GOTM 68 Spoiler

Magic_gorter · Sep 18, 2006

Peaster said:
Conclusion: IMO a 2025 finish is not possible with any plan that I know of. Probably 2026 is possible - with prior map knowledge, replaying, and some daring. Without replaying, 2027 would be a great feat IMO. [I got 5/6 in 2027, but had made no efforts at the Indians then].

Peaster I just replayed the game and finished in september 2025. So it is possible and mayby early 2025 or end 2024.

I build only 10 cities on the home island (rush build settlers). 10th city build in december 2022. Then build 4 howitzers and 1 ship at a time (also rush build). On this moment I was still in DEMO. Made one mistake....my first ship with 4 howitzers left my city and I was still in DEMO. Cost me a few turns before I switched to FUNDY.

From that moment I rush build groups of 4 howitzers and 1 ship. When I reached the Chinese I landed nearby, made peace and destroyed them on the next turn. Next turn those howitzers entered my ship (this ship went further west). A few turns later I reached the English and did the same trick. This ship went for the Russians.

The other two groups I build went for the Indians and the French.

I sailed around the Island of the French (landing on east coast should be faster i think). The French were the last civ to be destroyed.

Mayby end 2024 is possible if my first ship waited in a city till the seccond group was ready and destroy first the Russians and then the English. This way I could stay a little longer in DEMO without civil disorder and collect more taxes.

Destroying the other civs could mayby be done with 3 howitzers....if that works it is also possible to win a few turns.

I had of course the advantage of knowing where the other civs were. The irrigated fields of 3 civ's were visible.

I didn't build wonders...so my score was very low.....112 points (without scenario bonus).

Peaster · Sep 19, 2006

Magic Gorter - VERY impressive!

a) How did you get 10 cities by Dec 2022 (= "2200BC") ? You were doubling every 11 turns? That's the fastest growth I can remember seeing in ANY game! And with no huts and expensive IRB's ! I guess you were in Demo and set taxes at 100% to pay for all those engineers, and attack units ? No major unhappiness problems? I am surprised you could manage it!

b) I am a little confused about your journeys. A single transport went from Home to Beijing to English to Russians ? I imagined this map was too big for that. But it sounds like roughly 30 turns, which fits your Dec22 to Sept25 period about right.

What about Madrid ? You used a 2nd ship, maybe from Beijing?

Well, anyway, congratulations on a great result!!!

Magic_gorter · Sep 19, 2006

Peaster

a) my first city build an engineer when the food box was full. The rifleman was disbanded to get those shields. Build a road (no rails) and with a two tiles distance of the first city I build my second city in december 2020.

I went in demo in march 2020. Set taxes at 100%.

The engineers were rush build at once (IRB?) on the moment the food box of a city was full. I kept my cities small (size 1 and 2 to avoid civil disorder) and build no military units (emty city).

It is a little bit risky in a normal game, but the other civ's had ships with no military units so they could not take one of my cities. All cities were build with 2 tiles distance. Almost all the cities had 3 food and 3 shields in one turn. A few had 2 food and 3 shields. At the moment my last engineer was build I switched on building 8 howitzers and 2 ships. When I had enough money I bought them.

b)My first group was ready in may 2023 and sailed to the enemy (the English (east route). Made mistake of not changing to fundy (should have waited till july 2023). This cost me a lot of money. The second group was build end 2023. This group sailed west...first conquered Chinese and then the Spanish. The first ship conquered London and went back (a little west) to destroy the Russians (next time I better destroy them before the English). The third group I build went east to the Indians and the fourth group went for Paris.

It is possible to win a few turns....mayby build only 8 cities....and destroy enemy with 3 howitzers instead of 4. I will try it if I have time left before my holiday.

Peaster · Sep 19, 2006

Magic Gorter - OK, so you basically used normal ICS methods to grow quickly. And this works even better in Demo than Monarchy. The 100% taxes in Demo over-compensated for support problems (probably because you rarely had any units to support!) and poor ability to IRB. I'm surprised this works so well.

"IRB" means "incremental rush buy"... you pay for a warrior, change production to phalanx, pay for it, change etc, until you get to the bigger unit (engineer) that you really want. It is cheaper than a direct rush buy, but can be slower, especially if you decide to save more gold, and finish the last shield row naturally.

Thanks for explaining "b)". That makes more sense to me now.

Magic_gorter · Sep 20, 2006

Peaster - I now understand IRB. This was the method I used to get those engineers. First the spy and then the engineer. Build in one turn, because it's cheaper then building an engineer with RB when I need 20 shields.

Normal it's not possible to do this fast (we normally have not demo). But with demo you get so much money that the income is a little bigger than then buying those engineers. I just tried and it worked great.

Old n Slow · Sep 24, 2006

Duke, Great idea & plan. A real new thing for us to work out. I was very surprised at the barb irritation once my home civ was developing -- would sometimes get an outbreak every other turn when my civ was in a steady state (one time I noticed barbs appearing for five turns in a row.)

Also (re-)discovered an old idea. Set up an outpost about half the map away & grew an airport there (late into mid game however.) -- The air delivered trucks (natch the ususal supoport to justify $$) paid off handsomely (even f hte speed demons would gain by that trick or if their regular 'build a few & go' strategy would be sufficient.

Oh well, it's getting late inthe game -- I guess I should post pone the wonders and go out and visit the neighbors.

LordValuna · Sep 24, 2006

I just completed this as a one city( in replay) finished in Oct 2029
I didnt knock the AI cities down to zero(ie I captured them)
I used two groups consisting of 1 Battleship, 1 transport and 3 armour each

Duke of Marlbrough · Oct 3, 2006

Hoping to finish in time...

Now in 2030 Feb, two civs gone, two others being used for trade, next two not yet reached (even though I've found and bought some of their units

).

Ali Ardavan · Oct 3, 2006

Glad to hear you are playing again Duke.

Sharkbait · Oct 3, 2006

Finished mid 2030 after making many mistakes. Should have launched my assault earlier but was busy populating the continent. I railroaded as I went so maybe could have expanded earlier, but filled the place up. This might explain why unlike others I didn't have any barb problems - only 1 uprising near the end. I used Apollo to find the AI, building just as my 2 taskforces headed east and west - so no real loss to time.

starlifter · Oct 7, 2006

First thoughts.

The Good: Not much need for beakers; so trade bonuses are only half as important. You can choose any unit or govt from the start.

For a pure early-conquer, beakers=not of paramount importance. However, on this map, for GOTM play, trade is overwhelmingly important. The key unit I use, is not available: the Veteran Stealth Fighter. A small number of these can control all threats, if one has subdued the AI with haste. SF=ideal democracy combat unit! Get it with freight. However, gold remains the primary mover -- the the map itself is the "built-in" commodity-eliminator(yeah!!) -- for this GOTM, and the VSF will arrive only after most AI are extinct.

GENERAL PLAN
A quick glance reveals that this map has a profoundly powerful trade potential, as well as early conquer strategy. All civs and all stacks of units can be located early in the game, irrigation squares or not (see methods posted the the sticky thread).

ICS: I think Peaster has the right idea, IMHO -- similar to what I did anyway. However, I used ICS spacing, roads, very few RRs. To control happiness, military forces constructed in a Democracy and launched near-simultaneously in Fundamentalism. From the outset (after study and thinking, that is), I knew where my cities would be built since I could see the map -- including the sleaze cities (in my log I call them the x-cities, since they are ultimately destined for destruction in mid-game).

I considered building a Police Station, and using Republic (no unhappiness) during the voyage. However, there would be no post-size 3 cities yet -- and no infrastructure to boot. Plus, Republic limits the max slider to 80%. Ultimately, this set the conservative route of Fundamentalism, partly to avoid yet another mid-early game government switch, and partly to use gunboat diplomacy. Further, Fundy allows easy use of the gold factory with the tremendously powerful Fundamentalism small-city staged IPRB construction method amortized with precisely (well, nearly) timed completions, to maximize gold. This almost completely offsets the disadvantages of coming from sub-size 3 early game Democratic cities (note: this is a very unusual situation, which would not happen in a random map game).

The primary weapon of choice is the magnificent, overpowering Howitzer! The howies have no equal in this situation, and formed the military means to exert my will on the enemy. The plan was to make 4 task groups, to be sent out in certain timings based on mission. If shields were available (e.g., delay the launch, likely), an imbedded spy would make peace upon first contact, if necessary. Necessary means if unable to offload my howies, and blast offensive units. After peace, they would be expected to have 2 attacks apiece in a treaty-breaking surprise attack, thus annhilating the enemy.

AI & BARBARIANS
Since the Demographics said we began equally, then the AI would be in no position to begin a Wonder in very early turns. The AI would be no possible threat in first 2 years.

With the map revealed, barb threads would have warning... and being post-Mobile Warfare, no sea barbs. Empty undefended cities in early game, when the enemy is known to be a long way away is safe. Due to the pennusilar nature of the Human starting location, no barbarian threat can emerge with a ICS start, except from the very defensible East... in mid 2021 at the earliest.

However... a surprise was coming very early that would change things slightly. There was a lot of naval activity by the AI in the first few turns... destroyers, transports, and blasting. Really cool eye-candy! Fortunately, the transports seemed to be empty. The AI could not have built them, based on AI location and standard build times. But the human (at least me that is) started with no navy whatsoever. This set a consideration on task group composition: a spy would most assuredly accompany the howies, and sabotage/bribe any ship of threat en-route.

WONDERS
Wonder-wise, the plan was to avoid all wonders, and stay small, with 100% tax rate, until the main task groups are launched. No wonder is essential to conquer these civs, given the scenario and tech level.

Note: in practice, I decided to build the Pyramids along the way, which delayed TG 3 & 4 a few turns.

MILITARY
Task Group #1: Plan 3 howies, 1 spy. Travel East, expecting ~13 days from attack. Examine enemy units & locations with spy, look for new cities via diplomacy, then coastal direct assault on known city. After attack, load up and continue east to attack the next civilization ~7 days further. Heal enroute; build more if necessary.

Task Group #2: Plan 3 howies, 1 spy. Travel East, expecting ~9 days from attack. Examine enemy units & locations with spy, look for new cities via diplomacy, then coastal direct assault on known city. After attack, load up and continue east to attack the next civilization ~9 days further. Heal enroute; build more if necessary.

Task Group #3: Plan 3 howies, 1 spy, 1 engineer, 1 defense unit (MechInf). Travel East, expecting 9 days voyage and one day march from attack. Examine enemy units & locations with spy, look for new cities via diplomacy, then assault on spied city. Road & found nearby city, then sabotage, etc. if necessary, & make replacements as necessary.

Task Group #4: Plan 3 howies, 1 spy, 1 engineer, 1 defense unit (MechInf). Travel East, expecting 4 days voyage and 3 days march from attack. Examine enemy units & locations with spy, look for new cities via diplomacy, then assault on spied city. Road & found nearby city, then sabotage, etc. if necessary, & make replacements as necessary.

Note: In practice, TG#3 &4 had howies reduced by 1, based on ease of other TGs in annhilating the AI.

TRADE
After conquer, examine map state and gold reserve, and initiate trade with 2 Airported cities. The map itself is a massive trade engine. Pay attention to continents. Early on, attempt to max trade via demand of items like Gems and Copper to ignite the explosion. Micromanage raw arrows for max bonuses; watch the trade cap, and order the trade delivery so as to choreograph science requirement with trade beaker bonus. Keep science slider set to zero, and get one advance per turn. Do not forget the Scientist trigger man.

THE START
In the first Oedo turn (Turn 3), I declare revolution, and enter Democracy. To accelerate the start, sacrifice the Rifleman to get 20 shields, and produce an Engineer while Capital still size 1. Since the food box was almost full and you cannot disband your first and only city, population points were doubled for a mere 7 turns and 40 shields. After a single road segment, establish a new city with Whale, and a size 1 and a size 2 city now both make engineers. Since it is Emperor level, that is like having a temple already (compared to diety happiness control).

Conquer first, then expand. Remove enemy swiftly -- except the purple -- then switch back to Democracy, and build. Due to tech availability and map revelation, don't build big first, then wait fight a modern AI army. The AI is expected to build defensively at first, and possibly juicy late-game improvements -- either way, the AI will be building modern things with ancient shield output, and especially since its not diety, it will likely take eons before they are in shape to attack or build Wonders. If they do start wonder, it will likely be a modern one... again taking eons, and doing no real damage in terms of impeding Human conquering.

LOG NOTES:
1. All my sleeze (extra ICS) cities start with "x"; they will be killed later.
2. No rehoming of trade units.
3. No Recycling... but Environmentalism!?

(This post is 8052 characters long)

starlifter · Oct 7, 2006

I came. I saw. I Conquered. I Traded.

This is my log for January 2020 through December 2027.

I spent a lot of time thinking, and since the map was revealed, used the irrigation to find some cities (that does not work for all, BTW)... and used tedious clicking to find the rest. A long time before I built any offensive unit, I knew exactly where to point the ships, and what terrain they were likely to fight on. This was an overpowering help, and the catalyst for a quick attack.

And speaking of overpowered.... the Howies were sooo overpowered. Diplomatic tricks were not even needed to wipe out the target civilizations in turn. I had debated, however briefly, with myself about building vet howies with barracks. However, with low shield output per city, this would have meant several barracks, and the shield output was not worth it to delay the launch of the task groups. In hindsight, it should have been obvious, given I knew the enemy, and knew myself (to paraphrase Sun Tzu's "The Art of War"). No land unit can stand up to howies on flantland.

I was a bit surprised on a couple things. First, several AI cities had an airport. It must have been a long time in making them, since they are (in essence) an ancient "wonder", in terms of relative city production (e.g., the city had no modern shield-boosters, and the 160 cost is about the same as an early-game wonder like Colossus).

Another surprise was the naval warfare. After the naval shooting I saw, I did not encounter another battle nor did I see any enemy non-transport ships. I'm not a scenario-maker, but maybe it was all scripted, because it happened right on my doorstep?

Yet another surprise was how lightly defended the AI was. In hindsight, this was obvious... and even a little anticipated, but not really expected. Evidently, the AI is unable to effectively (rapidly) build a civilization in the modern era with ancient starting conditions (e.g., an engineer and no other cities). The AI therefore had no chance.

The world could be conquered by the end of 2024, if one is a pure conqueror and does not take a slightly conservative road (e.g., building Pyramids too soon). Two howies, a spy, and a transport can take each coastal city, if diplomacy is used. This will allow an earlier launch. Plus, no need to build the Pyramids. Just build the 3rd and 4th task groups, and go. The Mech Infantry were, in fact, never needed! A waste, especially because the spy... well, spied out the terrain and enemy so well!

The world was physically controlled in Game Turn 067. The game could have ended right then, score ~160 (GOTM ~359). An earlier conquer (at game turn 60) would likely get a GOTM~385 or so. Later, I may replay this just to try it. However, even without ECS on a revealed map in the modern science era, normal expansion would (could) yield nearly as good early growth. However, the map characteristics would be wasted... the map begs for conquer and trade.

Interestingly, both remaining civs offered 200g for peace, which I took. I had to break the peace (which was heretofore spotless) the next year to eliminate the European Union scum (I live in the E.U., LOL). The Indians became my pet, and I founded a pet-control city with the engineer.

TRADE
This game had such a low science cost (because it was not Diety?) that a HUGE amount of gold was lost in trading. Ugh. The only upside to that was that a Uranium or Coal or Gems or Hides all yielded the same value (cap) for a mid or higher developed city pair. That means an UN-demanded hides gave the same value as demanded Uranium (if properly delivered between appropriate cities). This is not often the case in "normal" random games, until very late game.

I kept a detailed trade log, and you can see the exact progression that fueled the trade-storm. And this was all done with no rehoming... the net effect was for small cities to build valuable freight (IRB them) before size 3, then store/pre-transport them to a faraway trade center, and deliver as needed, keeping an eye on cumulative science, to get one advance per turn with little waste.

In recent game turns, I simply reduced real-time by IRBing the freight to 30 shields, then spending the extra 10 gold by PRBing to 50 (instead of IRB to 40, then 50). As trade developed, few cities build anything. Everything is simply bought. Money flows in rivers. A single freight can simply buy (RB, at that!) an entire mid-game wonder, and give 1500 beakers of science.

Also, with so many wonders, I'm actually IPRBing, then delivering to 50 short, and letting a 50s city cap it off. Not a common tactic in most games, since all "small" wonders are already built. But 400 gold is 400 gold.

A trade entry like this, is decoded:

Route#17-Silver(u)-C02(as7)-N01(as12) 1034g(nocap;1128) [waste ~200 sci]

"The 17th trade route was Silver produced by city named C02 which had an airport and superhighways, size 7. The freight was delivered, undemanded, to city N01, wich had an airport and superhighways on a different continent for 1034 gold and 1034 science beakers. It did not get capped by the 2/3 rule; the cap limit was 1128. The cumulative trade waste on this turn was about 200 science beakers."

I will post some screenshots and other information later. I'll also send a pre-2030 save or two in, since this game may be over so quick. BTW, I saw some people were posting this sort of information, so here is mine, too:

Code:

YEAR:        00 01 02  03  04  05  06  07 
Peaster:      1, 3, 4,  6, 10, 15, 25, 39
Ali:          1, 3, 6, 10, 16, 23, 29, ?
Starlifter:   2, 4, 9, 10, 13, 19, 22, 43,

And here is the game log for 2020-2027. The game is still in progress; we'll see how much "real" time there is to grow a little more.

General codes:
GT - Game Turn
GTLS - Government Tax% Luxuries% Science%
s - science
g - gold
TF - Task Force
S- - "Start" (as in Start a certain advance)
MT - Mass Transit
M - Population, in Millions
Mt - Metric tons (shield output)
SF - Stealth Fighter
FT - Future Tech
cap - The trade delivery was capped by the 2/3 rule
nocap - The trade delivery did not reach the 2/3 science beaker cap
x-City - A city of mine whose name starts with x; that city will be destroyed.
DEAD - A civilization was destroyed.

Code:

GT  Year-Mo
--- -------  # GTLS ---------------------------
001 2020-01 001M703 Set 70% Tax 
003      03 001A460 Revolution; Located all enemy cities on this revealed map (Assume 1 per civ).
004      04 001D100 DEMOCRACY  
007      07 001D100 Disband NONE Rifleman
008      08 001D100 1st Engineer; Road; Make another Engineer.  
009      09 002D100 Founded xUr NW of Babylon (Sleeze city)
015 2021-03 002D100 2nd Enginner; All cities will be progessively Roaded, including over the East Trees.
025 2022-01 005D100 5th Engineer; Founded Ellipi 
028      04 006D100 6th Engineer; Founded Akkad
037 2023-01 009D100 10th Engineer (164gold, 1spy, 2 engineers)
038      02 009D100 1st RR link from Babylon to xUr; Will RR to upcoming City#10, but not Uruk forest.
039      03 010A460 Launch TF#1, east (3 howies, 1 spy: xEridu transport, all Howies fron Nineveh)
                      REVOLUTION; Founded Lagash
040      04 010F802 FUNDAMENTALISM (23 gold/turn); Will make base RR (no trees for now)
047      11 010F802 Launch TF#2, west (3 howies, 1 spy; xUr transport, all Howies fron Nineveh)
049 2024-01 010F802 009gold; Making freight for Pyramids instead of 3rd TF 
                      NOTE: Pyramids are for long game & will delay conquer/pet date.
                      Barbs wandering East of Lagash; only Partisan + Leader is left
                      Lagash protected with Spy+Attack Road, if Barbs approach; but moving SW
                      TF#1 is 2 days from Russia
051      03 010F802 Spy: D&S; killed all mil; spied terrain on RRs
052      04 011F802 Russians-DEAD (Moscow, white); 155gold
054      06 012F802 PYRAMIDS; Chinese-DEAD (Bejing, blue); 25gold
                      Making TF#3 (East for Indians, purple) and TF#4 (West for E.U., blue)
057      09 012F802 Spy: D&S; Attacking English now; all their military dead.
058      10 013F802 English-DEAD (London, orange); Launch TF#3 east (MechInf, 3 howies, 1 spy, 1 engineer)
060      12 013F802 Launch TF#4 west for E.U. (MechInf, 2 howies, 1 spy, 1 engineer)
061 2025-01 013F802 Making MC freight
063      03 015F802 Yellow-DEAD(Bolivaria: Madrid, no airport.....ugh)
065      05 016F460 MICHELANGELOS CHAPEL
066      06 016F802 Marine is waaay east of Paris (no factor)
067      07 017A460 Indians & E.U. offer 200g for peace; accept; Peace; Founded R01 (Pet keeper)
                      Spotted Indian marine with new city; REVOLUTION; Spy sabotaged Marine
                      (Could end the game right now, but will build & grow)
068      08 018D640 FUNDAMENTALISM; Demand tribute from Indians(War!); Killed Indian units except Eng
                      Broke peach treaty with E.U. (ouch!); E.U.-DEAD; roaded river
                      DEMOCRACY; only A.I. city: Karakorum (Indian pet, size 6); Renamed cities.
073 2026-01 019D640 Growing; Plan; Prepare for King Trade; Save up for key Airports and SHs.
074      02 019D640 Cry 'Havok' and let loose the terrifying Freight of War!
                      Route#1-Spice(d)-N01(as8)-A01(a8) 1044g(cap) 
075      03 021D640 Begin one Advance per turn with 3 beakers output....
                      Route#2-Gems(d)-A03(a5)-P35(as8) 990g(nocap); set 1 scientist. 
                      Founded 2 cities
076      04 021D640 Laser, S-Superconductor.   (N01 Coal demand gone! Wait. Send A04 Copper.)
                      Route#3-Copper(d)-P33(a2)-D11(as11) 1056g(cap)  [~250D vs ~380F]
077      05 021D550 Superconductor, S-Stealth.  
                      Route#4-Copper(d)-A04(a5)-N01(as10) 1068g(cap) (N01 now demands Coal again!)
                      Route#5-Coal(d)-A05(a5)-N01(as10) 1068g(cap) [Note: Wasted ~600 science]
                      P35(Either spend 80 & waste 13 shields, or go to 50%L for 43g to keep growth)
078      06 021D550 Stealth, S-Recycling; JSBACH
                      Route#6-Beads(u)-A02(a5)-N01(as11) 630g(nocap)
079      07 021D550 Recycling, S-Fusion
                      Route#7-Gems(d)-N01(as11)-B04(s4) 1080g(cap)  [wasted ~300 science]
080      08 021D550 (No Advance; bungled trade rather badly in planning)
                      Route#8-Gems(d)-P32(a1)-A03(a7) 630g(nocap)  
                      Route#9-Silver(d)-P33(a6)-A03(as11) 1180g(cap; Sci 1638) 
081      09 021D550 Fusion, S-FT001  *** TECH TREE DONE ***
                      Founded C04(Uranium!)
                      D11 Silk and R01 Copper EXPIRED... waited tooo long. Silk is now junk.
                      Route#12-Oil(u)-B03(as6)-N01(as12) 830g(nocap)
082      10 022D550 Peace forced upon us by Senate
                      (No Advance; bungled trade rather badly again)   
                      Route#13-Silver(u)-R01(as6)-D11(as12) 746g(nocap)
                      Route#14-Oil(u)-H06(as6)-A01(as12) 224g(nocap) [junk to finish advance]
083      11 022D550 FT001, S-FT002
                      Route#15-Coal(d)-P35(as12)-H02(as12) 1116g(cap)
                      (R01 Copper which EXPIRED at H02 is now demanded again!) 
084      12 022D550 FT002, S-FT003  
                      Route#16-Copper(d)-R01(as8)-H02(as12) 922g(nocap; both=Continent7)
                      Route#17-Silver(u)-C02(as7)-N01(as12) 1034g(nocap;1128) [waste ~200 sci]
085 2027-01 023D550 FT003, S-FT004; Working on Engineers, Freight & Hoover Dam  
                      Route#18-Gems(d)-A0a(a8)-P33(as8) 1140g(cap)
                      Route#19-Wine(u)-C03(as12)-N01(as12) 1140g(cap)  [waste ~600]
086      02 023D550 FT004, S-FT005; Barbs spewing out at A05 (Stealth will eat them)  
                      Route#19-Dye(d)-A01(as16)-P32(as4) 1152g(cap)
                      Route#20-Dye(u)-C03(as12)-N01(as16) 1014g(nocap)  [waste ~300]
087      03 026D541 FT005, S-FT006; Barbs spewing; 1st pollution (A5)
                      Built Airfield at 206,10 to recover Stealth which killed leader (no city near) 
                      Build 1st MT at A5; Founded 3 cities; Lots instant buys; Can't spend it all
                      Route#21-Dye(d)-H06(as3)-A06(as16) 534g(nocap)
                      Route#22-Silk(u)-D11(as12)-P33(as8) 1164g(cap)  [waste ~50]
088      04 026D640 FT006, S-FT007; No Barbs around  
                      Route#23-Uranium(d)-C04(as2)-P35(as16) 1176g(cap)
                      Route#24-Silk(u)-P32(as6)-D11(as16) 990g(nocap)  [waste ~400]
089      05 028D640 FT007, S-FT008; HOOVER DAM; Score 382; 15.7M, 189Mt; 949(251)gold/turn  
                      Route#25-Gold(d)-A02(as12)-N02(a2) 1188g(cap)
                      Route#26-Cloth(u)-R01(as12)-H02(as16) 597g(nocap) 
090      06 029D640 FT008, S-FT009; Barbs@A06/Airfield-KilledAllWithStealth  
                      Route#27-Silk(d)-H06(as6)-P05(as18) 1056g(nocap)
                      Route#28-Hides(u)-A02(as13)-N01(as18) 1200g(cap) Score 519
091      07 029D640 FT009, S-FT010; [017p 0250mt 0519s]
                      Barbs@A06/Airfield-KilledAllWithStealth  
                      Lifting spy & freight to PetKeepers to cause war.
                      Making key instant Vet Stealth Fighters @310 each; lots Eng @185-210 each.
                      10 freight; 9 more next turn.  20 Engineers; 9 more next turn.
                      A05 makes one eng each day (42 net shields).
                      Route#29-Salt(u)-A04(as12)-N01(as18) 1212g(cap)
                      Route#30-Wine(u)-A0a(a12)-N01(as18) 1090g(nocap) 
092      08 029D640 FT010, S-FT011 
                      Killed barbs at D02 and D04, and leader with SF & howie.
                      Rehomed a fighting Wool caravan from an x-city (x-cities will die).
                      [2 trade, 2300g] Out of money to instant buy engineers........ 
                      Must build freight reserve for more cash; 3+ day stock.....
093      09 035D640 FT011, S-FT012 
                      3 Trade, same old stuff... founded 6 cities, but will kill 3 x-cities (Sleaze).
094      10 035D640 FT012, S-FT013 ; CURE FOR CANCER (3 new celebrations) [score 618]
                      3 Trade, same old stuff; no barbs in sight  
095      11 037D640 FT013, S-FT014 
                      Accidently built Offshore in N02.
                      3 Trade  
096      12 035D730 FT014, S-FT015 ; Barbs again@airfield; Indian Marine done-he expelled a spy.
                      Indians making a paratrooper (4-shield production rate)
                      Insisted Indians "withdraw" troops: "Prepare for WAR".
                      My howie killed both the marine and the alpine (only eng is left).
                      1 Stealth killed 2 barbs+leader.
                      Messed up in C04... irrigated but did not reposition; cost growth.
                      6 Trade

OK, hope that helps. More will come later, as the game progresses. Good luck to all, and to all: have fun!

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starlifter · Oct 7, 2006

By Old n Slow:
Also (re-)discovered an old idea. Set up an outpost about half the map away & grew an airport there (late into mid game however.) -- The air delivered trucks (natch the ususal supoport to justify $$) paid off handsomely (even f hte speed demons would gain by that trick or if their regular 'build a few & go' strategy would be sufficient.

Hey OnS! Great to see you still civing in GOTMs!!

Your idea is excellent, and I'm sure you've seen what the effect of distance can do on the trade value in Ringworld. If you can, make sure the deliveries are on different land masses, and both have airports, and the source has Superhighways. Take an AI capitol, and celebrate it via Democracy ... all the AI capitals in this game are good trade partners. Don't trade between 2 small cities... at least one needs to be large to get 1000-1500g, especially for undemanded junk.

If any AI cities are still alive, check if they have airports (use a spy). If so, pick one and send it junk with a feeder... your bonus is no sliced in half when trading with AI cities, which means smaller cities can max the trade bonus (the 2/3 cap), and even those cities will be quite "happy" if lux are ~30%.

Use your money to buy more key freight and airports +SHs.

BTW, this map is one which is so fast that even the "speed demons" will be caught by builders like us. hehe. Trade and democracy are still king! :king:

starlifter · Oct 7, 2006

By Magic_gorter:
I was surprised to see that the AI civs were easy to destroy, so I could very quickly eliminate them all. I don't know if the other GOTM players find it easy to destroy them too.

Me too. The AI was hardly a speed bump. It has to do with how the game was programmed; it uses the same AI decision tree for late-game construction decisions, even when production output is low ("ancient"-levels). This seemed to cause it to be exceptionally "stupid" ... until it gets its core cities set up presumably. In my game, no AI had even founded a 2nd city. And with howitzers in human hands early, those few AI units were easily eradicated.

starlifter · Oct 8, 2006

I am in 2028 now, with a single pet city that can be killed anytime. I've just read the thread in more detail. There are a lot of good posts in this thread!

by Ali Ardavan:
1. Switch government at first chance to Democracy. (We start with Monarchy.) Keep it in the expansion phase then switch to Fundamentalism for warfare. Democracy allows more income and is the only form of government that allows taxes to be set to 100% which is what we need in the beginning.
2. Produce mostly spies and a few mech infantry for defense.
3. Build a few paratroopers for quick defensive backups. They will also be useful for offense later on.
4. Produce veteran military units only. There are several reasons for this. One, the units will not become obsolete later on. Two, this is a war game and the rivals (presumably) have all the techs as well and hence are an even match. Three, barbarians setting is at maximum and they are likely to show up in strength.
5. Build more roads than usual during expansion taking advantage of the immediate availability of engineers.
6. Build needed wonders aggressively or the rivals will.
7. Essential wonders: Pyramids, Michelangelo, Bach, Magellan.
8. Desired, but not essential, wonders: Adam Smith, Hoover, Cure for Cancer.
9. Nice, but not a priority, wonders: Shakespeare, Copernicus, Newton, Darwin, UN, SETI
10. Trade has lower priority than usual. This is partly because contribution towards science is next to irrelevant and partly because the one time bonus will be low given the negative effects of Navigation, Invention, and Flight. (Positive effect of freights is no match for the negative ones.)
11. Place more importance on coastal cities than usual because of the immediate availability of harbors and offshore platforms.
12. Build a helicopter and send it around the world to find rivals.

1. Totally agreed.
2. Partly agree. Build a defensive spy. No defensive units; offensive road to help spy bribe any encroachers. Use spy only. Map tech level and penninsula constraint allows almost total disregard of barb issue. Build only on starting continent, until fleet is launched.
3. I did not even consider paras; had the game been planned to go long, maybe so, however. They would only slow down TG & key freight constuction.
4. I did consider this; however, with howies and knowing the attack battlefield (flatlands), plus the delay in the fleet, I put it aside. Use "T" shortcut to ensure you will fight no city-on-hill battles that would prevent a 2nd howie shot.
5. Actually, I chose fewer, to increase settlement speed; but I did connect all core cities by a single road enroute to new foundings, including the forest 4 or 5 squares east of the capital.
6. Skip all wonders. If the AI builds them, great; they are mine in a few turns, saving me (1) the effort (2) speeding my conquest and (3) preventing the AI from expanding or mounting a strong defense [hindsight note: to my knowledge, the AI never even began a single wonder, nor founded a 2nd city].
7. Only one wonder would be essential, under different game circumstances: an unrevealed map. In that case, I would have built Apollo and delayed the fleet launch. That would have been 600shields well-spent. But the map was revealed, thus rendering no wonder necessary to begin the attack. Of course, later, the "essential" wonders are: Pyramids, Michelangelos, JS Bach, Cure For Cancer, Hoover Dam, Adam Smith, Magellans Expedition... and a bit after that, Isaac Newton and Copernicus + SETI.
8. Properly timed Darwin's Voyage.
9. Liesurely build of remaining wonders, keeping in mind the IPRB hierarchy of wonder values to ensure a single freight can construct a single early/mid game wonder, or late game wonder with a few helper frieght in a 50shield city.
10. This is a point of radical disagreement

. The map dimensions alone mark this a trader's paradise! Look to the trade calculations, and you will begin to see why the "negative" effects you listed are not a factor.
11. Harbors, yes; Offshore platforms, not a factor... due to the outrageous quantity of gold that can be generated from trade. Unless a city can make 40 or 50 net shields, no city will be allowed to "build" anything at all on its own (e.g., without IRB or IPRB help). Simply put, one turn to build... or if gold (pay the 80 gold rush fee), or save 82-88 gold and delay construction for a turn. Nothing is allowed to take more than two turns to build, when gold is smashing into my empire like a super-tsunami. King Trade. :king:

12. Even if the map were unrevealed, I would use Apollo. Given it is revelaed, and irrigation/click/enter can find anything, then I'd skip it... plus Helos are slow. If I were to do this, I'd build Shakespeare, home the helos there, and send a bunch out, not just one. It would be interesting to play EC with a Helo rush. Call it an HRush (anyone play Age of Empires?). I may just try that sometime. Send out two wolfpacks of helos, and no ships/howies. Hmmm.

by Geofelt:
Building Apollo was the key, and I wish I had done it much earlier

Yes, that is the one wonder that I'd consider key, were it not for already knowing enough to do the assault. However, Apollo would give a clear snapshot of enemy force disposition, which would be nice.

by URUWASHI:
Bach , Michelangelo , will be necessary if you play in Democracy....why will a war fought in democracy ??

This is true, and to expand upon it... if you want to fight a big early game war in Democracy, you will be sh-- out of luck. It won't work by itself, without wonders or city improvements. You absolutely must build some infrastructure, which is expensive. But to do it fast is the chicken-and-the-egg paradox. You need money to make money, yet you have no money. And you need even more money and time to build wonders like JS Bach and MC, and Shakespeare. The best way to fight the early game war in this scenario is undoubtedly Fundamentalism.

... TRade is useless,
...
Caravans were useless ,
...

If not done properly, very very true. Once you see what trade can really do, it will open new horizons in strategic options in other games. On this map, caravans were in fact useless... they were obsolete and could not be built. You obviously meant Freight, but freight was the most powerful unit in the game. A single solitary (undemanded) Freight can... and in my GOTM on more than one occasion did... build a 400-shield wonder (well 399 of 400 shields) by delivering undemanded cloth (I think) -- while simultaneously funding 2/3 of a ~2200 beaker science advance.

by Magic Gorter:
With the AI not building more cities I was a little bit disappointed with this game. I hoped for more enemie units and cities so I had to work harder to beat them. In this game it was very easy to beat them in just a single turn.

How true! A single howitzer could have been used to defeat at least 3 civs, even in mid-2025. By making just 1 (or 2), late 2024 conquest could be cake. Could anyone... with perfect play... do it by July 2024? That might be tough.

by URUWASHI:
So I got about 15 " Free " Missiles and Paratroopers.
I made some basic misstakes ( ie , creating too many Bombers 120 shield , instead I could have created Cruise Missiles , or Paratroopers 60 shields )

Hey, General Patton! Or is it actually maybe General Curtis E. LeMay (famed bomber advocate)...

by Bestbank Tiger:
... I rained cruise missiles on Paris ... Bye-bye, you sneak attacking weasels. Eat that. ...

OK, so you're Patton and URUASHI is LeMay!! That is a great post, and fun to read.

by URUWASHI:
As the game started, I look for the Irrigated tiles...and found 5.
Could not find the 6th...and I wondered , with such a massive map if I have overlooked.
Wrote the location of all Irrigated tiles.....and again, Came up with 5...!!

And you will not find them all via irrigation.

by Peaster:
* Read every Civ2 article in the GL at Poly.
* Read DaveV's guide to ICS again, and try it out.
* Replay your GOTMs, with notes. And whatever you do,
* Don't put a math geek on your sales team!

Some civ articles are dated, but Slow Thinker has done a great job orgainzing over there; I just looked briefly a moment ago.

The ICS is good to understand; however, I personally think it needs to be taken in context (e.g., modified) with a player's aim in a given game, and the game itself. One of the biggest mistakes which some players, including myself at times, tend to make is to rigidly apply a strategy, without enough regard to the individual game circumstance. Improvise, adapt, overcome. One thing that makes Civ 2 the greatest computer strategy of all time is its apparant simplicity (in strategy game context), yet multi-levels of interaction and affect. Like the effect of roads when you have Democracy available starting in Turn 4. But the core of ICS is the relative percent of tile control for a given city count.

Mistakes? Yes. I pulled an "undecision" in early game by homing my Howitzers in one city with option of Republic+Police Station (no unhappiness due to military units away... in effect, an ultra-cheap "wonder", given the tight nature of the core empire). When I switched governments, I compared the options and realized the effort was wasted, and went the conservative route of Fundy. The economic power of the Fanatic IPRB is not to be underestimated, despite how the Financial Advisor may view things.

by Magic Gorter:
It is possible to win a few turns....mayby build only 8 cities....and destroy enemy with 3 howitzers instead of 4. I will try it if I have time left before my holiday.

I agree with the line of thought, but maybe 8 cities and 2 howies. I did it with ease with 3, even with Pyramid construction (which cost 4 freight, 200-shields). Transport+2 Howies is 190 shields. In the game, I sent Transport+3Howies+1Spy=290 shields. Nix the spy and one howie; earlier finish means (presumed) less opposition (e.g., face 2 units or maybe even one). I think it can be done by mid-2024, if done with boldness and no distractions (like Pyramids and 'extra' units).

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Duke of Marlbrough · Oct 9, 2006

starlifter said:
And you will not find them all via irrigation.

Given time, you may. Some of them may not show up from the beginning but, as they improve the terrain around them it can show up later.

I had one that I could not see, then, a year later it was there.

starlifter · Oct 10, 2006

Yes, they can change with time. Its not a direct (or at least exclusive) function of terrain improvement though; but I honestly can't recall right now what is the true mechanism. :eek:

Dinamo · Oct 11, 2006

I've finished in march 2028. My whole game was in fundamentalism, and my ideea was to send two war partys - 1 transport with 4 armors each. One went west and the other east. As for the wonders I only built Pyramyds and Magelan Expedition, and in the last turn Hanging Gardens just for score. I've expected the AI to build more cities but that was not the case. And now I'll have a go on GOTM 69.
BTW - wellcome back Starlifter - I've read about you in old threads and I learned some good things. I just can't help to notice that your return generated an increase in posts and new (old) ideeas. Keep up the good work !

LordValuna · Oct 11, 2006

Dinamo said:
my ideea was to send two war partys - 1 transport with 4 armors each. One went west and the other east. !

You were most fortunate, each AI has a destroyer on hand at the start. The transports wouldn't last long if they encountered one along the way :crazyeye:

Cheers to your good fortune :beer:

starlifter · Oct 11, 2006

... each AI has a destroyer on hand at the start.

OK, now I had to stop doing my real life work, and take a look (I'm now in 2028, but have not been able to play for 3 days). I let the game run with map revealed for the start, and I see several things...

Spoiler :

argh.

GOTM 68 Spoiler

Deity

Emperor

Deity

Emperor

Deity

Emperor

High Lord

The Quiet Moderator

Mathematician

Warlord

Deity

Deity

Deity

Deity

Deity

The Quiet Moderator

Deity

Chieftain

High Lord

Deity

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