Mayan Mayhem: A Huge Deity Histographic

Great work! Can I just ask, why do you play archipalego? Is it to because the AI choke even more on units or because you like to forcus on one war area at the time? Because surely it must be more time consuming with all the caravels?

Archipelago maps simply have higher domination limits than pangaea or continents.
 
Stoeretebeker said:
How many armies do you have, Spoonwood?

In 540 AD, as I recall seeing last night (I'm not looking at my save right now) I have one 3-knight army, thirty-nine 3-cavlary armies, and one 4-cavlary army for 41 armies total. I generally only attack cities with rifles with fully healthy ones, or an army with one or two hitpoints missing (a 13/14 army I'll attack with, as well as a 12/13, probably an 11/12, maybe a 12/12, maybe not, generally not a 9/13). Other armies will heal or help clean up other units.

AnthonyIII said:
Can I just ask, why do you play archipalego?

60% archipelago maps have the most number of tiles available of any possible map acceptable for the HoF. The more tiles, the higher the scoring potential for various reasons. It's nothing to do with military strategy. In truth, if I played pangea as I did in the Deity game earlier in this thread I would find things significantly easier... at least in principle... and not just because I wouldn't have to load units onto boats much, if at all. If everyone lay on my home continent, or at least almost everyone, I could either completely or predominately go with 4 cavalry armies. 4 cavalry armies can often attack and defeat rifles in cities without too much fear of losing even multiple times in one turn, and in my experience even attacking with them on the higher end of the yellow-line can work well against fortified rifles. Also, if fully healthy, a 4 cavalry army can take on a fortified infantry in a city and win often enough. But, for this to work in this game, I'd either have to have fewer armies that I can move around, or I'd have to wait until I learned Combustion... which would mess things up in several ways.

AnthonyIII said:
Because surely it must be more time consuming with all the caravels?

I think you mean galleons (or transports if you read SirPleb's old game), but yes, it does come as more time consuming.
 
550 AD-Akshak flips to the Sumerians. 2971 tiles under my control at the start of this turn with a score of 5917. In the east I retake New Sardis. The Hittite stack has grown and now has a pike, a medieval infantry, and a redlined archer. So, I may as well leave that spot alone.

I retake Akshak which has a 4/4 rifle, a 3/3 rifle, and a 2/2 rifle, but I only needed one army to retake it. I capture Kisurra, Zabalam, Agade, Lagash, Kutha...

I guess Sumeria has 15 cities left:





I also capture Nagsu, and Carthago Novo. As I believe I said before, I had ICSed my tundra, so I can get some more territory without doing anymore captures:



That said, I do plan on only settling in new cities which give me a significant increase in territory from now on, or in permanent locations. I'll have at least 3093 tiles under my control by the end of this turn.
 
Question: Should I disband some of my native cannons to put in temples in cities that can use them so I can get more territory with the same number of cities? I come in "average" to Greece right now, and "strong to "Korea". In the Korean war it'll come as easy to use all of my cannons, but I don't know how many cannons I'll end up transporting for the Greek war. I have 41 armies, as detailed above, and I think some 140-150 cavalry total. I have planted and chopped forests in some spots, but I guess it might do me good to do some more of this (I haven't kept track of where I have and haven't done this). I think I need most of my cash for galleons, frigates, and to get more gpt when I have it available.
 
550 AD continued-With some 75 non-native cannons, I think it worthwhile to disband some cannons towards temples in permanent spots. I could also disband cavalry for this, as well for armies, but I don't know if I want to do this yet. After doing 1 or 2 cities for disbanding, I decide the best strategy comes as to buy up to a multiple of 10 shields, and then disband the cannons for the rest of the shields on a temple. I have 3113 tiles under my control by the end of this turn.

560 AD-I see Persia defend three times, two times with a pike, and one with a spear, winning all three battles. Saldae flips to the Sumerians and New Arbela flips to the Persians. I have 3088 tiles under my control at the beginning of this turn, with a score of 6143.

In the west I recapture New Arbela. Saldae has a 3/3 rifle in it at size 4, and I attack it with a 5/5 cavalry, spawning another MGL. I capture Sumer, Ur where I use 6 armies to defeat 6 rifles, Bad-Tibiria. I also spawn another MGL. I capture Erech and Kish also. I'll have at least 3221 tiles under control by the end of this turn.
 
560 AD continued-after railroading some Korean territory I also manage to capture Babil. Silly AI with their pillaging of roads:



570 AD-The Russians declare war on me. I don't lose any cities, and they didn't attack me with anything. Agade, Akshak, and Kutallu flip to the Sumerians. Score to 6375, with some 3186 tiles under my control. Hopefully Persia will die this turn:



So that I don't stall I'll start in against Korea this turn. I've decided I won't sign in everyone I'm not currently at war with against Russia so that I can duck out of that war anytime I like. That said, I will sign in Greece, Babylon, and the Hittites against them, since these alliances will come for free. So, really this means that I've only left the Byzantines out, which doesn't really worry me at all:



I recapture Akshak, Agade, and Kutallu from Sumeria. I get an MGL while attacking Taegu. From Korea I capture Taegu which doesn't work out as well as I would have liked:



And here's my solution to the difficulty:



I bet you guys can guess the spot from which my armies attack Taegwon, which I do capture. A 12/12 army loses to a 4/4 rifle in Sokch'o which stands at size 6. I do manage to capture that also. After redlining a rifle to 1/4, I somehow lose two 5/5 elite cavalry to it... these things I suppose do come as expected sometime with the number of battles I've fought. Korea will take a while to eliminate:



I think I'll have 3243 tiles under my control at the end of this turn.
 
580 AD-The Hittites finish off the Persians! Gades flips to the Sumerians. I have 3229 tiles under my control at the start of this turn, and a score of 6614. A few turns ago I had the luxury slider at 80% to keep all core citizens happy and as many semi-core citizens as seemed reasonable. Then 70%. Then 60% I think for 2 turns. Last turn I had it at 50% (with the extra declarations from Russia and Korea). Now that Persia has finally died, I don't need the luxury slider anymore. Hopefully I won't need all too many clowns or tax collectors in corrupt areas anymore either. I have some cities sitting at size 6, unable to grow, producing workers/settlers. I could use more specialists in these cities without starvation. However, since I don't think I'll have enough scientists to get Electricity in faster, I just let citizens work tiles for more happiness (for those that don't know, a happy citizen gives you 2 points, while a specialist or content citizen gives you 1 point). Also, since Persia has finally died off, I now control the Pyramids and Sun Tzu's without fear of losing them on a flip. So, I'll sell off all the barracks and granaries I have on my home island.

I recapture Gades from the Sumerians.
 
Q I have planted and chopped forests in some spots, but I guess it might do me good to do some more of this (I haven't kept track of where I have and haven't done this).

Remember that CivAssistII keeps track of where forests haven't been chopped.

Actually, this is kind of spoilerish, because it keeps track of chops done by the AI when you can't see it, too, but I don't think most people have an issue with it.
 
Remember that CivAssistII keeps track of where forests haven't been chopped.

Actually, this is kind of spoilerish, because it keeps track of chops done by the AI when you can't see it, too, but I don't think most people have an issue with it.

Thanks. I do remember reading that, but I don't use CivAsssistII and when I tried to install it on this machine I didn't get it to work. I did have a system (well two actually, but the second one I never full adapted to) to keep track of forestry in some previous games, but I've abandoned it in general, as the gains didn't really feel worth the time to me. They might here, though maybe not, I'm not sure.
 
if your problem with ca2 lies in its unwillingness to run under win7, my IT man managed to make it run on a virtual pc where an older version was installed. unfortunately, only either civ3 or ca2 is running there at one time, so i start the game in a win7-environment, play a turn, save and then have to change into the nt environment and pick the save into ca2 in order to get the new data in.

maybe this helps, it took the nerd quite a while to come up with that solution.

t_x
 
580 AD continued-I capture Akshak from the Sumerians. Due to Korean pillaging, I can't make any more captures in this direction this turn:



From Korea I capture Chonju, Haeju, Inch'on, Ulsan, P'yongyang, and Pusan. I'll have around 3324 tiles under control by the end of this turn.
 
580 AD continued-I sell off all the barracks and granaries on my home continent and decide to purchase some aqueducts and workers to pick up growth. I planted forests and chopped in many squares near a captured city, and I had multiple returns which did nothing. So, I don't think I'll chop forests. I thought about adding some native workers into newly planted size cities to speed growth, but decided against it at present. I had checked to see how much better I could do in research with scientists, but even though I could get Electricity faster at max research, I don't think it worthwhile to do this for Electricity, so I stick with the minimum run.

590 AD-Sumer, and Kish flip to the Sumerians. This takes my tile count down to 3291, with a score of 6867. I recapture Sumer, and Kish from the Sumerians. Here's another oddity:



The Hittites have become Furious with me. Gifting them 100 gold hasn't improved much lately. So, I decide on signing an alliance with them against Sumeria, which I won't cancel until I kill them. Fortunately, I don't have to pay them anything to do this. That doesn't do anything noticeable, so I also decide to pay 2 gpt to ally them against Korea. That didn't change anything either. Oh well.

I capture Iol, and New Theveste from the Sumerians. From the Koreans I capture Zama, Cheju, and Suwon. I attack with 3 armies at Manp'o, and win 3 times, but it has 4 rifles, so I won't capture it this turn. I finally realize that putting 1 regular worker on a flatland squares to road them doesn't come as effective as putting 1 regular slave on a flatland squares, so long as you can wait for the road to come in. I have 3390 tiles under control at the end of this turn, with culture pops coming in from temples.

600 AD-I lose Zama, some cannons, and some workers to the Koreans. I had foolishly left only one rifle in the city forgetting that their main contingent of units had gone this direction earlier to fight Sumeria. Ulsan flips to the Koreans. 3390 tiles at the start of this turn, with a score of 7127. I recapture Ulsan and Zama from the Koreans.

From Sumeria I capture Tingis, Dabrum, and New Ur:



When attacking Gigthis I spot an interesting stack:

 
600 AD continued-I don't see any sense in capturing Gigthis this turn, as I have another stack that I've worked on this turn:



From Korea I capture Manp'o, Ch'ongfu, Taejon, Thaenae, Iri, Hamhung, Chinje, Paegam, Kaesong, and Tokch'on. A lot of these cities consisted of size 6 or smaller cities which only had two rifles, sometimes 4/4 rifles. So, I played a little more aggressively than I usually do, even using some 8/13, 8/14 cavalry armies to attack cities. Fortunately, I didn't lost any more armies. Here's another example of a situation where "combat" settlers can help pick things up pre-artillery proper. The before:



And where's the settler can go:



I'll end up getting 8 chopped settlers and a cannon from all the forests the Koreans had laying around those cities next turn. Here's my army (and that's 321 for the native workers... I think I had 295 last turn):



I'll have some 3537 tiles under my control by the end of this turn.
 
I've noticed something else interesting looking at Moonsinger's game using CrPViewer. The Sumerians have the ToA and they're not on her home continent. But, she does get cultural expansions in some tundra areas. So, it seems that Moonsinger put temples in some temporary cities in her game. I have a hard time believing that's really the way to go, but it did get her tile count up at some points in the game.
 
EMan,

If I understand you correctly then, you do the calculations for the full 21 squares in the fat X first. Then, if any tiles overlap with another city you keep the overlapping tiles for the higher scoring city, and re-do the calculations for the lower scoring city without those overlapping tiles.

For example, were we to evaluate New Salonika and 251 in the 1st screenshot of post 94, we would first notice New Salonika as having 1 center, 6 coasts, 2 seas, 1 plains cow, 4 grass, and 6 plains. From what you've written above, it seems you would assign a value of +0.50 to a plains cow, since it has 5 food fully railroaded... and your numbers seem to have a base of 4 food when fully railroaded and increase or decrease by .5 for each food over or under 4 food respectively (except for sea squares, and city centers). So, New Salonika has a value of

((2+.5-3-6-1.5)/20)=-.40

With a plains sugar having the same value as a grassland, 190 keeper actually, if I did the calculations correctly the same value as New Salonika, but I digress.

251 has 1 center, 4 grass, 1 plains cow, and 15 plains. So, it has a value of approximately

((.5-1.5-7.5)/21)=-.40476... so it doesn't make the cut. But, supposing for a moment, just to try and understand your system, we had the threshold value at -0.50. Then, since 251 comes in weaker than New Salonika the overlapping tiles will get assigned New Salonika implying that 251 loses 2 grass, 1 plains cow, and 4 plains. Thus, supposing it didn't overlap with any other cities. So, it has 1 center, and 11 plains giving a value of approximately

((-1.5-5.5)/14)=-.42857...

Would you do the calculations that way? What did I miss?
I didn't forget about your question.....From Last Year! :lol:

The answer is YES. You've got it down, with one slight change, I just noticed:
You divided by 20 to get New Salonika's score. It should be 18, because the 2 Sea tiles don't count towards the Domination Limit! (Viz. You divide by the number of tiles included in the DL tile count, and Sea tiles are not included.)

However, there are a couple of things I need to point out:
1. Most important: I see I had a Sea Tile valued at +1.00 in my table....That was a typo.....Should have been +2.00. (Viz. the value of 1 Happy Citizen.)....Now corrected.
2. You example is complicated by the existence of city 190 Keeper, because that is part of the equation. (Viz. You have to determine the "Dominant" or "Senior Partner" city before doing the calculation on the unassigned tiles.

Having said all that, you certainly have grasped the explanation I was trying to get across.

Conclusion:
It goes to show the value of Sea Tiles and means that most of your coastal cities, unless they contain too many Tundra tiles, will generate more score than inland cities that contain mostly Plains tiles. :)
 
Thanks EMan. If I re-do how I've done things exactly according to your system that would definitely change some things on my map. Valuing sea squares as +1.00 (which I'd label a "6") in your system seemed a little high before, and now you say you have them even higher as a +2.00 (an "8")... maybe you're right... I did think I had a few too many cities I had labeled "temp". At least now it seems a simple matter to set up my excel starter program to not include sea squares as counted towards the domination limit. Thanks again!
 
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