Immortal OCC Challenge

Gliese 581

Your average civ junkie
Joined
Oct 11, 2007
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Sweden
I've been playing some OCC games recently and it looks like I'm going to finish my first Emperor game soon.

Since I can't recall seeing this kind of game in this forum I thought why not create an online challenge?
As always with my online games I decided to up the challenge for me (and others) a bit and this game will therefore be played at the Immortal difficulty. When you expect to lose it's all the sweeter if you win. :lol:
Everyone is welcome to participate.

I've played with almost all the industrous leaders in OCC. Some of them, like Ramesses and HC, I've played alot. My latest games though have been with Gandhi and I've come to realise that Industrous and Philosophical (perhaps not surprisingly) are both strong traits for a SSE since they help you get GPP generated faster and give you GPs earlier.

I wanted to do something different for this game though and so I decided not to use an industrous or philosophical leader.
Thinking on which leader to choose I eventually decided on the leader who has both the secondary traits I like the most in a OCC.
Spiritual and Expansive, In other words another game with Izzie, hopefully one I'll finish this time. :D

Spiritual is a great trait for diplomacy which is more important than ever in OCCs in my opinion, especially if you've just moved up a level. Furthermore, with just one city, the possibilities for micro-management with the Spiritual trait is awesome.
Expansive has some generic advantages like a cheaper granary and cheaper workers, although this is always useful the real strength in my experience for an OCC is actually the +2 health you receive. It has great synergy with getting a large population which you typically want in this kind of game and can be surprisingly helpful even very early if you like to chop away every forest in sight like me. Health sort of replaces happiness in how large you can grow even early since resources are scarce and happiness buildings are much more common. The GT is also available long before the NP should one be so inclined not to mention the happiness boost one can get from Rep and/or Monarchy.
Izzie also starts with Mysticism which enables an early religion or two and I wanted to diversify the possibilities of play as much as possible.

But let's get to the details, the rules:

Participation and posting is free within dated spoilers, please remember to rename saves to include your nickname.
There is no vote, everyone is free to play from any save though the main idea, similar to that of silverbullet's old immortal university threads, is to compare and learn from different players by comparing everyone's games.
It would be great however if there could be some pacing of reports to avoid 2000 bc -saves getting mixed with 1912, the end -saves.
It's not required but if you have the time, make a short (or detailed) report at some approximate dates like

1500 BC
1 AD
500 AD
1000 AD
1400 AD
1700 AD
End date

..or similar. It's much easier to compare saves if they all follow roughly the same timeline.
Another thing that is interesting to note regarding OCC reports is that build orders are relatively more interesting since it's easier to keep track of and compare that with only one city.

The settings:



I took a cue from Burn and decided to play with high water level to give the competing AIs less space to expand. Pangaea is helpful in order to control everyone be it by peaceful or aggressive means.
I've turned off events and huts to cut down on luck-based differences to games and as an additional crutch.

The start:



This was the first start I generated and I decided to keep it. I'm usually alot more picky with OCCs than general starts but this looks good enough with this leader and difficulty and interesting enough to pose more than one possibility. I'm not sure yet what to do with my warrior. :crazyeye:

Edit: A hint to cut down on micromanagement that I recently got myself is to get the latest BUG version which shows WHEOOHRN status on the scoreboard. That is a huge timesaver in a OCC since you need to be on top of your diplomacy game more than usual.
You can download it here:

http://civ4bug.sourceforge.net/BUGMod.html
 

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Many of my wins submitted for immortal EQM thus far have been OCC --> with the caveat that permanent alliances are on. This made the game significantly easier of course, since a judicious (and usually easy to obtain) PA can turn the game instantly.

Without that handicap, I can still think of a way or three to potentially win this. Hardest is probably conquest or space (not even going to consider time. If you can win time in a OCC, you should finish your conquest ;)). Culture/dom of course impossible, this leaves the easier UN/AP wins as the final options.

I wonder who the AIs are. This could be pretty hard or pretty easy depending on that. Either way, count me in ;).

Edit: Don't go joking with the pacing of reports though :lol:. I'll try to avoid that pitfall by posting the entire !@#$ing game, which will probably be between 30 to 90 minutes!
 
:lol: The first draft of the OP actually included a joking reminder for you in relation to the pacing part though I removed it before posting since I realised it would probably be a futile request in your particular case. :D

I'll guess I'll leave you out of the early game comparisons and go back and check your game after I'm done. ;)
 
:lol: The first draft of the OP actually included a joking reminder for you in relation to the pacing part though I removed it before posting since I realised it would probably be a futile request in your particular case. :D

I'll guess I'll leave you out of the early game comparisons and go back and check your game after I'm done. ;)

Hmm, I intended to at least separate the different year summaries into different spoilers, and save the game at the right times though. I just intended to do it all in one go with one post. I do that a lot in other series so that people can actually still compare to certain points in my game even if I finished it in one sitting ;).

All I ask is that people not forget its there on the first or second page of a thread :lol:.
 
Sure that would work fine, just use different spoilers if you want to report this way so others can gradually check your progress against their own saves without spoiling. :)
 
To 1480 BC (sorry overplayed a turn in my haste :p)

Spoiler :
I settled in place. I teched straight to AH through hunting, then went mining---->masonry. Built pasture and mines using 2 workers, then great wall. Then I decided to head for oracle.





Founded Judaism on the way and temporarily used it + OR to power the oracle production to slightly reduce the odds of missing it. Met all but one AI in this segment and since Cathy and Joao both have early favorite civics I opted to select them as the vessels of my diplomacy. I'm trying to oracle theology here, so I've researched all its pre-reqs, obviously.


To 25 AD (sorry, same problem...got it right after this):

Spoiler :
Finished the oracle first. Took theology. Not much else going on in this segment, just improving some wine, and cottaging :rolleyes:. Cathy demanded theology which was unfortunate as because of this I had to instantly switch to christianity and start chopping it out. Of course, whoring OR and chops deliberately I'm going to win it:



It only autospread to one city and that's mao's. I admit I used judaism deliberately with missionaries to block some autospread early on. More convenient than I was hoping for.

Also the final leader is gilgamesh so that makes life even easier ----> THREE AIs that like HR. Easy easy easy.

Empire figures @ 25 AD:





We've got most AIs pleased at this point. Gifting wine to my AP targets (except gilgamesh, he gets gold). As you can see I'm just headed to CS to speed my tech rate with all the cottaging a bit.


To 520 AD (Nevermind I also screwed this one up and forgot to save at all. I found the autosave though so I put the closest one in)

Spoiler :


Mostly just spreading religion and trades. I gave into a couple demands, traded with all but mao (he was churchill's worst enemy and I didn't want to piss too many people off). I had it VERY easy because hinduism spread to me (note ----> you can easily win AP without this occurring, via fair trade, OB, resources, and favorite civics, but religion makes it faster/easier).

Here are some specs:





Yay! Cottages in an immortal OCC!



For a not so bad tech rate, actually. In my immortal OCC EQM garbage I could get to around 600-800 BPT with cottages and some late specs, as long as I could get an academy. I even won the race to mass media and built the UN a few times this way. Looking good here though for an AP win!


View attachment 198125

View attachment 198126

View attachment 198127
 
To 720 AD and the end of the game:

Spoiler :
More religious spread. Favorite civics and fair trade kicks in and the top 3 HR lover AIs all vote for me:



Not much to say about it though, easier to just look at the saves if you don't understand from the following screen shots.

















Game time: 34 Minutes ;).

View attachment 198128
 
OCC = one city chalenge

Immortal OCC chalenge = Immortal one city chalenge chalenge :p

Might try it ......

If you're going to make fun of something like that, you should at least spell challenge correctly :lol:.

Maybe he MEANT for this to be an extra challenge? Maybe it was an intentional pun :rolleyes:.
 
lol 34Mins
nice one

Spoiler :
if i understand well you switch to christianity to build the AP then spreaded it to all civs on earth then went back to hindouism to keep good relation with cath/gilg/jao, after that all votes are done by christian cities (not hindouist ones even if you are hindouist). Am I right? I am not familiar with AP

edit : sorry, spoilers are in
 
Put spoilers in SPOILERS! :eek:

Edit: TY :)

Spoiler :


Yes, the AP was christian and it only counts christian cities, so you spread it to AIs that like you. Other religions can be used for this, but favorite civics are often the bigger factor.

 
Nice game TMIT. I normally take 34 minutes to decide where to build my capital :lol:. Well maybe not quite, but the only game I had that was shorter was an AW game where I started with a scout and an AI with a warrior was visible when I settled my capital :rolleyes:
 
I played this as well. Religious victory is boring so I went for space.

Spoiler :

Won in 1937, I settled 1 West to get the marble with the third pop. Went for AH /Mining/writing then oracle. Took metal casting from oracle, then teched towards literature. CS beeline after literature. Had a monopoly on education for a very long time, so I could do a liberalism-biology slingshot. Next target was steam power for the levee and then the beeline to computers. Got all the modern culture wonders to prevent an AI from going cultural. Cathy was faster than me with teching computers, so most of my remaining forests got chopped to finish the internet in time, which was pretty much the only time I felt the game was in danger. After the internet I just built the ship and the space elevator, beelining superconductors and fusion. Game time: 2:30 hours ;) .
 
Completed my game at 1290

Spoiler :

Lost to a Diplomatic victory from Mao. Was doing really well, won a war, got lib, building Oxford, then BAM.
 
Spoiler :


Yes, the AP was christian and it only counts christian cities, so you spread it to AIs that like you. Other religions can be used for this, but favorite civics are often the bigger factor.

So you are not forced to spread it to all civ??? You can do it only in the ones that like you? I still don't manage to see how it works... :(


I did a try with your strat just to see how it work :

wonders i have built : SH, GW, mids and AP
i gifted all my ressources to other civ to raise diplo, i used buildings to counter unhappiness and disease
main religion was buddist (only chinese were hindouist and russian were confu) but it spreaded very very very late to my city :(

so when i hit theo i began to spread christianity to each civ (targeting a high population city for friendly civs and backward/low pop city for those i knew they will not vote for me: russian and chinese)

The 2 first vote were done while buddism did not spread yet to my city so i was not friendly yet with most of the world. The third one was ok and i won around 1280AD

 
Spoiler :




So you are not forced to spread it to all civ??? You can do it only in the ones that like you? I still don't manage to see how it works... :(


I did a try with your strat just to see how it work :

wonders i have built : SH, GW, mids and AP
i gifted all my ressources to other civ to raise diplo, i used buildings to counter unhappiness and disease
main religion was buddist (only chinese were hindouist and russian were confu) but it spreaded very very very late to my city :(

so when i hit theo i began to spread christianity to each civ (targeting a high population city for friendly civs and backward/low pop city for those i knew they will not vote for me: russian and chinese)

The 2 first vote were done while buddism did not spread yet to my city so i was not friendly yet with most of the world. The third one was ok and i won around 1280AD


Spoiler :
To make the diplo win vote available, every civ has to have the AP religion. However, you want to keep your enemies to having as few votes as possible. This usually means spreading religion to the smallest cities that non-voters have, and spreading it to multiple cities of the people who will vote for you.
 
Spoiler :
one last question : isn't there a chance one of the other civ could be elected instead of us if we spread in too much of his cities?
 
Spoiler :
one last question : isn't there a chance one of the other civ could be elected instead of us if we spread in too much of his cities?

Spoiler :
Only if that civ adopts the AP religion as a state religion. You should try to avoid this. In my game I went to the extent of intentionally spreading neighboring cities Judaism to block potential christian autospread. It's rare that an AI will convert like that, but it's worth being mindful of if you send too many missionaries to an AI that the AP religion becomes its dominant religion. I've not had it happen before, but if it does use spies...
 
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