Again take a few seconds to read this introduction carefully to make certain you DO NOT run afoul of the divided spoiler rules.

This is the third and final spoiler thread to support discussion of the Gotm25-Mongols.

The objective of these divided spoiler threads is to provide a little organization to the discussion that will help more people find the topics that they are interested in without having to rummage through the entire game discussion.

The test for access to this spoiler thread is simple:

you must have submitted your final save file from playing the game.

You may discuss any information from the game but if you are posting reports of events and/or activities in the Ancient or Medieval portions of the game, those reports should be placed in the correct spoiler for that time segment of the game.

For many players their game may have already ended in spoiler discussion 2, but this thread is basically for final game comments and discussions that may have eeked out of the Middle Ages.

This thread is a great opportunity to post an overall summary of how your game progressed. This thread is primarily intended to discuss the capstone modern age events from those games that players did not choose to win in the middle ages.

We hope that all players have enjoyed this game and that you are looking forward to Gotm26-Asian Melee and perhaps the Iroquois Conquest game in Game6-4 of the Medal Play Series.

PTW1.21 http://gotm.civfanatics.net/common/swordsman_small.gif
I finished in 920 ad. Slow ehh.

Once at war I kept making steady progress but was very slow compared to others. I made much more rapid progress once I had cavalry.

I started out attacking the Indians, which went well, but then I got chivalry and the special units. It took me 9 turns to take out the Magog, which ate into the golden age. I then attacked Russia, who crumbled easily, and then Korea followed by the Arabs. I did this as I wanted to clear my northern frontier and stop everyone walking through my undefended homelands. However, the Arabs were pretty strong and taking them on slowed me down a lot. In addition almost everywhere in my game was defended by musketeers. Is there a good way to dissuade the AI from upgrading?

I had kept everyone at war throughout the middle ages. The Germans were destroyed by the Celts, the Ottoman were destroyed by a big alliance, the Egyptians destroyed the japs, and the Chinese were destroyed by the Persians and Celts. As a result once I had finally beaten the Arabs I made rapid progress in the South.

The major benefit of my slow play, is that by getting into the industrial age I got to see the cool graphic of the steppe settlers dismounting to found cities.

Originally posted by Offa
However, the Arabs were pretty strong and taking them on slowed me down a lot. In addition almost everywhere in my game was defended by musketeers. Is there a good way to dissuade the AI from upgrading?[/B]

The only fool-proof way is to destroy them first! ;) Seriously, I usually try to take out the resources as soon as possible. If you can get Gunpowder first, or nearly first, for example, you can identify the Saltpeter sites and try to get to them before the AI hooks them up, or at least before they get Gunpowder themselves. Also, watch for possible trades from AI with multiple sources. Also, trying to keep them low on cash helps somewhat, either large GPT deals or keeping them in constant war. When you begin your invasion, make sure you take out the resources as soon as possible if you haven't already, it will at least keep him from rushing new good defenders, and you will face a lot of spearmen and bowmen.

The major benefit of my slow play, is that by getting into the industrial age I got to see the cool graphic of the steppe settlers dismounting to found cities.

That is something I will have to check out, I was curious how they would work.

Way to go Offa !!

I am always in awe, (and somewhat jealous) whenever I hear of people ending before 1000AD.

I finished myself around 1400 with a diplomatic victory. I realized conquest was out of the question, so I thought I would try something other than a space ship victory.

This is my personal best (earliest date) for this type of win. Congrats to all who beat me and those who just play for fun like me.

Gotta so pack now, as I am moving at the end of the month. I'll keep my PTW disc in my computer so I can start up the new game as soon as I put my system back together.

Open - Civ3

Middle Ages (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=1373766#post1373766)

Han War (500 AD – 620 AD)
I declare War on Han + Ott are with me for Metallurgy. My army is 16 Ordus & 3 Korchins (I do not use them that often only for the occasional kill & for MP) & 11 Bagatur. My only defense unit was due to a Russian town flipping to me so I am full attack.
I did not upgrade units to Steppe Settler (short of cash) and continue building Ordus and settlers to fill gaps as I begin to raze towns more regurlarly.
Peace with Egypt with 73 GP & 5 GPT than Alliance vs Han for Silks & Wine
Bring Keltoi with me giving Metallurgy
This is a BIG alliance to fight the Hans but I certainly did not want to face many riders.
510 AD : I am one turn out of Steam with a leader in my pocket to build but what ? I go for Newton’s … losing some turns and elite wins for nothing. I continue to trade WM for some GP … I am really short on cash as I am rushing libraries in conquered towns to expand boundaries while searching at max speed to avoid being outdated. In retrospect, I should have rushed temples that are cheaper
520 AD : Arabs : WM & 255 GPT & 377 GP vs Steam + MPP for Coal & WM & 42 GPT :D. This MPP will be very useful for the rest of the game, forcing Arabs to fight when I want.
540 AD: Another WM deal… I am searching at 100% and still making 91 GPT !
Han are finished. Who is the next target ? I suspect, I need to go for Khazars & Keltoi & Germany in this order. In the meantime, I do some more trading
Arabs : Elect & WM & 63 GPT & 64 GP vs Indus
I re-declare War on Egypt.
Otto : Alliance to fight Egypt for Coal & Spices + Gems & 49 GPT & 133 GP for Indus.
I go for Democracy in 4 turns while moving my forces to attack Keltoi

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/GOTM25_660ad.jpg

Continuous Wars (Keltoi – Khazars – Germany – Ottomans – Togukawa – Egypt)
650 AD: I am now declaring War on Keltoi. One more leader for an army … I will be able to build the Pentagon. I have now 25 Ordus & 11 Bagaturs & 9 Turghaut & still 3 Korchins
670 AD : I declare War on Khazars & give Silks for Gorg to join fight vs Germans + Ottomans with Electricity to fight Keltoi…
720 AD: More leaders and just before the end of the MPP with Arabs. I have the stupid Keltoi to attack a purposely left lone warrior .. It triggers MPP with Arabs … Cool isn’it ? :D
750 AD : Trade Incense & Medicine for 220 GPT and then MPP for 95 GPT so I make some GPT…I sell Medicine to Ott for 79 GPT & WM. I have another leader to built the ToE in New Karakorum (razed & rebuilt Keltoi town). I leave Keltoi last town and try to have MPP with Arabs to trigger war against Germany. I still do not have nationalism & Arabs have also Replacement Part so they need to be my best pals till the end of the game.
780 AD : I finally get to fight the Germans. This war started in approx 800 BC ! Another leader comes just in time to finish Hoover Dam in razed & rebuilt town of Konisberg. Again Arabs are with me with the MPP.
810 AD : With Military Tradition in my pocket I start building some Cavs, I even updated few Ordus but I keep my cash for Libraries upgrade to expand boundaries and keep Ordus, they are great units :cool: bombarding again & again defenders. It is so efficient even against Riflemen even if you miss many times. They are cheap and numerous and fast. I also continue to build settlers in order to fill gaps and minimize rush building of culture. I start to shift my forces to the Ottomans in order to crush them.
A new leader builds the Military Academy.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/GOTM25_830ad.jpg

830 AD : Peace with Egypt for Nationalism & Trade Corporation for Scientific Method to Ottomans & Arabs pays WM & 240 GP & 67 GPT for Scientific Method. I declare War against Ottomans. At this moment, I have 3 Cavs & 4 Armies & 41 Ordus & 10 Bagatur. I need the Cavs to finish red-lined Riflemen. I did face some Balkan Dragoon but not that much.
850 AD: Steadily destroying Ottomans towns and replacing with my own produced settler. Some more deals to keep everyone happy. I have another left warrior that triggers the MPP with Arabs :D. Gifting lux to Gorg they have an MPP with Arabs. So I really can not attack these guys any-more. I will need to continue with Egypt.
920 AD : Togu is dead . I wanted them to leave my territory and they declared WAR :D. and Ottomans have a single town. I have stopped marauding Egyptians forces with a weak line of warriors and catapult because I will soon need to go after them. I have stopped producing Libraries that are too costly and I go for Temple in some towns, just to get this extra culture I may need. I just wish I would have thought of this earlier :mad:
930 AD : I trade with Arabs Replace Parts & WM & Slave & 244 GP & 48 GPT vs Atomic Theory. I gather Korea & Gorg for the War against Egypt and Arabs will be coming with me by MPP (as usual :D)… I now have 23 Cavs & 35 Ordus & 10 Bagaturs & 3 Korchins. I even used my last 2 leader to rush build libraries in order to gain territory.
960 AD : I am 19 tiles away from Domination Victory. I place some settlers in key position in order to ensure victory in next turn but I have cultural expansion that triggers my domination victory.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/GOTM25_960ad.jpg

Final Score 8412 – not too bad for me after once more failing at QSC time to have a decent (more than 10) number of towns.

Open - Civ3

I loved the effectivness of the combination of Ordus & Bagatur. These are lethal when used together and even against Rifleman. To be sure of the win you may need a cav for the final kill but this is not mandatory.

Mongols with these UU are very dangerous. I am not ready yet to face them in future game.

Looking at other games I think I need to improve my management of the research I intend to be confident when I am leading in techs and start panicking a bit when I am behind.

But my late victory is directly linked to my slow start (only 6 towns at QSC cut-off). So I need to work more to progress...

ptw 1.21 open

This is my first gotm, and judging by earlier post i'm regretting my submission. I lost the game :( in 1750 AD when the egyptians finished their spaceship.

I startet out with making war on my lesser neighbours when they were already in trouble and captured cities close to my territory. Eventually i ended up as the second largest civ (all but 5 wiped out), but i was greatly lacking in technology throughout most of the game. Not sure why, but i probably broke some deal, because the others were furious with me most of the time and refused to trade.

I usually play on monarch because i like to win in a civilized manner and not with force (no disrespect intended) and this probably was my downfall.

Salte, don't regret submitting your game. The GOTMs are fantastic to play in and many of the top players share their secrets in the forums to help the rest of us improve our game play. One thing I have picked up is that early expansion is the key to a good score-something that I'm still working on!;)

Re your note on the AIs refusing to trade, check out Bamspeedy's excellent article on AI attitude in the War Acadamy elsewhere in this site AI attitude (http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3acad_ai_attitude.shtml) which I personally found very useful.

OpenX (without special units)
http://gotm.civfanatics.net/common/ptw.jpg 1.27

Spoiler 1 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?postid=1357491#post1357491)
Spoiler 2 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?postid=1376048#post1376048)
Spoiler 3 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?threadid=69435)

340AD - 1305AD

Wars
I continued my MAs and phony war against Egypt. Egypt's hold their cities well. Meanwhile I attacked with cavalries vs weakest civ:
410AD - 450AD Coguryeo annihilated
540AD - 900AD Celts annihilated
800AD - 860AD Russians annihilated
910AD - 940AD Koreans annihilated

I had total of eight GL. I rushed wonders and buildings. Zero armies.

5000 years old Zulu's promised not to make wars anymore. Zulu's honored the promise by disbanding all military units to cultural improvements.

Science
340AD gifted Russians, Koreans, Ottomans and Germans to IA. Russians got Medicine, Koreans got Steam Power, Ottomans and Germans got Nationalism. I treed to buy techs but their price was too high.
350AD Russians and Koreans have Medicine and Steam Power. I trade with Koreans MT and gold for Steam Power. Russians: MT, WM and 1025 gold for Medicine. Germans: Medicine, Steam Power, MT and 345 gold for Nationalism. Russians: Nationalism for 1090 gold. I start own research max speed first to Electricity and after that towards Combustion. Electricity was gifted to each scientific civs. Germans got Replaceable Parts and I of course traded asap.
800AD ToE completed and last two IA tech acquired.
Modern Times: This time I wasn't lucky to get all four techs when I gifted IA techs to scientific civs. Only Rocketry and Ecology were gained. 7-8 turns per tech. So I made two choices. Researched optional Miniaturization and built the Internet. 1010AD Revolted and draw 7 turn anarchy period. Democracy "killed" corruption and research time per tech decreased to 4-5 turns. Universities were built even in high corruption cities. 1305AD When I finished my gotm. I had Library and Research Lab on every city (Literacy 89%).


Iron Works
There is at least 3 places for Iron works. Two in near Rajaputana's starting location and one near Khwarimizian's starting location.
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/gotm25_Kuningas_mini10AD.jpg
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/gotm25_Kuningas_mini490AD.jpg
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/gotm25_Kuningas_mini800AD.jpg
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/gotm25_Kuningas_IW.jpg

1305 Space race Victory. Firaxis score 9770.

Thank you for your words of encouragement(?) Tone. My main problem was that i've always thought of myself as a half decent civ-player, but i seem to be the only one having lost this game. Well, well, u live and learn i guess. I'll check out your link, and hopefully learn something.
BTW does anyone know about a longer list of CIV ACRONYMS than this one http://www.civfanatics.com/doc/civ3/Civ3_jargons.txt ? Its unsuffiscient

Originally posted by Salte
My main problem was that i've always thought of myself as a half decent civ-player

So did I until I hit upon this site! When I saw the scores that the top people were getting, I realised that there was still plenty of room for improvement. I'm still picking up ideas-as they say: the more you learn, the more you realise how much more there is still to learn (or something like that anyway).

Bollocks! Forgot Again. Open PTW1.27f
The Industrial Age brought global domination for the horde in 980 AD. This was in part brought about by the wonders of the steam engine which allowed the horde to utilise a zero defence sphere and commit more of their forces to the front. Of course some of the old timers lamenting the "old ways" of the steppe had to be convinced in the time honoured tradition of unarmed combat with starving bears.
Once all embraced the military possibilities of the the new technology the extermination of the Arabs and the subjugation of the Han were formalities.

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/SamGOTM3a.jpg

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads5/SamGOTM3b.jpg

Firaxis score : 8344

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/common/ptw.jpg v1.27f

I still need to get ~800 tiles for domination and I am bit past 1100AD. I did well going into the industrial age snagging Smith's, ToE and leader rushed Hoover next turn. The cash sucked out of the leaders for AT ground the tech pace to a halt. I killed several more civs.

However, there is simply no way I can finish any type of victory by tomorrow. Most of my time for today and tomorrow is already committed.

My performance in this GOTM will be terrible. The reason was taking to long to understand how to use my UUs. I should have played the test game to understand them, yet that would have required more time.

This was the best ever GOTM, and the UU were great. However, it doesn't make sense to try to play anymore GOTM after missing two in a row. I played GOTM to compare my scores to others, so playing the games after the deadline to complete them has no appeal.

My other interest was what other people found out about the game. However, the post count for the games is dropping. I don't see as much happening there either.

Conquest - Mac 1.29f

Finally done... 1415 AD with domination. Firaxis of 7308 and a nonweighted Jason of 7360.

My best score yet and my play is getting much better but I am still awed by players finishing before 1000 AD. Of course, apparently somebody got a 550 AD win! Yikes!

The Mongol's UUs were brilliant and I think I was able to use them well, until others hit the Industrial Age and I was well behind. At that point I moved to the end of the Medieval Age and built lots (!) of cavalry to complement my hordes and slogged on.

I cannot imagine the AI using the mongols at all well, which in some ways is a shame.

To the gotm staff and cracker... awesome work.

PS. Anybody, how do you figure out how many tiles you have and how many more you need to win a domination?

Originally posted by Boyd
PS. Anybody, how do you figure out how many tiles you have and how many more you need to win a domination?

You can use mapstat utility at
here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18243)

Civ 1.29f Predator

Sorry, my English is very bad!

Finished in 470AD - 10275 Fraxis

First leader in 800BC.All leaders I used for wonders.

800 BC Forbiden
450 BC Sun Tzu`s
390 BC Sistine
150 BC JSB Cathedral
110 BC Leonardo`s

Great libary captured from Khazars in 690 BC

130 BC

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/toyo_25_130bc.JPG

230 AD
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/toyo_25_230ad.JPG

340 AD
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/toyo_25_340ad.JPG

470 AD
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/toyo_25_470ad.JPG

Hystogram
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/toyo_25_470adhist.JPG

That is all
Bye!




Pictures links fixed by ainwood. :)

Civ3v1.29, Predator

Most of my game was posted in the second spoiler. This was my first time to finish a GOTM before the submission deadline. I finally achieved domination in 980ad firaxis score 8407. The last turns were painfully slow, and basically involved building many cavalry and filling in holes with settlers. My opponents all had riflemen for the last 15 or so turns, so knocking them out was tedious. Loved the game overall though. Until the "clean up" at the end, it was a blast.

I should have finished a few hundred years earlier, and from looking at others games, I believe the following were my biggest mistakes:

Founded on the spot because I didn't see the northeast wheat. That slowed me a bit.
Picked a poor first target for war. I think it would have been more beneficial in the long run to have attacked Ghandi first.
Should have set my opponents to war with one another upon entering the middle ages (like SirPleb).

I am sure there were many other tactical errors, but those are the ones I can see.

Great game GOTM team, thank you!

Tried for 100k victory this time.

Around 1000AD the game started to freeze. Restarted several times after it froze at 1090AD, but no cigar. Had to leave the game at 33000 culture points and making around 650 per turn.

Some impressive games from some of you :)

Phew, again finished the game on the last moment. After some bad choices I compensated by making some even more terrible choices to win with domination victory in 1370 AD.

Nothing for the newbies to learn about except that the Great Library indeed does give you all the techs that two or more civilizations has in the turn that Education is discovered!

I grabbed the GL very late, with only the first 3 middle age (MA) techs in my posession and it gave me about the compleet tech ladder for the the whole MA. :D

Yep, by far my only good move in this game. Something to remember on a Deity or semi-god game where the tech pace seems to go nuts some times. Just wait a few 100 years and then grab the Great Library so that you can harvest any tech EVEN AFTER EDUCATION that any two civ's have.

Another notice is the lack of reactions in this spoiler. I am submitting just before the end-date for this game and my post will still be on the first page (normally its much further on). Is this because we all played for conquest and that hack and slash games are to straigh forward to post spoilers on?

MPF

Originally posted by LKendter

Sorry to see you go LKendter. Its true that the number of posts is dropping. I just posted my endgame and my post is still on the first page!!

Still, the game has improved greatly thanks to Cracker and his team. Personally I would like to see more variance in the victory types (like the commercial victory once played in the medal series). Hope to see you around as all the good players and posters do have a vital role; they show the way to a better gaming perfomance.

Good luck,

MPF

LKendter, I know you have a large commitment to the Succession Games, but I encourage you to continue to participate in the GOTM. I have also had trouble finishing the recent games because of general life commitments. I didn't finish 22, 23 or 25.

I have also noticed an erosion of the number of posts and that some of the experienced players have stopped playing/posting. Bamspeedy and Moonsinger just to mention two who used to be prolific posters. However, the games will go on and I would like to see everyone who can play, continue to play.

Many changes are coming with the departure of cracker and the release of Conquests. Some of them may turn out to be very beneficial for GOTM. Hang around some more and give us your input. It is always very valuable.

Probably not the ideal place to post this, but following on from Zagnut's point, I was wondering whether the the reduced number of posts etc was also partly due to the delays in publishing results; lack of feedback causing a bit of disenchantment?

I've mentioned this in a thread or two before as something that we are working hard to rectify, and you will all see a massive improvement over the next month or two, so please don't give up on us! :)

Please also note that this is an issue that has very little to do with the transition due to cracker's retirement. Its more of a team issue where we just need to get ourselves organised and refocussed.

this is my first win at gotm, but my partizipation in the forums was bad. i didn't post at all and i hardly read any posts. but i can tell you how this came.
after playing the test game i downloaded the start file, looked at the starting position but didn't felt like starting at all. two weeks later i still hadn't begun the mongols' game and i finally decided to play it in conquest class. i expected more fun because of a greater chance of winning. I thought if i loose this gotm, just like the one before, i might loose interest in the event at all.
there was not much time left, but i finished my game by domination victory in 1555AD with a firaxis score of 8132. Ta-da!

here's a brief summary of how my game evolved and some ideas i used in my game:
i settled on the spot and built up a 5turn settler factory. this was enough on this map for a radius 4 city ring, that contained about 6 or 7 cities.
i found a lot of free space in the south, so i kept settling there, building up another city ring around a city producing the forbidden palace.
the magog were my first kill, followed by a cold war with the arabs with brought me a city in the peace deal without fighting at all. after magogs' fall i felt strong enough to fight at two frontiers at a time. i conquered khwarismia, and they were not defeated completely when i declared war on han and korea. the unique units that came into play were really superior.
leaders were used to build leonardos and an army followed by the heroic epic. sun tzu was also mine. with such a big empire at the beginning of the medieval age it was easy to compete in the tech race. early expansion is crucial.
i made always military alliances in the wars to keep the enemy busy. therefore i cautiously paid attention to treaties. i didn't want to violate them early to be able to make more ma's and rop's.
after korea i attacked russia, then india, securing the center of the eastern peninsula.
i picked the arabs as long-term friends, constantly renewing rop and such. this paid off in the endgame, when only keltoi, egypt and arabs were left. as egypt declared war, the arabs helped me a lot on the egyptian frontier while i was conquering the kelts.
the game got a little bit lengthy in the end, because i entered modern age and i tried for a diplomatic victory, a plan that didn't work out. right after that little trip for peaceful winnig i conquered 5 more cities in one turn and met the domination victory condition.

for me, the next one will be conquest class, too!

Originally posted by ainwood
Probably not the ideal place to post this, but following on from Zagnut's point, I was wondering whether the the reduced number of posts etc was also partly due to the delays in publishing results; lack of feedback causing a bit of disenchantment?

I think thats a reasonable conclusion. I also think that because GOTM25 coincided with the release of Conquests this contributed to lower submission and post numbers. GOTM 25 was a very time consuming game and players I think couldn't commit their civ time to it. For example both Lee and Krys, players who have complained about not having enough time this month have been experimenting with conquests in the SGs. I think that this was just an unfortunate clash as when I understand that cracker started working on GOTM 25, Conquests was scheduled for release in the New Year. I'm sure he would have arranged a quicker game if he could have seen into the future and if Firaxis had made any effort to keep him informed.
I think players are also becoming disenchanted by the superfast wins being recorded in GOTMs. When I started in GOTM 17, while I found the performances of the top players daunting it is at whole new level now and must be quite intimidating if you are new. I think that cracker may have seen the way things were going and tried to remedy it by the introduction of the three playing levels Conquest, Open and Predator. While this was a good idea - some of what were supposed to be hurdles for the predators turned into springboards and have helped to widen the gulf between new and top player.
This is just my speculation about what has being going on with the GoTM and cracker and a product of my trying to mindread him in the hopes of it giving me an edge.:)

Civ3 1.29 - Predator

Finally I finished my game. RL things made me almost sick in November...
Last weekend I played from 10AD to 390AD when I got my domination victory :D

But now, from the beggining:
I expanded very well. By 1000BC I had 17 towns. I got Monarchy in 1025BC and used it to jump to the Middle Ages. The Ottomans were already there and I noticed they were scientific... I put three other civs, Persia, Germany and Russia (I forgot the Koreans are scientific too...) in the MA by gifting techs and I was able to trade for Monotheism and Feudal Warlords with them :)
After that I stopped producing settlers (my cities were too small) and just rushed 15 gospodar with my gold. After destroing the Magog and capturing The Colossus and The Oracle, I got my first leader in 570BC. I used it to rush my FP in the city with the Colossus. The Khazars were my next target... They built the Pyramids and The Great Library in their capital, although when I captured it around 300BC I already had Education...
I used my second leader to rush Sun Tzu's in 370BC and entered in my GA, and rushed Leo's in 350BC with my 3rd leader.
The tech pace was insanely high in my game. I got Metallurgy by 10BC and Military Tradition in 110AD, and the AI made a good job researching the upper branch of the tech tree. In 130AD, all my 40 ordu archers were already upgraded to cavalry. After two turns saving gold I strat researching again because I wanted Theory of Gravity, that I got in 300AD. After that I turned off science and used the gold to rush settlers and to upgrade those new units.
I got 11 leaders in the game and used most of them to build wonders. In the end of the game I was missing only the Sistine Capel, built by Rajaputana.

Here is a screenshot of Vorskor, with the science at 100% in the end of the game. This city alone was producing 30% of my total science :D

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/science_city.jpg

Originally posted by ainwood
Probably not the ideal place to post this, but following on from Zagnut's point, I was wondering whether the the reduced number of posts etc was also partly due to the delays in publishing results; lack of feedback causing a bit of disenchantment?



I am sure you are right. The apparent death of the qsc was also pretty sad.

Another problem was brought home to me when I had to reinstall civ this week. Although the GOTM games are great, it is a big hassle to tweak the installation for the GOTM: install gotm21, then gotm24 then gotm25, and copy several files into appropriate folders. This procedure is surprisingly easy to mess up. If I wasn't already hopelessly addicted, I would be put off a lot by this.

The difficulty levels of the games seems to have drifted up as well: no regent game for ages. Smaller maps might also encourage people; it would certainly encourage me.

I hope I'm qualified for this thread. I tried 4 times on Sunday to use the submission form before submitting manually (I included the error message with the e-mail).

Quite a fun game. The need to coordinate the multiple units was quite a challenge. In the end being able to add cavalry was the difference from both a victories and time point of view. Being able to bombard with Ordu & Bagutar (and sometimes Korshin) following up with cavalry charges had opponent cities falling 2-3 per turn. Making sure to position troops on the border before declaring (the honorable thing to do) meant 4-5 cites were taken on turn 1 and 6-8 by the end of turn 2 in most wars, so that the counterattacks were often weak and always ineffectual.

I my game, the order of elimination was Khazar, Magog, Germany, Celts, Russia, Rajaputana, Khwarizmia, Goruryeo, Han Dynasty, Korea and Ottoman. I had just begun against Tokugawa when I reached the domination limit in 1130 AD (I think) with a Firaxis score of about 8900. I my game the Arabs were the big concern. They had quite a sizable military and were equal or ahead of me from Invention on. When the Arab Infantrymen appeared, I knew they'd be one of the survivors. At the end I was ahead Radio and behind Steel (and Combustion I think) to the Arabs, yet we were the only ones beyond step 1 on the Industrial Age tree. It seemed like the lack of saltpeter (and sometimes iron), meant I was killing spearman and longbowmen in most of the wars. I think I only saw 4-5 knights and only the Ottoman had riflemen.

Congratulations to all who completed this masterpiece, quite a finale to the Cracker era.



:worship: [dance] :band:

Bremp, great game! Thanks for the report.

Samildanach offers a very thorough analysis as to why posts may have tailed off. I can only add that the lack of posts in this thread may be due to most posts being successful games, and most wins in this game occurring without any need to enter the industrial era.

Originally posted by Offa

The difficulty levels of the games seems to have drifted up as well: no regent game for ages. Smaller maps might also encourage people; it would certainly encourage me.

I would like to see if efforts could be made to shorten the total playing time of a gotm. i don't have specific ideas for now, but obviously, this is a problem to a lot of players: some of them even left the scene in the past months.

as far as game dynamics are concerned, one should see that higher difficulty levels tend to accelerate games, because the ai contributes to a higher degree in science. on the other hand, deity level is not everybody's darling, it isn't mine, neither. :sheep: the three different classes might compensate that a bit.
firaxis' c3c release and cracker's latest games seem to point in the same direction - away from the "epic" game towards more scenario-oriented theme games.
would it be possible to distill this concept even more - maybe by starting settings which include several cities + a couple of units for each civ? this would abandon one of the most important discussion topics - "what will be my first move?" :( surely, it might be replaced by other exiting topics. :)

Originally posted by bluebox
I would like to see if efforts could be made to shorten the total playing time of a gotm. i don't have specific ideas for now, but obviously, this is a problem to a lot of players: some of them even left the scene in the past months.

I don't think there is a problem with the games taking too long for most players - some players have left, and others have joined. For every player who can't finish, there's a Gozpel who can't wait to kick the AI's butt again a few days later. More specifically, I don't see what aspect of the GOTM mechanics apprecaibly slowed down the game. GOTM25 took an unusually long time to play because the bombard aspect of some of the UUs makes turns last longer. The other GOTMs are affected only by map size and number of civs. Cracker tended to stick with standard map sizes, but usually included a large number of civs. The civ number slowed the computing speed for some players, but I don't think it affected whether or not most people could finish the game. My own theory is that players take the GOTM so seriously that they play much more carefully (and slowly) than they do in their own games. (I certainly do.) For better or for worse, this is the effect of top-flight competition.



would it be possible to distill this concept even more - maybe by starting settings which include several cities + a couple of units for each civ? this would abandon one of the most important discussion topics - "what will be my first move?" :( surely, it might be replaced by other exiting topics. :)

The reason that the first move is such an important discussion topic is that it often determines how well the rest of your game will go. People play the GOTM (and post about it) to compare their game, as well as to improve it. Your suggestion would make for a faster game, but I think that the GOTM is the wrong place to find a quick game.

Originally posted by samildanach


I think players are also becoming disenchanted by the superfast wins being recorded in GOTMs.

I find it particularly appropriate that this post was immediately follwed by Bremp reporting on a 390 AD victory. At least I have done my bit by lowering my game since my last effort.

The standard of the top 30-40 has improved a lot in recent gotms. Clearly posts by Cracker, Aeson & Moonsinger etc have to take some blame for this, but I think the rot really set in with posts by Qitai and SirPleb, who have written about the key points in a way that even I could understand a little. Fortunately the effect seems to have worn off a bit, so I will probably be losing at regent in a few months.

@ Offa I think it was Aurthur.C. Clark who said something along the lines of - technology sufficiently advanced enough will look like magic to an uneducated people. I'm speculating that we may be seeing something similar in that players who are new to the GOTM and consider themselves good players may jump to the conclusion that the top players are cheating ( of course we are both good enough players to see that such finishes are possible but not good enough to actually do it:) ) and leave without taking advantage of the knowledge of the great players that we have here to improve their game. I know what I wrote appears contradictory but honest! I'm not a communist and I wouldn't want to pull peoples games down to my level.;)

P.S I enjoy sarcasm but yours needs a little work:p

Originally posted by Txurce


For every player who can't finish, there's a Gozpel who can't wait to kick the AI's butt again a few days later.




:goodjob: So very true! This almost sounds like a quote...

I don't strive too hard to beat Bremp, SirPleb and Qitai, they play in a paralell universe and command their games from the start. I simply try to learn the basics and then I give it my best and sometimes I do well.

Like gotm23:

10 - gozpel 7651 560 Domination Victory 10642 :love:

First time on the top10 list and probably the last.


I don't believe the long games (well for most of us) deter people too much and not the game setups either. The lack of updating is explained and I'm happy with that and will actually do a QSC for the unique x-mas game, but only after I finished the Iroqouis game.

Two games in a row without submitting is a shame, but I'm stubborn by nature and take failure with grace (after beating myself senseless with emptied beer bottles I wake up and promise myself to do better next time). Last months game ended up freezing on me, when I had my first shot on one of those imaginary medals (going for 100k). Ah well, I missed out, but there are always more games coming and when I open a new save the old games are forgotten.

Predator was too stressful for me so I went back to Open and I can live with the different tech pace.

The discussions will become a vital part of this again, as soon the updates are done and sorted out. Until then, keep on playing!

Open 1.29
Used the initial area to create a single 4 turn settler factory with an adjaceant 2 turn worker factory. Didn’t really understand (read) about the minor civ concept and was content to let everyone build up their areas whilst I built a host of warriors for upgrade to swords. Used these these swords to relieve the magog of their pyramids and the lighthouse (which seemed valuable at the time….). Began building horse and archers for later upgrade. Used initial leaders for great lib, FP, Sun Tzu and Leos, army, epic then libraries thereafter. Monarchy thoughout, mine was the only opinion that matters!
Each civ to was allowed to fill its local area before I showed them the wrath of Khan, initially I convinced the gorygeo that the Koreans were a common enemy,using them as a buffer as I sent swords and horses along to establish a new holding in the north. Unfortunately for the green guys their culture began to steal my cities and their capital seemed the most central point for the FP, so they were next. Progressively allied with everyone possible except the immediate next target, wanted to keep a decent rep in the short term. Turned my forces east and began to chew on ghandi,Russia and khazar. Khazars were at somewhat of a disadvantage as their forces were all off chasing our common enemies,(Ottomans and Cleo) when the Mongols came to visit.

Maybe it was his steely glare or just the sheer number of troops pumping through, but the arabs seemed too big a bite. They were the tech leaders, along with the Han, and I was concerned that they could buy an alliance against me with their techs. Alliance with the arabs/Han allowed my eastern/western cities to be largely undefended except for the common route used by the arabs, i was stuffed if they ever turned against me.

Next were the Celts and Germans, again their forces were off visiting the western lands, research continued only to leos once education learned, and then stopped, thankfully the leaders chased banking/democracy rather than muskets, this meant I never had muskets leveled against my arrows.
Quick check on mapstat, have 1200 tiles in 380ad and need another 600, I continue to rush settlers in outer towns rather than rush temples, filling in gaps. Up to around 14 leaders, 7 or so have simply rushed libraries for culture (research on zero).
Major error was to find luxury tax on 40%, this had been going on for centuries, put it back to zero and got gpt to around 250-350 asking the governor to manage moods in most towns.

Used the Moonsinger artillery approach mainly, 3 move artillery is devastating. Used a simple rule never to attack until the defender was redlined and if possible the town size<6. Initial core continued to build hordes and ordu . Northern core was not connected to horses/iron except for one town, so everyone built bowmen for upgrade. Two of the isolated northern towns rushed harbours to share their lux with the rest of the Mongols.
Ended up with a bias toward ordu archers, as a good pack of these reduced most defences in a single turn, turghauts riding shotgun for defence and the hordes along for multiple attack against redlined defenders. Also had a large number of khorchin, bombardment was not effective but hey they were cheap to build via warrior upgrade from an outer town. (FP produced warrior every turn). In hindsight I really could have ignored any early warring and just prebuild for ordu (and turghaut) as they cut through everyone sooo quickly. Korchin lethal bombard was too erratic, preferred the 3 attack.
Turned off the “animate battles” to reduce time watching ordu bombardment, this eliminated cheering during the attack but you have to watch closely to see who wins the subsequent hand to hand combat!
Around 14th leader was Conan (against the Han), bit of a laugh, no mongol horse could carry Arnie for long, so he tottled off and rushed a library and began his political career on the west coast. He won’t be back.

Mongol conquered cities were often left in resistance as the horsemen set off in search of fresh meat, only reduced the resistance if I had to cash rush improvement/ settler. Leaders could rush in a resisting city and leave the sourfaced female resisters to gripe about the notorious Mongolian one night stand whilst the hordes advanced ,heeding crackers advice re the rapid advance.
Tended to attack several civs at the same time just to reduce travel time and efficiency, and simply because there were enough units to do it.
One observation, none of the minor civs had a large army in town, I set up embassies asap (azap?) but they only had two defenders not the large number of cannon fodder reported by others. I was also unable to buy many workers, but managed to find reasonable numbers of unemployed in the newer Mongolian cities.
Domination achieved 500 AD, army dropped off a bit with a mad charge to get the last bit of territory needed. Arabs and toku (2 cities)were still there and had researched to gunpowder and most of the upper techs – knowledge is power but horsies with arrows are absolute power.

i think i could have been quicker if i had advanced the tech pace and faced a few muskets, but importantly could have used the steppe settler upgrade by moving the 3 move offensive units close to where all the holes were.
Great job cracker (as usual)

Civ 1.29f Conquest

Well I guess it is too late to submit the game now, but I finally finished via domination in 1695 AD for 5686 Jason points. This is my earliest domination victory but obviously nowhere near the top guys.

I think I can put this down to two things. First the speed of my early expansion is just not at the rate others are achieving. Second the size of the military force that most people here seem to use is basically twice what I am happy to go to war with. I will have to work on these points for GOTM 26.

Thanks for a great game Cracker.