GOTM 16 Spoiler

Given the comment by Duke of Marlborough about the starting position implying a difficult game, once you get over the mountains to the west, there's plenty of good land. Actually, I don't think the first city (I settled it immediately) is going to be anywhere near my biggest or best. Found a nice river for the SSC on the north west of the continent. Changed my palace to here (expensive, but pays off in the long term). I reckon I can get well over 1000 science per turn out of it if I go for the spaceship.
Those Celts are a pain in the arse! Can't keep the peace. They have city walls now, so I'll just wait until I get tactics & cavalry.
It was easy to limit their settlement by patrolling south with a horseman.

The celts are a pain in the southern region, I have had a short war with them, letting them waste a few chariots against a well defended city, then they sued for peace.

We have exchanged a few techs and maps so now I know exactly what I'm facing and will probably cavalry charge them too.

Techs seem very slow, and wonder building has been difficult. I had one city building the great wall for a few turns then switched to mike's as soon as possible then the celts started building it, I sent in a few caravans and thought a had a good lead on them.

No more than four turns later they have nearly completed, I haven't got enough money in the coffers to rush build so I have to disband a trireme and musketeer and then buy.

I have a feeling that things should take off now, then the celts are going to get whats coming to them.

ferenginar

I don't know if I will bother submitting the game though, as it seems that none of them are getting through anyway.

Techs seem very slow, and wonder building has been difficult.

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Did you build Marco Polo's Embassy and become the science broker? I'm not convinced of the order of importance of Colossus, Pyramids, Hanging Gardens and Marco Polo's Embassy on a normal or large world. I think probably Colossus is best considering you'll need the longer term scientific benefit. There are so many good wonders early on. I spend all my time building settlers, minimal military and wonders in the first 100 - 120 turns.
In a small world, I think Marco Polo's Embassy is the most important wonder (followed by the Pyramids & Michelangelo's Chapel), since the game will be over quickly.

I have recently completed marco's and will science broker as widely as possible without giving gunpowder. I missed out on pyramids which has stunted my city growth because I concentrated on Collosus an Oracle.

I just seems that despite the tactics that I usually use, techs seem slow.

Ferenginar

I started this months GOTM a few days ago and played right through till 1AD.
I managed to kill the Zulu off early, using 2 horsies and losing 1, but I captured their city. I really like it when the AI attacks your units with its only defender!
The island isn´t really great and the decision where to put the SSC was also a difficult one. The site with gold and 3 other specials was really interesting, weren´t it for those many mountains.
I met the Celts and expanded as quickly as I could, changing to Monarchy asap to increase the city limit. I even already built the palace in my SSC, finished the Colossus there, working on the HG and am about to finish the Pyramids in the original capital.
The game is surely lagging somehow, not sure why, though.
But the Celts are finished off, too, capturing 3 cities and destroying 2. I saw an English(?orange?) trireme pass by, but no units to contact. The overall AI development seems even slower than my own, only the French are trying to build the Pyramids, too. Not a chance though.

Seems like an easy game, but one that could last really long, we´ll see!

I missed out on pyramids which has stunted my city growth because I concentrated on Collosus an Oracle.

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I never go for the Oracle because it's obsolete so quickly. I prefer Hanging Gardens.

Interesting everybody seems to be mentioning slow tech.
I've had the same experience. It's 1840 and I've only just got the Apollo Program. Considering the map size and green space, I expected pre 1800.
Maybe I haven't churned out enough engineers and sprawled fast enough. It's much harder to grow through We Love the President Day with luxuries on 30% at > King level. I really had to wait until Cure for Cancer to make it really effective.

I never go for the Oracle because it's obsolete so quickly. I prefer Hanging Gardens.

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Cardiff got the HG before me, oracle was next best to stem unhappiness, even if it doesn't last very long.

ferenginar

Synopsis of building wonders and whatnot. I am moving slowly, have many guards, but surprisingly little Barbarian activity. I even have Marco Polo, which is nice keeping up on the competition, but has yielded little science because the AI distrusts me. My idiot Senate has signed many Cease fires, but the "Revolution Rule of 4" has permitted me to continue to attack.

Ferenginar: I've been EMailing to matrix@civfanatics.net cc: m.c.lensink@home.nl and that has been getting thru.

1650 BC, Xerxes proclaimed Shah of new Persian Monarchy! 30,00,70%
110,000 people, 5 cities, inc $5 -0, Sci 9 in 8 turns, F11 Mfg=13, FS=8.6!

950 BC, declared war on Zulus to remove their Horse.

625 BC, built the Hanging Gardens of Pasargadae SSC. French switch to Colossus. Celts begin the Pyramids.

400 BC, built the Pyramids. The Celts and Zulus sign a secret Alliance against us, then run off. Discovered Iron Working. Choose Mathematics for Copernicus, over Literacy, Construction, Feudalism, and Polytheism, all of which we need. Building 5 Legions.

375 BC, the Celts Sneak Attack and kill an Archer. We kill a Horse. Founded Sidon Peat.

275 BC, French build Colossus. Zimbabwe is holding against the combined Zulu Celt onslaught, killed a Zulu Archer and Celt Horse, reinforcement Legions are coming, hopefully just in time. We have lost 2 Archers, 1 Horse.

250 BC, 610,000 people, 10 cities, $15 -5 = 10, Sci 36 in 8, Mfg=48 FS=5.2

175 BC, Cardiff built Lighthouse. 660,000 people. 3 Legions and an Archer rescue 2 severly damaged Veteran Archers.

1 AD, we capture Ulundi, size 2, and move in an extra guard.
780,000 people, 12 cities, $19 -6 = 13, Sci 42 in 9, Mfg=56 FS=4.7

20 AD, we sign a Cease fire with the Celts and save Ulundi from their Horse, Catapult and Warrior AND they give us 300 Gold! Tyre Coal mine.

100 AD, built Copernicus. Destroyed the worrisome Celt Catapults.
970,000 people, 12 cities, $20 -6 = 14, Sci 59 in 6, Mfg=63 FS=4.0

200 Ad, built Marco Polo, Legion survived Horse attack, founded Sardis.
220 AD, built The Temple of Zimbabwe and irigated the Corn.
260 AD, Spanish discover Alphabet!? We discover Polytheism, and choose Philosophy/Michelangelo over Republic/Science, Seafaring/Explorers, Construction, Feudalism/Pikemen, and Wheel/Invention etc. Our Legions survived the mopup attack last turn, there was no counterattack and we are advancing.

320 AD, we trade Polytheism to the Greeks for the Wheel. The Spanish and the Greeks sign a peace treaty, and we wait another 4 turns for Philosophy.

440 AD, built Michelangelo's Chapel. French and Greeks sign peace treaty. The Greeks got Seafaring from the French, and we trade them Philosophy for it.
Founded Samaria, and began building Explorers.
1,290,000 people in 15, $24 -7 = 17, Sci 67 in 11, Mfg=75 FS=4.8

680 AD, start the Revolution: turn=134 = 33*4+2, found Dariush Kabir.
700 AD, Xerxes proclaimed Consul of new Persian Republic! 30,00,70%
And, the Celt Catapult blunders into our Archer.
2,110,000 people in 19, $51 -12 = 39, Sci 142 in 9, Mfg=102 FS=4.

1000 AD, we buy Tintagel, storm and capture Armagh.
3,230,000 people in 28, $73 -19 = 52, Sci 188/5, Mfg=149 FS=5.0
2 captured Barracks, 10 Temple, 5 Library, 2 Markets. 14 Settler, 16 Legion, 10 Archer, 5 Pikemen, 2 Horse, 5 Crusader, 2 Catapult, 1 Trireme, 1 Diplomat, 6 Caravan, 3 Explorer, and in production: 7 Settlers, 4 Horsemen, 2 Diplomat, 4 Caravans, 4 Temples, 2 Library, 2 Markets, and 2 new Harbors.

Now Cardiff has City Walls -- the sole remaining Celt city.

Ugh! I don't think I am playing very well this time. I wanted alot of cities (as usual) since that seems to be the best tactic, and I also wanted to kill my neighbours as quickly as possible so that I would have room for the cities. But I also wanted some wonders and an SSC, so I tried to do all these things at the same time (as usual). The thing is, that you have to depend so much on luck if you are going to have just a little army, but still kill the neighbours, so I had to wait a little, and build cities close to the AI's before making an assault. With the terrain, it takes a long time to connect the cities with roads, so I had to skip that most of the times, and just keep building cities and settlers.

Right now I am 100 BC with 25 cities, but only 950.000 people. The capital has hanging gardens and colussus, while a city close by has the pyramids. I killed the green AI very fast with a chariot (they didn't have bronze working, hehe), and soon I have killed the yellow AI. The celts are not easy to kill, so I just develop the island a little before I try to take any more of their cities. I have seen a purple boat, but not made contact. I hope I will find them soon so I can give them some techs.

The thing is that I don't have currency yet. I should have picked that long time ago, but I hoped that either the spanish or celts would have it before I made my assaults, but they didn't. I have republic, philosophy, and soon monotheism, but no currency or trade. I only have 17 discoveries. Why am I so slow in research??

Don´t worry. This GOTM is slow for all of us.
I was very surprised to see how slow things are, even with 3 trade routes, the Collossus and Copernicus, my science is still lagging. I´m exterminating the Sioux right now, to make them my pet civ.
But all the other civs (the orange one are Greeks, not English as thought earlier) seem pretty strong.
My home continent is almost civilized now, I´m working on Mikes, Shakes and Magellans to get the show going.
I´m not sure though whether to switch to Republic, still too many wars too fight.

Well, on the positive side, trade is picking up, my settler contingent is increasing steadily and money seems to be no issue on this map!

My crusades will start soon!

Did anyone have trouble w/ the Zulus? They stumbled through the woods and took a couple of my cities, which I promptly took back. I thought they and the Celts might finish each other off, but the Zulus were too strong, and the Celts, damn them, gave up.

Once I got Crusaders, I went after the Zulus -- I've managed to cut off Zimbabwe from the rest of what's left of their empire. Once I send a few dips in there to take out the city walls, Zimbabwe will be mine! (Zimbabwe has both the Gardens and Marco, btw.)

I expanded west and south to start. I finally got around to building boats, and there's a continent across the water from the original starting point -- I've sailed all the way around it, and it appears wiiiiiiide open for massive Persian development.

Tech *does* seem slow, but I've got the Colossus and Copernicus in my first city, and I've been ahead of everyone else in science for a while now. It's 1500 AD, and I'm only a few turns away from getting Newton.

(edit: wrote this at work and goofed up the date -- i'm a lot later in the game than I want to be. And after reading lucky's and smash's posts, i realize i'm just a goldfish trying to swim in this GOTM pond with a couple of sharks!)

Not I.I wandered abit and got an archer.I settled my cap in the mountainous 4 special site and 2nd nearby where there was some whales.My archer found the Zulus in almost no time.Straight over for the hut pattern and there was Zimbabwe.
Found a few more units including a legion.That legion more or less conquered the Celts on it's own...all 2 cities .

Soon found out I was on a big island so went after Marco's asap.Made nice with some non military tech gifting and shared maps with the rest.AI is not doing very well in the city department.Just purple doing half decent.

at 1AD:
33 cities
23 techs
2 wonders
2 civs conquered
Monarchy

Marco's and Gardens built.Mich's will be ready for the oedo year of 60ad when I will establish a Republic.Only other wonder is purple's Pyramids in Little Bighorn,which just happens to be within sailing distance

I should have gone for trade right away. What was I thinking? Now it will take ages to get Michelangelos chapel, and I don't even have trade yet.

At 1 ad I have 29 cities, 19 discoveries, I am in republic researching every 5th turn. I haven't found the purple yet, but killed the yellow. The cities are growing fast with pyramids, and everyone is unhappy. I gotta have Michelangelos chapel! Raising luxuries is no good.

Ah well. You live and learn... At least there are 3 dead civs right now (french killed by greeks in the beginning).

Another part done, this is surely going slow! Techwise.

I have my purple pet city, destroyed the French, conquering the Spanish right now and will wait a bit more for Metallurgy to counter the Great Wall of the Greeks. Almost all land is settled but still with lot´s of space in between, will change to Demo as soon as I get it.
Maybe I also should have built the SSC on the mountain, like Smash did. Not sure whether that would speed things up though.
Anyway, time is speeding this time, don´t know why. I gifted the purple lots of things but the SSC is still not really humming.

One fun new strategy was implemented though, conquering the AI civs with only 1 diplo!
Try that!

Well, it worked like this of course. Position the diplo on the border, wait for several barbs and bribe them (got me 4or5 NON legions and 4or5 NON crusaders). Those were up to the task to conquer the French. Threw in some more crusaders for the Spanish and probably some reinforcements against the Greek as well.

When i read about this no city strategy with the huts and NON's units. (which was a surprise to me)

I thought using diplomats to bribe units is the logical step to have cities for point and still have a good military

I discovered Zimbabwe a barb city, so left that for the Celts to gnaw on. Shipping a settler overseas early didn't help my home island growth, though, and I'm stupidly waging a wasteful war by pushing against the stream of Celt elephants and settlers. My usual solution to a dragging attrition war is to build a road (or railroad) network. Still fighting, though.

This map is really about settling that big island, and managing both a peace and a war economy at once. Or am I thinking too much?

Nope, you don´t!

The key to success is the earliest possible conquest of your home continent and the surrounding islands.
Next objective should be decimating and isolating the purple civ to gift it all techs for increased research because that is awfully slow this time. Then should be the time to destroy the remaining AIs and settle the world.

It seems that smash, lucky and el_kalkylus have chosen what I would call 'the big gun' strategy in this game: expand, expand, then start your crusade when you feel like it.
I chose 'the early elephant'.
At 1AD smash has 33 cities, pop=1 240 000, producing 113Mt.
I have 9 cities, pop=670 000, producing 43Mt.
(but I have 20 vet elephants on the war path)
Is the big gun going to beat the early elephant?
Matrix knows the answer .

I made one of my resolutions -- I started earlier in the month. On the downside, I think that I'm still too careless in the opening. Lost a couple of cities to Babs (both had to be restarted) & was slow with the first conquest.

On the bright side I had my vet elephants ready when Zimbabwe added Marco's to their Pyramids; one turn later it was my Marco's & Pyramids.

Want to try an experiment. A bab horde broke out in an unpopulated area near one of my recently conquered cities (but across water so they won't trouble me). I'm thinking of sending a boat over with two engineers & the rest dips -- if I start a new city & let the babs have it & then buy the remaining babs, will they be Nons since the closest city belongs to them? then, of course, I'll buy the city back.

I need to keep reminding myself -- don't fight babs, buy them.