Bindy's Road to EQM -- Round 2

You can't change the religion of the AP. Once it is built, it stays that religion until it goes obsolete at communism.

mining inc is really good given target victory, the science producing corps aren't bad either

I thought the AP went obselete with mass media?

January 1983 on Noble, standard rainforest map. My space race games aren't nearly as precise as they could be, but this was a lot of fun. I should have had more cities, but I at least had enough to get oxford/wall street. Suleiman got uppity and attacked my weakest, I turned him away then took his neighboring city. Isabella declared just as I sued him for peace, so I took two of her cities (raze one, keep one). Was just rolling for a 3rd when she got rifles to match me in tech and beat me in numbers. Sued for peace, both cities I captured eventually were handed back to their owners due to the stupid AP.

Suleiman goes for it again later and takes the city he tried for earlier. An utterly massive stack of cavalry. I took back the same city I'd taken before, since it basically controlled the strip of ground between the rest of my empire and the city he'd taken. He crashed wave after wave of units into it but we held, and went to take back my city again. Sitting Bull never got into it, and I'm glad, because his army was impressive. We had a long mountain range separating us except a couple cities to the south.

This was an interesting map, production hard to come by. My Ironworks/Apollo city ended up being the one with tons of river tiles (I really think Levees are my favorite BTS building). Couldn't go with State Property as I needed the health from Environmentalism to sustain factories and power, not to mention the benefit of Mining Inc. I did go with Serfdom for the lion's share of the jungle clearing. I put cottages basically everywhere that wasn't a resource or needed irrigation, and still had plenty of food for specialists. Built Oracle/Moai in capital for great prophet, Pyramids/Hanging Garden in third city for GE, Great Wall in 2nd city (started next to stone), held a nice espionage lead from settled GS and SY until the other espionage buildings started coming around, stole a couple techs to backfill. After that Izzy went absolutely bonkers with her spending, even after I put up my buildings and ran at about a 10:1 ratio on her vs. other civs, I was at about 120% cost vs. her.

No aluminum. Only finished one engine. Had 9 turns left on the 2nd one's build when everything else was complete. 18 turns to victory with only one engine, I didn't figure adding a 2nd would shave off more than 9 turns. This is what I mean when I say my space race games aren't very precise...

bestje said:

mining inc is really good given target victory, the science producing corps aren't bad either

I thought the AP went obselete with mass media?

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nope, communism(unless they changed it after release). The reasoning is that communism is the most anti-religious tech in the modern age, I assume.

According to my tech tree (in game), it's obsoleted by mass media.

1858AD, interesting game. Shaka keeps invading with massive stacks of cuirassiers, takes a city or 2, I defeat his stacks, take the cities back, get peace. First time I was unprepared and he took the city that was building ironworks with 4 turns left on the build

I'll have tanks soon though so that will be the end of Shaka as a threat (plus vassals Gandhi and Ragnar).

The space race is alot more intersting in BtS, I've gone the rocketry before aluminium route, teching electricity now. You can't build casings after building appollo anymore, so there'll be a gap while I get some more tech. And you don't need computers to go to Alpha Centauri, unless you want to build the space elevator it seems. I think we will just stick with our slide rule and abacus

Tech plan is get Industrialism, build a load of tanks, raze India and Sweden, that should teach Shaka a lesson or two. Then get the 3 Gorges Dam and start building parts I think.

I went the south route for my BtS SS. I'm not sure if it's more efficient but I wanted labs before I got Rocketry. Plus I didn't actually research rocketry myself... internet baby! That and a PA. I abused my game Although a PA SS is slower than a non-PA SS in BtS if you have a good leader. Survy is a really crummy leader (at least for space) so I had to piggy back on my SS run.

The funniest part of my game was that I turned Mansa into an Alex like attack dog. Poor guy was bribed into so many wars that his neighbors got pissed. Eventually Wang attacked Mansa and vassalized the poor sucker though. That meant that I had to stop Gandhi's culture attempt on my own. Since my PA buddy was doing all the research, I just built tanks via SP workshop/mills and took out Gandhi.

I rushed my way to Industrialism while Catherine took care of Gandhi's culture attempt. Now quite some time after that, I positioned a couple of tanks in front of the last city captured by Cathy, and noticed some 50 cossacks plus 30 grenadiers in it - no kidding. And there might be other SoDs around that I haven't found yet. Is this normal on immortal difficulty? Cathy vassalized both Gandhi & Darius (who aren't exactly weak either), got about twice or thrice my land and pop, and is researching like mad now (maybe 20 turns away from Infantry if she follows Koreas tech path, otherwise less). So I think I'll have to do something about her before the end, but am afraid my 10-20 tanks simply won't be enough to stop the sheer number of cossacks overrunning my lands...her homeland is fortified with a moderate amount of rifles & cossacks.
What would you do?

Make a PA with her since she only needs to be Pleased to do so. But I'm guessing you didn't check that box in the settings, so it's not an option.

In which case I would quickly make a small defensive-minded stack w/medic and a couple collateral units to sit on a forest/hills near that city and absorb/reduce the SoD. And I would send my tanks to raze her capital while building more tanks to ambush her attacking force before it can do to much damage to your homeland. My theory anyway, no idea if it would work. I'm not a great warmonger by any means.

This of course assumes you don't think you can win without another war. I'm not sure how much of a tech lead you have.

July 1968 win on monarch for me, a fun if very long game (except the end, that was boring).

Shaka and co. DoW'd 4 times, first time I was unprepared, he took 2 cities, I took them back and gave him Divine Right for peace. 2nd time I was prepared, he still took a city, I took it back, he gave gold for peace. 3rd time I slapped him hard, more gold for me. 4th time was ridiculous, I was 1 turn away from tanks, so he got a good kicking, and I razed a few Indian cities as well. He also bribed Hammy into DoW'ing as well, so I took his pentagon city (he cheekily built it 4 turns before me!) and another, then he was my vassal.

No-one dared invade me after that, I had tons of tanks and a massive tech lead.

Made lots of mistakes, biggest being that my stasis chamber got destroyed by a spy after it was built, I didn't know they coukld do that. So I built it again in my 2nd best production city, it had a casing with one turn to go. When the stasis chamber was complete (engine completed a few turns before in ironworks city), I added it and then clicked launch... without the 5th casing being built, oops. So it was a nerve racking 18 turns with an 80% chance of success. A Mayan city went legendary 2 turns before the end, no worries.

Shaka kept trying to vote himself religious leader with not enough votes, until I built the UN and then Ragnar was 2nd in pop (I gave him biology when he asked for it, didn't want another war), Ragnar was voted sec gen. He then tried to vote himself the winner, I was ahead on the vote but didn't have enough votes to win. It was about 2 turns before my space victory.

sounds like an exciting game, mine got a bit dull once monty had decided that knights against cavalry wasn't going to work

I find Shaka is a much more capable warmonger than Monty the loon.

It as only my 2nd BtS game (both wins though, on monarch, culture with Hatty first off). It has been a fairly good introduction, learn about the early tech tree diferences/early wonders and do nothing (except get invaded right at the end and bady beaten up) after an early rush and removal of Wang in the first game, and learn about the space race techs without having to worry about navy or defending multiple fronts for this one.

I'm thinking of trying emperor again next (still only got 1 win in warlords thanks to Bindy's first challenge, with praets and Augustus), but the size of the AI stacks in BtS is a bit worrying. Shaka seemed to do nothing but build huge stacks and vassalise people.

Keen to try out some sea warfare next game so will try one of the new x&small maps I think. I hear good things about privateers.

The cossacks have been taken care off. It wasn't fun though...
You just know there's something wrong when a bodycount of 90 cossacks and 40 grenadiers/rifles comes at a cost of 35 tanks and 20 inf/marines, all of which at level 3-5, including some medic3s...and that while mainly defending your cities.

Wang Kong destroyed estimated 50 further russian units. He was attacked by Cathy 3 turns before I joined the war. For some weird reason Darius became my vassal the turn after I declared. Without these two allies, the Khmer civ probably would have been dead by now.

The war isn't won yet. I captured Versailles and the Eiffeltower, but wasn't able to press on to Moscow yet due to those horribly effective Airships. What's more, Wang Kong stole Assembly Line from me, and any turn now he might trade it to Cathy for peace.

Gandhi is still trying to win culturally, having blown up his fourth city to some respectable 15k in 1840. I have to take at least one more city from him.


\edit: no PAs. I'm playing a serious game here

My game was accepted, so here's the link... I still do't know if you can look at it before it is published, there's an update due on the 25th anyway.

http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/game_info.php?dsply=&entryID=10912

July 1968 space colony win, 22383 points, epic/standard/rainforest/monarch, Khmer civ
Opponents: Hammurabi, Pacal, Shaka, Gilgamesh, Ragnar, Gandhi

I'll try an emperor game today I think.

Nope. Cant' see game details till it's published

@Karmina: Sounds like the game is starting to fall under control though. I will re-try this game without a PA to see what kind of date I end up with. I got an early 1900 date using Pacal on a different map so I'll see if I can improve on that with the Khmer. My Khmer date with a PA was not very good anyways...

At long last, success!



Not spectacular, as you can see, but I seem to end up with a lot of space wins in the mid 20th century, so why should this one be any different?

This was a hard fought game for me; I restarted a bunch of times. I found myself with not quite enough land to maintain a lead, so I vowed this time to do a little early land grabbing.

Here's the capital, which I won't even try to spell:



I liked this start because it showed sugar and gems, resources that are less common, so more tradeable. I was on the south center of the map, between the Sitting Bull's Americans, and Lincoln's.

The pace and plan was set by two quests that I got early, build 7 swordsmen and build 7 libraries. There was a bonus for being in hereditary rule for the swordsmen quest, and I was conveniently going for the Pyramids. I got the Pyramids, revolted into HR, and got my 7th sword, and went to visit Sitting Bull in rapid succession.

As you can see, all my melee troops got drill I as a result of the quest:


The library quest has a bonus if you have the Great Library (extra GS in the city that doesn't go away at SciMeth), and it doesn't take much to convince me to build it to begin with:



It took a little longer that it should have, but I eliminated Sitting Bull completely:



I then took some of Washington's cities (including Washington), which were mostly desert/flood plains, and got him to capitulate. He and I controlled the entire southern stripe of the map. Washington ended up having my only Aluminum.

There was one more significant war, which pitted Cyrus, Washington, and myself against Izzy, Asoka (who capitulated to her early and stayed a vassal for the duration), and Frederick. I razed a few of Izzy's cities, and took one of Asoka's, and that was teh last of the fighting. I had tanks and modern armor, and Izzy had grenadiers. Asoka had cavalry and infantry
I took peace after Izzy took one of Cyrus' cities on my border and Asoka showed me a stack with 30ish cannon in it.

Two funny late events:

That must have been some ancient civilization!


and possibly the most useless event ever (notice the map):


And late in the game, here was my GP city, with National Epic and National Park:



Sulemein, who was mostly keeping his head down in the warring, had a plan that just didn't quite have enough time to develop:

In any case, I had about 8 spies in his cities to cause revolts if necessary so he couldn't get the culture he needed.

The game is here, post-update, which is supposed to be within the next couple of hours as I write this. I will make a point to add any games I find to the first post after the update.

Game 3 to follow, back to Vanilla/Warlords, soon!(TM)

Congrats Bindy, you beat my date this time

2 out of 3 entries on the table for monarch space colony (standard size) are Khmer now I'm propping up the bottom of the table.

And Gre_Magus beat my culture date this update (after I beat his or hers from the last update) so my first BtS game wasn't a table topper either

Congratulations all!

I found five games at these settings; I added them below and to the first post.

shyuhe Immortal 1861 A.D.
Bindamel Monarch Jan. 1951
Paradigm Shifter Monarch Jul. 1968
bestje Prince Jul. 1955
hecubus Noble Jan. 1983

Thanks for playing all!

Bindamel said:

Congratulations all!

I found five games at these settings; I added them below and to the first post.

shyuhe Immortal 1861 A.D.
Bindamel Monarch Jan. 1951
Paradigm Shifter Monarch Jul. 1968
bestje Prince Jul. 1955
hecubus Noble Jan. 1983

Thanks for playing all!

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I'm just here to make y'all look good

well done everyone!

whats round 3 going to be?
and can i get my game added to the list for round 1 please

bestje said:

well done everyone!

whats round 3 going to be?

Click to expand...

You'll find out soon(TM)

bestje said:

and can i get my game added to the list for round 1 please

Click to expand...

Done!

Oh, and hecubus, I thought it was really cool that we had entries at 4 different levels.