TSG15 Game in Progress

Welcome to the TSG15 Game in Progress thread. This thread is used to discuss the game once you've started playing. There are no reading or posting restrictions as such (apart from normal decency), although we encourage players to use the spoiler tags for screenshots. Here you can post questions related to the game and share your achievements/anger/frustration/victories while you play. Please remember that we are running a family friendly site, so express anger or frustration with this in mind.

Please use this thread to discuss your goals for the game and your opening moves through about the first 80 to 100 turns. How did your planning change to make adjustments for the many changes in the recent patch?
- What Social Policies did you choose and why?
- What tech path did you follow?
- Did you try to build any wonders?
- Any neighbor that you targeted for the dustbin of history?

Once you've completed the game, head over to the TSG15 After Action Report thread.

Oh boo, and I've already disqualified myself...

Had a particularly lame barbarian encounter and loaded on impulse. Bleh.

Moderator Action: Once you have opened the save, please post in the Game In Progress thread.

--plenty of spoilers here--

Well, I've started this off and stopped my first session around turn 104. I got to astronomy on turn 100, with a GS.

I suppose the real change post-patch has been going for the GL and then NC.

For policies I've gone Tradition all the way, to maximise growth. I think I've completed the tree already.

Two mistakes I've already made: I bought a worker, but many turns too late, I could've done it much sooner and would've reaped the benefits. The second mistake is that I've been doing my best to get as many RAs as possible from the beginning, when I suspect that money could've been better spent on buildings, workers, or settlers. The boosts I've seen, with 5 or 6 RAs in effect, many of them overlapping, don't seem like much. And of course they'd be much more cost effective after building the PT. Ah well. We'll see.

I think my build order was monument scout granary worker? Then GL, a warrior or two, and NC. I messed up with the GL though and only got a 4 or 5 turn tech.

I settled one west, on the hill, for the observatory. This added a couple ring 3 sheep.

On the positive side, I was lucky enough to find two barbs in the middle of stealing CS workers, which I then claimed for myself. Also did one encampment quest for a maritime CS...and got another quest to find persia for the same CS, which I did. Huts were unremarkable...gold / upgrades, one culture maybe?

Also built HS. Tech path has been very science focussed, although just before my first RA hit I researched all my lowest tier techs to try to boost the bonus. I think I either already have or will soon have a university up in my cap. I've built two other cities--expansion was slowed by the early wonder focus in the cap. New York is east, near the sheep and a mountain (obs), claiming two incense and the dyes in the 3rd ring.

Building very little army has hurt me, though, politically. Egypt DoWed me, followed shortly by China. Boston was settled north, 5 tiles from Beijing, next to the whales. They've been the rougher aggressor, chucking warriors and archers at me like there's no tomorrow, backed by a general, and they've managed to take the city. I will get it back, but researching iron late meant I didn't know I wouldn't have any to upgrade my warriors. It seems there's only 2 iron available with a CS...in fact I'm not sure I've seen any other iron on the continent. That's probably a good thing, considering my current position, down a city.

...so, the games going alright. Could've been a lot tighter...I guess I tend to play first and think later. I'll be interested to see what kind of results others are getting, and whether where I settled was the best choice or not. I'm happy I got Astro when I did and I can now start getting into some good science policies. I'm not sure where the last AI is--same mega continent, or his own island?

Got another short session in: ended turn 123. China had sued for peace, which we took (they'd lost many units with amphibious attacks). Egypt also sued for peace. The turn our treaty with China expired, we attacked, with upgraded swords (bought Sydney's favor) and a horse. Recaptured, no losses. China sued for peace again shortly thereafter. Russia DoWed me on t119. In fact I'd noticed in the diplo screen the text "They backstabbed you" several turns beforehand, but we'd never been to war, so...is the AI tipping its hand early? Anyway, New York is very well defensively situated at the mountain pass, so there's no danger there, and we have our military now for defensive. Before this DoW, though, I was considering pushing on to take Beijing....

In the middle of all this, we built the Oracle. Porcelain tower is up next. Also popped a GG and burned him for a GA.

Played first 70 turns. I practiced a bit at emperor to watch the new level of agressivity of new AIs. They certainly are more agressive. But i managed to get a lot of ruins. About 12 approx. Found 3 of them far far east when 2 other civs where wandering around without taking them.

I found 3 culture ruins! So i decided to get a free worker and a free settler very fast from the Liberty tree and settled south of China. Rush buyed a library and built another one in capital while beelining for Philo but not before taking mining to let the worker some useful tasks.

I didn't want to go GL first because i saw some early builds in my practice games and it's a bit of a waste because you can build the NC faster giving you a ''free tech'' turn for turn comparison to the GL. Yeah it's 1 maintenance and no GS points but i wanted to be agressive as well. After settling 4 cities total, i got maths to begin the construction of HG to make my capital a real powerhouse. I bought 1 worker and allied with a maritime cs and got 2 iron from him.

I have to defend against Russia now but in 9 turns the HG will be completed and my capital will spam the Pikemen of doom soon. I plan to get HS then ND and PT with 2 GE. Then spam RAs until the end.

Picture :



Edit(2nd part until turn 101) :

Made peace with Russia with gold and marble from him. Finished HG then connected all cities for the meritocracy bonus and trade routes. Capital, with insane production, have finished HS in few turns to get a free GE. Then got a 2nd GE from the Liberty tree completed, started a GA at same time. China declared war on me, but i'm first in soldiers, techs, production and gold(and maybe pop). The big fat guy easily repusled his miserable warriors and made peace with another large pot of gold. Rush buyed a university in Washington and will build garden and HE to boost GS birthrate.

Pictures :

Porcelaine Tower


Then Notre-Dame


Washington the wonderful :


Edit(3rd part until turn 181) :

I began to sign more RAs and concentrated on growth. Capital built the Ironworks and National Treasury and we kept the maritime cs allied for the rare 2 iron tile. Went at war 3 other times. Ramesses broke 2 RAs and throwed some units but failed twice. I got a nice pile of gold for the last war. China broke an RA and did the same. 4 turns later she sued for peace and gold again.

I discovered Harun alone on his island and he is incredibely rich. I continued spamming RAs and built Public schools everywhere and running more scientists. Now i'm in the industrial era and i began factories production. I spotted aluminium to a cs close to me and i'm gonna get this before i will need it for spaceship elevators. I have 6 RAs waiting and i opened the triple branch after electricity(burned 2 GS) to get the highest median to maximize RAs. I don't know if it's the right thing to do. I went Rationalism some turns ago and i'm going to get a boost for my universities in 1 turn.

Pictures :

Land


Capital


Techs


Policies


Edit(Final part until turn 242) :

I managed to stay in peace long enough to get all RAs signed from past turns. I built the Gate and Louvre in cap to get enough GA turns for the end. I used Oxford to get Apollo and after that i rushed Belgrade and got aluminium. But Hiawatha got mad and Ghandi too. They declared war on same turn against me. I took the last policy to get the 2 free techs that i used to rush Spaceship factories that i built in 3 cities. I also built 3 tanks just before.



With such advanced army i couldnt die so easily.



Then i got bugged about a last tech(Particle physics) i needed. Knowing that a last GS would take too much time to get nano, i prayed to get beakers from last 2 RAs which i got(edit : I read somewhere that RAs give beaker in the current research tech. That explains why i managed to get Particle physics). I then easily got nano from my last GS



Got surprised to get all spaceship techs but have not finished spaceship factories yet!
But finally everything matched almost perfectly. Some few turns before victory :



I managed to get a better time than previous patch...go figures.

Interesting. Your Philidelphia is in the same spot as my New York. I'm planning to drop my 4th (and last) city on the 2 horse tile smack in the middle of the other three cities--doable because I settled my cap 1W.

I've been thinking I need to be a bit more aggressive as well--maybe finish a couple of quests this way. Maintaining iron supplies is costly, though, and Sydney is a bit far.

I settled on the hill south of the incense and next to the mountain for the observatory. I tech rushed to Philosophy, grabbed the wonder production bonus in tradition, built worker, granary, Great Library, National College, Stonehenge, in that order. I tried to build the Hanging Gardens but missed it by 5 turns or so...that really hurt my plan of having a monster capital, but oh well, moved on.

I only grabbed the one policy it tradition and moved into patronage, which looking back now was a mistake. I was able to have 5 allies at one point, but later in the game I was having gold problems as I never built a second city, mostly because I was so busy building wonders and Russia was just expanding everywhere, even 1 city west of the mountains next to Washington. I ended up completing patronage, got a couple extra great people out of it and weakened other civs city-state rates...but other than that it seems like a waste now. I moved into Rationalism after completing Patronage, since this was a science victory and I already had the Porcelain Tower. Unfortunately I only signed 1 or 2 RA's after this since my gold income was in the red for so long.

I took Geneva because two friendly citystates desired me too and I needed more cities, but this sent me into war with Hiawatha, who was under a DoF at the time. I was worried his denouncement of me would hurt my relations with Catherine (and her massive army of cannons), but luckily I remained friends with her for much of the game. I took one of his cities but then struggled for many turns trying to take another. I thought my military tech lead on him would be enough to walk over him, but he put up a very good fight. The rough terrain in his country certainly helped him big time, especially the mountains south of his capital.

I finally ended up declaring a bare-bones peace treaty with him in order to take Belgrade (I need more cities bad, gold income is like -40 a turn at one point) so that I can connect my cities and start gaining gold again. This act of course sends 8 other city states into permanent war with me, further killing my Patronage decision. But atleast I have gold now.

I don't know if I'm going to win this. Arabia could win a Diplo victory, but I have the tech lead and just got combustion, so I don't think I have to worry about the UN being built any time soon. Now that gold income is positive again, I think its time to use my advanced arms and start taking more cities, prolly China's since they are fairly weak and I'm not ready yet to face Russia and her massive country.

Edit: I read about half of Tabarnak's post (I still haven't found any of Arabia's lands, but have met him) and am very impressed by where his game is at the same turn of my game. I think I should have expanded instead of trying to build a super Washington, but that regret is prolly linked to not getting Hanging Gardens...damn that Wonder is powerful!

I'll post my experiences up to turn 108 when I discovered Astro.

I settled Washington in place, New York on the north coast between 2 cows. Bought tiles out to the whales. Build order in Washington was something like Scout -> Monument -> Granary -> Stonehenge -> GL -> NC -> Oracle -> Hagia Sophia. The HS GE went to NY and built Porcelain Tower, the Liberty GE went to Boston (settled in same place as Tabernak's Philadelphia) and built Notre Dame. Philadelphia is to the west, in a surprisingly decent location 1 W of the sheep. 2 fish, freshwater farms to the north, horse tiles, 2 incense.

Social policies were simple. Tradition -> Aristocracy -> Liberty stuff. Now debating between Patronage and Rationalism.

Wars with China and Russia. China was close to taking NY but I held on.

first hour went pretty well, loads of ruins (some of em really close to each other - never seen that before) - and all these contacts making me cash loaded - lets see what i ll do with the gold

I went for A Glib start and it's interesting to see how this compares with Tabarnak's NC 1st approach. I do have shots from 75 & 100 turn for comparing (How do I upload them?).

It doesn't seem to make that much of a difference, Tabarnak of course has more pop in his 4th city, and gets the PT a couple of turns earlier than I, but my 1st RA arrived around 110 so I didn't need it that early. I used Ragusa for extra food.

So I moved to hill, build scout-worker-Glib-archer-NC in Capital
Rushed a Lib in Washington that I founded between the cows. Made two mistakes here. I tried to found in the river crossing tile, but this was to close to Lhasa. Costed me 2 turns in founding and I forgot to buy the Fur tile Build order here was monument-archer

Somewhere I founded city 3 & 4. Boston to the West claiming the Dye and Incense and Philadelphia to the East claiming the 2 incense.

Aroun turn 50 when I just finished the 5 turns delayed GLib (a gamble for CS that worked out ) Wu DoW-ed me and almost till the end we were at War for 5 turns and peace for 10 turns. Never got anything out of the peace treaties

Around turn 100 I got ND, a couple of turns later PT, bought some Unis. Than I tried to get as many RA's as possible, but that wasn't easy, because of all the wars that were going on that made money tight.

Beelined for Public Schools, and build some wonders to get GP'S for the end phase. Missed ForbPal by two turns so happiness always was borderline.

As Tabarnak I conquered Belgrade for the Alu

Smaller & Bigger mistakes I made other than the ones described above:
-Didn't bulb Apollo in time, costed me 7 turns to build it, where I could have build SS-parts
-Should have gone earlier for fertiliser, that would have helped growth for Philadelphia
-a bit more investment upfront in Army, may could have helped for better peace deals ??!?
-between turn 75 and 100 I had a tile in Washington locked on a 1 food/1 hammer tile, must have been in my blind spot . That has costed me for sure.
-at one point in time I focused to much on the top part of the tech tree, that I got maybe not the best amount of beakers out of 2 RA'S

When I finally bulbed (9 GS, 2 techs from SP and Oxford) to Nano I got DoW-ed by Hiawatha, who was my friend all game. My savings + the proceedings from selling all unis-schools and libs, went into Armor and not into SS-Factories. BTW, I wasn't able to sell the observatories, bug???

Game Summary:
-money and happiness tight game
-looooooots of wars, AI is much more aggressive and shows up with at least 8 units at a town, at the end China and Egypt were gone.
-new RA system is pretty strong

Tx again for a fun game

So I planned to play like around 100 turns the first go around, but kind of lost track of time so played until turn 233. I think I am doing good, not great.





For a science victory I should probably be further along tech wise...


But I am happy with my capital, espec. its production


I am ahead of the other civs tech-wise, and probably militarily as well so perhaps I just need to declare on, lets say, Hiawatha. He is getting a bit close to a cultural victory it seems. Persia may give me fits as well... it seems as if he's going for a diplo victory.

My closes neighbors are pretty pathetic. I could of taken out Russia early on but I decided to keep them around. Moscow fell pretty early in the game (maybe like turn 60 or 70, or even before). I had my three proper cities already up and running when I decided to go for Moscow. After one of my archers found a ruin and upgraded to a crossbowman super early I went for it. I made peace with Cathy and let things develop for a while. After Russia founded another city my an iron deposit I took that city as well.

A curious thing I witnessed right before I stopped was when Sidon conquered an Egyptian city that bordered Moscow to the north (well originally it was Chinese). For a few turns Sidon had TWO cities and so then I bribed them to be my ally. They had like five resources!! This two city Sidon didn't last though to my dismay the city just vanished after a few turns...

I am pausing at turn 100 to note my progress. I can't remember all of the details, but here's what I have:

I settled just east of the Mountain near the starting position for the observatory, went for early GL and got it. Then went for NC. Purchased two settlers, so I wouldn't have to slow growth.

I have mostly been going for wonders in the capital, and as of turn 100, I have built the GL, NC, Hagia Sophia, Chichen Itza, and the Hanging Gardens. I built the HG later them normal and didn't plan on building it necessarily, but AI seemed slow to build wonders in my game.

I have only completed one RA. I am waiting for completion of Porcelain Towers for more. am about to start building the PT now in my capital, which is a production powerhouse thanks to HG+worked mines.

China declared on me early, and I fought off her rush and sued for peace, getting a sweet deal. I have been aggressively selling resources and open borders for cash, staying peaceful and friendly with all.

I have had one golden age, extended by the CI, which is still going on. I am about to pop my first scientist. I have focused on gold and have used it mostly to buy buildings and settlers.

As of 100, I am pulling in 70 beakers/turn, with three cities and a combined total population of 20 in the empire.

Tradition>Aristocracy>Legalism>Monarchy>Patronage>Philanthropy for policies as of turn 100.

I like this patch very much, and I personally feel that once the bugs are ironed out, the game is now ready for real competition. Also, I have finally switched completely over to Civ V.

godotnut said:

I like this patch very much, and I personally feel that once the bugs are ironed out, the game is now ready for real competition. Also, I have finally switched completely over to Civ V.

Click to expand...

Don't think it will be ready for competition until 2K or Firaxis releases the contents of the gamecore.dll file so a mod can be created to secure the save and provide data on how the game was played.

my game sounds little bit like godonut ones.
Wonder whoring in cap ....
Guess thats pretty much what every1 is gonna do with newest patch.
Happyness lvl is very good untill now - just not sure if I want risk RAs - with ais being so aggresive.
Somehow whole RA concept is just dumb - as u get totaly nothing if not fnished - too much of an gamble for my playsyle which is very math oriented

Tommynt wrote

just not sure if I want risk RAs - with ais being so aggresive.

Click to expand...

I only had China as aggressive neighbour. All others were friendly almost whole game, giving me DoF's all the time. Somewhere in the game Ramses backstabbed me, but then he was already in war with almost everyone.

And Hia backstabbed me when I bulbed to the end, fair point I guess. I only lost 1 RA (250g) to Ramses. Percentage (math) wise that was not too much, though most of the time I had the 7th or 8th weakest army....

In turn 225 Plinius finished a list of Pointiest Sticks: 1 Hia: >5500, 6 me ~700. and he was my neighbour... I signed lots of RA's with him.

The AI behavior is quite random. It just adds to the fun factor in my opinion.

@leif erikson
Did you try shooting an e-mail at them about this?

So far I really like the new patch! The changes to the SPs, the wonders, the AI tweaks and general re-balance is all great. But I dont like that RAs are so important now. PT and Rationalism seems the only way to go (at least for a science game). And RAs still feel quite gamey - instead of tech-blocking we now have to sit and optimize medians. Along with the risk of the AI DOWing you the turn before the RA ticks in.

I tried a test game with Washington on Emporer to get a feel for the many changes and try out the Hanging Gardens. From that game I learned to keep up my military and focus on mid-to-late game RAs. Early game RAs seems less important. HG is just super fun and I cant wait to try an OCC - maybe for a culture victory.

Here are a summary of my game so far (lots of spoilers):

Turn 1-51
In this game I settled on the hill for early production bonus and observatory. Tech order was Pottery -> Writing -> Calender to get an early GL and I lucked out with a hut giving me Mining so I could do some early chopping. Build order was Scout -> Monument -> Granary -> GL-> NC.

I bought my first worker as early as I could get the money and the second worker was donated by Egypt. My scout (now upgraded archer) found a lonely egyptian settler and knowing that Egypt could easy become quite a problematic AI, I decided to declare war and steal the settler. I nearly messed this up because I had forgotten my scout was now an archer so instead of capturting the settler I shot him for for damage! Doh! Next I got him with the move-order button and transported him home for some chopping duty.

My NC finished at turn 48 and right after that I founded my second city up north close to China partly to block of the map as well as gaining sea access in case of a strange fractal map.

I wanted as many early SPs as possible, so I got the early monument and allied with Lhasa for an early culture boost. I started with Tradition and Aristocracy since I knew from my test game that I would probably build a lot of wonders. The all focus went towards completing the Liberty tree starting with a free settler.

Picture from Turn 51:


Turn 51-101
With so much open land I decided to settle to more cities. This is unusual for me pre-patch because of the SP penalty, but it seems much better balanced now. I also decided to try out something different and see if I could build Hanging Gardens in my third city, Boston, placed in the middle of all those hills and mountains down south-east. The forth city I placed far away up north-west with all the silk close to Hiawatha. He didnt like that one bit and still remembers it today!

To support my new cities I bought a warrior and build a chariot archer quite early. This meant that Russia for a short moment were Afraid in their status! Funny. But that soon changed and it wasn't long before both Russia and Egypt DOWed me. I wasnt really scared because Boston was so well protected behind the hills and mountains, so it was more an invitation for some retaliation later. Just couldn't find that damn iron anywhere! And the citystates kept getting their workers stolen by barbs, so they didnt hook up any iron. Oh well - I decided I had to wait for Minutemen and Cannons before attacking. In the meantime I focused on growing my cities and building some infrastructure.

The four-city start + HG in non-capital did mean that my start was rather slow, but hopefully it will snowball later. Oh - another lucky shot: when my scout reach up NE on the continent I met a tireme from Arabia (who seems to be on another continent, I am yet to find him) which meant access to Mr.Rich and a permanent RA friend. Nice.

Picture from turn 101:


Turn 101-151: War!
I had signed 3 RAs during turn 90-100 and with both PT and Rationalism complete (I got that around turn 110), the RAs returned a lot of beakers. I was headed for Chemistry and with the third RA i got most of Fertilizer and decided to complete it (by turn 123 I think). That really boosted my growth throughout the game, though happiness was a constant problem.

With Minutemen and Cannon tech I now build a small army of two cannons and 3 minutemen along with an upgraded chariot archer and started attacking first Russia and later Egypt. I took one Russian city and got the other in the peace. Against Egypt I went straight for the capital and then got a money + luxuries in the peace. I could easily have taken more cities, but there was no way my happiness could keep up, so I decided to stop at that point.

All this war-mongering had delayed my science focus quite a lot, but I felt it was worth it at this point and I would hopefully comeback much stronger later on. My cities focused on Universities and I got the +2 Science pr specialist SP (SPs are very slow now), so the tech-rate improved quite fast.

Screen from Turn 151:


Turn 151-179 (where I am now)
Now I could start to see some real snowball effect. I got some more RAs and completed Scientific Theory (lots of coal on this map!) and every city got a Public School. My tech-rate really improved, but I have neglected GS production, so I'am still a bit uncertain on how it will pan out.

China and Hiawatha both DOWed me with the same message of (something like): "I know this is hopeless, but I have to try. Best of luck to my army". I was really amused with this new behavior. It seems right that they actually try and with Hiawatha it meant that he cancelled my RA for Steam Power the before it should tick in. Really annoying! I assembled my old army and it was easy to kill off their mohawks and pikemen, but with the game being this far along I decided not to take their cities. Instead I got some nice peace deals and could go back to focusing on infrastructure.

I have now signed RA with 4 (or 5?) civs and are planning on how to maximize them. I have some GS saved up, but I also need those for later techs. I'm also focusing more back on some wonders and my culture production, so I can get some Happiness. It would also be nice to get some early Railroad since I have a lot of roadtiles in my sprawling empire. But that doesnt work well with the RAs. Hmm. Oh well, we'll see where this ends. Maybe every civ DOWs me and all the RA plans falls apart.

Screens from turn 179 (current):

Map


Cities

Don't think it will be ready for competition until 2K or Firaxis releases the contents of the gamecore.dll file so a mod can be created to secure the save and provide data on how the game was played.

Click to expand...

I completely agree. I was just talking about the mechanics of the game, but I eagerly await (please, please ) the arrival of a mod that will let the awesome GOTM staff verify results, check for illegitimate replays, and offer a solid foundation for competitive play. That said, even if such a mod existed, prior to this patch, I don't think the RA-agreement orgy-fest would have offered much fun in terms of competition.

let me try to recall...

caution spoiler!

settled on the hill 1W.

build order: built scout -> monument -> warrior, bought granary, library, GL (gave theology, didnt micromanage and this was only expensive tech available), NC

had a settler from SP which had to wait until NC was built. New York east of the 2 incense at the mountain.

SP: started with tradition, then more or less one or two of each of the trees, what i assumed was best. didnt see I would get a great person from metriocracy anymore?

politics: my scout and a warrior discovered large parts of the continent, all AI friendly except Wu. Suddenly saw 4-5 chinese warriors near my border and feared they would attack - but I had a spearman at Chinese border (upgraded scout from exploring) which may have prevented the attack. Then Russia asked me to join war against Wu which I did. Dont really have an army though - no fighting yet.

Other / forecast:
I am really irritated by the lack of iron on the continent. Ally with CS that will get 2 iron, but cultural borders have yet to grow there.
No clue at the moment how to attack Wu without iron. Cant even built cats.

Wanted to annex Beijing but no plan how to do that. Will opt for 1-2 more cities. Will check if I still can build HG - didnt know they were so powerful.
Need to focus on astronomy now and discover. At the same time try to get money to buy CSs for the science benefit they bring with the social policy. This was always my key to have superior tech vs. AI.
also need to focus on assigning GS points - which I rarely did before...

sebasm said:

@leif erikson
Did you try shooting an e-mail at them about this?

Click to expand...

They would probably think some lunatic was bugging them.

If I were to email them, it would be about releasing the full SDK and code for the civgamecore.dll.

godotnut said:

I completely agree. I was just talking about the mechanics of the game, but I eagerly await (please, please ) the arrival of a mod that will let the awesome GOTM staff verify results, check for illegitimate replays, and offer a solid foundation for competitive play. That said, even if such a mod existed, prior to this patch, I don't think the RA-agreement orgy-fest would have offered much fun in terms of competition.

Click to expand...

I figured as much.

Just wanted to be clear about where we are, to keep any false rumors from starting. Or hopes that competition was just around the corner.

Game still full of bugs.

Example, In my game AI kill Egypt, I took Memphis back and resurrected Egypt. Same turn I made defense agreement and soon made peace with Darius.
A few turns later Darius declare War on egypt and defense agreement did not fire!
Not result I expected.