[BTS] BOTM 262: Saladin, Prince - Final Spoiler (Game submitted)

[kcd_swede]

BOTM 262: Saladin, Prince - Final Spoiler - Game Submitted




Use this thread to tell us what happened in your game, particularly anything after 1AD

Did you win?

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If you are participating in BOTM 262 then you MUST NOT read this thread unless

• You have submitted your entry

Posting Restrictions

• Do not post any savegame file from the game. Discussions and screenshots are fine but not actual games.

 

[nocho]

After 1AD I prepared first to get rid of Tokugawa. He was cleared off the map without too much trouble, be it with a short peaceful interlude to get reinforcements close by.

Teching went rather slowly. I had rushed the MoM with a GE in the late BCs. My next great person was also a GE which was used for a first golden age. However, after that I popped two low-odds Great Artists in a row, which of course were of no direct use with the Great Artist from music. So I didn't get a second GA until well into the 1200s.

By then I was still busy with Stalin. His first city had fallen rather easily with the veterans from the Japanese war, but the battle for St Petersburg was rather bloody. In a rare AI display of good tactics, Stalin threw a whole bunch of catapults at my stack and wiped it out nearly completely. It also didn't help that he had a magic crossbow that was unscathed after 4 camels tried to trample it down. He also sent some raiding parties by boat to my soft Japanese underbelly and two cities switched hands a couple of times. So the war dragged on quite a while, finally I did manage to get St Petersburg, but had to peace out for reinforcements. After that ran out, the rest of Russia was annexed speedily enough.

Then I poured my units into Khmer lands to attack the Chinese from there, they were the most backwards. Conquered it all without trouble. Meanwhile I had been filling out unclaimed land on the home continent. As the former Chinese cities came out of revolt I attacked the Khmer, but hit domination after conquering their first two cities.

All in all quite a slow game, in part surely due to suboptimal play. Hit domination at a time when in other circumstances I might be busy assembling space parts, in this case I just barely had libbed biology.

 

[donsig]

A fun game, I learned alot from this one but still lost to the AI. Chinese space victory. Took Beijing hoping to stop the launch but I guess that is a Civ3 thing. I did learn that spies can sabotage space ship parts. Had a 68% but missed it. On top of that disappointment somehow my docking station went missing and so the Chinese won the space race by five turns, On top of that I was only 5% away from the land I needed for a domination victory. Could have snagged that if I hadn't trapped my army in Beijing on the Fool's Errand.

 

[Jimmy Thunder]

Good fun game - loved the puzzle of the low commerce start with very few strong (peaceful) city spots nearby.

I went for a Space Victory this time.

After my peaceful Pre-1AD REX I got a couple more pieces on the board (Hanging Gardens complete and Construction) and went for Ethiopia. Toku DoW'd him first so I had to jump in quick to make sure I would get what I wanted. Very easy fights to take out his 3 best cities and sue for peace. When I took Aksum I got the Pyramids and switched into Representation. I made peace for Code of Laws and Monotheism, then started to tech into CS which came in at 840 AD.

I got Stalin to pleased fairly early on, he was doing well and made a useful tech buddy.

A few turns after CS I declared on Japan and took Toku's best cities with Elephants and Cats before making peace for his Machinery tech. The peace break was good with the remaining Japanese cities being a buffer between me and my mate Stalin and I needed some time for more units and army healing.

In this break I went Liberalism -> Astronomy in 1230 AD to get my international GLH trades up and running and to send some settlers to the antipodes. Around this time I built a new palace in Kyoto where I put Oxford University.

I had to quickly take out the last two puny Ethiopian cities because Stalin and Toku declared on him and sent their armies in.

Next event was 1320 AD when I made final war with Japan and took his three remaining cities. Around this time I settled Australia and New Zealand for some nice internal trade routes.

Stalin was fearing that I was becoming too advanced, but I had a plan for that, teching straight for Communism and sharing in some State Property made him a very effusive comrade.

I'm unfamiliar with optimal space racing but thought the plan for beelining Super Conductors (1610 AD) and building lots of labs was the way to go.

I built Apollo Program with aluminium in 1695 AD and actually managed to get some useful trades along the way from Stalin; Steel/Democracy/Corporation/Railroad. It was all selftech after that point though. With a big home continent full of grassland workshops I was in a "hammer economy" that would benefit nicely from Three Gorges Dam (1715 AD).

Around this time I started playing war with Khmer for some capture gold.

I launched my spaceship with all the parts in 1814 AD with one turn left on my 4th golden age.

While I was watching my ship fly through space I declared war on China and took their cities over 7 turns to give me something to do and for a higher score. Was fun playing with gunships, modern armor, bombers and marines.

This felt like a fast Space Victory for me with 1834 AD. I came out satisfied with my meta-strategy with coastal cities, GLH, emphasising production, short snappy wars, partnering with happy Stalin, and lots of settler building. I'm sure I messed some stuff up, maybe my wars were broken into too many parts, and I'm bad at micro - but that's what GOTMs are here to help improve!

Fun fact - I built exactly 0 cottages this game!

Spoiler Happy Joe :

 

[antimony]

1580 Diplomatic victory, got it 1 turn earlier than in the previous Victoria game despite a slower tech pace (1030 Astro, 1430 Mass Media), mostly by better great people management and planning for the UN build (having all cottages and windmills in capital 1-turn from being converted to workshops and mines, etc.). Wasn't necessarily planning to go for the same victory again, but having 3 friendly neighbors on continent due to same religion and no way to get a clear military tech advantage in the midgame made it the more natural route.

Got 7 great scientists in the end from running caste-pacifism most of the game except for whipping rounds (thanks to SPI), first for philosophy for pacifism and for some tech trades, 2nd to start a golden age, 3rd for printing press, 4th-5th for scientific method, then I libbed Physics and used the free GS on Electricity (7th GS after mass media used for chemistry to boost workshops). Traded the pre-reqs for Communism ASAP to Zara and Stalin so one of them would research it for State Property.

In the first UN voting round I was 20 votes short of a diplo Victory with Zara, Stalin and Toku, eventually got Mao to +9 with shared civic when he finally adopted State Property, and got to +10 by bribing him into a joint war on Sury just before the 2nd diplo victory vote.

 

[Jimmy Thunder]

@antimony a very clean game. You are the king of beelines!