TSG2 After Action Report

Hi there! im another long time lurker, first time poster.

I was really exited to play this gotm out as i tried an ICS game with Napoleon before, which ended in a surprisingly easy space victory. This time i wanted to give it a little more thought and do even better. There was much more warmongering going on and i had plenty of fun ;)

Start:
Spoiler :
I settled in place and went for scout/worker/settler/monument(?)/pyramids/great library, techwise i went for masonry/sailing/writing/philosophy/trapping/civil service(gl)/horseback raiding. i left out on calender for quite a bit and lost to stonehenge, of course, but i successfully slingshotted civil service and got the mids, which proved to be huge for the many cities soon to spawn and i got a second city near the marble in the north. After proving to be useless to build any wonder ( it lost on the oracle :( ), it started to gain some gpp for the first great scientist.


Mid Game:
Spoiler :
Being in the middle ages, i finally spent my culture points on the commerce tree to get the 20% discount on rush buying. Sciencewise I beelined banking and the tech for big ben. Hammerwise I started settling like crazy, while building 4 horseman and a chariot . As soon as the chariot and my first 2 horseman finished, ghandi dowed me :crazyeye:. In consequence he lost his capital and had to sign a peace treaty, for some money, of course. The settling continued afterwards , while my ever growing worker force built TPosts everywhere ... until ... Elisabeth dowed me , which was - again - easily crushed by one knight, 3 horseman and a chariot. So the settling could continue, while our capital worked on the forbidden palace and a great engineer for big ben. I spent most bucks on colosseums/tombs/circus.


Late Game:
Spoiler :
After getting th forbidden palace and big ben fairly early- both around turn 170-175 - and covering half of the continent with a yellow color and with uncountable white dots, i felt quite strong. I beelined astronomy next to get some deals with those unknown civs. Through these deals i got about 15 happyness and very very many "We love the King parties", which almost lasted to the end of the game. i beelined nanotechnology next, set my few policy points into rationalism and i let most of the ciies grew to size 8, then i installed 2 scientist in each of them. Becourse of my big tech lead to Napoleon and Montezuma i could fend them off with a very small army, several times. each time giving me a new tech via Research Agreement. Sadly, with all the small wars going on, I started setting up my 2 production cities too late, which costed me at least 10-15 turns. They weren't great either, only producing 140-150 hammers with almost all possible multipliers. Soon afterwars the spaceship launched. Really liked the map and the warring with those hopeless aztecs and french, who would always return to peace and a new research agreement.


edit:

Score : 4633
 

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It was fun game. I slaughtered Gandhi as soon as possible, then I went on Elizabeth. After some time entire continent was mine and I decided to stop growing. On turn 300, in peaceful space bulding phase, I suffered Washington's leader screen hung (it happended to me in several games before, there are no choices available, just the welcome text from leader and it's impossible to return to game). I loaded last autosave and finished without problems in 1919. I hope the game will be patched well before real GOTM starts ;(
 

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Cynox said:
Hi there! im another long time lurker, first time poster.

I was really exited to play this gotm out as i tried an ICS game with Napoleon before, which ended in a surprisingly easy space victory. This time i wanted to give it a little more thought and do even better. There was much more warmongering going on and i had plenty of fun ;)
Click to expand...
:wavey: Welcome to the GOTM. Glad you stopped lurking to join us.

Congrats on your win. :goodjob:
 
I think I had a similar strategy to a lot of people. Warmonger first to take over the continent then boom the economy to the win.

Spoiler :

First thing I noticed was the lack of nearby happiness resources. I hooked up the horse and cranked out a few horsemen and chariot archers. This led to early conquering of almaty to get the dyes then I pushed north to Gandhi. I took his capital and then regrouped for a bit and tried to take the aztec capital before he got to powerful. I ended up having to pull back after he popped a catapult in his capital.

I built a city by the aztec capital used that a base of operations to kill his army. The pause in fighting while I regrouped really hurt though. I managed to pull off a rifleman mini slingshot with the scientific revolution policy as I mopped up the Aztecs. There was a nice pileup between myself, the french and the english at the last aztec city. The english took it and I used the excuse to DOW on Elizabeth.

I slogged my way through the rest of the continent, keeping the capitals or really nice cities and back filling a few more of my own. I think the two biggest mistakes I made were not focusing on war early enough and not specializing my cities till pretty late in the game. I should have saved a few extra great people to carry me through golden ages for the last space ship parts. The extra hammers for that are definitely nice.

I waited until after I had the continent to myself to start befriending city-states. I figured the money was spent on military and the extra food would have just caused happiness problems. Darius ending up owning most of the other continent, I let him have it. I think he teched into the modern era around the time I finished my spaceship.
 

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This is probably going to be the latest finishing, lowest score victory of this GotM, but I'm happy with it because I managed it doing what I'd set out to do at the beginning of the game, which was not to DoW anyone (preferably, not fight any wars at all, which I also managed) just to see how big an edge the whole 'conquer-and-puppet' strategy gives you, and if it's possible to win without doing it (and it was ;) ). I may at some point replay this using the warmongering strat, and maybe also one where I spam cities like crazy and build science improvements in them (in this game I only had 3 cities).

I was a total underdog for most of this game because not warring allowed the other civilizations to do so. Ghandi was wiped off the face of the planet fairly early on by Elizabeth, and Monty was stomped by Napoleon, but never ended up taking his capital before peace was made, and war didn't break out between them again. I have no idea what was really going on on the other continent, apart from the fact that Darius' score was pretty damn big, and I think America got their capital taken (at least) at some point. Near the very end of the game, Elizabeth and Darius' both DoWed Napoleon (who was top for the majority of the game), only to have Napoleon wipe out Lizzy in an embarrassingly small number of turns.

While this was all going on, I just sat there with my three cities, signing Open Borders, refusing to DoW on civ A after civ B asked me to do it for the umpteenth time, trading resources to keep my happiness up (was one of the real challenges with no puppet cities, or City-State allies, since Monty and Napoleon wiped out most of them), and just generally trying to whack out the most science per turn as possible. It was a close call, but this actually made it one of the most fun games of Civ I've ever played, which is impressive for a totally peaceful strategy :p

Endgame was particularly tense, a) Being fortunate in that a Tech Agreement gave me Biology as I was on my way to Nanotechnology and b) Managing to get some Aluminium from Darius in order to build a Spaceship Factory in Thebes. I probably could have still finished in the last 5 turns if I'd only had one of these things happened, but if neither had happened I probably wouldn't have made it. I had RA's going for as much of the game as I could financially support, they were critical in giving me enough techs in time.

Spoiler :
Moved my Settler to found Thebes on top of the marble for the wonder production bonus. Beelining to Writing for a Library to give my science an early boost, and GL for a tech slingshot. Set Thebes producing a Worker.

Turn 6 - Ruins give me a map, revealing Delhi, even though I haven't met India yet :p

Turn 10 - Ruins upgrades my Warrior to a Spearman Meet Ghandi. I offer Ghandi a Pact of Cooperation, which he refuses, only to have him offer me one when it's his turn O_o Dodgy diplomacy. I sign it anyway.

Turn 11 - Ghandi offers Open Borders, meaning he has Writing already. How!?

Turn 18 - Ruins give me a point of population in Thebes

Turn 19 - Meet Elizabeth

Turn 21 - Finish Writing, now beelining to Theology so that I can slingshot to Education with GL, and then to Acoustics. Well, that's the plan

Turn 25 - Adopt Tradition

Turn 26 - Meet Monty. Pact of Cooperation signed.

Turn 35 - Faced with a choice between building the National College now in order to (hopefully) make sure Theology's done before I can finish the GL, or build the GL now and probably have to get Theology instead of Education as my free tech. I'm going to take the risk.

Turn 46 - National College built, put a citizen in the Library so that the the times left for Theology to finish and the time for the GL to be built are both 13 turns. Now to cross my fingers...

Turn 58 - Adopt Aristocracy

Turn 59 - The gamble paid off Now have Education relatively early on in the game. Begin work on a University, and start researching some techs that'll allow be to improve Thebes' resources

Turn 82 - University finished, at long last. Building a Work Boat to provide Pearls, as my happiness is dwindling a bit, then I'll start on the Porcelain Tower. Beelining to Scientific Theory

Turn 97 - Met Napoleon

Turn 109 - Porcelain Tower completed, built an Academy with the GS.

Turn 121 - Researching astronomy has made me hit the Renaissance Era, allowing me to adopt Rationalism and Humanism.

Turn 125 - Memphis founded

Turn 153 - Adopted Sovereignty

Turn 162 - Meet Darius

Turn 177 - Research Scientific Theory, at long last :p Beelining Chesmistry for Ironworks, need some heavy production output

Turn 189 - Sign a Pact of Cooperation with Darius

Turn 192 - Adopt Secularism

Turn 218 - Chemistry done, beelining to Railroad

Turn 225 - Founded Heliopolis

Turn 236 - Adopted Free Thought

Turn 289 - Adopted Scientific Revolution and grabbed Replaceable Parts and Flight

Turn 292 - Railroad complete, beelining to Rocketry

Turn 342 - Finish Radar and use a GS to pop Rocketry, begin building the Apollo Program in Thebes. Begin research on Satellites.

Turn 343 - Adopt Order (mainly for Communism, although I might not reach it before the end of the game)

Turn 361 - Satellites completed, beelining Robotics

Turn 378 - Apollo Program complete, Thebes begins building the SS Cockpit

Turn 390 - Adopt Socialism

Turn 405 - SS Cockpit completed. Confidence from mid-game is gone now, I don't think I'm going to make it before turn 500.

Turn 414 - Napoleon completed the UN, funny really given the amount of City-States he's conquered :p I'm not worrying too much about this.

Turn 418 - Robotics is at last completed. All three of my cities proceed to begin building SS Boosters. Beelining to Plastics for the Research Labs, hoping the improved Science output will give me enough to reserach everything I need in time

Turn 429 - Adopted Planned Economy

Turn 437 - First set of SS Boosters completed

Turn 439 - Plastics complete. Second set of SS Boosters completed, use a GS to pop Penicillin, now beelining to Nanotechnology

Turn 450 - Final set of SS Boosters completed and added. This is going to be close...

Turn 459 - Adopted Communism

Turn 462 - Particle Physics completed, Memphis gets to work on SS Engine (due to complete in 31 turns, yikes!)

Turn 471 - Nanotechnology complete, Thebes begins SS Stasis Chamber. Beelining to Future Tech, although it hardly matters now

Turn 486 - SS Engine completed and added

Turn 487 - SS Stasis Chamber completed and added. VICTORY! :D
 

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I suffered the shame and ignominy of defeat to Civ V for the first time! So I have seen the 'failure screen' - reminiscent of the old Civ I - archaeologist discovers your empire's ruins in the dust. Ha!

Anyway, I failed through getting dragged into a war, but not being prepared for a real military game, and then getting backstabbed by Elizabeth and then Montezuma.

I had initially joined Elizabeth in an attack on Gandhi - and successfully conquered his tiny empire.
However, while I still only had about 5 units, and only one in Delhi, Liz declared on me and took that city from me.

I sent my remaining units to try to wrest it back off of her, but saw quickly that I needed more power. These units camped in the forests nearby and fought off her attacks while waiting for reinforcements. Finally I had enough, and rode in to take Delhi back again!

Sadly, that was the moment Montezuma chose to declare on me and send a big stack (10 units!) for me. At this point my whole army was in and around Delhi, so they had to hold on at all costs. My homelands were undefended. They couldn't hold on, though, against Monty's catapults and longswords - and so I had to build up the defences back home against the oncoming assault.

When the attack came, I thought for a time I could hold out, but the bombardments took out city after city (I only had 3) - and so I was dead!

My immediate afterthoughts are (1) that my research rate was awful - by the end I was attacked by muskets while I was still using knights, and (2) I needed to focus on one approach - conquest or peaceful tech-ing

I must have another try. Possibly a peaceful approach.
 
This is a first for me, I think I never actually posted in one of these threads before. I played many of the Civ IV games out of order, as I found civfanatics too late.

I did the obvious, too, and warmongered it up to build an enormous puppet city empire with 15 of 16 city state allies (never got to liberating the last one). The game ended after 356 turns in 1936 AD with a score of 4247.

It could have ended significantly earlier if I had gone for a diplomatic victory and even earlier than that if I had gone for conquest. I could probably have achieved a cultural victory too, but that would have taken longer. At the end of the game, I had 20 social policies unlocked and was generating 274 cpt, more than enough for only four non-puppet cities.

I think I could have been less reluctant to go to war as well and made it a lot shorter. I was hesitating a bit before every war but it turned out that neither the happiness hit nor my opponent's military was a problem, ever. And the final part could have been over much faster too if I had set up production cities, which I never really got around to doing.

You can watch the replay here if you want (and if your browser isn't IE): http://discordia.erinye.com/civ5replay/ts2.html

Spoiler report :

I annexed Delhi really early, no Indian military anywhere to be found. I then went on to puppet all of Liz' cities except one that I let Vienna raze. Then I continued with Napoleon, and later Monty. Around turn 200, the continent is finally mine and I'm also allied with all the city states on it by that time.

I just barely manage to grab Washington before Darius gets it, then conquer most of Arabia. Mecca was one great start location. After having puppeted almost all cities I conquered and having conquered all civs except Persia, I stop my war efforts and re-focus on tech. At this point, all city states except one that Darius annexed early on are my allies and the only cities in my empire that are not puppets are Thebes, Memphis and Delhi.

I neglect setting up production cities in time, but annex my puppet Paris and build it up to 111.3 hammers (before spaceship factory). Not too good but it worked out, so who am I to complain. Thebes and Memphis (my only two own cities) were slightly behind. On turn 357, the Egyptian spaceship is launched from Thebes, just as my giant death robots reach Washington. I would have attacked Darius with them if the spaceship had taken any longer.


Spoiler economic observations :

My final stats on turn 357 were 1853 bpt, 89 gpt, 9 happiness, 274 cpt, score 3016 according to diplo overview (adjusted score in hall of fame is 4247).

I could have easily won this game much earlier, but even dragging out the game like this, the economy never crashed despite my huge amount of puppet cities. It does work. I could without doubt have won this game culturally with almost 150 turns left and unlocking a new sp around every 15 turns.

Main takeaway: Puppet early and puppet often; ignore building maintenance, it can be managed. My final total income was 766, of which 535.5 was raw city output and 222 from trade routes. My total expenses were 685 gold, 555 of which were for building maintenance. Meaning the cities easily paid for themselves. SPs like Socialism helped manage the expenses. Even if I had not managed to make more gold than I was spending on my puppets' building sprees, at 1853 bpt I was in no danger of losing units anytime soon (deficit comes out of your bpt before you start losing units). I could easily have conquered the last remaining capital if I had needed to in order to secure a victory.

Happiness was 415 vs 406 unhappiness so the size of the empire was not a problem either. A whopping 311 was contributed by buildings, most of which built by my puppets. So they take care of their unhappiness as well.
 

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This was my 2nd play as my autosave of the 1st play was lost due to the start of new games.

1822AD Science victory.

A serious bug found.

Clearly I don't have any deal with English, however the OB I provided with them last forever :rolleyes: and their units spam and block my road, want to build railroad in your own empire, that's a dream if there's a foreign unit stands on that tile.:lol: Oh, those units also blocked my spaceship parts as my railway network is so great to try. Now you don't need spies to deter the spaceship victory, surround a capital with some cheap units will do the same job.
Spoiler :




Now here's the result, I can't declare her forever for some mysterious reason, that would be great if she is a super powerful deity AI if the other way around also stands!:D
Spoiler :




Here's the graphic bug. Notice the yield of the sheep tile. Some other tiles around are also wrong.
Spoiler :


 

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Very pleased with that, even if it isn't close to the others posted in here :D First victory on King difficulty in any civ (except Rev for the iPhone, even Deity on that is a joke :lol:).

Early Game
Spoiler :
I went for the CS sligshot and grabbed it on turn 50 by which time Ghandi had already built Stonehenge in Delhi. Made an observation in my notes that the AI seems to get a pretty big bonus to culture on King. Thebes was pitiful compared to all AI cities, including city states.

Founded my second city due north on the river. Delhi (Ghandi) builds the Hanging Gardens on turn 70 and I start rubbing my hands a little bit... Elizabeth is rexxing away, popping cities up everywhere (she always does this for/to me).

Ghandi builds the Oracle in Delhi (his 3rd wonder) turn 96. I get first golden age a few turns later and war dec Ghandi on turn 104, take Delhi 5 turns later with a tiny tiny army. Ghandi uses his gold reserves to buy units and protect his second city. He routs my rag tag bunch completely so I sue for peace, I only wanted Delhi anyway.


Middle:
Spoiler :
In the mid game I didn't really have too much of a strategy. I settled one more city and captured Tyre and tried to ally with as many city states as I could afford. England and France are getting pretty powerful at this point, especially Elizabeth, Lizzie settles 7 cities and starts building more units. Napoleon realises there isn't much space left so kills off some city states and India. Elizabeth doesn't like this so pens him back into his corner a little bit.

Around turn 200, both Ghandi and Elizabeth DoW me on the same turn and I lose Delhi to England after about 20 turns of war. Luckily around this point I get muskets and churn a couple out and retake Delhi with them about 20 turns later. Fragile peace with England ensues, she's just busy fighting Napoleon and Monty anyway. I'm convinced I'm going to lose at this point and that even if I don't lose, there's no way I can get a space victory. The Arabs have sailed the seven seas to say 'hi' and revealed they're hugely advanced and a pretty huge nation and England have nearly conquered the French. I just dig in for defence against England...


Late:
Spoiler :
Elizabeth DoWs me not long after peace expires, crushing the remaining Indian cities on the way. I still don't have a large army at this point and so I rely heavily on the Artillery stationed in Delhi and two well promoted rifles to wipe her out before she reaches the city. H Castle is an absolute godsend here!

I then reach that bit in the research table where you can get some modern techs and I go straight to mech infs using 3 free techs :crazyeye::crazyeye::crazyeye: 2 from the policy in the rationalism tree and one from a G. Scientist. Defence becomes very easy at this point... So I push the attack a little. But not much as I still only have about 5 units. Anyway, long story short, clear out the south side in line west from Almaty and to the north. The city states in the middle of the continent split England from me.

At this point I finally think "I could actually win this... but probably not the science victory" so I beeline to globalisation and think about building the UN. But all has been quiet on the Arab front and it turns out that he's been fighting a costly war to wipe out the Americans (Persians already gone) instead of building spaceships parts for the Apollo project he already has :crazyeye::rolleyes: So yeah, I build the apollo and all the pieces and launch :lol: Could NOT believe it.


So yeah, very happy with my first victory above Prince and my first science victory in Civ 5 :king:

Things I learnt:
  • Building units is good
  • I'm probably better than I think I am :lol:
  • Mech-infs with medic and march promotions are amazing/unstoppable :hammer:
  • I should write fewer notes early game and more notes later game
  • Which opponent civs will be picked in GOTM games is obvious.
  • I need a mid game strategy

[I will upload a save as and when I get back to my games computer assuming I remember...]
 
my first space ship in civ V :)

nice game though I still have to learn quite a bit...

settled in place and started expanding; eventually Monty attacked France and as a consequence both India and England asked for starting a war - and I agreed to both with a 10 turn delay - 4 vs. 1 :goodjob:

My mini armee (3 units) conquered two cities, and then the beating went on to Napoleon together with England; shortly after a successful peace Gandhi attacked...! ... and lost as well

in the end I head lots of cities and was in a temporary lack of happiness - next time I have to focus more...

the rest was then rather boring as I tried to accelerate the space ship using oxford, rationalism, research agreements without too much micromanagment...of course I carried around 10 (?) city states supporting my science and proving culture, food and units which also helped...
 

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I don't understand SPs. Could someone please explain why you would save up the SP points to buy at a later turn? I tried but the cost went up after each purchase so it seems like all I did was waste turns without SP benefits.
EDIT:
Found a problem with tech deals. Later in the game they appear to never end. I was 10 turns over with a tech trade but it didn't give me the tech. And in diplomacy the option was grayed out so I couldn't start a new one. Then when I DOW'ed I got the tech. Go figure.
Does anyone know how to tell which workers are captured vs. which are home grown? Seems the home grown ones cost maintenance but the captured ones don't (or vice a versa).
The AI (England, India, Aztecs and America at least) never gave me anything (not even 5 gold) for peace. For example I tried every turn as I whittled down England for over 10 cities. After each city I negotiate peace but they will give me nothing. So I didn't think it was worth it and eventually just finished them off.
 

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1814AD, 2479 score.

I lost my notes from the start, but I can give an overall summary.

I settled on the marble and took the warmonger path from very early on. I did grab Stonehenge early on, but ignored most of the early wonders. Second city was settled to the south in order to pick up some horses. Once I could get a couple horsemen out, I went after Monty who at the time only had two cities. He attacked Rio on the same turn I attacked him, so that was a nice added bonus (free city state ally!). After that, I went after Ghandi since he was just sitting there in his one city building wonders and I wanted the pyramids :)

Elizabeth was the most aggressive by far, settling two cities down towards me along the river there and being a general nuisance, so I tackled her next. I took London the turn after she built a wonder there, which was rather amusing :) Lastly, I cleaned up Napoleon who had not done much to date and put up little resistance.

All conquered cities were turned into puppets (I might have razed one or two that were in especially poor positions) and I began putting tradeposts in for the vast majority of the puppet's land improvements in order to keep my finances ahead of the building maintenance. I believe I had 9 puppets on the original continent. Around this time I also settled my third city up around London where there was a very nice river spot which was unoccupied. I didn't see any other great city spots on the continent that were not already taken, so I went with 3 normal cities for the rest of the game.

My economy was picking up very nicely around this time, and I had taken the policies to support city state allies (and the science bonus), so I began bribing all the maritime and culture city states. Shortly after conquering my continent, I sent out caravels to meet the civs on the other continent. Between some trades with second continent civs and the city states, I soon had all the luxury resources available and was in permanent "we love the king day". I pretty much rode the happiness edge from here on out with my population easily expanding to the happy cap each time it was raised.

With my economy humming and things cruising towards a victory, I got bored and sent over my army to the new continent. Whats better than trading peaceful civs for luxury resources that you don't have? Conquering their cities and owning the resources yourself of course! I started with America since he was closest and took the two cities that I wanted from him. He then offered me a bunch of his other cities for peace, so I accepted (and quickly went -30 happiness). Not wanting all those crappy cities, I traded a couple to Darius and a couple to Harun - they didn't really have a lot to offer since I was taking most of their money in luxury trades, but my main goal for the offer was for them to go to war with eachother as well as George, and they happily obliged.

Then, sick of Darius stealing MY wonders, I went to war with him. At around 1300AD, I accidentally won the game via conquest when I took his capital - oops, I hadn't realize that Darius had taken Mecca. So I backed up a turn, gave Washington back his capital and then resumed so I could grab Darius' wonders. (Amusing note - when I went to George and asked him what he wanted for the city, he gave me the "I don't think there is any way this trade can work" bit, I guess because he knew he had nothing worthwhile to trade me. I ended up trading the city to him for 1 gold total since that was all he had and no income). I left all 3 of the other civs alive, but cherry picked the best half dozen locations on the continent for some more puppets and razed a few poorly located cities that were infringing on my puppets. After that it was a pretty easy cruise to victory.

Lessons learned
- I could have done a better job setting up my cities for teching since I had zero observatories built and I think I could have stacked some of the science wonders better. I probably also could have timed my golden ages a little better so I had more going while building my spaceship - by that time my great person GAs were down to the 4 turn minimum.

- If I were to replay, I would try to get a third city settled to the north along that river there that was not a puppet - it is a nice spot and I wouldn't have minded having another normal city or two. Maybe even just going after Elizabeth first and razing her city if she plopped one there.

- Puppetting everything was much more effective than I figured it would be. I got that strat from the gauntlet thread when they were going for a culture victory, and it worked great. I was able to grab quite a lot of policies with only 3 real cities and your science is based primarily on population so having direct control of what your vast empire is making is not very important. (honestly, I don't like this about the game - that you are encouraged to create this vast empire that you then have little control over. I think they need to make the buildings more effective so that it actually matters what you build)

-In addition to easily having a conquest victory, I also had a diplomatic victory locked up for a long time but was nowhere close to a cultural victory even with only 3 cities.

-I didn't even touch the bottom half of the tech tree except when absolutely necessary. This is kind of sad since it is all the military techs and I was executing a military strategy, but was able to do so effectively without investing anything into those techs. I can't recall the tech names, but tech I researched after the final space ship tech was the one that gave me fertilizer... I kept thinking that if my population couldn't grow fast enough for the happiness cap, I would grab fertilizers, but the maritime states always keep me at the cap even without fertilizer (and not to mention I never built farms in any of my puppet cities, just tradeposts).
 

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Duckweed said:
Here's the graphic bug. Notice the yield of the sheep tile. Some other tiles around are also wrong.
Click to expand...

I ran into this a lot as well - usually everything was shifted in one direction so that it was showing the yields for the tile next to it. I think it really is just a graphical bug though and the underlying yields are still alright.
 
3020 Score
431 Turns
2011 AD


I think I had a similar strategy to a lot of people. Warmonger first to take over the continent then boom the economy to the win.²

Spoiler :
 

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I tried to play without war mongering. Got jumped on often by AI... held my own but result was Napoleon became huge. Too huge to offer me any hope of victory, as he inevitably caught up and pulled away in tech as well.

Made lots of NOOB mistakes along the way. Have lots to learn. :)
 
As I mentioned when describing my defeat, I tried another attempt. Obviously, this one not for submission - I wanted to learn, and see how different approaches would work out.

This time I went for peace, peace and nothing but peace. Even if this meant grovelling and smiling at Montezuma even as he attacked your newly-allied city state.
I managed a Gt Lib slingshot to Civil Service which gave me a slight tech edge, and then I aimed to follow this up by researching along the already advanced tech line, while allowing the numerous research agreements that I made to fill in the techs on the other branches. I did get a series of these agreements, while everyone seemed to be peaceful and wanted to use their money for research. However much good it did me, it did always cross my mind that the other party to the agreement was probably getting something even better in return from me! I had no way of knowing.

Anyway, eternal peace worked very well - for keeping me out of trouble. I'm not sure how well it worked for giving me a nice tech lead, as I found by the middle-ages that several of the other civs seemed to be getting ahead of me.

Speaking of the other civs, the way the balance of power settled in the world was a little different this time. Montezuma dominated my continent, but since there were no wars this did little more than squeeze Napoleon, Elizabeth and Gandhi into the corners. Over on the other continent, things were different, as I found out later in the game. Darius was working his way into becoming the world monster-power by defeating his neighbours one by one. Eventually he owned the entire land-mass.
I haven't got a good idea yet of what a high tech rate looks like in Civ V. I was looking at 200:science: as being a good target to aim for, and then I passed that in the later game - but it was all horrifically too slow! I began to realise as the 20th C approached that I was never going to have got to all of the spaceship techs in time. I got to rocketry early in the 20thC, but didn't complete the Apollo Program until 1975 if I remember right. I had universities everywhere, and I remember attempting some wonders or other buildings that improve science output (just can't remember finishing them) I guess my tiny civilization - just 5 cities - would never be able to pump out enough research. I don't know the answer yet. Perhaps a big population?

Towards the end, things got a bit exciting on my own continent. First Montezuma decided he needed a little more space and took out Napoleon and Gandhi. He was assisted in the latter attack by Elizabeth and her city state allies. It was interesting to see a city state owning 2 cities, when Tyre captured Delhi. Gandhi was not conquered, but lived out a solitary existance on an ice-floe.

I began to expect an attack, despite all of my simpering and smiling. I wasn't going to survive it, having kept only the smallest of military presence. Elizabeth passed a couple of cutting comments about me being defeated by a local alley-cat, but I stayed alive.

Then, long after I had given up the game and was just hoping to live out until 2050, she attacked me! I had money and was able to upgrade a few muskets to rifles. I even had an artillery. Amazingly, I hung on for a few turns. Possibly she wasn't as advanced as she should have been, and her army wasn't as scary as I thought. I defended against a few waves of assault, but began to get the feeling that this would never stop, and I would get overrun before 2050 (now only a dozen turns away!).
I had asked her for peace, but she wasn't having any of it. I had also tried Montezuma, and though he wouldn't go to war with her he was happy to sign a pact of secrecy with me against her - my first of the game!

This suddenly came good a few turns later. It was reminiscent of the climax of the first Jurassic Park film - where the survivors are menaced by the velociraptors only for the T Rex to suddenly appear as unexpected and inadvertent rescuer by attacking the raptors. Just as I was staring at the next wave of Liz's armies, and had just lost my best defenders - in came a mighty and powerful wave of Montezuma's forces to wipe out her forces in no time at all!! He then proceeded to eliminate her over the next couple of turns.

Finally it all calmed down again and I lost to Darius on time, as was inevitable. It had been for a long time. I only ever built the cockpit of my spaceship, and only had one more space technology by the end. I still had several still to research, let alone the parts to build.

Oh. I also got to see how the UN vote worked out. I'd not met it before. I think Darius built it, but it really wasn't going to resolve anything, as all but 2 of the city states had been eliminated by this point and so nobody was likely to get more than a couple of votes.

So, some interesting discoveries (thoughts? musings?) on how peace works out, and how fast a tech rate is actually needed. Perhaps I'll try conquering my continent and then researching like crazy in my next attempt.
 
This was a hard-fought victory where I had my hands full with Elisabeth & Napoleon. Luckily enough Washington seemed happy with his own continent and didn't intervene on our continent. King is at the moment the perfect difficulty for me, I think.

In attachment the necessary files.
 

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Sadly, I completely forgot to go Rationalism, as I am so used to Cultural Victories from the HoF Gauntlet. I could have finished much sooner had I gone down Rationalism instead of Commerce.

Write up:
Spoiler :

Settled to the SE of the starting hill. Decided against settling on the marble, I hate giving up the production bonus. Turned out to be better, as there were horses to the south that I was able to use. First builds were Scout, Monument, Worker.

My initial plan was to play this like a cultural victory, then switch to full on science once I hit Industrial Age. I also decided to go Wondertron in my capital, so I grabbed Tradition and Aristocracy ASAP. After completing the Worker, I built Stonehenge, GL, Pyramids, and Oracle, and got them all, fortunately.

My warrior scouted out the nearby ruins, but saved them for the scout to pop. The scout grabbed three ruins all told, I'm sure you know which ones they were. First two were Unit Upgrade (Scout to Archer, which is why i used the scout), Culture (which helped me get to Aristocracy in time to help build wonders), and Writing (HUGE help).

Tech path: Pottery, Calender, Mining, Masonry, Philosophy, Theology, Education(GL), Animal Husbandry, Trapping, Wheel, Horseback Riding. The Great Library actually finished while Theology had plenty of turns left to go, but I was able to Shift-Enter to defer picking a tech until Theology Finished, at which point I grabbed Education.

When the scout upgraded to Archer, I sent him and the initial Warrior over to Ghandi and took him out. While I had met Elizabeth, Monty, and Napoleon, I didn't know where their cities were, so I decided to grab Monaco, which upset Elizabeth for some reason. After Monaco, I marched down to take Almaty, figuring another CS would declare on me when I did. Sure enough, Vienna declared permanent war for attacking Almaty, but that's fine. I had no use for cultural or military CS, just Maritime (which I hadn't found any yet).

After capturing Almaty, I swung north to go after Vienna, but the terrain wasn't great for attacking (no cover except across a river) and around this time, Monty and Elizabeth decided to declare on me together. This was just about the time that my Horsemen were coming online, so I broke off the attack on Vienna and headed to take out York, which Elizabeth had settled right by Kuala Lumpur and Tyre. My Horseman, War Chariot, Archer, and Warrior were able to take out York, but I still couldn't find London. I swung around and followed the coast north till I found Elizabeth hiding way up there, and took out London. Monty had settled a city right next to Vienna, so I figured I would head over there, as another horseman had finished building. As I arrived, a HORDE of Monty's troops poured out of the Fog of War, so I accepted Monty's request for peace. He even threw in about 200g for my trouble.

This is where it gets funky. Two turns after we agree to peace, Monty asked to join a secrecy pact against Napoleon. Sure, I say. Two turns after that, he wants to go to war against old Boney. I'm guessing Monty is itching to use his firepower somewhere, so I agree and we march to war! Or, Monty Does, and I follow behind him with my horsemen and let him do all the work. I finish what I started with Vienna, then I steal Orleans and Paris while Monty takes out the defenders, and right about then our peace deal expires. Hmmm, all his forces on the field, in the open, what to do?

I plunge the dagger deep in Monty's back, wiping out all his forces. Or so I thought. Four or five more spearmen and swordsmen come from the south, apparently hidden in reserve. But lo! A great general has spawned in Delhi, so I quickstep him over to Vienna to meet with the rest of my horse brigade (four horsemen, war chariot, and an archer) and renew the assault on Monty. My poor Scout-Archer dies, as does a Horsemen who overextended and didn't see those Spearmen hiding in the forest. Eventually, superior speed and the leadership of Montgomery win the day against the Aztec Hordes.
All told I end up conquering my continent around 140 turns in, with 12 puppet cities. I don't annex anything for a looong time, no need. I kept to the upper tech as long as possible so the puppets were only building libraries, Burial Tombs, universities, and the occasional walls. Once I got to Biology (used my first three GS to get Archeology, Scientific Method, and Biology), I grabbed the middle three social policies in Order, which put my happiness back to the positive. I had sent a Caravel across the ocean and made nice with Darius, Washington, and Harun, and hunkered down for a long peaceful buildup.

The rest is fairly basic. I researched as fast as I could though the trees, picked up Commerce (a mistake, shoulda gone with Rationalism) and built wonders. Once I hit my 500 Golden Age, I stayed in an almost permanent golden age. With Chichen Itza, Taj, 2 Generals, 2 Great Artists from the Louvre, and another General from Brandenberg gate, I sailed though to building the Spaceship. For most of the second half of the game I was generating 400gpt, which made buying factories and plants fairly easy.

Mistakes I made: Rationalism was the big one. Another was not going after Monty first. He's a warmonger, gotta kill him quickly.

Overall, Egypt is an easy Science Vic guy (not as easy as Babylon, but who is?). Puppets are definitely the way to go; I never built a single settler, and I didn't annex a city until after I got Steam Engine. There was simply no need.


Also: Did anyone else notice the Pirates of Krakatoa?
 

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Settled one hex to the SE, I think, which worked out great as I ended up with 4 sea resource hexes which made the seaport worthwhile.

Planned on taking over continent then teching. Spent too long making wonders at the start instead of making Horsemen. Even though I got the Horsemen out late they did the job. Took out Ghandi, then Elizabeth. Napoleon took London, when I relieved him of that I liberated England. Wiped out France with Monty's help. Took a break to build a couple of troops, then had to attack Monty early as he was in constant war with the City States and was attacking the ones I was allied with. Surprised him in the field, one Cavalry killed 3 riflemen in one turn. Left him with a couple of cities, gave one back because of unhappiness and did a research agreement. Washington wiped out everyone on the other continent.

By then I was about 10 techs from the finish. Railroaded a couple of cities for the production bonus. I had just enough cities at the end that each one built a part. All the rest were puppetted. I only razed about 5 mostly in the north.

Even though I could tell once I started attacking that I was too late to be competitive, I really enjoyed the game, especially the big battle with Monty.
 

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Boy, it surely would have helped to have played for a science victory before. Basically I had neither a clue about the time the Apollo program will take nor that I will have to assemble the different parts in my capital. Basically this had me lugging parts from Rome and London to my capital without having build any railroads... ;)

This have cost me about 10 turns (had to build the last part in my capital and ran out of GA), but I will not complain too much ;) I think that by avoiding this mistake and some other minor ones it should be possible to finish this one close to 1600.

Basically I stayed with my original strategy and settled on marble while using the GL/GS slingshot to get me to accoustics. When I saw how close Ghandi was to me I bought a second warrior and went after him (my scout got the archer upgrade from a hut - no techs from huts sadly).

My starting build order was Scout, Worker, Library.

Research was Pottery, Writing, Philo, Sailing, Theology, Animal. I managed to get the Oracle and GL without any problems and used the GL to get Education while using a GS from my Library for Acoustics.

For policies I took Aristocrcy and decided to save the rest for Rationalism (might have hurt me a bit, maybe immediatly taking Patronage might be better that this stage). Acutally I was surprised by my good happiness levels, so getting friendly with more maritime states might have been better.

By turn 30 Ghandi (1 city) was gone with Liz (1 city) following around turn 60.

I only went up to Secularism (+2SP/specialist) in the Rationalism tree at frist (around turn 80 IIRC), saving the rest for some order policies.

I delayed my first GA till about turn 105 (after completing Chizen Itza), sometimes even giving away luxuries for free just to stay below 500. In addition I annexed London to get rid of some happiness when I ran out of new luxuries to give to Monty or Napoleon) - sadly way before having gotten the social policies I wanted essentially forcing me to waste +30% on the social policies. Maybe being more selective in in number of luxuries I develope might have prevented this and helped to get those policies faster.

After Monty finished the Hanging Gardens around turn 100 I DoW (he just had 2 cities), around turn 110 Napoleon followed (just 2 cities, too).

At around turn 120 the continent was mine, but I have only been able to puppet 6 cities which was less than I had hoped for.

Around turn 125 my Caravel found the southern part of the 2nd continent.

Around turn 140 I entered the industrial era via Biology and take the middle line of the order policies up to planned economy.

From the mid 140s up to 190 there is basically constant war and in the end (basically due to abusing the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse) only the city of Washington is left.

At turn 200 I produce about 435 science and 230 culture with science soon to rise drastically (at the end I got close to +2000 SP/turn).

At around turn 215 I bulb 4 GS to get to Rocketry and am really surprised that my best production town (London at this point) will need 13 turns to complete it (and we are talking GA turns here).

At some time shortly before starting the conquest of the 2nd continent I annexed Paris as my 3rd production city.

Well, after having build the first spaceship part I saw that I have to move it to my capital, without any railroads or sometimes even roads in place (used harbors for traderoutes) this took quite some time. I thought that having 3 production cities would enable me to build the parts without needing the production bonus from railroads, so I did not build roads to/from Paris/London, too ;)

In the end my main lessons I learned were:

- Manage Golden Ages better
- you can have too many luxuries ;)
- Build Railroads
- maybe wait a bit longer before conquering the first continent, some more puppets would have been nice
- and if you have such a low number of puppets/high happiness at least ally many maritime states fast and dont save up your policies
- the Apollo Program takes a long time, bulb for it ASAP, keep just 2 GS or the 2 free techs from Rationalism to tech for the first parts
- King AI is less competetive on building wonders than I thought (maybe no Aristocray next time and just wait for Patronage to open up and invest there and no need to waste the marble by settling on it)

Thats it, good luck in your games and have fun, it will be interesting to see if somebody is able to finish before 1600, but I think it is possible.

CharonJr
 

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