The ICS Experiment informal thread

This is just an informal thread to continue the conversation for my soon-to-be released ICS map for people to try. The previous parts of this discussion can be found here in the Maya/Arabia ICS thread.

Now that the patch fix is out I will try to play some to see how ICS has been fixed with the removal of the auto-annex bug. (You can also report your findings to save me some time, too, haha.) I will try to have a map ready sometime next week and there will be 4 civs to play the exact same map with.

So far, Maya and France are certainly 2 of the 4 civs. The other 2 can potentially be Arabia, Egypt, Celts, and Ethiopia. If there any other suggestions for civs or additional 'votes' for any of these post them here. Also post any settings suggestions. The map will be pangea but stuff like ruins or no ruins are up for debate as well.

I will be back after Thanksgiving to continue this conversation and I hope to see some interest in this.

Thanks
HR

Arabia figured prominently in the other thread (and I've never played Arabia), so I would favor them. Celts and Ethiopia might be a bit duplicative of the Mayans, given their religious advantages.

One not on your list is Russia; great production benefits from strat resources and greater ability to trade excess resources makes for competitive "wide" game. Haven't tried real "ICS" with them, and their UU comes pretty late, but would be interesting to see if they could keep pace with civs that have more natural advantages.

Of the 4 that you suggest I would pick Arabia and Egypt, but what about Iroquois?

I vote for ruins. I believe they are there for play balance for the human.

I would say The Celts would be great for ICS and should be included. I dont understand Maya and France though. They were never that big. Arabia, yes. They are a great Civ and you should play them at least once if you havent already.

Possibly USA and or Irioquois.

Also, I think you will need to define ICS for this game. In my mind ICS means something like 8+ cities by turn 100, 25+ cities by turn 200, 40+ cities by turn 300, etc. You can even settle faster than that (as in my game in the other thread where I had 54 cities by turn 300 and 3 more ready to plop down), but that could serve as a minimum guideline. On the other hand, tommynt is calling 8-10 20-pop cities ICS, which in my thinking is barely even "wide". So you will need to decide beforehand if you want to allow just "wide" as being acceptable, or require true ICS.

And, I would suggest at least Immortal since Emperor is probably too easy. Of course the potential problem with Immortal is the re-rolling if you don't get a religion with the important beliefs. Without the proper beliefs you won't be able to ICS, so this will make the "non-religious" civs more difficult (e.g., Arabia compared to the Mayans).

And, I would suggest at least Immortal since Emperor is probably too easy. Of course the potential problem with Immortal is the re-rolling if you don't get a religion with the important beliefs. Without the proper beliefs you won't be able to ICS, so this will make the "non-religious" civs more difficult (e.g., Arabia compared to the Mayans).

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Beliefs dont really matter, its more about the later choises, also ai chooses totaly random anyway and very often it picks sucky stuff ...
And if u dont outfaith AI u r doing it wrong anyway - well maybe apart deity

I d want Pagodas, Cathedrals and +1 food from shrines and temples
Byzantines all the way baby

ICS shouldnt defined by some number, but to use most/all land available, and if u settle after turn 120 more cities u r just crippling yourself.
In fact just using liberty tree and spaming more then 6 cities is ICS allready in the term on nonperfect play

My vote:

Maya, for most powerful UB in game.
Ethiopia, where early faith is as powerful as with the Mayans, yet without the science boost.
Egyptians, faith + happyness is just what is needed for ICS. Put a wonder on top. Weaker than above two.
Byzantines in the desert? For some powerful religious combos.

I don't get the usefulness of Celts though. +2 faith p/t overall & some happiness from operas seem a bit desync'ed with early need for faith & happiness in ICS.

Agree with tom, beyond 10-12 cities the curve of effectiveness starts to descend, unless the true goal is domination. Otherwise, why would you go for 25 cities apart from it being an eyecandy? For all i know you can have 80 cities, my calculator says it is pretty possible, but what is the point?

well im not going to require TRUE ICS. this isnt really about getting the fastest turn victory like the Sci challenge but it is still about attaining a victory and its not about most cities possible either. to me, this is about having decent sprawl so that the game play goes far enough beyond typical 6-city or less tactics. And it means settling the cities not just taking them. 6-8-10 cities is just barely considered "wide", imo.

I wouldnt consider this ICS unless you settled at least 15 cities PLUS whatever puppets/annexes you take by the end. Pretty much any dom game seems like sprawl because youve conquered lots of land but you didnt settle your own cities. Victory condition is irrelevant but I do prefer domination for this style of play. Plus other civs go quite wide and you can take plenty of their puppets but you still didnt settle them.

This wont be optimal for RedRover57 and it probably wont be what tommynt wants in a game either. But they view ICS at the relative opposite end of the definitions so I intend it to fall somewhere in the middle.

I havent decided on emperor or immortal yet. and doing versions for both is so tedious in the map making that im not going to do both. emperor will let more people try it and succeed but even going for as many cities as you can while being good and efficient with your military will still mean sub-200 victories. that probably means you couldnt get to 20 cities. and immortal will be a decent challenge for the better players but might not be winnable for those that are more comfortable at emperor. the new patch stuff has changed the game enough that i need to play some ICS myself at immortal to see what its like. so far ive only gone small n tall on immortal/deity.

im already getting on board with Egypt too. that will probably be the 3rd one. And Rome or Russia are interesting choices. I like the Rome one for their UA and going wide.

im having 2nd thoughts on Ethiopia. The Stele replaces monuments and puppet build orders prioritize monuments which makes me want to keep to the small settled number for Ethiopia while having a vast puppet empire. ICS negates its UA altogether and it has a late UU that might not even be needed.

USA and Iroquois are interesting. I'll think on them but nothing is really standing out yet to make them seem as sound. USA has nice UA but im not sure how necessary it is to going wide. And at some point Iro's UA becomes irrelevant as the whole map isnt covered in forests.

And if it werent generally limited to pangea Dido would be an interesting consideration. Free Harbor ICS sounds like fun at the very least.

my choices for the other two civs would be Russia & Inca...or are you not using DLC? If not my 3rd choice would by Byzantines. Russia gets all that extra production. Inca's UA saves a ton of gold in a wide empire, plus, the more terraces the better. Byzantines because religious happiness is pretty crucial to ICS.

Here's a good map to try on. I don't ICS exactly, but I try to build as many cities as practical, with 4 tiles between them and grow them all to size 20. It is both wide and tall, I call it "round". Coined a phrase! I tried it as India a few months back in vanilla, never needed coliseums. I know Hammer is setting up his own, but I just really enjoyed going round on this map.

Arabia, terra I think, emperor, all standard options.
Requires all DLC except Korea and WotAW.

Byzantium, for the big ICSing faith acumulation and a strong religion to help the empire develop.

Carthage, because it is even useful on pangaea, both for connecting conquered cities and for spreading your own.

Incas, because they are great at military, can make their cities grow without sacrificing production and yet create huge trade routes and roads everywhere.

I agree with the first-mentioned civs, and with the Iroquois sugestion.

Arab is a catch all civ. So use Arab for experiments. Strive for Great Library, The Mausoleum of Hallicarnasus, Petra and Macchu Picchu and you're all set.

Persia could be good as well. You'll want Markets anyway, so getting markets that also give happiness would be nice.

dont see how civs like arab or iroqu could even be compared to mayas

mayas and maybe egypt (depending on difficulty) are clearly the best ICS civs

and i ll give u guys another short view how to do it: (when aiming for s turn 210+- 20t win)

tech order: pot - stoneworking - horse - towrds pholisophy - towrds CS - universities - towrds xbows -
Bo: scout, monument pyramids (granny depending on land) worker, buy/steal another worker - real pyramids settler 4x library - NC - settler 5x

other cities monument, shrine, lib (if low production buy it) before cap can do NC

sp sorder: towrds fee settler --> 2 in Piety --> other lib sp till u build CI --> GA from lib --> GA from piety --> finish lib --> now either 2 in trad or patronage or switch right into rati

faith --> pantheon depending on land --> pagodas --> musques --> faster spreading should not be needed so maybe 50 faith for used dude

RedRover57 said:

And, I would suggest at least Immortal since Emperor is probably too easy.

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That depends on your personal ability. I struggle at Emperor level, and have never managed a win. So it's a rather subjective statement.

How about this? 2 Civs (France and Egypt) at Emperor and 2 Civs (Arabia and Maya) at Immortal. And for variety reasons they will be 2 different maps.

Really all of the civs are powerful enough in the right hands but Arabia and Maya fair better at Immortal in the hands of players that dont play Immortal so well. Maya is a strong civ regardless but them and Arabia will be nicely balanced for people who would rather play in their Immortal comfort zone or challenge themselves with a step up. And the patches have made the game a little more difficult for many of us.

@tommynt: in your hands it doesnt matter the civ, really. but Arabia gets gold/lux bonus (trade routes and bazaar) and camel archers. use all your horses on chariot archers, upgrade and roll over everyone while having lots of gold. they may not be as fast as maya in your hands but they are quite powerful, period. of course your games wouldnt last long enough for oil to matter but in others hands it is also very useful for the final combat stages with air attacks.

It's just an idea. Discuss?

just dont see how the lux bonus of arabia is any useful if u r wide and flooded with multiples of lux anyway and proly at war a lot and not even trading
and the camel archer? not like xbows dont do the job same good

If you are taking votes, put mine in for Egypt as well. They are one of my favorite to go wide.

Arabia has religious start bias, tommy. ICS'sing in desert can bring about a lot of faith.