Emperor Cookbook V: Saladin [Archive] - Civilization Fanatics' Forums

ChromiumL

Mar 18, 2009, 10:12 PM

The Emperor Cookbook is a concurrent succession game series to help readers learn how to play and win at Emperor level in Civilization 4: Beyond the Sword, v3.17

This is the 5th game of the series.

For more information or to discuss the format, please visit the Monarchist Cookbook Bullpen (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=272935).

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Our fifith Emperor Cookbook game features Saladin. We will be playing at Emperor difficulty, epic speed, standard size fractal map (with low sea level). This is NOT an isolated/island start! Huts and events are disabled for this game, as they tend to make things more random.

Here is the info on our leader, his unique unit and building as well as our starting position and settings:

Our Fearless Leader:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0001-5.jpg

Our Starting Location:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0000-6.jpg

His UU:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0002-5.jpg

His UB:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0003-4.jpg

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Round one lasts from 4000 BC - 1500 BC.

Please play this round and submit your report into this thread by next Sunday (22nd).

IMPORTANT: Please use spoilers if you want to discuss opening strategies prior to starting the round

At the end of your Round, please remember to name your save with your name, game and Round # & game date (i.e. "EC2 Round 1 MyName BC-1500.CivBeyondSwordSave"). (And please don't forget to attach it to your Round report, either! )

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Roster:

YOU! - contributor, voter - our most important fixture, the readers who follow the threads and play along.

Now that we have upped the difficulty level, we will return to the 'best ball' system of selecting and playing saves. What this essentially means is that after we have completed each round, everyone will have a chance to vote on which save is in the best position. The winning save will be used for the next round.

If there is any player who is strong at Emperor+ level, it would be great to have you post your saves to show us how it's done. However, I request that any of you who realize your round was far superior remove your save from the voting. This rule is intended to ensure that the game doesn't get into a overly strong winning position after only a few rounds (because what fun is that?).

Voting Rules:

1. You may NOT vote on your own save (but you are encouraged to state the strengths and weaknesses of your save)
2. Only those who have posted a round may vote (those who are shadowing are always encouraged to express their opinion!). If someone misses a round, but have played all previous rounds, they may vote.
3. Don't vote on a save that has voluntarily been removed from the running by the person who submitted it.
4. At the end of each round you can vote on 3 saves for first, second and third place. I believe that these votes should be made publicly in order to allow for as much discussion as possible. I strongly encourage you to explain why you are voting for a particular save. This is one of the best ways to learn, and that's what this game is all about! If you feel uncomfortable voting publicly, PM me with your vote.
5. How you vote is up to you. Some people may want to vote for the 'best' save, others may vote for saves which they feel provide the best learning experience. Just make sure to explain what criteria you are using for your vote (overall best, best learning experience, etc).

After a couple days for voting and discussion a winner will be declared and we will move on to the next round.

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And with that, let the Game begin...

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Intrathread links (ToC): (note, the turn sets are subject to change, this is a tentative schedule to get this first round underway, we are still trying to find the best length for each round)

Round 0: The starting save (this post)
Round 1: 4000 BC - 1500 BC- MkLh (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=207504&d=1237459566)
Round 2: 1500 BC - 400 AD- Lansky (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208487&d=1238184144)
Round 3: 400 AD - 1100 AD- Now Playing!!
Round 4: 1100 AD - 1500 AD - upcoming
Round 5: 1500 AD - 1700 AD - upcoming
Round 6: 1700 AD - 1820 AD - upcoming
Round 7: 1820 AD - 2050 AD - upcoming

I-imp

Mar 18, 2009, 11:23 PM

I, the humble Prince/Monarch player, decided to play through this to 1500 BC. Honestly, I felt I could have done better (Like not letting the initial warrior get eaten:cry:) Maybe I could have even founded a religion, but felt it best to opt for something else. Like agriculture.

Actually, I don't know how to write a report, so I'll let someone else go before me.

timmy827

Mar 19, 2009, 12:11 AM

I've spent too much time playing RB variants so I don't really know my skill level, but I would say that I am normally comfortable playing at Emperor.

I doubt this first save is going to be the best though. Did not try for religion, could have had one though. Settled 1E to get very nice capital site. It was very tempting to settle 2nd city to get the pigs/gold in initial screenshot but as it became clear we are on peninsula, I pushed east with 2nd and 3rd cities to avoid being boxed in. That may have been suboptimal as it seems no AI's are at close to us - have met 4 but not found borders yet. Exploration has not been great, had poor luck getting explorers killed but that has been balanced out by good luck so far with a rather thin barb defense.

Near priesthood for intended shot at Oracle (marble hooked up), although not sure what to take - with only Mansa founding a religion among met AI's I am tempted for CoL.

Settler has just finished for city 4 and I have aimed at putting it south for pigs/gold by having worker road there and ready to chop for its monument, but other options are out there.

Map and lands:
http://i236.photobucket.com/albums/ff82/timmy827/EC%20V/Civ4ScreenShot0000.jpg

Leventis

Mar 19, 2009, 01:33 AM

The start looked like fun so I had a crack as well:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/1-Mecca.jpg?t=1237442834

Like timmy827, I thought 1E looked quite inviting and so I settled there, losing a turn in the process. Early tech path went Agri, Mining, BW and AH. Then went for masonry, pottery and got to writing before the other 4 civs. Took OB with Gilgamesh and scouted his land but the other 3 seem waaaay away somewhere SE. I decided against going after hunting --> archery as I often do, which meant I was forced to found a copper city. Settling in place at the start would have meant that copper would be attainable after the 2nd border pop, but I didn't have this option. I decided to settle here:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/2-Medina.jpg?t=1237443121

Not a great 2nd city, truth be told, but I had little choice. I borrowed the corn from Mecca to give it a growth spurt for a while since the capital has plenty of food. Should be fine post irrigation and make a nice production city.

Settled Damascus to grab marble, wheat and cow.

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/3-Damascus.jpg?t=1237443639

The peaks aren't all bad, since when the border pops I will at least have a better fogbust to the east. And really, there is no rush to expand at the moment -- I was tempted to settle further out but it seemed risky to overstretch without a decent number of axes, not to mention the financial strain. The goldmine only goes so far.

Have a handy Woodsman II warrior runing around out east:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/4-WoodsmanII.jpg?t=1237444001

A few barb archers came for my capital just as I was getting a few axes out, but not before they razed a cottage.

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/5-Whip.jpg?t=1237444059

I also got a madrassa out really early in the capital to help boost the goldmine research. As yet, I haven't got OB with anyone except Gilgamesh (not much point), so will wait until I find the other civs.

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/6-1500overview.jpg?t=1237444225

207479

RJM

Mar 19, 2009, 02:44 AM

I have a question about the starting position. If you have already played any moves, please take care how you respond to avoid giving information about the map.

There is a tile three south of our starting position that has access to pigs gold and corn - plus a flood plain. It seems to be coastal, although this needs to be confirmed (for example by moving the warrior). If it is coastal, do people think it's worth moving there before founding the city - particularly since in our starting position, the only visible resources in our fat cross are gold and wine? Alternatively doe we use it as a second city site. Should we move east to get the corn in our fat cross even though this also delays city foundation? Is there a case for moving north-west and founding on the first turn?

RJM

assass1n

Mar 19, 2009, 03:36 AM

Food is crucial for capital, I would settle with corn in BFC

RJM

Mar 19, 2009, 03:53 AM

Food is crucial for capital, I would settle with corn in BFC
Good point. It is possible that there is a food special in the BFC if we settle in place - there are 9 tiles that are not yet visible. Does the map generator guarantee us three resource specials?

RJM

assass1n

Mar 19, 2009, 05:04 AM

First Round

Techpath was
Med > Agri > Min > BW > AH > Masonry > Pottery > Writing > Priesthood ( 1 Turn )

Lost my screenshots PC restarted :mad:
Met Musa :D Shaka,Giggles,GK :D
Settled 1 City near the copper
Another near the pigs
We already have a route with Shaka and Mansa founded Hindu :goodjob:
I got Stonehenge but don't think the Oracle would be necessary though I have researched Priesthood
http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/9408/14691529.th.jpg (http://img22.imageshack.us/my.php?image=14691529.jpg)
http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/1751/mecca.th.jpg (http://img21.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mecca.jpg)

This is the save
207489

MkLh

Mar 19, 2009, 05:48 AM

to 1500BC:

I skipped an early religion because IMO it's not a good tech path for a civ that lacks almost all worker techs. Tech path was AG->AH->Mining->BW->Pottery->Writing->Poly->Priesthood, started CoL.

Medina claims bronze, built Stonehenge also:

207500

1500BC: An annoying barb archer is about to pillage a gold mine. But that's just the price for placing Medina 2 tiles away from Bronze (I wanted that fish).

207501

There's a lot of land here:

207502

207504

helemaalnicks

Mar 19, 2009, 07:45 AM

I don't get this game. I started a game, grabbed bronze on the first city. Though I'd be safe for the first border pop. No clue what I did wrong as opposed to f.e. the guy who founded horse city as his 3rd city. Barbarian entering my borders 2350BC:

http://i179.photobucket.com/albums/w301/helemaalnicks/cookbook1.jpg

I'll submit a safe later where I'm almost dead.

Ok, wasn't too bad, went into my borders, pillaged the corn, and went out again. Must be some kinda bug. Anyway. 1500BC, got bronzen fish up, and wheatcow marble. I just told shaka im not gonna stop dealing with the vile mali, and I will probably have a woodsmen 3 warrior next turn.

Save:

RJM

Mar 19, 2009, 08:48 AM

I decided to move my warrior ne to get as much map visibility as I could before deciding where to settle. After a lot of thought, I go for the plains site, adjacent to the coastal tile. Lost my warrior to a lion!
1900 BC meet Shaka (by boat), but an archer arrives a few turns later, so he's on the same land mass. My techs were mining, BW, agric, pottery, writing, fishing, sailing, masonary, poly.
RJM

shyuhe

Mar 19, 2009, 08:58 AM

Food is crucial for capital, I would settle with corn in BFC

It's irrigated corn to boot. You definitely want that and gold in your starting BFC.

edit: and by gold, I mean the plains hill one, not the crappy desert one. Although irrigated corn + pigs + desert gold may be good as an alternative capital site. And yes it's coastal. Or at least on a big lake. The plains tile NW of the gold isn't "fresh".

@hel:

Barbs will enter borders if they're up against them and see an improvement they can pillage. But it doesn't mean they' continue towards you capital at such an early year. Also, I would settle the second city with copper in the first ring. Second ring takes too long to get access.

RJM

Mar 19, 2009, 09:08 AM

I don't get this game. I started a game, grabbed bronze on the first city. Though I'd be safe for the first border pop. No clue what I did wrong as opposed to f.e. the guy who founded horse city as his 3rd city. Barbarian entering my borders 2350BC:

I'll submit a safe later where I'm almost dead.

Ok, wasn't too bad, went into my borders, pillaged the corn, and went out again. Must be some kinda bug. Anyway. 1500BC, got bronzen fish up, and wheatcow marble. I just told shaka im not gonna stop dealing with the vile mali, and I will probably have a woodsmen 3 warrior next turn.

First Round

Techpath was
Med > Agri > Min > BW > AH > Masonry > Pottery > Writing > Priesthood ( 1 Turn )

Lost my screenshots PC restarted :mad:
Met Musa :D Shaka,Giggles,GK :D
Settled 1 City near the copper
Another near the pigs
We already have a route with Shaka and Mansa founded Hindu :goodjob:
I got Stonehenge but don't think the Oracle would be necessary though I have researched Priesthood

I tend to run my defenses on the light side, but 2 warriors guarding 3 cities in 1500 BC is heroic! And 1 warrior guarding 3 cities leaves me speechless - whatever works for you I guess.
RJM

helemaalnicks

Mar 19, 2009, 09:17 AM

I tend to run my defenses on the light side, but 2 warriors guarding 3 cities in 1500 BC is heroic!
RJM

lol, I know, miscalculated the bronzepop i guess. If I had axes as soon as the bronze got hooked I'd be fine, but that's obv not the case here. But the guy with the 3cities no copper setting has'nt build that much either. I guess I should've sidetracked through archery

Leventis

Mar 19, 2009, 09:22 AM

No clue what I did wrong as opposed to f.e. the guy who founded horse city as his 3rd city. Barbarian entering my borders 2350BC

Well, 3 cities + 2 warriors + Emperor = Welcome Barbs.

helemaalnicks

Mar 19, 2009, 09:27 AM

Well, 3 cities + 2 warriors + Emperor = Welcome Barbs.

2 cities, one of em trying to hook bronze asap, but already know about it being bad. Im greedy, my second city shouldve been cr**y, or I should've settled in place. I know I seem like a newb with my save :D. But I haven't run in serious barb trouble for about 10-15 games now, so I'm not too worried about this aspect. Just bad timing on the mistake, doing it on a public game ;). However, if you look at the above saves, I'm not the only one falling for greed>defense mistake on this map. My save has a woodsman 3 going for it, consider that when voting, I could always whip the axes if I get in serious trouble.

budweiser

Mar 19, 2009, 09:28 AM

There isnt much non-spoiler discussion about what to do first here. I think you move the warrior 1 NE to see whats there. Then move the settler 1E into the woods, possibly settling there next turn depending on what is revealed.

Research AG, then Pottery, then mining? Or maybe AG, Mining, Pottery?

helemaalnicks

Mar 19, 2009, 09:32 AM

budweiser

Mar 19, 2009, 09:44 AM

why pottery so early? I never did that before...

Partly because you are only 2 techs away from it, and early cottages will allow a bigger initial expansion. The UB is also a Library, you will want that sooner rather than later.

Now, the gold partly mitigates the value of early cottages, but it also allows a higher happy cap so you can work more cottages.

Now a certain strategy is becoming clear, once we have an improved tech rate via gold and cottages, we can begin to tech up the religion line, and make a stab at the Oracle. We could take MC from that, make earlier forges and increase happiness yet again. Or we could Oracle HR or CoL.

This is the kind of discussion that I think people may find helpful.

shyuhe

Mar 19, 2009, 11:04 AM

Here's a totally different take:

I moved the warrior 1NE and didn't find anything new. I decided to go coastal though and sent the settler 2S from the start. I found the oasis and settled next to it, setting research to polytheism. Voila! Hinduism :D

Here's the 1500 BC screen:

http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd161/shyuhe/misc/Civ4ScreenShot0152.jpg

Wonders are going very slow so oracle for CoL shouldn't be a problem here.

Soirana

Mar 19, 2009, 11:15 AM

Well, let's call it shadow to 1500BC. although i doubt i will go on.

Warning - i did have IW and scouted well, so think before looking at save. In description i will mention as little as possible.

Well, two gold hills, promise of non isolation and low sea level... Guess that was coming if we have marble nearby:lol:

Sorry, no screenshots, was lazy.

I ended being 1w, although by fog reading i thought i was moving away from floodplains. Well before i saw cows i was thinking about 1N. Cows fitted my strategy lot of more than FP.

Started techs Agri-Mining-AH [gold is priority as is second city for second gold. That is my opinion.]
On other hand we have 3hills without forest +cows...

t42-i found horses [damn far] - went for writing.
t51-found zulu
t79-met Gilgamesh. what a nice company...
t80-settler number three - keep him in as i will have alpha in two turns.
T82-Alpha- shaka won't trade with me despite giving him mysticim... Get BW from Gil, for writing+myst. Thank god we have copper!

t83-Alpha to Gil for IW+Pottery [Shaka is still not trading with me]. Sent few my fogbusting warriors [that is why i liked cows:)] to search more trading partners. Espionage distribution tells were should be some.

Aslo moved my copper settler to another location.
Let say [IW spoiler]
Marble+iron+wheat+cows, beat crap out of copper city, especially since i can get iron in first ring. Saved myself a settler..

t92-Met Mansa -Sailing out of him for IW, [got poly for masonry from Gil]

I am in... I don't know 5 turns maybe to currency slingshot. After i will stream axes settlers and workers, while teching towards literature. I already have tech advantage. Shaka still claims about archers which is good.

Well, knowing how late i met AI's that was rather gambit. On other hand i had half road to horse and fogbust line to horse place. in case i would get royaly screwed, which is near impossible on Fractal.

Have a good cookbook.:goodjob: to all for participation.

shyuhe

Mar 19, 2009, 11:31 AM

@Soirana:

Love the alpha gambit. I don't think I've ever skipped BW entirely like that. The things you can do with early gold :lol:

Gumbolt

Mar 19, 2009, 12:29 PM

A new cookbook :goodjob:

Its a leader i am yet to play so this should be fun. Will have to make a decision on starting location once I load save. 2 gold should ease the pain early on!!!

Congrats to all those that finished the last one.

Gumbolt

Mar 19, 2009, 01:12 PM

Okay have gone for different too. I assume it is I havnt looked at others yet. :)

21/03/2009 - added a few screen shots!!

I saw the wine and i laid the city there. (Bonus trade) In retrospect a bad idea given 2 sea resources i lost out on. Still I am happy with starting location.

I went warrior to build city up to size 3. After founding Hindu religion i teched Agriculture. followed by mining/ priesthood/masonry/writing and alphabet. Risky strat i skipped BW. It does leave me with lots of forest.

Meanwhile my warrior explored the land finding no obvious near neighours. Eventually Shaka and Mansa found me by way of scout. :(

As TMIT always says. Kill shaka if he starts near you!!!!

I built my second city to grab 2 food resources and the marble.

3rd city was laid to grab the gold and pigs.

come 1525bc i traded for BW and hunting with Mansa. I may have done a second trade with him.

Overall 3 cities. Oracle 2 turns off. (COL or currency?) copper inside my cultural borders thanks to border pop. Reasonable science although i need to expand.

Probably a bit weak defensively but copper should fix that.

Thinking AP win might be possible if I get my defenses up and I am not over run by barbs.
http://i375.photobucket.com/albums/oo195/gummby_2008/salcookbook/salcook10000.jpg
http://i375.photobucket.com/albums/oo195/gummby_2008/salcookbook/salcook20000.jpg
http://i375.photobucket.com/albums/oo195/gummby_2008/salcookbook/salcook30000.jpg
http://i375.photobucket.com/albums/oo195/gummby_2008/salcookbook/salcook40000.jpg

Gumbolt

Mar 19, 2009, 01:17 PM

KingMorgan

Mar 19, 2009, 02:30 PM

Settled 1E, Poly. Hinduism. Chopped a settler, then oracle 6 turns to complete.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=207587&stc=1&d=1237490809

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=207588&stc=1&d=1237490809

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=207589&stc=1&d=1237490851

207586

champ82

Mar 19, 2009, 03:56 PM

Move Settler 1 East.

Techs went Ag, Mining, BW. After BW I put it to hunting before I checked the map to see where / if there was any copper. I didn’t realize I left it on until I was half done researching it, so I just finished and went to archery. I didn’t like where the copper was and there didn’t seem any rush to get it with PRO archers. Animal Husbandry, Masonry, Polytheism, Preiesthood, Writing.

Build order went worker, warrior, start barracks, warrior, finish barracks, archer, worker, archer, settler. Wait, I have 3 archers, must have forgot to write one of them down.

Other notable events –
3575 – Meet Gilgamesh from SE
3475 – Budhism founded
3350 – Hinduism founded
3250 – expoloring warrior gets killed by lion 5 N 1 E of Mecca
2100 – Medina founded to have immediate access to marble and wheat.

http://i574.photobucket.com/albums/ss188/champ82/01-05-Medina0000.jpg

2000 – Judiasm founded
1675 – Great Wall Built. I start building Oracle.
1525 – Meet Shaka, Stonehenge built.

The problem I’m having is that at the current rate the Oracle will be complete before I get writing. I hate to wait to finish the oracle but I really want COL. If I were to finish the game alone I would take the gamble andchange the build queue of Mecca so that I would be one turn away from completing the oracle, and then put something else in there, wait for writing and then finish it.

http://i574.photobucket.com/albums/ss188/champ82/01-Oracle4turnsaway0000.jpg

The known world -

http://i574.photobucket.com/albums/ss188/champ82/01-knownworld1500BC0000.jpg
I have a settler, warrior, and archer waiting inbetween the horse and wheat to the SE. I will find the city after I obtain writing.

The state of things –

http://i574.photobucket.com/albums/ss188/champ82/01-DomesticAdvisor1500BC0000.jpg
http://i574.photobucket.com/albums/ss188/champ82/01-MilitaryAdvisor1500BC0000.jpg

So I think my game falls into the ‘could be better, could be worse’ category. There’s no real reason to pick mine over KingMorgan’s (and probably some others) other than an extra challenge as far as I can tell. I think my chances of getting COL and a religion are pretty good. My security is OK I think for now (especially as random events are turned off.) It will have to be beefed up if Shaka is close though. I didn't get the copper yet, but I really don't see the rush. I'd rather get land that would get eaten up by Gilgamesh or others first. The Madrassa should be good culture defense. I didn't explore very well obviously.

Gumbolt

Mar 19, 2009, 04:14 PM

Move Settler 1 East.

Techs went Ag, Mining, BW. After BW I put it to hunting before I checked the map to see where / if there was any copper. I didn’t realize I left it on until I was half done researching it, so I just finished and went to archery. I didn’t like where the copper was and there didn’t seem any rush to get it with PRO archers. Animal Husbandry, Masonry, Polytheism, Preiesthood, Writing.

Build order went worker, warrior, start barracks, warrior, finish barracks, archer, worker, archer, settler. Wait, I have 3 archers, must have forgot to write one of them down.

Other notable events –
3575 – Meet Gilgamesh from SE
3475 – Budhism founded
3350 – Hinduism founded
3250 – expoloring warrior gets killed by lion 5 N 1 E of Mecca
2100 – Medina founded to have immediate access to marble and wheat.

http://i574.photobucket.com/albums/ss188/champ82/map1525AD0000.jpg

2000 – Judiasm founded
1675 – Great Wall Built. I start building Oracle.
1525 – Meet Shaka, Stonehenge built.

Insert 3rd city picture.

The problem I’m having is that at the current rate the Oracle will be complete before I get writing. I hate to wait to finish the oracle but I really want COL. If I were to finish the game alone I would take the gamble andchange the build queue of Mecca so that I would be one turn away from completing the oracle, and then put something else in there, wait for writing and then finish it. I’m not founding my 3rd city until I get writing.

The state of things –

Insert photos

So I think my game falls into the ‘could be better, could be worse’ category. There’s no real reason to pick mine over KingMorgan’s other than an extra challenge as far as I can tell. I think my chances of getting COL and a religion are pretty good. My security is OK I think for now (especially as random events are turned off.) It will have to be beefed up if Shaka is close though. I didn't get the copper yet, but I really don't see the rush. I'd rather get land that would get eaten up by Gilgamesh or others first. The Madrassa should be good culture defense. I didn't explore very well obviously.

I think you posted the wrong picture!!! Either that or I have been playing the wrong save. ;)

champ82

Mar 19, 2009, 04:22 PM

I think you posted the wrong picture!!! Either that or I have been playing the wrong save. ;)

Yeah I'm new to writing reports / spoilers / using photobucket. Can you tell? I caught it later myself.

Gumbolt

Mar 19, 2009, 04:31 PM

Least you loaded some pics. i got a bit lazy on my report. :(

Lansky

Mar 19, 2009, 04:49 PM

I liked my round overall but it could have been better.

I have a lot of faith in the beginning capital city placement script so I just blindly settle in place. So Gold, Corn, Wine, 3 flood plains. I've had worse.

I am pretty sure I took a very different route from what other people will have done. Only two cities currently. Capital settled in place and Medina to the east claiming corn, cow, marble, and recently revealed grassland iron. Copper and Iron are within cultural borders and are being hooked up. A third worker out in 3 turns and a third settler out in 7. An amazing barb city is up a bit to the east which would be easy picking for some swords. Explored a decent bit of the map with a woods2 warrior but have neglected the upper half. Obviously built The Oracle to claim CoL (Medina is the holy city).

What makes this most likely different is that with gold in the BFC, revealed marble and 3 FP's I went after Pottery > The Oracle > Alphabet. Alphabet decision was based on the neighbors discovered so far
-Ghengis: E somewhere
- Shaka: Directly SE
- Gilga: E somewhere
- Mansa!: He's east of Shaka and south of the other two likely. Probably won't be alive for long.

Tech wise we have Alphabet(monopoly in the known world atm), CoL, IW and one turn into Currency but I'm not sold on this tech up next. A lot of tech brokering was done in the last few turns but nothing was given to Shaka. Really want to see him smeared early. Have the free missionary heading towards him (unescorted gambit) to make him a religious pariah hopefully. Mansa/Ghengis are Buddhist.

Big down side is only 2 cities at this time.

Well I think you can get most of this from the save actually... meh.

Save properly posted here - http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=7900274&postcount=91

dirtyparrot

Mar 19, 2009, 06:11 PM

I'll start off by saying that I have not played past Prince difficulty (although I do beat Prince on a regular basis) and this is my 1st time participating in any cookbook. I haven't really documented much, but I think I've had a respectable beginning (I guess others can let me know whether that's the case or not).

I decided after seeing hints of a coastline in the initial screenshot, to settle 1SW from the corn (cost me 1 turn). I cranked out a worker, then a warrior, then a settler. I started researching agriculture, mining, and then BW. I decided to really limit my exploration because I had no idea when barbs start popping up on Emperor.

So far, I’ve settled 2 cities and I’m about to get a 3rd (down by the marble/wheat/spice/cows). I’ve used my archers for fog-busting and my city placement means that I only really need to worry about barbs coming from the right side. Both my cities have granaries and I’m about to get my first axeman. So far, I’ve only built one worker, but most of my best tiles are being worked (obviously that’s insufficient, but I figure with the barbs and Shaka as a neighbour that a strong military can’t hurt). The worry of jumping 2 levels has made feel like I need to micro-manage like crazy.

So far, I’ve met Shaka, Gilga, and Mansu. I’m currently researching alphabet in hopes of being able to trade with other civs. I would appreciate any constructive criticism from others.

Here's Mecca
207622

And Medina
207623

Future site of my 3rd city
207624

Mecca city info (note that next turn I'll flip the build order)
207625

Medina city info
207626

Relations
207627

Power graph
207628

Also for some reason I can't play this save using the BUG mod.

gspchamp999

Mar 19, 2009, 07:14 PM

Teched - Agric, AH, Mining, BW, Pottery IW

Next settler to settle Wheat/Cow 8 Blocks to the right of my third city.

Monuments built in two non-capital cities.

Have two non-upgraded chariots so far.

207629

207630

assass1n

Mar 19, 2009, 11:10 PM

That's the way I play it when I see four AI's on my continent they do the fogbusting I don't I haven't got even one barb coming and I can get axes quick enough :D

RJM

Mar 20, 2009, 02:18 AM

That's the way I play it when I see four AI's on my continent they do the fogbusting I don't I haven't got even one barb coming and I can get axes quick enough :D

The great thing about these games is learning new techniques from other people. Can you say some more about fog-busting by the AI? On your save, I assumed that barbs (warriors, archers or axemen) could appear within 3 tiles of each of your cities at any time. Is there something that prevents this happening? In my save, I have posted axemen to gain experience from the barbs that I thought would appear. Have I wasted my time?

RJM

Soirana

Mar 20, 2009, 04:29 AM

That's the way I play it when I see four AI's on my continent they do the fogbusting I don't I haven't got even one barb coming and I can get axes quick enough :D

There is a question when do you meet four AI's. I still haven't despite some efforts.

Another thing that is low sea level and quite a teritory in east.. Is suspect barbs will kick some assess in nearest few hundred years. As soon as barb axes will slaugther all these scouts they will start searchinng for someone to kill.

assass1n

Mar 20, 2009, 04:33 AM

The great thing about these games is learning new techniques from other people. Can you say some more about fog-busting by the AI? On your save, I assumed that barbs (warriors, archers or axemen) could appear within 3 tiles of each of your cities at any time. Is there something that prevents this happening? In my save, I have posted axemen to gain experience from the barbs that I thought would appear. Have I wasted my time?

RJM

Actually it depends on the number of fogged tiles on this continent (world ?)
the AI's usually start with two scouts and they keep them running around so very few barb spawns occur and also we don't have Events On so no barb uprisings
yeah I think even I should have put an axeman on a forested plains so that it gains exp for HE :cry:

RJM

Mar 20, 2009, 04:58 AM

Actually it depends on the number of fogged tiles on this continent (world ?)
the AI's usually start with two scouts and they keep them running around so very few barb spawns occur and also we don't have Events On so no barb uprisings
yeah I think even I should have put an axeman on a forested plains so that it gains exp for HE :cry:

One of the loading messages implies that a tile that has been "unfogged" becomes fogged again - presumably if it's not visible from an active unit or city. Is this not the case?
RJM

assass1n

Mar 20, 2009, 06:24 AM

Yeah it's like that :)

RRRaskolnikov

Mar 20, 2009, 07:52 AM

Hi :hatsoff:,

found the starting screeny amazing so gave it a go:

The plan was to work both gold resources asap. I settled in place...

Techs went: Agriculture (corn) -> Pottery (cottage those fps asap, thinking at early bureacraty) -> hunting -> archery (opening with pottery means no time to hook up copper or horses) ->mining -> BW ->Writing -> fishing -> sailing (to have an exploring WB and establish early TRs) -> work on alphabet (4 turns to go at 1500 BC with enough gold to finish it).
Builds in the cap: worker -> 2 warriors -> worker -> archer -> settler -> worker -> archer -> settler -> worker (on going)

I settled the pig /gold/corn site first then the cow/marble/wheat one (GLib :yumyum:).
Plan is to push for COL then CS while going on with the REX (my next three sites are marked). Only one AI met so far (yeah I lost 2 warriors over 3 :smoke:), the friendly Genghis Khan!

Units: 2 archers, 1 warrior, 1 workboat, 3 workers
eco: +37bpt/-3 gpt, 13g in reserve. No GP points yet (no lib so... :lol:)

Some pics:
Cities:
http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo58/RRRaskolnikov/Civ4ScreenShot0876.jpg

Resource map:
http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo58/RRRaskolnikov/Civ4ScreenShot0877.jpg

Techs researched:
http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo58/RRRaskolnikov/Civ4ScreenShot0878.jpg

Units:
http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo58/RRRaskolnikov/Civ4ScreenShot0880.jpg

I had no time for a more detailed report, so just ask if you want to know something I didn't mention :)

Cheers,
Raskolnikov

Leventis

Mar 20, 2009, 10:47 PM

Raskolnikov, I quite liked your save but there's something I don't get... Namely, how come you went with sailing instead of AH? I can't work this out -- you have cows ready to be pastured and will have pigs in your borders in a few turns. Surely this would be better than having an exploring workboat and 1 trade route to GK.

Nonethelesss, I think you're in a great position here to build some axes and kill some barbs. That 2nd working goldmine means you can easily afford a 4th city right now. All in all, I'd probably vote for this save at the moment :cool:.

RRRaskolnikov

Mar 21, 2009, 02:51 AM

Gumbolt

Mar 21, 2009, 04:31 AM

@Leventis:

I choosed sailing because I want foreign TRs asap. The moment my wb will see one other border, I 'll get them and it's a big boost to your commerce early on (I 'll get 1 more commerce per city minimum)... As I went for early alpha, I will probably ask nicely AH to one of my opponent (I bet they are chickens out there) :p. I have enough food anyway for now :).
And yeah the plan is to REX, but more than one more city! The land is excellent so few cottages and building research in some cities will allow fast COL.

You do have 2 gold resources. I dont think 6 trade will outweigh that for many years. Alphabet will make sailing tradable. That being said i dont think i teched sailing or AH. :lol:

On a side note. Are you lot all using a patch? I dont get all the extra data at top of screen that some get. Stuff like great people in x turns/generals etc. Also the diplo info too. Hmmm

RJM

Mar 21, 2009, 04:50 AM

On a side note. Are you lot all using a patch? I dont get all the extra data at top of screen that some get. Stuff like great people in x turns/generals etc. Also the diplo info too. Hmmm

BUG!

RJM

dirtyparrot

Mar 21, 2009, 09:04 AM

Gumbolt you can download the latest version of BUG on the link below
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=202755&package_id=248908&release_id=663411

Gumbolt

Mar 21, 2009, 09:08 AM

Gumbolt you can download the latest version of BUG on the link below
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=202755&package_id=248908&release_id=663411

Cheers for that!! I uploaded some screenshots to my save. :)

Abegweit

Mar 21, 2009, 01:50 PM

I headed south to the ocean. Blue circles forever! Tech order Ag-Mining-AH-BW. Build order: Worker-Warrior-Worker-Stonehenge. I really don’t understand the antipathy that so many players seem to have towards this wonder. I build it most of the time that I start with Mysticism. It’s a good choice while letting the city grow. The Priest is useful and it solves the issue of border-popping.

The initial warrior wandered around the map, exploring. He met Charly, Mansa, Genghis and Shaka on the way. We know where the first three live and Shaka must be to our southeast. The warrior just survived an encounter with a barb archer which gave him his tenth HP, woody III status and unlocked the HE. :dance:

http://i296.photobucket.com/albums/mm171/abegweit/AbECV1.jpg

My second city went one north of the original starting point, claiming the corn, gold, copper and other goodies. The borders just popped and there are two workers on the copper so it will come on line Real Soon Now. We are already working the gold and corn. With three hills and copper, it would make a fine production city but there is sooo much cottageable land… I think I’ll move the capital here.

Teching continued with Pottery and Writing. Then back to the religious line with Masonry, Polytheism and Priesthood. Currently researching Monarchy for the wine and HR. I don’t usually follow this line. Normally I trade for these techs but I figure that the wine makes it worthwhile.

Third city went on the Marble. The capital squeezed out a Madrassa to compliment the Gold and is planning to build the Oracle. After that, it will become a settler/worker factory to start our REX. There is lots of land.

http://i296.photobucket.com/albums/mm171/abegweit/AbECV2.jpg

Perplexity

Mar 21, 2009, 01:55 PM

Here's my attempt, first time posting in a cookbook.

Seems like a solid start. Plenty of land.

I have four cities. Dotmapped out several more. Not sure if the next settler should go east near Shaka or fill in southwest of Mecca.

http://i489.photobucket.com/albums/rr259/Perplexity_photobucket/Civ4ScreenShot0011.jpg

Mecca has Stonehenge and a Madrassa. No granary yet. Going to work these five tiles and produce settlers/workers for a bit.

http://i489.photobucket.com/albums/rr259/Perplexity_photobucket/Civ4ScreenShot0012.jpg

2 workers and 5 warriors.

http://i489.photobucket.com/albums/rr259/Perplexity_photobucket/Civ4ScreenShot0013.jpg

Tech order was Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, Mining, Bronze Working, Pottery, Writing. Now researching Alphabet at 14bpt at 50% science. 19 turns to go. Second gold will be online soon though.

http://i489.photobucket.com/albums/rr259/Perplexity_photobucket/Civ4ScreenShot0014.jpg

Save:

Abegweit

Mar 21, 2009, 02:02 PM

The problem I’m having is that at the current rate the Oracle will be complete before I get writing. I hate to wait to finish the oracle but I really want COL.You are four turns from both the Oracle and Writing. You get the tech first so there is no problem.

On another topic, I agree completely with RRR and soirana that getting both gold online has to be a priority.

Gumbolt

Mar 21, 2009, 02:24 PM

RRRaskolnikov

Mar 21, 2009, 02:36 PM

Gumbolt

Mar 21, 2009, 03:13 PM

@Gumbolt: the contribution of TRs compared to the two gold will quickly increase as we gain new cities (and I don't plan to stay at 3 cities long). Gold mines are important early one but it's a pity to know 5 AIs, have access to their map, and not having TRs with them. And anyway, I think it's more a general idea. you won't have 2 gold resources in every starts, on contrary you will always get commerce from foreign TRs.

Cheers

I dont doubt the value of trade routes. I normally trade with the Ai for sailing unless i want GLH. Maybe something to think about in the future. Without road it can be useful for resources in cities.

Its something i have not played around with too much. Might do some testing on this.

Abegweit

Mar 21, 2009, 03:48 PM

Its interesting looking at this and another save. Almost worth a feudalism slingshot with the Oracle. Minor risk of someone else building it. Although Feudalism is not a tech i would consider trading away so early to the likes of shaka, gil and co. Interesting idea. I was simply going to grab COL but you may be right to be more ambitious. Through judicious use of scientists, you should be able to finish Monarchy and The Oracle both in about 10 or 11 turns.

You will be well set up to pump out great priests. Production capital maybe. Indeed.

gspchamp999

Mar 21, 2009, 03:55 PM

BUG!

RJM

I downloaded BUG and would like to uninstall it. It slows down civ too much for me, where is uninstall option?

dirtyparrot

Mar 21, 2009, 03:59 PM

I downloaded BUG and would like to uninstall it. It slows down civ too much for me, where is uninstall option?

There's an uninstall that comes with BUG. It's in the BUG folder. Although, BUG should not slow down CIV. You can't ask someone like EmperorFool in the BUG mods section of this forum. They're probably better at answering questions you may have.

Abegweit

Mar 21, 2009, 04:15 PM

@Gumbolt: the contribution of TRs compared to the two gold will quickly increase as we gain new cities (and I don't plan to stay at 3 cities long). Gold mines are important early one but it's a pity to know 5 AIs, have access to their map, and not having TRs with them. And anyway, I think it's more a general idea. you won't have 2 gold resources in every starts, on contrary you will always get commerce from foreign TRs.

Cheers

The problem with this line of reasoning is that you don't have TRs and aren't likely to get them for quite some time. The barb city blocks you to the south and who knows what's in the north. Another city might very well appear there. How do you know that there are five civs anyway? You've only met one.

RJM

Mar 21, 2009, 04:24 PM

I downloaded BUG and would like to uninstall it. It slows down civ too much for me, where is uninstall option?

I've never noticed a problem with BUG slowing things down. However, I haven't installed the latest update. Is it simply the stream of messages, or does the whole game slow down?

RJM

ChromiumL

Mar 21, 2009, 04:42 PM

Here's my save (we will start voting tomorrow!)

I have been playing around a lot lately with a religious economy (using shrine), so decided to start going in that direction.

I decided to move my warrior onto the hill and saw a lovely river/corn that lured my settler one east.

Summary: Teched buddhism (founded), mining, agriculture, animal husbandry, pottery, bronze working, writing, hunting, archery, alphabet (19 turns). Built 2 more cities after capital -- one for gold/pigs/corn (yes, overlap with capital will allow the city more production and fewer useless coastal tiles), and one for wheat, cows, marble. I am a little short on units (decided for extra worker over another warrior), so I have 1 warrior with Woodsman II guarding the north, then one warrior in each of my other cities (except the capital). However, I do have 3 workers which is awesome, and important given the number of improvements needed. I am 7 turns away from the oracle and with a 80% tech rate am producing 26:science: per turn and -1:gold: (with 58:gold: in the bank this is pretty sustainable), or 23:science: and +2:gold: at 70% tech rate.

My Lands:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0005-4.jpg

Yes, that is a barb archer SE of my third city--but it really shouldn't be an issue.

Details:

Tech: I wanted an early religion, but I also wanted to get that gold/hill online as soon as possible. I realized that if I built worker first in capital, I would have time to get meditation (and hopefully Buddhism), then go for mining and the worker would only be idle for 3 turns (probably enough to build a road to the gold). This was sorta a risk, and I usually don't go for Buddhism--but I was pretty sure I could make it, especially since I could cut the number of turns by switching to the gold for a turn or two. Thankfully, my plan worked perfectly (or this save would have been a dud). So, my tech path was Buddhism, mining, agriculture (for corn), animal husbandry (for cows and later pigs). After this it became a little less obvious where I wanted to go next. I finally decided on pottery, then bronze working, then writing. When I saw where our copper was, I decided that I wasn't going to put a bad city up by the copper (yet) and went for hunting, archery (what good is protective if you don't use it!), and finally working on Alphabet (19 turns). With a 80% tech rate I am producing 26:science: per turn and -1:gold:.

Tech Situation:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0006-2.jpg

Cities:: After building a worker, I built a warrior that allowed Mecca to grow to 3, followed by a settler, another worker, then I started on a monastery with the hopes of building a missionary to send down to my neighbor Shaka whom I had just met. As I was about to finish it, Buddhism spread naturally so that meant I didn't have to build/escort a missionary (yay!). After that, I think I built another settler then finally started working on the Oracle (7 turns left). I debated on putting my second city on the empty plains/hill SW of Mecca, or just straight 3 south from Mecca. I finally decided on 3 south since it could borrow the corn, and would also have the potential for significantly greater production (2 plains hills vs zero). Medina has a monument and 1 turn away from granary. My third city was just formed east of Mecca, getting wheat, pigs and marble. It is still working on a monument.

Mecca:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0004-5.jpg

Relations: Shaka (our closest neighbor) has my religion (Buddhism)... yay!! Otherwise, I have met Genghis and Mansa (Hindu).

Abegweit

Mar 21, 2009, 04:51 PM

I would appreciate any constructive criticism from others. OK. :) Since you asked, the single biggest problem with your game, by far, is that you only have one worker. Compare your capital with mine. We both started in the same location. :goodjob: on that!

Mine is a stinking mess of unheath :D. Every tree in sight is dead. Despite the fact that it built three workers to your one, it has reached size six (without building a granary, which it doesn't need right now anyway) and is working four mines to your one.

Try it over with my build order, worker-warrior-worker, and you'll see the difference. BTW, first worker started out irrigate-mine-road-pasture-road. Then the timber started falling. :lol: Every time you grow you should add another mine.

You don't have to build Stonehenge like I did. There is certainly nothing wrong with a settler right after the second worker followed by a granary or something next.

gspchamp999

Mar 21, 2009, 05:09 PM

I've never noticed a problem with BUG slowing things down. However, I haven't installed the latest update. Is it simply the stream of messages, or does the whole game slow down?

RJM

From the moment I clicked 'Single Player' on the title screen and it took 10 seconds to get to the next screen, everything is slowed down.

I cracked my game so I don't have to worry about having the CD in my PC, and if no one else has issues with BUG slowing the game down, it is probably related to the crack.

Abegweit

Mar 21, 2009, 05:25 PM

I cracked my game so I don't have to worry about having the CD in my PC, and if no one else has issues with BUG slowing the game down, it is probably related to the crack.That's not the explanation either. Cracking the game won't slow it down.

IPEX-731BA5DD06

Mar 21, 2009, 07:25 PM

Emperor's CookBook V

Saladin, the Sprititual, and away we go to 1500 BC

1st move was to move the warrior onto the near by hill, to survey the lands about my starting position, and seeing this,

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%201%201500%20BC/Warrioronhill.jpg

I moved to settle 1 east, screen shot taken after movement.

1st build is a worker, 23 turns, Research is Agriculture (14)/Mining (12). By time worker is produced, I'll have both tech's, farm 2 corn, build gold mine.

3745 BC Lose to a Lion at 32% for the attacker... Just great.

3374 BC Mining in, decide to go for Bronze working, then Pottery, I plan on whipping heavely.

2675 BC I lose a 2nd warrior to a lion this time at 23.4% attacking odds, across a river no less.

I think were Isolated.

2400 BC I met Timijin, but I've no idea where he came from, I was distracted by a barb archer, near my undefended capital.

2000 BC I decided to whip a 2nd warrior, since I've done so badly on the battle odds so far, 4 from stonehenge, but I'd rather not lose capital, then lose stonehenge.

Sure enough, I win, 3 to go on stonehenge, building worker in city 2 at size 2, roading to 2nd city. Imporvements lost; 1 gold mine, 1 corn farm unirrigated.

1825 BC I met Mansu coming up from the SE, Khan must have come that way as well.

1500 BC I have 2 cities (bah) 1 gold mine, about to be pillaged for a 2nd time. 1 Corn farm (enough food) 1 farmed floodplain. 2nd city has 1 Wheat farm, and 1 Marble Quarry, all linked by roads.
Capital has 3 barbs bee-lining the city.

Tech's researched, in order; Farming, Mining, Bronze working, Animal husbandry, writing, pottery, masonry. Started on a run to Priesthood for Oracle.

3 workers, 3 warriors, 2 barracks, 3 barbs :lol:, 2 opponents met; Ghengis Khan, and Mansa Mansu, both from SE.

The North is going to be a barb spawing ground, ignored Great wall.

All in all, a poor effort really, it just went so Quickly.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%201%201500%20BC/Empire.jpg
207863

dirtyparrot

Mar 21, 2009, 07:46 PM

OK. :) Since you asked, the single biggest problem with your game, by far, is that you only have one worker. Compare your capital with mine. We both started in the same location. :goodjob: on that!

Mine is a stinking mess of unheath :D. Every tree in sight is dead. Despite the fact that it built three workers to your one, it has reached size six (without building a granary, which it doesn't need right now anyway) and is working four mines to your one.

Try it over with my build order, worker-warrior-worker, and you'll see the difference. BTW, first worker started out irrigate-mine-road-pasture-road. Then the timber started falling. :lol: Every time you grow you should add another mine.

You don't have to build Stonehenge like I did. There is certainly nothing wrong with a settler right after the second worker followed by a granary or something next.

I figured that a was light on the worker side. Anyway, I played the game through until 1000BC, whipped a worker (the next turn after 1500BC - might as well take advantage of the granary) and had Medina build another one. Once I had alphabet, I was able to trade for all the missing techs and managed to build the Oracle in short stead (thanks to the marble and 3 chops). Took CoL with my free tech. I'll probably build a couple more workers and then a settler. Thanks for the feedback.

I'm just thinking for the next round, with so much forest around the place, the Madrassa allowing us to run 4 specialists, and I count 3 GP farm sites in the immediate vacinity, and us having marble that the Parthenon wouldn't be a bad thing too have and it would be relatively cheap.

Abegweit

Mar 22, 2009, 02:34 AM

General comments:

It seems that the popular 1E spot runs into city placement problems that the minority of us who chose other locations didn’t have. This is, of course, completely a matter of luck but it remains true. It makes it awkward to bring the copper online and devalues the other gold site. I think that helemaalnicks and MLH found the best solution to the copper problem but even that it not ideal. RRR, shyuhe and I (among others) will have a powerful clam-fish village to the west. This location is far less valuable in the 1E games because the fish is lost.

This game also illustrates the importance of bringing rare metals online. Every game which is making more than 20 BPT has Mecca and Medina located at the two gold sites.

Comments on the individual saves:

Man we have a lot of them! :cool:

IPEX – 16 bpt Stoney Barracks 2 cities 7 pop, 2 cities 9 techs. Not close to either Bronze or Archery and the barbs are on the prowl. Quite honestly, we are in serious danger.

ChromiumL – 26 bpt Monastery Monument 8 pop, 3 cities. 12 techs. Buddhism. Good overall development. No sign of getting metal online. Has archery (AKA two useless techs) to compensate.

Perplexity – 11 bpt Stony Madrassa 9 pop. 8 techs. 4 cities. Very nice! Only game with this many. Disagree strongly with placement of Damascus, however. It will never to able to work the gold as it lacks food. It should have been on the plains hill 4 west. It should also have been called Medina :)

Abegweit – 27 bpt Stony Madrassa 9 pop 3 cities. 11 techs. Oracle on the way. Woody III warrior. Powerful production capital and Medina will be very nice too.

RRR – 33 bpt 9 pop 3 cities. 11 techs, although I have to disagree with the choices. Best tech rate of all. Vive les cottages!

Dirtyparrot – 23 bpt Granary, 6 pop, 2 cities + settler, 10 techs, only one worker. Good placement of cities.

Champ82 – 16 bpt Barracks, Monument, 6 pop, 2 cities + settler, 11 techs, Oracle on the way.

Gumbolt – 24 bpt 9 pop, 3 cities, 10 techs, Buddhism, Oracle nearly finished. Lost the fish and crab :(

Soirana – 24 bpt Madrassa 8 pop, 3 cities, Oracle on the way. 15 techs incl Alpha and IW. The Alpha gambit obviously worked out very well!

King Morgan – 16 bpt 10 pop, 3 cities, 8 techs, Hinduism, Oracle on the way. Only one worker. Working too many undeveloped tiles.

Shyuhe – 19 bpt Granary, 9 pop, 3 cities, 10 techs, Oracle on the way, Hinduism. I disagree with the placement of all three cities. Possibly the positions were chosen to avoid having to pop borders? Nice to see three workers and a fourth almost finished. :goodjob:

RJM – 24 bpt Madrassa 5 pop 3 cities, 10 techs. I have to disagree with the builds. Damascus and Mecca need Granaries and the civ needs workers.

Hele – 18 bpt Barracks Monument * 2, 8 pop 3 cities, 9 techs. May well get a Woody III on the next round. :D Why does Mecca have an irrigated FP when both corn aren’t :confused:

MLH – 20 bpt Madrassa Stony, 11 pop 3 cities, 10 techs. Having barb problems but nothing serious as he has an axe. This game should turn around real quick. Medina should be building a workboat. One axe is enough for now.

Assass1n – 16 bpt Stony, 7 pop 3 cities, 10 techs. I have to disagree with city placement. Hele’s Medina is better-placed.

Leventis – 13 bpt Madrassa 8 pop 3 cities, 9 techs. Once again, city placement issues.

Timmy82 – 19 bpt Monument, 3 cities, + settler, 11 techs

Votes:

The best game clearly belongs to Soirana with the brilliant alphabet gambit that paid off handsomely. Other games may be better in other respects but this overshadows them. Unfortunately this game is not in the running so….

3 pts – MLH Copper is online and has an axe. Has Stonehenge and a Madrassa. I like the scientists in the capital. The barb problems are temporary and soon will be over. The second gold will soon be online. It’s late but… it’s soon.

2 pts – RRR Nice capital with cottages well under way. Copper is online and Medina is coming along as well. Has the best tech rate of all. There is a lack of productive capability however.

1 pt – ChromiumL Nice overall development. Medina is much further developed than in other two games due undoubtedly to his having snatched Buddhism. The lack of metal is a serious drawback however. I do not like defending against barbs with archers. Nor do I like researching hunting when I have nothing to camp.

Honourable mention to Gumbolt for a good solid game but loosing the fish and crab, while understandable, simply devalues the save too much.

RJM

Mar 22, 2009, 04:04 AM

Soirana – 24 bpt Madrassa 8 pop, 3 cities, Oracle on the way. 15 techs incl Alpha and IW. The Alpha gambit obviously worked out very well!

The best game clearly belongs to Soirana with the brilliant alphabet gambit that paid off handsomely. Other games may be better in other respects but this overshadows them. Unfortunately this game is not in the running so….

There's nothing to stop us choosing Soirana's save is there?

BTW, a number of saves have not adopted slavery. As a spiritual civ, this is not an issue, but since events are turned off, I wonder why not.

RJM

Soirana

Mar 22, 2009, 04:42 AM

RJM

Mar 22, 2009, 05:02 AM

IIRC, slavery is tad more expensive...

And i think we went through the policy of shadows at time Dave showed how to use Keshiks properly. If that causes any problems I will simply delete my save and make few screenshots instead.

Slavery is a tad more expensive, and as a spiritual civ I can understand waiting until your ready for your first whip before switching. On the other hand, I would have expected the benefit of whipping to outweigh the small increase in civic cost.

I don't remember the "policy of shadows" discussion. (I'm afraid there are an increasing number of things I don't remember. Actually, I don't remember how a shadow differs from a regular save either - perhaps you can remind me.)

RJM

Gumbolt

Mar 22, 2009, 05:54 AM

General comments:

Honourable mention to Gumbolt for a good solid game but loosing the fish and crab, while understandable, simply devalues the save too much.

To be fair i could of traded Alphabet for 2 techs so counting techs isnt a great guide here. I think anyone with alphabet or on way to monarchy will have done well. Oracle in itself is another tech. If you want to value techs perhaps you should add a weighting to them. Alpabet is over 700 hammers. mining is 120ish. So I might value fishing/mining/hunting/agr as 1pt. AH/BW/Sailing/Writing as 2/3. Then monarchy /alphbet 5-7 with IW as 4. You can normally judge by the overall civ score how techs have advanced anyway. You might also grade them on importance although this will differ map to map.

I saved the alphabet trade for mansa to get IW! Also it leaves options open for others if the save went through! The 2 sea resources were a shame but i did get the religion. If I take COL one of my three cities will have 2 religions and this will bode well for spreading them. Its not clear yet if any other religion has been found on my continent. In terms of barbs the mountain ranges help as a nice border and the coastline protects my rear.

It could be in my interest to delay the Oracle but not sure how far down tech tree i could reach. I might even be able to bulb theology with a GP. The Madrassa will speed this up. One of the big advantages of my saves over others is I have not chopped a single forest to date. As maths comes in this will yield greater hammers.

In terms of soirana saves. I respect fact he wants to shadow. Its always interesting to see what him and Shuhe can do on these games. Keep posting the saves. ;)

Its about learning a higher level right?? The more saves to compare the better. The Alphabet gambit was good on his.

Not sure on the voting side yet. :)

Gumbolt

Mar 22, 2009, 06:09 AM

Interesting idea. I was simply going to grab COL but you may be right to be more ambitious. Through judicious use of scientists, you should be able to finish Monarchy and The Oracle both in about 10 or 11 turns.

Indeed.[/SPOILER]

Its almost a shame you didnt go for a religion too. A religion offers the same culture as a monument. The plus side is an early spread religion can yield 20-30 base gold a turn with a holy city. That being said with your production city and HE with lots of units you can probably capture a holy city anyway. Sh would offer 16 culture and 2 GPTS too.

You are of course relying on the religion spreading to all your cities. I had no problem there.

I guess this would of slowed down the forest chopping you had planned. Its all plains and simple now. hehe.

Soirana

Mar 22, 2009, 06:29 AM

Slavery is a tad more expensive, and as a spiritual civ I can understand waiting until your ready for your first whip before switching. On the other hand, I would have expected the benefit of whipping to outweigh the small increase in civic cost.

as spiritual tou might switch off it again if not planing to whip in next five turns. Playing spiritual properly is good juggling with civics, actually things like Paya or Mids are becoming more powerfull

I don't remember the "policy of shadows" discussion. (I'm afraid there are an increasing number of things I don't remember. Actually, I don't remember how a shadow differs from a regular save either - perhaps you can remind me.)

IIRC, that was due to some players clearly not being learning emperor... Offline I am playing immortal only. I'd guees Raskolnikov, shyuhe and Abegweit are at very least solid immortal players.
Nobody says these cannot participate, but they are left with right to take their saves out of voting. Call it "shadow" or whatever you like.

I actually liked reading last EC. No imagine doing that from my saves
- round one - GLH
-round tow solid foothold on other island
-round three - no more Gilgamesh...

There is of course playstyle question - I am at best if generating early advantgae and using that to get more advantage and... oops, I am over domination limit:lol:
Put me in tight space race and i will probably loose horribly, so i need to take of things bit earlier.

I started round while trying out oracle bulb for Currency. Never done that before and had no idea how good it is... [answer is good enough].

Gumbolt

Mar 22, 2009, 07:19 AM

I actually liked reading last EC. No imagine doing that from my saves
- round one - GLH
-round tow solid foothold on other island
-round three - no more Gilgamesh...
.

Loving your take on the previous cookbook and taking down Gilga. It certainly needed to be done. I do think early wars when you start on a island isolated are hard to do. If you wait for the Ai to have LB/CB and Mace he will be far too developed come castles. Although i had some success with my LB/cat rush on him. It did Kill my economy a bit. That being said the Ai with galleys early on are weak.

How often does the Ai pop up with 10 galleys and escort ships to dump 10 units? 2 galleys and 4 units maybe. By which time the Ai has lost most of the units and is awaiting for the ship to make a round trip back to base. In this time peace is declared.

Come galleons and transports the AI plays this game a lot better. I dont think the Ai is well suit to naval combat on big and small maps.

Leventis

Mar 22, 2009, 07:57 AM

Just quickly before I get to my votes, @Abegweit's summary: Very nice getting all that tabulated but obiously it can't tell the full story. Two critical things I considered that weren't mentioned were 1) who had the copper online and 2) what was the military presence like. On the face of it some games looked quite playable until you open the save and see 2 warriors guarding 3 cities :rolleyes:. It's important also because in the next round we will look to ReX, and people who have a few axes already will be able to start that very swiftly. Anyway, on to the voting...

Votes:

3. RRRaskolnikov -- For a few reasons: Firstly, I think this save would be a great platform for the next round because it could be played in a lot different ways which would be interesting to explore. I think it's clearly the best game out of those who didn't settle 1E and I'd like to think I'd have played it in a similar manner had I settled in place myself. There is also potential for quick ReX and getting a few axes out to kill some barbs, and economically the position is very strong. 2 goldmines and 3 cottages up already is more than handy. As I said in a previous post, the only issue I have with this save was the choice of Sailing over AH. I understand why he chose it, but I still think AH would have been even better. It's no big deal though, as we can pick up AH next to get cows and pigs up. All in all, I think it's a job well done :goodjob:.

2. Shyuhe -- This save is far from perfect in my eyes, but nothing really damning. I'd definitely change the Damascus build to a monument, and crank out some more axes. Speaking of which, there are 2 axes sitting in pretty passive positions when they could be out fogbusting and getting some XP. Oracle will be done in under 14 turns with some chops, and there are a few options as to what tech to take. I'd probably be moving the capital at some point as well; Mecca is a very nice city but it just doesn't look like a capital to me with all that cottageable land around the place. Again, in a good position to expand in the next round.

1. Abegweit -- I really want to make Medina the capital in this game! Seriously, that city could be a beast by the mid game. I have a few issues with the builds (granaries), and would like to have more units. Hopefully that copper can come online before any barbs start pillaging the lands.

RRRaskolnikov

Mar 22, 2009, 10:00 AM

@Abegweit: I didn't mean I know the # of AIs on the continent (even if I have already read some spoilers after playing :lol:), but just that when you know you are not alone, focus on getting those TRs is a good habit (on my game, I planned to grab that city fast anyway asa I have 4 axes). You are right that perhaps going straight for alpha and trading for sailing could have been another option.

and now I will check thousands of good saves :goodjob:

Cheers

Lansky

Mar 22, 2009, 10:15 AM

Is the fact that I only linked my save and did not properly attach it going to prevent my participation in the series? If so I can try to go fix that just got lazy about it. Would really like feedback on my games as occasionally my games just fall apart and figured this was a good place for that.

Gumbolt

Mar 22, 2009, 10:21 AM

Abegweit

Mar 22, 2009, 10:26 AM

To be fair i could of traded Alphabet for 2 techs so counting techs isnt a great guide here.I missed this. Sorry. :blush: I totally agree this is important but I had thought that Soirana was the only one with expensive techs. Too many saves to go through. Had I realized I might have voted differently but I'm not changing it now. Sorry again.

Lansky

Mar 22, 2009, 10:29 AM

Gumbolt I mean that I linked my save like so-

http://forums.civfanatics.com/attach...1&d=1237499047

but for some reason I could not get the forum to attach it to the post properly. I'm not at home right now to play with it but there is probably just some button I'm missing to get it to work. I got lazy and hoped that the link would suffice.

Edit - okay now trying to click on that link it doesn't work so I can see the issue. Argh

carl corey

Mar 22, 2009, 11:02 AM

How did you upload it? The way to include it in a post is to click on "Go Advanced" (for advanced reply options), look under the posting window and click on "Manage Attachments", then upload the file in the pop-up window.

gspchamp999

Mar 22, 2009, 11:12 AM

Never posted my save.

207926

shyuhe

Mar 22, 2009, 11:51 AM

@abeg:

Yes my city placement is not very long-term. I'm more used to immortal/deity needing copper in the second city without a border pop. Hence Medina's location. Little did I know that barbs don't bother you before 1500 BC :lol:

@soirana:
Yes, I'm not exactly learning emperor. I just wanted to see if I could throw in a save with Hinduism for fun. Saladin can run a very powerful religion economy and I may try to show that in this game. I don't think my save is overpowering by any means so I'm going to leave it in for now.

And now some comments on games (in no particular order):

IPEX: Your expansion is a little slow - I think this is the cost of the early stonehenge. Madrasa + gold is good, but Mecca should 1) have the second corn farmed and 2) get the cows pastured. Not really sure why you farmed the FP first as it's less food than the corn for one coin, and it also takes 1.5 times longer to farm (wasted worker turns). Your lack of a strategic resource and/or archery is a little worrying as well.

Chromium: 3 cities is good, but again there's a lack of strategic resource. But you have archery so it's not that worrisome. I would move the fobgusting warriors on to hills so that you can clear more fog. I like the city locations. The buddhist monastery is a curious build. I'd think a library is better at this point since you're not really going to have time to build missionaries?

Perplexity: Nice aggressive settling taking advantage of stonehenge. I'm not a huge fan of where Baghdad is - I think 1W on the river is stronger as it picks up fresh water. I'm guessing you put it there for the third wine? Also, settling on the hills/plains/wine gives the city center 2/2/2, which isn't bad. You need a lot more workers if you're going to expand this aggressively though. And a strategic resource or archery so that you can protect your cities :)

Abegweit: That's some crazy scouting! Also, I think Mecca is better 1W as it gets freshwater and remains coastal. Either way, it's probably better to move the capital to Medina for bureaucracy, and workshop over Mecca - it'll make a good grassland production city. And I would actually change techs to monotheism and try to oracle theology. It'd make for an interesting game :mischief: Not much to criticize in this game.

Raskolnikov: Your little scouting WB is amusing :lol: Not sure if teching fishing was worth it so early, especially since you don't have any cities to grab the fish/clam yet. Mecca is strong, but may run into some hammer issues in the midgame. It'll make a good bureau capital though. And I don't get why people keep on building cities on the marble, unless you're going to build the oracle. It's a great tile to work, and 1SE of its current location picks up grassland cows (making 15 base hammers with the two plains hills, cows, marble, and wheat at size 5).

Dirtryparrot: You need more workers! Mecca should build another worker, not a madrassa. Unpastured pigs is a big nono. Especially since you're pasturing cows first. Plus a second worker will help you chop those forests around Mecca for some good early production. Your fogbusting is good, although archery + copper is a little redundant.

champ82: I think Medina should have been built south for the gold/pigs. The marble is good but you probably didn't need it so early. I'm also not sure why Mecca is working the wine. You can always whip the Oracle to completion so that you get it just as writing is completed. Also, Medina should probably build a settler or worker - not a barracks. You shouldn't need a barracks so early in the game when there's still lots of land to settle.

Gumbolt: I don't like where Mecca is. It blocks off the fish and the clams :( Although you probably couldn't see it before you settled, settling one off the coast like that seems a bad idea. You also need more workers - I'm not sure why you spent so many worker turns building those roads. You could have built farms etc. Your cities are great for commerce but you're going to have to settle a few production cities soon.

RJM: Damascus should be building a monument before a lighthouse. And I'm not sure why you haven't scouted more (even if your starting warrior was eaten early). You have an axe sitting idle who can go explore east. Also, why are you teching polytheism? It's a little late for a oracle run - are you gearing up for literature already? You also need more workers - 1 isn't going to cut it.

helemaalnicks: Your worker is farming the wrong corn. The irrigated one should get farmed first, even if it means the worker has to travel an extra turn or two. The extra food is crucial. I would also try to fogbust a little more - especially since your Damascus has no garrison. I'm also not sure why you have a barracks in Mecca already. Those hammers would have been better spent on a worker or settler, or a fogbuster.

timmy: You didn't need to road those horses - you have access to them as they're on a river in your culture already. I'd also hop into slavery to whip out a few buildings. You can always switch out after 5 turns if you're worried about slave revolts. I would also move your fogbusters to hills so that they can clear more fog - especially the north.

Phew that's a lot of saves to look at. I won't be voting - I think any of these saves can win this map given the land available.

ChromiumL

Mar 22, 2009, 12:22 PM

I would make a fancy post with links to all saves--but that seems sorta counter-productive now that people already have great summaries of saves (thanks to those who made the effort--thats a lot of work). Lets vote through Tuesday/Wednesday depending on how quickly we get votes posted.

As far as shadows go--its fine to post saves (so that we can all look in awe), as long as you make it clear that the save isn't eligible for votes. I request that anyone who plays at Immortal level (or has a clearly overly-superior save) usually 'shadow' rather than actually submit saves for votes (as overpowered saves early on = boring game with less learning opportunities). This means we can all thank Soirana for the example of awesomeness, but that we will NOT vote for the save, since s/he asked us not to.

Also--I don't think there is anything wrong with defending with 3 warriors (with archers on the way) on a save where you have very amazing defensive terrain (mountains and peninsula). Not sure what the obsession with metals is, I would rather defend with archers (especially since we are protective) than place a lame city to get a metal on line more quickly (I'd rather just hold out for border pop).

@Shyue-- the monastery was there because I wanted to send missionaries to my neighbors (mainly Shaka) in order to convert them. I didn't realize that we had a trade route already and my religion spread when I was only a few turns off from building the monastery. I figure it will be good anyways, since for my save I would go for a religious economy. To be honest, I am amazed at how few saves went for an early religion. In my mind, that's a huge loss since you can make tons of gold in the holy city...

@Lansky-- that link you are posting is broken. Maybe you have a pop-up blocker that is preventing the pop-up window with the upload options from opening? Follow directions Carl Corey gave and tell us where you have issues and maybe we can troubleshoot with you?

Gumbolt

Mar 22, 2009, 12:25 PM

Gumbolt: I don't like where Mecca is. It blocks off the fish and the clams :( Although you probably couldn't see it before you settled, settling one off the coast like that seems a bad idea. You also need more workers - I'm not sure why you spent so many worker turns building those roads. You could have built farms etc. Your cities are great for commerce but you're going to have to settle a few production cities soon.

I had 3 workers. I normally do 1:1 early on. From what i can see no one else had more than that. I dont think my save had pottery or BW till 1525bc so thats the reason for a lot of road. it did help spread my religion to all my cities.

The capital wasnt greatly placed but I went for the extra commerce on the wine and the religion. I hadnt realised the coast would be so close either. Looking at starting screen does hint at ocean southwards.

I did like the southern city that some placed but looked far too inviting for me. :lol:

Gumbolt

Mar 22, 2009, 12:37 PM

I missed this. Sorry. :blush: I totally agree this is important but I had thought that Soirana was the only one with expensive techs. Too many saves to go through. Had I realized I might have voted differently but I'm not changing it now. Sorry again.

Its not important. My capital placing will condemn my save to the abyss anyway. I think many will get the oracle built anyway come the next round with Marble so close.

RRRaskolnikov

Mar 22, 2009, 01:51 PM

As far as shadows go--its fine to post saves (so that we can all look in awe), as long as you make it clear that the save isn't eligible for votes. I request that anyone who plays at Immortal level (or has a clearly overly-superior save) usually 'shadow' rather than actually submit saves for votes (as overpowered saves early on = boring game with less learning opportunities). This means we can all thank Soirana for the example of awesomeness, but that we will NOT vote for the save, since s/he asked us not to.

If you request, I will do. No votes for my save please. I will still post my comments on saves :).
@Shyuhe: isn't my little wb cute? :lol:

edit about marble city location: I find that on marble has more long term potential than one SE of it because it has more food... and the other cow can be used by another city.

RRRaskolnikov

Mar 22, 2009, 02:01 PM

To be honest, I am amazed at how few saves went for an early religion. In my mind, that's a huge loss since you can make tons of gold in the holy city...

Yes, but it makes less religious tensions between the AIs. So the tech pace will likely be faster (more trades between them ), and there will be less AI- AI wars.

dirtyparrot

Mar 22, 2009, 03:19 PM

Dirtryparrot: You need more workers! Mecca should build another worker, not a madrassa. Unpastured pigs is a big nono. Especially since you're pasturing cows first. Plus a second worker will help you chop those forests around Mecca for some good early production. Your fogbusting is good, although archery + copper is a little redundant.

I thought that I had mentioned it in my report (must have forgotten), but the madrassa build was simply there for 1 turn to allow Mecca to grow to 4 and then the worker was going to be whipped. I played this out until 1000BC, ended up chopping the Oracle (took CoL) (thanks to tech trading) and have 3 workers. The problem was that I was just about to do a whole bunch of stuff the few turn after 1500BC (so I didn't get to put most of my plan into effect, but it worked). You're completely right about not having the pigs hooked up. That should not happen.

shyuhe

Mar 22, 2009, 04:10 PM

In view of what chromium said, don't vote for my save either.

Abegweit

Mar 22, 2009, 04:40 PM

In view of what chromium said, don't vote for my save either.And mine too. Also withdraw my votes. FWIW, I play all levels from Monarch above. Monarch for fun. Diety for punishment. :lol: I am comfortable on Immortal but like Emperor best. Lazy, I suppose.

I will probably shadow the next round/

Abegweit

Mar 22, 2009, 05:09 PM

Also--I don't think there is anything wrong with defending with 3 warriors (with archers on the way) on a save where you have very amazing defensive terrain (mountains and peninsula). Not sure what the obsession with metals is, I would rather defend with archers (especially since we are protective) than place a lame city to get a metal on line more quickly (I'd rather just hold out for border pop). You are quite right that there is nothing wrong with defending with warriors. They do quite fine until the barbs have axes (and, often, they never get them). Just figure out where they come and place a couple of units in the path. Replace the dead.

The problem I have is with the archers-on-the-way part. I hate archers. Like warriors, they can't actually attack the incoming hordes. So, like warriors, they can't prevent pillaging. Furthermore, it's a huge waste of research. The icing on the cake is that hunting is less than useless when you have nothing to camp.

ChromiumL

Mar 22, 2009, 05:21 PM

Shyue and Abegweit -- Thanks for withdrawing your saves, they are amazing, but like I said, they would probably make for a easy win game. It seems like over time we have realized that in the 'vote for best save' style secession game, the actual difficulty level is actually easier than it would otherwise be. So Emperor game is actually closer to monarch difficulty.

Also, I don't have any problem with letting people who shadow vote (unless they don't want to). They may be able to provide some insight into what is important to look for in a good save.

@Abegweit-- I always go for the easier levels too... so I guess I am lazy too :p I can also see what you mean about archers. I tend to fogbust more than I did in this save, and an archer can fogbust as well as an axeman. I can't even remember the last time I had a barb pillage something in a game... probably it was the last time I played with raging barbarians on ;).

Lansky

Mar 22, 2009, 06:42 PM

@Lansky-- that link you are posting is broken. Maybe you have a pop-up blocker that is preventing the pop-up window with the upload options from opening? Follow directions Carl Corey gave and tell us where you have issues and maybe we can troubleshoot with you?

I get the window and upload the file from my computer but I'm missing some very obvious step I'm guessing. I get my save under current attachments but it is not added to the post and if I copy the link it claims to be invalid. Messing around with it currently.

Gumbolt

Mar 22, 2009, 06:48 PM

Anyone else want to withdraw before I place any votes? :mischief:

I actually didnt have a problem with Shuhe, soirana and others saves. If everyone starts shadowing there will be no one left to vote for. Also its interesting to see some different approaches. This save certainly offers that.

I am actually amazed the immortal cookbook doesnt get more players. So many seasoned players on here.

Gumbolt

Mar 22, 2009, 07:00 PM

Yes, but it makes less religious tensions between the AIs. So the tech pace will likely be faster (more trades between them ), and there will be less AI- AI wars.

This is a double edged sword for me.

On the one front getting oracle COl slingshot is not difficult on emperor. So getting a religion is not always difficult with a bit of planning. Even without marble its an easy chop.

The advantage of the bud/hindu religion is the holy city in your capital. Mix this with SH/Oracle/madrassa and you have a holy shrine quite early. Also a strong cultural capital.

Religious tension will only exist if another Ai on your land mass founds another religion. Even if this does happen theres nothing to stop you adopting it and spreading yours by the back door for an AP steal.

The problems start when you have 2 religious pacts and you have to pick a side or just have no religion. Downside of no religion is -ve diplo points if you refuse an Ai religion.

ChromiumL

Mar 22, 2009, 08:21 PM

I actually didnt have a problem with Shuhe, soirana and others saves. If everyone starts shadowing there will be no one left to vote for. Also its interesting to see some different approaches. This save certainly offers that.

I am always glad to see different approaches--but I am concerned that if a save is too strong (especially in the first round) it makes the game itself less interesting. I doubt people want to play in a game that is an obvious win. I am totally open to different suggestions if anyone has one--but so far the best option I can think of is to have people voluntarily remove themselves from the vote. I just hope that doesn't prevent higher level players from occasionally stopping by to show their skills!

shyuhe

Mar 22, 2009, 08:57 PM

I am actually amazed the immortal cookbook doesnt get more players. So many seasoned players on here.

I tend to finish my immortal games in one go so the cookbook format doesn't work so well for me. You know, that one more turn thingie...

As for this game, I just wanted to play around with an early religion - I rarely go for them in my offline games. But Saladin's madarassa makes it really easy to get a GP for an early shrine, which can be immensely powerful - especially if your holy city is your capital.

@Chromium: This map is quite an interesting one. There's lots of land to expand into, but some top notch warmongers on the starting continent (I don't think this is spoiler at this point since you can see the other AI on the various saves). I think the key will be to get them to dogpile on somebody other than yourself (hint hint, MM). Although the difficulty is that all can declare at pleased (including MM!).

Lansky

Mar 22, 2009, 09:28 PM

I think the key will be to get them to dogpile on somebody other than yourself (hint hint, MM). Although the difficulty is that all can declare at pleased (including MM!).

Kill Shaka and use religion/civics to get Gilga to friendly in no time. Dog pile Ghengis or Mansa. I know "easier said then done" but that is how I view it at least. Gilga usually stays in HR for a long long time if really needed.

RRRaskolnikov

Mar 23, 2009, 02:57 AM

I am actually amazed the immortal cookbook doesnt get more players. So many seasoned players on here.

Hehe, the problem is that sometimes you don't have time when the thread starts... but I am actually waiting for the next installment (+ I am not too fond of DG, I feel he lacks sinergies)... This game have a really nice map with an unusual leader that opens up plenty of possibilities (as we saw with the various openning), I think that's why so many players subscribed this thread :goodjob: ...

Cheers

RJM

Mar 24, 2009, 02:25 AM

I didn't find it easy to make my choice - so many saves, then a lot of the good ones withdrawn. My analysis and votes are a bit random, but for the record, this is how I view the saves.

Assassin no marble, very weak def
Champ82 marble, no copper, only 2 cities (but settler in place), 10 exp unit
Chrom marble not connected, no copper, weak def
DirtyParrot no marble, archers, only 2 cities
GSPchamp good expansion, chariot
Gumbolt marble, no slavery, no copper, weak def
hel possible 10 exp unit, marble not connected, weak def
Ipex no copper, only 2 cities
King Morgan no slavery, no copper, no marble, could whip oracle, no trade routes
Lansky marble, only 2 cities, no copper
Leventis marble, axeman
mklh no marble, no slavery, pity about the barb archer
Perplexity good city expansion, no copper, marble not connected
Timmy827 marble, good expansion, no copper, archer, no slavery

And the votes:
#1 Lansky
#2 Timmy827
#3 Chrom

RJM

ChromiumL

Mar 24, 2009, 12:14 PM

So far we only have 3ish people who have voted... come on people! Vote! We will allow one more day for voting.

Gumbolt

Mar 24, 2009, 03:13 PM

Few Notes.

Timmy827 3 cities, 3 workers, 1 settler, 19bpt, 1 gold online. Not sure on early expansion choices citiy wise. 2nd Gold seemed obvious.

Leventis - 3 cities, 3 workers, madrass and 3 axes. 13bpt.

Assasin - Bud Religion, Shenge, 3 cities, 2 workers, 1 warrior and 1 gold online. 16 bpt. Weak defence and lack of workers is a worry.

MKLH 3 workers, 3 cities, 1 axe, 1 pesky barb, Sh, Madrass and Great Scientist in 12 turns. 20 BPT.

Hele - 3 cities, 2 workers, alphabet in 9 turns, 18 bpt.

RJM - 3 cities, 1 worker, 2 axe, gold/copper and a madrassa. 24BPT

King Morgan 3 city 1 worker, oracle soon, 1 gold online, possible feud slingshot. 16BPT

Champ 82 2 cities, 2 workers, 3 archers, oracle 4 turns. writing in 4 turns too. Puzzled by 3rd settler so far out. No copper so archers will be defending while barbs pillage. 16 BPT

D Parrot 1 worker 1 settler 4 archers and 2 granaries. 23 BPT

Ras - 3 workers, alphabet in 5 turns, 3 cities, 2 archers

Perplex 4 cities 2 workers, good cap with Madrass. No copper is a big minus as 4 cities already built.

Chrom - 2 gold 3 cities, Bud religion, Oracle 7t, no copper for 10-15 turns and weak defences.

Lansky - COL and Alphabet already, 2 cities and 2 workers Reasonable tech rate but slow growth and mongols look strong.

GSchamp - 3 cities. 3 barb archers near your 2nd city. You do have 2 chariots. You will need them!! If you make it through a rush on shaka is possible. Just worried your cities are 6-15 tiles from capital.

Might have missed one or three immortal players. ;)

Hmmm more notes to follow.

1. king morgan. Purely to try a feud slingshot with oracle. (3pts)
2. MKLH - Yes the barb archer is annoying but GS approach will help game play. Philosphy bulb? (2pts)
3. lansky Strong tech wise but weak on expansion. if mongols are strong then this could be a good challenge. (1pt)

Overall voting was tough but I have gone for interesting.

Lansky

Mar 24, 2009, 04:19 PM

bleh too many saves

#1 RJM
#2 Leventis
#3 Chrom

assass1n

Mar 25, 2009, 03:15 AM

My votes

1. king morgan
2. lansky
3. ChromiumL

Perplexity

Mar 25, 2009, 09:06 AM

Humph well I'm a little bitter that nobody liked mine. I thought 4 cities + stonehenge was pretty nice. But I'll get over it and vote anyway. I'm going to choose among the saves with an early religion, since I basically never get one and I'm curious to play something different.

So I think that's just ChromiumL, Gumbolt, and King Morgan (since Shyuhe withdrew his).

King Morgan -- don't like the expansion away from opponents rather than towards
ChromiumL and Gumbolt look very similar indeed to me. I'll go with Chromium, slightly better city placement imo.

So:

1) ChromiumL
2) Gumbolt
3) King Morgan

KingMorgan

Mar 25, 2009, 10:44 AM

Sorry for the slow voting.

1. RRRash
2. MKLh
3. Gumbolt

(I wish i could withdraw my game because it is too good) :lol:

RJM

Mar 25, 2009, 10:46 AM

Humph well I'm a little bitter that nobody liked mine. I thought 4 cities + stonehenge was pretty nice. But I'll get over it and vote anyway.
This is my take on your save:

Having built four cities is a good, although 2 of them are not yet contributing much, and even Medina doesn't have a great deal going for it. You have blocked off a good expanse of territory. However, as a result of your expansion, your research rate is rather low and by the time you finish alphabet, you may not have too much to trade. It will be quite a while before you have access to copper or iron and another city to hook up the horses will hit your economy. Archery is 10 turns away, even if you switched now. You could end up having to defend against barbs with just warriors. Stonehenge is a goodish wonder. The culture will help secure your territory, but you are a long way from a great prophet. It is by no means a bad save (I certainly rated it better than mine because of the expansion), but there were a lot of others to choos from.

RJM

RJM

Mar 25, 2009, 10:50 AM

Sorry for the slow voting.

1. RRRash
2. MKLh
3. Gumbolt

(I wish i could withdraw my game because it is too good) :lol:

I thought RRRaskolnikov withdrew his save; if he didn't, I would have voted for it.

RJM

ChromiumL

Mar 25, 2009, 11:52 AM

If you request, I will do. No votes for my save please.

I probably should have made it more clear about who had withdrawn their saves. Sorry about that.

Perplexity

Mar 25, 2009, 12:22 PM

When are you going to close voting?

ChromiumL

Mar 25, 2009, 12:56 PM

Right now :).

Here are my votes:
3rd - MkLh - Oracle would be better than stonehenge, but not building monuments is nice. I really like the city placement, especially the copper city (i'm not sure how I missed that!). Barb is annoying, but not a real issue in the long run.
2nd- King Morgan - Good save overall. I would prefer to see Medina in the fish/copper spot. Great exploration, and I am curious about how a feudalism slingshot would work out--never seen it before.
3rd - Lansky - Probably a bit too good. It would definitely be too good if you already had 3 cities!

So that brings the vote to:

11 points - MkLh
9 points - King Morgan
8 points - Lansky
7 points - Chromium
3 points - RJM
3 points - Gumbolt
2 points - Timmy
2 points - Leventis

Congratulations MkLh!! We will be continuing with his save (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=207504&d=1237459566).

The next round is through 400 AD, and will end on Sunday. Good luck on the next round everyone ;).

Gumbolt

Mar 25, 2009, 01:09 PM

KingMorgan

Mar 25, 2009, 01:57 PM

Ah, wasn't sure if RRR's save was in or out, so thought i'd have a vote for it anyhow, i wasn't the only one not paying attention ;)

Well done to MkLh, good save which i will play right now!

dirtyparrot

Mar 25, 2009, 06:16 PM

I meant to do this sooner, but write down my ranking. I can't remember who has withdrawn their games, so if I include an invalid game ignore that selection.

1. Raskolnilov
2. MkLh
3. Can't come up with a 3rd, it's between helemaalnicks, leventis, ChromiumL.

I just realized that the voting was completed. Nevermind what I just wrote. I might continue with my save and shadow or might do both. In the interest of fairness, if I do both, I'll play the public save 1st. I'll probably wait a few days (hopefully by then I forgot most of the details) and then play my own save.

Perplexity

Mar 25, 2009, 06:24 PM

My report, heh. Logging and just one screenshot at end.

Logging by BUG Mod 3.6 (BtS 3.13-3.17)
------------------------------------------------
[b]Turn 100/750 (1500 BC) [25-Mar-2009 18:17:03]
Hope that the barb archer will attack and lose to mecca axeman.

Unqueue medina barracks.

Shuffle workers around.

Note that we're not in Slavery. Don't understand why we're researching CoL so switch to Fishing for Medina.
Research begun: Fishing (7 Turns)

Turn 101/750 (1475 BC) [25-Mar-2009 19:04:27]
60% Research: 18 per turn
0% Espionage: 4 per turn
40% Gold: 4 per turn, 1 in the bank

After End Turn:

Other Player Actions:
While defending in Arabian territory at Mecca, Axeman 1 (Medina) (2.75/5) defeats Barbarian Archer (Prob Victory: 94.8%)

Good.

Turn 102/750 (1450 BC) [25-Mar-2009 19:06:33]
60% Research: 18 per turn
0% Espionage: 4 per turn
40% Gold: 4 per turn, 5 in the bank

Turn 103/750 (1425 BC) [25-Mar-2009 19:08:20]
60% Research: 18 per turn
0% Espionage: 4 per turn
40% Gold: 4 per turn, 9 in the bank
While attacking in Arabian territory near Medina, Axeman 1 (Medina) (0.80/5) defeats Barbarian Warrior (Prob Victory: 87.3%)

After End Turn:
Mecca finishes: Granary
Medina finishes: Axeman
Damascus grows to size 3
Damascus's borders expand

Turn 104/750 (1400 BC) [25-Mar-2009 19:08:49]
60% Research: 19 per turn
0% Espionage: 4 per turn
40% Gold: 3 per turn, 13 in the bank
Mecca begins: Settler (10 turns)
Medina begins: Granary (12 turns)
One turn of granary then will switch to WB when fishing comes in.
Axeman 1 (Medina) (Axeman) promoted: Combat I

After End Turn:
Tech research finished: Fishing

Turn 105/750 (1375 BC) [25-Mar-2009 19:11:10]
70% Research: 22 per turn
0% Espionage: 4 per turn
30% Gold: 1 per turn, 14 in the bank
Research begun: Masonry (6 Turns)
Medina begins: Work Boat (6 turns)

After End Turn:

Other Player Actions:
While defending in Arabian territory near Mecca, Axeman 1 (Medina) loses to Barbarian Archer (3.00/3) (Prob Victory: 90.8%)

Lose as a 90.8% favorite.

Turn 106/750 (1350 BC) [25-Mar-2009 19:12:07]
70% Research: 22 per turn
0% Espionage: 4 per turn
30% Gold: 1 per turn, 15 in the bank

Logging by BUG Mod 3.6 (BtS 3.13-3.17)
------------------------------------------------
[b]Turn 106/750 (1350 BC) [25-Mar-2009 19:12:32]

Logging by BUG Mod 3.6 (BtS 3.13-3.17)
------------------------------------------------
[b]Turn 106/750 (1350 BC) [25-Mar-2009 19:12:35]

After End Turn:

Other Player Actions:
While defending in Arabian territory at Mecca, Warrior 2 (Mecca) loses to Barbarian Archer (1.11/3) (Prob Victory: 67.2%)
Mecca lost

Lose as a 67.2% favorite.

Sigh.

http://i489.photobucket.com/albums/rr259/Perplexity_photobucket/Civ4ScreenShot0015.jpg

Gumbolt

Mar 26, 2009, 04:17 AM

@ Perplex. Chrom said he wanted a challenge. You could of chopped an axe in another city once you have slavery. Not sure why you lost medina. (hardly a spoiler)

Going forward it does seem attack is the most obvious option. The other Ai are plain nasty!!! Most of the city locations eastwards will probably have barb cities sooner or later. Plus Shaka will attack someone sooner or later. The current game set up is geared for that approach.

Just called up BT. Helpful as ever. I now have no phoneline till 3rd April. So no broadband till least the 6/7th. That rules me out of this round. Although i could view screenshots at another house. :)

I think it would be unfair really to post a save if i am unlikely to vote on them. I may join the next round.

ChromiumL

Mar 26, 2009, 03:00 PM

If the round is too short, we can make it a little longer--the 1500 BC to 400 AD is always long anyways. Why don't we give one more day and go 'till Monday.

assass1n

Mar 27, 2009, 09:01 AM

Second Round

Shaka captured Barb city and wasted exactly zero troops on it and as soon as I got city next to barb he went WHEOOHRN I started building axes but he declared immediately and took Baghdad I spammed axes took back Baghdad and bribed Musa into war :D I haven't met Genghis but I think he dogpiled MM as MM is still in WHEOOHRN
I got pissed with Shaka's DoW and just didn't bother with screenshots
I have 3 religion (Confu , Tao , Christianity) no Hindu spread to lands and it won't as all my cities are Confu/Tao/Christian and I have the Confu shrine
Bulbed Philosophy and researching Currency now
Have 8 cities though Bulawayo might face cultural pressure
Tried cycle but Shaka forced me into Slavery :(
Here's the save

208447

Lansky

Mar 27, 2009, 03:13 PM

Round Two!

Long Version-

Immediately swap to slavery and begin to whip away all of these silly population points. The archer was of no consequence at all as it runs off the hill then suicides into the axe I put onto the hill the next turn. Shaka immediately grabs the eastern barb city. He is much more powerful in this save. So I devote this round to a few goals.

1. Killing Shaka
2. Bending over backwards for Gilgamesh – Want him Friendly
3. Keeping Mansa Musa alive and yet more hated than me by Ghengis.

Decide to stop research on CoL and start in on Metal Casting. It’s a large tech but the extra production and happiness will pay off when the war with Shaka starts. This early it is also immensely popular with the AI’s as trade bait. Mecca begins on the Oracle once the granary is done, which leads to something I’ve certainly never done before: The Machinery Slingshot.
http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/MachinerySlingshot.jpg

The only city I found is next- Baghdad. Settle it the same place I had a city in my game. Shares corn/hills with Mecca and gains marble/cows while being riverside. Every city gets a forge (probably stupid for Damascus, but it never hurts I guess), granary, and barracks. Then units are put in queue. Shaka founds a city right where I want the next one (Ondini) and once it hits size two I declare and capture it. No clue what his army is like but crossbows this early has to be superior, and well they are. As the round ends I am in the middle of fleecing Shaka. So far catapults have only been to bombard as the crossbows and swords have had 70%+ odds in every battle. The best unit Shaka has had so far have been catapults. Might see an elephant before its all over, but even then it should be too little too late. The only casualty as of yet is an axe to a barb. Baghdad has a Great General sitting in it. I was going to settle as I already have a level 4 medic2 axe from barbs/war, but figured I’d let everyone potentially make their own decision about what to do with him seeing as how he spawned 4 turns before the end of the round.

The Army:
http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Civ4ScreenShot0019.jpg

Tech wise it has slowed down a lot due to the war – duh eh? Mecca has produced two Great Scientists, which I used to give Mecca and Damascus academies. Mecca is getting 4 or 5 villages ready for when Bureaucracy is done being researched. By then the economy will surely need it. At the current rate the next great person will come in 40 turns and will have very high odds of being either an Engineer or Scientist. Due to really high barb activity and some bad luck with an axe scout no foreign trade is open with Gilgamesh due to a lack of scouting. A trireme is currently on the way to remedy that and a spy is heading off towards Shaka and then to hopefully map out the rest of the continent. The current tech picture looks like so.
http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Civ4ScreenShot0017.jpg

Diplomacy went fairly well. The entire continent is Jewish and until the previous turn when Bulawayo was captured I didn’t have a Jewish city so the empire is still in paganism. Despite that Gilgamesh will be friendly in a few turns and Ghengis certainly hates Mansa a lot more than he hates me.
http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Civ4ScreenShot0018-1.jpg

Ghengis has a large Kheshik army but is so backwards that he will not be a long term threat. Mansa is decent tech wise but is Genghis’’ punching bag. He’ll likely declare on Mansa in a few turns in which a few free diplomacy points could be nabbed if really needed. Cannot trade with Mansa anyway because he is Genghis’ worst enemy and until recently Gilgamesh’s as well so we agreed to end trade relations. Mansa is still sore over that one.

And of course a screenshot of the current empire.
http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Civ4ScreenShot0011.jpg

Short version-

Downsides: Only 7 cities and even after acquiring Shaka distance penalties will need to be overcome and while at tech parity the tech pace is rapidly declining. Third GP not due for a bit. Scouting is lackluster at best.

Upsides: The 7 cities will turn into 10+ once Shaka has been dealt with, which involves moving an army already good to go. Gilgamesh will be friendly in a few turns once the religion and civic modifiers tick up or he asks for some sort of help.

KingMorgan

Mar 27, 2009, 05:19 PM

Ding,Ding - Round 2

Not a bad round, headed up the CS route to Lib, had to reconsider my religion as Shaka wasn't too happy, SPI is useful ;)

Missed MoM by a few turns, still nice pile of gold. Unfortunate border pop from manus killed my trades with Gilaga, hence the slight unhappiness. A swift road will allow the deals to be remade. Drama could be cancelled although you may want to shoot for Music.

Relations are good, save manus - faux war to keep gilga and Shaka happy, not too worried as i'd like his cities on my borders - cheeky of him to capture them. GLib and Path are nearly done, looks like an easy Lib, i'd be tempted to take steel if the situation allows.

http://i377.photobucket.com/albums/oo214/KingMorgan1/Civ4ScreenShot0173.jpg
http://i377.photobucket.com/albums/oo214/KingMorgan1/Civ4ScreenShot0174.jpg
http://i377.photobucket.com/albums/oo214/KingMorgan1/Civ4ScreenShot0175.jpg

208496

IPEX-731BA5DD06

Mar 27, 2009, 11:11 PM

Round 2

Once again, I start off by reviewing the cities, builds, troops and land.

1st thing I do is adopt Slavery and whip out those Granaries. Next up will be further Settlers and axemen to take that barb city to the SE, but first I must deal with the barb archer.

Damm barb archer, moved off the gold, and went for our bronze, I moved out axeman, 1 square to stop him coming back for the warrior, and was attacked winning. :goodjob:

Whipped Granary, whipped barracks followed by axe, then Granary in Medina, and whipping Granary in Damascus.

I have a :gripe: moment, moving the injured axeman atop the gold mine at 2 strength, I lose to the barb warrior, cleaning it up with the other warrior, 22.4% for the attacker. Archer attacked at 25% and wiped out 3 points off the axeman. :gripe: 2 times in a row.

Lose a 2nd axeman now at 69% odds attacking a barb archer on a mine for extra points. Now back to 3 warriors only.

I build a road on the gold, which didn't have one. (Pillaged??) link cities via roads not crossing rivers, building Madrassers now then settler wave.

1st Great Scientist is born, settle into city for 6 Beakers recurring, as I plan on whipping some more and losing scientist. Bulb Mathematics, no stone, double chops Hmm No.

975 BC I try for the Ocacle in Medina, don't expect to get it, but gold would be nice, looks like we'll found Confucianism. Building Settler and axeman now.

850 BC We found both Confucianism and Baghdad, Confucianism was actually founded in Damascus, Spread it to Mansa to start some war's back East.

I have to research Masonry to build the marble Quarry, to build the Oracle quicker, I think about 6 turns of less on Monotheism, but wont' matter in time. Mathematics it is. Damascus grew into 1 unhappy at 5, so is now building a settler while awaiting the removal of whipping anger.

575 BC I fall 4 turns short of the Oracle, I was looking at taking Civil Service with it. Could have whipped for 2, but 2 short of Mathematics, the stop to Masonry which speed up Oracle...BAH...More failure cash, more 100% research.

Nb: In hindsight, I should have done this, Bulbed Mathematics with the great Scientist, but I REALLY didn't expect to even get close to Oracle, and for a civil Service Sling shot...NO WAY!!!!! :wow:

395 BC I make the following trade with Mansa.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%202%20400%20ad/Alphatrade.jpg

I now look to trade with the others.

Looks like Gilgamesh built the Oracle, 2 turns :gripe:, and won't trade Metal casting, building the Colossus are you?? Khan has nothing worthwhile, so Mansa has nothing to trade CoL's for :lol: We have iron in our city, as I'm sure you know, in Mable city, which I settled. Looking to take Mansa Barbarian Acquisition from him now.

260 AD Gilgamesh has declared on Mansa, I whip swords for 2 pop in most cities, and prepare to declare myself. I've refused demands from Gilgamesh and Khan for Mathematics and writing respectively. Now I want mutual war bonuses with Gilgamesh, and Mansa's Ex-Barb city.

Next turn who comes on by, none other then Gilgamesh, asking for a war ally, 4 turns too early, but can't refuse that smiling face.

110 BC [The Battle of Teoihuacan]

The first sword rushed the battlements, swinging furishly, and WINS at 20% battle odds, our forlorn hope has made the breach in the battlements. The 2nd sword wins as well, our troops are taking objective with minimal losses.

The 3rd group doesn't reach its objective, setting back our battle plans. The next 2 swords fall attacking Skirmishers, allowing the final sword to win and the axe to win. The City is now doomed, at 1 population, with only an injured Skirmishers troops guarding the city, the war is over next turn.

95 BC The war is WON, we have achieved all objectives, and now await peace, 1 turn on Monarchy, then couple into Currency, and peace for Currency. Workers are needed to rebuild our economy, Great Library is being built in Mecca, Parthenon in Damascus our war city. 2 river side wineries are to begin construction next turn. For the loss of 3 swords, we've achieved much.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%202%20400%20ad/Teoihuacan.jpg

I also make the following trade to Gilgamesh.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%202%20400%20ad/Metalcasting.jpg

115 AD I come across the city of Bantu, chasing a barb worker, I don't have enough troops to take the city, and looks like Shaka will beat me to it, if he doesn't I'll snag it our from underneath him, if not..oh well, maybe a war declaration..maybe not.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%202%20400%20ad/Bantu.jpg

145 AD I have a heart attack :faint:, as the barb axeman I saw earlier going to Bantu, is at the gates of the future Bureaucracy capital, but I've sent an axeaman to back up the sword I have there.

175 AD The barb axeman attacks and at 20% odds beats a 9/10 swordsman. ARRRGGGHHH..I clean up with the axe.

205 AD I snake out Bantu from underneath Shaka's troops..:woohoo:, I now need twice as many workers and to save the economy. 30 turns on civil service. Bantu's 1 off the coast, but at size 5 and saving 1 settler I elect to keep it. Developed farms/pastures and 2 workers helps as well.

235 AD I make peace with Mansa, as he had a sword at the gates of Bureaucracy capital, and I only had a warrior guarding the city, as the axe went north to Bantu to help take the city. I need more workers, axes, Archers to guard cities, and recovery of Economy.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%202%20400%20ad/Mansapeace.jpg

400 AD I trade Aesthetics to Genghis Khan for Horse back riding and 20 gold, as he doesn't have gold we still can build Shwedagon Paya, as I don't have Hinduism, that would be a excellent idea.

9 cities as of 400 AD, not great, but 3 taken in war, 1 from Mansa, 2 from the Barbs with 1 of those from under Shaka's nose.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%202%20400%20ad/F1.jpg

Overall, poorly played I feel, as I crashed economy and am still inching to Civil Service, which I was looking at getting from Oracle, but for Gilgamesh and 2 turns.

12 workers, weak army, some good cities, some average. Signified Bureaucracy Capital site. Archers x 2 coming online next turn, courthouses being built.

On tech's Shaka has Feudalism :wow:, rest seem to be not teching much at moment, about to explode I think. Mansa has Machinery as well.

Average effort, I whipped a lot, setting the stage I feel, winnable from here, really any save its winnable from UNLESS you've had some major bad luck.

http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/kk264/IPEX-731BA5DD06/CIV%204%20PHOTO%20SHOTS/Emporers%20cook%20book/Book%205%20Saladin/Round%202%20400%20ad/F5.jpg

Build the Great Library, Parthenon, should build the Shwedagon Paya (forgot till now), 2 don't have Aesthetics as yet. 3 don't have currency. Tech in hole, economy needs to recover.

I've done a lot of whipping with overflow into either workers, forges, courthouses or even troops.

Still haven't adopted a religion, only have Confucianism and Christianity.

Enjoy.208519

On the best selection mode, I feel we are doing ourselves a disservice, by constantly selecting the best save, we end up with a better and better position. I feel it'd be best to select a challenging or most interesting save, not to win game from, but to develop gaming skills. You learn little by having it all given to you, just to expect a silver platter lifestyle.

Leventis

Mar 27, 2009, 11:13 PM

Round 2: 1500BC - 400AD

I decided to stick with the current tech path (CoL), figuring there was a chance of scoring an early GProphet from the wonders anyway. In the meantime, I switched to slavery and whipped The Oracle to completion.

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/04-OracleWhip.jpg?t=1238211132

I chose Monarchy, since I figured it would be good for trading and especially for Hereditary Rule. I intended on building a lot of units to capture barb cities/fogbust/keep my power rating up anyway. Meantime, CoL had given us Confucianism, and I promptly built the shrine courtesy of the GP from the capital.

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/05-GPShrine.jpg?t=1238211869

2nd civics change, abusing the Spiritual trait:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/07-HR.jpg?t=1238211917

Now diplomatically I wanted to keep Shaka off my back for a while, and I noticed he had no religion yet, so I obliged him and sent our missionary south:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/08-SpeadConf.jpg?t=1238211997

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/09-AdoptConf.jpg?t=1238212077

And a few turns later we are both Confucian :). Turned out to be a smart move, because he was getting feisty:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/10-ShakaWarRequest.jpg?t=1238212152

I indulged him and joined in -- Mansa was in no position to hurt me and Shaka would more than keep him busy. Just did it for the positive diplo with the Shaka, which soon got him to pleased. Meantime, I started using Gilgamesh as a trading partner, getting a pretty sweet trade with monarchy:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/11-GilgameshTrade.jpg?t=1238212276

With the neighbours busy butting heads, I began expanding more, firstly taking that barb city to the south...

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/13-BarbCity1.jpg?t=1238212408

... and then the one out east:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/15-BarbCity2.jpg?t=1238212485

By now Mansa had taken peace with me and I was at pleased with both Shaka and Gilgamesh, which was very nice indeed. I used them in a few more trades:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/16-ShakaTrade.jpg?t=1238212676
http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/17-GilgameshTrade2.jpg?t=1238212761
http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/18-GilgameshTrade3.jpg?t=1238212761

Continued to expand, settling Najran in the north for wine (no screenie), and by taking barb cities, opening up the HE in the process:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/19-BarbCity3.jpg?t=1238212894

I adopted OR, and got yet another Great Prophet when I really wanted a GS for an academy. I settled him anyway:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/21-GP2.jpg?t=1238212822

And that's where things ended for the round. Great Library and Heroic Epic are all but finished:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/22-GLib.jpg?t=1238213114
http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/ECV/23-HE.jpg?t=1238213114

Civil Service is 7 turns away, economy is fine and getting stronger all the time. Have a strong military, using the marble city as the main unit pump. Diplomatically, things are great -- Shaka and Genghis hate Mansa, and Gilgamesh is a bit of a fence sitter, but pleased with me also.

Finally, a look at our lands:

http://i351.photobucket.com/albums/q452/Tasos_Bougas/25-MapView.jpg?t=1238213820

IPEX-731BA5DD06

Mar 27, 2009, 11:16 PM

spoil report Please

Lansky

Mar 27, 2009, 11:27 PM

Leventis

Mar 27, 2009, 11:32 PM

I was under the assumption voting was based on what save you think would be the most fun/interesting to play and not necessarily the "best" one. It could be the best one, or maybe not.

From the OP:

Voting Rules:

4. At the end of each round you can vote on 3 saves for first, second and third place. I believe that these votes should be made publicly in order to allow for as much discussion as possible. I strongly encourage you to explain why you are voting for a particular save. This is one of the best ways to learn, and that's what this game is all about! If you feel uncomfortable voting publicly, PM me with your vote.
5. How you vote is up to you. Some people may want to vote for the 'best' save, others may vote for saves which they feel provide the best learning experience. Just make sure to explain what criteria you are using for your vote (overall best, best learning experience, etc).

Seems pretty clear.

RJM

Mar 28, 2009, 01:55 AM

Round 2
On the best selection mode, I feel we are doing ourselves a disservice, by constantly selecting the best save, we end up with a better and better position. I feel it'd be best to select a challenging or most interesting save, not to win game from, but to develop gaming skills. You learn little by having it all given to you, just to expect a silver platter lifestyle.

I don't think this is an issue with this round. If I've done the sums, only 2 people regarded the winning save as best, while a number of us didn't rate it in the top 3.

RJM

assass1n

Mar 28, 2009, 03:12 AM

Yeah pick the worst save around that will feel more like a challenge I agree with Ipex

KingMorgan

Mar 28, 2009, 04:23 AM

Lansky

Mar 28, 2009, 10:03 AM

Picking saves is very subjective, I had a telling off becuase of my lack of workers, yet other people thought my save was good enough for a vote. :D

I think so long we don't play from an overpowered save we'll have fun and learn a thing or two from the stratergies that we see in other peoples saves.

I'm already interested to see all the different choices by both the players and the AI's from posted saves for round two. Even if everyone played exactly the same various AI civs have played their hands very differently. Cool to see.

shyuhe

Mar 28, 2009, 10:10 AM

Here's another shadow round.

Oracle for monarchy, self-researched just about everything else. Genghis and Gilgamesh are at war with MM, and I'm in a fake war as well. Shaka hasn't been doing much - I think he's boxed in. I can bribe him in to war for pretty cheap but I haven't done so. He'll probably dogpile on MM soon enough anyways.

Tech screen at 400AD:
http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd161/shyuhe/misc/Civ4ScreenShot0164.jpg

Relations:
http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd161/shyuhe/misc/Civ4ScreenShot0165.jpg

And empire (11 cities I think?):
http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd161/shyuhe/misc/Civ4ScreenShot0163.jpg

Fustat is more of a joke than anything else. I just didn't want to give up all that green space to the land leader. The sheep up north need to get settled soon for health. HE was unlocked last turn hunting barbs. Military can be pumped from the HE city once it's online - I don't have much of a military right now as I'm not too worried about a war declaration.

ChromiumL

Mar 28, 2009, 12:05 PM

On the best selection mode, I feel we are doing ourselves a disservice, by constantly selecting the best save, we end up with a better and better position. I feel it'd be best to select a challenging or most interesting save, not to win game from, but to develop gaming skills. You learn little by having it all given to you, just to expect a silver platter lifestyle.

This is an issue--which is why I do three things:

-encourage people to vote for the save they find to be the best learning experience
-encourage strong players to 'shadow' rather than submit saves for votes. This is especially important in the first few rounds. (and I do appreciate those who shadow, because it is fun to look at their saves for ideas!)
-I wait to vote last, so my vote can be a tie-breaker, and also, at my discretion, I will not vote for saves that are overpowered and would otherwise win if I did vote for them. (as I did with Lansky's save in the last round)

In this case (though I haven't started the round yet), I don't think MkLh's save was overpowered.

The problem with changing the vote system is that people don't want to vote for the 'worst' save, or a 'mediocre' save. In the past, I suggested going for the #2 voted save, assuming that #1 is too strong--but I think encouraging people to vote for what they think will be the best 'learning experience' is probably best.

I sometimes do get discouraged though, when people aren't willing to try any strategy other than 'bash heads' (though this is a VERY effective strategy--so I can see why people do it). However, I would really like to see us with an AP, UN or culture victory at some point -- just for the learning experience!

RJM

Mar 29, 2009, 02:03 AM

I accidentally played an extra turn. I've picked up the auto save from AD 400. I hope this is not a problem.
I decided to expand into the territory at my end of the land mass (before someone else did), so the priority was capturing the barb cities and building settlers. Atfer CoL I went for fishing, alphabet, currency (to try to rebuild my economy), Aesthetics, literature (for GL) and currently civil service

I had a small war with Shaka, but nothing too serious. I have almost filled "my" territory with cities, but my research rate is not good. Also, everybody else is Hindu, and I have no Hinduism in my empire - that will be a problem.

RJM

ChromiumL

Mar 29, 2009, 12:53 PM

I'm going to arbitrarily extend the round by 1 day (to monday) so I have a chance to play it.

Stupid life getting in the way of my civ playing!

assass1n

Mar 30, 2009, 04:23 AM

Hahahaha
This isn't done :D

ChromiumL

Mar 30, 2009, 02:58 PM

Finally--Here is my round:

I took a pretty big risk at the start of this round--figured that if it didn't pay off, then my save wouldn't be picked, no big deal. That risk = building oracle and getting civil service with it...

Tech: In order to get civil service, I needed to get CoL and mathematics first. With CoL, founded Confucianism in Damascus. Fortunately, my gambit worked out perfectly, and got civil service from oracle. Next I teched fishing and sailing (for fishies and trade routes), masonry (for marble), I think I did currency next (for extra trade routes), then aesthetics and literature. Finally came metal casting, machinery, construction, and I am currently working on engineering (maybe for Notre Dame?). At some point, I also traded MM for Calendar (I think I gave him CoL?). I also teched monotheism somewhere in there for organized religion (need to tech meditation for monasteries--I forgot about it). Oh, and somewhere in there, I used a great scientist to bulb paper.

Tech Situation:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0010-2.jpg

Cities: To start off, I immediately switched over to the oracle in my capital. Now am 1 turn away from Parthenon in capital as well. First, I settled the marble/cow/corn city, then I took the barb city to the SE (I can't believe Shaka didn't take it--maybe he was waring with someone else?). Finally, after much debate about where to sit my next city, I settled on the pigs/wine and tons 'o' floodplain spot. When my capital popped a great prophet (darn oracle), I used it to found the Confucianism holy building in Damascus. (My future plans, in this case, would be to spread Confucianism to as many cities as possible--even though I am Hindu).

Our lands:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0009-3.jpg

Relations: I have met Shaka, KK, and Mansa, and we are all Hindu (which I have spread to most of my cities). Thankfully, that doesn't mean that KK isn't bashing Mansa's face in. Everyone except KK is pleased with me. I am trading around a few resources--mostly for happiness and +relations. I should have explored the map more (just have a fishing boat doing the work now--but I was convinced that Shaka would declare on me, so I didn't want to send any of my troops off running around.

Relations summary:

http://i239.photobucket.com/albums/ff108/ChromiumL/Civ4ScreenShot0011-2.jpg.

Summary:

60% tech rate for 130:science: per turn and +7:gold: per turn.

6 cities, 4 workers, 6 axes, 2 swords, 2 warriors

ChromiumL

Mar 30, 2009, 03:03 PM

@RJM - no problem with your playing a turn too many, and submitting the 400AD autosave. I doubt you could have gained any vital info in that one turn :).

And--its time to vote!

Here are the saves submitted for votes:

Assass1n (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208447&d=1238162395)

Lansky (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208487&d=1238184144)

KingMorgan (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208496&d=1238192346)

Ipex (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208519&d=1238213547)

Leventis (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208520&d=1238213576)

RJM (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208620&d=1238310147)

Chromium (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208849&d=1238443080)

Not submitted for a vote (but fun to look at!):

Shyuhe (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208556&d=1238252991)

Lets vote through Wednesday...

RJM

Apr 01, 2009, 04:10 AM

Assass1n: Poor tech rate and tech position. Bulawayo will be a flash point
Chrom: Good tech rate and best tech position
Ipex: Poor tech rate and tech position. Awdaghost could be good buffer
King M: Very good tech rate and good tech position. At war with Mansa but he will accept peace; but may want to wait and capture M's city, s of Baghdad
Lansky: Reasonable tech rate and position. At war but will accept peace; but could wait to capture Zulu city, e of Ondini
Leventis: Tech rate not too bad, but tech position poor.

Votes

#1 King Morgan
#2 Chomium
#3 Lansky

KingMorgan

Apr 01, 2009, 03:20 PM

Lansky - Liking the stack, different strategy. Not sure if the map called for it, plenty of land for a reasonable REX, but thats my peaceful nature.
assass1n - Good, low tech rate and not many improvements.
Ipex - low pop, well whipped, No soldiers. Workers?
Leventis Good, liking it.
RJM, Good expansion, tech is bad because you have 3 workers, one is heading off with the horseman. I'd not bother with building any markets yet. 25% of nothing is still nothing. no cottages and/or no specialists = no reseach. I think if you'd built 10 more workers earlier in the save this would have been a strong postion.
Chromium, Good tech, suprised on the lack of exploration and expansion.

1. Lansky - might as well give it a go.
2. Chromium - soild easy save to play
3. Leventis - well rounded.

Lansky

Apr 01, 2009, 05:53 PM

#1 Leventus
#2 King Morgan
#3 Chromium

Reasoning being -

Leventus: As said before just a very solid round. Nothing exceptional, but the game can go a lot of different ways and this save is just a very good jumping off point.
King Morgan: Strong relative tech rate and strong expansion.
Chromium: Civil Service slingshot. Feeling it is incredibly strong for a diplomatic win with either "a sword or a pen" so to speak.

Leventis

Apr 01, 2009, 09:10 PM

Some general comments on the saves: Overall, I was amazed that people didn't focus more on military, and in some cases, diplomacy. Tech situation was quite similar for each of the saves, so I made my distinctions based on diplo, military, and how things will look once expansion is complete.

3 votes: Lansky I like the stack. I like the diplo situation. Still have room to expand through paece/force. Carrying on from here will obviously mean killing Shaka. Tech pace will pick up quickly after further expansion/peace, and you are doing quite well for now.

2 votes: Chromium Reminds me a bit of my game. Ahead of me in tech but behind in expansion and military. Diplo (and Mansa) is keeping you from being a target, but I feel we still need to boost military in thee next round. I'd get at least 2 settlers out ASAP to settle the north. Tech rate is great and your economy can easily take the hit anyway.

1 vote: King Morgan This is solid, but could have been better, IMHO. There are some things I don't understand (please answer or comment KingM :)). Firstly, how does Mansa have that southern barb city (i.e. why didn't you take it), and Gao? Those spots really belong belong to us, and now it looks as if Shaka is going to get the southern barb city which will be a total pain. If we carry on from here, we should bribe him to take peace with Mansa and take it ourselves. One more thing, why are your cities grown into so much unhappiness. They are at +2 and +3 :mad: some of them, and the GL could have whipped them all away a few turns back. Are you intentionally keeping their pops high? Finally, what are you planning on doing with the Great Prophet? He has been there a while :D.

RRRaskolnikov

Apr 02, 2009, 02:24 AM

1 vote: King Morgan Firstly, how does Mansa have that southern barb city (i.e. why didn't you take it), and Gao? Those spots really belong belong to us, and now it looks as if Shaka is going to get the southern barb city which will be a total pain.

Mansa also took it in my shadow and I had to dow to reclaimed it :) I am surprised no one got "Shaka" related troubles, in my game he was in WHEOOHRN since 200 AD despite pleased status and I had to ask him a tribut to avoid a surprise DoW...

Lansky

Apr 02, 2009, 06:14 AM

Mansa also took it in my shadow and I had to dow to reclaimed it :) I am surprised no one got "Shaka" related troubles, in my game he was in WHEOOHRN since 200 AD despite pleased status and I had to ask him a tribut to avoid a surprise DoW...

Oh he was very angry in my game. He took the SE barb city maybe 3 turns into this session and instantly began getting ready to attack me since Mansa was a Jew and I was a pagan. I still would have attacked him anyway, since I always attack him when I'm his neighbor. Just kind of pushed stuff along.

KingMorgan

Apr 02, 2009, 09:36 AM

Lansky, Manus took the city before i knew it even exsisted, the Northern one i got beat to the capture by a few turns. If you'd read my report you'd know about the unhapiness ;) The borders of manus now capital expanded killing my trade routes and thus my trades with the AI, a new road is being built and you can remake the deals to cure the unphappines. Or you could whip in some units and take the manus cities, i'll leave the choice to you. Prophet is up to you as well, you could build the shrine or settle in flooplains city or cap, very disapointed to have a GP rather than a GS.

ChromiumL

Apr 02, 2009, 12:23 PM

Yay--finally got some votes in!

With that, let me make my own votes:

1st - Lansky - I am not too great at figuring out the balance of war (how to keep tech rate high when capturing cities), so, for me, this save would be a great learning opportunity. Not to mention that stack is absolutely delicious!

2nd - Leventis - Nice all around save. Good expansion, I like the fact that you are building hero epic/moai statues early. Good military too...

3rd - King Morgan - I like the save, but the way Mansa is surrounding you is not cool. This save would require a quick build of military and taking out those cities (hopefully before someone else does!).

So that brings the final tally to:

10 votes - Lansky
7 votes - KingMorgan
7 votes - Chromium
6 votes - Leventis

That makes Lansky the winner! We will be continuing from his save (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=208487&d=1238184144)! The next round will run through 1100 AD, and we will start voting somewhere around Monday.

RJM

Apr 05, 2009, 01:47 AM

Because of the impressive stack in Bulawayo, I decided to continue the war against Shaka until he was no longer a threat. I thought it would be easier to make him a vassal, so I switched to Feudalism. (This was a mistake; Shaka did not capitulate until a long time after I discovered it.) My research path after that was Aesthetics and Literature (for the GL). I then went for Paper and Education. I picked up various other techs on trades. The combined effect of the war and the cities I captured was to crash my economy which now needs to be rebuilt. I made a couple of small mistakes towards the end - I forgot that I could build missionaries without a monastery so I wasted some hammers. I then sent my first missionary to the wrong city.
RJM

Gumbolt

Apr 05, 2009, 03:28 AM

Still offline here till wednesday so I am an unlikely to take part in this round.
I have now played on my own starting save to finish. I got an AP win around 1325ad. The religious start on my initial save made this somewhat easier.

As i eventually grabbed 3-4 religions on my save these spread conveniently and I was the only player to use my religion. I used a GP for xtianity and chopped the AP. This helped with lots of wars as all the Ai adopted different religions. Gilga did start off with my religion but switched to xtianity. Shaka went conf.

I did lose one city to Shaka early on around 1000bcish but I took this back with numbers and eventually used my religion/AP to force a holy war against him with gila and the mongols joining. I eventually took a few of his cities. i had very few issues with barbs from my save position.

As for spreading AP religion i built some ships and sent my missionaries hunting. Probably could of done this much earlier if I researched oiptics. I had no trouble spreading the religion. ;)

I got the Ap win on the first vote. I did have to give Gilga enough free techs to make his dilpomacy +11 with me. His yes vote and me being the onlu candidate gave me the win.

I dont really want to give anything else away till you have reached this stage.

I will upload a save once I am online and once you are past 1100ad. ;)

Lansky

Apr 05, 2009, 03:57 PM

Round 3

Okay basically one giant war against Shaka and a really long phony war with Mansa. Plan was to just eliminate Shaka, but got lazy and had him capitulate with one city left. Yeah pretty useless, but he’s still managing to tech Aesthetics for me. In 1070 Medina popped a GE that is sitting in waiting for a potential next turn set. No real good wonders coming up though unless Divine Right is grabbed and perhaps Versailles rushed. I'd lean WS or Oxford myself.

http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/GEisborn.jpg

Diplomacy – We’re untouchable for the time being. Gilgamesh is friendly. Genghis made Mansa capitulate and is friendly. I have an OCC Shaka. Genghis will attack Gilgamesh, but we don’t have enough to bribe him to start a war currently. Could start up another war or fully recover the economy.

http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Diplo-1.jpg

Techs – Gilga has a slight lead still largely due to trading from him at a loss. I have not been racing to Lib, but at this point I’d still see it as winnable depending on the other continent. Genghis is behind but captured the Jewish shrine which is HUGE. I’d really like to get this from him personally.

http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Techs-1.jpg

!5 cities. Gilgamesh settled a really annoying one in the middle as the war was winding down but I’d expect it to flip culturally at some point. Biggest problem is a lack of stolen workers and subsequently working FAR too many unimproved tiles. Still have tons of jungle to chop and cottages to build. Medina got the MS. Otherwise Wonders have been built and lost, mostly by design, for some gold. Currently in the beginning of a tech cycle - using merchants to push up the slider. A few more turns until next civic swap (around when guilds would finish) is possible at which point slavery to finish up some courthouses and other key buildings is planned. Remaining stack is in kwaDukuza as my first instinct was to build up and attack Genghis, however this would be tricky diplomatically. Would need to gift Gilgamesh a tech, which we don’t have atm, in order to be safe from a drop to pleased and subsequently backstab.

http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Empire-2.jpg

ChromiumL

Apr 06, 2009, 05:50 PM

My round:

My goal for this round was to either destroy or vassalize Shaka, then do everything in my power to improve the economy.

War: I ended up taking several more of Shaka's cities: flood plain/pig city to the east, the newly settled fish/wine city to the northeast, Fish/iron/sugar city to the southwest, Shaka's capital (clam/rice/gold/spices), and dye/cow city to the southeast. I also took the barb city to the north after the war was over. After I teched vassalage I accepted Shaka's capitulation for some gold and the rest of civil service. I was in a war with Mansa for a while, but only for the added relations. I can potentially bribe Genghis into war with Gilgamesh for Philosophy, Civil Service and Paper.

Tech: First I went for Feudalism so that I could make Shaka my vassal, then I got the rest of Civil Service from him. Next was Aesthetics and Literature (for GL and HE), after that I went for philosophy (founded taoism), Paper, and used a Great Scientist to halfway finish Education, which I just finished up completely. I'm not sure what is best to tech next, but its sitting on Liberalism. There are a few techs that I am missing that the AI has (engineering, compass, theology), but its not really worth it to trade for these things IMHO.

Cities: I focused on building 'tons' of courthouses. I whiped a few in some places with extra pop to spare. I just finished up the Forbidden Palace in one of the Southeastern Shaka cities. Also build Great Library in capital, Parthenon and Heroic Epic in Baghdad (also settled Great General in Baghdad). I am currently building a lot of Madrassas, even in production cities--so that I can try to get Universities and Oxford up ASAP.

Right now at 40% tech rate, I am getting 193 bpt with +7 gold.

Lets wait another day to see if anyone else has a save to submit...

KingMorgan

Apr 07, 2009, 10:29 AM

I have a save, here it is

http://i377.photobucket.com/albums/oo214/KingMorgan1/Civ4ScreenShot0181.jpg
http://i377.photobucket.com/albums/oo214/KingMorgan1/Civ4ScreenShot0182.jpg
http://i377.photobucket.com/albums/oo214/KingMorgan1/Civ4ScreenShot0183.jpg

210034

Gumbolt

Apr 07, 2009, 11:43 AM

I will join next game. I have kind of given myself an unfair advantage map wise if i continue. I will post save from the end of my game next week. :)

ChromiumL

Apr 08, 2009, 12:08 AM

Alright, its votin' time!

Here are the submitted saves (not many this time!):

RJM (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=209641&d=1238913993)

Lansky (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=209746&d=1238965470)

Chromium (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=209900&d=1239058187)

KingMorgan (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=210034&d=1239130869)

Lets vote till Thursday or Friday...

RJM

Apr 08, 2009, 12:43 PM

It's rather fun to know that each of us will get at least 3 votes!

Here are mine:

#1 Chromium - good tech rate and liberalism within grasp
#2 Lansky - also good tech rate, but I don't like the tech path
#3 King Morgan - lower tech rate and Shaka still active

RJM

Lansky

Apr 09, 2009, 03:39 PM

Pretty amazing round of voting here :lol:

#1 Chromium - Strong position and set up for standard Lib push. Could perhaps delay one or two techs and try to claim something along the lines of MT or Democracy.
#2 RJM - Similar to Chromium only a bit slower tech rate.
#3 King Morgan - I just don't want to deal with Shaka again. I hate that AI script. Freaking wack job.

Regardless this game feels won baring an unforeseen tech/military giant on the other continent.

Gumbolt

Apr 10, 2009, 09:10 PM

I could vote if it would help get things moving here. Not sure I really have voting rights though. :(

RJM

Apr 11, 2009, 12:52 AM

I could vote if it would help get things moving here. Not sure I really have voting rights though. :(

I'm not sure that would help. I think we should wait for Chromium and King Morgan. We can then decide what to do next.

RJM

KingMorgan

Apr 11, 2009, 03:42 AM

Hi Guys, sorry for the delay - it's been a crazy week and a crazy Easter holidays thus far.

1. Lansky - not my tech path, but i'm interested to build castles and a warlike approach, for this reason top spot.
2. Chromium for the blanced approach - i was aiming to do something like this but failed :( i'd vote this top but that would not be a learning approach.
3. RJM - Good save, behind on the tech - only problem. WORKERS Shaka has 6 workers and 2 cities. You have 4 workers and 12 cities. (Lansky has 6 workers)

RJM has more improvements than Lansky - tut, tut. ;)

Excuse my ranting but i never realsied the importance of working well improved cottages, building workers ealrier and more of them, working early cottaged tiles made such a differece to my game - a very simple thing but for me, so effective at increasing my game.

We should rigg the next game map for "cottage heaven" and play a Fin/Exp leader ;)

RJM

Apr 11, 2009, 07:11 AM

RJM - problem. WORKERS. Shaka has 6 workers and 2 cities. You have 4 workers and 12 cities. (Lansky has 6 workers)

Well, maybe 4 workers for 12 cities may be a touch light even by my standards. But, I have difficulty establishing to my own satisfaction the benefit of the oft quoted rule of thumb - 1.5 workers per city. I've tried replaying the first 100 turns of this game many times. I really can't see any noticable improvement in having 3 workers. This may be my play style, for example not chopping as much as I should or perhaps my research order, or even low population cites due to whipping. I'd be interested to know what you use all those workers for.

BTW
RJM has more improvements than Lansky - tut, tut. ;)

Is the "tut, tut" aimed at me or Lansky? What's the problem?

RJM

Gumbolt

Apr 11, 2009, 09:24 AM

3 workers does seem a bit low!!! If I start a war i like to try and steal a worker or 2 on first turn of a war.

I had a game recently where i took a barb city and took 4 workers in the city. So 3 isnt a disaster. Its just finding a rich source of workers to harvest.

KingMorgan

Apr 11, 2009, 10:02 AM

Is the "tut, tut" aimed at me or Lansky? What's the problem?

RJM

Lansky, he has more workers yet less improvements. Sorry i'm not having a go just trying to help, as i said having more workers earlier helped my alot in my game.

ChromiumL

Apr 11, 2009, 12:53 PM

Sorry I haven't done this sooner--its been a busy week for me too!

Here are my votes:

1st - Lansky - Good tech (though I am a tad mystified by the tech path... I guess banks will eventually be nice...But I would prefer Oxford and Liberalism). Once again in this save Gilgamesh is becoming a monster. BUT, theres a good tech rate, and control of a lot of cities.

2nd - RJM - Gilgamesh in this save is even scarier than in the previous save. With Mansa as his vassal the two of them will tech themselves into a huge lead. The economy is also in the gutter--but its nothing a few courthouses won't clear up.

3rd - KingMorgan - Tech rate is better than RJM, but Shaka is going to be a huge nightmare to get rid of...

That leaves the vote total at:

8 - Chromium
8 - Lansky
5 - RJM
3 - KingMorgan

If I would have posted earlier, I would have said its fine for Gumbolt to vote (hes probably played the round, and hes a regular player). So, right now I either have to make an arbitrary decision (and probably pick my own save, since Lansky won the last round), or I let Gumbolt make the tie-breaking vote.

I don't really like making an arbitrary decision since it involves my own save--so I will let Gumbolt do the honors. He logs on regularly enough that I don't think we should have to wait too long ;). After he makes a vote, you can start playing right away from either my or Lansky's save (whichever he gives more points).

The next round goes through 1500AD, and as usual, we will give people a little more than half a week to play.

Lansky

Apr 12, 2009, 12:48 PM

Regarding the questioning of my save.

Tech - It's a gamble. If I can keep Gilgamesh at friendly (may be tough) then the idea is a push on Mansa/Khan with Knights/Pikes/Trebs (I forsee most of his army consisting of elepahnts/LB's by then) in order to grab the Jewish holy city and a large chunk of land. I see this as a small window to back stab a major power block before they can catch up in tech. This does of course hurt my own tech pace, however with enough land I normally just don't care if I lose liberalism. With the Jewish holy city (that shrine has to be a monster by now) and that much land a back stab on Gilgamesh with Calvary/Cannons or even Infantry should work. Not at home, but I also believe Khan has the 'mids for an early PS military build up, but I am not positive on this one. The castles should also give a large enough espionage lead to keep him in HR for as long as we desire if it is prioritized.

Workers - The warlike tendencies also means that most of the workers I have over RJM were very recently captured from Shaka. When given the choice I tend to prefer to steal workers/cities as opposed to using my time to produce them. Not always efficient, but its my style. I am relying a lot on cycling between merchants for my teching and whipping for my production. I need to work on my vertical/horizontal growth while I am at war. It's a weakness I readily admit. In this regard I feel Chromiun put me to shame this round.

Gumbolt

Apr 12, 2009, 04:10 PM

Ackkk I leave for a few hours and next i have to make a decision. Oh the heavy burden. I will only judge on what I can see as i have played this game to a win already.

So we have Lansky with a slightly slower tech rate. Shaka as a vassel. Heading towards banking. I do like The GE ready for a nationalism MM grab? Downside here is that the Ap is built and thats a risk. Gilga again is a pain. Although the empire is large enough to take him or another Ai on.

Chrom has a better tech rate and is heading towards liberalism quickly. No other Ai has paper yet on this continent. So there could be a chance for a steel grab? Shaka is a vassel and mansa is khans vassel. No Ap built here.

I do think you would find chroms save the easiest to win due to the tech position. Yet Lansky has put forward a brave plan of how he will hard graft a win. This I would like to see. It will be a different sort of challenge to the usual lib race win and Ai stomping game. Theres a possible Ap win if you can vassel Khan/ Mansa.

So I personally will give.

2 votes to lansky.
1 votes to chrom.

I have not voted on the others as it was a tie breaker vote anyway.

ChromiumL

Apr 14, 2009, 12:04 AM

RJM

Apr 14, 2009, 12:56 AM

Just FYI--I think that I am going to need a break from leading the Emperor Cookbook after this one is done. I don't want to burnout, and my 'real' non-civ life is pretty busy right now. Hopefully someone else will continue it while I take a little break (I still want to play!). We may still have a few weeks left in this round--I just wanted to let y'all know about what was going on.

Thanks for your efforts in organising these games. I've enjoyed playing them and I've learned a lot.

RJM

RJM

Apr 14, 2009, 01:10 AM

I decided that Lansky would play out his approach far better than I could. I therefore switched a lot of things around and in particular switched to researching paper and education. My whole turnset lacked cohesion. Every time I saw a new opportunity, I went for it. So when I got a great prophet, I sidetracked my research to try for Islam (which I got). Another sidetrack got me a great merchant for economics. I built the Uni of Sankore, but missed the Spiral Minaret by a few turns. I have begun to make contact with the other continent, and presumably I will get an economic boost when I discover astronomy in a few turns. I didn't realise there was a sleeping great engineer, but noticed it in time to build Oxford, which may have been a reasonable usage. I seem to have a technology lead, so I would expect to win a space race from here.

RJM

KingMorgan

Apr 14, 2009, 12:44 PM

I'll continue it if there are no objections - i can miscount the votes and have my save top every round :) ;) seriously though, I enjoy the games and would like to see it continue.

Well done ChromiumL and thanks for the hardwork. More time for SGTOM ;)

Gumbolt

Apr 14, 2009, 06:12 PM

Sounds good!

Hope you don't mind me putting you on the spot like that Gumbolt :p.

That makes Lansky the grand winner (I am interested to try his strategy too...)

We will play from his save (http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=209746&d=1238965470) through 1500AD.

Just FYI--I think that I am going to need a break from leading the Emperor Cookbook after this one is done. I don't want to burnout, and my 'real' non-civ life is pretty busy right now. Hopefully someone else will continue it while I take a little break (I still want to play!). We may still have a few weeks left in this round--I just wanted to let y'all know about what was going on.

No worries. I hope the vote made it more interesting. One of the things at the higher levels that bugs me is how the Ai always beeline to banking/economics letting the play grab edu/lib. Seems to happen every game for me. If its not that they take TM for the golden age. I am sure the Ai does have a general plan.

Lansky

Apr 16, 2009, 04:19 PM

Well it went poorly relative to what I would have wanted. I would advocate not voting for this save unless you want to trudge through a reeeeeeeeeeeally long war.

Nothing to really spoiler but just in case. I have broken Genghis' back however its a VERY defensive war. Take a city, he sacrifices his latest SoD, take another city. Have the Hindu/Jewish shrines. Gilgamesh is friendly but taking off techwise. I do have him focused espionage-wise so he will be friendly until I decide otherwise. After taking out Khan (Mansa has one city left) I'll have 40%+ land mass so superior production versus Gilgamesh and the game would be over, but that would be one massive war. In retrospect declaring on Gilgamesh and bribing Khan into the thick of things would have been MUCH smarter. I was too fixated on the Jewish shrine - (It is REALLY nice though :cool:) Genghis just builds too many units to be willing to capitulate anytime soon. Oh and uh... Heroic Epic still has not been built. Whoops.

Edit - The difference in world tech rates between my save and RJM's because of the war is really funny.

ChromiumL

Apr 18, 2009, 11:56 AM

I 'should' have time to finish the round tomorrow, but if not, I will close the round then anyways...

Lansky

Apr 18, 2009, 08:13 PM

Eh, I say take your time and play the round when you can.

ChromiumL

Apr 20, 2009, 12:41 AM

Alright--finally finished my round. Sorta did it on auto-pilot, but I think it went ok.

I am going to keep this brief because their isn't much to say. I switched to teching for paper/education/philosophy, then realized I was way ahead on the race for liberalism so went for gunpowder/chemistry and then used liberalism to get steel. Got some other techs in the middle somewhere (guilds/banking/economics/compass. Just started work on replaceable parts. I spread Judiasm to all my cities and switched civics to organized religion for building bonus. Then I built a ton of Judiasm buildings for the free hammers. Also got a ton of banks/universities in there.

I just started building up some cannons for a hopeful push into either gilga or khan's lands.

Right now my tech rate is 548 bpt with +13 gold.

Lets go ahead and vote for the next few days, then we will start another round!

RJM

Apr 20, 2009, 04:00 AM

I believe we only have 3 saves, so I'm not sure the voting system is the best way forward. Perhaps we should each continue with whichever save we want to for the next round. Anyway, here are my votes.

#1 Chromium: I'm surprised by some of the builds, but there is a strong research rate and (probably) a tech lead.
#2 Lansky: Obviously, the war dominates, but peace is available if desired. On the other hand finishing the war might be an effective strategy.

RJM

ChromiumL

Apr 20, 2009, 11:33 AM

@RJM:

As far as my save goes, I think continuing from Lansky's save really just confused my mind. I wasn't really sure where the focus should be, or how to specialize my cities. I find that I tend to have this problem towards this point of the game in most of the Cookbooks (so its nothing personal against Lansky's save).

As far as voting goes, you are probably right. I suppose it would be interesting for each of us to continue our own save (or whichever save we wanted) to see where it takes us. I'm not exactly sure why the interest fell so sharply in the last few rounds but I suspect we can probably blame the SGOTM for taking up people's time.

Why don't we just drop the voting and play from whichever save we prefer... Post when/if you get victory and how you did it :).

KingMorgan

Apr 21, 2009, 02:56 PM

Sorry forgot to mention i'm on holiday.

Lansky

Apr 23, 2009, 04:32 PM

Continued from my own save and decided to just keep up with my total war motif.

Continued to wade through the war with Khan and finally broke his back simply by flooding him with troops. Baghdad puts out CR3 siege. During the middle of the war I head towards Communism for SP and the GSpy in order to start a GA with uh... I think a Prophet I have scratching himself and I get a surprise. Oh hey, I win the Lib race - Gilgamesh had Education for how long? 1450ish? When Genghis finally throws in the towel he also coughs up Astronomy, which ups trade commerce a bit. Can finally stop upping the culture slider for happiness and speed towards Rifling via the GA.

http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Lib.jpg
http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/GenghisDown.jpg

Thanks to 3 Shrines and one more on the way (Mansa founded Hinduism, Judaism, Catholicism, and Confucianism - lacks a shrine :crazyeye:) coupled with banks gold is very easy to get. Decide to build The Kremlin and just buy Gilgamesh into the ground. Thanks to having him prioritized as the only EP target and pumping the espionage slider to 10% I have full view of his empire and can track his SoD. It's very strong, but also very heavy towards CR3 Grens. When I finally declare I allow him to take a city and then retaliate with my CR3 Cannons. Losses are high, but he loses his entire stack while I split mine up into one large stack and 5 lesser ones. I quickly blitz his outside cities which still have largely Longbows and the route is on. Unfortunately to avoid a Diplomatic Victory mess (other continent hates me) I have to take essentially his entire empire. This is most of my army between the cursor and selected stack along with him giving up and of course victory.

http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Gilgagoesdown.jpg
http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/GilgaCaps.jpg
http://i660.photobucket.com/albums/uu326/lanskyj13/Victory-1.jpg