Lonely Hearts Club, BtS Edition, Chapter XLII: Boudica

r_rolo1

r_rolo1

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Welcome to the 42nd edition of the Lonely Hearts Club for BTS. In the Lonely Hearts Club we explore strategies to cope with one of the most dreaded situations in Civ IV ( possibly the main reason for reloads after the military collapse one :p ): starting in isolation....

For the 42nd game in BTS the chosen leader was Boudica of the Celts:
Spoiler :



Ok, "another Agg or Pro civ" :p Boudica was one of the BtS LH that raised some eyebrows when a pic of it got out, for a LOT of historical nonsense that the LH has ( and I'm not refering only to the medieval castle in the backround ;) ). It also brought some talk the fact that Boudica has one of the previous forbidden trait combos, Agg/Cha and it's arguable relation with both UU and UB ( that aren't exactly in the top of popularity )

As I said before , I like a lot of the Cha trait:not only because of the XP bonus, but also because of the easily acessible 2 :) early on. The biggest constraints to the growth of a civ are the happiness and the maintenance and cha helps a lot with the happiness part. Agg is purely a war trait, but it is one that lasts all game and gives a promo that boosts the strenght of the units The UU and the UB are probably the most discussed in CFC and I bet that most of the persons reading this already saw one of those dozen pages threads discussing it's usefulness, so I'll just say that, as most UU and UB, it can be very potent if well used and in the right enviroment and that the Celtic UU and UB, as it happens with some other UU and UB, requires a diferent play than a lot of people doesn't like to employ ( the spanish UB comes to mind in that regard: it is one of the most powerful UB in terms of warfare in BtS, because of the way it boosts a unit class that can't win more than 1 XP per fight, but some people find hard to avoid going Economics to outlast it's usefulness window )

A final note: Boudi shares with with Brennus the fact that they are Cha leaders that start with Mysticism. Stonehenge looks a very tempting proposition........

Her UU
Spoiler :

Oh, the very controversial Gallic warrior..... a swordsman that starts with guerrilla I and that can be built with cooper or iron. As a personal opinion, i was not too keen on them until I played a recent always war game with Boudica, and they are a very solid unit, regardsless of going to the guerrilla line or not ( another promo line that some people shun for no particular reason besides not being CR ;) ). as you can do them with cooper, you can get them earlier than normal swords most of the times and the free promo means that they can handle themselfs if you stay in the hills ( and the enemy can chop forests, but they can't flatten hills :p ).

But in here, unfortunately, the bigger action they will see ( hopefully ) will be taking barb cities ......
Click to expand...

Her UB
Spoiler :

Oh, the even more controversial Dun :p Dun is a wall that gives a free guerrilla I promo to the eligible units for it built in the cities with it. This means that only units that can have guerrilla I by default will have it from Dun, and that means archery and gunpowder units ( no, no melee :p This obviously excludes the Gallic warrior too ). A thing that is not told by the civilopedia is that the Dun counts more for the power rating than normal walls ( as most UU and UB, by the way )... not that counts much ( 3000 soldiers vs 2000 soldiers from a normal wall ).

In here... well, it will last longer than the UU ( until Rifling ), but I really can't see a good way of taking advantage of it :p
Click to expand...
After a while, I can see one way of taking advantage of the UB in isolation: Guerrilla line promoted grenadiers ;)

The start (Thanks to DanF for the solution of the unit change of place ;) .... The warrior/scout should appear always in the same place from now on, really :p ):
Spoiler :

2 Wines ( RL Celts would probably prefer beer, but who cares ) , pig and 2 seafood in a woody enviroment with no signs of hidden resources.... not bad, but somewhat unadapted to a civ that starts with Myst/Hunting.

Regarding the saves ( if you're using DanF change to the WB files load, skip this ): given some complaints about the efects of the AI starting without archery in high levels ( giving a unfair advantage to AI that have early UU and/or have early warmongering tendencies ), I decided to make 3 WB saves ( all in the same zip file ). The WB saves are equal except for the fact that one of them ( labeled Monarch ) has all of the AI with archery as starting tech ( corresponding to a game started in Monarch ), one ( labeled Immortal ) has all of the AI with archery,hunting and agriculture as starting tech ( corresponding to a game started in Immortal ) while the last is the corresponding to a game starting in Noble ( labeled Noble ). All WB saves are playable in all levels, but ( for a example ) if you use the Monarch one the AI will start with archery ( and archers ) in any level. This has only a slight effect in the human directly ( mainly via the garrisons of barb cities ), but has a huge effect on the AI gaming in the outer lands ( avoiding scenarios like Pacal, Shaka or Sitting Bull to take all the barb cities and becoming moguls ). I strongly recommend the usage of the Monarch save if you want to play in Monarch+ and the Immortal at Immortal/Deity.... All the speeds are working well ( no more games ending in 1900 ) The saves are zipped... you only have to unzip this to the worldbuilder saves or for the PublicMaps folder ( either one will do ) and load it from the scenarios.

Any problem PM me...


P.S WB saves are crosscompatible between 3.13 and 3.17 if they don't have No Espionage ticked. No problem with the patches here :p And as WB saves are no more than text files and Vanilla and Warlords WB are almost equal, you can play this if you exchange the non-Vanilla ( or non-warlords ) stuff ( in here it will be only leaders and civs eventually )

Again a small request ( not mandatory :p ) :

We ask the participants to do, if possible, a write-up with the victory save and a description of your game ( strategies, techs researched, wars,...). All the info should be in spoiler tags ( to not disturb other people's games ). If you want ( we would like to :p ) post reports at this moments of the game:

Checkpoint 1 - when we have explored the island and are aware of what resources it has. Its not so important when this is, but this is a time to discuss city sites etc. Don't look into a checkpoint 1 spoiler until you have reached this point yourself.

Checkpoint 2 - first contact - when we have met all the other AIs. At this point we can discuss our strategy to get to this point and our plans for dealing with them.

Checkpoint 3 - when we are committed to a victory condition (or at least think we are).

Checkpoint 4 - Victory (or defeat).


The last words are to wish good luck to all :goodjob: . And let the games begin!



P.S We don't have any kind of problem with defeats and reruns. Just play and enjoy ;)
 

Attachments

  • LHC XLII ( Boudica ).zip
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Wow another one already but I suppose I have been delayed in finishing my Peter game (I'm going to try to finish it this weekend) so this one will have to wait. :(.

Possibly go SH first whilst teching fishing or worker whilst teching AH but then the worker has nothing to do for a while so leaning towards the former. I'd possibly go scout first on a non isolated start but obviously that doesn't apply here. :)
 
Hi

Yikes, Im thinking Bootycall will be tuff in iso. With none to go and kill early it kind of like nerfs her a bit. And none of her starting techs help with the start loc unless there ellies or something in the fog. This might be good game to go back down to noble hehe.

Still Cha might still be helpful a bit. Plus the one thing you can always count on whe playing as is it means 100% sure thing we dont have to worry bout her jiggling her implants in the diplo screen every few turns.

Kaytie
 
I seem to be in war-weariness mode form my GOTM, BOTM, and Earth 18 games -- I have bogged down in all 3. With the GOTM 40 finish only a few days away maybe I ought to put this one off a bit; on the other hand maybe a day or two of LHC will give me the break I seem to need. Decisions, decisions.

I appreciate Cha just for the extra happiness, even if there's no one to kill at the moment. Overseas invasion with gunpowder units might turn out to be fun -- except I'll probably bog down again when I get that far!
 
Hi

Prince, Marathon, 890 AD checkpoint one. Land all expolred and still setting it all out.


Spoiler :
Settled in place teched fishing first then ag, ah, mining, bw. build order was kind of wierd, it was warrior, stonehenge until fishing done then wb at top of que then when wb done back to stone henge until ah done then worker at top of ques then back to stonehenge--might have been dumb way to to it but it did get me stonehenge done without even chopping for it hehe.

After stone henge I built second warrior and then settler and settled over by stone. Scout got wheel and pottery from goodyhuts so that helped me get going on mids which I had workers chop out after masonry got teched and stone got hooked up. I also got GLH done and HG and GL but missed out on collossus and gw and MoM and AP already built somewhere else by this point.

I didnt get a religion for CoL so we're still athiests at this point. And wonderwhoring has slowed down my expansion so land still not all settled out. Here is empire at this point:



Not exactly resource rich huh? Luckily I got silver and copper to pop in cap's bfc but still alittle behind and with no religion and darn few happy and health resources it look like Im gonna have to kill somebody asap.



Although being below average in most categories and DEAD last in power Im gonna be lucky if it isnt me who wind up getting killed :/ I gotta figure out how to get empire going or this could end up being a whomp fest with me on wrong side of the whomping.

Kaytie
 
r_rolo1 said:
Too much copy-paste :p
Click to expand...

:lol: nobody's immune to it, right Rolo ;)?

I.....don't have my primary gaming machine. I have a desktop with 512 RAM, a radeon card with 128 mb, and a 2ghz processor or so as my only current functional machine. This does not run civ nicely. At all.

So...I'll probably switch game speed to quick to compensate for the slowdown. Haha!

I'm gonna get owned :(.
 
Started the game. No screenies for now.

Spoiler :
Founded Buddhism and built the GLH. I currently have three cities up, and will be packing them tight to take advantage of the GLH. My main problem is the sheer lack of resources in the immediate area. To the south, in the jungle belt, it's okay, but close to the capital, it's all plains, hills and desert. Founded my second city to grab the Clams, Deer, and Crabs. It'll end up being a GP Farm/Production city, since there are two hills nearby. Third city is debatable. After grabbing IW, I'm not sure if I should place it near the Clams (south of Bibracte) to do the tight city placement and take advantage of food + hills for production - or, put it on the plains tile past the chokepoint to grab Iron and the Clams. The latter seems better...but i'd be wasting a ton of tiles. :mad: Whatever.
 
Hi

Prince, Marathon, 1362 AD checkpoint 2 met all the AI's and it is UGLY :(


Spoiler :
::sigh:: trust lhc games to put me in my place. I think I am in waaaaay to big a hole to climb out of. I settled out my land, it was pain not having a religion but figured since they ALL on other continents and GG's popping left and right that meant when I met they AI's they would all be at each others throats.

I teched out optics won the map race and it ALL downhill from there.

Turns out all those GG's was Hanni running away with his cont, he capt Ram and Ghandi but not only that they STILL pretty big in their own right so they ar ALL teching away.

Giggles isnt as bad but it not pretty either, he capped HC so they all working together too. Now if I had time I MIGHT be able to go after giggles and take his cont but I dont see ANY way to do that with that monster hanni breathing down my neck. He already in wheooh mode so it could be me or Alex but it dont look like alex will last too long even if it is him and after that then its me :(

My empire such as it is:



the demos:



and tech sitch:



and it is BAAAAAD. Only thing I have to offer is banking and even tho HC says he will trade stuff most of them too expensive or not helpful. He will give up only music or theo for banking and neither will help. Theo might be helpful IF I had a religion but I dont and music is on way to nat and mt but I am sooo far behind already teching all they to that wont do me much good.

And yeah I could trade optics, egineering or knights over to giggles for music but like I said music wont help me and since my ONLY hope which isnt even that big a one is killing off him and hc and try to catch up to hanni trading military techs over to them doesnt seem like best move.

Hanni and his buddies already have gunpowder and printing press tho. I dont see ANY way to catch up to that fin pluss printing press cottages is just gonna make it worse before it get better and with everyone united it just a matter of when not if hanni come charging at me. and when that happens it game over.

More than likely I am probably just gonna chalk this one as a loss it it just waaay too depressing to keep going. See what happens when you get me to move up a level before Im ready? :p Anyways I hope everybody have better than me and if I stop here then see you all next game :)

Kaytie
 
Kaytie:

Spoiler :

you are by no means in a losing position. There are ways to win without having 10 times the power score of your closest competitor :p You can still fairly comfortably use a cannon/rifle invasion to conquer the world or just bunker up and build a spaceship. Pretty much a standard isolated start victory path. The AI is pretty awful at intercontinental invasions so your only true worry would really be a culture victory by one of them.

Shrug

I think you are throwing in the towel waaaaaaaay too early. The only military tech anyone has on you in gunpowder. Hardly a game breaker without MT or rifling.
 
One small question guys- how do I change the speed to Epic?


EDIT: Ok, I have a problem. When I load the save, into EITHER PublicMaps or WorldBuilder save, it doesn't come up. I don't know why...
 
@kaytie
Spoiler :
Like lansky said - it's too early to say you can't win. You're aren't in too bad of a position actually. Pretty typical for an isolation map. Crank the slider up to 100% and use up that gold to get astronomy. Open borders with everyone and maybe trade it around if you can get anything good. Tech towards rifling and pick up nationalism sometime on the way. Get 10-15 galleons built while doing this. You also have time to put a theater and coliseum in all cities before rifling so you can draft. 2 drafted riflemen from each city equals 22, plus if you get globe up even better. Get 8 trebs built before rifling too. Put the culture slider at 20% if you want more. Build more galleons, draft 3 rifles per city and you have a huge army.

So 2-3 turns after you get rifling (probably way before Gilg gets it since you are ahead of him in tech right now) you have 15 galleons with 22-33 rifles, 8-12 trebs. Build/whip trebs everywhere while drafting and you can probably reinforce with 10-15 more really fast. Even if you lose 2 rifles and all trebs, the other 20 in the 1st city you take will kill whatever he sends at them. Then it's only 4-5 defenders per city, and you have 20 rifles, 15 trebs to pick them off one by one.

It's a short galleon trip to him, so 5-6 turns after rifling you can probably land. No way the AI can handle 20+ rifles, plus trebs at that time. I think you are really overestimating the AI's ability to defend itself. Then your small island which might not be enough land to win with turns into 2 islands, and you're #1 in land now.

Especially on marathon this should work. Depends on how much happiness you have how much you can draft of course, how fast you get rifling and you need to keep anyone from DOW's you before rifling, but it's definitely possible. If you have good production there are other ways you can go about it too.
 
All is well. Celtia starts its exciting adventures.

Checkpoint 1, to 390 AD:

Spoiler :
Short Report. I built the GW, lost the Oracle, lost Stonehenge, lost Buddhism, lost Hinduism, AND lost Judaism. Hindu and Juda were logged withing 10 turns of each other :eek: and am building teh GLH.

We have Iron, Copper, and Horses on our continent. Here it is, the upper (civilized) half.



And the lower (barbarian) half.



Teh GLHC due in 20 turns. 2 workers, 5 cities. I plan on building more.
 
Kaytie
Spoiler :
In my first LHC, the closest AI in terms of tech had 10 techs on me :faint: And I won that game :p like it was said by others it is a matter of broker things up.
 
Too lazy for a report right now but just a thought on the isolated land-

Spoiler :

This island blows!

A third is jungle but no calendar resources or gems. Small desert area with no floodplains or gold. Enough elephants to start a circus but by the time you settle the bottom half of the island all they are doing is taking up valuable riverside tiles. Bleh. No clue how I want to develop this thing. Its not awful but city size will be limited until outside contact a bit. Really glad Boudica is charismatic.
 
Checkpoint 1: Noble, Epic, 170 BC
Spoiler :
I settled in place and decided to tech fishing first for the seafood and increased commerce. I built Stonehenge until fishing became available, then built 2 workboats, a barracks, a warrior, and returned to stonehenge whenever I had to wait for the next useful building e.g. granary. Subsequent techs were conventional: mining > BW > AH > sail (lighthouses for seafood and possible GLH) > wheel > pottery > masonry (for pyramids and GLH) > writing > archery > math > currency.

I finished Stonehenge in 2025 BC; the "free" extra happiness seemed nearly as important as the +1 culture for expansion. I paused at 170 BC because I've just finished the GLH in Vienne and a few turns ago finished the Pyramids in Bibracte. I expect to try for the Hanging Gardens in Bibracte shortly.

The Celtic empire:
Spoiler north map :
Red is for horses so chariots can solve whatever barbarian problems there are; so far I've had little trouble a shock-promoted warrior couldn't handle.
Spoiler south map :
I expect to hold off on building further south until I get iron working; if there's no iron I'll use the copper if I need Gallic Warriors.

After Currency I expect to go for CoL then IW. At that point I may go for optics, which is much earlier than I usually go for it, to check out the competition.
 
Hi

up to 1432 AD, resigned :(

Spoiler :
I tried I really did. I set the slider to 90% got astronomy asap, traded it around, got open borders, even converted to hinduism and got hanni to pleased and teched out gunpowder but it wasnt enough. He was in wheooh at me for longest time and not like I was hoping on alex. Plus tech sitch was even worse than I thought. It doesnt show past what only is available to you for resaerch. Once I teched out gunpowder it showed hanni had mil sci AND chem so he came in with galleons protected by firgates and dumped grenadiers and trebs all over my cont I dont have anything that can hold that off. Plus economy back in tank now since what few trades I DID have were with hanni and his vassals and they now gone and I burned bridges trying to get on hanni's good side so neither giggles nor alex will even think of doing resource trade or helping me with war since giggles hate me for having diff religion and alex hate me for trading with his worst enemies. In fact they BOTH also in wheooh mode now and I am pretty sure it is against me and letting astronomy out the bag so soon mean they gonna get it sooner rather than later so I have dogpile in my future most likely. Not that I can trade much. Pretty much ellies is ALL I have to trade besides seafood and I have nothing that can guard my seafood from hannis frigates and even if somehow I could protect my cities from his grenadiers they can just walk all over at will in the open and pillage everything. But that unlikely. Running my science so much at deficet mean I have no gold left to even TRY and upgrade and even if I did best I could upgrade to would be longbows and maces since nothing upgrades to muskets. And rest of my military just trebs which I wa sbuilding up with thought of getting a group of them first while working to rifles or curriassors but that out window now.

So I am just gonna call it a loss. Thanks for the encouragement but like I thought Hanni just got too big too fast for me to even hope of winning and like I fugred would happen it just snowballed to point now it will just be watching him take my cities one by one while I cant do anything. Im thinking I probably jumped gun and moved up to prince way to early seeing how badly I got STOMPED. Oh wells. Anyways good luck to everybody else still playing hopefully you all will do better than I did on this one and see you all next game.

Kaytie
 
Kaytie, I am in about teh same sitch than you are, and I am slogging on. Keep trying!

To 1415 AD- Czechpoint 2.

Spoiler :
Well.... I built cities, built workers, and lost wonders. I also lost religions , and races. Liberalism is UFG.

The Celts are pathetic. They are backwards, weak, and.... pathetic. I won't bother with the step-by-step account, because there wasn't much to do except expand teh empires. I will drop right into teh meating of teh ay eyes. But we did reach teh GLHC, and we are running a hopelessly bad SE/TRE.

First was this guy:




And his master this guy.



:eek::eek::eek:. That's just scary.

Then the second continent comes along, starting with Alex, then Ramesses, Hannibal, Gandhi, and finally.... no one. Tech sitch is OK. I got a few good deals for Compass and Optics which I accepted. Forgotten what they were.




Our hopeless military:



Demos:




:cry::cry::cry:

And relations. I expect to draft up a military from this dust after Lib-Nationalism. Hanni/Giggles is my target, as teh backwards losers of the pack. No, wait, that's me....




 
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