How's everyone doing in the game?

I am in 500 AD, just killed the Aztecs and the Babylonians are almost dead (they have 3 cities left). The immortals are invincible!! :jump:

The map in this game is terrible! There are no rivers or ponds anywhere near the starting location, meaning no irrigation is possible for a long time. :(

Here is my histograph at 500 AD:

http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3images/gotm/mygotm01/histopower500ad.jpg

My game is similar. I have taken out everyone on the starting continent. Immortals are definetly the key, they have to be my favorite special unit so far.

I agree that Immortals are the key to this game (my game is described in the "goodie hut" thread). I think that I could have stayed alive longer if I had switched over to Immortals earlier. As it was, I was concentrating on making more Settlers to make more cities (hard when your population grows so slowly) and on getting some Temples so that I'd have enough Culture in my frontier cities to resist absorption into the Aztec empire.

I'm glad to hear that other people are having a better time of this map than I did.

Well, I'm glad to hear someone is doing well. The combination of prince level and a skinny landmass is doing me in. I'm at 500AD but just lost 1 of my three cities (down from 5).

My main problem was dealing with 3 hostile civs united against me. The Aztecs were a given, but the Babys slipped a settler past both of us and took the "neck" south of my first city. I first tried to culture-assimilate it, but the Aztecs & Babys united and attacked while I just had Archers and Spearmen. Once I got Immortals I fought back farily well (bad time for a golden age!), but the Zulus allied with the others and have been landing units behind the front lines on both coasts.

This is my fourth game - I haven't finished any, but save them as I accumulate more strategy ideas to try out. One of them is a King game that I will probably win, but with a bigger landmass than this.

The biggest AI difference from civ2 is that the AI figures out good strategies before I do - using terrain, multiple units, retreats, feints (move toward a city, then attack back at front). What I look forward to is winning a game with good strategy, regardless of the level. It looks like it's easy to do well if you are #1 culture or military, but I want to survive and thrive when I start out as "one of the pack."

Well I just finished the game and the world is in my grasp. I could have probably gotten a better score by letting the last civ stay alive while I develop the world... but what fun is that.

This completes my fourth game and it is my highest score by far!

man corruption in this game is a killer thats for sure. All of the Aztec citys I conquered are all producing only one shield under a monarchy :p I wiped the aztecs off of the mainland but they have a few outposts straggling off to the east; soon I will destroy the aztecs. Muhaha.

Originally posted by jeff
man corruption in this game is a killer thats for sure. All of the Aztec citys I conquered are all producing only one shield under a monarchy :p I wiped the aztecs off of the mainland but they have a few outposts straggling off to the east; soon I will destroy the aztecs. Muhaha.

Yeah, corruption is far too rampant. Some of the former Aztecs cities lost 16 out of 17 shields even after I swicth to Republic!!! :( Can't really build anything with 1 shield, and I can't rush build courthouse because I have only 25 Gold. :mad:

Once you have enough money hurry a courtnouse. Then try building The Forbidden Palace in one of the conquered Aztec cities. Sure took care of coruption in my game.:goodjob:

Courthouses don't seem to have nearly the effect that they did in Civ II . . . have you noticed that too? I'm building the Forbidden Palace right now; the only trouble is it's going to take like 80 turns to build!! :mad:

Do you know if We Love the King days decrease corruption in the celebrating city? I haven't been able to tell if they do or not . . .

this is just stupid. I am in a democracy with courthouses in almost all of my cities. Corruption is so bad many of my offshore cities shields and commerce are all corrupted. Most produce one shield per turn. I thought it was due to forgien workers but that is not the case. You just cant have huge empires across this map effectively. This map especially cause all it is is a bunch of islands. I didnt realize this and used my forbidden on the aztec capital but all of my captured zulus cities are pretty useless. Communism can help this but then you get a lot of corruption in the cities near the palaces :P oh well... I will previal over the americans!

Courthouse is useless. In Civ2 it halves the corruption, In civ3 it probably reduces corruption by 5%. :(

I got my first Great Leader at around 1450 AD. I chose to use it to rush build Forbidden City in Tenochtlan instead of creating an army. All the cities around Tenochtilan have much lower corruption after that. Now Tenochtilan (size 12) is producing 13 useable shields per turn. (used to be only 1 shield) I think having 5 or 6 productive cities is more important than 1 army. :p

Here is a screenshot of Persepolis in 1525 AD:

4 wonders built and another one is almost finished. :)

http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3images/gotm/persepolis1525ad.jpg

Thunderfall, why on your histgraph there arn't other 2 civs? Must be 6 civs or not?
I'm at 330BC now and triggered to the GA. This is my first Civ3 game and it's very hard to play although I'm a leader. Why when I've been discovering the Plyteism and Monarchy it was taking alvews 32 turns don't depending on science resource?
At despotism cities dasn't grow over size 6, it's pitifully.

At 10AD I've got 5 cities, 2 Wonders and Score=184(First).

At 210AD I've got 9 cities, 2 Wonders and Score=208(First). Some turn before I killed Aztecks. Go to Babylonian.

Thunderfall, why on your histgraph there arn't other 2 civs? Must be 6 civs or not?
I have no idea.. maybe it only shows the known Civs. I found the Iroquois and the Americans much later...

IS anyone else having trouble keeping and holding a city after capture? all mine are being "re-liberated"

The aztec capital was reclamed with 2 revolters eventhough i had 8 immortals and 6 capatults based there!! I lost my entire army to a couple of pissed civilians
where is the since in that?

I have even lost towns with no revolters and just a couple of content workers.

I became piss and i just raze each town from there on. Killed them all men women and children. Man those Aztec are annoying to deal with.

Has anyone had any success with holding captured citys? Is there a good ratio of troops to revolters to hold a city?

Anyways I have been having more trouble holding cities that capturing them. oh well.

Let me know if yall have the same problem

I became piss and i just raze each town from there on. Killed them all men women and children. Man those Aztec are annoying to deal with.

Bad idea to raze all the captured cities. After you capture a city, you should leave the city empty and station one military unit outside, preferrably a veteran immortal unit. This way you can take it back the next turn when the city defects back to its former owner. (The city usually has a spearman, so 1 vet immortal is enough to take it back)

Since you only need one unit to "guard" the captured city, you can move the rest of your troops to capture nearby cities. You can safely fortify troops in the city you catured ealier once the nearby cities are under your control. :egypt:

holding the cities is based entirely on culture it seems. The first city I had turned sides but after that no more did because I took some prtective measures. Make sure the city wont go into disorder once the resisters are crushed by taking some of your workers off and making them entertainers and then hurry a temple asap. It doesnt matter how many troops you have there but I think it does matter how many forgien workers. Make sure you take cities that arent surrounded by other cities but thats pretty commonsense. I always bombard a city's pop down before a takeover. culture is a big thing in this game thats for sure, religous civ's have the defensive advantage it seems. The histograph only shows known civs thats why in the beginning you cant view the histograph.

I'm at arround 1200AD, scores arround 400+(first).

Aztec declared war on me early, then I had Immortal. I lost one small city, then I gain it back plus another Aztect size one city. When troops of Immortal piling next to the size 7 Aztec captial. I asked their idea about peace. They offered 2 worker and polytheism for it. I agreed. Persian was in peace since then. Soon we know how to write and build Embassy with Aztec, and agreed on Right of Passage. Soon, we build road to Aztec. I selled fur to them for 1 gold per turn.( I raised it later).
About the time Persian was researching Literature, Aztect and Babylonian were at war. I decided to watch. It ended after years. Then we began to trading fur with Babylonian for incense. Later, we import wine from American, spice from Iroquois, but in much higher price. I offered Iroquois fur plus Engineering, American with fur plus dye.
BTW, I think my trade advisor is a great fortune-teller. He can prodict what's the fate of my offer with 100% accuracy. Every time, when he said "it probably Ok", it means it will be OK.

Another important event was that a size 4 Babylonian joined us from Island Iron. Island Iron is a middle size island with 3 iron 1 gold and at least one horse on it. They wish to have more access to the library in our Horseville town, I guess. Island Iron is even more crowdy now, with American joined the party from North. Now it hosts 4 civs, including Aztec, American, Babylonian, Persian; 6 cities, including 3 of us. However, We are controling all 3 irons, with a colony at north.
Game is tedious. Victory end is still far. We need some music, and we get it. One wonder related to it is under construction...( Maybe continued )

Egads, this was my first GOTM and I didn't fare that well (hell I didn't even bother to submit it)

I feel I got a little burnt by the way Culture works in the game.

I got nothing from the first hut, and barbs from the south hut, I quickly built two cities to my north and marched south to meet up with the Aztecs, I conquered one of their cities right off, built a long road to it and a colony on the horses and iron resources. Then I built a huge army of Immortals (10 I think, at least 9) and marched down to claim their capitol and get the Oracle. I met and smashed a Zulu village that was directly to the south of the Aztec capital to use as a base and invaded, I took over the Oracle without a single loss!!?! Pretty much every city I owned (7 at the time) had only one defender...I was entirely on an expansionist kick).

I stationed my entire army of 10 Immortals in the Aztec capital to stop them from resisting quicker, which it did in 2 turns (size 5-6 city at the time)...I thought I was going to be able to waste the remaining Aztecs in about 10 turns and mop up on any Zulu's that wandered by...much to my complete disappointment, dismay, disaster, and any other dis that you can come up with the Aztec capitol switched back and I lost my entire army in one turn...I had close to double (if not more) military units in the capitol than people to keep the peace, and the only real culture improving thing the Aztecs had was in my hands...I couldn't believe at how devestating the switch was...I lost SO much in one turn when I was basically going to drive the Aztecs into extermination...to give you a feel I went straight for immortals and then immediately switched to a war footing...I didn't bother with building anything but temples and barracks in all my cities (makes me wonder why the Aztec culture was so much better than mine...it was only slightly better!)

Regardless, with the loss of my armies and being only slightly defended I was pretty much doomed...I think I could have held them for awhile at the small section of land that joined the north to the south (where the horses were) but it was a losing position regardless of how you sliced it. Jaguar warriors and Impis would have been the end of my empire...all because of one random chance roll that didn't go my way. :(

Sigh, maybe next month.

:scan: I just finished GOTM1, my first, and was a little dissapointed the way it ended. I was cruisin around the map, mopping up any outpost colonies the AI had founded. After finishing I turned my knights towards the three remaining American cities on their main continent. Before I could conquer them all the AI gave me a Dominance Victory. I wanted all there cities.:mad:

I looked around at the Civ editor. The actual chance for a city to revert back to its previous owner is based on the ratio of culture points between your civ and the enemy's.

The following table should clarify:
Ratio of your civ's culture to defeated civ/percentage chance of reverting on first turn/continued chance

3:1 / 40% / 30% - "in awe of"
2:1 / 50% / 40% - "admirers of"
1:1 / 60% / 50% - "impressed with"
3:4 / 70% / 60% - "unimpressed by"
1:2 / 80% / 70% - "dismissive of"
1:3 / 90% / 80% - "disdainful of"

There's probably some sort of iterative formula that modifies this somewhat because the stats above seem to indicate that cities SHOULD revert to the defeated civ a lot more often. So it doesn't really matter how many units you have in the city which is a shame. So watch out!

maybe the percentage will contiue to drop 80% 70% 60%... with each turn.
Some one should look in to the game code more.

I think they were "Impressed With" my culture at the time...I should have fought it out now that I realize that your troops don't actually defect, they just cease to exist...I was worried about my 10 immortals coming back and whipping me completely.

Now I'm at 1435AD, score 606. Still peace all the way. But 3 new cities were culture-converted to join us. Two from Babylonian, one from Zululand. So the 200+ bucks I spend for rush building library wasn't totally useless.

Island Iron is even more crowdy. Persian just built a new town between the north iron and game.
We are hoping to provide library access to American as well. Oh, there are 2 horses on that island instead of one. Both are under control now, due to a recent culture expanding.

The culture of Persian Democracy is approaching 10000 points. The capital having 4200+ culture, 50+ per turn. Just finished Sistine Chapel in the capital and JS Bach's Cathedral in the city north to it.

Other civs are more friendly now. We can get Iroquois's spice with only one fur instead of 3 resources. When it's difficult to get a deal, we treat our guests with music, and they were happy to talk about their new discovery of Invention and Chivalry, pay tribute, and even empty their pocket :)

In your case, it was due to "nationality", I guess.

Originally posted by Malys Faisent
I think they were "Impressed With" my culture at the time...I should have fought it out now that I realize that your troops don't actually defect, they just cease to exist...I was worried about my 10 immortals coming back and whipping me completely.

Originally posted by Malys Faisent
I think they were "Impressed With" my culture at the time...I should have fought it out now that I realize that your troops don't actually defect, they just cease to exist...I was worried about my 10 immortals coming back and whipping me completely.
Did you acturally SEEing them coming back? My guess is that there is a chance that they don't exist any more. Because they are your special unit. maybe other civs can't use them..

This one is developing harder than other games I've had, I tend to be peaceful, and have gone most of a civ3 game without being in a single war.
Here the Aztec demanded iron, and I didn't feel like giving it to them, already into a major war and I didn't even have iron in my culture area.
I'm siting behind walls of a city 4 squares away from the aztec captal trying to hold off hordes of jaguar warriors, while trying to building a barracks and Imortals in a size 2 city near the iron mine.
oh and forgot the 2 minor hostal tribes in the area.

30 turns later and I bought every tech the babalons had and made an army, the aztec are going to die.

And 3 workers are moving the water back to my capital, 1 makes minor changes to the road going back and the other 2 move the water 1 square each turn (love industriest workers).

Haven't even hit 1 AD yet, but took the Aztec captial in 570BC.

I've never lost a city after I've taken it.
but then I tend to make a new town with an military unit escorting the coloniest to the site and the first thing built is the temple (rushed when pop hits 3 people, cost about 2 people).

Does anyone know anything really bad about rushing productions using people other than populations go down?

I killed off all the civs around 1270AD. Soon as they where dead another city would respawn!. Not only that when i killed this "new city" that appeared out of nowhere the game would go on and the damn AI wouldn't have a single city. I even went and exchanged maps.(world and territory) and i checked to see if he had any cities he could gift me but there where none...

I've been seeing a similar situation to most it would seem.

As my first city was building a spearman I sent my worker south acting as an explorer. I discovered the Aztecs and began working a road backwards as I knew I would need to get a city near there ASAP. My spearman wandered about defending my capital and my worker from barbs and did quite well - made it up to elite.

Once my settler was ready, I sent it south right away to be a buffer and staging area against the Aztecs. I was later able to establish a third and fourth city with usable protection (spearmen only), and I got The Wheel from huts and traded the Aztecs Masonry for something as well. Anyway, the time came to build barracks as I was studying iron working and immortals were about to take the field.

I was able to contact the Babylonians as they sent a unit up through Aztec lands. It was actually a bit scary as they were red in color and I'm used to THAT color being the barbs. Anyway, they had a fair amount of tech, and I was able to buy it rather cheaply. Nice.

So now began the art of rush building.

I don't think that too many of my cities ever got to size three. I rush built EVERYTHING for the most part. Crack the whip, here's your barracks. Crack the whip, here's your immortal. Crack - Temple. Despotism is actually a GREAT early wartime government and I'm still in one in the 1200's even though I'm through the whole first tech tree and have discovered both Monarchy and Republic.

Once I felt I had sufficient numbers of immortals, the carnage began. A horde of my veteran immortals took the Aztec capital along with the Oracle first thing. From there, it was just a matter of marching. There were some bouts of resistence and counter-attacks, but for the most part a steady stream of immortals rush built from my barrack-filled cities was too much. In the mean time, the Babylonians and the Zulus made sure they sold me all of their techs so I did not fall behind.

In the cities that I took over, I usually left a single unit - preferable one that was wounded - in the city while one or two units waited outside (great strat. Thunderfall). The new cities build a spearman and then barracks and then immortals. Occaisionally, I'd throw a temple in there as well. I did have the Oracle now after all. In fact, is a city with sufficient size I would rush build whatever I could as quickly as I could (after waiting a turn or so for a shiled or two to be added first). This worked well because it used up the foreign laborers. A city with 6 Aztec laborers could rush a temple, barracks, spearman and then an immortal over 7-8 turns and then only have a single Aztec laborer left. This meant that my Persian laborers equalled or exceeded the Aztec ones very quickly.

In any case, I cleared the continent by about 1000 AD, but all three of my former neighbors were able to settle on distant islands. At about 1200 AD I finally did away with the Babylonians and the Aztecs are nearing extinction. The Zulus have a single city left, but they are on an island populated with Iriquois and I didn't want to have to supply that front yet.

I've had skirmishes with the Americans, and I sent a force over to their continent to try to take some cities. However, they have discovered Feudalism and now have veteran pikemen who my immortals cannot seem to defeat very well.

Now, all is settled down and my immortals have played their part, the rush building of improvements is continuing in earnest. I will rush build with citizens for a short while longer and then switch to Republic in an effort to take a tech lead and get to Democracy later once it's discovered. I can also let my cities grow at that point :). Perhaps I'll try the Americans again once I have cavalry. I have not built a single wonder, but I captured the Oracle, Pyramids, Great Library and the Lighthouse. The Americans have the others and will likely have Sun Tzu's soon as well. Once I get a lead in tech, I'll be able to build some on my own - and likely take some from Abe as well :).

http://216.232.1.2/finalcity.SAV

My original supply of iron ran out at about 200AD. Was that ever annoying! Fortunately, I had just captured an Aztec city with iron and was in the process of roading it up so I only ended up going 1 turn without the precious resource. Otherwise it would have been a crippling loss.

Does anybody know if the chance of exhausting a resource depends on how many units you make with the resource or is it just a random chance, unconnected to how much you use it? For example, do I need to worry about my horses running out even though I've only built one horseman in the game or did I just use up my iron because I've been pumping out immortals like they're going out of style?

Anyway, I'm now at 400AD. I conquered the Aztecs in about 300AD with the help of the Babylonians and had the Babylonians and Zulus pinned down with just four and three cities respectively. The rest of the continent is under my despotic rule (bwahahahaha.)

I guess because they were pinned down they both started sending settlers escorted by military units into my territory looking for places to settle. I wouldn't trade maps with them so they presumably didn't know that there was nowhere up north for them to settle that wasn't within my borders. I kept demanding that they leave until the Babylonians finally got mad enough to declare war. Now I've allied with the Zulus and we're in the process of smashing the Babylonians. I've taken two of his cities and Babylon should soon fall to my immortal hordes as well (bwahahahaha.) I've also started fanning out across the seas to settle other islands and continents. Looking forward to finding the Americans and Iroquois.

Not much happened in my game. Only 20 years passed. One Aztec size 5 city get converted from the island wheat which is west of Island Iron. Cancelled Right of Passage with Zulu. Going to Cancel ROP with Babylonian soon. Disband ~10 warriors. American are asking a raise for wine supply. We offered them horse + fur. Iron supply is abundance, about 9 total. Planning to disband more warrior and upgrade the first knight. Gunpowder next turn.

My first game of the month was submitted- the only problem I had was that I didn't save real close to 0 ad, (only had 230ad or 230bc) I hope 230bc was close enough.

Based on some of the above responses(total domination, fast tech etc.), I doubt I will do well. I have a four digit score though, so not a complete embaressment.

I was trying to maintain a culture lead so that I could take over cities and I did an early strike on the aztecs. Kicked aztecs off the mainland and went to democracy and tried to buy all the culture I could get.

Traded for most of the advances as well as picking up the great library from aztecs capital.

Never made it out of the industrial ages and I was only one step behind the lead civ. No tanks or battleships appeared in my game.

Culture was brutal - tried to crank up WLTK day to no avail... Picked up Sufferage and Theory of Evolution right before the game timed out at 2050.

Goodluck all!

I'm pretty new to Civ. Played Civ II a little bit.

Now I have Civ III and what an awesome game, so cool I thought I'd try out the Game of the Month.

Played it once and got my behind quickly and thouroughly handed to me. Ouch.

I'm on my second time through it and I'm doing much better.

It's 610 AD and I've founded 8 cities and taken one from the Aztecs by force. I've sent two invasion forces to get the Aztec capital city (since it's so close to my borders) but it's not quite close enough. Both times I entered he sent me a message to leave and I had to declare war. This gave him about 3 turns to set up a defense before I reached the city. It seems to be plenty of time for him to throw an army together.

Luckily, I've been kissing everyone elses buts all game. I give them money every now and then to soften them up to my cause. The Babylonians are catching on how ever and it seems the more money I give them the more annoyed with me they get. I've cut off their funds.

One achievement was making it to the second age before anyone else. I've gotten most of my techs through trade and have been trying to save as much money as I can. Now I plan to put that money to use and research very quickly and make my lead even greater. As soon as I get calvary you can kiss the Aztecs good bye.

Almost all my cities have walls (those on the mainland). The other three on the north-western islands aill be a problem. The Babylonians and I will be fighting for those as soon as the Aztecs are gone.

I'm pretty confident that I can defend against anything that gets thrown at me at this point, thanks to the walls.

I have some questions though:

- What do I have to do to build a wonder so quickly. The AI players have been putting them up left and right, I fear I'll only be able to get some of the modern advances and capture some from them.

- Is rush building important in this game? I've never done it.

Endureth

First time trying this game of the month feature as i stopped playing civ 2 ages ago. Really like it. I got a bit lucky in that when i first played civ 3 i chose the persians as my civ because industrious and scientific seemed to suit my playing style from civ 2. As such, I was very familiar with the total domination of veteran immortals. This was my strat with the persians. First city where settler started. Tech choice is iron working. Worker mines and then roads 2 nearest grassland squares (luckily one has a shield on it ;) ). First city builds: barracks, spearman, settler. By this time or very shortly thereafter iron working should have been discovered and if you are lucky (which we are on this map) there is a source of iron nearby so your second city can form near it. Build a road to the iron, pump one more spearman from your first city and build a barracks in your second city then switch to straight immortals. In my game its 1000 BC and I've wiped out the aztecs and taken three cities from the babylonians while only losing one immortal. Naturally i traded for their techs before attacking them :lol: . I guess you could call my strategy immortal rushing. The disadvantage is the lack of early scouting and i was probably lucky that i sent my first immortal south instead of north or the aztecs might have been a little tougher to take out. Another disadvantage is that my golden age is already over :( However i now have 3 elite immortals and therefore a good chance to get a leader sometime soon. Still not sure if im better off using it to rush a forbidden palace (corruption is brutal in civ 3
:mad: ) or start an army and get the military academy. Ill probably go with the forbidden palace as that will give me 3 or 5 good production cities to fuel my immortal binge. Well good luck all.

I can't remember, but I think my game is around 1200 AD. The Aztecs just declared war on me a few turns ago when I got tired of their demands. I ran about 5 immortals over to their closest city, only to have them bushwacked by stingy Jaguars and Swordsman, as well as Pikemen defending the city. I managed to wipe out an Aztec army, and also united the most of the world (Babylon, Zululand, America) against the Aztec, which has certainly distracted them from Persia. I really think that I have done too little too late though. I tend to play a peaceful game (scientific or cultural) but this map was just not conducive to that strategy AT ALL. My military is puny, and I just hope I survive. I have some good trading relations with Babylon and Zululand, so I have cash. Plus, I am still in golden age and making 30 gold per turn. This is my first GOTM (I never tried it in CivII). I really need to be flexible in my strategy in the future.

-dowski

Originally posted by Endureth

- What do I have to do to build a wonder so quickly. The AI players have been putting them up left and right, I fear I'll only be able to get some of the modern advances and capture some from them.

- Is rush building important in this game? I've never done it.


I think that building wonders in your capital seems to be the trick. All other cities (at least early) will be hampered by bad bouts of corruption.

As far as rush building, it sounds like it is best used to kill off unwanted foreigners in captured cities. That's what I have gathered from some of the other posts in this thread. Also, I guess if you have the money (in a Monarchy or better) it can only help to rush build.

-dowski

I guess I have a slight advantage as far as experience playing, but here are my saves. Game won: 450AD.

As for advice... building settlers is not the only way to expand. just make sure you pick your battles carefully. ;-)

-J

Wow! I don't know a Firaxian is also playing the GOTM! :eek: Welcome to CivFanatics, Javier. :cool:

I guess I have a slight advantage as far as experience playing, but here are my saves. Game won: 450AD.

Winning the game in 450 AD is unimaginable. I couldn't even conquer the Aztecs by that time! :cry: Oh well, I'll try to do better in my second game. :)

I played Diety. Got my arse handed to me. Expected that.
Played this GotM. I expected to do ok, maybe win. Got my ass handed to me. Got very frustrated. Told myself that I would never play Civ3 again.
Read what J. Sobrado had to say about beating the game in 450AD and realized that I just need to find out how to play this game and try not to play it like Civ2 (which I was just able to beat on Diety before Civ3 came out). Damn you guys (Firaxis) for making the game so frustrating but so replayable! :)

Originally posted by Javier Sobrado
I guess I have a slight advantage as far as experience playing, but here are my saves. Game won: 450AD.
As for advice... building settlers is not the only way to expand. just make sure you pick your battles carefully. ;-)
-J

Slight advantage my ass!

Pffff. 450AD? Just wait until my computer starts behaving :p

In otherwords: damn. :)

got my first win, and it happened to be the GOTM :)

i've played a lot of SMAC but Civ3 is my first in civilization series. until tonight the best i had done was hang in until 2050 and lost by score.

i got nothing from either barb village, unfortunately.
once i had two towns i invested my lone worker in a Iron colony at the node a little ways south of the starting location. after that it was pretty much nothing but immortals all the way through 400 or 500 AD; mixed in a few horsemen to run down wounded impi and bowmen.

was definately interesting since all the Civs on the first continent had an early special unit.

then i just teched hard for a thousand years, the went Communist and mopped up with marines and battleships while Abe still had archers and musketeers.

corruption was really awful, even under democracy. i handled it on the continent by Forbidden Palace, but my island colonies never produced anything. sounds like you guys all had the same problem.

-Ramius

I cleared the continent and at 750AD have 435 points. I will develop and try to let alone Americans & Iroques. Forbidden Palace is the good thing effectively reduced the corruption. Republic dasn't reduce corruption better then Monarchy.

wow!
javier what was it you used to kick the aztecs(sp?) capital? 2 warriors? was realy lucky wasn´t it?

I was just wandering. Do any of you reload even once while playing GOTM (or for that matter "normal games"). Have you tried playing a complete game without reloading at all. (ok except maybe if you move a unit to the wrong square that you wanted.. like your mouse jumped or something)

Can you honestly say you don't reload during GOTM?

I didn't and I did not get a "very good" result so far. I'm alive and it's really not all that bad but, I didn't like wipe out the entire map either. :) I had some immortals early on and wondered to go south and try to crush the atzec but i didn't dear. Normally I might have "tried it out"

bla bla get my point...

Just submitted my first GOTM and thought I'd continue my synopsis of how my immortal rushing strategy went. As of last post I was at 1000 BC, had finished the aztecs and was pressuring the babylonians. Continuing veteran immortal production I managed to clear the continent by 530 BC and was fortunate enough to create one leader. I made a new city in the middle of the aztec/babylonian area and immediately rushed a forbidden palace using the leader at 490 BC. This basically tripled the number of productive cities i had. :viking: From there i set my research goal to mapmaking and went hard for the lighthouse so i could better explore the seas. I went on a colonization binge and put cities on some outlying islands which probably slowed me down. When I found the americans and iroqouis the americans had almost wiped out the iroqouis but both were behind me in tech. I took my time to build up an invasion force of 12 immortals and ferried them over. In one turn I took New York, Boston and Washington. The next turn a city america had built on my continent converted to me due to culture. From there it was just mop up. I would have been done about 200 years earlier if the damn yanks hadn't set up Seatlle on a remote island. Took 10 turns to ferry some immortals over there to finish him off. Here's my saved games if you are interested. Good luck all.

Originally posted by Javier Sobrado
I guess I have a slight advantage as far as experience playing, but here are my saves. Game won: 450AD.

As for advice... building settlers is not the only way to expand. just make sure you pick your battles carefully. ;-)


So, a little analysis. Clever, moving Persepolis over a square to be on the coast; good production for immortals and galleys, and on the right side of the continent even. I wish I had thought of this! I stupidly put my harbors on the wrong side of the continent.

His cities spread a ways out, which probably lent to extra corrpution. Did JS do this just to get the resources covered with as few cities as possible?

The big thing I noticed is that he had all his workers were captured foreigners, and none of them were counting towards his military expenses. This doesn't matter so much in despotism, since you usually have more than enough cities to support a giant army... but in the more "liberal" governments like Republic this can be great at helping keep costs down. Workers who require no upkeep... this slavery is almost politically incorrect, although relatively historically acurate (think Roman empire). :rolleyes:

I just finished my first full game of civ 3 which was also the GOTM. I was able to win in 1425 ad by conquest.

It took a bit to get started, but once I was rolling I did well. I made early peace with the aztecs and defended my two cities from the chokepoint on the continent (with the forest square). The babolynians wandered north and built a city near me, which I took quickly. Once I had immortals, I basically took full control of the game.

I took the aztec capitol, and then some time later got a leader and rushed the forbidden palace there. From there I basicaly just cranked out immortals as fast as I could.

I also discovered the power of getting workers by burning down cities. I built only one worker in the game myself I think.

Corruption was a big pain, but really the immortals were just unstopable. A 4/2 unit that early is huge. You can't get longbowmen until the middle ages and they are just 4/1. Almost felt like I was cheating. I don't know if I'd have been able to with if I had a different civ.

But it sounds like I'll do pretty well in the GOTM based on the other reports (at least I hope so!) - I've been playing civ for a long long time and this interation really seems good. New challenges and lots of improvements.

about the reloding stuff:
never reloded in the GOTM
sometimes do it to test something in normal games but mostly keep the bad outcome anyway
sometimes it even hapened that i klicked on the wrong thing to say and gave a 100g/turn tech to an enemy for free:( but kept the game anyway...

About to finish the GOTM ..........
by the way how to print screen n check the score ?

:cry: :cry: :cry:

I just finished my first GOTM about 30 minutes after I started. No fresh water, constant barbarians and then jaguars were too much to handle. My score was about 180, and I walked away loving the game even more -- it is so much deeper than Civ2.

I couldn't submit because the game deleted all my auto saves when I started another (another nice feature).

Thanks for the webpage and for the GOTM -- I'm ready for the next one!

I started my GOTM I for civ III.

I try to found as much Persians cities as I can in the first continent.

Then, I found the iron source and then start to build Immortals.
They were the key of my military expansion.

I have no other way to expand: make war with Aztecs, Babylonians and Zulus. I took most of their cities.

Right now, I'm in 1000 AD and the first continent is almost mine!
(Except 3 cities : 2 aztecs and 1 babilon one).
I've got all the first enemy capital: Zimbawe, Technotitlan and Babylone.

I do not kown if I will capture all the 3 remaining cities in the first continent in order to make the Aztec my ally: it would be interresting in the later game. I do not know yet what I will do.

I had 3 leaders: I made a army used to conquered with the used of Immortal the enemy cities. (Army are very powerfull!)
I used 1 of them to produce the Forbiden Palace in Nineneph. I do not have corruption problems any more. Except in the distand city alone in a small island!

I will used the last leader in order to complete a great wonder: I do not kown yet witch one !

I think I going to stop military compain in order to develop a strong economy and a impresive democracy ! Right now, I'm the first in science.

I do not know which way I will finish the game. I 'm sure I will not make the war to the others civs (American and Iroquois) except if they first attack me.

LeSphinx

The next leader you get, or if you still have on around, you should use to hurry-build the forbidden palace, somewhere on the south end of the continent. This will significantly help with production.

I myself was a bit disappointed with armies early in the game. With just one-off armies, it meant they were strong but could only attack once per turn. I had more success with a stack of immortals attacking 3 and 4 times per turn.

Did anyone else decide to go for a space race victory? I didn't relish shipping my tanks off to so many little islands, so I launched my spaceship in 1967.

My situation and strategy were similar to what most of you have described. I knew I needed to get Immortals quickly after meeting the Aztecs; I did, and the Aztecs were swiftly crushed. I left the Babylonians and Zulus alone while I regrouped until Hamurabbi dumped a city on the single square isthmus, splitting my empire in two! This would not stand, so I took all of the Babylonian cities on the continent except Babylon itself, and received a couple of island outposts in the peace deal.

Corruption became a major problem at this point until I was able to build the Forbidden Palace. This brought such a spark to my commerce that I was able to pull far ahead in technology.

After a prolonged peace, the Americans were sailing their Frigates up and down my coast, aggravating me to the point of declaring war. As soon as I did, the Babylonians, Zulus, and Iroquois all joined with America against me. With my tanks and battleships, I was able to conquer the remainder of my continent and the home continent of the Americans and Iroquois. My enemies were sufficiently demolished for my purposes, so I took what I could in the peace deals and never fought again.

It was lots of fun, I'm looking forward to GOTM2! :yeah:

celeron450

Right after I took Tenochtltitin it said I depleted my source of iron. Fortunately I found another sourc of iron that I was able to secure a few turns later. Has this happened to anyone else? I was really pumping out Immortals like crazy even scrificing citizens to get them out fast and I guess the game didn't like that. I was just shocked that it happened so quickly.

That was a while back though. Now it is 500 AD and I have eliminated the Aztecs and taken Ur and Ninevah with an army of elete immotals : ) and my new iron supply is still going and if it runs out I have 3 or four other ones on the westward isles that I am settling.

I first decided to go for a space race victory when I saw that it was rather easy to capture the whole starting island. Those Immortals are really good and they are cheap if you use your whip ;)

I was really lucky to get a GL in 400AD so I placed my second palace in the south of the island and my economy went up alot. When this happened and I saw how far ahead the other civs I was I decided to go for the domination victory. I controled far more then 60% of the worlds landmass (atleast I think so) but I never achived domination. I had to destroy every enemy city on the map and finaly win by conquest in 1826AD.

My civ built every wonder in the game except great wall and lighthouse untill industrial age where the game ended. I captured the lighthouse just a few turns after the babylonians built it.

I played a little yesterday and right now I'm in 1555 AD (around!) and I'm in a Democracy Administration.

Each scientific discovery is done in 4 or 5 turns!
I need to discover 3 or 4 more technology in order to switch to the Industrial Age.

Finaly I conquered the 3 remaining cities in the first continent.

Now, I'm pacific. No more war! I'm in peace with all the other civs. I make la lot of trade (Around +20 pieces of gold games each turn in my tresory because of trade!). I have 4 sources of iron, 4 or germs... So everything is Ok.

I have build Temple, Library and Marketplace in each cities.
Marketplace are powerfull when you have a lot a luxuries resources (6 of the 8 existing luxuries). Its gave you money and happy faces...

My culture is improving as well.

I will have 3 choices to finish the game:
- cultural (I never done yet)
- Space ship (Well , like In Civ 2)
- Diplomacy (Like in SMAC)

So, I will see.

LeSphinx

3950 BC Founded Persepolis on eastern shore.
3500 BC Khoi-San settlers joined Persia and founded Pasargadae.
3200 BC Villagers shared map, showing land across eastern straights.
2800 BC Susa founded on western shore in furry woods.
2590 BC Met Aztecs and acquired much technology for gold.
2430 BC Barbarians killed scouting warrior.
2390 BC Arbella founded near northern tundra/dye.
2230 BC Discovered iron in hills south of Persepolis.
2230 BC Discovered horses at chokepoint north of Tenochticlan.
1725 BC Founded Antioch near horses.
1500 BC Met Babylonians and traded technologies.
1275 BC Founded Tarsus in desert near iron deposits.
1250 BC Founded Gordium northeast of Tenochticlan.
850 BC Aztecs demand (and get) 14 gold.
825 BC Contact with Zulu via Babylon. Established embassies with Zulu, Bablyon, and Aztecs.
570 BC Revolt!
470 BC Monarchy.
??? BC Declare war on Aztecs (one turn prior to 410 BC).
410 BC Golden Age! Captured Tenochticlan and The Oracle!
350 BC Great Irrigation Project begins.
170 BC Persians build the Colossus in Pasargadae.
??? BC Teotihuacan razed.
90 BC Persians plant the Hanging Gardens in Persepolis.
70 BC Texcoco captured.
30 BC Tlateloco captured..
10 AD Golden Age ends.
30 AD Tlaxala captured. Darius, a Great Leader, leads the troops to victory! Peace with Aztecs.
70 AD Parthian tribe teaches Code of Laws in the northwest.
110 AD Americans build the Pyramids in Washington.
130 AD Meet Iroquois. Meet Americans.
190 AD Conscripts from village in northwest join Persia.
260 AD War with Babylonians. Uruk razed.
270 AD Persians complete a Heroic Epic in Susa. Ashur razed.
280 AD Babylonians build the Lighthouse in Babylon. Villagers in northwest give 50 gold.
310 AD Cyrus leads Persian Immortals in a memorable victory over Babylonian Bowmen!
340 AD Ur razed.
380 AD Harrapans share maps in the northeast.
420 AD Babylon and the Lighthouse captured.
440 AD Persia enters Middle Ages.
490 AD Zulu rebels from Hlobane rebuffed.
500 AD Ninevah razed.
510 AD Persians build a Forbidden Palace in Antioch.
530 AD Ellipi razed. Peace with Babylon.
550 AD War with Zulu.
580 AD Hlobane razed. Zimbabwe razed. Peace with Zulu.
660 AD Republic.
720 AD Cyrus helps the Persians build Sistine Chapel in Tlateloco.
860 AD War with Zulu. Mpondo captured. Half dead Persian Immortals make a stand against Zulu Horsemen and Achaemenes emerges as a Great Leader!
870 AD Zimbabwe razed. Hlobane razed. Peace with Zulu.
880 AD Persians complete the Great Wall in Susa (whoops, forgot to change that to a University...).
910 AD Persians complete the Great Library in Perseopolis.
920 AD Achaemenes builds Copernicus' Observatory in the Persian city of Pasargadae.
1050 AD Democracy.
1060 AD Zulu city of Intombe converts to Persia.
1320 AD Persia builds JS Bach's Catherdral in Susa.
1335 AD Persia writes Sun Tzu's Art of War in Persepolis.
1400 AD Persia builds Leonardo's Workshop in Tarsus.
1405 AD Persia enters Industrial Age.
1435 AD Persia builds Adam Smith's Trading Company in Gordium.
1445 AD Persia builds Wall Street in Tenochticlan.
1455 AD Persia builds Military Academy in Susa.
1500 AD Persia builds Newton's University in Pasargadae.
1515 AD Magellan completes Voyage at the Persian city of Persepolis.
1645 AD Shakespeare's Theater completed in Persian city of Persepolis.
1675 AD Universal Suffrage granted in the Persian city of Susa.
1695 AD Persians create Intelligence Agency in Tenochticlan.
1705 AD Persians develop Theory of Evolution in Gordium.
1710 AD First sign of global warming as grassland becomes plains.
1725 AD Battlefield Medicine developed in Persian city of Pasargadae.
1766 AD War with Zulu.
1768 AD War with Babylon.
1770 AD Isandhlwana captured. Zimbabwe captured. Ulundi captured. Calixtlahuaca captured.
1772 AD Akkad captured. Babylonians destroyed.
1774 AD War with Aztecs.
1776 AD Persians give Akkad and Calixtlahuaca to Iroquois. Hlobane captured. Xochicalo razed.
1778 AD Teotihuacan captured. Aztecs destroyed. Bapedi captured. Peace with Zulu. Persians acquire Swazi from Zulu. Persians give Swazi to Iroquois.
1820 AD War with Zulu.
1822 AD Iroquois citizens of Akkad rebuffed. Ngome razed. Peace with Zulu.
1826 AD SETI program completed in Persepolis.
1834 AD Iroquois citizens of Akkad convert to Persia. Persia gives Akkad to Iroquois.
1836 AD Persia establishes United Nations in Tlatelolco. Persia completes Manhattan Project in Tarsus.
1868 AD War with Zulu.
1870 AD Tugela captured. Zulu destroyed. Persia gives Tugela to Iroquois.
1872 AD Iroquois citizens of Akkad convert to Persia.
1878 AD Cancer cured in Persian city of Texcoco.
1884 AD Longevity discovered at Persian city of Tarsus.
1904 AD Bactra founded.
1918 AD Apollo program built in Persian city of Tarsus.
1955 AD Strategic Missile Defence built in Persian city of Tarsus.
1967 AD Iroquois citizens of Calixtalhuaca join Persia.
1983 AD Persian cultural victory.

Xerxes the Strong
Persia 1766 (Happy 548.9 Content/specialist 211.8 Territory 803.3 Future tech 0.9)
America 621
Iroquois 268
Zululand 182
Aztecs 110
Babylon 108

Well, never again will I raze enemy cities to avoid corruption. It's just an invitation to the AI to rebuild the city (or for another AI to build a city in the same spot). Better to take the corruption and get the benefit of the city than to have to re-conquer the damn thing. I lost two colonies near the desert spice north of Babylon before I finally gave up and built my own city there. It would have been much simpler to just keep the Babylonian city on that spot instead of razing it.

I suspect the AI is a bit handicapped on archipelago maps. This was a bit too easy. Perhaps the next GOTM could be on a Pangea. If it's archipelago, it should definitely be with more land.

Before you all say I suck, I'll just admit to it. I suck. I made peace with the Aztecs when I met them, but they declared war on me when I asked them to leave my territory or declare war (I had to do this, they were expanding into my territory) I took one city with a bowman (pre-Immortals era) and then was ritualistically beaten into submission by the Aztecs:cry: . Reading your posts just makes me realize that I'm gonna have to get a whole lot better in this game if I wanna compete next month. We'll see what happens in that game:D :D

I have reached 10AD and am doing ok.I have 16 cities.Only 6 were built by me :)
I went for Iron Working first to get iron and Immortals.Only 1 immortal victory is needed to trigger a golden age.
I built my cap 1 square over so I could reach the fish my worker exposed.Then I built a warrior while I made some roads to furs waiting for size 2.The warrior then found a hut containing a nomad.Yes..they do exist.This great luck was followed by another settler speeding the process along by adding my worker to the cap.3 of the first 4 cities built barracks while the other built some workers to road and colonize 1 resource.
Iron appeared but 1 square out of range of city #2.A temple was built so I could expand by cultural influence.A road was built to the iron after 10 culture points expanded the workable area and immortal construction began.
2 barb encampments gave me lots of gold to work with.Attacked the Aztecs and triggered my golden age.
Then I just worked my way down island capturing cities and workers.Along the way I secured the Oracle(built by Aztecs) and the Pyramids(built by Babs).
I'm getting the hang of moving into the square you attack which is different than civ2.Although early immortals make it easy.

A couple of tips to help out those who seem to be having trouble with GOTM1, based on my experience:

1. There's not nearly enough space to grow and win this one peacefully in any reasonable length of time. Get stuck in early and often, and use your immortals like the disposable shock troops that they are. Otherwise you'll still be stuck negotiating with the aztecs for resources in the 20th century.

2. The aztecs will give you all kinds of grief with those damned 2-move jag warriors. I was successful in containing him, after losing a stray warrior in the open, by putting a spearman next to his capital, fortified atop a hill. This kept him agitated enough that I was able to expand twice and get iron, buying me time to kick his butt with the immortals.

3. Bust out da whip. Early, often, and especially in just-captured cities where them defecting may be an issue.

4. When attacking with immortals, try to do it in waves instead of singly, and keep back 1 or two healthy ones to protect the victorious ones that have lost health. I never wound up getting a leader because the AI kept swooping in and assassinating wounded elite units that I left exposed.

That is all I have for now.

Cheers,
Callahan

Domination victory, Year 1640, 2547 points.

Subdued Aztecs 390BC.
Subdued Babylonians 380AD.
Subdued Zulus 570AD.
Subdued Americans around 1350AD.

The most important thing was where I put my capitol and my Forbidden Palace. I got lucky with Leaders, which helped a lot with the building. I rush built my Forbidden Palace on the Aztec capitol, Tenochitlan. Then I stupidly lost my own capitol for a turn, which placed my new capitol right next to the Forbidden Palace! Didn't fix that until I conquered the Zulus and rush built a new Palace way down south in Ulundi. Then almost the whole continent was producing efficiently for me.

Reforesting helps a lot, as did Democracy. Once I got railroads I was unstoppable. The Americans picked a fight with me and I got a third leader just then. Universal Suffrage makes war in Democracy a pleasure.

Immortals definitely 0wn in this game - I was using them even when I had Riflemen! Other tricks I use - let the computer build wonders, then take the city. And don't kill the enemy entirely, leave them with one city and practice extortion.

I've played a long time this WE.

Right now, I'm in 1930 AD.

I will go for the Space Race victory. Indeed, I do not like specialy the war. I've made it at the beginning (Artecs, Babylioanans, and Zulu) because I had no way in order to expand and have a good land for my cities. No way wining (for me) by domination or by military war!

The Diplomacy will be hard (Zulu and Aztecs do not like me!). Even the cultural victory : I only have around 47000 cultural points. So I think I will go for Space race vitory.

I just constructed the Appolo Program small wonder.

The next step is to prepare to buil properly my space ship.
Hope to finish the GOTM 1 during this WE and before the WE.

LeSphinx

1st Game of the month and I won. I can't believe I never knew about this site before. I lucked out by sending my first exporitory expedition south as opposed to north. Once I found the Aztecs I put a city on the choke point and had the north to myself. IMHO if you don't use the immortals to make war in the early game you are misplaying the persians. I could have done a better job rushing things, and am practicing that on a new game. I had much success by having a war, taking a few cities, then asking for peace and demanding one or two of the cities at the bottom of the AI's list. They usually give them to you, and they are the last ones founded, so they are likely to be their island outposts. The island outposts don't touch anything so they don't culture revolt. I still need to work on when to raze and when not to raze.
To sum it up: Conquest victory
1822 AD
1,748 points.
Early industrial. I can't wait for the next GOTM. Kudos to Matrix and all involved for the work and the concept and all.

I'm not that successful... my game will probably end with a histographic victory for me... I'm in 2030 now...800pts. The next strong has about 650. My problem was that my conquest in my first, agressive period were always stopped by permanently reverting persian cities :( When I stopped this useless strategy, I was a bit behin. So there wasn't much use of great conquests. I conquered only a few American and Babylonian outposts... and now I'm capturing a few Iroquis cities by Propaganda. All in all a rather peaceful game, not as successful as I had hoped, but I think its o.k. for my first game of civ3

Let's just say that I didn't even make it to 1 AD. This was my first GOTM (I didn't know about this site when I played Civ2) and it killed me.

Those Aztecs are mean SOBs!

:confused:

I just finish my GOTM 1.

I win by building the SpaceShip.
I built it on 1976!
I had 25 cities and a total popultation around 62 Millions people.

I'm happing about my first GOTM game!

LeSphinx

The GOTM is my second Civ III game. (Got a cultural victory in the first - at the easiest level.) I was very wary at first, did not even go after the huts until I had good protection for my new capital and second city. I had a warrior posted on a southern hill watching the hut there. Saw that the barbs were being attacked so I new I had neighbors close by. Not much room for Persia and no rivers!:(
I soon had a skirmish with the Aztecs and easily took one of their cities. Then they built another city between Persia proper and my captured city! I took this and then they came at me with swordsmen.:eek: Had to kiss some Aztec butt.:eek:
Both the Americans and Iriqouis built cities just north of my capital and I took them swiftly. Found Seattle on a small Island and captured it. The Thousand Year War against the Aztecs started in 300AD. The Persian monarchy used catapults and immortals to capture two cities in 1000 years. (They each had to be captured more than once because of cultural reversion.) The main benefits of this war were then many captured workers and the irrigation projects I was able to undertake in Persia thanks to the Aztec irrigation.

That's basically it.
And let me tell you I'm sorry for that: I was going to prepare a huge army of armor to invade the Americas defended by musketeers/pikemen. Just a couple of turns to get the armor tech.

BTW the game was fun and excellent:D

I crushed the Atzec with the immortals, build the second palace in Tenochwhateveritis and gone for the Babs who where building a new empire in the northwest.

Trade was good, the only annoying thing is the absolute crazyness of overseas folks regarding trade. Americans and Iroquis had excess wine/spices but asked for like three luxuries, iron and some tech. I left them with their stuff!

Bye

Berh

The Thousand Year War did have two other benefits. First, midway through the war Darius the Great formed the first legendary Persian army. This is the army that captured the Aztech capital. The other benefit was yet another Aztec city that was added to the Persian empire by the Peace of 1300 AD. This was really an insignificant little Aztec settlement far from Persia proper. Yet, it would play a role in Persia's later history...

After the Peace of 1300 the Persians gained the right of way through Aztec lands. Darius's successors had a great army but no war so they marched on a Babylonian city and captured it. The city was held against the Babylonian counter attack but a band of renegede horsemen from Zululand attacked and destroyed the weakened Persian army. Thus, Persia was back to its 1300 AD borders.

Persia was to sink a bit lower. The evil Americans attacked and captured Chicago to the north and the old Aztec capital to the south. Chicago was eventually recaptured but the old Aztec capital was never taken from the Americans. The people rose up and rejoined the Aztec nation!

During the American War there was continued harassment from Zulu horsemen. In the once insignificant Aztec settlement across the sea Cyrus the Immortal defeated a Zulu invasion force and built a great palace. Cyrus's victories led to the Persian conquest of a Zulu island to the east of Persia in the recent Saltpeter Wars.

Berhaven:

I've noticed the same thing about trade from the AI. They've got 3-4 extra, but won't give me a trade, even at better than fair terms. I'm with you though, screw'em if they want to play that way, I'll get my luxuries one way or another.:sniper:

My trading in this game has been minimal. So has my map trading. I think the latter actually prevented much of the former as I had to explore to find sea routes to some other civs. Trading opened up a bit more once I could make caravels.

My settler and city building has also been very limited. I have founded only three cities. Haven't made many workers either. I have many foreign nationals working for me for nothing. I had captured a Zulu worker during the Saltpeter Wars and was taking him back to Persia to complete a 'set' but my galley was lost at sea.:( (Never play Civ III when your wife is in the same room ranting and raving. It's tough to keep track of what you're doing!)

Well, i lost about 20 turns worth of building time to the coruption thing, sigh.

I drove south early with a force of Immortals and took many Aztec cities and then drove the Babylonians off the center island and eventually killed them. All without Iron in the 2nd half of the war i might add...my source dried up.

But I found a solution to the coruption problem.
I had about a 4 tech lead in science, went to Republic early to combat corruption...didnt work...so i lowered Science to 0% and just took in money and it about 15 turns i hurried a ton of Courthouses and then my Forbidden Palace finished around then and since then it's been off to the races. I'm on 3 islands and in compelete control.

Not sure how I will win though. :king:

WWWWWHHHOOOOOEEEAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!

I just achieved victory!!!!

Total military conquest, not even 1 city remaining in 680 AD!!!
It was my third complete civ3-game overall and i had the best score so far (won before histographical on chieftan and via spaceship on warlord).

i say my first regent-game and my first gotm-game ever are a succes!
I´ll go for Monarch next...

I wander why i didn´t win a copple of turns earlier though, by Domination. Anyone know when that happens? Some seem to have won through domination when they only had to conquer a copple of the last cities. But i had to conquer 'em all and LOVED it!

:king: :goodjob: [dance]

The Wars of Expansion began in the 1800s. There were some initial successes in taking cities on islands. Babylonian cities fell easily, Aztec cities not so easily. The renewed campaign against the old Aztec capital has faltered again while the Aztecs have captured some of the recent Persian island conquests!
The Persian Kingdom now has riflemen but this technological edge may not last long. Always looking after the happiness of his subjects the King struck a deal with President Lincoln wherein Persian military advisors taught the Americans about riflemen in exchange for American wines. The evil Americans no sooner passed their final exam in riflemen technology and then signed a mutual defence pact with the Aztecs! Of course the evil Americans cancelled the trade agreement and declared war on the Kingdom of Persia. It it good for them that America is so far from Persia!

The game went well for me, I had a lot of luck with my Immortals. My score was 3949 with a conquest victory in 900AD and a total culture of 3651. I think I got quite a few bonus points in my score for winning somewhat early, since my point total before I captured the last American city was around 400.

Like many of the other posts I've read the Aztecs came at me early. Luckily for me the spearman by their capital defended himself well and managed to take the city on the first turn of the war. Around 2000BC I built my first Immortal and found out how great they were in battle.

Around 500BC I started using the rush build with popualtion to dramatically inrease tha number of Immortals. The added side benefit was with all of my captured cities around 1-3 population I didn't have too many problems with disorder.

Since I was having such success with the rush building masses of Immortals and temples I never changed from Despotism and just kept attacking the other civs. My most common tactic was enter into diplomacy to see how many cities the next enemy had and then go after them. If a civ still had cities that I couldn't locate I'd sue for peace, trade maps, and then move my armies into position to capture them.

I only had two cities revert back to there former owners. This may have been due to my culture, since I would often rush build a temple right after I captured a city.

Well that's all folks.

Wow 3900+ points, sounds like I should have gone with my first instinct and keep rolling after I captured the starting island. After the initial burst of conquest I had a large army that I just wasted on guard duty. If nothing else I really should have pushed the attak so I could get a darn leader to rush a forbidden palace. Instead I placed a pretty peaceful game of colonization and eventual won by domination in 1904 with ~2000 points. I am still perplexed by how the other Civs kept up with the tech research? Do they steal alot? Is there anyway to prevent theft of tech before you have spies?

As others mentioned corruption is a huge problem. Do courthouses really work? I rushed built one in the aztec capital to help me produce a forbidden palace but after several hundred years the city still lost 12 of 13 shields.

Last stupid question, when you take over an enemy city and rush production or make workers how do you make sure the captured citizens are used and not ones from your culture?

Gee, I felt pretty good about my game (Domination victory in 1865 AD with 2040 points, 952 before victory bonus, and 17857 culture) until I saw what some of you did. Warmongers, all of you.

Well, I played somewhat conservatively. I held back my Immortals until 1000 AD when I felt my half of the continent was mature and I had just switched to Monarchy. Then I thought the time was right for the Blitzkrieg. I had a two stacks of Immortals ready to take Aztec holdings simultaneously on the continent and the main island east of us. The combined productivity of the Monarchy and the Golden Age after my first victory allowed me to keep the reinforcements coming turn after turn.

I was surprised that, during the conquest of the entire continent south of the isthmus, none of my elite victories ever produced a great leader. Not one. This made it unfeasible to make a Forbidden Palace south of the equator. Major bummer. But my military conquest was sweeping in scope and quickly extended to the entire world short of the American-Iroqouis continent and a few small islands. And just before I was about to tighten the noose on the evil empires the computer gave me the Domination win.

Presumably, I could have been much less conservative on defense and attacked with my Immortals earlier, thus getting a whole lot more bonus points at victory. But in a non-competitive sense, I felt it was a solid game that any leader bent on world domination would have been proud of.:egypt:

Sorry, I meant victory in 1685, not 1865.

And is there a rule about minimum turns to get some techs? Sometimes it seems even though I have the science output to get something in only a few turns sometimes the game caps me so that no matter how much I increase my science rate my gold per turn goes down but my turns per science doesn't. Is there a minimum and/or maximum turns for each tech instituted to try to keep your tech close to that which is appropriate for the calendar year?

I survived and won the first Civ III GOTM. It was an ugly win (histograph, score in 700s) and judging by the other posts in this thread it is no where near the top efforts.

It was a war torn game and once I became a monarchy I stayed that way till the bitter end. And the end was bitter. There was one island where I had three cities connected by railroad but only two infantry to guard them. The Aztecs landed a single cavalry. I planned to kill off the cavalry but got involved in other parts of the map and forgot.:eek: The lone rider entered the city where Cyrus the Great had built the forbidden palace and the evil Aztecs razed the city!:cry: Thus my only producing cities were in Persia proper, which consisted of the three cities I had built. These were busy building units to fight the Aztecs on the main continent. A terrible businees complicated by the fact that the Iriquois invaded Persia proper a few times. Once they captured one of my original cities but I took it right back. I was trying to rebuild its infrastructure when the purple forces came back. I made a quick peace with the Aztecs and moved back north. Managed to kill everything save two cavalry which were reduced to one hp each. Once of these units limped into my beloved Persian city and burned it to the ground.:cry: I barely rebuilt it before the end.

Fighting a war when both have infantry is a pretty wasteful affair. Reminded me of WW I!;) I did manage to retake the old Aztec capital - through cultural takeover! I had used my artillery to isolate it from the other Aztec cities (by destroying all roads, etc. around it).

Hope to do better next time...

I decided that in my GOTM I would take over the starting island, as most people did, but then I sat back and didn't try to win by conquest. I had my main island, I spread out over onto some other islands, and then I just researched and built some wonders and things. In the end I won by histograph score and my end score was around 1350 or something like that. I was happy just to survive, especially since I am new to the Civ series entirely.

Jeff

Finished the game this weekend with a domination victory. The country I went to war with first, was the last one I had to finish off (Aztecs). Something strange happened in this game, the Iroquois civ committed suicide. They had one city left, and I took it over through culture, when I did the message popped up that Iroquois civilization destroyed by Persians (I wish the Aztecs would have gone that easy).

Strategy: Rush build temples for quick culture, happy citizens and large borders, and barracks for veteran immortals. Most important of all, play the diplomacy game (Abe Lincoln probably still thinks that I will love him forever).
:love:

I won the game by conquest until 750AD. :king:

Made 4261 points.

I think the most important fact was, that I started early fleet-building.
I had been able to carry my Immortals fast to the other islands after I took the first island.

Here are my strategies:
*Build up your fleet.
*Don´t wait to long for the others to find you; go out and find them by yourself.
*Don´t stay in front of a city you cannot capture; carry your fleet to another city and see opponents army divide.
* Rush production. (Most of my cities didn´t increase beyond 3 citizens).
* Stay in despotism.
* Build immotals; let your people pray to their gods in the battlefield; your don´t need any tempels.

Always remember: If they are to strong, you are to weak. :D

Tae Shala, did you notice what your score was the turn before you took over the world? I am just curious what the bonus is for an ealry victory.

Searay, I read in one of the other forums that there is a minimum research time (~4 turns I think).

I had no fleet to speak of in this game. The last fifty years or so I didn't even have one lousy ship! That fried my taters, too, especially when the AI civs attacked my island conquests!

I did stay on monarchy the whole game and never once used my people to rush build anything. (I did use a great leader to build a forbidden palace.) I never drafted any citizens or changed from the 'normal' economy either. (Can one draft or mobilize while in monarchy?) I tried giving my people happiness and culture but it seems the best thing a :king: can do for his people is abdicate in favor of a republic or democracy.

From my experience early victories are the key to get high scores. :)

Originally posted by EEKthedog
From my experience early victories are the key to get high scores. :)
It sure is. I thought of giving my people some culture, and I began to improve my empire. What a waste of time. When I saw my score wasn't going anywhere, I decided to kill everybody. I finished the game by killing all the other civs in 2014. Score: 1343 (RIDICULOUS!!!) :mad: . If there's someone still playing, war is the way to go. Destroy the AI as soon as possible. I believe this score system is even worst than civ2. If we don't change it, every GOTM will be a race to see who finishes (and I mean winning) the game earlier.

This is my second post after writing about the Civ2 GOTM10 an also my second Civ3 game, first one to finish.
Living in Germany ment getting Civ3 in the middle of November. That´s why I didn´t have enough time to finish it in any other way than early conquest.
Persepolis was founded on the coast with access to fish. I had a lot of luck with my first hut to the south, which gave me Pasargadae. While exploring the island further to the south I met the Aztecs and later also Babylonians and Zulus. They were all very eager to trade technology with me. :)
While researching Iron Working my warriors including some veterans were able to capture the Aztec capital and another town to the south. A fortified pikemen on a hill next to their only city left kept destroying their units until I could capture it.
A little later the first immortals began waging war against Babylon and Zululand capturing many workers on the way.
At the same time my triremes with some warriors began exploring the treacherous seas finding the Iroquis and American empires and several goodie huts.
Soon a seaborne invasion began with shipping my immortals to their island. The consequent wars didn´t last too long and soon the world was mine.
:cool:

There's been a lot of people complaining about cities reverting to their original civ on other threads, but I haven't had much experience of it.

I'm wondering if anyone had any problems in this game with cities reverting after you conquered them, when you have loads of troops stationed in them or some such.

The one time it happened to me was one of their cities right next to their capital, but I only had one injured immortal in there so I wasn't bothered/suprised.

Incedentally, I'm going for a space race win as everyone else has gone for domination. Am I destined for a puny score?

One Aztec city reverted three times on me! Never lost a big garrison there though. I later took the Aztec capital and lost four of my five catapults when it reverted. :mad: The Americans later captured the old capital from me only to have it revert back to the Aztecs.:lol: Near the end of the game I laid seige to that same city once again. My artillery destroyed all the surrounding improvements and the city reverted to me!:crazyeyes

Catapults would be no loss to me! They're useless when Immortals actually do the job properly...

I've decided to keep the Aztecs, Americas and Iroquois alive, and through RoP agreements I'm blockading their ports!

Mind you my Sub lost out to an Aztec Galley...Doh!

Checked my Score before I won by conquest.

It was only 361. So I got 3900 bonus points.
(Seems I got one for each soul I sacrificed. :p )

what is gotm?:confused:

I just won a conquest victory in 170AD. I don't usually play for conquest but was pushed for time and love those immortals. I don't like the scoring system though as it seems very biased towards early conquest and I would rather build a large civ and win by spaceship. I think there is too much luck involved in an early conquest for it to be so highly score biased.
For example getting a settler in that first goody hut is such a large advantage and doubles your production rate. I also came accross the Aztecs city with my warrior and defeated it in one go.
Such luck in the early game makes a huge difference, especially on a small map.
I think that the longer a game go's on and the larger the map make for more skilled games, and think that like others have suggested limiting the victory conditions is a great idea. I'm looking forward to the next game as an early conquest (or a win at all, LOL) looks very difficult, and I suspect that a late conquest win won't have much more of a bonus than any other victory.

Just won domination through cultural expansion....in 1858!

I'd totally blockaded all competition through right of passage agreements, 3 turns from the Apollo mission, set for a Space Race win probably around 1900.

Then bang, one of my tiny cities borders, in the middle of nowhere, expands and I win by domination - no fair!

This will be at the bottom of the charts no doubt, hours and hours I put in to win by space race from 700AD rather than domination.

:mad:

I couldn't get my game submitted this weekend. My ISP was down on Sunday.
Overall I did pretty well in GOTM 1, I think.
COnquest victory in 940 AD with 3963 pts. I should have won about one hundred years earlier, but attempted conquest of Iriquois& American main continent with too few troops, and my conquests reverted back to Iriquois. Still, I'm quite pleased with my first GOTM submission.

Man, those conquest victories seem to be the way to go for GOTM scores. I was taking my time and soaking up the atmosphere too much. I won by domination in the early 1800's and I was kinda having fun chasing around the Americans as they settled the smaller islands of the world. I was building some wonders and just getting geared up for a space race. I even had a great leader languishing about - hadn't decided if I wanted to use it for the U.N., for a quick Apollo build, or some other deal.

My "domination" will be no where near the dates and scores of the conquest victors.

Is there some scoring deal that gives a conquest victory more points? Not sure if it was mentioned already and I missed it.

The age bonus is the real great deal in scoring. I won by conquest and got a pity score since it was too late.

I won't be able to turn in my game until Sunday, but I am the bottom of the barrel. I was playing until midnight last night and started again this morning, had to go to work in year 2146.

I built no wonders, was way behind in tech and money, but the AI isn't pushing me too much. I don't like war, it seems wrong, but from now on I'm going to roll like Patton. One question I have: a different game I never attacked anyone, but was swallowing cities with culture. When the UN vote came up I got three and another culture got 3, with one abstaining. I was pissed because HE was always attacking me. I would just rebuff his troops and continue empire building, never attacked his cities. Doesn't past history mean anything?

The Americans erased the Iroqouis early, them and (green) took out the Zulus much later. I had the (red) on the ropes, then backed-off because of war weariness. I had three cities flip back to (red) even though my culture was better. In one city I had a huge number of troops inside, poof gone. The first one I had justed rushed the forbid palace with leader and two turns later it flipped. The last only had a piker, I just finished a temple normally, and it flipped THE NEXT TURN. I had the city for a long time.

Always learning.

bump

*1.17 patch*

Xerxes the Magnificent dominated the world in 1060 AD for a score of 4009. On the map it seemed we had over 2/3 of the land for some time already but
looks may be deceiving. At the finish line Persia controlled 92,900 square miles, supporting a population of sligtly over 10 million souls.
America was the only other civ left with 6 cities on their starting continent (they had killed the Iroquois one turn after we contacted them) and just about entering the second age, while Persia was on the brink of discovering Democracy.
The Persian immortals were, well, immortal.
They began with driving back the Aztecs, started our Golden Age (4 turns of it spent in anarchy, urggh!), chased the Zulus all over the world, produced one Leader (Forbidden palace in Hamadan, south of Tenochtitlan) and were busy beating up the American swordsmen when suddenly the game was over. We never had more than 8 or so at a time but that was plenty.
Persia built the Colossus, the Hanging Gardens and the Great Wall, and conquered the Oracle (Babylon) and the Lighthouse (Zulu).
America built the Pyramids, and completed the Great Library one or two turns before Persia destroyed the last Zulu city. ;)

what you say?!

Congratulation Riballah, but...the GOTM #1 was of november...