev

I still have no idea how to use the "insert image" button to directly insert images into the text.
just added 2 pictures to my earlier post.
1440 BC - aquired IW by trading alphabet. i immidietly started producing swordsman/barracks from capital and Uttrecht to rush napoleon.
700 BC - declared war on napoleon after scouting with open borders. initial force of 7 swordsman + 2 chariots (lost pigs improvment cause of lack of forces back home) while more are being produced from my capital and Uttrecht.
475 BC - sued for peace after Napoleon lost his capital and another city, he only has one city left which he'll lose in 10 turns. he gave tribute techs priesthood and mono.

plans for the future - Domination victory - in 10 turns Napoleon will be defeated (after peace ends), i'll start building the great libary, switch tech towards maceman+cats and build buildings till then. When maceman r secure, unless some unforseen event occurs, i'll go against sitting bull (he's #2 in the score and landlocking me). I'll probably wait till Shaka DOW on him, wait 3 turns, and join in the fight. Hopefully shaka and ramesses will keep on fighting amongst themselves for a while (yeah, it happens in my game too :)).

responses:

Flamer - I'd probably found there again because it claims the most land as well as the 2 luxury resources (which give an extra happy after forge and market.) HR is not a complete solution to all happiness problems, it's ok if you're just trying to pacify your capital but the cost to produce and maintain military police for an entire country is prohibitive. I went for IW because I didn't want to be left completely hanging if I gambled for alphabet and the AI wouldn't trade.

I am aiming for space, if I wanted culture I'd settle Hague on the 4 calendar resources spot.

Nice rush.


Ungy - I picketed only the south and let barbarians from the north pillage my pigs and suicide on the capital. The barbarians settled only to the south (Napoleon captured it quickly) so you were unlucky. Usually if the barbarians settle sites that I want but in the wrong spot, I will settle other cities first then send a few swords to raze the barb city, they usually have 0% cultural defence and are easy prey even on deity.


I'll post another update on the weekend to 0AD or so

I couldn't stop playing even it's pretty late here and I've to wake up very early. What can I say I'm addict.

It didn't work out so well this time.


Tech-path.
Education -> Liberalism.

Events.

880 AD. After seeing Napoleon's new stack. 4 Musketeers, 4 War Elephants, 3 Maceman, 4 Crossbow, 2 Longbow, + many more at southeast of The Hague it was clear my chances are slim and I can't do anything to bribe Sitting Bull to fight I can only hope he joins for fun when I'm asking kindly at war what I will but because I still can't switch to Hinduism I doubt so I've to somehow take care of Napoleon's stack that's for sure so my plan is to defend a hill with jungle near The Hague and hope Napoleon attacks after that I capture Chartres and I take Tours and ask for peace. Tours is city with a hill so it's good for defending, after that as first planned.

900 AD. Trading with Genghis Khan. Paper for Aesthetics + 100 gold. How did I forget National Epic. I'm noob.
940 AD. Napoleon it's me or you! No help from Sitting Bull just what I expected.
960 AD. First Great General, I'm going to use it to get Medic III.
1000 AD. Napoleon took the bait and my stack held strong with minimal losses and his stack down to two.
1030 AD. Chartres defended by 3 Musketeers, 2 longbow, just to mention a few. After 3 cats my chances to win with my Macemens are 60% not so bad to be honest. I lost some units but still more than 10 units left and reinforcements are waiting in THe Hague, but it's important I capture Tours. Moved more Cats towards my main stack. Too few Cats definitely.
1050 AD. Sitting Bull asking a tribute. Of course, my darling. Man, if this game ends because stupid Hinduims didn't spread to my cities I'm going to cry.
1060 AD. New Napoleon's stack is approaching. 4 Trebs, 2 Musketeers, 2 Elephants, 2 longbow and 2 crossbow, and 1 axe. I don't like this little bit. I can only hope they don't get The Hague before I get Tours then I can ask for peace. Whipping starts in The Hague now. Sitting BUll still grabling it's balls, what's wrong with you, don't you want more land!
1070 AD. One longbow took another city defender crossbow at Chartres. Defenders down to two. Napoleon's stack coming towards my main stack I guess it's better than my city. I wait on hill. I just noticed my mistake why didn't I go straight from Chartres to Tours instead I decide go back to The Hague and get some unnecessary units. Reload? nope. Tours could be captured by now and I could be making a peace with Napoleon.
1080 AD. I can't believe I left 2 city defender crossbows and 2 spearman in Chartres. Now Napoleon's musketeers killed one of my last units. What are the chances that one longbow kills two crossbows. Let me ask. My main stack held and now proceeding now to Tours. I guess I can capture Chartres later. Also, second Great General. Military Intructor to Utretch.
1090 AD. Chartres lost, but my main stack is next to Tours. I lost also one of my Great Generals to Napoleon.
1100 AD. Tours cultural defenses are way too high. I was thinking about City Revolt it's usually works with Maceman rush why didn't I do it. Sitting Bull first to Liberalism. I'm 15 turn away.


THE END!

I started this one late, but here I am at 1480BC. I'm about to finish the oracle, then grab metal casting to tech trade. (and start my birth rate rolling a GPreist.

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0021.jpg

The gems/ivory down south people are talking about is already blocked off by a barb city, and since i have stone I'm going to try and get the pyramids so I shouldn't need the luxury resources anyways. Uberfish was saying how he likes to settle his most productive city first and I know my untrech won't be a good city at all..(its not even counted as on a river so I wont be able to build a dike or get the health bonus) but I settled it first to access the stone, and working the floodplains/wine tiles are excellent for the time being, and its really close. Later on that city will suck, but all my other cities within the vicinity will be costal, so that middle terrain would be probably wasted otherwise, and I can settle in the other good places without having to resourceshare.

tech path was - mining>Bronze working>sailing>wheel>pottery>mysticsm>meditation>preisthood>masonary.
then metal casting (from oracle)
build order was -workboat, workboat, warrior, worker, settler, worker, workboat, settler, oracle.

Should we play beyond 1500BC?
btw. How to make thumbnails?

Uberfish, I have a suggestion, though it's ur thread so it's ur call
I think that the point of this thread should be more on debates and less on a show of strength of how each is doing.

so I think it's best that instead of playing all the turns with the initial save game, we'll play till 1AD which is enough time for the initial strategy to be set and mature enough to judge it.

we'll then all post save games and walkthrough and discuss which startegy was the best and why, then decide again on the save game of 1AD from which we'll play 100 turns more and so on.

We're playing until 1 AD now, after that I don't mind whose save people play from. It would be more interesting to see how the game plays out from different initial settling decisions, and different strategies (attacking with swords, or medieval, or renaissance, or not at all) than everyone trying to optimize from the same save.

Even my game is over. I reloaded this morning thought give it a another to shot. At least I can say if I win I've won Deity with one reload. bwt, first to Lib. I just whipped more units my army was over 30 units. I used GM for golden age to push the last meters to lib and added little bit micromanagement, and built currency in some cities and used to get more gold from Education.

My thoughts about the first turns. I started with warriors as knowing how hard barbs are on Deity so I didn't want to end this too soon. I started with 2 warriors after those I noticed that north of Amsterdam is pretty much fogbusted, nice, so I built one more and used my initial warrior to fogbust south, but when I noticed that no copper I thought I'll gamble it's Iron or Warriors, hunting -> archery took way too long, AH for horses not big fan of Chariots and there was enough food from seafood to not work a pig, so I decide to make one warrior more just to make sure about south, but 5 warrior was little bit excessive, but who knows without my last warrior I didnt maybe find a gem. After that worker, then chopped two settlers, followed by two worker because a city without worker is like a cigarette without fire, then I aimed at writing via pottery to get a 2 scientist running and build granary before lib is just what I do. Second city was only found because of food and whipping possibility, again wanted to play it safe, now I had two amazing city for whipping so I couldn't go down without fighting, maybe it was better to build two more cities to south but all way to ivory was extreme.

I think one picture speaks more than thousands words I'm glad there's so many different kind of approaching to the game. I think Uberfist did a good job in long run, but there's many obstacles to overcome. The game is not yet over.

btw, I was kind surprised that every AI had IW once I got Alphatech. I wonder do they start with it and isn't that pretty decent city two north of horses.

Again. No idea what to do. No heading towards Liberalism, nor Civil Service. Just keeping to my standard deity rule - trying not to be a victim of a sneaky attack. Nappy is pleased now with me, but I do not trust him. His army is triple as mine. So I'd rather won't go for liberalism too soon. I'd rather go for feudalism for better defense. The good thing is that Nappy and I are hinduists, while rest of the continent mainly Judaists. G.Khan is buddist and has signed OB with Nappy. But many civs do not have signed OB with him, so there is no possibility to put step into my land. Only Nappy is a problem and my cities are small. Research is good, but the rest is crappy. I was limited to pop of 4 for a very long time.

I posted a screenshot of my game at 940 AD.
just won the race to liberalism, but still i'm not the best on tech.
I have 10 cities with a good economy (best has 13 cities, i'm #3 tied with #4), but I'm landlocked.
I finished the french some time ago, but i was stuck for quite a while cause i can't attack neither Ramesses nor sitting bull cause Ramesses is sitting bull's vassal. for quite a while decided to drop the domination aim.

My question is - did i lose the game already cause i didn't went for a more agressive approach from 475BC to 940 AD?

is a win on deity possible only if u're #1 on the number of cities (to counter those huge bonuses), and if so, how soon do u need to reach that goal?

I'm trying to find a kind of "if u haven't done this and that by year ... then u're 99% lost".

heres my game at 1AD. I think I've been very lucky in terms of pulling off the wonders I was able to build. I was able to build the collossus because I got metal casting well before the ai from oracle, and hanging gardens I already had a nested GE, and stone, so i built that in 3 turns via chopping/whipping (would have only taken a full 6 turn to build and not hurry, but better safe then sorry). I'm going to use that Great Engineer you see in my capital to rush the Great Library as soon as I get literature. (I hate 'wasting' him in that sense, id much rather settle him, but I think with deity ai they will beat me to it otherwise since I dont have marble or even the industrious trait bonus). As you may have guess I love buliding lots of wonders and usually don't worry about military later till I have better tropps and bribe other ais to help me.

heres a few ss's of my capital, tech, and city locations.
(images resized to 1024x768 so they dont clog screen)
My next city is going to be right on top of the cow resource to the far most norther part and on the furthest west tile - to acces the fish, and lots of sea itsn't bad with dikes/financial/collossus)



http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/techs0000.jpg

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0037.jpg

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/2110000.jpg

Nice wonder collection! I'm definitely surprised you managed to get all of those on deity.

well, Ive played a fair bit further now. The game is actually going allright, if I'm carefull enough I might be able to pull off my first deity win, I think the chances right now are 50/50, but right when I think I have any advantage, the ai astounds me at this level...



Here's where I built my cities:
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0054.jpg
I obviously wanted most of them to be costal to reap the benefits of dikes later on.

Heres my capital (1020AD)
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0056.jpg

I managed to build the UofS, Spiral minerat, and right afer my last post, hinduism spread in one of my cities, so I converted religion to hinduism since the AP was built by the hindus. I had to really stray from the liberalism tech path to get divine right, but I founded islam, and wiht 8 cities with 2 religious buildings each, that +32gold per turn im getting from the SMineret. You can also notice that in my capital for some reason I kept giving brith to Great Engineers so i kept settling them.

I finally realized I would have to invade the french in order get more cities and eventually win, so I started my first Golden age, switched to theocracy and did a big military push after having built monastaries/temples in all my cities. Hopefully I could take some french cities before sitting bull grabs them all.

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0057.jpg


http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0041.jpg
I decided to get economics from liberalism so I could get that free great merchant, I decided to settle him on my moai statues city (Roderdam).


And here I am at war with the French ( I also bribed Gilgamesh to goto war with Gengis Khan, and that worked out great they are lossing tons of resources over it)
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0043.jpg

I've maybe waited too long to do a military push, but I wanted to build a basic infastructure up first and get the wonders/buildings I need, then focus all my efforts on military. I've played on a little further, but for now Ill leave it at this. and I attached my savegame at 1070(right before liberalism).

Things are going crappy. No comments.

I suppose I will lose this game. I can only chose how I die ;). I can be destroyed by Shaka (and his vassal Ramses) who is close to friendly with me, but only close. He has 'We have on our hands right now info'. Ramses is friendly with me but his spy was stumbled in MY city (wierd). I can also wait till Sitting Bull launch his Spaceship. In that case I will have to upgrade my rifles and defend against Shaka. Bull has no knowledge of Assembly Line, but Shaka is massing forces near my borders and upgradeds longbows, axes directly to inf. The funny thing is that these longbows came from completely wierd direction (from Genghis Khan Empire). The real cool civs that could be my trade partners are vassals of Shaka and Bull (both Ramses and Gilgamesh) and I have no tech for them. Sitting Bull is moron with WFYBTA info, unless I have not traded for about 60 turns. Ghengis Khan is annoyed now, but he was my biggest dissapointment (he was cautious earlier). Completly another personality than in my previous games. Khan is also badly behind in teching, so I really do not understand his behaviour. The only hope is to wait till Shaka decides to go to war with Bull, but those are only dreams. I'd rather won't mention about my GNP - it's improved but worse than in my immortal games. But what should I expect? This is deity and 1600AD on deity equals 1800AD on immortal.

Spaceship? More like Ramessess cultural. Smart move on his side to vassalize for extra protection.

I'm actually going to skip up to 600 AD myself but post both saves because it's just general peacemongering.

The 4th city is Rotterdam to prevent the French stealing the spices, and then I build a city up north at the corn/cow site. Rotterdam will just be a cottage city for now and I'll build the Moai statues there later in the game.

I fell into old Warlords habits and researched alphabet, which was a poor decision as I couldn't trade it for mathematics once I arrived there. I should just have researched Mathematics directly as my target was Calendar to get +2 more happiness and extra food for my southern cities.

http://img69.imageshack.us/img69/5011/45893498ss0.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

In 675 BC I've just finished a library, at size 7 I can work all Amsterdam's resources and hire 2 scientists. The city continues to train workers and settlers.

I have pickets all over the north now but no real military units. Also I have contact with 5 of the 6 AIs. Napoleon has adopted Judaism, while everyone else is Hindu. I decide to stay in No State Religion because I don't want to antagonize either Napoleon, or Shaka who has a bad habit of marching halfway across the world to attack you given the slightest excuse.

Since I'm not going to use a state religion and Pacifism, there's low value in lightbulbing Philosophy. I build an academy in the capital.

In 50BC I have completed my initial settling target of 7 cities, tech is aimed at Civil Service and Bureaucracy and I will start replacing forests with cottages when I get there.

In 25 BC Napoleon indeed declares war on Sitting Bull, justifying the decision to not adopt a religion. Sitting Bull is just so good defensively that this will probably be a stalemate. Lucky break for me. Research is just breaking 60.

http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/2254/46445587hw1.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

I get CoL in 175 AD and start tech trading, acquiring Aesthetics and Monarchy. Civil Service hits in 400AD and that pulls in Metal Casting, Currency and Drama.

The French and Native Americans sign peace in 540 AD after an ineffective invasion. I get a great scientist in 600 AD just after finishing paper. Here's my city output:

http://img165.imageshack.us/img165/503/70463489mc8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Here we can see the effect of taking the south early and using the capital as a settler/worker pump. The capital has only just started to work cottages and we are behind where a typical Bureaucracy capital would be in research terms. On the other hand, the rest of my cities have been founded quite early and have had time to grow and make significant contributions to the economy taking me up to 178 research. They will be working on the prerequisite buildings for Globe Theatre in Nijmegen, and Oxford in Amsterdam - sadly without the benefit of organized religion. I'm behind in military tech and still want to stay neutral in the religious front to antagonize Napoleon as little as possible.

Taoism has been founded already. So I'll self-research philosophy and use my GS to part-lightbulb Education to make sure I get liberalism first. The AIs in this game are not research fiends, but deity is still deity and I am planning to trade philosophy off to the other 4 AIs as soon as I research it.

Given that I want to slave Nijmegen, work real tiles rather than specialists in Amsterdam, and do production in Maastricht I have no other suitable National Epic site. Therefore, I skipped literature.

Things became lucky for me. Shaka sent half of his army towards Khan. And general Defensive pact was signed. So now Shaka, Gilgamesh (who became Shaka's vassal and that was the reason I lost one cav) and Ramses against me, G.Khan and Sitting Bull (moron still do not want to trade). I am not idealist. I play with my new mod - expansive is replaced by 1 additional hammer from water tiles. Shaka has factories, I do not. But good things are: I constructed Globe in Paris which has 4 great generals so I can draft lvl3 units. I started producing Ships-off-the-line and Airships. My aim is difficult to say. For sure claiming holy hindu city (there are stationing about 30 inf), but I have similar forces standing nearby and also 15 cats. Airships will solve the problem. Shaka can have only 4 of them (only one city). I can have much more. And maybe mentioned Ramses-Cultural-Threat Problem. Also constructed fort near Paris. Now Shaka has to enter clear terrain to siege this city. I have no knowledge of Ramses power. But I am of a good thought. I made civic switch - Rep, Nationhood, Emancipation, SP and Teocracy. First I regreted this change, but things went right at the end. And the question. Paris has constructed The Statue of Zeus. Do you think that wonder can damage AI's economy?

No.

Shaka is invulnerable to WW.

Ramsy is going for cultural anyway.

Well my game seems to be fairly smoothly.



During my war with the french I only managed to capture 2 cities, before I decided to sign a peace treaty since the War-Weariness was really killing my economy and forcing me to put a 50% culture silder. (That bastard built the statue of zeus)

Right after the war, I teched Nationalism->constitution->democracy and built the statue of Liberty in Amsterdam. Amsterdam has really become a beast of a city, all that food and settled engineers have enabled me to make it a super-production city, and I haven't even built ironworks there yet.

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0069.jpg

I was able to make some trades for chemisty and promtly researched steam power to spam dikes, and then steel to build IronWorks. My plan is to delay researching astronomy/scientific method till those are the last techs I can research (since they obselete some of my wonders, and my 10 monastaries are bringing in +2Hammers/Breakers/Gold in all my cities). And I want to build the pentagon ASAP and have infantry/cannons to finish off the french with. (maybe Im delaying too long here, but I'm trying to balance infastructure/war)

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0049-2.jpg

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0067.jpg



I didn't actually end up attacking the French again till I was completely ready (maybe I delayed too long, but at the same time if im declaring war I plan to capture fast/efficently). I decided to fill a bunch of EastIndiamans with troops.

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0072.jpg


And sent them to the locations indicated by the red lines:
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0074.jpg


In the meantime I was able to finish the pentagon. (during my golden age, I ran theocracy, Beaucracy, but right before it ended I switched to Free-speech/organized religion). I hate wasting turns on anarchy when u can swich during GA's, and since I have the pentagon built I can build units with 2 promomtions without having to have a government that gives more unit experience. I'm a big fan of org. Religion, and tho some people might prefer nationalism/theocracy, I'm really a 'builder' at heart more then a war-monger, and so long as I have the pentagon, I don't feel I need theocracy anymore. I'll be loosing gold/hammers initially with free speech, but eventually once my villages mature to towns it will be by far a superior civic, and that +100% culture will help push my borders near sitting bull. I also used my pre-war golden age to switch to emancipation from Caste system since alot of the AI's had emancipation I was pretty much forced, and hey, I might as well start growing a bunch of towns since I'm also getting Free speech.

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0071.jpg

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0077-1.jpg

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0075.jpg


Needless to say, I made quick work of the French, and now my score is near the top. I am however worried about sitting bull and ramesses II, Ramesses has finished mining inc, and sitting bull seems to be to doing quite well too.
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0084.jpg


I really hate sitting bull.

Even tho we have the same religion, he is pleased me with me (+9), he can't be bribed to declare war on ramesses (which would be perfect right now), and he even refues to trade techs with me!

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0088.jpg
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0086.jpg
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0087.jpg

Ill end it here for now. I attached my save-game at 1690AD. I could try and mass tanks for war vs sitting bulls/ramesses, or I could just go from here and try to win a space-race victory, I'm really not sure. But I do plan on going Industrialism->Plasitcs to get the Three Gorges Dam asap. I've never won a diety game before (Tho immortal has seemed easy lately), and would really appreciate any advice from better players with experience on diety like unconquered sun :P

You're probably most qualified to say whether the game is space or domination pursuit. You already know your opponents tech pace better than I can assess it based on a snapshot.

The good news is no AI is close to cultural in your game.

uberfish, you have played into a position I have found myself in many times. You have good cities and are teching along enough to keep up in the trading game, but you don't have a land lead. In this situation I fall into the same old pattern of Liberalism -> Nationalism and try to draft my way to more cities. Is that pretty much the only viable path in this situation? Do you think you have enough land to win peacefully at this level?

Darrell

I nearly always upgrade my units and I take always advantage of free unit support as I get more cities and they grow and it works for me and why not because there's no extra expenses and usually I don't mind to spent money to get more units. I find it very odd that the good players like Staaty or Uberfish take never benefit of free support. It's 600 AD and most of Ubersfish cities are guarded by warriors. That's just odd. He has a free support to 19 units.

Ramses is no longer a threat.


edit:

An idiot Shaka sent half of his troops against G.Khan (as I said before). Then he sent another half against Sitting Bull. There was nothing else for me to do than attack both Shaka and Ramses. I took hindu holy city from Shaka, and started sieging Egyptian cities, but Shaka has completed Pentagon and when I saw CR3 artillery signed peace treaty with Shaka. Ramses lost 3 cities, but I am not afraid now that he'll be vassalized. Shaka's power was reduced very much. Sitting Bull also does not have extreme power. After gaining 2 'You voted for us' points, Sitting Bull became friendly which opened for me trading opportunities. I am not very experienced in Spaceship victory, but I'd rather go for Internet. Bull I suppose is upgrading his rifles now, so his research will be delayed a bit. Still Sitting Bull is one tech ahead towards the internet. I am also hoping that no great scientist will born, because I am counting on the third goldenage (fourth with Taj Mahal). The pity, Mausoleum of Mausolloss is in Bull's hands. Maybe some sneaky attack on his coastal cities, but ... This is deity. It would be better for me to focus on one target.

Nice.


1828 AD and no launched spaceship components, I wonder why.

@Unconquered Sun:

I only won Domination/Conquest on deity so I cannot tell why. But I will try answer anyway:
1) no financial civ
2) none civ has enormous number of cities and the size of these cities is poor

3) from my part: strong WFYBTA

The funniest thing is that I have nothing about SpacaRace, but I found out that most optimal way to launch Spaceship is to eliminate rivals. Not only my shrinking economy matters, but also ... F.E. Sitting Bull has Cristo Redentor. I'd like to add this wonder to my collection ;)

My baseline is 10 (good to decent) cities to win space on deity, so yeah my plan is to draft up and take Napoleon's land.

Now I have to chose how they die. First gifted oil to Shaka, basically to improve relations in a short period of time. He vassalized Gilgamesh (peacefully), but Gilgamesh was destroyed by Mongols I guess. Soon after that Ramses was destroyed by Shaka. I have two production cities, but one of them was producing Ironworks and this wonder I do not know the spelling. So only one of my cities produced tanks. Shaka's strength is double of mine but it aint a problem. Even now domination is possible, but I will resign from that (to much time in RL). Now Khan and Sitting Bull against Shaka. I stoped gifting Shaka oil when I saw his tanks, but maybe it is not bad idea to gift oil to him again. It would make this war more fair. Still no knowledge of Bull's demographics. It would be great to soften Bull and grab some of his wonders for free. Another dylama: victory - space or diplo. Only Bull would vote for me now and this means I would have to adopt Police State. Finally third great person was born and thankfully differed from the others so I can trigger Golden Age now, but perhaps civic switch now: Police State, US or stay with Rep. I do not know who whould be selected as another pretender to UN.

btw. What a funny world is that. None of Shaka, Bull and Khan had oil.

Launched 1905, and landed 1918 for a space race win!

This is my first win ever on diety, so I'm feeling pretty good about it :king:


I don't have time to make a huge write-up detailing every event, but here's some highlights.

I bribed gilamesh to goto war with Sitting bull for a few techs, and shortly after Ramesses declared war on Sitting Bull (putting me in a perfect spot for a SS win).
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0091.jpg

Ramesses ended up bringing a nuclear winter on the Native Americans (good thing I didn't declare war on him)
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0092.jpg

So I had researched all the nessessary techs and managed a launch by 1905:
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0096.jpg

Landed 1918:
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/win0000.jpg

Here's my score:
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0101.jpg

and Hall of fame:
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d101/Shamshaw/Civ4ScreenShot0102.jpg

Well, 39,542 seems somewhat underwhleming after how difficult this game was, being on diety, nowhere close to my 89,338 domination win on Immortal. This is my first-time winning without building The Eiffel tower-Broadway-Rock'Roll trio, and I also never built Cristo Redendo, but I really didn't need it, in fact I really didn't need alot of the wonders I built, maybe Ill try a less wonder oriented strategy now on.

Looking back, the starting location was amazingly good for the capital city, and dikes really are a ridiculously powerfull UB once you can build them. Had we not had such a good starting location with stone and good costal-city locations, managing a victory might not have been possible for me. However, obselete commented that this start was so 'powerfull' that game would more be like playing monarch, and rofl at that idea, this was by far the 'hardest' game I've ever won, and I've been playing on immortal for a while.
Immortal->diety is like going from Prince->Immortal in my honest opinion.
(at least in BTS)


I attached a few saves if anyone is curious.



edit:
btw, what does WFYBTA stand for?

'WFYABTA' means 'We fear you are becoming too advanced'.

And congrats your first deity win :goodjob:

I find this comment hilarious given your insane starting spots in some (most?) of your "Emperor" games :lol:.

Yeah no kidding. The map gen tends to spruce up your capital a lot no matter what. I have a zero-reload, zero-regenerate, zero-WB/cheating thread going on (also Dutch, but on Immortal) and rolled a nice starting capital. So what? Am I to reroll until I get the crappiest capital possible? :rolleyes:

Capitals aren't even the only factor, anyway! The best roll I ever got I think was one where I was Napolean, Emperor, on the northern part of a snaky continent (but I didn't know that at the time; I was playing Big & Small). Capital was okay but nothing to write home about. I settled a nearby city for stone and to build GrLighthouse, then REX'd south. I could go left or right. I chose right and kept REXing south and east until I couldn't claim any more good land. I sent a chariot west during this time and discovered that it was uninhabited! A few fogbuster chariots later and I had locked down that entire stretch of 5 cities' worth of land (Normal size map so that's a lot) while continuing the last of my REXing.

Conversely I've had some games where I had terrific capitals and yet had very little land and a bunch of Protective neighbors.

Anyway, I'd play this game but I am already pressed for time as it is and spend most of my forum time these days working on my Immortal Dutch Domination story. Congrats on the win Chef!

Some bug did not allow me to finish this game. The game crashed in 1916AD. Logs show that I completed 3 SSThrusters and F8 screen shows that none of them was completed. I am not sure what is true, perhaps the second, cause some civs were doing sabotage of my projects. I will try reload to 1914AD and disable production of SSThrusters.

edit: Several different aproaches to this problem and still nothing. Pity but the game would be won. This is the last entry.

I´m pretty late to join, but well... ...I played up to 1000 AD checkpoint (920 AD):

Everything was going fine early, settled 3 blocking cities in the jungle, decided to run a CE because not much water there + running broke + financial. Used a zillion of workers to clear jungle. Settled peninsula only later. Eventually joinde judaism, because my neighbours, France and Egypt joined.

Tech-early, as far as I remember:
bronze (no bronze in BFC), hunting, AH (no horses in BFC), archery, IronW, writing, Aest, some trades

Tech-later, as far as I remember:
Lit, CoL, CS, Drama, Nationalism, Education, PP, Economy (free GM), RepParts, Lib (Rifling next turn as freebee), rest traded

Wonders: GL, NE, Taj, Globe

Army: 12 melee + some archers, trebs and spies, but only to avoid getting attacked (no early war)


Actually we´re in a Golden Age
...

Short-Term-Plan:
Revolt to Nationalism & Caste next turn, start drafting and time next GP to continue Golden Age. Upgrade all 12 melee to rifles (fire trade mission from Eco GM), draft some more and run over France with 25+ rifles, some trebs and spies ASAP. Teching to MilTrad while stomping France (both shouldn´t take more then 8-10 turns). Then go berserk and conquer everything or peacfully teching to space

...

We are in very good shape and position and I think that both, Dom and Space are possible. Screens from 920 AD in spoiler


The southern cities:
160628

The northern cities
160629

View of capital:
160630

Army:
160631

Tech-Situation 1 turn pre lib/rifles:
160632

Oh, the save...
160633

Another impressive game Snaaty.

btw. My game points that there is no conspiracy among the warmongers. G.Khan finally declared war on Shaka.

Very impressive game snaaty.

I'm quite convinced in my game I should have perhaps built less wonders and built my first few cities far down to the south (I'm very convinced now that settling as far outward as possible to block ai expansion is the best strategy on diety, especially after reading U Sun's Justinian's university thread.)

I'm rather baffled that it seems you haven't even built a quarry on the stone on the east coast (my first city connected that to build Pyramids/HG/MS). I'm also astounded at your tech situation, how the heck did you end up so far in the lead before trading liberalism at 900ad?, very impressive.


Although I still managed a win for this game and am proud of it, if I was to replay I definately would change my strategy a little, your game goes to show there's ALOT of things I could have done better in mine.


I'm also surprised that you have access to marble, I suppose ramesses is trading it to you. I suppose that because I settled directly north/east as my 1st city(linking the stone), then just south of that (moai statues city I wanted to develop asap), Napolean and sitting bull had all the more terrian to develop onto, and my game turned out quite differently. Sitting bull built the AP (hinduism), and conquered a few french cities to become extreamly powerfull and advanced.

@ cheffster:

First, congrats on your win. Also extremely impressive how you managed to get all this wonders

...

Some quick answers:

On BtS-Deity it seems much easier to block off enough land when you expand VERY agressive towards the AI´s (they don´t settle behind you, due to the changed AI city placement so you can even open borders). You even can cripple them with your settling policy now (but remember to build some units...)

I usually don´t build wonders except the GL (and maybe the Taj + SoL), so I didn´t need stone (in my opinion, they only slow expansion and city development)

Yes, Ramses traded marble to me, just 4 or 5 turns before I had finished Nationalism... ...I initially wanted to conserve 4 forrests in the capital, but then decided to chop the Taj thanks to the marble

Getting a tech lead isn´t than difficult now on BtS. Simply try to get Aest before 800 BC, usually you end up with a monopol and can trade it around very good (I received Poly, Sailing, Math, Alpha), then go Lib and beeline CoL-CS-Drama while lightbulbing Phil (don´t forget to assign two scientists as early as possible) with CS/Phil/Drama you usually can backfill everything, from then on you should be able to maintain a tech lead