WOTM 25 Final Spoiler

Leif, thank you for a very fun game.

I missed the CS slingshot by one turn . I could get Math or Oracle in 1 turn, but not both. Hit the red button and then yelled at my computer.

Ragnar attacked Gandhi and I joined in about 1000AD or so, for my first war. Ragnar razed Bombay, and took one city. I welcomed Mansa in, and he took another. Gandhi gone. I declared on the French and invited Mansa and Roosevelt in, both getting a city. Roosevelt got Paris. Then declared on Churchill, who had declared on Roosevelt. Invited Mansa, Peter and Kublai, the game score leader in. I had not decided on who to get the PA with. Mansa got London. Decided on Kublai for the PA since he was biggest and when he agreed to a PA, warring was over.

Built the Pyramids early (first wonder), missed the Taj Mahal probably due to a Great Engineer, built the Statue without Copper (probably a bad move). Also wasted 2 turns trying to research Fascism for the great general.

I forgot about the Heroic Epic for a long while, but I think that helped me get a good string of Great Scientists. I build no cottages and finished at size 21.

I got the PA with Kublai pretty late (1600's). He helped with my tech rate, but was useless for building parts.

1868 launch.

ngraner42 said:

Leif, thank you for a very fun game.

1868 launch.

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You're welcome.

Glad to see you pulled out a victory. Sounds as though you went from happy to sad to confused and back again?

Glad to hear you enjoyed it.

Well, one important lesson I learned playing my first WOTM game, is not to wait too long to finish your game. I played the game in length the first day or so after release, but put it aside for quite some time for other things. Anyway, I guess I installed some mod or deleted assets not realizing the effect on all civ games. I can't finish my game since I can't even see the units or city names. In other words, my game is jacked.

Although I can't submit what should have been my first GOTM (i did submit the Ghandi GOTM recently), I will summarize my experience since I did play until the early 1900s. First, I'd like to say that the map and starting location were very nice. This is my first OCC and I really enjoyed the experience. Though quite different from other civ experiences, it does allow one to really focus in microing your big city. I was amazed at how much production, culture and wonders I could get out of one strategically placed city.

The level is over my head at the moment, but I was proud to get as far as I did and with what looked like a probable space race victory. War mongering really scared me in this scenario though it was inevitable.

1) I wonder spammed like crazy. I think I built all the important wonders including the Oracle, Taj, etc. However, I missed out on one of either the Great Library or Lighthouse.

2) Was able to PA Kubla though Defensive Pact and multiple wars with Saladin. Destroyed Mansa and Louis. Mansa was actually not a bad neighbor and we were friendly for some time despite borders, but he just had to go. Louis was a constant thorn in my side. However, I made a HUGE mistake that I didn't realize until after the fact. I feel stupid. I razed cities as opposed to gifting them to Kubla - or letting him take the last guy out. In addition, I airlift units over to him to help defend against Sally, but should have just gifted him a bunch and let him do the warring himself. Definitely a lesson learned here.

3) With Kubla, we were definitely in the tech lead. I was kinda proud that I was able to maintain tech superiority at this level. Space victory seemed inevitable unless some other AI achieved diplo. I started building parts in the early 1900s and finished off my last session around 1930. Now my game is jacked.

4) Interesting to see that others went with Kubla too, especially since I'm more a deer in the headlights - at least at the time. I've improved quite a bit over the past month and wonder what my game would have turned out now. My thinking with Kubla, besides his tech superiority, was to avoid PA with a neighbor. First of all, I wanted to take out Mansa and/or Ghandi via culture and war. I did take out some Mansa cities (cultural) before taking him down and also a Ghandi and Hanni city too - my land area was quite large as I was producing a tremendous amount of culture. Used some GA bombs as well. Second, I thought it a strategic advantage to have my PA partner in a different part of the world for easy foreign conquest and access. I may be wrong - not sure. Plus, about the time the PA came into effect I was close to flight, so getting troops over to him was easy.

5) What I think would have happened: I was well into building space parts at my cut-off, so I think space victory was in order but not until 1970 or so -unless Kubla played ball. In other words, barring getting slammed by AI wars, I would have been at least victorious in some fashion but probably not a great score. Was in a second war with Saladin, but he was proving no match. I would have taken, but unfortunately razed many of his cities. I can't believe I was razing cities. Not sure, but Caesar was becoming a bit unfriendly and I have a feeling he would DOW'd on me soon. A little worried there since he had quick naval access. Balancing strategic build priorities and units seems to be the biggest challenge in OCC.

Very disappointed that I wasn't able to finish due to technical difficulties, but fun game none-the-less.

lymond said:

Well, one important lesson I learned playing my first WOTM game, is not to wait too long to finish your game. I played the game in length the first day or so after release, but put it aside for quite some time for other things. Anyway, I guess I installed some mod or deleted assets not realizing the effect on all civ games. I can't finish my game since I can't even see the units or city names. In other words, my game is jacked.

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Sorry to hear that this happened. Do you know what you installed or did that caused this problem?

You completed the BOTM game using BUFFY without a problem?

Not sure how Warlords would be effected and not the other games.

@lymond: haven't you accidentally hit ctrl+B? This toggles the bare map view (also works clicking on one of the small icons over the minimap), giving the same effect (no city names and units).

@C63 - Interestingly, I loaded up again to check your theory and everything was back. Oh well, I guess it's too late now. bummah!

On another note, do yall rename your autolog text files for each game. I've been trying to set this up.

Space Win circa 1950 10K

This was a pretty fun game except for the end. I can't see how anyone managed a diplo victory. I got a PA with Khan and we were overwhelmingly elected SG in the 1800's. When it came time for the Diplo win, 2/3 of the remaining Civs constantly abstained, even though we had very positive ratios with them. So I had to change tactics and go for the space win. Khan only ended up building two spaceship parts and I had to wait several turns for him to finish. I should have placed them in my build que and I would have finished several turns earlier. Is the AI that stupid that he doesn't see the space win as a high priority when you're that close?

I toyed with the idea of a culture win but have not seen any examples of getting your PA partner to get the two other culture cities. Even so I knew that the more culture I got the safer it would make me. My culture borders would spread and prevent anyone from getting too close to me. Also allowing me to acquire resources I that were outside the BFC. I had most of the the Wonders that could be built and finished with a culture score of about 120,000. I never even built culture until the last ~8 turns. It makes me wonder what I could have had if I had built culture for 50 turns. It seems if your culture is more than triple that of all the other civs combined you should win. something like the single city culture win in Civ3.

The best part with my culture was that I even forced Mr. Culture himself, Gandhi to have severe problems. Before he was destroyed. I had surrounded Bombay with my culture. Several other AI cities were also surrounded and then auto-razed.

I declared war as soon as I discovered Alex and stole his Worker, crippling him early. I got peace then stole Saladin's Worker. He immediately counter attacked with an Archer and killed my Warrior and got his Worker back. This could have been disastrous, but I made amends with him. I did give in to some extortion attempts but had very little war the whole game. All early on and with some alliances the wars ended badly for the AI.

Khan was the #1 civ and I was the #6, so that is why I picked him as my PA partner. Of all the Civs on my continent, Saladin was probably the strongest but none of them were really worthy of the PA, I thought.

After reading of others success with the Domination win, perhaps I should have considered that. I didn't think it had much chance of success but I was wrong.

I won a late-game Diplomatic Victory.

The Plan was to get a Cultural Victory...
Things started off well: I founded most religions, hoping to go for a Cultural Victory. I chose a few target AI and spammed them extra missionaries. It was a given that our capital would be a Legendary City, but by the end, the closest cultural city of one of my chosen potential-partners (Churchill) only had just over 10000 of the required 50000 culture. Thanks to the bug (or design issue) that only lets you see the top ONE competing AI city for culture, it is a bit of a guessing game as to how close the second closest city might be and whether allying with such an AI would be a wise course. As a suggestion for others in future such games, I figure that one could count the tiles of cultural expansion in one particular direction from the centre of a city to get a very general idea of its cultural level, but it didn't come to the point in my game where doing so would have mattered.

Delaying Tech Research
Anyway, after I had gotten Military Tradition and had set up a few Defensive Pacts, I was loathe to research Scientific Method. Losing The Great Library and several Monasteries just didn't seem worth it, so I researched just about every other tech that I could get first. Finally, fearing that I would miss out on Liberalism because I had been messing around with unneeded side techs like Democracy for so long, I grabbed Scientific Method with Liberalism.

Poor Use of Great People and Civics
From there, I suddenly got the inspiration to go for Mass Media. I play so many cultural games or war-based games that it is not often that I get to the end of the tech tree. Thus, what could have been a great beeline was a slow push towards Mass Media. Further, I had three Great People spawn on my trip towards Mass Media, but because I hadn't planned for their arrival, none of them were used for light-bulbing. In fact, the one that was a Great Engineer did not even get used for building The United Nations, other than the few hammers which he contributed by being settled.

Further, having had Democracy, I could have switched to Universal Suffrage and used up some of my remaining cash to rush build The UN, but I hadn't thought of that idea until after The UN was built and I was deciding what Civics I should pick to try and please some of the AI!

The Good News
Even after all of those delays, I'd still managed to build The UN in 1320 AD.

The Not-so-good News
Yet it was to be to no avail--for centuries I was within 3 to 130 votes missed, never managing to have the right set of AI liking me all at once.

The Surprise Twist
Finally, near the end of the game, when shared wars started to kick in their diplomatic benefits and when my tech bribes were sufficiently large enough to get a +4 trading bonus from just about everyone, and still I wasn't winning the game, I gave up on going after a Diplomatic win and started to focus on a Space Victory. The next vote, when I selected a Diplomatic Win Vote (it was an automatic reaction by this point after having done it countless times), my heart jumped when I saw that someone had beaten me to a Diplomatic Victory! Then I read the name and my heart started beating again, as it said that Ramesses II had won!

Troubles Along the Way
A disappointment in this game was learning that Rock 'N Roll and the other Resource-giving Wonders only supplied one resource each. I am going to go out on a limb and guess that the Tiny map size is the reason behind this small amount of trading material. Regardless, I had been dreaming of being able to finally trade out 5 of each happy face type, only to be shot down. I'd even delayed getting them, hoping that one of my chosen potential-partner AI for a Cultural Victory would build some of them (so that I could give up on Diplomatic and go back to my Cultural plans), but when other AI started getting the required techs, I raced to get those three Wonders, managing to get two (Rock 'N Roll and Hollywood), losing Broadway to Hannibal.

I was seriously considering teaming up with Saladin for a possible Space Victory, when he decided he wouldn't bother to ask me and just joined forces with Peter. Okay, that's what I get for being nice to the both of you all game (no negative modifiers with either one of them).

My other top picks for a partner had been Churchill and Mansa. Churchill, however, having grabbed a Holy City from Gandhi, complete with the requisite Holy Shrine, refused to select the same religion as me anymore and yet he also failed to spam out any Missionaries, so I couldn't convert to his religion. Mansa was pretty weak military-wise at that point of the game and hadn't lived up to my hopes for picking up some of the World Wonders for which I had gifted him the techs earlier in the game, nor had he managed to be ahead in techs, so I didn't see much benefit to adding him as a Permanent Alliance teammate.

I was hoping to get someone else to want to be my partner once our shared-war time period kicked in, but I won before things got to that point.

A Few End-game Stats
I ended the game with 19 settled Great People, a size 20 city, and being half-way through researching Rocketry.

Further Ramblings
The map was a fun change and it is nice to have the odd game where early-game war mongerors can't clean up as easily. In hindsight, if one were going for a Domination or Conquest type of game, it might have been possible to destroy several of the AI early on and them hope that:
A) the AI whom you had left alive on the continent hadn't been friends with the dead ones and would thus still want to be your partner and
B) that the AI left alive on the continent would have used the opportunity to spam some cities, instead of waiting around until Galleons from other parts of the world showed up and took all of your hard-earned land

Armed with map knowledge (and knowledge of the fact that we had Horses available), I might go and replay the game for fun and see how well I can do in an early conquest spree. As it was, I didn't pick up Animal Husbandry until after I'd learned Alphabet, so I didn't even bother to build a War Chariot in my game.

Limited experience at OCC, but some basic ideas in hand, so ...

Settled south of the fish, which turned out to be on the horse.

Prioritized 'mids, for a specalist economy got that turn 74 (1080 BC), 'henge and Oracle built elsewhere that turn.

Built Parthenon turn 90 (650 BC), GLib turn 94 (550 BC). Got beat to Temple of Artemis, turn 100 (375 BC).

Turn 107 (200 BC) philo, found Tao. I am trying not to get invaded until I am ready so not adopting any religion. But Shaka declares in 450 AD. I repel his small invasion pretty easily.

520 I circumnavigate via map trading!

680 AD Alex declares on me ... can't get Shaka to make peace and he is a nuisance, so in 720 I get Louis to declare on Shaka. 880 I get Shaka to make peace.

920 I discover Liberalism first. Astro taken, IIRC.

1000 peace with Alexander.

Before this early war nonsense, I had decided a cultural win would be simple ... after all, I just have to get this one city legendary, right? I mean, they have adjusted that to OCC just like they adjusted the National Wonder rules for OCC, right? (Sorry if you hurt yourself laughing ... now you know who idiot #1 is.)

So I had built Sistine in 100 AD, Notre Dame in 600 AD, and in 940 went for Caste system and Pacifism ... artist spam.

Peace in 1000 with Alex, Gunpowder in 1090 AD, now lets spam culture.

Built the Taj in 1140, started maxing culture, built 5 GArt in a row

1480 the 5th GArt comes out, culture is at about 33500 (turns our the 5th GArt only saves one turn, at about 600 cpt) Five culture bombs, Thebes goes legendary ...

AND NEXT TURN, NOTHING !!!

Hmm, no one city culture wins, I guess ... now a scramble for getting a PA ... I don't have a lot of shared war time with anyone I am near friendly with ...

1525 I declare on Gandhi, as Hannibal has and he is one option ... but Musa is a better option, and I get him in that war in 1555.

Ragnar declares on Musa in 1560 ... now I am worried that Musa may get hurt, so I runs troops west. I have not declared just yet ...

1565 Shaka declares on me again ... this time mostly naval irritation, pillaging my seafood. He does tie me up repelling him and setting up a blockade outside the ice.

1570 Musa takes Delhi to kill off Gandhi.

1575 I declare on Ragnar ... share more war with Musa (my PA choice).

1665 Peace with Shaka the Pest. 1680 Musa makes peace with Ragnar. Can't interest Musa in any more wars at this time.

1730 Hannibal declares on me. Now Musa will join (1735).

1804, Finally get PA with Musa. He is tiny, about 4 cities. Need to capture Louis and Hannibal to give Musa some lebensraum.

kcd_swede said:

Why don't you attack Paris? Or better yet, Why the HELL don't you attack anything you lazy oaf!

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Ahh ... yes. City with one defender (or none after gunships) and it takes 5 turns or more for Musa to move an adjacent unit in to take it.

1806 Shaka declares on us (third time for me). 1816 Louis declares so we make peace with Hannibal to focus on Louis.

1856 Ragnar declares on us ... he is moving infantry and art at Musa's heart, we have the same and I am just starting to make tanks.

1860 Rag takes Timbuktu ... I arrive and hammer most of Rag's troops, Musa takes and Rag retakes 1862 ... I finish hitting Rag's stack and Musa takes it back for good in 1864.

Takes until 1922 to wipe out France. By now, everyone has built Apollo ... except us.

No way we get a Dom done with Musa's slow offensives ... grab London and Hannibal, then push for space is the plan, as I think Musa needs to be a bit bigger, and maybe get cities south enough to build space elevator.

1923 war on Churchill, 1925 Musa takes London.

1931 War on Hannibal, 1943 Musa takes Carthage, 1948 Musa finally takes Nottingham from Hannibal to kill of Carthage. Only sat 5 turns empty ... too interested in pillaging rather than taking the city.

Meanwhile, on the space race front, everyone else is making thrusters now. I built Apollo (Ironworks in Thebes, fortunately) in 1943 and Musa built a casing in 1947.

I beeline techs for space elevator ... of course, Thebes can't build it. Musa won't either ... I have to keep pushing tech to get them all in hand ... and KK is building his ship fast.

Ok, now race to internet ... build that, and now we have all the techs.

Unfortunately, Musa would not focus on parts ... although he did build Cockpit and was working on Life Support when Khan launched in 2006 AD. We only had 5 casings, one thruster, and the Cockpit done, with Musa 5 turns from Life Support and me 4 turns from Engine.

Maybe should have stopped conquest after Louis fell, or after London ... but then would Musa have had enough resources to get our tech moving fast enough?

A little faster city taking by Musa, and more focus on parts by him as well and we might have pulled it out, even after my culture wild goose chase. If those five GAs were GS and I built units or science instead of culture, then the space race would not have been in doubt.

Maybe for Civ 5, diplo has an option of 'Why don't you build ... " and a list of the parts?

dV

A very good attempt at recovery dV. I admire your flexibility and determination.

for sharing.