TSG 133 After Action Report

Welcome to the TSG133 After Action Report thread. In this thread you can post the results of your game. Please state victory date and score (preferably in the post title), as recorded in the Hall of Fame, and the most important: your path to glory!

STOP - Please do not continue reading this thread until you have completed and submitted your game.

Please use the Civ5 game submission page to submit your final, first play through, .Civ5Save file, saved AFTER the victory ceremony if you were not conquered (using the "Lemme play one more turn" feature.).

- Did you use your UU?
- How useful was your UA?
- Did you use spying to your advantage?
- Did the map type help or hinder victory and how?
- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
- Was Faith helpful to achieve victory? How? Did you build any faith wonders?
- What Social Policies did you choose and in what order? Which Ideology did you choose?
- What techs did you prioritize ?
- Did you try Sacred Sites, or n early Great Admiral

Game: Civ5 GOTM 133
Date submitted: 2016-04-16 05:02:56
Reference number: 34235
Your name: adcarrymaokai
Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 1300AD
Turns played: 125
Base score: 969
Final score: 2618
Time played: 5:43:00
Submitted save: Theodora_0125 AD-1300.Civ5Save
Renamed file: adcarrymaokai_C513301.Civ5Save

- Did you use your UU?
No.

- How useful was your UA?
For this victory condition, pretty useful, as I could choose 3 faith buildings.

- Did you use spying to your advantage?
Did not use spies.

- Did the map type help or hinder victory and how?
Neither. If the map had some some rich in faith terrain, like a desert or faith mountains, it would have been easier.

- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
Playing on King, I did not really worry about military, expansion, and did not bother sending caravans to AI's.

- Was Faith helpful to achieve victory? How? Did you build any faith wonders?
I built Hagia Sofia because I had nothing better to do. Some AI built Borobudur, and another AI got Mosque of Djenne, which I was supposed to have in 1 turn (was building it in an expo).

- What Social Policies did you choose and in what order? Which Ideology did you choose?
Liberty opener -> Republic -> Collective rule -> Piety opener -> Organized religion -> Mandate of Heaven -> Theocracy -> Religious Tolerance -> Reformation -> Citizenship -> Representation -> Meritocracy -> Commerce opener.

Picking Theocracy was a mistake, as I could have headed straight to Reformation and finished Liberty earlier. I was just in negative gpt and really needed to fix the situation.

- What techs did you prioritize ?
Luxury techs and then went for Astronomy. I later realized I had met all AI's, but forgot to change, and entered the Renaissance too early.

- Did you try Sacred Sites, or n early Great Admiral
This is a Sacred Sites victory. Never got an admiral, since the continents were not divided by deep ocean.

I generally play on Deity or Immortal, and Sacred Sites strategy is simply not viable there (maybe on Immortal with desert folklore or some very favorable settings). Someone gave a link to think map, so I decided to give it a go for once. Left side Liberty -> Full Piety -> finish Liberty and choose Great Musician. My GM was somehow very weak, but I guess that's because it's Quick speed. Never played quick speed before. Anyway, I messed up with my city placement and entered Renaissance too fast (and theoretically I could build a musicians guild in that case, but I did not), which made buildings more expensive. Anyway, it was fun, though the second half of the game was spent clicking next turn and settling more cities.

Your name: vadalaz
Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 800AD
Turns played: 100
Base score: 617
Final score: 2056

One of my worst games in a while, I made approximately a million mistakes.

I did farm an admiral, but it was pointless as usual, I found everyone with dromons. At some point barbs actually stopped bringing XP (I suppose it's because I got 30/30 on every dromon), so I attacked a CS. Took AIs' cities in peace deals on AIs' turns, so I got no yields from the city tiles themselves due to the stupid bug. Built WAY too many cities, I only had all three faith buildings in my capital. In the end I forgot this was a large map and didn't scroll down in the influence window, so it really surprised me when I didn't win after the weakest GM concert ever. Turns out I forgot about the Ottomans, never even got open borders from them, so it took 3 more turns to finish the game.

Really sloppy play, should've paid more attention.

Your name: michi216
Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 1160AD
Turns played: 118
Base score: 832
Final score: 2377


- Did you use your UU?
Yes killed a lot of barbarians with it.

- How useful was your UA?
Very useful -got 3 faith buildings.

- Did you use spying to your advantage?
No spying.

- Did the map type help or hinder victory and how?
Helped a lot since i could discover all other civilizations with dromones.

- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
I thougt that i could be able to win with sacred sites on this difficulty level (never tried this before).

- Was Faith helpful to achieve victory? How? Did you build any faith wonders?
Played Sacred Sites.

- What Social Policies did you choose and in what order? Which Ideology did you choose?
Opened with honor (killed a lot of barbarians), then left side liberty, then piety (everything except theocracy), then right side liberty

- Did you try Sacred Sites, or n early Great Admiral
Won my first Sacred Sites (was a lot of fun), didnt get the great admiral (dont know why?)

Your name: donkeyfish
Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 1120AD
Turns played: 116
Base score: 665
Final score: 1900

- Did you use your UU?
Yes (Dromon only). Had 5 that each got 30xp from barbs.

- How useful was your UA?
not very actually, since I only got 3 buildings in a few cities. I picked pagoda/monestary first, should have gotten mosque/monestary

- Did you use spying to your advantage?
no

- Did the map type help or hinder victory and how?
continents hinders sacred sites I believe. But "plus" gives space to spam cities

- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
Wasnt afraid of the expansion anger, since King AI dont have that many units

- Was Faith helpful to achieve victory? How? Did you build any faith wonders?
Yes, bought faith buildings for tourism

- What Social Policies did you choose and in what order? Which Ideology did you choose?
Liberty x3 -> Piety x4 -> Finish Liberty -> Piety x1. Havent done this Piety thing in a long time, so forgot that theres a 20% discount policy Would have been a lot better than my lousy musician.

- What techs did you prioritize ?
Pottery for Shrine, Sailing for Dromon, Philosophy for Temple/Oracle

- Did you try Sacred Sites, or n early Great Admiral
Yes & yes. Attacked the nearby CS to get one. Somehow missed Ashurbanipal with my scouting, so lost a lot of turns. My brain was certain he was on the same continent as the others. Didnt meet him before t90 or something. Big mistake.

Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 1610AD
Turns played: 151
Base score: 1460
Final score: 3244
Time played: 7:20:00

The first time I have ever done the Sacred Sites strategy. I'm just not disciplined enough to avoid taking the Tradition and Honor opener to complete it quickly.

I regretted this as I struggled to get enough tourism to overhaul the Zulus

Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 880AD
Turns played: 104
Base score: 699
Final score: 2254
Time played: 8:20:00

oh dear - vadalaz has one of the worst games in a while and I can barely keep up.


Well, anyhow...

- Did you use your UU?
Yes, the dromones were fine for exploring.

- How useful was your UA?
Getting two buildings from founding did matter as I missed out on a third building (or potentially second without UA) as 2 religions were founded about 1 turn before I could have enhanced...so I didn't enhance until very late.

- Did you use spying to your advantage?
Nope no spies

- Did the map type help or hinder victory and how?
Before the game I thought it would hinder but as anyone could be explored without astronomy it probably even helped.

- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
It made me go sacred sites.

- Was Faith helpful to achieve victory? How? Did you build any faith wonders?
Well yes....sacred sites
No faith wonders though, went earth mother and that was good enough.

- What Social Policies did you choose and in what order? Which Ideology did you choose?
Opened piety due to culture ruin, so I could built a shrine super fast (and still was only third!!! to pantheon).
Then opened honor, organised religion, open liberty, reformation (t48 probably one SP too early) finished piety and spent some more in liberty.
No ideologies.

- What techs did you prioritize ?
Pottery!
...then mining, sailing, various stuff that didn't really matter as didn't even build libraries.

- Did you try Sacred Sites, or n early Great Admiral
Yes and no
4-5 Dromones kept exploring and gathering some XP but by far not enough. At one point I simply crossed fingers and hoped that they'd do and they did - also looking at the large map it really feels like a single GA would've really had a tough job.

Misc
- Built GLH to speed up exploring.
- Had an 8turn overdue 1st GP (well to be honest it were only 4 turns and I also popped a faith ruin )
- Bribed the AI into some wars but stayed peacefull myself...
- ...except for Assyria, the dromone simply had to continue its trip and no one knew what the expression "open borders" should mean.

Oh dear.

Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 1890AD
Turns played: 215
Base score: 1377
Final score: 2118

Well, the times here are embarrassing for me. To be fair, I'm not used to quick speed or large maps or Sacred Sites. (what's that? - do some practice games?)

Settled by the mountain and tried to do a hybrid wonder hoarder / sacred sites build. Lost Great Library by two turns. Good omen. Got Stonehenge and two faith buildings at least. Was forward-settled by Rome (who managed 6 cities before I got 2 - not used to quick obviously). Social policies were a mess - Tradition opener, Liberty x5, then Faith x3 , Rationalism x2 and Ascetics x3. Ended up in a colourful Orthodox / Freedom vs Catholic Autocracy with Rome. Had to use artifacts, hotels and International Games to overhaul Rome. This appears to be what happens in a GOTM without a laser-like focus. Enjoyed the game though - had a nice Civ by the end of it.

Culture Victory, 1928AD, T234. Base score 1459, adjusted 2084.

Knowtalent said:

- Did you use your UU?
- How useful was your UA?
- Did you use spying to your advantage?
- Did the map type help or hinder victory and how?
- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions?
- Was Faith helpful to achieve victory? How? Did you build any faith wonders?
- What Social Policies did you choose and in what order? Which Ideology did you choose?
- What techs did you prioritize ?
- Did you try Sacred Sites, or n early Great Admiral

Click to expand...

- I only built the UU (mostly for the RP).
- UA made the early CV possible via Sacred Sites.
- I used spies to steal tech, but nothing spectacular.
- Continents Plus is my favorite shipping map type. I did not finish unfogging the map. I was disappointed that so few AI cities were coastal.
- Low difficulty level meant I could sleep walk through for for a relaxing game.
- Faith was important to buy lots of buildings and GP at end. I missed the faith wonders.
- At end I had full Liberty, Piety, Aesthetics, Exploration, and six in Order. I was first to Ideologies and I am pretty sure Freedom would have worked just as well.
- Nothing unusual for tech priorities.
- I tried Sacred Sites, but only reluctantly after everything was falling into place! I got three or four faith buildings in each of my eight cities.

Reference number: 34253
Your name: zxcvbob
Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 1904AD
Turns played: 222
Base score: 1675
Final score: 2500
Time played: 16:03:00

My computer crashed on about turn 204, so I reloaded and replayed the turn and kept going. I don't think it was really 16 hours because I left the computer running a couple of times when I wasn't playing, but I bet it was over 12 hours. Maybe that's why I'm so sleepy lately (just one more turn...)

I used dromons extensively to scout out the map. Found everybody before Astronomy, although Shaka was just a few turns before. I built a few cataphracts and used them a little when Rome declared war on me (mostly just fortified them around the one border city.) That was a *very* bad decision on Caesar's part; I captured all his cities except one (liberated Mecca) and didn't give him a peace treaty until over until 100 turns later when Monty was about to take his last city. I just sent in a knight from time-to-time and pillaged everything and stole his workers and settlers. He did put up a good fight when the military advisor said I could "crush" the Roman army and I went on the offensive (not sure how a legion managed to kill a full-health musket and the GG he was guarding)

I built 2 faith wonders, Stonehenge and Hagia Sophia. HS in one of my tertiary cities when I had a GE show up at the right time, mostly to get a wonder in another city for the Aesthetics bonus, and a free temple. I don't think I ever used that GP for anything...

The difficulty level just meant that I had a shot at Stonehenge. I'm not sure that it influenced much else. I took the Order ideology, and much to my surprise most of the AI's also took Order when they finally got to ideologies. Playing at quick speed messed up my timing bulbing GS's at the end and I got the Internet later than I should and still had leftover GS's and leftover faith. Also, when the game ended I still had 2 musicians that were travelling to Russia to give concerts.

It was odd being friends with all the AI's for the whole game. (being attacked by Rome doesn't count; that's what he does)

Question for those of you who did Sacred Sites. Did you open Liberty first and wait with Piety until after the free settler? Or maybe open Liberty, Honor, and Piety, and ignore the free settler for a while and just hard-build the first 2?

Whenever I've played a pure Piety opener, I get to the reformation too fast. If I wait until after the free settler, the AI's beat me to the reformation policy. (although with Stonehenge or a faith mountain you can probably plow straight through Piety and not hit the reformation before your first GP.

zxcvbob said:

Question for those of you who did Sacred Sites. Did you open Liberty first and wait with Piety until after the free settler? Or maybe open Liberty, Honor, and Piety, and ignore the free settler for a while and just hard-build the first 2?

Whenever I've played a pure Piety opener, I get to the reformation too fast. If I wait until after the free settler, the AI's beat me to the reformation policy. (although with Stonehenge or a faith mountain you can probably plow straight through Piety and not hit the reformation before your first GP.

Click to expand...

Opened piety then liberty to settlers in my test game built SH. I got calandar from a ruin. So after i got that and earth mother i knew i could rush to reformation. I was the second to reformation, but by then i had 3 buildings so was less worried about it being taken. The AI took Jesuit education

Sent from my SM-N920P using Tapatalk

Game: Civ5 GOTM 133
Date submitted: 2016-04-19 18:56:55
Reference number: 34254
Your name: ferenginar
Game status: Time Loss
Game date: 2050AD
Turns played: 330
Base score: 1578
Final score: 1578
Time played: 14:32:00
Submitted save: Ferenginar_TSG133_0330 AD-2050.Civ5Save
Renamed file: ferenginar_C513301.Civ5Save

Still got a lot to learn, would have helped if I knew the sacred sites strategy. At least I got the theming bonuses sorted out at last, not that it did me a lot of good.

Early on I had too much trouble with the barbs (first ever raging), then Rome just kept declaring war on me, and although I held him off, it just wasted too much time and resource.

EDIT:
Replayed the game, with sacred sites on two religious buildings, achieved CV at t257. Not as fast as I hoped but, one Civ just refused to play ball and another had lots of culture. But winning the international games and bombing them both with musicians had the both done in a couple of turns.

zxcvbob said:

Question for those of you who did Sacred Sites. Did you open Liberty first and wait with Piety until after the free settler? Or maybe open Liberty, Honor, and Piety, and ignore the free settler for a while and just hard-build the first 2?

Whenever I've played a pure Piety opener, I get to the reformation too fast. If I wait until after the free settler, the AI's beat me to the reformation policy. (although with Stonehenge or a faith mountain you can probably plow straight through Piety and not hit the reformation before your first GP.

Click to expand...

at King diff, it's surprising that the AI would beat you to Reformation and SS. ive always played my SS strategies with first 3 policies into liberty for the free settler then straight to Reformation. (resisting the free worker is really tough but it will put you behind more if you dont.) it's a total of 7 policies, one of which i'll get from the Oracle. most of the luck part comes from AIs either not going Piety or just being slow if they did, and at King they are pretty slow usually. and in terms of spending the faith points i'll make a GP > missionary > GP > buildings unless I can reasonably get Hagia before the second GP pops.

Byz gives you some wiggle room on that since you can get 3 buildings and therefore might need less total cities to spam. or you dont need a 2nd GP since you got 2 buildings from just founding but i think 3 buildings is more important than not spending the second 300f. and i prefer one of those buildings to be monasteries too. they are cheaper and their lack of happiness isnt a big deal since your 1-2 pop cities cant make use of happiness that exceeds its pop. you'll still get the tourism from it regardless.

strategically my biggest issue with this map was meeting everyone quickly enough. (forgot it was a large map with more civs.) i had 4 civs fully influential and i still had 2 more to meet. one was land locked and behind other civs borders so i had to overpay (3 luxes) for OB just to meet them. the other had just recently been liberated 4 turns before winning, haha, delaying it another few turns. that liberation just felt like the game wanted to prank me, haha. never had that situation before in a CV.

michi216 said:

Your name: michi216
Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 1160AD
Turns played: 118
Base score: 832
Final score: 2377

Won my first Sacred Sites (was a lot of fun), didnt get the great admiral (dont know why?)

Click to expand...

Welcome to CFC and thanks for playing this GotM! Have fun and thanks for submitting.

HR

Hammer Rabbi said:

Welcome to CFC and thanks for playing this GotM! Have fun and thanks for submitting.

HR

Click to expand...

Thank you very much. GotM seems like a lot of fun and i`m already waiting for the next game.

Thanks for your work!

michi216 said:

Thank you very much. GotM seems like a lot of fun and i`m already waiting for the next game.
Thanks for your work!

Click to expand...

There are lots of old games you can still play, and even comment on in their Opening Actions and After Actions threads, you just can't submit them anymore. It's a great way to stay up until 3:00 AM every night until you die from sleep deprivation. (BTDT)

Game status: Culture Victory
Game date: 980AD
Turns played: 109
Base score: 850
Final score: 2575
Time played: 6:26:00

- Did you use your UU? Only Dromons for exploring and clearing barbs.
- How useful was your UA? Very useful for the 3rd religious building for SS.
- Did you use spying to your advantage? No, nobody reached renaissance.
- Did the map type help or hinder victory and how? Thought it would take long time to explore all civs but was easier than expected due to not needing Astronomy.
- How did the difficulty level affect your game decisions? Obviously SS is viable on kings.
- Was Faith helpful to achieve victory? How? Did you build any faith wonders? High fpt is key for SS, especially with Byzantium 3 building strategy. I chose Mosque, Pagoda and Monastery (cheapest). I built Stonehenge early to boost my fpt, then also got Borobudur and GE rushed Hagia Sophia but too late to matter. Near the end, I was faith buying 1-2 new religious buildings per turn.
- What Social Policies did you choose and in what order? Which Ideology did you choose? Liberty left side, Piety to reformation with oracle, finish Liberty. Not even close to ideology.
- What techs did you prioritize ? I tried to delay all science tech to get cheaper buildings, after the required Pottery and lux techs. Turns out that getting Civil Service earlier might've been better as it allows me to get Open Borders sooner.
- Did you try Sacred Sites, or n early Great Admiral? Victory was SS strat, didn't get any admirals despite having many dromons.

Game status: Culture Victory
Turns played: 171
Base score: 1014
Final score: 1988

Game: Civ5 GOTM 133
Game status: Science Loss
Game date: 2047AD
Turns played: 327
Base score: 1627
Final score: 1627

Well, this is the first loss that I've actually bothered to finish and submit. I guess I didn't implement sacred sites well enough to win it. At the end of the game, I had 14 cities (built and taken from Rome and Assyria). I missed getting the third religious building, so this may have helped sink me (I messed up and moved my first great prophet to one of my more centrally-located cities instead of the capitol, and this may have been a factor). By the time Persia launched its spacecraft, I had 1009 tourism/turn (though I had only just gotten internet a few turns before then). I was gaining on Assyria, but there was no way I was going to catch Persia's culture. After getting Pyramids and Oracle early, I proceeded to get beat to every great-work wonder. Oh, and I had SIX unused great engineers. Rough one.