The Immortal Challenge Lineup - Game #25 America

All games in this series will be set to IMMORTAL difficulty. User civilizations, maps, and opponents will change each game, but the pace will always be set at standard and the starting era will always be ancient. We will try for a variety of starts, and not just having a crazy warmonger as your next door neighbor (although there will be that too). This isn't a competition so there will be no predefined victory conditions. New challenges in the series will be posted every other Wednesday.

Who can play?
Anybody can play. The more the merrier. Even if you normally don't play immortal games you are still welcome to try. The games can become great learning resources for the player trying to improve. Even if you don't finish the game, we are still interested to hear about your experience.

Do's and Don'ts
We are going to be using the honor system. Feel free to restart, reload, play the same game multiple times, but don't use the science overflow exploit. Also please don't edit the game in IGE. If you do chose to cheat, please don't share your results in the comments. Also, please use the spoiler tag if you post a picture, comment about neighboring civs, close by wonders, or locations of ancient ruins.

Also, please tell us about your Build Order, Social Policies, Tech Order, and what type of wonders you went after. I know a lot of this stuff seems pretty mundane to the experienced player, but the details are incredibly useful to people trying to learn.

Future Games in the Series
I want users to submit saves from turn 0. Preferably the person submitting the game has played enough turns to know the map is either difficult, fun, or unique in some enjoyable way. Write a short description as to why it is special and email the save to immortalchallengelineup@gmail.com

Important
If you submit a game for the challenge, you must have the DLC map packs disabled. Not everybody has them and they are honestly kind of useless. Having them disabled will allow more participants.

Click to expand...

Game #1 - Japan
Game #2 - Poland
Game #3 - Ottomans
Game #4 - Arabia
Game #5 - Brazil
Game #6 - Denmark
Game #7 - Songhai
Game #8 - Sweden
Game #9 - India
Game #10 - Russia
Game #11 - Germany
Game #12 - Aztecs
Game #13 - Egypt
Game #14 - France
Game #15 - Austria
Game #16 - Siam
Game # 17 - Venice
Game # 18 - Iroquois
Game # 19 - Greece
Game # 20 - Persia
Game # 21 - England
Game # 22 - Ethiopia
Game # 23 - Assyria
Game # 24 - The Celts
Game # 25 - America

Fun game so far. I've never had so many ruins, nor so many barbarians to clear. I wasn't able to steal any workers since Shaka just turtled, but I liked the starting dirt. I forward settled both Shaka and Denmark, but I pumped units after my first three cities before Shaka rushed me. He was stuck in a bad spot so once I cleared his initial wave I took his capital and that was that.

I've played pretty sloppy IMO but I've wiped out the Zulus, Denmark, and Austria, and am working my way east with the strongest army and 2nd in tech at turn 200.

By sloppy I mean things like annexing a city with my already late NC 1 turn from completion, and the not noticing for 10+ turns I could have caught up in tech way earlier. Anyway, it should be a formality at this point, but I look forward to getting artillery and scouring the eastern side of the continent.

Policy wise: I went for the left side of liberty and then full honor with Oracle for the finisher, now I'm just going full commerce with 3 policies locked down. Everyone hates me so the extra happiness after a couple more policies will be more than welcome. I've had two different barbarian spawns due to happiness issues, as well as barbarians attacking my borders at different times. I'm not too keen on leaving units at home, but it would have helped a lot in this game. City states are doing anything to help defend. I've lost a lot of units to sloppy warmongering, but I'm happy to just overrun the AI with what I have.

I'll probably finish in the 250-300 range, closer to 300. I'll upload some pics as I get closer.

Ulundi

Copenhagen

Lisbon and Sao Paulo

Met Shaka turn 1 and decided to spam out some archers and kill him before impis. Settled t1 on grassland river-hill, stole Shaka-worker t5, never gave peace. Unfortunately he somehow managed to weasel out a settler.



Due to Americas extra sight I found lots of helpful ruins that gave me a religion: Upgrade, Gold, Pop, Sailing, Culture, Gold, Upgrade (Comp bow), Faith and one more Faith!

Religion of choice: Goddess of Festivals, Tithe, Cathedrals, Religious Center, Religious texts,

I killed Shaka t102 then I took on Denmark, then Austria before I ended Sweden completely so I could ally his city states more easily. Proceeded to Portugal then Mongolia and last Brazil!

Had some minor setbacks slowing me down. I lost my first warrior and first scout. Didn't meet Brazil until very late and didn't see the terrain... I would have gone for Astronomy after Gun Powder if my scouting had worked out. I focused a lot on allying city states and had no problems with either happiness or gold.

Minutemen were amazing in the Brazilian jungle:



t239 Domination:



More details:

Tech: Archery, Pottery, Calendar, Writing, Mining, Philosophy, -> Construction, Iron Working, -> Machinery, -> Gun Powder, -> Civil Service, -> Education, Chemistry, -> Industrialization/Optics/Industrialization, -> Dynamite (Didn’t reach&#8230

SP: Right side Honor, Full Honor t83, Patronage opener, Full Commerce, right side first.

Purchases: 4x tiles, Archer, Library in New York, Upgrades Bowmen, Sugar tile, Whine tile, then upgrades and gifts to CS:s rest of the game.

Spy Steals: Drama, Chivalry, Printing Press,

Complete BO:

BO Washington: Scout, Monument, Archer, Archer, Archer, Archer, Library, Settler, Archer, NC (t80), Warrior, Settler, Stone Works, Aqueduct, Comp Bow, Colosseum, Barracks, Caravan, Caravan, Caravan, Workshop, Forge, Trebuchet, Trebuchet, Armory, Long Swordsman/Minuteman, Minuteman, Minuteman, University, WF, Cannon, Cannon, Cannon, Minuteman, Minuteman, Minuteman, Big Ben (Didn’t finish&#8230

BO New York: Monument, Warrior, Comp Bow, Aqueduct, Colosseum, Barracks, Swordsman, Workshop, Trebuchet, Armory, Long Swordsman, Long Swordman/Minuteman, Minuteman, Minuteman, University, WF, Cannon, Cannon, Minuteman, Minuteman, Minuteman,

BO Boston: Monument, Library, Colosseum, Workshop, Barracks, Armory, University, Aqueduct, Minuteman, Minuteman,

Fun map! I met Shaka the 2nd turn, so forward settled next to the lake for some protection. Gotta love city fire. Got a Spear upgrade, and later an Archer->CB, yes! Built a bunch of Archers and another Spear and took Ulundi t52, just after he built me SoZ. Took Liberty, but took the free Worker as 2nd policy to start developing. I had immediately DOW'd Bratislava, but in hindsight Panama City would have been better. Have not been able to boot-camp much because there are so many barb quests everywhere.

Are raging barbs on?

Expo'd E to get some early lux, then LV. Am building Oracle for Liberty finish which I plan to use on GW if it's still available, will hard-build 3 city NC (with puppet). Then likely unleash some whoop-ass, although only Harald knows my sins. I would go peaceful wide except there isn't much for unique lux around now. I haven't really used Minutemen, I like Acken's all MM approach, pretty funny.

I assumed I'd skip religion, but after all my military was built only 1 pantheon had gone, so I built a shrine and got 2nd pantheon, LOL. Took God-King because I wasn't sure what would help more, not enough workable silver, nor Earth mother stuff.