TSG118 After Actions

Welcome to the TSG118 After Actions Report. In this thread you can post the results of your game. Please state victory date and score (preferably in the post title), as recorded in the Hall of Fame, and the most important: your path to glory!

STOP - Please do not continue reading this thread until you have completed and submitted your game.

Please use the Civ5 game submission page to submit your final, first play through, .Civ5Save file, saved AFTER the victory ceremony if you were not conquered (using the "Lemme play one more turn" feature.).

- Describe any significant World Congress accomplishments? Who founded if you didn't? WC Proposal order?
- Did you use your UU/UB to any benefit for a Diplomacy victory?
- In hindsight, describe where you could have improved with votes, proposals, strategy, etc.

Players are encouraged to provide feedback on the game. Some players like to replay the game, and although we will not record the results from a replay, you can still post your new experiences (please state if the game is a replay). Please refrain from posting videos until the deadline for submission is over.

Your name: caeru71
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1907AD
Turns played: 327
Base score: 1164
Final score: 1790

I screwed up the last vote before the election and not thinking about it I reloaded the auto-save to correct this mistake. So I can't submit this save.

Monthar said:

I screwed up the last vote before the election and not thinking about it I reloaded the auto-save to correct this mistake. So I can't submit this save.

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ouch. feel free to discuss the game though, if the memory isn't too painful, haha. as always we really appreciate the honesty.

HR

Couldn't get the hammers to get a good start. Amazed at the inability to get wonders on king. Maybe Optics earlier would've allowed better second and third city sites off continent.

Grabbed the best resource rich start on lower left of island and then sent a settler next to northern mountain. Lost the grab 4 Temple Artemis. Main objective was to carve out enough living space to get the TECH going. Focused on internal trade routes and early war with India. Got lucky twice with invulnarability upgrade but those darn elephants did make the war slower than I would've liked.

Rome got uppity and killed all my cargo ships. In hindsight one trade route with Rome would've tipped the balance. He wouldn't call an end to the war and I didn't press it and thus my growth suffered.

The lack of strong religion hampered my game but no hammers has a cost.

went with lame growth and happiness from gardens but my religion didn't get spread until late in game.

Not sure what went wrong when I built city on citrus/jungle tile and got no citrus resource. I built city on location because I needed Happiness and no citrus left my cities floundering right after getting acquaducts. I may need to reinstall my game and user interface to get out the bugs.

Diplomacy is really a stunted Tech victory because getting all CS's is usually the easy part.

Moderator,

Could you add me to the membership? I have been unable to submit. The email link isn't working on my browser.

If you build the first city on another continent on a luxury, it will replace it with one of the unique lux of Indonesia.

glonnon said:

Moderator,

Could you add me to the membership? I have been unable to submit. The email link isn't working on my browser.

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Sorry, not sure what you mean?

All you need to do is go to this link, fill out the form and add your game for upload. Your forum name is all you need to submit, the email is to let you know we received it.

Your name: Billick
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 2024AD
Turns played: 448
Base score: 903
Final score: 1014
Time played: 5:35:00

First time playing Indonesia. This was... a struggle.


- Describe any significant World Congress accomplishments? Who founded if you didn't? WC Proposal order?
I let Gandhi found WC. Oops. I got the dark horse achievement as the booby prize though

- Did you use your UU/UB to any benefit for a Diplomacy victory?
Didn't use UU at all. I royally messed up and didn't get a religion, which limited the usefulness of the UB. I should have been expanding more early to take advantage of the UA.

- In hindsight, describe where you could have improved with votes, proposals, strategy, etc.
I made a ton of mistakes besides what I already mentioned. I missed out on Forbidden Palace. I took too long to get to Globalization. Once I got there, I forgot that it takes 5 turns to set up a diplomat, so I lost an additional 20 turns there. I pretty much made a mess of this game. It was fun though.

Since I had submitted Civ 4 games long ago, I answered the new upload question wrong. It works now when I put in first upload.

Thanks

Not a bit of shame not knowing this bit of archaic law. Actually first time playing Indonesia, not a big fan of the CIV but it was kinda interesting.

Not a fan of Melee units, cities not on continent or late Religion push. All tend to lead more or less to epic fails.

Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1898AD
Turns played: 319
Base score: 2026
Final score: 3215
Time played: 9:45:00

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Very bad hammer start. Settled on hill NE of start to get the river for later hydro dam. Decided against wonder spams, and only focused on essentials. There isn't good land to get a 2nd city up soon, so went with 1 city NC start. ToA with stolen worker from CS and my own both chopping forests and clearing the jungle hills. NC then HG after that. By the time Optics researched, India already settled the south spot, so I had to take some non optimal ones on other islands. In hindsight, I think it's better to actually go OCC until I conquer another city such as Rome, rather than founding 3 extra useless cities. Either they lack food or they lack production. By far Carthage and Rome were better than my other expos, they're even better than my capital by the end except for the lower pop.
Other essential wonders such as FP, LToP and PT were easy on this difficulty. No need to rush. Also build non essential wonders such as ET, Kremlin, Hubble, CN tower etc. Some were GE rushed as I had 1 extra GE generated due to early GE points, also from order tier 3. I also had too much faith and not needed for GS near the end.

Settled 3 extra cities on pretty bad islands. One of them next to Rome and eventually Dido backstabbed and Dow me twice for that city after she took Rome. I was careless and underestimated strength of her UU + SoZ, even against my superior navy of frigates. Lost the city but recaptured, but still was a big blow since I lost buildings and population. Later I captured Rome from her which was a very good city with Petra/Colossus/GLH, and I also captured Carthage, razed a few other cities before having my CS friends eliminate her so that I don't have the warmonger penalty. That provided me the gold to ally half of the CS.

Next went for Celts since Isabella asked me to, I wanted to take some culture wonders such as Sistine Chapel in Edinburgh. Once again, I let someone else do the killing blow so that I don't get warmonger penalty for eliminating civ. This time it was Spain eliminating them. Went peaceful for rest of the game, although Japan was starting to cause problem.

The problem for the late finish was the bad timing for WC. I decided to delay founding WC and it wasn't founded until turn 194 and I thought I had good enough science to win it before 300, except my science was bad due to having too many cities and conquered cities take a while to catch up. The problem with fast DV isn't about getting CS allies fast, it's all about having enough science to reach information era to actually trigger the vote. (The other way would be to eliminate more civs but I calculated I wouldn't be able actually trigger the vote earlier due to a lack of iron for more frigates. I would have to eliminate 3 more civs within 20 turns which wasn't possible without huge navy)

For the last 30 or so turns, I just spammed wonders as there was nothing else to do. I reached information era just 2 turns too late to trigger an earlier vote. Went Order for the extra production and boost for science, but still couldn't make it.

- Describe any significant World Congress accomplishments? Who founded if you didn't? WC Proposal order?
Controlled WC from the time I founded. I tried to delay founding to give more time, but still couldn't time it correctly. In my case it would be better to found a few turns earlier and I would win 25ish turns earlier. Proposal in that order: WF(won), +culture to WW, world ideology order, IG(won). Other civs just either tries to repeal mine or useless stuff like banning lux, embargo etc, which I easily blocked.

- Did you use your UU/UB to any benefit for a Diplomacy victory?
UU is the most useless crap in the game, I don't have the iron for it anyway. UB is good as it boosted GPP along with LToP. Never founded a religion, but UB provided a massive amount of faith.

- In hindsight, describe where you could have improved with votes, proposals, strategy, etc.
Timing the founding of WC pretty much makes or breaks the speed of winning at this difficulty as it is trivial to win at the very first WL vote. Also underestimated the amount of science required to get to information era because of founding too many cities. Probably better off with at most 1 self founded expo. I overshot science so much that I could've won SV. Also sitting on 13k gold just like deity AI.

Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1870AD
Turns played: 305
Base score: 1021
Final score: 1673
Time played: 5:01:00

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Completely peaceful 5 city game. Wanted to get sub 300, but it was just too hard due to my crappy T95 2 city NC start.

Used oral tradition for culture in the beginning of the game and later let Gandhi spread his religion to my lands. His jesuit education bought me quite a few science buildings over the ages...

Game: Civ5 GOTM 118
Date submitted: 2015-09-21 00:36:36
Reference number: 33254
Your name: Coilean
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1806AD
Turns played: 273
Base score: 1183
Final score: 2190
Time played: 10:05:00

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I wasted a couple turns looking for a better spot to settle before I returned to the hill 1NE of the start to found on turn 4. Due to the crappy hammers, I didn't get NC up until ~t110, and Education ~t140, and I think Printing Press somewhere in the t170 neighborhood (?). Entered Information Era ~t260 (bulbed 7 GS straight through Globalism), although I could have bulbed Telecom 10+ turns earlier if it had mattered for the WC timing. After that I simply did the usual buying up of CS's while waiting for the vote. I actually really dislike the gaminess of timing the WC voting cycles with your Information Era; at the time you get PP to found the WC, it seems more a matter of luck than skill to get the timing right for WL vote, given how far into the future it will happen (especially if you have to deal with a DoW in the interim). I would much prefer if the WL votes happened on their own independent 20 turn cycle, starting after the founding of the UN.

For SP's, I first finished Tradition, then went 2 in Exploration to pick up Maritime Infrastructure (the extra +3 hammers per city seemed crucial, given the scarcity of hammers typical of an Island map), Patronage opener (for FP), 2 in Rati, then 3 in Freedom. After that, nothing else mattered, although I went 1 more in Rati, 3 in Commerce, and finished Patronage at the end (although not in time to get any GP's). If I had gone harder into Rati from the start (and finished it for the free tech + faith bought GS's), maybe I could have gotten to the Information Era one WC cycle earlier, but it's hard to say what effect the trade off of losing the 3 hammers per city would have had over that period.

For Wonders, I opted to skip GL in order to get up the first 4 cities ASAP, given the scarcity of hammers. First wonder was Oracle (which finished Tradition), followed by Colossus, Hanging Gardens (this should have been done earlier, but I completely forgot about it for the first 100 turns!), Notre Dame, Leaning Tower, Forbidden Palace, Porcelain Tower, and Taj Majal (which kicked off my GA ~t220ish, which was still going at the end of the game with 25 more turns to spare), and a few other unimportant wonders after that.

I built no military whatsoever, instead keeping the peace with Rome/Japan/Carthage by periodically gifting them a Cocoa to keep the "We have traded recently" bonus maxed. I focused completely on a peaceful buildup with max food ships to the cap ASAP (followed by a food or hammer ship to each expo city as more trade routes came up). After ~t220 I shifted the cargo ships to gold generation, which was ~35 gpt per route.

I wasted a lot of gold on 2 rounds of RA's before I noticed I was only getting like 150 research from them (when I was producing ~450/turn myself). That was at least 2k gold that could have gone to better use, although it was probably irrelevant insofar as it was not going to help me enter the Information Era 25 turns sooner, to get WL vote one cycle ealier.

- Describe any significant World Congress accomplishments? Who founded if you didn't? WC Proposal order?

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There were only 4 WC votes, the last being World Leader. I passed WF and won the culture booster (which I used to bulb off my 3 GW, as usual, for ~1 SP apiece), failed to repeal the City State Embargo with my second proposal, and got Freedom as World Ideology with the third proposal (noone had a Ideology at the time of the vote, so there were no diplo problems).

- Did you use your UU/UB to any benefit for a Diplomacy victory?

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Having 6 extra free luxuries was amazing for early gold/happiness. I screwed up slightly when I founded my first expo on a copper, as I didn't realize the unique lux would overwrite it. Never built a single Kris Swordsman, but the UB was for sure useful with it's extra 8+ faith/turn generation across the empire, and it's ability to be built without a river.

- In hindsight, describe where you could have improved with votes, proposals, strategy, etc.

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Maybe going harder into Rati (and finishing it) could have gotten me into the Information Era 1 WC cycle earlier (for a t248 WL vote), but I am doubtful if I would have had the gold to get the necessary CS allies, even had I managed to pull it off. My main screw up was probably in not getting a religion; I was too focused on early growth and science to get up the shrines/temples in time, and given that I won most of the CS faith competitions later on, I probably could have made a pretty strong gold engine if I had managed to found my own religion in time.

Sclb said:

If you build the first city on another continent on a luxury, it will replace it with one of the unique lux of Indonesia.

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Yeah, I was displeased to discover this by destroying a copper! Live and learn, I guess.

Maybe going harder into Rati (and finishing it) could have gotten me into the Information Era 1 WC cycle earlier (for a t248 WL vote), but I am doubtful if I would have had the gold to get the necessary CS allies, even had I managed to pull it off. My main screw up was probably in not getting a religion; I was too focused on early growth and science to get up the shrines/temples in time, and given that I won most of the CS faith competitions later on, I probably could have made a pretty strong gold engine if I had managed to found my own religion in time.

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I never bothered with a religion, AI were spamming me non stop anyway. And I believe the UB candi's best use is probably to not have a main religion so that AI would continue to spam more for more faith output. Cargo ships networks basically meant each city had 4-5 religion's followers. Only 1 city with a majority religion is required for faith buys. I'm surprised that Dido never bothered to attack you, she was of deity level aggressiveness in my game, attacked me right after the peace with neighbor/expired twice. I didn't have the gold or happiness to bribe her off at the time, and probably cost me any chance of sub 300 win since I lost a city once to her. I went full warmonger mode after that and just didn't care about quick finish. I would've prevented losing a city if I used my units to block the water tiles, but I underestimated the kings level AI with SoZ boost.

Sclb said:

I'm surprised that Dido never bothered to attack you, she was of deity level aggressiveness in my game, attacked me right after the peace with neighbor/expired twice. I didn't have the gold or happiness to bribe her off at the time, and probably cost me any chance of sub 300 win since I lost a city once to her.

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At some point in the mid game I paid Dido a 20 gpt bribe after our Friendship had expired, and she renewed friendship next turn. I was pretty focused on growth/science/cash at the time (in that order), so I was making ~120 gpt and was happy enough to blow off 600 cash to prevent the chance of an untimely DoW.

My first civ 5 game in quite some time, and, despite some silly errors from me went, went pretty smoothly.

Your name: Zibby
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1926AD
Turns played: 346
Base score: 1736
Final score: 2515

Settled 4 cities, first in the plains SW from starting location, the other 3 on islands to the east, SW (near India) and NW (near Rome). Early on Rome and Carthage were the leaders, and but everyone had been unusually peaceful, and I was friends with all civs (except Spain who had no friends). When I saw neighbour Rome start building his navy up, I decided to get a DP with Carthage 'just in case', but I was then shocked when Rome declared war on Carthage, which then saw me declare war on Rome (and anoyingly get a backstabbing penalty with all other civs). An epic naval battle then ensured, and Rome was very close to capturing one of my lightly defended cities (down to half health), but then I got the 6 free foreign legions via social policy and quickly went on the offence, capturing Rome and another of their cities using just the 6 foreign legions with no siege support. After that I was a runaway tech leader and just started cranking out wonders until I could get the dip victory. Ended with 50 happiness and 30k gold.

- Describe any significant World Congress accomplishments? Who founded if you didn't? WC Proposal order?

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I founded WC - and early on made freedom the world ideology which helped my cause.

- Did you use your UU/UB to any benefit for a Diplomacy victory?

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Never had access to iron, so couldn't build my UU. I did build the Candi in my cities, but don't think they had a great impact. However, the UA of 3 free sets of luxuries definitely helped, especially in the early game.

- In hindsight, describe where you could have improved with votes, proposals, strategy, etc.

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Plenty of small mistakes were made (forgetting to sell excess luxuries and enter into Research Agreements until late in the game), but nothing major.

Your name: Apolex
Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1966AD
Turns played: 386
Base score: 2777
Final score: 3606

I settled on the cocoa next to the fish and went straight through liberty and got settlers on different islands and set them up with harbors ASAP. I first grabbed a spot next to Rome with the copper, then the north side of Ghandi's island to get truffles, and the east islands getting marble, and the west island getting citrus. I also settled the spot next to Gibraltar, and then did peaceful growth through about mid-game.

Early on I got a pantheon founded from finding many ruins and religious city-states, so I chose God of Craftsmen to get that critical +1 production in all cities over 3. I also went straight for Exploration to get the +3 hammers in costal cities ASAP since production was so limited.

I had a large happiness surplus the entire game, with it well over 100 at one point, making Golden Ages nearly constant.

After a chain-reaction of denouncements, Dido asked me to fight Rome with her, and I agreed since Rome was so weak and she would have taken the last 2 cities. I had a strong city next to Rome, so it was easy to take their capital and Antium when I got the 6 foreign legion units. Then I took the rest of Ghandi's island and peacefully grew thereafter to the victory.

- Describe any significant World Congress accomplishments? Who founded if you didn't? WC Proposal order?
Theodora founded the WC, but I had it thereafter. Successfully passed world religion, world ideology (freedom), and embargo against Byzantium since Theodora was the next most powerful civ.

- Did you use your UU/UB to any benefit for a Diplomacy victory?
I never got iron in time for the UU, but the Candis were ridiculously useful. I had selected Peace Gardens, which gave the Candis +2 happiness, and I was able to build faith really quickly by using trade routes to get 1 follower of every religion in almost all my cities. Pagodas were also really helpful.

- In hindsight, describe where you could have improved with votes, proposals, strategy, etc.
I wasn't really aware of the tricky timing issues with going for the World Leader vote - will have to pay attention to that next time to go for an earlier victory.

Game status: Diplomacy Victory
Game date: 1878AD
Turns played: 309
Base score: 2183
Final score: 3578
Time played: 3:45:00

I settled on the hill across the river and had my warrior scout whilst I built a monument. Typically, I'd build two scouts, but given the setup that wasn't appropriate. Pottery first allowed me a shrine and then I researched mining and bronze working to clear some of that jungle for plantations and more hammers.

I took first tradition, then liberty to get another worker quickly and then settlers. Settled early on my island before getting optics and putting one next to Delhi, one on the citrus island and one on the island to the right. I used my liberty Great Engineer to get National College...probably should have kept it for Chichen Itza as I lost that race.

Money and happiness were never an issue with Indonesia and in the Medieval Period my civilization started to come to the fore after that hammer poor start. In my game Rome was doing great following the construction of Petra and so once I had Frigates I took them out of the game. I had to get my iron from Spain as fate conspired to put iron out of our reach. Yup, no chance having any fun with Kris swordsman...

Another limitation was that there was no coal until I took Rome. For some reason my CS Allies didn't give me any. That delayed factories and Ideology - annoying. In terms of policies. Liberty, Tradition, Rationalism and then Order Ideology.

Eventually the Diplomatic Victory vote game around and I won it first time as I bought every city state I could.



Describe any significant World Congress accomplishments? Who founded if you didn't? WC Proposal order?

Manage to win two projects and get the one that gives culture boost to Wonders. That really paid off once I took Rome. I can't recall who founded the World Congress...

- Did you use your UU/UB to any benefit for a Diplomacy victory?

UU. What UU? The UB? Faith helped with a few scientists to rush to the finish. The extra luxuries was very beneficial for trading and general euphoria in my populace.

- In hindsight, describe where you could have improved with votes, proposals, strategy, etc.

I was pretty satisfied with my approach. Perhaps settling 4 cities rather than 5 would have helped. Potentially I should have built research rather than Frigates, but where is the joy in that? Ultimately I was just glad this wasn't a cultural victory we were chasing. Just looking at the screenie...I could have probably got another GS and grabbed another tech before victory. Similarly, 40+ happiness indicates clearly that I could/should have invaded more cities given I had the ships and the artillery lying around the shop or chasing barbarians. On that note, this was the first game in forever that I didn't take the first policy in Honor!