Monarch Student XIV - Sitting Bull

Barely playing civ IV at all lately, but I'm still hosting our MS games.
This time we play another AI failure, Sitting Bull. Crazy BuildUnitProb (same as people like Alex and Montezuma) on one of the most peaceful leaders (90 peaceprob at cautious) usually make for a really hopeless AI.

But I think he's actually pretty strong. Phi is always good and his UB brings the Pro trait to a new level.

The leader:



The controversial UU is a resourceless axeman replacement with reduced (4 vs 5 of a standard axe) but a massive +100% vs melee units. Not going to start a debate here, but I personally like it a lot:



The UB is a monument replacement wich grants +3 XP to the already buffed archery units. Not so hot for the human player, but far from useless:



The excellent start. Food, a nice river, lots of hills. And SB starts with agriculture, so we can tech straight to BW:



General comments about the map. Not really a spoiler, just a note about this game:



Barbs are on, events are OFF, everything default. Any problem, let me know.

What a nice start - if only the corn was irrigated it'd be amazing. Still, looks easy to get off to a great start with that capital. I skipped the last couple games due to work but will try to get back in with this one.

Cool! I come back after several months and "Monarch Student" is still going!

Had an absolutely massive blowout with the other half about civ-playing and was forced to "retire" from all Civ related activities for a while, but starting feeling the itch to play again and thought I'd see what was going on here.

So - signing in!

Although the wheels are really rusty... Could be quite ugly.

The anti-rush cow starts with an incredibly strong bureaucracy capitol this time, huh.

Hey gcm4738, welcome back, you really disappeared at some point. The series is going well. Not as popular as the old classics like NC and LHC, but we have a nice bunch of regulars.

We had some pretty harsh games, but this one should be easy, good training ground to restart after a break.

Emperor/epic, events off, to 10 AD:

Sigh - Seriously, if this is a Monarch series why do people keep posting Deity, Noble or other games which aren't Monarch? People trying to move up or learn Monarch would best be served shadowing or learning from games played on the appropriate setting.

SB in general is pretty good imo. He has 2 economic traits which can never be a bad thing.

Anyways, I'll play this one when I get home @ Monarch!



p.s. At the original spoiler:

Is it continents?

Crusher1 said:

Sigh - Seriously, if this is a Monarch series why do people keep posting Deity, Noble or other games which aren't Monarch? People trying to move up or learn Monarch would best be served shadowing or learning from games played on the appropriate setting.

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I think a number of us were at monarch when this series started, Ai Shizuka and myself included. Thanks to this series, we've moved up to emperor. So maybe we need to rename it to that level! Emperor is tough for me, but I'm about 50-50 on it thanks in large part to this series.

But, I've been beat up at work lately, so the idea of having some monarch cruise control games sounds good, so I'll give it a go at monarch as a result.

Crusher1 said:

Sigh - Seriously, if this is a Monarch series why do people keep posting Deity, Noble or other games which aren't Monarch? People trying to move up or learn Monarch would best be served shadowing or learning from games played on the appropriate setting.

SB in general is pretty good imo. He has 2 economic traits which can never be a bad thing.

Anyways, I'll play this one when I get home @ Monarch!



p.s. At the original spoiler:

Spoiler :

If that's the case regenerate and use a different save. If its Monarch keep it at Monarch.

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You might not have been around when MS started, but these series (NC, LHC, and MS) welcome ALL players. If you want to play your spoiler at monarch, do it, but there's nothing to say others who post can't play higher levels, or that current monarch players won't get insight from seeing them.

The first MS specifically welcomed higher level players as well. People can/should play any difficulty they want. The only series I'm aware of that didn't allow difficulty changes was/is immortal university, although when I bring it back I'll think about that policy (although WB saves mess up barb techs, which is problematic on a couple levels).

Crusher, it's like the Noble Club series. Called Noble, but people there play at whatever level they want. Same here, it just started from a NC game where there was a handful of people in the prince-monarch range. Then someone went "Hey, let's try monarch in a public game" and it became a new series. So it's more a "monarch and above" series.
About the maps, I like to mix it up. We had some painful starts surrounded by warmongers, easy starts with a lot of land, islands, pangaea, everything goes.
Not so sure about this one anyway. May seem easy in the early stages, but nasty surprises are possible later.

Budweiser, it's fractal, but:

I'm aware of other series but I disagree big time with people playing at whatever level they choose, especially if they are encouraged to - very counterproductive and selfish imo.

When I play a Deity series I play at Deity level. When I play a Noble series I am playing at Noble. When I played the Lady Series which was an "open level" I picked my current level of Immortal.

I cant emphasize enough that these series are geared at helping others improve their skills at "specific" levels. If this is not the case then don't call it a Noble or Monarch series because it is misleading. Someone trying to learn Monarch is going to get very little insight on how to play his game by watching me play at Immortal - too many game variables are fundamentally altered.

So, an open invitation to all, from me , do your best to be selfless and assist others trying to learn at this level and only play

Monarch

I'll play at Monarch. I am so temped to go WE on this...

EDIT: Actually, WE/Spy.

Crusher1 said:

I'm aware of other series but I disagree big time with people playing at whatever level they choose, especially if they are encouraged to - very counterproductive and selfish imo.

When I play a Deity series I play at Deity level. When I play a Noble series I am playing at Noble. When I played the Lady Series which was an "open level" I picked my current level of Immortal.

I cant emphasize enough that these series are geared at helping others improve their skills at "specific" levels. If this is not the case then don't call it a Noble or Monarch series because it is misleading. Someone trying to learn Monarch is going to get very little insight on how to play his game by watching me play at Immortal - too many game variables are fundamentally altered.

So, an open invitation to all, from me , do your best to be selfless and assist others trying to learn at this level and only play

Monarch

Click to expand...

Nobody owns these series. Also, people can benefit from higher level games, I am an example of someone who was on the receiving end of that benefit.

Nobody is being paid to give tutorials here. We're playing for fun. Recreation time. Being selfish is part of the point, and if we enjoy helping others or whatever then we get to select to what extent is enjoyable.

It's also arguable an immortal player like you or me UTTERLY BLOWING out the map even while skimping on some effort or perhaps doing things we normally wouldn't can be misleading as well. I can hit a CS sling pretty often on monarch, but it takes tight control to do it...not something somebody just climbing from prince would want to try as a "monarch" specific tactic!

Anyway, if that's selfish, so be it, but I'm not particularly keen on seeing posters tell other posters how they should play. It's one thing to say why strategies are effective (or not) and why the player should consider changing, it's another entirely to say "if you're on this forum doing this, you should use X style, difficulty, or speed". I am the first to admit, for example, that you simply can't compare marathon speed to other speeds...it's a different game entirely. That doesn't mean people shouldn't play it or post here though.

So, an open invitation to all, from me , do your best to be selfless and assist others trying to learn at this level and only play

Click to expand...

It was an open invitation. The name of the thread after all is "Monarch Student". I don't OWN anything in these threads. That title can be saved for people with many more posts and time spent here than myself.

People with greater skill can definitely show some great results at easier levels but that's the whole point. People learning Monarch want to know how we achieve seemingly impossible games. So lets help them by playing the appropriate setting.

Everyone is free to use their time how they choose. If you are an Immortal player and find Emperor and below a waste of time, and you don't prioritize helping others with less skill, at least find the appropriate threads with corresponding difficulties. That isn't asking too much.

You are taking it quite the wrong way I'm afraid, and perhaps even personal? If a thread is labeled "Monarch Student" how is it possible asking too much for people to play the Monarch setting so people trying to learn that level can learn?

Well, AI, since you suggested it, I'll try my first public game at emperor. I've played some off-line games at emperor, but haven't tried any yet publicly. Not that it matters, I always ended up getting too into the game to remember to get screenshots and post it.

@Crusher-I was one of the guys who moved to Monarch thanks to the Noble's Club along with Ai, Mich, gcm and some others. We all had a good time on the Toku game so the MS started. I'm a little behind the group now, but the same thing seems to be happening in this series. And I'd agree with TMIT, me seeing an immortal level player play at monarch would do me no good.

And I'd agree with TMIT, me seeing an immortal level player play at monarch would do me no good.

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That's exactly what the player needs so they can see how to improve their game. What they don't need is watching someone play an Emperor or Immortal game. I don't see how this is a tough concept to grasp.

When I was trying to learn Monarch I was doing every thread search in the world for Monarch games. The best situation would be an elite player dropping levels so I could learn from them - their game play is superior to an average yet successful Monarch player which means I am able to learn quite a bit more.

Just because someone suggests playing a certain level doesn't mean its the best advice.

It sounds like there's an agreement to disagree. In the meantime, let's all play! I'm going home from work now, and I'll play this baby at monarch.

Let's call the next game the Monarch/Emperor Student/Apprentice game, that can address all of us who've moved up a level as a result of this great series...

I don't think looking at a higher level player is useless.
I mean, it forces you in a "Hey, if he can do it at Immortal, why shouldn't I be able to do it at Monarch" mindset. Not sure if a monarch blowout by an immortal player is that educational. You see him getting rifling from Lib at 900 AD and win a 1300 conquest game. Then go try it yourself and get destroyed.
Just look at the recently bumped NC Napoleon, where TMiT actually plays it at Noble. 3 AIs warrior-rushed and then everything else with axes and axes+HA. Domination win at 840 AD. Fun? Sure. Educational for a "real" noble player? Don't think so. Interesting for said noble player to see what's possible with superior skills but I think he can learn more from the games played at emperor/immortal by TMiT.


About this supposedly easy game, I got facestomped in the 500s,



So ignore my advice and play at whatever level you want

Useless was a poor choice of words. The bottom line I'm getting at is a player can learn more from bettor or worse users playing the game on their level. I've started a new thread and Poll in general forums as not to hijack your thread.

I'll be playing this game when I get home. It looks like a lot of fun