SGOTM 08 - Geezers

Welcome to your BtS SGOTM 8 Team Thread. Please use it for all internal team communication, turn logs and discussions. Subscribe to it to receive notifications, and do not visit the other team threads for this game until you have finished. Please also subscribe to the Maintenance Thread for this game, where teams and staff may post non-spoiler information of general interest.

The Game
This will be the first Beyond the Sword SGOTM. Thanks, Gyathaar

Following his recent honeymoon in the Far East, Gyathaar, aka Suryavarman II of the Khmer Empire, is just Crazy About Wonders. He has decreed that he will win a glorious victory and that his total Wonder points per turn played will then be the envy of the world.

Suryavarman II is Expansive and Creative, with the Ballista Elephant to assist in acquiring Wonders he can't build himself, and the Baray to allow him to build the Hanging Gardens.

It is a Normal speed, Monarch difficulty game on a Standard map. All victory conditions are enabled.

The Objective
The winners will be the teams who achieve a Victory by any means, and who score the highest Wonder Points per Turn Played.

Five Wonder Points are awarded for each Wonder controlled by the Team, and are displayed as the 'xx' in "yy from Wonders (xx/310)" when you hover your mouse over your score in the game screen. 310 is the maximum Wonder Points score you can achieve if you control all Wonders and National Wonders.

Versions
This game will be played in Civilization IV Beyond the Sword, version 3.17, using HoF Mod 3.17.001.

If a later BtS patch is released during this game you will NOT be able to use it to play. You will need to complete this game in version 3.17 before updating your copy of BtS, or create and update a separate copy.

As there is no Mac version of BtS, Mac players can only join in if they are able to run the Windows version on their system.

Schedule

• The Team threads will open shortly.
• The start files will be published on Friday, September 12.
• Please try to complete the game within three months of the start date.

Starting Position
Here's the starting position - click the image below to see a larger version.


Map Parameters

• Playable Leader/Civ - Suryavarman II of the Khmer Empire.
• Characteristics - Expansive and Creative, starts with Hunting and Mining
• Unique Unit - Ballista Elephant (War elephant)
• Unique Building - Baray (Aqueduct)
• Rivals - 7 AI civs
• World size - Standard
• Difficulty - Monarch
• Landform - Big and Small
• Environment - Temperate climate, medium sea level
• Game Speed - Normal
• Everything else - Default

Notes

• Please visit the Civ4 SGOTM reference thread to check out the rules and procedures to ensure that you are adequately prepared for this game.
  
• Teams will compete for up to four awards - the Gold, Silver and Bronze Laurels for the highest Wonder Score per Turn Played, and the Wooden Spoons for the finishing team with the lowest final score.
  
• You can capture wonders, or build them yourself. Remember you cannot capture national wonders.
  A victory in turn 100 with 10 wonders controlled gets the same score as winning in turn 200 with 20 wonders..
  In BtS the max number of wonders is 62, including corp headquarters and holy city buildings, national wonders, palace and world wonders.
  
• All saved game files uploaded to the server are parsed through software that extracts and archives data about your save, including reload count for each turn set.
  
• Do NOT view any other team threads until you have submitted your last save - win, lose or retire.
  
• Do NOT download any other team's save.

Enjoy your game, and please be nice to each other

Roster

Sam
Erik
Harbourboy
The Hawk
Thrallia (Skipped until further notice)
AgedOne
Misotu
Mark

Turn 1: 4000 BC - 3000 BC - Yaso founded. Scout killed by panther.
Turn 2a: 3000 BC - 2720 BC - Meet Shaka.
Turn 2b: 2720 BC - 2440 BC - Steal Shaka worker, Henge BIDL.
Turn 3a: 2440 BC - 1600 BC - CoL in sight.
Turn 3b: 1600 BC - 1320 BC - Oracle built and CS slingshot achieved.
Turn 4: 1320 BC - 950 BC - Revolt to Bureaucracy & Caste. Convert to Confucianism.
Turn 5: 950 BC - 475 BC - Army growing nicely. Shaka resources pillaged. Meet Joao.
Turn 6a: 475 BC - 350 BC - Capture Nobamba.
Turn 6b: 350 BC - 200 BC - Capture Ulundi.
Turn 7: 200 BC - 50 AD - Raze Bulawayo. Make peace with Shaka for all his techs. Discover iron.
Turn 8: 50 AD - 275 AD - Shwedagon Paya built. Resume war on Shaka but should have brought more cats.
Turn 9a: 275 AD - 475 AD - Parthenon built. The war with Shaka continues.
Turn 9b: 475 AD - 580 AD - Great Library built. The war with Shaka is dragging on.
Turn 10: 580 AD - 760 AD - Kong Miao built.More military units built.
Turn 11: 760 AD - 860 AD - uMgung is finally liberated from Shaka's tryanny.
Turn 12: 860 AD - 1000 AD - Miss out on MoM & HG
Turn 13: 1000 AD 1150 AD - Meet Augustus and build Sistine
Turn 14: 1150 AD - 1280 AD - Miss out on Angkor Wat. Discover rest of AI civs.
Turn 15a: 1280 AD - 1330 AD - Miss out on Taj, meet the rest of the AIs.
Turn 15b: 1330 AD - 1420 AD - Democracy in and Oxford completed.
Turn 16: 1420 AD - 1550 AD - Build SoL and learn Rifling.
Turn 17: 1550 AD - 1605 AD - Teching towards Assembly Line and building military.
Turn 18: 1605 AD - 1715 AD - IW built. Lots of military trained, nearly ready to DoW Joao.
Turn 19: 1715 AD - 1780 AD - DoW Joao, war going well so far.
Turn 20: 1780 AD - 1824 AD - Bulk of Joao's cities captured.
Turn 21: 1824 AD - 1844 AD - Joao no more. Charlie DoWs us but we persuade him to make peace..
Turn 22: 1844 AD - 1864 AD - Building up forces for war with Ghandhi.
Turn 23: 1864 AD - 1900 AD - DoW Ghandhi, making good progress.
Turn 24: 1900 AD - 1910 AD - All of Ghandhi's cities in SE taken.
Turn 25a: 1910 AD - 1913 AD - Upgrade forces, DoW Augustus.
Turn 25b: 1913 AD - 1921 AD - Augustus is rapidly ceasing to be a factor in the game.
Turn 26: 1921 AD - 1933 AD - Peace with Augustus & Ghandhi. DoW rest of the world.
Turn 27a: 1933 AD - 1943 AD - Take last remaining wonder cities. Just waiting for Dom victory.
Turn 27b: 1943 AD - 1945 AD - Dom victory. Wonder points ratio = 0.83561643835616438356164383561644

Updated post.

=======================================================

Overall strategy:


The long term strategy is to build as many available wonders as possible and then with surgical strikes, capture all cities with wonders/shrines/corporate HQ. Our overall emphasis will be to maintain a rapid tech pace. While doing so, we will provide techs to 1 or 2 select AI's so they can help build wonders for us.

Long term plans for cities:

Yas: Wonder building, Prophet farm
Hari: Commerce from Shrine, Workers
Ulundi: GP farm, Wonder building
Nobamba: Commerce, production
Angkor Thom: GP farm, naval units
Angkor Wat: Commerce
Nagara: ?
uMgung: Military


Diplomacy:

Shaka: To be eliminated at some point.
Joao: Gone.
Augustus: Rapidly losing his mainland cities.
Charlemagne:
Boudicca:
Pericles:
Ghandhi: A shadow of his former self.
AI x: Tech Partner ?


Long term civics of choice:

Representation [Current: Police State]
Bureacracy [Current: Bureaucracy]
Caste [Current: Emancipation]
Free Market [Current: State Property]
Pacifism [Current: Free Religion]


Tech Path:

Artillery

City Builds:

Yas: Military
Hari: Military
Nobamba: Military
Ulundi: Military
Angkor Thom: Military
Angkor Wat: Military
Nagara: Military
uMgung: Military
Teo: Military

Current plans for wonders and GPs:

Click to expand...

Wonders_14-Dec-2008.rar

Checking in.

My preliminary thoughts suggest that we should be looking at a hybrid domination/conquest type of victory. Whilst we should be looking to build some of the early wonders e.g Great Wall (for spies), Mids and GLib I would see us concentrating on judicious rexing and building up our forces. Wonders built by the AI count just as well as our home built ones as long as we control them by the end of the game.

This post from Fifth Element's SGOTM07 thread sums up my views nicely.

An early rush is not necessarily a priority but may be appropriate if the cards fall right. I haven't had a chance to finish the test game yet but I'll try to do that before the game starts.

Are we going for early victory or lots of wonders?

Team member reporting for duty.

BTS installation - checked!
Supplies - laid on!
Son who wants to play Spore - deflected (not sure about that one)

Do we try and build the wonders, or take them off other civs?

Harbourboy said:

Do we try and build the wonders, or take them off other civs?

Click to expand...

Realistically we'll need to do both. As I posted earlier I can see merit in getting the GW, maybe Mids, and the GLIb. Colossus and GLH might be useful if we are predominantly coastal based but I don't think they are priorities. Once we subdue/eliminate the AI (he says glibly ) and take their wonders we then do our best to build the remaining wonders. We also need to aim to finish by turn 310 at the latest to maximise our score.

Hi guys and a special welcome to our new member Misotu ! On to a new one.

As our team play improved very much in our last game I like to see us keeping this level at least. Reports are done as before. The turnplayer should post a rough plan what to achieve in the coming turnset and posts this plan for discussions. Taking this into consideration we should adjust our rules a little bit. 24 hours for posting a "got it" and 48 hours for playing after there is a consensus on the game plan for the next set.

I played a bit with the test save especially on the beginning. I made some notes when which wonders were built by the AI, but I have these notes at home. I will post them later on. However this will be a rough indication only as the opponents in the test save will be different to those we will find in the actual game.

In another attempt I tried to build as many wonders as possible. The walkthroughs of the member "obsolete" are quite educational. They can be found in the strategy forums and are a little bit older. In my last try yesterday I was able to build 8 of the early wonders. With 4 cities + the monster capital this resulted in a comfortable tech lead.

Regarding the victory condition I am not sure. I have no clue how a domination/conquest attempt will work out on a big and small map. I have not played such a map in a single player game IIRC.

I guess letting the AI build wonders for us is a little bit risky. If there is a wonder crazy guy far from us we are screwed. At this level we should have control which wonders we can get.

Anyway the usual first questions

Settle in place ? Where do we move the scout to ? What tech first ? First build ?

My suggestions : Settling depends a bit on what the scout reveals. However I think it is a decent site. A lot of food, gold and much wood for chopping. I would move the scout 1NW, 1SW to reveal the last tiles for the BFC if we settle in place. Bronze Working I would research first while building a worker.

Plus what will the play order be? And who is ordering the first round of drinks?

The first round of drinks is captains privilege. Cheers.

I will come up with a roster later. Any volunteers for the first set ?

markh said:

I played a bit with the test save...

Click to expand...

You say 'the' test save..? I haven't seen one posted anywhere. Or was this your own map created?

I haven't tried any practice yet. Do you think it best we all have a try (time permitting) before we start for real?

markh said:

The walkthroughs of the member "obsolete" are quite educational. They can be found in the strategy forums and are a little bit older.

Click to expand...

Good find! I'm reading some of them now.

markh said:

Regarding the victory condition I am not sure. I have no clue how a domination/conquest attempt will work out on a big and small map. I have not played such a map in a single player game IIRC.

Click to expand...

I have played a few times on big & small, but (a) I wasn't trying to hoard wonders and (b) I didn't keep any notes .
Iirc it's quite varied where you start. Sometimes sharing a large mass. Sometimes isolated. Rather like continents from the domination or conquest point of view.

I would promote the general strategy of
(1) getting a decisive tech lead (while building some early wonders), then
(2) going military to take one or two of our nearest rivals.
(3) At that point, we may have gained a wonder or two, but that wasn't the point.
(4) Now we are strong and powerful, and can either push for domination, or go for some other victory, but meanwhile building more wonders.

AgedOne said:

You say 'the' test save..? I haven't seen one posted anywhere. Or was this your own map created?

Click to expand...

See what you miss when you don't follow Geezers practice threads. See this post.

I would promote the general strategy of
(1) getting a decisive tech lead (while building some early wonders), then
(2) going military to take one or two of our nearest rivals.
(3) At that point, we may have gained a wonder or two, but that wasn't the point.
(4) Now we are strong and powerful, and can either push for domination, or go for some other victory, but meanwhile building more wonders.

Click to expand...

Laurels go to those teams with the highest Wonder Score per Turn Played. I believe that the best way to achieve this is to own all the wonders built by the end of the game which makes conquest highly desirable. Since I'm sure that Gyathaar hasn't filled the map with weak AIs we may have to settle for domination.

Sam_Yeager said:

See what you miss when you don't follow Geezers practice threads. See this post.

Click to expand...

<wracked by feelings of guilt> Oops. Thanks. I'll have a look at it, when I can get the Spore-players off the good PC.

I vote for us doing well in this game, please.

Hi, Misotu checking in & thanks for having me on the team

I haven't played a succession game like this before - and I'm afraid I've only played a handful of games in BtS, all aiming for religious victories for the current Immortal gauntlet. So - I have absolutely no idea how the spying works, corporations are a mystery & I am very vague on the new wonders and civs available. Because of this, I'm not sure how much value I'll be able to add on the strategy side this time round (That's the bad news).

The good news is that I have played a lot of Civ, sometimes with quite good results, and I will do my absolute best to achieve the goals set for my turn. I'm a bit of a micro-manager, so I automate nothing and tend to check most of my cities most turns, which means that hopefully no-one will be left with a nasty surprise.

I'm hoping to learn a lot from playing with you guys - in the meantime, I'll have a look at the practice thread.

I guess the new member orders the second round?

Misotu said:

I haven't played a succession game like this before

Click to expand...

You might know the basics, but I summarize some things :

1. and most important : Have fun !
2. we never flame anybody here. Try to be nice to your teammates.
3. we never ever reload the save, play ahead or check the other teamthreads.
4. do not put units on automove
5. if you get into a situation during your set which puts you in doubt, save the game and come here to ask. You are not bound to play your set through once you have started.
6. play as careful as you can. It is just ten turns per set, so you do not need to rush through your set.
7. ask for skips/swaps well ahead if you know you will not be able to play

I think there is not much more to say.

We are definitely not a team of experts, but we have a lot of fun being non-experts. Hopefully we can win this game as I haven't seen a victory screen for the Geezers for quite some time now.

AgedOne said:

I haven't tried any practice yet. Do you think it best we all have a try (time permitting) before we start for real?

Click to expand...

We do not have to hurry and you do not have to play a complete game, so I think you will have some time. Especially with this gamesetup the beginning will be crucial. We will have to build wonders to get points for the victory condition and I do not see any alternative to building wonders ourselves, yet. Maybe someone else sees something I don't.

The trick will be to match expansion, military power and wonder building. We will be a juicy target once we are wonder heavy, so we will have to have a decent power rating.

Thanks for the extra info - this sounds good.

No worries about flaming - I'm *very* laid back (at my age I have to be ) and have played a lot of team games over the years. I take my turns seriously and do my best, but I don't get frustrated by what my team-mates do

Now the save thing, this is what interests me ... if I am playing 10 turns, how does that work exactly? How many times can I play a turn, save and quit, check with my team-mates and then load to play the next turn? I'm used to HoF where you have to play for around half an hour, but obviously that's not sensible in this situation. What are the limits, if any? I'm thinking that there are a number of things that could happen ... the scout pops a tech which is the one I'm targeted to research so I have to choose the next & it hasn't been agreed. Or I encounter a new civ that offers me a trade ... or whatever. Sorry to sound stupid, but I don't want to do something that causes the team problems ...

Do you use notes on the map to communicate at all? For example, if a hut becomes visible as a consequence of a map being revealed just as my turns are ending ... I could put a little note on the map.

Misotu said:

Now the save thing, this is what interests me ... if I am playing 10 turns, how does that work exactly? How many times can I play a turn, save and quit, check with my team-mates and then load to play the next turn? I'm used to HoF where you have to play for around half an hour, but obviously that's not sensible in this situation. What are the limits, if any? I'm thinking that there are a number of things that could happen ... the scout pops a tech which is the one I'm targeted to research so I have to choose the next & it hasn't been agreed. Or I encounter a new civ that offers me a trade ... or whatever. Sorry to sound stupid, but I don't want to do something that causes the team problems ...

Do you use notes on the map to communicate at all? For example, if a hut becomes visible as a consequence of a map being revealed just as my turns are ending ... I could put a little note on the map.

Click to expand...

If you are the turnplayer you can play a turn only once. Once you have opened the save and changed something (moved a unit, traded something, etc.) you have to save the game if you do not want to go on. For example you are the turnplayer and you open the save and move a unit that reveals a massive stack of an AI at our borders and you are not sure what to do you save the game and go on from there after the team agreed how to go on. There is no time limitation, so you can save and leave the game after 30 seconds if something is revealed you do not want to deal with on your own. In no way it is allowed to change something and not save the game. Replaying is not allowed. The only exception is if your computer crashes. Then you are allowed to reload, but you have to replay the turn as best as you can. If something like this happens it is always good to mention this in your report and inform the staff. As you play HOF games I guess you have changed your config file to autosaves each turn. If not please do so.

Yes, we use notes sometimes. You are welcome to do so.