The Deity Challenge Line-up - Game #11 - Morocco

Nice job in setting this up! Im gonna start it up here in a few minutes. This Civ is pretty strong actually. Usually a desert start for you players who like to try for DF and Petra. Another thing about them is they are more prone to get trade routes sent to them if I remember correctly compared to other Civs. I don't like the 50/50 gamble on Petra but I might try it if I see alot of desert hills. Perhaps settle next to the Mtn on the Bronze instead.

Let's start this off with some funny quotes from Grendeldef...

1. I'll piss off peeps for another 2 weeks. Let the normal mode resume next time regardless of the host.
2. The starting land mass tends to be larger than half of average Pangaea but since the CSs are spread out evenly there should be some land to expand to but border tensions are more likely so the possibility of early wars is greater. Just hiding in the corner is trickier than on Pangaea and likes.
(Terra vs. Pangaea)

So we are are 2 weeks later and it looks like the normal mode has resumed! I would like to go out and warmonger but a map and start like this makes me very lazy so it will be a classic hide in the corner Turtle game for me.

I decided to settle on the Bronze and was a little upset to see this huge Mtn Chain. Anyway I scouted around and found some ruins but nothing to write home about. I tried to steal some wokers from Denmark and Hawaii but no chance. I think it was turn 3 or 4 I declared war on Tyre to worker farm but never got one. I did pillage and steal a worker from Kiev and I saved two others from barb camps. So not too bad with 3 immigrants but I've seen and done better.

Early DOF from the Irish and ofcourse since I am Morocco they sent me a caravan asap. Funny to see all the AIs basically go Piety or Liberty. France went Full Honor and is the only one to get into Tradition afterwards. I wasn't going to try for a Church since the Irish are next door and since the Patch it is even harder since the AI loves Piety now.

With this land I chose to go 3 city NC and got it done on turn 72. All 3 cities next to a Mtn. for Observatories later on. I'd like to build a fourth on the desert/coastal but happy is an issue and not sure it is really a good location. I may just live with 3 cities only this time. I see this game is going to be uber peaceful and shouldn't take too long to finish. I may run into an AI CV problem but that happens in my games from time to time.

Im using one caravan for food to the cap and the other I sent to Tyre for a quest which was a very bad decision. I gambled on HG since I notice that the AI doesn't like Tradition anymore and completed it on turn 92. Im glad I didn't try for Petra since it went off on turn 71. Education looks like around turn 111 and I'll either go to Acoustics next or up to Astronomy.

SP's were Full Tradition and not sure what to pick next... maybe Commerce. I did get a late Panth and chose God King but it looks like I am going to be Catholic this whole game and the Irish have an ok Church but nothing really awesome.

Actually I saved at turn 180. Another Pic to post at turn 200. This game for me is a bit of a snoozer but I expected that since I was stuck in this fortress. The trouble I have with builder games like this is I have so many good choices I get confused a little bit. I built Sistene Chapel which is something I haven't done for a long time. I guess I could of got Globe Theatre but another wonder I never try for. I did get the PT on like turn 162 which is early for my games. I also forgot that I got the Oracle around turn 120ish since nobody wanted it. I could of planned out Oxford Radio better instead of bulbing but I can use Oxford for Sat. instead. I reached the Mondern Era as Denmark just got into the Industrial around 175-180. I guess Order as usual and race to build the parts for SV.

I had +40 food in my capital on turn 100 which is alot for my style of games. I was growing too fast and had to stunt all the growth to keep happy. Gold was a problem for awhile but I fixed that. I rushed 3 Public Schools. I did manage to get into Ratio on the same turn as I finished Acoustics so you know how that goes. I guess the only problem is that Alex might be a monster down the road but the AI never seems to win a Diplo VC. I worry more about a CV but since Denmark is building wonders along with Poc and Assyria Im not sure I'll have a problem. Time will tell. I've been neck and neck with the tech leader for some time now.

My B.O. was... Scout, Monument, 2x Settler, rush bought a Granary, Library, etc.

I started this up and only got as far as turn 60. I walked for a turn and ended up settling on the other side of the river in range of oasis (which I bought) and the cows. My big move was to make city 2 up to the NE on the other side of the mountains as a 'trade bait'. I have one trade unit running to The Celts from there and shorlty after got a DoF. I will put a second one on Harold. In about 5 turns I will have enough gold to buy the Library in city 2. Then I will make NC.

Sorry to hear it's a snoozer for you. I thought that people might try to solve the puzzle of how to get cities in good positions for trade to take advantage of the UA, or ambitious warmongers might find a way to crush everyone. It's certainly not so hard that you can't choose your VC, but don't worry, I can pick a slightly harder map for the next one. Hopefully it's not so easy that everyone breezes to <T250 victories!

I guess the whole game won't be a snoozer for me. Once I get a huge Tech advantage I'll have some fun with wars. I guess I could of tried to do something out of the box and made it harder on myself but when I see a starting location like this I tend to get lazy since I have no fear of a war. Even if someone DOWed me I wouldn't worry too much because Im pretty sure those units would get slaughtered trying to get in. On the other side of it I have a hard time getting out and the more I get comfortable the more I just want to stay warm and cozy inside these mtns. Now one thing the AI could do is have Tyre as an ally and declare on me and it would be lights out most likely.

I guess snoozer is the wrong word. I guess slow build up is better. I just feel so damn safe in this start and it is such an extreme compared to the last game. I bit**ed and moaned that whole game but it was a tough chore warmongering the whole map. However when it is finished it feels more like I had to really work for that win. This game will most likely just be a matter of time. It feels like Emp when I can just sit back and wait and slowly build up.

Im pretty sure you will see some fast wins on this start but my games seem to always go beyond 300 turns since I tend to just play and play fast instead of worrying about being optimal.

The start was OK, a few hills and a mountain helped, but then my initial scouting revealed not too many good expo locations. I wanted 4 cities because I think it&#8217;s much better for science than 3 cities, so I had to get right in Boudicca&#8217;s face to settle my 2nd, including a very early war in which I stole 2 workers and a settler with my upgraded spearman. Lucky, I guess. 3rd city went to the jungle for 2 reasons: first I wanted to test whether it&#8217;s possible to get a functioning city that can (if required) have enough hammers to build spaceship parts in 15 turns or less without any hills or mines (just by using production boosting buildings and policies), and secondly I wanted to make sure I had some buffer against the Danes if they came berserking down from the North.

I realized that with Alex and Nappy out to the East that the key would be keeping Boudicca sweet, so I began to regret the war and wondered whether it would make me pay in the long run, but Civ 5 being Civ 5, she offered DoF really soon after I made peace with her. Not sure if this was the &#8216;Morocco effect&#8217; Fluphen Azine mentioned, or just one of those things. I&#8217;ve had it happen to me a couple of times before. High forgiveness rating maybe???

Anyway, I sensed that with only a small strip of green fields between Dublin and the place where I wanted to put my 4th city, that I would have to get the last settler out fast and delay NC and construction, in order to beat her to it. This may have been the best decision I made. NC came somewhere in the 90s.

My initial aim is always domination, and I thought about going for the Just War enhancer, but I missed out on the 5th religion by a few turns. Still, I really wanted Kiev as an ally and they wanted a prophet, so then the new goal was Leaning Tower, which I missed by ONE TURN! So no prophet for me as I went Tradition not Liberty (a rare thing for me, but there was no room for expos!).

In another piece of good fortune, Boudicca reformed and chose Jesuit Education, which allowed me to get a very early university in Marrakesh.

Settled on site, surrounded by mountains & sea without immediate neighbours I thought I'd give the revamped Tradition a peaceful try but then this sort of opportunities open up so I DoWed Boudicca - if our cities had been a tile closer I'd have kept the peace.




T19 Tradition opening, T22 Stone Circles pantheon from ruins and two turns later same scout popped 60 faith ruin but Boudicca the Pope already founded on T23 so I'm not expecting much from religion. T35 stole third worker & made peace in hope of friendship but hasn't happened yet. T41 met Kamehameha as the last leader with a Shoshone worker desperately trying to get back home.
This also resulted the common early problem of too many units hence I fed the 3rd Celtic worker to barbs and trying gently to guide it towards Marrakech.

3rd city, hopefully, will be near Kilimandjaro & 4th coastal but other than that everything is open. Without Celts in next door I'd gone Trad/Piety for testing purposes but that's probably out.

Not really alot to say. I just sat here and built buildings only. Kremlin and Hubble for sure. I could of had more wonders but I opted for other buildings that didn't take so long. I had no army at all this game except for 2 archers which I executed for desertion. We lined them up against the wall and gave them one last request. I would of pardoned them but they let two sneaky Viking Settlers settle on our backside.

Ofcourse after a few turns Denmark thinks they have cracked this fortified empire and decides to DOW us since our cities are only 25, 14, and 13 pop at around turn 280 lol! Our empire never pulled more than 725spt but since we had many GS's and RA's with the whole world including the Vikings we really didn't need much.

I rush bought a Rocket Arty and I had a gifted GWI that stopped any attack. Later I rushed a Mech Inf unit and also a Sam to stop the bombing. Denmark brought down the walls in the Capital but could not crack the mountain or the river. They never gave us peace but they decided not to press into the slaughter anymore. The turn that they Dowed us I paid Greece to attack them since they had all the CS's near us and Denmark and those CS's had a ton of units which kept Denmark busy. I was happy to blast off into space and get away from this Mtn Chain on turn 312. Perhaps if it was Dido she could of stormed over the Mtn and took the capital or if Denmark had the CS control that might of done it too. Ofcourse Alex was a beast and I really never had a CS ally the whole game. Oddly enough Alex, Poc, Denmark and the Irish were flush with cash the whole game. I wish my empire could say the same.

All in all a very next turn type of game for me. Im way too lazy to try to dominate the world through those Mtns and hills. Hawaii and Assyria got wiped out clean but Alex couldn't crack Poc or the Irish. Last challenge took me over 40hrs but this one a mere 8-10

My Social Policies were the usual when I play this way. Full Trad, Full Ratio, Wagon Trails in Commerce, and 6 deep into Order for Spaceflight. I only had enough Faith to buy 1 GE at the very end. Last thing I noticed that my score was as low as I ever seen it at 918!! lol

I was sending food to the capital early on. I posted before that I had +40 food at turn 100 but happy became a problem. After I had no problem with happy... population did not matter. I ran all special people in my city for the science boost and worked alot of production to build more and more buildings/wonders. I did have a huge gpt problem though and had to run most caravans to cities for only 10gpt avg each caravan. Instead of saving up gold I used alot of loan gold to rush all science buildings. Most of the game I had very little gpt since I was constantly borrowing from my DOFs. I had so many DOFs 5-7 the whole game with many RAs and plenty of GS's for bulbing the techs. I never worry about getting a SV by turn 250, that does not matter to me. I only care that I win via any VC.

Since I did not feel like trying to expand away from this Mtn. Chain I just played a simple turtle game. I took the tech lead at around 52% and never looked back. I could of played it a different way and made it more interesting for myself but why bother when you can just sit here and click next turn till you win! Also understand when I play my games I hardly ever reload or restart. If I click something wrong I usually just live with it and hope for the best.

Even though you do not like the last 2 maps/games I would like to see how you tackle them and post up how you won or lost. Id like to see your massive cities sorta like how KB plays and always has like a 50 pop capital!

Since last report, I just used diplo to get the others to fight while teching to the finish line. Like others I did not feel very threatened most of the time. I must admit I was worried when Alex, Kammy and Ash all disappeared in the total wars that allowed Nappy and Pocatello to build HUGE empires. I thought to myself: “If one of them wants to come West then even Boudicca won’t be much a buffer.” This proved true when Harald DoW’ed her and took the city nearest to my borders. I put a gatling with GG right on the border and checked that border every turn like a hawk.

I don’t really enjoy Science victories, and may even go back and try to clean out the continent with tanks and bombers another time, but then I prefer early and midgame wars anyway. Maybe on the next DCL I will be able to test Peddroelm’s 3 city honour/autocracy strategy?

Please tell me what you didn't like about the map. While I can't please everyone, if I have a feel of general opinion, it assists map choice. You can also submit to the email address in the first post. For those that wanted wars and weren't prepared to venture out beyond the forest of Boudicca to look for them, be assured that the next map will be more warmonger friendly. I'm a warmonger myself. I just wanted to give a different kind of challenge this time around. I thought that since there isn't much room, one challenge could be finding good locations for trade cities. And for the warmongers who do want to assault this map, there is some stern opposition. Pocatello's military reached six figures in my game.

TLDR: I'm sorry if you didn't enjoy this map. Please tell me why, and submit ones you do like.

First of all ... very nice Empire. I like how you expanded outside of the Mtns and made it work. I didn't like that idea since I didn't want any trouble and since I seen how protected this start was I played a better safe than sorry strategy. I find it funny how we won at about the same time and your Empire is way more impressive than mine.

It wasn't that I didn't like the map exactly. All maps give me something to complain about... that is just my nature. Im never happy with what I see. Im always looking over the fence so to speak. I guess the best thing for me is that I need alot of early choices. This map, in my mind, gave me only one. Yes I could of got ambitious and expanded outside like yourself but when I see a start that says if I stay here I can't lose I will take it every time. So in that I didn't challenge myself because I figure I have no need to. If Im gonna lose to the AI, the AI is gonna have to break through this natural Great Wall and I really didn't see how they could do it. I knew the Irish would get a strong church going and if I just let her convert me I would never have to worry about her.

It certainly is not your fault or the maps fault. It is my own fault for being so darn Lazy but that is on me. The reason I was saying this map was a bit (a bit not totally) of a snoozer is because I knew I could win by not having to do anything except build. After it is over it is a nice change after the last map made me work so darn hard.

Also this start did not even make me want to try for a Petra Gambit since that desert start was horrible so I did not have to choose to go for it or not. Im hoping Shark Diver tries for it because I don't think you can get it and even if you do I don't think it is worth it with only 1 desert hill. I think I answered your question to the best of my ability and if not I am not going to try again lol (just kidding you)! Also you were right about having trouble getting trade routes to my empire. Even though almost all Civs were my DOFs they did not send me many trade routes till very late in the game.

Same thing that happens far too often - any sort of navy including cargo ships in rendered next to obsolete due to polar ice. Same thing in smaller scale happened with my maps so I'm rapidly coming to conclusion that the future DCL maps (at least most) should be rolled with a mod that prevents polar ice touching the main continent assuming a) it still exists b) it works c) is not required to play the map - I could easily give up the point c but a & b are sort of mandatory.
Another thing that really annoys me is the number of coastal tiles but there's no way fix that without a script change. The mostly one tile wide coastal waters might be accurate to the scale but from the gaming pov it just stupid especially when there's no non-military vessel which can pass without OB. Any sort of just settled village effectively blocks navies from going from a sea to another.

But instead of endless ranting and pointing out the multiple failures of Firaxis I think I could squeeze in few more turns and if it wasn't apparent already I have no complaints about this DCL particularly.

Thanks for the kind words. I'm not really much of a builder ordinarily. I like to try and win as fast as possible with domination as I hate the long grinding wars of modernity. But it was good practice, if nothing else, for when Plan A doesn't work.

I hear you about choices, and will make sure the next map has a LOT!

Is there a mod that allows for editing maps and produces saves that will load un-modded?

IGE or something like that? For future maps I am more than happy to remove the ice as long as the save will still work for everyone. I too don't like being blocked in but had until now assumed there was nothing one could do about it. It is one of the stupidest things about the Firaxis maps that the ice is even there at all. The other stupid thing is how ridiculous some of the peninsulas are!

Sorry you found the map boring. I wanted something that was a little bit similar to the Incan map, but not as easy for science, and a little bit easier for domination.

What kind of map do you like to play?

Editing the tile by tile for a DCL seems excessive since takes it the element of surprise away but it's possible - I just don't see a valid reason to go that far.

At some point in the past I used a mod which essentially was a script doing the same - replacing the ice tiles touching a continent with a coast or sea tile - but without revealing anything one isn't supposed to know. I don't know why a map rolled with such mod wouldn't be playable for everyone but the issue never came up. If the mod still exists on Steam it's easily tested.

Yeah, well, that's not gonna happen.

I found time to get an hour of playing time in. As promised, I decided to go for Petra, and this setup gave me a pretty good opportunity to try a more creative approach at it.

I settled the Capital on grassland/river just South of the copper. My plan was going to be to focus on science and culture, go Liberty, and use the free settler as last policy to complete the tree and just march settler and GE down to the middle of the desert where more tiles would benefit from Petra.

BO was scout > Monument > Shrine > Library >Settler > Granary > Caravan > Watermill

Everything went incredibly well, as I got an early cultural ally (barb camp and returned the settler), both scout and archer accepted promotions, and goodie huts were slightly above average (no religion huts).

I was on pace to complete the tree on t63 and would have settled settler and popped GE on t66 (If settler appeared on the right side of capital). This would have been my earliest Petra ever on Deity.

Like I said, everything was going incredibly well………..until Napolean built Petra on t60. That quiche-eating surrender monkey barely even had any desert in his capital and he builds one of the earliest Petra's in history? Suffice it to say, I walked away, managed to not kick my dog, and found something……ANYthing…..else to do.

I'll go ahead and play this out later in the week, but the Petra gambit didn't work this time. I've already got DoF from the skirt-wearing Celts and I'll probably get 2nd or 3rd religion.

The nice thing about this approach to Petra is that it doesn't totally screw up your game if you miss it. Also, taking Citizenship (free settler) last allows you to take Representation much earlier. This allows you to zip through the tree 10+ turns more quickly, avoids higher science costs from early city, and makes it much easier to complete another policy tree before Rationalism. I think this strategy is workable for early Petra, and if you can get a cultural pantheon, you can probably get Petra before t60. Getting that wonder in a non-capital city is wonderful, as that city can do a lot of heavy lifting. It's like having 2 capitals.