http://www.civfanatics.net/methos/hof/staff/gauntlet.gifWhile the general Hall of Fame is an ongoing competition, we like to run time-definite competitions between updates that we call Gauntlets. Standard Hall of Fame rules (*) still apply, but any games meeting the settings will be counted towards the Gauntlet.

(*) Please read the >> HOF rules << (http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/rules.php) BEFORE playing!


Settings:

Victory Condition: Space Race (though all victory conditions must be enabled)
Difficulty: Prince
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Standard
Map Type: Continents
Speed: Normal
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 1.74.002 or 2.13.002
Date: 25th June to 10th July 2008
Must not play as Inca.

The earliest finish date wins, with score as a tiebreaker

What, a couple days passed and not a single reply here? :) Well, I think I should go and start working on a game for this minor...

Not sure whether I should use a sub-optimal but unplayed leader for my QM like Hannibal or go for the top space race leaders like Lizzie. Let's see what I can come up with...

Not sure whether I should use a sub-optimal but unplayed leader for my QM like Hannibal...

I'm halfway through my Hannibal attempt using the needed for Prince EQM rationale.

Im playing Elizabeth with oracle slingshot for CS and axeman rush on nearest opponent.
Had a great start but kinda messed up the rush somewhat, I should have built that barracks :)
Archer on hill or behind wall is evil.

Anyway, Ive been thinking about great liberary. Is it really that good? You can just as easiliy give birth to at least one scientist with normal specialists for academy, and you prolly wanna tech through scientific method which would obsolete TGL

Im playing Elizabeth with oracle slingshot for CS and axeman rush on nearest opponent.
Had a great start but kinda messed up the rush somewhat, I should have built that barracks :)
Archer on hill or behind wall is evil.

Anyway, Ive been thinking about great liberary. Is it really that good? You can just as easiliy give birth to at least one scientist with normal specialists for academy, and you prolly wanna tech through scientific method which would obsolete TGL

I think the Great Library is worth building. Great Scientists that aren't used for an academy should mostly be settled in your capital and can generate a healthy amount of research over the course of the game. With a library, university, observatory, lab, academy, Oxford, Free Religion and Representation, your settled scientist will be earning over 32 beakers a turn by my calculation [(6 + 3) * 3.6]. At that rate, it takes just over 50 turns to yield as many beakers as you would get from lightbulbing. (And even before you have all those multipliers - e.g., before you build a lab - your settled scientist is still doing good work for you.)

Manged to finish before 1800 at least... I dunno how those HOF entries were done oO I thought my game went great.

Problem with prince is that you cant really trade with anyone(AI sux) and that is really bothersome, I guess it may have been easier with slower speed and more invasion.

Like in my game I used liberalism to research Computers thats like :)

Maybe a stupid question, but do i upload games for these minor contests the same way i upload them for the normal HOF? And does it count both for this contest and for the HOF?

Just finished in 1956, probably not good for a top 10 here? How can you end it befor 1800? I realy got the feeling i maxed the science output, did had some minor wars but finishing 150 years earlier seems incredibly good.

Thnx,

yes upload as normal and it counts towards QM

Maybe a stupid question, but do i upload games for these minor contests the same way i upload them for the normal HOF? And does it count both for this contest and for the HOF?

Just finished in 1956, probably not good for a top 10 here? How can you end it befor 1800? I realy got the feeling i maxed the science output, did had some minor wars but finishing 150 years earlier seems incredibly good.

Thnx,

Yeah, you just upload as you do for an HOF entry.

I took a look at one of the #1 HOF games for similar settings to these and it seemed like the guy had an amazing number of cities. So I think maybe the key is to expand fast and keep expanding, somehow without bringing your economy to its knees. Also, of course, I'm sure you need to make your capital a research powerhouse.

But I don't know, I don't have a sub-1800 finish so don't take my word for it.

Just finished in 1956, probably not good for a top 10 here? How can you end it befor 1800? I realy got the feeling i maxed the science output, did had some minor wars but finishing 150 years earlier seems incredibly good.

Thnx,

I had a startlocation on plainhill with 2 commerce resourses and 1+ food resource as well as access to flood plain.

Settled 4 cities or so and then I built the oracle for CS.

I built a barracks and an army of 8 axemen in my capital (with byrocracy, 2 turns each) and invaded a nearby AI. This game me a total of 7 "real" cities, I also settled an 8th and very late a 9th.

A few cities were cottaged, one turned into production city and built wealth and 2 cities ran specialists. Pyramids might have been nice for representation but I had to wait for the actual tech.

Anyhow then I just teched for useful technologies on my way to the spacerace. I also traded quite a bit with the AI, you can give away obsolete techs and they pay you gold. On this difficulty you shouldnt need to worry about the competetion

Still pritty good imo :D. I had a little competition. And ragnar who was friendly offcourse declared war on me as a neigbour. We where equally strong so i couldn't take any cities from him. Later i became real good friends with him and kept asking him to anoy ramsess and ghandi who where on my heals. when i finaly launched my ship ramses and gandi where building therye first SS casing.

I find it difficult to keep everyone as friends. I managed to get my continent all judism but ramses and gandi changed later to christianaty, then the . .. .. .. . hit the fan :D.

read the article on triangle diplomacy in the war academy, you don't need everyone to like you. a couple of sides to trade with and back you up in wars is all you really need.

EDIT: why is my post longer than the one above even though it has less text?

You have a picture in your user info on the left.

Finally submitted my entry, 1826AD. Hannibal wasn't a wise choice for this map/VC after all. Could have won some 10 turns earlier if Peter didn't backstab me in 1800AD when I was 2 turns away from shutting down research. He was my war ally for most of the game, helping me vassalize the 2 english queens who shared our continent. I suppose he became too jealous of Hanni hanging around with 2 sophisticated ladies while he ended up playing solitaire on his Friday nights. :p

I finished the game at 1635AD. I think the key in that gauntlet is to conquer as much cities as dom level allows. AI won't help you too much in research, but they are easily can be counquered.

Don't build a military economy, but have enough army to attack 2 cities simoultanously. I was lucky that I had a horse in my capital (and 1 gold, 1 cow, 1 pig and 7 flood plains), by that I cleared my territory from Isa before building a settler. She didn't even had archers. Madrid was good positioned as well, having 1 gold, 1 sheep, iron, silk and 5 floods. I started to build cottages as much as I can, at the end I had 90-100 towns.

I played with Eli, but I'm about to think that Mansa or maybe Vic would be a better choice.

I finished the game at 1635AD. I think the key in that gauntlet is to conquer as much cities as dom level allows. AI won't help you too much in research, but they are easily can be counquered.

Don't build a military economy, but have enough army to attack 2 cities simoultanously. I was lucky that I had a horse in my capital (and 1 gold, 1 cow, 1 pig and 7 flood plains), by that I cleared my territory from Isa before building a settler. She didn't even had archers. Madrid was good positioned as well, having 1 gold, 1 sheep, iron, silk and 5 floods. I started to build cottages as much as I can, at the end I had 90-100 towns.

I played with Eli, but I'm about to think that Mansa or maybe Vic would be a better choice.

That's a fantastic time. How many cities did you have in the end?

That's a fantastic time. How many cities did you have in the end?

29-30 cities. I had to give 2 cities to the Russians in order not to reach the dom level. There were 4 AI-s in my continent, only some Russian cities remained.

Did you play with max opponents? In my games (6 AI) the AI always start too far away, at least for an axe or chariot rush, and the best I could get was 3 AI in my continent.
I did submit another entry, this time with Korea (sub-optimal, I know) but even after taking 2 AI (1st with his catapult UUs, 2nd with cannons) and owning 20 cities, I couldn't break the 1800 mark.

I'm 6th with 1983AD, using Ramesses II.

In my first ever Civ IV HOF attempt, I got 1925, using vanilla and Mansa.

I did no war, at all, which is probably a mistake - I should have taken a couple of guys down, gotten more cities - I did have one american one flip to me, after I culture bombed it twice, but that's not all that useful...

Did you play with max opponents? In my games (6 AI) the AI always start too far away, at least for an axe or chariot rush, and the best I could get was 3 AI in my continent.
I did submit another entry, this time with Korea (sub-optimal, I know) but even after taking 2 AI (1st with his catapult UUs, 2nd with cannons) and owning 20 cities, I couldn't break the 1800 mark.

I played with 6 AI's as well.

If you don't play with the min opponents, the dom level will be a bit lower, and the other reason is that it is still easily in prince to settle down a city or conquer it from barbs than from AI.

Anyway, I think the first rush is the most critical. I was lucky that in my submission I started with a horse, it helped a lot. Partly it was the key for having +1 city, +1 worker and a clear territory at the early game. There can be situations in prince when warrior rush works as well, but it's quite risky (if AI have enough time to build an archer, you lost).

The 2nd rush shpuld be elephant or macemen rush, fulfilled with catapults and maybe knights. The 3rd rush is very situation dependent.

I don't really like axemen. They are mostly defender units, it is wise to take 1-2 of them in bigger armies (if you want to defend your mounted army), but not more.

I keep getting early 1700-s as Cyrus. Early rush is indeed important, and with some luck you can conquer 2-3 AIs with Immortals. The problem with Cyrus is that his traits are not so good mid game, i.e. recovering after conquests is painful.

I keep getting early 1700-s as Cyrus. Early rush is indeed important, and with some luck you can conquer 2-3 AIs with Immortals. The problem with Cyrus is that his traits are not so good mid game, i.e. recovering after conquests is painful.

Well, with Cyrus the price of the early rush is the later disadvantage of lack of fin. I think it's better to have a leader without an early unique unit but having the fin trait, since the goal is SS and not conquer victory:)

I experimented a bit with conquest and I was surprised at how few cities the AI built early on. The game where I tried and was successful with a chariot rush I only took 2 cities from the AI I killed and they were quite far away from my capital, (there would have been space for at least 4 full city square in between).

Is this not a problem? Do you settle a load of cities between wars or do you leave alot of land barren?

Well, with Cyrus the price of the early rush is the later disadvantage of lack of fin. I think it's better to have a leader without an early unique unit but having the fin trait, since the goal is SS and not conquer victory:)
Well, Charismatic is a good trait, +2 happy (with Monument) kinda compensates for the lack of Fin. On the other hand, having all conquests done by 1AD is not such a bad idea.

Well, with Cyrus the price of the early rush is the later disadvantage of lack of fin. I think it's better to have a leader without an early unique unit but having the fin trait, since the goal is SS and not conquer victory:)

Elizabeth is a good leader for SS. She is financial for good research and Philosophical to pop more GS for bulbing through the tech tree.

Well, Charismatic is a good trait, +2 happy (with Monument) kinda compensates for the lack of Fin. On the other hand, having all conquests done by 1AD is not such a bad idea.

Charismatic is not a big help in prince, I didn't really had problems with hapiness since only 2 happy resources wasn't available in my continent.

However the advantage of a continental rush before 1AD or between 1AD-1000AD with fin is hardly can be compared. It is possible that you are right in this question, but it also needs a big amount of workers as well. Middle age conquests also mean that you will have (mostly) infrastructured cities, and a time when you can trade in your continent before declaring wars.

Btw I played it with Vanilla because of the easier CS slingshot.

Elizabeth is a good leader for SS. She is financial for good research and Philosophical to pop more GS for bulbing through the tech tree.

I played my 1635AD game with her, but I'm not sure that she was the best choice. So few of the needed bulbs can be fulfilled with a GP. You still can have enough GS for academies if you build early the great library and national epic. Qin Shi or Mansa maybe could do a better work.

Charismatic is not a big help in prince, I didn't really had problems with hapiness since only 2 happy resources wasn't available in my continent.
It's great in the very beginning, before the Calendar. +2 happy means you can start heavy whipping as soon as you switch to Slavery.
However the advantage of a continental rush before 1AD or between 1AD-1000AD with fin is hardly can be compared.
In Warlords is not that great, since the AIs do a lot better job on defending during Medieval wars.
It is possible that you are right in this question, but it also needs a big amount of workers as well.
Never had any problems with that. Whipping + captured Workers. The AIs in the beginning build Settlers and Workers rather than units, this is one of the things making early conquests so attractive.
Btw I played it with Vanilla because of the easier CS slingshot.
Well, Vanilla has some advantages, like cheap Bureaucracy and not so smart AI. :)

This Gauntlet is finished. Results:

1st kovacsflo 1635 AD
2nd Andrei_V 1715 AD
3rd ssjos 1725 AD

Congratulations!

Why isn't my game (http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/game_info.php?dsply=&entryID=12692) listed in the top 10?

The only difference i just noticed was the version.... but it's a BTS gauntlet right? So i asume we use the latest patch and hof mod... right or not?

I don't care mutch for it as i took first place for normal HoF. But still i like to know why i'm not accepted for the G-minor 47.

thnx!

Why isn't my game (http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/game_info.php?dsply=&entryID=12692) listed in the top 10?

The only difference i just noticed was the version.... but it's a BTS gauntlet right? So i asume we use the latest patch and hof mod... right or not?

I don't care mutch for it as i took first place for normal HoF. But still i like to know why i'm not accepted for the G-minor 47.

thnx!Settings:

Victory Condition: Space Race (though all victory conditions must be enabled)
Difficulty: Prince
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Standard
Map Type: Continents
Speed: Normal
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 1.74.002 or 2.13.002
Date: 25th June to 10th July 2008
Must not play as Inca.

The earliest finish date wins, with score as a tiebreakerSorry but BTS games were not eligible for this gauntlet. We treat BTS Space victories as a seperate victory condition called "Space Colony" due to the difference between winning at launch vs. winning on arrival at AC.