COTM 15 First Spoiler: Ancient Age, Contacts

I had planned to open this thread on the 5th as usual, but it is a Friday and I might not be able to check it again until next Monday...

...and I was too curious to see how it was going


So, here you are the first spoiler thread for COTM15 - India.

In order to read and post in this thread, you should:
- Have completed the Ancient Age (i.e., be researching a MA tech),
- Have contacts with all other civs,
- Have a reasonably good knowledge of the world geography (i.e., where the other civs are, where the main resources are).


By the way, anyone interested in the corresponding Hunting Tips?

Got five minutes left today, so the first spoiler this time is coming from the AI

Having a lot of better things to do -but not feeling like them, I tried this: I added another civ, picked at random of course (England if you are wondering ), switched India to AI and placed my english self somewhere else (it won't be hard to guess once you have the full world map).
Of course I never researched anything, avoided contacts as much as I could and in general avoided interfering with my experiment. And I watched what India did in the hands of the AI.

Not too well, as you can expect. Their problems started of course when they decided to settle in place. No cows.

Actually, Lan Xang settled close to the mouth of Ganges, soon claiming the eastern cow within their borders.

The western cow was never used, and at 1000 BC India had the grand total of 5 cities.
By this time, Delhi was fully committed to building the Oracle.

A sixth would be founded around 900 BC, marking the peak of Indian expansion and glory, but that would also be the beginning of their slow decline.

Most AI entered the MA around 650 BC -India did in 350 BC.
EDIT: No wars took place in the Ancient Age. So peaceful this little world was... or seemed to be...

And Gandhi was so lazy that he didn't even take a screenshot for me to post here

Open class, going for 20K

Delhi was settled one east of the start, and Bombay (the 20K city) was one west. I had to give in to a couple demands because my military was pathetic, but I avoided wars. Self-Research was the Republic slingshot, literature, then eventually currency after the Great Library gave me many techs.

Bombay built a temple first, then, after a barracks prebuild ran out, I traded for Masonry to start the Pyramids. However, before I ever completed them, I traded for Mysticism and built the Oracle, then reordered the Pyramids. Basically, my citizens never had any idea what they were actually building. A key decision point arrived in 1050 BC – I discovered literature and had enough shields to complete either the Pyramids or the Great Library. I chose the lower-culture Pyramids because I felt confident I could get the Great Library. Two turns after I eventually completed the Great Library, the Vijayanagar completed the Temple of Artemis, and all the remaining ancient age wonders fell in the cascade. If I had done the Great Library first, I almost certainly would have lost the Pyramids, but I probably could have had (for example) the Hanging Gardens and had more culture and more shields toward the next project… but the Pyramids are just so useful especially since I had to join workers to Bombay, and I still had endless jungle to clear – I’m really not sure which was better.

Anyway, I just started a palace again while I researched currency to enter the Middle Ages in 490 BC.

Culture in Bombay:

-2710 Temple
-1525 Oracle
-1050 Pyramids
-1025 Library
-670 Great Library
-650 Coliseum

In 490 BC, Bombay was at 660 culture + 27 cpt.

Research:

-2950 Writing
-2350 Masonry, Pottery, Warrior Code, Bronze Working (trade)
-2310 Wheel (trade)
-1830 Code of Laws
-1790 Mysticism (trade)
-1725 Iron Working (trade)
-1550 Philosophy and Republic
-1050 Literature
-670 Mathematics, Map Making, Horseback Riding, Polytheism, Monarchy, Construction (Great Library)
-490 Currency

I am a lucky man. Last COTM, the RNG screwed me and Germany RoP raped me on turn 10 or something. Someone said the RNG owed me one. Well, after only one elite win attacking, my redlined elite horse got attacked by a reg warrior, and I got a leader .

There is a TON of iron on this map. Was that to make sure no AI opponent would be ironless?

So far I've killed the Xang Wang (or whatever), have taken a bite out of China, and planning a war elephant rush on Persia. There is a culture gap near their capital, which holds the great wall. I'll send 10 jumbos and settler, so I can settle, pushing their borders, allowing me to delcare war and already have Persepolis under attack. With the great wall mine, I can then attack full on.

By the way, I think east was the better way to go, as I went west and the Lan Xang settled there before I could. I promptly killed them, though.

Karasu said:

Not too well, as you can expect. Their problems started of course when they decided to settle in place. No cows.

Click to expand...

this is a very interesting spoiler! how could india lose the eastern cow!?!? this is too big a butterfly effect.

open, 20K


Delhi was settled to the west while Bomby, the culture city was founded to the east. i was afraid that we're surrounded by jungle and wetland but my scouting warrior very soon reported a lot of fertile land around us.
nothing special happened during this period and i remained peaceful during the ancient age. the only accident that didn't see much action is in 2470BC., captured two workers from Lan Xang. RNG god is really helping me. My warrior didn't lose a single HP in defeating Xang warrior accompanying a settler. I guess I don't need to worry about Bomby population for a while since I also got 2 from trading. Bomby is a culture powered by multi-national immigrants.

culture building:
temple 2630BC
oracle 1375BC
library 1250BC
mausoleum of mausoll 975BC
great library 590 BC
colosseum 490 BC
all the other wonders were grabbed by AI..
1000BC:2 worker (far too fewer… I know…) 7 warrior, 5 archers, 1 granary and several buildings in Bomby
8 cities, 27 population


compared to Chamnix's game, my tech pace seems to be slow.. i intentionally avoided trading with AI, hoping this could enabled me to build wonders before the required techs become avaible to AI. apparently i need more practice to control this..

Open - going for 100k?

I had a pretty explosive opening so I can only imagine what the MM pros did. Settled E and built a granary there. In 3050BC, Lan Xing builds right next to me, which was annoying...but also I needed an excuse to show off these cool city graphics.


Republic begins in 1550BC from Repubic slingshot, so now there is 2 4-turn settler factories. I didn't manage them that great, but results are still good. Other cities are building workers, settlers, and horsemen.

QSC Stats
19 towns
34 population
2 settlers
14 workers
9 warriors
2 horsemen
1 galley
all AA techs

Well, all that Iron is a sort of compensation for the last COTM... and having a UU that doesn't need resources was too much of a temptation, as DaveMcW guessed in the pre-game thread.
You can also see it as a small gift to the 20k-ers, who were ready to start complaing about the lack of Ivory...
And then, it gives you the option between staying and building swords, or running for some horses.

@Davidcrazy. Both cows are outside the city radius if you settle in place. The eastern one fell soon within the cultural borders of a Lan Xang city. And India never settled in a position to make use of the western cow.

If you like this kind of thing I'll try to do it again next time with some more details, and maybe trying to give the AI a starting position where settling in place is an option...

EDIT: Meteor, these graphics are really cool!

@Karusu: I always wished there was an option to simulate games to see how the AI will behave. Your method is pretty close.

Open Class - Domination

Settled West with a Warrior/Settler/Granary build and then more or less settlers in the Capital from there on.
Went for Republic slingshot which was achieved in 1575BC but reverted to Monarchy to build the military and commence warfare.
No real issues except the Arabs threatened and DOW in 975BC but a largely phoney affair.
Research slowed down and had to do Construction and Currency which meant a delayed entry into MA at 390BC.
Army now ready to move on the first target which will be Lan.
QSC
11 towns
21 citizens
16 techs (missing Cons/Curr/Lit/Mon)
8 workers
7warriors
1 archer
5 spears
3 swords
1 galley
1 granary
1 barracks

Towns
3950 Delhi
3150 Bombay
2270 Madras
2190 Bangalore
1830 Calcutta
1650 Lahore
1475 Karachi
1225 Kolhapur
1175 Jaipur
1125 Hydrabad
1000 Bengal
650 Chittagong

Open, going for 20K.

I was open-minded as to whether the East or West site would be the 20K city - until I settled Delhi to the west, and saw all those lovely BGs. After discovering Iron Working, things looked even juicier. 28 shields per turn at size 12? Nice

My QSC was a little... slow. Bombay took an age to get going as a settler pump, with the biggest setback being the barbarians knocking a population point off it (It was either Bombay or a worker.)

As a result, when I entered the Middle Ages in 775BC, I had four cities and a settler en route to the horses-by-the-lake site near the Chinese borders.

I'd met everyone bar the Japanese (not really a boat-tastic starting location!!), payed off a number of demands, and generally got by by brokering techs around.

Anyway, back to Delhi: in it, I built:
3950BC Palace
2750BC Temple
1650BC Oracle
1275BC Mausoleum of Mausollus
1175BC Library

3 turns from the Great Library, 570 total culture, making 15 culture per turn, as shown in this picture:


Onwards and upwards....

Neil.

[Edit] The rest of the world was merrily warring away with each other. I also bought about half a dozen slaves, which really helped speed things along.

Everyone is going for 20k. People like me going for conquest will have it easy.

Own said:

Everyone is going for 20k. People like me going for conquest will have it easy.

Click to expand...

FWIW, there are going to be some very fast conquests and dominations on this map. Central location, zero-resource knight UU, low corruption, cheap temples? Expect at least half-a-dozen BC wins.

After playing several test games with this start I decided to go with science over growth in the beginning and maximize the use of the gold hill (that doesn't mean I settled in place ). Early to chivalry early to victory I figured. Settler west, worker irrigated, roaded, and chopped the forest giving 2 warrior builds and (explorer and MP) then a settler as soon as we hit size 3. The second Twin Tower is founded 2 east in 3200 I think as Im sure many people did. My second city used the cow and the gold as much as possible. Writing was set to 100% and learned in 2630.

Upon border expansion I met a V-people warrior coming from the south (Note: I did like the different civs' variety but dont have the game in front of me right now to do their names justice). He traded me the knowledge of pottery and 10 gold for alphabet. I wanted an early warrior or two to spam alphabet and masonry on every AI so they would hopefully get math ahead of time for me, which was about 50/50 in test games. The Blue Jungle Dwellers were soon met when they slapped a city right in "my" area at like 3300 BC! Hmm close neighbors is good I reckon.

Everything was going according to the meticulous plan I had scribbled down until 2310 when the Vishnu or whatever wanted to dance:
.

What the heck is this. Hunting barbs or crazy AI sneak attack? I was leaning towards crazy sneak attack so I moved my workers and settler out of the way and told them to leave. They declared. I felt good about my 4 warrior defense vs. the 3 Vs that were showing until the first warrior completely waxes my defender in the capital. Luckily the other two died and the third died on his second attempt. I let the war run on until they would give me a city for peace. I hadnt even thought about warring in the AA in the test games I played but the situation turned out so well I declared and killed an Arab scout before I hit the republic slingshot (became a republic in 1675). I had exploring warriors in the neighborhood that had already found Sumeria and Persia so they were redirected south and east. The Arabs plopped a town down right below sumeria


that I attacked with 2 regular warriors vs. a regular AI warrior defender and burned. Arabia gave me a city for peace. I never would have tried these shenanigans if the Vs hadnt of attacked and fouled up my original plans.

On the tech front, as of 1675 none of the other civs had researched math which was disappointing. But two turns in the Maya got it, and I traded for it, researched currency then construction, traded for Maps and Poly, and entered the MA at 1225. I then got the biggest break in the game but thats for another spoiler.

QSC
18 cities
33 pop
5 barracks
9 archers
1 random spearman
4 warriors
2 galleys (one killed by barbs)
all contacts except Japan



The markets are elephant prebuilds. This was certainly my best GOTM, due largely to the strong starting position and being able to plan out the AA and just plain good luck with the math from the Mayans and not getting killed by the Vishnagaya whoever. Of course the RNG would turn against me but thats another story.

Expect at least half-a-dozen BC wins.

Click to expand...

I'm at 50BC and only have taken out one civ!! I didn't expect the gold or anything, but...

Open - Going for 100K

Decided to settle by west cow, on a hunch. Wish I'd settled by the east one now after seeing all the marsh to the west. Anyway, apart from a slightly edgy period of protecting my workers from some nuisance barbs, the early expansion went fairly well and I achieved the Republic slingshot in 1650BC. I enter the Middle Ages in 975BC whilst plotting the tangled web of wars and alliances I am about to weave. Which victims I choose will wait until the next spoiler.

QSC Stats:
17 cities - 36 pop
2 granary, 2 rax, 1 temple
1 settler, 10 workers, 13 warriors, 1 archer, 1 horse, 1 curragh.
All contacts.
All AA techs except Construction (2 turns) and Monarchy.

After seeing MeteorPunch's post I wish I hadn't chosen to do 100K. Looks like some sleepless nights for us trying to squeeze out the last grain of food, MP! Good luck

I love India. This map is good. I'm not sure I will finish, I had some very bad RNG luck on this thing burning through 11-12 vet archers to kill just 2 javelin throwers. The high point of my game was my 1325BC republic slingshot. My game is still winnable but it's the busy season at work.

chunkymonkey said:

After seeing MeteorPunch's post I wish I hadn't chosen to do 100K. Looks like some sleepless nights for us trying to squeeze out the last grain of food, MP! Good luck

Click to expand...

that's very true! this map does seem to be a pretty good one for 100k...

Open, 20K

Before starting this game, I had done some testing. From testing the following plan was derived:
City................... location.............. function
----------------- ----------------- ----------
Delhi.................. east of west cow. 20K
Bombay.............. west of east cow. workerfactory
Madras............... west of west cow workerfactory
Banglahore.......... east of east cow. military

So, after founding Delhi, initial building orders were warrior, settler, warrior, settler.
First warrior went exploring and the second MPing Delhi.
Bombay buld warrior (exploring), settler (Banglahore) and then workers for a long time.
Madras claimt the west cow and build workers.
Banglahore build warrior (MPing Delhi), archer (barbcontrol) and then palace-prebuild for the FP.

This plan meant that culture build-up would start late, but then, with 2 workerfactories, things would develop fast.

Contacts were made:
3100BC Sumeria
2850BC Lan Xang
2710BC Arabia
2190BC Vijayanagar
2070BC Persia
1950BC China
no Japanese contact

Culture builds in Delhi:
2390BC temple
1475BC Oracle
1450BC library
1225BC Mausoleum of Mausollos
1125BC colosseum

In 950BC we entered the Middle Ages

I took the Advice of DaveMc and went with a 2CC conquest challenge.

Intention, Conquest victory with only 2 cities.

Restrictions: I am only allowed 2 Cities. I don't have to raze a city I capture till the end of turn which allows me to sell improvements as I suspect i'll need all the cash I can get. (These restrictions are modified later on in the game unfortunately. The main one was I needed 4 cities for an army.)

3950 BC: Decided to found Capitol West of the gold.
3100 BC: Bronze working from Vijayanagar (Celts) for Alphabet +10 gp.
2850 BC: Pottery, Masonry, Warrior Code from Lan Xang (Maya), for Bronze, Alphabet, ceremonial burial and 56 Gold.
2800 BC: Meet China. Found 2nd City next to the coast instead of one east of the gold. Hoping to get Collosus for faster research. I will also get 7 Bonus weeds here + a critical luxury

2670 BC: Trade Alphabet to china for 10 gold and a worker.
2630 BC: Contact with Persia.
2350 BC: Trade Alphabet and 8 gold to Persia for the wheel. Trade the wheel to Lan Xang for 66 gold.
2310 BC: Looking at the nice terrain with wheat, and luxuries and resisting the urge to build settlers. Also wondering if I can get the republic slingshot with just 2 cities.

2070 BC: Contact Sumeria. Trade Alphabet for Mysticism and 13 gp. Terrified that they have 5 cities already.
Trade Mysticism for Iron working from Vijayanagar (Celts) Writing researched. Start on code of laws. Wow, Iron central. Should enable lots of trades later on for my little civilisation. (But i'll probably stuff My rep up like I always do.)

1950 BC: Trade Mysticism to China for a worker. Seems like a bad trade but he'll get it soon enough anyway so I might as well get a worker out of it.

1600 BC: Contact with Arabia. Polytheism and 51 Gold from Sumeria for Writing and Iron working.Horseback riding and 37 Gold for Polytheism from Lang Xan

1525 BC: Persia Demands Polytheism. Of course I give it to him what with just 5 warriors as defense.
1450 BC: Researched Code of laws. Praying I can get Philosophy in time for the slingshot.
1350 BC: Trade Code of laws to persia for Map making and 88 gold. Code of laws to Arabia for 82 gold. (Im gold short)
1375 BC: Capitol finsihes Oracle.
1275 BC: Researched Philosophy and got Republic free (Lets out a sigh of relief.) Will revolt to republic after collosus finishes

At this point i'm ahead of every civ in tech but miles behind in cities.
The plan now is to build up about 15 swordsman and take out the celts. After that i'll build the great library while spending all my cash rushing swordsman hopefully take take out the maya.

1100 BC: Declare war on Sumeria. Bribe Persia and Arabia into War against Sumeria. Hopefully I won't have to fight at all and hopefully I will be ahead of them in tech so I have somthing to barter with should they get the better of me.

1025 BC: Collosus Finshed, accidentally triggers golden age. Whoops
1000 BC: Traded Republic to Arabia for Mathematics + 5 gold.

Quick save: 4 workers, 6 warriors, 5 swordsman, 2 Cities. Awesome huh?


950 BC: China demands code of laws. Refused but war not declared. Finished Literature, Revolt to republic to rush swordsman.

900 BC: Early golden age not so bad. I'm getting a swordsman a turn from my capitol with over 30 sheilds

730 BC: With 13 Swordsman, its time to attack Celts, Allied Lan Xan to the attack with a hefty bribe. Still no attack from Sumeria although I can get a City for peace.

700 BC: First Celtic City falls! Hurrah!
670 BC: Funny sight, a squadron of about 8 sumerian archers/swordsman are pursuing a lone warrior of mine. Where am I leading them? Right into persia of course!

650 BC: I think the enemy AI needs a little work. The celts sent out a new settler with 1 warrior escort. Right past 14 swordsman!

630 BC: 2nd Celtic City destroyed.
610 BC: 3rd Celtic City destroyed. Sumeria getting the better of Arabia so I give 160 gold for peace.
590 BC: 4th Destroyed.
580 BC: Gracious Maya demands gold. I have to yield though
570 BC: Another Celtic City bites the dust. Yet another dumb Warrior escorting a settler past a swordsman. Oh well I could use the workers.

550 BC: Golden age and 1 turn swordsman ends
530 BC: 1st celtic swordsman rears its ugly head.
510 BC: Celtic Capitol Dead and another city dead. I had a very hard time abandoning it. The Celts are well and truly stuffed. With only 5 cities left including the capitol. 3 of which I could get for peace.

470 BC: Contact with Japan. I guess they are on the same continent. They have loads of cities but not much Tech wise. Another Celic City falls. I get 3 Cities, 1 worker and 3 gold for peace with the celts. They are now down to just their capitol. I buy right of passage of the celts for 3 gold so I can surround his capitol so he can't sneak out any more settlers.

(I accidentally ruined my Military alliance reputation which would come back to haunt me later on.)
I send my forces toward the Maya in preparation of a big attack.
Thankfully at this point, having 20 swordsman I have a "Strong military" compared to everyone except the Persians. Thinking of allying 3 nations against persia.

390 BC: Completed The great library in my 2nd City (Thank goodness for that!)

370 BC: A very nice year. The great library yeilding: Construction, Currency, Monarchy and Feudalism. Bringing me into the Middle Ages.


Something extremly odd has happened in my Game and I want to ask someone about it possibly a GOTM staff member. I'm almost finished the game and want someone to have a look at a save file to offer an opinion.